AND A SUNNY MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU AND YOU AND YOU

And then the end of the year is upon us. I don't know about you but I am not entirely heartbroken to see the end of this difficult year. Under the blazing Singaporean sun, I am letting go one month at a time.

In the concentrated heat, amid koyals and beetles, monkeys leaping in through windows for fresh bananas and the occasional languorous green snake, I eat and unwind my own coiled tense muscles.

In the midst of celebrating Christmas eve, the nephew and I contemplate a tired beetle, struggling to climb aboard a raft...  not dissimilar to me in the final stretch of this year. 

In his last hours, the beetle had two friends trying to build walls of protection around him. 

Later, at Christmas lunch under tropical sun, Raf insisted I eat with the upturned beetle beside me ... oh well, all part of the great merry go round of life. Merry Christmas everyone!