Around Us

Snapped outside my rented house in Seremban.

A friend of my sister's called me recently to ask regarding nutrition for his terminally ill father. The conversation goes...

Him: Doc said my dad is in late stage of liver cancer. His tummy is bloated. Testicles swollen. He is yellow! But we are still hopeful that he can get better!
Me: I'm so sorry to hear that... well...
Him: Actually I called to ask if he can eat prawns, beef, chicken, fish (etc. etc.). I'm concerned that these food might nourish the cancerous cells, making his condition worse!
Me: If he has the appetite, shouldn't be any problem. No food restriction unless specified by the doctor.
Him: Yeah, that's what I thought too! The normal cells also need to eat right?!
Me: (know still ask!) Yep, that's right!
Him: What bout soup or beverages? Anything that is poisonous to his body, considering he has liver cancer now?
Me: Err... anything should be okay... (provided you don't feed him alcohol).
Him: Anything we can do?
Me: Make him feel comfortable, ease his pain and let him eat whatever he wishes. You can actually check out the hospice in Cheras that deal with palliative care.
Him: Palliative?
Me: Oh, it's a place that make patients like your dad cope better with his illness.
Him: Oh...

And I later found out from my sis that his dad passed away a few weeks after our conversation. I hope I'd given him the correct advice.

Actually, all I wanted to say was that I didn't know the tree outside my porch could look that nice. Till I turned the porch light on last nite. It's always been there, for the past 2 years, and none of us had noticed it!

Carnivale @ 1Utama

This photo was captured at the 1Utama new wing. 1Utama was having a carnival-like event to promote their new loyalty card, called the OneCard. Colourful isn't it?

26.05.2007 @ 2125hrs by T30.

Merdeka Eve

It was Merdeka Eve and after dinner at my Ampang home, we left for my Cheras house. We decided to use the Hulu Langat route to avoid traffic jams in the city due to Merdeka Countdown.

The first few kilometres of Hulu Langat from Ampang is known as "little-Genting" or "love haunts" for youngsters and old-folks alike. The view from here is magnificent, but we don't normally stop by as it is dark and infamous with folkloristic tales of rapes and robberies.

We however made a brief stop as there were many cars and makeshift mamak stalls along the little-Genting stretch. Realising the majority of people there were Indons, Banglas and Pakistanis, we decided to head home...

A few turnings ahead, there was this Tourist's Look-out Point which we had never bothered to stop for in the past. Rach suggested we stop and enjoy the night view.

There were already loads of people when we reached the "summit" of the look-out point. Expensive beverages and "Merdeka Buffet" were served. There was also a "ge-tai" (stage for karaoke) up there. It was sort of happening. I didn't bring along my tripod and these photos here are taken purely by my professional, talented, and surgeon-precision hands:

>> All photos are clickable for a larger view! <<

This picture here is taken with 3X optical zoom. An idea of how far KLCC is from the Hulu Langat Lookout Point.

This was the nearest my Sony T30 could zoom-in with the maximum 7.2 megapixel set. Lowering the resolution to 5.0 megapixel saw the distance shortened by God-knows-how-many-kilometres:

I was mesmerised by the view, and also by my inborn professional photo-taking skills. I started to play around with the camera settings...

... and the skyline turned into a golden hue. Cool! Rach was starting to get bored while I kept snapping more and more photos. As usual, when I'm into something, I din give too much of a shit about things around me. Haha.

We decided to wait for the Merdeka fireworks.

12.00am sharp. No signs of fireworks. Puki we were conned!

KLCC's fireworks were the largest and most conspicuous from the lookout point, but it was also the last - after Bukit Bintang, Dataran Merdeka, and other small-time fireworks from some KL housing areas.

And the one here below is my best piece of firework shit. It spirals up! Wuaaa...

I didn't get to enjoy the fireworks as I was consuming too much energy stabilising my arms. I'm glad to know that I'm a prodigy photographer. Muah, ha, ha, haha.