Look Away! (Published mid-July23 NWWQ as part of a trio, titled These I Commend To Thee)

Sometimes it does happen you cannot tell a story. If it prompts strongly enough for outline or drafting, afterward it must be put aside, kept for some future, unknown eventuality. Filed away. Sensitivities of various sorts might be involved, usually identification of personalities, delicate or dangerous subjects. Sometimes the material was simply too blunt and direct, too strongly declarative.

In this case the matter presented flatly and rather awkwardly; head-on. 

A cat feeder in the acquaintance was found at her usual corner, on the grass in the midst of her litter. Pigeons, crows, mynahs & sparrows hovering roundabout.

Against the legal order, this lady surreptitiously continued to feed the birds as well as cats, usually early in the morning before dawn. After so many weeks the fowls recognised her and flocked whenever she appeared. They would even wait outside her door mornings and evenings at her usual times. 

Approaching 7pm. Lady providing for her outdoor lot. The fact the birds might be stealing some of the feed behind her back was nothing to do with her, Mr Policeman. 

Crouched on the approach and fixed in her purpose. 

Coming closer across the road, the handsome B/W tab between her feet was sighted. 

Stout & thick-bodied, rather like herself, the animal was relishing the choice feed this lady gave both her indoor favourites, and also this the near segment of her outdoor. (Expensive Belgian product saved in the long run with vet fees & related.)

Greedily the beauty here—and it was indeed a beauty—tupped at her stainless, azure bowl. Feeder close behind caressing with both hands along its flanks. 

Stroking rhythmically she was, the lady, with some rapidity. Firmly and with grip. This was no mere patting of the coat.

Coming from a squatting culture, the thickset old Feeder easily maintained her posture, concentrated carefully above the figure before her. 

In that pose the lady’s panties might have been clearly visible, did one direct the gaze in that region. 

Standing little over a metre off in the gutter watching, the lady failed to discern the onlooker’s presence. 

Fixed and closely focused the while.

We did have there a decidedly tricky/sticky circumstance. 

The observer might creep off perhaps. Perhaps the lady would entirely fail to notice. Even if she did, the marking of the retreat might not come until after the cat had finished with its lusty feeding.  

Otherwise, one could venture a cheery Hallo and negotiate the further in some fashion. 

Stroking and stroking. The ritual prayers within the niche at the Hindu temples oddly came to mind. 

Beautiful form this puss; not unlike the lingam. Rich, healthy colour; handsome

proportions.

Ordinarily it might not have allowed such close attendance upon itself.

 

 

                              Haig Road, Singapore

 

 

 

 

Chewy Chews

That’s a surprise down there I suppose. VERY SG-ean by golly! Check the franchise next time yr passing. Likely same guy who does the massage chairs beside the escalators in the malls, the candy-coloured office booths with wifi/print/scan near the dunnies at the train stations. There’s a pavement OJ machine with greenish fruit stacked behind the plastic everywhere in these parts. Presumably the machine first pierces the orb, then crushes the FFF outta it and the juice collects in styrofoam with a vacuum seal, sheathed straw stuck on the side by the smiley face. Forget how much, $5 - 6. Nutrition details, sun-kissed goodness; &etc. Seen dads showing toddlers how to operate. See, the coins go in the slot, here. On yr tippy toes. Notes, here. Don’t get yr fingers caught!… Gives them a head start on competitors in the select schools too. Vitamins ready for yr growing child. Might be a tune laid on to cover the grinding/whirring outta sight. Catty Helen in the front room in the house gets her feed fr a boutique supplier who sources in Belgium. Discerning owners would never stoop to that Chewy Chews from dispenser malarkey. Looking fwd to a Prof of Life Writing at East Anglia, shortly to publish a book on the cat craze of early C20th. This modest penman has had three cat pieces published to date, stemming from the local neighbourhood. No great mystery: gotta get yr loving wherever you can find.

High Honour

 

The man had not a word of English, nor even a smattering of Malay, most like. Had to be a Mainlander, who could converse in some fashion with the local Hokkein workers. Chinese patrons at Mr Teh Tarik were rare. Mid-late thirties; Buddhist jade on his wrist; coloured strands brought from in front over the back of his head. Over these more than six months he had not been observed at a counter; backstage lad, dicing vegetables or dishwashing. Eye contact had not been made until 2 - 3 days ago one evening after his shift, when he passed Al-Azhar on the lower path, whereupon, lo and behold, suddenly here he was climbing up the slope toward the table. The deep bow might have preceded the offering of the hand. Oh! Oh!… Ni hao. And, Kong xi fa chai. (Two weeks into the NY many locals were still celebrating.) Chap had been charmed at the first and especially charmed by the second; a little gasp escaping following the latter. A few days later, same place & time, here he was again, almost passed on this occasion, but seeing the eyes raised to him over he came, from the upper path this time, the outer edge. Similar repeated. On both occasions deep bows and a gesture toward the open journal full of the Pentel black lines. Definite bows in that direction. Shy smiles, bows, flowing well-wishing, gratitude and honour. There was little doubt. Extraordinary as it most certainly be, but little doubt. In this quarter similar had been expressed over the years in more articulate form by Malay and Chinese both. They were grateful having the scribe among them. Perhaps it was clear he was not writing about the upper end of town either, the food or attractions; some of the lads who had featured in the pages had no doubt quietly put it about. Made you blush in turn. Again, how far back into the ages did this kinda thing fetch. (Not taking part in the current ganging up & demonising the lesser element here.)

 

 

Brainstorming Creativity

I'M MISSING MY CHILDHOOD would now need to stand for the earlier in the day slipped from mind. Thick & fast they had passed for some reason on that particular day, a little battering, truth to tell. Tamil lad here footing West on Geylang, other side of the columns on the walkway and caught in the last stride. Language in any case would have made an exchange tricky; perhaps in this instance outside chance something might have been possible. These guys missed their families back home; it was a given. In the text mssgs to their Indo & Filipina girlfriends there was always missing to-and-fro. Missing, missing. You could count on it. And child too universal now. The concept here of course was more Western, much more than anywhere a young chap like that hailed from. Little harking back to the sweet, carefree days of innocence for his kind. (Although on that subject worthy of mention was the young boy at Tekka yesterday coming up to the lift holding mummy's hand. Just at the point of passing, the little mite looked up smilingly, suddenly turned the hand he held in his own, and planted a smacking kiss on its back. You saw it! Right before your eyes.) One could imagine that item produced during brainstorming in Delhi or HK. Even Dhaka or Ho Chi Min. The other case earlier that same afternoon was something else again. On the 67 at the upper end of Jalan Besar—Big Road—a chap in green along by the stores there had borne on the rear of his own tee or polo the remarkable, never seen before, bold, blindingly lightning-streak-white COGNISANT. Cognisant. Walking among us middle of the day, confident and tall. Proud as punch. No need scratch the scone for that one trying to recall the like on these streets here, or anywhere else one had ever ventured. Cognisant like never before across the journey of life, eyes peeled throughout. Not a snow flake’s chance in hell that one slipping by. Fit for embossing on a shield carried into war on distant shores. Indian most likely; dark. Possibly Malay. Twisting round and ducking to try to catch the front made that ID problematic. Some kind of two-three letter pair of anagrams high on the right pectoral. IT? Fintech? Security? It was a unique, muscular copywriting purveyed in these parts, Sing in particular. Sing was like nowhere else on the planet with the main force forcing of the adopted tongue. 

Singapore 2011-23

Scenes From Far Away

Oh! Pic in the paper from Turkey. A father rugged up against the cold in his high vis, sitting by the rubble where his daughter was buried by concrete slabs, from where only her hand protrudes. The father holds the hand, his other inside the pocket of his jacket. Difficult to convey in its entirety to the locals in the Tropics coming up to the table during the morning teh.

Proper Rites

 

Wild entry from Helen this morning, positively raging and without any preliminary. From the get-go there was something clearly the matter. Helen had entered the kitchen with her shopping trolley, which she kept inside the main entry door. Ordinarily, when Helen needed to fetch it she came in from her room and immediately took it outside. A woman of the neighbourhood who she didn’t know but who knew Helen had approached her the night before to offer her rice. Helen fed birds (illegally), right? She could use it, right? Turned out later there were 6 - 7 packets of a kilogram or more that almost filled Helen’s trolly when Helen was encountered shortly afterward by the waste bins after breakfast. In the kitchen Helen had little time to talk. While she spoke her hair shook and came loose in a couple of places. No time to talk, OK, Helen reiterated sternly. She wasn’t going to be held up. The woman was going to leave the rice at the corner of the lane toward Onan Road. Later in the subsequent conversation by the bins it turned out the woman concerned might have been a Malay man’s maid from Block 2, sent over on the errand. The man often passed by there and knew Helen and her feeding, like so many others. There was the rice and around the corner in Onan proper by Galaxy Tower, a cat that Auntie Ena formerly fed had passed away overnight. As Auntie E was weak on her pins now and found it hard to come down, Helen had accepted the responsibility for that particular cat too. Last night she had noticed it looking poorly; for some few days she had not been eating her food. Something was wrong when a cat was not eating Helen’s choice food, but in this instance the cat had not looked that bad. Then this morning she was dead. At the waste bins later when Helen had calmed down she told how she had come upon the cat in the morning, saw it lying there and when she came up to pat it found it stiff. The cat was not particularly old, maybe fifteen years. Helen had been feeding it since 2020. Dog years were x 6 - 7 in human terms, Helen more or less agreed. In cat reckoning it was a factor of 3, Helen said. Making this particular cat 80, Helen had calculated in the kitchen. (Later in the morning Wan Ling had explained the more complicated life term of cats.) Ordinarily there was nothing wrong with Helen’s arithmetic, or reasoning. Clearly she had been in a state. Off to get the rice. Don’t want to talk to you. At the bins Helen was met coming up from the slope and showed the rice in her trolley. That would save her $40-50. Monthly Helen spent $30 just for the bird food. Helen fed the crows, pigeons, mynahs & sparrows only at night and careful about it. So many people had the so-called bird problem wrong, the government included. In the telling in the kitchen it had seemed someone had brought the dead cat to the rubbish bins for disposal. Out there later when we talked again there was no sign of it. No. There it is, Helen indicated toward her door, where a large cardboard box sat on the paving beside Helen’s outdoor chairs. It was of course Helen herself who had brought it over. Some of the sharpness again in that, though not as bitingly as in the kitchen earlier. If it was up to her, Helen would dispose of the body in the large green waste bin. What was the use of anything else? But in this case Helen could not do that.  Over coming days Maureen would notice Bush Girl’s absence and ask after her. Helen had called Maureen between times to convey the news, knowing that Maureen would want to arrange a cremation. $120-30 wasted, according to Helen. What was the sense once the cat was dead? This had long been a point a friction between Helen & Maureen. Instead of helping Helen with the cost of good feed that saved on vet bills, Maureen spent money on hopeless cases, $8-9K recently on a couple of doomed cats whose condition the vet had clearly explained. Irrational. Money down the drain. One could not reason with Maureen. Maureen would come over shortly to see off Bush Gal (not Gal, Helen had snapped earlier in the kitchen leaving for the rice). It was Maureen who gave all the cats their names; by which Helen meant the outdoor cats. Helen had names of her own for her litter. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Publication News - “ Voided “ - Sunflowers at Midnight

 

Hallo everyone

Hope all is well & good in yr various corners.

Another publication to announce, this one with a small outfit in New Jersey in the States called Sunflowers at Midnight.

“Voided” focuses on Singaporean public housing — the HDB sector, where something like 85% of the population reside. Sometimes referred to as pigeon-hole living, the grounds & corridors of the estates are certainly kept clean & orderly by the foreign workforce. At the base of each tower stand vacant, open spaces called Void Decks.

See how you like it, again freely available, p. 17-18 here —

https://indd.adobe.com/view/c15c3376-044e-433b-9016-4fbf9c6f5e66

Greetings & pozdravs 

P