[JacqueMerlin]

SPARK

My first time into SPARK was on a Monday night. Knowing that the crowd will be virtually non existant, I thought it will be good for me to go over for a glass of whisky. The wifi in SPARK works and it serves as my temporary relief from loneliness. While I was checking my mailbox in SBF, I saw a reply from a source I do not remember having dealt with in the past. We communicated and exchanged numbers and little did I know that he will be my partying partner for 2 nights.

I returned to Spark on Wednesday after having my work completed with one of my colleague Joseph. He said that he should go get a drink with me in some exciting nightclub called Wax in the Guting Metro area. Reaching there wasn’t exactly challenging as the club is clearly visible and within a stone’s throw from all the exits of the metro station. But what disturbed us was the lack of queue despite that it’s Wednesday. We stood outside Wax for about half an hour seeing no one physically walking in leaving the club attendant standing like a stone statue outside. Sensing the imminent disaster, Joseph quickly suggested a change of venue to salvage whatever limited time we have on this Wednesday Ladies night.

We took flight and went down the stairs to board a train to City Hall station for Lava. It took us about an hour to get there and the queue trying to enter LAVA was beginning to look staggering. Joseph discouraged by the slow moving queue looked at disbelief at how fast things developed. But I explained to him that I look at things from a different perspective; the brighter perspective. Expoliting the opportunity, I started to scan the gender of the queue soomehow being reminded of a senior member of the partying fraternity that the male to female ratio was 5:4... a number I hardly found any grounds to dispute. I had to concede that indeed, LAVA attracts the male crowd more effectively than the ones we hunt for. More predators than prey makes the entire game daunting to play.

I suggested to Joseph that we should proceed to Spark merely across the street quickly before any queue builds up. As we made our way there, We somehow started to develop a premonition that things in Spark will probably be worse off. But anyway, we need to get over there before we can be safe to conclude if our conclusion is indeed right.

We were greeted by an empty flight of stairs down to the club and the stretch of queue was hardly promising. Joseph stared in disbelief and for a moment felt like deja vu as he started comparing Wax with Spark.

Nonethless, a trip was made and the night was not getting any younger, therefore we made our way into the club. Paid a modest NT$500 to walk into the hardly filled nightclub with earsplitting music ricocheting at every corner. We exchanged for 2 glasses of whisky and started to chat about work. The crowd did build up but rather slowly. We noticed that although the number of females were more than LAVA but I could sense the hostility within their solidarity. Approaching them will be disasterously humiliating.

But I had to prove my point to Joseph, “Perhaps it is more of a curse to discover that I possess this inexplicable sense of accuracy when coming to sizing up a person’s character or mood by observing their body language and details of their appearance or the activity they were partaking during our meeting.“ Joseph stared in slight disbelief which I quickly commenced explanation to dispel his skepticism, “Look across the bar table and you will see 3 girls sitting over there. The girl in green has looked over to our side several times the entire evening since she got in. All 3 of them are seemingly educated youngsters from seemingly above average background regardless of education or family. But that also mean that they possess an aura of pride that borders on haughtiness and perhaps even contempt for certain types of life. The typical kind of girls you find in Singaporean Churches.“ Joseph stared in amazement as I told him that they will spurn me with a patronizing attitude, a hallmark of such girls rather than barbaric regurgitation of vulgarities you commonly see in Chinese savagery.

I walked over and greeted the ladies politely first asking if they speak English. Their replies were just as I expected, a resounding yes brought forth by educated elegance. I went on to politely introduce myself remembering to express gentlemanly respect fully aware that reciprocation is not possible. The ladies looked at me in disdain and irritation as I extended my desire for communication. All 3 girls looked very young and were already doing their masters degree. I expressed that it is a feat for them to be that accomplished at their tender age and told them the fact of how education eluded me when young. Trying to engaging them in conversation seemed rather fruitless and thus I decided to choose my own topic.

“Our government unfortunately pays little heed to the pleas of those who elected them in,“ referring to how education is a form of privilege in Singapore for the Singaporeans. I said that they would rather pay obscene pay cheques to themselves and hundreds of thousands to a foreigner who regards the citizens of the country who sponsored his living expenses as lesser mammals. The recent hype over some medals won by buy-in sportsman actually yielded greater sums of reward than a fellow citizen who had to slog equally as hard. For some who are intimately related to that sublime paralympic participant know the difficulties to overcome given the illness that impairs her capability to function as a normal human being. Such indignance finds no avenue for redress except through the internet whereby the government normally regards as 2nd tier media until the recent fall in votes jolted them out of surrealism.