Get Your Gun And Meet Me By The Door

I have come to realize why I have become and feel the way I do now.






I am hope-less.

And Monsters Came Raining Down

I think in a hospital, what truly separate nurses from doctors in delivering patient care is the night shifts.

Where in daytime, the nurses are basically carrying out orders and treatment plans from the doctors. Night shift nurses own the hospital after midnights. On call doctors have to cover several levels, thus incapacitating them in the whines and whims of each patient suffering at night. Probably the only time a patient would see a junior doctor at night is that he/she needs a blood sample or he/she is crashing. The night shift nurses are their only lifeline.

In night shifts, I had spent hours beside a critical patient, spent hours trying to chill down a feverish patient with several baths, reassured anxious patients and families, attended to patients in pain, shock and delirium, fought with the dazed and sometimes, literally sat there with them in bleary eyes until the spooked ones slept.

No one delivers more care than night shift nurses.

No one.


Just got off from my three nights. On the second one, I had a conversation.

Let's call him Patient Boy. He is only sixteen and he had multiple brain surgeries. Nowadays he only wakes up to throw up. He was a bright student before his accident and was in fact in one of the most prestigious school in the country, now he could barely remember his own name.

Infection hit him pretty bad, tainting his bloodstream, circulating the venom in his body. It was four in the morning when I crossed over to his bedside with my gloves and scrubs. I switched on the light, the only blight in the room. As I ran the antibiotics with syringes and burettes into a line on his arm, he woke up and stared at me.

PatientBoy: Ah Kiat?

Me: Ya. Sorry. Be done in a minute.

PatientBoy: Ah Kiat?

Me: Mmm?

PatientBoy: What... What you know?

Me: Huh? (Leaning over)

PatientBoy: What do you... you know... you know other than?

Me: Again? What do I know?

PatientBoy: Other than nurse.

Me: What do I know other than nursing?

He nodded.

Me: I know many things. All the small things I guess. I know how to draw. I can draw cartoons with no legs. I can't draw legs well. I know how to write. Not very good, but I just like to write. Almost anything. I know. I know how to watch good movies. I had been a reviewer once and I can do a analysis and comparison of films and genres.

There I was, in the wee hours of morning, trying to prove to myself that I know something, to a stranger.

Me: How about you? What do you know?

PatientBoy: I know nothing.

Me: Come on. What do you like best?

PatientBoy: Computer games.

Me: Ah. Last time I played a bit of computer games. I'm an impatient guy, so when the tough gets going, or when I couldn't jump that virtual wall in the game, I gave up. I rather write, create than to jump through hoops devised by others. In another words, I'm not really good at computer games.

PatientBoy: You are lazy.

Me: That's correct.

Welcome To Earth

We are going to talk about actors.

Xie ShaoGuang is the only Singaporean actor that can act. Fullstop. Yes, I had stop watching television since he retired early this year.

If I calculate the ratio of gender and race in raknax's award of professional acting, I would probably be a sexist and a racist.

The handful of actresses weighting against the list of male actors in my books were Jodie Foster, Christina Ricci, Emma Thompson and Emily Watson. The list for the male actors is much much more.

With the folding of 2007, I was supremely happy that I had found my favorite black actors. And for that, most part of this entry will be about them two.

Samuel L. Jackson for his performance in Black Snake Moan.

And Will Smith for his portrayal of the Omega Man in I Am Legend.

I Am Legend sank for two reasons. The director Francis Lawrence and the fucking director Francis Lawrence.

Francis, you ruined John Constantine a while ago, one of the greatest character ever.

Then you went on to ruin I Am Legend this year. One of the greatest Sci-Fi book ever.

You ruin my Christmas. Please, for the love of God, scram back to make MTVs for Britney Spears and Jennifer Lopez.

For the rest, if you are keen on watching I Am Legend, watch it for Will Smith.

For the longest time, Will had been the black John MacClane. These couple of years, we see his direction shift as he made somber movies like Ali, The pursuit of happyness, I. Robot and now I am Legend.

Will is the lonely Omega Man of an infected Earth. He had a dog called Sam. This can be parallel to Tom Hanks' Cast Away. Tom had a volley ball named Wilson. If you really had to ask, I could not and never imagine crying for a pissin ball. Now a dog as your only companion, I can. After Will held his infected mutt in his arms and strangled his only companionship in the world, he cried in fury, solitude, grief and rock bottom sorrow.

My favorite scene and that alone defined Will as one of the greatest actor alive was the one he went back to the movie rental store after Sam's death. He was sunken, his eyes bloated and cheeks trembling with tears. He approached a female mannequin and said shakily:

'Hello. I... I promised a friend (Sam) I would say hello to you today.'

His eyes darting and more tears began to flow.

'Please say hello to me.'

'Please say hello to me.' He begged again.

One can never get any lonelier that that.

Heartbeats - The Knife

The Knife - Pass This On

D Is For Dangerous

The Comedy Of Memory is a bizarre story about two girls. One has no future to boot and the other comes from the future. Almost everyone have their names that begins with the letter D.

Darcy.
Dorian.
Daniel.
Dahlia.
Furiya. (Probably have to kill him off in the story for not having a D in his name.)

It's a common habit not to name characters with the same letters as to avoid confusion. And then I read Austen's Persuasion. I think there were three or four dudes named Charles in the book. It was hard at first, I have to identify which Charles was who by finding who's with hanging out with him at that time.

Thus, the experiment with the D's. Will good management with the storytelling able to ease reader's way into easily identifying characters with similar names?

D Is For Damage.

Dorian jumps the tracks of time against her will by a greater plan. She's a space monkey, training to press a couple of buttons, whom will never know what was her purpose or why she had died. Like a phoenix, she was nauseatingly reborn again and again into a variety of space, time, culture and locations. Determined to learn about her purpose and the identity of the higher power that shuffles her in the flux of time, she had to remember to remember.

Question: What effect will time travel have on people?

Brain damage! Time travel shatters memories. It was not known if Dorian's selective amnesia was deliberate or due to the trauma of time jumping. Dorian have no effective time based perception, deficit in attention span and possesses a damaged retrospective memory. Dorian functions instead by prospective memory which are event based. She can only progress her life with cues.

Stuff her into a MRI machine and have her on a CT scan, Dorian will present a complicated case of neurological disorders with plenty of lesions and stenosis, preferably in the prefrontal lobe and the hippocampus region.

D Is For Darcy

The questions with Darcy.

Darcy's occupation - Chiromancer or hair dresser? It's a tougie, though I thought it would be interesting to feature palmistry in the story.

Darcy's involvement in the greater plan? I'm still trying to figure that out. Can a single person ever strive to doom a planet?

D Is For D-Cup
Unfortunately, there is no person with such bust size in the story. Only God, Bryan, Chang and all those who knows me knows I love Big Busty Naturals.

Darcy Goes To Work

Currently writing a short fiction called 'The Comedy Of Memory'. Despite the title, it was however not funny, at all. Want to write it decent and readable - testy, but trying. I'm posting an excerpt of the first draft, probably will bleach it again and again, probably will delete it altogether if it clash with the other parts. Am posting it because I sort of like how this one turns out.

Darcy Goes To Work

   Darcy decided that she had sat by the fridge long enough for the shadows to seep in from the window grills. It had begun to rain and the storm was matronly to care into every homes. Daniel's rage parasitic to the roving climate always invites rain without fail. Darcy had wanted to grin at her grim observation was hindered by the ungenerous black eye stinging on the right.
   What is the time now, Darcy wondered as she gotten up from the floor. She had work to get to. Avoiding splinters from the broken blender and the porcelain plates, she ran the tap at the sink. Daniel won't be back for hours, she would have to clean up the mess before he gets home. With a damp rag, she pried the bruises and blood off her discolored cheek with abrupt grimaces. Darcy wondered if they could afford another blender? Do they really need one? It's only good in making cocktails in this home. Alcohol always give Daniel an excuse to act up. The vicious circle with Darcy at its mercy. She also wondered if her body would ever get used to Daniel's rage?
   She thought about the times when she was being little, with Dahlia. Their father used the belt on them all the time. Time is a funny thing. Human is the funny thing, that it. With enough time, human can get used to almost everything. She had gotten used of the belt by the time she turned eleven and she didn't even winced once. Then their father had decided that the time for corporal punishment was over in their household and never laid another hand on the girls again. How funny humans can be? She ran away from a home that had decided not to beat her ever into this home that hits her every other day. The cycle again. Will Daniel come to that epiphany that her father had? Her right eye throbbed wickedly at that hint of suggestion.
 
   Mopping away the glasses and her blood off her kitchen floor, Darcy went for work downtown. It was a school night and the evening bus was packed to hilt. The shingles and the concrete roofs were drummed with the machinations of the monsoon. As Darcy had stayed before the school, she had a seat by the window staring listlessly at the wayward rain before the wet kids trampled onto the bus. The city cried its teardrops down her window panes. Her murky reflection showed a middle age woman, malnourished and black-eyed. Though the wind sewed her bones, it smeared a numbing frost on her epileptic cheek. Her eyes, uneven and seemingly hollow glared at herself in the splashing lights of the evening traffic had tried to explain that it had almost always rained whenever she was hurt was nature’s compensation for her inability to cry. It’s hard not to get self philosophical and spiritual when you are always with yourself. With no one to talk to. And when you have no where else to run and hide, you’ll seek comfort in that space, no matter how claustrophobic, will shelter a womb for you to crawl inside. Just to die in there so you could live another day. She looked to the urban infrastructures and its unnatural lights for an escape.
   There will be none, Darcy had decided long ago. She would have left Daniel if she could, but she couldn't do it. The sacrifices she had made for their relationship and they had gone through so much together.  She still loves the young poet. It was this love that burns her most than his rage. Perhaps if one day, both her heart and the clouds could stop crying, just like when she was eleven again, when the alligator belt with silver buckle stop breaking her soul, then she could be forever free from men. The groundhog days of Darcy Kathiravan are in prefect sync then, she thought, with all that ever will be in her future. Imprinted on every reflection on the windows, the buses, the gutter puddles, the moonshine and every broken blender was her future on the kitchen floor with Daniel and the thousand puzzles of glassware.

The Killers - Mr. Brightside

Jimi Hendrix - Red House

Radiohead - All I Need

I Am Your Father

My father was a stern and silent man.

Every night, he would sit at in the kitchen by himself, rolled tobacco into smokes and drank beer alone.

He was probably lonely. But he was a proud man and men like him kept to themselves.

And he would sat there in the shadows, drinking to himself.

I am becoming my Dad.

American Express - Andy Roddick & Pong

American Express - Jerry Seinfield & Superman Part 2

American Express - Jerry Seinfield & Superman Part 1

American Express - Ellen DeGeneres

American Express - Wes Anderson

American Express - Kate Winslet

American Express - M. Night Shyamalan

American Express - Martin Scorsese

Nirvana - Lithium

Nirvana - Radio Friendly Unit Shifter

Nirvana - Breed

Modern Way - Kaiser Chiefs

Wham! - Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go

George is the king.

Wham! - Last Christmas

The Arcade Fires

This entry was composed in the afternoon of 28th November, 2007.

Returned to the soft silky comfort of the bed from a night shift at ten this morning. I was late for bedtime. As soon as I popped myself into slumberland, my cell rang.

'Yeah?'
'You asleep?'
'No. Not really. Yeah?'
'The police called and they want to know what happen when you guys found her. I tried to call *, but uncontactable.'
'It's just like what we have reported. Asystole when we found her. Cold and clammy. No breathing. No pulse. CPR was initiated.'
'The police needs to know that. They were asking and I don't know enough to tell them. Can I get you to call them?'
'Huh? What? Now? Can it wait? I'm going back tonight.'
'They want to know now.'
'I... Okay. Alright. What's their number? I'm going to need the patient's name and NRIC too. What exactly do they want to know that we didn't already reported?'
'They want to know what was it like when you guys found her.'
'Nah. I was in the resus the whole time, but I didn't found her. It was *. I was at X-ray dept, escorting patients. When I came back to ward, I saw * pushing the E-trolley, calling my help. I wouldn't know what had happened before.'
'In that case. Alrighty then. I will call the police and tell them that and see if they still want to speak to you. Keep your handphone open eh?'
'Sure.'

I had begun my shift yesterday, determined to go home on time. The earlier shift was marred with stupidity and ignorance that held me back from home and I was eagerly determined not to repeat the errs again.

I zoomed around the ward as an In-Charge. I had worked for almost a year and they had decided to hook me up with a newbie *. I was ahead of my time, clearing medications, IVs and monitoring. I was determined to go home on time.

At the stoke of the midnight. I received a case of headache from a fall. The girl was nineteen. She was allocated to the corridor bed.
'Why corridor? How about bed 49?' I asked.
'They are saving someone special for us.'
Always a bad news when the Bed Management starts to crack jokes. God knew that it wasn't the doctors that nurses fought the hardest. The bitterest struggles were often dramatized between the Bed Management and the nurses. They like to round up the fifty patients from emergency dept, handpicked the worst case scenarios, the ones that shouldn't be nursed in general ward with inadequate resources, the ones lingering with a breath connecting to a support machine, the ones yellow and black. Often they came into the ward and collapsed almost immediately and had to be send to the Intensive Units. And what's the holly point in that?

The nineteen year old girl was fine though. Talking away jovially despite having to be cramped in the corner of the corridor.

Twenty minutes past midnight, a woman shrieked. I dropped the task of my midnight Nasogastic tube feeding and went to see if anyone need help.

There were blood all over the floor. Did someone fall? That was my instant question. A fall in the ward is the damnedest shit that could happen to a nurse. That was probably an overstatement, cos there are a million and one damnedest things that could always and will happen to a nurse. Bed 35, and old cherry teacher with white hair was doused with her own blood, more was jetting out from her IV site at the wrist. An afternoon shift nurse was holding onto her. The nurse was preparing to go home and attended to the screaming first. She was punched in the socket by Bed 35.

Bed 35 was rational and communicating when I admitted her the day before. Apparently after the surgery, she had lost her marbles. She communicating all right when the four of us tried to restrain her to the bed.

'What! What! Why you hold me like this? (Spit!) Jesus will see you! Jesus will come and kill you!'

And then she kicked me in the nuts.

'Jesus will come and kill you all! Because I am Christian! Jesus will see you and see this and will punish you for these!'

Entered the doctor, she prescribed sedatives and we fought to jab her tossing arm with injection.

She slept like a baby thereafter.

By then the back of my scrubs were stained with botches of her blood.

The rest of the night were pretty okay. Bed 45 kept pressing the call bell, crying loudly in the ward of pain and misery. Bed 56 walked around the ward like a zombie afflicted by a week's old insomnia.

At three, we were alerted to Bed 61. Apparently he had defiled a promise to another nurse on behaving without restrainer. With a free arm and plenty of time, he had worked on tearing off the IV drip from the drip stand and let the saline showered him all over. We worked on cleaning him and changing the bedsheets. He grew angry at the thought of restraining and tried to threw himself off the bed with the good arm.
'Wow.' I was amazed. 'Your limb power is improving.'
When he was transferred to the ward with brain hemorrhage, he was drowsy and couldn't lift a side of his body at all. Now he was progressing to throw himself of the bed with speedy manipulation of his good side. It was always the case when a person is given too much time on their hands, despite being restrained, they'd work their way around in true human spirit. I had seen patient trained their toes to free the reins of their arm restrainers and pried Nasogastric tubes from their noses.

As we tied him, he turned bestial and fought us nails and teeth. I didn't expected any kinder response.

At four thirty, with another staff, we escorted two patients, one bed after another to the X-Ray dept. I had sneaked Philip K Dick's Paycheck beneath the basket under the bed so I could have something to read while waiting. The wait was long at this ungodly hour, I tossed and turned at the plastic chair to a piece of a wall, trying to get some sleep.

At five thirty, I pushed the last of the patient back into the ward and saw people running around. * was pushing the E-Trolley and looked at me with a horrified look on her face.
'What happen? Which bed?' I threw.
'Bed... Bed 63.'
'What? Who, whatever! Just keep moving!' I rushed along with her.

Bed 63? Bed 63? I barely know her. Came in yesterday from a hip contusion. A very elderly lady. But to collapse from a hip contusion? What are the chances?

I traced the line of her neck and felt nothing. She was cold and clammy.

'You called the doctor?' I threw.
* nodded as she worked to connect the ECG strips on Bed 63.

It was a flat line.

'What management? DIL, Do Not Resus?' I tried another shot at finding a pulse.

'Nothing. It's a freaking hip contusion!'

'Okay. Call the family to come down now and get the rest of the staff in here now!' I said. The house officer arrived in the same stupefied shock as we began manual CPR on the frail lady.

We clanked down the bed, tore open the plastic wrappings of the tubes, hooked her up on absolute oxygenation as I hiked myself with one knee on the bed and began the chest compressions.

'Adrenaline!' The house officer yelled.

I tore open the drug kit, yanked open the confinements of the E-trolley and ransacked the glass ampules of the resuscitating medications. 'Adrenaline.' I showed her as I pushed in the saline. I hit her with Adrenaline through her IV line. No response. CPR was restarted.

The neurological medical officer arrived with the rest of my staff. We pushed in more medications to start the heart. I had stopped my compressions as her heartbeats trembled in the cavity of her chest. The heart rate was one ninety.

I was at a moment amazed by the returning of the heartbeat. She was dead when we found her, and yet her heart was pounding now.

'Blood pressure?' The medical officer asked. I snapped back to reality and tried to take the blood pressure. Unreadable. I looked at the chest again, fearing the heartbeats were gone. The chest were rippling. Heart rate - One seventy.

We heard rustling of feet's and weeping sounds. The family had arrived. * was preparing the trachy set as the Registrar arrived. She reviewed the case, had us repeating the resuscitation and spoke to the family.

'Now what?' I whispered to my colleague. Heart rate - One fifty. No detectable blood pressure.

'We wait.' She said as she continued to squeeze oxygen in.

Heart rate floated and sank to ninety seven. The medical officer came in and ordered to stop the resuscitation. We stopped charging the patient with absolute oxygenation and switched to a more comfortable apparatus. The earlier hope upon witnessing her heartbeats swept aside as I realised that it was purely chemically induced. In time, as the chemicals died, so will her heart.

We packed the setting, wore her back her clothes and placed her in a more comfortable position. The E-trolley beeped on her chemical heartbeat. The family was allowed in. The entire mob was crying away at the suddenness of the event.

Thirty minutes, at the break of the morning sun shinning into the hospital windows, her line was flat.

Finally when all documentations were done, I checked the clock on the wall. I was two hours late for home. So much for determination. Will and determination though will slow diseases, but will never stop death. The frailty of the living. I sighed heavily as I scrubbed my hands.

I went home.

'In that case. Alrighty then. I will call the police and tell them that and see if they still want to speak to you. Keep your handphone open eh?'
'Sure.'

I waited in my covers for my cell to ring. It never did and I sank into the sleep of the sandman. I woke up five hours later and saw that the time was three forty-five. Exactly the same time I had woke up the day before. The sense of Dejavu was strong. I couldn't sleep anymore. I sat at the computer and started writing this. At five, HL returned with lunch. We ate to a comedy, laughing away with pieces of meat between our teeth. Seeing that I had half an hour more to start before my shift, we laid in the bed with me holding her from behind. I smelt the shampoo in her hair.

I had closed my eyes and said with much effort.

'Do you know which was the worst part? When we detached the ECG from her body and removed the E-trolley. The grandson had asked anxiously on how could we monitoring the patient if the machine was removed? I told him that her heart had stopped. I almost couldn't bring the words out from my lips.'

Half an hour later. HL was sleeping. I showered, packed my stuff and left for my night shift.

Kaiser Chiefs - Everything Is Average Nowadays

Episode 25: Air/Love Is Destructive

raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax
raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax
raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax
raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax
raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax
raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax
raknaxraknaxraknaxraknaxraknax

i'm craz'y.

Episode 26: My Purest Heart For You (Sincerely Yours)/ ONE MORE FINAL: I Need You.

raknax.

'Good evening, Mister Salesman. I need something. I need lobotomy.'

Domo Arigato Roboto. If only time and space are mechanical.

[Flashback] I saw Shinji Ikari sitting on the hedges of a cliff, brimming with the evening mist of sorrow and self pity.

[Flashback] When I was in primary school, there was a stony path in which leads into the school. I used to hurry myself to get in front of the commuting students, thinking that if I could get in front of them, one by one, I will best them in life. I avoided the cracks in the pavement too.

raknax. raknax.

[Flashback] I saw the shadow of the baby bed fell onto me as my father smashed towards me. My arm gave way.

[Flashback] When we were too deep in our kisses in the playground at three am, I asked her of her bra size and she seized my hand into her cotton shirt. I was nineteen.

'What exactly do you need, sire? We only sell regular stuff for regular folks.'

[Flashback] I used to look out of my kitchen window and wondered how will it feel like if I just climb over?

[Flashback] WXJ never felt love for me. But she had pecked my cheek in the bookstore. I was red with shyness.

'I need something.'

[Flashback] I sat uncomfortably in the pub with HL and Chang. There was a mammoth cake with free alcohol served. HL had called a dozen people, and no one came for my birthday. That was this August.

[Flashback] I used to hit my younger brother when we were younger. Just for the kicks.

'But we only sell...'
'LISTEN TO ME! PIGFUCKER! LISTEN CAREFULLY!'

[Flashback] I wriggled in fright and pain as my hallucinations contoured with the effect of my medications and pain. I couldn't sleep. I was terrorized all the time while I was in the hospital for my operation. I couldn't sleep at all.

[Flashback] When the morning came, I requested to shift my bed. I couldn't sleep on that bed! It was damned! But I did not tell them the reason. I just demanded that I need to change my bed.

[Flashback] Am I just doing this alone? I asked meekly. WXJ said, don't be absurd.

[Flashback] Erm... Why have you decided not to visit me in the hospital? I mean, people I barely knew came, but you and I have a decade of history. 'I am having problems with my girlfriend.'

raknax.soraknax.sohowdoyoudo??!! You are a piece O' cunt.

[Flashback] The fling had declared, 'My parents are not at home, they won't be back until midnight.'

Come on Shinji had the whole bestial metal of Unit 01 to hide, I am just a human meat bag.

So I'm not homicidal. The terrorist decided. I'm just suicidal. With that thought, he detonated himself.

[Flashback] Robin.

[Flashback] Alfred.

[Flashback] Boon.

[Flashback] Good luck for your chem prac tomorrow. Rem to stir carefully. - Read Joyce's pager texting to mine.

[Flashback] Joyce wrote in my chinese textbook: 人以人之间因该互相帮忙，世界才会变得更美好!

Two days ago, I dreamt my youngest brother drowned. I couldn't sleep again.

[Flashback] ? to ? - I loved you.

[Flashback] At twenty, I decided to live for five more years where enough is enough. I have thoughts about planning the end. Preferably in Jurong areas. Where the jump is furthest away from my flat. This way I will not scarred the memory of those still living in  Chai Chee.

Cobain sang - We can plant a house, we can build a tree. We can have all three!

[Flashback] ? to ?: Do you miss me? I know I do.

[Flashback] The three of us. White uniforms and red ties. We were inseparable.

[Flashback] Jennifer: Are you afraid of dying?
                  Me: I don't know.

Cobain wrote - It's better to burn out than to fade away.

[Flashback] The Fling: I feel so cheap.

[Flashback] I have many friends.

[Flashback] The Fling: You will never find someone as good as me! She will never know you and pleasure you the way I did!

[Flashback] The Fling: Why? Are you feeling sad? (Chuckles) I'm with my boyfriend now. No time to talk (Chuckles more).

Sera to Ben (1995) when they met: 'For five hundred bucks, you can fuck me in the ass. You can cum on my face. Just keep it out of my hair. I just washed it.'

Ben to Sera (1995) when he died: 'See how hard you make me, angel?'

If only time and space were mechanical.

甘き死よ、来たれ

'I need to forget.'
'...' The salesman/wizard of Oz stared.
'Please. Everything.'

欠我十块 千里之外恶搞版

Nirvana - Breed - Reading Festival - 30/08/92

Arctic Monkeys - Teddy Picker

Erasure - A Little Respect [Princes Trust 1989]

The Soothsayer - Post Mortem

This entry is dedicated to fellows who stayed since 1848, witnessed a time line of wheelchairs, wondered about the irony of a cigarette and sat through a funeral with a pretty redhead and the 'porn people'.

Thank you for your patience and consistency.

Had planned to write an afterword halfway into the series. After several editing, I decided to cut short the entry into FAQ formating.


The Origins.
I hadn't plan on writing a long one. Probably a two to three parters about supernatural elements, critically an anti-hero in an already familiar background. My favorite fairy tales were Pied Piper, Mermaid and the Matchstick Girl. The latter struck my core the most because the notion of death in dreams than living like a dog allured me deeply. Seeing that I often turned to fantasies, it's not very hard to understand why.

Before Soothsayer, I was actually comptemplating on a story about a suicide bomber. The terrorist at the brink of his vengeance to the world was desperately trying to fight his blood lust psychosis, had decided that this world needed saving than a wholesale destruction and there were too many beautiful things left to thrive. He had detonated himself in an abandoned beach, figuring that he was beyond salvation.

That notion was reflected as Eilert became the terrible Danish Fire Monster.


Other Influences.
The influences became obvious as the series formed shape. Gaiman's storytelling through multiple characters angle, The Swamp Thing, Lucifer and my life long fascination with fallen angels.

And Evangelion. With all the stories about super-beings and mechas trying to defend the world from apocalypse and destruction, they always succeed in the end, thus ending the episodes as gay as can be, happily ever all. Evangelion opened my eyes with the world actually lost and it ended in blood and smokes. I was awed by its highly interpretable ending of Shinji and Asuka by the sea of red amniotic fluid alone in the entirety of the post apocalyptic world.

I had always tried to incorporate real issues that I'm had been immersed: Sacrifice, Afterlife, Faith, Euthanasia and Fatalism. Euthanasia, one of the topic that I spent weeks researching in school years for a group debate. (I then made Sarah Qwek stumbled upon Vvael's book whilst researching for a debate in Intermission.)


My Stance On Literary Violence.
In Altered, tridents were employed. I loved tridents and written a story medieval war story where lots of tridents tore and pierced the bloody skies. People just don't write enough arms in stories. My weapon of choices would be throwing knives, tridents and revolvers.


North.
In the episode North, though it was never mentioned, Eilert did put down the leprosy patients.


Testament.
Testament was the change. I abandoned the Eilert angle and went for the publicized version of the Danish Fire Monster in the eager eyes of Madeleine Mattiassons. It was a refreshing change. I liked it a lot. I rarely write character's background into the story, only to give away bits through conversation and their course of actions, in Testament, I gave a swift tour of Madeleine's past and I enjoyed writing it so much that I knew I had to write Eilert's too (Monster). There were many background stories I was interested in writing, but never gotten around to it. One of them was Oriaries. It would be fascinating to depict her in her nursing scrubs trying to save London from Cholera.

I began to weave actual historical facts into their time line which I had decided was 1849. Myth had it the matchstick girl had first circulated in 1848 in Denmark. By 1849, I gathered that Eilert should have accomplished a reputation as the local bogeyman.

In Testament, we came to learn that Eilert was just getting well adjusted with his powers and even expanding his ability to burn folks without contact. He was getting too powerful for his own good. This story would go nowhere! He can't be killed, he got tons of power, he could kill people from a distance, his notion of burning people into dreams is simply too romantic to write him off. All there were left was the struggle for his humanity. I had to find out more about the human core in him so I could end this story rightly. Two endings opened up at this moment:

Eilert would perish. But then what's the moral of the story if a kind hearted man should die?

Eilert would thrive. He can't. He would be the King of the world. Here by jabbing real historical facts posed the problem that the whole whole cannot know about his existence, except that he was a myth. With his armor of flames, I couldn't hide Eilert from the world any longer.

I cornered myself with another problem. Madeleine survived till present times. It had wiped out any chance of me plotting apocalypse in the future series, for apparently, Eilert remained nothing more than a legend. He have to go somewhere.

Thus the descent and the suspension.

Testament was the only single person view point writing for Soothsayer. I have decided not to get into my character's head again. It was very exhaustive as I find that minds can be very distracting, emotional and shifting altogether. (I tried to reference this experience in Phantasmagoria.)


Why I Plough On?
I had realised that it would take longer to end the series and no one seemed to be interested enough. I cannot just cancel it, my pride would never allow me to pleasure people that much. I would write on until it is really conclusive and in accordance to the earlier story line. My motivation to complete Soothsayer was pretty much based on defiance and spite.

Then the responses picked up a bit. Though I will still write on regardless of readership, but having people who read it helps in pushing me to write faster.


Aad.
Tribute to Cujo.


Servants.
I was dragging the series. It was then I had decided to blow up the joint and bring forth the war to Hell.

Servants revealed Vvael's mortal name: Uncle Bou. Later which Sarah Qwek came upon Bou Blanc's 'To Hell With Heaven' book, for those who had never read Servants would probably get confused.

Kepharel was a goth boy.


Cigarette.
My favorite episode. I rarely explain in details about the characters or the environment's features, but with Cigarette, I decorated Hell.


Candlelights
I enjoyed writing the rainbow scout so much. He was like that parrot on the shoulder of the pirate.

My favorite character in the entire series was Asmodai.

The time line in both Heaven and Hell was fashioned after Vertigo's Lucifer in which the devil and God went into exile, leaving mankind to their devices.


Genders.
In the original roles for Sarah Qwek and Jane Masaki were male intended. It was then I realised the gender ratio in the series wasn't equally distributed with the storytelling heavily relied on Vvael, Eilert, Suicides and Kepharel. Though the celestinal leaders were Balthial and Oriares, I had to write more female leads into the story.

The location was selectively Australia as I had often heard about racial discrimination tales of the Chinese over there. Sarah Qwek was a Singaporean student, sharing an apartment with Jane Masaki. I got the Japanese name from Amu Masaki, a skillful Japanese pornstar who had now retired. She is my age.

Jeniong had raised quite a few loopholes in this episode which I truly thank her for. I decided to leave the mistakes as they were to present my growth in the series.


Malignancy.
This episode always conjured a variety of emotions within me each time I read it. I like it that the good cop and the bad racist cop had a role reversal in the end, sort of like the movie Crash. And how Sarah was shot instead of Jane.


Exodus.
The plan was to have a two parter describing the fall of both realms and then the finale. Saul was a typical two dimensional hero type. Marianne was named after a bubbly temp clerk in my hospital who went on to medical school this year.

The two options of exit from Heaven at this point was the Ascension Stairs which only the angels could pass, thus mortalized and the Limbo Of Infants.


Conscription.
Conscription was yet another extra addition to the series. I was having a terrible time tying up all the loose ends for Exodus (II). I wrote and rewrote seven times over a span of an entire month's time and it was frustrating. Conscription allowed me to get away from the vehicle of the plot. I wanted to write something senseless and nonchalant to the series. Of all the angels, Degaliel was the exact embodiment.


Exodus (II).
I killed off Kepharel in a Shakespearean way. Enter stage, gave speech, short battle, killed by a mortal stab, exit stage.

Suicides was supposed to seek out Asmodai, but somehow that slipped through my fingers.


Epilogue.
Epilogue was written under thirty minutes. It was the one I kept returning from time to time. It was the only proper ending I ever wrote for anything longer than two pages. It revealed more about the friendship bonded by the angel Vvael, the demon Suicides and the human agent Eilert.

The Nursing Home was named after deciphering's real name.

The football game that Suicides was watching was referring to American Football, not soccer.

Suicides never reigned in Hell thereafter. In his travels among the stars, he unwillingly helped Marianne in defending a siege in the Limbo Of Infants.

Higelot died from a stroke and his daughter inherited the care of Balthial.

Balthial lived to two hundred. A year before her natural death, she had recovered well enough to perform simple chores around the house and had routinely rise to watch the brilliant sunrises every morning.

Abandoning her nursing degree, Sarah Qwek returned to reside in Singapore.

This experience had been valuable. I was somewhat proud that I was able to see it to a proper end.

laters.
raknax.

Little House Of Savages

Just got this from yahoo: Santa was warned to say 'ha ha ha' instead of 'ho ho ho' because it may be offensive to women.

ho ho ho!

Work all day and misses every meal possible. At the end of the day as I stood at the edge of the platform, all I could think of were A&W's curly fries, ice cream wafer and root beer float.

Decided not to spend as much time on multiply. Been collecting materials and ideas for a 'book'. Will attempted to write one. A soft core science fiction. Lending from my Soothsayer's experience among multiply users, I would probably just post bits and excerpts from the new story which would be very long and patience needy. If you have read it and agree that I'm heading towards the right direction, let me know.

Jigsaw falling in pieces.

Will still persist in the final two episodes of the MTP travelogues and a review on Densha Otoko.

That is if I have any time at all.

I haven't been drinking at all since my Chaoyangpo trip. Miss it a lot.

Been reading a lot about phosphate. Phosphate is strange purple hue in my head. Ah? Oh, have you guys read anything interesting lately? Let me know, keep this place warm, eh?

Isn't it pretty nice to know that somebody's waiting for me at home at the end of the day?

Ho ho ho!

Homework - Let's all spit at every closed circuit cameras possible, ya'?

Doraemon's alleged endings.

Rating:	★★★
Category:	Other

Saw Doraemon: Nobita's Dinosaur movie poster in The Cathy, I was overjoyed by this remnant that reminded me of my times. Doraemon had surely been an iconic figure of the eighties and introduced me to a world of possibilities, wishes, sci-fic and what may seemed to lit my flight of fantasies.

Seeing that I was thrilled by a cartoon, Hao and I talked about Doraemon. He told me that he was informed of the three alleged endings probably created by fans.

I went on the web and seek the speculations.

There are three current and often quoted urban legends that started spreading in late 1980s of an ending to the Doraemon series.

The first and the more optimistic ending was made public by Nobuo Sato several years ago. Doraemon's battery power ran out, and Nobita was given a choice between replacing the battery inside a frozen Doraemon, which would cause it to reset and lose all memory, or await a competent robotics technician who would be able to resurrect the cat-robot one day. Nobita swore that very day to work hard in school, graduate with honours, and become that robotics technician. He successfully resurrected Doraemon in the future as a robotics professor, became successful as an AI developer, and thus lived happily ever after, thus relieving his progeny of the financial burdens that caused Doraemon to be sent to his space-time in the first place. A dōjin manga for this ending exists.

The second, more pessimistic ending suggests that Nobita Nobi is suffering from autism and that all the characters (including Doraemon) are simply his delusion. The idea that Nobita was a sick and dying little boy who imagined the entire series on his sickbed to help him ease his pain and depression no doubt angered quite a lot of fans. Many Japanese fans staged a protest outside the headquarters of the publisher of the series after learning about this suggestion. The publisher had to issue a public statement that this is not true. (This ending actually correlates to the ending for the series St. Elsewhere, which ended in 1988.)

The third ending suggests that Nobita fell and hit his head on a rock. He fell into a deep coma, and eventually into a semi-vegetative state. To raise money for an operation to save Nobita, Doraemon sold all the tools and devices in his four-dimensional pocket. However, the operation failed. Doraemon sold all his tools except for one used as a last resort - Dokodemo door 如意门. He used it to enable Nobita to go wherever he wanted, whichever time era he wished to go. In the end, the very place Nobita wanted to go was heaven.

The third ending, when I heard it from Hao, I was utterly depressed. How can the purest story for children ends so painfully? Children shouldn't have to die in stories. Not especially when it had so entwined with my boyhood.

Since Fujiko F. died in 1996 before any decisions were reached, any "endings" of Doraemon are fan fiction. However, it is apparent from many episodes and movies where Nobita travels to the future that in the end he does marry Shizuka, leads a happy life and separates with Doraemon, although Nobita and his friends fondly remember him.

Screw that dude who made cup noddle, I will hail only to 藤子 F. 不二雄.

Lonely Inc

Rating:	★
Category:	Other

Bryan looked on as I scrolled the pictures in my handphone.

Me: 'This is my face when I shit in the hospital.'

Bryan: 'Erm. Okay.'

Me: 'Here another. This is me shitting at home.'

Bryan: 'Alright.'

Me: 'This is me shitting in Hong kong airport.'

Bryan: 'Right.'

Me: 'This is at Beijing airport. See the grimace? Must have been pretty hardcore.'

Bryan: 'Are there no pictures other than you shitting in your phone?' He took over the phone and scrolled within.

Bryan (disgusted): 'My god. It's all about you taking dumps.'

Me (shrugged): 'I'm a lonely dude.'

What You Think Is Funny, I Think Is Rude.

Rating:	★
Category:	Other

Benji Silverman worked as a stunt crew for Candid Camera. His job was probably one of the most interesting, as it varied from him posing as a Police Officer to cleaning the streets when the script called for it.

Yesterday, they had wrapped up a gag involving a pretty crew to get male bystanders to strip in the public for the new season was quite a riot and no doubt surely attract higher ratings with this new batch of writers for the show.

Today they ambushed cameras in an elevator and had planted a suspicious looking garbage in the corner in the elevator. By placing a 'Maintenance' on the other elevator, regular folks would be flushed to enter the bugged up one.

They had managed to lay the smack of surprise, if not some anger to the minorities. But with editing, only the positive reactions made it to the screen.

They waited until an elderly lady named Rosie Zulkbaiyark entered the lift with her walking stick and a huge grocery bag. When the door closed and the lift humming in its ascend, Mdm Rosie was eying the black garbage bag with disgust and curiosity.

There Benji hid, waiting. With the signal to pounce from his earpiece, Benji sprung himself free from the bag like jack in the box, waving his arms around in jubilee.

Mdm Rosie was shocked to the inches of her life went to grab something from her bag. Sometimes people maced Benji, he was half expecting it. Though the other half of him was expecting an inhaler from the old woman which looked like a hundred.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Mdm Rosie had closed her eyes shut in tears and squeezed the trigger of her pistol at Benji. She had shot Benji twice in the face and three more in the chest.

'Oh my god! Oh my god!' Mdm Rosie was heaving in shock while reaching for her inhaler. She did not even dare to open her eyes to see what it was.



End.



This story is my response to telecast gags meant to terror innocent folks out of their wits for infantile humor underlying a subplot for racism.

SCADshorts

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Other

My Favorite Color

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Other

This entry is about my favorite color. It used to be blue when I was much younger. Blue was a boyish color. In my teenage angst, it was black. Everything black.

I always thought I have this thing with purple. But purple is such a queer color!

When I was in secondary school, a girl and I made a secret date at the darkest staircase in school. We planned to feel each other up and probably should hormones insist, fuck the living shit out of one another. As I was spineless as always, I chicken out the last minute. Now whenever I think about that incident, I always think about two other things. One is to slap myself on the face for my cowardice and the other, the color purple.

I guess since that girl, I had subconsciously relate the color to sex. Not just any sex, but unrequited sexual pension.

This morning, I realised that I can be so turned on by the color.

No kidding.

Eleven years from now, when Martians enslaved us by poisoning the Earth with radioactive invasion, thus making us all sterile. I would probably be unleashed in a Colosseum with thousands of martini drinking Martians. I would be fighting the enslaved Neptunians dressed in purple who will fend me from raping them in blind fury and color lust.

We Used To Have A Purpose

Rating:	★
Category:	Other

Just got off from the worst night shift I ever had.

It was fucked.

Never thought this business was all about hurting them.

To save them, we had to forcefully plunge, defile and rape their dazed and confused souls of once pristine and pure into bruised carnage of venom.

To hurt something so pure eventually blackens our own souls to a point of no return.

Actually it were all of no big matters, unfortunately I was too much of a chickenhead to understand the bigger picture.

I can tell you what happened. But why would I want to do that? To myself again?

All I want to do now is to hit the shower and jump straight to bed. Away with the debris in my head and the smudges upon my breath and hopefully sleep a dreamless slumber.

Thom York - Videotape

about death and love.

Oasis - Whatever

The Walkmen - Little House Of Savages

Comic Bush & Sosie at White House Correspondants Dinner 2/2

part1 : http://youtube.com/watch?v=96m1g2Pdkvo

part2: http://youtube.com/watch?v=1yZNK96NRow
sry for the audio delay...

Comic Bush & Sosie at White House Correspondants Dinner 1/2

part1 : http://youtube.com/watch?v=96m1g2Pdkvo

part2: http://youtube.com/watch?v=1yZNK96NRow

Clinton's Last Days in the White House

Democrats' humor!

Noel Gallagher -Sad Song

Radiohead - 2+2=5

Kaiser Chiefs - Ruby

Kaiser Chiefs - Everyday I Love You Less And Less

Kaiser Chiefs video for Everyday I Love You Less And Less.

White Town - Your Woman

The Hives - Tick Tick Boom (Music Video)

MTP - Village At The Edge Of Forever

There was no road to Chaoyangpo Village.

There was an initial plan to build one through, but clashing with the local development of a railway track and several corruptions among the developers, there won't be a road to Chaoyangpo Village after all.

The dirt track were dampen with bubbling soil and it made our little car bumped in agony. We passed some grey washed out abandoned factories and buildings. We passed tractors and lands of yellow crops. We seen the morning sun and inhaled the thickness of the cold in the air.

'The first one to the left.' Directed HL in Fenyang dialect I sometimes heard when she was conversing with her mother over the long distance call while in Singapore.

The taxi rolled into the Chaoyangpo village through the tracks of splintering rocks and cracks of dirt flying passing the windshield. We saw a brown mutt yelping away by the first one to the left.

HL's dog. Dan-zi.

I was introduced to Dan-zi as the cutest dog in the world. Her world. I had only knew Dan-zi in photographs.

Dan-zi's yelping alerted a woman who came out in grey sweater and a woollen pants from the first house to the left.

HL's mother. She wore a ponytail and had eyes so small that when she smiled her eyes disappeared.

I was introduced to her mother as her favorite person in the world. Her world. I had only knew her mother in photographs.

A man strolled out of the first house to the left and joined his wife and his beloved mutt.

HL's father. He was wearing black shirt and pants and had hair jetting up from the hind of his head as if he had just woke up. I had only knew her father in photographs.

The sun was barely up as we unloaded our baggage from the taxi and I braced myself to meet her parents whom I had knew so long through our conversations and photographs. It was surreal to have them pop into my radar of reality. I could only cover my distraction by shaking their hands.

Apparently, physical contact was kept to neat minimal in Chaoyangpo. Their handshakes were loose and hasty. It was not of poor courtesy as I learnt when I was introduced to the rest of the villages in days to come. They often greeted each other with just a simple nod and departed from one another saying, 'Ha Lai Ba!' Which in Fenyang dialect meant, 'To drop by/come onto to my house for a visit when you are free.' To adapt to that no touching gesture, I would raise my palm and say Hi while tossing a sheepishly grin and an occasional wink whenever I was introduced to the villagers. To that, they had thought this was how Singaporeans had greeted each other and they would mimic that effect to make me feel welcome.

After all. I was Chaoyangpo Village's very first foreigner as I was told by HL's father. Chaoyangpo Village was so remote, deeply tucked in the mountains that people usually exit the place to find work in the major towns and the cities. That probably explained why I didn't see much youngsters in their prime staying around the village but instead it was populated with elderly and tiny kids.

Releasing the loose hand grip, HL's father Mr Yang helped us carried the loads of baggage into the first one on the left.

The exterior of the house were made of dark bricks like a fortress with great metal red doors bolted with metal and iron.

 

We entered into the walkway with gardens assorted with different greens at each side. There was an apple tree right smack in the center of the courtyard.

 

We went around the apple tree as HL wanted to show me the infamous toilet. it was surrounded by a brick wall of the height of a child and then simply just a hole to defecate over with. We then entered through the kitchen which had a large flat stove that could only be cooked by burning coal beneath it and a large jar of water for all usage on the left and a tiny gas stove by the right hand.

 

A large mahjong table laid smack in the center of the kitchen. The mahjong table had cost a small fortune; it was electrical and could 'wash' the tiles and popped them up in ready assembly with a touch of a button. The dices also spun in automation inside a glass dome and the table could congratulate the winner in an electronic voice.

As our journey was overbearing, Mr Yang gestured for us to clean our faces while Mdm Yang poured steaming hot water from a great red flask into a basin. It was very welcoming especially it was getting so much colder since we had arrived in Chaoyangpo Village. We then went through the living room where there was a great green bed by the window and a couch in front of a television on a cabinet.

 

The green bed had no mattress was called a 'Kang' as they could burn coal beneath it for warmth in winter. On the green 'Kang' laid the family cat. I often heard stories about how the family cat often bitch slapped Dan-zi when he tried to bully her children. And so the old puss won the rights to mellow at whichever places she damned pleased, be it couch, the bed or inside the covers with HL while the dog remained on the floor.

After the living room was a small hall where it was pretty much for storing stuff. There was an old motorbike in a corner and two large cabinets on the other side. While one kept clothes, the other stored snacks and consumables like mooncakes and dried fruits.

They brought me at last into the bedroom where another 'Kang' was by the window and another small bed by the wall.

 

I would be sleeping in this room with Mr Yang while HL will share the 'Kang' in the living room with her mother. I quickly picked to sleep on the bed by the wall as not to impose on my host.

They had prepared breakfast and gestured us to the kitchen where they hooked up a wooden plate over the mahjong table, spread across a red cloth and served breakfast. I randomly and innocently picked a seat facing the exit and HL nudged me to change as she whispered to me that that was reserved for the head of the household. I quickly attempted to change my seat but Mr Yang forbidden me to do so. In half gestures and half spoken Mandarin, he explained that since I was the guest, I should sit there.

When we were settled, we had eight dishes in front of us. Chicken. I liked to eat chicken and literally have chicken in every meal and so HL made a deliberate effort in telling them. And more chicken dishes on the table. Pork, steamed buns, very cold noddle strips and veggies that were not found in Singapore. Mr Yang then motioned if I would like to drink. Despite HL's protests, I decided not to act coy and nodded. In my game, I had decide that since I do not smoke, then I must drink to show my manliness. Mr Yang brought out two glasses and asked me how much I could drink.

I have long heard about the wickedness of Chinese wines and the idea of drinking so early in the day was kinda freaking me out. It's seven thirty for crying out loud. I pointed out half a glass will do. My Yang peered at me as if he had something to say. He poured half a glass for me and a full glass for himself. We sat down and he began to tell me stuff in Fenyang dialect. I looked to HL and she translated that it was customary to pour a full glass for wine and half a cup for tea. I smiled faintly and tried the wine. My tongue burned at once. The drink was so strong that I couldn't even swallowed the mouthful. But to leave it stinging inside orifices was much worse an ordeal, I gulped down that mouthful and just kept coughing. It was then I realised HL was glaring at me. She whispered that I should raised my glass to her father when I drink it.

Having meals in Chaoyangpo Village was a battle for me. While in Singapore, my mother usually just whipped three dishes in the early afternoon and would went to work. The entire family just reheat the dishes over and over again throughout the day. At Chaoyangpo, each meal consisted eight to twelve dishes. Corn, more veggies, bean spouts, more chicken, slated fishes, dumplings, dumpling soup, porridge, Chinese pancakes, etc. Then I learnt that one would have to raise his glass for a small toast as if asking for permission to drink or to inform them that I gonna down this sucker. On another hand, if one person started to drink after his toast, the rest must follow suit. They drank every meal, at every excuse and kept pouring like there's no tomorrow.

I found out that each bottle had caused RMB9, which is only one dollar something in Singapore. If alcohol cost that little in Singapore, I would probably drink at every meal and every excuse and kept a mountain of them at the back of the house too. HL was weary too at mealtimes, she had to nudge me here and there, kicking me under the table to finish the dishes, to talk her father, to put food in their bowls, to talk to her mother, to raise a toast and to stop kicking her back when she had kicked me.

Life in Chaoyangpo Village was uber sedentary. We went to bed every night at ten and wake up at seven in the morning where I would brush my teeth by the apple tree to get ready for breakfast. Which after we would either do some chores around the house or played mahjong. Then lunch time where I could continue to drink more alcohol and after sit around the television stupefied. Dinner would soon follow where the dog and the cat would circle us like flurry sharks for pieces of food. After dinner we usually just get ready for bed. There's not much to do in Chaoyangpo and of course we were trapped in the autumn rain.

The night when we arrived was mid-autumn festival and I was trying hard to introduce to her family and friends on how we had celebrated mooncake festival in Singapore. We lit up lanterns, eat mooncakes, set up candles all around public property which probably always catch fire and burned roaches under the void decks. Folks in Chaoyangpo Village did otherwise, they gathered for a reunion dinner and lighted up fire crackers. We didn't as a short shower had appeared in the afternoon and so after dinner HL and I just sat on the tiniest stools on the corridor and admired the full autumn moon in her glory.

 

We talked under the moonlight, with the springy leaves from the apple tree rustling above, in a village tucked in the mountains, away from society and the hay noises. That memory was precious and will forever treasured.

The next day we woke up to the autumn rain which would not stop for four straight days. Any moment you peeked outside the shades, it would be raining buckets. It became so biting cold that we had four pieces of clothes on and kept making hot chinese tea to keep us warm. On any good day, the rain and the free time of course would meant cuddling sessions, but instead we were two goody good school children with maximal supervision and always kept a virginal distance apart. We didn't even dare to hold hands.

When the rain have gotten smaller, we brought out our umbrella and wore our thick boots and coats to venture out around Chaoyangpo. We had went to her uncles' homes which in one, I had the opportunity to converse with a true blue communist. With HL's translation back and forth, we discussed about exploitation and corruption. We also went to the neighbours' houses which had doted HL so much when she was younger. There was this old man, frail in the knees and jolly like the sun. We talked about this medical condition and advised him how and when he should take the multiple combination of his medications.

 

We went around the mountain to see flocks of yellow sheeps, the weaving of quiet mountains hidden in the distant mist and visited the farmers hard at work in the morning fields.

There wasn't much pictures for this entry as the camera batteries went dead on my first night in Chaoyangpo. Though Mr Yang went and purchased more batteries but they just went limp dead in my camera. Apparently, my camera preferred a picky diet. It was then revealed that a battery branded 'NanFu' might be a fitter choice. Trapped in the cold autumn rain, we could only scourged within the two grocery stores in the village when the rain had gotten smaller. But all the batteries we have gotten perished the minute they entered my camera. 'NanFu' was rumored for sale only in the town a long distance away from the village. By day three, I was exasperated and requested for HL to enter town soon.




The photojournal of this entry can be found here.

This entry is part two of a four-part travelogue.