Pacific Northwest: Part III (Hurricane Ridge)

The next day dawned rainy (as evil Mr Weatherman had forecasted). We drove back east towards Seattle, and decided to try Hurricane Ridge to see if the rain would hold off. On the way up the Ridge, this is what we saw: [[image:pacnw47.jpg:Bambi? Is that you?:center:0]] Bambi! And his family, too: [[image:pacnw45.jpg:Bambi’s Aunty?:center:0]] [[image:pacnw46.jpg:Bambi’s Mommy?:center:0]] I couldn’t see any big antlers, so I presume these are female adults. Although what do I know about deer in North America? Nothing, really. In the meantime, what about another video distraction? Say “Hi, Bambi!!” [[image:pacnwbambi.jpg:Where’s Thumper and Flower?:center:0]] But this early on in the drive up, it looked promising (weather, I mean). We might be able to see some stuff. Right? Wrong! By the time we got to the top, to the lookout point, the temperature had dropped to below freezing, the wind was whipping us around, and freezing rain attacked us. 🙁 […]

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Pacific Northwest: Part II (Rialto Beach)

After the wet Rainforest adventure, we relaxed and napped in our room before going out to dinner. Vincent recommended the Smokehouse, a little outside of downtown Forks. This guy welcomed us: [[image:pacnw30.jpg:Is this what Eric Cartman looks like grown up? Pie!!!:center:0]] It served excellent local seafood and we had a lovely meal. We were too full to try the pie though. 😉 When we left the restaurant, wonder of wonders, the sun was shining! We decided to take advantage of the break in the rain and headed down to Rialto Beach for a little post-dinner beach sight-seeing. Here’s Vincent at the entrance to the beach: [[image:pacnw31.jpg:Vincent at Rialto Beach:center:0]] Views of the beach looking left and right: [[image:pacnw33.jpg:Looking left:center:0]] [[image:pacnw34.jpg:Looking right:center:0]] See those big tree trunks lying on the beach? They’re driftwood. Yes. Driftwood. The biggest blinking driftwood I’ve ever seen! See this giant formation of driftwood – I see […]

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Pacific Northwest: Part I (Hoh Rainforest)

Last month, we packed our bags and took a flight to Seattle, WA for an almost week-long Pacific Northwest extravaganza. We met up with our friend Vincent (a citizen of Gloomville), who went to good old ACS way back when, and who is an Admin at the Unofficial ACS Alumni Forum, and he had thoughtfully planned an itinerary for us. We arrived in the evening and Vincent took us out to a lovely dinner (but we didn’t take any pictures because we were so out of it from the flight that I forgot to take pictures). We checked in to our hotel and Vincent said goodbye, but he would be back early the next morning for the first thing on our Pacific Northwest itinerary was to go to the Olympic Peninsula for a couple of days. This means an early morning ferry ride on a weekday (to escape the huge […]

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Family Reunion in Belle River

July has been a pretty eventful month for Vin and me, I have all kinds of things to blog about. But it has also been a pretty busy work month, so it hasn’t been too conducive to blogging. But before we finish out the month of July, I wanted to reflect back on our trip up to Belle River, Ontario earlier in the month. A family reunion was held at Vin’s cousin Liz’s house. This is the maternal side of Vin’s family – Vin’s Auntie Vera settled in Canada and we were happy to be included in the gathering. This was my first time meeting everyone other than Joanne, so forgive me if I make any mistakes naming all the family members! On the day itself, luckily we had name tags. 🙂 [[image:bru01.jpg:Auntie Vera on the left, cousin Pam on the right:center:0]] We had a lovely time at Liz’s place […]

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The other side!

Irfan’s First First Cousin

Today begins a new era in Irfan’s life. He is now officially a first cousin to another human, in this case the less-than-a-day-old, yet nameless newborn son of Kak Nor & Abg Kie. He’s a pretty handsome, but quiet and sleepy dude. Which is better than the poor girl in the cot beside him, who seemed to be having a nightmare. What nightmares can a 3-hour old baby have anyway? We’ll go and visit Irfan’s new cousin again tomorrow and see if we can get better photos. The nurse gave Cik Emma a hard time today for taking pictures in the ward. The sleepy one: The sleepy one turns the other way: Irfan decides to join his cousin in the dreamlands:

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Hawaii Day 10 – Last Day and Home to Lily

I know, it’s been two months since the trip and I’m finally getting around to putting up the final installment of the Hawaii pictures. But, in my defense, I am slow. Just a few days ago I finally emptied my suitcase of stuff from the trip. Yes, just my stuff since Vin unpacked his suitcase almost immediately while I stalled and stalled. That’s me. Procrastinator all the way. 🙂 So to remind you, in Day 9, remember we met with some interesting cats wishing us goodnight at the Volcano Inn? [[image:hi153.jpg:Scary Guard kitties?:center:0]] They apparently patrol the inn and keep out the riff raff :). In case you’re lazy to click on the link to the previous day’s blog entry, here’s a reminder of what they look like: [[image:hi144.jpg:Kitties!!:center:0]] Here’s what the outside of our room looked like in the light of day: [[image:hi151.jpg:The door to our room and the […]

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Hawaii Day 9 – Finishing our trip around the Big Island

Another beautiful morning in Hawaii. We woke up to this gorgeous view: [[image:hi126.jpg:View from the Marriott lanai:center:0]] But it was our final morning on the sunny side of the Big Island. We were driving back to Hilo via the Volcano this afternoon. Before we left, we decided to enjoy the pool: [[image:hi127.jpg:Swim in the Infinity Pool:center:0]] [[image:hi133.jpg:Pool with slide and waterfall:center:0]] And go back to Anaehoomalu Beach: [[image:hi128.jpg:Vin by the signboard:center:0]] [[image:hi129.jpg:The beach:center:0]] [[image:hi130.jpg:Catamaran:center:0]] [[image:hi131.jpg:Vin reading under the coconut trees:center:0]] [[image:hi132.jpg:Memories of home, lambaian pokok nyiur:center:0]] After a morning spent swimming in the pool and in the sea (for me) and reading and enjoying the sun (for Vin), we packed up and said goodbye to the Kona side. For the first time ever, we were going to drive 360 degrees around the Big Island, and go back to Hilo. We passed through a lot of lava vistas: [[image:hi134.jpg:Lava rocks and […]

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A reader of books

Irfan’s One Utama Walkabout

One fine day, Irfan Shafiq went a-walking about the hallways of the mall known as One Utama. Movie Carnival 2007 weekend was just around the corner. So there were plenty of well-known characters loitering about the concourse of the new wing of the mall. One of the most remarkable things there would be this here thing in the following photo. A Transformers movie Optimus Prime! It’s not on sale yet for another two more days. Apparently the guy bought it off eBay. A stellar looking toy! Not too far away, Irfan got his photo taken with some famous Cybertronians in their latest guises, Optimus Prime and Megatron… ….as well as the gang from Far, Far Away Land… … and the family from the Evergreen Terrace in Springfield, USA. All the way from Zenn-La is the former astronomer turned Herald of Galactus, Norrin Radd. Because he was positioned at a high […]

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Hawaii Day 8 – Hotel Hopping and Sunset

We requested late checkout so we could enjoy ourselves on our final morning at the Hilton Waikoloa Village. It was a beautiful sunny morning, and we wanted to go snorkeling in the lagoon. Look at the difference in the pictures between yesterday and today, due to the sun: [[image:hi104.jpg:Fantastic hammock location:center:0]] So until 2 PM Hawaiian time, we enjoyed ourselves to the fullest, starting with a bout of putt-putt golf (my first time and it was rather embarrassing, so no pictures OK?). Time to snorkel! I took a bunch more pictures on the way to the lagoon: [[image:hi100.jpg:Canal:center:0]] [[image:hi102.jpg:Passenger boat on the canal:center:0]] The hotel grounds covers pretty much this whole bay. You can walk from end to end in a big curve, or take the train like we did on our first day here, or you can also catch one of the frequent passenger boats that pass by and […]

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Hawaii Day 7 – Lazy Day at the hotel

Day 7 dawned beautiful and sunny. We decided to have ourselves a lazy day. I believe there was some post-breakfast napping, some reading on the lanai (balcony). We can see this statue from the lanai: [[image:hi85.jpg:Meditating Buddha:center:0]] In the afternoon, we decided to veg out by the pool with our books. It was a little bit cloudy so the water seemed a little too cold so we didn’t do too much swimming. Here’s what some of the grounds of the hotel looked like: [[image:hi86.jpg:Lagoon:center:0]] [[image:hi87.jpg:Bridge over the lagoon:center:0]] [[image:hi88.jpg:Hammock by a coconut tree:center:0]] [[image:hi89.jpg:Sea turtles sign!:center:0]] [[image:hi90.jpg:The Ocean Tower from the other side of the lagoon:center:0]] The sea turtles sign – we’ll talk more about sea turtles in the next entry on Hawaii (Day 8). Here’s some of the view of the ocean: [[image:hi91.jpg:See? It’s cloudy:center:0]] [[image:hi92.jpg:But still quite beautiful:center:0]] We walked by the Dolphin Quest while they were doing […]

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Hawaii Day 6 – Journey to the Kona Side

We actually didn’t get to walk around Hilo too much, because neither Vin nor I was in the mood for a walk in the rain. It rained the morning we left Hilo: [[image:hi64.jpg:Rain, rain, go away:center:0]] So we hit the road, to the other side of the island where the mountains block the rain. Going up the coast, it was still pretty rainy until we were pretty close to Waimea. [[image:hi65.jpg:Blue skies, yayyyyy:center:0]] There is the obligatory stop for malasadas (a portuguese donut, VERY yummy!! ono kine!). [[image:hi66.jpg:Locals say only this place’s malasadas are excellent:center:0]] Waimea is pretty elevated. It’s where the Hawaiian Cowboys are. You can see pine trees along the road here: [[image:hi67.jpg:On the road at Waimea:center:0]] There are plenty of pastures and meadows with cows, and horses. [[image:hi68.jpg:Pasture with Kohala mountain in the background:center:0]] Strangely enough, even this high up, there’s some cacti: [[image:hi69.jpg:Teddy bear cactus along […]

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Receiving swag

Irfan’s Sports Day

Precipitation did give us a break this morning. The sun shone brightly. Since we’re not too far from the equator relatively, a shining sun means sweltering and scorching heat. Tear glands were overtaxed in their efforts to cool off meatbag human bodies. However, Irfan’s school sports day did not yield to the heat. Participating with Irfan’s school is its sister school, where the kids wear violet-and-yellow as opposed to Irfan’s blue-and-yellow uniforms. There no real competition, just the kids all having fun doing the stuff they’re doing in the following photos. In other news, Irfan seemed to be under constant attack by a smaller kid who likes to push him around. From my observation Irfan just avoid the blows until he gets hit then he pushes the kid hard, which dissuades from further attacks for the time being. If this keeps up, I’ll have to write an entire entry around […]

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It's larger than the Cygnus from the Black Hole

A Birthday At Irfan’s School

It was supposed to be sports day today at the kindergarten. Unfortunately the heavy rain had other ideas, so instead the school proceeded with the birthday party of a boy, whose mother I discovered was my classmate in Perlis. Small world. The principle postponed sports day for tomorrow. Hopefully precipitation gives us a break. I’ll take more photos tomorrow. It’d be interesting seeing a bunch of hyperactive 5- and 6-year-olds running around competing for something. Below, Irfan poses before the humongous cake. It’s a 6 there not a 9. The cake being conveyed from car to the kindergarten. Look at them Smarties. Irfan awaits the eating of the cake. The troops assemble for the singing of the birthday song. Yeah, that song. The one everyone’s familiar with. Finally Irfan reveals to his mother his uncanny ability to eat cake.

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Hawaii Day 5 – Volcanic Adventure

In the late morning of Day 5. we drove to Kilauea, which is an active volcano on the big island. Kilauea has been continuously erupting for some 24 years! Pretty amazing stuff, and we had decided to do the Crater Rim drive and drive around Kilauea Caldera. [[image:hi57.jpg:Me by Volcano House:center:0]] First we stopped by the visitor center and Volcano House to pick up some literature on the volcano and map out our plan for the day. We had originally thought to take the Chain of Craters road down to the ocean and hike to the edge of the lava to see if we could see where the lava meets the ocean, but we’d gotten a late start to the day and decided to do the drive around the volcano for the day. Here’s Vin at the viewing area of Volcano House: [[image:hi53.jpg:Vin with Kilauea Caldera in the background:center:0]] [[image:hi54.jpg:Don’t […]

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Hawaii Day 4 – Sayonara Honolulu, Hello Hilo

So after 3 nights in Honolulu, it’s time to go. We ate our last fabulous Hilton Hawaiian Village buffet breakfast (free continental buffet, $5 to upgrade to the entire buffet thanks to the Hilton Honors membership, and well worth the money). We relaxed on the beach, took a last dip in the waters of Waikiki beach, and went around the hotel taking last minute pictures. We also said our goodbyes to the beach and the sun for a few days, for we are off to Hilo (the rainy side of the Big Island of Hawaii). [[image:hi35.jpg:Orchids:center:0]] First off, some pictures from around the hotel. Statues of real people as well as gods: [[image:hi34.jpg:The guy who built the hotel, I think:center:0]] [[image:hi36.jpg:Legendary goddesses in the process of tapa making:center:0]] [[image:hi45.jpg:I forget who this was:center:0]] [[image:hi41.jpg:Don’t mess with this chick – garang!:center:0]] Some of the trees and plants that caught my eye […]

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