Easter 2007 – Houseboat Day 3

07 April 2007, Saturday – The sun, sand and the sea….

After a hearty breakfast (Roti Prata and Porridge! – thanks to Christina and Esmond!), we set sail for a spot further north of South Straddie, in search of blue waters, and after about an hour’s drive, we found our spot!

We embarked from our houseboat, into the motorboat and onto shore with sands that crumble underneath our feet. We searched for a spot, big enough for our ball games and clear of stumps sticking up from the sand.

Once we’ve got our motorboat secured on the beach and after rounds of photo taking, we launched into our first game – Poison Ball. 6 vs 6 – Group 1: Haw, Shy, Pearl, Heng Onn, Pei and Rachel, Group 2: Kareen, Christina, Jit, Esmond, Ian, Roger.

As if we didn’t find Poison Ball physically challenging, we started Captain Ball with the same grouping composition. We were all running, jumping, snatching, attacking, defending, sliding, rolling, falling, bumping, scratching, tripping etc etc….. In the end, it was 5:3 (Group 2: Group 1). Once again, we’ve amassed sufficient injuries to stop the game (Pearl had a bruised left eye – gift from Roger (who strongly objects and denies this...), Christina and Rachel had scratches on the knees, miscellaneous bruises on everyone ….) but start another…

This time, in the water. We tried to out beat the other on “mushy-ness” by carrying, hugging, piggy backing, shouldering each other’s partners, turning Roger into a green-eyed monster before trying to launch himself onto Ian who quickly rejected him.

Then we played “Monkey”, while Pei learns how to swim from Jit, Pearl seriously swimming laps, Christina swimming to keep herself warm, Kareen trying out Esmond’s goggles.

When we are all wrinkled from staying in the water too long and Christina having cramps in her legs, we returned to our houseboat for some delicious “tunch” (lunch + tea). We had Shim Ram Yun noodles with leftovers from previous night’s steamboat dinner.

After tunch, we were all so flat out that we crashed on our bunks until dinner! (We were grounded. The water was too shallow and we couldn't budge. So the analyzers (Ian, Roger and Heng Onn) looked at the charts and tide table and decided that we'll move when the tide comes in in the evening. - Thanks to the crew who reminded me of this.... blog writer getting old... can't remember all the details...)

Dinner was seafood marinara fettuccine, seafood pizza and Shy’s famous Chicken Peri Peri pizza.

After dinner, we settled for another round of Pictionary Charade. Group 1 consisted of Heng Onn, Christina, Haw, Kareen, Esmond and Rachel. Group 2 has Ian, Roger, Pei, Jit, Pearl and Shy.

Everything went well for Group 1 (thanks to Esmond’s “power”) who successfully proceeded into a number of sixes on the dice. But the same cannot be said for Group 2 (thanks to Ian’s “power” of throwing 1) who was moving at a snail’s pace. It was as if they were “cursed” and the red dot on the dice followed them throughout the game.
The game went so well, that within an hour, Group 1 had completed the game, well ahead of Group 2. Not contending to defeat, Group 2 challenged Group 1 to another round.

"One!!!!"

This time, into the middle of the session, Ian finally found out that he must be “really really mad / cross” at Group 1 in order to throw a “six”. He did manage to throw “sixes” in his practice sessions… but when it came to the REAL throw, he was still stuck with 1. This had thrown all of us into fits of laughter and Group 2 in solid resignation of their fate.

Again, Group 1 managed to finish the game within the hour. With time on our hands and too early for bed, most of us embarked on a different game.

Pearl, Roger, Christina, Jit and Rachel went with Chinese checkers. While Heng Onn (very much to our shock and surprise because it was well past his bedtime and he was still very alert and wanting to play Risk), Esmond, Shy and Ian PLANNED (literally!) to play Risk.

The four of them spent more than an hour, discussing on how they should go about playing the game (Mission vs Conquest) when the other group was well into their game of Chinese checkers with their pieces all colliding in the middle of the puzzle (i.e. cluster f***).

Suddenly, Heng Onn, with a very serious expression, rushed out from the “little boys room” exclaiming that while he was “doing his business” he saw a boat right beside ours and that we seem to be moving!

Immediately we dispersed to the front and back deck to see if it was true. True enough, there WAS a ship beside us and we had drifted! We had no idea where we have drifted off to and for how long we have drifted.

We had an emergency discussion, upon which Roger drove us to a spot with Heng Onn and Ian as the navigator, Esmond, Rachel, Haw and Kareen as deck watchmen on the upper deck – ensuring that there were no passing ships / boats.

It was very dark and very hard to see our surroundings and make out our exact location. After we’ve anchored, Roger, Ian and Heng Onn tried to make out our exact position based on the beacons on the horizon. We didn’t get to bed till past 2am….

Easter 2007 - Houseboat Day 2

06 April 2007, Friday – All aboard!

We were so excited that most of us are up by 8am in the morning! We were vying for the bathroom and lining up along the corridor, hurrying whoever was inside to hurry up and reminding him / her of the water restrictions….

We had egg sandwiches and ham croissants for breakfast (courtesy of Christina!). After breakfast, Heng Onn, Pearl, Roger and I, set off for the mainland so that we could get to the nearest service station to get some of the stuff which we’ve lost last night.

We got to the pier and called the security to open the gate for us. We were told that we have to wait for about 30 minutes (coz they were very busy and it was Easter) but lucky for us, somebody appeared in 10 and mentioned that they’ll leave the gate unlocked so that we could get back in when we are done with our shopping. We drove 15 minutes to BP and stocked up on dairy products, batteries, travel pills and 2 Nandos chicken.

We got back to the houseboat, stored our purchases and braced ourselves for our voyage through the maze of channels up to South Straddie. Roger (the driver), pulled up the anchor, locked in the gear and steered us through the river towards south of South Straddie. Ian (the captain cum navigator), Heng Onn (the co-navigator) and Esmond (the parrot cum deck watchman) took their respective positions on the boat to ensure a safe journey. The journey took us over an hour and on route, lunch was cooking and a few of us (Kareen, Pei, Shy and me) had a game of monopoly.

When we got to our destination, we anchored and Heng Onn, Roger and Esmond took the motorboat out to the shore to recce the area. Meanwhile, lunch was served and we had fried rice and rice vermicelli in soup (thanks again to Christina!). We also had Nandos chicken on top of Christina’s delicious cooking.

The boys returned from their recce trip and Roger excitedly exclaimed that there is a beach volley ball court and shower facilities on shore! When we were done with our lunch, we set about changing into our “play costume”, slapping on loads of sunscreen, putting on our cap and riding the waves across to the shore in the orange motorboat. When all 12 of us got on shore, we made a beeline for the beach volleyball court after securing our motorboat to ensure our return trip to our houseboat.

We split up into two teams and pitched against each other. The result? Blue black hands, palms, thumbs etc. (too bad we didn’t get a picture of our injuries….). After a few rounds, we decided that we’ve had enough injuries and wanted a rest. Roger suggested that we take 10 minutes trekking to the other side of the island to blue waters since it is facing the ocean. (our current side has black, murky waters that’s not appetising for swimming purposes….). So we pack up our stuff and walked in single file.

We walked and we walked and we walked….. 10 minutes past and we haven’t seen any blue waters around… all we see are green leaves, brown shrubs and hairy balls….

After loads of “Are we there yet?” from the crew, there finally was a light at the end of the tunnel (figuratively and literally speaking…).

The sand was so fine, the water so blue that without hesitation, we dumped our bags in a corner and ran to the waters. We stoped short when our feet got into contact with the cold, clear salt water and hesitated… until…. a water fight broke out. The thirst for revenge set about a chain reaction and we were splashing cold water on each other in the cold blustery wind. (again, we were having so much fun that none of us want to miss out on this opportunity to dunk the other into the water, hence, no photos taken of us in action….)

In the end, we all got wet. Christina and myself even took the chance to exfoliate using the fine sands from the sea! As the sun started to set, Roger herded us out of the water to start our walk back to the boat. We dried ourselves, took some shots of the aftermath, and headed to our motorboat.

When we got back to the houseboat, I started to prepare our steamboat dinner while some of us took to the shower. We had two different flavours for the steamboat – Satay and “Ma La” flavour. We were all so hungry that we dug into our dinner with so much fervour that we literally snatched food from each other.

After dinner, we settled for a game of modified Pictionary. Instead of drawing (coz we didn’t have enough paper supplies), we did charades. We split into two teams and pitted against each other. It was good fun and we had a lot of laughter (especially when Ian kept throwing one on the dice and Esmond and team having sixes, as if Esmond was Hiro Nakamura – from American series, Heroes – who could stop time, tele-port and change things! Ha ha!)

After four hours of charade, Esmond and team (Christina, Heng Onn, Pei, Jit and Rachel) won the game, much to the dissatisfaction of the opponent. It was past midnight when we all retire to our beds for a good night’s rest before facing the next day’s adventure.

Easter 2007 – Houseboat Day 1

05 April 2007, Thursday – The start of a much anticipated trip.

12 of us decided to go on a Houseboat trip together this Easter and have been preparing for this trip for months! (We had menus, shopping lists, meetings and discussions, even uniforms!) Finally the day has arrived and we were all so excited about this trip.

Rows and rows of houseboats waiting for the Easter crowds to board....

Roger, Ian, Pei and Jit proceeded to Shipper Drive at Coomera for the briefing at mid day. (After the briefing, Roger had given me a call and instructed that all of us that are still in Brisbane are to finish our shower first before starting our journey to Coomera. There are only 2000 litres of water for 12 of us for 5 days. Our initial reaction was – WHAT?! )

Roger, Ian and Pei took time off for a pose during the briefing session...

Heng Onn, Haw, Shy, Esmond and myself reluctantly worked full day on Thursday before each of us met up according to plans. Heng Onn will meet up with Haw and Kareen at Kelvin Grove, before picking Christina up from home. Shy and myself will meet up with Esmond at the Valley before leaving for Sunnybank to meet up with Heng Onn and gang.

We split up (Christina and Kareen shopped for groceries at Woolworths at SunnyPark, Heng Onn and Haw went with Shy to his place for shower, Esmond and myself returning home for shower and last minute packing, loading the boot with our purchases bought the night before from Welcome Supermart) before meeting for dinner at Little Singapore at 8pm.

After dinner and dessert (bubble tea!), 3 cars (Heng Onn, Shy and Esmond) travelled in a convoy and headed for Shipper Drive at Coomera. We had originally planned for 2 cars but have had too much luggage and groceries to bring that Shy was activated to drive another car.

When we arrived, the gate to the pier was locked and we were told that we had to wait for Security to come and open the gate for us. Luckily, not more than 10 minutes after the call, somebody with a black jacket on a bike came rolling along. The gates were opened, cars were parked and we started unloading our goods into metal trolleys.

Roger and Jit came to meet us at the car park and couldn’t believe their eyes when all the goods were loaded into the trolleys. We needed 4 trolleys for all our stuff! 4 full loads!

Then we were informed that due to safety reasons, the houseboat has been anchored off the pier and we needed to go in batches on a small motorboat across to the houseboat. We were a little sceptical but were still upbeat about it and had proceeded towards the pier when we were told that half a trolley load of stuff had fallen in the water.

For a moment, we were all stunned and couldn’t really register what we’ve just heard. It wasn’t until the information was repeated and seeing some bags of groceries floating in the water that came to realise that we’ve lost some of our stuff to the water!

We frantically try to recall what we’ve put into that particular trolley and realised that they were all stuff bought from Asian grocery stores (which is not readily available there! Aaargh!). Meanwhile, Roger and Jit boarded the motorboat to scoop up all that were floating in the water.

When that’s done, we boarded the motorboat in 3 batches and headed for our houseboat. We re-packed all the stuff into cupboards, eskies and storage areas before we settled down for a briefing (which is where we learned that we had to take very very short showers – 1 to 2 minutes water running time – once a day, due to limited power from the solar panels, the TV can only be turned on for 3 hours a day maximum, how to use the toilet and discharge it when the septic tank is full, etc etc)

After the briefing, we had to draw lots to decide who gets which room for the trip. Heng Onn picked out 5 cards from UNO and let each representative from each couple draw a card. In the end, the rooms with double beds go to Pei & Jit, Haw & Kareen. Rooms with double deck berths go to Heng Onn & Christina and Esmond & Rachel. Pearl & Shy takes the trundle in the living room, while Ian and Roger will each take a sofa.

Once everyone is settled into his / her own rooms, we went to the upper deck where we shared some beer and have a game of UNO. By midnight, we were all tired from our long day and headed back to our beds for sleep.

The pier at dusk....

Suay!!! - 3

18 March 2007, Sunday - "Suay ka kao peh"!

"Piang!!!!"...... Our glass door in the dining hall came crashing down, David, who was still awake at around 3.30am was startled to hear such a loud crash of glass and thought that a window had fallen. He had immediately went downstairs to investigate.....

The burglars felt a pang of guilt and left Esmond his tie for work...

Esmond had just fallen asleep while I was sound asleep only to be woken up by David's incessant knocking on the bedroom door, calling out to Esmond in an urgent tone. We woke, only to hear that somebody had used a brick to break our glass door! (In fact, I thought I heard loud glass shattering noise in my sleep but I thought I was dreaming / Esmond had dropped something. Esmond had just fallen asleep and had heard the glass shattered and thought that somebody had dropped something too!)

Immediately, we knew somebody had broken into our home. We searched for a weapon (we didn't have any real weapons and had only managed to come up with an umbrella...) before proceeding downstairs to confront the invader(s).

Esmond shouted out and warned the invader(s) to "Get out now...!" before we cautiously made our steps down the stairs to the dining room. Esmond turned on the lights and we were greeted with a whole dining hall splattered with glass shards. No sight of the invader(s) within our home. The only proof of the invader(s) existence was the broken glass door, the damaged curtain and two bricks....The invader(s) had used the two bricks in our backyard to break into our house!

The two bricks used for the break in....













One of the bricks, hit the frame of the door to the garage and put a hole in the same door...

We surveyed the surroundings and Esmond realised that his bag was gone. His bag didn't contain much but notes and keys for his work. My camera was gone too! My Fuji Finepix S5000 bought at Harvey Norman, City Hall - Singapore for SGD599, which had took numerous good photos and captured thousands of memories had been stolen by scum(s)! And I had only used it the morning before when we went to support Roger and Ardy in their badminton competition at the Sleeman Centre! Now my camera and all those pictures of the two guys in action are gone!

The white chair in which my camera was "sitting in", covered with my cap and a bottle of Sprite. I reminded myself to bring the camera up to the room before I went to bed but I was too tired and forgot about it... (That'll teach me....)









We also noticed that the burglar(s) had quietly, systematically removed the broken wooden shelf from the front of the glass door so that it won't hinder his escape. He had also placed markers (Esmond's slippers and another brick) in the backyard to lead him to his exit route, just in case he panicked and forgot his way out!












Esmond's slippers pain stakingly placed to guide the burglar(s) to their escape route, the broken wooden shelf that the burglar(s) had moved from the cement floor in front of the glass door to the grass patch....










The slippers (greying dot on the centre left of the photo) and the red brick (brownish red dot on the centre right of the photo) leading the burglar(s) fast escape out of the unit's back door...

Esmond called the police and his Group Security Division while I called the complex manager. He and his wife came right over to our unit, surveyed the area, contacted the "Glass guy" to come replace the glass door and lent us their broom so that we can clear up the dining room to avoid any injury to all.

We swept the shattered glass into a plastic bag and left them in the laundry. Meanwhile, the "Glass guy" arrived to replace the glass door at 4.30am! He was a very fast worker who knows his job. A few unscrewing and rescrewding here and there, pulling and yanking of some railings, knocking and dismantling, a new glass door is in place. All within half an hour to forty five minutes.

In fact, he arrived faster than the police! The police took 4 hours to come and they only arrived at 7.30am! By that time:
1) we had all finished clearing up and vacuuming the dining hall, kitchen, living room and stairs to rid of any glass shards remaining after the sweep,
2) Esmond and I had made a drive around the neighbourhood to see if the perpetrator(s)s had dumped his bag since there's nothing worthwhile in it,
3) Esmond had finished fiddling with his car's idle rev,
4) All 4 of us had gone back to bed to catch up with our sleep

only to have the phone ring again half an hour into our sleep. The police had finally arrived.

The police had also done neighbour checks and had got the Crime Scene Investigation unit (who will come either later today or tomorrow) to collect any available evidence from the scene of the crime... We've got a whole bag of shattered glass for them to go through....












Good luck going through the whole bag of glass shards CSI....


Lesson of the day:
1) Always lock your door and pull your curtains closed at night
2) Never leave any valuables in plain sight
3) Have weapons around the house just in case you need it
4) Have a powerful torch light within your reach
5) Have home and contents insurance
6) Some people are sick and desperate enough to trespass into a complex with a security gate, look into units, remove anything that's hindering their escape, mark their exit route, smash the glass door, grab the items, make a run for it while he / she knows that someone in the unit is still awake coz the light and music was still on
7) Things happen very fast - the burglar(s) probably took 2 seconds to grab the things and go
8) such events happen any time, anywhere under any circumstances, sometimes right under our noses.... (Esmond and Kelvin was watching Prison Break until 1.30am, Roger, Yenki and me were playing Chinese Checkers until 1.30am, David was Yenki's adviser and had gone back to his room to play games when we turn to bed for rest at 2am, I only fell asleep at 2.30am, Esmond only came to bed at 3am. The burglar may have been scouring the area and was quietly doing his stuff while each of us were going about our own stuff at the same time!).....

We are thankful that:
1) the burglar(s) just took the bag and the camera and didn't go for my wallet and mobile, didn't decide to come upstairs, hold us hostage and grab more things
2) not anyone of us were hurt (except financially)
3) that we have an onsite manager who came to us in the middle of the night, interrupting his sleep
4) that the Glass guy came very promptly to replace the glass door so we don't have to take turns to stand guard in the dining hall

After this incident, we are more appreciative of:
1) the security level in Singapore (throughout my nearly ten years in Singapore, I haven't experience a break in)
2) the efficiency of the Singapore Police force (the response time, the rate in which they solve crimes, their ability to track down perpetrators. QLD police have yet to capture or even "smell the trail" of the sex pervert(s) assaulting female joggers who go for their morning / evening runs in the park since 4th quarter last year, sex pervert(s) who break into people's home and sexually assaulted them - since the beginning of this year.... If these incidences happened in Singapore, I'm sure the pervert(s) would have been tracked, caught, caned, jailed by the end of last year. )
3) Window and door grills in SG, MY.
4) home and contents insurance (coz we didn't have any currently but are planning to have one soon....)

Hopefully:
1) the burglar(s) are caught, punished heavily (i doubt so... they'll probably get a slap on the wrist judging from the lame penalty system in AU) and our items returned (seriously doubt so coz I lost my mobile when I was in Uni 4 years back and they still have no trace of it....)
2) no more such incidences and our items are safe within our possession

We will:
1) keep all valuables out of sight
2) lock all doors, put a mahjong table against the glass door, draw the curtains shut every night
3) buy home and contents insurance
4) be more aware of our surroundings

This is definitely not a good start to a new year... Barely a month after our accident, we got burglared! Hopefully, these two instances are the only two Suay articles that I'll be writing for the rest of the year...

Surprise surprise !!! ~~ 3

13 March 2007, Tuesday - Holmead St....

We again lay ambush, this time in wait for the lead actor to return from the city after his romantic dinner with his wife-to-be....

One ring from Winnie and we left for Winnie's place and even Aunty (Winnie's mom) was an accomplice! She let us in and we even parked one of our car inside the garage so that when Kelvin comes back with Winnie, there were no clue of our existence there...

When we heard his car coming into the driveway, we lit the cake and his on either side of the wall. He came through the door and we sprang the surprise....

He was shocked to see us there! He had no idea at all! (Yay... the surprise was successful!

成功！)

We had fun and presented him with his present...

The surprise was all Winnie's idea... she was the mastermind....

Happy Birthday Kelvin!

Surprise surprise !!! ~~ 2

03 March 2007, Saturday - China Sea Restaurant, Milton

We lay ambushed at the China Sea Restaurant, waiting for the leading actress to arrive who was absolutely clueless of the set up....

Come 7pm, she arrived - to our disappointment without much drama.... (ha ha...). However, I did see the subdued surprised look and gleam in her eyes....

It was a gathering of good friends and family. We had good company, good food, not to mention good time...

Happy Birthday Kian!

Suay!!! - 2

04 March 2007, Sunday - Wah lao..... What a start to the year of the Golden Pig....

We were happily going about on our way to Market Square at Sunnybank, when suddenly a white car who was trying to overtake a car that's turning right, started turning into our lane, not seeming to see that we were right beside her. So we sounded our horn and stopped in our tracks to avoid the collision. Luckily, both of us managed to stop in time to avoid the inevitable.

However, that was not the end of the story yet. Approximatey 10 seconds later, we were rammed from behind! It was unexpected and the bump from behind had given Yenki and me a whiplash from the seatbelt.

It wasn't a very major bump, but it had managed to dislodge the head unit (stereo) from it's "box", the exhaust pipe from it's holder.


The popped out head unit / stereo....







The culprit? A 50+ Bosnian man driving his month old Honda Jazz. He was mad, and came out of the car, ranting and raving about, accussing us that we had caused the accident and that there was no reason that we had to stop at that T-Junction. He demanded that the police be called and had possibly called but failed.

The "Honda" sign was "stuck" underneath our car license plate...










As much as we tried to explain (in English) and calm him down, the 'uncle' didn't seem to take a word in and continued about his ranting ways. As there were no injuries or damaged public property, the police will not get themselves involved and will only instruct us to take down each other details and go directly to our respective insurance companies. In the end, he resorted to calling his daughter who was at Kuraby. But his mobile had ran out of credit, so he had politely requested to borrow my mobile to call his daughter, and he thanked me for it. But right after that, he turned his head to face Esmond and started ranting again. (I don't know if it's the adrenalin or the shock, my hands were shivering as I was keying in the numbers! But I still kept my cool... )













When his daughter came, he told his side of the story. Then his daughter listened to our side of the story, took a look at both our cars and told her father our side of the story. As much as she tried to explain in their own language, her father still refuses to accept our version, even though we had taken down the license plate of the white car and was willing to hand it over to them for their insurance claim.


The dented bonnet of the 1 month old Honda Jazz...







So the daughter turned to us and said, "Don't mind my father. This is how they handle accidents in Bosnia." She also said that she knows that it's her father's fault because he had rammed from behind. In Australia, regardless of any kind of situation, you will be at fault if you are the one who rammed other people from behind. So to her daughter, it is clear that there's no point in pointing fingers at us.

Fortunately, both of us have comprehensive insurance, and we each only have to pay a minimum sum of $300 - $400 for total repair of our cars.

Again fortunately, his daughter was very understanding and reasonable. There wasn't any drama. The same cannot be said about her father though. Because, in order to illustrate his version of the story, he himself had gone into the middle of the road, ranting and shouting about, hands pointing everywhere, not minding that there are oncoming cars on both sides of the roads and he himself might cause more accidents and endanger himself and others. His daughter and son-in-law had to drag him back to the sidewalk more than 3 times!

So what have we learnt from this episode?
1) Anything can happen anytime when you least expected it
2) You can just lose somebody in a blink of an eye (we met Kelvin on the road barely 5 minutes before the accident)
3) Seatbelts saves lives (it saved me from banging my head against the dashboard, Esmond against the steering wheel, Yenki against the back of the driver's seat)
4) Speed kills (on a stretch of 60km/h, Yenki and me have whiplash from the seatbelt. I felt the "force" of being thrown to the front. If the car behind us had gone any faster, say 80 - 90 - 100km/h, there'll surely be much more serious injuries, i.e. got blood and possibly bone jutting out as per army's saying....)
5) Stay calm, no point shouting and pointing fingers, ranting and raving like a lunatic

So, even though we were involved in an accident, we have to be thankful that:
1) there's no serious injuries,
2) that the car wasn't any faster than 60km/h,
3) that the daughter was understanding and reasonable,
4) that people were concerned about our situation and had came out of their houses to check if everything was fine (one even offered to let David wash his hands in the tap in the garden),
5) that we have our friend's support and concern (thanks David! for rushing out to our aid and putting the exhaust pipe back into its place),
6) that we had purchased comprehensive insurance coverage

Hopefully, this minor little accident has warded off any big ones that may be heading our way this year.

P/S: After putting the exhaust pipe back in place, we proceeded on our way to Market Square to do our grocery shopping.


Esmond: Hello, hello... yah, some bugger kiss my bum lah.. damn suay lah..

Interesting looking melon / gourd...








金猪年差一点变猪头。。。

在今年农历新年的元宵节上午，我们正想要到市场买些食品。三人一同坐一辆车子，朝向小台北方向驶去。路途中我们还遇上了Kelvin，闲聊了几句才继续我们的路途。怎知，不到五分钟后，我们便被追撞！

有一辆白色轿车，为了避免跟在右转的黑色轿车，驶近了我们的路线。那司机并没有意识到我们就在她的左边。为了避免与这辆白色轿车相撞，我们想起了喇叭，并同时紧急刹车。

我们庆幸没有跟这白色轿车发生意外。正当我们把视线都放在那司机上，我们被一股推动力，强力的推向前！

我心想，“糟了！我们被追撞！”

我担心益荣 和美玉受伤，赶紧往他俩瞄了一下。辛好，他们都没什么大碍。

很奇怪，我并不觉得撞击声很大，可是屋内的人都纷纷跑出来看个究竟。

之后我们再往车后看，发现是一辆丰田爵士。驾驶者是一位约五十来岁的红毛先生。他怒冲冲，气呼呼的从车子走出，并大声地责骂我们。说我们并没有理由把车子停放在那，这起车祸都是我们的错。我们试着解释，可是他却不愿意听进脑。他的英语程度也不太好。最后，他便打了通电话给他的女儿。

当她的女儿到达时，听了她的父亲的解释，再转身听听我们的解释。之后，他边看了看两辆汽车，便说“我知道是我父亲的错。请原谅他的大哄大叫，应为这是波斯尼亚解决车祸的方式！”

可是，她的父亲却很不干心，继续指责我们， 经管他的孩子已经解释数百遍！他还走到路中央，比手画脚的大喊。有好几次，他差一点就引起了另一场车祸。

交换了个人资料，我们把车子开到了附近的油站，想把排气管 勾回原位。车后防撞器 已变成了花猫，还凹了进去。搞定了排气管, 我们继续往小台北购物。

后语：我和美玉都有whiplash，也就是安全带所造成的肌肉酸疼。我的头不能够完整的向最右边或左边转，抬头也会痛，肩膀偶尔有点麻痹。医生说看起来不大碍，这是车祸最普遍的伤。可是，要观察一个星期，若还没复原，就要回去复诊。

希望这小小的意外，已经把更大的灾难或祸害给挡住/解了。让我们都平平安安，建健康康的度过这一年。