Barred!

Last week, I carried out a social experiment. I’d heard from a few friends (men, mostly) that hanging out at bars alone could be interesting. Sure, I thought unkindly, it must be for them; after all, it offers a great chance for them to chat up girls (who I figured hung out in all-girl groups at the same bars). But I was convinced it couldn’t be as fun for a girl to go alone. At least, one who isn’t looking to get picked up. (Word to the liberal thinkers: No, I have nothing against people looking to get picked up or those who do the picking up; just that it’s not what I wanted out of this experiment).

But how could I diss it until I’d tried it? So off I went, by myself on a Wednesday night. I couldn’t bring myself to do it over a weekend; I was too chicken for that. I figured I’d seem less like a loser and more like someone who enjoyed their own company if I went on a week night.

The intention was to go to Jigger & Pony on Amoy Street during Happy Hours, but one look at the interiors from outside made my already cold feet go sub-zero. The inside of the bar looked swanky, in dark, rich shades of red and black, with an ominous glow from low-burning candles. Definitely not the most boisterous bar settings, I thought.

On the other hand, Sugarhall next door, looked more inviting. There were a couple of groups outside, laughing and generally being more human. And the deciding factor was that I could actually see a bar that one could hang out at.

So I entered and, without waiting to be asked, perched myself on a stool at the bar counter. The three bartenders behind the counter and the usher who was about to guide me to a table looked at me in surprise for about 2.5 seconds. Then everybody went about the their business. Score, Rashida.

The waiter/usher brought two menus and placed them in front of me. I asked what they had going for Happy Hours. He brought me a different menu and said that Happy Hours ended at 7.30pm. “So, did I just miss it?” I asked it. It was probably around 7.33pm by then. “No,” he said, “it’s fine, you can go ahead and order.” Score, Sugarhall.

I played safe and ordered the Planter’s Punch. And after being asked if I wanted a snack, I ordered the hand cut fries as well. Turned out to be a darned good idea in hindsight, seeing as how generous they had been with the rum in a Happy Hours drink – score, Sugarhall! An empty stomach with that drink in a somewhat sleepy state would not have been a good idea…

So there I sat, with my fries and drink, and the bartenders kept giving me smiles every once in a while, but there was no chance of a conversation. The guy two stools away from me kept up a chatter with the girl bartender, obviously sharing his knowledge of drinks and, unless I’m very mistaken, exasperating the girl, who of course couldn’t say anything to him. seated as I was at the far end of the table, conversation with anyone else on the other side was impossible. Pity, because there was a group of three men there. The seemed more approachable at any rate than any other groups, which were bigger and therefore more formidable, or the couples, who were completely off limits on account of being happy with just each other’s company.

So I sat there munching my fries (again, glad I had them. The drink would have disappeared much sooner on it’s own and I’d have had to order another, or clear out of there otherwise) and occasionally sipping my drink. The girl bartender asked me a couple of times if everything was fine, but she was much too busy for me to converse with her.

It was quiet, with about three tables being occupied. One was a big bunch of girls obviously out for ladies’ night, another was two couples, and a third, two guys. Another couple walked in and went to the far end of the place a while later, and I couldn’t really see them from where I was seated.

After about 40 minutes of being seated there, one of the bartenders came over to my end of the bar and started wiping down glasses. This provided ample opportunity to chat while he worked, so he struck up a conversation. Am I grateful to him! The conversation went something like this:

“Is everything okay?”

“Just fine, thanks.”

“Do you come here often?”

“No, this is my first time here. I was supposed to go to Jigger & Pony next door, but I couldn’t see the bar table, so I came here!”

“Oh, they do have a bar, but it’s smaller. Actually, both the bars (Sugarhall and Jigger & Pony) are run by the same company.”

“Oh,” I said.

Then, after a while I asked, “Do you guys have a signature drink?”

“What are you having?”

“Planter’s Punch.”

“Oh, that’s the Happy Hours menu. What kind of spirits do you like?”

“I like rum. And generally drinks that aren’t too sweet.”

“We’re a rum bar, so we have over 78 (I think that’s the figure he mentioned) kinds of rum here.”

“Oh, great! Then I walked into the right place,” I smiled.

After that, he went on to point out a couple of other drinks he said I should try, but I thanked him and said maybe I would leave it for the next time.

After a little over an hour, I was done eating my fries and my drink was finished, too. I contemplated whether I wanted another but, truth-be-told, I was a bit bored. I’ve always looked upon going out – whether it’s for drinks or food – as a social activity. If I had to, I’d eat alone, but never at a fancy place; I just always found that very… sad. And as I’d expected, I was bored drinking by myself.

But, I must also confess that could possibly be because I chose the wrong bar. Not that there’s anything wrong with Sugarhall. In fact, it’s chilled out with good drinks and friendly staff. But for a trip alone, it probably wasn’t the best place. So, I might give it a go again later this week, and go to a real, boisterous bar and see if I can have myself a good time!

Singapore – Take Two

For somebody who remembers the smallest of details about the randomest of things, I often suffer from deplorable loss of memory when it comes to certain things. Such as the date I first set foot in Singapore. It was the fag end of July, the date being 23^rd or 27^th, I forget which. But that was the year 2012. It is now July of 2014. Two years. TWO years. Did I notice it’s been that long? Hell, no!

Time, to employ a cliché, really has flown by. And I can’t even begin to explain how quickly. Life until the age of 23 (well, a month short thereof) was simple, steady. Not boring, never boring; but… predictable. The levels of naiveté demonstrated by me were of stratospheric proportions. Knowing all of this full well, the sister decided to accompany me on my first foray into an ‘unknown’ land. Now, knowing—and loving—Singapore as I do, it seems a laughable matter that I or anyone else could ever have considered this place as one where I needed to be careful, on account of the ‘unknown’ factor.

The first year went by with life and, more importantly, my lifestyle, undergoing no major changes. Much as I dreaded becoming a student again, I found that I could slip into the role—the pursuit and achievement of good grades included—easily enough. Buddies were exactly the kind of people I had always befriended even back home – vice-less, rock solid and thus, to some, boring. The year was interesting enough to teach me how to multitask, how to survive writing the most boring papers while holding a myriad of different day jobs/internships. Getting out didn’t happen often, given that I lived on pretty much another planet. But when we did, it was fun. I did have a few friends outside of Uni, thanks to Couchsurfing, but I’d meet them only once in a while. I went to a bunch of cool places, too, thanks to the enterprising CSers!

Graduation was a time of great pride. It also brought the brother to Singapore. Considering how adamant he was never to visit, this was a major highlight for the year! Post graduation, the job search languished. In the meantime, I shifted houses twice—which would have been impossible without aforementioned Uni mates—and visited Bali for 11 days. A trip home ensued, in which a short term work project in Goa was also included. The Bali trip ensured I was flat broke by the time I got back to Singapore and, once again, the dear darling Uni mates came to the rescue, as did another Couchsurfing friend.

Amid all of this, life’s ups and downs did not leave me untouched. From the highs of living an independent life to the lows of losing a very young friend, it’s been a constant see-saw ride.

November was a period of desperation. Two months for the visa to expire, a mind-draining part-time position in hand, but no full-time job in sight. Well, desperate times call for desperate measures. And thus, when I got a call from a certain country club, I blazed in and pretty much put down an ultimatum. “You either hire me, or you don’t,” I said to them, though not in so many words. Contrary to my own expectation, I wasn’t thrown out. Starting January 2014, life in a stable job began. Early mornings and long working hours meant early nights! Add to that the daily chores before turning in each day, and I had newfound respect for all working women with families. Move over, Superman.

But let me backtrack here a bit. While the job search was ongoing, moving out of NTU meant I had more time, better access to people and places. And so it began that I started going out more often, meeting lots of fun people. It was always interesting because I met new people, learnt new things. And then, in early 2013, I met a few people who went on to become faces as familiar as my own. Was that necessarily a good thing, given that I now spoke to fewer ‘new’ people every time I went out? Maybe not. But did the experience of hanging out with them change my life? Yes – some for better, some for worse.

Essentially, I was now, well and truly, ‘on my own’. Even though I had lived in Singapore for a year, so far, Uni had closeted me. The outside world was a whole different ballgame. Between job searches and painful landlords, the list was endless. To add to that, I came to be in touch with some people who were so different from me, I think it was the wonder of it all that attracted me to begin with. I often felt ridiculously naïve; almost as often as I felt glad to know a bunch of people who had so much to teach and share; it was incredible.

But my time in the ‘outside’ world also brought me in touch with elements I had never experienced before. From not having my best friend standing next to me to offer a way to politely refuse the advances of men at clubs, to seeing the absolute recklessness and debauchery demonstrated by some people, I used to be left speechless. And then I was asked, “Why do you get so culture-shocked?” That’s when I knew I had to either get with it, or get out of it. So I chose the former – to some extent. Has that always been a good idea? Absolutely not. Has it taught me more in the past one year than I learnt in 24 years prior to that? Yes. I still can’t understand some behaviours, thought processes and attitudes, but at least now, I can camouflage my feelings.

Sadly, I have also begun to do something I never thought I would – I have begun to comprehend things that, in the past, wouldn’t have penetrated my power of reasoning because they were so alien. And that was a good thing. Because this, the new me, the one that comprehends all this, has also learnt to be less rigid. The world is no longer all white or black. The shades of grey that I had managed to avoid for the longest time have seeped into the lens that I view the world with, as well. But what hasn’t changed, is the way I feel about it. And that’s worse, because I now do things that are in accordance with my new behaviour, but not so with my old beliefs. And this constant internal tug-of-war is soul draining.

That’s life in Singapore so far. But it certainly wasn’t all bad. The only difference is, some of these are things I should have learned much earlier in life, to save me the multiplied effects now. It’s always better to learn late than never to learn at all, but the longer we take to learn life’s lessons, the harder the task of doing so. And I had to learn the really, really hard way; but at least I learned.

Friends from India who have stuck by my side like my shadow during this phase know the changes and therefore empathise, but I suspect those whom I haven’t met in the last two years will barely, if at all, recognise the person I have become.

So that’s what two years in Singapore have been like. I love my life here and I love the independence, the sense of accomplishment that I feel every day. So what if I don’t always like the me doing all of these things.

P.S.: I’ve sat in a car in Singapore plenty of times, but never on a bike. Just as the two year-mark was coming to a close, and I was panicking at crossing another year without a bike ride in Singapore, an angel heard me and I got the most perfect bike ride – empty stretch of road, at 2:00am, with a cool breeze. Dear angel, if you are reading this, a big Thank You! (And I wouldn’t mind another ride.)

I WANT TO TRAVEL

Across the land

And over seas,

I want to travel,

Oh, I beg you please.

Many seasons are gone,

And several plans dashed,

But nothing of them has come,

And all hopes have crashed.

To travel means to see,

Places and people new,

Adventures too it brings,

Which are not in number few.

When I meet travellers,

In the walk of life,

They tell me their stories,

Some of fun, others of strife.

But through it all,

I've never met anyone

Who said travelling wasn't fun,

Who thought they should quit and run.

I want to travel

And see the world,

I want to know what it is like,

To have it before me unfurl.

And therefore,

Across the land

And over seas,

I want to travel,

Oh, I beg you please.

Life's Like That

Life is the cherry,

Upon the Universe’s cake.

You can be merry,

Or put everything at stake.

You could take life as it comes,

Or just let go,

For it will take its own course,

Like a Broadway show.

Put it in hibernate mode

And hit the snooze button;

Before you know it,

Your troubles will be forgotten.

But worry incessantly

And nothing will be got,

Except a massive headache

And you’ll have your happiness shot.

Treat it like a princess,

But remember there’s a catch;

The princess is a Damsel in Distress

To whom you have to prove your match.

So don’t worry my friend,

Whatever will be, will be.

Ke sera or not,

Can any alternative you see?

Most likely you won’t

And in that is a lesson, a fact;

Don’t worry too much,

‘Cause life’s just like that!