I went back home for lunch today

I went back to the coffee shop near my oldhome for lunch today.

To my own surprise, I could still recall the faces of the stall owners. To my greater surprise, they had not shifted nor retired after 4 years. Those stall owners had been working there since I was a little boy. One rarely sees hawkers working for so many years without having to shift or close down, at least that’s how I feel.

The scenes which appeared before my eyes as I walked towards the coffee shop reminded of the days when I used to walk home from the nearby bus stop. Treading through the footsteps of my (much earlier) youth was like wandering through a dream – I almost couldn’t tell whether I was walking or drifting.

Many changes have taken place since I moved away from here. Some of the old shop houses were knocked down and the entire area replaced with an empty field, while new flats sprung up in previously vacant plots of land. I tried to recall what each view used to look like back then as I walked along a deserted lane, a lane that was never devoid of people as far as my memory served.

A playground filled with noisy children, empty benches that were always occupied by some elderly folk, dilapidated shops which still see owners keeping their cash in high hanging buckets, vanished into the air. Just like the way it happens in dramas.

As I tucked into my lunch, I stared at the all too familiar Pandan Reservoir and the ever-busy West Coast Road, wondering if the water in the reservoir still glitters as brightly under the rosy setting sun, if the sky still turns into a lovely purple hue upon the approach of dusk, if loving couples, and happy families still stroll around the reservoir while taking in the charming beauty of the surroundings.

I wonder if I’ll float back in time if I were to stand atop the walls that form the reservoir once again.