Maximum Ditsiness

I was hunting for my Shanghai trip boarding passes last night and only found the outbound flight pass. Wondered where I could have chucked the return boarding pass and thought, hmmm, maybe it’s in my passport cover pocket. So I opened the top bedside drawer and searched for my passport.

Only it wasn’t there.

Got into a state of panic and looked again in the drawer, pulling it out as far as I could. There were my four old expired passports, my diaries, some pens, some bookmarks but no recent unexpired passport. Looked all over again in utter disbelief, in the bottom drawer, under the drawers, even the gap beside the bed.

Still no passport.

Looked into my dressing-table drawers and the other bedside drawers. Searched the dresser top. Went to the storeroom where my bags are and looked into each compartment of the bags I brought to the States.

Still no passport.

Prayed frantically to God and tried to remember where else I could have placed the passport. OK, I had sent my backpack for repair because its zip puller was falling apart three weekends ago but surely I had emptied all the pockets! Or had I?

Decided to go to sleep regardless reasoning there was no point staying awake worrying. But still, I couldn’t help thinking of the procedures (or rather, hassle) I have to go through if I have to replace my passport – lodge a police report, having to explain how I managed to lose my passport, go to the Immigration office to apply for a new passport [and all that queuing!], fork out money to pay for the new passport and photos, and oh probably having to take half-day leave too to apply for the new passport and another half-day leave to collect it. This absent-mindedness sure is costly.

This morning I decided I would place a call to the store where I sent my backpack for repair and ask if I left my passport in there and if not, I would apply for half-day leave and return to my bachelorette and ransack the place to look for it.

The store only commences business from 10 am. It was a long wait alright. In the meantime, I called Lin to tell her [She bombarded me with, ‘Shouldn’t that be the first thing you keep after returning from a trip?’, ‘You just came back recently so it shouldn’t be difficult to remember where you put it’, ‘Did you leave it at HQ?’], and then asked another mate to pray for me. Aye, I was that desperate.

At 1020 hours, I called the store [well, just in case it doesn’t open on the dot]. The person who picked up the phone was polite and courteous. He told me that my backpack is ready for collection [actually I already knew that since last week but decided to wait ‘til this weekend to pick it up]. I asked nicely if he could check and see if I had left something [Lin advised me not to mention passport specifically] in it, telling him I’d hold.

It took only minutes but it felt like forever. My palms were almost moist as I held the phone. He finally returned to the phone and asked [and I think in a somewhat incredulous voice]: ‘Is it your passport that you left in the bag?’ I almost shouted with relief and said, ‘Yes!’ and continued as if seeking confirmation, ‘It is in there then?’ He said, ‘Yes.’ ‘OK, I’ll come and collect it maybe later this evening or this weekend. Thank you!’ and quickly hung up.

Oh phew, what a relief! Thank you, God.

I managed to persuade my mate to come along with me to collect my bag during lunch and everyone in the store seemed to know me. I even asked, ‘How did you know my name?’ before realising and groaning inwardly that they must have all looked at my passport. I bet the whole store had been laughing at me. I must be the first and the one and only customer ever to have sent something for repair and leaving a vital document in the item.

Lin told me I was very lucky to have recovered my passport. Yeah, I’m a lucky ditsy lassie, I am. You haven’t heard of the time when I misplaced my tube ticket, my Paris Metro ticket [and got fined for it], absent-mindedly walked away with a huge postcard with Kevin Costner on it in Paris without paying [OK, I know, I know, he’s a has-been but this happened way back when] and couldn’t return it as we lost our way and couldn’t find the stall again but I later lost the postcard so it really wasn’t theft, almost left my camera on a London double-decker bus...

I really must stay focussed from now on. Because as I have discovered, my absent-mindedness could turn out to be costly. And I think I’ll wait until June before my next visit to Gucci KLCC.