Frivolous Universe

SNAPSHOTS FROM THE IRRETRIEVABLE: A Malay island, a cherry dress, and the bright light of dissolution

 Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, Penang National Park

Last week I returned to the Malaysian island of Penang with its colonial facades, rickshaws, and Protestant cemetery full of East India Company Esquires. The last time I visited Penang I was eleven years old. I stayed with my family at the Eastern & Oriental Hotel. I can clearly conjure memories of the E & O’s old crank elevator with its metal accordian grill, the stooped Malay operator, and–cloistering them all–a crumbling sea wall.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

Twenty-three years had come between us when I once again stepped through the swinging doors of the E & O. The only object I could find to corroborate my vivid childhood recall was the crank elevator, long retired. From its door hung a polite placard: danger please do not touch the grill.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

Scanning the lobby of the renovated E & O was like trying to glimpse familiarity in the face of a friend who has crash-dieted down one hundred pounds.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

As the structure changes, so goes the territory. I realized the many ways I am unlike the hermit crab who can cast aside his shell.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

I marveled at how I had been treating my memory–the most fugitive of landscapes–like it was a map of the actual. The world always has been and remains a specter of light and shadow. The map is never the territory. The map is a snapshot taken of Chinese money as it burns in a Malay alley in a wild and tidy pile.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

This is why photographs, like memory, hold us in their thrall.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

Where did they come from? Where did they go?

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

How to measure the distance between what is and what was?

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

In moss.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, http://http://www.frivolousuniverse.com/, FU, cherry dress, Free People, cardigans, J. Crew, Gizeh Birkenstocks, jade rosary, Burmese jade, Mango sunglasses, wooden fan, Koh Kret, Penang, Malaysia, islands, Georgetown, Southeast Asia travel, street style, E & O Hotel

In creepers.

Cell phone photos by Tetoro 

Cherry dress: Free People; cotton cardigan: J. Crew; sandals: Gizeh Birkenstocks; rosary: Burmese jade custom-made in Phnom Penh; sunglasses: MANGO; wooden fan: souvenir shop, Koh Kret.

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