My car broke down and help came in an unexpected way

I had this realisation the other day that I wanted to blog about. Only remembered it just now.

This happened close to a year ago. I had a problem with the fuel pump of my car. My car suddenly slowed to a stop despite me repeatedly stepping on the gas pedal. I was stuck on the furthest left lane of a four-lane expressway. I did not have any emergency numbers to call. The only colleague who went on the same route to work as I did was on vacation. I had to call my boss who lived in Seremban and who told me he was caught in a jam. He needed half an hour to get to where I am. That literally translates to an hour.

I got down from my car, left the hazard lights on and waited. So there I was stuck, alone on a KL highway with Monday morning traffic wheezing past me at 90 km/hr on average.

Twenty minutes passed by and after being passed by by people who thought it was more useful to honk at my car than to come down and help me, an old uncle on a motorcycle finally stopped. He told me the obvious, that it was dangerous to stand on the side of the road like that. He also told me to keep my car boot open so that people can see the stagnant car from afar and slow down in time.

I told him I have friends coming already, constantly trying to ‘read’ his intentions through his body language. He rode off after telling me to stay behind the car instead of in front of the car in case someone knocks into the car and unwittingly took me with it. I thanked him for the sound advice.

Another youngster also slowed down for a bit. I yelled on top of his rumbling motor engine that I have friends coming and thanked him before he sped off.

It was about 100 cars later or roughly another 10 minutes before a man in a light brown jacket stopped, took off his helmet and asked me what was wrong. Somehow I told him the real problem, that I had tried to step on the gas pedal but the car won’t budge. He told me to open the hood of the car. I fumbled at the driver’s seat, trying to figure out where the damn release was. He told me to wait on the side of the road and got into my car to release the hood himself.

I remembered praying that he won’t speed off with the car, momentarily forgetting that the car isn’t going anywhere anyways.

After he looked at the engine, he gestured me closer and told me it is not the engine’s problem.

Then he looked at the back seat, and took the whole of the backseat off. There was a small cup in the middle of skeleton of the backseat. The cup had thin see-through tubes leading into and out of the cup. Inside the cup was some orange liquid, which looks extremely like the petrol we pump into our cars. The smell confirmed that it was.

The man told me that the tubes to my fuel cup were loose, so the petrol couldn’t get from the tank to the engine. He told me to give him a few more minutes to make sure the tubes were as tight as he could probably make them. Then, he told me to start the car.

I listened to him, did what he told me to do and the car revved to live.

I thanked him profusely, as if he had saved my whole family from the plague. When I asked him how he knew how to fix it he told me that he is a foreman (mechanic). He then got on his motorcycle and escorted me a short distance to the next toll booth before speeding off on another branch of road while I continued on to my destination.

I don't think I can recognize him again if I see him again today.

When my boss got to work that day, he arranged for the company mechanic to look at my car. They confirmed the foreman's diagnostics and promptly installed a new fuel pump into my car. When I told my boss how I got out of the whole problem, he said that I must have done some really good things to receive karma in that form.

We both had no idea that the real reason was much simpler.

Someone was watching over me.

Because I was two-weeks pregnant.

The right attitude on the roads: Try your best to avoid accidents!

Every day when I leave for work, I switch on to one of three of my regular radio station dials and listen to the traffic report. Apart from the usual areas that are hot spots for traffic congestion, there are occasionally a few needless traffic jams that were caused by onlookers and more directly by people who caused accidents on the roads.

Most of these accidents in fact can be avoided and should have been avoided, if only people adopt the right attitude on the roads.

In Malaysia, there is this 'my way / your way' syndrome that is taught by drivers and driving instructors to newbie drivers. Way here is a direct translation of the word in Chinese (all dialects) and BM, as no such word exists in the English dictionary. The closest would be "right of way", which still doesn't ride the idea home.

In essence, if you are on a particular lane, and someone cuts in, that person should not have done so as that is 'your way'. And usually, a driver would show their authority over their 'way' by not giving way. Be a bit lackadaisical in your driving and boom, another accident has occurred in an otherwise 4-lane highway, free of any jams until that bloody moment.

So why don't you stop caring about whose 'way' it was supposed to be and just try to mutually avoid banging into each other? Giving way to a car or two on your daily drive home will only set you back 5 to 10 minutes but at least, you would avoid being a casualty or a statistic in the accident numbers of the day. Plus, giving way would let the traffic flow more smoothly and slow-moving traffic is still better than stagnant traffic.

What? Familiarity breeds contempt? If you let one car pass, all the other cars will follow suit and you will be forever stuck in that junction? I doubt you believe that that will happen in reality. If everyone gave way, once you give way, someone is bound to give way to you to proceed into the lane. Someone just has to start the cycle. I try to start it every day. Personally, I feel that it is working, but that could just be the drugs talking.

I kid.

And as for those who cut queues, why endanger yourself and your passengers by getting in their way? They may be in a hurry due to an emergency, and if they are not, they'd have to face up to summonses by the officers in white or deal with the consequences when they get themselves into an accident while cutting queue.

And if you don't already know, if you get into an accident, you would be fined for reckless driving, regardless if your head is bandaged or not.

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Crud.. I just remembered that the holidays start tomorrow for Hari Raya Aidilfitri (Selamat hari raya, Malaysians!) and today's traffic would be.. horrendous.

Typical traffic jam scene in Malaysia - from theStar