The promise

In the honeymoon of our friendship, when we first fell in like, A and I went to Taipei. Every day was a joy. We were in the city of authentic Taiwanese sausages, the National Palace Museum, Jerry Yen and Jay Chou, who was with us not only in spirit but also on surround sound: All the shops in Ximending, the two-bit Taiwanese Harajuku, would play his songs and we would feel luckier than Toto top-prize winners. We were happy when it rained or didn’t rain, shone or didn’t shine, or even when a taxi took us past an Italian Tomato restaurant. Italian Tomato! Maybe Meteor Garden was shot there! The thought alone was bliss.

I was so in like with A, I never once thought to tease her about her Teochew-twanged Cantonese when we went to Hong Kong from Taipei. She was so in like with me, she told all her other friends about me. She didn’t - and doesn’t - like spending sprees but she went with me when I wanted retail therapy. On one occasion, she asked, “Would you ever marry me if I was a man?” and answered, “You wouldn’t.” “You would be too nice to me,” I said. I do like my men lean and mean.

Now A has married my hanyu pinyin namesake, a not-lean, not-mean man who is nice to her and her grandma. She has always been more sensible than me.

In the weeks leading up to her wedding in the InterContinental, she didn’t turn into Bridezilla but I became Bridesmaidzilla. I hardly had dinner; I bought my first SK-II facial mask, first concealer and first anti-frizz hair balm; I weighed myself so much, the scales capitulated and said I had shed 2kg of my Chinese New Year blubber.

Feicius, the Confucius of our house, counselled, “What is your job as a bridesmaid? Your job is to make her look good. Your job is to make her look thin. Eat.”

“But I bought a BCBG dress,” I said, offering my official line. Unofficially… Maybe my mother knew… Maybe she smelled something… “Do you want diamonds with your dress?” “No, no, no, not my wedding.” Did I protest too much? Didn’t I?

I did do my job as a friend. Minutes before the big moment, as A was waiting to make a bridal entrance, she seemed to lose her nerve. “I know it is a little late but am I doing the right thing?” Not quite knowing how to answer, I asked, “Is he good to you?” It was the right question. “Yes. He’s very good to me. I’ll be very good to him.” She made the vow with such a solemnity, I blinked back tears; then we stood in the suite, held hands and went back to waiting for the wedding marshal’s signal.

No LoVe lost

We have fallen behind. Fashion, as anyone who has visited Hong Kong knows, is a race to wear this season’s die-die-must-have or the best copy from Causeway Bay, maybe – why else should models strut along run-ways? – and somehow or other, when we were ransacking our bedroom closets for the worst clothes to wear to the market, the competition has come to little Bukit Batok.

So it is that Fei and I are at the market one morning, watching the world go by with her LV. “Wah, atas, siah. See the girl with the –” says Issey Feiyake, naming a limited-edition zillion-dollar canvas bag I have never ever heard of. Monogram-less and on a girl in shorts and sandals, it looks like any other canvas carryall. But what do I know? The guru has spoken. I’m just a shoe slut – the CK in my life is not Calvin Klein but Charles & Keith.

Then I catch sight of the chic monogram: a woman dressed up and made up to the nines, in pink high heels, with two bagfuls of food and in a pink shirt-and-skirt set so sheer, the world can read most of the multicoloured LVs on her undies. She is quite a sight on many, many levels. “Made in China,” says Fei. “The undies or the woman?” “Both.”

Like little children again, we point her out to Pa and Ma, but they act all blasé. We are told of a newcomer to the neighbourhood who goes for morning walks in her qipao. “Fresh off the boat, trying not to lose face,” says Ma, who travelled here on the same boat some 50 years ago. (She is not the same, she maintains. Her parents had made her here before her mother took the boat to, and gave birth in, China.)

We have fallen behind, not that we want to be ahead – it is our birthright to look as laidback as we want in the heartland – but where has Bak gone? For one thing, he has gone bottle-blond (Fei says it makes him look like a Johor video pirate). For another thing, he has gone temping for LV, manhandling in its store and warehouses all the bags we will not buy. Bak, LV runner, our pride and joy.