I hope everyone had a good Christmas this year. :) I had fun myself, but right now am dealing with the aftermath..... lol. Lots of training to catch up on, and I'm also down with the flu, fever and the works, mostly I think cos of the clubbing at Opera last night... Blah. Church was an enjoyable affair too, and Ernie was performing in one of the dances that morning too. Yes I know. Ernie, dance? Not a likely combination eh. XD Anyways it was my first Christmas with him, just the two of us so I was anticipating that it was going to be a good one. :)
My attempts at making beef ribs for dinner. Ernie bought them a day in advance so I could marinate and season them. OK I know it doesn't look like very much from my crappy pic, but not bad I suppose for a first try! Took too much time to cook them... so we went out to Bubba Gump instead.... and had the ribs for supper and for the next day! Am so relieved they turned out all soft and falling off the bone in the end. Would've been a real waste of good beef ribs.
And I went to great lenghts to plan a surprise for Ernie... wrote him a poem and gave it to him in the morning... pretended I didn't buy him anything.... but at the end of the day.....
Brought out the huge box..... And packed inside was......
Cos my boy only deserves the best, no? :) And the moment I saw this I just knew I had to get it for him - it was perfect! Classy, masculine, and unique. I just knew he would love it and he did! :D
And guess what he got me for Christmas.
Nothing. Yeap. How convenient.
Sorry that I don't have any pics from church for now cos they're all still in Ernie's cam but I'm sure I'll get round to posting them soon. And now.... back to our vacation last weekend! After 2 nights in Camerons, we headed further up north to Penang. Mmmmm food.... glorious Penang food.....
We met some Penangites during our trip to Camerons and they recommended this place called "Sister's char kuey teow". Claimed it was famous for having the best kuey teow in the whole of Penang! So there we went searching high and low for it......
Finally spotting it at the end of Jalan Macallister!
It's just this little kuey teow store at the front of a dark, dingy and hot coffee shop. And boy... it was packed to the max! And.... there was a SUPER long waiting list for char kuey teow. Whoaaah. Sure looks like everyone's here for some of that! So while waiting.... we had....
Some special Penang yam cakes and
otak-otak. Now usually I really hate yam cakes. But this was really good! Very smooth and creamy texture, and it went so well with the heaping amount of fried onions they gave us. The
otak-otak was alright too, cooked with lots of lemongrass and other herbs for that special flavour.
Prawn mee. This wasn't so good. :( Not very flavourful or "
kaw". Definitely have had better.
Oh what about the so-called
legendary kuey teow??? The verdict - it's nothing to shout about. No idea why so many people were queueing up for a plate of that, or why we had to wait close to an hour for kuey teow like that. Heck, we all even fundamentally agreed that even Gurney Drive dishes out better kuey teow!
And so we all made a move to check into our hotel. Cranky and sleep deprived from having to curl up on the freezing floor with Ernie in Camerons... you have no idea how elated we were to find that Berjaya had given us an
upgrade. Our very own
suite!! With our own master bedroom, our own
living hall, and (what on earth...?)
two TVs!!
Our king bed. Which, as always, gets wrecked within the first five minutes of entering by Ernie.
The cosy living hall. Doesn't look like much from this pic but it's great! Our own suite, without having to share with anyone!! :D Needless to say, we will be sleeping very well in comfort and privacy.
Checked out the recently opened Hard Rock Hotel/Cafe in Batu Ferringhi. Not as large as the one in Bali.... but still impressive nevertheless!
Ernie getting excited and posing with the guitar of Vince Neil from Motley Crue
And with the guitar of Nikki Sixx (also Motley Crue). With his very overused rocker pose. XD
The inside of Hard Rock Cafe
They even erected a statue of Michael Jackson sitting on a throne outside the cafe. It's so new, it doesn't even have it's bronze plaque yet!
Nagore Place... it's supposed to be a stretch of restaurants but I guess it's only happening at night. Everything was closed in the daytime!
We alaso paid a visit to the Peranakan Mansion. This is my favorite place to visit in Penang, hence the excess of photos... haha. Basically it's an old Peranakan house that once belonged to the Kapitan, and has been restored to it's former glory to reflect the lifestyle of the affluent family. The tours are also very detailled and interesting. On top of that, you are also free to roam the house, touch or sit on the furniture etc.
The main entrance hall, with the majestic staircase
Our guide giving detailed explainations of each room and section of the house.
The restored wooden doors with elaborate carvings
The main dining hall. The men also have a seperate dining hall for business conversations.
Exhibits displaying jewellery the Nyonya women wear
One of the bedrooms, done up like a traditional bridal chamber.
Another bedroom, done up like a bridal chamber which reflects another era.
An old camera
This doorframe bears some very unique carvings of lychee fruit hanging down from the top... which is a very unusual design for a door in any culture!
Extensive collections of glass vases
The courtyard
Function hall
The family temple, which still has the original ancenstral shrine
The temple courtyard
Bats living in the temple... which was considered to be a sign of good luck
My mom having pictures taken inside the function hall!
Later that night.... at Gurney Drive for dinner! This hawker here is frying up some good hor chien. There was a long queue for this one too, but this time it was a wait that was well worth it!
Took a trip to the War Museum the next day... it's an expansive outdoor museum that is actually a very well preserved fort from the days of WW2 and the Japanese Occupation. The grounds are very vast, and there are tunnels and stuff too that you can explore hands-on.
Replica of a war cannon
One of the tunnels leading down to the ammunition storage rooms. There were also many small escape tunnels but we couldn't explore those as we didn't have a flashlight with us...
Where ammunitions used to be stored
One of the tunnels that was lit with a single bulb, so we could go up this one... but at the end of it, it's a steep climb up a steel ladder in pitch darkness!
Brings you back up to ground level
The ladder we came up from
One of the two firing bays
One of the exhibits
Another exhibit depicting the execution of a soldier during the Japanese Occupation
Yes I know this probably looks really fake and remodelled... but this place is the actual execution site of the soldiers during those times. Gives off real creepy vibes, knowing this fact and being there in person. Oh and a little way off from this is a rectangular stone slab buried in the earth, which is actually an old guillotine base....
Oh and there is also this small house with large and very graphic photographs of people getting tortured and executed during the Japanese Occupation.... and dead bodies in many states of mutilation. Really makes you wonder, what kind of a sicko would take pictures of these!? And keep them till today!? *shudders* Absolutely couldn't bear being in that showroom... absolutely wouldn't post such pics here either but if you wanna see them you should take a trip there yourself....
An old shed or storeroom where a tree has grown through
Old barracks that have been converted into showrooms and exhibits
More barracks.... there were so many blocks of these... some were sleeping quarters... others were kitchens and things like that. You could actually go in and explore these buildings... and believe it or not, for RM20 you could spend a night camping in one of these! Spot of thrill-seeking, anyone?
Dorm beds that have been restored and repainted
Another one of the many tunnels...
In conclusion I thought the War Museum, thought it didn't look like much from the outside, was a very good experience and well worth the money. It really gives you a good insight into how it was like during the war times, or how it was like to be living as a soldier in those times. And the frequent chills I got from looking at the exhibits, the old buildings, and perhaps too from the sheer silence of the place.... Really makes you feel relieved that we weren't born during that era.
Back to Batu Ferringhi cos mom wanted to take a walk in the Spice Garden... this is the view of the ocean from the top of the hill
And we were fortunate enough to spot a flying fox bounding thru the trees!
Later for dinner we stopped by another "local recommendation"... a restaurant famed for it's unique name and good seafood. Looked promising. We were told they are usually fully booked by 7pm, and we were feeling pretty lucky, arriving at 5pm and getting us a table!
Hor chien. Okay. Apart from the fact that they gave us really big oysters in this.... the dish is an epic fail. =.= It was tasteless and so terribly sticky. Like eating a mouthful of cornstarch and goodness knows what else. Yeeech!
The only dish I really enjoyed would be this I suppose - the cheese-baked prawns... but then again anything with cheese on it tastes good, and this was so not worth the price - RM36 for just a few prawns! I don't know what it is about local recommendations but somehow they seem to be really misleading........ either that or we don't know how to eat. =.=
In future... whenever in doubt.... just hit Gurney Drive!!
And that wraps up our Penang trip! I have such a good time everytime we make a trip there.... definitely looking forward to the next one! :D Till next time..... damn I got alot of carbs and fat to burn!
