Durian Treat, Selangor, MALAYSIA

I jumped at the invitation of my neighbour, Haji Jamaluddin to visit his durian orchard in Taman Melawati, close to where we stay. I have been looking forward to being at a durian orchard to sample the experience. It was the peak of the fruit season.

A solitary durian waiting to fall

To most South East Asians, durian is the king of fruits despite its strong pungent smell, much to the horror of those from the western countries. “Taste like heaven, smell like hell” is a popular remark by westerners, obviously trying to be polite to the locals.

It was a steep climb up the hill to reach the orchard. The dirt road was slippery due to the heavy rainfall the night before. The few villagers who lived there could still ride motor bikes on the road with ease. We met several people passing by carrying durian and other fruits down.

The orchard was on a steep hill-side about 1km walk from the foothill. It had an area of less than 2 acres and almost fully planted with durians of D24 variety and some jackfruit trees. Durian was the feature attraction. There were about 80 trees planted in 1983. It was purchased some times back when the price was only at a fraction of today’s cost. Haji Jamaluddin built 2 huts, one for resting and another acted as the collection centre. There was also a makeshift toilet with running water collected from nearby stream.

Haji Jamaluddin found 2 in the bush

On arrival, I could see durians caught at the lower end of the orchard at the bamboo fence. The fence was purposely built at the lowest point so that it would catch durians tumbling down the steep gradient. It worked like an automated collection point and saved the workers a lot of time looking for the fruits. According to the 2 workers, this year had been a bumper harvest.
A good pile of durians

We went around the orchard looking for fallen durians in the bush. We had to be careful as the thorny durians were still falling here and there from the tall trees. One missed Haji Jamaluddin by a few feet. In less than 2 hours we collected a big pile of fresh durians, about 50 ripe fruits. We sampled a few. Haji Jamaluddin told me that they would taste even better the next day when the flesh would ripen.

The good stuff

Cleaning away the debris

After piling up the durians at the collection hut, the workers would clean the fruits using the brush made from the coconut leaves. Otherwise, there would be too many things like leaves, soil and debris sticking to the thorns. Then they would grade the fruits according to size and perceived quality. Only experience could tell between a good and bad durian. Those that failed to make the grade would be separated to make “tempoyak”, another local delicacy.

You could see Petronas Twin Towers (KLCC) from the slope of the orchard

After spending about 3 hours at the orchard, we decided to leave. You could tell that a person had just had durians. He burped a lot and had that heavenly smell of the fruits that we love so much. To the westerners, they still smell like hell.

Golf in Manila, the PHILIPPINES

4/7/2007 (Wednesday)

John (a close friend from Sabah) and I left my house at 5AM to pick up Zack on the way to the Low Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT) at Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA). We had an early flight to Clark Airport in the Philippines on Air Asia flight AK32.

After checking in and paying for excess baggage, we went to have our breakfast at McDonald’s. Then we boarded our plane scheduled to depart at 7.20AM. The flight to Clark took about 4 hours. We arrived on time at about 11.15AM. Ramlan, an old friend of mine, now working in Manila, was at the airport. He was waiting for his wife and daughter who were on the same flight. He arranged for our transport to Manila. Together we got onto the waiting van driven by Romeo, one of Ramlan’s Filipino staff.

The drive to the Philippines capital on the highway was pleasant but the moment we reached the outskirt of Manila we were caught in a traffic snarl. Just like Jakarta, the traffic in Manila was heavy due to the large population. It was made worse by the indiscriminate stops in the middle of the roads by the many jeepneys and buses to drop their passengers off. There were also peddlers on the road selling things like mineral water and cigarettes. It took us a good 3 hours to arrive at our hotel, the Heritage Hotel located in Pasay City, at the city’s outskirt. It’s a four star hotel owned by Singaporeans and managed by a Malaysian.

After checking in, we went to look for some groceries at a store called Gold Rush. We bought some fruits, biscuits and drinks. Zack and I shared a room which did not come together with breakfast while John’s room came with breakfast. We paid USD85 a night for our room on line through AsiaTravel.com while John paid USD86 through AsiaRooms.com. We had to skip breakfast just because of USD1 and different booking websites.

That night we went to Dampa in Paranaque to have our seafood dinner. It was a place where you had to first shop for your food at the wet market and then choose any one of the restaurants around the market place to cook your dinner. Just as we were having dinner John asked me whether I noticed that there were no flies at the market. I did not notice any fly. John said whenever there was no flies meant that the fishes were injected with formaldehyde, the chemical used to preserve corpses. Oh Boy!

The Bangus fish looked very fresh and tasted really good. We finished 2 of them. Then they brought our next fish, the pomfret ordered by Zack. He took one bite and spit it out. It tasted bad. When we arrived at the hotel and figured it out about John’s comments, we realized that he could be right. There were no flies at the market, the pomfret looked fresh but tasted rotten, there was no ice to preserve the fish and yet they looked fresh. Oh Boy!

5/7/2007 (Thursday)

In the morning we had 2 meetings with our business associates in Manila, Pronto Express Distribution, Inc. and Goetz Moving & Storage, Inc. After the meeting we were looking forward to playing a round of golf only to realize that golfing in Manila was quite a hassle. Most of the clubs are private, meaning the guests must be accompanied or checked in by members. Elias Maravilla from Goetz tried to arrange for us to play at Riviera Golf Club and the moment it was confirmed we headed straight to the golf course.

John looking at Zack's putting. I gave up after hitting the ball into the trees and lost my 2nd ball.

The Riviera Golf Club is located at Silang Cavite. It has two 18-hole courses, Langer Course and Couples Course. We tested the Fred Couples Course. The fairways are well maintained and it looked like the course was built on a former coconut plantation. There were coconut trees everywhere lining up the whole courses. The greens were a bit too slow. The 11th hole was quite a memorable hole. This 514 yard par 5 tees off across a deep ravine onto a distant landing area. Then, a cart will ferry the golfers across the ravine to the other side to continue play.

Hole 11, the Riviera

The weather was not on our side as it was drizzling with some lightning during our game. By the time we were on the green of the 12th hole, we had to call off the game due to the adverse weather condition. It was also getting dark. However, the Riviera is a beautiful course that we will play again given another chance.

We had a simple dinner at our hotel. After dinner we hit the casino trail, stayed there for a while and then off to bed. The long meetings and walking course at the Riviera took toll on us.

6/7/2007 (Friday)

We were supposed to have a meeting with Famous Pacific Shipping Group and the Malaysian Embassy in the morning but the meeting was changed to the evening. We decided to look for a golf course to play and checked out the Navy course. When we arrived at the place, dropped our bags and took a quick look at the course, we quickly loaded the bags back into our van and left the place. The course was not appealing enough.

Finally, after driving around to find a good course to play, we ended up in Alabang Country Club. The club which is affiliated to Zack’s Saujana Club in Malaysia enabled Zack to play but not us. John asked the poor lady at the desk to bend some rules and finally we got to play after a long wait. Like I said, golfing in Manila is such a big hassle.

Both Zack and I were really struggling with our shots today. It made higher handicapped John look good. We managed to finish only 9 holes before we quit because of our meetings.

Alabang Country Club is a reasonably good private club set in the neighborhood of Manila’s elite. Even the family of the Sultan of Brunei has a house in the area.

We had a meeting with our associates at Famous Pacific Shipping Group. After that we proceeded to our embassy for a meeting with one of Zack’s friend, Wan Jaafar, who works at the embassy. We met several embassy staff including the Trade Commissioner, Zahid and some key personnel.

John has been calling for some curry since the day earlier, so we decided to have our dinner at an Indian restaurant called Kashmir in the business district of Makate. The food was halal, good and reasonably priced. The mango lassi was really good. I had a double.

There was nothing much to do after dinner so we checked into the casino again. We won some, we lost some.

7/7/2007 (Saturday)

We were looking forward to playing a good round of golf today after 2 disappointing outings. Elias, the guy from Goetz had made arrangement for us to play at his brother-in-law’s club, Canyon Woods Residential & Golf Club located in the highlands of Laurel, Batangas.

The drive from our hotel to Batangas took more than 2 hours. We passed through the rim of the volcanic crater of Taal Mountain. It was a scenic drive through Tagaytay up to the golf club. The weather was a bit cooler than the lower lands.

When we finally arrived at the entrance of the golf club, we were held up for more than 15 minutes by the security guards at the gates. Security seemed to be a big issue at most places in Manila. The guards were all armed. After a few phone calls, we got the clearance to enter but had to wait for our escort. We were escorted all the way to the club house by 2 security guards on a motor bike. Elias and his brother-in-law, Raymund were already waiting for us.

Canyon Woods is a par-34, 9-hole golf course. It was carved on a steep hill side making it a very challenging course with narrow fairways and small landing areas. It calls for precicision game. It plays to very different elevation, from the tee box to the green. For example, the 143 yard par 3 hole 5 plays to about 120 yards due to the steep slope to the green.
Hole 5, Par 3. The green is the white patch in the middle

I had a good round with back to back birdies in the opening holes. Raymund was also scoring well on the tricky course. I wish I could say the same for the rest. Elias called the 451 yard par 5 Hole 6 the "Nightmare Hole". It plays over a steep slope to a landing area that doglegs left. From the landing area you have to cross another ravine. I had the nightmare of a double par score at this hole.

John praying for miracle at the "nightmare" Hole 6

We decided to end the game after 9 holes. We had a late start and the sun was getting hotter.

Our hosts, Raymund (2nd) and Elias (4th) at the edge of Hole 9

The view from the club house

We had lunch at Raymund’s club where we met his wife and son. It was a good spread of buffet lunch. The drive back to Manila took about 3 hours because of heavy rain and heavy traffic. We had a good rest.

We had dinner at Sea Food Wharf with Wan Jaafar, his wife, Melody, Ramlan and his family. It was a good sea food dinner.

8/7/2007

We left our hotel at 7.30AM to Clark Airport to catch our return flight at 11.45AM. It was still too early when we reached Angeles City where Clark Airport is located. We had some pancakes at Jollibee Restaurant. Jollibee is a popular restaurant network in the Philippines similar to McDonald's.

After checking in, we proceeded to the waiting lounge for our flight. Clearing the immigration was like at any other airports that we have been to. It was slow but smooth. However, I had some problems with the security guys. Apparently the scanning machine was out of order and the security personnel went through our carry on bags. After frisking me, one guard was asking for the money that was in my pocket. I had about PhP9,000 left and the limit was PhP10,000. I refused to hand over the money. Then I recognized one guy by his name tag who took away my Saigon Hard Rock Café cap during my last trip. He has similar last name with one of the former Presidents of the Philippines. He remembered me. I tried to get into conversation to get away from the guy who was asking money from me. Instead, the Hard Rock Cafe guy asked me to buy some liquor for him from the duty free shop. I had enough. I decided it was time to get out of the place.

The flight back was on time and I was asleep most of the way.