On The First Day Of Christmas

We woke up at about 10.00 am the next morning, because we got home about 3.00 am the night before, and went to bed at probably about 4.00 am. We had done the silly thing of driving to Heidelberg to see the Christmas decorations people put up outside their house.

Note to self for next year:
1. Don't do it again.
2. No one can afford Christmas decorations. Everyone's saving their money for the Boxing Day sales.
3. It's 2 a.m. They've switched off their decorations, silly. Haven't you heard of global warming?

So it was 10.00 am on Christmas day, and we decided to drive somewhere on the spur of the moment. We flipped open the Melway, took out a pin, closed our eyes, and randomly stabbed a hole on the appointed page. The hole said Lorne.

(Okay, so we decided on Lorne after some discussion. But a hole in the Melway sounds cooler.)

We started grabbing at leftover snacks in the house, and made our way to my brother's car. We decided that we were going to do the Great Ocean Road in style.

Malaysian style, that is. Fill that empty plastic Coke bottle with boil(ing)ed water, causing the plastic to cave in. Pack that four day old bread with the meat floss. Grab the biscuits from the pantry - but only the opened packets! What's that left over in the fridge? It's coming with us!

We stopped by a Shell station on our way out, and I ran down to the IgA nearby which was, surprisingly, open, and bought proper snacks - Doritos, Tim Tams and meat pies. Mum looked at me like I was turning Aussie (which I was, mate. Gotta love the meat pies, crikey!).

It was a beautiful drive all the way through to Geelong. The mournful rain of the days leading up to Christmas and Christmas Eve was quickly forgotten in the bright sunshine and clouds borrowed straight out from the opening sequence of the Simpsons.

The Great Ocean Road has never failed to capture my imagination every time that I have had the pleasure of driving on it - endless roads snaking into forever, revealing around each corner a sight more breathtaking than the last - green hillsides with quaint little houses strewn among the grassfields giving way to the awe-inspiring sight of the majestic sea, a silent, eternal witness to all the changes throughout the years around these coastlines.

We spent most of the time driving in the car, but we stopped at all the scenic sights to take pictures, and my brother and I had this silent competition between us to see who could take the best shots.

Ladies and gentlemen, for your judging pleasure tonight:

My brother's


Mine's (yeah, I know.)


and Mum decided to join in:



Okay, ladies and gentlemen, those among you with a photogenic eye will come to the conclusion


that my Mum's the rightful winner.

The pictures only capture a snapshot of the fun we had that day! I did not manage to photograph my shoe which got wet by the seawater when my brother insisted 'Touch the water, HK! Touch the water!' or how smooth the sand felt to touch, or how my brother overturned the sticky date pudding into his precious car! Haha!

It was a really fun day in the sun, but unfortunately we had to rush home as I had to attend a Christmas party organised at my church pastor's house. It was quite a rush to get there, I was an hour late, and I was in charge of the drinks along with this other guy.(Thankfully there were others there to cover my multitude of sins.)

The party turned really fun when we got to the Kriss Kringle bit - it was a Kriss Kringle with a twist: You got your presents in sequence, and opened it up there and then. The person who gets a gift later has the option of swapping his unopened gift for any of the other opened gifts.

I was one present away from getting a cool gift for the first time in my life - a Kathmandu wallet - when the person who picked the last unopened gift was the guy who was in charge of the drinks with me. He looked at me with an evil smile, and said 'My, HK has kept pretty quiet the whole night, ah, and I would looove a Kathmandu wallet!'

Anyway, I ended up with this instead:
Brokeback HK.

What would I want with a fluorescent pink cowboy hat, I ask you?

Sigh, well, there's always next Christmas.