Life, Travel, GRACE

Not a new movie. It has been released for a while. Just got to watch it on HBO lately (was it HBO, or Fox Movie? Never mind which channel). Superb acting by Helen Mirren and Alan Rickman. And know that this is Alan's last movie before he passed away. You should've seen him in all the Harry Potter's movies. Back to this movie, besides the good acting, the plot and the development of the storyline are excellent. Gripping and intense. This is the warfare of the modern day where drone is used to surveil. Decision is made based on the image channelled via the drone or bug. Pretty interesting. When military people decides to take out the life of a group of terrorists (including the suicide bomber in this movie), protocol comes in. Every decision made has to be weighed for its consequences in terms of collateral damage, legal implications, diplomatic consequences and humanity. In the end, the ultimate purpose outweight the rest, where some distortion or improvisation acts are incl...

Last Sunday's sermon was about how to achieve happiness in Christ. All the while we have been  portraying Christ as a savior dying for our sins on the cross. This have been translated into images or paintings of Jesus (i.e. Jesus on the cross). But why not we visualize Christ as a happy person. In fact, he rejoices in God. Surely his face should be radiant and showing happiness. Otherwise, children won't come near to Jesus. Thus, a laughing Jesus should brighten the day. Then I was constantly at his side. I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence...Proverbs 8:30 (NIV)

Somehow the experience of commuting by train reminds me of the circular train trip in Yangon two years ago. Back then, there was not many tourist places in town. So taking a local train could be a good idea to check out the activities of the locals. In fact, circular train is one of the must-do activities in Yangon. The journey took us about three hours. It started from downtown, travelled north to airport area and then came back to downtown, in a loop. There was bumpy ride in certain section. We got to see where the locals live as well. Overall, it was an eye-opening experience, although I got bored towards the end of the journey. Inside the train Food vendor selling fruits in the train Some of the huts seen along the way The train stopped in one of the stations which appeared to be a local market. Back to train station   Photos were taken with iPhone 4s.

Getting to Prague city center via public transport was easy. We quickly checked in to our AirBnB place. In recent years, I've been lodging using AirBnB as I can have access to kitchen and washer with a price less than those offered by hotels. We stayed at the upper part area from Nadroni Museum. Besides the museum was an opera house. Even though these two places were near to where we stayed, we didn't drop by that places. Instead, we headed straight to the Old Town and across the Vltava river (the following day). I have to admit that for this trip, I didn't do much background check on the places nor make any proper plan of the itinerary visit. My bad. Well, further down from the museum was Wenceslas Square. After a few minutes walk along the street, we reached Old Town area. Needless to say, the must-see object in that area is the Prague Astronomical Clock. I got to know this place from my friend, not from last minute reading. Luckily he told me, otherwise I would become a...

Have an opportunity to attend conference in Ostrava, Czech Republic this week. So Dr Mike and I planned for a two-week trip in Central Europe. We planned to cover Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, Vienna, Cesky Krumlov and perhaps Auschwitz. We arrived in Prague two days ago, that was Saturday morning. Our flight had transit stop in Singapore and Zurich. The flight took us about 15 hours in total. Amazingly, I didn't have much jet lag; probably because I slept more in the flight. Getting to Prague city center was easy. We took a bus then transit to metro. It cost about kc32.00 per person. That's about RM6.00. Not too bad.

I did not watch volume 1. Thought it was another money-sucking-superheroes-movie. Then I came across its soundtrack. I got hooked. The selection of songs for the soundtrack was very well done. That was volume one. Now, recently I listened to the soundtrack of volume two. Again, I was hooked. Those 70's and 80's songs were great and well fitting with the movie. Because I like its soundtrack, so I watched the movies (both vol.1 and vol.2). I must say vol. 2 has more humor and better characters development. Initially I thought vol. 1 soundtrack is better. After watched the movie, vol. 2 soundtrack is not too bad. Great songs from the 70's and 80's. Awesome mix!

After my trip to Dubai last year, I went back to my hometown. That was in late November. This time, number two son was with me. Besides staying in his grandma's house, we went to Labuk Bay Proboscis Monkey Sanctuary. It was my first time to that place although the sanctuary has existed for ages. This place is situated right at the edge of an oil palm estate. Very similar to Sepilok, except that you won't find any orang utan. There will be a lot of proboscis monkeys. Feeding time is where you can see all the monkeys coming to the open area to get free food. And of course how could resist to take a photo with the monkeys. All photos were taken with iPhone 5s