Thirty Four Thirty Fives in One Room

.. and then some thirty sixes bitterly turning thirty seven in January.

It was my class’ 20th reunion and we had a gathering on 8th August 2008. Whoever decided to organise this, didn’t really care that we had to miss the Beijing Olympic Games Opening Ceremony for this.

But we didn’t seem to miss it. Maybe if it had been a whole bunch of boys, that might have been different.

Every five years, we meet. I missed the first two. Very reluctantly went for the third, less reluctantly went for the fourth. Each reunion it gets easier to put on a brave front and meet people you sometimes feel you want kept in the past.

And you meet some people whom you really enjoyed the company of in school. FQ, TI , CML, MO, BC.

And others who have lost so much weight, they’re unrecognisable. AH (with whom I took the bus home), PW. They both look fabulous. And fabulous is not a word I use frequently.

Being with this group of women, whom I’ve spent 10 years with, and some spent 12 years together because they met in kindergarten and continued on the same school till ‘O’ Levels, the whole affair was quite easy, comfortable and casual. It felt a little bit like putting on an old pair of jeans.

I started attending these things out of obligation. It always seemed someone was trying hard to include me in these reunions. Even the casual meet ups throughout the years, when someone who’d been away for a while, came back for a visit, I’d get a call from MO.

I’d always come up with some excuse not to attend. But at certain point, you realise you can’t keep coming up with excuses (lies). And one day, it’s going to get you. Plus, it’s hard to organise these things, get people together. So I thought I’d just be, you know… supportive.

MO who’s always been at every reunion and casual gatherings, missed this reunion because she’s now migrated to Melbourne so her children can grow up in a less stressful environment. And now that she’s gone – and I wouldn’t say I’m at all a close friend – I did miss her being with us. She sat behind me in class next to CML who claimed she’d never grow up. Yeah, two boys and a job at Wendy’s heading its hamburger bun research arm, she’s grown up quite a bit

MO would always call me personally to get me to attend these things. But this year, it was an SMS from the ever cool headed BC. Wasn’t the same.

Compared to the last reunion, the organisers managed to contact more people who have made lives overseas. They came from all over: UK, US, Malaysia, Canada, Hong Kong… while some decided to attend the Olympics in Beijing, two were partying in Ibiza, some had just migrated and are starting new lives in other countries, some who are teachers overseas (no leave) could not get away and some chose not to attend because they still had issues with some of those who did attend the reunion.

Every time at the reunion, I can identify at least 80% of the people there. But I am frequently left to wonder where I was when I was in school.

For example, I just found out that the snooty AS, who with the snootier AY, this duo who used to tie their sweaters around their waists and flip through expensive volumes of Vogue that the rest of us could not afford, AS, when she was growing up, had to deal with her mother’s constant bouts of depression.

And our head prefect DC, who is not contactable because she doesn’t want to have anything to do with our school because her little sister lost her battle with cancer and passed away while we were all still attending school together.

Or that AN’s (the one half in Ibiza) father swindled the parents of my classmates when we were in primary school. And that LA (who left for RGS after PSLE) told her that her father was going to get the police to go after AN’s father and AN, who was totally ignorant of her father’s activities bawled her eyes out.

And then there are the photos of classmates – some of them including me – I have NO photos! And I don’t recollect having taken photos with my classmates, except for the official ones.

I was also reminded, that SLH (smartest girl in our year, and currently a drug pusher) was in a McDonald’s ad. AS (yes, Miss Snooty, who isn’t so snooty any more) was, with her younger sister, hosting some kid’s show when she was in secondary school and also apparently tried out for the Fame Awards.

Where was I? How come I never knew this stuff was going on?

If I’d known all this then, maybe AS wouldn’t have seemed so snooty, but distant. AN wouldn’t have seemed so wild and rebellious but trying to find her identity and distance herself from her family. Who knows?

At the end of this, I can’t help thinking how undervalued the full school is. When you stay in a school from kindergarten/primary to secondary school it’s very different. But when you have a full school that is tiny – no more than 80 students took their ‘O’ levels each year then; our primary school then was small when compared to other schools – the experience is special.

Those two (GG & AN) in Ibiza may have been in different classes at some point in school, but they have stuck with each other through thick and thin. TI’s married to a guy introduced by SS, a few years after graduation, in a relationship that spanned continents. I am acquainted with many of my classmates’ younger sisters who also studied in our school. Our connections are just not within our year. But because we were a small school, we knew many who were ahead of us, and those who were coming up after us.

I’m not close to any of my classmates. I don’t keep in contact with them. I’m not a sentimental person.

But as I get older and get used to the idea of reunions, maybe, just maybe I am more sentimental than I think I am. And that connections to the past mean I’m closer to my classmates than I realise I am.

Well, whatever it is, I know that come 2013, I, with FQ (with whom I won a cooking competition, and made CML pissed) am in-charge of the post-dinner drinks.