Basic Manners

So MIL came to KL two weekends ago just so we could drive her around the city to visit her relatives (sure. Why not?) After we did our rounds we went back to our place to wait for BIL and wife to pick her up. It was a bit late in the day for me to make dinner so we ordered pizza. BIL and wife, who brought her sister along arrived just in time for dinner. And then the most bizarre and awkward thing happened. SIL and her sister started talking in Chinese at the dinner table. DH and I looked at each other and then DH asked her, "wow you can speak Chinese?" To which SIL replied, "yes I learned it in school." Now here in Malaysia not every Malay is fortunate enough to learn Chinese, or any other language, as a third language. We usually converse in Malay or English language, and this girl started talking to her sister in a language no one else at the table could understand.

I don't know about you guys but I find that to be incredibly rude. Now how would she feel if I start talking to DH in English at her home at her dinner table when I know full well that she's not that fluent in speaking and understanding English? I had to literally restrain myself from rolling my eyes. I didn't want to say anything coz DH and MIL were there and I didn't want to make things even more awkward. But in retrospect, I probably should have. Come on! It's basic manners! When did it become okay for a guest to come to your house and start to converse to another guest in a foreign language at your dinner table? I must have not gotten that memo.

Anyway, I had to let it out of my chest and when DH and I were in the car on the way back home from work last Monday, I brought it up. And thank God DH thought that it was rude too! He said that it's probably because SIL is still very young (she's 20 or 21. I don't know and I don't care) and is still a bit immature. For goodness sake, she's married and has a son. It's time to grow the blardy hell up. And age does not excuse a person from behaving badly, don't you think? And what message is she sending her son when she acts like that?

So true, Mr. Astaire

So, anywaaaaay, apart from that unfortunate incident I had a lovely time that weekend. DH and I went to my best friend's house in Langat for dinner. Mom thought that it would be a good idea to bring BIL who came back from UK for an interview along, and he was happy enough to tag along. I'm so glad that he enjoyed himself. Being a German and not used to the Malay culture yet, I could tell that he was a bit bewildered by the experience. My best friend's family is the super friendly type and whenever we go to her house, there's no shortage of loud conversations and booming laughter. So yeah, can't blame the guy for looking like a deer caught in the headlights LOL. Sorry BIL. You'll get used to it. Give it time :P

Friends. Sisters

'Tis The Season To Be Jolly...

...for the most part, at least. I realize that I haven't been blogging for two weeks now. There's a reason for that. We celebrated Eid two weeks ago which was fantastic. Here in Malaysia we take Eid seriously and we usually take a whole week off to celebrate. My celebration started when my little sister came home from Sabah for a short five day holiday to celebrate Eid with us, which was awesome coz we rarely get to see her. Then my family returned to my parents' hometown in Batu Gajah to celebrate the first day of Eid with their relatives. It's always wonderful to celebrate Eid with my side of the family because I get to see my aunts, uncles and cousins whom we probably see once or twice a year and us cousins, we're pretty close.

I bought some firecrackers and fireworks and brought them back to Batu Gajah and we had a blast lighting those bad a**es up. It's a wonder that the police didn't come for us coz there were some pretty big bangs going on. Surprisingly I didn't eat much during Eid this year. I lost a bit of weight over the fasting month and I'd really like to stick to my current weight. Can't say the same about DH though. He ate at every relative's house we visited.

On the third day of Eid we went back to DH's hometown. DH's side of the family don't normally do much during Eid so we spent most of the time at home. It was a good thing I brought some books to read (finished all four of them in the course of three days). By the fifth day of Eid we were back at home since DH wanted to go in to the office the next day.

Me & DH

Me & lil sister :)

And then last week I started going back to the office after nine days of merriment. Obviously being a company made up of 80% Malay Muslims, people were not yet in the mood for work, which was fine by me. The less my phone rang, the more work I could get done. And then on Friday we celebrated Merdeka (Independence Day) which was another public holiday for us. People say that Malaysia has got the most public holidays in a calendar year, and I think they're right. Not that I'm complaining.

Anyway, on Friday one of my buttcheeks got married. That day was a special day not only for her, but for me too. This friend has been through a lot in the past couple of years. She went through a nasty divorce. Her crazy ex-husband continued to make her life a living hell even after the divorce.

So, sometime last year, around the time I had my first miscarriage, she met a lovely guy. He came with her to the hospital to visit me but at that time I didn't get to see him simply because he thought that that was a private time between me and my friend and he didn't want to intrude. (The first sign that he's lovely.) I remember her telling me about him when I asked her who she came with and her face lit up, although she quickly realized that then was not the right time to talk about her love life, with my miscarriage and all. I didn't mind to be honest. At least I got to hear some good news about something.

The second sign that I knew that he's a decent guy is when DH told me that he is. Now I bet you must be thinking "how the heck did DH know?" Well, DH is a pretty good judge of character. So when DH told me that my best friend's boyfriend (now husband) was a good guy, I believed him. Plus, he is really good with my friend's kids. It's lovely to see them them together, him, my best friends and her kids. Her kids now call him "Ayah" (Father). Everytime us buttcheeks and our husbands go out for dinner, he would always join us and we talk and laugh together. It's as if we've known him for years.

Anyway, back to the wedding. The ceremony was held at a mosque in KL. Seeing my friend in her wedding dress made me tear up a bit. She looked happy and gorgeous beyond words. I had been very good at holding back my tears until the kadi announced that the "nikah"(solemnization) was "sah" (valid). I could feel my eyes welling up already and avoided looking at my friend for fear that I might cry. So far so good. And then when the ceremony was over, I went over to her to give her a hug, I started crying. I congratulated her and told her that I love her and the tears just wouldn't stop. To say that I was happy for her and her new husband was an understatement. After all that she's been through, she deserves all the happiness in the world. Oh and another sign that her husband was perfect was when he made a speech at the reception, thanking her two kids who are 7 and 5, for sharing their mom's love with him. Isn't that the loveliest thing ever? :D

So here's to you my friend. I love you with all my heart and wish you all the happiness in the world. Ameen.

Me & lovely buttcheeks. I would love to post a picture of my best friend in her wedding dress but I'm not going to to protect her privacy. Sorry.

In other news, another one of my buttcheeks told us girls that she's two months pregnant! Yay! Alhamdulillah. She's been struggling with secondary infertility and after seeing my RE and taking a couple of cycles of clomid, she's now got a bun in her oven! I am over the moon for her because I know that it's a struggle for her to conceive too. So here's to you too. I love you and wish you a smooth pregnancy and a safe delivery. Ameen.

Ok now for the not so jolly bit. You know how new moms sometimes think that everything revolves around their babies? It's starting to annoy the crap out of me. It's like every conversation I have with these new moms must have, I repeat must have a mention of their babies.

Me: wanna go out for lunch tomorrow?
New mom: Oh I can't. Baby needs his nap time.

Me: Have you made your baju kurung for Eid?
New mom: Oh yes. But I can't make one with beads because baby might pull them and put them in his mouth.

Me (while talking about food): Duck rice is actually quite good.
New mom: Oh last night baby played with his rubber ducky during bath time.

And it doesn't just stop there. Every freaking tweet and every Facebook status is about their babies. For the love of God, I'm so happy that you're a mom now but everytime this happens, it feels like I'm getting my teeth pulled. Please new mom, please stop before I stab myself in the eyes.

Don't get me wrong. I know that it's their right to post whatever they want on Facebook and tweet whatever they want. But it just amplifies my sadness me because I can't do all that. To be honest, I don't think it would bother me that much if I weren't infertile and have had two freaking miscarriages. But I am infertile and I have had two miscarriages. So sue me for being bitter. There. I got it out. Phew. I feel better now. I can now go to bed. Goodnight.

Of Zombies and Anniversary

It's been a while since I last updated. The reason being I have now turned into a zombie. Yup you read right. My goodness, this year's Ramadan has really taken a toll on my body. Every day I wake up at 5 a.m. to prepare food for sahur, stay up for Fajr prayer and then go back to bed. Wake up at 7.45 a.m. to get ready for work. Go to work till 4.30 p.m. Reach home at 5.30 p.m. and straight away start preparing food for Iftar at 7.30 p.m. And the cycle repeats itself for a whole month. I swear after we celebrate Eid, I'm gonna sleep one whole day to make up for my lost sleep.

Aside from being zombified, Ramadan this year has been lovely Alhamdulillah. I don't feel that hungry. It's just difficult to keep my eyes open at the office. Heck, I'm trying to keep my eyes open as I type this post.

Anyway, yesterday was my 7th wedding anniversary with DH. We've been together for 10 years and have been married for 7 blissful years. I wouldn't say that every day of that seven years has been smooth sailing. Heck, we went through countless BFNs and two miscarriages. I was at my darkest hours during my two miscarriages, and every day during those hours, DH was at my side. But during the seven years we've been married, we've also had A LOT of laughs. I love his sense of humour and I love that he loves mine. Even after seven years, I can't imagine being a day without him. Sometimes when I wake up at night, I will find him holding my hand as we sleep. Surely that counts for something?

We planned to have Iftar at Tony Romas, but knowing DH, his tummy won't be happy if he eats anything other than rice for Iftar. So I told him that we could postpone our anniversary dinner to next week. We spent the afternoon watching "The Help". Awesome movie by the way. I was delighted to find that the movie is as good as the book. Anyway, since we went to the market yesterday morning for our weekly provision, I made dinner of oxtail soup, deep fried garoupa and stir fried oyster mushroom. And yes, his tummy was very happy after that :P And to make up for not celebrating our anniversary yesterday, DH suggested that we go for a holiday after Eid. Hooray!

Here's to my DH (who doesn't know the link to my blog, and never will :P). Happy 7th anniversary my darling husband. I have loved every minute being your wife. Babies or no babies, there's no other person I'd rather have on this journey than you. May our marriage be further blessed by the Almighty. Amiiiinnn...

Ramadan Mubarak

Today is day 6 of Ramadan, the fasting month for Muslims. So far Ramadan has been pretty easy, probably because I've been observing it since as long as I can remember. The biggest challenge for me is the lack of sleep since DH and I wake up at 5 a.m. every morning to have our last meal before fasting till sunset, I end up feeling like a zombie when I get to the office. Also I really need to keep my temper in check. Hungry lawyer = grumpy lawyer. I feel bad for my internal users (sometimes) coz I bite their heads off whenever they act like they've never worked in their entire life before, but hey, "you have to help me help you" is all I gotta say.

I have been cooking every day for Iftar (the time when we break fast) this fasting month so far, and my dishes are kinda touch and go since I can't taste them to see if they need any more salt, chili, tamarind juice etc but so far DH is not complaining :) Here are some of the dishes that I've made.

clockwise from top left: stir fried squid with tumeric powder and french beans, beef in soy sauce, stinky beans and fried fish with sambal

clockwise from top left: chicken korma, fried fish, grilled eggplants, stinky beans, fermented fish (terubuk), kuih koci and sambal belancan

I tried making donuts a couple of days ago. I got the recipe from The Cooking Photographer. It turned okay and DH loved them, but because I halved the measurement (since there's only me and DH to eat them donuts), I don't think the measurement I used was all that accurate :P

For today's Iftar DH wants tomyam (spicy Thai soup), which reminds me I need to make a list of things to buy from the supermarket. Will write more soon. Ramadan Mubarak everyone!

p/s: It's nice not talking about IVF and the whole infertility thingy once in a while, don't you think? :P 

If Only...

I was having coffee with DH this morning and it suddenly hit me. If I hadn't miscarried the first time, I would have had a baby already by this time. How depressing is that? And then I was trolling my twitter feed when I saw my buttcheek's tweet on this blogpost. I think I wrote a few blogs ago that I have come to terms with my loss, but then again, I guess when it comes to the loss of your child you will never really come to terms. 


This afternoon I bumped into someone I know at the office and she asked me if I was pregnant and looked at my tummy. I told her, "no. I'm just fat." Seriously, when will people ever learn not to ask these kinds of questions? They're highly inappropriate. Although she doesn't know about my struggle with infertility, it's still inappropriate. 


I dunno. It's been a really weird day. I just want the day to be over so I can head home and have a cuddle on the couch with DH.

Ramblings

So I was scrolling through my Instagram feed a few days ago and saw photos of my friends' babies. And then it hit me. It doesn't hurt anymore when I see them. After the miscarriage, it used to upset me so much to see photos of my pregnant friends or photos of their babies. I even unfollowed some of them on Instagram and muted them on Twitter. Pretty bad eh? Everytime I looked at them, I would think to myself that this was all so unfair. Why them and not me?

And then that feeling disappeared a couple of days ago. Don't ask me how or why. It just did. Maybe I have healed emotionally. And though it's a good thing, I can't help but feel a little bit guilty. I'm starting to forget what it feels like to be pregnant, to be carrying my little peanut in my womb. Granted I've never experienced morning sickness, so there's nothing to remember about that. One thing I do remember is waking up in the middle of the night, sometimes more than once, just to pee.

Anyway, I think I'm over it. It's time to let go of the past and move forward. DH and I still haven't decided when to start our next IVF cycle, and I'm fine with that. I don't want to rush into anything. All I know is that right now I'm in a standoff with infertility, and I gotta say, I ain't gonna the one who blink first.

In other news, AF finally came last Friday and it was nasty! My God what it did to me emotionally. I was in such a crappy mood that even the tiniest things set me off. I know it was my hormones messing with me but I felt like DH wasn't paying much attention to me, so I didn't speak to me almost the entire weekend. Poor guy. I bet he didn't know what hit him. I did go for a little run yesterday to let off some steam so that calmed me down a bit. DH ran with me although truth be told, I wouldn't mind going running alone.

Ooooh I also watched The Amazing Spiderman with DH on Friday night. Though I was in a foul mood, I quite enjoyed the Spidey reboot. There's nothing new with the plot. I wish they could have gone with a different storyline and the villain played by Rhys Ifans, well, I didn't quite connect with him. Probably because I'll always think of him as Spike in Notting Hill. But Andrew Garfield does make a better Spiderman compared to scrawny Tobey Maguire. If you haven't watched it, you should.

Tell me he doesn't make a yummy Spiderman

Let's see. What else did I do last week? I was on a Friday Night Lights (the TV show, not the movie) marathon last week. I managed to watch up to the Season 4. I haven't been obsessed in a TV in a long time but my God was I hooked with this one. There are so many things I love about this show and my only regret is that I didn't watch this earlier. I love the story line and the script in my opinion is one of the best on television. There were moments that made me smile and laugh. There were moments that made me cry like a baby. I love that the show addresses racism and death. I love that the show focuses a lot on the football story line, which is what the show is all about, but at the same time shows the reality of being teenagers in high school, their trials and their tribulations. I love the realistic portrayal of the relationship between Coach Eric Taylor (Kyle Chandler) and his wife Tami Taylor (Connie Britton). I love the interaction between Coach Taylor, Tami and their daughter Julie (Aimee Teegarden). And I love Matt Saracen (Zach Gilford) who plays the shy, stuttering football player who was forced to take on the role of QB 1 after Jason Street (Scott Porter) got paralyzed. I love the relationship between Matt and Julie and the depth of their teenage romance. Call me a silly goose but I love teenage romance. It reminds me of the crushes I had on boys when I was in school/uni :P It's all so realistic and the acting is second to none. I gotta say though that I prefer the original characters in Seasons 1 through 3 than the new ones that came on after the seniors graduate. And I was kinda disappointed when Matt Saracen left Dillon for Chicago in Season 4. For me, aside from Coach Taylor, he is the heart and soul of this show. It's too bad that FNL only got to Season 5 before it got cancelled. I feel like there's so much more stories they could tell on the show. I could go on and on about this brilliant show but I'll leave that for another day. But watch the whole series if you haven't. It's worth your time, trust me.

"Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose"

What Went Down Last Weekend

So last weekend was a busy weekend for me and DH. We didn't go back to my parents' house since they were away anyway, which is a good thing coz we got to do whatever we wanted with our time. On Saturday, I channeled my inner Cinderella and cleaned the house and did the laundry. Why I had to do a truckload of laundry when there are only two people in my household is beyond me by the way. I wanted to call my weekly cleaner but she had to clean another house, so I thought what the heck, I'd just clean the house myself. I can't say the house is sparkling clean but it's a start. After making lunch (mutton curry) and DH has had his fill, we went to KLCC for a date. I managed to refrain from buying anymore books from the bookstore. DH managed to get shirts from his favourite label at a discount so he was a happy duck. I then treated him tea at Ben's where we both had milkshakes (chocolate banana for DH and Oreo for me) and some buffalo wings.

On Sunday DH and I went on our weekly hike up the hill. We came down at 9.30 a.m. and got ready to meet our friends for brunch at Plan B Bangsar. One of these friends is my buttcheek who had a miscarriage a week ago.I've been avoiding seeing them after my own miscarriage but I gotta admit, I missed them, hence the brunch. Besides my family, this group of people are my biggest supporters in my battle against infertility. We talked about the miscarriages but didn't dwell too much in it, which I'm glad. There's no point in dwelling on something that we have no control over, right?  It was really really great to see the girls again after two months of silence. I was hungry and had a craving for the all-day breakfast platter which had a hash brown, sausage, two poached eggs, sauteed mushroom, grilled tomato and baked beans (whoa!). I didn't get to take a photo of my platter coz as soon as the waiter brought me my dish, I attacked it as if my life depended on it hahaha. 

Love these girls to death

Anyway, it was a really good weekend. I mean, I love my parents but sometimes having weekends to ourselves to do whatever we want without having to go back to their place is all that I need. 

What did you guys do last weekend?