Pure Escapism

Left my troubles behind for an hour so just now, taking refuge with Bertie Wooster in New York. I've nearly finished viewing the DVDs of the various Jeeves and Wooster series made for Granada tv, being now on the fourth and, sadly, final series. I've never quite understood what critics, some of them, have got against purely escapist literature and the like. Thank goodness that Wodehouse created a world it's so easy to slip away from it all into.

Bertie buying the Collected Works of the great philosopher for Jeeves's birthday: There's nothing I like better than to curl up with Spinoza's latest. Made me want to start on the Ethics all over again. Almost.

Two Els

It's a very simple idea. Get two highly articulate musicians and let them talk about the music they love. Have a red hot band on stage (James Burton on guitar, Allen Toussaint on organ, gasp) so they can play a bit as well. Allow in a quietly appreciative audience to listen and then show it on television. What a change from the usual filler muddying the air waves.

I could have listened to ten hours of Elvis & Elton doing their thing, but the one hour we got on Spectacle last night will have to do. Most of it was a tribute to the people who influenced them and what a treat to hear names like Laura Nyro, Leon Russell and David Ackles being accorded the respect they deserve. (Quite honestly, though I've heard of Ackles and knew he was highly regarded I never really got exposed to his stuff, but Elvis & Elton's storming version of his song Down River at the end of the show made me seriously consider righting that omission.)

Great sane line from Elvis: David Ackles finished his career in community theatre but why should that be regarded as some kind of failure? Helping develop the talents of young people and sharing a creative gift sound very like success. (Or words to that effect. It was well said, however he put it.)

I wonder if the reason we don't get much intelligent conversation on the box is because it undermines what the box really stands for?

Indulgence

Spent the late afternoon in the Black Box theatre at the National Library Building on Victoria Street, and was very glad to be there. Quite a few of our drama guys were in attendance also for Family, an engaging play that I'd never heard of before. I think it's a homegrown piece, based on the matriarch of a big Chinese family which establishes itself in Singapore , involving numerous trials and tribulations.

I can't remember having a bad afternoon or evening in any black box style production in this country. And this was no exception with the usual virtues on display: great ensemble work: beautifully economical sets, making much of little in highly imaginative ways; a delightful physicality in performance; nicely measured and cleanly executed lighting and sound; a desire to engage with experience in a serious yet entertaining manner. It was especially pleasing to see one of our old guys, the very talented Hadi, in action - and to recognise his growth as an actor.

The only downside I'm aware of in this 'local' style of theatre is a tendency to milk scenes for all they're worth in a somewhat self-indulgent manner. These groups are not afraid of a bit of melodrama. But perhaps that is an essentially Asian trait. And I suppose self-indulgence is a virtuous fault - it speaks of a confidence in communicating depths of emotion and experience

In Celebration

I was a bit surprised this afternoon when Noi reminded me that only a week ago we were celebrating the latest wedding in her family. After a busy week the images of the joyous occasion were beginning to slip form my mind. Hence the reminders above.

Acting Naturally

Isn't it splendid that two of the last ten contestants in American Idol, two of the ladies, in fact, have less than perfect teeth? Oddly they happen to be the best two singers from their gender, and I'd tip them both to make the top three. I suspect that by that time someone will have 'fixed' (filling a gap here, realigning there) what never needed fixing in the first place. But since they both appear to be refreshingly secure in themselves and their quirkiness I am hopeful they will remain unblemished by perfection.

Great Expectations

Now awaiting the call from the missus to pick her up from the bus station. Real life is about to resume and I am truly thankful.

A Proper Response

Finding it a bit difficult to engage in genuinely sustained reading lately, I've been dipping into the wonderful and eminently dippable Selected Letters of Ted Hughes. There are gems on every page. The letters to son Nick are particularly striking - peculiarly tender and wise.

And then I remember how poor Nick ended his life. I've occasionally said to classes that sometimes the only sane response to what you're reading is tears. They think I'm joking. I'm not.

Squaddies

The ever-ready battery in the Manchester United machine - that was the almost felicitous description of Park Ji-Sung last night by a decently over-excited commentator after his fine goal. Notice it could apply to a number of United regulars, Darren Fletcher being undoubtedly, yet again, the man of the match. The pundits who describe United as a one-man team (at one time that one man being Ronaldo, now the mighty Rooon) clearly know next to nothing about the game. Success over the last twenty years has been delivered above all else by the depth of strength of the squad and the manager's ability to turn good players into very good, almost great, footballers.

So Torres's 'demand' that Liverpool buy five quality players to show they're serious, seriously misses the point. You need to win with what you've got to be winners.

Staying Lucky

We were one car away from a major shunt on the highway coming back to Singapore this afternoon. Noi wasn't with us - she's staying at the Melaka house to help ease things back to normality for a couple of days. I was giving a lift to Hakim & Intan and Kak Kiah's brother and they were all a bit startled, as was I, when three or four cars ahead of us in the outside lane decided to push into each other in what seemed like slow motion in the grey rain a few kilometres beyond Machap. They ended up strewn across the two lanes of the highway whilst we managed to draw to a reasonably elegantly unhurried halt behind a chap who also kept a good distance between himself and the mess in front. The guy behind us had also had the sense to keep a sensible distance so that was the end of the carnage.

I don't think anyone was badly hurt, it was all too slow for that, but obviously there was going to be plenty of business for the car repair services in the area. Just how much we only realised as we rounded the blockage, which was quite easy for us being so close so there no queue to speak of, and suddenly realised that what we had witnessed was just the back end of a much longer shunt. I'd guess it involved a further twelve cars at least. The thing none of us could quite grasp was what had happened to the car right at the front, a red one, that meant everyone ploughing into him.

So it's appropriate to be thankful I'm back here in one piece and life can get on without enormous disruptions of one sort or another. I mention this in the awkward knowledge that it sounds a bit like crowing over the misfortunes of all those involved in the mess on the highway. Any celebration of good fortune can sound that way, and some can be meant that way. But I'm trying to mean mine as a genuine recognition that just being able to keep things going in a routine manner is an enormous blessing that we, well me at least, are apt to overlook.

Newlyweds

An air of a deed well done, of accomplishment, hangs over the living-room at the Melaka house. Rozaidah and Rizal (hope I'm right over the spellings) have taken that long dark limousine for their mystery ride. (The metaphor, Springsteen's, doesn't quite work due to the distinct lack of limousines - thank goodness - on kampongs in Malaysia, but it will serve as a way of crossing cultures.) There's a strong sense they know what they are doing, despite the fact they look barely old enough to marry. They had the great good sense, for example, to keep things simple when more might have been demanded. This suggested they had grasped the essential fact: it's the days following the wedding, all of them arriving as relentlessly as the years pass, that are the important ones - the day of the wedding is really neither here nor there in the great scheme of things as long as you avoid an out-and-out disaster.

After that each day is a new challenge to make what you've got work as you take the mystery ride. If you're lucky, it really turns out to be a journey down the tunnel of love. A sort of undeserved grace, in my case.