Batik Day

After spending the morning at the National Museum, we headed to the Craft Complex  at Jl Conlay.  The Grab car we booked from the museum (he had just dropped off a passenger) was quite unsure if he could bring us there easily due to the numerous road closures as there were anti-government protesrs (more on that on another post).  The trip went easily enough as the roads we took were all open. 

After purchasing some North Bornean pearls at the main shop, we headed to one of the craft cottages.

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We paid RM 15 each for a small batik picture we would paint.  There were many designs but I chose the traditional Malaysian kite called “wau” because you know,  Malaysia truly Asia. 

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 Rhoda and Tita Cel chose flowers. Perhaps being a late Saturday afternoon we had the whole place to ourselves.

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The batik lady set some glasses if water, paint, and a bunch of brushes and gave us a few pointers then we were on our own.

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It didn’t take too long to finish painting because the picture was small and simple.  It was also easy to paint because we were painting on cotton rather than the silky cloth we were using at church.

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Here’s the finished “wau.”  I just realized I should have used less yellow on the details.

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Tita Cel’s

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Rhoda’s

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It was a nice way to spend the afternoon and a memorable one as you get to take home your very own Malaysian souvenir.

Life in Upside Down

Squeezed in-between more traditional shop-houses and sites is the fun Upside Down Museum (RM 27).  

The staff tell-you how to pose and take the pictures.  Using a selfie-stick simply won’t do justice.   My pic below isn’t as fun. I just look like a bat hanging down compared to the one with the book shelf.

Doesn’t this scene remind you of a horror movie?

Always more fun to be with a group.

The price is kind steep but it was well-worth all the fun.

Feeding a Hungry Ghost

Today is first day of the Hungry Ghost Month to the Chinese.  It’s that time of the year when ghosts need to be appeased with entertainment and food.  Been here in Georgetown in Penang for the past four days already for the ICTM-PASEA and got the chance to go around with my university colleagues today and see some hungry sights.

At the Chew Family Jetty, we saw a few families making ghost offerings.

Rice Balls at Restaurant Famosa

Eat or Not Eat: EAT!

I’ve been to Melaka twice and both times I have  failed to get in.  I have not heard of Restaurant Famosa along Jonker Street but the long lines, strategic corner location, and tantalizing picture menus out front somehow meant that it was one of the best places to eat in Melaka. In a place famous for its cuisine, being one of the IT places to eat means something really good is cooking inside.

If salt had a flavor other than salty this would be it. Flavorful saltiness, perhaps?

On my third trip to last January I was determined to finally eat here and this time I had a winning chance.  Staying in Melaka for three days which meant being able to beat the lunchtime crowd.  Fortunately, Restaurant Famosa opens at 9:3o in the morning.  At 10:30, there was hardly anyone there but the two people in the roast counter were busy packing roast duck meals in styoropore lunch kits. The middle-aged guy in a white boat-hat and apron was busy carving-up the duck while the other packed it with a large cup of steamed fragrant rice.  There must have been about a hundred orders as rows and rows of neatly packed lunch kits placed in large plastic bags lined the tables behind them.

I’m not a fan of chicken rice as the white chicken flesh makes it look so raw.  I settled for the roast pork with 5 pcs of their famous rice balls and a bowl of fish ball soup.

While waiting and since there weren’t much people, I went on a mini tour of the spacious restaurant which was a converted shophouse.  Marble-topped tables and chairs were neatly placed in the common area while an enclosed space with carved windows was reserved for private dining.  At the far corner near the restroom was a row of Chinese royal costumes for rent for a photo-op at a made-up imperial throne and background.

I liked thesquare marble-top tables with wooden legs. They look like the ones in traditional Chinese tea houses.

I should have stayed here so people wouldn't see how much food I was eating.

It didn’t long for my food to arrive.  The rice balls weren’t just any ordinary steamed rice formed into compact balls.  The rice was a little sticky and very fragrant and tasty.  It perfectly complemented the roast pork.

The pork was sliced thinly and had really crispy skin I  could feel it crackling between my teeth while I relished the tender pork meat. It had a salty bite to it that was very flavorsome. If salt had a taste other than salty, that would have been it.  I had yet to finish my entire serving and yet I was already making plans of coming back the next day for more while all the while contemplating of having an additional order of  barbecued pork.

It was too late when I realized the fish balls in the soup were just the ordinary fish balls  and not something more exciting.  The soup was good anyway and came in steaming hot in a large white bowl.  I should have taken the suggestion of the order-taker to try the wanton soup.  The picture of the fish balls made me think it was something akin to a wanton.

My favorite topping is the green one.

And in Melaka, what perfect way to end a meal than with a bowl of cold cendol.  Unlike the watered-down version available in some stalls, this one was quite thick with coconut cream and was heaping with condiments.

I had a really really good meal and thoroughly enjoyed it so much that I went on my last morning in Melaka for brunch before heading to the bus station for the trip back to KL.  Never mind that I’ve already had a Nonya rice dumpling and a popiah at Poh Piah Lwee. I just had to tuck into my taste memory the flavorful saltiness of the roast pork, the fragrance of the rice ball, and discover the barbecued pork.

I went to the much smaller restaurant just beside the larger one.  It was almost 11 so there were more people.  A group of women who seemed to have come from Singapore occupied the next table. While a Malaysian Chinese couple sat across me. I threw all embarrassment to the wind and ordered a plate of roast pork and a plate of barbecued pork. Halfway through the meal, I ordered an additional two rice balls as I was about to finish the five I had ordered. Of course, a cendol ended the meal.

Burp!

Raising the Red Lanterns in Malaysia

No, I’ve since arrived from Malaysia (and before that, Cambodia) last Jan 12.  In celebration of Chinese New Year, I thought I’s post some pictures from my trip to Melaka and Kuala Lumpur.  I stayed at Chinatown in both places which means lots of really good Chinese and Peranakan (in the case of Melaka) food and shops and streets decked in colorful red lanterns and other Chinese decorations.

MELAKA

As one of the homes (the other being Penang) of the Straits Chinese, Melaka is especially fun with its daily evening performances of comedy skits, songs, and dances on a large stage at the end of Jonket Street.

Raise the red lantern!

It’s on special occasions such as these that the sweet sticky rice cake made from glutinous flour and sugar and steamed in round tins covered with banana leaves makes it appearance.

Ti Kuih

KUALA LUMPUR

I’ve always thought that KL was more Chinese than Malay especially when you stay at the close to the commercial district and of course, to Chinatown.

The sign said that it was the biggest artificial cherry blossom tree. It greets you at the lobby of Berjaya Times Square.

Chinatown is the best place to stay for me.  Not only are the sights within easy walking distance, there’s a lot of good cheap food to be had especially in the evening when stalls set-up along the streets.  Though not as vibrant or as Chinese-y as Melaka, a few shops raised the red lanterns and colored the otherwise backpacker area-looking streets.  While having a a dinner of claypot chicken rice, a dragon dance passed by street.

Flowers and lanterns are blooming

Stop… Look… Enjoy… KL. Seeing it again.

This was my third trip to KL and if it were not for my friend, I would have stayed longer in Cambodia or would have stuck to my original plan of going back home to Manila via HCMC.  But I had booked my January 5 Air Asia flight from Phnom Pehn and there was no turning back.

I arrived at the LCCT with a large box filled with Cambodian traditional instruments I had collected from Ratanakiri and Phnom Pehn. “Ke mana luggage storage?” I asked a female Malay security guard walking along the narrow corridor that connected the domestic and international areas.  She looked up at me from her mobile phone, frowned and said, “Where you from?” then curtly answered, “Inside,” which was the wrong answer as I was to find out later that the storage facility was just outside the international arrival area.  I seemed to have disturbed her texting. It cost more than RM 400 to keep the box for 5 days but it was roughly the same cost of getting to/from the airport on a cab with the box.   I was instructed to have the box x-rayed at the domestic check-in area first.  Got the valuable “Security Checked” sticker on the box, paid the fee, then took the shuttle to Chinatown.

It was past 8 in the evening when the bus finally came to a stop. The flight was delayed which made for the late arrival. It was a 30 minute walk to Jl Sultan and to Transit Point Guesthouse.  It took a while before I was let in and up the flight of stairs (thank god I didn’t have the box with me) as the one-armed Indian guy manning the reception was on the second floor doing some laundry.  A password was needed for the electronic door and first-time guests would have to ring and wait for someone to answer the intercom. I was getting spooked with the homeless guys hanging around so I just kept on pressing the doorbell.  Fortunately, another guest heard me and called the guy.

The single room was clean enough and had good a/c which was what really mattered.

I had some roti with cheese  and nasi lemak all washed down with a glass of rose juice for late late dinner at an Indian food stall in front of the convenience store.  Really good and delicious.

Other than heading to Melakka for the weekend there wasn’t really anything planned on this leg of my trip since my friend ditched me.  A national park was totally out of the question due to costs and time.  KL lay before me and what else could I do but dive in and experience it again.

Make no mistake about it.  KL is a beautiful city with majestic Islam-inspired architecture and modern buildings. It’s a place that wants you to walk, stop, and look.

At the annex of the Central Market

CHINESE BUILDINGS, AND ISLAMIC-INSPIRED ARCHITECTURE

It wasn’t my first time so I had no need for a map and simply took to the streets where my feet would take me.  I like staying at Chinatown as old Chinese shophouses are just a skip and a hop away from KL’s colonial core that sit side by side with more modern structures.

I keep seeing the Moghul-inspired KL Train Station designed by AB Hubbock each time I wait for the train at the Pasar Seni station which is just a few minutes walk from my accommodations.  Beckoned by its beautiful towers, I headed there one fine morning.

Except for being a stop of the KTM Commuter all operations have move to the modern KL Sentral. The emptiness and the silence seems to magnify its magnificence as it sits stoically.  It was a little tricky to get here from the Pasar Seni station as most sections of the walkway were closed.  I went through the POS building and exited to the other side, went-up a car park building, crossed the parking lot and to the walkway linking it to the station.

A HINDI TECHNICOLOR WORLD

A sizable Indian community (descendants of the Indian workers brought by the British) means lots of good Indian food and the wonderful technicolor Sri Mahariamman temple.  Hindi temples are the most colorful of all temples I’ve visited in Malaysia.  The ziggurat-like piece on top of the entry way is people with deities and other personages from the Hindi cosmic world in wildly colorful outfits that look straight out from a technicolor dream.

It is best to see the station across the KTM office

 

THE MAN FROM SABAH AND ZOMBOANGA

I took a cab (RM 8) from Berjaya Times Square to the Kompleks Budayakraf to check out the some handicrafts and hopefully see some artists at work.  I was disappointed as there wasn’t anyone there doing anything.  One workshop where a young woman and a child were making small  batik paintings had a “No Photos” sign.  At another workshop, an amiable guy was working on a large textile.  “Are you from the Philippines?” he asked me.  I smiled and answered, “yes.” He went on to say that his mom was from Zamboanga but left her husband to move to the Sabah where she met his dad.  Ethnically he is a Bajau from the coast of Sabah near Sandakan.  He has changed his name to Jon Bagul to make it more appealing to buyers of his large-scale colorful batik paintings.  He’s also bored and would rather talk to me. I had a nice chat with him to while away the time as it was clear I would see no other artist. He’s now my Facebook friend 🙂

His father is a Bajao from Sabah and his mother is a Bajao from Zamboanga.

 

The craft center is big and has a good collection of expensive finely made handicrafts. The beautiful wood carvings made by the Mah Meri of Pulau Carey were at  RM2,500 and up!

More interesting is the two-level museum showcasing the different handicrafts and how they’re made from the gathering of the raw materials to its final finishing.  Exemplary craft masters awarded by Malaysia as national treasures had their profiles displayed together with samples of their crafts.

Most enjoyable were the exhibits at the second level accessed by an elevated walkway.  Large samples of Sarawak’s colorful textiles with their geometric patterns hung from the walls.  I was surprised to learn that a certain textile of a group in Sabah had its origins from the Philippines!

It took me 15 minutes pass the beautifully-restored building housing the Badan Warisan Malaysia offices that bats for preservation of the city’s colonial relics and the Seri Melayu restaurant.

BEARS AT BUKIT BINTANG

These bears represent a particular country and have been traveling around the world to promote world peace. They look kinda creepy though. I still prefer the Care Bears.

 

I wasn’t particularly excited arriving in KL as I had seen most of what the city had to offer but the next following days made me re-think it and by the time I was heading back home on the 12th, I had wished to stay longer.

The Streets of Georgetown, Penang

An old house converted into a lodging place with a small museum on the ground floor

 

I was rummaging through my hard disk looking at my travel pics and saw these bunch of pics from my two trips to Georgetown in Penang.  This UNESCO World Heritage site is one of my favorite places to visit.  In spite of mass tourism, it has managed to retain its small town feel.  I never tired of wandering its streets where you can find some wonderful architectural gems just waiting to be discovered.

 

 

Decaying but still beautiful

 

 

Street posts with shrines where people burn joss sticks are quite numerous

Precious and Delicious

Central Market is the place to browse for interesting finds from kitschy tourist souvenirs to expensive pewter to unusual antiques.    The former wet market’s second lease in life (it was rescued from demolition by conservationists) is beautiful Art Deco architecture with fun browsing opportunities.  Persistence and the ability to bargain in Bahasa-Melayu has yielded a particularly precious keepsake— an old rebab hanging anonymously at a small shop tucked in a corner of the ground floor near the ATMs. The shop was crammed with antiques some of which made me swoon with delight only to be replaced with frustration at the high price.  After the cheap finds in Indonesia, the high price in Malaysia was a bit of a shock.  Nevertheless, I had to take home something I could preciously own and remind me of this particular trip so out came the card and with one swipe, RM 200 was gone from the my credit.

After I had bought a "kompang," the shopkeeper consented to let me take 1 picture of this instrument which costs more than RM1,000!

On the second floor was another precious find, albeit something closer to the stomach than to the mind.   We decided to treat ourselves in this most heart-breaking of all nights while traveling—the night when you finally pack your bags, weigh them, check your planet ticket, and bid a silent farewell to your hotel room (in my case, my guesthouse room).  A treat meant dining in a real restaurant with proper food service.  No more fluorescent lights and plastic chairs and tables and waiters that simply put your plate of food in front of you.

We had been attracted to the Rainforest Cafe which advertised a  Ramadan buffet. When we got there we were told it was offered only on Fridays.  We checked the menu of  international dishes but none seemed interesting.  We were resigned to the food court until we stumbled on the wooden exteriors of  Precious Restaurant as we came up the stairs.

It truly was a  precious place for a memorable meal.  After all the delicious and authentic Peranakan cuisine we had been dining on at Melaka and Penang who would have thought that back at KL, we would be feasting on yet another spread from some Nonya’s generations-old recipe stash.

These two Nonya went crazy with the last remaining "pie tee!"

These are the "pie tee" before the two Nonya above devoured them.

Entering the the restaurant we were transported to the resplendent world of the Straits Chinese.  Time-worn wooden tables with chairs, no two of which are exactly the same, are arranged  in a simply but beautifully furnished spacious area. On one side is a small area with folding wooden wall for private dining.  With its long table that could sit around a dozen Baba and Nonya and walls  adorned with old doors painted with  faded flower motifs, you could dine like a true Peranakan.

"Otak otak" all wrapped-up in a banana leaf.

"Otak otak"

The food was utterly savory and delicious with the multi-hued flavors bursting from each dish.  Most notable was the otak-otak which arrived from the kitchen in a small banana-leaf parcel steaming hot.  The curry flavored the flaked fish deliciously.  Unlike the one we had at the buffet at the  Sri Nonya Cafe in Georgetown, this one tasted really like fish and had a finer texture.  Come to think of it, anything offered in a buffet is bound to have some quality issues.  Fun to assemble and eat was the pie tee— an appetizer of julliened carrots and turnips and minced chicken which you put in tinyhat-shaped shells and topped with a spicy sauce.

It is my opinion that if Indonesia’s contribution to rice cuisine is nasi goreng then Malaysia’s is nasi lemak.  This is one tasty rice that could be eaten cold and still be delicious.  But the rice tinted blue with butterfly pea flowers was just as delicious and visually exciting.

I liked the way vegetables are flavored and cooked in Peranakan cuisine.  The Chinese are masters at stir-frying so the greens always come out of the fire crisp.  Perhaps we should have been more adventurous with our vegetable choice as we had  Nonya Chap Chai again.

All good Peranakan meals should end with a sweet bowl of Nonya Cendol.  At Precious, this was served separate with the milk and gula melaka which cued me to ask for more of the latter.  It was as sweet as sweet can be.

A cup of milk and a cup of "gula melaka" for my "cendol."

If only for the really delicious food served amidst tasteful interior  and the outstanding service by the well-mannered waiters, dining at Precious was nothing short of precious.

A Baba and some Nonya

Chocolates and Ballroom Dancing at the Red Garden

Red Garden seemed like an immensely and cheap place to try out the varied Penang cuisine so we headed there for our last  dinner in Penang.  It was just a stroll away from Lebuh Chulia anyway.

We dropped by at The Chocolate Boutique first for chocolates with exotic flavors like chili, durian, and curry. Unfortunately, they didn’t have the latter one.  It was unknown to them even if the branch at Kota Kinabalu, where I first become acquainted with this marvelous chocolate place and its Beryl’s brand, had them.  Maybe certain branches had specific stocks.  Too bad because nothing could be more exotic than curry-flavored chocolate.  They did have the white chocolate with coconut, though.  It was less than an hour to closing so there were hardly anyone there.  The best thing about The Chocolate Boutique is the free sampling which we kinda took advantage of especially when no one was looking.  The place is divided into small rooms which had a certain theme such as “fruits” which had fruit-flavored chocolate on the shelves.  The “love” room had heart-shaped chocolates. I took home a box of durian chocolates, the coconut chocolate, and a package of durian white coffee.

Option paralysis set-in at next door Red Garden.  I couldn’t decide what to have.  Chinese, India, and Western were definitely out.  The girls had it easier as Yna went for Japanese and Julie and Jeannete went for biryani, satay, and lamb steak.  Me? I took the easy way out too—stop choosing and just order!  I had an assam laksa (very tasty tamarind-flavored soup), a Hokkien mee, belacang fried rice, and fried oyster.  A big bowl of cendol turned down the heat of the noodle soups.

Hokkien mee

Assam Laksa. The tamarind puts some oomp on the soup.

Surprise! Filipino food makes an appearance at Georgetown! We would have ordered out of patriotic duty. But longganisa or tocino paired with spaghetti? Anemic-looking pics of crispy pata? No wonder no lines at this stall. Sad.

Tuesday night is ballroom night at the Red Garden and a keyboard-singer duo came on at the small stage at the center of the food court.  The female singer wasn’t bad at all and she had none of the nasal singing that usually accompanies Chinese singers when they do English songs. The male keyboardist sounded like a karaoke whenever he sang.

Elderly couples took to the small dancing area.  It seemed like some take the dancing seriously as a couple of middle-aged ladies were a little dressed-up. It was entertaining to watch the characters that people the dance floor.  Catching everyone’s attention was  a fifty-ish man who stood at one corner of the dance floor and lip-synced all the songs while miming it.  It was hilarious especially when he would point at someone pretending to be referring to that person in the song.  At the front of the stage, a Caucasian lady of about the same age, probably a little older, danced stiffly and awkwardly alone looking  like a flag pole strutting on a windy day.  She never once left the dance floor.  A little later in the evening, she was dancing with a fat special child. Apparently, the waitress with a bad wig day at the Sri Nonya Cafe has a sister; at least in wig.  Dancing with an white-mustached guy in a fedora, striped long-sleeved shirt, and suspenders was a lady, a little younger than him, wearing almost the same type of blonde wig! Maybe wigs are really in these days in Georgetown!  Hers was a little better though as it looked more natural.  The couple seemed to dance in slow motion unmindful at times of the music’s up tempo.  They also had strange dance steps.

Option-paralysis at Red Dragon. How about some frog?

History, A Waitress with a Bad Wig Day, and Drunked Bastard Part 2

After the trouble with the tuk-tuk bastards yesterday, nothing could ever go wrong today not especially if breakfast was yummy machang from Cintra Food Court. I may not have found the small shop selling freshly-fried cheow tow and the “famous curry puffs” stall was still closed but the Hokkien dumpling and the Golden dumpling which were actually machang (a term the Chinese girl recognized) more than made up for it.

We walked to Penang Museum but not without dropping by the small adjacent shop selling curious where I bought a curious-looking 2-stringed lute with a scooped-up body and elephant carving at the back for RM60. The shop had a couple of other musical instruments but I could only afford to buy one.  The lute which the Chinese shopsman said came from Sarawak won out over the bowed Chinese lute.  When queried as to where he gets the stuff, he said that people come in and sell stuff from their houses which doesn’t seem to be far-fetched.

Three ladies and an old trolley

This was also my first time to set foot at the Penang Museum. It was small but the exhibit rooms were well-stocked and had very informative displays that were curated nicely.  Each of the ethnic groups living in Penang had their exhibit rooms and the Peranakans were of course the most lavish of them all.  The Indian room was also nice with its short glass walls with flickering lamps by the entrance.  The second floor exhibit was a little more serious as it was more on Penang’s history.  Pictures aren’t allowed in the museum but we managed to take some anyway as there was no one there and the staff were all at the lobby.

No, those aren't Kuya Germs' clothes on display. Those are costumes worn by "boria" musicians.

Walking along Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling and on to Lebuh Light we headed to Fort Cornwallis passing by the glorious colonial buildings housing the Supreme Court, the Town Hall,  and the City Hall then along the Esplanade.

City Hall

The Fort seemed to be in a little bad shape.  The galleries narrating the history of the founding of Penang seemed forlorn and there was no air-conditioning anymore.  Gone too was the re-creation of an army camp on the grounds near the cannons.  There wasn’t much too see nor do except take pictures of the cannons.

Yna wanted to go to lunch at a Western restaurant that accepts credit cards as she was running low on cash. She also said she’d treat.  I suspect she just wanted to go to a more decent place than the non-air-conditioned local restaurants she expected me to take them. Credit card+Western restaurant= nice place!

Since she also wanted to go back to Straits Heritage row I suggested that we eat somewhere there.  Lonely Planet came-up with Eidelweiss Restaurant which seemed to suit the girls.  The Indian cab driver was very friendly and pleasant.  Thank God!  After yesterday’s mishaps with the tuk-tuk bastards, it was refreshing to be driven around by a really nice person.  We arrived at Eidelweiss only to find out it was closed on Mondays.  Since we had alighted from the cab already there was no way for us to look for another place.  Since Straits Heritage row was just a short skip away, the girls headed to Bon Ton while I headed to the cafe for another slice of Ginger treacle cake.  Jeannette came back and said that someone from the shop mentioned a small cafe with lots of plants that serves Western food. It sounded like Amelie which we passed by yesterday.  It looked more like a sandwhich and drinks place.  While Julie and Yna stayed at the shop, Jeannete and I walked through the length of Jalan Kapitan Keling looking for a place to eat but all we found were gold shops.

Back at Strait Heritage, Yna was done with her shopping and we all assembled at the apom stall at the leafy park just across it.  While waiting for the middle-aged guy to prepare the pancakes filled with bannanas and peanuts who should we see sleeping on a park bench behind the stall?  Drunken Bastard!!!!!  He looked so peacefully asleep that I wanted to get one of the pans heating on the portable stove by the apom stall and whack him with it.  Or perhaps, get a load of the stack of bricks at the corner and dump it on his face!

Brown sugar-filled "apom" flavored with fingers.

After the apom had been paid for and received, the girls were reluctant to eat much to my amusement as the guy was holding it with his bare fingers.

Maybe it was coincidence day but as we waited for a cab to take us to Jalan Nagore so Jeannette could get her durian cheesecake at Continental and we could have lunch at one of the restaurants there, who should we flag but the same Indian cabbie! Learning that we hadn’t had lunch yet, he suggested the food court at World Park where we could have our choice of cuisine.  Good idea!

Yna still insisted on a credit-card accepting place so we ignored the fast food and headed to the much nicer area where the shops and restos were.  First stop was an Indian curry house.  Nah.  Across it was a Thai resto.  Not too excited.  Stomachs fluttered and hearts pounded when on a chalk board the words “Buffet” were written and up above, the resto sign board read ” Batik Nonya Cafe“! It was the best of both worlds— buffet and Nonya!  No questions asked. The language of appetite spoke to us and we responded.  The buffet only cost RM9!

More of a proper restaurant than a cafe, it was spacious and was nicely furnished.  The buffet spread had clear soup, chicken like the one we had at Restoran Peranakan, otak-otak, fried rice, sigarilyas cooked in a medium-spicy shrimp,  paste, fried fish, baked beans  (which I suspect came from a can) with egg, and eggplant cooked in a spicy sauce.  For dessert there was red bean soup and a small ice-cream scooping station.  The food tasted good and judging from the size of the crowd lunching at a late hour (it was way past 1pm), it seemed to be popular.  Mixing vanilla ice-cream with the red bean soup was particularly good.  The star of the restaurant however was a waitress Yna dubbed as Tessa Prieto for her blond wig which really looked like a wig.  It was so stiff and it looked so flat on her forehead.  She was very nice though, constantly updating Jeannette about the fried fish which had run out on the buffet table.

The girls finally ate their apom but put a scoop of ice-cream.  I guess it kinda takes away the flavor of fingers when it resembles and tastes like a cheap French crepe.

As if we had not come from a buffet, we headed to Continental Bakeshop just across the street for durian cheescake.  “It’s lemon cheesecake today,” the cheerful waitress at the counter said.  Durian wasn’t in season anymore so they’re not sure when they’re gonna have one.  Yesterday was my durian cheesecake lucky day!

We all shared a cheesecake and a lemon custard tart instead.

Of kurtis and kurtas.

Walked to Jalan Penang to shed off some calories and do a little shopping which turned out not to be so little.  Yna bought a pewter salt-and-pepper shaker at Hong Giap Hang which had a wide range of pewter ware from the cheaper Rennaisance brand to the top-range Royal Selangor.  The large shop also had a lot of other stuff including some small Chinese drums and flutes from Sarawak.  I resisted the temptation promising myself that I’d get to Sarawak someday and buy there.  Next door was a less fancy shop selling mostly Chinese stuff where Yna and Julie bought those metal balls which you roll in your hand.  It was a steal at RM10 from RM15 per pair.  At the next shop, the girls bought some sarong pants.  Yna finally persuaded Julie to buy one.  It really did look good on her.  Julie was to surprise us at next door Sam’s Batik House where after a little persuasion she bought a couple of nicely-embroidered blouses. Actually, everyone went over the top at Sam’s like we were all turning Indian fashion conscious.

It started innocently enough with Julie and Jeannette persuading me to buy a striped beige long-sleeved cotton polo.  I was more interested in the hand-embroidered kurtas and even the long formal Indian men’s dress that were so richly embroidered but they were all running into RM100 and above.  I think they were intent on making me buy something to balance-out their shopping. The shirt only cost RM25 and the shop attendant was really pleasant and easy to bargain with so I bought it.  The girls finally left me alone to go at the back with Yna who was buying clothes for her kids.  When I joined them, the shopping spree had began.  The women’s clothes were really beautiful, especially the hand-embroidered ones, and the fabric cool to the skin.  I went back to the men’s section and discovered the buy-one-take-one rack of kurtas which were a steal at RM50 for two items.

By the time we were finished, the girls were loaded with blouses, I had three kurtas, and we even bought Rhoda some clothes.  I think we spent about two hours in the store.