Really remarkable. As in the case of some of the encounters with the fair sex here, one needed to pinch oneself, accept the unfolding reality, switch off the internal video monitor and return to the task at hand. Aduh! Gasping. Very little doubt it was all precisely as disclosed by Mr. Osman here. You didn’t need to get up to the Caribbean to source mag. lit.; plenty of action-packed colourful picaresque, unaccountable personality was on offer in these SE Asian tropical parts, as the young Indo novelist realised last year with his much-acclaimed. (No need sample the contours in that case, easy to guess; and the facility too.) Dart man Jamal lives and writes his own story daily. The man had revealed himself progressively over the stops at the table: widowed so many years; younger Filipino wife taken eventually; oodles of pesos gifted up there and much appreciative love rained down upon the benefactor. Death phobia was nothing out of the ordinary; broadly shared everywhere. How many events had the man come across to report. Just the other day the poor victim had been at the table behind there by the passage, large as life. Gone ready.... How many tehs have been plonked on the table? Here. Drink up. Please, you bring me luck.... //Jamal, makasih. Please, no. Thank you. Cannot…. Useless. Two or three returned and once six dollars foisted upon him when Jamal was found at the counter and pleaded his own side. He was buying for so many. Cannot. No.... A darts champion, won numerous trophies and some cash prizes too. His good pal Osman had blown the cover properly some months ago. A tradie; one of the simpler kind. Few shillings short of the full quid. Good at heart. Jamal missed out on the invites to Harbourfront when Osman met his collared brigade—retired teachers, principals, public servants. There may have been a magistrate among the regulars. Toffs with noses in the air. On one occasion when an invitation to join the circle at Harbourfront was finally extended the pearl that Dart man Jamal dropped on the table for the gathering centred on the old Commie Chin Peng, who had departed the region when the Rightists under LKY locked up the shop. Fellow had hid up so many years in Thailand was it? Kept well away. Wrote his memoirs; &etc. In fact Dart man Jamal knew to the contrary, the real story: a shootout it had been on Shenton Way in the heart of town back one fine day in ‘67 thereabouts. Body had been held in real cold storage since, right up to the present. Not everyone knew…. At something equally fatuous Osman who had opened the door at Harbourfront was unable to contain himself longer. No more of these cartoon stories, Jamal! Done with them! Suda!... Tricky-sticky. Overcome in the end and no hard feelings. Late last year there had been more serious, deeper hot water when one of the illegal ciggie sellers had blown his top at Jamal’s showering of the Batam lasses with fries and drinks. Down in the carpark on for young and old; bruises, black eyes. The stairs were right there by the pillar past the counter. Jamal had touched seventy. Had he been present he would have prevented escalation, Osman was sure. Dear me. Then this evening, and not for the first time, the display of the bundles had been once staged again. What had he won last time, $50k? (Accepting a treat from Jamal one did him a favour blowing big winnings his way. Oh! So many bigger near misses too—a single number out of sequence; 6 instead of 8; 1/7 &etc.) Tonight a princely one hundred thou on previous night’s much anticipated CNY jackpot of $12mil. Real giant loot. Queues had snaked from the outlets around the blocks, as usual; island-wide frenzy. Unzipping his leather shoulder bag and dropping his deeply dyed moustaches, one bundle the size of a brick could hardly be clasped in Jamal’s giant mitts. (Cigla, brick in Serbo-Croat during the hyper-inflation.) There! See! The second may have been marginally lighter. Rumpled notes, edges all mussed. With such a gigantic payout the authorities had been unable to provide usual pristine pressings presumably. No mileage any longer, however, with Osman that little show. There had come another outburst too on that particular malarkey. (Fifties on the outside and newspaper cuttings within, at Jamal’s kitchen table with his wife’s seamstress scissors when the lady was out.) Harmless enough. Certainly no offence this side, truly. None. Wherefore? One knew well and more than well how hard it could be coming up with something to captivate. To slay all and sundry in an audience. How to get one’s voice heard? Not easy. You needed to be snaky sly and inventive.
Geylang Serai, Singapore
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