CHINESE NEW YEAR 2013

This year, I was very much looking forward to Chinese New Year mainly because instead of the lau juak lau juak celebration that usually happens, this year, we would be holed up in Rompin Bungalow, Fraser’s Hill.

We first found out about this bungalow a year ago and even though our stay there was only for a 2 days and 1 night, we absolutely enjoyed how serene and quiet the place was, not forgetting of course how the bungalow was excellently managed and tastefully decorated. The only problem is they don’t rent out room by room but you’ll have to rent out the whole bungalow which cost about RM1700++. So we’ve been trying to plan a holiday back there ever since but it’s been tough to get 10 people to go together and no way my wife, kid and me would rent it with just the 3 of us. So we were really excited that we managed to secure both our families to celebrate New Years eve there and this time, we made sure we stayed 3 days 2 nights.

Needless to say, we all totally appreciated the break in a quiet and quaint comfortable bungalow all to ourselves. BBQ on the first night and steamboat in the open cooling air was really refreshing. No need to rush around for things or prepare elaborate meals. Even sight-seeing was done at the slowest pace possible. A total opposite of how we would have celebrated CNY but a wonderful reunion nonetheless where more time was spent conversing and enjoying each others company.

Here are the pics of the wonderful place…

Location:

Rompin House,

Lot 2490,

Jalan Semantan,

Bukit Fraser,

49000 Pahang

03-2730 9988

TOP 10 + 1 WAYS TO KNOW THAT YOU’RE IN PENANG…

If you happen to be kidnapped and place in this strange island, here are 10 ways for you identify that you are in Penang:

1.          You wake up at 3am with a heart burn from overeating the whole day.

2.          When ordering food, the average dishes per person is 2 and one of the dish is always Char Kuey Teow.

3.          It’s 12am and you still have food that you have “ta pau” and not eaten in your hotel room.

4.          The lines between breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper is blurred. It’s just eating 24/7.

5.          You walk pass the mirror in your hotel room in your underwear and you could have sworn that your side view width has increased substantially.

6.          When you sit down in the toilet, there’s a huge chunk of meat (your stomach) that protrudes out more than usual.

7.          Whenever someone asks you about your next medical check-up, you change the topic immediately.

8.          You are driving and at an intersection (without a traffic light), you shiver, sweat profusely, convulse, shake uncontrollably and then decide to get down from your car, place cons to stop incoming traffic and drive out of your intersection. All in all, it took you 30 minutes to cross the intersection.

9.          You are bathing and when you look down, you realize some appendages are not as visible anymore. Your middle kingdom seemed to be blocking your view……… ….. ….. …... of your toes.

10.     You walk down Batu Feringhi and there’s a firesale for DVD… 50% off the price you pay for in KL

11.     Pig’s blood is a main ingredient in your Curry Mee, Yam Rice, etc.

AWESOME BAWESOME BALI

My family (me + wife + baby) made our first trip to Bali recently. Through the years, we’ve heard our friends and family visiting Bali and the amazing place it is but was always pulled back by the fact that they don’t have a clean beach. My wife and I absolutely love beaches and have thus far only made travel trips to places with nice beaches.

That aside, we decided to give it a go. So as usual, we booked the plane, the hotel, the driver, for a 5 days trip.

These are some of the amazing things that we encountered throughout the trip. The irony of it all was we only went down to the beach by our hotel for like 2 minutes throughout the entire trip. :P

Day 1: Tanah Lot

A definite must go. The only regret we had was we did not spend enough time here. The view here was really breath taking and refreshing. Spending half a day here just chilling by the sea and admiring the batu-bata would be something we would really like to do the next time we’re here.

Day 2: 

Tegallalang Rice Terrace

Nothing but greenery here.

Paddy Field on the Hill

Kintamani & Lake Batur

The view here from the top is really spectacular with the volcano mountain on the left and the huge lake on the right. Most of the mountain is covered in black stuff from the outflow of the lava. Forget about walking down to the end of the road as you’ll be heckled by traders. Pick a restaurant, sippa cuppa coffee and enjoy the view

The Volcano

The Lake

Tirta Empul

This is one temple that puts culture back into perspective. Being born, bred, raise, indoctrinated in Malaysia, the schema is always… the gong (big and small), gamelan band and the keris is a definite culture of the Malay. But in this temple, you see all of that (even the music played is similar to that of a Malay traditional band)… for a HINDU ceremony. At this point of time, I just stood still trying to reconstruct the schema that I have been brought up believing in. I’m not going to speculate what came first, who adopted who (just like how our Negaraku ended up being some song from Hawaii “Mamula Moon”)… but the great big lesson here is this… there’s no such thing as supremacy. One culture is adopted from another and no one culture is superior from another. When you start making supremacy claims, you end up being the butt of the joke.. i.e. like how Hang Tuah is actually my brader.

The source o the Holy Water	Hindu Warriors 	BSB + 1
Amazing Balancing Act	Kids preparing for their dance	Bathing in Holy Water

To Hishamuddin, I apologize for calling you a racist when you raise and kiss your keris. I now understand you were also standing up for the rights of the Hindus.

Day 3:

Garuda Wishnu Kencana (GWK) Culture Park

If you feel like you have some spare change and for some reason feeling very charitable, then the GWK park is somewhere you might wannna go (Entry fee is IDR50k p/pax). There’s nothing much here except for 2 big statues; Wishnu and the Garuda.

Wishnu

Garuda

Gila

Krishna Ole-Ole Bali

This is seriously the FIRST place anyone should visit in Bali. It’s a shopping centre with everything you would be looking for in Bali (paintings, handicrafts, bags, clothes, food, souvenirs…..). Prices here are fix at a very very reasonable rate and you’re spoilt for choices here. The best part about this place is it gives you a feel of the price of the items for your further reference when negotiating with traders throughout your trip (Bali is one place you need to bargain… bargain…. bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… bargain… ). So if you’ve not have much experience in bargaining, do visit a few pasar malams first before going.

Our driver/ tour guide / baby sitter

Our trip was made perfect by our wonderful driver, Suryanto. When looking for a driver, our biggest worries were: 

i.Drivers that bring you only to places which they earn commission – like Kuching, Sarawak drivers;

ii. Drivers that keep jam breaking and make you feel like throwing up 

Suryanto was definitely none of the above. He was an excellent driver (trust  me, you’ll need one as good as him cause the roads in Bali is super small with loads of car). Not only did he bring us to really good and cheap restaurants, drove super smoothly, was super friendly, honest in every way possible, became our tour guide (he was not obliged to cause he was only suppose to drive us around), he also helped us to carry our baby girl around!!! We really appreciated the extra effort he put in. Allowed us some romantic hand holding moments. He really made out trip a memorable one.

So.. if you’re going to Bali and you are looking for an awesome driver to bring you about, here’s his contact:

Email: booking@rentcarinbali.com

HP: +62 8123842670

The rest of our 4th and 5th day was spent just strolling around town.

Things NOT to do in Bali, Indonesia

I just got back from Bali and it was truly an enjoyable trip. However, instead of starting off with the goods about Bali, thought I would start off by sharing about what NOT to do (hopefully can save you from some unnecessary ordeal..)

1. Never EAT seafood at JIMBARAN – SHADOW “TIOK” Technique

As much as Jimbaran offers a magnificent view of watching sunset while having dinner, it is also the one place they employ the Shadow “TIOK” technique.

At 1^st the price seems pretty reasonable… but then when you receive the bill… the weight of the food seems a lot heavier… check the comparison between our seafood dinner at Jimbaran and Kuta.

Seafood at Jimbaran (“The Cuisine”)	Seafood at Kartika Plaza - Kuta (“Segara”)
Weight: 400g Price p/kg: IDR 75k	Weight: 300g Price p/kg: IDR 100k
- 4 clams at “The Cuisine” weighs 400g while 12 clams at “Segara” weighs only 300g
Weight: 200k Price p/kg: IDR 315k	Weight: 300g Price p/kg: IDR  290k
- 2 King Prawn at “The Cuisine” weighs 200g while 7 prawns at “Segara” weighs only 300g
Pathetic small fish that weighs 800g! Guess it was weight with the water it swam in.	The menu from Segara
Proof for seafood at Jimbaran	Proof for seafood at Kuta

2. Visit Uluwatu Temple

If you’ve watched “Planet of the Apes” this is one place you get to experience it for real. Monkeys here are super hostile and have no qualms about grabbing things from you and to make matters worse, the population of monkeys here seems to be equal if not more than the humans. Special items on their list grab list are slippers, sun glasses, spectacles, water bottles, plastic bags holding items.

Wife was walking up the temple stairs when a fat monkey dashed at my wife feet to try to strip her of her slippers. Even when my wife screamed, the monkey was as adamant as a rock to get the slippers off my wife which it did at last… it then bit off the flower on the top of the slippers and we had to pay some guys selling monkey food IDR10k to throw some food at it to get it off the slippers.

By now, you’re pretty much freaked out at the monkeys but guess what… you have to continue walking through a battalion of monkeys all around to see the whole temple. Due to the shock and the super heighten state your mind is on to kung-fu fight any monkeys that approaches, I pretty much don’t remember anything at the temple except for the beautiful scenery overlooking the ocean. It doesn’t help too when you constantly hear ppl screaming when attacked by the monkeys. What was in the temple…? I seriously don’t remember. There was an hour left to spare before the famous Kechak dance was to start but we decided to just leave just in case a war between human and apes really did happen.

The problem with the monkeys are they are regarded as sacred animals to the temple… some sorta guardian to the temple.. so…

- If you’re a Chinese, you can’t crack open their skulls, pour alcohol into it and devour their divine brains.

- If you’re an animal control dude, you can’t shoot them to reduce their population.

- If you’re a caretaker of Penang Botanical Garden, you can’t chase them away.

- If you’re orang asli, you can’t sumpit them and have them for dinner.

- If you’re Paris Hilton, you can’t skin them off their fur and make a fur coat outta it... though this would be the one time I’ll support the fur industry.

=

3. Walk to the end of Kintamani Volcano/Lake Batur viewing area

Demons exist here. From the moment we arrive (which was at the end of Kintamani viewing area as they have the best view here), while we were changing Athalie’s diapers, a demon lady was pestering us to buy t-shirts from her… “3 t-shirts for 50… 3 t-shirts for 50… 3 t-shirts for 50… please help me… please help me… “ she seemed nice (always remember, demons are always deceitful) and after following us for about 5 minutes, I agreed to buy from her when we’re done sightseeing (I was feeling very generous that time… thought I would do some charity to absolve me of some of my sins).

When we continued toward the end, more and more demons just started to appear… each one blocking your path, pestering you to buy their t-shirts, their Harley Davidson models, their key chains, their hair clips, their arts, their children, their grannys, their dogs… and these demons don’t just disappear when you tell them “No thank you” (or when you do a Hail Mary)… they keep stalking you and stalking you and stalking you and would go into a trance like intra-bargaining mode (bargain with oneself…. Ie. 1^st they’ll tell you 3 for 50… then u keep walking.. they tell u… 4 for 50… u keep walking… 5 for 50… u keep walking… 6 for 50…. u keep walking 7 for 50… u keep walking… FREE!!!!)

The highlight of the trip was when we returned to the “3 t-shirts for 50” demon lady. After picking about 3 t-shirts, I paid her IDR 100k… hoping to receive a change of IDR50k when she said, “Another IDR30k… It’s RINGGIT 50”… We went BERSERK!!! WTH!!! RM50 for 3 super thin see-through t-shirts that you would probably only want to see Pamela Anderson wearing while walking out of the pool!!! We insisted to have our full amount returned or IDR 50k. Demon lady tried to hanky panky and tried to 1^st return IDR20k.. IDR30k… that’s when my wife threw a hail Mary, washed her in holy water, nailed a cross on her forehead, shot her with silver bullets and strangle her with a chain of garlic before she relented and returned IDR50k. I have never seen my wife get so mad… was quite the experience…

In conclusion… if you really have to visit the places, just do the following:

1. Jimbaran - just go to any restaurant, picked the best seat (closes) to the beach, order plain water and buy corn from the vendor and enjoy the sunset. Forget about the seafood.

2. Uluwatu Temple – be dressed accordingly.

3. Kintamani Volcano/Lake Batur viewing area – make sure you bring along the necessities