by Phoen, Sam;
“Look what it says here,” Saraswati exclaims. “‘It’s traditional to get a little boy to roll across the nuptial bed before the bride and groom consummate their marriage, so that the first child will be a boy.’ That’s in the old days right? Surely modern people are not so bothered whether they get a girl or a boy first?”
“It’s all that nonsense about the son carrying on the family name,” Eric replies.
“And look what you have to take to your bride’s family on the wedding day – jewellery, a leg of pork, sweetmeats, Mandarin oranges, fabric, rose syrup…”
“Is it like in India where you have to exchange cows for your bride?” Rajah asks with a laugh.
“Oh my God. I can’t bear such elaborate rituals. It says here that the Peranakan wedding is celebrated over twelve days. Twelve days! I think that when it’s time for me to marry, I will elope,” Eric says.
“Oh, that sounds like fun,” Saraswati says.
Nine
“Maybe it’s time for you to invite your Indian friends over for dinner,” Clara speaks directly to Eric, at breakfast. It’s been a while since they have spoken to each another.
“What?” Eric asks, in disbelief, his spoon suspended in mid-air. He instinctively wonders what her motive is, then instantly regrets his ungraciousness.
Benson looks up from his iPad, astonishment splashed all over his face.
“Well,” Clara says, her voice muted, compared to her usual high-pitched notes. “Salimah says you’ve not been eating much at home but at the Devan’s. We ought to pay back, right?”
“That’s so thoughtful of you, honey,” Benson manages to say.
Eric is dumbstruck. All kinds of thoughts zip through his head. So far his two worlds have been kept apart: his luxurious life with his parents and his time with his friends from a heartland estate. Will the two sections collide like tectonic plates?
“But you don’t like Salimah cooking curry or garlic in the apartment,” he says.
“Who says anything about cooking? I’ll get it catered from a high-end Indian restaurant. The food will arrive here all cooked.”
“Shouldn’t we take them to a restaurant then?” Benson suggests tentatively. “Might be easier.”
“Not the same, right?” Clara says. “Eric is obviously fascinated by them and has been spending so much time at their home. We must at least let them visit ours.”
The suggestion does not thrill Eric, but he’s not sure why. What is his mother up to? He can’t imagine his mother liking Auntie or Uncle Devan. They are way down her social scale.
And how would the Devans feel, coming from a small flat in an estate of towering HDB blocks and only knowing that way of life? How will they feel visiting an upscale, luxurious condominium with manicured gardens, Olympic-size swimming pool and cascading waterfalls, where the monthly maintenance fee would be probably be half of Uncle Devan’s take home pay? They were not envious people and did not rate material success over spiritual contentment, but still, the deliberate contrast seemed inappropriate.
“I’m trying to make amends,” Clara says to him in a facile, soft voice. “Give me a chance.”
Eric cannot refuse his mother. He’s a glass-half-full type. If anyone shows, even remotely, the willingness to be better, he was ready to concede. Maybe his mother genuinely wants to be good.
“Okay, I will ask them.”
The evening does not begin well.
Eric’s home is located off both the bus and MRT routes. Residents here own cars and take taxis so public transport accessibility is not a necessity. The selling points for a HDB flat – near MRT station, bus stop, food centre – are not relevant. The Devans have taken an MRT to the nearest station, then a taxi from there to save costs. Although Eric meets them at the main gate, they still have to traipse through the grounds to Eric’s home, meandering through the extensive gardens and water features, taking extra time to be vigilant so that Rajah does not slip into the overflowing infinity pools and artificial streams.
They are very late by the time they reach the apartment. Clara is a stickler for timing, so that does not sit too well. Also, since the caterers have brought the food almost an hour earlier, she is worried the food will not be piping hot. The moment the Devans enter the apartment, immediately after cursory introductions, Clara rushes them to the dining table.
“Come, come. Food is all ready. Eat, eat, eat,” she says. “There’s tandoori chicken, lamb korma, keema, fish cutlet, sag aloo, onion bhaji, dhal, lots of papadam, naan bread, basmati rice…”
Eric’s friends, so alive and warm in their home, look displaced here. Mr Devan seems dwarfed by the extensive display of luxury. Mrs Devan, in her going-out sari, looks as if she is drained of her usual sparkle. Nathan is strangely pensive and Saraswati hides behind her mother. Rajah is upset about something.
It was a mistake to invite them here, Eric thinks.
The unusual smell of garlic and curry is in the air. Eric wonders how his mother is coping with this since she is always insistent that the apartment should not smell like a curry house. Gleaming stainless steel chafing dishes are set out on the sideboard in the dining area, blue flames underneath keeping them warm.
Like the sideboard, the wooden table and chairs are designed and made in Italy, their cushioned backs and curved legs carved with elaborate leaves. The wooden tabletop is laid over with a sheet of protective glass.
“My wife is worried that you might go hungry,” Benson says to Mr Devan, trying to make excuses for Clara’s haste.
“No worries. It’s good to eat early,” Mr Devan says.
Clara rattles on, not giving the family time to adjust to the unfamiliar environment. The family looks uneasy, eyes scanning the rich furnishings and elegant wallpaper. Rajah looks uncomfortable in his new surroundings. He always needs time to get his senses attuned to new places.
The table is laid out formally with crystal glasses, trendy, designer cutlery and gold-bordered, Royal Doulton fine bone china. Cloth napkins are rolled up in pretty napkin rings. The whole setting is alien to the Devans. Rajah seems out of sorts. He cannot snap into new surroundings with the immediacy that sighted people can.
“Let me help you,” Clara says, offering a plate and telling him what each chafing dish contains.
Her diligence is overpowering. Too much information is thrown at Rajah all at once and Eric can tell that he is overwhelmed. When Rajah is anxious, his head nods continuously, like a clay doll with limbs loosely attached to its body.
“Mum, I’ll help Rajah,” Eric says, going to his rescue. “It’s okay, my friend. I’ll tell you what there is and you tell me what you would like to eat. Are you all right? You don’t look your normal self.”
“I’ve just heard about that six-year-old boy in China…”
“Oh, that is horrible. It’s all over the Internet. The boy from Taiyuan whose eyes were gouged out by an aunt who sold them to organ-harvesting thieves.”
“Yes. It’s already sad that a person is born blind. How tragic that a healthy boy with healthy eyes is made blind for nothing,” Rajah says angrily. “I cannot understand how anyone could do this to another human being, especially a relative whom one trusts!”
It’s the first time Eric has seen him angry.
“I heard that the aunt committed suicide. She must have regretted doing it.”
“It doesn’t help the boy, does it?”
“What are you two chatting there for?” Clara asks. “Come and sit at the table.”
Mr and Mrs Devan, Nathan and Saraswati sit poised at the table, their postures rigid, eyes taking in the finery and food. Mrs Devan looks worried, probably wondering how Rajah is going to cope. It is easier for Rajah to eat with his fingers than with cutlery as he can feel his way around his food more easily.
“Mum, I think it will be easier for Rajah to manage without cutlery,” Eric says.
“Oh,” Clara says. “But…”
Everyone at the table registers her tone of dis
appointment.
“What a splendid idea,” Benson says. “Real curry should be eaten the proper way. With our hands! Who wants to taste stainless steel when we can taste our fingers? Salimah, take away the cutlery and bring out finger bowls.”
Clara glares at Benson.
But the Devan family perceptibly relax.
“We are so grateful that you’ve invited us for dinner,” Mr Devan says.
“Eric has told us so much about your family and we just have to meet you,” Benson says. “It is we who have to thank you for making Eric so welcome in your home.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble,” Mrs Devan says. “We love having Eric with us.”
“Yes, he’s doing so much good for Rajah, reading to him…”
“Mr Devan,” Clara says. “Eric tells us you are a nurse.” The way Clara says the word makes it sound tainted.
“Just call me Gopal. Yes, I’m a nurse.”
“Quite unusual, right?” Clara says. “Men nursing?”
“Clara, honey,” Benson tries to interject gently.
“It’s okay, Mr Teo,” Mr Devan says good naturedly. “Everyone asks me the same thing. I’m used to it. It’s funny that no one says anything if a woman becomes a doctor but everyone thinks it strange for a man to be a nurse. It’s true that more women are in the profession rather than men, but the word nurse is not gender-specific. It simply means taking care of someone medically.”
Eric is so proud of Uncle Devan. He talks in such a dignified way, not at all rankled.
“Please, call me Benson. Yes, I agree with you. I think it’s wonderful that you choose to do such noble work. Not everyone has the aptitude.”
For the first time, Eric sees his father in a different light.
“Salimah, can you hurry with those finger bowls? We don’t want curry dripping onto the tablecloth,” Clara calls loudly. “After that, can you pour out the orange juice, please?”
Salimah brings out small scented bowls of water, an orchid floating in each. Then she picks up the crystal jug of orange juice and goes round the table.
“Real orange juice,” Clara says. “Freshly squeezed.”
Eric takes Rajah’s hand and guides it to the crystal glass so that he has a firm hold. The glass has a long stem and wide base; Rajah is not familiar with it and cannot gauge its relationship to anything else in the room. This makes him nervous and unpredictable.
That is when it happens.
Rajah picks up the glass and moves it towards his lips. Unable to see his plate or judge any distance, the glass catches the rim of the gold-edged plate, strikes the metal cutlery, and its stem shatters.
Clara shrieks, “Oh my God! The crystal!”
Alarmed, Rajah lets go of the glass and the crystal globe shatters against the plate. Orange juice flows into his tandoori chicken and down into his lap. He panics and stands up abruptly, knees hitting the table. Yelping and floundering, his chair topples backward and crashes onto the marble floor, followed by a cracking sound.
Clara shrieks again, and so does Mrs Devan. Rajah is even more agitated and almost loses his balance. Eric rushes forward to catch him in case he trips over the fallen chair. Mr and Mrs Devan get up hurriedly to go towards their son, to calm him down. Saraswati starts to cry. Chaos reigns.
Eric is mortified. He has never been so ashamed. No, not of his poor friends – but of his mother.
Ten
It stormed the night before but the day is now bright, the sky clear with little clouds. The sea is calm, signalling a pleasant journey by boat. Thanks to Rajah’s encouragement, Eric decides that it is time to visit his grandmother. One way or another, he has to know how she feels towards him. There is no point in procrastinating like his father, putting things off until he is unable to deal with the issues. Or be too late to see his grandmother alive. She is so near and yet so far.
Eric picks Rajah up at his home. Rajah is ready and waiting, excited about the trip. He has a small backpack filled with snacks Aunty Devan has packed for them – shish kebab wrapped in chapatti plus several samosas, some cut fruits in a Tupperware box, bottles of water. There are also Tiger Balm mosquito repellent sprays and patches.
“Your mother sure won’t let us go hungry.”
“It’s the Singaporean way of saying ‘I love you’.”
“That says a lot, doesn’t it? That my mother does not cook?”
Fortunately the Devans are forgiving about the dinner fiasco. Mr Devan offered to pay for the broken crystal glass and the damaged chair but Benson dismissed the idea.
“They’re only things,” he said. “Things can be replaced. It’s more important that no one was hurt.”
The Devans have a good laugh afterwards, recounting the evening when Eric next visits. Nathan acts out Rajah’s disaster with the glass and the chair and Rajah actually laughs at himself. He was overwrought at the dinner but is back to his old self.
“You should have seen my mother’s face!” Eric says to Rajah.
“I do feel bad about breaking her precious things.”
“Oh don’t! Her taste is not mine anyway. Besides, things are easily replaced, like my father said.”
Clara is not happy when Eric tells her he is not going to accompany her that Sunday to Mass. He has summoned his courage to say the unspeakable to her. Even Benson’s eyes widen, though he does not interfere.
“What’s so important that you have to go for on a Sunday?” she asks. “It’s the only day in the week that God asks of you.”
“You ask of me, Mum. Not God. It won’t make a difference to God if I go to church or not. If he is truly God, he will know why I’m not going,” says Eric. “Maybe this is as good a time to tell you: I’m not going to church anymore. I don’t think Catholicism suits me.”
“You what? Not suits you? Not go to church! You’ll go to hell! I can’t let you go to hell,” Clara cries, truly distraught. “I’m concerned for your soul and your afterlife.”
“I don’t believe in a hell after death,” Eric says. “Hell is here and now. People can be spiritual without being religious.”
“Catholicism is the one true religion. Where are you getting these preposterous ideas?” Clara’s voice rises several decibels. “Is this the influence of your Indian Hindu friends?”
“Leave my friends out of this. And you don’t have to adopt that racist tone. It’s your kind of fanaticism that results in religious wars,” Eric says.
Clara’s jaw drops. Eric walks out on his mother. Her behaviour at the dinner for the Devans was the last straw. She seems to have little empathy for other people and no inkling on how she rubs people the wrong way.
But Uncle Devan taught him that anger was corrosive so he tries not to be angry at his mother; he mustn’t allow that Incredible Hulk persona to lie in wait inside him. He has learned to channel his anger, concentrating on his breath, allowing the prana to flow. He cannot wait to graduate from school and be out of his mother’s grasp. He will study hard to get an overseas scholarship so that he can be independent as soon as possible.
“Benson! You’d better teach your son some manners!”
“Why is it that whenever you’re not happy with his behaviour, he’s my son, and when you’re happy with him, he’s your son?”
“Don’t you talk back to me too!”
“Well, here we are at Changi Ferry Terminal,” Eric says to Rajah. “We have to take a bumboat across to the island. The boatman has to wait for twelve passengers to fill his boat before he will leave.”
“Why is it called a bumboat?” Rajah asks. “Is it the same word as our bum?”
Eric chuckles. It is interesting that ordinary concepts can have a different take for someone who cannot see.
“Well,” says Eric. “As far as I know, the Dutch word for a canoe – boomschuit – is made up of boom meaning ‘tree’ and schuit for ‘boat’. Such wooden boats were used to ferry people and goods from the port to the big ships which could not get close to the harbour. Through time, the
word got corrupted and became just boom, then later, spelled bum, with a ‘u’. But in English, the word does not look like it’s supposed to sound like boom so became pronounced as bum. Nothing to do with our backsides!”
“Gosh Eric! You sound like an encyclopedia!”
“I just like knowing where words come from.”
“You’ll make a very good teacher as well as a writer.”
As it is a weekend, the boatman does not have to wait long for his quota of passengers. So the Chinese man in a half-buttoned shirt, cigarette drooping from his lips, gathers the group together and directs them down the gangplank. To get to his boat, Number 8888, feng-shuied for good business, passengers have to step over other boats, all tied and moored side-by-side to each other, bobbing up and down as the waves slap at their sides. Thick ropes and slippery decks have to be traversed. Eric is concerned about the undulating motion and the prospect of Rajah slipping. But others on the boat stretch out helping hands to convey Rajah safely into their boat.
“Oh this is fun! What an adventure!” Rajah says joyfully. “I can feel the wind in my hair already.”
The boatman collects $2.50 from each passenger. Eric pays Rajah’s fare. The motley of passengers is casually dressed in shorts and T-shirts: a group of teenagers going on a day hike, some tourists and some residents returning home with Styrofoam boxes and supplies from the mainland. Then the boatman starts up the engine, belching out kerosene fumes that are overpowering even when the door and windows are slid open. One of the women coughs. The teenagers use their phones to take photos of themselves in various poses around the boat, teasing each other.
The journey takes just under fifteen minutes. From the mainland, the verdant island looks near enough to tempt a strong swimmer to swim to it. As they move away from the mainland, Eric looks back and sees the old colonial houses set on the hill on the mainland, now used as holiday bungalows. A couple of smart restaurants are perched close to the water, including a sailing club and yacht club. In the old days, only the rich had properties with direct access to the sea and beach. But the government provided ordinary people an opportunity to be near the sea by creating a boardwalk that fringed the coast, so that all Singaporeans, rich or poor, could enjoy the same things, closing the gap between classes. Clean public swimming pools, gardens, board walks and park connectors were built, so that recreation is now within everyone’s means.