sopped up drivel. dith has grown out of bad habits.
Dean and fatbulous.com
Again I was on the way down to meet Jason, but not running late, thankfully. As I was near the safety of the escalator leading down to the mrt, a guy approached me.
He handed me his name card and begin his sales pitch with: Do you drink 8 glasses of water per day?
Of course my answer to that was 'No'. I drink much too little, in fact. Then I asked him: "Why?"
Turns out he was selling health products.
He asked me if I knew anyone who wanted to lose weight, say, five kg a month. Naturally you approach potential customers, so immediately i shot at him: You referring to me?
He gave me a once over, and told me that no, I was fine.
Laziness overtakes me at this point. I shall appease the masses with a quote of the entry I wrote about this incident in my main blog.
i was approached again today
by this guy at the mrt station
he walked over to me and asked
Do you drink 8 glasses of water a day?
i blurly looked at him and said
no.. why?
apparently he's selling weight loss kits.
he asked me if i knew anyone who wanted to buy
i thought to myself
huh? you making a dig at me is it?
so i asked him flat out
you referring to me?
he gave me a once over look and said
no la. you look ok what.
hmm. sweet words from a wolf? lies all lies? hua yan qiao yu? or truth?
truth to tell, he wasn't good looking himself
i was quite fascinated with his crooked teeth.
(hmm dith. always so mean)
anyway rattled on a bit
then i said i gotta go
i looked at his namecard
so i said
you're Dean?
he said
wah, so fast you see my name liao
i said yeah. gave him a half-smile
(didn't mean anything. just tired and cynical)
i also noticed there was a website
so i commented on that
then i was about to leave when he asked me for my name
as usual, people need to hear it at least twice before it registers in their head
I'm Dith. i said.
he said cool name.
then he said ok, cya dith
i gave a dismissive wave and uttered bye.
I actually was around the area the next day, but in the afternoon and with my mom. He wasn't there. Muahaha. Mean me wanted to show his flaw to mom.
ahem.
Toa Payoh North wa doko desu ka
I apologize in advance for my poor grasp of the japanese language. Just thought that using Japanese for the caption would be fitting. This encounter is interesting, although it made me late for a dinner and movie appointment. (Correction: you were ALREADY running late. Besides you were WAITING for the bus.)
I was totally staring into space at the 235 bus stop outside my house. My mind just decided to up and die after I defeated the fantastical tough monster the FFX beastiary had concocted after I caught all the nine monster types from the Calm Lands. Not to mention my sister came home all distressed and stuff, and I kept feeling that I looked weird.
Lazy me decided to take a bus that day instead of walking like I always do these days. While I stared at the glorious view across the road, nothing registering in my mind except for blank bytes, my subconscious mind noticed a girl in uniform come into the edge of my vision.
Cute girl, short hair.
She spoke in halting english and wore a uniform that I didn't recognise until later. Nothing registered in my mind.
She asked me for directions.
First she asked me the way to Toa Payoh Central. I told her to take the bus I was waiting for, two stops to the terminal, and that she could even walk but the route was not really straightforward.
Then she asked me the way to Toa Payoh North. Something clicked in my sleepy mind. 1000 Toa Payoh North: SPH building. So I asked her if the area she wanted to go to was near SPH.
SPH? Singapore Power House? She looked quizzically at me.
The fact that she was not local was slowly beginning to register in my mind. Singapore Publishing House or something, I told her. Then I thought of the morning rush for the mrt.
Braddell Station?
Yes yes, she needed to be around that area. But wasn't the bus to take 231?
I told her the opposide bus would go to Braddell mrt too.
Ah, Yellow Pages there? she asked.
Get down at braddell and it'll be nearby I concurred.
With a thank you and a smile, she headed to the opposite bus stop to wait.
I suddenly recognised her uniform and accent.
Catholic Junior College, probably Japanese. A Japanese exchange student?
My chance to make further query was gone. She was already crossing the road.
Clumsy at Yio Chu Kang
I feel a tad bad for giving this entry such a title, but that's what makes this encounter stick in my mind so endearingly so. I hope he doesn't read this.
I was minding my own business, waiting for Alvin to pass me my computer bootdisk, and yes, for once, i was early. I chose the nice niche between the phone booth and the ATM machine, where I had seen Nigel and Alvin waiting before. I watched people come and go, trains come and go. In fact, I hadn't been waiting long at all when this guy approached me from the ATM side. He walked over via the back of the ATM machine.
I suppose he was too busy riffling through his five dollar tickets or trying to get my attention for he didn't notice the metal pieces on the floor. Those that resemble planks. I don't know what to call them. So the obvious happened.
He tripped on the way over and nearly fell on me.
Anyway he caught himself before he did so, but he had already lost his professionalism and dignity as a salesman. Image and presentation clinches the top points to make the grade when you're a salesperson or promoter. One slip and eyebrows raise.
He regained his balance and stumbled over to me. He then proceeded to tell me about these five dollar tickets that would grant me discounts. Interesting. He had forgotten about his lapse in suaveness.
I don't like people who try to sell tickets.
They apparently get commision for doing so. Especially those two dollar 'charity' tickets. Note the inverted commas. If you're paid to do charity, why term it charity?
So i shall call them "ticket pushers". Notice 'pushers'. Negative word being used. heh.
So I told him I had already bought that ticket five times over and given them to my friends, and that I was now broke. I gave him my sweetest smile and after knowing that his efforts were in vain he smiled, said thank you and left.
He left via the front of the ATM machine. I never saw him (trip) again.
p/s: I noticed that he had managed to sell some tickets before approaching me, so I don't suppose the lack of forthcoming revenue from me would be of any problem to him.
I have been told that I have an Information Counter face, or just a gullible face. Interesting how nature has chosen to hmm.. disguise me? Fine. I admit I do wander about like a lost soul at times. But no, i am not
that gullible. At least, I'd like to think I'm not.
Anyway, to kickstart this blog, we have three tales.
The tale of the clumsy boy at yio chu kang mrt station, the tale of the japanese exchange student and the tale of the weight loss trainer at toa payoh mrt station.
This blog shall be dedicated to one of dith's extraordinary talents; how she almost always seems to be approached with alarming high frequency by strangers.
Asking directions, donations, pushing products or whatnot.
Read on, and contemplate what surrounds us every day: people-to-people relations. and of course, communication.
