Another Saturday in Geneva

Les Samedis aux Geneve can be very boring and lonely. So if like me, you are alone on a weekend in between meetings, be prepared to be creative or settle for less. This time of the year though, being alone in this fair city by the lake is quite bearable even if your friends and countrymen have heavily hinted of being tres occupe and bade a firm a lundi just before lunchtime on friday.

So there I was, really at a loose end, after having checked out of one hotel and checked into another and being disappointed for not getting a room with a clear view of Mont Blanc and Vieille Ville. Really not in the mood to complete the report or unpack or let such a beautiful day go to waste! So down to the lake i went, to take advantage of the free pass for hotel guests courtesy of the public transport authority. Made ambitious plans to take the bus, the tram and the boat and wander around till the sun goes hiding...well, we'll see.

Took the bus and stopped at Secheron to trek down the park as far as the Perle du Lac restaurant and walked back again all the way to Quai du Mont Blanc, then onto the yellow and red boat to Geneve Plage and walked around the teeny weeny bit of sandy area wherefrom this part of the lake got its name. Too far to walk to Jardin Anglais, so au bateau back to Port des Muettes. What a lot of people, what a sunny, breezy day! Well, one can only ride the mini train to Jardin Botanique or Vieille Ville, or stare at the Jet d'eau and read all the names of famous watch makers on the skyline, so many times...Omega, Piaget, Hans Leutenegger, Tissot, Franck Muller... i remember checking out the prices of Franck Muller watches on my first visit and read with amusement, prix a partir de CHF35,000/=...The chill came quickly to a tropical being compared to these locals and temperate tourists, and it was not solely because of the sudden gust of spring breeze on the lake.

There was still a few hours of sunlight left, and to get warm, retail therapy would be the best option. Walked to Stand (that's pronounced exactly the way my kampung folks in Teganung say Sungai Tong in a hurry) and found myself on the tram to Moillesulaz to stop at Bel-air. Yes, that is the name of Geneva's own Oxford Street/Newbury Street/5th Avenue/Rodeo Drive/Orchard Road/Jalan TAR (some time back) /Bukit Bintang/The Curve; you got the idea! Well the glitter of Globus and Bongenie was not for me, a Prada or Longchamp would look somewhat suspect or at most, a clever first copy on me! So cuci mata at affordable Swatch and ambil bau at L'Occitane, then just let these mocs take me to their happy place, the cafe in fnac, for some iced tea and live music. Oh, this is a French/Suisse equivalent of Borders, my favourite shop in all of Geneve after les chocolatiers.

The bartender who also held the key to the WC pretended to dutifully escort all ladies in need to answer nature's call. Some light-hearted banter in broken French finally got me the iced tea and vegan quiche, then back to listening to a heavily accented Mary Jane and some pseudo Jason Mraises by the 3-piece band, till the tea and quiche became history. So off i went down to the rez (de chaussez) where they had moved the CD section. First the recommended songs, some jandb's, then the new world/African and Latin, no, no rap, some violin concertos and back to Jazz. One by Melody Gardot kind of set the mood for the evening...nostalgic words but not sad, of being alone but not lonely and mostly of missing the ones that make the heart smile.

I wandered out of fnac at closing time, the sun still smiling and i was in dire need of a seat so boarded a passing tram to nowhere. Well, it turned out to be the one for Moillesulaz again so i rode all the way to the terminus near Caran d'Ache hq, then back all the way out to Avanchet on the other side of the lake, arriving outside my hotel at Gare Cornavin, just in time for maghrib. Some salmon pizza from Manor to smooth the report writing, a little unpacking and a half-hearted attempt at uploading the photos...then it was bed-time, dreaming of a Sunday in the sun.

Kampung Tanpa Halaman

Wish I were with Zara. I am a bad, bad grandmother. Zara is going to be 2 weeks old and I have yet to see her. Well, the truth is, I am not a very assertive person. I just don't know how to broach the subject with my boss or go into HRMIS and apply for a whole week's leave right after returning from a three day most needed vacation of sorts in my kampung tanpa halaman (village without compound). True, I seldom go on leave other than the occasional medical and there remains a total of 69 days to my name, but assertion is not my middle name. So I have not gone to see 13-day old Zara.

It is a love-hate relationship of sorts that I have with that place south of the border I call my kampung tanpa halaman. So many reasons to hate yet many more memories to love, the way I love my 3 year stay on the 25^th floor of Great World City. Yes, a building is a city there but well, a village to me. Spent 3 hari raya eid-ul-fitr in that kampung and made real nasi dagang. And since down on the ground there is no compound to shout about, actually up to 5 floors below my apartment is a shopping complex, it is to be sure my kampong tanpa halaman.

That April visit was the first time I was back there since I left, walking down memory lane with precious people from that part of the past doing the things we used to do then,......going to Tong Seng for chicken rice then ice cream in the mall, and to River Valley for nasi padang, and hang out all afternoon at the bookstore until it was time to wander into the restaurant for dinner and then spill out into the crowd on Orchard Road for that long, long walk back to the hotel.

Anyway, I could not make the short non-chalant walk up to the boss to ask for leave after that holiday, neither could I bring myself to ask for a week or so off to go see my Zara this month, since I'll be away from office close to a fortnight, to attend meetings at my other kampung tanpa halaman. Yes, I go to this place so often, it does feel like I am going back to kampung! But almost always, I stay in a hotel, no halaman, just Rue de Lausanne outside the hotel.

So here I am sitting at the concourse of St. Pancras international, wondering what Min and Eez thinks of their Mama and one day, what Ary and Zara will think of their TokTok. I hope they forgive their yellow-bellied grandmother who has been forming a whole gamut of feeble excuses and laughable reasons for not applying for the time-off and making arrangements to go to Doha and see them.

The gentleman sitting beside me on the flight over was actually visiting his brand new grandchild here in London, before he flies off to New York. He is even worse off than I am, even though I say so myself. It took him 4 months to come see his grandchild who was born in January. But will I break or match his record? I pray neither! I will go see Zara soon, well before she is 4 months old and goes home to her kampung halaman for the summer and hari raya.

Welcome Little Zara@Peanut

So the last time i posted anything on this page was 4 August last year....ape mimpinya hari ni rasa nak menulis?!

I received the news at 5.20pm Malaysian time....A tiny little bundle of anugerah Allah arrived in Doha today, all of 3.135 kg of joy to Eez and Amin and may be Abang Ary!...Alhamdulillah! Baby and Mummy doing really well, i'm told...Alhamdulillaaah....

Been going back and forth between Flickr and Facebook, waiting for her photos...but i guess the happy Daddy has not had a free moment to get the photos up yet.

I should go to bed...Good night little Zara, it's morning really...will tell you all about how it feels to be your grandma next time!

Almost Full Quorum

This feels rather strange, writing this post, i mean. It's the same feeling i had the last time i tried writing again after stopping for a couple of weeks; present case being four.

Well, a lot of things have been happening in the country, contributing to my getting nauseated by the antics of the players and the commentaries of most of the onlookers. In a way, i have been waiting for the nausea to subside before writing again, so the sick feeling in my stomach does not become too obvious. I would like to maintain a certain dignity here and not stoop to slander and vulgar language in my posts.

And life has been going on comme d’habitude for me.

Two Saturdays ago Chah and i were at the airport again, waiting for Eez and Ary to come home from Doha. We had to hurry from the car park as the flight had landed when we arrived at KLIA. But it was a long, long wait at the railings again, more so because i just could not wait to see my one and only grandson, Zachary.

Well, it took Eez a whole hour to come out through the glass doors at Arrivals. That must have been a major feat too, considering poor Eez was all alone, handling the suitcases, and of course Ary. All the placard men had gone and the meet-and-greet area was quite empty when i heard a child crying and saw this little head with rather sparse hair bobbing along the glazed part of the glass wall before reaching the doors. True enough, it was a very tired and grumpy Ary on the trolley being pushed by an equally exhausted Eez.

It took a couple of hours for Ary to do the salam with me, and a couple of days to run to me and give a High Five, or allow me to carry him. Getting reacquainted with Ary took so much longer than i thought it should as i kept disappearing to go to work, coming home only to find that it was well past Ary’s bedtime. First i had to work on that particular Sunday before the Green Room Briefing, then work into the nights for the rest of that week and the whole of this last one; a mad scramble to meet the MAD deadline.

This job as Government Servant, especially in guarding the country’s economic interest, is sheer hard work, contrary to what most people would like to believe. Sometimes, work even comes before family. So can you blame me for getting nausea attacks when irresponsible people behave in ways that would make us regress into oblivion?

Well, this weekend i semi-vegetated, just to recover. It has been a particularly nice weekend, really. Amin is finally home from Doha and with Eez and Ary, the three of them are back from Jelebu. We semi-celebrated Eez’s and Tok-tok’s birthday after JayJ got caught with the surprise cheese cake. And because Chah has gone diving again, we are only almost in full quorum!

Search Your Hearts

Well, a whole week has passed, and the hearts have not been back. I don’t just want the new ones, i want the old ones back…OK, we’ll give it a bit more time….may be email those good people again…

In the meantime, thank you Cak, AG, Lee, TLady and Ka for visiting and leaving comments; thank you to those who left without a comment too, well may be next time, when you have time.

The feedjit has informed that unidentifiable non-my visitors to this page include ones from Metz, Lorraine, fr; Cambridge, Ma, us; Toronto, Ontario, ca; Cairo, Al Qahirah, eg and Norfolk, Va, us.

Sad to say, although they all sound quite familiar, and Min, Eez and Ary went to Cairo late last year; and i went here http://www.norfolk.gov/about/ to see if I’d been to Norfolk; i have really only been to one of these places, i.e. Cambridge, Ma. Actually that is the place Quan, the twins and i stayed for an entire year, just over a decade ago.

Do I want to write about our life in Cambridge, Mass today? Oh it was a whole lifetime ago….may be next time.

Today i need to finish my Brief. It’s a long brief, yes this is a long brief, made longer because it has to be jargon-free and can be read and understood by non-practitioners.

What? Work on Sunday? Not a habit, just simple accountability and responsibility.

And that is not as much as i can commend most people with, these days, not even simple a&r. And the sad thing is, this absence of a&r is the very thing that is bringing shame, bringing this beloved country of ours down. I'm no so-po blogger so i'll let others do the talking while i can still contain my wrath.

In the meantime, search your hearts!
Well, see u in my next write!