Dear Readers,
here is the aforehand promised essay. Here, theokwek explores the themes of nationality, identity, and studying music professionally in the story: THE IDENTITY CRISIS, as recently, theokwek and a close friend in music (see johnlee: a bro in music, right) have been thinking and discussing about studying music for a livin. do read this, in addition to the poem below about THE PIANIST.
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The Identity Crisis
"Welcome to Singapore, young man! Baggage collection is at conveyer belt 47, enjoy your stay here."
Shouldering his violin case and lugging his decade-old suitcase, he collected his British passport and breezed past the mechanical police officer, his small frame barely making a sound on the polished marble floor. His feet, encapsulated in worn leather shoes, glided past belt 47 – he had no check-in baggage to speak of, even after earning himself a degree overseas – and on towards the glass double doors that separated him from his home of six years ago. Those doors, transparent to a fault and decorated tastefully with stick-on floral patterns, seemed to him mildly hypocritical. A door between worlds.
He stepped through, nodding casually to the policeman who stood sternly beside the doors, carrying a machine-gun just as big as his violin case. Six years ago, he distinctly remembered not having seen this side of the Singapore Armed Forces. But then again, he had renounced this, together with his citizenship, for the sake of what some would have called a primitive chunk of wood that thudded heavily in its case upon his bony back.
A gust of humid air swept his face as he exited the airport. The humid atmosphere that rarely appeared at Guildhall flooded his lungs, enveloping his skin in a layer of aerated moisture. He looked around, summing up his surroundings tentatively in a subconscious glance as he would have done before any recital: -
Honking yellow, green, blue and silver cabs slid good-humouredly in and out of neatly aligned parking lots, nowhere near the blurred chaos of Britain's hectic traffic. Tour guides queued up beside tourists of every possible nationality, chauffeurs revved up their engines menacingly while waiting for clients, a businesswoman in her fifties marched past him, scolding her son over a mobile phone line in a smattering of Hokkien, Cantonese, English, Chinese and unprintable languages.
For a second, he was taken completely aback by the wave of unfamiliarity. The last time he'd been so lost, he was standing outside another airport, on the other side of the globe. After a stormy debate over his renunciation of citizenship and exemption from National Service six years ago, and much hype about this 'dedicated young musician' in newsstands across Singapore, he'd taken off from Changi with more fanfare then a visiting dignitary would have had, even hosting an impromptu recital at the departure lounge.
Upon arrival, though, he was hit by an in-the-face blanket of the grey smog and haze that permanently covered London's industrial-aviation sectors. Dragging his medium-sized khaki luggage over the cobblestones and bricks to catch a signature London-cab into the city centre, he felt like a small shrimp in the unfathomable ocean of creatures – here he did not have an identity, a name, a reputation.
His memories, once started on their path, could not stop. Floods of images came back from the fateful six years: his initial in the cramped hostel, practicing late into the night with his roommate; the grief he'd felt across oceans and continents as negative news about his sickly parents arrived in an email; his eventual acceptance into a small faction of the BBC performing group; the humble string quartet he'd established to scrape a name for himself in the arts scene, as well as to garner a few scraps of extra income; his rise through the ranks to lead the BBC Recording Orchestra; his hard-earned place as top scholar in the Guildhall School of performing arts; his being heralded in top tabloids as 'that talented Singaporean fiddler'…
And now, he reminded himself, returning suddenly to the present, he was back in his hometown, having left his position as a rising star in the arts world there in order to rediscover his roots right here. Yet nothing of the strange and puzzling sensation he felt upon stepping gingerly onto the smooth pavement outside could be associated with a feeling of joyful homecoming. He felt like, and inside he knew he was, a foreigner in his own land.
Was he British? No. Deep inside, he retained a love for bak kua, distaste for cold weather, a pining for durians, a soft spot for a home in an apartment block as opposed to a large, sprawling piece of land that was offered him by a wealthy fan. But was he Singaporean? No. For starters, his passport declared him a citizen of the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', his accent was different, his English was perfect, he was terribly inept at dialects, he could never stand anyone who spent hours gossiping at a void deck.
Standing there, his violin on his back and leaning ever so slightly on the handle of his luggage, missing dearly his life in Britain and lingering uncertainly at the threshold of a rojak society that happened to be his heritage, he suddenly realized that he didn’t know what to do.
Desperately, he searched his mind for any memories of life here before his tenure. His primary school – somewhere, he remembered vaguely, near the sea. His high school – was it something to do with the founder of Singapore, or was it another elite school set up by a Chinese towkay? His home, his siblings, where were they? A few years ago he'd received a cryptic email from his elder brother informing him of their shift in residence – but that was before his Yahoo! account was wiped out by a virus…
Fumbling, he slipped his violin-case expertly from his back and pulled at the zippers, his only wish to recreate that impromptu recital right at this spot six years ago before his departure. Maybe then he would remember those faces from long ago. Maybe then he would recall his friends, his family, his teachers, his schooling. Maybe then he could regain a slice of his identity.
Neglecting either to apply rosin or to affix his shoulder-rest to the instrument, he lifted it to his shoulder and drew an unsure, wavering chord. If he didn't have a name in the musical world, he might as well start making one. And he sincerely held on to the last straw of hope that his music would not be rejected in his own birthplace. What would he play? A tumult of churning emotions burned his heart. Something technical. Something profound.
Scherzo-Tarentalla by Wieniawski whisked out of his instrument, every demisemiquaver of it pitch-perfect and in rapid-fire succession. His fury, stress, fear, love, frustrations entered his fingers and in almost reflex movements, were transferred seamlessly into his music.
No crowd gathered to hear him play, though, as before long a heavily-armed, stone-faced member of the police force strode purposefully up to him and prodded him gently. His already fragile heart shattered at the words – his music, the darling closest to his heart – was rejected.
"No busking, boy."
