Entry @ 20.08.2028

I find that I get angry and annoyed very often these days. A lot of things can trigger it. And last Sunday, even breakfast angered me. I went to Fu Lok Noodle House at TT3 and ordered a cup of coffee and a kaya toast. 

Coffee, RM4.50 and kaya toast RM4.50

I was shocked because there was just one slice of bread served. One slice, cut into 2 to spread the kaya and butter, and then toasted. I was angry because it looked pathetic. And I paid RM4.50 for that miserable slice of toast. I would never ever order it again, but the worse thin was, it had spoiled my mood on a beautiful Sunday morning. I vowed never to order the toast here again.

Claypot noodles, RM11 

The claypot noodles used to be RM10. Now it was RM11. That's a whopping 10% increase. But at least the noodles were tasty and had a lot of ingredients in it. My mom always enjoyed it, and that was why I always brought her here for the noodles. Just don't order the toast ever again. 

On Monday, my colleague A cooked beef ribs curry and brought some to school .... 

She even brought rice so that we could eat the curry with it ... 

Beef curry and rice

I tried some, and found the homecooked curry to be very good; the meat was so tender that it fell off the bones. The spices were also well-balanced, very tasty indeed. Campur-campur, she said, when we queried about the brand of curry powder she used. Heh ... my colleagues were very generous and loved to share food. 

My colleague A peeling jackfruit or nangka from another colleague L's backyard .... 

The entire staffroom was perfumed with the sweet heady smell of the jackfruit. Luckily most people did not mind the strong smell. 

Fresh and juicy nangka ....

 

On Monday after work, we went back to Cafe Cafe. It was because after our meal the other day, we got a 50% off voucher. So we had to make use of this opportunity. We invited 5 retirees from our school - C, T, M, N and L. It was great fun to catch up with the retirees from time to time. The last makan session was in June, so it had been two months since we met up. 

Some drinks we ordered .... 

Apple juice, RM14.90 & Red Devil, RM18.90 - a concoction of beetroot, apple, carrot and ginger

Pineapple Passion Smoothie, RM19.90

We ordered some food to share. Funnily, the restaurant ran out of chicken, so we could not order anything with chicken ... except satay .... 

Potato Tuna Salad, RM22.90 

Madurese Chicken Satay, RM18.90

Claypot Kueh Tiaw with Beef, RM28.90

Fettuccine Alfredo with Grilled Norwegian Salmon, RM28.90

Thai-style Pineapple Fried Rice, RM28.90

Chao Chai Big Beehoon Soup with Prawns, RM48.90

The food and drinks here were alright. The portions were really huge. But the best thing was that everything was half priced! So we paid only RM20 per pax, and we got to enjoy an expensive drink and a lot of food. Heh .... I skipped dinner that night. 

The next morning, I could not resist eating kolo meehoon .... 

Kolo Meehoon, RM5

I think Mui Chin's kolo meehoon is one of the best in town - the secret ingredient is the chopped dongcai that gave extra umami to the noodles .... 

That day, we had to run 'elections' in school. The event was scheduled nationwide in all Form 6 secondary schools to select student representatives for the Form 6 students' council. This was already the second year for the elections to be held. This year, I think I appreciated the process a bit more, and I could understand how it would serve as a platform for students to understand the democratic processes and leadership development. These students had not voted before although some of them had reached the eligible voting age. 

So we tried to simulate the real voting process by setting up the polling centre, appointing polling clerks amongst the teachers, preparing the ballot papers, a ballot box, and so on. The students were told to show their ICs for verification purposes before they proceeded to check the ballot paper. We also counted the votes on the spot and announced the results straightaway. 

Durian from Fifth Aunt's orchard ... 

When I got home that day, I found out that Fifth Aunt had sent over some durians from her orchard .... I think there were just ordinary durian kampung, but it was yummy regardless ... 

On Wednesday morning, my newly-appointed superior bought us .... 

Taka Buttermilk Cheese Cake 

I think it was my first time eating this cake, and found it to be quite nice. The texture was soft and light, slightly salty and quite fragrant. 

She was so glad that the voting process went ok, and thought she wanted to reward us with cake. Heh. Then another colleague announced that she wanted to bring laksa the next day since both the students from her form class got elected. 'Mak YB', she called herself. Lol .... 

And she really brought laksa today .... 

Laska

Raya cakes from A's freezer ... lol ... 

Fried rice 

Not sure who brought the fried rice ... hmn .... 

Well, today is also my birthday. I don't like to be celebrated, perhaps because I do not like attention. So I did not tell my staffroom about it. If you know, you know. If you don't, I won't tell. So my friends who know about it will send me well-wishes via text messages. I truly thank them for remembering. Mom and I will just got our for a meal tonight. 

As I am typing now, school is officially closed this afternoon with immediate effect, and tomorrow also. Classrooms are moved online due to the haze. Darn. I don't like the hassle of online classes. Moreover, the instruction for us to work from school or work from home is not released yet. I would not want to wfs because there is no internet at school. Anyway, we continue to wait for further instructions ... 

Electricity Outages At Home

I was agonising over outages at my house over the weekend. How frustrating it was! 

On Saturday afternoon, the sky turned dark and it looked like it was finally going to rain. I was glad as it would definitely provide an immense relief to the hot weather, and also improve the air quality. 

I was at home at the time. I had turned on the living room lights, and was watching Youtube on my TV. It started to rain at about 4pm, and soon, it intensified. Suddenly, the lights flickered. I stood up, looked outside and watched the heavy downpour in horror. The rain was near horizontal as the gusty wind lashed relentlessly. Moments later, the house went dark. 

I thought the circuit breaker was tripped. But it wasn't. I checked the electricity meter just outside my front door, and it was not lighted. So I looked around my neighbourhood. The house opposite had lights on .... So I got worried.

I immediately checked the Sarawak Energy app for outages. My area was not listed. So I made a call to its hotline. It was difficult speaking to the Interactive Voice Response. There was a bit of a lag as I had to wait for the computer to process what I said and give me back a response. It also got my address wrong. I was flustered. So I said I wanted to speak to an operator. True enough, I was immediately connected to a staff. It sure was much better to speak to a person instead of a computer! My report was submitted immediately. Because of the bad weather, all their technicians were deployed at the time, and the sraf assured me that they would get back to me within an hour. They kept their word, and  30 minutes later, I was contacted by a technical team.

By this time, the rain had stopped ... and some of my neighbours came outside of their houses. Only then did I find out that there were a few other houses that also blacked out. Just then, the technicians arrived, and I told them the problem. They said they would go check the transformer nearby .... 10 minutes later, the electricity came back on. Thank goodness! 

The heavy rain had caused a havoc in some parts of the city. When I checked Facebook later on, in fact, a lot of trees were uprooted, damaging electricity and telecommunications transmission lines, and also blocking traffic. Flash floods hit multiple areas, and cars were seen to be floating in water at the low-lying areas. Roofs flew off and firemen were seen to be clearing debri from residential areas. The Kuching Food Festival was in its penultimate night, and the rain had damaged some of the stalls. The Unesco Gastronomic Pavillion was completely destroyed. 

Then on Sunday morning, another power outage occurred at my house. And it looked suspiciously that only my house was affected. So again, I contacted Sarawak Energy again. I was smarter this time and as soon as I could, I cut the computer off by asking to speak to a human oeprator. Heh. That morning, however, I had to wait longer for the the technicians to come since they had ongoing jobs to do first. I got really restless waiting. They only came about 2 hours later. After checking, the electricity was restored, but the technician advised me to change my circuit breaker since it was already worn. So I paid him to do it - RM250. It has been two days, and the power supply seemed to be stable now. 

Keep here for the record ... 

Entry @ 15.08.2026

University admissions were released yesterday, and I checked whether my students got the offers they wanted : 

Student A - he did not get any offers, so sad. He could submit an appeal or enrol in Swinburne. I asked him the other day, and he said he would perhaps go to Swinburne if he did not get offered to Unimas. 

Student B - Multimedia Computing - Unimas 

Student C - International Economics - Unimas 

Student D - Economics Services - Unimas 

Student E - Business Management - Upsi 

Student F - Developmeng planning  and management - Unimas

Student G - Tesl - Upsi 

After going through the list, I think I am quite satisfied with the courses offered to them. I am certain their prospects for jobs would be quite good in the future. Unimas is also more affordable to local students, and of course, they can stay closer to their families.  I am particularly happy with those Upsi offers. Student G aimed for Tesl and I was glad she got it. I have no doubt that she would excel in the course. Student E is now in IPG Teknik in fact, pursuing a degree in Education. I asked him to seriously consider Upsi, but he shomehow preferred the IPG currently, since posting is guaranteed. However, IPG trains him for the primary school, while with Upsi, he can possibly teach in a secondary school. Sigh. Anyway, I need to respect his choice. 

***

The mayor walk, now in its 7th year. is an annual free community fun walk organised by our local city council to promote healthy living, family bonding and community unity. Anyone can register via the iPeople app and then collect free t-shirts a day or two prior to the event. It was only in 2025 that I participated, My colleague M told me about it and urged me to register. So my few other colleagues and I did. Once our details were keyed in the app, a barcode was generated and we would be able to collect our t-shirts. 

I happened to have an occasional holiday on the day the t-shirt could be collected. So I went to the city council early in the morning, only to find that there is a long queue ahead. I stood in the queue for at least 40 minutes - and I saw a lot of my friends in the queue too. Heh. On the day of the walk, I also participated, walking the short route that was designated. There were a lot of freebies given out too - like sandwiches, isotonic drinks, and also plastic hand fans. 

This year, I registered when I saw the banner being hung on the streets. I registered myself, my mom and my Second Aunt. Yesterday, the t-shirts could be collected. I went to the city council after work at about 1 pm, and was glad that the hall was quite empty. Collecting the t-shirt took a matter of minutes. 

This year's t-shirt 
The t-shirts were yellow for many years, and there was always the very unmistakable image of the mayor. Heh, I suppose there was a political reason to the colour; they wanted the community to look like they were aligned to government coalition. I suppose they were one of the sponsors. 

The event was scheduled on Sunday, 16 August but it is now postponed due to the haze. Though the aci index has dropped to 164, it is still unhealthy for outdoor activities. The public is supposed to keep the t-shirt safely while the event is being rescheduled. Mom was sure happy to get her free t-shirt. Heh. 

There was an exhibition at the City Council called 'Crafted Tables For Two' - where table settings of local ethnic tribes were displayed. The exhibition was in conjunction with Kuching's recognition as a Unesco Creative City of Gastronomy and World Crafts City. 

Other eats this week .... 

Laksa

On Thursday morning, we had laksa before work; that day's laksa was amazing! Whether a laksa was good or not depended heavily on the broth. Mui Chin's version was quite authentic - and today's broth was very well-flavoured so that it enhanced the vermicelli and all the other condiments superbly. 

I had been craving for Nasi Goreng Sardin. The other day, I had eaten it at my canteen and instantly liked it. They used the Smiling Fish Fried Sardines to flavour the fried rice, and I though I'd try to recreate the recipe. I searched online and settled on this recipe :  https://cookpad.com/my/recipes/24640853?ref=profile

And my fried rice turned out like this : 

                                              Fried Rice with Smiling Fish Fried Sardines 

I used a bowl of rice, a bowl of cabbage, half an onion, 2 green chilies, 1 egg, 1 shallot and a whole small can of sardines. Following the recipe, I had the sardines air-fried first ... and then flaked and stirred into the fried rice. The taste was pretty great ... 

I also had beef noodles at Yeow Kee ... 

Beef noodles, RM10

Today, I did not have to wait for a long time for the noodles .... I liked the seasoning they used, savourty and wit ha hint of sweetness; I also liked that they were generous with lots of meat and tendon. 

Entry @ 12.08.2026

On Monday morning .... 

L's homemade grass jelly ... tasted natural and so refreshing! The plant grew verdantly in her backyard and she often made grass jelly with it! Just boil in water, add a bit of sugar to sweeten and custard powder to thicken. Easy, she said.

Then came a bouquet for Dr. T .... this is a bouquet from her former students, some members from the class of 1998 ... these students are now 48 years old! These flowers arrived one day early since her retirement was on the next day, Tuesday .... 

In the afternoon, I went to buy a gift for Dr. T. I was thinking of getting her a gift for a long time, not really knowing what to buy for her. But suddenly on mid-Monday morning, I thought I'd buy her a crystal bracelet. So I headed to Silver Point - a notable crystal shop in Kuching. 

The staff was very helpful and friendly, and helped me to select the bracelet. They also helped re-adjust the size and re-thread the stones. When I got home however, I looked at the bracelet and thought the colour looked so dull. How come it had looked so colourful at the shop? Only then I realised that they had very powerful lights at the shop to highlight the color depth of the stones. I should have taken the photo of the bracelet in the shop before I left. Sigh. Anyway, I'm glad I bought Dr. T something .... 

On Tuesday, Dr. T's big day. Surprise! My friend K gave me a scrunchie ... 

She made it herself using the scraps from our new staff batik .... she gave it to me because the scrunchie was too big for her and thought I could have use for it since my hair was rather thick! She had made a smaller one for herself and gifted me this big one. 

Dr T had not come to work yet, since the special retirement event for her would only begin after 10.30am ... so I went around taking photos of the various bouquets of flowers that came for her. 

This was from former colleagues from another school ... 

This was from former students 

This one was so cute! 

This was from our current batch of students, now in Semester 1. They bought veges and had them wrapped in a bouquet ... I'd say they are quite thoughtful! 

This bouquet of roses was from us teachers ... 

The special assembly took about an hour and a half. I liked her speech - simple but with messages for the school administration, for us colleagues and also for her students. A lot of former students also came back to say goodbye to her - I saw a few from the class of 2023, 2024, 2025 ... Student A had promised he would come and he did come, bearing her a gift which he quickly put inside her car ... heh ....

Despite her insistence not to accept gifts, she went home with her car full of presents for her big day. 

Retirement luncheon .... 

Normally, we had a small makan after retirement functions.

This round, we had rice with lemon chicken, mixed veges, stir-fried cangkuk manis, sweet and sour fish, okra with belacan,  tofu and egg soup, and a cup of milk tea. 

After everything was over, a few of us went back to our staffroom ... and we did a simple and unofficial post-mortem of the event. It was because we very quickly would have to organise another retirement! In a month's time! For Madam N! I did not see it but my colleagues said Madam N was overcome by emotions during Dr T's event and was seen to be crying. Well, Madam N is Dr. T's partner-in-crime, both teaching the same subject. Madam N has a different approach in teaching, but she is equally capable of producing many A's like Dr. T. After Madan N retires, we will be in deep trouble since there will be no one else teaching the subject. My school admin is really having a headache over this issue. Heh. 

Unlike Dr. T though, Madam N knew what she wanted on her retirement day - she had told her close friends about her plans, and we would co-operate to realise her plans. Halfway discussing, we were all distracted ..... 

We could see the Form Four block from our office, and we saw this very cute lion and had good laughs over it! Lol! We assumed that the kids were trying out their costume for next Saturday's fundraising event at our school. However, that evening, the school issued a notice to cancel the event because of the bad air quality we are experiencing currently. Our API Index hovered around 162 - 170 the whole day! 

Wednesday morning ... I checked the API the instant I got up. It stood at 170. I made sure I brought my face mask with me since the air stank. My colleagues brought fried rice! They had taken home the leftover sambal and the leftover rice from yesterday's luncheon, and cooked fried rice! There was so much rice left that they came with 3 containers full of fried rice this morning = enough to feed about 25 pax. Another colleague brought fish keropok to eat with the fried rice. 

As I am typing now, the API is 177 ... it is cloudy, hazy, hot and humid, and the air smelled really bad. I really hope the situation improves soon.  

A Gift of Egg Tarts

My colleague T would retire next week. 11 August 2026 (Tuesday) would be her last day and we would hold a special assembly to celebrate the occasion. T would be 58 years old on the next day, 12 August. We live nearby to each other. When I fell down in 2024, and could not drive to work, she was the one who picked me up in the morning and sent me home at the end of the day. I troubled her for a whole month until I recovered. After that, when we had to go for school events and functions, we would car pool. She would pick me up or I would pick her up and we would go together.

T is a devout Buddhist, and is very active in the Buddhist community - sometimes when there were events, she would share with me about it. She invited me to go for free vegetarian meals during the Wesak Day period, or contribute to recycling events occasionally, or to painting exhibitions. Sometimes, we would go for vegetarian lunches after school with the other colleagues. T is an avid painter, specialising in Chinese ink painting. She has had her paintings exhibited internationally and locally. The last one I went to was a few weeks ago at The Spring mall, where she exhibited 1 painting in conjunction with Gawai. Although highly knowledgeable in her field of study, and highly talented in drawing, T remained a simple, down-to-earth person. 

T holds a doctorate degree in her field of study. She was offered to become a lecturer at one time ... but after considering the salary and the logistics, she chose to remain a teacher. And she was certainly a dedicated teacher, producing many successful students. I know at least 3 other teachers who are her former students - CCV and NTC and PMM. T is indeed very experienced in her subject, having taught it for three decades - she is wahe trainer for the state, and often attended meetings at the national level. Indeed, she knows all the ways to help students to score. So every year, she contributes the most number of A's to the school for her subject. She can turn all potential students into an A-scorer. 

Last year, she taught my class of students, and Student A and Student B were obviously the weaker of the lot. To ensure that they could master the concepts well, T would go to class every morning at 6.30 am, just to teach these 2. Her efforts paid off when Student A got a B and Student B obtained an A-. When I met Student A recently, of course, he was thankful to have T as a teacher. He promised to come back to school on 11 August 2026 with a gift for his teacher. After all, T had always said that Student A was her "Little Sunshine". Heh. 

At my school, it was customary for us to collect RM50 per pax to buy a retirement gift for the retiring teacher. Teachers knew about this tradition, it was no secret. So, the committee would ask the retiring teacher what they wanted. Some wanted small gold jewellery as a momento, others preferred luggage bags or specialty sports equipment. Some just wanted the cash. Last year, A did not want any gifts but we collected the money anyway. A then used the money for catering .... we makan-ed on 2 occasions courtesy of the money A had given back to us.

It is the same for T. She had insisted that we did not collect the money for her since she had no material needs. We urged her to use the money for donations. She got rather upset, saying that she had the money to do donations and did not need to use our money for that purpose. After some deliberation, we collected the money anyway despite her protests. Of course we had our reasons too and after some discussion with her, she agreed to accept and then to donate the money back to us - a fund for us to use where necessary. 

Last Sunday, I received a text from her asking me about the egg tarts from Oriental Kopi. She said that she had only eaten the original version and not the seasonal varieties. She asked me which other flavours would taste good. Heh .... I did not know since I also went for the original egg tarts usually. The only one time I tried another variety was maybe a fortnight ago when Fourth Aunt wanted the Belgian chocolate ones. So I told her that the original one was good enough for me. 

Heh ... so I unabashedly guessed that she probably wanted to buy egg tarts for us at school. Only that I did not know when. Later on, my other colleague N did share that T had asked him to accompany her to collect the egg tarts on the coming Friday. Heh .... so that was another clue. 

Then on Tuesday whilst I was on duty in the afternoon for my club, I saw my students come carrying a whole bag of food containers. Why are you eating now? I asked my student D. He said the food was courtesy of T and that they had arrived late, so he did not have time to eat his share. I gave him the permission to finish eating the food first. How generous of my colleague T to treat her students before her retirement too! 

Vegetarian Manicai Beehoon 

On Thursday, my colleague R was talking about Oriental Kopi egg tarts. She had a craving, I suppose. Heh. We then talked about the food there. I asked whether she had tried the ayam gepuk, a new item in the meny. She said yes, but she did not quite like it. She preferred the mee kari. 

Moments later, we received our egg tarts from T. The students came distributing them on behalf of T. And we were all taken aback because each of us got 2 boxes! 2? Did T make a mistake? 2 seemed like a lot because in each box were 2 tarts.

Egg tarts from T

We called the students and quizzed them about the tarts. Why so many? Maybe teacher was so happy that she was retiring that she decided to buy a lot of tarts for all of you. Hmn ... not a very convicing answer from the students. 

My staffroom, of course, was delighted to receive the egg tarts ... 

I was just talking about it! R squealed at the coincidence.

Wah ... how much is one box ah? 

I paid RM10.80 for 2 pieces the other day. Don't for get the 6% tax. 

I'm reluctant to eat such expensive tarts. A wanted to keep her box of tarts for as long as possible.

Anyone allergic to eggs? N asked. You can donate your tarts here if you are allergic. 

Mmm, so yummy. D exclaimed as she savoured her tart. 

Eh, why so many pieces? A said again. Come, let's eat them quickly so that when T realises that she has given us the wrong number of tarts, we can tell her that we have finished eating them and cannot return them to her. Lol!!! 

Is P here? If he has gone home, let's divide up his egg tarts. 

Somebody call or text J so that she comes to get her egg tarts. Or else, let's just divide them among ourselves. 

Lol. My colleagues and their creativity! Suddenly, there were a lot of people who were compelled to become egg tart thieves. There was indeed a lot of laughter over those delectable tarts! 

And so I thanked my friend T when I saw her before I went home. Why so many? 1 box would be sufficient, I said. Then she told me that she had a difficult time purchasing those tarts. She called the outlet but could not strike a deal with them over the phone. So she had no choice but to personally visit the outlet at Vivacity Megamall to discuss the purchase with the manager on duty. 

She had actually wanted to give each person 3 pieces instead of 2. She requested for 3 tarts to be packed in 1 box. But the manager insisted that they HAD TO pack 2 pieces in 1 box. Each box would be charged RM0.50. They did not even have plastic bags to pack the boxes in, so T had to purchase her own. She was upset that they were so rigid in the way they did their sales.  

I was aghast that she had to spend so much just on packaging! But luckily, she said that the manager decided to waive the charges since T purchased a huge number of tarts. 

Who sent the tarts? I asked.

Since they did not have free delivery, T paid for one of their workers to deliver the tarts to school. However, the tarts were freshly made, she said. They only started making at 8.30 am and when it was delivered at 11.30 am, the tarts were still warm. 

I told her that my entire staffroom was overjoyed to receive her thoughtful gift and shared with her some antics of my colleagues so that she knew that her tarts were appreciated. 

On Friday after school, a few of us brought T for lunch at Cafe Cafe. 

Iced Lemon Tea

Garden Salad

Thai style Pineapple fried rice, RM17.90

Fettucine Alfredo with Grilled Norwegian Salmon, RM26.90

Chao Chai Big Beehoon Soup with Prawns, RM27.90

The 5 of us ladies shared the food over school gossip. It was good fun. Of the 3 mains, I think my favourite would be the pasta ... the cream was rich and garlicky and paired well with the grilled salmon. I'd love to eat this again. I did not quite like the fried rice, I thought the meat floss was a bit too sweet. The chao chai big beehoon was alright, a tad sour and no wine, since this is a Halal eatery. I like relaxing vibe here too. It's cool and a comfortable place to sit for a lengthier time to chit chat. 

A few more days, and T would retire from service. I will definitely miss having her as a colleague because she is so level-headed and reliable and responsbile. But I will revel in the fact that she has more time for herself to keep herself active with painting and travelling and also with all her charitable work. I wish her all the best in her undertakings. Since she lives in the neighbourhood, I have no doubt that I will see her around from time to time. 

Happy retirement Dr. T!