Jard's 7 Super Shots

I am taking part in HostelBookers 7 Super Shots! How did I come to this? Well, I was tagged by none other than ms Fie-nuts herself in her own 7 Super Shots blogpost.

It's a game initiated by HostelBookers where each blogger has to do the following steps. First, choose 7 of your own photos, one for each of the following categories as done below and then write a description for each picture. Once you're done, nominate five other bloggers to do the same.

Please be forewarned that I never claim myself to be a skillful photographer. I'm just a girl with a camera. Nothing else.

Here goes nothing, revealing the best/worst lot of them all!

• A photo that…takes my breath away

Night fall from the backyard of my home in Kota Belud, Sabah surrounded by paddy fields. Among the main reasons why I fly back so often. Taken with a Nokia phone.

• A photo that…makes me laugh or smile

When aunts come together and starts chit-chatting from dawn to dusk to help during a big festival such as a wedding. Picture taken at Kota Belud, Sabah. (Canon 500D)

• A photo that…makes me dream 

An abandoned building in Perak. If you don't want it, then give it to me! I'll restore it into a beautiful bungalow. Shot taken at Taiping, Perak. (Canon IXUS 105)

•  A photo that…makes me think

When will Kuala Lumpur ever be free from traffic jams? HAHA. Picture taken at a supposedly busy commercial area at Makhuhari Messe, Tokyo, Japan. (Canon 500D)

• A photo that…makes my mouth water

Not my best shot but it's the most googgled picture on the web.

Tarap fruit, only known to grow in SABAH ONLY!!! No way else! (Canon IXUS 105)

• A photo that…tells a story

"Hey Jard, why you're wearing ugly slippers?" Shot taken during my nightly mamak stalls hangout around Kuala Lumpur. (Nokia hand-phone)

• A photo that am most proud but really not worthy for any National Geographic shot.

Suburban area of my home at Kota Belud, Sabah. My mom wanted to turn it into a postcard. Haha. (Canon 500d)

Who else should I nominate? Lemme think.
Gonna nominate:

• @pummkin 
• @Soulzeshifter 
• @eyriqazz
• @ZarulUmbrella 
• @arabellamocha

OK, finally done! Yay!

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Bit By the Travel Bug and Don't Wanna be Cured!

I'm saying goodbye to my ROJAK ways of updating my blog and will entirely focus on travel posts. But the old posts will not be deleted nor unpublished as some of them are PAID reviews or simply a tribute to some generous benefactors. I don't wanna dissapoint any of them. To date, I still receive invites to launchings, blogger events, product reviews and such so after this I am gonna be selective on that. All of those will be parked under another blog ---> fromkualalumpur.blogspot.com. I'm still trying to improve the SEO rankings for that. =)

I won several blog writing contests these couple of months and hope that's testimony enough for you to trust me to write in a new blog other than this. Though it would take a while for the other blog to gain wider reach like this one. Hehehe.. After unpublishing hundreds of personal blogposts, the traffic to this blog suffered severely and you might find some broken links or two. Sigh. That's a sacrifice I'm willing to take to do travel posts in FULL SWING.

I'd like to put this full blame to Fie-nuts.com for encouraging me and endlessly telling me how good of a story-telling I am and it shows whenever I blog about travelling. I wanna to see if her claims are true and sure enough, I've been diagnosed bitten by a travel bug (and that's her! LOL). It's amazing that despite not being a PURE travel blogger before, I still manage to somehow receive sponsored trips to several places in Malaysia. I think the sponsors were targeting the wrong group of bloggers.

Who agree with me on this one?

As I told fie-nuts last night, bloggers with high traffic are OVERATED nowadays. Sponsors should seek pure and true travel bloggers or ones sticking to a particular niches who have blog content of more than 90% on travelling or certain niche. It was a shock that during the Tourism Conference a few weeks back that when asked by the panelist on who was a pure travel blogger, ONLY ONE PERSON RAISED A HAND among 400++ attendees!!!!

And so having admittedly stated in my MITBC blogpost (which were commented by blogger TheTravelCamel and also founder of travelblog.org. Haha!!! Am humbly honored by their comments!!!), the conference certainly was thought provoking and life changing. =)

I had a nice chat with Wilson (blogger from PlacesandFood.com) the other day and he says Digital Media should unite. It made me think, what happened to my personal blog, did it become a digital media platform where corporations aim to market their products (sometimes FOR FREE) and yet pay the "middle men" thousands just because they say they have "claim" on us bloggers? I met several potential advertisers during the conference and I sadly realize that all they're looking for are top bloggers and don't even care to read the blogs themselves. I kept telling them before engaging with bloggers, PLEASE read their blogs first. Does the blog suit your niche?????

Wahh.. such a long post. I think I have to end it with a piece of my mind, I for one don't wanna be CLAIMED!

Yours truly,
Jard the Great
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Calling ALL Malaysian Travel Bloggers!

Mayday! Mayday!!! Over and out!

A newly Facebook page has been created yesterday and I'm calling out to every travel blogger who might be Malaysian or simply residing in Malaysia to come join as a member. So far the group has RebeccaSaw.com on-board along with other notorious travel bloggers in their own right, PlacesandFood.com, WonderfulMalaysia.com and many more! The sharing of tips and questions related to traveling were non-stop since the moment the group was created.

So I'm inviting all travel bloggers to come join in the fun by clicking the link below

https://www.facebook.com/groups/275073469255691/

You won't regret it. =)

Last but not least, thanks to those who have already joined.

Let's 

Explore

Dream

Discover

together!!!

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Peluang melawat Gunung Bromo, Indonesia untuk anda!

Aku mendapat ajakan dari seorang travel blogger untuk mengikuti trip seperti yang tertera kat atas. Sebenarnya belum konfem lagi boleh join ke tak sebab cuti aku dah tak banyak dah untuk tahun ini. But as they always say, the more the merrier! hehe. Bagi yang berminat sila PM me through FACEBOOK (link kat tepi) atau melalui E-MEL - jardness [@] gmail [dot] com. 

Sebab bagi sesiapa yang berminat nak menyertai kami (setakat ini ada TIGA orang) untuk menyertai trip ini, sangat dialu-alukan. Jadual perjalanan sepanjang ke sana adalah seperti berikut. (Aku kopipes with minor edits dari e-mel yang ku terima pagi tadi).

Trip Surabaya-M​t Bromo-Sema​rang 27/9 to 2/10/2012

Pic credit to here. 

Day 1 

Lepas pick-up di airport Surabaya dan seterusnya melawat pusat kraf kulit, lumpur panas Sidiarjo, dan check-in hotel di Gunung Bromo.

Day 2 

Melihat sunrise di Penanjakan, melihat dari dekat kawah Bromo, ke padang pasir, breakfast di hotel dan check-out. Then ke Masjid Agong Surabaya, Monumen Kapal Selam, Shopping di ITC Jembatan Merah 

Day 3 Explore kota Surabaya naik public transport. 

Day 4 Naik keretapi ke Semarang. Free n easy. 

Day 5 

Kalau ramai (min 5 org) kita sewa kereta dan pergi ke kota kecil dalam 1 atau 2 jam perjalanan yang sejuk dan terkenal dengan pertanian di Salatiga, Ambarawa, Kopeng and Bandungan. Kalau tak, kita melawat bangunan tinggalan Belanda dan kawasan sekitar Semarang. Boleh juga melawat pusat perabot jati di Jepara. 

Day 6 

Pulang .... 

Nota:  Untuk mengetahui KOS perjalanan ini, sila hubungi aku secepat mungkin. Tiket penerbangan  atas tanggungan sendiri ye. =)

Cadangan Flight ialah:

KUL-Surabaya 27/9/2012 QZ7618 9.50am
Semarang-KUL 2/10/2012 AK1311 9am

Terima kasih membaca!!! =)
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Planning ahead for my next 2013 holiday retreat

I don't know if you guys already know about this but Airasia.com is having another of their FREE SEATS sale starting at 00:00 am, 14th of May 2012 (TONIGHT) until the 20th. Yeah, my salary isn't in yet so have to make do with what money I have left. LOL. All prices are inclusive ONLY of  airport charges and taxes. And it could be pretty cheap. Travel period is between 4 January 2013 until 22 May 2013.

Starting TONIGHT people!!!

I've been sharing this AirAsia.com promotion via my facebook page so hope you'd "like" the page to stay tune to many promotions in the future. =)

So let's plan ahead!!!

• First thing is knowing the holidays in 2013 so that we don't have to take so many leave from work. 

Calendar for 2013 (Malaysia)

1 Jan New Year's Day 

24 Jan The Prophet Muhammad's Birthday 

1 Feb Federal Territory Day 

12 Feb Second day of Chinese Lunar New Year 

11 Feb Chinese Lunar New Year's Day 

1 May Labour Day 

• Know the ticket prices of the places you want to fly to next year. All prices are to and from the destinations as stated below.

KL - Phonh Penh, Cambodia = RM 153.00

KL - Yogyakarta, Indonesia = RM 84.00

KL - Osaka, Japan = RM 181.00

KL - Vientiane, Laos = RM 124.00

KL - Clark, Philippines = RM 32.00

How did I get these prices? Well, I checked at Airasia's website and took the overall prices minus the SEAT PRICES. =) 

• Prepare the money and buy online!

I don't have a credit card and will be using my debit card. Hehe. So hope you guys get to buy your dream destinations' tickets. I'm sure the servers will be crazy starting tonight so have patience. Plan early and wisely!

Cheers!
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New Look!

I asked the help of another blogger to help me with the design. I was working on a travelling theme and VOILA!!!

Kalau ada kritikan atau teguran tentang template baru ini, sila komen kat bawah. Aku nak cuba template ini dalam dua tiga bulan. Nak tengok respon camne. Hehe. Rasa jiwaku muda remaja pula dengan template ini.

What say you?

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Malaysia International Tourism Bloggers Conference & Awards 2012

This is my first time attending a conference designed specially for bloggers who blog about travel and also for the key industry people in tourism. There were many people at the conference especially from the tourism sector (ministry people, hotel owners, tourist guides, tourist spots owners etc), marketing people from various corporate groups (AsiaMedia, Maxis, etc), PRs from distinguished organizations and then finally, you throw in the bloggers. Put all these people together in one room and what I get as a blogger?

Opportunities at your grasp.

But what concerns me now is my "rojak" blog. I love travelling but staying loyal to that one niche is hard because I'm not a hard-core traveler like this blogger. As one of the speakers, the well known David Hogan Jr puts it, "The narrower the niche, the broader the opportunities." 


Not to mention the UGLY TRUTH about travel bloggers as shared by the famous Alistair Watters (Founder & Owner of Travelblog.org) and Shane Dallas (The Travel Camel blogger of travelblog.org), blogging about travel in truth don't earn them much money. They do it because they are passionate about it. Shane Dallas also shared with us that all his trips were self-paid. He was strict to himself by saving money from his job as a government servant. And he's single. (Don't know why I have to mention this. LOLOL) In fact, money came from writing for printed/online publications or maybe from pictures that possibly National Geography are interested to buy and also getting invited to give talks about it. That's where the actual money comes from. Most likely caused indirectly by the buzz of your blog. Overall, I'm truly inspired by their stories. =)

From left: Alistair, ME!, and The Travel Camel.

The problem with the blogging world in Malaysia is there aren't many blogs sticking to one niche. If there is, most probably it's about food, technology and celebrity gossip. Sadly, I don't know any blogs that specifically blogs about tourism. (except for my friend I mentioned above. Even her blog title is relevant. LOL)

I don't think I can continue this blog as a travel blog with ignorantbrat as the URL name despite bagging an award in the Tourism Travel Blog category. (And gosh, I feel I don't deserve it after attending this conference!) Haha. Popularity votes by the public does have its ups and downs. But hopefully will continue to blog on it as a personal blog. =)

I met several individuals that made my whole experience at the conference joyful.

Mr. John Phang (owner of CP Welness Sanctuary)... who sat next to me throughout the whole conference.

Mr Phang, my seat neighbour. Very cheerful.

Mr Phang was the first person to say hello to me on the first day. He even shared a meaningful quote with me which reads as “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”  ― Winston S. Churchill. He's a very friendly guy. Too bad I couldn't meet the rest of his family during the Award Ceremony later on that evening.

Other people of worthy acknowledgement is Ms Jessi!! I've been reading her blog for a while. Mostly because she's so enthusiastic about the things she does in life. Beautiful photos and she did an inspirational story about her slimming down on her blog. Gotta admire her spunk. Recognizes her hair of red anywhere!

Jessi from thejessicat.com!

Jessi told me she was the official blogger for this event. Nice! =)

Of all the speakers, I can't really say which ones were my least or most favorites. But these two people below definitely held the microphone the most. Hehehe..

James Craven of Hybrid News Ltd UK and Sheila Scarborough, Writer,
Speaker and Trainer Specializing in Tourism, Travel and Social Media

I believe Tourism Malaysia did a smart move in inviting these prominent figures to Malaysia. Thank you for holding such a conference! There were many speakers that gave good talks to the audience and worth mentioning. Anuradha Goyal, Hanie Hidayah, Anis Nabilah, Dr Mridula Dwivedu, Mike Aquino, Nisha Jha, Stephen Doss, Windy Ariestanty, Iman Brotosena, Kiruba Shankar Sivaraman (the piggyback ride was memorable! Haha), David Hogan Jr, Jojo Struys, Joe Lee and Khairul Anwar.

From left: Sheila, Anuradha, Anis, emcee, Ali, Shane, James, Hogan and Dr Mridula.

With that I end my post by summarizing that the overall experience was definitely  refreshing, thought provoking and more ways than one, life changing. =)

Ps: Here's Ali's experience on MITBCA.

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Review: Vibrance Kegel Device

Ingat lagi pengenalan kepada alat Vibrance Kegel Device dalam sebulan yang lepas? Tajuk yang agak berani perihal kemut. Hehe. Entri kali ini adalah untuk mengesahkan kebenaran tentang penggunaan alat ini. Secara jujurnya ini bukan review dari aku sebab anak dara (aku!) dilarang menggunakan alat ini. Tapi nak terangkan kepada orang lain tentang alat ini bukannya susah manapun.

Cuma perlu buat satu video je dan para pengunjung blog ini turut memahami kegunaan alat ini kan?



Ha'ah.. jangan nak gelak tengok rupa bentuk alat ini.

Ya, aku tak sangka benda ini boleh masuk "belah bawah" tu. (fikirku sebagai anak dara)

Seperti dalam video, ada tiga tahap kemutan. Si pengguna perlu mulakan dengan tahap 0 dulu dalam beberapa bulan sebelum memulakan tahap lain.

Apa yang ada dalam pakej.

Sarung dia tahan lasak, anti-bakteria dan selamat digunakan. Selain itu ia diperbuat daripada getah silikon yang bermutu tinggi untuk memudahkan si pengguna membersihkannya. Boleh rujuk sini untuk cara penggunaan dari pengeluar.

Serba sedikit tentang akak reviewer untuk produk ini. Akak itu kerja satu pejabat dengan aku, mempunyai 5 orang anak dan berada dalam lingkungan 40-an. Beliau mengadu ada masalah SENTIASA terkucil tidak kira berdiri atau berjalan. Hajatnya ingin menjalankan ibadah haji dalam keadaan tidak mendaifkan seperti itu maka kerana hajatnya itulah aku memberikan alat ini kepadanya. Aku telah dihampiri ramai wanita yang berhajat untuk menjadi reviewer tapi cuma boleh pilih seorang je. =)

Akak reviewer yang senyum puas hati ketika menemui aku.

Genap sebulan kemudian aku meminta feedback darinya. Aku perasan semasa dia memasuki pejabat hari itu bahawa badannya agak susut. Hehe.

1. Pada mulanya, dia susah nak gerakkan otot kegel itu. Tapi hasil getaran pada alat itu membuatnya dia berjaya mengesan otot kegel dalam masa 5 minit je. Sekarang hari-hari boleh buat senaman menggunakan alat itu.
2. Masalah terkucil masih berlaku cuma dah kurang. Agaknya kena pakai lama sikit kot. Tapi takpe katanya, setakat ini dia puas hati dengan produk ini.
3. Berat memang susut manyakk ohhh.. Dia kata dah susut dalam 3 kilo. Hehe. Bagus-bagus.

Ahh.. kalau gitu, kalau aku kahwin nanti... seharusnya kena pakai alat ini kan?

Cara nak dapatkan alat ini mudah je, sila dapatkan Alat Vibrance Kegel Device secara online melalui laman MyBioinfinity dan boleh juga di dapati di Shins outlets atau di hospital pada harga RM 498.00 sahaja.

Ataupun terus hubungi mereka di talian : Customer care line - 1700 -81-0321
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Beijing Trip Day 5 - Ancient Cultural Street and NanShi Food Market

 This is our last day in China and we spent it in Tianjin. The night was spent at the Zhengda Hotel and we all had to check out as early as 8:00 am. Why? Because there were two more places to visit before going to the airport.

My comment on the Zhengda Hotel? Clean, spacious, much, way much better than the HuiDu hotel back in Beijing, but the the toilet in our room had some problems flushing. LOL.

First stop of the day was the Ancient Cultural Street of Tianjin. There were a lot of colorful buildings there and sellers of all kinds of merchandise. I was almost tempted to buy the leather wallets there that costs about RMB 35. But didn't, sigh.

A group picture, from left - CEO, Fie, staff 1, staff 2, Ms Lili, staff 3,
ME holding on to Akmal, the CEO's son. (Pic by Fie)

I didn't get the names of the other people in our group as we were the odd couple out while the others were on a company trip. LOL. Sorryyyyyy! Since we had a very tight trip schedule, I did manage to have small talk with some of them.

Various pictures in the Ancient Cultural Street.

We didn't go in through the front gate so there's no picture of it. Hehe. But the first thing we saw when entering was people selling antic merchandise on the floor of the streets.

Among being sold were old coins, old postcards etc.

The CEO's wife had a thing with ancient looking flutes and tried giving out a tune but to no success. Hehe.

"Pruhhhhhh! Pruhhhhh!" 

Haha. The seller said you have to practice more because no sound was coming out except the huffing and puffing of your breath.

After the cultural street, we stopped by the NanShi food market. Since it was obviously non-Halal, we only stopped for a quick look only.

Also sold here were souvenirs in the form of key-chains and such. 

Oh... and remember my post on the "boyfriend"? Some asked for a clearer picture of him.. hahaha. So here it goes!

Fie, the "boyfriend" and me! (pic credit to Fie)

OK, please don't look at the picture too long. Might lose your eye sight. LOL. 

We had our lunch and prayed at the same place before heading to the airport. It was sad to leave China but overall I'm glad to have joined this Muslim tour. This is my first time in doing so and might do so again in the future to other destinations.

Just need to find myself a travel partner.

=)

I guess this is my last post on Beijing Trip. Phewww... finally!!!

Signing off, thank you for reading!

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Beijing Trip Day 4 - Shopping Spree at the Yashow Market, Sanlitun

After several excruciating hours at the "second" Jade factory that afternoon, we finally reached the shopping area at around 4 PM. Ms Lili gave us only 3 hours to shop for our things and by the expressions of some of the people in the group, I knew it wasn't enough. All I could think of was buying stuff asked by friends back in Malaysia and it was quite a longgggg list. Sigh.

Sanlitun Yashow Market was the shopping center recommended by Ms Lili and it stood five storeys tall. Each storey is dedicated to different sections such as one storey for clothing, another for bags and shoes, one storey for electronics and accessories, etc.

As soon as you enter the building, you'll be greeted with the view below.

An escalator to any floor you desire.

The public toilet is just on the second floor if I'm not mistaken.  My first stop was to find cheap winter coats. I was able to bargain a hooded D & G winter coat for about RMB 200. If I bought two the price could be lesser. =)

Resorted to buying coats near the escalator to save time.

Some of the sellers know some basic Malay such as "murah! murah!" which means CHEAP in English. Hahaha.

Next on my shopping list was finding cheap replica bags for a guy and girl respectively. I'm not into replicas as the quality was questionable but my friend's wish is my command.

I found lots of Prada and Balengcia replicas. All at RMB 100 if you bargain hard enough. LOL.

As another blogger smartly put it, all of these are USELESS but highly desirable junk!!! HAHAHA!

LVs and HERMES were also sold in abundance!

I bought a HERMES replica for RMB 100 and also a Coach Men's Slingback for the same price. Hehehe. So far nothing was for me.

Later, as the spree was coming to an end, (the time to gather at the required place was nearing...) i went to the fifth floor to find an 8 inch PC tablet cover for my dad. I've searched everywhere in Kuala Lumpur but none was found. Fortunately,  you could basically find everything under this one roof! 

Tip of the Day: Never buy fridge magnets at the places you visit as it costs about RMB 10 per piece. No bargaining there! Whereas at Yashow market (here), you can get it at RMB 3 per piece!!!

After buying everything on my shopping list, I headed down the escalator.

Fake shoes were also sold in abundance. Name the brand, it's ALL HERE!

Glancing a bit before exiting.

The other people in the group obviously had a great time shopping. Some even came put of the building with very big bags filled with bought items! 

And out the building we went and across the street to the waiting bus.

We were on the way to Tianjin for the night. It took about 2 hours and a half to get there from Beijing. As usual I was asleep along the way but managed to notice that the driver had difficulties locating our hotel there. He stopped the bus several times to ask for directions. =)

Next entry will be my last one on this Beijing trip. The last day was spent at Tianjin before we were sent to the airport.

Until then, thank you for reading!

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Beijing Trip Day 4 - JingShan Park

We headed to JingShan Park just before lunch. We were given less then an hour there to do some sightseeing. But nothing was worth seeing if you didn't climb the many steps up hill to the Wanchun Pavillion (All Time Spring Pavillion) and that's exactly what Fie and I did. Unfortunately, the other tourists in the group didn't pursue this. =)

"Climb Fie! Climb! You can do it!"

To me, the climb wasn't half as bad like Great Wall of China. Fie became my willing photography model as we rushed to get to the top and then climb down in less then an hour. Fuhhhhhhhhhhh!

Clockwise from upper left: Fie at the first pavillion we reached at, Fie in front of the second,
antique picture of important ppl in front of the same pavillion at the back,
golden buddha in the Wanchun Pavillion.

It's not about the buildings that we purposely climbed all the stairs to the top. JingShan Park is famous for being strategically located just above the Forbidden City as seen in the map below.

Jingshan Park is a park full of hills.

And once we finally reached the top, LO AND BEHOLD!!!

We could see the WHOLE Forbidden City from the top! OMG!!!

I know the picture doesn't show much because I don't have powerful camera lenses yet. But through the naked eye, the view was MARVELOUS!!! It kinda knocked the breath out of us.

The view of the lake at the east side.

Ohhhh.... we definitely became the envy of our group when we climbed down breathlessly. This place is a must-go when you come visit Beijing anytime soon. It marvels me that I've been inside the Forbidden City before I saw it in whole on top of a hill. =)

Next stop is foot massage, lunch, another Jade Factory and finally a three hour shopping spree at Beijing's open market!! All in the next entry! I am sorry for the delay of the entries as I was pretty much preoccupied these past few days.

Oh and did you know?

I won the Malaysia International Tourism Travel Blog Award!!!  Thanks to all who supported and voted for me! Love you muchhhhhhhhhh!!!

Muahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

Until next time, thank you for reading!

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Beijing Trip day 4 - The Temple of Heaven

Moving to day four in Beijing. Second stop of the day after visiting the oldest mosque in Beijing was the Temple of Heaven. This temple was built in 1420 to be the place where emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties worship Heaven and offer sacrifices. In return they want more harvests and favorable rain.

Most of the structures were constructed in the Qing Dynasty in compliance with the layout system set in Jiajing's reign of the Ming DYnasty. It is built so that the compound wall done in a semi-circle in the north and a square in the south. Surrounded by double annular walls, the temple is divided into an inner part and an outer part.

The whole area is 273 hectares.

Ancient architectural complexes stand in the inner part including the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvest, the Circular Mound Altar etc while the outer part lies Divine Music Office to rehearse ritual music for ceremonies. (source is from the information board found at the temple)

As usual, we had to wait for Ms Lili to get our tickets. No tourist place is free to enter without a ticket.

I wonder how foreigners gonna understand the writings above the counter?

It was just a brief walk down the aisle and upwards to the Temple of Heaven. Many people were present during that time. Some were there to hang-out with fellow friends and I noticed the majority of the local visitors were elderly people!

Clockwise from upper left: Temple from afar, Temple from the side, Fie on the stairs,
and Fie and I at the front of the temple.

This my friend, is the great Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. Built in 1420 and originally rectangular in shape was used to worship both Earth and Heaven. Rebuilt in 1545 into a round hall with a triple-eaved roof, each covered with blue, yello and green glazed tiles respectively, symbolizes Heaven., Earth and the mortal world. The hall is supported by immense pillar which symbolizes the four seasons, the 12 months of the year, the 12 time divisions of the day and night and all the constellations. It is the only existing example of the ancient architectural style of Mingdang. (info from the information boards at the building)

Jianxi, a popular game among the Beijing people at the park. See the "ball"?

On our way out, we walked through a wide pathway where it's crowded with people playing Jianzi. A traditional Asian game in which players aim to keep a heavily weighted shuttlecock in the air using their feet and other parts of the body except their hands. It was interesting to watch them play. Hehe.

Next stop is Jingshan Park! -- next entry.

Thank you for reading!

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MITBCA (Malaysia International Tourism Bloggers Conference & Awards)

Hi all,

I know it's a bit late in mentioning this since only four hours remains before the voting period finishes. I've been gathering votes via Facebook and twitter from the day my blog was nominated in the "Tourism Travel Blog" category and with help from unbeknownst friends, I managed to lead for awhile. Just wanna say THANKYOU so much for your votes and support! Whatever the outcome tonight, I'll forever be in your debt. 

But that's not what I want to blog about.

Malaysia International Tourism Bloggers Conference is going to happen on the 8th until 9th of May 2012. Organized by the Ministry of Tourism Malaysia, it is going to be held at the prestigious Seri Pacific Hotel, Kuala Lumpur, just a few meters of the PWTC station. Registration is free and you could pre-register here. To date, there are only 170 places left so REGISTER NOW to avoid disappointment. =)

I think tea break and lunch is served as well. So that's something. Hehe.

Topics being discussed during the conference are relevant to the social media world especially on tourism. Details found here. Avid travel bloggers are encouraged to join. So don't miss this chance, OK?

I'll be there so meet you guys there!

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