Last Night After The Sun Went Down

I used to be a little boy, so old in my shoes.

Early twilight at Marina Barrage. 2 a.m.

We're sitting right at the top of the main building, staring down at port-side Singapore. Me and the guys. Like it always has been. Like it will always be. Breaking down our past. Living our present. Discerning our future.

Just 5 guys, hanging out as we have for 8 years now. We started in secondary school - naive, child-like individuals. And each of us, in our own little ways, are still stuck in those days.

We're talking about girls, and how we're miserable failures with them. We laugh at it. We're not quite different now as compared to our SJI days.

Nazir retains that witty, gentlemanly charm he had. And weirdly, 'British' is not the term for Nazir's style. For someone from a Convention, he's very unconventional. Tall, thin, wearing a hairband to hold back hair he's not bothering to keep in check. For now.

Mus still has the standards he had then. The deeper meaning of one's possessions, class, sophistication. And then the conflict between his disenchantment and his idealism. Tonight, he's in his Armani Exchange jacket. Jeans from the same brand. Black hi-cuts. Dark, brooding - he wore it.

Nas is feisty, sometimes bordering on cynicism. He's his mother's son, that dude. But these days he displays a gentler side. An anguished side, sometimes. Those uneven steps into adulthood. Nas has good posture - it was a random observation I made sometime ago. Nice square shoulders. Good tone. You hardly notice it, and we know why.

Aizat has always been interesting. Disciplined. Deadpan humour. Good in Maths. Tennis whiz. Slightly drained. Giving. Never awed by his roles in life. I think he's going to be the all-rounded family man. The grey hoodie he had on hid his good physique.

And looking at all of them, it really hit me how we're still the same person. But we've grown up so much. These guys deserve the best in life.





A few people have commented how I'm so different from my best friends. But I don't think we're such a close group because we're so similar anyway. They're my balance. Before recent developments, I've gone through 2 months without really spending time with them.

And hey no surprise, they were miserable 2 months.