We were raised to see harmless aberration as texture, as colour. The strange things that happen in our sleep, they’re accepted as something to tease, to laugh about.

Ah, I was still sentimental. I gave up the Canon in favor of a fresh start; when I turned 22, I sold everything, I moved to Nikon.

There were plenty of people out, doing people things. People-ing. What did people things entail? It felt as if everyone was too loud, too unnatural, as if the world had become too bright in the time we’d been away.

I learned quickly that purchasing food that could be grasped in both hands, eaten while weaving in and out of crowds, was the best way to stretch your dollar.

Television, of course, can be very good. At its best, it is a work of art; at its worst, a mindless form of company, the friend that prattles on about nothing at all and doesn’t mind you sitting there, mumbling noises of assent once in a while.

That you’ll be surprised at how disappointed you are when it rapidly devolves into mud-slinging between fans; that the disappointment is mainly self-directed, for once again you’ve invested trust in confident, faceless voices on the Internet, a rookie mistake.

It’s the Lunar New Year and we’re all trying to get lucky.

Existing between the contradictions that the different aspects of me perform, I find myself constantly renegotiating the boundaries between space and courtesy. Who decides what the line is between a reasonable and rude amount of time it takes to formulate a response? What is sacrificed in the name of acceptability? And who benefits from these choices?

Here is a list of hopes, thwarted dreams, optimism, and unfulfilled potential, in the form of selected applications on my phone

We wake up on January 1st to a full-blown thunderstorm. It begins raining at six in the morning, sheets and sheets of opaque rain coming down, flooding corners of Singapore and nudging us back into bed, making blanket burritos of us all. The second time I wake, it’s almost noon, and still raining.

The year is almost over but the rivalry between the cat and me persists. She is an unusually difficult cat, which, to be fair, is something that has been said about me as well.

I don’t have a good sense of humor. Or perhaps the right thing to say is, I don’t have an accurate sense of humor.

To me, the shift in the skies, the soft whirl of snow fluff, all seem to contain guarantees of happiness, of wonder. Promises of the new.

A thing that frustrated and amused adults in equal measure was my total inability to understand the concept of singular choice as a child.

Something people back home often ask is why I decided, when most people my age were entering the best years of their career, to kiss a job and decent money goodbye, and pursue, of all things, a staggeringly expensive MFA in the one area least likely to provide me with good returns of investment.

Part of the noodle’s allure is how it’s best enjoyed under the cover of midnight, slurped slowly while pouring over study notes, or warming your tummy after a night of dancing.

An interesting thing about the proliferation of Zoom, Google Meets, WebEx, Microsoft Teams (how on earth did Skype drop the ball on this one?), is that as we speak, we are reflected back digitally to ourselves.

My reaction to the elections has been full-bodied and primal. My skin turns sticky even in air-conditioning; I acquire an insatiable sweet tooth — which is an interesting development, as I haven’t felt compelled towards sugar in almost eight years.

This vaguely Thoreauian system is alien to me. Voting is compulsory in Singapore, so like it or not, you make a choice, and later on, this choice is held as evidence that you were somewhat culpable for the city that you live in.

When writing is going good, it’s amazing. When it’s not, well, it can sometimes feel like you’re quarreling with the atmosphere.