Koh Lipe - The Bachelorette Photos

As promised here are the photos from my not-so-recent trip to Koh Lipe. Enjoy!

Ok fine, this was taken at Telaga Terminal at Langkawi

Sunset at... d'uh Sunset Beach

Longtail boats

The only two crazy makciks taking photos on Sunset Beach.
Excuse the black borders. Photo was taken using GoPro and I couldn't be bothered to edit it out. Heheh

Now the two makciks doing jump pose

Now streeetchhhh..... my so called yoga pose

Makcik kalah judi nak makan breakfast. Hahaha

Ini breakfast nya... Banana-Nutella Pancake aka Roti Pisang sapu dgn nutella. Yumss!

My 180 THB lunch. Pad Thai and Coconut

The gorgeous view of Sunrise Beach from a resort that I fail to remember... but it's not far from Adang!

The famous post-box
(remember I said I traveled light... this is how... bring one shirt and a packet of detergent!)

The Elephant Cafe/Bookstore

Our romantic sunset dinner... Hahaha

Goofing about while waiting for our food

For more photos check out my Instagram : rayacahaya (the IT illiterate me has not been able to fix an IG widget onto my blog...gah!)

Koh Lipe - The Bachelorette Trip

When I booked a trip to Koh Lipe, everyone was like..."ARE-YOU-MAD-YOU-SHOULD-BE-STAYING-AT-HOME-NOT-DOING-CRAZY-STUFF-BEFORE-YOUR-WEDDING!" Of course, knowing me, still went through with it. Hey I came back safe. Ok fine, a little tanned and bruised. Heheh.

I only went with Sufia, we called this my little bachelorette trip. We flew in to Langkawi (partly the reason I wanted to go Lipe was because I wanted to shop for chocolates for my wedding favors in Langkawi) and took a boat to Koh Lipe. This was probably my first time ever travelling light. Seriously light, else how could I come back with 20 kilos worth of chocs??

Koh Lipe is a beautiful island, like many other islands in Thailand (ok fine, the only other island I've been to is Phi Phi) with white sandy beaches and crystal clear sea. It was also pretty busy and filled with mat sallehs and dogs, although since we were there for our diving courses we didn't really bother to bask in the sun and all. Halal food is easily available, but we underestimated the prices of food on the island and ran out of cash quite quickly with all our shopping and all. Luckily, there's an ATM along Walking Street and some places accepted credit card (Tip: remember to activate your ATM card before going overseas! or really bring lots of cash), and there were money changers too. We stayed on Sunrise Beach, in Adang Sea Divers Lodge since we were on a budget plus we spent most of our times outdoor so there wasn't really a need for a fancy place.

On Rescue Diver Course
Rescue Diver was a more serious course unlike OW and AOW, but it was really fun. It definitely helped build up more confidence in diving (although not necessarily confidence in rescuing people!) and also increased my understanding on skills learnt earlier. My instructor was Clare and she was lovely as Keira had told me. The boat exercises, which was rescuing an unconscious diver from the surface and getting him/her onto the boat, were difficult - I thought Clare was telling me to swim to an imaginary boat which was just a few meters away from 'the scene', then I realised she actually meant the boat we came in with. IT WAS TIRING. Having to give two rescue breaths and swim with the extra weight - I was lucky my victim was Toni, a skinny guy. And when it came to getting into the boat to lift the Toni, I was in a hurry (coz you've only got 30 secs!) and banged my shin against the ladder. That's how I got my bruise.

Ok fine, I actually got the bruise from one of the earlier exercises when I fell over the boat trying to throw the buoy to a drowning victim (Toni flapping his hands pretending he can't swim). Whaaat... the buoy was heavy, I didn't let go of it in time and so I followed the buoy off the boat.... knocking my shin at the edge of the boat... *sob*sob* it was embarrassing, but for some reason I found it super hilarious and couldn't stop laughing (I still did bang my shin against the ladder when I was getting into the boat during the later rescue exercise).

On Shopping
The main shopping area here is along Walking Street, starts from Sunset Beach to somewhere before Sunrise Beach. From what I remember items sold here are mainly beachwear and souvenirs, i.e. pareos ranging from 150 THB for the cheap ones and 450 THB for the higher quality ones, boardshorts, bikinis, those bright neon colored tank tops and t-shirts, they also have a few dive shops which sell dive gears (duh!), pharmacies, 7E, one or two bakeries/quaint cafes, and several restaurants (halal/non-halal). Haggling is permitted (well at least for the ones that I went to) and credit cards are accepted in most shops however they do charge a service charge of 2-3%. As mentioned earlier, it's best to bring lotsa cash (in THB or your own currency) or have an ATM card in hand.

On Food
It could be me who's just naive but you would think that an island surrounded by marine life would be the place where you could get cheap seafood. Think again! Prawns and squids which I can get at the local market for half the price were sold at a few hundreds to 1000 baht. Fish were also by the 400s-500s per kilo, not a price I'm willing to pay. As we only ate at Halal restaurants, I can only tell the prices for these places. A plate of stir-fried vege (read kangkung belacan) would cost around 100-150 THB, a plate of Pad Thai 80-100 THB, a bowl of Green Curry Chicken also around 100-150 THB and a big bowl of Tom Yam around 200-300 THB, actually generally everything costs about that price. The bright side is they are generous with their portions so you can share one lauk dish between 2-3 pax. There were several other kedai makans available around the island but we were too lazy to explore 'em.
p/s: When I say restaurants, I don't mean fancy air-conditioned, uniformly-dressed waiters. They are prolly one grade up your typical warong.

On Adang Sea Lodge
If you're looking for a romantic getaway on the island, you should definitely book a room at Mali Resort, Bhundaya, Serendipity or Idyllic Concept or well...  something along the likes. Adang Sea Eco Lodge is a no-frills resort catered for visitors on a budget like us, who don't need fancy decorated, air-conditioned rooms. It is not right in front of the beach but a mere 50m walk maybe? Though not luxurious, it is clean and comfortable and definitely not dodgy looking.

I hope I have shared enough info to help you plan for your trip to Koh Lipe or tempt you into planning for one. Will share photos in my next post. Drop me an email if you need more info!

The Married Rescue Diver

Alhamdulillah.

It's only April and I feel super lucky this year. My accomplishments (I wouldn't call it my bucket list.. just things I'd never thought I'd get to do anytime soon) to date are:

a) Visit Langkawi (yup, never been there before)

b) Get married

c) Visit Cameron Highlands (yup, never been there before either)

and while trying to achieve a), I managed to also visit Koh Lipe and get my rescue diver license!

As they say good things come to those who wait and I think I've waited quite some time for this! I'm really really grateful to have much rezeki these past few months. The list does not end yet though! Other things I hope to achieve this year

a) Go diving in Bali

b) Visit Penang (sure, laugh at me coz I've never set foot in Penang.... well have you been to Bakun before?? Pfftt.. thought so)
c) Buy a place of my own
d) Umrah (ok so maybe that's in Jan next year)

Hope I get to achieve them soon enough!

Redang and Tenggol

Today I finally dragged myself out of bed, switched on the laptop, not get distracted with other websites and copied some photos of my diving trips from my phone. So here's a short summary of (whatever I can remember) my trip to Redang and Tenggol last October.

Since I worked the whole month of September and didn't go back to KL, I managed to squeeze an additional day off from the bosses. So obviously I went diving, almost back to back. Sufia and I booked a trip to Pulau Redang early Oct and to Pulau Tenggol the week after. It's great to have a friend who, even though is super thrifty, has a lot of money and time and will easily say yes to any diving trips. We booked our trips with Seamonkey, as we had a good experience diving with them at Pulau Bidong. Thankfully I had some money set aside as Seamonkey ain't exactly the cheapest dive centers in the market.

We booked a room/chalet in Redang Mutiara Beach Resort and after reading the numerous negative reviews on TripAdvisor, I was really worried that we'd get a crappy room. Much to our surprise, they had renovated their rooms and while it isn't exactly 5 stars, it was decent and convenient. I mean how could you say no to a room that when you open the door, the beach is at your doorstep?

White sand at your doorstep

Fancy waking up to this view every morning?

Only remembered to take a photo of the room when we were about to leave, hence the messy bed

Small, but clean bathroom

Unfortunately the visibility wasn't too good so there weren't many photos taken underwater, plus whatever I had was in my laptop which was stolen. I did manage to upload some to my FB and the only photo that I thought was good enough to be shared is this:

Blue spotted stingray from a night dive in Redang

Here are some other photos of Redang Island for you to enjoy:

View from the jetty #1

View from the jetty #2

View from the jetty #3

View from the doorstep

View while having lunch

Sunrise from just outside my room

All in all we enjoyed our short trip here, my first time to Redang. This side of the island is slightly more private and quiet if you are looking for a simple place to sleep and shower and just bask in the sun all day. As usual in most of my dive trips we end up making new friends, this time it was Jose and two German guys.

Moving on to Tenggol....

I'm not sure if I've ever told the tale about my miserable day trip to Tenggol Island before. This was back in April 2013 when I first moved to Kemaman. As I worked 6 days a week and only had Fridays off, it was difficult for me to arrange for a 'short diving trip' even though it's easily accessible. So Sufia and I booked a day trip with one of the dive shops (or shack), and it was probably one of the worst trips we've ever been to. There was one DM to 10 pax, although probably 7 of them were so called 'experienced divers'. Thing is, we got ditched by the DM, vis was bad and I ended up having to take care of my buddy who at that time was still trying to get the hang of diving. We were also annoyed with that bunch who were boasting and bragging everytime they came up to the boat. Anyway, we kinda swore not to go with them again and luck was on our side that I met Macha from Seamonkey (from the earlier mentioned Pulau Bidong trip). He got us a package with Tenggol Coral Beach Resort and although it was a splurge, it was definitely worth it.

The resort was newly opened at that time, it was previously known as Tenggol Aqua Beach Resort which was closed for sometime and the new management took over they refurbished it a bit. We were lucky to be the only ones (with another couple also booked under Seamonkey) at the resort at that time. The weather was gorgeous and visibility was awesome.

A gorgeous view from the restaurant

MashaAllah beautiful weather

Just relaxing on the verandah of our little chalet

Ok a little messy, but still the sea and sky....amazing!

The double bed in the room

And there's another two single beds... 

As you can see the room is really big, even the bathroom is huge! The sea was super calm, well except for one of the sites that was super choppy at the surface - but the visibility was still marvelous. It was a bit surprising since October is usually the beginning of the monsoon season.

Can't beat the school of barracudas in Sipadan, but this was still a great sight

Not happy with the fin photobomb.... pfffttt!

Never been so up close with a batfish before! And there was a school of it that I could see from 10m away clearly!!

Alhamdulillah for the two trips, despite not being able to see the whale shark. I would love to be able to dive again in Tenggol sometime soon, that is if I have time and money. Do check out Redang and Tenggol, drop me an email if you need some contacts!

Cold Feet: 25 days and counting...!

No, not time to get married yet.. that's not like till another 77 days! (Doesn't mean I'm not just as nervous though)

But for now I have something else to be nervous at - my Rescue Diver course! So I decided to do something crazy just 2-months before my wedding, which is to do my Rescue Diver license. I'll be doing it in Koh Lipe with Keira, or well actually her friend Charlotte, but at Keira's diveshop, Adang Sea Divers. It sounds fun, thing is...

a) I'm a lazy diver. I really am. I like to be pampered - tanks carried for me, equipment and gears all fixed up for me, after dives I get tugged to the boat - no swimming required... during dives with strong current I just hook myself onto the divemaster and let him/her bring me around. Hehehe. I know, I know, such a bad habit. But I blame it on my 'trauma' I went through while doing my OW license.

b) I'm a lazy person. I don't workout, no running, no jogging, no whatever. Heck if I could park right in front of my bedroom/office doorstep I would. I do occasionally (read: once a month) practice yoga. But that usually lasts for 5 mins and I hardly ever wanna push myself to do further. So not exactly the fittest person or nowhere near fit. My stamina is similar to a snail's. In fact, the snail probably has better stamina, like it would last longer...just maybe it's kinda slow in movement.

It's funny with those attributes above I'm actually keen on getting my Rescue Diver's license. Maybe like Lisa (a Chinese diver I met during my Sipadan trip) said "We're Chinese. We like to get certificates." Hahaha. So here the date is getting closer, I keep telling myself to get out of bed and start working out but I'd always have some excuse... knee pain, period pain, tired after long working hours, it's raining, etc etc etc... so here's a (lunar) new year's resolution - to increase my stamina (at least for me to get through my Rescue Course)! 

Here are a list of activities that I would have to force myself to do, one way or another:

• yoga
• swim
• play badminton
• dance
• use that Nike app I downloaded a year ago

but here's what I'll  probably do

• yoga - coz I can do that in the comfort of my home. I just need to kinda make sure I do it more than 5 mins. Hahaha
• clean my apartment - I heard it's as good as working out
• sleep - I heard it burns calories

Do you have tips for me to survive my Rescue Diver course? Would you like to be my virtual workout buddy/personal trainer?

The Wedding Vendors - The Pre- post

Gong Xi Fa Cai! Xin Nien Kuai Le! Angpau lai lai laiiiiii....... (no, I really mean it, I need them big bux for my wedding. Esp since it's my last year before I start giving out angpaus)

I'm always amazed at how lifestyle bloggers have the discipline and energy to blog almost everyday. I guess the keyword here is discipline. I usually have a long list of things I wanna blog about, but at the end of the day I just roll around in bed. Heheh.

Since I'm pretty free right now, I thought I'll just take a few minutes to list down the vendors I've booked. It's also another way for me to avoid eating and sleeping and eating and sleeping (what I've basically been doing this whole CNY break). It's probably too early to be posted (hence why I'm titling it as 'pre-post'), but I have nothing better to do. Meheheh. So here they are by events:

Nikah

• Venue - The Surau behind my house
• Hantaran - DIY. Dulang rented from Rentales, flowers from Floristika Bangsar.
• Mini Pelamin - DIY. I'm praying hard the banglas I've hired my friends would be able to help me out on this. It was supposed to be with another upcoming wedding decorator, but I'm on a cost cutting mode and I have a feeling they had given up on me (I've been trying to schedule a meeting with them but never seem to get to do so, plus my bad I kinda gave them false hopes on the hall decor but in the end chose someone else instead).
• Attire - Unaisah Azlan. If you've come across other bloggers' posts on her you would know that Unaisah is a very busy designer. If you're looking to book her, I suggest contacting her months ahead (like me!) as she did take a while to reply to my email. Also, she told me she's going to concentrate on something else besides wedding attires soon. My first fitting session with her went well, although she used a 'template' for the fitting instead of the original baju so I don't know how it looks just yet, but I am sure it'll turn out just fine.
• Caterers - Dad's Surau friend
• Photographer - Shukry Ghany. I stumbled upon his Instagram and stalked it for a bit before asking him for a quote. I was a little startled at the quotation for 3 events and was at first not going with him. Later on, I decided to still proceed with him but only for the nikah and reception on my side (save sikit). The reason being, I found his style was not so 'typical' like other Malay wedding photographers. I would've loved to hire Stories, but of course the price was waaaaay out of whack for me, so Shukry it is! 

Reception

• Venue - Dewan Seri Siantan, Putrajaya. 
• Attire - Najib Salman. I came across Najib when I was looking around for someone to make our 'bridesmaids' outfits for my sister's wedding last year. Najib deserves a post by himself. Hahahaha.
• Caterer - I actually can't recall their name. Bahahahah. But they catered for my sister's wedding and they were quite good. As long as the official food critic my Dad is ok, I'm ok. Although I'm still annoyed at the fact that they don't have table and chair covers.
• Pelamin - I originally booked with 2.Bridal Sanctuary, however not long after they split up and now I'm going with one of the partners, Syed. He has now started his own business called Syed Signature Wedding. My drama on finding wedding decorators deserves a whole blog by itself. HAHAHAHA.
• Doorgifts - Various. I had a difficult time finding the 'perfect' doorgift. What I've learnt is, unless your budget is 'the sky's the limit', there is no such thing as perfect doorgift. If you're looking to give something useful and memorable, chances are it's gonna cost you a lot. And if you're planning to give something affordable (read: items that 'look' useful but are so small and not use-able, ends up a decorating piece), chances are the guests would already have ten of it at home and would throw yours away in the days to come. So I decided to just go with food. As my theme/concept is supposedly traditional, I'll be giving out telur pindang and some chocolates/dodol. I bought the bunga telur from Sri Impian in Kuantan (I had nothing else better to do in Kijal at that time, so I wandered about in Kuantan and came back with 16 boxes filled with 'em bungas) and the chocs will be packed in a white noodle box that will be ordered from Greentree. The telur pindang would be supplied from my watzisname caterer, chocs are (as of now planned) to be sourced in Langkawi, and dodol from  a guy named Khalid.
• Photographer - Shukry Ghany
• Invitations - Luv Card (Jakarta)

As I'm obviously far from being able to review these vendors, I will only post link to these vendors after the ceremony. However should you need information, do feel free to drop me and email. :)

The Budget

I started off with a simple budget (simple, not necessarily small) as I wanted to do something similar to my sister's, i.e. nikah followed by a lunch reception at the hotel. The driver was that I wanted to only have to wear one outfit for both events, a custom-made silk songket which I had been dreaming about ever since I stepped into Nor Atikah's Songket in KT and touched a silk songket bunga tabur a few months back. The thing is, during my sister's wedding we had a small lunch-do, a private affair for families and close friends. However, in Malaysia you can hardly ever keep your wedding small (everyone wants to be invited!), thus those who didn't attend my sister's wedding were already waiting for my invitation card.

I wanted to have my reception in the same hotel with another additional 200+ guests or so, I was hoping for a sit-down reception instead of the typical touch-n-go, 12-4PM lunch buffet. Unfortunately the hall couldn't accommodate that number of guests as one time, plus the number of guests kept increasing and so did the cost of it all. So the hotel was out of the question. That, and the fact that the hotel didn't really bother to keep in touch with me either (I had to remind them several times on the quotation, they messed up and quoted it to my sister who just got married!).

Then came every other person's little advise to me, "Don't have it on the same day, it's a bit of a rush don't you think?", "Do it properly, so that everyone can come,", bla bla bla. So I decided to split it to two separate days and frantically searched for a hall that could suit my number of guests and budget. I managed to get hold of Dewan Seri Siantan in Putrajaya, thanks to the help of my sister's SIL (and thanks to my other sister for giving me the moolah to pay for the deposit). By that time, I had already discussed with my fiance (chewah fiance!) and decided on our nikah date, but we had to move it since we couldn't get the hall on the next day. It had to be back to back so my third sister who's working in HK can be around for both events. My fiance on the other hand had a little bit more difficulty in booking halls in KL. He started looking in Aug for our wedding in April, but most of the halls were booked till June!

Back to my story on the budget, I also initally planned to utilise half the hall (cheaper mah!) but soonafter I had to take the whole hall to accommodate the whole world who self-invited themselves all my guests. So my budget was listed into three events, the nikah, my reception and the reception on his side.

For the nikah, I pretty much copied the previous budget I created for my sister which was on the hantaran, the surau decoration and other miscellaneous items that my dad took care of (giving the surau a new coat of paint, donations, and refreshments). Oh and how could I forget.... my outift!! And er... as well as my parents and sisters'. As I've always wanted to start a side business taking orders for hantaran, I decided I'd decorate it myself and save some cost there. I hope it turns out well, much better than my engagement hantaran. As for the deco, I did some searching around and contacted some vendors which I'll tell-all in another post. But recently, I've been going on a cost cutting mode and am inclined to decorate on my own (with the help of my banglas dear friends!). I initially wanted something a little more than my sister's and was slowly growing into an elaborate mini-pelamin (after hours and days and weeks going through #pelamin on Instagram) till one day I stumbled upon a photo also on Instagram of a small nikah ceremony conducted at a mosque, with no mini pelamins and what-nots. It occurred to me that I was being consumed in my fantasy and would be spending money unnecessarily. All I needed was just some draping to cover the office doors of the surau. The most important thing is that I get married, which will happen (InsyaAllah) regardless if I have fresh flowers or gold curtain tiebacks or shaggy carpets.

Moving on to the reception, which is the biggest chunk of the budget, included the hall rental (a fairly BIG sum), decorations, catering, invitation cards (which turned from a simple inexpensive piece to a simple but expensive piece), musicians (part of the fantasy), outfit, makeup and also photographer (which is also inclusive of the nikah too). I was a tad excited and already booked the hall decorators (a big drama with them, but that's for another post). After that photo on Instagram, I felt that I probably shouldn't have done so, but since I've already paid the deposit, I negotiated (and am still negotiating) for a less va va voom decor. Part of (the superficial) me still doesn't really mind spending, hoping it'll turn out nice for my photo album. Tsk.

Lastly, the majlis bertandang, i.e. the reception on his side. Initially I was thinking of spilling some of my guests into his function (hehehe!) but since my hall is big enough to accommodate tons of people, I transferred them back into my guest list. So technically I only need a budget for my outfit and makeup.

So there you go, the outline of my wedding budget. Of course everyone's budget differs to suit your own occasion, but I hope what I've shared could give you an idea of what to expect or trigger your mind on something that you might've overlooked and missed out. Thanks for reading!