Ok. So its not a real scooter. But one day … one day …

Its just that all the bureaucracy of trying to get a Carta D’Identita and then a Patentino after that is quite daunting.

But anyway Stickrinaz is enjoying herself! She really missed riding!

Other stickrinaz adventures :

• Stickrinaz in Malaysia
• The things I do for Chicken Chop
• Rinaz is a chair killer
• O what a day!
• rinaz and the chocolate factory

Next time I’ll leave at dawn!

Sidenote : All the RL pics shown are snapped using the Samsung Innov8.

Other stickrinaz adventures :

• The things I do for Chicken Chop
• Rinaz is a chair killer
• O what a day!
• rinaz and the chocolate factory

I prefer to be a speed demon myself rather than watching other people race :P

In any case, this is a montage of the scooter charity aid 2008 that I joined in on the 13th September. This is the 4th year for the convoy to raise funds for the Tabung Amal Aidilfitri for the needy.

Scooter Charity Ride 2008 from rinaz on Vimeo.

What do you think?

Related link :

• Charity Ride 2007

I’ll be there, as well as the Vesporeans and other various scooter organizations in Singapore. No scooter? Not a problem. You can be my pillion!

Convoying is heaps of fun! We’ll be convoying to Taman Warisan, and after that, we can explore the musuem as well as the stalls around it. Do join me! Really hope to see you there! :)

Links

• More about the itinerary here
• My blog entry on the charity ride 2007

Having already been to the fish farm about a month ago and thoroughly enjoying myself with the Vesporeans, I was definitely interested in attending this convoy. Plus, it is always nice to meet new people :-)

I reached the Piaggio Showroom pretty early and watched the people streaming in one by one. I saw familliar faces like Leonids and Moon_Star from the Vespa Club as well as many other new faces.

I’m actually a little surprised at how naturally easy it was for us to bond with each other even though many of us are meeting each other for the first time.

One of the first ladies that I met was Azizah, whom I admired the embelishments on her ET8 Scooter. It looked so royale!

Azizah tells me that it was a handmade job where she bought the stickers at DIY shop and sticked the embellishments herself.

I also met Glynis, whom was one of the winners for the Coke contest. The flowery decoration on her blue LX scooter was quite recognizable.

We headed in the showroom for the registration of the event and I looked around the area with all the Vespa related items.

After registration, we got a free goodie bag! It was pretty nice loot, considering that we only paid $10 for the fish spa admission alone.

Free perfume vials! Free Vespa notebook! Spa voucher! Awesome Vespa Tshirt! Woot! I couldnt wait to change into it :D

The organizer of the event, Sera, later briefed to all of the participants on the itenerary following a short message on the procedures of the convoy.

And soonafter we were off! It was such a beautiful morning, blue skies and fluffy clouds made the journey lovely.

For some reason, we were also accompanied by the media crew of Asia One which made me feel as if we were part of a reality series.

Not sure if you can see it, but the dude on the right is carring a humongous video camera

I couldnt help but notice them whizzing along crazily on the road. Slowing down at one point and then speeding up. Good thing there is no traffic police working on the day :P

In any case, in no time at all, we reached the Qian Hu fish farm:D

This is what happen when ladies get together. We take pictures!

We did not explore much of the fish farm area due to time constraints. Instead, we proceeded immediately to the fish spa area and waited for our turn to use the facilities.

As it was a public holiday, the area was more crowded than usual, with families spending time together. I saw dads trying to catch little fishes in the pond, children looking at the turtle pond and even more people at the fish spa area.

We dipped our feet in.

For some reason, the ticklish feeling was not as strong as the first time that I was here, even with the larger nibble fishes. Maybe I’m used to the sensation already?

Regardless, I did not even hear anyone screaming, which made it anticlimatic :P

After the fish spa, we proceeded to convoy to the Bollywood Veggies Farm where we were welcomed by the owner, Mrs Ivy Singh-Lim. What a treat!

She was larger than life with her crododile dundee outfit, complete with a huge hunting knife. It was scary! She joked that she was the reason as to why Mas Selamat would not dare to hide in her farm.

We were treated to such a sumptious lunch. I’m not sure whose treat it was, but thank you so much! There were so much food that my eyes boggled at the sight of everything

I felt so stuffed at the end of it and we were still given desserts after that.

It was a mix of various types of cakes. One of my noted favourites was the Banana Cake as well as the Jackfruit Cake. They were both so rich and flavourful. You could tell that it was homemade.

Lucinda immediately bought 3 loaves of Banana cake for herself!

After lunch, a couple of us proceeded to enter the farm area to take a look around. I’ve never been inside here before, so I was most excited to explore the place.

There were plentiful of different types of plants and crops around. The area was divided into different plots of crop. There were many signs showing the names of the plants.

There was even a eco-toilet. But I dont recommend that you enter the place. Its a little … ehm …

As we explored, we stumbled upon plentiful of props there that we had so much sillyness and fun with!

Rinaz, Glynis, Deanna and Azizah salutes Bollywood Veggies

Meichun and Azizah playing on the mini-tractor

In the end, we were just chilling around and enjoying the scenery.

I think that it was a most tranquil place. Even with the sun shining harshly at us, the surroundings still looked serene and peaceful.

I bet this place would look gorgeous when the cooler season comes and the red lillies bloom.

It was such a spectacular day. I find myself bonding with the others as we spent the day together that we were sorry to leave each other at the end of the event.

Thank you so much organizers and thank you everyone! I’m definitely looking forward to our next convoy! :-)

Have you been to the Qian Hu Fish Farm and Bollywood Veggies before? What do you think of it?

Related links :

• More pictures in the gallery
• My first time at the Fish Farm and Bollywood Veggies
• Qian Hu Fish Farm Website
• Bollywood Veggies Website
• Vespa Club Website

Other convoys joined :

• Roadtrip to Pengerang
• TAA Charity Ride 2007
• Roadtrip to Malacca
• Big Bike Fest 2006

Updated : The web-video on the ride is up on Asia One :-)

On the 12th of April, I was at the Singapore Expo to see the different displays of motorcycles (and a couple of bicycles) at the Bike Asia 2008 event. This event was jointly organized by the Italian festival 2008, which would explain why there were more Italian brands there.

I was supposed to meet the Vesporeans but in the end, not being able to spot any members, I decided to enter the hall by myself. There were already a large queue forming at the ticketing booth. It was about $8.50 per entry and when I was just about ready to pay for my ticket, the lady at the ticketing booth said, “Ladies enter for free today 11am – 3pm”

Hooray for womanhood!

And the first display that I headed to was the Piaggio display where the Vespas were being displayed. There were a number of upcoming models like this LXV 125. This model was physically different from the LX 150 that I was used to seeing mainly because of the handlebar.

The entire front was much smaller. Aesthetically, I think that it will take some adjusting for those who are used to the GT and the LX, as shown below.

Moving around the back of the Piaggio display, I saw a couple of Gilera scooters.

This scooter was 3 wheeler, giving it that unusual look. I’ve even seen 4 wheeled motorcycle on the road before. I guess, this would be useful to have as it wont topple during those wet and slippery days which is a motorcyclist’s nightmare. But all I can think of when I saw the face of this scooter was the Brain Bug from Starship Troopers.

Not all of the bikes had an overly unusual look to them. This one looked as if it was going to transform into a robot.

There were most certainly many Italian motorcycles from what I can see. Like this moto guzzi two wheeler, as posed by this cute kid which in my opinion is more expressive than the paid models. Why are they called “race queens”. They aren’t even riding, they are posing on stationary bikes! :P

Other Italian bikes that I saw was a large number of Ducati – which is a rather sexeh machine

Man, look at that body. Sweet!

“We are the Ducati Avengers – protectors of evil”

This is the Aprilia

This is the Cagiva

And this is the Husqvarna

All of them, though sexeh, is a little too fierce for my personal style but admittedly, they do look pretty sweet don’t they?

There were also a number of non Italian two wheelers like this adorable Yamaha Fino. I saw this bike for the first time about last year and thought that it was superbly cute. This was something that I would own, but its just that the storage compartment was really small.

There was also a scooter that I noticed and I just cant help gushing at how adorable it was. I would not mind cruising down the road with this little cutie!

This is the Demak Beetle which at first glance, made me thought that it was the Fino. But upon close examination, there were some subtle differences in them. Both Beetle and the Fino are both made in Asia -  I’m guessing that these are quite affordable.

And there was the one motorcycle to rule them all.

Ph33r the official traffic police motorcycle – complete with siren! This motorcycle is even more powerful than some cars and small enough to squeeze through traffic and to catch offenders. You’d better drive carefully if you spot one of these one the road :P

Since, this is a bike display event, I’ll just put one picture up to show that I’m not too biased :P

This is a rodalink display with a simulated screen – probably the next generation of the Wii.

After gawking at the different two wheelers, I found myself at the stage area looking at two men practicing on their motorcycles. They were doing bike stunts!

These two guys, Sergio and Fergo(?) are from Italy and they called their team “Motorlife”. It was quite exciting to watch them doing their stunts, which would be impossible to do on a regular bike. I know my scooter will break :P

Here is a short clip of the stunts :

Bike Asia from rinaz on Vimeo

All in all, I thought the event was pretty sweet as I could admire the different motorcycles. But I prefer events such as the vivo vespa and the Bike Bike Festival as not only I could admire the two wheelers, I could talk to the owner of the motorcycles, which makes it more personalised and interactive. Nevertheless, I still had fun :)

Do you like motorcycles? Did you go to Bike Asia? What do you think of it?

Link :

• Blog report by Arman Ahmad

You may also be interested in :

• TAA Charity Ride 2007
• Vivo Vespa First year anniversary
• Singapore Big Bike fest 2006

Sidenote : On 1 May, there is an outing for ladies with vespas at the Qian Hu Fish farm. Sounds interesting. Anyone wants to go with me?

Pengerang is a town in the southeast of Johore, Malaysia, about 80km from Singapore. Being near the sea, it was rather famous for its seafood. Imagine being stuffed with all the seafood that you could eat and having to pay about only $20!

A couple of weeks ago, the vesporeans announced in the forums about an outing to Pengerang for seafood. After the successful convoy to Malacca, I immediately jumped to the chance as soon as I found out about it.

Our meeting point was at the Jurong Bird Park. Prozzie was one of the first people there and we waited for the rest to arrive one by one.

Once everyone was assembled, we rode all the way to the Tuas Second Link Checkpoint. There were a number of other motorcyclists there already. I noticed a large group of scramblers with huge backpacks behind them. They looked as if they were going on a camp.

The custom check did not take very long. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that we did not need to fill up the white immigration cards anymore. That speeded up the process. In just a few minutes, we were out of the gantry and on our way across the sea.

And it was such a beautiful morning! It was just lovely to see the lovely blue sky with the fluffy white clouds and the glorious sun rays across the sea. At this point of time, I wished that I had a video camera installed on the scooter. I would have loved to show a streaming of the journey live.

We stopped at Gelang Patah for some breakfast. By the time we reached there, it was already crowded with people – people at the tables, people queuing up for food. It took us a good 15 minutes just to search for a place to sit.

Breakfast at Gelang Patah from rinaz on Vimeo.

After a sumptious breakfast, (Nasi Lemak for me!) we quickly topped up our scooter with petrol at the petronas petrol station. I met with the quirkiest cat ever.

This cat was sleeping right in front of the payment counter. There were a number of people whom accidentally hit it while making their payments. But the cat kept on sleeping and would not wake up! Maybe it was tired after working the night shift.

I noticed Kah Woon and Gmoh having the most interesting face covers. I’ve never seen anyone having these type of covers on the roads before. Have you?

Incidentally, Gmoh installed in a horn to his scooter. Not just any horn. But a bicycle horn!

Horn on a scooter? from rinaz on Vimeo

After our fill up, we were on our way!

Riding in the Malaysian roads is much different compared to riding in the Singaporean roads. For one part, the maximum road limit is 120km/hr while in Singapore it is 90km/hr. Imagine our amazement as we see the other motorists zooming by. They were really fast!

Prozzie watching the locals zipping by

It was a very long ride. For the next couple of hours, I amused myself by listening to the radio station on my ear piece and looking at the scenery. It was nice seeing all of the vegetation and plantation around. There were loads of palm trees, as far as the eye can see, at one point.

Halfway along the journey, we stopped by for a much deserved rest to stretch our legs. Riding for two hours straight is not very comfortable!

I met a few guys manning a roasted chestnut stall and they were quite amazed to see our Vespa Convoy. All throughout our conversation they were curious and kept asking me questions, since I was the only one in the group who could speak Malay :P

What nice looking scooters!
What club are you?
Where are you guys from?
Where are you all going?

After a couple of minutes later, we said our goodbyes and continued with our journey.

At length, we reached a sort of residential area. Even for being in the middle of the day, it looked kind of secluded. There were hardly anyone to be seen. We then entered a path to a village and finally saw a seafood restaurant.

We tried to park in front of the eatery, but as seeing that the parking area was rather small and there were quite a number of us, the kind lady who was working at the eatery offered to let us park in her verandah which is just a stones throw from the eatery.

By then we were very hungry! We ordered heaps of food to feed a platoon! Here are the food that we ate :

Stir fried vegetables

Sambal Cockles

Steamed baby lobsters

Fried Kang Kong

Heavenly Black Pepper Crab

Deep fried lobsters. These lobsters are really huge!

Oh I tell you, all of the food was so delicious! Its just heaven. I especially loved the black pepper crab and the lobsters. It was so juicy and succulent, that momentarily, I didnt care about risking to having a weight gain.

We ate everything and in the end we were all stuffed! I had to sit slumped on my chair for a long time, too full to even move. I just sat there in contented bliss.

When the bill came, I was mightily impressed as when divided with the people sitting at the table, each of us only had to pay about RM45 dollars. Thats about $20 Singapore dollars.

Nothing was left when we were done as seen below :

A long ride back to the customs. Such a relaxing day. I admired the beautiful fluffy white clouds among the blue skies. It was such a beautiful day.

Such a beautiful day from rinaz on Vimeo

It was nearly 6pm and for some reason, the group headed to the Woodlands Checkpoint. The good part about this checkpoint as there was no fees to cross the gantry. The bad part was that it was usually very crowded.By the time we reached there at about 6pm, it was already quite congested with cars. Fortunately for us, being scooter riders, we were small enough to squeeze through.

But it was when we were approaching the gantry that was the most trying. There must have been at least one hundred motorcycles(!!!) trying to get into the gantry. And the progress was so slow. It took a very long time for us to get closer.

Many of the people there were feeling hot and frustrated that they started to hit on their horns repeatedly. It was chaotic. The smoke all around, the loud horns. I kept my focus on to listening to music keep myself calm.

Big Jam at JB from rinaz on Vimeo

It was only after about 45 mins that we finally crossed over back to Singapore. I was just thankful that the entire ordeal was over.Nevertheless, I still enjoyed the trip today, solely for the beautiful view and the yummy food. I would love to do it again. Thank you so much for organizing this trip, Vesporeans :)

Links :

• Vespa Club, Singapore
• Kah Woon’s Blog Entry
• Gmoh Flickr Set

You might be interested in :

• Bikers Aid Charity Ride 2007
• Vespa Club roadtrip to Malacca
• Singapore Big Bike Fest 2006
• The Vespa Song (starring Rinaz and Malique)