Siem Reap~wonderful and awesome place to travel

I just came back from my holiday in Siem Reap and there is only one word can describe my feeling about this place...and the word is awesome.

We departed from Penang on 25th Nov and have a night stay at LCCT, KL. The journey to Siem Reap started off on 26th Nov early morning. After 2 hours flight, we reached our destination. The moment that we step out from the flight, we were welcome by the local people and the wind. I felt like flying.

Then we proceeded to the place that we will stay for the next 4 days. As told by the staff there, we will be given one cup of ice lemon tea, 20 minutes free massage and free flow bananas....and they keep mention they are FREE. So, we took the ice lemon tea and straight awat go for our lunch. The lunch is just so nice and yummy. After that, we went for our free massage. Damn cool! Well, it is a good idea to go for a sleep after the massage so we take a nap. Then, we went for the sunset. This is the first sunset that we went for but somehow it was quite disappointing as it was too clouded. Anyway, we still enjoy ourselves by taking photos and make fun around. We went for our dinner at Dead Fish, an established restaurant in Siem Reap. The food is nice but we prefer the one we took during our lunch. We sleep quite early as we will go for the sunrise the next day.

27th Nov. We took the van to Angkor Wat for our sunrise at 4:30a.m. When we reached there, the sky is still dark and we hardly see anything. While waiting for the sunrise, we search for the best place to see the sunrise, adjusting the camera and play around. The sun start to rise and I was amazed. My friends always ask me, between sunrise and sunset, which one I prefer most and my answer is always the SUNRISE. Sunrise give me hopes and it's a signature if a brand new day. We went around the Angkor Wat and all other temples for the second day. We had late lunch and late dinner on that day because the scenery is just too attractive and we just can't help ourselves from falling in love with the places. Well, everyone were tired so we didn't go for sunset.

28th Nov. We continue our journey with the rest of the temples. I was not feeling well on this day so I had missed 2 places. Gosh! Anyway, I am still amazed with the great carving. Fortunately, I managed to recover. 29th Nov is the birthday for one of the travel group and we planned to give her a surprise. Our plan is to go to one of the pub in pub street then two of us go and get a cake for her.

29th Nov. The places that we went to for te last day in Siem Reap were War Museum, Tonle Sap and Cultural Village. We started off the day with the War Museum. We listened to the story from a guy working there. He was almost crying then he has to stop from telling....and I cry. We finished the day in Cultural Village.

We left Siem Reap on 30th Nov.

This is definitely a fabulous trip for me...with fabulous travel group. And for those who never been there, Cambodia is a great place to travel and you will get the chance to obtain some valuable experience. Last but not least, you can see how lucky you are.

Cambodia....wonderful place, great people and nice food.

To my travel group, thanks for everything. I had so much fun with you girls and looking forward for our next trip.

051108

051108, my day starts as usual....I received a phone call from my dad about 10 something, he told me that my grandma passed away this morning.

My mind can't stop thinking of my grandma then I start to cry. My colleagues were so shocked as they didn't know what has happen at that time when I start to cry. Many of them came to my place and told me to calm down. I cannot control myself...

I want to go home immediately....

Inspiring Story

Watching TV shows is one of people choice during their free time...and is definitely my choice too. I like to watch singing contest as can witness some very talented people. And recently, there is a Taiwan singing contest show in 8tv "Super Idol" which attract my attention. Besides the many talented people, there are many touching stories for some of the participants. And the most touching one, and inspiring one is a girl from Nan Tou.

She is a native of Taiwan, Bu Nong Zhu. She posses the characters of a native-talent in singing and sincere. Her mother left her family when she was 3 to 4 years old. Her sibling have to stay separately and she need to work to earn a living for her family. She doesn't have a complete family.

But...she is a very optimistic person. Because of her positive attitude, she gains a lot of friendship. She has dreams, like what all girls does. She think she is a rich person, not because of money, but her life experience and friendships. Her attitude has inspired a lot of people, includes me.

Life has no duplication, be positive, enjoy it.

歌．頌

I like to watched magic shows during my childhood....I'm still like it now but with a bit of skeptical. Although magics is not real, but there are people still believe in magic...girls especially.

The very obvious example is the magic of make up. One looks gorgeous when they apply some make up. My opinion is that people looks nicer with some make up because the confidence level increased. One will looks better when they are full with confidence.

Personally, I seldom apply make up except when attending dinners. But, I do believe in this magic.

Another magic which I believe is the magic of songs. I like to listen to some songs when I am working, day dreaming, thinking...Recently there is a song from Eason Chen. The title of the song is 歌．頌. It is a touching song. Nicely written lyric by Lin Xi, a meaningful song and a good voice from Eason.

Travel Solo

I am thinking to travel alone....

Why Travel Alone?

Travelling alone is a rewarding experience.

First of all, choice is the biggest incentive to a single traveller....you can choose when you want to get out of bed :p....you can choose where to have your meals....you can choose which place to visit....

Second, more chances to meeting other people. Whether they are other travellers or locals tends to be much easier when you are on your own. You might make some new friends but bear in mind that safety is of the utmost importance.

Third, somehow you might find something or somewhere you really like so you would like to staying on or doing that activity again and again. You won't have to feel guilty about staying in one-place ages if you are travel on your own.

After all, travelling solo can be the ultimate freedom. And freedom is the essence of travel.

Ayers Rock, Australia

I watched a series of videos on Ayers Rock in youtube and amazed. This place came to my knowledge through my friend. She was asking me whether to join them for this adventure.

So, I went to search for the videos in youtube...watched the rock climbing video...start thinking...asking myself finally. Am I ready for this challenge?

I am engaging myself in some adventurous activities lately and I like it. After some adventure experiences: taman negara, white water rafting etc, what's my next destination? Mulu Cave, Mount Kinabalu, some more water rafting....

Haven't decide....yet, I am ready for another adventure.

Siem Reap, Cambodia

I'm going to Siem Reap with a group of friends this coming November....I am looking forward for this trip.

I have a list of places that I wanted to go and Siem Reap is definitely one of them. This trip will be on a backpacking basis.

I am doing some preparation on the backpacking gears now and research on places to visit.

More updates to come after my trip in November.

Single or Married?

One of my favourite song from Penny Tai 单身潜逃, the lyric of the song reflect my feeling very closely.

I enjoy my current life. I am a person who like freedom, and do not like the feeling of being control by someone else. Being a single, I can choose whatever life I want to live.

I'm not a anti marriage type of person. I still believe the happiness of getting married. For a girl, is good to have someone that you can cry on his shoulder if you are upset, someone that can hold you tight and hug you if you need it, someone that really care for you, someone that can go with you through thick and thin etc.

I want to get married, I want to have my own children. But if I cannot find a suitable and reliable guy, I rather being single.

Different World

I watched a movie last Friday. It was a movie took couple of years ago. The story is very simple, it talks about love.

The story itself didn't get my interest, but there is a dialog which attract my attention. The leading actor in the movie said to the leading actress "We are from different worlds, so there is no way we can be together" The leading actress said "Two people came from two different world, and if they are together, means both of them in fact have a new world".

I personally think this is very meaningful. In our life, when choosing our life partner especially, most of us tend to look for someone who are similar with us, i.e. come from same world. Then when we found him/her, we will have to live the same way like we used to live in. I agreed with the new world concept. I think the theory similar with the 1+1=3 theory. It is a result from a synergy effect. So, open up your heart and mind for all kind of possibilities.

Life is full with hope

I always tell my friends, I like babies because I see life is full with hope when I see babies.

My niece, Alyssa is the first grand child of my parents. She is now 6 months plus old. Lots of hair, cute smile, fair skin, innocent, happy baby.....

While everyone struggling with work issues, money, loan, bills, relationship problems...everything is just too complicated. We need some simple and innocent life and while looking and playing with babies, we are able to forget all of the problems that we faced. Just a simple smile from them, just a hug from them, just a kiss from them...even by looking at them, your heart gets melted.

Ever thinking, we borned to this world as an empty glass. Everyday, we put some liquid in the glass. The glass keep filling with thoughts, ideas, happy moments, desires, problems....good or bad, we still need to face them one by one. Some people will choose to face with positive view while some people will face them with worries. And when we try to keep everything to our own, the glass is full. Then, we are hunger of new things as the glass is already full. So, if you need something new to come to you, pour the existing liquid in your own glass. Be positive and keep moving.

New life, new hope. Life is great if we have hope(s).

Fight for...??

There are over thousand people work in my company, and every year everyone must go through the performance appraisal. Each year, 10% of us will group under a separate group whereby there is no increment as your performance is not so good compared with others. (although you meet the expectation on your job scope)

The fighting story begins....everyone fight for projects. Those who are happy with what they have are urge to change their working mindset. It's makes everyone working life hectic.

Life is never easy, and I do not wish to make my life even harder. I am looking for a simple life but working in this company do not permit me to do that. I would like to see progress on me day by day. But definitely, I do not want to fight with others. The way they conduct meeting also like in a war room. Scary right?

Fortunately, I still can be myself in my company. I can see there are rooms for me to improve further. Although sometimes I wonder how long I can stand. At my age, I still can stand the stress level. I believe, the tough gets going even things get tougher.

So, I need to be tougher.

When is your turn?

Does this question sounds familiar? For those who are still single, I think it is. When your friends get married one by one, people around you will ask "hey, when is your turn?"

Well, marriage is a matter between you and your partner. But, it's seems like we need to report to others that when we are getting married. For those who are yet to be attached to anyone, like me, what am I suppose to say?

Recently, my sister and her boy friend urge me to get married. This has make me very stress. I know what I want and I haven't found him. I do not want to get married just for the sake of getting married. Marriage should be something which will come to us naturally when relationship between you and your partner are mature enough and both parties are willing to love each other with any condition.

Parents, friends, relatives out there: please do not ask people this question again especially to those who are still single. I believe, when it's the time, he/she will inform you.

My colleagues...my friends

Most of my friends claimed that they are unable to be friend with their colleagues. They said"They are just my colleagues...not friends...and it's impossible to be friends." Some of them claimed that they need to "wear mask" in their working place, they can't be their true self.
What has happen to this society? With the advance technologies surrounded us, the human relationship is not getting stronger but in fact...it is worsen. Too lazy? too shy? scared of being cheated?
I feel lucky that I can be myself in my working place. I met very great colleagues here and they are now all in my friends list. We share common interest, we care for each other, we are fun loving, we are honest...we try to work hard (not yet?), play hard (really :p).
We make fun of each other in work place, and we never get angry because of that. Our office always full with laughter (mine one especially) and this keep me move on although sometimes I am stressed with my jobs.
I look for real friendship and I make some very good friendship here.
Friends, cherish to our friendship and I LOVE YOU GUYS.

White Water Rafting ~ 26 & 27 Jul 2008

Me and a group of friends went for white water rafting at Sungai Sedim, Kulim on 26th Jul 08. It was the fisrt ever water rafting for me.
If you were to ask me to describe the trip, I would say only 3 words: IT WAS FUN!
We departed from Penang Island at around 7 something in Jul 26 morning after breakfast. Reached there at about 10. We started the rafting at 10:30 after some water confidence testing.
The white water rafting has five level. Level 5 is the toughest one and they call it Xtreme. We started with the level 5 on the first day. We were 5 in a boat - they call it raft. As the ideal number of people in a raft is 4, we ended up with one person sitting in the middle of the raft and became the backup rafter. We stucked for quite a number of times because the skipper said our raft is too heavy as too many people. But we managed to go through the hurdles after some bumping, forward, backward, etc. Our raft capsized for two times. The first time when it was capsized, my spec out of my eyes a bit but luckily managed to adjust it back. But I was not that lucky for the second time. My spec broke into two pieces after a big hit. I was almost drowning when the raft capsized, I told myself I must rescue myself as I still have my parents, my family, my friends,....and there are lots of things I haven't done and experience. I told myself to calm down, practice yoga breathing and managed to do that finally. Thanks god. :) Everyone are fine. :) I was almost blind after the second capsized as my power is 500 something and I cannot see thing clearly if I didn't wear spec. We took about 4 and a half hours to finish the hardest level.
Everyone were thinking not to continue to raft the second day, i.e. level 1 to level 4. Luckily the skipper managed to build the confidence level of everyone after some conversation. To me, the confidence came back after the conversation. But it lost again the next day due to 2 major reasons:
1. I can't see clearly without my spec
2. my period came the second day
So at last, I decided not to raft the second day. But then luckily the skippers there allow us (who are not raft) to follow the landrover along the journey so that we can see how our friends raft and can take their pictures.
Things to remember:
1. never panic
2. stay calm
3. ALWAYS rescue yourself (but don't worry, the skippers are always there to rescus you. But you, yourself have to rescue your own. Meaning trust yourself you can rescue yourself and others can rescue you)
4. listen to the skipper's instruction
5. have good teamwork among the rafters
6. last but not least, HAVE FUN.

Being a traveller, not just visitor

I love travelling, and I'm sure there are many people out there love travelling as well.

Nowsdays, young people prefer backpacking rather than just follow the tour. By backpacking, you can feel the journey much better.

I had my first backpacking last year, my destination is Taiwan. Taiwan is easier to me as the national language there is mandarin and the taiwanese are very friendly and helpful. It was a memorable travel experience for me. Although we need to plan everything ourselves and sometimes we were lost, but definitely everything is worth.

My personal thought is that you can feel the place better if you being a traveller, not just the visitor. What's the difference? To me, being a traveller is to establish a communication channel between you and the people there. With this, we the travellers are closer with the country and can see their culture better. Being a visitor, like follow a tour, sometimes I feel that you just follow the destination chosen and you can't really select which place that you want to go. You just visit the places that have been chosen under the package and most of the time, we just spend time in shopping (which we can do in Malaysia obviously) and spend a little time in other activities.

The conditions to become a backpacker are:
1. you must have a good preparation on the place that have been chosen, like the accomodation availability, transportation, culture, etc
2. you must not have language barrier for the place that have been chosen
3. the people that will travel with you, at least there is someone who has good sense of direction and if possible all share common interest

I will think the people who is going to travel with you plays the most important role. It is not the place that is the most important, but the people who will have the biggest impact. Imagine if you travel to a place twice, the feeling will be different eveytime you travel with different people.

Try to be more adventurous, being a travellers, not just a visitors.

My laptop

My laptop crashed after I installed a program that is mandatory for my company. I heard from the IT guys that a lot of computers and laptops crashed after they installed that program.

Haiz....finally my laptop being sent to ICU - Intensive Care Unit.

I hope this case won't happen again to me, anyone in the same company.

Beatrice Hsu Wei Lun

Time flies, Wei Lun has passed away for more than a year.

Wei Lun is one of my favourite artist. I like the way she treat people and her talent in music and acting.

Wei Lun treat people with heart and make friends around. She has a cheerful and wonderful laughter that make people around her very happy. I like the way she smile.

Wei Lun is very talented. She learn music since her childhood. She know how to play piano, harp, guitar, drums, and erhu.

One of Wei Lun's dream is to get married before she reach 30 years old. So, I attached a picture of her in wedding gaun. She looks awesome in this picture.

Wei Lun, rest in peace and you will be the angel in your fans heart.

Starbucks

I'm not a coffee lover, but I certainly visited this shop for a number of times.

There is a shocking news recently about Starbucks. They have decided to close down 600 over branches due to economic down turn in US. Imagine a branch have 10 workers, then approximately 6,000 workers have became unemployed. :(

There are tones of people out there complaining that they need to work in order to earn a living...that's includes me. (honestly) I think with this news, we should start to appreciate what we have. Although working life is not enjoyable, but most importantly we are EMPLOYED. Even though we didn't make any big contribution to the society, but we are still contributing....and we will definitely get recognised. With this, we know the existence of ourselves and feel good.

Few months back, my manager told us that she was thinking to get the franchise from Starbucks last time...the time before Starbucks have its first shop in Malaysia. But at that time, people tease her that there is no one in this world that going to consume a cup of coffee at this price which is more than RM 10. With limited capital, she didn't proceed with the franchise.

Now, today, with lots of Starbucks in Malaysia, I think those people who ever think of franchise and didn't do that will be very regret. The moral of this story is that we need to grab the opportunity at the right time. When there is no opportunity for you, you will need to think of creating one if there is any chances. When there is any opportunity for you, please do not let go. There is no way for you to go back to the past...as past is past. Remember: Yesterday was a history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift.

Also, do not spend your time on regret.

Tiger

Tiger, this animal out of sudden appeared very often in my life recently.

The word tiger itself can be a name of a person, a guy definitely;

there are a lot of products with the word tiger with them, like tiger balm, tiger beer...tiger tea. Ever heard of tiger tea?

This type of tea can be found in Cameron. There is no where in Malaysia that we can find this tea as it is only for export purpose. I knew the existence of it through my sister-in-law. She is tea and coffee lover. She told me tiger tea has stripes on its seeds. So, this is why the name came from. The tea is very lovely.

Not to forget our Tiger Woods;

What's more, tiger is one of the 12 chinese horoscopes...

Can it be more? Hm...hehe...

To me, tiger is the signature of brave and style.

Farewell

One of my closest colleague has decided to quit her job and will start her new job in Singapore. She is very sad to leave her current company, which describe by her as the heaven; sad to leave her collegues, which she said is very hard to find in other places (I agreed); and most importantly her family in Penang.

There are many people that we see everyday, but we never talk to each other, and worst still never smile to each other.
But there are certainly some people that we do not have the chance to see each other everyday, but we keep him/her close at our heart and will pray for them.

I see her as the friend whom I will keep her close at my heart, wish and pray for her.

Friend, don't cry again...although you are doubts on your future but is a good thing for you to have a try at your age. Be positive, be energetic (always) and do keep hope.

Cherish to our friendship and hope to hear some good news from you. You know what good news is it huh?

Good Luck!!