Last Spring-Monday in 2005!

Look who's back for another bash??? None other than the Jedi Tony himself! With a new look hairdo and more muscle & spare tire around his waist! So cold on a Monday morning & he's already stripping to his T!! Looks really serious as always! B. William, as usual sporting his blue guernsey!














Action stations! The same old feud between B. William & Allan against any challengers! Marcus & Peter give it ago again! Kicking off every Monday morning for the last 10 yrs!(Sorry, I mean year!!) But not for long, as Allan's gonna be away for rehabilition from next week! Will be back in action in 2006 we hope!! I understand he's going to fit a "bionic" arm so watch out guys!!














One of our favourite lady players, Lily plots the next game with Elaine! Like 'peas in a pod' these 2! Wonder how many games they have partnered & won? Willaim & Glenn in action in the background!














Got their attention finally!! Lily's a hard hitting baseline to baseline player and gives anyone a good fight! Plays competition as Elaine does! She and Elaine look good as a pair! Lots of communication on court! (Not sure if it's not arguments instead?) Don't know cos it's all between themselves!














Ah!! Here we have our most renowned pair of mixed doubles players! Coleman calls them "Yong Kok & Sui Loong Loui"!! Not sure where that comes from but I think it's some famous legendary characters from a Cantonese marshall arts TV series! Legend has it that they both combined to win many a great battle against dark powerful forces! Sui Loong would skip onto Yong Kok's back & execute the killer stroke! Wonder if it'll work with badminton? Better ask Coleman if you want more details!! "I know nothing!"















These 3 some take a rest while the others soldier on! Let me introduce young Alan(son of William) who packs raw power & skill!! Takes after his father? Really fine athelethe who would easily match it with our Saturday champs! Glenn & Paul give us the "Maclean" look!














Lily & William combine to take on Jenny & Helen! Wonder what's hapenning? Lily might be asking "You don't want to do it here William? or "Are you alright old man?"














And then William partners Elaine for another battle.!! William's Elaine's favorite partner! She calls him "See Foot"!! Sorry I mean "See Foo"! which means master or something! But they seem to almost always lose when they partner each other! But Elaine doesn't give up easy! She still calls him "master" and insist on partnering him!














What's this? Tony's resorting to throphy hunting tactics? Going after 2 helpless ladies? No! I think it's the girls who want to challenge the men! Can't blame him!















There's B. William showing off again! Showing us how it's done! As usual partnering Allan!














There's young Alan partnering the more mature , Paul! Do you realise that there's more than 50 years separating their ages? How amazing!!















William giving his son Alan some fatherly advice before game commenses! Probably along the lines "Better not smash at me if you want dinner tonight!" or " Be careful or you might have to walk home!"

More New Faces & Our Badminton Clinic!

Every so often Greenhearts welcome new faces to the group! Some are seasoned players, others may be be just beginners! We had 4 relatively new players join us on a Monday morning 2 weeks ago and they were given the opportunity to pick up some tips from fellow group members. Below we have Coleman & Lena overseeing the 4 new players, encouraging them & coaching them to new hights in their badminton career! Monday's a good day for beginners as the group is usually smaller & hence more opportunity to learn. And the early 9am start is perfect when your mind is fresh and alert!!(For most anyway!)














More coaching for these new foursome!














And more coaching from our champ Lena!














Lots of interaction from the beginners too, pointing ,directing & argueing! All very enthusiastic & keen! They'll go far! The others at the far end are in a world of their own!














Finally settling down to some serious questions, listening & learning!














Look at the concentration of these beginners! Definitely good prospects for improvement & will no doubt be a force to be reckoned with somewhere down the track! Look out Elaine & Tony Tang!














Even our seasoned players don't mind close attention with training drills in singles if given the opportunity! Jenny prepares to learn some skills from Coleman on a Monday when the late risers haven't arrived yet!














The others go on their merry way enjoying themselves, playing as hard as ever ! Here we see Lena just taking things calmly while William is in a bluuuurrrr and under attack or maybe trying to attack!














Jenny finally feels ready for action after a bit of warm up in singles & partners "sexy legs" Paul!














The Monday elite team made up of Allan, B. William prepare to take on challengers Glenn & Peter!














Challenged again by Marcus & Peter! Don't they ever get tired? Those two hardly ever have a break on Mondays due to the smaller number of players turning up...but don't they ever need a rest? Wonder what they eat?














Finally; coaching's done for Coleman, and Peter, after a few tough games...it's time to sit back & take it easy and relax while the others sweat it out!

General Health Tips Part 2. Tap water !

At Greenhearts we exert a great deal of energy , generating sweat, getting the heart pumping while enjoying good games of badminton!. Lots of emotions , laughter, sometimes frustration & even spurts of anger is generated for some!! Whatever the case, there's an unavoidable thirst for water or liquids in exercising! A vital ingredient when exercising or just healthy everyday living! I'm sure you haven't escape reading or hearing about the health experts slogan "Drink More Water!!".
That brings us to an interesting experience I had with our so called "beautiful Melbourne water". You can drink it off the taps just neat! I had always drank from the taps at home normally thru a water filter! Cooking & boiling has always been done with cold tap water(to kill germs etc!). Recently a relative of mine brought to my attention, her experience with a distilled water retailer who did an experiment on her tap & filtered water! Well this was where I started taking notice! Below are the results of the experiments and it was repeated at my house with similar results!

An electrode was put into tap water, filtered water & distilled water to determine the result! See below!! The glass on the left was just tap water. The glass in the middle was pure distilled water. The glass on the right was her filtered water! The resultant tap water was foul smelling & looked really dirty! Of course there's the additional flouride & chlorine which goes with tap water too! Really put me off tap water! The pic on the right below is just more samples of resultant tap water.














At my house we used a filtered system where the filter(see below) gets replaced between 6-9 mths. But the water from this filter was just as bad as the tap water after the experiment! I suppose it may not mean too much since many people survive on tap water without much problems but its only my opinion that it doesn't sit too well with my body if I continually take in the Melbourne tap water knowing what the contents are! Any one interested can let me know & I'll get this guy to do the experiment at your place! The picture on the far right shows what my "white" kettle looks like inside! I guess that proves the quality of the tap water!








After the experiment at my kitchen I immediately decided to try out the distilled water which was on offer! It was called Refresh & delivered to households. I also use supermarket sold Nobles pure water(see below) which proved to be just as good! Apparently a lot of the so called bottled spring water is just as bad as tap water! I did not have any available atthat time for the gentleman to test!
Please contribute any experiences or information relating to health issues for us to share on this Greenhearts website for the benefit of all our friends, which may be of good use to us all.! HAPPY DRINKING! In fact I may start a new website to share these health issues & experiences if there are enough responses to these issues!

Featuring Some Elite Ladies Badminton Players & More!!!

Here's introducing one of our top notch ladies player Lena! She has come up in leaps & bounds since taking up badminton a few years ago! A very powerful left hander, with hard hitting baseline shots & incisive drops, and has won various Championship Trophies and actively involved in elite badminton competition! Both she and the lady player pictured below, have been almost unbeatable in the ladies stakes at Greenhearts! So complete have been their dominance been that few ladies dare venture into the courts to face them!














Ophelia(Poh Wun to her close acquaintances) is another top notch player who has very similar credentials to Lena! She's a fitness fanatic who swims, walks, jogs and has attended the Ai Peng elite badminton school! She too has won Championship trophies all over the country! She's a keen competion player who takes her badminton very seriously! No holds barred; no nonsense and very hard all round! Also has good baseline power shots coupled with cool net play & fleet footwork & stamina to boot! When she & Lena get together....watch out!!














And whom have we here? It's not one of our top notch ladies players but our One & Only Top 70+ Notch Player!! How would you like to play like him at your 40's or 50's let alone 70's? Paul has been Greenhearts' corner stone in terms of his consistency, fitness & skills! Try playing a game of singles with him if you dare!! A real envy of us all at Greenhearts! His favorite lunch is "Flied Lice!" Maybe that's the secret!














The guys have fun while Elaine & Mei casually chat away!














Some Wednesday action with Johnny serving to Albert & Allan while Jackie stands back ready to pounce!














Here's Johnny again, with raised racket, intensely concentrating on the oponents serve!















A touch of Saturday! Min & Eng Lye look really relaxed while Albert chats away on the left! Ben is focused on what's going on in the court below!














Greenhearts' badminton almost always end up with a nice feed somewhere...in this instance Lucky Yu! Johnny & Michael look really good after an afternoon's badminton! Elaine & William look on! The numbers seemed to have dwindled lately! Surely not because of a price increase for lunch?

Greenhearts Home Entertainment!

Hi fellow Greenhearts badminton fanatics! Apart from exercising to greater health on the badminton courts, we must also consider how to keep ourselves entertained..at home by ourselves or inviting friends over to have karaoke parties or even watch some action movies in a mini cinema at home!! I will share my experience with you on how I went about creating "My Home Theatre"! Here's just a glimpse of what it looks like. I will have more pics & details later down the track! Those interested...do keep in touch!!

Goto http://in2hometheatres.blogspot.com/ for more information.

Badminton Basics! Nourishment!

Yes! Food is the most basic requirement in the sport of badminton.!! Have you seen a great badminton player who diets on bread & water alone? You must have good food before & after playing badminton..by that I mean,..... not immediately before or after. Common sense must prevail! However most of Greenhearts badminton players appreciate good food! See how they look forward to a sumptious meal after a good badminton session! So let's take a look below & see what we have today!! Recognise the place?











The threesome(foursome in fact, with yours truly taking the shots.) below sit comfortable, discussing the days play, the weather, politics, gossip etc. after a Monday morning Greenhearts badminton session. But the main interest was "What are we having today?" Coleman,,William & Tony will eat anything!! Seriously!! Dish anything up & you'll be surprised! (Even if it's dog or cat!). But they eat well & play well!. Look at some of the dishes today below!











Pork spare ribs noodle!! (Wonder why they call it spare ribs? Why spare? Why not just ribs? Who needs spare parts in the body? Does it mean the spare is used when the real ribs get damaged? Maybe someone can fill us in!). Anyway, this was really tasty! Ask Tony! He sampled one piece & thought the pork was really "fresh"! Had a long discussion about "fresh"!











And this is pork balls noodles!. Looks good too!. Quite tasty balls.! Ask Tony! (You may wonder why "ask Tony?" all the time. Well he's good at sampling other peoples' food! That's why you should ask him!)











Can't remember what this was but must have been good, cos there were no left overs!! Actually it was really value for money if you chose the set meal..you had a free drink too...all for just $6.50. Beats Lucky Yu hands down!! (Sorry Patrick...just being honest!)












Tuesday. Greenhearts day off but what is this? Recognise this place? If not then you'd better find out where it's at! You have been missing some food man!!











Look inside! See any familiar faces? I'm sure you'd recognise Coleman, Geoff, Paul & Dora, and Willaim of course! Some of our very good badminton friends play at the Doncaster badminton club on Tuesdays & we occassionally catch up with them at lunch! Very nice & sociable people too! See what I mean!! Badminton & good food always go together!! I believe there's Nora & daughter on the left & Christina & friend (Partly hidden behind William.)











There's our friend Maggie who hails her voice across the restaurant with no need of any microphone but so effective! She always gets her message thru, whether you like it or not! Wonderful PR woman!











Some of the wonderful dishes so cleverly ordered by the ladies!! Seems to look like Ngau Lam Poh, Yee Pheen Kai Lan, Foo Quah Ngau, Phey Pha Tau Foo and an Egg Plant dish I think!












Badminton! What a wonderful sport which goes hand in hand with great food & wonderful company!! Those who don't play badminton really miss out on life!! Can you imagine what you're missing?