Mad Day of Departure

On Friday morning, I took a bus back from Ipoh to KL (LCCT airport) to catch a flight back to Palembang. I left Ipoh at 9:30am but halfway up a hill after Gopeng (30 mins away from Ipoh), the bus broke down! All the passengers had to come off the bus which emitted burnt rubber smell. It seemed like the timing belt of the bus broke. The driver called for help and he told us that there will be another bus coming to pick us up soon.

After 45 mins, a mechanic came on a bike to check on the situation. He told us that the office did not have any spare timing belts, so we had to wait for the bus which was supposed to be here in 30 mins according to the driver. Everyone was restless as time passed. Fortunately we had some shade at the side of the hill. Some people had to take a leak near the bushes along the hill.

After 1.5 hrs, a replacement bus finally arrived. There were a couple of empty buses which stopped for us but they were going to downtown KL and not the LCCT airport.

The replacement bus took off at 12 noon and reached LCCT airport at 2:45pm. I was really hungry because I did not have any lunch. I quickily rushed to the check in counter but was surprised to find that the Palembang Air Asia counter was no longer there.... they have combined all INDONESIAN destinations to one area and only had 6 counters. Of course there were long lines but luckily there were other PLM passengers. At 3pm the Air Asia staff finally opened a separate counter for PLM passengers. However, the stupid check in staff would not let me off the hook for a mere 1kg overweight baggage! He insisted that I could not take anything out from the luggage because there isn't any time left. Therefore I was forced to pay a RM20 overweight charge.

Upon completing the check in process, I rushed to the immigration area only to be stopped by another Air Asia staff who told me that my hand luggage is overweight! I was very pissed off and took some stuff out from my hand luggage and put them into a plastic bag. Then he told me that I was only allowed to take 1 piece of hand-carry. I pointed at the many passengers who had more than 1 piece of hand-carry walking past me and asked him why they were not stopped. In the end he gave in and let me through. By the time I reached the seat on the plane, it was already 3:25pm (my flight departs at 3:35pm).

I was also truly disappointed with the call centers at Air Asia. I had called the number for 3x and 15 mins each time but was always put on hold. If any call centers had to put a customer on hold for more than 5 mins, they should just close down their poorly managed call centers. After the rush, I was truly pissed off but also relieved that I got onto the flight on time to leave for Palembang.

90 & Still Dancing

I was back in Ipoh to attend my wife's grand father's 90th birthday celebration on May 22. We address her grandpa as Gong2 (cantoneses). Majority of our relatives from all over the world (Holland, US & Australia) made it for the event.

On that day after lunch, we had a brief tea ceremony at home where all of Gong2's children, grand-children and great-grand-children were there to offer him tea and get some ang pows (red packets with money) in return. We also attended a church ceremony followed by a dinner/dance reception later that night.

Gong2 is 90 years old but he still goes line dancing and play mahjong everyday. He had a heart operation last year but recovered very well. He was still trying to re-arrange the seating plans for the event on the night before. I had to learn up some line dancing steps from "Tango with the Sheriff" so that I could join in. Look at the sheriff in RED below:












The dinner/dance party was thrown by Gong2's daughters. Many of his friends, neighbours and fellow line dancers were invited to the dinner. It was fun because besides line dancing, we also had some partner dances and swing music.

You can see in the photo below that my 2.5 year old son dancing with me to the Chubby Checker's "Let's Do The Twist" song and he really enjoyed it. Maybe when he is 18 he would no longer want to dance with his father anymore?!!









Many of Gong2's line dancing "girl-friends" are 20-30 years younger than him. I can't believe there are still so many ladies being attracted to a 90 year old man. See what he got for his 90th birthday??









His wife Poh2 was a bit jealous and decided to take photos with 2 handsome "men" instead....ha ha ha!












Besides the party, we also had a good time eating all the delicious Ipoh food like Ipoh Hor Fun (flat noodles), char koay teow (fried noodles), white coffee (cappucino) and curry noodles. As shown in the photo below, some of our relatives were REALLY HUNGRY!












Family gatherings are always a blast!

Back To Civilization!

Tonight is my last night in Palembang before I head back to Malaysia for a 10 day break. I always feel as if I am going back into "civilization" when the plane lands back in Kuala Lumpur's LCCT airport.

Actually, Palembang is not such a bad place to live after being here for 2.5 years. The development of the city is rather slow compared to other cities in Malaysia. Only in the past 5 years, Palembang started to have its first fly-over (road), 4 major shopping malls, 2 so-called international schools (primary level only) and less than a handful of hotels (Novotel, Horison, Royal Asia, Classie - just to name a few).

Internet speed is slow in this region. Telkom's "Speedy" internet does not live up to its name. The slightly better service provider that we had is from MDP (Multi Data Palembang) - they subscribed to Telkom's fixed bandwidth line and re-supplies it to other customers like us.

When my director came for a visit last month, his comment about Palembang was, "Palembang is always busy and messy all the time". I am sure he did not mean that the city is dirty. I believe he did not get the impression that Palembang is orderly in terms of traffic control because there are still lots of motorbikes crowding the roads. In other bigger cities like Jakarta or Surabaya, bikes are less compared to cars. Palembang still has lots of trishaws (becaks) and bicycles sharing the road with bikes and cars.

When you compare the hustle and bustle of Palembang's traffic to the peacefulness of the highways in Malaysia (and the less crowded roads), the thought of "civilization" comes to your mind. It always feels like "home" whenever the plane touches down in Malaysia.

I guess I won't be blogging for the next 10 days when I am back in Malaysia (fully enjoying my time off). Until then, hasta la vista Palembang (until June'09).

Something Is Eating My Plants!

Recently something happened to my ladies fingers (okra) plants. The leaves have been "eaten" by some sort of pest until they appeared "holy". Upon having a closer look, I found small little grasshoppers! These little bugs have been nibbling at my wife's plants.













I do not have any good shots of these little grasshoppers but here's one from my low resolution phone camera which could not focus clearly (especially for macro shots). If all the leaves get eaten up, my okra plants will not be able to give my 5 okras per week of free vegetables anymore! I will need to find a way to get rid of those grasshoppers! Any non-toxic way that you could think of? Feel free to comment.....thanks!

Haircuts In Palembang

Yesterday I went for my haircut in PTC Mall's Johnny Andrean saloon. A JA haircut (including wash) only costs Rp32,000 (~RM10). However, everytime they cut my hair at JA's, the hair dressers will definitely say, "Oh, you have lots of grey hair, do you want to dye your hair?". This is without fail, different hair stylists make the same comment during my every visit. It made me feel as if I have loads of grey hair!

I have never found a better hair dresser in Palembang until my friend introduced me to this saloon next to a massage center. The price is a bit more expensive at Rp70,000 (double that of JA) but the hair dresser is more professional (supposedly came from Jakarta). The hair washing facility is better as they have this stump from the sink to support the back of your head while they wash (in other places, they just let the weight of your head supported by the neck rest). The environment is also more pleasant - quiet, not so crowded, spacious. The hair dresser is also more gentle with your hair (I don't like those that just snips randomly at your hair with a blunt scissors pulling out chunks of your hair in the process - they say it is called "thinning" - B.S!).

Another interesting thing is I do not know exactly how to tell the hair dresser what kinda hair style I like. 10 years ago I used to like this hairstyle called "Armani" hair style but recently I found out that in Malaysia they no longer have that cut anymore. I took some photos of my past "Armani" hair style and tried to show the Johnny Andrean people. They told me that it is called a "Mohawk" cut. Then when I asked for a "Mohawk", they gave me a "school boy" cut instead! As time passed, someone got it almost close to what I liked and I asked for the name of the hair cut. They said it's called "spike"! Ever since, I have been having "spike" haircuts in Palembang.

If it was not for the convenience of doing shopping after the haircut from JA, I would have paid more to get it from the pros at the massage center place (and also save me the embarrassment of feeling I have lots of grey hair). I hope my wife does not get a shock when she sees my JA "spike" hair style when I return to Malaysia next week.