THE PORTER, THE CANADIAN AND THE PRINCESS
Occasion: Helping a Canadian
Lady on my Warwick Conferences Reception Assistant cum Porter evening shift on making her private call to Canada from England via the
Telecommunication Centre in a disclosed room in a building within University of Warwick.
The lady is a conference participant for the Associated Country Women of the
World or in short, ACWW[1]
29th Triennial Conference held with participants coming from all
over the world. Malaysia included.
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| HRH Tengku Puan Pahang in a simple dress as you will normally see her walking in public or when not attending any official event. Photo credit goes to http://instarix.com/tag/tengkupuanpahang. |
As I'm escorting the Canadian
lady from a building to another, we had this small conversation just to keep
ourselves occupied and most importantly not feeling awkward during the 15 minutes’
walk. She walked a bit slow even after I slowed my walking pace from 8 miles
per hour down to around 2 miles per hour until I saw her dripping sweat. It was
one of the hottest summer in the UK and being in a building with air-condition
doesn't really help as the building was more like warm throughout the whole
year because the Great British Weather was always unpredictable and most of the
time the weather was always cool, dry and freezing and temperature even dropped
many times for whatever reason during midday. But today is different. It was
ridiculously hot. When we reached the second building, I politely allowed her
into the lift and carried on with my next question, after several minutes having
them stucked and now completely constructed in my cognitive mind;
Me: So, you're here for the
International Women's Conference?
Canadian Lady: Yes, it is
called the ACWW which stands for Associated Country Women of the World.
Me: (Looking at her tag the
size of a palm hanging from her lanyard by her neck which clearly had
everything written including her photo, name, country of origin and the conference she's
attending) So are you from Canada?
Canadian Lady: Yes, I am.
Me: Which part of Canada?
Canadian Lady: (She mentioned
this one state in Canada which sound like a Native American language that I could
hardly remember by now, but hey it's not Toronto)
Me: I'm no Canadian but I only
know one Canadian and that's Celine Dion.
Canadian Lady: Oh yes, she's
from Charlemagne, a town in Quebec City.
Me: Oh okay. (Never even heard of the place and don't really
care, just focus on keep the conversation going on)
Earlier, we had to walk out from the
building where my team is stationed and moved to the next building where all
the conference was held, and I saw a large group of ladies with so many nationalities,
proudly dressed up beautifully in their national dress coming out from the main
entrance of the building probably from the ACWW conference. I also happened to
see a group of my home country ladies dressed up in their national Baju Kurung dress completed with head
scarf. When we finally reached the telecommunication room and met the
technician man who handed me the weird looking device that connects it to the
ordinary looking telephone to make it available for international call, when the
lady popped up her question;
Canadian Lady: So, are you
from around here?
Me: Nope, definitely not. I
live in Coventry with my wife who's studying here in Warwick but originally,
I'm from Malaysia.
Canadian Lady: Malaysia?
(Looking surprised) I met a Princess this morning and she's from Malaysia.
(Looking excited)
Me: (Princess? For real? Like the late Diana Princess of Wales? That is so cool. Okay, that was a
bit silly for me think like that but honestly, after living many years abroad,
that was the first thing that came up in my head even though there’s no blonde haired princess in my home country, at least not in my knowledge)
 |
| The front view of the entrance for University of Warwick Rootes Building where all the big conferences are held. Photo credit goes to https://warwick.ac.uk/about/campus/tour/rootes/ |
Prior to this conversation, I
was made aware by my Malaysian Coventry Community that a Royal Member from one
of the Malaysia State Royal Family will be coming to Coventry for an official event,
but I didn't know that I was somehow indirectly involved in this event myself.
That was when she took out her
phone from her pocket and showed me her new screensaver that clearly had her
image in a selfie position with the other public figure whom she called the
Malaysian princess who looked like a well dress Malay lady clad in a neatly
wrapped head cover or 'tudung' with a simple yet elegant appearance unlike the
image that I always saw in a picture frame hanged on the wall on any of the
government offices in Malaysia. Moreover, because we don't address our
Princesses as simply ‘Princesses’ but in our own way which is normally Tengku
Puan, Tengku or Cik Puan to name a few. And her face reminded me of one of the
ladies I saw coming out from the building just now on our way to the top floor.
Later, when the business is done, I pointed her to the nearest bus station in
front of the university’s art centre as she asked me which is the nearest
clinic or hospital which explains all the extra sweat she had earlier.
That evening when my shift is
only an hour to finish and there’s hardly any participant collecting their
bedroom keys anymore, I decided to check my smart phone and googled on the image
search of the princesses of Malaysia and found that same familiar face the
Canadian lady showed me on her phone earlier that day and clicked on that
image. That was when a Wikipedia page appeared throwing all the information I
needed with the title on top of the page written in bold, Her Royal Highness Tunku
Azizah Aminah Maimunah Iskandariah the beloved wife of His Royal
Highness Tengku Abdullah ibni Sultan
Ahmad Shah, Tengku Mahkota Pahang[2].
Okay, now I know.
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| The Durian Experience by HRH Tengku Puan Pahang. Photo credit goes to http://www.mynewshub.cc/utama-sensasi/akhirnya-brader-ni-tahu/ |
In short, I don’t blame myself
for not knowing this but being a simple man, I can say it is fair enough I can’t
fit all the public figures including the Royal Family into my proportionately
sized head unless he or she made an impact on the national or world news and
make a big headline out of it everywhere even for just a day. But after what
happened that day, I also got to know that HRH Tengku Puan Pahang is a humble
down to earth royal figure that often make news headline nearly anywhere she
goes, YouTube included. I happened to watch this one video uploaded by MFs
Production Studio[3] on
HRH Tengku Puan Pahang durian fruit shopping experience in one of Penang’s
Night Market and HRH rather chosen to be treated as a random customer without
any royal treatment and allowed the seller to address her as ‘Kakak’ instead.
Now that’s a one cool Princess.
P/S: As I can't copy any offical images of HRH Tengku Puan Pahang in a complete royal dress due to copyright issue, you can have a full biodata and background by following its official link at http://www.dirajapahang.my/portaldiraja/?page_id=2282. Thanks.
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