Seeing moby dick

Sunshine and blue skies these days!! The other day we had a long road trip. Traveled about 3 hours by road and ferry up to the whale safari at Andenes. A whole busload of Spanish tourists were late and instead of setting off at 4, we left the dock at 4.30pm. The boat took us to open sea where the whales were. We were 1 hour away from the shore at the feeding grounds of the whales, it was so far out at sea, there was almost no land in sight. Coupled with the windy day, the rough sea wasn’t making sitting in it easy. Lucky for us, we all took the sea sickness pill 1 hour before the trip. Knowing me that I’d feel dizzy even from water training, I sat at the bottom deck in between sightings, which was more stable. But the bottom deck was also the ‘sick bay’ and there were people beside and in front of me puking into their puke-bags. The Spanish who had arrived late probably didn’t take the pill and probably formed the majority pukees. Pity them, go out to sea, gotta suffer and not in the right mood to see the whales somemore...There were those who looked really sick and green, and those who sounded like they were going to throw up all their innards, watching and listening to them was just disturbing man. Kinda reminded me of Matilda the movie, the scene where the boy in the school starts throwing up and then the whole hall of people starts throwing up after him...I was sitting there trying to focus hard on not getting sick which is a dumb thing to do, coz as jacq said, trying to not-focus on something means focusing on not focusing on it. So I decided to heck it and join the rest on the upper deck.

Most of the trip was either spent on traveling to and from the feeding grounds and waiting for the whales to appear. An uncle stood at the top deck looking out for the whales. Then he’d shout 'LEFT’ or ‘RIGHT’ and everyone would rush to the sides of the boat armed with their cameras. Sperm whales to be exact. We’d watch them blow their blowholes, until they are satisfied with puffing away (which can take minutessssss), THE moment comes when the uncle shouts ‘DIVING!’. They’d then dive gracefully and everyone would be clicking away at their cameras when Moby Dick shows its tail off before heading to the bottom of the sea, where it can stay for up to 40 minutes. As part of the package, we got to see 3 dives. In between, it was a lot of sitting around and waiting. I was so bored and suggested that we should just shout ‘RIGHT RIGHT!’ and hide behind something! Of course we didn’t do it, coz the boat was too small for us to be able to hide any decent, and besides, there was no place to run if they found out it were us.

blowing its blowhole

'DIVING!'

diving video, you can tell how rocky the boat was, and hear everyone shout 'DIVING!!'

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On the way back, I found out that pl’s camera not only has a screen saver, it has games too!

Now are those created needs or what?!

The most adventerous Ah-sicks in Singapore

we had a Singaporean feast! Cooked curry chicken and suan la tang for dinner, we had made almond jelly too, but were too full after dinner. Instead we had this…

chocolate pudding and vanilla cream. It was soooooooooo yummy! And so after the heavy meal, we went hiking up tjeldibergtinden (360++m). Trond drove us to the bottom of the mountain and we began the hike up. After much snooping in the bushes and following a misleading path, we found the actual path which led up the mountain. Was a rocky path which pretty much went upslope all the way. Reminded me of the time in NZ when we were trudging up Mount Sebastopol, grabbing onto plants and rocks as we climbed up. But lucky this wasn’t as ‘heart-in-the-mouth’ experience as that. I remember after that Anna, the guide who was commenting that my shoes were not really hiking shoes said ‘Now you have the most adventurous Pumas in Singapore!’. Half-way up we had to cross a marshy area and I had a strange cooling feeling at my feet. Great. The water had come in and I was soon walking in my soggy socks. Bleh. My shoes were wet and a little muddy, and I washed it before I came some more! Waste my effort!

It took us about 40 minutes to get to the top. It was only then that I realized how hard I had been panting. Must be coz of the crazy training that dragonboat does to me, that I’ve become so used to panting my lungs out it seems like second nature. Despite it being cloudy and foggy, we still got an aerial view of Svolvaer to the left and kabelvåg to the right and the sea in the front and the mountains at the back.

Svolvaer

kabelvåg

At the summit was a little box (you can see it in the pic of kabelvåg) with a book wrapped in plastic for people to write their names in it. It hadn’t occurred to me initially, and I opened the box wondering what was inside, bcc said ‘what do you think it was for, a post-box for the mountain troll?!’ *hmph* anyhow we left a message there.

Ha, the ‘not in china’ note started after pl and I went on a boat trip and someone asked us where we were from and when we told him we were from Singapore, he was like ‘oh, I know someone in Beijing’. Since then, we’ve whenever we wrote in a guest book, we’d always write something like this..

Thank goodness for the hike up, I’d earned my chocolate pudding I had eaten before.

And now I have the most adventurous Ah-sicks in Singapore!

Here comes the sun

the sun was out again today! yippie!!
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blue sunny sky days 3.5
cloudy gloomy sky days 4.5

blah!

more to come...

Happy feet

bcc bought me a pair of shoes!

we saw it at the shop the other day, but i didn't get it. typical me, wouldn't spend money on something unless i didn't have a choice. anyhow, the front part of my pumas are starting to come off a little, so it came just at the right time.

and there are little pictures on the sole at the bottom!!

i've got HAPPY FEET now!

=)

Berg

Best way to showcase norway's views gotta be through a panoramic shot of the sea and the mountains. Above shot comprises of 10 individual shots (wonders of camera functions...whaaa), was taken at Berg's graveyard (gunnar berg was a famous artist from the late 1800s who produced many paintings inspired by the landscape of Lofoten).

With the mountains in the back and the sea in the front, Berg must have known about feng shui to choose such a location for his final resting place man!

click on image for better view!

Sun

For those of you who cannot imagine how it’s possible to have 24 hours of daylight at one shot. Courtesy of wikipedia, here’s why:

The midnight sun is a phenomenon occurring in latitudes north of the Arctic Circle and south of the Antarctic Circle where the sun is continuously visible for at least 24 hours once per year
Since the Earth’s axis is tilted with respect to the ecliptic by approximately 23 degrees 26 minutes (commonly rounded to 23 degrees and a half), the sun does not set at high latitudes in (local) summer. The duration of the midnight sun increases from one day during the summer solstice at the polar circle to approximately six months at the poles. At extreme latitudes, it is usually referred to as polar day. The length of the time when the sun is above the horizon varies from 20 hours at the Arctic Circle and Antarctic Circle to 186 days at the poles. blah blah blah blah...


According to bcc, this summer has been sucky thus far. I guess it probably wouldn’t matter to me since I have not experienced any Norwegian summers. First night after we arrive, we get to see this…

reflection of the sun on distant mountains

cresent moon

That is THE midnight sun okayyyyyy , well not really coz it was taken around 11+ pm but still you get the idea. Apparently the sun hasn’t come out for the past 2 weeks, well lucky us! We went to the golf course at Gimsoy, where Unni lives and saw some people playing golf.

Those people playing golf should thank us man… coz we brought the sun up together with us for them to be teeing off at midnight!! Whahaha

Well the good weather only lasted 2 days. It was cloudy and rainy yesterday and this morning, the sun is still nowhere to be seen… wha lau ey…

NER NER NER NER NER

wha, i have to mention this!!!

went to an art gallery today and there i was in a theatrette watching a slideshow featuring the sights and sound of Norwegian life. And then NER NER NER NER NER comes on as the background music for one of the sections of the slideshow! yah the exact song that was used in the 2004 dragonboat slideshow done up by OSA, but only a different version. i kept smiling to myself, thank goodness it was dark... and so of course it's like a flashback to the past and the images of the Norwegian sea eagle on the screen were instantly replaced with the infamous triple 180 degree shoot of S's muscular arms hugging ZY after we came up from the womens' ivp. too bad nostalgia was short-lived, coz the slideshow ended soon after.

i come back and had to watch the 2004 and 2006 version of NER NER NER NER NER to feed the nostalgic feeling. and am more convinced that i am DAMN GOOD man!!! arhahahaha!....come 3rd august, i hope the girls like it.

Now i am convinced that there must be some CD out there filled with NER NER NER NER NER soundtracks specifically for use on slideshows! and it must be like number 1 on the music charts for the geeky people who have nothing else better to do than to make dramatic slideshows for all you people to enjoy!

Murphy's Law

First time traveling so far away form home and it was a classic case of ‘whatever can go wrong, will go wrong’ It all started after the plane touched down in London for our transit flight to Oslo. Heathrow is so crowded that our plane had to hover in the air and wait for a ‘parking space’ before we got to get off. We are half an hour late and made a mad rush to our next gate. Thank god the flights were in the same terminal.

1hr 45 mins later, I am sitting in some small room with a police officer who wants to call bcc up. He was probably suspicious of me when I told him that I was going to be in Norway for such a long period of time. Much to the amusement of bcc, I had assumed that it was standard protocol for people staying in the country for so long. He was kinda polite whattttt.

The baggage came out late. We wait and we wait. To our horror, the belt stops moving and the guy says, ‘that’s all the luggage from Heathrow.’ Apparently our luggage didn’t move as fast as we did when we reached Heathrow, so we made it onto the flight to Oslo, but the bags didn’t. And so now I was hating myself for not buying the travel insurance. Coz PL’s gonna get $200 for every 8 hours delay. Dammit. We originally had 2 hours between our flight from Oslo to Bodo. But thanks to all the drama, we had only 30 minutes left. Checking in, the woman says ‘you better run to your gate’ and so we did.

Somehow the metal dectectors in Norway are darn sensitive. We reach the check in area and some uncle in front of us mysteriously keeps setting the metal dectector off. He takes off his belt, and he still set it off. And so he comes back to take off his shoes, but only decicdes to do so after he takes his time to put his belt back on. It was 20 minutes before our flight leaves and pl and I were getting kan jiong. Expectedly, both pl and I set the alarm at the metal dectectors off. Surprisingly for me it was my shoes. Who was to know that there were metal elements in the shoes?! I take off my shoes and walk through the metal detectors bare-footed. The lady offers me booties but too late, I was already through and ready to get my bags and dash towards gate 28.

Thank goodness the gate was near the check in area. They were already making the last call for passengers to board the flight. It was then I realized I had misplaced my boarding pass. Wow, like what else could possibly happen? I rush back to the check in area and apparently it had slipped between the x-ray machine. Well, better found than never. And so we were embarked on our 3rd flight of the journey.

1 hr 30 mins later, we reach Bodo. For the first time of the journey we get time off to sit down to catch our breath before the next flight. The next flight was a free seating one and so being the kiasu Singaporeans that we are, we checked in early, hoping to sit near the boarding gate so that we can be the first ones on the plane. The screen showing the departure information directs us to dutifully park our butts at gate 19. And so we wait. It was almost time when I heard an announcement (thank god I heard it, coz pl hadn’t), a last call for passengers going to Svolvaer to go to gate 16. Well done, they had changed the gate without us knowing. We were one of the last ones on the plane and for that we sat right beside the wing. So whatever view we got was one with a large propeller at the side. Lucky the views were breath-taking enough to make up for it.



So 4 flights and 25 hours after we leave Singapore, we finally make it to Svolvaer. We hadn’t bathed in a day, we had sucky aeroplane food, were jet lagged and had no luggage. Well at least it was good to see familiar faces waiting for us at the airport.

On an unrelated note

My external hard disk crashed. Yah, the one that i used to back up all the stuff i have in my laptop. All the essays i've ever written in nus, all 20GB of my photos. pp and i brought it back to the shop to get it checked. They thought the problem lay with the casing and so they had it changed... to a funky red one somemore. But still the same. The guy says he can't do anything to retrieve the data, but tell us there are people with 'special tools' who can get the job done. As though it were some big secret like that. Anyhow, he goes on to suggest someone who can help with the data recovery. It's gonna cost 200 freaking dollars, and i don't even know if he can get back everything.

Eriee thing is that both times my hard disks crashed, cl had actually mentioned to me before hand twice on seperate ocassions to back up my laptop and external hard disk up. Ha, it's like how Oprah always says that before something goes wrong, there's always this little whisper that comes to you first. Cl's like the voice from the techno-god... so next time she dishes out any advice on computers, better to take it and run.

Technology sucks... it's unreliable, troublesome and costly.

Note to self: back-ups crash too... seriously consider sticking to the good old film camera!

don't even ask how's my packing coming along... coz i've decided to go along with the idea of letting anxiety levels swell first

= )

it's amazing how fast one can work under the stress of limited time.

now time for the real packing... cindy says i should wait and let the anxiety level swell before i start packing for the trip. Then it'd be that deja vu feeling of having to meet an essay deadline, or the night before july race when i was desperately trying to finish my 'factory work'. The die also cannot sleep till it's finished kinda feeling.

(the room would probably go through another round of mess when that begins... big big *yawn*)

Still enjoying

So it's 4 days to departure. My bags are not packed, my room is not tidied and i still had time for this...


pw accompanied her Primary 5 kids to the National Education show and let me tag along. Despite having watched the parade many times, it's a whole new experience to be in a stadium with 52,000 11 year olds. They scream at everything and when the emcees say, "MAKE SOME NOISE!!!!" it's a cue for you to quickly put your hands on your ears, who would have known that kids that size could make such a shrill, deafning noise, which sends your ears ringing thereafter! But it all adds to the atmosphere. At least they are enthusiastic.



As usual i loved Soka's light display. Soka always puts up a good job each year with their amazing light display. It's incredible how they can come up with so many innovations year after year with lights. Last show at the National Stadium and me being such a NDP junkie, i'm glad i got to go, even though this meant that the fireworks display was noticably shorter and coz i was a tag along, i didn't get a goodie bag. But hey, at least i gotta watch it before leaving. So many thanks to pw for letting me tag along!! = )


For those who didn't get tickets to this year's parade and want to catch the fireworks, they come on twice at around 8pm and then again at 8.10pm or thereabouts. The planes fly past at around 7pm. Unless you are really into F16s making a hell lot of noise, or wanna see where your taxes are going for the purchase of expensive aircraft to protect the nation, it's probably alright to give that a miss.

If you don't already know

For those not in the know, i'd be leaving S'pore for this...


Yup. My Norwegian getaway to the Land of the Midnight Sun. BCC had been asking me forever to go visit her in Lofoten. So since i've graduated, what better chance to prolong my entry into the capitalist world to just be another statistic in the workforce. And so i'd be gone from 19th July onwards. The return date is tentatively set at 17th October, which is the maximum i can go for 3 months. While i'm there, i'd be working on BCC's mother-in-law's farm for a while, toiling away in the farm house and tidying the guest houses. There isn't much concrete plans yet for what i'd be doing in between but it's definately going to be 3 months of fun and indulgence... so stay tuned for the chronicles of a farmer up north...

For you poor things stuck in S'pore... go do something exciting for yourselves, like burn a tree or scream at the top of your lungs inside a MRT cabin... coz if you ain't living life on the edge, you are taking up too much space

Deadline

And so it's 5 days till i leave for norway, and i still haven't started packing or even thought about the stuff i should get or put aside for packing. BCC says i should e-mail her a list of stuff i decide to bring so she can look through it. MM is already talking about stuff i should bring over for BCC. Before i even start, i've got THIS to worry about...


My room's in a mess, looks like the inside of some illegal squatter. Stuff everywhere, spilling out of the room and even onto the staircase. This is the result of an overly ambitious, ill-diciplined project that began like some 3 weeks ago, which saw me either sleeping on the bedroom floor or the sofa. Who would have known i've got soooo much stuff?! Even if i get it packed before i go, i wouldn't even be able to bask in the glory of my fantastic organisational skills.If it weren't for the fact that i've got all my stuff outside my room obstructing the staircase, i would jolly well leave this mess till october.

Damn, i need a deadline...


Note to self: plan ahead!