Shanghai!

We had 4 holidays during Hari Raya and took the opportunity to take a short break ourselves. We were excited. We are supposed to visit the World Expo in Shanghai. But upon arrival, we decided to change our plans.

Shanghai is so crowded. Everywhere we go...it's only people and buildings that our eyes behold. However, we delighted ourselves to the magnificent sights from the Oriental Pearl Tower, the beautiful sceneries in Yu Yuan Garden and in Hangzhou, we found beauty around the West Lake etc.

On arrival at the Arrival Hall, we were greeted by a huge group of fans who were waiting anxiously for their idol. Their greetings took us by surprise as we did not get to see who the celebrity was. We were told that he is a Korean star. However, with all the excitement in cheerings and screamings, it was impossible for us not to feel 'grand' (ahem!)!

We stayed at Citadines Shanghai Biyun, a subsidary of the Ascot. This hotel apartment is cozy and comfortable.

The Oriental Pearl Tower - An outstanding landmark of Shanghai.

A panoramic view from The Oriental Pearl Tower - towering at 468m high, it's the highest tower in Asia and 3rd highest in the world.

Shanghai! Shanghai!

Yu Yuan Garden - An exquisite layout with beautiful scenery. The artistic style of garden architecture have made this garden one of the highlights of Shanghai.

Chenghuangmiao surrounding area - a commercial center where one can taste delicious local delicacies and enjoy some shopping. It was packed with people (both local & tourists).

The busy and famous Nanjing Road known as "first Street in China". It is one of the busiest and most important commercial place. Endless shopping. It's always packed with tourists. Here one can feel the pulse of modern Shanghai.

The Bund

Took a train to Hangzhou.

"Ripping water shimmer on sunny day
Misty mountains shrouded the rain
Plain or gaily checked out like Xizi
West Lake is always alluring." - Su Dongpo

These poetic sentiment leaves one in no doubt of the glory of the scenery that inspired them.

Silence is the language of God

Having missed the Winter Soulstice in December last year, I was privileged to join Dehyana for the 2009 Summer Soulstice Retreat at Lucky Valley this June. I had no idea what the Summer Soulstice Retreat is all about but I was told that Lucky Valley is a place with excellent qi and a perfect retreat for the body, mind and soul.

I managed to hitch a ride from Chee Wah at the eleventh hour and we arrived at Lucky Valley in the afternoon. After a hearty organic vegetarian dinner, we assembled at the Pyramid where we were greeted and hugged by Dehyana. She was like a goddess, ever so radiant and warm. After the introduction and a brief 'getting-to-know-you', the session was opened for us to share our purpose of being there. For me, my heart is open to learn.

The session ended at 12 midnight and we were each given this note:

Dear Retreat Participants,
The purpose of your visit to Lucky Valley Retreat is to learn and grow and listen with ears. Talking inside the Temple(pyramid) is okay because it is where we meet each day to learn and to grow through group participation. However, before a session begins if you wish to be in Temple, please maintain Sacred Silence and only speak when necessary. We're here to learn to communicate with our divine Self through the act of Sacred Silence.
When on retreat, we want to listen, with not only our natural hearing, but also with the "ears of our heart." We need to listen to the interior sounds and words of God within. To do this, we need to be quiet and silent. Therefore, there are times and places when it is good to talk and sing and laugh. There are other places and times when we need to respect the gift of quiet and silence.
The lunch room, our bedrooms, corridors, outside near any of the buildings; these ought to be places for quiet and silence. Sound travels easily through walls and windows, so we ask you to be sensitive to others who may be trying to rest or meditate or pray. If you have a cell phone, please turn off the ringer and set your phone to silence or vibrate. As an added courtesy to your fellow retreatants, please use earphones if listening to a CD or MP3 player.

Thank you kindly,
Dehyana

Oh my God, this is a Silent Retreat!! No talking for 3 days.

Why Silent Retreat?
When we are silent, we can listen to the silence of our soul. Our inner being speak to us and we can discover ourselves. Listening is a skill and it takes time to develop such a skill. We rarely take time to listen. How can we hear if we do not listen?
Only when we practise being quiet, going within, taking time to listen and creating the space to listen, will we hear.

What is a Summer Solstice?
A Summer Solstice is when the sun’s path across the sky, the length of the daylight, and the location of the sunrise and sunset all shifted in a regular way throughout the year. The solstice happens at the same instant for all of us, everywhere on earth although our clocks say different times. So it resulted in early dawn, late sunset, longest day, shortest night.
It is an astronomical event, caused by the Earth’s tilt on its axis and its motion in orbit around the sun. Because the Earth doesn’t orbit upright (tilted on its axis by 23.5 degrees), Earth’s northern and southern hemispheres trade places in receiving the sun’s light and warmth almost directly.

Lucky Valley
Lucky Valley is situated in this God forsaken land in a small town of Pahang called Muazzam Shah.
The retreat is nestled admist 500 acres of fruit orchards, vegetable plots and herb gardens, cultivated on a previously virgin jungle (which still lines the perimeter of the land) lies a remote haven called Lucky Valley. It is also known for its abundant natural healing qi and alkaline water. Surprisingly, the retreat frequented by foreigners and local groups who normally come on organized energy-enriching retreats. As the qi is suitable for meditation, it also attracted many Tai Chi, Qigong or Yoga enthusiasts.
(pix:see these energy balls?)
Qi
The magnetic field in Lucky Valley is extremely strong. The centre piece of Lucky Valley retreat is the pyramid or temple. It is specifically built to harness the powerful orgone energy into the pyramid. Those who are sensitive to energies will be very aware of these energies, as well as other spiritual energies that are available there. Believe it or not, I could actually feel myself ‘floating’ while standing on the centre piece.

Food
Food grown here are organic and free of pesticides. Our meals were vegetarian and wholesome. Oh, I love every meals here! Everyone is required to wash their utensils after every meal.

Lodging
Lodging is as simple as can be. It is back to basics with no television, no hair dryer, no hot shower, no air-condition. We have an option of twin sharing or dormitory. I chose the latter and was glad to share space with Lynette (KL), Kam Lye (Ipoh) and Janet (Malacca). We each had a bed with a small pillow and blanket and yes, that’s about it.

Lessons
KNOW THYSELF
Briefly, the Summer Soulstice Silent Retreat is about getting to know oneself. How well do I actually know myself? It is to stop looking at my neighbour's life and look at what is in front of me. Then I began to discover that everything is a mirror image of my mind and I carry with me along my life.
In the words of Thomas Dreier, he said "The world is a great mirror. It reflects back to you what you are. If you are loving, if you are friendly, if you are helpful, the world will prove loving and friendly to you. The world is what you are."

to be continued

Almost Paradise

Food
All our meals were as simple as can be. So we ate simply - buffet most times and each meal was very Malaysian. No complaints; we ate what the people cooked which were mainly fried rice, fried mee and meehoon, vegetables, fried fish and chicken or tofu. Oneday I overheard someone ordering a cuppa at a cafe asking, "what coffee do you have?" And the reply was, "Our coffee is nothing more than normal! No latte or mocha." Ha! Ha!

Lodging
CI Lodge was very basic but clean and decent. At least housekeepers made sure that they changed our sheets and towels everyday. People there are not greedy. We left all our belongings at the lodge almost everyday without fear of things being stolen or missing.
Security
Christmas Island is a worry-free zone where crime rate is almost zero. Imagine this; they never need to lock their cars, they can even leave their car keys inside and not afraid of theft because it never happened! We were told that we can 'borrow' any of the vehicles that has a key in it..drove and have it park at the same parking spot after that. Believe it or not, it is really that safe!

Pulau Tenggol
Christmas island actually reminds me of another island in Malaysia which I visited some 20 years ago with a group of colleagues and scuba-divers. Pulau Tenggol in Terengganu was then still a very virgin island with just one hut. We set our own tent and camp there. Everything was so back to basic and the sea was beautiful with crystal clear waters. Now it's being so commercialized with resorts and pubs etc.

Go with the flow..
The whole Island's experience would be perfect if things were a bit more organized. We wasted sometime waiting. Waiting for immigration clearance - waiting for the Chief to arrive before we could start dinner - waiting for race to start etc. But then again...very often, we tend to forget that we are on holiday and more so, in an island where everyone and everything is so complacent and almost worry-free. So while we're there, we just need to go with the flow...

Perfect Getaway
Otherwise, Christmas Island is a perfect choice for anyone contemplating a getaway to a destination where time and nature have stood still for a million years. You get the best of both worlds - prehistoric trees, plants and fantastic robber crabs that can so easily be seen; while unique birds seen nowhere else in the world cruise the skies of one of the last bastions and where people are learning to live with nature.
If only this rare ambience could be maintained for as long as possible.

10 things I brought home from Christmas Island :
- Smiles of warm & friendly faces
- Nature's Best
- Memories to cherish
- Pictures to share
- Additional friends
- Two fridge magnets (1 for my nephew, 1 for me)
- A medal
- An extra piece of running vest
- Prize money (from the Marathon)
- Suntan

I would like to thank Julie Wong for arranging everything and making this trip possible and memorable. I do believe I'm very fortunate to have a husband, my soul-mate who has been running and going places with me all these years...many thanks to you, John!

Nature Unlimited

By 5.30am, the sun rise up and began to brighten the whole island. John, Francis, Teresa and I were ready to do an hour of recovery jog around the vicinity of our lodge.
Beautiful beaches and birds
After breakfast, we were fortunate when one of the locals volunteered to take us to Lily Beach and Ethel Beach. He even loan us another car as his car couldn't accomodate 8 of us. So, John drove the other car and followed him.
Along the way, we passed through the rainforests which are so alive with unique species and subspecies of birds; noisy flocks spreading their wings everywhere. Being laid-back islanders, all of these birds are very approachable.
Ethel Beach and Lily Beach are next to each other - isolated and picturesque sand beaches with coral reef. I mesmerized as sea birds flirt on the thermal updraughts. We spent sometime there and then moved on to visit 2 ancient temples at South Point and the mines.
The afternoon was spent at leisure at the Poon Saan Community Club. Some tried their hands on the snooker table, sing karoeke or just lazed around, not doing anything.

Later that evening would be the Event of the Year (?) for the people of Christmas Island as celebrated their 50th. Territory Anniversary. Excitement filled the whole island as locals as well as tourists came all dressed up for the occasion. Each community work together to put up their best performances; lion dance, malay dance amongst many others.
Ocean Planet
While waiting for the parade to begin. We sat near the beach and there, I looked out to the wide Indian Ocean right in front of me. It reminded me of a poem 'Ocean Planet' taken from the book 'A Fish In My Heart' by Ron Stevens. This poem is kinda fun...a debate between the ocean and the earth. Let's read it here :

It's not really hard and it's not really moist
Depending on location, view point and choice.
Yet the place we call earth is mostly quite wet
It's not a big problem for most, I would bet.

Now the earth was quite firm the name was his,
And the ocean got mad cause the volume was hers.

So they both made comments about size and scope,
To own the name was each of their hope.
Back and forth they made tremors and splash,
And the earth responded with the occasional gash.

With very big waves and monstrous icebergs
The ocean made wet some parts of dry earth.
With volcanic action and piping hot sand,
The earth made a splash and regained some land.

In time it was all done and none was won,
The earth would stay hard and trimmed by some sand,
The ocean would be more and cool the earth's core.

The fish had the vote and this was quite grand.
They voted for the water and not for the land.

The name would stay earth but the ocean is boss;
For the ocean will flood
And the land will be lost.

Many of Ron's poems come with a message : that we can live in harmony with the oceans.

Nature's Wonder

Sight-seeing and Nature's Beauty
The afternoon was occupied with sight-seeing at various spots in the island. The saying "A picture paints a thousand words"...here are some scenes to behold!










As it was a Saturday, there's an open-theatre where the locals can watch the 'almost latest' movies under the stars at Poon Saan at 7.30pm. But that particular Saturday night, we had dinner cum stage performances put by the locals which lasted like forever. Therefore, after the fireworks some of us decided to call it a day. Indeed, we had such a full day.

One with Nature

Just where is this island?
Christmas Island is a dot in the vast Indian Ocean, an Australian territory and its closest neighbour is Java which is 360km away.
Geographic
It is an island with steep limestone cliffs, a rugged coastline and a plateau that supports rich rainforests. On mostly calm days, coral reef is visible beneath metres of clear turquoise water. When the water swell is up, blowholes spout impressively.
63% of it is national park containing species of flora found nowhere else in the world. The island 80km coastline is an almost continuous sea shift of up to 20 metres in height. In a few places, the cliff gives way to shallow bays with small sand and coral shingles beaches. The largest of these bays forms the island's only port, Flying Fish Cove.



Heritage
The island was named on Christmas Day 1643 as a British merchant seaman sailed past. But it wasn't settled until 1888 following the discovery of high quality phosphate.
Weird and wonderful structures - buildings, train tracks, and odd locomotive are feats of engineering in this remote place, marking its industrial heritage of phosphate mining.
Culture
People who live here are mainly from Australia, Malaysia and Singapore. Thus, a mix of culture. All islanders are permenant Australian residents. While English remain the official language, Malay, Mandarin and other Chinese dialects are widely spoken.
Climate
Christmas Island is in the tropics with an average temperature of 25C. The island is green, cool and lush when it rains; hot and steamy when the sun is out.
Specialty
Crabs - The most noticeable local is the Red Crab with over 100million of these vivid red creatures living on the forest floor. However, no one is allowed to eat or catch these crabs (else, a heavy fine will be imposed if caught. they will also be banned from entering the island for life!) During the crab season (Nov/Dec), the traffic has to stop for crab crossing!

Birds - Birds of the rarest found nowhere else in the world flirts on the updrafts. You don't even need to leave the settled areas to get good sightings at close range of endemic CI Frigatebirds wheeling overhead and the graceful undulating flight of the Golden Bosun, an elegant CI form of tropicbird.
Nature Wonders - lush rainforest, underwater paradise, idyllic beaches and awe-inspiring sea and landscapes...so untouched, pristine and beautiful.

Day 1
We touched down on the island via MH8484, a catered flight which carried 140 passengers (abt. 36 runners and 104 line dancers). After the immigration clearance (which took ages!) we got up the bus which took us for a brief tour around the island.
We learned that the island's population is only 800 residents. There are 7 policemen, 2 taxis, 1 supermarket, 1 hospital, 1 school, 1 Community Center, 1 Visitor Center and a few restaurants in the island. Supply of food is air-freighted on a weekly basis. Therefore, whenever there's a group of visitors coming in, the villagers must be informed or otherwise, the island will experience a shortage of food.
After the introductory tour, we were taken to CI Lodge for check-in. The lodge is clean and as simple as can be. There's no lobby whatsoever. Yet, they made an effort to welcome us with a decent tea reception served with an array of local pastries and coffee.
Later, we freshened up and rested before dinner at Poon Saan Park nearby. It was a dinner and dance with the theme ‘Red Crab’ and as the theme suggests – the dress code was RED. Line dancers were dancing while runners were carbo-loading for the next day’s marathon! There was a dance performance put up by Chris Watson and the girls. After that, most of us (runners) went back to our rooms to retire, leaving line dancers to dance the night away! This brought us to the end of day 1.

Day 2
Flora & Fauna Run
The theme of this run is initiated by a runner Julie together with the locals. The running course took us a loop into the woods, then out to the open road into the woods again and then back to the road and into the woods to complete the 21km route.
We gathered outside our lodge at 6am and waited to be chauffeured to our starting point which was at the Christmas Island Cricket & Sporting Club. The weather was extremely windy and the race didn’t start until 8am (9am M’sian time). As everyone was in holiday mood, no one made a fuss about the delay in time. We mingled around and get to know one other. Fun Run started an hour earlier than Competitive Run and by the time, we finally got started – it was getting warm.

At first, I found it rather difficult getting my feet to adjust to running the uneven paths in the woods. However after awhile, I got used to it and soon gained momentum. I was actually enjoying my run and when I was out to the open road, I increased my pace and ran comfortably.
Lost in the woods...in reverie
Next, I returned to an easy mode again when I entered the woods. It was then I got diverted and lost! It was own carelessness. I was admiring the beauty of Nature and day-dreaming, trying to make poetries that I missed the turning at 8km marker. When I finally ‘woke up’ from my fond reverie…oh my god! I realized that I was all alone and there weren’t any distance markers. I turned and ran all the way back to locate the last marker which wrote 8km.

Aiyoh! By then, everyone else was ahead of me and I knew I was way behind…needless to say, I was the last runner! Still, I was in high spirit and being mentally strong I told myself to continue running the best I could. So I ran with absolute abandon and finally managed to catch up with Gail, Julie and Wai Keen who were walking then. Slowly, I ran passed other runners and overtook them one by one, the last one being Teresa. They were all surprised to see me coming from behind. But the last 7km proved to be rather painful as the sun was already high up and shinning mercilessly on us. The open road was hard, hot and a bit hilly. I stopped at the last water station and gulped half a bottle of water, which was so unlike me as I normally don’t stop when running a half marathon.
The last 4km was running in the woods again…not long, I was so relieved when I sighted John, who waited anxiously for my return. He was also relieved to see me! I told him that I lost my way but I didn’t give up. Then I realized that I’ve ran an extra 6km. The clock read 2hr 27mins (yeah, for 27km!). Despite that, it was a good run and I still managed to secure third placing.
to be continued...