Thread by decadence

I was digging through my old drafts looking for some inspiration when this one popped up at me. I wrote this about a year ago for the commonwealth essay writing competition. Obviously, I never actually finished it, partially because the teacher was too lazy to push any of us to finish our essays =P.

I realise that the forum rules state that the stories posted are supposed to be related to WC3 or a campaign, although it looks like nobody's actually bothered to follow that rule. So for the sake of keeping to the rules (at least, until I get my powers back to remove it), I'm er ... making a cinematic campaign about a commoner called Muthusamy who runs a Mamak Shop.

Note: everything that Muthusamy says should be read with the thickest possible indian accent you can muster, especially the 'yah'. (If you've never actually encountered the accent before, then I recommend that you download all the seasons of "The Kumars at No. 42" and "Goodness Gracious Me" and watch every single episode. Now.)

Around the Corner (yah)

Around the corner, there is a mamak shop, run by an eccentric little old man named Muthusamy. He is very happy to see you. "Velcome to my mamak shop, yah!" He exclaims happily, "Ve sell ewerything under the sun here, yah!"

"Vould you like to buy a wase?" He inquires, cocking his head a little to one side and looking you over intently, as if trying to discern what sort of customer you are, "It is just being shipped in from India, yah!"

"It is being somevhere here, hold on vhile Muthusamy is searching for it, yah!" With that, he turns around and goes back into his claustrophobic little shop, and you can hear him rummaging about, searching for the vase.

You hear a loud thump and you run in to see if he needs any help. Muthusamy is sprawled on the floor, holding a quaint little vase up in the air. He sees you and gives you a toothy grin that makes his face look rather like a black hole with teeth. "Muthusamy is falling because the ladder is being wery shaky, yah!" He chuckles, patting the ladder fondly as if it were an old family pet.

As he gets up, you look around his shop, and you can't help but notice the uneven texture of the red paint on his walls. When he sees you scrutinising the paint, he smiles and says "You is being wery obserwant, yah!"

"What kind of paint did you use?" You ask curiously, "It has a texture unlike any other I've seen before."

He nods his head and smiles sagely, "Ah, you is discowering Muthusamy's little secret, yah!"

"It is happening when Muthusamy first opens his shop, yah!" His eyes cloud over ever so subtly, and a distant, almost wistful look comes over his face. He appears to be looking right at you, and yet somehow you know that he isn't. It feels as if he is looking back into another time.

"Back then, Muthusamy is opening his shop in a veek, but he is not having enough money to be painting it, yah?" He pauses and smiles dreamily, as if reliving the very memory he is recounting. "Muthusamy is asking friends to be coming and helping to move the shelves in, yah, but they is bringing lot and lot of betel nuts and leaves. Muthusamy is asking them why they is bringing so much, it is not being a party, yah! They is smiling and telling Muthusamy that they is hawwing big surprise for Muthusamy - they is painting Muthusamy's shop, yah! They is taking all the betel nuts and chewving them, yah? And they is spitting them all over the vall!" He pauses for a moment, running his hand over the wall absently to feel its texture.

"It is staining the vall bright red, and making Muthusamy wery wery much delighted! The police is being delight also, they is being wery happy because they is saying spitting on vall is being wery much better than staining Serangoon Road red, yah!" He chortles.

"But Muthusamy's mama, she is not liking it, yah," He says, shaking his head ruefully and pointing at a picture of a stocky, fierce-looking woman mounted on the wall, "She be saying betel nut spit is belonging on the road, not on the valls. She be saying Muthusamy should be using her pottu face paint to be painting the valls instead, yah!"

"But Muthusamy is being wery clewer, Muthusamy is making beautiful garland dipped in sandalvood oil and giwing it to mama, yah," He says, beaming with pride, "Mama is being so wery happy, she is forgetting about the whole paint thing! She is vearing Muthusamy's beautiful fragrant garland ewerywhere, yah!"

He plops himself down on a stool, motioning for you to do the same, before continuing, "My darling vife is wanting it too, vhen she is seeing Mama parading down the street vith her beautiful garland." He points at another photo frame mounted on the wall, with a rather demure looking indian woman smiling shyly out from it. "She is being called Wiolet, yah, She is being my childhood sveetheart! She vas being so beautiful," he reminisces, as he takes down the photo and uses the corner of his grubby white shirt to clean the glass, smiling fondly at it.

Sensing that he wants to ruminate some more, you ask him "So how did you fall in love?"

His face lights up immediately, and you know you've asked the right question. "Vell ..." he begins hesitantly, "If Muthusamy be telling you, you must be promising Muthusamy you is not be telling anyvun else, yah. It is being a secret family tradition and Mama is going to be drowning Muthusamy in coconut oil if she be finding out he is telling you, yah." You nod your head quickly, your curiosity piqued at the thought of a secret so important that Muthusamy's mother would have to go to such lengths to keep it under wraps.

He leans in closer, as if he is about to impart a wondrous gem of knowledge to you. "It is being a special family recipe, yah," He says in a stage whisper, "Muthusamy's Mama's Mama's Mama* is accidentally discowering it when she is being a young maiden of just tventy, yah. Vun afternoon, she is be making mutton curry in the kitchen, yah, and she accidentally spills her entire jar of sandalvood and lawender perfume into the curry. She is being dewastated, yah - she is spending vun whole night before preparing the curry for her belowed Kumaran, who is going off to be fighting in a vaar!"

He pauses to swat a hapless fly against the table, briskly wiping his hand on the front of his shirt before moving on, "Vhere vas I? Ah yes, so her belowed is going off to fight the vaar, yah? She is being wery much in lowve with him, but he is not knowving, yah, and the poor girl is being much too scared to confess her feelings for him, so she is making the curry and hoping that he is be knowving how she is feeling. And the curry is ruined, so she is not knowing what to do, because he is already vaiting in the dining hall. So she whispers a prayer to Kali and brings the curry to him for him to be eating it," He pauses dramatically, "and he is absolutely LOWVING it! He lowves it so much that he is getting down on one knee and asking her to marry him right there and then, yah!"

He stops to stare intently at your face, obviously expecting some sort of amazed reaction. You do your best to affect a look of utter wonderment and evidently succeed, judging from the brief look of satisfaction that steals across his face before he quashes it and attempts to look modest. "Muthusamy is telling you it is being a great secret!" He crows delightedly, "And that is how Muthusamy is be getting his darling Wiolet to fall in love vith him - he is making the magic curry and giwing it to her to eat for her birthday, and they are falling head ower heels in lowve vith each other!"

With that, he leans back against the wall with a contented sigh, the corners of his dark brown eyes crinkling and a beatific smile spreading slowly across his face as he savours yet another happy memory.

The kettle whistles, and he jumps up and hurries to the back, where you glimpse a little makeshift pantry with a stove and some jars. He carries out the kettle and a jar filled with a brown powder - probably coffee, you think. He sets them on the table and takes two cups from his shelf. "Vould you be liking a cup of Tongkat Ali Coffee?" he asks, holding the cups.

Noticing the blank look on your face, his eyes widen. "You is not knowing what Tongkat Ali coffee is? It is not being possible!" He half-yells in indignation.

"You must be trying it today, most definitely you must, yah!" He says firmly, pouring a cup of hot water and vigorously stirring the coffee powder in.

"It is being wery good for your health," he says enthusiastically, every bit the eager salesman. "And it is being ewen better than wiagra, yah!" He says, giving you a roguish wink that makes his face scrunch up like a rumpled cheesecake.

He sets your cup on the table after stirring the coffee thoroughly, and watches with bated breath as you take a sip.

"Vell? How is you be finding it?" He inquires eagerly.

"To be frank, it tastes like normal coffee, just with a slightly more bitter aftertaste," You say with a slight frown.

His face falls slightly he realises you dont share his enthusiasm for his "miracle drink", but he quickly brightens up. "Ah, you is not experiencing its full pover yet, yah!" He says, smiling knowingly at you.

As you drink your coffee, you look at your watch and nearly keel over in shock. You've spent nearly four hours in his shop! He sees you looking at your watch, and glances over at the clock on the wall. He clucks and shakes his head, saying " Ah, time is really passing really quickly, yah!"

He clears the cups and chucks the jar onto a shelf, going over to a little basket strung from the ceiling and pouring out his earnings for the day into pouch. He pulls the shutters down and locks them. When he sees the bewildered look on your face, he chuckles and says "Ve vill be leawing by the back, yah!"

He notices the vase on the table and remembers. "Ah, so vould you be liking to buy this wase?" He asks.

"Yes, please," you tell him.

"Ah, you is making good buy, wery wery good buy," he says, smiling at you and gesturing emphatically, "it is being a hand-crafted wase from my hometown, and Muthusamy is only charging you tventy-dollars because you is being such a vunderful customer."

You hand him the money, and he brings the vase to the back to wrap it up. When you go into the back, he is sliding the vase, wrapped in newspaper, carefully into a cardboard box. He then puts it into a red plastic bag and hands it to you. He pushes the back door open, walking out onto the street behind. You follow him, and the door swings shut with a little click.

"Vell, thank you for coming to my shop, yah, see you again sometime, yah!" he smiles, pats you on the back and skips off in the direction of a block of HDB flats, humming a little tune that probably came from a bollywood movie.

You realise for the first time that the jar seems strangely heavy, so you open the box and rip open the newspaper at the top. Inside, you find a large packet of tongkat ali coffee powder. You smile to yourself and trudge silently back towards your house.

*Indians employ a system of patronymics and matronymics for their sons and daughters respectively, (i.e. the sons take the names of their fathers and the daughters take after their mothers) so an example of a son's name would be Sanjeev s/o (son of) Abishek and a daughter's name would be Lakshmi d/o (daughter of) Natarajan.

Glossary

Mamak Shop – A corner store generally run by a middle-aged indian man wearing a sarong, which is a large tablecloth wrapped around the waist in place of pants. Mamak shops are known for selling practically EVERYTHING, from shady phamaceuticals to toys and candy. The owners usually spend a large amount time in their shops, sparking speculation that some of them actually live there.

Betel Nut – A popular indian snack made using the nuts and leaves from the betel palm tree. They wrap the betel seeds in the leaves from the same tree and chew it. When the flavour is gone, they usually spit it out into the most convenient receptacle, which usually ends up being the ground. Because of this, and the fact that the betel nut juices stain anything they land on red, the places where the indians congregate tend to have very colourful roads. Serangoon, better known as Little India, is one of these places; the roads there are more red than black.

HDB - An acronym for the Housing Development Board. The HDB is responsible for providing decent, affordable public housing for the masses, and they have succeeded in those particular areas, although the aesthetic aspect leaves quite a bit to be desired. One person in particular, whose name has slipped my mind, once described HDB flats as "vertical cemeteries of the soul". I'd explain the implications of that, but I doubt anyone is here for a 6000-word commentary about Singapore's socio-political climate =P (no, it is not a province in China).

Kali – The Indian Goddess of Destruction, known for her taste for blood and human sacrifice. The irony here is intentional.

Tongkat Ali Coffee – Tongkat Ali is a popular traditional malay herb obtained from the roots and bark of the Tongkat Ali tree. It is claimed to be a potent aphrodisiac, testosterone booster and anti-cancer agent, among many other things. Tongkat Ali Coffee is basically coffee with the herb added to it.

Bollywood - India's equivalent of Hollywood. Its movies are (in)famous for their convoluted plots and the peculiar tendency of the characters to break out into song and dance (especially around trees) for no particular reason.

Not bad. Not bad at all. I liked how you made the reader the main character, that was novel. The entire thing was pretty impressive. All the little touches that you did I thought brung it together really well. And the accent was pretty funny too :P

Thanks =). The perspective thing was kind of a coincidence. I just started writing and the story just decided that it wanted to be written that way. And I know it's ironic that I'm commenting on a comment, but it's brought, not brung =P. Sorry, just couldn't resist =P.

Finally someone wrote a story! It was a nice change from...well, nothing I suppose, but it was a nice change none the less. The way you wrote the dialog made it sound like a real conversation, the little things like going off on tangents, swating at flies, etc.