You say Po-tey-to, I say Po-tah-to

Being married to a person who has a totally different culture does not mean a bed of roses all the time. People think that being away from home, having someone to care for me and the kids and having a new life is like a life of a dream come true. Sometimes its not…

The culture. Being the 'orang melayu' who doesn’t have the foggest idea about what 'social grace' american version is all about, tend to sound so square and ignorant. Not being permitted to even step into a bar and clubs or even an all night concert when I was young also did not make me feel as if I was missing something when growing up. I think I have gained strong family relationships with my family, and that my parents at that time were my loyal companions. Yup, my curfew was 5pm on weekends.

When I moved here, the word 'clubs' and 'bars' and 'going out drinking and dancing' sounded pretty offensive to me. I mean, I was not brought up with all those. But I learned, as I get exposed with co workers who love to party. I learned to mingle and get to know the concept of 'having pure fun'. The visit to the bar was like an 'every 2 months' or celebration venue for birthdays, going aways or just pure innocent de stress. Yes, I have great fun when I go there. Being there for just an hour is always enough for me, when the husband would be waiting outside the bar an hour later (please, you might think that I would be too drunk to be going home by myself? Diet coke for me only please). I feel that I really do not have to drink to have fun…but sure is fun watching co workers get tipsy after a few drinks hehehe.

Another is…being 'clingy' to my husband. Yes, I am clingy to my husband. When I moved here, I could not be left alone by myself (the kids were still back in Singapore then). I would demand to be taken everywhere the husband would go. I am still not use to not having the husband next to me at bedtime and not having him around me when I am back from work. Sometimes I would get pretty irrationally moody when he has a task to do, like watching a musician friend perform at a local club or down in LA or even taking pictures of musician friends who are doing recording in the evening. But I am still not as bad as before, sometimes I would appreciate him not being around for a couple of hours in the evening :)

Emotional grief. Would that make you nervous? Back home, it is 'taboo' to show your emotions to others. You're to be seen and not heard. Keep feelings to yourself and deal with it yourself..but not here. People here tend to tell you when they don’t like you, swear at you when they hate you or even shove you away when they don’t want to see you. Rudeness? To asians, yes, way beyond rudeness, that’s what I call sometimes macam orang hutan, tak pandai mengawal emosi (cakap melayu supaya tak kena pelangkung dengan sang suami, but I didn’t mean him, you know what I mean). It can be a rather common scenario to find that some asians who don’t know how to speak up tend to get 'trampled on' by others. Lets exclude the 'nyonyas' who physically trample on others in the market Jadikan, sesungguhnya kita orang melayu sungguh berbudaya, bercakap halus dan kekadang sensitif. Samada kita suka atau tidak, kita harus memberanikan diri kita untuk 'put your foot down and tell them that we're normal beings like them'. Did you also ever hear that asian wives tend to look nice, gentle, docile and charming in public but can be such terrors in the house? The asian wives kalau dah naik loktang, that we're worst than the demon? Hehehehe…enough said about that.

In a nutshell : Beng married to someone who is totally different from my culture takes 200% effort to make a marriage work. Macam barangan 'made in China' versus 'made in America'…one is tougher than the other, one is totally different from the other. I love my 'made in America' husband and will always do :)

If I were to factorize every element here, this entry will be a 10 paged one. Lets stop here and let me think of more to share. Readers, do not hesitate to share if you have any in your mind!

Back for now...

I am still running around like a headless chicken. Visitors came and went, same goes with Christmas and the long weekend is almost over. I am having my pre-menstrual tension and seems like I am gong to bite someone's head for no apparent reason at all.

The sister in law's wedding is only 5 weeks from now. The daughter and I had to brave the post Christmas crowd this morning at 7am to get her a nice black outfit for the wedding. Now, we have the shoes to look for.

My kebaya that mak brought for me from Singapore does not fit anymore. The black dress that I wore to a friend's wedding 2 years back does not fit me either. So I will have to hit the stores to get an outfit for the wedding.

We managed to go for a long drive yesterday with Lilac and family to Bear Valley...GREAT FUN!!!

Busy busy busy

I know, I have been quiet lately. And I shall be quiet for the rest of the week due to these issues :

- There will be visitors all week this week. A friend from Singapore is coming on business and we're playing host. Another visitor will be coming on Thursday. Its my gf (founder of rantauan.com) from LA and here to spend time with us till Christmas Day.

- Due to the previous point, the cleaning brigade is hard at work. I will be on vacation on Wednesday, so that I could :

- Clean the house. Steam the carpet, clean my room, the kids room and the laundry house.

- Make some curry puffs for the holidays and bring to the office the next day.

- When the visitors come, we will be busy 'mencekik' at our favorite restaurants, and bringing them sightseeing. Thank goodness a Christmas party was cancelled and brought forward to New Years Party.

- I barely have time to breath…barely! Even at work!

- I miss Ayu already, I feel like crying. We had a great great dinner at her place….had so much fun! Now that shes not here, the phone will be so quiet. But she will get her car back from our house, with a trunkload of stuff, hehehe.

I will miss you as much as you will miss me (hehehe). Take care and have a great holiday!

UPDATE : Tuesday, 12/20/05

Busy day at work. Had a 7:30am meeting and our boss started his day here after being on military duty for 4 mths! I am soooooooooooo glad that he's back, I was in tears when I saw him!

Got a $200 holiday gift certificate. Applied for amazon.com and got myself an iPod Nano!!! Thanks to Gerald, for suggesting that I get the nano instead of the shuffle. So this will be my 2nd mp3 player. The first one is my 30gb Creative Zen mp3 player.

The first visitor is here. His name is Joseph, here for only 2 days on business. He's taking the 'David Tour' right now, in the midst of the rain and dinner tonight at our fave restaurant.

Its pouring outside! So can't go shopping. :(


2nd Update, Thursday night 12/22/05
Got back from work. Did my 400 calories burned stepper exercise. 2nd visitor has come! Issy brought loads of indonesian food, nasi bungkus, nasi urap and all. So what if i am on diet? Mencekik terus mencekik!

Fondue business...

The husband received a phone call from our singaporean friend, Winston. I know, this is follow up from the voicemail Mardiana left me. Sorry Mardi, your kak Ely nih asik terlupa jer nak call back!

So…Winston said that its going to be a Fondue dinner party. OK…(see Ely's eyes looking up the ceiling with a huge ? On her forehead) fondue…sounds like 'fun do'! I heard about this fondue business thingy but made the husband ask Winston, what EXACTLY will we expect from at this dinner? So the husband, very well trained darling here, asked him if its high carb (that’s my ultimate question!).

According to Winston and the internet, fondue is... cooking your food while eating with cheese or chocolate dipping. Like steamboat lah…instead of soup in the pot, its melted choc or cheese and the pot is smaller. OK…(Ely getting nervous) food dipped in chocolate and cheese. The cheese I can accept but the chocolate? I love them chocs but sugar? Ini sudah melanggar undang2 South Beach Diet! But that’s OK, I know a party would not be complete without Ely and the husband. I am still going there and will mencekik. But I might also bring salad and some healthy stuff….jangan marah Mardi :). I guess 35 to 45 minutes on the stepper after the fondue affair on Saturday night eh?

Besides fondue party, I have also heard of 'Lingerie party' and other parties. As you know America, create as you go!

Have any of you gone to any 'never heard of this kinda' party before?

*Cakap pasal fondue, teringat steamboat. Maybe I should invite friends for steamboat party eh?*

Being a lefty...

Whats wrong with being left handed? When I was back home, being left handed was not a common thing. Firstly, according to our culture, using your left hand is not a good thing unless you're 'cleaning' yourself. You're not allowed to give and take with your left hand, not allowed ot eat with your left hand, or so the elders say 'tangan syaitan'. Yes, I do get insulted when my husband takes things from me with the left hand.

I still can do things with my right hand. I use the computer mouse with my right hand, like normal people and I use a pair of scissors with my right hand too. If anyone is curious, I do eat rice with my right hand but left with cutlery.

I remember when I was little, my parents would swat my left hand when I was eating a bar of chocolate with the left hand. They would say, 'tangan mana?'…ooops! And when I was in school, the cikgu would say,'Suraya (she didn’t like calling me Ely, she said it was 'unmalay'), kenapa awak tak tulis dengan tangan kanan awak?' Eh eh cikgu nih, as if I could just automatically switch my right hand ability to write?

Until I moved here, that’s when I saw that being left handed is common after all. Just the management section alone, there are 4 left handers out of 7. Down the sales floor, a bunch more. I mean, I have never seen that many left handers in my entire life before and it sure felt good to be normal! You know, sometimes we do high fives when we meet fellow left handers.

In a forum group that I am in, there was a posting asking if it was normal having a kid who is left handed. Are there any impairments or would the kids be inconvenienced when he/she grows up? Heck no, its totally normal to be left handed

I have heard good things about being left handed. That we're more artistic, sharper in thoughts cos we think with our right brain? I don’t know how true those are (maybe all of the above?) but I sure love being left handed.

Buy, buy,buy...

"5 blouses, 3 pants…that’s not enough. Just bought 2 new pairs of boots online. The iPod is on sale, should I get a 2nd MP3 player?"….yup that was me talking to myself.

Last week had been such a bad bad bad bad week for me. I spent quite a bit of money on just about anything. New clothes, new pairs of boots….cos they're all on sale! I know, I know, I always say that sale goers are all suckers, so I am…I am one sale sucker! Our company had a travel fair, all at 50% off, and guess what I got? A backpack for myself, a leather purse, a pair of gloves to match with my scarf, a journal book, an unbrella…did I miss anything?

I know…I am getting bad. Its not that I do this all the time. But xmas sales here can make a person go nuts!

Now my only mission is looking for an iPod shuffle for myself. I just wanted a small mp3 player as oppose to the 30GB Creative Nomad that I already have. But iPods have been sold out everywhere except online, you see, I don’t want to shop online, I want to go to the store, touch it, pay for it and leave!

Well anyway, enough said, my co worker and I are going to the city at lunch to check out the new store H&M…ayu, will let you know if I get anything ok.

In the meantime, here's a happy picture of me at Jen's place last weekend. Happy giler kan?

Holidays...

The holiday season has come again. That’s when after Thanksgiving, where the stores go on sale and everyone scrambling to get christmas gifts at the best prices.

Now that Christmas is about 2 weeks away, Christmas parties are everywhere. The kids have their own party and sleepovers, the parents (that’s me and the husband lah) have our own housewarming/Christmas party/parties.

Hmm, it gets pretty hard when the party for the parents are so far away (like Sacramento, 3 hrs drive each way) and we have to drop the kids to their respective parties and pick them up if they decide that they do not want to sleepover. This problem is more for my daughter, whos gfs' places are 10 minutes drive away but 50 minutes to take a bus.

And then she wanted to get gifts for her gfs. OK ibu suggested homogenic gifts for her 2 gfs, nope, she wants unique gift for each of her friend. Aiyoh, you see, my daughter nih kan, takes a long time when she does shopping. If she does shopping for herself, it can take 30 minutes just to select one pair of earrings. Imagine how long it will take to get for 2-3 friends??? Ibu slapped her forehead when Mas said that she was going to get a unique gift for each friend.

The son, he's always the 'I don’t know, I don’t care' person. No sound from him except for whinings in the morning telling paps (the husband) that his eye was twitching, that his leg hurts, that he thought he had a fever, etc etc. We received a letter from the School District last weekend, inviting us for open houses of 4 different High Schools in the area. The husband read it and said,'Nah, Mat won't go to High School till 2 years later'. Errr, hello? Mat is going to High School next fall (next September)!!! Hah…how time flies when we're having fun. The son is going to 9th grade (Secondary 3) next year and we still thought that he is not there yet. He has been getting awesome grades this year…with 3.675 GPA, so a better school will be the one for him.

As the year is drawing to an end, I feel that this year had been a trying year for us. Our family life had been 'frozen' due to the husband's injury. So we had to put our moving project on hold. Hence, the thought of having an addition to the family will be on hold too (need more space mah!).

Now that the husband is 70% recovering from his operation, has his career path all set up for him, the search for a bigger house will be on its way pretty soon…maybe sooner than we might expect. Addition? AFTER the move…which I don’t know when..so just watch out for it ok!

My mind, my soul, my energy...

Sometimes I feel that the world can be unkind to me. A positive person that I am, I can also have the feeling of being down, of being so drained out by problems, which are not mine.

Please do not get me wrong, I live for myself, my family and for others, especially my friends who trust me. But when my job involves solving problems, management problems, I sometimes get pretty mangled by this.

My typical day…lets say a Monday…no...there is no typical day actually but here I go.

Come to the office. If I was off on Friday, my emails would have at least 50 unread messages (all time sensitive), and then there are messages on my desk from either my peers or the management for immediate attention. If there are network problems then that’s another task for me to take on apart from the projects with tight deadlines. Did I mention personnel problems too? Now this is like a one day solving task for me if it involves me being the management side and a co worker who might get 'nailed' over what she did. When the boss leaves the office at 5pm, I could just count to 20 and he would call me on the phone and starts bantering over the day's happenings. And here I am again, listening to the boss and saying 'I know how you feel.' etc etc. I love my job, I don’t huff and puff but it could drain my energy out of my system pretty bad that come 5:30pm, all I want to do is just go home.

When I get home, it’s a flip of the coin again. Ely's still so dazed from thinking all day but when we get home, the kids will have their problems as well. Mas will have her 'friend'/'crush' or even physical (like PMS) problems and Mat will have no problem (most times, thank God!) except for picking on his sister and making her scream! The husband will have his recap for the day or when we need to punish one of the kids, we have to sit down and discuss what would be the ideal punishment. Yes, we argue over making decisions, sometimes we end up not talking to each other because of that (ibu the life saviour, paps the punisher and vice versa).

And then we have online problems. Getting emails from my sister at times pouring her feelings, and my beautiful friends who pour as well. I know that I don’t or sometimes can't solve problems. But I always make a point to be available when they need me. It makes me feel good knowing that my friends have been heard and that they feel better after a nice online discussion. My friends have been wonderful to me especially when I am down or angry or feeling stupid.

And all this everyday work that I am doing, is more on problem dealings. I learned one thing though, that friendship and family ties work both ways. I give, I take, I support. Maybe I should repeat again, SUPPORT...my family and friends most times when they need me. And I am not afraid to share my views should I see anything which I do not feel comfortable with and not afraid to share my views in a positive manner. I will never bring my friends and family down should I not like what they do, or I would never call myself a good friend. Good relationship does not see the distance between friendships and ties. Good relationship is understanding and respect to each other, regardless of age. Regardless of whether you are a mom to a child so far away, a big brother to a sister so far away or a daughter to your parents.

Forgive me for bantering, I think today, I need time to myself to recover my energy from all these. I wish that I could go to a warm sandy beach and be by myself.

I am sorry to my husband for running out of energy at Mas' flute recitation. I sometimes just zone out when I am out of the office, not having enough energy to 'reroute' my mind back to the family. I am sorry to some of my friends for not being able to have long conversations when you were busy pouring your hearts out. There is nothing wrong with me, nothing at all. InsyaAllah, I shall regain my energy and pass on my positive vibes to my dear friends soonest possible.

One more thing from me :
To those who live away from home and might not have known this already, please remember that although we are far away from home, that our job as a brother, sister, daughter, wife or even friend still stays. We never know when we're going to see our family again to feel their love in person. But remember that family is a treasure in your life, in your heart. Love your family, every moment you can. Nurture them and respect them anyway you can. At least when we leave this earth one day, we know that we have not done anything to hurt our family, leaving traces of resentment for you.

*Ely can't even hold her head up to work today. Ely's reaching for her coffee and drinking it, hoping that she gets her energy back. Hey wait…someone's singing a christmas song and dancing, trying to make her smile. Ely smiles and she feels better already*

Japanese style torture...

Have you ever been 'tortured' into eating? YES…last night, the four of us were tortured into eating sushi. Ayu, Gerald, the husband and I were tortured to eat till we dropped!



Ayu and I skipped lunch (don’t know about the boys) just so that we could savor this moment! It’s an 'all you can eat' sushi 'buffet'. The procedure : we order what we like and eat till we can't eat anymore. The first round was great. Everyone was very hungry and excited. Wah…makan, makan, makan, happy sekali. As you can see, the first tray is a HUGE one…a little bigger for the 4 of us. Then came the 2nd tray…we call it the killer tray. By the time we're done 3/4 of the way, Ayu and I were laughing…we have OD'd (short for Over Dosed) on the sushi.

The husband kept reminding us that we HAVE to finish the sushi or we would get charged more for every sushi that we couldn’t eat. Gerald already said 'I did my part already', I was half awake from the rice (yes ….diet kena sabo big time) and the husband was dividing the sushi as in how many we need to eat! Ayu? She thought that she had done something really smart, by putting the sushis in the napkins and putting in her bag. You see, on the menu, it says 'no to go' means that we can't do what Ayu did hehehe (see picture).



Its Monday morning and I am still full from last night's dinner. Had a granola bar and coffee and still am stuffed.

Thanks Gerald for the lovely dinner, thanks Ayu for helping us 'finish' the sushi from the tray hehehehe. Love you!

Weekend...what weekend???

I know, I know, its time for me to update this page. But what to write about eh?

How my weekend has been so far and how am I going to spend the remnants of the Sunday before going back to work tomorrow? Hmmmm...

All I can say is, I finally have exercise machines in my room! The ole fashion 'rider' from Sharper Image and the 'Stepper'. I know, some would say 'Sekarang baru nak exercise?' yes...sekarang baru nak exercise. But I have been doing my 45 minute walking at least 3 times a week tho for the past 3 years. But only this time, its more like the lower body toning...to firm up my hiney. These machines were donated by a family friend who does property management and his clients just wanted to get rid of them...still in mint condition!

Some of my lady co workers say that I have been losing my butt. I also heard that one co worker quit doing the stepper after people commented that her hiney looked smaller. Hahahaha, I don't care, I just need to firm up after losing that much!

So...10 minutes on the rider and 220 steps per day. Yes...I know, not enough, but must build the stamina mah! So kepada sesapa yang tak sabar tuh, tolong duk bersabar OK, nanti tak lama lagi kakak kau will put in more minutes and more steps day by day.

Oh and I also bought a book (see my sidebar), A Million Little Pieces. Very insightful, very refreshing...to those wondering how come I haven't been online this weekend.

Happy Sunday night to those here, and Happy Monday to those in Asia!!!

Lil lady on diet

When your 11 year old daughter asks you if she's fat, DO NOT say that she is, even if she truly has the potential to be fat if she does not stop eating her snacks!

It first started when we were buying her a pair of jeans at Old Navy. She was at school at that time but advised me that she is size zero for women. OK fine, went to Old Navy, got her 2 pairs of jeans in size zero. Got home, she put it on, alamak, tak muat! So the next weekend, we had to take her to Old Navy again to change them jeans. Tried size 2…tak muat, size 4 tak muat, so lets try size 6…muat! So size 6 she is now! She was upset cos she felt that she has gotten fat. Well, sure, she has turned into a young woman with curves. She might have inherited the 'hiney' from her mom hahahaha. I told her that shes growing but she insists that she should go on the South Beach Diet like me….HUH??? Am I dreaming or what?

No…she is too young for this kinda diet. She needs the carbs to run and play that flag football that she plays in school with the boys and she needs the energy to run around like little kittens in school. But the husband and I recommended for her to cut down on junk food.

Its not that we have much junk food at home. They're mostly 'light' popcorn, no chips, no candies and sugar free ice cream (thanks to me!). But them cookies, she just does not know how to put down! It’s the carbs!!!! But we just listen to her whining saying that shes fat (which she truly isn't). Whateverlah budak.

Two days ago, she was wearing one of the jeans that I bought to school. The husband said that she looked 'slim' in them. She said 'Oh STOP IT!'…but that sure made her smile :)