Tiny little metal frights, the injectors of the western mind. Needles slide under the skin and into the veins. They hide in doctor’s office drawers and in the underbrush and alleyways of urban junkielands. Those are the needles that facilitated Kevin Arkell’s addiction to speed and carried HIV into his bloodstream. Now the other kind of needle, the noninjector that’s slowly making its way into western medical practice, is providing Arkell a new kind of relief from pain.

By the Needles is another multimedia tour of a corner of urban culture by regular contributor Poh Si Teng and her crew at XPRESS online.

Production: Poh Si Teng
Images: Justin Maxon and Justin Mott
Design: Dian Angelov

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Poh Si Teng is Director of theCICAK. Thumbnail by Howaye.