Category: Life

Pappy flew back today. It’s not the first time because he occasionally visits us. I used to cry each time he flies back when I was in college but those were the days.

Today was an exception and I don’t really know why. We hugged each other before he walked out the door. I went back to the kitchen to wash something as I watched Pappy getting on to his friend’s car who would get him to KL Sentral.

As the car drove on, my tears dripped down for no explicit or explainable reason at that point of time. I asked myself what’s wrong.

I held back the tears so it was only two drops from each eye. But now that I’m writing this, it’s more than just two drops.

Pappy helped fix the light. Maybe it would be deemed as something a father should do but it was more than what a father should do for me. I liked the way he insisted to get it fixed even though it was already late. It was a tricky one as changing to a new bulb didn’t work but he got it figured out the next day.

I guess I was thrilled because I have been using a dark bathroom for more than 3 weeks because I tried changing the bulb too but it didn’t work.

I’m grateful for him being supportive throughout these few days when I’ve been pretty worried about very petty things that do matter. He didn’t help me out on solving any of those but I knew he was encouraging me and sharing the courage I ought to have. That’s more than enough for me.

I love you, pappy.

“Are you free to go to the wedding tonight?”

Pappy asked, which actually means “Can you come with me to the wedding tonight?”, or in other words, “You have to come with me to the wedding tonight”.

Knowing Pappy, when he asks you if you’re free, he’s actually expecting you to be free so yea….I went to the wedding with him. Something unplanned since I came to know about it at a very last minute.

It was a Malay wedding. I know it’ll be a grand one but it was more than that. It took my breath away. It was one of a kind.

There was a band that was playing some soothing music (pardon my lack of music knowledge to describe it specifically, I know there’s a term to the music being played but I don’t know what it is) at the cocktail reception. There were more Malays than Chinese like me so I felt a bit awkward in terms of dress code because most were wearing baju kurung and kebaya. I asked Pappy if the invitation stated any specific dress code for the ladies, he said no…it just said formal.

My little flowery dress and me felt relieved upon hearing that. I was expecting the wedding to start on time, not like the Chinese weddings that never starts on time. I was wrong. Dinner was only served at 9:30pm because we had to wait for the arrival of VIPs. It was ok because there was something about the atmosphere, the decor of the ballroom that excites me.

The moment I entered the ballroom, it’s pinkish. Dark pink lights shining from the ceiling. There were also cherry blossom trees placed along the aisle. It was free seating so we chose a table near to the exit/entrance. The moment I sat on the table. There were origami cranes on the table. A Japanese chest box for each of the guest and inside the chest box, there are 3 packets of Japanese nuts. I was so delighted in seeing the chest box and even more delighted knowing that I’m going home with it. 🙂

You seee….everything is just so nice.

Then, you can see on stage there’s the usual pelamin. What stood out was it was again infused with Japanese theme. There was a Japanese fan, Japanese curtains on the backdrop and Japanese plants on both sides of the pelamin.

The arrival of the VIP guests was accompanied with a Japanese tune and there goes the bersanding ceremony.

Dinner started off with maki sushi and miso soup. Nice! Next was rice served with beef, chicken, prawn and vegetables, all in one plate. Dessert was lovely. Green tea cheese cake and my favourite black sesame ice cream.

There was another band playing jazz throughout the dinner so I was very surprised when the emcee announced that Anuar Zain is here to sing too! I like that guy!!! He started with this first song…Sesucinya Cintamu. My heart terus melt because it was so nice. I love his voice.

This has got to be one of the nicest wedding I’ve ever attended.

It’s 1.43am and I’m still awake. I was planning and researching on my travel plan for 3 hours straight after dinner. I’m having a headache just having so many things running in my head.

The tedious part of planning for a holiday is always at the beginning. The other part is making sure if I’m brave enough to travel alone. This trip that I’m taking will be the trip of my life because I will be travelling very very far ON MY OWN!

I love travelling so it shouldn’t feel like it’s a pain but trust me this time, it’s different. I’m very excited but also scared at the same time so I guess I can call it thrilling.

I think I over-processed my brain which is why I can’t sleep now. I’m dead tired but I can’t sleep.

Maybe some milk would help.

My mind is very occupied. I should slow down a little before it explodes.

Had dinner with a friend on Friday and talked non-stop for 3 hours.

Spent Saturday and Sunday with Iris. Was trying to free my mind and just relax. And now that Monday is approaching, my Sunday near-bedtime is worrying me.

I think I should just go to bed, do whatever within my means from tomorrow onwards until I get everything settled.

It’s 2.56am, as good as 3 in the morning. I have this heavy feeling of wanting to do get a few things done and feeling like time is so little. That’s what keeping me awake suddenly, on top of the mosquito bites I’m getting.

I’ve been sleeping without air-condition for about 2 weeks now. It’s noisier with the window open. Stupid cars with loud engines would zoom by sometimes.

I’m back to turning it on just awhile ago because I’m stressed. I don’t like this feeling. It’s like there’s an auto reminder machine growing in my head. It’s bedtime, I can’t do any of the things I want to do and it can wait till morning but the heart longs to do it because I’m not sure how I’m going to cope.

Dear God, please give me strength and courage to get through August and September. Im feeling rather overwhelmed even though they are not here yet. Thanks for an exciting July, so many things happened this month, compared to the months compiled in one. Not all are good but I’m sure there’s a reason to all things that have happened.

Now please sprinkle some sleepy dust on me so that I can proceed with my sleep.

I came home and it was past the scheduled cooking time. I was torn between staying back at work to complete more work and coming home to cook.

And so I stayed back for another half an hour and came home preparing and cooking like a crazy lady.

I was very sure the rice cooker was cooking my rice because that was the first thing I did. So when I was done with the soup and veggie, feeling happy it’s done and I can get to eat now, the rice cooker was detected without a pulse. My heart dropped for a second.

It’s the electric cable connecting the rice cooker that was loose which was why the rice cooker failed me.

I went to the bedroom and lied down on the yoga mat, letting the fact sink in.

I had an appointment at 9 and it was 8.30 then. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry but I was sure I wasn’t going to have dinner, my own dinner.

I went to meet someone and had roti canai at the mamak, still feeling sad but trying to hide the story with a normal face.

The only comforting part is dinner is ready for Iris since she was back around 9. She left me some soup and veggie but by the time I came home, I was already full, not with roti canai but with lots of mixed feelings.

Why did I have to cook? Because of those prawns again. I cannot freeze them again after defreezing. And for some reason, they don’t taste great. And the soup, it took me a day to figure out why it felt like something is missing. I forgot to add the bloody salt.

I shall end this post with 3 bad words.
#*$

I should be sleeping but I’m awake typing this while I wait for my Tupperware-full of prawns to defroze a little so that I could take some of them and store them in a smaller Tupperware for tomorrow’s cooking session.

It’s going to be Vegetables and Prawn Stir Fried + Carrot and Corn Soup tomorrow.

I’m very tempted to try my hands on Japanese Potato Salad this weekend.

*Short pause*

Okay, I just got back getting some of the prawns out. My fingers are frozen now and I killed a few prawns in the process, some with heads off, some with tails off because I forced them apart from the group of frozen prawns. I cannot wait anymore, I need to sleep. Hah!

They are still prawns anyway so…I guess it’s okay.

I’m happy with my cooking progress and sticking to my daily crunches and stretching exercises. My daily routine now is to think of what to cook tomorrow and make sure I have the ingredients available when I come home from work. The daily challenge I’m setting for myself is to cook a variety of food. For example, if I had to cook eggs two days in a row. One day has got to be steamed egg, the other fried. I must have vegetables so it’s either stir fried or made with soup. And if time doesn’t permit, it will be a combo. Vegetables with meat in a dish. I don’t mind one-dish meal if I were to eat alone but because my sister is eating too, so I usually try to come out with a minimum of 2. On weekends when I have more time, I can have three, which includes a soup. I can only have porridge when I’m eating alone, because again my sister doesn’t like porridge. She doesn’t fancy soup that much as well but so far she has been drinking whatever soup I boil, not as much as me though but it’s fine.

I have never deep-fried in my life because I have a phobia with “jumping oil” and simply because I don’t know how to deep-fry. I don’t know when I’ll get to that part to learn how to deep fry. I think it’s easy, but I don’t really fancy fried food. kononnya sangat healthy.

One of my favourite food…tofu, which I think I’ll have it tomorrow. Cheap and nutritious.

Alright….time to go stretchy stretchy. 🙂

I’m a very angry lady today. I was ditched by a friend.

I was out today to meet a friend, who needed a listening ear and I went intend to be all ears. In the end, it ended up me leaving (I didn’t had any choice) because she wanted to meet a guy. It made me feel like a time-filler, a back-up plan, disposable at anytime, not really a friend.  I won’t treat my friend that way. I mean if I’ve dated my friends, I will go out with my friends. And not going out with friends but heart is with another person. I’d rather you not going out with me then. Walking alone would have been much soothing for me than to know you need me when you think you need me and I can be disposed of when you don’t need me.

I walked to the car park. Face black and all. Held on the steering wheel very hard too. Drove with a black face and stubborn hands to the saloon to get my haircut.

When I came home after the haircut, I charged to the kitchen and whipped out a meal. No time to think. Just want to cook. Washed the unwashed rice cooker harder than I usually would. Still angry ma. Just want to cook. Still disappointed. I bought kimchi from Jusco because the lady was giving out food sample and when I tasted the kimchi soup, I immediately fell in love. Had to get one. Then, I was compiling my mind for list of food available in the fridge so I just decided to cook kimchi soup with tofu and beef.

I didn’t know how much kimchi I should put, not sure if water is too much but I wanted more soup hence I measured two big bowls. It didn’t taste right so I added a little bit of miso paste (while cooking and googling with my iPhone for this miso tip), added tofu. Marinated beef at a very last minute because I was thinking the kimchi would give flavour to the beef but then Iris suggested I should marinate so ok lah, I marinated it. Not sure if the beef would smell too beef-ish (I think there’s no such word, so pardon me) so I added ginger at a very last minute.

Let it boil some more. Tasted the soup. Very nice wor.

The only fail part is I cooked the beef for too long, a bit tough but it was still okay lah, edible.

Only after I finished dinner did I feel better.

Mega sale has started but my heart is not really with the clothing stores now. I like to do groceries now and enjoying every moment of it. I’ve been doing groceries 2 days already. I like to go to the vegetables section and my mind will start wondering what I should get, what I should cook. I’ve seen ladies buying vegetables and there were a few men too. They looked like they were more experienced than me in getting the good stuff. I am very impressed.

Tomorrow I have this desire to go to pasar pagi to get pork and chicken to make soup. This is so not me. I would always go with my mum and she’ll pick those stuff and I’ll carry for her. So I’ve not really picked chicken or pork at a pasar pagi on my own and I’m not sure how to pick a chicken that is good because they look all chicken to me. But my mum would know which to choose from. So I guess experience matters in this case. I shall learn.

I’m getting domestically-inclined. My mum would be proud because she has been nagging me for ages to learn how to cook.

Cooking must be from the heart, it cannot be forced.