Song, wine and directions

For some strange reason, my website was almost inaccessible last night and the server was so slow I couldn’t post anything. Nothing much happened yesterday, anyway.
Today my mother took her mother and sister (who’s also a mother) out for lunch at Bistro Cameleon over at Robertson Walk. I sneaked out in the middle of the meal to hand my credit card over to the waitress. The ladies were pleasantly surprised. It was the least I could do – these women have been feeding me since I was little.
Judging from the weighing scales, I’d say they did a pretty good job. Yikes.
The interesting thing is that my Por Por (maternal grandmother) loves the fusion food there. She and I each had a bowl of California Don which is essentially generous chunks of maguro (tuna) sashimi, avocado, mayonnaise and soya sauce, garnished with fried shallots, seaweed strips and green salad, with Japanese rice.
Later on in the afternoon on my way for my first jazz piano lesson, I missed an earlier exit at the BKE, and ended up at the Woodlands Checkpoint on the way to Johor! There was a massive jam and it took me twenty minutes to extricate myself from the queue.
I told the lady stationed at one of the booths that I made a wrong turn. As I had no passport, she took my identity card and told me to pull over at the Immigration Department further up the road. The two police officers on duty looked rather amused. They made a check was made on my details to ensure I wasn’t a convicted criminal trying to flee the country.
Supressing his mirth, one officer guided me through a restricted area (staff parking zone) and I made my way to the music school, while making some frantic phone calls to my colleague Gurmit, a Woodlander, as well as my piano teacher, whom I hadn’t even met before. ‘He must think I’m such a dork,’ I told myself.
Fortunately, the student after me was also late, so I managed to have a chat with him. “You look familiar,” I said. “Do you play at Blu?” He nodded. That was great news to me, because I like the music there. He told me that a few band members got together to run this music school.
He gave me a briefing and also asked some questions about my musical background.
[ And excuse me now – while I bring out my Mother’s Day present and card for mum. At the stroke of midnight. ]