Saturday, December 04, 2021

Trip to Legoland Malaysia 2021 (Part 1)

Hello peeps!

Our JB trip is not complete without a visit to Legoland Johor. I have to say, I prefer going to Legoland post-pandemic because of less queue and less crowd. In fact, my kids were able to ride on rollercoasters to their hearts' content!

The last time we went to Legoland was back in August 2018. We bought a day pass to the theme park and the girls had their first taste of riding a rollercoaster. They loved it! Sadly, back then Khadeeja did not meet the height requirement for most rides so she was unable to enjoy the theme park very much. The girls had been talking about going back to experience the rollercoasters again and when we got the chance to return 3 years later, they were over the moon!

This time around, we decided to stay at Legoland Hotel. Upon checking the website, I noticed this campaign:

Credit image: Legoland Malaysia

Under this campaign, Legoland is offering several packages for staycation at Legoland / Legoland's Premium Partner Hotel at an attractive price. I decided to check out the 'Awesome Xperience for 4'.

Credit image: Legoland Malaysia

Seeing that the package includes breakfast and theme park tickets, I decided to get this package for our Legoland visit. It's seriously way cheaper than if we had booked separately.

The only drawback of buying a package is we can't book our hotel using the online booking system! Instead, we had to email the hotel with a reference to our voucher code to book the hotel. I don't know why we can't just key in the voucher code in the booking system.

After I emailed the details of our hotel booking, I did not get any confirmation so I had to phone the hotel to check if they got my email. For a big establishment like Legoland, I did not expect my call to be left ringing for half an hour without anyone picking up. I had to attempt to call several times because it kept being answered by a machine and then left ringing for a long time. Luckily I did not give up because eventually my call was answered. I told them about my email booking and asked them to check, and true enough my email ended up in the spam mailbox 😐 After locating my email, then the staff quickly keyed in my booking in the system and sent a confirmation email. Phew! Disaster averted.

Finally it was the day to check in to the hotel. After stopping at Pondok Santapan Larkin to have breakfast, we drove to Legoland Hotel because our plan was to drop our luggage and checking in after we are done at the theme park. We arrived at the hotel at 11am and upon seeing the basement parking was full, hubby dropped us off at the lobby and went to find parking. I then decided to check if we could register early because it was barely noon, and check-in time stated is at 3pm.

It was our first time in Legoland Hotel and the girls were awestruck when entering the lobby. From the hundreds of Legoland figures behind the reception area to the lego castle and the lego ship, everything was exciting to look at. I was pleasantly surprised to be informed that our room was ready and we could check in immediately if we wanted to.

Legoland Hotel lobby

Lego castle

We got our room keys!

There are three themes to pick from - Pirate, Kingdom or Adventure. These themed rooms are located at different levels. The girls decided to pick Adventure themed room and our room was at Level 2. Even going into the elevator was another new experience because when the doors closed, immediately the discotheque lighting played up and the theme song 'Everything is Awesome' blasted out. My girls were thrilled beyond words.

The doors at the Adventure Room level

Will continue my review of the Legoland Hotel Adventure room in my next post, stay tuned...

Wednesday, December 01, 2021

Food Hunting in Johor Bahru

Hello!

We are back from JB after spending a few terrific days on vacation. Meeting great people aside, food is also another reason why I love going ‘back’ to JB.

If you ask me what food I love the most, I’d say it would be Sarawakian food of course. But studying and living in Johor for 6 years have me craving for Johorean food occasionally.

Now on to my food journal (albeit not so healthy but oh-so-glorious food journey!). The night we arrived, we were tired and didn’t feel to drive and look for food after checking into our hotel. So we decided to check out Nasi Lemak Simple across our hotel on foot.

1. Nasi Lemak Simple

We ordered Nasi Lemak with fried chicken. Much to our chagrin, we were told that we had to wait for 10minutes because the rice is still cooking and the chicken part that we wanted was finished. However when food arrived, our disgruntlement evaporated as we tucked into our hot, aromatic rice served with delicious sambal and fragrant fried chicken (sorry no photo because we didn’t expect the Nasi Lemak to be scrumptious)

Verdict: HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! The sambal is not too spicy much to our liking. The chicken is marinated well and delicious. Would eat here again if we are in JB.

2. Kacang pool Haji

The next morning, we woke up extra early to have our breakfast of kacang pool Haji. Knowing the restaurant will get packed later, we made the decision to beat the queue and arrived at 7am. Despite being the first customer of the day, we didn’t have to wait long for our food of kacang pool lambing to be served, accompanied by thick, soft bread which was spread with butter and lightly grilled.

Warm broth made of fava beans and minced meat served with soft bread

Kacang pool is apparently a Malaysian twist of the Middle East’s foul medames dish. Served with sunny side up with runny yolk, the flavor is further enhanced when you squeeze the calamansi juice over the broth and dip the soft, thick bread into the broth. This comfort food had me clean up the bowl including the chopped onion which I normally hate, because it’s that good.

Going early means we can easily find parking spot as the shop is by the roadside with no dedicated parking

We attended the wedding at lunch time so lunch was served during the wedding.

For dinner, we decided to go for seafood at Senibong. There was a long queue of cars to Senibong as there is only one narrow car lane to go to Senibong. Entry was RM2 per car, and we were lucky to find a parking spot behind a mosque.

3. Senibong Seafood Village

Since everyone was hungry, we decided to order a set menu for 4 pax comprising of steamed siakap fish, kailan with salted fish, chicken tomyam, fried tempura squid, sambal cockles, white rice and a jug of red cordial drink. We added on sweet & sour crabs but when the order arrived, we got salted eggs crabs. The restaurant owner kind-heartedly gave us some discounts for the wrong order, knowing that re-order will force us to wait longer due to the large turnouts that night.

My advice is to go here 9pm onwards to avoid high peak hour.

While waiting for food to arrive which took an hour, we enjoyed the view of the waterfront and Singapore island across the straits

On the second day, I had a date with my ex-roommate and BFF at a glasshouse cafe called ‘Fifty Trees’. It kinda reminded me of my iPad stylus called ‘FiftyThree’.

4. Fifty Trees Cafe

We shared our breakfast menu of sliced avocados and sunny side ups and soft shell crab spaghetti bolognese before ordering lemon cheesecake for dessert. The cafe also have pancakes and waffles in their menu and I ordered Nutella pancakes and big breakfast for takeaway.

FiftyTrees

Dare Devil espresso

Eva & I shared this sliced avocado on toasts served with garden salad and sunny side ups

Desert was lemon cheese cake and cappuccino

Eva

Patrons are allowed into the glasshouse to admire the various houseplants

In the afternoon, I craved for mi rebus and tulang gearbox (beef marrowbone) so off we went to our next food destination not far away from our hotel:

5. Restoran ZZ Sup Tulang

Famous for their sup tulang, Restoran ZZ is another popular restaurant with mostly outdoor seatings for their patrons. We opted to sit under the trees to enjoy afternoon breeze while having our mee rebus sup tulang, while the kids enjoyed their bihun sup.

The mee rebus has the right consistency, not too think nor too thin. There were generous chunks of meat off the marrowbone and the noodle is also delicious. Khayla enjoyed the beehoon soup even though it was slightly spicy that she finished it all.

View of the restaurant while waiting for our food

Mee rebus tulang (gearbox)

Blissfully sucking out the marrowbone jelly

On the last day in JB before we left to Legoland, I requested to have breakfast at another popular breakfast spot.

6. Pondok Santapan Larkin

Initially I wanted both nasi ambeng, a Javanese heritage food, and lontong for breakfast. Alas, the last packet of nasi ambeng was snapped up by a pregnant lady so I had to be contented with just having lontong kuah while Suami Terchenta had roti Arab and chicken curry. The girls opted for their favorite kuih buah melaka instead.

The curry was delicious and Khayla also loved the Roti Arab

Lontong kuah

Lastly, before we went back to KL, we also stopped by at our friend’s restaurant for lunch.

7. Restoran Haji Jani

The restaurant serves many Malay & Javanese dishes such as chicken and beef rendang, keli berlado, sambal paru, pedal & hati ayam masak kicap etc. The food is mouth-watering and price is reasonable.

Posing with restaurant owner, Kak Linda

The next time I’m in Johor, I must try Nasi Ambeng Mat Corner, Mee Rebus Haji Wahid, sup tulang merah at Banafee, banana fritters with Johor soy sauce based dip, Briyani Gam and many other Johorean menu at local’s favorites. Just thinking of it makes me hungry.

Sunday, November 28, 2021

Majlis Kawen Yana & Kidir

Salam semua!

Firstly, kiteorang nak ucapkan ‘Selamat Pengantin Baru’ buat Yana & Kidir! Sedar tak sedar, dah besar dah dak Yana ni, dah mendirikan rumahtangga. Semoga perkahwinan ni diberkati Allah SWT dan bahagia ke anak cucu…

It was a beautiful wedding

Dah lama tak menulis pasal Geng KAMIE. Dulu kemain rapat lagi kiteorg, pergi camping sama-sama, buat majlis buka puasa, pot luck, berkaraoke, jalan-jalan ke Melaka & macam2 lagilah. Seronok tak hengat masa tu. Punya la rapat sangat kiteorg siap boleh tinggal baby Khayla dengan Sis Lin pegi jalan-jalan ke Singapore.

Sanggup datang dari JB nak join pot luck kat rumah kiteorg masa ni

Kecik lagi si Yana ni masa join first activity GENG KAMIE dekat Sedili, Johor (Yana paling kiri menyorok belakang En Suami Terchenta)

Wedding Yana & Kidir ni dekat Ariz Hall, Eco Palladium. Serius cantik teruk tempat ni! Nak cari parking pun senang. Sampai-sampai je, kiteorang tunggu Kak Retna & Kak Linda dalam kereta. Sempat la perasan pengantin datang naik kereta sendiri, suami Yana yang drive. Dalam hati, kagum betul dengan pengantin ni sebab sempoi je takde karpet merah, takde kereta berhias dieorg sampai pun ramai yang tak sedar.

Dari dalam kereta, kiteorang tengok perarakan pengantin masuk ke dewan, diiringi kumpulan penari tradisional & kompang & gendang. Lepas pengantin dah masuk, barulah kiteorang perasan Kak Retna & Kak Linda dah masuk dewan. Apa lagi, tergopoh-gapah la kiteorang keluar kereta, tapi sempat lagi kak Siti Delima call kat belakang. Tu pun mula2 tak cam sebab tak tau pun dieorang dah tukar kereta BMW. Kerlass Kak Siti! So takde la menunggu kak Siti, terus tergesa2 ke dewan. Tapi sebelum tu, kenalah register MySejahtera & scan suhu badan ikut SOP sekarang.

Tak nak cerita banyak, kita layan je gambar-gambar kiteorang masa majlis kawen ni:

Dengan Sis Lin, ambik gambar bukti kedatangan katanya 😆

Bila Che Mat & Suami Terchenta bertemu, mesti citer pasal kerja ni 😜

Kumpulan penari membuat persembahan tarian yang berjaya menambat perhatian Khayla

Acara memotong kek. Berseri2 dak Yana kat sini

Rasanya kiteorang la yang paling havoc bergambar dengan pengantin dak Yana & suami

Kecoh-kecoh diteruskan dengan Sis Lin sekeluarga kat bawah pentas pulak. Kalau tak havoc, bukan Geng KAMIE namanya 😂

Kemain kiteorang kecoh lepas dah isi perut, sampai 3-4 kali photographer ambik gambar. Barulah suasana meriah di majlis kawen kan?

Posing dengan kakak pengantin pulak, dak Naz

Sebelum balik, kita ambik gambar kenang2an di photobooth. Kak Linda posing macam bukan mak anak 2 😆

Ikutkan hati nak lagi lama bersembang dengan Sis Lin tapi memandangkan dia sibuk melayan tetamu mungkin kena tangguh lain kali. Lepas majlis mesti penat kan Sis Lin? Apapun, tahniah diucapkan kepada Sis Lin & Abang Sabar yang menerima menantu. Persiapan kawen dak Yana ni memang tip-top, takde cacat-cela di mata kami. Walaupun tetamu ramai tapi penganjur & tuan rumah berjaya menjaga SOP. Takde berebut-rebut ambik makanan, makanan caterer tolong cedukkan, dewan pun tak sesak. Khayla & Khadeeja suka sangat dengan doorgift cotton candy sampai 2x ambik & of course la aku paling bahagia bila dapat telur pindang Johor hehe.

Wednesday, November 24, 2021

How I Decorated and Furnished My House Under RM5000

Hello readers! We've just updated our house look and yeay, so many people are lovin' it! We have several people calling up to view our rental house after advertising this on Mudah.my and many queries of - 'is this the actual unit?' like they can't believe our ad LOL.

Let's have a look at after vs before photos:

After re-decoration - Scandinavian minimalist concept

Before - bulky furniture and heavy drapes made our house look small and cluttered

At first, we wanted to hire ID people to re-decorate our house but when the quotation reached us, the numbers made my eyes bulge. Since the reason we are re-decorating is to rent the house out and there rental rate at our area is not exactly premium, we decided to wing it and re-decorate the house ourselves. The best part about DIY decorating is we can actually do it all under RM5000!

Dining area

Guest bedroom

Hallway

So here are step-by-step how to decorate with a shoestring budget for beginners:

#1: Have an ID sense (like, fashion sense for the house)

It's not necessarily be you yourself. Heck, I don't even have much ID sense as seen on the before picture (like I can't even budget how big is the sofa compared to the living room and ended up with the sofa taking most of the living room space!). So what I did is I consulted my close childhood friend because I know she has better eye than me :)

It's important because someone who has good ID sense can already picture in their mind the finished look and know the right concept for the space and layout in your house. I took my friend for a tour of the house and she immediately suggested we went for Scandinavian minimalist concept because 'it just blended so well with the greeneries outside' (her quote).

If you don't have such friend, then ask yourself what kind of style you want? Knowing the concept/style is good because you can search furniture by the style keyword so you will end up with a 'put together' look for your house.

If you are as clueless as me and don't have a point of reference, there's always a good apps around to help - mine is Houzz apps which has thousands of photos I can filtered by room, style, room size etc.

So many photos to browse by the concept that I like

#2: Have a realistic budget and stick to it

What I lack in ID sense, I made up in budget department. I'm a budget person. I'm not a people person but I love numbers. Drawing up a budget is not hard, guys. All you need to do is list all the things you want to get for the house style that you picked and then put a price tag to it. Next, decide how much you want to spend for the entire project. For me, since I plan to furnish and update my house look, I decided that I only want to spend not more than RM5000 on the project. The lesser the number, the more creative you have to be and I'm not that creative. Or maybe I can but I don't have Finance people to challenge my number. Anyways, I think I can pull it with RM5000 budget and here's the snippet to prove it:

We ended up only spending RM4.8k for the house furnishing / re-decorating

Important note - I don't list it here but in my mind I have divided the list into 'essential' items vs. 'nice to have' items. We bought the essentials first and then updated our budget (Actual column). Anything that exceeded the budget means we have to slash our 'nice to have' items i.e. either we get something cheaper or we remove from the budget list. For example, initially I wanted to get a nice armchair for the living room but since some of the essentials are under-budgeted, we removed the armchair from our list.

#3: Scout for best price

Thank God we live in the era of online shopping! I must admit that a large chunk of the budget went to Shopee because Shopee has the best price that we know of. We bought bed frames, wardrobes, coffee table, carpet, dining table set, wallpaper, bedside table and mattresses from Shopee and they arrived within 1-2 weeks.

Apart from Shopee, we also shopped at Kaison for some home decor items. We bought the Queen bed frame and mattress, as well as the sofa from a small furniture shop (note: we should've checked SSF first, because they apparently had huge discounts on beddings and sofa that matched the price we spent but SSF had better quality furniture sobsss).

#4: Set a project timeline

This is optional of course. Some people with constraint budget may put on hold / buy in batches whenever there's a good deal. Since our goal was to let the house by end of this year, we had only 2 months to plan and execute our project. Project timeline helped me to plan shipping lead time, installation time and lastly when to finish the touch-ups for photo-shoot session to start advertising our house.

There you have it. So let's recap:

What - is your dream style & budget?

Who - is someone you know with good eye for home decorating? If none, go to Houzz apps/Pinterest for inspiration

Why - reason to re-decorate e.g. to rent it out at best rate

When - draw a project timeline

Where - Shopee, Kaison, SSF are a good start to look for best price items

How - Refer above steps of decorating and furnishing a home under RM5000

Happy decorating!

Thursday, October 28, 2021

Visiting Sekinchan, Selangor MY

The picturesque Sekinchan fishing village #shotoniphone11pro #noediting

It has been so long since we left the city. Our last trip was to Gold Coast Sepang back in March before another spike in cases led to the re-implementation of inter-district travel. We miss our hometown in Bintulu Sarawak badly. We miss the scenic Tanjung Batu beach, the salty air, the abundant fresh seafood and the laidback lifestyle at our beloved hometown and the nearest that we could experience something like this is found in Sekinchan, Selangor.

Funny that before the pandemic hit the world, Sekinchan was hardly a popular destination. Located in the Sabak Bernam district, it was more known as a sleepy fishing village and with its paddy fields. But Sekinchan has done a wonderful job re-inventing her image to become a tourist attraction (coupled with the restriction on inter-state travel which limits the choice of travel destination) that draws many visitors within Selangor and KL every week.

There are a lot of Facebook posts, blogs and Instagram stories on attractions in Sekinchan that we decided to experience Sekinchan ourselves. This post is to present Sekinchan from my view during our weekend visit last month.

It took us almost 2 hours to reach Sekinchan from Kuala Lumpur. The weather was thankfully sunny which allowed us to take plenty of good photos.

Happy faces in the car on the way to Sekinchan

Our first destination was to Sekinchan Paddy Gallery / Sekinchan Rice Mill Factory.

We couldn't help but feel awed when passing acres upon acres of green paddy field like emerald carpet spread as far as our eyes can see:

But when we reached the Paddy Gallery, we were disappointed to learn that the paddy processing factory was closed on Sunday. Note to travellers intending to visit Sekinchan: come on Saturday instead.

Instagrammers made a beeline to capture a moment at this hut covered with paddy stalks

What I can say is Sekinchan is a beautiful place and a nice retreat for weary city dwellers like us. It was a nice change to be outdoors exploring the mesmerizing paddy fields, bamboo pathways and fisherman boats docked at the jetty.

Clear water reflection of a mosque

The bamboo pathway is one of the sought-after Instagram-worthy spot

This made me want to pay another visit to Arashiyama Bamboo Forest in Kyoto

Our last stop before heading back to KL was to Redang beach (not to be confused with Redang Island in Terengganu).

A colorful signage of the Redang Beach

Sadly the beach area was littered with rubbish washed up from the sea and irresponsible visitors. When will Malaysians learn to love our heritage by getting rid of 'there'll be someone to pick up after me' mindset?

Beach was packed with crowds enjoying the sea breeze

Bright blue sky adorned with kites of all shapes and colours

Of all the places we stopped by, Khadeeja enjoyed playing with sand and seashells the most

If you are a seafood lover like us, don't forget to stop by at the fisherman jetty where they sell freshly caught fishes. They would happily help to clean the fish for you so you could store the fish in the freezer immediately after reaching home. The price is also very much cheaper than KL supermarkets.

In summary what we enjoyed during our Sekinchan day trip:

1. Taking photos at paddy fields

2. A nostalgia of our childhood at Ah Ma's House

3. Enjoying fresh cold sugarcane juice at bamboo walkway

4. Kids enjoy chilling at Pantai Redang

5. Buying cheap fresh fishes and prawns at fisherman jetty

Recommended place if you love outdoor and going back to suburban lifestyle. I'm already planning to go back for a tour to the Sky Mirror and Fireflies mangrove.