Its been quite some time, no! Wait! Its never been a time since I was 5 (because at the time when I was 4 years old, my sister came to this world) that I’ve taken dinner with my parents, alone, with no grumpy sister or annoying brother by my side. After what seems like centuries later (or at least I can’t remember what it felt like because I was too young then) I have been given the opportunity to have erm, candlelight dinner with two people that I owe the world to for the rest of my life.

So, since its going to take some time to repay my parents back, so why not tonight since my other siblings are busy with their own activities. The plan was supposedly to have steambot near my place but as expected, the place was jamed packed with hungry humans before the night started to turn dark. By then, my dad was already asking for an alternative place to eat. As usual, I prefer to just keep quiet since I’m not the driver. However, tonight, mom decided to pressure me for an answer so I suggested the nearest air-con restaurant I know (very hot weather ma today). Since my parents have not been there before, I thought it could be a nice place to let them try something new.

The place was quite nice, too bad I did not take the camera along or I would have taken some pictures of the food there. At first, when my parents glanced at the menu, they had no idea what to order although I have given them some suggestions. I too was not really familiar with the place as I’ve only been there twice but I do know this place is all about food presentation and price.

Of course by then, my dad was already complaining about the cost of tonight’s dinner by the time he settled for the mango salad, lamb steak and ice lemon tea. After much reassurance from myself that I will settle the bill, he just kept quiet. My mum, on the other hand, ordered some dory fish with mustard sauce and hot jasmine tea while I had my favourite cabonara spagetthi and cold jasmine tea. Did I mention that their jasmine tea is absolutely wonderful? They mixed the pungent jasmine tea with honey to create a sweet taste that leaves you wanting for more tea!

The wait for food wasn’t too long and in no time, we were already digging through what we have ordered. Overall, it wasn’t too bad although I doubt my parents think so. According to dad, he said the food was too expensive while mum commented that the dory fish has a little fishy smell. When I asked if they would visit this place again, they quickly shook their heads and said no thank you. As mentioned before, they said this place was too expensive.

By now, everyone must be curious as to how much the bill was. Erm, it was about RM60 with 36 cents change inclusive of service tax. To me, I guess it was a little costly especially since dad did not even mentioned that he was full. As I am blogging now, he’s already rummaging through the fridge for something to eat. He did, however, mentioned that the price he paid I paid! for the lamb (which was about RM16++) could add in another RM20 or so and get a whole sirloin or something like TGIF.

Duh… next time remind me not to suggest any places anymore. I prefer so stay quiet, as always and only comment when I pay the bill.

My sister recently took up a temp job as a kuli. Poor thing. Actually its for her internship programme conducted by her college which requires her to work for a minimum of 100 hours. Why I call her kuli? Well, basically she’s working for 100 hours without pay. Anyone needs any kuli? Really poor thing. Its already so sad that you have to work but work without pay?! Moreover, because she’s taking up psychology as her main subject, she has to start working in some company which requires psychology-on-the-job and more specifically, child psychology.

After about a week or two working in a very renown franchise kindergarden near my place, I heard enough of stories to conclude that this kindi is really very “hap pok” to the poor children.

For example, the food that the daycare children eat are usually plain porridge. The porridge are cooked using really low grade rice. That is, what we call as beras pasir. Not only that, the porridge might as well be called water rice because the existance of the water is more than the rice. Moreover, its just plain porridge. How to eat?!

Then there’s also the occasional rice with soup. But guess what? The children might as well drink water because the soup is as salty as the taste of water with no ingrediants with a few pathetic bits and pieces of vege here and there.

The worst I heard was that there was once a kid celebrated his birthday in the kindi and there were leftover nuggets. So being a frugal principal, she actually “recycled” the nuggets but dipping them into the soup the very next day as an added ingrediant for the children to eat. Wa, what a bonus!

What kind of human would let children eat leftover food? One of my friend asked if it was a very budgetted kindi but I told her that it wasn’t. And even if it is, no one would really treat a kid that way, right? I mean these kids are only 3-4 years old and I’m sure any parent of theirs won’t approve of eating yesterday’s food. I think even the parents also won’t eat it la!

Really outrageous!

In the material world, its hard to see anyone with a big heart. Its not surprising. Take a look when you eat food courts or coffee shops, various people come approach you to “donate” some money. Most of the time, many people will just shun them away. Even me is one of the people and its not a big wonder at all. These people most of the time are just there to take opportunity of your kindness or is most of the time able-ed people that sell you soft toys for sky rocket prices.

However, last sunday morning, when I was out taking breakfast with my family, I saw kindness that is pretty rare in the city. In a coffeeshop in Serdan, a man (with down sydrome, I think) was carrying a pretty heavy weight of prawn crackers and was going from table to table seeking for customers. Most of the time, the customers would just turn him down and he would walk on the to next table hoping that the next one would buy from him. As he approached one of the table in the restuarant, he asked a man if he would like to purchase some prawn crackers (actually, his speech ability was a little slurred due to his disability). At first, I thought the man would as other people did, shun him away. However, the man instead turned and asked politely how much would a pack cost. The prawn cracker seller told him, “RM3 sir”, and the man purchased 2 packs. The prawn cracker walked away happily, knowing that he is 2 packs lighter.

Perhaps, many would think that there isn’t anything special about this man, but for me, I was touched at his kindness mainly because he was a man that doesn’t believe in buying prawn crackers. And that man is my father.

P/s : The prawn cracker’s weren’t that nice.