A visit to UMS Aquarium Museum

Finally, we got to visit the UMS Aquarium tucked beside a hatchery and a scenic seafront. Passed this place on numerous cycling trips but the timing was never right.

And then the aquarium had an open day to commemorate World Coral Day, with free entrance. Of course, we jumped at the opportunity.

The place is quite small actually. One third of it serves as a marine museum, with displays of bones and shells and corals. 

The more colourful part of the display is of course the marine life section.

There is a large aquarium with many fish... not just the exotic colourful ones, but also quite a number of those that one can find in the market.

A smaller tank with an awesome garoupa that's almost a meter long. 

A really small tank with a single baby turtle.

An open tank where visitors ARE allowed to touch live starfish and sea cucumbers.

After the brief visit, we had lunch of pizza and pasta at a new food joint in Kingfisher. What a delightful way to laze away a Saturday morning.

Ice cream and waffles

There is this tastefully decorated cafe near our home which serves delicious food. It is also where we would drop by from time to time for dessert and chill out. The boys enjoyed the place very much, as you can see. We had chocolate ice cream waffle and baked pasta. Yummy!

Mummy's birthday

Today is mummy's birthday. We celebrated with a nice dinner of grill and pasta, followed by a delightful cake at Secret Recipe. Why only one piece of cake? Coz that's all the space left after the sumptuous meal.

MInd-building games

The boys are growing up fast. Gotta think of some activities or games that stimulate their minds, so that they don't spend too much time facing the idiot box. Nowadays the box is gone, replaced by the idiot screen.

A jigsaw puzzle contest seems to be a good place to initiate that sibling rivalry. 

Hari Raya Open House

This is probably the first time we went for a VIP's Hari Raya Open House. Sabah CM and his cabinet members hosted the Raya do at Likas Sports Complex. 

It was a sweltering midday and the crowd was huge. Thankfully the queues were short as they opened many food counters, and they were quite generous with the portions. Just that you gotta eat standing coz there were very limited places to sit.

An interesting band filled the air with evergreen Raya songs.

Feeling thankful for the peace and harmony in the land.

The forbidden playground

We went to check out the new playground at Tanjung Lipat bay near to home. There were some plastic sheets hung on some of the equipments... not quite sure what they meant. Then I realised that the rubber flooring on the ground was sticking to my sandals. Gulp!

If want to tell people the place isn't ready, better way is to put notices or cordon off the area la. 

Few days later somebody did cordon off the playground. But we have already 'been there, done that'.  

Cello Rock concert in KK

Break of Reality, a cello-rock band from USA came to perform in last weekend. I was lucky coz Bryan, the sound engineer in church was mixing for the show... and worship team members got free tickets. Yay!

Brought Ryan along to the show. It's not often we get concerts in KK, free lagi tu. Why free leh? Coz it was a cultural exchange initiative sponsored by the US Embassy.

The acoustics in JKKN auditorium was amazing. No echo, no buzz or hiss or whatsoever. Bryan did a fantastic job on the sound. The instruments sounded clean and crisps. OK, having the best seats in the front row helped too.

The cello band gave a spectacular performance. The short drummer was witty and cute, and engaged well with the audience. The music was accurate and moving... but it gets dull after an hour or so.

And so they jammed with local finger-style guitar maestro Roger Wang on the song 'Yesterday'. I would say the highlight of the night was a joint performance with the award-winning bamboo band from SMK Tamparuli. They played 'Jambatan Tamparuli' and 'Tinggi-tinggi Gunung Kinabalu'. Energetic, passionate, young performers homegrown in Sabah. East meets West... truly music is a uniting language.

Thank God for a memorable night of soaking in world-class live music. If I get to be young again, I want to learn the cello. Cheh!

New year ride

New Year's Day ride with Marcus and Dr Tan. Route: Kingfisher Park - Signal Hill - Berjaya Palace hill - Tanjung Aru beach - Tanjung Lipat - Kingfisher Park.

Lesson learned: one ride a month is not enough to maintain the stamina.
New year resolution: one ride each week.

Amazingly, three weeks into 2017, my gouty attacks have not recurred. It was like almost continuous painful attacks back in October to December 2016. 

Fitness exercise is a necessity after crossing over into the 40s. Gotta earn my health from now on. Can't take it for granted anymore.

Space to spare