gettin’ on

by Pavle Radonić

For some light entertainment the night before there had been the cricket broadcast from South Africa for the finale to the series. The radio seemed right at this former British bastion.

Newspapers had been enlarged the last couple days to include The Hindu and Times of India over lunch at the KV table. The Straits Times had reported Paul Anka fans anticipating a treat here and Eric Clapton recently. (Less than vibrant the latter seemingly in his first concert.)

Yesterday a gathering down at Parkway Parade Mall near the waterfront for afternoon tea. It was a short twenty minute walk from the house along the side lane into the other Singapore of bars, boutiques & artisanal bakeries. Expats every side whiter-than-white (an old washing detergent ad). Dog-walkers by the dozen, and not all Domestics on the ends of the leads. How they hated the unending reports of their kin on the Mainland continuing in their ancient, ingrained delectation. If you happened to carelessly call the locals Chinese, watch out for yourself, Buster.

Within the cool at Parkway big-hair ladies in leopard skin prints and over-dressed kiddies kicking their feet beneath the tables. Michael Tong had marshaled a small party of what turned out to be his Rosary group, with the addition of a Yorkshire visitor. The latter had been a social worker, retired to the East coast and escaping midwinters each year. A leg on to Cambodia usually followed, where Ian had found another niche.

Conversation covering the Ukraine, the local drought, walking paths in Sin’pore. Someone mentioned the recent news of property prices sky-rocketing on Hainan, as cashed-up Mainlanders went in search of clean air.

Fine pastries at Ya Kun Coffee-Shop, nothing like the sod offered at other chains. Pleasant tea-party mood amongst good, well-settled older folk sipping without slurping; piped music from the corridor and rich soap perfume from more than one quarter.

Smooth, comfortable sailing under a refreshing breeze overhead, with the abrupt conversational hand-grenade landing in the middle of the table the very last thing that might have been expected.

Possibly someone had made reference to a recent tummy upset and runs resulting; one of the party complaining of a bad turn charged to some particular resto a day or two back. After the smoke and din had died down it had been impossible to recall how it had all begun.

Without warning, from left field, delivered as if from behind a hedge, here was Michael Tong launching into the midst of the gathering. Innocently enough to begin, with the recall of a family dinner table from days of yore that took a particular twist.

A slight, momentary hesitation in Mike's offering; brief catch in the throat as he progressed his story.

…No, he would continue with what he had started.

And speaking of runs...

Back in the day, little boy Mick had been under the dining table at home in Kluang—then Port Swettenham, Peninsular Malaysia. From that vantage beneath the cloth observing the talking shoes.

The men jabbering upstairs had likely forgotten his presence.

Grandpapi, his Da's Da, rattling at his son, Mick’s own Pa.

The former’s dog-eared slipper opined this particular something to the latter’s polished lace-ups.

Daddy has been feeling poorly, out-of-sorts. Weak in the gut & ailing. Not to put too fine a point on it, specifically, it had been the runs that found the man short, irritable and restless the whole of the morning.

As he listened, young Michael saw himself reflected in the bright toe of Da’s shoe. Up on the bridge of the ship Da himself was cloudy, grey and crumpled, little Mick knew.

A pretty pass. Nothing of good from it and no remedy.

…Well, actually, GrandPapi had sumthin to say about that now.

Ridge of his dirty old left slipper scuffing the rug and ruffling the surface, as the old man crossed at the ankles.

Young Michael watched and listened. (The little old lady had lived in a shoe of course.)

Son, suggests Grandpapi, you wan somethin rec'fy that ready? Well, you listen me…

The crease in the carpet smoothed with Grandpa’s new move.

What you be needin, continues he…

Then, stopping, like he had forgotten where he had left his keys. Often did that Gramps.

…You wanna get outta strife, what you be needin now is a wee littl’ tug on the ol' opium pipe. My dear boy. That’d put you right as rain in a jiffy.

Bear in mind, Reader, Parkway Parade Mall. The whispering, snot-green sea beyond the condominiums. Italian tiles through the halls, potted ferns. Girls by their mothers with knees drawn close in their school uniforms. Along the concourse watch-sellers stood life-sized Swiss tennis players to draw customers.

The Katong precinct where canaries and parrots swooped through the trees, a stone’s throw away. Daffodils & pansies proffering themselves to honeybees.

Sun-set tones of Equatorial gold casting over the shop-houses. Longest drought in well over a century might be keenly felt up over the Causeway; not so much in Lion City, with its treatment and desalination plants (together with an ironclad guarantee from Johor for water through to the 2060s).

Good Catholic Michael Tong ten years before had been exorcised of some kind of malignant possession by a Buddhist monk—an altogether other, longer story. Here the man sat shamelessly introducing his old Grandpa’s opium smoking days of sixty years before.

Port Swettenham (where young Mick was born). KL. Malacca. Here in Singapura. All the towns along the stretch had formerly provided good gear at reasonable rates for the old coolie class after their hard day’s yakka in the field and on the wharf. Choice cultivation laid on in numberless dens.

Ricochet recall then of the poor unfortunates who had slid down the slope on the Great Southern Land, stoppered up double-whammy from the horse, and methadone together these many long years. Losing the teeth was one thing, but it was a fair stretch perched on the stool too, straining for relief there.

Hard hits galore bit of a joke in contemporary Singapore, where the past often bubbled up from deep within the cellar.

Of course, with the present-day legislation it would prove a tricky, risky remedy for a common problem. Common despite all the famously fine fare on offer everywhere in the restos & food courts of the island Republic.

None of the others seemed to have heard Michael's youthful reminisce. A scooped passage of time now longer relevant to these denizens.

Sips of Twinings. Bracelets slipping over wrists. Glances over the collections of plates across the table and straightening in the chairs.

Geylang Serai, Singapore 2011-26

NB. For readers unfamiliar with Oz pigin, brief lesson for “hard hit”. Rhymes with the term for human waste. (Deutsch scheisse.)

Photo of Pavle Radonić

BIO: An Australian writer of Montenegrin heritage, Pavle Radonić spent ten years living in SE Asia, where a disproportionate number of his publications originate. Recent work has appeared in Action, Spectacle, Sagebrush Review, QU Literary Magazine & Hobart Pulp. (Denver Quarterly & Post Road Magazine forthcoming.)