Don't expat too much hor..

Alone in Raffles City now.. wife is celebrating her birthday with her ex-classmates.. so I thought it would be a good time to meet up with my bandmates.

Was 45 mins late. But no one was here anyway.. so it does not make me late coz theres no one waiting.

Yazid is on the way now. Fiza replied to my msg saying that she's not coming. Azil got stuck in the rain and might not come. Umi uncontactable coz i dont have her number with me. Shida will come at 8. Nas in KL. Din and Hamdy MIA.

There were no seats at Starbucks so I ended up having my lunch in Burger King.

There's an overzealous Sarawakian staff who was mopping the floor and saw some teenagers moving chairs around and he thought that it was his civic Burger King Staff duty to stop them from doing so.

Ordered my meal next to another teenage boy of about 17-18 yrs old who cant talk in tune. He ordered in a single, monotonous tone.

10 CHANGE FRIES TO ONION RINGS

20 CHILLI OR KETCHUP? CHILLI. AND MAYO.

30 MORE CHILLI PLEASE.

40 CLS

50 GOTO 40

Imagine all these orders made with a robotic, monotone voice.

Ahh.. dont you just miss GWBASIC. Days when you thought that programming was easy. Till you came across an alphabet plus plus.

Recently, in the Singapore bashing facebook group, one Aussie woman commented that she cant understand what Singaporeans are talking about.

She should talk to this guy. No one can ever misunderstand what he wanted to say.

Does anyone, besides the Aussies, even understand what the Aussies talk abt anyway? Coming from a place where you speak ONLY English does not make ur command of the language fantastic. I had been to the States and Australia too many times to be able to know THAT for a fact.

Ok. Din just called me to tell me that he is on the way.

As much as I love Australia, London, United States, there are always downsides to everywhere.

Obviously, Singapore is not a perfect place. If u are a Singaporean and you dont like Singapore, move to Johor.

Too bad that they dont allow you to buy a gun in Johor, and yet a huge number of crooks theres own more than just a single gun. Yesterday's papers mentioned that even the Police Chief in Johor was tied up in his house while it was being burgled by 3 fellas.

And if u can't control the crime, blame it on the Indonesians. The Malaysians had the habit of blaming the Bangladeshis several years back for the crime spree.. It's always a foreigner. Never the local.

But then again, I personally know of some ppl who had been robbed by obvious locals.

OK.. This entry was continued at home now..

Yazid came with Ima soon after I wrote the first part of the entry. Din arrived with Lina.

Went down to Singapore Flyer coz they wanted to watch some motorbike stunt show..

The event turned out to be massively attended.. with the attendees turning out to be 95% mats who ooohed and aaahhed at every jump the stunt bikers made..

Some of the mats wore identical shirts.. Spotted one wearing a Singapore Bikers something.. like he belonged to a professional bike clan. heh..

After abt 15 mins, there was a break so we walked a lil bit further out of the crowd to get some drinks.. that was when I saw IT.

IT was a BIG screen showing the Manchester United/ARSEnal game.

I had wanted to watch the game, but since I was out with the band, I thought I could just get the result afterwards.. But God's bigger plan was for me to watch and enjoy the part where Manchester United picked up the Premier League trophy for the third successsive year.

Shida, Umi and Fred met us during half time of the game..

So after the match, walked over to Esplanade, and I went down to Citylink to fetch my wife and daughter, who had gone for a karaoke session at a place where it was Family Friendly.. with songs even for little kids to sing.

Spent a lil bit more time with them before we all headed back home.

So that's it abt my entry, after months and months of not blogging. And when I do, its the typical.

Wife.
Daughter.
Band.
Mats.
Manchester United.
Programming.

And here, back to the stupid Aussie from the Singapore Bashing group.

Seriously, if Singapore is ALL that bad, none of u EXPATRIATES would wanna come over here.

But of course, u do want to, coz Singaporeans put Ang Mohs on such high pedestal that they feel like princes and princesses.

I had a Swiss friend who worked here before.. and he loved being in Singapore.

Coz Singaporean SPGs would throw themselves at him. And he get free drinks, no queues, and extra preferential treatment coz he is a tall, good looking ang moh.

I dont really blame this kinda ang mohs for taking advantage of the situation. Blame the Singaporeans who gave it and whined abt how service staff are discriminative towards Asians.

I am a service staff. I give preferential treatment to anyone who comes. So when u get it, take it with grace and dont whine abt it when u get back to Aussieland.

Most of the ppl worldwide that I had met are nice ppl. But we do come across some asses.

One of my friends was shouted at while she was in a tram in Melbourne. She was sitting down and here comes an Aussie woman who started shouting to her to tell her to give her seat to the REAL Australians.

Till someone else in the tram told the woman that the REAL Australians are the Aboriginals. Not the Ang Mohs who came down on their 10-pound tickets or sent down under for being petty thieves.

And not too long ago, in London underground, a seat was empty in front of me when someone alighted. So graciously, I moved over to let an old ang moh man sit down.

He started shouting at me, saying that I should take the seat coz MY ppl had been doing it in HIS country. We had taken over their jobs and all.. so why not just take the bloody seat too?

I wanted to retaliate, but considering that he is an old man, I let it go. Everyone in the quite congestedly full cabin was staring at me while it happened.

To all Brits who think that we stole something from them by living in the UK.

Firstly, I DONT LIVE IN THE UK. So I didnt steal your job. I am happily employed here, in Singapore.

Secondly, I am a tourist. So I normally wont be there for more than a few days. I dont really have much time to steal your job. Even if I did, it will be just for a few days packing some groceries in Tesco, if they would allow me to. But they dont. So I dont have anything to steal.

Thirdly, my country is better than yours. Coz YOUR ppl love to come here and mingle with our pretty little Asian SPGs. Somehow, YOUR ppl like to come here and work and steal Singaporean jobs coz our country is open enough for anyone to come here and work, no matter where u are from.

Fourthly, our MRT stations dont smell of urine. We dont carry guns, and neither does our crooks. Except for One-Eyed Dragon, but he's caught and killed.

Fifthly, since the old man mentioned, YOUR PPL.. ermz.. I still couldnt figure it out, who does he refer to as MY ppl. OK.. I am an Indian, but I dont look Indian. Malay? There's not that many Malays in the UK who stole their jobs except for Ashley Isham. The rest of the Malays there are either studying or selling Malay food. But I am not a Malay. I am an Indian who doesnt look Indian. I dont look Chinese. The only ones who stole their jobs are the Italians. And theres no way in the weirdest world that I could even look Italian. I am not even so much of a fan of pasta.

So again, to all Brits who think that MY ppl had stolen your jobs.. We didnt. YOUR ppl came over to con the Malay Temenggong to colonise MY country. Thanks ah.. go bully some dumb fella and take his island. Lucky we got smarter hor.. and got back our island.

To all Aussies who think that we speak funny.. if only you would record your own voices. You think Singaporeans speak funny. The rest of the world KNOWS that you speak funny. Enough said, mate.

Ang Mohs like to come to Singapore to work while leaving their wives at Jelita, Holland Village, Serene Centre and Tanglin Mall supermarkets. So they end up talking to some PRC cashier at the tills.

With that and when they found out that their husbands are enjoying the attention of the SPGS more than their EXPATRIATE jobs here, they got bored and angry and ended up in a Singapore Bashing facebook group saying that Singaporeans speak funny.

We dont. Maybe the SPG that your husband was sleeping with speaks funny. But the rest of us dont.

And how in the world did she know that we cant speak our own language well? You can understand Malay meh? or Tamil?

Singlish is not a bad thing. Aussies have their own weird slang. Mates do refer to copulation too.

How ya doin? Mate?

No thanks. I'm married.

Another weird EXPATRIATE that we had was the one who commented on the arrest of Mas Selamat. Got this Ang Moh terrorism expert who mentioned that Mas Selamat might have been planning attacks to some Singaporean icons. Such as the Singapore Flyer, the Merlion. And he mentioned, "Now, that, would be spectacular".

Wahahaha.. attacking the Merlion would be spectacular?

We, the normal Singaporeans, dont even find the Merlion spectacular. Attacking the Merlion would not be spectacular. It would have been DUMB.

Not many except for the poor Bangladeshi workers who had to clean up the mess bothered so much except to laugh it out when the Merlion was struck by lightning.

That's the kinda EXPATRIATE that we need? To come and make some dumb comments thinking that he would know what Singaporeans think of our national "icons"?

Haiyah..

I am more forgiving to the Englishman in the tube coz England has got good football. I dont watch rugby.

Anyway, the blog entry ended the next day, on 17th May at 2.10pm, at home.

Huggies Photo Contest

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The best gift of all..

At last..

After 8 months of waiting from the time we found out that we had conceived her..

After 10 months since the wedding..

After 23 months since we got engaged and dreaming of having a child together..

After 1 1/2 years since we bought her first clothes.. M & Ms baby rompers which looked too cute to pass so we got it for our planned first child..

After months of paranoia and worries throughout the pregnancy..

Our little bundle of joy arrived at 2.43pm on 02nd Nov 2008.

Now comes another years and years of paranoia and worries..

and lots of sleepless nights..

I can remember clearly when I first found out that I am gonna be a daddy..

I had just landed into Brisbane on 04th March 2008. While I was just stepping out of the airport when I felt my phone beeped.. so at the entrance of the airport, while waiting for the rest of the crew, I checked my phone.. and there was this msg from my wife..

"Pls msg me when u land. Make sure u do..."

and..

"I got something very impt to tell u. It's nothing bad. I bet u tt its not bad news"

Obviously, I wasnt gonna msg her. Out of my pure kanchiongness for the "something impt", I called her right at the airport entrance..

And she told me the beautiful news.. that she tested positive using the home-test pregnancy kit..

I froze..

Totally..

I'm gonna be a dad.

I was totally speechless. I forgot at that point of time that I was in Brisbane.. coz for a moment I thought I was in Heaven.

A leading stewardess next to me saw my face changred and asked me right after I put down the phone.. "What happened?"

I couldnt talk for a moment.. I could just smile..

One of the happiest moments of my life..

I was totally crazily happy..

8 months later.. I was crazier and happier..

Of course.. initially it came as a mixed feeling.. from the time my wife had her first contraction that beautiful morning of the 02nd of Nov... I was so excited abt her arrival.. and still hoping that she remains a SHE coz of all the dresses and the pink stuffs we had already bought.. if she turned out to be a HE, we cant possibly let my son wear the dresses.

I saw the pain she had to go through, and felt totally helpless, coz, as a husband.. I could do nothing to ease that pain..

I was just praying that everything will go fine and the labour will be fast and uncomplicated..

She came through at 2.43pm, and the first thing I noticed when she was coming out was.. she started screaming when she was just HALFWAY out of my wife.. no need for butt hitting to get her to cry.. no Ma'am.. this little girl is capable of doing it right from the womb..

That was the most beautiful sound I had ever heard..

The doc placed her right on top of my wife and though I had always pretended to be concerned abt her gender, I was actually more concerned abt her condition and I was scanning for any physical imperfections.. not that we would love her any less if she does.. but at least if she does.. we can be prepared from the beginning to do something abt it..

Our little bundle of perfection remained a little girl and thus became the official owner of the dresses.

Through the pregnancy.. I was so paranoid..

What if I was sick and had passed some sickness to my little baby?

What if I am sick with some deadly sickness and wont be able to see her..

What if I had died before she came and I became a nightly story that her mom tells her on how I could have been a good dad..

What ifs..

Then I realised that I was being too paranoid and I guessed that every father-to-be would go through the same phases of paranoia.. So I decided to be more optimistic and start planning for our lives together..

Right after I cut off her umbilical cord, the one of the nurses took her to the warmer to warm her up.. and was the first to notice and comment.. that my daughter has a deep dimple on her right..

Wow..

And considering the fact that she has a beautiful mom..

I was planning on how to interrogate her upcoming suitors.. the ones who attempts to be my son-in-law.. so I shall list down the criterias one of these days..

Right after I buy a shotgun to place in front of the house to scare them away.

We got EXACTLY what we had prayed for..

We wanted a baby right after we got married.. we didnt.

Coz if we had gotten her during the first month, it would have been impossible for us to do what we did during the honeymoon.. up the mountain, but we wouldnt have been able to ski and snowmobile and all those things we did and my wife will not be feeling good..

So we conceived her during the honeymoon..

We had wanted a girl to be the first baby..

And we got a girl to be our first baby..

My wife had an easy pregnancy.. or rather.. much much easier than I had expected and anticipated.. so it made things so much easier for me as well..

No morning sickness, no moodiness.. just during her 5th month, she felt pain at the tailbone and close to the end of the pregnancy, she was starting to feel the pain at the pelvic when the baby started to move downwards..

She didnt feel the Braxton Hicks.. and felt her very first contraction pain hours after the water bag broke..

The delivery was very very smooth and fast..

I had used up all my annual leave for the wedding and the honeymoon.. so the only available leave that I had was my 7 days matrimonial leave that was to be used within 12 months of the wedding..

So initially, I had wanted to apply for the leave from 10th Nov till 16th Nov, coz the expected due date was the 11th..

So our gynae mentioned that if I would apply for it on the 10th, my daughter would have come out when I come back from flight.. so he told me to apply for the leave a week earlier as it is a trend now that they give birth on the 39th week..

So I applied for my leave from 03rd Nov, and I was off from work from 02nd Nov..

and she came on the 02nd Nov.. right on the date that I was hoping she would arrive.

We wanted her birthdate NOT to coincide with anyone so she can have a birthday party just for herself.. and true enough.. she has her own date.. and it only coincide with Shahrukh Khan but he's not invited for the birthday party.

We chose to have her delivered in a private hospital as compared to KKH coz of some horror stories that we have heard.. so we chose Gleneagles Hospital..

I compare Gleneagles to a rich, pretty girl who has an attitude.. it looked all glam and pretty from the outside, but u have to be patient and swallow ur anger and bear the attitude..

Somehow I think they chose the best of their staff to be at the frontline to present a good front.. but I find the nurses very grumpy and and always in a bad mood.

Not the Filipino nurses coz they are mostly polite and nice.. but the local ones..

But they get most of the things done.. MOST.. not all..

Coz when we informed the nurses that the baby has a discharge on her right eye and asked for some swaps to clean it up, she didnt come back.. had to inform another one and waited for more than half an hour for it..

And so I had to go over to the nursery and blasted at the nursing officer coz all that I wanted was a clean swap so I can clean my baby's eye myself..

I didnt even ask them to do it. I didnt want to delay any longer coz I'm a new dad and I'm paranoid and I wanna make sure that my daughter don't end up having an infected eye.

The second nurse came to us shortly afterwards to apologize coz she was stuck with another patient..

Fine.. but it didnt excuse the first nurse to ignore us anyway..

And the Malay girl at the cashier's, as I headed down in the morning, was so aloof and cold, and abrupt in her manners..

Except in the afternoon when she was attending to some ang mohs, then I saw her smile..

But the counter staff at the admission.. they are not short of fantastic.. very helpful and friendly.. and the admission when we came in was effortless..

The staff at the labour ward was good too.. nice and friendly and took care of my wife as much as I had thought they could afford to..

But we decided to go to Gleneagles coz we knew that the baby will be taken care of.. I spoke to a male nurse somewhere just not too long before my baby's birth that in his experience during the attachment in KKH, he saw a baby who's back was lined with feaces coz they were having too many babies and too little nurses.

And our first time at the polyclinic a day after I came back from Brisbane to confirm the pregnancy before we wailed out to tell the world.. we were hurried out of the clinic by the doctor who was more concerned abt going for lunch even though we arrived at the polyclinic way before lunch time and was delayed by the registration process and the waiting time..

and to compare that to our gynae, Dr KW Lee.. wow..

Of course, there's a price to pay for everything though.. and at the end of the day.. I knew that I had done all I can to make sure that I provided what I can for my wife and daughter during the pregnancy and delivery..

So my little baby princess has officially become a Mother..

And this old man, after almost 36 years of his life.. has officially become a Father..

and I promise u, my little girl.. that I will be the best dad I could ever be for u..

So, my darling.. I present u to the world..

And will guide u through ur life, in which I plan to be a very integral part of, no matter how intrusive and naggy and old fashioned u think I am..

I used to be cool though.. even if u find it hard to believe when u are old enough to read this..

So now, I present to the world..

My little baby girl..

Who's picture I stole from my wife..


Nadya az-Zahra Binte Zulkarnain

Cultures and Counterculture and being Effectively Bilingual.

Happy Belated Deepavali to my Indian friends and anyone who's Indian (including my wife, my brother, my sis in law and my upcoming daughter) who comes across this posting.

Had to go to work yesterday, despite it being Deepavali.

I dont celebrate it anyway.. not in a sense like a celebration kinda thing.. But I miss Deepavali of those yesteryears.

Sweet cakes, Thosai, Curries..

I dont have that many local Indian friends nowadays that will invite me over for Deepavali. I used to have quite a number of good friends who will invite me over for Deepavali and Chinese New Year and Christmas, and I will invite them over for Hari Raya and my mom will cook her trademark Briyani.

Somehow, besides my wife and my mom and myself in the mirror.. I dont see much of other local Indians around anymore..

Came across an Indian man, somewhere in his 50s in the lift yesterday as I was about to leave for work.. I wished him a Happy Deepavali and asked abt his celebration plans for the day..

So he told me that he was going to the temple and afterwards, heading down with his wife and kids to his parents place to celebrate.

Thatz when I realised..

I dont see or hear much abt that nowadayz..

Locals.

Somehow, I miss them.

Recently, in my futile attempt to repair and clean my Armani specs.. I removed the screws and was unable to fix it in back..

So a few days later.. when I returned to Singapore.. I headed down to Tampines Mart, to an optical shop.. to get it fixed.

So the guy working in the shop, laughed when he saw what I did and showed me how to do it.

There's a trick to fixing it in as the spring in the frame will move the alignment of the holes.. and without using a wire to hold it in place, it's impossible to fix it in.

This is a fella in his 30s, who might probably spot some Ang Kongs somewhere and his natural language is Hokkien.

I like Hokkien speaking Bengs. I have a lot of Hokkien Speaking Beng friends and I am always comfortable with them.

I might be stereotyping on the Ang Kongs.. but I know enough Hokkien speaking Bengs as I had grown up in a neighbourhood who's official language was Hokkien and Tamil.

That's Dover Rd.

How I miss that place.

It's a place where Malays and Indians and Chinese will sit together at the coffeeshop and we are all friends and we'll cover each other's back and everyone who's in a secret society will be in the same one. No matter what race u are.

Not that I was in any. My societies are all not so secret.

I was doing National Service as a policeman back then and I was rest assured that those guys would not allow anything bad to happen in the neighbourhood. In fact, I know them being very anti-drug addicts so we didnt get that kinda problems in the neighbourhood.

They just like to chill at the coffeeshops and drink their tea in the morning and beers in the afternoons till evenings.

Back to my Hokkien-speaking mentor at the shop.

In all friendliness of a Hokkien speaking sales-rep who's attempt to speak Malay to my mom was admirable, he refused payment for the services rendered to me (not that I expected him to charge as it was a trivial matter.. but it was his working time anyway.. he could have if he wanted to though it will be very weird if he would) managed to sell my mom a new pair of specs.

That's how it used to be.

Our locals who used to run the moms-and-pops neighbourhood shops knows enough to create a rapport with the ppl enough to secure their own regulars.

Back in Dover Crescent in the 1990s, there was a shop called Jumbo.

It was a 4-unit minimart ran by this middleage plump, happy looking, always smiling owner, who's known to everyone as Jumbo.

Jumbo will give discounts to everyone for about everything.

Even cigarettes have discounts.

He will waive off anything if he feels like it.

Take a drink which will cost abt 80 cents.

U take it from the fridge and go to the counter..

"Jumbo.. how much ah?"

"80 cents.. aiyah nehmind.. 60 cents sudah"

That's how it was..

Jumbo with his everything got discount.

U dont need GSS to get a sale there.

And he knows a lot of ppl by name. He greets them and was always nice. So he gets a regular stream of customers.. and when they decide to tear down the block, he moved over to the main road and bought a coffeeshop.

And his coffeeshop is the only one there so he makes a lot of money still.. just that Jumbo no longer physically need to run the place so he can just collect money now while ppl work for him.

But I doubt there's anymore discounts since he's no longer there..

So here I am, 20 years later.. whining about the loss of our locals.

Dont get me wrong. I'm not xenophobic.

Never had been. Never will be.

I'm just pissed.

As I had mentioned months and months back.. there was an incident in Coffee Bean where a PRC counter staff asked me to speak in Mandarin, while I was at one of their outlet in Forum Galleria.

If u walk around neighbourhood malls and u come across a sign looking for sales staff, u'll definitely see it with "Able to speak Mandarin"

Open up the classifieds nowadays and u'll see ads with requirements like "Able to speak Mandarin (to liase with Chinese speaking customers)" or "Effectively Bilingual"..

I came across ads nowadays to requires "Malay speaking" and not too long ago.. one which states "Tamil speaking (to liase with Tamil speaking colleagues)"..

now.. that's just weird..

What's Effectively Bilingual?

Can I tell them that I am effectively Bilingual coz I, the Indian Man, can speak English and Malay?

I am DEFINITELY, EFFECTIVELY, BILINGUAL.

But can I get the job?

Nah.. coz Effectively Bilingual means that u must be able to speak Mandarin or any other Chinese Dialects.

I think the government must put a stop to this.

Recently, while walking ard White Sands Shopping Mall in Pasir Ris, I saw an ad looking for sales staff..

Must be cheerful and pleasant.

Must be able to speak Mandarin.

Foreigners Welcomed.

So what does that mean?

It means that any PRC foreigners who wishes to come to work there, can. While I, the local, would not even be given a second thought.

And dont get me wrong..

I dont have anything against foreign talents.

If they come with talents.

But to take them for the sake of taking them? Its really eradicating all the cultures and subcultures that we Singaporeans had built through the decades and decades of assimilating ourselves.

Those childhood textbooks of ours in the 70s and 80s talks abt Ahmad, Peter, Ah Seng and Muthu.

The Olympics itself had shown us on how some ppl can just use us as a platform for themselves and create a joke out of the country. Forever in the history of the Olympics are now etched the facts that Singapore won a medal through a Beijing resident.

My mom became a Singaporean in the 80s.

She had lived in Singapore since the 40s. Grew up here, worked and went to school here, in Telok Paku and TKGS.

I dont have a problem with foreigners who comes here and WANT to be here coz they are in love with the way we are. Everyone here comes from an Immigrant root. Except for the Malay friends of ours of course, but they are mostly quiet so, me, the one who came from three immigrant sides of South Indian, Pakistani and Chinese, is whining.

Foreigners are welcomed. Just that, if u wish to stay, be, feel and think Singaporean. We had gone through so much changes as a society that if we evolve now, we'll be an open pot where ppl can just throw in any ingredients.

Throw in things that wont dissolve and all u get are individual solids that wont merge and at the end of the day, the cauldron will just explode.

So what is it abt being Effectively Bilingual?

Just to liase with Mandarin Speaking Customers?

what about those English speaking Indians and Malays and Eurasians?

Not to whine about things that appear greener on the other side, but any other countries would not tolerate these nonsense.

In Australia and UK, they depend so much on trade with other countries too..

But try to advertise some jobs as a Software Engineer and put there, "Able to speak Mandarin, to liase with Chinese speaking customers"

it doesnt mean that Australia and UK dont make money coz they dont support such a mindset.

Through Wiki.. I came across this statement..

"Australia's largest export markets are Japan, China, the US, South Korea and New Zealand"

China.

They do trade in China, but they dont advertise for jobs that requires a receptionist to be Effectively Bilingual.

How about trading with a Japanese? Shouldnt we look for Japanese Speaking employees to liase with Japanese Speaking clients?

We all know that Japanese ppl are more comfortable in speaking in their own Japanese language.

It is an offence in a lot of countries even to ask a simple question like "Do u speak Italian?" if the job dont call for that language proficiency, like being a translator or a journalist in an Italian newspaper or something like that.

But somehow, even though the government does not condone it, the private companies are taking advantage of the situation.

I miss our locals.

And those immigrants of so many years back who try to be Singaporeans.

Cultures are beautiful. U can keep ur culture while maintaining a distinct Singaporean identity.

Just be Singaporeans when u come over and not expect the rest of Singapore to change to adapt to u.

Being Multi-Racial and Multi-Cultural is nice and colourful. I dont wish Singapore to be any other way. But if we allow ourselves to accept diversity while being diversified, soon enough we'll be just like New York.

While being more talented and artistic due to foreign talents, New York has its own shares of triads which springs from different subcultures. And they have guns. Not what we need for Singapore anyway.

Aiyah.. my brother says that u give up the rights to whine when u dont do something abt the problem. But I'm just a whiner. And I'm just lamenting the loss of our own Singaporean culture.

and I'm still Effectively Bilingual.

Mariska Hargitay!

The Past, Present and the Future..

I'm in my room in Tokyo now.. or rather.. in Narita.. just outside of Tokyo.

18 days time till the full pregnancy term.. 40th week.. but our gynae mentioned that the baby might come out a week earlier.. so tentatively.. 11 days or so till the arrival of our baby girl..

Had our weekly scans now.. and the baby's position is good.. facing backwards.. though doc said that she might move around a lil bit..

We are first time parents.. so obviously, clueless and kanchiong.. we know whatever that we think we know through books and websites.

Of course u experienced parents of multiple kids would laugh and scoff looking at our naivety..

But its ok.. I'ld rather be kanchiong.

And clueless..

Anyway.. it seems like the rain in Singapore for the past 2 days had followed me to Tokyo.. and I think I am falling sick.. I had been down with a bad case of food poisoning for the past few days and spent my off days in the toilet.

ok.. a recap on what had happened recently..

My past is haunting me.

Ok.. didnt really haunt.. but in all pleasantness.. a lot of ppl of whom I knew when I was much younger reappeared..

First was my sec school classmates.. Norizam, whom I met last year in Funan.. Zahed several months back in Tampines Mall.. Yasser, Norlinda, Anuar, Zuriany on Facebook.. Hawa on my flight to Sydney..

Then my bestfriend, Siti Sohrah.. whom I mentioned just a few days before.. recontacted through Hawa again..

And several days back.. Isriyanti, found my blog.. (btw, Yanti.. my name is Zulkarnain, not Dzulkarnain :)

ok.. so whatz the problem now..

Nothing actually..

This is an entry for my wife..

I have the best wife in the world.. and therez nothing and no one in the world that I would trade her for.

We have the best life we can have..

But now with all my old friends coming back.. i'm just afraid that she'll feel threatened by their presence..

Or not really their presence..

But the fact that there are somethings abt me that she doesnt know..

Like when Siti tells her that I used to draw..

and now Yanti mentioned that too in the comment..

And my former neighbour's kids.. who used to come down to my place to ask me to paint for them.. and we met one of them working at Mothercare..

I dont draw anymore coz I'm not really good at it.

Just like pool..

I used to like to play pool..

Till I met some really really good players who hustle almost for a living..

and i realised how stupid I look when I played.. so I stopped playing..

Now I cant play pool for nuts..

So the same.. I dont draw.. I dont paint. I stopped doing that a long time ago.

And thatz the reason why I didnt mention it to u..

So before u say it..

Or before u can even think abt it..

Let me reassure u, my baby..

That i'm so much in love with you..

I know that u might not even feel threatened.

But i'm saying this just in case u are.. and just to reassure u..

No one in the world wants me except u.

Sorry.. I'm too old.. value oso not much already.

So just to tell u.. Baby.. I love you.

And now, for something thats totally irrelevant..

I dont hate turtles.. not even those flying ones..

Though I do hate them turtles that wear the metal hats and throws axes around..

I love dancing palm trees.. they make me happy..

I smile when I look at them.

I dance along at times..

But something really bothers me..

Smiling clouds.

I just find that smiling clouds are very, very condescending.