Stop & Stare

Boy, what a morning it has been.

I was feeling kind of excited last night as I left work, ready to hit the road straight to Singapore in my new car. Well, new old car that is. The previous car I was driving was starting to make one too many noises and my boss finally agreed to change it to something that didn’t look like it was about to fall apart before the next traffic light. The replacement just came last Saturday, and I was eager to put the car through its paces, to check out what this baby can do.

Zoom zoom zoom.. and before you know it, I was right at the border of Singapore. So far so good… it felt like I was on a flying carpet… with wheels of course. I decided to hang on the phone a bit more talking to my other half before crossing the border.. enjoying the air conditioning and the soft feel of the leather.

And then everything just went started to go downhill..…

The hazard light suddenly came on, lights started flashing and beeping sounds started coming from areas I didn’t know existed in the car… and finally the engine itself chocked to a silent eerie death.

“WTF...?”…

I turned the ignition but the car wouldn’t start. A desperate call to my boss asking for advice – he told me to wait and try again later. What a genius. Didn’t work. Popped open the hood and peered in and started touching and shaking stuff. Had no idea what I was doing. But all men feel compelled to ‘pop the hood and check’ as if they knew a thing or two about fixing a car. Gave up and went back in. Opened the glove compartment and did what I know only engineers would do – read the manual. While it wasn’t as cool as popping the hood, it was a lot more informative. Read cover to cover hoping to find a solution, but still wasn’t any closer to getting the car started. At least I now knew what all those knobs and lights were for.

By this time it was 3am in the morning, and I hadn’t had a bath in 18 hours. Stick, dirty and smelly, I decided to try getting some shut eye in the car. But with the windows half open, I kept getting up every half an hour convinced that a bunch of night raiders were about to pounce on me and drive my car away. But since my car was out of order, they’d probably get pissed off and kill me instead. Or so I imagined.

Anyway, I somehow managed to make it to morning with some decent sleep and all my body parts intact. Hope against hope, I tried turning the key again. No sound. Damn car just won’t start. Lucky for me, I was parked right at the rest stop. Took my bag out and went to the washrooms. They had showers there mostly used by lorry and bus drivers to freshen up. So, a shower and a shot of caffeine later, I was feeling almost alright again. Quick calls to the workshops and some colleagues and tow truck was fast on its way to rescue me from my misery.

But this being Malaysia, it was just a matter of time before a bunch of busybody’s started congregating around my car. All men of course. How do they help? By standing around the car, hands at their waist, staring at the engine, thinking really really hard. We men like to think we can fix anything if we stare at it long enough. Only guy that was helpful was the tow truck guy. After all, he was the one actually charging me for assistance. But not before trying to kill me it seems.

After hooking up the car, I hopped into his truck. Maybe I was high on caffeine or something, but I was kind of enjoying sitting in the old beat up truck. Had a real old school feel about it, and it didn’t even have seatbelts! Coolness! I was thinking this might turn out so bad after all. I’m riding old skool style babe!

….and then he made a right turn…….and the door next me swung open, and I could feel myself being thrown right out the door, my body floating in thin air before crashing to the ground in slow motion…before getting squashed by the incoming cars….

OK, not really . But it really did feel like it was about to happen.

The door did swing open, but I managed to cling on to something to avoid flying out. Wasn’t proud of my few whimpy cries I accidentally let out in the face of certain death, but considering the truck driver himself almost shit in his pants too, I wasn’t too bothered. With doors locked this time, I sat close to the centre and keep my grip firmly on the seat for the rest of the trip. Riding old skool didn’t seem so fun after that. Damn it, why isn’t anything going right today?

But not to worry…as I write this, I’m sitting snuggled into a nice comfortable seat with air conditioning, free wifi, and a pretty looking waitress fetching free flow espresso coffee for me while I wait for the mechanics to figure out what the hell’s wrong with my car. I can tell they’re on it because from where I sit, I can see the mechanics all standing around the car, hands at their waist, staring at the engine, thinking really really hard. I’m sure that’ll do the trick.