2003-05-05 - 6:27 p.m.

Visit Alfian's Secret Wank Shed to read some of his writings that are available on the Internet

I have to admit, I am a big fan of Alfian Sa'at. Thus far, he had written and spoken about many things that a mere mortal (read: moral coward) like myself dared not write nor speak while I was still a Singaporean.

I have often encouraged my Singaporean friends to read the works of Alfian Sa'at. I sincerely think that what he had written is important and pertinent to them, especially if they are young and Malays. As far as I know, there are no other writers in Singapore who are vocal enough to voice out about the adversity faced by the Singaporean Malays.

Alfian often refuses to be regarded as a 'Malay writer' writing about 'Malay Issues'. It is understandable, as I think, Alfian would rather be considered as a mainstream Singaporean writer than simply a token Malay in Singapore's English literary scene.

Some of us in Kuala Lumpur were lucky enough to catch 'Causeway', a brilliant play by Alfian late last year. I really enjoyed the play and I certainly think that it was the best play in Malay I've watched in the last couple of years. Recently, I managed to catch up with Alfian and I even managed to get him to participate in an e-mail interview. Here are the answers that I managed to dig up from him:

NZ: I first saw your poem while riding on the MRT. It was ages ago, but I remembered that I felt rather intrigued. Not because of the poem, but because the writer is a Malay dude. So tell me Alfian, did your literary success come easily to you? I mean, let's face it, you were the darling of the Singaporean literary scene?

Alfian: I'm not sure if I can say that it came 'easily', as you've mentioned, although I was fortunate that my first collection of poetry, 'One Fierce Hour', received generally good reviews. In that sense I didn't have to publish a string of publications to find my way out of literary obscurity.

And I don't know if implicit in your question is the idea that I was more readily embraced because I represented a minority Malay voice, and it's a fact that the Malay contribution to the Singapore English literary scene has been small (offhand, I can think of the poet Mohd Haji Salleh, who was part of Edwin Thumboo's generation, now based in Malaysia, and this one novel called 'A Modern Boy' by a writer with the pen name Derek Mosman). Undoubtedly , I have entertained the idea that some of the recognition that I have received might come from a middle-class political correctness that's operating from a certain guilt--that Singapore literature is rather Chinese-dominated, and hence a concomitant need to recognise diversity.

But then that's giving Singaporeans too much credit. The majority's idea of their Chineseness is often a question of whether they are Chinese enough or less-than-Chinese-hence the supposed schism between the Chinese-educated and English educated Chinese, and the various kinds of angst this throws up-from accusations of becoming 'yellow bananas' to cultural cringes about being too 'cheena'. I don't see the majority really examining their Chineseness in relation to other races in Singapore; how it can possibly oppress, discriminate against and exclude those who are not Chinese.

NZ: So Alfian, have YOU always wanted to be a writer? Well, what are you waiting for? When did you first discover that you have a knack in writing?

Alfian: I think I had quite a firm idea that I loved writing-although I don't think I seriously entertained it as a vocation. I've known that writing was a calling since I was in Primary School-my favourite subject was English, especially composition. In Secondary School, I would often choose essay topics that involved creative fiction rather than what one termed 'argumentative' essays (this description, 'argumentative', also was not something that sat well with my pacifist nature-I often read it as 'cantankerous' rather than 'rhetorical'!).

Along the way, there were various validations-being selected for the Creative Arts Programme when I was in Secondary 3 (the only participant from my school who was not in the Gifted Education programme), getting mentored by the playwright Haresh Sharma, winning Best Script awards for school drama festivals when I was in Raffles Institution, Raffles Junior College and later NUS, and posting some of my poems on an NUS billboard and getting favourable feedback-the last eventually propelling me to compile a manuscript.

This was originally titled 'The Marooned Island', and later I changed its name to 'One Fierce Hour' (after a line in a poem by G. K. Chesterton), because a lot of people were uneasy with what they considered a logical aberration-one could be marooned on an island, but what the hell does an island that is itself marooned mean? In retrospect, I'm glad I changed the title, because although a lot of the poems were about Singapore, I didn't want the book to carry this notion like a crest on its sleeve.

As for what I have been waiting for, maybe the day that one can make a living as a full-time writer in Singapore. Admittedly, the market is small. And reading has not been

imprinted as an essential activity in the public mind, unlike other societies. Walk into any bookshop in Singapore and you'll find shelves of management, self-improvement and self-help books-a symptom where literature is still perceived to be something utilitarian, and not an end in itself.

NZ: You are trained as a doctor. How much has this affected your writing and in what ways?

Alfian: It's only provided a contrasting backdrop against which my writing becomes something more valuable to me. The medical profession is concerned with language that is exact, as a way of overcoming the fact that it is very much an inexact science, where human factors often confound statistical trends and deterministic outcomes. So writing, and poetry especially, has helped me to restore a sense of balance to what language can also be:

ambiguous, unpredictable, mysterious-and all this contributing not so much to chaos but richness.

NZ: Do you have a reason why you'd continue writing, when you can always make big bucks as a doctor. You have a mission, perhaps?

Alfian: I don't think I have a mission. The only thing I know is that if I don't write, I feel restless, vacant-I feel like an impostor in my own life. Writing is one of the means in which I hope to apprehend reality, and I feel it all the more urgently because I live in a country where narratives become displaced so easily-where the myth of orature is substituted by the myth of statistics, where alternative versions are amputated so that, paradoxically, a certain singular story can be made whole.

NZ: X'ho seems to mention your name quite often in his writings (especially in his book: "Attack of the S.M. Space Encroachers"). How do you get to know him? So, how is he like in person?

Alfian: X'ho picked up my first collection of poetry, 'One Fierce Hour' and it provided him with the assurance that his voice was not a lone one in the wilderness. It's lonely when you know that you have a very difficult relationship with the country and State, where you are convinced that dissent is an intrinsic component of democracy, while so many others might view you as a shit-stirrer or troublemaker. So, I think a lot of my writings reflected his own struggles, and established a sense of kinship. He came for one of my poetry readings, and we became friends.

He is a beautiful person, one of those people I know who does not wear his non-conformity as a badge. Visually he is striking-his tattoos, his Mohawk, and sometimes his thick-framed geezer spectacles-but what has always struck me is that he is not out to outrage and profane his surroundings but to tease out its capacity for generosity, and

compassion-in accepting difference.

NZ: If I'm not mistaken, he said that Chinese Singaporean like to gripe, but not Malay Singaporean, when of all people, they should be the ones to gripe. So what's your comment on this?

I can't comment on this, because X'ho is making a comment which involves a certain amount of self-criticism. He's making a specific claim which is contextually-bound because he is a Chinese person himself. And I don't want to detract from the importance of that kind of statement, by agreeing or disagreeing with it. There is too little of this perilous activity which I would call 'speaking up for others' in Singapore-be it by straights for non-straights, by the Chinese for non-Chinese, by the able-bodied for the disabled.

NZ: Alfian, I knew of a few Singaporean Malays who acknowledge openly that their own government mistrusts them. They argue that they are often treated like a second class citizen and made to look like potential terrorists in a Sinocentric community we call Singapore. Can you explain why?

Alfian: I think acknowledging it doesn't mean accepting the fact. There's a crucial difference that has to be maintained between the two. And I think it's important that people voice out these sentiments, because I think a lot of what is wrong with Singapore society lies in its capacity for denial. We've denied Singapore's indigenous history, denied our dialect roots, denied our over-dependence on State mechanisms. So, to openly acknowledge these things can only be a good thing, because it draws attention to a problem that does not register in public consciousness.

NZ: What about Malays who dissent. You, for example. Do you experience any kind of repression or pressure from the government? If I could recall, you once said it has been very difficult for you to live in Singapore nowadays? Why? Is the oppression or repression (if there is any) getting more noticeable and intense these days compared to many years ago?

Alfian: I've not experienced any form of pressure. Although I have to say that my second collection of poetry, 'A History of Amnesia', was not granted a Publishing Grant by the National Arts Council, for arcane bureaucratic reasons-but I suspect that it has to do with the mention of certain figures such as Chia Thye Poh, the political prisoner who was imprisoned by the PAP for 32 years, and Josef Ng, the performance artist. The National Arts Council has as one of its disreputations the high-handedness to proscribe performance art in Singapore, a knee-jerk response provoked by one of Ng's performance art pieces where he snipped his pubic hair (not in view of the audience) to protest against police entrapment of homosexual men. Due to the media-orchestrated public outcry this produced, the Arts Council decided that in future, all performance art in Singapore will not receive any funding, and furthermore, will only be given licenses upon the deposit of $10 000. For a long time, the Singapore art scene was haunted by this strange spectre of censorship where an art form, and not simply its contents, was under a de facto ban.

I find it difficult to live in Singapore not because of any overt State repression but because the indifference and apathy that I see around me is anathema to any kind of creative activity. There is almost no civil society here, there's widespread political disenfranchisement, and a tendency towards self-censorship, which goes beyond any theorisable 'Asian value' or 'culture of restraint' or 'pragmatic society'. I find it difficult to live in any place where the search for social agency is so difficult, and as history has shown via the gleefully litigious nature of the ruling party, so perilous.

NZ: You called yourself a Malayan. Why is it so and how do you define that?

I use the term liberally. There is an element of course of Tay Kheng Soon's (a prominent Singapore architect) own theories of this particular Malayan identity-of a breed of people who were inflecting their own immigrant nature against that of the South-East Asian backdrop. And who were deeply concerned with what cultural and national identity meant to them. Of course there is something quite admirable about Tay trying to resuscitate an incomplete historical project, but sometimes I wonder if he is not lensing it through nostalgia. The Malaya I have in mind, on the other hand, is a theoretical space which exists between the Singapore and Malaysia that we know of today. It is not formed merely through something as concrete as Re-merger, and hence has to be vigorously imagined. In this Malaya that I believe in, indigeneity and the immigrant condition are both given equal respect (some might argue that this is the case in Singapore, but this is false, of course, since in Singapore the concept of indigineity is violated simply through its non-recognition). I admit that it is a Malaya that is a Utopia, and is thus anchored in the future-and hence a different one from Tay's, which seeks inspiration from the past.

NZ: PM Goh called those who migrated from Singapore as quitters. I am proud to be a quitter. Are you going to be a quitter anytime soon, dear?

Alfian: I am not going to use these kinds of reductive labels, even subversively, as you yourself have. : ) Suffice to say that I have given myself the choice of leaving Singapore the moment I realise that my love for the country is irreconcilable with what it has become.

NZ: Can one be happy in Singapore. Are you happy living in Singapore?

Of course it's possible to be happy living in Singapore. If you're Chinese, middle-class, have the right political connections (such that in the army you can be given the position of a 'white horse', exempting you from the kinds of treatment dished out to thechildren of the hoi polloi, or that you can get into certain elite schools despite not making the academic cut), can afford a maid, have a car, a country club membership, Singapore is for you. Once in a while you can convince yourself that charity means sending a cheque to the Community Chest, and that poor people in Singapore bring it upon themselves because they're too lazy to take advantage of a flawlessly-oiled meritocratic system. With any luck, you could insulate yourself from the fact that donation isn't the same thing as volunteerism, and that most of Singapore's poor are actually daily-rated workers, who do more work in one day sweeping roads or shoveling dirt than you have ever done in your entire life. Your inter-racial interactions might include grunting a greeting to your Malay chauffeur or taking the change from the female Indian attendant operating the car park payment booth. And you'd be happy, if you equate ignorance with happiness.

I'm not truly happy of course, because as that multiple-choice-question option goes, I'm 'none of the above'.

NZ: So tell me, are you Singaporean Malays' poster boy, or their bad boy, as X'ho so aptly inquire: 'Skew Me, You Rebel Meh?'

Alfian: Neither. I don't represent any specific constituency, least of all the Malays. I am proud to be a Malay person, but this pride does not extend to delegating myself as their spokesperson. And I don't self-consciously don the kind of 'rebel' persona you've mentioned either. Although if 'rebel' means not apologising for my opinions, then 'rebel' it shall be.

NZ: Alfian, what was the general consensus of the Malays in Singapore regarding the "tudung" issue? And what's your sincere view regarding the "tudung" issue?

Alfian: I can't speak of a general consensus, really, because the debate was mostly dominated as a squaring off, a binary confrontation between the fathers who wanted their children to wear the tudung in school and the government. I think the media treated it as a 'sensitive' issue, to the point where views were not sought by our man/woman-on-the-street commentators. I think there were a few letters to the Forum pages, but predictably the Ministry of Education stepped in and started emphasising the importance of having a 'common space' in school. And for them a 'common space' is defined as one where individuals are not allowed to show signs of difference.

But the flaw in this explanation is that this so-called 'common space' is one that has been predetermined-by the majority. It's not as if all the constituents of this 'common space' participate equally in its formation. So this 'common space', as a friend of mine pointed out, is an already 'cultured space', where certain values are inscribed: secularism, the illusion of meritocracy, and the indoctrination of State propaganda through the study of National Education, a compulsory school subject. It's important to note also that the schools try to cultivate an environment that is as close to Singapore's ethnic demographic makeup as possible, which is why in 1987 there was a proposal to cap the number of Malay students in primary schools at 25% maximum, based on the completely unfounded reasoning that the formation of such ethnic cliques (or shall we use their lexicon and use the word 'ghettoes'?) results in academic underperformance.

Of course certain rarefied bubbles exist-as in the case of SAP schools, which consist of an almost 100% Chinese enrolment. These schools were a leftover from those that were built with resources by Chinese clan affiliations, and they represent a certain double standard when it comes to the government's rhetoric on multiculturalism in Singapore.

My own view is that the issue isn't so much about curbing the rise of Islamic fundamentalism or whatever; something the government has feared , exacerbated since PAS' capture of Terengganu in Malaysia. The main issue here is whether or not the government will back down under pressure from any acts of civil disobedience. And in a country where it's essential to maintain a meek and disempowered citizenry, this cannot be allowed to happen. A few fathers who try to challenge the monolithic state mechanism cannot be allowed to make any significant impact on civil society action and must be mown down systematically.

NZ: Am I imagining things, or the Malay MP's aren't doing anything to confront the issue by getting themselves in touch with their Malay constituents? They seemed to echo what the Big Brother wants them to do, instead of what the Malay community thinks of what they should actually do; to represent them as a community.

Alfian: This is not a new phenomenon. The general consensus I believe is that the Malay MP's are there to package the government's directives and make them more palatable for the Malay/Muslim constituent. There's hardly been any cases where they serve to actually lobby for Malay causes and rights. I think I won't discuss in detail the kinds of positions Singapore Malay MP's find themselves in, but you can find a very good chapter on this so called 'conflicting interest' between 'ethnic' (sectoral) and 'national' interests in Lily Zubaidah Rahim's book, 'The Singapore Dilemma'. I think what is very telling about the fact that the government sees the Malay/Muslim community as a problem community-- that needs to be contained and perhaps neutered--is that we have a Minsiter-in-Charge of Muslim Affairs, but not one for any of the other religions.

NZ: In Singapore, I grew up thinking that we Malays can never be rich and successful. Even the STPB brochure back in the 80's (dunno if they still do) stated that we Malays are mostly government servants, teachers and laborers. Like you, 'I had always felt that there was something wrong in being non-Chinese in Singapore'. Do you think the mindset of young Singaporean Malay somehow changed today?

Alfian: I think there's a generation more aware of their position in Singapore society. I received an email recently from a Malay Singaporean boy in his late teens who wrote about wanting to join the navy. If I'm not wrong, he told me that his father had served with the British Navy when Singapore was still a colony. Anyway he admitted that he's aware as a Malay Singaporean, getting into the military is going to be an uphill task. Because Malay loyalty has always been an issue with the Singapore Armed Forces-you don't find a single Malay airforce pilot in Singapore, for example. There was this line that really struck and saddened me, where this boy said said, 'I know what I feel for my country, but what I really want to know is what my country feels for me.'

NZ: How much of the Singapore history do you think had been manipulated to favor the Sino majority in Singapore? Can you cite examples?

Alfian: Haha. Well, I'm aware that it's been difficult to carry out archaeological excavations in Singapore. That for me reveals how much we think our pre-colonial history is of any value. Recently an article in the Straits Times came up that mentioned that the remains of a 'Royal City' was found at the Padang. It never mentioned that it was a 'Malay' Royal City. And among the objects unearthed, there's mention of Chinese porcelain, etc, and 'indigenous' stoneware and earthenware. There's such reticence to recognise that 'indigenous' in Singapore is really equivalent to 'Malay'.

NZ: Are you free to say whatever you wish to say in Singapore, or do you have fears of kena sue one of these days?

Alfian I also don't know lah. All I know is that to import that kind of fear into my life will just destroy my writing. Nothing contaminates the writer's task more than self-censorship.

NZ: Tell us more about your work entitled: 'A History of Amnesia'. Whose history are you talking about?

Alfian: Singapore's. But I'm talking about a history you won't find in Lee Kuan Yew's memoirs.

NZ: I really love your play, "Causeway". Who commissioned you the play and where did you get all the ideas to write the play?

Alfian: It was commissioned by the National Arts Council for the Singapore Arts Festival in 2002. Many of the ideas were thrown up when we did our devising sessions with the director, Alin Mosbit, and the cast. : )

NZ: You received a scathing review of "Causeway" in ST (Straits Time) Life. Yet, in Malaysia, it seemed that you are getting rave reviews for the play. How come, lah? Are we seeing a Jerry Lewis Syndrome here?

Alfian: Aiyah. Reviews are like that lah. I'm not going to gripe or whine about not being recognised in home country, etc. Very tak malu. But there were some positive reviews of

'Causeway' as well, most notably in the English newspaper TODAY and the Malay newspaper Berita Harian.

NZ: The writer, who wrote Causeway's review personally attacked you and perhaps your work too. You defended yourself and called her 'the kind of vermin all journalists inevitably turn into'. Was it necessary to respond to her attack? Looking back at it now, do you reckon there are better ways of responding to it?

Alfian: I just have this major problem with journalists. Especially if they write for the Straits Times. I don't know how to deal with the notion that they're the nicest creatures when you meet them in person, but in their articles it's all claws. I'm aware that sometimes it's editorial interventions at work, but at the same time I can't help but be disturbed at journalists maintaining this duplicitous front. I think it was more an attack on journalists in general than on her. Hmmm.

NZ: Alfian, can you tell us about your play that you co-directed and co-wrote with Jeff Chan, "sex.violence.blood.gore". How much has August Strindberg's "A Dream Play" inspired the play?

Alfian: I didn't direct lah. I can't direct to save my life. It's Jeff Chen, by the way, the name of the director, in my opinion one of Singapore's most radical and avant-garde directors. Actually Strindberg's play was the starting point for 'Asian Boys Vol. 1'.

"sex.violence.blood.gore" was something I co-wrote with the playwright Chong Tze Chien. He wrote 2 scenes, I wrote 5, and Jeff edited them for the stage. Somehow it all came together in the end, despite scenes ranging from dream sequences to an expedition to the North Pole to the life story of virgin porn star Annabel Lee.

NZ: Now, what about "Asian Boys Vol. 1"? What a gorgeous title for a play? Were there problems faced in staging the play?

Alfian: None. By the way I came up for the title while clubbing with Jeff. We wanted to call it 'The Dream Play', after Strindberg's 'A Dream Play', but Jeff thought that it lacked punch. So he came up with all these raunchy suggestions, like 'Cock Show' and 'Dick Flick'. I was pretty aghast (my name will be on the play!) so I faster faster suggested 'Asian Boys Vol. 1'.

NZ: Why wasn't the play banned, when "Talaq", a play about violence in an Indian Muslim marriage, was banned in Singapore on the ground it would offend religious sensitivities? So, is this an indication that Singapore is trying to be slightly open with gay-related issues?

Alfian: Well, you have to realise that there's a hierarchy of censorship in Singapore. At the top of the list is politics. If you want to put up a play where someone acts as Lee Kuan Yew, might as well just swallow a bottle of sleeping pills and don't wake up in the morning. Second would be religion. And then race. A distant fourth is sex. The hierarchy is established based on potential electoral constituents-the government won't allow anything that might potentially upset any significant religious or racial lobby.

NZ: But seriously, I don't think plays like this can ever be staged in Malaysia. Like, I could probably create a similar play in Malay with tons of scrumptious gay in-jokes. But of course lah, you know what will happen next? So how?

Come back to Singapore lah! Haha.

(NZ: By the way, recently there was a 'gay themed' theatrical production played to a full house in the Actors Studio, KL, called 'Angels'. The play was conducted in Chinese [Mandarin and in Hakka]. And interestingly enough, the play opens right in the middle of a gay cruising park).

NZ: PM Goh hopes to make Singapore a fun place, a bit of a bohemia. So what has he done so far, in your opinion, to make sure that this is not just another lip-service by him?

Alfian: He's gone on to make statements like 'In Singapore, we take our fun seriously.' I didn't know whether to be relieved or scared when I first heard that?

NZ: So, which one comes first, the name 'Pasar Telok Ayer' or 'Lau Pa Sat'?

Alfian: This one I haven't done my research on, so I really can't comment. But really, I think the name's just there on a signboard and a map. If enough people insist to refer to it as 'Pasar Telok Ayer' then this particular name won't be extinct down generations to come.

NZ: $ingapore or Singabore?

Alfian: Both lah.

NZ: Manglish or Singlish, which one is sexier?

Anything hybrid is sexy. By the way, did I tell you I've got blood in me ranging from Javanese, Hakka Chinese, Negri Sembilan Minang and Riau islander?

(NZ: hahahah! Very funny one!)

NZ Lastly Alfian, which one is fun, a life as a doctor or a writer and why?

Alfian: Both lah. How to choose. Like Chekov has said, one's his wife and the other's his mistress. But I guess my problem is I don't which is which yet!

* Suggest a column/blog topic

Oleh Nizam Zakaria

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