Bright Trip Feb 2010

I have finally uploaded some of the photos that we took in Bright. That was my second trip down, Chris and I enjoyed ourselves very much as usual! It was good to catch up with Uncle Chris and Aunty Annie.

Click here to see the photos.

Gardening Bliss

Chris and I are fortunate that our rented home has a large veggie patch. With the help of Chris’ dad, we have few veggie plants planted at the beginning of this year. We have tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchinis, squash, rhubarbs, and bok choy. Other than the veggie patch, we also have lemon tree, fig tree and grape vines at the backyard. The lemon tree is very useful as I often harvest them so I can have coke with lemon, or made sangria, or seasoning seafood… The fig tree is huge and almost take over the whole backyard! I haven’t really had fresh figs before and I had my first experience early this week. They were so refreshingly sweet… I’m planning to learn to cook something delicious with the ripe figs and perhaps dry some for Chinese soup!

Chris has been working hard around the veggie garden. I must say that he did a very good job, as he wakes up early to water the garden and do the same thing when the sun sets. I have tried to help to water the garden in the afternoon few times, and this is the happiest time for the mosquito coz they will have a feast – me! I had seven mosquito bites one time on both of my calves within a 5 minutes watering.

We have plenty of vegetables from our veggie garden, we have been giving them away because we have too much! Although I reckon maintaining a veggie garden can be quite costly as we have to purchase fertilisers and items to killed the bugs. However, the experience is priceless – seeing the veggie grow big slowly and the tomatoes turn red, it can fulfils your boring working day.

Little trip to look forward to…

Chris and I will drive to Bright to have a little holiday.

We both took this Friday and next Monday off, so we will have 4 days and 4 nights there in Bright VIC. Chris’ uncle and aunt own a bed and breakfast there so our main reason going there is to visit them. But also Bright is a beautiful relaxing town. The last time we went there we enjoyed ourselves very much.

Hopefully we will do some wine tasting, camping or having picnic at Mt Buffalo… or simply do nothing for few days, just enjoying each other company.

It is always good to have something to look forward to…

Pure Happiness

I have experienced pure happiness today. This is very different to the happiness that I used to know, because it is not about myself.

When I heard the news, it was like waves after waves, because there were three great news and they were about my cousins.

This happiness was so intense because there is no where to release it. I only can share it with Chris and congratulate them via emails.

This effect of this pure happiness was strrange, the body temperature raises which make you want to run. The mind was suprised which make you want to scream.  The heart was so excited that pumps so fast. It makes you feel restless. I took me a while to calm down.

My cousins are just like my sisters, I wish all the best for them and hope happiness always be with them.

Disappointing flying

I have a love hate relationship with the flying business.

My dad has been working for Haeco (a branch of Cathay Pacific) for over 25 years. Without him and his job, I won’t be at where I am now. Because of this job, I also have more opportunities to travel and I caught my first plan when I was three.  Although I have not yet fly in business class or first class… oh hang on, I did got an upgrade when I flow to Bangkok few years ago with my cousin… anyway, my point is that I am very familiar with the economy class service level from my experience.

When I went to Australia to study, I will go back to Hong Kong at least once a year to see my parents. By that time, I’m used to travel alone. I often observe how some people do not know how to operate their personal entertainment unit or feel embarrssed to stand up and do a little stretching execrises. As well as how well the flight attendences handle annoying customers, or whether they have smile on their faces.

I used to fly with Cathay Pacific a lot because of my dad’s work, however after I turned 24 I no longer have the privilege to fly with Cathay’s cheap staff air ticket.  I’ve since fly with few different airlines, including but not limited to Qantas, Virgin Atlantic, Continental Airlines, China Airlines, Bangkok Airways, Dragon Air and etc. The most frequent one is Qantas, both domestic and international.

Although Qantas is the first commercial airline in the world, its services has been declined for the past 5 years. I believe one of the cause is that the company wanted to cut cost. Qantas has switched all their aircraft maintenance to overseas, and they won’t purchase any new aircraft until approxmiately year 2020. The flight attendences are old and rude, no smile when serving and the food is horrible!  The air craft was so hot during my last travel from Hong Kong to Sydney. I was literlly dripping sweat! It wasn’t an one off mistake, my aunty also had the same experience.  Qantas used to be ranked as one of the world class airline, equal to Cathay Pacific. I’m not too sure about this now. 

Qantas has been allianced with Air Asia last month. From the airline point of view, this has strenghen its Asia routes as well as their aim of cost cutting. However from the customer point of view, Qantas has offically down graded. If I travel to Malaysia and purchased a Qantas air ticket, I would have some level of expectation on their services. I could not imagine how would I feel if I end up catching a Air Asia air craft; receving their services; and concering about my safety just because of this alliance.

My last few travel with Qantas was truely disappointed, it is frustrated to experience such bad services when you know they could do better. Qantas is no longer a world class airline in my heart.