"I can’t even shuffle cards smoothly with two hands!" That's something people often tell me after watching me perform magic tricks using only my left hand. Their reactions always make me smile. What they don't see are the countless hours I have spent
Receiving an award should have been a happy moment. For me, it was something I feared. During secondary school, I was among the top 10 students academically. I worked hard and received awards for my achievements. But some of my classmates laughed at me and teased me because of my
At about 9.30 on the morning of 18 July 2025, I bought my 97-year-old father a bowl of black sesame paste. Six hours later, he was dead. My father lived in a three-room HDB flat along Bendemeer Road in Singapore. Since my mother passed away in
When I was a child, there was one simple thing I could never do properly. I could never separate a mosquito coil without breaking it. No matter how carefully I tried to pull the two spirals apart, one of them would snap. Sometimes both would break. My father could do
"I believe in miracles. As long as Xavier wants to fight, I will continue fighting with him." I remember saying those words to the doctor while my twenty-year-old son lay unconscious in the Intensive Care Unit at the National University Hospital in Singapore. Xavier was connected
When I was a little girl, my best friend was a toy penguin. It had a rubber button that made a funny quipping sound when I pressed it. I would pull it along behind me as I wandered through a big house on a hill. The house was filled with
Recently, I visited my father at the nursing home. He looked at me, but he could not remember my name. I waited, hoping that something would click in his memory. It was only after a nurse prompted him that he finally recognised me. I had known for years that this
It was almost 11pm when a Taiwanese woman invited my husband, our two young daughters, and me to follow her into the mountains. She said she owned a tea plantation. What could possibly be so interesting about tea leaves in the dark? That was my first thought. My second was
My fatness brought me fame, glory, money, and plenty of admirers. Yes, you read that correctly. Hi, I am Sharmilah, your Fat Diva. And I have always been proud to be fat and fabulous! I was once chosen to model alongside China's top 40 models at an F1
I was seven years old when my father threw me into the deep end of a swimming pool. I couldn't swim. One moment, I was standing at the edge of the public swimming pool in Toa Payoh, excited about my first swimming lesson. The next, I was underwater,
"If only you were half as smart as Charles, I would be very proud of you!" Those words from my mother stayed with me for years. Charles is my cousin. We were both born in 1961, shared the same grandfather and carried the same surname. But that seemed
An elderly woman was trying to force my clenched teeth apart with a stainless steel spoon. Others poured basins of water over my body. Someone tried to force milk down my throat. They were desperately trying to revive me. I was 33 years old, unconscious after a terrible electric shock,