Becoming Ah Lan Toh

Chow Kit Chronicles, #1

In swinging 60s seedy Chow Kit, Kuala Lumpur, in recently renamed South East Asian country of Malaysia, cabaret singer Ah Lan is taught a unique method by voice coach Sammi to not only make men clap but to stand up in more ways than one.

Sammi is looking for love, setting his sights on one particular GI in the audience, who is on R&R from the war in Vietnam. And so is Ah Lan. But her chances are slim—she stands a head taller than most Asian men.

But as fate would have it, her elderly neighbors the Tans are helping to fix her up with a very tall Affendi.  He tells them he bartends at a club but, but left out the stripping on the side. 

All this while Ah Lan is puzzling over the subtle changes to her body: broader shoulders, harder muscles, for instance. When a jealous colleague hires her dressmaker Madam Chan to invoke some local black magic on her, she begins to morph.