Balik Pulau Hua Hee Lai Herbal Sauna

I said i will come back!! After a small gathering with Mouse, Soon, Li Soo and Andry, we went to Hua Hee Lai Herbal Sauna. It was a rainy day and i just couldn't wait to jump into the Sauna Room. It was so warm inside there. The herbal smell make me feel very relaxing. After a Sauna, we took a bowl of Bubur Chacha to fill our stomach.

Nice picture taken on that day. After cut down the three, the boss further separate the trunk into few pieces and the big one was use as a table(This table had been used for some time). This newly put forty leaves was found on one of this table. Wow, really strong vitality!! 生命力超强!!

Balik Pulau Durian & Herbal Sauna

Oh yes!! It's Durian season again. In a gang of 5, today our mission were looking for cheap and nice durian. Somebody suggested us to try at the durian stall near the Penang Airport. When we reached there, we saw there were only 2 opened stall. After parked our car near the roadside, immediately we headed towards 1 of the stall and asked asked for "ANG HEH"(red prawn) but he didn't have. So, we just asked him opened any nice durian will do. Basically, we just ate 2 durian as the quality of the durian of this stall was not so nice. Choo Pui and me were very dissapointed.

Luckly, Andry decided to continue our mission at Balik Pulau. At 1st, we did not know where to go as nobody in the car knew any Durian farmer at Balik Pulau. Suddenly, we saw one partially hidden durian stall opened at the main gate of the durian farm. So, again Andry decided to have a try here. When we reached the stall, we told the Aunty that we wanted to eat durian. Aunty had recommended few durian type to us which were Kung Poh, 600, Ang Heh, Durian Kampung. Most of the people loved 600 very much but i still prefered Ang Heh. They said eating Ang Heh make their nose feel like eating WASABI so they didn't like it.

After our Durian Lunch, we asked for Aunty permission to visit her durian farm. Without thinking much, the aunty said OK.

Look what did i found!! A lot of big durian hanging on the tree. It was not the 1st time i visited durian farm but i still feel very excited. Durian= King of the fruit!!

After the farm visit, we went to one of the Balik Pulau Recreation Spot(Not so sure about the name) to view the scenery of Balik Pulau town from top of the hill. Due to monsoon season, Penang was a bit hazy at this time. When we're about to leave, we saw a sign board showing a direction toward Herbal Sauna House.

Young man always curious about something new. So, we decided to take a look. 1st we saw a restaurant. When we went deeper, we saw a lot of timbers. We believed it was used to cook the herbal.

This was the entrance to the sauna room. One thing really suprised us was this herbal sauna facility was free of charge. You just need to pay for your will. According to a lady there, it was opened from 11am till 9pm. I had went in to to sauna room to have a look and the whole room really full of herbal smell. Too bad, i did not bring any clothes to exchange so i could not have a try this time. But i was sure, I WILL BE BACK!! Haha....

There was a restaurant next to this sauna house and the boss was trying to set up a prawn jigging(fishing) pond.

The concept of this restaunrant really attracting us. It was something like "Back to natural". The whole restaurant was made of timber(wood) except the simen floor and the pond. The fence, the chair, the table and decoration items were mainly made of timber and Bamboo. Really a nice and relaxing place.

Overall, we had met today mission and WHAT A NICE AND NEW DISCOVERY!! Balik Pulau, a Mysterious place. There are more and more to be discovered here.

Some old photo

I was flipping through some of my department old photo today. Some of the team building was held before I joined this company. Suddenly, some of the old memory flashing in my mind…..

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26^th June 2006

Today was my 1^st day in work and my boss told me that tomorrow was our company team building day. So, what was team building? What did it stand for? My boss told me that tomorrow we did not need to come company, just need to gather at the Jerejak Jetty. We would have some games and lunch on the island. I was extremely blur at that time because I did not know why did we have team building, where was Pulau Jerejak and the worse thing was I did not know everyone here. I only knew who was my menthor. So, could I enjoy the games? What happen if I did not join this time? I was planning not to join but I was just too new and I did not dare to do so. Haha…

27^th June 2006

I woke up very early today and requested my housemate to send me to the Jetty. Once I reached the jetty, I tried to look for any familiar faces. Haih…It was not a comfortable moment for me as the place was crowded with people and I do not know everyone here. At last, I had found some familiar faces and decided to stick with them for this whole day. Do you know what was my first thought of my division people? Not so helpful and did not know how to take care of freshly. They seems not understand how freshly feel when we did not know everyone here. Just so lonely~~ However, I am playful person. I had no problem playing games with somebody I did not know when came to game session. “When I play, I play with my heart. I don’t care who you are or where am I ”. And, I was just so lucky cause my team get 1^st place in the competition. We were the CHAMPION team!!!

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………This photo was taken 2 years ago but this was the 1st time i saw this photo. I really did not know most of the people inside this photo at that time. What i remembered was someone called me to take picture together. Only today i realized, we were all from the same department. Haha.....really "SAP HA SAP HA".

I did not know who snap this picture, but it was me. This was one of the tele match we played at that time. I just couldn't do rabbit jump and this made me moving very slow in this game. Maybe this was the reason the camera man could had a good snap on me. I hate this game!!

This was the second team building at Park Royal Hotel and my team became the CHAMPION again!!

Penang National Park

14th June 2008

We had a mission today. In a group of 10 natural lovers, we were planning to explore Teluk Kampi, Penang National Park. Penang National Park was not a new location for us as we had been hiking to Muka Head Light House and Pantai Kerachut before. This time, we have decided to challenge ourself for another small mount toward our destination Teluk Kampi. I have heard from my friend before that it was not an easy task and not recommended for a beginner.

8.30am: After register ourself, we begin our hiking journey.
10.00am: Reach Pantai Kerachut whithout facing any problems as everyone was full of energy.

10.30am: Heading towards our next challenges, "TELUK KAMPI".

11.15am: Too bad, we were lost. Andry and me were leading the group and both of us get trap by some stingy plants. Immediately, we gave signal to others not to come nearer as we did not hope more and more people get trap. Luckly, Andry had a mulipurpose knife with him and we successfully removed ourself from that dangerous place. After some discussion, we had decided to "Patah Balik" as Choo Pui said there was another road that can lead us to top of the hill(according to some online source, we need to reach top of the hill then only hike towards Teluk Kampi). So, the rest of the journey was lead by Choo Pui as they said we were bringing them to "Holland" just now. Haha...
12.00pm: We reached top of the hill and everyone was very happy as we believed we were on the right track.

12.35pm: Hooray!!! We reached Teluk Kampi.

There was a lot of stingy plant along the hiking track and we keep on remind everyone whenever we spot this dangerous plant.

Some nice pictures taken by Andry and me using our IXUS 860 while we were on our way to Pantai Kerachut.

Photos taken at Teluk Kampi.

暖暖的棕子

真的好想吃妈妈裹的棕子。我想，大部分的游子都有相同的心愿。我工作的地方真的太远了，再加上现在油价上涨，所有的物价也必定会跟着起价。看来未来想回家也得想想裤袋有没有钱，好残酷啊！我亲爱的马来西亚政府，请您为我们想想吧！“吃”了那么多年，也总该“吃”饱了吧！为什么我们不在你那人民生活水准提高的数字后面产生共鸣呢？为什么在父亲的年代一个人工作能养活一家六口而现今两个人工作要让一家四口生活好一些都那么难？（叹息）

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俗语说得对， 有失必有得。虽然今年不能回家和家人一起过端午节，但我在这特别的日子里收到了朋友送来的棕子。就这么暖暖的几粒小棕子，里面包涵了朋友的真心，吃进口里还有那浓浓情谊的味道。真的太棒了，谢谢你 SIM 和老鼠。还好在这陌生的城市里还有你们这班知己相伴，感谢上天有这么的一个安排。愿我们在忙碌的同时也不忘彼此问候，互相打打气，加加油！

Dumpling Festival : Bak Chang!

Today is the dumpling(also known as Bak Chang@ZongZi) festival day. In Chinese, known as Duan Wu Jie. Smallbell has been chipping in to help in making the bak chang since last year's festival. Before I go into the process of making dumpling, here's a brief history on it.

I'll refer the dumpling as Chang. Chang is traditionally eaten during the Dragon Boat Festival which falls on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Chinese lunar calendar. This day also commemorates the death of Qu Yuan, a famous Chinese poet from kingdom of Chu who lives during the "three country wars period". Qu Yuan tried unsuccessfully to warn his king and countrymen against the expansion of their Qin neighbors. When Qin Dynasty took over Chu Capital, Qu Yuan was so disappointed that he drowned himself in the Miluo river. According to legend, packets of rice were thrown into the river to prevent fish from eaeting Qu Yuan's body. However, there was another version which states that Chang were given to a dragon that lived in the river.

So much bout the story, let's talk bout the process of making Chang. Chang are wrapped in bamboo leaves because it imparts its own unique smell and flavour to the rice. The rice will be lightly precooked by stir-frying. Ingredients include red bean paste, chinese black mushrooms, salted duck eggs, chesnuts, cooked peanuts. The ingredients are prepared separately or mixed together depending on the practice of the family. Once all the ingredients are prepared, here comes the process of wrapping the Chang. Wrapping the Chang will takes a lot of patience and practice for a new beginner.

As for Smallbell, wrapping the Chang is as easy as eating the Chang(btw, she can really eat A LOT of it, trust me). She's so well trained in it and that makes me really proud and glad that I found the perfect gal(At least i won't have to buy Chang in the future..hehe).

Not to be missed is also the Jianshui Zong(Kee Chang in Hokkien)(碱水粽) where the glutinous rice is treated with lye water which gives them a distinctive yellow colour. It usually contain no filling and are often eaten with sugar or light syrup or kaya.

That's so much on Duan Wu Jie, we'll be back with more updates.

My 25th Birthday

The time passed so fast, and it's my birthday again. As usual, Andry will brought me out for dinner before we had a small birthday celebration with my gang. I still remember that last year Andry brought me to "The Ship" and we took our dinner inside the ship. And this year, he brought me to "Victoria Station" and we took our dinner inside the train. Haha....I am wondering what will be his plan next year? Probably need to celebrate inside a plane.. :-P. Overall, the food in Victoria station was very delicious, and the environment was quiet romantic as well. Andry had order a main course which served with lobster and another side dishes
"Escargot"(something like snails), the food really thumb up!!!

After taking the romantic dinner with Andry, i had another gathering with others friend on the next day. And this time, we went to Chili's Penang. We'd met up around 7pm and start ordering for our food. Thanks to Sim, Mouse, Soon and Li Soo for coming.

And these were the dishes that we'd order.

After the dinner with my gang, Amy gave me another suprise when i reached home(Another suprise after the Fuel Price went up). She bought me a 250g birthday cake. I had remind everyone not to buy me a birthday cake but left out Amy. She did not know i don't eat cake. Haha....However, have to thanks Amy for the tiny black forrest cake. Since we'd birthday cake, i force Amy to sing birthday song for me. Ha.......

Thanks to everyone who had given me a call and all the sms......