Resurrection of interest in blogging.

Yours Sincerely ( Y S )has stopped blogging for a long, long time since  FC  has taken over his social communication. Some friends and eldest daughter commented that  FC does not have the depth, subtlety,  creativity, definition and inspiration of blogging as a social communication media.

Perhaps, among YS' resolutions for 2013, having survived the Mayan D Day ( sic ) , is to continue blogging.

Have a better new year - 2013.

Make sure that you slip into the Pearly Gate with a worn out and thoroughly used body - sun burnt from holidays at Hawaii, Bora Bora, Christmas Islands, Mauritius Islands etc  ;  hands and fingers with callouses  from holding golf irons and woods, tennis and badminton racquets, bowling balls, snooker cues etc ; waist and shoulders with marks of bungee and para gliding straps ; feet, legs and shins with gashes and cuts from trampling, jungle trekking and climbing ; shoulders with muscles from diving and swimming ;  and stomach still digesting Alaskan oysters and king crabs; Boston lobster; morsels from the Chinese signature dish " Monks Jump Over The Fence" etc and your bladder still holding " Chardonnay ," 24-year  X O , and maybe your favorite Starbuck coffee. And with disheveled hair, creased clothes, worn out shoes, broken watch, cracked glasses...........  and say : "  Yipeeee......... I made it !!! "

Have a better 2013 ! Decide to live !! Make every day count !!! (Don't just count the days!! )  The days are long and the years short for retirees !!!!!!!

.... of public transportation

Yours Sincerely ( Y S ) did his bit for the environment and also for the love of other road users who had the necessity to drive. During the last Chinese New Year, he went down to Kuala Lumpur ( K L ) by coach, MARA Liner. The senior returned ticket comes with a RM20.00 discount and you practically have the whole coach to yourself. ( Business is so bad for this company that the coach hardly carried 8 passengers for a 34 seater both ways ! ) Y S also saved on petroleum and did not burn extra rubber on the highway. And perhaps saves a few hundred ringgits from the police coffer.

Sinking himself on a single seat, Y S slept and slept, and dreamt and dreamt for 6 hours before he arrived at Pudu Sentral, the coach terminal in KL.



There was no need to fight for space on the festive congested highway or to play hide and seek with the police on their speed trap spree.

Y S also did not have to put up with the raging stalkers who are normally found in very fast-driven and expensive cars. They would appear very suddenly behind you, tail gated you and the front of their vehicle fills up the whole of your rear mirror while you are struggling to over take the vehicle on your left at more than 110KPH. These stalkers would flashed and flashed their high light as if they could not slow down and are in a great hurry. You feel as if they are going to bull doze you off the road if you do not make it to the left lane fast enough. If you could not make it to the left lane fast enough, their loud horn would blast you to eternity.

Fancy you get more and more of such drivers as you are nearing KL, somewhere after Tapah. As they overtake you, you get no chance to have a glance at them. Their heavily tinted windows shadow them. Their registration plates are single or double digited. Somehow, these drivers are above the law !!!!

Once in a while, it is nice to be driven. You get to relax and enjoy the scenery and you arrive refreshed and ready for your programme.

A change to the rigid life routine is refreshing !

..... of our club's gymnasium

Have you ever realised that putting on weight is a whizz but removing it off, especially from around the waist can be exhausting and for some it remains there " until death do we part. " Yours Sincerely's ( Y S ) N Zealand trip was where Y S was pampered with food by his daughter and this was followed by the Chinese Lunar New Year where Y S and family spent it with his sister who loves to cook. The result was a few kilos around the waist.

Fancy that a few weeks of feasting could easily cause an increase of 3 or 4 kilos but several months of exercises could hardly remove it. They call this quantum physics.

So, Y S has sentenced himself to the RKC ( Royal Kedah Club) gym every morning and has made several interesting observations.

The gym is like the golf driving range. There is a certain fraternity which inspires free and unsolicited advice. Within your ear shot, you can hear tips on how to do this machine and that machine, and how this diet and that diet has worked effectively. And how this and that person has his or her this and that muscle torn and suffering from this illness and that etc etc etc.

Often you see the serious ones hard at work. They could not afford a smile. They sweat profusely and are proud to show you that their sweat drips down like rain drops on the floor and machine. If they shake their heads hard enough, they would stain the walls with their salty sweat. Their t-shirt is normally soaking wet and they pant and grunt to despise your under-effort at exercising.

Often Y S observe a middle aged lady but still in good shape: slim, supple and firm. This particular lady is a bit of an exhibitionist. She would hop on this and this machine and work on them effortlessly. And her finale is always how she contorts her body to the left and front, left and right, also effortlessly. She could sit and her fore head could touch the tips of her toes repeatedly. A feat for a lady of her age. And she does all that proudly in the full view of the gym spectators of all shapes and sizes. All admiring but some envying and a few sneering, perhaps our of jealously !

Also often Y S spots the " rollers" who are always over-weight and visit the gym perhaps for the first or first few times. They are a bit conspicuous and never announce their appearance or disappearance. They would quietly roll on the treadmill and walk for a few minutes. Then roll on the cross trainer. Then roll on the multi-gym. Then hop on the exercise bike. Then roll on the leg machine. All these for a few minutes each. Then stand and admire the weights on the storage rack, perhaps saving them for the next visit. BUT .... but they will never miss the vibration plates .................................................


Some plant themselves on this machine until grass could grow beneath their feet. Y S' only worry is that they might entangle their small and large intestines ! Or if they constipate, they may have to dash to the toilet ! LOL

Y S does not know which category he belongs to ! Y S just wants to maintain whatever muscles the Good Lord has given him before they are rudely snatched away by age , especially untimely snatching. To young readers of this blog, start saving your muscles when you are young.

So, exercise on.

... ...... Of confusing practices in the Malaysian Catholic Churches

Dear Editor,

“Being a Catholic convert and having left far behind many Chinese pseudo-cultural practices, I am confused and aggrieved by how the church is accommodating such practices during the Chinese Lunar Year Masses year after year in the name of acculturalization.

I particularly refer to the use of red candles; big joss sticks; the offering of food; three bows before a replica of the ancestral tablet and the setting up of a red ancestral altar adorned with sugarcane beside what should be the only altar of Christ in the church.

Reflecting over how I took a firm stand and in the process hurt my family for not partaking in ancestral worship, I am aggrieved to see that the Church seems to encourage it. Some say that it is not worshipping but merely showing respect to the ancestors. But then we have “All Souls’ Day” and “All Saints’ Day” specifically for that purpose. The semblance of what I used to partake in and what the church is condoning now is too close to confuse me.

Of course, I am not against such acculturalization but simply want the church to take a firm stand on this matter for the benefit of the faithful like me.

If the setting up of a red ancestral altar, the lighting of red candles and joss sticks, food offering, and bowing before the ancestral tablet are allowed, I am glad that I can fully participate in the forth coming “Cheng Beng” festival in April !

Thomas Chua
Alor Setar

......... of Waimangu Volcanic valley in N Zealand

A visit to Rotorua , north island of New Zealand (NZ) is a must to feast the eyes on geothermal features, soak in the geothermal lakes and also smell all the sulfur you can.

Yours Sincerely ( Y S ) was taken to Waimangu Volcanic Valley which is the world's youngest geothermal area. Y S stepped into a world of astounding geothermal features and gigantic volcanic craters.

The four hour walk, with lots of coaxing and encouragement from the daughter in the forms of tit bits ( chocolates and Muesli bars and rationed bottled water ! Y S and Better Half were tenderly treated like old folks from the homes on an outing. ROFL ) , introduced Y S to huge steaming lakes, bubbling hot spring, newly formed terraces, mysterious inferno craters, and powerful volcanic activity. There are rare and unusual plants which have adapted to grow in the hot earth and rapidly regenerating native forest. All these were seen up close as you are a part of nature in this park.

The tickets are a bit costly and the walk long , so you are away from itineraried packaged tourists who are usually taken to the Old faithful geyser just to witness the periodic sprays.

A dip at the Polynesian Spar that evening ( Sorry. No photos allowed) completed Y S' full experience of Rotorua.

Nevertheless, it is quite daunting to think that your property lies above tons of molten lava, and that you are practically conducting your life daily on them!

This visit is top on Y S' lists of things Kiwi I did.

.... of what we did in New Zealand II

Daughter took us to a quaint restaurant, FLEUR at stone's throw away from Moeraki Boulder, tucked away at an idyllic spot, surround on three sides by the sea.

The quaint interior of Fleur Place is very Kiwi and maritime for your liking. You can see in the photo posted , the renowed owner Fleur Sullivan, all gray, on the left , signing her latest book " FLEUR." At 70 plus she still makes her presence felt in her restaurant, going around "Hello" here and there, delighting Y S.

This the main door into the restaurant. Like the door of our "Kampong' (Village) toilet. But.. ....... when the door is opened, the crowd of lunchers (My own word for people who are lunching.) and wafts of the delicious food may make you berserk looking for your reservation. If you don't know about the place, you may not choose go in.


Sinfully delicious dessert to titillate your taste buds and shoot up your glucose level. But who cares ? You are on a vacation. (Anyway, whether you eat or not, the difference in your life span is only 2 hours.Terms and conditions applied.)

The green shell mussels in the big bowl are ultrally fresh. This is one of the few "Orang Putih" (White Man) cookings that is not that "buttery and cheesy." The flavoring is just enough and so the taste of the seafood is not robbed off like the Chinese "Kam Heong" frying where the taste of the seafood is simply robbed off by the flavoring. Y S' "Cod wrapped in bacon " was a real treat.
Better Half's "Seafood Chowder' is equally exquisite.

Finally, my ratings on the scale of 5 :-

Food : 5
Desserts : 4
Presentation : 3
Service : 5 (Delighted by the owner's personal presence.)
Ambiance : 3 (Furniture a bit old. Chair rickety. But then they are for rustic reasons.)
Toilet : 4
Cost : 4 ( If you don't convert! )

Thanks Dr Adeline for the treat.

....of what we did in N Zealand

With 20 over days to spend with your married daughter and her beloved hubby in a foreign land could be quite daunting. How to spend or kill time when the couple went to work ? Yours Sincerely (Y S ) does not like to be cooped up, and be "home alone."

You know what ? Daughter laboriously planned out an intensive, extensive and comprehensive 21-day itineraryon a spread sheet that covered eastern north and south island of New Zealand. Talking about killing time ??? And the days were just enjoyably stretched to the limits, taking advantage of the longer summer day light, and her impeccable, meticulous and proactive planning where everything was pre-booked : car rentals, hotels, resorts, restaurants, parks, tour packages, museums etc etc etc. You just cannot beat a Phd holder.

There are too many web sites describing amazing places in NZ, so Y S only wants to share his personal experience and from an aging father point of view the places and experiences.

A short drive away from Dunedin, Y S was taken to visit the Moeraki Boulders.

The Moeraki Boulders are a group of very large spherical “stones” on Koekohe Beach near Moeraki on New Zealand’s Otago coast. These boulders are actually concretions that have been exposed through shoreline erosion from coastal cliffs that back the beach.

They originally formed in ancient sea floor sediments around 60 million years ago

Some of the boulders weigh several tonnes and are up to 3 metres in diametre!

Maori legend tells that the boulders are remains of calabashes, kumaras and eel baskets that washed ashore after the legendary canoe, the Araiteuru was wrecked at nearby Shag Point (Matakaea).

The Britons have Stone Hench. The Kiwis have Moeraki Boulders. Geologically impressive. Some look like dinosaurs' eggs. Y S was impressed.