She Knows!

It still boggles me sometimes how my mother knows things. She would randomly call, although she’s normally text right in the middle of me getting a cold. She would just casually mention something which I’ve been thinking, or thinking of doing. And she does this all the time.

I am fairly sure she had not put any tracker or listening device on me. I checked.

However now that my mum knows (and of course as an extension, my dad knows too), I can just share this supposedly A SURPRISE to everyone.

Remember that I have been moaning about burning out and that I have been thinking of taking sabbatical? I ended up doing just that.

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

I mean, not yet. I gave my boss a very long notice, as I am planning on going back home to Indonesia in June. It is going to be just me, leaving my husband who is saving his holiday allowance so that he can see his own father later on this year. It is going to be a very long holiday. And the most important thing is, it was going to be a surprise for my parents!

Then, my mother did her thing again. One day on our regular phone call sesh, she asked me if I could take a holiday request in June because my nieces and nephews are on school holiday. She is planning to take us all on a holiday in the sun. HOLIDAY IN THE SUN!! This is also the reason why I know she does not have a tracker. No one who listens to me moaning about how shitty sunny weather is would suggest a holiday in the sun.

But it is the chance that we can do holiday as a family that perks me up, so I eagerly agreed. I told her I will do a holiday request, and book a flight.

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Thing is… I had already booked a flight when I told her I was going to. And I was already working my notice period when I told her that I would request a holiday time off. I could have told her that, but I was too surprised myself that my mother just ruined the surprise I was planning for her. This is a counter-surprise I did not expect, you see?

Now, some of you might think why I did not just tell my parents that I have resigned from my job. I am an adult, and I know what I am doing. I have a plan, and a financial means to fund my sabbatical. Why didn’t I just tell them?

I know they wouldn’t like it.

If my parents live in the UK, they will vote for Tories. I am not saying they are bad people, but they do believe in conservatism. I mean if you are taking away the far-right out of Tories, you are left with those who believes in conserving tradition, the old way of life. Things such as: traditional work ethics, traditional family values, etc…. a lot similar to what most Eastern cultures believe too.

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Now, if you are a Labour/Libdem members, and you don’t know how to reach out to BAME in the UK, read this. I am talking at least for people like my parents: they don’t want to be victimised, instead they want to be appreciated that they have worked so hard to achieve what they have achieved. They don’t want this new liberal freedom to do whatever you want to do, they want you to offer stability so they can carry on what they and their ancestors want to carry. I am not saying that this reflects what I believe, I am just offering you an insight to why your PM is a Conservative BAME.

Anyway, I’ll drop the politics for now. Back to my parents.

My suspicion was obviously correct. When I admitted to my parents that I indeed had resigned instead of taking holiday break, they were distraught.

“In this economy?!” my mother exclaimed.

My father was a bit less dramatic. I think he’s just happy that I finally have more time with him but at the same time he had to make some sort of fuss to appease my mother.

Now you need not worry about me. I’ve been my parents daughter for almost four decades, I know what to do with them. So I just let them rant about this for a couple of minutes while trying to calm them down, telling them that I had a plan. Like a clockwork, when she finishes ranting, she tells me how silly I am and bursts out a nervous laughter. And that’s the end of it.

Photo by Alex Green on Pexels.com

She’s ready to talk again.

“So what gives away?” I asked.

Apparently, normally I would take forever to get holiday dates, and book a plane. And, on top of that faff, I would normally only get a couple of weeks, three weeks tops. This time around, not only that I got the date set within a three days, including getting the tickets booked, I have a much longer holiday. My mum reckoned something was fishy, and her supernatural motherly instinct told her that I was not telling them the whole truth. My dad concurred.

So… before I leave you to do your own thing, this is moral of the story.

I am learning a very valuable life lesson. If I want to keep something secret from my parents, better not break my habit.

They know!

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I Will Not Survive The Countryside

I saw the dark skinny legs, crawling on the window on my peripheral vision. So I did what my innermost animalistic survival instinct told me to do.

“Hubby!! Help me!! Spider!!” I screamed, unable to compose a legitimate sentence. I ran out from the kitchen, calling out my knight in shining armour.

He rushed to the rescue, and came back out with a very annoyed expression.

“It is not a spider, and it is OUTSIDE!!”

Oh yea… there’s that thing about glass window. You can see things outside.

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Apparently the ‘spider’ was a daddy long legs. What a stupid name. And you know what Anne-of-Green-Gables, Daddy Long-legs are spiders too!

Then for the next 10 minutes my husband would take his time to talk me through the anatomy of the bloody animal. I tried not to look, because the sight of it gave me goosebumps. But he insisted, and said,

“Come on this is important. You cannot survive the country like this…”

He is probably right. He is not the first person telling me that either.

My father in law lives in a rural area, up in the beautiful hill. Soon after we are able to, we are planning on moving up where he lives. To get closer, and at the same time taking care of him because he is now living alone in his 80s. This sounds like a great plan for me, because I came from a reasonably tight knit family.

But whenever I brought up the ‘rural bit’ whenever we are talking about the plan, I got a range of reaction from ‘looking a bit concerned, along with a bit of wincing’, to ‘straight up ‘laughing in my face while telling me that I am not gonna survive the rural life.’ Fair assessment. I would not even think I could survive a countryside, let alone rural village.

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I have no defense to that judgement. In fact, I don’t think I need to defend myself. I was born in a city, albeit not the big capital city, and had lived a city life for the rest of my life. I have the savviness to navigate and survive in cities. I breathed through pollution, slept through midnight city noise, squeezed through small spaces and crowds. I can do that. I am mobile, physically and socially. I can go to cafe and order a ludicrous novelty coffee without feeling awkward with the names. I tried cocktails, and enjoy fine dining and wine pairing. This is a part of urban lives.

I trade all of those with inability to calmly react to creepy crawlies, or stingy buzzers. Before I got married, I used to keep RAID insect spray with me on my bedroom. I stapled insect net on my student accommodation room. I am not taking chances. I have a fucking hayfever to prove that I am not suitable for the outdoors. I am THOSE people who walk on the shady side of the street, literally. And if I have mud on my face, that better be the dead sea mud facemask.

I like small useless lapdog with lots of non shedding hair, and very little activity. If they can fit on a coffee mug, even better. Although my father in law said that the small dog might be killed by either fox or some kind of bird of prey if we have one in the country.

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I realised that I might not good with farm animals either after my encounter with the chickens. We were supposed to collect eggs, but after seeing how the chicken reacted towards me getting to their eggs nest… should I say that I… chickened out. (don’t hurt me). I did hold a milk bottle for the goat kid once, but probably would not have done it had my MIL not there to protect me from the bigger goats. And… The only time I actually handled a cow was on Stardew Valley, which I am very good at. Thank you.

Of course I will not survive the countryside. If I have to do it alone. But I have him! My husband! My knight, my hero.

Right?

He’s not impressed. As a guy who was once a forest ranger, he found my extreme reaction towards insects is probably beyond annoying.

But he should have known before he married me. I never made it a secret! Dammit.

And now… for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, and… in phobias and in philias. HE STUCK WITH ME MUAHAHAHAHA…

*cough*

I see myself out.

Ta.

Have You Seen It..?

Twenty something years ago, my ex went into my social media account (probably an obscure name now, but this is one before facebook), changed my profile photo from one that showed only me, to our couple photo. Nothing revealing, nothing sexual, just… a couple photo. The problem is at that time, I had not come out yet. To anyone.

They basically outed me using a single photo, and I did not know it yet until I had a phone call from a concern (angry? upset?) relative.

As a background for the story, I came from a country where it was not only very religious but also notoriously homophobic. It is getting better now, but back in early 2000’s this is not something you would like the public to know about. Merely for your own safety.

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It was not easy, but long story short everything ends up well for me. The story about me being outed, is now an old news, and nobody talks about it anymore.

However this gets me very wary about social media. Never again I share my social media password to any of my partners after that. And at the same time, I learned that I feel more sympathetic to people who got this social media ‘incidents’. Whether their photos were leaked, or some people who probably thoughtlessly post their own NSFW photos, even little tweet that does not age well.

“Have you seen *** insta story?” this question was followed with a murmur, and sudden burst of laughter. Not necessarily the nice kind of laughter.

Because how close this hits home to me, I usually try to get away from such conversation. Sometimes I couldn’t get away easily because the colleague would just shove their phone in front of me, showing something that is obviously NOT for me to see.

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While I was incredibly perturbed, I couldn’t help feeling glad that 20 years ago, smartphone and social media was not the way it is today. At that time, anyone who wanted to see what was on my social media profile, had to go their computer, struggled with slow internet connection, and went to a specific URL. You could not find this ‘feed‘ of my status/photo update on your own page, let alone get a phone notification that urge you to see the update.

However the “have you seen…?” sort of triggered me. This seemingly non-harmful little question, said in a gossipy sing-song tune, was the one that got me into a bigger trouble than just a partner who were jealous, and controlling. Later on when the topic was no longer to painful to talk about, my bestfriend told me that she’s been telling people who asked her “have you seen…?” referring to my social media, with “yes I have, now mind your own business.”

And I determined to do the same, when I face the same situation.

Such situation presented itself several times since then. However last couple of years, with the rapid development of social media, I’ve got then more often. Which in itself, very concerning.

Photo by RDNE Stock project on Pexels.com

One time was when one of my colleagues, someone who I consider as a young person, who was in the middle of their journey of finding themselves posted an NSFW photo, complete with the self-affirming quotes. I saw the photos days before the other colleagues did, so I wasn’t so surprised when later on my superior at work came semi giggling showing the particular photo and asked if I have seen it.

When I confirmed that I had seen it before, they asked me why I did not tell them about it.

“It is not my photo to share, and not my business either. I just felt bad that such young person like that felt like they had to do this to feel good, blind to the fact that this might be a bad decision that will stick with them for the rest of their lives.” I left it like that. I really did not want to engage.

The other time when -again, a colleague came to me with -again, another NSFW photo of a colleague. This time I had not seen the photo, because I did not have an account on this particular social media apps. However, because I knew this person more personally, I kind of have a feeling that there must be something really wrong about the whole situation.

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I asked an intermediary, a mutual friend who did not have an access to the photo (and would never have one because I never told them which social media apps where the photo was posted) to alert this particular colleague/friend. Which was a great decision to do because the photo was posted by accident, and they took it down immediately. But the damage was done.

The damage.

Not many people realised about the damage, immediate or long term. This is why many people react the way they do when they found ‘interesting’. I use the term ‘interesting’ very very loosely. What I meant really: gossip-worthy. Something that is actually challenge conformity. Something that makes people feel better and righteous because someone has fallen by doing a social media faux pas.

The kind of damage that until now still affects me.

I really do hope that my refusal to engage, to take a good look and scrutinise, and to get involved in sharing and discussing such contents would also be a learning opportunity. As I want to steal one of the OG guru, Socrates: the triple filter test before you are ‘sharing a(n insta)story’. Paraphrasing just to jazz things up a bit.

  1. Is that true? Have you fact check?
  2. Is that good? Kind? Malicious?
  3. Is that useful for the audience? Helpful?

If the answer is not then maybe it is a good idea to scroll up and shut up.

Righty ho, now I need to kidnap a puppy because this feeling of self-righteousness is somewhat nauseating.

Until then…

hide your puppy.

xx

Review: The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling (podcast, documentary series, The Free Press, 2023)

I never thought, in a million years, that I would write something about Jo Rowling. First of all, I am not a fan of Harry Potter. Not the character, nor the series. Not the books, nor the films. I have to say, I was not even sure how I ended up listening to this documentary to start with, but I did not regret it. I ended up enjoying it a lot.

I did read Harry Potter. The first book came out in Indonesia, conveniently translated, when I was a high school student. I did get caught in the hype, and if you were one of my high school friends, you would have found me curled up at my classroom corner reading one of the Harry Potter books.

I was told that the original version (British version) is so much better. However this is over 20 years ago, and my English was way patchier back then. I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the book as much as I might be able to do now, if I read it in its original language. But anyway… For awhile I did enjoy Harry Potter. I got sorted into a house as well… that’s how much I liked it early in the days.

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For some reasons, by the time Goblet of Fire came out, I stopped reading Harry Potter. And I never enjoyed the films either. Maybe the gloominess of it that put me off back then. I promised myself though, I would try them again… I just haven’t got around to do it yet.

Why did I tell you that? Well… mainly to establish that I did not have any feelings towards Rowling, positive or negative. For many people who grew up with Harry Potter, and loving it, Rowling was like their idol. They saw her as this progressive author who send the message about diversity, acceptance, love, and kindness, who brought her this incredible magical world of Harry Potter universe. I don’t have that kind of view towards her — I saw her more as a writer that has made it in the literary world, and deserver every penny she made out of her book, and the whole franchise.

So when J.K. Rowling suddenly being labeled as a transphobic, I wasn’t as offended or hurt, or even… betrayed, as many of her fans did. I was just surprised that she was. When she was condemned for defending Johnny Depp when he was vilified by the media as an abusive husband, I wasn’t angry the way her fans were. Again, I was just surprised that she did. So when I saw this documentary podcast popped on my spotify suggestion, I thought… why not?

Photo by Edmond Dantu00e8s on Pexels.com

The podcast creator and host was Megan Phelps-Roper. If you don’t know her already, let me fill you in. Phelps-Roper came from ‘the most hated family in the US’. Yes, you might have seen her in the past picketing funerals too. You are correct, she was a member of Westboro Baptist Church. In fact, her whole family were.

She is now distancing herself from the church, although she is still very open when talking about her experience with the church. Phelps-Roper’s background as a former anti-LGBT gave an incredibly unique perspective when poking about Rowling’s feminist view about transgender issues. She has a level of compassion towards Rowling, and this willingness to open up room for discussion which many people are unwilling to provide.

This podcast documentary gave the contexts around Rowling’s controversial tweets back in 2020. I found that understanding these contexts is not only give me a better perspective, but also open up a possibility for discussion or even reconciliation. This is the positive thing that I learned.

The negative?

Well… I also learned that we are now also live in the world where polarisation is reaching the peak. You have to be on one side or the other, and being a centrist means you are the enemy of both sides. You cannot just be right, or left, you have to go to the extreme side to be a part. Rowling, as liberal and progressive as she is… is not extreme enough.

Photo by Gotta Be Worth It on Pexels.com

Anyway… I am sure this is the part where I should make a recommendation, or a verdict whether you should or should not listen to this podcast. Well… I think you should… however….

However.

From the podcast I also learned that there are many people who are so hurt that even the mention of J.K. Rowling’s name is enough to make them gag. Rowling would talk a lot, presenting he point of view, and there is no apology for what she believes in. So if you are one of these people, I don’t think listening to this would be either helpful or healthy for you.

But if you are a Harry Potter fan, or Rowling’s fan, or even like me, someone who just want a good podcast to listen to… give it a bash. You might like it too.

To listen to The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling:

https://www.thefp.com/witchtrials (the official link from The Free Press)

if you are using Spotify

Companion readings:

The Sun Is Shining And I Hate It

Okay. I admit ‘hate‘ is such a strong word, and at this point I might not hate it yet. However I know for a fact that I will hate it later on when we are having a full blown summer. Then… I do hate summer.

I came from a place where we only have two seasons: summer, and heatwave. I know you’ve probably been told that it was dry season and rainy season, but seriously with this rate of global warming, who knows when the rain happens?

Photo by Nikita Igonkin on Pexels.com

When I was younger — when the seasons were still slightly more reliable, I used to love rainy season.

I had a theory: our favourite season is the season where we were born. I mean I was totally convinced that I love Indonesian’s rainy season, and British autumn, because I was born right in the middle of the season. But then my husband would come and destroy the whole theory because he was born late winter and hates winter with passion. And off course, Australia did not help by having the opposite season we are having here in the UK.

I mean… Christmas on summer time? You are technically taking away half of the Christmas songs: Frosty the Snowman? Let it Snow? White Christmas? Or something very very wintery like: In The Bleak Mid Winter?

Outrageous.

If I live in Australia, I might hate Christmas too.

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God I dread summer.

Last summer in the kitchen, the temperature inside the kitchen was nearing 40. I was the pastry CDP — basically I was the dessert-maker, and making pastry was hellish. Butter melted like nobody’s business, ice cream tubs are a total mess. But it was not as bad as if you are working next to the grill. We popped the food probe and they read 45! How can you expect people to work in such heat?

We pulled it through like bunch of bosses. But not unscathed.

Anyway, when today my husband came back in from smoking outside with a beaming smile on his face and said, ‘It was a nice day outside’. I was suspicious. I twitched the curtain and some UV ray entered the room.

‘It’s a shit day,’ I corrected him.

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When the rain stops, and the sun comes up… Will come the sleepless nights, when it is hot and clammy, and the whirring sound of the fan will accompany your nightmare if you manage to fall asleep. Will come the non stop sneezing during the day as the hayfever season peaks. And I will be miserable.

“Oh my god!” I hear you say. Then you suggest me having a day under the sun in the garden, with ice cold beer or chilled wine. Then the online shops suggest these pretty sundress with almost nothing protecting my skin from the skin aging catalyst, cancer inducing UV light.

Let me tell you something.

Asians, born and bred Asians, do not sunbathe. Sunbathing for Asians is literally 10 of minutes 10 a.m sun for babies to warm up for the day. That with a good amount of UV protection.

So, true to stereotype, I avoid the sun like vampires do.

Photo by Daisy Anderson on Pexels.com

It was a running joke that British Summer is extremely short and non-existent. BUT, just like the two-seasons in Indonesia, that is no longer reliable because of the global warming.

In 2011 when I arrived in the UK for the first time, I was met with the Indian Summer — how the Brits called the heatwave back then. I was told that it is unusual that we have warm days on September. And I did find that the summer of the following couple of years would be temperate with a couple of week of warm days. But now things has changed.

We have heatwaves over heatwaves, I even contemplated buying us air conditioning system because of how hot it has become.

And it is only May. Imagine how miserable I would be in a couple of months.

Well… until then,

take care.

xx

May… be?

I AM BACK!

Not sure whether I actually left, but I am back.

My goodness it is May already, and I feel like I have not yet achieved anything meaningful this year. What a disappointing first half of the year.

I am definitely far behind my reading target. Undoubtedly far behind my travelling target. And obviously, by the way I treated this blog, I am way behind my writing target. If only I can say that I have done better in the kitchen… I have a stack of recipes I planned to try, but I haven’t tried anything new or exciting lately.

Well… I started to pick up my knitting again these last couple of weeks, and so far my scarf is going well. I am trying a new stitch too, so I think that makes up for my failure to be productive in the kitchen department.

When I talked about this to my colleagues — about how unproductive I feel, and how I am not doing very well in being sociable as well, they would raise their opinion about my gaming hobby.

I agree I might have days when the first thing I do in the morning is to go to my computer and start playing game until late afternoon. And then worry about dinner. But, that is one of only a few things which I find can help me winding down from the stress from work. So really, I am not willing to give up gaming.

Both my husband and I are introverts. I am not as introverted as he is, and sometimes I can pass as an ambivert. We can spend our days at home playing our games, separately, and being very… very comfortable in our little invisible bubble until one or both of us was hungry… or horny.

We enjoy listening to documentaries, and podcasts, and having a great time discussing about the subjects for hours. So we don’t like going to places that is too noisy or crowded where we cannot have a nice and calm conversation, or sometimes even.. discussions.

But yeah… productivity wise, I am not doing very well.

I am meant to be on a diet as well, but I am now writing this while eating an ice cream. I have this lockdown weight gain I have not been able to shift for the last couple of years. The lockdown has got us (me) a horrible habit of snacking mindlessly while doing everything. I even snacking mindlessly at work.

Now I thought I am going to make it this year.

The world seems as if it has gone back to its normal self. Last year we finally managed to see my family back in Indonesia. We can go to work pretty normally now without having to worry about staff suddenly call in to say that they can come in for the next two weeks because they’re tested positive for COVID.

Of course I was very optimistic that I can pick up where I left off in the early 2020. In fact I have been thinking a lot about my plan back then and remembered that I was planning to have a sabbatical from work.

I remembered how burned out I was back then, and I was planning to take a year of not working and instead going on an extended holiday.

I thought I can resume that plan. Can I?

I understand that the world is not the same as it was in 2020 right now. As a family obviously we were financially better back then. We were not in a global recession back then. I had more savings to carry me through the months I am planning on being unemployed back then. Three years ago this idea of going on a sabbatical did not sound at all crazy, but it seems like it is now.

God I am rambling.

Maybe I should come back a bit later when I am a little bit more with it.

Until then,

Take care x

Actually… That Is Not Funny

I like laughter. I like the sound of laughter. My favourite laughter is my father’s laughter. He’s got this deep belly laugh that brings me so much joy. Not even Brian Blessed thundering laughter can match my father’s.

That is why I like telling my father stories and anecdotes. Like the best dads out there, my father always found my anecdotes funny. Those weren’t even a well engineered jokes with a punchline at the end of it.

No wonder I thought myself so funny. The thought that encouraged me to tell anecdotes to probably*) my second favourite man in the whole wide world. My husband.

*) I said probably because sometimes my husband would act slightly assholey, enough to knock him down one level under my baby brother, which made him the third favourite man in the whole wide world.

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One instance when I told him that I might want to be a stand up comedian, he looked at me bewildered and told me that he believes that to be a comedian one needs to be funny. And unlike my father, he does not always found my anecdotes funny. Sometimes for a very good reason.

The other day one regular customer came to my head chef — probably because of the intoxication, or probably because of inherent misogynistic attitude towards female hospitality workers— he asked her if I was willing to have a ménage à trois with them. First of all, bold assumption that my head chef is interested at all in him. Second of all, bold assumption that I am.

When my head chef told me about the whole conversation she had with him, I was confused. Who?

I am a chef. I work in the kitchen. Unlike front of house worker, I don’t interact with customer more than an occasional ‘excuse me’ when I need to squeeze through the crowd of them. Sometimes I do smile too, but that usually to the customers who come with their dogs. In general, for me customers are just a bunch of faceless people who comes and goes.

Photo by Quang Nguyen Vinh on Pexels.com

Front of House personnel on the other hand are used to such customers like that. I heard from bar staff how they got rude comments on regular basis, they even know the creeps by the name. They even remember how these people want their drinks even though they don’t deserve this kind of personal customer service. But anyway…

I told my husband this encounter. Giggling away, because I thought this is just another stupid story between us hospitality staff, and creepy customer in the pub. Giggling away, because normally my husband is always up for this kind of rude jokes, even when I was the butt of the joke. But this time around he did not find it funny at all.

And for once, I am happy he did not find my anecdote hilarious.

He started off with the difference between sexual banter, and sexual harassments. This sounds like mansplaining for some people, but I think I did need some reminder. Working in hospitality and dealing with creeps at work means most of us have developed thick skin. We became desensitised to this sort of misbehaviour, and no longer calling it out as it is. So I think it is good that he reminded me where the line was.

My husband carried on with how he has heard of so many stories about how hospitality workers being exposed to such abuse. There is no other industry where this kind of abuse and harassments are tolerated, so why hasn’t hospitality keep up with everyone else in protecting their workers? I don’t know. I am not used to asking this kind of thing. I just found it funny, when it was not.

I should not find it funny.

What a twist.

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Pexels.com

Maybe I am NOT funny. Maybe my sense of humour is actually so twisted that only fatherly love can tolerate how weird I must have sounded. Of course the realisation that my husband was for once right, did knock my belief in myself. What if he was right and that I am not as funny as I think I am?

Well… I am going to retreat and sulk, and probably soul searching a bit while eating some ice cream. Until then…

Take care xx

Would You Have A Cake For Breakfast?

I woke up this morning realising that I have a whole chocolate fudge cake from M&S. I bought it a couple days ago when I was shopping for flowers. I was distracted. It was chocolate fudge cake. I think I made my point quite clear.

For whatever reasons, this morning when I woke up, I saw aforementioned chocolate fudge cake, and had it for breakfast.

Because, why not?

When I was a child my parents would never ever ever let me have sweet sugary food as breakfast. Asian breakfast is usually quite hearty and savory. Fried rice with fried egg on top, if you’re lucky you might even have a slice of frankfurter sausage on the side. Rice congee with the options of chicken, duck, or pork for protein, with deep fried char kwai (indonesian: cakwe), or if you like the century egg on the side.

Photo by Whiteplatestories on Pexels.com

Not into something fried in the morning? May I introduce you with the idea of having dim sum for breakfast? Hot food, steamed inside stacks of bamboo steamer. You got chasiu bao, siew mai… Oh my god, I am hungry.

Basically I grew up thinking that breakfast has to be savory. So it feels incredibly rebellious for me to have a slice of cake for breakfast.

It is rebellious. Even by the British standard.

On this side of the planet, sweet food for breakfast is not a new concept. Danish pastry is the perfect example of sweet breakfast, and it is perfectly acceptable. Other than Danish pastry, you can also have jam on your bread for breakfast, cereal (and the amount of sugar kids pour to the bowl of milk to eat the cereal with), you put maple syrup on already sweet american pancakes, even when bacon was involved.

Even oatmeal porridge!

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When we adapt oatmeal porridge in our family, we treat it like a healthier more fibrous version of rice congee (see above). So we mix savoury toppings with it, so it become suitable for breakfast. Here in Britain, we put sweet toppings instead: honey, fruit, jam, chocolate spread… or if you are running out of creative ideas, just more sugar would do.

But why not cake?

The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that the reason why we haven’t started eating cake for breakfast is mainly because we were told not to do it when we were younger. We did not ask the reason, we just did, and that becomes natural for us not to have cake for breakfast. And I think this is absurd.

The fact that restaurants, pubs, and a lot of establishments selling food are now in agreement that NOT ONLY we can extend selling breakfast items into brunch time, we ALSO sell all day breakfast. Granted that when someone say all day breakfast, they are talking about full English breakfast, but I think it is only about time that we can also normalise eating cereal whenever. Not just breakfast.

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Yes, the fact that you can eat food which are traditionally assigned for breakfast menu for lunch or dinner, means that now the food barrier have been broken. Which logically, there is nothing stopping you for having cake for breakfast.

A whole essay just to justify eating cake for breakfast.

Worth it.

Can I Have Your ID?

If you are not from Britain or not familiar with the law about alcohol consumption in this country, let me give you a little bit of an introduction.

You cannot buy alcoholic drink if you are under 18, and it is illegal for anyone to sell you one. However you can consume alcohol in some restaurants if you are over 16, as long as you are accompanied by adults (who buy the alcohol for you). These seem simple, but then there is a ‘challenge 25‘ policy.

Challenge 25 policy is pretty simple. Basically the person selling you the alcoholic beverage would ask you for an ID if you do look younger than 25. I think the idea is that a 17 year old girl could easily pass as 18 with the help of some make up, but would be hard to pass as 25 year old woman. So is 16 year old boy could grow enough moustache nowadays and pass as someone older, but would be hard to pass as fully grown 25 year old man.

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Although I did giggle a little when typing ‘fully grown 25 year old man‘. Most of 25 year old men I met could easily have the maturity of 12 year old, but I am generalising and I am sorry for doing that.

When I was a bit younger, say just over 25 year old, being asked for an ID is a bit of a faff. I was studying for my MA and needed some help to be creative with my paperwork… why don’t we summon Mr. Daniel to the mix? However as a foreign student, I do not have ‘normal’ photo ID to show to the British shopkeepers. Often I got my Indonesian resident card denied as a proper ID, so I had to carry with me my passport. Passport. To buy alcohol. What a faff.

Now as I am nearing 40, being asked for ID is a very much welcomed nuisance. The change in their expression, the compliment that follows next…. “Oh you don’t look a day older than 20“. My husband’s face when he is trying to hold his laughter. I mean, he is older than I am, he could have had a 25 year old child. How creepy is that?

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As someone working in hospitality, I think it would be a great idea to incorporate safe guarding with customer service. Asking an ID for a woman who is almost clearly older than 25 is. from my experience always met with gratitude, and almost always set a great mood for the rest of the evening. Hospitality business owners… you’re welcome.

However, it does make me wonder. Do men experience the same kind of happiness when they were asked for an ID? Would they react similarly when they are asked to prove their age, when they are actually older? Would they feel elated when they’re mistaken as someone younger?

Or is it just us women who are so insecure with our ages, so that look younger become so important to us?

I am not sure I have the answer for that. This is a blog, not a philosophy class. I will let you think of the answer yourself, while I am basking on the joy of being asked for an ID, to prove myself worth this glass of cold liqueur.

Until next time.