Battle with the Bulge

My colleague, who is rather “warm in the pockets” and is therefore fortunate enough to have her hair washed and styled by professional hairstylists every weekend, related to me that, last weekend, her favorite hairstylist recommended a tried- and-true (or so he claimed) slimming product to her, who happens to be quite “gebu” (read: plump).

Apparently, his sister, who used the product, lost 5 kilos in two months.

Whereupon he received a shock when my colleague told him that she was quite happy with her figure!

If she could recall, his exact words to her were “Haiyaaa!! Mana ada orang pompuan tak mau kurus?!” (read: “what woman does not desire to be thin?!”)

Unfortunately, he’s quite right.

To borrow the words of Austen, “It is a universally accepted truth” that women throughout the world and throughout the ages, desire to be thin.

Me included.

As far as I can recall, all of my girlfriends and female relatives (yup, we gebu-statured ladies tend to stick together..!) have at one point or another tried all kinds of things: slimming pills, meal replacement shakes, slimming tea and fat-busting massage soap/cream, slimming belts, fat-burners, injections, etc etc etc. We’ve tried enrolling ourselves at the gym, (yeah, that’s us, Linda!) we’ve gone for slimming treatments at huge costs (Ros…. RM3,000 was it??) and we’ve bought expensive running shoes and tights for that morning/evening jog in the park (sounds familiar, Saba?!) . We sweated it out at aerobics sessions (I’m sure Hajar remembers this) and at the sauna (what a great time we had, sis Faizah!). We’ve deliberately missed eating dinners with the family at home and lunches with our colleagues at work. We’ve deliberately deprived our bodies of heavenly treats like chocolate and cheesecake at parties and nasi minyak at weddings.

Oddly enough we never seem to realise that hardly any of these methods work for long. All the kilos shed always manage to come back on at breakneck speed!

Moreover, our battle with the bulge have made us sado-masochists. It seems like we take pleasure in torture and depravation – albeit to ourselves. We disregard the hazard it may post to our health (I actually landed in hospital for a week with a gallstone the size of a 20-sen coin, my bile duct aggravated by a slimming product!).

S'truth! Women are cruel beings indeed!

And think of the thousands of Ringgit spent! If we had saved the money that went towards our battle with the bulge, we would have been a great deal richer by now!

But looking at the positive side, our common quest for slimness has brought us all closer. It provides an avenue that allows female bonding where secrets are shared; gossips are exchanged and time is spent together. It's practically a virtual exclusive club where only gebu-statured ladies can claim membership!

Having said that, you were probably wondering… “Ape ke benda nama slimming product yang adik stylist tu guna?” (read: “so what was the slimming product that the hairstylist’s sister consumed?”)

Don’t worry, I’ve asked my colleague to find out this weekend!