Behold...Low Light Photography!

I was in Singapore for the last 4 days and during dinner on the first night at Singapore, my friend took a picture of me. When she saw the picture after taking it, she got shocked.


She told me that the picture was able to capture natural colors and interestingly, I did not use any flash for the picture. Unconvinced, I showed her another picture by taking another picture of her, with the same settings.

I basically used ISO 800, with lighting set as florescent high levels. The most important thing about the picture is that there is sufficient amount of back lights in order for me to take the picture. But then, while I examined some of the pictures which I took during the nighttime dinner at the Lake House, I noticed there is evidence of grain. Someone told me that higher ISOs may result in picking up of grain.


Maybe I might have to try shooting it at 400 ISO.

English Ladies In The Making

On the second day of our trip at Cameron Highlands, we had an afternoon tea session at The Smokehouse. Located somewhere between Tanah Rata and Brinchang, all of us decided to go there for tea. This was one of the oldest spots in Cameron Highlands.

Staying there is roughly at around $150 to $200 USD per night so it would not be a problem for tourists to come here and stay for a night or so.

It was a great time for all of us to have tea time, despite being priced at $22 per person and interestingly, there's infinite refills.



My cousins and my aunts were at one corner and tried hilariously to reenact a tea-time session among themselves as English ladies while the men had theirs at a bigger table.


This is what we had as tea - freshly baked scones with Tea.

More tea, vicar?

It was raining there heavily in the evening. We couldn't move out to get our vehicles, but there was a piano there which my uncle played many songs that most of us would tag along. Unfortunately, the room guests were complaining about the noise we made and we stopped after someone from the staff came and told us about it.

Further Readings:

1. Reminiscing the Past, 55 Years Later
2. Am I Driving As In The Shining?

Reminiscing the Past, 55 Years Later

My paternal grandfather was the resettlement officer of Cameron Highlands during the Templer years (see Tun Sir Gerald Templer) in 1950-1952, before he applied transfer to Ipoh (that's how he met my late grandmother). He was second in command behind the district officer, E.M Sheppard, so it was his duty to assign lands to natives there.

During his time there, he noticed a lot of Aborigines, or the actual Sons of the Earth here wandering on the main towns of Cameron Highlands. He used to tell us stories of how Templer's convoy got ambushed by Communists, how he practiced weaponry at Kea Farm and spending his free time at Tanah Rata.

For him, coming back there after 55 years evokes a lot of memories which awed us, including my parents, my relatives and my cousins. Not all joined in like my brother as he was having examinations and the others unable to commit due to their schedules.

The District office, located at Tanah Rata was refurbished extensively unlike a small house 50 years ago and I could not remember what has changed since my last visit there 12 years ago.


This shop, now called You Hoo in Tanah Rata was once a sundry shop. Above is where my grandfather used to stay during his three year tenure here. He remembered some few guys here notably, the village head in Tanah Rata is a man called Dick Cheong.

On the second day, we took him around the spots he would remember most. After that, I noticed that he remembered three spots: Kea Farm, The Lakehouse and The Smokehouse.


This was taken at Kea Farm. Before the new shop lots were up selling vegetables and flowers are up, there was a roundabout at that place where he used to go in there. Down there, near the Chinese primary school, it was where he practiced shooting with Stern guns, Enfield rifles and grenades used in WW2.

The Lake house in Ringlet was a famous location as it was built opposite a lake that houses a hydroelectric generator that powers Ringlet and Tanah Rata. While we were tinkering of the location for our second day dinner, we decided to have there since it's raining heavily there.


I actually experimented one shot in black and white and my dad, who was with me, came in and was surprised over the photo style of how the picture was taken. From that commendation, I felt that I've captured one of the best photos that I've taken so far. Perhaps, that shot above should be printed out and saved as a photo album.

Further Readings:

1. English Ladies In The Making
2. Am I Driving As In The Shining?

Am I Driving As In The Shining?

Last Monday, I was on leave as we had a 3 day family gathering at Cameron Highlands. My colleague William told me that instead of going via Tapah, I can access the new route to the other side of Cameron Highlands via Simpang Pulai.

After using the other road back to Kuala Lumpur on Wednesday, I finally realized that going from the new route is much more shorter than the conventional route. The conventional route is about 100 kms long, that is 52 kms from Ipoh to Tapah and another 47 km from exit at Tapah to the first town called Ringlet.



On the other side it's about 91 kilometers from Ipoh town to reaching the other side of Cameron, a village called Kampung Raja.

However, when I drove from Simpang Pulai to there, there was no petrol station all along the way so you need to have adequate fuel, at least a quarter tank or more to go there. It was raining that day, so....



I thought for one moment that driving through the wide roads on the mountain side is similar to the opening segment of The Shining. It is not as winding as the old route so I took my time and overtook some vehicles on the way up. I somehow loved the white skies on the pictures that I've took. This was taken using Neutral color settings of my Powershot camera.



So this is the crossroads between the East Coast and Cameron Highlands. Up ahead is the route that goes to Blue Valley and Gua Musang, a town at the western side of Kelantan. It's about another 43 kilometers from here to up there, which we would cross the state border. Turning right is going to Kampung Raja, that is about another 20-30 kilometers from the crossroad.

On the third day, I left early, thereby unable to join my other family members in visiting the Boh Plantation estate as to reach back in Kuala Lumpur before my half-day shift starts at 2 p.m. On the way from Ringlet back to Tapah, there had been 5 occasions of landslides, thanks to Tuesday's heavy rainfall. The first landslide forced motorists to wait for 30 minutes for the road workers to clear of the trees. The third landslide forced motorists to wait for 10 minutes as to let fellow drivers from Tapah go up before letting us ahead.

All, in all, on that third day, I managed to reach my office 10 minutes before 2 p.m, but I didn't feel like eating lunch so I had biscuits at office.

Further Reading:
1. English Ladies In The Making
2. Reminiscing the Past, 55 Years Later