I will be away

I am flying off tomorrow to Vietnam and crossing border to Cambodia for the next two weeks. My travel partners are my coursemates which is also our so called degree's graduation trip. This time we make it a budget trip, going to cheap places, staying in cheap hotels, taking cheap public transportation, eating cheap food, but hopefully not coming back half dead. hahhaa...

Wait for my return with lot's of interesting stuff!

Earth Hour

Have you seen this "60 Earth Hour" billboard very often recently and wonder what is it?

Is yes, congratulation and thank you for paying at least some attention to our mother earth.

If no, you're not suppose to but this is also my purpose of writing this entry.

Earth hour is an event organized by WWF encouraging the households and businesses to switch off unnecessary lights for one hour, in order to create awareness towards climate change and global warning.  

Earth hour 2009 has attracted 83 countries and more than 2700 cities around the world to participate in this event. 

I am supporting it of course! And it's my pleasure to invite all of you to join together with millions of people from north-south-east-west. No matter from which corner you are, switch off your light between 8.30pm - 9.30pm on 23 March 2009. ( depending on your local time)

And here are some ways to spend Earth hour in dark.

* Gather family & friends for a night picnic in your local park and look at the stars
* Enjoy a family dinner by candlelight
* Organise a treasure hunt in the dark
* Take your dog for a night walk
* Have a candle-lit bath
* Sit in the dark and share stories
* Organise a family night playing board games
* Share a romantic night in with your loved one
* Upload your ‘on the night’ photos and videos to flickr and YouTube respectively, and then add them to the Earth Hour flickr group and the global YouTube Group.

www.earthhour.org

International Hot Air Balloon Fiesta '09

The 1st ever international hot air balloon festival has been held over the weekend from 19 - 22 March at Putrajaya. Balloonist from different part of the world have came to join the fun! I have personally tried flying on hot air balloon once not long ago, and this time I got even more excited seeing so many balloons at a time.  

preparing 1...

preparing 2...

"purple+red+white hot air balloon" from Belgium

"orange+yellow hot air balloon" from Japan

this is actually an orange from Belgium but she was to shy to take picture 

"blue hot air balloon" from France

"colourful hot air balloon" from unknown

"basketLESS hot air balloon" from Malaysia

Look closely! their feet are hanging in the air

"yellow hot air balloon" from unknown

"giant nescafe mug hot air balloon" from New Zealand

"ele-pig hot air balloon" (elephant ear + pig nose) from Belgium

"sad clown hot air balloon" from Belgium

*life is wonderful, remember to smile*

Crocs

Pampered my feet with a new pair of Crocs. This newly arrived crocs named "Olivia" has a simple yet girlish design, where the fingernails are nicely protected by the enclosed front and leaving the feet to breath from the strap behind in warm weather.   

There are two holes (front and back) which can be can be exchanged/ decorated with accessories, making it different from others. By the way, the original bling bling was actually white.

The nubs inside the sandal help to stimulate blood flow and act like masseur while I'm walking, it's so comfortable  =)

Back to KL

Ah...finally it's weekend! I came back to KL last Friday after enjoying a month long holiday back in Sabah. I am currently half-employed/ unemployed. Half-employed because the previous company I attached for internship is short of manpower so I'm back to help out. As I promise to be there temporarily so I am still consider unemployed, while waiting for my Degree's result. 

Well, I had really laid back lifestyle for the past one month and I am still trying to adapt myself to busy KL life. 

This is my Mon-Fri daily routine:

6.45am - Suppose to wake up at 6.45 but I will normally snooze until 7

7.15am - Wake up unwillingly and kelam kabut take shower, change clothe, dry the hair

7.30am - Depart from house

++Stuck in the traffic for an hour++ 

8.30am - Arrive office and have a quick breakfast

9.00am - Start working!

12.30pm - Lunch time (for 30 minutes because we are really busy)

6.00pm - End of the day. But most of the time we need to stay back for at least 15 minutes (or up to 1 hour)

7.00pm - Stuck in the traffic again for an hour

8.00pm - Reach home. Exhausted......

++Do some house cleaning, laundry, dinner, check mail bla bla bla++

11.00pm - Time to bed

I am typing this with my eyelid half close....good night people~

Kundasang

Had an family outing/ mum's classmates gathering to national park during the weekend. How great my mum still keep good contact with her high school friends after so many years they have graduated. We stayed in Celyn Resort Kinabalu with a group of 24 persons. Most of them were husband & wife and only few families brought their children along. And I guess I was the oldest "child" there. =(

The row of white buildings are the hotel rooms we were staying

With a long balcony outside where the uncles and aunties had late night talks

And the best part is, our hotel rooms are overlooking Mount Kinabalu!

Surrounding the resort is full of mountain ranges, flora and fauna. I am not sure how high we were exactly but I am sure we were higher than the clouds. haha...

I woke up very early to catch the stunning sunrise. And that is also the best time to see clear Mt. Kinabalu before it got covered by the cloud.

Some random shots when I was too boring there

Dad and I cannot tahan the boredom and we went and visit Sabah tea farm

My favourite shot of tea leaves and the blue sky

White water rafting @ Kampar river, Perak

Aha. You should have an idea of WWR by now if you read my earlier post. So as promised, we gonna raft across the South China Sea from Sabah to Perak this time. 

I didn't actually plan for the trip, in fact it was a prize won by my friend in a photo competition and he was given a 2 days/1 night stay for 4 persons in Adeline's Rest House. Well, we knew it isn't a fancy 5-stars resort with mouth-watering cuisine but what interest us was the water rafting activity located just 5 minutes walking distance from the rest house. 

Oh yea, this is the photo that he won us the trip by the way. I was the "so-called" model. hahaa...

Bus ride from Pudu bus station to Medan Gopeng took about 2.5 - 3 hours and we were later transferred by Hilux to the inner land. Another 30 minutes more on the narrow and stony road before we arrive. 

See, rest house also got reception, don't play play....somemore hand-written one, so artistic. It was still acceptable until Adeline, the founder/ lau ban niang/ receptionist/ the cook showed us our room after check-in. We were half fainted when we see this.

Open air big room with tilamss berlipat-lipat at one corner. Not even a proper bed. 

This is how our little "cute" bamboo hut looks from outside. The lower part is the dining area and the upper part is the bedroom. Oh wait, should I call it a bedroom because it looks more like an empty room storing recycle tilams to me. ahhaa...Anyway, according to Adeline the concept of the rest house was purposely built based on Orang Asli style, enabling the guests to experience kampung life.

Okay, forget the bad part and I really love the first lunch provided. Maybe we were hungry too, the chicken wings are delicious! And we were told by Adeline there is a spa we can enjoy after lunch. So my friend and I went and check it out.

O...kay.... so this is the natural spa Adeline was talking about. Freaking cold water spraying out from the pipe. I tried to put my hand in and I can feel my body freezing already. 

Undeniable, air is so much fresher there and the quiet surrounding making it a good place to escape from the noisy and polluted city.

Since it was a 2D/ 1N package we were thinking to have water rafting on the first day unfortunately it was a heavy rain day. We had a cold night in the "bedroom" and I was so happy I brought my super giant size scarf because I don't feel like covering myself with the blanket they provided. I am afraid they never wash it and I can smell the body scent of the last person who used it. 

Luckily it's a sunny day the next morning (at least something to woo our day) and we can finally go ahead with the activity we have been looking forward.  

 

Yea, this is the rafting river I mentioned earlier, just 5 mins walk from the rest house. There is a bridge actually, if you wonder how the bus cross the river. Water level gone really high due to the heavy rain the night before. 

This is our embarkation point. The water here seems clearer and more like a white water comparing the milo colour one in Sabah. And this time I have pictures while we were rafting. It was taken by one of the raft master.

I am sitting in the middle with pinky shorts

Paddle hard! Our raft master, Kevin looks so cool behind.

We all look so nerdy with the helmet on. hahaha...

I enjoyed the trip overall except the accommodation as you can read. But if you are someone who likes to enjoy back to nature life, that would defnitely be a heaven to you. However, if you're a city boy/ girl like me, the rest house is a no no. You can choose to stay in Gopeng town and join a day trip to water rafting. Nah, my second cert. for chanllenging the Kampar river. 

Oh by the way, Riverbug is really profesional in rafting. Check out http://traversetours.com