10.45pm - today i came home and cut my hair.
i feel more human now.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
11.39pm - today was the last day of school ever. of course, it being the last day i had to end my journey off with a bang... by burning a whole in my blouse. of course, it definitely cannot beat what happened on the first day of primary school when i got my pinafore stuck in my undies (P1 ij girls don't realise it's important to wear shorts on the first day of school)
anyways, because i'm superduper moody and the situation allows it, i'm posting my statement of experiences. enjoy humans watching.
---
IJ KAMAMA OLEH OLEH AH AH!
By Samantha Chui (7)
Secondary 4/9 '06
If someone had told me that my years in IJ were going to be as eventful as it has been, I definitely would have invested in a sturdy armour instead of heading unprotected into the whirlwind I call my secondary school life. The last four years in this school that I have grown immensely attached to, has been embellished with some of the most meaningful yet best experiences I have ever had. Fortunately, life changing ones too!
Stepping into a (kind of) new school after 6 years in the CHIJ Primary school, I was adamant about being able to fit in and to make friends with the people I would journey my last four years in IJ with. I had, after all taken about 5 years, before I came out of my shell and talked to the people I had been in the same class as, in primary school.
I remember the pre-school orientation that we had to go for in December of 2002 very vaguely. However, I recall sitting in the front row of the classroom my class would reside in with my mother, as I eagerly awaited the arrival of my classmates. Pair by pair, my classmates trickled in with their respective parents in tow, and I realised with great distaste that I did not particularly like two-fifths of my class and had never spoken a word to the majority of the other three-fifths. I remember the growing lump rising higher and higher in my throat as I sat through the briefing, before heading home to enjoy the rest of the holidays, and thinking of how I would handle the next two years with the same bunch of people who used to terrorise the corridors of the primary school.
The first day of school was somewhat filled with perpetual swelling and ebbing trepidation. I was thrown into what I deemed to be "foreign" with not many people to call my own friends. However, over the weeks I developed strong bonds with many of the people in my class and was pleasantly surprised to have been voted into the class committee as the Class Treasurer, a role that required high levels of responsibility and organisation-both of which I thought I scarcely possessed at that time.
A few weeks into the school year, my two best friends and I stepped into the AVA room with hopeful hearts to audition for the School Choir, of which my sister held a leadership position. Growing up in a rather "high profile" family, I have often been cast in the shadow of my elder siblings. People sometimes forget that we grew up with the same influences and the chances of us having similar aspirations are incredibly high. The assumptions that people instinctively make about me wanting to "follow in the footstep" of my sister have often been more hurtful than not. However, over the years I have learnt to take that comment in stride and have even begun to develop a sense of pride towards my siblings.
My first year in the CHIJ choir with my two best friends was not as smooth sailing as I hoped it would be. The choir committee was strict and the physical training we had to endure every Saturday morning was tedious and extremely draining. However, the upside of physical training was the nice set of abdominal muscles I did not know my body was capable of honing! We trained hard and realised the importance of being independent yet also somewhat reliant on our "team-mates" at the same time. In 2003, we participated in the Singapore Youth Festival where we attained a Gold Award. Having almost not been able to personally participate as I had performed badly during my first Octets at which I was lambasted, the sweetness of success was indeed great.
During the CCA orientation, at which I was already helping to promote the choir, I was pulled to join the basketball team. As I had a severe fear of balls, I was certain that I would quit after the first day. However, the draw of the extremely united team held me back and I never did have the chance to stop completely. My fear of catching balls has since then greatly decreased and I am living proof that getting hit by a ball would not kill me, as I had previously thought.
My inability to remain idle for long periods of time was therefore eased by my hectic schedule revolving around my two CCA's and my academics. I was however therefore unable to join The IJ News Team and the English Literature Drama and Debate Society, which meant that my two other loves for writing and acting, had to take a backseat in my life.
2003 was also the year that required quick adaptation skills, as not only were we placed into a new group of people but we also had to adapt to two new physical territories, the original Toa Payoh Campus and the Holding School at Thomson.
January 2004 marked the start of my Secondary Two year. I was once again voted into the Class Committee and therefore required to restrain myself from all rebellious tendencies.
My journey with Secondary 2/8 was a lot more pleasant than that with the same group of people the year before. In Secondary 1, my clique was not only as we call it "act cute" but also borderline "wannabe cheena ah lian". As strange as it may seem, I actually really miss my "wannabe cheena ah lian" days and it still constantly serves as a laughter-inducing tool on a daily basis. My group of friends in Secondary 2/8 was one of the main contributors of "in-class entertainment". We would often break out in song, with harmonies if I should add, in the middle of tests and assignments. Often we were silenced, as our group consisted of 2 almost tone-deaf members and 2 boisterous laughers.
CHIJ has also allowed me to further exercise my leadership skills on a larger scale. I was inducted into the Blue House Committee and served a term running from mid-2004 to mid-2005 during which I headed several House Projects and participated in a few others. I also helped to recoup losses made from a misprint of t-shirts, by selling them at a lower price on my own accord during the Sports Day. However, the politics revolving around the whole house voting system was but too much to handle and although I had adequately contributed to the house, I felt that I was never properly acknowledged by the higher-ups of the group.
Secondary 2 saw great achievement for me. I participated in my first ever Flag Day, got into the school Basketball team, performed at Voices on Wings-the choir's inaugural concert and also had the privilege and utmost honour of performing at the Esplanade. These are but some events that I will forever find memorable even after I leave the school.
During the course of the year, I also realised that my classmates and I were actually not very different. We shared a common distaste for the same members of the teaching staff; particularly a certain temporary history teacher who found it necessary to constantly berate us for no rhyme or reason (some of us even spitefully tried to fail our history examination, which I failed on my part as I scored a C5 despite not studying at all). We were also often caught laughing at the wrong times and were too lazy for our own good.
Secondary Three saw us going separate ways and I was once again not with any of my good friends. Fortunately enough, we had banded Chinese classes and I found myself seated with some of the same people I had spent the previous two years with.
2005 was conjointly the year my faith evolved after many years of remaining stagnant. My church's Confirmation Class and Confirmation Camp, in particular helped me to plant my feet into the ground and seriously begin to appreciate the wonders of life and to really turn to God when I need Him. Singing the Psalm with my two best friends during our Confirmation Mass was but the pinnacle of that stretch of our Journey of Faith. That night, we went back to our respective homes and relived the whole experience in our heads over and over again. However, with all that is good, comes the bad. After confirmation I found myself backsliding and ended up befriending the wrong people. The "inner rebel" in me took over the "usually cautious" me and I ended up making some mistakes that I still regret. Nevertheless, my mistakes have made me a better person today and I am appreciative of what has come out of it. I am not only a much more mature person than I started out with, but I am also more sensitive to the needs of other people around me.
My participation in the Pacific Basin Music Festival in Oahu, Hawaii, has been one of the greatest events in my life albeit one of the few that I have suffered the most in too. We had to endure the dreaded morning runs to build up our stamina and had practices that sometimes stretched into the latter part of the evening. In Hawaii, we had to battle the inevitable jet lag and suppress our burning desire to shop as we knew that we had the power to make or break the Nation's and School’s image, with us being one of the two representative schools from Singapore. Unbeknownst to most of us, what we thought was "giving our all" did not suffice in the eyes of the Committee Members and our conductor. The majority of us found ourselves placed under probation with the danger of not getting the chance to represent our school at this International Competition. In the end, we all got past that obstacle. As the last clap in the Hungarian song of our competition repertoire rang out in the hall, we knew that we had a good chance of doing well. Although we did not get the opportunity to be the esteemed Command Choir of the Festival, we achieved a Gold award during the Festival Awards Ceremony where we subsequently burst into tears of joy.
My participation in the Community Involvement Programme in CHIJ also flourished. I had the opportunity to work with the sick and the aged at the Singapore Christian Home for the Sick and The Aged. We sang songs for them, played games and even helped to feed them. My time at the home taught me to value my life more as although I have always known there were people worse off than I, I never saw the need to help them.
Secondary Four was the year we moved back to the upgraded Toa Payoh Campus. The implementation of the Homeroom System required us to have a General Orientation during the first week of school. I recall putting on the most hideous pair of white sports shoes that were chunky, glaring and yet brilliantly comfortable all rolled into one.
Although the Homeroom System enabled us to keep awake by moving to the different classes, our legs greatly abhorred the additional work it had to do. The first few weeks of getting used to the ridiculously loud Third Bell was also very trying. I have since then learnt to enjoy and relish in the sounding of this bell which has become a part of my Secondary Four life.
Before the start of the year, I had decided that it was best to concentrate on one CCA and my academics as it was going to be the important year I would sit for my 'O' levels. I chose Choir, my first love, and am glad that I did. Donning the blue gown one last time during the World Down Syndrome Day performance held in school was painful and yet fulfilling. I never thought it would be the last time I would perform with them as the Singapore Youth Festival Opening Ceremony was supposed to be my last. However, as I had underperformed at the Mid-year Examinations I decided it was best to leave to focus more on my studies. Leaving the choir so prematurely, a whole month before the other Secondary Four's did was probably the hardest thing to do as I had only just begun to apprize the choir.
Recently, the Secondary Four choir girls bade our final goodbye to our juniors during the farewell party which they organised for us. Hearing the cheers of our beloved juniors and seeing their appreciative smiles as we entered the canteen for the event was very hard to bear. The day ended with them presenting a montage to us in the AVA room after which we dedicated a song we had put together for them. There was hardly a dry eye as we left the choir one last time but our hearts were so full that we felt we had achieved something so much bigger than what we had all expected.
I remember being naïve, thinking that I had a lot of time before I would leave. Time, unfortunately, never waits for anyone. Four years turned to two and eighteen months turned to two weeks. With hardly a month to our GCE 'O' level examinations and thirty-two minutes into the last week of school, I know that I am leaving CHIJ with more than I bargained for. I have friends that I will have for life, experiences that are etched so deeply into my mind and heart and lessons that have made me the person that I am today. Although, there has been a great deal of suffering and general unhappiness I believe that "being unhappy makes being happy a whole lot happier". We all deal with changes in our lives in different ways and there are things that we "also die die want to change". If you ask me, I would never want to change the things that have happened these past 10 years in this great place I call my "second home". For through all the imperfections, I have found the epitome of perfection. My only wish now is to know that I have paved the way the next generation of IJ girls will walk on and for them to find their own little perfect place in our world imbued with imperfections.
anyways, because i'm superduper moody and the situation allows it, i'm posting my statement of experiences. enjoy humans watching.
---
IJ KAMAMA OLEH OLEH AH AH!
By Samantha Chui (7)
Secondary 4/9 '06
If someone had told me that my years in IJ were going to be as eventful as it has been, I definitely would have invested in a sturdy armour instead of heading unprotected into the whirlwind I call my secondary school life. The last four years in this school that I have grown immensely attached to, has been embellished with some of the most meaningful yet best experiences I have ever had. Fortunately, life changing ones too!
Stepping into a (kind of) new school after 6 years in the CHIJ Primary school, I was adamant about being able to fit in and to make friends with the people I would journey my last four years in IJ with. I had, after all taken about 5 years, before I came out of my shell and talked to the people I had been in the same class as, in primary school.
I remember the pre-school orientation that we had to go for in December of 2002 very vaguely. However, I recall sitting in the front row of the classroom my class would reside in with my mother, as I eagerly awaited the arrival of my classmates. Pair by pair, my classmates trickled in with their respective parents in tow, and I realised with great distaste that I did not particularly like two-fifths of my class and had never spoken a word to the majority of the other three-fifths. I remember the growing lump rising higher and higher in my throat as I sat through the briefing, before heading home to enjoy the rest of the holidays, and thinking of how I would handle the next two years with the same bunch of people who used to terrorise the corridors of the primary school.
The first day of school was somewhat filled with perpetual swelling and ebbing trepidation. I was thrown into what I deemed to be "foreign" with not many people to call my own friends. However, over the weeks I developed strong bonds with many of the people in my class and was pleasantly surprised to have been voted into the class committee as the Class Treasurer, a role that required high levels of responsibility and organisation-both of which I thought I scarcely possessed at that time.
A few weeks into the school year, my two best friends and I stepped into the AVA room with hopeful hearts to audition for the School Choir, of which my sister held a leadership position. Growing up in a rather "high profile" family, I have often been cast in the shadow of my elder siblings. People sometimes forget that we grew up with the same influences and the chances of us having similar aspirations are incredibly high. The assumptions that people instinctively make about me wanting to "follow in the footstep" of my sister have often been more hurtful than not. However, over the years I have learnt to take that comment in stride and have even begun to develop a sense of pride towards my siblings.
My first year in the CHIJ choir with my two best friends was not as smooth sailing as I hoped it would be. The choir committee was strict and the physical training we had to endure every Saturday morning was tedious and extremely draining. However, the upside of physical training was the nice set of abdominal muscles I did not know my body was capable of honing! We trained hard and realised the importance of being independent yet also somewhat reliant on our "team-mates" at the same time. In 2003, we participated in the Singapore Youth Festival where we attained a Gold Award. Having almost not been able to personally participate as I had performed badly during my first Octets at which I was lambasted, the sweetness of success was indeed great.
During the CCA orientation, at which I was already helping to promote the choir, I was pulled to join the basketball team. As I had a severe fear of balls, I was certain that I would quit after the first day. However, the draw of the extremely united team held me back and I never did have the chance to stop completely. My fear of catching balls has since then greatly decreased and I am living proof that getting hit by a ball would not kill me, as I had previously thought.
My inability to remain idle for long periods of time was therefore eased by my hectic schedule revolving around my two CCA's and my academics. I was however therefore unable to join The IJ News Team and the English Literature Drama and Debate Society, which meant that my two other loves for writing and acting, had to take a backseat in my life.
2003 was also the year that required quick adaptation skills, as not only were we placed into a new group of people but we also had to adapt to two new physical territories, the original Toa Payoh Campus and the Holding School at Thomson.
January 2004 marked the start of my Secondary Two year. I was once again voted into the Class Committee and therefore required to restrain myself from all rebellious tendencies.
My journey with Secondary 2/8 was a lot more pleasant than that with the same group of people the year before. In Secondary 1, my clique was not only as we call it "act cute" but also borderline "wannabe cheena ah lian". As strange as it may seem, I actually really miss my "wannabe cheena ah lian" days and it still constantly serves as a laughter-inducing tool on a daily basis. My group of friends in Secondary 2/8 was one of the main contributors of "in-class entertainment". We would often break out in song, with harmonies if I should add, in the middle of tests and assignments. Often we were silenced, as our group consisted of 2 almost tone-deaf members and 2 boisterous laughers.
CHIJ has also allowed me to further exercise my leadership skills on a larger scale. I was inducted into the Blue House Committee and served a term running from mid-2004 to mid-2005 during which I headed several House Projects and participated in a few others. I also helped to recoup losses made from a misprint of t-shirts, by selling them at a lower price on my own accord during the Sports Day. However, the politics revolving around the whole house voting system was but too much to handle and although I had adequately contributed to the house, I felt that I was never properly acknowledged by the higher-ups of the group.
Secondary 2 saw great achievement for me. I participated in my first ever Flag Day, got into the school Basketball team, performed at Voices on Wings-the choir's inaugural concert and also had the privilege and utmost honour of performing at the Esplanade. These are but some events that I will forever find memorable even after I leave the school.
During the course of the year, I also realised that my classmates and I were actually not very different. We shared a common distaste for the same members of the teaching staff; particularly a certain temporary history teacher who found it necessary to constantly berate us for no rhyme or reason (some of us even spitefully tried to fail our history examination, which I failed on my part as I scored a C5 despite not studying at all). We were also often caught laughing at the wrong times and were too lazy for our own good.
Secondary Three saw us going separate ways and I was once again not with any of my good friends. Fortunately enough, we had banded Chinese classes and I found myself seated with some of the same people I had spent the previous two years with.
2005 was conjointly the year my faith evolved after many years of remaining stagnant. My church's Confirmation Class and Confirmation Camp, in particular helped me to plant my feet into the ground and seriously begin to appreciate the wonders of life and to really turn to God when I need Him. Singing the Psalm with my two best friends during our Confirmation Mass was but the pinnacle of that stretch of our Journey of Faith. That night, we went back to our respective homes and relived the whole experience in our heads over and over again. However, with all that is good, comes the bad. After confirmation I found myself backsliding and ended up befriending the wrong people. The "inner rebel" in me took over the "usually cautious" me and I ended up making some mistakes that I still regret. Nevertheless, my mistakes have made me a better person today and I am appreciative of what has come out of it. I am not only a much more mature person than I started out with, but I am also more sensitive to the needs of other people around me.
My participation in the Pacific Basin Music Festival in Oahu, Hawaii, has been one of the greatest events in my life albeit one of the few that I have suffered the most in too. We had to endure the dreaded morning runs to build up our stamina and had practices that sometimes stretched into the latter part of the evening. In Hawaii, we had to battle the inevitable jet lag and suppress our burning desire to shop as we knew that we had the power to make or break the Nation's and School’s image, with us being one of the two representative schools from Singapore. Unbeknownst to most of us, what we thought was "giving our all" did not suffice in the eyes of the Committee Members and our conductor. The majority of us found ourselves placed under probation with the danger of not getting the chance to represent our school at this International Competition. In the end, we all got past that obstacle. As the last clap in the Hungarian song of our competition repertoire rang out in the hall, we knew that we had a good chance of doing well. Although we did not get the opportunity to be the esteemed Command Choir of the Festival, we achieved a Gold award during the Festival Awards Ceremony where we subsequently burst into tears of joy.
My participation in the Community Involvement Programme in CHIJ also flourished. I had the opportunity to work with the sick and the aged at the Singapore Christian Home for the Sick and The Aged. We sang songs for them, played games and even helped to feed them. My time at the home taught me to value my life more as although I have always known there were people worse off than I, I never saw the need to help them.
Secondary Four was the year we moved back to the upgraded Toa Payoh Campus. The implementation of the Homeroom System required us to have a General Orientation during the first week of school. I recall putting on the most hideous pair of white sports shoes that were chunky, glaring and yet brilliantly comfortable all rolled into one.
Although the Homeroom System enabled us to keep awake by moving to the different classes, our legs greatly abhorred the additional work it had to do. The first few weeks of getting used to the ridiculously loud Third Bell was also very trying. I have since then learnt to enjoy and relish in the sounding of this bell which has become a part of my Secondary Four life.
Before the start of the year, I had decided that it was best to concentrate on one CCA and my academics as it was going to be the important year I would sit for my 'O' levels. I chose Choir, my first love, and am glad that I did. Donning the blue gown one last time during the World Down Syndrome Day performance held in school was painful and yet fulfilling. I never thought it would be the last time I would perform with them as the Singapore Youth Festival Opening Ceremony was supposed to be my last. However, as I had underperformed at the Mid-year Examinations I decided it was best to leave to focus more on my studies. Leaving the choir so prematurely, a whole month before the other Secondary Four's did was probably the hardest thing to do as I had only just begun to apprize the choir.
Recently, the Secondary Four choir girls bade our final goodbye to our juniors during the farewell party which they organised for us. Hearing the cheers of our beloved juniors and seeing their appreciative smiles as we entered the canteen for the event was very hard to bear. The day ended with them presenting a montage to us in the AVA room after which we dedicated a song we had put together for them. There was hardly a dry eye as we left the choir one last time but our hearts were so full that we felt we had achieved something so much bigger than what we had all expected.
I remember being naïve, thinking that I had a lot of time before I would leave. Time, unfortunately, never waits for anyone. Four years turned to two and eighteen months turned to two weeks. With hardly a month to our GCE 'O' level examinations and thirty-two minutes into the last week of school, I know that I am leaving CHIJ with more than I bargained for. I have friends that I will have for life, experiences that are etched so deeply into my mind and heart and lessons that have made me the person that I am today. Although, there has been a great deal of suffering and general unhappiness I believe that "being unhappy makes being happy a whole lot happier". We all deal with changes in our lives in different ways and there are things that we "also die die want to change". If you ask me, I would never want to change the things that have happened these past 10 years in this great place I call my "second home". For through all the imperfections, I have found the epitome of perfection. My only wish now is to know that I have paved the way the next generation of IJ girls will walk on and for them to find their own little perfect place in our world imbued with imperfections.
Monday, November 20, 2006
8.28pm - today tarcia, thoms and i got kissed not once but TWICE on the lips by a hottie!
this hottie! (the one of the left you sickos. although between the 3 of us we have decided that his daddy's a hottie too)
his name is ethan and he's our three year old sugar daddy! apparently he's living in Japan now. at one point in time, he was jumping around screaming in japanese.
he sang us the barney song and hugged and kissed us and swam to us and ATE SAND a couple of times. AND WE HEART HIM!
he has the prettiest blue eyes! (although you can really see it here)
all our first sons are gonna be ethans ((:
SUPERSEXY!
i miss you ethan! whereever you are!
this hottie! (the one of the left you sickos. although between the 3 of us we have decided that his daddy's a hottie too)his name is ethan and he's our three year old sugar daddy! apparently he's living in Japan now. at one point in time, he was jumping around screaming in japanese.
he sang us the barney song and hugged and kissed us and swam to us and ATE SAND a couple of times. AND WE HEART HIM!
he has the prettiest blue eyes! (although you can really see it here)
all our first sons are gonna be ethans ((:
SUPERSEXY!
i miss you ethan! whereever you are!
Friday, November 17, 2006
10.52pm - myspace is making me all wonky. and kids, it really is veryvery addictive. anyhows, last night i stumbled across this guy called ronnie day who's a pretty good musician. i somehow managed to link myself to his livejournal and he really is an amazing writer too.
Living Richly [29 Jul 2006|03:30pm]
It took less than a week for Tony and I to lose all of our shame. Our first couple of nights living in the van, we showered at a friend's house in Los Angeles. Then, we'd park at the beach, and like California chameleons, we would dawn board shorts and shower with the surfers. Once the tour took us away from the coast, we started hiding in family restrooms, the kind that lock, and we'd splash down in the sink. Every time we stepped out, there would be some couple and their kids waiting with a new set of dazed and bashful faces. Tony and I started playing it off like we were a gay couple, but as we drove deeper into Red-Neck America, this joke lost it's luster. By the time we reached Oklahoma, Tony was ass naked at an old truck-stop pump, in full squat under the spigot. As he fiddled with his genitals beneath the stream of water, a trucker walked past with lowered eyes and I filmed from the car wrapped in a towel laughing uncontrollably.
Having lost all shame, we now shower with industrial sized water bottles wherever we feel like showering. We wear ridiculous bandannas with our shirts off and moccasins on our feet because they're comfortable. We are infallible, indestructible, shameless and proud. We do what we want, when we want-- because what we want to do is most often times what we have to do. People avoid making eye contact with us as if they're scared we'll ask for their spare change. Other people offer to sell us drugs, because we appear to be desperate, hopeless and in need of a fix, but we're not. We're comfortable, happy and fulfilled in our routine. We're the coolest people we know of.
One night, after I play my set, after we change into our pajamas, after the van is packed and all the people have left, Tony and I go looking for dinner.
We're in Memphis, and we heard of a place called Beale St. with real Memphis barbecue. It's almost 2:00AM, but we were told this street doesn't sleep, and as we drive downtown things come alive. The closer we get, the less we fit in with our white skin and white van. Neon lights play off platinum rims and gold chains illuminating the night. Thunderous bass rolls towards us from every direction. The culture shock sets in like a high, and my blood starts dancing through my veins. We park the van, and having been told it would be stolen and we'd be mugged, we take with us those things we want to let go of in person, and leave the rest to be taken from the van.
We don't know where Beale St. is, but as we walk we notice the density of dark bodies increasing. I start to forget that I'm white. African American culture has always appealed to me, and I'm now completely immersed. I take advantage of my new found blackness, and I talk to the first person I see. He's a malnourished homeless man, skeletal and withered like a dried weed.
"Some change?" he asks hopefully.
"Of course." I reach into my pocket and pull out a hand full of coins. I extend my arm to the man, but he won't take it.
"I need to earn it," he says. And he starts dancing-- I think. I'm not sure exactly when he is dancing, and when he is just sitting on the floor, but I'm sure it's all part of the show. He crouches down on both knees, and gyrates his hips as if making love-- slow and tender love. Then he stands again, and walks in place before returning to his invisible temptress. Once he tires himself out, Tony and I both let him know how impressed we are, and I ask him for some advice.
"What you need?" His face seems heavy with genuine concern.
"We're looking for some barbecue."
"Bar-Bee-Coo?"
"Yes sir, Memphis barbecue."
A smile wiggles it's way onto his face. His teeth are small and separated like stained and shattered seashells. His eyes are yellow with jaundice, but still very responsive, set back into his oily black face the way cartoon eyes are in a dark forest. He's nodding his head as he raises a finger and points.
"That's the best place in town," he says.
"Then that's our spot." I stand in our silence and then decide to ask him if he'll join us for dinner.
"Oh, I'd love to, but I can't."
"Why not?" I ask.
"They'll arrest me."
"They won't arrest you."
"They'll arrest me."
"You're my guest. They're not going to arrest you," I assure him, though I don't know whether or not they'll try and arrest him. I'm excited at the possibility of confrontation and even more amused with the prospect of being unjustly imprisoned myself. "Follow me," I tell him, and he does.
We walk towards the restaurant, towards the neon signs and lines, towards people, and then more people. With each step the density increases. It's like an urban corn field, and it's growing. Across the street from the barbecue restaurant, I see something almost frightening, but all at once absolutely stimulating and exciting. It's a river of black heads as far as the street stretches, rolling off of one another like greased ball bearings. This is Beale St.
I enter the restaurant with the homeless man; Tony follows closely with a camcorder clutched nervously in his hand. Time seems to slow as we enter the restaurant. Laughter outside fades under the brassy moans of an old jukebox. The dining room is still and removed from it's active surroundings like an exhibit in a museum. Everything is distinctly wooden. Most buildings are made of wood, but this place felt like it, bare and unfinished like a log cabin. We seat ourselves near the window and wait for service.
The handful of other customers look confident and settled, probably regulars, and I can feel their eyes on us. Hateful eyes, not looking to understand-- just looking-- and judging. Our homeless friend seems restless and suddenly very aware of his own appearance.
"I'm jus' a bum," he mumbles, looking down to his lap and folded hands.
"You're not," I tell him, "you're a guy just like anybody else."
"Naw, jus' a dirty bum," he insists. "Trash. No good for nothing or nobody."
Tony stops filming. Our waiter approaches the table, his face twisted as if he were approaching something foul. He's white, everyone in the restaurant is, with the acceptation of our homeless friend. They seem to be resentful of the exclusively black traffic outside, huddled together in their wood cabin like it's some sort of racial fallout shelter. Tony and I place our orders, and I ask our homeless man what he would like.
"What' you think I want?" he smiles sarcastically. "The rack of ribs, Baby!"
"Rack of ribs," the waiter recites, meeting my eye for confirmation, as if the homeless man were a small child who could not be trusted to order for himself.
"Rack of ribs!" I confirm.
"And a Coke,"
"And a Coke!" I chirp. We close our menus and anxiously await our food. A woman brings us drinks, and the homeless man complains about his Coke being watered down.
"If it's going to be watered down," he tells her, "I may as well just have water." And she brings him a water. Then, just as she's leaving the table, he changes his mind again and asks for an orange juice. I smile apologetically at the woman.
"We don't have orange juice."
"Ya'll can't find any?"
"No," and without another word, the woman walks away. I start talking to the homeless man. I want to prove to him that he's not a bum, and I soon find that he doesn't think himself a bum anymore than I do. Underneath his insecurities, he sees himself as a dancer. And not a father, though he would have liked to have been, but a lover to a woman in Chicago. Though he hasn't seen her in several years, he knows without a doubt that they're still both very much in love. He is also a hard worker, but as he says, "it's work enough just looking for a job in this town".
"There's nothing you can do?" I ask him.
"Not without an I.D."
"You don't have identification?"
"Left everything up North," he says.
"Well, why don't you get a new I.D. card?"
"Costs $50, and I don’t have my birth certificate."
I'm quiet for a moment while I think about his situation. I can sympathize, as bureaucracy affects all of us in similar ways. The government has a way of complicating simple things. This man has no money, and no identification. With no identification he can't work, but without a job he can't afford his own identity. It's a horrible catch, and I wonder how many others have found similar circumstances. Across the table, Tony's face is heavy with concern. He doesn't speak. so I keep talking.
"You can't get I.D. because you don't have a job, but you can't get a job without I.D.?"
"Now you' got it," he tells me.
"That doesn't make you a bum," I theorize, "that just makes you American."
"It makes me a dirty bum. A beggar. I sleep on the streets."
"I sleep in a van," I confess.
"But you have money in your pocket, and a place to rest your head."
"That's true," I admit, but I can't help feeling like we're both caught up in the same net at different places. I've got taxes I need to pay, money I have to earn, bills I must meet. I'm caught in the endless cycle of having. And the homeless man, hungry for privilege and luxury, is forever not having, but both of us are always wanting. Everybody is wanting.
The waiter walks out from the kitchen, and asks me if I'd like our food "to go". The homeless man had said he wanted to eat elsewhere, but I deliberately ask for our food "to stay" with a smile. The waiter's passing patience peels over his face as he walks off. I listen to our dancing friend talk.
His homeless face is as dark and oily as an olive, with scars and holes cut cleanly and healed perfectly like carvings on a tree trunk. He has been places, I imagine. His speech fluxuates, as it seems he is constantly forgetting and then remembering that he's "jus" a dirty bum". Beneath the shreds of tattered clothing and torn pride I see the unmistakable glow of stashed candor and confidence. He knows that he deserves better than the world has given him, but it seems that he keeps this knowledge hidden somewhere deep inside of himself, safe. He is as complicated a person as any other, and in need of love just as much.
Between masochistic rants about his own filth and failures, he gives Tony and I small glimpses of his humor and natural story-telling ability. I imagine that he must have one day been a fantastically flamboyant dancer, eccentric and excitable.
The waiter returns with our food, all boxed and bagged. "I brought it to go," he announces, obviously pleased with what he thought to be a very cleaver way of asking us to leave. I don't leave, only thank him and begin unpacking the boxes at the table. The waiter, feeling personally attacked, exchanges a glance with the manager who is now standing across the room.
"That's the manager," our homeless dancer tells us.
"Don't worry about it," Tony assures him.
"Yeah, fuck that guy," I agree.
We eat our ribs and gumbo, drink and talk. Our new friend, the dancing homeless man, shares his ribs with us. The vaguely familiar sensation of warm food in a proper restaurant must have settled his nerves, because he seems to relax, and a sustained smile never leaves his face. Tony and I also exchange many smiles, both of us vicariously happy through the homeless dancer.
Eventually, we say our goodbyes. I make sure to personally deliver my gratitude and a generous tip to the waiter. He looks slightly apologetic and ashamed. The homeless man, not at all ashamed, marches proudly off into the night.
Tony and I walk back to the van, and are happy to see that nothing has been stolen. Once inside, Tony starts recording me on the camera. Sometimes we film each other in an interview setting, and he thinks I should put a closing on the footage he's collected. I realize that I never learned the homeless dancer's name, and struggle to think of something better than "bum".
I could address him as "The Homeless Man", but it still seems to have negative connotations. Maybe he would prefer to be known as a dancer, or perhaps a lover. I don't know much about him, but I do know that him being homeless is probably one of the least significant things I learned, and I didn't even have to talk to him to figure it out.
Maybe that's why people tend to chose words like "bum", because it's easy, obvious, and it says absolutely nothing about the humanity of the individual. Maybe it's too hard for us to accept that there are millions of people around the world with dreams and feelings not at all different from our own-- people with no hope of ever realizing these dreams. Maybe it's a reality most would rather ignore, but I feel fortunate for our encounter.
Over a plate of ribs I had my first conversation with a new friend, we were black and white as any two things can be, but not at all dissimilar. The world walked by while we ate our ribs inside-- Tony, myself and our dancing friend all knowing something about ourselves, something secret, something great.
sometimes i just need something like that to remind me i'm human.
Living Richly [29 Jul 2006|03:30pm]
It took less than a week for Tony and I to lose all of our shame. Our first couple of nights living in the van, we showered at a friend's house in Los Angeles. Then, we'd park at the beach, and like California chameleons, we would dawn board shorts and shower with the surfers. Once the tour took us away from the coast, we started hiding in family restrooms, the kind that lock, and we'd splash down in the sink. Every time we stepped out, there would be some couple and their kids waiting with a new set of dazed and bashful faces. Tony and I started playing it off like we were a gay couple, but as we drove deeper into Red-Neck America, this joke lost it's luster. By the time we reached Oklahoma, Tony was ass naked at an old truck-stop pump, in full squat under the spigot. As he fiddled with his genitals beneath the stream of water, a trucker walked past with lowered eyes and I filmed from the car wrapped in a towel laughing uncontrollably.
Having lost all shame, we now shower with industrial sized water bottles wherever we feel like showering. We wear ridiculous bandannas with our shirts off and moccasins on our feet because they're comfortable. We are infallible, indestructible, shameless and proud. We do what we want, when we want-- because what we want to do is most often times what we have to do. People avoid making eye contact with us as if they're scared we'll ask for their spare change. Other people offer to sell us drugs, because we appear to be desperate, hopeless and in need of a fix, but we're not. We're comfortable, happy and fulfilled in our routine. We're the coolest people we know of.
One night, after I play my set, after we change into our pajamas, after the van is packed and all the people have left, Tony and I go looking for dinner.
We're in Memphis, and we heard of a place called Beale St. with real Memphis barbecue. It's almost 2:00AM, but we were told this street doesn't sleep, and as we drive downtown things come alive. The closer we get, the less we fit in with our white skin and white van. Neon lights play off platinum rims and gold chains illuminating the night. Thunderous bass rolls towards us from every direction. The culture shock sets in like a high, and my blood starts dancing through my veins. We park the van, and having been told it would be stolen and we'd be mugged, we take with us those things we want to let go of in person, and leave the rest to be taken from the van.
We don't know where Beale St. is, but as we walk we notice the density of dark bodies increasing. I start to forget that I'm white. African American culture has always appealed to me, and I'm now completely immersed. I take advantage of my new found blackness, and I talk to the first person I see. He's a malnourished homeless man, skeletal and withered like a dried weed.
"Some change?" he asks hopefully.
"Of course." I reach into my pocket and pull out a hand full of coins. I extend my arm to the man, but he won't take it.
"I need to earn it," he says. And he starts dancing-- I think. I'm not sure exactly when he is dancing, and when he is just sitting on the floor, but I'm sure it's all part of the show. He crouches down on both knees, and gyrates his hips as if making love-- slow and tender love. Then he stands again, and walks in place before returning to his invisible temptress. Once he tires himself out, Tony and I both let him know how impressed we are, and I ask him for some advice.
"What you need?" His face seems heavy with genuine concern.
"We're looking for some barbecue."
"Bar-Bee-Coo?"
"Yes sir, Memphis barbecue."
A smile wiggles it's way onto his face. His teeth are small and separated like stained and shattered seashells. His eyes are yellow with jaundice, but still very responsive, set back into his oily black face the way cartoon eyes are in a dark forest. He's nodding his head as he raises a finger and points.
"That's the best place in town," he says.
"Then that's our spot." I stand in our silence and then decide to ask him if he'll join us for dinner.
"Oh, I'd love to, but I can't."
"Why not?" I ask.
"They'll arrest me."
"They won't arrest you."
"They'll arrest me."
"You're my guest. They're not going to arrest you," I assure him, though I don't know whether or not they'll try and arrest him. I'm excited at the possibility of confrontation and even more amused with the prospect of being unjustly imprisoned myself. "Follow me," I tell him, and he does.
We walk towards the restaurant, towards the neon signs and lines, towards people, and then more people. With each step the density increases. It's like an urban corn field, and it's growing. Across the street from the barbecue restaurant, I see something almost frightening, but all at once absolutely stimulating and exciting. It's a river of black heads as far as the street stretches, rolling off of one another like greased ball bearings. This is Beale St.
I enter the restaurant with the homeless man; Tony follows closely with a camcorder clutched nervously in his hand. Time seems to slow as we enter the restaurant. Laughter outside fades under the brassy moans of an old jukebox. The dining room is still and removed from it's active surroundings like an exhibit in a museum. Everything is distinctly wooden. Most buildings are made of wood, but this place felt like it, bare and unfinished like a log cabin. We seat ourselves near the window and wait for service.
The handful of other customers look confident and settled, probably regulars, and I can feel their eyes on us. Hateful eyes, not looking to understand-- just looking-- and judging. Our homeless friend seems restless and suddenly very aware of his own appearance.
"I'm jus' a bum," he mumbles, looking down to his lap and folded hands.
"You're not," I tell him, "you're a guy just like anybody else."
"Naw, jus' a dirty bum," he insists. "Trash. No good for nothing or nobody."
Tony stops filming. Our waiter approaches the table, his face twisted as if he were approaching something foul. He's white, everyone in the restaurant is, with the acceptation of our homeless friend. They seem to be resentful of the exclusively black traffic outside, huddled together in their wood cabin like it's some sort of racial fallout shelter. Tony and I place our orders, and I ask our homeless man what he would like.
"What' you think I want?" he smiles sarcastically. "The rack of ribs, Baby!"
"Rack of ribs," the waiter recites, meeting my eye for confirmation, as if the homeless man were a small child who could not be trusted to order for himself.
"Rack of ribs!" I confirm.
"And a Coke,"
"And a Coke!" I chirp. We close our menus and anxiously await our food. A woman brings us drinks, and the homeless man complains about his Coke being watered down.
"If it's going to be watered down," he tells her, "I may as well just have water." And she brings him a water. Then, just as she's leaving the table, he changes his mind again and asks for an orange juice. I smile apologetically at the woman.
"We don't have orange juice."
"Ya'll can't find any?"
"No," and without another word, the woman walks away. I start talking to the homeless man. I want to prove to him that he's not a bum, and I soon find that he doesn't think himself a bum anymore than I do. Underneath his insecurities, he sees himself as a dancer. And not a father, though he would have liked to have been, but a lover to a woman in Chicago. Though he hasn't seen her in several years, he knows without a doubt that they're still both very much in love. He is also a hard worker, but as he says, "it's work enough just looking for a job in this town".
"There's nothing you can do?" I ask him.
"Not without an I.D."
"You don't have identification?"
"Left everything up North," he says.
"Well, why don't you get a new I.D. card?"
"Costs $50, and I don’t have my birth certificate."
I'm quiet for a moment while I think about his situation. I can sympathize, as bureaucracy affects all of us in similar ways. The government has a way of complicating simple things. This man has no money, and no identification. With no identification he can't work, but without a job he can't afford his own identity. It's a horrible catch, and I wonder how many others have found similar circumstances. Across the table, Tony's face is heavy with concern. He doesn't speak. so I keep talking.
"You can't get I.D. because you don't have a job, but you can't get a job without I.D.?"
"Now you' got it," he tells me.
"That doesn't make you a bum," I theorize, "that just makes you American."
"It makes me a dirty bum. A beggar. I sleep on the streets."
"I sleep in a van," I confess.
"But you have money in your pocket, and a place to rest your head."
"That's true," I admit, but I can't help feeling like we're both caught up in the same net at different places. I've got taxes I need to pay, money I have to earn, bills I must meet. I'm caught in the endless cycle of having. And the homeless man, hungry for privilege and luxury, is forever not having, but both of us are always wanting. Everybody is wanting.
The waiter walks out from the kitchen, and asks me if I'd like our food "to go". The homeless man had said he wanted to eat elsewhere, but I deliberately ask for our food "to stay" with a smile. The waiter's passing patience peels over his face as he walks off. I listen to our dancing friend talk.
His homeless face is as dark and oily as an olive, with scars and holes cut cleanly and healed perfectly like carvings on a tree trunk. He has been places, I imagine. His speech fluxuates, as it seems he is constantly forgetting and then remembering that he's "jus" a dirty bum". Beneath the shreds of tattered clothing and torn pride I see the unmistakable glow of stashed candor and confidence. He knows that he deserves better than the world has given him, but it seems that he keeps this knowledge hidden somewhere deep inside of himself, safe. He is as complicated a person as any other, and in need of love just as much.
Between masochistic rants about his own filth and failures, he gives Tony and I small glimpses of his humor and natural story-telling ability. I imagine that he must have one day been a fantastically flamboyant dancer, eccentric and excitable.
The waiter returns with our food, all boxed and bagged. "I brought it to go," he announces, obviously pleased with what he thought to be a very cleaver way of asking us to leave. I don't leave, only thank him and begin unpacking the boxes at the table. The waiter, feeling personally attacked, exchanges a glance with the manager who is now standing across the room.
"That's the manager," our homeless dancer tells us.
"Don't worry about it," Tony assures him.
"Yeah, fuck that guy," I agree.
We eat our ribs and gumbo, drink and talk. Our new friend, the dancing homeless man, shares his ribs with us. The vaguely familiar sensation of warm food in a proper restaurant must have settled his nerves, because he seems to relax, and a sustained smile never leaves his face. Tony and I also exchange many smiles, both of us vicariously happy through the homeless dancer.
Eventually, we say our goodbyes. I make sure to personally deliver my gratitude and a generous tip to the waiter. He looks slightly apologetic and ashamed. The homeless man, not at all ashamed, marches proudly off into the night.
Tony and I walk back to the van, and are happy to see that nothing has been stolen. Once inside, Tony starts recording me on the camera. Sometimes we film each other in an interview setting, and he thinks I should put a closing on the footage he's collected. I realize that I never learned the homeless dancer's name, and struggle to think of something better than "bum".
I could address him as "The Homeless Man", but it still seems to have negative connotations. Maybe he would prefer to be known as a dancer, or perhaps a lover. I don't know much about him, but I do know that him being homeless is probably one of the least significant things I learned, and I didn't even have to talk to him to figure it out.
Maybe that's why people tend to chose words like "bum", because it's easy, obvious, and it says absolutely nothing about the humanity of the individual. Maybe it's too hard for us to accept that there are millions of people around the world with dreams and feelings not at all different from our own-- people with no hope of ever realizing these dreams. Maybe it's a reality most would rather ignore, but I feel fortunate for our encounter.
Over a plate of ribs I had my first conversation with a new friend, we were black and white as any two things can be, but not at all dissimilar. The world walked by while we ate our ribs inside-- Tony, myself and our dancing friend all knowing something about ourselves, something secret, something great.
sometimes i just need something like that to remind me i'm human.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
1.29am - in view of how badly my papers have been, and how impossible it probably is for me to get 10 points for l1r4, i have decided that to rethink my options.
i'm seriously considering the culinary course at TP, which also happens to be in tampines (i don't quite think i am fated to actually be in a school near home). Seeing as how everyone at home seems to be taking the same courses and how the course at TP is new and soooo, might be easier to get in i might actually put it as my second choice! but the thought of having to take accounts again makes me feel like stabbing someone with my toenail.
so yes, if i don't get into NP through JAE hopefully i'll get TP through JAE and NP through DAE/JPSAE. then i'll get an interview and test thingum, knock their socks off, get accepted and think of which one will suit me better! YAY!
righty-o.
i'm seriously considering the culinary course at TP, which also happens to be in tampines (i don't quite think i am fated to actually be in a school near home). Seeing as how everyone at home seems to be taking the same courses and how the course at TP is new and soooo, might be easier to get in i might actually put it as my second choice! but the thought of having to take accounts again makes me feel like stabbing someone with my toenail.
so yes, if i don't get into NP through JAE hopefully i'll get TP through JAE and NP through DAE/JPSAE. then i'll get an interview and test thingum, knock their socks off, get accepted and think of which one will suit me better! YAY!
righty-o.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
3.56pm - i wanted to do NaNoWriMo but noo. thank you o levels. anyways, physics was disgusting! i'm gonna hunt down that MORON who set that bloody paper and slap him/her good! IT WAS FREAKING STUPID! english was pretty good. i think i wrote a good essay for Dreams. but situational.. EHH. it's another thing altogether. comprehension was surprisingly good. i've never done such a simple summary! HOORAY to the person who set that. i finished early and wrote another essay on my question paper. HAHAHAS.
7 more to go.
GOOD LUCK FOR GEOG, GEOG PEOPLE! i hope i pass :|
7 more to go.
GOOD LUCK FOR GEOG, GEOG PEOPLE! i hope i pass :|
Saturday, November 04, 2006
9.51am - YES. sam is awake. late may i add. i was supposed to get up at 8 to run though which is moronic, i know. especially since i was up til 3 reading 'teen idol' for the 4th/5th time. hahas
good genes i wish i got
1)tall genes
2)bigger than small boobage genes
3)smart genes
4)unlazy genes
5)small waist genes
6)slightly smart genes
genes i got
1)shopaholic genes
2)expensive taste
3)hyper genes
4)weird genes
5)big broad feet genes
6)reading genes
7)music genes (btw i have the talent equilivant of a peanut)
genes i hope i got but can't really tell yet
1)"old but don't look old" genes
ANYWAYS! thansk all who voted for the dresses. HAHAS i realised i should have stood up for the pink dress but heh. HAHAHS
KEN AMAN = 5
BCBG=3
good genes i wish i got
1)tall genes
2)bigger than small boobage genes
3)smart genes
4)unlazy genes
5)small waist genes
6)slightly smart genes
genes i got
1)shopaholic genes
2)expensive taste
3)hyper genes
4)weird genes
5)big broad feet genes
6)reading genes
7)music genes (btw i have the talent equilivant of a peanut)
genes i hope i got but can't really tell yet
1)"old but don't look old" genes
ANYWAYS! thansk all who voted for the dresses. HAHAS i realised i should have stood up for the pink dress but heh. HAHAHS
KEN AMAN = 5
BCBG=3
Friday, November 03, 2006
help me choose one kids! my arms are so fat. i want to cry. HAHAS oh well. necklines are both low. AHH. but the back for both are pretty high. so yeah. go me! i really dont know which one to wear :| so yes. TAG ME BOARD with you preferred dress! my right arm seems to have suffered a stroke. oh my gawd.
