Maro-velous

Love is in the air .........

2011-09-08T01:33:00.001-07:00

We are getting married soon!!!
17th September 2011 its our special day.
We hope to share our moment of joy with friends and family!

Good Morning Vietnam!

2010-11-18T03:29:00.000-08:00

Vietnam - its such a peaceful place and its hard to believe it was a mess before. However, you still can see the leftover scars from the buildings, landscapes, cultural , on the face or even in their heart deep down inside are still suffering from the past.

We barely understand their livelihood , hence we took a local freelance guide tour us to his own country. He shows us the beautiful part of vietnamnese people and also show us the real livelihodd of their people. We appreciated so much , as he is not showing just the commercial tourism side of Vietnam.

Living along the river is a total different world than living along the sea like us. And this river are flowing pass across 6 countries from Mainland China, Maynmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and then Vietnam - the Mekong river. The name of Mekong river recall my secondary geographic lessons. And now Im standing here, and ride on a small boat cruising on Mekong river. Its hard to believe!

Floating market was a fascinating scene to us, its happen in early morning , people are selling from the boat. Cu Chi tunnel also eye opening to us, how people survive from war. We had little taste of gun fire in battle field and experinced crouching around the tunnel.

The most memorable things in Vietnam was the foods & drinks. Its was purely simple and tasty.
Vietnamnese coffee really blew Ian & Steven away! ( Im not a coffee person , no comment from me....) The Pho noodle and springroll ...our favorite! not to mentioned the Vietnamnese ABC....love it!! And the coconut ice cream! (sorry for being lost control , when talk about food )

Its such a short trip, but we are amazed by Vietnam - a small country just revealed to the outside world.

Walk a thousand miles

2010-03-04T18:37:00.000-08:00

LOMBOK - A place will overwhelming your memory with fascinating cliff over seasides, beaches, volcano mountain with mystery stories. Rich cultural of Sasak tribe are eye-opened experience. I still think Lombok is one of the romantic island!

This trip, we are here for the adventure trekking trip to volcano mountain -Rinjani (3726m). Its sounds crazy, but we want to see great view and had great experience other than Mt. Kinabalu which we had done several times.

Transit at Singapore and Bali, we managed to stop by our favorite food stall in Kuta town - "Warung Made". Had some crab and nasi campur.

Next early morning catch a local flight to LOMBOK ..its took about 1 hour from Bali .You actually can view Mt. Agung far from Lombok. From Lombok aerial view, we saw a few islands near by that must be the famous Gili islands, then the amazing shoreline view of Lombok island....we touch down Mataram Airport at Lombok with the 1st sight of Rinjani Mountain.

This beautiful island have unlimited coast line, coastal road link you from a place to another.....all the way with beautiful scenery over cliff and beaches until we arrive the hotel. We love the customer service of the hotel , its great service and fanstastic stay. Highly recommended for our friends who like to visit to Lombok.

http://www.quncivillas.com/hotel/opening.html

Local tour service is available book online or can arrange from hotel. We get a day tour around Lombok, visited to local market, Sasak village, and beach.

The following day, woke up in early morning, travel from hotel to the mountain base and register to park authority. Its a rather small and simple registration centre, cant compare with Kinabalu park at all.

We are getting excited about the trek to the top of Mt. Rinjani. Its a long way to go............... we started at about 8:20 am , the weather is perfect, clear sky, we can see the summit from the starting point. We pass from gravel road in the local farm, follow by savanna field and to the mountain area. Passed so many magma river, met a few mates who did the same like us.There are 2 porter follwing us, they carried all the stuff (food, camp, drink, firewood, cooking utensils, portable toilets,etc) and one young and experienced mountain guide lead us , his name is MACHO.

After 4 hours of walking, we finally stopped for lunch, its not pack lunch, but they took out everything and start cooking for us. They served us with hot cofee and tea, local fried rice and chicken...yum yum...! Bonus : we got time to take a nap before continue another 6 hours journey to the based camp.

At last, we are the last group to arrived to based camp. Overnight over the cliff side with beautiful summit view at left and lake view at right. However, strong wind kept us awake. The next day before sun rise, tried to get to summit even with strong wind. We didn't make it to summit, the narrow walk way and strong wind is not a good condition to climb up to summit said local tour guide. But we enjoy the best moment at the top!

The camping site with lake view, porter preparing breakfast for us.

Wildlife at Mt Rinjani.

The highest point we can reach, background is the summit of Mt. Rinjani.

Finally, a great afternoon nap even with the volcano eruption near by.....

Newly active volcano right in the middle of Mt. Rinjani ring mountain.

At night, we capture the magma fire from the volcano mouth.

Lake of Anak Segera with a legendary story of a princess.
Macho is fishing at the lake during sunset.

A satisfied and happy face after two days of adventure + challenging trekking.

we walked a thousand miles together..... : )

Sleepless city in Asia

2010-03-04T18:32:00.000-08:00

Sawadee ka!!

The common worlds you will hear from people in this sleepless city. People greet each other and street hawker food is everywhere. Sharpen your taste bud and get ready for some sweet & spicy foods (what I meant here, spicy food is really SPICY !!!)

There is so many layers and so many faces in this city, you must spend time to discover it layer by layer......some people just experience the best of Bangkok (Bar, Pub, food, entertainments, shopping.....) , but there are some other layer you might want to discover in Bangkok (slum area, poverty, historical places, mystery of Thai people, etc.....). A place rich of cultural.

Lets share some of our experience with you......

Suan Lum night market selling concept light for decoration. You can ask for discount in market, if you run out of cash, they do have money changer in the night market too. Shop till you drop....Floating market is very famous for local and tourist to trade for food and souvinier. We enjoy the noodle soup and coconut drinks.We went another open market - Chatuchak market, we love here because you can find all kind of stuffs, good, cheap and convinient. As normal, i can enjoy my shopping, whereas Scian can enjoy his food shopping (please see the picture below for explanation). I can't forget the coconut ice cream, its sooooooo delicious...must try!!

Hahahaha-- caught on scene

Most unique and oldest Chinese house in Bangkok city. Belongs to Course Director and convert it to a scuba training centre with a training pool. Our friend Poosak and family. Thanks for inviting us to visit his house and family.

Scenery of Palace before the thunder storm. To arrive this place, took us a long way and long story to tell you. Tips in the map : beware of tuk-tuk and people claim themselve government servants. We only saw this important tips after we experinced it...hahhahaha

Saxaphone bar - one of the recommended jazz bar in town. People are really enjoyed with the perfomances.....
Vertigo & Moon bar at roof-top of Bayan Tree Hotel. You can have the whole view of Bangkok city

http://www.banyantree.com/en/bangkok/dining/vertigo_and_moon_bar/

China town in Bangkok - seafood was great!

Scian + Ray = Scian Ray
So happy like a kids, becaue for the 1st time visited to aquarium. See things in a different way.

My close up with Sand tiger shark.

Wonderful people

2010-03-03T00:20:00.000-08:00

I'm thankful for the wonderful people in the world like you.

Beautiful faces are those that wear a friendly smile that say, “I care.”

Beautiful eyes are those that show,
the kindness and warmth that glows below.

Beautiful lips utter kindly words that
so the soul like the songs of birds.

Wonderful people touch and bless;
they inspire hope and happiness.

You will always be, wonderful to me.

Best Friend in Okayama

2009-09-27T00:05:00.000-07:00

The Goddess of the ocean have granted me a best friend from Okayama, we link to each other by the breeze of the sea, we dive together, we laugh and smile, although we are far apart and speaking in different language. But deep in our heart, we are best friend forever.....

Momotaro hometown - Okayama

2009-09-27T00:02:00.000-07:00

There is a famous Japanese legends about Momotaro (桃太郎) who born in Okayama. I read about this story when I was young , 10 years old. Now I really happy to visited to the origin place of this legends after 17 years, the legends still very popular in this town and became one of the attraction.

Let's story time......

ONCE upon a time there was an old man and his old wife living in the country in Japan. The old man was a woodcutter. He and his wife were very sad and lonely because they had no children.

One day the old man went into the mountains to cut firewood and the old woman went to the river to wash some clothes.

No sooner had the old woman begun her washing than she was very surprised to see a big peach come floating down the river. It was the biggest peach she'd ever seen in all her life. She pulled the peach out of the river and decided to take it home and give it to the old man for his supper that night.

Late in the afternoon the old man came home, and the old woman said to him: "Look what a wonderful peach I found for your supper." The old man said it was truly a beautiful peach. He was so hungry that he said: "Let's divide it and eat it right away."

So the old woman brought a big knife from the kitchen and was getting ready to cut the peach in half. But just then there was the sound of a human voice from inside the peach. "Wait! Don't cut me!" said the voice. Suddenly the peach split open, and a beautiful baby boy jumped out of the peach.

The old man and woman were astounded. But the baby said: "Don't be afraid. The God of Heaven saw how lonely you were without any children, so he sent me to be your son."

The old man and woman were very happy, and they took the baby to be their son. Since he was born from a peach, they named him Momotaro, which means Peach Boy. They loved Momotaro very much and raised him to be a fine boy.

When Momotaro was about fifteen years old, he went to his father and said: "Father, you have always been very kind to me. Now I am a big boy and I must do something to help my country. In a distant part of the sea there is an island named Ogre Island. Many wicked ogres live there, and they often come to our land and do bad things like carrying people away and stealing their things. So I'm going to go to Ogre Island and fight them and bring back the treasure which they have there. Please let me do this."

The old man was surprised to hear this, but he was also very proud of Momotaro for wanting to help other people. So he and the old woman helped Momotaro get ready for his journey to Ogre Island. The old man gave him a sword and armor, and the old woman fixed him a good lunch of millet dumplings. Then Momotaro began his journey, promising his parents that he would come back soon.

Momotaro went walking toward the sea. It was a long way. As he went along he met a spotted dog. The dog growled at Momotaro and was about to bite him, but then Momotaro gave him one of the dumplings. He told the spotted dog that he was going to fight the ogres on Ogre Island. So the dog said he'd go along too and help Momotaro.

Momotaro and the spotted dog kept on walking and soon they met a monkey. The spotted dog and the monkey started to have a fight. But Momotaro explained to the monkey that he and the spotted dog were going to fight the ogres on Ogre Island. Then the monkey asked if he couldn't go with them. So Momotaro gave the monkey a dumpling and let the monkey come with them.

Momotaro and the spotted dog and the monkey kept on walking. Suddenly they met a pheasant. The spotted dog and the monkey and the pheasant were about to start fighting. But when the pheasant heard that Momotaro was going to fight the ogres on Ogre Island, he asked if he could go too. So Momotaro gave the pheasant a dumpling and told him to come along.

So, with Momotaro as their general, the spotted dog and the monkey and the pheasant, who usually hated each other, all became good friends and followed Momotaro faithfully. They walked a long, long way, and finally reached the sea. At the edge of the sea Momotaro built a boat. They and all got in the boat and started across the sea toward Ogre Island.

When they came within sight of the island, they could see that the ogres had a very strong fort there. And there were many, many ogres. Some of them were red, some blue, and some black.

First the pheasant flew over the walls of the fort and began to peck at the ogres' heads. They all tried to hit the pheasant with their clubs, but he was very quick and dodged all their blows. And while the ogres weren't looking, the monkey slipped up and opened the gate of the fort. Then Momotaro and the spotted dog rushed into the fort and started fighting the ogres too.

It was a terrible battle! The pheasant pecked at the heads and eyes of the wicked ogres. And the monkey clawed at them. And the spotted dog bit them. And Momotaro cut them with his sword. At last the ogres were completely defeated. They all bowed down low before Momotaro and promised never to do wicked things again. Then they brought Momotaro all the treasure they had stored in the fort.

It was the most wonderful treasure you can imagine. There was much gold and silver and many precious jewels. There was an invisible coat and hat, arid a hammer that made a piece of gold every time you hit it on the ground, and many other wonderful things. Momotaro and his three helpers carried all this in their boat back to the land. Then they made a cart and put all the treasure in the cart and pulled it back to Momotaro's house.

How happy the old man and woman were when they saw their son return safely from Ogre IsIand! They were very rich now with all the treasure that Momotaro had brought, and they all lived together very, very, happily. http://www.japanippon.com/fairytales/momotaro.htm

There is a song about Momotaro too, I made Shoko sang to me:

« Momotarō-san no uta » 桃太郎さんの歌

Momotarō-san, momotarō-san

(Momotarō, Momotarō) 桃太郎さん、桃太郎さん

Okoshi ni tsuketa kibidango

(Those millet dumplings on your waist) お腰につけたきびだんご

Hitotsu watashi ni kudasai na?

(Won't you give me one?) 一つ私に下さいな！

Agemashō, agemashō

(I'll give you one, I'll give you one) あげましょう、あげましょう

Ima kara oni no seibatsu ni

(From now, on a quest to conquer the ogres) 今から鬼の征伐に

Tsuite kuru nara agemashou

(If you come with me, I'll give one to you) ついてくるならあげましょう

Fascinating Kyoto

2009-09-15T00:00:00.000-07:00

I continue my exploring in Tokyo with Akira & Utako. They stay in a lovely town - Kodaira, quite and convenient place to stay. Before continue our journey to Kyoto, I was invited to a dinner with friends, a 10th anniversary musical theater of " The Lion King", Tokyo view and DIY pottery. Each of these events is my 1st time experience, I felt so great never before!

The pottery I made....

Final product

Utako's pottery workshop & collections (sugoi ne!)

Wonderful dinner with friends (Ebihara & Eriko san)

The new version of fastest bullet train in Japan!

O-bento! Oishi ne!

Nijo Castle - where Ninja live last time.

Traditional desert famous in Kyoto

We went for site visit at Kyoto and Nara together with Shoko. Kyoto and Nara are old cities where the building is still very unique and most of it is listed in world heritage sites. In Kyoto, you will feel like the oldies Japan, the scenery of the temples is absolutely amazing although weather is really hot and humid. The best time to visit Kyoto is Autumn , where the leaf all turns to colours, you will be able to see the wonderful scene with colour background, plus the weather just nice for sight seeing.

Kinkakuji (Golden Pavilion)

Hot summer season must have one Matcha ice!!

Kyio-mizu temple on hill over see the Kyoto city

Kifune dinner with beautiful river scenery

Nara is most scenic with nature, and the atmosphere is more natural compared to Kyoto is more commercial for tourist. The famous mascot for Nara is Japanese deer (Sika), they are protected animal and walk around temple and street freely; most of the time they are very gentle animal, except when you want to feed them with deer's biscuit (Sika senbe) , they turn aggressive...beware!!

Summer holiday in Tokyo

2009-08-26T09:21:00.000-07:00

My apologies for late updates the blog, been busy after the "long summer vacation"........... Here definitely will tell you about stories from my summer vacations, thus its already months over, but the memories always fresh and real in my mind. An unforgettable & wonderful holiday!

Ok. Stop asking why summer vacation? Since that I'm staying in near to equator and having summer for 365 days a year back in my country. We actually don't really have a real summer, this only apply to countries with 4 seasons. To experience one, you need to go abroad. I just did, visited to Japan during summer season. Before the trip , heard from Japanese friends that summer in Japan can be very hot, much more hotter than here and ....in my mind: " how hot it can be? I'm used to have summer whole year round"

I'm so grateful this trip I can do so much, experience so much and see so much in Japan. In total of 2 weeks time to experience Japanese lifestyle. Landed in Narita Airport, the feeling was totally different because last time 1st came to Japan was winter season...landed in early morning, it was so cold out there. Met with Akira and Utako san , a lovely couple all the way came to airport welcome us and started become our tour guide in Japan throughout the whole weeks. Otosan & Okasan: Thank you so much! Arigatou gozaimasu! Great hospitality in Tokyo together with you both , Hideki chan & Fumiko chan, and Ebihara san and Eriko san. Also thanks to Aiko and Akira san, Yuka chan, Fumiko chan, and Keiko chan...lovely friends meet up in Tokyo. (Konbenasai Obata san, I really wanted to meet you, but not enough time to visit you in Nagoya. Hopefully next time!)

The Edo-Tokyo Museum (江戸東京博物館 Edo Tōkyō Hakubutsukan) is a museum of the history of Tokyo, established in 1993. The main features of the permanent exhibitions are the life-size replica of the Nihonbashi, which was the bridge leading into Edo. In the first Japanese history lesson, I start to understand the Japanese lifestyle and the systems actually develop in the early stage since Edo period. http://www.edo-tokyo-museum.or.jp/english/index.html

The first evening, we have dinner cruise in Tokyo Bay in a Japanese traditional style Yakatabune boat together with Hideki chan and Fumiko chan. The dinner serves with shashimi and tempura, free flow of alchohol beverage , big basket of snacks plus the wonderful nice scenery of Tokyo Bay. We pass over more than 8 bridges which I've forgot all the name. One of the famous one is Rainbow Bridge (レインボーブリッジ Reinbō Burijji) is a suspension bridge crossing northern Tokyo Bay between the Shibaura Wharf and the Odaiba waterfront development in Minato, Tokyo.Completed in 1993, the bridge spans 570 metres (1,870 ft).

After 2 hours eating and cruising on the boat, the table are still full with foods and drinks.....and as you can see from photo, Ian is still eating , hahhahahha! You will amaze what we have ate on the boat......shashimi, hotate, goby tempura, sweet pea and etc. It was an wonderful and amazing dinner!

Another full day of fun and joy in Tokyo Disney Sea.... we all turn to become child and enjoy the adventure and fulfill our dream to be in fantasy imagination world! Tokyo DisneySea (東京ディズニーシー Tōkyō Dizunīshī) is a 176 acre (712,246 m²) theme park at the Tokyo Disney Resort located in Urayasu ,Chiba,Japan, just outside of Tokyo. It opened on September 4,2001.Tokyo DisneySea has become one of the most popular Disney Parks in the world, attracting an estimated 12.4 million visitors in 2007. In 2008, it was the fifth-most visited theme park in the world at 12.5 million guests. There are seven uniquely themed areas or "ports of call". The entrance to the park is Mediterranean Harbor, which opens up to six more nautically themed ports: American Waterfront, Lost River Delta, Port Discovery, Mermaid Lagoon, Arabian Coast, and Mysterious Island. (Source:htt p://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokyo_DisneySea ) We spent the whole day and went around the parks and visited most of the attractions and get to play some of the games. This is because our Disney guides : Hideki and Fumiko chan who was running up and down to get us the fast pass for the famous attractions and games. We thanks to them so much! Ichi-ban guide!

We have short stay in one of the famous tourist attraction in Tokyo, Asakusa. Its close to Kaminari-mon, where you can buy souvenir and visit to temple. Food corner is all over the place. You can get food for 24 hours too. We love one of the food corner near to Asakusa station where they serves chilled Japanese beer and alcohol and hot grill foods (yakitori, porks, etc). There is a famous bar just across the street , Kamiya Bar (http://www.kamiya-bar.com/), always full house. The first time customer must try their famous "Electric Bran".Best recommendation from local, unfortunately we unable to get in there because its full house.
Its very convenient to get around Tokyo by subway. We do station hopping from Asakusa (浅草)to Akihabara the famous electronic town(秋葉原電気街 Akihabara Denki Gai), walked into the prime central of Tokyo with surrounding of skyscrapers, visited Imperial Palace (皇居 kōkyo). We enjoy various types of food along the way...shushi, ice-cream, ramen, etc..... Its highly recommended you should visit Japan at least once in your life......

There will be more blog about my next journey to Kyoto(京都),Nara (奈良) and Okayama (岡山市). Till then, hope you enjoy the reading, and start to plan your trip to Japan !

Bali surfing ~fun~ trip

2009-08-26T07:41:00.000-07:00

Bali known as Thousand God's Island because on the island is full of temple ... in every house, in a village, in a town and for the island. Religious and cultures still the strong influence among the society. Even the building height was restricted to not more than 4 floors.

Bali give me a very peaceful and relax feelings, all people dress in casual and walk around to enjoy the foods, beaches, sunshine, watersports, drinks, live music, shopping, reflexology,etc................so much you can do in Bali. You can plan for your own style or you can just follow any of the travel's plan. I love the motorbike ride around Kuta, although a bit scary (its because my driver's skill not so good ;p / the motorbike rider in Bali is so professional). Besides, I love the Balinese food, not too spicy but tasty, for example the Babi guling hohohoho ........ of cause the others like Balinese satay, Nasi campur, bakso....... and the ice tea is my favorite too, its just unbelievable! Well, not to mention of course the cultural dances, temple , arts, paintings, home deco and massage is wonderful and well known in Bali. Here end my story of my Bali trip........

Wait!........wait a minute....seem like I forgot the main highlight in this trip. My blog title is "Bali surfing ~fun~ trip", of course the highlight is the surfing part!

Surfing is the first experience for us, although we do a lots of diving sport, but surfing is a totally different sport for us. We sign up with Odysseys surf school to learn our first lesson, the school advertised "Guarantee standing up in first lesson", hohohohoh........
The surfing instructor named Site , he is a rather skinny but tough young guy from Indonesia, he patiently teach us, how to balance ourselves on the surfing board..... he pushed us toward the breaking waves, until he count: 1, 2, 3! Go! .......we have to try to stand on surf board and start to surf toward beach. Its just too fast ....before we are able to balance and stand on board, already reach the beach. Its not as easy as you think, before you really tried it! But its real fun, we got lots of fun shot by the cameraman from the surf school, just cost you about RM120 in DVD. Best memory and we get addicted to it, want to surf some more, by the time, you can feel the whole body just ache and muscle are tensed (for those are not often do exercise). We definitely be back for surfing again!

Description for Bali : A place highly recommended for travelers, a place for for romantic couples too, a place that I definitely will be back there again!Besakih temple at Mt. Agung , also known as "Mother Temple" - the largest temple of Bali island, attire rules to enter the temple with sarong,shirt and sash to show respect to the worship place for the Guardians. I got my songket to wrap myself, bought from open market.Warung Made is the famous Balinese food restaurant in town.

Always full house.
Food lovers must go!

Ready for surfing lesson....go and break the wave!
Open market with cheap sale of souvenir.

Shopping queen! (Like always)Romantic sunset of Seminyak beach Me and Scian with the beautiful Kecak dancers.

Photos mostly taken by Scian Ray.
Thanks!

Mabul Marine Week 2009 is coming!!

2009-07-10T19:38:00.001-07:00

18th - 25th July 2009 is the yearly event of Mabul, please find your way to participate this event and join us the environment cause to keep Mabul clean.Children of Mabul educate from young about environment cleanliness and conservation of Mabul
Healthy people should live in an healthy lifestyle and clean environment.
Come and join us in Mabul!

Belgium Vs Holland

2009-04-20T02:55:00.000-07:00

I started my own holiday journey in Holland. It was a cloudy day and got shower rain in the evening. There is no fixed plan for this holiday, just relax and go along with the flow........ I booked a hotel a month ago through online hotel promotion, reasonable price with good location where situated in Museumplain with 2 minites walking distance to tram station and Rijk Musuem, 3 mintues walking distance to Van Goh Museum, near to branding fashion shoplots. I got a single room in lower ground and facing to backyard, but the room is clean and tidy with internet access, Im statisfied with it. Im here for holiday, not gonna stuck in the room whole day. So grab a map, camera and winter cloths, time to look for excitement out there!!

I thinking of coming back to the Naturalis national natural history museum in Leiden. So I took a chance to visit there again by myself. Straight to the central station and took a ride to Leiden. Then can make a route from Leiden to Utrecht central station meet with Ingre and Nuno (friends from Netherlands) for dinner (Chinese cuisine)!

The Natural History Museum is a place to learn and inspired by the amazing art works of our Mighty God and intelligent of Homo sapien. I only have limited time to visit this place, hence choose some interesting topic, spent most of the time at animals and plant collections. This museum posses many world class scientist to analyze samples that collected and stored in here. And yet still many work need to be done by the scientist nowadays, continue field trips and collecting samples and anylzing data...... We visited collection room with special permit, its an library for another level of people who wish to study more.

Its a familiar picture in our biology text book.
Charles Darwin - Family tree.

The 1st real sample of Coco-de-mer I ever see.
I been told by a friend from Seychelles, its special in their country.
Source Wikipedia: The Coco de Mer (Lodoicea maldivica), the sole member of the genus Lodoicea, is a palm endemic to the islands of Praslin and Curieuse in the Seychelles. It formerly also occurred on St Pierre, Chauve-Souris and Ile Ronde (Praslin) in the Seychelles group but has become extinct on these islands.

Amazing corals collection display here...maybe just less than 5 % of their in house coral collection.

I kind of like this botanical display.....feel like in the forest.

Colorful butterfly reminds me form six biology assignment to catch insects.

Wonderful places will never missed by people who searching for it.......

Finally I found a gateway to a place called peaceful and lovely....Belgium, a neighboring country to Netherlands. To me, its also namely Chocolate heaven, because chocolate made from Belgium is so great .... taste good! The moment you put in to your mouth , its melted with the strong chocolate flavour.....emmm... yummy ! yummy! The happiest moment is to have instant made chocolate in front of me....

Beside chocolate, I love the buildings structure very much, always admiring those days architect was so smart and so artistic to build such a wonderful piece of art in this world. I spent most of the time in the Grand Place which people decribed as "the most beautiful square in Europe" located in very heart of Brussels and I went to St. Michael church and say a prayer there.

Sunday market? ! of course there is Sunday market all over Europe. Just similar to sunday market in Gaya Street. You will find a lots of cheap stuffs....flowers, food, cheese, cloths, electronic devices, CDs.......I enjoy the walk and love the flowers there.

Was my last nite in Netherlands....a night with silent good bye to the place I enjoy and wish to come back again ! To the Kingdom of Netherlnads - May your beauties remain and your mistery keep flowing like fountain....

Sister the sister

2009-03-31T00:15:00.000-07:00

The lovely cute sister i ever met! Fumiko and Keiko.....
They call themselve , chichai chichai sister

Happy birthday to Keiko san!

Wish you have a marvelous years to come!

Party at night - Allan and Rika

2009-03-09T07:38:00.000-07:00

I amsterdam

21 Feb 09
Kota Kinabalu was Sunny; hot ; humid. Soon I enter to an extra-ordinary situation. Spending day and night in airplane and airport in total about 22 hours. Feel like I being keep in a capsule for a long time, waiting to be release to another world. Can't really feel what happens outside, only the drastic changes can be notice when I open my eyes again in the next day. What I doing here in flight is eat sleep, eat sleep and eat (of cause there is a little bit of reading and movie).....

22 Feb 09
Altitude reading is dropping...looking out from the window, dark and nothing,......looking out again, passing through layers and layers of clouds, still cant see anything yet,..........looking to the far end, something there, dim orange yellowish clouds at the far end, its sun rising in the somewhere out there......somewhere the places I pass by just now, keep looking out to the window. And know what! I just witness a magic show with my naked eyes, the city street lights just appear and bright up the whole beautiful night scene from top. Woooahhh....this is Kingdom of Netherlands.

The moment stepped out from the Schipol International Airport, you got the real feelings of being in a winter time Kingdom of Netherlands, cold, windy, rainy.....just nothing like this in Malaysia.

The whole trip to Netherlands are invited by colleague in WWF-NL, Carel Drijver. So nice of him, personally come to airport in the early morning and bring us to check in hotel using his oldies volvo. He also got whole week plan for us.

Its feel like Venice with a lot of canals as you can see when you walk along the street in Amsterdam. Everything is nicely arranged here including the buildings, roads, houses, boats,.....

The most important mission to visit here is to see a thousands of tulips in front of me, I was worried that my dream couldn't be fulfill because the tulips season will be only started in the end of March. However, we able to found the tulips in floating flower market famous in town. MiSSion Accomplished!!!!
Food = cheese. People eat cheese everyday in every meals. Morning breakfast with cheese ham bronjes, Lunch with cheese ham bronjes, dinner can eat pizza or pasta or nacho with thick cheese (of cause a lots of people eat heavy meals during dinner) Its so easy to get around with public transport here, tram and bus or taxi are everywhere. The major transportation tools is bicycle, where you can see thousands of bicycle parking at the road side. The wired thing is almost all the bicycle are same model and same colour, very uniform.

Heineken beer is the local brewery famous in town. We got this in Malaysia too, but I think people back in my country like wild beer "Harimau" the most. Heineken in here just like reflection of "Harimau" back in Malaysia. Cheers to Heineken!

23 Feb 09
This is the 1st day visited to WWF-Netherlands office based in Zeist. You will impress with the building of WWF-NL. This is special design known as the most sustainable building, with a very special features and its an environmental friendly building with zero emission of CO2. Its not only naturally ventilated but also obtains its heat requirements from staff and equipment in the office while solar arrays provide electricity and hot water. A backup biomass system is also in place. All the lights in the building are install with automatic switch on and off by body heat sensor, means the light will automatic switch on if somebody enter the room, its save energy. WWF-NL have a lot of species protection programme world wide. How I wish I can bring back the giant panda (bigger than me, see the photo below).

24 Feb 09

A Sunny day, laid back day for preparation for tomorrow meeting. We managed to walk around Amsterdam in the afternoon. Looking for food and some entertainment and excitement (in middle of day) hahahahha

We found an interesting candy ~ a lollipop made from hemp. Taste like herbs...emmm..yum ..yum Hemp is made from flowering plant - Cannabis , for recreational use is outlawed in most countries. I even saw advertisement on tram, Hemp make the world different with shoe made from hemp, unbelievable!

The legendary Red Light District with a lots of sex shop, live show, prostitution everywhere and women are display behind a window. Its can describe as window shopping for women. Its like a sex heaven for guys! No surprise, there are a lot of gay pub too......

Dinner with one of our colleague from WWF-NL, Karin, she bring us to a pub call Harleem, nice and small shop, we definitely go for our beer Heineken and nacho with chicken and cheese....we ate as our dinner...that nite I am still fighting with my jet lag so badly, its was 8:30 pm in there, I almost felt asleep at the bar....so embarrassed. soon we head back to hotel and lay down on bed till next day morning ...

25 Feb 09

We heading to another city called Leiden, where the natural history museum Naturalis situated at. Meeting with Dr. Bert the coral expert in Netherlands, who will come over Semporna in next month for reconnaissance of Biodiversity expedition in the future. Dr. Bert bring us visited to the collection room for coral, invertebrate and fishes..... here you can find almost all species in the world, even some extinct species you can see here too. They preserve it nicely and studies the DNA and other related information can derived from the samples. I will write a bit more about Leiden and Naturalis in my next post, because I revisited Leiden and Naturalis in few days later. Its just so much to see.

26 Feb 09
We move to another hotel near to office in Zeist. Morning, we walk from hotel to office, took about 10 minutes. Today is a special day, we going to meet with all our donor for Semporna project. Some of them is my 1st time to meet them, so exciting!

Municipal building of Zeist just situated in front of the hotel we stayed. What a beautiful scene in the early morning.
Lunch prepared for the meeting with donors. Typical dutch lunch: bread, cheese, ham, salad, fruits, soup.......During lunch time, we didn't have proper lunch because we are presenting to them. So ended up we get so hungry at 4pm. Headed back to hotel and go to restaurant have nice dinner and beer....

Here I have another beer Wieckse and i love the cheese sticks so much......

27 Feb 09

Last day of working in Netherlands, Carel decided to bring us to his house and go try out the skiing.....woooahh! that will be interesting!

Its a rainy day, we trapped in a traffic jam so bad......

SO good experience to do skiing indoor . Can feel the cold and ice, of cause the fun of learning skiing is the best!

This is the skiing lane for higher level people who already master the skills, never mind, we decided to come back for this next time.....hahahhhahaha

Finally Carel bring us to his beautiful 17th century house, its a lovely house with garden. He decorated the house with a cozy feeling.

We have our supper with Carel talking about the things happened in a week, everything going well and thank Carel for arranging for us, this is a very meaningful trip and I learnt a lots from here. We look forward for more work interactions and hopefully good news from Semporna to the people in the Kingdom of Netherlands who cares about the people in Semporna. Till then, enjoy reading and wait for my next post about my next journey by my own....will share with you more interesting things i encountered along the journey.

Blog 1st Anniversary !!

2009-01-04T02:43:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday to Maro-Velous and Maro!!! They born on the same date 4 Jan.
Its took me a while to re-update my blog, my apologize due to my hectic schedule since my long holiday started (holiday sounds very free and easy, but this time is pack and fun).

I would like to share my photos took during my holiday with you all. Hope you enjoy it! Till then, happy diving !! my next update might be interesting ; ) cant wait!

2nd time birthday celebration ...does it means I am 2 years older for this year? ? ? OMG!

This is my birthday present from Allan , sugoii ne!

Allan forming bubble rings....

Tanjoobi Ometedou!

2009-01-03T02:42:00.000-08:00

Its your Birthday~ Happy Birthday Utako san!
Its a precious time to celebrate your birthday here on Mabul island.

With the blessing of family and friends

Birthday dive at Sipadan with thousands of Barracuda

We wearing our Sipadan uniform of the day

The models

Its fun and hurt by the heavy rain drops

New Year Eve Party ~ Jungle night

2009-01-02T02:39:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year !! Time flies.....now we come to the end of year 2008, the brand new year just knocking on your door. You will open the door with what kind of feeling? exicting ? happy? sad? curious? normal? No matter what you feel about it, you just have to face it and take the new coming challenge with your truthfull heart and believe that better things are waiting for you to go for it. So, I wish you a fruitful new year!

How I celebrate my new year? What a great new year dinner and party i attended in SWV resort, MABUL. Fresh idea and delicate arragements from staffs give all of us a wonderful and unforgetable celebration to welcoming the brand new year! Theme for this year is Jungle night. The event venue was decorated like a jungle with wall painting, trees, leaves, animals .....plus the sound of jungle. Party start rite after the dinner, with several performances, games and dances....people are high and enjoy so much!

Dinner table set in the Jungle

Akira san enjoy the jungle dinner

Delicious ~

Golden man ... i must touch the gold man ...
so that next year i will have a prosperous year to come!

Staff performance the legenary dance - Ocho ocho

Allan and the golden man .
Did u notice something wrong with the golden man?

Andy and Ron is the video and camera personnel of that night

Tomato dance - Akira & Utako's favorite dance

Game : big shoe wearing by many people

Im also enjoy the show and taking photos of fun moments

Jungle King - Jimmy !

Jungle ladies - Shoko, Nina, Abigail.

The winner of the night - yeahh!!! Yellow team!

Red team won the second prize! Not bad ohh!

Mabul.Si Amil.Silam.Turtle Tomb

2008-12-31T23:03:00.000-08:00

Third part of my holiday was spent with friends and friends and friends .....after the Christmas, heading back to Semporna for a series of dive trips, because Im gonna soak myself in saltwater for the rest of my holiday!!! Yeehhh hahhh!

1st quarter : Back to my second home - Mabul island for a 2 day trip with Scian Ray, and meet up with my Otoosan(Akira), Okaasan(Utako) & Oneesan(Shoko). Finally we meet again, since 1 1/2 years ago 4 of us gather in here. Shaishiburi !! In between, this trip is the 1st trial of Scian's brand new Ikelite housing n Olympus DSLR cam in saltwater.... We do some ritual ceremony to the cam and bring it down to P1. Obviously the 1st dive got problem with the setting, Scian got fade up he cant shot the favorite ghostpipefish and Imperial partner shrimp. Advice for those newly cam, pls do trial before proceed for the boat dive, you have to get use to the new cam, setting, position, bouyancy and etc.....the cam doesn't work well in the beginning is normal, try to fix the problem and get used with the cam...then you can really enjoy the underwater photography. Well, finally the second dive at Maki Point, cam was doing great....pheewww!

We spent great dinner together and drinking session at bar
and shoko dancing practice....so much fun and laughter .......

My sister Shoko, been a while I have not meet her
since the last few days before I moved out from SWV 2007.
Really miss her so much! And finally we meet again in SWV.

OMG! look at that! I eat more than Scian....
no wonder Im fat and got tummy nw :p
Cannot like this anymore...diet! diet! diet!
start next year lar...hehehhehe

~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~

2nd quarter: Depart from Mabul in a cloudy n windy morning to Si Amil island. Wake up early...actually didn't sleep lar...blame the cup of tea after dinner and the Christmas tree. But I awake for the whole day, so energetic because to dive in Si Amil and guided by Allan ~_~

The 1st dive at Si Amil and 2nd dive at Denawan was fantastic with so many fascinating marco such as pygmy seahorse, leaf fish, orang utan crab, bubble coral shrimp, nudibranch, crab-eye goby, purple eye goby, etc....plus the vis is good and water a bit cold.... After 1st dive, we landed Si Amil island 1st beach, nice and clean beach with blue sky and clear water....just like heaven!

Surface Interval stunning monkey action

is the symptom of narcosis....eh?

hw come boatman also got narcosis leh? ?

Scian was already knock down

by the non-stop diving schedule in 2 days....
how can he survive for few more days?

Oh ....Between, I forgot to mention that I actually found a brand new ikelite housing with Olympus DSLR cam underwater in Si Amil...huhuhuhu...so lucky me! ; p I own it for a few minutes lar, then I kindly return to the owner, if not ahh, the owner will CRY ohhh!

~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ .~

3rd quarter: I granted a special dive visa hopping from Semporna District to Lahad Datu District, been seeing the nice picture and heard about the legend of Silam Bay for so long. from Allister, Steven and Chris. Now I about to dive in the legendary sites....dive at wreck and Qi Qi house reefs. Not only these, are special because dive with a group of divers which all using powerful underwater camera !! Again, my cam is the smallest one plus already low batt before entry to water. Poor me!

The 'Ocean 7' heading to LD wreck (dint get the name of the wreck,
perhaps Steven can help with this) for treasure hunt!

Chris like Greoge Clooney in the movie....leading the team.
Look carefully, he look like Greoge Clooney!

OMG! Greoge in the town!

Here is the team, Greoge, Matt and Brad Pitt with their Ikelite toys!

When arrived to the site, the wreck can clearly see from the surface, with the highest point just about few metre from the surface, and the deepest part is about 25 m according to local DM - Steve. Total length from the bow to stern is about 150 m. Vis is not that great plus low sunlight density, hence low density of light penetration to the bottom. I cant get the full view of the wreck but only a few quick snap of the stucture and I playing with creative lighting to create a refractions underwater as I learnt from Mauricio. The result was not good, but happy to share with you its turn out like an abstract picture and look like a seahorse!

The second dive in Qi Qi house reefs was awe-inspiring to me.... the complexity of reefs structure in Qi Qi house reefs so amazing and the this mini MPA as good example to the surrounding reefs. Steve told me can see school of Pajama cardinalfish, he said really "man ba" (Hakka) means full of cardinalfish everywhere. Its proven as soon as I enter to water... I can see it from surface...."man ba" cardinalfish. Beside the cardinalfish, gobies everywhere too...yellow shrimp goby, smilling goby, rayed shrimp goby, Banded shrimp goby, flagtail goby.... just like gobies heaven.....I spent most of the time at shallow , enjoy my favorite view of the schooling cardinalfishes around the staghorn coral at shallow...with a bit of sunlight ....so beautiful and breathtaking scene, unfortunately without my camera :( and I shall return !

We have exciting boat ride during strong wind and heavy rain back to jetty. Before landed on the jetty, Ken was shouting to the restaurant staffs immediately prepare hot milo !! hot milo!!

Uploaded stuffs, refreshed up and start BBQ. Food and drinks are the essential goods after dives and exciting ride.

These three people ahh...Non-stop eating only

But pity these three people hard work to do the job.These three people lagi teruk ohh....curi tulang only!

Talk in secret but laughed out loud!

BBQ of fish and squids + Lime

+ Chili = delicious

~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~

4th quarter: Night dive at turtle tumb, enjoying the night hang out together and meet up with The Master : Allister and Josey. The aquanerds members so sweet to celebrate birthday for Scian and my early birthday too... thanks for Steven arranging the delicious blueberry cheese cake and thanks to Allister n Josey the wonderful n cute birthday present, thanks Allister for a n old man birthday advices.... thanks for the suprise and early Birthday celebration! THanks guys! Im so happy to have you all to celebrate with me ....

With Allister da Bee, how could we not laugh our's head off!

Happy birthday to birthday boy (30th Dec) & birthday gal (4th Jan) .

~ Part 3 The End ~

Peaceful Christmas

2008-12-26T02:15:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas!

Its the way to greet people.....

Peaceful Christmas

Its the one I granted for this year.....

People are busy as usual for Christmas shopping, partying, cooking for great dinner...... Im spending great time relaxing at home with family. Its seem like long long time ago I never been like this before.

When you stop and look around you....what are people doing in this precious moment once in a year? are they spend the time and money worthly and wisely? are they realise the true meaning of Christmas ?
Unfortunately the cruel answer is more than 90% is not!

I been spending Christmas for the past 20 years in a different kinds of feelings. Some of its, already fade in my memories... but some of its are remains deeply in memories. This year Christmas make me more appreciate the moment spend with my family. Please cherish your family as the Mighty and Mercy God loves you unconditionally...

Mabul Reunion 2008

2008-12-25T03:20:00.000-08:00

Gathering of old friends in Mabul Island make a splash for the friendship forever!!

Enjoy the show!

Members in the trip: Lee, Diana, Jay, Nina, Vienna, Helena, Tan Kai Lee, Amy, Miki, Yuka, Akiko, Abdul Shukor, Charles, Lynette, Aaron, Alex, Allan, Jimmy, Bobby, Ron, Rika, Andy, Froilan, Ramil, Abigail, Azean, Aw Soo Ling................

Just Married

2008-12-13T01:26:00.000-08:00

Best Friend's Wedding ~ Yeong Yih & Lee Yun

Congratulation!
You're a wonderful couple joined by God
May your marriage be blessed in God's Love!

New look in a coming new year

2008-11-28T21:30:00.000-08:00

Been a while keeping my long hair diving , sometimes just thaught about to cut it. Spending time in KK for a week and plus greeting seasons is coming, just about the right time to change my hairstyle. So go ahead and just do it.

How you like my new hair style ?

Unbelievable Trip with Mauricio Handler

2008-11-28T19:30:00.000-08:00

Early in the morning, 4 am..... stars and moon stil shinning on the dark sky, fishermen are paddle out to the sea searching for their income and food for family. We are struggling to get out from our comfort bed. But when we are about to experience this extraordinary trip and get excited to have good weather for the day(This how my skin get suntanned - all thanks to the good weather) , we feel never the best before!

We moving out to the sea follow the path of the fishermen by the "fishy smell" all the way to their fishing grounds. We were just in time to catch the sunrise with the fishermen working on ground. Fishermen are doing their hard work to get the catch of the day and hope for their luck every moment...... we can see all the happy, ego, satisfy, disappointed, hope, curious, excitement faces here.

We able to dive in one of the Fish Aggregation Device (FAD) , witht a tuna weight more than 70 kg, getting the underwater shoots.... so amazing when I saw the picture me and tuna took by Mauricio.

I must be the most lucky gal in the world, who are able to learn from the pro. Even just a 2 days trip to the fishing grounds and local villages in Semporna. Learnt a lots from the Pro. Thanks to Mauricio, a great photography buddy and buddy for searching the meaning of life out in middle of nowhere on the earth.
This is how you ended up when you not enough sleep and have to woke up in the early morning doing work - totally collapsed x_x

The following next day we traveling to another remote island - Denawan......visited to local Bajau sea gypsies village. Meeting friends, knowing their lifestyle, eating the local food......

Joe, Mauricio and Alex also enjoy the trip with drinking coconut.

Time Machine - back to 80's

2008-11-21T07:35:00.000-08:00

I never believe what happen to me this morning, I was ride on a time machine in about 1 hour, back to 80's and leave me an awesome memory. Although I like watching fantacy movies like Back to the future, but never come across to it, so real. ......
Was rushing to find a taxi to Tawau Airport, get on a cab and started my journey to 80's.
The 1st feeling when i get on to the taxi : ohhh...this is something different in 21st century. Oldies Mercedes Benz, white body, inner maroon leather seats , an old taxi driver with more than 30 years experience. I can imagine those days will only the wealthy people are affordable to ride on this taxi.

On the way to airport, I was reading a magazine about the deforestation in Borneo...is the area where exactly I am now!! Its so sad to know the fact of huge dense virgin forest are turn down to oil palm plantation. Illegal and unsustainable logging with the lowland development is the main cause for loss of wildlife habitat.

I was looking outside to the window, all is oil palm along the way to airport. Even I ride on the time machine, but unfortunately cant bring back the original view along the road side. How I wish this time machine really works and bring me back to 80's. Perhaps, when I look out from the window, I can see dense forest with wildlife passing the road, Pygmy elephant, wild boar, deer, etc. If, I can, I will stop them before its too late...... If I can, I will protect it as much as I can..... If human know how to predict the future.....If human can go backward in time and change the history......If......

Trip to Semporna from the WWF Chairmen Visit

2008-11-05T01:36:00.000-08:00

Our Semporna team are pleased to accommodated the WWF chairmen and CEO from all over the Asia. The trip started to show them the impacted coral reefs by the dynamite fishing in this region, secondly show them the challenges of people to find the alternative livelihood and struggling to survive for most of the stateless people who live here for few generations.

We stay overnight at Borneo Divers Mabul Resort, they serve us with BBQ along the swimming pool on the 1st night. Presentation and discussion of the Sulu-Sulawesi Marine Ecoregion as the Apex of Coral Triangle by Dr. Annadel and Coral Triangle by Lida in the evening. This is the high ranking people discussion on the vision of the conservation for the nature and what WWF can do to play an important role in achieving our goals and objectives.

So close to the world class famous dive site - Sipadan. Of course visited to Sipadan for snorkeling and diving. In addition visit to the turtle hatchery site on Sipadan Island. I was so lucky to be able to go along with these high ranking people, and I learnt a lot from them. Hope in the future, I can be 10% like them will be good enough. hahahahhaha

This also my 1st time to met our CEO of WWF-Malaysia... Datuk Dr. Dinosyius. We are pirates of Coral Triangle. hahahahahah

A day in Mabul

2008-10-30T04:00:00.000-07:00

As I said, Mabul is another home for me. Im happy to back there for family reunion with my mummy instructor and cute Melanie.

Diving at Paradise 1 with Mel and Lynette , and...... Uncle Alex. We enjoy it very much as same as the 1st time we dive together at the same site. This time, Mel and I doing bubble ring practice underwater while Mummy n Uncle Alex was busy with taking photos. We saw seahorse, giant turtle, pipehorse, baby lion fish, rainbow runner, giant frogfish, cleaner shirmp.......

Mel bought a Manta soft toy, she is collecting marine creatures soft toy , buy one of the soft toy each time she come to Mabul. I wish to do that too....hehehe collection of soft toy. Well, I can recall i had big mashi maro, big puppy, set of mashi maro, bunny, bear, dolphin, pooh,.......

I was just sad to leave them again..... and back to my work. Miss you so much Mel ! Hope we can dive again together in Si Amil and Sipadan.

KL - Programme Standard Training

2008-10-28T00:17:00.000-07:00

We plan for the planet!

Team from Sabah : Rashidah, Kertijah, Irwansha, Julia, Max, Ito and Shan Khee.

Kuala Lumpur - a busy metropolitan city with lots of skyscrapers, infrastructures, peoples, transportations, restaurants, hotels, shopping malls...... there is good things and bad things to live in such a busy place. For me, you will hate it and you will love it in some point.

Few of us was assign to attend a training in PJ office for 3 days. On the arriving day, we already felt the traffic jam from airport to hotel. Transportation in KL sometimes you will feel so convenient, but sometimes you will get headache about it. LRT perhaps is the cheapest way to go around KL, but you need to be more aggressive when during the peak hours. I mean aggressive !! hahahaha. Well, people might think peak hours why dont just hop on to taxi. Its worse! ! Its hard to find a good and ethic taxi driver around town...... sorry for misjudge some other friendly and ethic taxi driver. We facing the problem with taxi driver almost everyday ...funny story that my friend experienced was the taxi driver ask for RM10 to issue the receipt to my friend, where the taxi fare just RM3. Ridiculous!!!

Well, as i said you will love it because in KL you will easily find all kinds of restaurant, delicious foods, from cheap street stall to the most expensive restaurants. We stayed Cititel in Midvalley. So much convenient for us to find food and shopping.

One of the street art decoration at KLCC which I impressed with - Soft drink can wall.

Discovery Si Amil

2008-10-09T19:37:00.000-07:00

Si Amil island (4º 18’ 33.83” N 118º 52’ 08.99” E) situated south east or Semporna town, about 45 minutes boat ride from Semporna. Beutiful beaches, clear water, blue sky and historical settlement from ancient Japanese sardine factory. Nowadays, Si Amil island only have Army based there and monkey live on the hills. Diving in Si Amil now is promoted to enhance the protection of this wonderful reefs.

Divers will always rest on the white sandy beach during surface interval, with providing nice food and fantastic sea view. You are in Paradise on earth!
Visitors of Si Amil island leave a signature on this memories board at Jetty.
Turtle carcass found at Si Amil beach, suspected dead cause by boat's propeller.
Wohhh! monkey on tree watching over you. BEWARE! You are now enter to monkey territory.
Latern flower with bright yellow colour is very fascinating for taking photo.

This is ancient settlement build since 1934 with the Japanese name on the sign.

Living life in the jungle will impress you.

This is the steep hill we need to climbed up to the top of light house. Although, short distance, its really a challenging exercise for us.
Top of the light house you can see the great view of Semporna islands... When i was up there, i was stunned by the breathtaking view of the whole Ligitan reef. Its so unbelievable i was witness this beautiful view with my own eyes. Its definetely worthwhile to go up there even so exhausted.

This is not funny, we have gone thru a steep hill up to the tower, after that, there is another steep hill go down to the beach side....a single miss-step, you will be down there in few seconds. hahahaha
We follow along the coastline and reach to the cave entrance.
Inside the cave its size like a small room, there is one smaller entrance tunnel to another smaller cave , from the smaller cave, there is another smallest tunnel to another smallest cave .....all the way went in to the smallest cave. The finding is we all come out with a vey muddy and dusty faces but very happy and excited with the adventure trip.
At last, we all manage to take a fresh well water shower at Army based.
The well water so fresh and cool to freshen up our tiring and adventure trip.

We leave Si Amil island with a good memories, we might be back again for another cave discovery adventure trip. Here is another potential tourism attraction site in the future and waiting to be discovered. Nature + historical + tourist = money $$$ !!!! can you see that! So please protect it, as we protect our pocket!

Is-land hop-ping

2008-10-08T07:20:00.000-07:00

Round trip Semporna Islands give me a deep insight about the richness of seascapes.

Normally we do visiting islands and do diving , but this trip is totally different. Spending more time on surface and discovering islands around Semporna - Timbun Mata, Sibuan, Selakan, Matabuan, Pom-pom, Pandanan, Mataking, Timba-timba, Boheyan, Si Amil, Kapalai, Mabul, Roach Reef........

Beautiful weather just perfect the shootout and getting nice sun tanning. : )

Timba-timba island seascape have a similar sand bar with Mataking island.

Footsteps on soft and white sandy beach on Pandanan Island.

Professional in work.....sshhhh ....do not disturb

I like this picture, because its not only show the beautiful seascapes, but also reflect the hardwork of those professional work under sun to get a good piece of art.

Struggling to live - a lesson learnt from mother nature.

Semporna is a place where you can find a lot of people living on water village, its a basic living concept. Nowadays, resort adopt the concept and motified to a luxury water bungalow resort that you will stay with. Beside water village, people also living on boat - nomadic Bajau laut (Seagypsies), or living on land with a simple hut.

A nice view of coconut island....Sibuan
Innocence kids in Sibuan , they don't know what's happen in the world out there. Maybe they didn't even bother, or maybe they don't need to know about it.

A piece of art from the nature....so nature without a fancy decoration.

Second respectively huge Giant clam i ever see in my life beside the live one in Sipadan. Its too sad, already harvested out from the sea.

Pearl farming is also part of the mariculture activities in Semporna besides fish and prawn.
Floating bagang that introduced from Indonesia. View from far look like a pirates ghost ship!

2008-10-02T01:51:00.000-07:00

29 September 2008 (1st of September in chinese calender)

5:07 am A baby boy was born in Keningau Hospital.

My sister new born baby named Oswald Chong Minn Kee.

Im upgraded to aunty level already! hahahaha

I hope bb Oswald will be healthy and growth fast.

2008-09-24T23:05:00.000-07:00

God didn't promise days without pain.

Laughter without sorrow,

Sun without rain.

But He did promise strength for the day,

Comfort for the tears,

And light for the way...

海洋の海、浜および空

2008-09-24T19:35:00.000-07:00

私は子供以来の海を愛する

海岸で私は感じる従って平和緩めれば

私は神に、私海岸に住みたい祈る

神は私の祈りを聞いた

高等学校では、私の寄宿学校はKKの海岸に近い.Tg. Aru 浜, 歩き、日没の眺めを楽しむ場所.それ以来、私は日没を愛する

その後、また海岸に置かれる私の大学

私は海洋科学のコースで受け入れた

一日一日と、私は海との親密な関係を有する.私は卒業生の後で海の深い理解を有する

私の最初仕事は美しい島MabulのDivemasterで. ここからたくさん学んだ,たくさん見た....私は人々からたくさん会った, 彼らは私の友人、家族で

多くのまた現在の新しい仕事海洋を救うことの直接努力.私は海を維持し、保護すること私の最もよい試みる

これは海へ私の情熱で

PADI Project AWARE - International Clean Up Day 20th Sept 2008

2008-09-22T22:54:00.000-07:00

Pom-Pom island is a newly developed island for diving tourism in Semporna. Situated at South-East of Semporna town about 45 minutes boat ride. Currently 2 resorts operating on the island (Pompng Island Resort and Sipadan Pom-Pom Island Resort).You might not heard about this name before, nevermind.....will briefly let you know about the unique of this island thru our Project AWARE clean up trip at Pompong Island Resort from 19-21 September 2008.

A group of passionate divers were sign up for a meaningful weekend diving trip co-organized by WWF-Malaysia & Wonderful Water Diving Services. Embark from Semporna jetty, most of us never been there before except Deadrie was there last week. Everybody was excited to see and experience the new diving environment and boutique style facilities on Pompong island.

I like the cozy feel of the resort and its isolated. We felt like charted the whole resort for this activity. The diving schedule is very flexible up to us….. we started our 1st dive at Pom-pom island in house reef. Its a slope area down to 40 m ... there are a few artificial reefs sitting on the sand slope bottom. The artificial reefs was set up in few months back, immediately result in aggregation of fishes for shelter such as grouper, batfish, snapper..... besides, artificial reef also serves as the house or substrate for invertebrate (featherstar, hermit crab, nudibranchs, etc), coral and sponges to growth. We visited other dive site such as a site in Kapikan Reef, was a great site for macro, Magic Rock and others. We saw fascinating macro such as leaf fish, frogfish, nudibranch, Mabul dottyback, jawfish, organ utan crab, bubble coral shrimp, mandarin fish, and also huge green and hawksbill turtle.

I must say the food is very tasty and healthy lar, i love the soup very much ...much more better than some of the resort in Semporna. Everyday we had 5 meals per day...... started with light breakfast which is the baked bread and egg. Then after 1st dive, you can have your breakfast. Lunch is good before get a short neap. After the last dive of the day, they serve you bubur cha-cha (deserts).....free and easy activities such as kayak and walk on beautiful beach....after a sunset drink the dinner is served.

The contemporary blended with the natural feel of the resort make you so comfy ..... Lay down on the sofa you will immediately fall asleep with the gentle sea breeze..... plus the relaxing music, just perfect!

Clean Up Day is set on 20th Sept 2008.

We done the underwater clean up 1st before we started the beach clean up. The challenging things we encountered was the current underwater while taking a group photos. There were people hovering, and people grab on the rock to stablize themselve and post to the camera......we ended up with a very funny group photo underwater....hahaha...what a experience. While during the clean up underwater, current is less and ease the divers for picking up the trash unserwater. We collected some funny stuffs underwater such as LV leather handbag, school shoes, napkins.....

Beach clean up was carried out after a short break, we covered beach area in front of the resort. We tried our best to clean the beach within 1 hour, and collected about 15 bags of rubbish mainly consists of plastic bottle and food wrapping and container.

Every participants received a highest appreciation from PADI Project AWARE and the organizers (WWF & WWD) with a certificate and event T-shirt. The mission accomplished for this year, we hope to have organize more even for more participations of local divers! Till then, happy diving!

17-21 December Mabul Reunion Trip

2008-09-15T20:15:00.000-07:00

Great news and update to all of you!
The Mabul Reunion Trip is confirmed on 17-21 December at SWV Resort.
Arrival date on 17 Dec: Flight schedule is MH2121 7:00-7:45 am BKI-TWU.
Departure date on 21 Dec: Flight schedule is AK5834 10:45-11:30 am TWU-BKI.
Member confirm will come included our belove Instructor Lynette Yee, ex-DM :Lee, Jay, Diana, Nina, eX-staff: Vienna, Helena, staff: Amy and our guest / bestfriend from Japan :Yuka chan.

All are welcome! We will have a great time there! Cheers!

2008-09-15T09:16:00.000-07:00

A day of silent, a day of rest.

A day of hardwork, a day of efforts.

.............................................

Sitting in a coffee shop, enjoy a ice blended coffee and blackforest cake....while waiting for the next plane to take off. Is this gonna be my regular lifestyle? or just a temporary.

Time pass by , I dint have time to realize

I was traveling too much here and there

Can I have a short time, just a very short time for myself to think ...what have i achieve so far?

Tioman

2008-09-14T23:19:00.000-07:00

Wherever I go.....sunset will be the great thing i enjoy the most!
Its kind of different feel to see sunset at Mabul , Tg. ArU or Tioman.

Tioman island was my 1st visit of West Malaysia Island. It was much more bigger than I imagine. Hehehe....

Flying off to Tioman by Berjaya Air....(expensive oohhh!) But much more convinient than travel down to Johor - take ferry from Mersing. Recomended for light traveller can take the ferry route.

I was accepted to a Coral Reef CSI training in Tioman.

We based in Paya Beach Resort. Nice and wonderful beach resort. I learned so much in this training, meet with so many important people who work in coral reef conservation from various agency and different countries.

Sunset bar of course not out of my sight too. Tshing Dao Beer its the favorite there..... Duty free area how can i resist the attraction of alcohol..... just one or two bottle only lar for the whole week. Im not alcoholic bah!

Enjoy the choco frenzy too........yum yum!
Training ended very fast in a week. Its time to get back to Sabah , Semporna ....there is another trip waiting for me.

Visit to World Heritage Site - Melacca

2008-09-08T08:25:00.000-07:00

A wonderful day for wonderful visit to a state which full of historical places.

It was a area of where the Baba nyonya was born.....was a busiest port and business centre in last decade. Melacca strait is famous for the international shipping route for British, China, Hong Kong, Portugal, Nertheland....... hence, you can find the building, cultural, food or generation from these countries who visited Melacca.

So many interesting places i visited. Nice food, colorful building, a very busy town, full with historical path, which is the ideal place for me to visit. People everywhere, due to the public holiday.

Holding my 450D capture every single moment of the beautiful town. Can't resist to visit all the places, although we walk for quite a distance (from afternoon to evening).

Thanks so much to my friend, volunteer tour guide and model. hahahaha...... Its boring to take only building without a model. Wai Ken is old friend in Uni Japanese class. Hakka tour guide is very hard to find ohhh...

2008-08-31T19:26:00.000-07:00

Holiday escape to Mabul & Sipadan - diving paradise

Was able to get a few day holiday just before the training trip to Tioman. This time so meaningful because was able to diving with my parent from Japan and a friends group leaded by Taguichi san....

We dive in several places included Yoshi Point, Kapalai and Sipadan.

Great diving was obviously in Sipadan on the last day. We start the morning dive at Barracuda Point with a warmest welcome by the school of Bumphead Parrotfish which we were expecting to see them, a school of Batfish, we are surrounding by Jacks! a medium current drifted us to meet with the school of Barracuda which coming up from the deep to form a soldier team. After passing the school of Barracuda, because the current was getting stronger, we drift to the platform where sharks resting place. We was amazed by the schooling whitetip shark hunting with a few treavally and big guy (grey reef shark) also. I tried to stay longer to able to get a short video by the tiny camera of the hunting behavior of sharks. But unfortunately current picking up, and we have to move..... that scene is my 1st time I see. I would say the dive is amazing, fanstastic!

Resting on Sipadan sounds like a hundreds years ago for me......I haven't been there for a loooooooooong time. There is slightly changes that i noticed, the old building was demolised. But the sand still as white as i know, the sky still as blue as i remember, the people still as nice as i met before. You know, sometimes people thaught the environment has change as time pass by, but its might be just illusion, the fact is the people themselve does changes. . . . . . . Back to the dive, we were greet by the old friend with the whole family in Staghorn Crest - Turtles. We actually planned to go South Point, but the current way changed, so we heading to Staghorn Crest. Turtles is everywhere, up on your top, look down another turtle, turn left there is a few more swimming out, turn right they are hanging and sleeping on coral trees, dont forget to look infront, they will bump in to your face......Turtle frenzy!

Afternoon dive, we head back to Sipadan, bussshhhhh!!! into the sea......Drop off is last site we visit. The mistery of turtle tomb still remained. Fears and respect is the feeling for people passing the cave. This dive, we were concentrated to look for our "Target" - Purple fire goby, Sailfin Goby and dancing goby. Mission complete!! we spend time in shallow end at beginning of Barracuda Point with the schooling Jacks and out of the blue just behind the schooling Jacks a swriling shadow....its BARRACUDA!! we swim out to blue enjoy the swriling barracuda under the sun. It was a best day ever...... we started and ended with schooling Jacks and Barracuda. Seem like the Jacks and Barracuda, all folks in Sipadan just gave us a warm welcome and farewell party!

A tiny winy piccolo painted frogfish Ron (DM) found !! Amazing rite?!

This funny grouper have a cute behavior, im taking photo of her, she was curious and come straight toward the camera....a several times. I was playing with her in couple minutes.
we dive in P2. Found Shoko's baby coral planted last year August. Its been a year already. Baby coral still healthy and growth! Although its broke, but now growth back. Its about 5cm height and 6 cm circumference. Hope its will growth bigger next time i come to visit again.

Celebrating Kado san 300 dives in SWV! Ometedo gozaimasu !
I fall in love with the sunset here..........
My favorite shoot ! : ) lovely couple i ever met!
Enjoy the sunset after dive its my favorite hobby. Akira and Utako too. We love the sunset in Mabul. Just so romantic and always keep my heart warm and sweet. I got a favorite shoot just want to share with everyone. Hope you like it : )

The day we leaving, was raining. Seem like the nature also being sad of our leaving. For sure, we will be back again! Akira n Utako will be back soon in New Year time. We also looking forward to it with the acompany of SHOKO next trip.

See you again! Matane!

We embark flight from Tawau to Kota Kinabalu International Airport and transit to Kuala Lumpur International Airport. From here on, I have to say Good Bye to my dear parent and friends. They will have to transit to Narita Japan. Wish them have a safe journey and hope to see them again!

Tired but happy !

And again, Im continue my journey.....

Kudat - the best!

2008-08-29T10:22:00.000-07:00

Im return to visit Kudat again since last few month i went up to Kudat for training and survey.

I love the small town. Easy to meet with people, easy to get around and always find some nice and simple food.
There is a shop sale nice breakfast with pork......we love it so much! However, what i want to say is the shop actually no name.....we called it No name shop. Funny! We also found out there is actually nice breakfast on the 1st Floor of centre Market. Fried noodles with pork ....oso.

Now, new concept of Kopitiam have arrived in Kudat.....they got brilliant ideal and good location for business. How about Semporna!!?? Im looking forward to it!

This time the work is easy....just to get film while doing the survey of Humphead Wrasse. ABC TV crew - Mark , Keith and Steve were very nice person. However, underwater shooting all done by Simon from Scubazoo. I impressed with their proffesionalism in work. Filming and production is a cool job!

We went to fish grow out cage, Maliangin Island, Banggi Island and Market for filming.

Main title is Live Reef Fish Trade (LRFT) an very important issue to look at in Sabah now.

The last night, we had seafood dinner at Explanade Kudat.

Lobster rice wine soup - i like the most! hehehe
The crew was happy and our "star" also happy!

Akira n Utako in Mabul!

2008-08-26T22:32:00.000-07:00

Parent visit to Mabul...

Im so happy to meet with Akira and Utako in Mabul on the day they arrive.

Although it was a short time, because im rushing to Kudat on the same day,but im very happy to see all of them are healthy and happy..

I leave Mabul and heading to Kudat....a long .....way drive about 7 hours. But i will be back here soon...

Searching in life

2008-08-17T01:31:00.000-07:00

Obviously people are searching all the time
Searching for love
Searching for happiness
Searching for a better life.....
For this, you willing to spend out all your efforts,
travel around the world, up to the hills, down to the sea; day and night....
Keep searching in your entire life.....
until the day you get tired, exhausted, old, weak....
In a sudden way then you will realize that ....
Actually, happiness is always by your side .......

Happy Birthday to SHOKO!

2008-08-12T08:26:00.001-07:00

Tanjoobi ometedo gozaimasu ne! Shoko!!

Im so miss the celebration last year together with you at SWV resort.
I also wish i can celebrate your birthday together.
Miss you so much! Hope to see you again soon!

Happy Birthday to you!

080808 - A day to celebrate

2008-08-08T05:02:00.000-07:00

Eight is a most welcome number in Chinese society. Today is a special day to celebrate for the occurance of triple eight in our calender for once in a life time. Well, its not gonna have anything happen to the world, unless you do something to make it special.

People of the world celebrate the opening of world's largest games - OLYMPIC in Beijing today!
Maybe some of the family in the world celebrating new born babies in their house.
Maybe some of the couples celebrate their love and get married by today.

What will happen to you by today?
Its all up to you to make it a special day or a normal day.

For me, a special day will means a lot to me ...
If i got a call from family members...
If i got a warm greeting of smiles this morning to brighthen my day...
If i got a simple Hi from a fren far from me...
If i got a place to rest ...
If i got a achievement today ...even a small one
If i got a happy mood and healthy body...
If......

so many If in our life....
its all up to you, how you want it to be...
So...
What make your day so special today?
Share with me.....

Celebrating 080808!

Sporty days!

2008-07-30T00:17:00.000-07:00

WWF Sport Days! held in KK from 24-27th July in varies locations.
Different games was compete by 4 teams.

There are Nemo ! ! Simba !! Shern Khan !! & Panda!!

GAMES:

Futsal

Bowling

Badminton

Fishing

Volleyball

Tug-of-War

Dart & Pool

extra activity: drinking and kareoke! hahaha

The teams competed for different types of games and challenges ....go thru all the physically and metally challenges ....here comes the winner of the WWF Sport day - PANDA! 1st rounded up goes to NEMO!! (YEAH ! my team!) hahahaha....... 2nd rounded up is Simba and last is Shern Khan. Everyone got prizes and happy to spent time with colleagues in these few days.

Sabah Head Hunter Story

2008-07-29T09:46:00.001-07:00

Sabah - also known as North Borneo where is land below the wind lived with many tribes.One of the interesting story about origin people of Sabah is the Head Hunter story, its a true story about the warrior in ancient time. Monsopiad - ancient warrior in Kadazan tribes who hunt for evil warrior's head as the sign of triumphs of war.

Monsopiad Cultural Village is a place to experience the Kadazan tradition and cultural. Arrival of guests welcome with colourful traditonal dance and handicraft bacelet. They will serve you chilled "Lehing" (local rice wine)as welcome drink.Emmm...taste good....yumm yumm. Don't drink too much 1st, otherwise get drunk. The tour guide brought us to different section of the village to show us the tradition and cultural of Kadazan before the dinner is serve.

The house of skull - is the place to keep the 23 skulls which is hunted by Monsopiad (one of the ancient warrior). The skulls is protected from the evil spirit by dried coconut leaf. The descentor of Monsopiad is still living in this village and keep the tradition of old descentor. However, the civilazation have slowly fade out

the cultural and tradition of the old descentor.The young generations now is no more practice the Bobohizan (Bomoh = spiritual / traditional healer) knowledge.

Next, tour guide also shown us the traditional way of making the rice wine, explaining from process of paddy to the final product of rice wine. Traditional tools are using in those day, perhaps now is all using mechinary to produce rice wine. Any different in taste ? i guess so!

Following is the traditional sport which using sumpit (blowpipe) to hit the ballons. Kadazan people using this technique to hunt animals. The sharp and tiny bamboo stick is dip with poison when hunting. Few of our honour guests from Indonesia and Phillipines tried this traditional sport. They have fun. We tried to send some of our friend to stand in the middle...but no one do....hahahaha

Errrggghh....hungry already after a short walk. Dinner is serve at a small hall. We have tasted the local traditional food of Kadazan people...such as Bambangan,Tuhau,Lehing Chicken soup,..... yummy!
Especially the Lehing chicken soup ahh...so tasty, its my favorite. I had 3 bowls of its...hehehe!

While having dinner, the team of dancer shows 6 -8 performances of traditional dance in Sabah : Bamboo dance from Murut, Rungus dance, Sumazau dance.......

What a interesting dinner we had in Monsopiad Cultural Village, everyone is going home with stomach full of delicious foods and eyes full of colourful dances. Get to know better the facinated tradition & colourful cultural of Sabah. COME & VISIT SABAH!

For more information pls visit these web-site:

http://www.sabahtourism.com/en/

http://www.monsopiad.com/Welcome.html

http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Academy/7637/kadazanDusun.html

MARISLA - Cross Site Learning Workshop

2008-07-29T09:05:00.000-07:00

21-23 July 2008, 3 days workshop conducted by WWF in Kota Kinabalu.
Was so happy to be participated in this workshop and learn from others MPAs experienced experts from Philippines and Indonesia. Famous MPAs representative such as from Tubathaha Reef, Manado, Palawan and etc.....

The four ladies from WWF was part of the committee
Please guess what status are they.....
who is single ?
single available?
single not available?
Engaged?
Wahahaha.....

A lady from WWF-ID was given name as Mama of turtle, because she been working on turtle conservation since 13 years ago until now. Especially Leatherback turtle in Bali.

Her data of turtle satellite tracking impress us .

My Project Manager - Dr. Annadel S. Cabanban and colleague - Myezana Ismat. They both are the ladies that i really respect and i never found other like them in this world.
Dr. Ann, she is perfect lady, knowledgeable and greatest women i ever know.
Mye, she is young, energetic, stylish and beautiful mother i ever met.

Weekend in KK

2008-07-28T00:13:00.000-07:00

New faces of Kota Kinabalu International Airport

People come and go
people smile and cry
people wait and rush
People black and white
All types of people u see here
All types of emo u can see here
Sometimes is good to stop for a while
Take a few minutes to rest and think for yourself

Jesselton Point , Kota Kinabalu

A beautiful jetty for enjoy sunset and relax.
I was there almost every evening ...............

When the sun is set, the moon is up............
Good time to hang out for a drink with friends at seaside
Make you feel so alive after a tiring day.
Thats what i love about be in KK,
except those traffic, noise and pollutions...

Mabul Marine Week 2008

2008-07-27T22:22:00.000-07:00

Dear all, I know everybody been waiting for the Mabul Marine Week update. I apologize for the delay due to some technical problem with my laptop.

I Love Mabul!! - - - - its the theme for this year Mabul Marine Week. This is the 11th years of Mabul Marine Day event in Mabul island. This year also is a historical event for Mabul island, with the 1st time all the operators and community work together organizing and participating this event.

Group of divers participating in coral transplant programme in SWV Resort

Underwater clean-up by divers to collect rubbish in several dive sites in Mabul.

This is my 4th years of joining MMD. Is everything same like years before?

This year is different from the previous MMD, Im more involved in children and clean up programme with local community, not involved in transplant coral and underwater clean up.

Its give me a very good feeling of people in Mabul and the team work spirit from the dive operators in successfully celebrate MMD together.

Creating awareness amongst divers and community is the main objective, however getting people work together is another achievement for this event!

Mabul community enjoy the exercise Aearobic in the morning

before proceed to the clean up of the island.

Adorable Mabul kids with very pure smiling

Kids shouted "We Love Mabul!"

School kids with foreigner kids are playing together - interchange cultural - friendship

Congratulated to Bobby - Chairman of MMD 08 and the team member. He been working hard for the event with less sleep, less drink, less cigarates.......just to concentrate to make sure everything go smoothly. Hahahaha -----good for him.

Yeah! im so happy to join MMD 08 !

Bobby, Allister and Allan going "sot sot" (crazy) already for this MMD...too excited and too happy to participated in MMD 2008~ I LOVE MABUL!

At last, would like to thanks all the people in participating this meaningful event and hope the next year will be have a greater achievement . Im happy to be there and met with some of the frens who also join the MMD. I will be back! Mabul!

开拓生命

2008-07-17T09:04:00.000-07:00

一帆风顺的人生, 虽然美得让人羡慕;
但惊涛骇浪的经历,也会令人刻骨铭心.
淋过大雨,天空放晴时才会加倍珍惜.

摘自<开拓生命的宽度> 吴若权著

ERIC WU - MY FAVORITE WRITTER
He wrote a lot of books about the philosophy of life, living, family,love, business,....
Just love his philosophy, some of it suit me very well.... some of it make me realise that living in this world its not just about living, its a complicated and beautiful things that you would not be fully understand it until you get to the end of your life.....perhaps.

If you are able to read in chinese... i would recommend you to read some writing by Eric Wu.
Hope you will like it....

放手

2008-07-16T03:46:00.000-07:00

如果你一直迟迟不肯放手,

也许该问问自己,

真的还能拥有对方吗?

为何不甘心?

不甘心被辜负?

还是不甘心过去的付出?

是害怕孤独?

还是不愿示弱?

放手吧!

放手让他走,

你会因此获得自由!

付出是美好的,

祝福是永恒的!

在放手的刹那,

下一个幸福已经在不远处,

快乐地向你招手.

摘自<今天是幸福日>

文字<曾郁雯>

December Reunion Trip In Mabul Island

2008-07-12T02:03:00.000-07:00

There is trip going on from 17-21 December 2008!

Reunion trip for ex-swv staff!

Some of the ex-staff will go back to SWV and have a reunion with all!

They miss Mabul! Mabul also miss them very much!

Ex-staff will coming : Lee , Diana , Nina , Jay, Vienna and Helena!

If you have planning to go SWV during that period of time, please come to join us for party!

We miss you all too! We hope to see everyone there!

Cheers!

Mabul Trip with Frenz

2008-07-08T00:37:00.000-07:00

A warm welcome from SWV Dive guide..........

Friendly dive crew with friendly seasnake.....

This trip was so happy to have Yuka A. to completed her Divemaster course in SWV.

Meet with friends is my favorite hobbies....hehehehe

Allister is the Bee man and Josie is the cute gal
Yuka's Birthday present .... Hope you will like it!
Dive ladies........

Yo! Lets dance together!!Sumazau! ocho-ocho, chili chia-chia, pamela one....
Ron chan n Yuka chan.....after yopparai! hahaha

Lets enjoy some of the underwater photos ......

Roach Reefs

2008-06-13T23:21:00.000-07:00

Everytime i visited to Roach Reefs, i have new inspiration from the scenery there and happy to meet and dive again with Obata san. This time our mission is to dive and access to the status of reefs that near by to Roach Reefs. (Where nobody dive there before...i guess only fishermen visited the reefs) It was suprisingly nice reef below 10-20m, big coral heads up to 7m height ; huge table corals and healthy branching coral ...... another mission is to count for Mameng (Napoleon wrasse) in Roach Reefs.

This big barrier made up from rubble by stocky tilefish (hoplolatilus fronticinctus) a species of tilefish only found in deep outer reef slope from 30-70 m.Robocon- squat lobster also the kawaii critter that i like the most commonly found in Roach Reefs. hehehe.....Robocon : what you staring at ? huh? never see creature so cute meh?
Thanks so much to Obatan san....shows me many special in Roach Reefs. Hope you will be back soon!!

Mameng ....Mameng where are u ??

2008-06-13T03:32:00.000-07:00

Mameng - the nick name for Napoleon wrasse (Cheilinus undulatus). Expensive Live fish in seafood restaurants which served amongs the high level of people = rich man. Who afford to eat this fish. Its highly vulnerable and listed in the CITIES Appendix II. Export is limited by quota. But how much Mameng are left in the wild? What is the mean size of Mameng out there? How to protect this vulnerable species from being extinct from the reef?

TRAFFIC SEA, Fisheries Department and WWF comes together to reinforce and revise the quota of export Mameng from Malaysia to other countries. An FAO study method is being used for the research - Non- detrimental Finding.

The divers team in MABUL ...bIG Panda (Daniel), Frogfish (ALbis), Goatfish (Harun), Funny turtle (Binjamin), Smart & Lucky gal (Julia), Skinny pipefish (Nina), Pufferfish (Japson).....eh? whr is the seahorse (Alex)?

A new team in Mataking - Albis, Gan, Harun, Julia, Me, Binjamin, Allister, Josephine, Japson and Min Hui...........eh? this time whr is the Panda go???? oh i knw...Panda got show in Cinema - "Kung Fu Panda".

Hey!! is this a Casino cruise ? well, people getting too bored during surface interval...

or they get nitrogen narcosis ord!

Cheers for the Mameng and friendship of conservationist!!

Activities in Mataking & Kulapuan

2008-06-13T02:23:00.000-07:00

Mataking The Reef Dive Resort with crystal clear water

7 June 2008

Was able to joined the awareness programme organized by The Reef Dive Resort in Mataking island - Reef Day & Reef Check! Great and Fun!

Reef Check organization director - Julian Hyde was given introduction and fish survey training for divers whereas the shcool kids invited from Semporna town was having colouring and quiz , snorkelling programme and beach clean up competition.

8 June 2008

WWF organized another programme with local community in Kulapuan island.

Although its a raining day, gotong-royong and kids programme was successfully held and i was supprised by the overwhelming response of kids in Kulapuan. Hope we will be back here for more public awareness activities with local community here. We shall return! hahaha!

Do you know how to write your name?

2008-05-23T06:47:00.000-07:00

If you do know how to write your name, you are very lucky!

So touch ...Encouraging his friend to write.

Some of the kids in Semporna dont know how to write or read......its due to issue of proverty and illegal immigrant, they are not able or no chance to go for education in school. They start work since young.....help people for transporting heavy stuffs or collect recycle plastic bottles to earn money for daily expenses. Poor kids.....

Willing to learn how to write thier own name, make us tears fall. . . . the kids need help!

Free education programme to poor kids come across to our mind. Will establish a education programme for them to learn academic and conservation.

Sunday Market at Gaya Street

2008-05-22T08:08:00.000-07:00

Sunday market is one of the highlights of local attraction spot. Especially in Sabah - Land Below the Wind. Sunday market is one of the day that people gathering for small scale trade with set up stalls along the street. Here you can find almost everything...............colourful and cheerful in the morning, make your day delight! Come and experience it....

Varies Local Handicrafts for tourists to bring back.

Foot massage by blind people

Local fruits .....banana, guava,Lime.........

I was able to have sunday walk with Vienna and mummy.... we have so much fun!

Mabul sunset

2008-05-22T06:52:00.000-07:00

I love sunset of Mabul.....

Field trip to Kudat

2008-05-16T18:16:00.001-07:00

Kudat known as the Tip of Borneo which is the most northern part of Borneo, famous of peanuts and coconut. Tun Sakaran Marine Park located in Kudat which is the purposed largest marine parks in this region, consist of the Banggi island, Balambangan, etc.....

The survivor team! Yeah!

1st Day = sunny day: still fresh and happy!

Department of Fisheries, TRAFFIC SEA & WWF formed a survey team to Kudat for a Non- detrimental Finding study in the field for Mameng (Humphead Wrasse). We aboard on "Mameng" and headed to field site.The fun ride started with the sunny but windy day ...a bumpy ride to Banggi n Tigabu.

Windy day create a hard time for crew to park the boat.

5-6 strong man is pulling the boat like a buffolo....

Its was constantly strong wind throughout the field trip, due to the typhoon. Its was ok and a bit risky in the 1st day, but the second nite in Mandidarah was the worst ......very very strong wind and raining, we all awake by the scary weather suddenly came in no way. The rest house we stayed is shaking and felt like collapse. According to meteorologist forecast info, we were in 20 km away from path way of typhoon tail of Myanmar. OHHH????

WAH! big wave keep blashing toward our boat...

Due to the bad weather conditions throughout the whole week, we have to cancelled our trip and back to mainland. Finally we survive from big wave and storm, back to kudat safely.

Its was a fun trip i ever had! hahaha!

ES-CA-PE

2008-03-11T01:36:00.000-07:00

Was able to ES-CA-PE to a wonderful island on earth.

Mataking - an island famous with beautiful beach and luxury resort.

I was almost fall in love with this island and beaches....

Foot track all the way towards Mataking kecil.

Only during low tide you can walk to next island.

What a wonderful heaven and earth.....
Turtle being nesting here last nite...we dint have luck to see.

Who this handsome guy? Japaness or Korean..haha..its my brother lar

Lun helping me doing Reef Check during his school term holiday.
Hardy - DM Mataking with his twins.

Thanks Hardy for helping in Reef Check around Mataking,

Pandanan, Timba-timba, Pom-pom, Kulapuan and Boheyan islands.........

Mabul my second home

2008-03-01T07:54:00.000-08:00

So nice to be home with perfect weather and beautiful coral reef...

Warm breeze and the familar smell of Mabul make me feel like im so back to home. Diving with Yuka n Midori always fun and happy

Hey...pls guess what is this look like? Peacock? flower?

TA TANG! ITS SAILFIN GOBY!!

Congratulation to Midori san for 400 dives!

We greet by the morn sunshine at Barracuda point, although we din't see the school of

Barracuda this trip, but we always have a best feeling with Barracuda Point.

3 diving angels hahaha

Midori chan and Yuka chan super heavy repeater in MABUL

We are friends, we also in a big family in MABUL. : )

Cozy Roach Reef - lite n easy

2008-03-01T06:41:00.000-08:00

Spent a lovely lite n easy week at Roach Reef ...... been diving here for a few times. Love the feeling here very much. The simple cottage with beautiful sunset and nice breeze at night time make u feel like in a Paradise. Diving sites around all with unique topography and interesting marine creatures. We are really happy to meet with the happy resort manager - Obata san (sometimes gila-gila n skebe... :p) and Dive instuctor Morie chan and New instuctor i forgot his name (SO SORRY NE)...... and all the RRR's staff are very kind and nice.

Best view of sunset......

Dreaming on hammock

This sandal bring me around all the Semporna Islands

The special sport of RRR is tree climbathon amongs the Hermit crab.

Don't look down to these hermit crab, they already form a Hermit crab management on this island, believe it or not.........

RRR dive site map - Lobster Point, Mid Rock, Corner, Viking Point, Second Reef, Twin Peak......

Working underwater (Reef Check)...this is how i look like...serious underwater

In RRR you will easily find many species of Nudibranch...which is one of my favorite

Obata ojiji san + Morie kawaii chan + Nina = Happy divers :)

Bye bye Roach Reef...we will be back soon!

Chinese New Year Holiday!

2008-02-14T02:38:00.000-08:00

A lovely dalmation puppy make me so happy...i wish belongs to me.

Chinese new year the happiest will be kids....becoz of Ang Pow! Me too!

Old classmate gathering ......

Ladies ...................

My grandmother

Sweet Memories.........

2008-01-12T02:24:00.000-08:00

Natsukashii itami da wa
Zuttto mae ni wasurete ita
Demo anata o mita doki
Jikan dake atomadori shita no

“Shiawase?” ta kikanaide
Uso tsuku no wa jouzu ja nai
Tomodachi nara iru kedo
Anna ni wa mo eagarenakute

Ushinatta yume dake ga
Utsukushiku mieru no wa naze kashira
Sugisa atta yasashisa mo ima wa
Amai kioku sweet memories

Don’t kiss me baby
We can never be
So don’t add more pain
Please don’t hurt me again
I have spent so many nights
Thinking of you longing for your touch
I have once loved you so much

Ano koro wa wakasugite
Itazura ni kizutsukeatta futari
Iruaseta kanashimi mo ima wa
Tooi kioku sweet memories

Ushinatta yume dake ga
Utsukushiku mieru no wa naze kashira
Sugisatta yasashisa mo ima wa
Amai kioku sweet memories

Sweet Memories (English translation)

What an unforgettable pain!
I’ve already forgotten
But at the moment when I meet you again
The time went back to the past

Please don’t ask me “Do you find true happiness?”
I don’t know how to tell lies
I have some intimate friends
But I dare not to be hurt by the flame of love again

Why is the lost dream always
The most beautiful experience in one’s life?
The tenderness in the past has become the
Sweet memories

Don’t kiss me baby
We can never be
So don’t add more pain
Please don’t hurt me again
I have spent so many nights
Thinking of you longing for your touch
I have once loved you so much

That day, we were both young
There’s no need to hurt each other
Those past events that have faded every years
Become distant memories ….sweet memories

Why is the lost dream always
The most beautiful experience in one’s life?
The tenderness in the past has become the
Sweet memories

This song remind me a lots of " sweet memories"
Hope you like this song too...

Here is the link to listen the song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBhynDrySEk

A Time for Everything

2008-01-08T17:58:00.000-08:00

ECCLESIASTES 3: 1-8 & 15

A Time for Everything

1 There is a time for everything
And a reason for every activity under heaven:

2 A time to be born and a time to die,
A time to plant and a time to uproot,

3 A time to kill and a time to heal,
A time to tear down and a time to build,

4 A time to weep and a time to laugh,
A time to mourn and a time to dance,

5 A time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
A time to embrace and a time to refrain,

6 A time to search and a time to give up,
A time to keep and a time to throw away,

7 A time to tear and a time to mend,
A time to be silent and a time to speak,

8 A time to love and a time to hate,
A time for war and a time for peace.
.................................................................................

15 Whatever is has already been,
and what will be has been before;
and God will call the past to account.

*****************************************

I always believe there is a time for you and me........

So, when is your time?

Nina's album

2008-01-04T01:37:00.000-08:00

I would like to share my special album with you .......its a special made from Japan. Shoko make this album for me as a birthday present for this year! I love it and very touching when i saw this album.....its full of our memories here. A sweet memories that nobody can understand and nobody can take away! Its all belongs to me and Shoko and the friends we meet in Mabul. I would also like to dedicated this page to Shoko.

ARIGATOU NE! URESHII KATA NE! WATASHI NO TAISETTSU NA TOMODACHI!

I always have tears of joy when i saw this album......... Thank you! Shoko !

Its Birthday for my blog and me!

2008-01-03T23:28:00.000-08:00

Happy birthday to me and the new blog! and to my best friend who have the same birthday with me.....Xiao Chun Happy Birthday! She just get married !

We know each other since primary school in Tenom, going to the same Church and working in same tuition centre before. She is a nice person to me and best friend forever. Now she just upgraded to "auntie level" haha! Just joking bah!

Wish you have a happy family!

And would like to say Happy birthday to a little gal (nephew of my close friend- Joshua) who birthday is 1 day early then me, we met for the 1st time and be so close and having fun time together! She just lovely and cutie. Cant believe that she can show u hand sign of "i love you" .........Happy Birthday Thong Thong for your 1st birthday!

Of course not forget to wish my beloved "okasan" Tanjoobi omettedo gozaimasu! Utako san celebrate her birthday with me last year and the year before. So sorry that i couldn't celebrate together this year.......but we met in Mabul and having a short gathering. I wish she will have a great diving in Mabul and Sipadan! Hope to see her again soon!

we dressed in yukata for a party!

Our Birthday celebration in Mabul with Shoko, Akira and Jay

Happy Birthday also to all the January birthday boys and gals! (some i knw like Eve, Nicole.....)

Lets sing a birthday song:

"Happy birthday to you........ Happy birthday to you...........

Happy birthday to everybody........... Happy birthday to me!"