A present at 30

Around June this year, I started thinking about turning 30 in a positive way. The twenties no longer felt like a golden era I had to cling on to. I started telling people I was 30 when they asked. Tomorrow, that is what I will be.

I did think, though, that I should do something momentous and cliched to mark the turn of the decade. Perhaps get that tattoo. I thought about trees and roots and words, and then I forgot about tattoos.

But God thought it was time for a body modification too.

I started feeling it in my chest, pms symptoms dragging on a week too long.

On 9th November, I groggily took a pregnancy test first thing in the morning. No spectacles on, teeth unbrushed. Two lines appeared. I took the box out to k, who was already up and trying to submit a paper online. I showed him the box and the test stick.

"What does this mean? So what does it mean? You're pregnant? Don't worry, it may not be accurate."

I would have clobbered him, except I was also unsure that something so cheap could be relied on to tell me the biggest news of our lives. So we shrugged it off and went about our day. In the afternoon I took another test. It was positive too.

Again, we pretended it was false. But we brought home a digital ClearBlue pregnancy test kit, because the more expensive, the more accurate?

It blinked and calculated for a minute, way longer than my cheap tests took.
Finally it decided. "Pregnant."

Humans are strange beings. A printed word is like the News, it just Is. With that word, we finally allowed ourselves to believe and rejoice.

I called my parents. My mum picked up, and I told her to go wake Daddy up. "Why, you're pregnant ah?"She just didn't let me have my moment. Lots of fumbling and phone clicking later, they were both on speakerphone, and I said this big sentence for the first time. "Yes, I'm pregnant."

"Congratulations,"my father said very properly. I wouldn't expect anything less from him.
"Aiya, I knew it,"said my mother.

The next few days were happy ones, telling k's family and my friends, absorbing all the joy that was exploding around us. We went to Choon Kit and we got a gynae appointment at Mt E. I was seven weeks in.

At the gynae's clinic, I was still worried that my test result was a false positive. I did a urine test for the nurse to check, and I was waiting for her response to tell me if I was really pregnant or not. But she glanced at it and tossed it into the dustbin. "First pregnancy?"she asked. That was a relief.

Then finally, we saw it for ourselves on tv. A mass of black, my uterus, which I'd always thought was faulty, and at the top, a blueberry-sized cluster and a tiny blinking dot. Our baby's beating heart. Dr Kek turned the sound on. I felt k melt into my side and lean his cheek on my head. All my worries about him not being in the moment had been unfounded.

I carried that beating heart with us to Tokyo, and I fed that beating heart lots of food. I took rest stops in the middle of our long walks, and went to bed thinking about the beating heart.

Today, our little blueberry is the size of a lemon. The last time we saw it on tv, it was waving its hands about and bouncing. I realized that even while I couldn't see it or take care of it, God was making it grow, and it was busy doing its own thing inside there.

Tomorrow I turn 30, and already I care less about my own birthday than the impending birth of this little one.

Thank You God, for your gift in Your good time. We don't know where we're headed or what You want us to do. But for now at least we know we are to take care of this gift You've given us, and that's more than enough.

Movie Dreams

1. I had a magic time-travelling notepad. It was palm-sized and I believe you could buy it at most HDB stationery shops. To time-travel, I just had to write the time and date on one of the lines and touch the printed pencil icon beside it. I tried it and had an incredible whizzing feeling, and was brought back by five minutes.

So the grand plan was to go back several decades and cause an upheaval in the kingdom. My partner and I were changing into our costumes in the public toilet of the castle, and packing sunblock in a rush. We climbed down a million steps to the carpark lobby, where we saw the enemy's horse carriages parked. My quick brain told me that when we returned to the present after causing our upheaval, we had to come back five minutes earlier to puncture his carriage tyres. It was all perfectly planned, and then I coughed and woke up.

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2. My mother's dream. She was a village girl in the Middle East, unmarried and vulnerable. News came that a horde of men were coming to rape all the unmarried women in the village, and so there was a flurry among the virgins to get themselves husbands. All found willing men, except my poor single mother.

Fortunately for her, King Kong came to the village, not being so big as to cause a major stir, and told my mother he would marry her if she wanted. The horde of rapists was so imminent a threat that she agreed. Later on she admitted to King Kong that she actually didn't love him. She'd only married him for the protection. King Kong was very sad, but said, "Actually I know that you're just using me, but it's alright."

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3. Last night I was part of a group of happy students sent to a foreign land to do good. Little did we know that when we arrived in that foreign land, we would be rich but under their evil influence. Nights were spent in a hotel party setting, reclining on various armchairs and watching our leaders do evil things. I had not yet been tainted by evil, and wanted desperately to escape. But k turned evil one night, murdering someone the way our leaders did, in a circular arena enclosed by glass. He rose to leadership of our group and wore elaborate jackets of white and red. He was still the k I knew, but I was numbed with fear of him.

My chance arrived on my birthday, when a busload of Singaporeans made their way to our foreign camp to attend my birthday party. I saw them, all motherly and well-wishing, and knew that I had to try and show hints of my distress. I couldn't explicitly ask for help, because I was under the watchful eye of Evil K. One of the Singaporeans was my Chinese teacher from primary school, and we cried as we looked at each other and expressed our greatest thanks.

Mother to k: Come, stir this.

Mother to me: Quick, take photo of him!

Yesterday was my parents' 31st wedding anniversary. Also bong's and paki's birthdays. But we can only celebrate one thing at a time. So it was my parents' anniversary.



Beauty and Mothers.

Not a very flattering shot for either of us, but the only one on my dad's computer.

I don't know what I would look like if my mother hadn't been around all my life. I've said before that I'm not dressing the way I feel inside; largely because my mother edits my wardrobe, pushes me to dress for my body type, skin color, and age.

Words that have shaped my life include:
"You need a waist."
"Yes, those shoes are too flat."
"I know what you're trying to do, the natural look, but please draw more eyeliner."
"Today you look like a small kid!"
"Women like us need makeup. Like Zoe Tay, she needs makeup."
"Watch, when you turn 28, you will suddenly dress like a kid."
"Shall we dye your hair tonight?"
"Because you weren't around to stop me, I bought this for you."

And because of these words, I have looked better, acquiring a waist, having noticeable eyes, looking more proportionate, and everything my own eyes cannot judge. In the same breath, I have come to not be able to see what I look like, judging instead only what my makeup looks like. And I've come to care more about what looks good on me, rather than what I feel like wearing.

In turn, I contribute to the discourse on her daily outfits. People wonder what we talk about, she the famous speaker on campus who people come to for mentorship and counselling. Yes, we do talk about the Bible and God and all the important stuff. But every morning, it's more likely to be "Should I wear this necklace?" "Quick, tell me what shoes I should wear!" or "Look at my new eyeshadow."

My mother turned me into an incurable vainpot. But when I tell her so, she says, "You influenced me ah! Before you were born I didn't care about such things!"

Pottery is wearing me down. Just when I thought I had developed the strength for it, I"m learning how contradictory pottery is, like a coquettish Chinese girl quoting riddles. I refused to let my teacher correct my pots as he always does, because I suspected I still didn't have the skills to complete a pot. I was right. He tells me I have to learn taichi, and use my mind to tell my hand to remain in position. Sharon and I gaze at our dizzily spinning pots and magically make them grow tall, and suddenly they collapse and open up like calla lilies.

But it's good. I was feeling my arms and being happy at how strong and firm pottery is making them. When I got home I made my mother squeeze them.

"So soft!" she cried. "Soon they will jigglyjig!" And flicked them to demonstrate the jigglyjig.

Birthday Silliness

My mother doesn't know she's being set up in a mock kiss shot.
But I know it.

Happy new year everyone. Tomorrow: First day of primary school for a cousin, first day of secondary school for many, first day of a new job for me. How do I drag myself out of the holiday-ing mood? My room is in a festive catastrophic mess, too many goodies are uneaten on the kitchen counter, and I can't find my nail polish remover to redo my nails. I simply cannot go back to normal life tomorrow.

So imagine this. My mum invited her professor friends over for dinner, and I came home to things being laid out. "They're bringing a friend," she tells me. "Bring out an extra chair." They arrive and she says, "Their friend didn't come." I don't particularly care, but I offer to clear away the extra chair, and my mum hushes me away with a "Not now la! Let them rest."

And tadah, just before dinner, k shows up and my parents shout, "Surprise! It's your birthday!" It's not my birthday, not even a week to it, but it's suddenly carnival night on Tah Ching Road with fireworks spelling my name. He brings a strudel and is proud of himself for keeping his visit a secret.
So thus begins my first birthday cake of the year, with k and my dad the most exuberant and expressive birthday singers one could ask for. Professor Keith and his Lady Goodness Jeanette were interesting birthday guests, telling spy stories and how their first date was on an African safari.

My parents are always trying to give me birthday surprises. There were a few consecutive years of surprises, until I had to tell them to stop because I expected it. The very first surprise was when I was five or six. She shoved my friends and me into my room to play Candyland, and when she called us out all my friends were in the living room. I pretended to faint, because I was a dramatic kid. I did that a couple more times until my mum said, "stop it ah."

Last night my mother was mighty pleased with herself because I had the shock of my life. Firstly that k had shown up; secondly, that it was my birthday party to begin with. She said, "I had it early so she would be surprised. Next year we'll have it in October. Confirmed surprised!"

Today my mother told lots of people how I used to aspire to being a coroner. A forensic pathologist, some call it. She told them that while other little girls carried their dolls, my dolls were all wrapped in plastic and covered in marker lines. It's true. Although I gave up playing coroner pretty fast because it was too easy investigating a murder I set up myself.

The moral of her story was not to worry about what we will become, because we are constantly changing. I, for one, am not a coroner. And after going through university and interviews and various jobs, I still don't know what I will become.

I was hired for this job to be a copywriter. When they learnt I had graphic design training, they made me one of their graphic designers. When they learnt I had motion graphic training, they sent me to work for a film director. When the director learnt I can loop music for her soundtrack, guess what, that's my job too.

I didn't have to whip out my portfolio for any of these opportunities, didn't have to prove that I'm at all proficient. One guess is that in this real world, whoever happens to stand next to the shovel picks it up. But a better guess is God's giving me the opportunities to do everything I ever liked doing. And then maybe I will learn what I can live without doing, and what I want to wake up for everyday.

One thing I've already learnt, that doing things as if I was doing them for God, and not for Man, makes everything better.

i love my family!

Convocation came and went and the outfit wasn't as awkward as expected, and the after-ceremony buzz wasn't as exciting as expected. Maybe cos not everyone in our batch was there, and everybody was scattered with their own clusters of loved ones.

But I am truly happy to have graduated, for I didn't do it alone--I was sent to school by different supporters every year who wanted to see me through university. Sometimes in school I wondered if I was doing the right thing, if i could just walk through without putting in too much effort. But nobody can think of just walking through, when every cent of that education is paid for in answer to parents' earnest prayers.

I didn't really care for the mortar board, or the certificate, or the transcript. But seeing my parents so happy, I was happy that I could get these things. We went to the supermarket the day before and my parents made me choose flowers that they could give me after the ceremony. My dad was hyper-wound the entire day and stressed my mum up.

So now I think I know what education is for: it's the last thing parents can give you before you try and make it on your own, and it's a rite of passage you have to go through together. I don't have any family besides them, and I wouldn't want to spend my convocation day with anyone else.

This birthday, hongkong was a familiar queer friend,

with laundromats and bellboys who haven't changed in fifteen years,

and fathers who had to sleep right there and then while we waited

while looking at tights more expensive than shoes

and parents who are strange and wonderful together.

We're not awfully exciting but we want to be with each other.

I used to have huge ambitions, but now I don't. Not really. I just want to be walking meekly on the ground in God's shadow, to look up every few steps and see that I'm still following Him, to pick up some weeds that look like flowers along the way and be contented to think they are flowers.

I used to need to plan and accomplish great things. Now I just want to be useful--cleaning up if i'm in the house, buying a present if i'm out, drawing if i have a pen. I would hate to be very busy and accomplished out in the world, and not useful at all at home.

I can't see what the future will hold. I can only see what is before me today, and what I can do in the next few hours. And so I hope to do it with all my heart.

Sometimes she looks in the mirror and gets a shock, because she sees me. It's not the features exactly. It's something else, our regard for the world perhaps, that makes one face like the other.

At my age she boarded the Logos and sailed around the world, living in Europe, Africa, India. At my age she left my father, her then-boyfriend, and went to do what God was telling her to do. This photograph is of her at twenty-four, married and in Singapore.

If we regard the world in the same way, with that arch of the eyebrow and a settled mouth, why is my life so different from hers when she was my age? It seems like all opportunity for life change hangs in the next three years, the time gap between us in our photographs.

In some ways I'm doing what she didn't get to do in her time. In other ways I'm doing what she used to do--drawing, writing, answering the phone in her voice. But always there is an envy, the same kind of envy that I imagine someone has of a twin whose life just seems to make more sense.

I never realised it until now, but I have a bizarre appetite for danger.

My dreams about organised crime and kidnaps started when I was about seven years old. I could blame my father for making me think that all men were out to get me--he was always teaching me to punch and block and duck. I got boxing gloves when I was in primary school, and a punching bag last year. The first movie my dad took me to watch was Lethal Weapon. Today, I'd watch an action thriller over a romantic comedy anytime.

My mother has made her contributions too. "If you're in the lift with any man, hold your key in your fist!" For eye-poking purposes of course. She has her own tales of fending for herself in India against drunken men and hooligans, with knives, boiling water and stones.

I've been trained in self defense for years. And so I always walk around ready to practice what I've been taught, expecting danger to lurk around every corner. I look behind me when I walk home and I remember the details of people in my lift. I requested pepper spray for my last birthday and am rather disappointed that all the defense i get to do is in my dreams.

Today in coffee club, I saw a man leave his table abruptly and storm off. He was wearing sunglasses though it was dim indoors, and he had this menacing expression on his face. And he left his bag behind on the chair. I immediately blurted, "Bomb!" I tried telling the waitress about the suspicious bag when she took our orders, but Dawn hit me on the head. Later I saw that all his friends had left their bags behind too, and of course they all had to come back and sit around and laugh and talk again.

And then I got home. I put my key through the keyhole and turned, and pushed on the door. But it was stuck. I pushed harder, but it only budged a millimetre. It felt like it had been glued to the doorway. I rang the doorbell and stared at the door. The logical conclusion I came to? That a burglar had broken in and taken my father hostage and had taped the door shut with masking tape. Then I thought that if that was indeed true, then the burglar would open the door and stab me or kidnap me as well. I ran behind a pillar and watched the door from a distance.

I'm blogging about it now, so you probably can guess that it was a false alarm, and that my father opened the door and that the door was only temporarily stuck. You're probably even laughing at me now for being paranoid.

But it's not my fault. When i got through the door, I told my father all my worries and why I'd run away. He said, "Smart! But next time get to your phone first and call the police."