Busy weekend

The exhibition in conjunction with International Women's Day went into full swing over the weekend. With more crowd anticipated, many activities were held during the weekend.

I had however promised Kerp that I'd be attending his wedding reception in Kelana Jaya, so Saturday was my off day. After all the obstacles Kerp & Pinky (his wifey) had to go through, I made it a point to attend. I still went in the morning to Kinta City Shopping Complex to help set up the Buddies booth, and once the volunteer on duty arrived and after briefing him on what to do, I left things to him.

It was about 10.20 am by the time I made a move from Ipoh. I had promised an alumni senior of mine that I'd notify her once I leave Ipoh. She wanted to pass some goodies for me to distribute to the poor HIV families under my care, and she thought it would be better if she caught me before the wedding reception. I told her I'd usually reach the Damansara Jaya exit in 2 hours, and since yesterday I needed to take the Subang exit, I told her it would probably be 2 ++ hours.

But hey, I actually made it to Subang toll in 2 hours. I stopped after the toll, and noticed there was a text message from my senior, to say that she was waiting for me by the roadside in front of the CGC building. Got from her some clothes, pillows and a pair of ladies shoes.

Then off I went to Dewan MBPJ Kelana Jaya, where the wedding reception was held. The moment I got to the parking lot, I saw Raden Galoh and her family. RG too wanted to pass 3 bags of toys to be given to the infected/affected kids under Buddies. Ahh... great! I always prefer to make my trips to KL or anywhere else more than just a single purpose trip. This time, other than getting to attend Kerp's wedding reception as promised, I also managed to get a load of stuff to be given away to the poor HIV families.

Sorry, I didn't bring my camera along to the wedding, so no pics from me. But I did get to meet quite a number of fellow bloggers, among them were Dato Rocky, Kak Ena, Kak Ton, Mat Salo, Shah, Zorro, Elviza and of course, Raden Galoh. Many of Kerp's wheelchair friends also came.

I left right after the arrival of the royal guests, HRH The Regent of Perak & his consort. (Oh, bukan tak hormat my raja, but I had already eaten and was already outside the dewan when he arrived).

By about 4.30 pm, I was already back in Ipoh. It did occur to me to just drop by Kinta City for the exhibition, but I finally decided not to. I needed some rest myself. Besides, today, the last day of the exhibition, I was on the morning shift.

But hey, I still managed to mow the lawn (yep, using my brand new "kerbau") this morning before going for the exhibition!

Together with me on the morning shift was a young "temporary" volunteer. Temporary? Well, she was interested to become a volunteer, but she will only be around until August or so, as such we can't really take her in to meet our PLHIV clients and all (due to confidentiality issues). But taking her in to help with exhibitions and awareness campaigns wouldn't be a problem at all. And it would be good exposure for her!

2 volunteers and 2 buddy bears

Right behind our table, there were handcrafts... nope, these were not made of rattan, they were actually made using recycled magazines! Anyone interested to find out more, or if you wish to order (manalah tau, nak buat bekas hantaran ke, or nak buat souvenir items ke), you may contact Rita.

Performances on stage began at about 11.30 am or so. The Pink Champion of Perak (support group for breastcancer) started off with a mime.

Then the DJ called for 5 women to come on stage for a game. The game? Since the theme of IWD is "Equal Rights, Equal Opportunities - Progress for All", the women were supposed to spell Progress for All... backwards!

Next up, JAZZERCISE!

The jazzercise instructor and her team performing.

And this was the scene when she got members of the audience to join her on stage!

Oh no, I didn't join the jazzercise! Didn't want my body to shake on stage in front of everybody! Shy lah! After all, I had my share of exercise for the day when I mowed the lawn at home earlier in the morning!

But I did join the next event called "Drum Circle" organised by KAMI. Right now I can't for the life of me remember what KAMI stands for, but it's a family support group for mental illnesses. By this time, my shift was just over, and 2 other volunteers came to our booth to take over.

Yep, that's me on stage with a kompang just waiting for instructions.

Then a few of us exchanged intruments. First the kompang, then I got to hentam the... errmm... whatever-you-call-it drum.

There were a few other performances after that, but since my shift was already over, and I figured I needed some rest after a stretch of activities for the whole week, so by 3 pm I left.

Tomorrow, after office I'd better go to my NGO center to make sure that all the reports for our coming AGM are ready to be distributed. We need to send out the notice and reports to all members ASAP as our AGM will be at the end of this month.

I'd also better check out on Halimah... if her baby has been discharged from the hospital. She did mention to me that the baby had some "jangkitan kuman", but I don't really know what kind of infection she meant.

A blog reader has also donated some money through me to be given to Lin, who needs to go through an op in early April to remove her fibroid, so I'd better make sure I pass the money to her soon so that she doesn't worry too much about her finances for the time being.

Ah yes, back to normal routine...

Another long weekend

Ahh… another long weekend gone. The last weekend ie 18th – 20th December, I was in KL to attend my school alumni dinner. This weekend I was back in KL again. My nephew’s engagement was on Saturday in Kajang, so by Friday I was already at my brother’s house in Damansara Jaya.

When I was in KL last weekend, Yati sent me a text message informing me that her husband AJ had been transferred from the CCU to the normal ward. She did mention how worried she was, looking at her husband’s condition. Since the hospital’s visiting hours had been shortened of late, I haven’t had the opportunity to visit him at the hospital.

This week, another text message came, not from Yati but from my fellow volunteer who had been assigned as AJ’s buddy. AJ died early morning on Christmas day at the hospital. I was already at my brother’s house by the time the news reached me, so no, I didn’t visit. I decided to send my condolences to Yati via SMS and I apologized to her for not being able to visit. I will probably check on her later. Knowing Yati, I think she’ll cope. She already had plans to sell drinks to earn some income for herself and her children. And since she’s staying with her mother, at least she doesn’t have to worry about where to stay.

Since I so happened to be in KL this weekend, Mamasita, who also happened to be in KL for her son’s engagement, arranged for some sort of get-together with a few bloggers on Sunday. It was supposed to be a brunch affair, but the place she chose, a Korean restaurant, only opens at 11.30 am.

I wasn’t really sure where the restaurant was located – while I knew how to get to OU, within OU itself wasn’t familiar territory to me. So yep, me being me, I was early – the first one there. After finding out the location of the restaurant, I decided to ronda-ronda for a while before going back to the restaurant to meet up with the rest. As I was walking over to ronda-ronda, I saw a familiar looking lady. It was Dalilah aka Raden Galoh. Yayy! Got friend to chat with while waiting for the rest to come.

While I was chatting with Dalilah, a text message came in. It was from the organiser, Mamasita, informing me that she was already on the way and telling me to “tunggu jap!” For a while there I was thinking of replying her SMS to tell her that since nobody was around, I went back… :-) But in the end I decided to be a good girl…

After a while there she was… the ever smiling Mamasita… only this time I managed to catch her off guard, so this pic comes without her “iklan ubat gigi” smile… hehehe…

A few minutes later, Dr Rohaya, or better known as Raw, got there. Raw is Mamasita’s sis-in-law and also my junior in school, in fact we were both in the same school debating team many many moons ago.

And then the lady bloggers (plus a few husbands/sons who decided to sit at another table nearby) started trickling in. It was my first time meeting Desert Rose and Edelweiss.

Then came Kak Teh from London and Shahieda from Capetown. Waah… international bloggers meet lah this!

Tireless Mom dropped by for a while with her kids (tireless kids?) but they didn’t join us for lunch as they were going off to attend a kenduri somewhere. Kak Puteri Kama came later after I was getting bloody fool… oops, I meant bloody full…

Dengan penuh semangat Kak Puteri bercerita, apa jugalah dikelentongnya Dalilah tu!

Blogger Zendra came by when I was almost leaving. By 1.30 pm, I decided to make a move as I was planning to drive back to Ipoh after zohor. It wasn’t an easy task… the peluk-cium goodbyes took some time, and to add to that, masa tu lah masing-masing nak bergambar… including our Choc-a-blog kakak here from London…

And finally, what good were the guys there for if not to take group photos of the ladies huh?

It was nice to have met you wonderful ladies. Glad to know that this orang Perak was not the only peghak one around who was trying to figure out how to eat the Korean food... hahaha!

Over the weekend

No, no shopping for schooling needs over the weekend.

Right after my weekly pasar tani routine (a different kind of shopping), off I drove to KL to attend my alumni’s dinner. Now that I have a GPS, I no longer have to do my homework before heading to KL. Otherwise, usually I’d have to “study” the KL & Klang Valley Street Directory before going anywhere near the KL city centre!

So yes, I attended the TKC OGA dinner at Shangri La, KL.

Oh, just the usual things… all the pot pet pot pet when old friends meet… arrival of the royalties… speech by the Yang DiPertua… speech by the organising chair… makan-makan (of course lah, it was dinner anyway!)… and the entertainments…

I sat together with my batchmates somewhere at the back. When we wanted to take a group photo at our table, one of my friends called one lady who was standing at the back, thinking this lady was one of the hotel staff. The lady obliged and was cool about it so my friends all thought she was actually a hotel staff. I had been observing the lady earlier and had suspected that she was a bodyguard of one of the royalties.

Well, indeed she was. So yep, we got a mata gelap snapping pics for us! Hehehe…

Anyway, on Saturday night I was at Shangri La, then next day, on Sunday, I headed to Marriot KL to meet up with some friends. A group of friends, most of whom I had never met before. Out of these friends, I had only met two of them prior to this meet. These are fellow bloggers. Can you recognise them?

Thinking blogger?

I have been named for the Thinking Blogger Award by Kak Teh, Apandi and Raden Galoh. Why did 3 bloggers tag me? No, not so much because I got many people thinking, but because I'm such a slow thinker! Very slow to respond! But then again, if the award came with a prize instead of a price, I probably would have responded immediately... :-)

When Kak Teh first tagged me I had a few bloggers in my mind whom I wanted to name for the award. Before I had the chance to respond, my PC crashed. Hard disk couldn't be saved, so bye-bye to so many files which I haven't had the opportunity to save on my thumb drive... aargh!!

By the time I got back to the blogosphere, all the people whom I wanted to name for the award had already been named by other bloggers. Having lost quite a number of files in my old hard disk, I don't really have the time to bloghop to search for other potential recipients.

As such, I will have to respectfully withdraw from participating. Nevertheless, thank you to those who thought my blog was worthy enough to be named.