A SNEEZE NOT TO BE MISSED

Started the week with a seminar on 'Geography of Food'

Love the art works and the colours in the background

Wednesday was at Felicia's investiture

Thursday was a reflection session

Round of sharing among friends

CNY celebration and lunch for some senior citizens

Passing the baton to the new ones

At Yishun Safra's Eatzi

Can't wait to dig into my crayfish

More choices available here now

Good bye and farewell to Fahmy who's going to Tasmania

Two's a company, Three's a kaypoh

Boiboi needs some sleep after the grilled chicken

End the week with FOOD too!

LET'S CELEBRATE WHILE I BREAK...

Prior to the long Chinese New Year holidays, I was busy meeting up with friends to celebrate or or just have fun in one way or another. There was a seminar and an investiture to attend plus a makan session for a farewell and graduation. There was also a lunch for senior citizens to host. It was a real hectic week and it took its toll on me.

I fell sick during the long break and resorted to drinking barley water and drowning myself with more liquid and tasteless porridge. My lips were cracking up and my super loud non-stop sneezing brought tremor reaching 7.5 on the Richter Scale to my whole neighbourhood. My husband warned me that another sneeze from me, our whole block would collapse in a rumble, like a pack of cards. He even planned on buying more life insurance in case I brought the block down and he was unable to make a quick exit, he said.

My maid is no source for comfort either. She complained of never hearing such loud sneezes before. Not even in her whole kampung (village) where she came from in Sragen, Indonesia, she claimed. Where would she be taking refuge when I start my volley of sneezing? Behind closed door with earplugs stuff in her ears. Why am I surrounded by people who can't appreciate sneezing as soothing music to their auditory senses?

Jokes aside, I must admit that I do sneeze real loud. I could see people from my opposite block putting their heads out from their kitchen windows like a vulture, looking out for that culprit who had broken their quiet moments with a jolt. I wonder how many of my neighbours had choked onto their fishball or shove their chopsticks into their nose instead upon hearing my ear-drum bursting sneeze.

The nature in the way our HDB blocks are built does not help either. With so many blocks standing close together, you could practically put your hand out and pluck the banana from your neighbour's dining table of the opposite block. What I am trying to say is that, whenever I sneeze, the sound echoes and increases the decibel.

I can't help it if I have two large lung cavities that take in more oxygen and when the time comes for the carbon dioxide to be expelled because of the irritation down my respiratory tract, I would just let go of the stale air like a compressed accordion. I would feel more comfortable and relief with as much air being released through the loud sneezing than try to snuff or silent that dreadful sneeze.

I lost out on the extended Chinese New Year holidays because of the flu. Very 'rugi'. I had actually planned for a Batam Escapade but decided against it, fearing that the shops might not be opened for me to raid them. I nearly jumped at my cousin's suggestion of driving up to Mersing, staying overnight and witnessing the eclipse on Sunday. But the cold and the flu had overtaken and ruled over my body. My nasal, deep husky voice had let people mistake me for a lounge and even a rock singer. I swear I could clobber that guy over the phone who addressed me as a 'Mr' if I had not put the phone down in anger and disgust but instead asked for his identity. Didn't he know he had been talking to the lady with the nightingale's voice who would be able to cajole Samson eat his greens from her hands and David the Goliath lull in his sleep like a gentle baby?

I know why I fell sick. Insufficient sleep and going to bed past midnight consecutively on many nights were the reasons. That always happens to me especially when there is lot of work to be done and everything needs my attention at one go. I wish at times I were an octopus, to really multi-task simultaneously and have more time to pamper myself. And for the past years, without fail, I always fall sick during Chinese New Year. And this year history repeats itself.

Hey you flu bug, you're not going to get me in 2010 during CNY again! I don't need to be cooped up in the home again. I hate you! I am going to stock up on my 'jamu' or herbal supply from my next Batam trip to stay healthy, robust and invicible to virus, germs and bacteria.

By the way, I don't need any insurance agent to be knocking at my door either!