Alas poor Justine

Alas poor Justine

The comeback's hit a hard-hitting tennis machine

In the form of Serena, who was dressed for Halloween

In a performance we cannot berate

As you have played so little of late

With bated breath we shall wait and see

For the next serve down the Tee

1 Wedding, 2 Brides, 3 Airports and a Funeral

Trip to Europe Sept, 2009.

The Schedule

Tues 08/09/09 LCCT to Standstead (Air Asia), London
Thurs 10/09/09 Gatwick, London to Zurich (Easyjet), Switzerland for Jackie's Wedding
Mon 14/09/09 Zurich to Luton (Easyjet), London
Wed 16/09/09 Standstead, London to Cork (Ryanair), Ireland; visiting Leslie in Killarney
Fri 18/09/09 Cork to Standstead (Ryanair), London
Sat 19/09/09 Paddington, London to Tiverton Parkway (First Great Western), Devon; visitig Fiona in Shillingford
Sun 20/09/09 Tiverton Parkway, Devon (First Great Western)to Paddington
Weds 23/09/09 Standstead to LCCT (Air Asia)

Hotels

London Edward House Hotel
Rapperswille Jakob Hotel
Killarney Killarney Towers
Shillingford Barleycorn House

Other Stats

Number of Pictures taken: 996 (4.2G)
Distance Travelled: Lots
Most shocking event: Paying 12.5 Swiss Francs for a Big Mac Meal! Here's the proof.






Pictures of the trip may be viewed on my Facebook account; look for cincaluk or Seet Cheng Khim.

GOD's trip to Manado II (Aug-Sept) 2009

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The Drama of the First Dive

So off we went on the dive boat, a luxurious 30 footer (approximately). With a dive preparation area at the back, a dry area at the front, where meals were to be had and a chill out semi- covered area at the top.

Nice I thought, so off we went to the first dive site an hour and a half away. Having rested and lulled into a comfortable sense of well being… I was suddenly brought back into reality during the first dive briefing that the dive was to be a wall dive! But….but….but…it’s my first dive in 2 years! I wanted to shout out. Ah well…. “In for a penny, in for a pond”, as they say.

So with a pounding heart,I took a giant stride into the water. “Oops… I forgot to inflate the BC!” But that was of no consequence, as everyone was already descending, and so was I …. Very quickly indeed. Quickly inflate the BC I thought. “Ergh…. How do you do that? Isn’t there suppose to be a button you press to do that? Like this red one? Yes!!! Press it!!! No not that hard!!” Phrezz…. The BC over-inflates and I start rising…. A little too fast! Damn!!! Got to deflate it now, “How’s that done again???” “Must be the button next to the red one” Phrezz…. Damn too long again! Damn… I’m shooting down too fast again. So down, up, down, up…. until I finally get to some sort of stability. “Phew… that wasn’t so hard!” ( takes a look around….) Now… where is everybody…

“Are they below me?”

“F$%k!! there’s nothing below me!” (starts breathing even harder)

“Where are they!”

“Oh… they’re all above me!!!”

“Hmm… are they supposed to be that high above?”

“Let’s check my air and depth levels”

“Oooh… 36m and 150 psi”

“What was that the Dive Master said at the briefing? Open Water Divers, max depth 20m?”

“Ah well… so I exceed that by a smidge….won’t be the first time”

“More worrying is the air pressure, 50 psi gone just to get to a stable depth! And I’m a heavy breather!!! Ah well, let’s try to remain composed from now on and conserve a little air now”

However about 40 minutes later I discovered that my air supply was down to 50 psi. Bugger!! Time to surface. “Hell…Let’s push this a bit what’s the difference surfacing at 50 psi or 30 psi”

So at 30 psi, I approached the dive master (DM) and indicated to him that I was going up!

So I slowly ascended, but at 6m I did my impression of a cork in a bath, and popped up without so much as a “Cheers”.

“Eerh… what am I supposed to do now?”

“I suppose I’d better follow the group who are 10m below me.”

“Damn…this is the most expensive snorkelling trip I’ve been on”

“But the view’s good”

The view at snorkeling depth ( a fellow snorkeler)

So after 15 minutes of ‘snorkeling’, I had lost track of my group of divers (was following a different group), I checked my air pressure and it was, next to nothing.

"No wonder I'm sucking so hard to suck air in"

I then thought that it was best to fully inflate my BC,but... nothing happened!!

"F%@k! No more air!!! Double F%@k!!!" "Okay... time to use the snorkel"

So I lifted my head up and spotted the 2 boats including one that said ‘Tasik Divers’ in large bold letter on it’s side.

"Oh dear, I forgot to check the name of the dive boat. Anyway, the dive centre was Tasik Dive Centre, so... the safe bet is to head for Tasik Divers"

So there I was slowly making my way to "Tasik Divers" when the "friendly chaps" on the other white boat start waving to me. "Ah.... this is what I love about Indonesia, the people are so friendly" As I approached "Tasik Divers" the chaps on the white boat decided to get even friendlier and got quite close.

"Oh...I wish they wouldn't do that, now I've got to swim around them to get to Tasik Divers and it's quite hard work breathing through a snorkel as I have to suck the air in instead of it being forced in by the pressure from the air-tank."

Finally I got onboard "Tasik Divers" to much commotion as it emerged that the white boat was our dive boat!!! Ooops.... never mind said the boat-man as I made my apologies in halting Bahasa Indonesia, we are from the same company, so no problem.

So after settling down for a while, whilst the right, white boat recovered the other divers, I was then transferred to the white boat by jumping off "Tasik Divers" into the sea for a short swim to the white boat.

But... did the drama end there? No way!!!

After jumping into the water, what did I do??? What came naturally of course... opened my eyes!!! And I'm wearing contacts!!!! "Oh...Triple F*%k" I said as I realised and immediately shut my eyes. I surfaced and opened my eyes to find that the contacts were still there in my eyes.

Phew.... there ended the first dive of the trip to much amusement of my fellow divers.

GOD's Trip to Manado

From the 27th August to the 1st of September 2009, I joined GOD's (Great Ocean Divers) and 15 other GOD buddies on a diving trip to Manado.

Having only dived a handful of times since my certification in 1996, I was a little apprehensive about the dives here, as it would include wall dives, meaning one would dive along the face of a cliff!! Now for someone who doesn't like heights, floating over an area where you can't see the bottom really isn't my idea of fun.

Diving at the sheer Wall of Bunaken

Anyway, packing aside my nervousness and a new underwater camera housing, I climbed on board Air Asia's flight AK432 to Manado (albeit 20 minutes late) and joined in the fun.

The drama began almost as soon as we reached Tasik Ria Resort. We arrived almost at mid-night and began the process of checking in. As the hotel staff were a little overwhelmed with the amount of luggage (lots of dive equipment), I decided ( as I had very little dive stuff) to haul my luggage and myself to the room. BAD idea!!!! The resort was sprawling and there were no signs! So having rapidly lost sight of most people within the first few minutes, I ended up walking around the gardens for half an hour hoping to stumble upon the room or at the very least Reception so that I could get guidance. Thankfully out of the shadows steps a slightly drunk German guest who rather unsteadily pointed out the general direction of the Reception and despite my better judgment, I followed his advice. Thankfully German efficiency won through, and I did find Reception and the receptionist did lead me to my room and I settled in for a good sleep.

I unpacked my toiletries and went to the bathroom to clean up. However I stepped back into the bedroom and it was still warm and stuffy!!! Hell!!! the air-conditioning wasn't working!!!! So I called up reception, who promised to send a maintenance staff to check. Dubious as I was that Maintenance would be on duty at 1 am, I waited and to my surprise, he turned up within 15 minutes. As I suspected, he could not solve the problem as the fault was either a faulty compressor or a compressor which is short of refrigerant, he said he'll check the outdoor unit. After 15 minutes, he still had not returned to fix the problem whence I promptly called Reception, who promised to check on hte matter and promised to get the problem solved in 15 minutes. (Yeah right!) 15 minutes later.... still the blower was blowing hot air, so once again I picked up the phone and called Reception, who tried to sell me the idea that the problem will be fixed within 15 minutes! I promptly told him that that's not going to happen and that insisted that I be placed in another room for the night. After much more hot air.... he finally agreed and came over to the room to lead me to the new room. So I packed up my toiletries and followed him to the new room and promptly fell asleep at about 3am.

The next morning I arose and went for breakfast at the appointed time of 7am Indonesian time (1 hour behind Malaysian time right?) I sat down for breakfast and felt strange as I was the only person there. Sensing something wrong, I promptly went off to the dive centre (which I noticed during my late night wanderings from last night) when I found the rest of the group preping up for the morning's dive. I hurriedly apologised to everyone and completed the necessary preparations (filled out forms, ordered the necessary dive equipment, rushed back to my room to pop in my contacts etc.) The dive centre was sceptical about my dive credentials as I did not bring my dive card along with me and said that I would not be able to dive the second day if I did not show them some proof of certification. So I had to 'phone home and arrange for my certification form to be faxed to the dive centre to be able to continue diving.

After that drama, We went diving (finally...)

Then the drama of the first dive!!!

(to be continued.....)

Smug Bastard

This is for the Surveyor with the Quiver who poo pooded that my suggestion of signing Michael Owen way back in early June. Well not only did SAF sign him, but 2 goals from his first 2 matches (albeit against Malaysia) and I'm grinning from ear to ear like the smug bastard that I am. Go number 7!!!

Snaps from my travels - Macau

Some pics from my Macau trip.

Travel Schedule for July

The following is my Travelling Schedule for July.

28th June -2nd July Macau
2nd July - 6th July KL Travel Fair
10th July - 12 July Bali Patta Fair
15th - 18th July Singapore to meet my younger sister on her way back to NZ from the UK.

Boy...I'll be whacked.

After Bali, I'll probably be moving into Mum's new flat on a temporary basis.

Activities in the Park

I went for my first morning bicycle ride this morning at the MBMB Park.
Remarkably the park was full! There was people everywhere!!!

Attached are photographs of the organised activities in the morning.

Aerobics in the Park

Line Dancing under the trees


Jogging Track

Dad's Birthday's

Last week dad celebrated his Birthday 3 times!!!

The first, a surprise lunch arranged by Madelina, at the new Bei Ziang Restaurant on Friday the 6th of June.


The second, lunch at Ole Sayang.




And the third at Renaissance Restaurant, a treat by Dr. Ee.

Roger Moore Moments

Since I'm not in the mood of being creative at the moment, I thought that I'll just share what I've found interesting on the net.