Trip to UK: Spring in Swindon

My trip to UK has finally come to an end after two weeks of fun and exciting yet rather tiring exploration.

The solo journey started in Swindon, a scenic town of Wiltshire. It was the beginning of spring this time around. I am happy to see little green leaves slowly sprouting through the naked tree while bright colorful flowers are blooming wildly almost everywhere. Even the birds are chirping happily too.

The weather during my two weeks in this stranger country was lovely. The sun is always out playing while the cold breeze joins in to just balance up the temperature.

On my first day of arrival, I decided to explore this little town on-foot. I got myself a free little map from my hotel reception, then head-on to one of the famous shopping center, Swindon Designer Outlet three miles away from where my hotel located. I have to admit that walking at this distant is not something I would do back at home country but with such a nice weather and a new place to explore; it would be a total waste if I did not give it a try. I am glad that I had this walk as it was an astonishing walk through the residential areas, parks and churches surrounded with daffodils and wild flowers blossoming at almost every corner.

The one thing that I noticed most of Swindon is the amount of roundabouts that they have, either big or small. It is as though they are in-love with roundabouts. The one roundabout that stands out among the rest is of course the famous roundabouts named Magic Roundabout. This roundabout gained the magical title because of its uniqueness for having 5 mini-roundabouts circling one big roundabout. Madness! I stood by the roundabout to observe, but still not able to figure how the actual flow works. So I gave up. I suppose just like the locals said when driving through this unique roundabout, “Just close your eyes and hope for the best”. Fascinating isn’t it?

My days in this peaceful little town ended with perfect orange sky and sore feet *grin*

Flickr Photo Featured in Other's Website

I was browsing through the Internet search engine and was surprised to stumbled to the below websites.

So what's with these websites? Well, probably it's not something to really go hu-ha all about, but I guess it does consider something big to me. My Flickr photos are featured in three different websites and I did not realized till I was going through the search engine.

First site is in the official Atomium's website http://www.atomium.be/Photos.aspx

A picture of my visit to Atomium in Brussels, Belgium was chosen to be part of newly setup website.

Second is some of the pictures from my recent visit to Hat Yai, Thailand. I came to realized there is a website featuring my flickr picture.

http://www.thailander.com/thailandpictures/boat_trip_by_floating_market_hatyai_flickr_image_by_aliza_tan/

Last but not least, is a picture of my home-made wedding topper of a bride and groom sitting on a 3-tier cupcakes stand.
http://customcaketoppers.net/page/2/

Yaay! I am all excited about it!

CNY 3D2N Trip to Hatyai: First day

CNY this year is celebrated in Hatyai.

That is right! The whole family left for Hatyai on the new year morning but of course after we distributed ang pows to those that are still single. The journey up north was rather smooth, probably many still celebrating ther first day of lunar at home. By the time we arrived our hotel in Hatyai, it was already noon in Thai local time. Immediately we check-in to our rooms and out again to start hunting for foods as everyone were pretty much hungry after a light breakfast at home earlier.

My first stop obviously and a-must to have is the coconut ice-cream! It has sticky rice, sweet potatoes and peanuts. One cup is never enough for me….yumms!

Ice-cream seller

After lunch, we went on for little walk around the town area before we head on to Klonghae Floating Market for sightseeing. Little that we know, the Floating Market is full of stalls and boats selling many types of foods at reasonable price.

Mugs to go with drinks 

(selling at THB20 for small, THB25 for medium)

Rows of boats selling many types of foods

Foods on boat

Lady on boat

Colorful foods

The first stall that attracted our attention is the many types of fried worms, grasshopper and other exotic foods. Being curious, Uncle bought a packet with mixture of 3 sizes worms at THB20. Not wanting to miss out the fun, of course I gave a bite to the smallest worm. Well, the taste not as bad as I thought it would be, but I doubt that I will give another try again. *LOL*

 Dare for a try?

Large worms

What we bought for THB20

As we walk further, we discovered more exotic foods and some real tasty foods. My new found favorite food is called Yam Ya Ma Ma (or that how it should at least sound in Thai). It is a bowl of seafood noodle with extreme tangy and spicy soup. Thinking of it now makes me salivate.

Ants larvae - one that we dare not try

Super delicious Yam Ya Ma Ma

Feeling hot and sweaty, we decided to take a boat ride at THB20  per person for a trip along the river. Just look at the beautiful scenery offered to us!

Great view from boat ride

Reflection

The view is simply breathtaking

An elderly is trying to catch fish but stopped to wave at us

Our first day in Hatyai ended with one last place, Night Market. We practically bought nothing much except for more Yam Ya Tung Sen (glass noodle).

Night market foods

Night market shopping

Return to yesteryears: Batu Gajah (part 2)

After the first visit, I was somehow fascinated with the calm and cooling surroundings of Batu Gajah. With the weather around CNY month goes up to the extreme and unbearable (well, at least that’s what I felt), I knew this is just the right place to be.

I persuaded my parents and a cousin to join me for a plunge into the cooling water whiles the sun still burning hot. My mom cooked some instant meals for us to feast over there and off we went. 

Plenty of flora and fauna

Wild flowers

White rounded brinjals

Ahhh…..now this is what I call heaven!

CNY 2010: A Day Away

Chinese New Year is just a day away. Like many years before, CNY is always about gatherings, celebrations and foods; and there is no exceptional for this year too.

This will be my second year to spend CNY at my in-laws and this is also the second time I will celebrate CNY at a neighboring country, Thailand. Yes, the whole family will be going to HatYai for a 3 days 2 nights trip. No doubt I am pretty excited with the trip, but I will definitely missed the gatherings (which normally happen on the 2nd day of CNY) at my mom's eldest sister place.

Though we won't be home for another 3-4 days, I thought it would still be nice to decorate our space with some CNY stuffs. After all, CNY is a celebration of 15 days.

Here, a little corner of our room is decorated with oranges or known as 'kam' in Cantonese which  actually represent 'gold'. This with hope that it will always bring us abundance fortune and wealth throughout the year(s).

What is CNY if without any CNY plant?

 

Happy Chinese New Year and Gong Xi Fa Cai!!

Return to yesteryears: Batu Gajah

I return to the place where as a child, I would spend most of my evenings there with my two elder brothers and a bunch of friends from the same neighborhood.

Locally known as Batu Gajah, our so-called playground is within the jungle forest of Tanjung Bunga. A 10-minutes walk from our home would lead us to a very shady area by the hilly rocks and a chilly stream at almost 6-ft deep. Of course, there was a shallow area for a young child like me (then) to play around too *grin*

Looking back, I could not recall how we ever plan of the meet up time, but somehow or rather we would end up in a large group leading to the same direction. Perhaps I was too young to remember all that. But I certainly recall clearly that almost every evening with the sun still shining on us, we would plunge into the chilly stream to cool down. The place is secluded with no one else is there to bug us (except of mosquitoes!).

When I went back to the same place after around 15 years later, the place has changed tremendously lot. The stream is no longer 6-ft deep and not as shady as before but I all can say is that this place is still a serene place to just unwind and cool down. The hilly rocks still remains the same just the stream is now merely 3-ft deep.

Standing there brings me back to my childhood times when there were no worries and all we do is just have fun and play all night long! We owned no computers, hand phones or any high-tech gadgets, but we had lots of fun times exploring the nature!

Some of the pictures taken from my recent visit...