Kuching 2015 : Places of interest

Posted in Everyday Life, Leisure & Travel by Minci 先生

Coming back to Kuching playing tourist was fun. I have difficulty telling my colleagues of what they could expect from their visits to Sarawak. Kuching especially, as I feel that it is a place NOT for shopping but more of a place to discover Nature and Culture. Depending on what you’re looking for actually.

I used to go back to Kuching during EId. That is the time when you see Kuching become so vibrant and festive as people wear their nicest and most colourful clothes to the mall or to the movies.

This year around our little family decided to explore more of our hometown. Near Gawai season. Here are a few places to name a few.

MATANG FAMILY PARK

The admission fee was cheap for Mykad holders. Only RM 4.00/pax and visitors get to spend their time at the park and bathe in the waterfall or BBQ-ing for as long as they wish. Bring an extra pair of clothes. There is no dress code but please do not skinny-dip.

Hazeeq was still afraid to be in the waters but he enjoyed his imaginary fishing. Going there in the early hours of the day was serene. The water was cold, the sun itself had this nice warmth to it. I think its a good place for locals especially to just allow themselves to immerse in the beauty of the place and enjoy what Mother Nature brings.

We did not go to Bako National Park this time. I went there some time ago during houseman-ship. It is a boat ride away from the mainland and the trekking paths are more ‘adventurous’ and scenes more interesting. I would recommend it to more avid hikers.

Gunung Santubong is also nearby. An hour away depends on where you live. heard that they’re introducing new things at the Damai Resort – so that should be equally fun as well.

CAT MUSEUM

Located withing the Petra Jaya vicinity, the museum is located in the DBKU administrative building up a majestic little hill. Admission is FREE but visitors will be charged for the cameras/ phones with camera they bring in at RM3/each.

It is basically a museum that collects everything there is about cats and elaborate on history, popular culture, superstitious beliefs and many more. It is astonishing at how capable they are in making such a cute museum just to tell us about cats. Hazeeq had a grand time there as he posed with whatever big cats he can. Well.. the parents too!!

KAMPUNG GERSIK

This is the popular village that houses the famous Sarawak layered cakes. They have Dayang Salhah, Mira Cake House and D’Nona to name a few. They can pack our cakes nicely and neatly in a box safe for flight handling. The strips of cakes naturally would cost between RM 10 – RM 25. They have the dry and wet layered cakes and most of them are colorful as much as they taste heavenly. They make good gifts to inlaws. He he.

MAIN BAZAAR/WATERFRONT

This is a very beautiful strip along Sungai Sarawak especially at nights. Apart from boat cruises and , if fancy is not your middle name – they also have the Bot Penambang where you pay a very small fee to get across the river. For fun. And perhaps pay a visit to Kampung Boyan for the local food, Kampung Gersik for the layered cakes or visit Fort Margherita.

This is also a good place to get souvenirs – I bought my keychains, fridge magnets, songket sarawak and pua kumbu there at a very reasonable price. The locals are more than happy to help wrap them up for you – again safe for flight.

KUBAH RIA/PASAR MALAM

Sometime ago, this particular market was known as Pasar Satok because it was located at Satok. Now that they have relocated – it is more known as Kubah Ria Market. As any other market, we have all the wet and dry goods and this was where I hunted for my Laksa Sarawak paste, the powdered spice for my Bubur Pedas and all sorts. They also sell those rare vegetables you don’t see in the markets at tanah semenanjung such as Sayur Midin, Dabai and Terung Asam.

Its a good place to see what people eat. Who knows if you might come across exotic finds such as the crawling Ulat Sago.

So these were the places we went during our stay. Of course other honorable mentions include The Sarawak Cultural Village, Orchid Farm, Chinese Museum, Jalan Masjid India (Carpentar Street) and Semenggoh Wildlife Centre (orang utan)

If you were to visit outside Kuching, thats where you’ll find The Niah Cave, MULU Cave and Dolphin Sighting places. Do come by to Sarawak – it is an interesting world of nature and culture. Next up, Food glorious food.

16Jun2015

Kuching 2015 : 56 Hotel

Posted in Everyday Life, Leisure & Travel by Minci 先生

I chose 56 hotel primarily because it is within my budget for a long stay. It is located in town with nearby 2 shopping malls and plenty of other small eating outlets. Initially it was a choice between the Lime Tree Hotel and this one but I ended up choosing 56 hotel because its 8km from the wedding venue I was supposed to attend.

56 hotel rated themselves as a 3 star hotel. I agree. Any room without a mini fridge is a 3 star hotel.

But it has a few plus points;

Breakfast like a little- King

There should be something for everybody especially for kids. I am not hoping for 12 different pastries for breakfast or 19 types of fruits in a salad. Variety is the key even though its a choice between ‘two’. Throughout my 5 day stay, I get to sample food like Nasi Goreng Dabai, Nasi Lemak, Mi Kantonis, croissants, koko krunch, porridge… with fruit juice and hot beverages. Needless to say, it was a great start everyday as we fill up our tanks early on. The selection is admirable for a 3 star hotel like this one. I praise them for the effort and hopefully they would keep it up.

In house toiletries

.. including self-embossed towels! Although we bring our own shower gels, it is always nice to have new ones to try – be it a shower cap or a cotton bud. I also loved their prompt housekeeping – very fast, efficient and the room always smells nice. Crumbs swept away, pillows and mattress fluffed up for another snooze fest at night after a tiring day. They also earned brownie points by providing an in room kettle – very important for parents with children who still drinks formula milk. As for the complimentary beverages … well well.. thank you very much for replenishing them without fail daily.

Location

Not that we were planning to shop at the malls or anything -but having not only one, but two shopping complexes in less than 5 KM radius of each other is a delight. Food seems so nearby and it does provide an avenue for a short brisk walk to get rid of the extra calories. These malls are The Spring and One City Mall. All within ‘free hotel shuttle distance’. Which brings to my next point …

Shuttle Service

56 hotel provides free shuttle service to these 2 malls and also airport transfer – on allocated hours. I did not use the service myself but I suppose you could always make arrangements at the front desk.

I made my booking through Agoda.com. The website has great deals on Fridays especially to members and the membership is FREE. As long as you have a safe and fast internet connection, the online booking process should be without hiccoughs. I paid a total of RM 538.44 for the 5D4N stay in Kuching.

Our little family would like to thank 56 Hotel for the wonderful hospitality. Hope to see them again soon.

My next entries will be about places we eat and places we went. Cheerios..

8Jun2015

KUCHING 2015 : A brief itinerary

Posted in Good Things, Leisure & Travel by Minci 先生

This week should be a good time to catch up on the journal-ling of my trip to Kuching – my hometown. As this is a yearly trip, I decided to take advantage of my waran hence we traveled as a WPUA customer of #airasia. This means Hot Seats, Free 40 KG baggage each, free 20 KG sports equipment, hot meals with a snack box.

We stayed overnight at my parents house and left early the next morning to Putrajaya Sentral to leave our car there. The overnight parking at Putrajaya Sentral is so much cheaper than the ones they have at the airport. Of course, security is a concern but one just has to pray hard.

Then as usual we took the KL Transit Train and voila within 20 minutes we were already at KLIA2.

Checking in was a breeze as a WPUA customer. The queue was shorter to begin with. Thankfully, there were no flight delays and the flight attendants were friendly and accommodating despite a full plane since Gawai is just around the corner – what else could I wish for.

I leave you with my itinerary. A brief account of what we did during our stay there. Its different when you travel to a city as a tourist/traveler as opposed to someone who originates from there. We look for different experiences and things. Perhaps you could at least get an idea of where to start.

Ho Chi Minh : Duna Hotel

Posted in Leisure & Travel, Reviews by Minci 先生

If you pay peanuts, you get peanuts.

(And people would still try to grab more of your peanuts)

Duna Hotel was rated on AirAsiaGo.Com website as a 3 star hotel. When we reached there, it was more like a 2 star hotel. I would not recommend this facility to family with small children. The type of people coming in and out of the hotel are just … suspicious. I almost mistook it as a secret brothel.

We arrived at the hotel by 3 pm and to our dismay our booking was not there. This is so against AirAsia’s secure booking policy. But the top management of the hotel insisted that we didn’t have a room booked with them and said that it was full. Mr Husband was obviously not happy but thankfully remained calm because ‘shit happens’

He tried calling the AirAsia centre using the number given but conveniently no one was there to answer the call.

After much delay, the receptionist suddenly recommended we pay for a room which was miraculously empty because the customer who was supposed to have that room canceled their booking. So we paid because ~~they put a knife to our throats~~ we were tired and at a foreign place.

Duna Hotel also operates a tour agency. It seems that we were not the only unfortunate ones with a horrible money-related experience here. A group of young European tourists were ‘ripped off their money’ when their supposed bus trip route was cancelled. Instead of discussing alternative routes with them, the agency took the liberty to book another route which made stops at places they did not want to go at a cost slightly more. Needs no guessing here that they were horrified. I mean who wouldn’t. One of the more vocal women in the group demanded a refund in exchange they will forget about the whole incident and say nothing more about it. But the hotel decided to play games. They were only going to give back a 50% refund despite the problem rooting from their side. After much bickering and soft threats from the group, the management finally gave in. I have to applaud the beautiful angry lady for she was damn serious when she said in her Russian accent, “If you don’t give us our money back, I will sit here all day and tell all the other tourist what you have done to us!!”

It worked.

After the short drama, we were finally ushered to our room. It was clean and the bed was comfortable. We had horrible next door neighbours though who can’t seem to shut the door properly. Bang sana, bang sini. Then there was the inevitable fireworks and noise after midnight from the public park across the street.

We reconciled our differences with Duna Hotel over free WIFI and breakfast. Although most of the spread was NON-Halal, we were still able to enjoy their simple fried rice with delicious soy sauce, the toast and scrambled eggs and lovely Trung Nguyen coffee. I can’t seem to replicate the same taste coffee at home. Another visit to Ho Chi Minh it seems – at another hotel.

20Feb2015

xin nin kwai le

Posted in Everyday Life by Minci 先生

Its a long weekend for the general public and I am grateful to have at least a full 2 days off as compared to them. Despite not celebrating the Chinese New Year (CNY) .. I am still in a festive mood and trying to enjoy my quality time with my parents and of course Mr Husband and Hazeeq.

I try to make it a habit of visiting my parents at least once a month to see how they’re doing. Occasionally they would drive over to my place for a change of air.

My neighbour who is celebrating the CNY has been very quiet for the past 2 days. Perhaps they are celebrating elsewhere as we have yet to see the festive side of them for the past 3 years we’ve been living in this neighbourhood. I was looking forward to some lion dance and firecrackers or a glimpse of the lovely sweets and cakes but the gate is closed shut. HUhu.

After 2 full days at my parents house, it’s time to go home. The traffic from their place to ours was incredibly smooth. It was ugly yesterday as stated on the news. We heard that the journey from Malacca to Kelantan took up to 12 hours by car. Say what?? Thank god my parents house is just a football game away. Although it could get up to 5 hours, at most. Yikes.

Prior to reaching home, we stopped at Old Town White Coffee at KIP Mart for lunch. One of those places where people don’t seem to frequent at that hour of the day. We love lengang places. We abhor overcrowded areas unless we have to.

Anyway, HAppy CNY.

Xin nin kwai le..

Minci Moss

Influenced by everything. You knew me first ;)

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