Who am I

This video clip is just so awesome. I've watched it a few times. They are so creative!!! Watch it and you'll know what I mean.
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(err.. no pic there.. but if you just click it, you'll get to see it on youtube)

Singapore (July 25th - 26th, 2008)

Shopping in Singapore always sounds glorious - if you have the money, that is. The exchange rate used to be RM1 : S$1. That was waaaay back into the 1960s and 1970s. Somewhere along the way, the Singapore dollar strengthened and when I went there last weekend, it was $S1:RM2.35. :(

Rajen was already in Singapore and I had to take the train into Singapore. It was a 10-hour journey and Rajen got me a sleeping berth so that the arduous journey wouldn't be too hard on me. He wanted to get me a 1st class sleeping berth but it was all sold out. :(

I've taken both the economy and the 1st class berth previously and yes, it makes a world of difference. If I am not mistaken, the 1st class berth cost RM198 one way while the economy one cost RM38. What's the difference? In the former, you get to sleep in a "room" for 2, have your own toilet, plenty of space for your luggage, sandwich or some snack with a drink, wider berth. The latter? Just look at the picture above. It's so cramped. For once, I thanked God that I am not tall and neither am I too big a size. The entire berth is 2' X 6'.

I brought 2 books to read incase I got bored - Mercy by Jodi Picoult and The Shack by William Young. I finished one book (Mercy) on the train and could've finished the other but I had motion sickness and had to resort to reading only when the train stopped at the different stations.

I managed to sleep for the whole of 3 hours (midnight to 3am).

At 4.40am, we arrived at the JB train station and the immigration officers came on board to check our passports. I think the whole ordeal took about 45 minutes. And we were off again.

We arrived at the Singapore Immigration at about 5.30am and we had to disembark to get our passports stamped. There was a long queue but I was in no hurry. Even after I was done with the Immigration, the doors of the building were locked until 7.30am. Sigh! What a waste of time.

The train pulled into the Tanjung Pagar Station at 8.42am. Well, there you have it! The 10-hour journey into Singapore which began at 10.38pm.

It was a long time since I last took a train into Singapore (well, only 3 years ago!) and I kinda lost my bearings and had to ask around as to where the nearest MRT Station was.

By then, I was a little hungry and wanted to eat at McDonalds. It's a must for me to eat a McDonalds breakfast everytime I come into Singapore. I think it was the hash browns (at that time, the McDonalds in Malaysia didn't serve hash browns) that got me into making this a tradition.

I walked into a 7-eleven and asked 3 questions:-

Q- Where is the nearest McDonalds?

A- No McDonalds here. Must go to Chinatown

Q- Where is the nearest Post Office?

A- Just around the corner

Q- Where is the nearest MRT Station?

A- Just cross the road and further down on your right is the MRT Station

I went to the Post Office to post some letters and then walked to Burger King for my breakfast. The Shack proved to be interesing and I read about 100 pages of it before realising that time was slipping away.

Reluctantly, I took the MRT to Clark Quay and from there, asked directions to the Grand Corpthrone Waterfront Hotel. I made a lot of wrong turnings because some people gave me wrong directions (Grrr!)

It was a good thing I knew how the hotel looked like (pic 1).

I headed towards the direction of the hotel (pic 2) but after a while, the road curved and what I thought was the hotel (because of the curved structures) was actually another hotel (pic 3). Grr...

It took me 45 minutes in total to walk from the MRT Station to the right hotel and I arrived there hot and sweaty. Yuck!

I took a long bath and headed out again.

Once again, I decided to walk to the MRT Station. I still had no clue as to where it was because I went round in circles earlier. I stopped at a shop nearby and asked where the nearest MRT Station is. The man answered, "There's no MRT Station here"

Hello!!! Didn't I just asked where is the NEAREST MRT station?

I decided to be more specific. "May I know where the Clark Quay MRT Station is?"

"It's a 15 minute walk", he replied.

Phooey! 15 minutes is nothing to me!

The weather was great ... until I saw that the bright blue skies had turned into a glowering shade of grey. I told myself that all I needed was 15 minutes of no rain.

It wasn't a 15 minute walk and I walked in the rain for all of 3 seconds. :) And yes, I got seriously wet.

I took the MRT to Orchard Station, thinking of going to the Popular Bookshop which is right above the station but to my surprise, the way up was blocked off. Worse still, Popular was no where in sight. :(

I tried to use the underground way to Takashimaya but that too, was blocked off. I had no choice but to use the escalator up to Orchard Road. They really did a great facelift (pic above) of the station.

I went to the Borders bookshop nearby, browsing to see if there were any books (with huge discounts) that interest me. None!

Just above the bookshop was this place - Memories. I spent at least 2 hours here. (!!!) Needless to say, I spent lots of $$ here too. :( Most of what I bought were papers.

Now, you might wonder ... paper do not cost much but get this ... even at a 50% discount, the cheapest piece of 12"x12" paper cost me 55 Singapore cents... which converts to RM1.30 per sheet. Most of the plain papers cost between S$0.55 to S$1 each and patterened papers cost between S$1 - S$3.50 each. I bought a lot of every type. So go do the math.

I wanted to go to Burger King for lunch. I had in mind the Mushroom Swiss with chicken burger but for once, they said that they couldn't change it from beef to chicken. There was nothing else that I liked, so I went to Takashimaya to look for food. By then I was kinda tired and wanted to sit for a while. I saw MacDonalds and had a Spicy chicken Burger (yummy). By then, it was about 4pm and I was super famished. I didn't even bother with the many looks the people were shooting me at the way I gulp down the burger.

After lunch, I went to Kinokuniya (again to see if there were any discounts on the books I am interested in), and then to "Creative Hands", which is just one floor above. Once again, I spent some $$ there.... sigh!

Spotlight was my next destination and if you know the layout of the shopping malls, you will know that it is two stations from the Orchard MRT Station. And yes, I walked there. I think it took me 30-40 minutes to get there.

I met Frances for dinner and we went to MacDonalds. I didn't eat much because I was still feeling stuffed from my late lunch.

At about 10pm, while on the way to the Paragon to meet up with Rajen, I came across this acrobatic show at the pathway along Orchard Road. I was awestruck by how agile this lady was.

When we went back to the hotel, I finished reading "The Shack" before going to bed. Sleep came very quickly as I was exhausted by my day's shopping.

Looking out of my hotel room window was this awesome view.

Memorial

We had a Memorial Service in honour of my father-in-law on July 6th, 2008. Relatives from all over the world (Australia, Singapore, Thailand, UK and America) came - some of whom I have never met before while others were vaguely familiar.

The event started at 3.45pm in a beautiful setting in Puri Hotel, Malacca. It was almost like a garden "party" with trees and plants landscaping the interior of this roofless area.

A few people spoke about my father-in-law and how he had impacted their lives.

At 4.30pm, we adjourned to the Tamil Methodist Church, which is just around the corner. Some walked while others took a short trip in the comfort of a chartered coach.

The Memorial Service started at 5pm, with Rajen being the emcee and Dason the worship leader. Rev. M Tankaraj spoke on Pilgrimage and Rev. Benjamin closed in prayer.

The church was almost full. Apart from relatives, church friends from Agape and clients came, too.

Eulogies were given by Ernest, Benjamin, Rabin and Rajen Devadason.

At the end of the service, a sum of money was given to the Tamil Methodist Church, Malacca from the estate of my father in law.

A photoshoot at Taman Devadason

We left Taman Devadason and the coach took us to the gravesite in Bukit Baru, where my father-in-law's remains were laid a few months ago.

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There, Pastor Robert Suppiah conducted a very short service.

We dropped by for a visit to the family home, where his widow, Aunty Timah greeted us upon our arrival.


Finally, the last item on the schedule - DINNER!

It was past 9.15pm when we had dinner at the Rotunda. The food was great but by then, we were all too tired to enjoy the strong breeze and the lovely sound of the waves crashing onto the shores of the Straits of Malacca.

When everything was over, we realised that God had been so good to us. The weather was simply perfect. It wasn't too sunny and it didn't rain at all. Also, everything went smoothly and according to what we planned - though there was a small incident which took place in the bus but that lasted about 15 minutes. Other than that, everything went according to plan. :)

Would you hug a person with HIV/AIDS?

What will your reaction be if you found out that your long time friend is HIV positive? Will you still hug them?

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I've been asking people around me that question for the past few days. Some of them looked as though the cat got hold of their tongue. It was a full 20 seconds before they answered me, "Sure, why not?" But the nervous tell tale sign of fear was apparent on their faces.

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Last Sunday, a lady walked into the church. She is HIV positive. She's had it for more than 10 years and her latest check-up showed that her immune system is stronger than a normal person's.

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She's currently serving with Hope Foundation where people (especially women and children)with HIV/AIDS can go to for support.

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God has changed her life. From what she considered as a huge disadvantage, God turned it around and used her for His glory. :)

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And yes, I did give her a hug...

Blackout

Nobody likes it when everything goes dark all of a sudden.... especially when they're in the midst of doing something which involves something hot and boiling.

I was in the middle of scooping out the heart-shaped pasta from the pot when poof! everything went black except for the light emanating from my laptop which was nearby.

I think I sort of expected this blackout because about 15 minutes earlier, I went out to the porch area and noticed that the street light in front of my house wasn't working. Then I looked around ... the house on my right was in total darkness... so was the house after that... and after that ... and after that. I looked back at my house and I've got lights!!! The house on my left wasn't in darkness either. Something definitely was wrong.

Well, I think someone must've called 15454 earlier because the TNB technicians were at the nearby sub-station the moment I experienced darkness.

Rajen and I had a romantic "torchlight" dinner (as opposed to candlelight dinner) ... that was AFTER I splattered some of the bolognese sauce onto the table and floor because I was trying to hold the torchlight and at the same time balancing the heavy bowl of sauce. The bowl slipped from my fingers and I wasted a small portion of the sauce.

We decided to go to my parents' place because both of us had work to do on our laptops.

We were there until 12.45am. By then, I expected the problem to be fixed. But alas, we came back to darkness.

The TNB technicians were there, blocking off a portion of the road. One of their vehicles were parked in front of our house and we had to wait for them to repark before driving into our porch area.

We found out that one of the cables was burned and they need to replace it. Gosh! Burned!! That sounds really dangerous.

It wasn't exactly a chilly night but I decided to take a cold bath before I sleep.

I couldn't sleep!!!

I looked around and saw that Rajen was wrapped up in his blanket (!!!!!) and snoring away. Gosh! That's not really fair, right? There I was, feeling so hot and bothered and he was feeling cold and already asleep??? Something must be wrong somewhere. Perhaps the heat was localised!

I decided to wake him up to tell him how unfair life was. He laughed and said that he was feeling a little chilly (!!!) and wanted to know if there was a negative 2 on the fan mode.

1.35am and I was still trying to sleep. I wished it was raining so that the air would be cooler. But then again, it was a selfish thought. If it were raining, the guys out there would get wet.

I sighed and tossed around some more. I just didn't want to think of how hot and stuffy it was getting to be, or how little sleep I would get if the problem wasn't fixed soon, or how sensitive my hearing suddenly became, or....... sigh! I just wanna sleep.

I must've drifted off into a semi sleep state for a while but at 2.07am, when the power came on, I was immediately awake - knowing that sleep will come very soon.... and it did! :)

Mrs Ong

She taught me Maths when I was in Standard 1

And was my class teacher when was in Standard 6

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I was a Brownie from Standards 4-6

And she was one of the Brownie teachers who taught me

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She once praised me on my sequin sewing

And used one of my projects as a sample

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One day, I played truant and skipped a Brownie meeting

She saw me (and my friends) in town and gave us a good lecture

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It's been years (err... more than 20 years) since I last saw Mrs Ong. I've always remembered her as a skinny and slightly frail BUT firm teacher. She gave her very best when she taught us - we can see the passion in her when she teaches us.

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Last Sunday, I had the opportunity of seeing her at Curry Leaf. She didn't really recognise me - which means I was not naughty enough for her to remember me - but then, it's been years since she taught me. I don't blame her cause I looked totally different from the scrawny girl I was in Standard 6.

Mount Kinabalu (July 2nd - 5th, 2008) - The Certs

Related Post:
Mount Kinabalu Revisited

Well, after ALL the huffing and puffing and panting and ranting, I received these two certificates with pride.

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Yeah! I DID IT!!!

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Why two certs?

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If we ascent via the Timpohon trail, we'd only get the coloured cert on the right - which was what I received last year.

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The Mesilau trail is longer and slightly more difficult. Hence the additional cert.

Two Trails and a Mountain

Related Posts :
Mt Kinabalu Revisited

There are 2 common trails to Low's Peak : The Timpohon Trail, which is only 6km to Laban Rata and The Mesilau Trail, a more scenic trail which is 2.2km longer.

Last year, we took the Timpohon Trail. It was steps and more steps - all the way up.

This year, we decided to take the Mesilau Trail. The terrain is very different from the Timpohon Trail. We even had to go across via the suspension bridge - very exciting!!!

After Laban Rata, the terrain is more rock based and for about 200 meters, we had to climb up with the help of the ropes. After that, it's flat ground for about 1KM before the rocky & tricky part to the Peak.

Mt Kinabalu - Flora & Fauna

Related Posts:

Mt Kinabalu Revisited

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It isn't often that we see beautiful & unique flowers and plants that are of a rich hue in this tropical country. More often than not, we don't take the time to admire God's creation of nature.

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I, for one, am guilty of that. At home, all I have are three red bamboos just outside the compound of my house, which unfortunately, have to rely on the rain to survive.

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When we climbd Mt Kinabalu 2 weeks ago, I told myself I MUST stop to take more pictures of my surroundings - plants, flowers, trees, earth, etc - and I did. :)

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Of all that I snapped, the picther plant is my favourite. I had to detour a little during the descent just after the 5KM mark on the Timpohon trail. It was my very first time seeing this plant and it's just simply amazing!!!

Hendry Weather

Related Posts:
Mount Kinabalu Revisited
The Team
Facts & Stats
One Interesting Conversation

What IS a Hendry Weather?

On June 30th, just 2 days before our trip to Kinabalu, Hendry wrote us an email ...

Dear Team,

I've checked the wheather forecast of KK for this whole week and it'll be having thunderstorm for one whole week. So be prepare for the rain~!!

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Cheers

Hendry

And he DARED sign off with the word "cheers"

There I was, trying to tell myself that it's gonna rain a lot BEFORE the climb and not at all DURING the climb when I received this email.

We prayed so much harder after reading that email. I, for one, was worried that it might rain during the climb and the weather up there would be super cold like last year's. The thought of climbing in the rain didn't sit too well with me either.

It was clear blue skies with a temperature of 32C when we arrived at Kota Kinabalu in the late morning. It didn't last long, though.

Dark clouds started forming even when we were on our way to Kundasang.

In the van, someone remembered the email which Hendry wrote only 2 days earlier. And thus, all the blame went to him. Soon, it became apparent that it was going to pour and we "accused" Hendry even more.

We decided to give a name to this gloomy weather and "The Hendry Weather" came into mind. To cheer our disheartened mood, we decided to do a forecast on what a Hendry Weather was going to be like.

Someone mentioned that a Hendry Weather means rain everyday

Another person decided to put a positive note on it by saying that it will rain on the 1st day, but from the 2nd - 4th day, it will be blue skies and sunny weather while on the 5th day, it would rain again.

And so, the definitions as to what a "Hendry Weather" would be like began ... while poor Hendry couldn't get a chance to defend himself.

Well, by the end of our journey, the Hendry Weather was defined as :-

-Heavy Rain in the evening on the 1st day of the trip

-A little Rain in the evening on the 2nd day

-Perfect Weather on the 3rd day

-Torrential downpour for at least 5-6 hours in the morning on the 4th day

That weather was simply PERFECT for our climb and we had a great time!!! PTL

Mount Kinabalu (July 2nd - 5th, 2008) - The Team

Related posts :
Mt Kinabalu Revisited
Facts and Stats

One Interesting Conversation

Peter & Helen Lai - Even though they are a lot older than I am, they are also a lot fitter. Peter did a great job with the worship leading and other duties he was asked to do. I was especially touched when I saw the care and concern he had for Helen when she fell ill. He was willing to forgo the summit push and to accompany her back to Laban Rata (but that did not take place as Helen recovered later).

As for Helen, I am really glad that she was able to summit this time. Not only has she recovered in a short time, she summited so much earlier than I did. Bravo!!!

Pat & KL Gan - I really admire their strong determination to make it up to Laban Rata

Doc Peter Ch'ng - Well, what can I say? He still looked energetic and fresh even after 4 hours of hiking down from Laban Rata to the Timpohon Gate.

Aunty Rose - She is the oldest of the team members and she made it to Laban Rata via the Mesilau Trail. I only hope that when I get to her age, which is mid-sixties, I will be as fit as she is.

Doc James - Even though he is super fit and could fly up the mountain in a short period of time, he took his job as a sweeper seriously. I admire his positive attitude. Also, he only took 2 hours and 35 minutes to get from Laban Rata to the Timpohon Gate - WOW!

KG - His willingness to relieve Doc James of his duty at the last 500 meters and the many calls he made arranging for help for the late hikers showed his dedication to help every team member as much as he possibly could. What I'm amazed is the many times he had to uh .. go to the toilet .. and yet he was still strong enough to last the entire climb - considering that he had to eat more to replenish his energy.

Also, he's the person who managed to get us all heated rooms. Yeh!

William - With work demanding his time and attention right up to the eve of the trip, I wonder how he could even focus on the climb. I guess being a triathlete helped a lot.

Johnny - I thank him heaps for carrying my backpack for most part of the climb from Laban Rata to Low's Peak. I had so many extra warm clothing that I didn't use because the weather was not as cold as I thought it would be. Thanks also for helping me especially while climbing down the tricky bit near Low's Peak. It's easier to balance when there's someone to help you.

Francis - I thank him for being with me from 1.2km - 4.5km. I know he could've gone a little faster if I weren't there but he stuck around long enough to make sure I was okay.

Hendry - I thank him for being with me from 4km - 6km. He did really well during the summit push, especially for someone who had AMS right after the Sayat-Sayat Checkpoint. Good job! Great determination!

Chan Boon Pin - Forgive me for doubting, but I thought that he might not make it to the Peak. He surprised me!! Even with his previous knee injury and staggered strides, he made it, right up to Low's Peak - and at the top, he sat there for so long, signifying his right to sit there for as long as he wished because he earned it. And yes, he definitely earned that right. I could see the contentment and satisfaction in his facial expression and I was happy for him.

Chan Lu Vin - What I admire about him is the fact that he did not feel the need to rush to the Peak, like most youngsters would want to do. Instead, he stuck around for his dad (Chan Boon Pin), helping, encouraging and urging him to go on.

Siew Keng - She must be quite fit as I have not seen her train at the Kepayang Hill nor anywhere else. Congrats on summiting.

Cilla - Gosh! She was the first to arrive at Laban Rata (at 3.15pm). She actually did the first part of the journey in 6 hours 45 minutes!!!! That's totally unbelievable as I happen to know that she was suffering from stomach cramps the entire climb and at one point was bending over in pain as she climbed. How on earth did she do it? Also, she was the first in our group to reach the summit. Bravo!!

Esther - Knowing that she is not the athlete type, she did rather well. The important thing is not how long she took to climb.... it's whether of not she reached the peak. And she did! And she was given brag rights for it.

Eunice - She's "D" person behind all the planning - from flight bookings to accounting to as little as luggage tags, she and KG both helped make the trip enjoyable and fun and easy for the rest of us.

Planning and organising for 19 of us is not an easy task. There were so many nitty gritty stuff that had to be sorted out. One thing I am grateful for is the fact that she spent 45 minutes on the phone, talking to the customer service personnel for my change of flight.

And her task did not end on the 6th of July, 2008. She'll be compiling all the pictures and copying them into DVDs so that everyone can have the full collection of pictures taken during the entire trip. That's one long, tedious task!!!