Innocent je dulu2

Writing this blog dgn cerita2 yg takde kena mengena dgn my studies make me happy. Especially dgn cerita2 dari dolu2 boleh buat i tersengih sensorang. It's surprising how much little details i can recall..(kalau ada diary i tu lagi best citenya kut because i bet i jotted down every single detail).

I forgot that before i met his parents during easter hols, there were school breaks in between. I vividly remember that we had a mid-term break and Valentine's day in 1992 fell during that break. As always, i would be spending my hols at my guardian's. She was this eccentric english woman who was married to an italian man and they had a son who was one year senior. Her husband was a trouble shooter of an oil and gas company and he was never around. I have never met him. Other than having a few wards including me, she also rented out the rooms in her house to a few college students. She has this big, 3 storey Georgian house. Apparently, the husband didn't know that she has all these people staying with her. On the very rare occasions that he'd be home, the students would also be away for e.g. christmas hols.

So, on that valentine's day, my guy travelled all the way to where i was staying in his little Fiat panda. And he brought me some roses! First time dapat bunga dari jantan....bukan nak mengutuk jantan melayu but the mat salehs start quite young at being romantic...ok la..kalau yg perangai afrit tu pun afrit jugak la. I mean, when i was in form 3, i pi tuition kat satu tempat ni. I was from an all girl's school so kat tuition place tu la baru boleh nampak boys. There was this one particular guy who liked to stare at me but pas tu boleh pukul canang kat sekolah dia yg i perasan dia minat kat i. What is that about??? Kalau bab2 bukak pintu, ladies first bila beratur for lunch at the dining hall tak usah cakaplah kan? Cuba kat sini...kita perut memboyot pun still kena berdiri takde tempat duduk dlm LRT (a ah! Still kena bawak keta sendiri ke KL padahal jantan tu boleh bawak officemate dia pulak! Oopss..ni cite lain la pulak...cite yg akan diungkit2 sampai 7 keturunan. MG, i hope you're reading this)

One thing about HughGrant ni, he always smelled so nice....and pakai baju kemassss je.. you know, with his shirt and tie, and jumper and a blazer when in school. Bila datang jumpa i pun cam tu jugak (minus the tie and blazer lah). What i noticed also, whenever he has his rugby/cricket practice, mesti dia akan siap mandi semua and then baru jumpa i kat library, then we'd go for dinner (kat sana depa panggil tea because at 5pm tapi makan cam kita makan malam/lunch i.e. heavy. I'm still confused till now) before going home. What i liked about him also was the fact that i could be myself with him. For instance, most of the times before dinner, i would perform my asar prayers because kalau nak tunggu balik rumah takut tak sempat. The reverand at the school was kind enough to let us use the chapel to pray. And you know, if he couldn't find me at the usual place at the library, he'd actually look for me at the chapel and would wait quietly until i've finished. I thought that was so sweet of him.

When he came up to see me, we did the usual stuff like makan2, pi tengok wayang, jalan2 kat taman bunga etc. So much energy at that age kan? Kalau sekarang toksah harap la...naik kereta saja OK, please? It was quite a relief to be able to spend time with each other outside school. Ye le..kan kat sekolah tu cikgu jadi mata2. Pegang tangan pun boleh kena detention tau! (Which we both kena from 2 different teachers on the same day! Takle sampai detention, tapi kena warning je la..It helps that both of us idakle terkenal dgn perangai afritnya kan so we go t let off quite easily..)

During the easter weekend, i went down to where he lived for a change(dekat2 dgn sekolah i jugak) to meet him..also because he said, i would like you to meet my parents. oh no....! Gabra jugak mula2. My guardian said, he must be pretty serious about me, kalau tak takkan bawak pi jumpa parents, and that was coming from a mat salehkan, so i pun percaya je la. We must have been going out for 3+ months by then. The thing is things were OK the way they were...i had my head firmly screwed on my shoulders. Kita pun tau kan, setakat cinta monyet je, kalau tak declare feelings pun takpe. Come summer, we'd sit for the A-levels, then cuti panjang and then we'd go to our respective unis. Dah ada kawan nak bersembang camtu pun dah cukup dah. Then he had to say those 3 words. Tu yg buat i lemah sikit tu..why la he had to say it?

So he picked me up at the train station..since it was still early, we went for lunch and then kitaorg pi panjat bukit. It was not just any other hill. You see, i could actually see the hill from my bedroom window at the boarding house but we girls were forbade from going up there pasal banyak hippies. Later i found out from the other girls, aku je la sorang yg tak pernah panjat, depa semua dah! Talk about aku yg menurut perintah!



I was so ill-prepared to meet his parents. Tak bawak apa2 pun setakat karipap sendiri je (as Esah would say..sorry melucah sikit di situ). He was the only child..his parents were quite elderly. Apparently jenuh depa try nak dapat yg satu tu..sib baik la keluar yang berjenis gak. They live in this place yg castle dah dibahagi 4...even though dah kena bahagi pun, it was still quite big. Ada sampai 3 tingkat u! His bedroom window overlooked a small church and ada kuboq lama2 (trust mat saleh yg tak penakut pada benda2 camtu kan. Sib baik le tak jadi rumah mertua i ke kalau tak mesti cemas nak balik kampung). When we got there, only the father was at home...doing cross stitch hahaha. The mum was at the church tengah bersiap2 apparently ada wedding the next day. They had a cat named Simba. He showed me where his room was..kena naik a spiral staircase. We sat in his room tapi dia tak bagi tutup pintu because he didn't want his parents to pikir yg bukan2 (OK ye Esah, i nak tutup pintu bukan pasal i bohsia tapi ada draught la. Imagine kau rumah lama, dinding batu sekeping2 tu, and ceiling like so high. Kang kalau masuk bawah duvet, dia ingat tah hapa2 pulaklah kan?). The funny thing was, his dad came to get us nak beritahu maknya dah balik. Antara naik tangga tu paknya dah jerit panggil nama dia..hehehe...agaknya he didn't want to catch us unaware kut..yeah like we were just looking at his baby photo album.

I thought his mum was OK..made some tea, keluarkan their fruit cake and sembang2 kosong. I remember us talking about my dad's kebun, and goats and tah hapa2 lagi. Then his mum asked this question..have we figured out how far nottingham u (where he was going after alevels..eh..MG pun pi situ. Lupalak i pasal laki i) is from the uni i was going to? We just looked at each other..seriously, we weren't thinking that far ahead. When we decided which uni to go to and filled in the forms, we were only friends then. All i thought at that time was that i'd like to spend another 2 weeks after the exams at my guardian's before i go back to Msia for the hols. So that we could berpoya2. In fact memang i dah book tiket kapalterbang pun. Lepas tu apa nak jadi que sera sera le kan.

After a few hours, it was time for me to get on the last train back to my guardian's. I got a box of chocs from his mum which for a very long time i kept the box even when i've eaten all the chocs. And he gave me a small teddy bear yg boleh pusing2 kepala, kaki tangan semua.

It was all so innocent then...we saw each other mostly in school. Bukannya ada hp to sms or skype or ym cam bebudak sekarang. Weekends pun tak jumpa because dok asrama bukannya boleh keluar sesuka hati. Boleh la nak pi keluar pekan jenjalan but tak tau le pulak nak berdating kat pekan padahal he was a day pupil and he had a car. Kalau nak anytime boleh kut, tapi tak pernah terpikir. In a way it helped me to stay focused on my studies. But i think my naivete also caused the relationship to break.

OK folks until next time, i'm so sleepy, esok kena bangun extra awal utk jadi lab rat lagi, tata!