Questa è Enida

I”m having trouble publishing posts here today.
Looks like I will have to now shift to Facebook’s Notes.
If you are not on my Facebook yet, add me, per favore. Grazie mille.

I felt high.
High like a million dollar lady last week to have been invited as a panel speaker at a forum in Shah Alam. So high, I was actually flying over the highest peak of Bukit Kayangan. That, for a creepy-crawly like yours truly perasan high-muck-a-muck, is high. I must admit, I didn’t come down to earth for many days after, as my head was stuck in the clouds. No other creepy-crawlies have ever got the opportunity to be a fellow penalist with Jimmy Ong and to be talking about the ‘Wow! Factor’ in Event Management. (I did use the word perasan, did I not?)

And when I thought one million was high enough, I was made to feel like a six million dollar woman when the program head and advisor invited me to be a judge at another event in the same week. Now, that was a bit tough for me. (To be judgemental, that is.) I can be critical, yes. Every breath I take is a critique. But to be judgemental is out of my mental capacity. When it comes to students’ performance and output, I evaluate. I don’t judge. So, evaluate I did. That six million dollar opportunity was not a saxophone, I wasn’t going to blow it!

And boy o boy sweet home Alabama! Did I ever have a blast!

It was one of the best I have seen! For a faculty of which English is not the media, it is surely led by someone who understands that speaking English will not jeopardize the sovereignity of one’s maternal language. And I simply loved their tag line: “English, we’re speaking it!” (Though to many, it sounded like: “Bahasa, we’re skipping it!”)

The highlight of my 1+6 million dollar week, however, was not the speaking at the forum. Nor it was the judging evaluating the students’ performance at the Grand Finale. It was what happened just as I was leaving the hall.

I heard the sweetest hello.

While the prices of most grocery items have either gone up just a tad or have stayed pre-slodo, there are more cut-downs than we know. Of course I will give you examples to prove my statement:

Nutri–Plus sausages or wieners:
There used to be 7 big wieners in a pack. The price has not gone up (yay, you think?) but the Monster Slodo has taxed one wiener from each pack. The sausages too have been reduced in size. No, no price reduction.

Pops–Rite Light Microwave Popcorn:
RM10.70 is now for only 3 bags of 3.3 oz popcorn. Monster Slodo has stolen 2 bags out of each box. Yes, RM10.70 used to be for 5 bags. Nope, no change in price. And yes, no more hills of popcorn even in smaller bowls. How much do you wanna bet it used to be 4 oz per bag? Light micowave popcorns have sure gone lighter.

Well, this is just to name a couple. So you can imagine when I heard that Milo was going to lower their price, ahak ahak…there was nothing on my lips but a smirk. Yeah, right! I am so going to redeem some points for a kitchen scale. Oh ye, with little faith!

p.s. Email me if you confuse Monster Slodo with Master Frodo. And oh, I just learned that Milo originated from Australia. I have tried the Jamaican Milo but me no like the taste (it smells like dedak ayam too. Iyew!)

Three weeks ago I bought a pack of 4-in-1 CD’s. Sixty songs altogether. I scanned through the titles and amazed myself when I realized that I actually knew 58 songs by heart. The other two I thought I must have heard, and found out later that I did. But one that keeps coming and humming in my head is this:

Barang yang lepas
hai jangan dikenang
kalau dikenang meracun lah diri…

And so tonight I stopped mengenang for a little bit, and stopped meracun diri. I just let myself merasa. For tonight I’m healing.

I know you are waiting. Do know I am writing.

Read this just a while ago and went “Wow!”

[wow]

noun
a joke that seems extremely funny

syn.
belly laugh, sidesplitter, howler, thigh-slapper, scream, riot

verb
impress greatly • The speaker wowed the audience.

To keep these Canadians happy when their traditions are in question is not really a job for this minority Malaysian in my house, I tell you. But tonight, just like those two other nights last year, I was put in a role of a Tooth Fairy again. And this time, a Front Tooth Fairy. I went flipping and flapping upstairs and downstairs looking for a little box that could fit a 50sen coin (cheap fairy!). Of course I could not find any! All boxes of all sizes I have accumulated all my life are on their way to The Land of Tzars, duh!

So this little-but-not-so-little Canadian gal would have to be contented with a 50sen coin wrapped ever so nicely in an aluminium envelope with a green corsage her fairy mommy got as a VIP at a forum earlier in the day. Sorry Monchy! Not only your fairy and squary mommy believes in recycling, she also believes that keeping a tradition doesn’t cost a thing. Neither does love.

Now go whistle, baby!

To all commentators and comment-leavers who have taken their time to read all the lines and what lies in between, to review, to reflect and even to rage about what I write…thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you for your time, thank you for your thoughts, thank you for your TLC.

To be frank, I would not have put the visitors counter if I wasn’t curious about how many readers would come visit my words and visit their own mind while reading mine. I truly appreciate every visit and re-visit whether you leave a comment or curse the day I was born. (Yeah, obviously too much SATC!)

I do read your comments as they come in via my email. And I do respond to each and every one of your comments – some in written words, but the rest in thought thoughts, and all…with curved lips on my face.

I just wrote this email to Laurie at WOW! Factor, a corporate event management company in Del Mar, California:

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Dear Laurie,
I was browsing and googling for Wow! Factor in Event Management when I came across your company website. And then I saw this embarrassing spelling error in the ‘About The WOW! Factor’ page:

“… – Protect the pubic against fraud and unfair practices, and promote all practices which bring respect and credit to the profession.”

It should be PUBLIC, don’t you think?

Good day!

Regards,
Enida

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I have nothing against pubic being public. I mean…I am very comfortable with my body, and am not embarrassed mentioning vagina, pubic hair, labia, vulva and anything down under, bottom or behind. And as much as I would like to ‘protect the PUBIC against fraud and unfair practices’, I would really like to promote all practices which bring respect and credit to any profession. That, my dear Laurie, includes the practice of checking one’s spelling before making anything corporate, public.

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With that, I conclude my pubic speaking.
Thank you.

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