Goodbye Mom

Leaving a small tribute here in the memory of my step-mom, my Ah Ee, my mother for 28 years of my life, who went back to be with the Lord on the 9th of June…

You came, you left, you leave behind a sea of sadness, but so much memories of hope & joy.
As sudden as you came into our lives, more sudden it was when you went away.
You are now with the Lord. May you now have the peace that you desired & so deserve.
Your world now is the world of eternal comfort and peace and everything nice.
RIP Mom, till we meet again someday…

Mom left us suddenly on the night of the 9th of June, 2016. She had Stage-4 lung cancer, but it wasn’t exactly cancer that took her away from us. I don’t know the exact cause, but I suspect it to be a combination of diabetes and the potent side effects of the cancer drug that she was taking.

On Thursday, 9th June, morning I received a whatsapp message from Dad saying that they had admitted mom into the ICU of the local specialist centre in Butterworth. She was breathless, and her blood pressure had risen to 214. Her blood sugar was also high.

By the afternoon, everything had stabilized, and her chest x-ray actually showed that the cancer in her lungs had abated!! Ultrasound results were also good! A while later, another message came saying that mom’s kidneys aren’t working and that a dialysis would have to be done. About an hour later, I saw a lot of missed calls on my phone (was charging the phone on the laptop), and finally the whatsapp message bearing the bad news.

Only the doctors were with her at that time. Dad, sis Hazel and Su the maid had momentarily left the hospital, having been told to return in 4 hours’ time as dialysis would have taken that much time. They went for dinner, and had just reached home when they received a call from the hospital. This was after only about an hour from when they left the hospital. By the time they got back to the hospital, mom was gone. Doctor said her heart failed. It was that sudden. Nothing of what anyone expected. Only 2 months back, mom was looking fine. We watched a movie together (Zootopia) and even had dinner in Penang. Still can’t believe that she’s gone, so soon.


Our last outing with mom, Penang, April 2016

Thanks Mom, for coming into our lives. For accepting us as your children. For accepting our family as your family, our children as your grandchildren. Thank you for accepting our father, a widower with 3 children as your husband. For loving him, helping him, and taking care of him so thoroughly. Thank you for giving us a sister, and nurturing her to be the wonderful person she is now. Thank you for the discreet acts of love that you showered onto us, never talking about it nor asking even once for recognition. Without you we would not have done many things, might never have had the chance to further our studies overseas. You gave us that valuable gift.

I’m sorry not to have known you better. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to return the kindness you’d given us. You are a deeply misunderstood person. To some, you are proud and unfriendly, unsmiling and insensitive. But they’ve not seen your jovial side, nor your kind side. They’ve not known the things you’ve done, always done subtly, without fanfare. To me, your actions speak louder than words, and I thank you for everything that you’ve done for us.

Maybe it was a blessing in disguise, maybe God did answer our prayers and took you home, without letting you suffer the deadly effects of cancer. One last time, Mom, goodbye.

Here are some photos of the wake and funeral for remembrance's sake…






Mom’s last time in her beloved Butterworth House


Makeshift kitchen & tents – One good thing about Malaysia, you can close up the road and use part of the park for a function like this, without needing a permit. Just an understanding from the neighbours is all that’s needed. (We blocked 5 houses’ entrances for 3 days). Thank God for giving us such understanding and accommodating neighbours. If all Malaysians can be like this, it’d be paradise


The church service at our home…


Bidding our last farewell to Mom




At the crematorium, with Pastor Bernard on the right

Family and friends have been a pillar of strength for us throughout the few days of mourning. Thanks everyone for your kind wishes and support… Here’re some photos of family we seldom see.


Family of my cousin sister, Ah Yee (she’s my natural mother’s brother’s daughter), taking a photo with Stacey, Jason’s daughter (left)


Tua-Kor (Big Aunt), with cousin brother Kok Seng, and wife


Tua-Kor’s other son, Kok Leong, and family


Dad’s younger brother, Seihan-Chik and Seihan-Chim from Singapore


Mom’s elder brother (right), and elder sister and her husband (left)


In laughter and in tears – mom’s former long-time maid, Nanik (left), and Sukate (Su), her current temporary maid


In happier times – a family picture outside our Butterworth House, Jan 2015

Three Years in International City

England Cluster, International City, Dubai – a view from our window

Today is exactly 3 years since I returned to Dubai in 2013. I’ve made much progress since. I’m 3 years older. I have another son now, and he’s 1.5 years old already. My eyesight is getting better …at blurring out things which are too near my face. (I now have to hold my mobile phone at arm’s length to read what’s written on the friggin screen. …Maybe I’ll get a selfie-stick …to help me see better.) I have maintained the same weight and waistline (happy). I have maintained the same position and salary (unhappy). I still have hair and genuine teeth. I still remember birthdays and forget where I put the friggin pen, towel, phone, car keys, rings, watch, etc #@*#! My wife says I’m too serious now (my ex-boss should see me now, he who complaint that I was too childish before). And I’ve got a car now in Dubai, and paying off the loan on our own apartment!

Which reminds me …last month was our first anniversary of shifting into our own apartment!! So it should be a celebration of sorts eh? Well, here’re some pictures of the area we stay in, International City a.k.a. 龙城 (Lóng Chéng, or Dragon City in Chinese).

The development of International City started with the building of Dragon Mart, a huge mall filled with Chinese shops and goods, the largest China-product mall outside China! (Well, that’s what the developer of the mall claimed in their web-site!) With Dragon Mart came a residential area called China City (which was later renamed China Cluster and the area expanded to become International City, with other country-themed clusters added like England Cluster, Russia Cluster, Persia Cluster, etc. 10 different-themed clusters in total).

This place is now something like a Chinatown of Dubai. This is where most of the Chinese community in Dubai still stays in and is where you’ll find Chinese supermarkets, restaurants, etc. The Chinese still call it Dragon City, 龙城 (Lóng Chéng). (…Chinese somehow aren’t very good with names, especially non-Chinese names, they’d prefer numbers to names anytime!)

International City looks like a friggin Persian rug on the map. (Don’t believe me, check it out on Google Maps!) The town-planner/ designer (whatever you call it) must have just copied his favourite design from his fabric pattern book, and pasted it onto the map. And Voila! International City. It looks really interesting from the air, but it’s even more interesting on the ground. Fancy driving around flowery roundabouts, and getting confusingly lost? Come to International City! (But watch out for the hundreds of crossroads. They’re blind junctions waiting for accidents to happen. I know because I stayed right beside a crossroad for 2 years and the sounds of a screech followed by a bang became so normal, that we didn’t bother checking outside anymore).

And that’s about the long and short of International City, Dubai


Our old apartment block, V23, Russia Cluster, International City




Posing with the flowers outside our old home, at Russia Cluster


Justin, Russia Cluster, near our neighbourhood supermarket, E-City (everyone in the supermarket knows Justin by name. Who wouldn’t? With him running all over the place, and us having to shout at him to behave, or to find where he is)


Justin and his ‘toy shop’, Russia Cluster home – his only customer was his papa


Mommy and the cow kids, Russia Cluster


Doesn't look like Dubai huh? But it is! Justin and his didi (sister) at the car park of our old Russia Cluster apartment block, fully grown with reeds. Anu likes the reeds! Says it adds greenery to the place!?!


Finally, reeds all cleared! Providing a better view of the adjoining England Cluster


Spain (straight ahead) and Italy (on the right) Clusters near our family clinic, the local clinic that we frequent


Italy Cluster, International City




France Cluster, near Lulu Express, one of the larger community supermarkets in the area




Justin at the car park of our England Cluster home, Block Z-03


Family picture, England Cluster, International City, Dubai

Oh, and there’s some exciting family news from the other side of the world! My sister, Kim gave birth to a healthy baby girl last Saturday, 28th May, in Auckland, New Zealand. Yippee! Now, we have a new baby in the family, Sophia Skye (...unless the parents have a change of mind again, that is).

Temple of the Sacred Tooth

Kandy Lake, and the Temple of the Tooth Relic (the pitched roof buildings at the back), Sri Lanka

I love festivals. Religious festivals or whatever. It gives me a reason to celebrate, and I don’t have to crack my mind for ideas on what to write about in the blog, hehe!

It’s Wesak Day! (OK, it WAS Wesak Day …when I started writing, ahem). Wesak (or Vesak) is a day commemorating the birth, enlightenment and death of Lord Buddha (…I wiki’ed it, OK?) In India, it’s called Buddha Purnima. I dunno what people do on Wesak Day, I just remember that every year in Malaysia, I’ll get a day off from school, (which is always good news for a student, …especially a lazy student, …like me). I guess devout Buddhists will pray at temples, and that’s about it.

And since it is (was) Wesak, here’re some pictures of a famous Buddhist temple in Sri Lanka, the Temple of the Tooth Relic. If you’re god, even your teeth are sacred.

And if I’m god, I’ll give my cracked tooth and half-decayed teeth to the followers I like least, and save the best teeth for my favourite disciples. And I’ll still have a whole load of other bodily parts and personal items to bestow! I’ll probably make a catalogue of my body parts and personal items, listing them according to how valuable I think they are, and who they’d be given to. I’d probably give 1MDB (and its bosses) a piece of my poo. It’d be called holy shit! …Maybe that’s why I’ll never be god.

Enough of that nonsense! Here’re photos of the temple.




Temple of the Tooth Relic, Kandy, Sri Lanka – the last time I visited in 2004, the place was teeming with soldiers carrying machine-guns!


Temple of the Tooth, first floor – lotus flowers placed outside the tooth relic chamber – that’s probably the closest you will get to seeing the actual holy tooth. I heard that it’s quite rare that people are allowed to see it, and… nope, I dunno when we can do that. Besides, it’ll probably look like any other tooth except that it’s really ancient, and holy, and placed in the nicest of containers, or whatever they use to keep a tooth




Views of the Tooth Relic Chamber – this holy temple lies in the compound of the royal palace of Kandy. (Yup, Sri Lanka used to have kings. Then the British came and did what they did best i.e. friggin conquered the country.) Another view can be seen in this post. Note: DO NOT TAKE A PHOTO OF THIS CHAMBER BY POSING IN FRONT OF IT, WITH YOUR BACKS FACING THE BUILDING, or …that’ll probably be the last you see of your camera or phone. I helped a local couple to take a photo of them in front of the building, and before I could walk off, the temple officials were already there, giving the locals what must have been the lecture of their life. I dunno what happened after that, I snuck away as fast as I could!


Temple of the Tooth Museum


Temple / Palace grounds, Kandy, Sri Lanka


The streets of Kandy, Sri Lanka

The Gemsters of Sri Lanka

Continuing on scams, here’s another scam, on another tropical island – Sri Lanka. But this one’s not as bad as the money-changer thieves of Bali. Not even close to half as bad!


Sapphire mine, Sri Lanka – OK, OK, it’s a replica. So what?

Sri Lanka is famous for its sapphires. And I’m the type of tourist who likes to see famous things, whatever they are, be it sapphires or animal-poop coffee (Indonesia) or Dead Sea mud (Jordan), and so on and so forth. And so, on our tour of Sri Lanka in 2013, when we were in between Polonnaruwa and Sigiriya (two tourist attractions in Central Sri Lanka), our trusty tourist car driver brought us to a sapphire processing place. Even better, it was a ‘government-approved’ place! So far so good, except that I didn’t know that ‘government-approved’ in Sri Lanka also means ‘highly over-priced’!


Gemstone showroom, somewhere between Polonnaruwa and Sigiriya, Sri Lanka – At the time of visit, there were only 3 customers, 2 adults (us) and a kid (Justin). And that’s Justin, in the picture, going wild, having the whole friggin hall to himself!

Anyway, the place was a lavish building in …err, the middle of nowhere (no, I have no idea where it is, except that it’s about an hour before you reach Sigiriya from Polonnaruwa). The entrance was like the concierge of a 5-star hotel (…umm, OK, 4-star), with valet services (but hey, we had a driver of our own!) There were life-sized replicas of sapphire mines in the building (ya, inside the building, with air-con, not outside). We were shown how craftsmen, cut, polished, etc (how the heck could I remember? this was 2013, OK?) basically made sapphires out of err… stones. Yeah, they looked like stones to me, but nicer and harder looking ones!

And finally (no surprises here), we were taken to the shop! That’s where you’re supposed to buy something to make it worthwhile for the place to make all those life-sized replicas, and have such a nice building, and employ all those professional looking people. (Government-approved doesn’t mean government-sponsored, OK?)

Sapphires aren’t the cheapest of things (they’re not called precious stones for nothing, OK?) and are beyond our means (told you we’re cheapskates!) Besides, we know next to nothing about the value of gemstones. Of course, if your skin is thick enough, you don’t really need to buy anything. Never mind the free tea, or free tour that they give you. After all, they’ve done a good job of showcasing their country to the rest of the world. That should be a good enough reward for them already, right?

But we’re not the type who go for free rides, and so settled for a semi-precious stone, an amethyst (a purple gemstone). We managed to knock the offered price down by half. Not a bad buy we thought. And that was the end of it until we had some time to shop around in the town of Kandy and found out that ‘hey… we could get it for a lot cheaper than what we’ve paid for, those friggin government-approved cheats!’ (And there went the tips of the driver for the day. ‘Sorry driver, you’ve had your commission!’)

We went to the extent of visiting another ‘government-approved’ gemstone place in Kandy just to check. And came out feeling a little better. (The friggin place was selling stones at higher prices than the shop we visited!! OK, driver, you’re not so bad after all).

But it’s OK overall. The little shops in Kandy and the shops at the airport might sell the stones cheaper, but they didn’t have a lavish building, or exhibits of sapphire mines, or free tours (and tea), or a whole contingent of staff to chaperone you around. Who’ll pay the salaries and fund the establishment (and pay the government for approval)? That’s where we come in. And that’s how I justify paying higher prices for the gemstone we bought, which is definitely worth it, when compared to the scumbags who conned us of our money in Bali!


How an air-conditioned sapphire mine looks like, Sri Lanka

The Real Monster of Bali - The Money-Changer

Wanna know who the real monster in Bali is? No, it’s not the Rangda. Nor Calonarang, nor Miss Hell 2016. It’s not even Ravana. It’s the bloody crooked money-changers of Kuta! F#@* them, F#@* their entire family! The dishonest ones I mean.

Beware these crooks. They’ll offer you an incredible, too good to be true exchange rate, and when you change, they’d do a magic trick, a swap, and you’ll be short-changed, without you knowing, until it’s too late to do anything about it. I was a dumbass for falling for it, …but that’s what I did. Here’s what happened.

Was in Kuta, Bali and wanted to change 800 dirhams or ringgit into rupiahs, so we walked around looking at rates (and other stuff while we’re at it). Walked past some shops in Jalan Melasti (the road between Kuta and Legian, coming from the beach), when one chap called out “What money you want to change?” “How much for UAE dirham?” I asked. “3700!” he said without even stopping. “Are you sure?” (The exchange rate should be about 3400 rupiah per dirham). “Yes, yes, come in.” And that’s how I was caught! How stupid can I be huh? The saying “if it’s too good to be true, it probably is” didn’t come out just by chance, OK?

The money-changing desk is right at the back of a clothes shop. (TIP: TO BE SAFE, CHANGE YOUR MONEY AT THE OFFICIAL LOOKING MONEY-CHANGERS! NEVER AT THE SEEDY LOOKING MONEY-CHANGERS WITH A DESK AT THE BACK OF SHOPS!) Anyway, the guys (there were 2 of ‘em) kept asking me to change more money, but I’ve done the arithmetic, and 800 dirhams was enough for us for the rest of our trip! So, AED 800 at 3,700 Rp per dirham works out to a whopping 2.96 Million rupiah! I wanted 100,000 notes but they gave it all in 50,000 notes! And so I counted, and kept the cash in 3 stacks in front of me – 2 stacks of a million and a stack of 900,000. All going pretty well.

Then the unscrupulous bloody crooks gave me 7,000 and ask for a thousand back (which is just a ruse to confuse you. They’re supposed to give 60,000, not 6,000!). Anyway, their plan worked, I gave them back the 2,000 note and said “keep it” (1,000 Rp is like 25 fils!). While I was at it, doing mental maths in my head, the fellow in front of me moved the 3 stacks of money slightly, “one million, two million, 900,000” he said, counting aloud. I watched him to see that he didn’t do anything with it. Yup, the 3 stacks are intact (well, that was what I thought!). I quickly pocketed the money before they could touch it further and started to leave. They warned me before leaving not to take the money out as there were many thieves around. (How would I know, that THEY were the bloody thieves!). We left, walked a short way down and realized that “hey, they were supposed to give me 60,000, not 6,000!” We went back to the shop, and were really surprised to find that they were so ready to give us the 55,000 Rp which they short changed earlier!” Luck must be on our side …but how wrong was I?

It was not until we returned to the hotel that night that I realized what happened! They fucking siphoned off 900,000!!! From right under my eyes! One whole stack of fuckin cash! I only had 2.06 Million left with me! Those sons of bitches, scums of humanity! Our loss …200 friggin dirhams! (about 50 USD), (if calculated using the actual market rate of 3400 rp per dirham). May they rot in hell! (I’ve marked out the location of the thieving money-changers as the ‘Location’ for this post! Coincidentally, someone else has marked ‘dishonest money changers’ in the same place in Google Maps! Looks like I’m not the only one who’s fallen for their tricks!)

Scams can really ruin your holidays if you let it get to you. And yes, I didn’t sleep for almost the entire night! Thinking of ways of revenge, and of all the curses I can put on them, …and their generations to come. “Let him live a long life, but with a stroke that’ll leave him half-paralysed! Live long enough to see all his children fail in whatever they do, to see their properties stripped away…” (Oh yeah, I’m evil, …it’s my dark side, I feel like I’m Anakin Skywalker turning into Darth Vader…) Things like that really fuck up your brains! And I blame them, bloody mother******* money-changers! I thought of the honest tourist car driver, driving the entire day and getting just 600,000 friggin rupiahs! Life is unfair, but it ain’t my turn to put it right, so I wrote off the loss (with lots of encouragement from the missus, …that’s how she can be so wonderful at times!)

But not all is bad in Kuta. Here take a look at these!






Fabulous Kuta Beach, from the hotel we stayed in – Kutabex Beach Front Hotel


At Kuta Beach, Bali - nice to look at, but sweltering hot in the afternoon heat!


Streets of Kuta, Bali, Indonesia – this was my second trip to Bali. The first was err… in the early 2000s, can’t really recall which year, but I went with sis Kim, on a whim! We were in Ipoh, and I was in between jobs …I think (which may put the year as 2000, …it was before the 2002 Bali bombings I remember). We were talking and mentioned Bali and decided there and then to go. On the next day (or was it the day after), we were in Bali! On the first day there, we rented a motorbike. (Both my sister and I knew nothing much about riding a motorbike, let alone have a license for it!. But how hard could it be?!) We learnt soon enough, and ended up practising bike driving for the whole bloody day, on how not to crash into anything in the congested streets of Kuta. We gave up after one day, and just hired a tourist car to take us around for the next 2 days, hah!


Ground Zero Bali – the site of the 2002 Bali bombings


Statues by a temple in Kuta, Bali


Entrance Gate to Kuta Beach, near our hotel






Finally, Kuta Beach in the evening, the low tide and the beach’s relatively flat surface made the reflections a delightful sight