Gimme a (toilet) break

KLIA: Approaching the common main entrance to the rest rooms, I saw a cleaning lady, I took a quick glance at the gender sign and made a left towards the Gents. But the lady was staring at me. Walking past her, she followed me with her eyes. As I entered the wash basin area, she was actually tailing me, shouting 'Oi! Oi!'. Crap! Did I just enter the Ladies? Bladder was about to burst, result of trying out some 'water therapy' in the morning and not making any stops all the way from Sentral. I was on the verge of panic. My engorged bladder would undoubtedly relief itself should some lady in the loo screams. Then I see urinals. MALE urinals. The aunty saw them around the same time, too. She hushed, blushed and got the **** out. I skipped, unzipped and let the waste out. Coming out of the dunny, the lady was nowhere to be seen, her bucket and mop waiting her return from exile somewhere.


CHANGI: Bladder was about to explode again. Toilet, check. Gents, check. I hurried in. Then I see the above on the wall! Did I actually goof and brought my grief into the Ladies this time? I was livid. In Singapore, they'll brand me a perv, jail me and the papers will have my sorry face all over it. Just then, a great sight for exploding male bladders: The urinal. It was the Gents, after all, 'Mommy's Helper' or not. Just why would they still call it 'Mommy's Helper' when it's in Dad's John?

Twice within 3 hours, I was mortified with the prospect of having entered the Ladies. Wonder if I should do the water therapy again.......


Water therapy info

Lencongan

I was supposed to blog about a visit to Narita Village in the outskirts of Tokyo. But I came across a LENCONGAN (diversion) that had me write about this instead. All because the darned portable 60GB hard-disk holding a few thousand photos, including the hundred-odd taken around Narita, decided to check out of permanently. I was hopping mad. "Du-uh! ******* hard-disk mati katak!" (literally: to die a frog's death) was my internalised exclamation upon the discovery. Interesting idiom this one, relating to the seemingly ignoble end to the frog. And there are many ways the frog doth croaks. One photo of which I kept in my laptop:

This amphibian hopped into the wrong pond for a dip: A hot spring. Took this picture on a drive from Cameron Highlands to Gua Musang, along which route is the hot spring. Other scenes of a frog's demise are too graphic to be shown here or even be photographed. You must have all seen plenty. I must say that the frog population must have dwindled a lot because I, for one, can recall coming across a lot more dead frogs when I was younger. Global warming? More roads and more vehicles? One too many biology lessons? Or the wise men of old really knew something about the leggy ones' inevitable leap towards extinction, mostly under undignified and unglamourous circumstances?

Then it got me wondering if anybody actually calls his/her blog mati katak? Voila! There is one such. I sincerely hope it is a misnomer, for such an appellative certainly comes with it a foreboding connotation. I am not about to jump to conclusions. For I have a more pressing undertaking at hand: To procure a new portable hard-disk, so I could travel around with my collection of photographs once more.

Before that can happen, I must first make sure the 500GB external drive at home hasn't gone the way of the frog looking for a hot dip.....

SELAMAT HARI RAYA EID AL-FITR to MUSLIM FRIENDS.

Maaf zahir dan batin to all.