It does, really. One moment you’re floating among the clouds, next moment your on all fours in emotional mud.

I got a job offer from KL yesterday. Obviously that made me happy.

Headhunted, well, not really, perhaps she was just phoning to find out whether or not I had friends who would qualify for the job. Needless to say, we got talking and it’s pretty much like what I’m doing now - in fact, it’s almost 100% my current job description - but it’s in Kuala Lumpur (as opposed to my current Kota Kinabalu - you know, close to my son).

Before I would consider anything at all, I do need to find out what the pay is - she didn’t have this detail handy, which made me think perhaps it’s not that significant. Considering what I have here, it will have to be a mighty big incentive to have me pack up all my shit and go there. She gave me a hint as to what her salary is, but she’s a top dog and if I can’t earn near that then why move?

Last night we said goodbye to a Tazmanian friend of ours who’s been out here in Kota Kinabalu and Sabah for a stretch with WWF (The wildlife fund, not the grown men in tight costumes, although he’s possibly interested in both) - we went to Atmosphere for their 10pm to midnight happy hour and oh was the hour happy. The cocktails average about RM11.50 including taxes (a damn good deal if you know alcohol prices in KK) and they’re arguable the best in town. The Bloody Mary is hands down, without a doubt, the best anywhere, but I advise you to drink that one last, as every other cocktail will seem to pale in comparison afterwards.

And that’s it for the floating amongst the cloud bit, but being on all fours in the emotional mud is not so easy to talk about, not because I’m an introverted, alpha male afraid of his own emotions, oh no dear, if you’ve read any of the older stuff on this blog you will realise I have verbal diarrhea when it comes to talk about emotions.

No, it’s difficult to talk about because in the great scheme of things it’s actually quite complicated. Or it was. But that’s about as much as I can say.

But excuse me, because now I have some wallowing to do.

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With a start I just realised something.

I’m at work (taking a brain break now), I was pouring hot water in my giant-cup with the weak green-tea bag for the umpteenth time this morning, not thinking about this in particular, when, like crap on your shoulder from a random, spiteful pigeon, a thought dropped in on my mind.

The realisation was that in my life, at least four women (that I know of) got married to the next guy they dated after me.

I’m unsure how to feel about this, because I’m not sure whether to see this as a good thing or a bad thing. I guess women who get married will necessarily have to do it with the guy they see after the guy they saw last, unless, of course, the guy they marry is the first guy they’ve ever been with. You follow?

But out of the not-so-large collection of relationships that I’ve had since my very first one when I was 16, is having 4 women marry the next guy not a large number? Percentage wise, it’s a double digit figure not too far from 50. Should I be alarmed?

Almost a Virgin-taker

It actually happened to my very first girlfriend, which in the context of this perceived flash-crisis is more disconcerting than the rest.

Renee. Ah, sweet girl, but I was young and innocent, immature and confused and the way things were going we were both going to lose our virginities, which at the time would have been morally and religiously reprehensible and thus, I terminated the relationship with a stupid excuse that I wanted to “experience other girlfriends”, clearly thinking that if we gave ourselves to each other, marriage would be necessitated and at such a young age, would be the end of my single self.

Well, she went on to date the hunky rugby player Hans, and years later when I bumped into her again she had married the guy. I was perplexed by an emotion then similar to what I experience now, but I admired her for getting married a virgin - or, losing her virginity to the guy she ultimately married, which ever way it went.

Virgin-taker

Several years and a few girlfriends later I dated Carine. Hot chick with large boobs that she had actually had reduced. As large as they still were I couldn’t help but wonder (fantasize) how large they were to start with. Anyway, she took my virginity so that was the end of that worry, but our relationship was superficial and largely based on equally large breast and the allure of an inexperienced boy. When the one lost its novelty and the other became a lie, the relationship died a fairly painless death for both parties concerned.

Well, she went on to date a hunky Dutch guy who could have been named Hans, and years later when I bumped into her online she had married the guy.

A little bit of Culture, a lot of Religion and no Sex

Not so many years and not so many girlfriends later I met Fransonè. South African woman at her best, but oh so Afrikaans, very religious and reminded me of my chaste days and thus the short relationship was sexless. It was a relationship with a pre-determined expiry date as I met her in the months leading up to my first ever overseas adventure.

The goodbye was nevertheless emotional as we had shared much and on a cultural and background level I guess she was the woman I had had connected with strongest during my formative years (I was not yet 21 and still forming). Shortly after our break-up I left to go overseas.

Well, she went on to date a hunky guy not named Hans at all, and two years later when I bumped into her at Canal Walk, I couldn’t help but notice that was sporting a huge rock on her ring finger and she had married that guy.

Da Ai Zai Jung Guo - 大爱在中国 (Big Love in China)

Many years and not so many girlfriends came and went and I myself got married (it was after a girlfriend, which is quite a controversial story, especially for my xyf - but irrelevant here) and divorced and I had many adventures, triumphs and downers. Eventually the energies of the universe conspired and I found myself in China.

Long story short, Karen stole my heart on Wudang Shan. But shortly after this relationship started it was also marked to expire when I decided that I had to return to Malaysia to be near my son. In spite of this we had a whirlwind romance and got very near and dear to each other in a very short time and this farewell was positively heartbreaking. I left China to return to Malaysia.

Well, she went on to date a hunky… well, I hope he was hunky and not some random bloke from an influential family that her parents organised for her (although that is probably what happened). Anyway, I recently got hold of King (the foreign language teacher formerly known as Prince) and he updated me saying that Karen had gotten officially married.

When I read it in his email, what I felt was strangely familiar, but I had given it no thought and pondered not the familiarity of the scenario until just then that fateful moment, minutes ago when I was pouring hot water into my giant-cup with the weak green-tea bag for the umpteenth time this morning.

And having recollected and notched on my belt these four women, who got betrothed to and, consequently, unified with the very next fellow following the demise of the relationship I had with them, I’m still not sure what it is I’m feeling.

Ponder

Do I feel honoured because I think I was such a great loss that they felt they should grab and ball-and-chain the very next bloke that comes along out of fear that they would let another great catch such as myself slip through their fingers? (Bwahaha, enough vanity to power a small country). Or…

do I feel like I was slapped with a wet, smelly trout across the face because they felt that following the heartache and torment that I introduced into their previously tranquil lives, all they want to do is remove themselves from the dating pool and live out the remainder of their ruined lives in the arms of a man who perhaps they think they love, but who certainly love them and a hellavulot better compared to the ruin they found in me?

Or still, am I completely delusional, perhaps high on a weak-tasting-but-actually-quite-strong green-tea brewed from a low-on-taste-but-high-in-oomph green-tea bag causing me to over-analyse unbelievably trivial manners when really I should be working?

Yeah. That last one.

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The sun didn’t come up today. Morning had broken, but the sun was not there. I drove to work and noticed only black cars, white cars and those coloured cars which are almost colours, but aren’t really. Without the sun my day had no colour. Nothing bright. The trees were dull gray, the ground they grew from black. Their leaves looking like it was covered with dust, drowning out the colour, turning the leaves into the colour of the inside of a disused furnace. The road was blacker than usual, the lines not white, but gray, stretching off into the smoggy distance.

I got to the round-about where I was expecting the colour of Chinese New Year decorations to liven up my bland day, but there wasn’t. Instead, on the off-white grass grew light gray flowers and from the black wires suspended above hung black lanterns. The dome of the mosque was dull, matte gray. Behind it I could see the cloudless sky, but even that was a pale light black.

I drove past the golf course, drab and life less, silt drifting on the golf course lake, making it obvious that beneath the dark black surface there was no light, there was no life. Hope had drowned there before. The parking garage looked like it always does, different shades of gray, devoid of light and dusty. Rubbish lay about, shades of black and white. At the staff entrance plumes of gray smoke drifted slowly upwards, smokers, chefs and stewards in their black and white uniforms, engineering in their black overalls, dragging from their cigarettes in equal slow motion, voices muffled and inaudible, white teeth behind gray lips which could have been smiling. I didn’t notice.

My black shoes made empty sounds on the dull surface of the gray tiles of the dimly lit corridor, neon lights hanging overhead, emitting bright gray rays, accentuating the grayness of the walls. My office had turned monochrome too, like bad reception on the public channel. White noise drowning out laughter and morning greetings, every sound recorded on a cassette tape being played too slow. My gray cup of coffee with the three table spoons of white sugar tasted bland and bitter.

I walked past the Marina on the way to my morning meeting, the dark gray water of the marina basin, although clear, but clearly lifeless and without fish. The fish had left, went looking for love elsewhere. Rubbish littered the corner where rubbish usually litters the corner; chips wrappers, chocolate bar wrappers, empty drinks bottles and unidentified pieces of junk floating about in a black and white collage. The black rocks glimmering in the absence of the sun which wasn’t burning down on my light gray head.

The coconut trees lining the boardwalk, hunched over with their shoulders dropped, their dull leaves drooping, the coconuts hanging in a way tears hang on the eyelids of the sad, waiting to accumulate enough momentum to roll down cheeks. The water of the swimming pool, slowly dripping from one level to another, molasses running down the side of gray waffle.

The morning meeting had many people talking deep and slow, unhappy voices emitting white noise. Moments laps and the tape speeds up, but the colour still devoid the scene. The lobby, full of people, shades of black on the floor, shades of white on the pillars, plants and water dull, slow and gray.

I was busy today, my colourless day – the work kept my mind on work, the absence of the sun didn’t seem to bother me so much when work occupied my mind. The absence of colour didn’t matter when I typed Word documents and read my emails, black letters on white backgrounds, keyboard with it’s white letters on the black background. The mouse is black, the screen is black, even my mouse pad is dark gray.

Just before I left for home a few rays of sunshine shone on me and briefly colour touched me. But like the glint in the eye of a beautiful girl, temporarily transfixed in the gaze of a young boy at the traffic light while she’s on the bus and he’s on a push bike, all to soon it too was gone. The sun disconnected, the colour went off line.

I drove home in my black car with the gray seats on a dark asphalt road with white markings. I got caught at the traffic light on gray, stopped on black, and crossed when it turned light black. At home I parked in the gray driveway, opened the black gate and stepped onto the white tiles of the living room with it’s gray walls. The stairs were dull and black, my bed a pit of despair.

And as a sunless sunset brought dusk upon my day, the white moon was already announcing the arrival of the black night from the east. At least, at night, everything is supposed to be black and white.

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Yesterday morning I was listening, over the internet, to a Cape Town based radio station, KFM, and heard “Bodyrockers - I like the way”. Just what I needed as a pick-me up.

I downloaded the song and listened to it over and over again and it really lifted my spirits, like I had forgotten music can do. So the worries with Lara, although not out of my mind, were filed securely towards the back.

I was feeling so confident that I took the pants, which I bought a week or so ago, but was too long to wear, to the tailor I had discovered in Wuyan. I hadn’t had the guts to do this before, as it would require a level of Chinese which I do not poses.

Taking the trusty No.5 Bus I settled down and saw on the clock it was 13:20 and knew it would be time for Lara to take her break. I had barely finished this thought when my phone rang. It was someone phoning from The Restaurant’s phone and could really only be one person. I played it cool.

“Hi”, I said, chirpy as if nothing was wrong and I was unsure of who it was. “Hi”, she said, voice crackling as she has a bit of cold. I said “Oh, hi, how are you”, cool as Mr. Cucumber. She said “fine, and you? Where are you”. “On my way to Wuyan, on the bus”, I replied, offering no more than that. A brief pregnant pause followed. “Oh” she said. I offered nothing else. “You want come here?”, she asked after another few grating seconds. “Why?” I replied, not in the mood to make things easy.

“I want to see you.” And if my heart was a cookie, there would be crumbs all over the bus. Few things in life feel as good as knowing that someone wants you, even if it is only to see you. So I dropped the act and said sure, I’m on the bus already, I could be there in 10 minutes.

15 Minutes later I walked into the restaurant and it was great to see her. That smile of hers instantly disarming me.

I did frown a bit and asked her what the previous night was about. So she pointed out that my phone had no money, because she did try to phone me when she realised I had turned around, and then she did run outside to see where I was. By then my long legs and anger-fueled pace had already carried me across the busy road and out of sight.

So I felt better. I would like to say we embraced, kissed and made up, alas, we barely touch and thus the preceding is hardly likely. In light of what happened this year, I see this as an excellent test of my substance.

A question of ‘why are you with this woman’. Just of one thing? Am I really the dirty bastard that this year perhaps it might have looked like I am? Or am I the decent gentleman my mother raised who strayed a little bit off the path?

Anyway, it was good to spend a few hours with her. We had some lunch and afterwards we returned to The Restaurant and I thought her some more basic English. She likes to speak English, but her vocab is limited. She was quite sick and also a bit tired, so I watched her sleep for 15 minutes, which was great. People, when they sleep, are most peaceful and often most beautiful.

I went to a Pharmacy alone and managed to mime my way through getting her the correct medicine, which hopefully will help.

Afterwards I journeyed to the tailor in Wuyan, where communication was unnecessary, as when I walked up to the shop, bag in hand, they guessed what I wanted. The tailor swiftly measured my leg, flung the pants over the manually operated sewing machine, undid the previous seam with a few strokes of a blade and proceeded to stitch up the new measurements.

I haven’t tried it on yet, but I’m fairly confident it will be ok. It will be ok, like the rest of me.

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Well, there you have it. Stupid is as stupid does and tonight, stupid did just that.

My best intentions not to contact Lara lasted less than 24 hours. Although, I have to add, she SMS’ed me this afternoon. So I thought, “Ha! Now I have the power”.

I took my sweet time in replying, thinking of course, that she would be nervously on edge, watching her mobile phone the whole time, periodically checking if it was still working. All in anticipation of my all important reply.

Instead of my usual lightning fast, desperate-written-all-over-it reply of 5 seconds, taking my time I took a whole 15 seconds on this one, really working the suspense.

And then she didn’t reply. So I thought it warranted another SMS… and another. A victim of my own emotions, see?

In between my two classes this evening I fired off another SMS asking if she wanted me to go there (The Restaurant), but no reply. After class, sitting on the edge of my bed, pondering the perplexities that is woman, I thought screw this, I’m not Tom and she’s not Jerry, so I refuse to play these cat and mouse games any longer.

So I typed her a nice SMS saying, I don’t understand her, she doesn’t understand me, we should maybe just leave the whole thing alone, and then fired it off thinking what must be will be.

What was to be was that at that moment my phone indicated that I should check my service provider, because the message could not be sent. Checking revealed that I had run out of airtime. A sign?

Ever the optimist, I thought that’s why I haven’t had a reply from her earlier and that she probably did SMS me to say “come here”, but without airtime I couldn’t receive it.

So I scarfed and gloved myself and set off on my quest, as so many times before, to Liuyan. On the way I thought to myself what am I thinking, why am I doing this, obsessing like this, making such an ass of myself. The thoughts were impaled by Cupid’s arrow as I arrived at the bus stop near The Restaurant and walked my way in.

From the street level there are maybe 15 steps down to The Restaurant, so you can see who’s coming before they actually arrive. Lara usually cover’s the front desk as I think officially she’s the hostess. Anyway, as expected she was near the door with a colleague, but I saw her before she saw me.

I looked down to find my footing on the steps, but as I looked up again a moment later, I saw her running away into the Restaurant. I froze… shocked at first, confused a second later. Then I caught the eye of two of her colleagues, felt myself going red, turned around and left.

I decided to walk home. It took me 40 minutes which is the pace of a brisk walk. For the first few blocks I was fuming. Angry, humiliated, defeated in my quest for love.

After another few blocks I realised that her actions tonight is what I wanted - a clear communication. I can handle rejection, what I can’t handle is being kept in the dark and being non the wiser either way. Of course, my ego hopes that she would have tried to phone as soon as she realised I had turned around. My ego would be laughing thinking that she would hear the message that says my phone had no credit and would feel sorry for what she did and would spend the night lying awake, perhaps shedding a tear for the hurt she caused me.

My ego is mean and self-centered.

So here sits stupid, having over-played his hand, having made the classic primary-school mistake of being too eager. Putting too much paper shreds on the fire at one time can kill the fire.

And of course now there will probably also be no friendship. In fact, I have now veiled the whole restaurant in awkwardness and even the dynamics with Uncle W and T will maybe have changed.

What says the old adage - don’t piss where you eat… or sleep, or work.

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