14 Sep 2007 05:56
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The South African Solar Challenge is a 4175km race for solar powered cars around South Africa taking place from 22 Sep 2008 to 8 Oct 2008. Like all self respecting international events, this race will require its participants to spend a half hour in.... ERMELO!
But in all seriousness, anything that can present opportunities to relieve the general and increasing world wide dependency on oil is good and noble work. |
07 Sep 2007 01:26
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When we were planning to go to Kuala Lumpur, we were advised to visit the Batu Caves. To be honest, it sometimes takes a little convincing to get me excited about tourist attractions, but not in this case. That is because, from the moment we are born, all men think caves are cool.
PHOTO 1: I had been under the impression that we'd be heading to the caves through some real old school villages, but this was not to be. Apparently that would still have been the case until about 10 years ago. The first sighting you'll make is not of the caves themselves but of a large gold statue. And with good reason, it's just under 43 meters tall. And it's gold. PHOTO 2, 3: A better look at the statue of Lord Murugan. In my mind, huge statues are the kind of thing that used to get built in the days of yore, but this one was built between 2003 and 2006. It's a concrete structure, but is painted with actual gold. PHOTO 4,5: Those stairs lead into the actual cave and they look a lot because they are a lot - 272 in all. There's a sign at the top instructing visitors that the stairs are not to be used for exercise purposes - i'm not sure if this has ever been a genuine problem.
   
PHOTO 6: There are tons of monkeys all over the place and they will take anything that you don't keep a strong grip on. PHOTO 7: A view of the surrounding area from up the stairs. Ten years or so ago, this would have been a whole different world. PHOTO 8: The entrance to the cave - this is probably a good point to note just what sort of caves these are. There are a number of caves of varying sorts in these lime stone hills, and to quote wikipedia: 'the largest and best known is the Temple or Cathedral Cave, so named because it houses several Hindu shrines beneath its 100 m vaulted ceiling.'
   
PHOTO 9-14: The interior of the cave. The cave itself is huge, very impressive and quite beautiful. Inside you'll find a mixture of shrines and commerce - the display of wide screen TV sets caught me a little off guard. There's also another small flight of stairs inside the cave and while it pales in comparison to those outside, it does drive the nail into the coffin.
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06 Sep 2007 06:18
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Rather than just scouring Kuala Lumpur for thrifty electronics purchases, we thought we'd try getting a bit of the city under our feet. One of our attempts to do so was to make our way to a part of the city sometimes referred to as Little India. PHOTO 1: On our way there. I like trees in cities. PHOTO 2,3: The streets around little India. If you were looking for grit, you came to the right place. A lot of lower income high density housing and a very different feeling from the central business area where the Petronas Towers are. Which is quite a harsh adjustment considering the towers are about a 10 minute walk away from where these photos are taken. Or at least, they'd be a ten minute walk for a better man than i. For a man like i we'd be looking more at a grueling 15 minutes.
 
PHOTO 4,5,6: After eating at some restaurants that were aimed more at the middle class and higher Malaysian, we thought we'd try something a little more, and i hate to use the term, "real". And this street side market packed with people and vendors in Little India seemed a good place for us to grasp at the "real". Which was a great idea and i'd recommend it to anybody, but beware ye delicate western palate! A lot of the food you have to choose from is resting deep in some fairly thick and delicious sauces and if you're not too careful you may just find yourself rustling up a hearty helping of pigs' ears (those would be the fellows behind the rice on the far end of the plate). I noticed the interesting food choice i had made after detecting a certain texture of meat with which i had not previously been acquainted. |
05 Sep 2007 13:08
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Okay, today we take a look a Kuala Lumpur's chief camera magnet, the Petronas Towers. It's a very sad thing that most of the world got to know these towers through the cinematic gonad-footstomping that is Entrapment, because they are really breathtaking. They're tall enough so you just keep seeing them no matter where you are in the city and with their steel and glass structure they look remarkably different as the light changes through the day.
PHOTO 1: Our first sighting of the towers, driving into the city (taken artlessly through the window of a speeding vehicle, as is my habit). PHOTO 2: As seen from our hotel room window, heading into dusk.
PHOTO 3: The towers by night, the amazing light design turns them into a whole different creature. One thing that no photo can really do justice to is just how damn big they are. They're just this big huge serene thing and they really do exude a weird calming energy. God knows i sound like i'm spouting hippie flavoured offal, but it's true. We'd go sit by them for an hour or so each night, eat ice cream and just feel great.
PHOTO 4: My cherrie and her ouk. One thing you'll notice, particularly at night, is a whole lot of tourists trying to wrestle their cameras into getting a shot of people posing in front of the towers. If you have a wide angle lens you'll be fine, but the proletariat have a fair bit of tripod gymnastics awaiting them. This photo is the product of what i would risk calling herculean effort, with us standing about 200 meters in front of the towers, with the camera tilted as far back as it could go at the bottom of a short flight of stairs directly in front of us on a woefully inadequate 10cm high mini tripod.
PHOTO 5: As seen from the KL tower, which is a tall structure in its own right, standing up high on a hill, hence the helicopteresque view. |
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