Another Wacky Week of Wonderful Work

My favorite hair style of the night, which I will attempt once I find my cheekbones again

This has been another one of those weeks that I love.

Last week we spent preparing for a hair show that happened Monday night. It was fierce! The lead stylist was Japanese and hearing her speak was wonderful because she was amazingly polite and profusely thankful. All of this was in Japanese, so I'm just going by the tone and the repeated 'domo', 'arigato' etc and the bowing.

Here's a pix from the night. Not taken by me, although I wish I had as much skill and such super canggih equipment. The photographer is Michael Sin.

Have you seen 'camera envy'? I was sitting with some of the photographers and they were checking out each others equipment surreptitiously. Quite funny until I got caught up in it too and begin lusting after the super long lens and the extra powerful flash and the battery pack. Even with my kit lens at it highest zoom it didn't help much...sad, sad, sad.

Still it was a great night for hair design watching as there were 500+ stylist there and they pulled out all the stops and had unbelievable hair styles, and some super funky styles.

The next day was packed with interviews... in Japanese. Sho kawai!!!!

Wednesday, I'm still at it preparing for my mini break that starts in 6 hours or so, and I'm not packed yet. There is a place beyond panic where things take on a scary clarity - I'm right there at this moment. Also 6 cups of coffee.

What does this have to do with the Malakoff Charity Ride?

Well, I did ask every other person I met there if they ride - some of the answers were hilarious and not suitable for a family type blog, so I will leave it to your imagination.

Terengganu Young Riders

The young riders with their support team and some of the Malakoff riders (white & green jerseys)

...and after I asked for riders under 18 only

I've gone on, and on, and on about the young riders from Terengganu. Finally managed to find the pix of these young people, although not all of them.

When we set off from Gombak there were a few young riders with us as well including Rahimi who I've posted on earlier.

Once in Temerloh, Ishak joined the ride with a few young riders who had cycled from Kemaman the day before. I don't have pix of this team - if anyone does please email to malakoff.cr@gmail.com or post a link in the comments.

In Kemaman another group of young people joined us, with their own support team of parents in tow. They had found out about the ride through Ishak and the Kemaman Teachers' Cycling Club.

So on the final day, the Malakoff Charity Ride, numbered more than 120 riders, and had a much expanded support team too.

All these riders are under 18 years, most are between 12 to 16 years.

Not all of them are from loaded families but they have the interest and the passion to ride.

You know that they have been training hard from their tans which have gone past golden brown to the burnt to a crisp level.

And surprise, surprise a number of them are girls, and they were as fast as the boys, and a lot faster than most of the men aside from the pros (no offense to any of the male riders). Anyway this was a ride and not a race, so placign doesn't matter.

But back to the young people. Terengganu seems to be the place for raising professional riders.

Is there a cycling academy in Terengganu? Would anyone be interested to set one up there? If the parents of the young riders are an indication, it should be easy to get support for such an academy.

Malakoff Charity Ride in the Star

Cyclists distribute donations in charity ride
http://thestar.com.my/metro/story.asp?file=/2008/5/29/southneast/21351825&sec=southneast

Yes, its about all of you, the Malakoff Charity Ride riders and support team, and the charities that you've contributed to.

TEMERLOH: Participants of the charity ride organised by Malakoff Corporation Berhad arrived safely and on schedule to hand over donations to several charitable organisations and welfare homes.

A total of RM26,000 was distributed to five recipients here during the journey which saw some 80 cyclists travelling a distance of 480km from Gombak to Kuala Trengganu.

Their aim was to raise RM60,000 for the underprivileged and the amount would be channelled directly to selected homes along the route.

Present during the ceremony were the firm’s managing director and chief executive officer Ahmad Jauhari Yahya and its senior vice president Nor Shakiman Muhammad.

The recipients in Temerloh were Darul Izzah Orphanage (RM10,000), Rumah Sri Suria (RM5,000), SK Bandar Temerloh (RM5,000), Bukit Damar and Bandar Temerloh Community Learning Resources Centres (RM3,000 each).


For a good cause: Cyclists passing through one of the routes in Temerloh during the charity ride.

Earlier, two orphanages in Gombak were given RM2,500 each shortly before the flagging-off ceremony.

The entourage later arrived in SM Chukai, Kemaman where they handed over another RM28,000 to three organisations and hosted a dinner for 40 hardcore poor children.

The recipients were orphanages and poor children (RM20,000), Kemaman orphanage (RM5,000) and Kompleks Penyayang Community Learning Resources Centres (RM3,000).

The cyclists had a truly rewarding and satisfying experience.

For blogs of their journey, the public can log on to malakoff-cr.blogspot.com.

East Coast Mee Goreng

Mee Goreng, the fried noodle, famous Malaysian breakfast and tea break dish for decades.

The recent Malakoff Charity Ride 2008 stop at Temerloh & Kemaman, had chance to taste the authentic East Coast Mee Goreng of which so memorable until today.

Had the same dish for past few days at hotel meetings, eating out at night, realised that the taste of Mee Goreng here still hard to beat the East Coast style. Talking about the simplicity of ingredient preparation, frying the noodle, mixing it with chilli paste or sambal, stir it with sawi and then to serving, worth drolling while typing this.

Anyone who beg to differ?

Kemaman Teachers' Cycling Club

The Kemamam Teachers' Cycling Club is a cycling club whose members comprise of ...surprise teachers from Kemaman. I had the pleasure of sitting next to one of the members of the club during the charity dinner at SMK Chukai.

The cycling club has been around for some years now. It was started by a this group of teachers when they realised that they were getting larger round the middle, and were not as fit as they had been in the past. After researching lots of different options, they decided on cycling as it was suitable for all ages being a low impact exercise.

Soon they were hooked and were pedalling on weekends.

From Ishak, I also found out that the Kemaman Teachers' Cycling Club is also active in encouraging young people in schools to take up cycling as a sport. They must be a positive force for cycling if the number of young riders in Kemaman is a gauge.

Here's a picture of 11 of them who joined the Malakoff Charity Ride for the last leg Kemaman to Kuala Terengganu.

The chairman of the Kemaman Teachers' Cycling Club is En Said Ahmad Shauffi - he's the one in the styling red polka-dot jersey. Speaking for the club, Said Ahmad hopes that more will be done to help young Terengganu cyclist.

He told me that it's part of the Terengganu culture to ride. The kids there love to ride, they have the stamina and the speed and are not afraid of the sun or of long hours of practice and training. The parents are supportive too, because they have seen the success of riders like Haidar.

Over the two days that I was in Kemaman and Kuala Terengganu, I saw many more riders than what I would expect. By riders, I mean that they had their bike helmet, jerseys etc, not just on a bike running errands.

However, Said Ahmad said that the cost of road bikes is a major barrier to more young people taking up the sport.

The young cyclists who joined for the Kemaman to Kuala Terengganu leg proved that the cycling is a part of the Terengganu culture bit was very true. They were zooming ahead at like 50km. It could be the training, their youth or the huge amounts of fish and ulam in their diet but they rocked!

The oldest member and rider who was participating on the day was Mr.Heh, who at 63 years proved to be dynamite.

Guest bloggers welcome

Thanks Aini for the post. Anyone else interested in guest blogging - English, BM or Chinese - all are welcome.

Haidar the Kemaman Export

Name: Ahmad Haidar bin Anuawar
DOB: April 25, 1986
Height: 169cm, Weight: 59-61kg
Siblings: 1st of 6 siblings, 4 boys and 2 girls

Ahmad Haidar is a typical village boy from the suburban area of Kemaman. His passion for cycling started as a young boy who was impressed with his uncle's shiny racing bike. He would normally take out the bike for joyride only to be scolded later by his uncle for his misdeed. But this didn't dampened his spirit to one day ride a bike of his own and to earn a living doing what he liked best - cycling.

When he was in Primary school, armed with his trusted bike, which was remotely a racing bike like the ones he owns now, he joined several local kampung races aptly called Race Nyamuk("Mosquito race") and won almost every time, much to his mother's annoyance. Of course every mother would like the best for their children and all she had ever wanted was Haidar to excel in his studies. But seeing that his interest was more to cycling than studying, she relented and just prayed for the best for her first child. Eventually his uncle saw his talent, too and supported this passion of his.

During his Fourth Form, he started to meddle into road bikes and road racing. Then when he was in his Fifth Form, he entered Sukan Remaja which was organized by Sport Excel and he was officially discovered. There was no turning back for him. Subsequently he entered Sukma under Pahang's ticket. It was during 2004 Sukma in Negeri Sembilan when he was noticed by Rahim, who is currently coaching LeTua.

Rahim told Haidar that he has the potential that he was looking for in a cyclist and coincidentally they were looking for talents to form a cycling club called LeTua. Haidar didn't give second thoughts about it and was taken under Rahim's wing. Their trainings were mainly done around Subang area where they lived in the nearby Kg Melayu Subang.

Donning LeTua's jersey, he competed in several Asian cycling tours and proved himself in the international circuit by standing on the podium in some stages, namely third placing in Stage 7 of Tour Indonesia in 2005, Stage 9(Tour Indonesia, 2006), and first place wins in Stage 3 of 2007 Tour of Siam and Stage 3 of Tour of Hong Kong in 2007.

For this Kemaman born cyclist, his favourite routes includes Fraser's Hill(with a compulsory detour in Bentong for the famous Kow Po ice cream and ais kacang(shaved ice)) and Genting Highlands. The longer the climb, the better for him to build his strength. He also would like to see more youngsters participate in cycling and hopes that the cycling scene in Malaysia will stay alive and more new talents will be discovered and nurtured.

**Haidar uses a Time road bike, frame size 50 with Campagnolo Record groupset

**written by Aini Zakaria