Our trip

Not at home at the moment. I am typing this in our luxurious and spacious hotel room in Kota Kinabalu, Le Meridien. We arrived this afternoon at 2.50pm. Left home this morning at 7.00am, its a long journey by car. We are all tired by now but its been good so far except for the obvious problem of our car almost 8 hours. But we reached Kota Kinabalu safe and sound, Alhamdulilah. Good thing is its a free internet connection here in the hotel. Gonna be here until thursday, we will leave tomorrow for our next hotel stay. This is gonna be busy and adventerous trip after all.

Gonna update more in my other blog with details of our journey and pictures. So i just stop here and now.

The Route of our daily commute.

Just want to share the journey we take every day getting to work. These are the tracks of our daily commute, approximately 100km one way. Leave home at around 5.45 am while the road is still deserted and the day is still dark.

I took this picture when we saw the moon was very bright at 5.45am in the morning. I've never seen a moon as bright as this before. Very beautiful.

We usually continue our journey while taking it easy and absorbing our surrounding. Here is when we reached the double lane Tutong Highway. Up to here the journey was usually smooth, no stress but it will be over soon when we reached the end of this road.

The one lane Telisai road begins. This is where the headache starts, every day. There are so many cars queueing. And its even worst if we are late, which we always try to avoid, considering the circumstances.

We reached Sungai Liang juncture. We were early and the police traffic still hasnt come otherwise here is where the long queue is. On some bad days, the queue will be until Sg Paku after Telisai. If we are early, it is not so bad.

The area where BMC is. The double lane starts again and we can have a sigh of relief.

The road along Lumut Bypass. If we are early no problem. Its smooth sailing. This road is good except for the absence of lighting. Its so dark at night and can be very dangerous. In fact this stretch of road has claimed so many lives. Day time no problem. Early in the morning is so peaceful and look at the clouds forming. Its different every day.

Almost reaching the Anduki juncture. Dangerous road where there is a U-turn where sometimes careless people just make a U-turn without thinking. Got to be careful.

Accidents are a common occurance if you travel long distance like we do.

Some road along the Anduki road is still under construction. It has been going on for a few months. They are widening the road. And this road is bumpy too. Hopefully they will be able to solve the bumpiness.

We have our very own Detour like in the Amazing Race! This is along Jalan Tengah where we have to have a detour to reach our office. They are repairing a bridge over there so we have to use Jalan Utara instead. It was chaos at first where all the cars have to use this road to go to Kuala Belait but its getting better these days. Discipline people!

We are almost reaching our office. This is along Jalan Utara near the Panaga Health Centre. You know where you are when you seen one of this! The nodding donkey, our oil and gas symbol.

The Panage Health Centre.

Our BSP Head Office surau. Its very near to our office built especially for BSP staff.

This is where we usually park our car. This is around 7pm when we reach our office. Alot of people already in but not from my department!

My office!!!... And no body here yet.

Usually i am the first to arrive and i live in Bandar almost 100km from here. The rest live around KB or Seria. How lucky they can leave home at 6.45am or something to reach office. Some even arrive around 8.00am!

Exercise

We went for jogging/brisk walking today. This was a much needed and long overdued exercise, at last we managed to squeeze some time to do this. Felt really good after that, it was a good half an hour, i was sweating profusely. Half and hour was not much but its a start. Wished i could do this more often. I badly need some good exercise. I am worried about my weight, although i maintain it and it stays like that for a few months but in fact i've gained all the 5 kg i lost one year ago. But for a reason that i dont want to mention here. Think i do need to lose that weight again gearing up for next year. We may want to do that again, the last try.

We arrived at Damuan at around 5pm and the place was already packed with people. We should have come earlier. At last we managed to get a spot to park when someone left. My girl suggested we should try Jerudong Park the next time we went jogging. Thats a good idea. Its nearer and more secluded.

The track for the jog. The weather was perfect but no wind. Everybody was doing their own things. We jogged for one round and a half. Thats good as a start. I havent been doing this for a few months so i wanted to take it slow.

The majestic Istana Nurul Iman greeted all the joggers. One cannot miss this lovely sight when jogging here. It does look magnificent from a far.

Got to take care of my health from now on i guess. I went for my blood test last thursday and now waiting for the result. Our daily ritual is taking this multivitamin, Vitamin C for our immune system and my blood pressure pills. I really feel i do need all these supplements as i dont think i am that healthy, though i dont feel sick or anything like that, its still good to take these.

We had my home-made sphagetti as breakfast this morning. A hearty meal definitely not good for dieters. Anyway, my plan was to take everything and eat anything during the weekend and i hope i can eat less during the week days. See if i can stick to that routine from now on. Will try to do more exercise too. Will update as i progress.

Excapade Sushi

One of our favourite restaurant to go to almost every week. Outing out is a norm with us and our very few choices is in Excapade Sushi, either in Kiulap, Gadong or KB. We always ended up here. I was not a big fan at first, but hubby insisted i should tried it out. I was actually not an adventerous eater but once I tried it i got hooked. The food was so yummy!!! My girl is now getting into it too. We look forward to our next visit already.

Ayang and my favourite. We seems never to get enough of this dish. Its the best sushi in the whole wide world.

Hubby's favourite, amongst other things in Excapade Sushi. He is the king of japanese food. I have my limit but he is limitless.. hehehe. He can't get enough of this too.

This is also Ayang and my favourite. Never missed it though its a bit expensive.

Our family favourite. We never miss this dish too when we came around.

This is not from Excapade but this is the best tom yum soup in town from another of our favourite eating joint. I never tasted tomyum as yummy as this one!

Guess where this restaurant is? This is the place where we get our best tomyum soup. Well one of their branches that is.


Wait till our next eating out!

Amazing Talent!

I am very impressed with the talent of this Brunei lady. I ever ordered her cup cakes, they were simply beautiful. And look at the rest of her creations. Hjh, i hope you dont mind me linking your website to mine. Very impressive.

The cup cakes we ordered for my girl's birthday.

http://sinahbisc.blogspot.com/

Busy busy busy

Its staff reporting and peformance assessment time!

Straining my eyes and cracking my head to support my 3 staff in the office. Its that time of year again. I need to write a good report for these people, they are counting on me, i know they have worked hard all yea, except maybe for one new guy who is still taking his sweet time to catch up with everyone. And since he is new i am not going to do the write up, might as well. Its all up to his old department.

Staff ranking is on friday so i am in for a battle. I want to give my staff a good feedback and will try to fight for them to have a good and decent performance points. These people are good at what they are doing, i cant expect more. I have to see their level as well so i guess their performances are acceptable. I wish they are more pro-active, eager to do more or sell themselves more rather than stuck on their chairs day in and day out. But hey... at that level, i dont think its fair for me to stress themselves too much.

I am also at the learning stage to become a good supervisor. I have 3 staff to look after. The real challenge is next year 2009 where i will be responsible from the very beginning. Need to come up with their tasks & targets, IDP and the whole expectations and KPIs thingy.

So its gonna be busy busy busy.

I guess i've done it all, i am being a mother at home and a supervisor at work, although for 3 staff only but still. Thats so much responsibilities but alhamdulilah so far i've done the best i can.

Its confirmed

We picked our new amah this weekend.

The current amah is on her way out of the door, and out of Brunei. Not that she is bad and cant do housework. But its more to her attitude. She should be more respectful and know her limit and boundries. I am not asking for her to behave like a slave but a little respect will do.

The new amah will be coming within the next month or so. We've chosen a woman called Kasiah. Out of all the biodatas we received thus far, this is the one we prefer most. She looked ok, clean face and wearing tudong. Not that it means anything since sometimes they were ASKED to wear tudong for camera. But we are following our instinct so i hope we are choosing the right one.

Of course its not easy to choose someone to work for you from a picture and a biodata. I wish we could see her face to face and conduct a bit of an interview. But its not practical to bring her over from Indonesia just to do this so we have to make do with the picture and biodata only.

We deposited the money yesterday to the employment agency, signed all the paperwork and decide on the tentative date of her arrival and the departure of the current amah. So all is good and in working order.

Went to Excapade for dinner last night, our usual favourite place to go Japanese. Hubby cant resist the special promotion of 30% discount for platinum card holder and i never say no to a good meal hehehe.... As usual Excapade's was packed but we still got a good table. So no problem there. I will upload some pictures later.

Dental & Massage

Today we went for my girl Ayang dental appointment. Well it was actually overdue, she should have gone in June but it dragged on until today. Simply because she was schooling all these time. We did go in June but we came just a few minutes late than the rest of the crowd and didnt get a number! Who would believe that the number of patients to be seen by the dentist only 30. If you came after no. 30 then tough luck. You had to come back some other time. Thats what happened to us, we just missed one number. We were supposed to be number 31 and 31 was not on their list so no number for us. Nothing we could do but went home. I supposed nothing we could do with this, the service was for free afterall so why should we complain? If you want a good service then go to the private dental clinic. It is as simple as that. The bottom line is we were late. People were queueing up from early in the morning, even before the clinic door was opened. But today we were lucky. Ayang got number 14 and we waited until 9.00am before she was let in and got her teeth checked. Very simple procedures, she had nothing to worry about. Her teeth was perfect, very good conditions, nothing need to be done except some cleaning. Then off we went. I am proud to say that Ayang has her perfect teeth, unlike me of course.

While waiting i couldnt help but noticed how depleted the heath clinic was. The ceiling was all torn and waiting to fall on people's heads. I am sure it leaked when it rained. And not one of the clocks were working and we were in a clinic! Somebody need to look at this plain and simple. The maintenance of this health clinic simply sucks. I wonder how the doctors feel working in this not so pleasant conditions? Or they just didnt care as well???

The health clinic we went to this morning...

I was so looking forward to my massage this afternoon. My shoulders were so painful. Today i had Rezza as my massage lady. She is a Filipinos and she was really good. I've been going to this massage centre for the past year and it was ok. I even started going for my facial.... I enjoyed the hot stone massage since it was really relaxing. The hot stones although uncomfortable since its hot but it did wonders to my muscles and joints. But it was spoilt towards the end of my massage when my left leg cramped. It was really painful and i hate it when it happened. It didnt usually happen during day time but it happened today. Rezza had to help me and she was really worried when her next customers already arrived. I tried to relax, though i was worried and in a lot of pain too, i had to pick up my girl from her ugama school. I hate that when it happened. I guess i need to check what triggers the cramp although i think mostly i had the wrong move.

Some pictures of where i go for my massages...

De Stress from inside...

The set up was ok, it was rather small but simple, nice and cozy..

After picking up Ayang from school we then visited my parents in Lambak. My brother was there with his new car. As usual always boosting about it, anyway, thats how he was so no comment. When they left, as usual again, my parents took us for dinner and this time we went to a restaurant i never been. The food was quite nice. Then we went home and call it a day...

Our dinner.

Amazing Race Asia Season 3

I may be old and a mother but i still have my own favourite tv program... One of them is TARA 3. Last night was the penultimate episode. Second from last episode, that is. This is one of my many bonding time with my girl. She looovesss the show too. She watches them every time it was on air. Once or twice is good enough for me but not her hahaha. We always wait for thursday night 9.00pm. I make sure nothing come my way, we finishes dinner and wait in front of the tv. Every week.

Last night, we knew who the top 3 finalist were. Very intense and very stressful indeed. One of the team didnt deserve to go into final when one of them gave up in the middle of the task. Didnt like that one bit. Thats Sam & Vince. Ida & Tania impressed me. They were tough old cookies. Ida was ok, i knew her from her films and she was one funny gal. I am ok and happy for them. Geoff and Tisha was so and so. I didnt like them much but ok didnt hate them either. They need to work on their relationship, especially after this TARA ordeal. It didnt look good, i dont know they still see each other now. Poor AD & Fuzzy resigned to their fate and being eliminated last night. Poor gals, they were tough broods but some where along the line, they couldnt take it anymore. It gutted me when Fuzzy had to do all the hardwork. Its been like that all along. I wonder why AD didnt want to do the tough task. In the end they suffered the consequences. Was Fuzzy trying to prove something/ That she can do it despite her size? Dunno.

The 3 final teams

Ida & Tania - Malaysia

Geoff and Tisha - Philippines

Sam & Vince - Hong Kong

What's up?

So what did we do this weekend?

As usual so many things lined up. On saturday we went to the amah agent to get some biodata. We were thinking of sending our current amah home early, maybe in December. Her contract will expire in March 2009 but i cant wait to let her go! The sooner the better. Its not that she didnt do her work properly but there were a few things that i am not so happy about her. For one, she was the kind who also speak up to me. Always has something to say if i say something to her. If i am not happy with her then she will reply back. I believe in people who gives respect and she lacks that. She doesnt always listen to me, and i keep on reminding her all the time about certain things. The list goes on and on. So we got to know this amah agent from the paper and decided to give her a visit. Her office in Melabau Complex and she showed us about 4 biodatas. But unfortunately none gives... We were looking for someone age around 20+. I prefer this age for a few reasons. Our current amah is 30+ and she always acts as if she is the madam of the house and i dont like that one bit! So looks like we have to keep looking. Or we can live without an amah? Not an option right now i am afraid. Nobody will be at home with Ayang when we both are at work and thats the problem.

Anyway, then we went to Nissan showroom and checked on this new car. Very sleek and nice. Nissan Murano, it has all the right category and the right specs. I kind of like the car. It costs B$58,700. Not too bad. We expected it to be around 60 - 70k. Even the recon costs around B$50k so this is a good deal. Very powerful car too, 3,500 cc with 18inch tyres. Not that we wanted to buy it... We prefer diesel car according to our nature of job and life styles at the moment but at least we get to know it close and personal.

Sunday as usual another outing, to the Mall again. Ayang was invited by her BFF Nonie for her birthday party at the West Street Cafe the Mall. So we sent her there and hang around while we waited for her. Hubby went to the apple shop again and looked for the Ipod Touch. Still looked cool and we were still impressed. But not going to buy it! We passed that age i guess where you have to get what you saw. Not anymore. We were becoming more sensible i think. Buy only what you need and not what you want!


We hang around the mall doing nothing. It was packed as usual. Its like this every week. There was electronic of some sort exhibition today so it was really busy and noisy. Lucky draw and some entertainment on stage. But we were not part of the crowd.



So tired wandering around and ended up at Swensen. And i had my coffee again. We were actually very full so we just ordered that, hubby opted for a tomato soup. Its not too bad actually.

My coffee..

Thats my weekend. We went home around 4.30pm with Ayang happy meeting her BFF. It was alright weekend. Its always better to be at home with family and watched tv. We also found out today the Bali Bombers had been executed by firing squard. Its all over the tv. I am not into capital punishment but those people had done the extreme. Well, i am not going into details for now. Dont want to spoil my appetite for dinner tonight. And I have some doughnut from Fun Doughnuts waiting for me....

Obama Wins!

Congratulations to Barack Obama for winning the election and becoming the next 44th president of USA. Very historic moment for the whole of America, the first black president. Thats about 120 years after black people were eligible to vote in the US election. This is a win for all black people i guess. So lets hope for the best to the American people.

He is definitely a new future to all the black people in America. The vote was like 95% were from black and only 5% of all black people voted for McCain. Even the white voted for Obama, the ratio was like 57% of white voted for McCain and 43% went to Obama. Most of the young people also voted for Obama, looked like he is very popular. Basically, overall popular vote was 52.3% for Obama and 46.4% for McCain. Well done!

I guess Obama is now in for a lot of hard work ahead of him, everyone expects him to do well, very high expectation i am sure. So all the best to him.

Short Gateaway

Just a quick update on what we did yesterday and today. It was fun, awesome short gateaway. First we went to a colleague bertahlil ceremony then we went off to Miri. Hubby was sent for a course in Miri for a week so my girl and i accompanied him for the weekend and we went back home today while he stayed. Its short notice but thats the beauty of having a small family, we can just hopped into our car and went away without having to consider too much of anything. My girl has started her school holiday anyway so there was nothing to worry about.

We stayed in Marriott Hotel and Spa. Very lovely, love the setting although the services were a bit slow. But this is just a short stay so we didnt want to argue too much.

The lobby was spacious. We stayed here previously so we were not that surprise of course but its still nice to be greeted with an auspicious space.

This is our room. Its very nice, the setting was lovely and we enjoyed our stay. Need to check with hubby what is this hotel rated. Its fully equipped, every thing you need in a hotel and more. I should have downloaded one thing that most hotel didnt have. A torch light! We have been to so many hotels and its fun to discover whats unique about each hotel. We encountered things like umbrella, sejadah and alot more.

A scene from the swimming pool. The pool was quite big and on sunday there were lots of people. But today at the pool it was deserted so we went again for an hour dip while hubby attended his workshop.

Havent been in a swimming pool for a long time so yesterday i did get into to the pool. Only after persistent persuasion from my girl of course. She loved swimming and this is one of the reason why we went!

We had a lovely time at the pool. We had fun. After swimming we then went to have buffet dinner at the Zest, Marriott Hotel. The food was typical buffet food and it costed us RM70.00 each.

And now we are safely back in our home, and i am exhausted so i am gonna stop here. It was a long drive for me without hubby. I spent about 3 hours on the road from Miri to Bandar. Tomorrow is another day at work and need to attend to some serious business with the boss and my staff. At least my girl didnt have to go to school tomorrow so she can have a good rest. Its really exhausting but fun weekend. Thanks hubby for taking us!!!

The weekend.

Saturday is here again and as usual its off work and we decided to go to the mall. My girl needs new bedsheet. Her beautiful bedsheet has came to the end of its life cycle so i guess its time for a new one. So off we went to the mall.

The weather threatened to rain but it didnt rain afterall.

We arrived at the mall at around 10.15am and the area was already jam-packed. I wonder when is the time when this place is deserted?

We were on our way to the bedsheet shop.

This is the place we found the nice bedsheet for teenagers and small kids. They really had good ones but the staff were not so friendly or helpful. We were left on our own most of the time but i guess it was ok, would prefer that than them following us around.

Found what we want then off we went to have lunch at Pizza Hut. We decided to go western today. So we had mushroom soup with garlic bread with Chicken Club Pizza. It was yummy.

The Chicken Club Pizza.... Not bad.

My favourite drink, the ice blended capucinno. It was really nice but cant have this too often or i might gain some more weight (as if i havent hehehe).

We then went round the mall and as a mother i couldnt resist to go to the grocery store and buy some groceries. Today i was looking for low fat milk and butter. I was planning to bake some scones later today. I guess its part of me to think of this thing, think of what to cook for my family of course. This thing need planning so my mind is always spinning on what things i need at home for later.

At the wet market of Grand Utam, we met this gigantic fish. It was really huge. So we didnt want to miss taking picture of it..

We also went to the computer shop which sells Apple computer. And something caught my eyes and i become very fond of it. A new gadget in town, its so beautiful, its gorgeous and sleek and sofisticated. And I love it. Ayang even likes it so its now on the list!

The item is.... Ipod Touch! See if i can find a picture of it in a bit...