Fly to the Land Below the Wind

9 – 11 JULY 2010: Just 3 days after my HK relatives went back that I’ve yet recovered from my tiredness; I’ve to pack for my 3D2N trip to our land below the wind. I’ve been to Kota Kinabalu twice over the last 10 years for hiking and island hoping; and this time around was Sandakan.

It was a planned trip that we booked the flight early of the year. A friend of mine was origin from there; who suggested us to follow him back to his lovely hometown for a short weekend trip. An early morning flight it was (720am) where we reached Sandakan 3 hours after that. A lovely and peaceful town it is; with no traffic at all, friendly local people (and they speak hakka too), very fresh seafood and beautiful landscapes it has.

To summarize what I’ve done within these 3 days.

Food:


Temples/Church:


Local attractions:


Don’t know why, I really love Sabah a lot. I could feel myself at home being there, probably because the local Chinese speaks hakka. Do you have any local state or city/town of your interest?

I Love Burger

29 JUNE 2010: I’m always a burger lover. During schooling and Uni time, I could only afford those Ramly burger that I still like it until now, especially the burger special with extra mayonnaise..simply yummy. Can hardly find a nice Ramly stall nearby my house now.

A friend of mine, Mr. P has recommended this restaurant in Bangsar Village but I never thought of paying a visit. According to him, the restaurant (Daily Grind) serves the best burger in town. Therefore, we went for it during one of these Sunday. Met with him at Starbucks when he was playing around with his new DSLR. Am I a talented model? Walked down to the restaurant after an hour of chat, and I was surprise that I wasn’t aware of the place despite hundred times of visiting to this mall.



Ordered a beef burger recommended by the waiter. The food portion was just nice and the burger tasted great. A comfortable atmosphere with lovely music, and good food; I love it.

Are you a burger lover? What is your recommendation for my next visit?

Chickie Me

29 APR 2010: It’s a monthly routine for me to go for haircut. Mostly the usual style that I’ve got a little bored with it. Therefore, here’s my conversation with the hairstylish:

E: As usual?
Me: Hm…thinking of change a little bit.
E: Trying somehow new? Something shorter?
Me: Maybe. But is it hard to manage?
E: Nah, not at all.
Me: Sounds good.

Enjoyed myself with those magazines and Blackberry for some time until I looked at the mirror.

Me: Alamak, apa ni?
E: Something new for you (Smiling).
Me: Hm…is it a little too short ?
E: Nope, just a start for you to get used to it. Next time could be shorter. Very easy to manage, you don’t even need to gel on the side.
Me: That’s true; hardly see any hair for me to gel also. :(

What do you think of my new look? My dad commented that I look like a chickie

Whore No More

26 APR 2010: Looking back my recent postings and found out that I didn’t camwhore that much comparing to last time, maybe months back. Has anyone actually noticed about this?

Is it because I’m getting older, and lost the courage to camwhore anymore?
Is it because my life is getting boring and routine?
Or is it because I’m tired of my own look?



Perhaps it’s time to pass my tiara to the next generation. Who’s next?

Hong Kong (2007 vs 2010)

15 - 21 JAN 2010: Went to HK for 7D6N trip with family. Took quite a lot of photos over the week even though I was there 3 years back. Went to some of those same places again as my 2nd sister and nephew were along this time around (They didn't go 3 years back). The weather was lovely (13-18C). Anyhow, not much of shopping this time around as those outlets were selling mostly winter clothes.

Coincidencely, took some photos at the same places as 3 years back. Therefore, I tried to put those together to see my changes over the past 3 years. Guess nothing much changed apart from being an older me now.

These are the selected shots of my nephew over the trip. Such a naughty but photogenic little boy he is.

Well, when and where will be my next trip?

Christmas Weekend

24 DEC 2009: It was a Christmas Eve and an off day for me; therefore I brought my nephew for a walk and picnic at a park in Cyberjaya. It’s a very nice park that I used to jog here pretty often before I joined gym. Packed some snacks and drinks along as I knew my nephew would be tired running around as there’s a huge playground within the park.

Sitting at a corner while watched him running around the playground, realized that he has grown up a lot. A much taller and heavier him now that I could hardly carry him around anymore; means an older me nowadays too. We spent about 2 hours within the park, and of course cam whored a little. Think my nephew has the potential on cam whoring, what do you think?



25 DEC 2009: Friends invited me to stay-over in Genting on the night of Christmas Eve, where we had a little party with gift-exchanged. I bought a gift and wrapped it nicely. Think the wrapping is comparative with Danny’s wrapping lo, hehe. And during the trip only I realized that Genting has strawberry farm too.

Among all those gifts below, which do you think is mine?

Self Lock Up

1 DEC 2009: I did the same silly mistake again this morning, locked up myself within the main door and grille. Here is the story; I woke up and get myself ready as usual and walked out the main door with my usual stuffs i.e. bag, wallet and cell phone. Follows the normal routine, I walked out the main door, locked it from inside and closed the door; the next step would be opening the grille’s lock. And only I found that I left my keys inside the house!!!

The helpless me ended up stuck between the door and grille. What can I do in such condition? Obviously I couldn’t break my own door and grille. So I called my father back to release me out. Luckily he was just nearby and it only took him 15 minutes to come back and save me out



Do you have such a stupid experience before? What would you do in such condition?

Fun Time with Cups and Cakes

12 NOV 2009: Wanted to bake egg tart initially, but cousin came over to my house over the weekend. So I thought it would be fun to try cupcakes instead. It didn’t take me long to prepare those ingredients like butter, flour, sugar, lemon etc with help of my cousin. Being a lazy her normally, I was surprised that she has been very attentive and helpful for the whole process.

Cousin was a little worried initially as it was our 1st time of baking cupcakes, but it turned out nicely on par with those selling by bakery..LOL. With a little creativity on the frosting, the cupcakes even looked more appearing



What do you think of the cupcakes, considering it was my 1st attempt of baking cupcakes?

Melbourne Trip 2009

Day 1: Touched down Melbourne Airport at 12:30am and quickly went over to friend’s house to unpack our stuff and rest. Woke up early the next morning to visit some wineries and a historical town nearby Melbourne named Bendigo. Felt a little tipsy after few rounds of wine tasting and it was definitely a good experience. We ended up bought 2 bottles of red wine that cost us AUD20 each.



Day 2: Woke up early as it would be a long day tour to the Great Ocean Road. It is Victoria’s most spectacular route and is recognized as one of the world’s most scenic coastal drive. No doubt that it was a wonderful driving experience with magnificent scenery along the way. And the famous Twelve Apostles are one of the largest limestone rock stacks in the world. It was a cold and windy day but luckily all of us wore enough clothes. Dropped by at the nearby town called Warnambool for dinner before drove all the way back Melbourne.



Day 3: A day tour to Melbourne Zoo. Met up with friends at Victoria Market for breakfast and took a tram to Zoo. Bought a daily tram ticket cost AUD6++ with unlimited ride throughout a day. The zoo was quite packed with families on weekend, and it’s very well designed and maintained. It was my first time experience seeing Kangaroo and Koala bear.



Day 4-6: Planned to visit Philip Island initially, but we cancelled the trip due to some circumstances. Therefore, we took our own sweet time with city and shopping tour for the next 3 days. Nothing much in Melbourne city itself apart from some gorgeous cathedrals, art center/theatre, Federation Square, Library, Town Hall etc. Had a day shopping at Victoria’s Market though I didn’t buy much due to the high exchange rate of Aussie dollar.



Nothing much to shout about the Melbourne city itself apart from the magnificent Great Ocean Road. Anyhow, what matter most was the great company I had along the trip. I believe we had gone through enough along the whole trip that had definitely strengthened our friendship.

Ekiden Relay Run 2009

4 OCT 2009: Went for the 4th Ekiden Run 2009 at Putrajaya with the usual marathon kaki. There were 10 of us in 2 different teams. I was the team leader that of the team named H5N5. What a dramatic name given.

The run started officially at 8am where it was a relay run that each of us had to run for the distance of 3km. I was pretty stressed as 1st runner. Everyone ran at a very fast pace for the 1st 1km. I pushed myself a little faster than my normal pace in order to keep up with others and completed the 3km within 17 minutes. Not too bad I guess as a 1st runner with less than 20 ahead of me. Finally, my team finished the run within 1 hour 20 minutes at 50th. Well done team!!!

It was a fun and well organized event. However, the organizer shall locate more remote toilets at the interchange section as I saw lots of guys did their business around the bushes. Kind of disgusting and I bet it wasn’t something proud to be shown especially to foreigner.



Who is interested to form a team of 5 for next year? And a fancy name for the team?

My BIG Day

28 SEP 2009: It’s my birthday today, but I chose to work instead of staying at home. A quite day with gloomy weather that allow me to flash back some of the memory for the past 30 years. It was 20 years back since my mum left us, 9 years since I graduated from Degree and all the things that I’ve done and gone through throughout these years. I remember a conversation over a radio last few days about what age is considered old for guy/lady. And one of DJ said we’re old when we start to flash/talk back about our old time. Ouch….is it what I’m doing now? Time really flies I would say.

I’m always glad that I have a great and supportive family/relatives and friends being around me, where they had organized some birthday celebrations for me over the weekend.

1. Lunar birthday celebration with family and relatives. Lovely dinner and had a great time with all of them, always.

2. Went for short hike with friends at Cheras, and they threw me a little surprise celebration.

3. Monthly birthday celebration with close friends. 4 September babies celebrated our birthday together. Nothing is better than sharing the happiness with a group of close friends.

4. Celebration with buddies and gym mates at Karaoke. They had a great time with the singing where I was just being an audience.

Those celebrations were fantastic and this would definitely be a memorable year for me. Thanks everyone for always being there for me.

4D3N Chiang Mai trip

31 Aug 2009 : DAY 01 - ARRIVAL CHIANGMAI

Took the morning AA flight to Chiang Mai (Around 3 hours). Warm welcome by the tour guide (Mr. Siao Ma) who spoke mandarin. First destination was Doi Suthep temple that located in the west of Chiangmai city on Doi Suthep, 929 feet above sea level. As we have a senior visitor with us, we took the tram car up to the temple. You can choose to climb up the 300 steps by yourself though. It was a wonderful 1st day with fascinating view of Chiang Mai town and chilling fresh air at this temple.

After the trip, we went for a Khantoke Dinner where we were served with Northern Thai food accompanied with cultural Lanna-Style Performance during the dinner. Checked in to our hotel (Centara Duang Tawan Hotel).

1 SEP 2009: DAY 02 – CHIANGRAI DAY-TRIP
Woke up at 630am for early breakfast at hotel and headed to Chiang Rai via Van, which took around 4 hours drive.1st drop off point was Mae Kajan Hot Spring, which didn’t give me any surprise. Stayed for 30 minutes and went to 2nd destination, which was White Temple (Rong Khun Temple). As it was rained at the time we reached, we happily carried our umbrella and walked around the temple. It is a very beautiful temple with all white in color, which is very different from typical temple around Thailand; a must visit place if you happen to come here. Proceed with lunch nearby The Golden Triangle, which is the intersection between Mekong River and Kong River (The border of Thailand, Vietnam and Laos). Took a boat ride to a small village located in Laos, which has nothing much there apart some stalls selling local-made souvenirs. Another 4 hours drive back to Chiang Mai. And yeah, I managed to hit the hotel’s gym for an hour of workout. The night ended with shopping along the night market.

2 SEP 2009: DAY 03 - CHIANGMAI
After breakfast went to visit Orchid & Butterfly Farm before we proceed to Ban Tong Luang (Mix Hill Tribes village) to visit those Chiang Mai famous long-neck people. The village was nice and clean, where the whole village was actually supported by government. There were some nice looking ladies, but most of them were married with kids. Anyhow, I think the village was too commercialized and kind of loss its culture. The next destination was Elephant Camp in a Natural Park, which was quite an interesting place to visit where we were entertained with some performances by those well trained elephants. Took our lunch and visited some bird nest and honey manufacturers before visited the final destination of the day, which was San Kham Pang Village (Home Industries). This village has assorted size and design of those paper-made umbrellas. The umbrella was nicely painted with assorted design and colors. Had dinner and did our final shopping at night market.

3 SEP 2009: DAY 04 - DEPARTURE DATE
After breakfast, packed our stuff and happily flew back to KL.

Berry Berry…I LOVE YOU

28 AUG 2009: I’ve just got this new toy few days back. It wasn’t that user friendly initially but its beauty covers all the downside. I’m still in the progress of learning to be with her 24x7. Nothing fancy about the phone physically or functionality wise. However, the build quality is good and emailing is excellent by using this phone.

I guess I’m falling in love again…unfortunately just with a mobile phone.

My Little Guardian Angel

26 AUGUST 2009: Sometimes, a gift from someone that doesn’t cost much monetary wise but could really touch our heart deeply. A good friend of mine came back from Singapore and made this little gift for me; a little angel made from crystals. I saw such thing before at those shops but I felt nothing towards such fancy accessories. However, when my friend told me that it was hand-made; It was kind of touched me suddenly. Therefore, I hang it in my car where looking at it every day reminds of this precious friend of mine.

What is the cheapest gift you have received that meant a lot for you?



As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been extremely busy lately with works that takes away all my time from blogging and checking out all your blogs (You know who you are). I felt good last weekend when I finally had time to catch up a movie and some drinks at KL. Hope all of you are doing well too.

Selamat berpuasa to everyone.

Sg Gabai day trip & Adidas KOTR Goodies Collection

26 JULY 2009: My 2nd trip to Sg Gabai for these 2 months (Went there last month with a group of friends) but this time around was with family and relatives. Slept at 3am the night before due to clubbing, but woke up at 8am to prepare myself as a driver.

It took around an hour of drive from Serdang to Sg Gabai. A lot of fruit stalls along the way selling mostly durian, mangosteen and cempedak. Reached the destination and they charged us RM1 per person for the carpark/entry. Just paid it since we’ve already there, and then we have to walk up hundreds of staircases to the best picnic spot (carrying food and drinks). The waterfall was nice but I think they need to put more effort to maintain the facilities i.e. toilet. Had our picnic and spent few hours there before we drove back to Serdang. We dropped by at the Hot Spring on the way back, where the place was packed with aunties and uncles. Some of them even brushed their teeth there…so funny.



29 JULY 2009: Adidas KOTR run will be held on 2nd of August at Shah Alam. My friends and I drove over to Stadium Shah Alam to collect the goodies bag. The line was quite long when we reached, but we still patiently queue for it. Anyhow, we were still standing at the same spot after 10 minutes and we started to loss our patience. Even the pakcik who stood in front of us also complained about it. Anyhow, nothing much inside the goodies bag apart from a running shirt, bib and RM50 Adidas voucher. But I do really like the shirt given this year, which it's very well designed and sharp in colour (Orange + blue stripes).

Note: I took the M size and it’s so damn tight. Think I have to diet for whole week to fit into the shirt on this Sunday.

Siemens KL Run 2009

19 JULY 2009: Just 2 weeks apart after the Standard Chartered KL Run, I’ve joined the Siemens Run that held in KL. As usual, waking up at 5am early morning would be the toughest thing for me. This time around I took some banana and energy bar bought from Cold Storage the night before.

Reached Dataran Merdeka at 630am and did some warm up exercise. The crowd wasn’t that much comparing to previous run. And guess what, I met with another 2 bloggers there. What a surprise to see them, but sorry that I could hardly recognize both of you especially at early morning when my brain was still sleeping. Anyhow, the event started punctually at 730am where I reached the finishing line at around 830am. The router itself has a lot of hills with quite some numbers of water stations.

The sad thing is I couldn’t get a medal for this run. Anyhow, they gave away a goodies bag containing a big bottle of whitening lotion, energy bar etc. Quite a good deal and it was definitely a good experience for me.



Next run: Adidas King of the Road. Anyone?

Dinner at Ozeki Japanese Restaurant

4 JULY 2009: Was invited by a close gal friend for dinner at Ozeki Japanese Restaurant in Menara TA. I’ve never heard about this restaurant before, where I drove there with another friend of mine. Found the building itself and simply park my car at the roadside. And there was an Indian buddy requested for RM25 as he claimed it was jockey parking. Fine, I drove my car again to a proper carpark that cost me rm15. Damn, since when the parking in KL become so expensive? The last time I came around the area for clubbing, it fee was rm10.

Reached the restaurant at 9pm and some friends were already there, having the peach salad. Quickly grab some salad as I was very hungry. Then, we ordered some foods recommended and a bottle of red wine. The food served was great in taste comparing to other Japanese restaurants. I love the peach salad and chicken wings very much. Another bottle of red wine after finished the 1st bottle, and we called the night off at 11pm. The damage on wallet for the night, RM600 for 4 pax. I’m so gonna eat bread/biscuit for the rest of month.



Anyone of you been to this restaurant before? How was the damage on your wallet then?

Company Annual Dinner

13 June 2009: Went for my company annual dinner at Crowne Plaza hotel, located beside Wisma Genting. The theme of the dinner was “Occupation Night” where I supposed everyone should dress in their dream occupation. But surprisingly only 10 of them reeally put effort to dress up. As I’m damn busy lately managing and running few projects on my hand, I just simply dressed like an office boy. Well, I thought of being a fisherman though but I didn’t have time to prepare those clothes and tools.

The ballroom was located at 30th floor, which is quite with a lovely view of KL. The dinner was scheduled to start at 6:30pm but lots of typical Malaysian colleagues were late. So the dinner ended up started at 7:30pm. It was a buffet style dinner where the food served was fine with acceptable varieties. As far as I’m concerned, I ate quite a lot of salmon and mutton that made me feel guilty until today. But luckily I did go to gym these 2 days to burn those excessive calories taken.

Talking about gym, I purposely went to CF earlier today to join the cycling class. But the class was full, with 5-6 names on waiting list. So I ended up did my routine workout of running plus weight training. Will definitely try out the cycling and bodypump classes someday.



Oh yea, almost forgotten about the lucky draw session. The "lucky" me have got a voucher for a night stay at Cyberview Lodge with 2 breakfast. Why on earth I need to stay there as my house is just 10 minutes away? So I traded it with my colleague for a Nike bag. Not a bad deal huh, at least I can use the Nike bag for gym.

3D2N Lang Tengah trip

8 June 2009: Was busying with works for the past week after back from the island trip, till no time to blog about it. Yaya, I know Granny Twilight has been complaining again on my expired blog again. We wouldn’t name him Grandma for no reason right, hehe. Here is a summary of the whole trip.

Wed - 27 May 2009
Took the bus from Pudu Raya at 1030pm.

Thu - 28 May 2009
Reached Kuala Terengganu Jetty with my aching back and ass. The 8 hours of bus-ride with uncounted stop/rest in between has been tested my patience. Sleepless and exhausted me could almost scared off other tourists around Kuala Terengganu. Took the boat to Lang Tengah at 800am where we reached at D’Coconut Resort an hour later. Upon arrival, we quickly went for snorkeling and camwhore around the resort. Not much surprise though with the usual fishes and corals.

Took lunch at the restaurant where the food served wasn’t that good as I remembered. First snorkeling trip outside the island at 3pm but I skipped it as I was so tired; and I went for a short sun-bath instead.

It was the first night in the island. We brought some beers and a bottle of whisky that we ended up with a lot of drinking and some cheeky games till 2 hours passed midnight.

Fri - 29 May 2009
Supposed to go for sunrise jungle trekking, but we skipped it again due to rain. It was a free and easy morning that we had walked around the resort for photography and camwhore. Another (2nd) snorkeling trip at the noon itself, but I skipped that again (Haha, you might start cursing me). Well, snorkeling wasn’t my main purpose for this trip as I just wanted to relax and recharge myself.

It was 2nd and final night in the island where we spent it with stargazing and had some quality conversation among few of us. The sky was much clearer with much more visible stars comparing with KL. The same old sky, but it’s totally different from 2 points of view. Same thing happens on our daily lives, aren’t we all seeing thing/issue just from our point of view? Being a selfish and negative us? Just a thought of mine over the night.

Sat - 30 May 2009
Woke up at 7am for breakfast to take the 8am boat-ride back to KT. Reached KL at 7pm where the tired me took a LRT back home.



The above is just a short summary of the whole trip, and I didn’t mention some of the details of course especially on the cheeky games part. Anyhow, it was a great trip where I’ve met with some wonderful new friends. Most importantly, I’ve recharged myself after so much stress (due to work and also relationship) for the past few months.

Beach…Beach…Here I Come…

27 MAY 2009: I’ll be leaving later tonight for my yearly island trip at our east coast. It’s a 3D2N trip where I’ll take bus ride there this time around instead of flight. Therefore, I’m expecting a long sleepless night inside the bus and will be extremely tired and ugly tomorrow.

Anyhow, hope it’ll be a great and enjoyable trip for me, with a lot of swimming and sun tan. Have a wonderful week ahead ya and see you all again this Saturday!!!