R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

Quiet dignity, and screaming it.
(Image truncated to fit. All rights reserved by and all credits go to Paramount Pictures and MTV. For full image and other information about this lovely movie, please visit go here. No sues me please. T_T)



It's the name of a song.

Ragged memories of a video of a rendition too long ago involve retro-istical nasal voices, heavily made up African-American women, and too many sequins. Ahh, the sequins! Make them stop! Make them sto-

Vivid stuff. In a brilliant application of linguistic devices I have just thought of while sipping tea, my thoughts on the stuff may be summarized as "Earn or Burn". Everybody knows or has known at least one piece of shit who thinks he's gods' gift to insertfieldhere, and a majority have probably entertained very satisfying images of said person shaved bald and dangled over a slow fire.

In a world of punk kids who think they're tough shit, and condescending ugly people who think I'm a punk kid, I haven't found a whole lot worth respecting. One half of the parents is an obnoxious source of many a belief I was adopted, the majority of the teachers I was inflicted upon were overbearing and slimy in their illusions of grandeur, and let's not get started about my many run-ins with incompetent policemen who think their uniforms give them the moral high ground to talk down to you from. Except the ones who arrested me, of course. They did a good job, there, but that's another story altogether. It is my personal belief that up to half the population of the generic figures-of-authority have no business being there but hey, I'm uneducated, what do I know?

Suffice to say that, as I psyched the self to gear for an interview of sorts with one of the few (fine, the only) replies to my many solicitations for consideration to give me money, I was gearing more to sell what I had (thinkth thou no evil thoughts), than to actually learn anything.

Mr Ancob (if you haven't yet figured out no real names are used here where possible, then, um...figure it out) described himself as "...an European man with grey hair. Easy enough to spot.", over the phone. And so he was, so he was. I had no trouble whatsoever identifying him upon reaching the stipulated place. Alas and alack, what had we here? Engaged, was he, in interview-al conversation with a distinguished Indian gentleman, immaculately garbed in the white-collar standard of shirt and pants, presenting a stack of documents much thicker than the few sheets I had. Hong gan liao, I think to the self. There goes the job, and so much for the afterglow (no hidden reference, I just thought it sounded nice. Yes I know it's the name of a song and yes I know the song itself. What is it with my sudden love of bracketed text? Beats me.).

So I find a seat behind them, and scratch at the writing samples I had brought, inking out typos I would swear weren't there before that added nicely to my confidence right then. After two years or so, Uneducated@Chair time, they finish, and Mr Ancob sees me for the first time.

"Oh! Are you..."

I affirmed that I was, indeed, his four o'clock.

"Gosh, I hadn't realized the time! I hope you haven't been waiting long. What time is it now any...", he trails off, fumbling in a pocket for a timing device.

I reassure him that it hadn't been at all long (actual-time wise), and that I was actually somewhat early.

"Ah, so you're early! Very good!", he exclaims, making me feel for all the world like the kid who spelled C-A-T right. There was just something in his demeanour, something about the way he weighted his words, that left no doubt as to his genuine pleasure. He excused himself to retrieve my Resume and such which he'd left in the office, and spying the Marlboro Lights he held in one hand together with some documents, I surmised it would be acceptable to consume my own last stick in the wait.

Bemusedly, alternating thoughts of doom and hope, I take very same seat the Indian gentleman vacated, gestured over by Mr Ancob before his departure. It was, disturbingly, still warm. Spreading yesterday's papers before me, I proceeded to finish said cigarrette over a few articles. Worth mentioning here is the mosquito I expertly laid the smackdown on as it hovered hesitant, looking for an opening. Examining the tiny corpse with disgust, I noted the distinctive black and white stripes of Aedes Triseriatus, and entertained brief thoughts of dengue fever before letting it flutter gently to the ground, "It Couldn't Happen To Me." mental defense firmly in place. Thank gods I never intend to visit prostitutes.

He returns soon after the murderous deed, and as I hurriedly put away the paper, comments on recent news are exchanged. At some point of the wildly digressing conversation, we return to the matter at hand: The evaluation of the possibility that I would be working for him. I whip out the plastic file, suddenly unsure as to what I should hand him. I had four choices, and all of them seemed suddenly inadequate.

Indeed, such was true. Going over my work with a pen, I was frankly at a loss about what to feel as he began marking my document. "You don't mind if I mark this, do you?", he checks with me, having already underlined some underlines and circled some circles. Not at all minding, and not about to disagree, were those papers what I would be consuming for dinner, I hurriedly gesture my immense non-mindedness towards it, the long-regressed student in me already shoving innate mild Writer's Affront aside. Mr Ancob began to set himself to the task with a will, and I was increasingly drawn into the spontaneous lesson.

He decides, a quarter through the document, that it was entirely too ornate, and asks for another. Shrinking a little, I proceed to offer another by-this-time even more inadequate one. The process begins anew, and we plow through this one. Mr Ancob continues to point out where exactly the document is lacking, and positively coos over sentences he denotes as "Bee-YOO-Ti-Ful! I knew you could do it!", complete with sideways elbow nudge (which, in a bit of awkwardness, missed). Meh, if school had been this good, it might just be me on trial for racist comments unbecoming of a PSC scholar.

Wow.

We then speak more at length about my possible employment, and Mr Ancob, half-in-jest, says I should be paying him for the lesson, and proceeds to relate how his father used to take on apprentices, who in an archaic system of Respect, would pay him to work for him. Rather than any form of outrage however, I fully agreed! In less than an hour, the weight of what I'd learned from Mr Ancob about writing professionally was worth its weight in gold. Seeing as how it, um, weighed nothing, let me just rephrase that as "A lot of money". Which in all seriousness, I would have paid.

Let's take a moment here to relate the one other interview I landed, some time back. It was a new startup, with the intent of publishing and distributing a magazine similar in concept to the free distribution of Juice, I-S and GameAxis, but of course with different content. I'd sent my resume in, and that was about it. I receive a call with a request for an interview, and was only too happy to acquiesce.

I turn up. The Editor interviewing me directs me to a table, whereupon she thrusts a stack of forms upon me to fill out, three-quarters of which were requests for information already provided in my resume. We speak briefly thereafter, corporate-assessment questions asked and answered. I am thanked and shown to the door, never to hear from them again. No, I am not bitter. That, really, was about it.

Mr Ancob then continues to tell me how he used to set potential employees to a -test article- of sorts, and how he would call some of them up after days, and discover they hadn't done it because they'd found another job. Pfft, Singaporeans. To prevent my head from falling off should I start nodding, I voice my agreement. We talk again at length about everything and nothing in particular before we shake on it and part ways. His last words at that meeting were that...he liked my pants. I leave the premises, feeling something entirely foreign through disuse, which I later am able to identify as Respect, pure and simple. Oh, and with a vague afterimage of nostril hair. Don't ask.


Appreciating for the first time how difficult an informative yet elegantly simple, short article was to write the following day, it was with much relief that I sent off the finished work to Mr Ancob. I receive two replies when I next check my mail, one confirming my selection for the assignment, with brief details, and another succinct one from Mr Ancob with a sentence I stared at for a bit. Quite a bit.

"I visited tehuneducated and I thought it made the test a waste of your time."

Hopefully, Mr Ancob doesn't mind me quoting him. And, I don't know, having what matters to you (in my case, Writing) validated from someone you respect just feels...pretty damned good.

He reminds me, Mr Ancob does, of my Junior College home tutor, Mr Lawrence. Except Mr Lawrence has the fuck-off biggest beard you're likely to see in Singapore off a Sikh. Had anyone else been my home tutor, it is entirely likely that I would have turned out less...eloquent. Not that I'm being a credit to him, with the results I got. But hey, an A in Literature for knowing roughly half the syllabus, with the other half compensated for with eloquent bullshit, isn't too bad, I think. Ah, the days.

" 'Sir' is a term of respect. You will have that respect until you abuse it." Though rather different from my personal views on the R.E.S.P.E.C.T, Coach Carter has a beautiful line there with regard to the term of address. It is a term of address I use for people who have earned mine (and just forget the sorry excuses for Officers I was required to use it on in the Army, alright?). Lovely, lovely film. The movie is an inspiring story about basketball, and more importantly, about Respect. Watch it.

Though I leave out quite a few names, here, seeing as they are who I have talked about in this title-themed entry...

Mr Lawrence, Mr Ancob, thank you, sirs.




P/S: Yes, did a bit of nip and tuck on the layout and such. Let me know if this is better. Also, I figured it was sickening to prelude something while the sequel lies snug in procrastination, hence the title changes. About a Girl, should I ever continue it, probably will have to be more...circumspect. Not something I'd like to incorporate into a piece, no.