Five fabulous days...

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday...sniff sniff Thursday came too soon 

Was it only a month ago that Margo and I flew off to Hong Kong to visit Camille and Viboy for much needed r and r? How time flies when you're having fun... Lots of talk, lots of eating, shopping and of course, more talk. I even forgot I was sick! And then all of a sudden, along comes Camille to Singapore to replicate that same five day experience. She landed Sunday and left Thursday, and I managed to see her everyday. (Yes, CelesteF and Margo and maybe Scho got to see her more, but hey, this is not a competition!) Sunday, grand welcome Japanese Barbecue dinner at Kazu--yumyumyum...Monday the Samsons hosted, serving up a lovely mushroom soup with chorizo garnish, osso buco and not just one but two desserts, the mere memory of which makes my mouth water. (Lemon torte! Lemon torte!). Tuesday, coffee and Elvis cupcakes with Leanne, Margo and CelesteS at Toast. Wednesday, lunch at Project Brothers AND dinner at S. Maharani, plus coffee and dessert at Prego. And on her last day, just hours before Camille had to board the plane, we celebrated CelesteF's birthday with Peking Duck and dimsum at the Raffles Hotel. For LUNCH! On a WEEKDAY!
Oh my goodness. Way too much eating, but hey, it was fabulous fun as it always is.

Camille brings out the best in all of us, in the same easy way that she brings us all together. She is light and sweetness, good humour laced with a wise, tacit understanding. Why oh why did she have to move away? Come back soon, dearie. We have to do that again...and again...and again. And next time, bring Viboy! We need more people here who live on our planet. Love ya girl--muwah!

Now what am I going to do? I guess it's back to the diet and exercise journal...

What would you do, if you weren't ...

doing what you're doing?

1. I frequently think I should have gone to med school. I'd be a gynecologist with a specialty in internal medicine. I felt that particularly strongly after reading Natalie Angier. Consider that western medicine is based solely on the male body!

2. I'd be a lounge singer cabaret-style--like Andrea Marcovicci.

3. I'd be a la leche league consultant. Really think I'd be good at that.

4. I'd be a headhunter. Goodness knows I've done it enough--might as well get paid for it.

5. Teach lamazze.

Two Cents On Hollywood Goss

Read over breakfast this morning that Jennifer Aniston is officially seeing Vince Vaughn.

Vince Vaughn??!! Vince Vaughn?!?!

After Brad Pitt? I mean, he's amusing and all, and certainly a er large hunk of a man. But there doesn't seem to be much else there, I'm sorry to say. I mean, we're not even close to the writer-director comic, sardonic psyche of a Ben Stiller or an Owen Wilson--two guys who will fool around in flicks like Starsky and Hutch and Zoolander, but it will be crystal-clear that both are, together and individually, capable of so much more. Vince Vaughn? This is clearly a rebound thing, yes? I agree, Brad Pitt is such a tough act to follow that virtually anyone would pale in comparison. But Aniston should set aside her momentary attractions and her temporary loneliness, and consider the possibilities of teaming up with someone who will do something substantial for her and her public spin. She made great strides with that Vanity Fair cover and interview. She should be content to stay solo for awhile. There is much dignity in solo.

Ultimately, she needs a romantic alliance that is creative and stimulating. The kind of connection that will give people a buzz that surpasses physical. After all, she has a career to focus upon--Friends is long gone. What about someone like Viggo Mortenson--okay, yes, he's married so that poses a problem. But someone with smarts, talent, and quiet assurance. Someone whose looks are evident but not over obviously so. Off the top of my head? I'm thinking Steve Martin. So he's a bit older, but no older than Harrison Ford is for Calista Flockhart. What about George Clooney? You just know he'd go for her--but this would be a two to three year, non-marriage thing. Or why not a brilliant character actor? Someone like Philip Seymour Hoffman if she's so into girth? Hear he's done wonderful work in the new Truman Capote bioepic.

Someone. Not just anyone. Think about it, Jen, please. Let's talk more next time we have lunch...

A Tale Of The Unexpected

The view from Caroline's 

Ordinarily, I'm like a book I've already read--even to myself. I spend a day in Paris; of course, I take the Eiffel Tower photo. I resolve to start exercising and start eating right, and I slip into a bad binge by the third day. I'm asked to do a single on Lindt chocolate; is it any wonder that I succumb to a square or two or three? I am a rerun. I am an old movie after primetime. I've been there, done that and am doing it again.

It's time to try something different. On today's work incident--the second one of the week, I should go with my gut. Push to the extreme. Stick out my neck. It's time to surprise myself and do the unexpected ... not just pretend to. Act deliberately, decisively and have no regrets. It's the only way to go, really.

No more vintage Noelle. It's time to try a new twist on a different melody. And if we don't know the refrain, we'll make it up. After all, anyone can write a new song. The question is can we keep it on the airwaves?

And we keep wanting more

Thrown for a loop 

That's just how it goes. Have to keep making those lists. Have to keep jotting things down. Have to keep finding room in the day, in the week, in the month, for all the things I want to do. And let's not forget the free time I want to have to just sit and think, hmmmm, yes, I
want that too.

Meanwhile absorbed in the third chapter of Russell Shorto's The Island At The Centre of The World: The Untold Story of the Founding Of New York. It's just so gripping, like you're living in the story. And really happy about my new Tiger food container; what a way I've come from my third grade tupperware fwoop containing cold rice and equally cold fried chicken. Today, lunch was a pint of steaming hot corn and mushroom soup and a large slice of sourdough granary bread. Missed badminton today in exchange for two episodes from the 6th season of The West Wing; tried to make up with 50 minutes on the elliptical.

The first day. Yes, that went well enough. Got thrown for a major loop though. It's something unexpected and potentially jarring. I'm still trying to decide whether to get upset or majorly apprehensive. Remember serenity. Breathe, breathe, breathe...

Let's see what will happen first before flying off the handle. Just be like Kaylee and Coby: take it easy, day by day and find lots of reasons to laugh. Remember the way Kaylee starts every prayer when it's her turn: "Thank you for this day, and all the fun we had..."

Which is as it should be.

Once more into the fray

As I start another chapter, help me learn serenity 

On Monday morning, it's back to work. Back to the old company, but it's not the old job. I've always believed that the ability to do a certain thing, even to do it well does not make doing it an imperative. When I resigned from my position as Senior Copywriter at McCann-Erickson in 1996, this was my guiding principle. And yet, here I am about to embark upon similar territory, led as it were by happenstance. And I'm not unhappy. I am quite the opposite, yet puzzled as to why.

Perhaps it is the creativity of it or the challenge of persuading people that this is the way they should take, not that. Maybe it is the potential satisfaction of being able to point to profit that I was responsible for. I'm not sure. At the moment, all I know is that I am a different person now from the person I was a decade ago. I am a writer. I am a mother. And I am more flexible and so much better able to see the big picture now than I ever used to be. I'm taking a deep breath and hoping to master a skill I have only recently begun to learn: serenity.

And so it starts.

Things I do

I direct my kids in trick shots 

1. I never buy wrapping paper. Instead, I buy plain brown packaging paper, wrap my gifts in them and have Kaylee or Coby "decorate." Sometimes, if I have a small-enough gift, I will wrap it up in a colourful page from an old magazine.

2. I watch too much tv. These days, it's reruns of old sitcoms like Frasier and Cheers.

3. My gifts to children, as well as to adults, are usually books.

4. I keep in touch with old employers on the theory that...you never know.

5. I take naps.

6. I can't go a day without opening all my email.

7. I sing to myself. Karaoke, acapella, in cabs, while working. You name it, I sing it.

8. I like to ask people what their average day is like, from the moment they get up to the moment that they go to sleep.

9. I spend a lot of time writing about how I never write.

10. I direct my kids in skits, videos and photographs.

Sick

What's not to love? 


When you're home in bed with a temperature of 40 degrees and a pounding headache, alternately sweating and chilling in a fitful, restless sleep, just a glimpse of these faces is enough to make you feel a little better--even if that glimpse is only from a distance.

Writing friends

me and Caroline 

The only overseas trip I had to take for my last job was a quick turnaround junket to Paris to interview the architects of the new Louis Vuitton flagship store on Champs-Elysees. I flew Business Class on Singapore Airlines, landed in Paris at dawn, was met by a car and chauffered to my hotel, Hotel D'Aubusson on Rue Dauphine off Pont Nuef, just in time to shower, get dressed and make my way to the press conference at the LV architecture department headquarters. I would be free in the afternoon but would need to fly back at ten the next morning, ergo the need to fly Business Class.

Still, I was happy for even one day in Paris, and it was the perfect time to meet my friend Caroline Cheng, face to face for the first time. Margo introduced me to Caroline via email, saying, "She's a writer, too." And on and off, Caroline and I have kept up a nice correspondence, mostly discussing how we're not writing, because the duties of motherhood and the details of living often get in the way. Married to Frenchman, she has a lovely pair of five year old twins, and lives just off the Rue Montaigne in a marvelous flat with a magnificent view of both the Eiffel Tower and the River Siene. Although Caroline and her family fly to Manila every year, we had never had a chance to catch up there, so when this trip materialised, I knew it was my chance.

After lunch with LV principal from Shanghai who gave me a complex because apart from English and Mandarin, she could speak French like nobody's business, I popped into H&M for a bit of shopping, then took the Metro to Alma Marceau, right in the heart of Caroline's glamorous neighborhood. I climbed the steps to her fourth floor flat, met both her children and her husband and what can I say? We were like old friends instead of new, effortlessly picking up the threads of conversation that we had only just begun, right smack in the middle. We were kindred--able to talk about everything, all the while telling jokes and making snappy comebacks as though we had been doing it for years. Her delightful husband, Eric shooed us out of the house to have our dinner and continue the tete-a-tete at a nearby bistro, which turned out to be Bar des Theatres on Avenue Montaigne. Caroline turned to me conspiratorially, saying, "We're eating where Gwyneth Paltrow likes to eat," knowing instinctively that this little factoid would thrill me. Sure enough, I was buzzed to read US Vogue October and find that indeed, the Gywneth interview took place right there.

The hours we spent over dinner and wine and dessert and coffee were among the most pleasurable I'd spent in a long time. We talked about (what else but) writing, raising children, and the challenge of combining both. We talked about our childhoods, the way were raised, mutual friends, all the while discovering our shared loves, dreams and ambitions. When it was over, she walked me to the Metro, and we hugged, giggly and hilariously close to tears, knowing full well we both had no idea when we might see each other again but ever certain of the authenticity of our friendship.

These days, when I'm faced with the blank screen or a new page in my writing notebook, I think of Caroline, who may be doing the same...across the ocean, another writer in residence.

If you can't take the heat....

...don't play with the boys.

You have to learn to take it. Or at least, learn to give back as good as you get.
They trash-talk, you trash talk. Stop labouring under the severely mistaken notion that these people are your friends.

Just play the game. Play it as hard and as well as you can.
Don't be nicey-nicey. This isn't a gradeshool playground.
And when the nasties strike, detach. Shake it off, and focus.
Don't lose your temper. Don't throw your racket. Don't cry.
Stop being such a girl.

Just play the game.
Or stay out of the kitchen.

On the complexity of friendships with women

From the age of six, I have been mystified by female friendships and it seems that in my life, it's become a pattern for me to be hurt by them, even as I am determined to find and reap their rewards that are exhilerating, yes, but frustratingly few and far between. My bewilderment perserveres to this very day, even though I do continue to have them, and try to nurture and seek nourishment from them. I must admit, however, there are times I feel a very real impulse to give the whole business up all together as simply being too difficult--like losing weight or reorganising home files or getting rid of household clutter for good. (Right now it occurs to me that those three things I mention are easily accomplished by every other woman, so perhaps, I'm just not built that way?).

It always seemed to me that where friendships among women are concerned, there is unwritten handbook containing a system of rules that are not reasonable, sensible, or consistent within the context of what authentic friendship means. That handbook seems to have been encoded into all women at birth, yet mine seems to have some sort of virus. My access to it has apparently been blocked.

Why is it that you can't be completely honest with a good woman friend? Why is it, in fact that you shouldn't be? Why is it that you can't talk about anything and everything with her without a judgement being made or a mind being made up? Can friendship among women be totally and utterly devoid of even the smallest measures of envy, insecurity, and competition? While I found that it can happen, it does only once in the very bluest of moons. And it is, by no means, permanent. Why is it that a friendship with one woman affects your friendships with other women? Why can't each friendship stand separate and alone? Why do women seem to want to foster exclusivity such that some are left out and some are kept in? Why does there seem to be an unwillingness on the part of many women to share their friendships and to be inclusive? Is it perhaps because one of the highlights of friendship for women is talking about other women?

Growing up, I was often made miserable by my friendships with women. I would happily make a connection with someone and enjoy that energy of shared interests and views, only to be unceremoniously ditched the very next day for another somebody, for no reason that I could fathom. I vividly recall trying to reason with them, "Why can't we all be friends together?" It was apparently impossible; in friendships in a child's world, there is that inclination to have it be all or nothing, with no room for anything in between. In the all girls' highschool I attended, there were two modes of friendship--the barkada--where you were one in a gaggle of girls all of whom you were equally close to or rather equally distant to. Or you had the one best friend. Or, if you were lucky, you had the one best friend and you both belonged to the same gaggle. Due in part to my short attention span and to my being hard of hearing, I was inclined to have one-on-one friendships...and had through highschool, the proverbial best friend friendship--which was not without its ups and downs. Any connections I would make with other people would be have to be defined to my best friend as not being as true, valuable or essential as my connection with her.

I still have absolutely no clue why one friendship works and one doesn't. I know that some people get along better with some than with others, but I also know that some people choose their friends for reasons other that person's ability to be a good friend. It doesn't matter to me who my friends are friends with. And while my natural preference would be to be friends with everyone, especially my friends' friends, I am beginning to accept (though I don't understand) that can't always be the case. I am starting to suspect, too, that there have been times that my friendship has been sought for things that I represent or for things I am believed to have, rather than things I actually am. And when things begin to unravel or fall short of expectations, it is perhaps because the base of the friendship was flawed to begin with.

Despite my best intentions to the contrary, it does appear that my friendships with women have lives of their own. They wield a power that goes far beyond what I want or intend; in fact, it may even contradict what I want and intend. Can a woman sincerely wish for her friend and want for her, all the very best things in life, without having that wish take anything away the person she herself is in the world...as a woman? This has been for me and continues to be a lifelong mystery.

What I have found is that if you keep it close, but not gut-wrenching, flesh and blood close, the course of your female friendships can be smooth. But don't cross the protective lines. As one of my male friends said to me, "Very few women can have the kind of all-out 100 percent friendship you want to have."

Unless you can do as Merlin instructed Arthur to do in the Lerner and Loewe musical, Camelot:

How to handle a woman? There's a way said the wise old man. A way known by every woman, since the whole rigmarole began. Do I flatter her, I begged him answer. Do I threaten or cajole or plead? Do I brood or play the game, romancer, said he smiling "No indeed." How to handle a woman? Mark me well, I will tell you so. The way to handle a woman, is to love her. Simply love her. Merely love her. Love her. Just love her."

And if you can't do that? I guess you move on, and keep searching for a girl after your own heart.

The corporate exit phenomenon

You've turned in your resignation letter. You're ready for a brand new start. And then, your supervisor asks you, as a personal favor, to stay on for a specified period of time. It could be two more weeks. It could be two more months. Part of you may be thinking, what the hell. You may be thinking, why burn bridges? Who will it hurt if you stay longer, anyway? Clearly, you are not aware of the corporate exit phenomenon.

This is the dynamic.

Stay longer, and you will only be hurting yourself in the long run. More time at this job (one that you've already decided you don't want!) means more possibilities for you to screw up in some way. And even though you mean to continue doing your best, the psychic effect of knowing that you'll be leaving eventually could well work against you, causing you to be careless even though you never intended to be.

Stay longer and you will see that the psychic effect of knowing you are leaving is also affecting your colleagues. Unconsciously, they will treat you as though you are no longer there. Or worse, they may resent you're eventual departure and try to offset this by getting you to do last favors for them.

Stay longer and your own supervisor will very likely try to pile things on upon you, holding you to your promise of work at the highest level, squeezing you of every last drop of work you can muster, all because he or she can.

Stay longer, and by the end of that specified extension period, you may find yourself liking everyone just a little bit less. They may well be liking you less, too. You will have expended whatever goodwill you might have enjoyed had you left shortly after tendering. It is also likely that the whole experience will leave a bad taste in your mouth. And rather than have pleasant memories of the good times you had, the entire time will be coloured negatively by that final period of finishing things off.

At all costs, avoid the corporate exit phenomenon. Make a clean break. Do yourself a favor. Take your leave...and just leave. Not only is it the best thing to do, it's the right thing to do.

Trip of the moment

While I've always loved strong female vocals, recently my preferences have taken a rather odd turn. It started maybe a month ago when I walked into That CD Shop in Great World City. A woman with a voice as sweet as honey and English lightly accented, sang The Bee Gees'"Staying Alive" to the mildest of bossa nova beats. I know that description can hardly be appealing, but the reality of it drew me to the salesgirl to ask what was playing. She told me about Eldissa--three Brazilian lasses who did covers as well as a couple of their own tunes. When I asked her to play more, she fast-forwarded to Irene Cara's "Fame", Anita Ward's "Ring My Bell", Lipps' "Funky Town", Abba's "Gimme,Gimme,Gimme", Michael Jackson's "Rock With You", The Village Poeple's "Go West" And Barry Manilow's "Could It Be Magic", among others. Baduy na kung baduy. And yet it isn't. In fact, it's pretty cool, actually. Listening to Eldissa is like experiencing a series of emotional epiphanies about long ago times, for these are old songs sung like new. Who could have ever imagined that "Go West" could sound so cool?

And then, while browsing at a Hong Kong bookstore, I noted the soundtrack and inquired what it was. A Japanese femme named Noon was singing Frank Sinatra, strong vocals and again, an accent that was startlingly, impossibly attractive. What's up with that? Noon is kitschy cool. When I got back to Singapore, I dropped by Gramophone and picked up Noon's Better Than Anything. Now I'm addicted to that cosmopolitan Tokyo air in "Moon River", "One Note Samba", "It Had To Be You", "Call Me", "Danke Schoen" and others.

There's a whole lot of Diana Kralling going on; and everything is starting to sound alike to me. How marvelous that there are these voices from other worlds, singing the standards in extraordinary ways and giving the old songs their own inimitable flavour. I am so tripping.