Mary Lao had no idea her husband was struggling with the anguish of displacement. Although she was dimly aware that they did not seem to be enjoying a lot of sex, she was not overtly concerned. The novel excitement of fast and furious income was her new route to orgasmic gratification.
Harrison, her sales manager, was the one who triggered the formulation of two more of Mary Lao’s Five Rules of Success. He related how his former sales manager challenged him to be frank about his utmost fear as an insurance agent. It turned out that he was fearful of approaching English-educated prospects who refused to speak Mandarin, for he himself had a poor grasp of English. The sales manager then challenged Harrison to secure a sales appointment with one English-speaking prospect at the beginning of each week. Until then, he was not to allow himself any other sales appointment for the rest of the week.
“But why would you want to accept that challenge?” Mary Lao had asked, not comprehending. “Your income will suffer for no good reason.”
“Look around you. Ninety percent of our sales agents are Chinese-educated chaps like you and me. They are dipping their fingers into the same pie. Hardly anybody is approaching the English-educated prospects, out of fears that are similar to mine. But because I made it compulsory for myself to overcome that fear, I had to. Once I picked up the English language, my market expanded quickly. That was the key factor that catapulted me to sales manager status ahead of my cohort. If you give yourself the same challenge, I see you making sales manager within two years.”
Mary Lao bit her lip in a head rush of invigoration and trepidation. Like many from her generation, she feared the alien language spoken by the Westerners. Unlike many from her generation, she almost never backed down from a challenge. The next evening, Mary Lao approached Elizabeth from next door and made her an offer. If Elizabeth could coach her in English, she would share half of the commission she earned from the first 10 policies she sold to English-speaking clients.
For Elizabeth, Mary’s offer couldn’t have come at a better time. She had been eyeing a new entertainment gadget she spotted in one of her student’s houses. It was a videocassette recorder that was recently launched in the United States, but not yet commercially available in Asia. The price was exorbitant, but the promised commission sharing from Mary Lao eradicated her concerns. She made her student’s father promise to buy her one on his frequent business trips to the United States.
In less than two weeks, Elizabeth’s ultra-modern entertainment gadget arrived. She was the first person to own a Philips videocassette recorder within a 30-block radius. The student’s father also generously allowed Elizabeth access to their collection of videotapes. Elizabeth picked Mary Poppins and designated it as Mary’s tuition material. The two, together with Gimme Lao, watched the videotape every evening for seven days straight. Elizabeth made mother and child practise the dialogues and learn the songs by heart. The trio had a fabulous time lip-synching the songs from the soundtrack. Gimme Lao fell in love with the magical nanny and insisted that his mother name herself Mary too. That was how Mary Lao acquired her English name.
Elizabeth was smart to pick musicals from the private collection she was given access to. After Mary Poppins, they moved on to The Sound of Music, Fiddler on the Roof, The King and I and My Fair Lady. Not only could these musicals withstand repeated viewing, it was easy for Mary and Gimme to pick up the language humming the assortment of catchy songs till they were etched in their minds. Elizabeth teased mother and child and reflected that had she jumbled up the sequence of her selection, Gimme would have named her mother Maria Lao, Golde Lao, Anna Lao or Eliza Lao.
By the time Mary Lao found herself humming to the tune of “Loverly” as she spread kaya and butter over a slice of bread for Gimme’s lunch box, she knew she was ready to tackle her first English-speaking client. And she already had a target in mind.
There was an Indian family of 12 living in a unit directly above the barbershop. They were prominent only because nobody could figure out how they had managed to squeeze a dozen people into the single bedroom apartment. Mary Lao had never spoken to them, but had observed their routine and counted no less than eight children. Every evening at seven without fail, the eldest daughter would bring her siblings to the playground and supervise, while they went wild on the jungle gym. A month ago, Mary Lao would have crossed the family off her prospect list for two reasons. One, they spoke no Mandarin and she herself spoke no English. Two, a breadwinner with so many mouths to feed was not likely to have enough savings to kick-start an insurance programme. But in accepting the challenge that Harrison issued her, Mary Lao decided to tackle the impossible. She was going to talk the head of the family into buying the protection his family so obviously needed.
After dinner the next evening, Mary Lao left the dishwashing to her husband and brought Gimme downstairs to the playground. Ten minutes later, the Indian brood arrived. One of the younger girls pointed at Gimme hanging from the top bar of the jungle gym and started chatting excitedly to the eldest sister in Tamil. Mary Lao approached them with a broad smile and asked if the girl knew Gimme in school. The girl nodded shyly. She was in the adjacent class in the same year.
“I have seen you and your husband before, but I didn’t know you speak English.” The eldest sister sounded pleasantly surprised. “I am Sabitha Subramaniam, and this is my little darling Omala.”
Mary Lao was glad that Sabitha was friendly and chatty. In fact, Sabitha did most of the talking over the next hour, providing elaborate answers when Mary Lao asked about the Subramaniam family. As it turned out, little Omala was really Sabitha’s cousin and their fathers were brothers. When Sabitha’s father died of a heart attack several years ago, Omala’s father took in Sabitha’s mother and her brood of four. Since Omala’s father had a brood of four himself, and adding to that Omala’s mother and grandmother, he became responsible for an extended family of 12.
“Very, very hard for your uncle!” Mary Lao exclaimed. “So what work he do?”
Sabitha was heartened by Mary Lao’s empathy and chose to disregard her jumbled English tenses. She hesitated a little before she replied, “My uncle works as a prison warden. I know it is tough for him. But he is a responsible man and he loves us dearly.”
From the corner of her eyes, Mary Lao could tell that the neighbours strolling past were hurling curious glances in her direction. Although there was a sprinkling of Indian and Malay families living in the same block, they tended to keep to themselves. Since most of their Chinese neighbours spoke no English, they might nod and smile as they crossed paths along the corridor, but would be ill-equipped to carry out a conversation. The spectacle of Mary Lao carrying a conversation with Sabitha for over an hour was so out of the ordinary that an obese Chinese woman stepped up close, folded her arms and watched intently as though it was a television programme.
“This woman lives directly above my family,” Sabitha became uncomfortable and whispered to Mary Lao. “She is never very friendly. Can you ask her what she wants?”
The obese observer pointed at Sabitha and spoke to Mary Lao in Hokkien. “Tell her that her mother should close the windows when she cooks curry. Otherwise the smell travels up and in through my window and stinks up my kitchen.”
Mary Lao flushed. The Hokkien word for curry was a phonetic translation and there was no way Sabitha could have missed it. Sabitha immediately became agitated and enquired, “Is she complaining about the curry smell? Tell her she should mind her own business. In fact, tell her she should wring her laundry properly before hanging them out to dry. How many times has her dripping laundry dirtied ours? And she has the nerve to complain about our curry smell!”
“What did the Indian girl say?” the obese woman wanted to know.
Mary Lao refused to be embroiled in what could easily escalate into a quarrel. She told the obese woman firmly that she was discussing business with Sabitha and told Sabitha they ought to ignore the obese woman. The obese woman shrugged her shoulders and remained w
here she was, watching the conversation continue with mild interest, as though she was watching a foreign language movie without subtitles.
“My neighbour cook sambal chilli every morning. I no problem with that,” Mary Lao declared.
“Sambal chilli is really too mild,” Sabitha boasted. “My mother makes a wicked curry. The first time you try it, I guarantee you tears will stream down your face.”
“Really?” Mary Lao laughed, her mind churning quickly. “Why not we test? I ask my neighbour make hot-hot sambal chilli. You ask your mother cook hot-hot curry. Saturday I come your place. Dinner.”
“The challenge is on!” Sabitha laughed.
The obese woman recognised the word curry and decided that the two couldn’t possibly be discussing business. Once again she prompted Mary Lao to remind Sabitha to close her kitchen windows. To sidestep the minefield, Mary Lao quickly bid Sabitha goodbye and summoned Gimme to go home.
When Saturday rolled around, Mary Lao and Gimme paid Sabitha a visit armed with a jar of Grandma Toh’s sambal belachan. Mary Lao panicked when she saw the sumptuous spread Sabitha’s family laid out for her. There was chilli parotta, chicken salna, sambar idlis, kadala curry, pineapple rasam and Chettinad-style chicken curry. Blushing deeply, Mary Lao apologised for her miserable jar of sambal belachan. Sabitha laughed and explained that this was the first time they had a visit from a Chinese neighbour in the 10 years that they had lived there. It was an honour.
The Subramaniams laughed heartily when Mary Lao and Gimme both choked and shed tears over their curry dish. In contrast, Sabitha’s siblings and cousins scooped spoonfuls of Grandma Toh’s sambal belachan into their mouths and rolled their eyes giggling. The contest was unceremoniously over.
What surprised Mary Lao more than the family’s hospitality was the opulence of the household furnishings. A majestic wooden carving of Lord Ganesha riding a mouse, measuring over one metre, dominated one wall. This was framed by drapes of saffron satin that ran from the ceiling all the way to the floor. Three smaller but intricate Tanjore paintings of Krishna, Balaji and Lakshmi hung from the opposite wall. Gimme Lao was fascinated by the shine of precious stones on these paintings and stood staring long and hard with his mouth agape. The women wore gold bangles, while the head of the household wore multiple gold rings. Mary Lao simply could not figure out how a prison warden could afford such luxuries for the family.
It wasn’t until Mary Lao had to use the toilet that she solved the mystery. There was a built-in cabinet in a corner fully stocked with cartons of cigarettes. That was Mr Subramaniam’s secret. As a prison warden, he doubled up as a supplier of cigarettes and other items the prisoners were willing to pay for. It would not surprise her if Mr Subramaniam dealt in drugs too. It was necessary for the Subramaniams to keep a low profile, thus they continued to squeeze themselves into the tiny one bedroom apartment and hide their jewellery from sight. But Mary Lao’s unprecedented neighbourly visit was too much of a temptation, so they decided to deck themselves out in their finest gold.
Mary Lao was dizzy with delight when she stepped out of the toilet. For the rest of the evening, she continued to worm her way into the Subramaniams’ confidence. By the end of the second week, she had Mr Subramaniam sign on the dotted line for four insurance policies: one life policy for himself and three endowment policies for his three sons. In her heart, she was humming the tune to “Loverly”.
All seven of Mary Lao’s sales agents were familiar with the Subramaniam story. Mary Lao used it to illustrate the third and fourth of her Five Rules of Success.
Gnash your hottest chilli. The one that brings tears to your eyes and triggers a coughing fit so severe your windpipe feels like bursting. For once you learn to handle the hottest chilli, you can feast on dishes that are out of reach to those who cannot handle their chilli.
That was the third rule.
Had Mary Lao assumed the Subramaniams could not possibly afford to buy insurance and chosen not to approach them, she would not be able to close four cases in one go. In fact, Mr Subramaniam subsequently referred two of his fellow prison wardens, to whom Mary Lao sold three more policies.
Thus the fourth rule: do not judge a covered dish.
After the tearful introduction to the Subramaniam brand of spicy curry, both Mary Lao and Gimme became enamoured with Indian spices and dishes. Every other week, Mary Lao and Sabitha’s mother would bring one another dishes to sample. Gimme Lao became fast friends with Omala in school too. During lunch break at the canteen, Omala would slip Gimme Lao a piece of Dharwad pedha from her lunch box, and Gimme would share his ang ku kueh. When they moved on to year three, both children enrolled in the school band and became recorder buddies. While waiting for the school bus home, the pair would whip out their hard plastic recorders and practise their band pieces together. The girls in their respective classes mocked them by calling them a kopi susu couple, which directly translated to ‘black coffee with white milk’. Peeved, Gimme Lao and Omala simply counter-launched their offensive and called the girls various demeaning nicknames.
Although the two often joined each other for lunch breaks, Gimme Lao almost never got to see Omala during the morning tea break. That was when Omala retreated to the secluded corner of the garden behind the janitor’s storeroom to play zero point. Gimme Lao played various games with the boys. There was hantam bola, police and thief and the ever-popular hopscotch. But none of the boys played zero point. It was a girl’s game; one that Gimme Lao secretly wished to play.
Zero point was a game played using a rope made of intertwined rubber bands. Two girls, acting as height markers, held one end each and stretched the rope taut at ankle level. The rest of the girls took turns to straddle the horizontal rope and perform a set of skipping manoeuvres with incremental complexity using their legs to draw patterns out of the rope. Once everyone had a go, the rope was brought up to knee level, and the game replayed. By the time the rope reached waist level, most of the weaker players would have been eliminated. The last girl standing won the game.
For weeks Gimme Lao hid himself behind the janitor’s storeroom to watch and study the game. Omala was quick on her feet but too short to tackle the rope at chest level. Two of the best players were in year five, tall, rangy girls who dominated the game. Of the two, the one with a mole on her chin was a harrier. She ordered the other girls around, decided the queuing sequence and determined forfeits and penalties. Her name was Gan Ah Sai, but the girls called her Garnasai, or ‘like shit’ in Hokkien, behind her back. The other girl, Kai Li, was Garnasai’s loyal sidekick. The two had the last say when it came to the game of zero point.
Eventually, Gimme Lao could not bear it any longer. He stepped up to the two of them and announced that he wanted to play too. Garnasai gave him a dismissive glance and shook her head. Kai Li added, “Zero point is for girls only. No boys allowed.”
“But I want to play,” Gimme Lao persisted.
“You can play if you are a girl. Are you a girl?” Kai Li teased. Some of the other girls started giggling.
Gimme Lao kept quiet but would not leave. He stood to one side and watched as Garnasai executed a flawless pattern with the rubber band rope held at chest level. When she finished, Gimme Lao announced stubbornly, “I can do that too.”
Garnasai glared at him and snorted. Omala decided to put in a good word for her buddy, “Let him play. He can take my turn and I will just watch.” Kai Li objected, “No, he cannot take your place. Only girls can play this game.” Omala threw up her hands and challenged the other girl, “But why?”
Before Kai Li could answer, Gimme Lao remarked coldly, “Because they are afraid I will beat all of them.”
For a while, a frozen silence descended on the group. Garnasai glared at Gimme Lao, who stood a full head shorter than her. When Gimme Lao returned her glare and did not flinch, Garnasai decided to issue him a challenge. “You can be the first boy to play zero point if you can beat me. Until then, you will play as a girl. Omala can lend you her f
rock.”
All the girls broke out into paroxysms of laughter. Even Omala laughed, until she suddenly remembered Gimme Lao was her buddy and quickly hid her grin behind a cupped palm. Gimme Lao himself frowned, silently contemplating the challenge. When he eventually made up his mind and nodded his agreement, all the girls gaped in astonishment. Even Garnasai found it hard to believe Gimme Lao actually accepted her challenge.
“Quick, let him have your frock, Omala!” Kai Li urged gleefully. Omala looked doubtful, but Gimme Lao nodded to reassure her. All the girls wore the same white shirt and blue shorts the boys wore, but had an additional pleated blue frock worn over the first layer. Gimme Lao took over Omala’s frock and quietly slipped it over his head. All the girls started to giggle hysterically. Gimme Lao folded his arms, bit his lip and waited patiently till the game resumed. The moves he had observed and studied from afar were not as easily executable as he had imagined. By the time recess ended, Gimme Lao had never once managed to move past the waist level. Garnasai snorted at him and pointed her thumb downwards. The other girls scuttled back to their respective classes and eagerly spread the news that Gimme Lao wore a frock to play zero point.
When Gimme Lao returned the next morning to the secluded garden, there were a handful of boys from the other classes who were gathered there leaning against the wall of the janitor’s storeroom. They alerted one another once Gimme Lao approached and cackled loudly. Gimme Lao felt the deep burn of his own blush. He did not know then, but there was a betting pool among the boys as to whether Gimme Lao would have the guts to put on a frock in their presence.
“Are you going to join us, Princess Gimme?” Kai Li teased. The girls giggled and the boys cackled.
Gimme Lao strode over to the girls but shook his head when Omala gestured to ask if he needed her frock. For this morning, he would just observe the game. He was certain the boys would grow impatient and leave soon. But Garnasai understood his strategy and shred it asunder by throwing him an ultimatum. If he did not put on a frock and play zero point right away, he could forget about playing the game ever again.
Let's Give It Up for Gimme Lao! Page 7