After months of deciding, I finally went pro on Flickr and eventually nuts with organizing my sets and collections. It doesn’t help that I have another entirely separate account for my knitting items and yarn stash; I could take a bit of time moving that to my current account…

As I was moving stuff, I realized that I never shared much of the pics from my travelogue when I was still in Malaysia and moving around Asia. I still have more to upload but here are some of the complete albums courtesy of a nifty plugin and Flickr (naturally)…

Vietnam (Hanoi) ‘05
It was supposed to be a break for me while I was in the middle of switching jobs. Turns out to be more that what I bargained for. Anyways, here are pictures from our Hanoi trip (Aug 6 to Aug 14) taken with a disposable panoramic camera, Canon Powershot A75 and Olympus SLR OM2000.

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When Mum first arrived, one of the “juicy tales” she filled me in was about a fellow traveller in her Eastern Europe tour group who ended her holiday in an Austrian hospital, recovering from a mild heart attack.

It got me thinking for a moment - exactly how many of us have travel health insurance or are protected in one way or another when we travel for either work or leisure? If we are insured via a health insurance, is it necessary then to purchase a travel health insurance?

You have to forgive me for asking really weird questions - I woke up at 455am and went on to spend about three hours on a train just to get from Lucerne to Neuchatel.

To hit the point home, I caught the flu in France. Bleck. Not that I need insurance for that but it was hardly pleasant to catch the flu while you’re on vacation.

Anyway, I better go read my insurance clause to check…

Visa-issues aside, Nil (and I) have been thinking of make a trip to the US - it has always been on his list, the whole Grand Canyon exploring thing among other stuff - and after my parents’ trip last year to the States, well, lets just say that he brings it up at every opportunity he gets!

I’m still trying to delay it because of the whole visa thing; it’s pretty difficult for Malaysians to obtain a visa and once you’re rejected, you can forget about ever applying again…or so I have been told.

Sure, I would love to check out the States but for purely selfish motives - I want to do more yarn shopping!!!!!!!!! This would probably entail me bugging him to head over to the West Coast instead of the East. He may not jump on the idea; after all, this hubby of mine is pretty selective when it comes to travelling. I don’t think he’ll even bite if I try to feed him this “Orlando vacations” thing. Theme parks are just not his style…even though he did enjoy the water slide at Sunway Lagoon.

Anyway, we’ll see how it goes. Right now, we have a budget to think of not to mention other family commitments. Life is really different when you’re married, y’know.

Suddenly a clean yet simply furnished home (sans all the toys and gadgets like…swing sets, plasma TV and what-not is both welcoming and comforting!

The trip to Marseille was an eye-opener, to say the least. The city is the second largest in France and is the biggest commercial French port (the other is up north in Le Havre). It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea and therefore welcomes a Mediterranean climate to its shores. This means that in summer, temperatures can soar up to 40 C!!!!!!!!!!!!!

When you reach Marseille, the first thing you’ll noticed are the palm trees, cactus and bougainvillea - yes, if it weren’t for the stone brown Mediterranean homes, I would never have suspected that I was in France.

The south is hugely different from the north (think Le Havre, Strasbourg, Colmar, Nantes, etc) in that it sees a huge influence from Algeria, Tunisia and other neighbouring countries. To reach these countries, all you have to do is just hop on a ferry and that’s it! You’ll find that there are a lot of prevailing Southern attitudes as well - terrible driving, plenty of impatience and one big huge bordel (mess) when it comes to getting things done or even just finding your way around the city.

It didn’t help with Nil giving me his personal thoughts on the city and its people…and they weren’t pleasant ones either.

After getting used to the Swiss idea of cleanliness, ordeliness and patience, the stench of pee in fire escape stairways, the illegal parking and littering reminded me of home with a different climate. It didn’t help that we ran into a couple of problems when retrieving my personal effects from the shipping company.

Still, Marseille is worth a trip if you’re interested in a French-Mediterranean with spectacular views of the sea and plenty of touristy sites to visit. Make sure that you slot it in during spring or autumn because summer here can get pretty hot and pretty pack with locals trying to jostle for space at the beach! Plus the greenery is greener during those seasons - in summer, everything is just dark green.

And oh, bring plenty of sunblock for those good sunny days, k?

The draw for “Paying It Forward” is going to happen later so anticipate results soon!

…and while I’m away, have a great Christmas and happy partying!!!!

Come 18 November, citizens from this once British-y island will be casting their votes for the state district elections. Advertisements have been rolling out on TV and non-media related mediums like billboards and stuff.

Come 31 January 2008, the public poll for the proposed taxi fare increase in HK will close. Members of the public can send it their thoughts on the matter via email, some website comment page, fax or call in to a dedicated line.

Meanwhile, on 10 November 2008, Malaysia’s Prime Minister was quoted saying the following in a major English daily.

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The damage? RM1.6K (Unbelievable right?)

The loot? Here’s the whole huge list:

• Toner (biggest size), day and night cream plus eye cream from Lancome
• Eye cream and night cream sample size from Lancome
• Three shirts from G2000
• Two silk ties from Italy
• Two flannel zip-up jackets
• One round neck flannel sweater
• Three sweaters (two cashmere and one wool)
• One cable knit pullover
• Three 2-piece woolen cardigan
• One brown knitted coat
• One short plaid coat
• One long red coat
• One short sky blue coat
• Three Addis circular needles
• Five eight-ball pack of lambswool yarn
• Two three-ball pack of wool yarn
• Twenty-nice balls of alpaca-wool yarn
• Four balls of variegated wool yarn
• Four balls of tweedy wool yarn

My shopping list originally called for only items for Nil, two coats and yarn for two sweaters but because I had so much leftover cash, I went ahead and bought items off my list. Mum and I found bargains everywhere from this Sasa-equivalent called Bonjour (they offer 35% discount on a lot of their products compared to 25% at Sasa - for the same items) to the shops at Ladies Market, Temple Street, Causeway Bay and even at Ngau Tau Kok!

Definitely a favourite place for shopping!!!!! Oh, did I mention that the siew ngor (roast goose) was fab????? Le Lapin thinks I’ve gone nuts shopping for so many things. Yes, finally got to met that skinny unshaven dude after one year of chatting online! That blur sotong left his plane ticket with me. So now, I have to see him again…will probably try and get him some of that Hainanese chicken rice that he has been craving for. Heh.

Yup…am on my way to HK for a quick shopping spree. My shopping list sees items like winter jackets and yarn! Really, what did you expect??? Yarn addict here, remember?

See you on Sunday! Oh, Happy Deepavali!