If I had heard the same song that's ringing in your speakers now when I was in my dad's car at about 2030hr just now, I swear my weak heart would skip beats. Or maybe it decides to even stop beating altogether, because the tension and fear in the car was just too... overwhelming.
So here's the story.
My dad spotted some red icon lit up on top of his speedometer. We did not know what it meant, but already had an intent to send it in for servicing. We managed to clear a massive traffic jam, and dad even managed to park his car properly at SS2. All was well until when we were on our way to Chowyang pasar malam.
We were on the main road, vying for space with other vehicles. At a turn, the car suddenly gave an unfriendly jerk when dad was applying the brake. Before I could figure out where that jerk came from, dad's Civic jerked, again. Dad mumbled something about brakes and swerved into a nearby Mobil station and after a brief check my dad just rushed to the mobilmart and got himself an RM18 brake fluid. Eighteen bucks what the hell??! But I thought if paying two ringgit less than twenty would get up back up and running then it's no big deal.
Dad opened his bonnet and hence started our sit-down-yank-brake-get-up exercise. If you still don't get how the exercise was done, let me tell you. We took turns to get onto the driver's seat, pressed the brake a few times, and got out of the car to check on the new brake fluid. But after a few yanking the fluid in that little compartment seemed to diminish disproportionally and in the end we've come to an intelligent conclusion.
The brake is
NOT functioning. Special emphasis on NOT, to bring out the idea that the brake cannot work at all, not that it's function improperly. Because if it's just a malfunction that means there's STILL braking effect when you yank the brake. Which is not the case for dad's car, because even if you yank it with your life, the car would just do an unfriendly jerk and continue with minimal deceleration.
SCARY OR NOT!
Dad had to resort to using his handbrake to control the speed. To complicate matters even more dad's car's a manual. So basically the drive home was an exceptionally adventurous and exciting one involving stages like danger detection, brake yanking before handbrake-pulling after car jerking and in the process mild panic attack which was forcefully overcome by the will to survive. *Gasps for air* Allow me to take a breath before I continue.
After everything I told my dad to thank GOD for delaying such 'excitement', and not letting it happen when we were caught in that massive traffic jam. Imagine having a car swerving right in front of you and emergency braking does not work. Or imagine reversing into the parking lot just to realize the brake does not work AT ALL when your rear wheel is barely a few inches from a deep drain. After all these imaginations of 'what if's you'll understand why I thanked Father of Heaven for shielding us, once again.
That's about all my adventure for today. Cross fingers for tomorrow.
Apparently Bahrain does not only lack a good cultural mix - it even lacks internet connection. WHAT THE HECK! All along I thought I could communicate using email (which is already the MOST PRIMITIVE way of digital communication), but just found out today that techno-savvy people in that small country suffer badly. As for me, my one and only mode of communication to that small country is gone. I'm officially helpless.
