Stunning Three Sisters - MUST SEE for all

Blue Mountain, named from the blue haze caused primarily by Eucalyptus trees. It emits oil vapour into the atmosphere and scatter the blue light more than any other colour in the spectrum. Why blue then? errmm.. all I know in science, if not mistaken, blue light is the shortest wave-length.

Blue Mountain is listed in World Heritage, and since then housing and tourism here have been spurring. I heard from the tour guide, houses surged from $10,000 before listed to $200,000 right now. The guide also mentioned Blue Mountains is so tough and rugged that it took Captain Tench, the explorer, a quarter of century to discover a way across Blue Mountains. The view of cliffs, valleys and the pale looking hills were simply magnificient. The landmark is simply the Three Sisters rock formation, and we walked the Giant Stairway which contradictory from its name, it was the 400 steepest and tinest steps I ever seen.

Pui Shez and I also visited Paragon Cafe, one of the Art Deco cafes, which Katomba, the town was quite famous of its arts and antiques, and to some for its chocolates and coffees. Paragon's hot chocolate was the super chocolatey, and pure. I had the biggest Continental breakfast, served with bacon, sausages, eggs, hash brownies, mushrooms, tomatoes and toasts. Australia typically has many good breakfast restaurants, and I also realised the mastery of bacon - rough, meaty and tasty.

We visited also the heritage-listed hotel, The Carrington which looked almost from another era, with lifts still functioning without sliding doors and only fit 3 persons. We just missed the Winter Magic Festival, and also the Yulafest, kind of a dinner feast and exchange of gifts. Yulafest is basically a country self-declared Christmas for the sake of celebrating Christmas in winter. Yes, this is what you get Down Under!!! :)

Next day, still around Blue Mountain, we took a full day guided tour to the limestone Jenolan Caves - adopted the Aboriginal lang means high mountain. It's a favourite destination of travellers for more than a century; but yet I cant imagine me being a tourist, yet a century ago, we had tourists visiting the same thing. How bizarre!

I heard the cave was discovered by an European, when back then it was initially used as a hideaway, who was a thief who stole and hide cattles. The European wanted to retrieve his animals, so he followed the trail and found this impresive limestone formations. The caves inside was simply amazing. We explored every corner, crawled, climbed the staircase, went through tunnels and I also learned performances, carols, concerts and mass are being held in the cave. We were demonstrated of the 5mins sound effect knowing where the prayers and priests stood. It did sound good, very spiritually sounding indeed.



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Visit from Sis w whole Luggage for me!

My sister flew to Sydney for work, yes intentionally,to bring me a whole cabin luggage of warm clothes and shoes and more $$ to spend. :)

We did a quick tour on SYD Harbour Bridge, Opera House and The Rocks!! Didnt know Opera House has separated "babies" roofs to the "mothers" ones being the main building. Impressed me was that it reflected different views depending on where you are looking from. The house was officially launched in 1973, construction lasted almost for 2 decades from it first won the design competition in 1950s. Late evening, it started to pour, lucky us, we didnt climb up the Harbour bridge as to what we were close to paying for. So, I went to gym, which turned to be redundant. Idiot us, we finished up a whole heavy greasy Korean meal right after that.



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Colleagues are sarcastic, but harmless!

Been a week in SYD already! Work is progressing well, with some flexibility and honeymoon-ing still. :) Yesterday though, my colleague was really funny! She picked up the phone, wanted to make a quick call. The conversation went like this:

Colleague : Hi ABC. How are you doing?
ABC : I am ok!
Colleague : Oh, that didnt sound very good! What's wrong?
ABC : Yeah, I fell last week, went for a check up and found a deep cut, doctor said needed to stitch...and ....so....I waited..I took leave...and...I have no time.....
Colleague : So, have you done the report?
ABC : No. Was on leave last Friday.
Colleague : Ok. But let me know when you are done. thanks
ABC : Sure. Cheers
Colleague : Bye bye

My colleague hung up, stood up and mutterred, "Man, so that's what you get when you say HOW ARE YOU" HAHA..yeah, agreed darn long call but she is just plain funny when she doesnt need to be one. I love Aussie sarcasm - they are funny, yet not quite offensive! But there are times, I seriously dont get the joke at all! But that's my mission! I want to get into their cultures!

SYD - Overstuffing till I puked!!

I know!! This is insane! I did eat SO MUCH, the day began at 8am, my colleagues, Jane, Pui Shez and I went to the fish market to check out OZ seafoods. No kidding..gigantic lobster, oysters, fishes, abalones, even the "ikan bilis" is big enough that when you bite, you could actually feel the fish meat. One fish would have 10 different types and names, so taking all these pictures will hopefully help me to remember what I saw. hehe..What impressed me further was the market was nothing like wet, smelly, cramped, or dirty!! Very clean and you really dont want to leave the place. Anyway, not all seafood were lovely and big, some were ugly and gross, the Mud Crabs, and Marron, God knows what's that!

We then went up to Star City, to the Casino ( as usual, checked ID for young deceiving ASian looks esp. me :) ). Was in for an hour, tiny player though but acted BIG. haha. We then stopped over for ice cream, moved on crossing Darling Harbour, got a little amused with my fragile umbrella turning inside out and over. haha..that was really silly! Did a bit shopping at Paddyton's market and Chinatown, then another round of Korean food from yesterday. One day, too much greed! I was smashed, that's what I mean! Food combination was all wrong and sinful !!

What more about SYD? Too mmany foreigners!! You hardly find local people, starting from DHL office itself. Definitely many Asians - Koreans and Chinese around, and it has yet to struck me "YES, This is SYDNEY!" No...not yet!



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SYD AIR - Breath IN Breath Out !

Cant believe I am here!! Sydney after a week on my new job. Touched down at 7am, went straight to custom check! Wasnt expecting this at all, but the officer detained me for 20min Q&A session! Where, what do you do, why, how long, why, how long again, any credit cards, who's picking you ( even I myself didnt really know who was getting me and neither did I had his contacts ) :) Anyway, I passed through, gave them the magic number to call - i.e. DHL Sydney Office no.!!! :)

At 9am, Mr Duc Ngo picked me and my colleague. He was driving, clear blue sky, seriously clear, not a single cloud!! Was enjoying the view until Duc proposed to start work immediately. No food, no tea, no freshen up, off we headed to office! Intro and work, finally got home at 4pm, wanted to shower, but NOOO...realised shops are closing at 5.30pm, so we rushed off for grocery shopping! Back home, 1st day - dinner was Chinese food, why? It was right below our serviced apartment. Man..crap and expensive!! Heard from my friends Chinese food in AUS was supposed to be better than in Singapore!! I wanna keep my fingers crossed! There MUST be something better than Singapore!!! haha..

1st week at work, HR Shared Services

Back to Malaysia, it's all LOCAL now! First day at work, immediate being schedules for a week long induction. Second and third day, we had VIP visits, and they were regional heads from all over the world. Proud to say, our HR Shared Services in Malaysia is the first to set as Asia Pacific POC, and will be replicated in other regions.

So, what you see when VIP comes? The answer is EVERYTHING!! All of the employees were smartly dressed, desk stations were clean and tidy, new biscuits arrived in bulks, lots of paper towels and cups, wallpapers were hung up, gigantic DHL banners and even country flags were all put up decorating our walls. HAha...funny to experience the local excitement! Though must admit, awww..we have quite crappy toilets!

Well, I have a reason to celebrate though. I am going to SYDNEY!! Definitely more updates to come...