bakedbean

Very nice

gobbledonk

Ahem - let's just say that I can see both sides - neither wowser nor complete tosspot.

(I still think I could sell a line of t-shirts emblazoned with little other than 'Hansum Man', 'Cheap Charlie' and 'Butterfly', but I know how quickly the Thais would copy each t-shirt, right down to the font. Gotta love the entrepreneurial spirit )

Exhibit A: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/like/2709...iphx=1&lpid=94

bakedbean

Golf.

Quite a lot of golf courses dotted around Malaysia so I hear. Anyone play golf? Must be quite tiring in this climate?

Anbar

You play at night It's cooler !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:

PoolieAbroad

Tee Off at 7 15 am and walk nine holes and normally not a great problem.
Normally demolish 1 1/2 litres of water on the way and a few big mugs of tea upon return.

I would not walk 18 holes mind you and the buggy becomes a great help.
Double the water intake and home for a few

bakedbean

.....and how's it going, Bluenose1 ?

Davita

One of BB's things to do was 'write a story for BE Malaysia'.
Here's one I wrote for another forum but it has relevance to Malaysia.

I confess……I’ve done jail time!

Many many years ago, when I was young and a little reckless, I joined a group who were similarly dysfunctional. We were arrogant swaggers, pretentious and loud. I wasn’t the leader of this rebellious group but I wasn’t swayed by others either. Our infamy and notoriety was self-inflicted independently.

It was in Malaya that we connected. This was before Merdeka and even before the ‘new’ Singaporean authorities really clamped down on youth gangs and freedoms of expression; before car-spraying and graffiti was outlawed and before long hair was even fashionable…..we claimed to have inspired the crew-cut!

Whilst messing around doing what young people do, and thinking our antics were entertaining and even a little amusing, it seems the SG Government thought otherwise and ‘sent’ us to Changi jail.
To those unfamiliar with Changi as a prison….it was a notorious place and got its reputation when the Japanese Army of Occupation used it to intern and torture 3,000 civilians and POW’s during WW2. It was designed to house about 600 and still did until year 2000. Many books have been written about this hell-hole.

Our gang, and others accompanying us, were transported to the Changi jail gates by truck. The sky was dark. Singapore is a stone’s throw from the equator and the sun sets around 6:30 every evening but the prison was very well-lit with ominous floodlighting, which made the grimy less-than-white painted concrete walls look inhospitable. In contrast, the barbed wire on the top of the walls, and the sentry posts at each corner, gleamed brightly and hauntingly in the lights. I recall the entrance door as massive. It was of wood and iron-work and, in another dimension, could be considered art……but tonight we wondered if we would ever see the front, and freedom, again.
Our reception was very informal and not as foreboding as expected. We were quickly frisked then summarily shown which direction to take. With great trepidation we filed one-by-one down an alley then onto this large podium stage where, seated in front on concrete benches, wearing just shorts and flip-flops, was the entire prison population.

After quickly setting-up our musical instruments us Royal Air Force servicemen, calling ourselves ‘The Venom Skiffle Group’, started our routine with a Lonnie Donegan rendition of the ‘Rock Island Line’ to a loud spontaneous applause.

It was 1957 and our ‘jail time’ was to entertain Changi’s prisoners!

xizzles

I confess - you had me there, Davita!

Great little read

bakedbean

Well done Davita. I half remembered this story from another place but had forgotten the punchline.

Davita

This is another essay...although it appears personal it isn't....it's an ode to the many of the British Generation that endured between ww1 and ww2 that we younger one's may not remember...

My Dad; verbally abused his machine as the drill bit off-center. His arms, freckled with metal scarf and glistened with sweat as he talked loud, even while smoking an old cigarette. Still he was lithe about his lathe and slowly milled out a shell cylinder to a given, exact bore…..it was wartime.

My Dad; pencil-stub on his ear, spurned ink, he micro-metered in thous’ scrawled on fag packets, and tabulated a slide-rule. Mild mannered but steely he was…but not like mild steel; which rusts. Dad had dockets for jobs, corners transparent now from light machine oil.

Time-served my Dad; branching from door handles and shell casings to parts fitted to Concorde and NASA robots. Slightly hard of hearing from the din of the shop; forefingers described arcs and cutting angles. Milky white and messy from coolants and lubricants, but he never forgot to ply the broom to the shop floor.

At night, in ‘Red Square Pub’ beer swilling Shop-Steward Dad swapped stories of worker’s rights, Stalin, Lenin and Marx, and what did the Daily Worker say about how to implement Socialism into the ‘Peoples’ Government.

Years later my Dad; retired but still making a go of a shoe-repairing shop denied his obvious failed business acumen and constantly berated his son to provide stewed tea…strong enough to stand an upright spoon, and a fag. His son’s chamfered life hated such gross pedestrian habits and left home to his own salvation.

Dad; after enduring two world wars and the depression, is immortal. Even as he finally hobbled on his one remaining leg past the door to His blue sky…...he never really believed it was heaven or salvation…he still saw a work in progress.

R.I.P. Dad

NeonHippy

Thank you Davita. My dad also lived between the wars and made munitions for the navy. I fondly remember being taken to the dockyard as a young boy and sitting astride a torpedo that dad had help create.
He passed nearly thirty years ago and your ditty was a timely reminder that I have not thought of him for a while.

Batmobile

I confess……I’ve done jail time!



GOOD POST!





Just read one of them - ‘The Naked Island’ by Russell Braddon (1952) – a fascinating account of life as a POW in Changi


Braddon was an Australian who served in the Malayan campaign and was a POW in Pudu and Changi prisons and on the Thailand-Burma Railway. Whilst a POW he met Ronald Searle, whose Changi sketches illustrate the book.

bakedbean

- join a choral society (friend doing this)
- go help the Vega humanitarian vessel
- write some articles
- book a holiday or three
- systematically try out all the wines in Cold Storage

Anbar

Is there a flying school at Penang airport . Have tried google no luck.There is one on Langkawi ,But flying to Langkawi to take flying lessons is not on.
What about Golf courses ,have found 3 so far in the Penang district, any recommendations.
Hope to out your way later on in the year.
I'll get the first round in at a meet up

JC3

Hi Anbar,

Sorry don't know, but I'm sure the guys listed here will know:
Private pilot training Malaysia | Learn to fly Malaysia

It looks like the Department of Civil Aviation Malaysia (www.dca.gov.my) also has a list of APPROVED FLYING TRAINING ORGANISATION (AFTO) available as a PDF but their website doesn’t appear to be working tonight.

JC3