WHEN THE URGE HITS

Regular visitors to this blog site know that I often take public transit down to Chinatown and back. Usually the Number One on Clay Street, returning on Sacramento. Sometimes, however, the buses on Pacific are more convenient. Though rather crowded around early evening. Lots of senior citizens also catch that bus, a few of whom express themselves.


"I'm tired and my ass itches!"


Okay, old man. Please sit, but don't scratch. We can respect your seniority and forthrightness, and we don't want you to collapse. But as for your skin ailments down "there", we will take your word, please do not put thought into action.

Think before you scratch. Always.

The rest of you, ditto.


I tend to be wary of people thinking aloud; they're usually crazy. Down at my bank, however, the counter person assisting me was talking to herself barely audibly: "yat pak man. Yat pak sap, yat pak yi sap. Baat go sin". One hundred. One hundred and ten, one hundred and twenty. Eight cents.
It was soft, quite subconscious.

When I talk to myself, it's usually in Dutch. Though sometimes specked with foreign terms. Cantonese, Hindi, Indonesian, German. But I have NEVER said: "Ik ben moe, en mijn reet jeukt". Whoever might be listening does not need to know that my reet is itchy. Including myself.

Actually, if any one were to ask what I said, I would probably assure them that I was quoting from Scripture. The prophet Elisha, regarding Naaman's wife's leprosy, for instance. Parts of her also jeuked.

我嘅籮癢啦，肛門股燃燒了。

Join me in praying that neither today's bank teller nor any of us ever utters the sentence above ('ngo ge lo yeung laa, gong mun gu yin siu le'). Instead, let us consider the prophet Elisha, and the wife of Naaman's leprosy.




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