my saboteur - shadow and light

saturday april 27 was the first day in about six weeks where my family had no agenda or structure for the day. i had longed for such a day but when it finally arrived i felt eerie and restlessly searched for what i might be forgetting to get done - but there was really nothing to do except stock-up our empty fridge. we had arrived late friday from our trip to bombay and were all exhausted. we let our daughter sleep in and when she woke we wandered over to giant. i suggested lunch at dtf and my daughter asked, 'do we have time?' for weeks before we went to bombay our only meals had been grabbed sandwiches, slices of pizza or noodle packets. we ate well in bombay but it had been a hectic time with much to do. 

late afternoon we began putting up new curtains - curtains we had bought for the new apartment. they looked beautiful but i began re-experiencing complex emotions about the 'non-move' nightmare. i felt a sudden anger and hatred for myself. i cursed my stupidity and a tear spilled out of my eye. i remembered how my husband at one point, before we signed the lease, had suggested just sprucing up this place. unfortunately by that time i had been adamant that we needed a third room for guests.

being in bombay i had thought about the incident with a wider lens and i knew that part of wanting a bigger place did come from wanting a space where guests could be comfortable. the other lessons of this experience were also being slowly processed in the background of the busy days there, though the distance had reduced the pain. now the pain was creeping back. i told myself it was natural but it felt horrible and heavy in my chest and when we sat back admiring our efforts i could no longer hold back the quiet tears. i had de-cluttered materially, my communication with my near ones was authentic and i was finding my way back to my deepest core but there were lessons i had missed. i still had to explore my inner saboteur.

in bombay i had sifted through my desk storage and found old journals. i began reading one from 2002 where i had recorded my work with caroline myss's sacred contracts process. the archetype wheel i had drawn then seemed like it belonged to another person. i had changed immensely, some of the archetypes had less importance in my life and new ones had gained power.

caroline myss suggests that there are four archetypes of survival that are intrinsic to all of us and are involved in all our most demanding challenges. these four are the child, the victim, the prostitute and the saboteur. i sensed that the saboteur was the one that had been active all through this challenge.

the saboteur archetype is described in several ways, it is connected to fears, betrayal and disempowerment. the shadow saboteur keeps us from reaching our highest potentials. in the late 1990's when our little family was going through its scariest challenges i felt the energy of the saboteur strongly in my husband. the most frightening memory of the saboteur energy for me is how it compelled him to destructive behaviour where he spent years trying to sort out messes that he had made. for years of his life he took three steps back for every one forward sinking deeper into a sticky vortex from which it took herculean effort to escape.

the description of the saboteur archetype which has most meaning for me is that it is the guardian of ones choices and is about the methods and ways in which one sabotages their relationship to Truth. i knew from december what i needed most in 2013 was to have a lot of time alone, a lot of time to get back to writing, to re-discover my core values. instead i invited people to visit both in jan and in feb and then pushed this move. all the time some part of me was being sucked into a whirlpool of fear and i kept acting out of them. i did not heed the warnings of the 'light' saboteur and slipped deeper into denial and self-lies. i was blinded, i was seduced.

fortunately things suddenly changed in early march when a friend did a healing for me and encouraged me to clear my fears daily. the fears were crushing the air out of my lungs and beginning the practice was arduous. but as i cleared them i activated my light saboteur which helped me to re-align with my deepest truths. i knew that living in a small and eco-friendly way was closer to my truth than having a large space which included an extra room for guests. i knew i had made a mistake but clearing fears had also put me in a good enough place to shrug and tell myself that i would get out of that space in two years when the lease was up.

luckily things proceeded in a way that i didn't have to live in a space where i felt my soul and spirit were at risk. perhaps my light saboteur had saved me from further damage?

but i had sabotaged myself and lost time. it was painful to hold a mirror up and fully face the destructive image in it yesterday. i was scared when i recognised how this time i was the one who was carrying the shadow saboteur. i was  the one who had made the destructive decision and i was scared that i would do it again. i knew i had been going through a phase of shaky self-esteem and had made choices that blocked my forward movement from the beginning of this year. now after four months i am back where i had started - or maybe a few steps back from where i was on jan 1. lost and unsure of where to go, what to do or write. i am blank but i have learned how i betray myself. i honestly don't know how to move forward right now except just try to be completely and nakedly truthful about my shadow saboteur and constantly test the energies that i allow close to me. also very seriously build around myself a community of people who will see me through times like this when my own perceptions are untrustworthy.

i've struggled to find the words to write this post and yet i am unsure if i have been able to convey that truth i wanted to.

rosie

we returned last night to an apartment that was missing something. of course rosie's little cage wasn't there waiting for us but the thought that we would not be rushing over to pick her up first thing saturday  created an horrible ache within us.

rosie chose to leave this world last sunday while we were away. it was a huge shock to us and to our friend who was taking care of her while we were gone. our sturdy little rosie seemed to be improving with the meds the vet had prescribed her. i miss her but am also glad that she too is now in a place where no bars surround her. 

rosie truly hated being within the bars of her cage. she, like fuzzy, came to us as a house guest for three weeks when her first family was travelling in december 2011. both sat huddled together in their empty food box during the cab trip to our apartment. fuzzy chose to stay in there and watch us when their cage was set down. rosie clambered up the door and sniffed vigourously. she jumped into her owners hand as soon as he opened the door. after he left she climbed up again and with a lot of fear, never having handled hamsters before, i opened the door and she zoomed around the room till she tired herself out and then fell into an exhausted sleep.

that was her way of dealing with change, go hyper, check out the environment and sleep it off. the strategy worked for her for as my daughter remarked nothing stressed rosie out. she was happy and it was contagious. she took us out of our dark moods and made us laugh with her crazy antics. anyone who thinks hamsters don't have personalities havn't met rosie and fuzzy.

i was the first to handle her but she soon became my daughters favourite. shibble could not ever resist her charming plea to be let out and rosie was often found reading a book or exploring every nook and corner of shibble's room. my husband often walked around the house proudly holding one little hamster in each palm. every time someone visited us rosie had to come out and sniff at the newcomer before running off to explore the room over and over again. 

her first family must have been told that rosie was a boy hamster and we continued to believe this till her last weeks. we all thought she was a little male with lots of aggressive testosterone - we even joked about changing rosie's name to killer. fuzzy was almost twice rosie's size but most times she bullied him. when he exercised on the wheel she would climb on and try to run the other way till he got tired and got off. fuzzy liked to sleep on the wheel and rosie would jump over him and run making sure her feet dug into his face. if he turned around she would just climb over and get on the other side. alone on the wheel rosie ran so fast that she often turned right over with the momentum of the wheel. she would tumble over and keep running. watching her on the wheel was sheer joy.

rosie had no survival instinct or she just trusted in us or the universe. she would jump right over the edge of heights and we had to be really careful to keep watching her wherever she was. she was so tiny that she would wiggle into the smallest of holes and disappear. we would panic as we tried to reach her but she would be happily grooming in a dark corner. 

one day we woke to see a miserable looking fuzzy with a bloody face. when this happened again their first family separated them to avoid them hurting each other fatally. so, when they returned to us in june 2012 they were in separate cages and interacted only under supervision. rosie's cage had what is called a mushroom hanging from the ceiling - we called it her condo. it had a tube through which she could climb up into the top which had several holes on the outer surface. she loved sleeping with her head on one of the lower holes but she would poke her head from any of the 'windows' to watch what was going on in the room. sometimes she would sit and watch tv, sometimes she would look over into fuzzy's cage and sometimes at us. she would agilely jump out of the window when we opened her cage door. 

watching her drink water also made us smile. she would just sit with her mouth to the water tube, eyes closed and drink for 20-30 minutes. later my husband discovered that she loved licking water off our fingers. hamsters are supposed to dislike baths but rosie learn't how to rub her back against her water bottle and get it soaking wet. maybe it helped her stay cool. one afternoon she was restless and i put my hand in to see what was wrong. that was the only time she ever bit anyone. it turned out that her water tube had been clogged by hairs and she was thirsty.

she loved food and ate up all the fish before fuzzy got to them but she was so hyper that she remained tiny till one traumatic incident. rosie and fuzzy were wandering the room and fuzzy was following her around while she ignored him. maybe it was revenge for all the bullying he had been the target of - fuzzy got on top of rosie and before we knew it chewed off her ear. rosie squealed and we pulled them apart and cleaned the ear up. by morning it was already healing and it grew back completely in a couple of weeks. after this rosie ate and ate and ate and got fat. she would sit on her haunches and stick her head out like she was throwing a punch at fuzzy if he came near. he soon learned to stay away and began to cower if she came near.

once after we shampooed her with some strawberry foam and were drying her with a paper towel, rosie grabbed it and began manically shredding it to bits. she stuffed her cheeks till they were twice her size with the shreds and ran around the room when we tried to pull the paper out of her mouth. we got long bits of it out but still once she got into her cage she spat out the rest and happily pulled it around the litter making a cosy nest. maybe this should have given us a clue to the fact that she was a girl hamster. fuzzy shredded the paper enthusiastically but never tried to make a nest of it.

after fuzzy passed on she got more and more attention. as she aged she lost the ability to use her back legs and would drag them along. she also developed cataracts yet she never stopped wanting to wander to some of her favourite spots in the room. though she did suddenly develop a survival instinct and   would back off from the edge of the sofa unlike before.

it was heartbreaking to see how passive she got when she developed a stomach infection. in the tension of the 'non-move' we were going through we probably got her to the vet a few days later than we should have. but with the increased care she improved despite the vets gentle warning that she might just die. we discovered how much she loved chilled apples and papaya. to get her to take her probiotic all we had to do was hold her on her back in our palm and put a cotton tip with the probiotic to her face. she licked it off till she was tired of it and then pushed it away with her paws, and then screwed up her face when her paws got sticky. she could barely eat her solid foods but she would peck at her apple treat and lick up the cream inside. she could not groom herself and she loved it when we cleaned her off. she loved being clean. it perked up her spirits.

it was when she was ill that we realized she was a girl. and then we were even more in love with her. rosie was a warrior, nothing fazed her and she found a way to be happy always. she taught us how to be happy too. there will never be another like her and we all just want her back here with us. her short life was rich and sweetened our lives immensely. 

another transition

i am leaving for bombay tomorrow and mostly whats on my mind is little rosie. i think she knows we love her and i am lucky that she will be with a true animal lover. rosie is frail but not ill anymore thanks to the vets advice and medications last week.

it feels like another transition time for me. when i return to singy a third of the year will be gone and i feel heavy sadness when i see the months that i feel i just circled and circled like some hawk trying to fly with a long  rope tying its foot to some unknown centre. learning some deep life lessons but still a sense of doing nothing which pulls at me. yet, i feel that this doing nothing is what i need most in the next few months before i actually begin doing.

there are times in a person's life when all decisions seem wrong and all actions go haywire. in the midst of such times the best thing to do is stay still and do as little as necessary till something shifts. these times many ancient wisdoms say are due to forces beyond ones control. i pray i have the inner balance to  push away the restlessness that tugs at me to keep doing.

this morning i woke and saw that the apartment that gave us hell was back on the market along with the same agent. i felt a bit dejected that i had been able to do nothing to protect the next person from this space that looks beautiful on the surface but definitely holds something unpleasant within it. but my tarot advised me to cut my losses and leave.

perhaps this episode will appear in the memoir i write. i definitely stumbled on to some part of singapore's underbelly here. something has been calling me to write about my life since this year began. and this week a friend reminded me after hearing about this experience that my life has certainly been 'off the curve'. yes, i think i have had more than the 'normal' share of strange experiences - both positive and negative.

what a normal life should be is really a mystery to me. perhaps in writing about my life i will discover it.

my mum and sister wait in bombay. my mum's been ill and i look forward to boosting her spirits. i am leaving my laptop behind and will miss blogging but i think its time to try to assimilate the days of this year in relative silence before moving ahead.

ebbing and uncovering

weds morning - just three days after we handed over our keys i woke already feeling the energy of the unpleasant experience ebbing. i am surprised with how fast that's happening, even yesterday i was having all kinds of intense negative thoughts and feelings. the day feels bright and light right now.

we are settled back into this apartment with a lot of our clutter gone because of the sorting process of the move. i talked about de-cluttering before but i wasn't doing enough. feels like a strong wind blew through and swept so much away. we even were able to give away three pieces of furniture in this de-cluttering process. no wonder this gorgeous feeling of lightness.

the stormy wind is still blowing through my insides and i welcome it. it's blowing away layers of dust and revealing things hidden away for a while. yesterday what it revealed was very painful.

i saw just how much i have floated up from my deepest essence. i knew particularly that the intuition and the inner radar that i had cultivated with so much care had been lost - maybe over the last few months but maybe even longer. i can't help coming back to the thought that if i had not lost it i would have easily 'read' the signs and walked away from all this in february itself. the traces of something dishonest and hidden were there all along.

the thought that i wish i had pursued this issue with SCT also haunts me on and off. gone are the thoughts of wanting a righteous vengeance but i still feel that allowing people like this to get away is adding to the negative energy in the world. 

but as i thought more about the question my friend had posed to me 'what within you is against walking away?' i also found other answers.

by staying there and tangling with that energy i also was adding to such energy in the world. every time we got an email from the agent/owner we got upset and angry. when we were with the 'thug' like people the owner had sent to intimidate us our tempers flared and i particularly had feelings of wanting to punch a couple of them. my feelings of vengefulness were at their highest. as i write this words from 'the history of karate' come to me. one of the great sensei's of the goju lineage said - when your anger rises withdraw your fists, when your fists rise withdraw your anger.

there are situations in life where one does need to confront injustice and nasty energies but how one does it is so important. i learn't that if i did want to continue that fight i would have to work hard on coming from a calm and peaceful space within myself and not from the same place the other side did. if i embodied those same energies that i was trying to combat then whatever the external outcome, i.e. even if i got all my money back, i would still have added to those energies in the world. the only way to deal with those energies is from a centred place that will not become them. and to do that i need to really clear myself.

i am not that clear today and that is agonising. less clear than i was some years ago. particularly since october or so last year all sorts of angers and passions have clung to me, layer upon layer. this storm is helping lift away those coverings. i wish i had never strayed from this knowledge but this has truly been a very small price to pay to be guided back to what's most important to me. 

i still do wish passionately that nobody else is cheated by these people and i hope i can do something that can support this wish. i tried to post a comment on the singapore expat forum. i didn't use names. but it was removed. i also wrote a letter to straits online not even using the apartment number but they didn't post it. if i can find another way to caution people i will try to do so but otherwise i think i am moving fast away from this episode. 

today my biggest concern is about leaving our quickly ageing hamster rosie. her health goes up and down. i am so worried that she will pass on when we are gone. my husband even suggested postponing our trip to india - but all we can delay is a week and she might linger on beyond. we will be leaving saturday and though i want to see rosie again on the other side of this trip i don't want her to live and suffer and i also don't want her to pass on feeling we abandoned her. this is excruciating. 

moving towards closure

yesterday we handed over the keys etc. to the owners POA and agent. they had spent more than an hour in the apartment on saturday supposedly inspecting it to see the problems that we had brought out. but instead of really looking around they had spent the time saying the apartment looked in great condition and trying to pressurise us to feel the same.

so yesterday when the first thing the agent did was scoot around, calling the POA and trying to show her what she claimed we had spoiled we got so mad. we told them to sign the letter or leave that they had plenty of time for inspection yesterday and that they could inspect as much as they liked after we left.  at first they ignored us but when we yelled and said we would leave with the keys if they continued the behaviour they scooted back and signed. we left.

we felt such a sense of relief as we got out of there, though even then i knew that i was the one furthest from closure. the decision to close the deal completely for me was based mostly on the fact that my mother is unwell and i needed to see her. my husbands mother has had surgery in both eyes and he needs to see her too. we could not be here to follow through with CST or CASE even if we had wanted that.

i am happy with the choice we made. but it is the social activist part of me that needs to do something yet. yesterday we sent a complaint to the agents boss not really expecting a reply. but this morning we see a very sincere reply from him along with an apology. i am glad that some investigation will be made but i don't care to know what the result will be.

i also want to post on some public forum some sort of cautionary note about the space but yet unsure where.

this weeks been surreal. and i am glad that i am far from it. complete closure for me might take some time and reflection and releasing the trauma from the experience continues. today i will visit the physio and have my messed up back attended to.

thanks to friends who have read and responded and thanks to the silent readers. blogging daily has been therapeutic for me and knowing that people read it and understood added to that. time to be quiet for a while.

journey's end?

i think a decision has been made finally by us. some part of me is not happy with the decision and a friend clarified for me that reflecting on that part might teach me something valueable.

yesterday we met four of the most reprehensible people i have met in a very long time. i shudder and want to vomit when i think of the time we spent in their presence. 

we were supposed to meet the owners agent and POA for a joint inspection. my husband actually thought it was better he went alone for a one-on-one to try to settle it one last time. my daughter and i decided to go with him even if all we did was kept quiet in the background. when we got there we saw four people waiting. supposedly for an inspection. they took turns to try to scare and threaten us about the consequences if we would try to file a claim. they said the filthy oven wasn't too bad and they would eat out of it. one of them even said she would be ok cleaning up other people's muck. the agent was the worst. she denied verbal statements and promises she had made. she lied and even insinuated that we had broken the washing machine. they threatened that the owner would take legal action if they did not leave with the keys. they proudly told us that they each own several apartments in the city and they never had problems with any of the others. we did not get intimidated by them. just angry. i think they were in disbelief that we did not let them take the keys.

i dont know why i had actually believed that they were there to create a resolution. perhaps i trust the goodness in people too much? maybe we should not have let more than two of them into the house?

after they left my legs were shaky and heart pounding. three of us sat in a cafe and talked. the first thing my daughter said was, 'they are not nice people.' my husband wanted to get as far away as possible from them. i needed closure but was far from it. but all of us felt physically sick and as we spent time away from the apartment and from those people we felt better. my daughter talked of how her yoga teacher had told her that sometimes its best to just walk away from something. after meeting these four people we knew that there was no possibility of resolution. they were people without empathy or conscience as  another friend clarified for me.

but there is a part of me that is not on the 'side of walking away'. on the surface it's the part that does not like being cheated. as i look deeper i see the part  that believes in pursuing justice to its very end. this part feels that allowing something like this to happen is literary feeding those systems that threaten, cheat, oppress and in the end accumulate and grow. i have an image of an open toothy mouth that i am throwing 15,600 SD in and a monster growing and growing. what if it grows so much that the goodness on earth is engulfed by it?

as i write this two things come to mind. the yin-yang symbol. each 'half' contains the seed of the opposite and when one grows to a tipping point it will start ebbing and the other start growing. the wisdom of the i-ching is based on such beliefs and i often have found comfort from the i-ching hexagrams.

but i also have another experience of 'good' and 'evil'. when i first began meditating i understood that when good grows within a person or a system its not like evil has less space. the whole person expands and the evil too grows. 'making energetic progress in the good' is a constant challenge and one that must be practiced with every breath. we truly have both all the good and all the evil of the universe within each one of us. so, i suppose the converse, which sometimes i lose sight of, is also true - when evil grows so does good.

sometimes walking away from something maybe very hard but it is the best thing to do. when i think of this situation in karmic terms i feel easy about walking away. it is some karmic exchange that i must make. when i think of it in terms of social activism its hard to walk away. i am still left with a lingering sense of defeat. but knowing which battles to fight on which day is true wisdom too.


i also have realized that we just were coming from two completely different value systems. while we valued relationship and fair resolution all they valued was money. is it possible to reconcile such differing values? i suppose the only way i can begin is to find the 'greedy' monster within me and try to reconcile within myself.

hopefully this journey will be over today. we have written offering to pass over the keys and signing a letter that absolves each of us of all liabilities. i know in walking away i am leaving the owner and the others who came thinking they succeeded in frightening us which makes me a bit mad. but honestly if i obsess about it i am the real fool. i also have a feeling that i can't identify clearly, embarrassment and sadness, seems to be the closest description. for a while i was so cut off from my core, my genuine instincts that guide me away from whats not right for me that i succumbed to some seductive energy. i know today that i have work to do on inner reconnection and ascension.

ps - its also interesting that it was easy to let go of that need for accountability from the owner/agent once i met those people. i would never have got it. but everyone else we spoke to understood immediately this feeling we had.

compensation

yesterday i didnt feel like writing because i had no good news about the problematic lease. i was very depressed. tired by this week of dealing with making sure we have a roof over our heads but more by the energy of nasty emails which didn't respond to any questions we posed but continued to make baseless accusations. struggling to keep my centre. as things to do eased the emotions became harder to deal with as i gave them more space to emerge. 

all three of us are worn out but my husbands office lawyer says that this is just what the owner is trying to do and to keep strong. there is logical reason to keep our spirits up. from initially demanding 14 months rent and the agents commission her demands went down to 6 months and commission finally yesterday she came back to the the offer we had made on monday of her just keeping the money paid so far, three months rent and releasing us from the lease.

i should have been ecstatic right? we should have jumped on it? but i found myself angry and cheated beyond belief and wanting some 'compensation'. i had to examine my reactions slowly for they threatened to engulf me in anxious muscles and a burning rising up from my belly and spreading to the top of my head. i burst into tears and my daughter just withdrew into a little ball on her bed. later our family had its first fight since this crisis began. 

why couldn't i take the offer now? we had made it ourselves just five days ago. 

crisis times often force us to reconnect to our core values. this transaction was about money and i began thinking of what this 'compensation' meant to me.

money. my relationship to it is so complex and very simple. i have seen it come and go in my life. i was born into a very wealthy family but luckily my parents did not believe in splashing money around. we lived in a patriarchal joint family with my uncles families living on the other floors of our four storey home. my cousins always had more possessions than my siblings and i did. at that age i yearned to have more. my mum was brought up in a gandhian household and my dad was just my dad. he believed in enjoying life but did not really need money to do so. picnics on the beach and taking all the kids in the family, about twelve of us, on excursions was his way of enjoying life - besides music and sport. i loved him and i think i have a lot of him in me.

i unfortunately lost him at the age of ten and slowly my uncles who were our financial trustees siphoned off our money. this kind of thing is common in india. we lost most of our money but still had enough to live. if we wanted a holiday or money to study we had to beg for what was ours. at another time i went through a phase when i barely had survival money. my husbands business sunk and he got into debt. we lost our home and it took us about five years of living in other peoples homes before we felt stable again. now after five years of being here in singy we are quite comfortable.

so, money comes and goes. i fear being on the streets but have no real urge to accumulate money for 'security'. working here in singapore is the first time we actually have savings. so losing our deposit is not such a big deal. i just feel that we will make it back sometime. peace of mind once lost is harder to recover though.

but money is not simply money in this case. as i began to think about my reactions i realised that it also is a symbol of ethics, accountability and responsibility. the owner or the agent have not once acknowledged that they were remiss in any way. they have not taken responsibility for anything that has led us to this mental duress. i suppose they have legal advise not to or maybe they are just those people who never reflect on their actions but spend their lives blaming others.but this is where i want a response from them. of course i am unlikely to ever get an apology so a partial refund becomes some sort of apology for me. Not sure if this makes sense to anyone but me. 

Beyond that i realised that i really have a strong need for justice and for using my life experiences not just for me but to bring awareness to unfairness in the world. i do not want anyone else to suffer the way we did. an 'apology' and preventing further suffering also drives me, though i do not yet know how i can use this experience for awareness about such practices here.

i think we did well in this crisis. focusing on what was needed to be done initially and getting it done even as emotions were overwhelming. then as we settled our most basic needs, tiredness peaked and we began talking about our feelings. exhausted and feeling the trauma of a week that feels more like three months but the worst is over. i just wish it were all over. 

is everything really that subjective?

i think its time to start trying to get back a life. moving is listed as one of the most stressful experiences in a persons life. what we have done is a partial double move and sending emails to shanghai every day (finally the owner is in direct touch with us) is becoming really stressful.

i woke up in darkness. it was 4 am. i felt really depressed but as i tossed and turned in bed i began getting really angry.

so far i had focused on just getting work done, on solving problems and settling in somewhere. there had been no time for allowing too much feeling. and even in the limited time i sat back and reflected i focused more on what i did to contribute to my predicament so i could learn something and grow. but today complex emotions began exploding out demanding space and time. i connected with the intense sense of being cheated, conned and squeezed for a fault that lay more with a negligent owner and agent than me. this has reached an unbearable limit.

i used to have a strong temper. years ago when i saw the damage this was doing to people i loved i worked hard to change it. i began with meditation and yoga which helped but then one day i had a dream about a woman in a karate gi and i began doing karate. the effect that had on calming my mind and helping me control my temper was even more obvious.

in karate there is no first attack. every kata starts with a defensive move. its something that has seeped into my very being now. and perhaps that this is one reason that i and my family have tried to be polite and attempted to see all perspectives as we deal with this situation and communicate the same. i think they saw this as weakness and no matter how reasonable we tried to be we found ourselves labelled as demanding. today i feel its time to go on the offensive and get through this as fast as possible. 

in communicating with the owner and earlier the agent we have taken time to craft emails that explain our point of view and list relevant details to explain the same. all we got back were short emails insisting that we demanded too much and vague references to 'opportunity' costs. even when we repeatedly asked them to list both the demands and costs we have received no answer. whereas on our part we have painstakingly listed all the items that were problematic. we have a list of sixteen items and maybe taken separately some may seem minor and if there were just three or four of these on the list it would be reasonable to expect the tenant to have patience while they were fixed by the owner. yet, sixteen such items would in my opinion definitely count as a breach of contract on the owners part and make it 'untenantable.' she says our interpretation of the list is subjective. but are really all things that subjective? if you were renting out your apartment at $5200 would you not want the washing machine to work, the shower pipe to be nicely fixed and not just taped on with cello-tape, the drains cleaned and proper cleaning especially in the kitchen and bathrooms done before tenants walked in? would you not want your tenants to have a happy move-in? i know i would.

as for costs incurred. any business has overheads and start up costs. any owner wanting to rent out an apartment and get $5200 in rent for it has to be prepared for pre-move in costs of painting, cleaning and removing scratches i think. i don't own property so perhaps i don't really understand the way their minds work but our current apartment owner has wanted to keep his property looking good and is willing to paint and do the big repairs while we take care of the other things. we expected the same in this apartment. were we wrong? i don't really think so. we too incurred serious costs that we were just willing to let go off. 

the owner still is seeing a one sided view and asking us to pay her six months rent.

luckily singapore is a good place to resolve disputes like this i believe. there is CASE and SCT which can be approached. we were hoping to settle this without involving others but i guess in some cases outside mediation is needed. but it is unfortunate that the owner did not just take our offer of us losing three months rent so that she and we could walk away and go on with things.

maybe its time to take a run. i used to train five days a week before and now its been five days since i have exercised. stress levels around this are high but our 'home' is looking pretty great now. only four boxes to unpack :)

churning of the ocean of milk

woke after five hours of sleep. dark circles under my eyes and a heavy pressure in my head. last night after we ate another makeshift dinner my family got down to settling our living space in order. during the day we had finally been able to reverse all utility and postal changes and had begun to think of opening boxes. we changed the position of furniture in our living room and we seem to have a whole new room now. less cluttered with lots of 'white' space.

as others slept in this morning i sat and watched the horizon. there were dark clouds hovering over the distant shenton way area and the cars on the ecp bridge looked like tiny toys moving silently and smoothly like well oiled cogs in some machine. as i watched the clouds cleared and sunlight spread over the land.

everything is still uncertain about the fate of how things will resolve with the problematic lease and owner. but we seem to be coping better. we have been lucky in so many ways. the hidden flaws in the apartment were revealed to us before the movers actually took our furniture over. this apartment that had already been put on the market had not yet been leased out and we were not homeless even for a day. maybe we have been lucky too that the owner did not accept our original offer of forfeiting the entire sum of money we had paid to them but demanded more for we have been advised that there was definite breach of contract on part of the owner and we should not lose our deposit.

what we lost was peace of mind but there seem to be more moments of clarity as days pass.

there is a hindu myth, the churning of the ocean of milk, that i have always been fascinated with. those who have gone to siem reap will know it. there are many layers to the story and each detail of it can be reflected upon for days, but the jist of the story is that in the battle between gods and demons there was a time that demons held the upper hand and the gods were advised to churn the ocean to get at the nectar of immortality. they could not do this alone and had to co-operate with the demons for this task. mount meru was used as a churning rod, the great snake vasuki became the churning rope, and vishnu as a turtle supported the mountain on his back to prevent it from sinking. Once they began churning the first thing that emerged was a terrible poison that threatened to engulf the universe. shiva took it into himself to save life. it was only after the poison that the treasures appeared. last was the heavenly physician holding the amrita.

i feel its so fitting to think of this myth during this experience in the year of the water snake. i hope that now that the poisons have emerged during our churning and we have absorbed them in the best way we could, we will now see some of the treasures float up. already being able to count my blessings is definitely one precious gem.

since this horrible experience started we have been surrounded by suggestions, support and love from friends and so much understanding and good will even from strangers. this is the most priceless of treasures for me. i am so blessed that this experienced showed me how many people care about us and the amazing goodness within people.

i know myths, stories and belief systems are not absolute truths. they just hold some wisdoms that may be useful to help me get through difficult times. the calm mind that can touch the insights that any churning throws up can go through trying circumstances and emerge with more light and love.

who or what is home

sometimes you have to go a long way either physically or in your mind and body to arrive 'home'. remembering the alchemist and his quest and his arriving back to himself in the end. thinking of eliots words.

'We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time.'

i am home here in this apartment. this is my home in singapore and i had to go a long ways to re-discover this 'truth' through a journey that has been numbing, overwhelming and painful. 

sometimes in books the journey to self discovery is painful but beautiful. i know that there are lessons to be learn't in this experience but right now all i feel is the sense of being stuck in a nightmare. the last three days have felt like a year of heavy darkness and yet i cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel. there are moments i catch a glimpse or find faith that it exists and then there are times that it just feels scary and endless.

today before i get into the thousand things that need to be done i can feel a sense of peace for a bit where i can put myself in the shoes of the agent and the owner and try to see their perspectives. i hope feeling this will help us a bit in communicating with them. but in the end i also feel helpless and spiralling out of control. wondering how i got myself in this predicament. wondering how we will get out of it.

this year has been one that throws surprises up with the regularity and certainty of breath going in and out of my lungs. but i don't really believe that things come upon us all of a sudden. there are signs that alert us when something is wrong. how often we ignore them, how often we don't trust our instincts and proceed on a path that will lead to difficulties. sometimes i am unsure, uncertain about how to change a decision that i have made or change a course that i have have charted. sometimes i am embarrassed and feel that i will look untrustworthy to the other. sometimes i am confused about what is right - what i felt before or what i am feeling at this moment. so i ignore the little tug that alerts me and push on.

looking back i know this happened this time. there were signs along the way that clearly showed us that either the agent or the owner were not true to their promises. there were a couple of opportunities to pull out and yet we did not. 

i have to learn to forgive myself for that bad decision but remember not to ignore my instinct the next time around. right now i feel crappy and sometimes fall into blaming myself for missing those chances of escaping this nightmare.

there are other lessons here to be learnt. despite initially offering a settlement that seemed more fair to the owner than us we just had to face escalating demands and threats. sometimes its necessary to take a stand and sometimes one is doing it not just for themselves but also to bring light to things that can cheat and gobble. 

today all i want is to unpack boxes and settle into home but i have to be also taking those pics, finding legal help etc. etc. 

definitely in the thickest woods yet and groping to find the safe home within myself.

ps - and as my daughter very wisely pointed out to me this morning - when the space feels cluttered its time to get rid of things rather than try to move to a larger place. another huge huge lesson for me.

nightmare

i am writing this in the midst of a deep crisis and i hope that people read and share this information with others so they don't get into the same mess our family is in.

its hard to write in the midst of an escalating crisis situation.

we were scheduled to move into our new apartment 09-03 belvedere on meyer road this morning. we got possession of it on saturday. we are paying a rent of 5200 SD per month for this apartment and have already also given them a two month deposit. so we have paid 15,600 SD to the owner through the agent.

the apartment was supposed to be delivered to us in good condition with floors and cabinets scratch free, plumbing and appliances working and with professional cleaning done. we spent the better part of saturday cleaning up filthy kitchen cabinets, a fridge with food and glass in it, bathrooms with hair and other muck. it took us seven hours to clean the place and it was still had dirt in it. as we further used other things we found the fridge plug broken, the shower heads in two bathrooms broken and the curtains torn with the rings falling off in places, dirty shoe bags in the shoe closet, the final straw was finding that the washing machine door would not close. and the wooden floors began to creak in an eerie fashion.

throughout the weekend we often tried to call the agent and she would not take our calls but only communicate through email. in the condition it was in we found we could not move in today but will still have to compensate the mover his fees.

our current apartment agent and owner have an excellent rapport with us and have allowed us to stay on here. this agent was very sympathetic to our plight and said we should not have cleaned and fixed things but taken photographs of the condition the apartment is in. we explained that we were more intent on trying to make the place home rather than having evidence for legal issues. they were very understanding.

everyone also suggested that we consult a lawyer and do it today but we spent all of today reversing all utility requests and running to ikea to cancel the furniture delivery. everywhere we met with sympathetic and helpful people.

this morning we proposed to the agent that she talk to the owner to let us out of the lease agreement and we agree to forgo the 15,600 SD already paid. we felt was fair and in three months the agent and owner could easily find a new tenant. this was not a place that our family could live in. we apologized and asked to settle this amicably. this is a huge loss of money for us but we wished for peace of mind and decided to let it go instead trying to get into a litigation.

the agent this evening sent us an email saying that we need to pay fourteen months rent and her commission and any additional costs the owner feels are necessary. this is frightening to us. we do not have that kind of money and we have no clue how this will resolve since the owner and the agent are not interested in an amicable settlement.

all three of us are in a high stress condition. unable to eat and sleep and get on with things.

i am writing this so people know about this apartment and the agent, Raelene Tan, and be careful if they have dealings with the same. we are in a stunned condition especially since in our five years of living in singapore we have only met reliable and trustworthy people who do value relationship. everyone who talked to us understood that we must be feeling so upset to decide to lose so much money. yet the agent never even wanted to know why we were so upset. she only threw legal clauses at us and talked about her own commission.

we may go through more nightmares before we resolve this but the taxi driver who also sympathetically asked why we were so upset reminded me of the importance of telling people about this so they do not go through the same so i decided to write.