We had a blast and very tiring weekend yesterday. We were invited by Fitri, Abang Madzli and family for the 'kenduri doa selamat' in Antwerp. This 'kenduri' is purposely to celebrate Fitri for his achievement in finishing his Masters Study at University of Antwerp. He will fly back to Malaysia in this coming 18th June 2009 before persuing his PHD in one of the University in Liverpool for this September enrolment. Good Luck Fitri for your future undertakings.
As I always mention, Antwerp is located two hours by train from our place. We went off and tried to take a train at 10.15am. After waiting for 30 minutes, the train was arrived but 15 minutes late beyond the departure time. I did not suspect anything goes wrong at first and just assume everything is ok. Wait until the end of the story to know why the train was late. So, nevermind.
On board after one hour journey, I told Am I felt like fainting and light headed. Am asked me if I wanted to back to Liege and cancelled the plan to Antwerp. I said no because, this was the last time to meet Fitri before he flying back to Malaysia, plus he is quite closed to us. So Am said, ok.If I insisted so! Seriously, I was totally pale and straightaway he gave me his hot Nescafe to drink. After drinking, I could feel the blood rush into my head and my heart was pumping quickly to supply enough blood to all over my body. I guess, my blood glucose was too low after all.
In two hours time, we arrived in Antwerp. We took tram and step our foot at Abang Madzli's house around one a.m. After having the 'doa selamat' majlis, all the guests were served with a very good Malay meals and varieties of 'kuih muih' to be tasted off. I completely lost my mind after seeing the foods. I supposed to control my intake but I chose to ignore it. Who could say no to 'masak lemak nenas ikan sepat masin?', tiramisu, pudding, pineapple cake, 'kerabu perut', prawns, spicy fried chicken, chocolate cake ( special made by me..hheheh ), fruits etc. The menu(s) were so mouth watering. I tried all the foods but with a small portions like not I used to be. After two hours of eating, I needed to test my blood glucose level and voila, the result showed 164mg/dl. Hahahaha..I deserved the high glucose level after almost fainting on board before. Well, just kidding ok. I was totally scared after that because the reading should not be more than 120mg/dl. So, right on cue, I stopped all the meals intake and just had a plain water until this morning. Hmm..What a price to pay for having a baby for a gestational diabetic mum, like me!
After finishing chatting, laughing, eating and all -ing things, we decided to return to Liege by taking train at 7.43 pm from Antwerp central. So, En. Adnan (one of the Embassy staffs) offered himself to drive us to the Central station after seeing we carried a heavy stuff with us. A free petit washing machine that was given by Fitri. It not too heavy but quite heavy when you have to handle it for quite sometimes.
We arrived at the train station 30 minutes earlier but, unfortunately all the train to Liege was cancelled. The reason why? I did not know. I guess they have a few places of tracks maintainance all the way from Liege to Anterwp routes. That was why our train in the morning was 30 minutes late. It is bizzarre for Belgium train to arrive late unless something is wrong somewhere.
So we decided to change our route headed to Leuven and from Leuven took another train to Liege. So off we went. Again on board, the conductor said, we had to change at Aaschort and Hasslet if we wanted to go to Liege. Two times changed with the washing machine was a really bad idea. I asked the conductor why we could not change at Leuven instead? Because if we changed at Leuven we only changed once instead of twice. The conductor said something bla..bla..bla..I could not recall the infos. Bongok and moron as being me used to be. So we followed the conductor's instruction foolishly without following the right intuition decision making by our hearts. After having difficulties in changing train twice, there we were at the Hasselt train station, waiting to catch the next train to Liege.
Unfortunately, againnnnn the last train to Liege was one hour ago. In other words, we received the wrong infos from the conductor!
Sighhhhh! Seriously that stupid mistakes that should not be done by the conductor and us had been done. What a shame.
Again, we departed the same train and return to the same route as before to go to Leuven as our initial plan (before the conductor was messing our head with the two times changing train). We arrived at Leuven train station around 10.31pm. The next train to Liege was 11.26pm. So we waited for almost an hour with the pang of hungry feeling.
We arrived at Liege station at 12.15am in the night and again, there was no train to Liege Palais. So we took a cab that costed us Euro 15 to go back to our home. It was resulting us wasted three hours journey time, arriving home three hours late, spending time and energy changing the train four times instead of once, having mood swings between both of us after not having dinner. Nevertheless, after all the difficulties and challenging day, we arrived home sounds and safely with the washing machine. I think that was the unforgettable journey after all.
So you know, until now my husband is still sleeping soundly like a baby and I just woke up in the midday. I guess, we both lack of energy to be a morning person for today.
Anyway, to Abang Madzli and family thanks for having us. And, for Fitri, good luck for your future undertakings and thanks for everything. We will definitely going to visit you in Liverpool soon. Since we have some plan in our mind about going to the UK for our holiday break. To cover the part that we have never been to before when we were living there.
As usual the pics of me in week 34 of my pregnancy.
p/s .. Thanks to En Adnan n Nurul Huda for bring our baby stuff all the way from Malaysia to Belgium. Thankssss so much.
