First Guests To My New House

I called up a good old friend of mine this morning (ko tau ko sapa).

He is vertically challenged (mintak ampunn!!!).

He along with another good friend of mine (who is also vertically challenged) and his wife are planning to travel to Jakarta soon.

Their visit will co-incide with my moving to the new house.

I hope they wouldn't mind and would understand the chaotic condition of the new house. Please brace yourselves to sleep on bedsheet-less matresses with pillow-case-less pillows.

It would be a good idea to bring along your own pillow cases and bedsheets (paling cabuk pun Aussino) and leave them here for safe-keeping and later forgotten.

I will organise a "ribbon cutting ceremony" for you guys to officiate my new house. And ohh... please bring along the ribbons.

These people are my closest bestest friends. They are welcome to my house at any time of the year. I've known them since uni days.

I've shared a house with one of them way back then in Pelabuhan Mulut. Actually, the truth is I was an illegal squatter in his house. Not that I don't have my own place.

A short guy who loves to please others, an orang Jawa who loves to cook and a errr "slim" girl who loves to do nothing but sing and eat, you put them together in a house and presto!! you'd get a cheap stress relief medication. The reason why I was happily squatting there.

Ohh... there was another person living in that house but he's too busy admiring himself in the mirror to socialise with others.

But I digress.

Ok... this friend of mine told me that another friend, Ms Enon (bukan nama sebenar) wanted to come to Jakarta again.

I was jumping with joy!!! So happy I was that I started singing Barry Manilow's Copacobana at the top of my lungs!!

NOT!!!!!

She can come to Jakarta for all I care, but please not stay in my house.

I receive guests from Malaysia almost every month. Family, relatives and friends. Some of these friends, occasionally, would bring along others whom I know not. But I don't mind. It's another way of fostering new friendships. I have no problem with that.

The problem starts when the guests show little respect to the host.

A friend of mine with his wife stayed over at my place not too long ago. On the first night, upon the request from the husband, I took them to a Nasi Padang restaurant. The wife was not eating much. When asked by the husband, she said " Yang ni kat Malaysia pun ada".

I was screaming in my head "Woiii!!! kalau nak makanan yang takde kat Malaysia pergi Zimbabwe!!! Jangan datang Indonesia!! This is a Nasi Padang restaurant for goodness sake! What do you expect? Sweet and sour rhinocerous meat?!!"

Miraculously, I managed not to show my displeasure on the remarks made by the wife (this rarely happens though).

Then there was this one guest who was not too pleased when I brought her to ITC Mangga Dua despite being given a brief description of what it was like there. She stopped at one of the shops selling fake watches and started asking for brands which were not available.

The shop assistant showed a few pieces but this guest of mine started telling off the poor shop assistant. "I want brands which are known to produce only watches!!"

For all you know, to the poor non-english speaking shop assistant "Omega Egg" is a series of the Omega watches.

This is Mangga Dua lahh!!! If you want to find a knowledgeable watch sales-person go to Grand Indonesia!!!

Another guest was so fussy about what and where she eats. She complains on the food being served most of the time. She refused to eat in a cafe which she claimed was too smelly (I wonder how she could tell because she was standing about 15 metres away from the cafe's entrance!).

These are some of the guests which gave me terrible headaches.

Fortunately, most of my other guests are a pleasant lot. They don't complain much (not in my face anyway.. ada yang kutuk belakang tu siap korang!!). They don't mind eating in a road-side warung. Most importantly, they respect the host.

Treat others as you would like to be treated.