A Galleon & Yachts

Hmmm. . lots of pretty sailboats, yachts and a galleon???




D'ya love boats? I do! Come back for more of them. . later.
See ya.

ps : eerr. . .you don't have to come back later. you can view right now _ right  here  :)

Elephants

Wtfuss? At Singapore Changi Airport, a photo with a replica of an elephant commenced a couple of my mini encounters with the real ones. What the fuss about elephant???
Me defensive of my naiveness : Coming from my country where elephants are considered endangered species if not already extinct. I mean_ relatively speaking. I heard we don't even have elephants anymore in our national zoo ( which was the only place where I  representing my generation was able to see them ). I pity our little children. They have to be brought out of the country just to see these beautiful creatures.
Holy elephant!! I'm not even talking about dinosaurs!!! I know right! haha.

Anyway, the next morning I woke-up in a beach resort in Indonesia with these giants playing at my back. Alright_  sure they were not real too! haha.

So I walked around and found an elephant park in the resort. Yes, the real ones!

I would have been ok-ed already with  a photo standing beside one. .




But the man said : no, you have to hold the tusk, horn? whatever!
So that's the story behind this photo of me looking silly while not even holding but touching the white thingy of this kind heart giant.

Now, I needed to experience riding one right? But for a first timer like me ( who doesn't even frequent a simple horse riding ) I thought adult huge elephant was freakin' high for a possible fall! haha. Coward me! haha.

Swiss Club

I was sitting by the side. .

. . of this huge pool, so big I couldn't grab the whole of it by just one shot. So this is the center. .

this is the left side, facing it. .

and the right side. Ah, maybe not exceptionally big, but I think it's relatively huge cos it's in a private club.

The water was so inviting and I decided to take a plunge. ( no panic*, had my swimsuit beneath my shirt :)



But before I could do that, the rain poured in. Now I didn't want to get wet! haha. Nah, it was that the water turned so cold cos of the rain.

So I joined back to our table to savor these scrumptious dishes (later you go and visit my food blog for them) .

We were at the super exclusive Swiss Club in Singapore. My ticket to there was ofcourse my Swiss girlfriend. It's tucked away inside a Swiss village and needless to say for members only, and their guest : me? haha. There's that big lap pool, a gym and other fitness and health facilities. I saw right beside the pool a walk through to a mini forest garden.

When the rain stopped, we walked around and my friend's daughters invited me to take a look of their school.

So their school is in the same vicinity.

Take notice of the school logo - looks so familiar right? Looks like the Red Cross. If you're keen about the flags, Switzerland's flag is exactly that white cross on a red cross. Red Cross, the organization that's all over the world to help humanity, actually had originated from this awesome country of the Swiss.

Inside the campus, I noticed how the single - floored buildings were built to blend well with the nature.

For instance, this particular giant tree stands in the center, circled by school buildings. The girls shared to me that this tree has been there ( as small as them when they were in pre-school) ever since they started their school here.

The Swiss red dominates the entire school as well as white. .


which both compliment well the greens surrounding the school.

Apart from the awesome physical property of this school , just by merely talking to my friend's daughters (  a walking product of this school), I could sense the high standard of this Swiss School. The girls are smart and trilingual (they speak English, Swiss and German).
One of the perks of being an expat in one of the most modern cities in Asia. haaay. . wish,wish,wish*

North Bintan Tour (part 2)

Remember my little Indonesia trip? Lemme continue boring you with a Part 2 :)) That is if you're like me who hails from almost the same environment, being that my own country is in the same continent (Asia) and this North Bintan Tour package actually has reminded me so much of my own province.. . if  you could relate _ well, I'm warning you : this post could be one boring ride. On the contrary, if you're coming from a tiring city life, this may refresh you and if you're one nature lover _so why not? Go green!

Our second stop was a local beach - Sebong Pereh. Quite like one of our coves in my country. Zero crowd, totally non-commercialized_ which is pure love.




Prestine sea, neat creamy sand beach. In another time, I would love to beach around in this cove. But not that day  cos we didn't have time other than take a photo or two.




I went back to our package itinerary  and now I realized our guide didn't bring us to a *small Malay fishing village*, or maybe this beach was also the fishing village?? One thing thu', I didn't remember seeing a fishing boat here. . .

. .or just slipped from  my memory, cos I found this photo from my brother's personal collection of the place. Oh, I'm not really sure if this one belonged here. Whatever! haha. 

On our way to our third stop, signs on the road in local language were quite interesting. Thanks for the English translations.

Our third stop brought us to a farm. All the works - rice paddy, tiny fish pond, et., etc.. . and coconut trees!! Omg! I slept half of the ride to this place and woke-up wondering if  I were home! So much like my province in my country.

Sungka to us. I remember asking the guide how do they call this. . my memory gap works so well, I can't remember now, haha.

Just one look and I knew so well what's going on in this place. I almost suggested to my company to skip this one and went on to the next stop. Just almost but did not!

First of all we paid for this and secondly, the in- house guide was so enthusiastic to show us around even though his English was better pronounced in sign  language. His sincere smile was enough thu'. So out of politeness, we play along, just like real tourists with wide-open eyes.  

Under this wooden bridge, the guide said : fish! We took a look and saw tiny, tiny fishes, haha. What's this a joke? haha. But the guide was so kind so we replied : nice!

We went on tagging along behind our gentleman farm guide under the scorching heat of Indonesian sun.




Until, I had to cut this small rice paddy tour, really for real! At this point the guide was already on foot the muddy part of the paddy. Hey!! could we stop here? already?

We politely said goodbye to our guide and he smiled so sincerely backed to us. I guess we understood each other then, haha.

We were served freshly harvested coconuts from the trees around the farm. So sweet.

So there, the part two. Later, I'll share the rest of the tour ( we also visited Chinese temples and a local town). I'll see you in my next post, okey:D