Edmond, my colleague at Loof, once told me that my best feature was my smile. I could look gloomy and tough and give people the feeling that I don’t give much of a damn to anything. But when I smile, I look totally different. And much better.

Ever since a big change in my life, I started to give people the impression (especially first impressions) that I am this tough person that no one could mess about with. It kind of succeeded in a way, since these strangers have no idea how my past was like. But, however, once these strangers became regular acquaintances, I started to open up myself more. And I started to feel at ease with these random people, which therefore, brought my somewhat cheerful and happy side out.

There was this customer at Muse, called Alex, I think. (Gosh, I’m terrible. I can’t even remember his name!) Actually, he is a friend of my bar supervisor. So he drops by for a jug of Asahi every now and then, and he would make conversation with me, inviting me out to drink whenever I have an off day. So I was pretty caught off-guard when he mentioned that I looked better when I smile.