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Palm Garden and Chipping

So, for the first time this year we played at Palm Garden Golf at Putrajaya. It’s actually a reasonably easy course but for some strange reason, scores are never good over here.

But today, I had another mission: solve my chipping problems. It needs to be resolved. I’ve developed a really stupid, but maybe effective method. I address the ball in a narrow stance, with the ball in the centre. Then I shift my feet to 45 degrees of the ball, as in, in a really open position as if I am hitting the ball 45 degrees to the left of its intended target. Then I move my hands back to address the ball.

What this does is that I am chipping with an extremely exaggerated open stance. I’ve tried many times in my garden back home and I am hitting them perfectly. So it’s time to take Ranger Rick to the course.

Hole 10: We started at the Bismark course and immediately at the tough par 5. I haven’t resolved my drives yet, but again, my priority was to figure out my chipping so I didn’t really care much. I was still pulling my drive. My second shot was a good 5 wood, leaving me around 90 meters to the green. I hit my 3rd shot sandwedge fat and immediately now was left with a tricky chip over the rough onto the green. I took my sandwedge out, did all my standard setup and…..skull. I don’t get it. I can hit it perfectly from anywhere at home and when it comes to the course, it’s…completely fishes up. The skull left me with a long putt for par which I missed, settled for bogey (+1). DANG!

Hole 11: Tough par 4, but I didn’t hit it badly. I just pushed my drive straight right but for some weird reason, couldn’t find my ball. I am unlucky in many ways and usually if there is a ball missing, then it’s mine. I took a drop near the trees and stuffed a gap wedge to around 8 feet, and sank the bogey putt (+2).

Hole 12: Easy par 3. Aimed right with my gap wedge to around 110 meters and stuffed it to around 6 feet! I missed the easy birdie badly but hit the comeback for par. (+2)

Hole 13: This is the massive par 5 which as long as you don’t go right you are fine. I went left. WAAAY left. Surrounded by trees I actually hit a very lucky shot that skim every branches along the way and landed around 100 meters in the rough on the left. Now, it was an easy sandwedge to the green, with only one skinny palm tree in front of me. And amazingly, I hit the the palm tree smack in the middle of its trunk, rebounded into oblivion behind me to OB. Amazing luck. I could try to hit that tree a 1,000 times and never get it. Dropped for 5th, duffed the shot near the green. Chipping time! I used a gap wedge and I chipped it too hard over the green.  Seven on and one putted for a very unfortunate triple. (+5) However, the plus is that I actually contacted my chip.

Hole 14: It goes downhill fast. Tough par 3,with OB on the left, which I promptly hooked into. My second hung onto the green, but I three-putted stupidly for another triple. Two in a row and it looks like this game is shot to hell. (+8)

Hole 15: A very broad par 5. This is a welcome sight because the fairway is so accomodating. Yet another hook, another missed fairway but no harm. I hit my 5 wood left, which left me dead inside the trees and which I had to punch out to around 100 meters. Should be my bread and butter, but I hit it fat. Chipping time! This time with a sandwedge, but it was poorly hit and my next shot crept into the green, then two putted for double (+10). The chipping at least wasn’t bad.

Hole 16: This is one of our favourite holes because you can power this one onto the green if you hit a great shot. I hit a poor drive and hooked it left, but it still left me around 70 meters to the green. I didn’t hit a good shot which left me on the rough near the green. Ah, chipping! I used my gap to chip and duff it slightly, so it went too short. Two putted for a bogey. (+11)

Hole 17: Nice par 3, but I played too short with my pitching wedge and landed into the bunker. One out, missed par for bogey. (+12)

Hole 18: Very bad drive. It was just straight top, veer left and somehow survive. Left me around 150 to the green, my 8-iron was topped and into the water. Dropped and hit on the green for my 4th, two putted for six. (+14)

So, made the turn at a very poor number. But strangely, I was enjoying my golf more because at least my chipping was improving. Honest!

Hole 1: This is relatively easy hole, but I again skull-topped-hooked my drive and had around 140 to the green. My 9 iron found the bunker, hit my third out, missed par, and went in for bogey (+15)

Hole 2: 9-iron went into the bunker, out in my second, missed par and settled for bogey (+16)

Hole 3: Long, long par 4. I hit a reasonably hooked shot, which left me around 160 away, but my 7 iron was hooked terribly, leaving me with a very very long putt. 3 putted easily, and expectedly for bogey. (+17)

Hole 4: This is a funny par 5 with island green approach. I hit the same skull hooked shot but somehow found my ball. A punch out, and another sandwedge left me around 100 meters to a downhill green. Another committed SW took me to around 10 feet from the hole, but couldn’t save par and settled for bogey. (+18)

Hole 5: Another par 5. This time. This time, I hit the best drive ever. Ever. It flew for miles and the release was perfect. My second shot, I stubbed my 5 wood and hooked it to the left but no harm done. I was only around 60 meters. My 60 degree was very poor and I only managed to get onto the front. But finally, a two putt – par to take home. (+18)

Hole 6: Tough hole. Hit a hook to the left but still in a good spot. Hooked my 6 iron and it hit literally the only small tree in the vicinity of around 30 meters from the green. CHIP/PITCH! I took my sandwedge, implemented my extreme open stance and yes, hit a brilliant pitch to around 6 feet of the hole. I felt like doing a rain dance then and there. I celebrated too much I think as I powered my par putt like 4 feet past, and couldn’t hit the return! Double bogey – but very happy with my pitch (+20)

Hole 7: VERY tough par 3. Long and again, hooked my 7 wood into the adjacent fairway. Wow. I was faced with a very tough shot over trees onto an extremely sloping green. 60 degree wedge, implemented my open stance again and executed a very good flop over trees and softly to the edge of the green. Extremely quick putt was done nicely to around 2 feet and putted in for a very unlikely bogey. (+21)

Hole 8: This is a fine hole and I hit a very good drive. I was on the right rough and I must have misjudged my sandwedge so poorly that I duffed it. Now, I am about 40 meters with a daunting pitch. I hit a ‘meh’ pitch to the front of the green, but considering here I was weeks ago, this was a success. It actually flew over the bunker and got caught onto the fringe. I putted for par to around 2 feet and unfortunately, missed the bogey putt when my ball rattled around the hole. Bad double, but hey, chipping/pitching is fun again. (+23)

Hole 9: Hit a good drive that completely flew the bunkers on the left. Left with around 70 meters and hit my 60 degree pitch shot again with my open stance. Getting really used to it now. It crept to the front of the green, and two putted for a routine par to end the round (+23)

Conclusion: You would think when someone scores 95 it would be an unmitigated disaster, but I really enjoyed the game. This is because I am beginning to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel to my chipping woes. Sure, my irons and drivers still suck, but generally I am fine with those because I can compensate by aiming right to accommodate my hooks. I am not concerned. The chips however…you can’t escape this. There is no bail out, there are no compensating factor here.

Open stance, good tempo, and my chips will be fine. I just need to clock in a few more rounds to get this down to habit and I am ready for fine golfing again.

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I gave in to Astro

For many years, I’ve treated Astro as extortionist in providing so called sports package without golf channel. So I cut golf channel and told Astro I rather cut off my left arm than to subscribe to them again and give them all my hard earned money.

However.

After 3 years without Golf Channel, I finally could not resist the urge anymore and tapped in to subscribe to the channel for an extra RM10.60 per month. It’s not the money. Its the principal of paying this company.

Yes, I hear of so many alternatives like android TV etc. But am I brave enough to let go of Astro and go for these options? Sacrifice my football? Maybe, but let’s do it after World Cup. I can’t afford not to watch World Cup.

But yes, so I woke up on a Monday morning at 1.50 am to watch Mr Tiger Woods tee up in the second last group of the Valspar Championship. Honestly, without Tiger, nobody even knew what the hell this Valspar is about. I have no clue. Google Valspar and instead of the company information, everything is about Tiger Woods. You have one man instantly making a company nobody in this universe has heard of, suddenly famous.

To be honest, I had my misgivings of Tiger. Too many false dawns. Watching him chip and play in 2015 was like watching Michael Jordan missing a dunk in my 5 year old’s toy basketball game. It was painful and horrible. When he recovered a bit and wanted to play the 2017 season and then quit, I thought: The man is gone. How I wish I recorded all those games he played. You never know what you miss until it leaves you. And that was what Tiger was, not just to me, but to millions of golfers around the world.

But this time, he was sizzling. Like pre-car crash Thanksgiving day sizzling. You can see his drive. His iron shots. The swoosh sound of his irons and the thud of his impact. El Tigre was here and strangely, this time, the dawn isn’t so false.

So I watched, hole after hole. Birdie to start. Second hole, par save. Awesome. Par 3 4th hole, bogey couldn’t get up and down. It’s OK. Plenty of scoring opps.

However, he started missing his irons, he started missing his putts.

The most demoralising stats was for the final round 4 par 5s, he only birdie one. 14th was a heartbreaker. He was on with his second stroke, but three putted. If he had hit that, he would tie Casey. The next hole par 3 15th, he zoned in his iron to 6 feet but again missed his putt. He would have won the damn championship.

Instead he led in a 40 foot putt on the 17th to get everyone excited, but his last hole was poor. Too long a putt to tie, and he faded to second.

Disappointing?

Yes, for sure. Because I didn’t sleep and I went to meet a customer in the morning looking like a zombie.

But the great thing now is that I have Golf Channel back, and another Tiger Woods week in Bay Hill. Welcome back, TV golf!

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The Myth of Club Distance

An interesting topic that has recently cropped up, and topped off by a gilagolfer via an email, is the distance that I am hitting. He wasn’t the first that pointed out that my distance seems long in my blog description, and I am not sure if I have overstated some of these distance, because most of the time, I am using the distance marker of the course to dictate my clubs I am using. So if the distance marker is screwed, then obviously my description is screwed. I always feel sometimes, the 100m marker on some courses are understated. I look at how far Usain Bolt runs in the 100m dash and I look at the marker to the green and I am like, “Hold on, this is way too near. Usain Bolt will just take like 10 strides to reach the green from here!”

So obviously there are some discrepancies, but in general my thought process is this:

a) If I am 150m away based on the marker, I am deciding if an 8 iron or a 9 iron, depending on the green (downhill or uphill, back pin, front pin etc). I rarely take out my 7 iron for anything these days.

b) If I am 160m away, I automatically select a 6 iron.

c) If I am 170 – 180m away, a 5 iron . A 5-iron off the tee also works for 190m, anything over 200m I am thinking a wood.

d) Anywhere 100m-110m, a gap wedge

e) Anywhere 130m, a pitching wedge.

f) Anything 90m t0 100m, a sand wedge.

Now, this is the actual thought process I have. And there might be actual reasons to it, and its not because I am hitting pro distance. Of course, there a lot of mental gymnastics being used.

a) Not true distance

The distance might not be to the pin. I usually play it short because I am too cheap to use good balls, so all my golf balls are really old and lousy and rolls a lot. Almost never I aim for the pin, so the green could be 160m away, but I am actually looking to land it around 150 or so and hope for a good roll.

b) Delofting

I also deloft my club A LOT. I noticed this stupidity in my swing, because I break my wrist so early in the take away, when I am impacting my irons, I feel like I am compressing the ball and slamming the ball into the dirt. I usually take out a divot the size of Brazil. My address to the ball is in a typically closed position, which also reasons why I sometimes yank my ball way left like a banana.

c) Clubs

And my clubs are MP-54s. The loft is a degree lower than my previous RAC LT irons for all the irons, so that also goes a fair way in terms of distance.

d) One strength

The other problem with my swing is that I have only one strength: MAX. I have no other way of slowing down my swing or shortening my swing or playing those finesse shots, which reasons why my short game is like a walrus humping an orca. This problem is translated into the fact that if I have around 80m to go and its between a soft sand wedge or a hard 60 degree lob wedge, I would go for the lob and whack the living $hit of out the ball.

e) Swing with a soon-to-be expiry date

Some golfers play with a swing that’s so natural and relaxed, you wonder if they are in a coma during the downswing. I have a friend in his 60s who bombs the ball a mile, but he swings like he’s going for a picnic. Of course, him being an ex national cager, ex national hockey player and extremely adept in his hand eye coordination helps, but you look at him and you think he can keep his swing well into his 90s.

Not mine.

I feel like I am wrestling with a damn anaconda all the time with my swing. It’s like this massive reptile is threatening to gobble me up if I don’t put it under control. I have to constantly remind myself never to flip my wrist early, always lean to the right, always shift my weight, always do this, that, stop my overswing etc. When I pull it off, I feel like I deserve to be in the PGA tour. When I miss it, I miss it so bad, I end up in the part of the course where nobody ever goes to. And always, in my mind, I am waiting for the day this swing kills my back or spine and I have to swing like Charles Barkley after that.

f) My Driver is not Pro

You can tell that, my drive, although pretty long by hacker standard is nowhere near the pro distance. I will be lucky to hit anywhere at the 250m range. I usually hit it short because at a 10.5 loft and stock shaft, my golf balls are generally ballooning up without much roll.

g) Shape of shots

I set my shots up to draw, and miss by hooks. I can’t fade to save my life. On shots that end up drawing, the rolls are more significant, giving an illusion of a longer distance. However, the problems are a lot more…as they say, you can talk to a slice but you can’t talk to a hook.

h) The Overestimation of Hackers

And finally, it could simply be the disease that inflicts all of us. We all overestimate our greatness. How many times we’ve heard people go like, “WOW, I’ve just a hit a 250m drive!” and when you walk up to it, you see that it has barely trickled past the 200m mark. So all of us, myself included has a myopic view when it comes to our golf distance and for some unknown and maybe unconscious reason, always lie about how long we are. All guys like that, maybe. About golf distance of course, you pervert.

So there you go, those are generally my explanation. I am not pro distance, not by a long shot. My scores tell the truth – good games are in the low 80s, average games are between 88 – 95, and horrible games can blow to 100s.

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Third Time Lucky

Happy Chinese New Year!

We had a game this week, my third game of the year. The first two games were completely off…the first game in KGNS was a 100+ while the second in tropicana yielded an almost bogey free game – 5 doubles, 4 triples, 1 bogey and 8 pars.

This time around, we tried our luck at KGNS once more, and played A LOT better. The caveat is of course we played one nine on Championship and the other nine on what we term as the ‘Mickey Mouse’ course – i.e the non-Championship Kelana Course.I think we played a par 35 for that one. This caveat is balanced out with the fact that I was trying out by really old Hi-bore driver again, and an extremely old putter (PING B60 OLD), and another 60 degree wedge, other than my normal one. Switching clubs is always a problem in the best of times, its made even worse when you are struggling, but I thought, ah well, just for fun, why not.

The front nine was played in typical roller coaster fashion, but there were TONS of missed putts. Bad lag putts, bad short putts, and everything in between. It could be 2 – 3 strokes better, but at the end 3 bogeys, 3 doubles and 3 pars isn’t bad for Championship course.

Going into Kelana, it was again still very bad putting and chipping, but the last six was played with bogey, par, bogey, par, par, par to a +2. And this included a 3 putt and a missed birdie putts on most of the par holes. The back nine was played on a +5, and for the first time this year, managed to break 90.

So here’s to better golf!

The good news is now of course, fingers crossed, Tiger Woods is playing well again. I am thinking of subscribing to the Golf Channel once more, but the thought of the crooks at Astro getting any benefit is keeping me away from it.

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Tropicana – great course, horrendous caddies

Tropicana has always been a favourite haunt of ours. The advantages of the proximity to all our homes, the great fairways there, good greens and overall mixture of challenging holes and holes we can attack – and over 27 holes, it has become our preferred destination of weekday golfing.

Which brings the problem – it is also the preferred destination of a thousand other golfers. Even playing on a weekday, especially with one 9 closed, can feel like a weekend pace for some. Especially today, when we had an absolutely hopeless flight in front of us. You know those type that takes 2 minutes to putt a 3 footer, misses, kicks out a leg and screams a chinese expletive. It is very, very tiring just sitting down (yes, we finally gave up and all of us just sat on the fairway watching them do their nonsense) and seeing how frightfully inconsiderate they are.

While Tropicana is one of the best course in Malaysia (in our opinion), it is balanced out with the most crappy caddies in all of Malaysia. They are useless and the ones we experienced were idiots. I generally don’t like to comment too much on caddies, but today, there was one hopeless lady caddying for us (the other buggy, not mine). She had comments for everything. The clubs we used, the distance, what we should be doing and all that. Once in a while it’s fine but when I am at the 17th hole, and you are the caddy of the other buggy you DO NOT tell me to hit a 8 iron into a 140m stick. She just stood there and said, “For you, boss, use 8 iron”. I am like, who the hell are you? You don’t caddy for me so shut the hell up.

The final hole, where it was a 240m to the pond, while everyone was using 3 wood, I was contemplating between my 5 wood and a half controlled driver. Because I was feeling good with my driver. She immediately said, “Cannot! Tak boleh!” and I told her, the more I hear cannot, tak boleh, the more I say, BOLEH. And it was the last hole anyway and I just wanted to swing it. She kept grumbling for some reason. She is NOT my caddy. She caddies for the other buggy. My caddy was generally mute, which is the preferred condition I want my caddy to be in.

I hit a great shot, but it drew and it looked like it entered into the water near the green. The “not my caddy” laughed and said, “Padan Muka (serves you right)!” a few times.

I walked over to her and said in my broken Malay interspersed with English colourful words, “You do not comment on me. Once, twice is enough. If the golfer decides to use a club, the golfer decides. You do not make any further comment, or laugh or make fun of the golfer. You are not my friend. You are a god*amn caddy, and that’s what you do, so shut the **** up and caddy your sh*t or else I am going to leave you here or throw you into the ******* water. You are not my friend, so do not talk to me like you know me or you know sh*t about me. You don’t get any tips and I am going to put your card into the sh*tty caddy category later. Now get the **** away from me.” I said it in a very calm manner, but made sure she understood. She has no familiarity with me, and I have zero inclination to be familiar with her, so unless she wants her mouth stuffed full of golf balls, just do what your limited job scope is or get out of my sight.

I found my ball at the edge of the water, used my 60 degree and stiffed it to around 5 feet, missed the birdie and par my last hole. She avoided me after that.

This is not the first time, Tropicana caddies have given us shit. The problem with these caddies is that they think they are our friend. There was another caddy my friend scolded the other day (on the 1st tee, nonetheless), for showing up late, and not doing what she was told, and scowling and making a meal out of taking the club for my friend. He just told her to get away from our flight and basically kicked her out. The starter intervened before my friend went berserk on her.

It’s not like we want treat Caddies like crap. I get it. It’s not easy caddying for hackers like us. But when we have told you to shut the hell up once or twice, then just shut the hell up. Again, the concept here is you are NOT my friend, so don’t talk to us like how we talk to each other. They aren’t educated to caddy properly, and I fault Tropicana for that. If you give us hopeless caddies, then at least just let them carry our clubs and that’s it. Nothing else. Tropicana = great course, EXTREMELY USELESS caddies.

My game was amazingly up and down today. When the dust settled, it was 5 double bogeys, 4 triple bogeys, 1 bogey and 8 pars.

I almost went bogey free today except for the 17th hole when I hit my first bogey with a bad 4 footer miss.

And it’s not like I was driving it bad. All my triple came from great drives.I usually set up to aim right as I have my draw as my normal shot and hook as misses. For some reason, on all my triple bogeys, I hit great straight drives – either they went into the water or OB, or in one occasion, I simply could not find it. So driving wise, except for one hole where I topped it, it was a PERFECT driving game for me.

The other parts of the game was another story. My chipping was like a baboon trying to hump a kangaroo while parachuting down, with a dynamite attached to the ass. That’s how bad it was. There is something wrong mentally. I am mentally incapable to chip. I do it perfect on the practice range, but in the game, as if for some reason, I suddenly become a tapir learning how to tap dance. I don’t think it can be cured, like my color blindness, so I just have to live with this confounding handicap. This has turned many of my par or bogey opportunities to double and triple today.

But yeah – slowly, I am getting back up to speed for 2018. It’s at least a lot better than my first game for sure.

Oh by the way, at the end, we did tip the hopeless caddy and we also put her card into the ‘good’ category. For all our talk, we are actually very compassionate people and look – you are far away from your home, you probably have kids back home you are homesick for, and you probably made an honest mistake in being familiar with us when we don’t want you to – let’s move on, be careful next time. That’s why I like this group I play with, we are NATO people – No Action , Talk Only. Always threatening the caddies, but at the end we are too charitable to be angry for long!

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2018 begins…with Failure!

Like every year, 2018 starts with all the best intentions.

Lose weight.

Don’t swear.

Exercise More.

Spend more time with kids.

Sleep earlier.

Don’t overwork or overeat.

Play good golf.

And like all good intentions, everything is shot to hell within the first week. Really. I’m like, damn it! It’s like groundhog day!

Lose weight – In Malaysia, not possible. Because after english new year, is Chinese New Year. Only a stupid person will not eat anything in chinese new year. Only an EXTREMELY stupid person goes back to Penang and not have anything good to eat.

Don’t swear – This one very easy to lose. First hour of the year already gone.

Exercise more – I am currently exercising. In my mind. In my mind I am jogging and playing badminton and football.

Spend more time with kids – actually this is still going as planned. I am working a great schedule now to ensure I spend some time to take them out for food and hang out at the petrol station store more – because its cheaper than hanging out at cafes.

Sleep Earlier – No. Gone within the first day.

Don’t overwork or overeat – Overworking is subjective actually. I don’t think I am overworking at all. As in I don’t really know what the limit of my work is, so how do we know what “over”-working is?

Overeating — I apply the same theory.

Play good golf.

Ah. So we played our first game in KGNS. I started with a beautiful double bogey over the first 4 holes. Then I rattled in a triple bogey. Then at least I ran into a bogey, then I had bogey, bogey, par to end the front nine.

My drives were just horrendous, my stupid wedge was completely off and I was just playing absolutely fantastically lousy golf. It was frustrating, because there were some absolute beautiful shots in there, like my sand wedge on the 10th to 2 feet of the hole fro 110 metres. Or the booming drive on the 16th setting me only 60 meters away from the green and I stuck it to 5 feet (and missed the birdie). But 80% was CRAP. My 60 degree dug into the ground so much, that I can start a new career in landscaping. Every single shot I did was in the ground. Duff. Duff. Duff. I duffed, I think, total 6 shots. Until it dawned upon my stupid brain that the ground was very wet and soft, and I should be using something with more bounce, like my sand wedge! And voila, from there on, it worked! But I was on the 17th hole already! Stupid!

So, no, my first game, I think I didn’t even crack 100.

What a great start to the year!

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So yet another year ends – What brings 2018?

It used to be that once almost weekly I would have updated this blog, but not anymore. I would like to give the thousands of excuses like taking care of my two kids from getting killed by a thousand things in the house, like TV, fan blades and them jumping off the bed and swan diving onto my marble floor — sometimes I think I am in a real life game of lemmings. You know that game where I have to save those little buggers from committing suicide. Or I can blame my business, where I spend all the time figuring out how to get work done or get paid or how did I end up getting work done and not get paid or any of those permutation of events.

But I won’t.

Because the free time I have, yes, I am still whacking the tiny ball and trying to get it into the hole with the fewest stroke possible.

What does 2018 brings?

For one thing, I am finally playing reasonably good golf, after a LONG. Long. Time. Now, the very moment I write this I am going to jinx myself and I know for sure the next game will be a car wreck. But so far, the games I’ve been playing, I have been shooting regularly in the 80s, from the best of 84 to average of around 86 – 88 at least. I am playing probably to a reasonable 13 – 14 handicap now finally.

The best part of the game improved is my drive and irons. The driver is starting to click. I’ve developed a pre-shot routine that somehow works. It takes longer but it generally settles me down easier. It’s:

a) Select a far item in the horizon, point to it

b) Line up my driver and my stance

c) One practice stroke

d) Line up my driver and stance again

e) Do a shortened backswing to about quarter swing, to set my weight to my right

f) Waggle a bit

g) Look at something around 3 – 5 feet away in front of me (that means not in direction of the fairway, since I am already lined up perpendicular for a swing) – this usually ends up being the buggy, a stick, a tree, a bush, a monkey or a surprised caddy thinking I am pissed off at her

h) Take a deep breath

i) Take one last look down the fairway

j) Pull the trigger.

It sounds like a long pre-shot, but it’s actually quite brisk, around 15 – 20 seconds before I pull the trigger. I’ve been around guys who takes 40 + seconds to get the shot off, so I am considered ok. And it’s doing some incredible things to my game, because now, I am less rush, so I don’t swing so wildly. I still have this hook sometimes, but I am connecting it. I am much more confident that my driver is going to connect and when it does, it goes long, dropping around 240 – 250. I always think that we overestimate our distance, but I did do some measurements roughly and for some par 4s in Glenmarie valley, I was hitting my second shot into the green with a sandwedge.

The other aspect is my irons. After switching to my Mizuno, I can’t go back to anything else. I tried using my taylormade again the other day and promptly duffed or topped all my irons. The Mizuno is like a freaking samurai katana. It just feels balanced and awesome. It feels like I am having the staff of Gandalf with me. It helps that my iron distance has gone long as well – now for 100 meters, I am looking at sandwedge, for 110, a gap, and for 130, a pitching wedge and for 150 meters, a 9 iron. I hardly use my 8 or 7 anymore, because from 160 or 170 onwards I use my 6 iron and for 180 plus, 5 iron. I don’t use any utility and only occasionally I use my 5 wood to get two-on for par 5s. One of my friends calls me the Bull, for my bruteforce, not for my bullshit. At least, I think so.

And the aspects of my game that is completely stupid? Chipping, pitching, any shot that requires control. Except bunker. I love bunker shots now, and I use my 60 degree all. The. Time. No more sandwedges for me. But chipping? Nope. I have the yips. Pitching anything below 80 meters and I am likely going to duff it or skull it. I asked my friend if anyone sees a 70-degree wedge, let me know. At least I can do a full shot on it on 50 meters. For chipping, anything within sight of the green is puttable. A bad putt is a good chip, as they say.

So looking forward to more gametime in 2018 of course and guess what?

Tiger is back!!!!

Happy new year, Gilagolfers!

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Renewing Maid Permit – Part 2

For a golf blog, strangely one of the higher hits article is one I wrote in November last year for renewal of maid permit in Malaysia: http://gilagolf.net/gilalogy/renewing-maid-permit-in-malaysia/

Hence, it’s proven at the utmost ineptitude of our public services that so many people are at lost on how to renew their maid’s permit in Malaysia.

This year, we had to undergo something slightly different, namely the renewal of the maid’s passport and also the contract renewal (we didn’t even realise this), before going for the permit renewal. So you see, every year, there is a whole crap lot of renewal going on.

Firstly, the contract needs to be renewed first before the passport can be renewed. Now, I know there are manual ways to do the maid renewal, but we didn’t mind paying a little extra for our agent to help us out (plus, we think this agent is good. If anyone needs a reasonably good agent, drop me a note). Basically she took care of everything for us, and filled up all the required forms. We ended up paying around RM1,500 for the stamp and notary and insurance and agency fees, and also the embassy verification. Could we have done it ourselves? Probably, but it would have taken us some time to do it.

Once this was settled (you need to give copies of your maid’s old passport and permit, as well as your IC), we then head over to the embassy to sign off the contract and also at the same time work out the passport renewal. Once at the embassy, the agent was there and she sorted out everything for us, I just signed the contract (2 years) and then the passport was sorted out. The maid had to be there and we went for lunch and after that, the process was done. We just needed to collect it after a couple of weeks. There’s probably a whole bunch of articles on how this can be done manually without the agent to help, but since this is the lazy-man’s version, I would suggest to just use the agent to expedite the process.

Now you have the new passport, everything is settled, right?

No.

If you try to do what was in last year’s article, you will have a problem at the MyEG page (assuming you have sorted out all your Fomema stuff, which is the same as the previous article).

The MyEg site will state that there is invalid passport tied to your name. This means that if you renew the passport you need to make an extra trip to the immigration (in my case, Jalan Duta), and go to the second floor and state that you have a maid new passport, and they need to tie that passport to your name.

Honestly while this may look stupid, the whole process took around half hour only – the lady behind the counter was courteous and efficient, and the only problem was just the normal waiting period for your turn to be called up.

Once the passport is tied to your name, all you need to do then is to proceed with payment and once more head to the 21st floor of the IBM tower (it is named ‘CN’ for some reason on the lift button), and once on 21st floor, you just need to pass your maid’s passport and proof of payment. And bring your own IC.

Again, wait for another half hour or more and they will then lead you into another room where they pass you the maid’s permit card and also paste the new permit into the new passport. Bring along the old passport for verification.

Boom! Another year done. Contract renewal is every 2 years. Maid permit every year. Fomema, hopefully by next year, there is no longer a need.

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The Absence of Inspiration

Yes, I admit this blog has not been updated for the longest time. And the few readers coming back has wondered if gilagolf has indeed

a) Given up golf

b) Died

Well, neither is correct. You could say, for a), the drive of golf is still there. Still playing at least twice a month, and still finding it hard to crack 90 and still with an overswing and still suck at chipping. Golf is a game that does not commensurate and reward the time you put into it. It’s annoying that after more than 12 years of hacking this game, our scores generally remain as it is with a few improvements and many many many false dawns. I think as we grow older some aspects of your game improve. But some de-prove. For instance I am certainly driving a bit better now, but my short game has progressively become worse.

We played at Tropicana recently. And although I managed 6 pars, even with a sandy par (which is a big deal), there were tons of putts missed and chunked chips and shanked pitches. It’s like everytime I get into the 50 yards zone, I die. It comes to a point where for a par 5 if I know I have a very low percentage to hit the green, I prefer to hit it to the 100m marker as opposed to the 30 meter distance. It’s either a full 60 degree or a putt. Anything in between and I lose 2 – 3 strokes. If I have a choice between a perfect lie behind a greenside bunker I 100% wish that it was in the bunker instead.

So the journey continues. We still haven’t played any new course although we are plotting to go to Kota Seriemas in Nilai soon. The green fee is so expensive though – RM200 or more, and everytime that happens, we are reminded we can play for less than RM100 at courses like Tropicana, Kota Permai, Glenmarie etc under our RHB card. It’s just a hard sell. But yes we will be making our way soon there so stay tuned.

Speaking of RHB card, there are few things I would like to point out. They have absolutely a disgraceful credit card points redemption for the infinite. I mean, compared to the other cards I have. There’s literally dog-poop for things you can redeem for. Secondly, recently they lost Mines as one of their golf course to play on. Fair enough, it’s far away, but its still a very nice course to play on and I miss it. Thirdly they now impose this RM3,000 minimum spending on your card to use the golf benefits. Now this might not be much, but when you have 3 – 4 credit cards you are juggling and other cards give you way better points redemption options, planting 3K each month on a card that only gives golf benefit means sacrificing your other points allocation.

Also, this RM3,000 per month is stupid. They count it from a cutoff date to another cutoff date – for instance 22nd of each month to the 22nd of next month. So if you spend RM20K on 23rd of that month, then your previous month’s 3K is not hit and you can’t play golf. I have a friend who spends almost 11 – 15K on the card but because sometimes he misses the cutoff, for that month he is ineligible despite spending that much. Note to RHB – look at spend patterns instead of just a cutoff date. It’s stupid.

Lastly – if you registered your players with RHB and if someone last minute have to pull out, RHB disallows it. This means you either have to pay for a non existent golfer or you beg the course to cancel and play 3 ball. Which usually should be fine – but my question to RHB is, why won’t you allow another RHB player to replace? Oh – because its too last minute and the club disallows it.

Digging deeper, this is not true.

I found out that RHB’s procedure is that if you cancel/replace a player less than 24 hours of a tee time, RHB doesn’t even bother trying to send the update to the golf club. They just block it, so it’s not that the club disallows it, it’s because of RHB stupid internal procedure. I told them, look, just fax the damn thing to the club for a player update and I will sort it out. No, says RHB, we can’t because our manager doesn’t allow it and does not understand what is customer’s experience. So go suck it. (not their words but our interpretation).

Don’t get me wrong, RHB has been very useful for us over the years – but recently tee times are getting very crowded and tough to get, even with a RM3000 minimum spend and we are looking for other bank’s cards to maybe give us a little more benefits than just golf. If anyone has any better experience with other bank cards, drop a note.

OK – let’s try to get a tee time at Kota Seriemas then and write a review!

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Finally, A Birdie in Tropicana!

I managed to cram in a few games in KGPA, Tropicana and Palm Garden but eversince my birdie run ended, I’ve gone back to playing golf like a blind wombat high on meth. My game at KGPA was a train wreck and even the easy Palm Garden was no letoff as well. Then came Tropicana, where in one hole, I hit a perfect drive and with a sandwedge and 90 meters to pin, I proceeded to duff the ball FOUR freaking times. FOUR. And I hit the green and did a quadruple.

So, there was not much motivation to go on, really. I was thinking of actually quitting golf for a while. It got so bad that the Palm Garden game I missed I think around five two footer putts. In one hole, I wanted to fling my putter into the rough, but got snagged in my glove and it went spinning into the direction of my buddy and almost killed him. He didn’t speak to me the whole game and told me if I did that again, he is going to tomahawk me myself. I apologised. It was bad. It was not ethical and I am not like that. From then on, every bad shot was just greeted with a wry smile and a look to the heavens and a sarcastic thumbs up and clap to God. I don’t think God likes sarcasm. Because I played even worse and worse.

Things finally began to look up last game at Tropicana. I still missed sitters like two footers, but at least I got back my birdie. And it was on the index 1 hole nonetheless. Downhill perfect drive, took the left water out of equation and with the ball slightly above feet, I managed a pitching wedge to around 8 feet with a downhill winding putt. Perfect putt for me and it went in the hole.

So yeah, I’ve lost count of my triple bogeys and blown holes this year, but hey! I am now on Birdie number 4 for the year! Not bad, considering it’s like One birdie a month.

Next game!