Another Storm: Not My Romantic Kind

This time round, it was a freezing storm. Clad in a sleeveless top and knee-length skirt, goosebumps popped out all over my skin in a diseased manner.

I was feeling vulnerable, cold and pathetic as I stood at the bus-stop, heading home from tuition in Tampines.

Hugging my bare arms and balancing the warming the fats with the full-length umbrella, I walked to the end of the bus-stop where the main crowd of public-transport-dependants huddled, hoping that the few bodies there could raise the surrounding area’s temperature even by the slightest centigrade.

It was to no avail. Those bodies were as cold as mine.

I spied the warm-looking lit Coke vending machine and hugged it. Anything that runs on electricity (and more so produces light) must produce heat, I reasoned.

That disappointing vending machine offered me no hint of warmth.

I was hoping some chivalrous young lad would offer me his coat (well, it’s still Singapore, so forget the coat idea. Next!), or arm of warmth.

A golden-haired bespectacled (fashion oxymoron – golden hair doesn’t quite go with glasses) Ah Beng stood near me. I caught his eye apparently in my pathetic/feeling-pathetic state.

I was so desperate for warmth, I was even fantasising Golden Boy coming to my rescue, “Eh Xiao Jie, yao borrow wo de shou ma?”

The frightfulness of whether I would say “yes” or reject him politely didn’t occur to me at that point, so I continued drifting in my little fantasy.

Well, Golden Boy went up the same bus I did, got off the same stop I did, and walked the same way I did all the way to the security post of Aquarius, where I live. In our own respective space under our huge umbrellas, Golden Boy approached me with a wide grin, “Excuse me, are you a teacher?”

Imagine my surprise. I guess I’ve slowly evolved into the teacher mould.

Anyway, Golden Boy did his little chat thing, asked for my number, which I, in a too polite fashion, declined to give. His smile and confidence level was unaffected. Instead, he offered his name. It was this calm demeanour that left a good parting impression of him on me. I returned his offer. Anyway, I probably won’t be bumping into Edwin again, to Ly’s great relief I’m sure.

2 Girls In KL City

Among several other aspects, the 3-day shopping trip to KL did the most to my confidence as a capable female. It was my first out-of-Singapore trip without my Mum or a school being accountable for me.

While it was my Mum who handled the buying of train tickets and Ee Ee (my 4th aunt) whose penthouse we put up at for 2 nights, little things like taking a cab in KL (where most cab drivers speak only Malay – a language neither one of us were conversant in), finding our way around the monorail and LRT system there and walking around unsafe shopping complexes (sex and abduction crimes are so common even locals don’t feel safe in their own country) on our own did a boost to my confidence level vis-à-vis as a young independent capable female.

Perhaps I’m overrating the experience.

The shopping wasn’t as eventful. I didn’t fall head over heels in love with any particular piece of clothing that I bought. The round of shopping didn’t give me that “kick”. However, it was a fairly pleasant and nice break, lazing around for half the day at home and interacting with Ee Ee’s family, followed by a packed walking session in the selected mall for the day.

Shanci, my female companion, definitely did not get her shopping’s worth in KL (boy is she one fussy shopper). Unexpectedly, for both of us, what turned out to be the enjoyable and memorable element of the trip was the company of my relatives.

My fantabulously tolerant (of my aunties – their wives) and warm uncles ferried us to shopping malls and brought us around town.

Shan was more awed by and appreciative of these generous gestures because she does not have such encounters with relatives at home and also because, as a guest, it was her first experience of their hospitality. Looking through her eyes, I realized how I had taken this for granted and was reminded to appreciate them too. It made me remember how much family ties mean to me.

Shanci spent a lot of time with my grandma too. Mama, proficient in English, captivated Shan with her liveliness, stories and gossip.

Liberation From The Bra

The weather has been quite erratic the past couple of weeks, with mad sunshine accompanied with saturated humidity on one day, and huge rainstorms the next. I don't mind the storms, but the heat makes travelling and teaching unbearable.

I've resorted to shamelessly travelling around Tampines and going for tuition without a bra. Of course, I wear a dark-coloured opaque T-shirt to avoid visual indecency. Ly, being a guy and being the kind of person he is in addition to being who he is to me, protests my recent act of desperation brought about by the heat.

This is possibly a contentious blog entry, but anyhow, since I am already halfway through it, I might as well finish up what I have to say. (In terms of logic, this doesn't make perfect sound sense; in fact, it has no sense at all despite being masked in a logic-phrase sentence.)

To finish what I have to say, this is yet another perk of being flat-chested.

Pregnant

I like impregnated women, impregnated cats and impregnated clouds. Mums-to-be and rain-bearing clouds give me that warm smiley feeling in my face and chest.

But I don’t like the process of impregnation. The procedure still frightens me. The concept seems disgusting – making a concoction of two persons’ bodily fluids (and from there too) in order to breed life.

My little Lina giggly wrote me a pregnant capital “B” in her assessment book this morning.