Good Bye Penang and Moving Along the Dotted lines

I've been home for 4 and a half months. Indeed, never had I expected that it would be the most eventful 4 months of my life.

Yet, it is undeniably weird to say good bye to Penang after being away for so long. Was I in denial? Gosh, I'd be lying if I didn't admit that I missed Penang terribly. The friends, the food, the favorite spots and places, the traffic, the shopping, the air, the insanely early morning Dim-sum, the church, the adventist hospital, Desa U, N-Park, USM, the ferry, the bridge, campus life, the beaches, pulau jerejak, working at Dell, roti jon, Maggie goreng, roti tiga rasa, taking 2 hr bus rides everyday for 4 months to teach rich kids english, falling in and out of love and then in again, teaching Sadat how to swim, cheap juice in USM, bloody expensive fruit juices elsewhere, involved in an accident for the first time, learning to like Jazz music, going all the way to Jerejak just to ride a bike, the talks with jon, standing under the artificial waterfall in Desa U when I'm sad and stressed, cell group, shooting weddings, PKA..... I can go on, believe me I can.
The Lord is good. Sure it wasn't perfect, but life was full, absolutely full indeed. I am forever indebted to the friends and acquaintances that came and went at any one point of my life while i was there. The island itself was the most amazing 'playground' i'll ever be in. No wonder, no wonder some decide to live and die there. The beautiful hills, beaches and walks in town, gives you no choice but to remember the impressions and feelings that you had just by being there. Sadly, there were moments too when I saw development took a toll on what used to be natural and beautiful. I was reminded of my childhood and seeing the favorite tree i used to climb being cut down and seeing the pond I used to catch the prettiest fishes pumped dry and how much it hurts. I do hope that Penangites will know when to say enough is enough, before it turns into a large piece of concrete in the sea.
Thank you Penang for being that home away from home. I am what I am today because of what you are.

Hello Kuching.... now where is that post office again?

Going really WIDE

Okay, why I'm going to Miss Penang is that there's not many places in Malaysia that when you buy a new gear for your camera or perhaps a new camera itself, where you get out of the camera shop and Tadda!!, you're smack in the middle of a place where there's so many things to shoot! So I took it for a nice Urban Shooting session and found some really nice spots in Penang street.

That's exactly what I did. Went to the Shop, got out of it VERY poor but happy and shutter-friendly. I bought myself the Sigma 10-20mm F4.0-5.6 EX DC HSM. I got a sharp copy and absolutely happy with it. You know, there's just no wider lens in the Nikkor line up except for the fisheye of course. The Nikkor 12-24 costs about 2.5 times more, not as wide, so go figure.


Stay tuned for more blogs this year guys.

Images from Chirstmas Eve and Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

2008 was truly a year of change, and I have no doubt that 2009 will bring life changing experiences to a whole new level! Anyway, I had the chance to return to my hometown, Kuching on Christmas eve and celebrated Chrismas, then returned to Penang on the 26th, and in another twist, went back to Kuching on the 31st dec for My cousin's Wedding. Here's a compilation of images taken on my trip back. I bought a Nikkor 50mm f1.4 Ai-S lens and from what you'll see, is light years away from the f1.8 version. Christmas is also the anniversary of my photography! I started taking pics when I was 12, But I got my first film SLR on Christmas 2000. Things have truly changed hasn't it?

Condolences to Pr Lawrence and Family

Yesterday was a painful day to endure for Pr Lawrence, Aunt Nelly, Larry and Lorna and many of us who knew his son. Pr Lawrence is the pastor who baptized me back in 97. He lost his eldest son, Lownell to cancer. He was one of the youths that we grew up with at church. I was not personally close to him in any way but, we sang together in a choir quite a number of times. Our last conversation was at a burger stall, near his family's apartment, waiting for our orders, strangely, that simple meet was so strong in my mind. I'm 26 yrs old, and still incapable of rationalizing, describing or simply perceiving death. It simply felt awful. I was there to attend the funeral at church and spent the previous 2 nights before for the wake service. During the funeral service, his family and friends said their final good-byes. What truly hit all of us that day, was when his friend, also a patient in the same ward where he spend much of his days came up and spoke. He was steady, calm, eloquent, simply nothing even close to the stereotype that we've all imagined a cancer patient would appear to be. He describe briskly about their days together doing Chemo, the countless blood testing and hoping all that will be over and that they can live that normal life they used to know. He then questioned why he was let to live and not Lownell, not knowing the answer. He then defended that he was not asking for simpathy on the late Lownell's behalf, instead to be an encouragement for the rest of us who are living this difficult journey of life, to be right with God and truly bless every waking days we are alive. For we know very little if it is our last. At the end of the speech, I now understood in a very new and powerful conviction, what a fighter he was. I was told that he was the only surviving person in the ward he, Lownell and the rest of their late friends were in. At that moment, I was reminded of what death is. In fact, I was reminded of being a believer, a Christian, and why I became one. It was hope. Hope that out of all the beautiful joy and sickening nonsenses I've gone through being alive would be worth it, and when I die it aint too bad coz there really is something to look for to. Why? Death without the assurance from Jesus is truly the hopeless end that we are tying to distract ourselves from, through endless materialism and entertainment. Good bye Lownel, rest in peace.

Eye opener

I've reached the end of my 7 days off, which came with my night shift prior to that. Back in Penang and absolutely not it the mood to work later.

I was in Kuching from the 29th to the 2nd. I was actually scheduled to be in Miri, but my sis and I was informed that my grand dad was gravely ill. I was told to provide pictures of him to prepare for the obituary.

Upon arriving in Kuching, we hurried to the hospital and found out, gladly, that his condition improved. Apparently my aunts and uncles called up some church member and their catholic priests to come over to pray for him. He was able to sleep and eat with the least of difficulties.

I knew that he was all right after the prayer thingy, but what I didn't know was what happened during the session. Apparently my grand father was not able to sleep. He was there due to a weak heart, something congenital that he only knew few yrs ago. My aunts noticed that he kept getting up fully awake and asking some people to go away, but obviously no one was there la. He pointed at them and asked them not to stand near the bed and to ask them to stop disturbing him as he was sick. He kept naming people/ friends that were already, well, dead. Even the dude that just died in the hospital. So things got spooky, and my aunt did the thing that scared people do, to call the priests.

They managed to "shoo" them away somehow. I mean, I grand father somehow slept better and had this huge sigh of relief. I mean he's not senile elderly and all that, U can't pin point that he was 'nyanyuk' and all. Well, maybe it was due to his sickness that he was at his weakest point, that his brain matter got so messed up that he started to see things. Speak to any nurses out there and they can tell u that the dying normally starts to see and hear things.

Well, other than that, my own eyes were opened too. My grand ma was the 24x7 with him by his side. She's not too healthy herself but she was there, sitting on a plastic chair beside him, just watching over him and talking to him whenever she can. Her eyes glowed whenever anyone of the kids and grand kids came. This has been happening for almost a month. Love they call it. If I had to lose everything and have only one thing to keep, I'd say I want my family and love itself. I thank God that I witness things such as these in my life time. My eyes were opened, not at the LCD screen every 9hrs in a day, but to act of love and what it does to our life and of course, death.

Picture of Youth

Kids. They're always in their own sweet world. Where ever I go, I'll never miss the chance of capturing their moments. Childhood reminds many of us of discovery, innocence and most of all, the meaning of simple joy. I've compiled some photos of kids, most of them candidly taken. As a comparison and a reminder, send over your childhood pics and I'll post it in another blog. I'll start with mine. in the meantime have a look at the kids in this collection. Cheers.

Fung Fung's Wedding

Nothing to say for today, but would like to display some pics taken a week ago. What do you guys think? More to come..