honey pie, you are driving me frantic

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

Suzie-Q

Catapult

Sweetheart

Crazy legs

Falling-off-a-log

Around-the-world

The Swim

And the bright, all-wonderful Charleston!

pineapple calluses

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

"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

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.

swing it, spiffy cat!

bob, i've missed you

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

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

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

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

Happy Birthday.

"Reality leaves a lot up to the imagination."

les trois mousquetaires: sin, cos, tan

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

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

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...

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."

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

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

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

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!!!!!!!!

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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

Old military band, upper peirce reservoir

Ivy's kingdom

Eau de Singapour

grandmotherly feet

marilyn with pride

my reading baby

Grandpa's shoes

http://advancedstyle.blogspot.com/

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

grey gray nimbostratus

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'

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