Although my friend played me out with a no-show, it was ok as it was nice to see a 90% packed house at the Jurong East Stadium on the opening night of a new season. A lot of rah rah, boisterous (close to being irritating) announcer/dj, neigborhood sch band, dancers, balloons, confetti, etc. The first 20 minutes was played at breakneck pace but after the sending off of Tanjong Pagar's skipper, it slowed down. Soon Jurong scored a goal. It ended that way. Was slightly disappointed TP didn't make use of the some great chances that came their way. But was more disappointed that my friend didn't turn up.

40metres up amongst the trees walking on suspended bridge. Some parts groan and creak loudly but im sure its very safe.


DW signed my GB and asked for The Pagans' Ice. This is from their EP titled Hideaway from more than 10 years ago. (btw DW, u gotta be more specific about which Irene r u refering to?)

On the way to the cascades at Lata Berkoh, we saw a Green Pit Viper. Took me quite a while to figure out where it was. It's green skin cleverly camouflaging itself into the surrounding leaves & twigs. Our guide says its deadly poisonous. I made a mental note to avoid it later when we walk back. I think the fella likes the peace and prefers to be alone. 11 people including the 2 guides do make a lot of noise when trudging through the trail along one of the many rivers in Taman Negara.

We took a dip in the cascades (jacuzzi au naturel) and swam in the cool clear water. Our fellow traveler even managing a backflip (see pic). After all the trekking/crawling/climbing we did the day b4, this was definitely welcomed in our itinerary. An hour later we walked the 700m back to the sampan and somehow the group split up. I found myself alone along this stretch (see pic) which has calm waters accompanied by sounds of rustling leaves. It was good for a minute or two and I was enjoying the peace until the silence was broken by the last few fellow travelers catching up with me. That's when it occurred to me i entirely forgotten about that Viper lurking around somewhere.

In 1966, backed by The Quest, Rita Chao recorded a mandarin version of Pretty Flamingo. I dug this out recently and it has been on repeat1 mode the last 2 days.

Have u lost something lately? Go check out Found Magazine. Thanx Chern Han for pointing me in that direction.

What we did during the 3 days there was the "Easy Taman Negara Experience". i.e. Shooting the rapids, trekking here and there, canopy walk etc. Except for crawling through the Bat Cave which requires spiderman-style contortion of the body, the rest could easily be accomplished by senior citizens/retirees. Ok ok... maybe not the hike up the 1000 feet Bt Teresek which is slightly more siong.
This was us at the top of Bt Teresek. It was a cloudy day hence we couldnt see the mountain range that host Gunung Tahan (Peninsula highest peak).

Surprisingly leeches were as scarce as mosquitoes. I saw 1 (one, satu, yi) lonesome leech on a rock inside the Bat Cave. Green and standing erect, it has its top end stretching, wiggling upwards, drawn towards heat generated by human body. Out of the 12 of us, only 1 fella got bitten. When asked how the bite felt, he wasn't very forthcoming, muttering something like "pain...", "itchy..."

I'm sure Lennon would approved of The Quest's cover of I'll Be Back, retitled in bahasa as Aku Kembali Lagi. This is cool vintage from 1967.

im dead beat. a few days of running around in KL and Taman Negara. as always on these travel writing assignments, theres always something awesome around the corner. i guess the trick is not to expect too much b4 going. some pics will follow later.
met joe kidd at The Green Man last sunday and we yakked till 3am. he started his own blog recently. theres a nice shot of his cats having makan in the kitchen. go look and be warmed.

I grew up in Tiong Bahru in those four storeys SIT flats. One of the favorite games us neigborhood kids were into was hide and seek. This would involve nearly all the kids living in Block 26 and 27. The usual number of players would be less than 10 of us, including the "pah-san" catcher. On weekends/public holidays, it'd balloon to 20 over participants. Imagine 1 poor fella having to catch 20 others! There were a few instances when the pah-san catcher were girls or the younger ones who were so exasperated they would burst into tears and storm off "WAH MAI SNG LIAO!" ("I don't play already" in hokkien). So somewhere along the way we changed the rules to having 2 pah-san catchers if there were over 20 of us.

One of the places we'd hide was at the ledge of the 2nd floor staircase. We'd listen to the footsteps of the catcher and just when he/she's about to look over, we'd jump off & land on the grass patch below and scuttle away. Once we saw one of the older boy did a jump from the 3rd floor. He became the hero, the Big Brother of the kids. Another fave hiding place was the drain. Sometimes it'd be clogged with water and mud but we were all scrummy dirty kids anyway & none of us want to the be the first one caught and be the pah-san catcher when the game restart.

Hide & Seek at nights were the best. Especially the days running up to the Mooncake Festival. Probably cos all the parents were in festive mood and were a little more lenient in allowing us out at night. Someone thought of a great hiding place... Up in the trees. It was almost perfect until one of the older guys told us stories about hantus hiding in the branches at night. No one climbed the trees for a while, deciding to stick to drains or jumping off the 2nd floor staircase ledges.

My dad took this. Cathay Building. I think its around 1957.


Eric loan me his eldest sister's vinyl collection. Amongst the lot was this gorgeous bahasa version of The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore performed by The Quests. This was released in 1967.

When my sister and I was moving house three years ago, we discovered boxes of black and white photos taken by our father when he was a teenager. We always knew from our aunt that our father's hobby was photography during his teens but has never seen his works from that period. We also found out he slowly gave it up after he got married, cos he was focusing all his time on providing for his family. Those boxes are an amazing discovery. I shall find time to look through and catalogue them properly. This is me when I was ... I have no idea how old i was.


Amongst the pile of Oddies bootlegs, the one recorded at The Substation 23rd Sept 1995 must be one of their best ever Oddies gig. The band was in their elements. I believe Johnny Ong just joined them on drums and provided that tightness the Oddies needed. I have been listening to it these past few days and im still amazed, especially Poison Air. This gig also had Leslie Low lending a hand on guitars.

pat n i have known each other for 16 years. we got to know each other through trading vinyls while we were still teenyboppers. in many ways we still are (pat would differ on that cos he sleeps early these days... WAHA). we have been thru a lot of gd times and bad times, drunken times too. yes... pat used to chug them vodka/whiskey/brandy/u name it like water! even though he's not a good drinker, he's a brave one. he's also the finest tunesmith i know. coupled with an honesty and dexterity for delivering them straight from the heart, he has crafted some of the most gut wrenching songs ever.

feb 1992 from left to right: pat, adrian (our old friend from the defunct Mortal Flowers), kris (the gawky fella from the defunct Nirvana) hanging out.


i cannot remember how the members of Song Of The Siren look like. nor their names. all i know was this cassette recording which was on rewind-play-rewind-play mode on my walkman (discman was exhorbitantly expensive then). Color Pill was recorded on a basic 4 track home equipment setup. its pure DIY. gorgeously unschooled, unmastered and blistering with no-fi. whats really cool about it is it does sound like the spirit of rock n roll.

Hope u all had a good CNY holiday. Catching up with old family ties is good. Unfortunately as we all know, more often than not there are too much bs involved during such affairs making them a tedious matter to be settled ASAP. Grab the angpow $, grin a lot, stay the minimum quota of 35 minutes, then run....
For the last few years, the only relative i visit is my father's first sister. My aunt who was a pillar of support to my siblings and i since our parents' death, has a wonderful family. Her husband is a kindly gentleman in retirement while their children, all adults now inherited the same kind of goodly quality from their parents.

At least once a month, my sister and i always make it a point to have dinner at my older brother's place. We always gluttoned it up and loosening my belt is a standard procedure after each feast. Reunion dinner has that extra special feel. Its probably cos my 2 little nephews get to sit and eat together with us at the same table. That's when the dinner table become a messy warzone of splattering sauce and flying rice ricocheting around. Their father would let them be, only intervening when they overstep certain perimeters of bad behavior. But he always does it gently but firmly.

Here is the younger of the 2. His name is Kit and he's sharing his biscuit with me.


Though i havent heard Ecrus Garage new material, i always like their early stuff. Watching one of their last gigs in 97 just before the bulk of them got drafted into ns, I remember talking to a despondent Feroz who was resigned to losing the band. This is track number 4 titled Isthmus Ivy. Taken off 'Sounds', which i believe is the one and only EP they released. I'm glad they are still soldiering on.