About Me

This blog was birthed out of the dramatic people I encountered in the places that I had the opportunity to visit as a dive instructor, underwater photographer, travel photojournalist & a former travel editor with Malaysia’s Tourism Ministry. It’s a personal expression of what I do that takes me to different parts of the world, encountering different culture, people & experimenting different foods.

In my capacity as an instructor for the last 20 years, I have assisted in scientific researches around the region, had the opportunity to put all kinds of gadgets to test, learning & practicing scientific methods, teaching & training marine enthusiasts how to dive & logging issues & experience in the process, to bring you not just conventional travel news, stories and photos but stories from a very different perspective of a professional at play & photojournalist at work. Being commissioned to the ends of the earth in search of weird stuff and wildlife, I’ve been sent to track migratory birds in India, wobbegong sharks in Western Australia, find Vietnamese Boat People survivors to get to historical trails of their ordeal, paid to traverse in earthquake-prone countryside to recce new travel spots, planned & executed scientific expeditions as a diving officer, stumbled in political rallies caught in between cross fires & dived in shark-infested waters days on end!

Today, as Divevolk’s ambassador for South East Asia, I accept commissioning from tourism authorities, most notably, Dept of Tourism, Philippines Region 9, 10, 11, 12, Tourism Western Australia, Tourism Indonesia, Tourism Gujarat, Sabah Tourism, Tourism Turkey & Tourism Malaysia with the latest being Korean Tourism Organisation when I won the Samsung NX Traveller contest for being a photo expert. Taking assignments from travel & dive magazines around the region on a regular basis, I create content and publish periodicals online for various tourism boards. I was appointed as Sony Mobile’s Creative Ambassador utilising the Sony Xperia Z1’s smartphone in 2013 & was also Samsung Malaysia’s Digital Imaging Brand Ambassador in 2011. Detours USA’s made me their bag ambassador for the bags that I use when I cycle. Folding Bike Trading is my preferred choice of a full service bike shop while Lafuma, Manfrotto & National Geographic Bags are my main equipment sponsors for my lifestyle.

If you think I can benefit your business in any way, drop me an email & we can discuss further. Blogging is just an extension of my life for the stories that can’t be told in commissioned articles so talk to me if you want something creatively presented. Teaching diving has been my first profession and I have been appointed as National Dive League’s Instructor Training Promotion & Development Director in 2015. I accept advertisements and occasionally do sponsored blog entries just to spice things up.

I believe in professionalism in everything that I do. If I haven’t published anything that you are expecting, it’s either because an agreement has been violated or it has gone against my principles. I do not compromise my principles. For now, grab a cuppa & let your trackpad do all the browsing as I relate my amazing journey to you!

Below are features done by journalists from a few mainstream media over the years. Some people say I have had quite an eventful life. I’d say God is amazing to have orchestrated each of these experiences. Click on the thumbnail to expand the article into a more readable size! Pummkin has been my signature since I started loving the outdoors being the city bumpkin that I was, that many years ago, witnessed by those who loved me and journeyed with me this far. I adapted the word bumpkin to my initial, dropping the ‘b’ and added an extra ‘m’ in between, differentiating it from the word pumpkin.

Kwong Wah Yit Poh, 5 November 2012