During our recent China trip, we stayed one night near the Yangcheng lake, hoping to enjoy a dinner with the famous hairy crabs. It turned out that we were a bit too early, the season was just starting. It became quite an adventure, read the report here. We had hairy crabs, but they were slightly disappointing because there was hardly any roe and that is what makes them a delicacy.

When, end of October, we noticed that the Dragon-I restaurant in 1 Utama had a hairy crab promotion, we could not resist the temptation..:-). The crabs are flown in twice a week from Shanghai, they are not cheap, price is RM 400-500 per kg. In Yangcheng we had to prepare the crabs ourselves, here it was done for us by two nice waitresses who created a real work of art. And as you can see, now there was plenty of roe. Not healthy but so delicious…:-)

The next day I went back to Lata Tampit, this time with Aric, to show him how attractive these falls are. It was a weekday,during my first visit the 5th tier was crowded with people camping, now there were no other visitors. Beautiful large pool.

On 8 November the yearly Kathina ceremony was held in Taiping. In an earlier blog, Kathina Festival 2013 , I have given information about the background of this Buddhist festival. This time I went with Aric who had never attended. About the Festival I will write a separate post: Kathina 2015. Here only one picture of the monks waiting for the devotees to present their gifts

When I am in Taiping I always want to have a look at the Old Resthouse, probably a masochistic streak in my character. It is a real eyesore, half hidden behind a fence that proudly advertises the heritage of Taiping. But of course I still enjoyed my stay, meeting many friends…:-)

Recently I have written a post Kanching Mission(s), where one of the missions was to check for my friend Joe Yap if there was a lot of rubbish. There was, so she started organising a cleaning operation. I could not attend the event itself, as I would be in Laos, but I met her in Kanching a week earlier, when she went there with some of her volunteers. I met her there with my friend Rahim.. He had never been to Kanching, so I showed him a few of the falls, before it started to rain.

About our trip to Laos I have published already a few posts. More will follow. Here only a picture of an alms giving ceremony in Luang Prabang.

Several of my friends were interested in Lata Tampit, so I went back for a third time. It will not be the last one, the waterfalls are beautiful, access is relatively easy, a pleasant half-day trip with a nice lunch as reward. Edwin suggested restaurant Wonderland Valley in Bukit Tinggi, and that was a good choice.

We don’t celebrate Christmas, but I decided it would be a good time to have a small party.  From this post you will have noticed that I am still addicted to waterfalls..:-), so I invited friends with a similar interest. My sifu Khong had recently created a personal book with all the waterfalls he had visited, I had borrowed the book to show it to my friends. There was food, a Western style buffet. And I had created a slide show of the waterfalls visited by me during the last 10-12 years. Without identification. After the dinner my guests had to determine name and location of the various falls. Big fun. A nice party

A few days later I was invited for a real Christmas party by my friend Philip. With a Christmas tree, a turkey and lots of other food. And even the singing of Christmas carols, where I surprised myself by joining the others in “Silent Night, Holy Night” 🙂

For New Year’s Eve, we have a tradition that we celebrate it at home, with a nice dinner. After the countdown we watch the fireworks at the Curve from our balcony. Nothing spectacular this time, but the dinner was a success.

And so came 2015 to an end. In that year I published more than 40 posts and albums!

I wish all my followers a happy and prosperous 2016!

On 15 April 15 I arrived in the Netherlands for a stay of six weeks. Spring was late this year, I was welcomed by nice weather, flowers everywhere. And I was really craving for traditional Dutch food..:-)

I did not really celebrate my birthday on April 17, because the next day we had a Family Gathering . But I did not feel lonely that day, because I got visitors, my youngest brother Otto and my soulmate Inez. A good opportunity to practice  taking selfies..:-)

As usual it took me a few days to get acclimatised. I visited friends and went to the Vondelpark for a photo shoot, resulting in a blog Homage to the Vondelpark .

One of the big celebrations in the Netherlands is Koninginnedag (Queen’s Day), now renamed Koningsdag (King’s Day). Observed for the first time on 31 August 1885, the birthday of Queen Wilhelmina.  When her daughter Juliana became Queen in 1948, the holiday was moved to her birthday, 30 April. Then, in 1980 Beatrix became Queen. Her birthday is 31 January. Too cold to enjoy the many outdoor activities. Therefore it was decided to keep it on 30 April. Now Willem Alexander is King, born on 27 April, so they changed the date. Personally I think they should have kept it on 30 April. What to do when Princess Amalia (born 7 December) will become Queen…:-)?

I went to town only for a short while. Too many people.

A few days later I went to Utrecht to meet Yolanda, a former student, who has become a good friend. Beautiful weather, we walked in the town before we had dinner.

And of course I had dinner with my other Yolanda, Paul’s sister. It has become a nice tradition that we meet for a “sumptuous” dinner when I am back in Holland. This time we went to restaurant Bonjour. French cuisine, friendly service. And very reasonably priced: 24.50 Euro for a three-course dinner.

With my friend Inez I visited Rotterdam and Dordrecht on a day trip. In Malaysia, thinking about what to do during my stay in Holland, I had optimistically assumed that I had plenty of time for longer trips, but that was a mistake…:-)

On the evening of the 4th of May we have  the Remembrance of the Dead ceremony in my country. Quite impressive, I used to go to the Dam Square for the two minutes of silence. This time I was already on my way, when I noticed that near my condo there was a (smaller) celebration. So I attended that one instead. Impressive. After the ceremony I met (my second…) Yolanda at the Concertgebouw, where we attended a performance of the Anne Frank cantata. I hope the name Anne Frank is familiar  to everybody?  We finished the evening with a beer at the famous Welling cafe! Near to where I have been living most of my life. Nostalgia.

By the way, it was a good decision not to go to the Dam Square. Have a look at the crowd there!

The last two weeks of my stay were a bit too hectic…:-) I felt like the Flying Dutchman, travelling all the time. Of course I was to blame myself…:-) I had to maintain a calendar meticulously…:-)

First I went with Nico, Paul’s brother, to Santenoge in Burgundy, where we stayed five days in his country house, Living Like God in France. After coming back, I visited Ruud and Jur in Groningen. They live in a nice house with a beautiful garden. The next day we made a trip in the countryside and visited the old (14th century!) church of Zeerijp.

My following visit was to the south-west of the Netherlands, the province Zeeland where I visited a friend from my university days, a long time ago. Here is the report: Middelburg.

One day at home and off I went again, to Alkmaar, where Arie and Ineke are living. Another report: Alkmaar. The next day I continued to Valkkoog, where I stayed overnight with Lous and Arend. In the afternoon we visited the sand suppletion project of the Hondsbossche Zeewering (Sea dike). In the left pic below I have indicated the location of the sea dike in red.This dike was a weak spot in the Dutch defense system against the sea. Now new land and dunes have been created. Impressive. The visitor center had an interesting gadget where you could give the impression (with a soap film) that you were standing in the water. Of course we had a nice dinner, my youngest brother was also present.

Before going back to Amsterdam the next morning, I took pictures of the sculptures, ceramics and paintings created by My artistic sister

Finally the next day I traveled to Limburg with Paul for a few days of long distance walking, part of the Pelgrimspad

Then it was time to fly back to Malaysia, where I could recover…:-)

Of course beside all this, I visited and or invited friends. A few pictures

This visit was a bit longer than usual, the reason being that I was considering to come back once a year only, for a longer time. After this visit I think I will keep it as before, coming back twice a year, for about one month.

How time flies. It is almost months ago that I published my last Journal! Before I start forgetting what I did, I better write an update ..:-)

In February we visited our friends Pat and Roger in Melbourne. We enjoyed very much their hospitality and visited interesting places. During our 12-days trip I took more than 800 pictures and I am still struggling to write a trip report. Here are a few, just to get an impression.

On 19 February the Chinese Year of the Goat started. Last year on the first day of CNY, I visited Houses of Worship in KL with my friend Joe Yap. This year we decided to explore Putrajaya. There is a lot of interesting architecture in this government capital of Malaysia, resulting again in many pictures. Full report here, in this journal a few highlights of our visit. I find the older buildings rather megalomaniac, but many modern ones are beautiful and stylish. Like these ministry buildings.

Making a trip with Joe on the first day of CNY might become a nice tradition. Like having CNY lunch with my friend George, this time on the 2nd day. But of course I also went to Parit Baru, Aric’s hometown to to celebrate CNY with my adopted family…:-). After first visiting a “new” waterfall with Siang Hui and Nick. Another tradition, they celebrate CNY in Teluk Intan, not far from Parit Baru, and the last three years we have visited new waterfalls in Perak on the 3rd day of CNY: Lata Naga Air (2012),  Ulu Licin  (2013) and Upper Damak (14). This time our target was two waterfalls in the Klah river, near Sungkai. A beautiful trail and nice waterfalls. Detailed report later…:-)

My friend Rani joined this waterfall trip and came with me to Parit Baru for the CNY party of Aric’s family. Quite a crowd. There was food and fireworks. Here is the official picture. One Indian, one Malay, one Kwai Loh and many Chinese. There was a penalty if you were not wearing red and I was upset that my orange shirt was not red enough…:-)

Two weeks later I was back at Sg Klah, this time with Edwin, Janine, Paul and Fahmy. During my first visit we thought that we had found the second fall, Lata Tujuh, but comparing my picture with the one on the Internet, that was not the case. Looking at the Google Earth map, we had an idea about the possible location of this Tujuh fall, so I went back. True, we found another fall on that location, but again, not Lata Tujuh. However, it was a very pleasant trip with nice company. Looking for a suitable place for lunch, we found a nice shop, Nasi Bamboo Sg Klah. Will sure come again!

Of course I still walk regularly in Bukit Kiara. Sometimes alone, sometimes with friends. Recently I joined a group of hikers for a long hike, from TTDI until Desa Park City! A fun group, we had a birthday party, with cake, under the highway..:-)

I became a member of Friends of Bukit Kiara. We are worried about the plans of JLN to turn the park into a “recreational arboretum”. Here is a letter, written to the STAR by Pola Singh and me. Will it have any effect?

For another article Pola asked me if he could use some of my flora pictures. Of course no problem, so I selected a few. Here is the beauty of Kiara..:-)

We have started a cleaning and renovation exercise in our condo. Throwing away a lot of stuff. Like my old specs and my outdated computer and programming books. Bought a new bookcase for my books. The storeroom looks much better now. More to come…:-)

On September 8,  the Mid-Autumn Festival was celebrated in the Chinese world. It is also called the Mooncake festival because of the tradition to eat mooncakes during this period. We went back that weekend to Aric’s hometown and decided to combine it with a visit of Teluk Intan. I had visited Teluk Intan numerous times and knew that it was famous for its landmark, the leaning tower.

But there is more to see. A friend of mine maintains an interesting  website Malaysia Traveller and he has published an article about the Teluk Intan Attractions. It has a map with the location of the various points of interest. Here is a collection of interesting buildings. Visit his site for more details.

On our way back home, after the weekend, Aric suggested to stop for a while in Sekinchan. The village is famous for its seafood restaurants, but there is also a nice beach, Pantai Redang. In general I am not that keen on the beaches of the Straits of Melaka (Port Dickson, argh!) but this was a pleasant surprise. Local people have built a number of tree houses along the beach, using driftwood, parts of old boats, fishing nets etc. The result is very attractive. There is also a Chinese temple with a wishing tree. Will probably be crowded during weekends. Worth a visit!

Back home, we had dinner with Caroline, her boyfriend Dave and her brother Julian. Caroline is the daughter of my dear friend Yian Tze Ang, who passed away in 2010. Since then we have kept in touch, so when she came back from New Zealand to Malaysia for some time, we met for chitchat and dinner. One topic of conversation was that I had taken up playing flute after many years, but that I was unhappy with the condition of the instrument. “Why not use the flute my mother has been playing”, Caroline said, “She would have been very happy with the idea”

With some hesitation I accepted this generous offer, so a few days later I met them again, the flute was handed over ceremoniously and I am now playing it…:-)

Here is a first result, Paul and I are playing the famous Canon in D by Pachelbel. Keep in mind that both Paul and I have not been playing for several decades! We will have to practice more, and maybe Caroline will join us on guitar…:-)

The next weekend I went to Lenggong and Taiping with Joe Yap for a heritage trip, You can find a detailed report here.

My daily routine is still to walk in Bukit Kiara followed by breakfast in IKEA. When you have been following my blog, you will have read quite a few posts about Bukit Kiara, for example: Bukit Kiara, Not All is Well

I am pessimistic about the future of this unique piece of nature within the city. But still beauty can be found there.

Yesterday we attended a Chinese wedding dinner. Hundreds of guests, a huge banquet hall. A nice-course dinner, quite good food. But the hall was freezing cold.Good that the hosts were generous with Hennessy XO..:-)  The Master of Ceremony was in drag, quite funny (if you understand Chinese, that is). After the official toast, he made a round through the hall, making fun of the guests. And as I was the only Kwai Loh in the hall, of course he had to pick me, LOL.