Weddings

June is a month of weddings. That’s because it’s the 5th month of the Chinese lunar calendar. Chinese rarely get married in the 6th month; only the highly spirited, highly modern and the highly desperate do it in June. Fengshui master everywhere concurs it’s a not-so-good month - signs of half year marriages i.e. couples are always separated. Chinese don’t get married in August, the 7th month of the Lunar calendar – ghostly month – causes very bad luck.

Thus is the reason why I have had to attend to so many weddings this month. Yew Meng, Carols and Shookie’s.

I know, I know, weddings are happy occasions. That “once in a lifetime” moment for your dear friend, and you should be there to celebrate their joy. But the reasons I hate wedding far outweigh the above:

• It means I need to part with at least 100 buck a pop, more so if there is blood relation (not that I'm stingy, but hey, these are bad times);
• It means I have to work (jie-mei, usher, reception, program coordinator, the tea lady, etc);
• It means I have to dress up, brave the traffic and waste 4 hours of my time eating bad Chinese food when I could be watching CSI at home;
• It means I have to keep entertaining barrage of the same question, “when’s your turn?”

What can’t people believe these facts…

• Some people love to be single
• Some people can live together and do need to be married
• Some people can have perfect companions and don’t need to live together
• In fact, some people love themselves so much and are entertained by themselves so much, they never get lonely and they don’t need companions.
• Some people don’t need a STATUS
• Some women don’t need husbands, and definitely no maternal instinct for children (even in singular form!)

My aunt said I 'm not getting any younger - the usual. And this was coming from someone who got married at 48 and is still not 100% happy (albeit 95%).

I was actually quite offended this afternoon when this question shot from the mouth of my dear gay friend, Kenny. I rolled my eyes at him – “What about you? Do you ever think about getting married some day”? He answers “No” without thinking, but said “It’s different for you” – meaning because I am a woman. Once would think that gays being common victims of a stereotypical society would be one of the least stereotypical people. Guess not…

So, I have decided to employ a new strategy. Actual an old principle applied onto new settings. Every Chinese New Year Loh Sang, Wedding, whatsoever, I am going to bring a new man. Can’t convince them, confuse the helluva them…..

Sometimes We Do Need to Believe In The Good Ol’ Witch Doctor

Malaysian doctors prescribe antibiotics like candies, especially those locums. Every sick patient walked out with bag of colourful capsules.

I’m no fan of antibiotics. I totally agree with the effects of antibiotics resistances. Over the years, I have found that taking antibiotics all the time cause your immune system to be ineffective. Bacterias evolves and get stronger. Body's immune system on the other has not been had to fight anything, gets protected and lazy, subsequently becomes a weak army.

In fact, the last years times, every time I got sick, I allowed my body to battle it out on her own. I recovered eventually, albeit it took a little longer. But slowly, I got sick less often.

3 days ago, my arched nemesis came back to haunted me, after more than 18 months – my 2 useless ‘good for nothing but trouble’ tonsils.

I had fever all day and the fever came and went. Every time I took paracetamol, it subsided. About 5 to 6 hours later, after the effects of the medicine subsided, the fever came back. Day 2 was the same thing, except that the tonsil got bigger (it was agony to even swallow my saliva), and my ears were getting more infected. Even talking was too much of an effort. I had already resorted to sign language-ing my staff. And I was due to fly to Manila in 3 days. Na-ah, I don’t want to be sick on a trip. That's hell.

So no choice, I raised my while flag and went to see the doctor.

Sure enough, doc said “waa...very serious…not just white spots, but your tonsil are already coated in white”. I was quite amazed by my own pain threshold (hehe). He can’t tell if it was a viral or bacteria infection, but in lieu of my dire need to get well within a short period of time, I’d have to try antibiotics. Anyway, I told him, “gimme the strongest one you have”. He did – it was 110 ringgits strong, and doc said he needed more patience like me….go figure.

But I must say, that one of the most well-spent 100 ringgits. I woke up painless the next morning. Tonsils were still inflamed, but smaller. Painless eating, talking and laughing. Fever was gone and I was back to being the usual energetic bunny.

Sometimes, maybe sometimes, must put some trust in the docs.

The "Thou Must Never Let Your Bro Look Bad In Front Of Woman" Conspiracy

Have you ever noticed that when there is debate about directions, the women are always assumed wronged?

It gets more interesting when the woman is right! They boys will band together, agree with each other, twist your words and confuse you, even when they know you are right, and they are wrong!

I’m serious. It’s amazing. They may be friends, they may be enemies. They may even be strangers meeting for the first time. But no no no…. “bro’s ego getting puncture by a woman, looking bad in front of the women, we must protect”.

We went to Sling's new house this evening. I followed Al's car. Rud drove there separately. Al, being the typical "over-ego-fied" mail chirps "oh, very easy top get to my house, 4 roundabouts, staright, stgaright left and you're there. Simple!" Teah right....

I followed his car and there was no 4 roundabouts. 3, then a a left then before the 4th roundabout comes. So, out of concern, I called Rud and told him the correct directions.

He gets lost coming to the house and blames me for giving wrong directions, where in fact, when he repeated it, he didn't follow my instructions correctly.

When I told, Al nicely butts in and say "where got people give directly like that one. That's why I always say 4 roundabouts, then left..."

It was a big disucssion, OK. Rud reiterated it to everyone in the room at least 3 times.

Well, I certainly didn't think I made a mistake. But there was no jury. The old foggies there just stayed out of it and let it be assumed that the boys are right "since they usually are..."

We drove out, and god damn it I was right. Rud to a diff route. I told mom to update Rud. At whaddaya know - no apologies, no admission of wrong judment or wrong accusation, zilch. I was so tempted to text him "NO ALL WOMAN ARE BAD AT DIRECTIONS" but decided to win gracefully. The thing ALL men can't do!

I’m quite sure this is nature and definitely not nurture, since evry man behaves like that.

Sex and the City

I just watched the movie... finally. And in Singapore, because it's not going into cinemas in Malaysia.

Oh, I have forgotten how good the show is. I laughted and cried, and laughed and acried again.

I walked out missing Mark. He is definitely my Mr. Big.