Hope

I did something really silly today.

I made an effort to queue up in the endless snake of hopeful singaporeans heartlanders in the dreams of the 10 million jackpot.

Not that I expect to win any of it but while I was in the queue, I looked at all the faces. Aunties with sagging eyebags and droopy chins with large jade bangles, young executives in formal attire shading the boxes discreetly and the Filipino maids who are being nannies to their employees kids, chattering away in a language foreign to me.

There are so many different personalities out there but all of them are in the search of that hope. The hope to win it big. To have a complete makeover, to establish themselves in Shenton Way and to provide material comforts to the family back home.

If hope was suppose to be optimistic, it wasn't showing gamely on the faces of these queuers. Strangely enough, everyone queuing was basically frustrated or impatient, or the fact that all of them look forlorn, or just plain embarrassed of their prescene here to hit the jackpot like everyone else who was equally frustrated, impatient, forlorn and embarrassed. I felt the same way too, I didn't belong here. I just answered the call of my Dad who asked me to "try".

Try as I may, shading 7 out of 45 boxes, what are the chances of me getting the Toto jackpot prize of S$10 million? My chances are like 1 in 10 million but my dad wanted me to take a shot. The auntie, the executive and the maid also wants that shot, that hope, that dream of 10 million bucks. Ever wondered if people did not hope and know the harsh realities of life, what would be life after then when hope is nonexistent?

There would be no more gambling, no more stock market speculations, no more miracles at hospitals. Hope, is the very essence inside of everyone that people draw upon on, but discard when they get lucky in scenarios. Hope is everything to many but in fact, is just a term that reality drags upon and which people pin their expectations on. They can possess all hope in a minute, and lose all hope in a second.

Today, I got a reality check. Friends of close friends that I know of are getting attached like runaway couples without my knowledge. It just reminds me of the misery of what I have not fully experienced yet. Not that i am depressed but I question myself with "What ifs?" towards relationships, and then you will wonder what have I been doing wrong.

I know the hope of being loved by someone is all decided by fate. But I cling on to the hope that fate gets to me faster than those 7 winning numbers that will appear on my Toto ticket.

Money, not love, can be won by a $3.50 piece of paper. Because all it possess is hope.

- Benjamin

P.S. I dyed my hair brown today, it ain't obvious but I will provide photos tomorrow. I hope you won't think it's ugly.