Killing Time

This will be my last entry for a while so I will stretch it as much as I can. I get writing cravings much like how you get chocolate cravings. So here goes.

Last week I had lunch with a few old friends. When I say old friends I mean members of the press. As usual, I asked them about the latest dirt so Miss M (not her real name) asked me whether I have heard about Siti’s World Cup interview. I said no. So, gleefully she told me this: during the World Cup, her reporters went around asking local celebrities which was their favourite team and Siti answered (wait for it)…. AC (freaking) Milan. Choking his laughter, the reporter then politely told Siti that unfortunately AC Milan is not a country. Bada bing bada boom. All true.

The second story happened to be a joke. A reporter went to a mamak stall after covering an event and asked for roti canai. The mamak asked him whether he wants a Tun M roti canai or a Pak Lah roti canai. The reporter has never heard of such roti canai so he asked what’s the difference. The mamak answered, "Tun M roti canai ada telur, Pak Lah roti canai takdak telur," (to non-Bahasa speaking readers, the literal translation is "Tun M roti canai comes with egg, Pak Lah roti canai no egg". BTW the word "telur" means egg but in this case the word "telur" refers to its colloquial meaning i.e. balls; or as we cultured people call them — testicles.)

Heh. I love the press.

By the way, on the matter of Tun M versus Pak Lah my allegiance lies with Tun M. Pak Lah is alright but Tun M is my man. Sorry, I like ‘em smart AND with balls. It’s not even an option.

Last night I re-read ‘Kafka on The Shore’. This time I skipped chapter 16. Yes the chapter where Johnnie Walker cuts up a cat and eats its beating heart.  I was told the book contains hundreds of hidden messages and double meanings and complex layers but I didn’t get any of them. But I did wish I could talk to cats and make it rain leeches (or, make that raining watermelons coz it is so hot these days and a watermelon would hit the spot. On second thought, watermelons could be dangerous so scratch that and let’s get back to raining leeches. There are a few people that I would like to be sucked dry.) All said, it’s a great book. The best I’ve read in the past 10 months.

Last night too (oh it’s incredible all the things that I could do in one night) I watched 40 Most Awesomely Bad Metal Songs Ever on MTV. I could not resist and texted Saiful and then howled and rolled around the living room with laughter as the countdown reached no 1. Guess what it is. (see answer at the end of this entry). I grew UP with these songs. It is amazing to see how awesomely bad these songs are although back then they were the epitome of cool (okay, so was spandex and guys in make-up. We had some real bad taste). Kids remember, fifteen years from now this is how you would feel when you reminisce about 50 Cent and Simple Plan.

As I am writing this I suddenly find myself remembering my old apartment in Vista. Sure it was small and pratically furniture-less, I barely had any money and had to put up with some terrible housemates from Hades. But I was young (still am) and I had friends (I think some of them still remember me) and the only thing I had to worry about was who I would find sleeping in my living room (strangers, most of the time) so it was all good. Hearing Lal screamed like a prissy little girl as the boys huddled in fear while watching the Japanese version of The Ring (without subtitle!) at 3am was priceless. And yes I still remember how Ijam and gang furiously discussed The Blair Witch Project believing with all their little hearts that it was true. I used to have a wall covered with all sort of photos of all sort of friends who popped by at the apartment. I wonder where did I stash those photographs. Probably in one of those unopened boxes that I have lugged around as I moved from one apartment to another. And didn’t I use to own 3 cats? I am sure I did. I even remember that we named one of them Dayang Siti Nur Camelia (or was it Aieu that named the darn cat?). What happened to those cats? Anyone?

Dell sent an email the other day asking me about Mr Doctor and Mr Rockstar. Those who got to know me in recent times probably won’t believe this but I used to be hot (as in desirably dateable) and I used to multi-date (just like multi-tasking but with boys. Most of them have cars and I don’t drive so it was mostly out of necessity. I even managed to con at least 3 of them to leave their cars with me. It pays to have boobs). People used to have fistfights about me, no? Hahah. Or, at least I used to get into trouble with a lot of girls who were convinced that her guy was sneaking out with me (he probably was). But I digress. What I wanted to say here is that I dated Mr Rockstar (two dates, the first one sucked and just when you think it could not get any suckier, the second date did) but Mr Doctor and I were just friends. Right. Like that Ella and Hans Isaac movie. Hanya Kawan.

But, with multi-dating comes multi-horrors. Here are two horror stories that I want to write down before I forget about them altogether. They are not important. They rival all the bad dates stories that you can stomach at the Dating Hall of Shame.

Story # 1: The Cheater

I use to do this tv show for teens and had to spend a long night at the studio to set up props and what-have-yous. At about 9 or 10pm my cameraman and broadcast journalist came back from their assignment with a huge but suspiciously naughty grins on their faces. They went into the conti room, popped in a tape and called me. I was tired so I said no, I’ll watch them tomorrow. But the cameraman insisted, he said he had a really good and important footage that I must see RIGHT NOW. Reluctantly I pressed play. And there it was, the guy that I was seeing, walking through the crowd hand in hand with another girl. I think my eyes popped out. The cameraman said, oh by the way we went up to him to say Hi and we had a chat. He saw you? I asked. Yup, said the cameraman. I could not wait to see how he wriggle his way out of this one, he added. Well, I replied, I could not wait either.

So, what did I do? I called him. He wasn’t at his house. I called his friends. His friends didn’t know where he was either. I went out of the studio and sat in the middle of the dark carpark. I wasn’t mad. A bit amused maybe, mostly very curious. If you were the guy and you were caught that way — not only red-handed by reliable eye witnesses (yes, plural), mind you; but ALSO on a freaking beta tape, what would you do? 

I thought for a while and dialled another number. A hurried voice said Hello, and before I could say another word he said, I know what you saw and I can explain. Where are you now? I will come.

The number I dialled was my own private number. For the phone INSIDE my room in my own freaking apartment. He had been sitting there all evening waiting for me to get home so that he culd explain the, err, incident.

I could not remember what we talked about when he came to the studio but I remember that there was no drama. We probably went to have teh tarik at Ali’s Corner and then we went into the studio and I introduced him to the rest of the crew. The cameraman patted his back (not too gently, I recall) and the rest was que sera sera. I mean, what else could I do? Toss him out on his rear end? I wasn’t that dramatic. But wasn’t it a horror for him? THAT was punishment enough.

Story # 2: The Stalker

3 years ago I had an event to stage at KLCC. It was the morning of the launch and for some reason my team forgot to pick me up from my apartment. I had been waiting for about 30 mins and was getting reasonably angry when I discovered that yes, of all the things that they could have forgotten to do, they forgot to pick up their boss (I use the term boss loosely here).

So, what to do? I took a taxi, braved the rush hour only to find out that I have lost my purse! So yes, I was in a foul mood. Wouldn’t you?

Anyway, after the event was over I discovered I was hungry. So I borrowed RM10 and made my way to Mrs Fields kiosk to buy some cookies. I took the escalator 3 floors up and decided to look over the balcony to check up on my team. I stayed there for about 5 minutes before making my way to the kiosk and almost knocked a guy over. I look at him and smiled and said I am sorry and turned away.

Now, bear with me here, you  may think this is like a plot from a very bad movie but I swear it is all true. I have witnesses who could vouch that this really happened. The guy blocked my way and said (paraphrase), I have never done this before and I am very nervous. (dramatic pause) But for the last 3 days I have been gathering the courage to say that (pause) I think you are amazing and I would like to get to know you better.

Now, normally I am a reasonably friendly, easygoing person. But this was just… bizzare. Firstly, I looked nothing like Gisele Bundchen. I am using her as an example because I am watching Taxi as I am typing this. Come to think of it, even if I was Gisele Bundchen, Leonardo Dicaprio still didn’t want to marry me! So, the game evens up even if you are the hottest lingerie model on the face of the earth. Anyway, secondly, where did he learn all these lines? The School of Very Bad Pick-Up Lines?  Where is this school because I want to burn it down.

I said (while blinking rapidly from the sugar-deficiency), I am pretty sure you got the wrong person because I have never seen you in my whole life. And he replied, yes I know but I have been watching you from the balcony.

(Can you spell STALKER?!!)

I shook my head. I  am sure I laughed pretty hard too. I told him, that’s nice but I would like to buy my cookies now. And I did.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, that was not the end of it. After I bought the cookies and took the escalator down he was there again trying to chat me up! So I decided to cut the man some slack and told him he can have my number if he managed to get my full name. And you know what he did? He said, oho… so you are playing hard to get? I like that.

OH. MY. GOD.

True enough, later that afternoon he came to the concourse area and said he wanted to talk to me. I said, I can’t talk to you now coz I am working. However, if you are a customer…..

And yes, he went into the supermarket across the hall, bought some products, plonked them on the counter, looked at me straight in the eyes and said, I’ve bought these damn stuff so now you have no choice but to talk to me.

But he didn’t know that I was running the show and I had 6 people at my disposal. I turned to one of the promoters and told her, can you please take care of this gentleman and explain to him how he can play our Wheel of Fortune (well, it was an exhibition and we were giving away freebies and we had this wheel… you get the picture). The promoter escorted him to the Wheel of Fortune and I quietly disappeared to the stock room.

Now, this is the horror part. When I came back to the booth about 30 minutes later I found out that:
a) The guy offered the promoter money (a very handsome sum) to get my full name,
b) The guy offered the promoter DOUBLE that sum for my cellphone number; and
c) She took the money and gave him both.

I lived the next 4 days in terror every time the cellphone rang. He persistently called and texted me for about a month but in the end he just lost steam.

Now, you may want to ask, what was my problem? The guy wasn’t bad looking, he obviously had some money to  burn, he was resourceful and more importantly he still wanted to get to know me despite the obvious rejection.

ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FREAKING MIND? This is no romantic comedy. This is real life. If that had happened to your sister, you would have locked her in the house and let her out only after at least 6 months have passed. I was lucky I only had to endure a month of it.

Right now I miss Awa because I think only her horror story can top mine. Haha. I will let her confess about that in HER blog.

Trivia question: How many times did I use the word ‘freaking’ in this entry?

I end with an excerpt from ‘Kafka On The Shore’:

The strength I’m looking for isn’t the kind where you win or lose. I’m not after a wall that’ll repel power coming from outside. What I want is the kind of strength to be able to absorb that outside power, to stand up to it. The strength to quietly endure things - unfairness, misfortune, sadness, mistakes, misunderstandings.That’s got to be the most difficult strength of all to make your own…Everyone of us is losing something precious to us. Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That’s part of what it means to be alive. But inside our heads - at least that’s where I imagine it - there’s a little room where we store those memories. A room like the stacks in this library. And to understand the workings of our own heart we have to keep on making new reference cards. We have to dust things off once in a while, let in fresh air, change the water in the flower vases. In other words, you’ll live forever in your own private library.

Here’s to the boy named Crow.

Answer to the no 1 Most Awesomely Bad Metal Song Ever: Final Countdown by Europe.
Answer to trivia question: 5, including the one in the question. That’s still 5 times too much.