Identity

I was always mistaken as a Malay here, no doubt about that. It's my skin tone. 

I remember when I was in KL studying, some strangers whispered among themselves about 'this Malay girl' (me) dating a Chinese. I was moving house at that time. So I pretended not to understand whatever they were talking about. 

Then there was this time when I was in a taxi, the Chinese driver asked if I'm Malay mixed. So I said yes and played along. We were having conversations in the car and I tried so hard not to give away hints but I think I occasionally let slip my Sabahan accent but it doesn't matter I think and it's funny because I can speak Chinese and I know he can, but I just want to play along. And of all topics, he had to talk about rape. 

Another time was in Sungei Wang shopping when a sales girl excitedly asked if I'm from Hawaii. LOL!! Of all features. She was so shocked when I replied to her in Cantonese.  She was embarrassed. 

Then when I went holiday in China, the sales person would always face difficulty in assessing which language to speak to me. They will try from Japanese to Korean to some remote languages I never heard of.  

The most recent one happened during my trip to Hong Kong. Most, I think mistaken me as coming from China because my Canto sounded somewhat different from theirs until when I look puzzled at some words, only they guessed I am probably from Malaysia or Singapore. I had the best time in Hong Kong differentiating the Cantonese accents coming from different parts of the world. I can say the easiest to distinguish is those from China because it sounds softer and more polite while I think those from KL, Penang and Singapore carries a little bit of Hokkien in them. 

And then there was this sales person in a Chinese herb shop (I think she's from China) who confidently greeted me with "Sawadikaap" and spoke fluent Thai with me. I was like :-O :-O :-O ! No idea what she was talking about until I had to say, "我不懂..." (I don't understand). I don't know who should be more embarrassed, me or her. 

Zhang Jia Jie 张家界 - The real deal

People say picture speaks a thousand words and its true. I have no other words to describe the magnificent views in Zhangjiajie except that the cable cars were crazy. Whoever built it were crazy! How on earth did they managed it?! Its crazy I tell you. The ride was fantastic blessed with superb views. I was totally awed.....until now. 

I was telling my cousin that I pity those who has to go up the hill via this road. Doesn't it look worse than the ones at 'Tokyo Drift'? But you know what? We got a taste of this road when travelling to Tian Men San 天门山. Wasn't as scary as I thought. Phewwwwww....And the bus drivers were good. 

Another crazy road. *white flag..how on earth did they make that road??

Zhang Jia Jie 张家界 - Travelling

1st day of travel consist of 2 1/2 hours flight from Kota Kinabalu to Shenzhen, 2 1/2 hours bus ride from Shenzhen to Guangzhou and 2 hours train ride from Guangzhou to Changsha, Hunan. Basically whole day of travelling. 

2-3rd day - traveled from Changsha to Shaoshan, Chairman Mao Zedong's hometown. Visited his childhood home and Mao Zedong's square. After that was 7+ hours bus ride to FengHuang. 7 HOURS...please take note. I slept, woke up, slept and woke up..slept again and woke up and it was still 3.30 pm in the afternoon and the bus was still running. Everybody's head were dangling from the sideways. Caught some drooling..nah..LOL I was sitting behind so the most I could see was people's hair turned into a 鸡公头 （rooster head）After hours of 'fishing' in the bus finally we get to see FengHuang Ancient City. It was awesome and totally worth the 7 hours ride - at the same time was drop dead tired. 

Ah..let me show you something..

The megalong queues (sometimes lasted to close to about 30 minutes) we had to endure when entering tourist spots. China internal tourism is crazy. These people love cutting queues and pushing around. Now, it's not just the Chinese who are doing this. The Korean aunties are 2x5. Malaysians are too small sized to do anything. >.< Plus, our voices added up together are not as loud any ONE of them. Serious.

This is the scenic view in front of Chairman Mao's childhood home. It's so beautiful that I don't even feel like leaving. If only his old home is up for sale. :-P

Me and my cousin

The tour group at Mao Zedong's square. Try spotting youngster... :-P

Geese at a restaurant at FengHuang Ancient City. Hmhmhm...might have ended up in someone's plate by now. >.<

Vats of tasty wine. By the way, the alcohol content of the wine made by Tujia's are quite high. Approx 50-60% which is higher than your regular whisky. Gulp at one go and it burns like mad, though the smell is really good.

Map of FengHuang Ancient City. I was informed that there were 3 or 4 streets and a river. They even have bars (yes!) which is kinda cool. Someday I would love to stay for few nights to enjoy the village clubbing scene. Just picture ancient Chinese building with modern Chinese songs. Shopping at FengHuang is a must. In fact I regretted not buying some of the items there. Sigh..should I really make that 7 hours trip there in the future??

Houses built on stilts facing Tujiang (the river). The boats are for hired accompanied by famous Tujia folk songs (Tujia folks love to sing).

Another ancient city of Furong.

After Furong, we headed to Zhangjiajie.

Zhang Jia Jie 张家界, Hunan Province

I just came back from this place and before I forget my most memorable experience there, I think I should blog about it. While gathering my thoughts, I shall post this picture as a preview to what is upcoming.

I was here (yesterday)

Next time, the entrance to my house should be something like this - GRAND green lush bamboo. Even better if there's fountain behind it. Got air, got water = fengshui. 

In the morning, I will sit in the front porch to surf the internet while sipping my Java Chip. My maine coon will be lying beside me trying to observe flying birds. I will fix a home surround system to play Chopin everyday (or should I hire a pianist instead?).

In the afternoon, I will nap like never before. No one will be entitled to take my beauty sleep away. Even prince charming is not allowed to wake me up, unless if I'm having a bad nightmare (noonmare?) [ You know like those times when you feel pressed half awake - can't move, can't even shout ].  Ok, but if I have such a beautiful house entrance like this, I think I will only have sweet dreams. And only the sweetest. MMmMmMmmmmm...

At night, I'll be feasting on Sushi with fresh salmon and ebikko. Great chefs will come over just to marinate and grill salmons while I'll wine and dine in the pool. Are you drooling now????? 

You know, all these reminds me of The Sims 2. The only fantasy of luxury that I can easily achieve is in the virtual world. What do you expect, one hot tub there only cost 8000simoleons. Somemore the Sims don't have to work, cheat codes will do! But one thing they don't have there is massage chair. I think I need that. 

LOL.

This is actually one of the entrances at Alamanda. Still, it's mesmerizing right??? 

Odd break start of the year.

Amid all the glooms of church building attacks and the shattering visions of 1Malaysia (I myself were trapped anxiously waiting for news updates), I feel it's time again to look at the sunny side of life and while it lasts.

Last week, my good friend Serena came over for a week's visit. Remember my previous post on Kionsom? I then took a Thursday off to to discover the feel of being a Sabahan again. Ya, being dramatic.

I always feel that the mountain areas in Sabah are very peaceful and it always reminds me of the Rainforest music. Sometimes I feel like I can stay there forever.

The journey began at 6am with me arriving at Yinsoon's house. 6am! You know, I don't even wake up that early for work. But nevermind, I get to see how the morning school traffic jam again. Just like the sweet old days where all of us begged to grow up fast.

A good early morning best starts with Tuaran Mee. Tamparuli version also accepted.

Tamparuli's wooden shophouses. Not many left in Sabah. You can still find them around Papar.

The lone hut overlooking Mount Kinabalu

Me and Serena

Our 1st stop was at Kinabalu Park. Well, this is not the 1st time I've been there. But all other times, the stop was just to pop by and say hello to Kundasang's 'must stop' park. I suggested the visit to be a little bit more adventurous since we can't climb Mt. Kinabalu.

Ya, jungle trekking!

A short one. To Bukit Tupai Shelter

Come follow me!

The walk was through tree roots and stony staircases. Sometimes muddy. All I wore on my feet was a pair of Vincci sandals.

Right foot

Left foot

And this - the destination for the 380metres uphill climb.

Seeing rainforest. Cool.

The next stop was Kundasang War Memorial. And again this wasn't the 1st time of me being there. But if you're in Kundasang, this is also another must visit place. For people who love to take pictures, this would be a good place as it housed many types of beautiful floras and sceneries. Charge per entry for Malaysians is RM2.00.

They have this visual room to show visitors about the Sandakan's death march. When it came to the part where the soldiers starved to death (and it's really sad), the visitors in front shook their heads in disbelief.

Bangau trying to catch some Koi fish

Blooms at the park

And the Kundasang Valley. Sometimes when the sky is good, you can even see Mount Kinabalu. The view is totally superb.

The last stop was in Poring Hot Springs. Ok this would be a memorable one. 1st, I get to junggle trek again to a waterfall. 2nd, I get to dip my feet in the hot bathtub! Finally!

This waterfall would be around 100+ metres walk from the TreeTop Canopy walk's entrance.

I started to feel that this day was meant for real exercise after all those office hours and unhealthy non-exercise life. Glad that I can still walk and breathe!

The water was icy cold but not as cold as the one at Mesilau. I felt as though fishes were nibbling at my feet but when I looked down there was none. Weird.

There's another waterfall about 3km walk from the TreeTop Canopy walk, but because of time contraint, I have to leave that for another day. This time perhaps I want to really dip in the hot spring tub and visit the Sabah Tea Garden.

Yinsoon's couz drove real fast and we reached KK in 2.30hrs. Normal journey from Ranau would take about 3 to 3.30hrs. Surprisingly also, there weren't any no loaded trucks around to slow us down.

It is advised to leave Ranau/Kundasang before sunset as the roads are not supplied with streetlights and sometimes foggy.

What will you do when your brain can't stop thinking about going for holidays??!!!

I've got so many places that I want to go while I'm still young, eg:

1. Pasir Chagar Hutang at Redang;

2. Koh Samui / Phuket;

3. Go for massage (!) at Bali or visit Sulawesi

4. Angkor Wat (again)

5. Vietnam

6. Batanes, Philippines

7. Outward bound school that offers camping at island

8. Hot Springs

9. China

10. Silk Road

11. Maybe Kazakhstan (Central Asia mah)

12. Take train to Tibet

How to stay focus? How to stay focus??

Update 19:00hrs: I'm going for a short trip tomorrow! Yeay!

Pangkor

I think I owe my blog some nice holiday pictures. The last holiday I blogged about was my trip to Cambodia . Worse still, I only had time to blog about my first day at Siem Reap. I owe Angkor Wat the beautiful pictures I took. Soon, soon!

Ok back to Pangkor, I had the chance to go with Phang, Dom and Serena during my 'career break' after finishing chambering on 12.9.2009-15.9.2009 ( a night at Sitiawan).

No, no..we are not at Pangkor yet...

Look at the beautiful emerald green waters

The hotel we stayed - Anjungan Resort

We checked in to a family suite. It's a 2 floored room. The lower floor house has a Queen sized bed while the upper floor has 2 single beds. I love the ambience.

this is the upperfloor. One would think they can have a good nap or sleep overlooking the outside window. Aside from aircond, they will have a stand fan to boost. HAHA..No...as you can see, the upperfloor is the zinc roof directly. So instead of enjoying the perfect panoramic view of the room while sleeping, those unlucky fellas to sleep upstairs will have to battle with the heat from the zinc roof and moths flying around. The aircond unit is only enough to keep downstairs cool.

But the the upperfloor still looks nice.

Overview of the hotel. Very clean.

The Pangkor Experience

Ok, when we were there it was still Ramadhan month. So the whole island (aside from its residence) basically belongs only few tourists like us. Even the hawker stalls along the beach did not open, not even in the evening. We stayed opposite Teluk Nipah and 5 minutes walk from Coral Bay.

Our food source came from the town. 
Food in Pangkor is very cheap - RM2.50 for a bowl of noodles!

Teluk Nipah...nice beach free for us, anytime anyday - night time also can

As we rented a car, we conquered the whole island within 30 minutes drive. Cool eh?! No traffic jam but need to watch out for 'Initial-D' like bends and motorbikes. The road only cater for 1 car per way and only 1 way. Some sites even recommended that you can even cycle around the island. Unless you are training for some cycling marathon, don't even think about it! There was when we drove past a very exhausted cyclist, he can't help but looked totally envious that we're comfortably in a car wheezing past him.

The Dutch Fort

Pangkor Town

Sunset at Teluk Nipah

Coral Bay

Snorkelling near one of the smaller islands...look at the fishes!

Inedible black sea cucumber

Corals

A glimpse of Pangkor Laut

As we're not rich (and no sponsors) all we can do is to catch a glimpse of the famous top resort - Pangkor Laut Beach Resort.

 Must take group photo

Emerald green seawater. If only there's emeralds buried under.

The Fishing Village

Fishing dock belonging to a friend of Serena

The Jetty carpark and the famous pink vans

Oh and also one thing about Pangkor is that aside from Pasir Bogak and the residential and town area, the rest of the island is pitch dark at night. Fret not, I did not encounter any supernatural experience while being there. Only sounds of waves will fill your ears at night (and maybe your friends' noises).

In fact, I couldn't forget the moments when me and my friends visited Coral Bay on our final night stay to search for for the blue simmering don't-know-what-is-that on the beach. It's so pitch dark and yet peaceful. And only the sound of waves to keep us company.

Would I want to visit Pangkor again? YES.

p/s: Special thanks to Foo Woei and Serena's friend for the company spoiling us with food.

YUM!