Bario, Miri, Sarawak trip @ 25 – 28 Nov 2011

Fast Forward – Bario, Miri, Sarawak trip

Haven’t update the blog for quite awhile. Recently attended a trip to Bario. Incase you wondering, Bario is a Malaysian village located in the centre of the Kelabit Highlands in the north east of Sarawak, very close to the international border with Indonesian Kalimantan, and 3280 feet above sea level. It is the main settlement in the Kelabit Highlands (Wikipedia).

I’m honored to get asked to join the trip, a bunch of photographer, myself, and strangely, i brought smurf along. (One couple – husband and wife to be more precise, 2 guys, 4 girls and Smurf, 8+Smurf)

The plan is where we take a flight from Kuala Lumpur (KL) to Miri, then from Miri, we take another flight to Bario. I bought my flight tickets months ago online, as agreed, we fly Airasia from KL to Miri, and Malaysia Airlines (Mas Wings) from Miri to Bario. Same goes with the flight back to KL from Bario.

Airasia to and fro, KL – Miri flight cost me around RM500, while MAS to and fro, Miri – Bario flight cost me around RM250. Now i have to admit, initially i’m having doubts with the flight expenses, it is technically more expensive to travel to Siam Reap or any neighbor country destination.  Having doubt then? Now no more.

I brought all my luggage (A Crumpler’s Customary Barge and 6 Million Dollar man)to the office on 25th. Attended a briefing and left my office somewhere around 2.30pm in the afternoon, my flight was somewhere 7.30pm that evening. Having lucky to be approved for a half day leave, i get the opportunity to visit the nearby photography store for a final shopping before the trip. Obviously i knew what i needed, i packed a CPL filter and a new Sandisk Extreame SD card and moved on to KL Sentral. Managed to catch a bus which transit directly to LCCT (Low cost Airport, where Airasia Fly).

It’s a sleepy afternoon, so needless to say, i sleep the whole journey from Kl Sentral to LCCT. Upon arrived, as usual, i checked in my Customary Barge (its too big for hand luggage) and waited the others.

Fast Forward – KL – Miri

We flew from KL to Miri that evening and arrived at Miri somewhere 10.00pm. We checked in into a small hotel at Miri town to spend the night until tomorrow earning morning flight to Bario. Well, the night didn’t end there as we roamed the street for food. Surprisingly, Miri is not as Night going as we thought, most of the shop / restaurants close for business even on Friday night. Amazingly, there’s not a single Mamak Stall. Well, what can we say about different culture. I’m sure KL was buzzing every minute of Friday night. Finally able to found a restaurant that still open for business, and we served our-self plenty of Noodles.

Fast Forward – Morning at Miri

As you can see from the picture at our right. Miri do have an amazing sunrise with purple cloud. The air seems fresher and the sky seems wider. Too bad we’re rushing.

We didn’t even have time to take any breakfast as we rushed to the Miri Airport for our flight to Bario. We witness the sunrise at Miri that day throughout our journey from Miri Town to Airport. Amazing.

We are asked to stand on the weighing scales at the Miri airport checking counter to make sure that the plane does not get overloaded.

Since many of us haven’t consume any breakfast yet, we get our breakfast at the Penang theme restaurant at Miri Airport.  The nasi lemak ain’t bad, but suprisingly i can’t finish them.

Fast Forward – The Departure Hall @ Miri – Bario

Waiting patiently at the departure hall. Our plane from Miri to Bario is those 16 seater twin otter planes, which i have a picture upon touch down at Bario.

From what i read online, on normal days, when passengers are few, the plane will be full of goods get piled onto empty seats, along the aisle of the plane.

“The flight across from Miri to Bario is a wondrous sight. The birds eye view of Sarawak’s jungles below, the Mulu National Park demarcations, the Murud Peaks, Batu Lawi and the small villages + longhouses dotted around in remote parts of the upper reaches of Baram – all can be seen from the tiny windows of the twin otter.” (http://www.journeymalaysia.com/MH_bario1.htm)

Fast Forward – On the flight from Miri – Bario

 Fast Forward – Bario – Arrived – Touch downed

 Fast Forward – Bario – Blue Sky, Green field

 Fast Forward – Bario – This is where we stay – Ngimat Ayu’s Homestay

Fast Forward – Bario – Ngimat Ayu’s Homestay – Borrow pic from Angeline

 

Fast Forward – Bario – Green & Yellow

Fast Forward – Bario – Food

Fast Forward – Bario – More Sky @ Bario

Fast Forward – Bario – On 4WD

Fast Forward – Bario – Flora & Fauna

Fast Forward – Bario – More Sun & Sky

Fast Forward – Bario – How bout some Sheep!

Fast Forward – Bario – Ngimat Ayu’s Homestay – Sunset

Fast Forward – Bario – Sunset

Fast Forward – Bario – Light Painting @ Bario

Fast Forward – Bario – Sunrise at Mount Prayer @ Bario

Fast Forward – Bario – Church at Mount Prayer @ Bario

Fast Forward – Bario – Scott aka Apoi our Guide @ Bario

Fast Forward – Bario – More Green

Fast Forward – Bario – More Blue

Fast Forward – Bario – Red Church – Building in progress

Fast Forward – Bario – HornBill, Not Kill BILL

Fast Forward – Bario – Long House

Fast Forward – Bario – Last Night

So far, you have seen plenty of pictures throughout my journey at Bario. We visited the salt factory as well as the Penan Community. I didnt capture any picture on both occasion.

Now, back to the last night at Bario. After the long house, we spend the dinner with Scott aka Apoi at his family long house, we have dinner the traditional bario way, the fish was nice, can’t stress that enough. As always, there’s plenty of wild boar, I have like 3 bowl of rice. Sadly, this will be our last night at Bario.

Early morning the next day (28th), we woke up early and have a final breakfast, before Scott transporting us to the Bario Air Terminal. As mentioned in some other article online, we need to pay RM10 service tax per pax (FYI). Our flight back to Miri just on time. We said good bye with heavy heart. Come back again one day we should.

Fast Forward – Bario – Bario – Miri

One thing to note, our flight stop at Marudi before continue to Miri.

Fast Forward – Bario – Long House

We arrived at Miri somewhere lunch time. Our flight back to KL at evening 7+, so we have plenty of time at Miri until the flight. We have our lunch at one of the local seafood restaurant. Next stop, we visited The Old Lady (The first oil well).

Fast Forward – Miri – The Old Lady

Fast Forward – Miri – Seaside

Fast Forward – Miri – KL

We arrived at KL somewhere 10pm 28th.

Final Thoughts

This trip (2 days 2 nights at Bario, 1 day 1 night at Miri) cost me roughly RM1400 inclusive of all flight tickets as well as food and accommodation. With the same amount of money, i could probably get a trip at Siam Reap with longer stay. But no amount of money could substitute the experience of visiting Bario.

Time at Bario past so slow, as everything seems so relax and slow pace. The grass here looks greener, the sky here looks bluer, even the air here breath cleaner.

The hike to Mount Prayer to see the sunrise is definitely a challenge for me, and others who are not so used to hiking. Although i’m inclined to say that there’s always better place than Bario for sunset, but the experience of seeing sunset at Bario were enough to mesmerize me.

The trekking into the salt factory was not so appealing to me, mud is every where and the factory is mere a hut with plenty of log nearby with its source of salt well where the worker will burn the salt water with fire to get salt. It’s pretty hard work, that is the reason why Bario salt is so pricy. But in truth, visiting the salt factory is one thing that you could skip if you decided to visit Bario.

Now, for the Penan people, they are poor and living their own way. Our group brought some food, sweets as well as stationary for kids. It’s pretty heartbroken to see them being rejecting the modern civilization. It will takes more than food / sweets / stationary to educate them the importance of education, modernization for them. They may remain with their belief and culture, but they could have done it in a way that accepting education for their kids. I’m so sad that i don’t feel like taking any picture of their young ones who don’t even wear clothes in full.

Transport at Bario for us is either walk or 4wd.

Homestay – we stayed at Ngimat Ayu’s Homestay, with the host Scott, aka Apoi being real friendly and helpful to us. The stay were cozy, each night around 3hours of generator and electricity. It does make me realized what a waste we were back in City wasting so much electricity, while the likes in the rural area don’t have enough.

The bath were “refreshing”, it’s cool of course, but after a day trekking or hiking, it really takes away all the tiredness. I hard Scott gonna install water heater soon, but, imo, its not an issue at all.  Sleep wise, i spend the night at a room with 2 single beds. Pretty clean and cozy. Food, we have plenty of Bario rice, wild boar and some local traditional food. Not much to complaint.

Long story short – it’s a very good experience, money well spend.

For more of my Bario picture see here – http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephanchan/sets/72157628236844815/

Coffeenottea – The beginning of a guild

ok. here’s the deal, i am able to psycho my real life mate into allowing me making a new guild in our current wow Taiwan server, naming it Coffeenottea. Its a fairly small guild at the moment, manage to squeeze in ten guild signature and successfully creating it. The guild aim to be an english spoken guild, with goals to achieve sustainable and remarkable result in cataclysm rated battleground as well as 10 man raid, which provide the same level of gears, much like the 25man version. With the limited resources (limited guild member and newly level 80), there is plenty to work on, but with one eye on cataclysm, there is no time to waste. This is gonna be a long long journey, and with Jaina blessing, it shall be a fruitful one.

My Indepth Opinion on the Current Arsenal team 01-10-2010

Ok, I just revamped the blog layout yesterday, it is kind of darkish now, pretty dull, I know, but I like it a lot. I knew it consist of wall of text at the main page; I’ll try to fit in some picture to make it less boring. The reason which why I haven’t done so, is because, I can’t seems to find the way to showcase that I embedded with my post. Until I manage to do that, I’ll cool with it for now.

To start off the post, I’m gonna talk about Arsenal Football Club today, one of the two club I support, where the other one will be the now Championship’s Leeds United.

I’m not gonna touch on my thoughts on the current Leeds United’s battle for promotion, but instead, I’m gonna focus on Arsenal’s 2010 trophy hunting attempt.

Arsenal FC, once hailed as the invincible, Arsenal’s “Untouchables” go undefeated for the entire season to win the Premier League in 2004. Fast forward 6 years later to this very moment, will we Arsenal fans, get to see the light once again?

Let’s do a point to point analysis, the untouchables build on the basis of a steady and strong back four, fortify by a steady goal keeper. The attacking flair is almost there, the French pair of Henry and Pires terrorized the defenders, while Cecs Fabregas working its magic with a very very young age. Well, I’m not any kind of expert in football, but here are my opinions:

Goal Keeper.

Our keeper is not as steady as 6 years back, Almunia, doesn’t really convince me enough, way too many mistakes. He never really looks comfortable stepping up for Lehmman (I may have the spelling wrong somewhere), he lacked the confident of David Seaman, as well as the arrogant of Mr. Lehmman, he don’t have a strong character, or at least, he don’t project a trustworthy impression, and I doubt his defender trust him much, enough said.

Fabianski, shown some promise through out his career, he is young, still early in his goal keeper career. He makes some major major high profile mistakes, (such as the one in the Champions League game with Porto), still, he may deserve more chance to prove himself. Why, u may ask. Well, he is young, he will learn through mistakes, people compare and claim Almunia and Fabianski rubbish, but they forget that Almunia is indeed way older than Fabianski, Almunia, spend much of his younger career, in the Arsenal reserve understudying, Lehmann, while Fabianski, do not have that kind of privilege, people looking for redemption after a disappointment (Almunia) in the form of Fabianski, he face huge expectation for him to step up from Almunia demise, he failed somehow horribly last year. After the recent CL Partizan game, he shown promise for saving the penalty, (although I do not think that save is imminent, it technically end the game, but it is not game changing, Arsene Wenger and the media might just exaggerate to sing the praise). Just give the lad another chance.

ok, Lets talk about the Arsenal, remaining goal keeper, Vito Man-one (I knew wrong spelling) seems to be a very good shot stopper, (from the few games he started) although again, with the pressure at hand, he made some mistakes, but hardly career threatening, he deserve more chance. And the Polish’ Wojciech Szczesny, ya he can rant all he want, but he is behind the pecking order right now, never seen him play, he might too deserve his chance.

I say, give Vito Man-one and Wojciech Szczesny a start, give them a chance to prove themselves, if they shine, then good news for us, we get our self some steady sold goalkeeper, even if they fail, they will know that they are not good enough and will stop ranting about first team opportunities. As for Almunia, I sincerely believe it is time for him to go, its pretty good joke for even people to suggest that Almunia should be England solution to the Goal keeper problem, as for Fabianski, let him fight the spot with Vito and Wojciech Szczesny, the winner gets all, the loser stay put. We knew Almunia quality, and it’s a long shot into the moon to now give a chance to the other three GK. Alternatively, buy a new GK and pray for the best.

Defender

Let’s start at the heart of the defense, Vermalen seems to be pretty solid, hardly make any mistakes, he is not the tallest center backs you see, but his leap is good and he timed his jump perfectly. I can’t wait for tomorrow’s game against Chealsea, Vermalen vs. Drogba, hopefully no more Sanderos’ish memories. Partnering Vermalen at the heart of defense is the options of injury prone – Djourou, newly signed, Laurent Konchieny, and Squillaci. So far, LK seems solid, very good in tackle, hardly gets a foot wrong, winning almost all the header against Roman Palychenko (yaya spelling) in the Carling Club, Totemham game. Squillaci is good in the air, pretty experience, but not the fastest CB around, which shown with good evidence in the recent few games. No comment about Djourou, hardly see him play. One thing to note, is that, it is a completely new lineup in the heart of defense, Gallas, Silvestre and Campbell all gone, so it definitely need a lot of time to for AW to find out his best center partnership, my bet will be on Vermalen + Squillaci, nonetheless, it shows a lot of promising.

At the side, Glitchy is never Ashley Cole, he is fast, but we hardly see him booming forward the Ashley Cole style, his cross is not particularly good, but he is good, one of the best, in my opinion. Glitchy not at his best last season, injuries as well as defensive frailty means he can’t play his own game going forward as much as he like. Also, with the likes of Arshavin roaming the left side of the midfield, Glitchy need to cover the defensive holes left by our Russian Maestro. Unless, there’s some sort of formation of game style change, else, Glitchy will always be Glitchy, but I do see plenty of light, with the upcoming (cross finger) solid center defensive partnership, I would like to see Glitchy going forward a little bit more and let Arshavin or whoever play at the left, to drift into the middle.

Sagna is posses, good stamina, good work rate, covering spaces, good fullback, but just like Glitchy, he is suffer with additional defensive pressure due to the weak link at the back (CB & GK) last year. This year, I hope Walcott share what Beckham teach him about crossing with Sagna, and same with Glitchy, with a solid center two + goalkeeper, Sagna can get forward more.

Now, here’s the trump card, Eboue, his forward run is a joy to behold, he dribbles like Messi, once a while, he makes us fans, excited, he can play full back, as well as midfield, I see him more effective as an impact sub with his speed, energy and enthusiastic.

Kieran Gibbs and Traore, serve as the backup for Glitchy, so far, Gibbs is ahead and I am seeing Traore leaving Arsenal pretty soon. With the continuous speculation of Glitchy leaving Arsenal, with numerous parties interested (Juventus, Real Madrid), Kieran Gibbs will have no problem filling in the void.

Midfield

This is the bane of Arsenal, Cecs Fabregas, enough said, he is one of the best in the world, his vision and passing showcase what we call, an art. If he is able to temporarily forget about Barcelona, stay injuries free, ignore the media, and focus on the game then, we are a step more closer to the trophy. Alex Song, just like his Africa counterpart, he cover spaces, he enforce the midfield, he protect his defender, he can only get better with more games under his belt. Just finger cross that he stay injuries free.

We get Walcott on the right, and Arshavin on the left, both posses pace, and acceleration, Arshavin is a very gifted technical player, he twist, turn, and can strike with both his foot, from distance, with power plus accuracy. He looks lazy; hardly defend, but that just make him even more deadly, more like a silent killer, I would say, little contribution but bag, he score. Walcott, is probably the fastest sprinter (50M) in the Arsenal team, his acceleration and pace is top notch, but I doubt his brain able to access all the information on the field with equivalent speed to make a viable decision. He always seems to have problem fitting in a good cross, paper said he learned from Beckham recently, and I hope the best. He did score several goals this season, he looks sharp after the World Cup snub, I said, if he cant cross well, just make a decent shot and we pray for: 1) a goal, 2) a deflection that lead to a goal, 3) a deflection that lead to a tap in, 4) a shot that also act as a cross / pass, 5) and many many more. Walcott should be greedier and have his eye on the goal.

Then we gonna focus on our other prodigy, Jack Wilshere and Aaron Ramsey, both of them shown great talent. Ramsey suffered from a career threatening injury, and in the middle of rehab. I am sure with his determination, as well as the support from the Arsenal fans and club, he will nurse back to full match fitness pretty soon. He is certainly one for the future. In the contrast of luck, Jack Wilshere is a lucky dude, now in line to join the squad for the upcoming England call up versus Serbia. He play with determination, not the tallest or strongest midfield, he is pretty small by his size compare with his counterpart, but just look at Messi, Rooney, they shows that size really doesn’t matter, another excellent example was maradona, the player, not the manager. The back heel assist for Arshavin to score the first goal versus Partizan in CL, a game ago, suggest that, he may be more suitable in playing a more advancing role just behind the striker. Certainly he won’t be able to play as DM to enforce the midfield with his size.

What about Denilson & Diaby? Denilson and Diaby both are pretty injury prone. Diaby injured at the moment, he resembles the old Patrick Viera, with Zidane style of flair, but he is way too inconsistent, giving the ball away too often, always dribble his way into danger, and put his team under stress. He need to improve and become more mature in his game play. He do have the talent, his dribble is a joy to watch, but I am also suffering heart attack everytime I see him hold the ball for way too long. Denilson, with his Brazillian root, do not seems to offer much attacking flair to the team, nor he is replaying Gilberto Silva, he is like a squad player to me, pretty average, but still, if there’s a manager in the world who can unearth diamond among rocks, then the manager name Arsena Wenger, we’ll see how good Denilson can be, he can, because he is Brazillian.

Now, How about Nasri & Rosicky? Nasri, can be a world beater if he stay fit and find his momentum, we can all see what he can do with the opponent, he single handily create and score the 2 goals against West Brom last week, although he fail to get a third, which resulted in the first lose for Arsenal this season, he is definitely in form at the moment, much like Walcott, Nasri should be more greedy and have his eye on the goal. Rosicky is also enjoying a good run in the first team, sometime playing as starter, sometime starting from bench, he still posses those attacking instinct, even after his horror injury, and I pray for him to stay match fit and he can really be the engine / diamond, impact sub or whatever u want to call him. He haven’t really play as the same player from his day playing in the Bundesliga, now, after the rehab, he deserve the chance to allow him to claw back to fitness to prove what he can do.

Strikers

Bendtner the big dane, tall and strong, good in the air. We all recalled how he scored those vital goals for us, but he just done not enough to prove that he is those top striker with 20 goals per season, he is way too unproductive, he missed to many chances, he always shot wide, but when he do get it right, he score big. Ya, just like some of his vital goals came in the time the club need it, he score big with the Baroness, this kid got “talent”. I still recalled his interview that he forsee himself surpassing Zlatan Ibrahimovic to become the best Scandinavia player at all time, well, we will wait and see.

Carlos Vila, shown talent, he score some beatiful placing shots this season, coming on as subsitute, he is quick but still, I can’t see how this kid being effective in the Arsenal attacking formation, unless he is going to stick to the side to play as a wing. As a striker, he is not scoring enough, I hope he will get more play time this season, so he can really prove himself. I really hope to see him emerge as our own Michael Owen.

Ok, here comes our Dennis_Bergkamp, RVP, not Van damme, its Van Persie, he play with flair, he hold the line for us up front when Adebayor jump ship to Man City, he strike with his terrific left foot, and he injured way too often. Again, he is not nurturing his injuries. And I can’t wait to see him back and partner Chamakh.

M. Chamakh, typical center forward in my opinion, he scored a few goals already, mostly from headers, he lead the line perfectly, and he adapt well into the Arsenal team. As mentioned earlier, I can’t wait to see him, partnering RVP upfront, this will allow RVP to dictate the play together with Fabregas while Chamakh can be our focal point much like how Adebayor done it for us. This is definitely the bargain of the season, coming in free transfer from the Bordeaux, Moroccan international built a reputation as a strong-running, intelligent centre forward. His contribution helped them to the French title and the latter stages of the Champions League.

Manager

Last but not least, I gonna talk about the manager, Arsene Wenger, I trust his judgment tremendously, I feel pretty good with the way how the club progressing, both financially and on the pitch. Although the club suffers from trophy drought for almost 6 years, but I do admit, reaching the semi final of the champion’s league on numerous occasions is no small feat. In Arsene we trust, it’s more like a belief, I would rather believe in something I support rather than opposing it.

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Sweet but sour in my heart…

Although flower might not always be an act of love, but I always treasure the moment when I first send u the purple roses that start off one of the happiest moment in my life. Deep down, I knew, I will not send any flower to any other girls beside her, because I am just too weak to handle the emotions when I try to recall those memories…  its sweet, but it also sour to the heart…

Moko diary – 04 August 2010

Ok, I have been playing world of warcraft Cataclysm beta for the past two days. Never actually find any time to wrote about this. I have double and triple check to ensure that I’m really gotten the key and not some bad keylogger or malicious scheme to steal my account. I logged into the battle.net account. Voila, there’s the Cataclysm.

In fact, it came as a major surprise to me to get a beta key, ironically a week after I cancel my current wow subscription. If my conspiracy theory hold true, blizzard take beta key as part of the customer retentionCataclysm beta key, my nonsense advise is to cancel your subscription now, I mean, now. programme. So if u dream for a

The first trouble I have with Cataclysm is comes with installation. I downloaded the installer, and start my slow and painful downloading journey. I have to freeup 13 gig of hard disk space to commence the download and installation process. The first try didn’t went well, the installation when error at round 70++. Then i realize, i need around 30 gig in total of free space (after i read in forum), so i have to delete my beloved “porn” to free up the enormous space.

So i start download again, this time, it went smoothly and voila. Download successful. I logged into the game, only to find that, i need do patching. So, after another few more hours, i finally logged into the game. It start off by…. (To be continue)

Moko diary – 03 August 2010

On my way to work now.. It still hurt me.. Pain.. First time attempting to draft a full scale post with my blackberry phone..

Going back to office after taking off medical leave yesterday.. My table should be full of documents to sign or handle.. Not to mention, my mailbox is likely to be full..

I guess, there is no different between a celebrity and a good employee.. Both depend to the spot light, both need to act pretty much in front of the paparazi, well in the office, people are watching u too.. Is it office politics? No.. Its call showbiz.. Hollywood.. And the road to sucess in hollywood is gonna be a long one.. Let see who I wanna be.. Brat pitt? Jolie? Or myself..

Testing Blackberry update

Testing

The botanical definition of a berry is a fleshy fruit produced from a single ovary. Grapes are berries. The berry is the most common type of fleshy fruit in which the entire ovary wall ripens into an edible pericarp. They may have one or more carpels with a thin covering and fleshy interiors. The seeds are usually embedded in the flesh of the ovary. A plant that bears berries is said to be bacciferous. Many species of plants produce fruit that are similar to berries but not actually berries, and these are said to be baccate.

In everyday English, “berry” is a term for any small edible fruit. These “berries” are usually juicy, round or semi-oblong, brightly coloured, sweet or sour, and don’t have a stone or pit, although many seeds may be present. Source