It's the third day of the official event and energy was still pumped up! Funny how every morning, Nay will still be the earliest bird, despite Gup's alarm being the noisiest and sometimes, the earliest. Although all our alarms rang astoundingly (of course, nothing would've
compared to Gup's persistent and metal alarm tune!), we'd snooze it and go back to sleep, knowing that when it's time, Nay'd wake us up. So, thanks Mama Nay!
Nay and I had a free day on the 28th, as both our delegates headed back the day before and so, we expected a lot of walking around, finally taking more pictures, mingling, helping other departments and just exploring the area like any tourist would, except that we looked cooler in uniform. That morning, I figured I'd help out at the information counter at the entrance of the exhibition hall since it was mostly what we did after our delegates went back last LIMA when Gup was stationed there. This time though, Gup was a part of OO but she did managed to escape to gallivant
with us, before she went bonkers in the OO.
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| I think I scared away a few people at the info counter. Whoops! (Shot by Newton) |
Nay and Gup was roped in by the police to stand by the red carpet laid out at the entrance for the king and other Sultans, until Nay got a call from her AO, saying one of her delegate escort was bringing his mother to the exhibition that day and needed her to guide them around. So, when she had to leave for her delegate, Capt. Kornsak a.k.a. Capt. Tony, I replaced her for the rest of the afternoon. Apparently I was pretty good at keeping people off the red carpet, which I did while making weird-ass faces to Gup who was standing opposite me to keep us all entertained. 'Cause let's face it, nobody likes standing and playing security guards to the red carpet for hours, in the humid atmosphere that we were in.
3 hours went pass, got to see a few Sultans including an incident where I almost bumped into the Sultan of Johor (no kidding!) but enough was enough. We went back in for lunch and scouted for a replacement. Thankfully, there were God-sent newbies who were walking around aimlessly. The rest was history, I'd say.
Met up with Nay, who was escorting Capt. Tony and mum around and tagged along. It was nice getting to know both of them lovely people. And guess what? We got onto the tarmac, after flashing our organiser's badge and having Capt Tony lead the way. Yay! I felt special.
(All tarmac shots were taken using Naomi's Sony Cyber-shot)
Cool fighter jets and plenty of static aircraft, all of which fancy names I was and still am definitely not familiar with, were displayed on the tarmac for viewing. Whilst Capt Tony and Capt Mama ran along taking pictures of their own with the aircraft and viewing the ongoing airshow, instead of finding shade under aircraft wings, the three of us didn't let this great opportunity go to miss! Nay kindly allowed me to hog her camera since mine was at the OO and I was just over the moon! (Thanks Nay, you da best!) I was glad that I got to go onto the tarmac on a non-public day, which meant the absence of large throngs of people walking around and not so many photo-bombed pictures. You know I'd be a happy lady when it comes to decent pictures! haha I shall just shut up and let the photos do the talking now!
We got to chat a little bit with Captain Mama whilst her son went to get drinks. She was such a sweet and demure lady who was proud of all of her military sons and country. When she found out that we haven't been to Thailand, she immediately said if we were ever visiting Bangkok, give her a call and she's bring us around! We could even stay over at her place. Wheeee, I bet we were all planning a trip in our heads already once she said that! hahaha Before they left for the hotel and called it a day, they invited us to have dinner with them at Cenang Beach that night. Of course we said yes, but we couldn't confirm about the timings 'cause believe it or not, we actually had three other dinner 'appointments' that night, two of which we've already put off for a couple of days due to workload.
After they left, we walked around some more, chatting up with fellow volunteers, roaming the hall aimlessly, trying to get souvenirs by asking for sweets (which miraculously worked ONE time! yay me!) and getting to know more fellow volunteers. Last LIMA, I remember we'd probably be rummaging through The Loaf for yummy eclairs and pastries selling at ridiculously cheap prices! But this time round, there were less choices and I guess, we were less enthusiastic about everything. Even taking pictures of booths, we were slightly less amused 'cause most of them were the same as the ones last LIMA.
5.00pm - Volunteers' Meeting time! This time, Ms Azlin informed us that we had to stay and sit in for LIMA'13's brand new milestone event - The ASEAN Commercial Aviation Awards. Whilst waiting for the arrival of the VIPs and the event to kickoff at 6.30pm, she gave us the green light to have tea and mingle around with aviation people who were having tea at the Tea Break Lounge, right outside the Multipurpose Hall. Funny thing was all of us volunteers took up about 3/4 of the lounge and we ended mingling amongst ourselves, which was great 'cause we got to strengthen new bonds and take more pictures! haha
I can truthfully say that the three of us have made more guy friends as compared to female friends this LIMA. It was like every time we were having a conversation, there was always at least one guy in our conversation. Not saying that we don't have any female friends, we do, just that we weren't as close to them as we were to some of the guys. I don't know, it's just something we've noticed on our journey home and after going through the pictures we took. Some of them were the three young faces; our LIMA'11 chum,
Khairul (second from left below), our 'adik' who's a year older than us,
Muiz
(far right) and friendly Faris
(far left) who was the unofficial LIMA'13 M&Ms supplier
. There was also Faiz
(second from right, second pic) who was this suave-lookin' handsome chap from Taylor's who could probably charm his way to every girls' heart with his pearly white teeth. lol! and
Syaim (far right, second pic), who was the sharp-lookin' dude I've mentioned before
here. Very blessed and grateful to have met such awesome friends this LIMA'13, really.
The aviation awards started at 6.45pm, with our former PM, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and his lovely wife, Tun Dr Siti Hasmah as VVIPS of the evening. The evening ended merrily after around an hour but honestly, we were all secretly going crazy to be in the same room as Tun Dr Mahathir! Once the event ended, we all rushed towards Dr M and his wife to greet him, shake hands and well, basically, have a silent inner fangirl moment there and then.
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| Happy faces when work's out |
We got back at around 7.30pm-ish and got going to the laundrette to quickly get our laundry done 'cause we knew we won't be able to squeeze all four appointments in one night! Since LIMA started, I guess there was a sudden influx of laundry at the laundrette, so when we got there, the lady in charge said they weren't taking in anymore laundry. So, we basically carried our laundry around whilst we went appointment-to-appointment. hahah it was funny!
Appointment #1 - Farewell dinner with Mazin at Palace d India a.k.a. Indian Palace which was down breezy Cenang Street. Mazin, whom we got to know better everytime he got bored and came over to chat us up. Funny how we first talked, it was also when he got bored and and came over to us one of the prep days, whilst all three of us were busy sorting out and scheduling exhibitors' lists. I was a tad bit annoyed at first 'cause well, I really didn't like being
kacau-ed when I'm working. So, it was really Nay and Gup who was
layan-ing him most of the time. With that said though, I'll give him full points for trying to start a conversation, 'cause some of the new volunteers were just sticking to their posse the whole time! So, kudos Mazin! haha Sadly, he had to leave two days before LIMA ended so since that Thursday was his last night in Langkawi, we figured we'd have dinner with him as some sort of goodbye.
Gup had Kashmiri naan which was filled with mixed nuts and raisins and her paneer (a sort of cheese with gravy) went extremely well with it. Nay and I shared a basket of cheese and plain naan, which we had with yummy fish curry. The food weren't too spicy but the portions were definitely of a very generous amount at a pretty reasonable price. As we were trying to finish up our food, we talked and chit-chatted about his life in Iraq, how he got to Malaysia, religion and how Iraqi Muslims differ from Malaysian Muslims etc. It was all quite nice, the exchange of culture and knowledge. Getting to know stuff about another country through the eyes of a local was always eye-opening, for me and I love it.
Appointment #2 - Dinner with Capt Tony and Capt Mama at the same place. It was great seeing them again after a whole day of assisting them around the exhibition hall that afternoon. Capt Tony ordered a whole bunch of food and insisted we ate some, but of course, we didn't bloat ourselves up even more after all that naans and paneers. So, being all Asian and feeling obliged to order something, Nay and I shared a glass of fresh orange juice, in hopes of helping with the digestion in our full stomachs.
We had a really good conversation about all our prospective future careers, mine being working for a non-profit. Since Capt Tony studied International Relations in Australia before joining the military, he gave me some tips and fill me in some of the nitty-gritty of being an International Relations student. Same goes to Gup and Nay for Law and Business respectively. We also had a good chat about must-try Malaysian food, and places to visit in KL, since they'll be stopping by KL before heading back to their homeland. I really enjoyed the conversations we had with Capt Tony and Capt Mama. It didn't feel like he was in the army, really, it was like speaking to our friend. And what are the odds of volunteers having dinner with a Thai delegate, right? See how LIMA opens up doors for you that you didn't even know existed, people?
Muiz was supposedly our Appointment #3 but we were too occupied with Capt Tony and by the time, we finished our dinner/chat with Capt Tony and Capt Mama, he had went back to his motel. So, we promised that we'd meet up the next night instead. After Madam Malar, Nay's Assisting Officer, showed up, we all said our farewells and added each other on Whatsapp. I'm even smiling while typing this two paragraphs! hahaha that was how awesome I felt it was.
Appointment #4 - Supper with Faris at Starbucks @ Cenang Mall. It was close to midnight when we walked from his motel to Starbucks and due to the lack of sleep and the overload of walking around during the day, we were all tired-drunk. We had the awesome Asian Dolce Latte which I think, the caffeine kicked in a little which was good. But I was very sure Nay was almost asleep, hugging her huge comfy-looking bag of laundry. We chit-chatted about a whole bunch of stuff and had a good time till about 2 in the morning and so, by the time we reached our motel and showered, it was easily 3am that we finally plomped onto bed.
That day was probably one of my favourite days out of all my LIMA experience. The next two LIMA days were public days and that was a whole fulfilling experience itself! So, watch this space for more tarmac pictures (this time with Dato' Mokhzani Mahathir!) and maritime displays at Resorts World Langkawi!
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