straight from the horse's mouth

Just yesterday, two men were in my office, servicing the printer. For a couple of servicemen on the job, they sure talked a lot… and loudly too.

So while I was minding my own business at my desk, I couldn't help but overhear their conversation.

They were chatting about several different topics when Guy A started sharing his problems to Guy B. He talked about his mother, brother and basically sighed a lot.

Guy A: itulah… banyak benda (see… there’s plenty of problems)
Guy B: alah kau dah kahwin ape (well, at least you’re already married)
I suppose Guy B was consoling him that at least he wasn’t alone in this.
Guy A: kahwin? Kahwin, tak kahwin… kahwin tu untuk lepaskan nafsu (married? Marriage makes no difference. Marriage is just to relieve your lust)

I was appalled! I felt like turning around and smacking Guy A’s bloody face. But then it wouldn’t be worth it – he’s not worth it.

It reminded me of this episode of this Malay programme I caught on Suria called Mahligai Kaca (it basically means “Glass Castle”… aptly captures the fragility of marriage). I was told that the storylines were derived from real family court cases, although I’m not too sure about the accuracy of this.

But I must say the programme was an eye-opener. I only managed to catch one episode, which happened to be the last one.

It was about this lady who’s been divorced twice but doesn’t give up her search for the perfect man. She finally fell in love with a man, also divorced.

However, her good friend and even the man’s ex-wife advised her not to marry him. They warned that he’s a womanizer and that he could turn abusive. But she turned a deaf ear on them and chose to follow her heart instead.

However, just a few weeks before the wedding, she started to have doubts about him. But by then, all the wedding invites were sent out and in her opinion, it was simply too late to back out. So she proceeded with the wedding any way, praying that she had been wrong to doubt him.

Sadly, just three days after the wedding, he started not coming home, preferring to keep himself busy in the company of other women. When his friends reminded him that he was married, he replied something along the lines of:

“I get married so that I do not have to commit a sin. Having a wife means you can have ‘it’ anytime you want, without resorting to visits to back alleys. A wife saves you costs.”

While I was disgusted with that notion, at the back of my mind, it was just an actor delivering his lines.

Nothing beats the disgust of hearing the actual words from a man himself.
N o t h i n g .

Food for thought:
We often wonder if we're marrying for the wrong reasons.
But how often do we wonder if the man isn't marrying for the wrong reason?

So I shall quote this from Mahligai Kaca which I think is very true:

"It's easy to find a man, but it’s not easy to find a husband.”

same guy, same agenda

Was checking my mail and was about to delete what I thought was typical spam when I realised I knew the name of the 'sender'.

Apparently I've been added as a friend on "SpeedDate.com" by the guy whom I thought is married. Sigh.

Previous readers may remember him from my previous entry (click here to read).

URGH!

juice spreader

The other day I received an sms from a close relative. She was asking me about a recent unfortunate event with regards to my love life. She was concerned about my well being of course, but I was too stunned to feel the slightest appreciation.

How the hell did she know? It was something very personal to me. Although it wasn't something wrongly committed by me, it was something private I had been guarding fiercely and only managed to share with a few of my very close friends.

How the hell did she know? I felt so exposed.

My mind whirled, tracing and mapping the links. I was so pissed! I had been so careful in controlling and containing the secret and pain but it slipped my mind that I was not and could not oversee the other party’s management of the event that had taken place.

It didn’t take me long to identify the source, the common place. Horror hits me when I realised I had also roped in a business associate to use the services of the same place. And that business associate is close to another friend of mine who’s not exactly the best guardian of secrets.

Shoot.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised if the rest in the clique knows about it too.

Was that why they were wondering how "I've been doing" more frequently?

Was that why they had then ‘considerately’ left me out of certain sensitive topics at our last gathering? Honestly, I was relieved at the time, but was that because they knew?

Sigh... I swear if the H1N1 could spread like any juicy news or rumour, the human race would be defeated.

mark-chicks

I stuck my head out my room door to see what the din in my living room was all about...

I was totally unprepared for the sight that greeted me.

Rows of makciks (malay aunties) were sitting on the floor. Who were they? I wondered, not recognising any one of them from my restricted view. And just as I decided to check on my appearance before I went out properly to greet them, a few pairs of eyes turned to me.

Spotted, I smiled. Okay… no chance to turn back now… I walked towards the ones sitting nearest to my room and then I realized… there were so many of them… probably twenty. Even the furniture was pushed to the side of the wall just to make room for them.

It was intimidating.

Despite their smiles, their eyes betrayed their analytical if not critical thoughts. Some nodded as though in approval of my manners and dressing. The rest observed me closely as I salam-ed every makcik and was systematically making my way towards them.

The dreaded questions hung heavily in the air…

“Is she single?”
“ How old is she?”
“What is she doing now?”

Urgh! I felt like an unwilling female contestant being graded by these “mark-chicks” in some reality game show.



* mark-chicks - malay makciks whose second nature is to mark the qualities in "anak daras" (single ladies)

the one who wanted to have an affair

One day, just for fun, I displayed my actual photograph as my msn profile picture. It wasn’t my usual practice back then but I was happy with my new haircut… the only thing I was happy about in a bad week.

Suddenly, n.g. messaged me out of the blue. “Hmm… it’s been ages since we chatted,” I thought as I saw his nick flashing, indicating an unread message.

“Hey, you look so pretty,” he typed. I laughed it off. In my mind, he’s always been a joker. n.g. was a former client by the way, in my former company. He was the kaypoh sort who’d crack stupid jokes to people. He was witty too… in an R(A) sort of way.

Once, he disappeared from work for a couple of days and when he returned, told my ex-colleague that he attended a course. “What course?” she asked, genuinely curious. “Intercourse,” he quipped. So yea… you get the idea what sort of person he is…

Anyway, we just updated each other on what we were doing before he went on to confide in me how he’s always been interested in girls of other races. “Uhoh…” I didn’t think I’d like where the conversation was leading.

Ok, the conversation went something like this:

n.g: you want to go out on a date?
(I recalled how I had been invited to his wedding a year ago. Ok… I better clarify before this becomes an embarrassing misunderstanding)
me: huh? What do you mean?
n.g: i am serious wanna have affair with you la… date meaning...going out as bf and gf lor. but secretly la
(silence)
n.g: your jaw drop is it... hee
me: so this is what you’ve been doing behind your wife’s back is it?
n.g: no lah never do this kind of thing before...if you are ok with it...you are the first lor

What the hell? I felt so insulted. He still had the cheek to tell me I would be the first! I was so pissed, I ignored him and immediately complained to a couple of friends online. “Not all men are like that,” my male friend, a staunch Christian assured me when I roared and ranted about how men nowadays are unfaithful and simply cannot be trusted.

“He sounds like he's trying to be funny and thinking that its cute. He doesn’t even sound serious. Think you're taking it too seriously,” my female friend said.

Was I taking things too seriously? I don’t know. All I knew was that I’ve known him to be quite cheeky but harmless. And I HAD been having a bad week, maybe it got the better of me? Maybe I will see the humour in this once I cool down, I talked to myself.

Well eventually I chucked it in the dusty crevices of my brain and forgot all about it. Until…

I attended an ex-colleague’s wedding a year later. A few close former colleagues and clients were also invited. And guess who should waltze over to my table? n.g. approached another of my colleague to say hi. I didn’t think he realized I was there. When I turned around to face him, his eyes darted away.

Hmm… if what happened had been a joke, he could have at least looked me in the eye, right? But noo... we never made eye contact. Well, cos he avoided mine. I looked at him directly as he stood there, all tall, dark and… well… NOT handsome.

He came alone, I overheard him saying. And immediately I thought of his poor wife.

the one who taunted me

contributed by one of our readers, random heart.


I got to know “Z” through one of those networking site where you subscribe at a nominal price to contact others (anakmelayu.com). The site allows you to write what you’re looking for under your profile so my line was: Looking for the perfect man, but since there is no such thing as a perfect man, I’m just looking for my lost things lah…

So Z sent me an IM (in this case it’s called sticky notes) that said: I might not be the perfect man but I’d want to be your friend.

A browse through his profiles sent warning bells in my head. So “jiwang ah mamat ni” - he was so into Malay literature and looked like he breathed and lived in it. Nevertheless, I ignored the warning signals and even exchanged msn addresses. I thought it’s perfectly harmless to get to know a new person. So we chatted on msn for a bit.

Though I have a slim face, I’m not really one. But when he viewed my profile photo, Z kept saying that I was beautiful la...blah blah blah. Even to the point of quoting the song that was hot during that time, James Blunt’s “You’re so beautiful”. He kept asking me out but I always declined. I wasn’t playing hard to get but I’m seriously not the kind who meet guys randomly like that. However, I then discovered that my best friend’s colleague is actually Z’s sister (Z wasn’t aware of that). That and a push by my friend finally got me to agree to meet him.

Z picked me up in this small loud orange car that was screaming for attention. We hadn’t planned what to do that day. So in actual fact, if he was disappointed by what he saw… he could have cut the date short. But no… we went for coffee, dinner and then even watched a movie! All the time he was attentive, nice and we shared a good conversation. He did not display any signs of dread at all.

Anyway, after the meet up, (which Z initially termed a date) I sent him a polite sms to thank for the day out but there was no response.

2 days later on his profile, he posted a poem for “Si Dia” (That special one). I was like “HUH? Did I go out with someone’s guy?” So I messaged Z online through the site. Guess what? No response at all.

I was annoyed and needed closure, so I sent him an email. I knew exactly when he opened it but being the coward that he was, he never responded. So I thought that was it.

But 4 months later…I received a message from Z on msn. I had deleted his nick but had stupidly forgotten to block him. He sent a heart icon. “Strange,” I thought but since I was away from my computer at that time, I let it go.

The next time, I received another message from him - the heart wink. Curious, I sent him a msg. The following is an excerpt of what was exchanged:

Me: It’s weird that you keep on getting the wrong window.
Z: Yes, life is weird.
Me: Don’t get philosophical with me.
Z: You are still angry with me, you are entitled to.
Me: …
Z: can’t we restart?
Me: Restart what? (restart what? Nothing ever started in the first place.)
Z: Our Friendship
Me: Excuse me Mr Z, please define for me what it means by friendship, if it means keeping silent like that, that’s bull lah!
Z: I had my reasons then.
Me: care to tell me what is the reason?
Z: I felt something for you. You were decent, I was not so.
Me: that’s great, I’m decent and I got snubbed. Thanks a lot.

To cut things short, it was as though he was imploring me to forgive him, but of course who would be that stupid right? So when it was obvious that I would not back down, His parting line was: Stay sweet, diabetic and huge!

So much for him having feelings for me. Bluergh. I was so angry that I closed the window without remembering to block him.

The next thing I know, on another day, he sent me a message again on msn that went: Eh I think your car seat right, you have to make it bigger so can fit you.

It was too much right? In the first place, I could even fit into his freaking small car. But at least this time, I remembered to block him.

Totally annoyed, I went back to that site and sent him 2 sticky notes to give him a piece of my mind. It went something like this: I fat ke, I huge ke, what business is it of yours? For the record, I let God deal with people like you. Just want to say thank you because I finally am able to block you on msn.

And just so you know, the only reason I even agreed to go out with you was because I found out that your sister is my best friend’s colleague. Have a nice life. GOODBYE.

And you know what the best thing is? I have not even shared how this person looks like. If you guys have watched “Pendekar Bujang Lapok” before, I’m sure you are familiar with Ahmad Nisfu - The actor with the unforgettable nose… Well this fella can pass off as his grandson. Seriously.

I figured he must be a serial dater, going out with ladies must be his hobby and at the same time keeping his options open. Well guys like these can seriously go fly kite.