Swimming in school

Went for all my tutorials today and realised to my horror that all my tutors are male. The Lit tutor has an unintelligle Chinese accent (the irony-he's from PRC), I suspect the Sociology tutor is gay, the South Asian tutor is a cute German with a child's handwriting (imagine a right-handed person writing with his left), and the Social Work tutor is the fatherly-looking lecturer of the module.

I suppress the urge to scream.

I think people should stop treating the Bukit Batok MRT track as a swimming pool. It is socially inconsiderate to put people through the ordeal of scraping up your brain matter and other haemorrhaging innards off the tracks, and imagine all the passengers that have to get out of the train and watch! (Ok they don't have to watch, but the inner kaypoh in everyone wants to see copious amounts of blood once in a while. Or maybe it's just me. No. Actually, there were quite a lot of people standing around just to catch a glimpse of the second diving accident.)

I know I shouldn't be talking about the suicide like a joke but I think that's because can't help it cos my grandfather just died and I don't really know how to react.

Blistering Brahms!

The Brahms concert on Sunday was hilarious. Five minutes before people started streaming in, Akiko and Yuji were frantically penciling in bowings. When it came to the concert, we were playing everything differently because the section leader suddenly decided to change bowings. So I ended up poking my bow into Toshiko many times. And halfway through I heard these two people sitting in front audibly whispering

"The cellos are not together"

Yuji later said he felt like turning to them and saying

"I know we're not together!"

It was so funny. Interval came quickly, thankfully, but not thankfully. I left my cello on a chair and it dropped and all the strings sprung loose. The section leader was adjusting his bridge when he heard a clunk and realised to his horror that his soundpost had collapsed. And to top it off, the A string burst. He changed another, and that burst too. So even after everyone in the orchestra and audience were peacefully seated, half the cello section was pulling hair backstage and scurrying around looking for spare strings. And when we were finally settled to play, we screwed up the whole symphony, came in wrongly, messed up bowing etc etc. It was, in short, a joke. Though of course it wasn't supposed to end up that way.

When the audience was finally spared from the traumatising experience of seeing Brahms murdered on stage, they clapped very loudly.

The concert mistress smiled, then rolled her eyes.

Star-crossed

It is strange how you should type a really long mail, then accidently delete it before it reaches me; and I should accidentally delete your email after staring at the screen for a long time and deciding to save it. (Now I could kill myself) You signed off in such a strangely affectionate way (you who keep your private self locked up in a walnut husk sealing it with a tight smile); it was quietly puzzling in a 'Hmmm..." sort of way.

Forget the words. They come out diluted, stunted, a paler shade of grey. This unholy dependence for reassurance unnerves me.I think I miss you, but I don't know why.

Spring

Spring - Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950)

To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know.
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify?
Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.

playboy bunny

Emceed at J. Kindergarden/Childcare Centre's National Day Party yesterday, dressed in blue bunny ears and a clown costume. Was at the act3 office at 7-ish in the morning cos bunny makeup takes almost an hour to paint on - from the white oil paints (that refused to stay on and had to be retouched up every 15 mins) to the bunny eyeliner to the bunny whiskers to the bunny red nose and red lips and bunny floppy fringe. And the bunny headpiece was totally throat constricting and suffocating. Only when the ears got lopsided did I actually have a chance to breathe.

It was all done in the name of fun (and money and not so much patriotism) and cos I haven't emceed since primary school I figured, why not? It was quite a last minute thing so there wasn't a script, just a programme list (that kept changing throughout the whole concert) Which kept the Fun the clown and Hiphop the bunny constantly on their toes. And when the mic was ungraciously snatched from us to be meddled with by the technician, they were stuck on stage micless in front of a whole lot of hyperactive and noisy malay kids all dressed in red with the moon and stars. So they had to resort to clown shouts and bunny squeaks to continue the show.

"And the next item is an action song called 'Under the Sea" by the J Playgroup"
*applause*
(no visible movement from the backstage.
Then we see a whole group of kids dressed as sea creatures staring mournfully from the stage wings refusing to budge. The teacher gestures to give them 5 minutes. The bunny and the clown look at the programme sheet in our hands which says '940-945 "Under the Sea" ' An ambitious programme, it is. In desperation the bunny and clown lead the crowd in another cheer for Singapore and talk nonsense on stage.)

When the little sea creatures finally decide to come up on stage, they stand stationary while the lively sea music plays. The seashell kid looks at the bunny and clown dancing along (desperately trying to get the rest to move to the ocean song), and bursts into tears. In the end they manage a little wiggle or two before meandering off stage.

When narrating the day's events to a friend last night, she asked "So how long did it last?"
"Forever"

When we finally got to the grand finale (the sing along session), we thought nothing could go wrong. But somehow they managed to play 'One People One Nation" twice, instead of "Stand Up for Singapore". So the bunny and clown were the only ones onstage trying to remember the words to the songs (and thinking they should have made more use of the community singing sessions in school, but it's too late anyway) so the parts where they couldn't remember the words to, they swayed and jumped and waved the plastic flag vigourously. It was a full body cardio workout.

The white bunny eyes took in the sea of red little ones and the vast amount of stars and moons and swore that if it had to see another red thing, it would give up the ghost. But the bunny agrees that the malay kids sing and dance very well. They just have the ... groove.

It was difficult not to get high cos the kids just had so much energy! In the end a whole lot of them trooped to the backstage (which was the fire exit cos we didn't have a proper backstage to hide in) to give us high-fives. It was really cute. The bunny recognises it's the only time it has sung the national day songs without any sense of irony.

I write of the bunny in the third person because I'll never admit to doing these things on my own accord. The bunny shall be my new alter ego. It's like the second skin that's growing on me.And it's blue.

Talking in your sleep

Today's birthday party show felt weird. Maybe it was because we hadn't done 'Sleeping Beauty' in 4 months, maybe it was because there was this hugely uncomfortable wig pinned tightly to my head, I don't know. The act3 office still looks the same, with the sound systems everywhere, the same watertank that goes 'blub blub' everytime someone takes a drink, the same coloured masks stuck on the walls of the rehearsal room; even the slightly musty smell of the costumes storage place was the same. There is comfort in familiarity, I suppose. And the last rehearsal, our director was still saying the same things about "preserving the moment", "playing real", then ending off with "like that lor". Which sounded funny considering he's not chinese, but it was cute.

In short, it just felt good to be back, never mind the bumpy rides in the company van, never mind the fact that the tape recorder screwed up during the actual performance and the tape jammed so the evil fairy had to sing her song without accompaniment, never mind that it was raining (as it always does when we do birthday parties at someone's house), never mind that it's the last show I'm doing before school starts. It was fun, just being with the same people again, looking at the kids run around and scream their heads off.

Our voices get swallowed up into our bodies as we grow. We talk softer, talk less about the things that matter, and more of the accomodating small talk in our effort to be less anti-social; which lacks the innocent brutality and directly simplicity of kids' talk, which says, in effect, nothing at all.

Like this, for example.