My Life Journey
It's All About The Experience
Day1 (KL-PP)
Jun 25th
Why make a vacation to our neighbouring countries, Cambodia and Vietnam, two of which quite unlikely the popular spots for holiday, some say? The assertion however does not go without its merit, for these two nations are lesser developed as compared to Malaysia, lest its health precaution against A(H1N1) is lacking and other alleged reasons including dirty environment, language barrier, and poverty-induced crimes. Picture of people begging and hazy atmosphere were perceived in mind of what may come prior to stepping into the strange lands. Alas, after 10 days, I felt that I could have happily settled in Cambodia and Vietnam as both are equally attractive and beautiful, in their culture and especially their citizens.
The travel idea was seeded some time in April and it slowly came to materialization in May – plane ticket booked, and plan sketched with the help of gracious university friends. The lads of the same ol’ badminton gang were the components of the trip – buddies and all guys that made this holiday less of a hassle, more of an adventure, quadruple of the fun and uncountable memories to ideally mark the end of our studies.
The precursor to our vacation abroad started at the Yeoh’s residence. Xiao Qi invited us to go over to her place for a small gathering, but many could not make it, so only Jack, Jesse, Kelvin and myself went for an overnight stay. There, we were showered with great hospitality by Xiao Qi and her family to great meals and sightseeing. Much of the story has already been narrated by Jesse – click here
Let me now indulge in telling the adventures to the foreign places. On the Friday the 12th June morning, both Kelvin and I had our own things to settle – he had to get vaccinations and I, job interview. Both of which ended around the same time at around 11am. That left us ample time to get to LCCT and catch our flight at 3.15pm. Jesse patiently waited for us (again) in KLCC listening to mp3 and munching bread in boredom. Poor fella, being a nice guy that he was, he did not even once complain on both occasions, earlier was at the KFC near puduraya, where he waited 5 hours for me and Jack! We packed economic rice for lunch, bought bus ticket RM8/person and headed to LCCT to rendezvous with Chunaki (Shean Chuan). Everything was smooth sailing and we were flown to Phnom Penh in no time. The health screening and declaration weren’t too serious at the checkpoint. I wonder would they really detain a person based on the colour gradient on the thermal screen. I find the health declaration form were pretty pointless as no one would admit themselves sick or having fever. On the hindsight, checking everyone in detail wouldn’t be practical as it would take too much time. This situation was pretty much the same everywhere. So much for controlling the pandemic. But I digress.
The 4.30pm sun was shining fiercely through the air that smelt and felt just like the air back home. A tuk tuk is supposed to come and fetch us to our guesthouse but it wasn’t in sight. We looked for our call card but none with our names in it and many tuk tuk drivers eagerly calling us to theirs and asking us which hotel to go to. This went on for almost half an hour. Thankfully, a persistent tuk tuk driver, Mr. Pearl offered his phone to call Pen, one of our friends there. He spoke to Mr. Pearl and said the guesthouse forgot to arrange transport, so Mr. Pearl will take us to King Angkor Guesthouse. And there began our journey through the crowded evening streets of Phnom Penh.
Helmets are not necessary in Cambodia during the evening, only during the day time where the police are at work. Even then, only the rider is required to wear the helmet and the enforcement is not strict enough and there were just too many motorcycles on the road, far exceeding the numbers in Malaysia. There were just as many women riders as male, and most of the motors carried more than 2 people, 3 is pretty common and sometimes you can see 5 hamburger-ed together. However, the traffic there are slower-moving, at most at about 60km/h, mainly owing to the traffic congestion. So despite the seemingly dangerous stunt of overloading, ‘mat rempit’ stint was not seen on the streets, or maybe we just didn’t see one.
High rise buildings were a rare sight. The side of the streets were lined with shops that looked very much like our single or double storey shophouses, some in poorer conditions than the others. Phnom Penh is the capital, thus some roads were quite wide and the buildings were more modern. Mr. Pearl manoeuvred his machine skilfully among the zooming vehicles from all directions. The wagon behind sat the four of us, looking into the streets and made comments about this and that. Roughly 20 minutes later, we arrived at the guesthouse, welcomed by Putty and Raingsei. One room of King Angkor Guesthouse costs $15 per night with free pick up (they paid Mr. Pearl $7). Simple math accounts to only $8 for accommodation, shared by the four of us. It was a good deal because the room was in fact quite nice. We bought a sim card costing $4 for use in Cambodia.
After shower, we were ready to go eat soup – that’s what they call their steam boat. Quite funny to say “eat soup”. Pen, Putty, Raingsei and one more guy whose name I forgot (so so sorry, but let me call you CoolJack) came to ferry us around in their bike. We first went to a shop and well….to go eat soup. It looked something like steam boat, only the soup taste differently but flavourful. They ate a lot of green leaves and herbs that some cannot be found in Malaysia, claimed our friends. There were beef, eggs, some internals, and noodles to be put into the boiling soup. And there was pig brain!!! Eeewwww..uncooked I thought they looked like mushroom until they told me. I wish they hadn’t. Now I had to try pig’s brain knowing IT IS pig’s brain! It tasted like tofu only with a hint of weird aftertaste. I didn’t quite enjoy it although known as a delicacy there. Everything rest, I enjoyed thoroughly, so did Kelvin and Chunaki. Jesse stopped eating earliest among the four of us as he finds the soup tasted weird but he had his fair share. This dinner of 9 (or rather 8 as Pen’s younger sister joined us halfway (FIY, she’s pretty) cost 75,000 Riel or RM 75. (RM1 = 1000 Riel; $1 = 4160 Riel).
Pen left for home with cute sister after dinner, and that left Kelvin and I sharing a motor with Mr. CoolJack. At night, we rode without helmets, so was everybody else. Their gas stations were always full of motorbikes, and the gas cost twice as much as ours. We rode around the town, weaving through the streets, enjoying night scenes while friends explained to us various local things. We passed a durian stall and we just ought to try Cambodian version of the king of fruit. We had two (cost RM 24), each different type but fleshy – one with harder texture but quite delicious nonetheless; one creamier which tasted nicer for me. We took away the rest and proceeded to the night market. The night market was set on a designated area and was clean with crudely tiled floor and yellow lighting all around. The center stage was showing some pop singing in Cambodian language. So we understood none but sounded funny to us. Chunaki and Jesse bought some souvenirs that they thought was a good bargain only to find out later they could have had better offer. Anyway, it was a good experience to see Cambodian side of ‘pasar malam’. They had mats on the floor for people who bought food at their stall to sit and eat. And most of their foods come with variety of sauce. Cambodian food is generally quite tasty unlike those in Malaysia which is mostly oily but ‘sedap’ also. Perhaps the diet of less oil and more vegetables made them quite healthy in the sense that most people we see are not fat. You can hardly see fat people and people smoking in Cambodia. Cool eh?
The motor gang proceeded to the riverside view. In the middle of the bustling city there were several well maintained parks and esplanade where people of all ages can chill out, take a walk, play badminton, juggling feathered balls, and for young couples to date. They wanted us to observe ‘two heads become one’ in those parks but I couldn’t see one. Maybe they are just too good at it. Break-ins were quite common and that’s why their house fence were quite high and some life-wired. So do not simply go around and touch people’s gate at night. The youths were all quite well behaved as I did not see them disturbing girls – whether they are on bike or walking. In Malaysia we still see guys by the road side, whistling in uncivilized manner when gals pass by. Something to learn, don’t we? We went on for quite a while before stopping for dessert. At that time we were very full and quite tired but still gave it a try, and we were glad we did. It was super delicious – plenty of chewy jelly, and assortments to go with durian flavoured shaved ice and condensed milk (cost = RM1.20 per cup).
Finally, we call it a day at about midnight and cancelled the initial plan to get up at 5am to see the folks exercise and dance at the stadium and parks. We washed and slept comfortably. Cambodia (and Vietnam) uses 2-pins plug point, so remember to bring an adapter for Malaysian electronic devices. Luckily I did brought one, thanks to Mum.
Hell, It’s About Time
Jun 8th
Hell it’s about time that I stopped studying. I’ve been studying for… well for as long as I can remember. Study cost hell a lot of money and during those period, sad to say, I made none, substantially
Now I shall pledge to make mum, dad and sis’s investment worthwhile, sooner rather than later, I hope. Having graduated at this time around hasn’t exactly been all rosy due to economic downturn.
Nevertheless, I’m delighted that I’m finally done with my degree. It was hard-earned to some extent and that piece of paper better be sweet-smelling when I get my hands around it and it had better serve its purpose in due time.
I hate and love the life as a student. Contrary to common belief, I hate studying. Hell yes I do, but I love to learn. Studying to me is pouring over notes and books and gathering information and doing endless assignments and projects and finally attested all the abovementioned in examinations. I hated those because studying in this kind of education system makes me all the more academic oriented and worst of all, I succumbed to it. It makes me feel like the unquenchable thirst of vampires for blood. You know it is evil, but you just can’t help it because it satisfies you at the end of the day, and more especially when you’re at the top of your game.
However, I learned a lot too. I’ve become more skilled at digging information, putting them through brain-boggling process, and producing quality results. I’ve become more diligent, paying attention to details and best of all, emphasis on originality. Probably I’ve become cleverer but not exactly smarter; otherwise I would have used my cleverness to make money, see.
One of the things that I liked most about life as a student is that you get to make a lot of friends and enjoy activities together. I love the people in my place, all of them – my batch friends, COP peeps, juniors and seniors, badminton gang, dearest roommate etc. etc. The events and people are those that shape a person’s character most.
To my batchmates, when we first started out – all aspiring engineers, and IT and Business specialists, we were quite close. We celebrated almost everyone’s birthday, and everybody would come and sing birthday song, eat cake, chat and take pictures.
We would watch movies together, sometimes in the common room and sometimes in each other’s room. I remembered we watched the lousy Alien-vs-Predator in the common room, but the crowd was great. We watched The Incredibles, Scary Movie, and Road Trip together too.
We would wait for friends to go to class together. That time, we would depart as early as 15 minutes before class started, but as we ages, we would wake up at the same time the lecture would start, or skip it altogether.
Through the years, large group broked into smaller clusters like what global warming did on ice sheets. The process is natural, but the again is the same everywhere.
Along the years, there were friends who became lovers…and then friends again, and there were those who stick it until today. What an efforrt! Bravo! On and off we had some meals together – our so called batch meals were great.
I enjoyed J04Unity too as it was something quite memorable and special. We even have our own t-shirt than I hope we can still fit into for many many more decades to come.
Although we were segregated, but I believe we all cherished what we’ve been through and cared for each other in their own ways. I salute you all for finishing this race together and thank you for your friendship.
I think I was a difficult roommate. I slept relatively early, and I get annoyed easily when I do not get enough sleep. I can get angry when I’m annoyed but I don’t usually scold or yell.
My silence can mutate into cold wars. I hated that. But my last roommate was a wonderful person.
He made a lot of positive impact in my life and I learned a lot from him. Not only that, he massaged for me countless of times too. There were people who talked about moral and there were people who practiced them. He’s the latter.
To COP peeps, you guys rock! You are all very fun-loving bunch of people. Whenever there’s function you’ll invite me and accept me for who I am.
The camp in Cameron was outstanding, so as many other activities. I love them all. Thank you for the farewell rock! Thank you for the friendship! Thank you for the fellowship!
To badminton gang, the moment we ended our last ‘power match’ I already missed it. I understand now there’ll be no more such fantastic gang to play with, or will there be another one? Probably not, very unlikely, or is it?.. hmmm. I miss it so much.
I don’t know how or when exactly we started playing regularly, but hell, I’m glad we played so many games together (never enough though), and shared so many personal stories at the sports complex.
Hope our pictures will still be there when we come back in August. Remember to go and check.
To seniors and juniors and respected friends, acquaintance, and even lecturers and pak and mak guards (for keeping us safe), you have all added colours into my life. I’ll remember the sports that we participated, the cook-and-eat-together time, supper-at-mamak-slash-McD-slash-tongsuikai times, the ‘ooos’ and ‘aaahs’ during movies in cinemas, the campings and holidays, the laughers, the sharing, the smiles, the hugs, and etc. etc. etc. And for that, I sincerely thank you all for the companionship and friendship. Thank you!
Hell it’s not about time that I start to miss you guys, because I already have, and am and will. Peace upon you, friends!
Camping by the Beach
May 11th
A simple thought is all that was needed to manifest it to a great camping trip. The preparation wasn’t much but what came out of it was fantastic food and nice bonding among close friends – something we rarely had the opportunity to do and probably would be the last one this time.
We departed on Monday afternoon rather late, near 3pm but nevertheless, we left with high spirit, looking forward toward a nice camping. We talked and laughed all the way to Lumut in Chung Ginn’s van. The weather was just perfect, and 6 of us is just the right manpower to carry all our stuff to the beach.
Jim, Teik, Kelvin, Shean Chuan, Chung Ginn and Jesse had loads to carry, but the heavy stuff were none my responsibility. Whuahaha. The ferry (RM 10 for two ways) arrived at 5.10pm and shipped us to the island.
Once there, we took a taxi (RM 15) to Teluk Nipah, our camp site. It was a public beach so we’re allowed to do pretty much anything we want. We owned it!
When we stepped our feet at the beach, the sun was already setting. So much for watching the sun set. A monkey must have felt our disappointment, hence decided to entertain us by peeing at our stuff we set on the ground. Luckily not all our stuff were rained by urine, only Chung Ginn’s sack that he use to put the tent materials. Huhu~~
The troublemaker, and his looming friends made us realised we were not alone after all. There were cats, dogs, and hornbills, and god knows what else on the island. So before it gets any darker, we quickly set up the tent, and the BBQ pit.
At first we wanted to set it at the front of the beach for nicer view but due to strong winds we changed location – behind a beach stand to guard against the wind. In the midst of setting up the tent in the strong wind, we totally overlooked the dump located only about 10 metres away. Thinking that dump looked harmless compared to our primate friends, we let our tent be as where it was.
Alas, just as we thought the slight rain would get heavier and ruin our BBQ camping, it miraculously stopped and the sun came out to greet us. It was a golden moment as we basked under the sunset and enjoyed its glory for a while before getting back to BBQuing our food while there was light.
Our chicken wings BBQed to perfection. But some were not so fortunate and fell onto the sand. Sad case, but we still had plenty of food for the night.
At one point, right after we had done with BBQ, we saw a living carcass lying on the beach. He must have been washed ashore from the nearby island. Poor stranger but luckily he still had his shorts on, or otherwise, his wee wee would have been gobbled up by the fishes.
Since he was alive, we invited him to join us for dinner, which he happily did so. We started a little fire by the side to give us some illumination at night, but it was still a little tad too dark. We had to rely on torchlight to help us see what we were eating.
The food was the best of all BBQ I’ve eaten so far. The chicken and char siu pork was superb. Salad and potato salad were also very nice and fresh. Even the tuna+telur cair turned out to be quite tasty. We also had bread, and hotdog with char siu and honey sauce. We even managed to keep the drinks cool in the ice box that we brought along. Wonderful! We were full for dinner and kept some for supper.
Later that night, a couple of caucasian came over and asked Kelvin whether we had weed. He was confused as to what weed was. Luckily they didn’t ask for grass, or otherwise Kelvin would have offered them our lemon grass. Haha… And no, we didn’t have any weed, and they left.
With our belly full, we proceeded down the beach and chilled out. We lied down, and dug our feet into the cold sand, and listened to waves breaking, and moon and stars staring us down. It was pretty romantic if you have to ask. What was better was the stories that we shared.
For supper we had the leftover food and the best of all – banana rolled with ham (suppose to be bacon but we bought wrongly =P) and BBQ with generous squeeze of honey! Whoaa..delicious like crap man.
That night, the stench from the rubbish dump was getting a little too uncomfortable for us. How wrong were we to think that it was harmless. So we moved our tent to the original place chosen – that is nearer to the beach. We all slept through the night, safely, although uncomfortably. Well at least for me, because I’m not used to sleeping on sandy ground (who is anyway?)
I woke up early the next day to be greeted by Jesse. He said he can’t sleep anymore and took a walk around the beach. I joined him and took some photos until the rest woke up. We all walked the beach a little more and then packed.
Dinosaur running on the beach
I think the most difficult part of camping was finding clean water, for drinking and washing. We were fortunate that the cafe by the beach nearby was willing to let us fill our empty bottles with water without charge. We used that for washing but no enough for bathing. We didn’t bathe the night before. But we didn’t smell either, or perhaps we were all smelly but didn’t realise. So the next mission was to find a place to bathe.
After packing, we walked further down to find a washroom, but couldn’t find one (yes we pee on the trees and the sand and the sea all these while). We had to find amongst the resorts nearby. After much searching, there’s one, also generously let us use the shower for free!
The shower is of course located outside, open air for all macho macho guys to bathe. Since I’m no He-Man, I rather stand behind the camera with Dinosaur.
Here we are. Dedicated to Wong Ning just to make you jealous… hmmm~~~
Refreshed, and cleaned, we took taxi back to the jeti and boarded a ferry to Lumut. We were a bit exhausted (just a bit) but glad that we had successfully camped and enjoyed ourselves.
The whole trip including food and transportation cost us just near RM 50 per person. For a happy trip like this, I consider it as priceless!
Thanks Ginn, Jim, Kelvin, Jesse and Shean Chuan for everything. Also thank my mum and sister who have helped in food preparation.
