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Shirt by Calvin Klein: $300

Pants by Hugo Boss: $650

Belt by Louis Vuitton: $1500

Socks by Paul Smith: $100

Shoes by Bally: $1600

The look of relief on the wedding planner’s face when it dawns on him that the flowers were delivered on time, the cake didn’t fall on the floor, none of the cute little babies broke out wailing, the sun shone brightly as if on cue and the rain clouds stayed away despite pouring incessantly for a week prior — that essentially the entire wedding was perfect: Priceless

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~*~

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More on my (mis)adventures in wedding planning next in “Anatomy of a Wedding” coming soon!

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We are a dancer and a songstress, a box of secrets and a mystery; we revel in our power for you can only see us as pretty. We will dance till dawn because midnight just isn’t enough; we are siren songs seducing sailors in seas wild and rough. We are Pandora and her chest and from it all your sins released; we will coddle you, boy, you and your little beast.

We are mirrors and we are smoke; we are meek lambs turn lionesses when you provoke. Where’s the fire in this nation without our passion in fair ration? You suckle at our breasts — infants, men or perhaps less. We can do all of this on our own, you have our ardour merely on loan. You may be the father, but we are mothers who won’t be tamed. We are Independence and we will have you call us by our name.

Merdeka…

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We are poets without verse, we are priests without sermons. We won’t lecture or curse, we carry our men but not their burdens. Even if war and violence do they insist, our dreams for peace will endure, persist. We know of other paths to walk; we patiently listen while others balk. Even if noise and lies are all they offer, we will mend and care for those who suffer.

We embrace nature in all her glory; we sit by firelight and tell her stories. We have drunk deep from the past, we have learned those in their arrogance will not last. You call us witches sometimes, you blame us for your crimes. But you know not of our strength, even crippled we are not lame. We are Freedom and we will have you call us by our name.

Merdeka…

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We are queens and we are kings; do not underestimate us simply because we have feelings. Oh we will weep and we will lament, but our tears will dry and we will ascend. We are emancipation and we are our own sovereignty. We can govern better and with more grace and dignity. The rules you flout, the laws you bend; the time will come when you descend. And no, we shan’t gather and gossip in glee when your downfall becomes a reality.

Nay, we have a country to heal, a country to unite. For all your talk of harmony, our nation engaged in strife can only fight. We are wisdom and we are maturity; we will toil for our people’s serenity. See, we aren’t afraid of sweat and blood; we will protect when you flee from the floods. We will honour our land that you have cloaked in shame. We are Liberty and we will have you call us by our name.

Merdeka…

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~ * ~

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Call us diva, poet or queen; we will be heard, we will be seen. Here be our challenge, if you have courage to bear. Make our nation stronger, better, if you dare. If your hearts truly desire things not to remain the same, then stand up and deliver and shout out our name —

Merdeka. Merdeka. Merdeka.

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You attract boys like a pack of bees to honey
Though not all of us gentlemen, you see
We do know we’re in the presence of a lady
For whom we aim to please, to keep always happy.

O! For the charms of your womanly warmth
We’d wilfully be wanton; we’d arrest and alarm!
We’d line up a week early like Singaporeans barmy
If only for a whiff of your sweet scent lemongrassy.

Your seraphic smile would certainly launch
A hundred sailors drunken and staunch
Stumbling and fumbling into tattoo parlours to ink
Your name, on their bouncy biceps, in glorious pink.

O! You wash us ashore with your thighs and your tides
You make us wanna flush and flower from inside
In warm, fuzzy ecstasy till we can dissolve and hide
Between your fingers? your bosom? we shall confide.

You make us gush and blush like harmless fools
We could sustain ourselves just being your tools
Your dappled cheeks, your winsome peaks
Be our lioness, we are but your lambs so meek.

O! You are our opium, our endless field of poppies
In your careless delectation we are delirious puppies
Don’t tease us so, when shall we get to play and party?
After all, we’re not getting any younger and you’re already FORTY!

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Happy 40th Birthday, my Lyrical Lady. You will always be All Woman to me.

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This is wine country. Adelaide was where Dionysus laid down to rest, they say, his warm genitals nestled amongst her verdant valleys. The god of wine spills abundance all over the land. A stranger would never thirst here nor be lack of good cheer, her people are friendly to the point of amusement. Neighbours tumble together to pass the early evenings away, wrapped up in each other’s rustic charms. Her city hasn’t much of a nightlife to offer, so why not simply frolic away at the farm?

She has been here almost six years. She came to study medicine. It’s a vocation, not just a career, she tells herself and anyone else who would listen. She doesn’t want to be a doctor, not just a doctor. She wants to help people. Still. It’s almost impossible to bear. Time decides to take the scenic route in Adelaide. Feels like sixty years, really. Almost unbearable.

This really is wine country, she thinks, looking down at her glass of Merlot. He would love it here, he knows everything there is to know about wine. More than she cares to figure out on her own anyway. Good wine, bad wine, how do you tell? There’s something pleasing about letting him choose the wine and have him ramble on about its age and bouquet and colour and all the other clever terms she deigns to appropriate into her memory. No, she’ll leave that to him. She guards her memory like a dragon hoarding rare treasure, filled to the brim with medical terminology and every single detail of him. Precious.

We’ve been together for longer than I’ve been here, here in this wide open country, yet just a big island, really. We’ve been together so long and yet I’m still infatuated. It’s ridiculous. Me on my big island and him on his small one.

My Singapore Boy, she whispers into the wine goblet, my beautiful Singapore Boy. She has seen someone blow the smoke from a cigarette into one once, filling its crystal curvatures with swirling silk. Wisps of something ethereal, something otherworldly. You could cross worlds, cross an entire sea. She wonders, if she attempts the same, would she see him, lost in the smoke and mirrors?

Instead, she takes another sip of the Merlot. It never tastes as good here, even in the middle of wine country, not without her Singapore Boy. It used to sour her palate so but she’s past that now. Now she simply smiles thinly and dreams of the day she stops being his Adelaide Girl. The day she becomes his Singapore Girl instead.

One day. Her smile widens and she finishes the Merlot. Good wine.

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For Jun and her Singapore Boy.

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We disguise ourselves.

This isn’t the colour of our skins. Our flesh betrays only our ethnicities, not our ambitions nor our answers (for what questions? we sometimes wonder). These clothes we wear, they do not make us. We are not nylon and polyester, linen or wool. We would like to think we’re silk perhaps, but no, we’re not even that. These threads will unravel, you can pull them apart. But we shan’t unravel, not even when we fall apart. You will not know us. We are masters of disguise, we are good at what we do.

A hundred strangers passing each other every day in the streets. Our hair spring free, snake and hiss like Medusan tresses, our hair we wrap up in fervent modesty. We do not know each other. We can dye our hair or hide it. We can get a permanent wave or shave it all off. It makes no difference, really. We are not our hair.

Our shoes and our bags. Designer labels scream louder than a gentle word. Prada, Armani, Versace, Gucci; we shorten Louis Vuitton as LV. The more brands we flaunt, the less of ourselves we have to be. Identities can be discarded. We don’t have to be who we are. We can re-design ourselves.

Our hearts? Well, let’s just say we don’t wear ours on our sleeves. Every single way we could get hurt, we will, every single day. No, we rather keep our secrets, and no matter how many tries you make, all we’ll offer you are safe lies and vows turned fake.

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We disguise ourselves, but not always completely.

This is the colour of my eyes. It isn’t black or brown or blue or green or gold. Look into them and you might catch an honest glimpse of me. Here are my dreams and my hopes, everything I ever wanted to be. Here is the ideal me, the imperfect person you can love cos I keep on trying despite failing. I can’t fail all the time, right? I look into your eyes and I see your faith in me. All your love for me. We can’t mistake this, the evidence is irrefutable. Our eyes say it all.

This is your nose, sharp and certain. These are your cheeks, soft as cushions. These are your ears, where I whisper my confessions, all the bad that I am and the worse still that I get — that you will forgive regardless. This is your face, this is mine. We can’t hide anything from each other, the lies and secrets melt away. We let go and just go on.

I trail a finger slowly across your face, from your forehead down to your chin, pull up and rest it on your lips. Tell me anything, my sister my brother my friend my baby, anything you want. Tell me anything and let it be a promise. Tell me anything and let it come true.

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For KT + SC, on their 1st wedding anniversary,
a super-cute couple who reminded me how our faces say it all.

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You lie in bed, worn out from your fight
“Rest and recover,” says he, “from your plight.”
You barely understand a single word
The dreams and shapes come and go with the lights
This is a hospital bed, this is where angels fear to tread
This is your quiet daze, have his grace instead
“Sleep, dream no more, have your respite.”
He leaves you first.

The days and nights, they come and go
The angels sing yet they hang their heads down low
You circle and twist and the sheets are chains
Inescapable, some sort of unfastened pain
No more words, only fight.
With your beloved by your side.
These are quiet days when grace seems dead
He holds you first.

He kisses you even as the moon loses her light
The night claims, and darkness spreads then dissipates
Grace that waits, grace sent from Heaven
Angels have no words, only this song for a pair of songbirds.
Dawn breaks, it’s morning again, you open
Your eyes and he is the first song you hear
The consonant cries, “My dear, dear, dear…”
He loves you first.

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For A Lil Fat Monkey + McCutie, a pair of lovebirds in sickness and in health. (Get well soon, Monkey!)

1. The Promise
Brothers and sisters, lend me your dreams.

There is time yet (but not much) before they fade away for good. Do you wake up at dawn to a grey morning, downcast and devoid of life? Have you lost all desire to rise and reap your rewards of the day? Is your alarm clock now lying five meters from your bed, shattered into smithereens by a most excellent effort on your part (considering you were still half asleep when you threw it)? Are you ready to give up and give in?

Listen to me then, sisters and brothers, and trust me when I say that it’s not too late. There is time yet. Don’t throw away your precious thoughts. Lend me your dreams and we shall walk together into the Garden of Rainbows.

Our hopes collects together as a phoenix egg, ready to hatch and burst into everything we can ever imagine. There will be love and wonder and magic and even world peace. And more. Just imagine it. Stars and hula hoops and blue doggies and all the power you crave. Nothing you want is ever ridiculous or too naughty. Share your secrets with me. I promise you I won’t laugh.

No, trust me, sisterbrother, I won’t laugh. Your secrets are sacred, dearbrothersister and I’ll make them come true. All of them, if you will allow me.

Trust me. Lend me your dreams.

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2. The Persnickety Pair
A couple of livid liqueurs, conversing in questionable notes, perhaps a little floral (definitely fruity) —

Plum Wine: Don’t believe him.

Peach Schnapps: Not a word he says.

Plum Wine: He’ll promise you the world. It’s easy, talk is cheap. Don’t cost you a single penny.

Peach Schnapps: Just spittle.

Plum Wine: That’s right, just spittle. He’ll promise you the world, an entire theme park airbrushed by the local Gay Pride Parade, all the colours of the rainbow, all the fun and crazy rides that will knock your socks off — heck, why not the time of your life while he’s at it — and do you know what you actually end up with?

Peach Schnapps: Tell them.

Plum Wine: A pink flamingo.

Peach Schnapps: A pink flamingo.

Plum Wine: That’s right, a pink flamingo! Like we needed one. Like “we went to Disneyland and all we got is this stupid T-shirt” except a T-shirt we could wear, what are we gonna do with a pink flamingo?

Peach Schnapps: Not many applications for one in the present market.

Plum Wine: That’s right. It’s utterly useless! Where’s booze? The babes? The real macaroni-and-cheese? We’ve been duped, I tell you!

Peach Schnapps: Indisputably.

Plum Wine: Gah. He’s gotten me so mad. I need a bloody drink.

Peach Schnapps: Well, don’t look at me.

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3. The Pride and Joy
You are not quite used to this feeling. You’ve let all these years go by and still, there it is. That feeling. Like you’re a young girl again, as though you can spend a lifetime falling and tripping head over heels, and it’d be okay. You can’t imagine anything else you’d rather do. You’ve found a place where you can be who you are, truly.

You’ve found a place where you can be in love.

Is it silly to want to shout out your joy at the top of your lungs, announcing this perfect moment (this promise of more, many more such moments) to the whole world, sharing in your good fortune? Is it foolish to be this happy?

You want someone to tell you it is neither silly nor foolish, that you never have to come back down again, that you can remain in the clouds, your heart ready to burst from the perfect madness of it all. You have found no safer shore than this careless bliss. You pray this smile never leaves your lips nor that forever kiss that tastes like all the colours of the rainbow.

You’re high up in the heavens and you’re not afraid to fall.

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4. The Powderful Path
Someone’s used a pocketknife and carved the word “Powderful” on the table top. It used to be a door, now reincarnated and painted white. The stains and scars show.

You’ve met the preacher (the utopian evangelist, such a sweet and earnest man). You’ve encountered both performing pranksters, partners in peerless protestations. And you’ve met the picture of perfection, the love of your life. Or simply a promise of that fantasy. You sit at the table and wonder, do you believe?

Be it a warm cup of plum wine (梅酒) or a chilled shot of pfirsch schnapps, you don’t mind. You sure are thirsty. There is something more you need to discover, something you don’t quite understand.

Do you need directions or do you need a destination?

Maybe you just need a path and to start walking.

The Yellow Brick Road’s waiting for you. Oz and the Land of Wonders. The other side of the Looking Glass, the other side of the Wardrobe. Never-Never-Land. Somewhere you will find all the colours of the rainbow. Some day you will find all your answers. Go on. Just make sure you strap on your ruby slippers first, or your Manolo Blahniks or your Jimmy Choos. Or maybe a pair of white Louis Vuitton sneakers.

You’re good to go.

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Credits: Photographs (taken @ Palate Palette) and design by Kenny Mah.

You’ve been invited. To an exclusive soirée. Behave.

We know how it will all end, of course. Everything falls apart, it’s the thing these days. So I begin to gently decline when she informs me it wasn’t a request. You’ve been invited. You will come.

And in the pause, in the alarming silence, there hangs a subtle “Or else…”

Or else what? We’d never know, these aren’t questions we ask. No, we just don’t ask questions.

And so I go. I even reach the restaurant on time. Some fancy all-the-cuisines-from-around-the-world buffet is in full swing. No fancy folks though, just families with querulous kids. Everything’s a mystery, everything’s exciting, even day-old sashimi. Not that they served that, no.

I was the only one at our table, naturally. I’ve always missed out on the concept of being fashionably late. Once you’ve allowed German punctuality into your system, it’s an abominable trait to try and be rid of. Still, it meant I didn’t miss the Middle-Eastern belly dancer sashaying out of the kitchen.

(Later, I’ll find out she’ll spring herself upon diners every hour upon the hour so my fellow dinner guests did not in fact miss her act, or what tried to pass off as one. The ladies at the table were rather merciless in their dismissal of the dancer of having neither the bosom nor the bottom required of this ravishing role.)

They arrived eventually, one charming couple after another. Different ages, different centuries even, maybe. She wasn’t joking. I was supposed to be young blood. Am I to be a last resort infusion to inject some life into this reclusive menagerie?

Then the star of the night arrived, the Lady of Fine Wine (as in aged well, ahem). I was to be her escort for the evening, her “poodle” as I had been informed to my indignation. Heck, if I played my cards right, I might land me a sugar mommy by the end the night.

Sweet.

Didn’t help much though, that I laughed heartily (perhaps too much so) at the jokes the gentlemen at the table cracked at her expense. Perhaps it’s true that hearing loss is a necessary item in one’s application for senior citizenship? To my dismay, I saw my reputation for chivalry being torn to shreds with every unfortunate guffaw on my part.

(But I couldn’t help myself. They. Were. So. Funny.)

Still, you know it’s time to leave when the waiters refuse to refill your Bottomless Wine Goblet. Apparently the restaurant has this habit of closing up every night. Fear not, beloved readers, we had cards still up our sleeves. The same five-star hotel in which this no-run-of-the-mill restaurant resided also housed a dance club, the name of which the Lady of Fine Wine promptly misheard as “Piles” and consequently questioned if it were for runaways from old folks homes only.

As we transfered our full bellies and heavy derrières from The Mill to Pulse, we were confronted by a sign that warned us not to conceal any bodyguards we may possess. (Do they come in handy pocket-sized packs these days? Wow.) The fact the sign was accompanied by a burly and finely-dressed bouncer convinced us that they were serious and probably wouldn’t take too kindly to our hearing-impairment humour.

We knew people who knew people, though. We got in.

(That’s the way the world works, kids. Don’t let anyone tell you no different.)

I must mention at this point that I had not one sip of alcohol in me all night, and despite the bottle of whiskey they had ready at the club, I stuck to sips of soft drinks. Which makes it odd that I was the first on the dance floor. Wasn’t booze supposed to give you courage? (Well, more of it certainly doesn’t hurt.)

It was Retro Night. Songs from the 80’s. (When did the 80’s become retro?) I’d feel old except I was the youngest person there. I hadn’t danced in aeons, really, but it all comes back. Like riding a bicycle or shagging a moose. (Did I say shagging? I meant skinning, I did.) Whether it was the Hot Hoochie Mama (Formerly Known as the Lady of Fine Wine) or being sandwiched in between a husband-and-wife-team who seemed rather happy humping my front-and-rear, it was to remember.

What it felt like. Dancing. So free. Wild abandon. Not a worry in the world.

Almost one a.m. I send you a text message. I say my goodbyes to the reluctant gang, now convinced I’m some kind of elixir for the elderly, and I exit the dance club, sparing Mr. Bouncer a friendly wink on the way out. The air outside is stunning. Nothing like leftover carbon monoxide from all the city’s cars to remind one what it feels like to be alive.

You drive the car over to the curb. I hop in. You smell like fresh rain and I can’t help but give you a smile that explodes. You ask me how the night was.

“Pretty good,” I say, “but not as good as with you. Take us home, baby.”

And so you did.

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Credits: Photograph by FatBoyBakes @ The Mill, Grand Millenium KL. Design by Kenny Mah.

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There are some soft shells here scattered like silences across the fields, where the daisies are afraid of being treaded upon. There is no wind, only the memory of one, and so we know, this is a dream, of course. A dream we share, a dream of us. A private space we inhabit, one we cannot possess when we are awake. We are not together, don’t mean we cannot be together. We keep telling ourselves this. It’s a mantra, it’s a reminder, it’s a prayer. It’s our hope. One day, we tell each other, one day things will change and we’ll get our chance. There will be no cages, no traces, no colours, no others. One day we’ll be together, just as we are, in this dream of ours. You can tell yourselves these things, when you are dreaming. But when we wake…

Who will wake up first, we wonder?

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For everyone who has ever told me they were in love but in despair also;
Here’s a prayer for you: May you be find joy always.

You are Venus and I am Mars. Is it true, then, those who love must be at war? These aren’t tantrums, this isn’t combat — we have no battle wounds but I fear it all scars just the same. We’re only human, after all.

Some joke delivered poorly, some shift in the wind, and it blows us the wrong way, we are thrown back in the fray. The silence is like a dull knife, deafening in its steady slice. Why do we always hurt the ones we love? I have had some practice, I have learned my lessons, except the most important one, the simplest wisdom: We can’t avoid this. We will always hurt the ones we love. We will always hurt.

These things we say, they are only words and words are meaningless. They are nothing. These things we say, they are all words and words are meaning. They are everything.

These rare (but rapidly regular) incidents of minor disagreements, of misunderstood disappointments, they creep up on us like misled malice, like thieves hitting the wrong jobs; we are always taken unawares. My fear is that one day it will be too much for one of us or both, and all this magic will end. We will cease and separate and return to dust. We don’t want to be alone again, not after having been together, not after having being One, but can we help this?

We will always hurt the ones we love. These things we say, they are everything.

How do you banish heartache from your heart? (The same way, one would assume, one hopes to forgo breathing from one’s life.)

I am Venus and you are Mars. We can choose to see our mistakes and our mis-steps. We’ve both scars enough, time to let go and let heal. We’re human, after all, and we can learn.

We’d be fools to not see what we have: a pretty near perfect thing going here. Let us be grateful for what we have: good fortune to wake up each morning in each other’s arms, to wash and break fast together, to come home to dinner we make together, to watch good films and read good stories (your Chinese fantasy novels and my damn American comics), to wash again and close the day, slipping under the covers, sealing the night with a tender kiss, ready to dream of the morning when we will do this all over again.

We can’t avoid this. We will always hurt the ones we love. We will always hurt. That’s okay. What matters is that we love each other, that we continue to do so, that we show it in every moment, from us exchanging quiet tasks like me cooking for you when you come back late or you surprising me by making the bed when I’m not looking. We never forget to be kind to each other. Love is a verb, they say, not just a feeling. Feelings come and feelings go. If we love each other, that goes on forever.

These things we say, they are nothing. Even when we are mad at each other for the smallest stupid stupid thing, we love in the silences. Let these little spats be our love as Fury, let them never be cold, never harsh. We shan’t be afraid, or be afraid but have this fear be good, for we want what we are together enough not to take it for granted. We shall cease and return to dust, but we won’t separate, not us. We won’t banish heartache from our hearts; we’ll bear it not as a burden but as proof that we are alive still and always, always in love.

So. Let’s fight. Let’s be childish and not talk to each other. Let’s take turns at crumbling first and then succumbing to a smirk, then a giggle, tickling the other in a silly concession of defeat, let us kiss and make up and fuck! let’s make love, let’s remind ourselves we are alive and in love and what a blessed thing this is. The stars are us and damn if we don’t shine till them heavens burst!

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This is Part Four in the “A Day in Our Life…” series. Read Part One, Part Two and Part Three.
Credits: “Graveyard Statue Series 1″ by Stephan Szpak-Fleet. “Seaweed” by Björgvin Guðmundsson.
Design by Kenny Mah.