Skip to main content

Kuala Lumpur; familiar yet so different



Kuala Lumpur, the capital city of Malaysia has been my home for a good part of my life. Coming back every now and then from Singapore either for meeting or visiting my family, I see familiar yet unfamiliar sights. Some of the buildings are still the same to me; but the vibrancy of people moving around Jalan Bukit Bintang and the Petronas Tower gives me this insight that Malaysia is indeed exciting and continues to carry its warm hospitality to everyone who comes here. It is seeing to believe that no matter how long I am away, I am still a part of this country in which I started my journey of life.


I took the opportunity to take some photographs of Petronas Tower, the highest building in the world, until dethroned by Taiwan 101. This grand and "steely" structure exudes a strange feeling of pride as a citizen of the country, even though it may have been branded as those mega projects that do not benefit the people. I am not so sure after experiencing the pictures that keep coming into my mind. I provided samples of this humongous structure from the ground floor up, showing the engineering feat of the bridge that pulls the two towers together, providing stability and also emergency evacuation. The silvery glint in the night makes this Petronas Twin Tower, a sight to behold, and an insight of creativity and engineering.

From the 41st floor, shooting downwards, I saw this colorful and artistic playground for children. Likely from the bottom, it is hard to appreciate the design, but the sight from above gives me a totally different perspective of what designer could come out with.
From another part of 41st floor, I noted that even a roof top below it could be turned into a piece of art. It demonstrates that what the mind could see, the hands can conceive. Circles, triangles, squares can form patterns that we could easily miss as banal.
Tonight at Petronas Tower, what I see through my camera lens can give me different perspectives. In life, what I see daily as routine could be changed into something totally out of the ordinary, if only I take the time to see through a different lens. Do I take the time to look at the situation from someone else's shoes? If I were deaf, would the picture be different without the distracting noises? If I were blind, would the feeling of touch provokes a different understanding of the same object? The object could be familiar; but it could be different, if only I let my mind be opened to new perspective.
Thank you, Petronas Tower for this provocation to think beyond the ordinary.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Keeping Fit and Sleeping Good

A couple of HP alumni mentioned about folding bikes, exercise, and alumni meet up to me. It did not take me long to decide that the idea was good and aligned to my life goals. I did some research on folding bikes and to my surprise; this is an exploding industry, as more people become more environmentally friendly. It was reported that the OCBC Cycle 2101 (March) in Singapore this year drew 9500 versus 5000 cyclists last year. The Taipei Cycle exhibition is one where bike enthusiasts will be happy to attend. The magazine, Spin Asia is a must read to have a better appreciation of this industry (http://www.motorculture.com.sg/page27.html). I decided to purchase the Birdy Touring (http://www.birdy.com.au/) which has 24 gears (3 x 8) to allow me to have more flexibility to build up my stamina. I like the idea of the monocoque frame and the discounted pricing by DigiNexx helps to come to the decision. Since April 9, I have been using the Upper Thomson, Venus and Old Upper Thomson Road. I tr...
1 comment
Read more

Having Time for Self, Family and Friends

Singapore is a small island with an incredibly efficient infrastructure. By choosing to leave home early for work, I took only 15~20 minutes to reach office which is about 20 km away. A two way trip is less than 60 minutes. During my stay in Kuala Lumpur, it took me three hours for these two trips. This happened only if I leave office late to avoid the horrendous traffic jam. This is a saving of two hours per day which is ten hours a week! This is an awfully lots of hours to spend for personal leisure, family and friends. Another good time saver is bill payment by a system called GIRO, where invoice is automatically deducted from my accounts and payment by internet. Both are easy and accurate. Imagine lining up in a queue to pay your bill either at the post office; government office or a bank. Each time I have to spend an hour just to do this chore. Good bye to these non value added chores; thanks to the electronic payment system! Each of us have only 24 hours a day, and time saved mea...
Post a Comment
Read more

Passion in Doing

  Hobbies are heart and mind engaging. They provide the fuel to keeping the body going. The fuel to do research, practise and improve to appreciate the end result. Photography has been in my blood for a very long time. The earliest recall is when my father lent me his camera, which then used the 120 roll (if I am not mistaken). The camera was like a big Lumix LX3, except that when you pressed a button, a flap came down 90 degrees with the lens. There was only twelve negatives. I must have been 12 years old or so. Then I went to France, and I had enough money to buy my own Yashica camera, which is like a point and shoot, except it used 35mm film. It was in France that I bought my Canon AE-1 (SLR) from a Japanese adult student who was going home. I had a 50mm lens and I then bought a Tamron zoom as well as a doubler. I bought many filters (50mm) and experimented with Kodak filters; which I could buy and cut the film. My Vivitar 285 is still with me; except it cannot flash; though the...
Post a Comment
Read more