Shouldn’t matter. The email said rain or shine, the brisk walking party would be there. My concern was whether I’d reach the meeting point on time.They said they would start their walk on the dot.
My handphone buzzed.
“Heavy rain everywhere. Walk is canceled.”
Looking out of the bus, I noticed a reservoir ahead. I’d often passed over the years but never had a reason to stop. I looked up from where I was seated. The sky was still dark in the way dawn is. Since I was out already, I might as well make a reason for myself.
Pressed the bus bell. The driver let me out. Stepped from the artificial cool of the air-con bus onto the snappy breeze of dawn. The rumble of the bus trailed away.
The rustle of the dew-laden trees filled the silence.
There was a pier in the distance. Further back was a golf green lit in harsh halogen white. A gentle breeze caressed the water’s surface. Small ripples breaking the reflection of the man-made lights on obsidian waves.
The park was deserted, save for two or three individuals resting under small shelters along the foot path. I stepped from stoney path to wooden board, and walked till the end of the pier. There was only the sound of water and wind. I positioned myself to take a few pictures of the distant lights. I was surprised to find that there were more colours captured on camera than my eye could see.
It started to rain, droplets growing into pelting water bombs. I hurried to a sheltered part of the pier. A man got off his bicycle and sought shelter as well. Probably came here to fish. There was plenty of room. He was my silent company while I waited out the rain.
When the showers slowed to a light drizzle, I left the pier and walked along the path to explore the rest of the park. There wasn’t much to see, partly because it was still dark, and because there wasn’t much to the park. I’d quickly reached the end of the path. I walked to the main road with a promise to be back.
I got to know MyVanillaWorld at a work-related function some time back. Learned that she was trying to record her own music. So I’ve been pestering encouraging her to do a musical mash-up some time. She didn’t mind me sending her my songs, so I did.
My earlier Good-night Not Goodbye song struck a chord with her.
Dan O-Connor’s instrumental track, “Love Letters” (by Dan O’Connor – Free Music By DanoSongs.com – licensed under a Creative Commons ATTRIBUTION 3.0 US license).
Done in 1989 as art practice (wow, 10 years ago almost to the month!)
Poster paints and ink on sketch paper. “1989 (Oct) Cover – adapted from Anne McCaffrey’s “The While Dragon” by Ivan Chew is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Singapore License. Please credit as “Ivan Chew – MyRightBrain.wordpress.com”.
Another of my book cover adaption. This one was from Anne McCaffrey’s “The White Dragon”, which I borrowed from the public library back then. While googling for the book, I just discovered the cover was by David Roe. Found a scanned image of the cover from this forum.
Basically an oversized racing bike, with a few guns and mini-turrets as props. Ink, watercolour pencils, poster paints on sketch paper. 1989.
Please credit to Ivan Chew – MyRightBrain.wordpress.com 1989 (May) Armour – SuperBike by Ivan Chew is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Singapore License.
Wasn’t sure how this would end up when I started with urmymuse’s guitar stems. If you think this sounds like a Japanese Anime soundtrack, then I’m glad
Was toying with urmymuse’s guitar stems. Managed to record a decent sounding lead guitar part for the chorus (which is what you hear in the track) but after that I couldn’t work out an opening guitar melody. So I headed over to Freesound.org for ideas. Found hanstimm’s “This is a strange town” spoken Japanese recording. Learned from one comment that the words meant “I’m looking at a strange town” and that inspired the title. morgantj’s track and yewbic’s Freesound sample completed the picture.
Ink/ Poster colour on sketch paper. May 1989. The title was from a phrase in the book “Wizards & Warriors – chronicles of an age of darkness”… borrowed it from the public library back then. I think it must be out of print by now.
Unless otherwise stated, all works by Ivan Chew is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Singapore License. AS LONG AS YOU ATTRIBUTE MY WORK TO ME (Ivan Chew, MyRightBrain.wordpress.com), you are FREE to COPY, SHARE, MODIFY, or SELL (yes, SELL!) content from this blog. And you do not need to pay me anything from what you do with the content(if you do, I'd be very grateful but that's not really required of the license). Do remember to ATTRIBUTE whatever you use here, to me. For permissions beyond the scope of this license, please contact me via MyRightBrain.wordpress.com or at RamblingLibrarian@gmail.com