Escape Procedure #141

Here's the scenario:

You just finished your morning ablutions in the toilet of your hotel room. You wash up, dry your hands and turn the knob on the door. Nothing happens. You turn it again, in the opposite direction. Still nothing happens.

There is a gap in the door. Enough to see the door jamb. Enough to see it doesn't retract when you turn the knob.

Great.

You can't call for help. No one will hear. Not by phone either. You don't have yours with you. Nor is there one in the bathroom. Obviously this isn't some fancy five-star hotel that would bring wine up while you soak in the bathtub.

Can't wait for housekeeping to come in to clean up and find you banging your head on the bathroom door either. You'd latched and bolted the room door the night before. Nobody's coming in, not without a chainsaw. Or a sledgehammer.

So what do you do? Here's what.

1. Look for a long, thin, metal object.

First thing that came to mind was one of those ear-pick thingies. Or even a tweezer. I have those. It's in my grooming kit (yes, I do have one though, to be honest, I use it less than a respectable gay man ought to). That's the good news.

Bad news: the grooming kit's in my suitcase. Along with my Swiss Army knife - which would also be terribly useful right now. But the suitcase is not inside the toilet, where I'm currently stuck in. Of course.

Everything else metallic in the bathroom consists of taps, rails and hooks. All too big to fit into the gap between the door and the frame. Not that I could actually remove them with my bare hands anyway.

2. Look for a long, thin, any-kind-of-material object.

Well, forget about twisting up pieces of toilet paper la. Or using the plastic straw from one of the spray bottles containing my personal, personal care effects.

The toothbrush then. Hey, it's a good fit! But too good - it won't get behind the jamb and move it. Shit.

3. At this point, it's time to consider breaking the door knob off.

I could do that. Granted, I'm not a (very) violent person, nor have I been paying enough attention to Body Pump to twist the damn thing off with one pull. But I could manage it. Eventually. With lots of banging, thumping and kicking.

Sigh.

Can't I not resort to destruction of property? More importantly, can't I not resort to bruising my pretty hands?

4. Like, what other options do you have?

Hmm... I could wiggle something round the jamb and pull it open. Like a wire or a rope.

Or the drawstring on my shorts. With some help from my toothbrush.

Voilà! Liberté!

The lesson learnt? Keep your head cool during times of crisis and one need not resort to petty violence to solve a problem.

That, and it pays to bring your grooming kit with you into the bathroom.

Verily, vanity prevails over violence.

Eating My Way Up

Warning: This post may not be suitable for those who are currently hungry and without immediate access to food; or those Malaysians who have been living overseas for way too long :P

My latest trip to the northern states proved to be a food odyssey of sorts. I ended up taking pictures of almost everything I ate. Don't know what the locals must have thought as I surreptitiously took photos of my meals with my phone. Here are the pictures...

Duck noodles froom Bidor. Wouldn't make a detour off the main road just to taste this but it's good enough to stop by if you're in the area. Love the herbal soup!

I had a photo of the Ipoh kai si hor fun but it's gone now. Must have accidentally deleted it. The best ever hor fun I've had was in Ipoh - and I don't normally like the stuff. Unfortunately, the one I had this round wasn't even nice. So losing the pic wasn't a big loss la.

One of the first things I had in Penang. Char kuey tiao. A definite must have!

Penang nasi kandar. Pretty good stuff. This one's from the Pelita franchise.

When Jay said I should go for Penang laksa, I had this. For midnight supper, no less. The curry soup wasn't bad, though having chunks of pig blood floating around in it made it rather dodgy. The hawker centre was amazingly packed, even at that late hour in the middle of the week. Guess Penangites must really enjoy eating!

It was only about an hour later that I remembered that curry mee was not Penang laksa! Darn, another meal to be added back into my list.

Nasi kandar again! My pal Jono told me that I simply had to eat at least once at Line Clear, so I googled up the name and found that it was only about a block away from where I was holed up. Of course I had to try! The food is pretty good, with the curries being more subtle in flavour compared to the usual overpoweringly poppy-laced curries most nasi kandar places serve up.

Now THIS is penang laksa! The laksa was good, but I love the retro-style bowl it was served up in even more :)

This one's on behalf of Louis - Hokkien mee, aka Penang prawn noodles. Mind you, I had to eat both this and the penang laksa above for a single lunch just to fit it all into my schedule. I'm kinda glad I didn't get more suggestions about what I should eat :P

And you thought I ought to have eaten enough. But when I got back to the valley, I decided I should have yet another 'local' specialty - Kajang satay. Thank goodness I didn't have to drive all the way to Kajang to get this.

Of course, I also bought stuff back to fatten everyone else up share in the pleasures. So like some demented cross between Santa and Chef Wan, I ended up distributing Tapah guavas and Penang tau sar peah to cousins, colleagues and friends. Munch munch munch.

Sometimes, travelling for work really isn't that bad at all :P

[ haiku ]

sit on summer grass
i bask in glorious noonshine
a bird shat on me

The Cities Of The North

It seems like much of the travelling I do these days is for work. I was visiting Ipoh and Penang a week ago. Tomorrow, I'll be off again - this time, to a "peaceful" land (read what you will into that).

Now, all this travelling for work may sound like some fancy jetsetting life but trust me, it's far from it. First of all, I barely go anywhere by flying. And when I do, it's ALWAYS by budget air. Secondly, there's nothing fancy about my destinations. Penang is probably the best place I can look forward to visiting. And of course, travelling for work is really about work. So there's no such thing as going sightseeing and such except for whatever I might be able to squeeze into the evenings.

So it was that my trip to Ipoh was packed with meetings. Across half the state, in fact. Definitely didn't have time to stop for any sights, natural or otherwise. I decided to spend the night in the refurbished station. Poor choice, because the rooms weren't as refurbished as the exterior. Of course, if dodgy uncles roaming the garden outside your window is your kind of thing, then you may like it for it's erm... convenience. For me, I was left to wonder where the famously smooth-and-white-as-tofu-skinned boys of Ipoh had all gone to. Probably KL. Tsk tsk.

I kinda wished I had just gone ahead to Taiping for the night. The air's fresher there, and the food is not only good, it's amazingly cheap. Maybe next time, then.

Penang was more of a dissapointment, workwise. I spent a good deal of time running around, rescheduling and ultimately getting ffk-ed (stood up) by half of the people I had made appointments with. Horrible manners, these people of the North. So having to deal with all this meant that I only had time to hunt for DVDs. And eat. And buy tau sar peah. And eat. And go for body attack, body balance, and body jam. And eat. And catch up with my ex-housemate. And eat. And eat. And eat.

Hey, one still has to eat while one's at work, no?

Coming up next: What I ate

Never Was A Cloudy Day

Do you remember the 21st night of September?
Earth Wind And Fire : September

To be honest, I don't have a very good memory. Facts and figures from my history books just slide off my brain cells like water off a duck's back. I tend to remember concepts better. And the tales of the Ainulindale and the Quenta Silmarillion (even though they're arguably from a history book as well). Oh and song lyrics dating all the way back to the '80s.

This is one of the primary reasons why I blog. I do remember many of the events of my life, though I would hardly be able to say how long ago it happened. Blogging to me is really a way of keeping my own little Book of Records. It does help. At least now I can put a timeline to what I've been through. Or at least what I've gone through since the start of 2005.

Take for example, a year ago. Thanks to blogging, I remember exactly where I was that day, what I did, and what kind of place I had to be winched down into. I remember hitting the gym for a quick shower that evening, and catching an eyeful of, erm, whatever it is people would catch an eyeful of in the showers of one the most notorious gyms in the valley. I even remember the exact condition of my skin that day.

I remember dinner. What I ate, who I ate with. I don't remember what is was we talked about (because I didn't blog about it). But I do remember that we laughed as much as we ate - which was a lot.

And I remember this - it was a fine day. A happy day. A very happy day.

Drowned Glass, Reincarnate

I ask you, do you want to come and play?
Get the world to come and play.
So sit back, relax, fasten your seatbelts!
It's going to be a bumpy ride
To the other side...
Christina Aguilera : Enter The Circus

He takes a breath, drawing in the scent of evening air cleared by the late shower. Clean. Fresh. Alive. He takes a look about himself, appraising the lay of the land. Above the far horizon, the twilight bends, breaking into an arc of fragmented colors.

He sits. He smiles. He has come home.

Ah, the feeling of laying new ink on a fresh page. Alright. So it's actually the tapping away on the keyboard, making words materialise on a freshly reloaded screen. But the gist of it is there. It's the start of something new. Or, in this case, the continuation of something familiar in a new place.

There once was a blog called drowned glass. It's still there (at least for now). But I don't blog there anymore. Sometimes, a guy just needs to move on. And this is where I've moved to.

New blog, new name, still the same gay old me. Don't expect me to be any wiser than I've been. Or wittier. Or whatever-er. I'm just here to record my days in the hope of seeing where I've been, to get an inkling of where I'm going. If you care to come along for the ride, you're most welcome. I accept constructive comments, friendly gestures, fabulous gifts and most major credit cards (though cash is always preferred).

Ready? Then here we go!