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Cleaning Up After

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On the second day of Raya, mum and I went out to breakfast at Restoran Yoong Seng . I had pork ball noodles, while she only ate the sam gan chong pork balls. In the afternoon, we had to get to Old Klang Road to check out our very first AirBnB guests. It was a joint effort between my sister, BIL, BIL's siblings, and myself. My sister did most of the interior design, and even made some of the furniture and decorative items from scratch. I just helped in setting up the listing. When mum and I got there, we found that the guests were a group of young adults from Penang. I thought they were students. Collected the keys and access cards from them, and sent them on their way. They left the place very tidy and even left the used towels in a neat, folded stack on the floor. Made our work easier, but it still ain't easy being the 'housekeeper'. We put the towels into the washer, changed all the linens, and washed the bathrooms. The most hated task would be making the beds

A White Raya

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With mum on a strict no-carbs diet, Raya ain't what it used to be. Plus, we had no inclination to go to any government open houses, so we just spent it at a local mall. Statistically, Sunway Pyramid is one the malls that we often ignore although its quite near to my place. The horrendous traffic and parking are the key reasons. So with most KL-ites out of town for Raya, we made our way there. The roads were clear and we found parking in a jiffy. For the first day of Raya, everything seemed business-as-usual. Only a few shops were closed. And since it was our first visit after a long time, many of the shops were fresh in our eyes. In my opinion, the Raya decorations were lacklustre. The focal point was the frame of a Malay village house, all in white. Event the silhouettes of coconut trees were white. Ever heard of a White Raya? Doesn't photograph well too. Our lunch was at Sho Kushiage , a pork katsu joint. Mum was felt adventurous and ordered the premium katsu with chees

AirBnB

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For the whole month of Ramadan, my client in Brunei was in half-hibernation mode. Staff left the office at 3:15 PM, and things couldn't move much, no matter how much their gangster COO bellowed and cursed. Most obvious was the week before Hari Raya where everyone was already in the holiday mood. The whole floor was decked out with lights, ketupats , tinsel, lanterns, and they even set up a desktop for a slideshow of photos from last year's festivities. Felt a little like Christmas to me. Whatever the case, I also welcomed the fact that I would not need to fly to Brunei for more than a week since most of the staff would not be working. Arrived back in KL on Friday evening, and had a short meet-up with SK at my sister's place. She had brought pungent cheese and cold cuts from her trip to England and Scotland. The next morning, we had breakfast together as well at Ker Yuan Kitchen , Taman OUG. Ate a whole lot of YTF that morning. The Tribe were there too because we had t

Corpus Christi

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Can't quite remember the last time I attended a Corpus Christi procession at church. Possibly close to a decade. In case you're not familiar with Roman Catholic liturgy, Corpus Christi is the liturgical solemnity celebrating the reality of the Body and Blood of Christ, i.e the Eucharist. In simple terms, the little wafer is Body of Christ, and the wine is the Blood of Christ. Mass started at 6:00 PM, where mum and I barely had two hours of rest before heading out to church. You see, we had spent the whole morning at Bukit Bintang, shopping at Pavilion and Lot 10. Five hours, and not a single thing caught our eyes. Ate a simple lunch at Dashi Dining , Isetan the Japan Store. Picked out some yummy stuff like Nagoya style chicken chop which is a rolled chicken dish with burdock, Sanma-Eringii roll, chicken skewers, and assorted oden ( burdock fish paste roll and konjac ). All were yummy with their use of dashi , the heart of Japanese cuisine. Back to the church procession. U

Mall Celebrities (SEA Games 2017): Vietnam Vic

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With legendary bloggers like SimonLover doing a blow by blow on cute SEA Games 2017 athletes like Welson Sim , I too must do my part for my spycam series. I spied this cute athlete from Team Vietnam at Uniqlo, Sunway Putra Mall ( think he stays at Sunway Putra Hotel ). Vietnam Vic was picking out pants and I was tempted to go help him. Anyway, I like his side profile and clam -ish hairstyle. I wonder what team he plays for?

Top Down Approach

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Saturday was a great day for KH and I to spend time with each other as mum had a day out. In the morning, she met up her friends for a vegetarian brunch at BMS Organics, Sri Petaling. I dropped her off and immediately headed home where KH was already waiting for me. Hehe. I'm sure you can guess why he was there. I didn't even bother with breakfast and went straight for the 'sausage meal' that was waiting for me. Started off with me bottoming, but for some reason, it wasn't working for me that day. So I suggested the we flip. Positioned him on the edge of the bed, eased into KH, and I got started. And for the first time ever, I finished the session ( or rather finished in him ). Not to say I enjoy being a top now, it is a totally different experience. And surely there's more to it that I have not tried. Pork was the protein-replacement meal of choice, so we went to have a meal of pork ball noodles at Restoran Yoong Seng . Come dinner time, KH and I had a sm

All About Ambuyat

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According to Wikipedia , Brunei's national dish is ambuyat , a dish made from sago. Visually, its nothing much to look at. Basically, its a stretchy, starchy paste made from pouring hot water into sago. Traditionally, its eaten with a special bamboo utensil called the chandas ( looks like a long chopstick for kids because its joined at one end ).  Using the chandas , one rolls the ambuyat around the sticks. As you can imagine, its also tasteless, so its eaten with a wide variety of sauces ( cacah ) and side dishes to add flavour. Since its already so hard to pick up, imagine eating it. The secret is not to chew at all, just swallow it! Well I had the chance to try it at a sungkai buffet at Empire Hotel. For something that looks like the congealed leavings of a  bukkake  party which are best swallowed, it's a surprise that I didn't like it! Photo credits: Sabaheats James Du

Coming to Klang

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Out of the blue, KH arranged a day out to Klang. He picked me up at 8:00 AM, and we made our way to AEON Bukit Tinggi where Gratitude was waiting to join us for a hearty BKT breakfast. The first choice was Ah Soon BKT, but it was not opened. Perhaps the owner celebrated Nuzul Al-Quran? Haha. Gratitude presented us with a second choice-- Fei Kay ( literally "aeroplane" ). Fei Kay BKT specialises in the clay pot variant, not the typical small bowl style of Klang. We tried both varieties, soup and dry. Being purists, Gratitude and I prefer the soup variant, but KH wanted to try the dry variant. To me, the latter is also nice, but it definitely ain't BKT. For second breakfast (we sound like Hobbit), Anton asked us whether we would like apom or kopitiam fare. KH wanted the latter, so we visited a branch of Cheong Foh . The place has a very different feel because it's renovated to look like a food court, where every food stall has their own counter, and the who

Who's Your Papa?

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Genebin and Zo  in Kuchai Lama is no more. In place of that cafe is a Japanese fusion restaurant that goes by the name PapaSan Canteen . One Saturday afternoon, KH and I had our lunch paktor session there. The owners implemented a 'forced' daap 3   toi 4+2 concept with the use of long tables. Very much like school canteens. All this to encourage diners to talk to strangers sitting beside them. In my opinion, there are two possible scenarios: Hey, that looks good. What is that? Oh God, don't order this. It tastes like crap.  The food's quite good really. Firstly, we had the signature Papasan Roll. Supposedly contains foie gras, but I couldn't detect it through all the garlic mayo. Served on log slice. Very Instagrammable. Next was something the waiter recommended-- G.M.C., short for Garlic Mayo Chicken. Big chuncks of chicken that are crispy on the outside and moist on the inside. And of course smothered with garlic mayo. See the pattern? Chef Jimmy loves g

Breakfast, Berlawak, Babi, Botanica

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With mum's special dietary requirements in force, there aren't many simple breakfast choices that I can choose from. For some reason, the trip to the morning market was shelved, so it was a leisurely breakfast that day. Went to SetiaWalk in search of a cafe that opened early. Only one choice was available-- TiPsy Brew O'Coffee . Looked quite promising actually. The interior was not the cincai type, they did have some work done with patterned raw brick walls, murals and such. I got the All Star Breakfast, while mum went for the Cheesy Baked Eggs. Both came with a choice of OJ or black coffee. Not bad at all. Got to love the jumbo sausage and scrambled eggs. When we left, some flea market stalls had begun operating, but truth be told, it wasn't comfortable to browse in such oppressive heat. KH had bought tickets to MACC's "Now That's I Call Jokes Vol. 8". Well we all know that most of MACC's investigations are jokes, but I'm not talking