Kampung Ahoy!

At our kampung house at the moment. Everything looked nice and welcoming although the area just outside the compound needed some weed trimming. It has been warm here lately with not much rain, so some of the vegetables we planted died. Never had green fingers anyway!

It has been close to a couple of month since we last been here. It looked like we were due to come here again!

Laksa time!

The next port of call was Kuala Kangsar. I have o admit that there were hardly anything in Ipoh that I can't find in KL. Might as well drive along to somewhere with more exotic things to find. Decided to have some laksa there instead, with some ABC for good measure.

Called Puan Anita and she suggested that I give our kampung house a visit. That's where I will be heading next.

The waterfront

Invigilating - Day 1

Spent the morning invigilating the Final MBBS Exam at Perak Medical College. Similar to what I did last year. It turned out that one of the chap I was invigilating with last year was currently the Deputy Dean. So I spent some time this morning in his office before being introduce to the Dean. Proper stuff!

The exam darted without a hitch. There was not to be any major corrections, all the paper work were in order, the students all turned up on time. I was still not getting used to how different the academic building look here compared to UM. But I supposed the UM building were from a different era.

Examinations finishing soon. Have to figure out what to do for the afternoon.

By the way, Park Ji-Sung scored our winner just after I wrote the entry last night. And then Chelsea only drew with Blackburn. Game on!

Drive up to Ipoh

It was raining all the way up to Ipoh. It started the moment I enter DUKE. Got worst by Sungai Buloh, but then really pouring by the time I reached Kuala Kubu. There were three accidents by the time I reached Tapah, all I was sure due to people driving too fast in the rain.

At my usual haircut joint in Taman MelatiI left Gombak at around 4.30 after a quick haircut, finally reaching Ipoh at around 7.30. Luckily despite the heavy rain, there were hardly any traffic. The rain eased off by the time I arrived at Simpang Pulai, but poured down I again by the time I planned to go out in search of dinner. Decided to stay at the hotel and have the buffet instead. And I wasn't disappointed.

It's grill night tonight, the carvery was pretty decent. Even the dessert was pretty nice and I went bak up to the room after some coffee in time for the big kick-off. It's just past halftime now and the score was still even at one apiece. The game wasceryainly hotting up with United trying to up the tempo. Watching while biting my nails!

Balloons!

To take my mind of the fact that I will be heading to Ipoh tomorrow alone without the boys, I decided to take them to the hot air balloon show over in Putrajaya. There were balloons alright, but unfortunately not of the hot air variety. We arrived there at around 10.30 am and the main exhibits have already brought their balloon down in preparation for this evening’s ‘Night Glow’. What was left in terms of balloon were four tethered baskets for the tethered balloon ride, which cost a bit to get into. Apparently the quota for the day have been sold out.

But the balloons were not all. There were helicopter rides, a big bazaar and stalls area, ‘waterball’, songstage and other activities. I reckoned there was easily 500 people in the crowd, so in terms of audience number, the fiesta looked a success. It was a shame that we came at the wrong time and the weather was getting warm then as well. It would have been better to get there either earlier in the morning or late evening, in time to watch the ‘Night Glow’ as well. Just pray that it won’t be raining.

Already coming downWaterball!The funny bikeThe thing that caught our eyes were this interesting looking tricycle, where instead you stand to peddle, you actually lie on a mini-platform and kick out to paddle. Unfortunately the queue was too long for us to try but it sure looked fun. We spent a few more minutes at the stalls, but by the time both Idlan and Irfan were already getting restless. We left the area before midday, and head over to the Marriott for lunch.

The vast lobby filled up with tables for todayWhat Chee Chee made for Puan AnitaWe were amongst the first to arrive and quickly get our food for buffet. Then in walk the clown. Put it this way, we saw more balloons from the clown than at the balloon fiesta! Since there was only a couple of table with kids, he lingered around quite a bit. He happened to be Chee Chee the Clown. He was the one that we got for Irfan’s second birthday party back in 2008. He also had him over for Imran’s birthday later that year, so I recognised him straight away! He spent some time doing his balloon tricks and entertaining the boys. The buffet hall was fully booked but they were for a corporate event which lunch did not start until way after 1 pm. Even the music trio got bored as there were hardly any crowd at the beginning and came over to sing for the boys. As usual, Idlan asked for an Abba song and they duly obliged.

Irfan looking bemusedThe boys just finished their crumbs only! Spoilt!Chee Chee joining in the singingWhile waiting around to burn the boy’s sugar down after lunch, a couple of people called on me. They were old friends who I thought during their Masters program at UMMC. There was a pharmaceutical company meet-up at the hotel the same afternoon and it was nice to meet up with old colleagues. We left for home just after 2 pm and then rushed out again. Just me and Puan Anita. We had some business to attend to ……

Puan Anita's new laptopPuan Anita has been fed up with her old 3 year-old laptop. She needed a new one. It was a shame that she did not want a Mac. Vaio was a bit too expensive for what it can do, so we got an HP for her. A good discount, decent package, with free upgrade to Windows 7 which I am currently installing. Apparently it takes a while to install.