25th August 2010, went to Penang since my parents complained about that we haven’t went for a vacation together for a long time. Well, there you have it, i’m offline blogging this post. [Picture from top: My second brother, Max, his soon-to-be wife, Siu Yun, my Eldest brother, Kah Leong, my mum, Kah Leong’s wife, Sim and my dad]
As usual, trips mostly means = eat a lot of delicious and famous food, so to no surprise the first thing we did on the island is eat a place at some road called Bangkok Lane which the place is famous for it’s Penang Mamak Mee, seen Indians talk in Chinese? Yeah? Well have you seen Indians talk in Hokkien? Not really. What’s Mamak Mee? It actually looks like Rojak Mee but the cook fried it but at the at the same vigorously toss and turn the wok around. They used some special sauce for it too, not really spicy and not really sweet but the taste is unique.
Later, we went to the place we’re gonna stay for two nights, a TNB bungalow near Batu Feringghi just beside the beach. I didn’t do much when i reached there cause i immediately took a snooze for like 3 hours before realizing everyone else went to the beach already.
Just woke up look.
A very sunny day.
A shady place to rest.
You can also have a ride on a trained horse for 20-60 bucks, depending the business they did on that day.
Overall, an ok day, we ate at the busy Gurney place during that night. Had all sorts delicacies to eat but over eaten. Went a little bit of shopping, went a little bit of night market walk. And that’s pretty much it. What really bugs me though is that there’s couples everywhere we go, heck, there’s already three in my family. Reminding me that i’m still single and about the things i hate about being single. Well, the only thing that kept me from being annoyed by that matter is that i listened to music during most of the time. It’s the only thing keeping my mind occupied i guess, not to mention there’s no internet where i’m staying.
Sometimes i wonder if being single is harder than having a relationship with someone, because it’s not easy to stop thinking about someone and say that it’s not love but you’re actually just feeling lonely.
26th August 2010, time was fully used on going almost everywhere on the island, but actually most of the time we used on shopping today, went to the new Komtar for quite sometime in the afternoon, Max was searching for teddy bear for Siu Yun’s convocation, took a whole 3 hours shopping, and i bought a pair of shoes there too, my shoes were really worn out i guess but it only stayed with me less than two years.
For lunch we went to some place i have no idea how my brother got us there but was famous for it’s Char Kuey Teow. The best things about this dishes is that they come with three huge prawns, but for me, i’m not really into prawns so i’m not sure what’s so special about.
Oh, but the guy that’s responsible for cooking it looks cool, he wore goggles while frying them noodles.
Before going to Queens Bay Mall for another go of shopping, we went to the snake temple too. Sadly they were closing, and i realized some of the snakes were just put over there as oppose of the truth that the snakes came to the temple themselves. But there are still some that really came by themselves, just sad about this has been totally made to attract tourists while ironically tourists are the cause of the dwindling number of snakes to voluntarily come to the temple.
Well upon night time and after Queens Bay Mall(i bought another pair of shoes!!). We went to have dinner at some restaurant near the ferry port, it’s actually built around a really old tree so you could see tree trunk and roots crawling on the walls, quite creepy in fact. A word of caution though, this maybe superstitious, the place hasn’t been renovated and seems they just let the roots and vines grow on the walls, only covering them with red cloths. But a lot of people go there so you won’t feel too much of the creepiness of that place and the food there is cheap considering it’s a “Dai Cao” or meaning you eat in a chinese family style. Plus i think the rice is free of charge, you can have extra without paying more.
This is the last night i’m spending here, i don’t really want to talk about Ipoh which is tomorrow since it’s mostly just more about eating. Overall, this Penang trip is good one, albeit i’m moody but you can truly see what is unique about the place when you travelled half of the island. You can see all types of civilisation; the peaceful Batu Ferringhi, industrial areas around Queens Bay and the busy streets of George Town. But one thing’s for sure is that if you know how to speak in Hokkien, it’ll really help you, like a lot. Not much on the “Penang Beauty” though, maybe it’s just my luck but i didn’t get to see a lot of them, next time i guess.
and thanks for reading thus far, i enjoyed writing it in a promoting style. While on the whole trip, i’ve also took videos and pictures so check my facebook if i get to upload them. I can now see that there’s a lot of work to be done once i’m back home, this three weeks will be full of activities such as prom planning and video editting and effectively filling up my three weeks left of holidays.
Oh, i guess by the time i upload this post, it would be on Saturday, so happy birthday to Kim too, hahah.