New Year Day in Bentong Buddhist Nature Farm

On the first day of 2010, the family went on a trip to Bentong. We were invited by my sister-in-law, who came down from Ipoh, to have breakfast in Bentong and then pay a visit to a nearby Buddhist Nature Farm (together with all her Buddhist friends). My sister-in-law is a staunch practitioner of the Buddhist philosophy. She started her journey into Buddhism about 5 years ago when she became a full fledged vegetarian.

We reached the farm at about 1pm in the afternoon. The weather was just nice with enough cloud covers to make it a cooling afternoon. I took the kids for a walk around the farm. The farm is actually a sanctuary for all living things. The people who ran the farm accepts all kind of animals from anyone who wants to donate them.


The water lily lake in the farm has lots of fishes, mostly donated by the public. You can see my kids were not enthusiastic about getting their photo taken.


Things started to get exciting for them when I took them to feed the cows. They were scared at first... but after a while... no fear... LOL.


Then we went to the goat stalls and the kids just loved feeding the hungry goats.


Jodene and Jordan reluctantly looked at me, when I told them I want to take a photo of them.


A family photo with the goats.

After the "animal farm", we followed the entourage to Bentong's Hot Spring. By then it was 2 plus in the afternoon. To my surprise, the Hot Spring was right next to the highway.


A suspension bridge leading to the Karak Highway across the river. Only if you think you are as versatile as the infamous Indiana Jones, would I advise you to cross over. The planks were loose and some parts rotten.


Just opposite the suspension bridge was the Bentong Hot Spring, in it's full glory! Sad!

When we reached the Hot Spring, I wanted to leave immediately... It was very sad to see that the place was in deplorable condition. Irresponsible visitors just piled up rubbishes next to the picnic hut area. The picnic huts were dirty and the wooden floor rotting.

To make matters worse, the state government did not see the sense of maintaining this natural wonder. The guard house were run-down and all signs were hard to read. Compared to the nearby waterfall at Hutan Lipur Lentang, this place is a shame! I am no environmentalist or a tree-hugger, but I just think this is plain negligence on the State government part.

The odd thing was that you still see a lot of tourists sitting by the hot spring soaking their feet. Some even immerse themselves and their children in the water. I wish I had taken some photos of the water just to show how disgusting it was. To each, its own I suppose...

Sad!

Fresh and Strange Longan Fruits

What? Never tried the longan fruits before? You dunno what you have been missing! The longan fruits are sweet and absolutely delicious! It is one of my favourite fruits. But the thing is... I have never seen a longan tree before.... :-) In fact I have been walking pass a longan tree day in and day out and I did not realised that it was a longan tree!

Yesterday, I was handed a bunch of longan fruits and I did not even realised what it was... LOL. The fruit's skin was green and the skin was hard and felt thick. The longans that I am used to seeing are brown in colour and the skin soft and easy to peel to get to the fruit inside.


Photo of a bunch of longan fruits I am used to seeing in the fruit market stalls (linked from Wikipedia).


The fresh longan fruits, which I did not even realised was longan.


The longan tree was very tall and the fruits was hard to reach.


A branch of longan fruits.


I packed some to let my colleagues try.

When I had finally gotten to taste the longan, it was not what I had expected. The skin of the fruit was thick and tough to peel. The meat of the fruit was fleshy, but lack the sweetness and juiciness usually associated with the longan fruit.

In any case, it was an experience to remember. Maybe the fruit had not yet ripen, hence the green skins... LOL. Maybe next year when longan is in season again, I will wait till the fruits is properly ripen :)

Family Fun at Hutan Lipur Lentang

Exactly 10 days ago, a group of friends together with our families went to a waterfall somewhere in the remote foothills of Genting in Karak to celebrate a friend's birthday... sort of... LOL. The place is called Hutan Lipur Lentang.

Actually it was a prelude to a fantastic lunch at a famous restaurant sponsored by the birthday boys, yeah... two birthdays... LOL. We got our families together to let the kids (those of us with kids) experience the "wild". My kids were very excited. They were freaking out when they saw the giant ants foraging in the forest path. Out of impulse, Joel could not help trying to stamp his feet on the ants! I managed to calm him down and got him to appreciate what the ants were doing... i.e. searching for food... LOL.

I had to take this picture... the rocks looked ideal for trials... LOL.

The river was flowing very rapidly... not safe for swimming.

My two boys mesmerised by the flowing river.

Thanks to Uncle Joe, my kids had the paper binoculars to purvue their surrounding with. Blurred as hell!

The guys pointing to the tiny tree growing out from the shadow of the giant tree... :-)

There they go again with their binoculars...

The rain the night before made the river unsafe for swimming.

Fast moving water.

The river, muddy and clouded with sediments.

There they go again.

A view of the picnic site from high above on the paths.

The river flooded, almost overflowing the banks.

The picnic site. Nice and clean.

George, the birthday boy, getting rid of a leech... LOL.

The tent was set up for the kids... but too hot for them to stay inside long... LOL.

All the kids going after the food... LOL.

All in all it was a fun trip. My kids definitely had fun and so did I... :-)

Giant Moth from Giant Caterpillar

Back in August, I discovered some giant caterpillars feasting on the leaves of the tree outside my porch.

Well, today, turns out that these caterpillars bloomed into this beautiful type of moth (I think). The wing span is at least 6 inches wide.

Giant Caterpillar

I have never seen a caterpillar that's about 5 inches long until that day when I decided to trim the tree in front of my car porch. The car porch and driveway were splattered with some sort of "fruit" shredded from that tree, at least that was what I thought until my maid told me that it was from those giant caterpillars. Those "fruits" were actually excrement from those caterpillars. Upon conducting a CSI type of investigation on the "fruit", I concluded that it was indeed excrements made up of digested leave fibres... LOL