Image courtesy of www.oldtimecandy.com

Getting back to chewing gum. I seem to have inherited a disorder I’d like to call “don’t fucken chew gum within earshot of me because I’ll definitely have to kill you.” It appears I have inherited this gene from my mother, because she used to go nuts when any of us chewed gum within ear shot of her. This disorder’s symptoms include an absolute irritable need to climb a wall whenever you hear anyone smacking away on gum close by.  When facing prolonged exposure, the feeling of irritation gets so strong, you feel like the inside bits of your body need to move onto the outside. It’s bloody awful, and once, when flying from Hong Kong to Rome, I had a woman sitting next to me chew gum the entire flight – my stomach still clenches up at that memory.  I can’t explain it, it is what it is, so to my dear friends be warned – I will rarely make a fuss about it, because it feels rude to do so, but I will definitely do everything I can to get away from you. Essentially if you do feel the need to chew gum and want my company, either spit it out or piss off well out of ear shot.

So for me, living in Singapore is living in paradise. I rarely encounter anyone chewing gum, and even though it is legal to get gum on prescription and most people bring it back into the country every chance they get, no, I don’t need to suffer that lip smacking sound on a daily basis. It’s absolute bliss for a person like me, so when people say but you can’t chew gum? I say isn’t that fucken brilliant? Not to mention, you never have to clean gum off your shoes, nor is there any risk my boys will pick up and consume a stray bit of used gum stuck to the pavement. Excellent.

Yours, without the bollocks
Andrea