The Thana City Golf and Country Club...

The Thana City Golf and Country Club is another golf course where our club has a reciprocal arrangement where we enjoyed 'free green fee'. As it is located quite near to the new Suvarnabhumi Bangkok Airport, we decided to play a game here on Monday morning after which we were able to go to the airport for the return flight home.

hole No. 1 par 4 416 yards..

The Thana City is quite an old golf course and the club-house looked quite jaded. Being a Monday morning the course was not busy at all and we were able to play our game at a lesuirely pace.

pakTgAzman at the tee at hole No.2..

It is a par 72 course measuring 6966 yards from the blue tee. The course is quite flat and you have the choice of walking with your caddy carrying your bag or taking the buggy for an additional 600 baht.

As pakHyder was sufferring from a sorethroat caused by too much 'drinking' and too much 'thai massage' he decided to go on a buggy with his 'sweetie and wholesome' caddy.

hole no. 4 par 3 measuring 148 yards .....where only pakdokter managed not to put the ball into the lake....

apartments at the fringe of the course..

Pakdokter has had too much golf the previous 3 days and was not in his best form. Pakdokter returned a score of 53/56. We had expected pakTgAzman to take home whatever bahts we have left but as luck would have had it, pakHyder who was ill with a sorethroat came home with the best scores beating both pakdokter and pakTgAzman.

Anyhow, the lunch was generously sponsored by pakHyder who probably ended up with nothing much from his winnings...

some luxury villas...




the look of an 'aspiring' champion.....

pakHyder despite being down with a sorethroat managed to put both pakdokter and pakTgAzman to shame...

the clubhouse from the fairway of hole No. 9...

pakTgAzman scored a 10! on this par-4 hole No 15....

since he got a par for this hole..he requested the putt to be re-enacted and posted here...

the return from hole 18....

The Interport Game against the Royal Bangkok Sports Club...

About 50 golfers from the RSGC made it to this annual pilgrimage to Bangkok to play against the Royal Bangkok Sports Club during the weekend of 14th and 15th March 2009. Some golfers (like pakdokter's group of 4) made our own travelling arrangements while others hopped on the package tour organised by the club's travel agent.

pakTgAzman and pakGarrick Law..



the partnership of pakdokter and pakHyder...

The first game was played on Saturday afternoon. After a buffet lunch at the club-house we all teed-off to a shot-gun start from our allotted tees.

pakHyder, pak?, pakGarrick and pakdokter..

The Royal Bangkok Sports Club golf course is located smack in downtown Bangkok and doubles up as the Royal Bangkok Race Course as well. It is a short course playing to par 66 but is cleverly designed to make use of all the available ground in the limited space of the course grounds. There are many streams and lakes too in this very tight course!

the golf course with the horse-race course at its perimeter..



Novotel Siam Square at the fore-ground of the golf course..

It was quite an experience to play golf here. Apart from a caddy who walked and carry your golf bag, there was also a 'fore-caddy' in each flight who will look out for your ball if you sent it into the water. The 'fore-caddy' will jump into the stream or lake and retrieve your ball for you. So no worries about not having enough golf balls in your bag!

Pakdokter partnered pakHyder and we both played to an 'adjusted' handicap of 21. (In our own club we played to a handicapof 24!) Our opponents were RSBC committee member Mr Garrick Law who played to a handicap of 20 and a young golfer ( whose name pakdokter has forgotten..sorry) whose handicap was 12. Mr Garrick Law is a British who had worked in Thailand many years ago and after selling off his private hospital enterprise in Jersey Island has decided to come back and retire in Bangkok with his Thai family...

The game was played on a 4-ball best ball format. Taking advantage of our handicaps, pakdokter and pakHyder were able to match our opponents throughout the game and only won the match after hole 17.

the driving range of the RSBC is in the centre of the course..

The rest of the RSGC pairs did equally well in their games. The first day game ended up with RSGC taking the lead from RSBC 21 points against 13.

pakGarrick trying to figure out how to beat pakdokter and partner..

In typical RSBC style, we were entertained to a sumptuous dinner at the club that night to be followed by a 'typical' Bangkok 'cultural show' which pakdokter is unable to post the picutres here. The pictures are only for 'mature' and 'cultured' viewers.....heh..heh....

Sunday morning saw us play the second round and despite being mesmerised by the 'potpourri of culture, cuisine and free flowing wine' the night before, the RSGC golfers surprisingly returned a better score of 21 -3.

Pakdokter again partnered pakHyder and played against RSBC committee member Vichet Bunthuwong ( the CEO of Bangkok Mass Rapid Trains -MRT) and Mr James Richard Amatavivadhana ( the Regional Director of Johnsons & Johnsons SEA). Pakdokter and partner managed to beat our Thai partners only at the last hole!

Apparently RSGC has never beaten the RSBC the past 10 years or so at their home turf until this year. Well done RSGC...

Bangkok...here we come...The Pinehurst Golf and Country Club...

The Royal Selangor Golf Club plays a 'home-and-away' interport game with the Royal Bangkok Sports Club every year, with the RSGC team visiting Bangkok usually at the beginning of the year.

Pakdokter and my usual golf 'kakis' took advantage of booking our flights way in advance and were lucky to have secured return-tickets to Bangkok on Malaysia Airlines at just over RM300!

With internet bookings at our finger-tips we were also able to secure comfortable luxurious hotel rooms located at the convenient location of Sukhumvit Soi 11 at a bargain. The Grand President Hotel, Bangkok, is highly recommended if you are thinking of a trip to Bangkok.

pakHyder,pakTgAzman,pakdokter and pakZaid..

RSGC has several reciprocal arrangments with golf clubs in the Bangkok region. With our introduction cards, the four of us, made it to the Pinehurst Golf and Country Club for the first day of golf early Friday morning. The Pinehurst is an easy one hour drive from the hotel, located not too far from the old Don Muang International Airport of Bangkok.

The reciprocal arrangements between our two clubs allowed us to play for a free green fee ! All we had to pay for were the 250 bahts for the caddy and the 800 bahts for the buggy. That's a cheap RM65 for a game of golf in a first class golf course in Bangkok.

pakTgAzman (whose handicap was 28 two months ago!) now plays like a single-handicapper..

The Pinehurst must have been built on a swamp-land or a former rice-field! Water was in play in almost every hole. If you did not have to cross a lake at the tee, you will have streams or lakes on one or both sides of the fairway. If you are a wild hitter, you better bring a lot of golf balls with you. If you do not believe me, you can ask my good friend pakZaid Ibrahim !

a luxurious villa at the resort..


water, water, water.....

Pinehurst is a 27-hole golf course. We played the West and North Courses, and from the blue tee the course measured 6492 yards for a par-72 course. Pakdokter played quite well for the 1st Nine West Course returning a score of 50 with one par to boot. PakZaid and pakTgAzman both returned a score of 51 while the 'tired' pakHyder scored 53.

this was his third ball into the water...

a grinning and cheeky pakTgAzman after a 'birdie' at the par-5 hole No 5 of the North Course..

At the 2nd Nine North Course, pakTgAzman was in his best 'element' and returned a score of 44 with a par and a 'birdie' to boot. PakHyder improved with a score of 51 and the 'old' men of the group, pakdokter and pakZaid only managed a score of 54 each.

We played a game of partnership, changing the partnership after every 6 holes and played a game against each other as well.

So, looking at the returns, I am sure you can guess who collected the most bahts!

but he was too scared of his wife to have this picture taken properly...he was trying to hide behind the girls....

Caddies in Bangkok courses are well trained in their job. However their inability to speak a good-enough English is a disadvantage. They earn 200 bahts from the 250 bahts that we pay to the club for the caddy and they take home all the tips they earn from the golfer. They do not get a monthly salary and has no medical benefits either. So their earnings are not much different from their counterparts in Indonesia or at the RSGC either.

Golf Camaraderie...

In my first post when I started blogging last year, I commented on how addictive golf was for me despite having started to play the game quite late in my life. I used to feel very intimidated when I played with other people as I was very conscious of how bad my game was and quite often I played alone in the middle of the day when I was sure that no one else would be playing at the course.

As I became better at my game I became more comfortable to play with others and discovered the joys of golf camaraderie.

I have met and made friends with many new people at the golf clubs where I belong and have also made friends from other clubs locally and overseas whenever I had the opportunity to play for my club against these clubs in interclub and interport matches.

Last week I was fortunate to have been asked to accommodate Mr Alastair Anderson, a lawyer from Perth in Scotland, who was on holiday in Malaysia and had walked-in to our club for a game of golf. As I was playing three-ball that morning with Mr Hyder Ali and Mr Zaid Ibrahim, we were more than happy to have Alastair join our flight.

Alastair's father-in-law, Mr A E Brown, was a member of the RSGC way back in the seventies when he was a research scientist with the Rubber Research Institute (RRI). In fact Mr A E Brown's name is engraved on one of the boards of the club's dining room, having won one of the many annual competitions held at the club.

Alastair is quite a fanatic golfer himself, I suppose not much different from pakdokter. He had made the stop in Kuala Lumpur after having spent a week golfing daily in Pattaya. He told me that he had signed up to become a member of the Pattaya Golf Society, and every morning he would go to a designated pub in downtown Pattaya where he would sign up with 20 or so other golfers and moved on from there for a mini-golf tournament at one of the many golf courses in Pattaya. And all this for just 600 baht a game!

Alastair invited and offerred to host pakdokter for golf games at his home clubs in Perth should pakdokter make it to Scotland some time in the future. Pakdokter would certainly look up Alastair if and when the opportunity arises....

Alastair at the tee at the par-3 hole No. 4 Old Course of the RSGC...

The same week pakdokter also had the opportunity to play with one Mr Gowraf, a 28 year old Indian national from Chennai who was also in Kuala Lumpur on a holiday. Gowraf plays to a handicap of 2 and is a regular in the Indian Professional Tour. He started playing golf when he was 10 and will probably soon be in the same ranks as the other internationally established Indian professional golfers like Arjun Atwal, Jyothi Rhandawa etc.

It was such a pleasure to play with such a good player and how easy he made it look to play regulation on in most of the holes.