Paper Rantings

Brought to you with the help of Nian Nian the Hedgehog:

1) How can a university library not carry the full volumes of Capital?

2) Why must I be writing on "space" if I can't be in Thailand now?

More to follow...

Humid Lovesicking

Mayee, Jing, Jr (mostly hidden) and Eddie at Newton. Salivating is integral.

Hopefully, soon, I'll board Tiger Airways to some beach too.

Monsoon showers, which make the air around our faces consistant suffocations-by-wet-towels, did not quite damp the craziness of my past week. I've just sent Eddie and his cousin, Jr. off to the airport, and it was a wonderful two days showing off my "uncle, drive faster" cab-taking skills and local ruminations. We spent a first night rather adventurously at Kerbau Hotel, a dingy place at Little India opposite Spell #7 where I used to walk past and swear living there at least once in my life. Wish accomplished, though I can't say I was complaining when we moved on to Sloane Court Hotel, whose little Tudor setting brought out the best of our island's (post)colonial confusion.

Dim Sum at Crystal Jade never let hungry foreigners down, though my mum, sis and Eddie saw proof that it does the same magic on locals returning after merely a 8-month absence too. I had my century egg porridge and lapped it up instantaneously. And for dinner at Newton Hawker Center, the same goes for my plate of cai tao kueh. Mayee and Jing surely added some feist to hosting at the table, midst some tales of Bangkok tiger shows.

More eating with Chris and Tania from the conference later tonight. I can do this, I can. But after 8 months of being spoiled by Cha Cha and two-buck-chucks, alcohol consumption is becoming a fast hesitation back home.

Addendum: Back from Holland Village where I still gave in to unreasonably priced wines. Tsk. But it was great talking with Chris , who's returning to England tm and Tania, who turned out to be one of my MA thesis marker. She's got to be one of the coolest persons I know, who combines political theory, Adorno, with a healthy addiction to American Idol. We exchanged tips on TV and she promised to start hooking on ANTM. Bertram and Matthew came by subsequently, passing me much well wishes and present from Zurich. At a place where I feel more like an Asian minority than I ever did in California, I know I'm in Singapore alright. Wearing a pink bracelet that Eddie's bought me from a Buddhist temple in Thailand, I should be as safe as risks go.

Vers Quoi?

I'll spend the next two months only beginning to comprehend what happened over the last two days but for now I know it was not just a conference.

Fini

I've impossibly wrapped up the paper for the conference and so am coming home for real in 2 days. On the way to get a massage-reward this afternoon, I saw a baby hedgehog on the streets (!). It was just about one of the best days.

Addendum: Ok so I did not take the picture above; but the hedgehog I saw was just as, if not more amazing than that.

The Event That Most Arrives

Remember my expressed tragedy over missing Sylvie Guillem when she comes to perform in LA just a week after I'll be back in Singapore?

Thanks to Shuyin's alert, Sacred Monsters will be coming to Singapore!!!! Even though my conference paper to be presented in less than a week's time is still a non-event, my death would be perfect now.

More, More, More of Less!

More of birthday celebrations. More of the best Aries.
More of end-of-term , less of papers.

Death to et cetera, et cetera.

---

Sometime ago he said that one story was not enough, now you write to ask for "more, more, more!" Lest neither knows, on their separate accounts and apparently with such different endearments that each time really only the same story is written over and over:

Thus, one must less oppose citation or iteration to the noniteration of an event, than construct a differential typology of forms of iteration, supposing that this is a tenable project that can give rise to an exhaustive program, a question I am holding off on here (Derrida, "Signature Event Context" 326).

Send-off: Minus One

It was fun watching someone stuff two and a half weeks of clothings and necessities into what I would take as a tiny weekend pack. I can barely wait till I take my huge suitcase out and pack half a year's of clothings, shoes and what-nots into a two and a half month trip.

And because only I can be licensed to talk about narcissism, I thought the best bon voyage token for Eddie would be a short story all about me, and a ginger chew sweet wrapper blessed with the glories of Southeast Asia. The continent RE-presents itself. After he ya-ya away in Thailand, we will meet back in Singapore in less than two weeks' time. LA, Mexico, and Singapore -- three countries in two months, we aren't doing bad at all.

It was thus a good decision to end the day with a shopping trip to buy presents for family and friends. Turned out that I had to buy myself a version of whatever I picked out for other people -- such being the curse of immaculate taste. Chatted with a sweet old man whom within 3 minutes brought the conversation to Chow Yun Fatt and the latter's controlling, Singaporean wife. I taught him how to pronounce 'Ziyi' properly since after all, he is working on a script for her right now. I left Starbucks wishing that I had begged for a job carrying chay siew for my Fatt. It would probably beat me trying here to write half-baked criticisms hands down.

Camping Ambers

Manny The Amazing Chef lets Sam try his 'Simple Vanilla Infused Syrup.'

Yay The Bench is Won! Check out that cute tree stump on the left.

Sam and I by the fire. What will I do without that "uncle-ah" for more than 2 months?

Nicole and I reading The Psychic Soviet and trying to evoke a Feminist Forest Revolution. Our efforts were drowned by everyone else grabbing their books and reading behind us. Death to pluralism!

Colin and Nicole before Colin leaves the band to pursue his solo career. Dig our bootiful tent in the background.

Mt. San Jacinto popped up like an alter-region of Southern California, and me like some mountain-deprived freak loved every bit of it.

Manny, Colin, Nicole, Sam and I reached the camping ground around 4pm, and after rejecting the original site allocated to us due to its children-manifested chaos, finally found our one-night home at a quieter, less terrifying Stony Creek. Since tent-setting took us 20 minutes instead of the proclaimed 5-hours, we had to pretend to hike around a bit before getting down to business, that is, finish off every bit of food we brought.

Manny was the chef du jour, and he brought the world's best kitchen into the wild. Zuccini, red peppers, onions on skewers, pita, snacks, veggie dogs, etc., his skills surpassed anything I'd have fancied working up. And mind you, this guy braved a bad cold to make all these gourmet preparations. Our night was spent in bliss round the fire, lapping up songs from Colin's guitar like "There is no death," "Long live death" from our made-believe band "The Drifting Ambers". Attempts to tell ghost stories a là East/west Comparatives got sidestepped for excessive love and beer all around. Tell me a year ago that I'd have made such dear friends in LA so quickly and so undeservingly, and I'll laugh to the mountains. Last night, there were plenty of laughing, but we were all up there doing it. Clearing our meals by 10 o'clock because we couldn't trust Nature's Maid, i.e. a bear, to do it, the last firewood crackled sleep.

Eddie, since he could not join us, lent me a thick comfy sleeping bag that proved to be more comfortable than my bed back home. The next morning, we were awakened by Colin's voice speaking through the "e-cord" (Manny's tent came with an outlet for electrical plugs, as camping 6000ft above ground naturally demands it). Coffee, eggs and breakfasts later, we trotted around a lake before heading down to our land of freeways and auto sales. I miss Mt. San Jacinto, and I'm proud to say that I didn't open a single page of the Being and Time that I brought up. Of course, my hubris of being a Dasein expert by the time we came down the mountain was exposed. But that's how people become experts in things, right? More camping guys, when I come back in July. Mmmmm...

Death By Event

i.really.don't.know.what.to.do.with.it.except.oh.
happy.birthday.to.me.my transcendental.life.
too.many.anniversaries.too.little.time.
four.years.since."to.leave.the.morning."
so.long.since.i.was.left.behind.
last.night.i.told.another.
what.it.was.like.to.see.
my.stillbirth.
.survive.

maybe.this.one.will.stay.awhile.
and.chase.the.offing.