Dah demam?

It's that time of the year again. Yes, apart from wedding season when you can't drive 2 metres without encountering one kenduri kahwin after another, it's Akademi Fantasia season!

Last year, ASTRO caused quite a stir when they announced that there won't be any Akademi Fantasia (AF) this year. I said, takkan lah! How can you abandon your most successful money churning enterprise? In the second year of AF, apparently 15 million SMS votes were cast. With tie-ins including SMS competition, endorsements, magazine sales, think of how many million ringgits ASTRO made? So I confidently told Abang last year, mesti ada lah AF tahun depan....and I am right, as usual...hehe..

Again I am amazed at human nature. Reality TV is fantastic for study of human behaviour, I tell you. I love reality TV; while I was in med school in UK, every saturday evening, nothing can tear me away from Big Brother. I booed at Melanie the tease, I gawped at what's-his-name's hard on and I cheered when Craig won. I guess it's the voyeur in me. I'm sure there's a voyeur in every one of us; that's why reality TV is so popular. It's the same reason why we peek through the curtains to watch our neighbours and their new bought sofa/car/girlfriends.

Everyone seems to have their favourite and some go a step further by setting up fan clubs for their favourites. They pledge their undying love and devotion (and money) week after week and sob hysterically when their star gets the boot. Puh lease la.... org tu tak tau pun kau exist, tau tak...? Don't be a saddo la...get a life. Kau derma kat tabung BersamaMu lagi baik. Some of these pathetic beings actually admit to spending RM100+ permonth for SMS votes. Gila ke apa...?

Anyway, I watch it purely for fun. When I go home, we all get together at Ma's house to watch it on TV. We all have our own favourites - ....I know Ma loved Aidil from the last season and she pestered us to vote for Mawi in the finals. It's one of the very few TV programmes that she would watch with us. It's a great way to get your atuk, nenek, cucu and cicit together. THAT is what I love about AF.

p/s: my favourite to date - Faizal...:) :)

Materialistic

Sometimes I wonder, "Ada org baca ke blog aku nihhh....??" :) but then I remember, I write as a way of expressing myself so it doesn't really matter whether it gets read or not...and I know for sure that there is AT LEAST one reader out there and you know who you are!!

As you can see, I lepak quite a lot at CARI.com.my. The forum there can be as enlightening as reading the dailies. Betul! Reading the Gossips board is like reading the Harian Metro free; artis mana mabuk, artis mana kena tangkap basah blabla. Abg prefers the Current Issue board himself, but I think that's too serious especially at the end of a day's work.

Anyway, one of the boards put up a question that I thought was quite interesting. It asked whether parents nowadays are too materialistic for their children's good? Are materialistic parents producing materialistic children? Why is it that more parents are using materials as a substitute for good ol fashioned values?

My parents weren't rich. But we weren't poor either. Sedang2 aje la. We had everything we needed and we were definitely not spoiled. I definitely didn't think my life was lacking anything and I feel that that is because we weren't babysat by the TV. Ma was not the type to put on a Barney cd, well video la,....come to think of it, Barney dah ada ke time tu? Let me put it this way, we had a huge TV in the living room but more times it was off than it was switched on. Plus maybe at that time people didn't advertise as much kot. I was a content kid.

However, when I started primary two at MGS (Methodist Girls' School), I experienced peer pressure. Girls there were rich upper class, english speaking, ballet dancing, piano playing girls. Compared to them, I was a jakun, and like a jakun I did act..:) I gaped at their 5 door pencil cases, their 48 piece color pencils, their collection of furry, sweet smelling stickers and most of all, at their Barbies. Whenever we had afternoon sports practice, these girls would bring their Barbies and play house with the other girls. I remember watching them act out Barbie going out on dates with Ken and admire how beautiful the dolls were.

I can't remember now if I had pestered Ma for one....but I never had my own Barbie. Ma was the type of person who didn't believe that kids should have toys that would cost more than a meal for a small family. Because she came from a poor family, she knew and appreciated the value of having money and she instilled that in us. Ma taught us to work for anything that we wanted.

For instance, I would wash Pa's car on Sundays for 50 sen. See, 50 sen had value at that time. Try telling a boy scout to do a chore for that amount today? Tak pandang punya la..:) I remember when Yaya was a baby, I was given 3 ringgit a week for washing the 'lampin's.....eh, what do you call reusable diapers huh? I would save the money carefully in my cheap wallet and spend it on things I wanted but Ma won't buy. I remember wanting to buy Michael J. Fox's video Bright Lights Big City once, and when I had enough (12 ringgit for a VHS movie - it was the 80s mah), off we went to the supermarket to buy it. I didn't buy it though. When I saw how poor the quality of the picture was, I decided that it wasn't a good enough reason for me to spend my hard-earned 12 ringgit, no matter how much I adored Michael J. Fox.

So, to this day, I can still get very careful with money. Though staying in a temptation-free place like Permaisuri, Setiu does help with building up of the savings. A healthy savings liberates me. I know that if anything happens, I have something to fall back on.

On the other hand, I love spending on people I care about. Nothing gives me more pleasure than taking my family out on dinner, or buying things for my anak buahs or brothers and sisters. Which is kinda weird, kan, because I'm doing the total opposite of what Ma did.....

Tapi, I say to myself, rezeki nie pun datang dari Allah. So it isn't really mine, kan? So, what's wrong in sharing and making people happy in the process?

Mama saya

Today's Mother's Day. I didn't wish my Ma, because I don't need a special day to be reminded of how much Ma means to me...and I hope Ma agrees with me and wasn't really hoping to be wished...! :)

Jokes aside, my parents and two of my siblings have been around the East Coast area during the weekend. They've been seeing Tok and Tok Ayah, some other relatives, their besan in Panji yadayadayada. They've just left my house this morning and I hope my directions to the Lebuhraya Pantai Timur was clear enough to get them home sometime today.

Anyhow, each time I've had to say goodbye to my parents have been harder; be it me leaving for the East Coast after a holiday in KL or vice versa, and they were here only for a night but the silence post visit is already bumming me out. Since I've already watched the particular CSI episode currently on channel 17, I have to be content with Aznil and Accapan instead.

Ma's life history is colourful, to say the least and I know she hasn't any regrets because of that that she is the person she is now. Moreover, it's because of it that she has raised us 6 kids so wonderfully.

I remember when I was younger, Ma and Pa would have long conversations in English, discussing what happened at work, with friends. Strangely enough, I don't hear them doing that as much nowadays, but that has laid foundations for us being bilingual (I was even trilingual at one time, but Cantonese went out the window once I joined Primary One).

Ma used to work in a bank (and can still count money notes like a pro) and one of the most clear memories I have of her back then was her coming back from work with Pa in his Peugot, her hands covered in melting ice cream because she was bringing back ice cream cones for us.

As I got bigger (vertically as well as horizontally, I might add), there were more memories to add to that. Happy ones and not-so-happy ones. Ma crying as she left me at MRSM, Ma laughing as she patted this huge but tame pelican at Regent's Park in London, Ma worrying as I introduced Abang to her for the first time....

I know I'd made her cry; I guess all children do that at one time or another in their lives. I hope the times I made her happy outnumbered the sad ones and I hope that she is happy with the way I finally turned out, albeit I think she is still unhappy with the fact that Nadiah Hannah is still cousinless...:)

Ma, I love you...

How fickle are we...

It's Wesak Day tomorrow. KL and states whose weekends are saturdays and sundays get a long weekend. Being in the East Coast, I have been looking forward to having my own long weekend, also on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Alih2, radio keluar pengumuman that it's NOT a holiday this Sunday....amenda nih..???

Last month, (or was it the month before), a PH fell on a saturday and a circular was duly circulated stating that when a PH falls on a saturday, it will not be brought forward to the Sunday, but when it falls on a friday, yes, we get a long weekend. So, why the sudden change in policy? Apabenda nih...?????

I do agree that Malaysians get too much holiday. Tapi korang cakap la awal2 kalau nak mansuhkan three day weekend. Ini klinik dah adjust dah all appointment dates, most staff had already made plans and you come up with an announcement like this. Apabendanya nih....?????

Failure

Last weekend I was extremely hurt by a statement made by someone I know, regarding my current childless state.

I am totally aware that people are talking, tambah2 lagi when hubby is from a masyarakat kampung who just thrives on itty bitty gossips like this. But if I don't hear about those things they say myself, then it's ok, I tell myself that it's just in my head. I tell myself that people MUST have better things to do then speculate about the state of my marriage.

Yet, when it stared at me right in the face, I just crumbled.

Despite all my achievements, to them I am nothing if I can't produce an offspring.
It does not matter that I have stood in front of the Taj Mahal when they have only seen it on TV in a drama starring Umie Aida and M. Nasir. They don't care that I have spent 8 years of my life in a country that they know as London (London is for the whole of UK to some people) and that I came back as a doctor, ending up in a God forsaken place in order to 'help people'. To them, I am a failure.

and sometimes, I feel like one too.....

Bengang

Today I really got so fed up with my Pejabat Kesihatan Daerah. Typical government officers, makan gaji buta kot...

For the past three months, I have been going to the other KK as the former MO had left for Selangor. Ok, despite having twice the workload of the other MO and having twice the number of antenatal clinic, I was asked to do so, under the impression that I would be able to claim elaun tanggung beban. So, compared to the other MO who has only one antenatal clinic and mostly free afternoons, I now have three antenatal clinics per week. This was on top of attending meetings, seeing out patients etc etc.

The stupid officer in the office even reminded me not to take any leave in the first 30 days so as to qualify me for the mentioned allowance.

Bayangkan la betapa sakitnya hati when she called me up today (the other KK has finally managed to wrestle a fresh MO from HKT) and said somehow she discovered that I am not eligible for it...? What the h????? You sebagai pegawai yang berkaitan patutnya tahu benda2 nie semua! and she even had the galls to suggest that I apply for mileage instead!? Bodoh nak mampus...

It's not the money that I'm pissed about. Money, I have. Duit gaji pun tak habis2nya dlm sebulan duduk kat tempat ulu nie. Tapi, kalau dia efficient dlm kerja dia, she should've informed me earlier and I takde la rasa bertanggungjawab menjaga klinik tu. Nak ambik cuti pun I selamba boleh suruh MO lagi sorang tu ganti and he wouldn't be able to give me excuses like I shouldn't ask him since I would be getting paid to be in charge of the KK.

Chua Soi Lek beria2 bagi amanat kepada staff KKM untuk menjaga kebajikan fellow workers. My foot la...! Bagi aku duduk rumah berkongsi dgn koloni semut and tikus. Suruh lupuskan perabut pun susah. Klinik pulak semua benda tak cukup. Staff curik tulang kiri ngan kanan, buat tutup mata je. Kalau macam nie, sampai bila Malaysia takkan maju....

Sakit hati betul aku...