Thursday, January 19, 2023

Baby Talk 1998

A telephone conversation between my son CJ Hariharan Menon and Sharon Nelson back in 1998, when Hari was about a year old.

She was calling to set an interview time and date with me as she was doing an article about my work in theatre and my relationship with my mum.

(as said to me by Sharon in 2014)

Ring, ring, ring....Hari picks up the phone

Hari: "Hello"

Sharon: "Hello, may I speak to Shanthini"

Hari: "She's outside"

Sharon: "Can you get her on the phone?"

Hari: "I can't, she's outside."

Sharon: "Okay, can you pass her a message, please. My name is Sharon and I'm a reporter with 'XYZ....'. I am calling to make an appointment with her for an interview. Can you get her to call me back?"

Hari: "I'm a baby!"

Sharon: ????!!!!!  ( SILENCE )  "I'll call again!!!"

NOTE FROM SHARON: it's a True story!! My silence lasted quite a while...then I laughed and laughed and told everyone who would listen. Can't believe I never told you that story, Shanthini!

Only found out about this conversation 16 years later, when I ran into Sharon at an event at Bobo's in Bangsar!!! 


Thursday, February 26, 2009

A Journey traveled with Yoges - 2008


A journey traveled with Yoges

This was published in The Malay Mail in January 2009

I bought my apartment- C 26, Riverdale Park, Bukit Antarabangsa in 1991. It was the very first apartment that I viewed when I wanted to ‘invest’ in a property. I fell in love with it immediately- it was bright, airy, spacious and nestled in a beautiful area called Bukit Antarabangsa. There was an avenue of trees that lined the road going up the hill to the houses/apartments and a forest reserve on the hill with small pockets of development here and there.

Thana and Yoges moved in soon after as newly weds. He an engineer and she a veterinarian. They bought Apartment C1 in Riverdale park. All the residents in Block C were new property owners and we got to know each other with our pot-luck luncheons, tea, B-B-Q’s at the car park area, our ‘gotong royong’ sessions of cutting the grass, painting the letter-box pillars, cleaning and painting the garbage area, sweeping the common stairways etc, since very early on, the management /developer (ZED ENTERPRISE) washed their hands from looking after the property. So we, the residents, took on the task of keeping our Block C clean.

Yoges became our ‘resident’ vet for those of us who had pets. Although we did take our cats to the clinic she was working in which was just down the hill, she used to bring home vaccines to save our cats from being traumatized with car rides.
Chakrapon was one of the privileged ones who got ‘home visits’ whenever it was his time to get vaccinated. She had a very gentle manner with animals so he used to ‘tolerate’ being prodded and poked.

One incident that comes to mind - I was visiting Yoges one afternoon and soon after there was loud mewing at the front door. It was Chakrapon. He wanted to visit as well. Yoges let him in and he did his usual greeting of rubbing against her legs and disappeared into the kitchen. It was a bit too quiet in there so I went in to see what he was up to. There he was, UP on the counter munching away at some sausages that she had left to thaw. Needless to say he got very ill and Yoges had to treat him a few hours later.  She never held that against him and allowed him to visit her often even when I wasn’t there.

On more than one occasion I have gone running to her door with my kittens/cats who were at death’s door as many of them were attacked by wild dogs and she nursed them back to health. She attended to them ‘outside of clinic hours’ even after a tiring day. She was a friend who saw me through the trauma of ‘Princess’ dying in my arms. She sat quietly with me at the stairs and just held my hand until I ran out of tears and believe me it took a while because I had loads to shed.

Yoges gave birth to Avinesh May 08th 1997. Five months and eight days later I had Hariharan. Our friendship took another course. We were both first time mothers and we shared our joy and frustration of motherhood. Very soon after, her second son Thivesh was born. Even though she had a tough time caring for two very young boys and juggling a career she always had a smiling face and a very cheerful personality.

I also found out that we had mutual contacts. Geetha, my cousin was her very close friend as they studied together and were room-mates at one point. Another was Pauline- Hari’s first piano teacher who became her neighbor. Sharmini P, whom I became friends with because our sons went to the same school, was her University mate.

Our children’s birthdays, festivals and other celebrations saw us getting together more and more.

THINGS CHANGE: soon residents at Block C started moving out. Thana and Yoges were one of them as their family of four and one maid found the apartment a little cramped. They decided to rent out the apartment and move to a house. They still dropped by Riverdale to visit Hari and me from time to time since their new residence was close by. We kept the birthday and festival get-togethers still going.
3 ½ years ago she called to say that she expecting another child. I could feel the joy in her voice  because her wish had come true….a baby girl- Priyankka.

THINGS CHANGE: with Hari and me moving out of Bkt Antarabangsa to Brickfields a year and a half ago and both families just getting on with our respective lives, (through no fault of either party) we didn’t meet up. The last time I saw Yoges was Oct 2007 when I bummed into her when I went up to Bkt Antarabangsa. The last contact I had with her was when we spoke to each other during 2008 Deepavali.

Dec 5th 2008- Friday 1.30 pm. I was in Bukit Antarabangsa handling some affairs for the sale of my apartment. I drove around and was amazed at all the development that I saw.
I guess while I was living there I didn’t ‘SEE’  all that was happening to the area but now after 13 months of not having lived there I suddenly ‘SAW’ those newly and partly finished construction sites; the numerous billboards all screaming some silly slogan…one of them being….“Purify your lives with hill top living” (?)
I thought to myself…” do we really need more? WHEN will it be enough?”

Dec 6th 2008- Saturday 8.00am. I get a call from my former neighbour, Rose. She was sobbing uncontrollably and said  “Shanthini, Yoges dah mati”  I couldn’t understand what she was saying and got her to repeat. This time I HEARD her – I was in shock! “Yoges? What? How?” was all that came out. She said that around 3.30 am the electricity was cut off. Most of the residents in the area awoke and very soon it became known why. A landslide had occurred about 150 meters from Riverdale Park on the main road. Rose went on to say…”her body is in front of our guard house”. It still all didn’t make sense to me because I had been to their house behind Club Ukay and that was no where near Riverdale, so I told her that it is not possible that it was her body. Rose informed me that the family had moved to the ‘Little Sydney’ bungalow lots earlier in the year. After I put the phone down….still not quite believing what I had just been told, I decided to call Pauline since I knew she was Yoges’s neighbour. Pauline confirmed my worst suspicion and said that she was at the hospital with Thana and the boys for a medical examination. Feeling helpless and not knowing what to do, I did what I do best. Inform others whom I knew who might not have heard about the tragedy yet.

Dec 13th 2008 – Saturday 1.00pm – a week has now passed…..it feels like a year!!!
Went for Yoges’s funeral on Sunday the 7th of Dec. Tears were flowing when I saw a note written by the children placed in her casket. …. It said that they would try to get on with their lives without her ……and the last line read “Our family will never be whole again”

Nobody’s lives will be ‘whole again’ after this tragedy…..especially the ones who lost their loved ones and the others who had to evacuate their homes now that ‘THEY’ claim it is no longer safe to live in hillside sites. Where were ‘THEY’ when we were buying our properties? Why were the plans for these developments even approved if THEY knew it was unsafe since now engineers are coming out of the woodworks claiming that in general the soil in most parts of Malaysia is ‘soft soil’? Sigh! I truly hope THIS TIME AROUND the authorities will STOP pussy-footing and STOP blaming one another and DO something that will help those who lives have been turned upside down in a matter of minutes.


BUKIT ANTARABANGSA- a once luscious green hill that led me to share a journey with a beautiful soul and who took that soul away to remind us not to be greedy, ungrateful, selfish, corrupted human beings!

Friday, October 24, 2008

The Karmic Tale- 2008


Posted originally as a note on Facebook- 20th Oct 2008


Tuesday the 19th of October 2008, started off like it was going to be like any other Tuesday. I went to teach the kids at SNLC (Special Needs Learning Centre). 
Classes went smoothly!

After class around 11am, I went to Carrefour at MidValley to purchase items for Brian Lariche’s last collection for 2008. 
My friend Brian gets his friends to buy food and/or household items and he distributes it to various homes and institutions in the Klang Valley about 4 times a year. 
A very noble cause which I contributed to whenever I could! 
That too went quite smoothly. At about 12.35 pm, with 300 sardine tins and 80 oil containers (not true figures but it does make a good read), I went down to the Gardens car park which is where I usually park because the one at Mid Valley is very chaotic. 
I always thought the Garden’s car park to have the BEST layout compared to other shopping malls because I have never had problems locating my car. 
In fact, I was just telling this to my friends Manon and Sharmini when we went to catch the movie 'Journey to the center of the earth' at MidValley the week before.

This time though, I couldn’t remember where I had parked, but it did not cause me any major concern.…. I was CERTAIN it was the purple pillared area and there was an 'a' after the number.

I thought it would just take a couple of minutes to locate it, so OFF I went, shopping cart in tow down every purple pillar area. Half an hour passes and my clothes are sticking to my skin from being in an underground car park with no ventilation, with my adrenalin on overdrive and my anxiety levels starting to rise. 
I sighed with great relief when I bumped into a security guard. My savior! 
When he started communicating with me in his command of ‘Urdu Engrissh’ and sign language, I knew that this was not going to be the case. 
He was ‘articulate’ with his hands, yes, but it was pointing in all directions and I envisioned myself going on a 'Journey to the center of the Earth' 

Since I had recently graduated in sign language and ‘Urdu Engrissh’. I understood him perfectly!
He was not going to be of any help and I had to personally go down to get help from the security desk located one level down on P2.

So OFF I went with my trolley down these really steep walkalators which had no grip for trolleys.
There I was running down with my heavily laden trolley, almost crashing into the desk of the security guard in charge.

The security guard at the desk was a very nice chap and after I told him my predicament, he asked me for my car number and the model.
I told him it was a Silver Kembara, license plate WFM4702. 
He relayed this message to an elderly security guard standing close by who seemed quite pissed off because it was nearly his break time. Now he would have to do double duty. However, they both took pity on this ‘elderly’ lady standing before them. 
I guess they assumed that because of my ‘white-tish’ hair (premature mind you!). 
Very soon the elderly gentleman, who was definitely older than me, took off on his motorbike looking for the car on P1. 
He reports back 45 minutes later saying he found a lot of Kembaras but not mine.

By this time I was starving and decided to open one of the HUP SENG cream crackers packets I had bought (they really are the BEST because they taste so buttery and light) and offered some to En. Zain as well. 
Thought it was only polite to make small talk; asked his name and about his job since he was trying to help me find my car. 
At this juncture, he felt compelled to tell me his whole working life story (see what 3 biscuits will get you) about how the guards here are underpaid, overworked, and understaffed. That there were a lot of folks who found themselves in the same predicament as me, numbers were worse on weekends. 
As if not to make a liar out of Zain, a young Chinese boy walks up to the counter and says he can’t remember where he parked his car!!

Zain gave him a ticking off,  telling him that he was ‘young’ enough to remember where he parked his car. He then relayed the car number of the young man via a walkie-talkie with poor reception to the same elderly gentleman out there in P1 looking for my car. 

 After getting energized with five HUP SENG cream crackers, I left my ‘overflowing with goods’ trolley at the desk and went searching for the car myself…once again walking down every purple pillar area, this time pressing on the alarm button, hoping to set off the car alarm.

I kept looking for the car in 15 min intervals
, always reporting back to Zain to get the latest update from Pak Cik (elderly uncle). 
About one and a half hours later Zain decides to bring in more troops since there wasn’t much progress with the one elderly guy on a motorbike out there in P1, now looking for TWO cars! Three young security guards and one middle-aged one were roped in and they take off in their respective vehicles looking for my Silver Kembara.

Two hours go by, and by this time the butter I bought is melting and coating the plastic bag it is in. I go off once again walking the purple pillars of the car park when I noticed that there was also an orange pillared area next to it. 
I SWORE (and remember this if nothing else- I have a very good memory), this was NOT where I parked the car, but thought “what the heck….will go that way and see if the car decided to re-park itself”. 
Being a die-hard fan of the TV programme “My Mother the Car” (for those of you reading this who are born in the 70’s and later, you have missed an all-time classic sitcom) and all the Disney “Herbie” movies, I actually know that cars have a mind of their own.

Lo and behold! THERE was my Kembara in the orange area of the car park –pillar #30a (see! I remembered the ‘a’ bit)! 
This is not the end of the karmic tale!

I got into the Kembara feeling stupid but happy.
I was now ready to go get my things from the security desk at P2. 
However, I kept going around and around and around in circles because NOW, I couldn’t find my way back since I had to drive to P2. 
When I was walking, I found it easily enough, but driving was another story altogether.

I was getting very frustrated when I suddenly saw the elderly gentleman (remember him riding around in his bike scrutinizing all the car numbers looking for WFM4702?) 
I called out to him “Tuan! Tuan! Tuan!” 
He stopped his bike and had the most incredulous look on his face when he saw me.
He kept mumbling something over and over again. 
I got out of the car and close enough to hear him say “Mem! you bagi saya salah nombor kereta” - for those whose Malay is not as fluent as mine, that means – “Madam, you are a Shit Head! I have been going around and around in this car park for the last 3 hours, looking for a non-existent car!”

I said “Apa? Salah nombor?”  
Once again for those whose Malay is not as fluent as mine, that means- “What the hell are you talking about?”

I turn around to see what he's going on about and look at my car; WNY1762.
It suddenly hit me that I had given the guards my 11-year-old van’s number…WFM4702!!!!!
Now, in reflection, I believe that it was my trusted 11-year-old van’s way of telling me that I was neglecting it. 
I swear I am going to pick it up from Cinzia’s in-law’s place next week and start using it again.

I finally got directions to P2 from the elderly gentleman and 5 minutes later, I find the security desk. 
I get my 250 tins of condensed milk, 750 packets of Milo, 800 tins of sardines, 500 packets of powdered milk, and my one opened pack of HUP SENG biscuits all loaded into the car, making sure the 'liquified' butter did not get on the seats.
I sheepishly told the guards that this Silver Kembara WNY1762 belonged to my sister claiming that I had forgotten I was driving her car, and in my panicky state, I had given the number plate of my van.
They, I believe, thought I was senile!

I paid for the parking ticket, cursing the whole time that I had to now pay RM2 instead of RM1 since I had been there for four hours. The rate at Gardens is RM1 for the first three hours!

When I got to the exit point, I couldn't find the ticket! 
I’m rummaging through my bag; meanwhile a zillion million cars are honking behind me (come on!- it does make a good read) so I reverse the car and park at the side and start taking everything out of the purse, kitchen sink being the hardest to get out, but yet, I couldn’t find it.

10 minutes later and with lots of swear words muttered, with RM50 in hand to pay for the ‘lost’ ticket, I start the car.
Guess what! THERE it is sitting on the dashboard staring me in the face and saying “You put me here silly so that you would find me EASILY when you had to leave!”

Being Indian and believing that I was under a curse of sorts, I immediately went to the nearest Ganesha temple in Bangsar and broke some coconuts! (okay since you are dying to know- a thousand million of them!)
After this, everything went smoothly- I dropped the items for the charity homes at Brian’s place, 
(you’re lucky no more counting of things), got home, and crashed out for 3 hours!

The moral of the story is – actually, there is no moral…..just,
NEVER neglect your first and trusted car even though you now own two cars!
NEVER dye your hair black cos white hair comes in handy!

Next time around I am going to take a picture of where I am parked with my NOKIA 6102 or is it a 6210 phone (?)!

Oh! by the way, I am sure all of you reading this till now would have figured this out; if I hadn’t gone out looking for my car and had waited for the guards to find it, I would have had to be at Mid Valley car park till 10pm waiting for all other cars to leave. 
Mine would have been the ‘LAST CAR STANDING!!’ –makes a good movie title, don’t you think?

I wonder if they ever found that young Chinese boy's car!

NB: to my friends on Facebook cos nobody else will understand it:  I believe there are 568 or is it 865, no… it's 782 of you out there, right?

“THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart for being my friend and for all the karmas, sea creatures, plants for my green patch, playing, cuddling, petting Shadow and giving bones to Fei Chai, all the growing plants, hatching eggs, ‘buying’ me as a pet, ‘selling’ me as a pet, thinking that I am a HOTTIE, throwing Britney/beer/Obama at me, hugging me, sending me sunshine, butterflies, animals and suggesting countless other applications for me to add. Although in the past I have ignored some of your requests, please know that from now on I WILL accept ALL your ‘gifts’ cos I know it is YOUR way of letting me know that YOU ARE THINKING OF ME! 
God Bless Malaysia and the World!



Tuesday, February 17, 2004

Celebration of Life - 2004




Celebration of Life
-dedicated to Mummy

“Three gunshots rang out in the dead of the night! A body falls to the ground with a THUD! The man holding the smoking gun turns and walks away confident that he has gotten away with it. The full moon in the sky lights up the street.”

This sounds like something you would read in a Sherlock Homes novel, but it did happen.  My mum who was hiding in the shadows witnessed this murder. She was in a complete state of shock. When she finally got hold of herself, she went over to the body and checked his pulse. He was dead.

She immediately called my Dad and told him what happened and together they went to the nearest police station to report the crime giving a detailed description of the perpetrator. They took all the information down and then made her go through numerous mug shot albums but she couldn’t find the killer in any of them. They told her to come back the next day to speak to an inspector.

The next morning, however, we had some ‘visitors’ who turned out to be FBI agents. They were contacting my mother because the local police had reported this killing via the intelligence network and they immediately flew in from USA because the man who was killed was Ben Woods, an FBI undercover operative who had infiltrated a Mafia operation back in the US. He had become a part of ‘the family’ over 4 years. The FBI had a thick dossier of the operations of the gang and was in the midst of putting the case together to prosecute the head honcho. Ben who had after collecting detailed information about the Mafia operations over the years had recently faked his own death and was now out of the gang. He was on another assignment in Malaysia. He was to have gone back in two days and would have provided enough evidence to put the Don away for life.
After making my mother recount the details of what happened and with the description of the man who shot the operative, they were convinced the Don had carried out the murder himself as he felt betrayed since he had regarded Ben like his own son while he was with them. When he found out through his grave vine that Ben was an undercover agent he must have decided that killing him would mean there would be no one to testify at his trial and he would get away scot free!

They asked my mum to be the material witness in this murder and testify at the Don’s trial. Together with what evidence they already had and my mum’s testimony of his tie in with this crime, they would be able to get a conviction and cripple his organization.
However they told her that after testifying, our family would have to be put under the witness protection programme.
“Your family will be relocated and be given new identities. You will have to leave your present lives behind because the syndicate is very well connected and your lives will be in danger”.

She was in two minds now about testifying and decided to ask us for our opinion as to what she should do. Her decision to testify would affect all our lives. My dad, sister and I had no doubt in our minds that she should testify especially since it would help lock away a criminal for a very long time. We were willing to relocate to any part of the world as long as it meant we all stayed together.

With the decision made, the FBI came out to meet with us again the following day. They informed us that we would be given our new identities within a week and as soon as she testified we would be taken to our new ‘home’.

My sister and I were okay with the idea of relocating; however, we thought it would be a shame not to see our family and friends for one last time. We told the FBI of our plans to throw a huge party on the night before the trial. Of course we assured them that we would not let anyone at the party know the real reason, so we just made one up….it was going to be a ‘Celebration of Life’!

We invited Dad’s old office mates, Mum’s working colleagues, relatives, all our friends whom we hadn’t seen in a long time…..in fact everyone who mattered was there!

The party was in full swing when I noticed from the corner of my eye that my mum was sitting in the far side of the room not partaking in the festivities but just observing all the fun that everyone was having. She had a very serene look about her.

I went by and asked her if there was something wrong. She said “no Moleh, (a term of endearment in Malayalam) nothing is wrong! It’s so nice to see so many people here who are helping us celebrate life. You go ahead and enjoy yourself. I am fine here.”

I didn’t make too much of it and continued talking to my friends who of course had no idea that this would be the last time that they would be seeing all of us. I wanted to make the most of it. We celebrated till the wee hours of the morning.

The next day with my son CJ, who was 2 years old in tow, we headed off to mum’s house with our suitcases, ready to be relocated to wherever after the trial.

I found my dad and sister sitting outside on the porch with their heads buried in their hands and not responding to any of my questions.  I knew something was wrong! I ran into the house shouting “Mummy! Mummy!” NO RESPONSE. The FBI agents were in the house. They approached me and told me that my mum was not there.
She had been picked up very early that morning, taken to the trial proceedings for her testimony and was already out of the country to be relocated.
I was dumbfounded! “WHAT? WHY? I thought the whole family was part of this relocation exercise!!!”

They said that it was my mother’s decision. She wanted to be the ONLY one to be relocated because she felt it was unfair to have all our lives uprooted by her decision to testify. She had contacted them late in the night after the celebration and told them of her decision.

I started screaming and hitting them while shouting “NO! NO! NO! YOU CAN’T DO THAT! YOU CAN’T DO THAT! It was a family decision. We are ALL going to be relocated” I was beyond hysterical shouting these words over and over and over again!
*******************************************

My pillow, bed sheet and blanket were drenched with tears! I woke up screaming the same words.

Ah…it was only a DREAM! Phew! Or was it?
Two months go by and my mother is diagnosed with Breast Cancer.
She left us July 5th 2004, hardly 3 weeks after her diagnosis.
To this day, I still miss my mum and sometimes cry in my sleep at night but realize that she is in a better place with the Almighty as she is no longer suffering with what can be a ravening disease!


Friday, February 26, 1999

Anna and the King - 1999


Anna and the King

“So are you Anna?” was the one liner email that I received from my cousin Sashi in India when I had written to my cousins there that I was selected to act in this movie.
I was a little confused because I had written in great detail as to the role I was playing and the names of my very famous co-stars so I was a little irritated and replied “Hey cousin, read my email carefully and you will know the answer”. He wrote back “so are you Anna?”  Irritation level hit 10 on the Richter scale and I ignored his email.
5 years later when I visited India sitting in his dining room having tea with him, he asked me why I did not reply to his email. I had no clue as to what he was referring to. “I sent you an email asking if you were Anna!” “Well if you watched the movie you would have seen that I played Anna’s maid, Bebee” I replied. That sent him reeling on the floor laughing hysterically. I just sat there starring at him and finally when he regained composed he said still sniggering “Shanthi, I asked you if you were playing the role of the  elephant?” “Huh?” was my response. I found out that my cousin was being cheeky when he wrote me that one liner. ‘Anna’ (pronounced ‘aanaa’ in Malayalam) means elephant.
I swatted his head with a newspaper and he teased no more!!

Getting the role of Bebee- the nanny to Anna’s son- was something I never ever imagined would be part of my CV. How many actors in Malaysia can claim to have acted in a Hollywood movie of this magnitude? Well….we did have over 2000 Malaysians who played extras in the movie but that doesn’t count! I got a major minor role!!! And I would act along side Jodie Foster cast as Anna even though she didn’t look anything like an elephant and Chow Yuen Fatt, a mega star in the Chinese film industry cast as the King.

I went for the first audition with 9 million other people who got called for casting as well.
I met the casting director Priscila John

NOT FINISHED

Wednesday, February 26, 1997

The Cards that Life deals us - 1997


The Cards that Life deals us.

March 5th 97- The whole night was spent tossing and turning. Finally I got out of bed at 3.30am. My breasts were feeling very sore. I put it down to usual symptoms just before my period was due. The rest of the day was spent in misery. I was feeling extremely lethargic and weak. I didn’t eat very much. I didn’t have an appetite the whole day. Later in the evening when I was taking my bath I found that I couldn’t touch any part of my breasts. Both breasts were hard and very sensitive to the slightest touch. I was 39 years old. “I have breast cancer!” I thought aloud.
It is a little known fact but all Indians are aspiring doctors able to diagnose any given symptom!

I called the one person whose judgment I trusted; my sister. She confirmed it was breast cancer (remember she’s Indian too!)  Told me to seek medical attention immediately but since no Gynecologist clinics were open at that time of the night, I forced myself to get to bed for that much needed rest.

Needless to say I didn’t sleep much that night either, psyching myself up for the worse. Headed to Ampang Puteri at 8.00am.The receptionist said they had 4 gynecologists; 1 male and 3 women and I needed to make an appointment in advance before consultation.
“I need an appointment TODAY!” I didn’t want to delay treatment any further. I had read and heard from various sources that breast cancer can be treated if detected early.

“The only one available at such short notice is Dr Azahar, the male doctor. Most women prefer a female doctor for ‘womenly matters” That’s fine!” I sighed with relief. I was not picky whether it was a male or female groping my breasts as long as it wasA’ doctor. Making my way to his office I passed the other female gynecologists’ offices. There were at least 20 women waiting in every room. At mine there were 8.
Soon I was sitting opposite him telling him my concerns.
He had an extremely gentle demeanor and in a way I was actually glad that he was the one who was going to break the bad news to me. He listened to my prognosis, diagnosis and course of treatment (remember, I’m Indian) very attentively. He then asked me if I was willing to take a pregnancy test.
I laughed and with great conviction said “No, I cannot be pregnant”
I then went on to tell him my medical history.

In October 1979 while studying in Canada, I became very ill. The doctors couldn’t figure out what was wrong; I complained of severe shooting pain in my legs that left me at most times incapacitated; debilitated to the extent that I couldn’t walk even to the washroom. I will always be very grateful to my university mates; Danya, Tonia and my very dear friend, Sandie Krasin- who saw me through these difficult times.  I was admitted to the hospital almost on a weekly basis over the next 3 months. Besides my physical inhibitions, my condition was also affecting my mental state of mind. I missed a lot of my classes and was finding it difficult catching up with the work. I went through every known test and it all came up ‘zilch! NO KNOWN CAUSE! I went to different doctors in various hospitals but they were all equally dumb founded. At one of these visits, a Doctor said that my symptoms were psychosomatic and I needed psychiatric help. I began to believe that maybe it WAS all in my head until my former housemate Sylvia (a nurse) insisted that I see her family doctor. It has been a while since all this happened, so I can’t recall as to how he discovered that it was an ectopic pregnancy. It might have been a scan. He scheduled me for an operation the very next day because if the ‘growth’ was not removed it would get bigger, rupture and poison my system- i.e. I would die!  After removing the right fallopian tube, there was a lot of scarring in my left fallopian tube caused by medication and previous treatments.
Jan 10th 1980 (my birthday) I was told “You will never be able to conceive!” I was devastated!

For days, weeks, months even stretching to years, I was thrown into deep depths of depression every time I recalled these words.
“What’s the use of getting married then?” “Why would anyone want to marry me?” “My life is over!” “If I did get married would my husband be willing to adopt?” “Will I be able to love and accept an adopted child as my own? These were just a few among a truckload of thoughts that kept filling my mind during these dark days. Consequently many of my relationships with men suffered. I resigned myself to a life without husband or child.
In retrospect; I was only 20 when this happened. I viewed the situation very naively and was full of hatred for life’s unfairness.

Coming back to Dr A. He listened very patiently and still insisted that I take a pregnancy test. “What about my breasts? “Aren’t you going to examine them first?” I enquired. “All in due course! Let me rule out pregnancy first”. He took a sample of my urine and told me to wait in his waiting room. The 15 minute wait for the results seemed like an eternity.

Finally back in his room, I tried to read his face- no hint of what I was about to hear!
He was very calm when he said “I don’t know if this is good news or bad news, but you are pregnant!” My jaw dropped straight to the floor!
“Me? Pregnant? No! I have breast cancer!”
He told me to undress, put on a gown so he could do an ultrasound scan and show me the growing fetus.
“Me? Pregnant? NO! I have breast cancer!”
He said the scan would be able to tell how far into the pregnancy I was.
“ME? PREGNANT? NO! I HAVE BREAST CANCER!”

Even though this was the only phrase going through my head, I changed and lay on his examining table. He spread cold gel on my tummy and rubbed it with a torch like object. Immediately I could see my uterus on the screen and ‘a moving mass’. He started measuring various parts of this ‘mass’ off  the screen and concluded that I was already close to 3 months in my pregnancy.

3 MONTHS?!

“Me? Pregnant? No! I have breast cancer!” thoughts were replaced with “OH S***!! A breast cancer diagnosis would be a lot easier to deal with!”

When I finally calmed down (I am an actor AND an Indian, so I was quite the drama queen)
Dr Azahar told me that I should go home and digest all that had happened (if only it was that easy to make this go away). He said to come back within a week since the first trimester of the pregnancy was coming to an end. If I wanted to terminate the pregnancy, I would need to do it quickly.

I went home in a daze looking at my tummy the whole time until I reached home. I fell on my bed and cried buckets. So many thoughts kept racing through my head; How was I was going to deal with this? Was I going to be able to financially support me AND a child? How do I break the news to my parents? How would they react to this news?
This took a good part of the day and only by nightfall did I call my sister. She was silent at first and then asked me what I was going to do. I told her I hadn’t the foggiest idea and got ready for bed. “Sleeping on it might help” Lying there I kept rubbing my tummy and it felt so surreal knowing that I had a living ‘person’ inside of me. I felt it move (I know that this is not possible but I DID feel it move!). Tears rolled down my cheeks but this time it was tears of JOY! All these years I had yearned for a child and now I was actually having one. I started to imagine all the things we would do together; the birthday parties that I would organize for him/her, the story telling sessions, the games we would play, the cooking, the cleaning, the candle stick making!- I had it all planned out. With those pleasant thoughts I soon drifted into a deep sleep.

Breaking the news to my parents; they were in India for about 4 months visiting relatives when all this happened. Mum came back first. When I told her she was overjoyed. She was going to have a grandchild to dote on. Dad got back soon after. I was already in my 6th month but funnily enough I was not ‘looking pregnant’ just ‘fat!’ My tummy was a slight ‘bump’.

Telling Dad was the hardest for me. He being a respected elder in the community and I was not sure how he would react to the news. I couldn’t bring myself to talk to him in case it got too emotional so I opted to write him a letter: it was 10 pages long with me rambling on and on about how I would understand if he did not approve etc.
It was a Sunday when I went to my family home. My Dad was at the temple so I left the letter on his desk. I then sat on the sofa to watch some TV. My Dad came home shortly after. I decided to get on home because I didn’t want to be around when he read the letter. Just as I was about to leave, a strange thing happened. I was still on the sofa when Dad came towards me, bent down and kissed my tummy and told me he loved me. I come from a family who is very open and loving so kisses and hugs were common. This action in itself was not what was strange. It was the fact that he kissed me on my tummy. I froze! I looked at my sister. She froze! I thought “Did he already know? How?” I quickly got up and left. An hour later my phone rang and I saw it was from my family home. For the second time that day I froze. I dreaded answering it because I did not know what my Dad’s reaction would be. As the ‘Gods’ were with me on this one, my Dad said he was supportive of my decision to keep the baby and not to worry about what the community had to say as it only concerned us. He like my mum was ecstatic that he was going to be a grandfather. It is funny what parents want at the end of the day; a grandchild!
Due to my advanced age at pregnancy which sometimes has its own set of complications Dr A scheduled monthly check-ups so that, should there be any, he would have been able to address them quickly. My due date was Oct 16th. In my 4th month check up I wanted to know the sex of the child. It was a boy. I thought it was important that when I was talking to the fetus I would not confuse the child and give him/her a complex. The circumstances were hard enough as it was and didn’t want to add trauma to it all.

My pregnancy was a breeze and I enjoyed every waking and sleeping moment. I called him Hariharan –a combination of Lord Krishna and Lord Shiva’s names. I also was an avid fan of a world renowned Gazhal singer who shared the same name so thought it was a good choice since just like the miracle of getting pregnant, maybe some talent would miraculously get passed on to my baby. What a strange thought!

I did not suffer from morning sickness (albeit that one day when I felt horrible and thought I had breast cancer) no nausea, no swollen legs, no cravings for special foods other than the ones I had even BEFORE the pregnancy. However I was concerned that I did not ‘look’ the part. I was not ‘showing’ like some of the women I met in Dr A’s waiting room that at 3 or 4 months in their pregnancy looked like they had swallowed a beach ball and waddled around like ducks. Dr A reassured me that there was nothing amiss. He said I had an inverted uterus – an inverted uterus??? What the hell does that mean? I ‘ll have a BUMP on my back?!!!

This fact alone had its advantages!
Nobody suspected that I was with child. I carried on with my work without any prying inquisitive questions from anyone.
I shot a TV soap opera called “The City of the Rich”. I played a nurse who was conniving and delved in the black market trade of selling new born babies born out of wedlock to rich folks who could not have one of their own. To this day the producers don’t know the irony of that story line.

I acted in “Kuala Selangor”. Manomaniam played my drunken husband who was the ‘mandor’ (leader of the workers) of the rubber estate. In one scene he had to slap me on my face and I had to fall to the ground. We did many takes; he always ‘slapping’ close to my face (being the TV medium you can ‘cheat’ the slapping) but there was one take when his hand landed hard on my cheek sending me reeling to the floor. No prizes for guessing which take was selected! When I got back I was so worried that I had somehow hurt ‘little’ Hari. I hadn’t told anyone at the set that I was 8 months pregnant. I made an appointment to see Dr A the next day just to be sure and all was well!

I was paranoid about telling too many people. I thought it would jinx the pregnancy so I only informed people on a ‘need to know bases’.
The first were all of my working colleagues at Instant Café Theatre Company. They were so supportive, loving and above all, non-judgmental. They became very protective over me and made sure that it was not too strenuous for me when performing at shows from then on. Patrick (Teoh) told me that if I gave birth on the scheduled date, he and my son would share the same birthday. Wow! More talent rubbing off on my son!

I continued with my daily routine, doing shows, attending plays and going to various functions.

Oct 16th- Lead up to this day was filled with joy and trepidation; However on the day itself, I went into a deep sleep as soon as an epidural was administered and was snoring away. (to the readers-Give me a break! I hadn’t slept for over 36 hours) It was so loud that some of the other mothers in their respective delivery cubicles were getting annoyed and complained to the nurses. My poor sister who was my birthing partner tried to stop the ‘thunderous sounds’ but was at wit’s end. She was also very tired as she had been with me at the hospital for over 13 hours. She did what any human would have done in that situation; she went to the canteen to have tea!
Little after 7pm, she came back to a flurry of activity. The nurses had been trying to wake me up for more than half an hour. They were highly distressed because I had become violent and started hitting them and in a low exorcist voice said “GO AWAY! LEAVE ME ALONE! I WANT TO SLEEP!”  Dilation was 10cm and my son was ready to make his exit.
The nurses told my sister she was their last resort and pleaded with her to get me up. She started shaking me and yelling “SHANTHI!WAKE UP! YOU HAVE TO GIVE BIRTH NOW!
I think if I hadn’t woken up it would have been the first time in the history of the world where a mother slept through child birth! (Hmm..I wonder if that would have gotten me into the Guinness World of Records!)
“SHANTHI! IF YOU DON’T WAKE UP I WILL SLAP YOU, OKAY!’ did the trick. I sat up wide eyed with my sister glaring down on me.

 Dr A arrived minutes later accompanied by his wife who was also a gynecologist.
‘Would you mind if I stayed and assisted the delivery?” she asked with a sweet smile on her face. TWO doctors! “Of course not! Why should I as long as I am only charged one fee!” I replied with an equally sweet smile.
All that rehearsing of the birthing process earlier in the day went straight out the window.
Three pushes and he slid out the birth canal like in a slide; WHOOSH! Weight: 7.5kg. Date: Oct 16th 1997 Time: 8.55pm. He arrived as scheduled!
Ahhh! FINALLY I can get some sleep!

At the time of this writing, Hari is 13 years, and 8 days.

I guess we never know what cards life will deal us!