I love Penang because....

Where else can you find a state with the sea splitting it into 2 parts, the island and the mainland, and with both sides connected by the 23rd longest bridge in the world?

Where else would you get people who upon being introduced to a fellow from the same state would then ask "Mainland or island?"

And regardless if one is an islander or a mainlander, all can laugh and poke fun at the island-centric islanders who are strong believers in the statement that "there's nothing on mainland penang!", and likewise poke fun at the mainlanders who try to convince the islanders otherwise. Where everybody can find at least 5 island friends who can count the number of times they've been around mainland penang on just one hand, not counting passing through in order to travel to other states via the highway.

Island or mainland, we're still Penangites to the core. I'm Lovin' Penang!

Years ago, when i was in secondary school, we were required to join a uniform body and so i was in the Girl Guides. Back then the decision was pretty easy for me. My father was a King Scout, brother was a Boy Scout, my sister was a Girl Guide, so naturally i took the path of least resistance too.

When i first joined the Guides, i remember being too lazy and also too scared of my mom to ask for a new uniform since my sister who was/is alot taller than i am left me a uniform that didnt fit well at all. Definitely the navy uniform was a lot cuter than the next one.

Within my first year as a Guide, a new ruling was announced and we had to change from cute navy blue blouse with navy blue skirt and yellow scarf to a bright green blouse covered all over in 20 sen coin sized splotches of what was actually the logo of the Girl Guides' Association paired it with a dark blue short skirt and yellow scarf . The only consolation was that it was also the same uniform (swap yellow scarf for blue) as the Rangers a.k.a. big girl guides, so we wouldnt need to spend money buying new ones when we "moved up" into Rangers.

Since my sister couldn't hand me down her uniform yet as she needed it still as a Ranger, with a lot of grumbling abt expenses, mom got me my own blouse and i re-cycled my skirt from my years as a prefect in primary school. One of the advantages of not growing vertical much since age 12 is that i could wear the skirt from form 1 (height: 153cm) till i finished form 5 (height: 156cm). Not bad huh .

Life in the Guides was fun. Campfires, gatherings, camps, cookouts, drilling contests, tying/lashing wood to create furniture/fences/towers, tenderfoot exams, it was fun because we learnt many skills which would come in handy in later years. In form 3, i was part of the EXCO team (formally known by the super glamour name Court of Honor) as Quartermistress. One of my duties which i enjoyed the most was being in charge of the Fire-lighting Test portion of the Tenderfoot exams. To this day, i still cannot light charcoal fires as well as wood fires .

It's been years since i thought back about my short time in the Guides. As the years go by, most of the skills are getting rusty but they have come in handy time and time again, from basic first aid, to lighting fires for bbq, even right down to knots i used to tie my stacks of lecture notes together at the end of each semester ! If i had a choice, i'd repeat it all again . I'd be like those others who worked harder at learning what could be learnt and i'd sign up for more activities and try harder instead of trying to find ways to avoid work. Ah if only i had foresight back then to realize the skills would be useful, instead of hindsight now. Makes me wonder how those super hardworking schoolmates of mine are now, wherever they all are .