When we came over, there were ten instructors and one non teaching spouse who arrived at about the same time. Steve and Pam Wise (Pam is the non teacher) were here April 20th or so. They broke a lot of ground for the rest of us. Steve is a retired teacher from the London Ontario area and Pam has left her position in health care. They are both committed to their church and have in fact travelled to other places on mission trips. They have been to Germany and Bangladesh. Susan Tsin and Ken Cheung are a young married couple who are on a one year leave from the Toronto Board where they teach in a high school. They have about seven years experience each. Ken was born in Hong Kong and moved to Toronto at 15. Susan is originally Indonesian but has lived her whole life in Toronto with the exception of a short stint studying in China. Erin Donati and Mark Klimitz are a very young couple who are in their first year of teaching. It is kind of fun to watch the young ones (they are younger than our kids) as they settle into the new life and their first professional assignment. Mark Myers is an experienced international teacher. He spent five years teaching in Japan during which time he made the trek back to Canada to get his teaching certificate. For the past two years he has been in Tian Jin China teaching a high school program at the Pines. He is quite interesting and mixes easily with everyone both local and ex-pats. Les Hussack is also a first year teacher as is Easton Hanna. Les is from Dunnville Ontario and Easton from Toronto. Easton is via Ireland and is very proud of that heritage. And then there's the McNamara's, the senior citizens of the bunch.
On our first day here Pam and Steve met us and showed us around (See an earlier entry). As newbies arrived they conducted the tour repeatedly. They invited us all to their apartment and made the introductions. At that point Pam collected names and birth dates and she has become the designated social convenor of the group. So far we have celebrated four birthdays including Kim's. This also gives us a chance to get together and share stories and concerns. The Macs are sort of the liaison with management because we have known Frank, the program director, since the early 70's in North York.At the college we have met several new friends as well. One of our department heads (Bill's boss) Rowena Valberg meets us every morning at the gate to our subdivision and drives us to the college. 
This saves us a RM6.00 ($1.80) taxi fare. In the evenings we walk home which takes about 20-25 minutes. Rowena is a born and raised Malaysian. She was trained in accounting and did spend several years with an accounting firm in Australia. She says that her family accuses her of having an Australian accent. Rowena has been at Taylors for many years and teaches accounting as well as heading the business department. Another Department head, Joy Augustine, rides with us each morning. Joy is from Toronto and he intends to end his three year stay to take his wife and two young teen children back to Canada.
This saves us a RM6.00 ($1.80) taxi fare. In the evenings we walk home which takes about 20-25 minutes. Rowena is a born and raised Malaysian. She was trained in accounting and did spend several years with an accounting firm in Australia. She says that her family accuses her of having an Australian accent. Rowena has been at Taylors for many years and teaches accounting as well as heading the business department. Another Department head, Joy Augustine, rides with us each morning. Joy is from Toronto and he intends to end his three year stay to take his wife and two young teen children back to Canada.
Rowena and Joy are both Catholic and attend the same church. Early in our stay Rowena volunteered her friends Matthew Chong and Serena Wong to drive us to church. They have adopted us. Each Sunday that we are not otherwise engaged they pick us up at 7:30 or 7:45 and drive us to Petaling Jaya (another section) to attend 8:30 mass. The church is packed! There is a large and active Catholic community in Malaysia with a very diverse mix of race and culture. Many Indian, Malay and Chinese families sit side by side with the few old white people like us. The community feeling is wonderful. After mass Matthew and Serena insist on taking us around to show us the sights or to assist us to shop and return things to our apartment. This saves the aforementioned taxi charges. These side trips almost always include a meal of some sort and we get introduced to some excellent ethnic restaurants as well as some savings methods. We have had serious lessons on Japanese and Chinese meals so far (Matthew is a fanatic about sushi mi...raw fish). We have tried steamboat buffet. In this style one has a bubbling pot of two kinds of broth into which one dumps quantities of food selected from the buffet. Once the food is cooked...ENJOY! Its a lot like fondue.
Matthew and Serena discovered that we are golfers (loose use of terms) and invited us to play at their course in Port Dixon on the west coast. Port Dixon is a former harbour that is trying to be a resort destination. It is about 90 minutes from KL and Subang Jaya. These friends own a condo in PD and have in the past used it as a base from which to play golf a the local courses. The original intent when they bought in 1995 it was that they would retire there and play lots of golf. The shame is that the developer didn't have a contingency plan for the Asian economic collapse of 1997. Three of four buildings had been completed and Matthew and Serena bought in the forth. They were lucky that developer, who had their money, finished the block. Interests rates skyrocketed to between 16 and 20%. many people who put down a deposit could not afford to pay the balance and have walked away. The block now has 2% occupancy; this means that the maintenance fees are insufficient to do the necessary upkeep and the building is falling into disrepair. For example, the maintenance company cannot afford parts for the elevators and cannibalizes those in other areas for parts. As a result there is only one elevator working in this 18 story block and it sometimes doesn't work. The whole project is in the hands of the liquidators. On the other hand Matthew and Serena have done a wonderful job with their apartment and once inside their door it is magnificent. The views are awe inspiring wither from their balcony over the straits of Malacca or from their front colonnade over the town and the golf course.
When we left Canada we had put our golf shoes into the bags and then did the Hokey Pokey. When the music stopped the shoes were out. On Friday night Matthew and Serena picked us up and took us to their house where we were asked to select a set of golf clubs for the weekend. They each have at least two sets. They then drove us to a golf store nearby where we got new shoes at a very reasonable sale price of RM190.00 or about $60.00 Canadian. They then took us to the local steamboat buffet. Matthew is very quick with his wallet and it has been a challenge to beat him to the bill; we missed again this night. On Saturday morning Matthew picked us up at 6:30 and we headed for PD (Port Dixon). It seems that Serena had other commitments and could not join us. We got to PD and installed in the condo by 8:00 and went over to the golf course across the street. the place was almost deserted; we saw eight golfers tee off and the starter said we could go when we wanted. Matthew insisted on breakfast and we teed up at about 8:45. The day was hot and the course was damp and sandy. We played 9 holes and thought that was enough. Matthew again treated us to lunch before we showered and changed.
For the rest of the day we toured the area in which Matthew and Serena grew up. Matthew was pleased to be showing us around and Kim felt compelled to tell him how Bill travels down memory lane every time we are in the area of the Danforth in Toronto. We stopped at an exciting wet market at which everything one could imagine and a few things one could not were for sale. The fish were laid on tables on 'some' ice and at one stall a butcher used a very bloody tree stump as a chopping block for bones from the red meat they were selling. Afterwards we took Matthew to dinner at a beautiful resort hotel before returning to the condo and crashing.
The next morning Matthew had to make a presentation to a group of operating theater nurses. He is a pharmacist working for a skin care company; one of their lines is Nivea. He dropped us off at another resort hotel that had a nine hole walking only golf course. We had breakfast first of course and then teed off about 8:45. We were literally the only players on the course. The ground was damp (or wet) and the air was very humid. The course was beautifully manicured and landscaped. Both of us used sun block and Kim carried an umbrella to keep the blazing sun off. At the end of the round Bill had sweat so much that Kim took a picture because he was literally wet from the top of his hat to the back of his knees. It looked like he had been caught in a downpour. Matthew picked us up at 11:00 and dropped us back at our condo in the early afternoon. What a great weekend. What a great adventure!
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