8 DAYS | 79first person STORY JASON HAHN
A
manda recently woke
up with a rash on the
lower right side of her
rib cage. After getting
over the initial shock
of finding tiny red bumps on her
otherwise impeccably milky white
skin, she scrambled up out of bed
and marched into Saffy’s room to
show her.
Saffy’s immediate reaction was
to let out a little piercing scream.
To her credit, she recovered her
poise and leant in, still in her
nightgown, to peer at Amanda’s
dermatological development.
“What is going on with that?”
she sighed as she tilted her head,
the better to cast more light on the
red rash.
“I just woke up with it!” Amanda
moaned. “What is it? Oh God, I’m
deformed!”
Saffy hesitated. “Well, I’m no
Dr Sandra Lee, but that looks like
a rash!”
“You think?” Amanda snapped.
“Can you be less specific? You’re
the one who’s always watching her
YouTube clips. Hasn’t this ever
come up before?”
From beneath her sheer
nightgown, Saffy’s magnificent
bosom puffed up. “Well, she’s more
into huge lipomas and infected
cysts. This kind of little rash isn’t
really her kind of thing. There’s
nothing to pop!”
Within half an hour, Sharyn had
been summoned to the flat. She
arrived in a dizzy haze of something
fried. “Aiyoh, what is so urgent?
I was making prawn noodle, you
know!”
“Oh, is that what I’m smelling?”
Saffy said, managing to look both
repulsed and ravenous at the same
time.
“Here, look at this!” Amanda
commanded and lifted her shirt.
Sharyn, a veteran mother
who has seen her fair share of
unmentionable skin conditions,
peered over her spectacles and
sniffed. “Aiyah, is only heat rash
lah! Eidder dat, or is allergy. You got
Well, Dr Sandra Lee
is more into huge
lipomas and infected cysts.
This kind of little rash isn’t really her
kind of thing. There’s nothing to pop!
eat shellfish last night?”
“She had laksa!” Saffy piped up.
“Ah! Yah, lah! Is allergy lah!
Confirm!”
“But I have laksa all the time!”
Amanda wailed. “This is the first
time something like this has
happened! Will there be scarring?”
Her eyes swelled in terror.
“Aiyoh, a little allergy and you
so drama. Wait you have measle or
mump, then how?” Sharyn said.
It was a question that Saffy later
said reminded her of any number
of scenes in Game of Thrones when
someone is threatening another
with death, dismemberment, or
just general deprivation of life and
liberty. “You can tell she’s a scarymother!” she said with the kind
of admiration normally adopted
by people who don’t approve of
children in general.
Meanwhile, Sharyn swept out
of the flat to hurry back to frying
prawn shells for her noodles,
promising to be back later that
evening.
As the door closed behind her,
her piercing voice floated back: “No
need see doctor! I got medicine at
home!”
While Saffy and I went off to
the Coconut Club in Chinatown for
lunch, Amanda spent the better
part of the day holed up in the
bathroom, peering at her rash.
Every time she scratched, two
dots would join up to form a larger
bump.
“I can’t stop scratching!” she
WhatsApped Saffy.
“I’m going to turn my phone tosilent,” Saffy decided. “I need to
concentrate on this nasi lemak and
I can’t focus with her going on and
on about her rash. I just hope it’s
not contagious. Because that is
one ugly rash!”
“Shut up and just eat!” I told
her. “I think we need to order
another otak. Isn’t it just so good?”
“Amazing! But you can’t tell
Amanda I’m eating this, because
I’ve not told her that I’m no longer
vegetarian! She’ll kill me!”
Later that evening, true to her
word, Sharyn returned with her
maid in tow, lugging a big pot of
herbal soup that she swore had
cured three generations of skin
ailments in her family along withtopical creams and extra packets of
herbs from Eu Yan Sang.
“I specially pick these herbs
for you!” Sharyn said with pride.
“The Eu Yan Sang pharmacist try
to teach me, but I tell him to just
follow my instruction! Nah! Saffy,
you boil with two cup water and
then give her drink tree time a day.
Confirm by second day, all your rash
gone one!” she told Amanda. “But
hor, you cannot eat any more prawn
otherwise lagi scratch some more!”
By lunch the next day, Amanda’s
ugly red rash had faded to a pink
bloom, and by that evening, you
could barely see it.
“That woman is so wasted as
an accountant!” Saffy said. “She’d
make such a great doctor, don’t you
think?”
“And that Dr Sandra Lee would
be so out of a job!” Amanda
predicted.