Only tradition on these few days

I had not and I am not going to have any trekking activities these few busy days. We had new year eve dinner with my parents at my brother's place yesterday. This, actually a re-union dinner, is a grand dinner for us, during which everybody comes back from where they are.

This is what we call Family.

I shall bring my kids to visit our relatives from house to house on today, the first day of the new year. This is part of our new year culture. Red packets with some money inside will be given to the kids symbolise older by one year, grow wiser, more discipline and healthier for the coming year.

Me and my wife insist to go through all these together with the kids. This is the only way to pass on our tradition to the next and next generation. Culture and tradition shall not be challenged against scientific arguments. They are belonged to the inner part that guide us along our journey so as we will still know who we are while facing waves of modernization.

I will travel 140km to north for Kangar, the capital city of Perlis State on the second day. Kangar is my wife's hometown where her parents are staying right now.

My trekking will be resumed then. More interesting stories will be shared later, I promised.

Wishing Everybody a Happy and Prosperous Year of Ox

Tomorrow is the New Year Eve. I have been thinking of how to greet my fellow blog mates for quite a number of days.

Everybody is busy at cleaning up the whole house, hopefully to clear away all unwanted items and to welcome the new luck. By then, decoration will be put up.

My plants are also adorned with red and golden ornaments. How can I leave them alone on this festival? And I decided to greet everybody through the silent whisper of these little plants.






May the New Year bring happiness and Success to everybody.

Persistence

I do not have the opportunity to witness any trees or flowers in snowy winter. It should be, besides a lot of fun, a great experience to stand beside and praise them for their persistence to live proudly and strongly. And they will jokingly shake off the snow from their body to my face. There are always happiness if we would like to explore, only if we make friend with trees.

Though I am naive about winter, I know that trees at 4095m above sea level where temperature is about 8 degree C are my good friends. They are as brave as their friends in freezing winter.

When I was struggling my way up to the peak, they cheered me up. They set the example to me. If they could make it, why couldn't me? They might be small, but they were mighty. They did not live luxuriously, they did not eat or drink much.

I learnt mumbling from them. They did not sing loudly over a cold wind. I had to stop and listen carefully. They were so humble as such hikers might not have aware of them.

The rope which you see in the picture was to ensure we did not skid on the slippery rocky mountain, off course, the rule was we must not think we were as good as the trees without the help of rope. Man is not always the greatest.

If you hide the small trees with your hand, the whole picture turns gloomy immediately. I mean, our world becomes colourful just because of their existence.

To further enhance the colour, the blossoms smiled to me so brightly in the morning light. It was 7:00 am by then. They woke up early to welcome friends from all over the world, to provide as much oxygen as possible to us who needed to stop after every few steps for the next breath.

Trees are kind.

Harmony

I was disturbed emotionally this early morning, though I knew once I reached factory and started working, the feeling must have gone.

I happened to know that a new friend who I did not know, and might not going to know, visited my website. He was from Gaza, Palestinian Territory. (Thanks to Statcounter for this free service).

He might have stayed for seconds, he might have browsed through a few of my posts, at the end, this visit did create ripples in my heart.

I always mumble in the web, some of you have overheard and responded to me. I always mumble about the things I saw and the emotion that I felt on the place of my living. It is for sure will be felt very much differently at another corner of the world.

What I want to tell is that I am writing something which may somehow be a nonsense to someone who are suffering now; on the other hand, it may serve as a funny stuff that make him smile or laugh out loud. I rather prefer to believe in the later, and I always hope so.

The picture that I attached today displayed a harmonious place different trees live at. Be it Mr. Tree A, Mr. Tree B or Mr. Tree C, they have different names, they grow in different shapes and different colours, there is minority as well as majority in population, but they live harmoniously, and continuously to be century after century, under the same blue sky, in the only world we have.

I hope we can learn from the colony of trees.

And I want to share something I received today which was written by Regina Brett of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Ohio.

1. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.
2. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.
3. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

And lastly, I wish you a very good night....

Appointment with trees

It is fun to see people presenting trees differently from our normal view.

I have tried once, the experience was not bad. I am by then addicted to this and always think of further exploration. Only trees with big trunks or many branches produce gorgeous looks, I have a bundle of such trees in my jungles, along my trekking trails. Yes, I mean my jungles, they are belonged to me. Of course, they are belonged to you as well, if you like.

I have learnt enough thus I got permission from the trees everytime before I leaned forward and captured their pictures.

The bottom portion of this tree was rotten in such a way it produced a unique natural carving on its body. I did not able to show it clearly as not to over-expose the top. The stretching branches looked so small, they seemed to be very far away from us. In fact, it was a tall tree.

Let me tell you, when I was taking that picture, surrounding trees were as happy as a kid, they came so close to say "Cheese". They were all in my picture. I think Alice should like to join as well. It was the same for the second picture. Mengkuang tree refused to go away although I persuaded and promised to snap a few of its later. I understood that Petai tree was its closed friend for years.

What I want to show here is the "embedded branches" on the trunk of Petai tree. It looks outstanding over a smooth and whitish skin.

The shooting had to be done in a fast mode, as along this Penang National Park, eyes after eyes seemed very funny to me, as I were so odd to them as well by having some very odd photographing positions.

The eyes were belonged to the trekkers, but who knew, the tree were also watching, laughing, sharing and spreading the jokes around which would last for another decades.