At this rate, I am going to double up again in a relatively short period of time. Time to go for an apple a day diet!!.
We start the week at Gardens on Sunday. I brought my family along to help setup the seminar venue for the innovation seminar that would start on Monday. After setting up everything, Soh treated the team to Madam Kwan's. I must say that the quality of food at Madam Kwan's has dropped.
Monday morning, I was there again. We had cookies and biscuits for the morning before the seminar started. That was followed by dim sum and finger food for the morning tea break. Lunch was at the Spread. They served buffet with a tag line - "eat what you can see. And what you can see is a very wide spread of good food. This place is way better than Hilton for seminars! And then there was afternoon tea break with chicken boxing and chicken gyoza. I am not sure if we are stuffing up our customers just to keep them fat, dumb and happy or what. Thankfully, the seminar moved on to Penang after the Monday session and I did not participate. We had to quickly dismantle, pack and send the instruments to Penang by road. I heard that they had durians on the same Monday evening, followed by Nasi Kandar at the original Kayu. Much as I love that, that would be way too much!!.
The rest of the week passed rather uneventfully (food-wise) till Friday. Friday afternoon, Elaine W had to pick up her car after servicing was done. So I sent her there. First stop was Oriental Pavilion at Jaya33. We had roast pork and a really delicious Sang Har Hor Fun (big prawn flat noodles dish swimming in prawn roe). This was followed by a Tong Yuen in Ginger tea. Burrrpppppp!! No photos taken. Didn't plan on this lunch.
Evening, we drove up to Ipoh in preparation for a Malaysia Sales/Support meeting. First stop was Pusing Public seafood Restaurant in Ipoh town. Despite all the years of visiting Ipoh, because my 5th Uncle stays there, I have NEVER really explored Ipoh for it's famed food. This time, I was going to try as many famous outlets as possible. Pusing's captain was ethical!! She actually asked us to cut back on our orders as, in her opinion, we would be wasting a lot with our original order of 8 courses. The servings were big!! Even after cutting out 3 dishes, we were still full to the neck! Some of us had made plans for supper later that night. Obviously that plan was scuttled.
Next morning, a few of us (not all as that would entail logistics for almost 26 people) made our way to Foh San for Dim Sum. Foh San used to be located somewhere else in Ipoh and we visited the new site that had just been opened for 3 days. Congratulatory garlands were all over the place. It was only 7am and car parks were jammed, traffic was crawling and there were hordes of people waiting for an available table. It would seem that Foh San is so popular, the people in Ipoh don't mind waking up early to grab a table. They open at 6am and I hear that at that time, almost all the tables are packed.
After stuffing ourselves, we waddled back to the hotel for the meeting. Before the meeting started, I took orders for the famous Aun Kheng Lim salt baked chicken. You had to reserved in advance or they may not have enough chickens to sell to you. I had orders for 30 salt baked chickens! During lunch, we managed to park nearby, had lunch at a place that Kah Leng recommended - for Hor Hee and then picked up the chickens. Try to google Hor hee to see what this is all about. I did not take note of the name of the restaurant. It is near to the Salt baked chicken place.Hor Hee dish is a flat noodle dish in palatable, tasty soup, with meatballs and fish paste. I don't mind going again.
After we had collected the chickens, we stopped over at a "drive thru" soya bean outlet. It's called the Funny Mountain Soya Bean.It is so popular that we ended up waiting in line for almost 15 minutes. Then it was back to the meeting again.
After the meeting was over, the team split up and most went back to KL. A few of us stayed back longer to - buy Heong Pang (fragrant biscuit) from Gunong Rapat. I have always depended on my Ipoh friends to supply me this Heong Pang and today, I finally found out were the correct outlet is. You can get the same at many other outlets, but getting it from the original outlet is always an experience. Even Roger from Singapore bought quite a bit. - purchase Pomeloes. They look like over sized grapefruits. Again, in all my travels to Ipoh, I have always been buying this (and getting slaughtered price wise) at the Sam Poh Tong (or caves). Today, Kah Leng brought us to the wholesaler at Tambun. Prices were cheaper by at least 20% - And dinner before before we headed home. My uncle stays near the Ipoh Stadium BUT he had never brought me to this place near his house. Locally they call it Toong Koo Theng (mushroom stalls??). Officially, the place is called Gourmet Square. The place is appropriately named. Good food can be found in almost all the outlets. The locals in our team recommended Meng Wa Seafood for its' oyster sauce crabs and fried lala (a bivalve) in sauce. We also had Sotong Kangkong (Squid with morning glory) and ikan bakar (BBQed fish). The fish we had was stingray.
And after all that gorging, we all said our goodbyes and headed home separately. I see opportunities to visit Ipoh more often to try more food at different outlets.
Woke up to the news of the passing of Farrah Fawcett - one of the original Charlie's Angels on primetime TV. She died of cancer. Her death was expected. She had the last rites administered to her a day before.
What was unexpected was the passing of Michael Jackson, at age 50 - he is only 2 months younger than me!! Cause as yet unknown and speculated to be cardiac arrest. A brilliant entertainer and performer, if not a little unorthodox and unconventional at times. His life has influenced many and affected many. We are the world.
On the local scene, it is Jayson's last day in Agilent. Oi Chan follows suit in a week's time. Jayson leaves for personal reasons and Oi Chan due to a better offer.
To bid farewell to our soon to be ex colleagues, we had a dinner at Brussels located in Jaya ONE. 18 of us managed to attend, including the guests of honor. Brussels is termed a beer cafe. The prime offering is BEER!!. Entrees numbers about 5 or 6. As usual, it's the malaise of Malaysians - LATE!! We reserved the place for 6.30 and did not show up till about 7pm. The rest of the crowd came in by 7.30pm.
Most of use ordered pork lion, salmon fillet or lamb. The ones who arrived earlier (yours truly included) started off with a hoegarden. The waitress serving us recommended that we give Timmermans a try. Too fruity and sweet for my liking. But I still ended up with 2 glasses of beer in front of me. Ken was kind of interested in of the sweeter looking waitress that night but dare not ask her for anything. He was just hoping that she would serve us. I got him her name and even managed to get her to pose for a photo. Later that night, we realized why Ken was so reluctant to make a move. His girlfriend showed up to take him home!! Ken - Hui Min can still be a reason to come to that place again!!
Everyone wanted to give Oi Chan a farewell hug. Hmm... I wonder why? Nobody "volunteered" to give Jayson a hug. So he hugged his only glass of beer for the night.
And then, there were some who I am sure would have loved to hug Oi Chan, but dared not, so they hugged each other.
Beer- a drink that can make people make strange faces. In Kah Weng's case, it was guava juice that probably fermented in his stomach to cause this.
We also had 3 committed couple that night. At least one will be having wedding bells (or in the local context - yum seng) by the end of the year.No twosomes? No problem - we also have threesomes!
Great night, good company. Only thing that could have been better - clean the lens of my camera!! Sorry about the snow spots on the photos guys and gals!
Saturday (20th June)- I invited my mum's former boss's families (the children, their siblings and the next 2 generations). My mum used to work for the late Mr. Teh Gin Sooi's family. I wonder where I would be today if not for him. He helped me to get into the course of my choosing in TAR college after I had already rejected an earlier offer to a Bio Maths class. That course was the basis of where I am today. He was also kind enough to let us stay with him for many years. That was when we did not have a house of our own.
In any case, I have not had the opportunity to thank him or his missus (both have passed away now), so in celebrating the first half century of my life (51st actually), I invited all of his children and their children and families for a lunch do at the Oriental Pavilion in Jaya 33. We had Dim Sum, a suckling pig and longevity noodles. I told them that this was a help the economy lunch since the economy is in such bad shape.Damn!! I forgot to take photos of the food again!.
Well, Alex got himself a new friend - Benjamin. Looks like his uncles like to bully him. poor kid. Justin and family was there too.
And today, as I am pounding this this out, it is father's day. My mum just called me for dinner. She had steamed a chicken and a fish. My favourite dishes - steamed is healthy.
Monday started in earnest!!. 2 of the regional managers were in town - Roger and Sonti. Mr Wong has a large durian plantation and it is now durian season. "Come to my house for D101, D28, D24 and Red Prawn" he said. Due to an earlier commitment to another friend, I declined Monday's binge.
The invitation was still on on Tuesday. Damn!! I must try it. So this time with Roger and Pung in tow, we ended up at Mr. Wong's. I was so busy eating the durians, I forgot to take pictures!! Believe you me, they were really good. On top of that, bats had made their residence in the roof of the patio. So, sticky fingers and all, I just had to snap them and in the process, caught one of Roger and Pung, finishing up by drinking water from the skin of the durian. This supposedly helps to cool you down. If not, you may have a sore throat tomorrow.
We had opened 8 fruits and polished off 7. Then we adjourned to fatty Crabs restaurant nearby and had, spicy sour crabs, steamed fish, roasted chicken wings, satay and drinks. No photos again - too busy eating.
Another burp moment.
Friday, the Marcom team organized an LCMS user appreciation night for selected customers. the event was held in Hilton hotel, KL. Event was to start at 5pm. 2 key lessons learnt from our first evening, outdoor customer event:- - do NOT start an event at 5pm!! Many customers do not get off work till at least 5pm. then there is traffic jam to contend with. - do not start at 5pm because the sun is still out and it is near impossible to see the screen when we project onto it. We just cannot compete with the sun. Additional lesson on this is not to position the screen with the sun coming into your audience eyes (even if it is at an angle). I'll also let the photos speak for themselves here.
From 13th June onwards, it was like food glorious food, almost every night. I badly need to shed some of the pounds put on over the past 8 days or so!!
It started with The Wok. Location KotaDamansara, PetalingJaya, Selangor 26, JalanPJU 5/21The Strand, KotaDamansara The Wok Cafe is located at the newer shoplots across the road from Kayu’s NasiKandar. After turning into The Strand from the traffic light, keep left and you will notice a big electrical shop and Alliance bank. The Wok Cafe is just behind. Cuisine: Penang Style Nyonya
I had arranged for Vincent H and Cheah to meet to discuss a possible business proposal. So Mei's family, Vincent's and mine got together for a meal at the Wok. Suffice to say, the food was in general - authentic Penang fare. I'll just let the photos speak for themselvesFirst - the spread, followed by close up of some of the dishes
After all that, the only word I have left is - BURPPPP!!!!