Market Place

It was the first time back to Singapore since I had left when I was three. I had no recollection of this country except for some old photos that proved I had once lived there.

The blazing hot sun beat down on the back of my neck. I walked under the canopy-covered market place to escape the scorching heat. Fans were rotating from side to side, pushing cool air at me for a short moment until the humid air clung to my skin and became a reality again.
As I walked further in, the smell of fish was prominent throughout the whole market. Men wearing aprons, rubber gloves, and gum boots were throwing fish around. They were bargaining with customers in a coarse dialect I didn't understand. Trying to escape the stench of fish I move towards a cart selling incense. Little streams of smoke were coming off a thin stick hung at the corner of the cart. The incense masked the smell of fish. On the cart were bundles of thin sticks wrapped in a shiny piece of gold string. Stray dogs sat and watched as people went by. I felt an urge to go pet their shaggy fur, but I remembered my aunties telling me not to.
Ke-poh aunties laughed and gossiped away with each other as they walked arm in arm through the market. Their children lagged behind them with their backpacks and water bottles swung across their shoulders. They dragged their feet, looking tired from a long day at school and a pile of homework awaiting them once they got home.

I stepped out of the canopy seeing enough of the market for one day. Whiles walking back to the HDB flat in the scorching heat, a strange feeling of discomfort came over me. For a place were I was surrounded by "my people", I sure felt like a foreigner.




So... I'm bad at concluding paragraphs. lol.