Taklimat Pendaftaran Tingkatan 1

Today is my niece's registration for Form 1 at her new school. From 8-30am-10.30am all the parents are seated in the Hall to listen to 4 taklimats: from the HM, the penolong kanan HEA, the penolong kanan HEP and the penolong kanan for the afternoon session.

Halfway through the second taklimat, my mind started wandering. The Hal Ehwal Akademik teacher was explaining about sistem PBS, KBAT, Nilam, PT3, pentaksiran sumatif/formatif etc etc etc. His voice started to sound more and more distant. My eyes started to lose focus and my head started to bobble right and left as sleep took over.

Then the lady seated on my left tapped me on the shoulder and asked softly: "Cikgu tu dok cakap pasal Lembaga Peperiksaan. Lembaga Peperiksaan apa?"

I told her, "Hantu Peperiksaan tu."

She stared at me for at least 15 seconds and smiled.

"You ngantuk eh. Bertabahlah ye ada 2 taklimat lagi."

Ya! Bertabah! And my glassy eyes started to focus on the slides again.

Selamba je

🔸Itu la Madame, susah sekarang nak apply buat practical kat company-company sekarang. Banyak yang dah tak terima.
🔹Ye la kan? Tapi awak jangan putus asa. Kena hantar lagi resume ke syarikat-syarikat lain.
🔸Saya dah hantar banyak sangat. Tak takde jawapan lagi. Ada member saya sorang tu rilek-rilek. Selamba je.
🔹Ha awak jangan pulak ikut dia.
🔸Nak ikut macamana saya apply tak dapat.
🔹Awak cakap dia selamba je. Nanti leklu-leklu sangat kang apa pun tak dapat.
🔸Madame! Kan saya cakap...dia tu selamba je.
🔹So that's not a good thing!
🔸Haih. Schlumberger Madame. Schlumberger.
🔹Oh! Heheheh. Ok.

Bubbles

My niece and I were in our room hanging out together but doing separate things. I was reading a book and she was having one of her role-playing moments with her toy Minions.

Sometimes hanging out just means being physically in the same room together.

Anyway I overheard her Minions' conversation.

Minion 1: Oh Grand Master I have prepared your jacuzzi for you. Just as you like it.

Minion 2: Good good. I hope you remember how I like my jacuzzi to be.

Minion 1: Yes Master. Without any water.

Jadi saya pun tanya la dia, kenapa jacuzzi tak ada air? Macamana nak rasa bubbles dia?

Dia jawab: "Oh you can just imagine the bubbles Mak Long."

I told her that no bubbles meant no fun then.

Then she replied: "Mak Long you don't need bubbles to be happy. It's all in the mind."

And I was like, betul jugak kan. Agak deep tu maksudnya.

...."And any way Mak Long, the Grand Master doesn't need water and bubbles for his jacuzzi. He's the INVISIBLE Grand Minion.''

Ohhhh apesal tak cakap awal-awal. Now it makes perfect sense.

Kad Terup

Mak Long: What are you doing with my handphone?
Aina: Main game.
Mak Long: Game apa tu?
Aina: Game kad terup.
Mak Long: I never have any card games in my phone.
Aina: Ada. Mak Long yang download.
Mak Long: Aina jangan tipu Mak Long tau.
Aina: Haih. Tak tipu la Mak Long. Game Cut The Rope. Cut. The. Rope.
Mak Long: Owh. *sengih*

Badang tak jadi

A few days ago my cat Momoi threw up the tuna and prawn broth he had for breakfast. And the most disgusting thing was that he sniffed his vomit and started licking it back.

I waited a while to look for any Badang effect tapi taka ada pun so I just shooed him away.

I told this to my vet when I brought Tina for her sub-cutaneous drip. Well apparently according to the vet, it is actually quite normal for a cat or dog to do so. For them regurgitated food is still good food. Then she went on to tell me about how her dogs would sometimes eat each other's vomit and I told her another story in which my cats would be so penggeli and refused to look at their poop after they do their business and my vet agreed and told me another dog story about how dogs would sometimes even eat cat poop. All this crap talk while waiting for Tina to be done with her drip.

When I was about to leave the consultation room Dr June said to me, "Do you realize that we were actually trying to outdo each other with vomit and poop stories?"

Outside, I said hello to another client who asked me what was wrong with Tina.

"Dr June and you looked so serious while you two were discussing just now."

Padahal cerita muntah dan poo-poo.

Pen istimewa

Early this morning I received a Whatsapp message from a student of mine.

Very early in the morning.

Like 5.18am early.

Which surprised me a bit. And worried me. Because if you received text messages or calls at odd hours it can mean several things:

1-Someone died.

2-Someone is in the hospital.

3-The message sender is a stalker.

Anyway I read the message and found myself rubbing my eyes to read it again clearly.

It read: "Bonjour madame. I think I left my penis in your office last week."

My office, by the way, is filled with student assignments yang berbagai-bagai at the moment. Each class has a different project. So now I have scale models of French monuments, fun facts posters about France, 2016 calendars (You want one? I got lots), brochures, mini magazines on France...

...but a penis? I would have noticed it right away. Trust me.

A few minutes later the student texted me again: "Madame I'm soooo sorry. Pen madame pen!"

I was about to reply when another text came in: "Itu la madame cakap melayu senang kan?"

Then another text message, the last one: "Eh tapi pen dalam BM dengan BI sama je ek?"

So I tried to get back to sleep. But couldn't. Because Momoi was already on the bed meowing at my face.

Oh well.

Kentang goreng

Tadi ada sekumpulan pelajar datang ke pejabat saya untuk tunjuk assignment progress. Selesai diskusi salah seorang daripada mereka bagi saya kentang goreng dalam semangkuk polisterin.

"Madame kami belikan madame potato wedgie ni. Beli kat cafe kat bawah. Bon appetit madame!"

"Sedap madame wedgie ni. Selalu gak kitaorang beli."

Dan entah kenapa tiba-tiba madame terus kurang selera nak makan potato wedgie.

Diary dialogues

My niece has a very active mind. She easily gets transported into some faraway land in a blink of an eye. Sometimes a ball pen can be a handsome prince trying to save the sharpener princess from the clutches of ze evil ruler monster. Sometimes a paper alien conducts English class to a group of safari animals. Sometimes my handphone delivers a thank you speech to my two cats.

Yesterday she was looking at a MARA yearly planner (I think; I was beside her playing Word Scramble) and as she was turning the pages, she created conversations between all the photos of politicians and public figures who were honored from January to December. 

"Assalamualaikum Datuk. Jangan lupa petang ni Datuk ada appointment dengan Datuk Onn Jaafar. Lepas tu Datuk ada dinner dengan Tan Sri Ghaffar Baba. Siapa? OH...saya tak pasti la Datuk...Tan Sri Ghaffar dari company mana tapiiii...yang saya pasti dia bukan tukang gunting rambut. Get it? Barber? Baba? Hahahaha. Oh okay I'm sorry if you didn't find it funny Datuk. Alaaa kita ni kannnn *sengau* hidup mesti la suka-suka...gembira...hepi-hepi leww *double sengau* bla bla bla"

Nampak tak pengaruh drama bersiri dalam dialog di atas?

Dengan sedikit unsur lawak budak darjah enam.

Di kafe Wak Dol

This afternoon for lunch I made sure I took only half a fist of rice. Since I plan on also eating some more rice tonight. Kan semua health guru cakap setiap hari kita boleh makan sengenggam nasi putih sahaja for lunch. Dan segenggam nasi lemak for breakfast. Dan segenggam lagi nasi beriyani for dinner.

OK joke joke.

Well anyway at the cashier the adik yang tengok lauk saya cakap yang saya makan sikit sangat. Saya cakap yang saya nak kurangkan berat badan.

Dia jawab buat apa. Kat kampung dia di mana entah di Indonesia agaknya kalau orang perempuan kurus sangat tak laku. Tak ada orang nak masuk meminang.

Jadi saya pun cakap kat dia oleh yang demikian berdasarkan penaakulan mantik kalau saya pergi ke kampung dia senang la saya cari jodoh.

Dia kata tidak barangkali.

"Sebab Akak tinggi sangat."

OK. Fine.

I might need to go to Finland then. Or Iceland.

Tapi masalahnya kat sana tak ada kicap Habhal. How?

Missed call

I got a missed called from an unknown number early this morning.
So I called back.

• Assalamualaikum. I got a missed call from this number. 
• Waalaikumussalam. Oh ye ek.
• Yes. May I know who this is?
• A Muslim.
• Ok....may I have a name?
• This handphone belongs to A Muslim.
• Sigh. Mine too. Oh! Are you one of my students?
• Yes madame! Ini handphone A Muslim. Ahmad Muslim. Dia tengah drive ni.

*talking in background*

• Madame! Muslim cakap sori. Dia tertekan nombor madame.
• OK.
• Dia cakap hello jugak.
• Ok hello.

Pet talk

A few days ago I met up with a few friends for coffee and a little discussion. One of my friends brought along his elderly uncle.

After the short discussion we chatted a bit and came to the topic of pets. Everybody at the table were animal lovers and each one owned a pet or two so we sort of  ''updated the statuses'' of all the pets.

I told them about mine. The elderly uncle asked what animals I had at home. So I told him that I currently only have two 12 year old cats. I wanted to call them my geriatric babies tapi nasib baik sempat tahan diri sebab nanti takut elderly uncle tu kecik hati dan ingat saya perli dia. Tapi memang betul kucing-kucing saya tu dah tua. So old that when I go to bed at night I will just take either Tina or Momoi to be my hot water bottle because all the do is sleep sleep sleep. And they happily oblige.

The elderly uncle asked me what other pets I used to have. So I told him about Jimmy Snail, my pet siput and Agus our pet turtle. Tapi dua-dua dah tak ada. We kinda miss Agus because even if he was just a turtle and muka takde perasaan but still he seemed happy when anyone got home. Food source home, tummy happy. Bersemangat saya bercerita pasal Agus. Uncle hanya mendengar sambil tersenyum.

So kita pun borak-borak sikit dalam setengah jam. Then the elderly uncle apologized and said he had to leave. And thanked us for keeping him company sambil minum kopi.

When the old man left, I quickly turned to my friend and said, ''Nasib baik aku tak cakap kucing aku geriatric. Kalau tak mesti your uncle will feel offended.''

My friend replied, "Memang la ko tak sebut pasal kucing ko tua. Tapi ko tau tak? Nama uncle aku  tu Agus."

So I got up, went to the corner of the room and kicked myself.

New speakers

Yesterday I had some problems setting up my laptop in class. I had just bought a new set of speakers and was struggling to get any sound come out of them. I restarted, unplugged the cables, plugged them back on, tried again. Still nothing.

Then of the students who were sitting in front offered to help. I explained to him lengthily about my issue and offered some possibilities as to why this might have happened. Faulty speakers, virus infection, media player not functioning properly, jerebu, bad hair day bla bla bla.

He came to my table, looked at the screen, turned up the laptop volume which was on mute, smiled at me, and went back to his seat.

His friend sitting next to him said,"It's OK madame. My mother also like dat. She say donno why, when I check she forget to on something.''

''Ada sekali tu she open fridge but tak tau kenapa.''

...

''Madame pun like dat kan?"

snigger snigger

THE STARE.

''OK OK sorry madame.''

namun gelak kecil masih kedengaran

It runs in the family

• Mak Long saya memang nak sangat masuk sekolah asrama.
• Kenapa?
• Sebab semua orang dalam keluarga kita masuk asrama: Atok, Tok Ayah, Mak Long, Mummy, Daddy, Pak Su, Mak Su.
• So?
• Jadi saya pun nak buktikan yang saya pun boleh berjaya macam semua ahli keluarga.
• Aina...tak semestinya kalau tak masuk asrama tu tak pandai.
• Tapi saya tak nak ketinggalan. Saya pun nak masuk asrama macam orang lain. Saya perlu terus nyalakan OBOR-OBOR tradisi keluarga Mak Long!

Rupanya kami ni keluarga SpongeBob.

Strange encounter of the first time.

Yesterday morning a student came to my office to see me and to explain why he was systematically absent two times in a row.

I anticipated these kind of excuses:

1) Headache.

2) Stomach ache.

3) Terlajak tidoq.

4) Kawan saya tak kejut.

5) My body not delicious.

But no. He told me that he had a motorbike breakdown. Which I knew was a lie since his housemates had already told me that he didn't wake up on time. And didn't want to enter the class late because, menurut kata-kata para pelajar saya, "Nanti mata madame makin lama makin besar. pastu kami rasa macam madame nampak kitaorang besar kecik besar kecik je."

I told him that I knew he was lying. And that if he was absent from my class one more time, he would have to repeat my course again next semester, and that would not be something of a good experience.

The student just kept quiet. Then he looked up at me and say, "Saya janji madame saya tak buat lagi. Saspen jugak saya dengar madame cakap dengan saya slow-slow macam ni. Saya rasa macam dalam citer horror.''

And I sincerely think he had Ju-On in mind. Tapi versi muslimah sikit lah. Dan boleh cakap Perancis.

Jadi sebelum saya bunuh awak setelah menghantui hidup awak buat seketika, saya akan terlebih dahulu beri salam dan ucapkan Bonjour! Kalau awak nak saya nyanyikan lagu Perancis saya akan mainkan lagu Dato' Shake.

D'accord?