Happy Wedding Day #1

Weddings! Don’t you just love weddings?

I used to think it was nice, but I’m not so sure anymore.



Meet me, my cousin and my sister. My sister might hold a fan just like me, and my cousin might sit in the middle and hold a flower, but she wasn’t the bridesmaid and she wasn’t the bride. I was the bridesmaid. And of course I wasn’t the bride! If not I might be blogging about my husband and children instead of babbling about nonsensical things. Yes.

I’d rather think I was a lady’s maid that day. Well of course, brides and grooms are considered as King and Queen of the Day on their special day, didn't they, and what did us bridesmaids do that day? Hold an umbrella for the bride, blot the bride’s face from any excess oil or sweat, fan the bride so she wouldn’t get hot (for some reason this sentence cracks me up hahahaha hmm), fix their tiara and train, make sure their makeup is camera-ready, and other stuff that a lady’s maid usually do for their ladies…

I'm kidding I don’t really do those things. I just held the umbrella, fanned the bride, appeared in their photos (where are the photos anyway?) and thought, that’s it I’m outta here- I mean, let’s have the bride and groom have their moments, shall we? :D

Anyway, before I forgot, the photo above was taken two years ago, during my brother’s wedding. As you can probably see, our dresses (those are baju kurung with a weird twist - I mean 'modern' twist) were quite similar, and that’s because we need to make ourselves stand out as the groom’s honorable family members, and it won’t do to have other guests treating us as one of their own. We’re the family of the groom! We are honorable! I have no idea why but it feels so honorable to be the member of the King - I mean groom's - family!

Now, it was fun, dressing alike, almost taking us back to our childhood where wearing the same thing isn’t as embarrassing as it is today, but the drawback of this whole thing is that, people often confused us for one and another.

Take this for example. I was stalking the guests with my cousins behind our tinted windows (secret busted! Oops :P) when another cousin tapped my back and said, “Cousin!”

I turned around.

“Ack! Oops sorry! Lalala~”

Funny thing was, I also witnessed that cousin in the picture above getting the same treatment.

“Huda!” *someone tapped her back* *she turned around* “Oops! Sorry lalala~”

Yeah…we’re quite similarly odd in the head, just like how our clothes were quite similar I suppose.

But I can’t really blame them though. The rest of us, the members of the groom’s clan, DO look alike. We all have nearly the same coloring, 90% are bespectacled (the result of playing Facebook too much. Not me though not me :P), nearly the same height, has the same posture, wore the same clothes, but of course, I don’t have their brains and cool friends haha <- I just need to throw that in there do I? >.O

Anyway, as you may have guessed, the color theme of the wedding was somewhere between the brown and peach spectrum. How do we determine the color theme for a wedding you say? (maybe you didn’t say that but let’s pretend you did) Well it all depends on the color of the bride and groom’s attires!

If the bride likes a purple dress then the entire reception will be purply wonderland.

Or it could also depend on the bride's (or mother's) choice of color.

If the bride wanted green, and the mother wanted red, then you’ve guessed it, I’ll probably be looking like a walking Christmas tree.

Case in point, watch this video!


(The girl’s an heiress of a car company. Or maybe she’s the owner now? I’m not sure.)

BAD BAD BAD BADDDD example of a Malay wedding. Never in a million years would I have a wedding as grand as that (yes, that is grand) unless I marry a rich guy. Or a prince. But imagine your life after marrying a prince! Not cool, because I’m just a lowly citizen and have no nobility in my blood and certainly the Queen will treat me differently due to the different status but let’s not dwell into that further, okay?

Or you can always marry an astronaut!



But then if you miss your husband, you can’t probably call him or skype with him while he’s on the moon can you? …can you?

Anyway, back to that picture above! Can you believe it that we decorated the bride and groom’s dais? No? No? Well you’re right, we didn’t. But we did;

1. Make thousands of souvenirs for special guests until our fingers were sore.
2. Make hundreds (or perhaps nearly thousands) of little sweet bags for children until our fingers were sore.
3. Make egg flowers/bunga telur/hantaran/those things for the bride’s family until our hands can barely move.
4. Make thousands of goodie bags for guests until our hands can barely move.
5. Make lots of things to stuff into that goodie bags.
6. Make LOTS OF THINGS, period. But most importantly, we made all those things while watching Korean dramas and cursing, “WHY DO YOU PICK THAT GUY, AND NOT THAT GUY??!! THAT GUY’S NOT EVEN GOOD-LOOKING!!!”
7. Good times indeed. :D (but I don't have any pictures of those souvenirs to upload here ACK x.x)

(Taking all sorts of pictures is not popular two years ago. To us, that is. We'd rather watch soapy dramas and curse at the main characters than take photos. Yeap that's us.)

I can still remember it. The men were outside, cutting meats and cooking (lol? XD), the women prepared the spices and necessities for the cooking, cutting vegetables and onions and crying tears of onions while the girls (me me me) prepared all those creative thingies while laughing and tearing and wailing at the TV and the kids…well the kids…were in the gaming room, playing games and whatnot.

“Yeah you kids better stay out of the way!” most of the aunts said that to their children that day. I wish I was a kid. Kind of.

Sounds like a lot of fun, isn’t it? Yes, it was fun, but unfortunately, I won’t be experiencing such great fun again this year.

And, I would ONLY experience this again IF my sisters get married. I only got TWO more chances. But it’ll be ages before that, and who knows, maybe we wouldn’t keep the tradition by then. We wouldn’t be losing our fingers by making lots of souvenirs, maybe we’ll buy those store-made souvenirs instead, we wouldn’t be having a drama marathon, we wouldn’t be wearing clothes according to the reception theme, and we wouldn’t have a great slumber party in my room, because they might stay in a hotel with their families instead. My house isn’t large enough to fit all families and their children.

It makes me sad.

Even sadder is that, I won’t be experiencing any of that at all this year. (I think I’ve said that)

This year, the rest of my brothers will finally get married.

Then, I won’t have any unmarried brothers anymore.

I’m quite sad.

I’ll elaborate more in another post.

TO BE CONTINUED JENG JENG JEENGGGG HAHAHA I think it’s funnier in my head than written down hmm.

Zurich, Apple Store and adolescent crush

(you can actually see me in the store WHOA :P)

Things you should know;

My father likes to go to an electronic store.
My mother likes to go to a bargain store.
They love stores.

You can definitely conclude from these lines above that our trip to Switzerland wasn’t that educational, to be blatantly honest. ;D

I saw the nature, I saw the buildings, but I still know next to nothing about Switzerland. I was all up for their museums when my brother suggested that to us that day, but my parents, upon hearing that, quickly lashed out, “Museums? Boring!”



To think that they were the ones who brought us all to those museums when we were little.

I believe they are the sorts who used to think, “Oh, let’s bring our kids to the museum – even though we hated those – because they are educational, and good for the kids’ brains. Apparently.”

And once our brains are good enough, they’d say, “You’ve seen enough museums! We’ve endured those dreadful places for you too many times already! Now let us shop.”

Ah museum…how I love thee. I blame this on my parents WAHAHA. :|

Ah store…I love you too but I have no money. Literally.

(I saw an Albert Einstein museum in Bern but PLEASE! DON’T REMIND ME OF THAT! I MIGHT CRY!)

(It seems like the greatest thing ever!)

(But I miss it! And I might forever miss it!)

(Oh well, not that important.)

XD

I sincerely think that I’ve just missed out a huge experience by not stepping into Einstein’s house in Bern. Instead, we went to Migros so that my mother can buy pots and pans. But it’s okay, at least now my mother can cook better food right? Right.

So there you go, I didn’t go to any of those museums. I only went to stores, more stores, and yeah, stores.

(Same thing happened to my Singapore trip. I only went to the Apple Store, more stores, and yeah, STORES.)

Not a terribly exciting trip to blog about, but enjoyable nonetheless. At least now, I can brag to my other brothers.

“Hey I went to Switzerland’s Apple Store!” (insert evil laugh here)

But they’ll probably answer with a stupid question, “Oh yeah, do they have Granny Smith?”

And I’ll probably reply with an equally stupid answer, “I saw a granny…forgot to ask if her name was Smith.”

Okay I kid. I didn’t see a granny, I saw a little boy.

And my two-year-old niece saw him too.

It was...well I let you be the judge.

There she was, standing behind the store’s glass wall, her palms carefully touching it. In front of her, on the other side of the glass wall, stood an approximately four-year-old blond boy, completely dressed in black from head to toe, and his hands were nearly touching hers, if it wasn’t for that glass wall.

They were grinning at each other.

It was weird.

Okay, cute. Except earlier, there was a boy who was staring at her just like that, but he didn’t get the same treatment.

Perhaps because he wasn’t blond.

My niece’s taste is high. She prefers blond boys, apparently.

She didn't even smile at girls.

Weird.

(now her mother *might* come in here and beg to differ, but I must say, I watched her and that was what I saw :D)

The most adorable thing about this was when the boy’s mother was trying to drag him away from his spot, their eyes never broke the connections, not until the boy was no longer in sight.

And then my niece decided to throw a tantrum and demanded to be held.

The same thing happened again, and this time, we were walking down the street. A blond boy in a stroller passed by us, and out of a sudden, their eyes were locked on each other.

As the stroller went farther away, her head continued to turn toward the direction of the stroller, fixated on his back until he too was out of sight.

…

Can’t blame her though, Swiss boys are cute. Remember that cool Malaysian girl with her cool baby? Well, she married a British guy who works in Zurich. Yeah fail logic there.

My point is; different culture, religions and races shouldn’t be the barrier of true love. If they are meant for each other, if their destiny is with each other, then who are we to object them from being with each other?

If only more people could see it that way instead of trying to preserve the pureness of their blood/race/heritage and subsequently broke off the love of their child’s life. Nothing stays forever in this world, not even the world.

Okay sister-in-law, if you’re reading this - though I hope you don’t - I’m sorry for dragging your daughter in and accuse her of crushing over a, well maybe, two blond boys. :D It’s just that, we didn’t do much in Zurich, did we? I just remember eating a tuna sandwich in a seafood restaurant, and saw a MissChievous lookalike, and I think the lookalike was intimidated by our (my sister and I) constant glancing. But really, she kinda looks like her, and if people were to say that she’s her sister then we’d believe it on the spot. We are big MissChievous fans by the way, and, and…



Well that concludes my Zurich report. Hope you have fun reading it, and maybe I’ll write about other cities next. :D

I'm going to Medina tomorrow, so bye bye for now. :D

Things I Wanna Do in Malaysia #1

Siti Nurhaliza - Cuti-cuti Malaysia (Don't you just love this song? No? Okay fine.)

I watched the video and thought, "What the, I can barely see Johor!"

(though to be honest, if anyone asks me, "What's a great tourist spot in Johor?" I'll be, "Umm...hmm?")

(Tanjung Piai? XD)

(FAIL Johorean HAH :D)

According to my personal research, some of the most famous tourist spots in Malaysia (or at least among Arabs) are Kuala Lumpur/Selangor (duh), Langkawi (of all places, I've never ever ever ever gone there DX), Penang (used to go there once a week, but I’m by no means an expert of that place. Not that I'm a Johor expert anyway), Cameron Highland (went there once, it was AWESOME!) and Genting Highland (the land of entertainment and gambling. Apparently. Haven't been there before though).

I'd include Malacca in as well but that's more of an attraction for fellow Malaysians. You'd find students with their history textbooks roaming the street, studying the historical remnants - wait, that's probably just me.

To be honest, I used to never understand why Malaysia is such an attraction to tourists. I mean, our weather is hot and humid, we have a lot of small bugs, big bugs, small animals, big animals. There are snakes in my garden. And there are crocodiles near my grandma's house. And her old house’s backyard used to be filled with tigers to the point that if someone’s gone missing, they’ll say, “Oh he’s probably eaten by tigers.” Not anymore of course. But in my neighborhood, you can sometimes hear hens and chickens being eaten by foxes at night, and there are bats in my attic. Oh and also, there's a bird outside my window who likes to throw tree branches into my room. I'm not kidding.

(well that's because my family's house is in the jungle - I mean village. Honestly, I ran out of classy words to describe my neighborhood, but yeah, it's one of the most peaceful neighborhoods ever, saves for those animals. But would you rather have noisy animals or city pollutions?)

(Take your pick, I won't judge.)

(I'll take those animals, I guess.)

(I wonder if the bird is still there. It's been nesting there for two years already WOW.)

(If the bird's still there by the time I return to Malaysia, I'll take a picture.)

And lookie here, these aren't my cats, but they think they're mine.



Can you guess how many cats there are in these pictures?





Looks like playtime is over for these cats. Bye bye, come again, I'm sure you will. Because we're the only family in the neighborhood who eats fish, aren't we? :D

(Although I must admit, since we’ve moved here, the cats no longer hang out at our place. No fish, I guess.)



As far as the saying goes, the grass is greener on the other side of the world. Well, Switzerland’s grass IS literally greener than ours, and Saudi Arabia doesn’t have much grass to begin with, but I suppose, living with green grass all my life, we’ve always wanted to have something in our life that we didn’t have – or impossible to have – and disregard things that we actually have, which might suit us more than what we actually crave.

Perhaps this could be applied to the rest of the people. I bet some of you hate winter, but we – who’ve been exposed to the sun all year long – crave for some snow so badly. We don’t care that much for nature, beaches and wild life, but some of you might adore them very much.

Still, no matter how great other countries are, in the end, you’ll notice that nothing suits you best as much as your original home. It’s just the way it is. You might hate it, but it is the way you’ve been grown up with, and whether you like it or not, you’re gonna miss your home, the atmosphere, and everything about it.

(In my case though, I spend most of my time in a house anyway. So give me a house and it’ll be like home.)

Every country is unique, and i must say, Malaysia is too. There are things that could be done there (and perhaps somewhere else) that couldn’t be done elsewhere (elsewhere that I haven’t been to lol), so I figure I’ll list down those things that I wanna do before I forget and waste my time in Malaysia doing nothing again.

1. I wanna drink Lai Chee Kang.


(picture stolen from google)

Hi everyone, this is Lai Chee Kang. It’s originally a Chinese drink I think, but every Malaysian drinks it.

My mother ordered it all the time, but I'd rather have cendol...



(picture stolen from google too) Don't you think these cendol look like slimy, fat green worms that you can eat without feeling disgusted? No? ...no?

Anyway, lai chee kang! I like it just fine, but the reason why I'm so craving for it, is because of this video.



Queenie makes her own white fungus serum! And that white fungus soup looks strangely delish.

I wanna make that serum but I'm pretty sure my mother wouldn't approve of bizarre cooking unless it’s for the good of my health.

Skincare's not included unfortunately. "You're doing this for the sake of your skin?? How vain!"

Umm.

There's no other way around it! I need to include this white fungus thing in our diet or something, or at least make it beneficial to the health so that I CAN MAKE THE SERUM. Yup.

First thing first - searching for a Malaysian recipe that actually uses white fungus in its food.

Might be hard considering all of them are Chinese ones, and I don't even know what it's called in Malay haha hmm.

So I asked my mother, "Do you know that thing that (my cousin) used to use to scratch her itchy skin with?"

Bingo! I got the name.

And what do you know, white fungus is one of Lai Chee Kang's ingredients.

Here's the recipe (nicked from here)

* White sugar (gula putih)
* Palm sugar (gula merah)
* Barley pearl (barli)
* White fungus (fungus putih)
* Black fungus (fungus hitam)
* Dried lotus seed (biji teratai)
* Dried red dates (kurma merah)
* Dried longan pulp (longan)
* Canned lychees (laici)
* Grass jelly (cincau)
* Honey dates (kembang semangkuk)
* Sweet melon candy (kundur)
* Sufficient water

(apparently, white fungus in Malay is cendawan putih, but the blogger just translated it as fungus putih. Doesn’t matter though.)

I bet if I were to ask any shop assistants here for these rare ingredients they would scratch their head, bulge their eyes out, and be utterly confused.

So as you can see, it is nearly impossible for me to make a bowl of Lai Chee Kang here.

And it's not as if white fungus is easily accessible here either.

So once I return to Malaysia, I want to drink Lai Chee Kang.

:D

Zurich, chocolates and the money-changer man

If the factory of Willy Wonka really exists I'd rather thought it'd be somewhere in Switzerland, the chocolate wonderland.

A chocolate river, chocolate forest, all you can eat chocolate, hmm...

Imagine all those things in this picture are made of chocolate!



Hmm...

Anyway.

Welcome to Zurich! I only remember going to an Apple Store, a chocolate store, eating a tuna sandwich and meeting a cool Malaysian girl with her cool baby cruising about on the street.

(It was cold, hence the coolness.)

But first let me talk about the chocolate store.


All these shukulataaaa (that's Arabic for chocolate :D) are actually homemade.


Chocolat (that's French for chocolate) is like a staple food here. You can find it almost everywhere, and there's even a budget chocolate for people on a budget! Definitely not cool for people on a weight budget.


And I don't know what the German word for chocolate is...so I'll just say it in Malay. This coklat (!!!) store's name is...I don't remember. But if you go to Zurich then maybe you'll find it. According to my brother, the store is quite famous, so if you decided to ask around and stop a poor stranger just for the sake of trying the same chocolate I ate (harhar), I suggest you say, "You don't suppose you know this certain famous chocolate store where a girl in a hijab entered and tried to pay with a (insert huge amount of money here) Swiss Franc?" then maybe they can show you. And don't worry about the language barrier, Zurich is in the German Territory and you don't need to speak German! Hence why I forgot the German's word for chocolate.



*stupidly grinning at the chocolates *

*SNAP*

"Fatherrrr WARGHHHHH DELETE!"

Of course, that didn't happen. In fact, I didn't even overreact. What actually happened was,

"Please father can you take a picture of me with the chocolates? Make sure I look very weird and kinda drooling at them, okay?"

And believe me this is the only picture that clearly features all of these amazing chocolates. I have no choice but to publish this sad photo of the girl in a hijab who tried to pay with (insert huge amount of money) Swiss Franc on my blog.

It wasn't as if I wanted to pay the chocolates with a huge sum of money in the first place. I blame it on the money-changer guy.

You see, my mother put me in charge of changing (insert amount of money) Saudi Riyal to Swiss Franc, so off I went to the money-changer guy who dressed in complete Arab attire from head to toe.

Literally.

Arab guys intimidate me, especially those who dressed in those Arab clothes of theirs.

So I said, "Can I change these to Swiss Franc please?"

He looked at me confusedly, glanced at his friend, glanced at his other friend, then took the money uncertainly.

I have no idea why but he gave me this dubious vibe as if he didn't know what to do.

Then slowly counting the money, he looked at his friends vaguely again, before handing me a single note.

A single note.

"That's it?" I asked.

"Yes Swiss Franc, there you go."

"You're giving me this one single note??"

I think he was giving me a look as if saying that, "What, you want more money?"

Not that I wanted more money, but I was shocked to see;

1. A HUGE sum of money on a single note
2. Their apparent reluctance of giving me lots of smaller amount notes.
3. But then I pieced it all together - they ran out of smaller notes. That explains the uncertainty in his eyes.
4. Not that I looked into his eyes or anything.

I showed my mother the single, lone piece of paper that could get me in trouble if it were to slip away from my hands, and my mother asked, "Only this?"

"Yes."

"How are we going to buy anything with this?"

EXACTLY!

Now back to the present day, in the chocolate store.

So guess what, we tried to pay our chocolates with that money. Because my brother ran out of cash.

But of course, the cashier looked at the money, exactly the same way as the money-changer man, and called for her manager.

Embarrassing! Quite a bit.

The manager spoke, "Small stores like us don't have the changes for large money like this, I'd advise you to change this at the bank-"

Embarrassing! I'm easily embarrassed, really.

The manager said we could pay the chocolates with a visa card, and my brother did just that. Solved. Then we hurriedly went to the bank to change that blasted money into small pieces, and my niece lost her red balloon, cried, my brother went into McDonald to get another balloon for her, and she smiled again.

And interesting thing happened to this niece of mine. I'll talk about it in another post.

So, the moral of this story?

Money-changer people, please don't give tourist a huge chunk of money on a single note.

Yours truly,

Huda

Anyway!

Where's the chocolate, you say?

Well here it is!



Oh there's the store's name! Good, then you don't have to confuse people with the identity of the girl in a hijab who tried to pay- bla bla bla. :D



I dare you to drool.

Swiss chocolates are the best. (Or some may say Belgian. I don't know. I can't remember how Belgian's tasted like.)

Regardless, once you've eaten a Swiss/Belgian chocolate, you'll never look back ever again.

Mars Bars? Kinder Bueno?


*chocolates in a vending machine*

Hmph. *nose up in the air*

:P

Okay okay you should be thankful that you even know how a chocolate tasted like in the first place. Some people can't even afford to have a small bite.

I hope all of you will have the chance to eat this kind of chocolate one day. :)

Airports and Airplanes and Audis

(Welcome to the Red Sea. If you squint really hard, you can probably see Egypt.)
(Makes you wonder why I didn’t include this picture in my previous post.)

I’m gonna blog about Switzerland now YAY!

Okay first, reasons why I hate traveling by plane;

1. Airsickness. Or maybe not. Long-distance is fine, but domestic flight…*shudder*
2. Or perhaps the problem lies with AirAsia. MAS is slightly better (slightly). I wasn’t that nauseous throughout their flight.
3. Why would I take domestic flight in the first place anyway? Those places could be reached by cars! Well first, my cousins live at the other side of Malaysia, and the only way to reach their place is by planes (or ships? not sure). And I always get free tickets from Kuala Lumpur to Johor Bahru.
4. If you ask me, I would rather have a free bus/train ticket or stay at my brother’s house than that thank you very much.
5. That’s how ungrateful people sound like haha I mean THANK YOU for the free ticket.
6. If you ask me how someone as ungrateful as me could get a free ticket then sorry I can’t tell you.
7. Back to my plane pet peeve! Limited baggage.
8. And if your baggage is overweight then you need to do a surgery on it, take out all of its contents and ugh, you get the idea.
9. If your heart’s too weak and you can’t bear seeing your bag under surgery then you need to pay extra to the airport people so they can be happy.
10. Then the body-check! Sometimes for no reason at all, the detector starts ringing.
11. Or or there’s nothing in your bag but somehow it couldn’t pass the detector.
12. Suspenseful moment, definitely full of suspense.
13. And when you’re finally safely seated in the airplane, you look at the clouds, realizing that you’re up in the sky.
14. And there’s the sea at the bottom.
15. And this thing called airplane is carrying you over the sea, isn’t it weird?
16. Then you need to retrieve your baggage.
17. If you’re unlucky your bag will be missing.
18. If you’re even more unlucky, the contents of your bag will be spilled/ripped.
19. If something happened, you can’t really contact the person outside because international roaming somehow doesn’t work on your phone.
20. I might sound like a very ungrateful person, but really, if you’re driving a car then there’s no need for unnecessary pit-stops. And your baggage will, most of the time, be in pristine condition.

I was in the plane to Switzerland that day, when three black Audis came zooming in, parking exactly next to the airplane as if the airplane is their personal jet.

Maybe they are the royal family!

That can’t be…the royal family has their own personal jet, don’t they?

So these people must be at least…some stinking rich family.

The driver got out from the car and opened the car’s backdoor, and out came a man in a sweater. This action was repeated three times for every car, and from each car, out came a middle-aged woman (probably their mother) from the second car, and a younger man (probably the brother) from the last car.

One car for each family member! I don’t understand rich people. I would love to ride the same car as my brother, even though I wouldn’t have all the space to myself, but at least I wouldn’t be lonely and actually have some fun, right?

I’m just assuming that these people are related though. Judging by their faces and the cars’ number plates, I’m pretty sure they’re related. And they’re riding the same plane. Maybe they wanted to have their own space before being mixed in with fellow mortals. We fellow mortals needed to ride the autobus with the rest of the citizens, while they have an entire Audi for themselves. I’m jealous. A bit. Only a bit.

I sat beside the window and everything happened in front of my eyes, so I got a clear view of what was going on. Riding their cars like some company’s CEO (they probably are), they showed their passports to the head steward (maybe) and climbed the steps to the first class seat like VVIP.

I thought I wouldn’t see them up-close since my seat was at the economy class, but apparently they needed to store their hand luggage at my place (perhaps there was no more space for them to stuff their luggage in at the first class seat, or maybe they brought too much luggage, who knows). Hah! So I got a good glimpse of how they actually look like (they were right in front of me), and I also saw how other people really look like.

These rich brothers: eyeing the girls as if they themselves are the hottest people EVAR.
The girls: eyeing the brothers as if they are the hottest people EVAR.
The mothers of the girls: eyeing the brothers as if they are the hottest catch EVAR.
The mother of the brothers: didn’t do anything moderately interesting to be honest.

If I could only stand up and say;

“Hey you rich brothers with the latest Audi, just because you’re rich and all, doesn’t mean that you can get any girl you want.”

Or maybe they can.

“Hey single ladies, just because they’re rich, it doesn’t mean that they’re eligible.”

Or maybe they are.

“Hey mothers of daughters, just because they’re rich doesn’t mean they’ll suit your daughters.”

Maybe they will.

“Hey everyone in the plane, just because I look like a foreigner and travel to Switzerland from your place, doesn’t mean that you can continuously stare at me like this -> O.O”

Alas, I didn’t say. I have no guts. And I don’t want to risk embarrassing myself. :D

It’s fun though, observing people of different culture and status. I’ve read about it in books and stuff, but to actually witness it is another entirely different experience. Wealthy ladies removing their crystal-stud abaya and hijab, revealing their dyed hair and stylish clothes underneath. Young girls painting their nails even during the turbulence. Young women, dressing to impress, changing their clothes for the sake of the plane ride, and changing them again minutes before landing. Swiss people talking to me as if I’m a Swiss, just like them (lol) and middle-aged Swiss people smiling at me like those friendly European people I heard so much about.

And not to forget, the rest of the people (minus the Swiss) were staring at me like this -> O.O

What what what? Do I have something on my face? Come on.

Okay! A preview for the next post.

Tada~



I can’t guarantee I’ll continue these Swiss posts though. I mean, sometimes my fingers have a mind of their own. I was supposed to write about planes and airports in my previous post but I ended up talking about Egypt. And I notice that according to the first sentence of this post, I’m supposed to blog about Switzerland. But I didn't. Yet.

But we’ll get there! And we’ll see. :D I’m suddenly in a blogging spree, which means I’m kinda neglecting my daily routines lol ACK!

Airports and Airplanes and Egypt

I suppose I could blog about Switzerland.

But I kinda forgot what I did there haha hmm.

Well then let’s talk about airport and airplanes and whatnot!

I hate traveling by planes. I wish every place in this world could be reached by cars alone. Imagine a world where every continent is connected by humongous bridges - no I can’t imagine that.

My father even suggested to my mother, “Let’s go to Dubai! By car!”

And my mother answered, “Yeah and how many days will it take for us to reach there?”

“No problem, we can do a lot of sight-seeing.”

“You’re exhausted just by going to (insert place here) for one day, and you’re expecting to drive all the way there for days? I can’t imagine that at all.”

Yeah, I can’t imagine going to Dubai either.

I was supposed to go to Egypt this year. We’d planned among the Malaysian Community to go there and visit the historical sites, renting tour guides and bus and things needed for traveling. But most of us backed out on the last minute because their son/daughter/sister’s (in my case, sister) international school decided to hold their examination on that week. That’s weird you know, because by standard, it was a holiday week in Saudi Arabia, but their school decided to, “Oh let’s be different and torture our students by conducting examinations on that holiday week HAHAHA.”

Pfft. Whatever. So I spent that holiday week in my house, while some others went on a Saudi Arabia tour, some of them went to Egypt, and some went back to Malaysia.

Suddenly, that holiday week happened to be the week of the Egyptian’s riot.

It’s a blessing in disguise! For us, that is. This exam thing. Here I was, in Saudi Arabia, perfectly comfortable and happy, while across the red sea, they were protesting and sacrificing their lives for the good of their country.

Not to mention, the uncle and aunt and their daughter who decided to go to Egypt despite the riot were held back in the airport due to the curfew. And the flight was even delayed for eight hours before that! Imagine that, held back in Saudi for hours, then rode the plane, and finally were held back in Egypt for a whole lot more hours of painful waiting.

They were actually there because of their children, not the pyramids, of course. All of them, (with the exception of one who’d graduated and went back to Malaysia) studied there, and apparently the cost of food is so high the parents brought a lot of food from Saudi for their sake. We knew beforehand that the Tunisian’s riot was pretty bad itself, but Bin Ali stepped down fairly easily, so we didn’t think that Hosni Mubarak would be that stubborn.

We were wrong.

They were held back in the airport because of the curfew, and they could only meet their children the next morning. Imagine sleeping on the hard cold airport’s floor all night, and I don’t even know how Egypt’s airport looks like! And desperation calls for desperate needs, there aren’t any food left in the airport, and there was only one person who sells tea, a cup of tea for 12 Egyptian Dollars! Can you imagine that?

Examination. Blessing in disguise.

Thankfully, they met their children, planned to come back with them to Jeddah (the Malaysian government gave the students free tickets from Cairo to Jeddah), but the airline system wasn’t that efficient, they were on the waiting list for days, until the uncle decided to have a word with the people in charge, and finally, they’d acquired a ticket back home.

And you think everything would be fine.

Yes, I guess the nightmare is over. (although I’m not sure how bad the situation is, according to the students, apparently it’s not as gruesome as some media portrayed it to be, I don’t know)

(but if the prisoners are no longer held captive then it is gruesome in my book!)

But their hostel in Jeddah is utter chaos, apparently. (taking their words directly. I didn’t go there. I don’t go anywhere, really!)

(Because there was a huge flood in Jeddah.)

(That’s another thing to consider.)

The hostel, prepared by the Malaysian Consulate, was a building specifically for Hajj pilgrims to rest before continuing their journey. And because of that, you can expect that the building is more or less abandoned, with dead mice, and dust bunnies, and things like that, as it was only used once a year.

And, there are a lot of students being flown from Cairo to here.

You can probably sleep on the floor, but what about food though? Bathroom? So on and so forth?

I guess the uncle’s family is fortunate enough that they could go to their family house and rest there instead, eat their mother’s cooking and sleep on a comfortable bed. But the rest of the students aren’t that lucky.

Waiting for the next flight to Malaysia, stepping on Saudi Arabia’s soil but not going to Mecca or Medina, wondering what their future will be, how long will their universities be closed, what will happen to Egypt in general…

All the while sitting at the corner of the room in the same clothes you wore yesterday in Cairo.

Where was I?

Oh yeah! I was supposed to talk about airports and airplanes and whatnot.

I’ll continue about that in another post. :D

I thought of a thought.

Have you ever watched a drama where the characters always, always, talk to themselves openly?

For example, imagine this situation. A character was pacing back and forth in his room, obviously troubled beyond words. Biting his fingernails, he said, “I can’t let this secret be known. I must not let anyone knows that she is my daughter.”

And then BHAM! Another character suddenly heard that and complicated the matter further.

Often I found myself saying, “Why do you even monologue with yourself out loud anyway HAHA There really is someone who do that? o.O”

Because trying to think about this logically, if he didn’t blab his secret in the first place, then other character wouldn’t know the secret, and there wouldn’t be endless plot of blackmailing and heartbreaking and whatnot. But if he didn’t blurt it all out, the audience wouldn’t know about what’s going on in his head.

I try to imagine myself in a world where people freely to talk to themselves like it’s not a big deal.

“I need to do my homework. Ahh but I need to water my plants! My plants are dying. Nooo I can’t let that happen! What if it’s dying right this second! Noooo what am I going to do?”

It’ll be a noisy world indeed.

*I guess that's why we have twitter? :D*

Okay, so maybe there are people like that, I just haven’t encountered them yet. It’s odd though how most secrets in dramas are known by eavesdropping on characters when they were having their open monologue fix haha hmm.

This reminds me, I once stumbled across a comment on Youtube. The comment, more or less, said, “I wonder what language do bilingual people think in, dream in?”

I want to think in Arabic! Really I do. But often enough, it’ll be something like this.

I was in Jusco Taman Universiti (wahaha it’s a mall in case you don’t know :D), staring at the juice section, wrinkling my brows.

“How come we have such limited drinks??!!”

Oh. See? I think in English.

Then I’ll think, hey I should monologue in Arabic, just because I CAN WAHAHAHA probably. I mean I can kinda speak Arabic. Broken Arabic. I can hold a conversation. Yes I can.

*oh come on it's not as if other Malaysians who've been studying English all their lives can speak flawless English anyway? :D*

“Eih. Hmm. Hmm?”

WAHAHAHAHA I CAN’T.

Well actually I can, albeit a few seconds late, “Leish 3andana shuway sharb bas??!!”

Might be broken Arabic but hmm…yeah.

I seem to be able to monologue in Japanese better though. Sou sou, nanka muzukashikunai.

But I can’t for the life of me speak Japanese in public. I’m weird like that. 8D

And I can’t for the life of me roll my r. Allow me to demonstrate. MARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAA

I think I sounded a bit like, marllrrlllrra.

What the heck is that?

But I believe the topic of pronunciation deserves another post. o.o

Anyway, back to the monologue thing.

I asked my sister, who goes to an international school, “What language do you think in your head?”

She answered, “English.”

“Before that?”

“Malay.”

“Why is that?”

“Because all the resources are in Malay. Now all I read are English, so I have to think in English. There’s no other way around it.”

Sou sou sonna koto desuyone…

How to say that in Arabic?

Hmm.

Hmm…

Kitha? Hahaha FAIL. x.x

But I have always think and dream in English. And even those people in my dreams, who never speak English to me in real life, spoke English to my face (or at least, in dreams that I can remember). And to think that I went to a national school where all the resources are in Malay, and my parents speak Malay, with a hint of English here and there (not excessively like other parents though) so where did the English come from?

Whoa. I don’t know. :D

I lived in England when I was two months old until I was four years old, maybe that's the reason? :D Maybe? Maybe maybe? Maybe. :D

People are just people, okay?

So Malaysia is a multiracial country, and because of that, I am used of seeing various people of different races on the streets. There are a lot of foreign workers and international students here as well, so the prospect of seeing a foreigner isn’t terribly exciting.

*unless they’re European/American/British/Australian/all those people with white skin then you’ll probably hear coarse, creepy whispers of “orang putiiiih oraaang putiiiih” or “mat saleeeeh mat sallllleeeeeeh”*

*orang putih = white people = mat saleh*

*I really don’t get how white people got the mat saleh nickname*

*but there you go*

Imagine when a Malaysian decided to travel outside and realize that;

1. You’re a Malaysian. Wahaha!
2. You’re not that surprised to see so many people of different races so close to your eyes.
3. But apparently people are surprised to see how different you are.
4. Makes you wonder how different you are exactly, in terms of eyes/nose/lips/face structures and so on and so forth.
5. I mean sure, now that I think about it, we don’t resemble them that much. We don’t have such gorgeous eyes with amazing hues, small yet high nose, sculptured lips, prominent jaws, high cheekbones, sharp features, smooth like egg skin, curves, voluptuous figures bla bla bla…
6. OMG WE ARE SUCH A CONTRADICTION. lololol
7. What are we exactly? The Asians? I mean we look so…small and vulnerable next to them.
8. Not to mention they’re all that and they’re stinking rich! What gives?

*I might have observed that while drinking copious amount of Jeddah tea (I have no idea what the difference between normal tea and this special blend tea is, not a tea expert, you see) and they gave me such a huge chunk of sugar, I think it worth four cubes in total, and well, I lost track of how many cups I drank, and I might, as well got sugar rush. DIABETES! NO.*

*I was at a function you see, so that’s why I can observe all these gorgeous Arab women in all of their glory.*

*Funny thing happened at the function. I sat at the table. I don’t know anyone there to be honest. I know just one person but she hadn’t come yet. To make it worse she was the host so I can’t possibly spend the rest of the night mingling with her. I look Asian. Southeast Asian to be specific. All of these people were giving me strange glances. Because Southeast Asians in general only come here to work as a maid/labor.*

*Then their maids entered, and seeing me at the table, the maids decided to join me.*

*Bear in mind, all these maids are Asians.*

*They thought I’m a maid as well. Everyone did. Of course, I didn’t wear luxurious evening gown (!!!) or thick Arab style makeup (!!!) I think I wore baju kurung and a makeup so light people can barely see it under these dimmed lights.*

*Not that I went to functions all that much to know how functions really are, you know.*

*Especially not where women dressed like Academy Awards winners. Or nominees. Or attendees. Or whatever.*

*But that’s just the way I am. I’m very understated, you see. I don’t like bright colors. I don’t wish to cause temporary/permanent blindness on people.*

Back to the maid topic.

Seriously, I really don’t mind at all. I met a whole lot of maids here, and they are generally nice people, with a lot of stories to tell, and to tell the truth, I’m no better than them anyway. It’s not easy making money in this world, okay? I need to work my bones for a couple of bucks, and even if I have finally earned some, I love my money too much to spend it on unimportant things.

*what if I need to use the money to buy a super duper miracle itch cream that my mother wouldn’t let me because it is super duper expensive??? You’ll never know.*

*And what if I need to buy a new hard-disk??? Again, you’ll never know.*

I don’t think working as a maid/driver/nanny or anything is as low-class as some people put it. A job is still a job. Better than nothing, better than sitting on the street, begging for money. You still have your bones, you still have your skills, you’re still earning money in the right way, who cares really?

I mean, what gives these bosses to treat their maids cruelly, anyway? They take care of the house for you, they cook for you, your children are in their hands. They could, and I mean they could, sabotage your house for all you know, steal your belongings, poison your food, abuse your child, same way as you abuse them. If you want them to do your errands properly, the least you could do is to treat them properly, like human, for instance.

*though my mother’s ex-maid used to steal something from her. I mean, my mother was nice, she tried to make the maid felt at home, cooked nice food for her, provided shelter for her in our home, but the maid was in desperate need of money I guess*

At the end of the day, we are all humans, aren’t we? No matter if you’re a Caucasian or Arab or Asian, just because some people are from those third countries, it doesn’t mean that they deserve to be treated like that.

And some people, even if they look typical, could very well be richer than you. Who cares really? But some do.

This reminds me of something I once witnessed. Me, my mother and this aunt were talking to a bunch of Asian maids (similar language and what not), they chatted about their workplace, their bosses, their humongous three-storey houses located at one of the most elitist places in Jeddah, wherever that is, and the aunt said, “Hey, I live there too!”

And then they asked, “Really? What’s your mistress’s name?”

Cue for awkward silence.

I kid. The aunt instantly lashed, “What- I’m the mistress!”

Sure. I mean, the aunt’s probably the richest Malaysian in Saudi Arabia. Her husband is the second most important man at this bank (and here, the number one person must be an Arab, so a Malaysian to be the second man is a HUGE deal), and her son is the prince’s freaking classmate lol

But we still look Asian. And by looking like an Asian, it probably means that we are deprived of money and could do nothing but cook and tidy for a mere penny.

Oh, the misconception towards Southeast Asians in general.

One look at me, and they’ll think I’m from the Philippine. (what? Come on I have Thai blood lol)

*scoffing, nose up in the air*

If they heard me talk, they thought I’m Indonesian.

*still scoffing, examining their nails*

When I said I’m from Malaysia, out of the sudden, their reaction is…

“Malaysia? Oh my god you’re my best friend!”

I think KLIA is a great first impression for tourists. I guess. Maybe. Thank you KLIA. lol

But it seems to be the opposite in Switzerland, though. I didn’t get any strange stares from the locals, even though I look Asian and wear a hijab.

Apparently it’s because, “If you’re a tourist then you probably have a lot of money.”

lol what kind of logic is that. Okay, understandable.

Anyway, I just wish people wouldn’t jump to conclusion that easily. I might have contradicted myself somewhere, I might have written something that proves otherwise, but I’m trying very hard to not jump to conclusion and look at it from every aspect before finding a conclusion.

So people! As a Malaysian who grew up in a multiracial country, I can say that;
1. I don’t care how you look, I might be curious of what you’re talking about, because you’re talking in a different language and I’m the type who gets fascinated with languages in general, but all people, no matter what race, are just that, people.
2. Other races are not alien, people! We are people too. We meant no harm.
3. Their races might be infamous of inflicting harm on other people BUT it doesn’t mean that all of them are the same!
4. So what if our job is not as classy as you? So what if we worked as a maid, it’s not as if we’re robbing your money or anything. The maids work for their bosses, same as your husbands who work for their bosses. It’s just a job, come on.
5. And there’s also the case of family names. This tribe, that tribe, honorable family, ancient family, low-class family…

I heard of this happened to my mother’s Malaysian friend’s dear daughter, she couldn’t marry her boyfriend because she’s not from the same background and her ancient ancestors were supposedly the family’s enemy. How very Romeo and Juliet. Minus lust/love thingie of course. Or maybe not. I wouldn’t know.

And you thought racism only occurs when people of different races are together! Ah, how wrong.

Come on people, we’re just people! Ah. He’ll die, she’ll die, you’ll die, I’ll die, then the world will die.

Then you’ll see that you’re not that different from us anyway.

Hiiii blog long time no see :D

So I figure I’ll take this chance to explain about my disappearance from the internet realm/world in general.

I was sick.

I can’t play the computer or I’ll end up sick again.

So I was in bed. Almost all the time.

Bear in mind that’s typical of me. :D

Actually I’m not sure what I did back then, pretty sure I did almost nothing. :D

Then my brother and sister came to visit! Hooray.

I was still not touching the laptop or else I’ll end up puking at my screen, maybe. Let’s not take the chances, shall we? :D

Then I returned to Malaysia! Hooray.

Except not too hooray here since Malaysia is the land of ghosts and mystical powers (ehem) so I was even more sick. :D <- fake smiley face

I did nothing but watched countless of dramas (English Chinese Korean Japanese Indian Malay Indonesian Philippines Spanish you name it) and played a lot of games (on the PSP PS3 xbox360 NDS what have you).

Then I slowly opened my facebook.

And youtube.

Then I returned back to Saudi Arabia.

And resume my studying. :D

Do you know how peaceful Saudi Arabia is? You can scarcely find any ghost here (ehem).

Months passed by, and I was recovering (the healer here is really good and very nice), and still studying like mad…

When I suddenly remember…

My twitter, and the fact that one of my last tweets is I’m sick or something.

Some people might think I’m dead or something! Not that anyone would, but I don’t wish to disappear forever.

So I decided to update it.

Walla. :D

What kind of post is this? I don’t know. I just thought maybe I should post it. :D

P.S. I still hate doctors.

P.P.S I mean, why would they blame me if the medication's not working? Seriously.