Just Sharing

Happy Dragon New Year 2012

2012-01-22T20:55:00.003+08:00

Wishing all the Just Sharing readers a happy and prosperous Dragon year ahead. Thank you for all your supports by liking the blog and it is a great motivation for me to continue maintaining it! Enjoy the big day with your families and love one!

龙年行大运！

A Brief Review of Belawai Beach

2011-12-31T07:12:00.000+08:00

Belawai Beach had now become among the most popular relaxation and family gathering spot for people around Sibu. With the completion of Sibu-Tanjung Manis road, which allows accessibility from Sibu to Tanjung Manis via land transport with only 1 hour of driving distance, the Belawai Beach which is just additional half an hour's driving from Tanjung Manis became the nearest seaside view reachable by Sibu people.

1.5 hours driving to the beach is an acceptable distance for Siburians. Before this, the nearest beach is at Mukah Division which required double time consumption of the current. Thus, during weekend or public holidays, Belawai Beach will be crowded with visitors and don't be surprised if big portion of them are from Sibu.

Currently, there is no resort operates at the beach side, but a company named Reki Enterprise which I heard is the land owner of one small part of the beach had prepared some basic picnic facilities such as picnic tables, barbecue set, wash rooms and restaurant for the visitors.

These facilities are chargeable. A picnic table with a barbecue set will be charged RM4 per session (until you leave the place). If you want to use the toilet, you need to pay RM0.30 and RM1.00 for those who wish to take a bath and clean up the body after playing at the beach.

During peak period especially public holidays, you may need to pre-book the picnic facilities or else you may go back with lots of disappointment. Shelters are limited so do prepare umbrellas just in case of hot sun or sudden rain.

The beach itself is clean but the sea water is light brownish in color which contributes to the imperfection. Anyhow need to be thankful as with the Belawai Beach, Sibu people can now have more chances to experience picnic and spending leisure at a seaside than ever before!

Famous Sunny Hill Ice Cream @ Kuching

2011-12-23T20:30:00.000+08:00

I had been hearing about the name Sunny Hill of Kuching ages ago. There is a very legendary ice cream parlor here which is so synonym to the place, but I never being there before.

In the recent trip, thanks to PY for bringing us there to try out the legendary ice cream. Its location which is just beside the busy Batu Kawa-3rd Mile flyover and the narrow road in front of the shop made parking a challenge to the patrons. On the day of visit, we were lucky enough to get a parking slot or else we might need to leave the place without trying anything.

The shop was crowded with patrons at the time of our visit at around 4++pm queuing for their turn, but the service was quite fast. Thus the waiting time was relatively short. The shop itself has no luxury renovation or some sort, just an old-school canteen style with seats around.

There are actually very limited flavors to choose from, in fact, there will only certain flavors of sundae in sale on specific days:

     Monday to Tuesday - Strawberry
     Wednesday to Friday - Pandan or Corn
     Saturday and Sunday - Chocolate
     Everyday - Vanilla

There are few variations on how you wish the sundae to be served, either serving on cones, in a bowl with nuts or without, ice cream sandwich style (sundae with bread), banana split and etc.

As at the time of visit it was on Sunday and I had a bad throat condition, thus I only opted for plain vanilla chocolate mixed sundae served in a plastic bowl at RM2.50.

Other friends of mine had ordered vanilla topping with nuts (RM2.80), an ice cream sandwich and a banana split (RM3.90).

On my first trial, I didn't feel extraordinary yummy, but the strong milk powder fragrance attracted my taste buds! I personally like that milky taste, but it might not be the story for those not in favor. The sundae itself is super smooth, the smoothness that I never feel before having ice cream melting in my mouth. It is indeed cooling and refreshing! Apart from the nice taste, the ice cream was not too sweet! Thumbs up for this!

In a nutshell, the ice cream is nice... very nice in fact at the level that you will feel of go back and try again, but it is not super duper perfectly nice. That makes me curious why the small ice cream shop are so famous among the cat city's citizen?

After I browse through the web, I only discovered that there was actually a little story about the parlor. This little parlor had existed since many decades ago. So, many Kuching people were grown up with the companion of this ice cream shop. Thus, they have a very special love and childhood memories towards it. This had been passed from a generation to another. (Please enlighten me if I am wrong in this)

One more thing to mention, all the profits from the selling of ice cream of this shop will be used for the public service projects of the S.D.A. (Seventh-Day Adventist Church) missions.

The business hours of the shop is as follow:

     Sunday - Thursday   8.00am - 10.00pm
     Friday                      8.00am - 4.00pm
     Saturday                  7.00pm - 10.00pm

Poh Lam Laksa @ Chong Choon Cafe Kuching

2011-12-18T22:34:00.003+08:00

Talking about Sarawak Laksa, Kuching has the highest reputation in serving this specialty in Sarawak. Even when Sibu people selling laksa, some intended to name it as "Kuching Laksa" to boost their business and attract more locals to visit their stall.

So if you happen to visit Kuching, don't forget to try Sarawak Laksa here. About which stall in Kuching serve the best and most authentic taste of Laksa Sarawak, there are many versions, much depend on local preference.

The one I had been brought to in a recent trip to Kuching is this one, Chong Choon Cafe at Abell Road which some locals believe it serves the best Laksa in town by its Laksa stall here - Poh Lam Laksa..

Legendary may not always be true, but you just can't deny it when you see the patrons flooding the shop. At over 10.30am, the place is still crowded with patrons most of them craving for Laksa spoke everything.

We were fortunate enough that day to get a table once we walked into the shop. I heard even on weekdays, sometimes you still have to wait in long queue for your turn, or you have to "tap toi" with strangers just to eat its Laksa. This is how legendary the Laksa served here, no kidding!!

It is not logic if I tell you I went all the way to this old-school kopitiam for its legendary Laksa but in the end I didn't order the Laksa, right? Of course I ordered one!

Quite surprisingly, despite full house of patrons, the Laksa was served to my table within a very acceptable waiting time. For me this is an extra credit and thumb up!

At the first glance, the bowl of laksa did not look that attractive. The slightly darker reddish Laksa soup than it supposed to be, very limited eggs and chicken slices made me feel doubtful of its quality.

However when i slurped it into my mouth, it's unexpectedly tasty! The laksa soup tasted good despite the color not look alike. The soup is one of the key point to determine the tastiness of a bowl of Laksa. The rice vermicelli is not over cooked.

Nevertheless, the shrimps are not juicy and sweet enough. Otherwise it'll be another added point. I believe that if the stall owner could be more generous in topping the eggs and chicken slices plus some herb as decoration on top... that'll be even more perfect and presentable (but is that necessary??)!

Besides Laksa, Chong Choon Cafe also serves very nice toasts. There are quite a number of variation of toasts to choose from, but we only ordered 2 of them, egg toast and butter cheese toast to have a try.

They were indeed quite delicious especially go with the old-school coffee. Another specialty in this kopitiam is Teh-c-peng special a.k.a. 3 layers milk tea (as Sibu people called). I didn't try this since I did not realized it at the first place and I was coughing at that time. Will have to give it a try next time when have the chance to visit the shop again!

Oh ya! Something very coincident to share! On our way walking to Chong Choon Cafe, we suddenly spotted this van parking nearby. I bet Sibu people would be very familiar with this "uniquely decorated" van. Yes! It was belongs to the so called "Uncle Bersih" (By Peninsular people) or "Uncle Crazy" of Sibu, Hii Tiong Huat. Not sure what he did there, but what is for sure was that he drove this van all the way from Sibu to Kuching!! Sometimes you just need to salute him for his "craziness"!

A Little Friendship Gathering in Kuching

2011-12-14T20:58:00.001+08:00

This trip is not about visiting places of interest or spending leisure in resorts. We had no fancy schedule or routes, but we still manage to spend quality time together.

This is what our friendship is all about. Almost 12 years of friendship with everyone still feel close to each other is not something easy to achieve, especially when everyone has their own life, family, career and separated by geographical distance.

Flash back 12 years ago when we were taken by Unimas for a same degree course. From a total stranger somehow we got to know each other, slowly became close companions for lectures, assignments, dining and life sharing.

I believe there were actually sparks among some of us, but somehow the chemical reaction is not strong enough to form a new molecule. So we remain as what we are and who we are until this day.

Now, the brainy Anita is the mother of 2 and near to achieve her dream to become a lawyer or at least a legal adviser. Kayel is a going-to-be father of 2 and busy picking up his photography skills with his newly bought D7000. The pretty chabo PY is a successful news editor who gonna have her "living happily ever after" life soon. Baby face killer Chun still with his young look, but don't get cheated by his appearance because his roar can shake the earth! How about myself? Ok... I am still a tiny programmer cum a very amateur blogger who blog for interest but not for commercial (yet).

However I think our friendship is not about comparing how successful each other is, but we bless and proud of each others success. I guess that's one out of many factors that keep our friendship last until today. Comparing will cause jealousy which may spoil everything good in the way!

That's why for this gathering trip, there was no special event been arranged. We just follow our heart and some adhoc instinct on where to go and what to do. We just enjoyed and treasure the time to be together sharing and updating about our life.

I felt glad that in this trip, we had also visited Akuma and Linda. Akuma was my roommate for 2 years while Linda was our coursemate. Our last little gathering of 5 was on their wedding, which was about 2 years ago. Now, both of them had become the parent for a few months old baby boy. Feel glad to meet them back and my sincere congratulation to both of them!

Thank you everyone for every effort made to make this tiny yet great gathering a success. I truly appreciate this opportunity. Shall look forward for the next one soon!

Christmas Tree Decoration Contest 2011 @ Sibu Town Square

2011-12-10T21:48:00.001+08:00

For those who unable to feel the Christmas celebration in Sibu, present to you here is the Christmas trees decoration contest organized by Sibu Municipal Council annually. This year, the participants for the competition are various churches around Sibu area.

From Tien Tao Methodist Church...

From Xin Fu Yuan Methodist Church...

From Gereja Methodist Iban Pasar Sibu...

From Borneo Evangelical Mission (BEM) SIB...

From Borneo Evangelical Mission (BEM) SIB Permai...

From Calvary Church Sibu...

From Masland Methodist Church...

From an unknown church... the entire tree is made of bamboo stems...

From St. Mary of Divine Mercy Catholic Church... The Christmas tree is formed using umbrellas...

Another unknown works...

The following is from Zion Methodist Church...

Last but not least.. Christmas tree by Huai Ann Church...

You are free to judge who will be the winner for this year's competition!

A Visit to Sibu Development Exhibition 2011

2011-11-10T00:23:00.001+08:00

Sibu Development Exhibition 2011 was held at Sibu Trade & Exhibition Center from 28th October -12 November 2011 in conjunction with Sibu Municipal Council (SMC) 30th Anniversary.

I know it was a bit late to write about this especially when I actually visited the place on its very first weekend of this 3-week event. Couldn't find my mood to showcase about this exhibition as in my very personal opinion, there are nothing much to cheer and tell the story about. This exhibition just couldn't give me some kinda "kicks" to write about it.

However as a blogger who mostly highlight on Sibu's events and happenings, I finally found my mood to at least share a little overview about the exhibition. If you want me to describe this event using one word, I'll say "It-is-an-exhibition-with-plenty-of-nostalgic-photos"!

Yes! That's it! SMC itself occupied the most space in the exhibition hall. Once you entered SMC's exhibition compound, you would start to see a lot of very historical photos on the wall. Is good to see how a town named Sibu started with in the earlier years!

Some of these photos could really flash back our long lost memories. Just like the photos about demolition of the old open market which I used to go with my mum when I was kiddie before it moved to the current central market and the outdoor track & field stadium which turned to be the base of Wisma Sanyan now!

Of course besides those historical and classical photos, there were also plenty of modern photos on various venues and occasions in Sibu. Well, I guess only by comparison among the old and new, classic and modern, it'll then serve the objective of the exhibition which is about the development of this land, isn't it?

The miniature of proposed design of Sibu Town Square phase 2 showcased near the exit of SMC's exhibition area is quite nice looking, yet would it turns to be a real project is still a big question mark. Not that I am pessimistic, but I had a bad experience visited SIDEX (Sibu Development Expo) 2005 which proposed the old SMC building to turn into a very unique opera house, (but what the hell an opera house to do in Sibu? that's another story anyway...) but it ended up become Sibu Heritage Center which is a totally different design from its initial planning.

Apart from SMC, among other exhibitors are like JKR, Lembaga Air Sibu, Lembaga Sungai-Sungai Sarawak, Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia, Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad, Polis DiRaja Malaysia, ATM, Pejabat Pelajaran Daerah Sibu, Sarawak Energy, Lembaga Pelabuhan Rajang and etc etc.

One booth that attracted my attention is Jabatan Penjara Malaysia where they displayed the basic necessities given to a prisoner and also uniform of prisoners in different stages of imprisonment.

What impressed me the most in the whole exhibition is a row of high definition photos showcasing Sibu found outside the wall of SMC's exhibition area. For an amateur photographer holding a compact camera, I personally felt these photos are truly beautiful, heart touching and full of WOW experience!

I am not sure why this exhibition needs to be held for such a lengthy period as honestly there were nothing excited to explore except those historical photos. Yeah, I agree, it is good to organize such event once in a while to either remind or flash back or acknowledge Sibu people about the development of this land, but do it for a week to two should be more than enough. Furthermore, SIDEX 2005 as well as this edition had been held near to its upcoming election which couldn't help me to relate it with the election.

Now I am wondering when will be the next edition of this kind of exhibition?

1Malaysia Broadband Carnival 2011 @ Sibu

2011-11-01T23:31:00.000+08:00

When you read this post, the event was actually over, but I just wish to share some of my experience in it and to polish my half-dead blog!

This event was called 1Malaysia Broadband Carnival which was held from 29th - 30th October 2011 at Sibu Town Square phase 2. I didn't really notice about this event, until a friend mentioned to me it was a nation wide program and Sibu was one of the selected venue.

Yes! There were only 5 towns throughout the country been selected as the venue for this year's carnival and Sibu is one of them. It is also the only selected town in Sarawak for the event organized by Ministry of Information Communication and Culture in collaboration with Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC).

Please don't be too excited with the name "1Malaysia Broadband Carnival". You wouldn't get any broadband for free, or special cheap broadband subscription on the event really. It is not like "1Malaysia shop" or "1Malaysia meal" where you might get super-duper deal such as 2 chicken wings, fish and vege for a plate of lunch with only RM3!

No! This event is not such kind. It was actually just a program to create awareness on the usage of broadband in the country. There was no 1Malaysia broadband package available!

However, couldn't deny that the carnival itself was so happening and lively with a lot of interactive programs been arranged and lots of prizes to be won from one booth to another. Computer gaming were available for free in some booths and that definitely is the favorite for kids to try out!

The appearance of local animation characters Upin & Ipin mascot had heat up the already-hot Sunday morning. Kids as well as adults were grabbing their chance to take photos with them! Too bad Boboi Boy's mascot never appear or else it would be highlight of the day perhaps!

SibuFM radio station was there to broadcast on location and demonstrated the situation in a real broadcasting studio. A paintball booth also been set up although it is not broadband related activity.

As a whole, it was a nice and cheerful carnival to attend especially for those families with kids. It must have brought so much fun to the kiddies but for an adult like me, really nothing much to gain from it.

No matter how, I wish Sibu will still be selected again for this carnival next year and definitely I'll return to feel its ambiance!

Sibu BASE Jump 2011

2011-09-25T17:19:00.003+08:00

Sibu B.A.S.E. Jump is back for its 3rd edition! I had been following the event for 3 years consecutively and this year I had noticed some positive improvement by the organizer.

The jumpers participated in the 3 days event starting from 23rd-25th September has obviously increased if compared to last year! 23 jumpers from all around the world mostly from western countries such as Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, United States of America, Austria and Netherlands were joining the event lead by Gary Cunningham from Australia.

There are also 4 Malaysians taking part in this 27-storey or 126-meter height jumping from Wisma Sanyan Sibu, the tallest building in Sarawak. They are lead by Captain Aziz Ahmad, president of Malaysia BASE Association.

[Captain Aziz Ahmad]

Talking about Gary Cunningham, this name is very familiar to me. I had been mentioning about him since I follow the event from its first edition in 2009. If you wish to see my previous write ups, please click here. He returned to Sibu for 3 years in a row and this year, he brought even more jumpers to make the event grander ever and more excitement than before. Gary himself is the world record holder of the most BASE jumps made in 24 hours and also the technical adviser for this event.

[Gary Cunningham]

This year, as there were more jumpers, thus more variation of jumps could be performed by them. Apart from individual jumping, there were also jump-in-2 and trio jumping! It certainly added more entertainment and heart-beating element to the event and spectators were so amazed with the dedicated performance by these jumpers.

Sometimes they even broke the silence by clapping their hands for the exciting performance as a sign of satisfaction and amazement. This phenomenon is more rarely happened as in normal case Sarawakians are used to be shy. If they clap without been forced, it means the performance had really touched their hearts.

This year the organizing committees had put in more efforts to make the BASE jumping a more happening event. Trade fair had been set up at Town Square 2nd phase to make the event more carnival feel. Besides that, there were also night jumping which never been held before. It was a positive improvement and perhaps it was an effort to put this event in national's sports tourism calendar.

However there is still room of improvement to make this event better. In my opinion, for the night jumps, appropriate lighting should be set up so that the jumps could be seen clearly.

Besides the excitement, the spectators also took this opportunity to take photos with the jumpers everytime after they done their jumping. I believe it is a great experience for both the spectators as well as jumpers and I am looking forward to a better event next year!

[3 Malaysian jumpers]

Who said I only like to shoot photo of pretty girls? Do look for handsome gentlemen here in this blog!

[Rock man!]

[Nice tattoo!]

Perfect Ice to Quench Your Thirst @ Giant Sibu

2011-09-18T23:25:00.001+08:00

If I tell you the term "Perfect Ice", what come across your mind? You can ask at least three Ws and one H question about it. Why an ice can be perfect, what is so perfect then, where these perfect ice come from and how the so called "perfect ice" formed?

For me, the term "Perfect Ice" is not something that scientific and complicated. It is just another franchise shop I spotted at the newly opened Giant Hypermarket Sibu recently. The stall is specialize in selling fruit sherbet. What is sherbet? According to Oxford online dictionary, sherbet means "A cooling drink of sweet diluted fruit juices" while some other dictionaries may define it as "A frozen dessert made primarily of fruit juice and sugar".

Yes! That's exactly what Perfect Ice franchise is selling! Shredded ice made from fresh local fruits. Differ from the shaved ice from Iglool Snow Ice I reviewed few months ago, this shredded ice is not snowy but icy and smooth. If you ever taste the so called "The Coolest Drink on Earth" - the Slurpee sold only at 7-Eleven convenient shops, the shredded ice sold at Perfect Ice feel closer to it, but less watery and the ice is more solid and compact.

Perfect Ice smoothie is categorized into 3 levels of flavors. The Signature Flavors are the most common flavors which are formed from fruits like dragon fruits, mango, lime, honeydew, watermelon, lychee, pineapple and etc. Each flavor (small cup) is RM2.80 but you can opt for max. 2 mixed flavors (big cup) at RM3.80.

2nd level of flavor is called Special Flavors which are made from more uncommon fruits such as strawberry, Passion fruit, mulberry and apricot. The price is a bit higher with small cup RM3.80 and big cup RM4.80.

The 3rd level which is also the thickest flavor is called the Premier Flavors. Yam, Soursop, Orange, Durian, mocha, tiramisu, cappuccino and chocolate are categorized into this level. These are also the most expensive flavors with small cup single flavor priced RM4.30 and 2 mixed flavors RM5.80.

There are some flavors may be added or removed from the menu from time to time especially those related to seasonal fruits. In a nutshell, it is a very cooling beverage to enjoy especially during hot days besides getting some nutrient from the fresh fruits smoothie. Give it a try!

If you wish to know more about the making of Perfect Ice, look at the video clip below - the making of Perfect Ice as reported in 8TV program Ho Chak!

For more information about the franchise, here is its official site:
http://perfect-ice.com.my/

A MerdekaRaya Trip

2011-09-04T22:46:00.001+08:00

So, what have you been up to during the special MerdekaRaya break? Frankly speaking, I didn't do anything extraordinary though. I just taken some initiative to drive all the way from Sibu to Bintangor which is located more than 40 kilometers away!

Sounds boring? Yeah... I believe it is. You can either stop reading from here or continue follow my story.

Bintangor (a.k.a Minatang) is actually a small town with not much happening and places to go. The reason for this trip was just to spend the leisure with family members and at the same time, we read from a local newspaper report about the Engkalak at Bintangor is rather cheap. As family members including me are Engkalak fanatic, thus we decided to see if we could find some "harvests" in the trip!

[Engkalak or Buah Tebuluh]

It took me about 45-50 mins to reach Bintangor town. Once we reached there, the first destination no doubt was the native market where Engkalak could be found! Better look for them early than been swept clean if too late! Yeap! spotted plenty of Engkalak at the dark and crowded market with the selling price much cheaper than in Sibu. With RM 2/kilogram, mom had bought quite a few kilos of Engkalak to be brought home!

After a round of "shopping" at the market, we then stopped at Lu's Biscuit Shop. This is an old branded shop you shouldn't miss if you visit Bintangor.

The shop is well-known for all kind of traditional Chinese biscuits and pastries such as the famous "Kom Piang (a.k.a. kompia)" and "Leh Piang" (foochow wedding biscuit with sweet fillings). Most of the pastries are freshly baked and sold instantly.

In fact you may ask these so called "biscuits" are available in Sibu, so what is the difference? From what I observed, the Kompia at Lu's Biscuit Shop is generally thicker and much filling than those in Sibu. This is actually the dimension of Kompia one could get in Sibu long time ago, but because of rise of costs and whatever reasons, Sibu Kompia now had reduced in size and its thickness.

[Kom Piang a.k.a. Kompia]

Beside Kompia, the Leh Piang you could find here are also nice to eat with "explosive" stuffing!

[Leh Piang]

Apart from the mentioned, there were a lot more pastries you could try out.

Spotted a very old petrol station just beside Bintangor wharf. Just look at the pump, I believe you will agree with me!

After some walk around, is time for breakfast! Randomly selected a coffee shop to dine on... but had been waited for almost one hours for a bowl of Foochow style noodle soup to reach my table! Frankly, this bowl of noodle not worth such a long waiting at all!

We then continue our journey to another small town called Sarikei which is about 20 minutes driving distance away using its new route. Nothing much had been done there, just had some walk around at the town area.

For those who may not know, Sarikei is a town famous of its pineapple. So, if you somehow visit to this town, don't forget to capture your memory in front of the giant pineapple sculpture which symbolize the town of Sarikei!

After stopped more than an hour in Sarikei, we then headed back home. I know the trip wasn't that existing, but it was the quality time you spent with your beloved family members that count.

The Disappeared Tower

2011-08-26T22:47:00.000+08:00

Sibu people are commonly used to the existence of the telecommunication tower near TM Point at Jalan Keranji / Booke Drive including myself. It has been standing tall and straight at the location and served the Sibu people for more than 5 decades perhaps.

However, for unknown reason, this telecommunication tower had been dismantled recently (about 2 weeks ago). The dismantling works weren't easy. Workers have to take risks to climb to the top of the high tower and dismantled it segment by segment.

At this moment, the tower couldn't be seen anymore as it was entirely removed. Supposed there are 2 telco towers and now became one.

I personally feel not use to its removal as I had been seeing these towers almost daily from my home since I was small. Sometimes when I look on the tower's direction, I would have a very strange "illusion optic" feeling - is the tower covered by thick cloud today? But I know the answer is a NO! The fact is the tower had already been totally removed from our sight and the thing left is only the memories!

More pictures about the tower, you can try the following link:
http://sibuericluk.blogspot.com/2011/08/50.html

Sibu Open Badminton Championship 2011 @ Thumb's Up Badminton Academy

2011-08-20T08:55:00.000+08:00

Roundtree-Reliance Transport Sibu Open Badminton Championship 2011 is currently held at Thumb's Up Badminton Academy badminton courts located at Level 12 of Multistorey Carpark, Central Market Sibu. For local badminton enthusiasts, this is one of the highest prestige badminton tournament in Sibu annually held by Sibu Badminton Association.

Differ from previous years, this year's tournament had been shifted to Thumb's Up Badminton Academy's hall which provides international standard of Taraflex flooring technology and more complete facilities like proper shower rooms and changing rooms. If you wish to know more about the facility, read my previous entry "Now Everyone Can Play!".

As the facility is up to international standard, thus this year's tournament is more special with the presence and participation of some well-known west Malaysia's badminton players. These players include former national team men's double cum former national badminton coach Yap Kim Hock, former national team single player Kuan Beng Hong, once Malaysia's number 2 doubles Mohd Fairuzizuan Mohd Tazari and Mohd Zakry Abdul Latif.

[Former national player Kuan Beng Hong waiting for service]

There are more peninsular men's and women's players who took part in this year's event with some of them might be in national team but I personally not recognize them including the Latif brothers Mohd Razif and Mohd Najib in men's double.

[Former national coach Yap Kim Hock kind enough to pose in front of my cam! Thanks coach Yap!]

This afternoon I was lucky enough to be able to witness Yap Kim Hock playing in mixed double where he teamed up with a local player, but too bad his team lost in the match and fail to advance to the next round. I was late for Fairuzizuan and Mohd Zakry's match which was scheduled at 8pm tonight. They should be able to advance to final I believe.

[Mohd Zakry (left) and Fairuzizuan Tazari (right) kind enough to pose in front of my cam! Thanks both!]

[Yap in mixed double]

One thing to emphasize - Thumb's Up Badminton Academy Sdn Bhd had been using "Now Everyone Can Play" as their company's slogan which was initiated by me in my write-up introducing their facilities about 8 months ago!! Honestly, I didn't get a penny from this, they don't even know who the hell I am... but I think I am quite proud with it though!! ;)

Sibu Badminton Open 2011 will be held from 18th-21st August. The more important thing is - the admission is free!!! So, if you wish to see national players in action, it is still not too late for that. Just visit to Thumb's Up Badminton Academy at Level 12 Central Market Sibu tomorrow! Sorry, I don't have the schedule about the event, just read tomorrow's newspaper and you may get some tips from there!

[Latif brothers in action (correct me if I am wrong)]

[Yap Kim Hock in action]

[Kuan Beng Hong in action]

[Latif brother in action]

First Glance @ GIANT Hypermarket Sibu

2011-08-16T18:37:00.001+08:00

Sibu is so happening and people here are so busy these days. First, they were busy observing the opening of the 1st hypermarket in Sibu, the DAESCO Hypermarket about 2 weeks ago and the latest, Sibu people are busy with the newly opened GIANT hypermarket at Jalan Ling Kai Cheng.

Giant Hypermarket was officially opened for business on 12th August 2011 (Friday). Sibu people had been commonly waiting for this day for some times when the banners about the opening could be seen everywhere in Sibu town quite ages ago. As Siburians are basically lack of fresher place to go during leisure and the new Star Mega Mall with DAESCO Hypermart in it was a bit disappointed as it still not really in shape yet, thus locals are putting their hope towards this GIANT Hypermarket.

In fact, a day before the official opening, some Siburians already lost their patient and "raid" the place even though it was only soft-open to invited guests. Yeah! This is what Sibu people is all about... the "Kiannai-ness" (extreme curiosity syndrome) is just irresistible!

As a locally born, I inherited some "kiannai" spirit as well. I had visited the place on the 2nd day of its official opening. Yeah...I know the place will be damn packed and crowded! I know I'll be caught in long traffic queue! I had heard a lot about the jammed condition, I just don't care but to show I am just another regular "kiannai" Sibu guy!

Once stepped into the building compound, the feeling was just so different from my first step into Star Mega Mall. The variety of shop design and renovation, the lighting, the air conditional, everything and everything had been dominated by GIANT. Perhaps it is not fair to compare Star Mega Mall with Giant shopping complex at this stage as the previous just having a soft launching and the building just partially in operation. But in term of hypermarket arrangement and management, no doubt GIANT has better experience and more organized as this is its 121st store in the country while DAESCO is just at their first attempt in hypermarket.

Yeah! This is the true hypermarket I was waiting for!!! Maybe I am over excited, some people may feel what's the big deal? It's just a Giant Hypermarket!!?!! Maybe is true, for those living in big cities like KL or used to stay in metropolitan, it's really nothing so big deal as hypermarkets and shopping complexes are everywhere. But as far as small town like Sibu is concern, having an organized hypermarket in town means another choice of shopping among the limited and place to spend leisure with family. It is a big deal really! ;)

This Giant Hypermarket had given me a new experience and excitement of shopping in Sibu. Now, we can have a very "KL" feel of shopping. The goods in the hypermarket had been arranged neatly on the racks with large volume. There are wide range of choices for each variation of item. Basically, you can get any daily life necessities here ranging from DIY hardware, electrical appliances, furniture, camping equipment, bicycles, clothes, footwears, car accessories to wide range of consumable and raw foods and etc and etc.

Yes! Fresh market is also here! Local and imported fruits, vegetables, raw fish, chicken and beef, even the marinated meats are available for your convenience.

Fresh bakery? Yes... you got it! Right away from the bakery kitchen! Fresh and hot!

Lazy to cook? Cooked foods and snacks such as roasted chicken, fish balls and nuggets, fried rice and dishes are ready to purchase!

There is also a non-halal section to sell beers and liquors.

As conclusion, GIANT hypermarket is a one-stop shopping center for daily needs and necessities under one roof. I know other supermarkets in Sibu may also offer the same service, you can argue that it's because I am still fresh with it that leads me for such comments. Maybe you are right, but not neccessary totally right. It is the wide range of choices, more modern cum open management style that make it different from other supermarkets.

Go there and experience the ambiance yourself... perhaps you will agree with me after that, or perhaps it's just a purely fresh?!?!! For your info, Sibu GIANT Hypermarket is the first GIANT Hypermarket in Sarawak, and the next one will be in Miri which will be opened in a very near future.

Festive Feel @ Ramadhan Bazaar Sibu 2011

2011-08-07T23:57:00.001+08:00

Yes! Is time for Ramadhan Bazaar again! Every year, during the sacred month of Ramadhan in Islamic calendar where Muslims community are having their fasting month, Ramadhan Bazaar will become the center of attraction for source of Malay delicacies.

Ramadhan Bazaar in Sibu is special in a way that it had became a festival-like occasion where it is a "must-go" event and people come here regardless of race and religious view just to either enjoy the lively ambiance, spend their leisure during weekend or purely for the delicious and tempting foods!

There are wide range of Malay's delicacies to test your temptation threshold at this Bazaar, from traditional pastries, variety of Malay's dishes, snacks, stir fried foods, deep fried foods to barbecue foods. Visitors are free to enjoy the foods they bought on spot, but for sense of respect, preventing to eat in front of Muslim while they are fasting is of course a great deed to yourself!

Keropok Lekor is one of my favorite snacks among the Malay's delicacies.

Deep fried foods are so tempting, but "heaty" to body.

Discovered a stall with very unique decoration to attract customers. Are they selling croc or spider's meat too??!! :p

During the big hot day, stalls selling cold drinks and beverages always receive overwhelmed customers.

These ABC (Air Batu Campur) look attractive and colorful, but don't be surprised if they are really "air batu campur" (mixed ice) with toppings where you get a lot of air batu, but little of other ingredients. ;p Anyway and anyhow, these cold and sweet drinks are really SUPER fantastic in quench the thirst during the hot hot day!! RM2.50 for a package!

Sugar cane juice is also one of the most favorite stall at Ramadhan Bazaar of Sibu located at 2nd phase of Sibu town square.

Pulut Panggang fanatic??? Here you go! Fresh and baked on the spot!

Roasted honey chicken (Ayam madu) and satay? You won't missed them! Look for stalls with plenty of smokes at the right hand side of the bazaar!

Of course there are a lot more nice foods which I couldn't mention them one by one here, such as Kebab, Roti John, Nasi Briyani, Nasi Tomato, bubur lambuk and so on and so forth (yeah... forgive me for drooling when mention about them), so why don't you visit the bazaar to have a look yourself?

Reminder: Bring your hat or cap or whatever that can protect you from direct sun exposure when visit the place during hot day. I felt like almost pengsan this afternoon when visiting it at around 4pm under the hot sun. Is this a symptom of aging??? *_*

First Glance At DAESCO Hypermarket Sibu

2011-07-31T22:38:00.001+08:00

No doubt the hottest table topic of Sibu people recently is about the completion of the latest shopping complex called Star Mega Mall and the opening of the first hypermarket in the region - DAESCO hypermarket.

Star Mega Mall and its main tenant DAESCO hypermart was developed and operated by Daesim Group. Located at Jalan Tunku Abdul Rahman Sibu, it is reachable by 10-15 minutes of driving distance from Sibu town center.

At this moment of writing, the mall itself has not yet entirely completed, but Daesco hypermarket had started its business (soft opening) on 29th July 2011 (Friday). I believe many Sibuians were "long necked" for this day for quite some times as they were lack of place to spend their leisure and weekend.

Yeah! I admit I am a typical Sibuian and thus I took the break on Sunday noon to take a look on this new place. As expected, the place was flooded with cars but luckily the parking space is big enough and it didn't took me long to get myself a parking space.

Entering the building, there are shoplots on the ground floor, but most shops are not yet open for business. The hypermarket is located on the 1st floor and viable through a long escalator.

Nothing much to elaborate about the hypermart, just a typical hypermart with tall racks, lots of trollies, long row of checkout counters, tonnes of goods and daily necessities which you can purchase on. I believe these photos are self-explanatory enough on its outlook. It is a pretty warehouse style of hypermarket with no fancy interior design.

Frozen foods department is not yet ready.

There is a special section for selling non-halal products and also wine and liquors.

The other direction on this 1st floor is the departmental store mainly for selling children and men's attires.

The corridor-style 2nd floor is mainly for women's attires.

There are still quite a lot of efforts need to be done to make this place a better and comfortable choice of shopping, including the air conditional, the lighting, arrangement as well as some polishing and cleaning touch up. As this is just a soft opening, I believe the management is working hard on all these to make this place the first choice of shopping for the people from central region of Sarawak.

Sibu Lake Garden @ Permai Sibu

2011-07-30T22:20:00.001+08:00

Sibu Lake Garden is one of the few recreational park available in the town of Swan. Situated inside the housing area called Permai, Sibu Lake Garden also been known as Permai Lake Garden or Sibu Lakeside Garden.

According to a trusted source, this garden covering an area of around 130 acres and is a joint project between Sibu Municipal Council and National Landscape Department under the "Taman Awan Scheme". No detail on this scheme, maybe you can googling it! ;)

At its earlier stage, the garden only consists of lakes, fountain and nice landscape. Children love to play with water at the shallow pool while remote control enthusiasts utilized the lake facility as the venue to show off their radio controlled boat.

Recently the garden became more happening with the addition of new concrete structures which was named "Lakeside Corridor". The highlight of this corridor is a building which is conical in shape and mimic the Melanau traditional craft - Terendak hat or Melanau ethnic in some area called it as Tapou.

Beside the conical building is Lakeside Corridor restaurant.

The dining area of the restaurant which is facing the lake is a good place to dine on while enjoying the relaxing ambiance of the lake view.

In front of the dining area, there is a small section equipped with golf training facilities for golf enthusiasts to train their wood swinging skills! You may feel curious where the golf ball will be landed?! If I tell you the balls will fall into the lake, will you believe?

Yes!! That's exactly what happened!! The golfer will just let the balls to fall into the water! Luxury? But the trick is.... natural flow of the lake water will then bring all these balls back to the edge and the golfer can then scoop up the balls using the hand net or dip net.

So far I have no information if this golfing facility is open for public or just for private use. However, what is for sure is that the pedal boats are ready to be rented with charges of RM3 per head for 20 minutes of pedaling on the lake.

However, I strongly believe that whoever operate this boat pedaling business should improve the quality of the pedal boats in order to attract more people to ride on them.

There is also a boardwalk or jogging trek facilities which I didn't explore. Anyhow, I believe Sibu Lake Garden is a good recreational park for family activities during leisure and certainly worth a visit for its great relaxing ambiance and pretty landscape.

Hot & Roll @ Wisma Sanyan

2011-06-26T20:57:00.003+08:00

Spotted another franchise business in Sibu. Last week, I blogged about iglool snow ice @ Delta Mall. This week I'm surprised to see a newly added franchise stall at 2nd level of Wisma Sanyan, Sibu. It's called Hot & Roll.

Hot & Roll is a food outlet which specialized in baked wrap foods. There are 3 types of wrapper to choose from - crispy wrap, paratha wrap and chapatti wrap. For crispy and paratha wraps, there are 2 range of flavors for option, savoury flavor or sweet flavor.

For savoury flavors, you can choose the following fillings:

Chicken & Cheese
Chicken Floss
BBQ Chicken
Satay Chicken
Pizza Beef
Black Pepper Beef
Bolognese Beef
Double Cheese Onion
Tuna Salad

For sweet flavors, the variants are:

Apple Cinnamon
Banana Chocolate
Crunchy Peanut

For the above fillings, you can choose your favorable wrapper either crispy or paratha. For your information, paratha is actually what Malaysian called it as Roti Canai! Yeah... I just knew it as well... sorry for my innocent. The price is ranging from RM 3.90 to RM 6.90.

[Preparing crispy wrap with its fillings]

Chapatti wrap so far has only 2 choices of savoury fillings, Chicken Sausage and Chicken Rendang. They priced at RM 4.90.

I bought 2 flavors for testing. Chapatti Chicken Rendang and Paratha Tuna Salad for RM 4.90 each. In my personal opinion, both taste good but not too much of surprise. I believe I'll be more joyful if the fillings could be more in term of its quantity.

[Chapatti Chicken Rendang]

[Paratha Tuna Salad]

Sometimes you just have to believe that the pictures are strictly for reference only! ;)

Anyway, for those who haven't taste the foods, they are worth a try! For more information about Hot & Roll, you can visit: http://www.hotandroll.com/main.html

Iglool Snow Ice @ Delta Mall Sibu

2011-06-19T23:14:00.005+08:00

Iglool Delta Mall is a newly established franchising snow ice dessert stall in Sibu. I was not aware of its existence until I visited the shopping complex this afternoon. I have not been there for quite some time.

The stall was located at 1st floor of Delta Mall shopping complex, just beside the escalator towards the floor. I was stunned by the crowd surrounding and queuing in front of the stall at the time I was window shopping there at around 1.30pm.

The fresher concept of this franchise is that customers can place their order through a self-service touch screen kiosk standing in front of the stall. Operation of the kiosk is rather simple and user friendly. Just follow some simple on-screen instruction to place an order.

Kiosk users are first asked to choose their preferable language throughout the ordering process.

Upon choosing the language, menu of various snow ice flavors will be presented to kiosk users in tab form. Among the flavors available are chocolate, milk, green tea, strawberry and also mango.

For each flavor, there are different topping for customers to choose from.

After confirming the order, a resit will be printed out as a prove of ordering and payment. After the payment was made at the counter, you will be served very shortly and not much of waiting needed.

I had tried 4 flavors with family members. 1st - green tea snow ice with chocolate sauce. The ice have very strong green tea flavor and less sweet. It is nice to eat with the sweet chocolate topping it!

2nd - milk with champagne snow ice. Milky taste with the special sauce and cherry topping the ice!

3rd... mango flavor with passion fruit sauce. For mango lovers, this would be your choice! Very nice and strong mango flavor!

... last but not least, Season Strawberry Snow Ice. I am not sure what's the sauce topping it, but it is not bad to eat. However, the colorful sweets are a bit too hard to chew. Am I too old for that!!??

Each of these snow ice costs RM 4.80 per bowl, but the price might be vary depend on type of flavor and topping ranging from RM4.80 to around RM6.00.

The snow ice tasted "dry" and powdery, totally different from what we used to feel while enjoying traditional cendol or ABC. The well shaved ice not easy melt inside the polyethylene bowl, but the smooth and fluffy texture of snow ice melted instantly when contact with your mouth! That's a quite special experience for me!

I found out some interesting "knowledge" on one of the board at a corner of the stall titled "How to Enjoy Our Exotic Snow Ice". Lets ponder about it:

"To maintain its unique fluffy and smooth of the Snow Ice, the best way to enjoy the snow ice is by not stirring or mixing it.

It is advisable to scoop a little snow ice with a bit of its topping and put it to your mouth to feel the wonderful sensation of the delicious snow ice melting in your mouth thus feeling it exotic flavor spreading around your tongue. Hmm... it is the most indulgent treats you'll find anywhere."

So next time if you happen to try out the snow ice @ Iglool Medan Mall, don't forget to try enjoying this cold beverage using the above method and see if you are able to get the sensational and exotic feeling as described above!

For more information about this franchise, you can visit http://www.iglool.com.

Busy Sibu Wharf Before Hari Gawai

2011-05-31T21:07:00.001+08:00

Sibu wharf is always the busiest place few days before Hari Gawai when Iban friends were going back to their hometown/long houses to celebrate the biggest festival in their culture.

Wish all Iban friends Happy Gawai Festival, Gayu Guru Gerai Nyamai!

Hii Tiong Huat Strikes Again On Street!

2011-05-14T20:36:00.001+08:00

The most controversial local social activist, Hii Tiong Huat was seen this morning in town, near Sibu Gateway. He sat on top of his old Toyota car, which was modified to be his stage/platform to give political speeches and publicize himself during the recent Sarawak state election. For those who may not know, Hii was the independent candidate for N45 Bukit Assek constituency during the election. He lost the battle by getting only 180 votes which also caused him to lose his deposit.

Today as usual he parked his car at the pedestrian street in front of Ling's Garden, stood a billboard created by himself beside the car, he sitting on top of his car, then waving at cars passing by to attract attention. He was protesting on something. Written on the billboard:

"Soon Koh, Thai King, Ho Leng

Pekerja : 16/5, 8AM

Bermula Dari Sini, Perlu

Meninjau Tajuk Yang Berkaitan

Dengan Kehidupan

Bos : Hii Tiong Huat Mengajak"

Emmm... I am wondering if Hii learned from Putrajaya government by using Google Translate to produce the message on his billboard as the entire sentence are not properly structured, grammatically wrong and very Google Translate feel! From my interpretation, Hii actually wanted to ask the 3 politicians he mentioned, who are Bukit Assek ADUN Wong Ho Leng, Bawang Assan ADUN Wong Soon Koh and Lanang MP Tiong Thai King to start doing their works by solving issues relating to daily life of Sibu people.

Why 16/5 8AM then? I believe Hii means these politicians never do their duty as the elected representative of Sibu, so he wants them to start it by the coming Monday which is on 16/5.

A police was seen interrogate with him, but I guess he did nothing against the law and didn't block the traffic, so the police can do nothing on him. It's believe that Hii struck again on the street to attract attention as he is preparing to be an independent candidate again in the coming parliamentary election which is predicted to be held in a near future!

Scary Accident Scene @ Standard Chartered Bank Sibu.

2011-05-07T20:27:00.001+08:00

Spotted an accident scene this morning. It was located at Standard Chartered Bank, Jalan Ramin Sibu.

According to 2 security guards of the bank, the accident occurred at around 4am this morning. A motorcyclist believed to be working as a deejay at some pub/karaoke was the victim of the accident.

It is believed that the motorcyclist somehow run onto the pedestrian street, hit a alloy pillar and he flew off the motorbike and his head hit into the thick glass of the bank building.

From the blood stain, it's believed that the motorcyclist still able to stand up and walk around after hitting the glass before collapsed in front of it!

The scene is pretty scary with bloods everywhere and pieces of broken helmet covered with blood on the floor! Unofficial information saying that the victim already passed away. It is unsure that if the motorcyclist was riding in drunk condition or there are other causes of the accident. Anyway, to know about the details of this incident, please read the newspapers tomorrow!

Related news:
1. http://www.seehua.com/node/17504

A Short Trip to Tanjung Manis

2011-04-24T21:35:00.003+08:00

10th April 2011, a sunny morning. It was still in the campaign period of Sarawak 10th State Election. Sparkish had suggested to take a drive to Tanjung Manis on that day. 4 participants - Sparkish as driver, CoolFace King as co-driver, Rojak Toh and me as followers.

Tanjung Manis is a new integrated port which will become the primary import and export gateway for central region of Sarawak. Before this the newly developed township can only reachable via water transport through the mighty Rajang River. One can take boat express from Sarikei to Tanjung Manis which would spend you about an hour's time. However recently the road connecting Sibu - Tanjung Manis is almost complete. The 87km route which includes passing through as many as 8 bridges will only need around one hour if travel by car.

We took our breakfast at Fong Hing Seafood House across Igan River before officially started our journey to Tanjung Manis. This is what I ordered, the claypot noodles which was very big in portion and it is RM4.50.

After the breakfast, we began our journey. As I mentioned earlier, this journey needed us to pass through 8 bridges, big and small! After about 20 minutes of drive, we reached the first bridge, which is also the most major bridge among them called the Lebaan Bridge.

Just in case you don't know, the 1.24km Lebaan Bridge is country's longest bridge across a river! "Unbelievable? Believe it!" This bridge actually had caused some controversy upon its completion as it disallowed ships 20 meters and above to pass through. Want to know more about this issue? Click here for my older post about it.

We stopped a while at the highest spot of the Lebaan Bridge to see the scenery around it. As at that time it was still in the campaigning period of Sarawak State election, we discovered that BN was doing some activities at a long house nearby.

We then continue our journey. We passed through bridges after bridges, I can only name few, Sg. Lengan, Loba Satubah, Sg. Loba Pulau and Batang Belawai. When we reached each bridge, we stopped the car at the roadside and took some photos.

Some of the bridges were still under construction, so road users are advised to use the facilities on their own risks.

After rounds and rounds of stop and drive, we finally reached Tanjung Manis new township. We stopped our car just beside Tanjung Manis wharf. The wharf itself is nice! As it was near to the sea, you can see the water is light green in color.

The wharf was roofed so for those who are waiting for boat, they have a good shelter from expose under the hot sun.

Of course it was also a good choice for fishing enthusiasts where they no need to worry about the burning heat directly hit their skin as they can get protection from the roof.

There were nothing much to explore here except enjoying the breeze from the sea. The day was burning hot, the lunch time was here and we were all hungry. Thus, time to eat!!

Not much choice of foods around really. Only one stall was on business near the wharf area. We took a sit and it took ages for the eatery worker to entertain us. About the foods, we all went for mixed rice. It was all self-service including taking the rice! Yes! Take the rice yourself! Then, scoop the dishes you like and pay the money!

The standard price for the mixed rice was RM5.50! Expensive? YES!!! Especially when it was not delicious!! The curry chicken taste ok, but the livers were as hard as rubber and the mixed vege was like never cooked!!

There was a souvenir shop beside the eatery, but for me, nothing worth to buy.

There were actually few shoplots near the new township, but because of Sunday, most of the shop were closed so we didn't explore it further.

There was it! The 1/2 day Tanjung Manis trip! After the lunch and fooling around, we then headed back to Sibu. Nothing much on the visiting itself, just went to look at the place that we never being there before but overall, I enjoy the trip a lot as I spent quality time updating with friends and sharing some life experience together! Thanks Sparkish for the free ride again!!

10th Sarawak State Election 2011 - The Poster Wars!

2011-04-17T16:50:00.002+08:00

10th Sarawak State Election 2011 has finally come to an end. BN still won the majority with 55 seats, DAP 12 seats, PKR 3 seats and 1 seat won by independent. In this post, I am not going to elaborate on the election itself. What I would like to share is the posters from each party which I found around the town of Sibu during the campaigning period. No matter which party they belongs to, these posters are so colorful and fun!

This post is specially dedicates to those Sibuians who are abroad and not able to feel the fun of the state election. Hope you can feel some of the excitement from it!

::::::::::::::: Posters from SUPP :::::::::::::::

::::::::::::::::::::::::: Posters from DAP a.k.a. Rockets :::::::::::::::::::::::::

::::::::::::::::::: Poster wars!! :::::::::::::::::::

Helicopter Crashed @ Sibu Town Square!

2011-04-11T20:02:00.000+08:00

A helicopter was crashed at Sibu town square this afternoon around 1.50pm. This helicopter believed to be carrying Deputy Prime Minister's entourage from Bintangor to Sibu for election campaign events.

Deputy Prime Minister himself was not on this chopper. Heard that he just disembarked from an earlier chopper and on his way to RH Hotel for a meeting with school teachers. There were 3 helicopters landed at that time carrying DPM and his entourage.

The crashed helicopter was the last to take off heading back to Sibu Airport for parking and somehow it crashed back to the ground. There were nobody in the helicopter at that time except the pilot. Heard the pilot was quite severely injured and was brought to Sibu General Hospital with ambulance.

I took these photos around 6pm after I went back from work. At that time, the damaged helicopter body was still lying on the center of Sibu Town Square. It attracted quite a number of Sibu people to purposely go to the crash scene to shoot some photos for remembrance. After all this kind of accident is rarely seen especially in the center of town!

Policemen were there the seal the place and public are not allowed to go too near to the crashed scene.

Around 6.15pm, some authorities were seen started to cover the crashed chopper.

100Plus Go Kart Race Carnival @ Sibu Gateway

2011-03-20T15:26:00.000+08:00

This is a carnival event organized by 100 Plus at Sibu Gateway from 18 - 19 March 2011. However, I believe the organizer had extended the program for one more day as the event was still on the move this morning when I passed by the place.

The carnival is called "Thirst For Adrenaline Only at 100Plus Go Kart Race". The main program is the mini go cart race where the participants will try to come out with the best lap time. The 3 fastest participants will win some special prizes. The important thing is - the participation is totally FREE! So, anyone can try their luck!

Besides the main go karting program, there were also other activities and games for general public to participate on. One of them is cart racing simulator which was flooded with people most of the time especially by kiddies.

The Velcro Gym is naughty kids' favorite where they can "stick-on-the-wall" with a special costume or jump as they like on the air filled platform.

Water Tag is another fun game where players will shoot the water-fill gun to the special made target for some purposes which I am unclear of.

The participants of the Go Kart will get a chance to pose in front of a Go Kart car with 2 show girls accompanied.

2 giant 100Plus mock can drinks could be seen from far to attract more attention and crowds to the event.

Too bad for some reason I didn't take part in any of these events. Just went there to do some observation and shot some photos to be shared in the blog where I had left for months without doing any updates.

Satay Mee @ Sri Aman

2011-01-06T22:18:00.002+08:00

Years ago I introduced to you about Cha Kway, one of the very few local delicacy you can find in the town of Sri Aman. Recently I found another one which I believe worth to mention about. The food itself is quite common actually, but what make this food in a way special and unique is the gravy serving with it. The local Chinese called it "Satay Mee", i.e. noodles in satay sauce.

So, basically it is fried yellow noodles in Foochow style (stir fried noodles topping with gravy), but they made some modification to the gravy by adding peanuts into the cooking. This method gave the food with very nice peanuts aroma just like the taste of satay sauce (if you know how satay sauce taste like). That's where the name of the food came from.

You can opted the yellow noodles with Kway Teow, depends on individual preference, but for me they tasted equally nice! Sorry I didn't really note down the exact shops to eat these, but the noodles in the photo was taken at one of the stall at top floor of market building and the Kway Teow was at another coffee shop opposite the riverside. I shall be more detail next time!

Anyway, it is definitely a food that worth a try when you are in the small town of Sri Aman. So far I only found such cooking variation in this town, but feel free to argue if you have try it at another part of the state. One plate of the food is about RM3.50 - RM4.00, not that cheap actually if the living standard is taken into consideration.

Taman Panorama Benak @ Sri Aman, Sarawak

2010-12-31T21:50:00.001+08:00

Sri Aman - a small town and also the 2nd administrative division of Sarawak which I left part of my childhood there. I have a very special love towards the town, but I would leave that for another day's story. Although it is called the 2nd administrative division after Kuching, but this small town is pretty under-developed for some political reason perhaps. No! I know what you are thinking! But the fact is that all these while Sri Aman was lead under a BN-based party! Then why it was left behind in term of infrastructure development? I believe this is something we should seriously ponder about!

Anyhow, this small town is blessed and been awarded with tidal bore phenomenon on its Batang Lupar river which is known as "Benak" locally. This natural phenomenon is hardly found in other part of the country hence it became an important tourism asset to the town. A festive called "Pesta Benak" (Tidal bore festival) has became a major annual event which had attracted plenty of tourists visiting the town during the festive season.

Following the overwhelmed response from the public, recently a special platform to view the natural phenomenon had been built on the river bank of Batang Lupar which is called "Taman Panorama Benak". This is one of the very rare infrastructure development you can see in Sri Aman town in the recent decade.

Anyway, this artistic looking park is a nice add-on in beautifying the town and it has further strengthen Sri Aman's position as "The town of Benak" in Sarawak.

[Kubu Alice or Alice Fort is on top of the hill]

Taman Panorama Benak is located opposite Sri Aman Resident Office or beside/under Alice Fort near the town center. Its strategic location at a higher ground has make it an ideal platform to view the Benak phenomenon with more lengthy distance.

If you happen to visit the "peaceful town" of Sri Aman, don't forget to stop by at this Taman Panorama Benak and if you are at the correct timing, you may witness what the Benak is all about!

Christmas Tree Decoration Contest 2010 @ Sibu Town Square

2010-12-21T22:52:00.006+08:00

Christmas is just around the corner. As usual this is the time Sibu Municipal Council (SMC) organized its annual event - the Christmas Tree Decoration Contest 2010 in conjunction with this festival.

This is the 4th consecutive year the same kind of competition been held in front of Sibu Town Square Phase 1. Total of 12 participants taking part in the event, but this year saw a bit diffrence where the participants were from Non-government organizations (NGOs) instead of government bodies and local corporates in the previous years.

These NGOs include Lion Clubs from different division which form the majority, Junior Chamber International (JCIs), and Mdm. Loi's English Classroom, which is one of the local English tuition center.

Among the entries, the one caught my attention most is the artwork produced by JCI Mandarin Sibu which titled "The Eucharist - Sibu Kampua Mee". Yes! The design of the Christmas tree was to resemble one of the most iconic local delicacy for Sibu that is the Kampua noodles. I don't know how the person came out with this idea relates "the noodles" with "the Christmas tree", but I guess this is where creativity plays its part.

Another Christmas tree which I found more appealing was the one by Mdm. Loi's English Classroom. The puzzle-like Xmas tree was form by a series of alphabetic characters where some meaningful wordings/phrases were hidden inside them. These wordings/phrases were then been highlighted with various color, just like a huge "find-the-word" puzzle game. The Xmas tree was further decorated with few reindeer and 2 big hairy camels. I believe this is the most favorite Xmas tree especially to the kids!

For the "most recycled Christmas Tree", it is a co-winning. The Christmas tree by JCI Seduan was entirely built using mineral water's bottles, whereas Lions Club of Seduan built theirs using Henieken beer's cans. The former looks nicer at night under the LED lighting while the latter more presentable during day light.

The most artistic and elegance Christmas tree in my opinion would go to JCI Sibu. Made using dry sticks with brownish tones, their Christmas tree was decorated with "flowers" made by plastic bottles sprayed in striking blue color tones. These "flowers" were outstanding and eye-catchy from far. The heart-shape pinky wish cards hung on the Christmas tree gave additional color to it and I personally like and feel comfortable on the combination of color used.

Other products were just average. Anyway congratulation and well done on their hard works! They deserved some applause for this!

[Lions Club of Sungai Merah]

[Lions Club of Sibu Central]

[Lions Club of Sibu Pahlawan]

[Lions Club of Sibu Jaya]

[Lions Club of Sibu Berjaya]

[Lions Club of Sibu Mandarin]

[Lions Club of Sibu City]

For more photo, please visit Just Sharing photo album @ Facebook.

Here are how the Xmas trees are judged:

Creativity: 30%
Aesthetics: 40% (20% for day and night view respectively)
'Wow' factor (first impression): 10%
Durability and sustainability: 20%

Lengendary Penang Char Kway Teow @ Lorong Selamat Penang

2010-12-17T19:05:00.002+08:00

When talking about Penang Char Kway Teow (CKT), there are 2 very legendary stalls in Penang serving this. Well, maybe there are many but only these 2 so far make known to me. One is the Sisters Char Kway Teow at Jalan Macalister which I revealed in one of my previous post. Another one is a very controversial "Redhat auntie sometimes with goggle" CKT stall near Lorong Selamat which I'll elaborate in this post.

You can easily Google about the latter on the web. Then you will know why I said she is controversial. This auntie had make a big headline on the web as well as newspaper not only for her food, but also the "boycott campaign" launched on her on cyberspace for some reason!

[Picture taken from As Suanie Sees It]

I won't go deep into the boycotting issue, after all I am just a tourist and I got no reason to boycott a stall at a place of my visit who served one of the most authentic local delicacy, do I? Furthermore at the time of my visit, I don't even aware of this, so basically this is not an issue for me!

Despite facing some time constraint, my friends and I had tried our best to try out the CKT at this stall because we found it so legendary. This CKT stall had existed around half a century ago although it was not at the current location, but just few steps away. At those time there was no seating, no shelter, but Penangites as well as the tourists just didn't mind to queue under the hot sun for her CKT.

Now the stall is still at the roadside of Lorong Selamat, but in front of Kafe Heng Huat. So patrons can order their foods and enjoy slowly inside the coffee shop. However, there is a "symbiosis rule" that the visitors need to obey. You can't just order the CKT only without any beverage from the shop. Otherwise you will be imposed a penalty of RM0.50 per table! It is written big and clear on the wall! You like it or not, you have to follow if you want to try the famous CKT, unless you don't mind to "tapao" or take away or you may feel that is reasonable.

With a big red chef/artist beret on her head while frying kway teow, it creates such an impressive and eye-catching identity to the auntie and yes sometimes she even wear a huge goggle but not at the time of our visit! That's the reason why I called her "Redhat auntie sometimes with goggle" earlier in this post.

I believe that there are always 2 extreme ways to shape an iconic and outstanding personality, either you are damn pretty or choose to be clownish. Obviously this auntie choose the latter and it was not a bad decision after all!

However, you can be plain pretty but not plain clownish to be a center of attention! You have to be skillful in your area of interest then clownish may become the complimentary to boost the reputation. In this Lorong Selamat CKT case, the redhat auntie won't get such a big name in the business if she didn't cook a good food. She won't earn so much of controversial if not because many people are craving for her CKT!

We ordered 3 plates of CKT from the stall and waited for quite some time before the CKT arrived. After tasted, it didn't disappoint me! *Ummmph!!!* If compare to the Sisters CKT at Jalan Macalister, no doubt this one pleased my taste buds more although both were equally oily. It has the smoky wok fragrance that a plate of quality CKT should have. It was tasty! Oh ya, I noticed that these CKT was fried using traditional charcoal stove which may explain why the CKT here has extra kick!

The 3 prawns topping the CKT were really fat, bouncy and juicy! If compare with Sisters' CKT, this was certainly a knockout winner! There was no shredded crab meat topping the dish, but Chinese sausage became the added ingredient which I found tastier. Despite too oily, I really enjoyed eating this plate of CKT! If not because my stomach was too full after eating for whole morning, I think I would go for 2nd plate.

The price is also an absolute WOW!! Each plate of the CKT we ordered cost RM7.00 (default order)! You can also go for RM6.50 or RM9.00 version, but I guess they are just differ in term of ingredient's quantity. Although it was a little expensive, but I think it worth as the food is delicious, the prawns are big and I won't have them frequently anyway. No doubt this is a must try hawker stall when you visit to Penang!

To avoid any penalty for not ordering drink, we ordered Ais Kacang and there is nothing fancy to shout about. Nothing special about it, just a normal Ais Kacang with a scoop of ice-cream on top of it.

For those who wish to try, here are some of the info:

Address: 108, Lorong Selamat, 10400 Pulau Pinang.
Business Hours: 11am - 6pm daily closed on Tuesday

Now Everyone Can Play!

2010-12-14T00:06:00.001+08:00

Playing badminton on an international standard's court is no longer a dream for badminton enthusiasts of Sibu. Yes! "Now everyone can play" as long as you willing to pay!

Located at the top spot (Level 6) of Sibu 2nd multi storey carpark just beside/behind Sibu Central Market, there are 13 international standard courts to be rented. Many people even the local still not aware of it including me until I had been told of its existence recently.

This facilities is run by a company called "Thumb's Up Badminton Academy Sdn. Bhd." which I think is a local owned company (enlighten me if I am wrong on this). From the company's name itself, I believe that this is not just simply a company aiming in doing badminton courts renting business, but they will also focus on badminton sports and players development in the region. It is predicted that there will be more badminton clinics as well as major badminton tournaments been held in Sibu in the near future!

These courts are "international standard" because the floor is neither wood nor cement. They are using a technology called TARAFLEX flooring! TARAFLEX is the premier brand for indoor sports flooring solution which is widely recognized by most of the major sports federations in the world.

To explain the TARAFLEX in a less technical way, it is "rubber" kind of flooring. Thus it inherit the characteristic of rubber, which is elastic. Its elasticity is not spread around the entire area but only around the point of impact. Hence, besides giving the optimum performance to the athletes, it can also reduce the possibilities of getting injured, either by knocking, falling or diving or all kind of impact as it has the ability to adsorb energy from these impacts. So for those who love to "throw body", this is the most ideal flooring to do so without getting hurt!

Players also need not worry about slippery problem as faced when playing on conventional wood/cement flooring. TARAFLEX flooring gives tremendous grip to the shoes in dry condition until certain extend that I personally felt not quite used to it probably because all these while I was playing on a slippery wood flooring courts.

Apart from the flooring, the company also provided other necessary facilities for customers/players such as proper changing rooms, shower rooms with heater and wash rooms. Customers can also use the towel provided if want to take a bath after the game and according to a staff, this is free of charge!

Lockers are also available for those who wish to put their belongings at a safe place so that they feel secure thus can avoid any distraction while enjoying their games! These lockers are free to use!

Besides that, there is also an area selling all kind of badminton equipment such as rackets, shuttlecocks, stockings, shoes and so on. So, don't worry if you out of shuttlecocks or your shoes break apart while playing the games. You can always buy another one on the spot! See how convenient it is?

There is also an area reserved for gym! For the time being, this area is still pretty empty but I expect to see more equipment coming in to fill the area in the near future!

The rental price is not cheap, but reasonable and affordable. For weekend walk-in rental, it is RM15 per hour with time range from 9am to 7pm. On peak hours (7pm - 11pm), it is RM20/hour. Monthly rental fee is cheaper, range from RM330 - RM360 per month depends on selected time range. You will get even more discount if you go for yearly rental.

The courts are still pretty new and I believe they just started for business around November this year. So for those who want to try out the courts and facilities available, here are some of the information:

Thumb's Up Badminton Academy Sdn. Bhd.

Level 12, Top Floor,

Multistorey Carpark, Sibu Central Market,

96000 Sibu, Sarawak.

Tel: 019-828 2345 / 016-522 2345

Famous Teochew Chendul @ Lebuh Keng Kwee Penang

2010-12-07T22:05:00.000+08:00

People always say Penang is famous of its cendol, a cold drink consists of green pandan-flavored noodles (a.k.a. cendol), red beans served with shaved ais, gula Melaka (palm sugar) and coconut milk. I believe when people said this, most of the time they are referring to this stall, the one located at Lebuh Keng Kwee, an alleyway at Jalan Penang who called themselves as "Penang Road Famous Teochew Chendul".

Sometimes it's hard to explain why an isolated stall can get such a big name just by selling cendol. I always say it is either the quality of food served or its legendary. I'm not sure the story behind this one, but from the big name visited the stall before, such as the 1st "opposition CM" (Chief Minister) of Penang Lim Guan Eng and also famous Singapore's iconic comedy characters "The best in JB and some say Batam.." Phua Chu Kang and Rosie and of course many others local and foreign personalities, you just couldn't underestimate its popularity!

When you walked into Lebuh Keng Kwee from the busy Jalan Penang, you would see 2 stalls selling the similar product. Don't get confused, the one on the right would be the authentic one. If you still not sure, you can always find the one with the logo as shown in the photo below, or look for the stall with Phua Chu Kang's photo taken with the stall's owner who has a similar mole with him, or just look for the crowd!

There is no seat for the customers, but the patrons just don't mind to queue under the hot sun and enjoy the cendol on the spot. One good thing is that you don't need to wait for long as a bowl of cendol will be served to you in just few seconds time. The serving speed is quite amazing and I believe you can't achieve this without long term practices.

Anyway, the owner of the stall had made some improvement to its business by renovated the ground floor of her house to become a comfortable space filled with air-conditioner for customers to enjoy their cendol in a more relaxing manner. The space with proper seating is just few steps away from the stall. After we ordered and got our cendol, we had been invited by the taukehnio to enjoy our bowl of cendol inside this air-cond area.

If you feel unsatisfied by just enjoying cendol, you could also order Asam Laksa as well as Rojak at the stall in front of the air-cond seating area which I believe is some kind of business expansion and diversification by the cendol stall owner.

I believe what made this cendol so famous is because the coconut milk a.k.a. santan used were sufficient. Most of the cendol i ate were covered by shaved ice but this one was totally different. The entire bowl of cendol was filled with coconut milk then the shaved ice just submerged underneath. Thus you need less time waiting for the ice to melt before you can fully enjoy the beverage.

The volume of Gula Melaka added was just nice and it gave a very nice flagrance to the solution while it was not too sweet. One more thing is the green grass-like jellies (I called it "green pandan-flavored noodles" earlier) inside the bowl of cendol were really so much until it emerged outside the coconut milk! Maybe this is what "Teochew cendol" is different from other type of cendol?

The red beans were soft and nice to eat as well. With the size of the beverage served, RM 1.80 for a bowl of Penang Road Famous Teochew Chendul was certainly worth the money! No doubt it is a nice beverage to quench the thirst especially during hot day!

If you wish to try, here are some of the information about this cendol stall:

Address: 475, Jalan Penang, 10000 Pulau Pinang (outside Joo Hooi Cafe)
Business Hour: 10.00am - 7.30pm
Close: Open daily except if rains heavily

p/s: There is no exact spelling for the word "cendol", so "cendol", "chendul", "chendol" or "cendul" are all refer to the same thing.

Ah Lim Birthday Mee @ Jalan Macalister Penang

2010-11-28T22:06:00.001+08:00

When we walked along Jalan Macalister during the recent Penang trip, we were attracted by a banner hanging outside a shop written big and clear "Ah Lim Birthday Noodles" (written in Chinese). The curiosity had brought us into the shop to try out what is this birthday mee is all about!

The phrase appeared to be very fresh to us because as far as Penang delicacies are concern, people will normally think of those signature stuff like Penang Char Kway Teow, Hokkien Mee, Penang Laksa and etc etc. "Birthday mee" is something never came across our mind and never heard as well.

As the day still early, there were not many customers in the shop. We ordered 3 plates of Birthday Mee. While waiting for the noodles to be served, my curiosity exploded! As so, I walked around the stall where the noodle was prepare, taking photos and read some newspaper cutting displayed on the stall introduce about the stall, then tried to "interview" the owner.

"Boss, why it is called Birthday Mee har?", I asked in Mandarin. The owner's reply was very simple, "because people did eat this noodle during birthday lo...". Direct enough? But he replied me in a very humble, soft and shy way. He didn't have the ego like some of the widely well-known eateries around the country. Maybe his stall still not achieve that level yet? ;)

To satisfied our curiosity, the owner was kind enough to share some books introducing his stall and his foods to us so that we could be more informative about his product. You just can't underestimate his popularity when his stall as well as the food had been properly documented inside an well-established book, can you?

The noodles we ordered were served to us just in a couple of minutes. That's the moment our curiosity finally get fulfilled when the real thing was placed in front of our eyes. The Birthday Mee was actually the noodles what people from Peninsular used to call as "Lam Mee" which refers to noodles served with gravy.

From the information I get, what make this Ah Lim's Lam Mee so special is that there is no Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) a.k.a Ajinomoto or artificial flavor was added when preparing the gravy. It was cooked using the pork spare ribs for hours to get its natural sweetness. The noodles used are also specially selected from a specific supplier which didn't have bitter taste to preserve the deliciousness of the mee.

The dish also garnished with some bean sprouts, shallots, pinkish slivers of eggs, prawns and also some brownish ingredient which I couldn't figure out what they were. The taste didn't leave me with too much of impression, but for those who prefer to eat a lighter flavor's food, this is the one you should never miss!! The sambal provided is to add extra kick to the dish if you wish.

A plate of Birthday Mee is RM 3.00. Pretty affordable! We also had tried the nutmeg drink, which is a very popular beverage in Penang! Sorry... I forgot about the price..

The Legendary Sisters Char Kway Teow @ Jalan Macalister Penang

2010-11-23T21:27:00.000+08:00

Talking about Penang Char Kway Teow which is one of the signature hawker food in Penang, there are too many stalls or coffee shops around Penang you can actually get the food. I believe its status quo is almost equivalent to Kampua Mee in Sibu (Sarawak) where it's just too hard not to find it at nearly every coffee shop existed in the region!

I had Google around the net on the most authentic and famous Char Kway Teow in Penang before I went there months ago, but most of the write up I found is about a stall near Lorong Selamat. I'll leave the Lorong Selamat one for my coming post. For the time being, I'll reveal about another Char Kway Teow which had existed in Penang about half a century ago! I never heard or read about this stall before until our "tour guide" introduce it to us. He told us that it is one of the best Char Kway Teow in Penang.

To try it out, we had a 15-20 minutes' walk all the way from Garden Inn to an isolated coffee shop located at Jalan Macalister (somewhere near the junction of Perak Road and Macalister Road). Lam Heng Cafe is its name and here is where the Penang famous "Sisters Char Kway Teow" stall is located.

It's named so because the Char Kway Teow stall is operated by a pair of sisters. The Lam's sisters had fried the flat rice noodles a.k.a. Kway Teow for around 50 years exactly at this venue! Can you imagine that? Our country Malaysia is just about 52 years in age but they had involved in Char Kway Teow for around 50 years and until now the stall still standing tall! No wonder our tour guide told us both sisters had "produced" few bungalows just by doing this business!!

At the moment I stepped into the cafe and saw an old ladies frying Kway Teow at the entrance, I was a bit shocked. I believed that she must be one of the "legendary" sister who built up the "Sisters Char Kway Teow" branding, but she was far much older than I expected. Perhaps my imagination was affected by a classical photo I saw on a magazine about the sisters.

We took a seat near the rear part of the shop as the front part was filled and ordered 3 plates of fried Kway Teow. The service was really slow, we had waited for more than 30 minutes if not mistaken before the famous Sisters Char Kway Teow was placed on our table. A bit lost patient, but when you think of the 70++ years old lady handle the wok, you just have to forgive and salute her.

The Char Kway Teow was nice from the look, with prawns, eggs, bean sprouts topped with some shredded crab meat and placed on top of a banana leaf. But when I put it in the mouth, it's a way too oily and it just couldn't give me the "Ummmph!" feel. It was far from my expectation. I believed such a well-known Char Kway Teow deserved to be much tastier than this!

Anyway, I didn't feel the Char Kway Teow was that bad, perhaps it's just because of the inconsistent cooking standard and luck problem (bear in mind the cooking was done by a 70++ years old lady). Maybe just our luck not good on that day that's why we didn't get the best! Some people even commented that the fried Kway Teow is "not as before" but some claimed it is still the best!

No matter how, I will definitely try out this Char Kway Teow again at another time (if have chance) hope for a tastier serving. I believe that it worth a try even just for its legendary! A plate of Char Kway Teow is RM4.00 (by-default order) and the price may vary if you request for less or more ingredients add-on.

For those who wish to visit the Sisters Char Kway Teow, here are some info about the cafe:

Address: Lam Heng Cafe, 185, Macalister Road.
Open: 8.30am-12.30pm, 1.30pm-4.30pm
Close: Mondays

The Authentic Penang Asam Laksa @ Pasar Air Itam Penang

2010-11-16T20:47:00.001+08:00

I am not a big fan of Penang asam laksa. Been tried once many years ago, what left in my impression is that I don't like "some" of its taste.

But during my Penang trip recently, I never forgot to try on this local delicacy again which is so synonym to the town as far as its hawker food is concern! Talking about Penang Asam Laksa, I would just look for a stall which serves the most authentic asam laksa in Penang! This stall is located at Pasar ~~Ait~~ Air Itam, just near the foot of Kek Lok Si temple.

The laksa stall existed 3-4 decades ago and it's another generation-to-generation business. I get to know that in the morning this place is actually a wet market and the laksa stall will only open for business at around 11.30am until night.

The stall is always pack with patrons for a reason. Obviously is not because of its environment. Tables were place beside a small drain, flies can be seen everywhere and the place should be hot especially during afternoon time. Definitely not an ideal ambience for enjoying foods.

So, it's either the asam laksa here is so legendary or the laksa here poses a certain quality of deliciousness which make people craving for it. I believe it is both! Lengendary for tourists and local coming back for its deliciousness. Actually I believe these 2 factors are co-exist. The lengendary won't go too far without the deliciousness of the food, agree?

The key to the deliciousness of a bowl of Penang Asam Laksa at Pasar Air Itam is lies on its soured broth which is cooked with mashed fish, tamarind or asam (the source of the sourness), lemongrass and galangal.

Before serving a bowl of the laksa to customer, a big scoop of boiling hot broth will be poured into the bowl consists of rice vermecilli topping with ginger flower buds (bunga kantan), slices of onion, cucumber, lettuce, chilli and mint leaves. The soup will then be poured back to the pot and this steps would be repeated for 3-4 times before a final scoop of hot soup been placed onto the mixture and a spoon of prawn paste been added to the laksa and served to the customers.

It is believed that this is to make sure all the ingredients in the bowl will be served hot and there will be sufficient mashed fish topping the laksa. The taste is fantastic and so distinctive actually especially for those who love sour and spicy food.

I personally don't like the smell and taste of bunga kantan although I like the sourness of the soup. That's why I said I am not a big fan of Penang Asam Laksa. No matter how, I'll revisit the stall if have chance. With RM3 a bowl, it's definitely worth the money!

A Rushed Visit to Kek Lok Si Temple @ Air Itam Penang

2010-11-08T21:37:00.001+08:00

Our last but not least destination on the Penang trip on 6th Oct was the place that is so synonym with Penang's tourism, the Kek Lok Si temple near Air Itam. Supposed it was the 1st or if not the 1st it would be the first few venue to visit in our plan but somehow we changed it just because of the asam laksa at Air Itam which according to our tour guide will only open in the afternoon.

We reached the place at past 4pm, a little bit late actually. Tourists are advised to leave the temple compound latest at 6.30pm and some places such as the Bronze Kuan Yin statue area will be closed at 5.30pm.

We knew we were seriously out of time. Kek Lok Si isn't small and it is among the biggest Buddhism temple in South East Asia! With just less than 2 hours to go, we got to be hurry!

Therefore, we stopped at each station for a short while just enough to snap some photos before we continue to the next. We were looking for the entrance to the bronze Kuan Yin statue along the way which required a short ride of incline lift.

By following some signboard and after walking through a series of souvenir shops, we finally found the incline lift station which is "hidden" at a corner of a souvenir shop. Using the incline lift required a person to pay RM2.00 for one way. The staff told us the last lift to come down from the hill is at 5.30pm. There is an alternative road lead down, but it requires you to walk down the hill.

The unique thing about the incline lift is it moved diagonally instead of vertically for a typical lift. The interior is about the same, but the upper part of the incline lift was made from glass to allow tourists to view the beautiful scenery along the way.

It only took about 10 minutes to reach the higher hill where the bronze Kuan Yin statue is located. This is amazing! The 30.2 meters tall gigantic Goddess of Mercy statue was in front of my eyes and it was truly impressive!! A 20-story tall octagonal pavilion was still in construction to serve as the canopy shelter to the Kuan Yin statue with 16 granite pillars supporting the structure! It's truly an amazing construction to me!

[The impressive gigantic Bronze Kuan Yin statue and the pavilion which served as its shelter]

We couldn't spend too much time here as the workers were chasing us for the last inclined lift downhill 15 minutes earlier than the actual time. After reaching the lower hill, we then continued our visiting to the most iconic Kek Lok Si building structure - "Pagoda of Ten Thousand Buddhas" by paying RM2.00.

[Pagoda of Ten Thousand Buddhas]

We spent some time here snapping photos before ended up our trip by visiting the most famous Penang asam laksa near the foot of Kek Lok Si temple.

Penang Butterfly Farm @ Teluk Bahang Penang

2010-11-03T20:58:00.001+08:00

After lunch, we continued our Penang trip to the next destination - Penang Butterfly Farm at Teluk Bahang. We gone through a series of head spinning and curving mountain roads along Batu Ferringhi before reaching the destination. Our driver cum tour guide was kind enough to inform us that Malaysian will have discount for its admission fee.

Once reached the place, our tour guide lead us to the entrance where the ticket counter was located. He then quickly told the staff on duty "3 people" and he helped the on-duty staff to place some kinda sticker on our sleeve as a prove of payment I believe. He then told us "one person RM20". Without much thought and hesitation, we paid the amount, took the tickets and leaflets given to us and went into the butterfly farm.

For your acknowledgment, this butterfly farm is the world 1st tropical live butterfly and insect sanctuary! Can you believe this? Maybe it's not the world first but it is the world first in tropical region! It was opened to the public in March 1986, which is about 14 years of history by now!

Once entered to the farm compound, awaiting in front of your eyes was the beauty of tropical floras. The more impressive thing is that plenty of butterflies were flying around! These butterflies were so used to the human, so they will fly so close to you touching your skin as well as hair. If you are lucky enough, they may just stop on your arm or on your camera!

I never felt so easy to take photos of an insect before until I was here! It was the first time I took some close up on butterflies. However, it was not as easy as I thought. Bringing camera too close to the butterflies will scare them and they may just fly away! So, preferably bring a higher performance camera and I believe getting quality photos of a butterfly is something you could achieve in this farm!

If you think that it is all about butterflies only in a butterfly farm then perhaps you are wrong! Besides this beautiful insect, there are a lot more to see! At one corner inside the farm, the disgusting giant millipedes are shown to the public. Yes! We are talking about GIANT millipedes and not the normal one! The size is about maybe 20x of the normal millipedes which sometimes you could found at your house compound? Can you imagine that?

At another tunnel is where the live black scorpions were placed. These scorpions tend to stay in a group and didn't move around! Perhaps they were having an afternoon nap at the time of our visit? I am not sure though... but don't try to put your finger in to disturb them unless you really wanna find yourself some big trouble!

We also saw 2 green iguanas lazying around at a corner and what caught our attention more were a series of insects which were camouflage experts and blend so well with the surroundings. Moving Leaf insect, stick insects and so on are the only some I could name of. We spent quite some time spotting them and that was really fun!

[2 green Iguana]

[Can you spot where the Moving Leaf insect is??]

[A type of stick insects]

Insectarium or the mini zoo which located inside the butterfly farm compound is where all the unique creatures (not just insects actually) which we hardly see in our daily life were showcased. Among them were horned frogs/dried-leaf frogs (Megophrys nasuta) which look exactly like the dried leaves on the floor, some weird lizards which make me stood 3-feet away, flourecent scorpions, human-face bugs, tarantula, whipe scorpions and so on. There were so much of surprises in this section!

[One type of lizard]

[The lizards which have camouflage appearance]

[Dried leaves or horned frogs?]

[Whip scorpion]

That's not all! There were also theater room, A/V room and insect museum inside the farm to give education or organize some educational programs for the students and public to build up awareness towards the beauty of the insect world as well as the mother nature.

[Part of the insect museum]

[The landscape inside the farm is very pretty too!]

We wish to stay longer at the farm yet the time was chasing on us. I believe that there were more thing to explore if we could spend more time there. Before leaving the farm compound, we walked through a series of gift and souvenir shop where the only exit was located. We truly enjoy the visiting!

[Spotted a giant rhino beetle sculpture near the exit]

=====================================================================p/s: Still remember I mentioned earlier about the special rate for the admission fee for MyKad holders? Suppose it is 50% off for MyKad holders which means it should be RM10 per entry for each of us. However, we somehow didn't get any discount from that and we paid full like any other Japanese/Korean/China fellas! I had a long thought about it after this Penang trip yet until now I still cannot find an exact answer. I considered 2 situations:
1) Our driver cum tour guide was the one rushing to the counter and told the staff on-duty there were 3 visitors. He's the one placed a sticker on us as a prove of payment. Was there some tricks to confuse us in between?
2) Our driver cum tour guide was a very nice person and he served his customers very carefully. He just tried to be helpful by order the entry tickets ahead of us so that we could save more time for visiting. In hurry, he somehow forgot to tell the staff we are Malaysian who entitled for the special discount as he has plenty of customers come all the way from Japan (Yes! He can even speak Japanese!!).

I always tried to think positively, so I tried to convince myself that it is the 2nd case as I couldn't deny that throughout the trip, he really served us very well and he presented to me as a friendly, polite and professional person. No matter how, the RM20 we paid still worth the money!

Fatty Loh Chicken Rice @ Fettes Park Penang

2010-10-30T15:43:00.000+08:00

It was lunch time! We were scratching our head what to eat for lunch in Penang as we had too much options to choose from. Before we came out with any conclusion, our "tour guide" was kind enough to suggest us this eatery at Fettes Park, Penang - Fatty Loh Chicken Rice.

Our "tour guide" told us this chicken rice's shop had been doing the business for decades and it is one of the popular place to eat Hainanese chicken rice in Penang. Although chicken rice doesn't sound so attracting to us especially when we are talking about "Penang local delicacies", but at the same time we couldn't make up our mind what and where to eat, so we just go ahead with our tour guide's suggestion!

Just before the entrance to the eatery, you could found this very cute chef sculpture with round stomach standing tall beside the little staircase lead to the shop. Before you get your seats in the shop which is aircond-ed, you must first place your order outside the shop just after you climb the little steeled staircase.

After we placed the order, found our fengshui table and observed the surrounding, we just realized that this is not just "another-chicken-rice-shop"! This shop had gain some reputation when they won the title "Guang Ming King of Hainan Chicken Rice" in a Hainan chicken rice cooking competition organized by Guang Ming Daily.

They had also been awarded as Malaysia Top 10 Hainan Chicken Rice in "Malaysia King of Hainan Chicken Rice" competition co-organized by Guang Ming Daily and local tv channel NTV7.

We had not been waiting for long before the foods were served on our tables. We ordered roasted chicken for 3, roasted pork and a plate of taugeh cooked with oyster source.

The roasted chicken was smooth, juicy and tender which I believe is the most fundamental requirement in preparing a good chicken rice. The thinned sauce topping the chicken is nice eating with the rice.

The roasted pork was delicious as well whereas the taugeh just normal, nothing that special to elaborate about. Now come to the rice itself, I personally felt that the chicken rice was lack of some flagrance to please my taste buds. If compare to the chicken rice balls I ate at Malacca not too long ago, the delicacy level of this chicken rice is still far behind. Anyway, this is my personal opinion as how delicious is a food is something very subjective depends on individual.

One thing I would like to mention is the price here is pretty reasonable. With this much of foods we ordered for 3pax, the bill came out with just around RM26. The price was relatively cheap as the portion of the foods served were quite big.

If you wish to taste North-Malaysia champion's Hainan chicken rice, here is the address:
21, Jalan Fettes, Fettes Park, 11200 Penang.

Business Hours: Mon-Sun 9.30am-4.30pm

After filling our stomach, we continued our journey to the next tourism destination of Penang - Penang Butterfly Farm! See you there!

Pinang Peranakan Mansion @ Penang

2010-10-26T23:17:00.001+08:00

Botanic Gardens, Reclining Buddha Temple, Burmese Buddhist Temple, Fort Cornwallis, Queen Victoria Memorial Clock Tower and we were at our 6th destination of the Penang trip on 6th of October - Pinang Peranakan Mansion. Peranakan which also known as Baba and Nyonya mainly at Straits Settlements such as Penang, Malacca and Singapore are acculturated Chinese who had adopted selected local Malay culture and later colonial British to form their own very unique way of lifestyle and customs.

Pinang Peranakan Mansion is actually a museum of Baba and Nyonya in Penang where the mansion itself was owned by a very famous and influencial historical personality, Kapitan Cina Chung Keng Kwee. Remember about what you study in History book during secondary school about "Kongsi gelap Ghee Hin dan Hai San"? Yeah, the rival triad who caused the Larut War in 1860-an. Kapitan Cina Chung Keng Kwee was the "daigo" (leader) of Hakka (Hai San) group at that time!

Interesting fact is that Chung Keng Kwee himself is not a Baba, but he commissioned his mansion to be built in the influence of Baba and Nyonya architecture incorporating Chinese carved wood panels, Chinese Courtyard, English floor tiles and Scottish ironworks. The mansion itself reflects the typical home of a rich Baba about a century ago, including their luxurious lifestyle as well as their customs and traditions.

Admission fee for each adult is RM10 and free for kids under 6. The fee appeared to be a lil expensive to me, but trust me it worth the money as there are too many to see and too many to capture inside the mansion. Just in case you dunno, this mansion had become the venue for few film/drama shooting. Among them include "The little Nyonya"《小娘惹》by MediaCorp Singapore, a very successful local drama "The Iron Lady"《女頭家》produced by ntv7 and Double Vision, a film featuring Dr Sun Yat Sen refuge life starring by Angelica Lee(李心潔), "Road to Dawn"《夜明》 and others.

Upon entering the mansion is a wide space served as waiting lounge with air well at the center.

The room on the left was meant for gathering and is a reception hall...

... and the smaller chamber inside the room was the place for the ladies to enjoy their card games or did some gambling perhaps to spend their leisure.

Yes, these were the cards they played at that time which caught my attention. Perhaps these were the ancestor of Mahjong or they were totally different kind of card game? I really have interest to know. There was actually a tour guide in the mansion who will explain to you about the histories, the stories and everything about the mansion provided that you have at least 10 persons in a group visiting the place.

Coincidentally there was a big group of tourists visiting the mansion at the time of our visiting, so there was a tour guide trying to introduce the place to them. We tried to join in and listen, but the group was too big and the voice of the tour guide was too small to reach the back. We finally decided to give up and spent our time touring around ourselves while shooting as many photos as we like!

On the right side of the waiting lounge from the entrance was a dining hall with a long wooden western style dining table which reflects the western influence in early Baba and Nyonya lifestyle.

The upper floor showcase the family living hall, bedrooms, traditional bridal room with typical Nyonya matrimonial bed and sewing room.

The upper floor is also where all the antiques are displayed including women accessories. Some other interesting artifacts I found out are the huge vintage standing camera, radio, vintage platter player and many more!

Oh ya! Footwear is disallowed during you visit to the upper floor. So make sure leave you footwear (except stocking) before the staircase heading to the upper floor.

Another part of the mansion which may gain your attention is the kitchen on the ground floor. The kitchen space is relatively big which shows its importance in Peranakan culture. Here you can see all sort of cooking utensils, even refrigerator and oven of the old days!!

At another side of the mansion is an ancestral temple which look really impressive! You know those old time ancestral temple of rich families which you saw in Chinese drama? If you did, then this is exactly like what you see on tv!!

There were lots of colorful sculpture decorating the wall of the ancestral temple, each of them represent some meaning.

It was certainly a great eyes-opening experience visiting to Pinang Peranakan Mansion. If not because I was worry my camera's battery will get flatted for capturing too much, I would have more picture to share about this mansion. Anyway, you better visit the place yourself to feel its ambiance which certainly will impress you I believe.

The mansion is located at 29, Church Street and open daily including weekend and public holidays from 9.30am to 5.00pm.

Queen Victoria Memorial Clock Tower @ Penang

2010-10-21T21:02:00.001+08:00

This is not really a tourism venue but our "tour guide" stopped by here to let us take a look and he told us this is a very famous clock tower in Penang.

Yeap! It's the most iconic clock tower in Georgetown named Queen Victoria Memorial Clock Tower. The tower was built by a Chinese tycoon named Cheah Chen Eok in 1897 to commemorate the diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria's reign (1837-1897). This statement was carved on the structure itself.

The tower is 60 feet tall and it was to commemorate the 60th Queen Victoria's reign. This is not any coincidence but each foot represented each year of Queen's reign.

From the reading, the interesting fact I found out is that Queen Victoria never visit to Penang at that time and before the completion of the tower in 1902, she already passed away (1901).

Opposite the clock tower at the center of roundabout is a futuristic look metal sculpture which caught my attention. Heard it symbolizes "buah pinang" where Penang got its name from the plant.

We just stopped there for couple of short minutes before continue our journey heading to Pinang Peranakan Mansion. Not much nice picture taken about the tower, so these are the best I got! ;)

Fort Cornwallis @ Penang

2010-10-19T22:22:00.001+08:00

Honestly, I never heard of other old fort in Malaysia other than A'Famosa in Malacca, until few days before my trip to Penang, when I did some reading on the tourist spots on the island, I found out this fort in Penang called Fort Cornwallis. It became our 4th destination during the visiting to Penang recently.

Fort Cornwallis was built on the site where Sir Francis Light made his historical landing in Penang in 1786. This star-shape fortress is the largest standing fort in Malaysia and is named after the Governor-General of Bengal, India, Charles Cornwallis. Originally it's just a simple stockade made out of nibong (palm trunk) until it was reconstructed using bricks at a cost of 67,000 Spanish Dollars in 1793.

Upon entering the fort compound through its main entrance, each adult will be charged RM 2.00 and RM 1.00 for a kid. There are not much to see inside the fortress, basically just the old walls, old cannons and old structure. Well, I guess that's what a historical fort is all about, isn't it? However, there are some important artifacts in Fort Cornwallis that you may pay attention to.

First, is Francis Light's bronze statue which you will never miss when you enter the fort compound as it's placed near the entrance overlooking the fort. As at the time we reached the place was near to noon time, the weather was burning hot and the sunlight was so strong, that's why I couldn't snap a clearer picture of this statue.

Secondly, the gunpowder magazine structure at the North-West bastion of the fort. This structure was constructed in 1814 as a place to store explosive inside the fortress. Its pillbox shape design with thick wall was meant to minimize damages in the event of explosion.

Thirdly, the legendary Sri Rambai Cannon. I just knew that this cannon has a very interesting and legendary story behind it and if you wish to know more, please google yourself. ;p Anyway, this cannon was found in the Straits of Malacca in 1880 and placed at North-West bastion of Fort Cornwallis facing the ocean.

The cannon has Dutch East India Company symbol on it.

There were many other cannons beside the legendary Seri Rambai which you may like to take some attention to.

Fourthly, the Chapel. It's located at the south-west corner of the fort. It was built by Francis Light for worship purpose and is the earliest Anglican church built. The first recorded service taking place in this Chapel was the marriage of Sir Francis Light's widow or the mother of the sons of Francis Light, Martina Rozells with John Timmers.

Last but not least, the cell. The narrow space was first used as the barracks to house European artillery, then been converted into the cell room for prisoners.

"The fort was used as military and administrative base of the British East India Company to protect the island from possible onslaught launched by the Frenchmen. However, there was no battle has ever taking place at the fort, not even during Japanese invasion in 1940s." What an interesting fact about this fort.

As the weather getting hotter, we spent about half an hour to 45 mins before leaving the place and heading to the next destination, which was Pinang Peranakan Mansion. See you there... ;)

Dhammikarama Burmese Buddhist Temple @ Penang

2010-10-17T23:05:00.002+08:00

The 3rd stop of our Penang trip, of course is the one just few steps distance and exactly opposite Wat Chaiya Mangkalaram - the Dhammikarama Burmese Buddhist Temple. This Burmese temple is as fascinating as the Thai one in term of its architecture. With more than 200 years of history, the temple was designated as Penang State Heritage Site to be preserved as tourists attraction in 1998 during Visit Penang Year.

Upon walking into the main entrance you could see a long stretch covered path in front of you. Paintings are hanging high along the path and they tell the story about the life of Gautama Buddha. We stopped a while to look at the paintings and read the story. At this time, an old man (hereby call him the uncle) approached us and took the initiative to explain to us about the death of Buddha. We thanked him for that.

We then walked towards the end of the covered path to reach the main shrine hall. Here you can see a little different look of Buddha in Burmese Buddhism practice. There were monks on duty here and you can seek them for blessing and praying.

I think we were extremely lucky when we had change to witness the Relics of Buddha which had been displayed here for the public to view! The relics were sealed in a stupa-like container and been placed in front of the Buddha statue at the center of the hall. The relics look something like pieces of jade in few colors, such as green, white and black.

At right-hand side of the main entrance to the temple compound is another hall called SIMA Shrine Hall. The main attraction of this hall is it houses a giant all-marbled standing Buddha. The interior of the hall is decorated with very impressive wood engraving arts pieces which is really gorgeous!

Behind the giant Buddha image are 2 rows of smaller Buddha statues. From the reading I just knew that each of these Buddha statues is a replica of localized Buddha image from different part of the world during various stages of Buddhism influences including Japan, Pakistan, Nepal, Laos, Vietnam, Indonesia and etc. Too bad I didn't pay much attention on them during the visit. Perhaps I should do it next time if I revisit the place!

Behind the SIMA Hall is a courtyard with very nice landscape which worth to spend some of your time here.

A giant globe could be found here with 2 mythical look creatures guarding it. These creatures are called Panca-Rupa which said to be the guardian and protector of the world as they have the trunk of the elephant, 4 hoofed legs and 2 agile ears of the horse, lion-faced toe (chimera) with two deer's horn, the body and tail of fish and 2 Garuda's wings!

Dhammikarama Burmese Buddhist Temple is definitely a spot you shouldn't miss when you visit to Penang. We had spent quite long time here as there were too many points of photo shooting. As we were out of time, we had to leave the place after buying some souvenirs at the SIMA hall before heading to our next destination, which is Fort Cornwallis.

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p/s: Oh ya... just before we stepped out from the SIMA Hall, the uncle that I mentioned above approaching us again and he offered to take a group photo of us in front of the giant Buddha image as a remembrance. I first hesitated a while before handled my camera to him. We sat in front of the entrance, *catcha*... first photo done... "one more one more and this time put your palm together", the uncle kindly told us. “Wow! what a nice post!" I was thinking. *catcha* Ok, 2nd photo done."The photos very nice, without any handshake!", the uncle claimed. While gave back the camera to me, the old man whispered, "can give me some money? I just wanna earn some for living". Well, finally he shows his true color.

Anyway, I didn't blame him although honestly I did feel a little uncomfortable as initially we all thought he's a helper in the temple. At least he's working on something meaningful to gain some return which is better than another one just sitting at the entrance to ask for money by knocking a container on the floor. Rest my case here... just to share some experience... ;)
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Meet the Jumpers @ Sibu BASE Jump 2010

2010-10-16T22:58:00.005+08:00

Sibu BASE Jump is back again!! This is the 2nd time Sibu organized the heart-beating X-game event at Sarawak tallest building, Wisma Sanyan following the good respond from the participants as well as the public last year.

This year, there are total of 10 BASE jumpers participate in the event, with 5 of them are Malaysian and another 5 are foreigners (Enlighten me if I am wrong). Among these jumpers, there is one still appear to be quite familiar to me!! I knew he'll be back!

Yeah! He's the world record holder for the most BASE jump made at KL Tower BASE jump 2005 (I believe he is still the holder), Gary Cunningham from Australia! He's one of the jumper that leave a message in this blog last year saying that he truly enjoy the event and hospitality here and he's looking forward to come back the next year! [Read Sibu BASE Jump 2009 - The Jumpers Story]

I strongly believe that a person with so much of passion and discipline in the BASE jumping sport will not simply say this for fun. See, it's proven that he didn't! He is back in Sibu! Welcome back, Gary!!

When I saw a jumper made a jump from the rooftop of Wisma Sanyan opened a light blue color parachute with the word "NESS" printed on it, I knew that must be Gary! [Read Sibu BASE Jump 2009 @ Wisma Sanyan] I just can't mistaken him with his very unique white helmet (while other jumpers mostly wear dark color helmet) which appears to be fit his head so much but not his nose as Gary has a very sharply pointed nose! ^ ^ (Hope you don't mind I describe in this way as Asian usually very admire westerners with their sharp noses...)

[Gary Cunningham with his white helmet just touched down at Sibu Town Square]

When I saw Gary touched down on Sibu town square, I approached him and called him out "Gary!!". I never expect he'll recognize who I am as I seldom put my face on my blog and yeah... he just noticed somebody called his name, that's all. I tried to shoot some photos on this familiar face and nice to meet you back Gary!

[Gary Cunningham]

For your information, just in case you dunno... Gary has 3 set of parachutes! That's why he could make more jumps than other jumpers. But I believe it's not the quantity that count, it's his passion and interest in this sport that makes him the record holder!

Beside Gary, I also had chance to approach another jumper which introduced himself as Lucky! Lucky is an Australian as well. He looks young and just 26-year of age and had been involve in BASE jumping for 4 years, mostly in Australia, Asia and Spain regions. He's a very friendly, cute and naughty jumper who has thousands pose in front of camera!! Photos below prove this.

[The naughty pose from Lucky]

[His full name is Lucky Chance, a very special name]

When I asked Lucky how he finds about Sibu, he said this is the mostly friendly town he ever been to in Asia! Thanks for that compliment Lucky! (By the way, I'm the guy that intro myself as Owen).

I also met another Australia BASE jumper who called himself as Tim. Welcome to Sibu Tim!

[Tim in action]

[Timothy Deshon]

The highlight of the day was Gary and Lucky made a concurrent jump from the top spot of Wisma Sanyan. It's actually a bit risky but from their expression, I could see they really enjoy the excitement of doing so! What a great jump!!

Action of other jumpers...

Wat Chaiya Mangkalaram @ Penang

2010-10-13T23:44:00.000+08:00

After we left Penang Botanic Gardens, our next stop was Wat Chaiya Mangkalaram (or Wat Chayamangkalaram) which is a Thai Buddhist temple located at Lorong Burmah, Pulau Tikus. This is another destination you could never miss when you're in Penang Island.

We reached the place around 9am which is consider still "early". Therefore there were still not many visitors around, we were the few early birdies. I think this is good... as we spent our time shooting photos around without much interference! ;)

In front of the main meditation hall are some kind of giant Thai mythical creatures as well as dragon serpents guarding the entrance. According to myth or maybe is a legend, these serpents are the link between heaven and earth.

Besides its lavishly colored appearance and unique Thai architecture, the main attraction of this temple is it houses said to be 3rd largest Reclining Buddha statue in the world! Yeah, the statue is just inside the main meditation hall. Before you go in, don't forget to remove your footwear!

This gold-plated Reclining Buddha is measured 33 meters or 108 feet in length. In front of it are smaller shrines of Buddha and other Thai deities.

You can also find and read a series of gold-painted 3D images portraying the story of Gautama Buddha around the giant Reclining Buddha. Behind the impressive statue are niches with urns containing ashes of devotees.

Actually we had been told by our "tour guide" that visitors are not allow to take photo inside the main meditation hall houses the Reclining Buddha, but somehow nobody stop us from doing so although at that time there were temple staffs around. Heard that the temple staffs won't stop you from taking photos, it is the person that doing the photography business that set the rules! How true is this? Enlighten me if you know! ^ ^

We had a good time visiting to Wat Chaiya Mangkalaram where there were so many to see and so many to shoot and our next destination would be the Burmese Buddhist Temple just opposite of it!

Penang Botanic Gardens

2010-10-11T22:51:00.000+08:00

On 6th October 2010 as early as 8.00am, we started our one-day visiting journey in Penang. As we had limited time to explore the routes to all the tourists attraction spots, we booked a taxi earlier which the driver acted as our tour guide as well. He is so pro that once we boarded his taxi, he immediately took out few laminated leaflets to show us the tourism venues that we might have interest to go.

If you have no idea where to go, don't worry, ask the "tour guide" to arrange for you! They are so used to this business so this thing is just "sap sap soi" for them. We actually planned to go for the famous Penang Asam Laksa near Air Itam for breakfast, but the driver told us Penangites don't eat Asam Laksa in the morning. Thus, the well-know Air Itam laksa stall will only open in the afternoon.

So, we changed our plan. The first destination of our visiting was Penang Botanic Gardens. From the information I got, this garden was established by British way back in 1884 from an old quarry site. For the local, it is more known as "Waterfall Gardens" because of the cascading waterfall nearby.

Visit the gardens early in the morning is a nice thing to do when the weather is still cool and the sunlight still not burning hot. The surroundings are filled with hundreds species of plant, therefore the air there was so refreshing. It is a nice place to escape from polluted air in town center.

Because of this refreshing condition, therefore the garden is not just a tourism spot. It is also a place where the locals love to walk, jog or do exercise. Hence when I walked around the garden, I saw plenty of Penangites doing their morning exercises there. Why I know they are locals? Well, at least they talked in Hokkien with heavy Penang accent.

The quiet and peaceful ambiance in the gardens made it a good place for activities which need such environment such as Tai Chi or Qi Gong.

For tourists, this is not the main attraction. What attracted them most is the natural environment, various species of tropical flora and fauna which hardly found in the cities surrounded by concrete buildings.

Not far from the main entrance, a row of very unique trees caught my eyes. They're called the cannon-ball trees (Couropita guanensis). Not sure how to describe this species of tree, perhaps the photos give the best description.

Not only the trunk is so unique, even the flowers' appearance are very special too! Heard it is called "Cannon-ball tree" because the fruits produced from the tree look like canon-balls. The fruits will fall from the tree and crack open when hit the ground and causing a small explosion sound. Quite an interesting fact. Perhaps at the time of our visit it was not the fruiting season as I didn't notice any fruit on the tree.

You could also meet the Pinang Palm tree which is where Penang (Pulau Pinang) got its name! It looks a bit like coconut tree, but the trunk is much slimmer and taller than coconut tree.

There are also several green houses such as the fern house and cactus house, but I guess we were there too early so all these green houses were still locked and not yet open for visiting. I heard suppose we can easily see plenty of monkeys hanging around in the gardens, but somehow we met none!! Perhaps they were still sleeping or maybe we should bring some bananas with us??! ;)

Landscaping in this garden is gorgeous as well which really worth a visiting.

As the natural habitat is not the main purpose of our visiting and we're chasing of time, so we didn't explore much of this garden. After spending about half an hour or so in this place, we then left to the next destination. Anyway, I believe that Penang Botanic Gardens is a beautiful place to visit if you happen to cuti-cuti Malaysia in Penang Island.

Penang Trip and the Visited Places

2010-10-09T22:50:00.000+08:00

Just came back from a short Penang visiting yesterday with Sparkish and Rojak Toh. Supposed it was a 4-day trip, but it ended up with only 2 days 3 nights stay in Penang Island as big portion of the time was spent on flight transit.

Being to quite a few tourism spots during the 2 days visit. I'll sum them up in this post, so next time if you happen to visit to Penang Island, it could be your reference where to go. The more detail elaborations or photos will be followed in my coming posts.

Botanic Gardens

This garden actually existed since year 1884 during British colonization. Inside the garden you can see various kind of plant species and it is suitable for those who love the nature. It is best to visit early in the morning when the weather is still cooling.

Fort Cornwallis

Fort Cornwallis was built on the site where Sir Francis Light made his historical landing in Penang in 1786. It was named after the Governor-General in Bengal - Charles Cornwallis and is used as military and administrative base of British East India Company to protect the island from possible attack by the Frenchmen.

Queen Victoria Memorial Clock Tower

It is the most significant landmark in Georgetown which had been inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage Site together with Malacca. The clock tower was built by Penang millionaire Cheah Chen Eok in 1897 to commemorate sixtieth year of Queen Victoria's reign.

Pinang Peranakan Mansion

It is originally the home of Kapitan Chung Keng Kwee, leader of the Penang and Perak Hai San groups in the
Larut Wars from 1860 to 1884. It is is a typical representation of the Straits Eclectic style of architecture, highly favored by rich Peranakan families of old time. The mansion is now the Baba and Nyonya (Peranakan) museum.

Penang State Museum

Penang Butterfly Farm

It is claimed that this is the 1st tropical live butterfly farm in the world which exhibits about 150 butterfly species. Besides butterflies, various live reptiles as well as insects which we hardly see in our daily life also been displayed here which certainly is an eyes-opening experience.

Kek Lok Si Temple

The iconic tourists attraction venue in Penang located at Air Itam which you can never miss when you visit to Penang island! Regret to say that we didn't spend much time at this place as we were short of time.

Wat Chaiyamangalaram

The Thai Buddhist temple is one of the most popular tourists spot in Georgetown other than Kek Lok Si Temple. This temple is where the giant Reclining Buddha statue is located.

Dhammikarama Burmese Temple

This is a Burmese Buddhist Temple exactly opposite the Thai Buddhist Temple Wat Chaiyamangalaram above. Inside the main hall of this temple is a 8.2 meters height giant standing Buddha statue with gorgeous wood carving arts covering the ceiling.

There are actually more tourists attraction spots that we didn't manage to visit on this short trip because of some specific reasons. Take an example, the Penang Hill which suppose is a must-visit venue, but the cable car bringing tourists towards the hill top were still in maintenance and the 4-wheel drive service is unreasonably expensive. Khoo Kongsi which is the grandest clan temple in the country was used for movie shooting and St.George Church, the oldest Anglican church in Southeast Asia was still under renovation.

Fish Head Noodles @ Woo Pin Taman Desa

2010-09-29T19:25:00.001+08:00

I had been told that there is a very famous fish head noodles (rice vermicelli to be more accurate) at Taman Desa but I had never try it until my last visit to KL recently, my brother-in-law purposely brought us to this eatery to taste it out! Yeah... this particularly famous with its fish head beehoon's shop is named Woo Pin Fish Head Noodles Sdn Bhd, located at Jalan 1/109F, Taman Danau Desa, KL.

Don't be cheated by its signboard written "Ho A One Seafood Steamboat Restaurant". Trust me you can't find any steamboat there anymore. That would be the old signboard. Look for the green banners instead printed "Woo Pin Fish Head Noodles Sdn Bhd" which operate from 7.30am - 10.00pm daily and closed on Monday.

We went there on lunch time and it was shocking when I saw the influx of patrons flooding the shop. We were lucky to get one table soon enough without much waiting. Look at the notice on the wall saying "Please be informed that all tables are to be shared". It simply means if your table have spare seats, you need to share them with other customers. If your intention is to enjoy the food with your love one face2face without been disturbed, I think you better forget about it! Table for 4 is means to be for 4 and not for 2!

There are few variants of noodles combination you can order from. The most original one is the deep fried fish head with rice vermicelli in evaporated milk added broth. This is what I felt special about this food - evaporated milk been added to the soup which makes the taste so unique! However, the amount of milk added much contribute to its tastiness. Too much or less may spoil the taste.

Deep fried fish head is the best choice, but if you are in hurry, I would suggest you don't go for it because you need time to negotiate with the fish bones which appeared to be a lot! You wouldn't like the feeling of fish bone stuck in your esophagus, would you? For that reason, you can option for boneless fish paste version. These fish pastes are delicious as well, bouncy yet not that fishy, but I can assure you that deep fried fish head is still tastier!

For any reasons if you are not in favor of milky products, you can order the clear soup version. There are only 2 types of noodles you can choose from, either beehun or yee mee. Each bowl of fish head noodles with regular size priced RM6.50, certainly worth the money with the big portion and good quality of food.

Oh ya... if you are here, don't forget to try out their Foo Chuk Yee Mai (barley cooked with beancurd sheet and Ginkgo) as well. Heard they're well-known for this beverage. It's my first time had the drink and it was really tasty with strong egg fragrance! I believed eggs are part of the ingredients to produce the beverage. Each cup of Foo Chuk Yee Mai is RM2.00.

I will definitely go back to this shop and try the other version of noodles again if I have the chance in the future!