Saturday 18 April 2009

=D



It all started on that Wednesday night, like about nearly 11 p.m., when I was falling asleep...

...and my phone started vibrating.

So, me, being the person who hates answering phone calls when I'm half-asleep, pressed the red button.

Then it vibrated again.

So, me, being the intelligent person, looked at the phone number and recognised it and thought this better be urgent and I pressed the green button and said Hello?

It was June, on whether I wanted to join the Charis Hospice Treasure Hunt thing on Saturday.

=D that's when the fun began!

..

Saturday morning finally came.

Zac and June had already came to my place the day before, briefing me about stuff about the treasure hunt.

Apparently me and Peili were supposed to be the ones solving the cryptic clues.

Cryptic like:

House in main diagram. (Ans: India House)

Yeah, we'll get to more of those cryptic stuff later (there were loads!).

So 7-something a.m. June fetched me with Pei and Zac already in the car, and we went to St. George's Cathedral (the starting point).

And, believe it or not, we nearly got lost on the way there cuz we couldn't find the entrance to turn into the carpark so like we went on one big round...

...Peluh.

Anyways, there were 58 teams in all, and we were the youngest!

Mostly cuz no other youth would pay RM 100 per person to join (our team was all paid for d, cuz June and Pei's mom is the Medical Director of Charis Hospice, so yeah. thankyouu!).

The people already there.

The awesomest group ever :)
(uh, yeah, we had to wear oversized tees and become walking advertisements for ZHULIAN...)


7:50 a.m., and the final briefing started, before the mass flag-off.

Mr Organiser and Mr Organiser.

The crowd of participants.

So then we were given the envelopes containing the following questions:

Road Qs: All cryptic, 13 roads in all.
Heritage Site Qs: Not THAT cryptic, based on the Road Questions.
Heritage Site Feature Qs: Mostly cryptic, where you actually have to go to the Heritage Site itself and look for the answers.
Picture Qs: Go to the place itself and snap a photo of the thing mentioned, the clue is pretty cryptic.
Map Qs: Based on the map given; very, very cryptic.
Charis Hospice Qs: Based on the Charis Hospice pamphlet given during the briefing on Thursday night.

And the Hunt was on!

First hour (8-9 a.m.) was spent solving the utterly cryptic questions.

Pei the thinker,

Zachary the navigator,

June the driver.

Once we had most of the Road Questions solved and Zac had arranged our route, we bertolak-ed.

First we decided to go to the Penang State Museum, but it was too crowded (all the other teams went).

So we tackled the Clock Tower instead, for the first Puzzler.

It was something about which clock face never could have both its hands pointing at black diamonds on opposite ends...

...which was totally confusing, cuz all four clock faces on the towers were like either missing a black diamond or had a portion of gray background.

..

Next up, we went based on a hunch on a Road Question which went something like this: The first road you will be on during the race.

So, we went to Lebuh Bishop. (it turned out to be the wrong answer lol)

Parking metre :)

Where we couldn't find anything which corresponded to the Heritage Site Feature Questions, which were like:
In the carpark,
1. Sounds like a humped-back animal without borders.
2. Friend, I see doubly.

3. [i forgot; something about 'used to be twins travelling in opposite directions, now separated.']


Looking about.

Think!

Since we couldn't find head or tail of those cryptic questions in a carpark at Lebuh Bishop, we decided to walk on to King's Street, since it was adjacent and was mentioned in a Road Question: Road for a ruler.

Lots of Heritage Site Questions and such for King's Street.

Among them:
1. [picture of top of temple roof]

So we found the temple which had a roof which looked like the one given.

1a. What two addresses are under this roof? (We settled for 32 and 34 King's Street.)

1b. There are 8 men and only 1 animal. What is that animal?

It was this carving-thingy on the wall of the temple, so the animal was the monkey.

1c. Draw the symbol the [a number] old men and [a number] young men are looking at; name it. (It was a mural at the same temple, they were looking at Yin and Yang.)

Picture Question: Take a photo of the couple a surprised bird is looking at.
(Also at the temple.)

Kept on walking down King Street...


And solved more Heritage Site Questions:

2. Three flag-poles are in front of this building. (some Surau & Madrasah place)

3. Name of shop where you can drink tea.

We found this nice traditional Chinese tea shop.

Picture Question: Take a photo of 3 of your group members drinking tea. Don't forget to include the Sifu! (we made a mistake here: there was a portrait of an old man on the wall and the shop owners said that that was the real sifu - turned out we were actually supposed to take a shot with the living sifu (who said modestly that he wasn't really a sifu) who was making the tea. haha we thought too hard)

The special medicinal really nice Chinese tea that the friendly aunty made us drink lots of.

More Heritage Site Questions:

4. Second word is his going back. (a Chinese building: something Sih something something - Sih written backwards = His)

5. Remove the last letter, and the first and the fourth words become the same. (another Chinese building: Koo something something Koon - remove the 'n' and the first and fourth words are the same)

Yup, so we were pretty much done with King Street and moved on to some other roads. (I can barely remember them now)

Walking back to the car.

Among the other roads and sites we visited:

Road Question: I give way to love to build a hotel. (Stewart Lane - it gives way to Love Lane)
Stewart Lane's Heritage Site Question: A yacht to refit here. (Hainanese Mariners' Lodge)

Road Question: Sounds like black water locally, I hear? (Jalan Air Itam)
Heritage Site Question: Famous school not accessible to public
(Chung Ling High (Private))

Road Question: On a level that's disturbed.
(Love Lane - 'disturbed' indicates an anagram: rearrange 'on a level' and you get 'love lane'.)
Heritage Site Question:
I forgot it but it was really complicated, answer's Lo Pan Hong aka Carpenters' Guild. Picture Question: It can still strike a chord although it has taken a toll (the big bell inside the Carpenters' Guild)


More, with photos:

Road Question: Stuck in a Folies Bergere jam? (Lebuh Gereja)
Heritage Site Question: The entrance is guarded by two who are not locally born. (Pinang Peranakan Mansion - the entrance was guarded by two Greek warrior statues)

Oh, look, someone else's already been here...

The entrance to the mansion, and the trishaw we were supposed to take a photo of for a Picture Question (I think).

Next.

Road Question: Men in so-called 'master race'? (Answer: Armenian Street (insert 'men' into 'aryan/arian' (the 'master race') and you get arMENian))

So since we were on Lebuh Armenian we checked out the Cheah Kongsi:

Zac playing with the lion statue - there was a ball inside in lion's mouth. Zac was fascinated cuz the ball could move. lol..

And the Heritage Site Questions under Lebuh Armenian:
1. Base of a revolutionary leader? (Dr Sun Yat Sen's base)

In Sun Yat Sen's base.

1a. Under what cover name did the revolutionists operate? (We spent some time in the house looking at the displays and descriptions, so found a plausible enough answer (some Chinese name I can't remember now))

In the cabinet, (there was a cabinet in the place)
1b. Whose red ink?
(Stephen Scarlet)
1c. It is brave-sounding, but hesitate first!
(something in the cabinet with the label Sobranie - so berani, get it?)

1d. Escape routes led to which two villages? (Based on a map in the base itself - Kampung Kaka and Kampung Kolam)

Along Lebuh Armenian also, another Heritage Site Question which had the answer Ku Din Ku Meh's Residence / Islamic Museum.

So we went to the Islamic Museum!

And more Heritage Site Feature Questions about the Islamic Museum, like:

a. [picture] Whose father is this? (picture turned out to be Tun Abdullah Badawi's dad)

b. I forgot the exact question - the answer was two walking sticks in a display case, or at least that's what we got.

c. Among the five weapons, which is from Persia? (We found a display case containing five weapons, and the pisau was from Persia.)

d. Reporter's tin on a shelf which contains her in sobs. (So cryptic! After looking for ages, we finally found a display shelf with Datuk Dr Sheikh O Basheer's diary - see the SOB with her?)


Next up, Weld Quay (Road Question: Road you enter once you leave the ferry in car).

Heritage Site Questions under Weld Quay:
1. Name the seven clan piers whose names are on lampposts. (Chew, Tan, Lim, Ong, something, something, Mixed Surname (i dunno it was on a lamppost))

2. Out of the seven, what do you do when you eat? (Chew Jetty - chew when you eat)

So we went to the Chew Jetty to solve its Heritage Site Feature Questions.

Bumped into Steven, Ming Hwee, Kai Yann (the small face barely visible behind) and Bernard.

2a. From which province did this clan originate? (Fujian Province, got it from a description outside the jetty.)

2b. Address of house which has pencil at door to ward off evil spirits. (54 A, nearly got it confused with 54 which had a brush, not a pencil.)

2c. At the end, a building houses two instruments. What are they? (bell and drum)

More Chew Jetty photos..




Once that was over, we also stopped by at (Road Question: Stop! a Mughal emperor, I hear?) Jalan Tun Syed Sheh Barakbah.

Heritage Site Question: Place where founder landed. (Fort Cornwallis)


Heritage Site Feature Questions: Lots of them, we had to go a couple of galleries there to get the answers.

We bumped into Kamal & gang doing their Siviks project.

Next it was to P. Ramlee's House! More questions, more looking around...

And we then rushed (we were running late - our 6 hours were almost up) to the Penang Hill Railway, to solve more questions.

Jam on the way.

At the foot of Penang Hill (the station), June dropped me, Pei and Zac off and went to find parking.

But we only stayed there for less than 5 minutes, and June was nowhere to be seen.

Called her, and guess what? She parked somewhere and paid RM 3.00 for parking. So poor her had to start her car again and come fetch us.

Zac bought 3 of those for us. Thankyou! (:

Then we immediately drove back to town to take a photo of the Hainanese Temple (for what we thought was the answer for Picture Question 7 (part of the Map Question 1) but in the end turned out not to be).

Dropped Zac off a couple of blocks away from the temple for him to take the photo, and drove off into a side lane to park.

Zac ran off, came back, and we sped off to the Penang State Museum, for the third time (first time was when it was packed, second when we went to it based on the wrong question, this time we finally figured out its corresponding question).

And finally we solved:
In the carpark, (the Penang State Museum carpark)
1. Sounds like a humped-back animal without borders. (there was this old, old vehicle there which said Scammel: cut off the 'borders' (S and l) and you get cammel, which sounds like 'camel')
2. Friend, I see doubly.
(two cars there - Cadillac)
3. [i forgot; something about 'used to be twins travelling in opposite directions, now separated.']
(the hill railway carriage in front of the museum)

By then we were overtime (supposed to get to Midlands Berjaya Hotel (the one above One Stop) by 2:00p.m. - it was already past that), so we just rushed.

Zac: *points to the right* Turn left here.
June keeps to the left side of the road
Zac: No! No! Go to the LEFT! Left, left!
June keeps to the left.
Pei: You mean left or right? Cuz you were pointing right wad..
Zac: OH! Go to the right! I mean right! What was I saying?
June exclaims, barely makes it across to the right.
Zac: Stupid Zac...
June: That's why I thought you were saying left, left..

Everyone laughs about it for the next hour.

So we dropped Zac off opposite Midlands One Stop, and he ran up to hand in our answer sheets.

Next time we saw him was on the seventh floor of the hotel, waiting outside the ballroom, looking kinda disappointed.

Apparently we got 3 (I think) of the 6 Picture Questions wrong.

[and we found out that Zac didn't have to delete the other misc. photos he took along the trip, cuz all he had to do was show them the relevant photos, instead we thought just leave the 6 photos in the camera and hand it to 'em... aww..]

Anyways!

The tea was good!

At first I didn't plan to stay (I wanted to go for FLOORBALL!) but oh well, June/Pei's mom said the tea's good so I stayed for a bit.



My plate of food.

My plate of tumbled cakes.

Zac's dollop of cream (cream once in two weeks is okay, he says).

And that marks the end of a freakin' awesome treasure hunt.

I still don't know whether we won anything lol.

But it was really great fun, and I really really liked my team!

And I went to places I never knew existed :)

Went to floorball next (darn didn't get to try out a strategy I'm thinking of (Pei suggested it) for Wave Challenge).

Then youth service after that (fireBRANDS + Frontliners) was very terrific!

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