The walkway leads from the academic block to the canteen and hall. Every Rafflesian who has been to the Bishan campus, will remember the House and ORA boards, the wooden benches, the chairs and tables stacked inside the stairway to the top of the clock tower. The open air walkway with bougainvillea flower bushes on the second level, and that breeze that never goes away. This was the only photo I ever took from the Gryphon Lair, next to the prefect's room and the scout dens, a picture of just the shetted soccer field. Now walk that same walkway from the staff room and you hit a wall, cordoning off the construction site where once the canteen was. Where the physical world has left nothing behind, your memory carries on...
I used to just sit on the portion of the walkway where they cut off, inches behind the wall that stands now. The never-ending breeze would blow, and I would just have my random thoughts, or not even think at all, just taking in that moment between lessons, enjoying the view of the field or people walking to the canteen. Or watching the sun set, slowly but surely over Junction 8 in the distance.
Further on, it was the Gryphon's Lair, the relac corner above the canteen. It was the place for some carrom or board games, or just to sit on the old, discarded couches. If you were from 01 or 02 and more recently the RIPB, you would be in front using the lousy and loose powerpoint, connecting your hifi or radio and practicing some funk dance. Scouts would be having their meetings, or having first aid, rope tying or any number of activities in the Gryphon's Lair.
In the midst of all that activity outside the prefect's room, some poor prefects would be trying to plan an upcoming event, or would be holding a departmental meeting. The radio would be on to compete with the noise outside, the phone might be ringing off the hook with some teacher trying to reach a prefect for an event, someone would be shouting in jubilation for scoring an ultra-difficult win in carrom, the guitar would be playing as someone strums a tune, or at least trys to, and I would be writing in the board diary about that 'quite chio' gal.
Across from the PB room, would be the scout dens. The 01 den would be in its usual state, with that funny but familiar smell coming from the carpet from god knows when, and god knows what has gone into that carpet over the years. The cupboards lining the side of the den would be filled with patrol logs all the way from the first years of our group, the table surfaces would have been lined with notes for lashing or pioneering or (name your scout skill), 486 computers would be operating with someone playing some real oldie, older than doom or dune 2. Think really old. Some poor Sec 1 would be having his first lesson in playing expert carrom, getting trashed by a J1 or other who would be teaching the finer points on a seasoned carrom board (A secret which neither the prefects nor the 02 scouts have been able to crack, how 01 gets super-smooth and shining carrom boards without powder. I have made my , and shall say no more.) If you came really
late one nite, hear laughing and then bored voices, a long sermon-like speech on the essence of scouting, or just plain bullshit, relax, it ain't the moose head hanging on the wall of the den talking, nor have our dead old boys paid a visit. It's a GC meeting.
02 scout den? no comments, too boring. Oh maybe one thing, they like to throw shit over to our den, because the dividing wall between our dens is really that low.
Then there is the canteen, heaven on earth, provided you're willing to queue, you can find a seat or table without bird shit on it, and YOU ONLY ORDER FROM THE LEFT SIDE OF THE CANTEEN. LEFT SIDE. SAY IT WITH ME, LEFT SIDE OF THE CANTEEN. EMPHASIS IS FOR A REASON, REPETITION IS ALWAYS FOR IMPORTANT POINTS. LEFT, LEFT, LEFT SIDE. Drinks, dessert, WESTERN FOOD, and KI. Kampung Istimewa. Genetically modified HUGE chicken thighs fried with an oily but oh so wonderful batter. Nasi Briyani, only on Fridays, and only if you come fast enough and auntie can remember your name. Nothing else. Right side at ur own risk, it's your digestive tract so heed my advice if you want to continue having one.
The atrocious first floor toilets, where people eating from the wrong side will converge, and the banner painters, and the sportsmen who need to take a leak running in with their shetted boots, and the odd Rugger who has just been stepped on in training with metal studded soccer boots, and is bleeding profusely with a head wound above his right eye and getting his red Moor House shirt even redder, washing his wound in a basin where someone has spat in, washed his dirty hands or leg in, washed his paint covered hands with thinner in, and others we shall leave unmentioned. That odd Rugger is still very much alive...
And he is currently feeling nostalgic. That was the RI canteen block, as I remember it. Now there is nothing there, a construction site with piling equipment and cranes. Soon it will be the new auditorium, from 2007 onwards. Soon it will give some new Rafflesian his own memories, something he can hold onto even when he is old and graying, and the building itself no longer exists.
I guess this was how the Old Boys from the Grange Road or even the Bras Basah campus felt, seeing their school only in their memories. Bras Basah campus is now Raffles City, you can read the plaque for the memorial for Raffles Institution. Grange Road is now still part of MOE, but no longer a school. But I guess in feeling this sense of loss, I feel something else, that I have moved on somewhere in life, I am walking on in life. But right now, I'm just taking a glance back, through that walkway I have passed through, past that metal wall the world has constructed, but where my memory doesn't stop.
