Wrapping up 2015 & Christmas

2015 Xmas Tree

2015 just flew past!!!  Christmas is all done and dusted!!!  (The poor tree is looking so sad and its time to undress her (8/1/2016)!!!)

So many events happened in the short 12 months that I would like to wrap up in a nutshell.

Initially, I came home for health reasons, and then to slowly "settle down" back into Oz way of life.  Trying so hard to tame my "flying wings!  During that course of time, I also managed to start up a veggie patch growing rocket, tomatoes, zuchinni and some herbs I would frequently use in my cooking.  Then in June, I was bored staying home, and its not till end of October that I go away again, so I even took up a job and got back into real estate.  I managed to squeeze in a couple of short trips to Tassie and my yearly trip to Mabul/Sipadan/KL, but best of all would be we moved back in together with Becky and Ray.  Snowy can relinquish her alternate weekend visitation rights joint custody arrangement!

Becky & Ray dolled up da tree!

This year it was extra special as it is our first Christmas together again under the same roof.  The simple joys of just going together to find our Christmas tree and having the kids decorate it was so much more meaningful.  Come to think of it, we did not have a real tree last year in Betula!!!

I even made an extra effort to change and chop the xmas spread this year - yesssss I must admit I flipped a few magazines and selected a few new "twists" that I incorporated into the traditional way of cooking, and one of the highlights was the good ole fashioned spuds... instead of a normal roast potato, I made the hassleback potatoes and it was a hit!!!  Brussel sprouts I shredded and tossed with beans/asparagus and pine nuts and they even fooled Becky - she thought it was cabbage, so if your kids do not like brussel sprouts, this recipe will sure to win them over!!!

For mains, we had traditional roast turkey, pork, 2 legs of lamb, 2 slabs of beef (one medium rare, one medium well done), turducken, and glazed ham.  Sides consisted of hassleback potatoes, brussel sprouts/beans/asparagus, roast pumpkin, cauliflower cheese, tomato salsa, home baked bread, mayo pasta, Xmas coloured couscous and roasted root veggies with quinoa.

AlaSim homemade Pavlova

All up we had 28 friends and family for Xmas Lunch and a few stayed back for dinner and or joined in late, but there was still way too much food.  As usual, we over catered!  It must be a Chinese thing or how I was brought up - more is always better than less has always been my mom's motto in our family home.

Some of 15 varieties of desserts

I believe everyone had a jolly time and most of them suffered from food coma!!!  For me, I took a mini break and was resting my feet, but must have been cooked out, so I  crashed out before some of the last lot of guests left.  To my surprise (it might have been in my best interest) as when I awoke in the middle of the night and went downstairs to clean up, everything was done - left overs were packed away in the fridge, furniture all moved back to normal position, no dirty crockery and was absolutely mess free!!! Totally unbelievable!!! 

Some of the 28 guests at the dessert table


Fancy Roast Pumpkin

It has been a very happening 2015 year for me and it ended well with all good friends, in-laws and family coming together at Christmas time to celebrate - eat, drink and be merry!  Here's to many more better ones to come!










Mabul 2015



Bohey Dulang - my kind of paradise and my kind of heaven

Long story cut short, I am definitely going to hell when I die although heaven for me would be like this pix above!!!  The lies I told to keep everyone happy and I used the lamest excuse under the sun to escape work - a sudden death in the family!!!! (Actually it really happened except it was more than 45 years ago!)

I was still packing right up to the very last minute of departure from Melbourne as I was working a full day and did not know what to tell the boss --- so I came up with that excuse and least to say it worked a treat but I headed for Mabul instead!!!

Mabul Oh Mabul the things I do to come to Mabul.  Every year, it gets better than the year before, and this year was a ripper!!! I had blast in Mabul this year.  Firstly, it was to see PR as he recovered from a major health scare - I totally cannot imagine the awful thought of losing a friend, not just any friend but my best snorkel buddy. 

PR normally travels solo, but on this occasion, he had another German friend tag along with him this year and his name is D aka the Green Monster/Black Forest.... definitely a character from the Schwarzwald!!  You bet we had our fun with him!!!  A week later, my own 2 friends from KL came to join us on the island. 

My KL ladies

We were spoilt with all the home baked goods HS made and brought over for us....cakes and treats that put 5 star hotels high tea to shame!!!!

It was really nice to see all the friends and staff at UC - my island family, and this year's highlight was the birth of Aufa, so now I have a Mabul grand-daughter - as if I needed an excuse to go back again!!!

This marks the 5th consecutive year for me on Mabul and some of the Bajau children I have met over the years have grown.  To my surprise, now some of them even wear clothes!!!  There are 2 boys in particular that I have a soft spot for, and one of them even took on the role as my personal guide and held my hand helping me climb up to Bohey Dulang.

Sipadan fun crew

Two weeks on Mabul just flew by and this time we missed seeing Roihan who was away in Bali upskilling on diving!  We managed to squeeze in Sipadan x 3 times thanks to the management of UC and as always, Sipadan never fails to deliver all the critters - large, small and plentiful to overwhelm my eyes!



Baby Amaris from BC must be the youngest on Sipadan!

Oh...before I forget, I also had a invitation to ride in a Bajau boat and the boatman and his son taught me how to look and spear for octopus!!!  Priceless experience and I hope some day I can do it again.

Priceless experience with the Bajaus

The normal daily happenings on the island - meet new people arriving and leaving, haggle for the freshest daily caught life seafood, sip fresh coconuts, catching a sunset, do as much or as little as you wish apart from diving/snorkelling.  Tailor your own excitement and have fun fun fun in the sun!


Welcome to Bohey Dulang - definitely worth the climb!

For me, it is very relaxing to get away from the big smoke and learn how locals live in their surroundings - there is poverty everywhere and yet they all still seem to be happy.  I was observing 2 young Bajau boys playing with their little crabs and making them fight - a far cry from children in Oz playing with ipads and mummy's iphone to keep the little rascals happy whilst mummy is busy!!! 

On this trip there was a lot of refurbishment/developments happening at  UC and happy to report we were the first to stay in Chalet 6 upon completion.  When all the existing chalets are replaced, I reckon UC will definitely be an upmart backpackers haven!!!

We christened the New Chalet No: 6

Yesssss this machine gun is REAL!!! (Soldier behind me)

Compliments from the Chef

Zucchini of 1/1/2016

lst blog for 2016

I think last year, I might have posted about my first zucchini  harvest ... but this year, it was not only the first harvest of the year, but also the most massive zucchini ever!!!  It tastes so so good and it is so so easy to grow - planted it in October before I left on hols and forgot all about it and 3 months later, I am harvesting!!!

I am most surprised as the previous week I harvested about 6 of the normal sized ones and am quite sure this one was one of the smaller ones that got spared, but look at it now!!!!

I made Becky harvest it - and she marvelled at its size and it was longer than her forearm!!

Anyways, I fried it up with some garlic and oyster sauce and it tasted so yummz - must be because it was full of goodness and or organic-ness in it!!! hahaha 

Definitely one size that fed the whole family!!!!

Autumn 2015 Escape to Tasmania

I am back again after a few splendid weeks all over Tasmania.  This time round, I flew into Hobart and MB picked me up at the airport and I used Claremont, Hobart as my base.



Autumn Colours around MONA



Remember him?? MB - the total stranger that I did the 90 days outback trip with in his RV last year!?!  This time round, I was his guest in his home and when we toured the west to the east coast, we did it again in the RV.  RV-ing is such good fun and I highly recommend this mode of transportation if you are doing road trips.

It is a home on wheels and what I like most about it, is that it gives you total freedom to wander and discover places and not have to worry about finding accommodation or a decent restaurant and you can wander anywhere and everywhere and call it a night anywhere at any time - be it to be as close as possible to the sea, or to be  sleeping in total wilderness under giant gum trees, or if you could not be bothered or worry about the landscape you wake up to, then just drive into a caravan park or even park along the road!!!

Endless opportunities to tickle your every fancy!!! Mine is to sleep to the sound of waves and wake up to the waves pelting down our RV doorstep and the sunrise cheekily peeping through the RV window and or starring at the stars when I am tossing in bed and can't fall asleep when my head hits the pillow!!!

Somewhere in Tassie - lol

The Nut @ Stanley

I am not done with Tassie yet!!!  Still so much more to do but would like to camp out in the RV for nights on end the next trip and hopefully capture an aurora so that I can tick it off my bucket list!!!



Wild oyster for the picking!!!

 In a nutshell, we covered the "Huon Valley of Love", drove up West Coast to the tip of Montague/Stanley and came back through Launceston and covered most parts of Tassie except Cradle Mountain which I did with my Bear friend a few years ago!


 Some highlights that I can remember .... picked wild apples along the road.


Picking wild apples - tastes sooooo good too!

I even saw and have a video capturing wild platypus, saw a wild Tasmanian Devil but he was too quick for me to fire up my camera!  In St Helens, if only I was diligent, we could have filled up a milk crate full of wild oysters!!!  Definitely some of the biggest wildest freest range of oysters you can ever imagine.  The shell alone is the size larger than my entire palm and the oyster itself is like the size of a baby's feet - jokes aside!!!

Ate all the scallop pies we could find along the way from every corner of Tassie and my most favourite ones were from Richmond and Bicheno.

Scallop Pie

OH DEAR ... looks like I was working on this blog back then (March 2015) and saw it sitting in my DRAFT BOX (2/1/2016) and so here I am and am trying to recall the rest of this trip!!!

MB and his toys!!!!

Guess it is too hard to recall everything we did at the moment, but I had a wonderful time with MB showing me all the best spots and places that the normal tourists will never get to see.  I am booked again for Hobart on the 20/4/2016, so I will try to blog as quick as I can after this trip so that it is all still fresh in my mind!