Old Familiars

Got tagged by C, an old Army buddy, in a photo album on Facebook with photos from the Taiwan training trip that we went on in 2006. I would like to link to it somehow from here, because 1) it is most likely that photos of the Army days would only come to me via these indirect sources, for, regrettably, I almost went out of my way to ensure I didn't get photographed in fatigues, 2) these pictures really bring back a surge of memories; we really did make something out of a bum deal, and despite everything, we did manage to have a fun and enriching time, and it is a real achievement, and 3) strangely enough, I seem to look better in Army photos than elsewhere, or at least I like these photos of myself better; maybe it's the neat haircut, or the universally interesting context.

But I don't feel that it's within my rights to do so, because 1) these are someone else's pictures in someone else's Facebook account, and doing so smacks of presumption, even if we did brave hell and high water together, 2) it is self-indulgent, because the people who can best appreciate it are the people who are in the photos and are thus already tagged; to other viewers, the meaning that they carry for me must needs ring hollow, and 3) it is against military regulations to post pictures of military activities (especially involving equipment) online. Nonetheless, I am surprised by how grateful I am that these pictures have turned up. It really does make a difference. It makes those experiences seem more real, somehow; it helps to integrate what we went through then with what we are going through now, and thereby helps to make a more complete person out of very disparate experiences.

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Yesterday, after writing at SMU, went to meet up with Claud and Ian to go for a play at the Drama Centre (the one in the National Library). In fact, it was a six-play bill called the David Ives Project. Basically, it's six short, one-act plays by the same playwright, all dealing with the slippery nature of words: double-entendres, slips, faux-pas, misunderstandings, double meanings, ironies, puns and gibberish. It was really quite delightful, not only in the really funny wordplay, but also in the interesting stageplay: blocking, dramatic devices (some of which are patently out-of-this-world, involving instantaneous and non-linear time-jumps) and costuming. And all this was directed by someone I know (somewhat passingly); it kind of blows my mind that someone I recognise can actually direct a public, for-profit production, even before she is 21! But then again, she does come from the ACJC pedigree of big-budget, high-quality drama practitioners, so it is also something that is really laudable, that all their experience from school has not entirely been lost after graduation.

The plays I liked best were one about a man who falls in love with a washing machine (a play on the boys-with-toys issue), and one entitled The Philadelphia, about an existential phenomenon named after the American city in which one can never get what one asks for (part of a series of phenomena which include "Clevelands" and "Los Angeleses"). There was a particularly good one at the end in which linguistic inflections in terms of tone, imagery, expression and mood are explored. A couple try to converse with each other, and their conversation is tenuous and fragile: one small misstep in expression dissolves their nascent relationship, resulting in awkwardness or hostility. But each time they step wrongly, a bell rings, and they jump to the point in their conversation just before the mistake and are given a second, third, fourth chance to get it right. The snappy conversation, the whirl of moods that jerk from intimacy to alienation and back again, and the faux-pas whose larger consequences are barely grasped before the plot is rewound, all make this playlet most delightful to experience.

Anyway, speaking of old familiars, ran into Zhi at the play. We go way back - back to primary school days, when we were part of a clique of boys who all travelled together after school to our homes spread along the Eastbound train line. Lately, though, we had fallen out of contact, and our separate paths in JC and in Army (he is on a PSC scholarship) did not help at all, and it had come to the point where I would get third-party reports about his exploits, but I would not have opportunity nor cause to actually talk to him directly. And so, it was surprising and refreshing to be able to talk to him at length after the play, even going through the motions of our old tradition by riding the train back home in each other's company. Nearly six years of distance has left a lot to catch up upon, even if our old friendship no longer suited the shape of our current (pre-)college experiences. And so it was that when we came to instances of awkward silence, some other nugget of information from the previous years would easily flow in to fill the vacuum, delivering us from the painful rituals of meaningless sounds and gestures.

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And tomorrow, the deluxe immersion in old friendships in Saigon will begin. Just spent the morning packing - or rather, spent all of fifteen minutes gathering all necessary and available articles of apparel and equipment and putting it all into the trusty backpack. These things, necessary and fundamental but essentially mindless, do become faster with practice. Later, going to do some minor shopping to top up on other essential stuff: batteries for the camera, a new sketchbook, currency. And then, at 5am tomorrow, I'll be at the airport checking in. It has taken a while this time for the reality of this trip to sink in, but now, at the cusp of departure, I finally feel the excitement starting to invade my soul and dominate my thoughts.