Articles from this Category
2 October 2006
Above: Chinatown by night in the lead-up to the Mooncake Festival. In the evening, Jacob and Janet took us out for a drive and a wander around Chinatown. The area was very nicely illuminated and decorated with lanterns for the Mooncake or Mid-autumn Festival. Janet was very proud of how Singapore celebrates the various multi-ethnic […]
30 September 2006
It was after 2100 when I was picked up by step-dad, Lawrence, from Changi Airport. Roaming charges in Singapore are quite reasonable and I was able to ring him from inside the plane before disembarking, so that I didn’t have to wait too long. Back at Lawrence’s place, Mum had been out and was dropped […]
30 May 2006
I hate flying from west to east because it’s hard to get up in the mornings. I woke at 0700. After a momentary doze, it was 0900. There’s not much we had to do anyway, being with parents who are approaching 80 years of age. Step-dad’s relatives Jacob and Janet came to visit. Mum asked me […]
2 April 2006
I try to combine my world adventures with a visit to see family in Kuching. It was cheaper to fly from Johor Bahru across the border on a domestic flight to Kuching, rather than from Singapore’s Changi airport. Step-bro and his partner Josephine took me out for a very good dimsum breakfast at Lau Pa […]
10 December 2005
The Empire is located in Jerudong, outside the capital Bandar Seri Begawan. We took a visit into the capital today, a place we had visited before in 2001. We walked around the shops, visited the Royal Regalia museum, and from the waterfront took a water taxi to explore Kampong Ayer, the village on stilts. Brunei […]
9 December 2005
Today we largely relaxed and enjoyed the facilities of the hotel. In the evening, we went to Jerudong Park. This is an amusement park built by the Sultan in 1994 as a birthday for his subjects on his fiftieth birthday. Admission is free of charge. Not only that, the Sultan invited Michael Jackson to give […]
8 December 2005
It was five hectic days of admin (setting up electronic billing and automatic payments) and purchasing (furnishing and decoration). We were pleased with what we had achieved before leaving for our short holiday in Brunei. But we had one last important thing to do. I’ve been approached for a contract role at Vodafone, a company […]
2 December 2005
Above: Big plantain banana and a tiny banana, at a friend’s house. To get from Singapore to my hometown in Kuching, there are daily direct flights. But with high departure taxes from Singapore’s Changi Airport and a high fare, it was much cheaper to cross the border to Johor Bahru in Malaysia, and then fly […]
14 September 2005
I had only one important task to do today. That was to go to the New Zealand High Commission at Ngee Ann City to transfer my returning resident’s visa from my old passport to my new one. I was also able to vote for the New Zealand election by doing a special vote. With that […]
13 September 2005
After a ten night stay in my hometown, Kuching, I said goodbye to my family. It had been a busy stay attending to things like renewing my passport; researching and opening a bank account. Without internet at the house, it was a chore to have to drive to an internet cafe every few days to […]