It’s a small world afterall

(Ya’ll remember the song tak? The last time I sang it was in Standard 3, in a short sketch during weekly assembly –uihh… I hated those assemblies!)

My first date was at a McDonald’s joint in Plaza Pelangi.

I was about 16 years old (I started late but who cares ay?), I was clad in my Stussy skate pants, cropped hair and a Metallica T-Shirt (still could not believe that I paid RM 100 bucks for the damn T-shirt…) and a pair of Airwalks. I was smelling of the only perfume I could afford at that time on my school allowance, Bodyshop’s juba perfume oil.

My date was a fifth former. He was a student in one of the ‘prestigious Malay colleges’ (Guess la which… hehe…) and we met on one of our fathers’ gatherings.

Somehow, I fell to his sweet nothings and gave him my house’s phone number.

The date was awkward. For one, I remembered that I wasn’t at all hungry and he took the liberty of ordering for me. Occay.

And then we took to talking like penyus taking to water. I was impressed by his English (he stayed in the UK for some time) and he was impressed by the fact that I don’t bother to impress him.

Took us 2 more dates to get used to each other. We went out ‘dating’ whenever he was back in JB and whenever I got out from the ‘prison’ (I was also in a boarding school.) I made out with him, but he was not my first… ehem… I called him dude… we never quite graduated to the ‘sayang’ or ‘honey’ phase.

I am a late bloomer.

Dates back then was innocent and unassuming. You get the uncontrollable heart beats, like drums during a lion dance.

And I stuttered… swear to god. I did that. He was not at all that cute, though I thought his body was incredible… for an innocent chickadee I was back then, who was adamant on preserving my … ‘sunti’-ness… ehem…

We were hot for each other like any teenagers would at that time. Both of our families are equally reserved on things like these. We lasted a year. We just kind of drifted away.

So when we accidentally met last month, it was not so much awkward, but it’s more to… clueless.

I and a friend was eating our dinner at TGIF in JB when I last went back and a couple of guys walked in and sat at the table next to ours. He was with another friend. My friend was checking them out and she told me that they’re quite cute. I turned and noticed that they were checking us out too.

It took us quite some time to identify each other. Afterall, it has been more than 10 years ago. I just ate my dinner and drank my beer.
I was told by my friend that the cuter one is checking me out. I didn’t think much about it. I was concentrating more on my shrimp and steak.

And then he broke the ice (that I thought wasn’t even there.)

"Uhmm… you are S****** right? Teknik JB? Boarding school? Remember the Haji’s kenduri?"

It took a while for it to register. And then he told me his name;

"I’m Tengku Amar* la. Remember?"

Huh! And then I remembered, the whole thing, our first ‘date’, our first make out session even which was purely accidental but we knew that the both of us just wanted too badly back then.

It was surreal. He looked better now, he put on a bit of weight and still retains his goatee.

"You look different."

Well… considering the last pair of pants that I wore when I was with him was twice my size, yeah… of course. I am way over the baggy pants stage and was as a matter of fact in a pink halter sundress.

"That’s good right?"

He nodded and said a short yeah.

He told me that he is working in Dubai and was back for about two weeks for a vacation.

He also told me that he is single.

And I felt my friend’s feet nudging me under the table.

We exchanged numbers and have been keeping in touch ever since.

The whole thing makes me realize one thing. The world is small and funny unexpected things bound to happen.

Of course Tengku Amar * is one those unexpected things to happen.And I call him by his name now.

*Bukan Nama Sebenar , people.