It was a burning hot afternoon when my little brother Patrick and I took on the mission to find Melaka Art Gallery where there are supposed to be 150 excellent paintings of all ages. It shows on the tourist map that the gallery is only a stone’s throw away from Xavier church. Under the brutal sunlight of Melaka, we walk, bare-headed. The further we walk, the more desserted it becomes. “That does not feel right”, I told Patrick. “We either took the wrong turn or art is dead in this quaint little town”. To mark my words, a sign appears in grafitti right before our eyes and it says “Art Gallery”, with a little crooked arrow pointing upwards. We both stop, look up and stand there motionless for a while. It’s a long, lonely, narrow stairway leading up to no where.
And so up we walk, without a distant idea of what we may find. There is a weather-beaten, moss-covered wall on the right and to the left a few miserable looking old tombs. As we walk along the stairway up onto the un-known, the picture paints an eery, trapped, and vulnerable atmosphere to the place. We stood right there at the entrance where it says “Art Gallery” in grafitti, No one is around. Lying carelessly are bags of garbage, a few damaged chairs and piles of dead leaves. Dust of memories calls it home. Lime-light of the bygone can hardly be seen. Nothing is permanent in this world.
As we walk down the stairway back to the un-known, a few words come to my mind:
I walk the endless road To look for nowhere And so the shadows found Up along the stairs…
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