This had been the most challenging, most tiring, most shag, most miss home, most 迷失自己 yet most eye opening, most gained mentally and spiritually, most 找回自己 backpacking trip. One word to describe it: peer-less.
Start
The whole trip started off with the cheapskate gang wanting to save on 400 bucks so we landed in Nairobi, Kenya instead of going straight into Tanzania, and at the same time favourable because my xiao gu happened to be studying psychology in university in nairobi, and because of her participation in church activities there, she is in charge of a large compound which was luckily empty on the nights that we stayed in. So everything in the world lined up properly for us to land in nairobi.
Just to note, the flight from Singapore to Doha was the MOST CHILDISH airline!!! of course having seating arrangements that is in columns instead of rows did not help very much. i was asked to change my seat so that an angmo couple can sit together, and in so doing was sitting in close proximity to AML cripz. Waha!
Doha is an experience which shall be elaborated later.
Nairobi
Nairobi is quite a scary place. Heard that there's alot of robbery. Please do not travel outside after sunset. Nothing bad happened to us, we were really careful. Every landed property is heavily fenced and barbwired and has security with gun! this includes the foryu chinese restaurant. Wow. Well. We did not really go see the slums, only the richer parts of nairobi, and went to the supermarket and places that expats go. Well. Expensive. Hm. Its nice of xiao gu to accomodate us, and she is really a very good host, I dont host well, need to learn more.
Moshi
Epic bus ride that lasted 10 hours. In this trip the word epic will be used many many times, many many times. Hurhur. come some pics.
Nothing much to say about this bus ride, jus that when u get into tanzania u can feel the difference, the massai pple start coming out in bunches hahaha. Massai training school. hahaha.
Moshi is this small place that is near kilimanjaro, the roof of africa. This, together with Arusha, are two sites where people attack kili from. Haha. We stayed in buffalo hotel in Moshi, and we patronise the indo-italian restaurant opposite every night, nice pizza and nice spags, and nice everything, happy. The mama shop opposite buffalo should be in lonely planet oso, just to make the experience complete. Buffalo was quite an experience, loads of mites and insects, first time i used mosquito net, hahaha. Breakfast was another poleh poleh experience. And ofcus, the black face. waha.
Later we went to eat local foods with the guides, ugali was stopped at 2nd try, there's a chagas' dish that make use of unriped banana, this is very interesting dish, and very nice diblo dish later. hahahaha.
Kili
This is kilimanjaro, dun really think it shows the peak that we wanted to attack, but get a few of the iceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...this picture was taken at the shira camp. We took a 7 day machame route, which makes us much better in acclimatization to get to the peak. Well. i din lah. Haha. The route towards machame camp = SHAG! its mainly rainforest. yep. u jus keep walking, keep walking, keep walking, then there's this clearing area......and a sign that says no smoking..and turn a round and yea its the camp. Haha. SHAG.
The second camp is called Shira camp. I can only describe walking there in one word = SHAG. I cant remember much about walking there, besides...its jus alot of stones..kinda little vegetation..everywhere is everlasting love..SHAG..
the look of clouds from shira camp. hahahaha!
Then its SHAG time! After breakfast in shira camp, we went for a long walk..walk..walk..walk..walk..walk..everlasting love..walk..walk..walk..walk..翻越了千山万水, 我也要找到你呀。。。then after tt some of us decided to attack the lava tower..wahhhhh..wahhhh..wahhhh..wahhhh..wahhhh..ok walk upwards is someday will reach there..wads after tt is most exciting!!..we started to follow this trail of water downwards..jump! jump! jump! jump! jump! later we realised..we were jumping down along a waterfall..wahbiangzzzzzzzzzzzz!!:) Then we finally reached Barangu camp.
After breakfast is even more exciting!! Cos we attacked the breakfast wall!! this was when it really really felt like mountain climbing..i was kinda happy tt i had some mountain climbing exp in RI..but regretted not doing more..well..this is the REAL fun..hahaha jus imagine your eyes looking at the only place where u can step..if u cant step on it, then thats it..and if u look at the other places..tts the end..only 1 step at a time..tts how FUN it is! haha lucky i din die. bleagh.
then after that much more walking along the moon-like surface..walk walk walk walk finally we reached THE BARAFU camp..where the wind blows like freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee..Its damn cold..damn windy (we were eating in the tent and the tent was almost blown away)..and i vomitted like freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee..wah i nv had my stomach churn and squeeze every single drop of hcl out before..SHAG FUCK!
2am at BARAFU camp, we started on the journey to attack the peak.
Reached stella point at around 1130, by that time the other guys were already attacking Uhuru peak..so din go with them..well..its alright..cos after that is really WTF.
为什么没有人跟我说下山比上山难?!?!?!?!
I think its just because i got too shagged out from climbing up..and my body totally broke down after coming down..bleagh..
Serengeti
Serengeti in swahili means "endless plains"..indeed..after hanging out 3 days in it..we only managed to cover a small area only..indeed endless..the timing that we visit is one of the most boring seasons..not only there's v little tourist around..there's v little movement around..but thanks to good grace we managed to see all the big 5s!:)
Well jus in case you din noe wads the big 5..they are namely..leopard/cheetah, lion, water buffalo, elephant, rhino!!:) haha! Other things we saw are namely giraffes, gazelle, impalas, wilderbeast, mehmehs etc etc etc....and honeymoon lions ROAR!!
Ngorongoro crater
Ngorongoro crater is this roundish crater that was formed after the eruption of a mountain that was thought to be greater than kilimanjaro..it is really a 世外桃园, 人间仙境。 damn good. damn good. animals that come in forgot about going out. plants that come in. thrive. i finally got to understand wad it means by 桃花源。
Subsequently we went to Lake Maryana, wahlan eh the van got stuck. it got stuck. stuck. stuck in a mud pool that was deceptively shallow. well. luckily got fwenly pple driving van to help us pull our van out of deep shit. its really deep shit. hehe.
can u see the change in color in distance..thats the lake extending into infinity..终于和天在地平线交会。
ohohoh..running hippo is one of the most cute things on earth. thats assuming they are running away from you in a distance. well. most scary if its running towards u. Hohoho.
during the trip..i alws wonder why the clouds in africa seems to be more lazy than usual..look at them..they seem to be lingering at a lower altitude than those in singapore..and they linger so lazily..so lazily..poleh poleh..there's no rush in afrika!
Zanzibar
Wah the ship ride to zanzibar island cos 70USD!!! CHOR++++..but i dun regret going..hahaha we went to stay in kendwa..and it really ROCKS! jus that the weather is abit the chuis..
kendwa waters are quite good..but qy says that philipines are better..and cheaper..ofcus..hahaha snorkelling was a good experience..and we saw dolphins! whee!!!
Rest of the trip
In between the many places we shuttle using buses, which are bearable yet unbearable sometimes. there's alws a constant need to hide myself away from the sun to prevent sunburnt. and some of the movies shown along the way really make me laugh. like. not farnie. haha. movies like yellow banana expectation (with the ultra violent rays) and point of no return 2..really hilarious. wow.
doha is just nothing much to do there. ha.
the food in africa is rather interesting. ugali is made of corn flour and is this thing that resembles our satay rice..makes u very very full..comes with nice sauce tho..but i dun really fancy it..there's oso rice..and bread..and this chagas' food which they use unriped banana which i had a hand in trying to peel it..haha qt hard..but interesting..shld haf tou shi abit from diblo..the last night dinner was superb!
during this trip..i also thought about alot of things..i thot about the past relationship..which is already so distant so far..i thot about my ambition..which is on the way of brewing..i thot about my life..which can definitely be better..and i thot about the next 5 years..and settled it..:)
All in all, trip to africa had been a great eye opener..and i did things that i never had imagined myself doing..and dun really imagine i will be doing them in the future..haha..which is good issnt it? for now.:)
Full of mayday in my trip!:)
Cheers!
Yang
right from the start
At this point in time..i wld like to bring time back to the very start of the trip..even before the trip was planned..even before the pple visioned the trip..when i started earning the money that i spent for the trip..for this 3 wks..i spent almost 5.3k sing..this is a very large sum of money to me and i am totally broke now..but i wld jus like to say a very big thank you..even if you dunno its you..thank you to you for directly and indirectly make this trip ever possible..if not becos of you..your help, your encouragement, your understanding, your presence, your support, your scoldings, your love and your leaving..i wld haf not been able to soar..
and jus something that i had wanted to blog but leave it till the end. well. i realised for the first time in my life during this trip that i nid someone to control me..there were 2 significant fwens in my life who had made great difference in my life..and both had scolded me for some reason or another all my foolishness..well..i had more good fwens..but jus these two who really made deep impression in me.............i wonder...
In the continuous bid to find out the answer to the greatest question in my life, I had been thinking. Thanking about nothing. So I get no answer. It seems this is really why. As spoken by Jolin.
I had always be wrong. I had always been deficient. Its not good enough to be me. Its not good enough to be myself. Its not good enough to be there. It is about taking over.
I reached home at 10pm today. I left home at 6.30am and last night I only slept at 1am becos my computer asked me to do so. Well. I studied in school, ate my bento cold noodle which was not enuff for lunch, then went to do the FUN simulation thingy. ohwell. after which i went to run 7.4km around NUS up the hill and down the slope. Well. Then i rushed for tuition and ended up still haven eat my dinner now. Tough.
Argh. Not the worst tt i had experienced. At least today i can do a mind over body and get things done.
ok there is no doubt that wen bie lyrics has not much meanings. hurhur.
The other day was Jacky Cheung's birthday. 48th birthday leh! haha ofcus immediately i sms-ed ryan to wish him happy birthday. Haha. As usual old joke from the past but seriously ryan is damn ge shen! haha. and 933 morning show played this song to celebrate his birthday..
of course this is not for ryan. haha cheesy lyrics! but nice i guess?
well finally mars has left me ever since yesterday and not coming backa anytime soon. This past month had been a great mth with lotsa things coking up and lotsa anger thrown at other pple. Thanks so much to the people who are immediate around me for being understanding and acknowledging that this is a shitty time for me. Lotsa household issues settled too! HOPEFULLY! ok today is a new day of the shitty days yet to come! hahaha m5 mah ofcus must work hard cant slack.
I realised. There's alot of stuffs tt i never realise. Either becos im stupid or nobody had ever revealed them to me. Its always abt taking risk. and risk is probability complicated by how much u can afford to lose. and ofcus, luck, which is always so obvious. Haha. I dunno wad im toking about again. I think i can classify this under random words. Hm. had been trying to re-vamp my labels thingy but its so hard. Cos when i read my old post i oso dun understand wads going on. Ok this paragraph is about mahjong. The last paragraph is about horoscope. And the rest is for ryan.
wah shit im qt pissed off..cos i jus typed alot of things and they r gone..tmd stupid IE..ok i noe i shldnt use IE anymore its so unrealiable..but wadeva.
okok so i wanted to tell about wad i was really thinking for the last paragraph..basically i was playing mahjong..then in the last bei feng bei i wanted to diao zeng qt badly cos i had been losing money..so wad happened is tt i haf 2 tais by flowers alr..and i was closing with a chou pin hu waiting for either of 2 cards to complete the game..this was in v early part of the game..so i waited and waited and waited and waitedx10000 for the cows come home..but in the end someone else won..like..the question is..when do u decide to discard the comfort zone and do something different?
i guess wads wrong is jus my stupid delusion of comfort zone as well as suayness..well..as wad most pple will tell u..the right card will bound to come after u discard away ur tiles..well..tts true..very true..almost 100% sure..but..tt shldnt be the reason why we dun discard the tiles..so after a long winded discusssion jus now which was deleted..ive come up with the following conclusions..
to win..is the only real comfort zone..having the perfect game in a perfect situation waiting for 2 tiles to win chou pin hu is jus as good as waiting for 1 tile is just as good as not waiting for any tiles to win..ok lah slightly better abit..but not deemed comfortable at all..all these situations demands us to be as vigilant..as tactical to evaluate everything and weigh the risks..so having the perfect situation doesnt mean we can jus sit and wait..hahaha sit and wait is the perfect formula for losing issnt it?
so for my case..cos its still early in the round..so mebbe after waiting for 4-5 turns of picking cards..and if i dun hu..i shld start considering changing tiles..cos this meant tt i had 4 chances of zi mo..and 12 chances of someone fang pao..if by now i havent win..it jus means tt the cards are very dear to my fwens..so i shldnt and wldnt and cldnt snatch them from them rite! hahahaha! yet! i shld consider the risks of throwing my tiles out to change..lest change tile to win becomes a fang pao..wah then damn sian diao..hahaha
so after weighing all the risks..then we can decide whether to throw..or to carry on waiting..at the end of the day..not all games are meant for u to win..some games are for big win if u r good..some games are for small wins if u r very very very very good..and some games are if its not meant for u to win..the least u can do is not to fang pao..hahahaha..sad to say..this is the zui gao jing jie for me now..
in mahjong..aside from skills..pple benefit on good luck..but good luck from heaven doesnt come all the time..good luck from other pple's mistakes do come more regularly..so wadeva u do..try to harvest on them..and its supposed to be win game until proven otherwise..hahaha
actually..in my situation..waiting for 2 cards is the same as having a 9 tong and 8 tong at the start of the game..its a trap..u think tt soon the 7 tong will come..but then..it never come for me 80% of the time..it jus gives a false sense of reassurance..reassurance tt that will be a set tt is going to be completed..it traps u into thinking tt its a set completed..and sets u into the expectation tt it will be completed..then u get trapped inside..u cant give it up..then u go into this whirlpool of altered behaviour..u forget to weigh the risks..and u fang pao..and fail..
jus like my mahjong master shi fu alws say..the game is fluid..every tile in hand shld contribute in everyway to the eventual winning..no tiles shld be chucked at the side deeming a complete set..the mindset of winning with 4 sets of 3 and a set of pair is no good at all!
its a trap..a trap of reassurance..a trap of comfort..a trap tt things will be done when its not going to..and u think tt its done alr..a trap tt will raise ur expectation..a trap tt will change ur attitude..a trap tt will change ur thinking and mindset..a trap tt will alter ur behaviour..a trap tt will change u into a totally different person..then..u start to lose urself..u start to become different..u start to get obsessed..u start to do things tt u wont normally do..
so moral of story is..recognise register and remember traps in mahjong..identify the potential traps early..and..
jian hao jiu shou..
Imba leh jus found these.
Xiao zhu is like super farnie lah! hahahaha and i think its really an honour and glory to sing side by side with ge shen. Haha im really glad tt i had this honour and glory to sing with RYAN! hahahaha:)
So this is wad happened on xiaozhu's concert! Nice rite!
Here comes the imba original. Hahaha go listen to it everyday and sing during ktv ok!:)
梁静如的歌Ces't La Vie的前奏有这么一段的旁白:
ne laisse pas le temps te décevoir
ll ne peut être conquis
dans la tristesse dans la douleur
aujourd'hui, demain
au fil du temps le temps c'est la vie
Thanks for the uploader always able to find her song. Haha. I only heard the original once or twice before her, so I felt closer to keely's version, her voice got 特色, so niceee.
Was on my way home tonight on the bus. Did not want to take a lift because scared the silence, and scared people will be spending a lot efforts to entertain me, and me tired of entertaining people(just for tonight tho), and as usual I am a very paiseh person. Was looking out into the darkness of the streets, misty, cooling, and lonely. Then this song came in.
歌曲:鱼在水里哭
歌手:深白色2人组
我矛盾着无助
很需要你能给我一点点保护
想对你说的话却总说不出
我变成了植物
Thinking about what things that I want to say but cannot say. I realised there's almost none. In front of people, I will say what I want to say. Especially so these days after CSFC when I realised I became more and more vocal, and more and more mature. Actually, since young, even though I do not say much, I only remembered a few moments when things that I really want to voice out but did not. Lesser of these moments these days. None at all. Its not about whether I will say or not. Its more about whether I have anything to say or not. Whether I feel anything about anything to make me want to say anything or not. 我是植物, 行尸走肉。 对身边的事默默无闻, 对眼前的事视而不见, 对周遭的事毫不关心。 没有感觉, 没有体会, 没有思想, 没有心情, 没有需求, 没有要求, 没有坚持, 没有信念。 无心, 无神, 无色身香味触法。 Was wondering how did I become someone like that. They say 无欲则刚. I think so too, but then, for someone like me, its just pure sad.
I remembered that this song was commented as soapy. I agree with it entirely, thats why its only at 1140pm coming home after so much things looking out into pitch darkness Bishan park then I can fully appreciate the soappiness. Wah just feel like plunging my head into a pool of water and cry in it. 鱼在水里哭.
Somehow, despite all my wishes, I wish that things will go as you wish. Then, it can save us all the trouble of having to "惹出来做这个费心劳神, 呕心沥血的事" Quoted from 三国, talking about 徐元直推荐诸葛孔明给刘玄德。 Somehow, deep within the deepest wishes, I wish that things can be kind of like that, just like that.
I was saying, how do you know when you had picked the correct present for someone? Thats when after you decided on it, the more you think about it, the happier you are. The more you look at it, the more you use it, the more you are amazed that how good it is, and how the correct choice you had made. Same, goes to when you do something correct. Same, goes to the correct person, the more you been with the person, the more you know what I am saying.
Suddenly don't wish to be hot knife through butter. The smarter I become, I can still never be as smart as you, then might as well don't, might as well be 老实, 要做到淳厚质朴, 心无渣滓, 才能分心二用.
Less happy post if you happened to realised.
I think she is quite sweet and cheerful (I need a 傻大姐). Haha did not want to post the youtube of her performance, because not so sweet.
Cheers!
Yang =)