It was by chance, that my boss was invited to an event organized by St. Thomas Church to give a talk on breast cancer and cervical cancer. Being a Muslim, she passed the task to the only available non-Muslim in the department - yours truly.
It was only a two-and-a-half-days short notice. I was all stressed up, knowing that being an obsessive compulsive maniac, I would definitely need more time to prepare. Moreover, the stipulated time for the talk was 2 hours! How much do I need to prepare to talk for 2 hours?! I had been praying, for impartation of the message, at least to create self awareness for both breast and cervical cancer.
So today, without familiarizing the crowd before hand, I arrived at destination 10 minutes before time. It was a women fellowship with roughly a hundred of them. They had started praise and worship. With warm welcome, I was ushered down the aisle. The first question directed to me by the chair person was:
"Doktor caku Iban?" (Does doctor speak Iban?)
"Minta maaf. Aku nak nemu caku Iban..." (Sorry, I do not know how to speak Iban...) I answered with a head shake but agreed to deliver my presentation in Bahasa Melayu even though my slides were English written. In my heart, I was a tad worried as to speak Bahasa is fine, but to deliver a formal talk, it would take time to phrase and translate.
I must really thank God that the session went well with good response.
Thank God for the opportunity, for the experience to worship in Bahasa Iban, and for the attentive group who did raise up a lot of questions that showed they really concern.
Also, thanks to the deformed breast props I borrowed from the hospital. It stayed the crowd alert for some hands-on and of course, consuming time a little longer.
The token of appreciation.
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