Author archive
27 December 2015
Above: Stage at the wedding. Today, I experienced something different. In my half-century, I hadn’t experienced a Malay wedding. Tonight, I attended a wedding reception for Adlie and Amal. Adlie is the son of a friend and also nephew of an old school mate. They had married on Christmas day, exchanging their vows, but today […]
22 December 2015
Above: Noodles drying in the sun in a traditional part of my hometown, Kuching. Today I fly to Kuching for Christmas with my family. Being the festive season, flights out of Singapore were expensive and I saved SGD80 by flying out of Senai in Johor. It seemed like a good idea when I made the […]
19 December 2015
Before landing, there were no announcements on drugs, mandatory death sentence, prohibition on nunchuks, knuckle dusters etc. It must be optional as some airlines do make these religiously. Leaving the gate area, there was a cordon and staff stationed at various points with an iPad/tablet pointing the direction we’re supposed to head towards. I followed […]
19 December 2015
I fly out to Singapore in the wee hours of Saturday morning 19DEC after a full day in the office on Friday. I managed to get a bit of a lie in after the street Christmas party before getting dropped at the airport at 0015. The Air New Zealand check-in area was deserted 90 mins […]
13 November 2015
I woke at 0530, half hour before my alarm. I let myself out of my aunt’s house and grabbed a taxi to Singapore’s Changi Airport, getting there about 2h30 before my departure to Auckland. The arrival card butt must have fallen out from my passport after check-in and the immigration officer asked me to go […]
11 November 2015
My pre-ordered taxi turned up early so I got to the airport in good time. It allowed me some time in the lounge before boarding my short AirAsia flight to Singapore (the Garden City, Island State or Breakaway Republic). In the airline’s usual fashion, we left early an arrived even earlier, around 20 minutes before […]
9 November 2015
Above: Goodbye Mulu, hope it won’t be 21 years before I come back. Today I head back to civilisation (and internet again) in Kuching. I relaxed in the morning before going to the airport at 1145 for my 1315 flight. I based my timing on walking there but the owner was available to take me […]
8 November 2015
I had breakfast at my hostel outside of the park with Gwen (male) and Denis, both from France. Denis is originally from Madagascar. As it was Sunday, the family owning the place was getting ready for church at St Philip’s. They all wore “Askar Allah” t-shirts, meaning Soldier of God, I guess as in the […]
7 November 2015
The park hostel had no bed for me tonight. Rather than move into the more expensive options there, I thought I’d move out and give some business to the locals. So I stored my luggage at the guardhouse before going on my Clearwater cave trip. We set off by boat to Batu Bungan village, which […]
6 November 2015
As I had given up hope for the Pinnacles, I arranged to try the easiest adventure caving trip at Lagang departing at 1330. This gave me the whole morning free so I got the internet at MYR5 per day (expiring 0800 tomorrow when they change the password). Charlotte (whom I was hanging out with, travelling […]