FAREWELL MY DEAR FRIEND..

Woke up this morning to receive a text message from my ex-colleague... "Gie, sad news.. Jas passed away this morning."  I was stunned for a moment.. it didn't really hit me at first. I replied.. "Oh dear, I am sorry, thanks for the info." 

 I have heard he was sick, he has been sick on and off for quite a while and had been diagnosed as having that dreaded C.  I also heard that he was advised to go for operation and chemo but he declined preferring to take alternative medicine.  

I have known Jas for a long time, having worked with him for more than 25 years.  Not only a friendly guy, but really helpful and a great joker at that.   I did not only treat him like a friend, but also like a brother.  

I remember those working days with him, whenever he passed by my table, he would always be saying something funny, ridiculous funny that would leave all of us in stitches.  
Helpful and dependable, he would willingly do anything that I request even to the point of collecting or delivering my personal errands.  

 An affable guy, he can be quite 'fierce'  if pushed to the corner.  This I know,  he has done with other colleagues, but never to me.  There were times when he was a little hard up, (don't we all),  he would quietly come to me and I have no qualms about lending him some and telling him not to hurry in paying back  'cos I trust and know that he would always pay me back in his time.  After. I left the Bank, he kept in touch and  I was one of the few whom he invited to his daughter's wedding.   My regret - that I was not able to visit him while he was sick.   I never imagined he would go so soon and thought that he would get well eventually.  My deepest sympathy to his family and may they be strong during this difficult times.






Farewell from this earthly life my dear friend. You are now in a place where there is pain no more.  I am going to miss you, we all are .. so many happy memories, your jokes,  the laughter we shared, the assistance rendered to me. I am deeply indebted to you.  Thank you for being such a good friend, thank you for touching my life with your kindness.   God bless and may your soul be placed among those yang beriman.  Semoga kamu damai di sana Jas. 

Taken during Jas' daughter's wedding a year ago. 

His wife on my left and on his left,  an ex-colleague.

"MY WIFE, MY FRIEND..."

I heard this song at a wedding the other day...a Kadazan song which I have not heard for quite a while but now simply refused to leave my brain. I would suddenly find myself humming this song while cooking or washing or while taking a shower even driving. Gosh, please leave me already hahaha...ok let me exorcise it by sharing with you all.

This is a very popular song especially during Kadazan weddings 'cos of the meaning which is relevant. Whenever I hear this song, I think of all the happily married couples, so many challenges as in any marriages yet they thrive.

The cynic in me sometimes think that most stay married because they have to, because of the vows they made before God, because of the children or pride or just a sense of responsibility or finance, status even and so would just endure it and live with each other and do things for each other simply due to the need of fulfilling moral obligations even after the feeling of love had worn out a long time ago for some reasons or other. 

I remember the words my friend Agnes always say whenever attending a wedding, hear someone getting married or see a wedding procession.  She will say “for how long?”. First time I heard her saying, I glared at her.. hahaha.. but I know where she’s getting at.. Don't get me wrong. I believe in marriage and what it stands for.  

But then, there are people who stay married because they really want to and are still so in love even after so many years and could not imagine being with anybody else.  This must be what people call a match made in heaven.

I have a friend who has been married for almost 20 years now and she swore that she has not felt any different from when they just got married.  And I asked her what’s their secret and I expected her to say ‘love’, but she said simply,” mutual respect for one another and with lots of sense of humour!”  Mutual respect, she said encompass almost all things needed in a good relationship and so if you have respect for one another, everything else will follow. ‘Well it works for them and who am I to disagree. And a sense of humour? Ability to laugh and see the funny or even the positive side of situations even how grave it may be. Hmm...something to think about.

Ok,  this song is dedicated to such couples. May their love be forever and may their marriage be filled with sunshine and laughter and just enough challenges to make it exciting!!

TRAVELLING AGAIN?

taken at the airport during my recent trip to Vietnam

Hi All,
am baack...miss ya'all.  See I just couldn't resist it and so I just had to come back..teehee.  Now am a little free after all the 'hoo haa' in the preparations for the State Level  Harvest Festival Celebration and after tying up loose ends following that, am now not as occupied with deadlines and meetings and what nots..save for the Appreciation Dinner for our sponsors and supporters this coming Saturday.   Oh gosh, I am forgetting, we have yet to follow up on non-payments on our charity dinner tables from a couple of buyers and then there's that still outstanding from advertisers on the Charity Dinner handbook failing which, we could face a bit of problem in closing our accounts.  

Me travelling again? Nahhh.. not for the time being..  A couple of friends are enticing me a cheap direct flight from KK to Perth.  With  a luggage, the return fare is RM1,100.00.   Still thinking about it though I feel the duration there is too long from 14th to 21st September.. so maybe not. Even if the fare is reasonable, but to be there for that period could eat up them pockets even if we say,  stay at budget self-contained lodgings meaning we do our own cooking and stuff, we would still have to think about the fares for coaches, trains or even taxis, food and other miscellaneous.  My buddies are even talking about taking a coach and travel way down to Sydney, a rather attractive alternative, and I am even thinking that perhaps I could even bunk-in with my sis there.

Talking about self-contained lodging brings me down memory lane to my trip with these friends to New Zealand in 2012.  Planning our trip and hunting for cheap lodgings through the Net brought thrill, looking at all the lovely pictures and locations and of course the price, plus the freedom to pick and choose and the joy in arriving the place and seeing it for real is incomparable.   Ok, while some places brought us absolute delight, some experiences were rather daunting but I wouldn't trade the adventure it gave us for anything! 

There was this incident - we had rented a car and drove from Christchurch to Lake Tekapo where we planned to stay the night before proceeding to Queenstown with a stopover at Mt Cook.  Isn't GPS a genius invention?

 Christchurch

Our ride.  I was not the driver...:)

It was in dead of autumn and was brrrr freezing cold and windy, but the sceneries along the way were a sight to behold, simply exhilarating!  

We arrived Lake Tekapo, a popular tourist destination, a beautiful place by the Lake surrounded by snowy mountains (reminded me of Sounds of Music) around 9 pm.  We had not arranged any accommodation  beforehand as we read from brochures that there were several budget lodgings there. Upon arriving and inquiring several inns, we found one that was reasonable but charged guests per head. As we were on a budget, we reckoned that by cheating a little, we could save some dough...hahaha.. ok a cheat is a cheat no matter how small.  But back to my story, we gathered our wits and my 2 friends went to the counter and asked for a place for 2 while I and another friend crouched inside the car.   They managed to get a place and paid for two and we quietly checked-in. The lodge was a little way away from the reception area and also it was dark and so it was safe from anybody's sight.

  

 stop over at salmon farm..



we bought frozen ones too,  for our dinner..

 sceneries to die for

Lots of stop over, toilet breaks..

 the lodging, ours in the middle..

The room was big,  complete with a double bed and a double decker, a kitchen and dining table. It was gorgeous and to top it, it was fully furnished with complete kitchen utensils. Perfect! My buddy Teri squealed in delight when she saw a nice toaster. We were famished and so we thought before we had that dinner proper, we could have some toasted bread first. She plonked in the bread into the toaster and we went about unpacking and assessing what food to cook that night.  Then suddenly, we smelt smoke.. someone shouted "The house is on fire"!!      Then we realised, . it was the darned toaster.. it wouldn't pop the bread out automatically!  The bread was badly burnt and we again jumped up in shock when the fire alarm went off!  It was ringing so loud, I felt the that it echoed right through the mountains and the whole of Lake Tekapo!

 Most of the time we prepare or cook our own meals.  
Vegetables and meats are fresh and cheap.

that's us having our breakfast  

Mussels anyone? Can be found at any supermarket and quite cheap too..

meat is fresh and cheap.  More sheep than humans in New Zealand.

look at the view from our cabin..

 woke up early to catch the sunrise... it was frrreezing..

  

 wild flowers

taken from a moving car. That's Canterbury Plain.. 

on the way to Mt Cook. 

           
                         

... fire alarm went off!  It was ringing so loud, I felt the that it echoed right through the mountains and the whole of Lake Tekapo!

We nervously switched off everything and opened the windows to let the darned smoke out.. the whole house was filled with smoke. Then horrors, we suddenly remembered.. the people from the reception could come and check us out and if they see that there were more than 2 of us, we are dead for sure... hahaha.. That would be beyond embarrassment.  And so 2 of us ran helter-skelter to the car parked outside in the cold and windy autumn night and hid there for several minutes, cowering inside, giggling and peering through the car windows to see if anybody was coming to check us out...oh the guilt!! My friends managed to silenced the fire alarm and no one appeared..phew!  After several minutes, our friends whispered for us to come up and we had a good laugh that night. We were lucky, we had a narrow escape. God must have seen our plight .. but gave a good scare nonetheless, a good lesson learnt!  It never pays to cheat. To you guys who were manning the lodgings that night, please accept our sincere apologies.

So many more funny anecdotes during our travels and we were even spooked in one of the B & B in Wellington but that's another story. 

And so you wonder why I love travelling so much. I wish my pockets would let me do more...sigh..

Cheers and thanks for reading.

the rare times that we ate out at restaurants...very very expensive. 

A THROWBACK ....

Dear All, I just wanna announce that I will not be posting in this blog after this for awhile.  Can’t tell for sure when I will be back but you are welcomed to leave your comments if you so wish. 

However, I will still keep this blog open and will probably be posting something every now and then in my other blog ‘curls & eyelashes . Do visit me there when free.

Thank you all for your support these past years. Your comments and visits were very much appreciated and have brought me immense joy.   Love and hugs to you all. 

Cheers, till we meet again, Adios!  

Here is my last post.

called Gaagabang in Kadazan or Uduk Uduk as the Malays in Sabah call it.

This is a wild plant with medicinal value. 

During my childhood days in the kampong (village), where life was much simpler and carefree..my siblings, some friends and I, -  our playground was the jungle. We would roam the woods in the hills in search of firewood or wild fruits.The ripened fruit of this Gaagabang is purplish in colour and sweet. That fruit was our 'candy' as we didn't have the luxury of real candies. But we had lots of fun showing each other's purple/black tongue and teeth..

We would climb trees and pretended we were Tarzan, just swinging from frees to trees from hanging vines. Once, before I could get a good grip of the entwined vines, someone gave me a push to induce the swing,  I lost my grip, fell down into a ravine and rolled straight into a stream. 

My fall  hurt me bad 'cos for a moment I couldn't get my breath back and I thought I would just die. My lungs just refused to open.  I heard voices which sounded far away. Then miraculously, my breath came back and I felt like my chest was ripping and bursting into a thousand pieces!  I was helped out and not only dripping wet but shocked, dazed and very scared. What will mother say?  I'm gonna get a beating for playing a dangerous game for sure I thought.

I later found out that I fell on a huge protruding root of a tree. Thousands of angels must have been with me that day as I didn't break anything apart from a few cuts and bruises and an injured pride.

My mother never found out how I fell.. nobody dared tell her that I fell while pretending to be tarzan ...hahaha... Scolded, I was, but still she treated my cuts.  

Usually to stop bleeding or just treating minor cuts and bruises,  my mother would mash some young shoots of the Gaagabang apply onto the cleaned wound and tie with a piece of clean cloth. The next morning, no more gaping wound, the bleeding not only stopped, but the cuts dried up, no infection...

Those days seems so far away but even this simple plant reminds me of my mom.. It's more than 10 years now since she went away...but it feels like only yesterday.  Miss you mom....rest in peace...

Note: All pictures except for the Gaagabang are courtesy of the web.

PRAY FOR MH370

..where are you?...

The outlook of MH370 seems bleak. Nevertheless, let's not stop praying, for what else can we do in times like this but to pray to God for the safety of all the 239 passengers. Also pray for their families that they be given strength to accept any eventualities during this difficult time. May all the rescue teams, volunteers and the authorities be given positive leads soon.

Amen..

ANOTHER YEAR ADDED....

As the dust settles

On another year added to my life

I stand amazed God,

Once again you have proven

 Your wisdom and perfect timing

There were trials, pain and victories

Moments that required 'a try again'

You have been there

 Every step of the way

Sometimes I wanted to question –

Then calmness settle 

Cause a lesson needed to be learned

Today I just want to say "Thank you Lord"

 'Cause without you,

I would not have made it… 

You knew my worth

You knew my ability

You saw the best in me

When I sometimes questioned it..

EXOTIC BALI ON MY MIND

One day, months ago, one of my best buds gushed about the cheap flights offered by low cost carrier AirAsia to Bali which has now resumed its direct flights from Kota Kinabalu.  The direct flights were discontinued a few years back, a business decision I presume. Its resumption that commenced on 27th July 2013 was very much welcomed by the netizens of Sabah as they would no longer have to travel through KLIA.   The cheap flights from Kota Kinabalu to Bali thrice weekly every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday were snapped within minutes! Some must have been waiting in ambushed days after the announcement.  

What was supposed to be a trip for just 3 or 4 of us ladies, later swelled to 20!  Some of the tickets were acquired double than the amount that we paid.  The 6N/5D trip from 15th February was a dream come true for me as I have always wanted to visit this beautiful island!  

Bali is indeed magical, steeped in rich tradition and spirituality that focuses mainly on art and religion. Most public areas, homes and paddy fields are decorated by intricate carvings, paintings and artworks.   Home to many beautifully and sacred temples throughout the country, Bali villages hold many temple festivals and colourful geremonies.  I understand that ninety percent of Balinese are Hindu and around five percent Muslims, the remaining practise Buddhism or Christianity. 

..these offerings are found almost everywhere.. in and around houses, shops or other public places.  Looks like a potpourri of flowers

We boarded the evening flight from Kota Kinabalu and was met at the airport by the tour coordinator. Just as we were about to board the bus that was waiting, we were delighted to be welcomed with garland of yellow flowers. I laughingly told my friends, the flower smelled Bali!

We were brought to Ubud, a 1 1/2 hours drive away, with a stop-over at a restaurant for late dinner and later we arrived our hotel, a restful retreat set within a green landscape at the edge of Ubud's sacred Monkey Forest Sanctuary. 

 Our ride..

The monkeys wandering about the hotel..

The following morning as I walked along the beautifully landscaped garden towards the cafe for breakfast, I had a shock of my life when a couple of monkeys got into my path. We were earlier warned that these monkeys can be bold and guests were known to have lost their sunglasses or handbags being left around attended. And so upon encounter of these animals, I instinctively held onto my handbag as if my life depended on it.. hahaha..

We really had fun visiting and shopping in this amazing island and should another opportunity strikes, I would be in Bali again in a heart's beat. 

I hereby share some pictures of our trip and let the pictures speak for themselves, mostly taken with my hand phone cam.

stunning rice terrace, taken from a moving bus..

Above - Taman Ayun Temple

Ulun Danu is a Hindu Temple located at the hilly side of Candi Kuning countryside. It is set at a lakeside of Beratan  surrounded by hills situated in the plateau area. The atmosphere there is cool and breezy.

 Tanah Lot - a rock formation. It is home of a pilgrimage temple, the Pura Tanah Lot, and a popular tourist and cultural icon for photography.

 ..the guyz after getting 'blessings' Hindu ways..

 BBQ Seafood Dinner at Jimbaran Bay, Kuta

..took this as it reminded me of someone born in the year of a horse 

Cheers folks, thanks for dropping by and have a lovely week!