Tuesday, November 30, 2010
one
When I was younger, I used to think I lived in a world full of idiots who didn't get me, and it was just us, God and I, against the world. Now, several years wiser, I see now that the idiot was me, because I am indeed a freak of nature and it is, rather, the world against the both of us.In that sense I formed an island, separated from the mainland of the world (God was, well everywhere, pretty much like The Matrix) and no matter how hard I tried to fit in, my true self always outed me, the true self influenced by the media, my environment and perhaps a small part of my genes.
It is this true self that reveals itself clearly in the life that I choose to live, carved out by the decisions I choose to make and how I choose to react to the circumstances life puts me in. I suppose the same could be said for everyone's true selves, except that everyone I know seems more or less alike.
They dress similarly, talk similarly, behave similarly, react similarly...and probably think similarly. which is why the label 'weird' will always remain invisibly pasted over my forehead, like an elephant in the room (except for a certain group of people that always seem to lack tact whenever they open their mouth, notably those of the female kind).
Over time, I grew to be comfortable with this label, though I'm still uneasy with the word 'crazy' and derivations of it ('mental' is one of them). Unfortunately, one thing that still hasn't changed throughout these defining teenage years is my yearning for people's approval. I care less nowadays, and about less people too, but I still care...and perhaps I always will, unless I develop a thick skin overnight. Faugh.
Which is probably why I'm so upset now, it being a busy Thursday night out on the streets and me not having a group itinerary to join nor an inkling on how to spend the evening, as usual. "You think too much..." is what half my friends used to tell me, leaving me to finish off the sentence in my head, "...about yourself." But I can't not care about how I'm spending my life, not when there's so little of it left to spend as a human being, compared to an entire eternity as a supernatural entity.
I'm talking about a soul and, heavenly as heaven sounds, it sure is like nothing on earth, which makes earthly life somewhat of a novelty, something to be completed wisely, satisfactorily and actively, although my definition of these notions is likely to be highly unlike God's. But that's another debate for another time.
The crowds that walk past me on the sidewalk are happy, excited and probably relieved that work or school's over for the week. Some of them, like me, are looking across the railing at the brilliantly-lit cities and integrated resort that make up the Marina Bay seascape, while others are looking at their handphones, either Facebooking or texting (words and actions characteristic of this technologically savvy age we live in).
Most of them are with company. There are said texters or Facebookers who are probably killing time while they expect company to arrive soon, the usual couples displaying too much PDA in public, the out-of-place tourists with their bowler hats and camera straps hung round their necks, the businesspeople in their office wear probably out for a night of drinks to kick off their night of thanking God it's Friday and a few stray loners, staring out to sea (or bay, in this case) like me.
Every now and then, some rollerskaters and runners glide and pant their way through the crowd, either heading to the currently unused Formula 1 track up ahead or to the Esplanade Park on the opposite side, beyond the crossing under the bridge.
There is also another set of people looking at the commotion a few metres ahead of us: yet another new act showcasing its talent at the Esplanade courtyard. This evening's band look like a poor imitation of The Beatles if they were Asian and had gone karaoke, despite keeping their bespoke suits and bowl haircuts. And yet, a sizeable crowd is actually forming around them, a crowd whose audience nods their heads to the band's beats or videos the band's every move.
One man's meat is another man's poison, I guess.
The regular bumboatful of tourists make their way around the Bay, snapping flash-assistpictures of us as we snap pictures of them, although most of us standing here take mental snapshots. Behind them, the Central Business District lights up and a projection of a swirling circle of lights can be seen against one of the buildings. The Esplanade bridge itself is lit in a set of warm hues that change from red to green, to blue, to purple every few minutes.
For an uncounted amount of time, I allow my eyes to defocus and let the lights, the gentle breeze, the faint sound of lapping water and the moderately noisy chatter around me take up the space in my mind reserved for thinking consciously. It's almost like sleeping except the fact that this is a conscious effort and one that I can snap out of easily.
To the left, the unmistakable shape of three tall towers connected by what looks like a giant ship at the rooftop stand out against the cobalt sky: the Marina Bay Sands resort. Next to it is what looks like a glass spaceship with monorail tracks coming out of it, and next to the tracks is the Double Helix (Pedestrian) Bridge, so named because of its twisted shape.
Just beside the spaceship (sounds much more fun to call it that than a train station) is a concrete platform, with people looking towards us too: scattered masses of us watching each other, separated by the mouth of the Singapore River. It's a little too disturbingly Big Brother-ish for me, so I remove my elbows from the railing and walk away, past the Beatles wannabes and into the cool air-conditioning of the Esplanade Mall.
My instincts kick into gear (after a slight pause) as my feet take me up two flights of escalators, past a few footsteps' worth of glazed tiles and straight towards glass doors and Sensormatic security scanners that detect unauthorised removal of secondhand tomes and computer discs.
I walk into the coolest public library in this country.
They dress similarly, talk similarly, behave similarly, react similarly...and probably think similarly. which is why the label 'weird' will always remain invisibly pasted over my forehead, like an elephant in the room (except for a certain group of people that always seem to lack tact whenever they open their mouth, notably those of the female kind).
Over time, I grew to be comfortable with this label, though I'm still uneasy with the word 'crazy' and derivations of it ('mental' is one of them). Unfortunately, one thing that still hasn't changed throughout these defining teenage years is my yearning for people's approval. I care less nowadays, and about less people too, but I still care...and perhaps I always will, unless I develop a thick skin overnight. Faugh.
Which is probably why I'm so upset now, it being a busy Thursday night out on the streets and me not having a group itinerary to join nor an inkling on how to spend the evening, as usual. "You think too much..." is what half my friends used to tell me, leaving me to finish off the sentence in my head, "...about yourself." But I can't not care about how I'm spending my life, not when there's so little of it left to spend as a human being, compared to an entire eternity as a supernatural entity.
I'm talking about a soul and, heavenly as heaven sounds, it sure is like nothing on earth, which makes earthly life somewhat of a novelty, something to be completed wisely, satisfactorily and actively, although my definition of these notions is likely to be highly unlike God's. But that's another debate for another time.
The crowds that walk past me on the sidewalk are happy, excited and probably relieved that work or school's over for the week. Some of them, like me, are looking across the railing at the brilliantly-lit cities and integrated resort that make up the Marina Bay seascape, while others are looking at their handphones, either Facebooking or texting (words and actions characteristic of this technologically savvy age we live in).
Most of them are with company. There are said texters or Facebookers who are probably killing time while they expect company to arrive soon, the usual couples displaying too much PDA in public, the out-of-place tourists with their bowler hats and camera straps hung round their necks, the businesspeople in their office wear probably out for a night of drinks to kick off their night of thanking God it's Friday and a few stray loners, staring out to sea (or bay, in this case) like me.
Every now and then, some rollerskaters and runners glide and pant their way through the crowd, either heading to the currently unused Formula 1 track up ahead or to the Esplanade Park on the opposite side, beyond the crossing under the bridge.
There is also another set of people looking at the commotion a few metres ahead of us: yet another new act showcasing its talent at the Esplanade courtyard. This evening's band look like a poor imitation of The Beatles if they were Asian and had gone karaoke, despite keeping their bespoke suits and bowl haircuts. And yet, a sizeable crowd is actually forming around them, a crowd whose audience nods their heads to the band's beats or videos the band's every move.
One man's meat is another man's poison, I guess.
The regular bumboatful of tourists make their way around the Bay, snapping flash-assistpictures of us as we snap pictures of them, although most of us standing here take mental snapshots. Behind them, the Central Business District lights up and a projection of a swirling circle of lights can be seen against one of the buildings. The Esplanade bridge itself is lit in a set of warm hues that change from red to green, to blue, to purple every few minutes.
For an uncounted amount of time, I allow my eyes to defocus and let the lights, the gentle breeze, the faint sound of lapping water and the moderately noisy chatter around me take up the space in my mind reserved for thinking consciously. It's almost like sleeping except the fact that this is a conscious effort and one that I can snap out of easily.
To the left, the unmistakable shape of three tall towers connected by what looks like a giant ship at the rooftop stand out against the cobalt sky: the Marina Bay Sands resort. Next to it is what looks like a glass spaceship with monorail tracks coming out of it, and next to the tracks is the Double Helix (Pedestrian) Bridge, so named because of its twisted shape.
Just beside the spaceship (sounds much more fun to call it that than a train station) is a concrete platform, with people looking towards us too: scattered masses of us watching each other, separated by the mouth of the Singapore River. It's a little too disturbingly Big Brother-ish for me, so I remove my elbows from the railing and walk away, past the Beatles wannabes and into the cool air-conditioning of the Esplanade Mall.
My instincts kick into gear (after a slight pause) as my feet take me up two flights of escalators, past a few footsteps' worth of glazed tiles and straight towards glass doors and Sensormatic security scanners that detect unauthorised removal of secondhand tomes and computer discs.
I walk into the coolest public library in this country.
12:19 AM By Jessica
Monday, November 29, 2010
two
The thing that sets this library apart from the other branches is its focus on arts and entertainment, which is totally every youth's 'in' thing.It's not the books that attract me (because over here, unlike the other branches, there's only a small section for literature in which only movie tie-ins are stocked, while the rest of the shelves stock some pretty technical books or magazines on dance, art, theatre and music) but the extra facilities it has to offer me: a practice room with a view of the Bay and two pianos (an accoustic and an electric) and three almighty screening rooms -- perfect for someone who wants to watch shows in the quietest living-room setting they never (or rarely ever) had.
Besides, none of the other libraries have diffused lighting and minimalist furniture the way this one has. It gives the library a sort of sleek classiness that can never come with bright flourescent lights and tons of noisy people crowding the aisles.
Tonight the practice room is fully booked, which isn't unusual ever since people started finding out about this open secret ("What? There's a room here where you can sing and play the piano at an incredibly affordable rate of 6 bucks and 10 cents an hour??") so I resort to the other open secret instead and book two hours' worth of screen time.
There is a whole slew of movies here, being a jack-of-all-trades centre but somehow a master of none (I guess this makes more sense because it would appeal to more people than say, an entire collection of the same genre). Good thing I'm past all the teen-censored movies so I get to watch practically anything they have (except those from the Restricted section: frustrating since there are quite a few classic gems listed under that category).
After a few minutes of browsing, I pick Lars and the Real Girl -- comedic-looking cover, cute (and talented) main actor. He sure has come a long way from his badly-scripted Hercules days, this Ryan Gosling. A love story between a weirdo and a plastic doll...this should be light-hearted and fun.
I adjust the lights, slot the disc into the player, dump my bag on one of the two black leather sofas, stretch out in the other one and click on the remote as my senses absorb the soft lighting, quiet environment and comfortable seating.
Boy, was I wrong about this being a slapstick movie. Halfway into the show I was in tears of the heartrending kind, the actors and script being so good and all -- something that will always remain a rare blend, since most of the scriptwriters either write for a small community of idiots (I'd like to think that most of us in the audience are smarter than that) or are idiots themselves.
But I digress.
What started out as a tender introduction to a type of mental illness (namely delusion) expands into a story that is, intrinsically, about love and growing to love others by reaching out of our comfort zone. There are funny moments but they don't take away from the overall tone of the movie, which is a touching one.
The 'bawling point' of the show was when the Real Girl was sitting at the office pantry crying about her recent breakup on the pretext of her 'murdered' teddy bear ('strangled' by one of the co-workers) and Lars (who, until now never reciprocated her feelings for him) comes over and cheers her up by giving her teddy bear mouth-to-mouth and basically just by carrying out a conversation with her.
That scene held a mirror to one of the better moments of real life. I mean, you try and try so hard to win that person's affection, but it doesn't seem to work, and just when you're in the pits and defeated by some other tragedy in your life, the very person you least expected shows up and gives you what you want: his attention.
What kind of love is this, I wondered after I took the bus back to my second home and got into the shower, this undeserving, unbelievable kind? And then it gets me thinking about how this kind of love is supposed to be characteristic of the love that God gives us (although God isn't exactly Lars because He's the one trying to win our affection and not the other way round), and I cry a lot more as I think about the times He's come through for me and how the little moments stand out more than the big ones.
Like how the kindness of a stranger picking up my coat from the floor it dropped on has a bigger impact on me than say, clinching a lucrative account at work despite the terrible pitching for it on my part. Or like how a single, bright pink flower in bloom that was left on the grass the day Trent disowned me trumped getting all As for the toughest finals I've ever sat for (back in polytechnic) any day.
The shower is usually my place for letting my issues for the day bubble to the surface and get washed away together with the bathwater, so I feel no shame in crying here -- in thinking further, in getting closer to the answers to my neverending questions about life's situations. It is here that I can talk in silence (mouthing my words but stopping short of vocalising them) without passers-by looking at me strangely or asking me if I'm feeling all right and it is here that I feel most protected from the grim outside world at large. It helps too that there is something soothing about the rhythm of the water droplets hitting floor and skin, and the sensation of water cascading down onto and around me.
My mind stays a bit more on the subject of this undeserving love, its similarities to grace and where such moments can be found, if they can be found at all (since they tend to arrive unexpectedly due to the near impossibly of being able to orchestrate them, unless of course I was the one extending said love to someone else).
By the time I dry myself, wipe the mist off the mirror and look back at my reflection, I look and feel like a fresher version of myself already. It is with this peace and sense of satisfaction from having accomplished something for the day that I am able to drift off to sleep.
But then I start dreaming about Trent.
11:01 PM By Jessica
Sunday, November 28, 2010
three
I dream Trent and I are stuck in a genuine moment in time, except the ending changes.We are back to the evening before Trent texted himself out of my life. it is a Sunday, and Trent and I are with Ben and Cara celebrating over our latest gig at Third Place, which we performed earlier that same evening.
The mood is good, and we're having a great time laughing about just about any lame joke, although we all know it's because we're euphoric from the standing ovation we got from the crowd and admirers talking to us after we walked off stage.
Ben plays the drums, Cara sings along with trent, who also plays guitar, while I work the keyboards. We make a formidable team most Sundays, either jamming or playing at this outlet four friend of ours started some years back that has the unique circumstance of being a drinking place that doesn't sell alcohol.
The idea of Third Place was based on the concept of Ray Oldenburg's third place being one of pleasure and relaxation (the first place being the home, the second being the workplace) and the need for Christians and non-drinkers alike to hang out and listen to great music, besides the place being an outlet for showcasing music by kids whose music probably wouldn't be found out otherwise because they'd be too young to enter pubs.
They have a stage, audience area, non-alcoholic drinks and light snacks and -- here's the best part -- several jamming studios upstairs, albeit with average sound accoustics. So the four of us finish up our supper and laughter eventually, pack our gear and Ben drives his lady Cara off while Trent gives me a lift before heading to his girlfriend's (she doesn't want to come, as usual).
So we're in the car, talking in general before launching into specifics -- specifically his girlfriend. "Yeah, Mei Ling would've snorted if she'd been in the audience today when that girl handed me the flowers on stage, " he says, before giving a wry laugh. And then that silence that I know so well. Eventually I punctuate it, exactly like how it happened that night.
"So uh, how are you guys doing?"
(scratches his head with one hand while holding onto the steering wheel in the other) "We're okay. She's still...a bit...a bit insecure though. She actually cried on the phone when we were getting ready to go up earlier." (sighs)
"Oh...so that's why you took so long in the bathroom." (slight pause) "So she's still having that separation anxiety thing?"
(frowns and looks at me briefly) "It's not a Separation Anxiety Thing."
"But wasn't that what you called it the other day?"
"I didn't, okay!" (awkward pause) "Well maybe I did...I don't wanna talk about it."
"Okay." (I turn my head away and look out the passenger window)
"You know, you don't have to act that way. I mean, I'm taking the effort to drive you back, okay?" (gives me a sideways glance"
(I turn around to face him) "I'm not acting any way. Look, if it's such a big deal, stop the car now and I'll get out!"
Trent meets my gaze for a good while, then looks straight ahead.
The car continues moving, probably because there are vehicles behind us anyway. But this is where the dream gets different.
The conversation actually continues.
"Did you know you are such a thorn between Mei Ling and I? What are you trying to do, get between us?"
(I look at him, shocked) "No, you know who I am and you know I'm not that kind of person! And why are you bringing this up now, I thought you were fine with always driving me back?"
(Exhales) "I was...but now, I don't know."
(Long silence, I don't know what to say so I don't say anything.)
At this point we stop at a red light and looks me in the eye expectantly. I stare back at him, wondering what is it that he is expecting. The pressure of that moment builds up.
And then I wake up, although it takes a few seconds for my mind to register the dark silhouette of my room's ceiling and the whirring fan in the dark, somewhere. I lie awake for a few minutes, wondering what the dream meant and if it had any credit to real life. Then I close my eyes and drift back to sleep.
When I finally do get up a few hours later for work, I feel pretty bummed about having the dream, because obviously it gets me thinking about him all day and remembering the fact that we're not speaking to each other any more.
What really happened that night was that our conversations did continue, but in our heads and without each other's participation. It filled our minds as we sat in the car for the remaining few minutes of the journey, until I reached my second home (more like a 'second room', rather, since I only rent a room and the rest of the home belongs to my landlord and his young family) and said a brief "bye" before closing the car door.
The following day, during lunchtime at work, I got a text message from Trent simply stating:
"I dont want 2 have further contact with u nemore, so dont try 2 call back or msg after this. & i quit e band, told them alredy."
And that was it, that was the last contact I ever had from him, at least directly. Tried calling back, obviously, but he didn't pick up, obviously. I then texted him back asking him what was going on and whether we could work this out. I never received a reply.
All this happened three years ago yet here it is, still in my head, an taped video recording of what Trent sounded and looked like, and what happened that last night of us as a full band together, before he left.
The last I heard of him (from a mutual friend) was that he married his girlfriend, had a kid with her and settled down somewhere in Perth. So now he has a two-year-old running around somewhere with her mother in the land of the kangaroos and wombats. It's so strange thinking of this, because I always thought I'd be at his wedding, since he used to talk about it often enough.
I thought I'd be a permanent fixture in his life as he was in mine, that I'd drop by his place frequently and babysit his kids when him and the wife went out (this was subject to change in the unlikely likelihood that I ever got married and had my own family to tend to, and to the fact that he never mentioned moving overseas in his family dreams for the future). We went through so much in the 5 years that we stuck through thick and thin together and I thought we'd remain forever friends.
Looks like I was wrong, and years later I'm still trying to get over whatever it is I might have done wrong (to this day, I still don't know exactly what it was, because the problem with me getting a lift from him or bringing up his girlfriend's separation anxiety issues were just peripherals and clearly not the main reason why he cut ties with me).
I get through the rest of work that day mechanically.
7:16 PM By Jessica
Saturday, November 27, 2010
four
I wake up the next day feeling brand new. For some reason, yesterday's dream feels like a distant memory. I think part of that reason might be because the weekend is finally here and that means I get to sleep in, wake up at my own pace, not have to go to work and head home to home.I've always wondered if it's possible to ever live out that line from Franz Ferdinand's Jacqueline:
It's always better on holiday, it's always better on holiday;That's why we only work when we need the money...
The only way I can see that happening is if I find out one day that an unknown relative of mine died and left me a fortune or if I live off the royalties of a perennially favourite song I pen that keeps receiving airplay, much like Will Freeman's father in About A Boy.
Fat chance of that happening, at least for now so, like most of the population, I'm struggling to settle into a second choice of a job to put food on the table and independence from my once-overprotective parents.
The sun is shining brightly and a cool breeze is blowing into the box I live in that is so common in a land with limited building space like Singapore. Time to get up.
I brush my teeth, use the bathroom, pack my dirty laundry plus some belongings and take the bus down to Tanjong Pagar Railway Station to get a ticket back to Johor Bahru. Horizontal slits that make up a painting of ships sailing towards the shore decorate one side of the concave ceilinged wall, while window panes flanked by the initials F.M.S.R. with Malaysia's national emblem or jata negara in between them decorate the other. F.M.S.R. stands for Federal Malay States Railway, referring to the states of Selangor, Perak, Negeri Sembilan and Pahang back when they were termed as such in the late 1800s before Malaysia was fully formed -- a telling sign of how old the railway station is and how it is a marvel that it is still standing today.
The space in front of the counter is gloriously devoid of a snaking queue line that one usually sees on Friday nights and eves of public holidays -- my ideal situation. This allows me to get a seat (it's free seating for regular Johor-bound passengers) instead of having to stand up and I spend the next half-hour watching places from my past drift into view. I see the park where my poly mates and I used to hang out, the bus stop next to the overhead bridge where I used to transfer buses on my commute to poly (short for polytechnic), the row of shops where I used to have breakfast before classes and the mall I used to kill time at while in between classes whiz past.
These are distant memories of what my life was like as a poly student, like a movie reel playing in front of my window not unlike Radiohead's Knives Out music video. Those were richly emotional times, times that challenged and defined me to what's become of me today. Pretty soon, these memories are gone, just like the places, when I reach the Singapore Checkpoint and get out to have my passport cleared together with the rest of the passengers.
I get my passport cleared and get back into the train, seeing what I find to be the best view in this routine journey: a watercolour-like painting of the causeway, with smudges of orange, yellow and blue in the sky against unnaturally calm, glass-like waters making up the bottom half of the horizon (the water being this calm is unnaturally possible due to the separation of waters created by the causeway.
Soon enough, the train I'm in stops at Johor Bahru Railway Station and disembarks as well as picks up passengers. I am not among the passengers who disembark, for I stop at the next station. I give my mom a call her to inform her regarding my current location so that she can collect me when I arrive.
Her car is waiting for me outside the mall where the train next stops -- the revamped and renamed Danga City Mall. I vaguely remember what the mall looked like when it was still Best World Plaza, back when it still had a bookstore (Johor Central Bookstore which, though it sold outdated books, had quite a few good reads, particularly Random House books) and an inflatable castle with a giant slide at the atrium (I remember with particular fondness the brief exhilaration I got from sliding down the two- or three-storey-high setup.
I walk down the steps at the porch towards the blue Proton Wira 1.6 and throw in my bags before me. "Did you wait long?" are the first words I ask her, as I know she gets antsy if she ends up having to wait too long (by too long I mean more than 10 minutes). "A bit," she grumbles, but thankfully she isn't in an arguing mood today.
We go up the flyover just next to the Mall and head straight for the coast where Lido Beach is. Less than five minutes later, we’re passing through there, with the coast at our right and buildings at our left. On our right, we pass by the previously-opened-to-public-until-gangs-kept-killing-their-rivals-there jetty, the Tenaga Nasional Berhad hydroelectric generator and eventually a small stretch of beach with a rough cement road leading down to the water for sailboats to be tugged across.
Whereas on our left, we pass by a seaside hotel, a Chinese restaurant, seafront homes built in pre-war times and eventually a row of three-storey shophouses where mom, Dad and I used to have our typical Chinese breakfast until the shop ceased to exist (a Photostat shop now stands in its place).
Mom parks the car in front of the shophouses and we have one of my favourite lunches: black-sauced fried kuey teow with cockles. This particular shop does it well, adding copious amounts of black sauce (which I like) together with kuey teow strands that are not too fat nor too thin (but just right) and safely-cooked cockles that I love chewing on with just the right amount of effort (unlike abalone, which I find too tough to chew on).
It’s a windy day today, thankfully, so it isn’t hot where we’re sitting, which is alfresco by the shop, facing the beach and its coconut trees. In the distance, we see windsurfers trying to take advantage of the wind, while much nearer, fishing boats are docked near the beach edge and the road leading down to the water is lined with two parked sailboats on tow and even a few stationary cars.
It’s low tide so some of the kids are on the beach spraying sand onto each other while their parents watch (I don’t see anyone making sandcastles though), which wouldn’t be possible if it was high tide because the water covers the beach totally whenever that happens. Crows gather around and perch on the wires that link the streetlamps on the road, looking for food and cawing away loudly like they usually do. Up above, the sky is a dull, grayish blue, with gray clouds blocking the sunlight – ideal in such a hot climate like ours.
I conduct light banter with my mom about my trip back and how work’s been, but we’re mostly engaging in non-verbal communication, communicating silently that we’re comfortable in each other’s presence.
Pretty soon, our lunch is over and we get into the car as my mom heads back on the road. The road in front of us begins to take a turn to the left as the Duty-Free Zon shopping mall, hotel and ferry terminal comes into view and creates a dead-end where bikers congregate at the parking lot, amidst tourists and locals who just want to idle away doing nothing.
The road on the left leads us past low-cost flats, the Sultan’s palace gates, the equestrian range where Johor’s radio station is also stationed, the Sultan’s mosque, the sports club where I used to play badminton and swim at with friends when I was much younger and finally, home.
1:50 AM By Jessica
