The morning after

It was an early start and to be honest after the marathon sessions I had last night. I was starving when I woke up and breakfast would be a welcome. Shower, then a lift ride downstairs and on I went. I managed to avoid the crowd being early - I was down by 6.30am.

I was the first there though. My senior colleague, Alan (@palmdoc) was already there, playing around with his Palm Pre2 naturally. The breakfast spread was very good. I went vegetarian though as I wasn't sure if they were all Halal, but there wee enough on offer.

By the time I left, the queue was already building. A quick surf on the Net back in the room and it was already time for the lectures. The talks were held on an annex to the main hotel building, with room for more than 400 people in the main hall. A huge place.

Registration done. Now it was time to listen. As you can tell, the sessions were rather heavy. Lasting the whole day would be a challenge.

Checking in

The Shangri-La is impressive. And the attention to details were equally so. You would noticed that from the moment you stepped through the door. As you passed the entrance the staff would greet ad walk you towards the check-in area while taking your details to see if you have had prior booking. If you did - as I was - they just printed out your details, take your deposits and off you go. So painless.

The main lobby was spacious and formed the hub of the hotel. The restaurants were a floor down, so were the pools and the gyms. The meeting rooms were a floor up.

The room I was put up in was a standard one, but even the standard rooms ha plenty to offer. You have all the amenities you would expect, and more. I had an alcove in the room as a reading area. The broadband was world-class - pinged under 20ms and capped at 4Mbit - and it was free. I had all the TV channels I needed. I also had a comfortable work area. Upon checking in, a pot of hot Chinese was delivered into the room. A nice touch.

A hot pot of freshly brewed Chinese tea delivered to the room on checking inThe alcove really made me want to readSo I did, a bit. I read the 'Bro Code' of course.The lift lobbyAnd the it was down to businessUpon arrival, I had lunch at a Japanese restaurant at the hotel. Food was excellent. Unfortunately, I had a full afternoon program right after that. I finally escaped at 9.30pm, fired up my Skype and gave Anita a call.

I was really tired by ye time I finished my showers and done with the ironing - yes, I iron. I went straight to bed, falling asleep with the TV on.

The flight in

The flight in went very smoothly. A lot gave to do with the 737-800 that I took. The leg room on the plane was smaller than the usual 737 but the overhead compartments for storage appeared much bigger. Suffice to say that the plane was designed for short hop such as KUL-Singapore sector where one tended to take carry-ons onto the cabin. The passengers also tended to be the business type which prefer everything simple.

We landed in the rain and as usual, I was expecting a bumpy descent. It was cloudy, so I couldn't see much of the approach, but before long, I saw the famous Marina Bay Sands appearing on my window. An overcast day, so I couldn't really see much. The next thing I knew, we were already on the ground. In the future, I will definitely go for the 737-800 should I need to fly a short hop.

Immigrations and luggage pick-up was a breeze and by the time I landed, the driver was already waiting for me to me to Shangri-La which I will be staying at for the next three nights.

Good Morning

One of the thing I love about being on leave would be that I was able to take the boys to school. That was what I exactly did this morning since my flight will be at noon. This was followed by a quick breakfast with Anita.

Irfan had a school trip today. Not far. Just a quick hop on the school bus to Zoo Negara about 2 km away. He was going on about it all week, and hopefully he would not be caught up in the school holiday crowd.

All set. I was in my minivan in the way to KL Sentral when I wrote this, and as usual I will be taking the ERL.

Yangon Trip Slideshow