Moments Frozen in Time

No matter how beautiful a dimpled face or a tropical paradise is, one which could be magazine-property anytime, even with the dictates of photoshop, which may have gone terribly bad, hurting one's eye, or just be perfectly eye-candy, missing the moment frozen in time, is and always will be an empty frame devoid of joy, anger, reason, madness, euphoria, indifference, love, or emptiness; or an empty shell without its meat; or an empty head with but biting cold air alone. 

Captured moments, or emotive visuals, make a good story to write about. Those that could inspire dozens in some exhausted, forgetful crowd; those that could trickle down through the impossible cracks of the walls of a monster dam, unapologetic to raging waters; those that could move Everests or Cordilleras; or those that could see a gazillion inflamed stars and tickled pink moon dancing and prancing, in slo-mo, over you.

Image: Lorong 1 Toa Payoh, Singapore

Silver-haired Crowd

Revolving around and going about their own sense of time, the old ones, at the ripe age of 70 or 90 or the celebratory 100, gather their silver-haired crowd and find solace in this decades-old, AC-pumped place, stuffed with materials to chew on, or to sleep with.

Images: Toa Payoh Library, Singapore

Ninjas and Turtles

Ninjas and turtles. They thrived in water, mutually, as if they were in some happy, problem-free symbiotic relationship, or may be not, as the other was already groping for water, but not really. The other just needed water more than the other, I guess.

Wet and poised under the increasingly scorching sun, while sharing the same aerated pond in the park, ninjas and turtles caught my eye one Thursday afternoon. Three ninjas afforded themselves free swimming in a pond-turned-pool, and not only that, fished turtles out of the water using a hand net. 

As I went closer to the scene and took my phone out, I had been stopped and warned, or so advised. 

'Hey, you, be careful with your phone. It might fall into water,' said the tallest ninja, perhaps the oldest, too, obviously sounding merry and cheery about his own world. The youngest one was all smiles. The other one was scooping something in shallow water. 

Good advice. I thought about it for a while, and thanked the concerned ninjas. 

I held my phone tightly with my two hands, and confidently snapped pictures: first, of the ninjas, of the turtles next, and then of the unlikely group. Group picture. 

I went about my business, leaving behind the young ninjas and their afternoon friends, still out of the water.

Images: Toa Payoh Park, Singapore

Hardin sa Mang-uuma (A Farmer's Garden)

Your garden, peppered with your magical touch,

lies under capricious heavens and over silent, deep riverbeds.

It awaits the season of bloom, which cries of defaulted joy.

It is as patient as a vagrant crossing treeless lands, lost and parched and yellow.

It is, after all, a child without tantrums.

When it survives, you are the proud father.

When it grows, green and strong, you have found a pearl.

It wins every taste bud.

You can make yourself breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

It is selfless and giving.

Your garden, after all, is a forest, a nature with lungs.

Images: Cebu City, Philippines

Parkour Singapore

14 Shots and a Little Story 

Kid, when will you ever learn? I thought I had told you enough, a hundred times over. But if you had to learn the hard way, this way, then so be it. Just calculated risk, my kid. I don't want you going home with a bruised arm, a dislocated joint, a fractured jaw, a bump on the head, or a missing tooth. It's the least I want seeing from you. You don't have to endure all that jumping, flipping, kung fu, or whatever, or that gymnastics. Or that running on clean walls, like a lizard or Spiderman. Leave it to them superheroes. 

(Deep thinking) 

Hmmm, I heard your mentor, or the two of them, the other day. They made an awesome lot of sense, though. Talking to another student, they said bits of something like a necessary mantra to absorb before going out to battle: When in doubt, tame your fear first. If you are high on surefire Jet Li, fly to upper ground or drop 15 feet, gently, as if you are gliding through the air. I buy it, kid. Sure applies to life, though the latter part was a bit silly. You know the guy, right? 

(Quiet moment) 

So, go on, and please don't hurt yourself, again. Here is your second betadine. 

(Fast action)

Images: Clarke Quay, Singapore