Conquering Beauty

In the life section today the first of a promised regular column by a plastic surgeon by the name of Woffles Wu. In the tag the man stated a passion for beauty, the arts and life, in that order. Accomplishments included the production of a film titled Singapore Plastic... No! Correction. That was the memoir, Life In Plastic. The film was Singapore Dreaming. Presumably in a number of Asian countries similar material was mainstream in the better class media—Thailand, India, Vietnam. African nouveau riche and Eastern Europe the same. (In Serbia too, if not fledgling Montenegro.) “Sun sets on the Sayonara Syndrome” the inaugural column was headlined. Asians are beautiful, the doctor assured; there was no need to slavishly follow Western ideals. Mankind had been mesmerised by feminine beauty “since eternity.” Beautiful people would always find themselves desirable; it was a social equaliser. In this day of pol. correctness—“infuriating pol. correctness”—there was not enough frank acknowledgement given to underlying prime motivators. “But it is the truth. It is just the way people are.” Beauty was something that could be bought. The headline referenced an old Korean War Brando movie: a native girl in a love match with a GI had become concerned how her features might be received in the States. Marlon the Bomber ace, best buddy of the victim of Asiatic wiles, advised caution. Madame Butt. heartache and ultimate tragedy. Sayonara no more though. (In the doctor’s phrase.) That market in surgery had been superseded. Smoothing Asia’s own classic lines was the new frontier in that line.

 

 

NB. Straits Times, life, p. D7. 

Singapore was recently named top of the pile by the Economist intelligence unit as the most expensive city in the world.

  

 

                                                                                                            Singapore, March 2019

 

Moon Through Trees (After Basho & Bob)

Large group of older Chinese filling an entire row under the awning at Wadi was not common morning, evening, or any other time. Two prominent crosses on chains at one end left little doubt about the gathering—a small flock wandered blindly into the wrong pen. All three tables were tightly bunched with some added chairs squeezed, one old dear sporting an orange TIME BOMB tee two days after Christchurch. All bar the eldest male, a chap in his eighties, were soon to go before the Christian god craggy-faced, but dyed. Big spread before them on a Monday morning; this was no walking group. The guess was that the charter bus would roll up at 10:30, the group go down roadside like a line of ducks beforehand to wait. One expensive salon curl in a tint that took a dark ruby hue, fine silk blouse possibly accompanying. As usual the women had outlined the men, three or four widows likely among their number. Youngest might have been mid-sixties you would have said, until the red/white stripe rose from her chair and turned. Well short of fifty, the granddaughter of the aged by the way she took him under arm; mastering the old man like that before the eyes of the others, certainly not a maid. This woman’s move decided the matter: the party would adjourn for another day; for variety they would gather at a different eatery next time. There was no charter either; nearly a dozen made off, leaving a small group that gathered together at the far end of the row. The perm was by far the wealthiest at table, none of the others showed any sign of serious money lightly carried. That modesty had in fact been their parents’ generation; now even the Muslims were slipping up in that regard. If you got it, flaunt it. You deserve it; you earned it! Well along that road. Yasu the Japanese 1,000% Hindu says you live one hour here the equivalent of ten days in Tokyo, his hometown. Nowhere in Tokyo could one practise one’s religion quietly and undisturbed, says Yasu. The historical quirks in Singapore certainly enable that much; existential threats otherwise. Over dinner last night at the Wadi table Bluesman Yasu sang the lines of the Dylan song about the moon up through the trees, looking above from his chair where the real thing could be spied, bright just then and almost radiant. Well-travelled, spiritual Yas did not know what a problematic orb the old cheese actually made on the equator. The moon everywhere was the same, the man had complacently thought. More attention needed Yasu my man, you haven’t been looking properly enough on the terrestrial level.

NB. It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry, Bob Dylan.

Soekarno-Hatta Hanging

Touch over 35mins. on clear, open freeways in Jakarta on a Saturday; as soon as we cleared Thamrin City it was a breeze going out. As a consequence there would be a four hour wait at the airport. Newspaper nowhere to be found for love or money, what was worse; so said the first assistant enquired. However, it would turn up once Immig. had been passed. A number of lookalikes through the morning: at a flicker of passing admiration a woman showing her eyelids after a brief smile was a dead-ringer for Semarang Sugi in Sing; then just now a lad standing in for the delivery chap at J. C. Complex opposite Geylang Serai Market. The maid at the cafe was initially difficult to pick in the scrum. Likely the Chinese preferred their own kind, first thought; or else this girl may have been a younger sister/relative. Terribly complacent airs of the usual sort at the table. The gal was a maid alright, identifiable by the way she promptly hopped it in that particular manner when her little charge began wandering too far. Her youth and mixed features; when you looked more closely the attire of course. The definable Chins in the group carried salon cuts and all were decked in the same white tees: HANG OUT AND DO NOTHING. Easy for them to say. Well, roundabout slow, slow process of deduction. Clear skin on the youngster too; the four girls at the table had caked on for the screen shot. One started off another with her eye-liner and now the lass continued using her red & white polka dot compact. Youngster must have taken the little boy to the bathroom. Early-mid twenties too close for sisters that grouping, but not out of the question. CHILL it was in fact; not Hang. A mother had an altogether different aspect to a maid—a full and entire maternal patience displayed by a passing lass with her mite in hand. They must have told to girl to get lost, give them some quiet time. Perhaps there was a jumping castle here now somewhere in a corner. The transformation of Soek-Hat. over a mere four years was it? remarkable. Four years ago the airport had a country town aspect here, dusty outback Oz. Adapted to this new traveller class now; in the old airport the locals had predominated. A demonstration of the argument, “Build it and they will come.” En route a freeway board for the incumbent in the election scheduled for next month — JO-KER; ie. Joko Wiwodo gets things moving. (Kerja, work.) Correction: five of these CHILL Chinese. Did their grandparents duck low and survive the riots in the late 90s?... Well over a half hour: didn’t look as if the girl had been capable of drowning the toddler in the toilet bowl. If she was treated right there was no need fear. Blimey! Further correction: six of them. Mushrooming they were. A beauticians’ conference, delivering a weekend workshop to the locals, range of all natural products that couldn’t be beat. Cackles and titters as if they were reading thought bubbles from the guy at the end of the row. At this rate the quart hours’ spin one needed to be careful. How many seasoned travellers had missed FOUR flights—international flights; the last in KL actually sitting immediately by the gate happily dreaming? Aduh! Still not revealed to a soul and never to be…. Nobody gets a glass or cup at Tours les Jours, no need feel guilty. The plate for the croissant had been a special mercy; the girl had been getting the plastic out from the drawer. The plastic for the hand taught by international best hygiene protocol—they were coming on in leaps and bounds in Indonesia. Pain in the bum having to log in each time, assumption being once you were on that’s where you’ll stay forever and a day. A good hour the tot gone; panic as yet not in evidence. Some castle it must. Best not tarry further.

Rain and Floods (Hujan & Banjir)

A fair comment on prevailing local conditions here, in this moderately down-at-heel corner on Sabang; and not only here you would wager. For the first day or two passing along this commercial strip the sprinkles from a blue sky overhead had puzzled. A foreigner could not be expected to judge skies in other lands, nor light-seeming, high cumulus. It was the rainy season after all, tail end supposedly. Gerimis was the term for faint, lightest drops, usually distinct and unmistakeable. (The “e” mostly elided.) As the days passed on Sabang the conclusion finally dawned. It was not the fabled grimis at all that one was wearing here. No! Wrong. Au contraire. Not sourced from the upper reaches at all, properly speaking. Rather what we had here was leaking aircon units. Day three/four at the café, a chap came out with mop and bucket to soak up the pools that had formed in hollows either side of the entry. His unhappy turn on the detail; no wringer attached to the bucket making it hard. Early days in the corner seat up front the occasional spray had one looking out for drifts angling in from outside. Just today an office girl had passed grimacing with a piece of cardboard atop her head for cover. The length of the street she must have traversed, without some kind of shield asking for trouble. (The better salons were far from cheap.)

Front of House

Classic gleaming black stilettos pointing the young girl’s route out and away. Doubtful that sheen could have been delivered by spit and polish, or even the best creams; under this sun particularly. Pretty office lass unlikely to have a maid. Could Bapak and Mami stretch expenses that far? The girl’s own earnings would not suffice. Blouse like that one day wear; maybe Monday & week’s end. Immediately she stepped from the tiles of the café an awkward landing and twisting her ankle. Oh! Ya! Smiles for her understanding friend... What a passage the lovely would need to pick along that broken pavement, that higgledy-piggledy shambles of a track on Sabang. Truly defied belief that; surely there must have been similar footwear worn by ladies in the days before that had somehow passed completely without notice. Difficult to credit. There was a desk in one of the smaller towers within the street itself here where a flower chosen by the girl sat in a pot, a telephone ringing incessantly shaking the stem. Stairs; no lift. One of the taller towers further off was not possible—the Sweet would never have been able to make it.

Do the Scarves truly envy girls like her, the ones brought up right?

            As elsewhere, talk here on this street would ease everything, lessening the oppressiveness, the heat and even the hardship of poverty. Sharing around the pals while you scratched the bottom of your sole and your toes, like the fellow manning the STEMPEL desk directly outside the cafe. (Loosely speaking: a street stand rather. A camera could not be inflicted upon the man.)

Stamps, labels, office signage of the pre-digi form. The crippled off-sider today might be an elder brother—motorbike, what else?

Jl. Sabang it was still commonly called, despite the formally updated Hajji Agus Salim.

Notwithstanding predominant Islam in Indonesia, the Chinese ran the show that counted, the Stempel man suggested when he was done with his pedicure.

Worse still in Thailand and Burma, the man added, passing his forefinger over his throat.

Tower of Babel (Jl.Sabang,Jakarta)

Out front of the eatery—albeit airconned behind thick plate glass—a man selling books from tall stacks standing on the pavement. New, plastic-wrapped, serious volumes it appeared. Somehow yesterday the man immediately twigged his quarry might have been a Pramoedya fan. Pulled out the article as if from a hat and passed across. Pramoedya Ananta Toer, not Soer. Might not have been the prison notebook. When the chap discerned the gleam in the eye his hand quickly fell on another by the same author in the top third of one of the towers. Westerners liked dissidents of other countries of course; and Pramoedya was usually the only Indo writer known outside Indonesia. (Full disclosure: full admission. Apart from gleanings of the new young writer who had made a splash with some deftly adapted magical realism from the Caribbean Tropics to the SE Asian, Eka Kurniawan.) The stylish topi, the original panama, encouraged the man here. That kinda superior article denoted a reader, and Pramoedya perfect fit. Had the red bandana been donned yesterday the personal preference might have been all the clearer. Unnecessary for this book-seller. Not a speaker of the language? Well, makes no never mind. Store it up for the day, Chum. The lack of shade out there did not seem to bother the man, nor give concern for his store. Occasionally the waiters left one of the doors more invitingly open for passing customers and the stream of air provided relief. Today a young child selling double-strength tissue packs sat beside the door leaning on the glass for the cool. Diners indoors were in need of better than the thin material the restaurant provided after their rich, saucy meals. Thirty or more in each tower, on consignment no doubt.

A Short Axe Story (short 150 & longer versions)

You never call back a beggar of course. It was absurd, the people must have laughed to themselves. This was not the first time; but in this instance there was an audience and with the traffic noise it had needed a shout. In the dark it remained uncertain whether the man had any foot cover. Possibly he had been shod with flip-flops. During the performance while he had stopped briefly there had only been the single glance in his direction. Nothing that showed in particular. The smile the man gave with his look came from a certain kind of beggar in these parts. In childhood churchy people offered something similar. It was the man’s hand-clapping accompaniment to the song he sang that got you here, only really that. It was too much. It made you cringe and wince inside. How many similar did one pass on those streets each day and get by unscathed? There were so many of your own who had been missed too, kampung ghosts very much like this man standing there in the night before you, approachable only in hints and fragments of stories heard over the years. In the ancestral village and along the coast on the first visit the folk had smiled indulgently like that too, offering the kind of regard that had been common in those earlier times, and not just from kin. But it had been the hand-clapping with the song here that had struck most strongly. This man had risen up out of that frozen sea inside only because of his artless manner.

 

                                                                                                                       Tanah Abang, Jakarta

 

 

 

NB. The passage in Kafka bears regular reminder.

“I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound or stab us. If the book we're reading doesn't wake us up with a blow to the head, what are we reading for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us. That is my belief.”

150 word version

You never call back a beggar of course. It was just absurd, the people must have laughed to themselves. This was not the first time; but in this instance there was an audience and with the traffic noise it had needed a shout. The barefoot wasn’t even noticed; in the dark it remained uncertain. Possibly the man had been shod with flip-flops. During the performance there had only been the single glance in the fellow’s direction that showed nothing in particular. It was his hand-clapping accompaniment to the song he sang that got you, only that. It was too much. How many similar did one pass on those streets each day and getting by unscathed. There were too many of your own who had been missed, kampung folk very much like this, approachable only in hints and fragments of stories. The man had risen up outta that frozen sea inside only because of his artless manner. 

 

                                                  

Dining With the Brothers

A slip in the dark en route almost ending up in a bucket of water, like in the old Laurel & Hardy slapstick barrel version. Tricky underfoot after the grimis, light shower. (Easy to remember. And indeed, Jalan Slipi too was just up past the bend by the cemetery!) Some of the memorable aged, decrepit and crippled were missing on the street, though it was early days and a wet night. A punt on the nasi merah order worked out OK. Brown was red rice in Indo. Not a common alternative at the cheap eateries in Singapore, where as always the infatuation with white dominated. (Outside the dedicated veg. Buddhist operations that offered brown/red.) Well over a dozen Gojek & a Grab rider waiting to pick up orders. The new gig economy in action. The green corporate uniforms flashed backstage servants in Mozart operas, appallingly exploited and their womenfolk being screwed by the rich. Would the lads score R10k here in Indo, a buck? It had been $2 in Oz 2017. A third of the nasi & sixth of the tempe was left over at Nona Judes. (Search me for the oddness of the name.) All the kangkung was eaten bar the green chilli. After yesterday’s added protein at Plaza Indonesia’s Djournal there was careful checking of the small lettuce leaf. A couple of flicks had failed to dislodge the tenacious mites and decision taken for a quiet word to one of the waiters on the way out. Kechil, wriggling a finger. Kechil, he smiled repeating, as if the small size absolved of anything serious. Hopefully he understood. Mandi, bathe/shower, he was advised. Hopefully understood. They must have taken the plastic bag holding the leaves out of the fridge in the morning.

Tanah Abang, Land of Brothers, Jakarta. Ritzy Plaza Indo, where the cashed up breezily flew through Security, a short 25min. walk away, Ciliwung River dividing.