The Midnight awaits...

Madrid Rock-n-Roll Marathon - Race Pack Collection & Expo

2012-05-19T19:52:00.001+08:00

Madrid Rock&Roll 10K - Race Pack Collection & Expo
Venue: Pabellon de La Pipa
Date: 20 Apr 2012 (Fri)

One of the key events of the Madrid Rock & Roll Marathon is arguably Europe's largest Health & Fitness Expo (with most vendors displaying running related merchandise) held at the Pabellon de La Pipa, which is the venue where we'll be collecting our race pack. The Pabellon also hosts the Pasta Party tomorrow - free to all registered runners plus one guest.

Getting around Madrid is pretty easy with a wide Metro network that connects the entire city. The Pabellon de La Pipa can be reached from the Alto de Extremadura Metro station on Line 6 (Circular Line). Sounded easy.

But we were a little lost when we first came out of the Metro station and found ourselves in the middle of a suburb. Doesn't look like a Pavilion or Convention Centre of sorts anywhere near.

Walked around, asked for directions - and this was where it got tricky coz not many locals understand nor speak English well - until we saw a young man carrying an Adidas Madrid Marathon bag. And he looked more American than Spanish. Viola. He speaks English! A few pointers and soon we found ourselves at the Pabellon de La Pipa. The Alto de Extremadura station is the correct drop-off point except you need to know which direction to head off for the Pabellon.

The Pabellon is located in a very green park called the Casa de Campo, I suspect Madrid's largest park which used to be the royal hunting estate of King Filipe II. Among other attractions, it has a lake, the city's zoo and an amusement park. However the Retiro Park where we'll end our race is the more popular park in Madrid even though it's smaller.

We didn't get to visit the zoo in this trip... next time? :P

Race Pack Collection

Relatively easy affair. Not much of a queue. The race pack collection started yesterday (19/4) and runners can still collect their race pack till end of tomorrow. Plenty of time for everyone to come and get theirs. Counters well staffed and they were quick to grab your pack for you. We collected our race pack and bib, and were told to follow the "green line" to collect our Adidas running vest.


P/s Full marathon runners followed the "white line". The "green line" led us to the running vest collection counters which were placed at the end of the expo hall. I suppose the reason they separated the race pack and running vest counters was to make us follow the "green" (or white) line which would take us past a few key exhibition booths. :P


We saw Adidas, K-Swiss, Brooks, etc along the way.

The race registration - if I remembered it correctly - didn't ask us to choose our t-shirt size. We were allowed to pick our size here. I opted for "M" while waiyan took "M" instead of her usual "S".

The lady at the counter thought I should take a "L". Hmm. I must look fat!


Nice Adidas technical vest of very good quality, green for 10K and blue for full marathon. Interesting that the Male-ver has a sleeve while the Female-ver is sleeveless. In M'sia it's likely the other way round, for modesty reason. Heh.

Note: Yum - another Malaysian runner fren taking part in this race - was not so lucky. He came (with Jenap and Razak) on Saturday to collect theirs and found they've ran out of his preferred size and he has to take a "L" size (and hopefully have it adjusted back in KL).

There was a press conference in the Expo when we were there. According to waiyan, those people in the presscon appeared in one of the running magazines included with the race pack. The magazine's in Spanish so we still don't know who they are. :P



The Race Pack - beside the bib - contained a few running magazines, some flyers of running events (in Spain), a nice Madrid Marathon mug (the full marathon runners do not get this mug but they got a Madrid Marathon backpack instead).


The magazines were interesting read. From one of them - Distance Running mag - I learned about Ed Whitlock (above), an 81 years old veteran runner who just broke the Over-80 record (which was also set by him) for the full marathon with an improvement of 10 min to 3:15:54. At the time I wrote this, he's also the only person over 70 years old who can finish a full marathon under 3 hours!

If the impact has not hit you yet, think about this stats combo:
- 81 year old (how many of us would actually be able to live to this ripe age?)
- 42.195 KM (statistically only less than 5% of the world's pop ran this distance but to run 42K at 81 years old?)
- 3:15 hours to complete (this would put him around the 4.5+ km/min pace which at any age group, is a very good timing)

Let's put it this way; completing any one of the above would be considered a great achievement. Completing ALL THREE of them? Speechless...

Note: I can't even do 4.5 km/min pace for 10K... sad I know. :(

New Running Shoes for Madrid
Both me & waiyan ran on the K-swiss Blade Light Run shoes, and we love this shoe so much we were looking to get another pair before they "obsolete" this model (we can see this happening with K-swiss coming up with Blade Light Race, Blade Light This and Blade Light That....).

Not easy to buy K-swiss shoes locally in KL; Running Lab (Frank) in Tropicana Mall do carry K-swiss but usually they either don't have the color I wanted or the size (USA 11 or UK 10 for myself).


There's a promo here for the Blade Light Run at just Eu85 per pair (and with the Euro at a nice 4.05 ROE, this has to be an offer not to be missed! Plus they've new colors - purple and pink - for the ladies model. I though "pink" looks better but waiyan decided on the "purple" to coordinate with her wrist-wrap and RoadID bracelet. Le vanity of le woman. :P



I would have loved to get this "color" (above) but were told by them this model is only coming out in September (Fall) this year. So "blue" it is for me now. Will surely look for the above color when September comes. :P

Rock & Roll Series finisher medals
On display in the Expo were finisher medals for some of the R&R Marathon series which is held over more than 26 cities in the USA and in Europe, the race is held in Edinburgh, Madrid, Lisbon and Dublin.


The Finisher Medal for the R&R Marathon allows for engraving of your name and finishing time at the back of the mdeal... Nice touch.


And if you complete two or more races in the Rock & Roll Series within a single calendar year, you get to take back a special Heavy Medal award and call yourself a World Rocker!

Finally both the Full Marathon (Green) and 10K (Black) finisher medals for the Madrid Rock-n-Roll series on display. We'll be getting ours this Sunday, yah!


Around the Expo



The Adidas booth has a nice wall that says "...."
(waiting for my Spanish fren to revert with the translation)



SKECHERS was there in full force!


So's K-Swiss but this you already knew. :P

And the Runner's World magazine, ahem ahem.

Adidas too. With some souvenir Madrid Maraton t-shirts.

Waiyan having to re-arrange all the stuff we brought - or bought - from the Expo.


They carried the Adidas Madrid Maraton race pack bags... but I tell you, they looked more like KGB spies to me than runners!

Wifey's first step on Spanish soil... with her nice colorful shoe. :P

Saw this handsome German Shepherd walking around on his own near the Pabellon de la Pipa... trying to get a drink from the bottle. He has on him a tag (the red colored medal tag) that says "Policia" so I guess he has the authority to wander around. :P

Commentary: He's large and looks menacing, but was not a threat to anyone. He's walking around without a leash! Goes to show if dogs are properly trained and handled by their owners, they do not exhibit violent behaviour. In contrast to some of the recent local incidents involving "violent" dogs, the problem lies with moronic owners rather than the dog itself. Le Sigh.

Footnote
ROE = rate of exchange

What's next? A trip to one of Europe's famous footballing icons - the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, home of Real Madrid FC.

To view all the photos taken in our trip to the Pabellon de la Pipa, check out my photo album in Facebook
- 20/4/2012 Pabellon de La Pipa

Interesting running pics

2012-05-13T00:52:00.001+08:00

Saw this in Facebook (Giro Italia's page) and thought of capturing here. Running with the devil, as they'll say.

I've Learned....

2012-05-03T04:00:00.001+08:00

I've learned - That our background and circumstances
may have influenced who we are,
but we are responsible for who we become.

I've learned - That sometimes when my friends fight,
I'm forced to choose sides
even when I don't want to.

I've learned - That just because two people argue,
it doesn't mean they don't love each other
And just because they don't argue,
it doesn't mean they do.

I've learned - That sometimes you have to put
the individual ahead of their actions.

I've learned - That we don't have to change friends
if we understand that friends change.

I've learned - That you shouldn't be so
eager to find out a secret.
It could change your life forever.

I've learned - That two people can look
at the exact same thing
and see something totally different.

I've learned - That no matter how you try to protect
your children, they will eventually get hurt
and you will hurt in the process.

I've learned - That there are many ways of falling
and staying in love.

I've learned - That no matter the consequences,
those who are honest with themselves
get farther in life.

I've learned - That no matter how many friends
you have, if you are their pillar
you will feel lonely and lost
at the times you need them most.

I've learned - That your life can be changed
in a matter of hours
by people who don't even know you.

I've learned - That even when you think
you have no more to give,
when a friend cries out to you,
you will find the strength to help.

I've learned - That writing, as well as talking,
can ease emotional pains.

I've learned - That the paradigm we live in
is not all that is offered to us.

I've learned - That credentials on the wall
do not make you a decent human being.

I've learned - That the people you care most about in life
are taken from you too soon.

I've learned - That although the word "love"
can have many different meanings,
it loses value when overly used.

I've learned - That it's hard to determine
where to draw the line
between being nice and
not hurting people's feelings
and standing up for what you believe

NYC Taxi Driver

2012-05-03T03:12:00.001+08:00

A NYC Taxi driver wrote:

I arrived at the address and honked the horn. After waiting a few minutes I honked again. Since this was going to be my last ride of my shift I thought about just driving away, but instead I put the car in park and walked up to the door and knocked.. 'Just a minute', answered a frail, elderly voice. I could hear something being dragged across the floor.

After a long pause, the door opened. A small woman in her 90's stood before me. She was wearing a print dress and a pillbox hat with a veil pinned on it, like somebody out of a 1940's movie.

By her side was a small nylon suitcase. The apartment looked as if no one had lived in it for years. All the furniture was covered with sheets.

There were no clocks on the walls, no knickknacks or utensils on the counters. In the corner was a cardboard

box filled with photos and glassware.

'Would you carry my bag out to the car?' she said. I took the suitcase to the cab, then returned to assist the woman.

She took my arm and we walked slowly toward the curb.

She kept thanking me for my kindness. 'It's nothing', I told her.. 'I just try to treat my passengers the way I would want my mother to be treated.'

'Oh, you're such a good boy, she said. When we got in the cab, she gave me an address and then asked, 'Could you drive

through downtown?'

'It's not the shortest way,' I answered quickly..

'Oh, I don't mind,' she said. 'I'm in no hurry. I'm on my way to a hospice.

I looked in the rear-view mirror. Her eyes were glistening. 'I don't have any family left,' she continued in a soft voice..'The doctor says I don't have very long.' I quietly reached over and shut off the meter.

'What route would you like me to take?' I asked.

For the next two hours, we drove through the city. She showed me the building where she had once worked as an elevator operator.

We drove through the neighborhood where she and her husband had lived when they were newlyweds She had me pull up in front of a furniture warehouse that had once been a ballroom where she had gone dancing as a girl.

Sometimes she'd ask me to slow in front of a particular building or corner and would sit staring into the darkness, saying nothing.

As the first hint of sun was creasing the horizon, she suddenly said, 'I'm tired.Let's go now'.

We drove in silence to the address she had given me. It was a low building, like a small convalescent home, with a driveway that passed under a portico.

Two orderlies came out to the cab as soon as we pulled up. They were solicitous and intent, watching her every move.

They must have been expecting her.

I opened the trunk and took the small suitcase to the door. The woman was already seated in a wheelchair.

'How much do I owe you?' She asked, reaching into her purse.

'Nothing,' I said

'You have to make a living,' she answered.

'There are other passengers,' I responded.

Almost without thinking, I bent and gave her a hug.She held onto me tightly.

'You gave an old woman a little moment of joy,' she said. 'Thank you.'

I squeezed her hand, and then walked into the dim morning light.. Behind me, a door shut.It was the sound of the closing of a life..

I didn't pick up any more passengers that shift. I drove aimlessly lost in thought. For the rest of that day,I could hardly talk.What if that woman had gotten an angry driver,or one who was impatient to end his shift? What if I had refused to take the run, or had honked once, then driven away?

On a quick review, I don't think that I have done anything more important in my life.

We're conditioned to think that our lives revolve around great moments.

But great moments often catch us unaware-beautifully wrapped in what others may consider a small one.

Killing two health birds with one well-placed kidney stone?

2011-12-27T13:37:00.001+08:00

Someone please tell me BP Healthcare at the very least have someone with an above average command of English to go through their public marketing materials?

"Friendly medical practitioners soothe body fluid donators to ensure a smooth, flowing process. Tests take up to 15 minutes, after which upper class postmen whisk blood and urine samples to brainy testers. Examinations cover health obstacles like hepatitis B, liver and renal malfunctions and patients need not stretch their patience as results can be obtained within 24 hours. After a doctor's consultation, customers are entitled to a complimentary nutritionist consultation, killing two health birds with one well-placed kidney stone."

Source

I am thinking of going there for my regular health checkup (my last two were done at their place). Now I'm not... hmm.. quite so sure. Am not quite ready to understand how kidney stones are useful to kill health birds. :)

27 Sep 2011: Siemens Run 2011

2011-10-11T02:51:00.009+08:00

What are you running for?

Siemens has a reputation for hosting one of the more "fun" races in KL and with them donating the run proceeds to charity, it's a run that's always worth supporting. I missed the 2009 run as I was late to the party and the registration has closed. I did sign up for last year's but due to some last minute engagement, couldn't make it on run day itself.

Siemens only has 10K as the competitive category and with limited medals (150 for my Junior Veteran category), you need to make sure you come back fast enough to grab one of the finisher medals. Their running vest is from Brooks and usually far much better quality than those from the "more famous" brands.

This would be my first road races after SCKLM (which was at end June) and while I've been (trying) to keep to my practice runs at the gym and KLCC (thanks to new-found Sunday running buddy, Ang), the practice sessions been irregular at best as the project at WSM is rolling towards it's Go-live date - and BGC taking up whatever slack time I may have after WSM.

Which brings me back to this article's topic, what do I run for? Simple.... to ensure I'm fit enough to continue doing what I'm doing - work, business, personal, boardgaming, etc. And for this 10K races are the best way to keep me "honest" in terms of getting myself fit. Life always gets into our way of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and good fitness level - we'll always have the "excuse" to skip today's training in order to complete another assignment or report.

But when you know you've a race to complete sometime in the horizon, you will make an effort to get to the gym if only to make sure you dun suffer needlessly on race day. If you follow Covey's Four Quadrants, then "running to keep yourself fit" is usually a Quadrant 2 (Q2) activity and one we tend to "sacrifice" when push comes to shove timewise.

Ensuring I keep myself fit enough to run 10K races (which fits sweetly into a one hour time slot) helps to avoid this Q2 activities (exercise) turning into a Q1 firefighting crisis (when we've to take a rest/break from our hectic schedule due to reason of poor health).

Yeah, that's what I run for. :)

The run itself was not a good one for me though. Perhaps I've been slacking in my treadmill sessions. The route is similar to SCKLM 2011 except where we turned into Syed Putra, we kept along Jalan Tun Sambathan instead which made the route shorter by about 800m.

I'd an easier run during SCKLM, doing a 5:51 average pace and generally just chugging along fine. This time however I were struggling a bit to keep even a 6:00 pace even though it's on the same route. Told myself I won't be surprised if I'm past the 150 medals when I reach the finishing line at this pace.

But surprisingly the medals were still around when I came to the Finish point around the one hour mark at position #118 (within my category)! And the finisher medal - made of wood instead of the usual pewter - indeed looks good.

RESULTS

Distance: 10.06 km

Position: 118 (Men Jr Veteran)

Time: 60:45 min

Pace: 6:02 /km

This is the first of a series of races I'd signed up for in Sep/October (August was Puasa month so no races scheduled); the next being the much anticipated Adidas King of the Road held at Sunway next week.

RELATED LINKS

Siemens Run 2011 Official Site

Siemens Run 2011 Results

What dreams wouldn't we dream if we knew we wouldn't fail?

2011-09-20T00:46:00.002+08:00

Saw this writing shared on my buddy Hengy's facebook notes. A nice piece of writing - not surprisingly from Paulo Coelho, who in my mind is not just a writer of novels but a philosopher of life as well. Let me share it here for those who follow this blog. :P

--quote--

"We must never stop dreaming. Dreams provide nourishment for the soul, just as a meal does for the body. Many times in our lives we see our dreams shattered and our desires frustrated, but we have to continue dreaming. If we don't, our soul dies and Love cannot reach it.

The good fight is the one we fight because our heart asks it of us. The good fight is the one fought in the name of our dreams. When we're young and our dreams first explode inside us with all of their force, we are very courageous, but we haven't yet learned how to fight. With great effort we learned how to fight, but by then we no longer have the courage to go into combat. So we turn against ourselves and do battle within. We become our own worst enemy. We say that our dreams were childish, or too difficult to realize, or the result of our not having known enough about life. We kill our dreams because we are afraid to fight the good fight.

The first symptom of the process of our killing our dreams is the lack of time. The busiest people always have time to do everything. Those who do nothing are always tired and pay no attention to the little amount of work they are required to do. They complain constantly that the day is too short. The truth is, they are afraid to fight the good fight.

The second symptom of the death of our dreams lies in our certainties. Because we don't want to see life as a grand adventure, we begin to think of ourselves as wise and fair and correct in asking so little of life. We look beyond the walls of our day-to-day existence, and we hear the sound of lances breaking, we smell the dust and the sweat, and we see the great defeats and the fire in the eyes of the warriors. But we never see the delight, the immense delight in the hearts of those engaged in the battle. For them, neither victory nor defeat is important; what's important is only that they are fighting the good fight.

And, finally, the third symptom of the passing of our dreams is peace. Life becomes a Sunday afternoon; we ask for nothing grand, and we cease to demand anything more than we are willing to give. In that state, we think of ourselves as mature; we put aside the fantasies of youth, and we seek personal and professional achievement. We are surprised when people our age say that they still want this or that out of life. But really, deep in our hearts, we know that what has happened is that we have renounced the battle for our dreams - we refused to fight the good fight.

When we renounced our dreams and find peace, we go through a short period of tranquility. But the dead dreams begin to rot within us and to infect our entire being. We become cruel to those around us, and then we begin to direct this cruelty against ourselves. That's when illness and psychoses arise. What we sought to avoid in combat - disappointment and defeat - came upon us because of our cowardice. And one day, the dead, spoiled dreams make it difficult to breathe, and we actually seek death. It's death that frees us from our certainties, from our work, and from that terrible peace of our Sunday afternoons.

The only way we can rescue our dreams is to stop being cruel to ourselves."

--adapted from Paulo Coelho, The Pilgrimage

--unquote--

To me when I started the first boardgame meetup years back, I've envisaged the vision of "New OTK" of today. It's been a long road... glad we've arrived in some forms and some parts. There's still a longer road in front I'm sure... but when you are living your dream, the hardship matters less.

Coelho's writing reminded me of a quote I always held close to my heart. A quote that never fails to lift me whenever I felt the road in front is hard to continue... when turning the other way or simply stopping was so much more easier. We may fall. We may stumble. But cold and timid, we will never be. :)

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” ~ Theodore Roosevelt

Lord of the Rings Chess Set

2011-08-14T00:36:00.002+08:00

While surfing eBay looking for some other stuff, I stumbled upon the LOTR Chess Sets from Eaglemoss. Not any wanna-be chess set featuring LOTR figures but a very polished looking hand-painted set.

It obviously comes with a price. L Issued in sets of 32 pieces, they used to have two sets and have recently announced Set 3. With each set costing around USD180.... hmm.. Not cheap to acquire them.

http://www.lotr-chess.co.uk/index.html

BIM2011 - Running along the coastline

2011-06-23T03:01:00.003+08:00

Even though we only slept around 12 m/n (after getting back from the Carcasean boardgaming session), I felt well rested when I woke up around 5ish. The plus point of staying just 1KM away from the starting point (Likassquare Condo) is that you can afford to wake up later and just saunter your way to the race venue. :P

The races start earlier here compared to KL ie 6 am for our 10K and the ungodly hours of 4 am for the full marathoners! :O The reason is simply the sun rising here 1.5 hrs earlier than KL even though both locations are on the same timezone so a 6 am start here is about equivalent to a 7:30 am start in KL.

By the time we were on the road towards Likas Stadium (start venue) around 530ish, the full marathoners have already been on the road for 1.5 hours. Gosh.

We didn't actually saunter since we thought it might be good for us to slow-jog our way to the Stadium, which was a useful pre-race warm-up for us anyway.

A view of the dynamic Likas Sports Complexs which houses an Olympic-size swimming pool... this complex is located along the route from our condotel to the stadium.

Likas Stadium is imposing.. It's the 8th largest football stadium in M'sia with a capacity to house 35,000 fans! Even though it was not even 6 am, the sky was as bright as any morning sun!

We were flagged off sharp at 6 am. No funny celebrity warm-up stuff, no longish speech about nothing, just a quick "Hi How Are You All This Morning" and Bang! Off we go....

The route for the 10K run... starting from Likas, then a 2KM stretch along Jln Tun Fuad Stephen which is the coastline run before we enter the city centre, an u-turn at the 5KM mark and returning in the opposite direction along the same route.

This is the road heading out towards Likas Condotel (that's the tall buildings after the arch) and another 500m we'll hit the coastline. J

This being my 2nd (actual) race this year (the first was the now-infamous ENR at Sepang), my plan for this run was simply to take it at a leisurely 6 min pace. The route here is flat. I mean FLAT with no elevation at all so for those with pace to burn, this is actually a good race to do your PB in whatever category you wanna do.

It's only 1.5K from Likas Stadium to the Tun Fuad Stephen roundabout (above) and from here we turned left and were now running along the coastline of KK facing the South China Sea. Ah.. the sea breeze!

This coastline stretch is about 1.5KM long and it's really such a blissful feeling running along it with the sea breeze in your face! Priceless experience - especially for us city-folks given only to running in the concrete jungles of KL.

Somewhere along this stretch, I saw the 1st Kenyan runners coming from the opposite direction heading back towards Likas Stadium. It's just 6:15 or thereabout and with just 2+ KM back to base, this guy was going back with a timing of around 2:30 hr for a full marathon!

In case you are reaching for your calculator, that's an awesome 3:30 min pace (in other words, he ran each KM of the 42+ KM at the average pace of 3:30 min per KM)!! *shakes head*

At Km3 we start to reach the city centre though the coastline is still very much visible along our route.

The next KM took us alongside one of the newer shopping malls in KK - the Suria Sabah (wonder if it's related to our Suria KLCC?)

After Suria Sabah, we were running along the Harbour Front (above) which has a 2KM boardwalk (arguably the longest in Asia).

We made our u-turn just before the KK Wet Market (the large covered building above). From here, it's just the same route back in the opposite direction. Yay! Another 2KM of coastline run!!

The 21K and 42K went on further down this route... past Le Meridien KK, all the way to Sutera Harbour until they reach Tanjung Aru where their u-turn was.

This was a picture of me stopping for a cuppa of Gatorade at the 7KM mark, taken by Tey. See the coastline in the background? J

The last 200m was on the stadium's soft track.. My Garmin tracked my time at around 59+ min but there was no official time for me as there were some problems with the race bibs they used for this race.

However the BIM organizers were more than willing to help you check your official time from their data if you provide them with sufficient info. A quick email exchange with (the late) Andrew Voon gave my official time as 59:03 min. Sadly, there was probably the last email exchange I'll ever have with Andrew as he passed away suddenly last week.

Overall this was a well-organized race (compared with the ENR, haha), started on time, routes well-marshalled, drinks available almost every 2-3 km (for 10K route) and your goodies like finishing medal, t-shirt and a wet towel were handed to you at the finishing line (makes it easier rather than having the runners queued up for this after crossing the finishing line).

Kudos to Andrew and his organizing team. BIM is a relatively new race (this is their 4th year) and I wish they'll continue to grow from year to year.

waiyan did well in her 10K too. Think she came back around 68:30 min. J

I enjoyed this run a lot.. Probably the best run in all the races I've done. Think part of the reason is that I did not set any finishing target for myself and just decided to do a 6 min pace. I find that at this pace I can just coast along and in the morning air of the South China Sea, while running my mind reflected on where/what/who/why/when/how of my life and I probably achieved clarity in some aspects of those contemplations.

I'll certainly be BACK here for next year's run!

Next: Post-run photo shoot

Borneo International Marathon 2012 date announced!

2011-06-21T02:27:00.003+08:00

It's set for 6th May 2012 (Sunday) and online registration is expected to open 1st Oct 2011. We did our first Borneo run last May (see first blog entry here) and my extremely busy schedule is keeping me from writing the rest of the blog entries.... but we thoroughly enjoyed our run (and also the short holiday at Sutera Harbour) and will definitely want to come back again!

If you'd ran in the 2011 race (full or half-mara) and were coming back to the last KM around 8:00 am - 10:00 am, you might find your pics in my BIM2011 albums here in Facebook.

Official site for Borneo Marathon

http://borneomarathon.com/

------------------------

NOTE: I wrote this entry almost a week back and it was sitting in my journal waiting to be uploaded to Blogger. However on Saturday (June 18) morning, I read a sobering news on one of my running fren's Facebook wall saying Andrew Voon (Race director for BIM) has left us suddenly when he collapsed during his morning run and never woke up.

I do not know Andrew personally but I admired very much what he has done for the Borneo International Marathon (he was one of the founding members) and am sure part of the success of BIM was down to his planning and dedication.

I enjoyed my BIM run this year, luv the feeling of running along the coastline... and I'm sure I'll now return to KK next year for BIM2012 to run again in this wonderful race and to say "goodbye" to Andrew.

Life is fragile... live it now.

BIM2011: Race Pack Collection

2011-05-15T12:24:00.004+08:00

It was 2 years ago that I first noticed this boutique race - Borneo International Marathon - held in the land of the hornbills. The picture of the proboscis monkey (which I kept confusing as orang utan) on the finisher's medal made it a unique medal to collect. The attraction of running along the coastline is probably a strong second pull. And earlier sessreps from Yim (who attended the 2009 run) pointed to a well-organized run.

In 2009, the event was held in the later part of the year (October if I'm not mistaken) but in 2010 they switched it to May 1st which happily coincide with the Labour Day public holiday here. This year's even better, May 1st falls on a Sunday which means Monday is the replacement day-off for us (and we do not even have to take annual leave for Monday).

Not wanting to miss this good opportunity to swing by KK for the Borneo Run this year, we were rather quick to sign up when they opened for registration in December 2010. Yup, they have good planning and started promoting their way almost 6 mths to the event.

Early registration means early flight bookings and while AirAsia continues to offer cheap flights into KK, we found MAS' schedule more amenable to us. If I remembered correctly AirAsia's deal was around Rm400 while MAS about Rm550 per pax. However AirAsia's flight required us to wake up in the ungodly hours of 3am or something since it's departing around 7am (Sat) and then leaving KK on the 9am flight on Monday hardly giving us enough time to R&R (rest & relax) in KK (which beside the Race is part of the reason for this trip).

Some of you might wonder what's wrong with a 3am wake-up on Saturday. Well for one, I do have to host the Boardgamecafe.net's Friday meetup which usually ends (if early) around 2-3 am Sat morning so that meant I'm rushing straight off the meetup to the airport? Nosireee.... I would rather get a couple of hours rest in-between and then get ourselves leisurely to KK in the afternoon.

Oh yes AirAsia do have flights leaving on times better suited to our itinerary but that would meant their cost would be similar to MAS. So MAS it is, which gave us a 12 noon flight out of KUL and a nice 7pm flight back from KK.

First to-do on our list upon arrival at KK (after checking in to our hotel in Likassquare) was to get our Race Pack from the Community Hall, which is about 5 km from Likassquare. We took the complimentary shuttle van from the hotel to get to the Community Hall in good time and the Race Pack collection went smoothly.

I noticed Jesseltown Hotel's located just opposite the Community Hall so if you are thinking of staying somewhere within really short walking distance, you can consider this hotel (not that I've any good nor bad reviews about it).

When we were searching for an accommodation for this trip, we were deciding whether to stay in the city centre (which is just a short 4-5 km the race venue Likas Stadium) or to stay at Likassquare, a short 1 km walk from the stadium. In the end we decided on Likassquare as their frontline person was more responsive and attentive to my emails.

As we were about to leave the Community Hall, we spotted Tey (Facebook link if you do not know who he is). He came with a posse of runners from KL (all from the same family I think). Wow! He's really passionate about promoting the sport of running!

Thanks Tey for this photo!

A little bit on KK City

We decided to hang around a bit in the city centre before moving back to the Likassquare area and were looking for a place to sit and have a cup of coffee.. And we spotted Old Town White Coffee (OTK). Those of you who are boardgamers would surely understand my affinity with them. :)

This OTK outlet seems to be overstaffed but we couldn't complained since it meant their staff are very attentive to your needs.

We didn't order much food to eat as we were saving our stomach for tonight's dinner with Sean & his wife (that'll be our trip to Carcasean Cafe which was the main agenda for today).

My bib for the 10K Run. There's also a useful Starbucks voucher (buy 1 free 1) and a nice eco Newton bag. No running vest but they'll hand out a finisher tee at the Finish Line. You can also see their distinctive logo being branded everywhere.

When we left Old Town and walked around, we noticed a café beside OTK that was packed with customers! The peeps inside were enjoying their food and engrossed in conversation. The café was well (though simple) decorated and we could see a lot of those customers who appeared to be "runners", no doubt for tomorrow's race.

Ah.. Now we know why Old Town was relatively quiet compared to this buzzing place which is know as Fook Yuen Cafe & Bakery. :P We later found out - from Facebook- this was WHERE most of the runners (especially the West M'sians) were gathering to fuel themselves!

Strange sign post in KK. hehe... 164M to the toilet?

Yes, we are 0KM in Kota Kinabalu!

The interiors of the Likassquare apartment. Ours was supposedly a studio apartment but it's essentially a 3-bedroom apartment converted into a studio, to cater for couples like us who do not need 2- or 3-bedrooms.

But they do have 3-bedroom apartments for rent and the price would be very attractive for a group of 5-6 runners sharing an accommodation for this run. With the Start/Finish venue (Likas Stadium) being only one KM walk from this hotel, it's very well positioned for runners who are attending this Race.

The only downside is probably this hotel being away from the city centre hence you'll either need your own transport or to use their complimentary shuttle van when getting to/from the city centre. They even sent a shuttle van to pick us up from the airport!

We took a taxi back (from the Community Hall) and local taxis here go by a fixed rate rather than meter, which I think is understandable given the low volume of customers. Fare from city centre here is about Rm15-17 which is expensive considering the distance covered (barely 5 KM). The hotel's shuttle van is available as long as you make pickup arrangement.

We'll definitely be staying here again if we are back for the next run! At just Rm130+ per night, this hotel is well recommended by us especially if you are a runner coming here for the Borneo Intl Marathon. :P

Next stop: Carcasean Cafe for some boardgaming session & Race Day

--------------------------------------------------------------

For more photos, pls check out my Facebook Album

- BIM2011 Race Pack Collection

Links

- Borneo International Marathon

- Likassquare Condotel

The Bladerunners

2011-05-08T18:07:00.013+08:00

THE BLADERUNNERS
About half a year back when I was due to replace my Adizero Tempo, I was scouring the market to see what's new with running shoes and one brand caught my eye - K-Swiss. I actually first saw it some time ago while in the LRT when a young chap walked in with a nice dynamic looking shoe. It had 4-bands so it couldn't be Adidas. It was not until some of my runner frens started using K-Swiss that I finally found out which brand it was.

Note: I did end up replacing my old Adizero Tempo with another Tempo back in Oct last year (during the Adidas Refresh Your Gear promo) coz Frank told me the yellow model of BLR won't be available in Msia until March this year, and my old Adizero Tempo has had more mileage than it should be.

The Blade Light Run (BLR) caught my eye - in particular the yellow model (above) - probably due to it's bold colors, dynamic shape and it's close proximity to the weight of Adizero (which is a very light trainer). I don't run longer-than-10K races but still, I do not want to lug around a brick on my feet everytime I run. :P

In the early days, it was difficult buying a K-Swiss here since there's no one retailing the shoes locally. Everyone I knew who had this shoe bought them from overseas; usually S'pore or HK. You won't have that problem now since Runnerz Circle (run by Frank Chong) carries (almost) the full range of K-Swiss running shoes.

I didn't get around to asking Frank what's the story behind the Mashimaro but it was displayed rather prominently at the front of his shop. :P

Frank's store is in Kota Damansara which is kinda far from where I stay... so I've been dilly dallying about getting to his shop to look-see at the K-Swiss shoes. The Race Pack collection for the Energizer Night Run (ENR) on the 10th April at Tropicana Mall gave us an opportunity to swing around to his store. The ENR event itself is another big fubar story altogether (will save it for another blog entry).

It was not hard finding our way to Runnerz Circle in Kota Damansara - well, a Garmin nuvi sure helped made things easier. His store was opened a couple months back and I can see that Frank has now keep his shop well-stocked with all types of clothing & accessories for runners - and also triathletes. :D

But we are here for the shoes and it's close to closing time (5pm). :P So we promptly get down to business. He took out a few sizes of the Yellow BLR for me to try out, and I finally found one size that fits me.

The array of K-Swiss shoes available from Runnerz Circle. As you can from the above picture, Frank has one pair of the latest Kwicky Blade Light shoes in his store but we were told that was a trial pair from K-swiss and this shoe won't be available here until later.

Anyway I've already made up my mind long ago to get the Yellow Blade (even though I already have bought a replacement for my Adizero Tempo). No harm having another pair of good running shoes. This shoe looks like I could use it on race day which would then mean it can replace my aging Adizero Ace.

Waiyan also found the Blade Light Run to her liking and decided to get the red colored lady version of the BLR. Haha.. Good for Frank then, a quick double sales!

I took the BLR for a short run at KLCC Park the following Sunday to see how it would go with my feet before using it for the actual race day on the 16th (Energizer Night Run). The shoe fitted snugly and was very good to run in. Can feel the support when my foot hits the ground.

Another aspect of the Blade Light Run is their "drainage" technology - you see those pores in the shoes? - where supposedly even if you stepped into a pool of water, the heavy water would drain itself out from the shoes and avoid turning the shoes into a heavy wet lump.

I did not manage to test this out - and not that I'm keen to do so (hehe) - but Jamie Pang has written a very good review that explained this "drainage" part of the shoe. You might want to read Jamie's review if you are keen to find out more.

I've since used this shoe for two race days - hehe.. the only two races I ever did for 2011 so far (been real busy la!) - which were the Energizer Night Run and the recently concluded Borneo International Marathon. I did the 10K in both races and maintained a consistent (and slow! hah) 6-min pace in both races and I felt the shoes gave me tremendous support.

Waiyan has the same positive remarks for her red BLR. So yes if anyone asks us, this Blade Light Run comes highly recommended by us. But now the Kwicky is slowly turning our heads... hehe.

Btw if you fancy some t-shirts - maybe as souvenir - from past local races, do drop by Runnerz Circle as they have a Frank and Jamie's corners (see below) of past races' t-shirts available for sale. :)

Till next time.

Change.Work.Shop

2011-03-24T03:42:00.003+08:00

OSLO. Today's a full day change management workshop we did for the Oslo office. Not going to write much about the change management programme (since that's client specific and I would like to keep this blog personal). Perhaps let me share some pics of the Oslo office.

We owned the building, two of them in fact - and in Norway almost all commercial buildings are designed distinctively with its own identity. No mass design here. :P

As such, each building is able to convey it's own character and carry a facade unique to herself. Its actually quite cool to be working in such beautifully designed & built offices.

Our building faces the sea - being a maritime business - and while the water's all frozen now in winter, the view outside can be awesome in other seasons.

A concept prototype (below) of a futuristic car carrier using solar powered energy!

We ended our programme earlier than we thought and since we already have plans for tomorrow, everyone agreed tonight's a good time as any to visit the famous Opera House.

Random buildings on our way to the Opera House.

This is a restaurant and it disappointed us! It looks posh outside but on closer inspection, realized they serve only café food!

This (above) I believe is one of the good hotels near to the Opera House.

OSLO Opera House

http://www.operaen.no/Default.aspx?ID=27237

Operahuset, or otherwise known as the OSLO Opera House is right now the largest cultural building in Oslo for a city that's famed for her culture & arts. As one who luvs musicals, I've made it a habit of visiting opera houses where I travel and when me & wifey were at Brisbane 2 years back, we even booked ourselves tickets for "Chicago" at the Brisbane Opera House.

The bridge connecting us to the Opera House, and along the bridge you get to see pictures of the development of the Opera House from concept to completion of the entire building sometime in 2008.

A picture dated 2006 showing the Opera House almost completed...

Sally & John at the Oslo Opera House

We saw Oslo locals going into the foyer so I think there's a show or performance tonight. Too bad we were really on very short time here else I won't mind getting myself a ticket. :P

Ticket prices are reasonable with the front seats going for around NOK800 or about RM400.

You can't come to the Opera House without getting to the top! The snow-covered steps leading to the roof of the Opera House can be slippery especially when you are dragging along a DSLR.

Not sure which building this is (below) but it's situated just opposite the Opera House across the river. Seems like it's under construction or upgrading.

I've to think these are locals (below) as otherwise I wasn't able to differentiate which was frozen water and which was solid land.

Merchandising is always good business, and opera houses not excluded. J Seems like their current performance is "LULU".

Ooh..... rows of audio CDs. Bought an Edvard Grieg collection, and also a book about "Norway - Past Present & Future".

They sell everything it seems....

Sally & John in the foyer... definitely a show on for tonight, looking at the crowd behind them. :P

PEPPE'S Pizza

We were told pizza is one of Oslo's fave food, and the pizza here can be as good as the Italianos. After eating humble pie with the Chinese restaurant thingie (see Day One), I have an open mind on this.. LOL.

We went to a place near the central park named "Peppe's Pizza". Looks like a typical American-style pizza place....

But how did the pizza go?

Apology for a out-of-focus pizza... but you see.. The pizza smelt - and tasted so good - it's a sin to waste time taking pictures instead of chomping on them! Yes Oslo has great pizzas!! Compared to this, Dominos/Pizza Hut seems like junk food. Maybe I need to revisit Micasa when I'm back in KL to see if standards are comparable. :)

Today's still a relatively quiet day travel-wise since we did have a full day's work to account for. But stay tune for tomorrow we visit the famous Vigeland Park...

Meet-n-Greet makes for a Quiet Day in Oslo

2011-03-24T02:23:00.002+08:00

OSLO. The 2nd day was a working day for us in Oslo. It was what we call the "Meet-n-Greet" day; drop in, go around to say Hi and then sit down for some one-on-one with senior management and key staff. We also took the opportunity to go through some important project talking points with staff in the Oslo office.

Since we'll have an early start tomorrow and it's also expected to be a long day, we decided to just have a quick dinner nearby the Oslo office, and then adjourn for the evening.

The Oslo office faces the port/sea and right outside is a string of port-side restaurants. Water's all frozen though....

Today's slightly warmer than yesterday but it's still a sub-10C which actually made for a very very snappy and nice weather to be in as long as you are properly clothed.

We picked an Italian restaurant. Pretty unassuming in deco but I've to say their pasta is simply superb!!

That's all for a quiet day... more to come for tomorrow's sessrep where we went to the recently opened Oslo Opera House.

OSLO TRIP BLOG ENTRIES

Day One - Royal Palace
Day Two - Quiet Day

Day Three - Oslo Opera House

Day Four

OSLO 2011-02 PHOTO ALBUM

Day One 23/2/11

Day Two 24/2/11

Day Three 25/2/11

Day Four 26/2/11

OSLO - The 2nd Most Expensive City in the World?

2011-03-15T03:41:00.004+08:00

With Oslo being rated as the 2nd most expensive city in the world behind Tokyo, it's not your usual destination for an European holiday. Unless you've a desire to know all things Norwegian.

The current project I'm on requires a global implementation across 14 countries, as such "change management" is a crucial element to ensure not just a smooth roll-out but a solid buy-in after we go live. As part of the plan to soften the grounds before go-live date, we arranged for visits to key locations to deliver our change management & communication plans.

With the company being a Norwegian company - even though their HQ is now in M'sia - Oslo has to be the 1st port of call for us. The timing also couldn't have been better... we were due to do our Oslo visit in end February which is when winter is tapering off.

Winter is REALLY winter there, with tempatures dropping to below -25C at times and with -20C being the norm. Oslo is not known as the Winter Capital for no reason. However the February month is probably when Oslo is at her "warmest" in winter.

Then again, the BEST time to visit Europe is always in the cold winter season... never mind if the temperature is -20C. After all what other time can you get to pull out your expensive cashmere coat to wear?? hehe

Just a Drop-n-Run trip

When I was moving around Europe back in 1999-2000 on the ORCA Projects, I tend to extend my stay there after work is done. Makes sense since the air ticket is paid for and all I need to fork out would be the accommodation, which would make for a very affordable overseas holiday. J

This time this trip was a short drop-in, get-the-job-done, move-out thingie.

Partly becoz wifey is not traveling with me, and partly becoz the project demands required me to be back in KL soonest possible.

KUL-AMS-OSL

We flew KLM which required a drop at Amsterdam before transiting us onwards to Gardermoen Airport, Oslo. It's a longish 14 hr flight and with only an hour transit time at Amsterdam, let's just say all I saw of Schiphol Airport (AMS) was the journey from Gate A to Gate B. LOL

We arrived at Gardermoen in good-time (9 am) and quickly parked ourselves at a café in the Arrival Hall while waiting for John, our external change management consultant to arrive from S'pore (his flight was due to arrive half an hour after us).

Two basic hot-dogs and coffee cost us more Rm90. You did notice I mentioned Oslo is one of the most expensive cities in the world rite? :P

Day One was a Resting Day

Our Change Management programme was scheduled for Friday and we've a Meet-n-Greet sessions with some of the management and key staff on Thursday, leaving half of the day for us to kinda recover from the jet lag.

After checking-in to the hotel, picking up some emails, and a short nap, we met at the lobby to decide what we were going to do for dinner and the walk-about before dinner.

Sally, my colleague who has been to Oslo a few times suggested we visit the Royal Palace and then dinner.

That's me and Sally in front of the Royal Palace (Slottet).

John and Sally @ the Royal Palace.

I'd seen one or two runners braving the freezing temperature for a jog around our hotel area... how I wish I could do the same but seriously, you need to be well-prepared to run in this weather!

The snow was almost up to my knees! Never mind run... even walking can be a problem!

Some rehearsal for a show in front of the Royal Palace?

The statue of King Carl Johan in front of the Royal Palace.

A closer look at King Johan...

Oslo is a dog-friendly city so you can expect to see more pictures such as the one above in my blog entry of this Oslo trip. Well, I mean pictures of dog and not necessarily pictures of them peeing randomly all over Oslo!! Bad doggy! LOL

An Art of ICE

After a quick walkabout of the Royal Palace - really there was nothing much to see except snow here and snow there (spring or autumn would have been different) - so we started walking towards our dinner place.

Along the way, we passed into the centre area of Oslo city itself.. And there were some displays of ice sculptures and other art form.

The one thing I admire about Europe - and the reason I always favor Europe as a holiday destination - is it's beautiful and unique architecture. And Oslo is no different.

The weather was probably around -15C now, which was just at the nice level to enjoy the winter capital. :P

Sally was trying to locate a Thai restaurant here that served good thai food - we were skeptical. I mean, all the way here to eat Thai?? But it was a good respite from the cold to pop into this building to look for the restaurant.

I did find a nice bookshop but didn't have the time to pop-in for a look-see...

And there's also this café named "Cafe Bali"? Thai and now Bali... hmm...

More ice sculptures on our way out..... can you recognize this "famous" figure?

I suppose when in winter, there's nothing much you can do except play with ice! :P

Around the streets of Oslo...

This poogie was so obedient... sitting there posing for his owner to take a few snaps.

More doggy.... and no peeing. Good doggy!

The BEST chocolate - FREIA Firklover (or so I was told by Sally)

They were having a sales of FREIA choco bar at the duty free shop in the airport. You should have seen the number of bars we smuggled out of their airport!! Hohohoho... even the airport security lady was giving us the "winky look" when she saw our stash!! :P

We passed by the Parliament House (Stortinget).....

.... and also the Nobel Peace Center (Nobels Fredssenter) but as we were rushing for dinner, didn't drop in for a look-see except to take a quick snap of the building.

If I'm back here again - hopefully with wifey - the Nobel Peace Center is one place I'll be sure to pay a visit!

After failing to locate the ahem, famous Thai restaurant, Sally proposed a Chinese restaurant that she said serves very delicious and authentic Sze-chuan dishes. Chinese now? About 10,000 km from KL? Sure or not?

Sounds wonderful but I did inform her either a) she has not gone to good Chinese restaurant back in KL or b) it's a fine dining place!!

When she passed by this restaurant (above), for a moment I thought this was our dinner place! No disrespect meant but this doesn't really look "delicious". :P

Thankfully she continued walking .... hehe

The walk to the fine Chinese restaurant serving delicious Sze-chuan food seemed to take forever and ever! I was beginning to wonder whether it's Sally intention to walk us till we are so hungry & tired, any food would taste like Sze-chuan fine dining!!

We passed by this beautiful port.. Well, it's NOT that beautiful in winter, with all the frozen water around the stagnant boats but I suppose in summer or autumn, this place would look marvelous!

After walking what must have felt like half of Oslo, we finally arrived at our fine Chinese restaurant serving delicious Sze-chuan food!

I was half-expecting it to be called "Royal Sze-chuan Fine Chinese Cuisine" or something grand.. but it was simply called "Dinner Bar & Restaurant". Talk about keeping it simple, hah!

Ooi... is this the fine Chinese restaurant serving delicious Sze-chuan food? Anyway legs were tired, it was getting colder (must be closer to -18C now), it's also getting dark (Oslo gets dark around 5:30 pm this time of the year), stomach was growling... now's not the time to debate about fine cuisine but the time to sit down and have a warm meal!

Once we entered the restaurant, our mood improved! It was packed! People were queueing for tables and the place looks very nicely decorated and does appear like a nice dining place with a warm ambience.

Maybe there's some truth to the fine chinese Sze-chuan food after all!

We waited for a short while and were soon seated. But the head waitress - a pretty Chinese lady (from Sze-chuan?) who speaks good Cantonese and Mandarin, and English... and Norsk - informed us politely we need to finish our dinner by 7 pm. It was 5:30 then.

At first we thought she was joking but then realized she's dead serious! She explained we were the first wave of diners, and their 2nd wave starts around 7 pm! Oh...

The spring rolls for appetizer... well presented and tasted as good as they look!

Yes, their signature Sze-chuan soup! You can really taste the "sweet" and the "spicy" part of the soup distinctively... and the spicy part kicked in as you get down to the "bottom". I'm not one who take spicy stuff yet I almost finished the entire bowl. But the last two spoonful were really too fiery for me to finish!!

Compared to this, I dun think many Sze-chuan soup served in KL come close! The soup alone cost more than Rm40 per bowl so price-wise they are in the high-end but I suppose in Oslo, they are considered a "regular dining place" since a coffee & hotdog also cost me Rm50+!

Fried sea bass as the main course...

... and mixed vege.

I've to swallow humble pies and really have to give this restaurant TWO THUMBS UP!! You bet I'll want to visit this restaurant again (am sure wifey would luv the fiery kick of the sze-chuan soup). It's certainly not on the cheap side but for the quality & taste of the food, you simply need to try this highly-rated restaurant!

That's day one of my Oslo trip. Stay tune for the next instalment for our 2nd day where we had dinner at the port after our Meet-n-Greet session at the Oslo office.

OSLO 2011-02 PHOTO ALBUM
Day One 23/2/11
Day Two 24/2/11
Day Three 25/2/11

HUKM Run for a Ray of Hope

2010-11-13T03:10:00.004+08:00

Fresh from last Sunday's Terry Fox Run, this coming Sunday sees another charity run organized by the National University of M'sia to raise funds for the needy in PPUKM.

The interesting part of the run is that it's held in UKM, Bangi - a venue I've not ran in before which should make this an interesting run.

Those of you not doing anything this Sunday morning are encouraged to come and support this event. Registration is still available I think and it's just Rm25. I'm pretty sure there'll be a strong contingent of UKM students taking part.

You do get a very nice dry-fit t-shirt.

Note: Online registration is closed but you can register either at the race kit collection site tomorrow (Sat) or onsite Sunday morning at UKM, Bangi.

I'm still troubled by a "painful" ankle (didn't do much running lately so this is likely caused by too much bumming around) so hopefully I can get to do this run on Sunday. I suppose the risk of sleeping late on Sat and not waking up on-time is higher than my ankle pain. Let's see... :P

HUKM Run for a Ray of Hope

http://runforarayofhope.blogspot.com/

Busy As Busy Is

2010-11-13T02:51:00.003+08:00

Someone once asked, "Why are you so busy?"

I need a few secs to gather my thoughts before I can compose a reply. A weak one though.. that went like, "Why am I what?"

I suppose if I were to ask someone, "Why are you so free?" I may solicit the same response from those asked.

Anyway thought it might be interesting to post a snapshot of one of those busy weeks from my planner tool. :P

Software used: Achieve Planner

I color-code my activities. Green is for my running activities. Sadly I missed a run on Thursday. Purple is for Boardgaming activites, and Friday's our weekend OTK session. :P

This tool also allows me to define time charts ie certain time allocated for specific project/category in a week which is the concept of First Things First (Covey). This makes me plan and balance (as far as possible) my week according to the importance of the projects I need to work on.

The coming weeks are looking busier than ever but you are not likely to hear me complaining. For the busy man is troubled with but one devil, while the idle man by a thousand. LOL

Terry Fox Run 2010

2010-11-10T02:04:00.001+08:00

TERRY FOX RUN 2010
What's Fox, Pretty Celebrity, Boardgames, and Hope have in common? They all appeared in last Sunday's charity run in aid of cancer research, the famous TERRY FOX RUN! Were you not there? Aiyoh...
by jack208

Event: Terry Fox Run KL
Venue: Taman Tasik Titiwangsa
Date: 7 Nov 2010, 8:45 am

There was a poignant moment before the run was flagged off when the CEO of CARIF, a local non-profit organization dedicated to the research of a cure for cancer, went up to the stage and asked those who know someone who has been affected by cancer to raise their hands... There were thousands of people gathered at the padang in Taman Tasik Titiwangsa and I think you can see a hand from almost everyone.

Take a moment to digest that. That's how pervasive cancer is, sadly.

Dr Teo of CARIF

FOX
Thirty years ago, a Canadian diagnosed with cancer and with one of his legs amputated, decided to embark on a cross-Canada run to raise money and awareness for cancer research. He ran a full marathon (that's 42.195 km to those counting) every day and so began the Marathon of Hope.

Picture © Frostbite, CA

Today the Terry Fox Run is a non-competitive charity event held annually worldwide. It's an informal run, where your participation is more important than completing the distance, where everyone can run, walk, ride or wheel.

PRETTY CELEBRITY
There's always a famous local celebrity emceeing KL's Terry Fox Run. This year's no difference and they had Chermaine Poo (what, you mean you dun know her?) who's not only pretty but knows something about numbers too as she's a Chartered Accountant by training.

Picture © PM Tey

She certainly had the crowd's attention and did a fantastic job getting everyone ready-to-go!

Picture © Pueh-Tian Lim (runwitme.blogspot.com)

For more pictures of Chermaine, pls check out PM Tey's Facebook albums. I've stopped counting how many pictures of her were in his photo album. LOL.

BOARDGAMES
We took part in this run last year but as individual runners. This year, we thought of getting Boardgamecafe.net as part of our social responsibility to contribute towards this charity event by sponsoring their t-shirts.

At last year's Terry Fox Run

In return for our sponsorship, we get to have our Boardgamecafe.net name imprinted on the sleeves of the t-shirts. Cool!

Here are some pics of other boardgamers and runner friends who took part in this event and supported Boardgamecafe.net's contributions...

Chia Kai (right-most) who's just back from Greece (marathon) actually happens to be Hiew's (aka Hecose) nephew. Small world indeed! Oh.. you can also buy Small World the Boardgame here (hehe)

AyHeng, regular OTK kaki and his wife Li Li waking up early to come and support the event! Interestingly President Roslin - of their fave Battlestar Galactica boardgame - was a cancer victim. Wait.. she's a CYLON!

C_mun with her King Henry, King Richard and Princess Samantha! :P

King Richard who ran and ran and ran and ran... so much that he went out of juice later and kept wanting to lie down and tidur!! Hehe. Poor waiyan was the one chaperoning him..

C_mun's fren... oops we forgot to take any picture of Cheng Yee, a good fren of ours whom we've not been catching up with regularly since our Angkor '08 trip. Ian Tan is missing btw!!

This is what jack208 does when he's not boardgaming....

HOPE
Whether you walk, you run, you cycle, you wheel or you ride.... we all need to start somewhere.

Running - similar to boardgames (we hope) - unites all people regardless of race, profession and age.

The family that runs - and play boardgames - together, stays together.

Hope gives us the power to step out and try... well said, kiddo! Butwaitaminute kiddo... how come you wear this t-shirt? Never buy official t-shirt ar? Next year must buy ar? :P

This year is a landmark 30 Years for Terry Fox Run, and their t-shirt design this year is really cool. What? You didn't buy their t-shirt?

HOPE gives us the belief that we will finish this together... I like this shot very much. Good one, Lai Wah!

CONTRIBUTORS' LIST
We were actually not informed that our contributions would enable us to see Boardgamecafe.net's name in print on the Contributor's List board so it was a rather nice surprise for us when we saw BGC's name in the list!

It's good to have your company name starting with A or B

Next year however we'll get a bit more organized for such events and will come prepared with walking banners like this Starbucks group. :)

Hmm.. I think if she became Boardgamecafe.net ambassador, we'll see a super increase in new boardgamers!! What you think ar? :P

Photos to Remember
Here's some pictures taken by Lai Wah for your enjoyment!

Starting them young...

ET Phone Home?

Round and round they go... the blue t-shirts

Not just wheels... but wheels-with-style!

Wonder where we can get this? Your own custom trailer, powered by Daddy-Two-Legs!!

Check out the rest of the photos of this event at my Flickr Album.
All photos in my Terrfy Fox Run Flickr album taken by Lai Wah.

And a special mention for the two "celebrity" in the local running circuit - PM Tey and Pueh Tian - whom have done much to spread the love of running everywhere they go!

PM Tey (left) and Pueh Tian lending their support to this event.

Last but not least, Boardgamecafe.net will like to say thank you from the bottom of our heart to all those who have contributed to the Terry Fox Run in all forms and kinds. We'll be back for this again next year and we look forward to your wonderful support then!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LINKS
Terry Fox Foundation (click here)
CARIF Malaysia (click here)

Other Links
Pueh Tian's blog entry (click here)
PM Tey's Multiply Album (click here) - note: you need to add Tey as friend in Multiply
Boardgamecafe.net Terry Fox Run blog (click here)
Chermaine Poo website (click here)

Short & Sweet Theatre Gala Finals 2010

2010-11-05T06:03:00.005+08:00

A year ago, around the same time, we went for our first Short & Sweet Gala Finals at KLPAC. We luv it very much... and this year, we are back for more!

Short & Sweet is the brainchild of Dato' Faridah Merican (and her partner-in-crime Joe Hasham) making its debut here in 2008 with just the Theatre format. When we attended last year's Gala Finals, they've already added Dance to its repertoire (but being newbies to this show, we didn't know and thus missed that!)

This year they've added Musicals to the list and yet we contrived to miss the Dance Gala Finals again! Thankfully we managed to come to our senses and promptly booked tickets for the Theatre Gala Finals.

Short & Sweet Theatre is an innovative concept of a series of 10-minutes plays put together by emerging local directors, screenwriters and actors. The ten best plays are then selected to appear in a Gala Final night where awards are given out for Best Actor, Best Director, Best Production, etc.

With ticket prices for the Gala Finals at just Rm43/pax (comparatively the Kings & Queen show we attended a week earlier cost almost 7 times as much!), the event was backed by heavy sponsorship from various organizations, notably YTL one of the co-founders of KLPAC, an important hub for Malaysia's young performing arts industry.

Kudos to the following sponsors for making this happen!

ASHELISM in Theatre?

My niece Reimena has been helping us with some creative work (for Boardgamecafe.net) lately. Waiyan suggested we should take her along for the Gala Finals since this type of show is likely her cup of tea. Her first theatre?

We were early. Very. Hardly a soul there and we were half wondering if... we'd got the date wrong? Nah.. We were just.. very early.

After collecting our tickets, snooping around the box office to see what other shows they are having next, checking out the merchandise shop.

Bought S&S t-shirts and a mug for souvenir.

Eerr... I think the kid was waving at me! :P

And then it's time to feed our stomach. :P

The Curtain Call Bistro, the last time we were here (was last Sep me think) did not have much food to offer, except some really expensive meehoon goreng. However they have upped their game, and we can see they've a good list of a la carte meals to choose from.

Both me & wifey went for Singapore Meehoon Goreng - we saw a customer having this and it looked yummy - while Reimena chose Vegetarian Fried Rice, which was given thumbs up by her as well.

So ah well, we can now afford to have dinner here in KLPAC while waiting for the show to open it's door. Cool.

We hanged around the foyer waiting for the queue to form at the entrance to Pentas 2. As Pentas 2 is a free-seating theatre, we need to get into kiasu mode to ensure we queue early to get a good seat.

Last year, the Gala Finals had 10 plays. This year, they've added 2 more.

FARIDAH & JOE

They are simply awesome!! And KL's Performing Act industry owes so much to the tireless effort of these two in organizing, promoting and nurturing emerging talents!

Alrite, let's get to the plays....

1. Birds Fly into Ceiling Fans and Die

Two siblings struggle to move forward in their lives, unable to see eye-to-eye.

Hmm... first show was, not, that, fantastic. Maybe it's just me. The delivery of lines were wooden and bland. Think they were supposed to play two siblings in constant argument but can't feel the underlying emos...

I think the title is meant to be a sarcastic punchline, but imho it went flat.

2. The Bear in the Pawn Shop

Sometimes things found, remain lost.

The next play was better. Much better.

At least the actors delivered the lines more naturally.. and as a bonus, they've the youngest actor in the Finals - the 11 year-old Chea-Mun Tan who played the little poor gal who lost her brother's teddy bear.

This young gal got potensi! And she was given the "Encouragement Special Award" by Faridah.

3. Postmodern-isms

Three ideas on discussing the best seat in the house...

It continued to get better! A hilarous take on our different perspective of right vs wrong; black vs white. The setting? Three people debating heatedly over which is the best seat in the theatre.

This play has many convoluted lines... involving heavily interspersed of the word "right" and "wrong". Not easy to deliver and you need not just to memorize the sentence(s) but also the timing. Phoon-Chi Ho (above) did one amazing sequence of line that contained so many "right" and "wrong" that I think I need a recap in order to understand properly the context of that sentence!!

Viknesh was not too bad either... keeping up with Ho's delivery. Ho went on to win the Best Actor (Male). Well-deserved win I have to say.

4. Perfect Stillness

A man writes about his wife in stillness.

Ah well, the good run has to end at some point....

There were bits of this play that looked like it was reaching up but then ebbed away... Anyway I like it's morale of people needing to be honest with each other.

5. Unfinished

When will it end?

Next up was an interesting one. The actors didn't speak a single word, they merely showed flash cards containing hand-written words!

I couldn't take much pictures of this play since I found if I spend too much time peeking at time thru my lens, I would miss too much of the play if I do not read the flashcards!!

I suspected - but only confirmed towards the end - they are deaf-n-mute actors. My suspicion was confirmed when I saw their director talking to them using hand language!

Their director, Ms Larna Hoong was feted with the S+S Special Awards for Innovative Direction, and I must say she really did earn this!

6. 10,000 Cigarettes

Would you like to join the Cigarette Smokers' Hall of Fame? Terms & Conditions apply.

This was a quality one from the script point of view! Four ladies - all playing as heavy chain smokers - delivering their lines all interwoven with each other.

They really have to do lots of homework (ie training) in order to get the delivery to be pitch-perfect (to borrow from the musical line)! Not surprisingly their scriptwriter Alex Boun (from Sydney) won the Best Scripts award.

7. Wati dan Puan

Kisah hubungan your istimewa di dalam sebuah rumah yang tipikal di Malaysia. Berdasarkan kisah benar.

Then comes a touching, yet at times funny play about a typical Madam, her servant and missing Indon husband! Haha.

The delivery of lines by both actresses were so natural you would think they were just having a chit-chat on their own without the audiences around them. The script was in Malay which was also refreshing.

Was expecting Siti Farrah (who played the Indon servant) to win Best Actress and disappointed it didn't happen.

8. Triangle

The trigonometry of drama begins when one is getting married and one is having trouble putting on his sampin.

This about a man getting married to his long-time sweetheart, and his best man & buddy who was in love with the same girl.

Pretty "old" storyline.. but was not too bad, I suppose due to the camaderie you could feel between the two actors.

9. This is Heaven

But all endings are also beginnings... we just don't know it at that time.

This one lost me completely. Thought they were supposed to play husband-n-wife who have passed away and now met in Heaven to reminisnce about their good ol' times but both characters were played by women!

I'm not sure how the "endings are also beginnings" were drawn from the play itself? But the part that lost me completely was this play won the Best Overall Productions award (which would have been equivalent to the Best Movie in Oscar)!! Maybe I really dun understand Performing Arts... haiz.

10. Single Worded Title

You have got to know funny to understand meta.

I enjoyed this the most! Not only were their idea very ingenuitive, they actually managed to insert an actor into the audience as a "surprise" factor! The inserted actor were not even mentioned in their credits to avoid giving up her secret... but she (Nabihan Yaacob) walked away with the Best Supporting Actress (Female) award!

They also won the Best Director and the People's Choice Award, and this play took the most awards for this year! I would even consider them for the Best Overall Productions but I suppose the judges have other criteria.

I suppose having an oversized Justin Bieber (above) in your cast helps... LOL

11. Tipping Point

After three good years, Rob and Laura are breaking up. Now they're trying to work things out, their lives and happiness hanging in the balance, on the tipping point.

Another one of those monologuous talk-to-the-audience type of play. I think for this type of play, two from last year's Short & Sweet stayed in my mind! They were really good but this was just so-so.

Yet the actress won the Best Actress award. I'm stumped. :P

12. Energia

"Accept me the way I am" is a contemporary euphimism for...

Haha.. This started slowly.. And I was half-thinking the good plays have done their run... and then it surprised you!

When we love someone deeply, we'll always say "I'll love you no matter how you change". This play pushes the "change" part of your declaration ALL the way. And I really mean "ALL the Way"!! Haha.

Husband and ahem, wife contemplating a love declaration made many years ago.... (hehe)

Will you kiss me, honey? And they... almost... did... kiss on-stage!

DOUGLAS AH DOUGLAS

Last year, during the break when the judges went into the room to deliberate on their scores, they turned the stage into a dance floor and had everyone get off their bums to move it move it baby. That WAS fun!!

This year they decided to have something low-key, and instead of asking the audience to provide their own entertainment, they brought in Douglas Lim to deliver jokes to keep us entertained while they process the judges' scores.

We'd just seen Douglas Lim at last week's Kings & Queen of Comedy Asia and it would be interesting to see how many "fresh" jokes he has. He didn't disappoint even though you can see he did not come prepared and it was more of an impromptu performance for him.

His "Bear & Police Efficiency" joke was great.. I even had that videoed but sadly he asked us not to put that up on YouTube. Hehe.

I salute this lady.. She was translating everything- even Douglas' jokes - using sign language to a group of deaf audiences (some of them would be those acting in the Unfinished play).

And the award goes to....

For full list of award winner, go to their page here.

Nabihan Yaacob, the actress inserted into the audience, receiving her Best Supporting Actress award from Faridah Merican. She (Nabihan) actually sat next to waiyan!

Best Supporting Actor. Apparently his play did not make it to the Gala Finals but he still garnered the highest score to snag this award.

The Best Actress award to Shiva Kalaiselvan from the "Tipping Point"

The Best Actor to Phoon Chi Ho from "Postmodern-isms"

Special Encouragement Award to the youngest actor in the Final, Chea-Man Tan who's only 11 this year.!

Innovative Directing award goes to Larna Hoong for her well-staged no-word-spoken play "Unfinished" delivered by a group of deaf actors.

HAPPY DIWALI!

On the way back, we saw Bangunan Sultan Abdul Samad was bathed in luminous purple light! Not sure if this was for Halloween or Deepavali?

Until next year! We'll make sure we do all Musical, Dance and Theatre Gala Finals!!

LINKS

Jack208's Photo Album for Short & Sweet Theatre 2010 (click here)

Short & Sweet Malaysia website (click here)

Short & Sweet Malaysia blog (click here)

KL Performing Arts Centre (click here)

Kings & Queen of Comedy Asia 2010

2010-10-31T06:35:00.006+08:00

It was billed as the first ever night of kings.. and queen... of comedy where you get 5 stand-up comedians at the top of their game bringing you the BIGGEST laugh in a live comedy event! For some reason, the organizer is doing this show for a single night only (in KL) which obviously did help to ensure the show was a sell-out.

With the irrespressible "Queen" Kumar hosting a mix of the best comedians in Asia, and with two of the four kings coming from Malaysia, Douglas Lim and Harith Iskandar and the other two from India (Vir Das) and Vietnam/Australia (Hung Le), this was a show I ain't wanna miss (even tho' it's ticket price is quite pricey).

I'd a boardgame meetup event at Subang earlier on the afternoon of the show - bad scheduling I've to say - and by the time I got back from Subang, we were very pressed for time heading towards KLCC where the Kings & Queen of Comedy Asia (KQCA) show was being held.

The show was to start at 8 pm and by the time our car's parked inside KLCC, it was 5 minutes to 8 pm. We almost wanted to sprint all the way to the Plenary Hall... but noticing other "latecomers" who were walking at the same brisk pace heading towards the Plenary Hall, we were assuaged by their company. :P

Most of the musicals or events which we attended, be they held at Plenary Hall or Istana Budaya, did start on time so we do not suppose this would be an exception. But then again, this is a Malaysian event. A-ha...

When we got on the escalator leading up to the main lobby of the Plenary Hall, a huge sigh of relief as we could see everyone's still hanging around the lobby; most of them chit-chatting... some appeared "lost" and a few were busy taking pictures with the poster boards.

So the show is LATER than us! Hah!

My lovely companion for the evening

After catching our breath, we proceeded to check into the theatre. Seating was good.. we were in the center about 10 rows from the stage. We even managed to snap a few pics and still the show was not starting! Apa ini... show on Msian time ka?

Oh well, Mahathir Lokman's just seated behind me! :P He's a Datuk now, rite?

OPENING ACT - JAY ONE AND TEE Q LEE

It was not until 8:30 pm before the show opened with their catchy theme song, performed by JayOne and Tee Q Lee.

Still that's a full 30 minutes late... wonder if it's becoz some VIP guests were late??!!

QUEEN KUMAR (SINGAPORE)

However all's forgiven when the Queen came on stage, for she (or is it he) certainly knew how to instantly build a rapport with the audience.

Hosted by the awesome Queen Kumar of Singapore!

KING DOUGLAS LIM (MALAYSIA)

The show started - and ended - with a Malaysian, and Douglas Lim was the first to take the stage. It appeared they like to crack jokes at their own ethnicity - eg Kumar did not shy from making Indians the expense of his jokes and neither were Douglas short on Chinaman jokes.

While the event was labeld 18PL, I think you need to be even more liberal in your thinking especially on racial and religious issues in order to enjoy this show. This was particularly true when Douglas ended his session with a cover version of Justin Bieber's hit song "Baby" (rhyming to "Babi") J

I think if my niece Reimena was here for the show - being a staunch Groban fan and hardcore Bieber basher (and that's putting it mildly) - her face may turned smurfy blue listening to Douglas Lim's cover version! :P

KING VIR DAS (INDIA)

The 2nd act was by Vir Das from India, another comedian who's shorter (in height) than Queen Kumar who did not stop emphasizing this point. :P

While Douglas cracked cina-man jokes, Vir Das also wasted no time in laughing at his own Indian origins, all done in the name of humour and nothing serious (well nothing serious unless you've a very sensitive mind). He's also very fond of adult/sexist jokes which the audience lapped up voraciously! LOL

We have a short 20-min break after Vir Das' act, time for toilet break and in our case grab some (accordingly to waiyan) "tasteless" sandwich and drinks since we didn't have our dinner yet due to the rush to get here on time. :(

Kumar with his new costume after the Break. Ain't she sexy?

KING HUNG LEE (VIETNAME/AUSTRALIA)

After the break, it was Hung Lee's turn to entertain us and Queen Kumar cheekily introduced him as "not so well Hung Lee". Not sure if she has personally attested to this. hehe.

Hung Lee was good not just with the jokes but he also seems to carry around a perpetually funny-n-cute look who probably endeared him with the crowd.

I didn't have a good picture of him but perhaps this picture of him (from the Herald Sun Australia) will give you an idea of what I meant by "cute/funny" look.

Now everytime we take oatmeal, I'll think of his "oatmeal sandwich"! Haha

KING HARITH ISKANDAR (MALAYSIA)

They saved the best for last... our very own Mr KFC!

He certainly drew the most laughter all around... with his various innuendos of recent political and current events in Malaysia and Singapore. Seems like nothing is "sacred" to these comedians. What I liked best about him is his ability to actually take a piss at BOTH Malaysia and Singapore in the same sentence!!

His last act of comparing the differences between CSI Miami and CSI M'sia has to be - in my opinion - the highlight of the show!! Unbelievably funny, LOL.

APPLAUSE!!

I've to say before the show - and this being the first stand-up comedy on a theatre stage - I was not sure what to expect. If it's a concert or a musical, you do have an idea what you'll be getting but a stand-up comedy and probably solo act?

Queen Kumar milking the applause from the crowd at the end of the show...

At the end, we were not disappointed at all! It was jovial fun and not at all a bad way to spend an evening! It's certainly a new experience for us. But I do hope if they are repeating this show in future, they are able to organize it for a few more days instead of just a single show.

And start the show on time la! :P

I've read an article saying stand-up comedy is one of the hardest job in the world. Most people talked about stage fright or butterlies in the stomach when they were asked to just give a speech or talk... imagine how it would feel to get on stage, crack some jokes and have the audience laughing at your jokes!

Your entire performance depends on how the audience warms-up, connects to you and responds to your punchlines. As Jeff Green (a master stand-up) once said, "You can't solve stand-up comedy, you can't solve the audience. Tomorrow's different, and they'll laugh differently."

Kudos to these four Kings and one Queen for delivering one heck of a comedy show!

"At its best, stand-up comedy is the purest and most immediate medium for comedy and possibly even self-expression." The Guardian.

I leave you with the catchy soundtrack from the Opening Act of this show! Enjoy!

click here)

Check out the rest of the pics from Jack208's Photo Album (

-----------------------------------

The show's Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=wall&viewas=0&gid=35329974791

Zumba your Way to Charity

2010-10-22T01:19:00.003+08:00

ZUMBA YOUR WAY TO CHARITY
A group of dancers are hoping to raise Rm60,000 for Kiwanis Bangsar by doing a 2-hr public Zumba Fitness dance class cum party! Apa tu Zumba?

Hmm... from their official site, it says Zumba is a hypnotic Latin rhythms and easy-to-follow moves creating a one-kind fitness program that'll blow us away. J Okie.. Sounds FUN.

Where: HGH Convention Centre, Lot 475 Jalan Sentul

When: Nov 7th, 2010 (Sunday) 10am - 1pm

Price: Rm18/pax

Ticket costs Rm18 each, and I've already gotten two even though I'm not sure if I'm able to make it on that day (it's on Nov 7th) but never mind la.. charity ma, it's a good thing.

Visit their Zumba For Charity blog to find out more.

It's Show Time!

2010-10-22T00:59:00.005+08:00

IT'S SHOW TIME!
Busy is not good. Busy makes you missed good shows. Haiz. Wasn't even aware of it but Short&Sweet Dance Gala Finals was last Sunday (17/10). Could have gone but were not tracking it, so didn't even know the Gala Finals were on Sunday. L

If you like stuff like this, keep tracking them at the KLPac site, as their Short & Swweet Theatre Gala Finals is this coming 31st Oct.

However a colleague did give me the heads-up on another comedy show, the Kings & Queen of Comedy Asia. First of its kind in Asia. 2.5 hours non-stop laughter. 5 of the top stand-up comedians in Asia featuring the popular Harith Iskander and Douglas Lim (of Kopitiam fame). Only one day show?

Ticket price seemed pricey for a comedy show (then again, that's comparing with musicals held here in the past) but given the dearth of musicals on the local scene lately, what the heck la... let's dive in and see if this turns out to be a good.

So tickets booked and they will even courier the tickets to you. The tickets did arrive promptly.. and we are so looking forward to this Saturday.

To book tickets for Kings & Queen of Comedy Asia, go to TicketPro.

Mandarin Grill Once More

2010-10-22T00:19:00.003+08:00

Did not think I'll be back here so soon - after having dined here with wifey recently. After having been busy for weeks, we finally crossed one bridge and had the (project) contract signed, sealed and done. Of course, hard work needs to be followed by a celebration!

Vendor asked me to arrange the venue and it was a toss between Lafite or Mandarin Grill. In the end, MG it was - given it's proximity to the Twin Towers. No photos this time with this blog entry. Well, when you are having the VPs with you, it's not exactly proper to be carrying a camera and snapping each and every food that's brought to the table, while grinning like a cheshire cat and going, "Oh, dun mind me. It's for my blog. Keep eating... " Need to maintain my decorum. Hehe.

I did not have the Pumpkin Soup or their signature Roast Duck (as it's a dish meant for two). Instead I went for their Grilled Free Range Chicken which was good but it would have been better if they served choice of dark meat with a half chicken portion. I did start with the Alaskan Crabcakes (yummy) and ended with Tiramisu (didn't seem to be able to taste liquor in it).

We had wine this time, one that's quite tannic, Italian and I think it's Barbera. Service-wise, they are still good but somehow did not seem as attentive as my last visit. Perhaps back then, it was just me and missus - and less diners that nite - so I suppose they gave us a bit more personal attention.

And oh.. we saw one of their waitress slipped & fell on the "artistic" half-height step that leads from the main reception into the dining area. That was always an accident waiting to happen.. Luckily except for a bruised ego, no one was hurt. :P

Terry Fox Run 2010

2010-10-19T01:12:00.002+08:00

This was first posted at the Boardgamecafe.net site. I'm cross-posting it here to share with readers who are not Boardgamecafe.net fans.

They said "running" and "boardgaming" don't mix well. Argument is that one (running) is active while the other (boardgaming) is passive. One tests your physical limits while the other stretches your mental endurance.

The above argument carries some weight as often a boardgamer is not so into running, while you can't easily find a runner who's keen to sit down for a game of Agricola.

Between both ends, you do see shades of gray. I am of such a shade of grayness, and it's encouraging to note that I'm increasingly seeing more boardgamers or runners who share both passions.

All except one of these bibs belonged to a boardgamer!

In truth, both are not so different.

In Running, you have the Fun Run (5 KM or less), Short Distance (10K), Middle Distance (22K or Half-mara), Long Distance (42K or Full-marathon) and the Ultras (50K or more). Recently a group of my running frens came back from an awe inspiring 50K trail run in the S'pore North Face Challenge! Some of them are even contemplating doing the full 100K next. OMG!

You also get similar groupings in boardgaming - the Fun 30 min Games (Jungle Speed, Blokus), the Short 1 hour Gateways (Ticket to Ride, Samurai, Zooloretto), the Middle Weights (Puerto Rico, Power Grid) which take about 2 hrs to play, the Long Heavies (Agricola, Age of Steam, Imperial) which can go to 3+ hours, and the Hardcore Games (Thru the Ages, 1856, Twilight Imperium) that requires at least 6 hrs per session. And boardgamers also have their "100K" equivalent in legendary games like "1841" (12+ hrs) and "7 Ages" (14+ hrs).

We believe both are activities that promote healthy and positive lifestyle habits. We also believe just as prayer is good for your soul; boardgaming is good for your mind while running is good for your heart. Indeed a holistic way to balance your life!

Boardgamecafe.net's mission is to promote the joy of boardgaming to a wide audience in Malaysia - that you all know J - but we do not want to stop at just evangelising boardgaming to the masses. We want to grow a community of aCTive and hEaLthy boardgamers that's full of semangat!

A BoardgameKids event at a local orphanage, part of our social responsibility programme

Always on the look out to align our community engagement with corporate social responsibility, the upcoming Terry Fox Run this Nov provides an opportunity for Boardgamecafe.net to give something back to the community, and to further blur the shades of gray between boardgamers and runners.

The Terry Fox Run is a charity run in support of the Cancer Research Initiatives Foundation (CARIF) and is held yearly worldwide. This year is a very special year for this event as it marks the 30th anniversary of the Run and a special t-shirt has been designed to celebrate this achievement.

The cool 30th Anniversary Terry Fox Run t-shirt

Boardgamecafe.net will sponsor a number of the Terry Fox Run t-shirts and will give them out to 1) regular customers, 2) those who have bought more than Rm500 worth of games from us in the past 30 days, and 3) those who have contributed selflessly to the growth of the boardgaming and/or running community. Free t-shirts are given out at BGC's discretion.

You can also help support this cause by buying these cool collectible t-shirts from us at just Rm25/ea and in return BGC shall give you a voucher worth RM25 that can be used in your next game purchase. And of course, do come and join us on the day itself to celebrate TFR's 30 yrs of milestone!

What: Terry Fox Run 2010 (30th Anniversary)

When: 7 Nov 2010 (Sunday) 8:45 am

Where: Taman Tasik Titiwangsa

RSVP Here -> BGC Terry Fox Run

BGC at last year's Terry Fox Run

Whether you are a boardgamer who got into running, or a runner who discovers the joy of boardgaming - come join us and let us all run / jog / walk together this Nov 7th in support of this great cause!

"Even if I don't finish,

we need others to continue.

It's got to keep going."

Terry Fox, July 10, 1980

Question: When you are shades of gray, do you call yourself a "boardgaming runner" or a "running boardgamer"? Tsk tsk.

We look forward to see you at this year's Terry Fox Run!

----------------------------

About Terry Fox Run (link)

10 in 10 makes another 10

2010-10-17T01:35:00.002+08:00

10th October 2010 or 10.10.10.

Dates like this comes nought often. More so when it falls on a Sunday which offers the perfect reason for organizing a once-in-a-lifetime running event. Therefore not just one or two races - but more than five I can easily count - were scheduled for this date. That said, the two running events that received the highest profile were the Hooha Asia's 10.10.10 Fun Run and Nike City 10K Run (an event that's organized worldwide with S'pore and KL representing the Asia leg of this event).

We signed up first for the Hooha Fun Run (which was a 5.5K stint) but later when I heard Nike is going to print our bib number onto the Nike 10K City Run running tee, that was a novelty that's worth getting!

Here's a pic of the Nike Run t-shirt with bib number printed at the lower left corner. Pretty nice idea I must say. J

I'd initially thought of doing the "swing" i.e. start the run at Nike, then hop over to do the Hooha race. It's not often you get two high-profile races within closer vicinity of each other - Nike was in KLCC while Hooha starts in Lot 10, a 10-15 min walk at most. And even rarer that two short-distance races start at different time - Nike starts 7 am and Hooha starts 8:20 am.

In theory, it's possible to start from the Nike Run, complete the 10K run by 8 am, hop over to Lot 10 with about 5 min to spare and then kick off the Hooha's part of the 5.5K leg.

In theory.

That theory got flushed down the drain when Nike confirmed it'll start it's races - both the 5K and 10K - at the same time which would be 7:15 am now. There went my double-race prosperity bonus. Haha.

With a 7:15 am start and a 10K race, I am not fast enough to finish it on time to hop over to Lot 10. L

I was even contemplating short-circuiting my 10K to the 5K version as I saw both categories of runners following the same route until the 4K mark at the Yap Kwan Seng / Ampang junction where the 5K runners turn right heading back towards the Finishing Point while the 10K runners turn left towards Sultan Ismail to get to the AKLEH highway.

But the thought of getting to run on the AKLEH was tantalising. Not often do organizers do races that run on AKLEH. I suppose this made the decision for me. 10K it is then for Nike. And Hooha a miss it's gotta be. :S

Wifey waiyan who was in the 5K Nike category did actually do both races! Well done to her then!!

This would be the first time in months that my feet actually ran on actual grounds!! But if there's any run to get back into running, I've to say the Nike City Run would be one of the better ones. It's generally a fast track and it ran thru familiar places (at least to me) such as Kia Peng, Bintang, Ampang, KLCC.

Photo from Tey Eng Tiong's collection

I suppose when you are running around places or landmark you are familiar with, the route doesn't seem so far or daunting. And almost along every stretch of the road, we have sight of the KLCC Twin Towers, which was where the Finish Point is. You can say that kinda gave us something visual to lock in to.

This is also one of the few races where I wore the "official" running tee and not one of my usual Adidas. Reason #1 is that your bib number was actually printed on the tee itself! So if you do not wear it, you are running without a bib number.

Reason #2 is I find the Nike BRIGHT Lime-green tee quite... attractive!! Nike has also made it official it can ban any runners from the race if you are not in their official tee. I guess they really dun want to see runners wearing Adidas, Reeboks, Mizuno, Brooks, NB, Pagoda, anything but Nike!! LOL

I've to say this was a masterstroke as getting all runners - well, the majority anyway as I can still see a few "rebels" donning non-official tee in the run - in one singular bright luminous green made for a very visually spectacular race especially at the flag off!!

Photo from Nike10K Tweet

RACE STATS

Distance: 10.27 K (on my Garmin FR405)

Time: 58 min 06 sec

Pace: 5:39 min

After not having had any OTR (on-the-run) run for months, I'm more than happy to get my running feet re-acquainted with the tarmac. Hope to be able to keep to some more normal running schedule.

Btw NIKE sucks! All we got for finishing this race is a ... nice.. soft.. toy.

Picture taken from Bobby Yap's facebook album

A HOOHA END FOR THE MORNING

By the time I came back to the Nike finishing point, it was already 8:15 am and with the Hooha starting in 5 min, there's no time for me to hop over for a 2nd leg. In truth, I have no more JUICE left to run la!! LOL

So after catching up with cmun, both of us slowly sauntered over to Lot 10 hoping to catch some of our frens coming in for the finish. Turned out before we even reach Lot 10, Ainul called up and said he's already completed the race!! Aduh...

But we did meet up at Lot 10, claimed my Hooha Goodies bag - even tho' I didn't run - and managed to catch up with a few running frens - Julie, Karen (btw where's the photo ar?), Chia Kai, etc. Seems like the Hooha Run was more FUN??!!

Hooha Run Goodies Bag - nice ler?

And guess what? The goodies bag from the Hooha Run is SO SO much better than what we got from the Nike City Run!! Eerr.. .actually we didn't get ANY goodies bag at all from the Nike Run. Haiz.... in fact, not even Ais Milo or 100+ booth at the Nike Run.

To view a video of both the Nike City Run, and Hooha Run which was flagged off by a RUNNER (bravo PuehTian!) drop by Pueh Tian's blog and check them out!

- Nike City Run video

- Hooha Fun Run video

Tomorrow's Mizuno Run... let's see if my running feet will be touching the ground or it's Air Cheras again!