Regardless of how often we meet the members of Clan Chief, we still feel awkward when it comes to interacting with them. Because (as usual) we cannot communicate with the rest of the family except for a measly smattering of Cantonese which we have no confidence in, we find ourself discreetly quiet around the family members or hiding in the Chief's room watching telly or DVDs.
Then the Chief tells us that we're to attend the family dinner last night. A CNY dinner celebration with all the extended family. Oh, and to wear as red as possible.
We'll say it again. STRESS.
In retrospect though we think that there might be a slight plus point in having this communication barrier. Everyone was polite and we let the Clan Chief banter with each other while we focus on whatever dish is put before us by the waitress. And that helped to relieve some of the stress (most of the stress was relieved by occasionally chatting with the Chief).
We can only suppose that if we could converse with the rest of Clan Chief there might be more awkward moments and questions...probably. Or maybe just more requests to pass over the condiments.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Tutti Frutti Yoghurt Bitti
So there we were one night at the RHB Bank at Zaaba depositing our cheque when we saw this shop.
Caught us by surprise it did, for we never knew that a new shop had popped up in Taman Tun and was still open close to 11pm. And it was a store selling just frozen yoghurt by the looks of it. Nothing else but frozen yoghurt and canned drinks.
Ah well curiosity got the better of us and we ended up not only going into the shop for a look-see, but also ended up with a tub of frozen yoghurt of our own. How it came about? Tutti Frutti's approach to selling their yoghurt. We were looking for a menu with prices as to how much a tub would cost etc.
Instead of charging by the tub or by scoops, the store charges by the weight! It's RM7.30 per 100g, and they'll weigh your final product before charging you accordingly (interestingly we'd checked and some blogs/reviews are saying it's RM5.30 per 100g, price hike perhaps?).
So you pour out as much yoghurt as you like, mix 'em up if you want. We came across the following flavours that night: TF Original, Death By Chocolate, Verry Berry Raspberry, Strawberry Fields, Orange Cream and French Vanilla.
Our choice? Strawberry Fields and Orange Cream. Our more favoured flavours among the lot.
After pouring out the yoghurt there was the toppings to consider. And there were considerably many toppings to choose!
But since it was our first visit and we wanted to savour the yoghurt free from other tastes, not to mention we wanted to find out just how much the scant amount of yoghurt we poured costs, we passed on the toppings. On our next visit there with the Chief we will do our yoghurt with toppings (oh yes there will have to be a second visit!).
Our little cup of Strawberry Fields and Orange Cream, costing somewhere RM7.70. And it was good. It wasn't creamy, and so we thought that it wouldn't do anything to set off our lactose intolerance. However, after the yoghurt, and dinner after that, we found ourself meditating at the porcelain throne, so we need to have another go to find out if it was due to earlier dietary habits or it is actually due to the yoghurt. And Chief has yet to try the place out too, so yes we should plan a second visit, this time to really indulge.
Best bit? We thought the place just opened up the last couple of weeks, and when we casually asked the waitress we were told that they were opened for two months now!
Caught us by surprise it did, for we never knew that a new shop had popped up in Taman Tun and was still open close to 11pm. And it was a store selling just frozen yoghurt by the looks of it. Nothing else but frozen yoghurt and canned drinks.Ah well curiosity got the better of us and we ended up not only going into the shop for a look-see, but also ended up with a tub of frozen yoghurt of our own. How it came about? Tutti Frutti's approach to selling their yoghurt. We were looking for a menu with prices as to how much a tub would cost etc.
Instead of charging by the tub or by scoops, the store charges by the weight! It's RM7.30 per 100g, and they'll weigh your final product before charging you accordingly (interestingly we'd checked and some blogs/reviews are saying it's RM5.30 per 100g, price hike perhaps?).
So you pour out as much yoghurt as you like, mix 'em up if you want. We came across the following flavours that night: TF Original, Death By Chocolate, Verry Berry Raspberry, Strawberry Fields, Orange Cream and French Vanilla.Our choice? Strawberry Fields and Orange Cream. Our more favoured flavours among the lot.
After pouring out the yoghurt there was the toppings to consider. And there were considerably many toppings to choose!But since it was our first visit and we wanted to savour the yoghurt free from other tastes, not to mention we wanted to find out just how much the scant amount of yoghurt we poured costs, we passed on the toppings. On our next visit there with the Chief we will do our yoghurt with toppings (oh yes there will have to be a second visit!).
Our little cup of Strawberry Fields and Orange Cream, costing somewhere RM7.70. And it was good. It wasn't creamy, and so we thought that it wouldn't do anything to set off our lactose intolerance. However, after the yoghurt, and dinner after that, we found ourself meditating at the porcelain throne, so we need to have another go to find out if it was due to earlier dietary habits or it is actually due to the yoghurt. And Chief has yet to try the place out too, so yes we should plan a second visit, this time to really indulge.Best bit? We thought the place just opened up the last couple of weeks, and when we casually asked the waitress we were told that they were opened for two months now!
Friday, February 05, 2010
Sibu Solemnizations
Now this is a tad late because we had to take the time to organize and watermark our photos, unlike the recent Sibu photolog which we could immediately upload since we've done the whole thing up via the Comic Touch app.Of course, if we were to photolog the event of our entire trip we would run well over twenty photos, and that's way too much for a photolog! When we were making the photolog we initially included all the activities, but in the end it was too much for a comfortable read.
So our trip to Sibu in the middle of last month was to attend the wedding of our old coursemate and housemate during our uni days, ymlau to his Sarikei Sweetheart. We'd already missed the wedding of our other coursemate and housemate, AnTS, and whatwith us keeping more in touch with ymlau we dare not miss this one.
And it's our first trip to East Malaysia no less! And us being a blur case at times, it was rather a good thing that we didn't get our tickets early, because a) we would have bought tickets thinking his wedding was on 12th March instead of 23rd January; and b) we would have bought tickets to Kuching instead of Sibu.
Firstly, we must comment: the hospitality we received during our entire stay in Sibu was absolutely AMAZING. A couple of days before we were to fly over, we call to check the wedding itinerary with ymlau, and he assures us that he will be there to pick us up from Sibu Airport. If he can't make it, he will have someone come and pick us up, much to our protestations. Between Zinger and ymlau, we never needed to worry about transport to anywhere, and frankly we were rather paiseh to be imposing so much...
Upon our arrival we were greeted by the grinning faces of both our old housemates, AnTS arriving much earlier in the afternoon of the same day from Bintulu. We dropped our stuff at Kingwood Hotel, and were soon on our way to celebrate ymlau's bachelor party.
One thing we learn? ymlau's beer tolerance has indeed gone up over the years. His friends there have trained him very well. Drinks like a fish. Upon his arrival at the karaoke centre he was given a glass filled with three cans of beer to down in one go. And he did!
The amount of beer available!This brings us to a very important lesson. DO NOT HOLD YOUR BACHELOR PARTY ON THE NIGHT BEFORE YOUR WEDDING IF PLENTY OF ALCOHOL IS INVOLVED.
The bachelor party ended by 1am-ish, and we had to wake up by 4.30am to get ready for ymlau to pick up his Sarikei Sweetheart. We got to see Sarawak's first toll booths that led onto a single carraigeway 'highway', and along the way we made nine pit stops for ymlau to get rid of yesterday's alcohol, the queasy way...Poor feller, it certainly was a day for him to remember.
Along the way we got to see large expanse of fields, and at 5am-something in the morning, it was all beautiful with mists rolling about the fields... Should have tried taking a photo during one of those pit stops.
Arrived at Sarikei Sweetheart's place to be welcomed by fireworks, and we got to try the Fuzhou Red Rice Wine noodles, which reminded us of mee suah. After which the hengdai vs zhimui battle commenced. Twenty-three hengdais. Five zhimuis. All that was involved was some declaration of love before the zhimuis would allow the groom access past the staircase.
It's Sibu. Conversation for most of the part was done in Fuzhou or Mandarin.
We're used to it, after living with two Sarawakians for 3 years.
More fireworks greeted us when we arrived back at the groom's place.
After the traditional Chinese ceremony was completed the throng headed to the church to exchange their vows. After the service, ymlau's brother brought us for a heavy seafood lunch.We'd the afternoon off to take a quick power nap from our early morning, then it was around town going all touristy taking photos.
Come evening Zinger picked us all up for the wedding dinner at the Good Happiness Restaurant. Not all coursemates were here because it so happens that another coursemate was also celebrating her wedding on the same day! Some folks thought that they were both getting married to each other!Day after the wedding we went about the rest of the malls, and got ready to leave by evening. Short trip indeed.
To ymlau and his Sarikei Sweetheart, wishing you happiness and joy in your marriage!
Wednesday, February 03, 2010
Two Minutes
As it is we were confronted by a UNICEF fellow recently while on our way to get toiletries. We're a bit more apprehensive of them as compared to credit card promoters, because with credit card promoters they are rather direct in their approach ie "Mister, credit card free for life?", while UNICEF promoters mastered the art of finding some way to compliment you before hitting up their spiel.
Well most times we manage to avoid the promoters, we even remember in one case we were crossing from The Curve to Ikano via the bridge, and when heading back to The Curve via that same bridge we heard someone comment, "Wow! You're still reading while walking!"
Of course we only heard her peripherally, and we weren't intentionally reading as we walked past the UNICEF booth, it just so happens we were reading a rather engaging book and wasn't bothered with our surroundings.
Anyways, there we were stopped by a promoter commenting on our tie and all, and with no physical objects about us to indicate that we were too busy to spare some time and us being a nice guy and incapable of brusqueness, there we were sparing two minutes of our time, or so we were told by the promoter. Even though we have heard it before...twice, on different occasions.
Perhaps we should have just told him, "No thanks," smile and quickly run off. Or, "Sorry, heard it before but no thanks." Maybe lie (but such slander would show on our face!) and say, "Oh we're already donating!"
Maybe not lie. We recall how a WWF promoter followed up the question with a, "Oh that's great! How much are you donating?" Honest person we are, since we are donating to WWF we could answer her without hesitation and continue on our way unmolested.
But here's the thing. Since the promoters have the thankless job of trying to get random people to sign up and commit to a donation, and face quite a fair bit of rejections, and still have to think of nice things to say to get people's attention...would it be better if we nicely rejected them before they start their spiel, or midway after giving them some attention?
Well most times we manage to avoid the promoters, we even remember in one case we were crossing from The Curve to Ikano via the bridge, and when heading back to The Curve via that same bridge we heard someone comment, "Wow! You're still reading while walking!"
Of course we only heard her peripherally, and we weren't intentionally reading as we walked past the UNICEF booth, it just so happens we were reading a rather engaging book and wasn't bothered with our surroundings.
Anyways, there we were stopped by a promoter commenting on our tie and all, and with no physical objects about us to indicate that we were too busy to spare some time and us being a nice guy and incapable of brusqueness, there we were sparing two minutes of our time, or so we were told by the promoter. Even though we have heard it before...twice, on different occasions.
Perhaps we should have just told him, "No thanks," smile and quickly run off. Or, "Sorry, heard it before but no thanks." Maybe lie (but such slander would show on our face!) and say, "Oh we're already donating!"
Maybe not lie. We recall how a WWF promoter followed up the question with a, "Oh that's great! How much are you donating?" Honest person we are, since we are donating to WWF we could answer her without hesitation and continue on our way unmolested.
But here's the thing. Since the promoters have the thankless job of trying to get random people to sign up and commit to a donation, and face quite a fair bit of rejections, and still have to think of nice things to say to get people's attention...would it be better if we nicely rejected them before they start their spiel, or midway after giving them some attention?
Monday, February 01, 2010
TraffEQ
So one fine day the Chief was driving us to Cineleisure (no, still not used to calling it E-At-The-Curve yet) for a movie, and we were coming from somewhere in PJ sometime in the evening...meaning there's the usual traffic snarl. Just so happens, this one time the Chief decides to use the route that we normally take head to Cineleisure, and as it was, our route was a tad jammed up too.
Not too bad by our standards, as we find that we can usually breeze past the initial clog, but what we noted was that both of us had a different route of choice at most points. In our case, it's from Federal Highway, making our way towards Jalan University and cutting across to Section 17 via the junction just before Jaya One. Coming out at the Shell station on the Sprint Highway, we then head into TTDI and up Jalan Datuk Sulaiman and into Mutiara Damansara.
Chief usually takes alternatively the Section 16 way coming out towards Eastin Hotel, heads straight all the way to the junction where Jalan Damansara meets the LDP. From there it's all the way towards 1 Utama and to Cineleisure.
For us, we prefer moving with occasional stops. At least there's a sense of movement.
The Chief prefers a more efficient time-saving route. Which meant going through the hellish bit of traffic where the Jalan Damansara meets LDP and gets congested, where one ends up waiting for at least three cycles of traffic light changes before getting past. But according to the Chief, it's smooth sailing from there on without any more traffic lights until we reach Cineleisure.
Taking our route the Chief suffered with each traffic stop while in TTDI (short tho' the stops were whatwith few cars and smart lights) and one slightly long one at Burhanuddin Helmi. And another slight wait once we reach the junction before Tesco. Each stop we were treated to a look of suffering and a reminder of the time.
And just recently we tried taking the Chief's route...and raged nonstop in the car as we crawled ever so slowly towards the traffic lights at Jalan Damansara/LDP. Even soothing music did not help calm us down as we were, well, rushing to make it to Citibank to drop our cheque before 4pm (and mind you it was already 3.45pm when we got stuck in that snarl). Impatience coupled with a bit of aggressive driving helped make sure that no stray cars decide to cut into our lane and slow us down, and by stroke of luck we managed to get to Citibank by just past 4pm and hand in our cheque to the officer who was collecting the cheques from the machine at that moment.
Since we handed it straight to the officer and were not able to slot it in the machine first, we didn't get a receipt. If we did slot it in the machine, then they would have recorded it as a late payment. Oh well better no receipt than pay late charges.
Still, somehow we don't figure the stress from all that traffic is worth it!
Oh, and probably one day both the Chief and us will put to the test which way is faster.
Not too bad by our standards, as we find that we can usually breeze past the initial clog, but what we noted was that both of us had a different route of choice at most points. In our case, it's from Federal Highway, making our way towards Jalan University and cutting across to Section 17 via the junction just before Jaya One. Coming out at the Shell station on the Sprint Highway, we then head into TTDI and up Jalan Datuk Sulaiman and into Mutiara Damansara.
Chief usually takes alternatively the Section 16 way coming out towards Eastin Hotel, heads straight all the way to the junction where Jalan Damansara meets the LDP. From there it's all the way towards 1 Utama and to Cineleisure.
For us, we prefer moving with occasional stops. At least there's a sense of movement.
The Chief prefers a more efficient time-saving route. Which meant going through the hellish bit of traffic where the Jalan Damansara meets LDP and gets congested, where one ends up waiting for at least three cycles of traffic light changes before getting past. But according to the Chief, it's smooth sailing from there on without any more traffic lights until we reach Cineleisure.
Taking our route the Chief suffered with each traffic stop while in TTDI (short tho' the stops were whatwith few cars and smart lights) and one slightly long one at Burhanuddin Helmi. And another slight wait once we reach the junction before Tesco. Each stop we were treated to a look of suffering and a reminder of the time.
And just recently we tried taking the Chief's route...and raged nonstop in the car as we crawled ever so slowly towards the traffic lights at Jalan Damansara/LDP. Even soothing music did not help calm us down as we were, well, rushing to make it to Citibank to drop our cheque before 4pm (and mind you it was already 3.45pm when we got stuck in that snarl). Impatience coupled with a bit of aggressive driving helped make sure that no stray cars decide to cut into our lane and slow us down, and by stroke of luck we managed to get to Citibank by just past 4pm and hand in our cheque to the officer who was collecting the cheques from the machine at that moment.
Since we handed it straight to the officer and were not able to slot it in the machine first, we didn't get a receipt. If we did slot it in the machine, then they would have recorded it as a late payment. Oh well better no receipt than pay late charges.
Still, somehow we don't figure the stress from all that traffic is worth it!
Oh, and probably one day both the Chief and us will put to the test which way is faster.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)