Time and talk

"Dude, you'd better not anger me. I just need to make one wish and it will start raining!"

I often use this to threaten a friend of mine.

Works like a charm every time.

He plays cricket, you see. His matches are on sundays, and so every saturday night, he looks at the sky and does an anti-rain-dance in his head. In Singapore, the number of matches that get washed out outnumber those that are actually played.

In Singapore, everybody follows the rules. Including the rains. Firstly, I believe that Singapore is the only country where it faithfully rains every weekend. And it rains whenever I wear my white three-quarters or my favourite pair of jeans (it has an awesome butterfly embroidered in muted gold on the left thigh). I am seriously considering carrying a hair-dryer in my purse wherever I go. I remember this particular day when slant-rain caught me on my way to work on a Friday morning. My jeans were completely soaked in water by the time I reached office. Ever had the unpleasant experience of your wet clothes drying on your body? I felt so cold that I could not take it anymore. I had to stand under the hand-dryer in the toilet, bend my knees and lift one leg at a time under the stream of hot air.

Yes, I was vaguely aware that I looked like a peeing dog.

So today was a double-whammy. It is a saturday and I was wearing the same butterfly jeans. I walked into it myself, didn't I? I was getting late for a lunch meeting with a fellow blogger (she was gonna take me to this yummy aloo paratha place, which in all my 8 years here, I had not discovered) but the rain just wouldn't give up. It was the slanting kind of rain again, the kind that renders umbrellas absolutely useless.

As I hung around in the lobby of my block, waiting for the rain to tone down a bit, enough for me to get to the train station, I got really bored. So I started rolling up my jeans and making three-quarters out of them.

The cleaner of my block was standing there too. I recognised her because she's the only other person who's awake at the ungodly hour at which I leave for work. Once in a while, I'd also see her sitting on the steps, just staring into space.

I smiled at her. She smiled back.

"You live on level 6 ah?" She asked.

"Yeah." I said.

"With husband ah?"

"Uhhh.. no. With friends."

"Okay okay... you going out now?"

"Yeah... but the rain is too heavy."

"Yes yes this kind of rain... must wait."

"You waiting to go home?" I asked.

"No. I work here 8 years." She smiled.

I was a bit stumped at this sudden sharing of information. It took me a while to respond.

"8 years? That's a long time."

"Yes, very long time. For 8 years, I mop block 6 and block 14. I have to stay here until 4 o clock. Saturday and public holiday is half day. Sunday I don't work." She said.

I digested the information slowly.

"Hmmm... okay."

The rain was getting lighter, and I realised this was my chance. So I said bye to her, opened up my umbrella and started walking.

And as I always say, walking in the rain makes you think.

I was still wondering why she told me all that. Why would a complete stranger be interested in her work schedule and stuff?

And that's when I realised how bored she must be all these 8 years. She could only go home at 4, so after she had finished her work and before the clock struck 4, she had a lot to say, but no one to say it to.

Isn't it strange?

Some people have you, but they have no time to talk to you.

Others have time to talk to you, but they don't have you.