The toilet moments with Yasmin Ahmad.

Upon Yasmin Ahmad's death, a friend asked me: "Do you like your ex-boss?"

I didn't answer her directly whether it's a 'yes' or 'no'. Technically speaking, being an ECD, of course Yasmin was my boss, but I've never worked with her once. Her room was like at the east, my desk was at the west. I bet she didn't even know my name, for a small staff like me. My memories of her during my 3 and a half years in Leo Burnett, mostly in the lobby and very often, I bumped into her in the toilet.

She was very proud of her multilingual talent i guess, whenever she sees a chinese staff in the morning she would greet in Mandarin, she said to me: "小姐早安." Which means: "Good morning missy." Then if there's a cleaner or tea lady nearby, she would greet them in BM and cracked some jokes which I don't understand due to my poor BM standard. She was very loud, talked and laughed loudly. Sometimes when we met each other in the corridor she would speak to me in Mandarin, her pronunciation was not perfect so I would tease her: "Eh your Mandarin sucks la..." She fought back: "Your BM sucks also what???" She likes to sing a line or two when she walked in the office. She just do whatever things in her own way, in a word, she didn't give a fuck lah.

Many times I saw her washing her feet in the toilet basin. I pushed open the toilet door, saw her leg lifted damn high and sinked into the basin. Then she would said something cheekily like: "Hehehe, solli ah.", or " Ballet lessons!", or she just look at me with a smile and continue singing her drama tune: "La~la~la".

She was a funny person in the toilet, the funniest was when I sat next to the cubicle when we both peed at the same time, (i think out of her boredom) she asked me in Cantonese: "Eh, nei o liu ah?" Means "Eh, u passing urine ah?" I would just layan her and said: "Yalah..." Many times she asked the same question so one day I got fed up I said: "O si ah!" (means shitting ah!) Her response was: "Yer!" Hahahaha...

Not only talking rubbish in the toilet, when she heard a loud running water in next cubicle, she would ask: "Eh mandi ke?"

When she smelled something 'funny', she asked: "Eh baru makan petai ke?"

All sorts of embarrassing but funny questions would make the toilet break into laughters.

Honestly, I was never her fan, of course her works is splendid but put asides all her highly accredited works and fame, I only know Yasmin Ahmad as a friendly, down to earth and funny person, a real person you see everyday, in a plain aunty-like baju kurung, even she is the damn famous Yasmin Ahmad.

So, go back to my friend's question: "Do you like your ex-boss?"

Now I think I do.