Menacing Weather

It hasn't been a good Monday. It started with heavy traffic heading to SJMC after dropping the boys at school. It was supposed to be my day off sorting out the conference coming later this week but it turned out to be a long morning session.

As I was preparing to head to KL Tower to settle some arrangements, Anita called to say that her cousin's wife passed away earlier this morning.

After settling my affair at the gower, I headed straight to PPUM just in time to avoid the heavy downpour. All the way to UMMC the sky looked menacing. I wonder what the weather would be like during the burial later ...

Manage to meet a few old friends while I was there before going back to SJMC for some review. By the time in was done for the day, I was actually quite tired. Had a nap before getting up again for more emails and letters. So much for a day off ...

The Final Stretch

The MSH Annual Scientific Meeting was due to start in 5 days time and we were heading for the final stretch now. There were still last minute issues mainly on the technical side. It looks like I would be doing some tech stuff during the meeting to make sure everything would run smoothly.

To add to that, I would still be on call today. Praying that it would not be too busy as it would carry over for the next few days. I can see myself running around doing chores in the next few days. Hopefully things would be quiet by then.

Emails and letters had been the things which kept me occupied in the last few weeks and days. Once all were done and the meeting over, hopefully I could get some time off. Do a bit of photography perhaps ...

Praying that the meeting would be a successful one.

Danger Will Robinson

I had been watching the trailer for quite some time and when it finally came out today, I watched ethos first couple of episodes straight up.

"Lost in Space" received a Netflix reboot and the story was quite compelling. The Family Robinson was there of course - to keep the old nostalgic storyline going - although the premise was different.

Another bit that got me was one of the daughters was clearly not theirs. Hollywood wanted to keep the diversity thing going on I guess. I found that rather distracting.

Clearly Netflix spent a ton of money on this. The acting was solid, the special effect wouldn't be out of place in a mobile blockbuster. Now, the story arch must meet expectation. And expectations were pretty high ...

I watched 3 episodes so far. Another 7 to go for the season ...

The Meeting

ASH stood for American Society of Haematology. Every winter, they have a big meeting - the last one I attended was in Atlanta in 2012. But travelling across the globe was not really my cup of tea especially with the thought of entering the United States. I was lucky to be flown in Business Class on my last visit. I couldn’t see myself travelling otherwise. The journey would be unbearable.

Luckily, every year, ASH came to Asia-Pacific. The update meeting was held in Brisbane 2 years back and this time around it was in Bali - hence my trip. They also held a trainee workshop from the day before the meeting started. The meeting proper lasted for a day and a half.

The talks were generally great but the question and answer session were rather long with many long-winded questions from the audience. I was well into my second day as I wrote this entry and was planning our travel to the airport for the flight back. We decided to take a cab straight to the airport but the worry would be that we would get jibbed again by the cabby.

Grand Hyatt Bali

Sprawling landscape with somewhat disappointing beach. That more or less summed up the place. Definitely a place to just chill with the nice room. Anita would've loved it if she could come along.

The whole complex was big. We could easily get lost walking around the compound. The signage was also not the best.

For the first evening, we decided to stay in and have dinner at the hotel rather than take a taxi out of town. Nusa Dua is a rather protected cocoon. The are more than 10 hotels with tight security coming in and out of the area. I was sure it was for the safety of tourists. Traveling into town from the hotel was rather problematic logistically. They even have their own retail area within Nusa Dua.

The dinner was at a Balinese restaurant at the hotel. They even had a cultural show to boot. Food was nothing special however.

Breakfast was a similarly standard fair. They had a couple of outlets doing breakfast and we tried both. The one by the pool - called Salsa Verde - was better.

Since the program was tight, I didn't really get to enjoy the facilities. But that didn't stop me from getting a 10 hour sleep the evening I arrived. It had been a while since I had such lay in. More information are at the hotel website.