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White Meat Diet

Alec, ranting: Every day, I eat the same ta pao¹ local food as everyone else in the office, or I walk out to somewhere like Lau Pa Sat and eat whatever takes my fancy there. But then there's ONE day, where I just HAPPEN to be eating McDonald's in the office pantry, and everyone who comes in says "Oh, you don't like local food?"

Me: But I thought you talk quite a lot about local food with them?

Alec: I do! But it's like they refuse to believe! We went for a buffet and I didn't eat wasabi with my sashimi and everyone's first remark was "Oh, you can't take spicy food?" GRAAARGH!

Me: Well, why don't you explain that your girlfriend is local and you eat everything she eats?

Alec: Oh, that'll be no use. They probably think you're some SPG anyway.

Me: Haha, they'll be all like "Oh, you eat cock?"

¹ Takeaway

Narrow Outlook

Alec sent a link to Snake "befriends" snack hamster, a BBC News article, to my work email, and Outlook promptly classified it as junk.

I am displeased by this.

2006 Just Started And We're Already Below Par

Some people begin a new year by making resolutions, beginning diets, planning exercise regimes, or at the very least directing their energies to something vaguely useful.

We played minigolf.

Those of you familiar with my penchant for dumb kitsch will have no difficulties understanding why LilliPutt - "Funtastic Singapore in 18 Holes" held so much joyful potential for me.

Indeed, one need not even extend one's imagination far beyond this blog's last kitschfest to see why. My friends, I present to you: HAW PAR VILLA MINIGOLF!

Shifu is watching...

Alec's golf pro is a pretty intense guy, but he's really devoted to coaching from the ground up.

Fore2 jiao4

My coach was nice and chilled though. Very Zen. I realize I'm breaking 2 terrible taboos here, standing with my head higher than the Buddha and my feet pointing towards him, but I couldn't make the shot any other way! (Note to non-Mandarin speakers: the caption to the photo contains a pun so ghastly you'll be glad you don't get it.)

Fear my pink dimpled wrath!

This poor demon got a little short-changed when fearsome demonic powers were being handed out.

Fear my fucking flat-cap!

This guy has a bit of a demented Marcel Marceau vibe going on, and is final conclusive proof that flat-caps are pure evil in origin.

The other 17 holes featured an endearing mishmash of Singaporeana. Tiny mechanized trishaws, MRT trains and cable cars transporting your golf ball between the stages of a hole. Miniature versions of the Esplanade, Merlion, Suntec fountain, Boat Quay, Botanic Gardens gazebo, and in a slightly obvious attempt at self-glorification, the Big Splash building which houses Lilliputt.

But not everything was devoted to tourist attractions of Singapore! Some holes were devoted to venues which cater to ordinary Singaporeans and common pastimes.

Here oso got Crazy Horse¹leh.

For example, the Turf Club.

Some day we'll win a SEA games medal...

And, uh, the ski resort. Hmmm.

Oh, I nearly forgot. There was, of course, some competitive element in this whole exercise, as our blissful relationship of mutual respect and passionate devotion is not entirely devoid of bitter rivalry and petulant oneupmanship. If I were to say it didn't matter at all to me who won or lost, as long as we had fun, I'd be lying.

Na beh.²

Pap Cheer

While having a cuddle with Alec and prattling on about the various bits of my day, I also mentioned wurh's recent and rather endearing (yes, really) post about her pap smear.

And then one bit of pap smear humour led to another bit of pap smear humour and soon I was on a roll.

Me: What do you call it when you have a pap smear and it's really badly done?
Alec: What?
Me: A crap smear! Hahahahaha!
Alec: I think it's time for you to go home now.
Me: Have you heard of that high-tech kind of smear you can get over your mobile phone? It's a wap smear! HAHAHAHAHAHA!

[For ease of reading, I'll present the next few in Q & A form, omitting Alec's groans and my HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!s.]

Q: What kind of smear does Yoko Ono get?
A: A jap smear!

Q: What kind of smear does L'il Kim get?
A: A rap smear!

Q: What do they call it when the woman falls asleep halfway?
A: A nap smear!

Q: What kind of smear do you get if you slept around a lot when you took a year out from uni?
A: A gap smear!

Q: What do you call a smear which reveals that the woman does actually have a STD?
A: A clap smear!

Me, finally running out of ideas: I'm so funny.
Alec: ......
Me: Why aren't you hugging me any more?

Spandex Party Boy

Context for the following conversation: Not content with his previous dangerous pastimes of flying, skiing, hunting and polo, Alec is currently learning boxing. Because, of course, he already has an excellent memory, and is not scatter-brained at all, and never does anything that horrifies his girlfriend with its complete gobshiteness such as losing her library books, or nearly leaving her house to walk home after midnight while his wallet, keys and handphone are still upstairs in her room, or thinking he can windsurf when he hasn't windsurfed since he was twelve, subsequently necessitating the rescue boat, and so he can therefore CLEARLY, CRYSTAL-CLEARLY afford the potential brain damage...

Um, where was I? Oh yes - I was meaning to explain that for boxing training, he needed to buy a skipping rope the other day. In case you guys thought he was a paedophile.

Alec: When I was paying for my skipping rope at World Of Sports the cashier asked me if I needed anything else and I said, yes actually, I could do with a pair of black shorts. So he went and brought me a pair, they were black, medium sized, price was okay, so I bought them too. Trouble was, when I got home and looked at them a bit closer, they were made of this rather stretchy...
Me: Oh dear.
Alec: ...spandex material.
Me: Oh God.
Alec: I tried them on and they were, well, quite skin-tight. But I thought if I wore them with a long T-shirt, maybe I could just use them for exercise in the condo compound.
Me: NOOOO! Nonononononononononono!
Alec: So I got into the lift in my shorts and with my skipping-rope and there were two other people in there and you know that habit Singaporeans have of talking about people in another language when you don't want them to know you're talking about them?
Me: Yeah.
Alec: Well it's pretty bleeding obvious you're talking about them when you stare them up and down blatantly and the conversation's all in Chinese except for the word "skipping-rope"!
Me: Tee-hee. See, if you had a blog like everyone's begging you to, you could write stuff like this down. Though I daresay your fans would probably ignore the point of multicultural etiquette you're trying to make and instead just start chanting SPAN-DEX! SPAN-DEX!
Alec: A-LEX! IN SPAN-DEX!
Me: HAHAHAHAHA! A-LEX! IN SPAN-DEX! A-LEX! IN SPAN-DEX!
Alec: I was wearing a really long T-shirt with them!
Me: A-LEX! IN SPAN-DEX! A-LEX! IN SPAN-DEX!
Alec: This is why I hated primary school.

Haw Par Villa: Hallucinations, Hell And The Hokey Pokey

Spread the word - Haw Par Villa is the best trip you can have in Singapore without risking a criminal record.

[For non-Singaporean readers: Haw Par Villa is a statue park in the west of Singapore, built in the 1930s by two tycoon brothers who made their fortunes in Chinese medicinal ointment, and it's full of garish life-size statues commissioned by the brothers to portray stories from Chinese mythology and traditional Chinese values.]

Haw Par Villa's been terminally uncool ever since that spectacularly failed "Chinksney" themeparkesque revamp in the late 80s, but no one seems to have noticed that they've since reversed many of the ill-advised changes that led to its downfall. It's free to get in again these days (apart from the $5 parking charge and the $1 entry fee to Hell), and they've removed all those ridiculously kitsch additions like the rides and shows. So now, just the ridiculously kitsch original statues are left.

I took first Alec and recently Russ to it, and I think I wouldn't be overstating things to say they both left a little changed by the experience. I don't usually like to post too many photos in an entry, but my words really can't do justice to the lurid reality of Haw Par Villa on their own, so forgive me if you're on a slow connection and this entry takes a while to load. As usual, click on the photos for larger versions, and oh, be warned: CONTAINS WEIRD STATUE NUDITY.

Thou Shalt Not Say Anything About Anything

The following unspoken rules characterise most of the conversations I have had with the law students who have surrounded me since my return to Singapore. (Though obviously there are exceptions, who should know who they are.)

• If asked what you did over the weekend (which is rare) it is acceptable to state the title of the movie you watched, or the club you went to. But be so bold as to actually venture an opinion of the activity you participated that goes beyond "Yah, not bad lah, quite fun" and all of a sudden you're the weird one, because no one actually gives a shit what you think, especially when you do weird things that they've never heard of or considered doing.

• Personal information beyond the most mundane facts eg. "I have a cat" or the most trite statements "It's important to try and still have a life even though we're working" is unnecessarily revelatory and must be kept top secret. If someone is asking you about yourself, answer in monosyllables. Perhaps they have an ulterior motive. If they continue to try to draw you out (the flaming cheek!) answer in banalities to bore them into submission.

• Never give in. These upstarts must learn.

I am getting more socially awkward among these people by the day, because I don't know how to behave. In England I behaved as confidently and talkatively as I felt like being on a given day. I met my best friend within freshers' week, and within a month he told me things about himself he had never dared to confide in any other friend. In my public debating debut at the UCL Debating Society, I argued for the legalization of hardcore pornography, accused the other side of wanking under the table instead of listening to my team's case, and rejected one guy's incessant points of information by telling him he'd ejaculated quite enough. The club embraced me. In the pub, I let on that I was a practising Catholic. The club still embraced me. Throughout my time there I was an oddity, Chinese and female and Catholic in a club that was predominantly white and male and degenerate, but I never felt it.

But what worked so well for me in England seems to be anathema here, in my "homeland" where I should feel anything but an oddity. Confidence is overconfidence. Chattiness is met by reticence and suspicion. Before I went to England, I knew all this. I dealt with it by acting shyer than I really was, which seemed to make other people more comfortable with me. Since returning to Singapore, I've reverted to that old strategy, and I try to follow the rules when I actually know what they are, but it terrifies me. I don't want to wake up one day and realize that I have become my disguise.

I really want to believe that all these people have great personalities which they just choose to keep hidden. Perhaps they have Personality Parties on the weekend, where they let it all hang out, and then button their stuffed shirts up for the week ahead, and I just haven't been invited to these parties. Perhaps every dull statement made is actually code for "On the weekend I had a threesome and one of us was a goat." But if so, why stay locked in this vicious cycle of conversational nothingness, where I say nothing because I think they're boring and they say nothing because they think I'm boring?

Some days I wish I just had Tourette's syndrome. That'd be a great excuse to break the fucking ice.

Meeting People Isn't Easy

I envy people with great stories about meeting people they admire. Benny has his about meeting DJ Shadow in a London newsagent. Jordan at said the gramophone has this lovely two-part tale about his odyssey to see Cat Power at a festival somewhere in Switzerland (he didn't actually know where in Switzerland, though, which is what makes the story even cooler).

I, on the other hand, am unable to interact with people I admire without appearing like a complete idiot. I chickened out of saying hello to Zadie Smith the time I saw her on Torrington Place on my way home from the supermarket. I stammered something excruciatingly inane to Malcolm McLaren when he came to speak at a UCL Debating Society event the time he was considering running for London Mayor. In front of Neil Gaiman my mind went blank, and it didn't help that he was drawing me a rat because then all I could think was NEIL GAIMAN IS DRAWING ME A RAT OH MY GOD.

Even my brushes with almost unknown indie musicians descend into humiliation the moment I try to tell them (sincerely) that I like what they do. I am aided along this expressway to embarrassment by Alec, who either makes things worse or laughs at me.

Take, for example, the time we went to the Arts Cafe for a Ladybug Transistor gig, and were extremely impressed by the (unadvertised) opening act, Bart Davenport. Emboldened by alcohol, we approached him later to buy his CD. Alec, whose memory for names leaves much to be desired, had forgotten the guy's name but inexplicably decided to try and address him as something anyway.

Glancing quickly at the CDs on the merchandise table as he extended his hand in greeting, my favourite Alzheimer's patient saw "BART DAVENPORT" but only the first four letters of the surname registered. Hence - "Dave!" said Alec enthusiastically to Bart Davenport, "Great performance Dave, I really enjoyed it!" etc. and with every "Dave!" more and more bits of my composure crumbled into a little mortified pile on the floor. Luckily, "Dave" was so sloshed that I'm not even sure he noticed he was talking to a pair of nimrods, and thank God for that.

I accomplished the next indignity all by myself, and this still smarts so much I'm not even going to name the band. It was the first time we went to the Water Rats, and I was really impressed by one of the opening bands. They looked really young - they were wearing the sort of clothes I associate with teens who desperately want to scream their indieness to the world - but they had catchy songs, strong vocals and lots of energy. Sadly, only about 15 people were watching them, and most of the people who weren't us looked like their friends from school. This upset me a bit, as it always does when people don't get the appreciation I think they deserve, or the credit they're due. I thought they had real promise, and I was hoping they weren't discouraged by the tiny audience. I wanted to tell them I thought they were great. I didn't want them to give up on music.

So later on, when I was on the way to the bar to get my third Snakebite (you see the problem already) and saw the band hanging around, of course I went up to them and started a conversation.

Me: Hey, I really enjoyed your set.
Band (different members each time, we'll just call them Band): Thanks very much!
Me: You sound great, how long has your band been around?
Band: About three or four years.
Me: Cool, no wonder you sound so good. If you don't mind me asking, how old are you guys?
Band, giving me the first of many strange looks: Late twenties, mostly.

(This is where it all started to go pear-shaped for me. Late twenties??! Their dressing screamed 17!)

Me, thrown off now, clearly gobsmacked: Oh, right, right.
Band: You look surprised.
Me: Oh, er, no, I, uh, thought you looked a bit younger than that.
Band: Oh, really?
Me, gabbling stupidly while I tried and failed to move on: Oh, er, it's nothing, I must have been mistaken. I was, uh, just noticing the people watching just now looked really young, I thought maybe they might have been your mates. (Inner monologue: What the fuck are you saying, Michelle? WALK AWAY NOW.)
Band, giving me the second of many strange looks: No, we don't know them.
Me: Oh, right. Heh. Hmm. But anyway, you guys sounded really great!
Band, smiling tentatively: Thanks, we're glad you enjoyed it.
Me, clearly possessed by some demon of dorkness: Do you have a good sound guy, or is the venue sound system just really good? (Inner monologue: WHAT THE FUCK??! WHAT THE FUCK?! Ground, swallow me up now, I mean motherfucking NOW!)
Band, giving me the fuckteenth strange look: Well, the venue system's pretty good.
Me, now completely in bits: Right, right. Okay, gotta go deliver the drinks. Best of luck and all! (Walking away rapidly, not daring to look back.)

So I walked back into the other room, plonked the drinks down, grabbed Alec and started banging my head repeatedly on his chest.

Every day I thank every deity that could possibly exist in this world and the next that I haven't met Sonic Youth or Salman Rushdie yet, and I hope I never do.

Before Sunset

Before Sunset is a very romantic movie. I have many very romantic things to say about Before Sunset. But first, I have to tell you how fucking hot Julie Delpy is in this movie.

Sometimes I Get That Not-So-Fresh Feeling

We found out from a Singapore guidebook that the Sultan Mosque was designed by an Irishman named Denis Santry. This delighted me.

"So, in Denis Santry's salad days, when he was a young wild man living on his own, what did they call his little flat?" I asked Alec.

"What?" asked Alec, in a voice already steely with pain and resignation.

"The SANTRY PAD!"

I'm so witty.

Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover

London is the meanest ex ever.

I've spent the past year trying to get over our breakup, trying to convince myself that I'm happy with Singapore. Sure, this new relationship may not be as passionate or exciting or bloody-fucking-gorgeous as London was, and yeah there are still awkward silences on most of our dates even a year after we started going out, and yes it's true that I spend most of my time and energy trying to avoid its hot sweaty hands, but at least Singapore is safe and reliable and it's trying its best.

Who needs passion once you're past a certain age anyway? You don't need fire in your loins, you just need to be able to share a five room HDB flat¹ without killing each other. I can exist in Singapore. Who needs to live?

If I repeat this to myself several times a day I even begin to believe that I believe it. And then I find out that Battleship Potemkin will be shown on a huge screen tomorrow in Trafalgar Square, with a new soundtrack performed live by the Pet Shop Boys. For free.

I know London's moved on and is having a great time without me, but this is really rubbing it in.

¹ Public housing

There's No Scrabble Like Sexy Scrabble

The rules of Sexy Scrabble are that every word you make has to be sexual, or at least suggestive, or as a matter of last resort, of general vulgarity. Approval of words is obviously not obtained by referring to the official Scrabble dictionary, but is solely subject to the opinion of the vile rabble with whom you are playing.

And so it was that we converged on Yish's house two Saturdays ago to forget that we were actually mature sophisticated well-educated 24-year-olds, and, at least for an evening, to be puerile 17-year-olds again.

The major insight we gained from the experience was that for a good game of Sexy Scrabble, ordinary Scrabble rules must be very liberally interpreted, if applied at all, and the English language must be forced into all manner of compromising positions.

In our first game, adding letters to words already on the board to make some sort of phrase or sentence was permitted. In this way, Yish was permitted to transform DICK into DICKME. My later attempt to make VINDICKME was, however, rejected. My outrage at this was somewhat mollified when my later proposal to adapt MANGA into MANGAZE was accepted. Through a similar process, the slightly more surreal sequence of TWIGGY -> BADTWIGGY -> RIMBADTWIGGY -> PRIMBADTWIGGY -> IMPRIMBADTWIGGY was obtained.

The traditional approach of not revealing your intended words to the other players also gave way in pursuit of the common good. When Jianyi tried to use an A on the board to make JAW, Fay insisted that she needed it for her FANNY. When we all agreed that the presence of FANNY on the board was of vital importance, Jianyi had no choice but to produce JAWSEMEN instead, which was mutated by others later on to INJAWSEMEN and FOULINJAWSEMEN.

In our second game, we decided to try something a little classier. In this spirit, Yish started us off with BEGET, and I followed with AROUSE. This new classy version of sexy Scrabble soon proved to be dead boring and was soon abandoned in favour of transforming LOVER to TOELOVER, and RANDY to ISORANDY to OMISORANDY, which seemed like a good place to call it a night.

Going Native

Me: So before I bought the camera, we walked around all the different shops selling it to compare prices, and see who would throw in more extra stuff.
Alec: Like a free travel bag?
Me: No!
Alec, stifling laughter: Or, say, a free radio alarm clock?
Me: NO! Relevant stuff like CompactFlash memory cards!
Alec, chortling out loud: But wouldn't you prefer a free calculator watch?
Me: RRRROWR.

Even given the fact that Alec reads Talking Cock more than I do, the scary extent to which he is in touch with the Singaporean psyche still suggests he has not actually been in Ireland these past few months, but has instead been living a secret existence in a 3-room flat in Toa Payoh.

These Boots Were Made For Alt-Country

Word to Adidas for using Calexico's very lovely song Pepita as the background to their ad featuring big sports names running with Muhammed Ali. I'd have used Quattro instead, because it always makes me think of being borne across a vast expanse of night clouds at exhilarating speed with my bare feet skimming their cool damp surfaces, and that seems to be a fairly nice mental picture to have associated with sports shoes, given that my usual mental picture associated with sports shoes involves heat rash and a general longing for death. But Pepita's cool too.

Even More Un-PC Than Me

I was discussing upcoming holiday plans with Alec, specifically the Eastern Europe part of the trip. We were considering the cost viability of a railpass by trying to see if all the places we wanted to see were actually on good train routes.

Alec: Well, we all know you can definitely get to Auschwitz by train!
Me: ......
Alec: ......
Me: Okay, next topic of conversation.