Holiday Diary 2-A short post from Kuching

Dear Diary,

My family and I arrived in Kuching this Sunday.

We are just in time to celebrate my grandma's 76th birthday with the rest of the relatives in a restaurant. The food was great, same goes to the giant sized chocolate cake.

The next day we went to have lunch in 'After 4' cafe which is newly open recently. I had my first taste of Kuching kolo mee after such a long time. But somehow the kolo mee there just doesn't feel right so perhaps this is not the type of kolo mee my taste buds are yearning for. Nevertheless, there are many variety of food there and most of them is priced reasonably.

My family drop me of in The Spring where I window-shopped for a while before meeting with Graham. I had another lunch with him in another cafe and the kolo mee there taste a lot better than the former. Unfortunately I'm too full from the previous meal so I can't finish it. It is the first time I waste so much food. The bowl was still two-third full! I never expect such a big bowl of kolo mee at only RM4 with such generous amount of meatballs so it's very worth it. Well at least I did finish up all the meatballs and wantan.

After lunch Graham brought me to a few shopping malls around Kuching. It was a Monday afternoon and most of the places are quite empty and deserted. At night I had dinner with Graham and his mom in Heritage restaurant. The food and service are great. The place was very much sought after seeing that most of the tables have already been reserved. After dinner Graham brought me for a tour around Kuching to see the city's beauty lit by the night lights. I'm still not that used to Kuching's roads and most of the places so this tour was quite an eye-opener (provided I don't forget them :P).

Later on during the night I met some of Graham's friends and we went for Dota in a cyber cafe. Unfortunately we didn't even get to finish one round before the system crash due to an error in the game itself. Yes, of all the games Dota is the only one hit by the problem and it has to happen on the night I came here. We played COD4 instead and although I hate games that involve hunting down and killing people, surprisingly I found COD4 quite an exception and it was quite fun contrary to what I expected. After gaming we went for a game of pool and despite my continous losing spree, I'm pretty sure my skills have improved slightly (pardon my self consolation here). After the game we called it a night and I reached home around midnight.

That's all for now. Happy Winter Solstice!

Holiday Diary 1- Of outings and movies

Dear Diary,

Lest you slip into oblivion again, it will be best that I pen down everything before my own memory fails me.

Anyway, time does fly when one is having fun. I had hung out with plenty of friends during the span of the week.

My first outing was with Yi Herng and Jonathan to Sunway Pyramid to meet Chris. It was great to catch up with him again after such a long time. He told us all the wonderful experiences he had in his culinary classes and his internship. From what I’d heard, it’s not totally a bed of roses and you need to put in a lot effort, but it does sounds like fun at the same time. Heck, they even had wine sampling classes! Who doesn’t enjoy that?

Anyway, we window shopped for a while and try out many food franchises. I’d never eaten so much in one day! I had lunch at Manhattan, desserts at a mango pudding franchise, Chocolate Cream Chip coffee and Black Forest cake in Starbucks, some delicious Xiao Long buns at a classy Chinese style restaurant, and dinner in a sushi restaurant within the span of 6 hours. We watched a movie 'New Moon' before calling it a night.

The story 80% of the time revolved around the love triangle between a vampire, a werewolf, and a girl named Bella. Bella is always the damsel in distress who is constantly in danger, and Edward (vampire) and Jacob (werewolf) are the heroic hunks who will risk everything to save her, although jealousy obviously sparked between those two as they both want to claim Bella as their lover. The plot is slow and sluggish, but luckily the added special effects compensate for it. Otherwise, I would surely have fallen asleep somewhere between Bella’s long-winded “emo” moments. RATING: 6/10

On the second day, we went to KL Central to meet Sze Mei and went to Times Square. It was my first lunch in Subway, a burger franchise where customers can customize their choice of burgers including the type of loaf, fillings, and toppings. It was delicious and worth every bite! We catch another movie 'Mulan' starred by Vicki Zhao and Jackie Chan's son, Jaycee Chan.

The plot was nicely written with just the right amount of everything, action scenes during the war, romance between the main characters, and even some humour. Although it lacks really cool special effects, the storyline was captivating enough and filled with suspense. Rating: 7/10

We met up with Eric in KL Central before heading back home. Eric showed us his new camera packed with powerful megapixels that capture the crispest and clearest images I’ve ever seen. We played around with the various strange but interesting modes of the camera and captured some “disturbing” pictures that I won’t elaborate about here. The following day, my friends left to their own various destinations, Jonathan and Eric to India, while Yi Herng back home to Ipoh.

A few days later I met up with Chris and Serena in Sunway. We watched a movie titled Storm Warriors. This movie is heavily laden with all sorts of very fascinating special effects that will keep audience glued to the screen. However, if all those special effects are taken out, the plot of the story is actually quite ‘dry’ and simple. In fact, the movie doesn’t really end there so we will be expecting another Storm Warrior movie in the future. Rating: 6/10

Serena went back early while me and Chris catch some tea break in a Thai restaurant. The food was absolutely fantastic and I would definitely eat there again. We also check out a new restaurant “Fullhouse” that has just open recently and the place was stylish, elegant, and creative.

Apart from outings with friends, I do have some fun with my families and relatives. My relatives from Kapit drop by to visit for a few days. We dined out in the various food outlets in Puchong area and also went to the National Zoo. A few animals that are worth watching are the elephants, giraffes, and a cute troop of badgers that are very territorial. They will immediately assemble in a line and stare hard at any passer-by who they thought is an invading enemy. Besides that, watching the sea lion show is a must if you ever step foot in the National Zoo.

Sea lion's jump captured at the right moment!

A few days later my family and I went to the opening day of Taylor Lakeside Campus. How I envied everything there! All the facilities are top-notch and I almost fainted when I saw the computer lab--rows and rows of brand new big screen 20 inches (or more) Apple Desktop with full internet capabilities and paired with a chic white wireless mouse. The designs of the soon-to-be libraries, cafeterias etc are awe-inspiring. Nevertheless, as much as I ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’ at everything there, I was soon brought back to Earth when I saw the five digit semester fee. With such a high price, no wonder everything is as it is. For Petronas scholars, we are lucky that all our semester fees and even accommodation are fully covered and we do not have to worry about burdening our family financially for the sake of our education.

The Multi Purpose Hall was packed during the open day

The cafeteria

The computer lab

Pure awesomeness

At night, my family and I went to E-curve, a shopping mall. It was my first time there and although it was not as big as Sunway Pyramid or Time Square, the Christmas decorations surpass those in the other malls combined. There was a real live person dwho ressed up as a golden angel and posing as a statue. I really admired his ability to sit at a spot for a long time without moving a muscle. Amusingly, there was a Santa on stilts that distributed sweets to children.

I bet this is ot your typical Christmas ornament

This golden 'statue' attracted lots of attention

Santa's new way of preventing suffocation from massive crowding of children

One last movie that I’d watch, this one with my family, is Disney’s Princess and the Frog. Although it sounds like another typical lame fairy tale movie for the kids, this movie proves quite the contrary and worthwhile to watch. It had an interesting storyline and instead of the typical "princess waiting for a prince to rescue" plot, this story is another way around, or to be exact, both characters are mutually helping each other out. To give some spoilers, one of the side characters died in the movie, which is the first time I saw in a Disney movie where conventionally all good guys win. But at last, even after everything in the well-thought storyline, there’s still one tiny flaw in the storyline during the ending. Most people would not have notice, especially the kids who are the main target audiences. I guess fairy tales are still meant to be ended with happily ever after. Rating 7/10

That wraps up pretty much everything. I had yet to hit a boring spot in my holiday and I’m enjoying every single day of it. Will be on vacation to Kuching for the next week. More updates coming soon. Good night.

In the festive mood

Most shopping complex in KL are in the festive mood for Christmas as Christmas is just around the corner in a few weeks time. My family and I got to hang out at Metrojaya Time Square yesterday. The decorations are truly dazzling enough to put every shopper in a festive mood!

Live performaces and dances paired with lively songs and music

Ceiling decor: convincingly look like snow falling from above. Quite creative don't you think?

Life size Christmas sledge full of presents



Merry snowman!

A christmas tree beside a gelato ice cream stand. Rum raisin flavour is my favourite and it tastes sooo heavenly! (although it did burn a hole in my pocket)

This is one gigantic Christmas tree. It's gigantic enough to house a S&J shop underneath! XD

Giant tree with giant snowflakes decor. Not that nice to view from this angle because the snowflakes are obscuring the tree.

Performance by a choir group

As for dinner we went to Vivo Pizza. It was the my first time patronizing this pizza outlet (definitely a nice change of atmosphere from Pizza Hut) and I must say I would give it a 'thumb's up'. The ambience is nice with spacious seatings and the pizza is on par, if not, better than Pizza Huts'. The Hawaiian pizza simply tastes superb!

We went home after that with dad driving the car through the traffic-packed highways at night. We were all worn out but it was an enjoyable day for us nevertheless. Back to my usual holiday routine. Plan to hang out in Sunway Pyramid with some of my friends soon. Till then, good night!

Finally Home!!

Most of my UTPians pals who were already home long ago will probably snigger at this post. But after being stuck in UTP and my holiday delayed for one week, words can't describe the feeling when I finally reached home safe and sound. Cheers!

The last stage of leaving UTP was a mess. I overlooked Block O will be closed at 5pm. It definitely looked like it was closed when I reached there to return my key. Thinking it would be the best solution, I slipped my room key and sign-out forms through the gap under the door, hoping that the officer will see them the next morning. But to my surprise, the door suddenly swung open and the officer was there, giving me a strange look wondering what was I doing. I quickly stood up and said, "Oh, still open?" while he nonchalantly picked up the forms from the ground and went to verify them. That moment was really awkward and embarassing.

I must look like a complete fool kneeling down near the door doing something like that. Luckily doors are invented to be open inward, not outward which will result in the door hitting me right on the face. Who would have thought that there is still someone working inside when the door was locked and the lights are off? If this were to happen at night, I will definitely ran away with terror.

Despite all that, I guess I should be thankful that at least there is still someone there so I can have a peace of mind knowing that my key was safely returned. That was a funny, embarassing, yet creepy experience. But most importantly, lesson learnt! Never ever do things last-minutely!

That's all for now. Finally, Happy holiday to my self! Gotta cherish the time together with my family, all the good food, and comforts of home. Home sweet home! (^_^)