Euthanasian (安乐死者) – Chien Swee-Teng

Euthanasian (安乐死者) – Chien Swee-Teng
You were driving us around Jalan Besar. The sun was terrible, like we are stuck in an eternal tropical noon. You were driving us to look for a wood supplier, and the weather is driving us mad. Along the way, I pointed to you all kinds of people we should knock down randomly: the roadwork sign, the Indian workers, the orange vests and yellow helmets, knock a few and miss a few, like bowling pins, and drive into the ditch they have dug. Why are they always digging, pumping and drilling? The kid and her foreign maid after school, crossing the road, when green man is flashing, you have the powerful machine to knock and drag the bodies under the wheel for another few metres before you stop. The delivery man who just got out of the van and glanced into your car, sole breadwinner raising his family with a meagre salary, it is to supply the same old story to the local tabloid about why he shouldn’t die, the sick wife and children are now helpless. The Chinese man with crew cut cycling, I want blood on his oil stained white polo T-shirt, the shirt with the logo of a restaurant printed on it. Those students out on excursion, talking loudly, giggling, knock onto the pillar of the heritage site, let the roof, maintained with high conservation standards, collapse on them. The more they are innocent the better. You once said, it is sad to see ‘old clerks’, which you defined as balding middle aged man in short sleeve shirt from department store, a silver pen tucked in the shirt breast pocket, synthetic leather shoes with rubber soles, carrying a folder… but nobody calls themselves clerks anymore, we don’t know if he is really a clerk. Now he might not be wearing Montagut, Alain Delon, Pierre Cardin or Goldlion anymore, there are other cheaper brands that sound like other brands. You said at this age they are neither here nor there. Here’s one archetype of the old clerk waiting for a bus, he’s wiping his head, face and neck, then cleaning the spectacle frame, the corners around the lens, let’s swerve the car into the bus stop. But you reminded me that you are not driving an armour car or tank. I apologised, and we parked and alighted on Syed Alwi. Then I noticed an old lady. Nothing beats the sight of a petite old lady with slight hunch pushing a trolley filled with a huge stack of cardboards. I heard the noise, the noise of a plastic bag full of drink cans dangling from the handle like an aluminium bell; from the way she is pushing the trolley it seems very heavy. I doubt she is into recycling or environmental issues. Under the merciless sun, looking satisfied, tired but happy, a fruitful a day of collecting, how could one doubt her diligence, sometimes she took the cardboards with permission, someone’s good grace, sometimes minor pilfering when no one is looking. I can’t help it. I shall walk towards her and kick the pile of cardboard, scattering the flattened boxes on the road, she have all the time to pick it up later, I have all the time to laugh at her. She can curse at me all she wants; complain to her children, if she has any. If I am in a bad mood, I would not hesitate to kick her. And if I am carrying a pistol, I would not think twice about shooting her, killing her. I doubt anybody around would give a damn – it would be strange if they did, why not earlier? But I would not use any self-righteous excuses for this murder. It is not about how I can’t bear to see her suffer and so it is better for her to die. It is simply how I can’t suffer the undying sight of her. I am an individual, and individualism is what many artists like to preach. Hence, this is purely for my personal gratification and my esoteric sense of beauty.