Hey guys. Welcome back to my blog. I went to Macau the other day and mann was it packed! Anyhow it was a very short trip compared to the whole grand scheme of things (I was on sorta working trip to Hong Kong)
So I started out the day by visiting a statue near my hotel and then proceeded to take the bus to senado square. Sounds straight forward enough right? Nope!! Gotta prepare coins and also get dropped off somewhere else and being told yes this is senado square.
Anyhow, it wasnt that far off a walk but we walked for about 10 minutes to Senado square and BAM! It was freaking full of people!...
Should've expected that but oh well. Anyhow from there just follow the road and the crowd and keep heading up to the ruins of St. Paul. Along the way there will be lots to see like an old church and shops and old portugese buildings built backthen when the portugese managed the place.
At the end you will find the ruins and just a climb up to see it and all there is to be shown!
Where is Lombok.. thats the typical question. I actually would've asked the same question had it not been for the fact that my mom just came back from the said island a few months before.
Anyhow, as usual with trips, my story usually starts with a friend going " Hey we should go on a trip!" and as they say, history happened.
So, following that suggestion, we all decided on an island getaway, and being in Kuala Lumpur we were spoilt for choice and had the options for the numerous number of islands to go to. My friend Cheryl insisted on Lombok and I was quite hesitant about it as my mom's review of the place was quite dismal from the sites, the food and otherwise.
So I didnt hope for much but we made our bookings and arrangements and the usual research on things. As the date for departure got closer, the excitement grew stronger.
Accomodations!
When we made our bookings, this excitement was compounded by our booking of our accomodations. The booking process was semi-scientific in nature and racist too (Really!). This is because instead of stars, we relied on user reviews and instead of general user reviews we discarded the Ang Moh's (Westerner's) reviews and relied on our countrymen and singaporeans to give a more honest review from an asian perspective. This is mainly due to the fact that we know our countrymen will have higher standards and not be wow-ed simply by a view and if we say the food is good, you can trust us, THE FOOD IS GOOD.
So I made several vlogs for our entire trip there. I will be sharing the videos of the trip and I will be splitting this post into several posts due to the numerous amounts of things happening a the same time there.
Lombok Trip 1- Going on Flight to Lombok and Lombok Jetty. Lombok Trip 2- Using horsecart for transport and Aston Sunset Beach Resort Gili Trawangan Lombok Trip 3- Snorkelling in Gili Trawangan Lombok Trip 4- Pizza time in Gili Trawangan Lombok Trip 5- The Swings In Gili Trawangan Lombok Trip 6- The waterfalls in Lombok Island.
Getting There!
We booked our flight through Air Asia and the good part about this trip was the direct flight from Kuala Lumpur to Lombok without any connections. The flight was great as usual.
We had some McD before the flight and headed off to the departure halls. The one thing that peeves me about Air Asia though, it seems like ALL my flights are departing from the gates allll the way at the end of the terminal. If you have never been to KLIA 2, you guys should know that its A HUGE airport with long terminals. Right now they are trying to rectify that with walkalators but for now theres still a huge pain in the leg if you are rushing.
Now arriving in Lombok, the airport is not too small but still, when you disembark it is just mere footsteps to the immigration counter and then you are effectively out of the airport. So when we got out of the airport, we bought simcards for each of us and called our driver.
Driver
I digress a bit here. For places like Lombok and Bali, unless you are really familiar with the roads there, I don't recommend for you to drive yourself as the roads are of the obscure kind and provides little in terms of familiarity to point you to get to where you want to. So unless you are good at navigation, I recommend to get a driver to do the leg work for you. Plus, they will be of great help when you plan and negotiate.
Sim Card. Upon arrival at the
airport and upon exiting the arrival hall there were some vendors selling us
sim cards. Depending on the service provide you have back in your home country,
it might be cheaper to pick up sim cards upon arrival or pick up a wifi
transmitter rental from home. So go do your checking beforehand.
Anyhow upon arrival we
found the vendors and each of us bought one sim card which gave us around 4 GB
for 7 days for about IDR60,000 (RM 20 at that time). This was great as we used
it to liase and talk to each other since some of us had different rooms and
another group arrived separately.
So since we got our
simcards and almost immediately had internet connection (yeay civilization!) we
proceeded to call our driver and arranged the pickup.
From Airport to the
Barn (aka Bangsal) At the airport the
security was pretty tight. The security looked like soldiers and they put up a
barrier about 5 meters from the door and only those who worked at the airport
or were flying off were allowed in. There also had a crowd that had assembled
consisting of other drivers, touts and taxi drivers I think. If they ask, just
say politely that you have a driver or negotiate with them.
So once we met up with
our driver, we headed off towards the ferry terminal and first thing we all
thought about was FOOD.........
So our driver
graciously brought us to go eat at a restaurant named Taliwang Raya.For those who are not acquainted, Taliwang is
the famous dish common in Lombok made by the Sasak people. It consists of
chicken thats grilled halfway and then added the chillies and then fried which
seals the flavour on the chicken.
Lunch
So the restaurant was
placed in the middle of a paddyfield and is simply gorgeous. Blue skies all
around simply picturesque.
The restaurant
Lunch
One thing I must say
though, the paddyfields in Lombok is slightly different. it tends to have more
trees surrounding the paddy field.
Paddy fields in Lombok
After we ate we got
back on the car and drove off to Bangsal. The overall drive took us about 2-3
hrs so be prepared to sleep see the sights along the way.
Now I did plenty
of research before heading there. So I was informed that at bangsal there will
be a few different types of boats available. One was the public boat, another
was the fast boat and the last was fast boat.
Now for the Public
Boat, it costs VERY CHEAP but you are subjected to riding with other locals together with their wares that they carry to the island. This means that you are in it together with the veggies and the groceries. The next one is fast boat and speed boat. When you reach bangsal you should head to the white building. Inside there you can get tickets and then be on your merry way. We bought tickets for the public boat which costs about RM 6 if I am not wrong but they tried to push us towards the speedboat and fast boat. Further they lied to us saying the next boat was at 6 pm (it was around 2-3pm then). What happens is that the public boat needs to get 30 people and then you can go. You will be able to tell whether that will be awhile or not by the number on the ticket. When we got ours it was number 20-ish and so we didnt have a long wait. Traveller Tip :
Wear flip flops
Wear shorts
Prepare to get wet to get on and off the public boat. (There is no jetty and you get off the boat at the beach).
Now I end my post here but you can watch the video above for more vlogs on the trip. Should you have any comments or questions, please feel free to comment and should you want more videos, please subscribe for more.
Today I enlisted the services of an air conditioning servicing company. Its a general job that was mainly for cleaning and to see whether anything was loose as I heard some vibrations coming from the compressor unit.
At the end of the service, the serviceman passed me the service record which included the speed of the blower, the voltage, the gas pressure etc to show the difference between before and after the service. Fair enough I thought. But then he said you can use that for future service if you wish, you don't have to take with me but then if you want to you can use that as a reference.
I was slightly taken aback, I know in all honesty you might think I might take someone else just cause I want to try something else. But why? Why would you denigrate your service to immediately think that I might not take your service? You were honest, you did great service and you do more than most service men I know. Why would I not use your service? Anyhow.. Musings... What do you guys think?
Was watching Sirens just now and they were on about ICE (In Case of Emergency) contacts. I guess I am lucky to have my mom around that makes it easier. But who would be next? Friends, family or loved one? Would I want to trouble the family or have a loyal friend or someone who loves me to have in contact. Would they contact my friends or family or would I be left alone... something to ponder on.
I keep on hearing that. Video is the new form of media, the second largest search engine is Youtube and as such everyone should move towards video. I have embraced that and made my own. But I feel that its actually waaaay harder to make videos as the general downtime is very time consuming and tedious. A general video for me would be like this :
a) Number of hours or recorded content = Number of hours spent watching and reviewing the feel of the videos.
b) Cutting videos to keep the good parts of the content = A + (1-2 hours of editing)
c) Adding on transitions and songs and effects and re-reviewing shot and cutting down shots to make it shorter ) = 1- 2 hours
d) Rendering the videos = 20-45 minutes
e) Publishing = 20 minutes
So basically it takes a lot of your time to do 1 video. I have up to now uploaded about 52 videos on youtube and some have gotten alot of views and some havent. I am still trying to learn the finer science of it all but it can get sad seeing little to no views on the videos you spent hours to make.
Anyhow, I plan to expand my videos. I have been doing vlogs and travel recordings and its all great but I think I miss out on the opportunity to tell the whole story, the ins and outs. The things to be aware, the nitty gritty of it which if I included it all (and remember to re-state it) would make the video 2 hours long. Lol
Anyhow I am trying to figure out how long best to edit my videos. I am thinking 8 minutes would be best with a spillover to 10. Anything beyond that is boring to other people. What do you guys think?
Welcome to my blog. I am resurrecting my blogging abilities to try and capture more of my works on the literal world and to allow a further expansion on my creative skills.
I used to blog at immymumbles.blogspot.com and that has not been updated for years. I hope to be able to regularly and continuously blog and share with you my experiences and happenings in my life and onwards!
I am also now trying my hands at video editing and will time to time post my vlogs here to share with everyone. So lets get on it!
