Vahana's Face

“Into the tranquil and blissful world of a celebrity couple, during Singapore’s emergent period, comes a frightful specter shattering the life built by Spiros Zodhiates and Ophelia Qin. This story explores the possibility of the paranormal in an ordered rational world, founded upon tight scientific logic and insinuates that despite our outward confidence in a purely material world, these walls with which we surround and protect our human existence really have an egg-shell fragility, which can be cracked at any time. Such breakages allow us to glimpse into the existence of another dimension that’s there: the supernatural or spiritual world which invades us at times. And although frightening, looking at it straight in the eye, and not denial or suppression, is the best defense and remedy for it.” This fictional account is based on a true experience or incident, in the tropical island of Singapore, before she became a global financial engine and power-house.

In emergent Singapore, a celebrity couple, Spiros and Ophelia fell in love and got married. Their life was idyllic until the submerged and hitherto, unknown family legacy of Ophelia became manifest. A dark stain of  the occult flows in her veins in spite of herself. As the dark specter attaches itself to her, the nightmare spirals out of control, and requires all the audacity and shrewdness of the Qin eldership to outwit the dark entity. This, they do after a harrowing standoff with terror itself. Victory is achieved ultimately but not cheaply. Ophelia doesn’t escape unscathed. Neither did their happy marriage. The story at the end probes and questions the premise we have about life set purely in modern, rational terms. In spite of our knowledge of  things in this universe, many more things remain a mystery and can bring disaster upon our heads unsuspectingly. This dramatised account(written in a more sober and realistic tone of this genre) is based on a true experience and incident, in this remarkable, exuberant island of Singapore; and is set at a time before she became a modern, financial power-house she's today.

Nehemiah was born in South East Asia in 1952, the youngest son of a large family of twelve. Growing up in that region, he imbibed a great deal of multiculturalism and respect for other races. In independent post colonial Malaysia, he acquired an education, in which English was the principal but not the only language to be used or examined. And although, English was not his mother tongue, he developed a great affinity for this new language, picking it up as a second language, alongside what was spoken at home; a kind of home-brew babble of Cantonese and English, reminiscent of British Hong Kong. He worked for a while as a professional magazine writer after high school, but later due to a family crisis, the death of a beloved eldest sister, he opted for further studies in theology. For thirty years, having graduated with a B.TH, he worked variously as a teacher, counselor, trainer and missionary at different stages and places. Presently, he’s doing duty as an English instructor in China, having taught both university  and junior school students. However, two years ago, due to the frustration living a mechanistic clockwork life and the resurgence of creative, imaginative, impulses, he started writing again. To his very great surprise, his early efforts were quickly rewarded with successes, on both sides of the Atlantic. His poems and stories were published, having won in open international competitions against others. Nehemiah has come to the charming realization of how amazing life can be in turning one full circle without even trying. That no matter how far one has traveled forward along the timeline; one cannot fully escape from the traction of one’s own roots.