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Tag: Travel

First Time Visit To Kampar & UTAR – Little Town Of Perak

First Time Visit To Kampar – Little Town Of Perak – I went to Kampar, Perak yesterday! Kampar is a little town in Perak, far away from the big city but famous among Malaysian students as there locates a few higher institution – UTAR & KTAR. I have many friends who are studying at there but I’ve not been there before. I went to there with my girlfriend to check out some hostel room as she’s moving there to study.

It’s about 1 hour 45 minutes drive from Kuala Lumpur and the place is kinda rural. The first place I came across is the little town of Tapah before reaching Kampar. Kampar is very peaceful, there’s many hill and lake, and a lot of residential terrace houses which serve as student accommodation.

Nothing much, you can see coffee shops, rows of shoplots, cyber cafes, a tall hotel – Grand Kampar Hotel, Tesco, railway track and that’s all I guess. Haven’t explore much yet. UTAR is cool, the campus itself is big and has a modern squarish design. Unfortunately, the landscape doesn’t seems being maintained well. But afterall, it seems to be a good designed campus, just located at a wrong location. It should be something close to the city in my opinion.

The student accommodation is one special thing. Each row of terrace houses is named according top institution in the world like Harvard, Cambridge, Imperial and so on. And don’t be surprise that there’s 20 student living under one roof. That’s so, dense! And bicycles are everywhere.

Chee Pherng, Boon Hooi, Me and Peng Sheng in front of UTAR signage!

Met some high school friends there, tour a bit of the campus and went back home. Will be visiting there again, perhaps explore some cool spot. I have found a nice sunset shooting spot at there, will be back with a tripod and a proper camera! =)

September 3, 2012
Hong Kong: Old-School Bing Sutt Starbucks Coffee @ Central

Hong Kong: Old School Starbucks Coffee @ Central – One of the coolest place in Hong Kong to me is the old-school style designed Starbucks Coffee outlet located at Central area. I went there last year, and it was in one of my visiting list. What’s so special about this Starbucks Coffee outlet is the old-school Hong Kong coffee house design which local called it 冰室 (Bing Sutt).

This is a good blend of western coffee in to local Hong Kong culture. Although, the original Bing Sutt (Hong Kong’s kopitiam) design was not so dim, yet it brings out a warm, relaxing and mysterious feeling in the cafe.

It was full of people. It’s an attraction in my opinion and it has a unique Starbucks Coffee design. Mom went to shopping around Central area and me, dad and brother were enjoying a hot brew of coffee here.

It’s a little bit hard to spot out at Central area as you have to turn into a street and walk up a flight of stairs. Anyway, I’ve included a map below for your reference. =)

Starbucks Coffee (Bing Sutt design), Central

Floor M2, Baskerville House,

13 Duddell Street, , Central

Hong Kong

Telephone: +852-25235685

[googlemaps https://maps.google.com.my/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=215278323465761497274.0004b80a852f7e1d51867&gl=my&hl=en&ie=UTF8&t=m&ll=22.280236,114.156623&spn=0.002383,0.003433&z=18&iwloc=0004c7ac835b58c0f2a56&output=embed&w=640&h=480]

August 20, 2012
Hong Kong: Awesome Night View From The Peak

Hong Kong: Awesome Night View From The Peak – Something that I’ve stopped posting for quite some times and that’s my trip to China – Hong Kong last year. Suddenly remembered that I still have quite many thing about my travel to China to share, so I quickly sit in front of my computer and start looking for photos before I forget about it.

One of the nice experience in Hong Kong was heading to The Peak at night to check out the Hong Kong night view. I tell you, queuing up for the tram at night is a disaster, it could take you more than an hour for it as it’s a long queue, everyday! You can take the bus, if you know how to, or like us, we took the haggling cab waiting by the roadside. The cab charges 4 of us for HK$40 which I think pretty reasonable after some negotiation, as it brings us all the way up, and cutting all the long queue.

The temperature up there was superb, chilly, windy, cold. It’s very happenings up there, lots of people were taking photos of the spectacular view of Hong Kong from top. It’s just so awesome. At 8pm every night, there’s the light show, it’s weird that you see the light but you can’t hear any music like you can hear at the Avenue Of Star. Nevertheless, it’s worth to visit The Peak at night. I’ve been there in the morning before.

Click here to read more about my China Trip.

August 19, 2012
Malacca: Nadeje Cafe Mille Crepe Cake
Malacca: Nadeje Cafe Crepe Cake – There’s one thing that is very famous in Malacca, not the Chicken Rice Ball, not the Cendul, not a typical local food but it’s a kind of desserts, it’s layered mille crepe cake (thousand layer cake 千层蛋糕). Malacca must be familiar with this name – Nadeje, a famous cafe that makes good crepe cake and has a variety of flavours of them.

Every one was talking about it previously on Facebook, on Twitter and so here I am to check it out the place and of course, the crepe cake. There’s 3 outlets in Malacca, one in Melaka Raya, one in Dataran Pahlawan and the latest is at Jaya 99. We went to the most original outlet and that’s at Melaka Raya. It was 5.30pm and not surprise, people were waiting outside to be seated. It’s full house! We waited for like 20 minutes only then we got place to sit.

The interior decoration of the cafe is pretty cool and in a sense of contemporary design.

Looking at the menu, there’s many food for you to eat like pasta, chicken chops and more, but our main purpose of the visit was the crepe cakes! We ordered the crepe cake first at the counter upon entering and it costs RM9.50/slice. There’s many choices for you to pick and we picked 4 to try out. They are:
- Mango Crepe Cake
- Tiramisu Crepe Cake
- Chocolate Crepe Cake
- Original Crepe Cake
They all looked very pretty. The first few taste of them were good, they were sweet, but not overly sweet, and a strong essence of milk can be felt on our taste bud. It was nice, but eating more of them started to make me feel bored of it, it’s just too much of milk. Maybe, maybe it’s not really my favourite thing, or maybe it’s just too much, but I just felt enough of it after eating half. Some says it’s over-rated, some says it’s good,well, I’ll say, it’s good, BUT, it’s my first time eating crepe cake, so I can’t judge whether it’s the best or not. What do you think?

One more thing, original and chocolate are awesome.

Nadeje Cake House

G-23,25 & 27,
Jalan PM4, Plaza Mahkota,
75000 Malacca

Telephone: +606-2838750

Website: http://www.nadeje.com.my/

[googlemaps https://maps.google.com.my/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=215278323465761497274.000469feb8850ec72b675&gl=MY&hl=en&ie=UTF8&t=m&ll=2.190477,102.246838&spn=0.005146,0.006866&z=17&iwloc=0004c77aad427771cfb18&output=embed&w=640&h=480]
August 18, 2012
Malacca: Super Long Queue Capitol Satay Celup

Malacca: Super Long Queue Capitol Satay Celup – One of the famous food in Malacca is the Satay Celup. Well, to me, it’s just Lok-lok dipped into hot boiling satay peanut sauce. Let’s start talking about this famous Capitol Satay Celup in Malacca that everyone agrees that it’s famous…… for the long queue.

The last time I went for Satay Celup was the Ban Lee Siang’s, but this time I came to try the most famous one. It was about 7.16pm and the queue span across for shop outlet. The queue was indeed, very long. Since we were already, just queue up and wait, we’ll then see how good it is.

Instinct tells me that all of the visitors to the Satay Celup were all tourists or not Malacca. The queue was really long and it took us about 2 hours + to get a table. Cars passed by, tourists walked by, and they looked at the queue, looked at us, some even photographed us.

Actually, there’s another 2 outlet of Satay Celup located on the same row of Capitol’s. One have no customers, and another one has quite a number of customers, of course Capitol Satay Celup has the most. I think some people are lazy to queue and they go to another shop.

Queued from daylight to night falls, what we did was just talking all along, Facebook and talk again. I suggest you to get a chair, get ready some entertainment like video, or playing cards to wait. 2 hours, my friend! Or the best, don’t queue, don’t eat! I’m not going to queue again, I tell you.

Opens only at 5pm daily, and have a limited number of tables in a small space, Now I know why the long queue.

After 2 hour plus of waiting, of course it’s time to eat! Basically, Satay Celup is a dish where an assortment of raw and semi-cooked seafood, meat and vegetables on skewers are dunked into a boiling pot of peanut satay sauce. Each of the skewer costs RM0.90 and it damages me RM17 that night.

I have got to say, it’s not enough per stick like fish balls you only get two on a stick, or you get only one scallop on one stick. After trying it, the satay sauce does indeed taste different but then I still prefer Penang’s Lok-lok where you dip it in just boiling water, then you mix it with different sauce of your choice like satay sauce, tomyam sauce, chili, ginger and more instead of just one choice of sauce. Moreover, you get different pricing too in Penang instead of flat rate RM0.90, not to mention, better and fresher cockles in Penang.

Well, it’s my personal opinion. What do you think? If I would ever come back again for Satay Celup, I don’t wanna queue again (tired, not fun), I’m gonna go back to the Ban Lee Siang that I have been before, not this, just minus the cockles and the long queue. =)

Capitol Satay Celup
41, Lorong Bukit Cina,
75100 Melaka.

Telephone: +606-2835508

Business Hours: Opens daily at 5pm till late night.

[googlemaps https://maps.google.com.my/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=215278323465761497274.000469feb8850ec72b675&gl=my&ie=UTF8&t=m&ll=2.196631,102.252245&spn=0.005146,0.006866&z=17&iwloc=0004c729e347fe556edab&output=embed&w=640&h=480]

August 14, 2012
Malacca: Malacca Straits Mosque / Masjid Selat Melaka

Malacca: Malacca Straits Mosque / Masjid Selat Melaka – Just went to Malacca, the historical city of Malaysia over the weekend for a short trip with my classmate and checked out this new place that I’ve not visited before – the Malacca Straits Mosque, also known as the floating mosque for the locals.

It’s located on a man-made island of Pulau Melaka. Surprisingly, I didn’t see it in the top ten list of ‘todo in Malacca’ in some travel website. I actually came across it from blogs when I was searching for ‘Photography Malacca’ and the image result came top for it.

And so, I went to search for it on my little trip to Malacca last weekend. It’s pretty easy to find as Malacca is so small. Road direction signage does well in Malacca on guiding people to the correct destination. Just follow the sign to ‘Pulau Melaka’ or ‘Masjid Selat Melaka’. =)

The blogger, Jia Hui, Arvin, Wesley, Steve, Li Hong.

Well, it’s just a mosque, built on the sea, over looking the Straits Of Malacca. You can get some good sunset shot here and the mosque will look even prettier at night when the lights are up.

The Pulau Melaka basically has nothing much, just the mosque is interesting and that’s all. It’s pretty quiet on other part of it and many imcomplete construction project, don’t know why.

Straits of Malacca.

It’s fun checking out new places in Malacca. Perhaps I should get a tripod and wait for sunset next time. =D

Check out for more post about Malacca here.

August 14, 2012
(Almost) Sunset: At Malacca

View from the bridge connecting Pulau Melaka.

(Almost) Sunset: At Malacca – Malacca does have some good places for sunset watching like by the beach of Portugese Settlement, the floating mosque (Masjid Selat Melaka) and on the bridge connecting the man-made island of Pulau Melaka. However, I didn’t get a chance to really experience the sunset as it was still early and we were rushing to queue for the famous Capitol Satay Celup. Anyway, I will plan to go back to check out some nice sunset at this historical city of Malaysia. =)

Melaka Raya.

Check out for more post about Malacca here.

August 13, 2012
Yesterday At Kuala Selangor

Sunset.

Yesterday At Kuala Selangor – A spontaneous visit to the fishing village – Kuala Selangor on yesterday with my uncle. It turns out many of my relatives were there at my uncle’s place. It’d been some times that I have been to this peaceful fishing town 60km away from Kuala Lumpur. Since it’s still first week of my semester, I am still free to go anywhere. =D

Dodol machine.

Getting away from the busy city seems kinda fun too many as Kuala Lumpur can be boring some times. I pretty like the countryside area where you can see beautiful sunset, a clear sky with less air pollution, the sweet sound of nature and the friendly people.

Fresh crabs.

No, I don’t want to live at the countryside, but I enjoy being at there, for leisure and relax. It’s just fun.

Had a sumptuous fresh seafood dinner there cooked by my aunty and it’s nothing that you can find in the city. =D

By the way, I’m getting away to Malacca for the weekend, any new place to visit?

August 11, 2012
Brother’s Commencement @ NUS University Cultural Centre

Brother’s Commencement @ NUS University Cultural Centre – My big brother is now a real big brother! He has finally graduated from National University Of Singapore as of 2012 and he is now a truely professional working adult. I am so proud of him. It had been so many years that he went for studies in Singapore, more than 10 years already and time flies. I still remembered when I was still a little kid, following parents and him to Singapore for the first time long time ago.

Singapore, is now not stranger to us. I have visited Singapore for more than 10 times and it’s another familiar place to me. I went to his graduation ceremony few weeks back in one of the top university in Singapore and Asia – National University of Singapore. They called it Commencement (American-style) instead of convocation (British-style), it’s like a commencement to a new journey of life. Sounds cool. I was his personal photographer on that day, following him around to take photos of him with his friends.

At Universtiy Cultural Centre where the ceremony took place, it’s a sea of graduates in academical regalia, it invokes a feeling in me to study hard to wear on one in the future. Diploma is not enough for me, I shall go on to Honours Degree. =) Being knowledgeable and smart is just so cool!

Brother and his girlfriend from the same school and course.

Few more years for my turn but for now, study hard, live hard. Congratulates to my brother, Yikhung. =)

July 27, 2012
Johor Premium Outlets

Johor Premium Outlets – I believe many of you have heard before the Johor Premium Oulets at Kulai, Johor which sells designer’s brand product at a discount rate everyday. I’ve finally visited the place few weeks ago and bought stuff too!

Well, it’s located at Kulai, Johor, very near to Singapore’s Second Link and Senai Airport, about 40 minutes from Johor Bahru City Centre. It’s pretty sub-urban, there’s nothing around the JPO. Surprisingly, I saw many cars and tour bus at there.

I was pretty excited when I see the brands at there. Brother told me that the Johor Premium Outlets is exactly the same with the one in the USA. Cool right? However, he said that the retail outlet size here is smaller. Nevertheless, it’s still a cool place to explore and shop.

Looking at the products, I’ve got to say most of them are old stock. The price, some (not all) are at great discount. I’ve bought a Ralph Lauren Polo there, the price was a lot cheaper than the standard retail in shopping malls. It’s pretty hard to tell you whether the stuffs there are good buy or not, you have to visit it on your own. It’s a worth visit, something different from shopping at the mall. =)

Johor Premium Outlets

GPS: 1º 36’31” N 103º 37’59” E

More direction information here.

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July 18, 2012

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