Here's to life

It's been nearly impossible to blog for the past month. I moved, and the new place did not have an Internet connection for an extended period of time. Then my desktop at my parents' crashed, so what little online time I got became next to nothing once I lost my only computer with online access.

I finally signed up for a Singnet account last week, solved further problems that prohibited online access, and here I am blogging on a Dell laptop at my new desk. The experience is exquisite.

Other experiences -

In January, I got to have an old friend stay for a few days. Ice-cream and coffee and cookies and ideas about which is more amazing: that there is life beyond our planet, or that we are completely alone in the universe?

In January, I also started teaching at a particular university in Clementi. I'm teaching English to students from China, and dare I say, loving (and loathing...on some days anyhow) it. Since many of the other lecturers in the department are much older, I dress corporate in a bid to gain a measure of respect from my students. However, it seems I can't run from my baby face; in the washroom, I've noticed the quizzical looks from Singaporean girls (all dressed in the latest fads - knee-length leggings, belted tunics, babydoll tops which are on the return) who probably wonder why a university-going kid dresses like an office girl.

I get to have lunch with my old Michigan crony, Peiming, who teaches at the Conservatory, and we commiserate about being the youngest and looking the youngest (of course, she has a height advantage which I dismally lack). I get to walk around the bazaar area, taking in the sights and sounds as a tourist would. Today, I bought souvenirs. Two hand-painted wooden doll-magnets - the boy's dressed in a yellow shirt and blue shorts with suspenders and the girl's got on a red Hawaiian dress.

Two days ago, I found an old CD that marked my last undergraduate days in Ann Arbor. During that time, I had attended a few ceremonies, done my reading for the writing program, and had one final essay to complete. One afternoon, I left my brother to entertain my parents, and drove in the pouring rain towards the graduate library. I found relevant books on Percy Bysshe Shelley and his poem "Ozymandias," selected a carrel, and set to work.

Back then, I had my Creative discman constantly at my side, and on that afternoon, I was playing a CD my father had brought over for me. Jacintha Abisheganaden's "Autumn Leaves." She made several pleasant renditions of Johnny Mercer songs, but it was the final bonus track that I kept on repeat mode - "Here's to Life" which Jacintha sang for the film "Play it to the bone."

Staring at the rain falling over the roofs of the university buildings, knowing it was the last essay I would write as an undergraduate, wistful about my departure of a town I'd come to love very much, I spent more time listening to the lyrics of the song than analyzing the lines of "Ozymandias," which itself is a great poem about the passage of time and the inevitable fading of human life and all things material. It was a favorite poem of mine, but music has a slightly greater power over me and I gave myself over to the melancholic strains of the song.

Of course, a few years later, I returned to the same university for graduate school. Much had changed by then (in the town and in myself). But I was glad to be back and doing what I'd always wished to do: read and write. And then the time to leave came by again. It was harder the second time round. And what did I return to? I'm still not sure. Perhaps I'll leave it at a life that's been good and painful.

Here's to life by Jacintha Abisheganaden

Posted by Monoceros at February 12, 2007 10:27 PM