The Big Pirate Ship X-Mas Theme at One Borneo, Kota Kinabalu

Christmas Theme 2011 @ One Borneo Shopping Mall, Sabah

Been to the 1Borneo Shopping Mall at Kota Kinabalu, and this year they have this Pirate Ship Christmas Theme. It look to cozy and pretty, and they have my favourite color, blue...

Christmas Theme 2010 @ One Borneo Shopping Mall, Sabah

Went to this mall last year 2010 on a family trip, and they have rain deer and toy soldier. More to red color, and giant Christmas trees. 

DM trip to the Kota Kinabalu 2011

I went for a 4 days 3 night trip to Kota Kinabalu, KK is one of my favourite place to visit, especially the Kundasan area there they have the cozy weather, and the Mount Kota Kinabalu. OMG, cozy weather here I come.... oh wait, I'm here for the Charity Ride thingy, so have to settle everything first before enjoying.

Went to a house warming party, is my friend's cousin house. He did very well in KK, and bought a half million house to stay in. Is a 3 stories house, the outer looks is good, but they really need to put more effort on the interior. Or hire an interior designer to do the design for them.

Is time to check in to our hotel, I'm staying at the Sabah Oriental Hotel (formerly knowns at Beverly Hotel). There is a group of Filipino band, and the two singer can sing very well (and very sexy too).

This is how the lobby looks like, there is a water fountain just surrounding the stairways (and the x-mas tree), and they have lots of real tortoise swimming around the fountain.

After we checked in, we left our luggage in the hotel room. I called up my friend to pick us up, and tour us around the KK town. This is the night view from the Singnal Hill Observation Pavilion at Sabah.

We went to the Sutera Harbour Resort, it is a huge resort. I visited the place for quite a few time, and it was really huge, and pretty.

One of the best place to be when your at Kota Kinabalu. They have very nice restaurant there, and the ambient are super cool.

There is a dockyard where people with their own yacht can dock em here. There are more than 20 yacht here. Hope I can go for a ride on these yacht one day.

Cheers,

Wilson

Night view at the Sutera Harbour is pretty...

2 Days Bintulu Trip

Each time I only get to transit at the Bintulu airport, but this time is my first time to visit the Bintulu Town. I follow my friends at the charity society here for a short 2 days 1 night trip, and to attend a charity dinner. Bintulu is famous for the oil and gas industry here, and it also the only division which has the flight academic school here. So who wants to be a pilot, they can come here to learn to fly. When we reach Bintulu, it was meeting the whole day. I don't have any time to actually go around the Bintulu town, and took photo :( My friend bring us to a restaurant, and ordered a famous dish. Is the fish, they cook it by warp the fish with aluminium foil, and put lots of salt inside, and steam it. That restaurant is the only one who can make such dish, and is very tasty (according to my friend). All the fish are kept inside a fish tank, and there are a lot of fishes in that tank. I feel so pity for the fish, waiting to be slaughter, and be eaten by people just to satisfy people hunger. I still eat meat, but I just felt very sorry for the fish to watch the fish die like this. Waiting for people to pick which one is the fresh one, and eat it.... so I skip that dish, and let my friends eat my portion. By the time the meeting finish, it was very late, and my friend did bring us to roam around the Bintulu Town one round, so I quickly take this opportunity to take some pictures. Here is me at the Chinese Temple. That night, most of my friends had stomach ache. I'm the one who is ok, I'm been thinking, is it the fish... hm... cheers, Wilson

Dinner @ Siniawan Kuching

Visited Siniawan Town with my brother when he's at Kuching. Is a 30 minutes drive from Kuching, and every Friday and Saturday night the Siniawan old town will have this food fest, and karaoke competition. Too many choice, I order this batu kawa meat balls. Burn my tongue, I ate too fast. The latest trend, Angry Bird. Is all over the place, books, exercise book, lantern, t-shirt..... and the kids are crazy about it. uh!! gonna show you my ride ;)

Visitation To Julau, Sarawak

After my Kanowit visitation, then we took another detour to Julau while on our way to Meradong (Bintagor). And a little bit of background details about the Julau Town.

Julau is a town, and the capital of the Julau District (1703.39 square kilometers) in Sarikei Division, Sarawak, east Malaysia. The district population (year 2000 census) was 34,500. The population is dominated by Iban as well as Chinese especially the Fuzhou.

This is the first time I saw raw rubber, the lorry was loaded with these stuff.

During the rule of Sultanate of Brunei until the White Rajahs dynasty, Julau is one of the places situated inside Kanowit. Julau is a town, and the capital of the Julau District (1703.39 square kilometers) in Sarikei Division, Sarawak. So compare Kanowit and Julau. Julau is much smaller, and not much facilities here.

The warf, I'm not sure where this river links to, but since is near to the Kanowit Town, so it might be linked to Kanowit.

Or it might belongs to the village people which stay opposite the river, or in the long house.

My friend own a coffee shop here, and he told us that most of the population are the Iban people. So the Chinese can also speaks Iban here, and for the Chinese school, almost 60 to 70 % of the students are Iban, so they know how to speak Chinese.

One of the main problem which face by the Julau people here are flooding problem, cause each year during the raining session (Dec - Feb), the town will be flooded and become a water world. So did the gov do anything about this, well of course the gov are busy relaxing in the cozy office, drinking their coffee, playing their facebook game, and waiting for the next payday. weeeee~~~ they're so busy.

Cheers,

Wilson

Selamat datai ke website saya

Visitation to Kanowit, Sarawak

I went to Sibu with a bunch of friend, then we all drive to Bintagor, along the way we drove pass the Kanowit town. As I never visit the place before, so we decided to take a detour into the town of Kanowit.
Kanowit is a town and the capital of a district of the same name. It is located within the Sibu Division, Sarawak, east Malaysia and comprises 2,253.5 square kilometers in area. It is built on the mouth of Kanowit River at the bank of Rajang River, approximately 174 kilometers from the coast of South China Sea. It will take 45 minutes to get there by land transport and about an hour boat ride from Sibu. The main ethnic groups are Iban, Chinese, Malay, and Melanau.
This is the landmark singnature of the Kanowit town, the olive? hmmmm.....
The town takes its name from the Kanowit, a Melanau ethnic group called Rajang by the Ibans. The language is still spoken. There still are some Kanowit people living in the Kanowit area. However, the language is doomed to extinction.
The town center consists of three streets of 1930s vintage Chinese shophouses, almost half of which seem to contain coffeeshops, near the waterfront. The biggest supermarket is Hock Tong Seng Supermarket and it meets most of the needs for the locals.
During periods of celebration, the local karaoke can often be heard from far away with the pounding basslines of trashy 80's hits in English, Malay and Chinese. The best sight seeing can be had by walking along the riverside from town or up the Telecom Hill.
This is some where near the waterfront area, and beside us the the bank of the Rajang River.
I've also confirm the name of the river with the people there, they told me this is the Rajang River, and you can use the boat here to go to Kapit.
The market at Kanowit town. Uhh!! durians...yum yumm
There is also a Chinese Temple beside the river, although Kanowit is a small town but Kanowit has a decent infrastructure, enough to satisfy the small population's needs.

It has two primary schools (Sekolah Rendah Kebangsaan St. Francis Xavier-the earliest primary school in Sarawak, founded in 1883 and Sekolah Rendah Kebangsaan Yee Ting, a Chinese-run government school), and two secondary schools (Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Kanowit and Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Dipertua Haji Abdul Rahman Yaakub).

Fort Emma is a fort built in 1859 by Rajah James Brooke, out of timber and bamboo. It was named after Emma Brooke, sister of Rajah Charles Brooke. The fort remains impressive, despite years of neglect. It is now open to public as a mini museum.

Fort Emma was also the site of the last serious challenge to Brooke rule in Sarawak. In 1859, a number of Malay chiefs, led by Syarif Masahor of Mukah and supported by the Sultan of Brunei planned a series of attacks to kill all the Europeans in Sarawak and Dutch Borneo. In June 1859, Brooke government officials Charles Fox and Henry Steele were murdered at Kanowit as the first step of this plan.

The Tuan Muda Charles Brooke led a force of Iban from Saribas to revenge the attack and to recover the heads of the unfortunate victims. As a result, Mukah was annexed to Sarawak, Sharif Masahor fled to Johore and the "Malay Plot" was the last time the Malays and the Iban joined forces against the White Rajah.

The Pandan Beach @ Lundu, Kuching

Last week the Raya and the Independence day falls in the same day, had a few days off. So I went to the Pandan beach with my fiends, and also for Raya visiting (yumm yum, I finally get to eat the satay).

The top photographer Wilson Chin (me), this is the grocery shop just right next to the beach.

This is a public beach, so there are a lot of people came here to spend their holiday. My parent use to bring us to the beach when I'm little, miss the old days.

My friends :)

Cheers,

Wilson

The water are very salty, and I can't really open my eyes when swimming :S

The Most beautiful temple at Penang, the Kek Lok Si temple 极乐寺

I visited the most beautiful temple at Penang, is on top of a hill, and it's called the Kek Lok Si temple (极乐寺). In the Buddhist teaching, there is a place called the "Pure Land of the West" in Chinese is 极乐世界. The temple name was adapt from there.

I'm impress with the building structure, they have really details painting, and magnificent engraving, very huge Buddha statue, beautiful panoramic view on the hill top, and more.

I like where they have a lot of souvenir stalls on the way to the temple, and also a lot of food stalls. I tried some of the food there and it was really nice :)

That day when I visited the place, it was a cloudy day, I like it cause is not that hot. Took a lots of photos this time, the photos that I took 2 years back are all corrupted. I will make sure that I capture every details this time, and keep my photos in a safe place.

I've made a shot clip on my kek lok si temple trip together with my parents, check it out my friend.



Cheers,
Wilson
amitabah....

  

Visitation to The Penang Hill a.k.a Bukit Bendera

This is the first time I visited the Penang Hill, as I remember when I was a kid, I did read this in the text book about the introduction of the Penang Hill.




At first I know we need to use a train to go uphill, I tough it was a cable car, but I was a bit disappointed when I'm there, and notice it uses a cable train instead of a cable car. oh well, at least I don't have to climb all the way up.




So I uses the Penang Hill funicular train service to go up, and paid RM8 (round trip) for adults. The railway starts to construct at 1906, and had also undergo for upgrading after that.

From the trip up, it took around 5 minutes. The cable pulls the train all the way uphill, and the train did stop at the platform when going up. Is 833 above sea level on the very top.

Also there is a 5.1KM tarred road, is open for vehicles of hill residents, and for off-road motorcycle to travel up the steep terrain.

When on top of the hill, I can view almost the entire Penang Town. I can also see the famous Penang bridge. The weather up there is not as cold like when I'm at Kinabalu Park, Kota Kinabalu or Genting Highland. The view are block by haze that day, if not I'm able to capture good panoramic view of the Penang Town.




There is a India temple, called the Thirumurugan temple, and also a mosque. Not just that, it also has a huge canon on top of the hill. Now this makes me curious, why do they need a canon on top of the hill back in the old days? and is only one, is that for decoration. If they were to use it as defence, that will not be much help...




The old train used back in the old days are display on top of the hill, and i google it out, back in the old days, it takes half an hour for the train to reach to the top, that's slow.

I've record a video while going uphill, check my video out.



Cheers,
Wilson
chu chu.....chiko chiko chiko....chu chu.....

Penang Trip, Day 9 (Last Day at Penang)

My last day at Penang, and the only pace that I went is the Heong Shan Shi Buddhist temple. I was with my parent to attend a Buddhist chanting ceremony, as this is the month of July in the Chinese Lunar, so usually as a Buddhist it would be good if we go to the Buddhist center and pray.

There is a big puja ceremony at this Buddhist temple, and it starts at 9AM and ends at 8PM. Well of course in the middle there are break time.

This is the first time mom and dad come to Penang, and throughout this few days I bring them around Penang, and am really glad that they are having a good time here.

All of my brothers also concern about mom, cause she sometime worry to much about us. Guess all the mom in this world will do the same for their kids.

Thank you for following my travel post for this few days, and remember to bookmark my page, as I’ll continue to share some of the interesting about my daily life.

Cheers,

Wilson

Holiday ends today :)

Penang Trip Report Reports:

Penang Trip Day 1 (post 1 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 2 (post 2 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 3 (post 3 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 4 (post 4 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 5 (post 5 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 6 (post 6 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 7 (post 7 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 8 (post 8 of 9)

Penang Trip Day 9 (post 9 of 9)