whimsical flights of fancy

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tissue uncle

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

About a year and a half ago, an elderly man with one and a half legs with crutches set port at one of the nooks at Raffles MRT underpass.

He sells tissue paper.

He started out pretty well - his hair was combed, his eyebrows short and neat. He sells his wares with a clear voice. "One dollar, one dollar, one dollar, one dollar... ..." His tissues go for 3 a dollar. From that day, I stopped buying my packets of economical tissues from Watsons and buy from him instead. Never mind that I only get 6 packets of tissue for $2 when Watsons has 16 packets for $1.99. Uncle's tissue paper are always 3-ply and of very good quality. Always 3-ply.

He has never shortchanged me.

In recent months however, I notice that his health and his speech has begun to decline. His hair uncombed, his eyebrows longer and untrimmed. So kesian, I tell you. He went from "One dollar, one dollar" to something like "WON de, WON de, WON de". And it seems like it's harder for him to speak properly. I think he forgot to say "one dollar" already. And sometimes, if it's one of his bad days, it doesn't even sound like "won de". It's some gibberish sound.

Sometimes, I see people giving him dirty looks, as if his chants for your stupid dollar in exchange for 3 packets of 3-ply tissues is an intrusion to your personal space. When I see these imbeciles, I always envision pushing them from the back and kicking their asses with my pointy heels.

There's a period early this year when Uncle went MIA for about 3 weeks. I kept a look-out for him every morning at his usual spot but he wasn't there. I thought he had probably kicked the bucket and I remembered feeling so depressed, like maybe I should have bought more tissue from him or something.

But he came back a few days later and I wanted to hug him because yay! Now I can buy tissues from him again. And I also developed a strange habit-giving him more than a dollar for 3 packets of tissue each time.

Once, Uncle wanted to go to the gents. So he left his tissues at the spot, reached for his crutches, and slowly pulled himself to the gents. I wanted to look after his tissue for him but I was late as it was and also cos I thought, a bit siao-siao, yes? Standing beside packets of tissue at 9.10 a.m in my office clothes. And knowing myself, I'd probably help him sell the tissues hurhur... Excuse me eh~ If I can sell ice to Eskimos, I can sell tissue papers to imbeciles cheyybah...

I have now amassed like, 10 tissue packets-some in my drawer in the office, and my bags at home have at least 2 packets of tissue each. I never run out of tissue, thanks to Uncle.

I think I will dread the day when I don't see the tissue Uncle there anymore.

Because seeing him and hearing him every morning gives me a sense of hope that things will get better.

the enigma was spotted at 13:13