Lessons from the pool

I remember taking swimming lessons when I was still a little boy in primary school. Those were the days when mum and us would take a 15 minute ride on bus 98 (this excludes waiting time for the bus) which would take us through one of the oldest housing estates in the area. I know, because the 1-room flat where we used to live in was in the estate. Now the area only spots modern high-rise housing blocks with clinically well-planned neighbourhood parks and standard HDB amenities - nothing like the days of yore where shanty-looking flats were the norm.

Two weeks ago, I managed to catch a break and found time to swim again. I used to do that on a more regular basis when I was working in Toa Payoh and the swimming pool was just a street across the office. But the last time I swam was more than a year ago when I could still afford the time during lunch hour or after work. I enjoy swimming because it's is an easy sport which cost little; the water has a calming effect which never fails to relax me while I'm at it. Swimming in the pool, I often thought this is how a fish lives its life: slicing through water, under the surface, gliding calmly across the water body. Like any other sport, once you find your rhythm and pace, swimming becomes second nature and you start to enjoy the steady motion of moving in the water body. The water glides across your body as much as you cut through it.

Walking to the train station the other day, the image of the old swimming pool, now already gone, came to my mind. Almost intuitively, I could mentally reconstruct the physical setting of the swimming complex: the big spacious toilets with open cubicles and old pipes; the spectator gallery at where our belongings are dumped before we hit the pool; the small opening from the restaurant where hot drinks were bought; and the deep 12 ft pool and musky interior of the entire complex. All these details came to mind easily. But above all, it was the rather mundane journey of travelling weekly to the swimming complex that made the memory warm. This is just amongst a handful of memories from the yesteryears which come to the fore every now and then when one is hit by a bolt of nostalgia. Like all nostalgic memories, it harks back to a simpler life - that of an easily contented child who has yet to deal with the sobrieties of life.

diwali sky bliss

quaintly charming

They were moving on, I had to make do with a quick pause, so I moved closer to the beckoning gate, flipped my camera out and took a shot. I was drawn to the building the moment I saw it. I like how the gate opens up to a road leading to the main house, and how the fallen leaves and shrubbery around the gate gives the compound a quaintly charming facade. Just a chance discovery like this makes a whole lot of difference to an otherwise usual morning ride. Lovely.

Old is Gold

Old school breakfast at an old world Kopitiam. Eggs better than yakun (you've got to break them yourselves though), and toasted bread of the kind that I like (i.e. not the hard kind from yakun).

once in a purple moon Friday chill-out lunch

The weather was not so kind. Plans for a late morning swim were duly aborted when it became clear that this was no ordinary rain; I just didn't expect it to be an extraordinary downpour. [A day later, I read in the papers that there were flash floods at various locations because of the sudden deluge of rainfall.]

With a good one hour to spare before lunch, I decided to brave the heavy downpour and head to a nearby cafe and read my book. I folded my berms and risked being spotted in indecently short shorts to avoid the splashing of dirty water from the ground. With a small foldable umbrella and a breath of resignation drawn, I started into the crazy rain and adjusted my umbrella with the futile aim of averting the invasive rainfall. I huddled my bag and shuffled slowly across the street and corridors, mindful of the risk of slipping and falling. Having to find my way around this unfamiliar area, I thought to myself: It could not have been a worse time to be out navigating my way through this housing estate.

When my lunch mates finally arrived an hour later (I had settled in the restaurant instead of going to another cafe), I was almost done with my cappuccino. We talked about the restaurant and the merits of a shabby-chic design for restaurants. Therein was born the quote of the day, courtesy of my discerning and comfort-embracing friend: 'Toilets cannot be shabby-chic; they have to be swanky.'

a paris-esque moment

Balloons and romance go together, don't they, just as a bicycle and quaint shophouses make for a perfect match. In the absence of deep blue ocean and wind-swept coastal roads (with that occasional lighthouse in the distance), I think this is a decent backdrop for a whiff of snazzy romance.

Thursday, then and now

Thursday night, lounging in a cafe, daydreaming and reading my book - it seems almost crazy to imagine doing this just a few months ago. But this is for real, I am breathing and whiling away time on a working thursday evening, a period which for many months had disappeared from my life.

That's the past. This is the now.

Crackling Dusk

Stepping out of Clarke Quay MRT station yesterday evening, I was a little thrilled at seeing the sky.

Plumes of droplets-leaden clouds somehow managed to break away from the precarious mass that usually envelops the sky these days. They were at the furthest end from me, starkly contrasting with the rest of the darkening sky.

The ephemeral beauty was matched by its own sense of fragile transition. This was an image that either portended a yet to finish rain storm, or it was a crackling respite that marked the end of a dreadful rainy afternoon.

Sun goes down

As the sun goes down and takes along with it all the heady heat of the day, my heart soothes a little with the slowly darkening sky. The music in the bookstore wafts through the cafe, putting me in a relaxed mood. All that's missing is a bit of jazz.

I stared into the space outside the window, wondering if night heralds a gentler city and erases the troubles of the day.

All that remains is a void to be filled by gentle darkness.

dazzling rain

I love the dazzle of shimmering lights when you see through a rainswept window on a rainy night. The view of the world outside evokes a gentle hypnotic feel, enchanting in a way that only a kaleidoscope of colours could induce. Gazing through the window, I feel as if time has suspended and the world has slipped into a fuzzy trance.

If my day had been a grey, this was a comforting end to it.

Shabu Birthday

Josh says our mental faculties start to deteriorate after 28. Now, if only I knew that earlier, I would have a perfectly legitimate reason to justify my lapses at work in the past year.

We both gave a mocking smile and agreed that everything about our physical self goes downhill after the BIG three-zero. For the record, we didn't note this out of fear of aging. After all, our predecessors have all emerged unscathed upon crossing that milestone. This one's just slightly different from the Twenty-One mark which hit NOT LONG AGO. Everyone (assuming you live long enough) goes through this, so I guess it's the universal principle of 'strength in numbers' at work. People we all grow up with grow old together, and we can all laugh and cry or unite in celebration or mourning together. When an experience is shared, it is no longer as scary as it seems when faced alone.

Josh was born exactly 3 weeks after I arrived in this world. By some computational calculation that will never be known to us (some call it fate), we only met each other 18 years later when we both went through the shittiest part of our conscripted enslavement together. His was assigned the number and bed after mine; by default that made us buddies.

Josh married in January this year. He's now enjoying couplehood, though, as I've learned, family plans are not far away. Whenever we are on this topic, he would give a mock resigned expression. It's as though he's yet to leave boyhood and now fatherhood is on the cusp.

We had dinner (my treat for his birthday) this evening. Never mind that he has to sleep at 10 (+) every night and can't stay out late whenever we meet (or I will be talking to someone with open-eye semi-consciousness). Like the meet-ups we've always had, the dinner was never once quiet. Between the first ravenous mouthful of shabu shabu thin sliced beef and the last stomach-exploding morsel of meat, we updated each other of our present life, mentioned about LKY, talked about women and their factory talk, bitched about the annual torturous ritual called IPPT, and ruminated about the inevitability of life stages.

I hope he had a good dinner and not feel apologetic about my picking the tab. Happy Shabu Birthday Josh!

Tuesday Toast

1. I decided the lesser of two evils and settled for Toastbox to get my sweets fix after an unsatisfying dinner which consisted of roasted duck rice. That's half the amount of evil money that would have come out of my wallet if I had gone to Starbucks instead.

2. Toast Box seriously needs to update and change the sad repertoire of old chinese unoriginal songs that they are playing. I hear them all the time, no matter when I patronise them and which branch I go to.

3. Today's an important and supposedly happy day but because of a certain issue, I've been dispirited and heavy hearted. I hope I can resolve this soon and cruise ahead in a new Spring.

4. On a completely different note, I'm meeting Josh tomorrow for his belated birthday dinner, but I ain't have a place in mind. There's also a whole gang of people and individuals whom i've not caught up with for an eternity. I hope to find time to meet them soon!

5. Tomorrow shall be a better day. Gambate!