The Northern Chronicles Chapter 2

I’ve been in Penang a few months now and am rapidly settling into life here. The Tank with her Selangor number plates maintains a visible clue as to my identity as does my inability to converse in Penang Hokkien, but I have generally been taken in rather than taken advantage of when buying stuff or ordering things for the new cafe we’re setting up. Overall it’s been really quite good.

How good? Well, for starters, I’m typing this in a pub a few minutes drive down the road from where I live. Bailey’s is a little place that serves good Kilkenny which, though a very nice beer, for some reason makes me sleepy. I do enjoy it though. Bailey’s also has live football on TV and just the sort of atmosphere I like. In many ways it reminds me of Rennie’s when I used to live in PJ and The Yard when I was in Singapore. Both neighbourhood pubs populated by regulars and managed by a barkeep who knew how to make you feel welcome, when to engage you and when to leave you to your thoughts . Yes, it’s good here…


Let me list, in no particular order, some of the other good things here and why I’ve taken to Penang in such a big way.

Friendships

I’ve established some really good friendships in the last year and sometimes it feels like Ive been here decades rather than just months. The people I’ve met have embraced me and taken me into their fold almost like I were a long-lost cousin returned home, or a childhood friend come back to the hometown after years abroad. Perhaps I should not compare, and I concede I made some good friends in Singapore in the 25 years there, but there’s something touching and gratifying in the number, quality and depth of the relationships I’ve made in just the last 12 months.

OK so they can be a little silly, but they're good people to have around.

My new friends here have accepted me in a way and at a depth few, if any, of my Singaporean friends have achieved. And hey, I am one who works at friendships. I think this speaks volumes of the kind of people Penangites are. They may have a reputation for being Kiam Siap* but what I have found is a generosity of spirit that is touching and endearing.

Driving

Yes, Penang drivers are among the craziest in Malaysia. But, short of having an accident, they’re also among the most forgiving. Yes, they’ll create 5 lanes when there are really only three, and yes, they’ll cut you up on the left and swing in from the right, but when you need to get somewhere you’re not quite in the correct lane to get to, they’ll let you switch lanes. No fuss, no horning, no agro. It just works. I find my journeys in The Tank are usually stress-free and quite calm ones. In the last few years in Singapore, I’d gotten quite cranky every time I drove. Now, 800 km up north, I find I’m almost always quite the opposite. What is, simply is and I have little desire to thump another driver on the head for being such a (perceived) prick…

Scenery

Penang isn’t very large but has amazing geographical and societal variety. There really is a little for everyone. There’s the heritage area, the shopping centres, marinas and beaches, hills galore, more hills, and then even more hills!, a national park, plenty of hiking and mountain biking trails, plantations and paddy fields, orchards and waterfalls, fishing villages and homestays… I love drawing the living room curtains and sliding open the living room balcony doors every morning and taking in fresh air and the view of the often-cloud-draped hills nearby. And cycling around where I shall soon be working, Balik Pulau, brings me close to padi fields, the seaside, fishing villages, kampungs and more.

I love seeing this view every time I draw the living room curtains.

Agression. Or the lack thereof.

I always thought Hokkien was a rather rough-sounding dialect. Then I heard Penang Hokkien. Less authentic and original than the southern counterpart which I have become used to hearing, it is also a softer-toned language with more rounded sounds. As an example, ‘eat rice’ in southern Hokkien is Chiak Png - the ‘Png’ sound in particular being a hard, sudden stop with the feel and weight of a command - to me anyway. The Penang equivalent is Chiak Poi, which is altogether softer and gentler and carries an air of invitation and grace. I’m very used to not understanding conversations that go on around me. 25 years of being surrounded by Hokkien and Mandarin conversation, and not being party or enlightened eavesdropper to either has made me more aware of tone rather than words.

The same applies to Penang in many ways too but the difference here is that I find sounds of conversations here gentler and less seemingly confrontational or agressive. Penang Hokkien is partly responsible, but so too, I think, is how Penangites generally carry and conduct themselves. The pace is slower of course (except the mad motorcyclists) but it’s also how social etiquette is different. People are less afraid to make eye contact and to acknowledge each other. Sitting in a coffeeshop, strangers are generally more willing to smile or at least nod at each other. It’s a refreshing change I’m enjoying greatly.

Cycling

I don’t actually cycle as much as I would like to, but I must say I feel safer cycling around Penang - even with the mad drivers and bikers here - than I have ever felt in Singapore. There are cycling lanes, dedicated cycling lanes and trails everywhere which are great fun to ride on. I no longer have a usable mountain bike and running around on skinny 28mm tyres on my current bike means sandy or gravelly trails are a little nerve-wracking, but I still find that the diverse scenery and the friendiness of people in general make for a great cycling experience. My fitness has tapered off so much in the few years since my Celebrate Malaysia ride that I am not really capable yet, but I intend to be fit enough soon, to tackle a round-island ride. Soon… Meanwhile I happily ride 25-35 kms around the Balik Pulau area, discovering new trails and villages and more.

So we hammed it up a bit, but isn't it nice to cycle past padi fields?

Food

Must I even elaborate? Lonely Planet voted Penang top street-food destination in the world for 2014. Enough said.

Street Art

Must I even elaborate? When Penang began seriously gaining international attention these last few eyars, Ipoh, Johor Bahru and even SIngapore began to try and emulate the street art culture of Penang. JB had a serious faux pas with this when Ernest Zacharevic’s Legoman Mugging piece was not appreciated and was whitewashed. Singapore has her own issues with legislation and needing everything to be registered and allowed and so on. Penang, meanwhile, just quietly goes on being wonderfully creative. I mentioned to a few Singaporean friends that the infamous SKLo, the young Singaporean artist who pasted humourous stickers on pedestrian crossing buttons and who got eventually done for vandalism, would have been right at home in Penang. One of them opined that in Penang, she would have been ordinary. And I think that sums it all up really. Penang is a widly creative place where thinking artistically and creatively is the norm.

And this brings me to an idea I have expressed a number of times recently - that the truly great thing about Penang is its self-confidence. This is a city/state with a history it is not embarrassed about. A place that instinctively knows and understands at a very deep level who and what it is. And where it’s headed. One that has a clear picture of what it represents and what it stands for.

For me, someone moving back after 25 years away and dealing with so many uncertainties and variables as I reestablish myself, building on a solid foundation like I find in Penang sure feels darned good.

The Tank Chronicles Chapter 4: What A Drip

There was water in the front passenger footwell. The carpet was wet when I got the car and the Puspakom inspection had mentioned some rust in the floorpan of The Tank. I had the carpet dried out with a wet/dry vacuum when I got the car washed one day and I then realised the aircon was the cause of the contstant drip. I took to driving with a towel stuffed up the side of the centre console and every time I parked, I would have to wring this towel dry. And sometimes it really was very sodden.

I finally decided to have a good look at the leak and found two things - condensation around an insulated pipe leading to or from the colling coil was the source of the leak, and when I peeled back the carpet, I also found a thumb-sized hole in the floorboard of the car.

When life hands you lemons, make lemonade they say. When life hands you a dripping pipe and a hole in the floor, make a drip tray.

And so I did… I cut a 1.5l PET bottle in half, leaving the cap on. In that I cut a small hole through which I fit one end of a length of half-inch garden hose. I didn’t have any silicone on me so I sealed this connection with liquid glue from a glue gun. The hose had been pushed in about an inch or so and I used duct tape to add some strength to the connection and also to channel water dripping into the bottle directly into the hose rather than the base of the cap. If I had silicone on me I could have avoided this step.

The open half of the PET bottle/drip tray was then wrapped around the kink in the pipe so as to collect every drop of condensation. The other end of the hose was then simply stuck through the hole in the floor!

I pushed back the carpet around the whole assembly, and replaced the side panel and voila! I’d stopped the leak. As I write this about a month later, the passenger footwell remains dry so I’m chuffed. The aircon is not the best on a hot day so when I have some spare cash and time, I’ll get it all looked at properly. In the meantime, I’m very happy with the hole in the floor doubling up as an exit point for water.

At least until I have to drive through a flood when the gaps in that hole may prove to be an unplesant ingress point instead. Ah well.

LWE Chapter 2: Death's lessons

Death comes in groups it seems.

Tessie, who took care of my kids for 17 years was the first to experience it this time. Her father passed away a few days ago followed very shortly by her mother. The old couple must have wanted to be together I think. Both had their chalenges in the last few years and Tessie often messaged me about them - the old man had some form of dementia it seemed while the old lady was increasingly frail and needed oxygen and then hospitalisation.

A few days later, my KL friend Julie rushed up to Butterworth to attend a cousin’s funeral.

Then just this morning my best friend Gan’s brother passed away. I still don’t have all the details, but I know Chong Wan fought Leukaemia some years ago so I’m assuming it came back.

All this has caused me to revisit the idea of death and what it is and what it means. I am not afraid of death and never have been. I may have my nervousness about the way I die - please, no fire and no drowning - but I think the main thing is that I would miss life terribly. Life, despite, or even sometimes because of, the challenges I face every now and then, is such a beautiful and rich experience. There’s so much still to do and I think on my death bed I would be thinking of that one more thing I still want to build, or that place I want to visit or the old friend I want to have one last chat with.

In a way this is the idea I’ve often espoused - that we should just forget about this whole Life After Death thing and instead focus on our Life Before Death. I don’t measure my worth in dollars and cents (or Ringgit and Sen as teh case may be) but instead on the positive impact on the people around me and the world in general. There will be haters of course and people whose life journeys and mine just simply do not match up. That’s fine. I don’t live for them. I live for people who were put in my life for a reason. And I feel incredibly proud that some of those people have benefitted from my being in their lives, and I feel chuffed too that others have helped me be better or more enlightened for them having been put in mine.

We’re all here for a reason and a big part of that reason is always to learn. I reckon that when we’ve learnt enough, our reason to exist ceases and we go. Or, when we’ve shown we just are completely incapable of learning, then the Universe probably thinks ‘Alright, enough is enough, let’s yank you outta there…’.

This may sound like growth is a limited or limiting thing. Well, I think in some cases it’s got a short plan and in others the projection is much greater and the timeline correspondingly so too. We are, after all, all individuals. And though this sounds just so Monty Pythonesque, the reality is that we are indeed unique, with unique traits, offerings, desires and needs. And plans.

Our lives are really a constant process of renewal - of learning and in some ways, unlearning too. We grow yet we revert to a childlike state.

Death too, is part of the process of renewal but here’ the interesting insight I had today: Death is not just a part of renewal for the departed. It is for those who are left behind too.

Interesting that death, by its very nature, gives birth - in this case to an important idea. Well it is to me, at any rate.

Life, The We-niverse and Everything. Chapter 1

Since I’ve begun compiling the threads here according to topics, I think it’s only fair to do the same with the random thoughts I have regarding the little things that make life what it is. And as I believe that we are all connected, I have decided to adulterate Douglas Adams’ fine title ‘Life, The Universe and Everything’ a little to make it inclusive, hence the ‘We’ substituting what I read as the ‘You’ in Universe.

Let me get straight into today’s thoughts which began life in the fires of a verbal spat between me and the ex-wife. I was chastised by a number of people and in my usual manner, began to rebut… then stopped. The realisation came that it isn’t necessary to explain my words or my actions for they were sincerely mine. And so I became unattached to the situation - not detached for that implies a disconnect. This isn’t normally easy for me, one who is guided almost exclusively by my emotional self.

Becoming fully unattached needed help. And help came in the form of a decent Roti Chanai, a hot cup of Teh O and some quiet time this morning. And a few messages form Mei and some friends too. Then the seeds of a thought that had been planted the night before germinated.

The thought I had last night is simply this:

“If I truly believe in who I am, I don’t need the approval or validation of other people.”

Some people are naturally confident and self-assured. Some, like me, are less so. We may be confident in our ideas, our values or the thinking which we reflect, but we are less assured when it comes to the decisions we make, the interactions we build, or sometimes even the person we perceive we are. Ideas, by themselves are ethereal, flimsy, essentially fascinating but ultimately useless. Unless we act on them. And though we may be confident in our ideas, being less so in our actions means we ultimately fall some way short of being effective.

The thought from last night, watered by fish curry and Teh O, grew this morning into a particular sanguine feeling that replaced the turmoil from the night before. Other ideas and thoughts that had floated before me seemingly at random in the last few days suddenly reappeared and connected with last night’s thought.

"There's no disaster that can't become a blessing and no blessing that can't become a disaster."
"We are all creators. We create things, or we create ideas, or we create excuses.”
“How sad to be a man (or woman) who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing.” 

and so on…

It’s a beautiful morning out there. I’m going out to create some worthwhile things. And I am grateful for th opportunity that descended on me last night to learn more and to be a little more enlightened in this we-niverse of ours.

By the way, this isn’t a self-help blog. I merely jot down my thoughts and sometimes explain why they seem significant to me. If they have meaning for you too, then I am grateful for that and thankful you have navigated here. Do leave a kind word...

If, on the other hand, this is all utter rubbish to you, I am grateful too that you have either found a different reality that makes sense to you, or that at least you’ve added 1 to the visitor numbers here.

The Tank Chronicles Chapter 3

Blinded by the light. Not

It was a couple of days after I brought the Tank to Penang. I took her out to get my dinner late one evening. The roads around the apartment are a little chaotic with roadside stalls, bus stops, mechanic workshops and little side lanes all on or meeting the main road. The resulting pedestrian and motorised traffic movement is complex and though a little shy of Hanoi’s or Mumbai’s standards, still requires some degree of concentration at the wheel.

Remember I said I’d checked the lights? Well, I certainly checked that they came on and in the dim carpark at the apartment, I could verify this every time I moved The Tank in or out. So imagine my surprise that night when I drove out into the dark and found I couldn’t see too well. At one point on the main road, I couldn’t even pick out a pedestrian darting across and only saw him/her as a silhouette in the glare of oncoming cars.

Hmmm… a closer inspection back home revealed the beams were not too bad at the top, but virtually non-existent on the bottom. The reflectors were obviously perished and to prevent someone - maybe me! - joining them, I figured I’d better get them fixed.

Replacement reflectors seemed to be the brightest idea...

I trawled some of the spare parts dealers on the Volvo groups I’d joined on Facebook and picked out some headlamp replacements, then also sought Ah Guan’s advice. As usual, he provided some wise words of caution - essentially that replacements headlamp units may also have dodgy reflectors. He proposed a better solution which was that they had a source for some Taiwanese-made replacement reflectors and could change my tarnished ones. That seemed to be the brightest idea (ahem) and I gave the go ahead. While waiting for the parts to arrive, The Tank ventured out only during the day and on one night when I had a late meeting in town, the guys were kind enough to pick me up and send me back.

You can see the dullness in the headlamps in the picture at the top. Here's The Tank having her eyes taken out. The wheels were off because I also did a brake pad replacement at the same time.

A few days later, Ah Guan said he had the parts so The Tank had her free parking spot in their workshop while they sorted her eyes out. Just to explain - Lorong Macalister is a coupon-parking area and the residents/tenants who don’t have season parking tickets play a dodging game with the parking wardens who come infrequently and irregularly. When they do appear, someone usually gives a call out and doors come flying open and men and women scurry out with their car keys in hand to scratch out a new and valid couple before they got slapped with a RM50 fine. The Tank was safe in Ah Guan’s workshop for the day.

The headlamp unit on the floor, waiting for surgery.

You can see how dull the reflector is.

All cleaned up and waiting for the replacement reflector.

And don't her eyes look all sparkly again?

In the evening, I picked her up and she was all sparkly and shiny in the eyes and the trip home was drama-free. Cost? RM195 each without labour.

Ah Guan says the manufacturer has stopped producing these reflectors so I guess other owners will have tools for alternative sources or try their luck with old units.

The Tank Chronicles Chapter 2

When the aircon doesn't blow but isn't broken. When the wipers don't wipe but aren't broken. When the horn doesn't toot, but isn't broken.

By the time Pian the mechanic had finished with the car it was evening. Mei had asked if I’d drive straight up and I said I wouldn’t drive long distance at night with an old car I’d just bought. The last thing I wanted was to have to fix something on an unfamiliar car by the roadside late at night.

When I first saw The Tank, everything major worked - aircon, lights, wipers. When I saw the car for the second time, the horn didn’t work and neither did the aircon blower. Pian spent so much time attending to the other things he ran out of time to look at these two items. He did manage to ascertain the windscreen washer pumps were no longer working though.

I’d checked the lights and they generally worked fine. The right brake light would also screw up the right indicator circuit causing that to flash faster. It could be that the circuit was shorting and an indicator bulb could not work when the brakes were pressed, causing the faster flashing. There was also some issue with the right rear reverse lamp so obviously the wiring to the right rear lamp cluster needed some attention.

The aircon blower issue was a strange one - when the aircon switch was clicked on, you could feel a trace of cold air coming through the vents. When the blower knob was turned to any of the speeds though, this feeble draught of air would immediately cease. The compressor would still be running, but no air at all flowed from the vents.

The aircon switch and the blower knob below it.

I figured I’d get the aircon guy next door to Soon Loong to have a look when I got new tyres put in the next day. Then as I started up the car to leave Pian’s, the blower suddenly worked! I figured it was a wiring issue and decided to take the car and solve this later.

So off I drove through KL traffic for the first time, making it without any drama or fuss to my hotel, then to Soon Loong the next morning. The aircon worked all this time, but when I restarted the car at Soon Loong, it didn’t work again. Same symptoms. I asked the aircon guys but they said they needed 4 hours and I decided a trickle of cold air would be enough for me - or hopefully the gremlin would disappear like it did before, so off I headed for Penang.

"Old cars have no window tinting... I was soon sweaty, sticky and sleepy."

Old cars have no window tinting. I discovered that this, combined with just a feeble wisp of cold air, is not the ideal condition to be travelling through the afternoon with. Within 60 or so kms, I was sweaty, sticky and sleepy. I stopped to wash my face and have a short nap. All this while I wondered about the problem. The blower had previously come to life when I had restarted the car with the aircon switch on. Perhaps that was the answer? Maybe the electrical demand from the clutch on the compressor sent a surge of electricity through old relays and circuits and kicked the blower into life? I’d worked out it wasn’t a case of reversed contacts as that way the blower might simply suck rather than blow. The fuses were all good too.

With some hope in my stomach then, my sweaty hand turned the key and the engine started instantly… I put my right hand to the vents and nervously turned the blower knob with my left… Nothing! Darn, I was convinced it might work. I switched the engine off and tried again. Still nothing… OK hot and sweaty it was going to be then.

Another 60km and I really was suffering. At one point I switched the aircon off, put the windows down, put a cap on my head to stop my hair flying all over the place and drove that way, like it was normal to do in the early 80s when this car first came out. Global warming and deforestation meant that the ambient temperature was a little bit higher than it used to be in the 80s though but I thought I could survive the next 300kms or so.

Then it rained.

Windows up, lights on, wipers on. Errr…wipers on. Please. Damn! They didn’t work! Flicking the stalk about made no difference. I was sure they worked before because Pian was testing them. Hmmm was this how it was going to be with The Tank, then?

Jiggling the wiper stalk about didn't help when the wipers didn't wipe.

Fortunately the screen is more upright than in modern cars and at the speed I was travelling at, and the relatively light rain, I could still see as most of the rain simply blew off the screen. And so I carried on for some time. After a while the rain stopped and the heat returned. I stopped at the Sg Perak rest halt to get a drink and also to try the start cycle again. A few goes at the ignition and no difference. Hmmm...

Once more on the road and I was making rapid progress, The Tank running at 115-120 km/h quite happily - though my GPS showed the true speed to be about 8% less than that. I was surviving with the trickle of cold air, the weather having cooled a little. Then at one point, I suddenly felt a gust of air form the vents. The blower had started working again! I had no idea why but I sure wasn’t going to stop and risk losing it again. So in high spirits I continued on my way.

Then it rained again. heavier than before. I knew if it got too much I’d have to pull over so with dread in my heart I pulled the wiper stalk down pessimistically. They worked!!! Aircon working! Wipers working! What was going on?

No more drama all the way to Penang and my new home in Relau.

The next morning the blower was not working again, and neither were the wipers (they must be linked!) but I made it without discomfort to Georgetown and created a stir at Ah Beng Motor Services, the Volvo specialists at Lorong Macalister. Ah Guan - my usual go-to guy - and his brother plus a couple of the other mechanics gathered around The Tank appreciatively. Guan’s brother (whose name I don’t know) sat in the driver’s seat giving The Tank a look over. I mentioned the car was in good shape but needed some small things sorted out, and mentioned the aircon blower, the wipers and the horn. He started the car up, then switched on the aircon and blower and lo and behold! It all worked. And the wipers too!

He explained the problem: “Ignition switch”.

Ignition switches have a number of positions - locked, 1 (when the steering is unlocked), 2 (when many electrical circuits come online) and the spring-back 3 (starter cranks). When you turn from 2 to 3, the circuits momentarily cut out so power can go to the starter motor. It seems this old thing, having seen many miles, would not spring back to 2 too well so some circuits - no prizes for guessing which ones - would not reconnect.

The guys here really know their Volvos. You don't see any in the picture but step inside and you'll see 850s, V70s , S70s, even a couple of 122s sometimes. The Tank was the only 240 (well, OK a 245) around and attracted some attention.

The Tank filling up a lot outside Pedal Inn.

The cure? I could replace the switch barrel for around RM300-400, or I could live with it by making sure the switch went back fully to 2 each time I started.

I chose the second option happily - I was going to spend some money doing some important things and felt this key thing was an inconvenience but not much more than that.

So there we were, The Tank and I settling into Penang life. Aircon working. Wipers working. Oh, and horn too as they were all linked.

Next chapter: I’ll write about not being blinded by the light.

The Tank Chronicles Chapter 1

Would you buy a car that reminds you of this?
(July 5, 2009 - Source: Hamish Blair/Getty Images Europe)

French cars: they’re meant to be stylish, temperamental, loaded with personality and - dare I say it? - je ne sais qoui, aren’t they? You kind of expect a french car to give you wow and worry in equal measure.

The Swedes, on the other hand have  a coolness about them, a calm, even temperament. Less overt but steady and reliable. And even if a Swedish car were to expire after many years of trustworthy service, you’d expect her to do so quietly, with dignity and with little fuss.

I guess if I were to use Tennis as an example, I would think of a French Car as Henri Leconte - talented, unpredictable, occasionally making you laugh. And the Swedes, well take your pick from Bjorn Borg, Stefan Edberg, Mats Wilander…generally steady and unflappable chaps who do very well and who rarely let you down.

So, when I was contemplating a replacement for the Honda Airwave I’d run happily for 8 years, I narrowed the list down to two estate candidates - a Nissan AD Resort and a Citroen ZX Wagon. The former would be no-frills, plasticky but generally easy to fix. The latter would be a little more striking and recognisable, and being the less complex model in Citroen’s lineup, probably easy to maintain too.

I trawled through Mudah.my and sought opinions on the Citroen and generally had my mind set on the French car. I even viewed one which looked good on the screen but turned out to need far too much work in real life. Peeling paint, torn interior, mechanical issues… I walked away. The price was good so I became quite confident I could find something I liked under RM10,000.

Visits to used car dealers didn’t yield much - an AD Resort that refused to start, and a ZX that looked good but needed minor work. I quite liked the latter and asked a mechanic contact to view the car and assess it so I could make an offer but 3 days of stormy weather were his excuse for not going so I never managed to get back to the dealer on that. Then one day in Selayang, I met a dealer who drove up in an old Volvo 240 GL. It looked good propped up high on large 18” wheels. The paint was rather distressed (which we thought was intentional) but the interior looked fine and the engine sounded smooth. It was his personal car and we chatted for almost an hour about cars. He showed me a couple of pictures of AD Resorts that had been done up - 300hp in a 25-year old Japanese tinbox? OK that one had Wow! - but were out of my budget.

I won't show pictures of the engine and interior, but must admit the owner had done a marvellous job with this car.  This particular one had no price but the one below was looking for a new owner at about RM14k.

Adry was enthusiastic though and over the next two days he continued to send me pictures of AD Resorts in varying states of repair. We narrowed the possibilities down to 2 models and I made arrangements to have a look at them.

In the meantime, I came across a ZX that looked beautiful on screen. A shiny blue (Subaru blue lah, not Barisan Nasional blue, as the owner eventually told me), it looked the part at just over RM10,000. I made an appointment to view the car.

About the same time, Adry sent me a picture that was to change my whole direction - an old Volvo 245 Wagon. A car that was pushing 30 years old - a good 12 more than the blue ZX - but which looked in good nick. So suddenly, I had a whole new option - the first Swedish car I’d ever considered owning.

The more I thought of the Swede the more I liked it. The car would not just be conveyance, it would also be the platform to advertise the new ‘thing’ we’d be doing in Balik Pulau in Penang and I figured the Volvo would have the recall factor and visibility.

I eventually did get to see and test-drive both cars. The ZX was really pay-and-drive as it needed no work whatsoever. It was a truly beautiful and beautifully kept example of the ZX. The owner was even going to change the front suspension bushes as he didn’t like the ride. The Volvo, on the other hand, had rough edges which needed work. Quite a bit of small and minor things - missing wipers, an aircon fan switch that didn’t work, a speedo that also didn’t operate, and so on.

This picture from Mudah really was how the car turned out to when I eventually saw it, as my pictures below show.

This was perhaps the most difficult decision I had to make and I agonised over it for a few days. I gave myself a final deadline, had two looks at each car, even went to the extent of measuring the boot floor-to-ceiling height to see if my bikes would fit inside.

The photo that started it all. Though this wasn't the actual car that became The Tank. This was an even older unit which was in very bad shape though the pictures didn't show it. I did like the rims in the picture but am very happy with the ones on The Tank.

The Tank on the morning I paid for her.

The comparison list was long but it ultimately could be summarised, most amazingly, thus:

“The French car would be the rational choice and the Swede would be the emotive one.”

Besides the image of the Volvo, I was also more confident she would get the right sort of attention because the workshop just across the road from Pedal Inn was a Volvo specialist. I’d sent my Honda there for some attention and they had done a decent job so I was not concerned about maintenance.

So, after not-sleeping on it (I really did spend a restless night or two) I finally opted for the Volvo. When I picked her up I found that none of the work had been done so we spent an afternoon at a workshop getting some things sorted out.

The next day I put new shoes on the old girl which I was now affectionately calling The Tank. Although the tyres on her still had ample tread, I always change the tyres on cars I buy as they’re the only contact patch with the road and you never know what damage may have been inflicted on them by the previous owner - kerbed wheels can be damaged internally and could blow out at speed.

Pian the mechanic at Gombak who fixed up a few things and did a wonderful job. Warm and kind-hearted bloke to boot. Let me know if you'd like to send your car to him in Gombak.

The guys at Soon Loong along Jalan Penchala in Petaling Jaya put new shoes on The Tank. They do a great job at a great price. 

So here I am now, the owner of a Swedish car for the first time in my life. Read more about her in the next few chapters. I’ll talk about the fan switch that didn’t work but wasn’t broken, the wipers that didn’t work but weren’t broken and the horn that didn’t work but wasn’t broken…

The Northern Chronicles Chapter 1

The view from my new place.

Mei and I had been thinking we’d retire somewhere in Malaysia. Despite 25 years away, it’s home for me of course, and it’s not far from Mei’s ‘home’. Factor in all the other reasons - food, relative affordability, nice people… and even when you balance that out against a political climate that isn’t very encouraging, crime that is prevalent, public transport that is non-existent and so on, you still get a pretty good argument for a retirement in Malaysia.

Our plans were also to set up some sort of Eco-friendly B&B so Malaysia was an obvious choice. We’d looked initially at Ipoh and had even made a couple of trips up to look at property there but eventually set our sights elsewhere. Yes, Ipoh is a lovely place, and yes, it’s Cantonese, and yes, the food is fantastic, but it’s just a little too old, tired, and perhaps even faded. More importantly it was no longer on a busy tourist trail and if we wanted a sustainable retirement business, Ipoh, despite its attractions, could not quite make it.

Melaka was our next choice. It was, after all, one of my favourite cities in Malaysia. Turns out ‘was’ became the operative word. IN recent years, I reckon Melaka has somewhat lost its charm. Development that has ignored the historical heritage and natural attractions has become a turn off. Land reclamation, for example, has destroyed some of the seaside eateries’ attractions. The Portuguese Settlement has been affected too, and has also suffered from a lack of proper guided support. It seems to me that in trying to provide a little to everyone, Melaka is simply failing to provide an excellent experience for any one.

Then it came time to smile… My Senyum Sajalah exhibition in Penang at the end of 2013 gave me my first extended experience of Penang. I spent over 10% of 2013 in Penang, researching, chronicling and eventually exhibiting. It was a wonderful time and I made new friends whom I know I will have around me for many years to come. 

“It seems that when you’re on the right path, the Universe conspires to help you on the way”

I remember telling Mei one day that we could forget Ipoh, Melaka and even Johor. Penang was the place for us. She came up for the exhibition and spent some time with me and agreed. And so we took the first steps towards settling up North.

Among these were exploring some business opportunities. It was at this time that I discovered things in Penang move a little slower than I am used to. Our negotiations for some business premises began in January and it wasn’t until June that that our plans had to change because the location became unsuitable for a variety of reasons. We quickly found another and finally signed the lease a few weeks ago.

It seems that when you’re on the right path, the Universe conspires to help you on the way. My friend Newton had accepted a job overseas and left a few weeks before my arrival in Penang. He generously let me stay in his apartment. I also had to sell my Singapore-registered Honda Airwave as it didn’t make sense to keep it here. You can read about the wheels elsewhere on this blog. She’s a 30-year old Volvo 240GL Wagon. I’ve affectionately dubbed her The Tank.

So here I am now, making my first steps towards settling in Penang. I’m slowly prising open this oyster and discovering the pearl within. The first steps have been good and when I turn back and look at the footprints I’m planting here, I feel very happy and proud.

Farewell dinner with my old yoga mates.

We had a great farewell dinner at New Ubin Seafood in Singapore.

My son, Mark (on far right) joined us for dinner.

Just one of the many loads I took up in my trusty Honda Airwave.

Your personality is not you.

A quick thought for the weekend:

Don’t be attached to your personality for it is probably not the real you.

We construct images of ourselves which we put up for others to see and experience. These constructs are often not the real ‘us’. Few ever truly put themselves up, wholly and completely.

As an extension, don’t be attached to constructs other people put up as themselves either.

Linked Up Follow Up

I hit submit on the last post, then checked my email and this link came up:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbz2boNSeL0

No coincidences. 

Thought of the Day: Linked Up

I don’t believe in coincidence. Nothing happens by chance. If you look back at key moments in your life and think ‘Wow! I’m so glad this person appeared just then’, well just accept that that person was meant to be there. And if he hadn’t appeared, someone else would have, to give you the same opportunities you were always meant to have.

Many people have proven pivotal for me in these last few years. Right now as I type this, I am sitting in my new home in Penang. I moved here just a few weeks ago and this really isn’t my home as such: it belongs to a friend who has gone overseas for work and rather than let the place sit empty, he’s let me live in it.

I can also easily trace back the string of events and the people associated with them, that has led me here. So let’s work backwards.

This place belongs to Newton whom I met when he was a partner at Pedal Inn in Georgetown and I stayed there for a few weeks while doing my Senyum Sajalah Exhibition. I did Senyum Sajalah because my friend Clifford was involved with the Camera Museum where it was held and he extended the invite to me. Clifford thought of me because I had taken some pictures of him and his wife. I was doing photography because of an idea my ex-client Louise Tan had planted in me while I was wandering around between focussed careers. She asked me to take pictures of her PR clients, I did and the idea of a company to do photography was born. That company is Chronicle People of which my friend Johann Annuar and I are partners. I met Johann because I needed advice on cycling through Malaysia and sought out my friend Joe Nathan who introduced us. The idea to cycle through Malaysia was because of Bill McDannell who walked across the US to petition against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The ride was made possible because my friend Johari Low started the wheel turning by saying he’d support me and because my ex-colleague Andrew Wilson asked a very important question of me “In 5 years, would I be happy I’d done the ride, or regret not having done it?”. I was even cycling again because of my wife who reintroduced me to cycling after many years away from a bike.

Each one of those links is no different from the links on a bicycle chain - if any one had broken, the entire sequence would have been altered.

"...ask yourself what each person means to you and how each person in your life makes your life different."

The thing is though, if any one link had broken, I do believe that some one else would have stepped in to bridge the gap.

If Louise had not asked me to shoot her clients, someone else may have asked me to shoot his family.

If Bill McDannell had not walked across the US, I might instead have read about Rory Stewart walking across Afghanistan.

And so on…

I believe that every single person in my life is there for a reason. And I believe it is the same for you too. It may sound predatory, selfish or self-centred but it really isn’t: so ask yourself what each person means to you and how each person in your life makes your life different.

Then ask yourself what you may mean to each person in your life and how you make that person’s life different. For of course, you are placed in that person’s life for a reason too.

The First Words in Two and a Half Years

Not a word written here in two and a half years. Well, time to do something about it.
In the last two years I’ve actually done quite a bit including focussing more on photography (pun very much intended), having my first exhibition of my photography work (a solo exhibition in Penang called Senyum Sajalah), making lots of new Penang friends and falling in love with Penang in the process, and most importantly, finally actually relocating to Penang to set something new and wonderful up.
I’ve written about Senyum Sajalah elsewhere and it was featured in The Star and on even mentioned on radio, but if you haven’t read about it, then please go to SenyumSajalah.tumblr.com. I’ve recently been encouraged to finally get up and do some of the follow ups I’ve been promising including the book version and I’m slowly stirring and moving in that direction. You’ll be able to find out more on that site.

In the meantime, I have moved to Penang and currently reside in the flat that belongs to a friend of mine - a new friend who has shown me amazing generosity and kindness. I’m slowly making this place a home and though Mei is not yet here with me, I’m too busy settling in to stop and think about it for too long. Before she comes out this way, there’s budget air travel anyway, and whatsapp and whatnot to help us keep in touch.
One of the things I’ve had to do is to pass my Honda Airwave which I have grown to like very much on to a dealer to sell on. If you’re looking for a very versatile car that has served me well for 8 years,give me a shout.
In her place comes The Tank, a classic 1985 Volvo 240 GL Wagon. She’s quite a comfy thing that is a little rough around the edges, but she brought me the 400 km to Penang from KL where I’d picked her up, without much fuss. She’s getting loving attention from me and the guys at the workshop in Lorong Macalister in Georgetown. They;re Volvo specialists and when I drove her in they all came out excitedly. She’s going to get some care I tell you…
She’s also going to get some coverage as I decided to share some of the experiences of owning and running this 30-year old Swede in The Tank Chronicles. Right here on this blog and on Facebook. Stay tuned…

I will also share a heap of other things that are happening right now, as well as the odd thought that flickers across my consciousness or my soul.
So all in all, expect this blog to get revived and for the light to shine a little brighter now.