On the day of filming, the crew came down to the Queenstown outlet to interview Mary Lao and shoot Wei Wen’s brother in action. Unnerved by the filming crew and their ominous equipment, Wei Wen’s brother paled and became horrendously clumsy mixing the beverages. To calm his nerves, the supervisor put on a cassette tape and played Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy”. Almost immediately, Wei Wen’s brother delighted everyone by laughing and dancing to the tune. The crew reacted quickly and captured it on film.
When the documentary aired two weeks later, it was the bonus clip of Wei Wen’s brother dancing and having fun that captivated the audience. Viewership tripled when the episode was dubbed and broadcast again the following week on the English channel. The Too Sexy clip became the talk of the town, spinning off into more newspaper article mentions than Mary Lao could have hoped for. Singaporeans from the opposite end of the island took the MRT train to Queenstown just to visit Wei Wen’s brother and have their pictures taken with him. The protagonist himself was not entirely aware that he had become a national sensation, but was generally happy to oblige when customers requested that he pose for the camera brandishing his Too Sexy V sign.
Mary Lao brought the family out for a celebratory dinner at the prestigious Shang Palace restaurant at the Shangri-La Hotel. She ordered individual servings of Buddha Jumps Over The Wall for everyone, including Skye, who had no idea how extravagantly expensive the soup was and complained that he did not like it at all. Mary Lao laughed and promised that if the revenue figures continued to climb, she could make this a monthly visit until Skye cultivated a taste for the delicacy.
As dessert was being served, Mary Lao turned to Gimme Lao and asked that he stop being so stubborn. Pastor Kong had been urging her to bring him to church. Gimme Lao should open up his mind, Mary Lao remarked. Witness the blessings God had bestowed on them. Her Pearls of Love business venture was an astounding success, and Wei Wen did not have to worry about her brother’s livelihood the way she used to. It was all God’s work!
Gimme Lao made a face and said that there was something he had not brought to their attention the past few weeks because they were all so engrossed with the filming project. Barber Bay had been admitted to hospital as a terminal case more than a month ago. He had just passed on the night before.
EIGHT
GIMME LAO WAS back at his office on a Sunday morning. He had three more hours to clear his work before he needed to pick Skye up for his swimming lesson. After that he had to preside over the monthly Youth Executive Committee meeting at Bukit Panjang Community Club. But first, he had to clear the major hurdle of the day. He was to conduct an exit interview for Pay Ming Kuang.
Gimme Lao had mixed feelings about this turn of events. Although Pay Ming Kuang was clearly his chief rival in the race to head the Communicable Disease Division of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, he would never wish such a dishonourable discharge upon the poor man. Gimme Lao could not imagine how it must feel to have one’s name splashed across the front page of the Straits Times in bold, ignominiously featured as one among a dozen men netted in the most notorious police sweep of 1996. The other 11 men had their names printed in size 10 font in paragraph six. Pay Ming Kuang had his name printed in bold, font size 22, headlining the article. He was not any more or less guilty than the rest. He was simply guilty of being the son of Pay Wee Khoon, the tycoon who headed Pay Conglomerate, which owned and operated, among other entities, the biggest banking group in Singapore.
It would not be stretching the truth to describe Pay Ming Kuang as mousy. The man was short and scrawny, spoke softly and had problems asserting himself. He had kept a low profile in medical school. In fact, no one would have found out about his imposing family background had Professor Eleanor Moh not let it slip when she conducted the module on communicable disease. Professor Eleanor Moh herself was a prominent figure. Not only did she head the Communicable Disease Division of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, she was married to a serving cabinet minister in Parliament. The first day she walked in to the lecture theatre, she scanned through Gimme Lao’s cohort, spotted Pay Ming Kuang and waved at him with a warm smile. As the rest of the cohort watched stunned, Professor Eleanor Moh enquired after his mother and suggested Mrs Pay call her secretary to make arrangements to meet up for high tea. It had been ages since they last chatted.
It took the cohort less than 48 hours to dig up the details. Pay Ming Kuang was third in line to inherit a family fortune worth close to a billion. Both his brothers had chosen to work for their father. The eldest was engaged to the daughter of a local shipping tycoon, while the second was dating a girl whose father made it to the Forbes list of Indonesia’s 50 richest. Pay Ming Kuang himself was not attached. That effectively elevated him to being the most eligible bachelor in the cohort.
Prior to the revelation, Gimme Lao did not pay the mousy young man any attention. Now that he did, he began to notice a pattern. The reason Pay Ming Kuang was seldom spotted in the student cafeteria was that he was often dining at the staff cafeteria at the invitation of various professors and heads of department. Professor Eleanor Moh herself openly invited the young man to join her for lunch after her lectures. The cohort quickly arrived at a foregone conclusion. There were only two spots available for their batch at the Communicable Disease Division of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, and she had reserved one of them for Pay Ming Kuang. There was only one spot left.
Gimme Lao wanted that last spot.
A medical career looked like a great option when one was 14. Income was steady, social status was guaranteed and one suffered minimal impact from an economic downturn. But Gimme Lao had expanded his horizons over the years. He had witnessed his mother amass her fortune by leaps and bounds leveraging on her sales and business acumen. There was no way he could measure up by working as a general practitioner running a neighbourhood clinic. Serving in the army, he had witnessed how some cadets clandestinely enjoyed privileged treatment because they were from prominent families. Gimme Lao had no respect for these privileged offspring; they were where they were by an inexplicable stroke of luck. He did, however, look up to their parents, many of whom had made a name for themselves in their chosen field of endeavour. These people earned the respect of the community.
Gimme Lao would like that—to earn the respect of his community.
During his first year in medical school, Gimme Lao took time to study the alumni records. Although some had made a name for themselves regionally as top of their fields, they were known and respected only within the medical community. It was the handful who branched out into public service who had made a name for themselves among the general public. In fact, Gimme Lao was surprised to learn that doctors were grossly overrepresented among the 87 members of parliament. It would appear that a medical background opened doors more easily in the political arena. That realisation was directly responsible for Gimme Lao’s awakening. He would eventually seek public office. That would be his calling.
Gimme Lao had no illusions about his handicap. He did not come from a prominent family and knew no one who moved in high places. On the other hand, he had absolute confidence in his abilities. He was sharp, focused, brilliant and persevering. Once he made up his mind about anything, he always made it happen.
The Communicable Disease Division of Tan Tock Seng Hospital was not a spot top that medical students vied for. There was hardly any glamour or prospect in it. For Gimme Lao, it was the perfect spot. It was small enough that he could shine easily, and Professor Eleanor Moh was on hand to discern and appraise his performance. Gimme Lao had done his background check on the professor. Not only was her husband a cabinet minister, her cousin was a serving member of parliament. With her connections, she could be his ticket to board the speedboat headed for his ultimate destination.
Gimme Lao knew he needed to make it easy for Professor Eleanor Moh to distinguish him from among the two hundred medical students in his cohort. An afternoon’s leisurely swim at the university pool was all it took to map out his strateg
y. The following week, Gimme Lao dropped by Bukit Panjang Constituency Office to sign up as a volunteer for the Youth Executive Committee. When the interviewer frowned and asked why he chose to volunteer at a constituency so far from home, Gimme Lao lied and said it was near his in-laws’. The truth was, the Bukit Panjang Constituency Adviser appointed by the Prime Minister’s Office was none other than Professor Eleanor Moh’s husband, Dr Liew Kim Keong.
By the second meeting of the Youth Executive Committee, Gimme Lao realised he faced a hurdle. There were seven different committees under the umbrella of the constituency, and the one he belonged to was the least prominent. While the other committee chairmen aggressively sought Dr Liew’s attention and favour, his chairman could not be bothered to play the political game. The man dutifully organised events and activities to engage youths, but did nothing to convert his efforts into political playing chips. The committee was practically invisible to Dr Liew.
Gimme Lao knew he had to make a strategic move. He timed himself to drop by the constituency office just as the director was leaving for the weekly session where Dr Liew met the residents and discussed their issues in his capacity as the constituency adviser. Feigning surprise, Gimme Lao mentioned that he did not mind tagging along. When they arrived, the director could only interrupt Dr Liew’s session for all of two minutes to introduce Gimme Lao. There was a long queue of residents waiting for their turn to seek assistance or to air their grouses.
For the next two hours, Gimme Lao observed and took mental notes. The residents’ issues ranged from the pertinent and imperative to the frivolous and absurd. A woman complained that from her kitchen window she could spot a shameless couple in the opposite building moving around their apartment naked and having sex without bothering to draw their curtains. Another woman noticed groups of Bangladeshi construction workers enjoying their siesta at the void deck below her flat and worried for the safety of her teenage daughter who had to walk past them to reach home. An elderly man was unhappy that the local supermarket hired Filipino cashiers who could not speak his dialect. Yet another was livid that teenagers were making out in the neighbourhood park in broad daylight. All were adamant that Dr Liew had to do something about these intolerable issues.
Gimme Lao knew he hit jackpot when two elderly ladies came in together to highlight a problem. They had recently moved in to the new blocks at the northern fringe and were horrified to discover that there were no clinics within the vicinity. It was especially tough for the elderly folks, who were frail and lacked mobility, to have to take a bus down to the Bukit Panjang town centre to see a doctor. Dr Liew assured them that once all the new blocks in the northern fringe were built and occupied within the next three years, the clinics and supermarkets would sprout up too. He asked that the ladies be patient.
It took Gimme Lao several weeks to orchestrate the plan he had in mind. If things went smoothly, there would soon be a mobile clinic visiting the northern fringe twice a month. He convinced Mary Lao to fund the project by promising that Pearls of Love would be prominently featured as the main sponsor when the media coverage eventually kicked in. He roped in doctors from Tan Tock Seng Hospital to volunteer for the mobile clinic, while Mary Lao mobilised volunteers from church to run the logistics and operation. Once the pieces were in place, he asked the constituency director to arrange for a meeting with Dr Liew so he could present his solution.
Dr Liew was naturally impressed. He tasked the constituency director to help source for additional funds and personally invited Gimme Lao to join him and his wife for dinner on Sunday. There was a new Peranakan restaurant they wanted to try, and he would very much like his wife to meet a promising young grassroots leader.
Once Gimme Lao entered Professor Eleanor Moh’s radar, the hurdle was cleared. In time to come, Gimme Lao and Pay Ming Kuang secured the only two spots reserved for their batch at the Communicable Disease Division of Tan Tock Seng Hospital. During the Youth Executive Committee re-election the following year, Dr Liew Kim Keong pulled some strings so that Gimme Lao emerged the newly elected chairman. In return, Gimme Lao worked hard not to disappoint the adviser. He rejuvenated and led his team to overtake the other six committees to become the star performer in the constituency. By the third year, he chalked up a sufficient track record to be nominated as Outstanding Grassroots Leader of the Year for the Northwest Division.
The situation was however a little more complicated at work. Pay Ming Kuang’s father, the tycoon who headed the formidable Pay Conglomerate, sat on the Advisory Board of Tan Tock Seng Hospital. Chances were slim that Professor Eleanor Moh would rank Gimme Lao ahead of Pay Ming Kuang in the annual appraisal exercise. Although the taciturn man kept to himself and did not make any effort to network the way Gimme Lao did, he was nonetheless a competent and responsible physician. There was no faulting the man.
Until the notorious police sweep of 1996.
Pay Ming Kuang chose to keep a low profile for a good reason. There was a facet of his life he did not share with his family, friends or colleagues. They saw him as an eccentric who did not seem to crave company. None of his friends and colleagues knew his favourite haunts, and no one in his family questioned him when he habitually left the house late at night on Tuesdays and Fridays and did not return till three in the morning. His mother thought he might be out drinking. She secretly hoped it was drinking and not gambling or whoring that her son was trying to hide from her. As for the father and the two brothers, they were too busy to concern themselves with his clandestine lifestyle.
No one he knew would ever guess that he went into the forest on Tuesday and Friday nights.
Pay Ming Kuang first entered the forest four years ago. He had heard about the place through the grapevine. It was a stretch of wooded area sandwiched between the Tanjong Rhu Flyover and the shoreline along the East Coast. He remembered his first visit with heady nostalgia. He had parked his car along Fort Road and made a quick dash into the shadows. Once in the forest, the moonshine and streetlights were effectively obliterated. He leaned against a massive tree trunk and allowed his eyes to adjust to the darkness. He could hear nothing but the pounding of his heart.
After a minute or two, the blanket of darkness morphed into odd shapes and shadows. The undergrowth was sparse enough for him to make out a network of trails in the primary forest. There was the night wind rustling the leaves, and he could hear the stridulation of the crickets. Pay Ming Kuang emitted a nervous chuckle. He found it amusing that most people would describe the sound made by crickets as chirping. They were so mistaken. Male crickets stridulate by running the top of one wing along the lower serrated lining of the other wing, while spreading open the wing membranes to act as acoustic sails. Not many people knew this; at least not among his circle of friends. Then again, he had a tendency to pay excessive attention to details others did not bother with. That could be one of the reasons he had so few friends. People found him odd.
Growing up, Pay Ming Kuang was an odd child. Unlike his two brothers, who were rowdy and pesky, the boy was painfully shy. His mother was initially glad that her youngest was compliant and well behaved. The first incident that drew her attention to his oddity occurred when he was five. The two older boys had tied a coil of rope to her poor Maltese and set the other end on fire. According to the nanny, Pay Ming Kuang had shrieked with horror, stamped out the fire at the critical juncture and cradled the terrified animal while crying bitterly himself. The crying lasted three days. His mother had to instruct the nanny to sleep by his bed so that there would be someone to soothe him when he awoke from his tearful nightmares.
On the fourth night, it was the eldest boy who shrieked and hopped out of bed bawling. The nanny pulled back the blanket and uncovered a pincushion with a dozen pins sticking out like a tiny porcupine. When his mother questioned him, Pay Ming Kuang did not deny it. He simply muttered that his eldest brother ought to experience pain so he would never dish it out to others again.
Two nights later, her second boy fell vic
tim. The nanny found him howling in pain stuck to the toilet seat with an even layer of superglue.
Pay Ming Kuang’s mother gave the boy a severe scolding and instructed the nanny to keep a close eye on him. Two months had barely passed before the nanny highlighted yet another incident. Pay Ming Kuang had flown into a rage when he spotted a stray cat mauling an injured sparrow in the garden. Although he managed to chase the predator away, the sparrow was beyond salvation. After burying the feathered carcass under a hibiscus shrub, the boy was seething with vindictive fury for the next few days. The nanny thought he might be scheming some revenge. True enough, she finally found the trap he had set up behind the garden shed to lure unsuspecting stray cats. The boy had swung a toy propeller plane tied to a cord over the roof pipe and left it dangling. Underneath the bait he positioned a pail covered with a cardboard cut-out to which he secured the other end of the cord. Had any curious stray cat hopped onto the cardboard and made a jump for the propeller plane, it would have jerked away the cardboard lid and fallen right into the pail. The nanny shuddered when she removed the lid and looked inside. There was the cleaver missing from the kitchen, propped upright with two garden bricks, the sharp edge of the blade pointed skywards.
Pay Ming Kuang’s mother was a little shaken. She realised that her youngest exhibited some psychopathological traits and concluded that nanny supervision alone was insufficient. So she convinced her husband that they should send Pay Ming Kuang to some renowned boarding school where the child would receive the best possible supervision and education. Her husband nodded, his mind preoccupied with a new project to build a casino in Poipet, along the Cambodian and Thai border.
For the next 12 years, Pay Ming Kuang lived away from home in the United Kingdom. When he returned to pursue a medical degree in Singapore, his mother found that her youngest had grown from a shy and odd boy to a taciturn young man who cloaked his thoughts and veiled his feelings. It felt like the family had invited a stranger to join them in the house. Although she would not admit it, she knew it was too late to connect to her youngest child. She had not the faintest idea what would excite, mesmerise or frighten him. He was in a secret world of his own.
Let's Give It Up for Gimme Lao! Page 18
