Jeli

Semasa saya belajar di sebuah sekolah berasrama penuh di Kg Kongo, saya terpaksa belajar Sains Rumah Tangga selama 3 tahun. Dari Tingkatan 1 sehinggalah ke Tingkatan 3. Tapi sampai sekarang saya masih lagi belum berkahwin dan tidaklah pun menjadi surirumah. Saya tertipu. Tidak menjanjikan apa-apa rupanya.

Semasa mula-mula belajar Masakan, kami mula dengan mencuba resipi-resipi yang mudah. Cikgu saya cakap, resipi ni punyalah senang, sampai orang buta yang kudung sebelah tangan pun boleh buat. Kami diletakkan berpasangan. Rakan tag team saya seorang budak Jawa yang menurutnya, ''Masak ni kacang je.'' Dari situ saya sudah dapat membayangkan yang Job Description saya kemungkinan besar akan hanya tertumpu kepada aktiviti mencuci pinggan-mangkuk dan mengelap work station.

Resipi pertama adalah membuat jeli. Cikgu Norain menerangkan apa yang patut dilakukan. So far so good. Sebab tag team saya buat dan saya tengok sahaja. Cikgu suruh kami tuang larutan agar-agar ke dalam acuan. Kami pun buat. Kemudian tag team partner saya keluar sebentar untuk ke tandas. Saya gugup. Cikgu di hadapan menyuruh kami menuang air paip pula untuk menyejukkan jeli di dalam acuan supaya cepat sejuk. Saya pelik. Eh? Kalau tuang air sejuk bukan lagi cair ke? Macamana nak beku camtu? Tapi saya buat saja lah apa yang disuruh. Hilang akal ke apa nak bantah cakap cikgu? Nanti tak pasal-pasal kena DC. Penat oi kalau nak kena cuci tandas guna berus gigi. Penyiksaan ya amat.

5 minit kemudian.

Kawan saya kembali masuk kelas. Dia terus mengambil acuan jeli tersebut dan memasukkannya ke dalam peti sejuk. Saya mula mencuci peralatan.

1 jam kemudian.

Acuan jeli dikeluarkan. Masih belum beku. Orang lain punya semua ok dan pejal-pejal belaka. Kawan saya memanggil cikgu. Penyiasatan dilakukan.

''Nurhayati, apa kamu buat dengan air paip tu tadi?''

''Saya masukkan air paip tu dalam jeli la macam cikgu suruh buat. Nak bagi cepat sejuk.''

''Apa? Saya suruh awak tuang air paip tu keliling acuan tu. Bagi acuan tu cepat sejuk. Bukannya tuang dalam acuan!''

"OH. Padan la cair je jeli tu ye cikgu?''

Kawan saya yang masak macam kacang itu menjeling tajam. Pasti di dalam hatinya dia memanggil saya goblok.

Lain kali, kalau dah tau buat salah tu, senyap je lah. Jangan cuba nak mencari alasan yang entah apa-apa.

Kopi

This happened in a public toilet recently.

A lady entered a cubicle beside mine. While talking to the phone. Which is, I might add, a difficult thing to do if you don't have a hands-free kit as you need to hang your handbag on the hook at the door, unzip, pull down, sit, do business, clean yourself, stand up, pull up, zip up, flush, take handbag, open door and wash hands. And we all know that women aren't very big on those ugly bluetooth ear pieces.

Well she was still talking on the phone when suddenly there was the smell of coffee. Immediately you could hear her sighing and saying how much she regretted drinking too much coffee and how nescafe 3-in-1 makes her go to the loo more. Me I was just happy she had coffee and not petai during breakfast. But at the same time I was like wondering: hmmm...me too I had nescafe along with my cornflakes. Alamak...entah-entah bukan dia tetapi....

Then entah macamana somehow we came out of our cubicle at the same time. And what do you know...there was a lady outside with a cup of steaming hot coffee waiting for her little daughter in the toilet.

The power of suggestion. It plays evil little tricks on your mind.

Muzium Negara

Today was a Trip to the Muzium Negara Day with my niece. To the uninitiated (don't lie, I know many of you don't even have any idea where the entrance to the Muzium is), there has been quite a dramatic change from the last time I set foot there. Back then, the highlight would always be the ''sesi mengambil gambar bersama ular sawa albino''. Now they've improved. Now you can, for a certain fee, take a photo with snakes or exotic parrots. Ahah! Now you have the choice. The power is in your hands.

No, seriously, all the galleries have been remodelled, renovated, refurbished and the contents updated. It is a cool place to visit. And hey it only costs you RM2 for entrance fee if you're an adult. So to all my students who always complain dapat duit loan lambat la what la takleh lepak memana la bla bla bla ha jangan cari alasan just go to the Muzium Negara and soak in the culture and history. For RM2 that's even cheaper than a Ramli burger.

Well anyway that was the experiment. To see if I could go on a budget trip with my niece, not spend so much but still manage to have fun and learn something new. And I thought I did it. Entrance fee: RM2. Budak kecik free (maybe midgets as well, OK sorry that was a tasteless joke please don't come and sue me), after that right outside near the old trains my niece saw the ice-cream parlour. We had some ice-cream and corn in the cup and mineral water. Add another RM6.50. Then we went to One Utama to get this Toy Story 3 VCD replaced. Free. Then we walked a bit and when we were passing by Carl's Jr masa tu la anak saudara aku terus buat announcement yang berbunyi ''I think I'm feeling hungry'' sambil menuding jari ke arah restoran itu.

Masa tu lah bajet lari dan eksperimen tak jadi.

Heheheh just joking. We had a blast. Girl bonding!

A day with the kids from the Rukaiyah Orphanage

Last Saturday a girlfriend and I volunteered to spend some time with kids from the Rukaiyah Orphanage. They were sponsored by some wonderful kind-hearted people on that day to a) visit Petrosains KLCC b) have lunch at the Apartment c) spend RM100 to buy anything they fancy at Parkson. So can you imagine the joy and happiness on that day?

This was us goofing around at the Petrosains. This is the infinity mirror. You look down and it's endless. I felt a bit like Alice in Wonderland. With a double chin, of course.

A group photo is a definite must. The kids were smiling ear to ear while posing with their generous sponsors.

This is one of the kids I chaperoned at Parkson while they went about looking for anything they fancy. All within the RM100 budget limit of course. Of all the kids I mingled around with, he was the cheekiest. After spending some time ''scaling'' the departmental store, we felt tired and sat down for a while. Then he looked at me and said, ''Achik ni orang Cina ye?'' I replied that I was Malay just like him. Then he said, ''Oh...putih sangat la Achik ni.'' Then he asked me another question, ''Achik ni tinggi betul kan? Achik makan apa?''. Saya jawab, ''Achik suka makan tempe.'' To which he replied, ''Oh ye ke...tapi kalau tinggi sangat macam Achik ni mesti Achik dah hidup lama kan? Ada tak lebih 300 tahun?''

Adakah itu bermakna saya dilahirkan di zaman Raja Brooke?

Major pet peeve #1

You want to watch a program on TV. You come home from work early. You even have dinner quickly so you won't miss it. Then halfway through the program you doze off and wake up exactly at the ending.

Sakit kepala

For the past two days I've been feeling giddy and light-headed. Kadang-kadang rasa mual. I told a friend about these symptoms. We did a short checklist. Pregnant? Non. Menstruating? No. Panic attack? No. So we didn't come up with a plausible explanation.

At home I told this to my mom and she immediately gave me the answer. ''Itu angin tu. Asyik nak tahan makan je. Diet la konon. Makan malam tak nak. Angin tu semua berkumpul naik kepala.'' I mean, who needs Wikipedia when you have mommy at home?

I was very skeptical with this angin-naik-kepala notion until one day when I was studying in France, I had to go see a doctor because of prolonged head-aches. And believe it or not, the first question that he asked me was if I was suffering from any gastro-intestinal problems. And the second question he asked me was if I had been skipping meals. I asked him back if he had been talking to my mom. The doctor was not amused.

This morning I went to the gym to do a latin dance class. Balik dari gym emak saya ajak saya makan nasi lemak berlaukkan rendang kerang. Kemudian minum nescafe panas dan makan kuih tat.

Malam tadi untuk makan malam ada lauk ayam masak lemak cili api, ada ikan pari masak asam pedas, ada sambal sotong.

Sekarang kepala saya sudah tidak pening lagi.

Kawan lama dan baru

The week that passed has been very interesting because I made a lot of new friends and got reacquainted with very old ones. How I made new ones? I tagged along a girlfriend who got invited for dinner at her friend's house in Bukit Jelutong and me dengan tidak semena-mena dapat empat orang kawan baru dan dapat makan sedap. How I found back the very old ones (When I say old it refers to the time line in my life dan bukannya merujuk kepada umur mereka kerana mereka sebaya dengan saya dan oleh yang demikian masih lagi di peringkat lewat remaja)? One of my SRK Kg Tunku friends created a closed FB group for the class of 82 and included me in and I saw pictures of my sekolah rendah mates and terus saja add dengan harapan they would remember me and accept. No harm in trying right?

There are only a few things that I remember about my primary school days:
1) Di sebelah kanan sekolah ada Pejabat Pos.
2) Di belakang sekolah ada krematorium. It was a wonderful source of urban legends for us kids. Practically everyone swore they have seen at least once a hantu momok cina or india during their school days.
3) Semua budak lelaki nak main bola macam Kenny Dalglish. Semua budak perempuan nak pakai Bee Dees.
4) Until the age of 12, I thought that a girl could get pregnant just by holding hands with a boy.

Yes. Can you imagine that? Sebab itu ke aku masih tak kahwin lagi sampai sekarang? Sebab takut pegang tangan je boleh mengandung? :)))