Chapter 1 — The Blue Hour — NUS Graduation — Singapore
I didn't cry at graduation. Everyone else did. Mothers in sarees, fathers with bouquets going foggy in plastic, friends filming at University Hall, NUS Kent Ridge. I stood under the angsana tree outside the Hall, my robe folded over my arm because I couldn't stand wearing it. I wore a turtleneck even though it was 34 degrees because it felt more like me. I had my camera bag digging into my shoulder. That's what I was thinking about while they called my name. Not the degree. The bag.
I walked to the old heritage block at Bukit Timah campus to take a photo of empty tiles. Through my viewfinder I saw a girl in an old graduation robe leaning against the pillar, looking tired.
When I looked with my own eyes, no one was there. Through the camera, she was looking straight at me. I clicked. She smiled a sad little smile and was gone.
I sat on the hot steps and looked at the photo. In the grain, there was a girl clearer now. Same age as me. Bindi a little crooked. Name tag half hidden: N. Nisha. My name is Nisha. But on my birth certificate my mother's handwriting had crossed something out before it.
Chapter 2 — Packing Light — Toa Payoh
My flat in Toa Payoh Lorong 8 was never meant to be lived in, only survived. Third floor, no lift, paint like old teh-o. But the evening light from the west window, over the HDB blocks towards Bishan, made even dirty laundry look like a movie.
I came back at 4:47 pm. My flat-mate Priya had already left for Jurong. Just a mark on the wall where her tapestry was. I sat on the floor and put my memory card in. The photo of the NUS Arch was empty to anyone else. To me, with my little secret filter I had been building for three years that was supposed to remove everything normal to see what was left — the girl was there. Round glasses, light meter on a cord, white ribbon in hair. And another arm around her, with chipped nail polish, like someone who loved her.
I started packing. One suitcase for clothes — ten minutes. One suitcase for my cameras and hard drives — two hours. That was my real packing. At the bottom, in a black velvet pouch that used to hold temple jewelry, was my whisper box — a small black thing I built to make old lenses talk to my laptop. Modern cameras lie, they clean too much. Old glass has bubbles, flaws. Flaws can hear things. I once pointed it at an empty kopitiam at Tekka at midnight and saw a full room of people from the 1970s. I had hidden it after that because I was scared. Now I knew I wasn't imagining.
Chapter 3 — Point Of No Return — Tekka and Armenian Street
Little India at 10 a.m. smells like rain that hasn't come yet and jasmine garlands. I went to 14 Armenian Street, to Sam's camera shop at Bras Basah Complex where I used to buy magazines with my father. But the sign was darker blue and inside it was cooler. Behind the counter wasn't Ah Hock, but a man named Sam. Indian, salt-pepper beard, batik shirt, tattoos like circuit lines on his arms. He was cleaning a lens so slowly it looked like prayer.
I asked for old student cameras from the 1970s. He didn't ask why. On the wall behind him was a big photo I never saw before. Three girls on the steps of the NUS Arch where I saw the girl yesterday. One was my mother at 19, bindi crooked. One was a Malay girl with an afro and a FEELING GROOVY shirt. And one was the girl from my camera — Nuvisha, round glasses, light meter. Behind them, faint, an old Chinese man holding a big camera.
Sam said that was Mr. Lim, who took photos of every batch from 1972 to 1981 at NUS. He kept one copy, gave them one copy. He took a photo in 1975 of something that didn't want to be photographed — Kranji. After that people stopped seeing him, but the shop stayed open. Sometimes someone is here, sometimes no one. Today it's me.
He showed me a huge brass and wood camera from 1936 that was warm when I touched it. He knew the name of my whisper box — KADUKA — even though I never told anyone. He said Nuvisha built the first one in 1978 and called it Kaadugal — whispering of leaves.
Chapter 4 — The Camera That Remembers — Bras Basah
Sam didn't turn on the main light, just a small red bulb like in a darkroom. The big 1936 camera sat between us. The sandalwood smoke curled towards its lens like it was breathing.
Sam told me his story. He was 17 in 1976, failing school at Serangoon, fixing cameras here for two dollars. Nuvisha came in on a rainy Sunday in November, no umbrella, plastic bag over her books, glasses fogged, blue salwar, two plaits dripping. She asked for a working light meter in Tamil. She had taped a small circuit board to her Yashica. She said film hears more than the lens.
She started coming every week with contact sheets — photos of canteen aunties at NUS canteen, empty archways that had smudges that weren't shadows. One blackout night in August 1977 she found a big brass camera in the back of NUS Computer Centre under a tarp and took a photo of the NUS Arch at 2 a.m. when no one was there. The glass plate showed three girls on the steps at night, and behind them a boy holding a light meter — him — even though he was home sleeping in Toa Payoh.
That was when he understood — every photo it takes shows it is alive. Not the place, the photo itself keeps looking. She was shaking when she showed him.
Chapter 5 — Exposure Triangle — The Padang at City Hall
Sam gave me a small brass camera — No.2 FOR THE APPRENTICE — to carry. No battery, no screen, just wood, brass, bellows and a ground glass at the back. He said first lesson: you don't take a photo of what is alive, you let the alive thing take a photo of you.
I took it to Padang at Esplanade Park to test it somewhere ordinary. Through the ground glass, the padang wasn't empty. It was full of school children in old uniforms — white shirts, blue pinafores from the 70s. One boy stood right in front of me, bowl cut, too-big shirt, barefoot. He mouthed 'Akka, help me.' Elder sister. I lowered the camera — no boy. Through it again — he was there, pointing behind me.
I followed him in the viewfinder across the Padang to the angsana trees where grass was darker, towards City Hall. He knelt and dug. I knelt on real grass and dug with my hands until my nails were black. I found a small rotten school bag, greenish blue, metal buckle rusted. Inside, a class photo 1978 — thirty kids from Kranji Primary that was demolished for reservoir. Front row, him — missing tooth. On the back in a child's hand: Primary 2A 1978, Suresh a/l Muthusamy — if lost, return to 14 Armenian Street. That's Sam's shop address.
Inside the book was a drawing of the big brass camera with a child inside the bellows waving, and under it in Tamil: Camera remembers me. I sat on that Padang and cried with dirty hands.
Chapter 6 — Metadata — My Mother Hangs Up — Toa Payoh
I had to rebuild everything after my old laptop got fried — a tiny handprint in soot said the repair man at Sim Lim. I bought a second-hand ThinkPad with my photo prize money and stayed in the back room above Tekka Centre. Fan clacking every third turn, kettle, shelf for cameras.
I taped my whisper box to the small brass camera so it could write down where and when each photo was taken. I took a photo of the back room wall. The small camera made a thump like a book closing, not a click. The note it wrote said: today is May 13, 2026 here, but the photo says it was taken Aug 14, 1975 at 2:22 pm, at 14 Armenian Street downstairs. Every photo I took after that said the same date: Aug 14, 1975, 2:22 pm.
I knew that date. In my mother's old plastic file where she keeps birth certs in Toa Payoh, there was her old student ID — LETCHUMI MANIAM — NUS Computer Science 1976-1980. On the back she had written: Aug 10 viva, Aug 14 Nuvisha last seen — arch, Aug 15 police report, Aug 20 leaves Toa Payoh.
I called my mother in Toa Payoh, Amma, what happened on Aug 14, 1975 at the arch? Long silence. Then: Where did you hear that date? Who told you that name? I said Suresh's bag. She said stop. I said was Nuvisha — She said I never told you that name and hung up. I called back, voicemail.
My father picked up and said your mother is crying, don't call today. The small camera wrote on its own: SHE HUNG UP.
TO BE CONTINUED
By Sam Trailerman
DISCLAIMER: This is a work of pure fiction. All names, characters, places, events, institutions, files, plates (SJB 2847Y), reservoirs, kampongs, and photographs are fictionalized adaptation set only in Singapore — Pulau Ubin, Kranji Reservoir, Tekka Centre, 14 Armenian Street Singapore, NUS Arch, Padang at City Hall, Toa Payoh, Yishun/Khatib, Bras Basah, SLA File 75/214, PUB. The 114 families, Kranji kampongs, 1975 expansion, protest banners are fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons, villages, projects, agencies, or events is coincidental. Images are artistic renderings. No defamation intended. Not fact or history.
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