"C" is for Cookie that's good enough for me,
"C" is for cookie that's good enough for me,
"C" is for cookie that's good enough for me,
Oh! cookie, cookie, cookie starts with "C"!
Was going through my pictures when I found the zipped folder recently sent by my dad. I’ve been a big fan of this highway dummy and on our way to Perlis, my dad managed to snap some pictures as we approached the toll in Ipoh.
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Isn’t he ruggedly good looking?
I don’t normally do this but this time around, I simply have to share the wonderful photos that my dad took during his recent travel to New Zealand. He said he was scenery overloaded from the trip and looking at the pictures, I can understand why. Heck, even I feel that way even though what I did was just look at his still pictures. Can’t imagine how it would feel if I was really there.
So far, he has only done two entries; Christchurch to Aoraki Mt Cook and Queenstown but there will be more to come.
Really wish I was there and hopefully I WILL be there someday. 
Updated on 4/9/08: New entries… Milford Sound and Fox Glacier
Two years ago my dad took me and my grandparents to Bukit Merah to see the lake of the Bukit Merah Dam.
My grandpa told us an interesting story. He said when he was young, he had taken a train ride from somewhere to somewhere (I can’t remember the places that he mentioned) and he fell asleep during the journey. Much to his surprise, when he woke up, all he could see from the train windows was water… water on the left and water on the right. He was very sure that the train that he took crossed the Bukit Merah Lake.
On the other hand, my grandma was confident that my grandpa was hallucinating at that time as it did not make much sense that someone would build a track across such a big lake as the Bukit Merah Lake. After all, we were there at the lake and there were no signs of any tracks anywhere.
During my Public Health posting in Taiping early last year, I befriended our bus driver and told him about my grandparents’ argument. He told me that my grandpa was right and on our way back from one of our field visits, he took a detour so that he could show me the place where I could see the railroad crossing the lake. It was indeed there.
However, I kept forgetting to inform my grandparents of my discovery and on Monday, I decided to take them there.
Instead of being hidden among big trees like the last time I saw the place last year, the area had been cleared to make way for the upgrading of the railroad into an electric double track (did I get the name right?) from Ipoh to Butterworth.
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Signboard to the train station.
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The sign says Jeti Bukit Merah but there was no proper road to the jetty.
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My grandpa was so excited to see it that he couldn’t stop talking while my grandma chose to keep quiet and simply enjoy the scenery.
Bukit Merah Lake.
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When we left the place, both of them agreed on two things. Too bad the last time we went there, my dad didn’t bring us to the right place and too bad this time around, he wasn’t there with us.
We had a family gathering over the weekend as my brother was going back to Canada on Monday. My grandma cooked us nasi dagang and pulut kuning for the occasion.
My grandma’s nasi dagang. The BEST of its kind.
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My grandma’s pulut kuning (yellow glutinous rice). So good even when eaten on its own.
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Chicken and tuna curry to company the rice.
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A very happy customer.
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A full plate for starter.
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All my uncles and aunts turned up for the feast and we had a great time together. As usual, my cousins who already have a PS2 at home would ask if they could play our Wii.
(Translated)
Me : Would you like to play Guitar Hero?
Cousin : Not interested. (they have Guitar Hero at home)
Me : Would you like to play Guitar Hero with a guitar?
Cousin : (blinked, then shouted) YES!!!
Then our cousins from Melaka arrived and we changed the game to Mario Kart so that four people can play at the same time. Our six cousins took turns to play the game and while waiting for their turn, some decided to do an acrobatic show.
Great food + great company = great weekend.
During the one week school holiday, we had managed to pull our dad into our gaming activities. It started with a quiz game called the TV Show King. We knew he was going to like it simply because of the nature of the game.
Quality time.
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Since they always play the genius mode, my brothers would invariably end up copying my dad’s answer and my dad would keep changing his answer until the very last minute just to annoy my brothers.
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When spinning the wheel, the Mii would do an annoying dance.
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I then introduced him to Boom Blox, a puzzle game based on physics which Steven Spielberg helped to develop. Basically the objective of the game (depending on the mode) is to either throw balls to destroy your opponent’s castle or topple a tower to collect points or to pull planks from a structure without damaging it.
The best thing was yet to come. After days of resisting the temptation to play Guitar Hero, he finally succumbed and there was no stopping him ever since (even though he only played the song Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple).
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It was 11.15am. He just got back from a wedding dinner and almost immediately grabbed the guitar.
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Now… If only we can make my mum play the Wii instead of Spider Solitaire…
My wedding reception marathon had officially ended this afternoon when I left Zaid’s place. No more kenduri for me to attend for a while so I’ll try to get back to my Mulu stories as soon as I can.
Zaid’s family had shown great creativity and passion in preparing for the reception. Instead of a three-tier cake, they had a three-tier cupcakes. People might have been doing this for years now but it was the first time for me (seeing such a thing).
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I was further amazed by the gifts that they have prepared for the guests… Juicy looking sponge fruits. Well, they’re not really fruits. They’re made of sponges to resemble fruits and inside them were some sweets, chocolate and dates. They looked really yummy (especially those in the baskets which looked as if they were freshly plucked from the trees) that I had a very difficult time deciding on which one to take.
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I played along with Dolly’s sisters (they’re Zaid’s cousin and were there to help out with the reception) who pretended to sell real fruits. They offered the green ones (they looked good to eat as well… just like green apples) but I jokingly answered, “No thanks. That’s still unripe and must be really sour.”
After much consideration, I finally decided on the peach coloured ones. By the way, did I mention that they were handmade by the family?
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Just after 1pm, Aishah and her entourage arrived.
Was Aishah’s sister (the one wearing purple) pointing at me or what? Cute peek, Aishah.
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Inside the house, another simple creation fascinated me. I just love its simplicity.
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I’ve never seen Aishah in such a jovial mood before. All the time, she was either smiling, grinning, laughing or giggling. Really… I’ve seen her being very happy before but it was nothing compared to today. Not even on her wedding day last weekend. Perhaps last weekend she was stressed because of the preparations. Or perhaps… Just perhaps… For the past week… Never mind. 
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Devan arrived an hour and a half after I did and when we were thinking of leaving, Yi Zhe appeared and therefore, I shamelessly extended my stay for another hour.
They insisted we took a picture together before we left the place and so we did.
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Oh, we met Puan Rita (my A-Level biology lecturer) there and Devan met his biology teacher too. Interestingly enough, he had met the same teacher at Dolly’s wedding reception last year. Turned out the teacher was Zaid’s mother’s classmate and also Dolly’s mother’s good friend. It’s really such a small world.
For more pictures, please visit my GALLERY.
I was in Perlis to attend a dinner last Friday and therefore was able to attend Ila’s wedding reception in Taiping on my way back to Shah Alam on Saturday.
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I made it to Shah Alam at 6pm on the same day and rushed to Ashila’s house in Seksyen 11 (Shah Alam) for her wedding to Izuan who is also a friend of mine. In fact, I introduced them to one another about six years ago. We used to spend hours together during our free time.
I arrived to a scene of what must have been a grand wedding. Ashila and Izuan were having a final photo shoot with the professional (looking) photographers while others were busy cleaning up. After all, I arrived a good two hours after the reception ended.
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The photographers wanted to do an outdoor shoot for the newly weds and Ashila apologetically asked me to wait for them to finish. Making myself feeling at home (Ashila’s entire family knows me), I sat by the main entrance and chatted with her sister while making frequent glances towards the elaborate dais for the reception.
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Behind me was another (and smaller) dais used for the solemnisation ceremony the night before.
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About half an hour later, Ashila and Izuan reappeared. Ashila was clearly exhausted from the festivities which I overheard her father telling his friend had started on Thursday evening though I never asked anyone the details of the events. I only knew that the solemnisation took place on Friday evening, followed by khatam Quran on Saturday morning and the wedding reception in the afternoon.
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Ashila’s eyes began to itch and since she wasn’t sure on how to remove the contact lenses, she turned to Izuan for help. We then helped her to remove countless of pins (about 20-30 of them on my last count) used to make her headscarf stay in place while they shared their interesting wedding stories.
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Their wedding wasn’t a smooth one.They only went searching for the costumes that they wore for the reception three days prior and fortunately the designer managed to finish them by 11.30am on the reception day (which began in the afternoon). When asked on why such a late preparation, Ashila reluctantly explained that they were supposed to wear something else which were ordered from Jakarta but those costumes did not finish in time.
If that was not enough, Izuan was supposed to make a grand entrance to the reception by arriving on an antique convertible car but it was not to be as the car died on the way to Ashila’s house… Right in front of a BUSY bus stop, no less. To make matters more embarrassing, the groom’s name was written on the car registration number plate and they were escorted by two traffic policemen.
It was 8.30pm when I decided to leave. I apologised to Izuan for not able to attend his reception on the following day because I had promised Aishah to attend her wedding in Muar.
Upon arriving home, I discovered that my neighbour, Hanim was getting married that evening. Hanim had been my friend in school before I found out that she was also my neighbour (she lives just three doors away from my house). I called her and she asked me to come over but I really had to decline. I was feeling sick. She asked me to go to her reception on Sunday and again, I had to apologise as I had made plans to go to Muar.
That night I could not sleep well thanks to my multiple trips to the toilet.
I arrived at Aishah’s house at 12.30pm on Sunday. Much to my surprise, her mum and sister recognised me even though I’ve never met them before. Her sister explained that they knew me from the pictures that Aishah had shown them. As I’ve travelled with Aishah A LOT, it wouldn’t be surprising that Aishah had plenty of my pictures because I keep quite a number of her pictures too.
They insisted that I had lunch first. When I went back to Aishah’s room, she just had a short nap. “Really sleepy,” she said nonchalantly just like she would do on other days. Aishah on her wedding day was the same Aishah that I’ve known for 7 years.
She asked the mak andam not to put too much makeup on her. She didn’t even put on henna on her fingers except for the ring finger. She wouldn’t have had any henna on if her sisters didn’t threaten to tie her up and put it on while she was sleeping.
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Zaid (also my classmate since 2001) was supposed to arrive at 2pm but he was a bit late. To my amusement, as soon as he spotted me in the crowd, he made the peace sign, just like Ila did the day before.
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Aishah sure looked radiant that day but Zaid… Errmm… He was being his usual self.
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The drive back was uneventful apart from the traffic jam near Seremban.
By the time I reached home, I was feeling so nauseous I could not even tolerate the slightest smell of food. Went to the toilet a few times that night and a further 10 times on Monday. I was strongly advised to go to the hospital as I was not able to tolerate orally. Eating and drinking made me nauseous even though my appetite was better than ever.
Fortunately it cleared on Tuesday and I have not had any bowel movement ever since. Now I’m worried that I’m constipated.
For more pictures, please visit my GALLERY.
No, it’s not a mispelling of the word ‘kipas’ (fan) but a service provided by the Immigration Department of Malaysia. It is short for Kiosk Pembaharuan Pasport (Passport Renewal Kiosk).
It was the first thing that caught my attention when I reached the 2nd floor of the Kompleks PKNS in Shah Alam to renew my passport. I had no idea what it was and instead of turning right to the kiosk, I turned left to the Immigration Department. There, I was informed that I could and should use the KiPPas facility since my old passport was of the new version with a chip embedded in it.
A middle aged gentleman was renewing his passport when I went in and a few minutes later, his business was concluded and it was my turn. The machine itself looked harmless enough, resembling a banking ATM. The instructions were very clear and after inserting my old passport and my MyKad (identification card) into the designated slots, the words ‘Reading successful’ flashed on the screen. I was ready to put in the money and the envelope with my picture inside it when I realise that the application was NOT successful.
The reason? The data in the passport chip did not match the one in my MyKad. Why on earth would the data NOT match? I used the same documents when applying for each of them.
Whether I liked it or not, I had to renew my passport the conventional way. The officer who checked my registration form noticed the envelope in my hand and asked if I went to the kiosk. He asked what went wrong and didn’t look surprised when I told him (according to the machine) the data in my MyKad and passport did not match.
When I took the number (for my turn) at 2.30pm, they were calling 2278 and my number was a disheartening 2338. I sat for a while and seeing that the numbers barely moved, I went to look for something to read and bought a copy of Cleo. I’m not really a fan of Cleo but I couldn’t find anything more interesting.
I’ve just finished reading the entire magazine when my number was finally called at 4.30pm. The lady officer too saw the envelope in my hand and asked what went wrong with the machine. Again, I explained to her what happened and asked if it has happened before. To my surprise, she replied, “Often enough.”
What could have been a mere 2-minute business took more than two hours of my time. It was very frustrating. Looking on the bright side, at least I’ve finally done something about the expired passport. All I have to do now is collect the new passport tomorrow.
Last month I repotted most of my mum’s dying plants and recently they began to bloom. I was admiring (and taking pictures of) the tiny flowers of a vegetable plant when someone decided to have lunch and didn’t mind posing for me.
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Looking at a neighbouring stem, I noticed another company.
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It was worth all the time squatting in the middle of the day under the blazing sun.
For some reason, we now have only ONE TV at home.
Usually, it wouldn’t have caused any problem as only THREE people live here; my parents and sister, Kona.
However, it is again school holiday and all Kona’s brothers came home last weekend. They wanted to play PS2 while Kona insisted on continuing her Zelda game on the Wii. Someone came up with the brilliant idea of splitting the TV into two again (the last time they did that was when they wanted to play Wii while someone else wanted to watch TV).
This time… it’s Wii on the left and PS2 on the right.
Link went for an adventure on the left screen while a football match was about to take place on the right.
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But the best was when someone played Gitarooman on PS2… The little screen was further split into two.
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The games sure looked weird on the screen.