My Raya vacations

If you want to ask how busy a final year medical student can be, I think I will answer it's busy, but it's still tolerable, in my subjective way of thinking. However if we think objectively, I can tell that final year medical students only have 2 weeks duration of break for the whole 1 and a half year study, now you see how packed and tiring it is? 1 week for Hari Raya Aidilfitri and the other for Chinese New Year.

During this 1 week break, many of my coursemates went overseas, 1 group went to Bali Island, Indonesia and the other to Angkor Wat, Cambodia. Whereas for me, I chose to stay in Malaysia for spending my time with my family and her family. Both of us went to Johor Bahru from KL immediately after working.

In JB, we went to visit plenty of tourist spots...

During our bus journey to JB, we had a short supper break at the Yong Peng rest station.

at the seaside near the Singapore-Johor Causeway.

Sultan Abu Bakar Muzeum, not opened during Hari Raya...

an antique building within the compound of Sultan Abu Bakar Muzeum, few couples were shooting their wedding photos there.

JB clock tower and delicious Skudai duck feast.

JB Old Temple- of traditional vs modernization.

Malay houses at Danga Bay. (actually these are restaurants, but were closed during Raya festival)

sunset at seaside of Danga Bay.

After 3 days of short stay in JB, I followed again her family members went back to her hometown in Penang. There we also visited many places.

Penang Ferry experience, enjoyed the breeze!

Manhattan Beach at Ferringhi, Penang.

Siamese Lying Buddha Temple.

Burmese Buddhist Temple.

Botanical Garden.

Kek Lok Si Tenple

Bukit Genting Siamese cuisine, the "little Genting in Penang", ordinary food but breath-taking scenery!

As I am graduating very soon and surely there will be no much of break like this, so I always cherish the chance I have with my family and also her family, of course she also. Although I spent nearly the whole week with her family, I managed to be with my family at the last 2 days of my break, when they came to KL.

Really want to thank her for giving me such a memorable and enjoyable vacation.

1+1+1

Maybe you will wonder, what is the meaning behind this 1+1+1? A simple mathematical equation. Let's look at the following short film and hopefully you will get a little bit of idea from it.



It's true, in all sorts of society, we tend to group ourselves into groups, according to race, sex, interest etc, which are the most apparent things we can observe in almost everything we go through. Even within the same race, we also tend to group ourselves into smaller groups, with the people you feel good and share the same interest or opinions. Even with the same small groups of people, and you are so close to each other, you won't share the same thinking or the most valuable things all the time. Why is it so? Have you ever think of that?

Human, has to live in society, or in other words, we are not isolated. Even if we don't share the same culture, religion, beliefs, opinions and interests, we should not isolate each other, there is something called "sharing". Sharing is a very powerful item I think, as it creates understanding, and hoping that it in turn causes acceptance and appreciation.

Coming back to what is happening in Malaysia, the above shown is the situation we observe. Not only among the younger generations, it is even more severe in older generations, as they went through those hard time, and yet the racial problems is still carried on till now, with little or no improvements.

In the movie, 3 main characters representing 3 major ethnics in Malaysia, they go through the same things from the moment they wake up, having breakfast at dining hall, chatting over the same topics, and also shout in pain when their blood is taken, but what makes them so different from each other? Is that only the language? We can neither blame cultures nor religions, as they are heritages and should be preserved at all times, but what actually makes people so appart from each other? As I discussed above, probably there are lacking of sharing and understanding. When people forgot how to share, they never understand and tend to forget the importance of the existance of the other races and subsequently inequalities happened. Initially, I intended to bring out an issue of "we go through the same things, but what makes us so different?" One of the example of which would be the pre-university examinations. There are 3 pre-U examinations that I know of which are STPM, Matriculation and PASSUM. Although all 3 lead to the same local public universities, but the durations of study and its examination's difficulty are varied. We lead to a common destination, but why the paths are different? And "who", "how" and "what" make us so different? It's time for you to think.

Despite realizing the actual problems I portrayed- "seggregation", the more important step to do is to overcome it. Who should be responsible in making the change? It's us all, MALAYSIANS! We hope for change, understanding, equalities and peace, only with this we can bring harmony and productivity to this country, and therefore a developed nation.

How you can pronounce "1+1+1"? Either "yi jia yi jia yi", "satu tambah satu tambah satu", "one plus one plus one" or any other languages you know of. Special thanks to Andrew Mok who helped me with the ideas to improve Malaysia, and also Chuan Huan who helped me a lot in the post-production of the film.

Thank you for your view, together we might change Malaysia.

Lost in Klang Valley

Had a dinner with my sisters at 10pm yesterday at Look Out Point, Ampang, a place where you can enjoy the night view of Kuala Lumpur. Why having dinner at 10pm?? Hmm... some technical problems, let me explain...

Actually the date was at 7.45pm, my dear and I left for the destination from PJ at 7.40pm, because earlier we had jogging and we had to dress up ourselves for the date. Estimating reaching time will be in about 20 minutes, we rushed there with all the strength of the little "Kancil", luckily the road was not jam.

Honestly, we just been there once before this, and we were going there based on Google maps, our memory and a little bit of direction sense over there. We reached Cheras 10 minutes later at a round about and I struggle with which way to take as there were 2 options:
1. the previous memory told me to take around the streets in the gardens of Cheras.
2. Google maps and a friends I consulted earlier on told me to follow Kajang so that I can go there via Hulu Langat, an opposite direction from what I learned before.

In order not to mess up within Cheras, I took the second option and went down to Hulu Langat. Once reached there, I was totally not familiar with that place and no sign boards showing the direction to our destination. Went off the car to ask local people for help, few fellows directed me back to Ampang as there were sign boards showing the ways. OK I assumed there were no such road from Hulu Langat and followed their advise to Ampang. That time was 8.30pm.

Following the directions they told me, I came back back to the round about earlier on, this time I decided to take the 1st option and I went inside Cheras, the streets were really a mess and I gave up, go to Ampang lar...

Along the MRR2, I met Pandan Indah, a place where I thought was a entry to Look Out point, then I went into this garden, again it did not recall any of my memory and I knew I was at a wrong place. Went down the car again to ask for help, but the people there did not know the existence of such place, fine I called my brother-in-law for help, as they already reached that place from their home at Setapak, that time was 9.30pm. He directed me to Ampang Point and follow along Jalan Ampang. And to be on the safe side, I followed his advise although I knew it was going to be a very long way.

After several phone calls and a little lost at Jalan Ampang, finally I reached the place, at 10pm, and they were finishing their meals... I ordered ours and started taking some photos. About 1 half hour later, we end our date with joys and jokes and of course sweet memories. Special thanks to my 3rd sister, as she treated the meal!

finally could enjoy the fascinating night view of Kuala Lumpur...

starving... eat first!!!

from left to right: my 2nd sister, 3rd sister and 4th sister.

On the way back, we decided to go back PJ with our very 1st experience. Without much of lost, and one time of going down of the car to ask for direction from a policeman, we managed to reached PJ 1 hour later. This time, we really learned the way going to Look Out Point in a short distance.

Amazing right? Despite all the failures and anxious, I still managed to reach the place without much anger, and I never thought of giving up going there, as she told me it was such a rare chance we can have dinner with my family in KL especially my 3rd sister who just going to stay in Malaysia for 2 months after coming back from UK.

Well, sometimes I am quite admiring myself for the capacity I have. Now left few questions I had to answer although I don't know the answers.
1. Am I too stubborn? Once I decided to go, I never give up in looking for the way, ended up we having dinner so late and she had to drink milk in order to stop her gastritis, pity her.
2. My glucose store was actually quite sufficient huh?? Or I was in a very high sympathetic discharge state? As I could not feel any hunger? But I knew I was very thirsty.
3. How can I not remember the way going there? Although I was initially very confident to go there by own memory in a short time, towards the end I found that confidence sometimes disastrous.
4. I learned 3 different ways of going Look Out Point in a night, didn't I? And I went almost 1/5 of Klang Valley in 2 hours!! Which is equivalent to the time I can travel back my hometown, Bidor.
5. I used up half of the tank of the petrol... what a waste... haih...

the restaurant- Look Out Point!

self taken... before leaving.