While living in New Haven, USA some years ago, I posted myself on the AOL bulletin board and soon got respond from people of my age, among the many is a lady from the desert of California, it was really great to get friend in cyberspace for like the old way of having pen pal, it give one the opportunity to make new friends. Since the internet is so user friendly, cyberfriends thence to be really close, and with the understanding that we all love to make friends and discuss common issue and chat, we soon became close friend as though we have known each other for a long time and have physically met, but in this case we actually have not met, but I guessed it does not matter, for images of ourselves could be transmit to each other with ease via the net. It is really fantastic what this technology could do for the benefit of humankind, it make one easy to communicate and distance seem to vanished and became totally lost, it is as though we are close to each other. It is really nice to get email message from such friend and it makes me feel good, at time it really makes my day. At this golden age friends became very important and at time a necessity, for like me writing stimulate my faculty and make me alert and healthy and I guessed it the same with the others of my age group. I believe communication among human being are of utmost important for it is through communicating that we can go on being human. One of the causes of war and dispute among countries and people is because people did not or could not communicate and this at time cause animosity among people. Peace and lasting peace can only be reached if people could communicate effectively. This friend that live in the California desert which I would just refer as Mrs.M were a very cheerful and energetic lady when she were young and I believe she is as cheerful and energetic now, have live in Germany and as she related to me in one of her email, it was there that she first learn to drive and found the joy of driving. In another mail she also say that she had a great time in Penang, Malaysia in her youth, Oh what a Youth she would say and me, as a person that had a very colourful life during my youth, understood her joy of have a great time in Penang, I believe that we live only for a period as youth, young and vibrant, so we should make 'hay while the sun shine' and enjoy ourselves, for as we grew older, all the experiences we have had in our youth would add to the wisdom of today. Like her I have travel the world and understand the real meaning of life, I guessed this is one reason that we both click well...If you are reading this M.., have a nice day and go on enjoying life....And pass on those wisdom to the young so that they may live as we have live and enjoy life....And as the saying ' God give us Love, so He would not mind that we borrow it and share it with others ' Give all the love we could for the world really need it now....then ever.

The roti canai, the nasi lemak and the teh tarik [ these are Malaysian favourites snacks and hot drink] for Malaysian of all the ethnic or racial group, they love it and to them it is really Malaysian, where else in the world for a mere two ringgit one would have a hearty breakfast of roti canai plus teh tarik or nasi lemak plus teh tarik. The teh tarik [tea with milk] is real special in that it is truly Malaysian, you do not get teh tarik in the subcontinent of India where the great Mamak people originated. It was the Mamak[Indian Moslem] that started this teh tarik, which at one time was just a poor man's drink found only at road side stall or at Mamak's run restaurant, but to day it has graduated to a more classy places in coffee house's even in the five star hotels in the country. Where once youth would order beer at a gathering in a coffee house, now they order teh tarik, well teh tarik has gone places from it humble beginning at the road side stalls to the top of the hospitality industries. Say teh tarik and every Malaysia would agree that it is a sort of their national drink and everyone enjoy it and it goes very well with either roti canai [ a pan cake like bread fry on oil ]or the nasi lemak [rice cooked with coconut milk and served with spicy gravy and anchovies] The teh tarik, roti canai which is also the started by the Mamak and the humble nasi lemak, a Malay special dish eaten at breakfast has now became a national breakfast for all Malaysian. And to add to the already great breakfast menu, now another food from Chinese has became popular for all Malaysian, it is the Chow Kwai teow [ fried noodles with special sauce, Chinese style]so now it has became a truly Malaysian breakfast do, a blend of the taste of the three main races of Malaysian and they also say ' let have teh tarik..... Malaysian love to eat and this breakfast is only the beginning of the great Makan [eat] that Malaysian love to do all days and nights, Makan [eating] another of the many past times of all Malaysian. There is a saying here that Malaysian 'live to eat' and not 'eat to live'. With eating places sprouting all over the town center and open from early morning till late night and some even open for twenty four hours, some time one wonder when do Malaysian really stop eating. In is indeed a great place to live and enjoy eating and it has become a sort of a Malaysian past time, eating....

What is reality, Matrix, for those that have seen both the matrix movie, would somehow understood the question, what is reality, well we are now in the cyberworld and cyberspace is real to all of us who surf the net and enjoy the knowledge we get every moment and at the same time broaden our horizon of knowledge itself. We all know with the internet life on this planet of ours would never remain the same anymore, the changes is so dramatic in that before one could comprehend something, one are hurled into a new dimension of the unknown and had to quickly learn in order to understand the working of this new world of ours. For those that have ignored this revolution would be lost for ever. As the Dr.Mahathir Mohd, the Malaysian Prime Minister said once, we missed the industrial revolution and as a great nation we should never missed this revolution, that is the Information and computer technology revolution that is happening in our mist. For his farsightedness, we are here today in cyberspace with ease, we are indeed lucky to be where we are in cyberspace now, had not for his kind of thinking I doubt we would have advance so far in the arena of cyberworld. With the advance of cyberworld, we are now beginning to have such thing as cyberlanguage, cyberethical, cybernorms and on and on, we keep shortening the spelling for words when writing email i.e. you became just 'u', are just 'a'. Etc. And SMS message has became a new way of communication via the cel phone, a wonder in cyberspace, well we are going to see more and more changes as we progress in the world of cyberspace. As for the language is concern,I believe the English language would be the cyberlanguage of the world, some might want to differ, but I believe without understanding the English Language, one would not be able to communicate well in cyberworld and also would find it difficult to be involved effectively in the Information and Communication technology. It is indeed interesting to see all the innovation happening in our live span's and some of it without us realising are our own making, whatever it is, it has improve the quality of our life and in that makes this world an interesting place to live and enjoy.

They say that if you want to buy a property, like a house, a kondo or whatever, there are three factors that you have to take into account if you want to make a right decision, the first factor is Location, the second factor is Location and the third factor is Location, so as can be seen, Location is the factor here, I quite agree with these factors. Let me give an example here, the place I live is in Ulu Kelang, Ampang Jaya is the proper name, it is one of the oldest housing estate, developed in nineteen fifty nine, so it is rather old compare to the other development in this area, well in the early eighties came the development of a housing estate call the Taman Tun Abdul Razak and in short it is Taman TAR, well this taman tar is just a short distance from where I live, actually the nearest boarder is just five hundred meter only from my house and the boarder is marked by a monsoon drain and beside is the road that lead to the Kelab Darul Ehsan [ a recreational club ], You know what, a house in Ampang Jaya which is slightly bigger then in Taman TAR cost, let say Ringgit two hundred thousand and an almost the same type house in Taman TAR, guess what, it would cost three or four time that of the house in Ampang Jaya, so what is the rational here, it is the name Taman TAR, it is an elite name of a sort, with club house nearby and rich or cooperate people live, even a semi detach house with land of four thousand square feet would cost less in ampang jaya then in taman tar, one could get a semi detach house in Ampang Jaya for six or seven hundred thousand ringgit, but one could only get a link house,corner lot for that price in Taman TAR, so that what I meant Location, Location, location, it is the location that determined the price of the property and not the house itself.

In a kampong [village] where I grew up, there was no air or water pollution, the water was so clean and air was so refreshing, the word pollution never seem to exist, no one talk about pollution. Now that with all the talk about pollution I realised that there was also no sound pollution as well. The reason I am talking about noise pollution is that when we were living in the kampong in Kuantan, we could hear every noise of the wild, the crickets, the frogs, the birds and everything else that makes sound, since there were hardly any cars or buses, lorry or airplane flying by or any factories that create noise, the sound we hear every day in those days were that were created by nature. It was a pleasing sound and soothing to the ears. Now in the twenty first century the sound pollution is so great that one forget the existence of the natural sound, that we use to here in the period when we grew up. The environment and the atmosphere, what a great change and it is not getting better. It is the same with water, we got our water supply from the well or the river near by, it is clean and could be use for drinking even without boiling. And no one are found to fall sick, just by drinking well or stream water, it taste good and it is refreshing, now it is not the same anymore, all the water we get now, from the pipes,well or the river are not really safe to drink, and to make sure it is safe to drinks, it had to be boiled first. As far as the air we breath, it smell refreshing those days, but now, what with the haze, it just smell different, though the oxygen content is just suitable for the human consumption.

Kuantan is the capital city of the state of Pahang, the largest state in Peninsular Malaysia, it is situated on the east coast, where the sea shore is golden in colour and the beach is clean and the water is a welcome place to wade and swim, except of course during the monsoon season on the east coast, that comes at the end of every year, some time it came with rain for days and days, with wild wind and some area may floods. It is one of the wonder of nature, some of the populations would enjoy the flood but most would just would like it to see it gone. Any way it is a nice place to spend a quite holiday and enjoy the swim, especially at the Telok Cempedak beach on a sunny day. If one had the time, it would be wise to wake up early and watch the rising sun at the beach, it is a magnificent sight to watch and wonder, the golden glow of the morning sun as it raised above the horizon, it is a sight not to be missed. I know for sure of the greatness in seeing the sun rises as I have seen it many, many time before, for Kuantan is my home town and I literally grew up on those sandy beaches. We as kids would spend our week ends camping on the shores of the many beaches along the coast and enjoy the refreshing breeze and of course the sun rise every morning. Kuantan where we grew up was a small town in the forties with only two streets, one call the Main street and the other the Wall street, this street is named after a former British District Officer, Mr.Wall, in those day we would equate our Wall street with that of the Wall Street in New York, it was fun, we have a Wall Street in Kuantan, but then after independence the nationalist decided that colonial names had to go, so they rename this street as Jalan Mahkota, so now the new generation either do not know the Wall street that once exist or have totally forgotten about it all together, and the Main street has been change to Jalan Besar, Now Kuantan has grown to became the largest city on the east coast, with an international standard airport and a sea port. They are now building a new highway from Kuala Lumpur to Kuantan, which when completed would cut the traveling time to just less the three hours one way. It would be great for the development Kuantan, for more and more people from the other parts of Malaysia especially from Kuala Lumpur would be able to spend their time on the golden beach in Kuantan. As for me it is still my home town and would drive there from time to time to visit relatives or just to spend my time on the golden beach at Telok Cempedak and relieved the fond memories of past event. I shall never forget the exciting and adventurous time we had camping at Telok Cempedak and the great time we share with the many friends in our youth. Some I have lost contact and wished that if ever they read this, they would find the time to contact me, it would be great to meet again in our golden age.

Now that I have retired, I have all the time in the world to myself, so surfing the internet have being one of my past time, it has become a ritual of a sort, never a day that I am not wondering somewhere in cyberspace. It is a great place to be, so much information and so much knowledge to gain. I believe the internet is the next best invention of humankind after the invention of the wheel, both incidentally happen to be about communication. The Internet has made the world so small, compare to the time before it coming, distance now seem irrelevant and not an issue anymore, in getting information to and fro. The internet allowed us to communicate and transfer information faster then we are able before. Any thing that are in bits i.e messages, sound, images and the like could be move from one place to another in a matter of seconds, just a click of the mouse, a message is transported to distance places in an instance. What a marvel, an invention that has quantum leap man's means of communication. In surfing the net the other day, I came across an interesting blog site, it is call Bolehblogs. A site created by a young Malaysia lady with great ingenuity. I am indeed glad that Malaysian like her has taken upon themselves to make the cyberspace an innovative and interesting place to be. The lady that start this site is just know as Striz..., keep it up Striz.. You have done a great job that makes Malaysia proud of it's sons and daughters. In the spirit of Malaysian Boleh, you have proven that Malaysia Boleh [Malaysia can] and that's what make you that special among the million of Malaysian. We are a developing country and continue to push forward with incredible speed and soon we would be as develop as any of the western nation, if not better.

Dear friends, this is my blog. It is a sort of my journal, a web site or a personal bulletin, call it what you like, it is me in cyberspace. It contain my thoughts that I hope would enlighten those that read it. Many things cross one's mind when writing blog, so it is in fact an instant thoughts that are put into writing, so that others may share and enjoy. Some of my thoughts may refer to You, my friends and some are pure of my own imaginations, to make it interesting I try to relate the past and hope the it would help to bring back fond memories and eventually trigger some nostalgic past. We are just passing through and the past has gone but with it have given us wisdom, that I hope to contribute to those the read my blog. The present is now and the future is tomorrow but time pass so fast that hardly we realised, the future soon became the present. So my friends, let together make this world a better palace to live and sharing thoughts is one of them. Some time you might find You in my blog and I hope I do justice to your good selves. The blog is organic and alive, I try to keep it up to date everyday, so I would suggest that you ' bookmark' it and glanced at it from time to time, check the archives as well, may be you see You in the blog, if it has not been there as yet. If you find this blog interesting and useful, do send/forward it to your friends, so that they may share my joy of writing with them also. Have a nice day.

Today have being a real hectic day, just before ten in the morning, went to the bank to pay a bill, the usual bill. Talking about bill, it looks like the number of bill have began to grow in number, before it was just the utilities bills such as electricity, and water, but now the basic bills that Malaysian get nowadays would be at least six, the electricity, water, telephone [fixed line] the cel phone [two to three], the cable or satellite TV, the internet, the credit cards and on and on, well it look receiving bills and paying bills have became a culture of the society. Before one finished paying all the previous month's bills, the next month's is already in the letter box, and it does not seem to end. I guessed modern men just could not live without bills, it is their way of life and I believe live would not be interesting if the bills stop coming. We all know that we have to spend to keep the wheel of the economy running, so spending is part of the game call the economy. Money is the mean to keep this system of us running and keep us all alive and happy or the other way around. Some one once said that " what is money if you do not spend it" and then again "what is money if you do not have it". In the scheme of things, now a days, money play an important part in our society, it can ruin the society or it can make the society prosperous and with that came happiness. Well it look like money rule, I believe so....Well after paying the bill, only one of the many, back home there were plenty of handy work to do, so here I goes again, trying to fix the electric lamp the had stop working, probably the fuse in the plug had to be replaced, a new curtain rod had to be fixed and other little things that had to be look at, other wise it would stop functioning. I guessed it take lots of work in and around the house to keep it running, so an in house handy man soon became a necessity and for me the doing of the handy man's work have became a hobby of a sort. I enjoy toying with thing that need fixing and eventually I do really fix it and enjoy the pleasure of getting the job done....

I treasured my friendship, so let me introduce two of the special this time, they are Chinaman from Malacca and Tongsan from Raub. Malacca is the historical city to the south of Kuala Lumpur. It is one of the oldest city and have been colonised many time starting in fifteen eleven, when the Portuguese invaded Malacca and over throw the Malay Sultanate and then the Dutch, the British, the Japanese and then the British again colonised it until the country gain independence in nineteen fifty seven. Well my friend Mr. Chinaman is a retired army officer, he use to served in the commando battalion and as we all are aware, these characters that served the commando must be very special people, tough and I think a bit crazy. According to legend, before the regular army went to fight the enemy, they first send the commando unit, and some say that this commando are send beyond enemy line and are considered dead until they came back, I am not sure whether this are true, anyway these guy including my friend Mr.Chinaman are very brave man.... So the story goes. And the other friend is Mr.Tongsan, he live in Raub in the state of Pahang, a bid of a rural town in the middle of the Pahang jungle, one thing interesting about this town is that there are plenty of gold in the area around the town of Raub, I think this is the reason my friend Mr.Tongsan decided to stay put in Raub, probably his house is build on a mountain of gold, they guy is a developer of a sort, that mean in Malaysia is that this people build housing estate and the like and sell to the people and makes lots of money, so I guessed my friend Mr.Tongsan is a very very rich person. I am told he own a Durian plantation, but so far he has not invited my friend Mr.Chinaman and me to sampled his Durian, anyhow he is a really good man, he always sent email containing adult joke and the like and this I think makes us adult happy and at time laugh in front of our monitor when reading his joke. So how do I get to know these two great character, well it all start when our condominium in Malacca got into management problem, the company that managed our condo decided to quit and left the building in a limbo, so we the owners decided to meet and try to salvage the condominium and we had meeting after meeting and I think now after almost six years we began to get thing going with a new management. I guessed we were lucky in that our friend Mr.Chinaman live near the site of the condominium in Malacca, so he has been a sort of our rep. that keep an eye from time to time of our valuable property. We all trust him, because we know that the army trained him well and if one look at him, one would see the soldier in him, tough and honest......Interesting friends I have, I think so.

Of all the tropical fruits that a plenty in the Malay archipelagoes, the Durian and the Rambutan still retained it's original Malay name. Durian derive from the Malay word 'duri' with mean thorn, and Rambutan derive from the Malay work 'rambut' which mean hair. Durian is the king of fruits and loved by all, except by some European, it is a very delicious fruit and it smell great, but to those that are not use to the smell of this tasty fruits would find the smell too strong to accept, just like some Asian could not stand the smell of cheese so are some westerner to the smell of the Durian. But once tasted, this delicious fruit would surely overtake the repelling smell to some and would tempt one to have more and more of it. To Asian the smell is what makes the durian so special, it is the smell that bring you to the durian and then to the delicious fruits inside, once the shell of the durian is peel out. At time it would take hard work to peel out the shell/skin but quite so often it is much easier, actually if one know the trick just by looking at the skin among the thorn and tap on the top, one would surely find a line that could be a guide to making the opening's of the durian simple, once it is opened, the paste like fruit some time golden in colour, would surely tempt one to go on eating until, the stomach say ok, ok, stop for the time being, eating during is a slow process, one should eat it slowly and enjoy each fruits and then continue with another one or have a pause and then on continue to enjoy another one, by this process of eating, one would surely enjoy eating this King of the fruits. As for the Rambutan, it is much smaller in size and it is rather juicy and make great dessert. These two fruits have retain it original Malay name and is call by the same name in all the countries all over the world, Like most tropical fruits, it is a seasonal fruits, so one could only find durian and rambutan during certain period of the years. The Durian once tasted, one would yearned for it the next time one sense the smell, that is what this King of Fruits do, makes one to ask for more and more....

While waiting for my wife to do her shopping at the mall, I decided to sit a cafe and have a cup of coffee, a favorite drink of mine, the cafe situated on the lobby of the mall, on the outside facing a busy street. Cars were passing by and would stop at the pedestrian crossing, where crowd wait to cross the busy road. The road was once call the Batu Road but now it has change to another name. It is one of the old part of the city and busy with tourist. Before the coming of the cel phone into our culture, it would not be possible for me to sit and wait and later on find it difficult to locate my wife in the mist of thousand of shopper in the mall, but now with everyone having cel phone including us, it has change the way we move in the crowd, we no longer have to follow each other in order not to get lost, instead we could go on doing our shopping on our own and relax and can keep in touch from time to time with our spouse. With the cel phone we now have more freedom to move and yet keep in touch, It is said that in Malaysia now there are not less the thirteen million set of cel phone, this means that half of the population of this country have cel phone, it look like Malaysian would never get lost again in a crowd. Sitting there having coffee and wait was no more a stress but rather the opposite, it give one freedom and relaxation, I guess the cel phone have create a new culture to the people in as far as communication is concern. In a way it has improved the quality of life of the people. Suddenly there is a beep on my cel phone, and the voice of my wife telling me that she is some where and that we could meet there and proceed on with our kind of shopping. It is indeed a great way to communicate and be civil.

KLCC [Kuala Lumpur City Centre] or the Petronas Twin Tower is just a five minutes drive from our home in Ampang Jaya. It use to take hours to get to KLCC, but now with the opening of the new elevated highway, we could now get to this shopping paradise in less then five minutes, and if one have a Smart Tag, one could do it is just three minutes and in five minutes one would be parking one's car in the basement of the twin tower. The Petronas Twin tower is a splendor and magnificent building, a twin tower with a sky walk,that enable one to physically cross from one tower to the other at the forty forth floor. Public are given a free access to the forty forth floor and it is free, the only thing that one have to do is to queue for a free passes to board a lift to the forty forth floor, the view from there is a panoramic picturesque site of the city of Kuala Lumur. It worth a wait to get the passes and the ride up the fast lift to the sky walk, it is really a magnificent ride to the top, well organised, thanks to the management of the KLCC. Beside the twin tower is a smaller tower with shopping arcade and mall, it is among the largest retailing space in the city and boast of various multi national brands and of course the local manufactured goods. The food courts is the biggest in Kuala Lumpur, where one would find varieties of foods to give one a sumptuous meals that would satisfied oneself through out the day. Of course there are restaurants for the al carte that provide varieties of foods from various culture, it is indeed worth a try. Like any shopping mall there are many fast foods outlet and coffee shops of international standard. It make a great place to sit and chat with friends our a cup of great brewed coffee. Other then a delight for shopper in retail goods and food, the centre also have a great private art gallery, the one name Pucuk Rebong that belong to a friend is an interesting and educational place to make a visit. There is a LRT [light rail transit] station beneath the centre and make getting to and from for tourist much convenient. The Architecture of this twin tower if one of it kind and unique, and this make it a land mark and a symbol of the city of Kuala Lumpur. Just on the out side of the building, there is a sprawling garden of tropical trees and flowers bed, together with a wading pool and a fountain, it is a sort of a paradise for families with children, to stroll and enjoy the fresh air of the garden. During festive time such as the National Day celebration, live entertainment show of local arties are performed here for the public and most of the time it is telecast live to million of home in Malaysia. The whole of KLCC and it's garden is a must visit for both foreign and local tourist alike.

A month ago just about noon I received a phone call from a stranger calling from the airport, and saying that he is so and so and would like to meet me, I told him that in a way I am expecting a call from him, the reason being that my daughter,now studying in the USA, got an email from a friend from Sri Lanka, telling her that his brother would be visiting Malaysia. Since his brother have never visit other countries except for a trip to India, might need help when he arrived in Kuala Lumpur. So I told my daughter that, just give the person my phone number and I might be able to help, so that how this phone call originated. I told the caller whom, I would just refer here as mr.bh that to call me back when he has settled at his hotel in town, well he did call and ask me what he should do in the evening since he has plenty of time to wonder for the day, I told him where he could wonder for the evening and also told him to call me the first thing in the next morning. He say he would call me the next morning just before ten am. As usual when I have a appointment, I got ready and wait for him to call. Since I had no idea of how this person look like, he is a Sri Lanka's Tamil and like all Tamil this race would just look like one of the races of Malaysian, I had to device a plan of how I could know him when we made contact. Well, that morning I waited for his phone call but it did not happen, not until almost noon. To make thing much easier for him, I told him to come over to my house, which is not that far from his hotel [ he stay at a hotel near the famous Bintang Walk]He took a cab and arrived at my house, I invited him up and we chat and eventually we became friend. He present us with two pack of Ceylon tea and then I took him for a quick spin of our new capital city of Putra Jaya. He was fascinated with the development and the architecture of buildings in Putra Jaya.Then I drove to KLCC [the Petronas Twin Tower] and then we had lunch, took him around to see this magnificent building, the tallest in world and end off having coffee at a cafe there. We continue to chat and I gave him all the info that he needed to make his one week visit to Malaysia an worth while one, He said that meeting me was one of the best thing that happen to him on this trip, the reason being that he now could plan his holiday in Malaysia much more then he bargain for. We parted there since it was late and he had other plan for the evening. I personally had a wonderful time helping this young man and hope that he have an enjoyable holiday in my home country.

As a person who have travel the world and have live overseas, I think that most of us who arrived in a foreign country for the first time have one thing in common, How we wish that we have at least a friend or some one to contact on arrival. Personally I felt that many things could have being solved or make much easier had I had more info of a country from a some one in that country, or I could contact some one on arrival, not that there are not enough info already in the internet or from other sources, but being able to get info from friends or even a stranger through the internet or from just a phone call on arrival at a unfamiliar airport would surely help greatly. It would be great indeed to have a sort of a helping hand that would make life much more productive and beautiful in a foreign land. From my experience, holiday or staying in a foreign countries means more if one have a local friends, or a contact. A phone call would solved a million of the unknown problem and make one life more meaningful and beautiful. Malaysia is my home and know for the fact that most people want to makes friends and need a little help here and there in order to make the trip a productive one, I would like to help anyone in a small way I could, to make the live of anyone coming to Malaysia an enjoyable one. Selamat Datang ke Malaysia [Welcome to Malaysia]

Talking about friends, let me say something about my great friends who live in Singapore, for this purpose I shall refer them as only Mr and Mrs ml. Mr ml is of my age group, we grew up together in a small town on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysian, the town is now the capital city of the state of Pahang. It was in the mid forty that we were schooling there. I start schooling in a Malay School and then went to an English School where I befriend this dear friend of mine. We were young then, just kids and some how we both join the Boys Scout movement. It is in this movement that we soon became close friend, with others of our age, we would go camping at the sea side almost every weekend. It was fun, we slept in tents and cook our own food and enjoy learning new skill from each other and enjoy ourselves, usually the group would consist of some six to ten person. I am a Malay, Mr ml is a Chinese and there are others of the other races that make what at that time of our history as Malayan [Now Malaysian] We continue to learn many new skills everyday when we go camping or on an expedition to the outskirts of the town. In the forties the outskirts of Kuantan town was very rural and undeveloped, the river was clean and the beach were golden in colour. As we grew up and continue our education, we would continue to be friend and the friendship continue to grow. A person who still live in Kuantan now that I wish to mention here is Mr an, he is of Indian origin, this person is a sort of a philosopher now, well our friendship with the Mr ml continue even after we left school in the late fifty. We all went on our way in search of the rainbow, and soon we lost contact. Because the bond was so strong, we somehow got in contact again and this goes on for many many years. I got married and he got married to a five young lady in Singapore. He is a singaporean now and continue to live there till now, they have two grown up, one living in Australia and on still live in Singapore. We continue to keep in touch, some time we [my wife and I] would drive to Singapore to meet them and in this golden age of our we became more and more close and this has actually enriched my life. My wife and me have indeed found a truly remarkable friends in both Mr and Mrs ml, a God send that have make our life so beautiful.

It has been a great day, got an email from a friend in the UK, he say that he is going to visit Riga, a city at the edge of the Baltic Sea, he say it is where his ancestor came, the viking, I guessed that most of us in our golden age would try to o search for the past and hopeful would know who we really are. We have all time in the world to seek and try all the possible way of finding the truth of ourselves, as for me going to Bali last week was a sort of trying to find who we are really, we all know that history has never being fair to us, it is the product of the victor,so the looser never get the opportunity to write history, in fact some say the history is actually His story, the person who wrote the story. So to get to the truth of one's history, it would be best that we look it ourselves and may be we eventually get to the truth, I hope my friend in the UK, who is know as Paken, find the truth about his ancestor, when he visit the country of the Viking. Another email that I got today is from our foster child, living in Italy, they just went to Canada for a holiday, and we are hoping that they would be able to come over to Malaysia for a holiday the next time, from the content of their mail, it look like they enjoyed their stay in Canada and now are back to their normal live in Italy. This is why I love the cyberspace, it is a great way to communicate with loved one everywhere and keep in touch always.

Friends, the write up regarding Bali should be read from bottom to up [start from Sept 14], hope my contribution would in a small way help everyone understand the need to help each other in order to make this world a better place to live.

....Bali.. I guess we all still remember the Bali Bombing of last year, where hundred die and maimed. This incident almost destroyed the tourist industries of Bali, but the great people of Bali managed to overcome this and has since began to recover. To me personally we all should visit Bali, by doing so it would help these great people recover their lost ground and bring back the brightness of tourism to Bali. From what I gather from the local, it look like more and more tourists have made a come back to Bali. Our visit was in as small way, to contribute to that factor. We saw Bali and like what we see, it is indeed a great place to spend a holiday, where the people are friendly and the tourist climates are indeed a sort of a paradise on earth. By helping each other we would be able to make this blue planet of ours, a great place to live and enjoy life.

....Bali...We explore the temple and found it to be in perfect condition, the front of the temple have fresh water flowing through man make lake and water flowing from holes on the side of the wall, of course this water outlet is decorated with stone carving, everyone of it unique, I am told by our guide that people come here not only to pray but also for solace and seek blessing. I touch the water and find it cooling and had a mouthful and found it is refreshing. We then visit to see the magnificent work in wood carving, where artisan turn wood into great work of arts. Indeed their work of art are really one of a kind. Our tour of the day took us to the top a place near an active volcano, the weather was cool and the surrounding area was lush with padi field and fruits trees. Because of a religious ceremony, a part of the road was closed, so we had to make a detour, this was to me an extra, for we are now able to see the more rural area of the country, the journey took us through picturesque country side and we enjoy every minutes of this detour, it was indeed a bonus. One thing that I should mention here is that every where we went we found the Balinese were friendly, courteous and helpful. The street and the road side were so clean. Flower being part of the life of the Balinese, we found that they use flowers everywhere, in the bathroom, in ponds and of course in their daily religious ritual, every morning and evening they would placed small basket full of flowers and offering in front of their houses and religious monuments. One would also find that all their religious figure are covered with a black and white check sarong, according to our guides, that black and white is part of their philosophy, ...[to be continue]

A great morning and another great day, on the 3rd Sept, 2003 my wife and me went on a short holiday to Bali, the island of paradise, it was just as short flight from Kuala Lumpur and in mere two and a half hours we arrived in sunny Bali. To me it was a dream come through, to set foot on this island of the rising sun. After checking at our hotel in the hearth of Legian, we did some exploring of the near by shop and found it to be interesting, full of works of arts and craft that are unique to this island. Bali to me is special because it is the only place in the Malay archipelago that Islam do not reach, so it has remain a Hindu cultural area for thousand of years, as such going to Bali is just like getting in a time machine and there you are, in a country where the culture and tradition have remain the same for thousand of years, going around on a tour of the rural area, we saw temples built with great skill and decorated with stone carving. A temple we visited is thousand of years old and still in perfect condition,....[ to be continue ]

Before I proceed further in writing my thought in this blog, I would like to thanks the Blogger organization and it management personals for providing this opportunity to me, it is indeed a God send opportunity to be able to write freely and contribute my thought with ease and pleasure. Many thanks and May God blessed you all.

I am a Malaysian, a grand parent, live in Ampang jaya, near the capital city of Kuala Lumpur,Malaysia, love to write and hope that my writing would contribute in enriching the live of everyone that I came in contact in cyberspace.