I groaned as I trudged towards the Gillman Barracks in the morning. I didn’t have to but I wanted to help Jo and Max since I could come by and also pass them a cupcake or so.
Block 7 was where the #buysinglit event was happening from 24th to 26th February 2017.
For anyone who had been to Gillman Barracks, most of their reactions was, “Ughh ok fine, I’ll just go there once and never again” because it was just such an ulu place.
I removed my sunglasses as I stepped into the building, the walls were decorated with pages but I didn’t go up close to them to read.
This is the first year of #buysinglit and it was not at just the Gillman Barracks, it was also at Raffles City, the Empress Lawn, the Singapore Cricket Club and some other walking locations for literary tours.
Oh yeah and that’s Max and Jo, part of The Rolling Ronins collective (do give a like to their page).
Next to us was Jon Gresham and he was a lovely neighbour too.
Yassss come by and buy. That was Rex Regrets by Jerry Teo and a cameo of Kenny from Books Actually.
There were talks there and when there wasn’t, there was hipster music playing in the background as we waited for people to come by and buy our stuff.
Anyway, interesting observations of helping out a booth:
- When people realize that your books are comics, they think is it for kids and have that look upon their face of thinking that it’s not for them when it’s actually for working adults (but is all ages for them to understand). FYI, one of the stories is about mid life crisis.
- “HI I HAVE A BOOK that I wrote, how can I submit it to be published (to you)”. This has happened a lot of times which made me go “Huh”. Cause if they actually read, they’d see that the booth is a collective and that everyone did their own thing. You want a book printed and all, do it yourself kind of style.
- People are amazed that… we can write or draw and just do it on our own? I don’t know.
- I should sell food/snacks if it was at Gillman Barracks or some other ulu places.
So yes, that’s it.
But really, I’d like to sell snacks and food next time ok? Can be fun.
Anyway, after that, I ran to Raffles City (not literally run because there was a bus to the city). That’s the MPH pop up stall with the local books available for the event.
On the other side, there were short talks!
This was Ben Ben Diaries by Dan Kuah and Smith Leong with a cameo of Ben Ben at the event itself.
After that was Nicholas Yong‘s Track Faults and Other Glitches.
The fault was probably not in the stars.
And THEN running off to the Empress Lawn which was in front of Victoria Theatre to check out The Teenage Textbook Movie.
I wanted to get my book autographed by Adrian Tan so yay, success.
Phillip Lim shared with us the problems and fun facts about making the movie and wow ok. It was the time when no one in the civil service departments didn’t know who to direct to get permission for filming from.
Anyway, so fun.
My conclusion if there’s a next Singlit event, I hope it’s all in a more central area. It really is here and there.
Oh and that I’m totally selling drinks and snacks if it’s at an ulu place again.
PS. The bag design was cute if you bought $30 and above. I bought……………
$29.90 …………….
So I couldn’t get it………………….
