We are all accustomed to our nation’s hypocrisy. While sessions of Parliament publicly dedicate themselves to “ethnic and racial parity,” our government is a dynasty, firm and fast. We’re told, “In the future, things will change.” Minister Mentor depicts himself amongst a veritable rainbow of diverse Singapore dignitaries at the G8 Summit, and speaks publicly about a future of free and fair elections. Then he sues the Opposition Party again, remarking “One day we will welcome responsible opposition, but never this riff-raff.” Citizens come to heel as if our leash has been jerked. We eye our neighbors, wondering who is “riff-raff.”
My fellow finalist Joachim would have represented the famous “Harmony through Intermarriage” campaign that indoctrinates us all in sixth form elementary. Few follow its dicta, but evidently Joachim’s progenitors did. Some kind of hybrid Malay-Javanese-Thai-Pacific Islander, with some Chinese also in the crimped corners of his eyes, Joachim in one way looked like everyone on Singapore. In another way, like the conglomerated appearance of Singapore Airlines stewards, Joachim resembled no one at all.
Based on his performance, a future of Joachims would be tranquil. Sleek and friendly, he was like the macaques trained for petting at the Singapore Zoo. “Monkey Boy” we called him, and meant it as a compliment. He was so easy-going! Crouched over his microphone, held quite low as a monkey drags a stick, he’d sidle from one side of the stage to the other. “Who knows how I adore you? Who knows the love I have?” he sang, his falsetto girlish. His questions seemed sweet and unanswerable.
Pleasant as Joachim was, he irritated me. On third or fourth hearing, his voice seemed dull. His trademark, black-and-white Converse high-tops flapped and slapped. I imitated his bounciness, because I saw how it charmed his audience for a while. Hady also borrowed. In his case, it was a slipperier ease in high registers, along with an occasional “squeak,” and roll of his fine eyes.
But Joachim did not translate well. My imitation yielded the chiding from Rich I have already mentioned. Joachim’s lightness translated for Hady into something insipid which caused Pavithra to groan, “That’s not feeling, Hady! That’s nonsense!”
Joachim’s final song was “I Don’t Want to Know,” a dark piece by “Slave.” I like a dark mood and thought he did a good job. But, “I think you also ‘don’t want to know,’ since there is so little vitality in your tone” Ken fiercely said, and that night Joachim was voted off. I and the three others remaining hugged him goodbye, but I was not really sad to see him go. Over his head I studied Hady, who also did not look sad. The one who looked sad was Paul. And Paul was sad most probably because he sensed he was next.
A future of Pauls would be . . . outlandish. A return to some darker age. Of Mongol heritage, Paul is large. He is not muscular, and thus resembles an out-of-shape, peacetime khan — a rotting mango. Minister Mentor warns that youth on Singapore are getting soft in their privilege, and this seems true of Paul. He wore his hair most oddly, like a curtain draping his face. It gave him the aspect of a stone idol smothering in jungle growth. I say “idol” purposely, because Paul inspired idol worship sooner than any of us — within a week or two. Why? It’s hard to say. Most of Paul’s fans were quite young, so perhaps Paul indicates forces Minister Mentor warns of. I would liken Paul to Britain’s Boy George. To me, this soft, half-man-half-woman spectacle was shocking.
Paul on his last night was a sight. In a purple silk jacket and black jeans, leather wristlets and hair like a drape above dark lips, he mumbled “Purple Haze.” To my ears, he blubbered it. I had difficulty not curling my lip — though that night his fans took the unprecedented step of holding a candlelight vigil. Pauline and Pavithra also seemed unusually affected. Pavithra wept, pulling the gauzy edge of her sari over her eyes like a veil. If “feeling” was what we were all to aim for, then Paul succeeded! But it seemed the feeling was too sloppy, too womanish, to win out, and for that I confess myself very glad.
Ken and Rich brought Paul like tigers hunting in tandem. Ken’s face was stiff as a mask when he said, “That was — nauseating.” I was encouraged, but uneasy until I heard Rich. Rich’s response to Paul had been complicated. By turns he’d seemed fascinated and repelled. When the camera turned to Rich, what he did was laugh, and it was his trademark shriek, uttered just that once during the whole competition. He laughed and laughed, reminding me of an episode of The Finer Side when Rich and his sidekick got funny stuffing themselves at a Godiva shop until chocolate slicked mouths like brown lipstick.
Then he stopped laughing. His energy collected in his eyes, and he looked cruel. “No, Paul. No, no, no. Never that,” he said.
Paul was gone! I was glad. Yet I would be remiss if I did not admit I also owe him a debt of gratitude. Because of Paul, and the response he evoked, I adopted a soulful emotionalism within my husky style. No purple jackets for me, but a tuxedo suited me very well. I shed a hard-edged rocker demeanor (it makes me laugh to think of it now — certainly it was filial anger, that cliché of most Chinese sons, which caused me to adopt it in the first place) and in its stead developed the soulfulness of the Rat Pack style I’d already been inclining toward.
“Unforgettable,” I crooned, the following week. Pavithra’s lips dropped open, and Pauline’s hard eyes got round and soft. I held the camera’s lens in a fixed and haunted way as Paul had — but no one recognized this, and my break-out style was attributed to me alone.
That night, like a stern Asian father finally impressed enough to be generous, Rich Lee said, “That performance has made you unforgettable, Jonathan.” My swelling fan based screamed their agreement. Ken was even more generous. “Jonathan, we shall see you in the finals,” he prophesied, causing me to smile before adjusting my face into sadness as if on account of Jasmine, who would, therefore, certainly be leaving us that night.
I must not skip over poor Jasmine, though she was never serious competition. “Little people” is what Confucius termed women, and even enlightened men like my father treat them that way still. China’s one-child policy has eventuated a dearth of females in our powerful neighbor. Singapore takes care to avoid that fate. The phrase “the rights of women” is often on the lips of Parliamentarians. But even our moderate Muslims veil their women. My schoolmates and I knew they often circumcised their girls, despite protests to the contrary. Wrongly or rightly, women in Singapore seem destined to be a permanent underclass. Our government does not allow civic protest, but if they did, our women would not demand very much, even when they speak loudly.
About Elizabeth Sachs
