FOR all that enveloped us and kept us locked in that ominous year of 2020, the year began predictably enough, allowing itself a few months before upending all predictions. The one abiding principle through all this lay in words I chose to keep close to my head and heart decades ago - “Don’t follow leaders, watch your parking meters,” is what makes The Bob (Dylan) the living deity that he is, even as it possesses all the advantages of being true.
I shall begin this year as I did the last one - staying true to an ancient Chinese custom of waving to the clouds and mournfully declaring, “Bad rice! Bad rice!", that they among the jealous Gods may look upon me with pity and pass me by.
There is virtue in cunning it would seem, and as much of the rest of the world began grappling with the loss of incomes and anxieties of unimaginable proportions, I landed myself a job and a newly found family. Writing culture in the age of the pandemic will be a challenge, I was told: and on that cautionary note have settled to, here, in these pages, with a new found family, to share the stories and experiences of that most delicious of words - the heartland.
In this Age of the Pandemic we have not come to realise what a mess of the world we have made: we have come to realise just how much.
What remains, then, is to discover what is left of our inventiveness and imagination.
As we witness the turn into the New Year, let us call then for a chorus of “Bad rice! Bad rice!” and pepper it with just an added balm of May your New Year be blessed and bright. For me, this New Year begins as it always has for 51 years - a kiss on my mother’s forehead, and the wish, “Have a blessed birthday Ma.” – Eddin Khoo, Executive Editor - The Vibes
2020 was an interesting year, and one in which I could never have predicted would see me spending the first day of 2021, sitting in another (we’ve had two!) new office, finishing this note.
I had decided in late 2019 BC (before Covid), that 2020 would be a year of rest, relaxation and rejuvenation for all my bodies - physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. For those who know me either personally or from the years of sharing my journey in life with you on my various breakfast radio shows as you journeyed to work, you may have heard of my particularly stressful 2019 - battling breast cancer, multiple surgeries, work burnout, family stress and a kind of nameless apathy that begged for me to sit down and examine. I thought it would be difficult to let go of my show, my career, and so much of my identity which was tied up with what I had been doing for the last 23 years. But truthfully - it wasn’t. It was rather easy to let go of because it was just time. It was time to do something else, something new.
Looking back on those pre-Covid weeks of January 2020, I was blissfully ignorant of what was to come. Not just with regards to the looming global pandemic, but also with regards to my own self and where I wanted to be in the world. Having decided that a three month sabbatical would be enough to rejuvenate all that needed refreshing in my life, I found myself in a bit of a quandary when those three months ended in the middle of a total lockdown. Waylaid were the plans to re-train and forge a new career in helping others do what I do best - to relate to other people - in life, and within organisations. Instead, I found myself living in fear - of close contact, of people and where they had been, of getting sick. Again. Being immunocompromised, I had the most horrible dread that I would contract the ‘Rona and have to spend more time in hospital - in pain and fighting for my life. But as the months continued to see us in restricted social movement, I despaired, like many of you, of things ever returning to normal, and this was an even bigger dread. But this is our lives now. We must carry on.
In those early days of Covid-19, I did what many of you did - I cleaned my home, cooked some meals, made a feeble attempt at helping my teenagers homeschool (they are fairly independent and were not having it), caught up on my extended reading list, watched all the shows I wanted, stayed in touch with friends and family via video chat, and scrolled endlessly through all the social media platforms to see what the rest of the world was getting up to in the pandemic. I believe I thought that mostly everyone was doing the same. But as the months rolled on in the same tedious fashion, I knew that what I needed was a proper shake-up, and a reason and purpose to go out there and do things again.
When Terence Fernandez called me and told me he was setting up The Vibes, I was so excited for him. He is someone whom I have always greatly liked, respected and enjoyed working with on The Lite Front Page during my time on radio. But when he asked me to join him and the team as Culture & Lifestyle Editor, I was excited for me. This was exactly the purpose I needed in my life. And the opportunity to learn from and work alongside another great journalist and writer whom I admire, Eddin Khoo, is another privilege. I feel that in the last quarter of this miserable year of pandemic, I have been blessed.
Although the medium is digital and the conveyance is the written word, the essence of this role for me is still the same - to relate, communicate, tell stories, and to share. And I look forward to sharing with you, my dear friends. May 2021 be a year with a lot of great stories. – Shazmin Shamsuddin, Editor - Culture & Lifestyle
– The Vibes, January 1, 2021
