Would it surprise you to see a woman hauling her 32-week / 8-month size pregnant tummy at an airport if you saw one? I mean here lah, in Malaysia tanahair kucintaik. I am not talking about Pearson Airport. I did haul my 33-week size pregnant tummy there in 2002. Nobody cared, let alone looked surprised. Well, let me nyenyenye about what happened to me at KLIA and BKI Airport recently.
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A couple weeks ago, I went Cuti-Cuti Malaysia in Kota Kinabalu, where I was born. For about a week. Yepper! Hauling my 32-week prego tummy and the whole cargo, armed with Dr Ravi Chandran’s precious Fit-To-Travel (FTT) certificate/letter. At the check-in counter, I wasn’t asked for it. So okaylah. Air Canada pun, when I flew Calgary-Toronto-Calgary in 2002 didn’t bother. Maybe Malaysia was as lax, I thought. We proceeded to the boarding hall with the kangkong style of lenggang indeed.
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Lo-chia and behold, Cik Kak Asiah at the boarding gate…upon seeing my protruding cargo, stopped me and asked for the fit-to-travel cert. I handed it out to her feeling so relieved that I ‘came prepared’. Hmmm…if the story ended there ah, I wouldn’t bother nyenyenye about it today lah kan. Being the employee of the month as she probably would be, Cik Kak Asiah read the FTT certificate like she was going to memorize every single word and number, and take an exam on it.
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How much do you want to bet that she would find a fault? True enough! There was one. The date of the FTT. I was flying on October 29th and the FTT was dated 11 days prior to that day. Cik Kak Asiah dengan penuh dedikasi dan taat setia to the policy gave me the… “It’s in the policy that you have to have a certificate dated within a week or seven days prior to flying, Ma’am. We are sorry, we cannot have you on board.”
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Sorry seemed to be the hardest word for me to swallow that day.
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So I asked her what my options were. There was no way I could ask Dr Ravi to fax me a new certificate as he was also on leave until the day I was supposed to come back to KL. Would Air Asia reimburse us on all the tickets – mine, Be’s and Kitreena’s? Ha ha ha, that would be a joke! Anyway, Cik Kak Asiah asked me (politely) to just have a seat nearby while she ran around like a ladylike Chicken Little trying to solve the sky-is-falling problem we had.
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Cik Kak Asiah – if you haven’t already assumed it by now…is not her real name – had been very courteous for that 15-20 minutes dealing with our issue. Until! I was standing less than 2 feet away from her when I heard her exact words, “…Tapi perut dia memang besar lah!” speaking to a colleague on the walkie-talkie. Hah? Hey! That was NOT very professional of her to say that when I was standing right next to her desk. So what if my tummy was like the largest Wok With Yan‘s wok ever? Her ketidakprofesionalisma begitu menusuk bukan saja ke jantung kalbu, malah ke tali perut dan uri aka placenta ku! Cisss! Cakap siang pandang-pandang Cik Kak Asiah oi.
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Unimpressed, to say the least, I asked her to show me where in the policy that says that the letter had to be dated within 7 days. I remembered very clearly reading it and I very luckily printed it out and had it in my very right hand at that very moment. So, there was no way she could out-smart me, cross me, double-cross me or cross me out. (There! The difference between being smart and looking smart, ladies and gentlemen!)
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Cik Kak Asiah then gave me a very confident “Oh yes it is in the policy, I just know it,” statement and was going to approach the pilot to see if he would let me fly. Fine! I wasn’t going to crawfish out. Na’ah! Not after hearing her unprofessional words and knowing that she was bluffing me with the ‘oh yes it is in the policy’ bs. Sorry selorry. And in the meantime, Be was ready to blow a fuse over the whole thing and because Kitreena wasn’t in her best behavior either. Me? Patience? Oh, if you asked me 32 weeks ago…I might have had it.
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Just as the passengers started boarding like kambing terlepas kandang sembelih, a senior Cik Puan Kak Asiah came with an indemnity form and some apologies for me. She verified that the pilot had no problem having me on board as I was under 36 weeks prego. And that it was not true that I had to present an FTT Cert dated within a week of flying. She, however, did suggest that I should get a post-dated FTT for my return flight on November 5th -“to make things easier”. Hmmm, ok, whatever. Time to roll my eyes, and keep ’em rollin’!
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I did get a post-dated FTT for my return flight, actually. Thanks to Muzi, Dr. Ravi’s secretary. And guess what happened to me on November 5th, on the way back?
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A longer nyenyenye story.
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I woke up yesterday morning immediately jumping out of bed and leaping into the kids’ room. Kitreena greeted my “Good morning, Sunshine!” back with a puzzled look and a question: “Mom, why are you still wearing that old pyjamas? It has holes sudah on it. Is it because you like this pyjamas so much?” There she went again, answering her question on my behalf.
Questa è Enida 
