Egypt Opening Up Again

At the pyramids of Giza

I am very happy to note that the tours to Egypt are reappearing in the Classifieds. It is by far my most memorable trip in my many trips abroad, not least the tons and tons of historical sites, temples, palaces along both sides of the Nile making a tremendous impact to my mind that this is a truly special place, even though the Middle East has always been a place not for the faint hearted.

To say that the Egyptians were a world power some 3,000 to 5,000 years ago is not an understatement, not by a long shot. The architectural and engineering structures they made with immense precision led some to believe that the pharoahs had some kind of extra-terresterial help from outer space. 

I take all these proclaimations by the tour guides with a huge dose of salt. Tour guides says, they say, science and history say and then they correct themselves. This method of deception has always been guided by wrong interpretations of what actually happened and false hypotheses and the greater the lie, the better the story by the tour guides to keep the tourists entranced.

Singapore has a completely made up fireworks show with a BS storyline every night at 8pm outside the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Casino for the last 8 to 9 years. The free laser cum fireworks show tells about some mythical island called Temasek and the story is so far fetched that only telling and retelling it thousands of times, the tourist promotion board may hope to draw more curious and naive people from distant lands to come and see our "Merlion" - another BS figure spouting water from its mouth and it is a combination of a big fish and lion head.

Yeah, right. Maybe in 1000 years people from all over the world will say Singapore actually had Merlions swimming in the canal and prowling the streets everywhere as and when the need arose.  That is the 'history' created by the spin doctors and legacy story writers.  

Felucca at Sunset - Alexandria 

Back to Egypt, I went there with my family in 2009, when Noel was 15 and Andrew 12 ; the precocious pre-teen and mid teen. See the pictures below, they were at that age where history was confined to dusty textbooks and long forgotten empires. Hence, the Egypt trip was mainly a fun trip to hang out in the cruise ship along the Nile river, play with 2 other boys from the tour, kick sand along the ruined out temples at Karnak, Kom Ombo, Luxor and Memphis.  

Andrew monkeying around; As seen from the columns the temple was built during the Ptolemic (Greek) and Roman times,by the Greek conquerers to make peace with the Egyptians, as there were many temples dedicated to Horus and Sorbek, they chose Isis to dedicate.

Isis was the wife of Osiris and not that modern day Caliphate as created by Baghdadi. 

Kom Ombo 

As a first timer to Egypt, I was struck by how worldly wise Egyptian people, and as this was the pre Arab Spring era, the country of almost 90 million was ruled by the then dictator Hosni Mubarak. Since those days, the country has had 2 changes of Government, and now is ruled by an ex-General al Sisi.  

The history of Egypt is rich and before and from the days of Julius Caesar, Jesus the son of God, Mark Anthony and Cleopatra. A visitor can see the influences of Roman and Greek or Hellenistic architecture as seen from the designs on the columns.  

Abu Simbel 

Gods there were aplenty. From Amun - Ra,Osiris,ISIS to Horus (falcon head) and Hathor (Earth Mother) there literally were up to a hundred gods. Pharoahs were like gods too, and from the time they ascended to the throne, the Pharoahs were only interested in building their funeral pyre or pyramids to honour their death.

The beauty of this country is that they can manage to keep their wonderful treasures for thousands of years (with the exception of the looting inside the pyramids) and even had a secret burial ground called Valley of the Kings (and a separate Valley of the Queens) for the lesser kings from the year 3000 BC.

The rise and fall of empires is inevitable so my little red dot called Singapore needs to wake up to the fact that the exceptional leaders of the past (50s to 80s) have gone and all we have in their wake are technocrats and my opinion is that we are facing an era of decline both economically and possibly in the quality of life.  

Move On - Mike Posner

A very touching and personal video by Mike Posner.

Sad, funny, happy all at the same time. 

What can we do about life but to just embrace it with all its massive heartaches, setbacks, joys, triumphs, disappointments, challenges and frustrations. 

Much of it is situational, so how we deal with Life determines who we are as a person.

'Nuff Said.

All Right, Good Night ! (famous last words of MH 370).  

The One and Only Shoe for My Distance Running

ASICS Kayano 25 

I am first and foremost, a runner. A good one, perhaps in the top 10% of the distance runners if I ever really trained hard for it. It was rather unfortunate that during my younger teenage days, my parents enroled me on a swimming program to keep my brother and I from expending our restless youthful days with the 'samseng' (gangster) boys of the neighbourhood.

When I gave up 10 years of struggling with golf - from 1991 to 2000 I went running ; Yeah I did and still do things in the reverse. I actually gave up an 'old man's game' to train for a young man's sport - the marathon - at the ripe young middle age of  38  people thought I was downright crazy. My wife for one was so afraid that I would be knocked down by a drunk driver as I ran countless kilometers on the roads at 5 am or 5.30 am.

I had to make a time management vs family decision. Golf is a social sport which requires up to 3 other flight mates (or acquaintences cum friends) so there is the social interaction and need to find people with the time, senority and similar level and interest in golf to join you in a game. As I am an 'Eagle' or person who is happy with himself and not requiring loads of friends to mingle and enjoy company I found this aspect of golfing a chore.

Secondly, the time management. For me to play 18 holes (bear in mind I was still in my mid 30s and my kids were 5 and 2 years old respectively) would take 4 hours to half a day on Saturday or Sunday which meant I would be away for half a day on the weekends. Then, I am a below average golfer, so my game was frustratingly inconsistent. Hence I found that the coordination aspect, finding right golfing partners or flight mates, the time aspect to leave the family away for half a day on weekends too much to sacrifice.

Hence, after much thought, I knew I needed to expend my stress in a meaningful and healthy way, hence I turned to my first sport which I loved and still do, long distance running. Out I went to buy the quick dry running vests or sweat shirts, the 'bun huggers', socks and the most important 'equipment' of all - the running shoe.

  

Running is the interplay between the entire body frame and the muscle system all working seamlessly in one machine - my body.

I persevered through all the naysayers and I can proudly say that I have completed a total of 10 full marathons, possibly 6 to 10 half marathons and several 10 km runs in these last 18 years. The time has flown by, but I was and I still am having tremendous fun doing my No. 1 favourite activity - long distance running.

Early on, I spent money subscribing to the Runner's World Magazine which is basically a Bible for the runner from then newbies like me (in 2001). I read it cover to cover and gained tremendous motivation to buy the right running shoe, eat the right foods and sleep well.

The shoes are the most important of all - so after ticking all the boxes I realised that I was a normal pronator meaning my footstrike was more or less centre onto the road. After checking the reviews for months and trying various shoe brands and model, I finally came to the shoe which firstly provided me with the best cushioning possible for my footstrike as well as gave my gait some form of stability ; 

Presenting the ASICS Kayano ; it is a shoe meant for moderate to heavy runners with maximum mid sole cushioning. I choose normally 2 sizes larger to my footsize because I wear thick socks for running (1 size) and my feet expand during the long runs of 10 km or more (1 more size). Hence my size is US Size 10 and I have been using this size ever since with practically zero blisters ; yessir - zero blisters. 

I am probably a very biomechanically efficient runner which means I have economy of stride or cadence and am able to maximise my distance per unit Joule expended. I have not done a Vo2 max test but I reackon the conversion of O2 inhaled through my lungs would be higher than most ordinary folks. The most elite athletes have a very high VO2 max score for distances of 5 km or longer. 

I have been using the Kayano models (I believe I have around 20 versions !) all these years and have never lost the love for the shoe. It does not look like much, their colours are normally quite dull, the version 23 was all Black and the legendary ASICs twin swoosh with a counter swoosh is actually based on stitching which would give the shoe the best flexibility according to their Japanese Designers.

"Anima Sana in Corpore Sano" which simply put means a Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body.

It is a dream shoe for all those slightly heavy guys like me who want a damn good stability shoe and your feet thank you for it after a long run !!! 

Carpe Diem !!! 

Thank You for 100,000 Views !

                                                        Saints at 55 : Mad Men Roof Top Bar ;

L to R : Me, Joe Lee Oon Wah, Hung Kee Chong (black shirt), Faisal Alsagoff, 

Paul Ezekiel, Albert Hong.

Center (front) L to R : Kent Tan Keh Eng (pink shirt),A. Surendran, Thedassaidas, 

         Kenneth Fong, Gurdeep Singh    

It took a long time to reach this milestone, but thanks readers for the 100,000 views ! 

I enjoy putting my random thoughts online, and new my target is to to garner 100, 000 additional views every 3 - 4 years as compared to the first 100, 000 which took more than 10 years to reach.  

Thank You 

10 km run as recorded on my Polar M430

I have recently slowed down in my running speeds, as a natural process of aging I guess. Here is 1 for the record of memories past....

Carpe Diem 

My Rave Run at Nassim Road - 2 loops of 4 km each

Starting at the junction of Cluny / Evans Road opposite the entrance of Botanic Gardens East Gate

I have been running this route for the longest time. The reasons I run it are as listed below :

1. Proximity to home (5 minutes by car)

2. Access to car park just 2 minutes away from start point

3. Wide and (most importantly) tree lined roads more like avenues

4. Embassy row or many embassies are located here, so not many condominiums and hence not so many school buses plying the area causing noise and smoke pollution at 6 am in the mornings ! 

5. Many shrubs to put my isotonic drinks by the roadside. :)

So here goes the route (4 km or so) ;

Start at one end of Nassim Road, and head up the small hillock towards Orchard Road.
Turn right at Lermit Road and run one lap stopping at Cluny Road junction and head back
Turn right and head towards the Orchard Road area, to your left are the embassies of Philippines, Japan Embassy and that of Saudi Arabia.
At the end of Nassim Road at the T junction leading to Orchard Road, head back the same way and make a left turn back along Lermit Road and do the same forward and back.
Once back after Lermit Road, turn left and head towards the start point, the Russian embassy is to your left.

This constitutes 1 Lap of roughly 4 km length. It should take you about 20 to 25 minutes to complete.

A Beautiful Painting

                 Beautiful oil painting bought from one of the shops inside the Souq Waqif

                                             

It depicts 2 soldiers or 'cavalry' in their desert gear mounted on their camels with the backdrop of a clear blue sky. I bought it for roughly 260 Riyals or $100 Singapore with the mounting of the canvas on wood backing.

I spent practically half a day at the market browsing the shops and having a fantastic meal of Lamb Kulwa from the Iraqi Restaurant. (See previous post for details).

Inside the gallery of shops by Qatari artists 

I am most pleased with this piece of artwok and hangs on the wall in my small office.

Carpe Diem !