I knew I hadn't posted anything in a while but now that I'm here I'm realising it's been almost a month!
(I'll just punctuate this post with random food and outing pics ok?)
So since I last wrote, I've removed the incompetent caregiver from my premises, and her replacement - the one I was hoping to bring in - has been installed in my home and in my life.
Hermione asked for some details, so here goes. The biggest problem I had with the previous one was that she just couldn't speak English. My first caregiver has picked up a few words in Malay but it's no where near proficient enough for them to communicate with each other. She's got some nouns and verbs like eat, sit, poo, pee, shower, hot, cold. That sort of thing. But it's not her job to learn Malay. It was the responsibility of the Malay-speaking one to try and pick up some English. In the end caregiver #1 (CG1) just couldn't get her to help with anything cos she couldn't understand her.
The caregiver before her was worse off, really. She was fresh off the boat from Indonesia and yet with the help of google translate and youtube videos she managed to learn enough English that she could chit chat with CG1 by the end of the 2nd month. At least we saw her putting in the effort - she would try to say something, then put it into her fone then show it to CG1.
The incompetent one had worked overseas for 4 years, told me during the brief chat on video-call that she could speak only a little English, but could understand it no problem. Turns out she THOUGHT she could understand it.
Case 1 - "Could you steam the salmon and then put the same seasoning in it that I used for mama's fish yesterday?" She said ok. When I got home she had done all that, for sure, but she also went ahead and blended the fish into mush and dumped it in the freezer thinking it was meant for the mother. So I asked her why she did that, she said that's what I said. No. That's NOT what I said. And also, we only just made a batch of fish for mum yesterday, why would we make another today? And also, I've told her if she wants to cook for mum, use any fish except the PINK ONE - MAMA CAN'T HAVE SALMON. At the time I told her this she said she understood.
Case 2 - Please don't wipe my desk. It's tiring to have to come home and rearrange my stuff after you've wiped it and moved everything. She asked... what is it that she moved, I showed her. A couple of days later I see something else has been moved. "Did you wipe my desk? After I told you not to?" She said she did, BUT she didn't touch the stuff I told her not to move. "But you moved other things. I still have to rearrange my things when I get back. But I already said DON'T wipe my desk. My room doesn't need cleaning and sorting out. I'll do it myself." Her reply was that she couldn't stand to see something that wasn't wiped down as she was doing her chores. So that's why she just went ahead and kept wiping everything.
Aside from that, she is constantly doing stuff I'm telling her NOT to do. She mopped my wood laminate floors EVERY DAY! I told her not to. It'll ruin my flooring, I warned. She still did it. Till I actually stopped her while she was doing it one day when I happened to be home in the morning. And I hollered and she cried. Oh she cries at everything.
She would clean the windows every day. I told her not to cos it's ridiculous and unnecessary. She still did it. For about 2 months. Till I yelled at her. And then she cried.
I asked her why she keeps asking CG1 to go down to the shops to get veggies she says she's afraid of going to buy stuff. WTF. Afraid of WHAT? It's not like she doesn't go WITH CG1 and mum to the shops every evening when they take mum for a stroll / wheel around the neighbourhood. She's just afraid to go IN to the shop and actually BUY the thing. It's really dumb.
She wanted some stock cubes. I told her I'm not getting any more cos I don't generally like that they're made with palm oil. I have other versions of stock - granules etc which do the same thing. Those stock cubes were left behind by the original CG2 but she only used them when she cooked for herself. Not for the household. And since I refused to buy any more she bugged CG1 every day for 3 days to go buy some. CG1 just kept telling her no, cos I didn't approve of it. We don't know if she understood but after being ignored on day 4 (CG1 was sick of answering her by then) she stopped asking.
She eats a lot. Like I mean A LOT. Noodles are a side dish to her. She puts a whole bowl of ramen on a whole plate of rice. And every night she complains she has a belly ache. I gave up telling her not to eat so much carbs. Especially at 830pm at night when her bed time is at 10pm.
Also, I said, please take some vitamins. I'm providing them FOC for the house. Everyone just keep your immune system up, and we'll collectively be able to reduce the risk of passing anything to mum. She doesn't think vitamins are healthy. It's no good she says. But she pops a painkiller every night. And asked me for cholesterol medicine so that when her neck starts hurting after an oily meal she can take a tablet. Me - no. That's not how cholesterol works. I don't know which witch doctor she gets her information from but I don't trust her to be around my mother.
In the end the biggest biggest problem was her inability to learn/ speak English. I don't think she even tried. She just did whatever she wanted without regard to what we said. And mind you, I gave her instructions in BOTH English and Malay in the hope that she would get it over time. But she didn't. Her answer to me whenever I asked her how her English learning was coming along was - It's really hard, I'm not smart, I can't learn, I am not used to speaking English. Followed by crying.
Argh. It was just impossible. After 3.5 months with a water/gas bill that shot up by 35% and constant paranoia on my and CG1's parts that she was going to do something wrong, I had to let her go. My cortisol levels were probably thru the roof.
There are more stories of course but it would take days to tell you all of it.
Squid on a skewer at some Korean hot pot place
In comparison, new CG2 can type/text in English. Can speak it, enough to have whole conversations with CG1, and is very adaptable to whatever I've stocked in my kitchen. I chucked out the bread, jam, peanut butter, chocolate spread, noodles, and 3-in-1 coffee that incompetent CG ate / drank on a daily basis, and reinstated cauliflower rice, quinoa and other ME-approved foods in my fridge. Not that I couldn't have it before while incompetent CG was here, but the fridge was just SO full of her crap that I didn't feel like making a batch of anything to add to the mess that was my refrigerator shelf.
Anyway, we're all on the same page with food now. And I've noticed a drop in the frequency of my supermarket runs. It's ridiculous how much money I was spending on food. In the end I resorted to buying frozen sausages and cheap processed foods despite my NOT wanting to eat those because she was eating me out of house and home.
We went to a plant nursery building! It's new and very exciting to wander through. There was also a cold room with fruit and veggies for sale, and an organic grocery section. I bought chips. LOL.
Some days ago a friend of a friend was looking to donate her hospital bed as she didn't need it anymore. I took her up on her offer and have arranged for delivery this coming Thursday. Between dealing with CG exchanges and keeping on top of household groceries and sundries; and mum's supplements and diapers etc, I barely have enough bandwidth to manage regular work + music school (which is going GREAT by the way, I'm glad that's a huge positive in my life right now) - never mind think about logistics for moving a hospital bed in and getting them to dismantle and chuck out the current one. But I did sort that out eventually. So PHEW!
Fondles has also been busy getting together a hippy outfit for BIKSS' D n D that's coming up.
I eventually ordered everything from Shein. They really DO sell anything you could want. I'll ask him for a pic on DnD day.
We had dinner at a Peranakan restaurant that I actually approve of - Chap Chye
[The Peranakan version of this Chinese Indonesian classic incorporates tauchu and dried shrimp.]
[A fried meat roll made from spiced minced pork and chopped water chestnuts rolled up in soya bean curd sheets, and deep fried. It is usually served with small bowl of lor (a thick broth thickened with corn starch and beaten eggs) and chili sauce.]
Udang Goreng Assam (literally - Prawns Fried Sour)
It's actually just prawns marinated in tamarind juice and flash fried! Look for a Tamarind Prawns recipe online if you're keen to try it.
Free glutinous rice desserts
When BIKSS went for his annual medical last Thursday I went online and bought an air pressure mattress for mum - to prevent bed sores. I have been advised it's time to get one. So I did. He drove me to the collection point to pick it up.
Then we went thrift store shopping where he had more fun than he thought he would. I got a couple of brand new bags that I plan to gift this Christmas, and a cashmere scarf for myself. He also picked up a hippy bag to complete his DnD outfit and a grey scarf - it's very manly looking, we both agreed.
Kinda like that, only the whole thing is gray and the stripes are white.
Seafood something for sharing
We've also been shopping at Marks and Spencer. By some stroke of luck they're offering $1 deals on chips and other things recently, something they've never done before. BIKSS has been bit by the 'clearance-shopping' bug - you can thank yours truly - and told me about a bunch of chips he saw on sale. I said yes, of course I want some. He got me a dozen packets! The following day we went to a different outlet and of course we bought some more. Him more than me! Which is very out of character for him.
On the grounds of one of the Salvation Army thrift stores. The store was closed the day we went, but we sat and had a meal in the rain and checked out some cocks - I'm talking actual birds here!
Forbidden / unrequited love? So cute
Not cute. What even IS that?
Not your run of the mill Asian chicken, this one
Then there was this fellow
There was the ONE vietnamese cafe for food so we ended up there while waiting for the downpour to stop
Mixed fried spring rolls - meh. Looks a lot better than it was
Ours was the only table that wasn't getting rained on
Crab Soup
There's a German place I've seen a bunch of times but never tried. BIKSS has been once or twice I think. So we decided to have dinner there one cold rainy evening. It's in a mall which meant an a basement carpark and not having to get wet!
(The weather's turned suddenly. It's sweater weather now when it rains. But only when it rains. Sadly, when the sun's out it's still tropical island berms and tank tops for us. This makes getting dressed in the morning a little bit problematic. I've decided to just wing it in a tank and long pants or cut offs, making sure to have a trusty cardi in my bag. AT ALL TIMES. Cos I HATE the cold.)
We ordered a feta salad with walnuts and stewed pear, and a currywurst plate. I like currywurst.
This glass of elderflower mint soda was really huge - tall. And I don't have tiny hands or anything - I have an 8 and 3/4 inch handspan. Soi t's called "Thirstquencher" and it definitely lived up to its name! I'd go back there just for the soda.
That's all for this update. Here's the bag of snacks I'm munching on as I wrote this post. Also here's a cough (koff koff) I'm thankfully NOT giving you - my whole house is sniff-city right now. We're all in various stages of an upper respiratory tract infection. CG1 is recovering, she had the runny nose sore throat body aches and all that 1.5weeks ago, mum's done with being phlegmy, poor thing doesn't know how to spit it out no more, so I'm glad that's over, CG2 has just developed a dry cough, probably after I came down with a scratchy throat and drippy nose. Today I started coughing some. It is NOT funny.
The boss was kind enough to make a house call and jab us ALL with the flu vaccine. It's getting to be peak flu season for us here. Yuck.
Till the next update - ahhhh chooo!
