After we checked out of our hotel in Malaga, we took a taxi to the bus station. We would have to take the bus first to Granada and then from there a bus to Jaen. It was past noon by the time we checked out. In the end, we took the easy way out and just took a taxi to Jaen. We wanted to make it to Jaen before it got too late (no point burning daylight). Happily, we arrived in Jaen in time for a late lunch (lunch is late there anyway). Vin is a professor of Spanish and during his graduate studies he lived in Spain for a total of 4 (non-consecutive) years. His very first year there was spent in Jaen and he first went there 20 years ago this September. So this is truly a return to his Spanish “kampung” (hometown). He lived for 3 years […]
Continue readingEuropean Adventure IV: Malaga – Arrival
After we checked out of our hotel in Amsterdam, we went to the train station and caught the train to Brussels. It was a 2.5-3 hour train ride and I’d love to say that I took beautiful pictures of the passing scenery. We went through Rotterdam and several other cities in the Netherlands before crossing into Belgium. Unfortunately, I was so zonked out I slept most of the way. So…suffice it to say we took the train from Amsterdam to Brussels, and from there we caught a plane to Malaga, Spain. Malaga is a southern coastal city on the Straits of Gibraltar. We were to spend a night in Malaga before journeying on to Jaen (about a 3-hour drive north east). We had decided to splurge and stay at the Parador de Malaga Gibralfaro for the night. The Paradores is a chain of hotels established by the Spanish government and […]
Continue readingEuropean Adventure III: Amsterdam
The next leg of our European adventure started out by taking a train from Surrey to Gatwick Airport where we were catching a plane to Amsterdam. Now, before anybody gets overexcited about Amsterdam, we were only there for less than 24 hours (1 night) and so we did not get the full Amsterdam experience. Yes, no bike riding along the canals, no canal tours by boat, and we didn’t make it to Anne Frank’s house even! And no, we did not make it to the Red Light District… I think this means we must go back to Amsterdam and spend a little more time there! After arriving at Schiphol International airport, we took the train into central Amsterdam. And from there, we bumbled around (the Dutch tourism information people were incredibly unhelpful and unfriendly! I was quite unhappy with the service we received). We had reservations to stay at the […]
Continue readingEuropean Adventure II: Stonehenge and Salisbury
To continue our European adventure, Mei took a day off work and we went gallivanting around England while poor Colin had to work. We went to Stonehenge and Salisbury. Stonehenge was about a 1.5-2 hour drive from Surrey, and due to being tired and our body clocks being screwed up, we didn’t leave until mid-morning. But it was worth it. [[image:eur18.jpg:Mythical Stonehenge:center:0]] Stonehenge did not disappoint. The stones were mysterious, beautiful and just unbelievable. I could barely take my eyes off them. In order to conserve this ancient site visitors can only walk around the perimeter. People used to be able to walk right up to the stones, but of course they had problems with graffiti and people chipping bits off the rocks to bring home as a souvenir. But what we enjoyed the most was the free audio tour that was not only informative but extremely interesting. Some things […]
Continue readingCyclops, Shortchanged
Last Tuesday, I finally saw X-Men The Last Stand. But I’m not going to do a full review on the movie itself. The following two paragraph will summarize what I thought about it. Despite the misgivings of having Brett Ratner directing the third X-Men movie, and reports of behind the scene shenanigans that caused Bryan Singer to leave in the first place, I really enjoyed The Last Stand. Sure there were some plot holes and unbalanced screen time for characters, but they delivered what they promised: super-powered mutants beating the crap out of each other in creative ways onscreen. And I’m sure if the writers and director were given ample time without any studio politics involved, they would have given us something much more glorious than what we got. In any case, I because of the amount of details in this movie: a totally spot on Beast with amazing acrobatic […]
Continue readingEuropean Adventure I: Surrey and London
Recently, Vin and I went on a 16-day vacation to Europe. We went to a few countries, visited with many friends and for the first time ever, I travelled around the European continent. Prior to this, I had only been in London for 2 weeks in the winter of 1997. We started our vacation by flying to Gatwick where we were picked up by Mei Chin (my bestestestestest friend in the whole wide world) and Colin. We were to spend the first part of our trip hanging out with Mei and Colin at their place in England. *grumble* this is the 2nd time I’m doing this entry. My stupid computer froze and IE died when I was completely done with this entry. All was lost. 🙁 Anyway, we arrived at Gatwick in the morning, and after we dropped our bags off at Mei and Colin’s place, we decided not to […]
Continue readingIrfan Around Lumut
Last weekend, we were back in Sitiawan to attend a couple of kenduris. On Monday, Irfan’s grandparents decided to take us to Teluk Batik and Lumut. It was great, but the weather was hot and there were too many people about thanks to the school holidays. [[image:tbatik01.jpg:Bike’s getting too small for him:center:0]]Before we went out on Kereta Atok, Irfan was riding his bicycle. He wanted to ride his bicycle bicycle bicycle so much he wouldn’t leave without it. So, we put it in the trunk after which we pretty much forgot about it until we got back. [[image:tbatik02.jpg:Irfan and a tree stump:center:0]]Approaching the beach from the car park in Teluk Batik, both Irfan’s Atok and I tried to get a picture of Irfan. Usually getting a picture of him standing still is difficult, but he obliged us with this pose anyway. [[image:tbatik03.jpg:With Ummi & Opah:center:0]]Ummi and Opah posed for a […]
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What I Miss Most About Sitiawan
What I miss most about Sitiawan can be summed up thusly: I miss watching movies (at the big screen and home theatre) and discussing them from a geek’s point of view. I miss cycling to Teluk Batik and walking back on foot because of a flat bicycle tyre. I miss going on adventures in and around the mangrove swamps of Kampung Acheh, looking at mudskippers and paddling rented canoes and avoiding water snakes. I miss camping out at the sandy beaches of Pangkor’s Coral Bay, taking the ferry to and from the island and lying on the sand at night to count shooting stars. I miss camping out behind the District Scout House at the mangrove swamps of Kampung Sitiawan, getting up early at dawn to cycle around Sitiawan before everyone wakes up and walking in the middle of the night to the nearby cafe to buy air sirap when […]
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Working in the 21st Century
You know what I like best about working with the technological resources we have now? It’s the interconnectivity and flexibility, as well as the sheer amount of things you can make at home or at the office where before you had to outsource to another company. E-mail, instant messaging, direct file transfers, VOIP… they’re all indispensable tools for any type of work. With a notebook and a wireless connection, you have your files and all the knowledge in the world (well, not quite) at the tip of your hands. Yesterday, I wasn’t in the office. I was at home. But I was talking to at least 4 other people at work via Skype and cellular phone on speaker mode. Out of the 5 people involved only two of us were in the same room. Even with telephones, I can NOT see this happening in a company with a small setup […]
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Peter, Again
Some time last August, I drew Peter with Painter Classic. Here he is once again, this time with the new armored costume Tony came up with for him while MJ and he works as a New Avenger. It has bulletproof armour, enhanced computer-display visors and those extra pincer limbs not shown in the illustration below. I like the design, though because Tony came up with colour scheme, the outfit is red and yellow. Kinda looks a bit like Shiro‘s costume.
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Time To Abandon Ship!
It’s time for another round of SWAG‘s Member Theme Art Contest (Link broken)!!!!! Well, actually it’s my first submission, and it’s only the second topic ever. The topic is Time To Abandon Ship! and I wanted to do a free-for-all (during the pencilling I decided to pit Wookiees against Imperial stormtroopers). The guy abandoning ship is the one in the back, not involved in the brawl. It took me the entire length of the movie Regarding Henry on TV for me to digitally pencil, ink and colour this piece. Apologies for the shoddy colouring, by the way. Click on the thumbnail to see the full image, or if you’re game for an even larger image, head on down to where it’s at on deviantArt.
Continue readingAfternoon Storms
For the last month or so, the late afternoons, before the onset of dusk, is usually time for heavy rainstorms. They’re so heavy that sometimes, the hills in front of the apartment on the other side of Pandan Indah are totally obscured. Lightning tear across the sky. Thunder shakes the windows. Each time it hits, there would come a time during the storm when the lightning and thunder would coincide, which indicated that they were extremely close. This could be very disconcerting up here on the tenth floor. But today something new occurred. Not only there was an extremely bright flash of lighting coinciding with a loud thunderclap. The event also producted a strong electromagnetic field which caused my computer CRT monitor’s colour to go all purple. Fortunately, a quick usage of the monitor’s degauss function immediatedly rectified the problem. Thankfully the computer wasn’t damaged in any way.
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Illustration Friday: Sorry
A late entry to this week’s Illustration Friday is my version of the current topic: Sorry. Once I read the topic, this image popped in my mind and it’ll bug me to death if I didn’t realise it. Well, enough gabbing; let the illustration tell its story.
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Brief Pahang Incursion
Ain’s good friend from Univerity Malaya, Jalilah, got married last Saturday. It was, of course, another Family Trip to parts unknown; this time to FELDA Lepar Hilir 1 in the state of Pahang to the east. Since the car’s suspension was repaired a couple of days earlier, I felt confident in making the trip without having the car losing its tyres halfway there. So, at 1030 hours on that day, we left the house for Pahang. We didn’t take the new East Coast Highway, cause I miss driving on the old Federal main road east through Karak, Mentakab, Temerloh and Maran, which have better roads now and less traffic thanks to the new highway. It was quite a feat, trying to locate the bride’s home via the map that was on the invitation card. And who would have thought PMG meant “Pusat Mengumpul Getah” (Rubber Collection Centre). Right by the […]
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Random Banner Images
Now thanks to Pivot’s Rotator v1.0 extension, the weblog’s banner up at the top of the page randomly rotates through a bunch of images I made up just for the occasion. More images will be uploaded for quantity’s sake. Refresh the page, or just read the entries to see it in action.
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