THE CITIZEN

It was the sweat, he tells me. The sweat and the semen. That was how he squirmed his way out of the grip of the lizard, and how he hid in a hole the entire night, listening to my moans of displeasure echo across the bunker. The metallic creaking of the robot and the disingenuous hissing of the lizards keeping him away. They already have enough material to create a clone of me. They always did. The entire operation to prevent the cloning of Lee Kuan Yew was a failure before it even started. 

But today, Tan Vee Bun tells me to pack up my things. We’re moving to his home, his secret home which he shares with Robert Sebastian Cheong, whom I still dislike. I fill up whatever I have into an old army duffel bag and a few NTUC plastic bags, and we head out. It’s not like I have much to pack -- everything’s already been stolen by Joanne, disappeared to some other location where she no doubt is enjoying the ministrations of the robot’s well practiced, silver polishing hands. 

We sit in the MRT heading towards Yishun. Tan Vee Bun muttering to himself in the black reflections of the train windows, the lights of the HDB flats like circuit board LEDs scrolling right to left. 

I think about my next move. Yet another attempt to position myself in front of a well-oiled machine always one step ahead of me. When I understand my destiny, I find out they want to clone me. When I attempt to unite with my girlfriend, I find out she’s one of them. When I’m contacted by the resistance, I get captured and turned into a human semen machine. Throughout, layers upon layers of manipulation ensure my free will as the reincarnation of Lee Kuan Yew remains safely locked away behind the algorithms and machinations of reptile politics. But now, I have full trust in Tan Vee Bun. Together, we can bring down this nation-wide control, to bring my 八字 back into my hands for the good of Singapore. 

“We have reached Ang Mo Kio, please stand clear of the closing doors”

My thoughts, however, drift to the sermonising of the lizards. Their own machinations being a reaction to the pressures of a bigger world, the gravity of international intrigue, the current of economic flow, and the inequality of competitive advantage all coming into play in the feng shui of our livelihoods. When did it become this way? When did the machines and ideologies that helped us advance as a species become the controlling mechanism to pull us all into line, our bodies wasted, our lives a sliver of ennui, our souls on trial in perpetuity…  

Tan Vee Bun pinches my arm, rousing me from my thoughts, and pulls me onto the Woodlands station platform. I follow his lead as we blend into the crowds of heartlanders, some heading home, some heading to the market, others on a journey to Johor Bahru for cheap food, alcohol, groceries and cigarettes. In front of us, a group of teenagers talk excitedly of “lard noodles” -- apparently a specialty across the causeway, unhealthy enough to be practically illegal in Singapore. 

As for me, I think about Ramly burgers, forever associated with Joanne since we first got together, on one of our first holidays to Port Dickson. A fading image of the two of us, taking in the stench of the receding sea, brisk walking to avoid the mosquitoes, arguing about politics, and munching on those burgers. Later, I had a stomach ache, and Joanne lay in bed while I glued myself to the toilet. I remember a locust had found its way into the bathroom, and I remember thinking to myself it was good that I had the stomach ache and not her. She wouldn’t have been able to handle a stomach ache and a locust in the bathroom at the same time. 

Tan Vee Bun’s home is located behind the Seletar Expressway. Finding a blind spot between traffic cameras, we jaywalk across the highway, dragging my belongings behind. He jumps headfirst into some foliage, and I follow suit, whereupon we walk along a footpath into the jungle. The first thing I see are the Christmas lights flashing in the distance, which later reveal to be a kind of perimeter for the little household he’d built with Robert Sebastian Cheong. The remains of an ancient chinese home, done up with palm leaves, zinc roofing and scavenged army tarpaulin. A portable generator provides power for the lights, computers, refrigerators and air conditioning. Next to the house, behind a curtain of leaves, a storm drain provides running water for washing, while drinking water is stored in a large container hanging on a clothesline supported in between two trees. 

Inside the home, the place is tastefully decorated in a minimal style, the hard concrete and stone masked by strategic placement of curtains and carpets, while scavenged furniture is arranged and modified, together with soft yellow lighting and a slightly sweet smell from the scented candles, to give off the impression of a dream-like balinese getaway.