Updates…

Halimah & her baby…

I called up Halimah last week to find out when next she’d be coming to Ipoh next for her hospital appointments. Since I got a box of baby’s stuff recently from a donor, I was thinking maybe I’d send her home together with the stuff. Her kampong is not listed in my GPS.

I was taken by surprise when she mentioned that while she went home about a week after delivery, her baby was still at the hospital since born (that was about 3 weeks ago).

“Tak dok hospital tunggu anak ke?” I asked.

“Saya dalam pantang kak.”

Laa… for the last 2 weeks she just let the nurses take care of her baby. She didn’t even visit.

Anyway, pantang or no pantang, she had to come for her appointment at Ipoh GH yesterday. I told her to call me when she’s in Ipoh.

So yes, yesterday afternoon she called me from the hospital, at the baby’s ward. This time she’d be staying at the hospital with the baby. Finally! Only parents are allowed in, so no point visiting. I told her to inform me when she’s going home so I can send her the box of baby’s stuff that I have. I didn’t offer to send her home though… in case I’m not free then. But I do hope I will be able to send the box of baby’s stuff to her soon, I need more space in my room (to dump other stuff??)…

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Lin and her surgery

Remember I mentioned about Lin having to undergo a surgery to remove her fibroid? Well, she’s supposed to be hospitalised today and the surgery is supposed to be tomorrow. But when I went to visit her last week, she told me she was scared and was thinking of postponing the surgery. She said she wanted to try other methods first (not bomoh I hope!) to reduce the size of the thing. If that doesn’t work, THEN she’d go for the surgery. I told her that if indeed she decided to postpone the surgery, she’d better inform the doctors ASAP.

I called her yesterday to find out her decision and whaddaya know… she did postpone/cancel it. I bet she must have slept better last night! Her next appointment will be in June though… so let’s see if her “other method” works before the next appointment!

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Mrs K and her children’s bus fares

Mrs K’s 2 schooling children’s bus fares are covered by our Children Education Fund. Since I don’t trust them with cash (based on past expreriences with the family), instead of banking in the money into Mrs K’s bank account, I told her to get me the bank account of the bus driver, and yeah, I got the account details. And since I don’t want to go through the trouble of having to go to the bank every month to bank in the money, or to transfer the amount online every month (I may forget), I decided to do so via standing instructions to the bank. Every 1st of the month, the needed amount will be automatically transferred to the bus driver’s account. Which means there is no bank-in slip for Mrs K to show to the bus driver as proof that the amount has been paid.

Well, 2 days ago, I got a text message from Mrs K, saying the bus driver insisted that she show him the bank in slip as proof that the bus fares had indeed been banked in. He doesn’t have time to go check at the bank. I don’t know what Mrs K told him, but it seems the bus driver didn’t believe her. I told Mrs K to get him to call me direct.

The bus driver called me during my asar prayer… and so I didn’t answer the call. So he immediately called Mrs K and scolded her for lying to him. Well, after my prayer, I saw there were 2 missed calls from the same number. Although I don’t usually return calls to unfamiliar numbers, I figured it could be the bus driver. So I called back, and yes, it was him indeed. I explained to him the whole thing, about the children’s bus fares being covered by my NGO, how and when the money is transferred to his bank account etc. I told him that I didn’t want to give cash to Mrs K as I wanted to be sure the money is indeed used to pay the bus fares.

The bus driver didn’t sound as rude as Mrs K had described him to be. Probably like me, he too didn’t trust Mrs K and only believed the story after talking to me.

Looks like I’m not the only one who doesn’t trust her.