Conch (Jan26)

The old man with the trannie this morning at his usual place under Block 7. (Evenings it was Block 9; occasionally lunchtimes he might be found around the side at the back of 7.) Not often asleep mid-morning. Nights he could be caught slumped over on his bench, radio blaring and newspaper on the ground. For anyone else the crooked raised arm like that denoted the phone of course; a conversation. Not a man of his generation. And like the Indian loner at the Haig, this old man had never been seen in conversation with a soul. Slowing the pace, bending the ear, nothing could be caught, not the smallest quaver; no note of any kind escaping. Perhaps close and tight like that against an ear there was some whisper still audible like from a conch shell, heard only by the person clasping. From somewhere a street or two away it must have been a Buddhist chant of some kind fluting over. 

The Red Chair - published by NWWQ July21

As far as pavement barbers went this one was as good as any; for the Indians it was a twenty minute walk over to Guillemard. The night before there had been a queue and finally the wait was abandoned. A demanding Chinaman in the chair was wanting this, that and the other, making for a brief wait. In the second clan house further along one of the Taoist rituals was taking place, on the throne before the gods and devils a heavily tattooed former baddie-turned-savant rubber-stamping various documents and initialing others. Kids at the corner table helped themselves to soft drinks from the fridge; a couple of take-outs were delivered and the older man at the outdoor table opened four long-neck Carlsbergs, one for each of his pals. During the wait on the fussy Chinaman an unusual song was drifting across from further up the lorong. There were a group of youngsters in lableless clothes outside the last house in the row, with an acoustic guitar and some other kind of instrument. Five or six stood in the choir encouraging, We can, we can....something, something. Can we pray for you sir? the nosey parker in the panama was asked by a chap dealing leaflets. One of the girls of the group stepped forward. No money sir. Do you need a prayer?... Prayers would certainly not be amiss along that strip. There had been no revisiting the scenes in these lorongs the last number of years. Homelessness, beggary, the hunchbacked, deformed and amputees scrounging could be better endured than the trafficking of that quarter. Weekends the lorongs and side lanes along there off Geylang Road collected scores of girls and more in the brothels, young teens predominating. Pimps were regularly prosecuted for underage girls, without any semblance of change on the street. The barber that night had not been recalled—two or three men took shifts on that site—but the chap knew his regular well enough. Aodaliyaah? Aodaliya.... Ya, the great southern land; he had remembered. Understandably the man had been struck by the usage. As usual the working girls continued with very little hang-time. Viets, Cambodians and perhaps Filipinas, one or two trannies among the rest. On this second night there were far more girls and mainly Indian foreign workers customers. Pretty young girls without any need of smiling or enticement. Rapid negotiations, off up the spiral staircase or the old dilapidated house opposite, in and out. Of course whites were rare in the barber’s chair. Six-seven minutes for four dollars. It had been an early finish at the Cyber, well before ten. The street light was fair, but the Mainland construction labourers moonlighting wore bicycle lamps strapped to their foreheads. They used a narrow-blade machine and cut-throat for shaving; a gown was provided for clients. For brushing off a foam shammy was employed like car-washers used; broom for sweeping into the canal in front. Twenty metres down the gospel group continued; across the lorong the young lads followed behind the girls. Three or four girls were always waiting; it was very brisk. The stabbing moment that evening came when one of the young pimps returned to the corner of the canal opposite the lane, close by the chair. It may have been the cruising police car earlier that had sent the lad away. Here he was coming back to his post in a casual swagger. Seeing his approach, a young dark-haired girl suddenly leapt from the red plastic chair like the one the barber had commandeered and assumed her place over at the awning where her friends waited. A bolt of electricity could not have thrown her more violently. For the evening the shop’s awning had been half-raised and the girls slowly circled there showing their legs and curves. Sporting elaborate tattoos along his forearms and sharp red-tinted hair, the pimp took the seat. From the awning the lass bent forward to the young fellow with some witticism. HaHaHa. There was no answering laughter, though the pimp received the gambit well enough. It was OK, there was no need worry, there would be no anger. In the newspaper reports of prosecutions there were mentions of pimps trying out the girls at the outset in order to rate services. Customers enquired seemingly and a serious business needed to take its business seriously.

Nice and the Old Coolie

Through the morning the death toll at Nice rose ever upward. Earliest reports had at least thirty dead and one hundred injured; by 10:30 the number of the former had more than doubled, with some way further to go. A truck mowing down a crowd on Bastille Day gathered at the water-front watching fireworks. Later reports said the driver had continued on for 2kms scything through the mass.

Men like him were seeing the drone and rocket attacks in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere that needed to be scoured in the media on our side.

Old feisty Mr. Ng downstairs, a thin reed in his late seventies, told yesterday morning of a recent encounter with an American from California. The Chinaman must have startled the ang moh by his remarks on the wars being conducted in the Middle East. Was that a war firing on civilian areas from miles in the sky, with pilotless aircraft controlled from thousands of miles away? With no return fire, the people simply exploded, women and children? That's the way it is, was all that the American could answer.

Mr. Ng lived in landed property behind the Haig blocks. 

Another old granddad too who lived somewhere within the towers should be likewise honoured.

This morning as on all previous encounters, the second old man made a point of offering greeting, on this particular occasion firing unnoticed from the void beneath Block 4. 

There on those benches this man could often be found mornings and afternoons too, usually facing the inner wall of the block, so that he could not see the passersby along the path behind. And one must confess, it had happened on the odd occasion that that circumstance had been exploited and this chap had been slipped past unnoticed. 

This morning that second old granddad had risen to his feet for some reason and turned facing the square of lawn with its garden. Because aunt Josephine the cat-lady at Block 2 was out leaning on the railing on the other side, one had paid no heed to the trench opposite. 

Suddenly, Good morning, sir, like a rogue shot following a truce.

— Oh. Oh. Good morning to you too, sir. Howdeedo?

Along the pathways one first of all needed to quickly choose one’s language. Many of the older Chinese could not speak English, even rudimentary level. Ni hao for them. Old scarved Malays needed Pagi; Indians were often Muslim thereabout and the same was satisfactory for them too. 

A little tricky. Pleasant and easy for the most part. 

On occasion one had one's own preoccupations pacing by and a jack-in-the-box surprised. 

Some people didn't give greetings, nor did they seek them. The young needed to be differentiated too. No complaints; the intruder was yourself. 

Like Mr. Ng, this second old granddad had entered his late seventies and quite likely pitched beyond. Tall, corpulent, a gleam of dentures; legs beginning to give out. A stick helped and some days a maid pushed a chair.

Never failing in his salutations, morning, noon and night too once or twice. Always respectfully saluting the panama and often apologising for inadequacies. I no speak English. Good morning. Good afternoon, sir. Very well thank you. 

One of the yellow slave class had learned such as himself had no call enquiring after the health of his betters, especially gentlemen pacing briskly somewhere where bundles awaited at upper storey desks with secretaries jumping from their chairs. 

Should the latter personage grace a man like him with an enquiry after his health, he would be honoured. Even having his greeting returned, he was grateful. Thank you. (Routinely here thanks was given for a communication; for a trivial exchange. For someone having taken a moment for such poor pitiful beings.)

This eternally sunny granddad might have escaped the opium dens, the tin mines and possibly even the cartage at the go-downs. But he had been well brought-up otherwise. Never would he make a trouble of himself for his carers, you could be sure. (Doreen would be quizzed about family. To date the chap has only been sighted with the young Indo girl. On the other warm and smiling old granddad with the transistor on his Void benches, Doreen could not make identification. A matter of varying times she thought.) 

Occasionally the tall granddad got his periods confused and once the tongue was too quick correcting.

Cut Off at the Knees

Once every five or six weeks the Indian gardening detail perfume the pathways of the housing blocks with the scent of freshly cut grass. Upstairs ten floors high the windows shut out their work almost entirely. Emerging from the lift and turning onto the path early school-day athletic sports return first of all, the frosts and fogs banished by the spring that has arrived. On the far side of the void deck a line of beating wings suggested birds larger than pigeons, the flight too rapid to identify; out by the vegetable gardens numbers of mynahs come down hopefully to the ground. A crew of half a dozen lads with whippers breeze through the entire stretch of blocks here in under a day, easy going with good cloud cover like today.

          Younger brother Calvin had flown up from Melbourne the night before to be with the elder Francis during his by-pass operation next week, this morning bed-side the old Carnegie favourite here sitting face-up on display: How To Stop Worrying and Start Living. This was a re-reading for Calvin, some reminders being useful for him and other matter not so much. 
         More than likely Calvin had progressed from the more famous How to Win Friends.
         Teochew family the Yeos. The mother had regularly helped neighbours write back to loved ones on the mainland. 
         The sister Doreen had opted for the Charis Tabernacle church; elder brother a Japanese sect called the Mahikari with a temple in Geylang, some kind of modernized Shintoism it seems. Where the eldest brother out at Tampines had sought succour was not known as yet. 
         A highly indicative Singaporean family unit grouping for the Chinese most particularly. 
         Denaturing in the big bad vertical city was one thing; but followed by the kind of deracination one finds at the same time in the laboratory of ultra-modernism here grievously painful to witness. 
         By comparison the Indians and Malays have not suffered anything of the same magnitude.

Marauder @ Starbs (June26)

 

Quart past 11 nowhere to hide from the smoochin muzik, finally an appeal to the two young Malays. 

Gee, the sharpness must have startled the pair. Did most definitely startle the lumpy girl in particular….  

 ___ rubbish…

How in the heck did that get out?! Wholly unintended. Crickey. 

But sir, we…

White guy was giving the pair a hard time, because his hit parade—re-mastered swelling big number—was delivered to him on a plate with jam and cream complimentary on the side?… (Unfathomable.)

Sorry sir. Yes sir. Sure… 

Darling, you are Starbs, granted. I know. I noticed coming in. But yellow. Sulphur through & through. (She herself may possibly have been Chinese; many were hard to tell. The boy’s name tag had been sighted.) But, couldn’t you go your own way, like. Just do it? Be yourself, make your own tracks in the forest…(A nice Tamil girl the week before had been caught re-reading the Running Wolves book at KV.) 

Made himself shockingly tongue-tied and confused, the author. Irretrievably. The Arabic script tee the day after Hari Raya might possibly have been counterproductive, spooked the kids a wee. Island-wide they were alert for ructions.

Hopefully the CCTV failed, could not possibly have got sound beneath the fellatio fondling the vocalist was giving out.

Many thanks lads.

None of the other punters complaining thankfully, thin crowd in the last half hour before noon. Corner window job interview where the lookalike girls either side shopped for the same clothes, watched the same TV and dreamt the one dream at night. Around at entry two joined tables Singlish corporate mimicry for an SME strategy. 

The table further along was a better bet, even three feet remove made a difference. 

Toast Box was rather vacant too. There had been a thought passing. In the end the doll-house scale, tables and décor, decided against. (The Box at Bugis five years ago wasn’t that bad.)

Thursday. Taking a while to figure. At the Haig an old Indian-Malay coming along reported Har Yassin was still closed. Cat-lady auntie Helen under her umbrella pacing out the last steps for the refuge of the mall. Earlier there had been a rain-storm that had prompted look-out the bedroom window, heat sting through the glass.

 

 

Colour, Cut & Blow at the Top End (Mar26)

For those mystified by the author's recent preoccupation with politicians' dyeing & styling of hair, refer to the recent French example, si vous plait. (This blog does not concern itself with trivialities.)

Francois Hollande really pays $14,600 a month on haircuts?

• ABC (Aust.) online

  French president Francois Hollande causes a stir after it was revealed he spends €9,985 ($14,600) a month on a personal hairdresser.
  http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-14/francois-hollande-pays-14-thousand-dollars-a-month-on-haircuts/7628044
  
  
  
  NB. Francois not exactly hirsute on top, of course. For the follicularly challenged, the undertaking does demand more attention still.
  
  
  
  
  
  

Faun at the Haig

Mission accomplished more or less. Fair and reasonable success. Landlady Doreen had left for work early (she would return early too, but it was the morning that was important). As expected there had been little of questions or messaging from Ni. When Ni left Kovan she sent the usual courtesy message — she was OTW. Otherwise there was the single other contact, a call in fact, for the number of the block. Ni remembered the neighbourhood well enough, but it was easy to lose oneself in the thicket of towers. Entrance D she recalled; the markings on the blocks themselves were much less prominent. Ni didn't say from where she was calling and she wasn't asked. Her favourite almond milk had been bought for her, she was told the night before; no need stop for it on the way. Had she however cooked as usual, getting up early in order to have everything ready? The question the night before on the use of "auntie's" kitchen had not been answered; at that stage Dor's movements the next morning were unknown. A stop for take-out from the Haig might have been another reason for delay. It was best when Ni hurried along directly as she usually did; stopping for one reason or another was frustrating after a month of absence. Door left open as advised. No knock had been audible. Here she was then in excellent time, entering and closing the door promptly and quietly behind her. Neither the turn of the knob nor footsteps had been heard—as near as one could get to finger-snapping abracadabra. All excellent well. Ni could not have known whether auntie was in or not, leaving that uncertainty had been intentional. Adeptly negotiated by Ni. Pee... You?... What you Ni? Come to bed....The bed-cover was raised high, perhaps a naked flank was visible, or part visible; aircon high. Ni would be hot after her 1.1km trek from the MRT and not much less had she taken the bus. Last time you don't want take. Now you off.... What was a girl supposed to do? The last few visits Ni had adopted skirts because of her lover's preference for his particular kind of preliminaries in the love-making. Ni stood long-legged against the side of the bed. (Showing the room at the beginning Doreeen had called it a large single or 1 1/2 size bed. On her first visit to Dor's flat Ni had approved, saying it enforced closeness. She would repeat the same on this visit too. In the kampung she had what she called a king size bed, Ni said.) Pressed against the side of the mattress Ni unbuttoned her white frilly blouse, working almost as quickly as one would have wished. (Three years before after a two month absence another Indo lover from the other side of Java, the hot chili Eastern region, had literally leapt from the hotel room doorway into the arms, thereby causing a slight stumble and half-collapse onto the bed, where sexual union was completed within a matter of minutes of arrival.) Ni's blouse had a difficult zipper. Once it came off over her head Ni had thought to join her lover with what looked like new lime green briefs. Not permissible. Usually the briefs were retained and Ni strong-armed over the matter. Everything was different and contrary this morning. Immediate compliance. Now the girl could be admitted under the covers, coverlet raised for entry something like a cloth over the opening of a cavern. As she bent, in the act of plunging, Ni gave a brief glance downward, a kind of survey seeing what she was getting herself into. Briefest glance but no mistake; the head turned back round afterward. The smile was full of delight, it recalled girlish pleasure from summers around backyard pools where young lasses dropped themselves into the water with eager relish. A giggle might have escaped Ni. Another girl might have aimed for the far side of the bed against the wall; or one unable to be more direct would have attempted a nervous elbowing aside of her lover in order to enter the bed more demurely. In Ni's case the landing was aimed squarely atop her lover, with other, different smiles here. With each visit Ni was loading up a great deal in the memory bank. There had been an attempted break two years before when another lover, another kind of love, had been awoken. Ni was better than the others she confidently declared; the others which she assumed but said she didn’t want to think about.