What is it about me and habitual money-borrowers? I must've been an Ah Long in my past life lor. No matter how much I take care to
Now, lest you think I'm some neow ji, consider the facts that so-called friends have been borrowing money from me since time immemorial. The first incident occurred when I was in bloody kindergarten, when a classmate borrowed 50 cents so he could gorge himself with Chickadees. When he conveniently forgot about payment and I broached the subject, he stared at me blankly, "Got meh?"
That marked the beginning of me being much sought-after. For cash handouts.
Mind you, I'm hardly swimming in $$$ myself either hor. I just don't get it.
It's not handing over the cash part that I detest, but the having to chase for payment bit. I swear lor, getting these people to pay back is like trying to extract molars from their mouths. And I don't even want anything of theirs. I just want what rightfully belongs to me.
I'm not a bloody mint or an ATM lor. Like everybody else, I have to toil for my money and despite the common misconception...us lowly makeup girls don't have it easy. We're not even on the lowest of the low rung of the corporate ladder, so you can imagine how much shit rains down on us from above. It's blood money ok!
My handphone, at the height of my money-lending frenzy, was groaning from the weight of IOUs. Typically...
5/3/98
Yes, I'm ashamed to acknowledge that I've had so-called friends who are so pathetic I had to bail them out of their debts. One particular loser had the audacity to jio me out for lunch and expect me to pay for his share as well.
When I've had to ask for payment (none of these people ze dong pay me back when they get their salaries hor!), I am usually given this look like I'm the one who did the borrowing instead of the lending. Then come the avalanche of evasions...
"Eh yang, sorry ah. This month I can't pay you back cuz my grandma in hospital & I got to pay her bills."
"Orh, like that ah. Tell you what. I'm quite tight this month. On the 25th, I promise, when I get my pay."
"I don't have much cash on me now leh. Tomorrow lor."
"I've only got $10 left and I need it for my cab ride back. Another day lah hor?"
"Wah lau aye, you need it back now meh? Don't worry lah. I won't run away wun." (har?!!!!)
No cliche more apt here than the one that goes, with friends like these, who needs enemies? Truly lor.
I'm embarrassed to have to ask for payment, but these people are apparently unembarrassed about owing me! The way I go through life, it's as if I've got huge neon blinkers tattooed on my forehead.
Borrow all you want. Interest-free. Payback optional.
Over the years, I have weeded out most of these habitual borrowers as friends (i.e., sever all ties). I hate to say it...but due to my tendency to be a loser-magnet, I am suspicious of every new person I meet until proven otherwise. Or if a person called, and he or she has borrowed before, I can't help but think, "Must be to borrow money again lor, what else?"
And just when I think I've dodged the best of them...
I hit JB with a new colleague yesterday. It all initially sounded fine and dandy. She said she was going to bring SGD$600 there (I was actually naive enough to think, "Wah, $600 is alot sia. More than enough to shop at JB."). As history would have it, yesterday played out like a bad nightmare. The SGD$600-toting cow lost control and blew almost every cent on a prescription drug (she's a junkie; see what I mean by me being a loser-magnet?). After that, she was too broke to do any shopping and she still had stuff on her list not bought yet.
Then came the clincher, "Steph, how much you have on you?"
KNNCCB, I knew it would come to this.
I bloody hate it. I couldn't say no because she knew I had some cash on me. I didn't want to lend her any either because I didn't want to subject myself to the inconvenience of having to chase for payment yet again. But she was a new colleague and I didn't want to make an enemy (you know how petty females can be lor...may it be love or money, reject them once and they bear a grudge forever), so I settled for, "I only have SGD$50 to spare."
Between popping pills like candy and guzzling on gallons of coffee, the wired, empty-pocketed cow staggered into every shop with my SGD$50 (RM$113) wanting to buy anything and everything.
Then she asked the unbelievable of me (considering the fact that we hardly know each other!), "Steph, you help me sign card first can?"
Extremely reluctantly, I said ok. KNNCCB, she don't have her own credit card meh?!
She made a ruckus at a first shop haggling over the price and condition of a faux
She then breezed into a second shop and loudly haggled for an exchange of a supposedly faulty lock of a faux
Thereafter, she breezed into every shop as if my stupid credit card were her guarantor. Ya-ya papaya and lao lan as hell, she acted as if the entire
"Steph, this one nice boh?"
"Steph, should I get this or not?"
"Steph, what do you think of this top ah?"
KNNCCB, with my SGD$50 at stake, no way in hell was I going to be objective lor.
"No, very Ah Lian. Doesn't suit you."
"Don't get lah. You just got the
"No, don't get the top. It makes you look fat."
Eventually I lost patience, "Don't just buy for the sake of buying lah. If you don't need it, don't buy it. And you don't need ANYTHING!" (You only need to return my SGD$50 without kicking and screaming, and without me having to tear my own hair out chasing you for it...that's all you bloody need)
Thank God (in this case, there is one!) my credit card was spared and she didn't swipe a cent on it. If I had to pray hard for something (anything!), it wouldn't be to strike Toto or 4D; it would be never to be borrowed from again (such is the hassle).