My Own Happiness Project

My Own Happiness Project
because happiness begins inside and flows out...

20081031

the most recent boating trip.....

Few days back, just before I came back to KK, I had an afternoon scheduled for a trip one of the clinics that I have yet to visit till now, at Kg Tagas-Tagas, about 25 minutes by boat from Beluran jetty. The journey will take us upstream Sungai Labuk, rather than down to the open sea so the river width will get narrower and narrower as we go further.

There are a few clinics that are only accessible by boat under the administration of Beluran Health Office, though this is not one of them, but we decided that it is faster to travel by boat since I have a flight to catch later that day.

This is one of the boats we have in the district, small yes. Staffs from KD Kuala Sapi and KD Keniogan will usually commute by this one and they have to go through the open sea to come to Beluran. Imagine that.

Few are already beyond economical repair, like these two that are just hanging around at the Clinic dock.

I think this one is also already scheduled for BER, formerly used as water ambulance and vehicle for traveling clinic.

The staffs enjoying the afternoon breeze at our clinic jetty during lunch break.

The infamous 'klinik-2-alam' that can only be found in Beluran, as I was told. 2 alam because there are 2 entries to the clinic, via land and water. Half of the clinic is built on the river bank, while another portion extends to the water via stilts. Sadly the river part of the clinic is very fast decaying and already showing signs of collapse. We're currently waiting for approval for relocation to another site - also just as ancient - next to the district hospital. I hope we don't have to experience Titanic before we finally move out!

This is our ride for the day, a 27-footer with 300HP engines, complete with GPS trekker.

That day only 3 of us went for the visit, Chief Medical Assistant Sius, Sister Malin and myself.

Eksyen jerr
wearing the cool life-jacket.

Carrying logs along the river.

The River getting narrower as we get further.

Sister Malin getting dizzy from the stench, actually the night before, Azman our boatman found a dead rat in the boat, most probably brought in by a cat... or is it because he also kept food in the boat. It was extremely unpleasing to have to sit in the stench throughout the trip but okay lah bah, style kampung kampung...

Some parts of the river was so still, believe that this was taken from a moving boat?

The weather for the day was very misleading, I thought it was going to rain looking at he clouds, but as we landed, the sun was out at its full strength.

Near the village.

Mmm... not a sight for the superstitious.

Kampung Tagas-Tagas.

Where are the clouds I saw earlier?

Signs that we're nearby a health facility...

And finally here...

First thing I did upon arrival was of course to put the fan on full blast and sit in front of it...

Maternal clients being attended to while Sister looked on to supervise.

Our problem in the district is still high rate of eclampsia. One of the remedial action we've taken is to put up eclampsia emergency kit in all the clinics and make sure all the nurses are on their toes about the management.

Don't think we're in the village and we won't know what technology looks like!

Half way through the visit we had news about an attempted break-in to one of our premises in town, with the window grills being sawed off... That's my tired and troubled face, thinking that we had to go through police report and all that stuff later when we get back to Beluran... sigh...

But luckily it was a false alarm, and I get go back to KK in peace...

This village also gets flooded during wet season, so some of the buildings are built on really high stilts like this school...

Children playing... reminds me of pictures that Rarindra Prakarsa would take, only much nicer when he does it.

Time to head home...

Weather was fine when we headed back, so I'll leave this one in colour.

Never thought you can plant palm trees right to the edge of the river...


when will i be married.......

Plagued by a mild depression over my dear friend's upcoming wedding in December, I have thoughts and reflections over that matter too in my mind... and suddenly this quiz pop up in Facebook. So I took it.

According to the prediction, I'll be married in November/December 2012 at the age of 33. Darn, that's a long time to go...

Palis-palis...

And I've got 2 friends who wants to marry me, wow...
WHO ARE YOU? LETS START DATING NOW!!!!

arteo went to tongod.......

Pockets of areas in Sabah still have a problem with Malaria, and in fact, the picture of Malaria in Malaysia reflects closely to the picture of situation in Sabah. Colleagues in Peninsular will not as much bat an eyelid when they hear about Dengue, but with Malaria, everybody will jump halfway up their seats and be really excited about it. Here in Sabah it is almost a different story. Malaria?... Yea, we've got some at our backyard...

One of these pockets is the area around Tongod, Penangah and Entilibon of Kinabatangan District, and since they are situated neighbouring to Telupid (an area under Beluran district), transportation wise it is still more convenient to come to Telupid for check ups and everything else, so we have been directed to take over supervision of malaria control for these 3 areas.

Since it seems that this was a directive from Dato' Dr Hassan, our Director of Disease Control in Ministry, a fellow Sabahan who takes personal interest of things happening in Sabah, I had to make it a high priority to go around and see these areas we've just been assigned to. And the camera comes along too...

The weather hasn't been kind to the roads, going in to Tongod area is almost like going through Camel Trophy challenge (well, almost - if all your life you've only known challenges as sharp bumps on tarred roads)

Constructions on the roads with mud holes here and there made the journey 3-4 times longer than what it would normally have taken.

The Entilibon Vector Control Sub-Sector Office. We've come to announce a decree that their area has been taken by us. Resistance is futile... haha. Just a quick forum with the staffs there to ask on their needs and requirement to help increase productivity during this period of outbreak.

The village in Entilibon. We were back on the road heading for Tongod, the sky's looking gloom and we don't want to get trapped in the interior in the bad weather - it was a Friday afternoon, and the thought of being stuck here for the weekend was rather unbearable.

We've seen some odd and weird machinery used for transport and construction, never seen before in town - this one reminds me of a catfish, the cabin sits 4 - in a row! Weird, kan?

I've not seen Tongod Health Clinic but I've worked in Tungku Health Clinic for more than 2 years, so it's seen one seen all - there are 5 of these clinics built from a common blueprint in Sabah. Looking at the Clinic from the roadside brings back a surreal feeling of familiarity of being in Tungku once again.

This is very surreal... it's like I lived here before!
The staff quarters.

The waiting lounge for out-patient clinic, exactly the same.

The Accident and Emergency room, also used as Procedure room.

Even the mess they do on the procedure trolley is irritatingly the same. I used to throw a tantrum when I see this kind of mess left after a procedure... Let's not look at the sharps bin, I might start rounding up and scolding staffs that are not even under my care.

Used mosquito nets. Waste not, want not.

We went for a ride around Tongod town and it took us only about a minute and half to finish the tour. So we decided to go in deeper.

The old clinic, built during colonial time. Old timers would probably recall Australian Caucasian doctor manning the facility.

This is the headwaters of Kinabatangan River or Ulu Sungai Kinabatangan, the longest river in Sabah at 560km, the second in Malaysia after Rajang River in Sarawak.

Some macro shots for the fans of my macrophotography.