Domain of WH

611. Seng's B'day

This year Seng organized a b'day bbq @ home. It was a rather quiet affair. Then on the actual day itself, we had a nice family dinner @ Jurin and later cake cutting back home.

Seng's b'day bbq & after family dinner

Went around Penang with Mei Yi and her S'porean friends. They stayed at a back packer's place called Hutton Lodge. I never knew the place existed. Apparently it's very well known and highly recommended. Some of the stops inlcuded The Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion, Ferry, Line Clear Nasi Kandar, Sup Hameed, Monkey Beach (and also discovering there's a lighthouse there) and also the Wesak Day processions (where surprisingly I ran into Louisa & Juliana). In the midst of all that activity, I actually managed to find time to (finally) repair my PC @ home which has been out of commission for almost 6 mths.......maybe even longer (can't recall exactly when it died).

Hutton Lodge


Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion



Monkey Beach & the hike up to the Muka Head Ligthhouse


Louisa & Juliana at the Wesak Day Processions


Finally, it's alive!

It's one of those days where you think it's gonna be just another day, and then you hear an explosion nearby......and abruptly the power supply stops. Everything is silent. I ran outside and search frantically for the source, then, another explosion. Turns out that the TNB substation next door exploded. After calling the fire dept (naturally), I whipped out my 850IS and fired away. Then within a couple of minutes, the TNB staff arrived and accessed the situation. I suspect it's a big problem when they jumped back into their jeep and sped away, I mean sped away, wheelspin and all. So much for the experts. 15mins later the Fire engines arrived. They quickly spring into action and hose down the bloody substation. I'm no expert, but I thought you're suppose to use dry powder for electrical fires......especially since it's a bloody power sub-station & the risk of getting electrocuted is high. Anyway, they're the experts and they're the ones at risk. Surely they know better. I was wondering why the chief was standing wayyyy over by the fire engine. Maybe he needed to man the fire engine, maybe he needed to operate the radio from there.....or maybe, just maybe, he knew better.

Luckily no one was hurt and soon it was back to normal. Some curious idiots actually walk into the substation to see what was burnt (including this pregnant lady, hope the burning smoke and toxic fumes didn't get to the baby), some grumbled they're gonna be screwed becoz of the power outage, some complained that their new neighbor with over 10 C&C machines caused the outage, bla bla bla. Humans. :) As soon as the danger is over, they'll find something else to fill their time. Surprisingly they managed to bring in a mobile generator and got the power up and running just hours later. Not bad.

The fire; How come the fire chief is standing wayyy over here? Electrical fire & water? Hmmmmm

The fire engine that could; The rear of the engine, never knew it leaks so much water

The team from fire investigation unit; The mobile generator that was used to power the entire block

Was in Toys "R" Us in Gurney Plaza when I spotted poor Elmo in chains. How ironic. :) I wonder what's he laughing about.

After weeks of postponing, we finally went on a family trip to Cameron Highlands. The drive up and traffic at Camerons was hell! I've never seen so many cars in Camerons before. Must be due to the school holidays. Traffic was crawling downtown. So I basically spent most of my time at the bungalow and reading. The stay there was actually quite pleasant. Coming back down was another ordeal. We did make a stop halfway down at a tiny restaurant. It didn't seem like much, but the food there was good. A special mention is the cat fish head that we had. That was really nice. At first regreted going because was stuck in the jam and all, but in retrospec, I'm glad I went. The time spent with mom and all was definitely priceless.

After reaching Penang, rushed over to KB for Nicholas' son's birthday party. It's been a long time since everyone gathered together. It was good to catch up there.

Strawberries

Strawberry plant; Having steamboat @ Downtown Cafe

The bungalow we stayed in

@ the Cameron Bharat tea plantation; my nieces plucking strawberries

The cat fish, I never knew they had so many rows of teeth

What the fish looks like