Friends.

You never know how much a person is a part of your life, until there is a separation.

I've only known Seema since we both started oil painting lessons at the Tanjong Pagar Community Centre, in May 2008, so this makes it, what, one and a half years? Karen and I wanted to learn to oil paint, and decided that learning at the CC was helluva lot cheaper than learning at private classes.

So here we were, two beginners standing behind Lao Shi, who was painting a rather ugly pot with fake dusty lurid purple orchids, and lecturing us in MANDARIN on the basics of oil painting. I was already starting to go cross-eyed even though Karen was doing rapid translation into English, when we realised there was an Indian girl who was listening intently to Karen. She was new to the class too, and being Indian, we knew she was not going to be able to follow the lesson if Lao Shi was going to teach in Mandarin. That was our first meeting with Seema, our girl from India.

Amelia too, was new to class, and it was her canvas that Lao Shi was painting on. While Karen was doing translation, Amelia was nodding her head and making appropriate noises. The four of us naturally gravitated towards each other, being the newbies of the class and being forced to paint Really Ugly Orchids.

When class was over at 5.30pm, as we were packing up, we asked Seema and Amelia if they would like to have dinner with us. We didn't know where to eat, so we'd be exploring too. That was the start of a beautiful friendship, women of different ages, different characters and outlooks in life.

A rather odd quartet but bonded in friendship by our love for painting.

And now it looks like our quartet will become a trio. *sigh sadly*