Rich People Problems-Kwan 2017 (WWT)

Merchant Ivory film. They go rattling around this huge palace, dressed like underpaid
civil servants, but then they start speaking and they all sound like Maggie Smith. Auntie
Felicity clucks about like a mother hen, criticizing everyone, while Auntie Victoria seems
to be an expert on everything even though she hasn’t worked a day in her life. She even
tried to challenge me on the origin of the hantavirus! Then there are the Hong Kong
cousins—Alistair Cheng, who is very sweet but…how do I put it politely…not the sharpest
tool in the box, and his sister, Cecilia, and Fiona Tung-Cheng, both perfectly polite but
soooooooo stuck up. Why do all Hong Kong girls think the sun shines out of their asses?
They just chatter away to each other in Cantonese and go off on foodie adventures every
day with their kids. I suspect they only came to Singapore to eat. Every time they are
around I feel like they are assessing me from head to toe. I don’t think Cecilia approves of
Balmain. And then there’s Eddie. What a crazy fuck. Grandma has just died, and all her
daughters stand there staring at her body without a single tear in their eyes. The only
people who seem to be crying are the maids, the Sikh guard, and Eddie. OMFG I have
never seen a grown man sob like that. Crawling into bed and cradling his dead
grandmother. Dressed in a velvet smoking jacket! And then Nick—the only halfway
normal person in the whole house—enters the room and Eddie lunges at him. The aunties
start to scream but really, it’s a pretty pathetic fight, because Eddie hits like a girl and
Nick simply rolls him off and pins him to the ground. “Calm the fuck down!” Nick says,
but Eddie’s screaming, kicking, thrusting, and finally Nick has no choice but to sock him
right in the nose, and blood just goes EVERYWHERE. Especially all over my brand-new Rick
Owens toad-skin boots. And now I’m told we have to spend at least another week with
these people. Kill me now.
CAPTAIN VIKRAM GHALE
Head of Security, Tyersall Park
Ah Ling called me in a panic. “Aiyah, come quick! They are fighting! Eddie is trying to kill
Nicky!” I rushed upstairs with two Gurkhas but by the time I got to the room, it was all
over. Eddie was sitting at the foot of the bed, blood all over his face. He kept saying, “You
broke my nose! You are going to fucking pay for my nose job!” Nicky just stood there,
looking stunned. Alix smiled at me as if nothing had happened and said, in the calmest
voice ever, “Ah, Vikram, you’re here. I’m not sure what the procedure is. Who do we call?
Do we call the police now?” I was confused at first and said, “You want to report this
fight?” She said, “Oh no, not that. My mother has passed away. What are we supposed to
do now?” In all the confusion, I hadn’t even noticed that Mrs. Young was dead. I couldn’t
help myself—I burst into tears right there in front of everyone.
FELICITY LEONG
Eldest Daughter