Japanese Speech Contest - Penang Preliminary

This year I joined the contest together with my junior, Patrick. Even though the atmosphere was a bit tense before the contest, his unusual way of talking and funny gestures made me a bit relax. In addition, I met a few MMU juniors during the contest. They were there to support Patrick.

Gan-senpai, omedetou!

Congratulations Kelly! You are finally an official postgraduate at Todai. Hopefully, I will able to save enough dollars and cents to see you before you graduate :)

SS2 Murni

SS2 Murni is a very popular yumcha place around the area. According to a frequent customer there, everything there is nice. They do not have menus, but there's a lot of varieties, from Chinese, Mamak, Malay to Western. Based on our taste buds, there's pork inside the food. Thus, we thinked that it's not Halal.

One of the famous dish there is Claypot Lo Xu Fen (direct translation - Claypot Mee Tikus?). Mee Raja, though the appearance is not that attractive, it's delicious (RM7).

The fruit juice there is nice. They have 2 versions for the juice. Let's say Mango juice, they have the normal and the special one. The price difference is only RM1. But, there's a lot of difference in the ingredients, quantity and taste. Normal mango juice, of course, the usual ones (RM4). Mango juice special - they mixed with lychee juice, with lychee, watermelon and nata de coco inside (RM5).

Claypot Lo Xu Fen

Mango Juice Special

Mee Raja

DSU Gathering

It's been a long time since almost all the DSU Interns (year 2005) gathered. YS is finally back in Malaysia. It's nice to meet up old friends and catch up with old times.

Team Dinner @ La Bodega

La Bodega is an authentic Spanish Tapas Bar in Pavilion. Last Friday, my team had our team dinner there. The first impression on the menu is - too many pages, many unknown dishes and the list of drinks is more than food. The food there is really nice! But, with a price. A simple, normal juice can easily cost more than RM10.

Tiramisu

Goat Cheese
Lamb
Snails
Team Photo

Trip to Singapore

This is a very belated post of my recent visit to Singapore a few weeks ago.

Must-go places in Singapore:

Clark Quay
A very happening place at night. It is situated beside the river. There is a lot of restaurants and pubs by the river side.

River side view of Clark Quay
Bugis Junction
A shopping complex connected to the Bugis MRT. In the food court, there is a variety of food. The Korean fried chicken there is nice. It’s a very big slice of fried chicken, of the similar outlook as the famous Taiwan fried chicken. Gelato is a term used to Italian ice-cream. Comparing this and Leka Leka, this is much much more nicer.

Vivo City

Singapore Flyer Something like Eye of Malaysia. I have never been to Eye of Malaysia, so no comments on which is better.

View of Singapore City from the Capsule

Sentosa Island
The underwater world is rather small. But I sure like the glass over.

Underwater World @ Sentosa
Yummy places in Singapore:

Shokudo
Japanese food restaurant with a lot of branches around Singapore. It is serving Japanese style western food. There is a lot of choices for spaghetti. For every type of spaghetti sauce, it has its own menu.

TCC
A western food restaurant. Something like Secret Recipe but better and more expensive. But, their specialty is not in cakes. The spaghetti is nice. For those who are able to take high caffeine, the drink called “Morning Dew” is recommended. It is very fragrance.

Korean food @ Food Republic, Vivo City
They have the typical Korean restaurant menu there. However, the price is considerably cheap for its quality and amount. I was able to have a taste of long lost Kimchi (more to Seoul type). The tofu served in the songdubu supu (tofu soup) is really soft and fresh. However, the soup is not spicy enough. The beef slice rice is quite nice as well. It reminded me of the one I used to have in one of the cafeteria in Dongseo University.

McDonald
They have a series of ice blended drinks (eg: ice-blended mocha) which is not available in Malaysia. It’s nice, the taste can match up to Starbucks/ Coffee Bean and it’s available @ around 5 SGD.

KFC
The original recipe here is crunchier. As for the mashed potatoes, the potato is smoother and finer, but the sauce seems to be lacked of spices.

Original Recipe - very crunchy

Imperial Treasure Restaurant

One word is more than enough to describe the food here, “delicious”! The price is reasonable. The portion is huge. According to my friend TG, the “xiao long bau” here is even better than Dragon-i. I couldn’t compare since I have never being to Dragon-i. But, the “xiao long bau” is indeed nice!

Last but not least,

Meeting up old friends @ Singapore

p/s: the alignment seems to go out of control -_-

Maylin's Wedding

Maylin and Kah Heng just got married last Saturday! Congratulations!

The beautiful bride in the middle.

Old classmates

Ichiban Boshi

As the name implies, it is a Japanese restaurant. I am not sure if they have many branches around Malaysia, but the shop which I have visited is in Pavilion. There is many variety for sushi and the portion is a lot. Of course, it is a bit pricy than usual. I ordered Chicken Donkatsu @ RM13.90, excluding tax and service charge. The portion is huge, but the chicken is a bit dry. My colleague ordered another dish and his was yummy. Overall, it's worth trying out.

p/s: They have sushi for sell for take-away as well (in front of the shop). It's much cheaper. For sushi with egg, it is only RM0.50/ RM0.70.

Kampung Baru Nasi Lemak

Kampung Baru is a Malay village right inside of KL city very near to KLCC. But, what I didn't know is, this place is famous for its "nasi lemak". There are 2 famous stalls here - commonly know as the plate and the "bungkus"(packed) one. The plate one is served like the economy rice. However, the "bungkus" one is served in the traditonal triangle packaging, wrap up with newspaper and banana leaves. I went to both places for dinner before. Personally, I prefer the "bungkus" one. In addition, it is cheaper as well (RM0.70 for each pack, but the portion is not much). I took 3 packets - RM2.10. You can take some other side dishes, such as curry chicken. Of course, there will be extra charges.

The plate stall

Afternoon Shift

It has been almost 2 weeks since I started off with my afternoon shift. At first, I was a bit sleepy at night as I haven’t fully adjusted my normal schedule. There are several pros and cons for working on such odd hours.

Pros:
- Less traffic -> save time and petrol
- Cheaper lunch – economy rice at RM3.00-RM3.50 for 2 dishes (1 meat, 1 vege) at Damansara
- Can wake up late in the morning (complete 8 hours sleep)
- Beautiful view of KLCC at night

Cons:
- Other than working hours, most of the time alone on weekdays
- Less time to spend after work
- Expensive dinner at Pavilion
- It’s very dark and quiet after work

Niuzesui

Niuzesui is a shopping area with a lot of shoplots. It is located in Damansara, somewhere near the Putra LRT service station at Kelana Jaya. My friend told me that there's always a serious traffic jam around the area. However, everything is smooth and quiet when I went there last Sunday. As you reach, the first thing that you will see are the trees with beautiful lights.
Most of the shoplots there are still vacant and there aren't many visitors. There's a few restaurants at the front row. Good place for yum cha as there's hardly any people there.

Interesting Places

In my recent exploration, below are some interesting places in KL/Damansara:

Coliseum. The first western food restaurant in KL. Inside the restaurant, there's this old KL feel.

Dim sum shop @ Damansara Uptown. There's a lot of people in the morning. The fried food is not bad, but the steam ones is not tha nice.

Zhi De Shi @1U, Old Wing. This seafood noodle, RM14+ but a lot of ingredients inside. Quite a big portion served.
Rainforest @ 1u. Reminded of Suntech City in S'pore.
A very nice petshop @ Ikano Power Center. The aquariums there are really nice. You will be able to see soft corus there.

Gatherings

Recently, I have a number of gatherings. The meeting with Sok Teng at Ikea was an enjoyable one. It's the first time I had a meal in Ikea's foodcourt. There's a lot of people. Queing up to buy food was a headache. But, I like the design of the trolley for the food. (p/s: the food in the foodcourt is not that nice, but worth trying)

After lunch, we took a walk around Ikea. It was fun playing with the soft toys at the "playground" (There's one section in Ikea selling kids' furniture, soft toys and accessories. It turned out to be a playground for the kids.

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Gathering with my coursemates - Daniel, Jin and Sylvia. It was a really normal gathering, with a dinner and some shopping. As it was a Sunday night and most of us need to work on the next day, it's better to keep it short. Daniel looks the same, still on the cap. As usual, Sylvia grabbed a book from the bookstore. Jin, always order a lot of food.

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Queena's birthday is around the corner. So, we had an early celebration for her at Seoul Garden, Gurney Plaza. As usual, my transport manager Huey Sze drove me there. In the car, she kept me updated with the latest updates in my ex-company. After we fetched Queena along the way, there's even more updates. Haha.. In Seoul Garden, my ex-colleagues kept on stuffing me with food.

In addition, my mentee "showed" us her new partner as well. *Hem hem...* My dear ex-requestor, Jason was also there. It was a crazy shopping day. I bought a number of new clothes. I also met JoAnn, another of my ex-colleague in Giordano.

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Happenings of the Week

This week is a happening one.

Almost every evening, around 5pm, there will be a heavy rain. It has been like this since last week. From the glass of my office, I can see very clearly - the sky becomes cloudy, raindrops pouring down from the sky, getting more and more heavy and mist covering KLCC. These scenes, reminded me of the typical scenes in those end-of-the-world movies.
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Monday night, I met up with Andy whom I haven't seen for more than 2 years. He's down to KL for interviews. It's nice talking to an "old" friend again. There're so many things that we wanted to talk about, but we have less than 2 hours.
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Thursday night, it's the first time I attended my company's monthly birthday celebration. It's nothing grand, we only have 2 cakes, approximately 6kg in total. Everyone in the office gathered and sang b'day songs. It was around 4pm at that time, I feel so full after eating it.

Suddenly, Vicky came out with a movie plan at Pavilion. My poor passenger, Kit need to sacrifice himself by volunteering to take the LRT back. Vicky and I decided to award him with something on his birthday for his "good service". On the same day, I received many shocking news and discovered a very short route from my company to KLCC, thanks to Vicky. The movie of Indiana Jones at GSC, Pavilion was nice. The cinema was almost empty. Vicky and I were talking out loud, commenting on the scenes and actions during the movie, but it's ok. Most of the customers were taking the couple seats. For the normal seating, other than us, only 2 people were occupying them.

We enjoyed our dinner/ supper at KFC after the movie. The environment was really great. It was 9+pm, and there's hardly any customers there.

p/s: Getting lost in Pavilion can really make your legs pain
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Today I was busy doing my work and the others were already gone when I finished them. Thus, I asked my lunchmate to "tapao" for me. I waited till 1pm, expecting them to come back, but no signs of them. I waited again, thinking that they maybe a bit late, but after half an hour, still didn't see them. It was already 2pm, where have they gone ... I was extremely. Anil came back with a black face, telling me that food serving at the restaurant was very slow. *Ouch*

My team meeting ended at 5.40pm. It was already jam at that time. Kit suggested us to have dinner first and then go back later to avoid the jam. Anil joined us for the meal at Food Republic. The Pan Mee, totally not recommended. The soup was very oily. I felt ill after taking it. Now, my tummy is still unable to digest it properly :(
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Weekends @ KL

Last Saturday, I went shopping with my housemate in the daytime to get some groceries and a small plastic table. Tables nowadays sure are expensive. Around 5 years ago, I can this small table at around RM45. But now, it's around RM70! Wow... but it's 2 different places.

My brother came down on Sunday to join me for a bookfair at KL Convention Center. It's the 3rd Chinese Overseas Bookfair organized by Popular Bookstore. The bookfair is basically divided into half. One for English books, CDs and stationaries. While, another portion is for Chinese books. There are many interesting books there, especially the Chinese section. There're Chinese paintings' printouts for sale as well. Some of them are really nice. We were both amazed by the fine paintings. Even from the printouts, we could feel that the paintings are alive.

Just Connected!

Just a week disconnected, I feel like I am really out of this world. I wanted to do some CBTs (Computer-based Trainings) online, but unable to do so. I wanted to chat with my friends via messenger, but unable to do so. After deep considerations, I decided to subscribe the cheapest package of Izzi – wireless broadband provider, the coverage is only Klang Valley. Unlike the usual line connection, wireless is rather unstable. But, I didn’t face problems such as connect and disconnect. The speed is fluctuating and sometimes, it’s a bit slow for downloads.

After moving here for almost a week, I finally get use to the life here. For dinner, sometimes I go tapao or eat out with my housemate.

After my official 1 week training, I was thrown to do projects, departmental training and doing CBTs. Compared to other teams; my team is covering a wide scope. I have being reading a lot, yes, a lot! At times I feel like my eyes are going to pop out and my brain is definitely very exhausted. Not to mention, meetings. Yes, my team has a lot of meetings. But not time wasting meetings, they’re all very challenging.

The relationship between the newbies here are quite good. Vicky always deliver me a bottle of drink (can get all you want from the fridge), hoping to have a chat with me. But, she's always frighten by the scary atmosphere near my cubicle. The Anil/Kit combination is really funny. They 2 always tease each other. Playboy Faiz is always flowery with his words. Many more fun people in there.

Below are some of the photos taken recently:

Chulan Tower, my office is at one of the floors.

Newly open, not nice shabu-shabu shop at 1U. Nice setting though, but taste wise...

New Room

Hi girls and guys,

I have moved! Last weekends was a busy one - moving and cleaning. Currently I am considering several broadband packages to be installed, still not connected for the time being :( I have 3 housemates - 1 I haven't seen him so far. Parking lot - argh... another headache~

Last Post Before Moving

This is my last post before I move to my new place at Tropicana @ Damansara. Currently there's no internet access there. It will take some time from applying to installing the broadband (I haven't apply yet). Below is a picture taken from my office yesterday morning, a beautiful view of KLCC. I wonder how it looks like at night.

Weekend of Xploration

Last weekend, I went to Banting alone to visit my grandaunt (supposed to visit her with my bro). The whole trip took slightly more than an hour. I was not very sure on the way there, just follow the signboards along the way. Approximately 30 minutes for PJ-Cyberjaya and another 30 minutes for Cyberjaya-Banting. It always nice driving in Cyberjaya, because there's hardly any cars on the road.

Banting is a small town, near to Port Dickson. But, the things there are cheap. Plastic chair, in PJ selling at RM23; Banting, only RM16.80. Plastic rubbish bin, PJ selling at RM4.80; Banting, only RM2! One of the other reason why I like going to Banting is because of the fresh and cheap local fruits. It resembles a bit of Lorong Kulit.

Of course, I visited my bro on the way back to PJ. He only accompanied me for lunch at Dengkil as he's busy preparing for the coming final exams.

Happy Mother's Day to mummy! Hope she likes our special photo :D

1st Week of Work

Finally, my training have reached to an end. From the 3rd day onwards, I will be car pooling with my new colleague, Kit who's staying around the area. I no longer need to walk around KL with the heavy bag ^^ My energy has again regained.

This week is quite relaxing. The training starts at 9am but we're there before 8am to enjoy the free beverages and cookies at the rest place. The seniors normally bring some fried noodles or nasi lemak to the office for breakfast. Nowadays, I walk to lunch with my colleagues instead of driving. I normally hang out with 2 other girls and around 3-5 guys for lunch. So far, my lunch spots are Cosway, UOA and Pavilion food court. Sometimes I sure miss my ex-colleagues, we used to drive out for lunch. I just noticed that I can have a nice view of KLCC from my office. I hope that it looks nice at night.

Next week, we'll begin on a more detailed training based on our job scope. I wonder how it will turned out to be...