First vacay of 2013 - Tioman Island

Finally, my first vacay of the year 2013. And what's better - it's a dive vacay! Weee! My logged my last dive in August 2012, at Phuket - Kho Phi Phi which was to say the least - epic because of the 'shit' weather (as termed by my Japanese Divemaster) and we ended up puking more than diving. Read about shit weather diving here.

My colleague, whose dive nickname is Fox, organized this Tioman dive trip for us and we stayed at the most happening area in Tioman, called Salang. It has duty-free shops, several reknown dive centres, and of course, restaurants and pubs. People who enjoy night life prefers Salang to Air Batang or Tekek which are relatively quieter.

For the first time in my life, I flew to a dive destination. First, it was safer and economical. Second, it was less exhausting. Tioman was way too far to drive; I had experienced going on a road trip from KL to Lang Tengah and also Langkawi which I found too taxing and tiring even if I was just a passenger at the backseat. During our trip to Lang Tengah via Kuantan, one of our drivers in the convoy of cars dozed off and skidded, but nothing happened as he self-consciously slammed on the breaks. At one point, the car in front of us slammed on the emergency break because in the middle of the morning, approx. 3 am, there was a herd of cows/buffaloes crossing the village road.

When I landed on Tekek air strip (which belongs to Berjaya), I was pretty surprised to see how coffee-shop-ey the airport was. Technology was so minimal, I smiled gingerly when I saw how simplistic the baggage collection procedure was. Just take from the buggy....and go! I am not complaining, of course. I am just tamed by the fact that, many times, things can just work out perfectly and smoothly if we don't involve technology. And I thought Kerteh Airport was minimal.

This plane is smaller than the one to Kerteh

Gostan gostan gostan! 

No frills baggage handling

Jetty to Salang

Made 5 dives in this trip. The dives were so so as nothing fascinating about the fishes, except for a school of barracudas was spotted very near us as in one of the dive spots. One non-scary shark spotted. The most memorable dive was at Pulau Labas where there were several caverns in between rock-fall formation (my colleague is Ph.D. in Geology, he told us about the terms. ZzzZzZZZz). We had to swim in between those small caves which was quite interesting as this is where your buoyancy skills is put in used. Excellente!

Day 2 - Impending storm

Day 2 : Choppy waters + lightning. From our dive boat.

Rain also dive. Just do it.

Although it's the hot/dry season in Malaysia, Tioman saw thunderstorms on the second day of our dive. Lightning and thunder can be seen from our dive boats, and it was raining incessantly til nightfall. Visibility was bad in several dives which was basically contributed by the full-moon this week. Ohh well....another 'shit weather'?

Batu Malang. Supposed to be a great dive, turned our to be okay-okay only due to poor visibility

Yes, it's full moon.

I think accommodation was great for the price we paid. It's peak season, but I've got this cozy room with great air-con working and fan in place (just in case it gets too cold). But my hotel room was the hub for mahjong every night we were in Tioman. We have 4 Mahjong kakis...and they are basically Professionals/Gods/Kings in mahjong...whatever you wanna call it. I just charge them rent/tax for the use of my hotel room as gambling den.

At night activity: Dry swimming.

Third day: back to hot weather. The sun was high up and the clouds were gone. Yah, I don't get it either. Extreme weather back-to-back. Made 2 dives in some bay, but again, visibility sucked. Didn't see anything significant but some regular skunk clown fishes. Did see a shark, but it swam away swiftly after seeing us approach. Sissy shark.

Basically, a pretty laid back vacay in Tioman. I slept like 10 hours a day including naps. You must forgive me, but I haven't had evening naps for a very looong time. So, this Tioman trip gave me soo much hours of sleep and meals, I felt.....hmpphh....guilty. Busy corporate women is like dat wan...dunno how to relax/sleep/be wasteful.

This cat sleeps every time we sees it. I need this kinda good life! - Sleep Sleep Sleep

Red Snapper

Sotong bakar

Oh yah, meals!!! Seafood was soo fresh I had a spike in my cholesterol (I think!). The fish (red snapper) was soo large and fresh, I fainted in awe even before it was bbq-ed. It was grilled ngam ngam hou. And so were the prawns. The grilled sotong was done beautifully, but self-control got the better of me. I also had way too many ice-creams in this single trip alone. Two-three sticks per day, everyday in Tioman.

I finished a beautiful book which talks a bit of Cesar Millan, The Dog Whisperer, and why dogs listens to him and not you....bla bla bla. OH, BTW....I've got a new family member! Yes, for real. My family has gotten ourselves a cute doggyyyyyy called Pei Pei and we love her like mad.


Back to reality. Back to the city. Back to my money-making routines. Back to whitening cream on my tanned skin.

 So, Sunset, when will I be seeing you again?

GE13 is over, finally

There is no short in excitement as we once more vote for the fate of our country. We decide who we want our Malaysia government to be, but of course, the majority always wins. How the votes and majority are decided throughout the country is pretty much, I should say, out of our hands. 050513 will be my 3rd time voting but this election is said to be the dirtiest election ever, hence I was most excited to see what the outcome was. I've never felt prouder (I was proud to vote in the previous 2 elections too) to be citizen of Banglasia...I mean, Malaysia. Maybe also because this time the people are using social media to disseminate actual news, rumours, 'threatening' news, and loads of other rubbish,  making it one of the most interesting election, ever. I remembered in 2008 where Twitter and FB were still a game sharing, FarmVille-dominated avenue, many young people don't even care to vote. Like really...cause my friend said they didn't think their votes matter. However I was there in 2008, voted, and I remember the results were shocking to see Perak's close call, PR taking over Kedah and Selangor, and ex-PM Badawi's sad face. There wasn't much sharing on social media and you don't find it weird that time.

Finger with removable 'indelible ink' is all too common. Let's do a different voting pic.

As of the previous times, my family love to go rather late into the morning/afternoon. This year was no different. Some said we were stupid to go so late....just in case some foreigners take our names away. Oh, I mean....."Ivy Chai C**** H***" ain't an easy name for a female foreigner to steal. My name is rare like that beautiful HK actress. My family were not worried about the so-many-crazy rumours and were not a big fan of long queues under the scorching sun. First time voters on the internet are like super excited, but we are like....err...err....voting only mar. Nothing much during the voting process. Boringz. At a point, I did hate Whatapps and FB being the platform where rumours spread like wildfire. Victim no.1 was dark-skin Chua Lai Fatt. The rumour that he was a Bangla was proven to be false. Pity Mr. Chua. Sorry for the paranoid and hyper-emotional people on FB, including myself. The rest of the 13 May incident that 'may occur' where Malay kills Chinese....has never even scared me a bit. I saw Malaysians were all pretty much united this time, ever since the Bersih rally. I mix with Malays 95% of my time, hence I do know the ground level situation. My Malay colleagues are my best friends everyday at work. Never believe all the rumors on FB. 13 May 1969 was triggered by a separate economic and political situation from today. The FB is filled with rubbish; that I agree with Azmin. Please filter the news rationally and look up/research the facts, using systematics approach, see the whole thing holistically and don't be emotional.

People who supported PR are now cyberbulling Michelle Yeoh, Justin Lo, KRU, etc. for their open support for BN. For me, they are entitled to vote for anybody as long as they are Malaysians. As you have openly supported PR on social media, they have all the right to support whoever they want. I see so much cyber-bullying just because you are emotionally against someone else or against any party. Guess what, if I tell you now that I actually voted for BN for DUN, I guess my friends on FB will start boycotting me, heh? Yes, you guys lately are as emotional as a piece of wreck. But you see, why hold an election when you wanna stop me from voting whoever I want. Bangla (I dun want to be so racist: Nepali, Burmese, Indonesian, Pinoys, etc) are not totally at fault, as they really really do have a real Malaysia blue IC. I hate them for voting in our boxes, but bearing in mind that it was the previous policy by Mahathir that was the fundamental problem of all existing ghost voters today.


Then there was this indelible ink to prevent double voting. I mean, many countries around the world are using the 'indelible ink' to manicure voters' fingers before/after voting. It's there for a good reason. Well, almost....cause it doesn't stick well (fades off after a good scrub) for even an hour after voting. Probably our version isn't really silver nitrate, or the active concentration was minute, it didn't work on Malaysian's skin. Well, SPR said that because the indelible ink is 'Halal', it doesn't stick well. But not like we will be eating it anyway.

Didn't matter the outcome of the Election results, I was just having my fingers crossed that I could submit my marriage application form to the NRD of Perak on a day after GE. First, if there were a change of government in Perak, probably the present government servants may revolt (I said probably!), then NRD may not be on for business. Oh well, just a theory. But of course none of that happened, and I submitted my marriage application form to NRD. I am happy to tell you that the NRD are now opened on Saturday and Sunday (half day), and allow for max 6 couples to exchange vows (ROM) on weekends. Thank God! I was thinking I needed to take leave.

Happens that my ROM was set on...tada....on my birthday! My fiance was smiling all the way as he soon declared that he need not buy roses for me on two separate occasion. Just one. Of course I disagree with him.

Even my dad who is so into politics says that enough is enough after 0505. I know I still share things online with regards to the this election, but I am now wishing for more food food food pictures, cat meowing pics, and cute dog pics. I crave for some running updates and some cute gwiyomi or the likes that could do social media some justice lately.

Although we can never avoid politics as it is part and parcel of any citizen's lives, enough of elections news per se! Move on and work hard to forge unity with friends of other races (which I don't need much forging already). PR should go into the outskirts area of Sabah and Sarawak to gain trust (lots of it too!). Literally meredah hutan belantara and mengayuh sampan.

Work Hard! Move on! Bersih!