Green Day

I understand two icons now. Noah. And Freddy Mercury. I never thought that the day of desperation would come when I would use both names in one paragraph either but as Leonidas would say, "This is KERTEH!!!"

I feel Noah's frustration, his angst in waiting to step out on dry land. In like vein, for four weeks I have been drawing back the curtain only to find that the pelting from the night before persisted wetly into morning, and day break looked no brighter than day's end. Those four weeks and the hunger that the chilly monsoon winds and waters inflict have incurred upon me the girth gain of one Noah's larger hosts showing the results of forty days and forty nights of feeding with no frolicking. Whale would have been a fitter comparison but I doubt they needed the ark during the flood.



The Pilot's Meteorological Indicator Hill

But today was the second day without rain. The dove who returned with the olive branch yesterday hath not come back. The hill in front of the house that serves as my IMC/VMC indicator was clear!! It was a day to lean down the gangplank and stir the crank on my Merida. Holding my lungs in as I zippered up the Briko vest, I was appalled at the sight that glared back at me in horror from the mirror. I was ready for the obgyn to rupture my waterbag really; I should't be carrying that any longer.

Out the front gate, the routine right turn to the main road was traded for a left turn to head towards Kampong Chabang and who knows, p'raps Air Jernih fifteen kilometres further. Yeah, I have that Malaysian trait of heaping more on my plate than I can chew down ere the meal can begin, but I also believe in setting the eyes further than the legs can go so that I can push harder than myopia would offer as an excuse. Only, with a real plate and real food, I waste not what I want not.



Esiotrot

It was not long before I was pedalling my giblets out as the backroads provided gradients that bellowed their threats of cardiac arrest to anyone who has lapsed cycling for more than 72 hours. But the sting of sun upon the dermis was irresistible. I needed the sight of green foregrounding the deep azure, and such vistas can wring out a few more kilometres than would be yielded by breathlessness on twilight days. I fiddled with the Shimano triggers as the road climbed ahead of me to pave the bridge over the railway. It was revision that sometimes, a cyclist has no choice but to mash diligently. Again, the hill is not in the way, the hill is the way.

Yes, sir the grass is greener here

As I passed through the heart of Kampung Chabang, I encountered this young handsome bowler-hatted gentleman just short of the dotted line on his unfettered stroll to the other side of the road. I never leave one of these guys halfway to the greenests. One of my first garden finds in Kerteh was one such as he albeit of senior years, and from frequently finding them all over the place intact or struggling to remain so, I deduce that their demographics must be healthy. Perhaps the known scarcity of houses for rent in Kerteh drives for one to always carry one's home on one's back. I took advantage of this road less travelled to pick him up and wormhole him to his intended destination. After tipping my helmet to him in farewell I was not 30 seconds into furious pedalling uphill yet again when I sighted that which neither he nor I knew at the time of our meet-up: two 3-1/4 ton trucks hurtling past me on the opposite lane as if their drivers had graduated from Sepang's Inernational Circuit. I have new appreciation for the phrase not a moment too soon, though the value of what you don't know won't hurt you is completely lost for now. This one very nearly did.

Mist and Shadow, Cloud and Shade

After four weeks of rain, the sun drew out moisture from all living things. The hills were a fresh nature-laundered green, their misty breath hanging low and heavy even at 9 ad merides. Life was emerging to sun itself. Not all ended happily. One musang met with an untimely end as he attempted what my bowler-hatted friend had. This happens a lot in Kerteh, with simians and civet cats alike; this oil and gas town where the majority of hotshots believe in burning off the single offshore treasure faster than the refineries can process it by being speed demons. But damn, really, this was the T129 backroad for bloody goodness' sake. Must someone prove petrol prowess here amongst creatures who have more legitimate ownership to the premises than any conjured constitutional clause can claim for us?



The Beckoning Bicycle



The morning was drawing on. By the time I had made the junction twixt Air Jernih and Kemasik the sun was high. I braved uphill towards Air Jernih, pretentiously and falaciously not wanting to fail my alma mater, the old RMC, and pressed hard till my ribs cautioned me that they would snap out of my sternum unless I pulled over. I was at Kampong Semayor. I stood down at the mosque to sip some water and catch my breath. Okay, so this isn't going to make a 30km 'round trip, but after the month's hiatus, 26km would have to do.



The basis for the tint of G15 lenses



I hope this weather holds. Because I think I like the look of a green day.

Ode To Gee Eigh

This is what would play in my head when I was a general aviation pilot in Kota Kinabalu. Each day as I drove that short jaunt to the company to check my task for the day, a shiver would go down my spine.

Why?

Because the sight of the Crocker Range standing between me and all the intended destinations on the company's operating theatre always surfed my heart to my throat. It's like standing in the calm shallow pool downstream of a breathtaking waterfall, anticipating scaling the precipice, only your'e not Ethan Hunt. That very thing happens with valley winds. They build and eddy over the Crockers. When you're in the cockpit of a small helicopter like the Bell206B, you have to conjure the skills of a waterman, and how to negotiate your way around the rapids without dashing yourself to splinters over the water-polished boulders.

It's the thrill that made me feel completely alive by skirting on the fringes of possible death. Okay, so that is romanticising it, but any pilot would understand what I mean.

The heart rumbles in agreement with the hammering of the twin-bladed rotorbeat from 3 nautical miles away as you approach the crest of the range, the slopes rising to mock your frailty, then it pauses in bated breath to conspire with the eyes as they both gaze at the crest falling in sheer weightlessness under your feet as seen through the chin bubble, to deep menacing valleys passing quickly behind you that would embrace you in the arms of the afterlife should you tresspass where you do not hold sway over their world.

The cockpit of the Bell is often a solitary place when the job is done. All you have is the sight of that blade swishing past the cockpit bubble to tell you to that you're still buoyantly flying. There is no reassuring sound of another human voice in conversation over the intercom. Nobody to share the closing of the day with as the skids touch down on the company tarmac. There is just you, and the rest of the world beneath you. The solitary quiet can be spiritual. No, I have never in my stint flying the Bell dropped off passengers and whistled in the cockpit at two thousand feet and ten minutes later felt the presence of anyone from the Obits Hall Of Fame seated beside me, but honestly, that segment of time can become rather sacred and prayerful.

Yes, on rare occasions other thrills can make their way into a task. I thoroughly enjoyed a 3-day-2-night task in Kundasang ferrying people into and out of Kampong Naradan with Capt Harold. It was the rarified mountain air, the looking forward to hot meals at the end of the day, the coordination with a team mate, the see-and-be-seen of flying through the mountains, seeking out the river bend that conduits the way to the village tucked in the very horn of the valley where the local MP has his electoral activities to run, without colliding into each other in the absence of positive air traffic control.

Here at the end of the working day, there is fodder for conversation over a pint, your senior team mate giving you tips on how the local winds can wreak havoc at a particular saddle, reducing your main rotor thrust, sinking you and your passengers et alia if you know not how to ride the wave through the channel of the valley to the other side where calm prevails. Sleep comes as you tuck under the covers, whispering gently in your ear, "Enough. Enough now." Then a new day, mist over the peak of South East Asia, and more new fun till the sun goes down.

Bad weather springs as another source of unsolicited excitement as a given on any task. When our Premier was running a trip to Kemabong and Sipitang to officiate cultural events departure from KK itself was with cloud base at 1500 feet. But it was a helicopter party with Capt Harold behind me, Capt Ross ahead, my Flight Ops Manager somewhere in the air and the air force in the Nuris and the Blackhawk, so it allowed cross-consultation between aircraft on the weather conditions subject to who was ahead. The GA thing to do was to fly coastal to Beaufort and sniff the way to Kemabong through either Melalap or the Tenom valley Gap. Cloud cover forced me to emerge above cloud top at 5000 feet, but allowed crossing the range into Tenom where a break in the cloud provided a dive to low level and navigating by mist-laden rivers to Kemabong quite safely.

However, the second leg of the trip from Kemabong to Sipitang saw me trapped in pretty nasty weather in the valleys when three seconds of confusion between an erroneous portable GPS display while banking and scanning the limited horizon for recognisable features got the better of me. The downpour and all ridges and valleys choked with cloud saw me circling over and over and finally giving up, landing in a football field to sit out the weather. The curious locals who passed by provided forecasts that were far from encouraging. Three times when the rain abated, I attempted a lift-off but was beat back by a barricaded way ahead by nasty black cloud. Perhaps my passengers were chagrined at not being able to follow the Premier's proceedings, but a first-hand view at what bad weather looks like from the cockpit tamed their potential for complaint. It took to the end of the day for the weather to finally lift sufficiently to allow the non-instrumented Bell to hobble its way home to KK. I trust my face bore the hallmarks of a weather-beaten pilot.

I recall one trip to the Tip Of Borneo, to Simpangan Mengayau for a Brit millionaire who wanted to scout out a piece of land there that he intended to turn into yet another cash cow for his milking. He was waiting with his wife on the jetty at Bunga Raya Resort, on the Western cove of Pulau Gaya. The start of that task was already with trepidation as from start up to landing at the jetty, the aircraft seemed to be overconsuming fuel. A full tank of 95 gallons should have taken us on a round trip comfortably, and overconsuming with no refueling options en route was the start of the thrill on my captaincy. And dealing with millionaires poses its own strain on diplomacy, as some of them can be such petulant brats.

However, the good millionaire Gupta turned out to be a cool chap who accomodated me returning to KK for a quick top-up into the tanks prior seting course to Simpangan Mengayau. There, he met with another Deutsche Caucasian to chinwag over his millions as they downed bottles of Moet while I waited with his tourist guide in the public car park, allowing grown men to first pick up their jaws off the pavement, then mill 'round the Bell with the fascination only seen in toddlers for their Kodak moments. After an hour, watching this loses its novelty, and wandering uphill to the gazebo where the Deutscheman was rummaging in his basket for more Moet, I was suddenly lifted out of my mortal ranks when in the course of smalltalk, it became known that I was a Sea King pilot. Then Gupta confessed with ill-concealed pride his 14 hours as a sunshine pilot in waiting and asked for a more exciting trip back to Bunga Raya.

So, beginning with lift-off, I plunged the Bell over the hill and gunned for the coast such that my passengers were gawking at fir-lined beaches sweeping by their shoulders, parched paddy bunds and buffalo wallows scrolling swiftly past their feet and cars peppering their way back to KK's adorable coastline. Through my Randolphs, I could see Gupta turning his head backward to grin broadly at his wife. I wonder and wager his thoughts were of how his millions could make a pilot give them what few other couples could witness for  amorous thrills on a business trip. Yet, even on such as these, it can be quite exciting just keeping the customers satisfied.

But again, at the end of the day, like on many days, the cockpit is once again empty save for me, and I make my way home to the consoling view of KK's runway and the final stop at the company tarmac at Terminal Two, filling the silence of the thumping helicopter by singing to myself.

Reluctantly, I concede to bid farewell to my GA days.

Shiver me timbers, I'm a sailing away.

Blue Steak

A five day spell had come upon this sleepy town of stereotypically visible cultures. The preceding week bestowed upon those without a better guess five days of sun, the light of which we had not seen in months. I had forgotten the feel of warmth, of how the world looks under the pure luminescence of sunlight.

The days here keep rolling past, one day into the next in seamless overlap hemmed in by fatigue and the enormity of the facts that I must catch up on by reading manuals that are a sure cure for insomnia. I peruse through the pages, and I feel I get just half the story from the abominable meanderings of a manual translated from French into English. The words of a friend I turned to when at the crossroads between leaving general aviation and plunging into the world of offhsore flying keep ringing in  my head: "This is the learning phase. You must suffer as all of us did."

But frankly, the confluence of his words and my initial struggle in Marseilles congealed to paint a dark and foreboding picture of the offshore flying world.

Now that I have cleared my line check and am released to fly no more with training captains but with any operational captain, the dust has settled somewhat. There is no real "mystery" about flying offshore, as long as self-education remains a skill that has not been lost in the inertia of clocking extensive hours at the controls of the aircraft you are familiar with. Now as I peruse the manuals, I go slowly instead of the hunting and pecking for muddled information like poultry in the feeding trough. I may have  a long way to go yet, but as I see even my training captains reading through their manuals even after three decades in this business, I know that being a hot shot is no ambition to cling to.

Today was my first operational sortie to two rigs more than a hundred nautical miles from Kerteh. I encountered my first emergency, and returned home to discuss it further with my aircraft captain who was also my training captain for most of my line training sorties. It is in times like these that you really learn about your aircraft. You learn to trust it as you prepare to handle it as laid down in its documents and procedures.

I also recall my Flight Operations Manager's words when he tried to talk me out of leaving the previous company: "I don't want you to regret joining offshore flying. It's monotonous." Right. Twist my arm was more like it.

There is sufficient scheming and conniving in the offshore business to keep you on your toes. It is anything but monotonous. While I can with reference to the charts and the navigational instruments determine the oil fields I am flying over, I have not arrived at telling from a mere glance at a rig its identification. I do not yet have the entire operational area sketched in my head. I still have to refer to the manuals to know whether I am heading to an Exxon rig or a Carigali platform.

Planners will at times try and gloss over limitations that you must insist on safeguarding. Passengers will seek the aftmost seats in which to catch forty winks and by that choice offset the centre of gravity of the aircraft, and it is upon your shoulders to clamber into the cabin and usher them forward. There are various summary dealings and oversights, and weather and sea states. If anyone says that offshore flying is monotonous, I trust that either inertia has got the better of him, or its an expiration of hubris as his relevance is relegated to the general aviation world. This is not to lord over my brethern branches of helicopter flying, but really, as yet I cannot see monotony and offshore flying as synonymous.

In any case, this beast is a handsome machine to fly. Her equipment is top-notch and the apex of this learning curve is set far enough ahead to last my remaining years in the company.

In the mean time, I keep looking down through the left cockpit window between radio calls and cruise checks and muse at the vista below, for all appearances to me a marbled prime cut steak in infinite blue. I can get used to this.

You Know You're A Newbie Offshore Helicopter Pilot When...

1.  Your sortie cannot be written off in the authorisation sheets as "Cancelled Due To Weather".

2. You are expected to track navigational aids' radials outbound to your destination rather than look for a bridge or a valley or a limestone bluff that leads the way there.

3.  The popular question, "What's the name of that village down there at three o'clock low??" has been replaced by "What's the name of that rig?"

4.  You've stopped worrying about See-Fit or Controlled Flight Into Terrain (CFIT). In other words, you're not so worried about slamming into the side of a hill when encountering poor visibility.

5.  You've forgotten what the world looks like when  the horizon cuts your windscreen at a 45-degree angle of bank or the joy of skimming at treetop height over a hundred knots.

6.  On base leg to land in a violent crosswind you cannot overbank past 25 degrees to intercept the extended runway centreline for the sake of the passengers' comfort, so you overshoot said centreline and offer them the scenic landing of the runway to either the right or left of the aircraft.

7.  Your safety consciousness says the pilot who buries his head in the cockpit may one day be buried in the cockpit, BUT...you still have to bury your head in the cockpit sometimes as you do the paperwork for the passengers and payload for each destination platform.

8.  Ninety percent of the time, you're flying straight in the dead centre of a cumulus instead of doglegging randomly to get around it and you're not sure how much it bothers you...or not.

9.  You call out V1 and VToss and Vy instead of counter flapback and inflow roll, translational lift and above critical speed in a take-off run.

10.  The best brandname you have is a BHPC GMT, while your passengers unanimously wear Oakley, Tissot, Deuter and Red Wing.

11.  You meet your passengers off duty at the same restaurant where you slurp down kuey teow soup while they buy themselves a lobster...each.

12.  Pilot and passengers alike have congregated at the row of urinals in the mens' room 5 minutes before rotor engagement.

Would Jennifer Love HUET?

Here is a face that even I, as a mother, cannot love. Perhaps some Jennifer out there could, but to me, it is the ghastly face of the penultimate torture chamber, the horror that awaits me now every three years in recurrence. This is the face of the HUET simulator.

I don't know how young I was when my pre teen uncle took me to a disused kampong pool where he and his friends met for a unauthorised swim. I stayed on the banks, but in these vague memories, I remember him persuading me to ride piggy back on him into the waters where without warning, he dislodged me and I drowned, for an interminable replay of horror before he decided to toss me back on the banks.

From that moment, I have had a morbid fear of the water. I remember that ever since that age, during which I must have been three or four, I was terrified of washing my hair, and I would scream whenever I was given a bath. At the time I didn't know why I did that. It took me many years to understand, let alone get past that fear.

This phanthom followed in my footsteps all my life. Then in 1984 came the Royal Millitary College, and the complimentary two years of lowering the level of the olympic sized pool by ingesting the chlorinated water into my lungs and belly. My Regimental Sergeant Major, WO Thazali Che Lah, named me the parade commander of the swimming pool, for if I was in it, my voice could be heard throughout the college grounds, all the way up to Boys' Wing. The dumbkopf didn't see that I would have joined the blooming navy if I had better affinity for water. When the jungle warfare training phased into watermanship and river crossing, I was lucky that I was coincidentally paired with a swimmer and he reassured me throughout the exercise that I was going to be okay. I am still grateful for all his reassurances amidst the jeering of instructors and cadets alike, which quelled to reverent but disappointed silence when I calmly made it across without summoning the entire population of Hulu Langat to my rescue, making for less of  a show than they had anticipated.

Then I deluded myself into believing that all was well after being comissioned into the Royal Malaysian Air Force. I would be up in the air now wouldn't I? My only claim to being comrades with my white-uniformed brethren from the seafaring sister service was that I too was a Navel Officer seeing that I would never venture into water deeper than the level of my belly button. No, nobody in the wardrooms ever understood that either.

But then in the 90s, after a horrific Nuri crash off Mukah Head where only two survived from a crew of seven, air force helicopter crew bred kinship with their offshore fraternity when the Helicopter Underwater Escape Training was made compulsory for operational pilots and crewmen, a requirement that followed on to transport and maritime squadrons as well. My first taste of this devilry was in 1998 when I served as a copilot in Labuan.

The course was to be held in Tutong if I remember correctly, at Lee Safety Technology, an offshore safety and training centre. We arrived at Muara Besar at noon and were entertained at night by the course coordinator at Jerudong Park, but I kept a stiff upper lip throughout the festivities, not wanting to give away that I was already enduring nightmares about having my head under so much as even an inch of water.

Amidst it all, I was able to muster self control, kept myself single-minded and did all my escapes sucessfully, even the one with the smoked goggles to simulate ditching in darkness. I had to 're-sit' one escape as I had egressed through the wrong door, totalling 11 escapes altogether. Then on graduation day, the euphoria of not having died trailed me all the way back home to Labuan.

However, my demons were not exorcised. I had no idea that this was bloody recurrent training for aircrew. The truth hit me when I was in No 10 Squadron, in 2004 and I was nominated alongside crew from Butterworth. This time it was to be held in the Terengganu Safety And Training Centre, and the contractor had us housed in the Awana Kijal resort. Oh I knew this drill too well. We were so mollycoddled in Brunei too, but it was all the fattening of the calf ere the butcher's blade, I mused. Then I wondered, do the swimmers have a better time of it all anyway? Anyhow, that was that and again, I returned to KL Base feeling relief that it was for the time being, over.

My final stint was in 2008 under Megamas, again, in Brunei. It was a load easier than the preceding courses, as being the only pilot around, I just had to do one escape. To my immense relief and renewed religious faith, the instructors thought it better worth their while to concentrate on the crewmen who, for the first time ever, had the addditional task of extracting a casualty in the form of a dummy from the cabin during their escape. Phew!!!! Now I know why I am a mere pilot, and have only the side door through which to egress.

But final it was not. Whilst I was flying for the better portion of this year in Sabah HUET was not on the radar in the general aviation world. Less life threatening stuff was on recurrent training, like Dangerous Goods Regulations and First Aid. Then as I grew to be disconcerted with the general aviation's frequent flying in the Dead Man's Curve, I realised that venturing into offshore flying would mean I would have to contend with HUET once again.

So when I left Sabah for the current job, I floundered under the yoke of my nightmares coming back to snuff my lights out. I couldn't even fully yield to my flight training, my limbs frozen stiff from half my mind seeing all the drowning scenes from all the movies I had ever watched looping ceaselessly as I without success wrested control of this most recalcitrant helicopter. No, it wasn't her really. It was I. She is just...French.

I faced my demons two weeks ago, coming full circle, standing with bated breath at the edge of the pool once again at the Terengganu Safety And Training Centre, seemingly seeing the end of my days pendulously awaiting my acquiesence, all blue fibreglass and dripping from the pervious batch's escape training.

And we understand each other now. My demons may visit me once in three years. We shall duel. And then they shall depart after having made sport of me till the next triennial visit.

I was okay underwater once I yielded to being there. Save for one minor panic attack during which I took down a caboodle of water in the second escape, I managed every egress, and clung fast to the simulator once I had surfaced. It is a mere three seconds from unbuckling to surfacing, and as Brenda says, this is what may save my life in this job scene so I may as well embrace it.

No, my demons have not been exorcised. I still hate the water. I even hate it when people say, why not learn to swim?? Yeah why don't you go ahead and sleep in Joe's Apartment 24/7 for a fortnight then? And of course, this gem: Wot?? You can't swim?? I thought ALL pilots can swim. While it is true that there is no accounting for dumbkopfness, I have also lost count of those who can't tell airmen from seamen, and that I tell you is a serious dilemma when the sacred and the profane appear one and the same. Besides, tell me how much enjoyment to expect while being strapped into this claustrophobia-inducing capsule and the simulator operator does this:

In consolation, I would like to thank a certain Captain Micheal, an ex-Royal Navy pilot now serving in an offshore helicopter company, who with regard to HUET comfortingly put my age old question from paragraph 9 to rest  by saying, "Nobody ever gets used to it."

Yes, and thanks to Megamas and Youtube for allowing the media to be downloadable.

Even The Lowly

Certificate Of Test: a generous force-fed serving of Humble Pie which recurs on the basis of its unpalatability.

That's how I view my certificate of test. I am apalled at my dystrophic handling of the EC225 today. I wrestled with her, fought, grunted and struggled. But this bucking bronco would not be busted. I know I stayed up till 0200H this morning going through drills and memorising emergencies. I feel as though I have fallen. Indeed I have fallen. Fair it is then to take note that a hard fall accrues not just to the high and mighty, but can be at unsought for times, the staple of the lowly.

Okay, I am really trying to salvage my self worth. But as I recall my examiner's adjectives, the echo of words like mess, horrible and awful keep coming back.

But I passed. In 6 months I will face this same Sea Of Tea.

Hmmm. Okay that's done. I must stop mourning and move on as the pace is not about to let up.

Ahead of me I have a few sorties of Instrument Flying. Already the crew room is filled with the haggling voices of many aircraft captains with as many interpretations of the minima for departure under instrument meteorologocal conditions. The monsoon seems to have stirred a resurgence in the debate over when pilots may say no to a departure under weather conditions that are not altogether felicitous.

Now, the sight of a cumulonimbus can quail me. My one experience as an aircraft captain, of being trapped in bad weather and the subsequent isolation in the cockpit as my copilot petrified himself remains hardwired in my mind like the instant replay of a drowning incident. In other words, I would avoid bad weather at all costs. I love terra firma in comparison to the azure especially when I already know how things look, cockpit view, in thick black precipitation, with the prospect of the mountain crests gouging out your underbelly as you descend below cloud to avoid the thickest storms. Utterly unsettling.

Twice this week I have been in the jump seat, on operational flights to the barges and platforms, consuming about 3 hours each, and I am supposed to pick up 30 jump seat hours before I am considered qualified to progress to line training. The jump seat is a perch between the two pilots. It provides for a voyeuristic means of learning the inflight procedures for offshore flying so that by the time one is due for line training, he/she would have garnered enough knowledge on the procedures as to carry out copilot duties with minimal error and prompting. The reason why it is called a jump seat is because no sooner than one has strapped into it, the very fetal position it demands encourages the occupant to jump out. No, I really don't know the origins of the term. This is my personal rationalisation of an irrational posture to adopt whist in the process of learning and does not reflect the policy or viewpoint of the organisation.

Anyhow, I am getting used to the idea of being over the deep blue sea for hours on end, considering how I hate the water. I have watched without overwhelming fear as the EC225 consistently pulled passenger and crew alike through towering Cbs, emerging on the sunny side with better composure than a 737 doing the same barging through stormclouds. Yes, finally a helicopter that flies itself  right?

Now that has really got to be uber cool.

Still More Readjustment Blues

The mounds of hay in the compound stand in alternating states of dry and wet in harmony with the fluctuating weather. I keep struggling with this new aircraft that persists in baffling me to bits, like the sophisticated new girlfriend with tantrums encouraging the return to the former familiar girlfriend who would be much easier to navigate around. Yes, even with such a beauty as the EC225, I pine for my Sea King.

There are six weeks that stand between the emptiness that echoes through the house and the shrieks of arguments and insults that I hope will nullify this void I endure daily when the family arrives to end the agreed to exile we have been living for nigh a year now. Nothing changes much when you live apart from the people you can miss when you drop them off at school or when you open a lunch box and see the love that they put in it.

The bougainvillea has bloomed. Monkeys sip water from the roadside puddles and hold their conferences on the rim of garbage dumpsters, courting death at every convention. The village people find the carcasses as easily disposable as a toss straight into the garbage dumpster. A few days ago, I saw a herd of wildboar cross the road in waves of earthen grey just above the shrubline along the road to the airport. Sights such as these tell me that life may still be livable in this sleepy hollow where the moss gathers to watch the grass grow.

I have had my second sortie in the new bird. I will concede that she is beautiful, and lovely to fly. She is after all, not  8 months old yet in the livery of the company. But she takes forever to wind through in the system checks and start ups, making me wonder if this is the manner of courtships of all French ladies. Though having been to France and bits of Europe, Oz, Scandinavia and Blighty, I have no overwhelming fascination or movie star appeal toward the caucasian woman, if you will pardon my French.

Tomorrow is my Certificate Of Test. The moment my examiner asks me as he has said he will, "Are you ready for your C of T?", I do not know how much honesty I can muster in reply. Yes, I should have more faith in myself. Some of the guys ahead of me really should be an inspiration, even if what I know of them isn't...so I guess I am going to be waving back when I come out the other end.

Anyway, life has to go on and it has. After many weeks of having to make do with streetside warongs selling overfried fish, chicken smelling and tasting like the scariest substances you read about from internet spam and the crippling inability to tell nasi goreng kampong from nasi goreng kangkong, I finally found my favourite food tucked away in a tiny stall with no signboard run by a husband and wife team, simply known by word of mouth as 'Sundrams'. I have also befriended a copilot from China who recently teamed up in the company who is as crazy about rice and curry as I am so it's no winning awards for anyone who guesses who snapped this uncomplimentary picture of me straining at the bit to plough through the leaf.

Also, while skirting around Awana Kijal looking for him, I discovered not one but two Chinese 'no serve pork' restaurants less than two hundred metres from the lobby. So, Jin Hao and I alternate twixt Sundrams' and these two for our daily meals. Poor Jin Hao can't drink beer as he wants to obviate spiking his uric acid level, and he does not see himself cycling, but he confesses to loving the swimming pool. Yes. Right. Well, no friendship is porfiq.

Yes, and I did fall in love at a junction for about five minutes. This is the sweetest face I have seen in Kerteh to date, so should you harbour any armorous intent on visiting here for a beach romp, be warned that this is about as good as it gets. The face of a confused cow, staring at me, unable to deduce whether I was a life threatening entity or one worth goring with stubby horns, so we played at the out-staring game for the duration of the snapshot. The low rumble of a 20-valve Levin always tempts other means of transport beside me to show me their dust, so I do not blame her for such posturing at all. I grinned broadly at her before I drove slowly to the house, still seeing her indecisive face and soft dark eyes in my mind as my front gate loomed ahead of me.

But tomorrow I contend with mammoiselle. Sacrebleu!

Parles Vous Anglais?

You can imagine being whisked through 5 days of ground school, then returning to KK and packing up to organise your move back to the peninsula, and then before you can do much else, shoot off to France for simulator training on an aircraft you have not so much as sat in yet. It's rather forbidding isn't it? It makes me want to scream merde rather than Sacre bleu.

But here I am now in the middle of the week of simulator training in the ancient city of Marseilles. I am getting better at the EC225, though not as fast as I wish I could. My friends keep telling me that this is the "learning curve", and thus I must suffer as they all did. I am grateful for little satirical consolations such as these which they offer me. The EC225 in simulator mode is a bronco to bust, and I am once again wondering if I am worthy of my wings. But it should come to me before the end of my career, so that should not be so bad. With that in mind, I shall refrain from saying too much about my thorny path towards the left hand seat in the EC225.

Instead, let me speak of the corner of Marseilles I am living in. I am housed in the Adagio aparthotel and I glean from the signboards that this is in the Cote D'Azur, which sounds like 'the blue coast' to me. Fair enough, Marseilles Provence is a sparkling seaside city with an extensive port and marina, with ships the like of which I have never seen before. These vessels are so gargantuan I can imagine the entire population of KK on the deck of even one of them. Then too, the entire population of KK would in fact prefer the ship because the residences don't look all ultra modern and sparkling the way the port impressed me. People here live in little apartments posing as the Gallic equivalent of our own Pekeliling Flats in the middle of dingy Kuala Lumpur. The apartments astride the Adagio look post apocalyptic even, swarming with immigrants and numerous homeless people, lending an overall Book Of Eli feel to the locale.

Down the street, a right turn and 80 yards away is a pizza-kebab-salad canteen, run by an Egyptian named Mohammed. It's the closest point of sustanence for me, and so far I have been shuttling meals between Mohammed's cheeseburgers and kebabs in pita bread on the one hand, and jambon crudite sandwiches from a vending machine at Helisim on the other. I swear, the minute I am on board the mas flight back to KL from Charles De Gaulle on Tuesday, I am going to beg the stewardess for a nasi lemak, be it on the menu or no. I thought myself a true omnivore with Brenda's pastas, breads and pies but my real craving now is for a platter of biriyani rice, chicken varruval and sagh. Yes, sagh, not any other spelling variant of that word. Or maybe...hold that thought...

I have not faced too many problems with language, and the French's reputation for utter disdain towards the English-speaking has not made itself apparent yet. Perhaps it is the Helisim's mixed patronage of Americans, Australians and other international customers. Perhaps it is the presence of the many immigrants. Perhaps Marseilles is far from the fanatical Parisienne hub. My inappropriate bonjour and merci and misplaced sil vous plais are best dispensed with before the locals declare me barbaric. Kevin Kline and Depardieu have been no help whatsoever. On the subject of losses in  translation, while the French can communicate in English and indeed, do so when dealing with international clients, the results of their exercise of the language can be hilariously misinterpreted. I don't  think this notice over the vending machine needs elaboration to those with so much as a mild imagination.

The days have suddenly taken a welcome turn for the colder, nippier feel in the air. I am no closer to feeling prouder of myself than when I first attended ground school in Paka as I can't get a feel for the EC225 in sim. Everyone here is reasuring me that I am just suffering from simulatoritis. Yes, there actually is such as thing, and I can remember doing quite clumsily in the Sea King simulator in Bournemouth and Stavanger for at least the first 4 out of 12 hours. Okay, so there may be hope for me yet.

I am wearied, too, as this has been the third 3 am morning start for me, and my internal clock is really in  a shambles. I sleep at odd times, get hungry at odd times and I feed that hunger at times not of its calling. Anyone can tell you, that this is just so typical of a simulator course!

But then  again, the mid-point has been reached. Thankfully, my instructors are Malaysian, not Gallic. Some of them are former air force veterans. This makes things a bit smoother not merely because of the language or culture but also the date-time-group. They are in as bad shape as I am contending with jet lag, and this makes for better empathy towards this zero-offshore houred pilot.

Eventually, this nightmare in Marseilles will draw to a close. Then will come the type technical exam, followed by the C of T. Man, am I steady inbound for a party or what?

Being Dapple Grey

In about 6 days, I will be leaving Kota Kinabalu for the second time in my life. The first was when I was being handed over to yet another auntie for guardianship at the age of 16. This time, though, the election is self-motivated.

Though My Heart Quiver was penned after many weeks of restlessness, my sleeping hours pursued by a ghostly presence, of what I wasn't sure. It was only when I was flying back from Sandakan after my week-long detachment there that it began to form a discernible picture. I realised that as I kept flying with my heart in my mouth each time I encountered enroute weather and used my airmanship to cross the ranges as judiciously as I could, that this was not the way to fly.

I should enjoy going up in the air. I wasn't feeling that here. I kept getting the creepy feeling that at anytime this aircraft was going to take me to my death. I had flown the Nuri for a good 15 years now, and with all the derogatory names the media and civilian public had for her, I always felt safe flying her. I may not have always been in safe situations, but I knew that whatever happenned, by handling her correctly, I could overcome the hazards and remain in control.

Flying for the filming crew of Gerimis Mengundang drove the fact home that in general aviation, I would keep getting placed in situations that run against my aviator's better sense whilst satisfying the dictates of the clients' hire.

But God has been kind enough to me to have dragged me through 15 years in service life in gaining a marketable trade, and therefore I had choices when faced with this discomfort. I have been called by all the Malaysian offshore companies and I have settled for one, since they said yes to me immediately, that also because they were the first company I called.

I attended the ground school two weeks ago. I have tied up all loose ends in the current company and completed my clearance. My digital satellite receiver connection has been suspended till I reconnect in Kerteh. The phone and internet line will be terminated shortly. My personal effects were packed and taken away by the forwarders on Friday. I now sit in an empty apartment waiting for the prearranged dates to hand over the car to Transmile so that it can be flown to Subang, reducing the waiting time to a few days insted of a minimum of three weeks were I to send it via the forwarders, and the flight that will take me away from here for good.

Life's certainty of changes is about to take another pendulous swing in mine, and the lives of the ones who are dependant on me. The uncertainty of what those changes will bring is the source of a second round of restlessness, though I know that by all discernible means, this should be a change for the better. I will be flying one of the world's finest medium lift helicopters. I will learn to fly in poor weather with reference to my instruments and trusting to surrender the controls to the autopilot.  I won't even be dressing up in the traditional airline pilots uniforms as the company issues nomex flying suits to the aircrew.




 

So if all is as good as it heralds itself to be, what is it that has me second guessing myself? It's the perennial fear that I may have yarned myself a rope up out of the frying pan only to slide into the fire. But whatever comes I must face it as I have already signed 5 years of my life away during the ground school phase. It's too late to back out and I don't want to go back to the general aviation world.

Sigh.



Let's see what happens as I cross each bridge ahead and I pray that they are not suspended over a boiling lake of lava.

NHT

Here are some comments left by knowledgeable readers of Malaysia Today in response to " Singapore Armed Forces Conducts Readiness Exercise":

(a) A War is not always about the HIGH TECH gears.... Its about the Heart and True Patriotism. If the Polis only attack armless citizen, and SHOT people carrying a walking stick.... Multiply to a Solider at war, will start flee when The real Bullet storm....

See the Sargent of our Army force---- to the ----- so called Generals.......... all are way over weight.... How to fight?

(b) And the Government readily threatens to use army etc against the rakyat just because the rakyat wants free and fair elections. Weird

(c) WHAT!!! No Submarine? How to win???

OMG!!! I pray most fervently that this isn't a reflection of Malaysian intelligence, for if it is, we are doomed.

Then we have these in response to "Mindef says RM493.3m additional budget necessary to ‘maintain’ Scorpene subs":

(a) Heck, nowadays when we buy a car, we get maintenance free for 3 years. Now we just got hold of our 2 submarines and we forgot to ask for maintenance free. So let the taxpayers foot another RM500 million. Something is wrong somewhere folks. We can lose a jet engine. Wouldn't surprise me if we lose one submarine or two. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Really? I bought my Vios brand new, and it's still under hire purchase. All the calendar maintenance is charged separately. Where's the 'free' bit? Now I don't know if I should laugh or weep.

(b) JUST SELL IT LA... go and MAKE YOUR RM100m commission la.

WIn WIn for u and Rakyat.

The sub cannot sink anyway... in case of wars, I'm 200% sure that Malaysian Army will surrender within days.

The common denominator running through these and many more of the comments responding to the articles is the bloody vein of disdain the writers have for the Malaysian Armed Forces.

The Malaysian Armed Forces is apolitical by function. They serve the people under orders from the Supreme Commander which is our King.

First and foremost, I love reading MT. Having served the government for more than half my life, I see in MT's revelations a reflection of the cheating and fabrication I have witnessed as an airborne taxi driver for our Executive. And the comments under the MT posts reek of people who are dying to take a swipe at the government for the repetitive acts of ineptitude it has exhibited. I will not blame these guys, because this is the only avenue they have for self expression.

But let's get over the submarine that can't sink already okay? It was just ONE incident when the ballast tank pumps were unserviceable and it inadvertantly found its way into the news. It then became the new "missing fighter jet engines" joke for the Malaysian public. The navy made the decisive smart move to declare the sub unserviceable, for better not to submerge than for that same pump failure be unable to empty the ballast tanks and the submarine fail to rise, thereby poisoning all hands underwater.

Get past it. Keeping on with that stale issue is like being an old nagging spouse who will NOT let go if his/her partner's transgressions. Does this help the relationship? That the submarine sailed underwater from France to Malaysia seems absent.

Please read: http://securemalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/03/so-if-you-say-it-still-cannot-dive.html

I tried to register on MT so I could speak my piece but it was a long winded pay-first-before-registration, and through PayPal too. Defeated, all I have is the futility of my blog to rant in.

Now hear this:

The Malaysian Armed Forces is apolitical by function.

We have never engaged against civillians except during the May 13 riots when the police could no longer preserve public order, and yielded control to the army to disperse rioteers. Just once. For the hold over public order is a grip that the police do not want to yield ever again. That is why they kept it tight during the Reformasi days.

But sigh...in this country where the war was fought secretly while the rest of you slept in your beds, you have not learned to tell a soldier from a cop.

The striking new wisdom post Bersih 2 is, that while we can look upon you free peoples who braved chemically laced water cannons and tear gas and the truncheons as our heroes, the inverse seems impossible.

Interesting thought, isn't it?

We are in demand by the UN as peacekeepers as we have always conducted ourselves professionally in armed service. We have never been afraid to face the enemy whether those who terrorised our people from the jungles as commies or in foreign lands where lives of innocent civillians were under threat . We have lost men overseas in keeping our assigned watch over people not equipped for the job. For those who watch run after re run of Blackhawk Down on astro, please do not think for a second that the actual story of the ambush in Baqarra Market was what was being depicted. The true story is that nobody wanted to rescue the ambushed American soldiers because it was too risky. Only the Malaysian soldiers would go on to a ferocious gun and bayonette battle to successfully extricate the Americans after a dusk to dawn combat engagement.

Please read http://war-story.blogspot.com/2009/12/sabung-nyawa-di-mogadishu.html

We performed, in Congo, in Cambodia, Bosnia and Acheh. We were called upon to serve in the Ivory Coast a few years ago but we had to turn it down because we needed the Nuris here to serve the nation's needs. We still serve to guard against Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden.

The point is this: that our soldiers have died for the people, preserving peace, so that you can go about your business, even if it is to tar us with the same brush used against politicians.

We need the right hardware so we can do our work. Often in the past, matters were much worse in that we were told to accept stuff we didn't want just because a deal had been inked by the powers that be. And flying these machines, our boys have died. We are just asking for the right stuff. What shadiness takes place outside of our hands, is just that. Outside of our hands.

You may have a tiff with the boss, who in all possibility is an arse. Your differences with him is no fault of the guy who watches the gates in the interest of the company. It doesn't make you a better man if you spit on him as you exit the premises.

Please do not scorn the soldiers who have died, and who may die for you without you even knowing it.

I wish these armchair military analysts would pick up a rifle and stand sentry along the extensive hostile borders of this nation and know what it is to really serve your country; yes, a country that will most determinably forget that you stood to give your life for many.