My exodus from Selangor is not due to a certain genocidal pharoah and it's certainly not something for mother earth or anything. I did it because I'm tired of the life in Subang Jaya. Tired of the people here, tired of the hectic life on the fast lane and tired of being alone. For that, I decided to pull a friend and a cousin for a trip to Malacca.
In case you don't have an idea where that is, here's a picture to illustrate to you people who don't know where it is:
Photo courtesy of www.melaka.net and yes this is a printscreen.= )
Getting there was a boring 2 hour ride from Selangor if there's no traffic jam. After dropping our stuff in my grandma's house, we thouht it would be a great idea to go to some Tan Kim Hock place to try out their so call famous durian and coconut cendol. Just when we thought the road was clear, this hit us:
Roads are all pretty straight foward in Malacca. Any road you take will just bring you to the same destination. Here's another picture of the road:
Yah it was kinda jam then. But luckily jam in Malacca is not as bad as the ones in Subang Jaya at 8am. We drove about 20 minutes before finally catching this sign:
That's the sign for the Tan Kim Hock confactionary company or something. They manufacture sweet stuffs like dodol candy, durian cake and stuff. I'm not really a big fan of any of those stuff, I just came here for the cendol they claim to be famous in. The place we were in seems to be the HQ of Tan Kim Hock range of products, funny thing about them is I don't see any of their products in Giant and Cold Storage. I guess they're only for domestic consumers only.
Once we set foot into the building, this greeted us.
Tan Kim Hock range of products stacked like mountains taller than Everest. Doesn't look like the locals enjoy their brand of products too. The place was kinda deserted when we got there. Which is kinda odd considering Tan Kim Hock's a famous brand in Malacca or so I was told. It didn't really bother me then as less people=faster service. I paid about RM2 for coconut cendol and my friend as shown in the picture below ordered a durian cendol which costs RM 5. Expensive even by Subang Jaya's standards.
This is Tan Kim Hock's coconut cendol. Which now effectively redefined the words taste like crap . The coconut taste wasn't very nice to start with probably because I couldn't taste it to start with. Basically what you see here is everything there is. No santan, no pulut and definitely to coconut. Heh..now i know not to trust people when it comes to food stuffs.However the holder used to hold the bowl is a well thought out design though. Being an engineering student, I couldn't care less. Just trying to find something that I could comfort myself with after they conned me of my RM2. But still, what a let down...
That night we went to the Portuguese settlement for dinner before going cinema to watch the new Terminator Salvation . It's basically located by the sea. This is the picture i took before checking out the restaurants which are there.
It wasn't like this last time I've been here. I suppose the government got richer and decided to develop the place. After minutes of survey, we've decided to eat here.
There were food stalls lining up and the owners are like woo-ing customers to feast at their respective stalls. There's one stall whereby the owner doesn't pay attention to customers who visit this place. Wanting to know why he's the odd one out, we decided to give the restaurant a shot.
One thing about this place is their service is slow. Well, wasn't a problem to me because there are things to look around while waiting for the food arrive. There's one particular thing which caught my eye.
Dunno what that is, but judging by the way it's left, I was sure it's gonna be someone's dinner soon. Sighh... The food took about 20 minutes to arrive. It isn't going to win any awards on speed but the taste was satisfactory. Just to give you a look at what we had.
Dont be fooled by my expression though. That's how I look when i eat. The pièce de résistance of all the dishes we ordered is this.
It's better than any crap they serve in AC (Asia Cafe). The fish we had here was fresh unlike the ones in AC which I had to cope with for 2 years. Heck, even the juice they serve there was twice as larger for the same price.
The 3 of us spent about RM102.80 for dinner. A little expensive but I'd say money well spent.
Here is another picture taken on the Portuguese Settlement at night.
It's better than any crap they serve in AC (Asia Cafe). The fish we had here was fresh unlike the ones in AC which I had to cope with for 2 years. Heck, even the juice they serve there was twice as larger for the same price.
The 3 of us spent about RM102.80 for dinner. A little expensive but I'd say money well spent.
Here is another picture taken on the Portuguese Settlement at night.
We went to catch the Terminator: Salvation next and had Satay Celup for supper. In case you're wondering, Malacca is the only place in Malaysia where satay celup can be found in shoplots unlike the "luk-luk" trucks you see. Here's how they serve it in Malacca.
The brownish liquid you see here is peanut curry. A little spicy but that's what makes it nice. I didn't really eat much because I was still stuffed after what we had for dinner.X_X.One satay celup here costs about 50 cents a stick while some marked ones were slightly expensive at about 60 cents. The place we went for satay celup is called the Ban Lee Xiang. Somewhere in Jln Ong Kim Yew if my spelling's right.
My friend in the picture here at RM14 worth of satay celup. Apparently he wasn't stuffed after eating for Rm102.80 worth of seafood.
The second day was boring to say the least. Primarily because my friend had to go to Tangkak, Johor to run some errands. During breakfast, we went to this stall in Ayer Keroh before setting for Tangkak. The owner of the stall has this dog who would sometime stare at customers enjoying their breakfast.
The journey to Tangkak from Ayer Keroh is about 40 minutes worth by highway. It is located in Daerah Ladang in Johor.
Tangkak itself is a small town about 2 hours drive from Muar. In terms of development it seems the area resembles how KL looked like back in the 50s to 60s.
The only thing worth mentioning while in Tangkak was this particular shop which sells heong phneah.
The shop is small in size but it has it's own manufacturing area behind. I wasn't supposed to take this picture but rules are meant to be broken. Lucky for me I wasn't caught on the job.= ).
Anyways, they make all sorts of stuff here like tou sah phneah, Heong Phneah and even Mona Lisa brand coffee beans. Too bad I couldn't take a picture of it. They charge about RM 2 for both Heong Phneah and Tou Sah Phneah for each packet which contains 5 of each inside. I bought a few for personal consumption but my cousin was sorta reluctant to buy some stating he lacked ca$h. It's a shame really because the Heong Phneah was kinda nice. We pondered in Tangkak till 4pm before deciding to go back to Malacca.
For dinner we had fried oyster and Wan Tan Noodles in Bunga Raya, Malacca. My cousin recommended it so being n00bs about Malacca food stuff we went and tried. Wan Tan Mee tasted horrible, but that couldnt prepared me for this.
Seemingly harmless fried oyster which costs about RM5 a pack. Shit...that's expensive. Being the n00bs we were we bought 3 packs and tried it. It was okay for me but it sucked for for my friend in blue shirt. Poor guy got hit by diorrhea right after we got home. Funny thing is me and my cousin didn't get it. Talk about bad luck....Maybe that's why he thinks the fried oyster there sucked.hmmm....
After dinner we went for a walk in Jonker Street. There wasn't anything interesting there except for the stuff they sell there. Basically it's another pasar malam except it's packed and located in Malacca. Wanted to take a few pictures but I left my camera in the car. Mega bummer..
Basically that was everything in Malacca. The 3rd day was all about rushing back to KL to get my friend to work. Overall I think this trip is kinda boring because all we did there was eat. Initially I wanted to check out the tourist spots but changed my mind because of time constraint. My friend here had to run some errands and everything just gone to bust. A pity really. However I felt better after this trip with friends. Letting go all worries proved to be beneficial for everyone who went. My friend who gets to forget about work for a few days, my cousin for enjoying his holidays and me for being able to escape from the the continuing stress from civilisation. My exodus from selangor is my exodus from boredom and mental conflicts.
Shepherd
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