Adrian’s Blog

As i am into digital sharing photo, i will upload my Sabah trip with my family during Feb 2006. Enjoy the photo.. As usual, click link below

Sabah Photo

Here i am, came back from Kuching not even a week and i am now at Equotorial Hotel in Cameron Highland. Sitting warmly infront of firewood place. Ahh, so relaxing. Today is the second day i am here. Raining non stop in Cameron. On and off la to be precisely. EQ Hotel sounds expensive? Nah, i am not rich la. One of my friend got it free here.
The first day, we stay in Hotel Rainbow. Rm160 for 3 person. So only Rm55 each. Budget mah. But thumbs up for the room there. Recommended place. One of the guest told us she have been living there for 8 years. Maybe she mean she’s here on yearly basis la. Let me see.. what i did there.

Lets start from driving there.
My housemate, driving,me and one of my fren too. Started journey at 10am. Use old road as it’s quite congested in highway. Stop at Bidor at 2pm for lunch. The duck drumstick herbal soup is heaven made. Nice! Highly recommended for a stopover lunch. But be warn, tonnes of ppl and u will likely ended up waiting for place to sit for 15m and anothe 30m when ur lunch arrive at ur table. Then the journey continue..

Day 1 (20/10/06)
Stopover at Lata Iskandar waterfall. No DSLR camera. My sony T5 couldn’t do slow shutter speed. A 1/10 sec will be nice. Wasted, the waterfall looks like freezing when capture the photo. Thumbs down.Reach our destination about 5pm at Brinchang, Cameron. If i am not mistaken, it is 1500m above sea level. Wheather there is cold. But in Brinchang town, dun expect refreshing air. Full of diesel buses and lorries. Hunted for hotel and Hotel Rainbow is selected base on cleaniness, enviroment, bill and classy feel. After bathe, went out for dinner. Whatelse? With the cold wheather, steamboat is our perfect choise. Food there ‘makanable’ la. Then, take a walk at Pasar Malam and around Brinchang Town. Bought big juicy sweet strawberry. Very nice indeed. Then went back hotel relax and slept at 11pm.
Day 2
Rise early at 7am. Drive to tea farm and have our so called english breakfast. Ordered tea, scones,scottish short bread and cookies. Scone is like 2 buns, a little strawberry jam, cream and butter. Take a look in my friendster photo. Rather expensive. What to do, english breakfast. So expect to fork out english price as well. The enviroment there? Splendid, cold and nice. Then we drive up half way to Mt. Brinchang but got to come down as it is near 11:15am. Need to check out before 12pm.
Hunt for a decent lunch. Saw a English smokehouse. Nice scenery and cosy place. Take a peep at the main course. Cost Rm78. Forget it! Futhermore, it’s for patron only.
Next, we took our lunch at Rossette cafe. Was raining heavily that time. Super cold. Supprisingly, the food there is highly recommended. Curry mee. We even bought bread to eat with the remaining curry. Rossette is located at Tanah Rata.
About 2pm, my friend who have the free room called me. Telling us he have reached. So went EQ Hotel and and put all our luggage there. Another supprise here. A 5 star hotel but the room is so so aje. Even Rainbow Hotel room is much better. Only the EQ lobby is huge and nice. Then my friend joined us and off we went Strawberry Farm. A self picking strawberry farm. Choose all those big firm nice red juicy strawberry. So much of strawberry there. Bought a kg there. Cost us Rm30. Check it out the photo at friendster.
Went back hotel, bath and went out dinner. Wanted to eat rice but too crowded. Have to wait very long. Ended up in a mamak near hotel Rainbow. Sri Sentosa. You have been warned. The food there is SUPER TASTELESS. Enter with your own risk. Later went to pasar malam. Let me see.. Recommendation? Sweet Corn. Though it cost Rm3 a stick, it’s super sweet. No butter or salt needed at all. A must try.
Now in EQ lobby. The firewood already finish burning. It’s getting freaking cold. Damn. Well, tomorrow will back to Subang.

Day 3

Unfortunately, the hotel room is not able to fit us 4 person. So we went down hill at 12am. The journey down Cameron hill is rather dangerous, dark and a little scarly. Ghost came into our thoughts. U know, when u are driving so dark, sharp corner, cold, misty, rainforest everywhere.. We use the old road down hill as it’s nearer. I must admit that i am little scared. U got to negociate the sharp corner well. Anyway, my fren did it savely. Then reach toll and switch driver. Yup, i drove all the way back to Subang. Alas, we reached at freaking 4am. That is mad! Anyway, it’s a good experience.

Well, that’s all for my Cameron trip. Hope you enjoy reading this blog. Dun forget to check out nice photo. Just click link below and enjoy!

Cameron Highland Photo

The Curious Incident of the Dog in The Night Time. This is the book I am reading now. Actually I read this book before back in 2004. Suddenly I am into books again.

I read quite a lot back in 2004 and 2005. But then, I move to light reading like magazine. Use to review the book that I have read. Back in 2004 and 2005, I still haven’t started blog. Otherwise can read back my book reviews.

Here is some of the list of the books that I have read.

Dan Brown – Da Vinci Code, Angel&Demon, Digital Fortress and Deception Point.

Amy Tan – The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, The Moon Lady, The Hundred Secret Senses and the Bonesetter’s daughter.

Adeline Yen Mah – Falling Leaves Returns to their Roots, Chinese Cinderella and Watching the Tree Catch the Hare.

Mitch Albom – The Five People You Meet In Heaven and Tuesdays with Morrie

There is more of course like Picasso, My Grandfather by Marina Picasso, The God of Small Thing by Arundhati Roy and many more which I couldn’t clearly remembered.

The thing is it’s rather expensive hobbies to read in Malaysia. All those nice and latest book are not available in our local library. I often pay a visit to MBSJ library back in 2004. Some of the book there are a decade years old. Even the latest book they offer is 3 years old. No joke. A typical book itself cost about Rm35. And you could finish it in a day or two if you are addicted. If one month you can read more than 10 books, the sums will come up to…..you got the idea.

Back to the book, Christopher Boone, the autistic 15-year-old narrator of this novel, relaxes by groaning and doing math problems in his head, eats red-but not yellow or brown-foods and screams when he is touched. 4 yellow cars in a row made it a Black Day, which is a day when he don’t speak to anyone and sit on his own reading books and don’t eat his lunch and Take No Risks while 4 or more red car equal to Super Good Days. He is the type of logical thinking kids and love prime number. He also know the capital of every country well in his head. One day, Christopher found out that his neighborhood dog, Wellington was murdered. The dog was pierce by a garden fork. He set to find out who kill Wellington using his logical thinking brain.

I personally think that this book is wonderful and strange. A different point of view from a strange boy. A highly recommended from me. 

9th October 2006

9:30am - Our host sister drove us out to Kuching Town. Today is free and easy day. Visited Fort Margarita. A poorly maintain fort. Then we go to loads of souvenier shops. Ended up buying a collar shirt for my dad and a unique cat art design T-shirt for myself. For my mum, perharps if there is time tomorrow, our host mum will drive us to bird nest shop. Will buy bird nest for her.

12:00pm - Nothing much. Just jalan jalan shopping la. Sarawak shopping complex is err.. sorts of like Sabah type. Nothing to wow about. We did went to Waterfront. Kuching famous river cruise here. Just jalan jalan around that area.

7:30pm - After a super long time spending walking here and there in that area, our host came to fetch us for dinner. Oh, did i mention she’s working today? That is why she can’t join us today. Btw, she is a good host.

10.00pm - Reach home, took a bathe and now blogging. Ready to sleep liau. Tomorrow will be our last day trip at Kuching, Sarawak. Our flight back to KL is 6:30pm.

10th October 2006

9:30am - Our host mum cook a delious breakfast for us. Then she drove us to buy souvenier. Later we went to bird nest shop. Bought bird nest for mum. It cost me Rm190. Have lunch and head home.

4:15pm - Reach Kuching airport. Board 6:30pm flight back to KL. Now inside the plane. Still another 1hour 30 minute before touch down.

Overall, my experience visiting Kuching is quite fascinating. Visited most of the place. The best is still Sarawak Cultural Village. Eat quite a lot while in Sarawak. Hmm, gotta go on diet when i am back in KL. I guess that’s all for my Sarawak blog.

Check out my photo at the link below

Kuching Trip Photo

8th October 2006

8.00am - Reach Muara Tebas temple. According to our host, the temple was build for the fisherman to pray on their good catching as well as good wheather. This temple was build on top of a small mountain. Nothing much here.

10.30am - Sarawak Cultural Village. Entrance fees is Rm45. Worth? For me "Yes, on my every single penny". SCV potrays "live" of the state’s rich cultural diversity in one single place. Waited for their cultural show at 11.00am. There is different dancing for each tribe, namely Iban, Bidayuh, Penan, Orang Ulu and Melanau. After the cultural and tradisional show, we went to their each respective tribe home aka Sarawak longhouse. It’s on the foothill of the legendary Mount Santubong. There is 7 ethnic houses including Malay and Chinese. Took loads of photo here. None of the photo i shot here worth complement.

4.30pm - After a super tiring day at SCV, again we are back at our host house. Wanted to take a break and bath. Now after bath and feel so refreshing while lying on the bed. Ahhh…so nice resting after a tiring yet knowledgeable trip. Want to take a cat nap liau.

7.30pm - Dinner time. I find Sarawak Mee Kolok the best. Other than that are so so only. Take a walk at their street sales. Sorts of like Melaka Bunga Raya. End up buying a medium size backpack. Wanted to buy long ago liau. Even this trip i borrowed backpack from one of my collegue. Furthermore after discount only cost Rm25. Took some photo of de funfair nearby too.

11.30pm - Resting on my room now while blogging. Found out the backpack i bought dun have much compartment. The material use are so thin inside. Compared to the one my collegue borrowed me is like comparing a Nike with Niki or Adidas with Adidos. So close but yet so far. Chinese said "Yi fen chian, yi fen huok". One cent money, one cent of goods. Tomorrow will be free and easy. Our host are working. Will go to Kuching town ourself to explore. Guess that’s all for my day 2 blogging.

7th Oct 2006

10:45am - Well, here i am heading to cat town. Now patiently seating in airplane. Damn bored in the plane. Nothing to do so thinking of writing my first blog high above the sky. The journey will take about 1hour 45minute. There is an hour more before touch down.

12:40pm - Meet with one of my collegue friend here. She will be our host for our stay here. Reach our destination at Kuching Muzeum. A cat muzeum indeed. Erm, nothing much in this muzeum. Took a few photo but found only one photo that are worth displaying. It’s a bunch of small colourful cat that are being displayed for sales.

3.00pm - Our second destination is another Sarawak muzeum. Entology Muzeum. There’s a lots type of thing in display. Ranging from antique to animals. Dissapointed by the rules there. No camera allowed. One thing good about Sarawak muzeum. No entrance fees.

4:00pm - Sunday Market. Erm, sorts of like pasar malam. The only different is this market start from Saturday 3pm and last till Sunday noon! Bought a few Sarawak shirt for my collegues back in Selangor. Jalan-jalan and makan makan la.

7.00pm - Reach our host home. A very big house i must say. Now, just after a nice cool bath. Lying on the bed while writing this blog. 

9.00pm - Went out to jalan jalan at night. Sight seing Tabuan area. Then supper. After a heavy supper, went for a walk at Taman Sahabat. A small scale of Malaysia and China garden.

11.00 pm - Now on the bed again. A very tiring day indeed. Netherless i have my fun time today. Tomorrow will go to cultural village. They said it’s a long house with tradisional Iban and Bidayuh dancing. Must go to bed now. Tomorrow gotta rise at 6:30am.   

Booked Air Asia flight to Kuching, Sarawak on this coming Sat, 7/10. It was a short plan and voila, another 3days and i will be off to Cat town. So far, tak pernah jejak my leg to this cat town. Went to Sabah last Feb. Hope it’s as nice as land of Borneo. Will be going there with 3 of my collegue. Duration will be 4D3N.

I am now at No Black Tie. Waiting for the live jazz performance to start. They have plenty of house pour in the menu as well as wisky, red/white wine, coktail, beer etc. Non alcohol including fruit juice, cofee etc. You can even have your dinner here as well. They serve japanese n local. Price wise, a little steep though.
The enviroment here is cosy.Nicely build with wood element. Music they play? Of course jazz. Today they play mostly cuban jazz. Some are a decade old while some more towards modern type. I prefer smooth jazz.
Live performance by local player. There is no foreign performer here according to Reena, a friendly part time lady. Nice personality she have.
Now enjoying jazz music flushing my stomach with a cool Heineken. With the cool air cond, jazz, dim and peaceful place, what else can i demand anymore..
Ok, wanna fully enjoy the cuban jazz now b4 the live performance. Will post this blog tomorrow. Using 9300i to write this blog now. Reporting out

Continue blogging at Starbuck Genting now. Guess what? They played jazz here too. hehe. after battling with uncle lim and lose to him a few dimes. Damn ! Alright, that all.