Max, the hero

I have to write this. It is Max, he is a hero. Last night we had brush fire next to our north fence. It was late at night and Max was barking his head off. Usually we pay not much attention to his barking, because he would bark at anything that moves and of course at those rabbits running around mating in the yard.
But last night, his bark was different, so at about 2 am, Bill got up to look and he saw fire was raging right infront of our house. The other 2 dogs were sleeping in their houses, I don't blame them since the temperature was way below freeing. Max sleeps outside his house unless it was real cold like minus 20C degrees. He has grown a very thick coat and the coat is keeping him warm.
So, Max was awake and was aware that there was a big fire going on and he was barking towards the house and the fire that woke us up. Then the other dogs got out of their houses and started barking too. Bill woke me up and said we had a problem, there is a brush fire in the yard. We got out and got us shovels and started to put the fire out from the fringes around it. we worked around the fire so that it did not spread to wider area. Then after it got under control, we stared to get to the water. Of course, the garden water pump was frozen and it was hard trying to get the water hoses to the fire. We forgot that we had a water pump near the garage that we have it heated all day and night during winter time. Then I said, the water outlet near the garage may not be frozen. It was quite far from the fire, we had to make a very long hose, attaching hose after hose. The trouble was the hoses were not at the same place, some in the garage, some in barn and some near the chicken coop. At last we had the hose working and the water coming. It was very cold and our hands were frozen eventhough we wore gloves. Once the gloves got wet, they freeze. My coat was wet and it froze too. We took turn to water the fire and it took us an hour or so to put it out completely.

Actually the fire was from the ashes left in the brush after we burnt the trash 2 days ago. We burnt the trash/rubbish when the area was covered with snow. There had been burn band for a long time and we had been keeping the trash to burn when we have rain or snow. We did not realize that the fire did not go out completely 2 days ago, and was smouldering inside the big tree trunk and it took 2 days for it to go up in flame again. The vegetation is bone dry and although it is still covered with snow, the snow was of not of much help.

The water immediately turned into ice after the fire was gone. So this morning there was a big pool of ice where the fire was lastnight. The experience really scared me. I did not know that the fire can stay smouldering without any sign of smoke and break out again after days it was put out.

So, Thanks to Max, we could stop the fire before it spread out or come near the house. We would have a few 'hotdogs' and no house to live in or we would be dead.

Max my hero

The dream

A day before hari Raya, I got this message from an old friend who was desperately trying to reach me. She had no choice but to register as a member of rantauan.com in order to reach me. She wanted to keep in touch after such a long time. She gave me her e mail address and I immediately contacted her. I also told her about my blog and after reading my blog, she said that i should continue to write and write about all those travels that I made with her and others.

That brought back all the memories of my younger days gallavanting all around the globe.
I was with her in Istanbul, Turkey in the 1980's and what fun we had getting lost in that city. How excited we were when we saw "macDonald" and we thought we found 'civilization' after we had been having the local fares all week long. We were to be disappointed, for the burgers were not of beef, but of kambing and not to my delicate tastebuds. In Istanbul too we met a fellow malaysian, who was a prominent figure in his field. We met him in the elevator/lift of the hotel were staying, a grand 5* hotel. He assumed that we were Filipinas...then he heard us talking in melayu and he asked us "were u speaking malay?" we said of course. he was surprised that 2 malay girls roaming around istanbul. he insinuated that we were of 'bad' characters riding up and down the elevators in a 'grand hotel". We were mad and when we told him that we were not just girls visiting the hotel, we were staying at the hotel and my dear friend at that time was already a surgeon. I guess that put him in his place. We ignored him after that.

There was another experience in Innsbruck, that got us into stitches. We were so hungry for asian food, and one evening we saw this direction to a chinese restaurant that boast of having laksa penang on its menu. My friend and i were excited, we were prepared for the very 'fake" penang laksa, janji laksa, but we were not prepared for the ambiance of the place. The whole place scared the **** out of us. It was painted in black and red and have those ghostly chinese characters. We ran down the stairs and went have a kebab instead.

well, that's it for now..will cont later