Bouncing ball

Yesterday night after work, I was meeting my hubby and his 2 friends for dinner.

I wrote about one of his friends before that his life had changed from salted fish to abalone (sian yu bian bao yu), but not long after that, I heard from hubby that his life has turned back to sian yu. Let's call him A.

I'm not really sure what was going on, but he had to surrender his right of the Chinese cooling tea to the previous Boss and he needed some time to find another job and started as a worker all over again. At that time, hubby would sometimes meet him, talk talk, and encourage him. Good that he could accept the reality and did not give up as he has 2 young daughters, a maid and himself to feed. Luckily 1-2 mths later another Boss from his previous working place asked him to go back, and now he works at that place.

As for another friend, I had not met him for few years. He also had a big problem in his life that made him hiding and isolating himself for at least 1.5 years. He had financially difficulties due to previous gambling habits and went into depression. Only about 3 months back, hubby said he ran into him nearby our house. They sat down and drank coffee. He had finally turned over a new leaf, again. He was a bit different in speech, talked slowly (perhaps he had been too quiet for some times). One more thing different was, he told my hubby that he has been baptized as Christian. He used to be Buddhist before. He did meditation, went to temple to pray and so on. But with new religion, he has bravely come out from his difficulties and it's a good news for all of us no matter what religion he has now.

And yesterday it was my first time meeting him again. Let's call him B.

We had dinner in one old restaurant. Me, hubby and A arrived first. Fifteen minutes later, this guy arrived. He looked fresh and bright. You couldn't believe what he had gone through if you looked at his face now.

A ordered chicken rice and steamboat with beef, mixed meats and vegetables. We ate and chatted. Three of them often talked in Hokkian (Chinese dialect), and although I've been married more than 10 years and live in Singapore so long, I still can't really understand the language. And previously, during our gathering dinner, B was the one who always translate the Hokkian to English to me. This time, he did that again. Hehehe....

When started eating, B asked me a question, 'R, do you have interest to go to church? My church is very fun!' I was stunned for a while for his straight forwardness. After hearing that A immediately told him off, 'You ah, can believe in ur religion, but please la, don't drag her into it...' Hahaha... I could only laugh... They are very close, that's why they can speak freely. Then B continued, 'R not like u la.. She maybe like to go to church bla bla bla...' I could still only laugh :D

B used to be a joker and he is still now. So i know his character and didn't take his words seriously.

He was a supporter of opposition party. There was once before he got into depression, he asked my hubby out to attend the opposition party rally that was held at stadium next to our old house. He also went to see the result of the election together with hubby in the middle of the night. Hahaha.... I can't believe, even until now he is still supporting the opposition party eagerly. Fyi, there will be By-election nearby our area since one of the MP resigned due to his marriage affair. That's why we had this topic on our conversation.

It was a great dinner. The food was good too. A suggested us to have a drink before going back home. So we stopped by at one pub and sat outdoor, ordering one pint of Hoegaarden for each of us.

B continued his jokes. He just started working and he told us what he has experiences in these short 3 months time. He has to handle queries from different people and there were so much funny stories that he shared. I couldn't stop laughing. It was really a releasing stress session for me.

He really has turned back to himself again. Seriously, we all glad to see him to stand up again. His lives were just like a ball. It bounces up and down all the time.

A is also like that. He looked very tired and stressed last night. Heard that his maid is going back to Indonesia. He was worrying about his two daughters, who were taken care by his maid most of the time. Just hope he can overcome his problem soon and be happy again.

We finished at 10 plus and went back home. I was tired but happy. Hope everything goes smoothly to all of them. Start to work soon... Have a great day!!!