Colour my world

If I were still single and someone wanted to win my heart, he doesn't have to spend money buying me shoes or clothes or jewellery. Or designer handbags. All they need to get me is stationery. Instead of a bouquet of red roses that may wilt after a couple of days, send me a gift basket of products picked from a corner of the MPH Megastore.

Notebooks. Writing pads. Pens. I positively SWOON over a set of 48 colour pencils from Faber-Castell or crayons from Crayola. Heck, even post-it tabs. And a nifty case to carry them all in.

Leave me in the stationery section of a bookstore and I feel like I've died and gone to heaven.

Not that I'm a particularly talented artist or writer. But these are just some of the pens I am beginning to collect:

Saw a 'Best Buy' set of 6 comprising of brown, turquoise, light green, emerald green, magenta and purple. Justification for buying it: I can split them between me and my sisters. Unfortunately, my sister already bought a set. They're just as bad as me if not worse. Still untouched - the pens, I mean. The sisters too, come to think of it.

Started buying these Stabilo pens loose, adding them to my collection 1 or 2 at a time. Then found this set of 20. Again, most of the time it just sits pretty on my desk at the office.

Almost have the whole range. I redeemed RM40 discount vouchers from Parkson, but needed to spend them within a week. Bought 7 of these then and there, together with a small notebook and a pencil case. My excuse: I had to attend a so-called meeting afterwards and needed something to take notes with.

Greek Odyssey Day 9: Athens-Dubai-KL

Our last day in Greece. Although we spent the night at the Airport Hotel, we decided to take an early bus into the City of Athens to visit the National Archaeological Museum, specifically to check out the golden horde excavated from the Mycenaean royal tombs. We arrived at the Museum just as it was opening. Luckily for us, the museum was free-entry since it was off-season.

Some early arrivals who got there before us.

These golden masks were found covering the faces of the royal male dead.
Golden plates covering royal male infants.

Pieces of gold jewellery for the women.

This is what they would have looked like on Mycanean lady.

Other exhibits in the musuem included weapons:

A reconstructed racing chariot.

A private collection donated to the museum. Here is an earring, with a diagram of how it is to be worn.

Egyptian artifacts, including mummies.

The bright and airy display of the Museum. Muzium Negara tak nak upgrade macam ni ke?

A courtyard near the Museum souvenir shop.

Near Monastiraki station, an old mosque was converted into a folk art museum.

Bright display of fruits outside Monastiraki train station.

The remains of Hadrian's Library, next to the Folk Art Museum.

An inscription from the Quran above the entrance to the mosque.

The colourfully decorated mimbar of the mosque.

We had time to walk the streets of Plaka to do some souvenir-shopping.

There was also a weekend flea market, where everything and anything under the sun was up for sale - including these.

A mini-train the colours of the Greek flag along the streets of Plaka.

Another old mosque, but this one is closed to the public.

Remnants of the Roman Agora.

Back at the airport to catch our afternoon flight to Dubai.

A very satisfied traveller.

There was no Emirates business lounge, but due to its affiliation with Swiss Air, we were granted entrance to the Swissport business traveller's lounge.

I'm heading home I've done my time. Last call pre-takeoff.

Goodbye, Greece.

Just one last reminder: Greek salad on the inflight menu.

Greek Odyssey Day 8: Myrtos-Assos-Fiskardo-Athens

One last shot of Argostoli in the morning, from our hotel balcony.

Sorry ye, PETRONAS tak ada branch di Kefalonia. Bonuslink pun takde.

I can't remember the name of this beach, but there's a lot more where this came from.

Myrtos beach.

Hubby testing the waters at Myrtos. At 15 deg C, it's not a good idea to go swimming.

Local mountaineering champions.

Geological evidences of seismic activity.

Another view of Myrtos beach. Yes, we had to drive down that twisting road on the left.

Picture perfect. Go ahead, copy it as your screensaver or desktop.

As proof that I was there and that I did not rip off the above photo from someone else's blog, here's one of me & Myrtos in the background.

En route to our next destination: Assos. There's a medieval fortress at the top of the hill that we wanted to visit, but the road was not open to cars and we did not feel like climbing up.

Right at the northernmost tip of the island is the fishing town of Fiskardo. We had hoped to stop there for lunch, but no shops were open. People were just busy painting to get the town picture-perfect in time for the tourist season starting in April (my trip was just at the end of March).

Just southwest of Fiskardo, we found a small lagoon, again with interesting stratified formations.

For lunch, we stopped at a small village somewhere north of Assos. On the menu was seafood fettucine, greek salad and tzatziki. All items were ordered as single portions to share between the two of us, but there were still leftovers.

A nice cuppa Greek coffee to wash it all down. Specially dedicated to you, Ubi!

Our flight in th evening at about 5 pm back to Athens. I thought this was the end of our Kefalonian adventure, but there was more to come...

The personnel at check-in must have been confused when they saw a travelling visa in Hubby's passport but none in mine. They did not realise that his visa was meant for Malaysian travellers to Sudan, not to Greece. Malaysians do not require a special visa to travel to Greece. The police questioned us, to the point of making themselves look silly but they refused to apologise.

The same policemen were manning the departure hall, so to further exert their authority they asked for proof that Hubby's camera really was a camera. I thought I'd take a picture of them but they refused, so all we got was this: