Interesting YouTube finds on Alfian Sa'at
Tuesday, March 19, 2013 | 2:37 PM | 0 comments
Searching "Alfian Sa'at" yields some interesting findings on YouTube. Listed below are some interesting videos that feature the works of Alfian Sa'at!
1. A reading from one of his short stories, Malay Sketches
Reading I: http://youtu.be/Rv8f81KHMtE
Reading II: http://youtu.be/xOARlsbeLqA
2. An interview with Alfian about Nadirah, which is a play that touches on religion
3. A video montage of images that depict what is written in Void Deck
Void Deck
Alfian Bin Sa'at
Where the neighbourhood wives,After a morning at the wet market,Sit facing the breezeTo trade snatches of gossipAbout leery shopkeepers,The local louts,(Like that fella who's always drilling his walls –Gives me migraine)And that mad womanWho throws things from her window.With careful put-downs theyFashion boasts, about stubborn sons,Lazy daughters, who by some miracle or mistakeAlways score well in class.When words falter,Gestures take over: pursed lips, rolling eyes,Animated hands adorned by bangles ofGold, jade, steel, string.And children orbit around themLaugh without diction –Their games of tag a reassuranceThat there has been no hothousingOf who is unclean, unwashed,Untouchable. When they break outInto some kindergarten song,One almost believes in a generationCleansed of skin-deep suspicions,And free from the superstitions of the tongue –And old folks sit like sagesTo deploy chess pieces with ancient strategies.In a corner, a caged bird burstsWith the song of its master's prideAnd wrinkled women breathe, throughTai-chi-tuned windpipes, the operatic melody of the air...All a wanton fantasy.Eyes reveal a meeting-pointFor loners and loiterers:A sense of things reduced-Conversations that trickle throughBrief noddings at lift landings,Teenage rhetoric scrawled, in liquid paper,On the stone-table chessboard,(Where the king used to sit)The grandiose house-selling dreams of residentsCompacted in anonymous letterboxes;As an afterthought, an old man peesUnder a public phone.A place to be avoided, this,How in its vastness it devours hours.Little wonder then,Why residents rush through void decksBack to the cramped comforts of homeAs if in fear of what such open space might doTo cosy minds.
Published in One Fierce Hour (1998)
Labels: Alfian Sa'at, Stanley