Kuching Festival

It is 5pm and still the oppressive heat of the day has still not subsided, but stall owners are already arriving with their wares and food arranging them in partitioned off stalls lined up in an open space beside the Council building. This almost two football field size ground is gaily decorated with about 200 food stalls selling all manners of food that this city is famous for. Welcome to the Kuching Festival!

For three weeks, this colourful fair will open its gate to thousands of visitors from 6.30 pm onward to avoid the steaming heat of the day. By dusk, the weather will be sufficiently cool down to entice people to browse the numerous cubicles selling mostly food like laksa, satay, fried noodle, dim sum and many others. The main theme of the festival seems to be: Food , and more food!

By 7pm the crowd starts to arrive. Adults with children shouting with glee at baloon venders, wide eye, up- country teenagers in town for a day purposely to attend this event, Grandpa and grandmas accompanied by their middle aged shildren and grandchildren. Cooing courting couples sharing a cone of ice cream, a bunch of giggling schoolgirls, even a lone vagrant whom everybody give a wide berth. There is a stage erected at one corner where a crowd converged to watch a slap stick comedy sketch, to be followed by a singing competition later. The din compounded by the stage loudspeakers has now reach its peak and conversation has to be raised a notch to be intelligible.

The partition off stalls are arranged in a straight line along the perimeter of the ground facing the open space where hundred of table and chairs are provided for al fresco dining/eating. Shoppers only need to browse the food, get their order on the spot and carry their own food to an empty table, plonk thier food down and tuck in! Its simple as that. But you have to elbow your way to get at the food as there aare others who are as hungry as you are! And be ready for strangers ogling at your food and some admirers might even have the temerity to ask you which stall you bought your fare!

Baring in mind the whole fair is swarming with people thus getting an empty table often become a real hassle, thus you may have to appoint among your mates who to be the maitre d', so you saunter around and spot a table where the occupants seem to have almost finished eating, then you have to stand nonchalantly next to the table, and jump into a seat like playing musical chair once they got up to leave! That way you "claim" the table for your use even though your friend are still taking their pick with the food. Now come the hard part, triumphantly telling them you've succeed in getting a table but where, as the whole ground is almost a melee. Luckily cell phones come to the rescue and you tell them youre near the big neon sign of Carlberg Beer or the Coca cola soft drink stand. While you sit alone guarding your territory, others with food packet in their hands glare at you in envy. Some cheeky ones might even grap a seat despite you telling him the table is taken, grumbling that your mates wouldnt even return by the time he finishes his chicken wings, while you wait helplessly for what seem like eternity for them to come back with the food.

Finally, they appear grinning, sweating profusely hands full of glorious food. Now comes the enjoyment part. Good friends, great food, gaity atmostphere, and plenty of sweating, what more could one ask for. Unfortunately the crowd is getting denser by now and you may have a few "nonchalant" bystanders with shifty eyes but you try to ignore them, sometimes they give up, but a few may persisit with the tenacity of a vulture. And when all good food have come to an end, after dinner conversation have to give way to civic mindedness as you all got up to surrender your turf.

As you get to leave the ground, you may want to give it a last look around in case you miss something worth buying. Its like last minute shopping at the duty free airport shop before the loudspeaker announce the plane's departure! Finally after squeezing through the crowd with tousled hair and sweat smelling clothes you emerged from the exit. But your sigh of relief was shortlived as you watch in dismay as you have to wade you way thru the surging crowd to your car in the crammed car park, and you and your friends groan in unison at the propect of driving in gridlocked road back home. But, what the heck, it's just once a year and your love your tummy so much you'd sacrifiy anything to keep it happy!
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Bloody hell, if I knew blood donation was this easy!!!

Donating blood - a first hand experience


I had been contemplating for quite some time already, to do it or not to do it. I've seen people in shopping mall, spontaneously queuing up to donate blood as if they were about to board a bus, but just could'nt imagine myself lying on the makeshift canvas bed bloodletting myself. No way, its too gory and my wife is not much of an inspiration either, being faint prone when she sees blood.

One day, again in a shopping complex, there was another of these excercise and my wife was squirming as we passed by several rows of blood donors lying down to give their blood. I did'nt know what came over me but I stood forward and announced to the officer of the Red Crescent I wanted to donate too. My wife's stared at me dumbfounded, while I grinned sheepishly back at her. When the hospital guy got my name down on the slip of paper, I thought to myself : Thats it. there is no turning back!
I sat for what seemed like ages waiting for my turn to come and at the same time trying not to think too much about it, twiddling my thumbs and looking up at the ceiling. My wife was nowhere to be seen, having muttered she'd be back after buying the dress "just nearby only", so much for "in sickness and in health". Suddenly a smiling white shirt "nurse" tapped my shoulder saying "Your turn, Sir!" That's it! I'm doomed! The moment of truth! Can I back out now? No ! Thats would mean I'm a wimp and I'm not a wimp!
So, down I laid on the portable bed as Miss Nurse tried to look as benevolent as possible and with assuring tone told me to relax as she prepared a plastic bag to store my blood. I looked at the bag with dismay. That much? "D-do I have to fill up the bag f-fully?" I stammered to the nurse. "Yes sir" I thought she replied mischeviously as she took out the syringe. Don't ask me what happen from this point onward as I had my eyes shut tight till there was pat on my arm by the nurse, "It's done, sir". but to her credit, I must say there was no pain at all except like a pin prick.

I sat up, and there it was, my blood, nicely and securely "ta pau" in a plastic bag ready to save the life of somebody whom I'll never know, but it did'nt mattered, I've done my duty as a good Samaritan and hopefully will pluck enough courage to do it again. Now where is my wife?

Spitters & sneezers unmake my day

Of spitting and sneezing in eating places


Malaysian's table manner has sink to record low nowadays. Going to eat at public places nowadays mean having to endure the boorish antics of people sitting near to you and having your food laden with various virus, as if the kinds from birds and mad cow are not enough to spice them up.

I was tucking into my bah kut teh one morning in a coffee shop and there was this gentleman, obviously an office worker judging by his dress, just stting three feet away from me, he sudden heaved and "ah choooo!!!". No handkerchief, no hand covering his mouth, just plain sneeze into the air!!! I could feel the droplets of his outburst settling on my skin. Needless to say my appitite was doused and I left without eating. And that guy did'nt have the courtesy to look around and see the displeasure he had caused or apologized.

Another of my pet peeve is indiscrimate spitting. And Malaysian just love to spit! On too many occations already, when I was walking along the five foot way, there were people, most men, would "gaaaarggg....ptuuuiiiii!!!!" onto the floor, oblivious such a blob of slippery lubricant can cause a hobbling grandma to slip.

If you are reading this and include the above two mentioned habits as your pastime, please, may I suggest you indulge them in the privacy of your own home? Sneeze into the faces of your children or your pet, its quite fun to laugh and clean up later. Spit anywhere in the sitting room, sofa or besides the wash basin for a change, you have a maid/wife/mother to mop them up, isnt it?

Why you low down, double parking, no good son of a gun!

If you think spitters and sneezers spoil you weekend at the mall, wait till you get out of the shopping complex and step on to a typical Malaysian car parking lot. Now a parking lot is a place where lines are nicely drawn up and you are expected to park neatly, right? Wrong! This is the shared view of a seemingly large section of Malaysian drivers.

Let us categorize the first group of these so called drivers as "Crossed Eye Jack". Now Jack is a nice family man who would jump into his Rexton the moment his wife hollers "we're out of mosquito coils!". Unfortunately Jack is gifted with a line of sight that enable him to see a fly landing on the bridge of his nose perfectly, but alas parking a car properly is a touch-and-go affair, ie , he always parks his car at the right centre of the dividing line of the space, ie, he takes up two parking spaces. Many drivers have perfect eyesight but we have to call them by this nickname too. Sorry Ah Beng, Muthu and Ahmad.

Next is Mr Bangkok Park. This F1 driver wannabe is always in a hurry, a burn rubber, devil-may-care type, that swings into a parking space with a screeching halt and at exactly 45 degree angle of the parking lot. He doesnt bother to reverse and park in nicely and when confronted, retorts by rolling up his t-shirt sleeve revealing a full tattoo of a prancing dragon : "Ai yah.... never mind lah, I only park for 3 hours, not a whole afternoon" or worse: "You got a problem with my parking?"

Then comes Mr Tight Squeeze, who must have assumed you are a circus contortionist. In fact he's parked so near that both his and your wing mirrors are giving each other high fives.. You had to climb into your car through the window like a stock car driver, while he (on the driver's side) gets out easily with space wide enough to load a washing machine. And the worse thing is, yours is a brand new BMW 7-series and his is a rusting, clunker of a van with an extendable ladder tied to the roof. So you had to reverse gingerly while your wife and some sympthetic bystanders wave franticallly with their hand shouting "gostan....gostan.....gostan....oooopppp!!!"

Finally enters Mr. Tidakapathy a.k.a. Mr Sloth, whose real name is Ah Beng. This tooth pick biting, nose picking dude always parks at the entrance of the building even though he sees empty parking spaces two spits away, and in the process, always double parks or at a perpenticular angle blocking other parked cars' exit. His rationale is simple: he's here to attend show at the cineplex with his family," no big deal what". Two hours later and an exasperated P.A. announcers with a hoarse voice finally located Mr Tardy, he saunders out nonchalantly to find the commotion surrounding his car, Finally realising his oversight, he proceed with the speed of a wounded koala bear to remove his offending car. While the wronged parties shake fists at our hero for making them waitng for two hours, he vehemently protested "where got two hours? My watch shows only 1 hours 45 minutes only leh" and in the same breath mutters unhappily about something like "interupting his family's dinner at the KFC". Apparently, apology is not required here as he is also being wronged. Fair and square.

Dear fellow Malaysian, which category of driver do you belong to?