I, Stupid

"Only a fool lets his heart overrule his brain."

Anne O. Nimus

I touched down in Malacca yesterday (or rather, this morning) at about 1 am. First, I'd have to drop Odessa off at her house - she had hitched a ride from KL after attending her own meet there. As I pulled into her driveway, a woman in her late thirties or forties walked in after us.

Odessa got the fright of her life when that woman tapped the window on her side (we did not notice till that moment). The woman then proceeded at rapid-fire in Mandarin about a sob story of how her husband had locked her out of their home. We gestured for her to leave but she wouldn't listen. She even told us that she recently had an operation done on one of her breast ("wo de nai kai tao") and that she's not in good health, that her husband has two other wives and about how dangerous it was for a woman her age to walk around at that time.

The point is, she needed me to drive her to her sister's or brother's house somewhere in Klebang (!). That's a good 15 minutes drive at the very least. That woman also asked Odessa's permission to stay in her house for the night if it was not convenient for me to give her a lift (you should have seen the face Odessa pulled when that woman made the suggestion).

From the look of her, she definitely did not seem to be in much ill-health (she was in fact rather tough looking and wore her hair military short). Also, she looked weirdly calm for a woman who had a polygamous husband who locked her outside their house at 1 am in the morning. Call me crazy, but I had my suspicions.

Odessa hatched a crafty plan; she told the woman that I'd drive her, but she (the woman) should first get out of her driveway so I can back my car out. The idea was that I should drive off straight home leaving that woman there as soon as Odessa got her front gate locked up.

Luckily, that woman agreed and everything went according to plan. Just as I was about to zoom off leaving the woman behind to bite my dust, I had a sudden moral attack; "What if everything that woman said was true?" In spite of the fact that all clues pointed otherwise, I gestured for the woman to get into the car.

That's probably the un-smartest thing I've done in a long, long time.

The drive to her brother's/sister's/don't-know-who's house in Klebang was definitely the scariest car-ride I've ever been on. I never took my eyes off her for a single second, in case she should whip out a knife and put it to my throat. I had one hand ready to poke her eyes out if she tries anything sudden. Halfway through the journey, I began to entertain thoughts that she might not even be human at all. You never can know.

Somewhere along the road in Tengkera, she put her right hand onto (not into) her left pocket. I immediately barked at her in my very crappy Mandarin to keep both hands on her laps. I insisted on having a clear view of them (the hands, not the laps!) at all times. Thankfully, she obeyed.

As we're driving on the seaside road of Klebang, I asked her where exactly this relative's house is located. She said that it's already quite near and that I only need to make a right turn somewhere in front. Understand that Klebang is a really quiet, dark, deserted place at 1.15 am in the morning - and the housing areas in Klebang is even quieter, darker and more deserted than the main road. I pointedly told her I'm not going to drive into any small roads and that she must walk in herself. I have been worried the whole journey that she'd ask me to stop at a location where she had accomplices hiding, ready to rob, carjack and murder me. I've grown pretty paranoid after the mugging incident more than two years ago in SS15, Subang Jaya.

She begged me to drive her in, telling me that she'll ask her brother/sister/somebody to pay me RM 20 if I do so. I refused firmly. Failing that, she told me to pull over in front of a dilapidated grocery store that stood by the main road that supposedly belonged to an aunt of hers - and I did so, thinking that she couldn't have cronies hiding everywhere in Klebang. She got off and I immediately sped off without even looking back (that's in case she's a spook or spirit of some kind).

I was lucky that nothing untoward happened to me but I've no doubt that what I did was insanely dangerous and extremely stupid. I didn't tell my parents about this because I know that I'll get the scolding of my life if I did. I was putting the car and my life at risk helping to drive a stranger miles out of town when all she had to offer was a fake-sounding hard-luck story I didn't even believe in the first place. I'm sure grifters and con-artists would die to meet me - I'd probably be the easiest mark they would ever swindle.

My only comfort is some words spoken by Betty Cooper (that blonde in one of those Archie's comic books) I've read years ago;

"I'd rather be cheated than having to miss out on helping someone genuinely down on his (or her) luck."

The new eye of k0k bl0k.

In other news, my Mom and Dad just bought me a digital camera from Panasonic two days ago - in spite of my insisting that he shouldn't. I won't pretend that I'm glad he ignored my protests.


Sucker,
k0k s3n w4i