Adult Things

Gradually, as we grow up we start to realise that there are these "adult things" that are the worst banes in life. Family. Work. Money. Death. Retirement. Etc. For most people, all these "adult things" start to plague them when they start to work. Unfortunately for some, these things become their pals from an early age. 

I just finished my first year of proper labour for money work. And looking at my monthly expenses, I'm having a gigantic headache. Thankfully, I'm in a profession that offers a lot of comfort. The only thing that I have to worry about is how much I get to save. Many people I believe, do not get to save much. I don't know how to feel about it. Some people save more than me, I have great envy for that. 

Over the weekend, I attended Tania de Rozario's "And the Walls Come Crumbling Down" book launch. I had to rush out of the office quickly to attend this event punctually. 

Work. 

She's a lovely lady. Full of life. On surface value, I would never be able to imagine that this bubble girl wrote such a heart wrenching autobiographical account of her adult life. I shall not attempt to write a book review here because I really hate writing those at a time like this (right before I plunge into the comforts of my bed). I cannot imagine myself being in her situation. Her "adult life" was one filled with loneliness and this uncertain concept of home seemed to haunt her for years and years. But looking at her literary achievements now, perhaps leaving was the best decision she can make for herself. In Singapore, there is a great discourse surrounding the idea of home. However, this imagination of "home" is one that is filled with happiness and warmth. Which can be rather exclusive for people who do not have excess to such a lifestyle. Homes can be corrosive for some people, and leaving homes to find their tribes is more important. There is after all, no fixed rules in the world. Reminds me of this RuPaul interview that I watched yesterday. 

As I work my way into the second year of my career, I start to have a lot of doubtful feelings about this industry. It is one that requires me to commit ninety percent of my time. I am certainly not willing to do this given how my aspirations are far and wide. I wrote in my little book of musings today about the things that I want to become. An artist, a writer, a traveller, a professor... There are a few more. I have been stalling my dreams for quite a while now because I am generally lazy and full of false optimism that there is a lot of time left at my disposal. But another reason that I have come to subscribe to is the merciless overhaul of my time by this career. This job leaves no time for me to do the things that I would like to do. 

I would like to make a difference some day. It will never come if I'm always doing something. 

As I come to meet more people, people like Koh Jee Leong (who wrote the really intelligent "Payday Loans" and "Steep Tea"), it became more apparent to me that I have to START. I have to write. I have to get started. Even Samuel is off to a great start now. 600 or so days of ploughing through the sea of designers and artists, he now has a kicking magazine website. A casual conversation with a random colleague made me think about the inertia that I have, because of my work and my personality. I have been yielding to my laziness that I have not been creating anything of value to the world. I should be yielding to my love for the world to generate outputs that I can share. 

And I think too much. Not the intelligent sparring of thoughts. Not those kind. I waste too much time thinking about silly details. When I should be WRITING and DOING. Sigh. Nope, no sigh. I should not be sighing because sighing is for people who have a great deal of the world disappoint them. I have not done anything to warrant any disappointment. 

I've just been doing a lot of reading. This is something that I can be proud of. Over the past seven weeks, I've completed 8 books (yay) and I'm starting on my 9th today. 

- The Course of Love by Alain de Botton

- Steep Tea by Koh Jee Leong

- Death of a Perm Sec by Wong Souk Yee

- Harry Potter and the Cursed Child by JK Rowling

- Peculiar Chris by Johann S Lee

- And the Walls Come Crumbling Down by Tania de Rozario

- The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

- Now That It's Over by O Thiam Chin

This is a mini achievement for myself because I never believed myself to be a quick reader nor an industrious reader. I'm immensely proud of myself for gathering the patience and conviction to read. Reading made me realise that I can put out thoughts into words too. And best if I can fill up the gaps of the local literary scene in the form of writing. But that's a big project for another day. I feel more enriched by reading than anything else I've done in my own leisure time to be honest. 

Regarding the adult things that we are forced to do, I feel that this is a rather dreary topic which is going on in everyone's mind. I just don't want to be the kind of people who gets bogged down by all these that they become joyless. That would be the worst thing that can happen. 

A lot of thinking to do. A lot of actions need to take place too. Love. 

PS Pardon my bad english and bad grammar. I did not run a check post writing. 

NDP 2016

On most fronts, this year's edition of NDP can be considered lukewarm and uninspiring. The absence of crowd favourites like parachuting men, fireworks porn and military display had drawn the ire of the public for the past few weeks. Coupled with an expensive bill from the hosting venue, Singapore's biggest theatre event will probably go down in history as the worst follow up to the euphoric infestation that is SG50. 

However, I would like to argue that SG51 did do something right. Or rather, they did do one thing right. 

After fifty one long years, the country is finally incorporating the narrative of dis/abled people into the national discourse. There was an active inclusion of dis/abled people's stories into the entire show. The teaching of sign to the spectators, the special (and honestly the best and most meaningful) mass display segment that paid tribute to dis/abled people and their abilities, the scripting of a dis/abled child in the grandfather's overarching account of 'Badang' are just some of the evidence that there is an effort to acknowledge disabled people, that they lead respected and dignified lives. 

Ever so often, it is easy to yield their stories for the convenience and benefit of abled people. For so long, they have been portrayed as sad, unfortunate and useless. All the charity shows all those years ago seem to infiltrate an image that this is a group of people who needs pity and sympathy above everything else. Today, I feel that there is a great difference in how their stories are being told by the country. 

There seem to be sprinkling moments throughout the past two years too. The advent of The Purple Parade, the nomination of NMP Chia Yong Yong into the Parliament, and even most recently, Ms Chia's invitation to the US State Banquet for Singapore and Ho Ching's now-famous dinosaur print pouch made by local special needs designer. These are new and refreshing ways that we are looking at dis/ability. 

I believe the popular discourse needs to happen before it can trickle down into useful and careful policies. Or rather the discourse needs to happen for policies enacted to become useful and helpful. We need to keep at it, and never forget that there is a group that exist in our society. Sometimes visible, often invisible. 

And perhaps this is the start of how we can think about people who are different from us. That they deserve respect too even though they are not the same/similar. I look forward to the day when we can extend this graciousness and care to lesbian, gays, bisexual, transgender and queer people, and also all other people who are different and who live on the fringe in society. 

Only when we can renounce our hate and accept each other, can we sing, "this is home truly, where I know I must be" with all the gusto in our hearts.

Supporting Local

I've been a loyal audience of Singapore theatre since my uni days. Even more so now that I am earning my own pay. Theatre, being a more expensive medium (compared to visual arts and film), warrants a stricter survey of its quality before tickets can be purchased. There are theatre practitioners and groups that I follow religiously, because I have no worry that the thirty-eight dollars that I forked out would be a waste. They deliver quality. 

This is not really a post about supporting the arts, because if I (still) have to convince you to support the arts, you are basically living in an uncreative unfabulous hole, and I don't want to be your friend (just kidding, but please if you haven't seen anything other than Hollywood explosion spectacle, what are you waiting for?). This is about supporting local arts. 

We always talk about supporting local, but do we even know what it means? Does tuning in to local tv mean one is an ardent supporter of local content? I want to make a point that when people go to theatres to ONLY watch Wicked or The Swan Lake, they are discarding the good work that goes into making Singapore theatre great. Sure, it is important to educate ourselves on artistic canons but there are so many Singaporean artists who are dedicated to their craft. Trust me, their output is definitely deserving of your cash. These people need a platform. They are committed to tell the Singapore story, your story, to document this moment of time in history, this moment that we share. 

You know the feeling that we get when we learn that some Hollywood film crew came to shoot in Singapore, that is pride for our country. Why don't we channel that pride into consuming something that is designed and created by Singapore artists, for Singaporeans. The amount of sincerity and thought that go into these works are immeasurable. They hold up a mirror to our local society, politics and psyche that no other artists from any other place in the world can reflect so accurately. 

There are so many film/theatre/visual/language/digital/dance/musical/etc artists who really need your dollars and sense to keep performing. They need that money to earn a living and they need that motivation to just keep swimming. Give them a chance and we will be pleasantly pleasantly surprised. Out of all the local works that had came out in 2016, give a serious thought about how many you've actually seen. Then really think about whether you "support local". 

Writing

Writing is a difficult process. How true is that? Certainly everyone can write, but what purpose does it serve? Is it true that a writer always needs a reader? What is the best way to write? What makes a good writer? Would a condensation of years of thoughts into one single collection of poetry be a better body of work? Compared to someone who puts out publication all the time? Can an unpublished writer be a good writer? I don't know. Writing takes practice. How much time are we given to practise each day, each week, each month, each year? Given the pace of life here, any tinge of potential would be buried. Given the saturation of our routines and schedules, how are we supposed to explore the story in us? I see lots of people writing. They might not put out the best works but they are writing. I commend them for their efforts. Some people take decades to put out one single story that can move mountains. I commend them for their efforts. What kind of writer am I. The twenties, is indeed a time for exploration. What is my genre, I wonder? I would think poets, playwrights, novelists, screenwriters, essayists are the literary equivalents of painters, sculptors, videographers, cinematographers, etc. The medium is different but they each have their niche. Some people are giants in the creation of novels, but when it comes to a drama, they fall flat. I would think poets and novelists are two ends of a spectrum. One requires the precision of a surgeon's scalpel, while the other demands the security of excessive bandage. Musings. If you've seen your story appear elsewhere, would you keep writing? Would you still venture into the materialisation of a story already told?

I am still waiting for an untold story. 

钝化

六月一日的最后几分钟里，我突然想写一写关于科技的博客。“日新月异”是我经常教导学生形容“科技”的成语。的确，科技不断的展演进化，目的是为了让人类文明的生活更有效率。但是，怎么我总觉得自己似乎被科技这东西钝化、吞噬了。这到底是怎么一回事？

我本身拥有两台手机、一台平板电脑和两台手提电脑。有些科技产品显得重要非常，有的就显得奢侈无聊。赖于工作缘故，自己必须拥有多过一台手机和电脑。这几个产品似乎太多了，但是我相信我的科技产品使用率不低于任何一名同龄、同阶层的国人。我还记得在高一高二的时候，放学后就开着电脑，写着一些博文，偶尔还写写诗。随着智能手机的普遍化，这个习惯也跟着减去。过去习惯坐在电脑前，需要创作时，信手拈来。电脑毕竟方便打字，方便天马行空的文字创作。但是随着手机的智能化，我们开始忽略电脑，因为贪图方便而舍弃了电脑的广泛功能。这里暂且不论电脑时代以前的纸笔时代。写作的习惯因为智能手机的渗入而被碾碎了。幸亏，平板电脑不久后也开始流行起来，写作的习惯又慢慢回流。但是，就算平板电脑的使用瓜分了科技产品使用的时间，有些习惯的亏损是很难重新学会的。

此外，社交媒体的泛滥当然也带来了不少影响。我觉得社交媒体当然也分层次等级。如今青少年普遍使用的Snapchat其实就是最低档次的。它不鼓励用户与其他用户交流，难以取得精神思想交会的层面。Instagram和推特我觉得不相伯仲。两者都可以分享影响。两者在分享图和文方面都能够快狠准。面簿则是最高档的。我本身最喜欢的也是面簿。用户能在这个平台上分享字数较多的文章，也能在别人的文章上留言。我觉得它最能体现出“社交”媒体的精神。

写了那么多，我其实也不晓得重点是什么。练练笔吧？

THE ONE ABOUT PRIMADELI

Useful Link(s):

• Original Facebook Post: Post Link (29th April 2016)

It's important to recognise and voice out unfair treatments in Singapore. Especially if it concern matters of livelihood and employability, we need to voice it out.

As the conversations on race unfolds, I think it's good that this Primadeli controversy came to light in the mainstream. We need things like this to remind people that Singapore is not as racially harmonious as we would like it to be. And we need to do SOMETHING about it. It can be education, policies, enforcement and criminalisation, etc. As long as people are willing to participate and engage institutions in this dialogue, we would be able to keep the conversation alive and truly dream of a racially harmonious future.

We cannot airbrush this away by blindly subscribing to the rhetoric that Singapore is already a successful multi-racial country.

Taking a form class with an almost equal ratio of Chinese and Malay students, it becomes apparent to me that tensions do exist. Neither group will allow itself to be subsumed under another; there is no distinction between majority and minority. As I observe the way my students interact, I see matters of race come to light. Students start to grapple with uncomfortable stereotypes and untrue lingual labels of their own race. There was once several students in my class got offended by remarks that the Malays are indigenous people, while Chinese are immigrants who lack legality to their stay here. Quarrels happen often because of a lack of understanding towards history. We do need to ask ourselves what is the thing that is conditioning the young to devote to an unfair perception of society.

As issues of race unravel, I think there are several things that ought to be discussed in the mainstream. How are we treating the Indian community? Immigrants? Do we talk about gender inequality as passionate as we talk about racism? When would we finally be able to properly and politely allow discussions of homophobia and transphobia to enter the mainstream. This discussion will go on and on, I do hope that we would be able to come to a common understanding eventually.

摆渡 UPSTAGE

Useful Link(s):

• Original Instagram Post: Post Link (28th June 2015)

刚看完《摆渡》, 不知道为什么眼角有些湿湿的, 可能是因为有所感动吧。这部戏让我想起为什么自己会喜欢剧场。看戏对我而言不只是一种被动的接受, 也不只是对于商品的消费。更多的时候我觉得在剧场里的那两个小时是我一个月里思维最为活跃的时间。我必须一边看一边想; 试图回想过去看过的戏, 在几秒间做一些联系和整理; 试图推敲眼前的视觉, 对白, 表演等剧场元素所承载的目的和意义; 试图拆开与重组戏与历史, 戏与社会, 戏与人之间的关系和冲突。《摆渡》让我感受到看戏时的刺激, 并让我深深感受到剧场工作人心中燃不尽的火。

麦克白 MACBETH

Useful Link(s): 

• Original Facebook Post: Post Link (23rd February 2016)

(Photo Source: 众观)

一部好戏的力量在于它能在短暂的时间里改变某人的思维，让他从此改变他对某某人事物的看法。许多剧作家都有引导观众突破自己思维的独特方法。有些戏能让你在瞬间灵动、流泪、感怀、回忆。有些戏让你看了咬牙切齿，恨不得马上离开剧院。但在优劣之间要如何取舍什么是好戏，什么又不是？对于这个我本身也觉得很难界定。有些人觉得《爸妈不在家》是完美的，但又有些人觉得越看越有瑕疵。有些人觉得《钱不够用》俗不可耐，但又有些人觉得它能抓住眼球，通俗易懂。

最近看了华艺节的表演之一《麦克白》。看完之后第一个反应：为什么那么辛苦地腾出时间来看一个那么烂的戏？

这是一部改编自莎士比亚经典的戏，但是除了保留莎翁的对白，所有剧场表现形式都似乎脱离了原著。其实这是我能够理解的，毕竟现代人与旧作的共鸣不多。通过改写赋予文本新生命是必要的。剧里采用了一堆荒谬和参差不齐的手法来呈现经典。从开始的十几分钟，坐在观众席的我就开始感到不安。剧里偶尔严肃、偶尔夸张、偶尔悲壮、偶尔可笑，最后还开了枪，让人很难集中精神观察台上的一切。怎么中途洒水的情节处理得那么笨拙？演员还必须在漆黑一片中狼狈地抹干地板。尽管听某某人说抹地的动作具有节奏感，似乎有特别意义，我还是觉得这些安排都相当怪异，可笑。习惯坐在前排的我，也清楚看见西洋演员坐在椅子上观戏时的尴尬表情。怎么演员本身都好像不怎么相信这个作品似的。

看戏时所感受到的“不安”当然可以被解读为“布莱希特的疏离效果”，因为史诗剧场就是要这样荒谬。除此之外，我们当然还可以套用其它的理论，但是我们要在什么情况下才能决定：这部戏是纯粹的“烂”？我们要拿出什么证据才能裁定一部戏只是在滥用一些剧场呈现手法？一部戏又要如何确保在“抽离”的同时，观众是在进行思考，而不是对戏感到单纯的厌恶。导演是否应该能够预测观众的反应，并且加以引导，确保在100分钟后，观众的思维确实是改变了，而不是被封锁起来。如果观众在看戏的过程中，开始感到厌恶，不想保持开放的态度，戏是否还算完整？

这是我看完戏之后，最初的想法。

GRIND

Useful Link: 

• Original Instagram Post: Post Link (24th March 2016)

Grind, 24th March 2016

I think when people think about theatre, they imagine a space with a stage. And rows and rows of seats. A very comfortable spectator position that draws you in. However, Toy Factory's Grind smashed this notion to bits with a very inventive design of the entire theatrical space. There is no distinction between on-stage and off-stage because the black box is stripped of its familiar seats. The spectators gather in the middle and move around the black box, literally kept on their toes, observing every single movement intently. 

The spotlights shine harshly on the spectators, casting a great discomfort and disconnect from the usual theatre experience. This arrangement reminded me of how darkness induces a voyeuristic gaze. Under the glaring light, the spectator becomes naked and present. 

They need to think. 

They have to think. 

The topic of the play is nothing new but the formalist elements changed the way people received the subject matter. The space forces people to think and be kept in a reflective mode. And invokes a reflection about the plight of LGBT folks. 

Thank you to the fabulous people at Toy Factory! Another great work to add to our LGBT canons.  

TRANSNATIONAL CHINESE CINEMA

Useful Link(s): 

• First featured on: https://singaporereviewofbooks.org/2015/08/12/transnational-chinese-cinema/ (12th August 2015)

Chinese cinema has a history that has stretched beyond a century, yet film scholarship in this field has only begun to flourish in the past two decades. The complexity of “Chinese cinema” is perhaps the foremost reason for this torpid movement in academia. What does being Chinese mean? At various historical and geographical moments, this question carries vastly different interpretation —lingual, racial, national and cultural— each attached to its own unique set of problems. Certainly the complications increase when we try to understand Chinese-ness in a likewise perplexing discipline: cinema. The filmic medium has been an important arena for debates and negotiations of gender, sexuality and embodiment issues, enlightening scholars on how bodies function on screen.

With this in mind, Transnational Chinese Cinema does not aim to provide all the answers to explain what Chinese cinema is or what it is not. Instead it cuts deep into the confounding entanglement, “to begin a conversation around questions of corporeality and desire” and “film production, distribution, exhibition, and reception in a transnational Chinese context” (9). The collection of ten essays puts together the perspectives of scholars at various vantage points in the film studies domain. This article aims to highlight the exceptional efforts in this critical endeavour.

The ethics of failure is a key entry point in the understanding of Transnational Chinese Cinema. In Chapter One, “The Ruined Bodies of Transnational Chinese Cinema”, Brian Bergen-Aurand offers an enlightening and innovative reading of ruins. While ruins are conventionally linked to destruction and decay, the writer reimagines it as a site for rebirth and revival, highlighting the “experience, history, memory, culture, preservation, heritage and inheritance” that comes together with it (47). A vital justification brought forth in this chapter would be the theory of the ruined gaze, which is a way of looking at films by exposing and displacing the gazes of classical apparatus theory. By directing this focus onto films such as In the Mood for Love (2000), Bergen-Aurand offers an opportunity for spectators to “rethink the ethics of neighbours and locality in regard to these films and the spectral bodies they imagine” (47).

Building on this notion of failure, Mary Mazzilli explores the strategy of failure in films of Ruan Lingyu and Lin Dai in Chapter Three, “Female Chinese Stars on Screen: Desiring the Bodies of Ruan Lingyu and Linda Lin Dai”. Mazzilli posits that a close reading of these actresses’ films unveils a resistance against traditional gazes that position women as the fetishist object of the male gaze. The failure of feminine embodiment to align itself to the directorial narrative and cinematic frame activates a spectatorship that refutes the objectification of the feminine other.

Chapter Six, “Thinking the Inutility: Temporality, Affect and Embodiment in Useless and Walker” is another remarkable piece in Transnational Chinese Cinema which follows in the same vein as the previous essays. Hongfei Liao alerts us to the dangers of capitalism throughout his piece and further illustrates how the conception of “inutilizing the inutility” in Jia Zhangke and Tsai Ming-liang’s documentary films could be a potent force to resist against capitalism’s belligerence. The writer warns that filmic representations of inutility run the risk of being re-appropriated by capitalist logic. Hence it is necessary to rethink a new politics of “inutilizing the inutility” that could transgress this system of consumption, “for the purpose of endlessly relaunching more action and rethinking” (151). Liao thus embraces the embodiment of failure in these films, specifically in its temporality, affect and embodiment, as it activates “the audience to judge the scene”, calling us to “problematize [the] filmic problematization and even our own problematization” (152).

Bergen-Aurand describes the transnational Chinese film model as the ideal cinematic model to address questions about film production, distribution, exhibition and also reception in the introduction essay of Transnational Chinese Cinema. Sim Jiaying explicates this notion most thoroughly in Chapter Two, “Transnational Cinema as a Matter of Address: Considering Eros and Embodiment in Wong Kar-wai’s The Hand”. Sim expounds the manner in which Wong’s short film invokes a transnational cinematic reception through an “affective mode of address” (63). Instead of relying on filmic narrative to create meaning, Sim explains that Wong’s segment in Eros (2004) rely on film style to draw out spectator desire. This is a key component in understanding what transnational cinema can do and how transnational cinema can affect audiences on an international scale, regardless of their locality.

Other remarkable essays in Transnational Chinese Cinema include Hee Wai-Siam’s comprehensive account of famous film auteur Tsai Ming-liang’s body of work in “Coming Out in the Mirror: Rethinking Corporeality and Auteur Theory with Regard to the Films of Tsai Ming-liang” and Andrew Grossman’s insightful cultural study of Hong Kong’s adult rated cinema in “Random Act of Sensible Violence: Horror, Hong Kong Censorship and the Brief Ascent of ‘Category III’”.

Overall, Transnational Chinese Cinema touches the edge of previously unexplored grounds, providing new perspectives on the ways films can be read. By incorporating the sensibilities of scholars adept in film theory, embodiment studies, philosophy and cultural studies, the collection engages insightfully with Chinese cinema, charting the way we encounter transnational Chinese cinema and how we in turn interact with it.

Transnational Chinese Cinema: Corporeality, Desire, and Ethics of Failure.  Eds. Brian Bergen-Aurand, Mary Mazzilli, Hee Wai-Siam. Los Angeles: Bridge21 Publications, 2014.

TENDENCIES IN BOO JUNFENG AND EVE SEDGWICK

Useful Links:

• Original Short Film URL: http://youtu.be/YGlG1AVq1PU 
• First featured on: http://foreigninfluence.com/2014/04/10/tendencies-in-boo-junfeng-and-eve-sedgwick/ (10th April 2014). 

Edits:

• A revision has been made regarding the definition of “keluar baris”. (1st May 2016)

Anyone who takes a first look at Boo Junfeng’s Keluar Baris (2007) would immediately assume that this Singaporean short film is merely about a boy’s anxiety over his pending National Service enlistment. However, anyone who has read and absorbed the work of the prominent queer theorist Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick would probably have a radically different interpretation of it. In her 1993 book, Tendencies, Sedgwick asserts that institutions often align their principles neatly, creating a strict unified ideology which, in turn, produces silent presumptions about our identity. Social structures simplify reality and, in turn, simplify our visions of ourselves. In an attempt to vitiate the rigidity of such systems, Sedgwick proposes a perverse reading of texts, a reading that goes against the grain, that imbues these systems with fascination in order to disengage us from their enforced rigor. She asks us to uncover the queer nuances embedded in texts by unsimplifying them. Seeing “queer” aspects as the “open mesh of possibilities, gaps, overlaps, dissonances and resonances, lapses and excesses of meaning when the constituent elements of anyone’s gender, of anyone’s sexuality aren’t made (or can’t be made) to signify monolithically,” Sedgwick offers queer readings as alternatives views of our world (with political potential) that are so often neglected or hidden by the heteronormative paradigm.

Queer representations are heavily policed and discouraged across Singapore’s media landscape. In the Censorship Review Committee Report 2010, guidelines on television programming provide clear indications to screen PG13 shows only after 11pm. Programs with any portrayal of queer characters—such as Glee—typically belong in this category and are effectively exiled to a timeslot outside primetime. In film and theatre, homosexual content is routinely classified as “explicit” regardless of the degree of sexual explicitness. Given these national regulations, it is undoubtedly difficult to find images of queer life in any Singaporean media.

However, such overt restrictions do not mean that queer representations do not exist in across Singapore. It simply means that we have to take a closer look to uncover the queer moments in our texts. Filmmakers might find ways to smuggle queer meanings into their art. Texts could also gain new connotations over time. It is thus vital to review the media to search for queer meanings hidden in them. The works of Boo Junfeng, and Keluar Baris in particular, offer moments that prompt our engagement with Sedgwick’s charge for a queer reading because they resist simplifying our social structures and our senses of ourselves.

Keluar Baris presents opportunities for readings that could radically subvert a conventional default heteronormative interpretation of it and provides a guide for reconsidering our approach to other works by Boo Junfeng and other Singaporean artists.

The film follows the story of an eighteen year-old boy who returns to Singapore from Spain to serve his National Service (NS). NS is a mandatory conscription program every Singaporean male has to go through for 22 to 24 months and then remain on reserve for until he is 40 or 50 years old, depending upon rank. Throughout the film, the recruit seems particularly melancholic. Characters around him are quick to explain his gloom as an anxiety towards enlistment, and these explanations may hold some validity. However, there are gaps and dissonances throughout the film that suggest he could also be suffering from a certain homosexual anxiety and desire that continue to trouble him.

A lingering shot of a Spanish boy.

“Keluar Baris” is a Malay military command for dismissal, commonly used in the Singapore Armed Forces. It signifies a dismissal from duty, a return back home. The return home, back to one’s family would often be regarded as a cheerful event. Yet he seems to appear more displeased about keluar baris. Could it be the obvious lack of familial warmth? Or the pending enlistment that every single person in the film can’t seem to stop mentioning? Yet, even as these possibilities may obtain, a key instant suggests that the boy’s melancholy might actually stem from the possible separation from a likely gay relationship from overseas. While the boy sits in his room browsing pictures on his computer, a portrait of a young male Spaniard flashes across the screen. It could be brushed off as a casual perusal of his travel photos, but the mise-en-scène bends things. The shot is framed by the recruit’s shoulder, which invites an erotic gaze at the back of his neck and over his arm. As he clicks through the photos, the camera lingers for a full second when he reaches the photo of the Spanish boy, suggesting the heightened importance of this person. The mild sexual tension created by the relation between the recruit’s body and the foreign portrait builds. Then, it is quickly dissipated when the recruit’s father steps into the room. The gay sensibility of this scene is returned to the heteronormative framework of the straight household.

Gazing at enlistees. 

The film’s excess drama around enlistment could be construed as a view of conscription as the seizure of one’s personal liberty by the state, in general. Yet, it could also refer to a more specific situation. It is widely known and accepted that queer soldiers are severely marginalised within Singapore’s military. Soldiers who openly declare their homosexuality or present themselves as queer are required to register as “302.” They would subsequently be banned from command schools and combat vocations. This discriminatory practice is normalised in the armed forces and Singapore. Thus, the boy’s misery when he sees two uniformed enlistees on the bus could be more than just his apprehension towards enlistment. It could be an invocation of his distress over being discriminated against. He could be looking at his own fear of being forced out of the closet or the fear of being forced to stay in.

An airplane flying into the distance. 

The film also sets up a relation between Spain and Singapore, between a land of longing and a land of pragmatic demands. In the closing scene, the boy looks out the window and we see a plane flying into the distance. This seems rather peculiar as it hints of his desire to leave, even though he just returned. Welded with the soundtrack of piano tinkling throughout the film, his melancholy over being “home” becomes an opening for queer interpretation. Spain legalised same-sex marriage in 2005. Singapore retains the Penal Code Section 377A, which criminalises sex between men. Spain symbolises a queer time and place for this boy. Singapore represents a present home tied to heteronormative simplification and rationalization.

Boo’s skilful insertion of Spain as the boy’s gay sanctuary could go unnoticed by spectators, but on a closer reading, such an understanding seems logical and plausible. These gaps in the film twist and bend the heteronormative reading that has dominated our way of viewing films. Sedgwick’s proposal for a queer reading of texts hence disarticulates and disengages from the usual normative methods of consuming art straight. It is a call to “run against the grain” and embrace the multitude of possibilities spread throughout queer.

Prologue

“But I like the inconveniences.” 
“We don’t,” said the Controller. “We prefer to do things comfortably.” 
“But I don’t want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.” 
“In fact,” said Mustapha Mond, “you’re claiming the right to be unhappy.” 
“All right then,” said the Savage defiantly, “I’m claiming the right to be unhappy.” 
“Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphilis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen to-morrow; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind.” 
There was a long silence. 
“I claim them all,” said the Savage at last. 

~ Brave New World, Aldous Huxley

These are the words that left an indelible mark in me when I started my literature education about ten years ago. How morbidly empowering it is to be able to claim "the right to be unhappy". In a society obsessed with utilitarian goodness, the individual is often left to fend for his own rights. Rights of minorities often become a negligible factor in the grand design of things. This quote is a reminder to myself, to resist the wave of conformism. To not let status quo and the larger power structures dictate the will of the tiny and feeble. I don't know what I'm going to do, or in this case, I don't know what I'm going to write about, I only know that I can contribute in tiny ways to a more diverse, critical and alternative sociopolitical discourse. That would be my attempt at affecting change.