caffeination

Started out as an attempt to stay awake during the 8 am lecture.
Increased pulse rate, the voices of people amplified, the colours around seemed starker. Louder.

I could see mouths move, soundlessly, and what I heard was white noise.
Noise to drown thoughts, to stop thoughts from flooding the brain's crucible like New Orleans.

Words leaking in ordered
randomness from the tongue
of my tip. Chaos is comforting
when structure no longer serves it's function,
when stability is stifling and you piece together random facts to create meaning, like this.

The Brutaliser

"He likes to talk a lot" says my hairstylist in Chinese.

I look in the direction of her eyes and see a huge hulk of male meat batting his eyelashes, and filing his nails, palm facing up, in the manner of general feminity (which I severely lack, apparently). It is disconcerting to see a huge hulk sashay, it is more disconcerting to find out that he's a deaf mute.

It isn't that I have anything against disabled people, in fact, I think it is admirable that the salon hired him in the first place considering the limitations of communication imposed on the unsuspecting customer.

"He can do work, and he has patience", comes the answer to my unvoiced question. I think my hairstylist is psychic, maybe because my thoughts leak through then ends of my hair and enters her fingers.

Still, when your head feels like a watermelon about to be internally pulverised when he shampoos, and when you feel like your head is about to become detached from your neck as he rinses, you learn to take muscles more seriously, at the same time wishing that he wasn't so patient so the pain would be over and done with instead of being excessively prolonged.

Interestingly enought the stylist says that guys like his brutalising but females think he's really rough. (Ha! Finally, evidence to proof that I'm actually female. ) Even more fascinating is the way he tries to initiate conversation all the time. Despite his lack of vocal cords vibration, he occasionally makes squeaky noises accompanied by huge hand gestures and animated facial expressions, some of which I catch, some of which totally escapes me, all of which I smile and nod knowingly at, in an attempt to demonstrate some sort of emphathic understanding. Conversation is difficult to sustain, because can't communicate in sign language. I mimic his facial expressions, in an attempt to see how true last semester's reading on mimicry and understanding being directly related is. And it helped immensely because he stopped 'talking'.

Felt like I was in drama academy all over again.

At the end of the rather tense hour spent mostly in the anticipation of more head jerking and neck twisting, as I got up to leave, he mouthed a goodbye (his hands were covered in hair dye and were embedded in another head), and I realised the look in his eyes is good enough to melt chocolate with.

Chocolate, which is the colour of his skin.

(This doesn't qualify as a racist comment right? )

Kudos to the Yellow Ribbon Project! Speak Good English! Let's be Courteous! Stop Stopping at Two! Get married everybody! Female Graduates: Have more Children! (and don't say we said it, if not we'll lose more votes than we have...(is that even possible?))

Does the active promotion of local campaigns - past and present - earn me brownie points now?

street scenes

The shops shut up tightly, the street emptied of cars, with the occasional cab depositing its luggage-load of passengers in front of some dubious looking motel.

A group of American backpackers look hot and sweaty with their huge backpacks - the girls walk in front, the guys trail behind. Their backpacks are a fair show of gender equality, which does not mean gender equity. The old man in a cap stamps on soft drink cans, releasing a pungent sickly sweet scent of the cocktail of fermented sugared drinks. A chimney of smoke appears to be coming from a hole in his cap, but it is just my eyes, and how the night blurs all edges and screws up depth perception.

One particular late night walk along Bencoolen Street in a fit of insanity helped me rediscover the joys of walking alone.

[Well I wasn't really alone. My cello was bumping away behind me, the clunkity-clunk of wheels hitting the uneven stony floor reminiscent of a talkative mute man.]

figment of your own imagination

This site was introduced to me in an MSN conversation and was cause for much amusement, but also much worry. It is rather unnerving to see how many people believe this man's claim to be the "Son of God". Not only is it reminiscent of what Christ says in the Olivet discourse (Matthew 24:24),

"For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect."

It is notable to see how this man's doctrine, or what he calls the 'Spiritual Revolution', focuses on repentance and love, but leaves out the greatest manifestation of love which is Christ's death on the cross. Which I suppose is understandable because I doubt he would be able to cope with clamours for his death, if people start saying,

"You claim to be Christ, you might as well die like Christ".

As much as Christians are the children of God, this is a bit much, no?

Mac evangelism

It has taken me this long to discover the joys of listening to podcasts. It's so convenient to download news from all the different broadcasting companies and listen to them all in one bus ride to school. (what a geek!)

The new iPod nano is absolutely drool worthy. The size, the colour screen, just the fact that it's a new gadget is enough to warrant me blowing my money on it except for the fact that I have decided to practice serial monogamy and stick to my 20GB iPod which is still less than a year old.

Having said that, I still maintain that Steve Jobs is brilliant and I think it's really sad despite the prevalence of iPods (as a fashion statement notwithstanding), people are still reluctant to switch over to using Macs, because of the "it isn't compatible with many applications" reason. Seriously, unless you're an avid gamer buying the latest releases of PC games, or you're a computing student working with unintelligible (to me) computer language, Macs have everything you need (Microsoft Office, MSN Messenger, Internet Explorer), everything you didn't think was possible to want (dashboard widgets, say-goodbye-to-multiple-MSN-conversation-windows Adium,, no-spyware-and-incredibly-stable P2P download program Acquisition), and more stability that you could possibly imagine if you're currently a PC user still battling with the demons of viruses, spyware, popups, or the fact that it's "no longer safe out there" once you venture into the bug-infested waters of the W-cube.

Not convinced yet?

the strange sound

"How are you?", went someone today.

For a split second I didn't understand what that meant. The phrase sounded so alien and unfamiliar, the meaning divorced from the lips shaped to form that question.

Does that question demand an honest answer? Is the question asked to satisfy the person's voyeuristic interest? or is it just something to fill the space of silence?

I wish it was the first, think it was the second, but know it's probably the third.

guinea pigs

Recently I've had the strangest gigs ever. The normal gig involves sitting in some dark corner or big space playing background music with a quartet. Last Sunday, what I thought was a 'normal' gig turned out to be a performance in front of a whole hall of what might have been 500-700 people for a combined clan association's Arts Festival thingy at Golden Mile Tower.

But last night's one at Singapore Expo was classic. It was some National Day Appreciation Dinner for those who helped out with the Tampines GRC celebrations. Essentially, we were paid to play three pieces, eat a 10 course dinner, take photos of ourselves and the only 'cost' we might have incurred was listening to some weirdly flawed speeches of one particular minister whom I will refrain from naming lest I cross the OB markers. Also, we were subjected to the constant replay (ad infinitum ad nauseum) to National Songs of all lengths and languages. Some familiar 'favourites' (favourites to whom I really don't know but I suppose there will be people who like them) include Count On Me Singapore with its tempo extremely conducive for waving flags, except that in yesterday's case the only thing that we could possibly wave were chopsticks or our bows. I distinctly remember Kit Chan's 'Home' being played more than once, in different arrangements. And who can possibly forget the very exciting video clips of the parade which was so seamlessly coordinated between the Padang and heartlands? After watching more than thirty years of NDP video clips for Wednesday's Singapore Society Lecture, I couldn't be happier watching a replay of this year's just for kicks.

What struck me most was the minister's speech, where he mentioned about the important role of leadership and organisation, especially in view of the New Orleans crisis.It was something along the lines of

"The leadership helped in the evacuation of New Orleans"

MIght that be the hypothetical situation, or social reality?

An additional noteworthy phrase includes "The Singapore experiment will get better in the future".

That explains why we are all still caught up with the rat-like treadmill pounding. The scientists need more money to improve the size of the cages. Alternatively they can just turn the treadmill into a roulette, and get violent squeaks of protests from the rats.

black sugar

The other day in Social Work lecture, we had to draw an object that represented ourselves.I forget why we did it for (already!), but anyway I drew a pair of balances that was weighed down on one side by an invisible weight. It was a relatively painless process and the drawing was finished in a few seconds, which intrigued me immensely because I think I unleashed my subconscious self somehow. Normally, given my very pragmatic communication pattern, I would have put a lot more thought into deciding on any form of representation for myself, and apparently so did most of the people in that lecture.

Interestingly enough, an inordinate number of people drew something directly/indirectly related to heat and the SUN. Examples include, a sun with an angry face, a sun with a smiling star within, melting ice cream, the sun and the moon...the list goes on. Reasons they gave were generally,

"I appear happy and bubbly but I have a DARK SIDE."

Suddenly I felt this chill in the middle of lecture, like

"Oh no I'm surrounded by a whole bunch of repressed people who feel the need to be nice all the time?!"

Then I thought for a while, and realised that hey, that gives me the perfect opportunity to be evil, and then I was happy.

The Chasm Between

The people I've met up with recently all have different interests. Rock music to varying degrees, astrology, men, women, most of which you wouldn't call very Christian. And if any mention of religion comes up, it's mostly derogatory, sceptic, or the simple "Hah? Say again?". All the while at the back of my mind, I hear the voices in my head regurgitate phrases invoking the death and pain of hell from the Pandora's box of morning messages subconsciously absorbed in the haze of sleep at 8 am in the morning. It is very tempting, and very comfortable, to for once escape the need to code everything in Christian terms, to punctuate every other sentence with "Praise the Lord", to escape from hearing people say that when their body language says otherwise.

Maybe that explains why I rather talk to children - they lack the necessary pretense that comes with being in church. Who can deny that in such an institution, you don't even have to say anything to incur the silent running commentary of criticism that flashes through the minds of the pius, frantic Bible-flipper. (The greatest benefit of studying social work thus far is learning about Neuro Linguistic Programming and how to read people from their eye movements, and it is true that the eyes never lie.)

Back to before the digression.

For a long time now, the pretension and moral superiority of Christians have bugged me endlessly. Maybe it's just the church I'm in, or maybe it's a universal phenomenon. (blame everything on the church just like we blame everything on the government eh?) Until tonight, when I went for the rehearsal at Queenstown Methodist; there were all these old people singing in Hokkien and Cantonese and unintelligible (to me) dialects, and some parts of the songs sounded like the wayang you hear during the Seventh Month street operas. In other words, very Buddhist-funeral sounding. The words of the songs were simple, straight to the point (unlike this entry), but what was most striking, and what made me stop talking to my friends for a while and listen, was how everyone of these old people really believed in what they were singing and showed it.

How did I know they believed in what they were singing? Is there any objective measure, any standard criteria where I can tick off the checkboxes? No. Call it baseless intuition or what you may, some things come across so strongly that to not believe it would make you less a human and more a malevolent spirit. The simplicity of their faith, and their energetic earnestness in getting their message across was, I don't know...touching? It's something I haven't seen or heard for a long time. The singers were technically nowhere. Singing from the throat, no diaphragm support, sandpaper voice, what have you, but it didn't matter ultimately.

After all, to quote W.H. Auden, the best lack all conviction and the worst are full of passionate intensity.

Today, I think I actually felt something, which is a start, vague and unsubstantial and hopelessly subjective as it might be.

missing

THE Quartet is on hiatus for 2 weeks, because all three of the other members are taking their diploma exams ( while I struggle with the different ways of getting my vibrato wrong), and I realised that it's one of the longest breaks from each other that we've taken since May.

The first violin says, "Hah, you're going to miss us!"

And strangely enough I think I have to agree. I once told someone that I don't miss people easily. Thus everytime I say the phrase "I miss you!" in an sms or an MSN conversation, it's more a reminder to myself to miss the person more. I never say the phrase to the people I'm really close to, I realised, maybe because of a deep unwillingness to tie myself down to any one person in particular. Or rather, I refuse to acknowledge any sort of dependency.

Missing a person is paralysingly depressing, and there are too many things constantly demanding attention that I don't have time to miss anyone. On the other hand, maybe I just keep myself suffocatingly busy so that I don't have time to think/feel and do all the other messily human things, like the L*** word.

Then again, the fact that I'm writing this entry might mean that *gasp*, I'm actually missing people. Or missing things. Or appendages. Or whatever.

estranged

There are some people you can talk to online, but when you meet them in person, as much as you like them, you have nothing to say. Probably because after that endless amount of self disclosure (which talking online facilitates), any thing else would come across as small talk, and you're better off not saying anything at all to avoid looking stupider than you already are. Substitute the 'you's in this entry with 'I', and 'them' with 'you' for the non-in-denial version.

The last day of the seventh month, the void decks are fenced in by rows of long red candles bleeding smoke. Wonder if the Chinese in Klang are allowed to do the same. (Haze alert! )

I am this close to doing my sociology term paper on bloggers. The blurring of boundaries between the public and private self - when the private is calculatedly publicised, so people feel (slightly) bonded to you as a result of your 'self-disclosure' - is nice to explore, if for nothing more than the purpose of scratching my brain.

truncated post, fragmented thoughts. my life is in pieces already over nothing.

Wow what a dramatic ending. "She went out with a bang" - the ideal headline for a suicide.