Obscenity (Moderate & No Pics)

An appearance from Ja’afar last night, as usual in his case careful not to intrude, only assuming the seat after the invitation. We reverted quickly to talk of amore, as usual; the remarks at the state of his arms were let pass by Ja’afar. So, there was a new Batam gal on the scene, this one unwilling to perform the primary action and instead comforting Ja’afar by “painting.” “Painting” was OK, held Ja’afar; fair substitute. Ladies in relationships needed to quarantine the fuller intimacy, keep it sacrosanct; it was understandable, Ja’afar suggested. Ja’afar had fronted at the table with large bandages in the crook of one arm and a great bulging vein in the other. Every second day dialysis, four times a week, if the former regime, that of a couple of years ago, had not escalated since. As usual bowling up Ja’afar had delivered a big number Tom Jones that could be joined briefly in duet. Wow wow wow, wow wow. A romantic at heart like the Welshman, Jaf. (It may in fact have been the Indian Englebert. Both of these old smoothies had the colour tone as well as the big lungs that appealed to the Malay lads of the era.) Ja’afar had been widowed over ten years now and never remarried. Four or five years ago he had been camping around at the mosque overnight; since a married niece had taken him in. Niece and her husband had refused any rent; it was one of the good stories at Geylang Serai. A big bruiser pal who was hailed as he passed had some time ago extracted a debt from a chap Jaf had lent $600. There had not been violence it seems, only earnest “scolding.” Still, without the fear factor Ja’afar doubted he would ever have seen his dollars again. Was the poetic term for the circumscribed love-making one of Ja’afar’s own inventions, or was it common among the lads here? Previously it had not been heard. Ja’afar paused in answer. Ja’afar opened and closed his mouth once or twice without any word. Finally, with a Me or Mine he had claimed the kudos. A particular bar in Phuket Ja’afar recommended for writing inspiration; the name was famous he said, place packing in all-comers from all corners of the world. The feature attraction there was a chorus line of ladyboys, very beautiful many of them. High entertainment that Ja’afar could not recapitulate. Back in the day Ja’afar had visited ten and more times. Ja’afar liked painting himself now and again, he admitted, and was thereby warned to take special care he wasn’t caught by surprise in the wrong circs.

Sumptuary Laws

PM Najib in Malaysia caught on the hop during a TV interview speaking of his switch to quinoa instead of carbohydrate & sugar-loaded rice. Busy man had little time for exercise, so taken doctor’s advice on diet at least. A field day resulting for opponents comparing relative costs, declaring their own basic fare &etc. One recalled the debate between the patrician George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton when the former could not guess the price of a carton of milk was it? Here in Sing. this kind of political dynamite is managed much more adeptly. When one of the regular fluff journos takes lunch with a government minister or other high functionary an itemised detailing of the spartan meal is given prominent display in a capsule. More often than not in these cases a hawker centre is chosen for the meeting and the fare plain old chicken rice or fried kway teow at $3.80, with either unsweetened tea or bottled water from the treatment plants. Impressive at the famous rates of remuneration in this republic.

NB. An unusual exception today in the Lunch With Sumiko feature: venue the National Stadium Executive Suite @ the SG Sports Hub, where confit salmon, chicken consommé, NZ beef tenderloin, black forest cake & coffee/tea was partaken, cost omitted.

When the Music Dies

One more Medina garlic nan before the return. Every last morsel delicious. Could one OD on garlic? A month it might remain in the bloodstream at this level of intake, radiating from the pores of the skin. Yesterday at the vegetarian place opposite the old Johor temple the chap reminded that some branch of Buddhists eschewed onion and garlic both. (Not the hardy Daoists you would wager.) One old chap of the neighbourhood who occasionally frequented Medina had almost certainly passed on; or taken to his bed otherwise, which was effectively the same thing. Not difficult to pick from the outset that fast-failing supporter of the opposition figure Maria Abdullah. While the lady had been kept locked up every night the old fellow would come out for the candlelight vigil, first on one corner by the canal and then another as the police moved the group on. Chap would stand off to one side with a couple of allies looking a little warily roundabout. Once or twice talking at some length about what the country faced the fellow resorted to hoarse whispers. Back then it did not seem he had long to go and no surprise now to find him absent nearly a week. He was another rather stupefied at the count of his years on his back and expecting you to be similarly shocked. To have lived so long, who would have thought. This afternoon at the teahouse Razali clung to some hope that the opposition might prevail despite all in the upcoming election. Razali had also suggested there were whispers the military, police and allied services were ready to take control should the unaccountable occur and this old entrenched crew actually fall.... Gee, the penny suddenly drops too. It may be that Friday nights the blaring disco down here has been muted by order of the Sultan on the hill. Every indication thus far on this quiet, peaceful corner. Vaguely recalled now a report some months ago of a Sunday - Thursday working week formally instituted here in Johor at least.

Hot Dog

Was just going to say, stoking up a mite isn’t it? Bit of a blast in the middle of the afternoon. Short while before the young lads had put on a pretty lame and jaded lion dance a few doors along at what had been assumed to be the TCM shop. (You wouldn’t have thought the lottery place needed any help from the spirit world.) When the crew emerged and was returning to the truck the paltry dragon that was more worm presented a rather pitiful sight, a thin little string of fabric held up on sticks by the boys and nothing whatever like it really. In JB for budget rate lion dance evidently that was what your ringgit bought and nothing more. Ya, heat rising, lads bushed and needing a rest. Just as the truck wheeled off the chaps at the next table at Shaza Corner left and the old waiter coming over to clear the table first flicked a switch on the wall. Now, what was that then? What was the man playing at there? The overhead. Really?... It took a time for the blades above to come to a proper dead stop in order to confirm conclusively. No question. No two ways about it. At the two tables beyond the overhead fans were going full throttle, turned to 3 top of the dial. Soundlessly without any whir battering away. Here over the last table there was nothing on offer. No wonder it had been free. A true greenie the old timer — the colour of the polos at Shaza was no kind of travesty. There was once another fan at the mid-point between these last two tables on this side onto the square, removed since at some stage and only the stem remaining now. (Hopefully properly and safely decommissioned.) Did the owner here run such a tight ship warning the troops about unnecessary expense? Of course back home in Tamil Nadu if the fellow had electric in his house there would certainly be no lights left on and fans God forbid. Conjunctivitis in the eyes? Thin, spare frame, light on his feet still. Indoors it was in fact the same, the three occupied tables receiving the benefit, although the cashier did appear to be looking after himself with his fan whirling nicely overhead. (Rationalising with the goods on the counter before him perhaps.) In the granddad’s father’s time the sahib had kept attendants fanning either side of his sedan chair hot afternoons.

                                                      Johor Bahru, Malaysia, first week of the New Year of the Dog

Saturday Lunch

Half a cup of bryani, ladyfinger and double scoop cabbage that failed to deliver the ancient relish despite all the glossy hallmarks. On the side raw onion. $4 was charged by Manager Zahruddin, who usually sought to extract the maximum for the boss. A mint tea following — kosong, without either milk or sugar. Add $1.10. With the sun for the most part shrouded, passersby however uninspiring and the road traffic lessened on the holiday, an easeful couple of hours and more in the usual chair. Cabbie Cha who turned up well after lunch remarked on the length of the stay. The old illegal ciggie-seller in-and-out of the lock-up regaled us every so often with fragments of tunes. Happy, the old Uncle on the walking stick who had decided against heart surgery, commented with a sly smile. The pair had known each other not from childhood, but from their shared time over in Bedok, further East. A kind of Pessoa Rua dos Douradores without the sharp edges. (Sometimes in Pessoa’s pages it is like reading the far-gone Kafka — men situated well beyond the drips and drabs of the sufficiently tolerable. “....a kind of squeamishness about existing.”) Bahru mati.... in refrain a number of times from the old stager passing one way and the other. Eventually the walking-stick Uncle needed to be enquired just to make sure. More smiles forthcoming. Means, — Just died, saith he.

NB. The Book of Disquiet, No. 135 Richard Zenith. Then No. 159 “Fate sooner or later plays out an apocalypse of anxiety....”

Publication News (Bird - Entropy)

Hello & Zdravo to all

This month a couple of US online literary magazines are publishing pieces of mine, both originally written about 3 years ago now.

The first is titled “Burung — Bird” which unfolds a visit to the Bird Market down in Yogyakarta; the second delivers a rather different kind of jaunt through a then-new mall in the local neighbourhood here in Geylang, Singapore. (More on the latter once it’s out in about a week.)

Entropy has recently published "Burung," available open access, —

https://entropymag.org/

Cheers

Pavle

Cross Culture

In the usual way, the old regular auntie as she sits down to it offering some of her repast with spade hand, — Join me, Mister?
         Thank you. Silikan, silikan.
         Which quickly recalled our, Samo izvolte. Be my guest. Please proceed.
         But how did our own comparable invitation go?... Was it, Pridruzite?...
         On the equator eating out in the open this was all rather different. There was little alfresco in our corner of Europe and up until recent years none in Australia.
         Pridruzi.... Join me.

         The example returns in Slavo’s voice, his particular, polished gallantry. 
         How many fine meals were taken with Slavo? First of course together with Bab’s cousin Bosa in the kitchen, though it was Slavo who was the real host, outstanding bon vivant, raconteur and charmer. Later after Slavo and Bosa’s split we counter intuitively took Slavo’s part, not quite intentionally, but that was how it panned out. Eventually the rupture with Bosa, her daughter Nada and grandson became final. The then little boy’s name has now totally slipped.
         Afterwards Slavo stayed with us in Spotty two or three stretches, in the third bedroom at the end of the passage where he always sought to avoid meals. Without contributing rent eating our food was altogether shameful. Even commandeering the kitchen for his limited culinary offerings, such as beef goulash was an embarrassment.
         Still, we prevailed often enough and got Slavo to join us. In return he was always on the look-out for tasks around the place — new guttering for the house went up, useful shelving appeared, the garden and yard had never been so tidy.
         There were restos in Willy, Fitzroy, Footscray and Preston, with Bab always of the party. She had always been a second mother to Slavo out in the foreign land and all the more so once his own passed on.

         At least ten years of filling in Slavo’s paperwork, taxation, real estate matters, appeals against parking fines and the like, before we noticed that we in fact shared a common birthday. Golly! Really?... It was the other language that screened that fact, entering the figures in a Serbo-Croat transcription involved a disconnect. Neither of us were birthday people. Similarly orphaned at a young age and raised by mothers, that kind of commemoration did not figure.
         Much of the added layer, the more sophisticated, refined and certainly vulgar Serbo-Croat was learned under Slavisa’s exceptional tutelage. Brilliance, force, indomitable spirit is more difficult to conceive snuffed out and buried in the ground somewhere up on that hill above Komren where we marked Slavo’s elder brother Pero’s yearly observance. On that occasion Slavo might have pointed out his prepared grave. People commonly took that necessary measure well in advance in the Balkans.
         When the old auntie offering to share her food bid farewell and was offered Jumpa lagi, Till we meet again, she in fact responded with a South Serbian term; or at least a term the Southern Serbs shared after their five hundred years of Ottoman occupation.
         — Mash’allah!
         The precise, literal meaning remains in fact unknown to this day, though there is no doubt about the ceremonial courtesy involved.
         The second largest city in Serbia Nis. It had been the Nislije rising up against Milosevic that finally brought an end to his regime. During the trip to Slavo’s city we paid a visit to Cele Kula, House of Skulls out on the road to Sofia. The Bulgarian border was only 80kms from Nis. Yugoslavs from other quarters, more refined and celebrated locales, called the Nislije either Bulgars or Gypsies. Slavo and his wonderful ratbag crew of drinkers, footballers, harmonica players and wastrels of various kinds benefited greatly from the latter community in their midst. All that panache and verve, defiance and dazzling rattle was little in evidence elsewhere

Paper Tiger Again

The fish and noodle salad tossing, a fave of pollies out and about in the heartland here in their white polos with the lightning bolt insignia and track shoes, might be called lo hei. SPH staff photographed doing their part at a Senior Activity Centre. (Singapore Press Holdings, the conglomerate that owned the entire media in the Republic: print, visual, radio, web lock, stock and barrel.) The former gotong royong community spirit having been mysteriously snuffed out by the concrete, steel and glass piling such programs are widely advertised. All together now, dig in with the sticks, ups-a-daisy. Fun and laughter. Ho-ho-ho. Brewing up a happy storm, oldies stretching unpracticed smiles for the camera.

         Another corrective on the previous page too from the SG Tourist Board (STB) seeking to counter with some pizzazz the recently released survey from Time Out London that ranked Singapore 31 out of 32 “most exciting cities.” A slap in the face after all the try-hard. A couple of years ago they managed to get a gong on the World Heritage Site for the Botanical Gardens to add to the Gardens by the Bay, the iconic skyline down at Marina near the world class casino, Bird Safari, Chinatown &etc. A dash of humour deployed to counter this egregious misconception in London. Pics of luscious gardens, boring? You wanna call this brilliant skyline dull? Michelin-rated hawker food leave you hungry for more does it? For this pundit the inevitable question of course who could possibly have trumped Lion City for the raspberry? Who on earth? (Fifteen thousand people in 32 countries participating.)

Bloody Bloody Nose

You certainly do not stop to read this woeful tosh. The paper addiction remains strong, you have flicked through the usual blather and the eyes fall on suchlike. You are a foreigner, an ignorant foreigner. Curious, conscious of limited input. In the time honoured way the street, individual encounters, eavesdropping &etc. have delivered the best, the richest and most trustworthy of information: delivered the rhythm of life, the telling nuances and particularities. Research has limited value, only the bare minimum can be undertaken; all of that can be left to those other toilers in the field. It was only once in the region that the relevant key and seminal texts were taken up: the Analects, the Gita, a volume of the Hadith. That kind of deeply embedded culture was worth investigating. The newspaper added political shenanigans, the social outlook, commentary and interpretation. But golly! The twaddle with which one was confronted in the process. No complaints. No point. The more artfully turned trash, the complacent guff most places elsewhere had one retching just the same. You could often laugh at some of this here; not quite in the example ahead. This filler arrived from the US Bureau Chief in Washington who will remain nameless. Sub-editor we will blame for the headline: “Concerns mount over possible ‘bloody nose’ strike on North Korea.” A wallop there immediately in itself. Then we had the highlighted excerpt: “One of the biggest dilemmas the US faces in striking, say, a North Korean missile facility, would be whether to evacuate American families from Seoul and other places in South Korea within range of retaliation from North Korea.” Oh yeah, that’d be right. Perhaps that was on the table currently at Trump Tower this very minute, the Bureau Chief intuiting with his sharp, well-honed skills after years of journalistic ferreting and investigation. Isn’t that precisely what any responsible, right-thinking government would have forefront of their mind in such circumstances? Scrupulous concern for their own precious citizens. Might the Chief have noticed the recent displeasure in the US at the warming relations on the peninsular over there, the possibility of a dangerous separate peace breaking out in the wings. Gingerly steps in that direction. But best get real, the trigger button and the various contingencies to consider. Light nuclear options for the Ruskis too to cover that troubling quarter, recently mooted by other strategic specialists and commentators. US citizens over in Poland, Germany and the rest would need consideration.

Monsoon

In the first instance the guess was a spray from the upstairs window perhaps. Who was it in that room directly above, it was not clear. Maybe the Chinese Indonesian whose name would have been difficult had it been a first acquaintance. Wahyu. Nice brightly smiling chap encountered outside the door going through the mail in his striped office shirt. Finest spray the last suspicious liquid from a bottle say shaken out the window. A minute or two passed before some more descended on that same corner in the left window sash, drifting slightly to the right. Against the gray coloured shutter and the facade of the house on the corner it was visible, and nowhere else. Finest spray. In another very brief example minutes later again a few larger drops among the rest. This was not Wahyu now; it was something else. Minutes passing before faint gossamer yet again. Then the tree against the wall of the Indian’s house directly opposite gave off some droplets from the lower branches, falling onto the patchy grass beneath, with a number of leaves bending under the weight. Through the diamonds of the fencing visible. Now the question was whether the large tree on the corner might have been releasing droplets in a stir of breeze like the other smaller one and carried over. The distance was about ten metres up to the topmost branches; if that was the source the spray could only have come from the heights there, collected from rain earlier in the morning possibly. Minutes passed between episodes, five and more in the case of the longer gaps. Numerous passersby in the interim, mostly uninteresting. One older woman with a badly faded dye riding a bicycle first called a name it seemed, followed by, Zhao un. Ni hao, ni hao in a girly tone. A tall older man going on foot in the opposite direction carried a furled umbrella at chest level that like a wand appeared to give off a carnival-like tune. Dust motes mixed with faintest water droplets seemed to drift across on the air. Shortly after eight o’clock, an earlier breakfast before the window with the aircon low. Lightest gray cloud over palest blues. For the whole half hour none of the passersby could have felt the merest drop even on naked skin. Finally one old duck taking the corner from Carpmael proper and turning toward the Haig carried her white umbrella open. It would have been good to ask the lady whether it was against the sun, or the moisture in the air she was shielding herself. The first week of February was forecast to be dry and warmer after the recent afternoon bucketings the last 3 - 4 weeks. Floods in some parts and serious in neighbouring countries.
         This while reading Richard Zenith’s edition of Pessoa’s Lisbon window in The Book of Disquiet, after the poems had been read the month before. Quite uncanny much of that particular writerly consciousness delivered as if on a platter.

NB. The Book of Disquiet, Fernando Pessoa – ed. & transl. Richard Zenith

Pessoa & Co., Selected Poems - ed. & transl. Richard Zenith