Mostly Quiet

"I am humbled in this city
There seems to be an endless sea of people like us
Wakeful dreamers, I pass them on the sunlit streets
In our rooms filled with laughter
We make hope from every small disaster"

Painting by Chagall (2006) by The Weepies

What is the visual equivalent of dropping eaves?

There is this restaurant I haunt in the late evenings when I get these cravings for minced pork porridge at Plaza Mahkota which I'm missing now after I got mailed off to the other side of Malaysia. There's a few places like it in Malacca where the proprietors know me on sight and my usual order from memory because I am always distinctively alone. I'm only in my twenties but already I am falling into habitual patterns and the proverbial comfort of old shoes.

A few weeks ago, I was there and had my usual bowl of minced pork porridge - hold the offal and cilantro, please - when a family seated at a table in front of mine caught my chronically faraway eyes. It was nuclear, Chinese and peopled by three; a young father and a mother, and their six or seven-year-old daughter. It's a common variation of the same theme, except the parents spoke only with their hands.

The child chattered animatedly and audibly about cute inconsequentials, while her Mom and Dad reply in a signed language, which she appeared to understand. I don't know why, but I find them endlessly watchable. I guess it's the same reason why listening to the "halfalogue" of someone talking on a cellphone is so much more distracting (and sometimes annoying) compared to a proper back-and-forth conversation or a monologue, as psychologists from Cornell University have found out. That effect caught my notice, but it's not what held my attention captive.

It always felt a bit like I'm rudely intruding into the private lives of strangers when I allow myself to have thoughts about them, but I couldn't help but wonder how the parents met each other. Was it in a sign language class, a support group or at their mutual workplace? Did they, like me, find love on the internet, or were they introduced to one another by friends who thought they were a match made in silence? I may never understand but I imagine that being mute would define one's identity indelibly. It must be like being born a man or a woman; it shouldn't matter, except it does. I want to know what it's like to have the love of someone who does not see what marks you apart from the rest of the world as a disability, but as a shared experience. If for a day, I could live the silent man's life, married to his silent wife, I would.

I also thought about the little girl growing up with parents who cannot speak, and wondered if it impeded the development of her language skills. Was she raised with the help of grandparents or uncles and aunts during that crucial period of her young life when she was learning how to express herself verbally, something her parents could never teach her? If someone would make an honest film about this family, I would watch it - I would be grateful for that little glimpse into their inner lives, and cherish it as much as I did Last Train Home about a family fractured by economical circumstances in the fast changing face of China, and The Kids Are All Right, which told the story of a married lesbian couple and the two children they mothered with the help of a sperm donor. I really appreciate these variations of the same theme; these multifaceted diversity of the human condition.

I noticed that she acted as the voice of her parents. She made the orders and then later, the payment. When they were leaving, the lo pan of the shop came to their table to chat with them (he couldn't sign, but that didn't stop him from trying his hands at a crude game of charades). The lo pan's daughter later joined in and I found out, to my surprise, she knows sign language too. Perhaps they are related, or are friends - or maybe she has a loved one who is mute as well. I don't know why, but I'm endlessly fascinated by how deep and rich and utterly human other people's stories can be. We forget these things often. Some people never remember.

There are times when I let myself suppose a future in which I have kids of my own, and my encounter with the mostly quiet family was one of those times. I wanted to call it wishful thinking, but I don't think that that's quite it. The other day, I asked the Long-Suffering Girlfriend™ if she thinks I would make a good father.

Without the slightest wisp of hesitation, she said, "No." It really shouldn't, but it still made me feel a little sad.

P.S. As I was writing this in a Starbucks coffeehouse, I was sitting beside another family of three; an Indian father, a Chinese mother, and a child that defies and destroys the illusory lines dividing the races.

Has a voice,

k0k s3n w4i