"Beyond the Fall"

What is "Beyond the Fall"?
I've been reading this book for the past 3 days. I should be finishing tomorrow. It's written by a young man called Thomas, who resides in Singapore. He is a tetraplegic (person who is paralyzed in four limbs) and this book is about his life after the fateful Christmas Party in 1999, where he got drunk and somehow ended up on the ground floor when he was supposed to be in bed on the third floor of a friend's house in Bukit Timah.

How did I get this book? Why?
I was in Popular with mum and our two maids, Seuth Pov and Pher. Seuth Pov wanted to buy some books before going back to Cambodia. I just took the chance to spend more time with mum and dad. I was browsing through the shelves (not the the branch in South City Plaza has a good selection of books) and one section caught my attention. The first book was Lydia Teh's "Life's Like That", which is about Malaysian life. That was a good read. Will talk about it next time. Then next to her book was this book, which has a lovely painting of a sunflower on its cover. It actually looked a little like the art work produced by the kids dad teach. I flipped through, read the front and back covers, and the first few pages. At the bottom of one page read: "20% from the sale of this book will go to .......... Foundation...... Charity........" Oh yes, definitely buying this book. I'm a big fan of charity..... =P

So far...
I've enjoyed reading it. I envy Thomas' journey of life. I mean, I don't think it's any fun being paralyzed but I think he is getting much more out of life because he is more appreciative of life than most of us 'normal' people are. He wanted to share his experiences with the rest of Singapore (and perhaps the world) to show that people like him are also part the society and that they should also be taken care of. He was referring to how an enormous task it is for him and his maid to go 'jalan-jalan' in his neighbourhood - high kerbs, flimsy railing, uneven pathways, uncovered manholes, etc. Just imagine a really bad version of KL. There were a few typos but I guess that's alright as the publishing and editing was done by his close friends. I like the layout of the book, though. The idea of starting each section with a picture and poem is refreshing (for me, at least). Definitely refreshing when you have been reading Times New Roman font 10, single-spaced, in paperback published by Puffin or Penguin all your life.