the importance of not feeling ripped off

wife was in a sombre mood yesterday .As we hurried out of the house to get to work, she realized during lunch that she forgot her wallet. i gave her 10 bucks as she did not want the fifty.  she had breakfast with 2 pieces of cake and a drink which nearly cost her the whole 10 bucks.  she felt ripped off. she didn’t even eat the cake. she was not happy and felt bitter about it the whole day. i know how that feels.

when i stopped buying second hand handphones in 2004, i decided to get a SE-K500. went up to low yat and asked the guy on the other side of the telephone counter how much. ” only 700 ma…” the shite said. ” ok. tunggu ahh, saya mahu withdraw dulu” i told him. i went down 3 floors and got 800 cash and went straight back to him. as i was paying , the shite retracted his statement and said “750″. i was suprised. was my memory playing tricks? i asked again. and the sounds dribbling out of his pig eating lips were ..”750″. i was too tired to go haggle as nearly all the other phone stalls were closed and it was nearly 10pm in loyat. i paid. i felt ripped off. i cursed him and his family thru out the generations which started to happen about 50 plus years ago when they first came of a boat here.the stall is the phone stall near the escalator of the second floor. if you look to your left you can see the streamyx stall trying to sell you streamyx. so this shit phone stall is on your right.i vowed it would never happen again.

i dont give second chances when it comes to consumer stuff. i avoid all bad deals or deals which have no benefit or lessened benefit to me. if its too expensive , tell them to stick the product between their buttcheeks or something.we as the consumer can choose, and most certainly, can boycott.

the prices of things has risen since the  the recent fuel hike. but now  the oil prices are steadily going down. but the prices of the items are unchanged/risen more. my humble opinion is boycott the the traders who are making a killing and purchase wisely, don’t blame the government for everything. esp when the purchasing power is in everybodys hands.

Raya came and left

i had very high hopes for this years’ raya. managed to squeeze out the existing projects to finish out by 26 sept. the server was successfully put up and i just practically wished and pushed all other pending things for the week after raya. but it seems the raya spirit or easily put, the anticipation of raya was very weak. i could not find anyone singing or humming the evergreen classics of olde. quite depressing really. the only relief was some malay comedy on astro prima at 6 in the evening. at least filled up the laugh quota with that.  the exodus back to batu pahat was ok despite cutting in and out of coming traffic. i did not succeed in burning a lagu raya MP3 and playing it endlessly to Batu Pahat. i realised i have left the cd-rw in the office. at least the radios were playing raya songs new and old. nearly brought tears to my eyes. my wife was in the back with my son , calming him down for the car ride. i am a dad now. my son’s  first raya. i want to make sure he enjoys hari raya just as i do.

raya is really for the kids, i guess. nenek’s grand children have grown up and each cucu has his/her life before coming back to batu pahat and (horrors!) can’t wait to go back to their lives as soon as possible when raya’s done. we’re not kids anymore (groan). i have a kid of my own and dressing him up in baju melayu is one of the only things i can do to share the raya spirit ( eventho he doensn’t like wearing songkok, hehehe). there are rumours that certain cucu(s) wants to get married.it seems they arent kids anymore either. the cute girl cousins of yesteryears have grown up and instead of talking about cartoons, junk food and comics , now focus on handsets, dressing up like nymphs and boys. internet and globalization have reared their ugly heads. i only got 1 hari raya card. the rest were SMS’s.its the thought that counts. there are very few little ones this year. the hysterical laughter and gigling of little ones were few but loud just the same.if the rumours are true, nenek will have many more cicit to play with in the coming rayas.

Pakatan douchebags did not have their s*pt 16 take over. it failed. the taiwan trip was a funny to follow, seeing that pakatan mp stating and lying that they have met the BN mp’s and saying the defections are imminent is like the iraqi defence/information minister saying that iraq is victorious against the americans but knowing that the american marines are just at the door.