Celebration Nigh

Malls full throughout, people leaning along the walls of the corridors soaking up the freeze. The rich coffee tones of the carters at the street stalls had deepened some more, t-shirt competitions galore. Era's Batam pal, little stunted barrel flashing a smile in passing thought he wouldn't be recognized. In the handshake that followed when he was pulled up a suggestion of a deformed pinkie. Possibly just the bird-nest scale of bones. Chap had got himself the full month's work; Era went back after ten days, only able to scrounge hours here and there at something out at Tampines. Nene-grandma on a four-pronged walker with deep pockets in her dress. Woman has noticeably aged and slowed in these five years. A coin at one table, two dollars at another gran's table 7 or 8 years her junior. One of the younger mums in front came to chase her down with an offering; the oldie did not linger long with her hand out. A maid she looked with her two teen charges and kong-kong at table waved her on. For the mat salleh pointed avoidance, giving the chair a wide berth and walking on without slightest pause. The tee with the full Arabic alphabet from the Islamic Museum at KL prompted her not a jot. (Before other eyes that item could be a show-stopper and one half.) Earlier the Haig Loner was given a one and a couple of minutes earlier there at the market the Hindu lad selling the socks, belts and wallets another. This time for some reason lad had come out on an eleven day visa, raising suspicions at the immigration desk no doubt. A couple of sympathetic parties for the "Solo Aid" call-out. Some kind of better Hari Raya / Lebaran will be in-store for them in central Java.

The Tungku (July26)

Smart, reed-thin little guy Tungku looking a picture as usual this afternoon, and handsomer still with his goatee strands and moustache. (You look so young Tungku, someone recently flattered.) Weekly visits to the barber & daily shaving. (The latter during ablutions and feeling in the dark more than sufficient.) Only just woke, he confesses, after retiring 3-4am. Under the stairs at the market was Tungku’s chosen corner, where he mixed with some of the riff-raff who drank and traded in the illegal ciggies. A prince in fact among them, who declined disguise. Tales of lordly life related briefly: the blessing of parents at first biz ventures, appetite for justice & pride in the ability to meet all classes equally, from the beggar to most high. Self-described. Big, big flashing reminders of the chief leader of the pack in primary school, little mousey-haired, freckled Kenny Roussell. (Certainly back then never pronounced in the French.) What a joy it was to be invited to the birthday party at Kenny’s house in Hick Street, ‘66 or ‘67. Appalling shame at Babi’s horrid present, however! A striped rocket pencil-case that she bought without consultation. One that, astonishingly, Kenny accepted with finest grace and allowance. A leader of boys, and men, indeed!… Three or four times the dapper chappie here reported references by petitioners of various kinds to his royal person. One police inspector among the rest, who produced Tengku’s voluminous file with CCTV shots & prints. (You think it fazed the man? Wah! The Tungku was needed on-side.) A seat over in one of the off-shore islands, among other ancestral holdings elsewhere, that were stolen by Raffles & the Brit thieves. Lavender long-sleeve, black slacks & polished shoes in the heavy overcast well-suited that afternoon. 

On the Receiving End (Sept25)

 

After the newspaper, all the turgid crud one perforce swallows day by day here over this long stretch on the billboards, in the retail quarters and then borne by the poor sorry sods like a cross everywhere they go. Above all it was the youth most pitiful, herded through the housing towers, the schools & malls. STRAWBERRY LEAGUE left drowning the retina, and, PING! electric impulse flooding the brain before you could say Jack Robinson, or look away. Opposite at the table ROMANITE – For Pride and Glory, black hoodied lad hunched over his books. Crowd spilling onto the floor of the 8th offered a soft, bespectacled Indian confrere of the first lass, sporting The Same Is Tame. (Pass mark for rebellion in the Singapore frame.) All the sudden inspirations between breakfast and lunch from the designers in the lofts through the region. (Easy to differentiate the native linguistic flair of Anglo-American copy.) Little mouse eyes caught in the trap. School was back Monday. (Correction: possibly read Homanite here. Movie tie-in?) Strawberry  was fleecy woolly, matched with pink underwear briefs as it happened, that had ridden high on the girl’s thighs. Beside Homanite sat a contented blank maroon hoodie unfussed… perhaps there was something on his chest. Ya, in the Tropics still. Fiercesome aircon at the best of times, and on an overcast day with drizzle again, very Siberia.

 

 

                                                                  

                                                                                                                       SG National Library

 

 

Terrorizing the Floor

The big-size 130kg. Johor Malay late for work sheepishly offering the sign of prayer to the Tamil uncle at the register for his excuse—turned-up wrists more than palms. It was not the little tubby Tamil uncle he needed to worry about however; rather the big stern ISIS-like terrorist in back who was the obstacle. Another Tamil in fact—they were not all 1.55cm—sporting a bushy salt and pepper beard this year that only added gravitas. Carefully chosen and promoted by the ogre owner; one would guess the man was the son and not the little bantam Iqbal who liked partying and the ladies. The latest attention to detail was the four inch separation of the tables. Narrows the passage rather, but perhaps lunch-hour during Ramadan a couple of degrees separation between the faltering fasters was in order. Fellow sitting at table occupied with serious labour makes no never mind. Sorry Arrhh. How are you? Started speaking of late. Al Wadi won’t be opening mornings until at least the third week of July, many of the lads back to India and Malaysia for the festivities.

Spaceship Travel (Feb25)

Welcome back to our home planet, Major Tim, a well-earned rest now after the rigours of your travel. Dispensing with suction hoses for clearing your bowels will be a great boon—once more the thrills of gravity are yours. Otherwise the smell of the ground down here was missed? Yes, check Major Timmy, the dirty old brown ground. Who would have thought? Re-acquaintance with wind and weather generally bringing joy? Perhaps the passage of the seasons? Check again, Major Tim. Easily under-estimated. And no more temp. controlled packaged food delivered from afar back on terra firma, hey, this blessed watery planet of our forebears. What about picking some fruit from a tree branch, perchance, one in the wilds, untended and carrying hidden birds, fair chance. How would that be? Vegies from a garden open to the sky, rooted in the earth, our mother? 

         A treat awaits the hero, food for his soul. In Singapore we thought of him constantly up there out of sight, following through the outer darkness every step of the way. Hearty welcome! It must be beyond wonderful to have finally escaped the dazzling void.

NB. British astronaut Tim Peake recently returned to earth after six months on the International Space Station.

Down the Drain May24

Chinaman on a fishing expedition lookalike of the old butcher at the Haig, who had run a tote on the side in his day. (Spendthrift younger brother?) The Tamil uncle at the register knew the routine without being told, chap evidently doing the rounds there every so often same as round in Geylang Road. No shame about it, bent straight to work and carefully trawling through the plastic & cardboard muck. Often the coins must snag; one needed to be thorough. Last week a Bulgarian patron had gifted the Tamil uncle at the register a dollar that he was keeping as a lucky charm—it had not slipped him and rolled into the drain. Were it not for the wrong colour and the naked hands, give the Chinaman a pair of overalls with insignia, one might take the man for a responsible council employee. Little iron jemmy would make a person wonder passing him on the street. In the case here outside Har Yassin, not needed — grate pulled up no trouble and shallow pit made light work of it. Still the man was properly thorough, sifting, combing, dredging up the soggy sludge. Unidentifiable muck. Lastly run along the rim with fore and middle just to be sure, sometimes coins got trapped in there. Mid-70s, lithe & nimble. There were social services available upon application—join the queue, interview, proper ID. Doctor arranged. Now fill in the forms. Home inspection, earnings of children, domestic particulars again. Call this number in a fortnight. In Thailand & the Philippines, Laos & Cambodia, India & China, Indonesia, there was no safety net at all and elderly sleeping in the streets. Lucky Singapore.

 

Glory On High

This afternoon some lingering beneath a speaker in the ceiling of the stationery department at Kinokuniya. It had taken some little while locating with the volume turned down and the elusive voice battling against the hubbub. At first the sound seemed to be coming from a recess in the ceiling completely out of sight. Some soft light was also emitted from beyond that little ledge above the notebook stand. Later a second speaker in the same aisle was found turned off. Thought had been after the KV lunch and print of a couple of pages at Peace Centre a quick reconnoiter hoping to find a volume of old Tu Fu—sometimes confusingly rendered Du Fu, the poor girl at the Info desk needed to be informed. There was nothing of David Hinton’s translation, that had been established a couple of weeks before. Only Hinton’s Analects and the I Ching that had been already purchased. Some hope that the largest bookstore (English holdings at least) in S-E Asia might turn up the Tang star. Chinese city after all. TuF. had been rendered by a couple of previous notables—fair chance you might have thought in Singapore, steady sales ticking over. KinoK had been downsized a couple of years ago, usual chief victims. If you were after motivational, entrepreneurial, investment gurus, biz. management & strategy, conservative histories, mysteries, cololuring-in books, comics, celebrity, cook books, photography, design, more photography and design, you had come to the right place, all cards accepted at the register have a nice day sir. The LKY shelves alone could not have been sent up in smoke with less than three molotovs, not a chance, forget it. Man was hardly dead, only symbolically and figuratively. (The feud between the PM and his sister over accusations of political exploitation in the use of the dear father of the nation’s passing had been hosed down of late, all hush-hush in-family.) They had stocked Tu Fu once upon a time, sold out now, the fine young lass conveyed. She could not be quizzed on the history—it was not possible to punish poor innocents for the sins of the elders. No. Too bad. Good selection of Gel pens in stationery at KinoK, including 0.8s at $3.10 comparable to ArtFriend and Popular, at the shelves there among all the inferior biros and all the soft pastel colour varieties, when suddenly out of thin air one was quite unexpectedly lightly showered by Pavarotti early signatures. First like a compressed TV flowering of a vivid orchid hidden in jungle thicket, O Sole Mio’s rhythmic swelling bathing the brain. It was followed immediately after by Ritorno a Soriento. Melting. Caused one shiver followed by another. Here was a chance to show the locals one’s superior cultivated taste, almost word for word with the big man and phrasing perfect. The little jail-bait schoolgirl’s mum might have had entirely the wrong idea on the loitering. Strange in the Asian (more or less) locale receiving those melodies, the exhalation from that great old bellows. The fact the maestro had been dead all these years now perhaps added feeling, gone the way of Caruso, Mario Lanza, Jussi Bjorling and all the others. That short stretch of waters from the bays of Boka over to Bari, down to Brindisi, Sicily and up on the other side to Napoli rose up. They could have Sorrento, skip that jaunt. Thirty-five years ago there had been no malls in Napoli; in the old town near the waterfront there would be none now. Minimum of ornamental trees and shrubs. The mafia there would be a sight better than the entrenched tropical kind that could not be ousted for the next one hundred years. There was almost as much street prostitution in Napoli as Geylang, no fool would pay for indoor theatre. Fourteen-sixteen hours away for little over a grand. With the usual shuttering for the morning during Ramadan and the danger of the ogre owner Haneefa at the other option at that late hour, it had been Starbs for the morning cafe and attempted revision. As the customers piled into the outlet at the base of OneKM there nearing lunchtime the volume had gone up on the pitter-patter remastered golden oldies and prairie ballads. Something to do with the almost completely overwhelming effect a few hours later of the big man.