scherzo

Fall

2011-09-19T07:53:00.000-07:00

-ahem-

(This is the clearing of throat that says, I am nervous because I am going to write about my experience of turning 18, and I am, even more than usual, immobilised by the road of adulthood stretching into two parallel lines which meet. I am nervous because I fear that as I type, I will fix and set, and that is what I fear most in adulthood. To be something so definite that everything else is excluded. As I age I will lose the potential to become infinite.)

This year, I managed to put up very little resistance and let the guys take me out for LAN and drinks. As the night wore on, I mused about how my birthday experiences changed throughout the years.

In the heydays of my band days, it was effeminate childish antics involving giggling friends who gave gimmicky sex-related or gender-bending presents, like condoms and underwear and one year, the last year when we were on talking terms, I received a (probably hand-stitched) dress. I gave most of them back. But what I can never give back, what I remember the most (and therefore what hurts me the most) is how much mindless fun we had, how non-judgmental I was, and how deeply we felt like we understood each other. You were the family which I was satisfied to have.

When I realised I had no family, and that at the tender age of 16 I had burnt all my bridges, I spent my next two birthdays crying my eyes out in a park, mourning the anniversary of my existence. Desolation that deep consumes you. It becomes the thought you automatically slip into, instead of aspiration or boredom or sex or kindness or love. I saw the desert in the garden, the music went from my head, every second is night.

During my 17th birthday I was especially anxious, mainly because I knew many songs which sung of the ephemeral 17. 17 is the cusp between youth and age, the last frontier where you can exert the full force of anarchy, the mad dance before fixture. I felt like I was going to waste it, and I think I probably did. I participated in small adventures, maybe, but I was much quicker to withdraw than I was to explore. My world was a very small oyster.

This 18th birthday was spent with drinks and cards and video games and a cigarette. Although I did enjoy myself, in some way, I also felt like I was living a stereotype, that I was assuming false identities of maturity. The taste of metholated smoke and raspberry vodka in my mouth was not right, I felt like my every action was postured, and I didn't want to be like that, but my head was already unclear.

I think the sad fact is: nothing would satisfy me. I would find it hard to breathe in clubs. I would skim skin after skin with tired disinterest. The flavours of cocktails will dissolve into the same sweet blandness in my tongue. I will stumble away from sexual propositions. But I would also grow restless as my lover sleeps on my shoulder. I would be frustrated at his lack of bravery, her conditioned conservativeness, his obsession with order, her compulsion with connection, his domestication, her solicitude. All these people - lover, lovers, dancers, sleepers - all want me to become them. But my shapeshifter's instincts tell me the first rule: never stay for too long, lest you lose the ability to change.

My mother's birthday is one day before mine. Usually, we share a cake. Since I grew into an individual, I felt unfair, not only for myself, but also for her. Why should her identity and mine converge into a single piece of pastry? But if I mentioned that to her, her feelings would be hurt. The sharp knife of my individualism that tries to surgically delineate, this is me, this is mother, will mutilate her. I love her enough to want to make her whole, even if this means she holds part of me hostage, that my self will never be completely mine. And if I choose to leave, it inevitably means abandonment. Right now, I'm not willing to trade. I can only wish that in time to come, there need not be a trade. But I doubt so. Motherland is older than migration.

The traveller knows that his right to roam is always tangential to the claim of home. Some nights, he wakes and is filled with a terrible sense of mistake, being so far away from origin. But home is but one dream. My wish is let there be many.

Susurrus

2011-08-08T07:37:00.000-07:00

"She would have liked to tell him that behind Communism, Fascism, behind all occupations and invasions lurks a more basic, pervasive evil and that the image of that evil was a parade of people marching by with raised fists and shouting identical syllables in unison." (3.5)

"kitsch is the absolute denial of shit, in both the literal and the figurative sense of the word; kitsch excludes everything from its purview which is essentially unacceptable in human existence." (6.5)

"kitsch is a folding screen set up to curtain off death." (6.10)

"As soon as kitsch is recognised for the lie it is, it moves into the context of non-kitsch. thus losing its authoritarian power and becomes as touching as any other human weakness. For none among us is superhuman enough to escape kitsch completely. No matter how we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition." (6.12)

"Kitsch is the stopover between being and oblivion." (6.29)

From The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

***

So it is after everything that I decide to write. Before, the media circus made every word unbearable, and now, the silence bids me again. The cell is drowsily hot in the afternoon, which makes it impossible to read without sweating on my books (I have to make them last, it is only by the kindness of others that I can read now). I have pen and paper (they said I could study if I wanted to, and I will, to pass the time). Even after my confession, no one is quite sure why I did it. So again my writing is revelatory.

Some people think I am a monster. I feel the same way sometimes. But not other times. Especially not when I did it: just before I did it, rush of pure horror rising at the sight of him; when I did it, the giddy confirmation of acceleration; and when he fell, the absolute exhilaration of the exorcist. Even as he was falling I saw his face change, from a Dorian gray to human pink, before he hit the ground. When they found the body it was completely human - shattered, exposed and gaping, nothing to hide. I saved him, really. And damned myself. With the echoing thud the demons quietly left, their work done, and I slumped to the fourth-storey floor, absolved, tired, surrendered. You know the rest. The arrest, the trial, the confusion, the mournful eyes of everyone who ever thought they knew me.

I don't resent prison life. It articulates so plainly what I have always suspected: the blankness of existence, the vanity of purpose, the dissolution of all that is soluble under time. You see, within these walls, I am safe and free. No urgent pull and push and shove, no deadlines, no angels or demons. And when night turns the darkness is welcoming.

Shhhhh they said. I am a child again. The crowd is murmuring, I am in a circus. The acrobats swing so wildly. I clutch my small piece of bread. One of them whooshes past me, his or her eye a familiar glint. I hold up my arm and he/she grabs it, and off I go, up against the tent, darting from the spotlight, then there is no tent and I am in the night sky, two incinerator towers glowing in the distance...

Falling. Terminal velocity. The wind says, Shhhh, a lullaby. I say okay. I fall slowly asleep, it is a long fall. Blink, it is hot afternoon. I am in a marching band, I am in a marching band. Left right left right aching legs lockstep spin spider-sweat crawling down forehead I am in a marching band. Thread mill. Breathless nausea brown skin skinny leg think of something else five more minutes. Imagine sweet taste of cold water drip drop stop check bang. Warm brass on my arm, impossibly heavier. I close my eyes, tropical sun behind the lids, womb light, I think of something else.

By the gods, she is beautiful. Sweet Atalanta, perfect balance, Greek sun on olive skin, glistening oil running down her thigh. I am a nameless youth running in her footrace, sure to die before his time. Even now I hear her steps behind me, tap tap tap with an echo of sand. I am out of breath, lungs pulsating painfully, the horizon a blur, blood expanding in my skull, don't stop, don't stop. But I am too slow. She gracefully sidesteps me, delivering my death sentence with an arrogant arch of brow. Too much. I collapse, my battered legs a useless dead weight, my breath haggard, the ants will eat me. Formic acid. Lactic acid. The ants will carry me off, bit by bit. My vision clears, focusing on a roadside daisy. Oh how beautiful you are, sweet daisy, now that I am to die. How beautiful I have never seen you before -

Red sea. Night sky again. I have sung all your songs, this is home, where I belong, stand up for sing- I have sung all your songs. Sudden alarming colours exploding again and again, the roar of the crowd, the false thunder, the false lightning, smoke in the air, choke. I want a real thunderstorm. We are Singaporeans? The kitsch of inelegance. Soviet Kitsch? You are my sweetest downfall. Sex lib kitsch? I don't recognise you with your clothes on. Hipster kitsch? Redundant. You kitsch me not. I swing again,

into her kitchen. Crawling into her oven, there is space for two. I kiss her wrist. I whisper, This is the only way. I cannot save you. I can only accompany you into where you want to go. Together the gas slows our blood...

Castle. Overlooking a Scandinavian forest, full of dark creatures with myths attached. Always dusk. I wander the ruins, wet dew and damp floor underneath my ghost feet, the night is coming, I must return. Stone protects me. I shower in the wide white room, tracing flower arabesque. I read in the library, large fireplace, tall winsome shelves, old wood holding up old fibre, my own garden. At night the candle, the four poster bed, the cliff winds combing my hair. This night is eternal. When I realise this I run away, into the waiting forest, and new and beautiful dangers.

My father's finger bones, foul flesh still clinging, twisted away by me. What is this dagger I see before me? It is already in my hand. It is already in my chest. O psychopomp Muses, I'm not yet 27. Take away the pain. It hurts. It hurts very much. Hush, child, shhh. I am bleeding. No, you are only dreaming. Hush now. Sleep. Dream again.

The slow rocking of the boat wakes me. I am blind, such is the weight of coins on my eyes. I cannot tell who ferries me, his name escapes my memory. Still I must try. The bump of the boat against the cold shore. He lifts the coins off, and I stare into his blue-gray eyes. This is my chance. I jump into them - the last sound I hear is the clink of coins on deck, his surprised breath -

"So. You are back again," she says.

"Yes. I am back. Again?" I say.

She is not smiling but it is as though she smiled. Then she turns to the window and her lips move, but I cannot tell what she is saying because the winds outside are very strong, and the sand brushes against the glass, with the sound of the sea. The land here never changes, always changes, and like the forest, always dusk. Why do I remember everything now? Now I understand what she is saying. She is saying exactly the same thing when I first left:

"There is a quest. There is a story to be told. So although us children of oblivion do not care to live, I must do a terrible thing unto you. You will go into the land of the living, and live, and lie, and feel pain. And when you return we will welcome you, the proverbial son, the mad bard, the zero fool, your suffering having no consequence here. Will you stay or will you go? There is a story to be told."

I consider her words. Are they an invitation to stay, an order to go, a prophecy, or a memory? Will I wake up in my cell, reeling from a bizarre dream, or will the winds here exfoliate my memories of falling boy, white walls, prison food, mother's eye, sweat-stained books? Will my guards wake to find me missing, leaving behind only a trail of sand, and my small piece of bread?She turns back to look at me expectantly. I listen to the winds for a while and then I answer her.

Induction

2011-07-24T22:36:00.000-07:00

(School) life is cruel and ironic in the respect that it follows everybody's schedule, but never follow anyone's schedule. It's too fast when you need to eat, sleep, read, and do nothing, and when it's too slow you crave something to happen which will dissolve these timetable grids. Every child has wished for a disaster. A fire rushing everyone to the fields, to watch the books burn. Floods to swim in. Wild beasts on loose, forcing a fearful, exhilarating game of hide and seek.

The season of post-examinations was interspersed with dread and wretched acceptance. I expected the worst, and received only slightly better than the worst. Strangely, the school also thought it encouraging to hold scholarship fairs and summon seniors to share their adventures. So it was always with a sense of absurdity that I listen to people regale their success stories, my eyes sinking so far away from the sun. What the hell am I doing? Nothing. What do I see? Only the past, and its eternal return. Why am I not trying? Because death is so easy, and gets progressively easier.

Of course, I am also being deliberately misleading. Not being successful is not death. Just because I have no socially significant achievement to my name in these two years, doesn't mean I have to be dead. It's a convenient metaphor, though. It excuses my stasis.

The KI seniors who came back offered the same advice I've heard from countless motivational speakers, leaders-of-leaders, men of power and position, well-meaning teachers and relatives. "Go out there. Try. Don't be afraid."

I'm not afraid of what's out there. I'm afraid of what's inside - me and other people.

It seems to me that the most important epistemic concept I've learnt from KI, and absorbed most readily into my system, is Hume's problem of induction. People like to look at the good trends, and be optimistic. I'm not even obsessing about the bad trends. I'm just convinced that there are no trends, and anyone who wants to follow anything will find themselves lost, as I have.

There are two ways of dealing with Hume's POI. One is what I do, or rather, not do. I don't warm to acquaintances. I don't confess my life to any one person. I don't participate in any activities which, however remotely, will ask of me more than I can give. I stumble at "hel-", don't know whether to say help or hello, so I don't say anything. I patrol the borders of friends, family, studies, love, feud, gratitude, freedom, reason, grief, faith and need, making sure they mix only to the extent that I can handle, and making sure I am always in position to amputate any part which betrays me.

The other is what seniors have come back to say: Go out there. Try. Don't be afraid.

I've always wondered which is the better choice. Mine is the safest, of course - but because I distrust any drink, I will live dry, never knowing the sweet taste of cordial and wine and rose water. I stare at the opposite people with thirsty eyes. What have they done that I have not? Why is it that they do not die, they who daringly lick arsenic and dance away gleefully with their full strength, while I who has sealed my lips waste away?

In this respect I empathise with the Jewish people. How do you know if a prophet is false or true? Who can give up their soul so unquestioningly, and so completely? I wouldn't have believed. But it seems like I would never believe in anything. A skeptic is not superior. He's the saddest person who wonders why other people are so happy.

Last night, I had a dream about my most urgent confession, and an old crush promising love. Ridiculous. But I wished I never woke. Dreams like these are infrequent but disrupting. They make the borders entangle, and I spend silent mornings rearranging the lines.

University seems like a prospect foggier and further away. I am starting to seriously consider a life without university. For some people the line to higher education is a rope bridge, sturdy enough if you don't swing too hard, but for me it's a fine loose thread. It scares me how easy it is to snap it, and how tedious it can be to wind it back. My body is a spool and the thread is tight on my skin and I am getting dizzy.

Besides, I'm not sure what good I am to anybody. The only subjects which interest me are literature, linguistics, and philosophy - which are pretty much useless, economically speaking. Of course, I could read law and politics/public policy. But they carry an emotional sunk cost, in addition to the economic one. I can't afford anything.

And beyond these teenage musings, delusions or otherwise, I wonder if I will complete this bildungsroman, and return to society. Scholarship. Law school. Private practice. Five dollar words. Return home tired, have sex with the girlfriend, and fall asleep, dreaming of an old confession. And forgetting about it the next day.

Jetlag

2011-06-03T02:42:00.000-07:00

"There are many forms of love and affection, some people can spend their whole lives together without knowing each other's names... But on the wild nights who can call you home? Only the one who knows your name." - Oranges are Not the Only Fruit, by Jeanette Winterson

"They say you're not somebody,
Until somebody else loves you.
Well I am waiting to make somebody somebody soon." - Are We There Yet, by Ingrid Michaelson

***

When I was in Hawaii, my name was Travis. When I introduced myself to an Asian girl from California, she said, "Travis?" and I hesitated. Then I said uncertainly, "Travis." I liked the idea of the name, that it means "to cross over", but it felt wrong in my mouth, so I never used it again.

When I was in Brussels another girl, frustrated with the Chinese syllables, called me Dave. She said I looked like one. I was okay with that, so I introduced myself as Dave in Sweden. Still I never felt comfortable being Dave. Most of the time, my host didn't call me by any name, which I was grateful for.

Not having a name means no one but myself can tell stories about me. I enjoy this kind of sovereignty. Yet telling my own story also means I can continue to evade using my own name, sufficing with "I". In this way I reject fixed ways of thinking about myself. Truth be told I never liked nor disliked my name, didn't treasure or refuse it. It is just there. It is certainly useful sometimes, for people to call or categorize me, but it is not necessary for existence. The truest names are not words to be written or said.

My real given name is Jiasheng. In Chinese, this is made of two syllables, meaning "home" and "life" respectively. (Incidentally, there is a John Mayer song called "Home Life". I don't like it particularly.) I share the "home" syllable with my siblings - my sister is Jiamin and my brother is Jiayi. When my mother was pregnant with me, she pondered over which last syllable to complete my name. She told me the options she considered: grand words, typically Chinese-mercenary, imbued with promises of prosperity and success. And then I was born, and I had jaundice, and required massive blood transfusion.

Thus my poor mother, scared and emotional, lowered her expectations dramatically - no riches and no ambition, just for him to live. And so I became Jiasheng. Home and life. Yet for most of my intellectual life I was deeply convinced I was either homeless or dead. Trapped in a three-room flat with familial demons, I made it a habit to cycle away, or hop on a random bus, or travel to town and watch strangers, returning to the flat at night to trawl the dark corners of the Internet. On the road, I do my best thinking - that is, I live the most fulfilling life. But that is also when I feel the loneliest, and desire the most.

When I was in Europe, I sometimes dreamt of Singapore, and I was always confused which was the dream and where I would wake up in. In Inception, the characters wake up when they experience a sense of falling. In Europe, that was how I felt - the sense of falling all the time. As I watched the fields slide past the coach window, I drank in each flower hungrily, so certain I was that I would wake up two seconds later in the heat of the Singapore night. Of course I didn't. But it didn't stop me from such pseudo-lucid dreaming vigilance. I tried so hard to be awake during my perceived dreaming.

I would always remember the homestay in Sweden, even though it was the most uneventful part of the itinerary, compared to the city tours and seminars. My host's house had unfixed tiles on the door step, and as I looked quizzically at him, he said sheepishly, "Renovation." Throughout the house, though it was pleasantly furnished, I spotted bits of unfinished planks and odd angles of doors and rooms, which made me suspect it was a self-built house. That only impressed me. I was supposed to take a nap, but I slept through my alarm, and I woke up at around 3am.

At this time of the year, it was already light. I gazed unthinkingly at the soft square of light above my makeshift bed. Then I entered my host's room without knocking, thinking he was asleep, but he was awake on his bed, probably napping a short while before continuing working on his essay. The vestiges of dream had left me, but it was claiming him, so 15 minutes later he was asleep and I was sitting on the carpet, aware, staring at the window, the morning light at 4am off the coins on the sill, liberated by how far away I was from all I escaped from. Shantih.

When 7am came, his alarm rang, we went down for breakfast. His father was frying eggs. As I ate, the sound of toast reverberated loudly in my head, reminding me: This is not home. Yet I could not help myself stealing my host's life - being driven between the suburbs and a city school; the middle-class smell of ham and eggs and expensive men's fragrances; a sense that there is peace to be had, and a place to rest my head and heart. These are simple things made luxurious in my head. Then it seemed to me perverse to desire these things, and immediately I felt out of place.

When his mother asked me kind questions, I answered as quickly as I could without seeming rude. For the endless minutes of eating breakfast quietly with my host family I could mimic home life. This is how I wake, untroubled, and this is how I eat breakfast. This is my usual seat in my dad's car. This is school, and I study the natural sciences. I draw food webs. My questions are answered. My handwriting is knobby, but it is okay. Far away, in another land, in the literature texts, tragedy, instability, betrayal and other things register dimly. They do not touch me.

Yet how can I reject the life I own, or which owns me? On the plane bound for Singapore, I listen to my songs and watch the aisle through blurry eyes.

Now I am back in Singapore, feeling the familiar pull of misery, but at least it is familiar. Still, I have not reset the time on my phone. I rather add six hours to get the local time. It is stupid, sentimental and inconvenient, and I would probably have to reset it sooner or later, but never mind. Anyway, my body still thinks it is 18:55, when it is really 12:55. I will allow myself this little illusion, fragile as it is, for as long as it lasts.

Bathroom in Brussels

2011-05-27T13:28:00.000-07:00

Waking up, it is dark and cold and I am confused, feeling the heat leak out of my blanket into the room. Then I remember I am in Brussels and not a bright flat in Toa Payoh, the heat of the Singapore night and the glow of my sister's face fading into the vague outlines of hotel furniture.

I had fallen asleep while I was waiting for my roommate to come out of the bathroom. Now I see him bunched up in his blanket, and I sit up absentmindedly in my bed. Should I take a bath now? It is 3.23am. I get up.

Gathering my clothes beside my bed, I stumble into the bathroom. Click. The light is not working. Click. Click. Click. I pause. Click. Why isn't it working. Click.

I gaze furtively at my roommate. He is asleep. Guiltily, I try all the other switches. Softly. Click. Nothing works. Blackout? I don't know. Whatever. I'm going to take a bath anyway. I bring my phone into the bathroom. Only two bars of battery left, so I am frugal with the flash light. I use the screen light, but it doesn't last long, so I have to refresh it with a random key. Sink. Darkness. Tap. Darkness. Toilet. Darkness. Only the sound of water gushing into the tub now.

Then the handle turns. But the door is locked, so I watch the handle slowly return to its old position. I am naked now. Slightly annoyed, I wrap a towel around my waist, and open the door. There's no one there. I turn the corner to see my roommate sleeping. I don't think he moved. I don't know what to think. But I can't possibly just stare at my sleeping roommate, with a towel wrapped around my waist. If he wakes up, it would be difficult to explain. I return to the bathroom, and lock the door again.

I turn off the tap, and slide slowly into the tub of hot water. Ah. My phone is in the soap dish. Every minute, I press a random button with a wet hand to summon the light again, half expecting to see a ghost on the ceiling, long hair tickling my nose. Or a tub full of blood. Or a face next to mine, inhaling my breath. After a while, I stop pressing for light.

I stare into the nothingness. I don't know about ghosts. All I know is this body soaking in the warm water, muffled sloshes in my ears, the smell of water, this soft skin, this tired frame, this sorry heart. Into this utter darkness I release the recent memories: the foreign twist of names here; the dramatic angles of every Gothic architecture; the sudden beauty of roadside daisies; a dandelion wisp in shallow focus; the taste of my lip balm in hot chocolate. And others - older, sadder, lonelier. I think at this point I stopped being afraid. In some ways I am indignant, even confrontational - how possibly can you scare me? What tragedy can you offer that is greater than mine? What pitiful death of yours can match up to that which is my life? In other ways, I am glad you are here with me, you imaginary spirit sitting on the toilet or beside my tub or in the mirror only, listening as I tell my story silently, blindly, breathing air so close to water. Us common comrades in a world so unseeing, so wordless. Thank you. Dank u. Merci. In a foreign land this is the first word you learn.

I don't know how long I laid in the tub. But at some point I get up, get dressed, brush my teeth and go to bed. The next day, when I wake again, my roommate is already up. The lights work. I ask my roommate, Did you wake up last night. He said No. Breakfast, I tell the story to my travel mates, the adventurous version. Handle moved by itself. No lights. My teachers are slightly amused, slightly horrified. One of them gives me some salt wrapped in a tissue, tells me to put it in a cup in the bathroom. I left the tissue in the room. Room service throws it away the next day. Nothing weird happens for the rest of my stay, but on the last night before I check out, I write, pardon, on the misted mirror. In a foreign land this is also the first word you learn. A constant apology for your presence. Maybe someday when I die, I too will haunt a hotel bathroom, pranking people with a lesser life.

Critique: Rumours

2011-05-20T08:04:00.001-07:00

8 Reasons to Watch Rumours

1) The script will make you laugh (in a good way, not the cringe-laughing you do when the announcers screw up during morning assembly), unless you suffer from some kind of disorder which prevents you from laughing.

2) (Most of) the acting was baby-butt smooth, consistently funny, exhilaratingly memorable, and most of all largely believable. I loved everyone. Ken Bevans (Luk Yean) risked being shouty at the start, but Luk Yean proved to be flexible and convincing enough that I stopped wondering why they cast such a skinny guy. Jennifer Yip (who plays Chris Bevans) managed her character's panicky frazziness proficiently, making the opening scene (which she helms) highly effective. Claire Cummings (Jesslyn Chee) was hysterical fun. Cookie Cusack (Felicia Choo) was deliciously weird-ass and meaningfully awkward, which is a lot harder to achieve than it sounds. Ernest Cusack (Look Woon Wei) was a bit too shouty for my liking, especially during the parts when he was angry (contrary to popular belief, raising one's voice is only one of the many way to express emotion) and aggrieved and sarcastic. I enjoyed Natalee Ho's rendition of Cassie Cooper (the red dress and BDSM shoes help) but was slightly disappointed that she didn't exploit the crystal rubbing scene more. Sadly, PC Conklin (Andre Lee) could have done better with more gravitas and authority, something which PC Casey (Tricia Teo) achieved very well. Glenn Cooper was played by Kenneth Loh, who is easy on the eyes but has a voice that sounds like he has something stuck in his throat. Hence the flighty lines he delivered were weighted down by the (inappropriate) slow deadpan tone, which was unfortunate. Loh also had the dubious honour of breaking character the most often, smiling every two seconds at the dialogue (although to be fair, the dialogue is comedy gold, and I caught Choo smiling at times as well). But maybe he was obvious because the rest of the cast was solidly stellar. Such wonderful chemistry too.

3) A special mention goes to Greg Alva Ng, who plays Leonard Cummings. Kinetic, momentous and orally talented as usual, Ng performed dialogue with expert familiarity. Look out for his highly dramatic and rectal-prolapse-hilarious monologue near the end of the play and maybe do a standing ovation if your rectum still remains inside you.

4) I will attribute the splendid blocking, pace and development to the directors: Nick Perry (Director), Janne Hu and Ariel Navas (Assistant Directors). Although the climax at the end of the first act was rather lacklustre, the rest of the play was deeply satisfying for a comedy of that complexity and length I am also glad the directors did not insist on a more sophisticated interpretation of the comedy, which would have dampened some audience response. Which is why I didn't mind the fist-bumping and blatantly juvenile behaviour unlikely for members of the upper class.

5) The set is adequately designed (Lew Bing Quan), complete with art and plants and lighted hallways. I wouldn't have minded a teeny bit more lavishness, but it worked and didn't distract, which is enough for a fixed set.

6) Costumes (I'm crediting Ephraim Tan, who is listed bizarrely under Fashion Director, as well as Celine Tan Sue-Wen, and Celeste Yeo) were not bad for the women and okay for the men. Not surprisingly, my favourite is Leonard's bathrobe, followed closely by Cookie's 60 year-old Russian mermaid-moss crazy ladysuit.

7) The publicity (Andrea Quek, Charlotte Hong) this time round was comprehensive and cool. I liked the brightly-coloured posters with snappy captions, and the one mimicking the poker card, both which were cute and relevant. The other posters with the actors' faces were less appealing (and also misleading! They looked way better on stage. And probably in person). See here for the posters.

8) There is tacky dancing involved. This is a good reason for anything, tacky dancing.

If you only watch one HCI ELDDFS production a year, or like ever, this is the one to go. It is the most polished, engaging and entertaining show I've seen staged so far. Don't regret not going and listening to all your cool friends gush about it. Tickets for the last run (tomorrow night!) are limited and selling fast, as I hear. For those who are going, have fun! For those who want tickets, they're available at front of house. But I suggest you text the Ticketing I/C, whose number can be found also here.

Rumours, written by Neil Simon, directed by Nick Perry and produced by HCI ELDDFS, continues its last run on 21st May 2011, 7.30pm, HCI Drama Centre. Tickets are $8 each.

Muller

2011-05-02T07:58:00.000-07:00

There was this one time in Art & Craft class in primary 5 (4? 6?) when we were making stuff with plasticine (or some other doughy material?) and somehow along the way I got into a quarrel with my partner, Cheryl (Sheryl?). We were both struggling for the plasticine, four hands wrestling in a mass of white dough, and in my idiocy and frustration, I headbutted her head. Hard. My head hurt, so it must have been painful for her too. She looked at me with bug eyes and then she surrendered the plasticine, walked away, starting to cry. I don't think I ever apologized for that. Cheryl, if you ever read this, I'm sorry, it was incredibly stupid and violent and unchivalrous of me. I see you around in Hwa Chong but I don't dare to say hi, not because I'm afraid you'll headbutt me back, but because I don't have the guts to go up to you, asking you if you ever remember me, and if you don't, bringing up things when we were eleven and I was a jerk, and saying I'm sorry.

In another art-and-craft session, during Sec2 when I stupidly attended a sabbatical which gave AEP ACE points (and I didn't take AEP), I was working with this guy called Bryan. We were working on this really cool sculpture which I am proud to say was my brainchild. (Okay, on hindsight, it's a really amateurish work and the teacher probably indulged me.) If you go to the Science Research Centre Level 1, you can see a photograph of Bryan and I looking really excited about our sculpture, on a pillar. (I look really ugly in that pillar-photo.) I didn't headbutt anyone this time, it went well, we left the sculpture for the teachers to bake it. On a few occasions I sneaked into the art studio storeroom to admire the baked sculpture, and I would show it my friend who sneaked me in - "Eh look see I did this." After the sabbatical, Bryan and I would say hi to each other when we see each other. But because we don't share anything else (e.g. classes, CCA, sports), and because I tend to go into periods of anti-social withdrawal, we stopped saying hi somewhere along the way, which is what happens with most of my acquaintances. Now I see him at the gym occasionally and sometimes I do the "look of recognition", sometimes I don't. Granted, I usually ignore people in the gym, but one can always make more effort. To Bryan, and to all my other unfortunate acquaintances: there is nothing wrong with you, it has always been me, I know you don't care, and you'll probably never read this, but I'm sorry that sometimes I saw too much into myself and edged you out of my peripheral.

To the Hainan guy who sent me emails, of which I only replied two of them, then ignored your third email, I know you'll never read this, but I'm sorry that to this day I still haven't read your email, and I'm not sure if I ever will.

To Yu Quan, I've dissed your music before, most of the time because it was kinda uncool to like you. But truth be told there are nights when I'm burning midnight electricity and I loop your covers. You're not as arrogant as people tell me, and you're good at what you do, so keep doing it. I'm sorry for not saying this earlier. I'm not good at appreciating people.

To Zhi Hao, like I've said before, I'm sorry for blaming you for the whole haystack when you were only the last straw. Two artists meet to remind each other of their monstrosity, which is why artists don't usually like to meet each other. I have no more goodness than you do. I just promote the good side better.

To Jie Han, I don't know if you ever read this blog, but last week I went through my old blogs and our email correspondence, and I couldn't stop crying. I'm sorry that when you called my name in the canteen, I turned, stared, and walked away. During that 2 seconds of staring I only thought that you called me too late, that I didn't want to revisit the pain, that you had nothing to offer which would make me happy again, all of which is true, but you did no wrong, you were just the hero who left and made me the replacement martyr. While I had things to burn I was happy. But now that so much of me is charred, I am afraid of fire, and perhaps my rejection is a reflex. That day you called my name, I deleted you from my Facebook friends, like I did with most band members. I had originally kept you, hoping against absurd hope that you would notice, but I guess not. I also deleted our mutual friends. Secretly, I googled you and found your blog and Twitter with the infrequent posts and boring subject matters and uninteresting language, and I devoured each word like first-time parents. I'm sorry for being drama; I'm sorry for being not drama enough. But somehow I think that, like most people who disappoint me, I had an ideal of you when you were gone, but people are not gods or kings, they are too small to fill the beauty I have carved out in their absence. Maybe I made things up about you when you were gone, and believed those things. When you came back you disrupted my mourning. But who cares? Don't call my name again. You have a life somewhere outside my mind, somewhere you are not dead and forever glorious and saintly. Live that life, and if someday I manage to break out of my psychosis, I may join you in the ranks of sanity and plain words and social company. We will meet for lunch and carefully sidestep the landmines of memory, and talk exclusively about the present and future. When we run out of conversation, we will resist against reminiscing, both of us reaching for water to fill our mouths.

Close

2011-04-14T06:34:00.001-07:00

Recently one of the aforementioned Apollo girls kept picking on me. Her name is Hui Ran. In my vague memory her last name sounds like bentoh, but it doesn't leave a good taste in your mouth. On Talentine night she hovered around me, whispering clandestinely to her friends while throwing furtive looks in my direction. Then she walked straight into my back and shoved me with half her shoulder before walking away. I yelled, "Bitch!" but she didn't turn back nor stop walking. Before the show started I thought of ways to get back at her, the visions of her being ass-raped by a chainsaw and her eyeballs being dug out and stuffed in her nostrils particularly satisfactory.

The immediate Monday, I met her at the canteen again. I was holding a plate of meesiam, some of which spilled down my pant leg when she elbowed me again, and waltzed out of the crime scene, while my friend and I watched blinkingly. Throughout the meal, we bitched about her, and I continued the rant after that, using her Facebook pictures as fodder. It was intensely bad for my karma but what could I do? I wanted to fight her. I wanted to hit her so bad, not because she's a woman (cough) and I'm sexist like that, but because she makes me lose faith in women and humankind in general. Besides, I wanted to let her know that I'm not an anonymous frail blogger who would be threatened by a few shoves.

Fortunately, I reined in the violence. One of my friends came up with a brilliant plan to make her go away: I should blog that I think Hui Ran is in love with me, seeing her obsessive behaviour. It was failsafe because firstly, everyone who were still hung-up over the DF issue would read it; secondly, it would make her stay miles away from me, which is what I need; thirdly if there was a small chance she was truly in love with me it was the perfect opportunity to crush her. I was really excited about this plan. So much satire material. It would be in the form of a public love letter. An excerpt I noted down in my notebook with a grin:

"O Hui Ran, you beautiful thespian, we will make love to your favourite song, which is probably Who Says by Selena Gomez. You will perform an insipid monologue about your existential angst as an unattractive female, while I lavish praise over praise upon your feet, waving a flag of your face on my pole."

There were going to be a sonnet and a ballade and perhaps even a long epic, all metered and rhymed to her clockwork perfection. Who cares about my research papers? Payback, especially to girls with a surplus of aggressive passive-aggressiveness and a shortage of sense, was sweet. It was cruel and she deserved it. The idea sat snugly and smugly in my mind, like a constant dollop of honey at the back of my mouth, sending me good vibes throughout the week. I told myself I would write it when she bumps into me a third time. You want to get close? I'll upsize that to incredibly close and extremely public. It would cut her better than I ever could.

This is a small extent of my rage. During the few weeks or months of exiting high school band, thoughts of revenge overtook my mind even as the despair set in. I thought of scratching my conductor's car, setting the band room on fire and hijacking their concert. I vowed to hunt down all my defectors, making the rest of my life miserable just to make them miserable. Yes, I went pretty much the far end then. It took all my self-control to keep everything in, be barely civil, and quench the sporadic fires with nihilism and inertia.

When bad things happen to people, there are two choices: rage and despair.

You despair by biting the cyanide pill they put between your teeth, losing strength and falling fast, sinking into a place where you forever erode, not allowed to die.

You rage by crying foul, cursing all, gathering up your diminishing power and offer one last branch of lightning, a blinding glare which judges everything and forgives none, leaving a decay of thunder.

Scherzo (i.e. this blog) has mostly been my refuge for despair writing. Which is why when I write the critiques and my outraged responses, half of me feels out of sorts. That half tells me what I write is right but trivial. That deeper things abound, and I should pull my eyes away from clapping monkeys, no matter how loudly they screech. I heed my intuition, and dive away from the greed of your gaze.

Critique: Dead Man's Cell Phone

2011-04-04T17:59:00.000-07:00

Warning: Long post. And not very funny.

"Dead man cell phone?"

"No, dead man sell organs."

***

I was staying in school on Friday, as per my Friday-habit-of-staying-back-in-school (say hi if you see me at my class bench), watching my classmates go for the Friday run of Dead Man's Cell Phone (written by Sarah Ruhl), produced by Hwa Chong's ELDDFS, and watching them flock back to the bench when it ended. When I asked them how it was, many people's faces became weird, the kind of expression you give when you're trying to grasp words from your dramatic vocabulary and realize that a) your dramatic vocabulary is quite small and b) none of the words fit your experience. The first word everyone gave was, "Uh..." The first non-filler phrase everyone gave was, "I don't know" or "I'm not sure". Even the more artistically inclined friends I have gave variations of "I cannot give a definite judgment."

How mysterious. Thus it is with a metaphorical deerstalker on my head and a pipe in my mouth that I entered LT3 and watched the second and last run of DMCP on Saturday, 2 April 2011. And when I emerged from LT3, two hours later, I have an elementary idea why people had such vague impressions about it.

A lot of it has to do with the audience-actors interaction. When the play finally started at 7.50pm, 20 minutes after the stated starting time, the LT was packed with people promised a comedy and a love story, but Dead Man's Cell Phone isn't exactly a romcom, although it is supposed to be romantic and funny, at certain points. The absurdism and magic realism weaved into the script is key to understanding the play - but the general feeling I got from the audience was "This barely makes sense, I think it's supposed to be funny/artsy, but no one else is laughing so I won't." Which is a pity because Ruhl's dialogue is sensitive and subtle, and requires equally dedicated expression and acting to work their magic onstage. After the show, I was talking to one of the crew, who confided that Friday's run was better because "the audience was better." Apparently, the Friday audience laughed at more jokes. I was mystified. I know theatre, by its nature, is an interactive art – but this was the first time I’ve heard someone blame the audience for not “getting” the play. True, sometimes the message is lost between the stage and the seats, or that the audience is too distracted. This happened many times during the first half of the show. The solution is not to replace the audience, but to heighten their dramatic attention - remove the distracting elements, delivering one's lines better, and allow what is said (and meant) to sink in.

Let me raise some examples. I believe the supposed failure (of audience engagement) in the first part can be attributed to the very demanding role of Jean (Tan Ee Hsien) in the first scene. It is demanding because Jean is the only speaking character in the first scene, and the audience grapples for its first sense of the story through her. It is also demanding because Jean is supposed to be "sort of nondescript" as described by Gordon. Sadly, where Ee Hsien tried to act out "nondescript", I saw "disconnection". Although she was our protagonist, I felt very little empathy or investment towards her throughout the play. Ee Hsien fared better when she interacted with other characters, but she didn't have the free-spiritedness to carry off Jean's irresistible attraction to her outer world and her disregard of her self. For any thespian, to disregard the self is difficult. But I believe the character of Jean required just that - it required a desire to experience the external world more than her own mindscape ("I want to remember everything. Even other people's memories."). Ee Hsien was too self-conscious, and I felt that her best acting occurred when she is involved in Gordon's family as opposed to her moments of solitude and self-reflection.

On the other hand, Gregory Alva Ng who played Gordon had fine control in what exactly his character wanted to say and how to say it. The monologue in the second act required an absolute self-assurance, which Gregory delivered with precision and delight. A lesser actor may have passed off as arrogant, but Gregory’s Gordon was subtle in his sorrow, quick in his attitude shifts and confident in his position. The constant striding and well-intentioned blocking Gregory used to punctuate his points gives the audience enough time to digest the meaning behind the dialogue. Gordon was entirely believable and empathizable, despite his choice of career and infidelity; for that I applaud the actor.

Of course the characters of Jean and Gordon asks for different treatment by the actors - Jean is sentimental, quirky, spontaneous and fearless in her own little way; the audience will find it difficult to connect with her individuality; while Gordon is equally self-centred, the audience gels with him much quicker because he is egoistic - he demands attention and effortlessly gets it; his ruthlessness is a charm; his state of being dead, and being obsessed by Jean, requires you to listen to his story, a dead man’s tale. But for both characters – in fact all characters – Ruhl has given them a unique voice and something worth pondering about. While sometimes Ruhl’s dialogue may border on preachy lamentations (c.f. the Other Woman’s complaint about modern women’s inadequacies), many other lines are nuanced, funny in context, deeply ironic and worth some slow and leisurely thinking. Which brings me to a major complaint – the pacing. Be it the fault of the actors or the director (Jesslyn Chee), I found the dialogue sliding too quickly from one character to the next, without enough time for the impact of the words to reach the audience. This is why many a times, conversations in DMCP sounded deliberately obfuscating and alienating to the audience, when it is simply delivered clumsily, without special attention to stress on different words and the varied meanings the dialogue could have produced. I believe this is also why I found Gordon’s monologue the most effective – Gregory had complete control over his words, without being trapped by the rhythms of conversation – and scenes with more than three talking characters the least effective. The dinner scene was particularly difficult to watch because each actor focused on their parts instead of the exchange of words and the relationships between the characters, which should have primacy in a collaborative scene.

I had a major problem with Dwight (Werty Heng). He was meant to be an awkward, overshadowed, and needy younger brother – this was pretty much covered by Werty. But Dwight is also supposed to go through a transformation into a more assertive, eloquent, and responsive person, an important aspect which I felt Werty failed to explore. Take the small monologue where Dwight talks about the signals flying through the air, blahblahblah. This represented Dwight’s newfound verbosity – previously silenced, he should be flowing with confidence, overjoyed at finding a listener in Jean. But Werty stayed in awkward Dwight mode, stumbling over those lines which represented his freedom. Just before Dwight and Jean kissed, when Dwight was supposed to be aggrieved by Jean’s involvement in Gordon’s business, Werty chose (actively or passively) to stick to a deadpan face, cornering Jean. Not having read that part of the script, I actually had a small jolt of panic, thinking, oh my he’s psychotic and he’s gonna rape her. When they kissed, it wasn’t much better – my friend exclaimed during the intermission – “Where got people kiss don’t move one!” All the galaxies and stars and glowing houses and candles only served to strengthen the disconnection, which is highly ironic given the play’s insistence on human connection. I know there is always a dilemma between the modesty of the actress (i.e. “Okay I kiss you but no tongue ar.”) and the believability of the kiss. Sadly, modesty won and we, the audience, had to work our imaginations extra-hard and tell ourselves, “Alright, their lips are together, this means they’re in love. Okay. Okay. Lol where got people kiss so long one. Wa got stars. Wa got paper houses. So romantic. Okay curtain closing. Wa still kissing. Lol.” Even at the end of the play, where Jean and Dwight kissed yet again, the connection wasn’t there, which contributed to the audience’s disenfranchisement. Love requires not just paper but also connection. What was delivered was, in the play’s language, sending an “ily:)” text message.

I don’t have much to say for the other characters, but I will try. Mrs Gottlieb (Joy Chee) was played by a valiant 18 year old, who tried her best being the manic and imposing matriarch. I give her 4 stars for manic and 2 for imposing. I liked Jennifer Yip’s rendition of Hermia, especially the drunk scene, but she was still rather clumsy on the emotional scenes (c.f. “You have given me back ten years of my marriage”), I suggest, again, more pauses, and more emphasis. I know people will be mad at me saying this, but I wished the Other Woman (Tung Shi Yun) had bigger boobs, because somehow big boobs make the character more believable. Shi Yun also has the bad luck to deliver the most clichéd line in the entire play – I’m talking about “Oh, Gordon!” which she said with as much sincerity as Chinese pork.

I liked the director’s treatment of the fight scene between Jean and the Other Woman (outlandishly but appropriately dressed in a red parka), which presented the right amount of absurdism without deviating too much from the story; however, I am confused by the lesbian subtext because lesbians, like lesbian sex, confuse me. Other sexual references in the text, e.g. Dwight’s paper fetishism, I regard as unfortunate and distracting flaws in the script.

On set (Andrea Quek) and lighting (Esther Lee) design, I was unimpressed by the “minimalist, stylized, empty urban landscape... a la Edward Hopper”, mainly because other theatre groups have mentioned and used the DMCP-Hopper connection (see here, here, and here), so it wasn't original. After the play, I went to Google “Edward Hopper” and read through his entire Wikipedia page, and searched up some of his paintings. Edward Hopper was known to be a mild-mannered man and probably wouldn’t have been so hysterical as to roll in his grave, but he probably would have frowned and buried his face in the nearest clump of dirt.

One thing was the lighting. Hopper’s paintings employed lighting that was almost Baroque-like in its dramatic discrimination between light and darkness, but with the sterile quality of the Precisionists. Sadly, the technical constraints of LT3 often result in faded light edges instead of sharp, geometrical ones; spotlights became ambient light; and where the scene required a whiter, more clinical light, the stage could only provide a diffused yellow wash. Regardless, I wished the lighting crew could have tried to work around their limitations and surprised us with creative solutions instead of saying, “Oh, you know, yeah. Sorry.”

I disliked the set not only because it didn’t deliver the emptiness and alienation it promised, but also because of the problem with space. I thought the flexible set of three white flats, which certain media were projected on, didn’t provide the flexibility the play required. Especially, when scenes required a much smaller space for intimate one-on-one conversations, the flats, which were fixed to the ground, couldn’t be shifted to bring the stage space closer. I, however, thought that the scene in the stationery shop worked – the scattered boxes and rolls of paper had a shrinking effect on the “room”. Otherwise, the stage was far too big for the cafe scene and other scenes with less than three characters.

Finally, I am mostly satisfied with the film producer (Kwok Li Chen), who did his best with the disjointed images of the subway and surrealist black-and-white images when Gordon did his monologue. The TV static when Gordon dies is great, concept and coordination-wise. I am less appreciative of the space image when Jean and Dwight kissed, and the random sparks of colours which also appeared in parts of Gordon’s monologue. I don’t know who is responsible for the audio which played in the limbo scene, the tongue-in-cheek “music of the spheres”, but I like it very much. Actually I like that whole scene very much, except the end when Gordon shouts, “Mother!” which... just didn’t work.

So DMCP was not bad. It’s not bad given I only paid $7 to see it. I would have sympathized with the lack of time/time-management and the technical limitations, in light of BT1, but that’s not really my job, no. Still, I hope the next production (in May! I read parts of the script, it’s quite funny! Not sure why I’m advertising for LD!) will be better. I will probably be there too.

Dead Man’s Cell Phone, written by Sarah Ruhl and produced by Hwa Chong ELDDFS, has finished its run.

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Boy Talking

2011-03-24T04:18:00.001-07:00

What I replied to Tabby's text asking how was NS medical:

"Take photo, checkup, including groin exam with a very gruff army personnel, urine test which was gross, electrocardiogram which was weird because I had stuff clipped to my arms and legs and chest, the fastest dental check i had ever (the guy just screamed stuff like "c6 unerupted, b5 crown."), IQ test which i hate, it's like the impossible quiz, and being in a waiting room with like 30 other shirtless guys with moobs... sigh and they took my blood too those vampires"

...which pretty much summed up my trying day today. I hope this isn't considered under military indiscretion. "Loose lips sink ships" is my favourite one-liner wartime poem.

Also, from what Blogger Stats tell me, people are still reading the DF fiasco posts. So I shall grant everybody some closure, and this shall be the last formal address I have regarding the issue.

1) I'm functionally quitting LD. I've written an email to the LD exco, saying that I understand their difficult position (which is such a wonderful ambiguous term) and that I will stop going for LD activities until I get a reply from them saying, "There are no good reasons for you to go. Come back." So far it's been more than a week without a reply, and I don't think they're drafting a lengthy apology, using either the first or second definition, so I'm as good as gone. People who are still bitchy about the issue, I hope you are happy. I'm not exactly happy, but leaving a poisonous place does bring its reliefs.

2) Gathering intelligence, I've also learned a lot more about people. My deeply cynical side only says, "I told you so." The part of me that believes in the goodness of people, especially intelligent people, has been raped again. But I'm sure all these experiences will be a good chapter in my memoir someday. Coming to a store near you in the distant future; readers of this blog get a discount.

3) I am extremely grateful to the following people, whose names I've changed for my benefit and theirs:

The Geog Sistas^TM - for their fierce defense of me, and offering to bitchslap all my adversaries.

Liberal White Man - for telling me it was a very funny and well-written review, and that I don't have to worry about anything, and that I should keep writing.

Tall Woman - for being there for me, even the times when I didn't want you to, and understanding most of my shit, which is more than I can say for the company I keep around me

Galatea + Pushkin - for letting me know not all is lost, and for Galatea especially, for being mindblowingly smart, kind and generally admirable.

Guilty Girl Who Facebook-messaged Me - For reminding me most people have a conscience, but not all have courage, and I'm lucky to have both.

Jane Doe Who Emailed Me - For the general support, and again the affirmation in my beliefs/writing.

All The People Who Listened To Me Rant About The Unfairness Of It All - Thank you for agreeing with me and renewing my confidence in public sanity, and being as entertained as I am about this whole brouhaha. Common sense is still alive after all.

Generally speaking, I am overjoyed by the support I had this time. The last time I left a CCA, no one bothered or fought for me. I'm so glad I found some real friends this time, and chose rage instead of despair. I'm not saying that without the support, I wouldn't have insisted on being a pain in people's deserving asses. But with friends like these, the quest to despise ignorance, intolerance and hypocrisy is less lonely.

Also it made me feel less guilty about the so-called friends I left behind the last time. Before, I always had a shred of doubt, wondering if I was wrong to expect people to defend me. But now, with actual experience, I can say with more certainty - that you could have helped but you didn't. You're not wrong, but at least my disappointment isn't subjective anymore. Friends do have the choice to side their friends, and to fight for them. Mine did, this time. Maybe foolishly so, but that reckless loyalty makes it all the more touching. I love you guys.

4) Lastly, the thing that weighs heavily on some people's minds: Am I going to make this critiquing business a bad habit? My answer is I'm Not Sure. Firstly, I keep having the vision of LD hiring bouncers to prevent my entrance into any LD events. Secondly, I might be lynched by the crowds. But with all this free time now, you never know. Seriously though, if I do write future reviews/critiques, I will write them because I genuinely have something of value to say, not because I'm exploiting my notoriety as a loose cannon.

And I hope in the future, there will be intelligent debate and educated opinions on the subject matter. During the most intense period of the DF fiasco, I watched my blog stats septuple with mild obsession, but aside from the random fan mail, no one told me whether they agreed or disagreed with what I said. The cyber silence was expected, but we can do better than this. Literati, I appeal to you: Write, talk, argue, bitch even, but with me, out here, where we are protected by freedom of speech, mutual respect and common sense. Fear nothing but your duty to express truth. I know you prefer poetry, but this shit is real.

Apology: Critique: Dramafeste 2011

2011-03-09T19:35:00.000-08:00

Sadly, for some of you, I'm using the second definition.

Background information. After I posted my pseudo-review of Dramafeste, a quiet bitchy uproar seemed to have materialized off stage and off LT3, among faculty committees and feminist girl-cliques. Just yesterday, a classmate told me that my name, as well as the url of this blog, was written on the whiteboard of the Music Room, like a branded criminal and his sins. Today I was summoned by the chairperson of ELDDFS, telling me that as a member of LD, how inappropriate that post was, and how certain actresses were extremely affected being called "sluts", "brown bagger" and my comments on their acting techniques. And I have been advised to take down the post, because "more people are starting to read it" and I should cut my anti-social, insensitive and probably sexist act.

This apology (i.e. systematic defense of my views) will demonstrate that:

a) The critic does not make personal attacks,
b) The affected parties are taking offense where none are given; and missing the point; and therefore
c) The critic cannot be faulted (at least, on the accusations that has been levelled against him).

Furthermore, I will discuss:

d) The implications of this incident

***

I do not claim to know what exactly the actresses feel, since they've chosen to raise their concerns indirectly through the LD chairperson. But based on my impression, they think that I'm calling them "sluts" and a "brown bagger" and that my judgment of their acting were unfair.

I need to clarify a point of contention: my labels applied to their characters and not to the actors themselves. I quote from that pseudo-review:

"She was incredibly wooden and when in character, she was a brown bagger. (I reserve my judgment for the real person.)"

Note my explicit reference to her in character, and a disclaimer so large that you can't miss it: I reserve my judgment for the real person. And I reserve judgment precisely because I know actors are not their characters, and beneath that dreadful makeup, bad acting and horrendous emoting she's probably a nice person, i.e. not a brown bagger. But as I said, I reserve judgment, because I know the character but not the person behind it.

I also quote:

"Character-wise, I loved the sluts (red slut, call me)"

Again, how can anyone miss Character-wise? I hope you're not taking Literature. Or GP. Or any humanities-based subject which requires inference skills, actually. And how is labelling the characters sluts a misnomer? According to common usage, a slut is a sexually liberal person. How are the characters not sluts? They binge-drink, engage in flirtation with strangers, encourage promiscuous behaviour, and are lookist. I think we can say without much contention that the characters are sluts.

And obviously, (red slut, call me) is a joke. I know you're not going to call me.

James Franco didn't really cut off his arm. Ivan Heng is not a woman. Heath Ledger, as much as I had wanted him to be, was not gay. My point is - an actor is not his/her character. These actresses who have raised their passive-aggressive accusations against me - you girls need to know that. You have a life offstage, and I, as a critic, have nothing to do with it.

If the issue is about my strong remarks about your acting, then you, as a thespian, have no remit. The moment you decided to take on the script and step onto that stage, you are implicitly accepting that you will be judged, that you will be laughed at (and not in a good way) and if there is an unfavourable review (as there is in this case), people will read it. If this is your first setback in your acting career - I should say, Good For You. There are worse critics out there, who will not hesitate to pinpoint every small flaw and list your real name beside your role, as is standard practice (which I did not do, which is why I call it a pseudo-review). If you can't accept these things, stop your acting career and do something which doesn't put you in the public eye (and public criticism). When I build sets and props for ELD productions, I am prepared for people disliking it. But being a thespian exposes yourself many times more, so you need that kind of courage (which I must say, I don't possess).

Of course there is the issue of the validity of my views. Sure, you can question my credentials as a critic. I've only been to two Dramafestes, and a couple of HICs, and the number of plays I've watched in the last two years is less than 10. So you can decide for yourself whether what I said about you is true. But I think, if you can find any independent sources, that my views are not very different from other disinterested watchers.

If you (still to the actresses) have been innocently roped into doing Dramafeste for your faculty, perhaps out of loyalty or peer-pressure, and now has been forever scarred, I'm sorry, but if you had expected raving reviews and absolute adoration, grow up. I may be a member of LD, but that doesn't mean I'm required to sugar-coat my criticisms and inflate my praises. If you had done well, I would have given due admiration. And yes, LD membership does mean I'm inclined to encourage budding artists - but lying is not encouragement. You, as an actress, were bad. That's all.

I think I've made my case pretty clear. Some attitudes need to be adjusted. And mine is not one of them, unless you have further points of polemics.

***

What does this incident mean?

I am resisting the urge to drag faculty politics into this, because doing so will incur certain stereotypes which I don't wish to perpetuate. But it does allude to some characteristics of Hwa Chong students - unscrupulous high-achievers, unaccepting of failure, and having the need to hide behind anonymity and higher authority.

The fact that I've been treated like an aberrant, alternative voice, even within the Hwa Chong artistic community (if we can call ourselves that) and by people who supposedly are fervent supporters of freedom of expression, and that I'm asked, very blatantly, to take down the post, shows many things. It shows cowardice, dishonesty and intolerance. And very deeply, hypocrisy.

To the LD chairperson - I understand your role in this, which I pity, and I am somewhat sorry for your trouble. But I'm sticking to my position.

This post is important - which is why I am writing it despite my Block Test tomorrow. I hope more, if not as many, people read it than the actual critique. And I know you will.

Critique: Dramafeste 2011

2011-03-04T18:38:00.000-08:00

Artemis

Plot Summary: I can't really tell, but I think it is about crazy people killing babies, their sub-identities and each other.

Production Summary: They're trying to be meta but they're just plastic.

Once in a while a critic finds himself in a dilemma. Should I write a truthful, but hurtful review? The consequence is not so much of hurting the feelings of the scriptwriter and the cast (they should be prepared for the inevitable humiliation or fame) but traumatizing them enough so they would forever avoid the stage, thereby depriving us of such hilarity which was the Artemis play. Honestly, I laughed the hardest for Artemis than any other plays, because meta-humor always exceeds stage humor. It's so bad it's good. I would recommend it to achieve cult status in the Hwa Chong theatre hall of fame.

It's the perfect example of bad. Bad script, bad acting, bad makeup, bad directing, bad transitions, bad blocking - and I would say bad set and props, if there were any real set and props. This is a play where we revisited the good old days of classic bad - where scriptwriters confused tension with confusion, where mad-people makeup was basically clown makeup, where all acting basically followed three rules:

1) Limber limbs are sooooo important.
2) Make your accent sound really Anglo-pretentious, then add in some Singlish accent to make it sound more local.
3) When you're sad or mad or bad, do a CPL Classic Scream*.

*This is a time-honoured tradition started by our resident Scream Queen (to misuse an industry term) CPL, who also happened to have written ("I only wrote half the script," she emphasized to me after the play) the script. I didn't know what to tell her when she asked me what I thought of it. On hindsight, I have a perfect answer: "It's very postmodern."

2 minutes into the play I started a CPL Classic Scream Counter. 5 minutes before the play ended (noting that I did not know how it would end, it was that endless) I gave up. Basically, screaming became a literary device.

I don't really want to say anything about the plot (to use a broad definition), except that it continues to perpetuate the stereotypes of psychologically disturbed people. The schizophrenic characters (to use another broad definition) have coping mechanisms more objectionable than their actual insanity. Chopping up babies? Seriously? Babies were so The Biting Point, circa 2009. Other old elements include: crazies (one of the HIC plays by the High School Drama), split identities (Last year's Artemis' play) and random retarded boy with thick eyebrows (the eyebrows are creative, but the retarded boy stereotype has haunted Hwa Chong theatre since the start of my observation).

What was good about the play? Here was where I left my review to feed my fish, do the dishes and make an appointment to cut hair, and couldn't think of an answer. I'm still thinking. I'll let you know soon. But like I said to CPL, "Good effort, you guys!"

Athena

Plot Summary: TIOBEsque case of mistaken identity and corporate ineptitude.

Production Summary: A funny, if a bit forced play, with effective transitions, great set, experienced actors and some good one-liners.

In comparison, this review of the Athena play will be very boring because there's nothing much you can talk about a good Hwa Chong production. Everything was smooth. The set was cool-looking (my only complaint is that the clouds in the windows look like smoke from a great city fire, but meh). There was clever audience interaction and cultural references. The characters have a good chemistry between them. The fratboys were hilarious, although I have the nagging suspicion that good-looking people are always funny no matter what they say. I totally second how the auntie won the best supporting actress - she was so cute, miming to wipe the invisible walls. Yes, the play was racist (the uncool Jack Tan was supposed to be Indian? Ohhhhh) but this is Hwa Chong after all.

So yeah yeah Athena really deserved Best Play. Really working on a flow, huh? I have nothing else to write.

Ares

Plot Summary: Highly implausible story of a dead body found in the ICA (I am using the exact phrasing I used to summarize Athena play last year - the similarities don't stop here)

Production Summary: A prime example of how a good production is destined to fail with a weak script.

The pity about Ares was how everything was working, except the most important bit - the story. The similarities to Athena's play last year are almost uncanny. Both stories revolved around a group of people confined to a place, faced with a central problem. Both had to find a culprit. Both had extremely manufactured tension, to the point where you want to jump up on stage and say, "Guys, why don't you just _____ ?!" If the audience are itching to provide a solution that the scriptwriter has deliberately withdrawn from her characters, there is something wrong. Characters can have their eccentricities, yes, but they must essentially be rational, which is sadly a main problem for many budding scriptwriters. If you have an unsatisfactory problem, you will have an unsatisfactory solution, and a mediocre (or even meaningless) play.

What was good? The set made a good enough impression to win Best Set, but personally I found it uncreative - the jumping numbers were basically a recycle of last year's jumping elevators numbers, in bigger scale. Also it was distracting, which was dangerous with such a laborious plot to follow. They were rather clumsy on the details - you could see certain bits of the set peeling off and official signs in childish font. The characters were adequate - I found the germaphobe the most successful (read: least painful to watch) spastic guy in the history of Hwa Chong theatre. They shouldn't have picked two bobheads out of three female characters, but that is a minor pet peeve. The pick-up lines got tiring after the third one. And the real killer (the short bobhead girl) was obvious from the start (I was only confused because I didn't know if the dead guy was really dead).

So guys, remember: start with a good script. If not, settle with Best Set. To defend my faculty loyalty, I did shout very loud for Ares last night.

Apollo

Plot Summary: Girl who wants to be grown up but realizes "adulthood" is so shallow and - oh you guys, just watch an episode of Privileged or 90210.

Production Summary: Another well-produced play. I wouldn't have expected anything less.

Let me first say Best Actress did not deserve her award except by the fact that she was the only real main actress from all 4 plays (None of the Artemis girls would win, for obvious reasons; Athena only had 2 female supporting actresses; Ares had an ensemble cast). She was incredibly wooden and when in character, she was a brown bagger. (I reserve my judgment for the real person.)

EDIT: Apollo main-actress didn't win Best Actress, the stoner hipstress did. We are sorry for the error. Anyway, stoner hipstress did kinda deserve her award, since she was funny, but I doubt it takes major acting skillz to look disinterested, deliver her one-liners and deadpan the rest of her lines. (My favourite part was her 'chill face'.)

This play was even more American TV-style than other Apollo (or should I say HP?) plays. The transition of the first scene especially: the Peranakan (the EOEH reference, btw, is in very bad taste, mainly because I've just watched EOEH staged the day before) mother said, "Really, who are you -" and it switches to the next scene - so TV! (Anyway, that transition wasn't handled very well.) Teenage struggle is so overdone - so I have to conclude that Best Script is given for cleverness of dialogue and effort at moralization rather than the substance of story. (But the script does have some merits in theme - see Last Words.) I was annoyed at the cheap drama and lazy ending, and the parts I enjoyed the most were irrelevant to the story (mostly, the bimbo-hipster dynamic).

Also, I hate the Apollo tradition of faculty references which I don't get.

Character-wise, I loved the sluts (red slut, call me) and I thought the guy (Fan? Fun? Farn? Pharn?) looked a lot like the brooding teenager from Little Miss Sunshine. The too-cool-for-you hipstress was a golden product of hipster hate, which is ironic, which of course is part of the fun.

So yes, a typical Apollo production, with a slide from last year's Stereotype Play (which I didn't give a very good review of anyway).

Last Words

Which faculty followed the theme most faithfully? The plays of Let Them Eat Cake should touch on, if not address fully,

1) The ignorance of higher-ups,
2) the essential failure of empathy, and
3) the empty sweetness of the high life.

Artemis hinted the at the first one with the high and mighty mad scientist (oh, another stereotype) before its swift and sure descent into incoherence. Athena managed the first more successfully, and the second (with the cool Jack Tan and the whole forced moral coda) facetiously. Ares jerkily tried to fit in the first two, but as I said, weak script, weak story, weak conclusion. Apollo focused overwhelming on the last theme, which I suspected made it won the Best Script, and the first and second themes were also adequately approached, so there was some unity involved.

Indubitably the standard of this year's Dramafeste has dipped from last year's. My hope for next year: always, always have a story. The physical manifestation of acting, sets and props are important but they only play a supporting role. I look forward to a time when people watch plays in Hwa Chong not because of loyalty to their faculties but because they're truly entranced by the stories being told through movements and humour and worlds set on a small area but infinitely bigger than the constrains of the stage. Like I said to my friend last night, we're all stuck in this bunched-up LT. If there's a fire, we'll probably all die. So give us something to live for.

Letters To My Therapist (VI)

2011-02-26T18:48:00.000-08:00

In my life I go through cycles of expectations and disappointments. If I were sufficiently Buddhist I would have broken out of this endlessness and escaped into nirvana, which I speculate as a kind of suicide. But neither society nor my superego allows that. The latter, especially, puts up a commendable fight. So whenever I hit rock bottom, I revel in pseudo-nirvana for a few hours, enjoying the complete lack of attachment, and then I begin the torturous climb back up. A colloquial version of the voices in my head:

[In nirvana state]

Id: Nobody gives a shit.
Ego: You're right. And somehow I feel okay about that.
Id: That's because you don't give a shit about nobody giving a shit.
Ego: Totally. I have transcended the expectation-disappointment cycle. Wow I rock.
Superego: You guys are a bunch of anarchist lazy dipshits.
Id and Ego: Shut up.

(And the superego does shut up, for a while.)

[In post-nirvana state]

Superego: Some people do give a shit, you know.
Id: No. You lie. Nobody gives a shit.
Ego: Okay. Stop arguing. Superego, you're trying to make me expect people to care. But they don't.
Superego: That's untrue. They're only scared of you because they don't understand.
Ego: So I'm not lovable. This is doing so good for my depression.
Superego: See? Your toxic sarcasm and low expectations just positively enforces your vicious cycle. You should try trusting people sometimes. They're not all bad.
Id: That's really bad advice. Regular people are assholes. They hurt, lie, steal and betray without blinking an eye or knowing it. They're Gullivers with no strings attached. They stomp on you barely feeling the crunch of your bones.
Superego: You're really extreme.
Id: Better extreme and cautious than forgiving and tattooing a large 'kick me' sign on my back.
Ego: I think id sounds more convincing. But that also means I'll never get to enjoy a proper healthy relationship, romantic or otherwise. I'll never be able to trust, or feel like I belong anywhere, or even live with people.
Id: Ultimately, it's only you who matters. You're the one who gets all the scars.
Ego: So I either get scars or hide away forever? Are these my only options? Cutting my losses?
Superego: No. You can venture out. Start believing people may be dumb, but most of them don't intend to hurt you. And some of them will know your hypochondria and protect you from the needles of everyday life.
Ego: But how will I know which are which? Who will kill or save me? All of them have the potential for both. And every time I die I take longer to return to life, and my trust diminishes each time. How will I know?
Superego: Nobody knows. They just try. And most of the time it works out.
Ego: But so far it hasn't. So who can I believe. Hume says I shouldn't believe in "most of the time". I am desolate and lost, but no one would have mercy on me.
Superego: Because you wouldn't let them try. You have trust issues. You don't believe in the goodness of people.
Ego: Modernism doesn't either. But nobody gives them any grief.
Superego: They have their own grief. I know what you're thinking. Do not go down that plath.
Id: Why not? Rational suicide is big nowadays. And you know what? If you die, it will confirm your hypothesis. That nobody gives a shit.
Superego: That's your hypothesis actually.
Id: This is the story of your life. This is a random Thursday. At 0740 hours, you're at flag-raising, not singing like you usually do, but nobody notices, or someone notices but doesn't give a shit. At 0900 hours, your break-time, and you sit and eat alone, like you usually do. At 1015 hours, you refuse to do your Lit tutorial with your classmates, because you are too tired to pretend to be functional. Your Lit tutor implies that you are being a prude. You don't want to explain. Everybody thinks you're weird, or worse, just being yourself. At 1130 hours, you run away, to get away from the threat of ordinary people, with their carelessness and thoughtlessness. You hug your legs in a secluded corner where no one gives a shit. Later, someone tags you in a Facebook video, and to your quiet horror, you see your classmates playing a spinning game, making themselves dizzy, their laughter forever a sinister echo in your mind, while you hid, felt cold in the sunlight, and struggled to breathe. At 1200 you move like clockwork, and sit for a test, writing furiously, surrounded by puzzled classmates. At 1430 you go for a CCA meeting. At 1500 you register to donate blood, ticking "No" at the question, "Do you have any mental illnesses?" At 1515 you watch the dark red chase the length of the tube, then into the rubbery bag, frothing. You feel drained. The overhead lights are too piercing. You close your eyes. When it is done the Filipino nurse thanks you, in a bumbly accent, and leads you to the refreshment area. You taste the tang of orange juice. At 1630 you are at the high school school hall, practising Chopin's Prelude in E Minor on the grand piano, its yellowed keys like the skin of an old friend. You think about band. Your family. Friends. Acquaintances. The next day when they find your body, everyone is surprised. A classmate is quoted in the newspaper, "He was really smart, I never knew it would happen. I wished he could have talked to us." Another: "He should have taken it easy." The headline is, "Brilliant student takes his own life." There are some speculation about the causes - overperformance stress? sexual confusion? family problems? - and a schoolwide counselling system takes place. Civic tutors ask, Are you alright? as a standard greeting. Most people are annoyed. Your mother, with her sad, dumpy figure, stares at your funeral picture. For a week, some of your closer friends keep a candle burning at the place you used to sit, a flickering flame to light the nights. One of them blogs, "I hate him." And a few weeks on, only an extra name on the register they have yet to change.

***

And then the voices stop. Tutors talk to me. I confess my insecurities. I talk frankly about what kind of person I am. Some people do give some kind of shit about my life. I apologize for ignoring people, even though none of it is my fault. I try. I collect all the goodwill I can, squeezing them into a small brick, which I step on, hoping to see more light up the abyss. And I start expecting again. A fetus of hope gestating in my heart, destructible by a single breath, waiting for birth or miscarriage.

Letters to My Therapist (V)

2011-02-18T02:23:00.000-08:00

How does it feel like? Technically, I don't feel anything. That's the point.

It starts at night. After about three hours of sleep, I wake up. I want to go back to sleep, but I can't, so I stare inside my eyelids. My body turns from warm to cold to warm. I don't have the energy to get up. I make up dreams. Finally, I get up.

I feel like I've left some parts of me behind on the bed, like when I turn back, I expect to see a scattering of limbs and eyeballs and lips and tongue. But I don't. I shower with hot water. My skin still feels cold. I rub my nose against my reflection's nose, a spot on the misted mirror. When I turn off the showerhead it feels like part of me have gone down the drain. I get dressed. I look into the mirror, checking for creases and the right ratio of shirt and pants. I pack my bag, putting folders and pre-packed sets. I refuse breakfast, saying that I'm not hungry. I leave the flat.

I am familiar with the symptoms. But I'm not used to them. It's like when you swim, and you use a stroke that you haven't used in a long time, so the water around feels uncomfortable, tugging and pushing at you in foreign vectors. There is a dullness in my bones. My eyes are weary but it's not from the lack of sleep. My eyes drink in everything, but somewhere along lens and nerve something pauses and stalls, so I see everything and register movement, moving parts, but I cannot put anything together. Especially people and faces. I see a twist of lip, two rapid blinks, a slight shift of hip, but there is no meaning to them. Same with other senses. A harsh, guttural laugh. A creak and change in weight distribution on the bench when someone sits down. Very soon, everything becomes muted and distant - I don't even need earphones like I usually do. When I walk into the full canteen, at the very back of my mind I wonder why it's so quiet, until I realize there is sound, but it is all very far away, like I'm underwater. Everything is easy to isolate from myself.

People become a voice to listen to, instructions to follow, so some part of me can take over and operate automatically. But I watch without emotion from the back of my head. I'm not there, not really. I feel my mouth talking and sometimes pulling itself into a slight smile. But when people leave, I am relieved of those duties, and I look into the distance or at something insignificant like a pencil or a keychain, not really thinking.

I don't actually feel anything. I summon scenarios. Acid on my skin. An abortion performed with a chainsaw. The slow crunch of nasal bone underneath my fist. But nothing. I can probably watch an eyelid-removal surgery without blinking, if it is done quickly enough. When someone opened a door which I knocked my arm into, all I felt was a jolt on the arm, nothing you can call pain.

Suicide crosses my mind easily. Not because I want death, I must stress, but because I already know I'm dead.

And the abomination is how I'm expected to live - respond to human queries, write essays, converse with facial expressions, laugh, gossip, feel dissatisfied and desire things. I am beyond these, but I am brought back, so my moving body and rehearsed responses and automatic writing horrifies some part of me. A disturbed peace. I recite the opening lines of The Waste Land in my head. My breathing constantly interrupts my thoughts. The indignity of living. I am happy to have a glassy face, and if I smile too widely it would crack.

I know why people cut themselves. I finger a small blade. I feel a small jolt of thrill run through my finger. Something, finally. But I put down the blade. Boredom. And I know my fugue will be over before the cut heals. Misunderstandings are all the souvenirs I want.

It comes and goes. Sometimes there are triggers which I have learnt to avoid or, when I have the strength, slowly dismiss. Sometimes it lasts for weeks, or like today, a few hours. Through the years I accumulate remedies but also more triggers. American comedies help. Sad movies help. Anything to bring the emotions back. If you want to know, sex does not help. It only emphasizes the mechanical. Jogging makes me breathe harder, forcing my mind commit more to my body. But I sink back into blankness after.

It's not something I can help. My friends and family understand when they can. But they can probably never empathize. They try. They respect my aphasia. They know not to intrude into my silent, blank, terrible world. And I've generally come to terms with it. If this is all it takes to express my inner anguish and unresolved complexes - an occasional absolute apathy - then so be it. But during these times, my mind wanders and postulates, I see myself in the future caught in this sort of stillness, and it's sad. I'm in another country, the scenery beautiful, and it might as well been a postcard. I'm lying in bed and I'm cold, so cold, and nothing can warm me, not kisses nor embrace. My firstborn - he's wailing, a breath of life; she's exhausted but glowing, so beautiful and proud, and I watch my clockwork hands cradle him, terrified I would spread death.

I'm not a psychopath. It's true that when I'm in it, I feel nothing, so I'm not averse to strangling cats. And yes, I do invoke myself in intense situations, dragging a scalpel across a breast, eliciting blood and screams. The mind suggests many things. But I'm equally detached from cruelty as from kindness. So you shouldn't fear me, only regard me strangely, and issue some pity.

I don't expect you to help me. I don't think it's a problem, per se, only inconvenient. Auto-pilot works most of the time, albeit imperfect and strained. In fact, in our inconstant lives, I appreciate its loyalty, or my loyalty to it. Give me drugs to block it and I won't take them. It is a heady, haunting song during nights, so cold and clear, waking me from a life which is a dream. I am awake amidst so many dreamers.

Dogs

2011-02-01T08:54:00.000-08:00

Despite the deadlines I'm facing, and the fact that any free time should really go to this short story I might never finish, I'm going to tell three stories about dogs. Although I've never raised one, my encounters with three different (or perhaps not that different) dogs are making me muse enough to tear away from my readings of things less immediate, at least for this hour tonight.

I saw my first mysterious dog when I was thirteen, which was the goth period of my life, complete with late nights and eyebags, except I didn't wear goth fashion because I thought it was dumb, and I didn't cut my wrists because I was afraid of my own blood. Those days, because CCA commitments were minor, as they are now, I'd walk home from school, all 8km and 2 hours of it. Fact was I couldn't bear being at school or at home, so I preferred the solitude of the roadside curb, interrupted only by passing traffic and occasional joggers. Sometimes it rained and I never minded.

So one day, when I was walking home, I saw a dog stumble out of the foliage onto the pavement, which separated the forests and the road. It was far enough, around 10 metres away from me, so I wasn't bodily surprised, but its appearance intrigued me. In my memory, it was a white large dog, but it could also had been black. I stopped in my path, and the dog leveled its gaze at me and we stood there, staring, boy and dog. The general mood I had at that time was surreality - not dreamlike surreality, but a genuine, desperate expectation of other worlds, anything to escape this hopeless miserable life. I wished silently the dog would speak or beckon me to follow, and I would in return be entirely unquestioning, my faith rewarded with his. So silly and giddy with fantasy I stepped forward hesitantly, and the dog jerked its ears up and ran away, back to the place he had come from. I ran forward but it was already gone. Only later I wondered whose dog it was (I never saw any posters for missing dogs) and if it could ever survive in the wilderness (it was definitely not a local stray) - but at that time all I felt was unworthiness.

The second dog had a name. His name was Ruffer, and he's Kevin's dog. The first time I saw Ruffer I felt a great affection for him, namely because he displayed a great affection towards me. He was an extraordinarily pretty dog - a Siberian Husky-Golden Retriever mix. I was happy to let him lick my face or encircle me so I couldn't leave. His obsession for my attention was absolute, and when I left he always barked, like a love song. I liked him best when he laid quietly next to me as I sat cross-legged, smoothing his golden fur and scratching behind his ears. I didn't mind that he tried to hump me once, or that I suspected he was getting some sexual fulfilment from my petting and stroking. But eventually he began to gnaw on my hand - still with nothing but goodwill towards me - and I had to clench my hand to prevent my fingers from being bitten off. He became more aggressive, constantly running after me, disallowing me to leave, letting me go only when Kevin's father tapped the cane sternly on the table. Ruffer is still my favourite dog because I understand that he is loyal but starved for attention - like me, he needs reassurance and a single-minded love. But I have distanced myself from him, going straight into Kevin's house without lingering at the frontyard. Sometimes Ruffer stares at us in the living room, looking through the front window outside, like a jilted lover. But I hope he doesn't hate me that much or feel like I've abandoned him. I still like him a lot, but his desires and doggedness were too dangerous and ravenous, and I know the pains of being bitten.

The third dog I saw just an hour ago, when I was sick of structuralism and semiotics and went to buy some snacks from the local 7-11. As I was walking back home I saw another large dog, this time white with brown patches on its ears (already the details are blurring with the night), with a collar. He was wandering around the park, seemingly lost and hungry. I took note of the dog and walked on, paused, then walked towards it. It stopped, and raised its eyes to me, its tail straight. I was a little afraid that it would attack me out of desperation, so I didn't move. Then slowly I walked to a bench nearby, sat down, and stared at the dog again. Gingerly it approached me, and I saw it was slightly gaunt, and its eyes red around the edges. Admittedly I was scared - that it was rabid, that it was hungry and I had nothing to feed it, that it would bite me and I would allow it to. I could almost see the tag on its collar. Then, just as it was a few steps away from me, it turned and walked away. I absentmindedly watched it walk off into the blocks.

When it was out of sight, I suddenly got up, propelled by a wist of inexplicable guilt. I searched the area, eyes tricked by a clump of bushes or a large shadow, but I couldn't find the dog anymore. Perhaps it crossed the road into another district. Or somebody had a quicker heart than mine, with a ready hand of food and care, and took the dog in. But I had waited, wishing the dog would come and lick my hand warm of its own accord, always demanding the first step, never knowing the hunger of others.

So I went home without a best friend. Or that it was impossible to bring home one anyway. I don't have any dog food, and I can't afford the space. For the first time I felt as equally abandoner and the abandoned.

Okay

2011-01-12T03:28:00.000-08:00

My handwriting's changing.

These days I'm making conscious effect to cross my t's with a horizontal stroke instead of a downstroke. Just this. But it affects the other characters in subliminal ways, slight adjustments that you can't make out individually, but when viewed as a word or sentence or phrase becomes quite obvious. My words are certainly bigger, if that's any possible. I can't say if the difference is good or bad, the same way you can't like or dislike your belly button, it's just there. But somehow, my words are sharper. Perhaps more illegible, or as I like to call it, scripty. More final.

Some people tell me I have nice handwriting for a guy - I get flattered. But when people tell me they dislike my handwriting, I get offended. So you can say I'm quite proud of how I write. Thankfully, for my ego, more people like my handwriting than those who don't. Or perhaps people are just polite.

I don't know why I decided to cross my t's this way. I didn't always have good handwriting, you know. When I was in primary 3 or 4 I had childish handwriting. I think most guys stick with that for the rest of their lives. But something in my 10 year old brain wanted more. So I started staring at other people's handwritings. And there was a particular boy's which I liked, his f's with a back hook and l's with a loop, like how the primary school textbooks print the 'litre' sign. Thus my imitation began.

Over a few years I kept a conscious check whenever I wrote. I wasn't obsessed, but I wasn't forgetful either. Not about these things. Like Lucille in Housekeeping I was quite determined to improve myself - a boy who spoke Mandarin at home and halting English in school and wanted desperately to be good at something. So when I was P6 my handwriting was getting admired irregularly, but regular enough for me. The boy whose handwriting I copied was also in my P6 class, but by this time mine looked nothing like his. When I told my classmates the story behind Jiasheng's font, no one would believe me, especially not him.

What I actually had in mind for this post was typical of a "new year new beginning" sentimental piece, with some reflections from the past year. I did have genuinely new epiphanies about my personal development. It's surprising how really doing nothing (not thinking about doing nothing) enriches your inner world. Somewhere between all the queer movies, quirky fiction, gym-and-swim sessions, sleeping in, and occasionally doing work, some things unclenched in me. I was no longer that bitter. Maybe still a little bitter, but more pH7 than pH14. And it felt okay to feel.

It mostly comes in an open letter:

***

Dear you know who you are,

I have resented you. Sometimes, hated. For different reasons maybe: you being irresponsible, uncaring, treacherous, indifferent, or you plain broke my heart. And I blamed you, very much, and put all the distance I could muster between us so I couldn't expect anything from you anymore, neither hurt nor love.

But what I now know is that even if I judge you, it is not me who makes the final decision, if there is a final decision. Maybe you have acted kindly to others, or have been selfless. Or maybe you have done far more terrible things to other people than you have to me. But I wouldn't know. Where I have blamed you, others may have sung praises. Where you let me down, you may have saved another. The thing is, I can never say if you are a good person, or even a bad person. So you're not forgiven, and I don't forget, but I don't hate you anymore.

The final important bit of my reflections is this: that people come and go, they befriend or hurt you, but my life is mine and I am only responsible for my life. Funny quote that stays in my head:

Proctor: [With the cry of his whole soul] Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!

(from The Crucible, Arther Miller)

And so maybe the only protagonist and antagonist in my story is myself. The decisions I have made in my life determines who I will become. And many times in a day, thinking back, I am so very grateful that I have not chosen some other way, becoming someone who I cannot live as. And I respect myself for the ones I did choose. This road may be hard, but I'm alive and I'm still the protagonist.

Likewise, you have your own story, in which I may be a villain or a missed train. I hope yours is a good story.

With goodwill,
Jiasheng

***

And now for the boring stuff: School has started, and I am not pleased.

Homework (plus due holiday work) is already doing their pile-and-stress circus act, and I am a juggler. But in some sadistic way it's good to be back.

Recently (i.e. yesterday) though, I've been feeling lousy again. I told myself to be less grouchy but as I've predicted, depression doesn't knock when it comes. Because of some (probably permanent) changes in the household, I've been coming to an empty home after school every day, and when I lie in bed in the evening, that's when loneliness hits me like a brick. Not that I actually know how that feels like, getting hit by a brick, but all I can do is squeeze myself into a ball and breathe until it goes away. Then I get up, do some homework, eat some chocolate and maybe watch some 30 Rock.

Times like these, I scroll through my address book on my phone, then scold myself for being so needy, and never text anyone. I tried to remember the last time I had a real hug - not the loose awkward ones that I do with the sisterhood, but the pound-on-chest-breathless type, the one Tom Cruise gave to his son after they reunited in War of the Worlds, the type where you're glad for the glue between your skin and theirs - it's a long time ago. Times like these, I am a hug addict with his supply cut off. I've gone cold turkey long ago but you know what they say, you can't quit hugs.

In other news, I'm mostly stressed out for school, specifically the lit notes that Jeffrey has ordered. I lent Tianyu my WSS notes and I can't find it, so it's most probably still with him, and I can't make WSS notes. I texted Jeffrey today telling her I can't submit it to her by 12, and the sms conversation dragged on, with me trying to explain how I would rather not rush out note-making, and she half-scolding me. God I hate texting her. It always starts with her being vaguely intimidating and ends with her being amiable and telling me to relax and not be so jaded/uptight/defensive etc. I have enough drama in my life.

In other-other news, Keith gave me a souvenir from Japan, and when I asked what was it, he said I could read it myself. It was in Japanese and I read it syllable-by-syllable. "Wasabi shitake tea" was what it said. So today I went home and made myself some wasabi shitake tea, and by hammer of Thor it was awful. I should have been careful with a product named like that, but I can't really blame anyone - it was really wasabi-and-mushroom-flavoured tea. Some things go together, and some don't. Wasabi and mushroom don't. Wasabi and mushroom in liquid form goes beyond don't. The tea was actually salty. So now I have 23 packs left of this stuff. How now brown cow?

(And Keith, if you read this blog, I'm very sorry.)

Alright, I think that's enough updating for now. I really do have a lot of work. Reader: Go well.

Release

2010-12-25T09:26:00.000-08:00

25th December for me was a mild event. At around 2am, I finally unstuck my fingers off the keyboard playing Pokemon Mystery Dungeon (the expression is less figurative than you think, noting also the obscene amount/quality of porn I watch during the holidays), and decided to go jogging. It was partly because I missed Friday Gym Day (which was because I just couldn't, I was lying in a bed oozing sloth-essence). But then I thought, "I didn't have a proper dinner, so I should top up my energy reserves with two Ferrero Rochers," which of course turned into ten. I washed it down with milk, then Ribena. I finally went to jog at 4.45am. Less than two Sara Bareilles songs later (around 1km), I felt like puking. (Disclaimer: I am usually not that wimpy. It was the chocolate.)

So I walked. For thirty minutes, just to see where the path ended. Of course in grid-Singapore it never does, so I jogged about the same distance back before the puke-feeling rose again. I was tired of feeling lousy, so I did what I did when I felt horrible: I put some sad SB songs on my playlist and see which ones could make me cry, like one form of self-torture could neutralize the other. Breathe Again made me perform the crying equivalent of dry-heaving, I just kept sniffing and watery-eyed but nothing like a waterfall, the torrential kind I wanted. Then I realized I didn't have Gravity on my playlist, which led to the second realization that without that song I was never going to cry. Because it was a couple of years ago that I was on the same jogtrack, crying my heart out while Sara belted out her climatic note on Gravity, standing there so stupidly with earphones in, my stance utterly... something, I don't know, it was just utterly. If someone had seen me, I wouldn't have been so utterly.

That was two years ago. I almost never cry like that now; come to think of it I barely cry nowadays. It's not necessarily a good thing. Often I wonder where all the sorrow went. But maybe because I've lost everything by now, so I'm not so extreme, I don't have to be that sharp, prepared, settle-stuff person by day and a boy tear-choked in the park by night.

When I went home, I listened to Gravity on my laptop and still I didn't cry. I was dissatisfed with my failure at catharsis. Yet as I was showering, I had the anagnorisis I needed. It was my visually favourite time of the day, when the blue light that filters through the night turns into blue-tinged sunlight. I have a mirror in my bathroom, and I always watch myself as I shower. Almost theatrically (thus all the Greek terms), as the baroque angles of my face and shoulder blades softened into skin, I thought how wonderful my memory was, how it rubs off the acute pain of yesteryear's breakups. This was finally the real thing, not the self-enforced amnesia, but the feeling that so much pain is now a hazy photograph, the faces barely recognizable. Of course I'll never forget the misadventures whenever the song comes on. But new songs come, and that gave me hope that the shit I'm been through will come to pass (unfunny pun intended), and bring forth flowers. Roses, preferably, but daisies are fine too.

***

(And because I'm such an irregular blogger, and I know there are at least 3 people who check this blog every day, God knows why, here's part II.)

***

Still on 25th December, I went to sleep at around 7am and woke at around 3pm. Normally I would have lazed until my bladder imploded, but it was a public holiday, and there was a exhibition at NSM I would normally have to pay for, and closes at 6pm. So I ate a late lunch, abluted (is this a word?), and headed out to town, wondering if it would be crowded or deserted. It was a Schrödinger's Cat situation - would people stay home to enjoy the Westernization of their lives, complete with turkey and log cake, or treat the day as more time to window shop at Christmas sales? (I know Schrödinger's Cat is not an accurate metaphor - I just think the ö is really cute. That's why now there are three ös. Now four.) Turns out that it was an okay crowd, a bit of a Schrödinger's compromise (Five!). I even got to sit on the MRT. I read Murakami.

I have mixed feelings about Murakami. I like his short stories. I don't have the stamina for his novels. My novel reading habits are basically extensions of my short story reading habits - I like focused, theme-singular episodes. It's a generational flaw; we have no stamina. We like songs that basically say, "I love you" or "I'm so sad we used to be together" or "I'm gonna have sex with you" or "Bitch I'll cut your nuts/tits off", with the right flavour and ratio of beats and guitar. Anything more complicated than you can summarize in a sentence is tedious. Of course academically that's suicide, but sometimes, when people ask me what I'm reading, I want to say, "It's mainly about love." or "It's mainly about death." or "It's about listening to myself breathing."

So in a way Murakami does that, the stories I've read have a strong tone. The devious thing about him is that he is so hardcore postmodern, it's like reading a deep pond - skimming on the surface are all these flies and shallow-swimming small fishes, and skipping stones, all naturalistic like Japanese writing should be, but oh so deep the pond is. There is no trace of drama in his stories, only very calm surfaces, so calm it's unsettling, because you just know there's something stirring underneath, something so violent and flesh-feeding to offset the calmness. Calamity in calmness. Ha.

I'm also reading Toby Litt. He is one of my favourite novelists. I borrowed Journey To Space at least 3 times before, but I never got past the first page. My excuses were: no time, and not the best first paragraph. But I finally did finish it a few weeks ago, and boy it was great. I had the same excitement as I did when I first picked up Hospital, and emailed to him telling him how great it was (he replied, succintly). Litt has a way of translating dream images into a coherent and outrageous yet reader-friendly plot. I am a little bit in love with him.

I still have some local works (City of Small Blessings, Homeland, by Simon Tay and Darren Shiau respectively) that I suspect I might not have time to finish. I still have a good chunk of homework I told myself I would finish last month, then by 15th Dec, then by the year end.

Anyway, the exhibition was Pompeii: Life in a Roman Town. I wanted to see it for two reasons: one was undeniably literary interest, to soak in some history perspective. And the second was geography: the exhibition was based on Mt. Vesuvius' eruption and how it preserved parts of the town. But personally I love going to museums; they're such quiet and contemplative places. So I drank in everything: the details on every fresco, mosaic, earthen jars and pots and statues of every muse, deity, anonymous woman, the poignant casts of people and animals in their final moments of choking to death, clutching their tunics, a dog curled up in painful contortion, all frozen in. And the memorable ending line by Pliny the Younger, giving his account of the eruption, oddly festival-appropriate: "...everything was covered in a layer of ash, like it had snowed..."

I like Greek culture. I like the climate, the women, sometimes the men when they were shaved, the toga, the bathhouses and the philosophers. But I wondered if those men and women, as the pyroclasts entered their lungs and burned them inside and out, if they cursed their gods or prayed to them?

As I went home the sky turned very dark, and for a moment I wondered if it was getting late or getting wet. Turns out it was both. If the polar reversal in 2012 did happen, maybe we would have seen dainty snowflakes drifting variously onto our city, the beauty of which might have inspired political uprisings. Instead we had a miserable drizzle, which forced everyone into malls, and made my journey home a very claustrophobic experience.

When I reached home, I drank half a shot of cognac, to make me feel more like an adult. But I don't feel special, which pleased me. I don't do Christmas, like I don't do birthdays. He's just not that into you. But writing all these down is making me feel at peace, and I hope to finally rev myself up again, a wordful wakeful wonderer-wanderer.

Desire

2010-12-18T11:09:00.000-08:00

I am seventeen, and mostly I feel paralyzed by what I want. I want a lot of things.

There are so many books I want to read. Books that make me laugh or nervous or scream into my pillow or curl up in hope or grow silent for days. So much music to listen to - the golden gilded sound of classical, electrifying pop, twings and twangs and deliciously odd turns of indie, the grounded, core-moving low sounds of cello, timpani, metal strings of guitar, the celestial tink of bells and the right side of the piano. And silence, a comfort filling the end. Films that records life, how it should or shouldn't be, veritable or enhanced, a more controlled theatre. Colours on a canvas. Sculpture, those I can touch and feel its smooth- or roughness, and those I dare not touch. Places to go to: how far I can leave home before feeling homeless. To be an unanchored kite, waiting for someone to risk cutting their palms (so strong the wind), to thread me home.

I want to go to university, in a university town, make lifelong friends - those who call, and call frequently. To find some people, whose paces and mine match like morse code, clicking into coherent, meaningful, diary-worthy entries. I want to study Literature, but I know anything I study will eventually lead back to literature anyhow. Not just words, but meanings about the big things, the things people don't think matter in their monotony but matters the most, in life, death, prayer, danger, grief, or ecstasy.

I want a reasonable job, one that asks me to work, and pays me for what I do. Money is somewhat important. My job should be inspiring, and satisfactory, in the long run. I want to have a city apartment, decorated in industrial-zen. The colour scheme is brown-gray-blue, in muted tones. There should be a lot of wooden furniture, and to offset that I will recycle vehemently, and plant a forest somewhere with my will. There should be big windows to spy the city night, and blinds to re-enact a cop drama when the impulse comes. I want a bed for two and some space, so the two of us may feel the emptiness and huddle closer. I want to hate getting out of bed in the morning, because I'm accustomed to their warmth. I want a gender-neutral pronoun in English in common usage by then. I want a urinal in my bathroom. Whenever possible, I want to walk in my apartment naked. I want a functional kitchen, full of tools I use occasionally but with proficiency, and invite people over as often as my mood allows. (With guests, I will be dressed. The rhyme makes it law.)

I probably would like a car very much, but my green-guilt may prevent that dream from materializing. I would definitely have a bicycle to explore the limits of the city, and my fatigue. Wandering is a hobby. I want to soak in the night life, if only to see people in different lights. I want the singer-songwriters to wink at me from medium-sized stages, attending book readings, dance fearless in the mad strobing light, cutting me into bizarre stills and emerge whole, breath-heavy and light-headed but whole. In my spare time I want to learn to play the cello (to approximate my heartstrings), and possibly the drum kit (to awaken a sleeping tribe beneath my skin, thumpthumpthump a wracking riotous joy), and then the ukelele (to strum and summon Hawaiian winds). I will collect knick-knacks, like ticket stubs, and do pornographic jigsaw puzzles. If I live near the sea, I want to surf, and drift.

I'm often afraid I'll never get to do all these. But that's me - I'm a born worrier. Anxiety is a low hum in my body. Sometimes it sends jolts of fear down my forearm, making me drop my pen. Sometimes it throws me back into my past, or reminds me of the limits of the present. Mostly, it is a sleeping pill, asking me to drown in bland dreams, to settle for quiet desperation. But my dreams are never bland, they are psychedelic and as I wake I am alive.

Lightning

2010-11-09T07:26:00.000-08:00

I did some housekeeping today. First, some backstory, although the main story happened in less than an hour.

Yesterday (Monday) (The OP day), after my OP, I didn't go watch the movie with the class, as usual. It's not that I am boycotting Hui Yao, but it's not that I'm not boycotting him, either. Everything I do seems to become a habit over time.

Instead, I went to gym. (A habit.) And then I went to run. After which I showered, changed into my usual hang-around-with-nothing-to-do outfit. (If you must know, it's a sleeveless shirt that doesn't count as a singlet, and my trusty green jacket for modesty. And shorts, of course. I think I'm just filling in details to make my life sound more real.) When I got out of the showers, I met Bryan, who told me about the meeting he was going to have with his parents and the VP, about his results. I didn't have much to say. I didn't even wished him luck. Sometimes there isn't much to do about reality: you could wish and hope; scream and curse; but regardless how postmodern your world is, some facts don't budge. Stuff happens, and your frustration is independent of the causes of those stuff. If I've walked this road once, I've tripped a thousand times.

I texted Jia Han and Jerome, asking what they were doing. (At least I'm trying.) Jia Han replied much later, saying the class was watching a movie. He didn't say what. I didn't ask. Jerome (who represented the LAN-playing side of the class, aka, the guys) had training. I asked him out for dinner, because I haven't talked to him for a while, because I wasn't going to spend my post-OP day empty. He said okay (later he would grudge that I tricked him, he assumed there was other people going, and he would imply it was gay, but this is what I do, I ask people out and if they were stupid enough to say yes I would be happy to live with the accusations - ) so I waited for the afternoon to be over. I was tired, so I laid down on my island class bench. I was bored, so I read my comic. I was irritated by neighbouring people rehearsing for OP, so I listened to the radio. So there was I, listening to acoustic pop that I didn't mind but didn't like, reading Sandman which I liked, but have read at least three times, and lying down in the afternoon sun, a particular luxury that I rarely could afford, when a shadow loomed over me, and I hear a voice call my name through the music.

I knew that voice; it wasn't unique, just familiar, because I've listened it through the phone, face-to-face for four years, all the variations of it - soft, like when he speaks normally; strained, when he addressed a band; raised, as on the field. I also knew the voice because of the way it handled my name - it had the same quality of timidness that I noticed with alternating pride and regret in those four years. He wasn't the main people I hated for what they've done; he was part of the people I hated for what they've not done. Not sure which was worse, I had hated them all. I was healing, slowly yes, but I was healing, and I wondered what I deserved to have my bubble broken by this soft-spoken person, he who is on The Other Side. But I was also curious why he dared to call my name, to summon my stare. I sat up, took off my earphones, and said, "Yes?"

"Do you have the original score of The Pink Pather?"

(More backstory: He's asking for a euphonium/trombone/tuba quartet score I've bought in Japan some years back - a score that was too technical to be played by sixteen year olds. I guess one year makes all the difference.)

I was slightly taken aback by the triviality of the request. Curtly, I replied, "The juniors should have it." That much is true - I've heard it being played at HIC a week ago, and I know my juniors were there. I've taken care to avoid them as much as possible, and when they had said hi, I nodded and waved but never smiled. I regretted that, blaming children, but it was either that or pretend not being hurt, which is worse.

"Um, but I checked, it's not at high school side..." On hindsight, it probably meant he rummaged through their library, and didn't find it there. He couldn't have just asked the juniors? I wonder.

"They should have it," I said, but my tone very much said, "Get lost."

"Um, but is the original score with you...?"

I was frustrated. I knew it was a bad idea. But I sighed, and I said, "Will you be in school tomorrow?"

He quickly said yes. I said, "Alright. I'll pass it to you tomorrow."

He said thank you. I went back to my comic. But I wasn't reading anymore, I was annoyed with myself for getting involved. With nothing to do, I played Pokemon. I watched the sky grow dark, and the air cold, and finally Jerome came around, and since we were both not hungry, we had ice-cream. Not important, but after he went home, I took a bus to town, wandered the streets, and then I went home, feeling alone as usual.

I woke up late today. But when it was near 12noon, I opened my cupboard, and started taking out all the scores and files I have accumulated over the four years. I asked my mom for a box. I threw everything in - gifts from exchanges, notebooks scrawled with band admin, birthday presents (including underwear, bears, cards, the like), mouthpieces (one dented gold-plated SM3.5, one painfully-looking, personally-smashed silver-plated SM4.0), souveniers I've accumulated from Japan and Hawaii, conductors' scores, adjudicators' comment sheets, the wishlist of the band during one particular band camp, ties and stuff. My hands lingered on the NCO badge; I could have kissed it, but I simply let it fall into the box. I could have fixed my gaze on it as it fell between the clutter, but I didn't notice where it went. Everything that I could have said or done or written in poems, I have tried, and now it's time to put things away.

It amounted to a box, and a carrier. These things that used to haunt my room. I don't know whether they were too little, or too much. Too little because I thought these things were bigger, but now they're just bits of paper and plastic and metal, and perhaps I gave too much meaning to them. Too big because as I carried these to the bus stop, the string on the bag broke from my shoulder, and I knew from experience how heavy paper and cloth can be, when stacked through the years. Unfazed, I just put the bag on the box, and carried them both.

I waited at my island class bench. 10 minutes passed. I didn't think it was too long, and I wasn't worried if I was too late. I felt a sense of providence. Then, an anonymous number asked: Hi, are you in school? (I don't memorize numbers, and I lost my band contacts a while back, mercifully by accident.) But I knew, or I guessed as much, and before I could reply, he appeared behind me. I stood up from the bench, and fished out the score he wanted. And I said, "Here it is. But I need you to do something. Since you were so shameless to ask me for the score, I want you to take all my band stuff. Keep what you want, and you can throw the rest away."

(It differed slightly from the speech I've rehearsed on the way. But the gist was there.)

He asked uncertainly, "Including this score?"

I waved over the box, and the bag, and said, "It's all yours. Do what you want." Then, as I had rehearsed in my mind, I left. I didn't bother with the stride and the speed and the pace and the goddamned tempo, I walked. On the way to the bus stop, I met Jerome. I said hi, told him I was going home, and I walked. I didn't feel special or liberated or having a weight lifted off me, literally or figuratively. It was an ordinary Tuesday afternoon, I was still Jiasheng with a Past, but at least I'm not kidding myself, telling myself it's over. It may never be. If there's anything I've learned about myself, over these tragedies, it's that I have a fatal flaw, and that is the inability to forgive. Like that made me less human.

I can forgive someone who hurts, then apologizes. I can forgive the ones who can tell I am completely broken on the inside, and ask if I'm okay, even if they can do nothing to fix me. But for the people who hurt me, and never saw who they've hurt, I can't think of excuses for them. Don't they dare say they don't know, that I've always been the strong one, that they don't read my language - pain is universal, and if they can't recognize it, I doubt they can recognize anything.

So I took the bus home. I liked the fact that I felt nothing, besides a certain lightness. Like I have space for other things, other stories. After all, music, in its original meaning, merely meant a quality unique to the Muses. Song was one of them; there are others. And so with more bravery than I've felt for ages, I ask for another great adventure.

Pen, Sift

2010-11-04T05:38:00.000-07:00

I actually have a lot of ground to cover, although these few days haven't been very eventful. PW is very grating, and opportunities to destress have been sparse (or as a Geog inside-joke, spaz. This is actually really funny when in context, e.g. when the lecturer says, "Australia is not much affected by natural disasters due to its spaz population.")

Anyway.

1) I had a dream about Ingrid Michaelson last night, and although this is not preeminently important, dream-tales are tricky and therefore I should narrate it before the details fade and I have to fabricate them. I actually met her on two separate dream-episodes, and I vaguely remember also meeting Corrine Bailey Rae. It was like a altmusic fest. Well so I remember talking to dream-Ingrid, and I complimented her on her hair, and we flirted a little. I used "flirted" because I had the impression she liked me. Oddly, her boobs were not distracting - I always found them too in-your-face in real life. She had her signature specs on and she was very charming, she laughed a lot and I only regret that she didn't serenade me.

2) (As a KI/ELL sidenote, what tense does one employ when describing dreams? Dreams are strictly speaking, not past events, so there goes the past tense. If you think of dreams being an alternative reality, which sometimes I do, then should we use the simple present instead? What about premonition dreams? Recurring dreams? Layered dreams? Dreams with events that intersect, shuffle in sequence, endlessly connected? Clearly an area deserving of research.)

3) I read my old blogs again, and as usual, I miss my old self terribly. I wish I could go back in time, hug him, and tell him he has a wonderful soul. I know it doesn't make sense, since souls are supposed to be eternal and unchanging, but then again, so are identities... I'm undecided about postmodernism, which I think is supposed to be the point. My inability to commit is wrecking my KI studies though...

4) PW has been rather stressful, although from rather surprising or unsurprising sources, depending on how you look at it. I don't actually think I will talk about this issue now, despite all the enlightenment I've been getting by mulling this issue over. It's a bit like karma (for my sec2 days) and a bit like history repeating itself (for my sec4 days). I know most people won't understand this, which is fine.

5) Oh yes, speaking of blogs, I checked my blog stats for the first time today after Esther mentioned it (hi Esther!), and while the results were rather humbling (i.e. I'm as unread as I thought), I found some bits rather interesting. Excerpts:

Pictured are the search keywords that people use to get to my blog. I am disturbed but hardly surprised that some of these keywords include: antihuman scherzo, ass girl scherzo, and nypomeniac (which I can only conclude is a misspelling of nymphomaniac). I am intrigued, though, by scerzo jiasheng and scerzo lin jiasheng - who are these persons who knew me enough to write my name conjoined but didn't know how to spell scherzo?

(A sidenote - I am very proud of coming up with the name of this blog - it captures my neuroticism quite accurately. Originally, it was meant to be a foil to my emo blog, apologies (which is itself references the two meanings of apology); thus scherzophreniac, but as time went by, my depression spread over to here. I try to be funnier, though, when I realize there are people reading this.)

Exhibit B shows that lots of people who use Mac visits my blog. I don't have to wonder who. I am, however, intensely curious about browsers like Java, Iceweasel and oddly enough, Glue. I will check them out when I have the time and energy.

I do want to make the disclaimer that, although I am a little interested in who reads my blog, I'm not as obsessed about readership as I feel I should be. Ultimately, I think scherzophreniac should remain a personal blog, somewhere to type out my frustrations, the odd prose, test out my lyric wording, and let the other voices in my head have some breathing space. I don't usually write with an audience in mind, and I think you can tell this post is an exception.

6) Another thing about PW is how sometimes when I look at Shao Wee present the Case Study, I don't feel irony, but I imagine him lying unconscious, with a needle in his arm, and I have this small jolt of panic. I often question myself what role I'm supposed to play - the friend who respects his life, or the friend who respects his life choices. What is the greater lesson? No answer yet, but being the noncommital person I've been for the past months, I'm somewhere between apathy and subtle concern. Man, he's still such a kid.

7) I know Halloween is way over, but let me get this thought out of my head: it would be fantastic if the prettiest girl in Ares can dress up as Godiva and parade around the school. It will be such a spectacle and I will pay all my candy to watch that. Phyllis, if you are reading this, this is a suggestion for what we can do for Fac Outing. In fact, we should just make it an annual Ares activity: we shall sacrifice the prettiest virgin in the faculty, who will ride on a horse (if unavailable, Jeff will suffice). She will be exposed to the harsh winds in A block wings, her modesty protected only by her silken hair. Of course, in keeping up with tradition, the area will be vacated. Security cameras, however, should not be switched off for obvious reasons.

8) I still have two points to make, but I realized that they are heavier issues, and deserve their separate posts. Besides, this post now sounds rather frivolous, and I don't want to expend all my material on one post. So I will leave them to churn in my head for the time being, and hopefully they don't dissipate, or get displaced, which happens often enough.

9) I actually forgot to mention HIC, which was a HICcup, clipped, amusing and homoeroticized like it should be. If I have the time, I will write a review; if not, it is sufficient to say it was like the others.

10) Good night.

Remission

2010-11-01T07:56:00.000-07:00

This is my first blog post in a long time.

Since I've completely lost my ability to write, (except academic essays, as my promos results dubiously prove), I am going to get back. I'm going to narrate my days. History is easy. But to look at it, and myself in it, is the hard part.

What's the source of my aphasia? Many things. Betrayal is a old swamp monster. Disappointment is the light mist that hangs above it, sad and cold, thickening, blinding, stifling. I see my metaphors are coming back. But figurative language has always been my defense against literal tragedy.

It's not that easy, isn't it? To talk about what hurts. I have written, theorized, speculated, fabricated tragedies for people around me, sometimes strangers. What keeps them up at night, makes them cry when they're alone, and the brief thoughts that cross their mind between mild dreams, thoughts they only remember after the second bite of breakfast, with an unreadable expression as they drink their coffee, and that makes them silent for the rest of the meal. I've done that. But to do the same for myself is incredibly hard. I tried - after promos, my days are filled with empty Blogger drafts. But I couldn't. I didn't know when or how or who to start with. I didn't know whether to frame the events according to reality, that is, separate things, or according to my thoughts, where they are a roar of continuous heartbreak, a wave indistinguishable from my body, so when I gasp I don't know if I'm crying or drowning, or if I should even be resurfacing.

The verbosity/stream of consciousness seems to be functioning well, I think.

I'm not sure what I expect from my writing. My posts are always psychological, and they've always reflected my psyche pretty accurately. There's a part of me, the parenting one, that wants me to talk about my experiences candidly, with trustworthy friends, to counsel me. It wants to outsource the healing process, because it can't keep me together with mere painkillers. But there will always be a part of me which is inconsolable.

On Saturday, I went to National Library to find Fanon's Black Skin White Masks for my KI research. Honestly, I have no idea what to write for my IS. I'm thinking along the lines of sexuality, but it's a little overdone and I'm not too sure if I can milk anything out of Singapore that is remotely sexual without resorting to LGBT.

NatLib doesn't have anything on Fanon, but Woodlands Regional Library, so I went over. I spent a frustrating 20 minutes going up and down the four levels of Woodlands Library, and finally in the fourth level, where all the little kids are screaming and running about, I found it under the Family and Marriage section, next to How To Get Pregnant. This is very odd considering Black Skin White Masks is a social study on black identity and colonialism. But meh.

Afterwards I went home, packed, and went over to Kevin's for a movie-marathon sleepover. Kenneth was there too, and we watched a 4.5hr mystery TV series about the Bermuda triangle. It was Fringesque and it was alright. Then Kenneth left and Kevin watched 28 Days Later, while I dozed off. Then he went to bed too, and as usual I woke up first, at 8plus in the morning. It's always weird when I wake up in Kev's house, because he never wakes up early on weekends, and I'll just wander his room aimlessly. I tried everything to wake him up: stealing all his bedstuff, drawing on him, ruffling his hair, tickling him, but he's dead on Sunday mornings. So I switched on The Human Centipede with speakers on, and eventually he woke up at 11plus. We made soupy breakfast, and weirdly I fell asleep again after brunch, waking up at around 4 in the afternoon. Kevin was, of course, asleep again. I woke up with the cloth partition to the balcony blowing in my face (Kevin's room leads to the balcony); I've always found the afternoon light nostalgic. I laid there, wondering where my life was going, and why I was here. Then I went home, after patting Ruffer. Poor dog, I've been neglecting him, and Kevin is too damn lazy and allergic to play with him.

For the rest of Sunday, I read the papers, and mostly slept the day away again. My dreams were odd, but warm enough, and not entirely unpleasant.

Monday, I went to school for PW. It was okay, we got most of our shit together. We should be alright.

- we should be alright.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gINtHqwjr2M

Pre-Reflection Dousing

2010-09-18T03:27:00.000-07:00

"Because a subtle shift in the balance of the hormones that saturated your brain was necessary but not sufficient to change you into an adult. It was the noise that the world shoveled into your head that finally made you into a man, wasn't it? Isn't it the sounds out of people's mouths that make us feel we've aged months in minutes? Her tits look great: you hear that for the first time and it ages you. The cancer has spread to the lung: you hear that and it ages you. I think you should sit down for this: you hear that and it ages you. The rattle of the tax collector's clearing throat ages you. The snap of the chicken's neck as it's prepared for the cooking pot ages you. It is not the bending of your bones but the noise of the world that make you grow old, and turn your heart to a block of granite in your chest, and make everyone's head like mine is. Filled with noise and filth."

-From The Dream of Perpetual Motion, by Dexter Palmer

"All the time I was away on tour, Lindsay wasn't behind the counter in the library. She was living in an apartment block where people pissed in the elevator."

-From I play the drums in a band called okay, by Toby Litt

"If I was 17 I could find it in-between
The cushions of somebody's couch
I could find it. I could find it
If I was 17 I could find it in a dream
A dime a dozen kind of love
I could find it. I could find it
But I'm not 17 and I lost it in-between
The birthday cakes and fast mistakes
That roll by
Ba da ba ba da ba ba, ba da ba ba da ba da dum"

-From Locked Up, by Ingrid Michaelson

Hiatus

2010-09-02T11:18:00.000-07:00

I know it doesn't matter, but let's make this official. I've lost my interest in writing for now and will focus exclusively on reading.

Ecstacy Of Fools

2010-08-14T20:07:00.000-07:00

There are a number of reasons why I haven't blogged for so long, but having no inspiration is not one of them. On the contrary, it was like critiquing a movie, too enchanted by the flashing pictures to write anything at all in my notepad. Thoughts formed daily, and I was hesitant to note them down. Nobody consciously takes note of what happens when they're drowning - they only remember afterwards, when the memory is so fresh, the sensations of choking, the euphoria of sweet air - so in the same way I didn't want to commit anything to memory, afraid that if I held back, the experience would be inferior, merely recording. I thought that if I judged my life prematurely, things would change. So I let things go their way and became a sponge, absorbing and leaking and in a somewhat sexual way became objectified.

The central question, which spans all my blogposts, is - Who am I? or more distilled, What part of me remains constant?

I remember all my heydays. I was utterly confident, a leader who didn't believe in servant-leader-bullshit, a guy who fought back the resistance of elders whom I've lost respect in, and ran a successful band and an cooperative exco. I did it out of passion, and ruled from reason. I was hurt occasionally then, but the anesthesia of fulfillment did numb any resentment I have. Aside from a couple of heartbreaks, frustrations and pure bad luck, I led a busy life. I was more frequently happy, but not necessarily happy per se.

And now I'm leading the life that most people call social suicide. I'm realistically CCA-less, I rarely talk to my old friends, and with the new ones I treat with arbitrary ambivalence. I'm doing modestly well for my subjects, but only because I'm the only J1 in school with so much free time to finish my tutorials and read my notes. I attend all the University talks, knowing rather well that I probably won't get into any of them. I get bad dreams. I lapse into my inner world more frequently now, where everything is so clear to me, that the people around me become mere shadows skipping the surface of the deep, while I watch from below. I think philosophy is a very good opiate for the unsuccessful.

Increasingly I find it harder to judge if I'm really as much of a failure as I think I am. There are times when I loiter around campus, and I feel perfectly calm although the achiever in me is desperate to do anything to be famous, to win any prize and score any line on a testimonial. There are two ways I use to stop feeling worthless. The first is to outrun my ego, and think about suicide. That forces me to realize the absurdity of achievement. The second is to understand my worthlessness is only a product of all my expectations, and once I cut off any dreams of being somebody, I won't mind being nobody.

I don't know if I'm carving a way into my ruin or enlightenment. Either way, I'm straying.

But back to the question. What stays the same? I'm as critical as ever. I intuitively follow an internal code of ethics, although I know all too well what's right and wrong is hard to rationalize. I am proud of whatever I've been through. I am immensely self-aware, and I value this self above anything. It's not selfishness. It's the recognition that only I can be responsible for what I believe in, very much like parents take care of their children no matter how rotten they are.

Recently, two separate unrelated persons, both extremely self-important, told me that I'll never be happy. The confidence with which they said it disturbed me. They might be right, but when it comes to identity, I'll rather find out by myself. It is a vast desert tonight, but at least it's my desert. If they want to colonialize me, go ahead; but I leave no footprints, and the winds are cold and strong. Come closer, or further - I am as indifferent as the night.

Alcoholickytongue

2010-07-31T19:09:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I went home and demanded alcohol from my mother.

I've toyed with the idea for quite a long time, actually. I had decided against drinking a year ago, for various reasons, mainly intellectual. I didn't want illusory happiness and I didn't want to be in the situation in which I may hurt people by the things I unwittingly say or do. Oh, and when I grow up, I want to be the guy who drives my inebriated friends home, yelling at them from the front seat not to puke in my car.

But then my curiosity got the better of me and I thought, why not? I'm not a prude by nature. And what's the point of restricting myself from something I haven't even tried? So my mom, after ordering me to finish dinner leftovers ("You can't drink on an empty stomach!"), produced a bottled of VSOP Cognac (which I later found was a nicer word for brandy) which she bought over 10 years ago. It was so old that when we tried to decork the bottle the cork just disintegrated into crumbs. We had to decant the cognac into several smaller bottles.

So I had three shots, with ice. Sipped tentatively, of course. I'm not completely unacquainted with alcohol. Cognac tastes vaguely like those alcoholic chocolate I used to like, and with bigger gulps leaves a weird, but not unpleasant burning sensation from my throat down to probably where my stomach is (I've always thought my stomach was near my heart, but then again, I don't take Biology). I complained about not getting drunk in the first 15 minutes, and slouched on the couch watching television (I've had quite a long day). The cartoons seem to be funnier. I tried to walk in a straight line. I could. I tried playing the keyboard. I could. My fingers were a little sluggish, but my muscle memory seem to work better than usual. And everything sounds more emotional.

Then I went to bed, feeling giggly. Remembering the porter in Macbeth, I tried to get myself hard, but couldn't. I ended up sending text messages, replying whatever comes to mind, sometimes texting song lyrics. Some extracts:

"both doesn't rhyme with sloth, like great doesn't rhyme with treat. I wonder why"

"Lol it would be funny if i'm drunk outside. " (then I texted the chorus of "Country Road")

"Squishy boobs LOL funny heehee" (I think the squishy boob theme is from my attempt to get hard but failing)

"i want to squish some boobs. Squish! Squish! Uh oh. Sticky milk on my hands"

(responding to Cheryl's text that I'm now both a boob and ass man) "I'm boobass! Heehee boobass! Boobass! Stop saying that! Squishsquish!"

"Sleepily sloop movie loop. Hey i rhyme better when i'm drunkie frankie stein mime lime time dime"

"I'm poetiktok, imma clock, gonna blow my speakers up, tonight, imma fight, till we see the sunlight"

(responding to Tabby's question if my mom is also drunk) "Yep she has a red face heehee i don't i'm so pale like a ghost the angmokio ghost whoooooooo! Trick or treat! anti-meat! Give up your seat! Wash your feet! Meet and greet! Zhihao's, a creep!"

(responding to Cheryl's observation that Ke$ha is a right singer to quote) "She showers with vodka and for the more intimate region she uses red wine"

(responding to Tabby's question why Zhihao's a creep) "Slow soil" (Geog inside joke)

Then I fell asleep, with very pleasant dreams.

The Woman-Cartographer Scratches Her Head

2010-07-31T00:22:00.000-07:00

This blog post is dedicated to - you know who you are. (This is a long post. If you have GP/EoM homework, do your work first.)

Recently, I made two guides: The Guide To Dealing with Jiasheng; and The Guide To Reading Jiasheng's Body Language. I made them because I didn't want to apologize for my social behaviour anymore, and I didn't want my friends to suffer my misery (it's contagious, but expresses itself differently in different people). The guides outline how to read and react to me.

Today I find the need to explain my behaviour. I thought simply telling people what to do is enough, but apparently not. So I suppose I should explain. Hopefully, it will solve two problems: one, that my friends, especially the more emotionally attuned ones (aka girls) will learn not to hug a cactus, and two, that people will stop thinking that whenever I put my hood up and refuse to speak it means that my EQ drops to zero and I'm just having violent, irrational mood swings.

Yes, I understand that it may be a shock to people, but beneath that brooding hood is a furiously thinking, fiercely rational person. When I'm silent, the voices in my head get louder, and I listen to them. Call me crazy, but I happen to think it is a very good exercise in introspection. I don't quite understand why people (aka girls) are so concerned for my welfare; it is through these quiet moments that I find balance in my life. I need these lows. Okay, so some of my thoughts are not pleasant - they might be downright tragic, or existential, or nihilist. So what? We need that kind of thoughts sometimes. They're humbling, and at least I'm not repressing my unhappiness (which I believe is a much worse option). On the other hand, the shallow, instant-critic me? I may be happy then, but it's the same kind of happiness you get the first few seconds you drink iced water on a hot day. Immensely refreshing but also fleeting.

My blog profile description is "Thoughtless and thoughtful." I enjoy both sides of myself - the mindless joy of dancing and joking, but also surrendering to my autonomous thoughts, inspired by sadness. I understand it is a transcendental experience and may be difficult to understand. But this is how I get smart and learn to deal with emotions and problems and that is why I can give advice to sad people, people who call me at night. I don't think I should change my melancholic self. I only find it troublesome sometimes because it's very crippling, socially speaking. Having someone else to interrupt your astrosurfing is a little like Moses seeing the burning bush, he's in awe and scared and feeling small and sad, and then someone drags him out of the cave, eyes wide and shaking him, yelling, "ARE YOU OKAY?" When I'm thoughtful all external events are in fact magnified; I think you can call me periodically autistic.

I have a theory why I hurt my friends - or rather, why they feel hurt. I'm not absolving myself of blame. I'm only going to tell you what kind of person I am, and if my friends will continually feel hurt by this type of personality, then eventually they will leave, as they always have.

The theory is that when I'm brooding, I'm really taking care of my needs. I'm fulfilling my need to be alone and mellow and be spiritual. And when people (aka girls- okay I think you get the point) ask me if I'm okay and tug at my sleeve and touch me tentatively, like they're testing if my body has a spot which will instantly make me feel happier (there is, but they're too scared to touch it), I feel like their focus is not on me. I'm not saying that they're not concerned, but I feel that they are unconsciously fulfilling their own need to be motherly and caring. They want to take care of a guy, and I think their dedication is misplaced. I am not a boyfriend and I am not the dolls they used to play with, combing their hair and patting their tummies to sleep. When they try to care, I feel obliged to play the part to fulfill their needs; the need to feel needed and useful and nurturing. But what about my own needs? When I'm quiet and in pain I need to find my own painkillers and redeem myself my own way, not in someone else's embrace or concerned expressions. When I'm upbeat, I try to make it up to them, I play the fool and tell jokes and entertain, but when I'm zero, I am most myself. The self becomes preeminently important. So that is why I reject others, only to preserve a sense of self.

This is of course a theory. Maybe a person can be truly caring without trying (subconsciously) to reinforce their confidence in their nurturing capabilities. But I doubt so. Wanting desperately to help people is a very human thing to feel; I've felt like that many times, and I've expressed the sentiment many times (see here). And most people are welcome to other people being concerned and caring, because it makes them feel less alone. But I think differently from other people - as I've said cruelly to you-know-who-you-are, "Your concern irritates me." It really does. I think that's a rather comforting fact to know - that I will always tell the truth, or say nothing at all. I try my best not to lie, and I barely try not to offend.

Now that an understanding is reached, perhaps we can restart our love-hate relationship. Or I can write another guide.

Electric Dreams

2010-07-27T06:06:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, in these days, I wonder if there's a limit to my idleness. There's a sadistic personality in my head, mocking my Asian anxiety about having nothing to do. It's pretty much like a SuperMario game - you have to collect your mushrooms (accolades), upgrade yourself (go for courses) so you can shoot fireballs (um, no parallel for this). You need to defeat enemies (the pseudo-crushes, the mocking elite, the make-up lessons, the scholastic pretense, the canteen food, the girl who almost dethroned me in Literature, and two-thirds of the KI class) and avoid the pitfalls (a lazy afternoon whiled away, magazine-flipping, net-surfing, porn-hopping, movies-going, waiting for an email that will never come). If you stand around, like me, the time will run out and you fall anyway, tossed into the air and sucked into the ground. Hopefully you have more lives left.

If you're lucky, like some of my classmates, you get a Luigi to help you. But Luigi has his own goals, and his own princess to rescue. He has his own exco position and projects to work on. He writes his own poetry to submit to Foyle's. If he waits for you he'll never reach the flag. Your life counters are separate, after all.

So what? A Mario standing still in his game is a dying Mario, not an existential one. He's full of pixels and binary numbers, he's a complex being too. As long as your battery lasts, you can play on your Gameboy forever. Endless Marios will fill the place of a fallen one. The ghastly soundtrack plays on.

One day, all the Marios in your portable consoles will refuse to budge, their side profiles half-accusing, and the time counter will freeze. I can imagine your frustrated jabs at the direction pad. And if you take out the batteries or pull out the cartridge, the landscape will fade, leaving a single Mario tattooed onto your screen, a defiant voice saying, "I am here, and I fought your battles, slain your beasts, rescued your lover, ducked your fireballs, trod your lands, and you will remember me. I am your warrior and you are responsible for me. Remember me, this singular me, not the rest who have died before. And when I eventually die, from your neglect or clumsiness, you will mourn for me, I who is a few pixels wide, but I who is more alive than you ever were."

F5

2010-07-18T08:30:00.000-07:00

Coming back from the (rather useless) scholarship fair, this is the game plan:

(why am I using a sports metaphor?)

1) Get customary straight As for As

2) Sit for SATS

3) Get a scholarship

4) Decide, with consideration to cost, to go either to US or UK. But with preference for UK.

5) Get a double degree in English/Creative Writing or EngLit/Creative Writing or maybe other social sciences

6) Take some time off/get some work experience before taking on masters.

7) Ideal day job: arts journalist/critic/a managing position in publishing

8) Ideal side job: writing fiction

9) Ideal home: a functional apartment in the city which must be comfortable. (which means: no studio)

10) Ideal entertainment: Camping at home to play video games, playing the cello for recreation, reading, travelling

Sigh what a weekend. Saturday was PW, and then I went over to Jo's place for tickets, and the night was spent in town with Andrea at the night fest. Afterwhich I camped at Starbucks for 4 hours while waiting for the MRT to operate in the morning. And after that nap, STJ lunch and scholarship fair, and back to bed. I'm just typing this to show how much of a life I have, and also as an excuse for not doing any homework.

I wish I have a better ending to this but I need to slave for my homework again.

Weird Dream #69

2010-07-15T15:42:00.000-07:00

Setting: Canteen.

I was putting down my plate of food, before this girl pushes her plate just next to mine. I raised my eyes, and got up the table to get a drink, but then this woman wearing a purple blouse was blocking my way. She was massaging her breasts through her blouse with exaggerated motion. I just stared.

"So, why the green bag?" she asked coyly, still massaging her boobs.

"Um. I don't know," I said and then I woke up.

Glass Ladder

2010-07-14T23:26:00.000-07:00

Okay so yesterday I went out with Da Xian. It was pretty much a random move of mine, emailing him and asking him out for a movie, since I remembered he paid for my ticket the other time and the last time I met him was last year.

To be truthful, I didn't contact him for so long wasn't just because we were so socially apart. The last time I met him, I thought I could help him, just like I've always helped people who are dealing with mild depression, but I couldn't. I couldn't even connect to him, because he never wanted me to listen, and I thought that was a bad thing. So I force-stopped my empathy as much as I could and tried to continue living the fuller life. And then came along post-exco drama but that's another story...

But during the blocks revision period (okay I will mention blocks in another post but it is fubar so far), his comment suddenly popped up on my facebook status so I decided then to make contact with this strange person again. I don't know why. Maybe I wanted to find out what happened to the guy I abandoned but who didn't need my help anyway. But I think I just missed having a person I can ask out without having a real reason. That availability. Luckily, he's on his break from med school so after school on Wednesday I met him in the late afternoon.

I wore a T-shirt. It's almost tradition (well not really, since we only went out once or twice) that I wear a tee because he always wears a shirt. Oh, he was wearing all white - white shirt, white shorts and white shoes. He looked like a junior member of the PAP. But he was still him, I guess, angled jaw, odd gait, rarely smiling, critical eyes.

We went for a godawful movie called Predators, he fell asleep and I didn't bother waking him up. (On hindsight I should have waited one more day to watch Inception, but today [Thursday] I have to go for some kite-making workshop, which is in like, 30 minutes.) He spilled ketchup on his shirt but we discovered it only 15 minutes after the movie ended. Then he called Jie Han and asked about the location of some really good ramen place, which was where we had dinner. The ramen was okay. He told me about what he did, planning orientation camps, med school stuff, and his holiday in Batam. And about getting drunk and driving school. And about this friend in med school who helped him when I couldn't, and how he seems much happier than the last time I saw him.

We walked along Clarke Quay, St. Andrew's Cathedral, Parliament House, Substation, Fort Canning Hill, the National Art Museum, in that order. Mostly we chatted, and I led him around, tell him about the places I used to roam. The old creepy fort in Fort Canning. The cathedral. The Timbre at Substation. I've always wanted someone to walk these places with me, not consciously, but he did, and I realized that's what I've wanted when I had walked these places alone. For someone to go on long walks with me and just talk and catch up.

It was late when we parted ways. I went home at 11 plus and crashed in bed, forgetting my lit essay and econs readings. And this morning I woke up, all depressed, because I realized that a) my work's undone and I hate that and b) I'm regressing. I suddenly miss my friends, the real ones, the fake ones, whoever made me happy. I miss Liang Jun and Tee Zhuo and Huiyao and Zheng Yu and even Jie Xuan and Qi Fan. And now that this enormous gap in my past has suddenly flooded out, because when talking to Da Xian, it's hard not to think about percussion and band and Jie Han and Jie Xuan and Qi Fan and who we were, in that order.

Da Xian hasn't changed much. But I have. And our shared history is not something I want to review. I had, of course, thought about confiding. I thought of it the last year and I thought of it yesterday. He seemed the best candidate: logical, dependable, listening, judgmental and that's what I crave, to be judged and told I was right or wrong. (No one ever dared to judge me, or at least tell me what they think of me.) But last year, I was supposed to be helping him and I didn't want to steal his moment. Last year, I didn't want to put the burden on someone already so broken. And this year, I still didn't tell him because I got an overwhelming sense that he has his own life now, and because he rarely looked at me, only told me stories, I felt extraneous and worse, escorted. Like he's there because I asked him to (which was true anyway).

I thought I had a friend in him, and yes of course I do. But when I went home I still felt friendless. The feeling is strange because I know he can help and probably is willing to, but I don't want him to; it feels selfish and maybe meeting him was a mistake because the trade-off is reopening my scars. (I blame my bad self-stitching.) And although I intuitively trust him (which is rare), I also intuitively know that he's bound for brightness and hope and fulfillment and I would never want to be a roadblock. So I never said anything. Having someone walk me half night around town was good enough, and maybe that's the best I can ever get.

My Eulogy

2010-07-11T05:18:00.000-07:00

He was a deeply flawed person, yet he was also deeply aware of those flaws. He was his greatest critic. Much of his thought about himself and the world, sadly, did not materialize in his prose, but those thoughts were kept in their purest form in his imagination, and enthralled him to the point that we slowly lost him. He was often silent, and blocked out the people around him. He was fiercely private, and even his closest friends were not allowed into his secret domain. We understood it wasn't a choice, but a calling - he heard and saw things we could never see, and he sailed towards invisible lights. Some of us have felt offended, and all of us neglected. We tried to be with him all the way, but the enormity of the task - following him without knowing the destination - proved to be the deal breaker for many of us. Slowly we left, the breadcrumbs in his ruinous quest. And when he stepped off the edge of our visible sphere, we all suffered an inexplicable guilt, like we've let him down somehow. That we should have stayed. But he remains the strongest person we know, because he stood alone, striving not even against God but an unknown.

In his happy times, he brought joy to the people around him, but our relationships with him was always asymmetrical. No one could entertain him as much as he entertained us, just as no one could lend him the comfortable shoulder he lent us. He could never allow anyone to pity him, and only rarely allowed self-pity. He was a multitude. He was gracious and he was mean-spirited. His gift of the word was a two-sided blade - we have been praised with grandeur and wit, and we have been pelted with the sharpest and bitterest insults. He was quick to judge, and painfully indecisive. He hurt people but always knew how to heal them, if he so desired. He had a precocious understanding on how society worked, but he also chose to ignore some of its rules. He was at turns beautiful and ugly. He was sincere - even in his clumsiness. And even as he tried to pass off as slick and suave, the sight of a close friend will always elicit a sheepish smile on him. Pretense slid off him, and he was averse to hypocrisy.

When we were in school, he told us that he didn't know why he did well in literature, though over the years, we found out. His analysis was only structured by training. His literature teachers used to complain about his convoluted sentences and dense paragraphs, but still gave him top marks. In truth, his relationship with literature was an intuitive one, and out of us, he was the one who was touched most deeply by words. His almost autistic sensitivity to the literary arts also meant he could never explain why he knew what he knew. For he walked a different ground from us - what solid ground to us was to him, at best, shifting sands. His sense of reality was especially porous. We sometimes feared, and most often misunderstood him, which was the main reason he was so alone. We were afraid of that his uncertainty and doubt was infectious, and that those qualities would shake our grounded existence.

On hindsight, we let him down. This was not to say that he was disappointed in us - at some certain point in his life, he realized that his journey was necessarily solitary, and so stopped expecting us to follow. But we let him down in that we didn't understand that he was far more a spirit than a person, and it seemed that in his short life, he was only passing shortly through our material world. We have no doubt that he is bounded for a place beyond time. But during his transit here, he made us question, sometimes unbearably, our existence and purpose, and very often pushed his truth in plain sight, until it frustrated us and in resisting his truth, we resisted him. That was how we let him down. We exiled the messenger. We pushed him away, and made ourselves blind. And so quietly he went away.

Strain My Prose To Make Purple Dye

2010-07-01T20:03:00.000-07:00

Kings of Leon's Use Somebody is playing now; I've never really paid attention to that song seriously until I was on the plane in the middle of the Pacific Ocean en route to Hawaii, and it was on the radio selection of the plane. There was no way I could adjust it, so Use Somebody played intermittently played between unremarkable songs as I drifted in and out of sleep, half excited with an undertone of why am I doing here?

It's July. I've tried saying goodbye, cried angrily, turned passive-aggressive, given up, tried again, given up again, dulled into helpless submission, flared into self-righteous moods, and swallowed the bitterest of betrayals. So am I ready to move on? I want to. I need to. I remember choosing the highway, but I forgot that I've tattooed myself with intricate histories and stories of so many people, so many events. And these few months, trying to scrape off my own skin has been immensely painful. What had protected me burned and scarred.

It's July. Right now, I'm moderately happy. I'm not satisfied with my life but emotionally I feel pretty much at peace. This is part of the reason why I'm unearthing what we're all sick of hearing - I want to know if this clarity of mind will last. And if it does, I will be glad, not because the history is behind me, but because I know despite the hellish experience, there will always be something to look forward to that will heal me.

It's July. There will be so many more Julys. I'm breaking the rule that says, "Stop expecting", because I realized expectation fuels its own happiness, and my expectations are too abstract to be broken by any reality. I'm envisioning a love that is tasteless, scentless, sightless, silent and the only way to touch it is when it touches you. When you see me smiling silly, don't mind me. I'm detached, and they can't touch me. No one can.

Raise Your Hand, I'll Pick You Up

2010-06-30T18:48:00.000-07:00

Note - Chronicle post

So after blocks, I didn't feel particularly liberated, considering how my brain knotted itself into a quivering nervous screwball, full of geog statistics and economic theory. That, by the way, doesn't mean I'm going to do well, by the way. Hell is only suspended in a near future.

We watched Toy Story 3 after Math (which was surprisingly easy, I think I've been conditioned to expect the worst from Math) and it was great, I laughed and cried and was freaked out of my seat by that demon baby and the evil clapping monkey. Okay I know I sound autistic but I'm quite the sucker for animated movies.

Maybe it's my whole mood post-holidays, I guess I'm still in my high. I hope I never get down. But somehow I know when I do, I'll be able to float back to this buoyant happiness. It takes something to acknowledge gravity, then smile and say no thanks.

Aka Spiritual Marijuana

2010-06-22T08:11:00.001-07:00

I don't care if you don't exist. I don't know if you're dead or alive. I don't know if you've ever been born. I don't care if we never meet, or we miss each other by a step, a second, a smile, a conversation. I don't care if you're at the other side of the world.

Today, I know, with so much certainty that it scares me, that there is a you.

You may be an abstraction, but I know you will be there. And if you're not, I am happy with this secret knowledge, this blind faith. Your presence may flicker, wax and wane, and fade altogether, but I need to believe in you.

You're not pure goodness. You're not the perfect lover. But the thought of you burns me in the way love should. If I have to set my life alight just to illuminate you, so be it. You're so beautiful.

You're the final frontier, the last safehouse, my sweet shelter, the complete picture of desire. Your brilliance outshines my dark corners, so the vengeance, the hatred and the pain becomes small awkward things, embarrassed by light. So from now to you (you are the point of salvation) there is nothing that can wrench my gaze from you.

I love you.

First A Lesbian Then A Saint

2010-06-17T23:13:00.000-07:00

I don't know who you are. Please believe. There is no way I can convince you that this is not one of their tricks. But I don't care. I am me, and I don't know who you are but I love you.

I have a pencil, a little one they did not find. I am a woman. I hid it inside me. Perhaps I won't be able to write again, so this is a long letter about my life. It is the only autobiography I will ever write and oh God I'm writing it on toilet paper.

I was born in Nottingham in 1957, and it rained a lot. I passed my Eleven Plus and went to Girl's Grammar. I wanted to be an actress. I met my first girlfriend in school.

Her name was Sara. She was fourteen and I was fifteen but we were both in Miss Watson's class. Her wrists. Her wrists were beautiful.

I sat in biology class, staring at the pickled rabbit foetus in its jar, listening while Mr. Hird said it was an adolescent phase that people outgrew.

Sara did. I didn't.

In 1976 I stopped pretending and took a girl called Christine home to meet my parents. A week later I moved to London, enrolling in drama college. My mother said I broke her heart. But it was my integrity that was important. Is that so selfish? It sells for so little, but it's all we have left in this place.

It's the very last inch of us... but within that inch we are free.

London: I was happy in London. In 1981 I played Dandini in Cinderella. My first rep work. The world was strange and rustling and busy, with invisible crowds behind the hot lights and all that breathless glamour. It was exciting and it was lonely. At nights I'd go to Galenwars or one of the other clubs, but I was stand-offish and didn't mix easily. I saw a lot of the scene, but I never felt comfortable there. So many of them just wanted to be gay. It was their life, their ambition. All they talked about. And I wanted more than that.

Work improved, I got small film roles, then bigger ones. In 1986 I starred in 'The Salt Flats'. It pulled in the awards but not the crowds. I met Ruth while working on that. We loved each other. We lived together, and on Valentine's Day she sent me roses and oh God, we had so much. Those were the best three years of my life.

In 1988 there was the war, and after that there were no more roses. Not for anybody.

In 1992, after the take-over, they started rounding up the gays. They took Ruth while she was out looking for food. Why are they so frightened of us? They burned her with cigarette ends and made her give them my name. She signed a statement saying I'd seduced her.

I didn't blame her. God. I loved her. I didn't blame her. But she did. She killed herself in her cell. She couldn't live with betraying me, with giving up that last inch. Oh Ruth.

They came for me. They told me that all my films would be burned. They shaved off my hair. They held my head down a toilet bowl and told jokes about lesbians. They brought me here and gave me drugs. I can't feel my tongue anymore. I can't speak.

The other gay woman here, Rita, died two weeks ago. I imagine I'll die quite soon. It is strange that my life should end in such a terrible place, but for three years I had roses and I apologized to nobody. I shall die here. Every inch of me shall perish. Except one.

An inch. It's small and it's fragile and it's the only thing in the world worth having. We must never lose it, or sell it, or give it away. We must never let them take it from us.

I don't know who you are, or whether you're a man or woman. I may never see you. I will never hug you or cry with you or get drunk with you.

But I love you.

I hope you escape this place. I hope that the world turns and that things get better, and that one day people have roses again. I wish I could kiss you.

Valerie.

-From V for Vendetta, by Alan Moore and David Lloyd

The Formula

2010-06-13T10:46:00.000-07:00

So, the symptoms start. All the longing and missing and emotional up-downs. Let it be announced that I am crushing again, thank God.

I think having a crush for me is like what menstruation is like for naughty girls. It's a relief. It reminds me that I'm alive, and human, and capable of simple pining. Sometimes I get caught up in my abstractions and thoughts I barely remember being human.

A crush also distracts wonderfully.

But be careful. Watch the line. Don't cross it. Because if you do, you risk everything you've built up for yourself inside your circle. Remember. Remember. Circle the edge, but anything over will be your premature ruin.

There is still so much inside the circle. Deeper. Live on edge only to avoid the center.

I'll Willingly Drown In His SOC Prose

2010-06-09T03:51:00.000-07:00

Remember (please remember) the Chinese garden at the Met, that unlikely bit of outdoors indoors? It shouldn’t feel so expansive, yet somehow it does. My favorite place in Manhattan, I think. Remember that we went there together, Chase? Did I already ask this? One of our first days in New York, we were so tired and drunk on sex and the sense of recognition of those early days of our love, and we meandered into the Met, not with any plan, and the suffocating heaviness of those galleries of European oil paintings made us drowsy and we escaped (I never remember the path exactly, always have to rediscover it) to the Chinese garden court, and were nearly alone there, and anyway the gurgling of the water and the rustling of the grasses, the bamboo, seemed to cover any human sound, and we lay down there on that stone which had been chiselled out and shipped from its ancient source and no guard troubled us and soon with our heads tipped together on that dark slate we fell coolly asleep, dozed for who knows how long? Do you remember, Chase? I remember, too, when we woke, and turned to look into the pool beside our heads, and you thought you saw a fish, a little black darting goldfish-type fish, but it was only the reflection of my glasses, a black shimmering reflected shape that had separated, for an instant, from the reflection of my head and from the rest of my glasses, and seemed a separate darting thing, a fish, or a tadpole? Please remember, Chase, remember please remember, I adore you, my terrestrial saint, my angel wandering avenues, I’m your cancerous angel adrift,

Janice

***

From Lostronaut, by John Lethem. Find it on the New Yorker. I kept rereading it because it just blows my mind with how beautiful and sad it is.

Shut Up, Screwtape

2010-06-07T09:48:00.000-07:00

This blog had been deliberately left blank for a while because I was so caught up with the events of my life that I know if I start scribing I'll forget to lose myself.

As you probably can see from Facebook, I had a smashing time at Pre-U Sem with my seminar group, and it made all the unnecessary stress during prep all worth it, really. I need to thank Queenie and Andrea, both of them whom I've been working with more closely, for all the strength and strange happenings we've survived. And of course all the presenters and teachers and the HCI delegates too.

Oh gosh I had so much fun. I really need to ration this happiness.

Today is Tuesday morning, second day of my supposedly productive holidays. It isn't working so far. But it will. The first step is to get me off Facebook. *crosses fingers*

This is one of those goal-oriented posts, so here goes the customary list:

Objectives of June Hols

1) Academic
a) Block Test Revision (This covers most of my hols)
b) Lit publication works
c) Foyle's
d) PW (Oh, crud)

2) Social (this makes me sound really popular but it's so untrue.)
a) The Ladies
b) NCO ppl
c) Pre-U Sem
d) A10!

3) Physical
a) Exercise regular (I honestly doubt my resolve)

4) Others
a) Dabble in scripting
b) Dabble in writing a serious novel (or at least a novella, or a themed short story collection)
c) Service Learning Project

This is actually the bare minimum I need to do during the hols to make it worthwhile. And even if I do all these, I'll still fall behind the ideal mark. I hate this rat race.

I still get poisonous thoughts sometimes. Jealousy, envy, misplaced justice, or the newest vocabulary entry: ressentiment. I know they won't go away. But in these few days, I seem to develop this strange notion that as long as someone talks to me, and I work hard, maybe I can sustain this happiness/sense of fulfillment. Maybe if I remain conscientious in my studies, and take more initiative, I can overcome this void. And maybe if I write out the gray world I see introspectively, some sort of catharsis can take place and I will be happier. I don't know. Am I naive? Superficial? Probably. But we'll see.

And so I go.

Downdates

2010-05-31T08:24:00.000-07:00

There are too many buff guys here on my NUS hostel floor - I feel inadequate in singlets and want to do crunches and push ups now.

Woe.

The Irrelevance of Anxiety

2010-05-30T07:05:00.000-07:00

Somewhere along the hours on Malaysian highways, I played Paramore's The Only Exception, and somehow, the lines

You are the only exception

all changed into

You are only an abstraction

***

Which means, stop hoping. All ye who enter here. There is no you, yet, maybe never. Oh how frustrating is the possibility.

Can't Remember When It All Went Wrong

2010-05-27T08:00:00.001-07:00

I don't know how to express my anger, other than spiteful and fearful avoidance. Swearing isn't me (neither is it you, but like I said I don't know you). Crying doesn't help. Violence is tempting but fallacious. Jokes only last a day. And I'm afraid to stay in college in afternoons, because the sounds are everywhere. Every brass echo is my downfall.

I'm such a mess.

My Insecurities

2010-05-25T06:07:00.001-07:00

1) That I was wrong all along

2) That I have never been musical

3) That no one will ever see the non-sordid side of me

4) That I won't have the option of escaping

5) That my writing will be invariably bad

6) That I will die unloved

7) That they were right and I have wronged them

8) That what I knew about society will fail me

9) That any friends I make will leave me because I don't have the stamina to love them for that long without their equivalent concern

10) That I'm not a good person

11) That I will be judged by the ways I judge other people, because self-blame is enough

12) That I will never know what's good for me

13) That I will never know what's right for me

14) That my faith in the absurd will break

15) That the demands of my society will sooner or later beat me into submission

16) That a Christian God exists, and my eternal soul is made by this asshole

17) That China will become a world and eventually a cultural power

18) That my emotional/intellectual halves will split so radically that I can't keep the facade of sanity anymore

19) That love songs are just songs

20) That stories are just fiction

A Short Excerpt

2010-05-23T10:49:00.000-07:00

You know the entrances. They're everywhere, in between. The turn of an unfamiliar corridor. The old smell of children's clothes, kept away. A shadow in a black-and-white photograph.

Once I walked up an abandoned building, half-built, still eroding. The staircases were shaded and bare, the afternoon light was nostalgic white. I walked up to the highest built level, and stared out the blank blue sky, no clouds, all wind. It was an odd sensation, feeling everything moving but seeing nothing move at all. After a while everything seemed gray, then the world darkened slightly. Blink, and the sand gets into you. I blinked. Sleep, and you step into the wasteland. I stepped off the ledge, and the next world moved into place.

I lay here, naked and frozen. Sideways, I see my kingdom split down by the horizon, endless sands on one side, endless sky on the other. The wind brings voices.

He once told me that he would show me fear in a handful of dust. But his dust is here in my land. The winds bring them, the ashes, they always end up here. This is where everything comes to die after they stop rotting. Despair is our base state.

I wish I can describe to you the geography of my kingdom, but my sovereignty is a blind one. The sands shift constantly; the winds never stop. Structures appear and disappear beneath the gray waves. But they are all there, six feet under the obliterated.

There are, however, some places that appear more frequently than others. I wander around with a thorned crown. The blood that drips into the sand is an uncharacteristic black. I strain my ears, and just above the howling is some tinkling. The music is sad, slow, unrecognizable. The chords are never surprising. I stand there for a moment, shivering, and then the sand dune in front of me peel away, rubbing across the Colosseum. Somewhere in its internal maze is that piano.

As I enter loose paper fly out. I grab one of them. It is an unnamed score. I trace the quavers, then the wind wrestles it out of my hand. I watch it twist and vanish into the gray light.

The floor is littered with these scores. I do not know where they come from, but someone is playing them. My fingers are moving, tapping air. I have seen the piano sometimes. The music stops when I see it. But its echo of the last note lingers. Not an end. My hand raises to touch the keys, but then I draw back. This is a cursed piano. If I play it I will never be able t0 stop.

There are people here, sometimes. People I know. People I've read about. I see the Frenchman often. I don't understand him, but he speaks little. Mostly he cries, and mutter some French. I know he is looking for someone. Now I see him again. I reach into my pocket, and pull out a lock of golden hair. He accepts it, and climbs back up to his plane. I watch silently as the roar of the engines and the winds fight each other. Soon he is a speck in the white light of the moon. He will be back soon. They always come back.

It is so cold here. I pull out my hand, and hold it against the skyline that is no skyline. The edges start to blur, then they start to burn. The pain is beautiful. But I know it will deaden, like everything else, and sink into this dusty swamp. He told me once, that after we die, we get digested. But no one has the appetite here. We are the ones who got spat out.

This is nowhere, and everywhere. I can show you the entrances, but the exits are undefined by this territory. You can pray to wake up. Or you can lie down, and feel the cold claim you, and the sand bury you. Either way the winds will keep blowing. They never stop.

Outwit, Outplay, Outlast, Outbitch

2010-05-16T04:09:00.001-07:00

I thought I was calm, but I'm stuck in one of those things: the more you think about it, the angrier you get. In true Jiasheng-style psychoanalysis, I shall list down why I'm upset, even though I have a gazillion things to do now, it being a Sunday night.

The gist:

During choir concert yesterday, Andrea introduced her boyfriend (="Dick". Comments about him withheld, because they're not relevant). I said superficially mean and horrible things about her in front of him. Andrea blames me for being mean, insensitive and subversive, gangs up with Joel and Cheryl and they made me sit away from them, on Joel's ticket seat. I got passive-aggressive. After the concert, I left without them. When they called, I gave half-committed, half-aggressive answers. Andrea told me not to be a jerk, and I replied incredulously, "I'm the jerk?" Then I refused to pick up their calls. After that they tried to play it off as a joke.

Why I'm Angry

1) The classmates (I am using "the classmates" because each mention of their name will flare me up like the volcano in 2012) knows my vocabulary. These are the jokes I made at Andrea's (grrr!) expense:

To Dick:

"Do you think she's ugly sometimes?"

"What do you think about her thighs?" (Andrea has body-image issues.)

I know they are mean, but that's my usual conversation filler with Andrea. She has never expressed her dislike for the jokes before. (In my opinion she enjoys my perverse attention to her.) Why the hell should she be angry, just because Dick is there? If you ask me it's her own insecurities. And trust me, she was angry. You should have seen how she snatched my ticket.

2) Them thinking I'm the bad guy, when they all (including Andrea, if I may say) laughed when I made those jokes. Just because I'm a joker doesn't mean I surrender my rights as a social being. To treat me as dispensable is very hurtful.

3) I bought the ticket, but Andrea kept it. I trusted Andrea with it. She used that trust against me. It's a matter of principles - not so much of the thing itself, but the idea that she can use my property against me is appalling. Ticket hostage and blackmail! Would you believe how ridiculous and juvenile that girl is!

4) I thought Andrea and I had an understanding, and that I reserve my judgment on her on the things that matter, the serious ones. God, this is the woman I trust to talk about things I won't tell many other people. And yep, this is the way she treats me. I won't go that far to talk about betrayal, but there is a faint temptation. Let's not even talk about the dirt I have on her.

5) Cheryl. I'm not really mad at her, because women do stupid things sometimes when they are in a group and want to feel loyal to each other. (Feminist theory, for example.) But her being part of the Jiasheng bully group is disconcerting.

6) Joel. He was the one who wanted to go to the concert when he had no ticket, and I was the one who got it for him. Talk about social retards. Reciprocity is not in that boy's dictionary. (I will also decline to talk about all the other flaws of Joel, which will require an entire blogpost and then some.)

7) Andrea saying that I have insecurity issues when she criticized my behaviour today, during our KI research time. Yes I do have them, so what? This isn't about me. It's about how she's being insecure about her own problems, then using others to leverage herself over me. And then giggling over every serious comment I make about her behavior, playing it off as my problem. That is the true essence of a bitch.

Until the classmates realize how grave and serious the consequences of their actions, I will only answer in dirty sarcasm or plain white facts when talking to them. And I will always hold on to my own tickets in the future.

EDIT - Later in the night

Andrea called me soon after she read this post. I thought she was Cheryl. She apologized, and we talked for pretty long about a lot of stuff.

It's easy to forgive her because I feel like I don't really know her. So yes, he's not a bitch anymore, but only because I never knew her enough to know that if she's really one at heart, or she's doing it sporadically.

She said that she didn't know it was that serious, and I don't blame her. I'm hard to read. But I'm really glad she called. Because quite honestly, I didn't expect her to, thanks to my new abstinence from expectations. But that's the good thing about not having any expectations - when something good happens, it feels better than a calculated view of the situation.

Hmm. I wish I could say more but I have to be a Geog student tonight.

FURTHER EDIT:

After my post, all the parties involved apologized to me some way or another. I am grateful for having friends who readily recognize my emotional needs, albeit expressed passive-aggressively. Thank you and I forgive you.

I am also amazed at the efficiency of a blogpost at solving problems. If only I could blog everything out.

Coming Clean

2010-05-14T16:39:00.000-07:00

I made a really bad mistake during CSM. For those in my chatting circles, you might know that I don't talk about my personal relationship issues, particularly one relationship I keep hinting about but I always refuse to elaborate on. All you get to know is that it happened when I was sec3, and it didn't end well. And all of you happily assumed that it's probably just some dumpy NY girl or something.

So during CSM, we were wondering what to do. Tabby and I had this conversation (which was luckily only between the two of us.)

Tabby: Eh you can tell me about your relationship like 2 years ago.

Me: Don't want la..

Tabby: But who is it?

Me: Oh... you see him around but you probably don't know him.

Tabby: Him? It's a guy?

I seriously had a mini panic attack then and there. I'm usually very guarded but this time Freud slipped and broke his head. I quickly said, "Oh, it's a friend thing. It's hard to explain."

That much is true. But I also didn't want to admit that I regard my friendship with Liang Jun as a relationship, with all its connotations of romance, and that it's sexual. It's not sexual (to that extent) and it's only half-romantic. I don't know how to say this without outing myself, or outing my 15-year old self. Both selves are very confused people when it comes to love.

Even now, I have to say that I did love him as a friend. I know how it sounds but I did. So there you go. I don't want to go into details, because it might creep out some people. If you care, you can read an emotional summary here, when it had ended and I fell into a high-functioning depression.

In short and boring terms, we became close friends, then we grew apart. But I invested (rather foolishly, I think now) emotionally into the bond and it took me over a year to get over it.

I regard the friendship as a relationship mostly because when it crumbled, the heartbreak I felt was the strongest I've ever experienced by far. But now when I see him at the class bench and I don't feel anything at all. In fact whatever pleasant feelings I've derived from our close company has evaporated, so that may suggest whatever feelings I had was purely chemical (which is scandalous and something I don't want to believe in, though it may very well be true).

Yep. There you go. One of the darkest point of my life, revealed. The only comfort I get is that no one really reads this blog.

Being Creepy

2010-05-12T05:35:00.000-07:00

This is a TIR* post.

(*Today I realized...)

So TIR that I don't know much about Hui Yao. Not that I rightfully should, but after finding out on rather dubious grounds that he's back in band, I was silent for a while then got over it and decided to google him, to see what other huge conspiracies I was unaware of.

First few hits: Old exco rosters. Sigh and skip.

Random friendster and primary school class blog and cat9 project group, from the sec2 saga. Skip and sigh again. This is getting painful.

Sunbeam SL. Which he's doing now. Hmm, that's nice.

Zheng Yu's blog. An honourable mention, I suppose.

But like Hui Yao says, a long time ago (anytime is a long time ago when contact stops), he doesn't like being judged by his online presence. But he's a nice boy, according to Kevin. The welfare rep. He's funny, he speaks in tongues and he avoids trouble. Once, I heard him say that he hates ethics in KI.

And I thought, "Nobody likes ethics, Hyde (what I used to call him in emails). It's just that some people have to deal with it more than you."

I teared up today because I thought there was some unspoken agreement that we would stop hurting each other, and only when I thought I was too selfish did I stop.

So play away. It'll be another thing I have to tell myself - stop caring. Many times I threw ropes across the chasm I drove between us, hoping you'll get the hint, or to show, however feebly, that I was still trying. As many times, I withdrew the ropes.

In an alternate universe that is this one, I blame myself. But blame you? Perhaps before. But not now. I never blame those whom I've never known.

Jiasheng's Guide to Conflict Resolution

2010-05-07T23:23:00.000-07:00

(unpractised, unfollowed, no guarantees, highly hypocritical; an ideal)

1) Thrash it out.

2) Don't be silent.

3) Don't be selfish.

4) It's fair to expect certain things from friends, but what to expect depends on what kind of friends you have.

5) The length of your friendship is not a good indication of what kind of relationship you share with your friend.

6) Often, an argument with a friend is no more than a confession of the things unsaid.

7) Always assume pain is personal. Even if it's shared, always assume you feel it more acutely.

8) Betrayal is not a weird misunderstanding, or different viewpoints, or different values. It's the point when trust breaks, whatever the reason.

9) Sometimes trust is the real problem.

10) People change. Deal with it, then cry.

11) If you don't try, you don't have the right of giving up.

12) Talk honest.

13) If you've ever chosen a position over a friend, then consider the two circumstance: jobless, with support, or having no one to complain about your job.

14) Plus, no job ever thinks of you or celebrates your birthday.

15) Choices are not normative. They are directive. The choice you make just places you nearer or closer to the people you're in conflict with.

I Don't Care If You Never Read This

2010-05-06T06:35:00.000-07:00

In the movie Constantine, Angela Dodson tells John Constantine about her dead twin:

I used to pretend – pretend that I didn’t see things. By the time she was ten, they started forcing her to take anti-psychotics.. and treatments… and she would say to me, “Tell them. Why don’t you tell them, Angie, that you can see them too?” But I lied. I said, ”I don’t see anything.” Until one day, I finally stopped seeing. I abandoned her, John. I left her all alone. I need to see what she saw.

***

The problem, then, is a matter of choices. I don't know what to be more afraid of - that you don't see the world with my eyes, or you do see it but you choose to avert your gaze.

But meanwhile I still see everything with painful clarity and what you do is a thousand needles into the wounds which refuse to heal.

Rebellion

2010-05-03T13:36:00.000-07:00

I don't wanna be in love, I don't wanna be in love, because people in love are so ugly and stupid but oh they are in that place where my cynicism can't reach them.

***

Rule #1: When you travel, don't fall in love.

But I am always travelling.

Where I Live

2010-05-01T14:32:00.001-07:00

Funerals are held, almost every week, at the void deck. Mostly traditional Chinese ones, the ones with red-stitched yellow banners, and relatives drifting in their white t-shirts from table to table, playing cards and mahjong, munching peanuts. The Christian funerals have silver-threaded blue banners, proclaiming the whereabouts of the soul and the greatness of the Lord. You'd wonder how these 70, 80 year-olds found the Lord at their age, if they've known Him at all, and how St. Peter would pronounce Hokkien names at the pearly gates.

When there is no funeral, stray cats mingle with the ghosts. Sometimes real people, those old people who can't fall asleep, wander down their flats. I always confuse them with the ghosts. My neighbourhood is full of translucent people.

Just across my flat is a Care Corner where the old folks sing badly every weekend morning, when I value my sleep-in time the most. Those are the mornings when I wish the karaoke system had never been invented at all.

Once in a while volunteers appear in the Care Corner, putting up performances, and loitering around in big groups. Somehow, often enough, the volunteers are sent by my school. I watch them from the corridor. Bored students are the portrait of our education system and I've seen some of them doing somersaults before. But I never go downstairs. I can't say I'm ashamed of where I live, but it is odd, like peeing in a communal urinal.

The name of where I live is in a dialect but in English, the language of my thoughts, it is called Big Swamp. And I thought the name was perfect for such a place, where people die every week and while they are waiting for their turn they gurgle and sit around and blink. The old men are shirtless and the old women don't wear bras. All of them smoke. There is a heaviness and mustiness to this place. This is where no young plants grow and everything is in constant slow sinking, murky, sticky, uncomfortable. This is a swamp and every day I feel it sucking my energy away.

Every weekend, I flee the district. Travelling is my solace. Returning is like stepping back into my grave. There are ropes that anchor me to this big swamp.

I am afraid because this is where my parents grew up, and where they returned. But this is not where I grew up. Where I grew up, we had open skies and wide fields and breezy winds. Here the air is stagnant and the sky is building-stabbed. I don't want to live in a dying place. That is worse than living in a dead place. I know because in my dreams many things are dead, and I find that comforting. But a dying place is very much different. It reminds me that I'm still alive, and that robs away my sense of the eternal.

Life Of A Rambler

2010-04-22T08:13:00.000-07:00

Who are you trying to imitate today?

(Potential answers: Women. Explosions. Rainbows. Magnets. Vacuums. Black holes. Holes. An odd wallpaper. An amusing advertisement. Oscar Wilde. Makeup.)

(Typing in parentheses is fun. I'll keep doing it, despite major crisis in time management.)

(Who are you trying to insult today?)

(Realized is a strange, overused word. When you think of something, it is technically not realized. It is idealized.)

(When all your words are in brackets you don't have to care about the structure of your post. You can type as you will. A new idea pops up and you can just note it down.)

(I realized (idealized!) today that I will always be different. Not in the HSM-don't-let-nothing-stop-ya-from-chasin'-ya-dreams way. But in a no-nonsense way. I can't expect others to see me the way I see myself. So all this anxiety is unnecessary.)

(Live freer.)

(Who am I trying to insult today?)

(The imitations. The empty shells. Those who have given up spirit. Those whose only existence hinges on raw excitement. Touch them and their papery skin will tear, bleeding nothing. Listen to their accented jokes - listen for the hollowness in their voice.)

(I am insulting parts of myself, and all of you.)

(Suddenly, during 2.4, I realized there's this heavy feeling in my chest that wasn't there before, and I wonder if I'm going to hate the exercise I've grown to love.)

(Where is the love? The adrenaline? The sense of satisfaction? The overbearing pleasures over pain?)

(I just made a literary parallel. Between running and you know what.)

(I'm so tired complaining about it. I'm sure you are too.)

(Kimchi smsed me today, asking if I wanted to guestplay. For you know what.)

(I fell silent, laughed, felt my laugh was too bitter, adjusted it, fell silent again. I replied, "I can't and I don't want to.")

(I was being truthful. I feel bad. But who felt bad for me?)

(You? That was pity, resentment, anger. To be fair I felt all the same things about you too.)

(My "you"s are very variable.)

(I hate myself too, but in more elegant ways.)

(Than you.)

(Is holy holey? Religion seems to have many loopholes though. God himself must be porous.)

This morning, I thought about one question, which led to the next. What does it mean to love someone? Then, What does it mean to be loved?

(Do you know?)

(Do we know?)

Does she know?

(The counsellor.)

I'll ask.

Being Lost Is Inevitable When You Throw Away The Map

2010-04-20T05:35:00.001-07:00

"At last she put on her gloves and beret and very lightly kissed me goodbye. I felt nothing. But when she'd gone, I pulled up my knees under my chin, and begged the Lord to set me free."

From Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit

I am a little different from Jeanette; I rarely trusted the Lord. I used to declare my atheism proudly but honestly I'm not too sure about this whole God issue. I'm not even sure if it's relevant - I can very certainly live without Him, or at least not thinking about Him.

But yes, I do feel that way sometimes. And when I first read these quoted lines on the plane to Hawaii, they jumped out and touched me and seared. Sometimes I need someone to set me free. It's been 2, almost 3 years and I still regress back to that time.

Don't get me wrong. I am no longer in love. But whatever transpired still hurt. And it hurts more when I mingle the fond memories with the pain, so whatever happiness I can salvage from my life is inextricably related to betrayal, sorrow, heartbreak and resignation. I know the affair was childish, but memories grow just like us. They mature and get complicated and if you're not careful, they outgrow you.

That's why I say the things I do. Crude, inane, banal things somehow stretches the truth, distorts it, bending it too far for me to recognize and that's good enough. Because if I can concentrate on the physical, it may distract the emotional for a while. And emotional attachment is what I need but can't afford.

There are other reasons, of course. It's funny. It's revealing. It's liberating. I am (un)naturally interested and horny. It's far more educational than much of what I learn in school - it tells me about the people I talk to: their socio-psychological boundaries, their liberal level, their readiness to laugh, and on some strange but comforting level I connect with them more. My cards are all out on the table. If they want to flip them and start a game with me, we start to bond.

Recently I bought a notebook on impulse (I do it often), and decided that I will write to that person, the person whom I wait for every day, every second of my life to save me from this mess. But that notebook is still blank, beside my bed. I know what to write, but I don't want to jinx it. Y'know? I don't know whether the person exists. I think he/she must, but soul mates are notoriously impossible to find. Besides, the last lesson that Leng taught me sunk in deep: Never expect. But I hope, and to you, my irrelevant Lord, I hope my fickle faith is enough.

The Contract

2010-04-18T09:38:00.000-07:00

Hey, there. Come on right in. You may want to avoid the couch though; I've just had someone in from one of my darker stories and he or she left some cigarette scorch marks on it. I'll get it dry-cleaned later. But anyway. Let me put something out more comfortable. It is my domain after all.

There we go. Arne Jacobsen's Egg, a classic one-seater. Look at the curves on this thing, I know you'll appreciate it. I know you. Your application form says you're a bard. I've had a couple of bards now, but we do things differently here. Wait, did I say we? I'm sorry. I use the royal plural sometimes. Can you blame me? (laughs) I am sovereign. But then again, once you sign up, you're part of me. Or you've always been. I don't know why I even bother with the forms.

As I was saying, we do things differently around here. Usually the bard gets shuffled into a tiny role, sidelined by the hero. Not this time. I have this script for you already, it's exciting, we're going to throw you into all kinds of trouble. You will be sorrowful, lead a crushed existence, and limp half the way. Literally - your patron will order your left leg to be severed because you had an affair with his mistress, who was the one who blew the whistle on you despite mutual love because her face would have been sizzled with hot Arabian fat. Come to think of it, I'm not sure what does hot Arabian fat look like, but I'll Google it. Oh, and you'll meet the mistress later, she's Vogue-hot. I got my inspiration from last week's issue. The theme was Mediterranean chic. The issue, I mean.

I'm rambling. Sorry. Here's the contract. It's a lifetime contract, which is a little odd and obvious at the same time. You die before the end of the story (there's an epilogue). But if enough readers like it, you'll be immortalized, endlessly summoned for re-issues, re-editions, sequels if we're both lucky. I'm not sure how a sequel works without the main character, but I'll work something out. That's my job. You sign this contract and sell your soul to me. That's your job.

It's pretty straight-forward. You don't really get benefits, but the bare promises are there. All my characters are entitled to a minimum of a 3-page description, condensed or spread out. I understand this is important for your reputation. You will also enjoy breath-taking settings, or as breath-taking as my imagery can provide. You will rarely feel happy - the angle we're going is cynical, darkly humorous, and fantastic - but you are guaranteed with depth of emotions, complicated relationships, edgy sex, prolix dialogue, six half-page monologues, no mentions of peeing, many mentions of ejaculation, and a family background a mafia head would envy.

What else can a character want? Sign it. You'll be given plenty of improvisation chances. We're not strict on script here. The characters pretty much drive the plot. Plus all the hot chicks and one dude (we're appealing to the bicurious market) you're be liaising with.

You look flustered. Water? With ice, yes. Or do you prefer gin? See how the liquid browns immediately. I'll let you in a little open secret: we all like fantasizing. In real life I would be writing an analysis of scientific inquiry, due in 4 hours. But instead we're here, in this comfy, well-lit office, with expensive furniture and thousands of characters filed in these cabinets. Nothing can go wrong here, and when they do, there's spellcheck. Like Wilde said, morality has no dominion in the world of fiction. I am a murderer, rapist, beast, nun, priest, God - labels. They don't matter. This world is safe. I have power. Everyone who has ever dreamt realizes that. That's why stories sell so well. Every book is a universe.

So, Mr. Bard. Sign it. It doesn't matter, really. You can open the door, and walk out of this office, except that there's no road; this office is suspended in nothingness. Not even black. In the vacuum of my imagination, until I decide there's a road. Or a slide into a warm summer pool, with dried leaves swirling wetly in the ripples of your fall. Already the images are forming, deforming. Look at my signing pen, peer closely enough and you'll see it's made out of words. Like Shiny. Luxurious. Inky. Classic. Understated beauty.

I see you've decided to drink the gin after all. Don't be nervous. You can be like me too. I pity you though - I've always preferred prose to verse. What you aim to distill and crystallize and purify in a few words, I can expand and spin into a world of complexity.

Here's the pen. Sign here, here and here. Thumb print here. Initial here. How interesting, your signature is a poem? Which is different every time. Oh well, I don't care for consistency. I had a violent artist once. His signature was a picture of his self-mutilated left testicle. I think. He was an Impressionist.

Okay, we're done. You're officially employed. I'll take you around the company if you want. The Libido Wing, perhaps? The Mistress is waiting there. I'm sure you'll get to know each other more intimately. Not more than necessary, mind you - I still intend for your story to be serious literature. Keep it vanilla for now. Goodbye.

The Degeneration Of Expectations

2010-04-14T07:07:00.001-07:00

I don't need you to know my past.

I don't need you to understand it even if you know.

I don't need you to counsel me even if you understand.

I don't need you to love me even if you counsel.

I don't need you to love me forever even if you do now, for a second.

I don't need you to promise even if you suspect eternity.

I don't need you to keep promises when you make them.

I don't need you in my future even if you keep your promises.

I don't need you to need me, or us to need us.

I don't need. But it'd be nice.

My Monday Routine

2010-04-12T12:04:00.000-07:00

0000hrs - Procrastinating on Facebook

0004hrs - Realizing I have crapload of work

0005hrs - Grudgingly but unproductively starts work

0300hrs - Too tired to continue. Lie on bed for 15 minutes.

0315hrs - Finished Econs revision.

0330hrs - Sleep for a while.

0430hrs - Alarm rings. Aw, 10 more minutes.

0440hrs - Z.

0550hrs - Mom wakes me up. I groan and flip over.

0600hrs - I wake up, still moaning. Sleep deprivation to me is like what BDSM is to normal people.

0700hrs - I make it to school. My eyeballs sting badly when I put on contacts.

0800hrs - I start my Monday timetable.

0900hrs - I realized I didn't bring X/didn't do Y

Rest of the day - I promise next Monday will be better

Repeat ad infinitum.

I'm Only Funny/Vulgar Online

2010-04-06T09:32:00.000-07:00

Daniel says:

abra?

whats that?

jiasheng; wanna watch glee! says:

dude have you played pokemon

Daniel says:

NEVER IN MY LIFE

jiasheng; wanna watch glee! says:

fuck you

pokemon rule the world

Daniel says:

HAHA

i dont regret it

jiasheng; wanna watch glee! says:

i'll get my pikachu to shock you

zzzzz

Daniel says:

haha

i only know pikachu and snorlex

jiasheng; wanna watch glee! says:

i'll get caterpie to screw your ASS

and evolve there

so you get butterfree in your stomach

then you can't play for your concert

muhahahaha

sorry i had a really bad day

verbally abusing you makes me feel good

Daniel says:

HAHA

its okay

why? what happened?

jiasheng; wanna watch glee! says:

nah just keep losing stuff

lost my contacts lenses, lost my mp3, lost my lit text

if only i could lose my virginity too

I Never Wanted To Be So Drama

2010-03-27T12:09:00.000-07:00

"[T]here are different kinds of treachery/infidelity, but betrayal is betrayal wherever you find it. By betrayal, I mean promising to be on your side, then being on someone else's."

-from Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit.

Today, I reached home, took a hammer, and smashed my mouthpiece flat.

I guess this is the only way I know how to say goodbye.

Heartbreak In Hawaii

2010-03-25T02:57:00.001-07:00

In a few confusing days, it will be finally, definitively, conclusively over. I look out of the lanai (because the English balcony just doesn't fit), a sad song on my mp3, singing about unsolved cadences.

So the badges for technicality have passed. I didn't care after the performance but to be honest I did worry during the announcement. I was worrying, and at the same time denying that I was worrying. Doublethink produces odd sensations. Irony. Grief. Excitement. Reservation. Depression. Not joy. Never joy.

Gold is the combination of effort, time spent, energy dedicated. Gold is a mockery of music. The victory is an instruction manual, every pitch adjusted, every emotion crafted, every sweeping hand rehearsed and practised. My subtle shoulder sway is a show. My tense eyebrows are the performers, not me.

Do I sound bitter? I don't feel it. I'm blank. No, scrap that. I'm envious. At the love for music I see around me. Then when I look back home I realized that what I really want, but cannot have.

I'm frustrated at the artificiality.

I realized they are children, in the crudest, neediest, most immature sense of the word.

I understand that it doesn't matter.

I have seen what I didn't expected, but needed the most: that music is beautiful no matter the process or problems. Over my band years I wondered about the sensations/ goosebumps/paroxysms I felt when I played or listened to music, especially band music. I wanted to know why the music produced these reactions in me. I still don't have an answer but in these 2 years I won't get to find out.

I'm too tired. Yesterday in the shower I figured out the rest will never understand; if they do it will no longer matter. So despite the love that has sneaked back in through the week, I will stick by my decision. The four years have burned me out in ways I cannot begin to describe. I will need this minimum of two years to recover, and try to understand the whole sublimity of it all, maybe later, maybe never. But I will continue to wonder.

But yeah. Thank you, Hawaii, for your hospitality, for your cool winds and warm sun, for the beautiful setting and backdrop of a fulfilling programme. I am inspired, reignited, perhaps not now, but I know I'll revisit the passion someday. When the pain has dulled. I'll shelf it somewhere; it will be a jar of flame on my shelf. On my darkest nights the light will dance in my eyes.

Mile High Romance

2010-03-21T02:58:00.001-07:00

I close my eyes. I have watched three half-movies. Their plots are segments of absurdity cutting into my dreams.

I didn't know I missed you; these days have been drawing the focus out of me. I was too busy planning, scheduling, typing, arranging and rearranging to ask what exactly I was putting into my box, but while I was on the plane, in the middle of the Pacific ocean, passing the International Date Line, I realized I forgot to pack you. My hand grasped air; or the striking cold of a sleeping stranger's blanket.

The ocean at night is invisible; invisibly falling and rising, a whole generation of fish living and dying beneath the surface; the true mass grave. The screen on the back of the chair in front of me says,

Air temperature outside: -54 °C

The clouds are thick tonight. When the sunrise came I saw a dense line of red on the horizon, like blood, like compressed caked blood. The dark sea was the giant scab.

I close my eyes again. My ears are stuck. Cabin air is tasteless. The low roar of the engines is an unhummed song, with no beat. Draw near, you. All I ever wanted was to trace the outline of you.

I Bet Three Seconds

2010-03-08T04:09:00.000-08:00

I will go cold turkey. I will stop writing cryptic pretty emo words. I will make sense. I will not be radiating false happiness, but I won't sulk here.

Let's see how long I can last.

Spatial-Temporal Disease

2010-03-07T01:51:00.000-08:00

Been thinking about perspectives recently. I press the Zoom Out button on my graphic calculator, and the graph has a new tail, an undiscovered loop, and breaks the asymptote. Zoom out, and I see my speck-country. Out again, a land bordered by endless seas. And then the oceans are un-infinitized and trapped on a ball of magma, and the ball is rolling on space fabric. The sun is just a bit of light in a galaxy. The galaxy is just a twist of glowing bits. There are more than 170 billion galaxies in our universe. And that's just space.

What about time? Our lifetime is a short one. Our tenancy on the globe is 200,000 years old, and who knows how long we can last. Our cellular ancestors appeared 390 million years ago. You and I, we live 70 years and then we're done. Kind of makes homework look unimportant.

What about perspectives of scale? We're small, but there are smaller things, if you can call them things. Think of an ant. Now think of an ant's cells. Then the proteins inside that cell. The carbohydrate chains that make up proteins. The atom of carbon. The proton of the atom. The quark of that proton.

Quarks. They are the fundamental particle of matter (discovered so far, anyway). And according to what scientists can guess, they leap in and out of existence, depending on who's looking, depending if anyone's looking. Or they appear in certain universes. The uncertainty principle describes life aptly.

My ambition, from now on, is to be a ghost. An observing spectre without any effects on this world. I want to watch the world, not just our world, but the whole universe. I want to know if humanity is just a quark, flashing briefly in the timeline of existence.

I want to see those canyons of drifting gases in Mars. I want to be in the eye of the Great Red Spot in Jupiter. I want to watch the nebulae, their dust frozen in false colours. I want to be burned by a supernova, and I want to drop onto any planet which gravity is strong enough. I want to drown in metallic oceans and helium air. I want to ride on frozen waves of Europa and die in radiation. I want to be crushed by gas giants, descending slowly, compressed into a grave of liquidized atmosphere.

I zoom out, back into my life, in scale. When you've glimpsed eternity, the real world evaporates in the heat of your imagination.

A Real Critique Of The Plays (Principle of Charity: Ignored)

2010-03-06T03:29:00.000-08:00

Athena

Summary: Highly implausible story of a terrorist bombing the Green Line.

It was an extremely weak script without a focus. Much of the plot was stringed together by jokes, which quickly became the main (and sadly still insubstantial) fuel for the storyline. When we finally realize the terrific turn of events, the only horror we feel is at how forced and artificial the tension is.

Nonetheless, applause should go to the Terrorist who managed to flesh out a semblance of character from the absurd script. I had no idea why that Army guy won Best Supporting Actor, but the Bimbo was as funny as bimbos can be. The set was also painstakingly made and kudos to the PR team for those cool DSLR-esque promo shots (and the cast for risking their lives on the train tracks).

Artemis

Summary: Boy-meets-girl, girl-gets-despised-by-mean-friends, girl-gets-depressive (aka HC HSM/Mean Girls)

The premise has been done to death; the idea of "being who you are" is not only Disney but passe. It is on this fermentation of themes where the play is constructed.

Again, the obsession with student productions to be crowdpleasers has manifest itself in the form of math jokes, odd costuming and saccharine dialogue. The acting is consistent but the range of emotions made available by the scripting was limited. Half the time, I was distracted by the odd creases in the Nerd's crotch area than his indignation/sorrow/sense of justice.

The flashbacks were first confusing then unnecessary. I didn't like the oversimplified portrayal of the teenagers' emotions: they are invariably sad, in love, out of love, delirious or retarded. The social difficulties experienced by the female lead was also exaggerated and unrealistic, and her reactions to her circumstances were odd at best and unbelievable at worst.

It may or may not be implicit racism but I thought James (aka the Indian dude) was a pretty useless character in relation to the others. And wrong casting if he was supposed to be the moral centre.

Ares

Summary: About-To-Be-Divorced couple gets stuck in an elevator and saves their marriage.

The only "serious" production out of the four, I didn't like the title but everything else gets my nod. We see traces of forced dramatics, such as the premise of a simple solution to repair a broken marriage, the lack of a solid backstory and the frequent monologues, but most of the flaws are smoothed out by even acting. I thought the freeze-monologues were stretching the elevator mirror motif a little too far, and was a little disappointed that the idea of limbo and existential suspension (a la Jean Satre and his "hell is other people") wasn't explored.

The auntie voice didn't add much to the play besides a little comic relief. The little musical number was actually rather effective in bringing the point across. The tabbing of real conversation and inner monologues can get tiresome at times but generally did its job, albeit too straightforwardly. The main quad did a great job.

Apollo

Summary: The HyPers summon their intellectual pawns and create a brouhaha on stage.

Despite the hype, I thought Stereotype Play was standard to substandard fare. True, it was self-contained, had a nice cute theme, was highly entertaining, but after the play I just felt kind of blah. Perhaps I expect too much from Gregory.

I didn't like the self-insertion; it swings from self-deprecation to self-indulgence on a whim. The Girl herself was however pretty good, despite having to fit into the small well of characterization the script has dug for her. Unfortunately true to what the play promises, the other characters were forgettable, even the Best Actor (who is really a Supporting Actor, really), didn't make much of an impression for me. (Personally, I find the equation of Nerd and Cerebrally Challenged in bad taste.)

The theme of breaking intellectual trappings will not be appreciated by much of the non-creative audience, and strengthens my opinion that Apollo's play becomes a pet project for the scriptwriter, and is more autobiographical than thematic. The characters, like a fellow critic-friend of mine mentioned, seemed to fit the thespians rather than themselves. In this context I felt that the play is a party-gathering rather than a real attempt to bring humanity onto stage, which is fine and all, but matter less in our short history of Hwa Chong literature.

***

Last Words

I prefer Ares's play to Apollo's - not just because I'm an Aresian - but also because the production attempts to communicate beauty, and sometimes gets the message across. There are some meaningful silences I thought was exploited expertly. Apollo's play didn't try that much, and so once you forget the jokes, all that's left isn't very much.

[insert name here]'s friend, [insert name here]'s friend

2010-03-05T07:54:00.000-08:00

Watching the Ares play (I am boycotting the title because it's too long for its artistic merit) is a pretty surreal experience. Despite the predictable script, overused dramatic techniques and subtly anti-feminist themes, it was enjoyable to watch. The actors did really well and I am impressed at their hard work.

I did actually feel some tears welling up during the play because I kept imagining that Huiyao's lines were directed to me, especially the ones where he feels the wife isn't talking and opening up to him and blah blah blah. It's of course wrong and unhealthy to see the story this way but I couldn't help it. During the play, I entertained the thought of going up to him after the play, and apologize. Say that he did a good job, I'm sorry for treating you badly, let's be friends.

Sometimes I feel this way. Suddenly it's my fault, and I want to apologize. Then I think, why should I? It's not my fault. Then I immediately draw back into my cold comfort zone. I shift constantly between admitting my faults and being indignant at being forced to be the only wrong one. I alternate between anger and sadness.

But ultimately we're different kinds of people. We may understand the same things but we're different in so many ways. There are so many types of people.

There's the type who has seen the human condition and decided (prematurely or otherwise) that it is ugly and seething. That's me.

There's the type who knows the terrible limits of humanity. That's us.

But I don't know what's you. And as the days go on, I'm not sure whether it even matters anymore.

P.S. This is the 3rd time out of 90+ posts that I don't write the title in uppercase. This is a small post. Close your eyes slightly and it'll disappear.

Republicanization

2010-03-01T07:39:00.000-08:00

There comes the cliche moment in a teenager's blog when he/she asks, Who am I? This is a question I've hoped to avoid (forever), not just because it leaks maudlin reflection, and that I prefer to show rather than tell, but also because I don't know the point of the question.

And it's a loaded question. Really, when you ask Who am I? you're asking a series of questions, including Who was I? Who am I becoming? What are my passions? Where are the boundaries of my personality? What do I condone and condemn? What are my (Do I have) values? And so on.

Despite me being really tired now, I'm writing about this now mainly because of two reasons. One, the background pressure of running for council, a complete strange new endeavor, is forcing me to think about the WAI? question. Second, today during the class party I refused to wear the MG uniform for a dare. I know it would totally spoil my street cred but I just couldn't do it. I'm sorry for being a spoilsport. But the line is there; crossing it would mean certain death of soul.

So. The question. I have no answer. But like the spirit of tonight, people should just keep dancing to find out.

Waking, Loading, Waking

2010-02-28T11:42:00.001-08:00

So I was staring at my PC at 12midnight, half-awake from a forgotten sex dream, feeling like a failure because my HBL is undone and I can't write a freaking word for CAP, when I heard this small pop and then a hissing sound. I thought I was dreaming or it was happening to someone else but I realized it came from the kitchen so I slowly went up to take a look. I remember thinking it was a gas leak and I might be blown up into pretty bits of viscera and feeling scared at the idea. It took me a while because I wasn't wearing my specs and the water was spraying so quickly, but it finally dawned on me that one of the pipes under the sink has jizzed itself, and now water is flowing out, spreading dead bugs on the kitchen floor. I blinked for around 5 seconds, just staring, then I switched on the lights in my parents' bedroom and told them our kitchen has sprung a leak.

Then I watched Juno on DVD in the living room, with the sound set to low and the subtitles on. It's a nice movie.

Now I'm doing human geog.

What a surreal night.

Life, Concentrated

2010-02-20T19:03:00.000-08:00

Now that I've decided, it feels like I've woken up from a long dream, and now I am on my bed wondering what happened. And like a dream, the starkest memories are the details.

The NCO badge which I left beside qf. The labelled cupboard poles, with eccentric symbols I drew for each section. The pair of brown sticks we bought for Sean in Swee Lee. Scribbles and doodles on my scores. Brushes from the painting episode. Condoms and the Christmas tree. Dents in my mouthpieces. A ring of band members sleeping in the basketball court in 3am. The silent crying. Cans of red bull beside my sewing kit. Countless pricks, countless lengths of golden wires, feather boas, countless boxes of berets and gloves and lanyards. Black attires. Drowning in ties. Glossy photograph of a not-so-important award. Pages of minutes, agendas, proposals, email correspondences, read long into the night, with green tea spilling on my keyboard. Morning jogs. The nights when I close my eyes, and I hear voices of people in my life, all calling my name.

This is my tribute to the four long years I've had. In here I've had my best and worst moments in life. Fuck you and thank you.

Disturbing Dream #01010101

2010-02-19T06:58:00.001-08:00

I am swirling a big bowlful of chocolate. Swirl, swirl, swirl, goes my whisk. My sister watches me. Sparrows fly on top of the chocolate mixture. They have red chests and beautiful steel-blue wing feathers. Their beady black eyes stares inquisitively at me, heads cocked. For some reason, I know they're there, but I keep stirring. By the time I register my sister's screaming, the chocolate mixture already has deep traces of red in the wake of the whisk. For some reason, I am still stirring. I look into the bowl. I don't see any sparrows. But now I let go of the whisk - the thought of brushing against their chocolate-crushed carcasses at the bottom of the bowl is more stunning than the realization that I've killed them.

The Petition

2010-02-19T05:22:00.001-08:00

I've heard when artsy people feel downtrodden, self-destructive or corked up, they write bad poetry. I shall give it a try.

We are the unspoken

the unsaid. the uncalled.

We are the exodus of corpses

revenants trekking the path back home.

We are the flesh-eating, bone-rotting worms

ghosts haunting under your skin.

We are the grins of skulls

grey stains our testimony to time.

We are the scythe-holding black-robed men

cleaning your sins, giving you life.

We are the slow marching band

an elegy to the disgrace of death.

We are the legion of blasphemous demons

our tongues tying our lies in place.

We are the winged hosts of light

false infinity of falling fires.

We are the tricoloured crown

hues only wise kings can see.

We are the words you never dared

to speak, say, call.

So here we are. Now rhyme us and give us form.

Mutilation

2010-02-18T08:22:00.001-08:00

So life is getting busy, and I'm starting to dread the sunless lands of midnight mugging and bad complexion. Already my week is full up till the weekend.

I think my class is developing real well. You know it when discussions of sex are frequent, perverted and involves girls as well as guys. We already have a class couple, their various cheating partners, a couple of interclass relationships, a lesbian harem and plenty of confessed fetishes. I note great potential.

I'm reluctant to report on my academic progress. H1 Math is an endless session of drawing graphs badly. H2 Lit is fascinating but I'm confused between the wild fluctuations between the sophisticated and the really obvious. H2 KI shows great promise. H1 PW smells like trouble. H2 Econs is extremely patience-disintegrating.

I'm anxious, but not depressed yet. As usual, the whole issue of CCA bugs me like crazy and I have what, 3 days to make a decision? People are in between jobs or houses. Me? I'm in between bands.

But I don't want to talk about it anymore. This personal decision of mine is getting more damaging by the post.

One-Word Descriptions Of My Subjects So Far

2010-02-17T04:43:00.001-08:00

H2 KI: Heady

H2 Geog: Ironic

H2 Econs: Slow

H2 Lit: Latifah

H1 Maths: Retarded

H1 PW: Kiasu

The Linguistics of I Love You

2010-02-15T18:24:00.000-08:00

Abbreviation (Ambiguity)

ILY. I love/like/loathe/lick/lavish/lambast/let you.

Active/passive voice (Responsibility)

I love you. You are the one I love.

Conjunctions (The Complicating Factors)

I love you, because -

I love you, and -

I love you, but -

Stresses (Between The Lines)

I love you: It is I who loves you, not him. Denotation: Jealousy. Ownership. Possessiveness.

I love you: Among other things I do to you, or do with you, I love you. I kiss you only after I know I love you, not during, not after. Our consummation is a consequence, not a confirmation.

I love you: You, and no one else, is the recipient of my love. Exclusivity and purity.

Subject Verb Order (Irrationality)

I, Love, You. Subject, Verb, Object. Who says love is the verb? I say you and I are the verbs, constantly moving, in action and flux, submerged and rinsed and invigorated in the pool of love.

Tenses (Temporal Relations)

Simple present: I love you. A timeless fact. A universal truth. Or, a temporary proclamation.

Simple past: I loved you. Some people say there is no past tense of ILY, because love should be eternal. But without the simple past tense, we cannot tell fairytales. And they lived (loved) happily ever after.

Past participle: I had loved you. But you are already distanced by layers of events, I don't know how you still reach out to me.

Present continuous: I am loving you. Who knows for how long?

Imperfect: I used to love you. I don't anymore.

Conditional: I would love you. If.

Future: I will love you. In the future, when you have decided, when we've stopped arguing, when I've stopped crying, when the bitterness has ended. Time will heal all wounds. We are overdosing on time.

Punctuation (Ending the Phrase)

Exclamation.

I know this girl, she is what people called an ILY slut. Perhaps she has been brought up this way. She uses the three words freely, as a greeting, as parting words, as words of gratitude. "I love you!" she says, and we know she does not mean it the way we think. It is a cool party trick she performed for us, ceaselessly and never stale. There are ways she made ILY casual - not insincere, but not genuine either. She will never look straight into our eyes when she said the words. She will be smiling, half-mockingly. She will never say it softly, because that will make the words tender, and her neediness will betray her. No, she will say it like a joke, casting out her gift-wrapped love, and no one, including herself, would expect anyone to say it back to her.

Quotations and Brackets.

"I am the love that dare not speak its name." thus signed the letter. This is the morning after Valentine's, when that love is at the other side of the bed, still as if dead. I do not know his name - last night, I alternately called him Lord, Alfred and Douglas. He liked Lord the best. He was a great date - gregarious with an easy charm, winsome, a polished speaker. I found myself repeating his words after he said them, turning them around in my mouth, rubbing them with my tongue. He was laid-back, and he never said I love you. I asked him why, and he said, joking in tone but serious in his eyes, that he feared commitment. But there was a depth in his gaze, his sideway smile, the focused warmth of his left hand that made me recognize the three words in brackets, like an aside, a sustained overtone.

Question.

He just got out of a relationship. I knew it was a mistake to sleep with him but I did. I was reminded of my mistake when I felt his unshaven chin on mine, and his bed smelling musty from his sleepless hours. He kissed desperately, his hands clumsy on my blouse, his jeans sticking to legs with cold sweat. His mint-flavoured teeth was his only line of pretense. In between his grunts, sad and soft, he muttered I love you, over and over. Through his closed eyes, his bleeding lower lip, that senseless jerking, the creaking bed, those three words became at once a plea and an accusation. A question he asked himself. I love you? At last, when he came, they had no meaning at all.

This Is Not Ranting

2010-02-08T04:22:00.000-08:00

I've been having serious doubts about joining college band these few days. Today I sat down and tried every possible decision making process I know - weighing pros and cons, consequences, implications, future trajectories, benefits for various parties - and I still don't have a definite answer.

Some of the reasons I have for not wanting to join are valid. I honestly need to break away. I should try something new. I'm approaching a stage of obsession that soon I will not be able to control. Being in band reminds me of bitter and unpleasant memories and I should do myself a huge favour and move on.

Some reasons are invalid, but very real nonetheless. I'm still holding on to the chance that maybe if I don't join band, then whatever grievances that many people owe me may not appear that important anymore. Then perhaps I can find the opportunity to forgive Hui Yao and Teezhuo and Zheng Yu and the rest of the ex-exco.

But I'm not sure if I'm that big-hearted. I still haven't forgiven many of my seniors, even though they have left years ago. It's not a matter of stubbornness. It's a matter of right and wrong. From where I come from, when someone makes a mistake, he apologizes and make amends. But these people I'm angry at, they don't seem to realize what they've done.

So I thought I'd list out why exactly I'm angry at who. It will help me sort my thoughts, and it will release some of that poisonous pressure.

1) The entire exco. For planning Impressione and doing a terrible job. You have screwed up JC-HS relations and caused the exco numerous problems. When I defended the high school from the college band, I've had the best interests of the band at heart. But from what I've heard from Mr. Leng and the juniors, you've made things incredibly difficult for cooperation. You've also, deliberately or otherwise, made the next exco disenfranchised. The musicality of the concert was definitely not GwH standard. The admin is disastrous - watching the concert unfold from a third-person view, it felt like a documentary for How To Plan A Bad Concert. Impressione is history written indeed, but not the good kind.

2) Huiyao and Teezhuo. I know we had our talks before Impressione, and there was that one thing we couldn't agree on - that I was right, and that there is no middle ground. I stand by what I said. I feel hurt and betrayed because I thought that you would make the right decision - both professionally and emotionally. The two of you failed me on both grounds.

3) Ms Choo. For blaming me for the choice for Huiyao not to continue with band. For wanting me to stop interfering in band issues when help is requested. For expecting me to fix the problems of my batch, when I have no obligations to and it is not my fault. For thinking that I've not been honest with her.

4) Everyone. For thinking that the problems of my batch should be solved by me. Or for thinking that the problem is me. Open your eyes. I am only a symptom. Look at the real problems. I am the only one who sees them now.

5) People who are not joining band, and feeling relieved about the prospect. For leaving their dredges behind. For not putting in that last effort. For their words spoken once upon a time, that they love band. For blaming me for their departure.

And now I may not be joining band. There is just too much politics, too much trouble, too many commitments, too many flaws to correct, too many considerations, and in the midst of being manager I will lose the passion.

I'm not asking for a lot. I don't need apologies. I just need everyone to see what's really happening. Because I've always been the first to notice all the problems. And no one believes me until they need my help. You know what I'm talking about.

So yep. Thanks for reading.

I'm Emotional. Leave Me Alone.

2010-02-06T23:27:00.000-08:00

You know, my decision to not read the others' blogs was a right one. Too bad it doesn't matter now, because I just read everything and boy are they infuriating.

How on earth did I work with these assholes for so long, I wonder. It's like they have no shred of conscience or morals at all.

I try very hard to forgive and forget but they make it hard. As far as they're concerned, I'm still the ultimate baddie who wrecked their happiness and splattered blemishes all over their perfect finale. Their myopia is frighteningly severe.

Thinking about the unfairness of it all makes me want to puke.

Orientation Day 7 (Finale)

2010-02-05T06:58:00.000-08:00

Right in the middle of tonight, when all the wrong dance moves have been executed and the off-tune singing have been sung, when everyone is jumping and yelling and running and screaming, when faces glisten with unadulterated joy, when genuine, reasonless smiles are exchanged, when laughter is the norm rather than the exception, when no one has to be responsible for outrageous behaviour, when all judgment cease -

I find myself happy. And I start to want to start renew, to use the fresh impetus to break off the self-eroding track, to forgive, to withdraw harsh words, to make amends, to cut off the supply of misery, to separate duty from passion. To want to love. To stop thinking about the past, to forget about mistakes, to break chains. To empty the cup. To gather kindness into my life. To cherish and honour.

If only it's that easy. At least, I won't be self-defeating now. I will try - the rest is up to you.

Orientation Day 6

2010-02-04T05:51:00.001-08:00

1) There's something very liberating about typing this post while wearing my singlet, boxer briefs and spectacles.

2) War games was pretty awesome like WQ said, but I was really thirsty and had to resist the temptation of drinking from the water bombs.

3) I just ran into enemy territory and kept destroying water bombs. Stamina aside, my sprinting/avoiding techniques are actually modestly impressive (from years of anti-social behaviour). Most people don't catch me.

4) Highlight #1: I intercepted Ying Cong, who was carrying two water bombs in his homeground (Apollo) and tackled him to the ground and squashed his bombs. I'm not quite sure why this is a highlight, except that it felt supremely cool to pin the ex-vice-head of HSC onto the grass.

5) Highlight #2: Rushing into a line of Athena girls (including Xinyuan omg) and having them all topple me to the ground. They were all like "You're an ass," and screaming and shoving. Hilarious. Then this Athena guy (I vaguely remember him as one of the pathetic "gangsters" in the Aphelion classes in '09) telling me what a fucker I am and blah blah blah.

6) One interesting thing about war games is how civil some of us are to each other. We apologize for the slightest bump. After we tackled, grabbed, tau-poked, mobbed, and stole from other players, we'll say sorry and move on.

7) On the other end of the spectrum, FB informs me that many of my ilk have been savagely attacked by the ladies (or as I like to call them, the feral sex). Their weaponry include poison-tipped, brightly-coloured claws, fearsome kicks to groins, high-octave ululations and an absolute lack of inhibition when assaulting those with penises.

8) Highlight #3: Using the private shower cubicle that only I know about in the SALT centre while the rest waited in long queues :)

9) Ares won the War Games! Wikipedia says Ares is more specifically the god of bloodlust. Which I guess for PR reasons is subdued to just god of war. I wonder how the school deals with religious complaints.

10) Part of the fun of the War Games was directing all my passive-aggressive rage towards my seniors into the game. Every Apollo member became Sean Chia.

11) Class flag painting is mini-epic fail (I know mini-epic is oxymoronic). But I like my class better and better. 10A10, 10-a-cious-ten, feel the tension, ten out of ten!

12) After school, I secretly went to measure the class flag's dimensions and bus-ed to Beauty World to buy a new class flag.

13) Going to spend the rest of tonight sketching the design. Bon nuit!

Orientation Day 5

2010-02-03T07:49:00.000-08:00

1)My CG isn't as bad as I thought.

2) These days, I don't recognize my reflection.

3) When people tell me I look sad and lonely, I tell them I just have a neutral looking face. Fact is probably I am lonely and sad and there's nothing I can do about it. So stop asking! I won't smile just for you (or maybe I will.)

4) Guidelines to dealing with people you dislike: If they don't say hi, turn away or watch them pass you.

5) Guidelines to dealing with people you share a tumultuous past with: pretend not to know each other, and feel hurt and indignant when they don't even bother to say hi.

6) Guidelines to being in a new group: Don't talk don't try to lead don't be extra. There will be someone else doing that.

7) Guidelines to joining a CCA you used to lambast: Don't look like you're having fun, but don't look like you're sorry. Don't participate in any social events. Don't try to make friends. Do your job. Notes, scales, tone, pitch, articulations, dynamics, phrasing. Your blank expression is your punishment. Your apathy is your defense.

8) Guidelines to announcing your CCA: Don't bother to look at them; don't be guilt-laden, don't be self-righteous. The weight may crack your back but it's the mature, adult and inescapable thing to do. You don't have a choice. Every morning you brush your teeth and put the chains on your feet. The chains connect across campuses.

9) Guidelines to wandering the CCA exhibition: Don't bump into anyone, and put on your unfriendly face. Put that purposeful stride on. Smile a vague apologetic smile to enthusiastic salespeople. Shake your head a little, careful but determined.

10) Guidelines to being completely antisocial and insular: Put on mp3, read the extremely absorbing The Great Gatsby, flip the pages at random.

Orientation Day 4

2010-02-02T08:01:00.000-08:00

Bad day. Don't wanna talk about it.

Orientation Day 3

2010-02-01T07:53:00.000-08:00

1) I am very very tired now.

2) I know I'm being cynical again and this is extremely unhealthy for my social life, but I feel like I'm lying when I sing songs about how I love HCJC and will never leave it and my friends will stick by me forever and ever, ad nauseam.

3) I decided my subject combination yesterday: KI Econs Lit Geog and H1 Maths. Will be busy.

4) Elton just asked me about chain rule. I don't know what he's talking about (even more so than usual.) Crapola.

5) "Crapola" is my latest favourite minced oath.

6) I'm very very tired, and I feel like a party pooper.

7) I am a party pooper. I'm pooped.

8) I actually enjoyed today, but there's a but.

9) Shall concentrate on tomorrow. Sexuality talk! I must practise my snigger.

What Having OCD Means

2010-01-31T07:19:00.000-08:00

1) OG decided to wear red/orange/yellow shirts. My wardrobe is filled with shirts but not T-shirts, so I decided to go buy one.

2) Went to Uniqlo @ Somerset 313. Disliked everything.

3) Roamed town (on foot!) for 3 hours to find the perfect shirt. Failed. In the end, got a $10 red Giordano plain T at TP central.

4) Disliked the whole plainness of it, so went to Popular to buy fabric paints.

5) Reached home at 9 plus. Started sketching designs.

6) Decided on the design. Couldn't find any chalk to trace the shirt.

7) Was very angry because I remembered buying a whole box of chalk in Ikea a while ago.

8) Went downstairs. The convenience store said it sold its last stock. The auntie suggested going to a store 5 blocks away.

9) She said it might be closed, so I ran there. No chalk there either.

10) Considered going to Popular again. If it closed at 10pm, I might still have a chance.

11) Instead of waiting for a bus, which would take too long, I ran to TP central again (a hundred blocks and 15 minutes jogging distance away).

12) Gasping, breathless, I found Popular closed (since 9.30pm).

13) Tried going to the supermarket. Sometimes they sell a little chalkboard with chalk at the aisles. Checked every aisle. No chalk.

14) Sad and tired and frustrated, went home at 10.45pm with no chalk.

15) Tried looking at home again. No chalk.

I am this close to making my own chalk. I'm sure the internet will teach me.

Orientation Day 2

2010-01-29T05:08:00.000-08:00

1) Woke up at 7.15, muttered "Oh shit," sprayed deo, threw on my uniform, brushed my teeth, threw stuff into my bag and was out of the house by 7.20.

2) Flagged down a taxi at 7.25. The taxi driver asked me, "Late for school ar?"

I sheepishly said, "Yeah."

He said, "There's a lady waiting for one, but since you're late, I'll take you." I turned my head and there she was, the lady I cut off unknowingly. She didn't look angry.

"Sorry," I said, to no one in particular.

"No need to be sorry," said the driver.

3) Along the way, the driver interrogated me.

"Okay, let's just say la, if you get high marks for your sciences and low marks for your English and Humanities, do you think you should go poly or JC?"

I said, depending on personal interest. He went on this rant about how it'll be difficult to survive in JC with that kind of results. Turns out he was talking about his son. Adults have this way of asking for opinions only to validate their own view.

4) But he was nice, so I humoured him. He deducted 25cents off my final fare ($10.25).

5) I got into the Audi just in time (7.45) to listen to Hon pontificate about school values and mind functions. I think I have a mini-crush on the ex-NY-head-prefect. She sounds smart.

6) I met two men today. One, the guy giving the discipline talk. Two, the Games I/C at the tennis court. They sublimate violence.

7) OG Games was okay, mass dance was epic fail (for me), band was okay.

8) The most tiring part of my day is when I get home, just before I take off my contact lens, waiting for the PC to start.

***

For the twenty-six thousandth time, there's something wrong with me.

This entire day I was going through all the motions: leading my OG in a cheer, yelling my voice out, smiling a lot, playing the games, awkwardly dancing the mass dance, playing my instrument. And I feel so detached from everything.

Yes, the cheer words are coming out from my mouth. But my head doesn't vibrate with mindless happiness like it should.

Yes, I feel happy when my OG wins, but the ecstasy lasts for two seconds, and then I feel empty again.

Yes, I was playing in the JC band and I understand the musical phrases. The tensions and falls and cadences and what the music tells me. When I hear the horn parts in American Elegy, I understand the heart-wrenching ache and sorrow of losing one's child. When I hear the ending part of Noah's Ark, I can also hear the word covenant. The idea of a divine promise. Joy, but not quite. I can understand all these things. But like everything today, the understanding is an insulated one.

It's not like I'm apathetic, or I'm not feeling any emotions. If that was true I won't be able to understand all those musical ideas or find the motivation to learn the songs/dances/cheers. It just seems like I'm repelling all these emotions as soon as I register them. It's like a blocked nose. There's something stuck in the gears of my EQ.

I really need a therapist.

Orientation Day 1

2010-01-28T08:06:00.000-08:00

1) I usually don't write posts chronicling day-to-day events, but I thought it'll be easier this way. I'll just do another free-association/stream-of-consciousness post.

2) Amazing, the day before THE orientation, I got some sleep. Usually I can't sleep at all. The previous night, I chatted with Wei Qi and got warned about the dances and games and stuff.

3) Btw, a big shout out to WQ (even if you don't read this) for all your help with my questions about subject combinations and JC life in general. You're probably the only senior I can talk that well to. Thanks, above all, for being interested in what's going on in my life (when you have lots of stuff to study!)

4) I can already think of so many nicknames for the lecturers.

5) My OGL, Harrison, has that kind of distracted expression you see in businessmen in meetings which don't require their participation. He's not exactly daydreaming but he's not really there either, if you get what I mean. He's not capitalized AWESOME, but he's not incompetent either. Oh well see how. (Harrison is a cool name, though.)

6) My OG is still rather quiet but I guess it's okay, we'll warm up after a while. Oh the plus side, there are no explicit assholes in my group (with the possible exception of myself) and I'm starting to shake off that icy countenance I've worn for the past three months.

7) I don't like our batch song, it's so Secondhand Serenade, scars will materialize on your wrist when you sing it. The guy parts are in the same range as the girls', and they don't sound as nice one octave down.

8) The guy singing it to us, Preston, does he have testicles? Cassandra's voice is really sweet and clear though. When you close your eyes, Preston actually sounds higher (read: more strained) than Cassandra even though they're singing the same range.

9) If our batch dance is on FB, and if there's a dislike button, I would press that button.

10) This is my new way of greeting Band Exco '09. If they say hi (I don't really know why they bother), I'll nod subtly, with a blank expression on my face. It means, "I see you, but I don't forgive you." There are exceptions to this, of course. Some people I'll ignore entirely.

An Urban Love Story

2010-01-25T06:48:00.000-08:00

City of Angels

Dogs walk free with diamond collars

Free men hang from ropes and dollars

Train tracks stitch the jagged scars

Stretched faces on aging stars

Empty beds in furniture stores

Angels sleep on skid row floors

Broken wings for a dollar a pound

“Can you spare some change?”

I’m strolling down, rolling down

Sunset Boulevard

I see the paparazzi try to catch

A falling star

Just another day you’re on your way

In the city of angels

All the make-up in this town covers the frowns

Yeah the world seems upside down

Cars kissing on the 405

Colours blend and intertwine

You and me, we’re just a bunch of dreamers

Lucky to collide

Sure, we’re living on nickels and dimes

and the earth could shake at anytime

But we’re holding on to something true

and with your hand in mine

We’ll be strolling down, strolling down

Sunset Boulevard

They say that opposites attract, well

this is the city for us.

Just another day you’re on your way

In the city of angels

Leave the make-up in this town for all the clowns

Yeah the world seems upside down

In the city of angels

Let it rain, rain down

Wash the make-up from this town

Let it rain, rain down

Thirsty people all around.

Just another day you’re on your way

In the city of angels

Leave the make-up in this town for all the clowns
Oh the world seems upside down

Yeah the world seems upside down

In the city of angels

In the city of angels
Yeah the city of angels

***

I really want to visit L.A.!

I Don't Like The Econs Teacher

2010-01-24T06:32:00.000-08:00

He's fat, mostly unfunny, tells more jokes than content, oversells the subject, lame, and unnecessarily facetious.

The worst part is I actually like Econs.

The Caterpillar Theorem

2010-01-21T08:52:00.000-08:00

General interpretation:

"Place a man and a caterpillar in an isolated room. After time X, where X is an unspecified integer, the man will eventually have sex with the caterpillar."

Alternative interpretation:

"Place a man and a caterpillar in an isolated room. After X, where X is an unspecified integer, the man will squish the caterpillar and masturbate."

Empirical interpretation:

"Place a man (75kg; 1.8m) and a caterpillar (200g, 5.0cm) in an isolated room. After time (in hours) X, where X is an integer between 0 and 2, the man will, through automated actions, achieve neuromuscular euphoria."

Social interpretation:

"Place a man (no discrimination on income bracket, marital status, sexual orientation, and other non-gender criterion) and a caterpillar (any creature inspiring human disgust will do) in an isolated room (while assuring the subject that this is an anonymous test and legal protection to privacy is ensured). The need to conquer enshrined in the male psyche will cause a transgression in moral codes, encouraged by the promise of non-consequences."

Freudian interpretation:

"Place a man and a caterpillar in an isolated room. The man wants to have sex with his mother but finds solace instead with the phallic form of the caterpillar. The sexual intent directed towards the caterpillar demonstrates natural sexual deviancy in all creatures controlled by the pain/pleasure principle."

Women's interpretation:

"Men are horny bastards who only care about their prick."

Men's interpretation:

"It's true."

Basic Chronology

2010-01-19T22:07:00.000-08:00

So yesterday was a whirlwind. I had to sit for both selection tests for ELL and KI. It wasn't too bad, just that I totally screwed up the meaning of adverbials and complements for ELL and the KI essay question ("The complex globalized world has grave implications on absolute truth. Discuss.") begs my crap.

After that I went home and prepared for the meeting with the instructors, printing out the proposals and documents and filing them neatly into six separate files. The meeting itself went okay, I got shot down for the JC part, but the Hawaii part went smoothly.

The part that got me down was when I eavesdropped on the exco's meeting. They still have a long way to go. And I realized that when I started talking, everyone looked down and went silent. I would have been glad if I was still a major, but it was just depressing. I wonder if they're taking my words in.

On the bus home, I know that I can't go back. I can't possibly be the friendly, approachable senior. I'm not that type. When I chose to consolidate my position, my relationship with juniors will always be asymmetrical. It saddens me, but like everything else, I hardly have a choice.

Today I skipped the optional KI lecture, partly because I know I already want to join, and partly because I was too tired. I slept in till 11 today. Maybe I'll go catch Amelia later; she's working at TP central this week.

My Hobby

2010-01-18T03:21:00.000-08:00

When I'm bored, lonely, or alone, I become the Starer.

The Starer stalks the streets of Orchard Road. The Starer wears nondescript T-shirts and Bermuda shorts. That's why he looks like a teenager, with a hint of agelessness. The Starer has average looks - mean median mode with standard deviation approaching zero. His expression is blank. He walks slowly, deliberately so, with a regal purpose. He pauses in his steps when shoved. He strolls when hurried. He moves independently from the crowd.

You may want to know how the Starer's eyes look like. Perhaps they are mesmerizingly blue or steel gray or piercing green? No, his eyes are ordinarily black; brown if you look closely. But no one looks closely. There is nothing special about how his eyes look. It is his stare that is essential.

If you watch the Starer from a distance, safe from his scrutiny, you will notice a certain pattern to his watching. He raises his gaze upon someone for seconds - long enough to observe, brief enough for comfort - and shifts his eyes onto the next person. The cycle repeats. It is as though he is searching for someone - no, something - in someone. Sometimes, there is a moment when you catch the Starer's eyes on you, a second before they slip away. You sense disappointment. The feeling is mutual.

What exactly interests the Starer? His name is a misnomer. He doesn't just stare. He observes, imagines, postulates, processes and passes silent judgement. He is attracted to bright colours and sullen personalities. Beauty gets his attention, both the surface and subterranean variety. He looks at curves and bulges, smooth and awkward angles. He likes his subjects to be extreme - extremely bizarre, or extremely ordinary. He pays attention to faces and bodies, movements and expressions. In some way, the Starer is watching a dance, or a play.

The Starer imagines. He extrapolates the appearance of a person, and construct a possible, if implausible, life around that person. The straight-edge clean-cut businessman is a drag queen. The conservative office lady blinks nervously. A frameless pair of spectacles, sitting on her nose, is also simultaneously, momentarily, squashed between two kissing faces. A wealthy gentleman, waiting for his chauffeur in front of his hotel, taking a dump. The hardest people to fictionalize are children. They have little pretense.

People are somewhat wary of the Starer. His perusal is unusually offensive in urbanity. In the city, walls are the norm, because space is limited. Everyone likes their own square to stand in. But the Starer sees through walls. His black eyes are not vacant - they are twinned black holes, dark abysses swarming with unreality and possibility. So no one looks closely or for long. They look away, avoid his gaze, frantically piling sandbags to reinforce their walls. They don't want to look into his soulsucking eyes. The Starer wonders often - what do they see in his eyes?

Sometimes, the Starer unexpectedly meets people who play to his game; those who stare back. There is no aggression in stares, only passive observance. But these people have nothing to contribute, just like himself. The Starer desires content. He looks away from other people's stares, because they are not what he is looking for. Two wrongs do not make one right. Two vacuums do not make matter.

The Starer doesn't just look at people. He looks at groups. This morning, he watched the J2s leave their places at the class benches, and muses about the flux density of liminal places. He sits in the auditorium, watching the silvery threads of civilization, wrapping round and round four hundred hot-blooded seventeen year-olds, while a woman screams at them. He imagines the threads snapping off, and the howl of anarchy.

I like being the Starer. It is easier than being bored, lonely or alone. The steps are simple. Stare, blink, stare, imagine, repeat. I can hold all the conversations in my head.

Archiving...

2010-01-17T07:10:00.000-08:00

There is this memory I have of Jie Han that sticks to me like gum. I was in the old band room, wearing this Giordano T-shirt I brought from home. If I'm not wrong, we were painting the walls - fixing the cracks, washing brushes, vacuuming the dust, orange and blue walls - that's why I was wearing home clothes.

At some point, Jie Han walked in, and we said hi. He read the slogan off my shirt, "Life is not a job."

Then we both said, "Life is a chore."

We both laughed. I was probably holding a paint brush, and him holding nothing in his hands. I looked at him.

Thoughtful silence.

With regards to my relationship with this senior of mine, it's always the words that we don't say that make all the difference.

Person(s) Wanted

2010-01-16T06:27:00.000-08:00

Position: Confidant (If you prefer the term BFF, don't bother to apply)

Work hours: 24/7 (though I don't think I'm that inconsiderate)

Salary: None, but with benefits. I'll reciprocate. Swear.

Prerequisites:

1) Must be able to accept who I am.

2) Must be a liberal at heart.

3) Must have clear opinions on important issues.

4) Can have insane moments, but need to know when to get back to Logic-land, so I can go psycho once in a while too.

5) Must embrace or at least tolerate the multitude of contradictions that I am.

6) Must laugh at my jokes, or tell me that they're unfunny.

7) Must criticize me and allow me to criticize you.

8) Must have a soul, even if you don't believe in the concept.
9) Must have a degree of self-mastery, or at least self-awareness.
10) Must side with me, when I'm reasonable (which is always)

11) Must spend long hours/conversations/days listening to me talk about band troubles

12) Must not be excessively emotional

13) Must be able to bear with my OCD.

14) Must not take either of us seriously.

Applicants may add me on MSN, Facebook or contact me by email: jiasheng.hwachong@gmail.com

(Yep it's official I've hit a new low.)

Charlie Bit My Muse And She Hemorrhaged To Death

2010-01-13T08:53:00.000-08:00

Okay, confession/musings night.

1) Every year, the night before the start of school, I won't be able to sleep. I'll toss and turn and get in and out of bed, but I won't be able to sleep. The excitement and nervousness wrenches rhythmically somewhere in my chest. I like to press my palm against my ribs just to hear the pounding of ba-dum, ba-dum, my very own time bomb ticking away the seconds.

2) I'm scared for the new year. My commitment to the band is a social risk, as usual. What if I never make any friends? Or worse, lose them again and again?

3) What if I have to take sucky subjects like H2 Maths? I know school is supposed to be difficult but this is JC! Which means more autonomy, right?

4) Watching my juniors wear their long pants somehow devalues my uniform. It just isn't the same.

5) I'm not looking forward to Hawaii. Logistic terror; have to restrain myself from intervening; the pressure of needing to do well is like a stab from a needle. The songs are not enjoyable to play - at least not when I first listened to them.

6) When I imagine myself in 20 years' time, at 36, I'm in an apartment, lying on my bed, watching the red digits of my radio clock glow against the blue hour. I'm the only one at home.

7) The best part about swimming is when my eyes are directly beneath the water surface, and at that angle the underside transforms into this flowing liquid-glass; a silk mirror. Suddenly, the rectangle of the pool is a room, its ceiling wavy, its occupants headless bodies standing at the walls, as if being punished.

8) The worst part about swimming is the staring. I stare at a swimmer, he stares back, and we both look awkwardly away.

9) I've read every line in the Live Feed but my to-do list just keeps getting longer.

10) My cryptic sounding MSN PMs? I think of them on the fly. Right now it's soft mewing won't save us now. I have no idea what that means. I should be an indie lyricist.

11) The greatest hero of all time will be defeated by the inertia of cowards. Not so much of a prediction than a general observation.

12) Halfway through Fight Club, by Chuck Palahniuk. Good book, with a nihilist style. Easy to read, and greatly satisfying. If you're angry, read this book. If you're not, read this book and be angry.

13) In the book, the two characters fight. Exploring the physical limits of their bodies. See how much blood can be spilled and how much pain can be taken before the nervous system shuts down. Is it the same with boys and their games? When a kid runs around, isn't he trying to expend all that energy inside? But I never quite understood that sentiment. If anything, I took the exploration inwards, into theories and philosophy. I feel like my intellect is a small ball of light, passing through the multitude fog of philosophies. The dark clump of Nihilism. The white sterile space of Existentialism. The pink-purple mist of Romanticism. A measured spoon of Empiricism, the clear lines of Rationalism. The twins, Idealism and Realism. Their mother Dualism. The green-yellow sneer of Cynicism. Treading these treacherous paths is risky - you read too much into the lines, and the spirit of that movement possesses you. I got lost in Existentialism once. I'm not quite sure whether I've found my way out yet.

14) The best way to get over a crush is to get a new crush. The best way to get a new crush is to meet people, and give your best jokes a shot. The best way to find jokes is the internet, in between porn and wikipedia.

15) When I read a novel by a particularly influential writer, I absorb the writing style for the next few days. It's like Rogue from the X-men.

16) Axeman. Ex-man. A transwoman who chops wood?

17) I've been wanting to write this short story about soul mates, but it's not working. Maybe it's just the lack of experience. Like Mirza said, I need to live life a little bit more before that first short story collection.

18) I like reading my old blog posts. I'll self-publish them if I'm vain enough.

19) Question of the week: Which is your favourite biblical character? I can't make up my mind.

20) Question of the lifetime: Who would you escape with in a zombie apocalypse? Pure romantic question. Good night.