Tag Archives: throwback

[6/10] Memorable Moment : Bottom of the Bottle

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I was clad in my baju kurung school uniform that day, with ever messy short hair. We had just won a round of debate, and I was named the ‘Best Speaker’ despite perpetually saying ‘people under them’ instead of subordinates or employees throughout my speech in that round. Our debate-guru (in bold), Puan Kalai, shook her head after session and said, ‘Jo, what is ‘people under them?’. It was the 8th National English Debate Competition, we were supposed to compete in 4 four preliminary rounds.

In the next round, we were competing against a Chinese private school from Sabah. Being the young and dumb bunch that we were, we thought that the round should be easy, siding us. The motion for the round was something to do with ‘Imposing Environmental Labels on Consumer Products’. We were to oppose the motion. As the debate heated, we realized that ‘Government’ team had pretty good speakers. They pretty much were kicking our dumb bottoms.

One of them were saying how environmental labelling is important to educate people to recycle. I raised my hand confidently to rebut. ‘You see, this bottle here *whilst lifting the plastic bottle up for more effect* has no environmental labelling. But we still know that it needs to go in the Plastic recycling bin. What’s the use for labels?’. The other speaker also lifted up the bottle, and said, ‘Madam, would you turn the bottle upside down? Do you see the recycling symbol stamped at the bottom? That’s environmental labelling’. I said, ‘Oh, okay!’ and sat down.

Others in the room laughed. I wanted to hide under the table. Team from the girls’-school with a street name lost that round. Much to my embarrassment, this incident has since replayed like a thousand times in staff room, classrooms and our Literary & Debating Society meetings.

This probably wasn’t a significant, life-changing event in my life, but somehow, the memory of the day carried on with me over the years. Just days ago, our super-awesome debate guru proved how memorable my ultimate rebuttal failure was.

Note : This blog post is part of my 30 Days Microblog Challenge which I began in September 2018. To read more from this series, you can select ‘Microblog’ under Category. Or, search for #therainbowhatmicroblogs on Instagram. 🙂 Topics for this series are a mix of my own brainchild and prompts from my Insta-friends.

[5/30] 10 Amazing Things about My Ex-Boss

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The cheeky person who prompted me to write this clearly had first-hand experience of the drama that unfolded during my last days of work in Land of Pichonkun. It was all glitters and rainbows at work before I tendered my short notice resignation (no, it wasn’t. hahaaa!). Surprisingly (also shockingly), it was not as difficult for me to come up with this piece. So, *drum rolls*, here are the 10 most amazing things about my ex-boss which are purely non-fictional (this, I kid you not!). Oh, and we shall name my ex-boss ‘Ex-Boss’ throughout this post (because duhhhhh…) in order to protect their identity.

  1. Prepares incredible presentation slides – prior to meeting Ex-Boss, I mentally thought I was quite good at making presentation decks, but soon enough found out that I was mediocre.
  2. Has a sharp eye for details – almost always able to identify minute errors
  3. Curiosity to learn – if Ex-Boss doesn’t know, Ex-Boss Googles!
  4. Gets the bigger picture of things
  5. Gives random creative ideas – especially we brainstorm on events, activities
  6. Passion for the company – this was Ex-Boss’ first job, and Ex-Boss has dedicated 20-ish years of their life for the organization.
  7. Taught me most of what I know of Safety, Health and Environment (SHE)
  8. Patience for long discussions? – this remains questionable, though
  9. Workaholic
  10. Sort of indirectly got me to start my current attempt to eco-living.

I think this could be a kind reminder to all of us. Let not bitter moments cloud the good in others. Bridges do burn, unfortunately. We can either rebuild the bridge, or simply wish them well from the other side.

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All smiles for the camera. 🙂  And look, that’s Pichonkun!

Confession : As I wrote this, I had flashes of Friday afternoons during monthly Environmental Committee Meeting. I am just glad that’s all history now! 😛

Note : This blog post is part of my 30 Days Microblog Challenge which I began in September 2018. To read more from this series, you can select ‘Microblog’ under Category. Or, search for #therainbowhatmicroblogs on Instagram. 🙂 Topics for this series are a mix of my own brainchild and prompts from my Insta-friends.

[4/30] How I Met Sorru

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I think it was a Wednesday, which in UTP, translates to lecture-free second half of the day. I was sitting in Tudung Saji Café, my usual spot by the beam. I was probably doing some assignment or reading as I heard loud chatters approaching me. Someone asked me if I was going for the replacement class, I would’ve nodded, while mentally rolling my eyes. They were all headed to Chancellor Hall, to watch some debate competition, in a large noisy group. I was supposed to collect their quiz papers from class. I mentally mocked them. One of them, a tall boy wearing spectacles, muttered something. They conveniently decided to pass me a bag (one that they give out during orientation) and told me that one of their friends would come get it. I mocked them mentally, again, with a smile on my face. Who even writes their name on their bag with a correction liquid? Owner of the ridiculously tarnished bag came to collect his bag, grinningly.

I went to class that afternoon and collected every quiz paper with an Indian name. I only knew 2-3 of them. After an hour of class, I went back to Tudung Saji. Sometime later, they returned too. This was my opportunity to match names with faces, and possibly intelligence. In coming weeks after that, I made friends with them and was soon part of the big, noisy bunch.

That boy who passed me his friend’s bag always commented on my Facebook posts, texted me, always asked me out for movies and later settled for a KFC lunch circa July 2011. He drove me around, packed suppers and asked me answers for assignments.

Years passed. On a rainy night, I came back to my room exhausted after long hours in IRC. I opened my ‘unofficial email’ which I had only used for my BlogSpot account at that time. First sentence said, ‘I know you won’t see this email for some time’. As I read the email, I knew. I was in love with the boy who wrote me an email with grammatical errors. So, friends, this is how I met and later fell in love with Sarvish.

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Earliest snap I have of us, taken in 2011 @ Tudung Saji Cafe

Disclaimer: I have the tendency of reconstructing memories to my preferences, but I also have the gift of vivid memory for minute details.

Note : This blog post is part of my 30 Days Microblog Challenge which I began in September 2018. To read more from this series, you can select ‘Microblog’ under Category. Or, search for #therainbowhatmicroblogs on Instagram. 🙂 Topics for this series are a mix of my own brainchild and prompts from my Insta-friends.

4 Things I Miss About Campus Life

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Having an entire week off from work (thank God for maintenance shutdown) actually makes me feel as if I’m on a semester break. Those were the days when I sat at home, with lots of To-Do items and lil projects in mind, almost never executing any. Those were the days I zapped mindlessly from channel to channel, and had nothing to look forward to (except results and traumatic course registration, of course). I’m not sure if it’s a blessing or curse that The Mister is easily annoyed if I lived a sloth life. Hence, *drum rolls*, here it goes, four things I miss about campus life inspired by The Mister’s #throwbackThursday and reminiscence.

1.Being My Own Boss

In campus, we planned for dinners and suppers past midnight with no second thoughts. There were no strict curfew. There were no guilt if you went out for movies every week. Now that I’m back in the Nair household, I’d get 5 calls after clock ticked 9 pm. I reached home at 11.40 pm last week only to find my father fast asleep on the sofa whilst waiting for Baby to back *oopsssss*. Father just looked at me, then his phone, and said, ‘I don’t like this.’ I quickly ran upstairs (silence is the best strategy, ladies and gentlemen). You see, my parents don’t forbid me from hanging out, but it’s all way too exhausting when you have to rush back, and wish to be honest (but you can’t). This is already starting to sound like I’m a bad child, I’ll stop it here. I love being home and all, but, I miss late nights and early mornings. 😦

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2. Food, Food and Food

I used to complain A LOT about food while on campus, but I take my words back now. It wasn’t too bad actually. Since graduating, I’ve not consciously enjoyed National Chinese Breakfast Day (which is celebrated every time I crave for Tronoh aunty’s noodles, if you’re wondering). Cafeteria at my workplace could never possibly match Choy Pin lunches. That late night roti banjir with kari campur, that I always asked for tapao. Mi Sedaap from Rahman for teatime, or that shawarma I used to walk all the way to V4 for. On my lucky days, I get egg tarts and tau foo faa from Ipoh. Oh, and how can I forget the nasi lemak from V4 with squared papadoms (Yes, I have a thing for papadoms!). I miss how after tests or major presentations, we go in convoys to makan sessions. If I were to ever visit campus again, I’d write down a list of these, and make sure I don’t miss any!

3. Lazy Days and Randomness

If I were to plot a  pie chart of the distribution of all the things I miss about campus life, this would probably have the biggest percentage (no shame, sloth life is the best life!). Waking up late in the afternoon, binge watching on television series while munching on cereals with my legs up on the table,  late night conversations with the roommate and listening to her singing same lines of a song for an entire week. All these  definitely made life more bearable than my ordinary work weeks. We shouted by the lake (something I’ve been wanting to do since Foundation) after prayers in Tronoh temple. We drove aimlessly and ended up in Teluk Batik. We drove aimlessly and ended up in Ipoh, the other time. Actually, what I miss the most is, piled up clothes on my bed and feeding myself fat with junk food. Nobody really cared back then.

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4. Humans of Tronoh

Okay, so this is a little hypocritical of me to say. I’m such a douche when it comes to keeping in touch (and all of my close crackos are too, coming to think of it). Some days, I miss friends who used to be around me. I’m putting the blame on adulthood exhaustion that I don’t usually text or call up someone when I miss them. Back in campus, when you miss someone, you could just walk and knock their room doors. In most cases, you met them too often that you want to shut the door and pretend to be asleep (no, I’m kdding). Colleagues are fun people, but a good catch up with college friends is something that I want these days. The reminiscence gets really critical sometimes that I’d hope someone would actually tell me to wait at the V5 palang to go for dinner.

I have come to a conclusion that campus wasn’t the worst of place to  live in after all. All that ‘Can’t wait to be out of jungle‘ talks was pointless. This is a oh-so-cliched graduate who is shamelessly confessing that she’d travel back to campus had she a time machine. To those of you counting your days to leave campus, DON’T! Cherish your time there.