2009年的继续

2008 年的最后一天，在朋友家倒数加“泼辣”（Pot Luck）晚餐。马马虎虎吃过晚餐后，13人玩由贱葱主持的“天使魔鬼”游戏。我们的玩法是这样的：选一名天使，一位医生和三只魔鬼，其他的都是村民。天使知道大家的身份；魔鬼知道同类的身份，其他的人就要靠自己推测。“黑夜”，主持就叫大家闭上眼睛；然后叫魔鬼睁眼，静静商量杀一个人，然后闭眼。就轮到医生睁眼救一个人，然后闭眼。然后就“天亮”，主持人就宣布夜里有谁被杀，谁被救。若刚巧是同一个人，就没事，否则，被魔鬼杀的人就出局。然后大家就讨论投票杀掉一个被认为是“魔鬼”的人。天使不可表露身份，只可以通过讨论取信于大众。游戏的目的：魔鬼要杀完村民，天使与医生；其他的人就要除妖。

游戏进行得和晚餐一样：马马虎虎，糊糊涂涂。有一轮，天亮了，主持人宣布夜里被杀的，竟然是其中一位魔鬼！害得这位魔鬼阿炳一脸错愕，久久不肯倒地就死。知道内情的天使和其他的魔鬼也不知该秀出怎样的表情。结果这一轮游戏只好做废，重新洗牌。还有一轮，天使在杀掉两只魔鬼之后壮烈牺牲。一班村民居然不懂得承续天使的“遗志”把幸存的魔鬼干掉，最后让那女鬼一夜一个把村民和医生干掉得胜，气得我这位被村民投票干掉的天使大骂“蠢民”。

游戏进行了几轮，竟然连续抽到医生和天使牌。剩下一两次当村民。朋友发现了，说我老是做“好人”。另一位就说，假设给我当魔鬼，肯定不得了。我听了，颇以为然。在现实中，我是普通的医生，村民，没有天使的本事。然而，自己认为，要是我当“魔鬼”，以我的创意出坏点子，肯定天下大乱。之前在办公室，下班前，上司半开玩笑对我说：“新年快乐！学吃点肉喇！”我茹素多年，上司嫌麻烦，总爱以半开玩笑的语气叫我吃肉。我要找机会跟他说，这办公室如此风平浪静就多亏我吃素。要是我饮血茹毛，魔性大发，苏纳米（Tsunami）小姐必定会跟随左右。2009 年，我还是继续做好人。

“天使魔鬼”游戏，下面两个链接的版本有点小差异，都比我们玩的合理：
http://kevinshee04.blogspot.com/2007/10/blog-post_08.html
http://hfng81.pixnet.net/blog/post/21522712
贱葱说英文叫“Mafia”，有兴趣的自己搜寻吧。

Down

The preteen girl with school uniform entered the LRT holding her mother's hand. I could tell the number of chromosomes in every cells in her by one look at her face: Down Syndrome.
She was cheerful, greeting everybody with her friendly smile, shaking everybody's hands who were within her reach. By the time she was getting down, all the people within 10 feet radius were infected by her cheerful mood and waiving goodbye to her.
I shifted my focus from her to my newspaper. There was coverage on Sufiah Yusof. Left me wondering, "who are suffering more in this world? The one with IQ 180 or the one with IQ 80?"

Ride with the devil

I watched the movie ‘Ride with the devil’ by Ang Lee yesterday. An excellent movie. I will rank it among the best of Ang Lee’s. Made with a budget of RM38 millions, it grossed only RM635,096, which is the second lowest of Ang Lee’s movies. So, I will put it as the most underrated movie of Ang Lee.

Luckily for Ang Lee and his fans, this fiasco was followed by the huge success of ‘Crouching tiger, hidden dragon’, which I think is the most overrated movie of Ang Lee’s.

The significance of watching RWTD to me, is that, with this, I have watched all Ang Lee’s feature movies. Yes, all 11 of them. A huge accomplishment for an amateur movie fan like me. And this is the first time I did it for any movie director.

So, who will be next? Definitely not Alfred Hitchcock.

Quentin Tarantino maybe.

Evaluation

The word of the evening is ‘intriguing’.

The evaluator evaluating a speech, “the opening of your speech was good, the body was well-organized and the conclusion was intriguing. Blah blah blah”

The general evaluator evaluating the evaluator’s evaluation, “when you are evaluating a lady’s speech, and you kept saying things like ‘I like your body…I like your opening…’ it became very…intriguing.”

The house was brought down. Yours truly was banned from playing the role of general evaluator for life.

The making of ‘Perfect’

It started when I was resigning from my last job effective 20.3.2008 and waiting to start my new job in 1.4.2008. So, what am I supposed to do with the 10 days’ holiday? Initially I thought of going back to Penang and take a break. Then I bumped into a short ad on Internet, employing a locum for a clinic in Labis because the doctor was away due to some emergency. I called and was employed. Labis, a place that I would otherwise never set my foot on.

I took a bus to Segamat, since my friend SY volunteered to drive me to Labis from his hometown. There were only 5 passengers on the bus. And when the bus reached Tangkak, 4 got off and I was the only one left. I was reading the ‘very short stories’ book and thought that was a good setting to develop some story. The bus driver was a middle-aged Malay man who smoked. I remembered somebody said that all good stories are either about love or death. Writing a love story about my character and the bus driver?

No way! Over my death body! But wait! I had a better idea, over HIS death body! And the rest is in the story.

Confession

He took a deep breath and solemnly said, “ I have to confess…I am married…3 years ago. Ever since our son was born, she became unreasonable…” He buried his face in his trembling hands and his body was shaking. She was dumbfounded, pale as if life was vacuumed from her body. She was searching for words when he looked up, smiled and said, “April Fool! Gotcha!”

She slapped him and left.

“That was close!” she thought after she composed herself.

She was just a thought away from confessing her secret.

Perfect

All the passengers got off at Tangkak, I was the only passenger left on the 40 seater’s bus heading towards Segamat. The road is sandwiched by the palm oil estate with no other vehicle on sight. I feel nervous and uneasy. Suddenly the driver has a seizure and loss consciousness. The bus lost control and bumped into the gutter. I almost had a concussion. “Damned!” I thought, “The pill I slipped into his drink works earlier than expected!” I put on the gloves and walk towards him. “No motive, no evidence…perfect!” I smiled.