Malaysia: week 2

Aaaaaaand another week has gone by. And this is the moment where you realise you REALLY don't have much time left to do anything/see anyone! :O probably get to see a few people once more and that's it :( sigh.

What I've been up to for day 8-14 in Malaysia.

1. Met more people
My cousins super cute one year old baby will be celebrating her 1st birthday this week! Which means - time for baby gift shopping!!! I don't know if this has to do with being a girl/the whole maternal instincts deal, but shopping for baby stuff is SO FUN. Everything is so tiny and cute and fluffy and soft! I remember I went baby gift shopping with my brother once, and we found a baby blanky soooooo soft he almost bought it for himself. And the toys!! So many buttons to press and things to touch etc. Yes, I'll admit it. I'm one of those itchy hands that will touch everything and press everything. Especially if it says "Try me!". I'm the one who would press every button in a lift if the buttons were particularly nice to press.

2. More shopping!
I seriously need to stay away from the big shopping malls. Zara and topshop will be the death of me! Almost bought ANOTHER 2 pairs of sunglasses (keyword being "almost", now aren't you proud of me), but its not that I wear sunglasses all that often. Even though things here are cheaper after conversion, it still feels like I'm spending more money simply because the numerical value is larger here. And a RM100 note can only go so far. Especially if you hang out at Zara. I'm still secretly searching for the shoes I mentioned in my last post when I enter the shop. No luck. So many skirts and tops I wish I could buy, but I must resist. What if I had a duck that laid golden eggs? Hmmmmmm.

3. Miscellaneous entertainment
Watched spiderman (hello there Andrew Garfield) but LASERTAG WITH MY COUSINS. HAS GOT TO BE THE HIGHLIGHT OF THE WEEK! This was my first time playing lasertag, and boy have I been missing out on life!! Now I know why Barney (from HIMYM, not the purple dinosaur) loves it so much. The blinking suits, the laser on the guns which make it SO much easier to aim, the fluorescent graffiti on tyres, barrels and whatnot in the "warzone", hiding behind props, the awesome tri-tone you hear from the gun when you successfully shoot/tag someone... But my favorite part has GOT to be the mission impossible-esque music in the background. Seriously takes the "secret agent" experience to a whole new level!

3. More food.
I had a few repeated meals this week :p oh well, they were still good! Went for a sushi buffet today with Qien and Laks, and totally overdosed on sashimi. Right now the mere thought of sashimi kind of makes me want to puke :p only a little.

Let's have my top 5 of the week!

ABC @ my uncles Fishhead Noodle shop

Still my favourite Ice kacang of all time, and not just because its my uncle's! The ice is super melt in your mouth, unlike some places where the ice can be quite hard and stiff and it makes it really hard to try to collapse the ice without it falling out of the bowl, but this one is really nice and soft and collapses into the bowl nicely as you eat it. And I like how they don't put all the colourful nonsense syrups on top, just good ol gula melaka and some evaporated milk.

Shu Fun Kan (Tapioca flour noodles) @ Noble House, Klang

I know it looks disgusting, my apologies. Was halfway eating this before I decided that its too tasty to not have a picture of. Super chewy noodles, kind of reminds me of pearls in bubble tea, but these are chewier.. I think. This was very well done! Tastes a bit like Fried Kuey Teow without the kuey teow. Apparently its hard to cook the noodles because it might stick together/be tasteless etc especially since the noodles are so dense and heavy. Props to the man/woman who probably has a really big wok to fry all these. He/she must have really strong arms.

Funny story. We (my cousins and I) were supposed to eat Claypot Chicken Rice for dinner after lasertag, but after 1 hour of driving around and trying to collect food from 2 different hawker stores and failing due to various reasons, half of us went to join the adults at Noble House, and the other half had maccas delivery. lol. Okay I guess its not THAT funny. But you know when you're actually in the situation its really really funny. :p

Fried Bitter Gourd @ Jaipur Curry House, Taman Tun

Love this. Somehow it doesnt taste bitter! This is one of the only forms of bitter gourd I actually dont mind eating. Cannot imagine how people can actually like bitter gourd. SO BITTER. Apparently they charge by per plate instead of by how much you actually take (according to my mom, never actually bothered to check if this is true because its impossible to understand what the waiters scribble on the receipt) so if you do take these yourself, make sure to put as much as you can in the plate! (as we did here)

Papaya (aka Pawpaw) and Sweet Pinapple

LOCAL FRUITS HOW I LOVE YOU. Oh, and (I might get butchered for this) durian too! In Melbourne, all the papayas they have are usually raw. And they rarely have it. I used to eat papaya almost everyday after school. So yummy and sweet and healthy. My dad used to loveeee (and I mean LOVE) telling me how papaya is really great for helping with the... waste excretion process. Anyway.

Two style Kailan @ Penang village, Hartamas Shopping Centre

Please mind the crappy photo. Stir fried stems and deep fried leaves. Nothing too special about the stems but the leaves were AMAZING. Crispy, light, and paper thin. Not to mention really flavoursome. There was a distinct flavour in there that didn't quite taste vegetable-y or dried shrimp-y or garlic-y, but it was nice. I told my sister that it reminded me of Chinese new year cookies. Still cant identify what/where that flavour came from, but it was still delicious!

4. Chopped my hair!

The hairdresser literally sawed it off with his scissors, and then proceeded to dangle the stray, foreign looking, detached ponytail in front of my face. Im actually really happy with it (the cut, not the strange detached ponytail). This is the only hairdresser that I've actually revisited. All my life I either let my mom/my aunt (who were/are hairdressers) cut or salon hop. Never really had a satisfactory cut so I never went back to them. But this guy is good! He's super meticulous and does'nt just get it over with quickly, he actually takes time to make sure the cut is perfect. It takes 2 whole hours for a wash and cut. His name is Freelink from Emphasis @ Kota Damansara (yes, thats actually his name). If you're looking for a new hairdresser, get this guy! He's real good.

I guess its not THAT short, but hey, its above my shoulders! Thats short in my books!

And if anyone was wondering, the jogging rate so far is still: once a week. And this week, I didn't even enter the gym once. OH NO. I feel my arteries clogging up with all that pork lard.

One more week to go!! Precious 7 days with friends and family. I better make it count.

Till next time! x

Hello Avengers (and mini Thor!)

Obsession

Patent Leather Platform Court Shoe
photo taken from www.zara.com

Just take a look at these beauties.

After going on a hunt for black pumps about 6 months ago, I realized how hard it is to find THE perfect pair of plain heels. It needs to be plain enough to wear with everything, but yet still have sufficient detail so it won't look too boring. And because you want to wear it with everything, it needs to be PERFECT. It's like buying a pair of jeans. It needs to fit perfectly. Not too shallow at the front (till you can see the lines between your toes), not too round/too sharp at the tip, and of course they need to be comfortable. Nobody likes blisters.

But this right here - perfection. I personally believe that you can wear it with anything. Aside from the fact that they're surprisingly comfortable for a pair of heels, the slice of gold platform and heel is perfect! Have I mentioned how attracted I am to anything gold with a mirror-like finish? Like my asos rings. Or the clasps on my topshop coat. My friends say I'm turning into a magpie. And I seriously love how smooth and straight and perpendicular the heel is. In this picture I can almost see that little square you draw on triangle corners to show that its a right angle. I don't know if this is weird but I LOVE corners and straight edges and cubes/cuboids. Okay maybe it's a little weird.

I literally went to 5 different Zara outlets in KL in search of these in my size (and they werent exactly very near each other. Big thanks to Qien, Laks and my dad for driving me around!). I even went as far as to ask a friend of mine to see if she could spot these in Singapore . I'm THAT obsessed, it's borderline crazy :p Unfortunately, my mission remains unaccomplished. They were on sale since the day I arrived home, from RM360 down to RM200. Needless to say, they flew off the racks like hot cakes. I know this for a fact because Qien scoured the area days before I came back (you may have realized at this point that we are both insane. Come to think of it, thank God we don't study in the same country, because then we will both be perpetually broke) so she knows which shops have (or had) these shoes (and how many). But when I got there, none were left, of course. And even if they had a pair or two, it wouldn't be the right size. Which is why I need to channel my dissatisfaction and heart-brokenness here.


I'm keeping my fingers (and toes, and eyes, and heart, and everything else) crossed that they will be available in Melbourne (in my size!)

I cant believe I wrote three full paragraphs on a pair of shoes that I don't even own.

Till next time! x



On a side note, I'm thinking of getting a new hairstyle, but have no great ideas at the moment. Any suggestions?

Malaysia: week 1

An entire week has passed since I first stepped out of the aeroplane at LCCT. Time seriously flies by when you're busy stuffing your face with food. Which is literally what I've been doing since I've got here. With an average of 4 meals a day (sometimes 5), and one jogging trip a week, the odds are definitely not in my favour.

Can you believe The Hunger Games is STILL on screen at GSC pavillion? The movie has been out since March!

Recap of what I've been doing for the past week! More like a mini travel diary for myself, just so I make sure I'm not wasting the precious and limited time I have here.

1. Meeting people.
So good to see everyone again! Family, friends from all around the world who are back for their summer holidays. It almost feels as if someone hit the pause button when we all left the country and now that we're back, we just pick up where we left off. Everything feels the same! Aside from Laks' new car, some people have different hair and clothes. But apart from that... Same. My house looks the same, maybe with more ants than I previously remembered. Time to break out the ant poison.

2. Eating.
Undeniably one of the main events. In Malaysia, meeting people and eating go hand in hand, always. If I had to list out everything I've been eating, this would be a VERY long post. Maybe some pics at the end for some of my favorites :) so far, I haven't eaten the exact same thing twice! (aside from leftover dinner I ate for breakfast one morning, and nasi lemak but they were from diff restaurants so they don't taste the same at all, therefore it doesn't count) and I plan to keep this up until I've eaten EVERYTHING I wanna eat! Cant afford to waste any meal-slots.

And.... That's about it. Meeting people and eating. And other miscellaneous things like renewing my license, internship interview etc. Few other things I NEED to do but haven't got around to doing include taking advantage of the super cheap movie tickets here (hello spiderman!), swimming in the awesome not-that-new pool at my country club ( it's been built for more than a year, but I haven't had a dip in there yet. Can't even remember the last time I went swimming in a pool), and also go jogging more often because i find it nicer to jog here (excuses). More people I need to meet, more food I want to eat, and pasar malam (night market) cause I missed it last week!

OH, AND MORE SHOPPING. A LOT MORE SHOPPING.

So here we go, in no particular order, my top 5 picks of the week!
(I wanted to do three, but that was too hard)

Roti Milo from Devi's Corner @ Taman Tun
(Only remembered to take a photo after Ive started eating it)

For those of you who have yet to try roti milo, I know it sounds weird. But trust me, its delicious!

Silky Tofu with Black Sauce and Dried Shrimp @ Sri Kembangan

The Smoooooothest Tau Foo Fah EVER, with brown sugar @ Summit City Mall.

I cant imagine why anyone would order white sugar instead of brown sugar. Brown sugar is 500 times better!

Putu Piring @ Taman Tun

 This must be one of my favourite kuihs. Steamed rice flour cake with gula melaka inside and coconut on top, YUM. Not to be confused with putu mayam, which is also steamed rice noodle-looking cake (almost looks like steamed mihun in the shape of a flat circle) that is served with gula melaka and coconut on the side. Exactly the same ingredients, but yet totally different. I dont like putu mayam. Now that I think of it, there are so many kuihs that are made of the same ingredients - some type of flour (rice, tapioca, glutinous rice etc), gula melaka, and coconut. But somehow they all taste different.

Nasi Lemak with Sotong and Ayam @ Village Park, Damansara Utama

If you havent been to Village Park, you're missing out. Arguably the best nasi-lemak-accompanying fried chicken around. The Rempah is sooooo fragrant! I dont normally eat chicken skin, but this is just irresistible. And the rice is super fragrant as well without being too rich. Apparently they use coconut water instead of just coconut milk to cook the rice. I much prefer the sambal sotong instead of the normal sambal they use, but that also means an extra 5 bucks or so to my dish.

Did I mention that during supper the other day - there were four of us, and we had an appam, a limau ais, and a curry puff each, for only 12 ringgit in total! Thats ONE AUSSIE DOLLAR per person! I love Malaysia.

Till next time! x

Brunch Adventures: Proud Mary

There seems to be many good brunch places close to church.

I say brunch but we went during lunch. Thank God for All-Day-Breakfasts. We didn't go on a Sunday, because we were all on holiday and decided to go on a weekday instead, but we were not smart enough to make a booking for 9 people (We didn't know we could! But yes, bookings can be made on weekdays. In fact, if you intend to show up with 9 people, the waitress would MUCH prefer you make a booking.) and also were not smart enough to avoid the lunch crowd.


So after waiting for about.. 20 minutes. We got a table. We volunteered to sit outside to make the waitress' life easier, but it was more so we could get a table faster because we were (read: I was) really really hungry. Nobody wanted to sit outside (we soon figured out why) so it was MUCH easier for us to get seats as opposed to have to wait for 4 tables-of-two to simultaneously leave at the same time who were coincidentally sitting next to each other.


It was a drizzly morning. Which turned into a little more than a drizzle after we sat down. And then a lot more. After a very challenging seat/umbrella-rearrangement session to avoid getting wet (during which many ideas were thrown around, some of which gave us the exact opposite of the desired result), we made it work in the end!

Lamb Sandwich with Beetroot and Herb Yoghurt

The most popular dish here seems to be the Pork Belly Sandwich (among my friends anyway. On that day itself, out of the 9 of us, we ordered 5 serves of the Pork Belly). Its nice, but since I'm not much of a pork belly fan, I much prefer the lamb sandwich. And there's beetroot in it! How can you say no to beetroot! Nutritious, delicious, and purple.

Pork Ragu with Parpadelle and Parmesan

This was a winner. Not sure if its because it really was amazingly amazing, or if my judgement was swayed due to being REALLY hungry and in desperate need of warm comfort food thanks to the rain. And comfort food, this sure is. The pork is cooked for a certain number of hours (12? 24? DETAILS DETAILS. But its a long time, basically) and so its nice and soft and juicy. This was my first time having parpadelle, and I had a little bit of trouble eating it... in a dainty way. I couldn't get the whole thing in my mouth in a neat lump initially because well, you cant scoop it up with a spoon like spirelli or twist it around a fork and shove it in your mouth like spaghetti/linguine (both of these methods were what I tried before I figured out how to do it, which is to sort of fold it and stab it with your fork before it unfolds, and then eat it. But that was after I got my face all dirty). The yellow shards on top: I think it was parmesan. It tasted like parmesan. Once again - details. But it was definitely cheese.

I did think the portion was a little tinier than what I had expected, but then again I have a pretty big appetite, and like I said I was really hungry.

Syphon - Geisha - Columbia

Proud Mary is pretty well known for their speciality coffee. Never have I faced as many options while ordering coffee ever before. To keep with the coffee tutorial theme, I went with filtered coffee. Firstly, the way the coffee is filtered/extracted : syphon, French press, V60, or Chemex. And then which type of beans you wanted. I ordered a Geisha (among many other options the waitress was reciting to me), because it was impressed on me that that was the coffee to order. And then I had to choose which country's Geisha I wanted. This was all very overwhelming without my coffee mentor beside me (he was late).

But I got my coffee in the end, it was nice, but not mind-blowingly so. It had a very clean taste (what does that even mean). I guess what I mean by "clean" is... crisp/not complex I guess. I cant help but imagine a sheet of white linen when I say "clean". But besides the "cleanliness", I still don't know how to appreciate this to the full - yet.

Paid 10 AUD for this baby. Never in my life have I paid that much for a single cup of coffee. It must've been really good. Maybe I should've saved this one for a session at the later part of my coffee-appreciation program, after I've developed the taste buds for it. What a waste :(



Speaking of coffee, my dentist has expressed deep concern about my new habits... "OMG WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR TEETH THEY USED TO BE WHITE NOW THEY'RE BROWN OMG OMG  I am not very happy."
Isn't it funny how dentists try to talk to you when they're jamming foreign metal objects into your wide open mouth?

Till next time! x

Proud Mary Coffee Roasters and Cafe

172 Oxford Street

Collingwood

03-9417 5930

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