The Wonderful Adventures of Joshun Kadisoo

The CD shop wrote me today to confirm that Painted Desert Serenades (the album) has arrived and is ready for collection. Judging from the way he wrote the sms, he appears to have long ceased to care whether he spells the name of the singer/ band correctly or not. I guess if I'm eager enough to place an advance order, I'll figure it out.

In other news, the horrible 6-degrees-of-separation-nightmare that is Facebook has exhumed yet more incredibly embarrassing photos of yours truly at 10, 12 and 14, all taken by a classmate of mine who everyone remembers vaguely (as being a nice girl) but dammit did she have to spend her entire primary and secondary school career with her hand on the camera trigger. I mean, who trusts a 10-year old schoolgirl with a camera anyway? Film is expensive! Am still waiting for this Facebook fad, or maybe just the CHIJ on Facebook fad, to pass. I guess I shouldn't hold my breath.

Coincidentally, had a really fantastic dinner at Carnivore in Chijmes last Friday evening with friends, and sat, almost literally, on the very same spot where one of those photos was taken. How surreal. I walk around the place, and it's like an episode of "Missing" where I don't see the buildings, shops, restaurants that are currently there, I just see my old school benches with the IJ girls playing hopscotch and five stones, next to the St. Nicholas girls doing military-type mass calisthenics to a very scratchy Chinese revolutionesque song. I see Denise trying to play five stones despite her limited motor abilities. I see Choi Ming and Marlene sitting together on the second and top benches doing their homework and chatting. I see the girls from the other session getting dropped off by the school bus. I see myself in my little Bata shoes trying to get a spot in a game of Four Corners, or playing Crocodile with Marianne (who cheats, btw).

The amazing thing about Chijmes, which I don't think the casual observer would see, is that the floor tiles of the chapel and the orange tiles near the restaurants are the original ones used when the place was a school. The chapel columns are originals, lovingly repainted so that our little shoeprints are gone. The spiral staircases are also originals, given a nice paint job (although the painters would have been surprised to find stair no. 13 very clean and untouched since we all refused to step on it).

Yep. It's confirmed. I'm becoming a relic.