Buat saspen jer???

I was washing the dishes after lunch when Daniel suddenly came up to me...

D: Mummy...Nak go doctor Mummy!!!
M: (terkejut) What happened???
D: (pointing inside of his mouth)
M: Why??? (panicking already)
D: ada ayam...
M: laaa....ada ayam stuck dekat gigi? ingatkan apaaa la tadi...(phew...legaaa...)

Good Morning..

Daniel and I were walking to the town the other day when we passed by a house where an elderly couple and another middle-aged woman were having a conversation while puffing on their lawn. The elderly couple had greeted me a few times in the past, so I smiled at them as I was passing through. The old lady said "Good morning!" followed by the other two, and I said good morning back. Then she said "Good morning young man!!" to which Daniel replied by showing up his right hand (a'la Obama while addressing the people in a speech) while he was looking down...It was a hilarious sight if you were there to witness it, so everybody laughed and we continued our journey.

Then I looked at my watch. It was nearly 1 pm. "Morning???" I asked myself. Maybe they were mistaken and didn't realize that it was noon already.

Then we brushed shoulders with another lady. I smiled at her and she smiled back, greeting me "Good morning!" Now that couldn't have been a coincidence, right?

I wonder when do people here wish "Good afternoon" then. Our cut-off time in Malaysia is 12 noon, right? Simple. From 12 noon to about 7pm, we wish people "Good afternoon."Hubby said that they don't have good afternoons..They go straight from "Good morning" to "Good evening." People at his work place even called lunch as dinner! I don't know whether it is the practice of the people in this town only or these are common to all Britons...hehe....

By the way, most of the cartoon series here are translated from USA English to British English. I don't really understand this, because for me English is English...hehe... Hubby said Malaysians are thought British English but we talk USA English. That is why we simply don't realize the difference...hehe...

Entah laaaa....

The sweet and the cheeky...

The sweet:

"This my mummy!!" while hugging you tight at any point or time of the day..

"What's wrong Mummy? Why mummy crying?" when he saw me crying watching a movie...

The cheeky:

Coming towards you and out of a sudden, he would scratch any part of your body accessible to him. And when you spontaneously screamed "Ouch!!" he would point his little finger at you and laughed (buat-buat punya gelak) and then would go "nyenyenyenyenye!" while making a silly face....

That's my little prince....UPDATED....

What will I miss when I return home..

The greetings that you receive at the cashier's tills...As soon as you put your stuffs at the counters or the conveyor belts, you would be greeted with "Thank you" or at least "Hi/hiya!!!!! And with the return of your changes, definitely you would get your "thank you", "cheers!", "see ya"

In Malaysia, it's very rare to get this kind of treatment, eh? Nak senyum kat customer pun payah, apatah lagi nak berterima kasih kan?? "Bukan kedai aku pun" attitude, perhaps??

Crazy, crazy world...

Just during my 3 months stay here, I have read about so many crazy things that people do. Some of them were just unthinkable! There was this one case of a man being burnt by some thugs as he was dozing off while sunbathing in a park. Maybe it was a prank played by some naughty teenagers. Nak sangat sunburn, meh kitorang burn ko terus...agaknya laaaa...

There was also a case where an elderly woman was found dead after 5 years at her own home. How could this happen? Nobody smelled anything foul, was it? Or the place had always smelt bad, so that was why nobody noticed another bad smell? They only found her after her down stair's neighbour filed a complaint to the local council for a leak that came from her apartment floor. yikes!!! It just showed that people don't care about each other any more. Even I don't really know my neighbours in this apartment building (except for the guy downstairs who came and complained about the noise Daniel makes). It is a common lifestyle now.

And what about knife crimes? These thugs just randomly went and stabbed people to death! The government is taking step to overcome these crimes, normally done by teenagers gangsd, but from what I read yesterday from an interview, these gangs said, they would only hand in their knives for change with guns. "We kill. That's what we do" they said. SICK!!!! And SCARY!!!! Na'uzubillah!!!

And we haven't touch about racism yet. What people could do because of racism are just beyond belief. It's like we have never learnt from past experiences and still living in pre-historic era.

During one of the subway rides in London, I witnessed an act of racism, though a mild one. We were seated at the rear most area of the coach where the it was linked to another coach. Two guys from the next coach kept throwing small pieces of rubbish into our coach and then laughed out loud. I didn't know what their intention was, whether it was really racism or they were just playing the fool (they looked really foolish, by the way). I pretended that nothing happened and I wasn't bothered by the act. We were going off at the next station, anyway.

Just as we were about to get off of the subway, another Mat Salleh guy looked at us and began shaking his head. He looked pissed enough with the foolish guys' antics. He started cursing under his breath and said to us "What fools are they?" to which my dad said, "I thought they were your friends and they were joking with you." "No, no! I don't have stupid friends like those idiots!" He was really angry.

And as we got off the subway, the guy in our coach stood up, and screamed at the idiots, "What the hell! Bast#&d!!!" and shut the coach's window with a thump. Served them idiots right!

These sick, sick people are everywhere in our world now. May Allah prevent these psycho people from harming us or the people that we love...Ameen...

My London Adventure Part VI (finale)

At the Emirates Stadium, home of the Arsenal Football Club





We took off from my aunty's house at about 10am that Sunday and took the train to Arsenal, which was only 2 stops away from Turnpike Lane. A game was about to start and there were a lot of stalls selling the team's merchandise. But as I was not a fan, we didn't buy anything. Just took some photos at the majestic stadium and we continued our journey. Our next stop was Covent Garden.

Huge, huge crowds and a lot of acts were there. Again, I felt like I was in Malaysia's Central Market..hehe...















We didn't stay long though, because I still want to go to many other places. We then went to the Embankment. I wanted to take my parents on the river cruise, but they didn't want to go. So, we just sat at the riverbank, enjoying the breeze and the scenery.

After that, we went to Baker Street. I thought we could have lunch there, but we couldn't find the halal restaurant that I was looking for. Walked for a bit at Oxford Circus and then we took the subway back to Bayswater Station for lunch. Well, at least I was confident that we could find many halal restaurants there rather than we wandering around looking for a place to eat in the other places.

By the time we finished our lunch, it was about 4pm already. I had thought of going to Stamford Bridge (home of the Chelsea FC) and Wimbledon, but we were short of time. We did some last minutes souvenir shopping at Bayswater area, and my Mum bought another hand luggage...hehe...

I asked the ticket salesman at the counter whether our passes could take us to Heathrow, and he said no. So, we upgraded the passes (no fuss this time and definitely NO SWEARING) and we headed directly to Heathrow Airport.

By the time we reached there, it was about 7pm and Hubby had already reached there waiting for us with Abah and Mak's luggage. My parents came to the UK with 2 large luggage, and they left UK with 2 large luggage and 4 hand luggage...wakakakaka! I do not know how much would I bring when I return home later..hehehe...

So, they repacked everything so that the checked in luggage wouldn't exceed the 20kg weight limit per person. A lot of other people were also doing this, which made the scene quite funny...hehe..

I helped them checked in and after a few more moments together, it was time for them to depart. Soooo sad!!! My parents had left their last worn clothes for Daniel, in case if he should miss them or having trouble sleeping at nights because of remembering them. So, when my Mum cried before she went into the departure room, I jokingly asked her whether she would need Daniel's 'kain busuk' in case she would miss him later...hehe...

It was a tearful goodbye. We left the airport for Newark at about 9.30pm and reached home at about midnight. My body was aching from the extreme walking for the last 4 days and I couldn't sleep from the maximum exhaustion. Sempat basuh baju dulu and dry them all up before retiring for the night.

What an adventure!!!

My London Adventure Part V

Daniel at Turnpike Lane Station








And why were we at the Turnpike Lane Station instead of Kew Bridge Station for our next hotel check-in? It was because we couldn't find the darn hotel!!! We had stopped at Kew Bridge initially after the parade. I called the hotel for direction and was given the so-called direction to the hotel from the station. She said "Walk straight ahead and then turn right at the end of the road. We are there. You wouldn't miss it because there is a huge sign."

So, we walked, and walked, and walked, AND WALKED... It must have been about 2-3 km of walking. I became suspicious, so I called the hotel again. The same direction was given, so I thought maybe it was correct after all. A few hundred metres ahead, I stopped a passer-by and asked him the direction to the hotel. He said, "I have never heard the name of that hotel. I've been living here for quite some time but no, not that hotel.." huh???

So, I called the hotel again. This time, we had already reached the end of the road, and you've guessed it right, NO HOTEL. I tried using the GPS on the i-Phone but hampeh as usual...When I told the girl that we are at the end of the road and I gave her the road name, she said, "Sorry, I am not a local. I do not know that road, but if you had followed my direction, you would have been here by now." WTF??????

We stopped at a bus stop and I asked my parents to wait there while I walked further up for any signs of the hotel. NIL. ZILCH. Urggghhhh!!! I felt like wanting to squeeze somebody's throat..Why must you put someone who is not familiar with the area as the receptionist? Do you think that everybody who is going to stay at your hotel would be coming by car? Seriously, if you look up the London hotels in the website, they would usually give you the way to reach them by road (meaning that you are driving) and not by trains or any other public transports! Well, except for taxis, I guess, since we can tell the taxi driver that we want to go to that hotel and he would use the 'getting there' guide by the hotels!! ARSE!!!!

Fed up with the whole thing, I decided that we should take a bus or a taxi to reach the hotel. My parents had insisted that we just stay at the long-lost relative's house (which I have blogged about a while back). My dad had actually managed to call his aunty earlier that morning, and she had welcomed us to stay at her house, which I had declined since we had booked the hotel.

Anyway, we took a ride on a bus, which should have stopped at a place and we should have changed into another bus that was supposed to reach the hotel (according to my GPS). But telling the driver where you wanted to stop apparently didn't mean anything because the driver wouldn't stop unless you ring the bell. And since we didn't know where the place that we were supposed to stop was, and the screen on the bus also didn't state the place that we wanted to stop at, we actually rode the bus until we reached the final destination, which is in Hammersmith (and what a winding road too!)

And yes, I got really, really pissed off that I asked my dad to call his aunty again and told her that we were going to stay at her house for the night after all. Yup, lucky that we had an emergency back up plan. If not, we would have need to take the cab to the hotel and I just couldn't imagined how much we would be charged for the fares.

That was why we ended up in Turnpike Lane, and finally, we met with the long-lost English aunties and cousin. They had another visitor, so we had to sleep in the living room, which was not a problem at all. Just thankful that we had somewhere to sleep for the night and furthermore, had the opportunity to meet with the relatives. And had a good dinner that night (my dad's aunty was a chef at a hotel before she retired) so apalagi??? Hentam habis lah...Siap ada sambal belacan lagi tu....hehe....

(to be continued)

My London Adventure Part IV

After we checked out of the hotel the next morning, we walked towards the Earls Court Station. And as we reached the cross junction, we just realized that the station has a rear entrance which was very, very, VERY close to our hotel! The front entrance that we took when we arrived yesterday was quite a distance! hehe...The hotel should have put in their advertisement that people should take the rear entrance if they want easy access to the hotel! haiyaaaaa!!!

So, we went in via the back entrance. There were only machines selling tickets there, no people manning the ticket counter. There was a staff helping passengers with ticket purchases, so I just went ahead and bought the passes for the 3 of us at the machine. The guy helped me with the purchase, but he chose wrong ticket zones for us. But he said that I could upgrade the tickets before I travel, but it had to be done at the front ticket counter! haih! And then, he told me that the all-day passes were also good to travel on buses and trams. What??? And I have been purchasing all those bus tickets for the last 2 days for charity, was it? huhuhu...Takpe, takpe...Kita tak tau.... *bengang sebenarnya...hehe...*

At the front ticket counter, I waited for some time before a guy came to the ticket window that I was standing at. I explained to him that the guy at the rear entrance wrongly pressed the button at the machine for my tickets and I would like to upgrade the tickets so that they would cover more zones. He asked me, "Why did you purchase these tickets if you want to travel to more zones?" to which I replied that it was a mistake done by the staff at the rear entrance. He walked away with an angry face and I could clearly see from the glass window that he was cursing at me! I could actually read his lips!! Blardy fool!!! Manyirap la darah akak! Rasa nak give him a piece of my mind jer! Kurang ajar betul!! Kalau nak curse pun don't let me see it ok?? It was their staff's mistake, anyway!!!

My mood immediately soured after that. Since it was still quite some time for the next check in at the next hotel, I decided that we should go and see the Changing of the Guard at the Buckingham Palace. By the way, that day was Saturday, and there were quite a lot of upgrading services taking place at the underground stations.

When we reached Buckingham Palace, there were a huge crowd already waiting for the ceremony to start. By 10.00am, the security guards had already gathered people around and nobody was allowed crossing the area and we had to stay inside our group. The sun was glaring, but everybody waited patiently at their places.






























Anyway, snippets of what happened during the ceremony. This happens every single day of the year, and every other day during winter. Letihnyaaaa jadi guards!!! hehe....







































































Just as I thought we had had enough (2 hours standing under the sun in a crowded space), and we were about to walk out of our standing places, the lady security told us that we were about to miss the best part of the show! So, we waited for a while longer, and voilà, the gate nearest to us were opened, and the troops actually marched pass us! Many people had left before us, because we were not informed that the gate would actually open. Must be because they did not want everybody to flock in front of the gate..huhu...

Anyway, prior to that, we were informed and warned by the security people to take extra caution of our belongings because pickpockets and thief were at large during the ceremony everyday. Since we had our luggage with us, the security came to us many times to remind us to take care of our stuffs. And the lady security actually pointed to my Mum's pocket-sized and zipped al-Quran which she put inside one of the outer pockets of her luggage. She asked me, "Maam, is that a wallet?" to which I said no. "What is that? Is that some thing valuable? Because we have many bad people here everyday stealing stuffs from unsuspecting tourists" I said, "No, it's not a wallet. Just our Quran.." To which she replied, "That IS valuable, because my bible IS valuable to me" and then she laughed. Of course it is valuable to us la...But what I meant was it has no value for the pickpockets....Unless lepas dia curi Quran tu dia insaf ke...bagus gak....hehe....

After everything was over, we stayed a while under the trees at the park, eating sandwiches (sandwiches je la pun yang senang nak dibawa ke mana-mana kan?) They had set up lounging chairs in the park for people to have sun bath. Panas lah...tak kuasa...hehe...

Then, we took the subway to our next check-in hotel, the Kewbridge Hotel near Kew Garden.

(to be continued)

My London Adventure Part III

After a few photo shots at the Canary Wharf, we took the subway again, and headed to the Wembley Stadium. It was quite a distance, and by the time we reached there, it was nearly dark and only a handful of people were left in the train. We got stopped at the exit gates. Apparently, the tickets we purchased were not including the rides to the extended zone that Wembley was located. Thank God the lady at the exit let us out. I thought the whole day passes could be used to travel anywhere, but actually there were zones that were covered by a specific type of pass. Mano la den tauuuuu...hehe....

So, we took photos and lingered for a while there, eating our sandwiches for dinner. There was a concert being held at the Wembley Arena, and lots of people came for the concert. It was getting dark, and since I feared that our subway passes wouldn't let us ride the subway, I decided that we should take the bus. After all, I did purchase the all-day bus and tram passes also!

The bus ride back was quite an adventure, too. I couldn't seem to find the right route back to our hotel, because the bus stops at the Wembley area were quite scattered and the routes that each bus took were confusing. I decided to take the one that went directly to the final stop of the area, and then we would take another bus to go back to the city. But, when we arrived at the last stop, there were also different stops for different areas! I thought all buses would stop there, so it would be easy for us to find the right one to take to our hotel. Macam kat Puduraya kan? Haih!

So, after walking about some more (my legs were really killing me at the time), we took a bus. It was about 10pm already at that time. I thought of going to Oxford Street and then we could take a train to Earls Court. But, it was getting late, and I was scared that there would be no more trains when we arrive at Oxford Street. So, when I saw a subway station, I quickly asked my troop to get down so that we could catch the next train.

Alas! The services at that station were already stopped for the day! I could feel the blood draining from my face! Dang!!! And I felt really guilty for having to drag my parents along. If I could feel the pain in my body from the long walks, how would they feel then? Guilty, guilty!

So, I went back to the bus stop, studied the routes, changed to another bus stop, studied again, changed again and finally I saw the correct route that went directly to Earls Court. After waiting for quite some time, the bus came and I felt really, really relieved. Lesson learnt: Do not wander along until late at night if you don't know precisely how to get back to the hotel...hehe...

We all fell asleep as soon as we got ourselves cleaned up...

Tee hee hee....

Yesterday's conversation with His Little Highness:

Daniel: Shaponer....Shaponer...Shaponer.....
Mummy: Bukan shaponer la....TRANSFORMER....Trans...For....Mer....
D: Trans...po...ner....
M: Bukan ner, MER...MER!
D: Mer..mer....Shaponer....
M: Hmmmmmpppphhhh.....(gave up)

Later on yesterday:

D: Shaponer...Shaponer....
Ayah: (Mimicking him) Shaponer...Shaponer....
D: MER la Ayah! MER! No NER!!!!
Mummy: (Stumped for a moment, then....) Wakakakakakaka!!!!!

Inilah yang dikatakan ketam mengajar anak berjalan betul...kekeke....Dia sendiri pun salah sebut, ada hati pulak nak betulkan Ayah dia....kakakakaka.......