Went to Sentosa Flowers 2009 today. I gave last year’s event a miss, regretted it afterwards. so this year I made it a point to visit the show. it wasn’t as nice as what I had in mind.. but nevertheless it’s refreshing to enjoy the colorful flowers. thankfully it was cloudy today – it rained for a while but not for long. weather was perfect for walking around admiring the flowers.

the event was held at 2 locations: imbiah and palawan beach. imbiah had some giant flower walls and sculptures covered with flowers. queues were formed to take turns posing with the flower displays.. and I was too lazy to join the queue.

The flowers were not exactly fresh, maybe it’s because the event’s ending is drawing near. anyway, I was happy to find hydrangeas – white, green, pink, purple, blue..

these are orchids, said to be specially air-flown from taiwan. these are the freshest-looking among all others.

exhibits at palawan beach were not that great. the most interesting was schools’ gardening and sculpture display competition.

spent our chinese new year holiday in bali, bandung and jakarta for 6 days. here’s a quick recap.

Friday, 23 Jan 2009
left home really early we still got to pay midnight surcharge for the cab we took to airport. changi was super crowded, queues were formed at the check-in counters, immigration counters, as well as boarding gates. the flight was delayed for a little while since quite a number of passengers were stuck in the queue and unable to board the plane on time. finally the plane took off at about 8am.
we brought all our bags to the cabin and therefore we could get out quickly and hopped on to the shuttle bus to the domestic terminal. it was not as bad as I imagined, the shuttle bus was frequent enough, it’s free and in decent condition. the domestic flight that we took was delayed for half an hour. before the plane took off, as usual there was announcement, safety instructions, and the concluding remark was, “let’s pray together so that we can safely reach our destination”. we were like.. what?!
finally arrived, safely, at ngurah rai international airport at 2pm. took cab to our hotel, checked in, and immediately went out to settle down our grumbling stomach. had sop buntut, nasi empal and es campur at discovery shopping mall nearby. we spent the afternoon to stroll along kuta beach. kuta beach was nowhere near an ideal place to be, it’s crowded with tourists, dirty with all sorts of rubbish scattered all over, and locals trying to sell their goods or services. not that I was surprised, but it’s definitely worse than a few years ago when I last visited kuta.
we went for a quick swim at the hotel’s pool. refreshed, we then went out for dinner at poppies restaurant. the place was really nice with garden setting. thankfully it’s not full despite being so well-known. according to the waitress who served us, the business was slowing down recently. we had java ice tea, chicken supreme and balinese nasi campur. I enjoyed the balinese nasi campur, despite being spicy, it was tasty – consisted of steamed rice, serundeng, otah on lemongrass stick, beef rendang, sayur nangka, braised egg, sayur labu, ayam suwir and perkedel jagung. walked back to hotel afterwards.

my mood for shopping was gone together with the searing heat. even night time, if I stopped at a souvenir stall, I would practically start melting.. not to mention the touting and the real need to bargain as the opening prices offered were always bloody expensive.
Saturday, 24 Jan 2009
visited tanah lot. it’s still the same.. and it’s really, really hot. we did one round of sightseeing and hurriedly went back to car for some aircon. we spent longer time in the car travelling from hotel to tanah lot than the visit itself.

anyway.. we had lunch at bebek bengil (translated as dirty duck), ubud. but since both of us do not really fancy duck, we ordered chicken instead, haha.. with calamari and drinks. and we ate our babi guling bu oka at bebek bengil’s restaurant too. this was my friend’s idea – since we wanted to try both babi guling and bebek bengil in ubud, and bebek bengil’s restaurant was far nicer than babi guling’s. the food at bebek bengil was just so-so, I wasn't that impressed. babi guling bu oka was nice, but it’s oily.
in the evening we attended our friends’ wedding at tirtha uluwatu. the place was really nice with both traditional and modern touch. stairs, chapel and several huts connected by shallow pools and walkways. upon arrival we were ushered to the waiting room area, then to the small chapel for the short ceremony which took 30 mins to finish. the chapel and the ceremony were not meant for a particular religion, even the reading was generic enough. the back of the altar was covered with glass window and door, with the blue sky view. too bad it was a cloudy evening, otherwise the sunset view would be spectacular. the place was set right in front of a beautiful, clean and empty beach whose name is unknown to me.

once the ceremony was over, the guests were lined up to shower the bride and groom with flower petals. after phototaking session, we were ushered to the cocktail area, and then to the dining area. it was a 3 course dinner – salmon skewers for appetizer, beef steak or fish for main course, and coconut pudding for dessert.

Sunday, 25 Jan 2009
today’s agenda: parasailing at tanjong benoa, waterbom park and sunday mass. parasailing was quite scary at the beginning during take off time. but once we were up in the air, it was great – the view was breathtaking! the boat drove us for one round before we needed to get back down.

we had fun time at waterbom park. it was essentially a water theme park. it had several slides with various twists and turns. but before we could slide down we had to climb up the stairs first, which was quite tiring. most of the slides ended up at pools. most of them required us to wear the tubes. there were 2 types of tubes, single and double. the double tubes were very popular we practically had to stop and ask people before they even managed to return the tubes to the storage.
the slide that we took most often was called macaroni. but the scariest one was boomerang – it felt like riding roller coaster plus the water splash. fun!

sunday mass was at st. francis xavier church which was located near our hotel.

Monday, 26 Jan 2009 – Wednesday, 28 Jan 2009
Arrived in jakarta at 3.30pm and visited bandung the next day. We ate a lot – the usual food like nasi liwet ikan asin, tempe mendoan, teh botol sosro, and also ketoprak, bakwan malang, bubur ayam menteng. slurrppp..

had a fun time at forest adventure today. heard about it just a few days ago and decided to give it a try. booked online for a slot at 10.30am this morning.

we left home early for breakfast to make sure we had enough energy, and arrived at bedok reservoir early enough for a brief stroll enjoying the view before the stipulated start time. disclaimer forms signed, fees paid, bags deposited, and we’re all set.

forest adventure is a treetop adventure with 2 aerial courses – grand course for adults and kids course. the obstacles use ladders, bridges, trapezes, nets, swings and zip lines, connecting one tree to another, about 5 meters above the ground. participants move unaccompanied from one obstacle to the next – only with limited supervision from the safety instructor down below. everyone is equipped with harnesses and is required to be attached to the safety system with at least one safety line at all times. only one participant is allowed to be on one obstacle at any one time, and a platform can only accommodate maximum 3 people.

the grand course is divided into 4 sites. the first site is built near the reception area and comprises of easier obstacles. each obstacle has a sign indicating its name, safety instructions and its difficulty level. there are 4 levels in total: green, yellow, red and black. the first obstacle in a site is always a rope ladder to get up to the treetops, and the last one is always a zip slide – the flying fox.

our group was quite big, therefore sometimes we needed to wait a while for those who went before us to move further to the next obstacle before we started ours. and we could not stay idling too long at a platform as well, since those who came after us would need to use that platform soon. one of the safety instructor’s jobs is to check the flow.

there are two different paths at some of the platforms. participants can only choose one of them, but both always end at the same platform. the choice is either 2 of the easy obstacles, or 1 of the more challenging one - something like shortcut path.

before the session starts, we wore the harnesses and helmets, then the instructor briefed us on the safety procedures and demonstrated how to use the equipments. we finished all 4 sites after about 3 hours. when I first started at site 1, I was thinking to myself - goodness, what am I doing here.. but not long after, I started to enjoy myself.

the most scary part is the ‘tarzan’ obstacle, where we swing from the platform to a net, grab the net and use it to reach the next platform. my favorite obstacle is the zip slide – there are 5 in total, 4 at the end of each course and 1 at the beginning, used for practice. sliding on the steel cable from a treetop platform to the ground below across the reservoir, while enjoying the view and gentle breeze - it’s really fun!

finally had a decent break this weekend. went to sentosa cove to take a peek at the volvo ocean race village, watched a movie and went out for some shopping :)

photos taken at marina barrage:

I've finished reading the last book of Tetralogi Laskar Pelangi. It gives a nice wrap up to the whole story. As its predecessors, this book is no less inspirational, with detailed descriptions that make readers feeling involved in the whole storyline. But some parts sounds so surreal to me, I am starting to wonder how much a fiction this work really is.

Rahasia

Kuberi tahu satu rahasia padamu, Kawan
Buah paling manis dari berani bermimpi
Adalah kejadian-kejadian menakjubkan
Dalam perjalanan menggapainya

(Maryamah Karpov - Andrea Hirata)

watched Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella at esplanade theatre this evening. it's an entertaining show, despite the fact that its storyline is so well known.

the story went as expected, of course with the happy ending. but I didn't know earlier that the king is actually not so keen in giving his son a ball. a little difference could be noted near the end of the play, when the palace people was looking for cinderella by asking every girl in the country to try the glass slippers on. when they arrived at cinderella's house, cinderella was not there as she sneaked out the night before to go back to the palace and meet the prince herself. the fairy godmother was there too, helping them along the way.

the act when the fairy godmother transformed the pumpkin into royal carriage was very well done. it was happening at the back of the curtain and the blinking lights made it look so magical. cinderella inspected the carriage and the horses - she moved to the other side of the carriage - within seconds she reappeared wearing a completely different gown and hairdo. we could not decide if she was really that quick or if it was someone else who looked exactly like her.

the properties on stage were nicely done, and the casts' costumes were superb! cinderella's gowns were quite predictable and a bit boring, but the rest of the casts wore colorful, impressive gowns.

well open up your mind and see like me
open up your plans and damn you're free
look into your heart and you'll find love love love love
listen to the music of the moment people dance and sing
we're just one big family
and it's our godforsaken right to be loved loved loved loved loved

well open up your mind and see like me
open up your plans and damn you're free
look into your heart and you will find that the sky is yours

(i'm yours - jason mraz)