TANKS Travel Tales - a travelogue.......

I have always loved wildlife . But I am un able to take good photographs of wildlife , mainly due to a lack of patience and photographic skills . Whenever, I chanced upon an opportunity when a bird got near to me, I always tried my best to capture a photograph of it, hoping that one of these photographs will turn out well. I am not saying this photograph is good. But it was as good as it got for me. Wild bird ,  Kings Park and Botanic Garden , Perth, Western Australia , Australia (2018)

Most visitors to Cambodia's famed Angkor National Park are interested in its archeological sites, including Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom as well as many others. But for locals, sometimes, it was the natural surroundings of the sites that drew their interests. I was visiting Angkor Wat on my second trip to the Angkor National Park in 2022 when I caught sight of these two local kids admiring flowers on a tree.  From quite a distance away, I lifted my DSLR camera and zoomed in for a close-up photo of this magical moment.  Kids admiring flowers on a tree, Angkor Wat, Angkor National Park, Cambodia (2022)

12 months into 2025 and looking forward to 2026.......  Similar to my Travel Bits article of November 2025, I will start by repeating that I had just returned from another weekend trip to  Hong Kong . This was my 6th visit to the city for the year. However, my next trip will be just a mere month away, in January 2026, on transit while on my way to Osaka . Next week, I will embark on a road trip from Singapore to Ipoh . This trip will wrap up my travels for 2025. Meanwhile, I had already started planning for my first overseas trips in the first two weeks of 2026. I will begin the new year by traveling to Hong Kong, Osaka, Kyoto, Penang and Phuket in quick succession. A busy travel calendar to start the new year. Equally busy is my work schedule. I am expecting myself to be working on the go while I vacation. There are analyses to conduct, reports to write and online meetings to attend. A fast paced December to conclude the year of 2025 and an equally fast paced January to st...

Petaling Jaya, Selangor This article was first published on my other blog,  Monde des Stylos . This other bloc entered on anything and everything related to Pens and Stationery. Attending a local Pen Show is a personal milestone in my Journaling hobby. At such events, I get to not only meet like-minded enthusiasts in the world of pens and stationery, but also get to see and touch many of the pens and stationery that I would otherwise only get to see virtually from photographs online. Traveling from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur just to attend a Pen Show was the first time I travel specifically for such an event. Certainly a Travel Bucket List item for me! ****************** This was only my second time attending a pen show. And because it was the inaugural  Malaysia International Pen Show  and it was also held in a venue relatively close to my home city, I decided to travel to attend the show; also taking the opportunity to meet up with friends whom I have not met for so...

Malaysia's KTM is currently the only service provider that runs regular trains between Johor Bahru in Malaysia and Woodlands in Singapore . Nothing spectacular or amazing, I personally consider this as just a regular inter-city train connection between Peninsular Malaysia 's southern most city of Johor Bahru ( JB ) with Singapore's northern region of Woodlands. The only difference between typical inter-city trains and this service, is that this train service actually crosses an international border between two countries even though the actual journey each way is less than 5 minutes. Therefore, passports and travel documents are required for immigration and customs clearance purposes. Named the  KTM Shuttle Tebrau , this train service is highly subsidised when tickets are purchased in Malaysia at JB Sentral Station's Ticket Counters . Return tickets from JB to Singapore generally cost only RM5 at the time of the publishing of this blog article.  Buying the tickets in...

Johor Bahru (JB) is located at the southern tip of Peninsular Malaysia and is connected to Singapore via the Causeway , across the Straits of Johor. Due to its close geographical proximity to Singapore, as well as the favourable currency exchange rate between the Singapore Dollar (SGD) and the Malaysian Ringgit (RM), many Singaporeans and Malaysians working in Singapore, typically made day trips to JB via the Causeway. During these day trips, most travelers will dine and shop. It is not uncommon to see folks returning to Singapore from, JB in the late afternoons and evenings, laden with shopping bags. This happens on most days, not just the weekends. Although during weekends, the crowds crossing the Causeway are noticeably larger. Being someone who does not really enjoy being in a crowd, I mostly stay away from such day trips. On occasions when I drove across the Causeway, it was mostly to travel further inland into Malaysia, either to Kuala Lumpur or to Ipoh. But on one weekday after...