Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Weekend trip home for friend's wedding

I just went back to Jakarta over the weekend to attend a friend's wedding. I was contemplating if I should cancel and sacrificed the air ticket since Changi airport is considered a high risk area. I am not that worried if I kena the wuhaha virus but I am more worried if I am spreading it. I wore N95 that a colleague helped to buy when she went back to Malaysia over the CNY. The airport was not as scary as what my colleagues described last week, not sure if it was because I was taking a late evening flight. It was less crowded than usual and surprisingly, not that many wore masks. Perhaps it was 50:50. In the transit area, there were fewer people wearing. Perhaps they were just transiting and hence not that informed and worried about the latest happening. I decided to take of my mask since it was unfitted and uncomfortable. It was too small and the nose part interfered with the nose pads of my spectacles. I normally choose aisle seat but as precaution, I chose a window seat with 8 seats surrounding mine unoccupied. Initially I did not want to remove my mask so I was preparing not to eat the meal. Although I already removed the mask, I was just not in the mood to eat. By the way all the air stewardesses were also wearing mask.

I reached home past 1am and it was later by another 5 minutes, it would be a nightmare thinking on how to bring down my luggage as it started to rain heavily. After catching up for a short while with my dad and elder sister, I finally slept at 3am. I have been away for so long (almost 2 years) that my room does not feel like my room anymore: new aircon, my things on the bed were rearranged elsewhere, thick layer of dust, dim room light which has not been changed yet, and a new plain green bedsheet which clashes with wall colour that makes me eww. All these changed in the morning when I woke up as I felt that the feeling of restfulness was more shiok. The feeling of home with all the childhood memories and nostalgia is different compared to hotels or my rental room in Singapore. This is the longest period I have been away from home and clearly that does not change my feeling.

It was still raining although it was not as heavy as earlier. It got me worried because the sudden flood on the New Year's Day earlier this year occurred so rapidly within the few hours of heavy rain after the countdown. I wanted to go to Mal Kelapa Gading and the rain almost disrupted the plan. I refused to take the risk of dashing through the flood water and thank goodness there was GoCar. Rp 15000 just to 'cross' the road seems expensive but when I convert it to $1.50, it seems reasonable.

My main reason to go was to get cashew nuts for my landlord. We ended up spending more time taking photos with Disney's CNY decorations. My sisters were more excited but I was not so. Firstly the decorations were just cardboards and secondly I was in a hideous outfit. I could not find my jeans so I was in my old berms. I only took photos with decorations that blocked the lower half of my body. After knowing that some of the decorations were moveable, I went a bit thick skin with the bao and ingot decorations.

The manga industry in Indonesia seems to be dying. My sister has been telling me that there are not that many to buy anymore. The ~1.5 years worth of comics are just as many as ~6 months worth many years ago. The comics section in Gramedia is much smaller now. Even when I want to force myself to find a new series to collect, most of them are just not appealing. I ended up starting Edens Zero (Fairy Tail has ended and Edens Zero is the next title from the mangaka, Hiro Mashima) and Fate/Grand Order -turas realta- (Fate is a popular series that I never get to know further other than from its merchandises so this may be a good introduction).

I went to my friend's wedding in the evening. There were only around 5 of my junior high school friends there. One of them was quite unexpected since I did not know if he was close or in the same clique as this wedding friend. So it was our first encounter after almost 2 decades. Now come to think of it, it is quite curious how I get closer to my friend until I am willing to have a weekend trip for his wedding. I do not remember we were ever classmates at school last time. More than a decade later somehow I agreed to visit Japan with him and then another time 2 years later so I really owe it to him for going to Japan twice a year after that.

It was raining again in the early morning and the drain outside the house was already full. When I arrived (barely 2 nights ago), the drains were still empty. In some of the streets which are lower than my street, the water already spilled over to the road. Thank goodness it was not really flooding and I was able to go to airport with no hassle. Before that, we had lunch at a steamboat restaurant. I am not a fan of steamboat but since this was my father's choice, I decided to be guai.

That may turn out to be a mistake since I am sick now. I felt lightheaded on Monday afternoon but I was alright in the evening. I felt lightheaded again on Tuesday morning which I thought because I had not eaten breakfast yet. After I had breakfast, I felt like throwing up. Nearing the middle of the day, my colleagues started to notice that I looked to tired and unwell. I told them that I would see doctor after my meeting in the afternoon.

It seemed that I had food poisoning. I have been very tired in the past 2 days and did not have time to shit in the morning so maybe all the toxin was still inside me. I still shit once daily: not diarrhea but there was little solid and it was dirty black. Eewww... After afternoon nap, I woke up with a fever and the news of local transmission of the Wuhan virus which made me even more worried though I did not have any cough and flu symptoms though. I felt better this morning but after my lunch, I felt lightheaded and nauseated again. Gosh.. I still cannot pass motion as smoothly as I want so I think most of the toxin is still in me. Sianz... It really sucks to fall sick until you cannot do anything other than resting. Not to mention that with the ongoing wuhaha... damn... If I am still unwell tomorrow, I do not mind to get another MC until the weekend although that means I will be using one third of my yearly quota sia...

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