I was tagged by
Kak Teh to share my “Cringe Moments” about a week ago. Unfortunately work has been sheer madness, thus refraining me from organizing my thoughts about the piece I would like to share in this blogsphere. With two notable deadlines submissions earlier this week, I guess I deserve a break from all the “dry and serious writing” I’ve been doing.
Now, coming back to the tag, ummpp….it was kind of difficult to recollect my moments of bloopers and blunders. Don’t really know where to start though, but I’ll try and put up some of the moments that have gone into my LOL memory folder.
Cringe Moment No 1
This, in fact happened a couple of weeks ago at the car park of my client’s office. I was about to pay for my parking and suddenly I discovered that my purse was missing. At first I thought I had lost it but later I remembered that I had left it in my office drawer. You see, that morning I was extra industrious, took out my parking stubs and all other claimable receipts and passed them to my girl to do my claims.
The parking attendant, a foreign worker, told me that I was to pay RM15 for the parking (ohh..parking in KL is so very expensive these days!!). Alamak macamana ni, I didn’t even have a ringgit and how am I to get that all RM15 to dispose for my parking. I gave this sad plus pathetic look and told him my award winning sob story. I had all hopes that he’d buy it and did he?? Well, not quite. He said I would still have to make payments for the parking ticket. “Itu peraturan,” he sternly put it to me. Ahh…darn!! By then, I was already holding traffic behind me. As I looked at my rear mirror, I saw most of the other drivers were already looking furious with the delay.
Just a decorative pic..
Then I saw the gentleman who was in the car behind mine emerging from his X5. Habis lah I thought to myself, sure kena jerit punyer lah ni. To my surprise, the good looking gentleman leaned forward towards my car and asked what was wrong. In one sentence I blurted out that I didn’t have money to pay for the parking. I was expecting a lecture…but, instead he took out his Armani wallet (sempat tu mata tengok brand apa!!), searched for two ten ringgit notes and gave them to the parking attendant. He even told the attendant to keep the change.
I was speechless, it was as if the world stopped moving for a while. Once the parking barrier was lifted, he said to me, “You may go now and drive safe!!”
This can’t be happening, a good knight came to my rescue and I must say, a pretty good looking one too (got mustache, as I recalled later on how he looked like, no wonder lah boleh tergoda in that split second).
Before I drove off, I asked for his mobile number and I said I’ll pay him back. He just smiled and wave back at me and said this, “Nahh…my treat!!” Suddenly, I felt blood rushing to my face, probably due to the embarrassment and excitement of being “rescued” by the X5 knight. I still look out for his car these days when I go to the client’s office. It’d be really nice if I could slip a thank you note on the windscreen, unfortunately, the X5 was no avail.
Cringe Moment No 2
Again this one too happened in the car. I had this a pair of new shoes to wear to the office that day. New shoes would normally cause blisters to my feet if I didn’t do this one special ritual. My late grandmother once said that in order to avoid blisters from new shoes, you’ve got to give it a bite. Her rationale was, you bite it before it bites you. To my surprise, her petua worked miraculously well on me.
And that morning just as I put my new shoes on my teeth to give it a bite, the driver of the car parked next to my lot, peered at my windscreen. That time, the shoe was nicely positioned in my mouth and what a sight it must have been to him. He looked so puzzled upon the acts of his not quite right parking neighbour.
Since malunya tak boleh nak kata dah at that time so I wind-down my window, stuck out my head, held the shoes in my hands and said, “Kasut baru…” He too was stunned by my response. I saw him shaking his head and walked away. The flustered me sat still in the car for a little while longer, long enough till my parking neighbour disappeared into the lift. Since that incident, I have been so careful with my shoe biting ritual, only doing it at home in my room behind closed door. Even hidden from the viewing of Bibik and Nissa coz manalah tau kot-kot Bibik might think that, “So kesian my majikan, no money, makan kasut rupa nya!!”
Cringe Moment No 3
I usually have my lunch in the office since I don’t quite fancy the spread at the food court. Most of the time I’d have Bibik ta-pau sandwiches or fried noodles for me and I’d just go heat it up in the microwave and lunch would be ready in a jiffy. Tak payah nak rebut-rebut and queue at the food court. And because I don’t have to go out of the office, I didn’t bother much about the clothes I had on. Most of the time we are casually dressed when we don’t need to go out for meetings with clients. And neither did I bother much if my baju was transparent or too revealing coz we were just amongst us.
Unfortunately that day we had some visitors to the office. And boss had asked me to take them down for lunch. I relented initially but later obliged. Nak jadi ceritanya, that day I wore a long crepe skirt and a short blouse. The skirt had a thin organza lining and the blouse wasn’t long enough to cover my legs from having a silhouette expose. So when I walked in broad day light, ehem..ehem…waist down, was very visible. I though it wasn’t that obvious but later my girl whispered to me, “Puan…wayang kulit lah!!”
Ayoo…Amma, Appa…kari-valee!!! No wonder lah the guys walked as slowly as they could so that they could be behind me. Cisshhh rupa-rupanya they were having an eye feast!!! Not that I was Miss Malaysia ker, but guys being guys, I was sure it was cheap trill to them. Then when I came to the food court, I quickly got seated, and asked my girl to take care of the food orders. I didn’t get up at all till we finished eating. Itu pun masa walking up to the office, I was holding and “kepit-ing” my skirt. It was obviously wrong day, wrong attire for me. Truly a good lesson learnt for me though. Nowadays, I’d slip on my petticoat whenever I am in skirts or baju kurung. Sorry boys and girls, no more “terang bulan” privy from me, that’s for sure!!
Cringe Moment No 4
This happened when I was still teaching in Ui**. My first class with a bunch of engineering students and as the semesters before, language skills classes would always be given the last slot of the day. Kids would be tired and lectures were dead beat after a long day on their feet.
I looked at my time table and searched for the room where I was supposed to have my class. Since I was quite familiar with the rooms at the Engine School (those days it was “school” still) it didn’t take me long to get to my class. When I stepped in, the class was already packed with students. I introduced myself and got started with my expectations on their inputs during the class. I was going like, “You have this assignment, that paper due in…...bla bla bla,” very typical of me during my first meeting.
I was so absorbed in my explanation that I didn’t notice an Ustaz who had walked into the class, and at that time keeping silent at the back of the class watching me. The boys in my class went like, “Ehem..ehem..Miss…Ustaz tu..” I didn’t quite get what they meant so I just ignored their distractions and continued still with my talking.
I talked for a few minutes more and I could still see the boys fidgeting on their seats. Okay, let’s check out what’s the problem here, I thought to myself.
So I said, “Now boys, what seems to be the problem here? Are we or are we not having this business writing class?”
One of the smart alec said, “No Miss, this is not the time for business writing class.”
I replied, “No? Then what class are you supposed to have now?”
Another voice from the back said, “Sekarang masa Agama ya Puan Lecturer Bahasa Inggeris!!”
And you know who was the person who said this?? It was the Ustaz himself!! Fuhhh…I was crimson coloured by then. I couldn’t remember what I mumbled to the class and the apology I said to the Ustaz. Pulak masa tu zaman-zaman stilettos and skirt wearing days. Ustaz tengok atas bawah je lecturer English ni, who was in this one inch above the knee skirt and linen top. I picked up my stuffs and excused myself and walked out of the classroom. I think that was the last I saw the kids from that wrong class that I had walked into. The Ustaz, well if I recall well, did bump into him a couple of times at the cafeteria. I didn’t dare look at him in the eye for I was so positively sure he could still be rewinding that incident of me hijacking his Agama class. Ampun dan maaf yaa…Ustaz!!
