Mission Hills Golf Trip

Seven of us, Richard, Billy, Lee Heng, Cheong YM, Jimmy, Peter and myself made the trip to Mission Hills. Unfortunately, due to unforseen circumstances, one of the pioneer members Chi Keen had to pull out. Everyday, while we were having fun, we had to observe a minute silence to remember him!!!,

We left on Friday with high expectation, nice weather of about 27deg and great golf courses. However, we were in for a big surprise. The temperature dropped on the very first day of our golf at Citic Golf Course. It was a chilly 11-12 deg with a wind chill of about 3-4 deg. We were told it was a sudden drop in temperature.

Day 1 was at Citic Golf 中信. The course was beautiful with nice fairways and great course layout. The green was surprising fast although it was quite grainy. Most of us were caught by the fast and tricky green. Peter of course was more engrossed with Billy's caddy. Billy, perhaps being the youngest in the group keep getting the cute caddies. The big winner for Day 1 - Jimmy Ang.

Day 2 was played at Guangzhou International Golf Course 仙村, a reciprocal club of NSRCC. It was a walking course and quite a few of us were walking like duck with the kar-kui-kui at the end. The only day when rain drops felled on us, while we played. At certain point, the umbrella had to come out. I had the best game of the trip with 84. First 9 at even par, 2nd 9 at +12, pui!pui!pui! Richard was the biggest winner on Day 2.

Day 3 was the terror day. At Mission Hills Greg Norman 诺曼course. We struggled on this links-like course. Terrible grass "chang cao长草"!!. Any balls that went into the rough will cause you to lose at least 1 stroke, if you can find it. Lee Heng hit into the chang-cao in just about every holes. He gained the title of "rough master" after getting the hang of hacking the balls out of the rough. You can see the rough in front of Lee Heng in this picture.
One of the toughest course around, no joke. All of us were cursing Mr Norman at the end of the game. I had a good first nine of 42, but collapse with fatigue on the back nine with a 53. Even Richard, the cool cucumber also curse Norman @#$%!!!My only motivation was I had Shu-qi lookalike as my caddy. Eat your heart out, Billy!! With some dispute over the rules on ball lost in long grass/jungles, we did not bet cross flight. Biggest winner on Day 3 was Peter Koh.

Day 4 was at Hillview Course 峰景. This is a beautiful course with the best greens in this four days. It was really fast and true. This game was known for the slaying of the kong-long. Jimmy Ang was slaughtered and rightly so, cos he shot 103. He was down by more than 400 RMB. His winning for the past few days were returned to their rightful owners. Peter was again the big winner on Day 4

The champion of the whole trip is Peter Koh, who won the Fedex Cup equivalent with more than 800 RMB.

Peter played better and better as the days go by. More impressively, he played only with a polo shirt while the rest of us were wearing 2-3 layers of clothes. So Peter, what is your secret?? I think only I know...hehehe!!!

The one who missed the cut??? He was easily the noisiest one in the whole group. Make a guess? Actually, his ass-luck already started on the plane having lost the chua-tai-ti with Jimmy and Billy.

On the whole, this trip was really fun. Golf was at some great courses (notice I did not say we all had great games?) and all the like-minded kakis were truly wonderful companies. The day has come and gone but we are certainly looking forward to more golfing adventures!!!