ironic distance

yes man is dead

2006-01-16T18:29:00.000+08:00

this character has just been assassinated. you all move along somewhere else.

this, a long one

2006-01-05T23:43:00.000+08:00

the motivation is dead. silence is golden. for now.

boys and toys

2006-01-01T12:37:00.000+08:00

happy new year, you all!

until i can recover from the obsession with my civic and e-500. later guys.

alive and well

2005-12-15T00:11:00.000+08:00

sorry to all for not updating snippets and shots of this character for a very looooooonng time. been busy with work, although now i'm coasting on that side. thanks for the heartfelt emails.

sold the motorcycle. missed it so much. bought a car and coming from a motorcycle background, i've been obsessed with trying to get the ride confidence right. out with the stock suspension, wheels and tyres. spent a bomb on those. i'm broke. looking at replacing the brake system soon. performance? damn.

got rid of the ancient 3.2 megapixel camera which i won during a dinner lucky draw years ago with an olympus e-500. been taking pictures but have not downloaded to process them further. the car is taking too much of my camera and blog time. got to go now. i want to tune the suspension. too soft in front and i don't want to oversteer. and it's past midnight. bugger.

rip sondra.

impersonations

2005-11-01T16:14:00.000+08:00

the imitation of representations of lifestyles somehow bugs me. them poseurs are my pet peeves of the month. the law must persecute these counterfeits. we have laws against impersonations. i mean, we don’t impersonate a minister, police officer or a nurse. last i heard a boy got into deep shit for writing scheming emails, pretending to be our then education minister, admiral teo. unless you’re a member of the village people, this law makes sense because we don’t expect common citizens to walk around in body-hugging shirts, tight-assed pants and fake moustaches directing traffic and chasing thieves. there’s always a time for role-playing and pretence like when we go for fancy dress parties, bdsm flogging sessions or drama classes.

anyway, the law society must seriously consider condemning those who impersonate a barber. for many years, i’ve not been to a hair salon for a haircut, except last week unfortunately. i’ve my reasons. my barber is an honest malay man with 30 years of experience and plenty of barbering skills. ever since i go to him years ago, he knows my white hair, moles and scars on my scalp and ear wax better than the combined knowledge of those who know me. he has an arsenal of dirty jokes, is very aware of all the injustices in this world, has a supply of newspapers and magazines, treats his family like royalty and charges nine dollars. last week, you, sir, a hairdresser with a diploma, prepped me for brain surgery instead of a haircut. you acted the part by dressing like edward scissorhands but you don’t have his skills. and instead of giving me the best haircut, you tried to sell me your haircare products. wanker.

also, the law must be extended to those who impersonate a pole-dancing slut. honey pie, if you’re going to wear something so revealing, don’t cry and complain to daddy that you’re forced to play the sexy bimbo role while walking the aisle of a glittering company dinner or the office corridor. you’ve decided to wear the wet whore t-shirt, so act the part. go ahead and run on the white sands of fake beaches at sentosa and make some noise with girly giggles in your skimpy bikini. otherwise, stop the pretence if you’re not comfy with adorning a number on your thong. teaser.

the law must then bring to court those who impersonate lance armstrong. you’ve assembled a ten-thousand dollar racer and spent on accessories and gear enough to buy a jet, thinking that the next traffic light which is a couple of metres away is the steep mountain slope of the pyrenees. you then cycle on the footpath at east coast park with a see-no-hands-on-the-handle-bar stunt, sipping gatorade from a branded water bottle. we don’t want to see your stuffed ass in those spandex heaving up and down, and like a billboard, the screaming advertisements would give a good fight to those on women magazines for the squeeze as many award. and since we’re at it, we already know that you live across the road and pedalled at a record breaking speed of 10km per hour to starbucks for a frappe. sock a jock, you.

of course there need to be a law on those who impersonate a rally car driver. somehow you’re further inspired after watching initial d and you pretend to be the moody jay chou in your mitsubishi evolution. with the 20 inch muffler jet plane ear-splitting decibels, you launched like a rocket in your 20k rpm and 1000 bhp supersonic car round and round the carpark, scaring the neighbourhood cats, children and old women. you slay the fathers in saloons and the scooteratis as you impersonate a street bandit roaring down serangoon road with the blasting sounds of disco techno. i curse you for you deserve to take the bus and watch tv mobile. bunch of retards.

we must also have a law against the impersonation of a fakir. the fact that you attend a weekly yoga session at a cosy boutique yoga studio in a restored shophouse, pulling off a body contorting four-limb cobra about to strike the cat pose does not make you a holy sage. oxygen in, carbon dioxide out. feel it in your loins, the point of universal consciousness, and arrive at the flow and ebb of the interior and bring your being to the centre. in the soft piano music, the incense smoke gracefully drifts. you lie on the mat, all cushy mush, chanting om to exclusive yoga gear and organics vege diet. your self awareness reaches the height of spiritual fitness of modern urban fad. oprah loves you, sucker.

impersonating a member of an outlaw motorcycle gang must also count as a criminal activity. the fact that you ride a harley davidson with an open exhaust and your arrival can be heard even before you start the bike does not mean that i’ll pick you for a fight at a tanjong pagar bar. if i need a lawyer, i understand that you’ll give me a good rate to defend me for not polishing my bike like the gleaming chromes on yours. and can you tell your chief executive officer friend who owns ten harleys that the long distance trip up and down holland village is cancelled this sunday because of a possible inclement weather. you don’t want to ruin the chromes, do you. rebel retards.

the law must also prohibit men from impersonating women with an obsessive penchant for refinement. women of such affordable time spent all their money, or husband’s, on classic pedicure, french polish, aroma therapy body massage, anti-aging facial, detoxifying wrap, laser hair removal, milk scalp massage, seaweed body exfoliation, pampering foot reflexology, anti-oxidant deep pore cleansing and eye-brow plucking at spa centres. you trade in your macho swagger for effeminate endeavours. hail the nippon men! pretty boys like you who rather doll themselves up to be mannequins are an embarrassment to the ruggedness and frankness of mountain men who swore by their tiger beer at the male bastion of sleazy coffeeshops. piece of hairless nostrils.

this list is opened for further nominations.

two years have gone, but who can impersonate sweet adeline?

chant the night away

2005-10-29T19:49:00.000+08:00

you tried again the other day and i told my mum to lie. do i have to resort to that? i don’t want to speak to you. ever. but you called. the last conversation we had was an aberration for we promised that we must never be a part of each other. anymore. yet you tried to send signs. through the window, drawn by the moon i’d been tracing our speech. such long drawn nights. to think about it is so wrong. i was seduced by the vestiges of what you used to be. years ago. your conviction, faith and devotion to jah drove you to situate me as a derived. i didn’t understand that. that time. it was painful. and when you chose to live a life of prayers and contemplation, snipped them beautiful locks so short, and faced me with red, swollen eyes, i’d to submit to the never be. chant the tune of y mas gan. chant the night away.

sporadic exchanges

2005-10-24T00:48:00.000+08:00

there are points in time when we question the presence of someone in our picture of a lovely universe. but somehow we pretend that it's not a problem because we want to prolong that something before it’s taken away. the exchanges are nice and we hang on to them for circumstances brought us together, an attraction which is reciprocated and converted to fond conversations, which at times, went deep into the night. it’s indeed beautiful and who would not ever experience an intimate conversation, wishing that it would go on and on, to as far as the horizon only to be woken up from the haziness when dawn breaks its first light.

we wish for that to happen again and again whenever we are given a chance to renew these wee hour episodes. but then we stop at just that, sporadic exchanges, preferring silence over the odds of what the night can bring us. we wait for the next night. it goes on and on. we restrain ourselves from going across the deliberate closeness. and so the many nights and the many conversations are a burden for they've become complications in our relationship with other people. the fate of such sporadic exchanges comes to an end when it's impossible to carry on. breaking free from that someone is an understood and unspoken decision. the ordinary relationship beckons and there will never be any late night conversations. is that comforting? i heard somebody say, says devendra.

let it go, in case

2005-10-22T16:37:00.000+08:00

give it to me any time, that’s me
i lament too easily when you do so
it dawns on me almost everyday
or i’ll happily call you this monday
or perhaps thursday and dinner will be on me
your presence mends a tattered t-shirt
disturbing to me and i don’t know why
only if you’re at home
i'll be so, anew in a wound
so much ado about you
i’m too quiet, closed for viewing
your laughter leaves loud applause
streaks of blond, it’s going to be rough
i want to barge in but i must stand
the cover, the feel of a welded book
i walk past the shop for three days
stealing a glance at appropriate moments
and taking pot shots to see if you turn
i know for you are dear, you say
a drop of wine, humming a tune
sore me to complete the unfaithful
i succumb with half smiles and half ways
undeniable, i want to take some from you
your face brightens with flowers
i’m only dreaming most of the time
i know that, but be a part of it
for kissing your lips is enough
or should we blink and watch
let time slips and dives into the cracks
i’ll let go then for you’re in safe hands
just go in for i’ll be waiting, in case

a love forlorn is a love gained

2005-10-16T19:45:00.000+08:00

this ritual is like a messy room, a shabby and frenzied existence where the interplay of the condescending and the superficial is perhaps vulnerable and clearly revealed when meanings are contemplated. as a face to this contemplative ritual, love is the exquisite caress of a soft hand, an endless longing that soothes the absence. in the bed of a stale room, at the cold corridor of an office building, behind the shelves of an immaculate library, at the weathered table of an al fresco cafe, on the crapper throne of a small cubicle and on the sandy stretch of a crowded beach, where the mechanical surges of time forces itself on these denizens, someone is always chasing the longing. they’re out there devising intricate plans so meticulous or following trails of fate down to the end of the dim street. they wait outside by the street light, a picture of calm but the pulsating heart.

the never ending rain today subdued me from doing work. instead, i watched puteri gunung ledang and i was shattered by a love forlorn. this unfulfilled ache was massacred after the callous reality of carandiru imposed its savage reminder. that put me back to perspective on what this life can deteriorate to. realising that life can be too sober and joyless, i rode through the silliness of once upon a time in mexico and was concussed after that because of vcd overdose. i don’t want to lose my humour in this messy room for i know that everything's ok according to reverend al green.

i love my bee girl

2005-10-09T12:17:00.000+08:00

no rain

all i can say is that my life is pretty plain

i like watchin’ the puddles gather rain

and all i can do is just pour some tea for two

and speak my point of view

but it’s not sane, it’s not sane

work occupies most of my space-time linear continuum. and i seriously need to give my existence a satisfying essence by defining my subjectivity against my loved ones instead of devoting this self to the cold and logical dimension of plans, targets, processes, systems, structures and outcomes. this blog will be sacrificed until i'm situated in an ontological happiness. take care people, and be good to others. look into their eyes, listen to them speak and don't interrupt.

ship of fools

2005-10-02T16:20:00.000+08:00

the second bali bombings disturb the hell out of me. the chosen recourse is again political violence against forms of hegemonic control at the expense of the innocents. to stomach such a discourse takes a mind bent to believe that there’s no alternative but blood, gore, carnage and endless grief. ted kacynski, the zapatista army and osama bin laden.

and all these years, i watched these events unfold before my eyes in the comfort of my living room, mourning on my lack of courage and reason to be a rachel corrie, carlo giuliani and the tank man, while engaging in far greater depth on more important urban lifestyle and cultural artefacts such as indie films, indie photography, indie fashion, indie music, indie parties, indie books and indie hairstyles, and living an extremely contented and peaceful life in a hyper-safe and super-sanitised country where the foreign reserves are at a cool 100 billion united states dollars and the people are law abiding, quietly doing their own things and listening to every advice dispensed by the wise political leaders of the ruling party.

ship of fools

by ted kacynski

once upon a time, the captain and the mates of a ship grew so vain of their seamanship, so full of hubris and so impressed with themselves, that they went mad. they turned the ship north and sailed until they met with icebergs and dangerous floes, and they kept sailing north into more and more perilous waters, solely in order to give themselves opportunities to perform ever-more-brilliant feats of seamanship.

as the ship reached higher and higher latitudes, the passengers and crew became increasingly uncomfortable. they began quarrelling among themselves and complaining of the conditions under which they lived.

‘shiver me timbers,’ said an able seaman, ‘if this ain’t the worst voyage i’ve ever been on. the deck is slick with ice; when i’m on lookout the wind cuts through me jacket like a knife; every time i reef the foresail i blamed-near freeze me fingers; and all i get for it is a miserable five shillings a month!’

‘you think you have it bad!' said a lady passenger. ‘i can’t sleep at night for the cold. ladies on this ship don’t get as many blankets as the men. it isn’t fair!’

a mexican sailor chimed in: ‘chingado! i’m only getting half the wages of the anglo seamen. we need plenty of food to keep us warm in this climate, and i’m not getting my share; the anglos get more. and the worst of it is that the mates always give me orders in english instead of spanish.’

‘i have more reason to complain than anybody,’ said an american indian sailor. ‘if the palefaces hadn’t robbed me of my ancestral lands, i wouldn’t even be on this ship, here among the icebergs and arctic winds. i would just be paddling a canoe on a nice, placid lake. i deserve compensation. at the very least, the captain should let me run a crap game so that i can make some money.’

the bosun spoke up: ‘yesterday the first mate called me a ‘fruit’ just because i suck cocks. i have a right to suck cocks without being called names for it!’

'it’s not only humans who are mistreated on this ship,' interjected an animal-lover among the passengers, her voice quivering with indignation. 'why, last week i saw the second mate kick the ship’s dog twice!'

one of the passengers was a college professor. wringing his hands he exclaimed, ‘all this is just awful! it’s immoral! it’s racism, sexism, speciesism, homophobia, and exploitation of the working class! it’s discrimination! we must have social justice: equal wages for the mexican sailor, higher wages for all sailors, compensation for the indian, equal blankets for the ladies, a guaranteed right to suck cocks, and no more kicking the dog!’

‘yes, yes!’ shouted the passengers. ‘aye-aye!' shouted the crew. ‘it’s discrimination! we have to demand our rights!’

the cabin boy cleared his throat. ‘ahem. you all have good reasons to complain. but it seems to me that what we really have to do is get this ship turned around and headed back south, because if we keep going north we’re sure to be wrecked sooner or later, and then your wages, your blankets, and your right to suck cocks won’t do you any good, because we’ll all drown.’

but no one paid any attention to him, because he was only the cabin boy.

‘you damn fools!’ he shouted. ‘don’t you see what the captain and the mates are doing? they’re keeping you occupied with your trivial grievances about blankets and wages and the dog being kicked so that you won’t think about what is really wrong with this ship—- that it’s getting farther and farther to the north and we’re all going to be drowned. if just a few of you would come to your senses, get together, and charge the poop deck, we could turn this ship around and save ourselves...[continue here].

i want to be a laclau but i can't seem to find it here. face the void, i will.

forgetting and not repeating

2005-09-29T23:49:00.000+08:00

her presence in my life was once all consuming, and to remove her from that existence creates vague traces of her for me to call upon. what i can remember now are blurry spectres of the good and bad times we went through and for that i’m feeling nostalgic because she called me last night after more than seven years. a long time ago i held her so dear, and our past, present and future could have been something else. the failure of our love is haunting her and she just needs to affirm that it did happen and i want to believe so too. but for now i do not think those moments are ever going to be recaptured and recreated for our consumption. i beg to perish her and i feel so shitty.

of quills and theatre

2005-09-24T17:29:00.000+08:00

i was almost throttled to the point of suffocation these past weeks because of the truck load of work, which will continue to wash over the pier in the foreseeable moons. yet somehow i could wedge a couple of hours on a weekday to watch quills by luna-id, a theatre company with a mission statement just like the rest of them. the mention of marquis de sade and nudity sucked me into parting a healthy sum when i’ve to admit that i’m not a fan of plays and their exaggerated postures. i was more interested in how far our beloved patriarchal government would let us, sons and daughters of this concrete land, go to in playing with ourselves. i didn’t do any readings although a friend lent me paul theroux’s narratives on pain and healing, nurse wolf and dr. sacks, which, of course, i didn’t get a chance to read. i was truly opened to a funky butt-smacking jig of sensual and intellectual dramaturgic erection.

we got to the corporate-sponsored theatre and i was instantly cloaked in an abhorrence for the pseudo aristocratic manners of some of the wine-sipping patrons at the corridor next to the entrance of the theatre. observing the patrons was a spectacle itself although it was a let down that i didn’t spot anybody with leather outfit and a whip. some were dressed in their exclusive evening wear while others could fit in the supermarket crowd anytime.

i saw hossan leong and the boy friend searching for their seats in the dimness. they sauntered along the right aisle and stooped at every row to look for the correct letter. he and the boy friend decided to go to the other aisle, thinking that their seats were on that side. i let go of an evil chuckle when the couple squeezed all the way between seated patrons and only to realise that their seats were the last two seats at the right aisle. it was a dramatic entrance nevertheless.

the bell went and the play was about to start when a man and presumably his wife walked hurriedly to their seats somewhere in front. his foot caught something and with a loud thud, he was sent sprawling to the floor. he picked himself up and i thought it was an illustration of pain and embarrassment.

you may want to read the most unbiased review here, the empowering gay sponsor of the play. the ideological message of the play is crudely clear and clichéd, that of the war between the libertines and the religious fundamentalists, the blasphemous and god’s children, the free spirits and the nazis, the dissenters and the orthodox, the dominated and the oppressors, the rape victims and the rapists.

the textcentric nature of the play is weighty for me. perhaps i was tired, yet i did enjoy the elaborate and titillating adjectives used by the marquis character. the nude marquis in act 2 was unlike the unadulterated colourful pages of porn magazines. most in the audience i believe was trying to make out in the blur of the soft light the size of rehaan engineer’s dick and comparing it with theirs or their spouse.

towards the end, in act 3, the dramatic theatre seeped into space when the non-verbal and physical sexual simulations were displayed in a spectacular ambience of disco sounds and lights which awoke my listless existence. the wanton bestiality in the good was released in an embrace of the evil. the abbot had sex and was doomed to hell. he went mad and i woke up to an eager round of applause. damn the literary theatre and god is going to get sick of me.

a juxtaposed moth

2005-09-17T18:29:00.000+08:00

nowadays, in the repetitive humdrum of living a sedative urban life, i forgot the youthful dreamer in me who always put justice as an utopian ideal of my perfect world and the angry socialist student who would stand at the entrance of the train station selling the green left weekly to indifferent commuters. i’ve yet to give it up completely as there are still instinctive traces of me struggling for the underdogs in any situation i perceive as requiring my intervention. i’m hooked on the glazed eyes of the helpless. that’s the hero in me.

when i was a child, an encounter occurred at the void deck of my flat; i met death for the first time. a young lady threw herself out of her apartment and landed forty metres or so away from where i was. the neighbourhood kids ran in all directions but i stood rooted and watched the blood flowed out of her broken face. moments later, i looked away, closed my eyes and submerged in mental re-enactments of her agonising screams whenever her drunk of a bastard husband came back ~~home~~ late at night. i was a little boy and i wanted to save her. i didn’t get my chance.

that night i saw a white-striped moth in my room and i thought of her. i became curious and stumbled upon the world of moths, devouring every information i could find. for a period of time, it was my obsession then to bring together the peculiarity of moths and the universal salvation of justice, melting them into an image so potent that it drove me to live a life dissatisfied with the rich and powerful. that project failed when i discovered the hedonistic wilderness later in my life.

and till now i'm still waiting for my sigur ros.

a no-frills sappy talk

2005-09-11T22:51:00.000+08:00

i’ll give you my eyes first. i’ve a good eye for beautiful things and somehow i find you attractive. i’ve an intense pair of eyes. but the white part is yellow because of the years of abuse. the dirt, dust, fumes, smoke and sea water did it. my eyes aren’t striking anymore but the beautiful shape is still there. look away if you don't like them and i’ll close my eyes until it’s time to wake up.

my hand, take it for it’s meant to be fondled and played with. my palm is not rough because i turn the pages of books and type on keyboards all the time. and not smooth either because i do get it dirty when i fix my motorcycle and paint the walls. i’ve a couple of calluses and scars to show you. my fingers are strong too and if you need a good rub or open a tight bottle cap, they’ll do a good job. but you don’t have to touch them if you don’t fancy them.

and my mouth is not wide but i do have full lips, which is good for kissing and nibbling. i used to smoke, so the lips look more purple than pink. the teeth are stained and i can bite hard with them. i’ve said sweet nothings and i’ve cursed. words to soothe your pain and make you happy, i’ll breathe. my tongue, lets just put it that i’ve done wonderful things with it. so hush i will if you tell me so.

my heart, though, i’ll give last. when it’s yours, i’ll do anything just to see a smile. you see, it somehow flutters. it’s just so and i love the feeling for it reminds me of my flaw as a person. a cold and lonely figure standing still in the rain i refuse to be. this heart, i made it myself so i’ll feel the hurt if you decide to return it to me.

but listen to me. it’s ok. i see you, so that’s why i give you my hand, mouth and heart. life’s like that, so i shan’t stop giving because it’s not me to stop at it. i’ve walked your random road and i’ll stay away this time for i don’t want to worry you. we had pleasure while it lasted, though.

bodily wind in contemporary times

2005-09-09T11:56:00.000+08:00

today, i was sauntering along the corridor of my workplace back to my cubicle, after a much needed break from the exertion of my brain cells on planning a project which was given to me at a very short notice by the clever people, when i felt my tummy stirring a little bit. so i glanced around to make sure that there would be no troubled hubble and witness to accuse me of contaminating the clean air. between the unhurried footsteps, i decided to let go of a sample squeeze, a tiny seedy peep of a fart, which i reckoned then would be forgotten soonest and burrowed deep into the annals of my life’s sordid experimentations as a completely insignificant one.

as i walked on, i realised that i'd an emperor behemoth dinosaur tidal wave of a fart gathering a one hundred megaton nuclear force in the epicentre of my tummy. i continued to walk, but briskly this time, and let the ballistic monster ripped for a couple of long seconds. a gratifying deluxe grin formed on my face and at the same time i was trying very hard to contain myself from bursting into a mammoth laugh of an epic comedy. my tummy felt smooth and i was surrounded by the most foul-smelling gas. when i went past the toilet, i saw the cleaner standing at the door. she was staring at me with horror written all over her face. i waved and smiled at her before i ripped snort a guffaw all the way to my cubicle.

anyway, check out this book description:

the study of the fart in medieval culture participates in the widespread and productive contemporary study of the body, its practices and its hermeneutics. as a consequence of the cultural materialist interest in the quotidian, recent criticism has moved away from an abstracted conception of selfhood toward an appreciation of how the concrete daily regimens of bodily 'habitus', generally taken for granted, shape the horizon of our cultural and individual consciousness. the fart, in its parodying of language and its logic of affinity, leads us ultimately to the problem of hermeneutics, of the art of interpretation itself. although much of the medieval preoccupation with flatulence originates from the aesthetic of comic inversion, whereby farts 'sing' or parody human language or are mistaken for departed souls, it also reflects a more serious interest in bodily health. a multifarious typology of the fart will permit a better understanding of the phenomenon's protean wealth of meaning.

in a poppy field

2005-09-08T06:27:00.000+08:00

it’s still raining and i can’t sleep. at other times the pattering calmed me like hush little baby.

‘hush little baby, don’t say a word
mama’s going to buy you a mockingbird
if that mockingbird don't sing
mama's going to buy you a diamond ring’

but it’s not doing so now for i’ve been awake since, a restless toss around in bed. she’s the bug for this sleepless night. i hope she’s well, i sincerely hope so. a diamond ring i’ll not promise but a listening ear of the night i’ll be, like the pink roses, if not a delight, there’s audacity. plunging drops on cement ground, i spin into her inside this rain. the intent, a peek of the sun in a poppy field.

kaya toast and prison stories

2005-09-06T00:23:00.000+08:00

the other day, i received a call from a very old friend who i’ve not met for ages. he told me he’d just been released from prison for the second time. he beat the crap out of somebody and served his due. the first time he went in was also because he beat the crap out of somebody. i met him for coffee at an overly sanitised coffeeshop. he’s a hardened man with a violent temperament though he looked sad and lonely.

he told me stories of his time in prison. when he talked, it was like as if he was giving a sermon. he told me he doesn’t want to go in for the third time for he loves his wife too much. he’s finding it difficult to adjust to the routine of life outside prison because there’s no regiment which would force him with no choice but to obey. i told him to get a job and he told me that it’s not easy to get one. i nodded and gave him a wry smile. he swore at the whole world and i was worried that the old lady next to us would hear the expletives and choke on her kaya toast. before we depart to chart our own route, he told me that if i need any help to beat the crap out of somebody, i can call him anytime. i gave him another wry smile.

nowadays i can only dispense perspective, hinging almost like a parasite on the laboratory experiments of others when i once thrived on my own adventures. i’d pushed my limits as a reckless young man, but now i’m whimpering at the corner of my room trying to find ways to increase the size of my bank account and look pretty in front of the mirror. i’m that old that i’ll not even take a potshot at risking my limbs, mental state, emotional well-being and financial status for a sampling of the toxins and pleasurables of the prohibited, illegal, scarce and dangerous. anyway, i still hold a fascination in those who thrive at the margins of society - drug users, alcoholics, madmen, criminals, transvestites, taxi drivers and such people - who seem to be getting on with their alternative lifestyles, traversing prohibited spaces at the void decks and corridors of one room flats, coffeeshops with slimy dirty floors and smoky ktv pubs.

life is the irony, the parody and the absurd.

my niece enters our world

2005-09-01T20:44:00.000+08:00

my sister visited us and brought along her latest bundle of joy. it’s a she and she was asleep. my sister complained to all of us that she’s nocturnal, just like my brother. i looked at the newborn, trying to get her attention. i made faces and sounds, and gestured but to no avail. she was disinterested, communication was impossible. her fleeting eyes weren’t focused, moving from one object to another in the room in rapid succession. i was trying to follow her eyes in the hope of catching a glimpse of her world.

my sister came into the room and declared to the both of us that it was time for dinner. she sat at the edge of the bed and cautiously lifted her baby to a cradle position. she bared her bosom by lifting her pastel yellow polo shirt, revealing her nipple as she guided my niece’s mouth to it. is she hungry? i enquired. she nodded and cooed the baby to suck. how did you know? i create the need for her, she replied. oh, ok. like advertisements, you mean? like we all, living a consumerist ecstasy of a spectral cabaret in our advertisements. she shooed me away and told me to eat before the food got cold.

my sister is ~~god~~. she’s pulling the web of strings, networks, channels, radio waves, tunnels, cables, connections, lines, bridges and routes to structure my niece’s reality. soon my niece will recognise the inconsistencies, develops her identity against that of people around her and floats, like the rest of us, on multiplicities of realities, moving from a boardroom battle of suit and tie cut-throat profiteering in the day, lighting the holy candle in their shrine of a bedroom by the bed, praying for forgiveness to the virtual deity at night, to dancing in glee to the intoxicating multitudes of tribal identities in the weekend.

welcome to our world, little one.

i want her yet i can't

2005-08-30T19:49:00.000+08:00

i dreamt of her last night. i could see her distinctly. she was a little girl in a blue flower girl dress throwing a red beach ball up into the air under a very big and lush tree. the rolling green hills speckled with tiny white flowers, vast blue skies that go beyond the horizon and morning orange sun casting a sepia tone create a dreamy mood of a picture perfect bollywood panorama. the ideal has appropriated my psyche.

we are the subjects

2005-08-29T23:21:00.000+08:00

as i prepare for a regeneration
born out of the phoenix. a new
departure at the waiting room,
she’s the deleted original. crossed
out to make new, i look at her

with a different smile for she’s

a bronze sculpture re-engraved,

a repainted parchment leaving

traces of old moans and laughters,

a blurred superimpose of brown

withered flowers and neon bar

signs. i want to erase her, then

recreate her out of that erasure

for i’ve made a mistake

but the frivolous is pretence, like

a smear instead. it’s empty without

a crave, a virtue of fanciful strokes

i take the seat in constant resonance
of what it means when she exist
beyond the manuscript, staring at
me with a restrained face. she’s
warned me, but i delight in resisting
it and now i’m graffiti, upsetting the
flow of a coherent tour. a surplus,
sitting through from station to station
she and i are the subjects, an

endless view through a third window,

a play in the mirror room

spur to further moments

2005-08-27T17:01:00.000+08:00

even in her absence i submit to her
difference. like just now though it was
slightly fragmented but who can take
comfort in a delayed resolve at the
edge of a garage assault. and so the
sweet peas i bought are left to wither
as we defer a final decision to be
passengers on the same visit. our
difference is making us do repetitious
re-readings of the complex when
simplicity cuts an idle aesthetic of
squeezing into the tube. she’s too
troubled by that thought, though i’m
too willing to ride the ferris wheel for
broken bones and open wounds. i do
want to give her kisses and whispers
to create ‘new’ traces but she’s fond of
the archived fevers when i tend to
side-step them. choose the nostalgic
stories for they are recordings, a
supplement to make us complete. once
we remove the wall, there’re no sides
but just us. so rhetoric disappears and
language is not a game. we hold hands
like a poster of a couple seeking
shelter in a beating rain. a parody it is
not, though opaque and dense. i just
want her to button my shirt and tie my
shoe laces, not an enclosed nothingness
and for that thought, i’ll do the same
to her. she is a spur to further moments

a second-hand

2005-08-26T23:03:00.000+08:00

she’s television in an empty

cinema, but to get over her

is 60 cycles of habit kicking
i tremble in her care and so

i get myself decentred. a site

to tear down my coherence

for she’s the ambiguous,
populating a span and i ruse

to leave in a must. when even

the bench is still warm with

her words. i've to ignore her

diaries and let it be seen as

vacuous. why fret when slavish

bootlegging is glossy and

authentic. she’s a second-hand,

shapeless in harmonies. an

anti-art, i embrace her grandiose

schemes. and for that i’ll turn

down the volume. painting a

darker picture of a bland tenure

her random road

2005-08-26T00:10:00.000+08:00

i’ve to render her obsolete
so to prevent a gangrene, i
must be a go-between and
release my hysterical decoration
let her pass. she deceives me
a licence to self-refer, subverting
the linear signs i was given
earlier and now i’ve to get up
from the blow. her words are
deliberate, a glass conversation,
and i can’t see the sampled
tableaux in loops she plays
her song is the intended but
her apparent, a bad taste,
pretentious and radio dial
a catharsis, she escapes in
a mix of this and that. i wonder
why she’s like so today for
stranger things have happened
between us and them, so
i can’t seem to put her picture
on my wall now. she has gone
away. i relent this time, i learn
not to tread her random road

she likes me

2005-08-23T22:37:00.000+08:00

in it, i see her in daffodils and lilies
traffic disarray of side street cafes
a picturesque embarrassment of
horns and fumes and a post box
i can’t seem to get rid of the ruckus
more so when i’m on the escalator
a tunnel delirium, ignore the b-side
archaic meanings, too obvious
but fritter away upon pushkin’s clutch
like butterflies in a soulful city
and graffiti walls, baked in dense clouds
meditating sparrows at park benches
she lingers in that grim skyline
love and decay, orchestral effects
i succumb to wistful screening
her voice in copies, a record’s repeat
the rawness of demos, i like
caress her face with tender hands, i say
much like smelling her rhapsodic breath
i imagine so, her warm presence, a folklore
pressing against me in a gospel squeeze
but the room is still silent and cold
we sit across, pretend like strangers
in a morning crowd, busy with nothing
sappy overture, i deny. long digression
i am, so resist my theatrical submission

my morning jacket

2005-08-21T12:30:00.000+08:00

she bobs into the frame and that old feeling
reveals itself again. a terminal junkie, i still
am. a parlance of an acid drop i surrender
letting it go on the roof of make-believe
i draw her to the roof. we watch the sun go down,
a postcard best, masking what’s underneath
while we shoot the breeze, urging the trip

but imagine drawing an outline across her face,
like so. grace it on the altar, and touching her
will send quivers within a perimeter, for sure

i can’t expose this pretence. she’s not real,
i believe. but she keeps arriving with shopping
bags and stories when i muse over tea and scones
on preppy days and a deck chair. her lips swollen
i like her eyes. if only she wants to dance with me
a lowdown, i don’t need repeating

the con show

2005-08-14T14:28:00.000+08:00

inching closer, and i bail
forgive me pole dancer,

that eye is intended. revelry,

noodled i was long time ago
railing, i pretend in the crowd
of consequence she shows

deception, a public face
the scoops i get, muted

the ego. a stellar ride on

the streets, coaxing superheroes
she comes as i line the taunts
getting worked over a bad dismount
is never the intention. it’s hideous
she edges, dropping in when

all i need is a cutback to the

grind. that’s how i thrive,

delaminating the darkside
but who is to know loads of

charlie browns and her as i peek

into side-street restaurants,

show offs in feeble attempts,

i dissent. i shun the vibes and

she licks over rebel flags and

presidential non-election. as i

spin the method. concoct a phrase

in a squatter, looking up at

primal faces. open wounds, rip

the lull. she fails to see that,

i wonder why when i refuse a

sponsor, she tweaks the radical
a callous sponger, feeding on

modicum scraps left at the corridor

of a spin cycle. she opens to an

exhibition. but her meanings

dissipate into glassy snapshots
recover, she’ll try, as i anticipate

over beer with a silly grin of an ape

songs and wars

2005-08-13T11:40:00.000+08:00

all smiles are back, she said
as we sauntered across the road
like dyslexic alice in her wonderland
probing the night, circling the text
we found the door. i tied my shoelace
pulled up my jeans, anticipating
tongues and hands
saliva, skin and tender rubs
streetlights beamed in a hesitant cough
as we made our tentative toe
between lust and relief, undoing her bra
we copied a need at a shrine
enclosing our distant presence
at the wailing wall
with bullets and blood and hurting cries
the cosmetics of lies, we denied
a forbode of holopaw’s curious
we scrutinised
and declared that being apart
troubles the thoughts, which shouldn’t be
but we breathed easy then
for tomorrow is another arithmetic
of songs and wars

in the walls

2005-08-09T15:44:00.000+08:00

puncture the dullness, i say
when sophisticated articulations break down
like last night, we cry

refusing sanctified providence
we're stubs
to come through. we pose, upset
juggling fractured sense and predicaments
we allay as nonsense
tempers flare, moments despair
into fading echoes. we go on with the necessary
when these are clear codes
for medication
shelving it over cheap wines and idle banter
we ignore our pleas
condescending on worthwhile values
standing our ground
when beneath the harsh talk money is the fight
on slick streets and bright lights
we shudder, far removed from conversations
we had in good days
and at other times, i saw you gaze at me
making me fumble
a lingering age of heavy footsteps
odd silent moments
something has to stop, or else
strange things are going to happen
our expectations in the walls
between blurry lines, we may cross
kind words elude, regret is not an option
i don’t want that, so save us
being asleep is not me, lift the curfew
and i’ll hold your hands

of noise, of din

2005-08-06T14:34:00.000+08:00

to become us and oblivious to noise
in the lining creates a sudden refuge
of like-minded embroidery
for when we walk together
we see the same things. that scares me
i make out myself in you, dreams are like that
i can’t grip myself. reduce into love
too much of myself, a besotted mirror
of the last romantics, a genial hug
headaches and moans, cramps
and other stomach ailments, she says
but these are mere stories
we happen to like them between cloud cult
conspiring to take away time
crowding the space for others can wait
and we like that in a rabid civility
as we probe beneath the façade, losing
the sheen, unveiling the powdery dust
in tatters we display our scars, and we laugh
for speech seems so strange then
when we could’ve slept through the din
by the okkervil river of our nuances
though we’re wearing thin, emptying voices
our physical neglect deludes to mere sexual acts
at the end, parted lips, we remember

and we choke and don't let me go on
it’s not easy for we’ve taken a different book

and everything's forgotten soon

when stories told are not the same

what remains

2005-08-05T00:33:00.000+08:00

deny the frequent bugs for sugar-coated rain
cherish, try, believe so
we are here, but don’t let us carry on
teasing, shuddering preludes
caress the cheeks for sullen songs
guitar rifts, split right in the middle
the wounds, in time for a pause
we let it be, sliding a bliss
intoxicated at the side of the road
blind to oncoming lights
for we say the heck with endings
now the time, to dream over the plinth
and we promise to leave soon
ours to mull over, for sure
of suburban landscapes so nice
sipping lattes, a sinking low
while watching people outside the glass
thinly veiled, we eye each other, hopeful
but failing somehow for jibes show
no pain, though we laugh
an extended affection, tousled hair
ruffled by tender fingers, we smile
and share dreams, regrets and stories
at a dead-end, where borders plunge
like kissing the lipless, i feel
awful pretext, and we gaze for
what has happened can’t be returned
over the remains of what could be

a repeat

2005-08-04T00:17:00.000+08:00

in the departures, concealed by niceties
and white lilies, and longing perfume
there's nothing else to say
but mere repetition, over and over
whenever we see each other
for moments to go
draping our existence, speaking
an added excitement, and we got bored
leaving footprints on a wet ground
we dance in the humdrum
always the same, though we argue
and shout in silence
with blistered tongue, eyes faded
ears ignored, we shut the curtains
for it always end in vain
when the traffic stops
kisses i miss, hush tones i forget
call me out, when i look down
when i’m like that, when i want
to have your attention again
so deeply, like the last time
but only different this time, a repeat

entry taken away

2005-08-02T23:57:00.000+08:00

august is sacred. i've decided to take away this entry posted on this day. august will not contain any semantic noise. my august will contain incantations from the other side. coffee, chit-chat, flowers and see them smile.

vague presence

2005-08-01T00:23:00.000+08:00

what went on is never

the same. never repeated,

but i might as well linger
for us and other people
at the sidewalk, a moment

expected. space intrusion

and pretension. in smiles

and laughter. over lunch,

salmon sandwich and baked

apple tart. shared murmurs

and she looked across the

table with a glint for prayers

were over. prim and proper
for god had gone home
and we had to get it done
a small happiness, among

others, which was good enough
savoured and licked, what

is worth before it slipped

away. like my dream, last

night i did. how we held hands
and night is sleep. i felt odd

for i was thinking about it

the commute

2005-07-27T00:15:00.000+08:00

today, again i left the office late. i said goodbye to the piles of unfinished work and and free myself from the prison of my cubicle. this afternoon, a colleague, according to his understanding of chinese geomancy, told me that my workstation, like a prosperous village in ancient china, is very strategic. behind me is a mountain, the number three agent in the organisation, and in front, is a busy aisle, like flowing water. that is why he said i’m given plenty of opportunities and the latest is to handle a saudi delegate. i nodded, trying to soak in this very different perspective when all the while i thought work is mere simulation.

anyway, i marched with a purpose along the sinister corridor carrying my black helmet, gloves and protective eyewear and pretended to be an apache pilot on a mission to bomb the hell out of gaza’s denizens. i donned the gear and did the routine visual check of the tyres and brakes. the grime was obvious, time to wash the beast. i inserted the key and twisted it to the right before i hit the start button. the growl from the piston and exhaust pipe was throaty, like the raspy voice of zoe tay, heightening my senses to a decibel appropriate for a romp in bed.

the sky was overcast with a semblance of the morning rain threatening to inflict its wrath again. i prayed for mercy as i lifted my right leg to straddle it. my crotch saddled nicely at the edge of the tank with my thighs gripping the sides. a smooth ride, i was hoping for a death cab for cutie. the sun rays were nowhere and the landscape seemed grey and harsh. i joined the traffic, sucking in the fumes into my lungs and making out the glistening surface of the asphalt. i restrained myself from going to hyper-drive, especially so when the weather is wet and road is busy. the risk was not worth the thrill, at most, third gear. teetering at the border of a full-blast throttle, i restrained myself again and again. red light, green light, slow moving cars, vans, trucks, buses and lorries, pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists, road signs, road names and warning signs.

a right turn into my favourite back road and off i sped in an opened throttle only to be held back after a mere sixty metres or so by a silver sedan, driven by a balding bespectacled man. i was cursing at his hesitant driving. he signalled left and i anticipated the space. my right wrist was eager to make a handful twist. i saw the magic alley and went for it narrowly missing the car by centimetres, artless but satisfying. i rolled over small twisties, shoving my weight to the left and right with the engine barking as if coaxing me to revved harder.

before long i joined the tedium forced march of the evening traffic at the main road as i hustled for room, shifting, braking and accelerating, caught among suicidal drivers whose single objective was to destroy competition. locking in and loading the adrenaline hits, i lowered my gaze and posture into a cyborg union, man and machine, dodging, squeezing, passing and overtaking any hint of obstruction. i whizzed past, yet, another car and its horning, a disgruntled driver and a middle finger. my eyes opened wide, unnraveling the tentacles of alternate universes, anticipating intentions, making first moves, looking for clues, to be a couple of steps ahead of morons behind their wheels. their sluggish and unwieldy movements were jolted by the engine roar waking them instantly from their cocoon of hyperreality.

i let go of a smug beam and skirted out of their way to an open road, the high peaking as i broke free from the masses. i was in front of the line up, racking a long tube time on the first wave to the familiar sight of my neighbourhood, winding down the throttle to an idle murmur. i rolled my motorcycle into the parking lot and switched off the engine, satisfied.

making money

2005-07-24T15:21:00.000+08:00

he constructs a face in a performance
of individuation, leaving traces of human production
which is thought of as
lacking pretension, rejecting commodification
in between mediated vocabularies
and stereotypical naiveté
gaining authentic aesthetic through disturbing narratives
of abortion, sexual abuse, bulimia, poverty, slavery
violence, racism, alcoholism, war, mental illness
poignant hurt and rage
grim and grey and language games
personal heartbreaks repaired in mourning over entries
a healing, a therapeutic release
externalising experiences
through analytical scrutiny
surviving, transcending, distancing
his autobiography in context
a new identity in a discourse of self-assertion
alienation, defiance, rejection and separation
a struggle
always anxious for self-hood, self-display
change is inevitable, slogan on the billboard
in vignettes, episodic transcriptions, dramatic translations
cultural reflections on buses, taxis, trains and airplanes
a travelogue, a description, beatnik fiction, a wanderer
hypermasculine metaphor of the unstable and fluid
but still he goes back to the other side
of life's mundane, daily experiences
shopping, commuting, bathing, dressing, eating
and making money

border politics

2005-07-22T18:38:00.000+08:00

and so the mind swirls into a convolution of warp speed, turning the inside, out and outside, in, like a worm writhing in extreme pain. in such a moment, the need to move over stands in a precarious tilt of fabrication, refabrication and defabrication, clouding the room of existence into a territorializing mission for the future between thoughts of an idealised past. to reach the border always brings a sense of anxiety, a platform of checkpoints, perpetually unstable in an ever-shifting images, which requires interpretations and reinterpretations to connect the discontinuities, to join the incongruities, to piece together the displacements and to take back the dispossessions into one coherent reality.

borders, close for the foreign, the traveller, the wanderer, the outsider, and the other. the singularity is a whole of stitched up dismembered parts.

so love me, for i love you.

english, the language

2005-07-19T00:10:00.000+08:00

this tendency, urge, to re-create, move, relocate, continue, morph, reposition along cultural terrains, borrowing, co-opting through english, the language, stopping over and hitchhiking. they are not mine, refueling along petrol stops of a novel into the lives of neighbourhood characters, two-dimensional caricatures. they last in sporadic moment, making connections and saying goodbyes.

forever displaced, permanent drifting between homes, always on the road, in a particular direction, in circles or otherwise.

it was there, i thought
a comic strip
can’t seem to pin down
this present, this presence
scatters
in all directions
in blustering wind
chasing
a flying paper
futile effort, by the road
confined

to nostalgia
ironic shuffling
footsteps

of a traveller
cultural colours, adopt
discard, consume and throw
the wrapper
it was there, i thought

now i shall say

english, the language

is for others, i use
in multitudes, fast forward, fast backward
no difference, no rest, always on the go
i become immanent, urban quietness
temporary solace
fabricated emanant
missed takes on the real
they succumb
and i pose
and i listen
to silversun pickups

the weekend in kuala lumpur

2005-07-16T00:26:00.000+08:00

got an invite from a kuala lumpur friend to attend his wedding. saturday morning at approximately 15 minutes to 6 i took a taxi to parkway parade, the pickup point. parkway, basked in orange street lights, seemed too quiet at such hours. on the coach, i was alone among couples of varied ages and groups of middle-aged chinese women. it was going to be a lonely five hours to destination kuala lumpur. got through the slow customs and the first stop was yong peng, johor, where coach drivers were fed free meals for bringing in the passengers. my sleep was disturbed, and i was still drowsy when i ate the oily beef ramly burger, bought at 3 ringgit. when on the coach for the second leg, i had to endure the mischievous antics of mr. pierce brosnan in james bond, as the choice video for the rest of the journey. my intermittent sleep was disturbed again by the sounds of chasing scenes and rousing sex.

the travel agent decided that the three young couples and me were not worth a trip to the centre of kl. the coach proceeded to genting with the gamblers and we had to wait for a good 10 minutes by a busy road at a petrol station just outside kl, sucking in the fumes and frying in the burning sun. two beat-up proton taxis with two equally ancient drivers arrived and signalled us to get into their old bombs. the traffic was going at a snail's pace, as expected. the air conditioner didn’t seem to be working. beads of sweat formed on my forehead as the driver spoke in near-perfect english gave us a round of lecture on the value of british education when the land were known as malaya.

the drop off point was somewhere at bukit bintang, so i'd to give five ringgit to the taxi driver for the trip to crowne plaza, which is further down, as compensation for the detour. at the lobby i was greeted by a sweet smile. i was given the key with a smile and she returned my credit card [procedure, sir] with a smile too. my room was very nice, paid for by the extremely loaded kl friend. i got a good view of the twin towers, bathtub, shower cubicle and toilet bowl while lying on the bed.

i rang my kl friend to inform him about my arrival and he was busy rehearsing the moves for the dinner reception. i rang up a singaporean friend and he was busy shopping with his wife at klcc. i rang up the other kl friend and he said he was free for lunch. told me to wait at the lobby in 10 minutes, and he arrived promptly with his doctor girlfriend who wore a blouse with a plunging neckline, revealing her bra and parts of her meat. it was a very distracting affair as i found it hard to have a decent conversation when she kept bending over to reach the ashtray at klcc’s dome cafe. my friend and i had gourmet beef burgers when the singaporean friend turned up. he wanted to smoke too, so he left his wife somewhere in klcc. seven years of marriage and he's still hiding his cigarette habit from her. after the meal, i said 'goodbye' to the rest and told them to meet me at the lobby later. i walked around klcc and got bored for it is singapore. they all look the same and they sell the same things and they dressed better than singaporeans.

back at the hotel, again, my sleep was disturbed when i was awakened by the sound of the doorbell. the singaporean friend came for a smoke and catch up on the old stories. by the time he left it was already time to get ready and the room stank of cigarette smoke. quick shower, and i put on a white shirt, white tie, black socks, black trousers, black jacket and black chuck taylors. i looked like a waiter when i checked the creases on the shirt at the mirror. met the other kl friend and his plunging neckline doctor girlfriend, who this time wore an elegant kebaya. the singaporean friend was late and the wife was introduced and he confided that he too was distracted by the plunging neckline and i told him he should’ve squeezed them and he said ‘fuck off’. we hurried to the ballroom and outside the lobby i saw rows upon rows of gleaming mercedeses screaming welcome to fantasyland.

when i got to the entrance of the ballroom, i then realised the magnitude of this grand wedding. i was among the who’s who of kl upper crust malays. my other kl friend whispered that sitting next to me was the grandson of a former deputy prime minister, whose partner was the grandniece of the king of malaysia. educated in the united states of america, he spoke to me in a heavily malay-accented english. just like me, he liked bikes, but unlike me, he has a garage full of them. i wasn’t familiar with many of the faces but the luminaries, i was told again and again, included kings, ministers and other politicians, top civil servants, prominent malay and chinese businessmen, and celebrities. i ate dinner with immaculate mannerism and i still abhorred small talk in between observing the wedding ceremony and scanning for siti nurhaliza. after dinner we waited for ages for the other guests to finish congratulate the couple. family members, close relatives and friends had the customary photos taken on the stage and the kl friend commented my nice pair of shoes and i scooted off to join his mother for a joget at the side of the stage.

then the other kl friend told me to change and wait for him at the lobby one hour later. he brought me to a private party full of doctors at somebody’s house, and i reminded them that i didn’t want to stay up so late. i thought it was going to be a heavily sedated party, but holy cow, it was feral, a birthday bash, two djs spinning techno crap at a super huge house with a swimming pool and a guesthouse, and an extremely beautiful doctor in a micro black dress getting wasted on liberal shots of tequila and whisky. the doctors who were introduced to me had a cigarette or cigar between their fingers. and i told them that i for sure wouldn’t go to kl for medical treatment. they laughed and told me more cool and hip malaysian doctor stories and how many of them had the morning shift in a couple of hours time and how they're an anomaly.

that night i slept soundly and woke up at 10 wondering what had happened the night before. packed my things, soaked myself in the bathtub and waited for the kl friend. he came down with his designer wife and we had lunch at the hotel’s restaurant. he picked up the bill and i said, thank you. the spread was most excellent and we swap stories. he then sent me to the pick up point and a taxi was there to take me to a petrol station. i waited for the coach to arrive from genting and met a nice singaporean couple who invited me to join them at their table while bitching about the poor service and watching a big group of loud harley riders with no protective gear riding their lives towards the horizon. with bated breath i then joined the counter line with a clutch of classic wrigley’s spearmint in high dials.

michelle's joo chiat

2005-07-06T00:21:00.000+08:00

dearest michelle

i’m not trying to get at anything. it’s not my intention to elucidate my ideal [authentic?] joo chiat. and i’m not a fan of idealising and sanitising the past. the past isn't that pure and beautiful like what i’ve seen in singapore’s immaculate museums and so do the present and the future. i believe, any representation of joo chiat or other products is mediated by cultural, ideological and above all, especially so in singapore, commercial interests.

i’ve no preference, really. when it comes to the ideal joo chiat, maybe we should just go the whole hog by preserving not only the buildings but also the people, lifestyle and cultural artefacts of the past. we can then reconstruct the past through dramatised re-enactments of peranakan weddings. school children and tourists, i’m sure, will enjoy and learn from such activities. or else, we can just preserve the buildings and prop the landscape with boutique peranakan and eurasian restaurants, ornamental street lights, side street gardens, neon lights and colourful art-deco shophouses. we then invite the nouveau rich for a tour. if not, flatten joo chiat, bring in the vietnamese girls and build casinos, ktvs, and ten more hotel 81.

and, yes, i really hope that the lumps are benign. i truly respect the brutal honesty of that entry. it's so heartfelt. i love you more, michelle.

sincerely

yes man

motorcycle stories

2005-07-03T14:23:00.000+08:00

the motorcycle is on sale, but no serious buyer, reminiscence of the still subdued market when car dealers come into shopping centres to make people buy their cars and when nobody wants to buy houses anymore and when people worry about their factory jobs and when precarious living is the norm nowadays. it was the long weekend and i just recovered from flu. i wanted to see the sunshine after long hours of trying to read a couple of books in bed in between crunching headaches. the heat was unbearable these past few days though, but hopewell then.

i rang chua and kevin and we met at gelang patah esso petrol station at the second link in johor. a short trip it shall be and we talked a little on the value of having a drop zone in singapore and how expensive skydiving is. we decided on our usual short day trip to route 50 turning into kluang and onto a series of jam-braking 90-degree twisties and long sweeping epic curves, flanked by stretches of oil palm plantations and rainforests. truckers on slow-moving lorries carrying oil palm kernels and aggressive drivers on coaches carrying singaporean tourists kept me on the edge of my seat. sometimes a long-tailed macaque or two sat by the side of the road staring through my visor and cursing at the ear-splitting engine roar. i noticed a couple of dead snakes, flat in the middle of the road. we then turned right to route 3 towards kota tinggi.

we had our break only after kota tinggi at a roadside stall. it was rather rundown and didn’t look friendly, but we didn’t care. when i parked, i realised that all eyes were on us, observing our every single movement. i jumped over potholes and dried mudtracks and decided on the grass, seeking the shelter of the stall from the baking sun. the riding boots didn’t help in such terrain. i found a table, called out chua and kevin, took the dainese riding gloves off my wet hands, put the arnette swinger sunnies on the table and slipped the arai helmet off my head. i was drenched as i struggled out of the riding jacket. i was trying to get my senses accustomed to the strange surroundings, kevin satisfying his nicotine habit and chua wanting to pee.

and we were hit by the matronly middle-aged malay lady who’d been watching us. we asked for nasi lemak and many bottles of mineral water. she shrieked our order like commanding a battalion of soldiers. there was a reply from the kitchen and she stormed towards the voice with a picture of gold teeth and foaming saliva at the two corners of her mouth. her bright red lipstick seemed to be at odds with the pale green scarf, humid weather and one kilogram of makeup. a protruding mole on her nose made it odder. she clenched her fist and held up her arms and waved them in the air, mocking the stupidity of the lurking figure in the kitchen. i didn’t really get what it was all about as i stared at the other patrons who continued to eat silently. kevin chain smoked, chua asked for the toilet, and came back with a story.

cheesy night

2005-06-30T23:39:00.000+08:00

tonight i picked up an australian cousin from a singaporean cousin’s place somewhere in pasir ris. i took the cab, got to the void deck and a friend called, ‘when are you going to pick up the invite from me?’ i said, ‘tomorrow at 1, ok?’ ‘sure,’ came the answer. ‘will drop by at your workplace.’ ‘sure,’ i said.

climbed the stairs to the second floor, then called out his name at the open door of a singaporean cousin’s place. i gave him a brotherly hug, then told him to tell me all the stories. he said, ‘sure, mate.’ brought him to bedok central, then told him that bedok is unique because the shopping experience is different from the usual ones you get in other estates. he told me to explain, then i pointed him at a middle-aged lady in her faded pyjamas. i didn’t feel like explaining further, so told him to watch the action at the durian stall outside fairprice supermarket. he couldn’t stand the smell, so we sat at a distance. since we could tolerate noise, so we sat near a vcd shop.

he told me all his stories, so i told him mine. he said he’s on the straight path now, so i nodded and we’re meeting again this saturday. that’s how i spent my thursday night and i hope yours is great too.

peace.love.unity.respect.

2005-06-26T23:52:00.000+08:00

i can eat patience, the glastonbury festival is on and the rain is not a damper. i’d been a fan of such similar festivities, albeit at a much smaller scale. those days i'd be attending gigs of local bands like stomping ground and the opposition party almost every weekend at world trade centre [now harbourfront] and the substation, doused in energetic merriment of slamdancing and moshing, usually fueled by an endless intoxication of alcohol. i soon moved to hanging around at the metropolis, other venues which i can’t seem to remember and gigs at universities. i was introduced to the rave scene by my australian cousin, a hardcore psychedelic drug user. the plur anthem scared the shit out of me and so were my failing grades.

at times, i decked out in my best black t-shirt and forked out large sums of money for glamorous bands like metallica, sonic youth and silverchair. then big day out came and i thought it was grand. i got back to singapore still hyper-ventilating from the atmospheric senses and tried to find a spot in escapades to zouk and womad and discovered none. i found such mainstream music festivities gruesome. the co-optation and commercialization really irked the green-left of me, although nowadays i tend to believe in the value of our fascist state and its corresponding mass hypnotism.

anyway, what intrigues me is the communal uplifted consciousness, similar to any ecstatic religious, sporting and national gatherings, of the crowd of bodies in unison, induced by the loud music, smoke machines, blinding lights, alcohol and drugs. verbal communication is limited as everyone bops up and down. this altered existence far from the mundane repression of our materialistic society releases the constraints of formal public behaviour. it is therapy, spiritual cleansing to some.

my ears are still recovering after years of abuse. the glastonbury festival is on and going to be over soon. and, i still have time, i think, to really work out my abs and tan to boogie my johnson to the nation’s party. bleargh.

isabella chen

2005-06-19T19:02:00.000+08:00

singapore’s print media unleashed a concerted cinematic public lynching, almost like a conspiracy, on the prized goat of the week, isabel chen. she put up a breast-baring photo on her blog, and the powers that be of singapore press holdings made her their flavour for mass hysterical consumption. her blog entries are seen as further proof of the immorality of this young lady. a self-proclaimed sarong party teenage girl, who digs white baloneys of the master race, her ranking in the societal eyes of self-righteous singaporeans is equal to hell-bound rapists, killers, prostitutes and thieves. expectedly, the people’s wrath were quite spectacular and i could sense the whimpering of an injured dog on isabel’s last few blog entries as she made her way to new zealand. the puritans drew their swords and claimed that she’d deviated from the moral and traditional teachings of our forefathers, a witch who must be persecuted and hidden from the innocent and malleable souls of our children.

her entries also indicate a hint of her constant struggles with nymphomania, belle du jour and christianity, and for that just like all of us, she can’t be a unique and autonomous individual for her identity and being are a subjective composite socio-cultural construction of the literature she reads, television shows and movies she watches and people she hangs out with. there is no individual nor free will. so don't resist, just like all of us, but conform to the mould of the model citizen for the sake of the economic survival of this small country. the consumption of liberal sexual mores is one of those which is against the grain of a good singaporean citizen. our reality must match the willful construction of the elites who dominate singapore’s social and political power and, for sure, many people told me, know what is best for singapore. her nihilistic morality is far from the truth, a misguided teen she is, so bless her soul.

ps. say hi to your mom, the forest scares the hell out of me.

tripping tioman

2005-06-16T23:34:00.000+08:00

the tioman trip is gone [photos here]. that morning, i took the taxi to woodlands checkpoint. got through the customs with no bother from the officers. struggled with the crowd when boarding bus 170. i was leaning hard against the door. when it opened, i almost fell in an imaginary loud thud. got to larkin bus terminal and touts told me to go to kuala lumpur. i said ‘mersing’. they gesticulated to other booths. one booth said 10 o’clock and i said ‘thanks. will come back again’. went to the next one and told me to wait for a couple of minutes. a couple didn’t turn up, i got the seat, immediate boarding. i didn’t come back to the first booth. the bus was full of young malay ladies in colourful traditional dress, happily chatting. there was a certain grace about them and i overheard a conversation between one and a young chinese man sitting next to her. she switched to malay when the latter told her he speaks malay. they laughed and giggled throughout the journey. they exchanged contact numbers.

i arrived at mersing to the scorching sun, got the ferry tickets and booked the most expensive chalet in the island. i then lugged my backpack past the toilet and the ammonia smell somehow stuck on me. waited at the ferry terminal, noticed dried blood on the floor, listened to ‘mat rock’ songs emanating from a small radio on a chair a couple of metres away. i drowsed myself to the stimulation of my senses. the security man got bored of his excruciatingly boring job by helping to call out passengers of small boats and big boats, small ferries and big ferries. he had black lips from years of smoking kretek, a small tanned man in an oversized uniform. in a distance a couple was oblivious to staring eyes, busy taking pictures of themselves and exchanging captured moments in joy. they had similar flower motifs on their t-shirts and shorts, clearly head over heels, madly in love with each other.

the ferry came half an hour late and i thought it was normal for a laidback town like mersing, in fact, other malaysian villages, towns and cities as well. i’m fine with that, i’d to switch my expectations. a family of four jumped the queue for choice seats, ferry was full and the river mouth was dirty and smelly. two levels – air-conditioned or otherwise. i decided to go to the upper level. near 2-hour ride. water surface was choppy and strong winds almost ripped my nostrils apart. a man was busy video-recording the sights. he forgot his young daughter who was trying to tell him something. after a couple of attempts, she decided to join her mother in a doze. the man continued to record, i thought the overcast murdered the bright colours. my ancient 3.2 megapixel camera remained in my pocket. the couple was still busy taking snapshots and i saw a lady whose skin was as rough as the water then, wondered whether she would go into the sea for a dip. a malay-looking man with wavy hair was staring at the distance. he’d a gigantic gold cross hanging from his neck, had two cameras, a video camera, one son, one daughter, one wife and one mother-in-law. mother-in-law incessant complains about migraine irritated him.

there were a couple of drop off points, the crowd began to thin out, before mine. a group of singaporeans were waiting for the boat to take them to renggis island for a standard snorkelling package. they eyed me, a scrutiny for what motive i could only guess. took the small hotel bus to berjaya spa and resort. the room was extremely luxurious. i’m ashamed. thought of juara but this short trip prohibited me from doing a more adventurous one. another time perhaps for this one was meant to unwind my battered urban psyche. unpacked and went for a walkabout before a meal at the main restaurant. quite a number of splurging european tourists were bent on getting tanned under the thatch canopies, reading a book, baring their breasts. some were seen sipping martinis, eating pizzas by the sunken bar next to the swimming pool. the jacuzzi was popular, hardly any space left. it was bizarre to see a multi-ethnic contingent seated next to each other enjoying the bubbles massaging their crotches and butt cracks. had enough, i slept like a baby.

like other tourists, the next day was a routined routine of sunrise walk by the beach, buffet breakfast, swim in the sea, swim in the pool, ala-carte lunch, boat trip to renggis, snorkelling, sunset walk by the beach, western-themed dinner, room-delivery supper and sleep on a king-size bed. in between the routine, i spotted my favourite tioman character, an indian man in his fifities, swimming trunk was in the american flag colours, dark blue strip with horizontal red and white stripes. he looked like a half-naked captain america as he strutted along the edge of the pool. and i made imelda a necklace of seashells and dead corals, and smuggled them into singapore. that night i’d to apply lots of after-sun cream on my very sore face, neck, shoulders and back.

the third day was spent travelling back to racist singapore. the journey was delayed because the ferry had to wait for the tide to rise, the bus came late, the bus driver wanted to have lunch. adjacent to me on the bus was a middle-aged lady from china. she was with her son, only son i presume, and her husband. she freaked me out. she had thick curly hair, almost like pubic hair, running down her legs. my journey was dotted with occasional extended moments of my vision lingering on her hairy legs. i’m still traumatised, scarred forever.

turkish delight

2005-06-12T21:39:00.000+08:00

togged in shorts, t-shirt and flip-flops, i made my way to crowded east coast park with imelda for dinner last night. we decided to go turkish but hesitated initially because the restaurant was teeming with people. there were eight tables or so in the barely decorated restaurant as i stared at the faces from the outside through the glass door hoping that they would finish their food fast. i saw a mother nearest to us with her baby. with a worried look on a made-up face, she seemed to be waiting for her husband or her companion. i then wondered how she would eat when the table was taken up by a couple of shopping bags filled with goodies amongst sticks of balloons.

next to her table were four unlikely adults having a meal. two white dudes, two malay ladies and a baby. the dudes looked like they appeared straight from a backpacker’s fashion magazine; beer lao t-shirt, thai fisherman’s pants, stubble and unwashed hair. i slotted that in mind as a reminder for my next backpacking trip end of this year that only a true gentleman travel in immaculate style, just like michael palin. anyway, one of the malay ladies wore a tudung which i thought was a little odd and on her lap was an adorable baby of mixed parentage. i couldn’t figure out the connection between those four.

beside them was a teenage couple which i didn’t really notice except for the skimpy outfit of the pubescent girl. opposite the aisle was another couple with two motorcycle helmets occupying two other seats of that table. the couple appeared uncertain as they scrutinised the menu and gave fleeting looks at the other tables. after a persistent prodding from the lady, the man stood up and walked to the counter to make his order. next to them was a family loud in conversation. the couple probably was intimidated with their merriment display. the family's boisterous nature was against the pleads of a peaceful meal of the other customers. yet another couple sitting adjacent to them gave disapproval stares but continued to devour their turkish bread and kebabs. the lady was the adult version of the mixed parentage baby and her date was this mediterranean man with thick eyebrows and hairy arms. he was like a carpet.

after a torturous wait of a good five minutes, we came to the conclusion that none of the denizens would leave the air-conditioned cocoon, and so the footpath table it was. imelda did the ordering and she being the generous one last night paid for the meal. i asked for iskender kebab for i just love the thinly-cut grilled lamb slices on tomato sauce, bread and yoghurt. imelda ordered pide, turkish pizza i would call it, and chicken kebab. the pide was a little moist because unlike pides of other turkish restaurants, this one had eggplant and cabbage in it. my order came but it wasn't iskender kebab. i told the waiter and my growling stomach was already in protest. finally, it came and i savoured the sourish taste by the side of a busy walkway.

hordes of people walked, scooted and skated past us and sometimes stealing glances at our meal. we talked and i would laugh whenever i took notice of any goofball. soon enough, the other three footpath tables were occupied. a stud and a femme fag of the guppies kind were next to us. toned and tanned bodies versus my beer belly. immaculate looks versus my dishevelled projection. i’m too embarrassed and imelda insisted that i would look great if i’m anal about my physical appearance. i agreed with her and told her that i'll go to the gym, join club one seven, buy tight-fitting clothes and take up recreational inline skating. nevertheless, the word ‘anal’ caused my anus to pucker in a rhythmic convulsion.

throughout the meal, i noticed a few more quirky ones. two friends wore the same pair of levis jeans, black spaghetti strap blouse and exotic sequinned and beaded sandals. the slimmer girl had sagging butt while the other possessed tight ones though. in the midst, i saw a man with his three daughters. the girls were running around playing chase in girly squeals as the father tried to have a semblance of control. then i saw a balding man with his china girl, and moments later, a man with his vietnamese girl. the strong smell of shampoo pervaded the salty air when the vietnamese girl ambled past. i could have sat and observed the socio-cultural dispersions of the present singapore for hours but imelda reminded me that we needed go to parkway parade to exchange money for our short trip to tioman.

tv loves me

2005-06-10T23:54:00.000+08:00

when i switched on the tv, it was mainly to catch some mainstream news or an episode or two of ‘get real’. the latter, truthfully, is because of my fascination with diana ser’s vast forehead more than anything else. last night, however, i was out of synch with my cosmic understanding of what’s good for me. i watched the premiere of ‘lost’. i was hypnotized initially until the appearance of the polar bear. i laughed so hard and calmed down only when imelda smacked me on the head. i finished watching it and was so curious about the show that i read the summary of the next 23 episodes on the official website. i’m a sucker and i love tv.

nostalgia and the ideal

2005-06-04T18:02:00.000+08:00

when you wake up and find everything seems so blasé, you’ll end up like me, a blasé fellow. this whole week was a cauldron of the emotionally disengaged me. the fluorescent street lights were a blur similar to the running texts and images of girly magazines, the murmurs and sweat at bedok bus station were conflations of pink cotton candies, and advertising billboards locked the view of passengers to the greying hair of an old man instead of the manicured landscape outside. i’d been looking through the spectacle of my world sluggishly from a rocking chair on a tedium plane of frozen time waiting for somebody to be bowled out. it was slow and the fast-forward button was missing.

i was flicking the television channel on thursday night, and my brother announced to me that he’s being considered for a position at club med village of bali. that got my blasé existence excited. it’s not the ideal but it’s damn close to my idealised version. the beach and surf are only a few steps away from the private resort. the sun, the sand, and the coconut trees. clichéd, but i was already looking backward in a lingering longing. the remedy was a return to ‘home’, just like many immigrants whose diasporic identities somehow couldn’t fit nicely into the dominant socio-cultural puzzle of their adopted countries.

the place was gracetown, western australia and the time was the irresponsible youthful days. the drive along the coastal stretch brought the three of us to a hilly area. vast undulating hills on my left and the blue ocean on my right. we entered a series of sharp turns and behind the massive protruding rock wall the view opened to a much lesser ostentatious images of monaco i saw on television. the houses peeked from the cliff. i was like a child in a maze. we parked near the only general store and petrol station in town and soaked in the cold morning air. we surveyed the waves and got the vibes that the two main breaks were exclusively for the locals. we witnessed three generations of surfers went down the gravelled path. it was surreal, a scene which i never could have imagined until then. we sat at the exact spot of the future 1996 tragedy, watching them in envy in the chilly wind for a couple of hours. gracetown epitomises the kind of small town eco lifestyle i’ve always idealised versus the artificial concrete urban setting of this great country of ours.

when my brother told me jokingly that he wanted the dust-covered surfboard on top of my cupboard if he decides to take up the job, i felt a very strong urge to return to gracetown. the current ugly flats, crowded shopping centres, strict formalities, contaminated air, obnoxious teenagers and billboard infested walkways were inverted for the fond and precious memories of graceful gracetown. the yearn and appeal for the place seemed to overwhelm the realisation that my youthful temporal being has forever barrelled through the black hole of time. i can return to the place, but i can’t go back to my younger days. it’ll not be the same and the possibility of being disappointed is real. sanitizing the memories and betraying the present is a sign of dissatisfaction with my privileged current condition.

my brother is contemplating hard. if given the opportunity, i told him i'ld like to be in his shoes. but then again i don’t have the guts to give up what i have now for something else. i’ve been slogging day and night for the past many years to build my finances to ensure that my children, if ever i get married, will be playing mind-numbing playstation games, rocking to 5000 indie poop songs on their colourful ipods, developing their social skills through hours of faceless msn chat and sms, feeding their realities with reality shows, and tripping on a trip to disneyland, hong kong. for now, i’m happy listening to the crystal skulls.

history of my tears

2005-05-29T18:25:00.000+08:00

a friend cried while delivering a farewell speech dedicated to a man who has mentored him for 17 years. it was a sincere public display of unadulterated gratitude. he choked when somehow idealised nostalgic memories flooded him halfway through the speech. and looking at the last entry, now i’m in the mood to muse about the history of my tears while listening to samples of maximo park.

the very first cry i remember, if i’m not wrong, was when i was about four or so. the 3 cm scar at the bottom of my left foot near the last toe serves as a reminder of the intense searing pain inflicted upon a child by a piece of broken glass the size of a fifty-cent coin. upon seeing the red blood oozing out in copious amounts, i cried with a guttural vibrancy of a wretched woman leaving my throat hoarse for a couple of days. my uncle told me that when he found me i was in a frenzied state, swimming in the sand at the front yard of my grandmother’s house. besides cleaning the wound, he had to dig sand out of my mouth. it was authentic and it was my first performance.

there were other minor performances in between before the mighty scream when i was in primary five. this big fellow kept disturbing me in class. he got bored with the rest and came for me one day. i kept brushing off his provoking moves until he kicked my chair in mockery while on the way to collecting his exercise book from the teacher. i decided to wait for him outside school. i had several fights before this one, and little did i realise that this was going to be the first defeat. he appeared from the school gate and i put down my school bag. i ran as fast as my legs could bring me towards him and let go of a series of punches and kicks with a long scream of an anger. i used all my strength with the intention of exacting the mightiest pain on him. he calmly blocked my attempts. he didn’t even hit me and soon i admitted defeat. i walked away with my head down and a long drawn resignation sob in front of the whole school. it was humiliation. then on, i became fascinated with martial arts which i lost interest many years ago when i ruined my right knee. nevertheless, the years of learning karate, boxing and judo taught me how to control my more extreme emotions. it was also a transitional period to a more calmer existence.

still i cried during my teenage years, but it was exclusively performed within the private sphere of my home. crying in public is an act of weakness which every super-rational man who’s in control of any situation must avoid. there’s always a fear that a man crying openly invites derision instead of acceptance and sympathy. it didn’t help that i was engaged in mainly rugged and macho male-dominated activities and the people i know then were mainly boys and men. to thrive in this environment means that i‘d to restrain my tears and show my cold, calculated poker face. and it was this face that caused the relationship i had with my first girlfriend. i was still feeling the way then and i didn’t know that i'd to ditch the macho swashbuckling ways if i want to gain the acceptance of intellectual women. since time immemorial, the dumb ones are somehow attracted to the gun-slinging marlboro cowboy types while cheering with their pom-poms at the gallery to the brave attempts of subjugating their opponents. the more domineering women of intellect, on the other hand, prefer the emotionally engaged ones. the wimps, in macho vocabulary.

and so with my interest in women increased dramatically during my late teen years, i realised that my crying was not seen in disdain but i became the metro who was very much in tune with my emotional sensitivities. this intimate awareness made me more responsive and conscious of the rich emotional intensities of women. i was more ready to let go of a tear or two when experiencing vulnerable situations, especially in the company of women. camellia and kay adored me because of that quality. in our years together, i’ve to admit that sometimes the tears were a performance to get a simple cuddle or gain their compassionate responses. at other times, the tears were a natural and sincere flow.

with imelda, my tears have a different story. she’s the stoic kind who seldom displays her emotions openly. she’s also the kind who believes that her man must be strong in times of adversary. and a couple of times when i was in the mood to tell her my self-defining sob stories, i was greeted with hard-hearted remarks like, ‘don’t be silly’ and ‘must you cry’. the narrations were clearly told with the single objective to stir the listener’s heart. the tears in my eyes were clouding my vision. she was not moved at all by the stories and the sight of a teary grown man. i was embarrased. my understanding of feminine codes was undermined. she said that some men had come to use crying as a performance to hide their real motives. and i told her i’m not lee kuan yew.

i cried today

2005-05-24T19:04:00.000+08:00

i cried just now. i can't remember when i cried that much. i was too caught up with work, trying to complete the task i saw as very necessary that i forgot somebody else had her side of the story. i didn't mean to hurt her, yet she was hurt so bad. i thought what i was doing was right but when i appreciated hers, i caved in, i apologised, i cried in front of her, and i subdued the feminine codes.

solipsistic advertisement

2005-05-22T16:07:00.000+08:00

i’m too bloody lazy to muse today and teenage fanclub latest album is out. their first album, a catholic education, sure brings back fond memories. anyway, the boys won the dragon boat competition and that was great given all the hard training i forced them to do. some of them can already do thirty over pull ups and they’re becoming freaks with massive upper body and pencil-like legs. in between the races, i caught them comparing their tan and biceps. i then imagined them as a family of gorillas walking the great plains of congo.

on friday, i surprised jane by sending her a bouquet of pink roses to her workplace. the message on the card was something like ‘happy, happy 30th birthday. secret admirer.’ she freaked out, as intended, and was paranoid, calling the florist a couple of times to identify the sender. she sent an austere sms and i had to confess. i like her as a good friend and will do anything to make her smile and forget the daily drones. hitting 30 is a milestone to me and for her and everybody else too, i guess. i remember when i hit 30 i became old instantly.

we went to jerry’s yesterday with ah fong. i told them that when i buy flowers i usually would tell margaret, my most frequented florist at siglap because i’m too arse lazy to go to my usual florist at raffles city, how i prefer my bouquet. i like the flowers to be tightly bunched up in the centre with a sprinkling of seeded eucalyptus and white english statice as fillers. the flowers must then be bounded by wide and large green leaves, and wrapped with dark green paper. that’s how i like my bouquet. jane and ah fong gave an inquisitive look. the three of us also gave an inquisitive look when we entered the scarlet hotel.

anyway, ah fong is taking the plunge to pursue his passion and interest. he’s going to ditch a secure job with a secure income which will be the basis of a secure family and secure life, to become a photographer, an unstable job with an unstable income which will be the basis of an unstable family and unstable life. he showed us pictures of radiant hui hui in a studio shoot. the size of each photo was so big that we had to wait a good five minutes for all 128 photos to download. hui hui is getting married this june and we’re going to onyx at one fullerton this friday to celebrate. ah fong then gave us a run down on the finer points of studio photo shoot. to get the right lighting is tedious and i rather do outdoor photography. i told them i like the overexposed look in photos.

we all then finally made our way to climb adventure after a couple of calls from fizzure. shake and terrain were also there. ah fong wanted to make shake his photo subject and by the time we got there shake was already dead beat from the many climbs he already did. terrain, the motor mouth, let go of a barrage of expletives when i took pictures of her struggling to climb the wall. that shocked the other patrons. shake told me to take shots of her butt and i obliged. shake also told me he had a good view of the action as a belayer and insisted that it’s unhygienic to share climbing shoes. and being the good-looking and horny man that he is, shake also added that he can’t wait to go on his month-long june backpacking trip to brazil and argentina so that he can ogle at bikini-clad latin wimmin. in fact, he’s leaving this tuesday.

after that, fizzure, ah fong, jane and i walked in the rain to look for a coffee place. we couldn’t find any and ended up flagging a taxi for menotti at raffles city. we all had fancy coffees and equally fancy italian deserts on extraordinarily fanciful plates. beside us, a fat indian lady, a geeky looking chinese lady and an effeminate malay man were sharing yuppie tales of anguish and nostalgia. they were talking about flights to wonderful cities like london, paris, milan, tokyo and new york. and we talked about magazine design philosophies and argued about fonts, photoshop layering and glossy versus matt papers, and how it is sunny in perth and melbourne and bleak in london and singapore. we all love the london underground though.

i was accused by the lot as not being observant because i didn’t realise the waiter had cleared our table. i was nevertheless very observant of this beautiful indian lady, sitting at the other side. she was with two of her female acquaintances. her skin was dark brown and they glowed just like her attractive smile. she had sharp features on a perfect oval face: small and gem-studded straight nose which had a slight fleshy tip protecting the subtle nostrils, prominent cheeks which were highly set, full and round lips painted with cocoa-coloured lipstick, a not-so-deep set glittering eyes, and delicate and silky long curls. i was fascinated and i wanted to complement her looks but decided not to.

later, i left the group to meet imelda. we talked a little and argued a lot. i then went home, feeling weary, fell asleep and dreamt of solipsistic city.

nazi drag queen

2005-05-17T21:57:00.000+08:00

many of us are so obsessed with having a consistent self. we believe in these fabrications that we become hopeless romantics and stay in the rut until we begin to notice that everybody else is moving on. we tie ourselves to the lamppost of cultural practices, societal norms and expectations, religious rituals, familiar surroundings and faces, skin colour and parents’ wealth, chasing our shadows around and around without stopping to realise that it’s potentially liberating to unshackle the rope and walk down that bridge of the few who dare to break the stereotypes. be a drag queen, put on the thick make-up, sexy lingerie, blonde wig and black high-heels, take pictures and show them to your dad. subjectivity in a big city of rich countries is like browsing a catalogue: choose and you will be granted. and through this invention, a posteriori, we truly understand ourselves perfectly rather than the fabrications that are given to us a priori and accept without questioning.

it takes guts to experiment on the meanings and shades of our individual responsibilities as a person living among others independent from our given subjectivities. it can be as little as giving a cold stare at someone who continues to pretend that the old man standing in front of him doesn’t need a seat in the train, to embracing the libertarian standards of martin see’s ‘political’ film and drinking urine in public in a superstar suicidal celebration. i’ve pushed myself very far during my reckless younger days and as i get older i’m whimpering to an evident embrace of wholesome conservative entertainment and right wing politics. give me power and i’ll be a gun-toting nazi to ensure the hegelian organic unity in this community i live in is intact.

she's a social construction

2005-05-15T19:22:00.000+08:00

i woke up that morning and she was already up and about in the kitchen. it was a breakfast of minced meat in scrambled eggs served with toasted bread at the side. i gave her the most charming smile and said ‘thank you’ as she placed a cup of unsweetened hot tea with milk gently on the glass coaster. she then asked me whether i would be back for dinner and to that i replied, ‘no. i’m having dinner with some friends.’ i put on my socks and shoes, kissed her and left in a hurry with my bag, helmet, gloves, protective eyewear and keys.

i walked along the corridor to the lift area, passing by the distinct musty smell of my neighbour's flat. a lurking shadow of her so early in the morning was a familiar sight. she greeted me and began to turn her head left and right in rhythmic counts of fours, followed by up and down. she then rolled her shoulders. her morning beat is a one-hour walk around the neighbourhood. her husband left her many years ago and she single-handedly brought up her two daughters and one of whom i saw last night, clad in micro black shorts and flowery patterned top which revealed much of her not much bosoms. she was radiant and beautiful though, an eye-candy as she stepped out of her orange nissan march, adding to the smiles of male hdb dwellers.

the lift opened and i stepped out into the cauldron of humidity. the air was unduly heavy, i thought i was breathing water. a couple of steps later and the air was filled with the acrid smell of fish. she was squatting as ten or so cats meowed in anticipation of her delivery of rice and shredded boiled fish. her frizzy hair of permed curls were above her shoulders and the more i looked at her the more she looked like a fish. she laid cut-up newspapers on the floor and scooped the rice and fish from a big plastic bag. she saw me and blurted, ‘pak tor, ah?’ ‘no lah, auntie. so early in the morning.’

i got to work and switched on the lights as i would be the first one usually to arrive. i then put my black bag and helmet on the shelf where all the other personal paraphernalia like toiletries, shorts, t-shirts, socks, small towel, and a bottle of engine oil are. i then whipped out my laptop from the drawer under my table, fixed the lan, mouse, power and headphone cables, before i proceeded on to switching it on, tuned to woxy for some perky music and checked my emails.

fifteen minutes later i heard her heels slapping the tiled floor as she entered the office from the other door. as all of us are separated by six-foot panels, i could only imagine what she was doing from the sounds she made. like me and many others, it was her habit to switch on the computer first but before that she without fail would let go a long drawn resignation sigh as she plonked herself on the swivelled office chair. her appearance was always immaculate. always in bright coloured outfits bought mainly from mango, it was an appearance definitely suitable for a job which does not require boardroom power meetings. she had dark brown streaks running down her hair, a natural pink shade for her lips and a clear lacquer for her nails.

a devout buddhist and strict yoga practitioner, she embraced clean living, so no meat, alcohol, cigarettes and swearing. still single, i could see how her eyes twinkle and her speech slurred to a flirtatious hint, whenever i caught the two of them in conversation. but a relationship it would never be. sometimes, she told me stories of how she struggled to teach her maid to take the necessary care and precautions of her wheelchair-bound mother who was struck with a stroke a couple of months ago. and that morning i reminded her again not to sigh so early in the morning.

i felt the build up of liquid in my bladder. i got up, walked past her cubicle, waved at her, went out through the glass door and made a left turn for the toilet. she started her job early in the morning to ensure that both the male and female toilets were in spotless conditions. she had this cleaner’s cart which was filled with cleaning gadgetries and toilet supplies. she raised her tattooed eyebrows, gave a timid smile, as usual, and hastily made room for me in an already crammed space. i smiled back at her for the only language we could understand each other were gestures and facial expressions. she wiped the trickle of sweat on her forehead and continued with her cleaning. i decided that it was more appropriate for me to use the cubicle than the urinal. halfway through, a waft of concentrated air freshener almost choked me.

i went back to the cubicle and grabbed hold of my copy of ‘singapore women re-presented’. i flipped the pages and i didn’t quite like the voices in the book. i don’t think they’re representational but i like olga polunin’s painting on the cover though. i’m trying hard to understand women but somehow my interpretations always fall far away from an impossible understanding of the 'second' sex. i started with jane austen’s 'sense and sensibility' and gave up after a chapter. i really tried and that was because i wanted to impress my very first girlfriend in junior college. we broke up after six months. somehow i couldn’t carry myself to the requirements of a ladies’ man as i was more comfortable in the obnoxious territory of my male counterparts. the next attempt was when my third girlfriend, kay, introduced me to lisa loeb, alanis morissette, jill sobule and tori amos years ago, and i thought all women are poetic. in uni i then enrolled myself into a year-long gender studies module, and i thought all women are social constructions. now that i'm in the fantastic working world, i thought all women are ...

shites, so many things to write about and i want to respond to the latest 'political' film debacle. i’m trying to finish gabriel marquez’s ‘living to tell the tale’ but that biography has to wait until i’ve plenty of idle time. lined up behind that are the biographies of nick flynn’s ‘another bullshit night in suck city’, and edward said’s ‘out of place’. in the que also are yasmin ahmad’s ‘sepet’, stacy peralta's 'dog town and z boys', dagur kari’s ‘noi albinoi’ and sam green’s ‘the weather underground’. work is beckoning and there's not much time. do check out these videos before they're gone and have a good week ahead, you all!

bmw hp2

2005-05-08T12:52:00.001+08:00

i told myself i'm going to quit the motorcycling world and be like the rest by end of june, and bmw must come up with this 1200cc enduro beast. i'm a fashion slave and i'm fucked.

with this machine i'll be enticed to do this.

check out the specs. although it doesn't even come close to the specs of a top sportsbike, it's a powerful tool enough for a fun outing on the dirt tracks. pretend you're in awe even if you can't figure out the numbers.

engine
capacity (cc) 1,170cc
bore/stroke (mm) 101/73
max output (kW/bhp) 77/105 at (rpm) 7,000
max torque (Nm/lb-ft) 115/85 at (rpm) 5,500
engine configuration boxer (flat-twin)

power transmission/gearbox
clutch single-plate dry clutch, dia 180 mm/7.1
gearbox dog-type six-speed gearbox
primary transmission ratio 1.823

gear ratios
I - 2.277
II - 1.583
III - 1.259
IV - 1.033
V - 0.903
VI - 0.805
rear-wheel drive driveshaft
final drive ratio 2.82

running gear and suspension
type of frame steel tubular spaceframe, non-load-bearing engine
wheel guidance, front UPSD fork, dia 45mm
wheel guidance, rear BMW Paralever

brakes
front single-disc brake, dia 305 mm
rear single-disc brake, dia 265 mm
no ABS

wheels cross-spoke wheels
front 1.85 x 21
rear 2.5 x 17

tyres
front 90/90-21 M/C 54Q M+S TL, MCE Karoo 2 (T)
rear 140/80-17 M/C 69Q M+S TL, MCE Karoo (T)

dimensions and weight
length, overall (mm) 2,350
width, overall, with mirrors (mm) 880
handlebar width, w/o mirrors (mm) 828
seat height (mm) 920
weight, unladen, with full tank (kg) 196.5
max permissible (kg) 380
tank capacity (ltr) 13

fuel consumption
90 km/h ltr/100 km - 4.1
120 km/h ltr/100 km - 5.5

acceleration
0100 km/h sec 3.2
standing start sec 22.3
top speed km/h 200

and chua told me that he's going to organise a light enduro trip to endau rompin again come vesak day long weekend. i'm fucked.

syrupy hero

2005-05-07T21:05:00.000+08:00

idle beats

gave way to swirling vapours

i saw at the

yellow box today. the rain

in the sunshine
didn’t go down well

with the swearing, phlegm and burps
of the taxi driver. but there're more

than enough seatbelts
for the three of us,

she seemed to say. and i relented
on the dull tappings

of a mobile phone. entertained
by the idiocy

of the vagueness

further down the road
i held on to the seat

though i wasn’t afraid
just a tinge of regret

in a city’s rage
being immaculate

is not my forte. the map
is for me to explore its intricacies

and not to dwell

in an observation

from the 12th storey
but when the rain has stopped

and the road is dry
when everyone goes out again,

we look at the days
of snapshots

that remind us of the people
we’ve talked about. hoping

on a mutual faith
of the cold stare

the girl with the red lipstick
on the bus gave me. though

she didn’t notice it
for her wanderings skidded

outside the window
so she’ll never comprehend, like how
i’m oblivious

to the motion blur

in a moving vehicle
i just want to be nice

and empathise the taxi driver
he was rather ill

that was why he was

in a foul mood
still he drove

for a reason. whisper to me
i'm a syrupy hero. i over-indulge

forget new york

2005-05-07T00:54:00.000+08:00

how does it feel?
how does it feel?
to be on your own
with no direction home
like a complete unknown
like a rolling stone
bob dylan

when i decide my being, i mould the plastic to the plan, and soon it feels real, warm and comfortable like the familiar sweet smell from the bakery across the road and the routine of wearing my left shoe first. or so i thought. but certain elements of this form somehow will be resisted, like how i tell her that she’s chinese and she can’t live pretending to be a white girl. the people in government says so and they say malays don’t usually gamble, and the aunties at the void deck nod in agreement for they just told their children yesterday that malays are lazy. it’s hurtful because it’s an imposition, like a salesman selling insurance. ‘it’s good for you, sir. don’t you want your loved ones to feel secure if you, touch wood, get into a mishap. it’ll give you a peace of mind. you want that, don’t you?’

the moulds are cast, my space is restricted and i’ve a limited menu to choose from. i want to be a hero like a renegade doctor, saving the unfortunate and all, but i can’t for it’s just a dream, illusion and myth. i’m told to be a stenographer instead and record down other people’s words. i just have to accept that my pre-ordered being is as distinctive as the maps, graphs, monographs, statistics, demographics and architectural blue prints. i’m already defined, so no need to be a transgender or ultra-metro timothy go or be engaged in imaginative urban roaming. although liberating, living a life of continual shifts in plastic values and resisting dominant multiplicities can be very unsettling, so it’s better to just carry on living in bristol. the soothing familiarity of the accent is a lullaby of anti-adventurers. why resist when the familiar is comforting?

the dust has settled on the road, and i don’t want to sit by the street and suffocate again when a heavy truck passes by for the other side the grass is green and flowers have bloomed. i’m straight and i don’t want to get my ass pounded.

zircon gov. pawn starz.

2005-05-01T16:47:00.000+08:00

coming back to yesterday’s musings, i realise that there’s a constant flux of usurpation and cooptation of practices and products which are deemed as subversive, radical or madness. cosmetic surgery and tattooing are two products which are already commodified for mainstream consumers. tattooing is no more a resistance identity tag par excellence of a young male who sells pirated computer cds and illegal porn vcds by the roadside, but a chic symbol of coolness among bored middle-class youths. tattoos in tribal, traditional or underworld communities are religious, mythological, cosmic or superpower translations of their realities or social rituals, but nowadays, tattoos at parlours serve no meaning but mere decorations on skin canvases. it is depoliticised art, ridding the intended meanings of the original discourses. the consumer goes into the parlour or clinic, selects his tattoo or type of cosmetic surgery, pays for it at the counter, joins the rest of his executive friends on expensive harleys in the weekend with a new tattoo on his arm and a new nose pretending to be a rebel. loud and empty.

ayumi is monetary transaction and image manipulation. she is x’ho, eating disorders, cosmetic surgery, body shaping, fakir musafar and eyeliners. the body is the performance stage, indulgence and excess, the other in a cycle of subordination, acceptance, resistance and reappropriation, colouring the values and shifts of the owner against, in parallel or within the current parameters of societal acceptance. her songs are crap and i still cannot see the authentic.

i’m in limbo tonight
my eyes are on her. i listen
to the drones of passing cars
like salt on ashtray by the table
i discover her laughter. licking
her bitterness in this humid tone
reaching for the door handle
her lacquered nails
on shrivelled hands. typing
swiftly to send messages
like white and black paints
by the side of the road. inconspicuous
to my yellow eyes, but there
i know. it’s there
and i don’t quite like the haziness
between a howling radio
and the mutterings of a taxi driver
as she nods into a succumb
i wave the phone away
a faltering speech. the spell
is blinding. a gesture. i grin

reappropriation

2005-04-30T18:05:00.000+08:00

liminality, marginality, and structural inferiority are conditions in which are frequently generated myths, symbols, rituals, philosophical systems, and works of art. these cultural forms provide men with a set of templates or models which are, at one level, periodical reclassifications of reality and man's relationship to society, nature, and culture. but they are more than classifications, since they incite men to action as well as to thought. each of these productions has a multivocal character, having many meanings, and each is capable of moving people at many psychobiological levels simultaneously.
victor turner

i’m always interested in how we manufacture our bodies to conform or transgress claims of a perfect body. i, for one, believe in a foetal existence of non-modification, probably, because i was in resistance to the avant-garde guerilla statement my good friend was trying to make when we were fifteen. he was deep into inking his skin cheap through diy tattooing until he had money to go to a parlour later on. also, i didn’t have the same iron balls as his to modify my body. whatever it is, i was duly impressed. his was a revolutionary act at that point of time besides the ritualistic two cans of beer another friend bought at siglap’s 7-eleven every morning, on the way to school. he would gulp one at the alley behind, take the other one on the bus and suck it through a straw. for fuck sakes, we were only fifteen. i would like to thank god for bestowing me the good life although i was surrounded by misfits, rebels, losers and demented souls. these friends turn out shit now and somehow still cannot fit into the demands of modern urban living of this beautiful nation of ours. pardon them, dear god, for living in perpetual sin. amen.

nevertheless, their restless conditions to always resist the normative rituals, regimes, codes, practices, performances and rules of the mainstream generate a marginal social identity, seen as grotesque and idiotic by many. their willingness to pursue this discourse instead of living in yuppie glee like walking barefoot on the fine white sand along the beach, watching an imported play of a grand extravaganza complete with fireworks at the esplanade, buying an exclusive penthouse at east coast road, going on tours to nepal and tibet taking photographs and posting them on an online portfolio, sipping exotic tea lattes while reading marquez’s ‘living to tell the tale’, investing in stocks and shares for a better future, playing golf every sunday at the prestigious singapore island country club, driving a peugeot coupe-cabriolet around this sunny island, guessing who the next winner of survivor is, and dancing to down-tempo big beat at zouk.

my friend, at such a tender age, was already into reappropriating his body from the advertising media and fashion industry. he was into shock and awe and his parents were freaked out by this exhibition of visual politics. ‘mom, they’re only tattoos,’ he often said. he could pull it off because his parents named him romeo and he was the most good-looking dude in school and parkway parade. i’d never suspected his views and till now i believe it was genuine and not a stunt. he left this country about a decade ago and had never returned since.

anyway, ayumi still fascinates me. i’m hungry and i want to come back to this tomorrow after washing my motorcycle and a haircut. in the meanwhile, you all may continue to fakir musafar. have a great weekend!

my story

2005-04-28T23:45:00.000+08:00

i was curious, i was fascinated and i was amused. apparently a friend was ogling at this product by the brand name of ayumi hamasaki. i took it away from him and decided to borrow it for a day or so. i was intrigued and i studied the cd inside out. on the cover is ayumi in a camisole with pink lace-trimmings, pink bow on a v-neckline and pink floral motifs on black fabric.

here is a woman who has no qualms in manufacturing her body and facial features. she is transdermal implants, nail lacquer, face lift, anorexia bulimia, lipo suction, bodybuilding, tattoos, eye-liner, genital modifications, lip augmentation, piercing, eyeball jewelry, gender dysphoria, 3-d modifications, botox, implantations, laser branding, nasal sculpture, lipstick, apotemnophilia, beading, eyelid surgery, scarification, body contouring, micro-dermabrasion, breast reduction, mascara, body dismorphia, hair removal, silicones, laser skin resurfacing, abdominoplasty and ear sculpture.

the body is the other, not exactly a home, but a performance stage. histories, narratives and socio-cultural constructions. men, television, money, and beauty. oppression, ugliness, resistance, empowerment, agents of control, ideological manipulations and deviance. shites, i’m enjoying this. i’ll continue this sunday with a longer piece. now, i’m tired and i want to sleep.

of menses and crankiness

2005-04-27T22:18:00.000+08:00

[somewhere in marine parade]
>> i’m at the parking lot. where are you?
>> still at the library. there’s something wrong with the borrowing machine.
>> i thought you're done at the library.
>> no. you sound cranky.
>> am i? and you shouldn’t have told me to leave my workplace when you’re not done.
>> ok.
>> just 'ok'? so, are you coming?
>> yes.
>> are you sure?
[end of call. five minutes later]
>> where are you?
>> still waiting for you.
>> i’m at the atm machine .
>> funny. i didn’t see you walk past me.
>> i’m here already. can you make your way here?
>> yes, i will.
>> be quick.
>> why should i?
>> hurry up.
>> oh ok. i see you now.
[end of call]
>> what are we having today?
>> what’s wrong with you?
>> nothing is wrong. where are we going? i need to go home after this to finish some work.
>> nothing is wrong? you're a cranky twerp, i'll let you decide on where we're going to eat, and why must you go home early?
>> am i cranky? i don’t quite like your laidback attitude and i need to complete some work by tonight. where are we going?
>> i don’t know. up to you. and it wasn’t my fault. it was the machine.
>> yeah, but i waited for more than fifteen minutes and you could’ve informed me. but no, i was the one who rang you. weather is super humid and i’m itching from the sweat and wet shirt.
>> so, was it the weather or me?
>> both.
>> we shouldn’t meet when you've to go home right after dinner. you’re a twerp.
>> and you’re having menses. and stop calling me names.
>> now i’m the emotional one?
>> maybe.
>> you started it all first. you’re like the weather and you give me the itch.
>> are you done?
>> yes.
>> where are we going?
>> home.
>> what do you mean?
>> i want to go home.
>> ok, fine. we'll go home.

daffodils

2005-04-25T21:28:00.000+08:00

i tried to look and failed to see the sublime i was hoping for. i wanted to pull the strings so much, to make it resonate but somehow everything turned out insipid and monochrome. i lost the aesthetic, and that is a pity. perhaps, i was just tired. i could only make out her eyes. and until now her eyes never fail to bore me. they're that beautiful and were the ones i noticed first a long time ago. then, waves of meanings were born out of that single fleeting moment. daffodils were laid at the gate and on the inroad of mutual attraction for each other. i was filling up the gaps between the bricks on the pavement. the billboard was the future and when i thought that the end-point could be seen, i became ambitious in traversing the plane that i fell into the manhole of mere discourses of everyday whining. there were attempts to untie the knot but most of the time we let the knots be. we stopped at that and the signs were not giving any directions. in fact, we became useless signs and i didn’t particularly like that feeling. we're now at the opposite platforms, looking at each other intently and refusing to take our train. it's unresolved. and we don’t exchange words as freely. we merely give brief glances and smiles. the latency is a longing for i just want to let go of it all, meet her at the tunnel, hug her and tell her that it's going to be fine even if i don’t see the sublime anymore.

too unwieldy

2005-04-22T20:32:00.000+08:00

your chuckling

seems to fade. i squint
at the long hallway,

itching for it again
i can’t locate you today,

too baroque
for a riposte even. that is what i love
about

what we are now. no hands, no voice
no sound,

just echoes and memories
of yesterday’s script
and everything else

is the same. a simple foreboding
that never turns up. the exegesis
of a drying paint
the rebirth

of a messiah, a saving grace
waiting for you
to say something

waiting for you

while my eyes
gloss over the carnival. mute in denial
for this is not

a tragic visitation
nor is it a withdrawal. but a channelling
of discordant affections

into something
not too unwieldy. and besides

we’re not serious
though i never fail
to smile

at this childish percussions. admonished
for wanting the lollipop
behind that stained

glass window

don't you see?
i just want to savour

our here and now

while we can

be cool

2005-04-17T15:27:00.000+08:00

a week ago, in between mindless switching of tv channels, i saw the heineken ad featuring john travolta. immediately a train of warped images flew across my mind tracks taking me to pulp fiction, church of scientology and saturday night fever. i didn’t take further interest until yesterday when i decided to burn some time after a massive bowl of boston clam chowder at cedele depot. went up to the fourth floor of suntec city to look for eng wah and ‘be cool’ was on. i said, why not?

typical of an extreme self-reflexive flick, this film is not for the anal. reviews are mainly negative. but unlike these puckered reviewers, i laughed with the stereotypical two-dimensional cartoon caricatures of ‘be cool’ with five other couples. everyone in the cinema went home with a favourite character – mine is dabu. seeing ‘the rock’ as the pansy bodyguard who is into raising the right eyebrow, smacking his butt, and wearing a cowboy outfit while singing ‘you ain’t woman enough to take my man’ was extremely fetching. and seeing chilli palmer gliding through a disco full of uncoordinated dancing chinese patrons stirred my tickle bones.

the pop culture references were over-saturatingly pleasing. as i sat there, i was seduced to a semiological flurry of second-hand signifiers. i was constantly bombarded in a state of immediacy. and i didn’t want to let go of every moment as i gripped the sides of the seat for there was no time to think about the past and play the future in my head. no backwards or forwards, or pausing for a break, but only immediate savouring. the following text is a replay of how my ‘now’ vanished in the ‘be cool’ spinning ride. take note that it’s second-hand, a distortion and manipulation from the original, and reconceptualised for consumption.

sequels at the viper room
in the casino of sunset boulevard, american beauty
mr. lovejoy in a cadillac. seated on an ikea café chair
men in black on the street to a mediterranean villa
aerosmith tattoo above her butt cheeks
a groupie. and a cremation
chilli palmer smoked a cigarette. all the time
get leo then get lost
black, white and asian chicks. a touch of evil
the untouchables
martin scorsese in the kingdom of heaven. with
p. diddy, dub mds and jimi hendrix
pawn shop of a russian gang
clashed with black gangsters in a disco
of chinese patrons. funny that one
red baseball bat and the lips of steven tyler
all rubber and metal in the vines
kisses from anna nicole smith. big breasts
a larry king show from dawn to dusk. at the blue bar
bring it on. cheerleaders dancing to vanilla ice
for raji is like al pacino in scarface
a samoan rendezvous with nicole kidman

‘be cool’ is a hypnotic advertisement, candy coated with pop stars, cars, cosmetics and costumes of an extended mtv music video. i’m smiling now, realising that i was seduced to collude with a commercial.

taking off

2005-04-13T21:25:00.000+08:00

today i grinned again, feel so lucky. still have it now
started at the grandstand
and everybody was so nice. that made it even better
i find it compelling, when locked eyes seemed to want
but words remained in an unopened box
unsaid
knotted wish, in its sacred garden
we exchanged a laugh instead
tentative affection at a distance. i grinned
that was all i could afford. cheap sms
though we talked about her getting a doll
couple of days ago over msn. i told her so
good to have in bed and as a ruse
for coping with each other. i nodded and she understood
we laughed, benign flirting over cyber
and here i've to end. to wipe her distinct perfume
like how i smelled years ago. still the same
although i think i know what i need to do now
the doll and bed are make-believe. maybe real
how do i know
a fancier place it shan’t be. this has to be torn
like how things are not meant to be
but i can be indulgent. and i fear that
today we parted unspoken, orange lights on wet road
she still is and i feel lucky

and so i shall be

taking off tonight

be brave

2005-04-12T21:21:00.000+08:00

mom once said, sometimes things just happen
told to embrace them. my room darkens
and i don’t feel like
replacing the bulb. lilies admit that
show them the touch, and they come again
like a craving, tea latte and tiramisu
whenever i'm bored, i run
and that’s when i seize the plate
throw to the wall, and watch it shatter

into tiny pieces
now i don’t have to speak to you
again, at least my days will turn out different
pretending to be pensive
about the sounds i want to hear
there’s something about this thread
pricks me into a coma,
which is a little odd. don’t turn away
come into me, we can go to ibiza
then goa
and the trippy world of alice wonderland
wipe your tears. i’m giving you my being
but not the way you want it
so be brave, and always be so
when i leave without a word, i want to play
just let me be

yuppie scum

2005-04-11T21:55:00.000+08:00

i succumbed to the temptation and bought this made-in-china timberlands.

t-shirts, flannel shirts and such

2005-04-10T14:27:00.000+08:00

the space is tight like a noose, squeezing out the last drop of my being. the decorum and sobriety must be maintained, but i'm suffocating. the routine is like a stiff religious rite, all formal and dry to the throat. this, not a cheerful city because of the puritan endeavour to weave all aspects of citizenry life with a driven mission to make money. i trod on at eleven in the morning down orchard/scotts road to capture the delirious shopping psychosis. urban artefacts and practices. plastics, façades and masks. don’t resist like eddie vedder. lap up everything like bono. be consummated and entrance with the orgasmic feeling of shopping.

i also noticed that many kids spotted the same hairdo, t-shirt, jeans and shoes. they're clones just like their dads and mums in corolla altis, condominiums and suburban shopping centres. they and i have no voice of our own. when i open my mouth, somehow the words are somebody else’s. my words and body are from posters, maxim, classifieds, national bestsellers, and lyotard. i appropriate the language and images, and like credit cards and credit lines, i use them like as if i own them and at the back of my mind i know that these are borrowings. the party never ends as i continue to borrow and spend, borrow and spend. the cycle keeps going. i moved on past the array of shops, and advertisements on billboards and t-shirts. i glanced at the reflection in front of a shop in far east plaza and saw an uncanny reflection which looked exactly like the kids with the same hairdo, t-shirt, jeans and shoes.

i joined the fray at starbucks. saw a group of grunge-type boys with their guitars and amps, drinking expensive ethiopian coffee, or of other such exotic variants. ethiopia incidentally owes international financiers a cool six billion american dollars. one of the boys was wearing an electric green t-shirt, bought at topman with the words ‘surf club. live in harmony with the ocean’. the attitude seemed brash as they spoke loudly about the next practice session. some of the local bands are alright. i tried to support them in many ways, but lost the verve after a while. the scene is too small to swell like the mass factory production of the current brit indie hype. over there, they churn out bands like barbie dolls. and here, we produce soulless indie bands wearing adidas sweatshop t-shirt, drinking expensive ethiopian coffee and listening to techno junk.

at the other end, i saw a couple walking in. old, in their mid-forties. the lady spotted short cropped hair. she wore plain t-shirt and tight black aerobic pants, showing her voluptuous figure. her made up face belied her age, and accompanying her was a man in khaki cargo pants, dark blue planet earth skate t-shirt and thick silver colour frame glasses. he walked with a bounce as he ordered something and he had this sheen from his shaved head. the grunge-type boys were sneering and giggling. i let go of a sardonic smile and wondered what had happened to the angst-ridden, tree-hugging, flannel shirted, communist manifesto-thumping, long unkempt hair, anti-fashion bohemian.

greenish veins

2005-04-07T00:04:00.000+08:00

met a girl today at the park, scribbling plenty of words on a cheap exercise book, the kind you get at a school’s stationery shop. she curled herself nicely with legs bent and thighs touching her chest on the bench underneath a tree with pink flowers. my eyes caught her ultra worn-out black converse sneakers, the kind i've in possession since 1988. somehow, i took an interest in this girl who somehow reminded me of the simplicity i've somehow forgotten to live by lately. simplicity is a monk’s saffron mantra and a dervish’s white whirling dance. the gaze is beyond, the kind i was looking at in the distant eyes of this nubile peach. she had long straight hair, black and went just below her small and delicate shoulders.

at one point, she hugged her legs and went deeper into her thoughts oblivious to the drizzle and the smudged black ink, the kind you imagine from tears and eyeliners. and she continued to scribble after this short muse. she snapped out after a while with a crinkled forehead and red pouting lips, the kind i tend to associate with sullen brood of a child in class. the tiny greenish veins running through her arms were a contrast to her freckled face. her plain white t-shirt was also a contrast to her blue jeans. for that moment, she somehow was a symbolic poise against the artificial ornamentation and pretentious style of a city. on the other hand, i was pleasantly baffled with her nuances and subtleties, the kind you get from reading thomas pynchon’s ‘gravity’s rainbow’. these words are for the girl i saw just now at the park. she was togged in plain white t-shirt, blue jeans and black converse sneakers.

of pills and angst

2005-04-03T20:16:00.000+08:00

this morning i got up to find myself splattered by the rain and that restless void again. the night before, i'd left my window wide-open, the way i like it, whenever i let myself go into the lullaby of a deep state of semi-coma. i’ve been meaning to get rid of the void but somehow it persisted like a never-ending ride of an opponent’s intense hollering, threatening to make my resolve burst at the stitching which holds the good sense in the way i look at my life. i just need to dig a little deeper, not for meaning but a pill for me to take the next plane.

simplicity and contentment escape like how cigarette smoke disappears after leaving the mouth. i reached out for a fresh towel, and shuffled to the bathroom, with whirling thoughts and glazed eyes. proceeded to the ritual of cleansing with tap water i practised every morning. i love cold showers and never see the need for a water-heater in the tropics. i turned the gleaming chrome tap, and water gushed out of the oversized showerhead, replicating rain. like a child, i swore by the rides home in the rain, and cursed liberally otherwise. i then brushed my teeth with darlie toothpaste, struggling at the same time not to let the water from the shower hurt my eyes. went on to my hair and body. then i looked at the mirror and decided not to shave. with a stubble, i'm lucky to get a kiss from imelda. the love and care she provided for the past five years helped to make life more bearable, for at times the unique isolation of a restless void is somehow remedied by a simple sms.

i mocked the image i saw in the mirror with a middle finger and was replied the same thing. i flattered myself with thoughts of other people. the realities can be mean for many people are somehow trapped in the vortex of failed relationships and money problems. broken homes. hurls of hurtful words. work demands. bills and loans. checks and credit cards. promises to hold. books to read. songs to listen. i digress. i dried myself with the towel, and embraced the arrogance of progress. i live in the city. neon lights give me meaning and beyond snores and dreams, climax and orgasm, and bread and water, i can’t give up british indie pop, borders, urban outfitters and apple gadgets for a sedate life of a recluse anti-social misfit. i conform to the values of city life. i’m a juvenile. i changed to my faded levis and anvil t-shirt.

i tuned to woxy, my current preferred radio station, and cranked up the volume. it was temporary, but a good escape until cake’s ‘no phone’ blared out loud, reminding me of the wide open window this morning. it rained again and i had to shut the windows to prevent my bed with gaudy bed sheet from getting wet. i called imelda, and she said she was busy. i sighed. i thought of having a couple of minutes of conversation, but it wasn’t to be. i tried to do some work, but couldn’t immerse myself fully. i was offended with the ease my brother got himself into work. the blueprints of the club were scattered in his room. they were on the floor, table and bed. he was creating this excel spreadsheet with mind-boggling figures and at the same time was making numerous and seemingly important phone calls to dealers, contractors, colleagues and friends. i heard constant naggings in my head and he was laughing and making deals. he works day and night. i sleep at night.

i deviated and instead opened photoshop for a creative indulgence of an intermittent half-baked experimental image project of mine. i played with multiple layer blending, trying to mimic are age’s style. i couldn’t get the desired effect and gave up. i then sorted my photographs and downloaded recent images i captured from my ancient three megapixel canon ixus. i’m thinking of getting a better digital camera but my work prohibits me from creating space and time to justify the buy. as it is i don’t have time for my family and friends. i shut my eyes and prayed for the pope although i’m not catholic. faith in god has eluded me. my spirit is dry, yet i don’t believe in foucault’s adage of creating myself as a work of art. i can never be my own god for what i know are from fashion magazines and advertisements. my identity is tied to what’s hip and what’s not. they’re pretence like david blaine. i prayed for the pope again.

morning glory

2005-04-02T00:13:00.000+08:00

the stitching of this text
drawn from filaments which when pulled taut
disappear like a phoenix. so the hymn fade away
unlike her voice, which leaves a ringing sound

i hear her murmurings
in fleeting swells at the other side
behind those walls of wounds
drawing me nearer to her whisper
and lips
the bland and silent slips
of an unspoken ache

it's hurting when she cries out
to make out her bosom
in those puffy eyes
staring in devoted yearn
and i can’t extend my love song to her
a blooming morning glory

i wish to put my arms around her in bed
lulling in her sweet breaths
so dream of angels
flutter, a melodic verse
stroke her hair
and she presses her nails against my palm

i don't pretend to be blind
for she seduces me
between her stories
into unravelling my kernel and marrow
she is so
i want her yet i can’t

ditch this love

2005-03-27T14:28:00.000+08:00

i got up early in the morning telling myself that it was going to be the final thrill with two wheels. joe organised a track session at pasir gudang for the old crew. i was invited although i'd given up track riding a long time ago. i was enticed with a loan of a one-piece race suit and, of course, what caught me hook, line and sinker was his spare R1. there was no way i could reject the offer. as i got ready, channel newsasia showed news about politicians and businessmen and their projects and nothing else. i'd to reclaim the moment back for this has to be a day for the people. no speeches, no meetings, no expensive meals, no suits and ties, no handshakes and no secret deals. just a day where people go out with their family, lovers and friends. this is a day for ordinary people and not the bullshit spewed by the egalitarian elite.

i left my flat for the humid morning. somebody urinated in the lift again. motherfucker. that sight and stench increased my heart palpitations by a notch, just right to position the adrenaline for later. i inserted the key, turned it and pressed the start button to fire up my beloved. the rhythmic rumble from the grumbling exhaust was intoxicating. i was ready to ride, scampering to the flock to ruffle feathers and cluck at each other about our past and future exploits at the racing track.

i rubbed the tinted shield to clear the mist from my breath. i pulled into the road and rode mercilessly to joe’s place to pick up his bike. i was enveloped in the wind and the growl of the motor like a saran wrap.

i'm seriously considering it quits, and i’ve been dragging my soul on the black asphalt for miles this past year or so since my last accident. the wounds of indecision are still bleeding and the heart is aching. it's that difficult. i’ve been riding for years. since JC1 actually. ignoring our parents’ threats, we took our license when we were sixteen - it was legal then - and i’ve been a proud owner of a number of bikes since. it was liberating to break the duct tape of your parent’s clout of authority and won the battle of political will at such an impressionable age, although now i think i was an asshole for going against their wish. i started with dirt biking and moved on to posing on crotch rockets and touring long distance to as far as phuket and bangkok. thought of a road trip to the golden triangle, but that was just a dream. my last track session was two years ago and my last long distance trip up north was a year and a half ago.

my fair share of healed abrasions, bruises and wounds on my arms, body and legs, dislocations at the left shoulder and middle finger, and ruptured ligament on my right knee were like battle scars reminding me of what i went through with my motorcycles. these memories are priceless and can never be bought at borders.

the ride to joe’s was crammed with nutty motorists, like it always is, and i was one of them as i swerved and overtook every slow moving daddy’s car, like it always is. work had gotten me down, like it always is. and riding in such a reckless manner, like it always is, releases me from the pressure of work and puts me within the gruesome orifice of accidents. i needed to take the long route, like it always is, as long as i could avoid traffic. i rode the empty back roads.

i was greeted with a flurry of affectionate mockery, firm handshakes and solid pats at the back from joe, graeme and leong. it was going to be an intimate affair. joe’s wife came out with a a cup of hot lipton tea and the sweetest smile. it was all so nice. a self-made man, joe lived in a terrace house off old bedok. he quit his air steward job to set up a motorcycle accessories and parts shop and race whenever he could. he’s a top bloke, like a brother. he prepped the bike for me and i just needed to ride it. the plan was to meet the others at esso petrol station at the second link before heading to pasir gudang. it was going to be a couple of hours ride and we would be back by lunch time to avoid the frowns of wives and girlfriends.

the bike leaned on its side stand. ready and willing. i checked the tyres, tyre pressures, brakes, chain and sprockets, suspension and oil plugs to make sure. ‘anal as usual, eh,’ joe quipped. i gave him a daft look. i hopped on this blue beast to get a feel. it was like staring into the black hole of mortality when i looked at the speedometer. this production bike could out-sprint the most expensive and fastest car on the road without a sweat.

joe’s wife and nephew tagged along. we put our tools, kits and gear into their car and hurriedly made a beeline for pasir gudang. it is going to be a torturous road ahead to convince myself that i need to ditch this love for the sake of my other love.

shopping for shanghai

2005-03-25T23:38:00.000+08:00

as i stepped out of the radiant blue comfort taxi
the humid afternoon sun mediated
by the embracing automatic door of raffles city
bulbous spotlights projected above it
i'm reminded of the sheen on her nose
and glossy harper’s bazaar magazine of celestial sphere i so reject
i walked in her embrace stealing glances at the two very tall ladies
models perhaps for today’s shanghai in vogue
the heaving of her chest derailed
by my scurrying eyes in a sea of people
in between checking price tags and dishing out posb atm card
i put a furtive laugh for i saw a young lady in pink skirt with her boy
she shouldn’t wear white pumps with that
made her look like a tramp
and at the other side, down the escalator
i surveyed the throngs of bodies sliding casually
then she hushed my peepers
pointing to the direction of robinsons
we bought bras, panties, briefs, pants, skirts and socks
but we couldn’t find her flats
her short straight hair fell down her face
covered her peeved sigh of a forlorn shopper
with shopping bags we pressed on
brushed past the fairy herd of cameramen
boys with their toys
and two of them shared their camera settings with jubilance
while waiting for long legs to strut shanghai's wares
i called it quits, flagging the radiant blue comfort taxi
but i want words of fecundity
or something like that which i can’t seem to get them out
not too sure what to say now for my eyelids are heavy
my bed beckons like a sneaking feel

the magic numbers

2005-03-23T22:33:00.000+08:00

hymn for her
oh, my lover, won't you get away?
love or loathe i need to feel again
it won’t hurt to find love in the wrong place
i’ve been hurt before
but all the scars are re-erased

how in the pomo claptrap did i miss this one? this sappy song tore my heart into shreds this morning. been trying to recover since.

hairstyles at bugis junction

2005-03-19T00:28:00.000+08:00

i accompanied imelda yesterday to reds hairdressing at bugis junction, the epicentre of channel 8 trend followers. i was trying to be the good boyfriend waiting for her by sitting on the plastic white lounge chair near the entrance. i watched young ladies, including the female hairstylists, who looked like taiwanese pop stars walking in and out of the salon. most were barely in their twenties. they were stylish and chic in their peculiar ah lian way although the raffles city yuppie snobs and orchard road trendy teens would believe otherwise.

these girls were in heels, from low to high ones, and flats, although some were like flip-flops. they wore denim jeans, and i could see the butt crack of one girl as her levis hipster jeans hung too low, minis and skirts, with pleats and frills, and t-shirts which were mainly monochromes – electric blue, bright pink, jungle green and super yellow - with senseless captions and slogans, and very loose and, at times, skimpy tops. they had accessories like glossy purses and totes, and plastic jewellery. the colours were deep, yet bright and the design were mainly retro inspired. their make-up added to the defined taiwanese pop-star look. the very reason why they were at reds hairdressing was to complete the look. the hairstyles were mainly layered cuts of varying lengths to create that manga look of assorted curls – spiral, big and small. colours were still popular although i saw a couple of them dyed their hair matt jet black.

after a while i was bored and left for kinokuniya. i was browsing through fashion magazines and photography books when a balding middle-aged man chided the security dude in a raised voice. apparently he was not happy with the dude checking a lady’s bag. he claimed it was an invasion of privacy, gave a long lecture on the virtue of privacy and would call the police to arrest the dude for breaching the lady's privacy. the lady who was not related to him and the manager of the bookstore tried to calm down the tense situation. everyone had free entertainment and the dude pulled a very long face after the man left. he was visibly upset and because he was in uniform, he was clearly restraining himself from a definite outburst. i approached him and told him that life is alright and the balding middle-aged man is a dick.

renegade portraits: credit card

2005-03-18T23:51:00.000+08:00

[postscript / 190305] somebody complained, so i've to write this. renegade portraits is a fabrication project. if you're linear or came in here late, adhere to the following sequence when doing your reading to avoid confusion:

1. renegade portraits: processed orange juice
2. renegade portraits: seven cats
3. renegade portraits: dropped coins
4. renegade portraits: pasty skin
5. renegade portraits: credit card

this entry i hope is the last chapter of this made-up story. anyway, we continued to write to each other. she wrote about how she was shackled by the material things bestowed by her father. it was a form of control and if she wanted the good life, she knew she had to be a model daughter by fulfilling his wishes and demands during her early years as a teenager. when she was sixteen she was presented with a supplementary credit card. she became very popular among her peers. she was already sneaking into nightclubs, getting drunk, flirting with grown men and enjoying every bit of it then. and when she didn’t want to come home one fine day after a night out with her friends, she realised she couldn’t use the card the next day.

soon she grasped the controlling power of the credit card as her father could keep track of her spending and movements. she became obsessed and almost paranoid that the credit card became a surveillance tool. she was embittered that her thoughts, feelings, decisions and actions were somehow orchestrated and determined by processes beyond her control. she had to break the chain. this became her rallying cry to prise herself away from the debt as a good daughter.

her father was a straits born chinese who had ancestors which could be traced as far back as admiral cheng ho. his family owned a couple of hotels in the region, bungalows along thiam siew avenue and sixth avenue, and shop houses around joo chiat, katong and chinatown. to ensure the prosperity of his family he had to ensure that all loopholes were patched up, and having a daughter was especially difficult. it became his mission to ensure that she marry into a family of the same status. anyway, the last straw that broke the camel’s back was when she found out from her mother about her father’s plan to arrange her marriage with her second cousin. she decided to leave for good.

one fine day, out of the vast blue ocean and to cut this story short, she emailed me and told me to meet her at the straits kitchen. it was 8.45 a.m.. i walked into the hotel. i was very nervous. i headed straight to the restaurant. i mentioned my name to the manager. he guided me to a table. i saw her. and herein lies the very moment where the symbolic world of words through imaginative interpretations met the physical world of human flesh, blood and skin. i could gaze at her eyes, stroke her porcelain-like skin, get a whiff of her perfume, listen to her tense cough and even taste the trickle of sweat on her forehead. it was real although writing this entry puts me back into the symbolic world.

her presence was compelling. her words about herself seemed true. the regurgitations echoed the stories she weaved on her blog. she was every bit the person she portrayed. we made small talk initially before she went on to her usual self-reflective mode. she mused and indicated her suspicion on her real interests in blogging and intentions behind the writings. she said that she had a following and when she went on hiatus for a couple of weeks, many emailed asking about her well-being. she wanted to reach out to these faceless strangers but she couldn't bring herself to them as that would require a level of intimacy and trust which belongs to the realm of loved ones. she just wanted them to be a good audience and leave the theatre once she was done with her acting. nevertheless, she succumbed to my desire of wanting to know whether she was for real. she then wondered about the meaning of our meeting. was it just to affirm that we're both real? frankly i didn’t have a slightest clue what this meeting would bring us to. i could only nod in reaction to her musings. i didn’t have any answers which would satisfy the both of us.

her blog was like a vague public confessional exhibition. the seeming anonymity of the internet encouraged her to walk the treacherous path of her past and explore her fantasies of the future, never knowing when she had crossed the limit of revealing too much. she paused and stared through me for a few seconds. then she declared that she had never felt so vulnerable until this meeting. i tried to exude oodles of compassion. she stood up and said she wanted to leave. she planned to do her masters in fine arts in melbourne soon and suggested that we should continue corresponding. i told her to take care of herself and we went our separate roads. i pretended once again to be valentino rossi.

renegade portraits: pasty skin

2005-03-15T21:38:00.000+08:00

she wrote that she would like to produce an installation with simultaneous screening of four separate films in the same room. she wanted a mix of cobalt blue and titanium-zinc white paint for the room. the ceiling would be filled with photographs of women in various emotional states and in the centre of the room she would place a blue circular sofa. she didn’t want to put across prostitution as mere masculine exploitation but as a form of emancipation from the slavery of working class poverty. prostitution also involves an empowering interaction as prostitutes in modern societies make choices and control certain aspects of their working environment. she was determined to represent their voice.

upon leaving her father's home a long time ago, she believed that prostituting her body was the most efficient method to finance her education. she had a pretty face and gorgeous body and was quick to exploit those by becoming a model which was the surest way to cast the net far and wide. she joined a model agency, got herself a portfolio and was even featured in a couple of television adverts. her boss then introduced her to a couple of main players of the clubbing scene - beautiful women are required to make their joints attractive - who in turn had contacts with super-rich men with high sexual libido. in no time she was living in a district nine apartment right in the heart of orchard road. the rent was a couple of thousand dollars a month and the place had full condominium facilities. she was lavished with diamond jewellery, expensive watches and a mercedes roadster. she was juggling two men at the same time, a young, maverick stockbroker whose father was a successful businessman and a middle-aged indonesian man who dealt with diamonds. both were married. after a couple of years she had enough money to do a liberal arts degree in new york.

incidentally, i'm reading an autobiography of traci lords. indeed, an intriguing life and i couldn't imagine how she could have carried on after being raped at a tender age of 10 years old.

so somehow our worlds entwined from my fascination with her blog entries. her writings were pure magic and she could twist an enchanting fairy-tale out of mundane everyday occurrences. her life stories were like epic adventure stories which only a few would have experienced. anyway, it was my mission to make her believe that i was really a great guy with the sincerest intention. i wanted to build the intimacy and trust. i wanted her to be curious about me, and so i began to flirt with her by leaving charming comments on her blog and at times i would tease her. she was very cautious and appeared cold.

i knew she was reading my blog everyday because i had installed a web counter to track the visitors of my blog. and when i emailed her about her frequent visits to my blog, she then timed her visits only once or twice a week. it was getting uncomfortable and so i proposed that we should collaborate on a project. it would add meaning to the faceless interaction we had been doing so far. maybe, i was deceiving myself as she might just be really this fat geek with pasty skin who wore oversized thick-rimmed glasses, and the loser on the other end was me.

i was beginning to believe that if my words were seen as potential untruths, how the fuck to build the trust. i began to give her gifts, which were seen as something more tangible than just words. that would help to affirm my existence, and i really hope that she would trust me further. the intimacy was sealed once she was elated with the gifts. so from cryptic comments we began to open up and became more personal. we shared stories and were philosophical at times. after a while i wanted to know how she looked like, but she was sceptical of the idea as she wanted to experiment on a purely metaphysical relationship. she believed that once skin and flesh are exposed, the relationship is going to be potentially corrupted by libidinal gratifications, for example.

i started to believe that she was indeed a fat geek with pasty skin who wore oversized thick-rimmed glasses. i somehow couldn’t bring my feelings for another person to another level without seeing the person. i'm too embedded in the physical world and it's too difficult an effort to disentangle myself and live in a monastery. i love my television, computer, music, motorcycle, bed, clothes, watches and shoes. the physical world is fantastic when i can breathe the sweet fumes every morning when i ride to work, read the most trustworthy stories from the straits times, eat the healthiest food at macdonald’s, listen to the latest office gossips on the interesting lives of other people, digest the benefits of having a wide investment portfolio for a comfortable retirement and believe that having casinos in singapore is good for the economy. my reality is my physical world and no matter how fuck up it is, i just cannot develop a relationship with a nickname.

and so it shall be that in an 'anonymous' blog like mine, i just have to fill in the missing physical signs with peeks of my material possessions and everyday life episodes, and their corresponding musings and emotional responses. it's only natural that most people just want to know the size of my dick for them to judge my worth.

renegade portraits: dropped coins

2005-03-12T00:47:00.000+08:00

she wrote about how an obsessed reader who told her about how he hired the famous and certified international investigator, mr. harmon singh [PPA, PHF, CPO, CSC, FISM, CPI, CII] to track her down, but the attempt was unsuccessful. she covered her tracks very well. and behind the vagueness, she wrote more stories of sorrow and angst, downing valium and erimin, which she got from doctor yang, known for dispensing suppressants and medical certificates freely to those who wanted to seek relief from the burden of work. his customers kept coming and she was one of them.

i'm listening to interpol’s 'c'mere' now and last night i listened to an experimental attempt of creating music out of signals made by sputnik travelling in space. i was annoyed.

anyway, she wrote that she was going to write an autobiographical novel for that would be great to document her past. she also wanted to produce a performance play like zai kuning. years ago i watched his work. i arrived anticipating the enlightenment i would get among the gathering of similar minds. the audience was ushered to the back of substation. i saw 1.5 ml plastic bottles, covering the whole stage area, which used to be the favourite venue for alternative gigs in the early 90s with bands like the opposition party and humpback oak. the bottles were apparently filled with tap water.

a couple of performers then made an entry from a door facing the old national library, ran around, avoiding the bottles, although they purposely banged into each other at times. they then took the bottles, twisted the caps open and drank copious amounts of water. the intensity increased and soon they were gulping the water to the point of choking themselves. some were lying on the floor with foamy bubbles seeping out of their mouth. that shocked the fuck out of my friend, diana, who went to raffles girls’ primary school, raffles girls’ school, raffles junior college and nus, majoring in philosophy because she didn't do well enough like the others to get very prestigious scholarships to study in great overseas universities, and last i heard became a mere copywriter of a major bank. i thought of calling the ambulance, and short of giving mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to the few performers who for the sake of putting across a message put their life in jeopardy. these performers must be given the accolades of the prestigious darwin awards.

we were then ushered into the theatre studio. it was dim, illuminated only by the silent flickering images of advertisements. we were made to sit on the floor around two watermelons. while i was trying to find a comfy position, a couple of coins from my pocket fell and broke the silence. diana was embarrassed when i tried to grope around for the coins. i could only recover thirty cents or so. then zai and another fella came and started to run around and made contorted movements, twisting their limbs in bizarre fashion. they then smashed the watermelons with a mallet of some sort, ripped them apart with their bare hands and stuffed the red flesh into their mouths like a glutton. some of us dodged to avoid the juice trajectory while others just covered their face. performance over and the lights were switched on. zai took a towel and wiped his face. there was a discussion. i pretended to listen and busied myself with scanning the ground for my coins.

she also wrote that she would like to make an independent docu-film on prostitutes. her fascination with prostitution stemmed from her own experience in her early years as a young woman when she decided to whore out her body to achieve her ideal lifestyle. i'm tired now and this story will be continued and told some other day.

renegade portraits: seven cats

2005-03-09T22:12:00.000+08:00

i knew from the beginning that she manufactured her identity to the minute details to ensure her position on the pinnacle of the social ladder. she had to be the icon of coolness. she opened a shop selling alternative clothing labels from new york. she seemed intellectual with her perceptive cultural observations and many guys were intimidated because they didn’t have the vocabulary to cope with her discourses. she was into lacanian psychoanalysis and during her spare time she was too eager in deconstructing frithjof schuon.

she was voluptuous with the right proportion of flesh at the right places, sculpted through careful dieting and exercising. her pair of boobies were her greatest assets. they bounced when she walked and she would never be caught wearing a bra. she dated young men only because she loved to dote and mother them. their recklessness, tactlessness and volatility intrigued her and she would dump them after they got too tame.

she once wrote that she lost her virginity when she was 14 to the head-prefect of an all-boys mission school across the road. she claimed that the sex was nothing fantastic. she didn’t like the experience of being humped from behind. it reminded her of dogs. since then, she reckoned that sex was over-rated and she couldn’t fathom the fascination men hold on sex. she kept having dreams on having to do blow-jobs which she found demeaning.

she wrote about how her education in a convent school was worthwhile even though she didn’t like it that time. her school made everyone do literature and she appreciated that. she devoured books and came to the conclusion that life has no purpose. so she created her own purpose and lived her life by that until she found another purpose. life went on like that. nowadays, having a purpose was meaningless to her. lately, she would rather stay at home, do her garden, play with her seven cats and read a book.

she was anti-establishment and despised capitalist exploitation. she became an anarchist and boycotted fast-food restaurants such as macdonald’s. she cared for the environment but there were not much forests and no whales to save in singapore. she wrote about how her dad was physically abusive but pitied him when her mother’s affair with her boss brought to the world her half-brother. she also believed that her body belonged to her and declared her ownership to her parents on her eighteenth birthday with a tattoo of a maori motif above her butt cheeks. she had a few more tattoos and she pierced her tits, belly button, nose, eyebrow and tongue too.

i could only imagine her from what she had written. i want to be certain of her existence as i want to pin those stories on a distinct face which i can caress. i crossed the road and walked briskly to shaw house. i took the escalator down to the tunnel. a middle-aged man was drawing cash from the money dispensing machine. he was smartly dressed in a typical corporate uniform of tie, shirt and pants. his every movement was observed by an old man who was sitting on the ledge next to the entrance. the old man was in black. he worked for macdonald’s cleaning trays and clearing tables. he shifted his attention to me and his wrinkled face foretold endless stories of ecstasy and grief. i would have stopped and sat next to him to hear him out but i had to find her. she must be found.

renegade portraits: processed orange juice

2005-03-06T14:48:00.000+08:00

i took to the road on my two wheels, pretending to be valentino rossi, who no one can deny is the greatest moto gp racer, to orchard road via nicoll highway. it was 8.30 am.

the road was a little bumpy at times, all due to the massive underground train-network construction. everything above has to be reconstructed, fabricated, repaved, diverted, channelled, excavated, modified and maintained. at times i had to be careful on the chunky and square steel sheets on the temporary road. chan fell and broke his hip while riding on one of those in the rain last year. the loose granite rocks and lines of concrete mix that fell from the heavy mixer trucks made it more dangerous to manoeuvre. the fumes of a combination of asphalt mix and diesel fuel assaulted my nose, the dust and dirt hurt my eyes, and the hydraulic pile drivers bombarded my already defective hearing. beneath the ground i could hear the pleading souls of the construction workers who died in last year’s nicoll highway collapse. the road was empty, a figure of wretchedness and isolation.

i started the blog to keep myself entertained. she did leave cryptic comments, alluding to what she had read on my blog, on hers and other blogs, but somehow she didn’t want to leave her scent on mine. my schizophrenic musings believe that she was actually leaving riddles for me to piece together. nevertheless, seven people so far had emailed me. they either cursed me or said that they'd learnt a thing or two. one seeked advice and i told him to go read the torah, bible or quran. another one was too obvious in trying to be a literary critic of extreme coolness and social commentator of supreme intellect with comments like: ‘your writings are borrowings of baudrillard, derrida and other fashionable french postmodern theorists. you're a fashion victim, sir.’

so readers, don't ever believe my narratives for they're mere pseudo-intellectual and antithesis pieces. this blog is my playground and nothing should be taken seriously, although at times anarchy against the status-quo are performances of my superhero tendency to revolt against the purveyors of misfortune and cruelty. the syntactic strings of words and images are disjunctive and at times will go silent, indicating exhaustion from the participation of everyday life. the absence presupposes presence, so probably i'm somewhere else doing the things normal people do like eat, shit and sleep. sometimes i engage in rhetoric where the meanings can only be gotten from a very close reading of the subtexts.

in an effort to stave off the readers from cataloguing, branding and categorizing me, i've to engage in parataxical guerrilla techniques of discourse. and, occasionally, to induce misinterpretations, i purposely write using metonymy and endless signifiers. these are acts of harmless mischief to throw the readers off balance and make them go deeper into their thought processes. another technique to achieve this is to cause confusion by putting across polymorphous narrative mutations with traces of schizophrenia, indeterminacy, irony and immanence when in reality i'm homer simpson. superficial and impatient readers will find no meaning in such narratives, i think.

the parking lots opposite borders were mostly not taken although the down slope was a liitle disconcerting for me as an accidental slight nudge by careless pedestrians would topple any bike. found a good spot and realised that i didn’t have any parking ticket. it was too early and most of the shops were not ready to make money. i walked passed a café outside borders and saw a mother treating her son to a breakfast of processed orange juice and micro-waved sandwiches. she was sipping coffee, saw me and i gave her a wry smile. it was meant to be friendly, and she returned the smile. the affection was warm and i felt like giving her a hug, but i was dead sure she wouldn't want that from a stranger. she had an air of aristocracy. she could well be related to eric khoo, who has the penchant to come up with films on how fuck-up life is for ordinary singaporeans. i can imagine the glee and smug approval of the arty upper-middle class and super-rich crowd when they watch his productions. his father was once the richest man in singapore, with generations of financial clout, preservation of inheritance and succession of wealth accumulation.

while walking towards scotts road, i wondered where she was. i can't conceive a reality devoid of her presence. she has to be like me, busy with life making money. religious people say that my physical world is an illusion and i should pray to god everyday so that i can go to heaven after death. heaven is reality. she feels real on the internet though and, from her writings, i seem to understand her far better than my little niece, who's clamouring for my attention right now. i wonder if she's heaven. i wonder whether heaven is when a young man in a computer arcade immerses himself for hours in role-playing games, or a middle-aged man who pretends to be a teenager on an internet chat with a school girl every night, and a young lady who spends her waking life vicariously reading blog after blog. is heaven reality? is she heaven?

excuse me now for i want to spend time with my niece. to be continued…

gillette m3 power

2005-03-06T14:40:00.000+08:00

imelda got this shaver for me. it costs about 20 bucks and it fucking vibrates. the micro-pulses certainly add pleasure to a whole new shaving experience. i shall name it 'dildo'. fuck gillette because it is now owned by procter and gamble.

the third sex

2005-03-04T23:57:00.000+08:00

the breath grasps that last drop of flickering screen
seeping into a quiver of motley neon signages
i like the yellow and blue ones,
a block away

and drifting into synthetic landscapes
of plastic caps and plastic bottles
where dreams turned to mere words,
a web of semantics, urinated in copies of texts

make no mistake when she said:
i had fucking enough with this shit
putting down the can of tiger
with tattoos exposed and cigarette smoke

for conversations are child’s drawings
a spinning urban diaspora
of fractured identities

of lanterns, tabla and void deck weddings

reiterating the slurs between pints of piss
while we watched transvestites at scotts road
sashaying across with glittering smiles at japanese men
of androgynous politics, the third sex

i guess it’s not about where i am now
more like why i choose to be that way then and now, she said
and i said: why choose?

and she said: fuck you

electronica sunday

2005-02-27T14:11:00.001+08:00

my brother threw this cd at me this morning and i was thrown to the days long gone. when zouk opened, many of us, the restless ones, drifted to it. some of us were leading double lives, supporting friends doing their alternative live sets at small pubs in far east plaza, and when we were already half-drunk, proceeded to zouk for disco dancing later in the night. we hated house music but still we went. house music reminded us of disco music, john travolta, the village people and depeche mode. some of us were more interested in scoring the girls more than anything else. others were bent on getting drunk and the rest were just a tad curious about zouk.

my brother was at zouk since its inception. he left the place to set up a joint in bangkok with a couple of his friends many years later. it got into an intricate web of problems because of a simple mistake of not providing free entertainment and giving alms to a high-ranking thai military or police personnel. came back penniless a couple of years ago. helped centro before it perished like his about a year ago. and now, he's involved in another project at the same venue working for others. and he still owes me money.

i so fucking hate disco music [and its variants like electro boogie, new wave, italo disco, synthetic pop, electro funk, nu electro, electro dance, garage, dub, techno dance, eurodance, jpop, eurobeat, dance mix, hip hop, turntablism, experimental hip hop, electro pop, dark wave, cold wave, goth rock, industrial, industrial rock, electro industrial, industrial experimental, electronic body music, dark synth, happy house, hip house, chicago house, acid house, detroit house, ambient house, vocal house, brit house, dark house, epic house, anthem house, tribal house, deep house, funky house, latin house, gay disco house, french filter house, speed garage, party house, techno house, hard house, booty house, minimal house, progressive house, hi nrg, classic trance, ambient trance, acid trance, symphonic trance, progressive trance, anthem trance, break trance, techno trance, deep trance, ibiza trance, dream trance, epic trance, dutch trance, german trance, hard acid, hard dance, hardstyle, goa trance, heavy metal goa, dark trance, psychedelic trance, death trance, minimal psytrance, classic techno, ambient techno, detroit techno, euro techno, hardcore techno, german techno, japanese techno, swedish techno, bangin techno, tribal techno, industrial techno, minimal techno, gloomcore techno, dub techno, experimental techno, deep techno, acid techno, hard acid techno, funky breaks, ambient breaks, acid breaks, chemical breaks, big beat, anthem breaks, tribal breaks, florida breaks, uk breaks, dark breaks, progressive breaks, ragga jungle, jungle, oldschool rave, jazzy jungle, ambient jungle, disco jungle, drum and bass, jump up, neuro funk, trance step, darkcore, hardstep, techstep, darkstep, industrial drum and bass, experimental jungle, intelligent dance music, glitchcore, belgian new beat, techno rave, rotterdam hardcore, gabber cheese, nu style gabber, happy gabber, happy hardcore, trancecore, acidcore, new york style hardcore, terrorcore, speedcore, metalcore, digital hardcore, noisecore, powernoise, speedbass, ambient, ambient goa, electronic psychedelia, minimalism, musique concrete, sound collage, electronic classical, early synthetic, french pop, illbient, acid jazz, nu jazz, trip hop, downbeat, new age, ethereal and dark ambient].

i realised the connection between electronic music, rave parties, amphetamine and ecstasy over in australia. came back once upon a time and my used-to-be girlfriend introduced me to wong san and the mohamed sultan scene. she and her friends were tripping on ecstasy and i became their driver for the night. i was dumped by her at the second floor while she went around smooching all who knew her. everyone there was bopping up and down to the beat. their eyes were all rolled up as they chase the royal highness. it was spooky. i pretended i was among zombies as i sipped my non-alcoholic fizzy soda. i couldn't believe that it was happening in such a sterile place like singapore.

and what is the point of all these? nothing. it's sunday. i want to wash my motorcycle but it's going to rain and i'm thinking about work already.

fatistic progress

2005-02-26T18:48:00.000+08:00

to embrace modernity with open arms means that i've to believe in the fucking idea of progress in all its shades. and to be a fucking good worker, in a rational and logical environment where emotions are seen as weaknesses, i've to work at break neck speed at super efficient levels. i've to take advantage of advances in sciences and technologies to transform me further into a tireless dynamo with boundless energy. also, to sustain myself at this level, i'm expected to self-reflect my progress and the organisation's progress through motivational workshops, team-building and renewal sessions and yoga shit.

progress must be calculated. statistics and numbers are required to control population, political participation, literacy, housing, recreation, education, health, consumption, production and every single fucking aspect of modern life. excess and bloatedness will not be tolerated. bureaucracy has to be downsized, corporations have to be thinner and leaner, and individuals have to exercise and consume fat-free food. being fat is a barrier, weight and morbidity to be overcome.

today i saw a fat lady with big bouncing boobies in one of the boats amongst tanned, macho, muscled women and men. deep inside, my heart ached for the very brave lady after seeing the agony of the embarrassed inmates of that dragon boat.

and yes, finally, it rained this morning after such a long time!

rest in peace: king of gonzo

2005-02-22T20:34:00.000+08:00

the only man in my life until the time i was fourteen years old to tell me that he loved me was hunter ... he was dashing. i remember when he literally carried my books, and rode the bus home with me. and i remember his arm touching mine and i remember the hairs on my arm stood up straight. i don't know how we parted. i don't know when we broke up. yes, i remember. my mother laid down the law. she said if i ever saw hunter again, i would never see him again. i would be sent away. i don't think hunter ever knew how much i loved him. i want to tell him now. i want him to know it. every time i was getting ready to tell him, a long time ago, he would do something destructive and i couldn't tell him.

lou ann murphy iler

[high school sweetheart; hunter still has her picture up in his kitchen]

hunter thompson is dead. he did himself with a gunshot to his head. this is really sad news and i'm wounded.

herstory: reetika vazirani

2005-02-20T13:10:00.000+08:00

poet: reetika vazirani

she was trying to avoid the fall by grasping on falling ropes. she made calls and left messages. she wanted to see a priest and understand the meaning of the bible. and she prised the soul out of her little son’s body, and inflicted the same forcefulness on herself.

it's me, i'm not home

it's late in the city and i'm asleep.
you will call again? did i hear
(please leave a message after the beep)
chekhov? A loves B. i clap
for joy. B loves C. C won't answer.
in the city it's late, i'm asleep,
and if your face nears me like a familiar map
of homelessness: old world, new hemisphere
(it's me leave a message after the beep),
then romance flies in the final lap
of the relay, i pass the baton you disappear
into the city, it's late and i'm asleep
with marriages, they tend to drop
by, faithful to us for about a year,
leave a message after the beep,
i'll leave a key for you, play the tape
when you come in, or pick up the receiver.
it's late in the city and i'm asleep.
please leave a message after the beep.

hearing her voice makes mountains of tears out of me. and so i'll end this series at reetika.

herstory: diane arbus

2005-02-20T13:04:00.000+08:00

photographer: diane arbus

she joined her unusual subjects in a similar stark moment. it had to be clean for her as she went into the bathroom, and undressed before stepping into the bathtub. she took in a very large dose of sleeping pills to calm herself down. she then carved her wrist to let her blood ebbed into the water.

she said:

one of the things i felt i suffered from as a kid was i never felt adversity. i was confirmed in a sense of unreality which i could only feel as unreality. and the sense of being immune was, ludicrous as it seems, a painful one. it was as if i didn't inherit my own kingdom for a long time. the world seemed to me to belong to the world. i could learn things but they never seemed to be my own experience.

freaks was a thing i photographed a lot. it was one of the first things i photographed and it had a terrific kind of excitement for me. i just used to adore them. i still do adore some of them. i don't quite mean they're my best friends but they made me feel a mixture of shame and awe. there's a quality of legend about freaks. like a person in a fairy tale who stops you and demands that you answer a riddle. most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. freaks were born with their trauma. they've already passed their test in life. they're aristocrats.

herstory: janis joplin

2005-02-20T12:59:00.000+08:00

rock vocalist: janis joplin

she threw herself into the playground and didn't want to come out of it. she was in her panties and blouse, all alone in a cheap los angeles motel, chasing the dragon on the bed when her consciousness was obliterated.

a woman left lonely

a woman left lonely will soon grow tired of waiting,

she'll do crazy things, yeah, on lonely occasions.

a simple conversation for the new men now and again

makes a touchy situation when a good face come into your head.

and when she gets lonely, she's thinking 'bout her man,

she knows he's taking her for granted, yeah yeah,

honey, she doesn't understand, no no no no!
well, the fevers of the night, they burn an unloved woman

yeah, those red-hot flames try to push old love aside.

a woman left lonely, she's the victim of her man, yes she is.

when he can't keep up his own way, good lord,

she's got to do the best that she can, yeah!

a woman left lonely, lord, that lonely girl.

herstory: camille claudel

2005-02-20T12:55:00.000+08:00

sculptor: camille claudel

she let herself go into an infinite fall, joining the esoteric circle with a paranoid distaste for the exoteric. she made her sculptures with delicate affection, but destroyed them afterwards in fits of restless unrest. she lost the exoteric when her brother signed the papers that put her forever in a house for social lunatics.

i sleep naked to give me the impression that you are with me. but when i wake up, it is not the same thing.

madhouses are houses made on purpose to cause suffering. i cannot stand any longer the screams of these creatures.

herstory: anne sexton

2005-02-20T12:45:00.000+08:00

poet: anne sexton

anne said that plath’s death was hers. and so she numbed herself with a glass full of vodka for this meeting. entered her garage and into her red cougar. she had to have her music and so she turned on the radio while waiting for the sweet fumes to intoxicate her.

the truth the dead know

gone, i say and walk from church,

refusing the stiff procession to the grave,

letting the dead ride alone in the hearse.

it is june. i am tired of being brave.

we drive to the cape. i cultivate

myself where the sun gutters from the sky,

where the sea swings in like an iron gate

and we touch. in another country people die.

my darling, the wind falls in like stones

from the whitehearted water and when we touch

we enter touch entirely. no one's alone.

men kill for this, or for as much.

and what of the dead?

they lie without shoes

in the stone boats. they are more like stone

than the sea would be if it stopped. they refuse

to be blessed, throat, eye and knucklebone.

herstory: virginia woolf

2005-02-19T18:13:00.000+08:00

writer: virginia woolf

she entered the brink and stayed there even with the good support of her husband. she left him a letter, walked to the river near her house, and danced her queer world in the water. in the letter she wrote:

dearest,

i feel certain i am going mad again. i feel we can't go through another of those terrible times. and i shan't recover this time. i begin to hear voices, and i can't concentrate. so i am doing what seems the best thing to do. you have given me the greatest possible happiness. you have been in every way all that anyone could be. i don't think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. i can't fight any longer. i know that i am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. and you will i know. you see i can't even write this properly. i can't read. what i want to say is i owe all the happiness of my life to you. you have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. i want to say that - everybody knows it. if anybody could have saved me it would have been you. everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. i can't go on spoiling your life any longer. i don't think two people could have been happier than we have been.

herstory: sylvia plath

2005-02-19T17:49:00.000+08:00

the few went in so deep that they couldn't crawl back up. upcoming entries are for the women i'ld love to sleep in the same bed.

poet: sylvia plath

sylvia was on the verge a couple of times before but the stabs were futile. finally, she left some biscuits and milk in her children’s room, proceeded to open the windows and sealed the room with tapes and towels. she went into the kitchen and rested her head next to the oven. the gas suffocated her last breath.

the dead

revolving in oval loops of solar speed,
couched in cauls of clay as in holy robes,
dead men render love and war no heed,
lulled in the ample womb of the full-tilt globe.
no spiritual caesars are these dead;
they want no proud paternal kingdom come;
and when at last they blunder into bedworld-wrecked,
they seek only oblivion.
rolled round with goodly loam and cradled deep,
these bone shanks will not wake immaculate
to trumpet-toppling dawn of doomstruck day:
they loll forever in colossal sleep;
nor can god's stern, shocked angels cry them up
from their fond, final, infamous decay.

craptostrophic psychedelia

2005-02-16T23:46:00.000+08:00

buildings, structures, walls, rooms, curtains, cubicles, partitions and panels are antisocial and eccentric. voyeurism is vestigial when we tear down the walls of private space. when total visibility is accepted, nothing will appear obscene, vulgar or profane. no space is sacred for everything is communal. so, no more temptations to steal glances or close our eyes. no more urges to eavesdrop or shut down noise. no more desires to smell nice or block out putrid odours.

a friend was panting in a fluster when i met him at the corridor today. he said he saw a smiling man from china having a heavenly crap. the toilet door was wide open. he said that the odour was horrid, the farting sound was unbearable and the image of a stranger crapping was permanently embedded.

if you're interested to know about the business, go here.

little india: a psychogeography exercise

2005-02-13T13:19:00.000+08:00

the continuation...

the derive started at the multi-storey carpark, which is surrounded by a couple of flats. these towering rectangles are replicas of the mass-produced factory assembled boxlike flat i live in. the uniformity and geometric precision of these flats are typical of mass public housing projects for singapore’s low income families. standardisation, functionality, simplicity, warehouses, pigeon holes, scattered rubbish, graffiti, and urine in lifts were meanings i got.

i saw indian foreign workers chatting away in small groups. some occupied the stone benches while others were playing cards or having their lunch of packet rice and curry. this, a cosy hideout from the frenetic pace of serangoon road. there were signs in four languages saying that it is prohibited to loiter around this public space. the sanctity of these flats must be protected against the potential criminal elements of foreign workers. not far was a deserted playground.

i embraced the sweltering sun. beads of salty sweat trickled down my face. i wanted to lick the paths of tourists, locals and foreign workers. i started the stroll by joining the glee of jaywalkers to mustafa, which i last visited a couple of years ago. mustafa, to me, signifies little india’s erotic world of consumption, choices and indulgence. apparently, the architects behind the design of these chain of superstores adore robert venturi because the spatial boundaries between the goods was a practice in ambiguity with no obvious beginnings and endings. the complexity and contradictions made a child out of me as i imagined a wonderland in my wanderings. i bought a made-in-malaysia brylcreem and the lady ziptied the plastic bag.

i released myself from mustafa and drifted to whatever that would capture my fancy. there was no specific route plan, but guided somehow by the three parallel lines of race course road, serangoon road and jalan besar. while dodging people, drains and narrow pathways, i ended up further down the street. it was too quiet. realised that it was my tendency to drift to the deserted. reminded myself that i need to return to the pathological embrace of overgrowth, materialism, pollution and congestion of the great conurbation and urban crowding of little india. made a u-turn and explored further but could not find any intimacy. the air of monetary transactions was as intense as any other places in singapore. only the dealers and players were of a different breed.

nevertheless, new narratives of a certain kind are creating their own spaces with their parasitic symbolic value. they filch the grotesque images and representations of little india, appropriate and then package them. one of which is the prince of wales backpackers pub. it's meant to be a therapeutic station of the familiar for the urban pseudo-wanderer. after experiencing the first remove, the second remove is heavenly. went there a couple of times before but was turned off by certain elements after my last visit. incidentally, in my mini tours of various locales, this pub reminded me of the beetle box at joo chiat road.

the other narratives which arrested my attention were the attempts by visual and performance artists to voice their ideologies from little india. there is a proliferation of studios like the artists village, p-10 and other perumal artists, the other house and plastique kinetic worms situating their spaces around little india. their fascination with decay, grotesque, junk and ruins of little india are symptomatic of the addictive entertainment of bourgeois mortuary visitations.

the pub and artist studios are anomalies, they cater to the needs of avant-garde bourgeois youths, they are parasites living on the hype, and they are terrorist outfits out to appropriate space, transgressing the ideal india of serangoon road.

i met chua at his shop and he told me that his motorcycle parts and accessories business will be more profitable if there are plenty of motorcycle parking space. he wished me a prosperous and happy new year. i soaked in the irony from a distance while having fish head curry and watching stunt videos with chua and imelda in the shop. the fish tasted like frozen fish and the curry was too watery.

little india: part one

2005-02-10T15:21:00.000+08:00

bourgeois singaporean youths somehow find fascination with little india. to visit little india is to make a fashion statement. tales and photos are often exaggerated to the same level of journalists who survived the horrors of being bombed in fallujah. and so i need to immerse myself into this phenomelogical fad of touring little india. i want it to affect me, hurling its mysterious vibes at me for i'm bored with modern, clean, efficient and well-organised singapore. i want to go on a couple of hours of a disney trip to find the aesthetic in disorder, clutter, ugliness, noise, malady, violence and chaos. the kitsch enthrals me, it makes me fashionable and i'll have something so, so very, very cool to write about. and so i embarked.

the afternoon was fucking hot and i realised that my temper was reaching similar temperature proportion once i entered its vicinity. i was agitated and impatient. maybe it was the wrong decision to ride for imelda told me that a taxi is a better option. ‘we should arrive in comfort and in the right frame of mind,’ she said while i swore and cursed in hush tones at those who made my experience then awful. the unremitting disagreeable odours, snarling and sluggish traffic, nasty slew of fumes, narrow and crowded roads, ear-splitting honking, and jay-walking pedestrians added fuel to the fire. the skin on my arms and face were sore and my head was throbbing. i heaved a fucking big sigh of relief when i found a spot at a multi-storey carpark just off race course road.

to be continued…

[i realise that i want to go deeper into the psychogeography interpretations of my little india experience. this entry, i think, is going to be super long. i need time to reflect and construct, and i don't have the time now for i've to visit hell]

reunion dinner and pineapple tarts

2005-02-08T16:41:00.000+08:00

happy, happy lunar new year! may you all get lots of money this year. money is good.

rustic changi village

2005-02-06T13:41:00.000+08:00

met a very good old friend at change village for breakfast. he's a typical narrative of another urban bohemian bailing out from the terrorising merchant culture of the corporate world. he quit his banking trade last september to do the tough work of selling hawker food. with red baseball cap, skate shorts and t-shirt with ‘beastie boys’ emblazoned on it, he was an irony. he looked more like a juvenile teenager, far from the ideal masculine copy of domesticated jamie oliver or the corporate costume of white shirt, black pants and polished shoes he once put on almost every morning.

he told me he wants to go back to the basic life. the shitass made me muse so early in the morning. he was very sober, different from the mirth we used to concoct out of everyday life long time ago.

i remember him as a the prankster who tried to burn down our school. he was caught by our ugly discipline master and a public announcement was made the next day. he was suspended for a week. it was hilarious more than anything else. he was stupid enough to skip the science lab session by staying in class with another classmate. they got bored and decided to pile textbooks around the teacher’s table in a symbolic ritual of a rebellious affectation.

before they could get the fire full-blown, a pair of hands were already on their collars. the incident was part of a series of escalating puerile projects by competing clusters in the school. the eurasian boys were bragging about their satanic ritual that whole week. legend says that a couple of convent girls were seduced to participate and ended up losing their virginity in a messy rite at somebody’s home.

i also remember him as the one who would cause me to pee in my pants at the thought or suggestion of being a pillion on a motorcycle. my motorcycle was in the workshop and i became his pillion for a day. he was a madcap rider who liked to make suicidal swerves and sharp turns, especially in heavy traffic. that day i ended up on a taxi’s bonnet. i swore at him and he just laughed. he kept laughing although he was still on the ground next to his motorcycle. the taxi driver was going all nuts and other motorists were blaring their horns in disgust.

he is a different man now, happier rather than angrier. married to a gorgeous lady of a different culture, sex is still measly according to him but still better than before. ‘i like to build it up and let it explode once a week,’ he says.

the deserter's songs

2005-02-05T22:24:00.000+08:00

nostalgia slays my soul sometimes. before i leave my home tonight, i would like to share the deserter's songs. this i wrote many years ago, and i found it tucked between piles of papers in a box. my fucking hard disk marooned me many months ago and with it almost all my transcribed words, verses and stories. but the deserter's songs is one of the few lucky ones which i decided to print somehow back then.

the deserter's songs
plug into my ears as coded streams. a meandering of empty roads, i pace between signs and texts, cars and buses. i hear muses of a slide guitar although the sounds are falling. i remember her now. the mole on her tender upper lip makes me want to kiss her all the time. her eyes filled with tears, a soulful glow. but tears from cigarette smoke are no different from those of a mourning lover. i found a bench and sit down among the aunties, gambling away moments in zest. it is wry for it saps these honey-coated feelings, leaving a bland aftertaste. my pupils dilate, holding the wrinkled faces and trembling hands within a distance. i imagine her by the pavement, both hands on a cheap umbrella, waiting. she makes careful tiny steps, dust and dirt in slumber, tiptoeing almost, while threading a deliberate fear. i cannot figure out why this is so, for she rather resides amongst deadpan smiles, a fluke decorum of heinous pride, a standing ovation, misrepresented tributes and false adulations. all are like the falsies of small breasts, a cover up. a bohemian apostate, she is. i wince and gather myself, knowing that her faith is stronger than my dreams.

i wonder where kay is now. she was the other before this present other. got to go, i am running late!

confession

2005-02-05T00:07:00.000+08:00

dear reader

when i decided to come up with this blog, it was with the intention to put across my realities on the clothes line for cyberspace voyeurs, like you, to ogle at what underwear i wear. in my endeavour to put interesting shock-value materials, i hope to impress you that i am a fucking intelligent and sophisticated bastard who has a ten-inch dick and wears great designer underwear. it is done discerningly to arouse your primal sexual desires.

anyway, my blog is an autobiography of sorts. its anecdotes are influenced by what my ideal life is. an ideal life has to be cool. to be cool is viagra which puts me at the whip hand in my intercourse with my realities. to be cool is to simulate what cool people possess, think, feel, wear, read, drink, eat, listen and watch, and where cool people live and go to. my blog entries become a simulation of cool models of fashion, music, art and relationships. it becomes a fabrication no different from the life of the three stooges. my reality and simulation confluence to a blur. my realities are simulated and the simulations are my realities.

excuse me now. i need to go for a style overhaul, form a band, get a branding, and busy myself with self-promotion.

yours sincerely

yes man

dharma escapes me tonight

2005-01-31T01:32:00.000+08:00

panatipata veramani sikkhapadam samadiyami.

finding my neverland

2005-01-30T19:00:00.000+08:00

yesterday my codes were switched to the high morality, modesty and exquisite decorum of a modernist project by entering the humanist world. i watched ‘finding neverland’ and i thoroughly enjoyed the journey. it was very rare for me to let go of my playfulness and irony when making cultural observations like watching a film, but yesterday i fucking suspended it all and cried, just a little and for the third time this week, towards the end of the film. i am all nostalgic and romantic these past weeks and the ideal me will be something like joe, a lawyer and a humanist. fucktard.

anyway, the film is minimalistic, with conventional narrative structure, plot and camerawork. it was set in the post-victorian period of king edward. no busy roads of money-spinning hong kong, tall buildings of seductive shanghai, supermarkets of suburbia taipei, taiwan, and panoramic vistas of lord of the rings. no characters wearing armani suit. so no johnny depp wearing a tag heuer, drinking coke and driving a bmw.

no cryptic or smart-ass dialogues. no cool factor and no interferences. no explicit references to contemporary popular cultural artefacts. no eclectic patchwork of other genres or borrowing of references from other films. no corruption of media representations, constructions and imitations. no fragmentation, no uncertainty, no loss of context and no worries.

i did not have to criticise the film as a recurrence of jane austen’s sense and sensibility, as an articulation of the lifestyle of dominant aristocratic class oppressing the working class of the edwardian era, as a subtext of orientalist’s discourse of american indian culture, as a portrayal of anguished and absurd characters moving from nothingness before birth to nothingness after death, as a study of dialogic characters with no superior worldviews, as a social system with forced distinction between art and life, as a social construct which suppressed women, and as barthes' [for tessa] structural world of shared meanings of edwardian formal conversations and immaculate gestural language, social rituals in play-watching and tea-drinking, couture corseted gowns, lavishly prepared meals, and architectural grandeur of renaissance inspired buildings, which an idiot from singapore would never fully understand because of the plurality and endless playing of signifiers.

the film was very bare, sincere and unpretentious. it was a good old fashioned story of love. i was suckered into the story, believing in the characters and their experiences. i was defeated, subjugated and reduced to a willing submission of neverland. it was not a construction at that time, it was real to me. it was warm with that fuzzy, fuzzy feeling, you know.

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