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Archive for November, 2009

Judging Enida

Justifying to my best friend why I chose to bare my life and its personal details in my writing… I said, “So that people who enjoy talking about me will have an easy access to a reference, Cik Nan. If they have any doubt about a ‘story’, they can always refer to my blog and be anchored by my truth, my version. They can create and have their own addition to their edition. But my truth matters to me. I am, afterall, a reliable source for my stories.”

 

I have grown wise enough to not deny the fact that people talk. About me, and behind me. Not many will care enough to talk to me about me. People don’t only talk. They judge too. And that is perfectly human. I am not worried. For all I know, I have done that too, against my preference, principle and consent. As none of us is an island, we keep rubbing against each other for lessons, for comfort, for entertainment and sometimes for a challenge!

 

So if you caught yourself talking about me, do know that I know you’re talking about me. Whichever version, yours or mine, is fine by me. Just make sure the other person you are talking to knows that Enida’s Version is available on Questa e Enida before anybody starts judging a me.

 

 

 

 

Postlude:

I just learned a new word today:
gavel = a judge’s hammer

 

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Laksa Mana?

Akak tengah menyingsing lengan cardigan akak yang berwarna merah hati ni haa seraya menahan hati tengah marah akibat kesabaran dan keimanan diuji di saat dan ketika ini! Memang pe’el dia betul lah budak-budak ni. Bila tipon berbunyik je, dia pun mula laaahhh ikut berbunyik sama. Padahal tadi tipon tu diam seribu bahasa, satu bunyik pun tak ada dalam rumah akak ni. Toksahkan sebatang jarum, malah sebijik zarah yang jatuh pun akak tak dengar. Haaa sunyi tak sunyi rumah akak! Hah!

 

Gambar sekadar untuk perasan sahaja.

Sebelum ada yang kena rebus jadi kuah Laksa untuk dinner akak malam ni karang, baik akak menyingsing lengan menulis blog ni haa sambil menunggu marah akak reda. Dah lah satu hari ni akak taaaaaaakkk sesudah bertempik! Anak-anak akak ni asal bukak je mata, mulut pun bukak ler jugak buat bising. Segala keturunan bunyik ada: mak bunyik, nenek bunyik, maktok bunyik, tokwan tokki, achama achapa, kong-kong po-po punya bunyik, sampai lah ke cucu-cicit tompang lalu punya bunyik pun ada dibuatnya.

 

Akak memang boleh jamin dengan SIRIM lah, Bukit Pokrovsky ni kalau buat Majlis Anugerah Sempena Emak Paling Kuat Bertempik, akak lah tokoh yang terpaling hebat! Haaa dah lah TER, PALING lagi tuh! Bukan itu sahaja. Akak lah calon, akak lah juri, akak lah urusetia, akak lah usher, akak lah pengacara dan akak jua lah pemenang tiga tahun berturut-turut. Kalau lima tahun akak duduk atas bukit nih, lima tahun lah akak penggondol setia gelaran juara tersebut. Juara bertahan pun jadi tak tahan dengan akak. Apa susah, akak tempikkk je kat muka sesaper yang berani nak mencabar kekuatan tempikan maut akak ni. Haaa ada braniii?

 

Tapi memang lah… akak yakin lagi pasti, kalian semua akan terperanjat kalau berkesempatan mendengar tempikan keramat akak yang ternyata menyiat hati anak-anak akak yang nakal sebenarnya. Akak je yang tak rajin bercerita dan mengomel pasal kenakalan mereka dan keluarga mereka itu. Yang kalian baca semua cerita-cerita yang indah-indah belaka. Kisah menyayat hati yang akak karang bila hati telah retak. Bila hati tengah marah macam petang ni, bukan hati akak sahaja yang retak. Pinggan ayan serta mangkuk hayun akak semuanya retak menunggu belah. Nasib baik akak cepat tangkupkan ke batu. Nescaya jadi lah ia batu belah batu bertangkup.

 

Maka akak pun merayu lah kepada batu yang menjadi sebut-sebutan itu…

 

Batu lah belah batu bertangkup
Telan lah aku luluh lah aku
Aku dah rebus telur untuk hiasan laksa itu tadi

 

Akak terpaksa mengundur diri dulu untuk merebus apa-apa yang dapat akak tangkap dan rebus untuk menjadi kuah Laksa hidangan makan malam akak ni sebentar nanti.

 

Muahahahahahaahaaa… come to Mommyyy!
The water is boiling, the noodles are readyyy!
Muahahahahahaahaaa!

 

 

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Love Comes Easy?

 

Why can’t love be an easy conversation like the way we talk about how your day was? Why can’t loyalty be like asking if you have taken your vitamin for the day? Why does it have to feel this heavy, this edgy and this teary? Why can’t it be breezy like Sunday morning?

 

If love is in the air, why can’t I breathe, love?

 

 

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The BS Story

 

There is a story behind this Beef Stroganoff dinner I made last night.

 

Kitreena has been enjoying lunch from the school cafeteria. It all started when I sent her back, traveling on her own to Moscow from Singapore about a month ago – while I spent the extra two weeks in Malaysia. And since Daddy would not have time to cook or pack lunch for the daughter, Kitreena was finally introduced to the cafeteria food (despite Mommy’s suspicion of where those cafeteria staff’s index fingers have been).

 

Beef Stroganoff, once every two or three weeks, appears among four choices in one of the days’ menu. Kitreena, a big fan of Beef Kurma, naturally was overjoyed when she first saw it. Well, I am sure you can tell what has been her favorite since. She has been giving nothing so far but all the good reviews on the cafeteria food. I must admit though, I can’t dismiss what she said altogether. I have had a couple of meals there myself, and to be fair, the food is good for a school-cafeteria standard. Plus, it is the closest eatery to us on this hill. No, I lied. It is the only eatery on this hill. I shall say no more.

 

And now that I have come home, unfortunately fortunately, Kitreena still wants to continue getting lunch packs from the cafeteria. I believe it is mainly her way of ‘fitting in’ with her mates. And I also believe I am saying this because I am in denial. Nonetheless, I only let her do so  twice a week now. Apparently parents here are making use of the facilities and what privileges they have. This lunch-packing business can be time consuming, if one doesn’t have time and cannot make time to begin with. Worse, if one doesn’t find joy in doing it. I got time!

 

Okay, the Beef Stroganoff story is…
I told Kitreena that I make better BS than what she gets from the school cafeteria. (Yeah, both BS’s, I admit to that too.) “But the real challenge is the Mashed Potato, Mom. You’ve never made Mashed Potato.” she said. ‘Yes I have, too! Hello! I have watched your Grandma Johnson making it sooooo many times! So many that it felt like it was I who was making it every time!’ But of course, that is just my BS thinking. No. You’re right. I confess. By golly hail Mary, I never made Mashed Potato.

 

Lo and behold, yesterday’s Beef Stroganoff was no bs for Kitreena. I shall say, ehem! I passed the challenge. She was so impressed with both my BS and MP that she actually is going to pass on the Beef Stroganoff on Macaroni next week! No bs, but hello! Nobody makes Macaroni like Mommy does.

 

 

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Hoots In Boots

I started this entry with a title, which is not usual.  I mean, my style is… ramblings first, titles last. And that unusual title was a title of Shania Twain’s song that usually comes to my mind when I see a pair of boots. I changed my mind and changed the title so to avoid questions of unusual nature, as the title I originally started this entry with was Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under.

.

See what I mean? But then again, the boots in question have been under my bed. My very own boots and my very own bed. Winter just started, unsupposedly. And I had been in a tropical country where wearing boots is just for pussies in style. So the boots have been under the proverbial bed of roses.

.

Anyway, after just being wetted by cold rain this past week, the snow finally came back. And walking Kitreena to school has been made a tad more challenging if I insisted on staying in those suede Scholl shoes of mine. So the boots I got for a pretty good deal in Spring came in handy… or shall I say footy?

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For the love of me footsies, I had to crawl under the bed yesterday to get the boots in question out of the questions. The crawling part, later, proved to be the easiest and the most fun of it all – I didn’t know putting on a pair of boots can be such a workout. I think I lost at least 400 calories putting on each boot yesterday (not to mention, my temper!)

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The first boot was the killer. I could not get my foot all the way in! I tried it with the sock on, of course. And when the foot just would not slide in – even after putting all the 58kg push on it – I noticed that the sock was rubbing tightly against the boot lining. Fine! Sock off, then!

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I was about to lose the rest of the 400 calories, putting another try on the 58kg push, ready to strangle myself, kick my butt, scream on the top of my lungs if not hooting like the unhappiest owl and howling like the hungriest wolf, spit my green phlegm and swear at this Bloodyvostok winter in Moscow, when  I wiggled my toes and… uh?

“What is this ball of crumpled paper still doing in me bootsie?”

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Did I tell you they were a brand-spanking-kicking-butt new pair of boots?

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Hard Done By

Cold cold heart hard done by you...It’s the weather, I figured.
That fifth day I was here, that 23rd day of April… the weather was exactly like today. It is the weather. The weather that came with the news that love is sometimes not worth keeping, not worth forgiving, not worth giving. Such cold news that froze my heart harder than the oldest iceberg.

 

And today, if I could turn colder than the coldest snow, I would freeze all the warm thoughts and all my kind words, only to tell you my cold truth that love and all its hardened meaning has melted. Away. My seasonless love is no more waiting for the summer’s sun, nor it is fond of the firewood smoke kissing the snowflakes that fall on our chimney.

 

My love has gone weatherless on a day like today. And on every today, for the many todays to come. I have turned too cold to feel.

 

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Chill Out, Boy!

I wasn’t eavesdropping or anything. Just happy surfing me bloglist at the computer upstairs that is in the same room with the kids’ TV. But from the cartoon show Edrick was watching, I heard… “No offence dear, but I have had more ex-husbands than Snow White had dwarfs!”

 

 

The mischievious grin.

Huh?

 

I’d better put his jacket on and let him play outside for a bit.

 

So it is 2°C.

 

So what!

 

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Dari Kamar Ini

Lagu Dari Kamar
sung by Noorkumalasari

 

Dari kamar ini
Kumemandang ke luar
Suasana sepi
Seakan mencabar
Mengapa pengucapan
Tidak lahir di bibir
Seandainya berhadapan
Mudah ku tafsirkan

 

Sepi mengajakku
Renungi lembaranmu
Kuulang membaca
Surat bermakna
Indahnya bahasamu
Tersusun kata kata
Kau berkias mencuri hati
Di dalam seni

 

Aku pun mencuba
Menciptakan madah
Sayang bagai ada
Yang tak kena
Ku mencuba lagi
Menulis puisi
Ku sendiri
Tak mengerti

 

Dari kamar ini
Berdiri di jendela
Aku menyaksikan
Kumbang dan bunga
Sepi mengajarku
Menulis surat rindu
Sebarisan ayat yang mudah
Kaulah yang kucinta

 

 

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Take Her Words

My Kitreena.Things were not  going so well with  Be’s health that the doctor wanted him to check himself in at the medical center Sunday night. And since food was the last thing (or maybe the second last thing) on his mind, Be left before dinner time. So me Monchies and me had a quiet dinner just the three of us. No, it wasn’t a quiet dinner. It was a silent dinner.

 

It was Kitreena who finally said, “Mom, I am glad you are home. It is really good to have you back. I really missed you. It’s not the same when you were not here. Thank you for coming home, Mom.”

 

She is a sweetheart when it comes to saying the right things, ya know. And I am not saying this because she is my sweetheart. I guarantee that I can get some back-up votes here if I pull a few strings. But this gal almost always knows what to say. And what she just said went straight to my heart as I saw tears in the corners of her eyes.

 

Peace of mind of mine.“I will always come home, Monch! Don’t you ever worry about it. I am your Mom.” And of course I had to take an advantage by rubbing it in with, “You should thank God you still have a Mom and I am here, you know. You’re lucky. I don’t have a Mom anymore.”

 

Kitreena suddenly sat up and gave me quite a stern look, “Don’t say that, Mom! You always have a Mom. She’s just not here because she has to be in heaven.”

 

A silent dinner went on to be a silent night. We left it at that, as I believed what I just heard were words sent from someone who had to be in heaven.

 

 

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Bra Vo

Growth on me chesty?There’s  always  something  new to  learn  everyday. And today I learned about how to wash bras safely. Mind me, peeps, for talking about something (you might find) private. I am actually surprised to see that my blog is a pretty popular finding for those who Google words like tetek and kemban. It must have been from my earlier post on penyangkut tetek – the term for bra that KaCher and I used when we were kids.

 

And today, I did not just learn something new about bras, but also about my hardworking helper, Esmeralda Coloma. I had always wondered why she kept my bra hooks done when storing them in the drawers. I just realized that she actually keeps the hooks done even before putting them in the wash. And, of course, that keeps other laundry pieces safe from being ‘hooked’ by the bra hooks. Duh, Enida!

 

While it may not sound like a smart discovery on my part, I do think of Emy as a very thoughtful person. I mean, really… how many of our helpers really do care about our clothes down to that little bit? Unless of course you are lucky to have good thoughtful kindhearted helpers like Bibik, Emy and Joy like I am (and have been).

 

I am also thankful and proud of myself that I am a person capable of learning new things pridelessly. Brava Enida, Brava!

 

 

A little lesson in Italian in case you’re wondering why I am using Brava and not the common Bravo.

Una piccola lezione in Italiano per noi:

Bravo = for male (singular)
Bravi = for male (plural)
Brava = for female (singular)
Brave = for female (plural) – pronounced as [bra-vei]
Bra = for females only (optional for males with tetek)

 

 

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