Well I got my bike back and have done a bit of casual cycling over the weekend. The weather has just been crazy so far this month. In fact the record for the most rain to ever fall during the month of March was pretty well broken after only two weeks. There's been a lot of flooding as the rains coincided with very high tides twice, and there was an amazing thunderstorm on Saturday evening. I saw Singapore's last remaining Kampong (village) mentioned on the news for the first time. It's flood prone, and the government has just announced it would cost an unfeasible ten million to fix the drainage problem, for a mere twenty eight houses. The residents have stated they only want the basic building materials and they'll do the work themselves, which I think has been turned down. It doesn't take a fortune teller to know what that meant, and I bet that a redevelopment will be announced shortly.
I've just added a new page about my cycling expeditions around Singapore. Find it here.
I've added the photo pages, but still need to add captions to the more recent pics (Indonesia, Singapore and Hong Kong). I've added kind-of interactive maps to the Indonesia albums. The "Riau Islands" map extends right down to Belitung and Bangka islands, which I plan to get to eventually and are a long way from Singapore. I'm guessing it would take 24 hours to get to Bangka, by taking a ferry to Batam, another to Palembang (Sumatra) and a third to Mentok (on Bangka). The islands are a whole lot bigger than the others I've already been to, so all-in-all a good week would be in order for a cyling trip down there. I've got to get my head around making a prolonged trip like that, because I've just been no good at my own company recently, and find myself rushing back earlier than I'd planned. I reckon the trip will be a great adventure, to these large mysterious islands. The only thing I know about them is they're good for sweet (?) martabak. Sounds good to me!
Well, I finally got my bike back today, after a few delays at the shop. It's good to have it back and now I'll have to build up my fitness which I feel has gone after just a couple of weeks! Of course, seeing as the bike was as clean and well-serviced as it's ever been, it goes without saying that the skies opened before me, and though I avoided the rain the trip back was one of puddles. So, that was the first service, at 8800 kilometres. The bike has held up very well and after the service feels as good as new. Which bike? A Trek 7700 hybrid. Here's a link to the 2004 model. Mine is the 2001 model, though I picked it up in 2002. You can't go wrong with this bike, except that it's a bit ex, but then you get what you pay for. Perfect for distance riding and touring, well don't I sound like a salesman?
The boss showed us some competitors' systems today, which are our 'next project'. Reverse-engineering doesn't appeal to me; in fact I find it quite repugnant.
My bike is stuck in service for a week and I've been feeling pretty lost without it. So I started this site's revamp today, and got the whole layout together. It's the first change to the site in a couple of years, which had drifted into stagnentation due to a bloody awful Internet provider that was impossible to deal with. If you ever come across IIC Internet then avoid them at all costs! So, this is my first entry in my web log. Hmmm, I don't expect that anybody will read it, and really, the main point is that I've got somewhere to update my site on a regular basis.
We're off to Australia from March 25th till April 7th, flying Emirates, which is my favourite airline. It's cheap too, but it lands in both Oz and back in Singapore at pretty inconvenient times (after midnight).