An evening with Dato'

So there was a powerful earthquake taken place yesterday. It was felt by many especially those who either live in high-rise condos or working/surfing porn in their office cubicles on top of the sky scrapers scattered around town.

I belong in the first category. But I didn’t realise there was actually an earthquake until all the residents were told to evacuate our respective units.

And I was like, hey what’s going on, before went in again to fetch my Ramones’ Box-set CDs. I mean, if the buildings were to come crushing down, at least I can still claim to be a proud owner of a rare music album.

This evacuation exercise thing was a new experience to me. With all the residents taking their own sweet time evacuating clad in home attire (boxers, kaftans, sarongs), I thought the scene was like there was a huge orgy party going on.

But of course, a party is not complete without a clown.

Appeared out of the crowd was this bloke in his chequered pyjamas, cracking recycled joke that the earthquake should happen more often as so the residents can mingle around regularly and stuff.

And I went like, sure Mr Krusty.

The thing is, I don’t mind the used joke as his ice-breaker but what’s pathetic was he actually introduced himself as Dato, and his (young) wife, datin.

Firstly, what’s with the bright orange-coloured pyjamas la Dato? Secondly, stop being so formal because thirdly, we ARE living in a close-knit community – as apparently this fella was not aware of - naturally we address each other by our names.

If there’s someone who needs to socialise regularly it is our resident dato. Instead of cooped up with his (young) missus all the time, make an effort to read the condo’s notice board and join one or two of the residents’ many activities.

That way if there’s another earthquake occurrence (Nauzubillah), we can keep it completely informal. After all, its just an evacuation exercise, not a real orgy.