As Time Flew By

AsH will be closing shop for a week to spend a good end-of -2011 holiday with the Rainbow Band.

We have all been ravaged by time but the heart and spirit is still strong and sweet.    The old days and the present have been well woven into a mellow and mad tapestry.

It's now time for a laugh and a cry.

I hope you lot are prepared to look after Darby and Joan.  We usually have tea in bed in the morning, a kip in the afternoon - so you had better be quiet after lunch.  Do remember our bedtime is at 10 and a mug of  Milo is a must.

And for everyone else have a happy break and may you  enjoy your cups of  Milo for every night in 2012.

The Pot and the Kettle

Remember this bit of news in November 2008 when Malaysia banned Muslims from practising yoga?  Even the venerable Telegraph recorded the news.  Another stick to beat the Muslims with!

Read  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/malaysia/3509070/Malaysia-bans-Muslims-from-practicing-yoga.html

"The edict reflects the growing influence of conservative Islam in Malaysia, a multi-ethnic country of 27 million people."

According to the director of the Sivananda Ashram in Delhi, "chanting during yoga is to calm the mind and elevate our consciousness".

Well, on 25th November 2011 Father Gabriel Amorth, ..............

.................... the Vatican's Chief Exorcist (appointed by the late Pope John Paul II)  declared that 'Practising yoga brings evil as does reading Harry Potter.  They ......both deal with magic.

Yoga is the Devil's work.  You think you are doing it for stretching your mind and body but it leads to Hinduism.'

Vanda Vanni of the Italian Yoga Association  said, 'Yoga ia not a religion.  It is about freedom and a search to find one's inner self.'

'Giorgio Furian who runs the Yoga  Academy in Rome said:  There are some paths of yoga which do lead towards Hinduism but other paths are more philosophical but there is no direct link with religion and certainly no link with Satanism'

Read http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2066289/Yoga-work-devil-says-Vaticans-chief-exorcist-doesnt-like-Harry-Potter-either.html

Any sign of outrage from the liberals in our part of the world?

When I was in secondary school at Crescent Girls' School there was a lass whose English was superb and we were all in her shadow.  We were told this was because she was an avid reader of the Bible.  Well, for most of us fed on a diet of Beano and Dandy and Enid Blyton in our primary school years and romance writers like Denise Robins and Hermione Black and Georgette Heyer ( she's more pukka than the first two)  during secondary school, we hadn't a hope in hell of catching up with our Bible-reading classmate.  However I must confess I love Zane Grey's  'cowboy' books, but they cannot match the prowess of the Bible.

So I was astonished when on 26th November 2011 it was reported that 'The Prime Minister will send every school in Britain a copy of the King James Bible - complete with a foreword by the Education Secretary Michael Gove'

Mr  Gove .....

....... said the Bible was 'the most important book written in the English language'  and will be distributed to over 20,000 schools to mark the 400th anniversary of its translation.  A spokewoman from the Department of Education had this to say.  'We want all pupils to be able to access and understand the great literary and historical image of our nation...... It will help pupils - of any faith or none - understand and take pride in the history and culture of this country.'

What happened to William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens and Jane Austen and D.H. Lawrence and ......Enid Blyton (please!) ?

Here we are in Malaysia , taunted and accused of being an Islamist state.  We have Maznah Mohamad writing in the Guardian on 21 September 2006 ...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/sep/21/post406

...... pondering if Malaysia is an Islamic state,  of  'efforts to islamicise the state'.   This topic is a hot issue both at home and abroad.

Yet, here's Britain, the mother of all secular states,  touting and giving away to children a free copy of the Christian Bible.  I wonder, can you still get Gideon's Bible in the hotels in Britain?

On this note I'd like to recall an incident some years ago.  At the Multiple Sclerosis Charity Shop at Evington Road Leicester I watched this Muslim lady volunteer worker (in fact she was the manager) picking up Bibles, big and small. from the boxes on the floor and placing them on the top shelf.  She turned to me and said, "This is a holy book and should be respected like the Quran."

Then a lady (native Brit) came in and blithely asked , "Can I take these bibles to my church?  After all they will never sell!'  And she was rewarded for her gumption and left with a stack of Bibles for free.

And go to most Charity shops, you can find plenty of secondhand Bibles for sale!   Or you could a few years ago.     Perhaps they have a system, like they have for old spectacles, of sending them to the poor coloured countries.

An Exercise

He has been described as an English author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator, literary critic, librettist, broadcaster, autobiographer, reviewer, a sometime sergeant-major, a school teacher and Manchester's finest author.

It was said he spoke fluently in 8 languages - Malay, Russian, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Welsh and English  and some Hebrew, Japanese, Chinese, Swedish and Persian.

Just because he was a teacher in MCKK (Malay College Kuala Kangsar) and Kota Bharu Teachers' Training College from 1954 to 1957 and he wrote the 'Malayan Trilogy' after his 3 years sojourn in the Peninsula, he has been accorded quite a celebrity status by our literati class.

From 1958 to 1959 he was teaching in SOAS  (Sultan Omar Ali Saifudin) College - a very brief stint - because he 'collapsed' in his classroom and was sent home to England supposedly diagnosed with a brain tumour.  But he carried on living and writing for another 34 years and when he died he left behind quite a handsome property portfolio - a villa in Provence, in Callian of the Var, France and an apartment off Baker Street, London and some other locations.

When I was teaching in Brunei, I met an elderly English Language lecturer who worked with him when he was in Brunei.  She said the collapse in SOAS College was a ruse so that he could escape teaching on medical grounds, without losing his perks.  I checked on this.  In the late 1980s  he admitted that it was a "a willed collapse out of sheer boredom and frustration".

This 'contrarian' was John Burgess Wilson ( 1917-1993) otherwise known as Anthony Burgess, an illustrious son of English literature and culture.  In some circles he's regarded as a  20th century version of Byron.

I had heard of AB but I must admit I'm not too fond of fiction.  When I was doing my Masters in Leicester, I came across this article by AB,  "From Kampong to Computer" in the Sunday Observer of April 1984.  As part of my coursework I had to prepare a Comprehension Exercise for EL2 students and this was what I did.

My passage for the exercise was AB's article in the Sunday Observer.  Here is an extract from that article.

As the reproduction is not too clear - the script is after all 27 years old - I thought it would be best if I type it out.

The Malay for Malaysia,  Tanah Melayu, means 'Malay Land'.  It is Eurasian,  Sikh and Chinese land as well, and you can add to the deeds of proprietorship other, smaller races, including Buginese
and such aboriginals as the Temiars and Negritos.  But the Malays call themselves the  bumiputra or sons of the soil, and they call their language the bahasa negara or national tongue.  Malaysia is confirmed as the country of the Malays, and this is causing trouble among other Malaysians.

I served in Malaysia (which the British then called Malaya) in the 1950s, when what had been a British protectorate was moving towards independence.  I went back two years ago to make a television film.  I noted changes, and these had much to do with the new assertiveness of the Malays.  But the physical impact of that lovely country remained much what it had always been - hot, humid, green, jungly, fruity, snaky, the yodelling of the bilal on his minaret, punctuating loud pentatonic Chinese song on the radio, the ringing of the trishaw bells, the hawking and spitting of the long fasting day of Ramadan, the cry of the fever bird.

In the days of Somerset Maugham, Malaya relaxed in the warmth of a May afternoon that seemed likely to last forever.  It was wealthy then as it is now.  Rubber had been taken from Brazil to Kew Gardens, and from Kew Gardens to the state of Perak, where it flourished and bled endless latex to be processed into tyres and contraceptives.  In that same state of Perak (which means silver), tin proved more abundant than the costlier metal.  Tamil immigrants worked on the rubber plantations; the Chinese came to mine the tin.  Both industries supported a commercial structure which fed cultural transplantations from India and China.

The Malays had nothing to do with either industry or commerce: they stayed in their kampongs, growing rice, catching fish, training beroks or rhesus monkeys to hurl down coconuts.  The British took care of secular government for all the races.  The Malays, whom Arab traders had converted to Islam, gave sultans and rajas to oversee the administration of Muslim law.  Islam and British paternalism supported each other in a bizarre compromise which worked.

I divided my exercise into four parts.  Section A dealt with  "How are you going to read?",  Section B with "Language Work".  Section C looked at "Using and Deriving Information from the Passage",  and Section D with "Making Judgements about the Passage".

This Comprehension  exercise was meant for EL2 advanced learners at Sixth Form, University and Teachers' Training Colleges.  I stated in the Teacher's Notes that the purpose of the Exercise is to "develop critical reading skills ..... so that the student will be able to evaluate and make critical substantiated judgement about the quality, value, accuracy and truthfulness of what they read".

In Section B, I  inserted a part on 'The Use of  Words'.

A question  in Section C served to illustrate the relationship between statistics and statements and its interpretation.

The question :

3.  Look at the table below which shows the composition of the people living in Malaya.

     a.  What are the main races in Malaya according to (1) the writer's interpretations and  (2) the statistics?

For Section D, 'Evaluation'  I stated in the Teacher's Notes :  "This section deals with an analysis of the passage beyond the syntactical and semantical stage of comprehension, an aspect of reading which has not been given sufficient attention at the ESL (English as a Second Language) level.  The paralinguistic elements of any language that is used as a medium or object of instruction has to be included within the scope of reading, a level of reading  'between and beyond the lines' ........ to help the student to evaluate and understand the writer's intent, however noble or ignoble."

                                                      SECTION  D - EVALUATION
Making judgements about the passage.

Part I.  Recognising the difference between a  FACT and an OPINION.

A FACT reports what has happened or exists.  Its truth can be tested or verified.  Example : Tottenham Hotspurs beat Liverpool City 5-0.
An OPINION does not aim to report but to classify and persuade.  It expresses a feeling of approval or disapproval.  Whether the opinion is true or false cannot be demonstrated.  Example: John drinks too much.

Which of these statements are facts and which ones are opinions?  Write next to the sentence F for facts and O for opinions.

Paragraph 1
1. The Malay for Malaysia,  'Tanah Melayu' means Malay land.
2. Malaysia is confirmed as the country of the Malays and this is causing trouble among other Malaysians

Paragraph 2
3. I served in Malaysia in the 1950s.
4. I noted changes and these had much to do with the new assertiveness of the Malays.

Paragraph 3
5. In the days of Somerset Maugham, Malaya relaxed in the warmth of a May afternoon that seemed likely to last forever.
6. Rubber had been taken from Brazil to Kew Gardens and from Kew Gardens to the state of Perak.

Paragraph 4
7. The Malays had nothing to do with industry or commerce: they ........monkeys to hurl down coconuts.
8. Islam and British paternalism supported each other in a bizarre compromise, which worked.

Part II.  There are several ways by which a writer can give a slanted account of his subject.

1. By using emotionally-laden words, e.g. Yesterday, four brave and courageous policemen braved gunfire to capture the ruthless gangsters.  CLUE: look for the adjectives.
2. Implication by association so as to give his statement authority. e.g. A politician who never talks about his war experiences but makes certain that he tells stories about them to his audience.
3, By generalistion, e.g. To commit murder is wrong under all circumstances. CLUE: Ask yourself the question, "What is the evidence?"

Write down an example for each style of slanted writing from the passage.

1. Emotionally-laden words

2. By association

3. Generalisation

Part III.  You are a Malaysian Malay student. Write a letter to the author explaining why you disagree with some of his views.

Part IV.  You are a TV film producer and you want to make a short film about Malaysia with the intention of promoting tourism in the country.  Write brief notes about the scenes you would like to show after reading this passage.

CONCLUSION

1. As to the part about making 'critical substantiated judgement about the quality, value, accuracy and truthfulness of what they read',  Brian Harrison - my lecturer - commented,  "a tall order".  I disagreed with him then.  But 27 years later, looking at the unquestioning imbibement and imitation of material from the print, electronic and celluloid world I have to admit Brian was right.

2. We are very proud that literacy rates have improved tremendously.  Today, more people can write and read, not like some of our parents (like my mother) and especially our grandparents.  We claim that many of our youngsters are bilingual and trilingual.  But how many of them are capable of reading between and beyond the lines?  How many of our schoolkids are actually just 'barking at print' and getting more and more  mesmerised by electronic communication?

3. Anthony Burgess was described as " a man who loves and knows language so well he can twist and reinvent it to his own purposes."  There are now many wordsmiths like him - both local and foreign.

I shall end with AB's words:  It is one thing to use language; it is quite another to understand how it works.

South of the Border

This will be our first  'overseas'  trip in nine months since we got back to KL.  It will be a well-deserved little holiday and would enable a  test drive of  the cobalt-titanium hip.

Come Wednesday we shall cross this strip of water at Selat Tebrau.....

..... to get to the island Republic of Singapore.

Oh dear this 1963 map is outdated because Singapore has grown to this.

Singapore circa 2010

Note the expansion especially in the south-west corner.

The Rainbow Gang ..... sans Irene.

.......  will treat us like royalty - I hope?

As usual Jai will put us up - or - have to put up with us.

We shall be feasting on mee rebus, rojak mamak, lontong, air batu kacang, cendol, murtabak from Arab Street cooked as only Singapore's hawkers can!

We hope to meet up with Canary aka Irene at Ruqxana's Saturday lunch date.  The last time we saw Irene was when she did this little art work on my name.  We miss you, you mad artist!

Getting about in Singapore will be easy.  Other than the buses and the MRT,  Singapore's taxis are especially reliable and efficient.  They will  - unlike KL taxis -take you in whether your journey is for 1km or 20kms!!!!

But we are spoilt for choice where transport is concerned.  We can pick up Jai's top-notch VW

or Ruqxana's grand old lady coffee percolator.

We hope to be back by Sunday - sated, satiated and satisfied.

The Great and The Small

I've been caught up doing a room clearance - checking out dusty boxes and files - and found an article on the Great Mosque of Paris,  the first mosque to be built in Paris in 1926.

It's the largest mosque in France and the third largest in Europe.

However this ranking pales in comparison to its other credentials.

The Mosque was built to honour the soldiers from the French Arab Community (meaning those countries colonised by the French)  that perished in the First World War - sometimes called The Great War or what I prefer to term as the 'First European Tribal War" that engulfed the rest of the world.  Many of them died in the Battle of Verdun (in France) in what was considered the 'greatest and the lengthiest (battle) in world history'.  The battle covered less than 10 square kilometres and stretched for 10 months from February to December 1916.  Over 700,000 died, or were wounded or  missing in action.

The dead at Verdun

The Mosque also played a very significant role during the Second European Tribal War.  I wish some renowned Hollywood director like Spielberg would note this.  The Mosque provided shelter and safe passage and even fake Muslim birth certificates for Jewish children.  (Are you listening Netanyahu?)  It became a secret haven for those on the run from the Nazis.

And recently, Sarkozy, the French President of Jewish descent banned the right of Muslim women to don the burqa and the Hijab.  Sacre bleu!!

Sometime in the 1980s or 1990s (?) I attended a Conference on the Muslim Parliament of Britain in London.  I heard mention that London's Regent's Park Mosque .......

was built on land donated by King George VI in 1944  in exchange for a site in Central Cairo on which to build an Anglican Cathedral ( All Saints Cathedral).

 You see, 'there's no such thing as a free lunch'!  The British establishment regarded this as a tribute to the Muslim soldiers who died defending the Empire during the Second European Tribal War!

By the way what did we get in exchange for all the Cathedrals they constructed in Singapore and Malaya?

But there are also the little mosques - little havens of faith and peace.  I took this photograph .........

........in Penang last year, of a little mosque hemmed-in between two high buildings.  I regret I did not note the name of the mosque or  the street name.
This image is almost symbolic of the fate of  Malay-Muslims in DAP's Penang.

Two years ago, I went on a nostalgic trip to my old haunts in Singapore and was delighted to discover that this mosque, Masjid Hussein Sulaiman, had survived the onslaught of progress and development.

During my teen years I used to cycle to the Post Office........

.......... which was just next door to the Mosque - to buy stamps and to post letters for the family.  I would take this opportunity to cycle right to the end of Pasir Panjang Road - just for the fun of going at 'high speed' on top gear  on my trusty Rudge.  There was hardly any traffic and it was flat terrain all the way.  Wheeee!!!

As for this precious book written by Hadijah Rahmat ......

.......... it speaks for itself.  Geraldene Lowe, a good friend of Ruqxana, kindly gave me this book.  It's so poignant and sad to see the heart ripped out of the kampung.  Well, the kampung itself was dismembered.  Thank you Geraldene and Hadijah Rahmat.  This will be the only permanent  symbol of what we have lost.  I very much hope that Kuala Lumpur's Kampung Baru will not suffer the same fate.

And so, while we extol the grandeur and beauty of our grand mosques, let's remember and protect the little ones.

Desert Storm

It had a long run in both the printed and celluloid media - a story of a (sometimes) doomed relationship between a white 'goddess' and a hot-blooded, sultry non-white male, usually Arab-Muslim.

We know of Shakespeare's Othello the Moor and Desdemona the Venetian.

Then in 1924 E.M. Forster wrote "A Passage to India"  about Adela Quested's  fantasy of Dr Aziz Ahmed's sexual attraction for her.

From Hollywood in the 1920s we had the smouldering sex icon, the 'Sheik' and  'Son of the Sheik'  starring Rudolf Valentino.

Another movie  'Island in the Sun' (1957) touched on the delicate story of a black activist (Harry Belafonte) and a blonde beauty (Joan Fontaine).

So, I was quite chuffed to discover this same motif in my 1934 Woman's Needlework Magazine.

By the way, this was the period in-between the two massive European Tribal Wars aka the First World War and Second World War - when there was rampant unemployment and poverty of the lower classes (or the Great Depression) somewhat like today after the Banks' Crisis.

There was this icy-cool English brunette ....

 .........who was irresistibly attracted to ......... the Dark Cavalier.......

who actually turned out to be ...  An Arab ......... Sidi Zarouk ben Mohammed ben Amor Metlaoui!!!

...... from a noble and royal Moroccan pedigree!  (Well, it had to be aristocratic enough for our fine  English lass, hadn't it?)

"You see they are really still living centuries ago - they have their brutality and splendour, the magnificient qualities and the terrible faults of another age."   (Hold on mate, you're only making it more exciting for the English rose!)

Well, these words  (the ones in italics) could have come from our present-day journalists, academic and social commentators and of course Cameron and Sarkozy and  America's super-hero.

The one difference is this: present day magnificent savages have ... OIL!

Well, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, if only you and your father had played the game right.  Instead of  feasting and feteing  sultry western maidens like you did ......

...and English political scroungers like your father did .......

..... and donating loadsofmoney, to the tune of  Sterling 1.5 million, to the London School of Economics ...... you should have spent it on more worthy causes, if not in your country but to other poverty stricken people.  But rich Muslim potentates seem to have a penchant for throwing money at institutions in the West.  Shouldn't charity begin at home?

Undoubtedly your father provided Libya with an impressive education and health system that put Cameron's to shame - but other issues seem to have been neglected or made to look more dire.

Your father tweaked the Judaeo-Christian's tail once too often and he had to be run into the ground -in fact lynched by a mob while the self-righteous mullahs in the West looked away.  (Remember, they allowed  Chilean dictator and murderer Pinochet to get away with his "crimes against humanity"). 

And so, poor Saif, finally in your blackest moments you donned your traditional Arab robes.....

..... but you will not be a heartthrob like the 'Sheik'  (Rudolf Valentino) and other glamorous male Arab-Muslim 'heiristocrats'  for the trophy collectors in the West.

Perhaps , your father might have lasted longer if he had fostered this image of the Arabs  - as seen in this video "Ahab the Arab".  Long live Coca Cola and McDonalds and cheap oil!!!

By the way,it was not until the 1967 US Supreme Court decision that US-based inter-racial marriages were allowed.

Seksualiti Merdeka

If I was born in 1997 I would have a tough time right now coping with the pressures of being a female Muslim teenager, especially my sexuality.

There are all these early photographs of me ......... especially this one looking like a cool dude in my dad's shades, at the Singapore Botanical Garden when I was 4/5.

According to LGBT ideology this is most likely an indication of a non-female sexuality trying to 'come out' of the oppressed female/feminine Muslim's sexual ethics.

Should my parents be hauled over the coals for repressing my 'true sexuality'?  I think this is probably what they will say.

PARENTS:  Sometimes, in our culture .........

VICTIM-FEMINISTS'  WATCHDOG  (VFW):  You mean the oppressive Patriarchal Culture !!!

PARENTS:  ....... in the hope that it will catch, parents will dress up their daughter in boys' togs (mind you, not for all of the time) so that the next baby might turn out to be a boy.

And hey presto, it worked!  Mustakim was born giving them an ideal number of two girls and two boys.  Of course it's not as certain as going for a scan and then aborting the foetus if it's not the desired type.  After all, abortion is another much-vaunted human right like the right to happiness and freedom.  It has even been resorted to as a form of birth control for some busy women in Britain.

VFW:  What about this then? 

The scruffy kid on the right (front row) looks like a Hari Raya 1948/1949 version of Richmal Crompton's 'William'.

PARENTS:  Well, we can't stop her as she loves her boy's outfit.  We know she feels a little left out being the second child, stuck between the special first-born sister and the first son and the youngest one, you know, the second child syndrome.

But she seems comfortable and happy - we think she will grow out of it.  Children do go through such phases of wanting to be different, to demonstrate their distinct identity.

VFW:  What do you mean by that?  So you think that her dressing like a macho-male female is only a phase.  You believe that she could or would grow out of becoming a feminist/lesbian/transgender - that she will recover from this - like getting over a nasty flu?

PARENT (ABAH):  Hey, hold on a minute.  Where did you get the idea that a girl who likes to dress up as a boy is a budding lesbian?

PARENT ('MAK):  Abah, lesbian 'tu apa?

ABAH:  Nanti Chah. Nanti abah terangkan.

VFW:  How about this picture then?  She's now 15 and she's still trying to express her true sexual identity - to escape this patriarchal cultural agenda.

Above is the Kampung Abu Kassim 'samseng' at Jardine Steps sporting her butch hairstyle.

15 YEAR OLD TEENAGER (pleading) :   Stop it everybody!  Let me have my say.  I was born a girl and I'm happy to be one.  I love wearing those comfortable 'boy outfit' because I lead an active life riding bicycles, running around the backyard chasing the chickens in the evening to get them into the hen-house, wandering around the kampung with Mus cutting grass to feed the geese, cleaning the goose-house and uncovering their eggs  as well as cleaning the rabbit-hutch.  Also I love climbing up the hills along South Buona Vista Road (or The Gap) with my brothers - you can't do that wearing a frock or a baju kurung, can you?

Sometimes I dress up in the same girly attire as my sister which my dear ole mum had sewn for us.

Admittedly till today,  my sister Maznah always, always looks prettier than me.  And she's a better cook too!

By the way Abah, what is a lesbian?

ABAH:  It's ... it's a girl who ....likes girls ...ummhh ... prefers girls to boys.  And don't tell your mother.  She might throw away all your shirts and shorts!

But Abah, I like boys too.  Did I tell you about my boyfriends when I was in Primary One?

FRONT ROW:  Au Guat Eng (2nd from left), AsH (5th from left)

BACK ROW:  My boyfriends, Tan Aik Chuan (5th from left) and Ang Hock Kee (8th from left)

When I was thirteen, I fell in love with Ng Kian Ann.  It was a love that dared not speak its name because he was Guat Eng's paramour.  Guat Eng and I were always placed in the same team whenever we played netball.  You see, one day she fainted during PE.  When our teacher lifted her up, I had to tell the other kids to keep quiet (in those days, us demure girls never use the word 'Shaddup') and behave themselves - because they were all yelling, 'her knickers .... see her knickers!"

And then in 1957, on our last day in Pasir Panjang English School, before we all went to separate Secondary Schools,  Kian Ann waited for me at the bicycle shed ......

ABAH:  All right, all right. That's enough!  

31 August 1957, Tengku Abdul Rahman called out "Merdeka, Merdeka, Merdeka"  and I saw my father's tears.

Now, if I had been born in 1997, I would have to ask these questions.

Abah, what's this "Seksualiti Merdeka"?  Has Merdeka got a gender?  Is it because freedom must be made more sexy?  Or is being sexy and doing all kinds of sexy stuff, freedom?  You said Merdeka has to do with seeing our country free from British Colonialism, of working hard and being responsible for our country's safety, well-being and freedom?

  Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan mentioned the "marginalised LGBT"  in the campaign for "Seksualiti Merdeka".  Can  the 'marginalised'   include the poor, the orphans, the single mothers, the drug addicts, abused children and women, the OKU, the alcoholics?  Will there be a "Merdeka" campaign for them as well?

I know now that 'L'  refers to Lesbians.  What is the meaning of Gay (G), Bisexual (B) and Transgender (T)?

The dictionary says  'gay' means mirthful and cheeky.  I am always a happy and cheeky little sod.  Does that mean I am Gay too?

ABAH:  Look, I've got a headache.  Please get on with your homework and then help your mother with the laundry and the gardening.

That's yucky work.  Can I wash the car instead and Mus can do the laundry?

ABAH :  Just go!!!

Am I glad I was born in 1944.  Life was so much simpler for tomboys then, with no worries about being deconstructed by the Post-Modernist brigade.

                                             ------------------------------

Of course, Hamid's daughter Number Two had many girlfriends like Tai Ann, Geetha, Sumijah, Soh Khim, Maimunah, Asmah, Yvonne, Jeya, Dorothy, Ann, Aysha Bevee and a string of boyfriends stretching from Singapore to Brunei, Leicester and Penang.

When Hamid's daughter Number Two had enough of her wonderings and wanderings, Iain Buchanan managed to clip her wings (only with her permission of course) and got her started on wifely duties like cooking and marketing and sewing.  Strangely enough, she likes it.

But she still wears the trousers.  Here's the middle-aged Dominatrix, boots and all,  happily married  to the unflappable cameraMAN.

Mus, you refused to give me any chance to wash the car but you made up for it - years later - by introducing me to David Armand.  Thank you.