Tuesday, February 27, 2007

It's a small world



Just came back from a long lunch with a bunch of old friends and bumped into a close friend’s mom.



Long lunch is a perk when your company is in the process of a merger. Not my fault, really. Blame the system.

Bangsar is too small. You bound to bump into people you know, especially in BSC or Bangsar Village. It’s a neighborhood hangout.




I was told once that if you were to go out for dinner with a dodgy date, you might as well go to Cheras or Port Klang. Or perhaps, Gombak.

Bloody small world.




In Bangkok last December, I was out to shoot xmas lights and trees and new year decorations in Central World Plaza. At 2am, I was browsing around looking for a good spot with my camera and a tripod. (Yes, there were 20 other people with cameras and tripods, so I felt at home)



I volunteered to take a pic of one of the couples. (You know you can tell they were looking for someone to take their picture together kind of thing?). Before the guy handed the camera to me, he went:




Are you from KL?

Yeah (oh shit! 2am in the middle of Bangkok?)

I think I have met you before with so and so

That’s right, that’s right (I haven’t a clue, but I am sure we met before when he mentioned this particular friend who loves to party.)

The world is getting smaller.

So, behave!

Monday, February 26, 2007

Where's the party?



Went to a beautiful wedding on saturday nite.

The only thing I like about weddings are catching up with old friends and the food (which sometimes sucks). Rushed back, drove my date home and off to a little party at F's.



Another sorta catching up session with friends, old and new. The company was excellent, the host, very hospitable. He has planned for this party since days ago if not weeks. Armed with new cocktail glasses, new coffee table, excellent selections of drinks, blender, recently downloaded songs in the nano and its newly acquired ipod docking system, great cocktail recipe (from mixer.com, mailed and doctored by a friend with an additional vulgar ingredient), two decks of cards and mahjong.




It was 4.30am when we decided to call it a nite.

We had to fish out the house key from Mr host's jeans(pocket).

I wonder what would be the first thing in his mind when he wakes up the next morning.

"FARK! Where are my guests????"



It was definitely a great party, nevertheless....

Errr dude, we ransacked your fridge and it's time for you to replenish your stock of strawberry flavor BR.

Monday, February 19, 2007

The First and The Last

The Long Chinese New Year weekend give me an opportunity to do a bit of housekeeping on the thousands of photographs I have. The progress is very slow as I am still a baby in the world of Mac users.

Try to look at your holiday photos again and find out what was the first picture you snapped during that holiday and what was the last one.

Do you remeber the imression like...

oh.. I can't wait to explore this country....

or

I just wanna get outta here.....

Monday, February 12, 2007

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

One Morning in a Life of Monks

At Maha Ganayon Kyaung, AMARAPURA.



Modern subjects such as IT



It's a communal life. Food preparation for the whole monastery.



Lining up to the dining hall for lunch, at about 11.30.



Makan time. Vegiterians. Only two meals a day. Lunch is the last meal. The next meal is the next morning.
Not supposed to utter a single word during meals.


Lining up to wash their bowls, made of laquer.




Back to studying






Or just chill!

What Song?



I have 1,572 songs in my iTunes which occupy 7.32GB of the disk space.
If I were to play all the songs continously, I can have my 5.2 days filled up with music non stop.




But you know what? Besides having the choice of playing any of the 1000 odd songs, I sometimes feel that there are better songs which I haven't even down loaded.




The other night some friends came over and one of them downloaded these nice Indonesian jazz, Selalu Dengan Mu and Cinta Yang Ku Cari by Tompi. (Both are great!)

At the moment, those are the songs I listen to all day, every day.

Have you even gone really crazy about a song?

I have.

I have the songs in my desktop, lap top, iPod and my car and can listen to just them for a few weeks.

But its only for a few weeks. After which I will fall in love with another song....



It would be scary if that is the way I look at relationship, eh?

*the images have got nothing to do with the text....

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

Images of Myanmar - 09



A typical scene in Myanmar. Machanization in farming is still not quite accesable to the farmers.

Images of Myanmar - 08

These are very typical views in Myanmar. In fact I was told in Bagan (which I did not have the chance to explore), the whole scenery is so much more beautiful.




This country is actually very beautful even more beautiful to explore. Buildings are ancient built during early days of Bhudism. And they are still great temples all over the country. What ever it is, enough to deduce that there was a great power once, very advanced in agriculture, proud of their culture could possibly one of the great powers and civilizations.

I do not know much about history (which I kinda regret) but you can surely tell that was once ruled a great king during its era.




The people of Myanmar are very friendly and polite. They are very proud of their culture. With their sarongs (longyi) and practice in a big way like the celebration of the comng of age for children.




Surprisingly to me to get halal food is rather easy as there are major Muslims population in big cities. They are the desendents originated from India. Hence you can get chapati for breakfast, lunch or dinner. With dhal.... I adventurously tried the one by the roadside (suggested by Lonely Planet I thought) and ended up with food poisoning on my last day. But it was that bad...




Women, children and quite a lot of men stripe their faces with thanakha (powdered bark) as make up or perhaps sunscreen too. Almost 99 percent of the women I saw applied it. Makes me think the value and concept of beauty in different culture. Like the long neck, big ears in Northen Thailand.




Most taxis here are the worst condition vehicles I have even seen movinig on the road. It is very expensive the even bought one. The price told to me was very rediculous. And most of them are not air-conditioned.




Towns and cities are very dusty. I move around with the filter mask on my face. I could feel it in my throat in the morning especially.




One of the cabbies that I met was actually a university graduate. In fact he has a master degree in Anthropology.




Education in expensive, even at primary level. Poverty is very rampant to a certain extend makes me feel depressed and powerless. I wish I could to something to improve their condition.. I wonder how their government feels about this when they look at the way they live, everyday.... boy it's a huge responsibilty to be a leader.




Its a long uphill battle for the country to be developed. How could you develop a country without education, which I think the most essential foundation. How could you attract foreign investment without skilled labours to offer. It makes me feel proud about my own country, yet still think that my government could do a lot better.....




The country is rich with mineral. Ruby and sapphire are big here, probably the best quality in the world. They use gold and precious stones to adorned the statue of Buddha. In the ritual, they also stick gold (real) leaves to Buddha statue. That's a lot of gold.




They practice that since early days of their civilization. Gold are only for God and King. So, it was not a norm for the general people to own gold or keep them.

People are oppressed from expressing their political views. Quite sad really. Not much freedom in a lot of ways. Perhaps the government prefer it to be that way so the the people wouldn't be too smart yo be against them.

I still remember we passed through a road block at about 2am. All tourists are allowed through the check point with having to splash their travel documents. But, the locals have to line up and show their ID. I thougt that was really wierd. They should check the foreigners, no?

In Mandalay, curfiew starts at 11pm every night. If the police find locals on the street, they (the locals) will be questioned. To tourists, they wont.

There are street light, not as frequent as the ones that we have where I come from but, yeah, quite scattered really. The usage are rationed. Different areas get lit up in different nights. The roads are just dark. Could be piched dark. There was once I actually helped the trishaw with my travel torchlight. You just could not see the road.

Images of Myanmar - 07




Maha Ganayon Kyaung, AMARAPURA.

Images of Myanmar - 06


Lake Taungthaman, MANDALAY.

This lake is actually connected to the great Ayeyarwady river.

*Please observe the details in the background to appreciate this image. It was a bit hazy....

Images of Myanmar - 05

Images of Myanmar - 04

Images of Myanmar - 03




I was browsing through a shop where they make puppets, sculptures and tapestries. There were holes on the roof of the shop which allow ray of light to escape and beamed on to the carving / sculpture above. It's like, the "light from above".

I spent almost 30 minutes and scores of shots to get these shots.

Images of Myanmar - 02




I was walking down town Mandalay, early in the morning when the young monks walking around collecting food from generous buddists in the neighbourhood.

The monks only eat twice a day, but they can drink anytime they want.

Inspiried by crewcut75's hari raya posting of children faces, I decided to emulate his theme.

Images of Myanmar - 01



Part of an old monastery, made of teak wood. Each pillars were made of one whole teak tree. I shot this on the way out, the image is carved on the door. Simply stunning!

My First Collage



The first few shots I took as soon as I reached home with my newly acquired 50mm. I was driving like a maniac, couldn't wait to test the new lense. It's worth it!

I hope I have enough money to get a macro lense, soon....