As Xian Remembers...

STOP!!

READ THE PREVIOUS POST BEFORE YOU READ THIS!

Continual of the previous post. :D

Sixth day!!

The people who were going for the hot air balloon ride woke up early that morning. That includes Huixin, Huimin and their mom, Joel's family, my mom and me and my siblings, Faiz and his family and Eugene's family.

Everyone was pretty excited but the truly excited people were the ones who wrote the scare mails to Cihan. :)

We wanted to know what he'd think of the cute scare mail (and of course we didn't mention who we were in the letters).
We couldn't stop grinning when we spotted him at the lobby. Obviously he knew that we were the ones who wrote the letters (who else would know that he went disco-ing the previous night?).

More of that later on.

Back to the tour.
We were glad that the weather was being kind to us today, unlike yesterday. :)
The hot air balloon company sent vans to pick us up from our hotel and drop us off at launch site. Very kind of them. :)

Anxious people in the van. :D

We arrived at the launch site quite early in the morning and the crews were still setting up their balloons.

While waiting, I played around with my camera. :)

Taking photos of colourful hot air balloons!

Taking photos of random things can really kill time. :P

Bunsen-burner like flame but stronger and bigger!!

What flame is this again? Luminous or non-luminous?

Us.

The place for us to register for the ride.

We didn't know that we have to register until the all other groups left for their balloons.

We were the last!! :O

Huixin!! :P

So many people said they would rather ride on the ugly-looking hot air balloon as they can take photos of the pretty looking hot air balloons.

But I think riding on the prettier one was more worth it. :)

Being the last group was a blessing in disguise because we got the pretty hot air balloon!

:D :D :D :D :D

I think the first group got the ugly looking one. HAHA!

Inside the basket of the balloon.

It was impossible for us to move around in the basket because the basket was separated into four sections.

With 5 people in one section, it was impossible to even stand properly!

Our pilot of the day.

She has been a hot air balloon pilot for fourteen years!!

Very experienced pilot!

The engine of the hot air balloon.

I never knew hot air balloons need an engine and a pilot.

After everyone was in the basket, it was lift-off for us!

Rising very calmly into the skies.

The other jet lagged/overweight balloons. :S

Bird's eye view of Cappadocia.

It was kinda scary to be a few hundred meters above the ground in a hot air balloon!

I'm slightly acrophobic by the way.

And we were joking that the craziest way to commit suicide was to pay 250 USD for a hot air balloon ride and then jump off it as soon as it was high enough. It's death guaranteed!!

Nothing can save you when you fall, except Superman (if he was real)!!

Our colourful balloon! :D

Photo from Huixin's blog. :)

I think we were in the clouds because everywhere was blurry.

Haaahh....

Looking out into the horizon with a lover on a hot air balloon would be the most romantic thing to do.

I love this photo. :)

Huimin and my sister.

Me!! XD

People at the other side of the balloon. :P

Hot air balloons in the distance and a bit of Huixin's cap.

Ropes for us to hold on to.

Striking greenish soccer fields.

It was landing time. :P

Descending smoothly....

My brother and Huixin. Love the background. :D

Huixin with her Canon DSLR. :D

Hers.

All the balloons had different landing zones.

A few more minutes and we'll be on the ground again.

We didn't land on the ground, instead we landed on the hot air balloon company's trailer.

Pay attention to the circle thingy in the middle.

Getting smaller. That's the way the crews deflate the balloon, using the 'hot air rises' theory I think.

Balloon getting more and more out of shape. ==

Until it's finally shapeless.

The balloon is humongous!

While waiting for the cue to get out, I took some photos of this guy I don't know why.

Mega love the background. :D

No more balloon on top of the basket. :(

Waiting to get out of the basket.

Our hot air balloon without the balloon.

The only way to get in and out of the basket is to go OVER it.

The place where our hot air balloon landed.

Love the view. ;)

Instead of a light bulb on top of my head, my good idea is a hot air balloon. XD

Everyone's out of the basket and were busy camwhoring!

HAHA!

Huimin, her mom, Huixin.

Hurray!! Celebration time!

Again, taken from Huixin's blog.

Click to enlarge the photo so you can see my extensions. :D

Everyone was watching carefully as......

the pilot poured orange juice into the glass.

-.-

Popping the champagne! :)

From Huixin's angle. XD

And then serving it to the adults.

That was the first time I tried champagne (and/or any alcoholic drinks)! The champagne was mixed with orange juice and it tastes like Shandy except more bitter.

Smart thing to do Xian, especially with an empty stomach.

For the next few hours, I had a splitting headache all because of the champagne. :((

REGRETNESS LATER ON!!

Love this shot too. :)

Group photo!

We got certificates at the end too! :)

NEVER EVER LET SOMEONE WHO HAS NOT SO NEAT HANDWRITING TO WRITE YOUR NAME NO MATTER WHAT IT IS FOR.

I was the victim of one! D:

My sister has not so neat handwriting and she wrote our names when we registered and I ended up with a big fat HG YI XIAH on my certificate. Her N looks like a H and that's why! :(

FML FML FML to the max!!!

Walking back to van parked somewhere out there.

And that was the end of the hot air ballooning. :(

We reached the hotel half and hour later and had breakfast. I skipped breakfast (drank only a glass of milk) because my headache was killing me! I waited in the lobby for the others because the smell of food was making the headache worse.

I used the lobby's WiFi to Facebook.

Saw Zane at the lobby and we talked for a while.
ZANE LAUGHED AT ME FOR HAVING A MASSIVE HEADACHE AFTER JUST ONE GLASS OF CHAMPAGNE! :O

Zane mentioned that he asked Cihan about the letters he recieved last night and Cihan showed Zane his bag with ALL our letters in it! :O

I think he showed his (other tour guide) friends too. ==

Later on, he came over and told me that he was going to read the letters in the bus.

It was the entertainment of the day. What the heck.

As soon as we were on the bus, he took the envelope out and everyone noticed the big heart on the envelope that Huixin (well, they don't know that she did it) drew. They thought it was some kind of love letter. What the heck.

He didn't read the content of the letters out loud because he said that it was better for them to read the letters by themselves.

What to do? We had so many cute pictures in the letter, and it was impossible to read the pictures!

People who read the letters find them funny and that certainly cheered them up (a bit)!!

The letters are now somewhere in Cihan's house (that was what he told me in Facebook).

I should have taken photos of the letters, damn cute and funny!

One of the uncle told the others that we were having a whale of a time while writing the letters because he heard us giggling and chuckling and shrieking and laughing like there's no tomorrow from his room in the middle of the night!
Were we that loud? :O

We spent a few hours in bust travelling from Cappadocia to Ankara.

We stopped by a salt lake on the way and I didn't bring my camera along because I needed to use the loo very urgently. I didn't even wear my winter jacket. After relieving myself I was quite annoyed for not wearing my winter jacket because it was absolutely cold!! We took a stroll beside the salt lake... Some curious people wanted to know what was the degree of saltiness of the water from the salt lake, dipped their finger in the salt water, bring the finger to their mouth and tasted it. They said that was the saltiest thing they had ever tastes in their lives.
I was smart enough not to taste it because the sight of salt crystals every freaks me out. It was saturated salt water!
Saturated enough for the salt crystals to form!!
OMG!

We spent a few MORE hours in the bus travelling to Atartuk's Mausoleum. When we reached there, it about 5 degrees (according to the information written on the digital clock there) and was RAINING! I hate it a lot when it rains! This place is actually the tomb of the father of Modern Turkey today and a museum displaying Ataturk's contribute to his country, personal belongings and his history. The history of Turkey is way more complicated than Tanah Melayu's history because Turkey was involved in many wars, unlike Tanah Melayu.