We have been planning a gathering since about six months ago. Finally, we made it.
ShinKeat suggested to dine at Michelangelo's in Pavilion. Nobody objected and there we went.
Eric, ShinKeat, Me
ChauLun, DeYan, ChinNam
It's been really long since I last seen them. Reminds me of the happy days in Korea.
Carbonara
Each of us ordered a dish and we pass around to get a bite on each.
Gnocchi Al Gorgonzola - Potato dumplings with gorgonzola cheese and cream sauce
I picked the one above because of the P word and the C word. Haha.. And it tastes really good!
Pollo Alla Cacciatore
Lasagne Alla Bolognese
Quattro Formagi Pizza
Forgot the name but it's really yummy - tomatoes and french loaf
My drink - Mango juice
After the dinner, we went to walk around inside Pavilion. We had supper at the Hong Kong Dessert Place - expensive & small portion. So I decided not to put anymore pictures in here.
Though I think it's a little pricey to dine in Michelangelo's, the food is really good. Bravo to ShinKeat for organizing this little meet up. Keep in touch, mates. Billy, out.
It was Mike's birthday, we agreed to go to SS2 Murni for dinner as most of us never been there.
I've wanted to try out this famous shop in SS2 for a few times already, but everytime I came, it was very very packed and there were no place to park my car. Thus I gave up going there after a few attempts.
Jacky, HanChin, ChiaPoh, Cheryl
This time, we make it a point to go there early before it gets crowded. All of us met at the shop after work.
Cheryl, JooLi, WoonLee, Me, Wilson, Mike
It was almost 6 months since the last time we had a gathering with everyone from the TM gang. This time, not only the usual 9 were there, Wilson and Cheryl joined in too! A total of 11 people.
After halfway eating, it started to rain. Everybody has to move to the corridor with their food. See how Eugene [pic] eat standing in front of other shops. Haha!
Those who finished their food will be holding their gula-special-drink while standing at the walkway and take photos. Seriously, the drink is way too sweet.
Sorry peepz, I'm putting this because this is the only pic that ChungSeng (leftmost) take with us.
Well, after finishing our drinks and paid for the dinner, we head to Old Taste Kopitiam to continue our celebration.
We chit-chatted and caught up a lot with others who're not working at Menara TM. Finally, it's time to sing the birthday song and cut the cake.
JooLi presented our gift to him. It was a pair of cufflinks. Hope he likes it.
Last but not least, a happy group photo with everyone.
It was fun to see everybody coming out together. It's been so long since all of us gathered.
Mike wasn't feeling very well that day but he enjoyed his first birthday celebration with us here. Looking forward to our next gathering! Billy, out.
And so, after 3 hours of trekking, we reached a Karen hilltribe village.
Karen indigenous people are one of the famous tribe in Thailand. Some may be known through their significant long neck culture.
However, the villagers in the place I stayed do not practice the long neck thing.
There's a little stream in the small village and there's a bamboo pipe that flows water from the hill, and I mean clean cooling water.
The stream is the only source of water for the villagers. People take bath, wash their clothes and collect water from the stream. Well, since we're stay at the village, we had to live like one too. We bathed at the stream.
After bathing, we walked around the village before sunset. We realized that the people there rears pigs, chickens and cows. Almost every house you can see a piggie tied to the pole.
Some even gave birth to little piglets.
Erm... okay, I missed out. They have dogs too.
And the chickens fly...
One of their main activites of economy is agriculture. They plant all sorts of stuffs from rice, tea leaves, corns and others.
the lady is using this hulling tool to separate the rice and its husk
The sky is getting dark. We visited the toilet before going back to our "house".
The toilet is very very small, without any lights. That is why we were told to bring our own torchlight, incase we need to go to the loo at night.
While waiting for dinner, we SS-ed. We have to wear long sleeves and long pants to prevent mosquitoes from sucking our blood.
LeongKee, Kuan, MinBee, Me
Dinner is served! Food cooked by the Karen village people - Fried pumpkin with eggs, Fried mixed vege, Green curry and pineapples (a must have fruit every meal).
I don't really fancy pineapples but my perception changed after having sweet and juicy pineapples from Thailand.
After dinner, we had briefing from our guide on tomorrow's journey. Then, the head of the tribe village came to talk to us and play games with us.
Our dear friend LeongKee volunteered to play the rope game with Josh from US. The games were kinda lame but all of us tried our best to entertain the man who initiated the ice-breaking session.
It was not long till the games ended and all of us went to bed. There's basically NOTHING to do as there's no electricity at all. It was pitch dark and the only source of light is from the moon.
That's our beds, in the same room as the other ang mohs in the gang.
It was a peaceful and cooling night, though there's no fan in the room. I had quite a good night sleep, probably due to the exhaustion from the hiking. More hiking on the next day! Billy, out.
We signed up for the 3 days trekking package from Ben Guest House. It was the first day of trekking, we started our fine day with American Breakfast right at our Guesthouse.
2 eggs, bacons, toasts with butter and jam, fruits and coffee/ tea.
Well, after breakfast, someone picked us up from the guesthouse with a Tuk Tuk and head to a local market for us to buy some necessities before going into the forest for 3 days. We're supposed to bring our own water and toilet paper (for pang sai).
At around noon time, we reached Mork Fa Waterfall.
All of us get changed and jumped into the cooling water. The other angmohs are already splashing their way under the waterfall.
The water falls from a fairly high altitude, which makes us quite difficult to stand under the falls.
We weren't exactly satisfied with the water yet when the rain started to pour. We rushed to the toilet to get changed and got back up to the Tuk Tuk. The driver took us to a shop at roadside for lunch.
We had simple fried rice and pineapples for lunch. Then we chit chat with the rest of the people who joined the tour.
Kuan, MinBee, Me, LeongKee, Josh (US), William (London), David (London), Anthony (London), Terrence (Spain), Veronika (Spain)
We rode Tuk Tuk for less than an hour to reach the starting point of our trekking paht. Due to the fact that we didn't bring any shoes on this trip, we had to wear socks and sandals.
hmm.. whose feet are whose?
That's our tour guide, me, Kuan and LeongKee
Along the 3 hour journey, we saw many stuffs. First up, buffalos. And I mean smelly buffalos in dirty mud.
Then we saw a really really long earthworm. The worm detector aka MinBee saw it.
Then, we saw this beautiful scenery from high up. We've been trekking upwards all the while, kinda tiring.
Our guide suddenly told us to get near the side. He wanted to show us something - another worm.
He poked the worm using a stick and voila, it rolled itself into a ball! Amazing...
We also took photos with the rest in our team.
Malaysians and Londoners, with our guide
Malaysians and Spaniards
Jeng, Jeng, Jeng! We finally reached our first place to stay overnight - Karen Hilltribe Village. I'll post more about the Karen Village in my next post. Billy, out.
My philosophy of life is pretty simple - to live life to the fullest. Work hard not just to earn a living but also to experience unforgetable adventures around the world.
Eric, ShinKeat, Me
ChauLun, DeYan, ChinNam
Carbonara 
Gnocchi Al Gorgonzola - Potato dumplings with gorgonzola cheese and cream sauce
Pollo Alla Cacciatore 
Lasagne Alla Bolognese
Quattro Formagi Pizza
Forgot the name but it's really yummy - tomatoes and french loaf
My drink - Mango juice
Eric, ShinKeat, Me
ChauLun, DeYan, ChinNam
Carbonara 
Gnocchi Al Gorgonzola - Potato dumplings with gorgonzola cheese and cream sauce
Pollo Alla Cacciatore 
Lasagne Alla Bolognese
Quattro Formagi Pizza
Forgot the name but it's really yummy - tomatoes and french loaf
My drink - Mango juice
