Capek La Cipet…Macet La Macha

Sejak aku kembali ke hidup 9-to-5 ni, hari-hari aku kena tempuh traffic jam. Sejak harga minyak runcit turun ke paras yang paling rendah sejak sebelum pilihanraya umum dulu, kereta dah makin banyak, dan queue di stesen-stesen LRT kini bertambah pendek akibat ramai yang meninggalkan kehidupan ala marhaen kepada middle-income group semula. Dan aku jangkakan semua ni akan bertambah teruk bila budak-budak mula sekolah bulan Januari nanti.

Hampir tiga tahun aku tak perlu menyumbangkan plumbum ke udara KL, kini setiap hari aku dihiburkan oleh macam-macam gelagat yang lama dah aku tak nampak. Dari yang mengorek hidung macam Mail Kerbau merogol anak dara, hinggalah yang sembang dalam handphone sambil memandu motorsikal. Memang blood aku go upstairs kalau aku layan perangai-perangai cipet dijalanan…tapi aku sekarang buat relax aje sambil dihiburkan dengan telatah DJ Serena C dan DJ Pietro.

Aku terkejut tempoh hari bila aku sedang memandu, dengan tiba-tiba sebuah Proton Waja memotong kereta aku dengan deras dan memotong masuk di hadapan aku hinggakan aku terpaksa menekan brek supaya bontot keretanya tidak mencecah bumper hadapan aku. Berbakul aku menyumpah kimek yang memandu kereta tersebut. Aku cuba jugak perhatikan rear view mirrornya nak tengok muka kimek tu. Tapi tak nampak. Aku tengok side mirrornya juga tak ada arca muka pemandu. Kereta James Bond ke apa? Sampai di satu selekoh, aku dapat memotong kenderaannya semula. Rupanya satu makcik muda yang kelihatan tua, dan amat pendek, sedang memandu. Paras matanya betul-betul berada di atas steering wheel. Macam bawak kereta kebal! Pakai sunglasses lagi dalam hujan lebat pukul 6 petang tu!

Dan disebabkan hampir 3 tahun aku tak bekerja di pejabat, maka aku terpaksa membeli baju-baju kerja. Yang itu dah selamat aku lakukan 3 minggu yang lepas. Tapi yang tak cukupnya ialah handkerchief. Aku tak boleh tak ada handkerchief. Aku rasa aku banyak handkerchief tapi tak tau la magician mana yang ambik nak keluarkan arnab atau burung atau buat lap air akibat tak tahan nafsu. Tapi pokok pangkalnya, aku tinggal satu aje handkerchief.

So malam tadi aku ajak la Wifey pergi ke sebuah hypermarket…bukan la nak cari handkerchief, tetapi sebab memang nak kena beli barangan dapur. Jadi boleh la nak cari handkerchief sekali…dah alang-alang. Puas la kitorang pusing kat section pakaian. Seluar dalam memang bercambah. Begitu juga dengan stokin. Tapi handkerchief tak ada. Aku tak puas hati. Lalu aku pun mecari la staff hypermarket tersebut. Lantas aku ternampak seorang staff yang berat badannya aku boleh gerenti buat aku terasa underweight yang tengah kira stok di atas lantai.

“Dik, sapu tangan ada tak kat sini?” tanya aku kepada pemuda 120 kilo.

“Sapu tangan tu macam mana, abang?” tanya pemuda 120 kilo dengan penuh kehairanan.

“Handkerchief…handkerchief,” jawab aku.

“Handkerchief tu macam mana, abang?” tanya pemuda 120 kilo lagi dengan kebodohan yang bakal melihatnya dijadikan lembu korban Aidil Adha oleh aku di salah sebuah surau yang berhampiran.

“Macam ni,” jawab aku sambil menunjukkan sapu tangan aku yang dah 3 hari guna dan keras akibat selalu digunakan untuk menahan bersin aku.

“Tak tau la, bang. Takde kot!” jawab pemuda 120 kilo sambil menyambung semula pengiraan stok.

Kimek, memang aku nak kena guna lagi la sapu tangan ni selagi aku tak dapat beli yang baru.

Wifey pun kini telah bekerja di tempat kerjanya yang lama. Dia kembali ke jawatan asalnya dengan elaunnya dinaikkan lagi. Untung. Rasanya boleh tak lepas aku dah confirm ni aku berhenti kerja, lepak dua tiga bulan, join balik dan dapat pay rise?

Walau bagaimanapun, setelah pengstrukturan semula syarikat di mana dia bekerja, Wifey kini kena lapor kepada bos yang baru. Mamat ni aku memang tak suka langsung dan aku pernah warning mamat ni supaya jangan kasi aku nampak walaupun kelibatnya kalau dia tak nak kena lepuk dengan aku. Panjang ceritanya. Tetapi, cukuplah kalau aku nak beritahu engkorang semua bahawasanya Mamat ni adalah seorang WALI.

Walk Around Look Important

Kerja memang tak reti. Dia ni sebenarnya machai boss company tersebut. Tahap IQ rendah dari runner tapi tinggi sikit dari Forrest Gump. Tapi gaya macam Chairman bila bercakap dengan orang lain.

Aku bagi contoh la…ini contoh terbaik nak aku bagi untuk memberi bayangan akan betapa bongoknya Mamat ni. Wifey, rakan sejawatannya, bos lamanya, dan Mamat ni sedang duduk berbincang mengenai kerja bila rakan sejawatan Wifey kata dia nak pergi dengar mantan Presiden Negeri-Negeri Bersekutu, Bill Clinton, bercakap kat satu global branding forum. Semua forum speaker dibawa oleh Petra Holdings dan admission adalah free. Maka bos lama Wifey pun kata la Petra Holdings ni memang banyak duit nak bayar diorang punya lecture fees, dan sebagainya. Tak semena-mena Mamat bongok ni dengan penuh confidentnya bersuara,

“Petra ni memang suka buat kecoh!”

Semua yang ada terdiam. Kemudian salah seorang bertanya la kat Mamat ni Petra mana yang dia maksudkan yang suka buat kecoh.

“Tu la…Raja Petra…suka sangat buat kecoh!”

Apa lagi aku nak kata pasal Mamat ni? Mungkin engkorang boleh tolong komen sikit. Ini la orang yang jadi bos Wifey lepas ni. Standard macam tu aku sendiri tak berani nak suruh jadi gardener aku. Karang aku suruh prune aje pokok, dia tanamnya pokok plum sebab nak buat prunes.

Kalau aku jadi Wifey, memang capek la kerja dengan bahalol macam tu.

Inilah posting gara-gara selalu terperangkan dalam macet.

Being Prude

Here was what a wise man once said about prudence:

“Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by Incapacity.”

Amen to that!

Macam Bayi

Ini Bhai...bukan Bayi - The Star Multimedia

Yang kat atas tu bukannya Bayi! Itu Bhai!

Semalam aku dengan Wifey pergi ke Giant sebab nak beli barang sikit. Seperti biasa, benda yang nak dibeli tak dibeli, yang tak nak dibeli yang dibeli.

Masa tengah beratur, ada la bayi ni yang didukung mak dia tengah tengok aku. Aku pun buat la muka kelakar kat dia. Senyum pun tak. Bertuah punya budak. Memang tak bersivik. Tak ada etiquette dengan orang tua-tua. Aku buat lagi muka kelakar. Dia buat bodoh aje. Dia tengok kepala aku, lepas tu tengok muka aku. Aku gerenti dia mesti fikir macam mana aku yang rambut lebih kurang dia, boleh nampak tua. Lepas tu dia tengok kaki aku, lepas tu tengok balik muka aku. Mesti dia fikir macam mana aku, yang sebaya dengan dia, dah boleh berdiri. Aku cuba kali terakhir nak buat dia senyum. Terus dia pandang ke tempat lain.

Cipan punya budak, ni mesti mak bapak tak ajar sivik kat dia.

Saja aku complain…nak sedapkan hati sebab gagal nak buat budak senyum.

Supernaturally KL

Yes, some would have thought my next posting would be of my experience of going back to working 9-5 after more than two years of freelancing.

No. This time I would like to touch on the supernatural and KL’s share of it. I have posted some months back of my experiences with the supernatural when I was little, especially of the house I lived in in Melaka, which has been turned into an arts activities center. There was always this apparition of an old lady inside the house…and it was not limited to night time only.

Where I lived in Melaka
Where I lived in Melaka back in 1970-1971

I went to a famous missionary school here in KL for primary education (among my classmates from Standards 4 Merah through 6 Merah were Harith Iskandar Musa, a famous local stand-up comedian; Andri Aidham Badri, a well-known lawyer and partner of Kadir, Andri & Partners; and Mizan Yahaya who is now married to one of the Sultan of Johor’s daughters, and an immediate senior was Ronald Chiew, MD of Protemp Group of Companies). I remember an episode where one junior of ours was scared shitless when he saw something evil at the backstage of the hall where we normally have our daily afternoon assemblies. After that, I think it was Andri, another classmate of ours called Zamri Ridzwan, and I, went to the backstage to look for the apparition.

My father’s official residence at the Lake Gardens (it is now part of the Memorial Tun Razak complex) had its own share of stories. I remember when we first moved in, there was this huge tree in our backyard – and from it, this white apparition would swoop down and hover outside the window of our bedrooms. When I was 16, during one of the school holidays, I had my bed shook ala The Exorcist. I would hear voices inside the walls of my room, and even inside the door cavity. The verandah overlooking Lake Gardens had its own inhabitant – a woman in white, much like the one seen in The Ring or Ju-On.

Our guardpost on the hillslope going down was always abandoned come sunset. Several guards have been spooked by what they say was a pontianak. Those days there were lots of sightings of this type of apparition in that area especially at night, although I never saw one despite jogging there every night from 11pm onwards for months preparing for my military basic training. But at that back road from the National Mosque going towards Bukit Aman, I remember two guys on a motorcycle seeking refuge at our guardhouse after being chased by a pontianak on that road.

Pontianak in Tampines - can you see it mid photo?
Pontianak in Tampines – can you see it?

But I remember one incident back in December 1978, the night Malaysia was to have full colour television transmission. I followed Haris Hussein (now Datuk Haris Hussein, son of former PM, the late Tun Hussein Onn) and his father to Angkasapuri for the switching ceremony and we travelled in the escort car. The police radio blared about this guy in Setapak shouting for help as he was being hounded by a pontianak near where Danau Kota is now (that area was filled with trees and abandoned mining pools then).

Kenny Hills is quite a haunted place. While Spooky Corner reported on a ghost riding a motorcycle frequenting that area, I remember a friend who was involved in shooting a drama there telling me about how they had to leave all their equipment that night when a white apparition was seen flying around above them before sitting on a branch of a huge tree. If you want to know the exact location of this spot, up Kenny Hills is a lonely road that has a TNB sub-station at a junction with an abandoned bungalow next to it. Across the bungalow is a huge tree on the hill slope. That’s the tree. Well, I will personally vouch for how true this story is because I went there several times back in 2002 and saw it.

Langsuir
Langsuir

My daughter, Hana, has seen this type of ghost at least twice. Once outside of our house in Bukit Rahman Putra – it flew outside her window, and the second time was when the 4×4 she was travelling in during one of the 4×4 outings she went to broke down after sunset. The thing was standing outside the car door next to her. This was in Hulu Yam somewhere.

If you travel down Jalan Damansara towards KL, after the exit to Jalan Duta heading towards the Parliament, before the junction to Duta Vista (The Duke) motorists used to be spooked by a “woman” – and this was back in the 1980s.

There are three hospitals in KL that are haunted. Well, I know one very famous hospital where, if you enter a lift (elevator to some) at night and just peek out, a head would be peeking back at you from the other elevator shaft. That, I have personally seen. While next to this hospital is a famous specialist center, and this was related to me by a friend last night. His father is virtually a permanent resident of this specialist center. One night, he wanted to go down for a smoke after his father was already asleep. He entered the lift and saw a little girl looking up at him. He never thought anything of it but noticed the girl had this poke mark on her throat, and wondered why was this girl still up and about at 3am.

Ju-On
Ju-On

A private hospital across this specialist center, has a hotel next to it. Guests do not dare to open their curtains as something would almost always be seen hovering outside.

Even amidst the hustle and bustle of Chow Kit, around a decade ago, several people were reported in the papers to have been chased by a huge black supernatural figure. However, if you go there now, you would almost always get chased by huge black figures, especially if you are a woman – especially at night, although not limited to night-time only. Go figure that one out.

But whatever it is, KL, as colourful as it is, may be bathed in lights. But in the dark spots and grey areas, sinister beings lurk.

Getting Rid Of All The Rust

“If I tell you I’m good, you would probably think I’m boasting. If I tell you I’m no good, you know I’m lying.”

That was a quote from the late Bruce Lee that I used as my tagline in a dive forum. But whether it applies to my daily life from 17th November 2008 remains to be seen.

After 2 years and 7 months of freelancing (another nice term for being ‘technically jobless’), I am back to the life of a nine-to-fiver. That’s 8.30am through 5.30pm daily, and 8.30pm through 12.30pm on Saturdays from now on. Although life as a freelancer is much more fun, two reasons have driven me back into long-sleeved shirts, taking orders, wringing my brain for ideas, and lots of paperworks; namely:

1) at 42, being a freelancer could make others mistake you for a bummer. And with Wifey the wife now, it sounds odd everytime people ask her what I do for a living. Especially from her aunts and uncles, and,

2) in view of this global economic crisis, it would be more difficult to market my services as a freelancer – couple that with my health drawbacks too.

After leaving the telecommunications industry, and the corporate world, I tried to go into events management; helping out my father’s friend to lobby for events projects with state governments. But doing it for virtually no-pay was not my idea of a job. Travel cost money, parking cost money, petrol cost money, food cost money, and so on. My personal savings was wasted on a lot of things but I never got paid. In the end, I left, after the company looked the other way when I was involved in an accident on my way back from a meeting in Terengganu (having had very little sleep the previous three nights prior to the accident – and all because of the preparations made for the presentation in Terengganu). Of course my father was angry and started telling people I would rather dive and have fun, than work 9-5.

After that, I was invited by an acquaintance to do diving services, and I spent the rest of my money getting the right tools and experience for the job. It was good while it lasted. But diving in claustrophobia-inducing and extremely dark inlet/outlet valves of power stations, or doing inspection works and search and recovery works in strong currents and zero visibility is hardly fun as my father had assumed. Nor is the task of guiding inexperienced divers, or teaching divers from government agencies in hazardous conditions anymore fun than jumping off a building without a parachute. But it was good money – all until my health prevents me from doing anymore without exposing myself to unnecessary risks.

This new outfit I am in is an Oil and Gas company, and I have 13 job scopes to attend to. On the first day of work, I was to make an assessment on a proposal to acquire a vessel worth USD 13 million versus constructing a new one at USD 3 million less, but will not be operable immediately. I wrote my report immediately based on the technical specs that were given to me and made my recommendations to the board. I was told the board had decided to accept my findings and go with my recommendations. That was day one.

On day two, that was yesterday, I was told to prepare a study on the construction of marine spreads of offshore support vessels based on volumes of datas dumped onto my table on the global oil exploration, and take the current downward spiral of crude oil prices, and study the viability of the project, and prepare a paper for it. I am to wake up in less than 3 hours, but here I am updating my blog because my brain is working overtime and I have just e-mailed the study to my boss. I was also given the task to prepare an executive summary to be submitted to a petroleum giant. That requires more time but I will have to submit that by the end of today.

Were those the only tasks given to me on the second day? No. The boss came at around 5pm and gave me one whole bunch of resumes for the Assistant HSE Manager’s post and had asked me to go through them, and conduct an interview soonest.

Before he left my workstation, he slapped his forehead and asked, “You have not been confirmed yet, right? And I’ve given you the task to conduct job interviews as well.”

“It is my second day here,” I reminded him.

“Oh well, you seem to have a good grasp of the industry on your first day. I think you’re more than fit to conduct job interviews as well,” he laughed as he walked back to his office.

Gosh. Did I oversell myself during my interview session?

Anyway, Wifey returned to her former workplace on the same day I started work. So the routine now is leave home, send her to office, then drive to my office. But it feels so good going to work with her. We SMS each other often telling each other how much we love and miss one another. And at the end of the day, it is always soothing to see her smile as she gets into the car, and kiss me. Yes, I do miss the freedom of being able to hug her during the day, and do things at our own time. But it is good as she is less cranky now as compared to when she was a freelancer as I was.

Gosh, I have a little over two hours to sleep now.

Have a good rest of the week, people!

And, oh! One more thing. My description on the dive forum also states the following:

Cranky when not diving!

BEWARE!

Surrendering Freedom

The last time I don office clothes and left home to go to office was on the 21st April 2006 – a day after coming back from deploying artificial reefs in Tioman for DHL. I went in to pack my things, and so did 5 others. All of them returned to working in an office within the year whereas I chose to remain as a freelance, spending most of my time underwater, among other things.

Come Monday, I am returning to an office – working in the oil and gas sector. On that day, Wifey will also be going back to office, having been unemployed since 3rd September this year.

I am 42 going on 43. Working underwater has really made me feel my age, and healthwise I am no longer fit to spend long hours underwater at such depths. About a month after the divorce more than a year ago, I have contracted two other illnesses – namely Asthma and Hypertension (brought about by the stressful conditions of my previous marriage), the latter discovered only 3 weeks after I was given a clean bill of health after my biannual full medical check-up.

Yesterday, Wifey and I went out to hunt for office clothes for me. I had thrown or gave away almost all my office clothes back in 2006, keeping only 4 pairs of suits: the two pairs I made in Bangkok, a pair I had made in KL (emergency measures) and a pair of Zegna.

In this setup I will be joining on Monday, I will be handling 13 job scopes including things like providing technical expertise on all operational, oil and gas and marine issues, managing a fleet of work barges and other offshore support vessels for the oil and gas industry. The fact that a subsidiary is also involved in the construction of oil platforms, barges, work barges and support vessels – meaning they also work on Saturdays, means I will also have to work on Saturdays, limiting my dive weekends to only Tioman. Other places including Perhentian and Redang can only be accessed during long weekends: meaning I will only fly to those places as I hate to drive during long weekends. That also means having to stay dry for 24 hours after my last dive before catching a flight home.

This job will be a challenging one, nevertheless, but at 42, telling people that you freelance is not exactly cool. And having a 9-5 job means I no longer have that pressure of having to market myself although I will only be paid the equivalent of a full Admiral of the Royal Malaysian Navy’s starting pay.

Let’s hope my brain can still do office wonders…

Circle Of Friends

I was whacking a 1901 hotdog the other day when I noticed something on the drink cup:

Who are your best friends?

Those who know your deepest, darkest secrets and have found your major flaws, but love you anyway.

How true.

I have seen those whom I regarded as friends who would be unctuous when with me, put up an amiable facade, just to score points, then storm away in a fit of apoplexy just because I disagree with some things they advocate, or do not listen to their advice; but those whom have stayed are those I regard as true friends, and they fall into different circles of friends.

I have an inner circle that is made of friends whom I have known for more almost three decades now. They number less than five. Although we hardly see each other because of our daily commitments, we remain as close as ever.

I have one I would term as my ‘family’ circle. Ironically, these are people who were just imaginary friends to me as we became online friends first, before finally meeting up. And through them, I made more ‘siblings’ from one of their circle of friends. One of them who was and still is my best friend is, of course, Wifey. This family circle is the one I spend most of my time with.

I have other circles of friends as well, like my General Diver Friends circle, then I have my Closed Diver Circle made of people I can trust my life with underwater, and have this intangible pre-agreed understanding with. We would know by heart when the other team member would run out of air without even having to look at his/her gauge.

No matter which circle of friends I am with, or spend more time with, each member of the respective circle would always regard me as a close friend. I have members of a circle who would be too busy most of the time to spend a few hours a month, or every quarter even, but is always regarded by other members of the circle as a member of that circle – one of whom is a cabin crew: she is always flying; at other times she spends more time with her colleagues than she would with us – as a matter of fact, we did not see her for four full months before finally being able to have supper with her, and never again since then. And that was two months ago. Yet, we would send her an invite whenever any of us were to hold a function at home or outside. We don’t condemn her just because she spends less time with us than she does with her colleagues. I would call myself a fiend and not friend if I were to do that to her. It is her right to make as many friends as possible.

Sometimes, sticking to just one circle makes you dumb. And the dumbest in this circle would be the ones who allow one dumb to become dominant and controlling, and utter ridiculous remarks like one dumb soon-to-be-former-president of a united apathetic country:

Either you are with us, or you are against us.

And you cannot get any dumber than that.

Being Whacked On The Bed By Gong Li

I went out for ikan bakar with Wifey for lunch, before going for a haircut…or, more like cutting what’s left of my hair. I have been having this bad backache for weeks now, enduring the torture for as long as I could. Since I could no longer sit for more than 10 minutes without having to readjust the comfort level, I decided it was best for me to seek help at the usual traditional chinese sinsei outlet.

The last time I was there was more than 3 months ago. Wifey had to sit and wait while I got my back massaged. It was only for an hour then, but due to the gravity of my ache, the sinsei decided to poke me with acupuncture needles, and before I even knew it, I had more steely needles poked into me than a Hindu man would have during a kavadi-carrying session on Thaipusam day.

I arrived there shortly before 4.30pm, the time of my appointment. I quickly went up, and met the manager, who asked me the nature of my ache. In a mixture of very-halting Mandarin and English, I tried as best to explain what I was suffering from. So, a masseur sinsei was appointed to handle my case. She was this blonde chinese woman, in hot pants and white blouse, all smiles when she saw me. Well, if she was Gong Li, I would smile back, except that she’s not – she’s more like a Gong than anything else, and a huge one at that.

I hopped onto the massage bed. She scanned my back to find out the source of the backache – and it was actually the neck, and by the spine. She quickly went to work. All 100-kilos of mainland lard was transferred onto the small of the elbow while she tortured every acupressure points on my neck, shoulders, back, butt and the back of my legs. I found myself struggling to: (1) overcome the pain of the massage, and (2) keeping the ikan bakar that was threatening to jump right out of my tummy, permanently inside. Not long after, I also had (3) to keep my fart within my bowels. At some points, she would slap the part that I would stiffen up when fighting the pain and would say to me, “Lee-lacks!” If I had relaxed, rice and fish would have been on the floor, and I would have farted straight into her face.

I think she had fun putting me through the torture. Every single milimeter, including what the malays would call the urat halus where even Wifey’s elbows and knees could not reach, got scrutinised by the 100-kilo elbows.

I would usually fall asleep in the middle of a massage session. This time it was difficult. It was pure torturous pain. For more than an hour I had to endure the pain. Towards the end, I fell asleep. Either that or I had passed out because of the pain. Anyhow, exactly two hours after the session was commenced, it was completed. Half-asleep, I got up, feeling like I was recovering from a dose of general anaesthesia, got dressed and paid. She showed me where it went wrong and said the word “Bad” every time she pointed to the figure in the drawing. I felt relieved when she didn’t point to that part in between my thighs.

I walked to the car, feeling a thousand times better, and smiled to myself knowing I’d be able to whack Wifey again tonight, hopefully, without the discomfort of a backache. And if I do have one again a few months down the line, I hope it’s not Ah Gong that they will assign to me again.