I was gonna talk about attending Kristang classes for this edition, and how it’s affected me as a writer, as a Eurasian, and even as part of my family.

Then Nadia was taken to the hospital around four weeks ago.

I won’t tell you what she was warded for. (If you would like to know, you’re welcome to ask.) I will tell you though that Dr. Joella Ang and the team at Singapore General Hospital were amazing. They kept us informed of the game plan every morning and cared for Nadia every second of every day.

That helped to assuage our fears tremendously—but we were still understandably worried. The days immediately after Nadia was warded were some of the most emotionally harrowing of our lives.

The following Monday, at around 11am, she was wheeled into the operating theatre. Dr. Ang assured us she would be fine. Still, I spent the next few hours juggling cautious optimism with the possibility that I might lose my wife.

Sometime closer to the evening, they wheeled her out. She was in tremendous pain—but very much alive.

In the time since, Nadia’s been discharged and is recovering at home. My parents stayed over to take care of her while I flew to Perth (I’ll talk about that in the next edition). And I’ve woken up every day so incredibly grateful that we still have each other.

Needless to say, I haven’t stuck to my resolution to read four books a month. Here are the books I read in January:

1. The Faceless Thing We Adore by Hester Steel

2. A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing by Jessie Tu

3. Goethe’s Faust, translated by Walter Arnold Kaufmann

I still haven’t finished The Art of Thai Comics: A Century of Strips and Stripes by Nicolas Verstappen. Not because it isn’t any good, but because I didn’t take into account that its size and shape wouldn’t make for the most comfortable read while on public transport, so I’ve designated it “home reading only”.

Meanwhile, in the midst of… well, everything, I’ve at least managed to finish another novel by an Asian-Australian author:

4. The Spider and Her Demons by sydney khoo, the last unread book from my trip to Adelaide in 2024.

I’m reading a couple of poetry collections that I picked up in Perth right now, but I’ll be jumping into Standing the Test of Time: Celebrating 100 Years of the Eurasian Association, Singapore next.

(I’m aiming for forty books this year instead of the planned forty-eight.)

Luca has been an absolute gem—even more than usual. He can be finicky with his food sometimes, but while Nadia was in hospital, he didn’t give me any trouble during mealtimes.

And speaking of my babies, I’ve just received word from our publisher that one of the best independent bookstores in Perth has ordered Work-Life Balance, so expect me to shout that out in the next edition.

In the meantime, just a reminder that you can order our award-winning prose/comics hybrid anywhere in the world. Visit the outlets linked on this page of my site, or direct your bookstore to this Edelweiss page.

And that’s it for now.

I’m starting the second level of Kristang classes later this week, so I’ll talk about that eventually. In the meantime, if you want to sign up for the entry level classes, you can do so here.

Until the next edition, take care of yourselves—but also make sure you tell the people that you love how much they mean to you, try to let some hate out of your heart, and treasure all the good in your life.

You probably know all of that, of course (you’re a smart bunch), but when it feels like you might lose the person that’s most important to you, it really becomes abundantly clear how much you might be taking for granted—even if it feels like you haven’t.

And on that note, I’ll see you when I see you, folks.