First Day of OEV To Malaysia 2009

Hie All Cadets, Erm, I will be sharing with you the five days of my Educational Visit to Malaysia with you guys, such that although you guys did not attend for this event, you guys still can experience how this Educational Visit works. This is an informal post, so hope you guys can just relax and enjoy. :)


We reached HTA (Home Team Academy) at about 5.50am when we are supposed to fall in at 7.00am. Then, I played UNO with Kush and Joanne. I won the first round! Joanne came second. Kush came third. Erm, sorry, back to the topic. Went to settle some administrative stuff, and took a group picture with our current commandant of NPCC, SUPT Rosalind Khoo. After that, we went to the checkpoint both Singapore and Malaysia to clear our immigration and custom and we headed towards our first stop of our OEV in Malacca!


Our first stop at Malacca is not really counted as a tourism spot. It was a food court in Malacca. We stopped there to fill our stomachs and to give us energy for the rest of the day.


Changed into our NPCC full uniform, we proceed to our second stop. It is known as the Iou Pejadat Polis Kontinjen Negeri Melaka which is also known as the Royal Malaysia Police Melaka. It is a headquarter in Malacca. We ate our lunch there and then we watched some videos on how Malaysian Police carry out their roles as a Policemen. The video was quite long but it was interesting.



After that, our three Cadet Inspectors namely, Benjamin Sir, Soon Hui Sir and Izwan Sir, gave us a lecture about the NPCC structure of Singapore. It is an enriching talk, and we had certainly learnt a lot of things from it.



After the talk, we were given a bag of souvenir, Mr Bala exchanged the gifts, and then we toured the place awhile. Then, we took a group picture there. I managed to ask our tour guide, Mr. Paul, to help us take a group picture.

Next, we proceed on to sightseeing (picture 34 to picture 72), we went to the Farmosa, Christchurch, St Paul Hill, St Xavier church, and lastly The Stadhuy. On picture 35, it shows a big ship. Although this ship looks like any other ship, and it carries the same purpose, it is not an ordinary ship. This is a Replica of the Frol de la mar ship. Frol de la mar, which is also known as Flower of the Sea, (I think), is a Portuguese carrack of 400 tons, which over nine years participated in decisive events in the Indian Ocean until its sinking in 1512. The ship was told to be unsafe but then a person named Afonso de Albuquerque still used the ship as it could hold a lot of people. On 20 November 1512, the ship sank but Afonso de Albuquerque was saved. Robert Marx, a hunter spent 20 million dollars to bring the ship up on land again.

Sidetrack a bit, on picture 42, all those who wearing the blue tee are our Cadet Inspector. They are namely Izwan sir followed by Benjamin sir, then lastly, Soon Hui sir.


Back to the topic, on picture 50, it shows a picture of Fort A Famosa. A Famosa is a very old architectural debris located in Asia. A Famosa was actually due to be completely destroyed but a gatehouse was saved by Sir Stamford Raffles' love for history in 1810. The remaining gatehouse is called The Porta de Santiago. A Famosa had once been made up of long defensive walls, four large towers and a keep to store ammonization.


Then, on picture 57 is a wishing well. In the olden days, many people believed that if we throw a coin inside and make a wish, the wish will come true. No doubt, Joanne and I threw a coin to make one wish too. One would ask why does people believe in this myth. Hmm, let me give you a hint.

See picture 64, does that give you a clue?



Hah, let me reveal the answer then. On picture 64, is a father, not referring to your parents. In Christianity, father means priest. His name is Francis Xavier. When the saint died on Sanchian Island of mainland China on December 3, 1552, his body was temporarily laid on St Paul’s Hill from March to December 1553. It was then shipped to Goa, India, where his perfect body still lies at the Basilica of Bom Jesus. Well, not actually lies, his body right now, I heard, is still currently hanging outside a church in India! One might asked why was it temporarily on Sanchian Island? Well, this is because St Francis Xavier is the co-founder of the Society of Jesus in St Paul’s Hill. Notice I had used the descriptive word, perfect to describe about his body? Well, no doubt, his body now in India is still hanging outside a church in India, and in fact, it is not even decomposed yet! Some scientist think that the body had been added in some chemicals, that’s why it can be preserved till now, so they went to cut one of his arms to do an experiment. Then, another female tourist used her mouth to pluck out one of his toes to keep it as a memento. Then one stormy night, something happened to the statue. The lightening suddenly breaks his arm and a toe on the statue. People believed that is Father Xaiver wanted it this way, so up till today, they never arrange people to fix it. Notice carefully on the picture, and you will find out that his arm and a toe is missing in the picture.

Before leaving this place, we took a group photo there.


Then, we sat the coach to Kuala Lumpur. Our first stop in KL was food. We had our dinner in a hotel, which serves us the local’s Malay food. We had sliced oranges and watermelons as our dessert, and rice, vegetables, fish, eggs and nuggets as our main course. Drinks are plain water. Ha-ha. As for Kush, you have to ask him what he ate, because he is a vegetarian, and had different food from us.
On Photo 79, as you can see, is the famous Twin Towers building. The reason why is it named as Twins Towers is because that one building was built by the Koreans and the other is built by the Japanese. They so called had this competition among themselves, to find out who took a shorter time to build the tower. And the winner is the Koreans, which won the Japanese by 4 days. The tour guide told us before that the admission to this tower is free of charge, BUT, you have to be the first 500 people queuing up in front of the tower. This means that you have to get up real early to queue and have your ticket. What’s more is that one person can only have a ticket.


Then, we proceed to our hotel, Radius International Hotel. According to Joanne, it is three stars. Not bad uh. Went to the lounge to have our debrief and allocate our rooms. And the funny thing is they allocated me and Kush into the same room. Ha-ha, but in the end, changed partners of course! Went into ‘my’ room and took some pictures of the room. Ok, that’s about it for the first day.