Of dim sum and the attempt at tuning the mind

I have never been adventurous where food is concerned. If I am OK with a certain type of food, I’ll stick to it. I’ve lost quite a bit of weight since I moved to JB because I’ve come to a point where I do not know what to eat anymore. I’ll go to the same outlet day after day ordering the same thing. And I’ve gotten fed up with the choices that  I have (or rather the ones I don’t). You know you’re stuck in a rut when the guy at your local tomyam joint asks you, “Yang biasa ke malam ni bang?” before you even start to think of what to order. I’ve reached that point. I’ve got no supplies at home, so I have to go out to get something to eat. It doesn’t even remotely help that I can’t cook either.

That’s precisely why I have a great deal of respect for my friends who’d been overseas for their studies. These guys can usually cook. Heck, I’ve got a friend who can even prepare a stonking baryani! That’s just not for me man. I may just die eating my own cooking. So that’s out of the question.

Anyway, recently I found this place which sells halal dim sum. I’ve been trying to find a place to get decent dim sum in KL for quite some time now. Didn’t manage to find one. So to find a place in JB is a real blessing. And it’s cheap too. At least I have the opportunity to escape from my daily tomyam monotony. To be honest I’ve been to this dim sum place (it sells other types of food too) 2 or 3 times over the past two weeks or so. Although the dim sum is of the frozen variety, it’s enough for me to be contented. After all beggars can’t be choosers right?

So today, I went to the place to get my dim sum fix. Ordered 3 types and waited. Dim sum is eaten with 2 types of sauce. The sauces are identical to the one you get when you buy yong tow foo (is it spelt like that?). You get the dark brown coloured sauce and the slightly hot one. Tastes great when you mix them together, but the dark brown sauce is pretty much the standalone one. You can have it without the hot sauce. After about 10 minutes of waiting, my dim sum came. I checked the package I got. To my dismay, only the hot sauce was included. The other one was nowhere to be seen. So I very politely asked the Bangladeshi guy to get me some to which he replied in quite an inaudible manner, “dah habis”.

To say that I was disappointed would be an understatement. As I said, the dark brown sauce is the standalone one. Without it, the hot sauce would be pretty much useless. Seeing that there’s no point in dealing with the Bangladeshi guy, I called this Malay girl who to her credit was rather apologetic. However, being apologetic will not aid me in my cause for the sauce.

Shahrin: Macamana saya nak makan kalau takde sos yang tu (the dark brown one)?

Malay Girl: Mintak maaflah Encik, nak buat macam mana, sos tu dah habis (complete with muka kesian)

Shahrin: Tapi sekarang baru pukul 8.15. Kalau awak cakap awal-awal tadi mesti saya tak order dim sum ni.

Malay Girl: Tulah dia. Patutnya tadi saya bagitau yang sos tu dah habis.

The thought that I had in mind was, “boleh tak jangan cakap benda yang aku dah tau?” as in when she said “patutnya tadi saya bagitau yang sos tu dah habis”. So I asked her if she could just prepare some for me. Which she did. Out of what I don’t know. One thing I know is the fact that they ran out of the sauce was entirely their fault and nobody else’s. I repeat, nobody else’s fault. Certainly not mine, anyway.

After waiting for another 10 minutes, the girl came out with a container of the newly made sauce. She proceeded to tell me, “yang ni tak macam sos yang selalu ya. Yang selalu tu kita ambik kat orang lain. Dia datang hantar sini hari-hari”. I applaud the girl’s ingenuity. She knows that inevitably the sauce will taste like crap. So she set out to tune my mind to not expect too much from the sauce she just made. But I’ve known better than to fall for some amateurish attempt like that. Feeling quite fed up, I decided to leave, dim sum in hand. I had no expectations when I finally reached home. I know the sauce will taste like crap (didn’t I just say that before?). And true to form, it did. So I ended up eating dim sum without any sauce. Just when you thought you wanted to give yourself a bit of a treat, you end give getting the short end of the stick. Well, shit happens right?

I didn’t get the chance to check out the correct spelling of koay teow today. So that’ll have to be postponed for one more day. My apologies. I promise I’ll revert as soon as I can.