Term 3 action 2010

A day in Johor Baru

Having a look at the Sikh Temple in Johor

Visiting the glass Temple - Johor


Priests at the glass temple

In Little India with Roy & Shirley

Lovely old shophouses in Serangoon Road

Lunch at the Polo Club

Checking out evolution at the Botanical gardens

Breakfast (or was it lunch?) at Hwa Nam

Out the front of Hwa Nam in Thompson Road

Making Pittu Pirang in Geylang Serai during Ramadan

Chinese Opera stage not far from our place during ghost month

View over Toa Payoh from A friend's HDB

Visiting Felicity's friend Helen at her home

Sunday walk around McRitchie

Saturday Arvo choir practice

June 2010 - Beijing & Ping Yao via KL

Hello Kuala Lumpur !

In our recent June vacation after heading out our back gate and catching the bus across to Johor Bahru, we ended up on a very comfortable double decker bus - in the front two seats - heading up to KL for a long weekend before our early Monday morning flight to China.

We had time to take in the great architecture around KL railway station. Mogul inspired, British designed and built - you can tell they'd been in India before they got here.

Contrasting mosques: the grand and very modern National Mosque and the traditional, mogul style Masjid Jamek, both very commanding.

We also spent an (air-conditioned) day at the Petronas Towers - fantastic buildings - which finished with a 5.30 pm trip up to the sky bridge to take in the sights of KL. Who is looking most spooked by the heights... surprise , surprise it isn't me!

Sunday we did Chinatown and the outstanding Islamic Arts museum which houses arts and crafts from all over the muslim world.

... onto the middle kingdom...

Monday morning, due to an Air Asia flight time change, was an obscenely early start but we got to Tianjin airport in China ok then took the fast train into Beijing Nan Zhan ( Beijing South Station). It doesn't feel like you're going fast but at one stage I looked at the information panel and we were chortelling along at 325 k per hour !!!

Getting round on the Beijing subway was so easy. The new lines they put in for the Olympics took us straight to our hotel.

Highlights of China included the Great Wall. We did the 10 k walk from Jinshanling to Simatai. Man those steps are steep. We got up to the wall on a cable car, even that is a hike in itself, and after a testing 10k, we came down harnessed into a flying fox - wasn't hard to talk 'em into that one!!!.

We also visited the Forbidden City (Gu Gong) and the Temple of Heaven (Tian Tan). We actually cycled to the Temple early (5.30am) on a Sunday morning. No traffic going there but plenty coming back as we went straight through the centre of Beijing and around Tiannamen Square, past the Forbidden City and back through the hutongs to get to our hotel. Quite an adventure, but plenty of other people out riding bikes too and as Beijing is pretty flat, its very easy to get around on bike.

Getting round Beijing's Hutongs on bicycles.

There was no shortage of Chinese tourists wanting to have their picture taken with the boys - we could have started a small business!!! At Tiannamen and The Forbidden City we had queues!!

The Forbidden City...

We also took the subway out to Olympic Green to have a look at the Bird's Nest and the Acqua Cube. They keep them lit up till a certain time, then with no warning all the lights go off and the area is suddenly deserted. Not even a train back to the city! Thankfully we had a decent taxi driver, she delivered us to our hotel for a fair price.

Our hotel 'Red Lantern House' was fanastic. In Xinjiekou - a good spot in a hutong area. Our rooms were in a quiet courtyard, very pretty and peaceful. The food was great, the boys lived on toasted chicken sandwiches, whilst we favoured the chilli chicken or sweet and sour zhu rou (pork). It was a very friendly place, and I would thoroughly recommend it. They really looked after us and made us feel welcome. A great place to come back to after a day out on the bikes in Beijing. The shot below shows the courtyard with the doors on the left leading to the room we stayed in.

Oh yes, this shot actually verifys it - Xave did eat scorpions at Wangfujing snack street on our first night in Beijing. Given the greasy, oil-sodden noodles they dished up to us, the scorpions were probably quite appetising.

After Beijing it was off to the Ming dynasty city of Ping Yao. Completely surrounded by 6 meter walls and without cars (well almost, if you don't count the little scooter vans that are constantly ferrying tourists around). It is a preserved, walled town where banking first developed in China. It was wonderfully atmopspheriic, if a little hot and dusty at this time of the year. Once again, we stayed in an old courtyard house with traditional layout and decor, fantastic screen doors and detailed windows. We actually got there on yingwo (hard sleeper) from Beijing. The others', but not my, first taste of sleeper trains in China. Felicity was wondering about the cost of ruanwo (soft sleeper) on the way back - not a chance!!!

The walls and entry gates to Ping Yao.

Harmony Guesthouse where we stayed.

The delightful streets of Ping Yao.

A Confucian temple and school inside the walled city.

Confucian school - preparation for the entry exam to the Chinese civil service - not likely!!

So those were our June travels, a great experience to have glimpse of the Middle Kindgom. For now its back to Singers and to work & school for another term.

Five Days In Sarawak

Kuching Main Drag

Mosque at Sunset

Parliament Building

At the end of a busy first term we headed off to East Malaysia for a little break. Our destination was Sarawak on the Island of Borneo. The capital city is lovely laid-back Kuching. Kuching is bisected by the Sungei Sarawak - on one side is the Chinese town, businesses, markets, cafes hotels etc and on the other the Malay area with the various Kampongs. The image above is looking across the river to The Parliament building which the locals affectionately refer to as the lemon squeezer. Its on the Malay side. Little boats ferry passengers across from one side to another for 40 sen - very cheap.

Early Saturday arvo, we checked into Singgahsana Lodge and wandered round the riverside and tried a bit of the local food - kolo mee, pan-fried jiaozi and Kuching Laksa - all very good. As it was too late to book a tour we ended up organising to hire a car, with assurances from our hotel manager that it was very easy to drive around on a Sunday. We added a few more ringit to include a GPS with most of the locations we wanted to go to already programmed into it. After driving around in circles for 10 mins and with a lot of help from Xave in the back seat, I finally understood that if I did exactly what the GPs told me to do..'in 500 meters keep left... then turn left...' that would actually get us to where we wanted to go - even if it was different to what I had worked out on the map!

We headed up to Semenggoh Orang Utan Sanctuary where we saw one female and baby in a tree (no good shots on my camera ) and then did a bit of wet, rainy bush walking which was not a good idea before jumping back in the car and making our way out through the Borneo Heights hills to visit the Annah Rais Longhouse.

We wandered around the long house for an hour or so, a lot of seperate houses all connected by a common platform. We saw a cage of human skulls from the head hunting days. We met people coming back from working their gardens in the jungle, a friendly lady gave us some very delicious bananas to eat.

From here we drove to some hot springs and did some cooling off in a river. On the way back to Kuching we visited a place called Fairy cave. A humungous cavern four or five stories above the ground. The caven itself had a series of paths and stairways through it, alowing you to climb up to different levels, bats were flittering around- it was a bit spooky really, but definately worth the visit.

One refreshing aspect to the Singghasana was the roof top area. Each morning we climbed onto tall stools to eat our breakfast, looking out over a Chinese temple and the river precinct. A great way to start the day. The pool table, soccer game and hammock were optional extras enjoyed by the boys after getting back from our various activities around town.

Monday morning we set off to Bako National Park with a little sense of trepidation as we had heard the food and accom here were both a bit tired. We stayed in a 1950s Bungalow that was ok and the standard Malay food was actually quite reasonable as far as I was concerned - quite a few varieties of mee, tasty chicken curry, good kopi susu (white coffee) and a reasonable supply of apples and oranges - ok for a few days.

After taking the (local, bumpy, frequently stopping) bus to get to Bako Bazaar we got to Bako Nat Park by catching a small boat up (actually that should be down) the river estuary and along the coast to a little inlet where the Park offices and accomodation are set up. The river is tidal and we had to wait around for an hour for the tide to come in, but even that wasn't enough. Xave & I had to jump out and help the boatman push the boat through the shallows till we had enough water underneath us to get motoring along.

Bako wasn't really 'beachy' in the same way as Juara on Tioman. It has lots of mangrove areas and the water is more of a grey than the clear blue we had last year. Nevertheless, the attractions at Bako are the trails, range of vegetation and the animals such as proboscis monkeys that can be seen there. After our first afternoon scrambly walk to Paku beach and only seeing three monkeys way in the distance, I was wondering if we were going to be in for a disappointing time. However, as we got back to camp headquarters the boys who were way up ahead came bounding back to tell us they had found a contingent of Proboscis monkeys feeding in the trees. It was delightful to observe them leaping from one tree to another. They keep themselves pretty high up but I managed to get a few passable shots. They are such interesting creatures. Xave got some great video footage of them swinging and cashing through the branches that we may be able to upload eventually. We saw heaps of Macaques but as we can see these outside our back gate in Singers we were less gobsmacked - as you can imagine. We also saw some fantastic bearded pigs and Jordy actually spotted two bronze-back whip snakes in the vegetation near our cabin. The pitcher plants (carnivirous) we came across along the trails on the way to Telok Kecil were stunning as well.

Below having a rest along the trail on the way to Kecil Beach.

Magnificent pitchers waitng for an unsuspecting ant or other insect to drop in!!!

Telok Kecil - and guess what? A boat waiting to ferry us back, after a challenging walk!


A little stream, coloured red by the oxide in the rock at Telok Kecil.

Sunset at Bako, looking across the sea to Santubong on the Damai Peninsula, another popular spot close to Kuching.

Delima track into the Mangroves.

On the boat heading back to Bako Bazaar to pick up the bus to Kuching. The tide was in so it was a much quicker trip this time.

Traditional Peranikan sarongs and tops in the street markets in Kuching.

The people in Sarawak were so friendly, it was a pleasure to travel here. Could definately do it again.