The idea of this website. Exposing yourself to scrutiny to one and all on the web.
But I don't get much exposure. Not much, anyway. Not that I'm seeking it. Two thousand hits in five years isn't ---

You're not answering the question.
I'm not?

Why post anecdotes of your life on the internet where you don't have control over the readership? And you do realize you come across as an idiot at the end of it all?
Sometimes. Most of the time, not that it's ever intentional.

You're still not answering the question.
I just happen to like writing, I suppose. Maintaining this website gives my writing a sense of purpose, and in a way I suppose they're sustaining each other in a discreet sort of way, the writing and this website. Sometimes it's easier to write when you have a visualization of the kind of effect that you're trying to create; things like the mood and feeling that you want to bring out. Font style and size, pictures to complement the piece. It's like having a beautiful photograph in front of you and you just describe it in words. And also because I want you to share my suffering.

You don't seem to be suffering.
I don't?

You seem happy.
Well, sure. But not always. Sometimes it's hard. You can't always suffer. It's hard to suffer all the time. But I suffer enough. I suffer sometimes. I don't think your questions are entirely relevant by the way.

They're not?
No. The idea of this page is to introduce me, remember? What we've been discussing about so far has been the motive--- for want of a better word--- of creating this website, which has already been covered briefly in the acknowledgements section.

Erm right. So where did you grow up?
I was born in 1978 in Singapore. Tiny island-nation on the southern tip of Malaysia, in Southeast ---

I know Singapore.
Really? All my life I've lived in Holland Close, in an apartment just a stone’s throw away from this bohemian village called Holland Village, long before it acquired the bohemian tag. It's kind of weird if you look at it. Once the area was all just coffee shops and provision stores and the best-dressed people around were probably the counter staff who worked in the bank across the road. Now the place is choke-full of fast food outlets, fine dining and drinking joints and specialized shops, with American, Japanese, European and Chinese expatriates frequenting the place. Recently a government body moved into its new premises about ten minutes walk away so now you see professionals in office attire thronging the place during lunchtime everyday. Even the remaining provision shops have gone up-market in their pricing.

Who's in your immediate family?
My parents and brother. And my grandfather too, until he passed away when I was fourteen. My father's family used to live on this small island called Pulau Brani before moving over to the mainland. Two of my uncles stayed with us until I was about five, I think. I think it’s nice to live in a large family. You get to interact with more people and life is a lot more interesting in the sense that it's not just the same old faces.

Both my parents were working at the time so my uncles would bring my brother and me along for walks in the neighborhood during the day. Off the cuff I remember one of my uncles, my father's elder brother, telling me about how traffic lights work (actually he was rebuking me for playing with the buttons even when we weren't going to cross the road), and the other (the younger brother) fooling me into eating green chili.

I take it that you’re not very bright.
I don't think I was even in kindergarten at that time yet. Anyway those were just some anecdotes from my childhood. There were others like folding paper ingots with my grandfather to fill up this enormous brown paper sack, playing with this cool rounders bat my father carved from a wooden plank, and visiting my mother at her office in town.

What of your brother?
My grandfather used to tell me how he'd pour powder all over my face when I was but a defenseless baby and I remember getting freaked out when he got down on all fours and crawled after me like a tiger but in the end I got even when I grew a little older I guess, haha. I was this irritating little brother who got on his nerves more often than not but he let me get away with it most of the time. We had quite a massive collection of toys as well--- Masters of the Universe, Star Wars, Transformers, G.I. Joe etc. They’d be worth a mini-fortune today if not for those missing heads and limbs.

We liked our comics as well. Beano, Masters of the Universe, Roy of the Rovers and one mandarin title about two boys growing up in a monastery. We used to draw our own comic series--- a few pieces of blank A4-sized paper stapled together--- with characters we created individually and have cross-overs like the Marvel Comics group does to increase their readership pool.

What were your comics about?
There wasn't much of a plot actually. The protagonists would just run around a lot--- some can even fly--- and engage in a lot of fighting, martial arts style, with swords and somersaults, stuff like that. It was never gory though. One issue would be around six pages long and I would draw a really big close-up of a character’s face and stick it on the cover page, complete with title and episode number.

What schools did you attend?
I went to this kindergarten next to a huge swimming pool on the outskirts of Holland Village. I missed about two weeks of lessons, I think, before I was literally dragged kicking and screaming into the classroom.

Oh dear.
When I was seven I attended New Town Primary, a fifteen-minute walk from my home. Most of the kids already knew each other from nursery which the school also used to run, but I didn’t know that until a year later. My grandfather used to walk my brother and me to and from school, and every recess he'd buy us noodles to eat. This went on until I was in Primary Three, I think.

I was also in the cadet scouts for around three years I think. The scout uniform back then was an all-khaki ensemble with a white scarf, green cap, brown belt with HUGE silver buckles and greenish socks completing the look. The cloth was really thick, not like the cotton green material you have nowadays. On Founder’s Day we had to wear the uniform to school, which I did so with pride. There were these badges awarded to you for completing courses you see, in addition to badges that signify your rank.

So what did you learn as a scout?
I was only a cadet scout actually--- scouts are for the secondary school level. A bit of marching, which stood me in good stead in secondary school and later in the army. We also learnt all sorts of complicated rope tying skills, but I only remember the rift knot now: right over left, left over right. There was also a knot about a bunny hopping through a burrow, but I can’t do that anymore. Then there were the campfires and scout songs of course. I actually still remember the scout motto (Be Prepared), the scout rule, and the scout law, which is amazing, when you consider the fact that I can't even remember my college song from seven years back. And this was like almost fifteen years ago.

You mentioned something about having to march in secondary school?
Only in the first two years, before new buildings were integrated into the school at The Chinese High. The laboratories and classrooms used to be at opposite ends of the school and we had to fall-in outside our classroom on the tarmac road and march up and down a hill to get to the library or laboratories. It’s quite funny when you think of it; adolescents in shorts marching like military soldiers. We had to bow to teachers outside the classroom as well. There was this deep-rooted sense of tradition ingrained in the institution. The Japanese had used the school buildings as a military base during World War Two and occasionally we’d find Japanese tourists walking around the premises in groups during lesson time. Shortly after the war the school also hosted a brief stand-off between communists and the police.

The school has simply grown bigger and bigger since I left. I went back a few years ago and there were koi swimming around outside the new hall, new terraces, new buildings, and even a new boarding school. It's quite incredible.

Did you learn more interesting rope knots in your time in secondary school?
No, I was in Track and Field for the first twenty months and in the Micromouse club after that. There was an E.C.A fair in the first few weeks for Secondary One students and the various clubs would conduct trails for everyone. I didn’t think I really caught the eye, but I ended up in athletics anyway. The new intakes were all grouped together--- there were more than twenty of us I think--- and we would train thrice a week, sometimes four times, going on long runs and doing all sorts of drills to strengthen specific muscle groups. There is this flight of terraces that all students had to assemble on every morning for flag raising and morning announcements, and during training we would have to hop up the steps; first with either foot then with frog jumps. We also did wheel-carts up a slope occasionally, which was bizarre. Looking back all that training when I was thirteen has done me a lot of good, even though I struggled at the time. I always enjoyed the training though; it was the first time I was receiving proper coaching of any sort.

I still remember my first pair of running shoes, a pair of white Wilson with blue trimming. I'd keep it in a blue shoe bag and bring it to school every alternate day when there’s training. It's a good name, Wilson, not just for volleyballs.

Huh?
Castaway, Tom Hanks, desert island, volleyball.

Oh. You were saying?
I had that pair of Wilson for less than a year I think. Literally ran it into the ground. My mother nagged me to buy a new pair of trainers but I wouldn’t listen. Finally Wilson fell to pieces so I had to get new shoes, a pair of blue Adidas. That barely saw me through to the next year as well.

You must have done a lot of running to wear your shoes out in under a year.
Actually I played football in them as well. We would stay back after training sometimes and have a kick around on a full-length pitch. Not everyone was proficient at the sport, but because we were all athletes, we just chased the ball around for starters. I played in centre defence because of my height and probably because I could kick the ball hard as well, a bit like Tony Adams in his years as a donkey. There was this guy in our group who was my class-mate as well who easily stood out with his pace and intricate ball control. He told me he had developed his considerable skills while playing with a rubber ball with his kid brother when they were much younger. Anyway playing together with him after our training and showing the little that I could do probably gave me a chance to play in the class team.

We had a football tournament in school for the different age groups every year. Theoretically there would be thirty guys available to fill up eleven places in the team as we are an all-guys school but not everyone was interested in the sport. Anyway we had quite a strong team and reached the final where we lost by some farcical score, 4-5 or 5-6 I think. We were a couple of goals up then our goalkeeper conceded one when he was caught wiping his glasses but the whole team played badly that day. There were some tears shed at the final whistle but the following year with the same group of players we went on to win a gold medal for each of us.

We were streamed to different classes in Secondary Three and once again I had the good fortune to play in a fine team. We had a large pool of players to choose from and even those who didn’t make the team were football daft. I was playing as the last man in front of the goalkeeper and there were games when I barely needed to touch the ball! Once again I made the final on the back of my teammates’ efforts and won a difficult game to capture gold.

My good luck on the pitch ran out in my senior year though. The opposition keeper scored to dump us out of the tournament in the second round I think.

How did we end up talking about football?
Don’t ask me. Even back then I was known as the Manchester United fan in the class. It was all about Liverpool and Arsenal in those days, remember, and ironically I wanted to support a team that would be in with a shout but didn’t win things season after season. Arsenal won the title in 1990, then Leeds the year after. After United rose to dominance from 1992 onwards, everyone in school either loved or hated them. I never engaged in much mickey-taking though, I just enjoy watching good football. I have an Arsenal friend who could still remember Lee Dixon’s own goal from the halfway line a long time ago and we had a good laugh over it.

What about the micromouse club?
It was a stark contrast to Track and Field. There were less than ten of us in the club when I joined but it was a very close group and we had lots of fun participating in robotics and micromouse competitions on a National level. We were left very much to our own devices by the school initially but in the end I guess we were victims of our own success as we were merged with the computer club and then with the Maths and Science society. So we had gone from a new independent club to a sub-sub-set of an alien organization in the space of two years. In a way we were like micromice, running into dead-ends enforced by the authorities.

Meaning the loss of autonomy?
Yeah. Before we had only one teacher consultant, a nice --- well, ok, he was nice--- mild-mannered guy who would bring his wife and infant child along to visit our club room--- an empty classroom with a micromouse maze smack in the middle on the dirty floor--- occasionally when we stayed overnight in the days preceding competitions. His wife was also a teacher in the school, a genuinely kind lady who taught me in secondary one. They wouldn't do much in the room, just left us pretty much to our own devices, sitting around and watching us contentedly as parents do on a lazy evening, watching their kids playing a board game. Sometimes they would talk among themselves in hushed tones, just telling each other about their day, or making light conversation with us.

So from that cozy domestic setting, the club eventually moved towards a more systematically managed organization, with more teacher consultants (with the accompanying red tape) placed in charge of us, eyeing us with suspicion, other students from the parent bodies not quite sure what to make of this group of scallywags. Thankfully I was already in my senior year by the time the merger was completed, with only a project for the school's anniversary celebration before I could "retire" with all final year students. Even that felt weird, being in the limelight even for a brief moment. Although we had participated in competitions on a similar scale before, that was against other schools, and we were allowed to remain anonymous individually on that stage.

And that summed up your four years in secondary school?
Only briefly, yes. There were other events like the morning jog, where the whole school had to run around the school compound every Saturday, through a landed housing estate and up and down a really steep hill in the middle part of the route. There was this guy in my cohort who got away with not running regularly with whatever reason that it was. Anyway he had to be on stand-by duty since he wasn't running so most Saturdays he would be stationed at the foot of the hill before the mad dash up (it would be far more tiring if you trudged your way up slowly). He was a little big at that time so he wore specially-tailored shorts that reached around his knees; so while every other student had to wear shorts to school, he was the only one who turned up in his own Bermudas everyday. And as I said he could be found at the foot of that hill on most Saturdays, with both hands tucked into his pockets, grinning merrily at any familiar faces. It's funny the things you remember from school.

So he was known as the statue adorning the foot of the hill?
Not to my knowledge, no. I mean, that was my abiding memory of him seeing that we were not really acquaintances. I'm sure his friends have more interesting episodes to draw upon.

Maybe some people remember me as the guy with the broken arm as I had my arm in a cast and sling for a week or two in Secondary Three. We were having hurdles practice during PE lessons on the school's tarmac running track and a few people dodged out of actually hurdling over the barriers. I thought, "I'm not having any of that" and went racing at full speed around the bend of the track. Obviously that was the wrong technique to employ so I failed to clear the hurdle and fell on my left side. My classmate patched me up and after school I went to a clinic where a hairline fracture was discovered on my left elbow, on top of abrasions on my left waist.

The abrasions were actually more inconvenient as I couldn’t wear my shorts without hurting myself. I took more time to get to school in the morning, obviously, and on the first couple of days after sustaining my injury I had to walk in through the gates with the whole school already out in force at the terraces. The flag raising ceremony only started upon the principal's cue, so the whole school had to wait for this guy with an arm in a cast and sling to make his way to the terraces before the band started to play. The national and school anthems were played live by our military band.

How was junior college?
There were ups and downs, but the two years were undoubtedly the best of my schooling life. In fact most of the close friendships I have today were forged back in JC. In retrospect I don't think I was ready for junior college life back then though. I do find myself wishing I could go back as my present day self to relive that time all over again.

Hmm.
I know what you’re thinking. There being no rehearsals in life and all that.

Excuse me?
Nothing.

Why do you want to go back in time?
Because it’s gorgeous.

Who's gorgeous?
Not in that way. I just mean life that's in bloom, the invincibility of youth , and the infinite possibilities that are open to you at a crossroad in an early stage of your life.

And it's not now?
Things have since moved on; there are other crossroads in life, but they are different junctions. Not to say that they'e better or worse, just different. Anyway there were some wonderful memories like the mass dances and college songs (rather than the college anthem), among others.

So what stage of your life did you move on to after junior college?
National service. The army. Discovering more about yourself, how you react to adversity, managing people with different dispositions, playing football on Saturdays with proper boots for the first time, inheriting and maintaining a fish tank in the office.

You bred fish?
I killed more than I bred, actually. It was a decent tank, about twenty inches long and for a while it looked the part with plants dug into fine pebbles, pseudo-rock formations carved from wood and a variety of fish. Then I introduced a terrapin and some shrimps into the tank and there were decapitated fish parts floating on the water a few days later.

Terrapins eat fish?
Sure, but there were tiny fish, tetras and pencil fish. The terrapin would bury its lower body in the pebbles and pin unsuspecting passing fish down with its webbed fore-foot before devouring them. Any spare body parts floating around would be swallowed by the shrimps. Their bodies were almost transparent so you could actually see the fish bits being digested in the shrimps’ stomachs.

I guess it was not a pretty sight.
No, so I isolated the terrapin soon after. I also started this website during that time, in late 1998. It was sketched along autobiographical lines initially but I’ve pretty much allowed this site to develop its own identity over the years. Now the focus is more on my writings I guess.

Bill Clinton once said that everyone should have his own autobiography written.
He never mentioned anything about getting it published though.