Do you believe in magic

2011-10-30T22:09:00.002+08:00

Friends, let's slowly build our sandcastles, and let's try to do it together.

lionessa leonette lyonine

2011-08-27T15:19:00.004+08:00

"The Barbary lion (Panthera leo leo), also known as the Atlas lion or Nubian lion, is a subspecies of lion that became extinct in the wild or extinct in the 20th century. It is often considered the national emblem of Morocco/Marruecos/Maroc."

7 + 7 = 13

2011-07-10T14:15:00.004+08:00

~~} Silence is all I need

Not dark yet

2011-06-18T09:48:00.000+08:00

Leo Thirteen

2011-05-29T17:11:00.006+08:00

(When Padma and I were rushing for a train ride somewhere in a small town in India, on a bumblebee black and yellow autorickshaw, kicking up dust clouds through town roads, I caught sight, in the distance, of Leo XIII Primary School)

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.

Einstein

from Luca's quote bomb tonight

2011-05-22T23:14:00.007+08:00

I like nonsense- it wakes up the brain cells

Dr Seuss

Everybody's youth is a dream, a form of chemical madness

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Steel blue twilight in the world

And in my heart a timid star

Sara Teasdale

There's such an effort to try and explain people.

Tilda Swinton

I don't like standard beauty. There is no beauty without strangeness.

Karl Lagarfeld

Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.

Dr Seuss

Interstellar Travel

2011-05-22T18:47:00.005+08:00

There are wormholes in old books, the sky, an old musky jewellery box, bedtime stories, a song, a quote, a poem, a found photograph, a kiss (I wouldn't know though), the rain, the mail, going under the covers with toys. But will we ever know if there are mermaids and fishes (or unimaginable creatures) swirling and swimming in the underwater world of Ganymede? (warm currents, covered by a layer of ice, Ganymede, one of Jupiter's moons, looks like a glowing crystal ice ball you could suck on) And what if meteorites (pieces of rock from asteroids that fall onto earth) are actually of colours that we cannot perceive, imagine or know of. They are not actually grey. They may even Glow or do other things we cannot conceive, like glow/meld/morph/interlinked with new concepts. Oh how cosmology blows my mind. It's wonderful, it's coming, my rocket takes off in five days.

moon light years

2011-05-22T01:17:00.007+08:00

I can't give you anything but the air between us

dust particles that float in the cosmos between us

little galaxies of uncertain age

galloping to disperse, suiciding towards black holes

to free the space between us

a gravity-free void

to free fall into

free fall orbit

we'll lead stellar lives

STELLAR LIVES

free falling eternity

for as long as the universe keeps expanding

multiplying into infinite alternate parallel universes

(alternate or parallel?)

to the point of no time

time out of mind

no return, no mime time,

no infinitive relativity-

deep breath into love lungs

a trillion moons fly by our bodies

the stars shine forever

Love is

2011-05-17T23:02:00.009+08:00

my grandmother asking me what I want for breakfast every night;

when she watches me eat the nutritious steamed fish with ginger

that she cooked with her tubby belly sticking out at the flaming wok;

my father who doesn't give a hoot-ass about the art I make

picking me up from the mrt at 11.30pm in his pyjamas;

my mother, not giving up;

a real tight hug;

lunch at 12:15;

sitting close;

letting me use the toilet first;

sharing water;

packing lunch too;

a handwritten letter, sent by post;

a brush of the hair, pat on the head;

a rusty old accordion;

landing in India;

28-rupee thali eaten by hand;

phone call from home in another land;

delirium spice mixed by heart;

long silent train rides, crazy wal-mart;

magic marvellous masala chai;

sharing roadside pad thai

you had coffee I had soya bean

you have long hair I have short,

you are tall I am so tiny but we

confidently walk the dark streets side by side;

landing in changi airport and

going to the girl's toilet together;

waiting waiting waiting and then

going to the movies together;

sleeping over with the cousins;

the smell of dried flowers;

the fresh taste of mango;

the warmth of tangyuan;

the wholesome fragrance of nasi lemak rice;

when you tiao found dou jiang;

garage sales on sunday afternoons;

phlegm wriggling in the pavement;

an old hard scab;

a wrinkled veined hand;

a gloomy reservoir lake;

the talon of a black cawing crow;

droplets of nosebleed;

throwing chicken rice at the wall,

sweet sauce stain and red chilli brains;

terribly sleepless nights;

nearly a heart attack, angry blue blood;

the familiar smell of insect repellent;

rough tree bark outside my house;

rainbow suicides on sunny days;

playing pretend on rainy days;

pretending to love on empty nights;

a mime;

without time;

time out of mind;

fat juicy lemon-lime;

not needing to explain;

dangerous, poisonous, consuming;

simple, gentle, sweet, kind.

2011-05-08T20:05:00.001+08:00

I am my own castle; head to the blooming clouds, roots to the wet damp soil.

beautiful bag of old flowers

2011-04-04T23:31:00.009+08:00

'my heart will stay yours until the day I die

even tomorrow in other's arms'

(dear you-know-who, like the smile?)

Tweets from Yoko (I used to wonder why Yoko would subscribe to technology like tweeting, then I visited and found out that the way she tweets is wonderful and spreads something out there like ripples):

Watch the sun until it comes into your body and stays as a tiny sun. It will keep your face shining even in the coldest of winter.

Imagine a cloud slowly going across the sky and back. Send a postcard to your friend.

Look at a star in the sky not as something unreachable but as a planet you would visit one day.

Tell us when you first noticed the sky. Tell us when you first thought that the sky was beautiful.

The sky was the only constant factor in my life, which kept changing with the speed of light and lightening.

All my life, I have been in love with the sky. Even when everything was falling apart around me, the sky was always there for me.

As I told myself then, I could never give up on life as long as the sky was there.

The Abduction of Amelia Earhart

2011-03-28T23:43:00.008+08:00

I don't know much about her except for

'Adventure is worthwhile in itself'

but the moment I set eyes on

Collage by Joana Coccarelli

I knew it must have been.

Tonight I lay alone in the baby pool looking up at the salmon-smokey clouds in the night sky through artifically planted coconut trees in my auntie's housing estate, my ears were submerged in the pool so everything felt like a vacuum and I was somewhere else. Slowly I realised there was a ringing tone in the baby pool. Brrrrr...........brrrrr.............I sat up into the real world and looked around. There was no one else. Then I let my ears in again, they got filled up, and there it was, somewhere in the depths of the 0.6m pool......Brrrrr...........brrrr.................was it Amelia calling from outer space?

Then I got up and sat extremely still and my goosepimple legs were hugely magnified in the water and didn't seem like mine. Little bubbles were sprinkled all over my belly. They are like pearls you can't touch because they keep running away, you can't even feel their surface. But you can flick them up and they fly to the surface, like parachutes going the other way. I stared at the tiles with my eyes so close to the water it felt like my eyes were seeing that way by themselves, and the grimy turquoise tiles were like the surface of an alien planet with distorted proportions and no weather, and luminescent waves of light floated across the surface like gentle dancing, and I stared harder and it was like a miniscule Amelia was climbing the tiles which were steps from another angle, climbing endless grimy turquoise steps in an other-land that wasn't peaceful or bad but just. And then it was time to go home.

My love, she speaks like silence

2011-03-17T23:38:00.001+08:00

Saigon, please wait for me.

You have selected a departure date that is in the past.

2011-03-17T23:32:00.003+08:00

'Spit your oranges into this basin!'

'I am falling off the castle! Hallllp!'

'Spit, SPIT!!!!!!!'

'I don't understand why we are not in the swimming pool?'

'Why did I ever fall in love with you? Too many oranges! Madness bloody manic madness stupid craze everyday from bloody pips and orange peels and orange-coloured faeces'

'Let's dive off the castle and forget about oranges forever'

'WHY CAN'T YOU EAT LEMONS INSTEAD'

2011-03-08T00:44:00.000+08:00

Kristin's Dream In November

2011-02-25T21:23:00.004+08:00

I went thru the turnstyle to the party
In the risqué penthouse that was not
A penthouse, I followed people but maybe
They weren't people, it was ethical
To follow them over the edges of the balloons
Until we found some tapsons to eat, heartily
We indulged & found the right move in relation
To the movements of the lion's mouth, the mouth
Which counted all who entered & left waywardly
Haphazardly the immigrant sphere where
Frozen petals fell behind the red curtain
So slowly they woke me like a knock on door #7
Behind which I'm dreaming
& trying to tango remorselessly

Bernadette Mayer

*

After eight hours of sitting in an air-conditioned room in front of a computer analysing forms, papers and proposals, I get home and am eager for a hot bath but before that I like to stand naked admiring myself in the huge toilet mirror, under the orange light that casts eyelash shadows of black-spikes under my eyes, and thaw.

Jeanette, Oranges are not the only fruit

2011-02-17T12:12:00.003+08:00

"As it is, I can't settle. I want someone who is fierce and will love me until death and know that love is as strong as death, and be on my side for ever and ever. I want someone who will destroy and be destroyed by me. There are many forms of love and affection, some people can spend their whole lives together without knowing each other's names. Naming is a difficult and time-consuming process; it concerns essences, and it means power. But on the wild nights who can call you home? Only the one who knows your name. Romantic love has been diluted into paperback form and has sold thousands and millions of copies. Somewhere it is still in the original, written on tablets of stone. I would cross seas and suffer sunstroke and give away all I have, but not for a man, because they want to be the destroyer and never be destroyed. That is why they are unfit for romantic love. There are exceptions and I hope they are happy."

"The unknowness of my needs frightens me. I do not know how huge they are, or how high they are, I only know that they are not being met. If you want to find the circumference of an oil drop, you can use lycopodium powder. That's what I will find. A tub of lycopodium powder, and I will sprinkle it on to my needs and find out how large they are. Then when I meet someone I can write up the experiment and show them what they have to take on. Except they might have a growth rate I can't measure, or they might mutate, or even disappear. One thing I am certain of, I do not want to be betrayed, but that's quite hard to say, casually, at the beginning of a relationship. It's not a word people use very often, which confuses me, because there are different kinds of infidelity, but betrayal is betrayal wherever you find it. By betrayal, I mean promising to be on your side, and then being on somebody else's."

2011-02-17T12:10:00.002+08:00

The curious are always in some danger. If you are curious you might never come home, like all the men who now live with mermaids at the bottom of the sea.

Oranges are not the only fruit, Jeanette Winterson

2011-02-17T11:57:00.001+08:00

“Each second we live is a new and unique moment of the universe, a moment that will never be again. And what do we teach our children? We teach them that two and two make four, and that Paris is the capital of France. When will we also teach them what they are? We should say to each of them: Do you know what you are? You are a marvel. You are unique. In all the years that have passed, there has never been another child like you. Your legs, your arms, your clever fingers, the way you move. You may become a Shakespeare, a Michelangelo, a Beethoven. You have the capacity for anything. Yes, you are a marvel. And when you grow up, can you then harm another who is, like you, a marvel? You must work, we must all work, to make the world worthy of its children.”

Picasso

2011-02-17T11:54:00.004+08:00

Rusty John Lemon Snare

Drawings and words from an alternate universe

lemongrass clouds: My Star, Him

2011-02-02T00:03:00.002+08:00

Scent is a symbolic of flourish and intangible happiness

How many words can you rearrange your name into?

Thonburi

Kanchanaburi

Ginje XI

You like fish?

I LOVE YOU

I'm not saying I love you

2011-01-12T22:52:00.006+08:00

I won't say I'll be true
There's a crimson bird flying
when I go down on you

Ballad of the Broken Seas

I think he used to like my mother.

Now she is married to the only man she has eyes for and they have children. So does he, but once.

What hard eggs.

Spellbound

2011-01-09T23:46:00.000+08:00

The night is darkening round me,
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me
And I cannot, cannot go.

The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow.
And the storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.

Clouds beyond clouds above me,
Wastes beyond wastes below;
But nothing dear can move me;
I will not, cannot go.

Emily Brontë

Now it seems to me some fine things have been laid upon your table

2011-01-06T22:36:00.006+08:00

But you only want the things

you can't get.

If reality is constructed in the mind and life is only as we perceive it, then if given a chance would you want to be put in a sleep forever where your mind can dream whatever it wants to, construct worlds, greece, spain, oceans, even outer space, beyond the milky way, even back in time, kampongs and medieval castles; could you agree and accept that as reality, knowing flesh-and-blood life could never give you that? Could the lover from the dream become REAL like the blood and bones lover standing before you who is, equally, a perception?

What stops ye?

2011-01-06T22:17:00.010+08:00

Waking up everyday without reporting to someone, not spending the day in an air-conditioned room, using the day thinking and making things, but most of all

the world of adventures, places, rides, strangers, corners, oceans, fields.

I suppose I'm stubborn and seem mad, but I only feel sane thinking this way.

What does it mean to Make a Living?

I suppose, ironically, one has to work for freedom, towards being more free.

She comes down from Yellow Mountain
On a dark, flat land she rides
On a pony she named Wildfire
With a whirlwind by her side
On a cold Nebraska night

She ran calling Wildfire

ode to no one

2011-01-05T23:00:00.004+08:00

my cartwheels are never straight
for the dust inside my bones
pollute my young boy's frame
make my rosy little cheeks
the rouge of an old grand gran;
happy laugh lines are wrinkles
lying against plump pillows
on moonlit nights with crickets
outside the cracking wood windows
lying with soft feet crossed
can't sleep or weep
dreaming of cartwheels
and circus crowds
the marvellous blue-yellow tent
sticky slippery lollies
and steaming caramel corn.
i do cartwheels for you, my sweet
handstands tumbles somersaults
just to get to your dark hole
my love is a cartwheel
strong and free and flying hair
green grass to cirrus skies
to lie with you in a caravan
how grand we'd be
for no one to see
just me and my ruby ring
you and your hohner rust
forever young
forever old.

Do you think to kill me?

2011-01-04T22:55:00.014+08:00

There's no flesh and blood within this cloak to kill. There is only an idea. Ideas are bulletproof.

-V for Vendetta

*

A new year, and I've never felt more different. I don't know what it is. Wake up every weekday to do something that does not make me happy, wait for the next fulltime job with hope but a large dose of cynicism, brewing plans in the cauldron of my mind, butterflies in my stomach from possibilities, clinging onto old but always fresh fantasies of greece, spain, japan, and magic, more than ever, understanding more about the world and the un-world and myself and what I am to become, thinking of all my plans, plans, plans of which some may never bubble and some will. And the first meal of the year was The Elvis. It's going to be a good year.

*

I haven't slept well in three weeks, and am hardly allowed access to dreamland. Listening to MR. CHILDREN's 深海 restores some hope in men. One hardly meets them but I do everyday. The fruit uncle downstairs who has no favourite fruit.

Dive into the big blue sea!

Why is it so hard to find a sea around here to dive into?

Why don't we have a deep dark wood?

And John, because I can't ask my Mummy or Papa, why can't we lie down somewhere at night and look at the stars?

Lastly, what is the meaning of breasts and pubic hair?

honey pie, you are driving me frantic

2010-12-11T22:19:00.012+08:00

sail across the Atlantic

to where you belong

' ' ' blood oranges ' ' '

' ' ' self-invented 成语 from a fruit uncle, 42 years at the job ' ' '

' ' ' dear papa, i'm on a train ' ' '

' ' ' white capsicums- witches' favourite fruit ' ' '

' ' ' breakfast ' ' '

' ' ' i said i wouldn't buy leather, but for my bunions i did. ' ' '

' ' ' grandmother's worst horror: trusty 5-year old mary-janes, from forest treks to wedding dinners ' ' '

' ' ' the trees in ang mo kio are crying ' ' '

peppermint teardrops

2010-12-11T18:11:00.011+08:00

On researching for my job interviews I found Ecole Philippe Gaulier-

“As an actor and a director, I’ve gained so much through learning from him. Philippe is a true master not only because he is capable of seeing the hidden beauty of actors but also his great ability to liberate actors to present these beauties and shine uniquely on stage.” Ecole Philippe Gaulier graduate, Mr Alvin Chiam

* * * * * * * * * * *

Bouffon, an artform which he holds as a sort of inverted Clown, where a balance is struck between grotesqueness and charm.

During these performances, the bouffon's goal was to get away with insulting or disgusting the beautiful people as much as possible. Typically, the bouffon would target their attack on the leaders within the mainstream of society, such as the government or the Roman Catholic Church.

The ideal performance for a bouffon would be one where the audience is wildly entertained, and then go home, realize their lives are meaningless, and commit suicide. This of course is a theoretical ideal instead of an anticipated outcome.

Why is it so easy to enrol?

Why not? Everything is so complicated in France.

Why don’t you hold auditions?

Because the role of the teacher is to change the person, not to judge them.

sour raindrops

2010-12-05T13:30:00.022+08:00

On the bus on the way to work, passing Ang Mo Kio at 8 plus a.m. when golden sunshine is at its most glorious beauty, moving scenes play out as if it is a mini set I watch from the bus window. A long haired dark skinned man smokes on a little hill facing Caltex, his cigarette smoke illuminated against the golden rays. After Caltex, two Chinese men sit on pavement; one looks ahead with his tattered bag in his lap, one opens the day's papers. Moving on at regular speed, a maid pushes a baby on a little pink toy car. Behind is a scene of tall nice HDB flats. Should I think it's perverse or lovely?

At ALB we play with real memories, real people, real feelings. I am reminded of how the real reaches out from all the unreal we seem to be creating, when my father declines to attend the performance. Poor Engineer Mr. Ng is making me feel very emotional these days without realising it himself. Though eldest precious daughter Ng is also always giving dear Papa a lot of grief.

Looking back at looking back

I'm looking back a lot these days. Can't help it. Is this what they call the transition? If I go anywhere I only want it to be a place where I know how to make my dreams come true. Everything is then and now and how I thought life was ___ but it was ___. It's not such a tragedy because it's still wobbly jelly and not a dark hole but it still is a tragedy because now I know that all adults are people who believed in magic and spoke to themselves and played pretend; everyone had that in them, it's just varying degrees of letting go. When I listen to Lovely Rita it's the 17-year-old me in Sgt. Pepper mode, fancy-free at the garden tables. When I listen to Love Minus Zero/No Limit, it's old hot weekday afternoons that no longer are, it's all feelings I can't describe. Maybe that's why synaesthetics are so blessed. THE ONLY MAGIC POWER LEFT? The sages of today, they see things we don't, where are they?

Black-Beetle Bearded Man and Lovely Pirate Olive Oyl

It was the most beautiful dance I ever saw before my eyes.

Today at swing dance, my nervous friend was getting his bearings and consulting his manual of possible moves so I stood there waiting.

Black-Beetle Bearded Man had come from nowhere, an unfamiliar face (but so was I; maybe he is famous to all, unbeknown to me), a tall strong lanky body with a bearded face that somehow had a moustache that curled royally, and twinkling eyes. And she, the founder of the school, in her fifties I reckon, was in her pirate dress- half of it red striped with a qipao collar, the other half deep sea blue. And her red converse shoes as usual. They danced like pure magic. Hopping and swinging and tapping and polkadotting and his legs were like two jumpy grasshoppers and her wrinkles matched her clothes. It was like having googly glowing jelly move through your blood, watching them.

An old pot-bellied caucasian man in a purple shirt and high socks and sport shoes came too- another new face. He spent 15 minutes giving advice to a girl on how to dance, then rested on a chair. Another new face sat quietly on the floor with his backpack and legs wide open, observing everyone seriously. I left early to do office work due tonight and did not get to dance clumsily with any of them.

2010-11-21T21:02:00.003+08:00

Pi in the sky, and a broken heart.

from the cloud appreciation society site

Aren't they beautiful?

I hear crickets in my room. They're asking me to close my eyes, and be calm.

No Worries lemongrass tea

2010-11-16T16:07:00.006+08:00

Working hours, but my mind is drifting and I fail to take this seriously. What did people use to do at work when there was no computer to give them access to an entire universe while being physically around their colleagues, around printers, files, the boss? Why, they wrote on paper, with pens! Or clacked away on typewriters! And pushed their cateye glasses up if the un-air-conditioned room was making them sweat.

A photo of death-eaters is on my desktop ready for tomorrow. (23 hours to Harry Potter!!!!!!!! -gnaws madly at handkerchief-)

I went to craigslist to see what it's about, and found-

If you like pinacoladas - m4w - 45 (Singapore)

In search of a lonely married woman longing for spice and adventure.

I am a Singapore male chinese, 45, married and lonely.

Completely discreet and no commitments expected. Just warmth and friendship as and when you are available.

Write to discuss what we can do together in or out of Singapore.

Write to me and escape.

and

Bus 100 - m4w - 28 (Singapore)

I want to talk to you but I don't have the courage yet. I always see you at bus stop 62139. We always ride the same Bus 100, we alight at the same bus stop. It's just that we go on opposite direction. You never failed to mesmirized my day. I hope we can talk.

Rhyming Ode To Swing

2010-11-15T00:14:00.003+08:00

i wish i could

oh yes i would

swing everyday

i'd be so gay

in a polkadot skirt

that would happily flirt

with the bowtie of

my charming partner.

And stripey lollipop socks!

(matching clothes are bollocks)

They'd put on some swing

my heart and synapses ring

we would do eight-count:

one two

three and four

five six

seven and eight

sweetheart

catapult

suzie-q

crazy legs

the trouble starts at six

count, i look at our feet

it's like our hearts don't meet

my mary-janes are

half a beat behind

i hope he doesn't mind

i just started learning

my heart is burning

can't square-off right yet

my kick-pumps aren't set

and mama said you must wear a bra

when dancing with men.

i like the orange dim

looking at her and him

twenties charleston flaps

jockey hip-to-hip gaps

grammophone dreams

floral armchair beams

papa said dance-floor love is a deception

a rosy musk-perception

but 2010 doesn't quite matter

-is he the mad hatter?-

on a rainy ol' swing sunday

while waiting for the next song to start.

2010-11-14T09:57:00.003+08:00

If ya ever get lonely, just go to the record store and visit your friends.

penny lane, Almost Famous

You know that other girls have never been my style

2010-11-07T22:21:00.005+08:00

Suzie-Q

Catapult

Sweetheart

Crazy legs

Falling-off-a-log

Around-the-world

The Swim

And the bright, all-wonderful Charleston!

pineapple calluses

2010-11-06T11:54:00.006+08:00

It was the last time I would see him in my life. Going to India meant that. He was my grandfather's elder brother, fourth in line to kong kong's fifth and last. Actually he was the only one remaining of those five, five whom I would like to investigate someday because I see them as some sort of legend in my head, the five brothers, one of whom I've heard was deathly handsome like my grandfather and whose motorcycle-and-mint looks live on in his eldest son, who tries too hard to be charming. The fourth brother would not be thought of as a legend though, the way people imagine legends, because he was soft, and quiet, and kind and simple. I saw him at least once a year, every year of my life, at Chinese New Year (we always had homemade cookies by his daughter-in-law, the kind that is a swirl with a pink dot on top, and yeo's chrysanthemum tea), in his small, neat hdb home that seemed a different world from his younger brother's green marble floors and red carpets. He had a big belly always nestled behind the uncle white cotton singlet. He had calm, sad little eyes, did not want much or need much. He was my father's favourite uncle, and my father once got them a big tv because they couldn't quite splurge on it, and it would make his uncle's days happier at home. My father never told anyone else about it. Sometimes he would come and visit (not at Chinese New Year), sitting around unassumedly, with his oldest nephew (another remarkable man of cigarettes and rough lines) who is incidentally my grandmother's age, and we would all have dinner together. At my grandfather's funeral, my father bought the famous yong tau foo from outside and he slurped up the mucusy gravy before my eyes. This was when the house was still old, and we sat at the sticky outdoor kitchen table, surrounded by fried vegetables in thick translucent gravy and surrounded by the empty smell of funeral incense. The last visit to him was something I'd suggested because I knew it would be the last time. He had some stomach problems or cancer, I don't know anymore, and had a few months left. One Sunday afternoon we trudged there after lunch. When I entered his room, he lay on the bed, emaciated, looking at the ceiling. His big belly was almost no more, his legs were skinny bones and his dark construction skin was yellowish. There was a tube from his nose. The bed was very neat, the sheets smooth, and cotton blankets that had little regular holes in them (my brother had a pink one from childhood that smelt very nice). The room was dark, only light from a window. It was old and dusty but orderly. I started tearing while everyone stood around not knowing what to do. He seemed a bit happy to see us. After they all said something they went out to the living room to sit awkwardly, while my grandmother and I remained. My grandmother asked if he'd eaten and spoke to him very normally. I wondered how she did that. I wondered how he felt lying there everyday, death coming, and if my grandfather came to talk to him. After a while my grandmother went out and I was left alone and he asked me to sit down so I did. I held his hand for my own sake and started crying and he said hoarsely, like he feared the end, 'ah liap, ask her to stop crying or I will cry too....' but my grandmother was outside and couldn't hear him.

Now I'm back it's odd that he is in an urn in the columbarium and his old flesh is no more. Like a mould that melted into space, disintegrating into tiny little sparkly parts, like a scene from a low-effects space movie. It's a weird thought to get around. I'm glad I wasn't around for his funeral; I would have cried embarrassingly too much and maybe more than his own grandchildren. Everyone dies out and Chinese New Year will never be the same again. Sugus and Van Houten are from the swollen heady past, and now the first thing on Chinese New Year morning are the bright yellow chrysanthemums at my grandfather's grave, twin-decorating the photo my grandmother doesn't like (because of the expression of the mouth) but which I think embodies him perfectly.

floating away on a cloud

2010-11-05T21:10:00.008+08:00

"So...have you been dating any boys recently?"

"Nope."

"Do you have a boyfriend?"

"Nope."

"You must get a boyfriend!!!"

"Give me some advice lah."

"Hmmmm. First you must get a makeover, like put makeup, cover all your pimples...Then must be like, like, very funny, very smart."

"Okay."

"If you don't have long hair it's okay, because in the shows right, short hair also can. Also got boys like. Just that the most important thing is you must be like very funny, very fun."

"What shows?"
"Like those drama lah."

"But those stupid korean dramas are just silly shows."

"Yah I know, but you can also learn from them."

kong kong kong, kong kong kong kong, kong kong gong gong

2010-11-04T18:59:00.005+08:00

If you say the above with hokkien intonation, it means-

"grandfather said, container hit grandfather, grandfather blur-blur/concussion/silly-silly"

It's 7pm- half an hour to end-of-work but my brain is frozen from replying trickling mucus-poop-trails of work emails in friendly tones, researching for shows and dealing with lists. My work pal, who shaved off his mohawk this morning due to an accidental slight of the hand, has gone off for Deepavali. But not before we huddled together when everyone else was out of the room, used the office's navy-blue-and-lime-green brother sticker machine that I've been addicted to and secretly using far too much of, and made french phrase stickers for the girl he is in love with right now. Then he went off to see her, happily. I need to strategically put the sticker machine not on my table or it will seem like I use it all the time, which I want to, hug it and make endless stickers- Coeur qui soupire n'a pas ce qu'il desire. The trees beckon us tomorrow and I simply can't wait. No trees that say wisha-wisha-wisha! but I think they say ho-ho-hum-hum-bloom-bloom-bloom.

To be a hip cat, you gotta practise- plenty.

2010-10-31T23:24:00.002+08:00

swing it, spiffy cat!

bob, i've missed you

2010-10-30T09:11:00.004+08:00

your breath is sweet your eyes are like two jewels in the sky

Cardamom flavoured floss! It's not the thin, cutting translucent sort but made of soft but tough thin cotton and it's super shiok. Cardamom explodes like stars in my mouth so everytime I floss I am reminded of India, the possibilities of being there and the impossibilities of being here. I'm exaggerating but add a semi- in front of possibilities and impossibilities. They're building a kampong here. (http://www.kampungtemasek.org/)

*

Email from Gavin Pretor-Pinney, Founder--

Dear Mary-Jane Leo Salty Thunder Bindi Galaxy-Ladybird Smithereens (Member No. 22588),

I'm sending this quick email out to members of the Cloud Appreciation Society based in Singapore to tell you about a new 'cloudspotting area' that will be opening there soon, and to ask if you might be interested in speaking to The Straits Times about why you like clouds.

.....

The society has just agreed that the new observation deck on the 56th floor above the ION Orchard shopping centre, Orchard Road, which is going to open to the public in January 2011, should be recognized as a Cloud Appreciation Society 'Official Cloudspotting Area'. This is because it is going to be a great location from which to enjoy the cloudscapes over Singapore. The observation deck will be called ION Sky and will include a Cloud Appreciation Society diagram illustrating the 10 main cloud types, to help viewers identify the beautiful skies that they are looking out at.

ION Sky will, in fact, be the second official C.A.S. clouspotting area in the world.

*

This is bewildering. I don't blame them, but if they had done more research by living in Singapore for a bit, those innocent dreamy cloud-lovers may realise that ION is a symbol of the materialistic sickness that kills good things and via the infinite links of the world endangers the loving of clouds. Luce you said you understand, maybe I'm trying not to because it's HALLOWEEN.

I get so vehement I scare myself. Today it can be blamed on the chunks of blood falling out of me, but when it's gone there's nothing but to live outside the descending fog with a bunion aid splint. I'm going to have to get used to the frustration and bewilderment in my father's eyes everytime he looks at me.

*

Pet Sounds

2010-10-21T17:33:00.005+08:00

Every night now I say this: 'The night was quiet and nature was resting and I was at peace.' And then I can sleep. I made it up myself. Isn't that great? Saying it now my eyes feel a little tired.

Big Brian isn't scared of anybody and Little Brian is scared of everybody.

-Brian Wilson

(http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/aug/24/popandrock)

Synesthesia- possibly the only scientifically chronicled magical power of today

a sensation produced in one modality when a stimulus is applied toanother modality, as when the hearing of a certain sound inducesthe visualization of a certain color.

In one common form of synesthesia, known as grapheme → color synesthesia or color-graphemic synesthesia, letters or numbers are perceived as inherently colored, while in ordinal linguistic personification, numbers, days of the week and months of the year evoke personalities.

Over 60 types of synesthesia have been reported by people, but only a fraction have been evaluated by scientific research.

Synesthesia runs strongly in families, but the precise mode of inheritance has yet to be ascertained.

Synesthetes often report that they were unaware their experiences were unusual until they realized other people did not have them, while others report feeling as if they had been keeping a secret their entire lives, as has been documented in interviews with synesthetes on how they discovered synesthesia in their childhood.

To the contrary, most report it as a gift—an additional "hidden" sense.

As a child, Pat Duffy told her Dad, "I realized that to make an R all I had to do was first write a P and draw a line down from its loop. And I was so surprised that I could turn a yellow letter into an orange letter just by adding a line."

already october,vermillion hearts near the 169 busstop

2010-10-17T12:07:00.008+08:00

Final Performance
by Cynthia Cruz

I crawl along the wet floor
Of my mother's childhood,

A serpent, or a long-buried secret,
In my mother's bisque
Chiffon gown with small stars

Stitched in silver, a crown
Of tinsel pinned into the dark
Blonde knots and dreads of my hair.

I follow a sequin thread of dead
Things, stop when the moon clocks out,
Polish my long nails in the sun.

I'm drugged again having given up on lovely bitter powder potions (which i've concluded are better for treating long term illnesses slowly) but not having the heart to tell my white-bearded neighbour traditional chinese medicine doctor (who just called) that i switched to pills though i rejected the antibiotics from my adorably stern teletubby family doctor and i feel like Chief trying to beat the fog, beat the combine, run out into the salty night like the dog, the more i research on comic history jumping from one tab to another luce now i know how it feels but i never got to your level of tab madness google chrome is very good doesn't hang like internet explorer and you can STAR your favourites i chose the theme with mushrooms and elves in a woody forest and why are there so few female comic artists maybe i could meet lily lau and lat and kenfoo who hates facebook so much been rerereading Boy they went ISLAND HOPPING with their fearless mother during all their norway summer holidays oh roald you and quentin are my heros and quentin apparently has never married! i have been sleeping alone more than i ever did my entire life as grandmother is accompanying cousin in his house i found out that opening the windows at night lets you really feel the night and its orange darkness and the sounds of crickets in the forest nearby and feel the soft weight of the black tar outside and know of the possibilities of things while aircon suffocates you inside i can't breathe anymore aircon or the green phelgm tickles and my little baby cut her hair short yesterday as she bounded down the stairs she had a thick shiny chin length bob with a straight fringe (just like i had when i was my auntie's flower girl many years ago and they took that awful pouty photo in the living room) and her crazy violet plastic glasses and she was wearing her old mustard-and-navyblue spaghetti strap from giordano kids, a hand-me-down and her butterfly-thick eyelashes, a hand-me-down too that i have some of, and her silver-capped bad tooth, and it was like magic exploded before my drowsy brain but with my last bit of coherence let me describe what this cough-syrup feeling is like, like when the titanic hit a crazy huge iceberg in nowhere and you are falling, tumbling, nodding off to a place where it doesn't matter...

Un Chien Andalou

2010-10-12T23:02:00.005+08:00

Because a razor cuts across a frame of film,

I wince, squinting my eye,

and because my day needs assembly

to make sense of the scenes anyway,

making a story from some pieces of truth, I go

outside to gather those pieces.

Thousands of moments spooling out

frames of mistakes in my day.

As if anyone's to blame,

as if anyone could interpret the colliding

images, again and again, dragging

my imagination behind me,

I begin assembling.

I don't know anything, so I seek

directions, following the path

of ants from your palm, out

the apartment door to

a beach. Is this where I'm

supposed to ask if my hands on you

bend some light around shade? Maybe

I'm not ready for the answer. They say

art imitates what we can sculpt or write

or just see when we turn ourselves

inside out. I can't turn my eye away

from the sight of failure. The rain pelts rooftops.

I listen to the song, thinking

when the sun comes back,

beating down the door

in my head, I'll salvage whatever sits

still long enough for me to render,

before anyone knows what really happened.

A. Van Jordan

just like little girls and boys

2010-10-09T10:31:00.004+08:00

Happy Birthday.

"Reality leaves a lot up to the imagination."

les trois mousquetaires: sin, cos, tan

2010-10-06T15:17:00.009+08:00

2xy + 3z = 9

I miss the minute mint-green squares of graph paper, equations that mean nothing, jabbing the calculator with vigour, combining fat and thin strands of eraser dust into grime balls, the sound of a pencil drawing a long line, the dizzying blank cosmic world of (a + b)², numbers, letters, pi the eternal amount, models please, three significant figures and if Ahmad took 3 hours from point A to B at 70km/h, how long did Devi take at 54 km/h?

(Not the end, obviously! The uncontrollable sentimentality of a cancerian knows no bounds!)

I miss the pious share-the-love chime of the school bell, ice milo, the deep right-hand-side pocket of the pinafore to hide ham-and-cheese sandwiches from prefects, the warm chewey sandwich that mists the plastic and warms the thigh, the crazy feeling of Romeo and Juliet in a classroom, the long classic denim skirt of Mrs Sushilla, 听写, blanco mounds on hard tables, highlighted fingernails, crawling spidery ink on soft skin, the scrawl of the gray classroom chair if you scratch it, the long indent at the head of your square table, chalkboards and the floaty migration of fairy chalkdust clusters before they were arrested too, physics, chemistry, biology (xylem and phloem), trigonometry, the romance of a dark orange classroom, the sleepy soft whirring of the ceiling fan after recess, awkward bodies at PE, the dank saliva smell of the band room, bubbling test tubes of crimson and forest-blue, hijinks, laughing till we keeled everyday, the warmth of the OHP, the possibility of your entire, awaiting life.

I think OHPs have been replaced with visualizers.

Sukiyaki tears crash on...pubescent eyelashes!

x= [-b±√(b^2-4ac)] / 2a

leave me to the abyss

2010-10-04T15:27:00.002+08:00

half of what i say is meaningless, but i say it just to reach you

2010-10-04T15:08:00.007+08:00

I march into school at 7.20 as the speakers blare a warbly, sorrowful, heavenly instrumental version of Somewhere Over The Rainbow. People, including me, smile with their mouths but seldom their eyes. Off-white, gray and emerald.

Last week:

"Mervin!"

"HO YEAH." (intonation: HO4 YEAH3)

"Can you read the cloze passage?"

"HO YEAH HO YEAH"

"Ok, go"

"....SDU....Sexual Development Unit....sex parties..."

(girl raises hand during exams)

(me bringing her extra paper)

"can you ask gregory to stop shaking his leg? it's very distracting..."

Invigilation puts one in a daze. Up, down, up, down, stand, sit, lean, watch. Nervous students glancing at the clock. Someone has two correction tapes. Someone else has 6 similar pencils (maroon with gold words), and 4 similar black pens. I've found my invigilation calling. It's hard to daydream and be present, so I've taken to peeking at handwritings as I walk past the tables. How does she do her 'a's, why are his letters so long and skinny, nice prawny words.

After the first day of exams (english compo) I walked to the school gate to leave. In front of me were a group of boiz from my sec one english class. (I call them the kopitiam gang because during class they talk non-stop like chatty uncles of different shapes, sizes and lengths) Finally one of them noticed me as they passed the gate, started murmuring/exclaiming, "Miss Ng, Miss Ng" and the rest followed suit and suddenly, all but one of them were screaming like little girls and running away. The only one who stayed, the coolest of the gang, with a semi-mohawk on his tiny, pre-pubescent head, came up to me and coolly but sincerely said, "Hi Cher" and started discussing the compo topics. In a year he'll be taller and will melt the hearts of girls. For now, I'm glad the rest behaved like such silly poo-poos.

Presenting...

2010-10-03T11:47:00.005+08:00

Fishie the Jailfish!

and...

Oliver Paul the Octopus!

mostly created and glued together themselves

Me: "Yay, they can be friends!"

Them: "NO."

they forgot to meet Sharkie!

"Cher, chill."

2010-09-27T16:33:00.013+08:00

1. (having returned from the toilet where I chased him to because he had a stomachache after recess and just sat there groaning) "Cher! I go toilet ah, then pooooot, then no more already. Nothing come out. Inside got wind only..."
"Why are you telling me this?!"
"Cher can I eat lollipop? Please?"

2. "Cher you know what's fetish?"
"Yes."
"You got fetish?"
"I'm not about to tell you what it is."
"OH means you got lah!"
"Everyone has fetishes."

3. "Cher, so you going to join SDU lah?"

4. "Wah Cher who taught you to write cursive?"
"No one! Do people not write cursive anymore?"
"Yah. But I write cursive."
"I like cursive."
"Yeah...!" (with cool rocker hand signs)

He-who-everyone-fears. "I want everyone to take out a book and be doing something meaningful in the next minute! Do you know how many of you can be promoted from Normal Technical to Normal Academic at the end of the year?! Do you know you need an average of 70 marks for your CA? By the looks of it, none of you will make it."

(I nearly burst out laughing, the boys were making faces behind his back)

Oliver James, lost in the rain...

I want to surprise myself

2010-09-21T22:34:00.008+08:00

If a person feels that he hasn't really lived, but this person has incredible dreams every night that take him to impossible places, and if life is what we perceive of it, and memory is what we wish to feel and remember, then has this person lived?

I marked about thirty comprehension passages today and felt so sick calculating the marks (8/45, 33/65...), scrawling them big and red, cross cross cross cross my heart that I dislike comprehension and sorry I would rather let you read your love letter with orange highlighter hearts the girl from the neighbouring class gave you. I felt like I let them down by caring about comprehension and what it stands for (part of a chain effect that will possibly eventually repress them and prevent them from realising how great they are as people), but then I thought about it and realised it was (mostly) Singapore that has let them down. Just like it lets all of us down (the razing of Green Meadow is enough to make me throw myself at a wall AND MY FAMILY HEIRLOOM ROSEWOOD DINING TABLE SET WITH OPAL FLOWERS SPRINKLED-SET-IN HOW DID I LET THAT HAPPEN) but we may eventually stay here forever because we believe in something though people like possibly your own brother that you love and grew up with drives and honks with hatred and anger, and wants to be rich, and thinks a perhaps certain way about those students and those prcs and you can't help the fact that you love him and grew up with him though the days of toasted-bread-with-peanut-butter-and-sugar-and-milo are nothing more than a saccharine memory that glows in a space of broken teeth and unscrubbed smelly tongue.

But I'm glad I did not try hard enough to get a job and am going to wake up early to go to school tomorrow.

Everyone here is mad!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My grandmother cannot stop asking if the lights are turned off at midnight and the new maid brought her up empty bottles and thermos of no-water because she forgot.

Pappy

2010-09-21T22:13:00.006+08:00

I let him pick me up late from Yio Chu Kang MRT
though he falls asleep during the 9:30 news.
I smell of spice! spice! spice!
(The thought of India is a lovely
exploding cardamom in his ulcer-prone mouth)
He thinks of lice! lies? lice!
And warns me not to burn incense.
"Very smelly leh," he wrinkles his nose,
back hunched in a sheer white pajama-shirt.
Oh, Pappy.

When I went away to India
it was like he threw a kite to the sky
where it roamed tentative but quite, rather free
breathing sky air and kissing wispy cirrus
floating on cirrocumulus and plummeting
through Big Bad Cumulonimbus Storm Cloud;
they don't usually form in his head.
When the kite came back via Arabic wind
he had to rein it in a little for fear
it would get stuck in a tree someday.
There are many in Singapore but only the
wild untamed ones are worth a Singapore Dollar.
Sometimes only trees in a Mexican orchard
streaked with golden rays, delicious mud,
a lightness you don't quite feel here
are pine fresh fun yes yes yes.

So, mister Papa

I will miss you terribly one happy day
I will be so sad I don't know how to breathe, and-
"I love you," mouthed Triton, Ariel's father,
as her red hair flapped in the lashing sea breeze.

'Cher's rubber band collection

2010-09-17T15:33:00.015+08:00

My pride and glory!

These days I wake when it's still dark, have breakfast with my school-going sister, and take the bus with NS boys towards yishun. Work clothes are kept conservative, personality is reined in somewhat. The pen I hold the most now is a red one; the tone I adopt a stern-friendly one in the face of hoards of hot-blooded adolescents not sure what to do with their restlessness and newfound lust, and girls unsure of the attention they are receiving from the rascals. I am called 'Cher a million times a day- one of the best nicknames ever.

FUN, FRUSTRATING TIMES.

The system has reduced the beauty of what language really means (the love of reading, of telling stories, of understanding each other through words) to commodified vocabulary lists to be memorised and applied in contrived manners, comprehension questions to be categorised and tables of letter-writing formats. This is what is focused on as exams draw near. Throw them with a Revision Package, why don't we? These contain proverbs like Still Waters Run Deep, when some don't even know that it's = it is. D'you think, if teachers somehow manage to show children, from a young age, that reading can be one of the most beautiful things -to escape into another world, to hear a tale, to feel things you can hardly feel in daily existence- then the love for english would become a most natural thing? A neighbourhood school student can love and appreciate harry potter as much as a top school student can, and if he can't do as well for the exam because he may not grasp grammar or sentence structures as well, his love for the language will probably mean he will be more patient and open to learning these. Thoughts?

"My childhood is was a happy one but when I was younger, my grandma used to chase me with the cane."

I wish I could join the boys in having rubber band wars!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (You've never seen such experts in making bullets, manipulating rubber bands around their fingers, shooting secretly)

Instead, I confiscate them for my infinite bangle.

CHER, HE SHOOT ME FIRST!!!!!!!!

P.S. Trying to relief-teach english in a school where hardly any students speak proper english has only increased my loyal love for the glory of Singlish. Maybe one day, there will be Singlish Lit and the first book will be one that can make Singaporeans feel like never before; it will replace the pro-pah British English used to describe Singaporean life thus far. Written in a stream-of-conciousness way, no heed will be paid to singular/plural words, proper use of past tense, or varying vocabulary whatsoever. It would be a thoroughly real feeling. Sample portion: Mummy ask me if I want to eat dinner then I say I want lah but I kind of shout. Then after that she get angry and say I always think her dinner not nice so she go toilet and cry then wah lao, I don't know how to feel so I just lock in the room and cry also.

hokkien mee and milo monday to sunday

2010-09-12T11:03:00.011+08:00

Old military band, upper peirce reservoir

Ivy's kingdom

Eau de Singapour

grandmotherly feet

marilyn with pride

my reading baby

Grandpa's shoes

2010-09-08T23:52:00.002+08:00

http://advancedstyle.blogspot.com/

She smelt of old roses and he of cigarettes and mint!

grey gray nimbostratus

2010-09-05T23:01:00.008+08:00

disappearing heures

the time was left in bomb-ay!

a few nights ago i dreamt that i had to go through a very dark, long passage with just a torch to guide me. i had to do this with esmonde. neither of us knew what the convoluted passage would lead to; it was something we knew had to be done, and we knew there would be terrifying things along the way. we set off; somewhere along the way, he turned into sunil and michelle.

people living in the last kampong in singapore pay $30 for their monthly rent.

there's going to be a rolls royce facility at the seletar air base estate.

Charleston! Charleston! Charleston with me!!!!!!!!!

Swing dresses and loopy hop steps may take over bamboo sticks and knives.

What was Enid's darkest story?

Bob dylan singing scratchily on the record player is the bestest sunday night.

When people of the past had to slowly aim the delicate record player needle on the glossy black surface of a record and stand there for a while listening to the crackly marvellous sounds of it starting and watching the black lovely delicious disc spin with such elegance, they were probably more calm at heart than they would be if they had a grey and white itunes screen organised in boxes and grids. the circle invites a hug, and a mug of chocolate.

'the empty-handed painter from your streets, is drawing crazy patterns on your sheets'

And The BFG exists; he eavesdropped on us that night, right outside my window.

White Cloud Potato Soup

2010-09-02T23:13:00.006+08:00

Does anyone remember this, and the possibilities?

Shoe-box building; snow-dome; collage; sock people; seed and pasta drawing; post office games. Magic pack of cards in little hands and big-as-the-sky imaginations.

These are a few of my favourite things / I'd like to teach the world to sing / Raindrops keep falling on my head / I think I love you / The young ones, darling we're the young ones

And the young ones shouldn't be afraid.

yes, i do believe in magic.

2010-08-24T22:37:00.006+08:00

The Bull

Cloud Castle

2010-08-23T16:33:00.007+08:00

From The Cloud Appreciation Society's site-
(http://cloudappreciationsociety.org/patti-miller-member-11465/)

Patti Miller, Member 11465, emailed us with the startling news that The Cloud Appreciation Society is not the first society to have been formed purely for the celebration and enjoyment of clouds. During the 1960s in Australia there existed an organisation, founded by Patti herself, called the Cloud Club.

Just like the C.A.S., the 1960s Cloud Club had a manifesto. This was simply “to observe the beauty of the clouds”. It also held weekly meetings in its club house, located in the central western region of New South Wales. According to Patti, this was a “sandy clearing in a wheat paddock, decorated with flowers, interesting stones and broken pieces of china”.

How come the Cloud Club had never come to our attention at The Cloud Appreciation Society? It had never become famous, explained Patti, for three reasons: the internet had yet to be invented as a means of bringing like-minded people together; there was a long drought at the time in that region of Australia making clouds somewhat of a rarity; Patti was 11 years old and the only other member was her little sister. At each meeting of the Cloud Club there was just one point on the agenda. The two of them would lie back, look up and discuss what they saw in the clouds.

Cloudspotting gorilla
http://cloudappreciationsociety.org/cloudspotting-gorilla/

Karni Niwas

2010-08-23T14:48:00.005+08:00

From Padma- I wrote this in my journal: our room is like a powder pink dungeon that booms every time we close the door. Guess Where??

The enchanting room of window nook, tiny princess dresser hung on the wall, long stony shelves, the booming door, the electrified lizard by the toilet window; i present the humble cavern that protected from the outside world of cheats and bad men in the pink city.

Kya?

2010-08-23T14:37:00.006+08:00

When I brought my grandmother to buy a new radio at the electrics shop nearby:

- Uncle, no need plastic bag. Save plastic bag.
- Tsk, take lah
- No lah no need no need. Save the earth.
- (gesturing at my grandmother) This kind of auntie like plastic bag, can use at home, in the kitchen!
- Save the earth!
- They don't care about saving the earth one
- Aiyah!
- What age already. How many years left on earth only.

My grandmother insists that she tries to save electricity for our horrendous bill (she sometimes wakes up at 2am -not exaggerating- to hobble around with shrek face checking if all the lights are switched off), and also that without the use of plastic bags, you simply cannot keep vegetables and meat properly in the fridge! Then in the kampong days how? Aiyah, we buy groceries everyday! My mother-in-law buys it everyday from the market! One day $2, $3! Buy towgay, buy vegetables, buy fish!

Wah, super fresh.

The Cloud Appreciation Society

2010-08-22T12:26:00.006+08:00

Proud member

Cirrostratus fibratus
http://cloudappreciationsociety.org/collecting/shannon-d-moore/

Marry Me
http://cloudappreciationsociety.org/category/member-highlights/

A Clear Midnight

2010-08-21T11:55:00.006+08:00

This is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless,
Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done,
Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou lovest best,

Night, sleep, death and the stars.

Walt Whitman

where my dreams wait for me, where that river always flows...?

2010-08-09T13:08:00.013+08:00

National Day Weekend

(( * * * * *

my favourite Singapore videos

And for anyone who remembers watching this glorious piece of old television in primary school!!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0SCPud1eTY&feature=related

pmaybe the past, more than the future, keeps us here.

If Not For You / Sab Kuch Milega

2010-08-05T11:01:00.005+08:00

***

Having gotten tuned to the world of masala chai, clattering honks, gold-trimmed petite-square-sprinkled love-red saris, trains going nowhere, flower earrings, the times of india, pumpkin-orange turbans, twinkling eyes, curly moustaches, lizardy rooms, cold water, rickety buses, grime, rupee laundry, bumblebee-yellow-and-black taxis, dreams, jeera rice, adventure, danger and not missing home, it is now unspeakably odd to start life anew with mrts, clean hawker center seats, my palace-home, the instancy of email, bank accounts, the straits times. Maybe I was in a dream as I thought I'd be, but it felt more real than anything. And isn't real just in the mind? What's real is this: "After spending one million dollars on research, we have found that the number one cause of divorce is marriage" and my very real double-chin-a-shakin' grandmother griping about the neatness of my room with very furrowed tattooed brow, so off I scoot.

Judy Blue Eyes

2010-08-04T10:21:00.001+08:00

Food For Love, the company hired to provide food at Woodstock in 1969, made the following estimates for food needed to feed 50,000 people a day for a three-day festival. Figures include: 30,000 loaves of bread, 10,000 packs of marshmallows, 700 kilos of peanut butter, 75,000 litres of milk and over 200,000 kilos of ice.

*

37. While most acts revelled in having appeared there, sitar player Ravi Shankar found it a 'terrifying experience' and said the crowd in the mud reminded him of the water buffaloes at home in India.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1204849/Forty-far-facts-knew-Woodstock.html

HE WAS A PUNK, SHE DID BALLET, WHAT MORE CAN I SAY

2010-08-02T11:48:00.005+08:00

the Ellygator in my dreams. she wants to be an actress but her father says they have expiry dates so she wants to be a doctor and will have to 'work super super super super hard'.

"Yes, I will take care of the filing today. And no, that can't come off."

Life Signs from Panjim

Julie and Marion / Michelle et Moi

2010-07-26T22:15:00.008+08:00

"...do you think you could like me?"

P.S. Motley crew spotted at Thomson Plaza's NTUC on a monday afternoon. Alas they were more lovably eccentric in real life.

ode to padma

2010-07-19T10:43:00.015+08:00

dear padma,

my father said this looks fun.
p

you mad chihuahua

intoxicated with air-con avec silly pierre

hiding from the rain in panjim

making friends on the bus (not sure why you showed her the postcard with the seas of naked holy men)

I know you really got a kick out of this one...

and if you do expire at 55 i will visit you with lilies

in autumn

thanks for the ride (and all the wonderful meals we shared)

goodnight.

Ginger and Lemongrass, Bindi

(O the things you make me do)

a friend

2010-07-19T10:11:00.008+08:00

As Lucy said so too, coming back to your room from somewhere else after a long time is like meeting an old friend anew. (Firstly, we have the luxury of having a 'My Room' and a world of our own.) You open the door, take a deep breath of the musty air, a flitting glance around at all the things that were too familiar before you left, that are now magic little new-old parts of the world, the bits of you that you left behind when you went to see other places and people, your lungs send a signal to your brain, I'm here now....

"Hello."

And it seems, or maybe just in that moment alone, like all that travelling, somehow, was to get back here, as if you'd never left, to dream of the next time you'd travel again.

thar

2010-07-18T22:23:00.010+08:00

What I imagine about their lives: moustache oil, camel rearing tricks, rupees, dhal, chapatis, old mattresses, wives, sun, sand, shrub, dunes, folk songs, village friends, tobacco

And now, strangely or not, their photos are on the internet, a medium they may not have seen or understand.

Umed always said 'Velcome, Velcome' in a singsong way after we said thank yous for the meals they made from scratch. And Babu would say in jest, in response to thank you, 'Yes, thank you sir, thank you madam, thank you, thank you.' I tried watching them cook but they seemed to want to be alone, speaking in their dialect. Maybe they were catching up with one another; we were the first customers of the season. And we slept by ourselves on one part of the sand dunes while they slept somewhere near; we spoke about country-boys/city-boys and heard them talk very late into the night. I wonder what they were talking about for hours. And we were all under a big salty blanket of stars. They were 27 and 29 but looked 40, with weathered dark faces, deep rugged lines (the kind that run in some of the older men on my paternal side. it is most enchanting, like rough leather), old twinkling eyes, flower earrings, curly moustaches.

So happy and sorrowful.

our burnt loyal medals

2010-07-09T17:09:00.008+08:00

notes:
-the toering that desiree took about 5 cities to find
-her drapey latticed anklet from an aggressive gypsy
-the henna we got on our feet for the wedding
-indian summer sandals from lucy, that survived after cobbling

a-cha!

2010-07-09T16:31:00.009+08:00

We had a kettle
we let it leak
Our not repairing
made it worse
We haven't had
any tea in a week
The bottom is out
of the Universe

-Rudyard Kipling

let the wild rumpus start

2010-05-25T12:58:00.005+08:00

I mended my favourite red pants this morning. With instructions from the alteration lady who decided to give me advice because $8 per hole is too expensive. If I can mend my seemingly hopeless pants (hopeless according to gran who cannot even consider the thought that these pants are mendable- and I shall wear them to the airport tonight, with the bum above, and aggravate her, heehee!) I can do anything. Now it shall come to India, trusty ol' pants.

me in my lane, goodbye springleaf

see you in july.

The treatment of human head lice is a process that has been debated and studied for centuries.

2010-05-24T11:17:00.004+08:00

Hunting lice by candlelight by Andries Both, ca 1630 (National Gallery, Budapest)

17th Century Boxwood Lice Comb

Combs

For a treatment with the louse comb alone, it is recommended to comb the hair for 3–10 minutes (depending the length and type of the hair) daily or every second day for 14 days. Wetting the hair with water and especially with water and shampoo or conditioner will facilitate the combing and the removal of lice, eggs and nits.

A special finetooth comb that can pick out lice is used. The space between the teeth of the comb should be no more than 0.3 millimetres (0.012 in). Plastic combs are effective for very short-term use, but the spacing between the teeth will quickly spread out after repeated usage. Metal combs, being less flexible, are more effective for multiple uses.

Shaving the head

Shaving the head or cutting the hair extremely short can be used to control lice infestation. Short hair, baldness, or a shaven scalp are generally seen as a preventative measure against lice infestation. However, it is not recommended that children be suddenly shorn due to the psychological effects the child might experience.

It is not recommended that children's heads be shaved or even be given a short haircut for prevention or control of lice due to the psychological effects children might experience. Infestation with lice is not a disease and the medical symptoms are normally minimal. In any case, health providers and parents should try not to create emotional problems for children during examination and treatment.[27] Shaving of the area above and behind the ears and the upper part of the neck while leaving the crown of the head with hair is commonly used a prevention of lice among tribes in Africa, Asia and America (in America - Mohawk style).

you don't know if i can draw at all, or what records i am into

2010-05-20T22:06:00.004+08:00

i am in a little buzz from all the things i've been doing these busy days. my head is abuzz with spanish words and indian places, and the road outside my house yesterday was abuzz with dying bees that they poisoned again without warning anyone. just now i took my fifth injection on my left arm the warrior that is now tired. the resulting feeling from the fifth injection (taken after my dear ol' doctor paused because she said i took several different injections at different times and places and it may be bad for my body) into a bruised patch on my left arm was completely perverse- a sick, sore muscular feeling worse than pain, which gives me a wobbly feeling in the stomach and makes me think of the tight white muscular tendons of that frog we crucified and dissected in biology class in secondary 4- we shouldn't have. aye we even put our fingers through cow heart aortas and spliced open goat eyeballs.

i can't wait to leave everything and go to india, with all the dangers and adventures that await. i think it will be like a very real dream.

to a new life and forever adventures!

when you're alone and life is making you lonely

2010-05-09T11:03:00.003+08:00

(us; thoroughly wonderful midwife)

hugging and kissing in public i wonder if you call it romance

we held hands tightly in the dark. romance was watching our baby being born. the baby wailed! mister woodstock thought we were lovers (an idea that almost killed us as we are on almost opposing ends of the heterosexual - homosexual spectrum). we drowned in indian ink and almonds and a coffeeshop squawk and microwaved lunches and turgid bladders and resurfaced with our baby and its kaleidoscope bits. to the liking of people, for which we feel very heartened (hearten: to give courage or confidence to; cheer) and quite surprised. now diamond-sky is in marvellously grey manteuffelstrasse and i'm going to the colourful hot desert and hopefully our baby will travel to new lands soon.

don't look back, don't look back, that's the word

Santiago Accordion-Amigos Hearts Club Band

2010-05-09T10:23:00.004+08:00

DIEGO
Possibly a shortened form of SANTIAGO. In medieval records Diego was Latinized as Didacus, and it has been suggested that it in fact derives from Greek d?da?? (didache) "teaching".

SANTIAGO
Means "Saint James", derived from Spanish santo "saint" combined with Yago, an old Spanish form of JAMES, the patron saint of Spain. Cities in Chile and Spain bear this name.

JAMES
English form of the Late Latin name Iacomus which was derived from ?a??ß?? (Iakobos), the New Testament Greek form of the Hebrew name Ya'aqov (see JACOB). Related names: SEAMUS, JAMIE, JACK

SEAMUS
"one who supplants" or "substitute". In the United States, the name "Shamus" is sometimes used as a slang word for private detective.

JAMIE
a name derived as a pet form of James

JACK
a male given name, although in very rare cases it can be used as a female given name, and sometimes as a surname. The name Jakke was so common in England that it came to be used
for addressing any male, originally especially one considered a social inferior, and was extended to designate any male person, male animals, and even a variety of inanimate objects, such as
the device named jack for lifting heavy loads.

According to the United States Census of 1990, "Jack" is an uncommon American given name, the given name for 0.315% of the male population and 0.001% of the female population.

In English it is the diminutive form of the name JOHN,though it is also often given as a proper name in its own right.

JOHN
Because the name Jonathan is sometimes abbreviated as Jon, John is sometimes falsely considered to be a short form of Jonathan, especially in the United States. John is a variation of the Hebrew name Yô?annan, whereas Jonathan derives from the Hebrew ???????? Yôna?an, which means "Gift from the Lord" and thus is a longer version of NATHAN.

Also a shortened version of the latin form JOHANNES.

JANE
the English form of the Old French name Jehanne, which was an old feminine form of the male name JOHANNES.

JOAN
an Old French feminine form of Johannes (see JOHN). This was the usual English feminine form of John in the Middle Ages, but it was surpassed in popularity by Jane in the 17th century.

seasons in the sun

2010-05-06T23:32:00.012+08:00

I've always been fascinated by the life my parents had before I came along. How they met, their friends, in particular their life in NJC. I've never been of the hoorah-activities sort- it was just never a part of me, but for my parents this was what their junior college life was all about. And actually, it sounded glorious. It had a growing with the growing nation feeling. Some kind of innocence, golden old-new glow, fervence, joy, sincerity. My mother said that going to jc and making the decision to stop being shy changed her life; she joined council and met my father, who only asked her out for a date after A levels though she waited for him despite a fair amount of suitors. And my father was in at least council, soccer, malay dance, dragonboat, track and field, basketball. Since I can remember, their group of friends have been meeting every year at either christmas or chinese new year. I've gotten to know them and think of each them fondly over the years. Many of them married nj people too (slightly disturbing). I've always liked going for their gatherings, which are are a warm affirmative glow of friendship and that time. A few days ago, I went into our storeroom in the sweltering afternoon heat and dug out old albums. I found one I hadn't seen before. It had golden photos. That's the best way to describe these photos because they were (I think) taken at the period between the end of jc and the start of ns or university. That last burst of that hopeful, mad, carefree something. And it was amazing to see my father and his friends as...virile young men! From the photos they are evidently full of passion and energy and joy in living, and...I don't know what else to say. I just wanted to show them here.

papa is the one standing

papa is second from left. leftmost is the friend who used to organise christmas gatherings every christmas at his house, which had an old swing where the children would sit

this christmas tree leads me to the conclusion about when the photos were taken

Fabulous Four

papa is leftmost. i think the group met for badminton because uncle M (second from left) was leaving for france to study. uncle BH (third from left) is the one who organised years of christmas gatherings, a man who remembers birthdays, and uncle KS (right) is the mad joker of the group, no gathering can be dull with him. uncle M was one of papa's best friends (they came from humble beginnings- tanglin tech secondary school, and vowed to beat the acs boys in jc. at least, my father did) but completely unlike him in his decision to go to france.

Bjorn Beatle.

I gather this is sending uncle M off at the airport. Mummy is flanked by two beatles.

i love my rotten, ungrateful children

2010-04-24T09:06:00.010+08:00

The above words were on my brash family doctor's fridge magnet.

Yesterday was a historic day; I took my first injection in ten years.

Pickering Padma

my dream dining set which is being rightfully dusty in a sungei kadut rattan warehouse

Upper Thomson's Neverland

forty light years away

2010-04-23T01:26:00.002+08:00

If I'd been born in 1947 in another world, I would have watched stardust 50s in amazement and mary-janes. Adults dancing to Frank Sinatra, girls going mad over Elvis' pelvis, gleaming grammophones, nina simone. When the 60s hit, I would have been 13. The Beatles would have been a kaleidoscopic explosion in my pubescent life. I would have saved every penny to buy their records, discovered Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, cried for Simon and Garfunkel, admired Joni Mitchell and Joan Baez. I would have been 20 the year Sgt. Pepper was released, and 23 by the end of the decade. I'm not sure where I would have been. And if it was Singapore I was born in, I would have listened to my records from home in a kampong, tried to explain the english lyrics to my parents (if we shift back a couple of generations they may have spoken mainly hokkien and mandarin), cycled into town to buy records, and gone to sewing school, daydreaming with every
stitch. The songs of August 1965 would have been I've Just Seen A Face and Majulah Singapura. A camera would have been a piece of magic. In the Summer of Love, we may have had to leave our kampong for expressway-construction and move into queenstown, where we could go to Queenstown Cinema for late-night new movies, and a television to watch man's voyage to the moon.
p

What are we doing in 2010?

frequent flyer miles

2010-04-20T23:03:00.003+08:00

Watching an old movie is like visiting an old friend and discovering how you've changed. I remember so well how I felt about my favourite movies; the feelings are felt in embedded images and heart-squeezes that cannot be articulated. So when watching those movies again after sometime, you are watching not just the movie, but also yourself and re-feeling, as if an intimate observer, your intense feelings and associations to those movies. Do you feel that too? Is it strange? Punch-drunk love was, to me, dark frosty nights being the only one awake, red and blue, magic shifting landscapes, intrigue and strength. It is much the same.

making up for lost time

2010-04-11T23:04:00.003+08:00

¿dondé es tu chubasquero verde?

2010-04-10T23:34:00.006+08:00

Cuando tenia siete años, querré ser actriz, escritora o ilustradora. Pues, ¿no me he caedo demasiado lejos, no? Padma y mi iremos a Indio dentro de un mes. Quizas me encontraré mi primero profesor de japonesa allí. Dijo a la clase un día: ¨Siempre he querido ir a Indio a pie.¨ Irá a hacerlo eso verano, pero por fin, su amigo no pudo y pienso que Sensei no lo hizo. Despues, volví a Japon. Era un hombre maravillo que tenía sueños. Espero verlo otra vez. Me pregunto, ¿quien interesante vamos a conocer en Indio, y qué haremos padma y mi? Me siento que este viaje va a cambiar todo.

Almonds Anonymous

2010-03-29T09:44:00.008+08:00

'I'm a bumblebee!'

me/my brother

real false lennon

Mr Miller came home after travelling the world, plonked into his old armchair, and said, 'I think I'd like some fish and chips wrapped in newspaper, please.'

i wanna tell her that i love her a lot, but i gotta get a belly full of wine

2010-03-28T21:27:00.004+08:00

A gerbera my tubby doctor-neighbour tried growing in his garden, that he likes to tend to shirtless and showing his adorable humpty-dumpty tummy. He drives a light blue car and waves at me as if in slow motion (with neighbourly nod) when he sees me. One day I was cycling and saw him halfway reversed, just staring at his patch of gerberas. So I asked him about them, and he said he's been trying to grow them, feeding them with leftover vegetable skins (the dedication!) and giving them special treatment, but they seem to have developed a disease. He pulled some out; I took one. Today I looked where the plot was and it was all green, no more yellow gerberas.

wistful simon and garfunkel

2010-03-26T11:28:00.008+08:00

time it was o what a time it was
a time of innocence, a time of confidences
long ago it must be
i have a photograph, preserve your memories
they're all that's left you

me/my brother

my inheritance

please may i take a train with you

i promise to stick to you like glue

i won't get lost in the dining car

we can take turns to read al lado del mar

we'll pass through strange cloudy fields

have cake after all our meals

see all sorts of stormy sunny weather

pick up pennies and feathers

watch a busker, his accordion and drum

nap like cats in the afternoon hum

please lets take this trip someday

any,

any

which

way.

my father's hair does cartwheels

2010-03-21T00:24:00.002+08:00

像冬夜里没有光明

2010-03-20T23:48:00.012+08:00

We are in the throes of hard work and inspiration, which is a marvellous real way to be. I haven't truly felt this way since Let's lick lennon's lemons, which I just found out at dinner just now (after all these years) horrified my parents, my father especially.

But here is his admission:

"I must admit ah, actually ah, that tsd really give you very good training you know."

Yes Papa.

(It really must be horrifying for a man to see his 18 year old daughter in not-much, just big fake daisies covering the essential parts.)

*

The routine these days is, try to wake at 645, actually wake at 7, leave house by 745, listen and sing to Francoise Hardy in the car, reach at 830, put packed lunch in fridge, go to editing room, edit while being addicted to almonds, pee, microwave lunch, eat lunch, back to editing, eat more almonds and granola bars and cucumber with almond butter, pee more, microwave dinner or buy dinner, eat dinner, fill water, edit till computers shut down, backup, go home, bathe, sleep, inadvertently dream of Fantastic Yellow Pee, wake.

But the magic takes place in between all that (and ironically on big scary computers), despite it being in a cold and frigid lab. It takes place between lucy and I giving birth to a something from the bottom of our hearts. And now five days before the deadline, looking at the screenshots, I can't believe all the things we did; it all came from a feeling we wanted, and now it is Something.

KOPITIAM GOI GOUI JEWELS ABALONE IRON NR NRR ELDERLY WAVES FROM ITALY ANTICIPATION OF TOUCH ONE THOUSAND PEAKS AWAY THOSE IN LOVE FLACCID THING INDECENT SEXAGENARIAN GOT ONE WILDFLOWER KALEIDOSCOPE.

goodbye mister salinger

2010-01-31T22:25:00.003+08:00

'You never saw anybody nod as much in your life as old Spencer did.'

salty thunder knows no sweetness

2010-01-28T21:15:00.004+08:00

I do this

so that I won't become like this

though I'll miss them the day they are gone.

The current configuration of stars now known as the constellation of Orion roughly formed about 1.5 million years ago, as stars move relatively slowly from the perspective of Earth. Orion will remain recognisable in the night sky for the next 1 to 2 million years, making it one of the longest observable constellations, parallel to the rise of human civilization.

"What kind of nose?"

2009-12-27T21:30:00.004+08:00

On the morrow Wat and the Dog Boy were the firmest of friends. Their common experiences of being stoned by a mob and then sacrificed by cannibals served as a bond and a topic of reminiscence, as they lay among the dogs at night, for the rest of their lives; and, by the morning, they had both pulled of the noses which Merlyn had so kindly given them. They explained that they had got used to having no noses, now, and anyway they preferred to live with the dogs.

The Sword in the Stone, T.H. White

2009-12-21T12:26:00.002+08:00

My Grandmother

She kept an antique shop - or it kept her.
Among Apostle spoons and Bristol glass,
The faded silks, the heavy furniture,
She watched her own reflection in the brass
Salvers and silver bowls, as if to prove
Polish was all, there was no need of love.

And I remember how I once refused
To go out with her, since I was afraid.
It was perhaps a wish not to be used
Like antique objects. Though she never said
That she was hurt, I still could feel the guilt
Of that refusal, guessing how she felt.

Later, too frail to keep a shop, she put
All her best things in one narrow room.
The place smelt old, of things too long kept shut,
The smell of absences where shadows come
That can't be polished. There was nothing then
To give her own reflection back again.

And when she died I felt no grief at all,
Only the guilt of what I once refused.
I walked into her room among the tall
Sideboards and cupboards - things she never used
But needed; and no finger marks were there,
Only the new dust falling through the air.

Elizabeth Jennings

Pea-Trapping Moustaches

2009-12-20T22:42:00.007+08:00

This time as the obsessive clingfilm feeling comes over me, I think of myself as an archaeologist. Very, very slowly unearthing treasures and making progress bit by bit. Using the brush to dust fossils gently. Taking days to restore an underground artefact. It helps in packing my whole room, and not get all dizzy and ganchiong. I even slow down my movements, and remember to breathe deeply (not at dusty areas though). Things I saw today- lynn's note from the end of secondary four on how she will miss her lamb, sushilla's comments for a lit essay, madame butterfly shoved into a box wrongly labelled XJ's Movies, my special pens! (one of them has a radar you can use to eavesdrop on conversations, the other has balls and a hoop for playing miniature basketball), endless paintings the kiddos did on saturday nights, sparkly old jewelly purse i never used, giam3 cai3 fading paper of Starlight that Harris did in class. I was feeling hopeless and wondering why I was keeping everything when I realised why. It's because when I grow old and am a granny I will go back to my childhood and my past and take out all the artefacts and things and put them all around the house, and examine them and look at them everyday. I will be surrounded by all my young things when I get old. Diary pages could line the toilet walls, old purses used, toys displayed, nonsensical paintings that now have no space to be anywhere hung. It would be marvellous, not sad. It wouldn't be to hopelessly nostalgically indulge in old memories, but to...live in another way. Anything can feel different if you change the way you think about it. And now on, I think I can deal with my sentimental habits in a healthy way.

But something my mother said scared me a little. She said that when I get to her age, even a room will not be enough to hold everything that I keep. And that is possibly true. But I think that is ok. I will have a room, all organised, for everything. The walls could all be painted funny colours, and with different areas of the room for different times of my life. It would be like walking into memories. The Room of Memories!

Found

2009-12-13T21:11:00.003+08:00

a girl's best friend

2009-11-29T20:59:00.003+08:00

It's been a few weeks, but here's me new bicycle. It's from a handsome, long-haired, lean uncle whose quiet son helps him out at his small bicycle shop in Sembawang. Every neighbourhood should have an uncle bicycle shop! (mine moved away. Uncle had two dogs, Mickey and Minnie, the absolute loves of his life) It's the little-known hardworking people like them that make Singapore special. It's things like that I'll miss if I ever move away, that'll drive me mad when I'm alone in wherever it is and i want to drink milo in the kopitiam cup among pajama-wearing people or slurp cheap and good hokkien mee at a kopitiam table with yeos chrysanthemum tea, or bring me bicycle to the corner shop, where uncle will be. Anyway, Uncle gave me a karang guni horn that a few of my little neighbours love to press, but they need both hands to create the sound.

Spartan's March

2009-11-19T22:34:00.004+08:00

Suspended Cymbal Girl and Tambourine Girl

Back in the days, in the saliva-floor band room, we were on the other side of the partition, the side crammed with percussion instruments of all sorts. Timpanis, drum set, suspended cymbal, xylophones, huge chimes, a terribly big gong, endless files filled with old scores, all kinds of drumsticks and mallets, and a basket of random small instruments like castanets, maracas & triangles. We always made mistakes and even at the end of it all my percussive ability was rather pathetic. For four years I couldn't read notes (only rhythm but not do-re-mi) but I made it, evading xylophone parts. Once at an outdoor performance at Raffles City, I unconsciously vulgarly chewed gum throughout the performance and was punished by being made to guard the instruments while everyone gallivanted off during breaktime. Every Monday morning, we had to go early, the only morning we had to play the national anthem and school song for the school at the field instead of it coming through the intercom. When it was over and we had to listen to the boring Monday speech, we all sat on the track and picked at the little red-brown rubber bits. Best part was playing marching songs, they were the most glorious pieces! You felt so wonderfully smart in the uniform, shiny snare drum strapped over your body, marching in time, turning sharply, playing the snappy rhythm. (I still wish I were in a little marching band. We'd wear mad homemade costumes and march through streets playing magic songs) And now, my dear little sister is, lo and behold, in the same cca and same section, using my very first pair of drumsticks, playing from some of the same scores.

Ah Leaping and I, we had nicknames for everyone and laughed till we ached.

roll over the ocean, roll over the sea, go and do your part to build community

2009-11-01T22:01:00.001+08:00

but you never talk to me. you always talk to peter.

2009-10-29T23:53:00.008+08:00

Remember when we used to be obsessed with loveactually in jc? The time was sprinkled with the dust of some kind of simple glowing magic, in my mind it is (though 'growing up' was hard).

We would finish each others' sentences with quotes from loveactually, with the accents and timing all right. Desiree was obsessed with Glasgow love theme and Corrie played it endlessly on the piano. And having to watch it every christmas.

I wonder that the movie connected us, though I don't know exactly who us is. But I rewatched it again that day and felt that glow, which conjures images of the garden tables, big shady maroon umbrellas, beige classrooms, the glossy transversion bag I used to carry to school, carol's red and white shoes, cold milo from the canteen, and the wonderful simplicty of a black box with lights.

2009-10-22T14:16:00.002+08:00

“She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.”

Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov

Bob Dylan- Oh Sister

2009-09-27T11:17:00.002+08:00

with Scarlet Rivera, the violinist he picked up off the street and who joined the Rolling Thunder Revue.

ROLLING THUNDER SALTY THUNDER