What I've been up to …

Yes, I am right now in Haikou, Hainan. Where, you might ask. Haikou is the capital of Hainan, which is an island in China. Just google it, and I am sure you’ll find it.

Remember Hainanese chicken rice? Or Hailam mee? I guess those food originate from this island… Oh, BTW, Hainan = Hailam .

Now, back to me, DH and I caught the 6.50am flight leaving LCCT (KLIA) this morning, and we landed at Meilan International Airport about 3hours 15 mins later. Apart from 1 Mat Salleh, and 1 Malaysian Indian, we were the only other non-Chinese passengers!  When I say Chinese, I mean both the Chinese from China as well as Malaysian Chinese.  Just after we disembarked, 1 Malaysian Chinese greeted as, “Holiday?”, and DH said “yes” in return. I jokingly asked him “Balik Kampung?” (Going back to your roots) and he smilingly  nodded, signally his eyes to an old lady ( I think she’s his mum) .

Sometimes I wonder, IF I am a billionaire, I think I can come here and announce that I am looking for my biological relatives. I bet there would be crowds of Hainanese who’d queue for the DNA tests, to see if we are related, hahahaha! But alas, I am just an ordinary person who doesn’t have assets worth shouting/sharing!

Now, back to this trip… It’s a short trip – we are staying here for only 2 nights. We only plan to walk round the busy (oh, did I say busy? The streets do not look busy!) streets today and tomorrow before heading back to Malaysia on Saturday.

The following are some shots taken from the cab on our way to the hotel (from the airport).

A lot of palm trees:

Street lights that are both wind-powered and solar-powered? :

Wide and clean roads:

On a bridge:

And finally the view of one of the main streets, from our hotel room:

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It happened to me many many times, but only today I feel like blogging about it.

KTMB hotline is 1-300-88-5862

Getting through the line is very fast, but getting someone to actually answer your call is a real joke!

Try it yourself, and you know what I mean…

I visited KTMB’s website:

Aftergoing through a few pages, I was not happy with the information. I needed more, so I called their Hotline. Their hotline is definitely very very cold!

A few attempts failed. The calls just ended up being terminated.  I got similar outcomes when I tried the number a few weeks ago to enquire the latest ETS service.

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Shanny is a Malaysian, residing in Switzerland. I got to know her through the NeedlesNCraft e-group. Last year I had the pleasure of meeting her in person at Tini’s place.

This year, Shanny is my Birthday X-change partner. For the exchange, we need to send to our partner some gift, preferably hand-made.

Remember the tatted bookmarks I produced some time ago:

I could not disclose then, but the blue one was meant for Shanny.

I also made this gold-filled 9Malay: suasa) chain for her, using the stones that I bought at a shop in Kelana Jaya Mall:

As for the stash (we needed to add at least 3 stash), I opted for a cross-stitch kit that I bought some time ago (Oh, no! I forgot to snap a pic of it). I hope the kit qualifies for the 3 stash types, because it has thread and fabric. I also added a piece of cotton to the package, hence the final package looks like this:

Shanny, I meant to add in a Japanese paper fan, when wrapping them I totally forgot about it! .

So, Shanny, I hope you like what I’ve got you. And I also wish you a wonderful birthday – may all your wishes come true!

Hope to see you again when you come back to Malaysia, ya!

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We’ve visited this place a few times. I blogged about it the first successful  time and then another time.

Laast Saturday (24th July 2010), after the visit to Mae’s school (to collect his mid-year results), we decided to stop by at Leman Dawi Cendol again.

We saw some RTM people shooting some kids’ program, with a young girl interviewing Mr Leman Dawi himself:

We just went on to enjoy our cendols.

Being a jovial person, Mr Leman Dawi continued to greet his patrons once the shooting was over. He even came to talk to us:

While filling up the brown sugar container, he kept on telling us about the country, the area of a particular state, etc, etc.. What caught my attention was how Johor got the name. In almost ONE breathe, he said that the word Johor came from the Arabic word Johar, which means jewel!

Mr Leman even came closer to Aina to show her his books and notes that he always keeps in the pockets of his apron. He even showed some facts from his little notbook:

while Nafis looked on:

Sometimes Mr Leman can be too loud, but his command of the Malay language is really good, especially when he recites the pantun and sajak,

After having at least additional helpings on top of the 5 bowls we ordered (1 bowl for each of us), we finally said goodbye to Mr Leman and continued our journey down south to Muar. There were other new arrivals who were more than happy to see us emptying the table .

Mae will still be  in that school until the end of this year, so I guess I’ll get to have one or 2 more cendol visits here in the future.

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Last Sunday (18th July) I agreed to join Aisyah and the gang for a morning walk. I had not taken such walks for ages..

We started at 8.15am, feeling fresh:

We walked from Silverpark to the “loop road” and took a right turn to start a clock-wise walk.

We stopped at a few places, including the entrance to Bishop’s Trail and a bend we call “Eucalyptus Corner”:

There is a eucalyptus tree, whose leaves would give out the refreshing smell (similar to the minyak angin smell) from it’s eucalyptus oil in them.

We proceeded to Glenn House (where they shot the Petronas F1 commercial) which I think still belongs to KTMB :

We wanted to have nasi lemak for brekkie at the nearby stall, but unfortunately it was closed .

I always like the view of the golf course:

We continued our walk until we came to the clock tower, where a photo session is always recommended, especially for firt-timers:

while regulars like me just looked on:

The mat salleh lady behind me was waiting patiently for her turn to pose at the clock tower. No first visit to Fraser’s Hills is complete without a pose at this land mark!

Eventually we headed to the mosque. We were lucky that the newly refurbished cafe near the mosque was open for business!

Nice embience, really:

After the nice breakfast (no pic, photograper was busy indulging himself, hahaha!!), we decided to try the Hemmant Trail, after which we proceeded to Silverpark.

After a nice shower, DH and I took the 12 noon “down flow” to  come home while Aisyah and the gang continued to stay until they checked out later in the afternoon.

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We had not been to Fraser’s Hills for about 3 weeks. This was partly because we couldn’t find a suitable weekend, and also, yes, due to World Cup fever. There were in few times when we were free, but DH didn’t want to go there because he wanted to watch WC matches on HD!

So, last Saturday (17th July 2010), despite me feeling knackered (and missing my Needlecrafts meet in Ipoh)  we went there for an overnight stay.Furthermore DH also had to meet up with someone there.

Nik carries a blog about the meet here.

My friend, A had told me much earlier that she was coming up too, because her niece had booked an apartment in Silverpark. When she told me about it, I didn’t promise her anything, because (as I told her), I was supposed to go to Ipoh, and will only detour to Fraser’s Hills on our way back, if we were up to it.

Leaving home just before 11am, we managed to catch the (1.00pm-1.40pm) uphill flow and by 2pm we were busy cleaning the apartment.

Here’s a shot of my Lady in Red near the Selangor Dam. No, I didn’t drive the car that weekend. Only posed for the photo shot .

We were relieved to find there was no more leaking in the lounge, but we found out that there was sipping water at the corner of our bedroom:

On close inspection, we found saw some broken roof tiles for the lower unit, and suspected the same thing for our roof.

DH immediately contacted En Yatim from the resort, who soon came to repair the roof below:

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Managed to contact Aisyah in the late afternoon. She came over with her gang. Here’s a shot at our balcony:

We went outside, and DH managed a few more shots.

Of them, “trying” my car:

Us chatting:

We even spotted a bird on a branch of the Australian bottle-brush:

(I’ve trying unsuccessfully to upload this one pic!)

I didn’t offer dinner to them because I simply had nothing in the apartment. They told me they brought ingredietnts for steamboat,  and invited us instead ot their unit. DH wanted to check the new food court area, so we declined and ended having our dinner at the new place (with many familiar faces/operators).

Later that night, when I went to the resort lobby to get access ti their Wifi (hence Internet), I came across Aisyah and the gang again. This time we decided to rent the karaoke room for 1 hour (RM for 1 hour). We were told that (at 9pm)  it was already closed, but after persuatuon from us, the girls at the counter and the guys who were in charge of the karaoke room agreed  .

I sms-ed DH to tell him that I was in the karaoke room, but when he came, I had already finished the rendition of “Doa Buat Kekasih” with Aisyah, hahaha! So, he only managed this photo:

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I’ve been driving the faithful 13-yr old Mitsubishi Spacewagon for almost 13 years now (I’ll get a pic later). I have no complaint and am happy with it. It’s just that sometimes I feel awkward driving the 7-seater car empty, hence came the urge to get a new car . It didn’t take me long to decide on Mazda2 .

Yesterday just before sunset, we finally collected my new car. When we arrived the car was being polished. DH managed to get the first look when it was finally parked outside the Mazda building:

DH started the check on the car, with the helpful and friendly Shahroul (Mazda guy):

Side view:

After the checking, etc, when I finally drove it out of the Mazda outlet, stopped at the nearby Caltex, filled up the tank with RM50 worth of petrol, the car had traveled only 60 km:

When the car arrived home, it was nicely parked next to DH’s:

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I started to tat again yesterday during Nafis’ registration. I got bored sitting in the theater not doing anything so I took out my tatting shuttles and started to tat.

I eventually managed to finish a bookmark, and last night I finished another one in blue. Here are the two tatted bookmarks:

I also tried to create my own pattern and produced this today:

I don’t know what to do with it, and am not so proud of it either, but at least I have my own pattern .

In between the above items, I tatted a few little motives :

I think I am going to tat more before I get bored with it and stop.

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While we were busy with Nafis at Taylor’s College, Nukman’s school was having an Open Day yesterday. Lucky for us, Bok had agreed to go with Aina.

They didn’t just go as visitors, but they brought with them Wii, to help Nukman and friends man a games corner.

Nukman & Aina:

Bok & Nukman giving a demo:

Aspiring band members:

They even had karaoke with the “band”:

apart from the Wii, they also had PS2 and PS3:

While the kids were enjoying indoor, Aina told me that there was also a pony-ride corner:

A final pose, before the Tai-ko takes the stuff home, I guess:

Aina even managed to take a shot of the collection of the day for the Wii:

Sorry Mae Mama could not come, but I am sure you had a wonderful day yesterday .

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Yesterday we went to register Nafis for his college studies at Taylor’s College, Subang Jaya.

The day schedules for various programmes :

The registration yesterday was for sponsored students by JPA, MARA and Bank Negara. Nafis was indeed very lucky to have managed to secure a MARA loan to take up Actuarial Science via the American Degree Transfer Programme .

The queue for the initial registration at the far end of the pic:

While waiting for Nafis, I looked down:

Some of the programmes offered at the college:

There was a briefing by the Dean of the ADP programme (no pic) followed by the briefing on accomodation.

Finally it was the briefing by a MARA representative, who’ll be in-charge of the MARA-sponsored students here:

Both DH and I managed to be early for the free lunch at the college, but Nafis had to surrender some documents, so by the time he was ready to have lunch, it was too congested. We then took him to the nearby McD for his lunch:

We left him at the entrance of his apartment and came home. Nafis later came home with Bok, who went to fetch him. Later tonight we have to send Nafis back to his apartment because his programme will start first thing tomorrow morning!

Good luck, Nafis.  Do not let us and the country down.

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