Saccharine Tidbits Anyone?

I'm finally back from my hiatus - more accurately speaking, I was down with the flu bug for almost a week. I have never stumbled upon a more "auntie" experience than the one I had today on my day trip to some island in Johor. Thank god for Nicholas Sparks and the psp, I have been able to resist succumbing to pure irritation from the ever friendly tour guide who blabbers in the crudest hokkien cum chinese ever. Unfortunately, Jake was perpetually annoyed because the booming voice of the tour guide was too much for his ipod earphones to handle.

I reckon that we literally laughed out so loud that she must have sensed the possibility of her presence and demeanor being the subject of our inside jokes. You see, this extremely interesting personality was my form of television entertainment for most of the journey in the coach. She is extremely exuberant when it comes to the topic of otah, never failing to describe it in an orgasmic manner. Then, she gives her patrons her two cents worth of Aushwaylia - go figure out what that is, it's pretty easy, no prizes though. And lastly, she radically switches at the spilt second from tour guide lady to a preschool teacher, constantly referring to the kids at the back as "little friends", or to be more specific, xiao peng you. As she took the orders of everyone on the bus for some local otah, maybe except the xiao peng you(s), she totally skipped us as if we were under Harry Potter's invisiblity cloak. I'm guessing that the undeniably audible laughter was the culprit.

I honestly do not mock this wonderful tour guide or think negatively of her, its just that her demeanor and articulation tickles my funny bone. That said, back to the topic of the old ladies that we encountered today.

It's funny how Jake was mentioning that this particular old lady whom I helped to carry her heavy bag of salted fish and fruit, would gladly pay 50 Malaysian dollars for a piece of fake jade, but wraps up a piece of leftover dry chicken from the dinner plate to cook porridge for her grandkids. This same old lady amused me earlier by exclaiming very loudly when the skies were pouring how she was only going to go down the coach and "have a look" at the local delicacy store - she was adamant about refraining from making any purchases but before I could read the next chapter of my book, she came up with the most bags.

After such an enriching experience, I can only conclude that without these old ladies, there is a possibility that households might just starve like Oliver Twist.

School was relatively dreadful this week and I hope the second week does not include me staring blankly out of the windows for two hours straight - cos that seriously screws with the mind and sanity of someone who isn't exactly an introvert. So slap me with more assignments or something; anything beats making imaginary friends with the birds outside.

- Andrew