Kuala Visit Part 1

It is Thursday the 23rd already so I have to write about the 20th anniversary trip that I was talking about in the previous entry before I forgot all about it. I think everybody that turned up have the same general conclusion about it, superbly excellent!

I'll give you the rundown of the informal itinerary of the trip. Formal means the planned itinerary for the weekend planned by the MC0BA organizing committee (which is almost identical annually) and informal means whatever that was planned by our very own batch committee to commemorate our own experiences there that would run parallel to the main one.

Ideally we had to be there at 2pm on Friday 17th. Aplril at Safar1 Resort at 2pm even though my initial plan with my car-pool mates were shooting off at 2.30pm from KLSeeSee after completing the Friday Prayers there. Not surprisingly, only me and the driver adhered to the plan and we ended up shooting off from Jalan Doota toll booth after rendezvousing with our final car-mate chauffeured to the toll plaza in his brand spanking new German mark at around 3:30pm.

The trip up north was itself an event. With music from the mid 80's blaring through the very loud sound system dwarfed only the loudness of hearty laughs all around, it was definitely a trip back across time, with 4 almost-40 lads ganging up together, trying very hard to forget the 20 years that has passed by.

Is this love that I'm feeling
Is this love that I'm feeling
Is this the love that I've been searching for
Is this love or am I dreaming
This must be love
Cos it's really go a hold on me
A hold on me

After several stops while we were traversing the highway, we only arrived at our destination around 7.15 pm despite the driver clocking a minimum speed of 150km/h while we were cruising to be greeted by the sights of many almost 40 overgrown boys, laterally mostly, chatting up in the parking lot of the resort. It was not a minute before half hour that we finally offloaded our bags, shaking hands, hugging and reminiscing about old times. As for me, I am glad that I could recall the names or nicknames of almost all of them, save one or two of the pretty inconspicuous ones, despite not meeting some of them for almost 20 years compensating how age has taken the toll on the wrinkles and significant lateral expansions. Looks like my long term memory has not failed me as much as my short term ones. Signs of old age with silverish, receding hairline? Possibly. But at least all of them recognized me at first sights as well :p.

I wanted to choose the upper bunk beds but despite the fan spinning at full speed merely 5 feet above our heads, was a bad choice because in the prevailing hot weather, that would be suicidal considering that you will not feel a thing on the upper decks so naturally I moved into the lower deck of the bunk beds. So there we were, CEO's, SVP's, MD's, Macai's and Kuli Batak's alike bunking in double-decker beds, wet to the bone due to perspirations in those air-conditionless dormitories, sharing showers and toilets.

After maghrib prayers, we performed a solat hajat for our batch-mate who was supposed to come but unfortunately was diagnosed with AML about 2 weeks ago and is currently undergoing chemotherapy session and hospital confinement for at least a month. The solat hajat was also dedicated to one of my batch-mate mother who was at the time has been hospitalised in a semi-comatose state for about 11 months due to a stroke-like attack on the brain triggered by an asthma attack. She passed away on Tuesday 3:30am on Tuesday 22nd. April. Innalillahiwainnailaihiroji'un.



Consequently, there was a BBQ dinner. Courtesy of Gromm Hellscream aka Bawal, here's a cool video clip of the event. Great job Bawal! I can't view the video proper while in the office here so I'll link the video properly when I get home. As for now, anybody curious enough can go with the link here.

To be continued...

edited to add proper yootoob link and XC:XX. Copyright reserved ke? I don't know. Just nicked it off my FB XC Group