Sarong Party Girls

Having lived in Singapore for a year and failed to get under its skin – not the fake, expat skin but its deeper dermis – I was super excited to read 'Sarong Party Girls' by Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan.

Written in Singlish, the wickedly brash Singaporean patois that muddles Chinese and Malay dialects with quirky, jerky English, this is a book that makes no apologies for the materialistic goals of its narrator, twenty-six year old Sarong Party Girl (SPG) Jazzy. And it certainly doesn’t pander to liberal Western expectations of a feminist heroine.

Jazzy and her best friends embark on a mission to marry an 'ang moh' (white expat) and have a Chanel baby. This apparently simple plan throws up a maelstrom of gender, cultural, racial and class conflicts of which Jazzy appears blissfully unaware, leaving her reader to navigate this ethical maze without a map.

As a literary device, this is exquisite. I love books that confuse my moral compass. Can I blame Jazzy for wanting to be rich, when she lives on a small island that can seem defined by its blatant gulf between rich and poor – where the stupidly-wealthy expat men are sexually obsessed with the local women? Is it condescending and hypocritical to want Jazzy to continue her family’s cultural traditions by marrying an 'ah beng', shopping in wet markets and spend her days cooking in a stiflingly hot, government-owned flat – on the basis that, ultimately, it might make her happier than being the wife of an adulterous, culturally-homeless, morally-bankrupt ang moh?

Jazzy might be naïve, but most British readers will be clueless about the world she inhabits. We can try to impose our feminist ideals on her but, really, she needs to find her own way out of this tightly-wound labyrinth. At every turn it seems there is yet another man waiting to exploit her naked ambition; another childhood friend to betray. My delight in Jazzy’s refreshing honesty and buoyancy soon slipped into a slight sense of despair.

'Sarong Party Girls' has been billed as 'Emma' set in modern Asia but I think it’s more original than that; more fascinating and culturally-insightful than 'Clueless'. And it walks a much finer line between female empowerment and prostitution.

I absolutely loved everything about 'Sarong Party Girls', from its conflicted characters to its narrative structure - (conversational, non-linear, deceptively casual) and Jazzy’s voice - often hilarious, breathtakingly raw; it's a full immersion in the patois with translation neither offered nor necessary.

This is a book that will stay with me for a very long time. 24 hours after finishing it I find I am occasionally thinking in Singlish. For the first time since I left, I really want to go back to Singapore and discover this brilliant, tiny, complex country all over again. And eat lots of delicious chicken rice.