Things I do for RM800

Oh what a day.

Today I was sent of to the ends of the earth, aka Kuala Kubu Baru to attend an auction. Not as glamorous as it sounds I assure you.

No hammer weilding man in an expensive suit standing behind a podium in a lavish room with priceless Ching vases on display. Not on your life. This was a property auction.

Some joker decided to take a huge loan to buy a house in this village and now that he has defaulted on his loan, the bank decided to auction off his house and guess what, nobody wants to buy it.

Usually where these are no bidders for a property, depending on the type of land title, the Court or the Land Office will order that the reserve price be lowered for the next auction. And for this the lawyers are required to attend to this business.

So that was basically how I ended up at Rawang train station at 10 am this morning looking for a taxi driver to drive me to this small speck of a town called Kuala Kubu Baru. I am sure it was not too much to ask for something that actually resembled a taxi, maybe a small lit box on the roof with the word TAXI on it or even say, a the hint of canary yellow that is so close to the hearts of cab drivers the nation, nay, the world over.

But then, my life would be so boring if things always go my way right?

Rawang only has those Sapu taxies which are essentially normal cars illegally ferrying passangers for a fare. My using the word Normal here is really stretching it. They were these ancient vehicles that our grandads once use to court our grandmas with, back during the days when the world was still black and white and dinosaurs roamed the earth.

The first car I sat in refused to start. The second jalopy was no better. It was so old that I was told that when the car first came out, seat belts were not a prerequisite for the model. We naturally had no air conditioning and besides, the knob to wind the window has either rotted away or dissappeared and the only way I could wind the window was to turn the massive spanner that was clinging to the side of the car door like a dead raccoon. Whether the cab smelt like a furry small animal I could not tell you as I thankfully had a blocked nose.

I made to the land office in one piece and back without any mishaps like the engine falling through the car or having to stop to the side of the road to pick up the exhaust pipe.

And guess what, since nobody bid for that earlier mentioned property - I have to go back in August for the next auction.

Catch the next episode of Dicing With Death in two months time.