8 DAYS | 75first person STORY JASON HAHN
Seriously, it wasn’t
Jesus who brought
her that soup!I did! I did all
the hard work opening tins and lining
up at the chicken rice stall! So, how
come Jesus gets the credit?
I
’ve never liked New
Year’s Day. As far as I’m
concerned, it’s easily the
most depressing day in the
year. It’s like that annoyingly
cheerful friend everyone has —
the one who’s always happy and
optimistic and looking for the silver
lining, even when everything is
crashing down around them.
Like my friend Joanna who
lost her job and her beloved
grandmother in the same week. A
few days later, Mimi, her 14-year-
old Chihuahua, died from a kidney
stone infection. And just when
you thought it couldn’t get any
worse, on the day of Joanna’s
grandmother’s funeral, as the
whole family was getting ready to
head out to Mandai Crematorium,
her father dropped dead in the
bathroom from a massive stroke.
In the immortal words of Sharyn,
“Wah, damn suay hor?”
One week, one mini-breakdown,
and 10 boxes of tissues later, Saffy
showed up at Joanna’s house with
a pot of chicken soup.
“You can cook?” Joanna said as
she led the way into her kitchen,
looking surprisingly pulled together
for someone who had had such a
tragic fortnight. She had light make-
up on, her hair was glossy and
she was wearing a chic little dress
that if Amanda had been there,
she would have identified as last
season’s Prada. If you didn’t know
any better, you’d swear Joanna was
on her way to afternoon tea at the
Ritz-Carlton.
“I can’t,” Saffy said, eyeing
Joanna nervously for any incipient
sign of a breakdown. “It’s mostly
tinned soup mixed with some soup
from that chicken rice store down
the road, but I didn’t know what
else to bring! So... uhm ...how are
you?”
Joanna smiled brightly. “I’m
fine! Praise Jesus! I’ve had such
incredible support! I mean it was
a bit of a shock, of course, having
my poh-poh, Mimi and my father die
like that, but I’ve come to realisethat it was all meant to be, and
my friends have been so amazing.
I mean, how blessed am I? And
soup! Praise Jesus!” Joanna
repeated.
Later that evening, Saffy was
still extremely put out by the whole
encounter. “Seriously, it wasn’t
Jesus who brought her that soup! I
did! I did all the hard work opening
tins and lining up at the chicken
rice stall! So, how come Jesus gets
the credit?”
As Amanda remarked later,
it was the kind of metaphysical
question that probably even the
Pope would have had trouble
answering. “I mean, even though it
wasn’t the point, I can kind of seeher point, if you see what I mean?”
she told me.
I replied that Joanna struck me
as the kind of person who would
greet the new year full of pep and
unbridled joy, so I was on Saffy’s
side on this one.
“You’re still dreading the new
year?”
“I was thinking about it the
other day and I realised that it’s
not New Year’s Day that I loathe,
but New Year’s Eve!”
“Oh, I’ve never liked New Year’s
Eve!” Amanda said, shuddering
delicately. “It’s like the night before
an exam. You feel like you’ve not
studied enough, and that you
should study more, but you also
know that there really isn’t any
more time because you won’t
be able to absorb anything elseat such a late stage, and so that
stresses you out more than the fact
that there’s still lots of stuff you
could revise and that’s the stuff that
will turn up in the exam the next
day and not the stuff you’ve already
studied!”
“That’s exactly right!” I said.
“And that’s probably why we all get
drunk on New Year’s Eve! Just so we
can numb the horror of New Year’s
Day!”
Of course, Sharyn says we’re
overanalysing things. “Aiyah, still got
two more month to go, why you all
so gun-zheong and whir-ly so much?
New Year Eve, New Year Eve lor!”
But Amanda’s not having any of
it. “You only say that because youcan distract yourself from the horror
of it all by scolding your family. You
try being single on New Year’s Eve!
It’s the pits!”
“Please,” Saffy said, “even if
you’ve got a boyfriend, it’s still the
pits!”
“Aiyoh, you all ah! Got boyfriend,
complain. Don’t have boyfriend,
complain. Christmas, complain.
New Year Day, complain. New Year
Eve, complain! How liddat?”
Saffy, for whom withering
criticism is like sunshine to
Superman, visibly swelled up. “Oh
my God, did I tell you that I told this
kid off today on the MRT for not
giving up his seat for this pregnant
woman? The little punk gave me
such a dirty look!”
Sharyn dropped her head and
sighed.