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| Monday, 1-May-2006 12:00 |
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R&R at Avillion Port Dickson
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View from the upper rooms
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View from the upper rooms
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Just love how the place is full of greens
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1-2 May 2006
After getting a taste of the river at Kuala Mu and Pos Piah, I was hankering for the beach/pool, so took off to Port Dickson. The beach there, as expected was nothing much (I was itchy all over even from a short dip during low tide!!!) but the hotel was beautiful. Stayed at the cheapest of the lot, of course but it was already very nice. My digital camera's battery was flat so didnt manage to take pictures of the room, unfortunately.
I loved how they had lots of plants - it didn't feel like I was in Port Dickson at all!! 
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| Sunday, 30-Apr-2006 05:48 |
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OffRoad expedition to the Orang Asli Community
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Setting up early at Pos Piah
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Badrul entertaining the kids with the balloon pump
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The convoy arrives and was greeted by the kids & their teachers
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28-30 April 2006
Perak
Departed the PETRONAS Twin Towers at approx 8.30am for the PETRONAS Motorsports (Petmos) & the PETRONAS Adventure Team's (PAT) Off-road expedition to the Org Asli community at Pos Piah and Kuala Mu. The nearest town to the settlement was Sungai Siput, Perak, which was the last point where we get cell phone coverage. From Sg Siput, it took 2 hrs of off-road driving to get to Pos Piah.
The 20 plus convoy of 4WDs include 27 staff participants. 3 lucky participants will be selected to join in the annual PAT expedition. This year, PAT is organising a Trans-Nusantara trip which will involve a 43 day journey across Indonesia's islands. The participants will be tested on their interaction inter and intra-teams, how they interact with the community and they will be tested on first aid knowledge, 4WD skills etc.
I was in charge of organising the community relations activities with the kids. We visited 2 org asli settlements - Pos Piah and Kuala Mu.
We reached Pos Piah first. Since I was in charge of the community programme, I arrived earlier than the rest to set up. The kids were from Primary 1-6 and goodness, they are tiny and sooo adorable!! With a staple of tapioca only, maybe that's partly the reason. They're very inquisitive kids, but quite shy too. And easily amused! When a balloon came off from the balloon pump accidentally, they were laughing like crazy that Badrul did it again & again as it kept the kids in good spirit.
Before conducting the science shows, we were trained at PETROSAINS and practised on school kids. But this was orang asli children so I was kinda sweating it, but it turned out alright.
The balloon show was a basic science show which highlighted the principle of Bernoulli, static electricity, air pressure etc and after that we demonstrated how to make ice cream using full cream milk. Great fun!!
After cleaning up the mess from the ice cream show, we proceeded to our camp site. It was facing a river and being a member of the management team, I didn't have to set up a camp hehe. The participants were tested on how they set up their camp and after that they had to cook as well. The mgmt team had a cook's team taking care of that for us so all that was left for me to do was gather up the courage to take a plunge in the cold river for a bath 
It was very cold!!!!!!!!! but very refreshing indeed
Dinner in front of the river was very nice, and after that, I went around testing all the food prepared by the 5 teams (participants were divided into 5 groups : Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta & Echo). All of them had sardines in the menu as expected!
The management team all slept under a huge fly sheet on our foldable beds. My driver took was kind enough to fix me a mosquito's net - there really weren't that many bugs, so I was probably the only one using it -- felt like such a camping princess but what the heck, it gave me a sense of comfort. I slept easily due to the fatigue. The orchestra of snores by the gentlemen's went by unnoticed.
The next morning, we broke camp and made our way to Kuala Mu. Kuala Mu is much more remote than Pos Piah and the journey took approximately 3 hours. As usual, I was in the advance team as I had to set up the community programme for the children.
At Kuala Mu, we conducted an Edu-Race. The kids were divided into groups and had to visit various checkpoints where they had to perform tasks such as colouring, jigsaw puzzle, brushing their teach, telematch etc.
Before the race tho, the participants had to cook instant noodles (maggi mee) for the whole community. I think they cooked 400 packets of instant noodles!
The kids at Kuala Mu are much more shy than the kids at Pos Piah. It's so hard to get some of them to talk, but by the next day, they were all more relaxed. When we broke camp and we collecting garbage, it was the kids who were eagerly volunteering to hold the garbage bags and they were racing with each other to collect garbage.
After the edu-race, the participants were tested on some special tasks while some of the management team had a football match with the org asli. The orang asli won by a huge margin : 8 to 1!
Most of the girls decided to take a bath at the school's guest toilets, but as the river at Kuala Mu is even prettier than in Pos Piah so I made it a point to bath in it. Siap mandi dengan Ferhad (the singer) lagi. He was there following his 2 bro-in-laws who are friends of the PAT mgmt.
In the evening, the PAT cook's team prepared dinner for the community. After that, the orang asli (they were from the Temiar tribe) performed their sewang dance for us with participation from us. Ferhad especially enjoyed it. He took part from start to end.
Up next was a fireworks show and a karaoke competition for the org asli. Not bad at all, but they tend to sing a lot of 60s/70s pop yeh yeh song (S Jibeng et al) and dangdut (Amelina). Ferhad was one of the judges and he sang one song.
Someone actually submitted my name to sing a duet and it was one of my most humiliating experience - singing in front of the org asli and Ferhad! Gawd!!! Totally butchered the song. (Sandarkan Pada Kenangan)
After the prize giving session, it was our turn on the karaoke machine. I was asked to become the emcee so that made me forget bit by bit the embarassment about the singing. Besides singing, we even had a session of dancing the "Pocho-Pocho" (indonesian line dancing like craze), as the PAT expedition will go to Indonesia.
That night, I slept at the 'waterfront' again - very nice. But there were more bugs here so I was glad I had the mosquito netting on.
It felt sad leaving the kids the following day. Definitely would love to come again. The kids really appreciate what you do for them and that was the best part about the trip for me.
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| Sunday, 19-Mar-2006 12:00 |
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2006 PETRONAS Malaysian GP - Sunday
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Raceday!
Didn’t leave for the circuit with the group as I had to make a short pit stop to the MATTA Fair. Needed to book ground arrangement for my trip to Bangkok in Sept. Terrible timing, to hold the Fair during the F1 GP!!
It was a mad dash to collect brochures and sweet talk the agents into letting me book/pay next week instead of on that day.
Even managed to catch some tennis before I left for PWTC. So disappointed that Nadal lost to Blake. Blake to Nadal is like what Nadal is to Federer! The windy conditions at Indian Wells certainly didn’t help Nadal’s aggressive play and his injured ankle certainly didn’t make things any better I suppose. Clearly Federer would wrap it all up easily with Nadal eliminated. Dang it!!!
Managed to reach KLCC to catch the free bus transportation provided to PETRONAS guests/staff. But Abg Zul of PETMOS offered me to ride with him in a BMW event car which I gladly obliged. Got there by 12:30pm and headed straight to the Mclaren booth as Kimi would be making a guest appearance at 1:15pm. Oh my, how was I to know what a terrible decision that was!
As I predicted, Kimi arrived later, at 1:30pm and the place was packed to the brim with fans and later the Mercedes people made a human chain in the already tightly packed place. I was sweating like never before - every inch of my men’s small-sized but still baggy BMW Sauber-PETRONAS shirt was drenched in sweat. Disgusting!!!! I wish I could’ve won a lady tank instead.
Oh, and did I see Kimi? Hahahahahahahahhahaha….. Last year’s appearance when JPM came over was much better, got nice photos of him. This time round, not a single one! Couldn’t even see Kimi’s face!  Had I been able to make it to Kimi’s appearance at KL Plaza, wouldn’t have waited at the Mclaren Tent, but as usual, ever the curious cat, even tho I don’t even like team Mclaren Mercedes
Got to my seats just in time for the Drivers Parade. There’s no jet fighter planes this year, sadly. But I suppose, it’s noisy enough thank you very much. After years of sitting at K1 (my fave), the noise at the pit straight takes some getting used to. The new qualifying system (two 5 min sessions pole shootout) means there’s more cars at one time compared to just one car last year and boy, it was LOUD! It was SO loud, couldn’t really hear the commentary from my RM150 headphones (selling at RM100 this year, dang it!).
I was rooting for Alonso, but kudos to Fisi for a solid race. Didn't make mistakes, but then again, he was so ahead, no one really challenged him. Alonso’s refueling snafu seems awfully fishy to me!! Hhmmm…
Of course, deep down I wanted my man Schu to win but it’s not looking like the Prancing Horse Team are quite there yet. And what about Massa beating Schu?! I was already surprised he made in it one piece (knowing how reckless this dude is), let alone beat Schu!! He sure is faring well compared to Rubens, but maybe it’s Schumi’s age, maybe the 1 pit stop strategy seems to be the way to go.
Before leaving the circuit, stopped over Claude’s store to say hi. If only Marc (his brother) was around. Miss the guy, plus he would give me even better discount! Already bought some heavily discounted Alonso item from his other store on Saturday, so didn't buy anymore stuff. Schumi's cap was nothing really new so I'll pass. Wanted to get the team shirt (love the white incorporated in the design) but none in my size (blessing in disguise muahaha). Oh yeah, god knows when I'll be able to wear my new Alonso cap and top! Couldn't wear them for race day, and next year Alonso's leaving for Mclaren (arghhhh... my absolute nightmare hehe).
Had dinner at the Sundanese Restaurant in KLCC before saying our goodbyes. Sigh, back to work tomorrow Monday morning!
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| Saturday, 18-Mar-2006 15:08 |
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PETRONAS Malaysian GP - Saturday
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Finally I get to wear something not baggy!!! Couldn't wear my Ferrari red or Renault blue outfits, so wore my old 'Pole Position' BMW Williams top instead. Since I had to wear that huge PETRONAS Motorsports polo shirt yesterday, totally forgot to put sunblock on my arms - bad mistake! 
After quali, just had a few mins to go back to hotel to freshen up before me and Sabrina went down to catch the BMW Heritage Race Cars Demonstration. It was raining heavily but the show started on time at 6pm. The cars made a U turn at our hotel so managed to get a real good look at the cars. The Mille Miglia is the best, hands down... true vintage heritage. The rest are still pretty modern...
After the demo ran quickly to the nearest mamak to tapau Nasi Kukus with Curry Ayam cos I was starving like crazy. Just enough time for a quick shower and speed eating before everyone met at the hotel lobby to walk to Mandarin Oriental Car Park for the BMW Marquee event.
Most of the staff contest wineers were starving, poor things, as we had to wait a bit before they started serving cocktail hors d'oeuvres. Impressive makeover of the carpark, I'd have to say. Stellar job by the event organisers.
Show kicked off with the introduction of the 7 BMW Heritage Car drivers. The emcee allowed the floor to ask questions and someone actually asked "Where is Nico Rosberg?" Like d'uh, he drives for Williams Cosworth!  And a girl actually came dressed in a Renault top and a Renault cap!  Talk about insensitive/blur sotong!
This was followed by the main event - the BMW Sauber F1 Team Collectiong fashion show. The same models as per the Team Launch at Valencia so it was a damn good show. A feast for the eyes indeed - big on energy and attitude. A lot of tumbling, dancing and breakdancing -- loved it! Didnt take long before my digital camera's memory card ran out of space
The closing performance by Jocelyn Powers was just ok for me, guess the song choice weren't of my particular liking. Can't really dance to it, so I went to check out the Merchandise Area, more to oggle at the BMW cars rather than the clothes
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| Friday, 17-Mar-2006 14:59 |
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PETRONAS Malaysian GP - Friday
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Looong day!! We left the hotel for SIC at 7:45am and returned at 9pm (or maybe even later than that!) Besides watching the Practise Session, we visited the Formula BMW Asia Hospitality Tent and Support Paddock, raced at the Sepang Go Kart Circuit and even managed to squeeze a visit to Putrajaya for Friday Prayers and a short tour. Later at night, stayed till 2am at Hard Rock Café before my eyes gave in with all the smoke - and fatigue of course! And the next day we leave for SIC at 8:30am. Still early, but definitely better than 7:45am
Really enjoyed the visit to the BMW Hospitality Tent and meeting Matthias (I likeeeeee) and Norman. Later found out that fellow AtlasF1 forum member Mikko Nassi raced at the Formula BMW. Too busy with the Staff Contest programme preparation to PM him and ask if he was racing but should've known he would. Last two years he raced in Formula Malaysia, but this year it's Formula BMW Asia. If you somehow managed to read this Mikko, niwanda says hi
After Friday prayers at Putrajaya, we headed for the Go Kart Circuit where to my suprise found more fellow AtlasF1 members - Sith, Mat and Paul racing - why am I not suprised hehe. Sith's been to Sepang every year since 1999 and last year, he did a mammoth F1 tour. If I'm not mistaken, Oz (home GP), Msia, Spa, Monza, Canada, USA, China. And heck, he even came over to Msia again for MotoGP and I know he went to a few other races Down Under.
During the go kart race we were joined by the ESPN contest winners (from Asia). Their programme was handled by my colleagues from PETRONAS Motorsports. I believe this year's ESPN contest has already started. Winners get the VIP treatment for next year's Msian GP.
For the go kart challenge we were divided into 3 groups - everyone had 5 laps of practise before we raced for 5 laps. Top 15 times qualified to the semifinals, where the top 10 times move on to the finals -- or something like that.
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| Thursday, 16-Mar-2006 01:52 |
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F1 is back in Malaysia again!
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Briefing for the winners
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Briefing for the winners
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Zaman sharing his experience as an F1 Engineer
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Among the various F1 related programmes conducted by PETRONAS was my department's F1 Staff Contest. 30 staff from PETRONAS Groupwide were the lucky winners. The won themselves Diamond Grandstand tickets and merchandise by BMW Sauber, PETRONAS Malaysian GP, PETRONAS Motorsports and Sepang International Circuit.
It was a first for me, working throughout the GP weekend. I was on maximum restraint as I couldn't wear my usual Schumi/Alonso shirt/cap/bag/flag etc. Bought some new merchandise but couldn't wear them either - aarghh hehe.
But I had a blast cos we organised a lot of interesting programmes. Got to visit the BMW Asia Support Race Paddock, raced at the Sepang Go Kart Circuit and we got invited to the BMW Marquee cocktail event which was superb. Pics will follow!
Pics below are of the briefing to the Contest Winners and a sharing session with the F1 engineers with the Sauber PETRONAS Engineering Team, proceeded by visits to the Skybridge (level 42), Skyview Deck (level 83) and hi-tea at the Malaysian Petroleum Club.
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| Sunday, 12-Mar-2006 16:59 |
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Kemps visits Malaysia
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Upon completion of his training stint in Brunei, Kempley, who's in the British Army came over for a visit. Brought him to the usual places eg Central Market, Chinatown, Tugu Negara etc. It's been AGES since I went to Tugu Negara!! (read Lawatan Sambil Belajar aeons ago) . Trust him to notice all the army insignias on the ceiling of the Tugu Negara complex. From what he related to us, life as a British Army lieutenant ain't all that bad actually!
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| Sunday, 12-Mar-2006 12:00 |
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Echo's Concert at Nilai
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With Blue at Nilai Putra Indoor Stadium
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With Ana, Ummi & Amilda
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Miss a picture with an Echo banner? Never! :)
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Jericho's Jeans Concert
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Nilai Putra Indoor Stadium
2 - 6pm (Hence the oily face hehe)
What a hot day at Nilai! It was sweltering hot but Echo was hotter haha. He had his hair braided and wore jeans throughout the show with a few changes of Tshirts.
While waiting for the concert to start, they showed the video clip of 'Coming Out'. What a beautifully shot video! Echo's hair was curly and long in that video and he had a moustache on. I normally like his hair short, with no facial hair, but I thought he looked really good in that video.
Ezlynn started of the show with about 4-5 songs which we patiently endured haha... I don't know if she'll be opening at KK though, but if she does, you gotta wait for 30 minutes before she finishes and introduces Echo
Among the highlights of the concert for me would be Echo's duet of Pangako Sa Yo with Ezlynn (arghhh, this song is damn nostalgic!!!), his rendition of Glenn Fredly's 'Januari' (I love this song!) and Freddie Aguilar's 'Anak'.
Echo sang 'Anak especially' well. 'Januari', he had the lyrics on a stand and he missed one or two words at one time. The fans who were already singing along when he started singing 'Januari', started singing with him even louder after he made that mistake - and he made no mistakes anymore! The whole stadium singing along was a great feeling. It was probably one of the best moments betwen Echo and the crowd for me - and for Echo I'm sure cause at the end of the song remarked "Wow, that was a good one" (or something to that effect lah).
Of course, Echo introduced his current Panday co-star and real life beau Heart Evangelista and sang "You're So Beautiful" with her. After that she sang one solo song. Can't recall the title, but it was a song by The Corrs.
We all managed to see Echo at the end of the concert and it was great to get to finally talk to the other Jeans members - ie Jude, Dan & Aaron. We also got the whole band to sign a banner which I & Amilda made. We didnt really take a picture with the banner with our own camera but EMI & Time Broadcast took some on their video cam and camera so maybe it will be published in a VCD of the concert or at least published at www.jerichofc.com
It was also Bahrain GP race day on Sunday. Well done Schu & Ferrari! And you go Alonso! Malaysian GP next! Yeah, baby!!!!!! To those who will be going to the concert at KK, have fun. I will be going to the PETRONAS Malaysian Grand Prix (go go Schumi & Alonso!!) but will definitely be thinking of Echo and the fans at the concert.
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| Friday, 10-Mar-2006 14:47 |
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BMW Sauber Car Launch & Echo's Meet & Greet @KLCC
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With Sab & Ridzuan at the Exhibition at KLCC Suria
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Echo signing for fans
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Echo signing for fans
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TGIF! Best day of the week and quite lotsa things happening as well.
am : Petronas launched the new BMW Sauber F1.06 at home soil at KLCC Suria. The exhibition is called the Premium Partner Exhibition. Also went to check out Petrosains' Speed Exhibition in conjunction with the Petronas M'sian GP 2006. It opens to public next week, will be launched by the BMW Sauber drivers. Informative & fun exhibits related to speed.
pm : Jericho Rosales dropped by Tower Records for a signing session with fans while promoting his concert at Nilai on 12 March 2006. Later in the evening, Shafinaz sang at the Premium Partner Exhibition.
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| Tuesday, 24-Jan-2006 00:00 |
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LCAD Open House
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