In The Land of Cik Siti Wan Kembang

Spending the weekend in Kota Bharu, Kelantan. It's the monsoon season, so I expect less of the sun (which I haven't seen since I got here) and a lot of rain. On our way here, I saw some places under a few feet of water, but I do hope that it doesn't get worse than it is despite advance warnings of floods from the authorities.

We left PJ at 9pm exactly, with my dad driving first. He wanted to give driving a go while he was fresh and see how far it took him. We switched in Raub, so he went quite a distance before he couldn't continue. Not that he slept a wink when I drove after that, I think he felt obligated to keep me awake all the way thru KB. There wasn't that many cars as I would have expected, since 1. we drove at night and 2. it's the monsoon season, so I doubt people would want to come over here despite the holiday season. There was however, quite a number of lorries on the road, and that was what kept me awake: trying to overtake them lorries one at a time. It was fun though, since there's not that many cars on the road, so the road was quite clear. The lorry drivers were helpful in assisting safe overtaking, when they see the road ahead is clear and safe to overtake, they turn on the left hand signal to indicate that it's safe to overtake them.

We reached KB safely by 3.45am, although I think it would have been earlier if I hadn't taken off my foot of the gas and slowed down considerably towards the end of the journey. We weren't in a rush anyway.

Anyway, the house needed some repairs, and that's why my dad wants to come back here regularly. He's been coming back here every month or so to keep an eye on the house and do the repairs. Hopefully this would become a regular thing for us, this house brings back a lot of memories for us as a family. I missed living here, and I hope I can come back and settle down here in the future.

Okay, let's hope the rain doesn't get any heavier than it is, because I do have some plans to go around town and take pictures.

Till next time...!

At the movies - 2012

What was supposed to be a time away from work related headaches turned out to be a big group gathering. And it all turned out like that because of the simple reason being that neither of us could get a ticket for the movie. And hence the search was expanded, and in the end we ended up watching the movie 2012 at the Alamanda Putrajaya.

As I received/heard mixed reviews on this movie, I went in without any expectations whatsoever. My main focus was to enjoy the night out with the gang and especially just immerse myself in the fun activity that we call "movie watching experience". Popcorns, ice lemon tea, a cold and dark theatre, and you almost have everything in hand.

Unfortunately, the naysayers won the day that night. The movie was way below what was expected or a disaster movie, much less a Hollywood movie with a big budget. And this is coming from me, who has no expectations whatsoever of the movie (!) There was plenty of plot holes that I could list down, but since this is a big budgeted Hollywood movie, that is expected.

But I was more disappointed with John Cusack's performance in the movie, he seems almost lazy throughout and did not come out as believable as the reluctant hero-cum-doting father-cum-ex husband still in love with ex wife guy. In short his performance in the movie was below par as what is usually expected of him.

The other actors fare worse, although Woody Harrelson almost (almost...) saved the movie with his antics. He looked like he was having fun in an otherwise drab movie and I just wished he was on screen longer. At least that might have stifle more yawns out of me.

The action sequences were interrupted with scenes about family bonding, more so about the father and son relationship. One or two characters is okay, but all the main characters have that type of scenes, playing over and over again throughout the movie, interrupting what should have been a good action sequences put together. Well, when you think about it, the trailer is wayyyy better than the movie. The action sequences never stopped in the trailer. The guy that did the trailer must be applauded.

Then there's this whole end of the world thing. Gosh, I think we just got duped. I really thought that it's gonna be the movie that give us something to think about for our future, but it looks as if the movie makers just wimped out towards the end of the movie and decided not to destroy the world. After building up all that "world is going to end" crap and "we told you it's coming" sh*t in the previews, marketing and adverts, the movie just fell flat on the face. And at the end of the movie I really wish they would have done a better finale.

But, the graphics are good. I really applaud the Hollywood film makers for this. the graphics just blew me away...That's about all that's good in the movie.

The box office performance is quite good, so I doubt the film makers will care what the film critics or anyone who came out of the movie not liking the movie will say. I heard that they're developing a tv series based on the survivors' stories. And they would recoup back the millions that was invested in the movie. I just wish I could get back my RM10 from the cinema for a very poor movie...

Now, let's go back to YouTube to check out the trailer again...it's even more fun...:)

My flickr's most popular upload

Che Yu | Photo Outing, originally uploaded by W.K.Azlan.

At the moment this picture has generated 40 views...the highest number so far among my uploads...very popular apparently among the flickr browsers... :)

It's true what Din Arshad said during the fotoInspirasi seminar I went to earlier this year: "pretty girls sell pictures"... ;)

Thanx Che Yu...:)

Islamic Monument | Replica

Islamic Monument | Replica, originally uploaded by W.K.Azlan.

How do you travel around the world in 3 hours?

Try visiting the Taman Tamaddun Islam in Terengganu to see 21 Islamic Monuments around the world.:)

Since I haven't gotten around to my dream of travelling around the world just yet, this is as close as it can be for now. The replicas of the monuments really took my breath away (literally that is, the park is quite huge and it was a hot day when I went there). Some of the monument replicas houses theaters which showcases some historical artifacts and videos showing history of the buildings.

I've uploaded pictures that I took of some of the monuments, so come on down to my flickr and savour the beautiful captures that I took (IMHO that is...haha)

Sun Hunt 2009

Just a little jot on the biggest hunt event of the year as I take a break from doing my appraisals today.

Just would like to say congratulations to our Macam2 Adaaaa team for a good job this year. We finished at 22nd place, winning ourselves a Samsung MP4 player worth RM299 each....Ok la, berbaloi gak...although we did miss out on our target: the flat screen tv...the mp4 also has a flat screen to watch videos, albeit on a much much smaller scale...hahahaha...

Overall, we had fun in the hunt...and that's what we aimed for in every hunt. No use going to lots of treasure hunts but did not enjoy ourselves, right? And this is the biggest event of the year...rugi kalau x enjoy.

A lil bit on the hunt itself: I think TOS made a marked improvement this year in terms of dispersing the teams throughout the hunt sectors. There were 270 plus teams (?) in the open category, so it was quite a challenge to handle all of us. But they did good, where they break us off into 2 sectors in leg 1 at the beginning of the hunt itself. We improved a little bit on time management, but still lost out some time due to a couple of wrong turns and the traffic. Oh, and don't forget the famous M2A4 moment at the beginning of each hunt: D'uh...? What was question 1 again? hehehe...took awhile for us to start our brains in the hunt...

Hope we will do better next year, and the hunts to come. There's a lot of encouragements from the regular hunters and some of the masters out there, we would like to express our thanks for them for believing in us. We are steadily (but slowly) improving ourselves in each hunt.

In 2007, we finished 88th; in 2008, we finished 42nd and this year we finished 22nd place...what does 2010 holds for us, I wonder? *winks*

For the full results of the hunt, check Michael Pang's blog here. Congratulations to all the winners!

Oh, and if the F1 1Malaysia team is still looking for a driver for their team, drop me an email and I'll give you the contact details for Aini Fazlin (this woman can drive fast!)...the car seat still has marks of Farid's fingers from him gripping the seats so hard(!)...hahahaha...

On to the next hunt!