October 2014

324 326

PARTING SHOT
324 October14
Here’s your
c h a n c e t o
get published
– and make
some money
at the same time.
We’re looking for 500-
word written contributions on any
funny, poignant, practical or even
controversial topic that touches on
expat life in Singapore. Simply email
your stories in a Word document to
and we’ll
consider them for inclusion in an
upcoming issue.
By Dave Fox
“Excuse me!” he pants at me and my wife, “Can I ask you a question?”
“Can I ask you a question?” is my least favourite question in the world. The
follow-up is never, “Would you like a free weekend in Bali?”
So my standard answer to “Can I ask you a question?” is “No.” But on this
day at the mall, something goes terribly wrong. We hesitate long enough for
him to launch his follow-up: “Where are you from?”
When a salesperson asks where you are from, he does not care where
you are from. He is creating an illusion of friendliness so he can sell you stuff.
I try to walk away, but Kattina commits a tactical error. She confides we are
American and have lived in Singapore for three years.
“I have a gift for you!” the salesman announces because – ooh, how lucky!
– he has special gifts for Americans who have lived in Singapore for three
years. He hands us each a microscopic tube of Bubble Dream Body Lotion.
“Okay, let’s go,” I mumble, grabbing Kattina’s arm.
But it’s too late. The salesman has attacked my wife with a squeeze bottle.
He is now rubbing lavender-scented gloop on her and telling her to come
into his shop.
“I will wash your hands for you!” he says.
Huh?! Since when has it been appropriate for a guy to approach random
couples and offer to wash the female’s hands?
“You too!” he says, moving toward me. “I will wash your hands too!”
“No!” I tell him. “Lavender makes me nauseous.”
“I have something else then,” he says. And although my wife, who knows
I am fantasising about biting this man’s nose off, tells him to back off, it’s no
use. He squeezes something non-lavender onto my hand and drags us by
our wrists into his boutique, exclaiming, “I will make your hands as soft as
a baby’s skin!”
We have no choice but to enter the store. If we don’t go to thisman’s sink, his
gloop will remain on us for several more minutes until we can locate a public
sink. And I don’t think it’s legal to wash gloop into public sinks in Singapore.
So we follow him into his shop where slathers me with a second concoction
– a soapy, salty mix – then tells me to rinse, which I do frantically.
“How does it feel?” he asks. “Smooth like a baby, yes?”
I don’t know. Salty and slimy? Is that how a baby’s skin feels? Possibly,
in which case, I am more at peace than ever with our decision not to have
children.
I rub my hands together vigorously in an attempt to de-gloop myself. I do
all I can to splash the excess gloop all over his countertop.
He reaches for a third tube – some sort of après-gloop. “Now let me just
put on some...”
“We have to go!” I say, and Kattina has my back. “My husband doesn’t like
gloop,” she says, fearful we might end up on Stomp: “Ang mo with gloopy
hands bites salesman on nose.”
Before he can gloop us a third time, we find the only dignified solution we
can think of. We rub the excess gloop off on our shirts and make a desperate
sprint for the MRT.
Dave Fox is a Singapore-based
writing coach and a freelance
travel and humour writer; visit
for more.
The shopkeeper pounces, with an enthusiasm normally
reserved for over-excited poodles.