Month: May 2017

Ducks By The Paddy Fields

Ducks By The Paddy Fields. My friend, Rian Maelzer, booked a couple of hotel rooms in Ubud and Sanur, Bali through me, recently. I was happy not only for the bookings but I also know that as a seasoned international journalist with a great eye, he will return with beautiful pictures of Ubud.

Ubud is a center for traditional crafts and dance. The surrounding rainforest and terraced rice fields are dotted with Hindu temples and shrines. Ubud is one of Bali’s most famous landscapes. Bebek Tepi Sawah Restaurant & Villas is the hotel he chose and it has Balinese style rooms with marble floors and thatched roof gazebos.

True to its name, the hotel is in the middle of a paddy or rice field. The sounds you will hear are that from the cackling of the village geese and hypnotic gamelan percussion.

Rian is a very experienced, savvy and demanding traveler and his regular bookings are a testimony of the reliability and competitive rates at MyCen Hotels. Thank you for your support and for allowing me to share the pics, Rian.

#ubud #bali #indonesia #holiday #vacation #travel

Beaches For Your Sunset Pics – Part 1

Beaches For Your Sunset Pics – Part 1

Sunsets are almost always fabulous from the seaside. KL is landlocked. So what do we do? We can travel to a beach. Where can we go that is near and practical? In this series we look at three beaches I have captured beautiful sunsets previously. They are west coast sites facing the Straits of Malacca and the setting sun.

We start off with Morib beach. It’s fairly easy to get to if you can get on the SKVE which takes you to Banting.

On the Morib esplanade, Carmen was photographed showing off her IKEA cardboard camera known as KNÄPPA. It was a one time issue, was not for sale nor did it require assembly. Just insert the two included yellow IKEA batteries. Memory is built in. You can see the USB dongle jutting from the side. It is fully functional albeit the brutalist design. I like that it uses a peep hole as viewfinder.

The blurry images should make it a sought after hipster collectible. Is there a tripod screw hole? IKEA wants you to buy a chair for stability.

She won it in a contest and it was also given to the media as gifts. At the beach, we need not worry about rust from the salty air and sea spray corrosion. Be careful with your regular camera at the sea unless your camera is also a cardboard. At home. you might need to worry about silverfishes and other bugs eating your cardboard camera..LOL.

Seaside sunsets are unpredictable because of the travel distance and can fade fast became of changing weather. Always carry a flash for fill in light if you plan to do humans beside landscape.

Olympus OM-D, ISO 200, f8, 1/320 sec.

See Hotels in Morib and the Gold Coast, if you need to spend a night.

http://www.mycen.my/hotels-in-morib-and-gold-coast-selangor/

#sunset #dusk #beach #twilight #morib #goldcoast #selangor #ikeacamera #knappa

Hotels In Seremban

When I was in Seremban, I drove around the suburb town of Taman AST where I saw so many pubs, bars and nightclubs. Seemed like the capital of debauchery in Seremban.

Similarly, Kuala Lumpur has the Jalan P Ramlee area where gullible white male tourists fall n love with transvestite night workers and send a text to his mother the next day. “Mom, I fell in love with the girl of my dreams and may marry her” One Brit did.

.Anyway in the center of AST, I saw a huge building named Wisma CK or City Kingdom. I thought it was a Mega Church at first. Driving closer, I saw it advertising a convention hall and ballroom from outside but strangely there was no indication it is also a hotel  – the Fame Hotel inside. We KLites know so little about hotels in Seremban because KL city is so near and we can drive home or drive to the beach hotels of Port Dickson or PD.

I have only stayed at the Seri Malaysia hotel in Seremban previously and it was moldy and aging .There was also the Allson Hotel that changed its name so many times I don’t know its name anymore. It is now the Klana Resort Seremban, as I was to find out. Many new hotels have came about since. Many are in the new satellite township of Seremban 2.

There are some 36 hotels of varying price listed here. Click this link.

You may also want to consider:

The Royale Bintang Resort & Spa Seremban
Sri Mutiara Hotel Seremban
Sutera Hotel
Palm Seremban Hotel
Carlton Star Hotel
D’Sora Boutique Business Hotel, Bandar Sri Sendayan
Hotel Rasah
Smart Hotel Rasah Seremban
Hotel Lavender Lavender Heights Senawang
D&F Boutique Hotel Senawang Seremban
Uptown Hotel Seremban 2
Hotel Seremban Jaya
Lodge Ten Hotel Seremban 2
Pelegong Homestay Labu
OYO Rooms Seremban KPJ Kemayan Square
S2 Hotel Seremban 2

Angry Men Sitting In Front Of Coffee Shops

Angry Men Sitting In Front Of Coffee Shops.

A coffee table book should be about coffee or the traditional kopitiam that serve kopi. I am thinking maybe one day I should publish a coffee table book titled “Angry Men Sitting In Front Of Coffee Shops”. I always get some death stares when I stand in front. I think it is territorial aggression. I am a stranger or outsider from another town they sensed

Not all are angry men though. That’s how they react to a stranger with a camera. Engage them to find out more. They could be philosophical, for example. Like the elder man of the Orang Asli duo in Behrang (bottom pic). I asked him what was he thinking so hard about? He told me everyone has problems, with a heavy sigh. True. I replied. What’s the solution then?, I inquired further. He said “Let’s order another bottle of Cap Rusa Arak (a potent legalised local moonshine). The younger gentleman then asked me for my car and phone number. He started writing down all the permutations for lottery bets later. Love their decadent lifestyle . LOL.

#coffeeshop #kopitiam #orangasli #streetphotography #smalltown

The Junkyard Dog Sleeps Tonight

Scrap collectors hauled in a discarded mattress or two. The faithful junkyard dog finds a comfy spot different from the usual rusted metal, cardboard and other junk.

Saw this dog during my exploration of Hulu Bernam area recently. The junkyard dog is a popular movie trope often used to set up a scene with impending sinister activity or hostility.

For all its movie reputation of aggressiveness and alertness, it possesses a less-recognised attribute in real-life. Unconditional loyalty to owners who provide scant creature comforts.

Olympus OM-D, ISO 200, f5.6, 1/160 sec.

#streetphotography #documentaryphotography #junkyard #scrapyard #bicycle #dog #junkyarddog #olympus #omd