In Continuum.

The Sister Act

Living with my sister for the past twenty one years, I have come to the conclusion that my sister has only two distinct emotions. Happiness, and extreme irritation. My mother thinks that the fiercest people are the most timid at heart, and to her my sister is the perfect example for that statement. Underneath those tantrums and tempers is a girl too afraid to do a lot of things. To me, though her constant bickering about the world can get on my nerves, I am not complaining because when my father is away and the house is empty, she fills up the silence by her constant whining and bitching. But then again, there is a certain height to this threshold that you shouldn't cross, and once you do it gets very annoying to the others.

My sister and I never truly got along with each other. Of course, that greatly depends on if she is in a good mood or not. If she is, you might just have a nice chat with her the moment you step into her room. Sometimes, she might visit yours and you guys might end up laughing like wild hyenas too. But when she is in a foul mood, the members of the family will sense the invisible siren on top of her head as she wanders the house, warning us to stay five meters from wherever she is. Because we don't want trouble, and trouble would be to get in her way in any way. Talking to her is strictly forbidden, and if what you have to say is absolutely urgent and necessary, try to summarize your sentence into under five words. Anything more than that is just asking for trouble.

The mood of the house greatly depends on her, and my mother gave up about ten years ago to try to change her temper. Don't get me wrong, I love my sister. But I love her only when she is not going around pissing on everything in the world. She can be a nice girl, even if she decides to take a bite at my ear or burst out of the toilet just to scare me. But other than those times, I hate her little gestures of irritation once in a while. The way she rolls her eyes, or the way she makes that sound with her tongue, it really gets on my nerves.

Lately, because of the construction downstairs for the MRT station, she's been complaining nonstop about the noise, and the fact that she's been waking up to the constant pounding of metal against concrete every morning. Once in a while, she would scream "Shut up!" towards the site, as if the workers can hear anything more than a meter away from wherever they are. She vents her anger in the most ridiculous ways, and the problem with the noise is a constant topic at the dinner table, which my mother and I would received with the nodding of our heads and the generic "Oh yes, I agree" or "Yeah, that's right" answers. The truth is, we have heard this complain too many times, and maybe it is time to understand that it is inevitable to have noise?

It is not about whose room is bloody closer to the side of the house with the construction sister. I just think that if you are going to benefit from the new public transport system in a couple of years' time, you should jolly well stop complaining about the noise because it is a bloody construction site, not a library or an old folks' home. But then again, I bet she is going to be riding on the train in a few years' time and then telling us just how fast it took for her to get to Bishan, so happy about her new found ease in travel. To me, the pounding of the construction site has become somewhat of a background sound, and the only sound that disturbs me is the ones that my sister makes.

Other than that, she complains about the sound of our neighbors upstairs, running around in heels and moving furnitures in the middle of the night. Just now at the dinner table, with a chopstick between her lips and eyes rolling at inhuman rates, she spilled her complaints on the noise upstairs at night. Kids running around with heels, furnitures dragged here and there, and the sound of drilling in the walls too. To tell you the truth sister, our neighbors downstairs are probably wondering what the hell WE are doing in the middle of the night too. You probably don't notice because YOU are making those noise yourself, and this is what happens when you are sandwiched between two households, one upstairs and downstairs. If you are not happy about this, save up enough money and go buy a landed property, that will provide you with the perfect privacy and serenity. Or find a rich boyfriend and marry him in the next month or so, and make sure he owns a mansion in the Bahamas. Oh yeah, sorry I forgot. You are already married to those stupid boybands and their band members.

And stop complaining also about how irritating aunt is because she kept asking if you want to eat some more when you were back in Taiwan. We all know how old she is, and we all know that she had some kind of anger management issues. Besides, she was just asking if you want to eat anything else, she was just afraid that you might get hungry. You know how older women can get, they become a little naggy with age, so perhaps it is about time you realize that and stop whining about it. Because in a few decades you are going to end up like her, and let's see how you take it when somebody comes and says the same things about you.

Don't get me wrong, I love you my dear sister. But sometimes you can get on my nerves with your poker face and those little gestures of irritation. The truth is, as irritating as the world can be, that is how life is. It is all about compromises, and if you cannot compromise with the people and things around you, you are always going to end up pissed off with everything. Life doesn't go the way you want it to go all the time, so stop complaining and just bite your lips through the oredeal. It is not going to help if you are shouting at the Bangladeshi workers to shut up, when I am sure they themselves don't want to be working even on a Sunday afternoon because of a delayed schedule, nor do I think our aunt really wants to be naggy all the time. Because that is what life is, and that is how they are. Just because you are younger doesn't give you the right to be pissed off with the world.

Maybe it is about time you shut up about these little trivial matters in life. Or, maybe you just need a boyfriend like what my mother and I were talking about just the other day. You need somebody to love you, because nothing polishes you up like that kind of love. Whether it is a love that works out or one that fails, at least through those lessons you will only grow up and not remaining stagnant like you are now. Love, more than a lot of other things, is about compromises. Once you learn that my dear sister, perhaps the noise downstairs and the ones upstairs will become just the sound in the back of your head.