Tag Archives: anecdotes

Baby Bump & Good News (Not)

Life, That Time When, Thoughts, ,

Nobody prepared me for this. This, being the period from when you’re married and yet to deliver good news.

No, good news isn’t when you accomplish things at work and get recognitions. Good news has nothing to do with enjoying yourself on long-planned dream trip with your best-friend cum halal-husband. It’s also not good-enough-news when Red Devils won a Derby match, which you paid for heftily to watch in Old Trafford. GGMU – yay, nevertheless.

So, I’m writing this as a wedding gift to all new and not-so-new brides; inspired by very true stories. Oh yes, this is a click-bait. 😛

Baby Bump

On a very rare occasion that I did wear a dress to work – I chose to style it up a little, with a belt around my not-so-flat tummy. I was at a celebration with my friends & colleagues from my former plant. For context, I’ve not met anyone since my wedding since I relocated to across the Causeway.

Mr Hong Kong Man (in a very sweet tone) : Awwww, Thara – is that a baby bump, I see?

Me : Ermmm, hi Mr Hong Kong Man! Very nice to see you! Noooooooooo. I just found lots of places to eat in Singapore. (wide grin, high pitch laugh)

Mr Hong Kong Man : ………… Oh no! I’m so sorry! …. *more awkward silence – until I ran away to someplace I was not needed*

Poor Mr Hong Kong Man, I’m pretty sure he’s now traumatized for life. This was so hilarious because it really did seem to scar him more than me. This is someone that I really like & look up to. I’m thinking that I should meet him when I do get pregnant, just when I’m about to pop so that we can try the aforementioned conversation again – you know, for redemption.

Lesson #1 : Gain weight at your own risk post wedding – as it’s trickier to navigate. I’m also obliged to say, as a responsible writer-wannabe, take care of your health. I’m a hypocrite – work in progress.

Notes to self, 1) Either stick to my workout plan or get pregnant this year, whichever attainable. 2) Look in the mirror & ask myself, ‘Do I look pregnant in this?’.

Good News

On a not-so-fine day at work, I was getting bad refluxes which then exponentially got worse throughout the day making me puke multiple times. My engineer-turned-doctor work friends were troubleshooting me like any good professional would. They deduced as a matter of fact, that it can’t be food poisoning as I had same meals as The Mister, and he seemed fine.

Colleague L : You sure it’s not any good news?

Colleague A : I was about to say the same! Which is why I was asking the questions to be sure first.

To be honest, at this point, even I was like – is this it? It was as if Tsunami hit my brain. TMI – I know, but I checked, not once but twice.

Days later, my in-house Sherlock solved the case. I had greedily eaten a day’s old Roti Boy that I got from Ipoh without sharing with The Mister. Apparently, I ate the bun in two big bites as The Mister watched me from the other room, while I evil laughed at him. While I believe there may be some exaggeration to how I consumed the Roti Boy – it was crystal clear, what it was just that, a food poisoning.

Lesson #2 : If you’re about to eat old food, share it with someone (preferably your husband if you have one) for scientific reasons. Make sure you are able to recount all your meals for better data in case you need to be diagnosed for food poisoning – to avoid false alerts.

Good News (MVP)

While many people have asked me about good news in different tones, I have a notable winner who’s worth the honorable mention, from my temple visit last week.

Mr Kooky : Eppo pethu poda pore, un Appaku vilayada? (Translation : When are you giving birth, for your father to play with (the grandchild)?)

Me : Uhmmmmmm. Coming soon, Uncle.

Mr Kooky : It’s the circle of life. Finish it this year. Then continue, go for Number 2,3,4,5.

Me : *very very very awkward laugh, while the brain is hit with another Tsunami* Ok Uncle. Take care.

Lesson #3 : If you know the question is coming, like a responsible adult – run away!

Disclaimer :

This was written in humour & not to hurt anyone. Good news has been somehow theme of many of the conversations that I’ve been having in recent times. Please, do ask me about the good news – I’ll even send my Excel for better reference (seriously).

Until Further Notice

That Time When, Wedding,

I woke up this morning to see the screen of my phone with a pop up from my Countdown app.

‘50 Days till Engagement Day’, it read.

My heart sank a little. Almost in autopilot, I showered, got dressed and turned on my louder than average blender to make breakfast. It was an unsuccessful attempt to drown the gloomy, mehhhhness (I’m pretty sure this is a legit emotion that’s on the List of Human Emotions).

I started scrolling my phone, and the thought just dismissed (if I have to be specific, I watched this video, and got distracted!) 😛

While I was at work, the thought of my now-postponed-engagement crept back to mind, and I sent a screenshot of the countdown to my Free Therapist a.k.a The Mister. His reply was, ‘I want birthday’. The date of our planned engagement coincides with his birthday – and I wasn’t even really thinking about his birthday. Oppsss? Typically, I planned months ahead on lame games, puns and funs for the big baby.

It clicked me how this wasn’t even something worth fretting upon. It wasn’t like I was prohibited to get married to this guy! Our wedding might just happen on the planned date *fingers crossed*.

I mean there are bigger problems in the world – like a pandemic with no vaccine, not-so-great economy, Trump and an incompetent cabinet of ministers in a certain southeast Asia country ruining, sorry, running a government.

I have bigger problems. Piling up workload with urgent deadlines. Or, the fact that I can’t just go home to see my parents whenever I want. Or, that it’s been over 60 days since I had seen my groom.

So, I chose to just write a blog post about this unnecessary emotion– and then, let it go!

I’m going to end this post with a reminder how we used to be a decent looking duo in traditional outfits – and truth be told, now we’re both *coughs* very far from looking half as good. I guess the postponement is somewhat a blessing in disguise, eh?

Once Upon a Time in Ipoh ❤

The Wedding Nightmare

Wedding,

We were all seated around the dining table at my parents’ house. Some extended family members were there as well. I think it was teatime, because there were mugs of hot masala chaya on the table.

I was unwrapping one of the many packages that were on the floor. It’s finally here – our wedding invitations! Excitedly, I tore open the wrapping to see the invitations for the first time. Since I was not in KL at the time of finalizing the design – I had no idea how it’ll look. I took out the one of the invitations – and my hands trembled.

My heart sank – and I was almost on verge of tears! I kept quiet for a long time. My parents asked me what was wrong – and I got (embarrassingly) hysterical at this point.

This invitation looked so bad! It had those glossy printed wording – the font was all off. The colour scheme was so unflattering. And THAT wasn’t the biggest issue at all. One of the sentences said, .. Brides residence… and there were whole lot of grammatical errors and wrong use of apostrophes.

I told my mother, ‘I go around correcting people’s grammar, and look at my wedding invitation! It’s so bad! We cannot use this!’. My father was reassuring me that we can redo the invitations if I thought that it’s really that bad.

Someone made a snarky comment about how I was being petty, and this wasn’t even a problem – and how will I handle should problems arise in our marriage later.

Someone else said I was being an ungrateful. It added to fuel to the this whole fire of anger, confusion & disappointment. I felt helpless. I just knew that I DID NOT WANT to give out these invitations.

Almost exact representation of how I was feeling..

In distance, I heard the alarm ring on my phone.

No joke, I’m telling you – this dream was so vivid that my heart beats were going crazy when I woke up and sat on my bed. And to think that THAT is my biggest fear of what can go wrong, I really don’t know what’s wrong with my priorities in life.

Another point to note – the sentence that triggered me so much (…Brides residence…) is totally irrelevant to our ceremony – at least that should’ve triggered me – that it was a dream?

Dream Analysis:

I was bookmarking some wedding card designs before I went to bed. I also recall watching one of those videos on Facebook where the groom picks outrageously hideous dress for their bride – which almost always make the bride cry. A mix of these somehow manifested in the dream nightmare, I guess.

Cracked

The Mister, ,

When I was twelve, the new head teacher made all the girl prefects wear long skirts as uniform. On the day I walked to receive my badge as Head Girl, I tripped and fell in the assembly.

Months later, I was wearing a green baju kurung Kedah on Hari Anugerah Cemerlang. I tripped on the steps, while climbing on stage to receive the Tokoh Pelajar award.

At the age of 15, I would’ve tripped at almost every drain around the school. While in university, when I used to ride my bicycle to classes and library. On my way back, I would lose control downhill near the road between V1 and V2; and have fallen more times than I could admit. I drop my phone 3 times a day, (still).

My mother still nags me to be careful at work. When I tell her I climb tall structures, she worries. My safety helmet has saved me from knocking into pipes multiple times. By now, I must’ve convinced you what a clumsy, Humpty Dumpty I am.

So, just like my mother, The Mister has been self-appointed to point out (and nag me) about my clumsiness. He shrugs every time my phone takes a plunge, or  and give me the I-told-you-to-be-careful look when I trip.

But, guess who broke the screen of their 3-month-old Huawei P30 Pro just TWO days before the warranty ended? Which brings us to why does The Mister has a new phone in the first place? Because his previous less-than-a-year-old Samsung also had his screen cracked.

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Happy face because he has a screen insurance for SGD46 to break it for ONE more time!  

I’ll just end this post, with a smirk on my face.

Mirror, Mirror, By My Side

The Mister, Thoughts,

‘It’s because you are lazy’. That’s what The Mister said, when we started brisk walking at the Neighbourhood Park. We had just climbed three flight of stairs to get to the park; and I was already panting as if I ran a marathon (not like I have the experience of that). He insisted that we should jog, ‘Come, slowly, jog!’.

I maintained that I cannot jog, my ankle hurt and I might die of shortness of breath.

‘But you cycled in the gym last time! You used to run, you can jog! You’re just lazy!’. Bugger called me lazy. Twice! I had enough.

‘When I say I can’t jog, that means I CANNOT’. I walked away, angrily, made 2 rounds in the park, still walking briskly, mentally mocking him and gave laser stares each time I passed by him. My Amma nags me much lesser than this man!

Two days later, we went for a jog, again. We set rules this time; that I will jog to the best of my ability and that he’ll be considerate and nice(r) while at it. I did try to jog; and we completed about 1.8 km of jogging before I gave up. Frankly, I could’ve continued. But I just didn’t feel like pushing it? So, I used my ‘side stitch’ excuse to get away. Maybe I was just lazy?

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Oh, the shame I feel typing this. 

 

 Earlier this week, The Mister casually commented, ‘You don’t read OR write these days, ah?’ I pretended not to hear that, sailed on to a different topic. I’m ninja like that when it comes to avoiding anything uncomfortable.

I did not think much of it all, until earlier today, while trying to not regurgitate the yucky lunch I was having. Maybe there’s truth to it. I am being a little lazy? I have been slacking in many ways, relatively. I have the luxury of time these days, but I do nothing (other than rolling chapatis 3-4 times a week).

To all this, I had one very good excuse. I was still settling in a new country. That takes time, right? Duhhh. But, if I must be honest, I was already well-adjusted at work. And, really, it just feels like I live in an alternate universe where Malaysia has better public transportation and crappy banking app. Everything else feels the same? So, that excuse went down the drain now because transition was smooth.

The whole point to this is that I realized, that sometimes, in life, we might need someone who gives us a reality check. To be that mirror reflecting on things you and I would delusional-y ignore or avoid. Fortunately (sometimes unfortunately), that person for me is The Mister.

I realized how this is a sticky situation, because that means, mostly, I cannot get away with pity or long-winded stories with The Mister. He points out things as they are, and that’s just not so romantic, I must say.

Sometimes, I get oh-so-defensive about the little stuffs, but when I’m all alone eating yucky lunch (yucky lunch is an important variable, you guys!), his valid points somehow make sense.

Sometimes, I get that much defensive, that I make it a point to prove against whatever he has said. Like today, I am writing a blog post while eating fruit salad for dinner, after a 3.2 km run on a weekday!

Lazy, who? Sorry?

WhatsApp Image 2019-04-12 at 8.13.30 PM
I managed to run that same route, TWICE, today.

BUT, I have to also confess, I needed motivation to complete my mission; so I consoled myself that if I did run better, I would give me a reward. So……

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No, I’m not eating fruit salad for dinner. Korean Fried Chicken! ❤