Sunday, January 18, 2015 0 b*tchin

There and Back Again - A Penang Tale 1

Dear bloggie,

It been 3 long years since I last visited Penang. My last trip was to test my body, mind and spirit in the Penang Marathon.

The premise of this trip is quite simple, I had 10 days of leave to clear by April, I pretty much close a boiling point at my workplace... I had wanted to revisit Penang for a long time but my so called "buddies" were all busy hence...

I decided to take a week off and pull a lone ranger trip to the northern isle. Despite a lot of criticism on doing a solo trip = boring trip, I'm pretty much taken aback by how this trip actually exceed even my own expectations. Sure, there are parts of the trip the pangs of loneliness haunt me, but those moment are quite little. I had a lot of "me" time, where I just go and do whatever I want whenever I wanted to. As for human socialization, I had the sufficient dosage in the form of foreigner backpackers that stayed at the same hostel as me. I do however regret not joining them in one of their night bash at a club.

My original plan was to enjoy a slow ride north while enjoying the scenery from a romantic moonlight railway track via a night express train, however that plan was derailed due to in availability of train beds for booking (fully booked). So I opt for a bus instead.

Equipped with my trusty old backpack, I embarked on this 4 days, 3 nights adventure from Pudu Sentral at late noon. The journey was a VERY tiring one, being confined to my seat through most of the bus ride. It took a long 5 hour 30 minutes for the bus to finally reached Penang at 7.30pm. The bus dumped most of us at the Sungai Nibong bus terminal, where I got a bad first impression of Penang Rapid Transit bus when I had to wait AN HOUR for a bus to take us to Komtar bus terminal which happens to be just a short 10-20 minutes away.

Worn out to my bones, no thanks to unexpected hour wait for the bus to take us to Komtar, I arrive at Komtar around 8.30pm. Next, I had to locate my hostel so I can unload. Lucky for me, a kind Penangite actually show me the way to Ryokan Chic Hostel @ Jalan Murni, which was just a 10-15 minutes walk from Komtar (Was asked if I was Hong Kong). However my relief turned into panic when I learnt their bunk was already full. Yes, I didn't book in advance as my whole theme for this trip was to be as random as possible and do as little planning as I can. It's getting late and I had to find a place to stay for the night. Lucky for me, I short listed another hostel, Syok @ Jalan Chulia which happen to be just nearby.

I open the doors of the hostel entrance to see the receptionist and a kwai mui backpacker. The kwai mui backpacker flashed a courtesy smile to me as I awaited for my turn. After showing the kwai mui backpacker to her room/bunk which is located upstairs, I popped the question "Do you have a bed for 1 tonight?" Relief flooded me when she confirmed there is indeed a bed available. I was lead to my royal abode which is in the 1st floor ala Victoria Street 8 bed Mixed Dorm. The room also house a German couple and the receptionist herself (Yea, she slept in that room too). The next thing I instantly noticed is I could hear the street performer singing from the streets below. Free music. With my sleeping place finally secured, I attend to the next highest priority matter, my stomach. Lucky for me, one venue of the food list I compiled was just around the corner. I had a rather expensive Nasi Kandar at Nasi Kandar Line Clear. So-so only. Disappointed, I decided to call it a day.

Unfortunately for me, I found sleeping was quite hard due to noise from the street and vibration of heavy vehicles zooming by. I managed to enter lala land but was disrupted by the sound of Indian Bollywood music at 4am. Apparently someone decided it was fun to hit their stereo on full blast on the streets below. The disco event lasted around at least 30-60 minutes which after I had hard time falling back to sleep.

Syok@Jalan Chulia














Considering I couldn't much fall back asleep and I planned to visit Bukit Bendera in the morning, I decided to hit the road early morning. After my morning ritual, I was out to Komtar to catch a bus to Bukit Bendera. I wanted to complete this place before the sun gets too hot. Disaster strikes again as I learnt from the bus driver that apparently Bukit Bendara was close till the 19th... So I decided to go to Kek Lok Si Temple instead.

The bus took me straight to Air Itam, which took around 30 minutes. I felt a sense of satisfaction on not bringing my car to Penang and opting to utilize the public bus there instead when I saw the mayhem of driving around Penang. What a mess... I arrive at the bus stop just infront of Kek Lok Si Temple and at around 9.30am. From there, I had to do a short long hike to the temple. The temple was partially prepare for the Chinese New Year Celebration next month, as there was tang lung hanging all over the place


CNY 2015 ready!




































To reach the top of the temple where the Kuan Yin statue reside, I had to forked out donate RM6 for a round trip cable car short ride.

At the top, I am reminded of the majestic view of the gigantic Kuan Yin statue and the amazing view of Penang from a high vantage point.

Amazing how humans could build such a thing

View of Penang


























My zodiac sign














I however do feel the temple has been too commercialized instead of being a sacred place of worship with the tons of souvenir shop and donation boxes around the temple.

I was told by a sales lady in one of the souvenir shop that a week before Chinese New Year, visitors time would be extended to 7pm for them to catch the amazing sight of all lights at Kek Lok Si Temple being lit. It's indeed a shame I would be unable to catch such a majestic sight.

To be continued...
0 b*tchin

Kpop scandal

Dear bloggie,


This is probably the hottest funny scandal I seen for quite a while. Woi, haram leh! While most people are b*tchin it's just "brotherly hug", I suggest you take a closer look at the girls body language through the whole video.. very obviously "gatal".

I just hate the hypocrite image of a girl in tudung "gatal". To wear a tudung and "gatal", that just doesn't sit well with me. If she remove the tudung maybe I wouldn't be so pissed (cause let's face it, KPop SUX) but hey that me.
Saturday, January 17, 2015 0 b*tchin

Tracks trailer

Dear bloggie,


Brought a tear into my eyes just watching this trailer...
Saturday, January 3, 2015 0 b*tchin

2015

Dear bloggie,

It's 2015... Another year has gone like the wind... It's the time of the year where we look back on the previous year and see what how good/bad we fared and plan how do we look back the next year.

So a refresher on my 2014's New Year resolutions and some snide remark on how I fared...

  1. Visit a foreign land - Yeap, US is as foreign as it could ever get...
  2. Start gambling investing in dividend stocks - Epic fail
  3. Facebook less - Been clean of Facebook for a year, amazing feat
  4. Achieve my fitness goals - Finally after 5 years, I reached my 70 kg goal weight
  5. Write a full fledged application using Spring Roo - Epic fail + laziness
  6. Write a few technical post on Spring Roo in this blog - Hahaha...
  7. Learn to say "Fuck You" in 12 different languages - Only learnt one, Fakku Anata
  8. Land 1 date - Yes, my monk mean streak continues...
  9. Refactor my room - Epic fail
  10. Get a monk hairdo - Almost
  11. Watch more documentary movies - Mehkay
So, a mixed bag overall in terms of how I fared... Probably the US trip, going cold turkey in Facebook and hitting 70 kg weight pretty much sums up my 2014 story for me. Looking forward, what is my 2015 resolutions?
  1. Visit Japan
  2. Write a short novel
  3. Achieve 15% body fat at minimum body weight 65 kg
  4. Run 3 10K runs
  5. Build/Program a game
  6. Land 1 date
  7. Visit Penang
  8. Update my English slang vocabulary
  9. Go on a juicing diet
  10. Try out 3 new hobbies