July 25, 2009

Retreat in Bintan and Singapore - In-Villa Dining

"In-villa BBQ" How to make it? Let's try and find out.

Neat table setting was done by an associate in short time. The BBQ set came with a few appetizers, ie chicken salad, Greek salad, etc, side dishes, ie. potato, grilled vegetables, fried rice, dessert, ie. fruits. All food was good, except the oily fried rice. Even a bat was attracted by our dinner.


Here were the cast: chicken, fish, pawn, lobster and fillet. Our cooking skills? Chef's standard of course. Thanks for the fresh ingredients. Only garlic could enhance their taste and thus no extra sauced was needed.



Better presentation, better taste.


Dinner of another night. A seafood pizza with various seafood on top. Ox tail soup was rich while potato soup was very creamy. Behind the scene, there lemongrass ice-cream and mango orange ice-cream were awaiting us.


Extra: A melon in a Singapore supermarket which haven't seen in HK.

July 19, 2009

Retreat in Bintan and Singapore - Villa on the Rocks

Among many world renowned resorts, I picked Banyan Tree where to spend 3D2N because of it's reputation in running premium resorts.

Welcome to my independent villa. If you really love the villa, you can buy it and then you are entitled to share profits with the resort developer. For me, I prefer to be a visitor.


2 reasons why I chose Villa on the Rocks. The first is private jacuzzi and the second is boundless ocean view.



The room.


In line with the destination, all decorations are in Indonesian style.



Very rural feel roof.


This sofa is very comfortable to lie on and relax.



Shower in front of the ocean.


Towel art is very common in hotels during recent years. This one is royal peacock.


Complimentary items: tree top bananas, sea salt and a beanie turtle.


A tree which probably provides the bananas above.

July 16, 2009

Retreat in Bintan and Singapore - Day and Night @ Bintan

Forget all fame and gain. Simply lie back and enjoy the nature in relaxing mood.

Ebb tide in early morning


Blue sky and white clouds




Sun set



Crescent moon with little stars

July 14, 2009

Retreat in Bintan and Singapore - T3 @ Changi Airport

Jun 7-Jul 1, 2009

Where is a good choice for retreat? Certainly a place where you can receive good friend's warm hospitality. And thus I picked Singapore again. To make the break more relaxing, we further retreated to Bintan, a beautiful place with international resorts. Bintan is a territory of Indonesia but
is mainly managed by Singapore. It just takes an hour to there from Singapore by ferry. So convenient.

Let's stay in the city for some more moments before retreat. Here's the newly launched Terminal 3 at Changi Airport. Spacious and well-equiped. It's also the home of giant airbus, A380. This infrastructure demonstrates the Singppore governemtn does have determination to outperform its neighbours.





October 25, 2008

Weather Observation Course by Hong Kong Observatory - Lesson 2

Some weather information, such as temperature is not possible to be observed by our eyes. Thus, meteorological instruments are required.

This is thermometer shed. The open design allows better air circulation and can lead to more accurate temperature measurement in the air. The slanting roof prevents sunlight to affect the temperature inside the shed. This shed is a major source of our daily weather information.



Thermometer screen box is another instrument to measure temperature. Yet, the thermometer shed is better because of better air circulation.


This small bucket collects raindrop if any. With a cylinder, we can know rainfall information in Hong Kong. The instrument is called ordinary raingauge.


For heavy rain, more accurate information is needed. Show time for this drop counting rainfall recorder.


Apart from understanding the instruments, students also learnt about weather report and weather related proverbs. The former is very useful because we can now decode a lot of information from a simple symbol. The latter is more of fun. But it's good to know different season or geographical location may affect the accuracy of the proverbs.

The course combines only 2 lessons. Nevetherless, it's a serious course. We had lots of notes, including a CD version. We had a weather observation exercise to pracise what we had learnt in lesson 1. We had class graduation photos. The most important point is we are awarded a certificate. It really suprised me.

Moreover, we have a pen and a keyring. The yellow figure is Break representing Lightening in the "Weather Family" cartoon. Other members can be found at here.


Lastly, thanks for all earnest instructors' effort.