On the way to school this morning, the trio of Emily, Haris and Papa were being silly. Papa started a game of rhyming (rather badly) the kiddies names with stuff.

“Emily… Manily… When she gets back from school… she is so smelly!” Haris roared with laughter at this- “Hahaha, Kakak is smelly!”

To make it fair, Papa the went on “Luqman… hey man!…. he laughs like a pondan!” So now its Emily’s turn to tease her brother. Both of them were laughing gayly at this name game.

Then Papa added- “Shahira… mahira… kadang-kadang tak pakai seluar!“. Again, the two of them burst into giggles and smirks.

Well, guess what? The kiddies had their revenge, when they churned out this gem :-

“Papa… Lapa(r)… dia macam Gorilla!” and they went on chanting this many a times; and they shrieked laughter when Papa beat a drum roll on his chest ala a silverback. “Hahaha. Papa gorilla!”, laughed my dear boy.

We certainly had fun arriving at school. Just before then, we came up with one for Alisha too- “Alisha… Malisha… badan kecik tapi lari macam kuda!”.

If you saw 2 kids and an adult male snorting like mad asses (donkeys) this morning, in a Island Green Skoda Octavia FSi, that was us goofing around. And Mama asks why the kids are always disappointed when she has to send them to school.

Alisha developed high fever on Sunday night, but she slept well that nightbut you have to check with Mama to be absolutely sure, hee hee.

In the morning Mama asked Papa to bring the little one to the clinic, but in the afternoon, as morning are usually busy at our favourite neighbourhood clinic- Klinik Segara. The plan was to go after picking up Shahira and Haris at about 1pm.

However, since Papa was feeling under the weather as well, he changed the plan (Oh-oh!)…

The brilliantly clear plan (from the flu-stuffed brain), was to take Alisha along sending Haris to kindie; and then head for the clinic. It should be a breeze… how many people could there be so early in the morning?

So the crying Alisha in the baby seat and Haris in the back, we set off. Bibik? Papa certainly can handle the situation fine, what with the excellent child minding record; so Bibik was left home.

Drop Haris off at school. Check.

Park the car. Oooh! Very empty! Check. So far the plan is working most excellently.

Register in the clinic. Aaah! Quite a few early birds as well. Still no problems. Check.

Insist on regular doctor and not the new one. Check. What a clever chappie Papa is- the doc knows the family’s medical history.

Pop off to the newstand for a bit. Check. Again clever usage of time.

Pop back in and see the doctor twenty minutes later. Check….. or not, as it turned out.

It turns out that great minds think alike, and many a great minds were there that morning. So what time did we finally get to see the good old doc?

2 HOURS LATER; or rather 1 hour of carrying a sleeping Lisha, i.e.- 11:30ish regular time.

That just left Papa with about an hour before needing to leave the house to pick up the other two kiddies… some rest day this turned out to be. Another MC wasted.

Morale of the story? Choose your place and time to be “clever”; or as Mama would rather put in- “Listen to me- always!”

It never rains but it pours. August – September are busy months for this clan.

So we extend the warmest of wishes to our Aunty Rita. May she be healthy and happy; and make it easy for us by telling Mama what she wants for her birthday gift.

That’s the problem with having a string of birthdays, you run out of ideas on gifts . In the meantime, enjoy this special shout out to you from all of us.

Mama and Papa went to Gas Malaysia’s 15th Anniversary Dinner at PJ Hilton on 1st September 2007. Well, there were some Japanese guests that formed part of the pioneer team when the company first started ages ago. To cut a long story short, they had Dafi (AF5), Aznil and Misha Omar as performers.

They also Sazzy Falak as emcee- guess Gas Malaysia spared no expense. Anyway, Mama remembered (at some point) to record Misha Omar rendition of this famous Japanese song. She had the whole floor singing along- Japanese and Malaysian. Now what song can bring these 2 cultures together? Hear it for yourself…

Misha Omar Bridging Cultures [ 0:22 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download