All That Glitters is Not Gold

Shortly after my graduation, I visited my eldest brother in Singapore. I was accepted by the Institute of Education to do a year's teaching diploma. I decided to stay at the YWCA Hostel as it is located at Fort Canning Road, a more central location. I shared a room with a Malaysian student , Karmali. YWCA had not yet undergone renovation. If you wanted to lock your room, you had to push a mechanism to lock from inside, which meant that even with a key, the door could not be open from outside. Karmali was a TV addict who would watch TV till 3 am almost every evening. Since I am the type who cannot wake up easily once I have fallen asleep, I never locked the door.

One evening, after taking some flu tablets, I went to bed earlier than usual. Shortly after midnight, one of the hostelites saw a man entering my room and alerted the management. The staff made a beeline for my room but the thief had escaped.

"Choo, wake up! Wake up! A thief had entered the room! See if you lost anything!"
I was too drowsy and tired, and told them not to worry and fell asleep again!" Next morning when I woke up, Karmali asked me to check if I had lost anything. My violin was still intact. The record player which my student lent me was still on my table. The lovely jewellery my mom had given me was still intact in the box which was partially hidden in my somewhat messy and unlocked drawer. Nothing was stolen. Karmali told me that the thief had taken her big jewellery box with all her costume jewellery. Indian jewellry is usually full of heavy gold designs.... the thief must have thought they were genuine. Suddenly I thought of Shakespeare's play, 'The Merchant of Venice' and the sentence "All that glitter is not gold!" and burst out laughing. Although upset that some of her favourite jewellery had gone, Karmali also started to laugh.

"Not fair, not fair. The thief only took my things, never took yours", Karmali pretended to be upset. Knowing that I am someone who is not easily woken up even by fire alarms or earthquakes, I have no alternative but to pray for God's protection everyday.

I hope the thief had done some Shakespearean plays in school. When he saw the fake jewellery he had stolen, he would say,

"Alamak! All that glitters is not gold!"
The jewellery from YWCA which I stole!
Old Willy Shakespeare was ever so right,
My greed has put me in such a plight!

Gan Chau