(Shibuya, Tokyo) In our commoditized society, what is the price of friendship?
X: What do you think of Y?
Me: Sometimes I worry that Y only cares for people insofar as it advances Y’s interests. That once I have nothing to offer, our friendship will come to an end.
X: That’s funny… because Y said the exact same thing about you.
It was hard to say yes to the pretty girls who otherwise ignored me except when they wanted something: lecture notes, answers to problem sets, advice about this or that. I felt cheap for being so easily bought by a smile, but I gave in anyway. It sometimes seems like many of my so-called ‘friends’ are only interested in me because I have something to offer them.
(Asakusa, Tokyo) It’s when it rains that I need you most by my side.
I remember the taste of her specialty chicken curry, its rich coconut cream and spices that soak into the thick slices of bread. She would bring bowls of it to me, and Yeo’s drinks, before slipping a red packet into my hands while encouraging me to study hard. I only saw grandaunt once a year, because it was our tradition to visit them on the first day of the lunar new year. I remember the walk up to their three-room flat in an old housing estate, back when it had not been redeveloped yet. Those childhood memories are hazy, but I remember how magical their aquarium seemed, with toys and figures perched around the pond. They said it was good fengshui.
(Bank of Japan, Tokyo) I walk this empty street/ On the Boulevard of Broken Dreams/ Where the city sleeps/ I’m the only one and I walk alone/
In one of those cosmic accidents, my seat at the alumni LNY dinner was right next to someone who shares all my personal and academic interests (development, asia, microfinance, social enterprise, BOP etc), we have the same major and concentrations, we have the same career aspirations and life goals, and we even watch the same dramas. Over the course of some two hours of on-and-off conversation, the coincidences became somewhat eerie.
