The Question of Fat Vegetable
“My daughter is very fat. Although this is a fact, I cannot accept anyone saying that. I nearly fought a half-drunk guy at the coffeeshop when I heard him he calling her pui chai (fat vegetable). If not for my drinking buddies… pulling me back, I would have whacked that bugger. She is the only one I love, the only I am left with to love, the little love I am left with in this world. My wife died young, she is my only daughter… I did not remarry… no one suitable. But I always tell my daughter, my relatives and friends that it is for the sake of my daughter. She’s still young, the stepmother might ill-treat her. Actually, I learnt that line from some local drama series, used several times in different shows, to sound like a good father. When there’s a need I visit Petain Road. It is cheaper there. My old primary school classmate works there… he takes care of the girls there. And now he has grown old together with those girls who are old women. Now my daughter is in her late twenties, I am already so old, what’s the point of looking for a companion, a woman to nag at me, to quarrel with me. It is not as if I could get it up anymore, what’s the point? The doctor told me about my condition. It was like announcing to me my death sentence, terminal illness, few months left, like in drama series again. Cheebye, shouldn’t have gone to the health check at the community centre, that time. When I got home in the evening, after cleaning sai kang (toilet bowls), the public toilets at Raffles City have very high standards for cleanliness, need to check every half an hour, that stupid fat estate manager told my supervisor, but the people, they have no standard. No matter how well they dress just cannot aim properly, whether sitting or standing, whether shit, pee or blood at the female toilet. Although there’s also blood in the male toilet too, I don’t know from anal, mouth, nose or when peeing. I even cleaned dry semen stains before, chow cheebye. But phone numbers and vulgarities written with markers are even harder to clean, even if using thinner. That day, when I got home in the evening, I saw my daughter in the living room eating potato chips and ice-cream watching Taiwanese variety programme, so noisy, this TV programme, the people keep laughing. What’s there to laugh about, kannina? I thought about how she will be all alone when I am not around anymore. She doesn’t have many friends, although now she has a stable job in a photocopy shop, at least she has something to do. I thought about what she once told me, that day she was very sad, as sad as that time I brought her to the swimming pool. Some kids who laughed at her when she was learning how to swim. Two of them were her classmates, the cheebye kia’s surname is Liang or Leong, and another one wearing spectacles. I cannot forget the way that fucking kid, Liang laughed. But the good thing I heard is that my daughter saw that guy now, much older also quite fat. She told me nobody will want her, she will never get married. I remember what she once wrote in her diary. Yes, I checked her diary. She wrote about her curiosity towards sex, I thought is not a girl after all, she is a woman now. I thought about how she would die an old virgin. I feel sad for her. I feel responsible for the way she is. Why can’t she enjoy life like the rest? I thought of making a bold suggestion to her, asked if she wants to find a gigolo. But I know she has never had any intimate contact with any man before. I thought about perhaps, I am the only man she’s closest to, when she was a little girl, she sat on my lap when taking the train. I should be the one doing it. I told an old friend about my idea, he told me I am crazy, that I smelt too much urine or detergent at work is it? I don’t care I will go Petain Road, kin jio kar, to buy Viagra.”
In the approved film version, the father was found dead in the toilet from an overdosed of illegal sex drugs, and construed simply as the death of another dirty old man. The alternate ending, for the DVD version, is the sex scene between the old father and fat daughter which is neither grotesque nor perversely erotic but melancholic, like a depressing family drama. It was more or less a successful attempt by the scriptwriter and director, as some viewers were moved to tears, despite the apparently incestuous plot. A critic has related this to a Japanese film by Beat Takeshi, where the spirit of the mother, who died in an accident, possesses the daughter to live with her husband for another few weeks, and the Fritzl case, where the Austrian man raped, abused and imprisoned his daughter.
No comments:
Post a Comment