Today is my baby brother’s Birthday. I wished him Happy Birthday a day earlier ‘coz I got the day wrong. Haha! I thought yesterday was the 16^th of June, 2008. My brother was speechless! Having an absent minded sister like me, I’m glad he’s used to it.

My brother is 16 years old. 16 years old on the 16^th of June. My! That’s special, isn’t it? My brother just hates studying! He has a short span of concentration. He loves to play computer games, basketball, and chat with his friends the whole day long! So, being the considerate me, I bought him 3 text books as a present: Physics, Maths and Chemistry. My brother almost strangled me! Hahah! I’m glad I’m the eldest!

Today is the first day I’m giving a career talk to a bunch of 16 and 17 year olds! I’m so nervous! But it turned out fine! The talk was at a fertilizer plant. Outside the seminar room, was a Petanque (pronounced ‘petong’) court. I have never heard of this game, neither have I any knowledge of the origin of this word. It might be French. The game, according to an experienced speaker who was also new to the game, that it was very much like lawn bowling, except that it was played on hard, grey pebbles instead of the soft, green grass.

Petanque court

In Kedah, there are not many tall buildings. Most buildings are about 1 storey, at most 5 stories high. The tallest structure was a telecommunications tower, equipped with a lift to the highest point and a revolving tower, exactly like the KL tower, only shorter, and beautifully lighted up in the night, illuminating its surroundings.

As for food, Kedah is famous for its little, hand made kuih. I bought Dodol (a sticky kuih made from brown sugar!) freshly made! It was still warm when I bought it!

I also got the opportunity to snap a picture of Malaysia’s own Dr. Mahathir’s childhood home!

All right! I admit!

This is not exactly a picture of Dr. M’s home. Instead, it’s a picture of the gate outside his childhood home. It was closed when we arrived, so we could only get a glimpse from the outside.

Anyway, the highlight of my trip was this: I was curious as to why there was a Petanque court in the plant. So I asked the employees. All of them gave gave me the same answer, "Our previous boss loved the game so much so that he decided to share his passion of the game with his employees!" So, he built a Petanque court in the compounds of the plant and and the bug caught on!