Me, from A to Z
Andanapettai place. 1. My place of birth. 2. My mother’s hometown. 3. The place where I have my earliest memory – I was 3 or 4 years old when my uncle carried me to the mottai maadi (open balcony) at night. The moon seemed ginormous and further ahead was the Indian Ocean. Everything seemed so calm and peaceful. I tried to reach out and touch the moon. [When I thought of this concept and wondered what I would even use for A, Andanapettai clicked into place effortlessly. I decided to go with it since both represent beginnings.]
Blogger noun. 1. Where I started writing again when I was 17 or 18 years old. 2. The beginning of my sporadic writing journey over the years that spanned another Blogger account, two Tumblr accounts, Facebook Notes and now, thendraluthaman.com. 3. A term I don’t really like to associate myself with, for reasons I can’t quite pinpoint.
Coffee noun. 1. A beverage I’ve been drinking since I was six years old. 2. A beverage my grandmother introduced to me when she came to Singapore. 3. A beverage I drink every day and long for my grandmother’s take of late since I’ve not had it in six years. 4. My grandmother makes the best coffee in the world. Considering current events, I sometimes get scared with the uncertainty of whether I would get to taste it again. Then I realise, she is ageing and that maybe those days are behind me after all.
Decolonise verb. 1. What I wish for History. 2. What I wish for some South Asians, and their mentality surrounding fairness, caste, status, and apparently, patriarchy too. 3. What I’m trying to do for my own brain sometimes – of history, culture, and my own conditioning. 4. A term I went “Oh?” about in my early twenties, and now find myself caring more and more about.
Enjoy Enjaami song. 1. The current theme song of my life as it reminds me of my values. 2. Something about the beat and the lyrics takes me right to the part of India my family travelled to when I was young. See KAGITHAPATTARAI.
Failure noun. 1. What an inner voice uses to constantly describe me when it comes to thendraluthaman.com and my writing. 2. A term I consciously use to describe myself when it comes to thendraluthaman.com and my writing. Occasionally.
Golden Village place. 1. A cinema chain in Singapore 2. I’m insistent about watching movies in this chain rather than others. 3. A place where for two hours, I am part of something else and leave feeling like everything is okay, revitalised, and like I have this thing called life under control.
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport place. 1. The place I flew to with money I made myself for the first time in my life! 2. A place where I got an unexpected, “nice name!”, cementing my identity.
Instagram noun. 1. One of my greatest love-hate relationships. 2. There wouldn’t be thendraluthaman.com, my community, or even a life in writing if not for Instagram. antonym: FAILURE.
Journaling verb. 1. How my love for writing started. 2. A habit I’m quickest to forsake, only to get annoyed with myself when its therapeutic value becomes exceedingly clear just a few words in.
Kagithapattarai place. 1. Where we went during our yearly visits to India until I was 13 or 14. 2. My dad’s hometown. 3 Where I talked my grandfather’s ears off with stories about Singapore until the day he passed away. 4. Fireflies at night, paddy fields in the backyard, outdoor plumbing and toilet, clay stoves, mosquito bites, cows mooing, coconut tree that bears the most delicious coconuts in the world, no buildings more than two storeys tall or within ten meters of each other. 5. A completely different lifestyle from the one I had in Singapore, and constantly made me wonder, reflect, and realise, I am my grandparents’ wildest dreams. 6. The reason I REFUSED to get a Singapore citizenship until much later. See “The Immigration Officer and the Identity Crisis”. synonym: “home” until sometime in my teens.
Love noun. 1. Without which we are nothing. 2. A form of spirituality I believe in. 3. What I wish there was a bit more of in this world. See ROMANTIC.
Mulan noun. 1. The only Disney princess I wished I was. 2. A character that created a significant impact in my childhood with the messages of feeling like I’m unable to live up to my parents’ expectations, doing the right thing, and feeling like what I’m doing is not what I’m meant to be doing. synonyms: Sherlock Holmes.
National Library Board place. 1. A habit in my childhood. 2. A source of comfort in my adulthood – when a professor unfairly yelled at me in a class in university, I left the class. I wasn’t ready to go home yet so I went to the nearest library, browsed around and borrowed a book. When a meeting didn’t go well at my old job, I did the same, found the nearest library, browsed around and borrowed a book. 3. Books are a source of comfort, but the standardisation of library calling codes and layouts give me this sense of familiarity; when I walk into a library, I know exactly what to expect.
Oratorical competitions noun. 1. A form of competition where you give a speech around a title. 2. This was a BULK of my childhood – my dad and mum would write the speech, I would memorise it, rehearse it in front of my parents with the right gesticulations and intonations, compete, win something, come home. 3. This is also the reason I don’t really have stage fright and don’t mind speaking in front of a crowd. Ironically, I feel nervous about speaking on Instagram lives or on stories, because I’m worried people would judge me for my appearance.
Perumal name. 1. The way I choose to worship God. My parents never imposed religion on me, instead introducing me to it and letting me make my own decisions. As a kid, I was overwhelmed and fascinated by Hinduism and the sheer number of mythologies and Gods. When I asked my parents “Who do we pray to, do we pray to them ALL??”, my parents told me to pick whoever and however many I wanted. I chose Perumal (commonly known as Vishnu) because he was described as the Protector – Hinduism has Brahma the Creator, Shiva the Destroyer and Vishnu the Protector as the primary three Gods and my young mind interpreted it as Perumal can protect AND also create or destroy to protect something. I don’t know if Perumal is actually out there, but I always felt/ feel significantly protected. 2. Spirituality is a considerable part of my life although I’m fiercely private about it. I feel like I have my own relationship with God, which doesn’t exactly follow the conventional form of praying or Hinduism. Another reason I’m private about it, for fear of scrutiny.
Quadrennial adjective. 1. thendraluthaman.com will have been around for four years with this October. 2. I told my grandfather stories of Singapore for a quadrennial before he passed away. 3. I was at my old 9 to 5 for a quadrennial. 4. My secondary school education was the most formative four years of my life – education aside, not only did I learn about the “real world”, but I also learned about exactly what and who I didn’t want to be.
Romantic adjective. 1. The idealised way in which I view the world. 2. A belief that we could all be better and live in harmony if we tried; shared a little more love. 3. I’m literally always living life through rose-tinted lenses [one of my favourite phrases, and yes, I’m trying to find a pair of rose-tinted shades to match my ~aesthetic~] See LOVE.
Sherlock Holmes noun. 1. The character that created the single most impact of my childhood. 2. I read a compilation with four short stories on Sherlock Holmes, marvelled at his intelligence and swore to be as deductive and observant as he is (is? was?) 3. Sherlock Holmes was my version of a superhero; a superhero I was obsessed with, admired, and worshipped. synonyms: Mulan.
thendraluthaman.com noun. 1. My hope, my dream, my fears. 2. My love, my joy, my sorrow. 3. A place for my deepest, darkest thoughts I wouldn’t even tell my friends, but leave in the hands of unknown strangers for their validation and interpretation. 4. My proudest accomplishment. See BLOGGER.
Unexpected adjective. 1. The “theme” of my life – the call I got for my previous 9 to 5 was unexpected, getting the job was unexpected, many of my freelance gigs were unexpected, starting thendraluthaman.com was an unexpected move for me, the list goes on. 2. Everything that has been good or eventually turned out to be for the best in my life has been “unexpected”. See PERUMAL.
Valangaiman place. 1. Where I lived until I was two. 2. I have no memories of this place and remember nothing. Even when my parents specifically stopped in front of the house we used to live in. Zilch.
Walkman object. 1. The technology I'm insistent about using to listen to my music. 2. An obsession that has evolved over the years in the form of the actual Walkman, a Discman that had the “Walkman” logo on it, Sony’s Walkman phones, and always, always, Sony earpieces. Music has been a constant in my life and while I can tell you my earliest memory or when I started drinking coffee, I don’t know what is the first song I listened to, and I certainly don’t remember the first time I listened to music.
Xylophone noun. 1. A word I had no idea how to pronounce when flipping through those “A for Apple” books as a child. 2. The quintessential example of how my written English is significantly different from my spoken English; there are so many words I’ve seen, understand, and know how to use but have never heard. And so I compartmentalise them when in social settings so I don’t make a fool out of myself.
Yishun place. 1. Where the Singapore government offered us housing when we came to Singapore. 2. Where I grew up. 3. I’m extremely defensive about it, especially when there are so many jokes making Yishun out to be the Florida of Singapore. 4. What I knew should be “home” considering it’s where I grew up and everything but feel conflicted when I say it. See KAGITHAPATTARAI.
Z/ழ compound letter. 1. One man’s poison, another man’s medicine. 2. Everything comes to an end; the bittersweet reality of life. [Context: I know it looks like I cheated because I didn’t use a word starting with the alphabet “Z”, but this makes perfect sense to me so bear with me as I explain it: When I see the alphabet Z, I think of the Tamil character “ழ”. When we want to spell out a Tamil word with English alphabets, and we need to use the character “ழ”, we use the alphabet “Z”. But here’s the thing, the character “ழ” has an “L” sound and nothing to do with “Z” – regardless of whether you pronounce it as “zee” or “zed”. So, for example, the word “Tamil” itself is actually the anglicised version of Thamizh/ தமிழ். In the Tamil language, the letter “ழ” has a special place because presumably, no other languages have the same sound/ character; it’s celebrated for its beauty in the Tamil language. But when you describe it as an “L” sound or use the alphabet “Z” when referring to it in the English language, everything just falls flat. And I don’t understand the choice of letters for substituting “ழ” either. It has always been interesting dissonance for me in the sense that I wonder if “ழ” was a person, how it would feel? To be shrunk and made into something else it’s not when it comes to another language but celebrated in its own? And so every time I’m typing, writing, or see the word “Z”, there’s always this awareness in the back of my mind about the letter “ழ”. And since the word “Tamil” ends with a variation of the “ழ” letter, it feels like the best way to conclude this post – no matter where I am, where I go, what I do, no matter if I’m speaking English or have a blog in English, I am Tamil, that’s the end of story. It’s the one identity I’ve always fallen back on and felt comfortable in. I may be in situations where being Tamil feels like a disadvantage or situations where I’m side-lined for being Tamil, but I know how to adapt and evolve. Just like how the Tamil language has over millennia.]
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