Happy Mid-Autumn Festival!

9/29

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival everyone! Eat some delicious moon cakes! Today we woke up at 6am to talk a walk around the park. It was still dark when we left to the park to get some exercise in. As the sun was rising, we were almost attacked by monkeys waking up in the forest. Two monkeys were going at it on the tree tops and we were almost casualties in their dispute with branches falling. Sadly, they kept jumping around so I couldn't get any shots of them. After working up an appetite from running away from them, we went to get some herbal pig stomach soup with chicken oil rice--talk about hearty breakfast!

 

Chicken Oil Rice

 

Pig Stomach Herbal Soup

  

Rainforest looking Park with Monkeys

After breakfast we headed down to the Saturday market to see the usual collection of food, clothes and randomness. My aunt sat us down since Noah wasn't feeling well and as we sat down, I was fed curry noodles because it was mean to not order something to eat--casual excuse to stuff more food in me lol 

 

Incense holders 

  

Mixed snacks

  

 Colorful flowers for the festival

 

 Fresh chicken anyone?

 

Curry Noodles with tofu and roast pork

Doing all that, it was still early by the time we came back home at 10am. Took this time to catch up with my cousin and showed her some MHC moments like Mountain Day, Hip Hop class, and cultural events. After catching up, I took a nap only to wake up around 5pm.  

My aunt then took us out to the temple so I can burn some incenses to my great uncle as well as get some tang shui and yam. While at the temple, there was a section for lanterns made by middle schoolers. They were to use recycled materials and there were creative ideas for these lanterns. I really liked the dragon one that was made from computer parts--although I think I'm a bit bias because I just love dragons!

 Well Wishes

 Lanterns 

 

Recycled Materials Lantern--Hibiscus Flower and Birds

 

Temple lights

 

Recycled Materials Lantern-- Plastic Spoon Dolphin

 

Recycled Materials Lantern--Rabbit with Full Moon

 

Recycled Materials Lantern-- Computer parts Dragon

  

Dragon Dance heading toward temple

Noah didn't look so good so we drove around trying to find her a doctor--finally found her one at a 24hr location. My aunt informed me that on Saturdays doctors all go to disco and I'm not sure if she meant it as a joke or truth lol Disco still lives on in Malaysia apparently. Another funny story related to health was when my aunt informed me when I was little, I was very sick. I had a really bad cough and heart. An elderly grandmother was taking care of me when I was little and everyone had to work. This grandmother hated that I coughed so much so she told me to eat dog shit and it'll make me feel better but I just pouted every time she said that. One day, she coughed herself and apparently I said: "Grandma, you're coughing. You need to go eat dog shit now." That grandmother got so pissed! Lol, but when she scolded my aunt, my aunt defended me saying that she started it by telling me to do the same thing haha. Imagine a 3 year old me telling a grandmother to go eat dog shit--too awesome!

After the doctor visit--went to a congee and pan mee shop where I ordered the plain anchovy broth with plain and veggie hand torn noodles. Off to sleep before I can't wait up for the Singapore trip. 

 

Pan Mee with anchovies broth and plain/veggie hand torn noodles

KLCC--Chinatown Day & Food Tasting at Sunway MIGF

9/27

Didn't wake up as early as the day before but still around 8am. Went to eat some awesome nasi lemak near where I live and the line was worth the wait. The taste of the rice is just different--apparently the stall sells over 4 wooden buckets worth of rice everyday!! The rice is just so different--sweeter, softer and melts in your mouth, unlike the coarse rice we have back home. You can just smell and taste the coconut infusion when you breath in the air.

Nasi Lemak

Cha Guo

After breakfast, we passed through the morning bazaar looking for snacks to munch on and stopped at a colorful cha guo stand which had colorful display of food all laid out. Picked up some munchies and then went home to head out to KLCC Chinatown with my sis.

We passed through Jalan Petaling intersections weaving through food vendors, knock offs and back alleyways glancing and stopping every now and then to see if there was a good sale. I got a pair of cheaply made toms for about $12. (Hey, why not right?)

While weaving in and out of alley ways, we went to a Buddhist and Hindu temple to take some photos then onwards to Central Market for some touristy shopping. Saw they had the I love KL shirt so I thought of getting a blue one. Sadly, they ran out of blue and only had black or white. Normally, I would never wear an I love NY shirt, but this one says KL which is similar design to the NY one so why not?

Chinatown

Temple

Incense at Temple

 

Incense burning for prayers 

 

Central Market

Preserving Chinatown/Jalan Sultan

After spending the whole afternoon walking around KL, we went back home to head over to the Basam Malam (night market) over at SS2. This night market was so crowded that trying to find parking took over 10 mins. The square block was filled with small stalls selling food, trinkets, fake DVDs to shirts and undergarments. As we were passing through, I looked up and saw a shirt that reflected the craze PSY has created worldwise--Gangnam Style has hit M'sia.

Gangnam Style invades M'sia 

We stopped by a Taiwanese crispy pancake stall that offered different meats to put on the pancake.It was interesting so we ordered the ham one to try and it was actually really good. The pancake had some cabbage, mayo, hot sauce as well as the ham. The crispiness gave it a good crunch. The pancake was just a snack--the real dinner was yet to come. I was so stuffed at the end of dinner, I could barley move.

I think I've regain my 2nd stomach now which comes in handy when you're about to head to a food tasting that offers different samples of M'sia's fine dining scene.

Crispy Taiwanese Pancake

Overload of food

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9/28

Today we took it easy with the food and had clear pork stomach pepper soup with noodles instead of the usual spice intense breakfast. After food, we headed over to Sunway Pyramid Convention Center which held the 12th MIGF (Malaysian International Gourmet Festival) giving people a taste of what fine dining in M'sia had to offer. I had bought 10 tickets and each sample had a token worth so each ticket was a token. We arrived a bit early so we headed next door to the retail area and just walked around. There were lengthy selections of wine from New Zealand, Portugal as well as Malaysia. I got to sample so many great wines--I wanted to buy them all! (Well, not all...at least some lol) Where there is wine, there is cheese! I totally got my wine and cheese on today! There were also some cigar stalls as well as durian puree which was really great. I really wanted the durian puree because it tasted like the real thing! Sadly, TSA will kill me if I brought durian puree on the plane because if smell could kill--that's one deadly weapon (though it's nothing compared to stinky tofu.)

After my many rounds of sampling wine (red, white, sparkling and rose), we made our way back to the food sampling and started making our rounds. I had creme brulee, braised lamb, mushroom risotto, shanghai bun, scallop with tamarind shrimp and beers. Not all the food we tasted was good, but the idea is to sample what they had to offer. It's finger food, not really big plates so it really is a matter of tasting and pacing yourself between the booze and food.

We had planned to go to the lagoon after we munched on the food, but between the free sampling of beer, wine, cheese, gelato, and actual food--we didn't realize how much time had passed. The admission price for the lagoon wasn't worth the time we would actually spend there so we just walked around the mall next door.

We will be heading to Singapore on Sunday for about 4 days so the blogging will have to wait until the end of next week to continue. I can't wait to explore Singapore again. The last time I visited, I didn't have time to actually tour the city because I was stuck on a cruise boat for the whole time--eating ice cream no less.

Malaysia once again...

After 7 long years I'm finally back in Malaysia again. I'll be traveling around Singapore, Thailand as well as within Malaysia until November 1st. This time back, I've brought my HS friend,Noah on this trip. She is also a foodie so we will be fine.

The flight from JFK to HK felt like an eternity with 15 hrs straight watching all the latest movies released on DVD and then a 2 hour layover. Passed out waiting for the connecting flight to KLCC and then passed out once again on the plane for 3 hours. Once we landed, I went through the immigration line pretty fast and waited for Noah because those of foreign passport had to see immigration officers for their stamps while I had the smart card which scans your thumb print and passport.

Since it has been so long, I almost didn't recognize my favorite uncle. Had to take a closer look before I recognized him. As we drove away from the airport, our car overheated and we were just chilling on the side of the highway until my 2nd uncle came to pick us up. We sat on the railing as we munched on our beef jerky and drank out water.

Once the 2nd uncle picked up us, we got dropped off my aunt's place to settle down and chow down. My (1st) uncle bought us a ton of food--satay with curry sauce, fried shrimp crackers, moon cakes as well as cokes to drink. Chowed down on the satay but two orders of like 20 skewers were a bit too much to have for dinner at 10pm. After eating, we finally had a place that wasn't a 1/2 bent chair and it felt AWESOME to lay flat and pass out.

9/26

Woke up pretty early due to jet lag (6:30am) so I decided to empty out my big suitcase full of vitamins and ginseng. Chatted to my uncle for a bit and watched the news which consisted of China's grand opening first fleet operational with 5% of the sailors were women. Then came the hard topic of Japan vs China on the Diaoyu island. News is the most depressing thing ever to hear about! After that, my aunt came back so we headed for FOOD! Went to SS2 for breakfast and had two different kinds of dosa and a roti. I also tried the new 3 layer tehrik with 1/3 milo; 1/3 nescafe and then the tehrik... I DEVOURED my food in less than 10 mins of getting them...I was starving and trying to make up my 7 years of not getting decent malaysian food.

 

3 layer tehrik

 

dosa

  

roti 

Afterwards, my sis came around and saw her puppy. Went to a mall near by to get the necessities like shampoo and toothpaste. After the mall, we headed to dinner and stuffed our face with nasi lemak, grilled tom yum fish, blackbean sauce lala (clams) as well as chow kuai tehow served with the side of 100 plus!!! I AM IN FOOD HEAVEN!!

 

the choices

 

nasi

 

100 plus

  

chow kuai tehow

  

lala

 

tom yum fish

 Then I found a film heaven! Bought 10 boxes worth of instanx mini fuji films for 8 usd bucks a pop!

 

Jackpot!

now back to jet lag problems and passing out to wake up to another day full of food