Pure, Undiluted Shopping Heaven

Last weekend, our family went to an outlet mall. An outlet mall is (I think) a place where they sell straight-from-the-factory merchandise, hence said merchandise is sold at a much lower price than normal retail. Great, right? So anyhoo, this is what the outlet mall looks like.

It houses many different, top-notch brands. And it’s huge! And this is only Outlet Mall No. 1. There’s a No. 2… right next door.

Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhh…….

I really like her hair!! Next time I go to a hairdresser I’m getting this printed out and bringing it with me.

After a half day of shoppin’, we had a picnic lunch mat salleh style. Out in the sun. Not exactly by choice. All the freakin’ picnic tables were out in the sun. But I got a place in the shade so it wasn’t so bad. And lunch was delicious. I dunno…maybe food tastes better after shopping.

And that was a really really good shopping day. Literally shopped till we dropped. We were there from morning till evening and by the end of the day we were all drooping. Tapi sangatla puas hati.

Before we left, my sister and I went over to the Lindt store to buy ourselves some chocolate and I came across this.

Cherry- and chili- flavoured chocolate? Really??

On the way back, my dad wanted to take us to the beach. So we drove to South Hampton and passed through this town and oh goodness, what a charming, quaint, sweet little town this is! So picture-perfect. And the houses in this area are RIDIculous. I was a bit carsick and feeling queasy and swiveling my head every five seconds was not helping but I couldn’t help myself. Those houses were seriously beautiful… and all 5 minutes from the beach, no less.

Pretty right? The sand was super-fine so we had to take our shoes off but the sand was freakin’ cold. Well, not just the sand. It was overall freakin’ cold over there. But so pretty. So white. Took some photos but couldn’t wait to get my butt away from there. Sure didn’t feel like summer there.

Behold the damage. ;p All in all, it was a terrific day. An exhausting day. I was pretty much dead for the whole car ride back to Manhattan. Great memories though. With a 6 hour full body workout thrown in for free.

Paying a Visit to Lady Liberty

The family went on a field trip of sorts to go and visit one of the most famous ladies in the world.... Lady Liberty. To you clueless people, that's the Statue of Liberty which is situated on, well, Liberty Island.

To get to Liberty Island you need to take a ferry from Battery Park. The 15 minute wait for the ferry to start moving was nauseating to say the least. But I felt a lot more cheered when I saw the Battery Park clowns waving us g’bye.

Lady Liberty herself. For some reason I kept thinking of the first X-Men movie while on Liberty Island. I think the island is great. There’s not much to do if you’re not at all interested in the Liberty history (what are you doing here if you're not interested in Liberty history??) but if you are, this is a great spot. They have boards with info throughout the island.

View of Manhattan from the pier.

It started to rain heavily just as we finished our tour of the island. Luckily we brought umbrellas and also luckily, our whole family managed to get on the first ferry off the island. Woohooo!

After Liberty Island, we stopped off at Ellis Island, which used to be the gateway to New York for all the immigrants who made their way by sea (which, back in the day, was pretty much…everyone). They’ve turned the Ellis Island immigration building into this fantastic museum. In this dark photo taken by my lousy camera phone, you see an exhibit of the luggage brought in by the immigrants. The real, actual luggage they brought in. And some of it was wicker so I salute the preservation process.

This is the actual Registry Room where the… I dunno..’immigration process’, I guess.. took place.

A photo of the Registry Room as it was back in 1909; packed with all the immigrants hoping to gain entry to the United States and a brand new, hopefully better life.

Some interesting Ellis Island trivia.

The bunk beds provided for the immigrants who were detained for some reason or other. These bunks were cramped and they slept on the wire mesh bottom of the bunks sans any mattresses and were only provided blankets at night.

This is a column which stil holds graffiti scribbled on by the immigrants; a piece of personal history forever etched on the granite…. Or whatever stone it is that was used to make that column.

In this particular exhibit, they had walls mounted with pictures of the immigrants who made the journey to the United States. Mostly the pictures were of them back in the ‘old country’, before they made the journey. See that picture in the topmost row… the one in the middle? Don’t remember the name but that young Japanese girl was 11 years old when she made the journey alone to join her parents who had gone to the US ahead. Can you imagine being 11 and going on a ship alone for a God-knows-how-long trip?

These exhibits were donated by descendants of immigrants who had donated their ancestors belongings which they had brought with them to the Ellis Island museum?
I am just awed by the fact that the white baby dress is still white! And it’s not falling apart. Haha. But mostly, it’s just amazing that these things are still around. These people packed up all their belongings..their whole lives.. to start anew in a strange country.

All in all, this was a great trip and I just wish I had more time to just linger there but my whole family was waiting downstairs. Can you believe they did not want to take a look at what Ellis had to offer? Rugi..rugi…

Searching for the Brooklyn Bridge

I have not been keeping my promise to blog regularly. For good reason! Writing takes me a good hour (and usually more) in front of the PC and I just do not have the time or inclination for it during this holiday. One, we’re always going out and when we do stay in, oh my gosh, the TV programmes they have here can have my butt plonked on the sofa all day long.

Do accept my apologies…moving forward.

A lot has been going on since coming here, so to spare you guys having to read such lengthy posts, enjoy these photos instead. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words right? (said the lazy blogger). Enjoy!

During our bus ride to Chinatown. The NY bus system is so great. Definitely disabled-friendly. They have platforms which lower to the street for wheelchairs to board and the driver will make sure the wheelchairs are secure for the ride too.

After we got off the bus, we actually had NO idea how to get to the bridge. We could see it but we didn’t know how to get to the end of the bridge. So we just kinda wandered around Chinatown (and under this semi-scary underbelly of this underpass…it was very cool and breezy though) and all the while I was terrified that we would get mugged or something. After all, we're just a river away from Brooklyn and I have some scary preconceived notions about Brooklyn.

The Brooklyn Bridge is a gorgeous strolling place. It was really hot and sunny but really nice as well. Made for gorgeous photo ops.

That's me pose-y peering over at the Manhattan Bridge from the Brooklyn Bridge.

Coming To America

Heloooo everyone. Sorry for the blogging delay (if anyone cares or notices that is…). The past few days have been great except for the jetlag and the crappy PC we have at home. It is so freakin’ slow and hangs every few minutes. Yesterday I attempted to upload some photos onto my Friendster page and after two plus hours of doing the same, I felt like shooting my brains out. But other than that, it’s been great!

Right now it’s 4.35am and I am wide awake while the rest of the fam is asleep, as normal people are prone to do at this hour of day. Like, I said, the jetlag sucks. I awake at 7-10am, then by 5pm I get sleepy and usual end up sleeping, then I awake at 10.30pm-12am and stay awake till 4am. Today I’m straying a bit from my normal schedule coz I only woke up at 2am. Sigh. I am waiting for this abnormal circadian cycle to end. They say to minimize jetlag, you should drink a lot of water. How can I drink when all I do is sleep? Oh and watch TV. You guys will not believe the great TV shows they have here!

So let me go back to my journey to America. The 21 hour flight was NOT fun. The first eleven hours to Sweden, I was sat next to this big, strapping mat saleh guy. He must’ve been over six feet tall and pretty much filled his seat space. So going to the toilet every hour to stretch my legs was NOT an option. I’m sure he would have let me out if I asked but he pretty much slept the whole time so…. Like I said, not an option. I went to the toilet once during the eleven hours and tortured my bladder by holding it in the rest of the way.

My seat was right on the wing so I had a gorgeous view. Of the wing. And some clouds. It took quite some maneuvering to see any land. But what I did manage to see during the landing process in Sweden….OMG, Stockholm is such a pretty place. I can’t even explain it. It looks so green and fresh and undisturbed by the ravages of urbanization. I totally fell in love. Upon landing at Stockholm airport, I straight away texted Mun and told her, “Mun, Sweden is gorgeous. Save up! After Nepal, let’s go to Sweden”. She texted me back saying, “Right on!”. As you can see, we are completely successful in deluding ourselves that we actually have the funds to go to these places … but let’s not think of that now.

My great view. I kept expecting to see a goblin here ala Twilight Zone.

After the plane re-fueled, we re-embarked and oh, what heaven! Most of the previous passengers disembarked in Stockholm so the plane was half empty for the rest of the flight to Newark. The seat beside me was vacant as well which allowed for comfy sleeping and stretching out.

The airport is Newark is pretty nice but that was the first time I had ever seen so many guns in one place. All their staff there pack heat! Kinda scary. I was preparing myself to duck and seek shelter at any given moment, just in case.

First thing we had to do was clear immigration. So I go to this line, say Hi and put my passport and the immigration forms on the counter. The immigration dude flicks a look at me (I smile, he doesn’t smile back), slides the documents over to him and just starts a-typin’ away with nary a word. So I just stand there for one minute in total silence and I’m thinking, “Urgh! Typical New Yorker. So rude!”. Bengang tu! Theeeen, he looks over and says,”Oh btw, good evening” with a smile. Weird right? But so cute when he smiles. ;p

There was supposed to be a short interview, fingerprinting and taking of your photograph (which everyone else had to do) but Miguel (my cute immigration dude) just asked me two questions and waved me on. Eh, biar betul? So I asked, “Errmm, no need to take photo?”. And he said, “Naaaah”, probably thinking “Ek’eleh, over tul minah ni nak amik2 gambar lak. Orang cakap boleh pergi, pergi ajo le”.

So off I went to get my luggage, go through customs and out to the arrival hall where I saw my mom, my youngest sister and my dad (in the order that I saw them) for the first time in a year and a half. There were some tears. I tried to hold them back but dammit, those tear ducts just leaked of their own volition. It was great to see them again and I’m already kinda down at the thought that I’m gonna have to leave them again so soon.

On to more cheerful things though. Straight from the airport, the office driver wanted to take me on a mini-tour of NY. So we set off for Brooklyn with the driver cum tourist guide pointing out interesting stuff all the way. We stopped at this pier in Brooklyn where there was this huge telescope thingy. People were lined up to peer into this thing. Uncle Driver said that through this telescope you could see all the way to London. My sister and I were like, “Whaaat? How is that even possible?”.

The telescope thingy: It looks nice and it's kinda cool but I honestly don't know why they bothered building this thing....

Peer into here and you'll see your peers over in good ol' England.

Turns out there’s a camera in there and you actually see London via the camera. Ceh! Beriya je buat telescope besar-besar. But it was cool nonetheless. People were lining up just to step in front of the screen and wave at each other. There were also whiteboards and marker pens provided so you could write a message to the people on the other side of the pond.

After dozens of photographs against the Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan skyline, we set off to Manhattan. Before going home however, we had dinner at this Persian Grill place. Yummy much! I had this thing called Khoresh Gheymeh, which is basically a beef stew with lentils and tomatoes with some fragrant rice. The food was great but I was still queasy and headachy from my long journey so didn’t enjoy it as much as I would’ve normally.

So basically that was my jalan-jalan upon touching down in NYC. Have had a glimpse of what NY has to offer and I am itching to go out and discover more.

More to come….

Past and Present in One Moment

[Composed on 22 May 2008]

Right now, I’m eating an extremely fudgy, extremely sweet chocolate cake that I brought from home. A garlic aroma infused cake, I might add, since in my haste to pack-the-cake-and-go-to-work this morning, I packed the cake in the tupperware that I usually use to store the week’s worth of garlic that I’ve pre-peeled and pre-chopped for my cooking ease.

Right now it’s 4.52pm and I’m at work but I’m obviously not working since I’m blog-composing. It’s wrong, it’s bad and I know it but how is it any worse than that group of ladies who are currently also not working but instead chatting and laughing away? Normally I would also be in that group of chatting ladies but that’s not the point right now. The point is I can’t even work because my head is a-buzzing with all the things I still need to do before I leave. I leave on Saturday, today is Thursday so I’ve only got a day to go. *high-pitched squeal!!* Like seriously, I don’t think anyone expects me to be able to work anymore by now. Extreme excitement would impair anyone’s ability to work right?

But instead of dwelling on the many errands I still have to run before I can jet-set off, I would instead like to dwell on the reunion I had last night with my oldest friends ever. I’ve known these girls ever since I was five or six (if I’m not mistaken) from back when our dads were posted in France. One of them is Naz, who I had been keeping in touch with and started meeting again regularly since sometime last year. But Fiza, both of us hadn’t seen in at least 12 years!

Her family has been living in all these exciting, exotic countries and she’s been studying overseas but she’s on a visit back to KL right now. At first I lamented the timing seeing as how I’m leaving just as she is coming back and oh, the timing sucks coz now we can’t do that Parisienne gathering thingy Naz was planning. But with a little bit of planning and a determination to meet, we did have our mini-reunion yesterday night.

I’ll admit. I was a bit (maybe a lot) apprehensive at first coz as I said, I hadn’t kept in touch with Fiza for more than a decade (we re-met recently on Facebook) plus she’s been living overseas practically all her life. What if she’s too sophisticated for me? Would she think me very kampung? Would we not get along? What if the whole meeting was nothing but a string of awkward pauses and minimal, too-polite conversation?

I was being over-paranoid as usual. Turns out we had a blast. I was the first one there so was sitting there waiting (apprehensively) when Fiza showed up. I was speechless for about a second. It’s so weird seeing someone again after so long. But after that, there was no awkward silence. Probably because I was yappin’ away so much [Hope I didn’t bore her too much…].

Soon after, Naz arrived and we chose to eat at Madam Kwan’s. A first for both me and Naz. [Quickie food review: The food was quite nice but I prolly won’t go again coz I am not one to pay RM15 for a plate of normal Malaysian fare. I had the chicken rice, btw, which was OK…although I have had nicer RM5 chicken rice]. Dinner was a lot of fun, what with all the reminiscing and dredging up of random old facts.

I remembered that the last time I saw Fiza, she was wearing blue-framed specs. Naz and Fiza talked about this boy, JR, from back in first grade…a boy of whom I have no recollection whatsoever. We talked about the time all our families went on a ski holiday together and Naz’s family car got stalled on the icy slopes. Fiza remembered that when both our families went to Monaco, she was jealous that I had a swimming suit and her parents made her swim in her skivvies. I remembered a time when Fiza and I spent hours on the phone, playing pirates (she doesn’t remember though). And ALL of us remember this particular classmate who permanently looked like he/she had rolled out of bed right into class.

So yeah, it was a whole lot of fun. A lotta laughs.

Fiza is heading back to her overseas uni in about a week and she’s planning to go ahead and stay and work there so have no idea when we’ll get to gather next. Hope it won’t take another 12 years for us to see each other again.

Aaaaahhh, nothing like rehashing old memories with the people who knew you when the only things that mattered was what toy was inside your Kinder Egg and who had the most unicorns pulling their pretend-carriage and who was the first one who would catch a ladybird during summer-time picnics. Good times….

Frazzled...Frantic...Fun!

Three more days to go until I get on a plane headed for the biggest apple of them all.

And I am so unprepared I feel like screaming. I still have stuff to buy for my mom (the chore itself is not bad but I've been to three stores in different locations and there is no green and purple food colouring to be found!), I need to go to the dentist, I have not yet packed and have not even given thought to what I should pack, I was hoping to get in a mani and pedi before I go (something I've held off until this week because I was doing major cleaning at home during the 3 day weekend), I still don't have a wingman to help me with checking in the luggage at KL Sentral (it's not a one-person process, this) and to top it all off, I won't be able to catch the Champions League finals this week.

I'm excited to go but for the moment, the excitement is buried under a mound of panic and frazzled nerves. To any of my friends who were jealous about me going, we can switch places right about now. And then we switch back again when it comes time to board the plane. ;p

Speaking of plane, it's a 22 hour flight so I hope I'm seated next to a nice, polite, clean, childless person who does not feel the need to fill the 22 hours with endless conversation. And who doesn't mind letting me out every so often so that I can stretch (to avoid very potentially fatal deep vein thrombosis) and go to the loo (although I am not fond of airplane loos…. I have disturbing visions of getting stuck in there during turbulence…gah!). A cute guy with all the above characteristics would be really nice. But if it did happen, I would prolly suspect the cute guy of being nice and polite because he was trying to dupe me into being an unsuspecting drug mule and shun him anyway. What a terrible world this is that we have to be unduly suspicious of everyone… or is it just me who is unduly suspicious of everyone?

I am also terribly paranoid that I'll be walking down the street in NY and random people will beat me up because I wear a hijab and they'll think I'm a terrorist. Or salespeople won't want to serve me in shops. Sigh. As you see, I'm not exactly a rainbows and unicorns type of girl.

Goodness, I sound all gloom and doom. Not at all befitting of a girl about to set off on one of the best holidays she'll ever have (hopefully that is). It must be the stress of not finding green and purple food coloring.

I actually can't wait to go. *grin*

Still Got Nepal On My Mind

Since Monday, a colleague of mine has been trying to coax me into joining her for a trip to Hong Kong in August. Trying unsuccessfully, I might add. One, because I get back from the US in July and she expects me to up and take leave for another holiday in August? Don’t think so. Two, I have no funds for this trip. The third and most important reason: I have no interest whatsoever in visiting Hong Kong. China just doesn’t make my shortlist of places to visit before I die. The Great Wall and the Uighur community do hold some interest for me but then again, these two things aren’t in Hong Kong are they? So no, I don’t foresee a trip to the Far East for me any time soon.

I’m rather bemused by the travel bug that seems to be going around right now. As I’ve mentioned in my previous post, I’ve been bitten by the Nepal bug. Mun, who I emailed yesterday, replied me with the expected, “Sounds great. Let’s go. How much does it cost?”. I, of course, do not know yet how much it costs because if I start doing solid research, my candy floss trekking daydreams might be smashed to Hades. Let’s keep the care-free dream going a bit longer.

Then she sent me another email in which the destinations ‘Kota Kinabalu’, ‘Nepal’ and ‘Bali’ were all mentioned. In ONE email. Whooaahh! The head spins. This goes way beyond travel bug…this is, like, a travel vortex. And I like! I might just be sitting at my desk and not have gone anywhere yet but just discussing all theses places makes me feel like a jetsetter. And ‘feeling’ is just the first step towards ‘being’, right? [The travel vortex has made me dizzy, I have no idea if what I just said makes any sense].

So, back to Mun. We met for a Subway lunch [I don’t think a stupid sandwhich is worth about 10 bucks but they’re so yummy, I can’t help myself…] today just so I could show her the Nepal brochures. She’s mighty hyped-up too now. She couldn’t believe all the activities on offer. She was already, like, “OK. 6 days won’t be enough for all this. Travel pun dah 2 days… “(“Trekking two days…”, I interject) “…Ok, trekking two days…bungy, tengok badak (at the hunting safari), mountain-climbing…(and upon seeing a photo of a Kumari)…as soon as we arrive at the airport, aku nak make-up macam ni!”.

So we’re both excited now. Realistically if we were to go, this is definitely a long term plan kinda thing. Just saving up for it would take a few years, I think. And there’s the whole question of whether my parents would even let their precious daughter travel to Nepal (wasn’t Nepal the place where that mat saleh traveler murdered all his innocent fellow travelers… or maybe it was Bhutan? Or Tibet? But around that region. I read it in Reader’s Digest). But it’s a fun activity to aspire to. And if it does come through, it’ll be one heck of an adventure.

Let the planning and saving begin.

Nepal Caught My Eye

[Composed on 13 May 'o8...yesterdaylah]

My boss just came back from a business trip to Nepal with a bunch of meeting papers to file, a Nepali Times newspaper and a few brochures from the Nepal Tourism Board.

So I was looking the newspaper and it really isn’t that great a newspaper. I wonder if it’s the main Nepali newspaper. It was pretty boring and not much news in it. No international news at all. But their English is pretty good.

The thing that struck me most were the adverts. Or to be more exact, the celebrity endorsements. There was no Brad Pitt for Rolex (or is it Tag Hauer? Can’t remember) or Josie Maran for Maybelline. Instead it was Saif Ali Khan for Lenovo computers and Amitabh Bachan clad in a green boxing robe with green boxing gloves for something called Glucose-D. I guess people over there don’t give two hoots about Hollywood. They’ve prolly never even heard of Paris Hilton, those lucky, mentally-untarnished people!

After scanning through the newspaper, I turned my attention to the tourism brochures.

…… and thus begins my love affair with Nepal. That place is gorgeous! There’s no two ways about it. And it would really appeal to people like me who like outdoorsy activities. The most popular activities are mountaineering (Everest…hello!) and trekking but there’s also kayaking, bungy-jumping, paragliding, light-craft flying and hunting (not a big fan of this one), among others. [Kind of like a poor man’s New Zealand…although I’m not sure how cheap or expensive travel in Nepal actually is. But I do know that NZ is super-expensive. Pretty much decimated my dreams of going on that Lord of the Rings tour. Sigh]

But it was the trekking brochure that hooked me in. Wide open, rustic grass meadows, wooden teahouses along the treks, mountainous scenery… I can just imagine Genghis Khan and his horse-riding army storming across the plains and singgah rehat at the tea houses before setting off again to widen his empire. I doubt teahouses existed in his time (or maybe they did…and was Nepal even part of his empire?... Genghis Khan history is not really my strong point) but they look so quaint and ancient, like they belong in that era.

So now I have visions of myself in a fleece jacket and ski cap lugging a huge backpack; trekking along the Anapurna trek site with the Himalayas over my shoulder; eating dinner of goat’s cheese and bread; warming myself with heat from a kerosene lamp; covering the toilet pit after I’ve used it; dancing in my head.

I’ve already sent off an email to my fave travel buddy Mun,shooting off a Nepal holiday suggestion. Realistically it’ll prolly only happen in 2,3…maybe 5 years time.

Wait for me Anapurna. I shall come!

My Non-Friday Randoms

I know I’m normally only random on Fridays but what the heck! I guess other days can be random too. Anyhoo, check this out.

This book was in the teen readers section of MPH. And there were a host of other books along this line but this one just popped out at me coz of the oh-so-subtle title. Teen books are marketed at like 11-15 year olds! They shouldn’t be reading books called ‘Slut’. Or ‘Slut?’. Or ‘Slut!!’. When I was 11, I didn’t even know what slut meant. With books like this coming out and aimed at young girls, is it any wonder signs like these are popping up everywhere?

You know the Spiderman saying, ‘with great power comes great responsibility’? I have another one for ya. “With rapid globalization and materialistic tendencies comes great moral decline”. I saw this no-smooching sign in the back of a taxi. You go uncle!

So let that subject be for now. Now cast your eyes upon this next photo. What do you think it is?

Showed the pic to my two cousins and they both went , “Eeeuuuwww. Apa tu? Eeeeee….”. I asked them to venture a guess. Lil boy said, “Itu ulat ke?(Is that a bug/insect?)”. Then his older sister held up a finger and said “Kita tau!! Itu rumpai kan?! (I know. It’s seaweed!)”. When I told them that it was actually an Alien donut from Big Apple, the expression on their faces where priceless. “Awak makan ke ni?”. Yup, I makan-ed it indeed and it was deliciously chocolate-y but not sickeningly chocolate-y like the Chocoholic donut. If you can get past the presentation, give the Alien a try.

Last but most definitely not least, last night as I was about to haul my butt off to bed, I was stopped by my cousin who asked me to help her with her homework. “Sure”, I said, as I am always ever-willing to help my cousins with their homework. Turns out she wanted me to draw for her. She assured me that her teacher said that if the students didn’t know how to draw certain animals, kakaks and abangs were allowed to draw for them (although parents are strictly forbidden coz mak bapak dah pandai sangat. Huh?) and since ‘kita mana ada kakak atau abang’, cousins also can lah.

I have not been blessed with any artistic talent whatsoever. I wish I could draw but I am really bad at it. So I thought, what the heck, the teacher will prolly think my cousin drew it herself anyway (yes….my skills with a pencil are that bad).

But it actually didn’t turn out tooooo bad. In fact, I think my drawings were kinda cute. Or maybe I’m just deluding myself and they really are super-lame. Let me know! :)

Airport Sojourn

Last Saturday, I sent my siblings to the airport for their flight to NYC where my parents already are. I shall be joining them in two weeks time, God willing.

Back to my sibs. It was a lot of….well, not really stress but feelings of kepala hotak berserabut while preparing for their trip. My mom had ordered a whole bunch of stuff to bring with us, I had to liaise with the ticketing officer for the tickets, bust my head figuring out how to transport 3 suitcases and 3 people to the airport in a mini-car and worry about excess luggage. It was not pleasant and I was too frazzled to feel excited or plan for my own trip.

In the end, all turned out well. It turns out that if you’re traveling on MAS you can check in your luggage at KL Sentral the day before your flight so I didn’t have to worry about transporting luggage plus people to the airport. Convenient eh? It’s actually required that you buy an ERL ticket if you want to check in at KL Sentral (KLS) but we didn’t do that and weren’t even questioned by the ERL staff posted at the KLS check-in section. That super-confident-bordering-on-snooty expression I told my sibs to put on their faces worked!

I was also really concerned about excess luggage but I guess checking in early, being friendly and smiling widely all the time really do work in softening service providers and making them tak berkira. Try it next time.

Not only that…..

Terer or not? Priority baggage ok!

On Saturday, we went to the airport nice and early. I did not want to go through the trauma of missing a flight again, thank you very much. Had breakfast at McD. I don’t know why, I just love the McD breakfasts. I think it’s the English muffin that’s so yummy. At first I was gonna order myself the Big Breakfast coz that poster of the plate with a huge serving of fluffy scrambled eggs, sausage and muffins just looked oh-so-heavenly. I’m glad I didn’t though. In reality, it looks like this.

Damn misleading marketing!

As they were preparing to go in, I was a bit concerned because my brother’s name on the ticket was mis-spelled and I’d read that if the name on the ticket and the passport don’t exactly match, you ain’t getting’ on that flight. Dah la the guards’ faces were super-duper garang and serious. I was praying hard that he’d get through. Lo and behold, get through he did. Thank God.

We saw them off right till the end of the viewing area. I did not even know there was such a place as the viewing area because I would normally just wave goodbye at the ‘balcony’ overlooking the immigration counters, then we’d head back. But through the sweet/hilarious actions of my sister’s boyfriend who had also come to see her off, I came to know of the existence of the viewing area. Basically you can look down on your loved ones while they’re going through the whole security process, perhaps see them getting frisked by the security personnel, before they disappear off to get onto the airport shuttle thingy which’ll take them to the terminal. I saw a baby getting frisked. Poor baby.

Then you can sit in a huge glass-walled hall while trying to guess which plane your loved one is gonna board as well as which runway the planes will use to take off. Fun airport activities to pass the time.

Which plane are they in?

In two weeks it’ll be my turn. Yeaaahhhh!! Noone will be seeing me off but seeing as how I’m going to the Big Apple, I’m not too devastated.

Wow, I really can’t wait.

Nice Surprise!

Today I got a really nice surprise.

My friends will know that I complain about my brother a LOT. And it’s usually justified coz he rarely acts with the maturity of the 20 year old that he is. For example, I got home last weekend and two lights were on. The last time we were home was two weeks ago and I left before him (although on the same day), so the lights had been on for two weeks. And he’d forgotten to take out the trash (although thank God it was all dry trash and no food in the bin). I guess being the only guy among the sibs with two older sisters causes him to overlook such things as domestic responsibilty. So when I went over to see him yesterday, I was not best pleased (although I was very restrained and cheerful in showing my displeasure…. I don’t want to stress him out).

But today he’s done something really nice so I gotta give him props.

I asked him to go back to our house to mow the lawn (we seriously have this weed that’s grown so tall and sturdy it’s like a new species of tree or something) and also to clean his room so that after he and my sister are safely on the plane on the way to my parents, it’ll make it a bit easier on the sister-cum-maid who’s left behind to do the brunt of the rest of the cleaning. And also if he still had time, to please empty out this huge red plastic barrel on our porch which over time had become filled with old newspapers and junk mail.

I texted him around 3pm today to ask his progress, hoping that there was progress to be reported while preparing myself for the fact that he hadn’t even woken up yet. My exact words were, “Hi Bang. How the cleaning going?I hope it’s going. Kalo tak, SIAP!Haha”.

And he answers back telling me that the cleaning is all done and that he’d brought back reinforcements to help with the lawn and cleaning. AND he’d washed my car. Which is a total bonus coz I didn’t even ask him to do that. Wow. Of course, I’m a bit mortified that he brought company to the house while it’s in such an obvious state of mess (our waterpump is STILL on the konk so I haven’t mopped and really cleaned in a while) but oh well, I guess I gotta be thankful that he fulfilled my cleaning objectives at all.

I don’t harbour any delusions of him suddenly totally turning over a new leaf and giving me cause to stop my complainin’ and naggin’ completely after this but a surprise like this is nice and my feeling of goodwill towards him now will serve him well during those times when he acts up again and I feel like throttling his skinny little neck.

I just hope he doesn’t forget to bring back the suitcase with him which is actually the real reason I lent him my car to go back home in the first place (cleaning was secondary). And the lights. Oh and I hope he doesn’t forget to lock the doors.

Snap, I better call him and make sure now. Later.

[Update: My bro just brought back the car and it's sooo clean. :) Oh and he left the tall, sturdy weed standing coz he's so intrigued he wants to see what'll happen if left alone. Oh well, I can't be mad at scientific interest now, can I?]

For The Indian Food Connoiseur

I can’t remember if I’ve already posted about this but my colleague is resigning. So my department is down to two people. I anticipate days of intense boredom interspersed with days of intense stress ahead of me. But this post isn’t gonna be all grumbly and whiny.

Instead I would like to talk about the farewell lunch we threw for her yesterday. Last week my boss asked me to arrange something so arrange I did. After discussing with our other friends/colleagues, we decided to throw it at Sri Nirwana Maju restaurant in Bangsar. It’s a banana leaf rice place and said colleague loves banana leaf rice. And apparently it’s a really good place. I spent about two hours at work ‘researching’ the place and the food reviews were very encouraging. So it was all set.

Last Friday, I went to Bangsar to ‘rekkie’ the place as well as to make reservations. And alang-alang dah ada kat situ, my rekkie-mate and I had breakfast at the place. According to the foodie blogs and sites I’d been researching, the breakfast food there is really good.

I had myself the rava thosai special. It’s rava thosai (rava thosai is (for lack of a better explanation) a roti jala-like version of thosai, it’s hole-y and crispier) with diced onion, chilies and egg. Super yummy, I tell you. I’ve had rava thosai before and NONE have been as good as this. The dhal was ok, not too memorable…but it doesn’t even matter coz the thosai was so good it can even be eaten on its own (to steal a famous bread brand’s slogan). Me mate had chapati and according to her, the chapati was ok but the curries and chutneys were to die for.

Me Rava thosai....

The curries and chutneys.

*Burp*

Yesterday we went again for the proper lunch. Another colleague (who is apparently on very intimate terms with the Nirwana Maju menu) ordered for us. All of us had banana leaf rice (which immediately comes with servings of youghurt cucumber, long beans with lentils and deep-fried peria) and she ordered up some fried squid, fried chicken and fried fish. Oh and a dish of mutton curry. Not the healthiest lunch option but we Malaysians don’t really care about that, now do we? As long as it’s sedap.

And the food was pretty good. Especially the squid. Although it would have been a lot better if it hadn’t been on the threshold of hangit. Oil too hot maybe?

After the lunch, the Nirwana-regular colleague whipped out a bag of Swiss chocs from her bag for our dessert. Monday was her first day back at work after a two week holiday roaming around Switzerland and Italy so that was her buah tangan for us.

So, conclusion time. I don’t know about the banana leaf rice (maybe banana leaf isn’t my thing) but I definitely recommend going to Sri Nirwana Maju for their breakfast offerings. I spied their delish-looking vadai so that’s my aim next time. As well as their roti canai which was reviewed as ‘really fluffly and flavourful’. How flavourful can a roti canai be? I intend to find out. Plus I’ve been raving about this place to my cousins, aunties and friends and promising all of them that I’d bring them to eat there, so I gotta fulfil my promises right? Hee~.

Oh, just one thing though……