Category: Asia

Header of the Month: What the kids in Nepal taught me.

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When it comes to procrastination, I think I’m the queen.

I have been wanting to write this post for a while, and it took me two YEARS to finally get around to it.

I think part of me wanted to make this post perfect, since I felt that this travel story that I’m about to write deserves the best. Everything that had thus far come to my head never sounded good enough – I don’t even know if this post is going to cut it.

It took a terrible earthquake that practically damages Kathmandu to shake me out of this mentality, and I decided to write this post about the kids in Nepal, because I’m thinking of them, and I’m praying for their safety.

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The historical tower built in 1832 that collapsed because of the earthquake.

I went to Nepal exactly two years ago on a mission. I had never been much of a charitable person, and definitely not someone who would proactively make time in the weekend to help people in need. And for that, I felt genuinely horrible, as if I were a very evil person. So I decided that perhaps a trip to the poorest country in Asia would make me more charitable.

I expected the living conditions and the tough terrain of Nepalese mountains would teach me a thing or two. And I did learn something from them. But the credit for the best lessons learned should go to the kids, really – I went there to teach them some Mathematics and English, but I came home feeling that I have learned so much more from them.

Here are some life lessons that I had the privilege to be taught by the wonderful kids:

Go the extra mile (or two) to learn

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I remember complaining in my head when I arrived at the mountains and found out that we had to wake up at 6 AM the next morning to prepare for the materials because the kids are scheduled to start their class at 6 30 AM. Grudgingly I set my alarm, only to be woken up the next day before my alarm went off by the chirpy noise of the kids outside! The kids were there an hour early! What made me feel even more ashamed of myself afterwards was that I found out that some of them lived two hours’ walk away, which means they woke up at 4 AM, just to attend the classes that we were going to teach! I never recalled having so much motivation to learn, even though I had all the access to education right at my doorstep…

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Highlights from Mariner of the Seas.

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A lot of people say that cruise trips are not for the young and energetic. I wouldn’t lie and declare that I disagree with them; it can be slow, lazy and full of old people and families with small kids. But just because the majority of your company is not young adults doesn’t mean you can’t have fun, and looking back at my holiday pictures last week, I actually think that I was a lot more active than the past four months sitting in front of my computer at work.

My family and I decided to go on a short trip to Malaysia on a Royal Caribbean cruise since we got a very good deal for it. SGD 300 for 5 days 4 nights is a steal considering the price practically includes accommodation, food and transport. So that’s how we found ourselves on our second Royal Caribbean Cruise after more than two years (the first was in Alaska back in 2012). This time, we had the honour to be on board Mariner of the Seas.

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Here are some of the highlights from my cruise trip.

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QZ8501.

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I am just very shaken at the moment by the news of the missing Air Asia flight. I pray for the safety of the passengers and crew onboard and for the families to remain strong through this extremely trying time.

It broke my heart when I skimmed through the list of passengers on board. Some are clearly families who are flying to Singapore to celebrate the new year.

Although it is a different route, this is what my family has always done for the past few years. And for us in Singapore, taking the Indonesia-Singapore route just feels like commuting on a bus. You just assume that you will reach your destination safely because you have done that so many times. So it really hits home.

So my thoughts are with all of them, who are waiting at Changi Airport for the arrival and news of their loved ones.

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Header of the Month: Christmas Wonderland in Singapore.

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I love Christmas markets. There is something very charming and romantic about those rows of little wooden huts with slanted roofs, fairy lights tracing their edges, selling everything from warm wine to cakes and earmuffs.

Over the years, I have visited Christmas markets in Copenhagen, London and Paris and never seemed to get enough of them. They are definitely one of the things that I miss the most from being in Europe.christmasmarket1

So imagine my thrill and excitement when I found out that Christmas market has finally come to Singapore. I love it so much that I have been there not once, not twice but three times over the past week!

The Christmas market (or Christmas Wonderland as the official name goes) is located at Gardens by the Bay’s Supertree Grove. The Supertrees on normal days are already very impressive if not somewhat menacing (a lot of people have mixed feelings about the veins sprouting everywhere from the ‘trees’ and I do agree that from afar it looks kind of odd). I always compare them to scenes from the movie Avatar.

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Supertrees!

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Geylang, and its hidden charms.

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It is now officially 97 days (ninety seven!) since I last travelled. I did not know how I have survived without travelling for this long, but that is not to say that I have been sitting idly doing nothing. A lot has happened in the past three months, and in fact, as I have said many times previously, I have been very busy. I was leaving my previous job, and now have somewhat settled into my new one after a period of steep learning curve. Just last week, I said bye to the only steadfast in my Singapore life for the past eight years: the flat I have been staying since I first came to Singapore. It was part emotional, part stressful trying to move and throw away some eight years’ worth of junk. I can’t believe how much of a hoarder I am, but I really am one.

ANYWAY, I’m not here to discuss my habit of keeping-things-just-in-case-I-have-a-use-for-them-in-the-future. Rather, it just feels a little weird that it is December and this time last year I was getting ready to go for an epic trip to Myanmar. But here I am, in my new flat, wifi-less (I’m attempting to publish this post using Wifi hotspot from my phone plan) and travel-plan-less, and I have to say I did feel a little miserable earlier today.

Which is a bit unfair of me to say that I feel miserable to be stuck here in Singapore. It is after all a very cool place to live, and my friend just told me of a Christmas market at Gardens By the Bay which I’m going to check out next week. And to remind myself that it is not such a bad thing to be stuck here and to appreciate things around me more, I decided to write a post about one of my favourite places in this island: Geylang.

I know that Geylang isn’t a place where most people would consider their favourite. It is after all labelled the red-light district of Singapore, and it definitely does not look glamorous nor does it sparkle with the city lights that this country is so proud of. However, it is at the same time the least pretentious part of Singapore where things happen when they happen, and clearly no one seems to think there is anything wrong with a brothel and a Buddhist temple to be situated side by side.

To be honest, the street full of brothels does not seem that interesting.
Let’s be honest here, the street of brothels doesn’t seem all that interesting.

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Tanjong Pagar, day and night.

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Before I go to sleep to start my weekend, I thought I would share with you my two favourite photos from this week taken by yours truly (ahem).

Since I’m spending a lot of (read: too much) time in the office, I figured I might as well take advantage of the fact that I work in a penthouse with floor-to-ceiling windows surrounded by an amazing view.

I mean, I’m practically living in a penthouse, how cool is that?

Oh and the view.

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Working late does have its perks sometimes, really.

Have a great weekend ahead everyone!

Singapore Formula 1 weekend.

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Once a year Singapore gets a major influx of tourists. There is no prize for guessing why.

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While half of me is really glad that I do not have to shove through with the crowd and spend the whole night in an unbearable humid and warm weather, as I’m looking at the eager-eyed tourists wearing the passes, the other half of me does miss the fantastic weekend I had almost exactly a year ago, being pushed around, getting all sweaty and sticky but at the same time be part of the heart-racing and deafening night race excitement.

So here is me joining the hype by reminiscing my favourite moments at Formula 1 weekend exactly one year ago. And hopefully you will see why you should go to the Formula 1 at least once, especially if you live in Singapore.

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Header of the Month: Myanmar Theme Song.

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The view that inspired it all.

I recently rediscovered a hidden ‘talent’ of converting famous songs into parodies. Although I can’t share the one that I composed two days ago just yet (since there is a high chance I might get sued by someone), here is one that I wrote and dedicated to my awesome trip in Myanmar last December (which I had to sing and dance to on our last night there, thanks to the request of my demanding friends and travel mates).

Please play the Lion King’s ‘Circle of Life’ in the background, to fully appreciate this song.

The Epic Myanmar
(Inspired by the song ‘Circle of Life’)

From the day we arrived in Mandalay
And blinking step into the sun
There’re more temples than can ever be seen
More to do than can ever be done

There’s far too much capcai we eat
With fried rice, pork curry and noodle
But then in Bagan we got diarrhoea
Mbak and Tika* never fell sick at all

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Fruits Fan Club in Hong Kong.

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I’m having a slight sore throat, most possibly because of my rather unhealthy lifestyle over the weekend. What made it worse was the lack of fruits in my fridge that I can just pop to my mouth to soothe the throat, or more importantly, to soothe myself psychologically that I have eaten healthy today.

So since I can’t get my fruits instantly, I shall do the closest thing that can get me to them – writing about them. And no, I’m not going to list down the health benefits of different types of fruits, but rather, I will transport myself back to March last year when I chanced upon the most copious mountain of fruits that I have seen in my life: at Yau Ma Tei Fruits Market in Hong Kong.

As always, the best things during travel are the ones that you stumble upon accidentally. We certainly did not plan to visit this fruit market, not at 2 am in the morning at least. What we were doing before that was definitely not of people who were sophisticated enough to appreciate how fruits came about to our table every morning.

I was too busy thinking that Aaron Kwok and I were meant to be since our hands fit perfectly into each other.
I was too busy thinking that Aaron Kwok and I were meant to be since our hands fit perfectly into each other.

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Montigo Resorts at Batam.

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Anyone who has travelled with me knows that I have extremely low standard for accommodation. My logic is that since I will spend most part of the day travelling, I just need a bed to sleep and a clean bathroom to shower. I will normally opt for a hostel or a very cheap hotel, and so far both have worked fine with me. Rarely has an accommodation given me a bad impression that I do not wish to set my foot there again. In fact, I would recommend most of them to friends travelling.

Up until two weeks ago, I only had two places that I would advise anyone to avoid at all costs. First was the apartment that I stayed in Hong Kong. It was actually clean enough considering it looked very old, but for some reason it gave me the creep. As we were sitting down in the living room chatting away at night, we suddenly heard a surge of water bursting from the pipe in one of the bathrooms. We were understandably surprised and in a desperate attempt to push away any thoughts of ghosts from my mind, I went to check the bathroom and somehow came up with a scientific explanation to calm myself down that perhaps it was because the water in the heating system overflowed. As I’m writing this, I had no idea how I managed to talk to myself and my friends into believing that. As if to prove me wrong straightaway, my friend found a few sheets of test papers on top of a shoe rack and the name of the student was ‘Demon’. Now I know that Hong Kong people have an interesting way of naming themselves (Apple, Orange, Kitty, Ice, Star, Bambi, etc), but when a Demon appeared together with bursting water pipe, it was enough to scare all of us that we had to watch funny Bollywood videos to calm ourselves down.

Second was a hotel in Copenhagen that I stayed in summer 2013. I have never been so sure that poltergeists exist until then. I distinctly remembered putting my earrings on the table only to find the next morning that they were gone. After turning the room upside down, my dad found each side of the earrings at different corners of the room. What was even creepier was that they were not the only items that had moved overnight. I was charging my camera battery and in the morning the battery was no longer in the charger. Instead, we found the battery separated from the charger below our blanket. Either one of my family members had a case of violent sleepwalking that none of us knew about or my memory was certainly failing me or…

Anyway, the point is so far, only these supposedly supernatural encounters have created an impression so deep and deterring that I swear I will never go back again. Montigo Resorts have somehow found a loophole in this theory and gave me the next scariest experience than demons and poltergeists: cockroaches.

Yes, you read that right, cockroachES. With ES. Plural. Four to be exact. And I only stayed there for 2 nights. For a place that we paid quite a considerable amount for (even with the 1-for-1 voucher that my friend had, it was still quite a pinch), I was expecting at least a basic level of hygiene and that guests can be pretty much cockroach-free. But no, our first encounter of a huge cockroach was during our late-night dinner right on the first night and my friend saw something fly across the room. We (I) tried to ignore it and pretend that it COULDN’T have been a cockroach – what were the odds?

But as we were finishing our dinner, one of my friends exclaimed, “OMG, I see it now. And it really is a cockroach.”

Very understandably, I screamed and jumped up the couch, barely being able to stand because my knees had turned jelly.

We all stood in suspense until the cockroach crawled out of the villa. Only then did we dare to head back to our room, only to find another one was waiting inside our bathroom. And the next day, I saw another one at a different toilet. As an added bonus, we were also visited by a hairy giant spider. I felt I was right back in Nepal whereby everyday was a battle with a new species of crawling and flying creatures.

Spider hunter.
Spider hunter.

If not for the extremely comfortable pillows in the villa and my energy completely drained out from the shock of seeing cockroaches, I would probably have been insomniac over those two nights.

Continue reading “Montigo Resorts at Batam.” →