When I feel like I'm losing my voice, my personal thoughts or my sanity (or all of the mentioned!) - I blog.
More often than not, I sign in to the user account window and then wonder what to write. Compared to the dazzling, witty, interesting, hilarious, profound, just-plain-kepo-fun of other blogs I visit, mine seems so dull in comparison. Hardly ever any photos. If so, none of the author. Goodness, the author doesn't even reveal herself. How neurotic can one person be?
However! Today, I have found not one, but TWO, great blogs. Ta-daa: Joyce Tagal and Hannah Yeoh. Blogs that inspire me that one day, I may not only be a better writer, but that I might be a better person. And also to have more interesting, worthy thoughts to blog about than what I have now. And both are women and committed Christians. And very much patriotic Malaysians, though educated abroad. (One is still studying in the US). It reminds me that no matter how far in the world I roam, God's calling will always bring me to where he wants me to be, for His purpose. For now, I believe it is Malaysia He is ultimately calling me to.
And because I am feeling extra-creative today, I have a little creation for you guys:
He looked at the aluminium (or was it stainless steel? Don't know, don't care) trays before him bearing heavy loads of fish curry, chicken, steamed egg, boiled vegetables in sauce and other typical Malaysian dishes. Deng was troubled. Today had not been a good day. The boss was upset because a contractor was giving him trouble, and the was lots of tension in the office. The air-conditioner breaking down after dripping water for a week, did not help to improve the general mood. Hot and sweaty, stressed and tense; Deng was relieved when it was finally 12 o' clock and he could shuffle out of the narrow doorway for his lunch break.
"Which one you want?" The middle-aged serving woman standing before him with a metal ladle and a plate of white rice barked. Deng realised he had lost his focus and held up his palm, pretending he had been perusing the choices the whole time. "I want this.....this....and that vegetable." "That's 3.50." He paid and took his plate to the smallest table; only fit for one, two if you were sharing a plate.
He paused to say grace, out of habit. "ThankyouLordforthisfoodblessittoourbody'suseinJesus'nameAmen." Still the plural pronoun, after two years, with Jing and the kids gone? In the back of his mind, he knew that altering it, or dropping the habit completely, would mean that he had given up on them ever coming back and for things to return to the times when they were happy. When he was happy.
Digging into his food took total concentration. Deng was the type who did not like to have conversation over food, which was good considering he had no one to converse with. It required undivided attention to ensure that there was a proportionate mixture of rice, meat and vegetables in each spoonful; so that no one taste was dominant to his taste buds. And of course, to carefully separate the fish bits so that there would be no stray fish bones in his mixture.
Despite this, Deng took no pleasure in eating. It was just a habit, and without it he would not have the energy to work, and gnawing pains or gastric would kick in around 4.30pm. The serving ladies noticed that he always picked the same dishes whenever he came, which was a few times a week. Strapped down in the monotony of their lives, they would speculate about him: that he was a loner who repaired computers and hardware for a living; that he used to be a rich man whose wife had divorced him and left him poor and destitute. The truth was less grand than that, but they were content believing their own concoctions about him, content to let him point out the same dishes again and again, pretending to wait for him to ask when they already knew what he would pick. It wasn't nice to pry, not with a decent guy like that who minds his own business and brings us steady income.
Deng finished his task, the bones and debris were neatly pushed to one side of the plate. He looked around and for a moment someone who was looking closely would have been surprised at the look of desperation in his eyes. It said, "Help! You see this man in a pressed shirt and clean brown pants, but this is not me. I pick the same food to eat everyday, but that's the only choice I make. I did not pick this life, I did not pick this loneliness. And I don't know how to get out. Help me." The expression was gone the next instant.
He got up, and walked back slowly to the office. 12.45 pm. He would be back early. Maybe the boss will be pleased. Then again, he probably wouldn't notice.
Soundtrack: Moby - Natural Blues
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