shocking 6 year old

My little one has never ceased to give me heart attacks. Maybe a 6+ boy is meant to do that anyway. Just last week he got punched in school and came home with bloody lips. Then this week he tried his 'power' on a classmate, and got himself in trouble with the boy's mother (serves him right). When I asked him what he did, he said he jentik the boy on the hand :-). In return, he got a jentik from me, plus a ban to go to anyone's house for two days.

Yesterday he threw tantrum at his cousins' house, resulting in him breaking something, which, naturally gets more punishment from me. This time, it's a week's ban from visiting the cousins.

Of course when he feels like it, he'd be an angel. He'd offer to dry the dishes when I wash, or arrange his books neatly on the table. He'd speak sweetly to me and use all the magic words of 'please', 'thanks', 'good' etc. That, when he's fishing for compliments and rewards, or maybe to test whether he is still loved after being a naughty boy.

Today another shock awaited me at home. Since I wasn't the one who picked him up after school, I only found out when I went home. He excitedly announced "mom, I've lost my shoes at school!". I froze on the doorway, unable to believe my hearing. "What, how could anyone lose their shoes at school?" I said. He explained to me that during one of the lessons, they had to go to another room and were required to take off their shoes. When he went out of the room, his shoes were gone. Suddenly an image of a little boy walking barefoot in school gave me the giggle and I decided not to give him a long lecture of taking care of one's belongings . "I still have a sock though", he said, as if a sock would be of any use now.

Ya, ya, ok, so my products are not good?

I went to a reflexology center a few days ago, thinking that I could have a nice, relaxing foot massage while waiting for the kids to finish school. I've never been to that place before so I thought I'd be left in peace. How wrong I was. The moment the 'sifu' started my massage, the lady cashier started promoting 'her products', supposedly 'the best' in the market, based on years of research in a developed country.


The lady asked me what shampoo I used, to which I answered 'rejoice', and as expected, received the disapproving 'not good'. She went on to promote the products and her multi-level-marketing business. Hmm...I've experienced many MLM businesses before, blame it on my youth and ... the desire to always have the best. Now I can only conclude that yes, maybe the products- toiletries, supplements etc are good, but they are also really expensive.


I've quit buying those expensive products. Thank god I finally realized that life has to be lived realistically. Within one's means. If all the products in the supermarket are really that bad, then perhaps 3/4 of the world population or more would all be affected. Come to think of it, those are the products my parents used on me since I was born anyway, and touch wood, there haven't been any serious health problems in the family. Those products couldn't be that unsafe then. Well, I've got to live within my means anyway...

Durian! Durian!

Never been much fan of durians...all because my first memory of eating durian was that it gave me a chest pain (reflux?). That, and also throughout the years I've grown to dislike the smell. It's just too strong it could give me a headache sometimes. But yesterday was an exception. My family had a gathering with our friends that we haven't met for months. C and C have a fruit orchard so they brought durians and mangosteens for us. Instead of running away from the durians this time, I sat with them, too engrossed in the talking, and later admiring the way they all seem to enjoy the durian session. It gets more interesting when they talked about the different type of durians- the bitter durians, the honey durians, the 'teka' (or whatever it is :-)). Curiousity took over. I was tempted to taste a bit of the flesh of different colours, and waited for the chest pain to come. It didn't :-) Meaning I had taken just nice, not too much of durians this time. I am still not very comfortable with the smell...but around good friends, I am willing to bear it!

Aren't we all both good and bad?

I heard the term 'muhasibbah diri' (self reflection) on the radio some time ago. Being me, I often listen to the Muslim's Friday sermon on the radio as attentively as I listen to the priest's homily at church on Sundays because I know I always learn something from them. The imam said that we have to examine ourselves before saying bad things about others, as sometimes the bad things we say reflect our own weaknesses.


How true indeed. It is often easy to look at someone's negative traits especially when that someone is not very popular among the community members, or the colleagues. And as opposed to that, one tends to view a popular person always positively when in actual fact, that person may commit some crimes once in a while. It reminds me of something I read somewhere, that "most people are neither all good or all bad. Rather, most of us are in the middle of the two". I quite agree with that statement. In fact, I am extending it a bit more to say all of us are both good and bad. Of course, I have no backup in saying this. It's just a feeling. With this self-reflection, I hope I can remind myself all the time to look for people's positive traits even when I do not like them, or when they are not treating me right.


Well, I'll start with the grandmother next door, who scolded me yesterday for parking outside her gate :-) She lives alone, and after talking to her a few times, (mostly listening to her whine about how bad her relatives are), I made the wrong move of assuming that she didn't have any relatives with cars visiting her. Hence the occasional parking outside of her place. But ouch, I have taken things for granted a bit too much. Just as I flashed her a big smile when I stopped my car yesterday, she marched towards me and without a preamble, gave me a long lecture about not being such a nuisance by parking outside of other people's place. Because I parked there, her son had to park far away when visiting her a few days ago. Well I have only myself to blame this time. Even though she didn't give me a chance to apologise properly, at least by giving me that long lecture, she had been really honest. So one point for honesty for the grandmother. She might be grumpy, but she is such a good gardener. So two points for the grandmother...well well...one point for me for admitting my inconsiderate mistake...

The Weirdest Assignment

My line of work is considered unexciting, if not boring sometimes. Well not many would think teaching, researching, occasional editing and translating exciting anyway. But last week I learned that it could be.

On Thursday somebody requested me to anchor a pair of Dusun herbalists in Ranau for a filming, apparently funded by some organisation affiliated with the National Geographic. When I asked what does an anchor do, the person said, simply assisting them in the filming, mostly translating what they say into English. It sounded interesting, especially that it would give me more exposure on over a hundred types of herbs. So I agreed.

On Saturday, hubby, kids and I drove off from KK to Ranau at 5am, something I had never done before, to join the filming crew at 7am. Still a bit drowsy from lack of sleep, I met the crew members and happily let them know I was ready to do the translation, only to be told that I was supposed to host the film. I was taken aback, but because I had come all the way from KK for that assignment, decided to give it a try anyway. After all, the producer told me if I wasn't good enough, he'd not go on with me.

He scrutinized me critically, decided that I needed to wear an overall to create a 'jungle girl' look, checked that I had the right hat on, and got me started. It wasn't easy at all. Having had no preparation, I met the herbalists, had a warm-up session of obtaining as many facts about them and their farms, and tried to memorize all the herbs they told me about. After about an hour, when the herbalists and I started to warm up to each other, the producer announced that it was time to get to work. They put a little speaker on me, and set up the camera. The producer briefed me on what he wanted done, and the herbalists and I started our acts while the kids had fun in the river on the herbal farm. I am most impressed with the herbalists; even though they are elderly, they acted naturally without any script for guidance. Taking cue from them, I found that words came easily to me, and being in front of the camera became exciting. One by one, the facts that they told me earlier came out, interwoven with our impromptu dialogues in Dusun. Giving a commentary on each selected herb on the farm became easy, instead of stressful as I thought it would be.

A few 'cuts' in the beginning of the filming gradually subsided. Halfway through, the producer offered me to host a few more of the series he was working on, which I unfortunately had to refuse because of my tight schedule. Apparently he found me easy to work with, which I was happy to know. And it was also fun to know that I wasn't camera-shy- at least I can do some other things apart from teaching. We completed the filming in about 6 hours (and it was going to be aired for a half hour slot only); dealing with 20 herbs and enjoying some break sessions. In those 6 hours I got to know and like the herbalists and the filming crew. I learned that chemistry is indeed crucial when working in a team. When everybody likes one another, the task becomes light and fun, and easy to complete. That was indeed a weird assignment. I still wonder how did I land on that...

Forgetfulness

Post operation, I'd like to blame my forgetfulness on the anaesthetic used on my. Like yesterday when I dropped by at the office to submit my mc, I promised Wan that I'd give her a buzz as she would be in a meeting. But when I arrived there I realized I didn't bring my mobile, or my office room keys so I couldn't even use the phone to give her a ring. And before that, I was supposed to be driving the kids to the tuition centre, and they told me they'd be waiting at my cousin's house. And what did I do? Drove past the house and had to make a u-turn. Luckily the kids didn't realize I did that or they'd be teasing me about it endlessly.


But I can't blame forgetting my passwords for many web accounts on anything, can I? To think that I only used a few passwords and still can forget them...It's kind of embarrassing. Two months ago I had to call my uni help desk for forgetting my library password, even the secret question that helps one to have the password sent via email. I got hold of it and I thought that's it. Then I realized I have forgotten my gmail password. When I did remember, there were hundred of spams in the inbox I almost lost interest in my gmail. Worse, I forgot my airasia login password, and malaysiaairlines' too, just as I was making a travel booking two weeks ago. I thought I jot them down somewhere, but even forgot where. The greatest blow is this morning when I was trying to open my student webmail account. It says "your credentials are not recognised"! Oh dear me...what is becoming of me. Maybe it's nature's way of reminding me to be more organised :-(

The eye operation

I had a squint since I was young, but it wasn't prominent until a few years ago. Blame it on all the reading and studying :-) But seriously it was causing me a problem. One eye is short-sighted, and the other, long-sighted. My Dr say ideally that shouldn't be a problem, but since I had a squint, it became a problem. It caused my eyes to be unable to focus most of the times. Well sometimes they seem focused, but most of the times, I couldn't make them so. And my eyes got tired fast, making reading so not fun.


So my Dr suggested a corrective eye surgery for me months ago. She said she would fix the muscles to make them lax, since the problem was that the muscles were so tight. I thought about if for a long time- with mixed feelings. Scared, a little bit. Excited, also a little bit. I decided to give it a go during the kids' school holidays, and the semester holidays at the uni so I could have a good recovery period.


'D day' was yesterday. I admitted myself to the hospital at 10.30am. Thank goodness I brought my laptop so I could work while waiting for 2pm, the operation time. I hated it when the nurses pushed me on the trolley, even hated it when I entered the super cold operation theatre. When Dr Dayang, my nice Dr said hi to me, I told her I was feeling like doing a 100m sprint to get away from the miserable room. But of course I couldn't have done that anyway. So on I went with the operation, enduring the scary jab and was sent to dreamland in seconds.


When I woke up, Dr Dayang had fixed my eye. Oh thank goodnesss it was only an eye. I really need my other eye to do my work. She did a test this morning and told me happily it was a success. She has reduced the squint degree from 45% to 5%. Well I have a red and gritty eye now but surprisingly it wasn't as painful as I expected. Even the post-operation headache lasted only about 2 hours. I hope my eye would recover soon and I won't get tired too fast when working anymore. I do feel good actually. Thank God.