Glad To Be Here

Let me start this post with this:

Sun set view from the window of Hilton Hotel. The sun set later compare to Sabah as Kuching is a bit further to the left of the globe. It also gave us a feelings that the day is still bright even when it is already 7pm.

On the 2nd day, we went out to look for our relaxation time from body massage. We were welcomed by a double rainbow! Not so clear from the photo though.

Then came across this which already got some people waiting in line to take photo.

We started off our body massage with the compliment ear candling..it is not painful at all, just showing my silly face.

After that, didn’t take anymore photos.

Then the following night we took water taxi to get across the Sarawak river for our Mee Golok. It took us less than 5 minutes to get across, by the time I was ready with my camera to take more picture from the boat, we have already arrived. It cost us RM0.40 for one trip per person.

View from across the river with all the nice lighting.

My Mee Golok. I still prefer our local Ngiu Chup. The black source is actually extra soup for the noodle.

Next thing we did was to get some Kuih Lapis or Layer cake which is the local delicaci that one must try when visiting Kuching. Seen here is shelves full of different kind of Kuih Lapis.

This is really the end of Kuching trip’s photos.

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Goodnite, it is pretty late now, little Mer already sleeping on the couch here in my in-law’s place, I better make a move.

This is going to be full with photos, I’ll try to put in those relevant and beautiful one (I hope). Before that let me share something first. I had really bad headache when the plane was landing, really terrible one. It happens twice on both ways. Probably due to my block nose but it never happened before, not this bad. What came into my mind is that what if I just explode on plane, blood vessel broke? I would have just die there? Anyway, am totally safe now and hope my next trip to China will not have this experience again. I don’t think I’ve bought any travel insurance for this trip, not like when we went to Australia years ago. Probably an extra medicare insurance would help.

Enough of that worry, let’s start the photos from the first day of visit.

View from the hotel, overlooking the Parliment House which is still under construction. At night it looks like one of the tower in “Lord of the Ring”, those Gothic style house.

View of Sarawak River from Waterfront. It has a very nice shaded walk-way.

The look of the street full with old structures and with Chinese look.

Then we walked all the way to India Street which the taxi stand is right at the end of the street. That’s where we got our taxi to UNIMAS on the first day.

This is how it looks like from the taxi stand. I like the direction plate.

End of photos sharing..

Yup, am in the Hilton Hotel Cino Restaurant using their free 15 minutes access , need to make this super fast.

Our plan later is to take the water taxi over to the other side of the river, get our Mee Galak and enjoy the night view from the other side of Kuching. A friend of ours from UNIMAS will be bringing us around, then will meet up with Anton’s brother-in-law there. Hope to have a great night and am sure to buy more Kuih Lapis to bring home. Colleagues at home will get to enjoy it for sure.

This PC that is being set with a timer will automatically disconnect me when 15 minutes is up. I don’t have a laptop, if only there is laptop for rent and maybe with a cheap laptop rentals comes with wireless internet connection, that would be good. But, oh well, dream on for me here, especially in this part of Malaysia but then it could be very expensive. Okay, time is almost up. Will write again if possible.

This is to continue from the previous blog post and yet still no photos *sigh* So I’ll just keep this short.

We started the 2nd day with a rush, woke up at 6 something, got ready and went to have compliment buffet breakfast in the hotel, lots of choices but limited time and small stomach to enjoy them all. Then we were the last two getting on the University’s bus to UNIMAS resource center.

Started the course in a cold room for I forgot to bring my jacket along in this trip! Fortunately our friend is kind enough to borrow his G2000 jacket to me. But i only get to enjoyed the warm for a few hours as later he himself felt cold and was wearing it all through. However I was still fortunate to get another blazer for the afternoon session from a kind librarian here.

With the coldness like that, I think I need those body fat as protection layer to keep me warm and won’t be needing any of the nuphedrine (diet pill) to get rid of them.

After the course, we went back to Hilton with a 48 seater bus! Yup, no longer with a mini van. We straight headed to enjoy our body massage which come with free ear candling! That was a relief and pampering time for us, however, after that my neck is still stiff.

The following things we did was to have dinner in Barong Tinuk which according to our friend, this is where the West Malaysian will come to dine. Anton ordered Nasi Goreng Dabai (pronouced as “dabao”). Well, I don’t quite like the taste of it, but the Tom Yam soup is yummy! RM5 with two prawn and lots of crab sticks.

After that was to have a stroll in the northern part of Kuching where we get to see our hotel from the other side of the river. Too bad I didn’t take any photo.

Here, this is going to be an all photos blog post, with caption of course.

This is where we stayed - Seafest Hotel.

View from the hotel front.

Sunset taken from the hotel.

The day after, I was caught up with meeting, so didn’t go anywhere, but I
managed to visit the local pearl store.

This is where we go to get our pearl.

See all those glittering stuff? Sorry, it was getting dark then..

Did I get anything for myself? Of course! A pearl bracelet and earrings.
*Grin*

We get to visit Sipadan Island the day after. More photos..

Some other island that we saw on our way to Sipadan

Sipandan Island from afar after more than 30 minutes boat ride.

Relief to be able to stand on the ground again.

Left side view of Sipadan island right from the jetty.

Right side view of Sipadan island right from the jetty.

We tour around the island in an hour.

Sea-turtle hatching site. It normally takes 45 days for the little turtle to
come out from the eggs, then they’ll only be release to the sea at night, to
avoid being eaten from predator.

Little sea turtle which was born just that morning at 6am (23th May).

After the walk around the island, it was time to head back to our hotel. We
took a different path back to see other interesting places / island around.

Since visitors are not allow to over-night in Sipadan Island, they’ll
have to go elsewhere to stay. Divers can’t fly straight away from the dive
too due to the pressure difference.

Kapalai Resort with lots of star fishes on its water.

Mabul Resort, just beside Kapalai.

Another resort nearby.

Sand Island which doesn’t have trees initially.

Still here, my one hour is not up yet, so might as well write another post before I’m disconnected from the net.

I’m sharing a room with my colleague who runs on the machine almost everyday. So I’ve promised her to check out the health centre here (Seafest Hotel). They got a few machine including those weight machine, but there doesn’t seems a lot of people using them. Right before we came down last night, there were a man there but he doesn’t look like a body builder for us, which obviously are not taking bodybuilding supplements, so we are really not going to embarrase ourselves if we would to use the machines here. However, I don’t have my running shoes and extra clothes for exercise, so Mary is the only one using the health centre last night. All hers *LOL*

As for me, I was trying to get myself connected to the Net by using my handphone, but the line connection here is very low, sometimes down to zero. I really wish it could be better so that I can talk to my boys longer. I wonder if they miss their mommy..

Am here, really here in Seafest Hotel of Semporna accessing the Net using their business centre’s internet service. I wasn’t happy with the speed though, because they are charging RM8.40 an hour! And it is not even broadband. But at least I’m connected and am surfing away. I noly allow myself an hour on this. So let’s just make things fast here.

I’ve a complain now so far, that is: I need a massage therapy! I can feel that my head is heavy probably due to the new bed that I’m not used to it and I hope tonight I can sleep better since it is the second night now. I wish they are offering massage service here. But what do you expect? They even charge for their health centre. RM5.50 per session! And this business centre only open till 5 pm.!!

As for tomorrow, we’ll be going to the Mabul Island! Yay!! I hope the weather is fine and no storm, else we’ll have to cancel our trip.

Problem of loading photos from my digicam is solved! Yay! The worried is just being caused by a program in the notebook which I’ve uninstalled and the error/virus notice never show again. So here.. got lots to show but just let me show you some that I took while enjoying our food.

It seems that one of the reason that we go out is to get our food, be it lunch or dinner. That is one good reason to get my dad on his feet, get change and go out, even if I have to carry little Mer on my shoulder if he sleeps.

We went out to Ajisen Ramen (also in Malaysia) to have our lunch on Sunday (27 Aril). It is famous for its noodle with thick pork ribs soup, high in protein, yummy.. When dad’s big bowl of noodle came, he posed for a happy photo.

Yummy ramen

Dad with is bowl of ramen

The boys even happier when they get to have their ice-cream on our way back. So happy that they don’t mind sharing with each other!

As for Monday (28 April), we went to Little Sheep (小肥羊) that night. It is famous for its steamboat and lamb from Mongolia which being sliced into thin strip. Yup, got, ourselves a ying yong pot full of soup. Ying yong means one is hot (chili hot) and the other is normal soup. It is really super hot! Both are full of garlic!

Ying Yong pot soup base

Raw lamb slices

And just yesterday, we went to Kung Fu for our set lunch. Everything is being steamed, what we call “tun”, steaming but with close individual lit for the food inside. With RMB17 for kids meal, we get a bowl of rice, a bowl of steam egg, chicken with mushroom and a cup of soya bean. Worth the price especially if the boys love it and they share the portion.

Little Mer gave his thumb up for the steam egg

That’s all so far for my food opportunity all with the two boys around. I hope they’ll sit down properly and finished their food everytime insead of me spoon feeding them sometimes just to make sure that they eat.

This happened right away on the first morning that we had in Hong Kong. “Yum Cha” means “drink tea”, but in another meaning “breakfast in the Chinese Style” (my own translation). Just like some of you drool over the dim sum that we ordered. (Yes, finally I can load photos from my digital camera)

Siew Mai

Zhu Chiong Fan

Beef ball and Fung Zhao

This is after when we almost done.. yummy.. and full..

Well, I didn’t take most of the photos right away before eating, that’s why some are not in the original number, The siew mai suppose to be 3 in a bowl. Anywa, enough of drooling, let’s talk something else here. Check out this Thermal labels if you need to print label on to stickers. They are offering low prices everyday.

This is part two of our getaway for last year to Hong Kong.

We chose to stay in Hollywood Hotel simply because it is cheaper, even though I said cheaper, it was HKD3K per night inclusive of 2 days tickets for Hong Kong Disneyland. It is the 2nd stop for bus ride from Disneyland’s station.  The hotel has light blue colour scheme with Mickey Mouse trademark (triple circles) everywhere. It has a shop just next to the main entrance to the hotel lobby with very nice decoration.

Hubby has chosen the room which has nice view of fireworks at night, which they had it for both nights when we were there - 30th and 31st December. Hubby enjoyed the 2nd night’s firework from the hotel room actually.

Nice green inside the room and we got the boys glue to the TV most of the time with Disney Channel. Cal was having fun wearing the kid’s bathrobe.

Mer was having fun in front of the camera with his silly posing. We’ve booked the room for 2 adults, 1 child and 1 baby, that’s why there is a babycot there. There even provide a baby bathtub, I mean those plastic one la..

See the nice deco in the shop? Yup, so full of Christmas spirit. I only allowed myself to get a set of ear-rings from there, don’t know where to use the rest of the things in the shop and further more they are not cheap

Another cute deco along the pathway of the hotel. The boys absolutely love this bronze Mickey Mouse.

Enough photos for this time. I’ve scrap some photos for the stay in Hollywood Hotel - Sunny Day