Six hours in Amcorp Mall?

Yes, we did that on Sunday, day after our son's wedding. Our two daughters went there earlier, and the younger one left for an assignment while the other shopped while waiting for us to join her.

The wedding reminded me of our wedding and I remembered my best man had told me before, to inform him if around so that we could meet up. Meanwhile, while looking around, I saw an old wooden deck chair similar to ours, which in turn was almost the same as one used by my father before. From Rm450, I bargained to Rm300, knowing the wood work needs attention and the rattan needs replacement. Lingam said he could take it to B1 and when I am ready to give him a call to load it into our car. I actually loaded it and went back to B2 to park at the same space! When my best man arrived, we were not ready to leave so he said he would park his car and look for us at Kar Fei Dian (kopitiam in Mandarin). My wife has not met him for many years, if not mistaken, since his wedding in 1987! Yet, as she was walking towards the loo and he was coming in from the entrance, she pointed at him and said, 'You haven't changed! I can still recognize you!'

I was glad Cheng was with us and I introduced her and she got to chat with him, because with his years of experience in our government service, I could see them interacting in a meaningful discussion. His first degree was in International Relations (Cheng did Politics and International Relations), and his Masters was in Urban Planning (Cheng did Social Policy Analysis), and now Cheng is doing Ethnic Segregation in The Nederlands for her PhD. His wife was with EPU in the PM's department and is a PhD holder. So any question from him or Cheng to him was answered in a relevant manner, unlike the usual small talk when meeting parents' friend for the first time.

What I find most interesting was Cheng's lament that though she had yet to need information from Malaysia, she had friends who did research on Malaysia. The main complaints were: either information was unavailable for one reason or other, or having obtained the information you are told that the research papers could not be published!

I can still remember my friend's lament many years ago, about the fact that he did International Relations because he wanted to be in the diplomatic service with the chance of being posted overseas, but till he retired, he had never been given the chance!

Anyway, Cheng had an appointment with friends and she left, leaving us to have dinner and a chance to continue our chat in Amcorp Mall. It was a spur of the moment decision to call up my ex-college mate and we were to discover later that my son and younger daughter were disappointed as they were expecting us to have dinner together!


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