Idiot patient #24981

Typical conversation at the dentist's:

Dentist (D): Ok, sir, you have a minor swelling around your molar. You need to take some medicine for a few days to help ease the pain and also to reduce the swelling before I can go in and do a root canal treatment.

Patient (P) : Ok. So will I feel pain?

D: You have to finish the 5-day antibiotics course that I am going to prescribe for you. Then the swelling will go down, and you will not feel pain when I do the treatment on that tooth. But you must finish taking the medicine accordingly first.

P: Yes. Ok. So will I feel pain after doing the treatment?

D: No, after we have performed the root canal treatment, your tooth is essentially 'dead' and therefore you will no longer feel pain from that particular molar tooth. But you must first take the medicine that I have prescribed for you, complete the whole course, and THEN come in for the treatment. Ok?

P: Ok. (Thinks a while...) Ok, So if I take the medicine and tomorrow I don't feel the pain, I can come to do it tomorrow?

D: No. You need to finish the entire course of the antibiotics I have prescribed for you first because the swelling may not have subsided adequately by tomorrow even if you don't feel the pain. So, you may still feel pain while I am performing the procedure if we do it tomorrow.

P: The root canal will be painful? I thought you said it won't be painful....

D: I said.... You need to take the medicine as instructed, whch means taking the antibiotics three times a day for five days, by which time you will finish the entire course of the medicine, and THEN when I do the procedure for you, you will not feel the pain.

P: Oh so no pain lah?

D: Yes, finish the medicine, then swelling goes down, then no pain.

A week later....

P: Doc, you said no pain, how come I still feel the pain? What kind of lousy medicine did you give me?

D: Hmmm.... (examines the tooth and finds residual swelling)... have you finished the medication that I prescribed for you?

P: Erm.... no, I didn't.

D: Why not?

P: I stopped after taking it for one day. I thought no pain already, so no need to take anymore.

D: [Speechless]

Honest, this happens all the time. And people wonder why my hair is falling out.

Redang 2008: Part 4

On my final day in Redang, I could not go diving due to the 24 hour 'no-fly-time' to make sure I don't get the bends en flight.

So I could only stand on the beach and watch with envy as divers go out and then resurface with smiles on their faces for having completed yet another rendezvous with the sea.

Later, I chanced upon a kiosk in the resort which offered 'temporary' tattoos using waterproof ink airbrushed onto the skin.

They had lots of designs to choose from, mostly stylised animal shapes like scorpions, snakes, dragons and dolphins. I chose a snake design for my back and a scorpion for my arm.

Nice or not? Hehehe.... For the next week or so, I will have to be careful not to scratch my back and also remember to lie down prone while sleeping.

Here's the scorpion design on my arm. It was supposed to be blue and red but they had run out of blue. So I settled for black and red instead. I think it makes me look 'fierce'. :p

Then, I got talked into having a third one... at a discount, of course!

I chose a lime green gecko for my left leg. Check out the red toes. Cool or what!

All in all, it was a fun way to spend the afternoon, getting all 'decorated' and having a reason to walk around half naked. Ha!

And that was it for my trip to Redang this time around. The diving was just so-so, my camera housing got kinda busted (yay, another reason to go shopping for a new camera....housing) and I got a few tatoos, even if it was only for a week. :)

Redang 2008: Part 3

I had some problems with my camera while underwater. Well, actually I had problems with the underwater casing. Some of the buttons wouldn't respond accordingly and I spent half the time just pressing the macro button like a crazy monkey on its first beetle of the day.

When I finally got it to go macro, the white balance button got jammed up pulak! DANG!

Hence the relatively few and poor quality of pix this time around. Solly lah. Asther, kasi chan ah. ;)

In any case, the poor visibility during most of the dives, coupled with the storng and unpredictable current made it all the more difficult to keep focus and get steady shots of anything animate. So... sponges, anyone?

I went back to Sandy Bottom again to find more qierd creatures I may have missed last year like this scorpion fish that doesn't swim. It walks!

The DM had really sharp eyes to spot this flatworm just lying erm.. flatly on the sand.

This is not a snake, its a pipefish. Sorry bout the green, forgot to switch on the flash / strobe light.

I took about 30 shots of this teeny tiny ... something... perched onto the whip coral. Asther?

Here's the Mrs Pipefish that we spotted swimming not far from the grey one.

Ooh... a new kind of nudibranch. Asther?

Another hermit crab wearing a 'Private Benjamin' type of hat.

The prerequisite shot of Nemo!

This is what they call a table coral. It was really big, about 10 feet across.

Up close, the surface looked like a 3 day beard growth on Nan's chin.... ;)... or on Crew's scalp....

A pair of very shy red feather stars trying to appear as inconspicuous as possible.

When I finally managed to get the camera and its housing to work, all the fishes had gone away.... sigh....

SO, what to do? Take pics of my dive buddy for the dive lor.... Meet Gregory, divemaster extraordinaire!

Redang 2008: Part 2

No trip to Redang would be complete without going for a dive (or two). This place never fails to surprise me with its bountiful fish, beautiful corals and out-of-this-world creatures.

My first dive was to a newly discovered Vietnamese boat wreck about a mile out east from the resort. The trip there was rather eventful as the waves and strong current took its toll on my queasy stomach. :p

The visibility this time around was quite bad, as we could only see only a few feet ahead of us, prompting some of the less experienced divers in our company to panic a little.

So down and down we descended into the blue nothingness, the bad viz not helping much... till we caught sight of an ominous dark shadow....

Imagine swimming in the semi-darkness, straining your eyes trying to make out the shape of something quite huge in front of you, and at the same time, turning round every few seconds to make sure you haven't lost sight of the others in the murky waters.... and then you see this, a huge spear-like anchor jutting out from the stern of the sunken ship pointing right at you.

I don't know why, but every time I see this picture, that dreaded Celine Dion song begins to echo in my mind and I know that it will go on and on....

Everywhere on this ship, all sorts of marine creatures, great and small can be found either attached to its surface or swimming around hunting for food.

Here's a blue-spotted stingray making its escape from pesky scuba divers disturbing its afternoon nap.

It took me about twenty shots to get a semi-decent picture of this tiny spider crab that was hanging on a whip coral for dear life as the currents swept everything (including us) around like rag dolls.

Anybody missing a brain?

I have to say that this dive was one of the most challenging ones I've had in Redang. The currents were really strong and the termoclimes made havoc of the visibilty not to mention causing a lot of us to get a shiver or two halfway through the dive.

Indeed, the lack of visibility only made this dive all the more mysterious and memorable. The only problem I had with it was that it completely jammed up my camera's ability to focus on anything but the biggest of creatures. ;)

Redang 2008: Part 1

Last Wesak I decided to go to Redang with a few of my buddies for a short break. As usual, I took the Airasia flight from KL (LCCT) to Kuala Terengganu where I then made my way to the Merang jetty about an hour from the airport. Oh, do try the Roti Jala on the in-flight menu. I really liked it and is highly recommended!

From Merang, it was another two hours by boat before we finally sighted the distant silhouettes of Redang Island made famous by that Sammi Cheng-Richie Ren movie "Summer Holiday"

As we approached the island, we could see a few small fishing-type boats anchored near the shore. These were used to transport the holiday-makers to various coral reef sites around the island for snorkelling and swimming.

Finally we arrived at our resort, Pelangi Redang which was situated in the heart of the main stretch of beach, Pantai Panjang.

After checking in our respective rooms, I decided to take a walk by the beach. I soon realised something. It was almost deserted!

Where was everybody? I looked to my left and my right and was hard pressed to find a single soul.

This was really strange, like something out of the Twilight Zone....

Then I realised the reason: it was only 10.00am! Since it's Island-time, everybody would still be asleep! Sure enough, people slowly began to come out of their hibernation and pretty soon, the beach was once again abuzz with activity!

As it was the long weekend, there were many families who took the opportunity to bring their children along for some fun in the sun.

And of course, there were the jokers whose idea of fun was to bury their sleeping friend in the sand in the hot afternoon sun to cook his nuts off....

Luckily the poor guy woke up in time to shake it all off..... oh wait, he actually liked being buried in the sand. Good luck getting all that sand out of ur ass, buddy!

Most of the other people just did the conventional thing: Hit the beach! Woohoo!

This time around, the waves were pretty high, and there were even a few surfers trying to ride the waves!

This couple was just content to stand there and look.... what a waste of a barely-there bikini!

Ah, this fella had the right idea.... why bother getting your hair wet with sea water, or have sand up your butt? What better way to pass a lazy afternoon than lying in a hammock, swayed by the cool sea breeze as the sound of the waves crashing onto shore lull you to sleep....

Life should always be like this.....