BluE Scrubs

For some bizarre reason I thought about a few significant men I have encountered in my life.

Sometime ago, one said to me as I was walking off the escalator in that Berjaya Time Square with him, ‘Why can’t you wear proper heels and proper handbag like other girls’. (not exactly the words out of his mouth.)

It was so selamba and needless to say a rhetorical question. It made me struggle for a while for appropriate something to say back. Never been told that one before. I thought I was supercool all this while.

The fact is I am probably not the kind he would normally be seen with, strutting the over populated over polluted city called KL with heels 24/7, clutching some overpriced funny looking thing called handbag, pencilled in eyebrows- when are they going to overwrite with a marker pen, saving them having to reapply it- funny yah?, poker straight ironed hair – what, they think baju is it must iron all the time.

Some serious slagging own species there, but hey I do those sometimes- not flippin draw an umbrella above my eye socketlah ok. When I want to feel casual, relaxed, and loose and airy and light and gay and merry in my own skin, do you think I'd appreciate an off key comment like that? It’s not easy to be what people expect you to be especially when comfort is compromised. I am for comfort, first, always.

I give in sometimes, but never on request. There are ways to make me dress up and put myself through torture with heels and the full works, but not by what’s just been said by him. And however cliché it might sound, it’s not what you say it’s how you say it.

Funny thing was, I felt hurt a little when he said that. He even went on, somebody of YOUR age should dress like a woman. I wasn’t angry, just gloomed. Frustrated that he couldn’t see beyond my physical appearance which includes what I wear. Felt like a complete old bag there and then.

You know, people will forget what you said exactly, people will forget what you did precisely, but people will never forget how you made them feel. The feeling still lingers.

Sometimes I dig my self an answer to questions like that when I am alone, most of the time it’s while walking towards my car, because I know as soon as I get in the car, those thoughts will leave me like dry leaves shaken from a thin tree, as I drive off.

Also in the car, reasonable thoughts like, I still get asked for ID outside HRC Pattaya or outside Walkabout, and I still get semi shocked expression from patients when I say I am a proper as in qualified doctor, filled my deflating sense of self. If these thoughts were bricks, they could probably build a multi-storey car park next to the hospital by now, instead of this flippin’ The Pit.

All of a sudden a silly thought entered my mind, ‘I wish he wouldn’t just walk up from the car park this morning’. I kid you not, I looked seriously like a woman been dangled upside down in a wind tunnel and I should probably walk around with a ninja wardrobe with hazard written across it.


Then walking up the hill towards me, I saw a figure. Broad shoulders, careless spiky hair offset by clean shaven jaw line. A combination qualified for an effortless look which I suppose would suit only certain people.

The sun was glaring, wasn’t sure if that’s who I thought it was.

Bollocks. It was him.

‘Hey doc hospital is that way’, cocky greeting and he laughed, a friendly laugh. He looked fresh, must have had a good night sleep I suppose. Alright for some isn’t it. I accommodated, I grinned wearily. I couldn’t say more, because I ‘ve forgotten the toothpaste.

He stopped curtly as we merged so I had to as well. My throat was dry, my lips were chapped my eye bags growing funny looking potatoes, as red and itchy as ass crack, and I just wanted to turn around pretend I hadn't seen him, but it’s too late.

Gosh I know I can’t write shit, but just look at the amount of shit on this page.