I was fortunate to travel to two countries that have close relationship to my life
1) Taiwan: as a descendent of Chinese, it is normal for me to compare with Chinese descendent in Malaysia and in Taiwan

2) Japan: I watch Japanese drama, love Japanese food and use Japanese product. It was dream like for me to be able to travel to Japan
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Interestingly, these countries are closely related to each other.

Taiwan was under Japanese colonial for half a century. Till todate, many things in Taiwan are still heavily influenced by Japanese.

The train, they way they being polite, the product they use, they way they promote the products/awarenes, tv shows.... Etc

I immediately realised this on day 1 I stepped into Japan (i went to Taiwan in April, then to Japan in October)

In Taiwan, I went to Taipei, hualien, kaohsiong, taichung, alishan.

In Japan. I went to Osaka, Kobe, Kyoto, nara and Hokkaido.

Nice view in Taiwan... In terms of nature sightseeing in alishan & hualien.

Taipei, taichung and kaohsiong are urban cities (shop till you drop in Taipei and weather in kaohsiong reminds me of KL)

We thought of visiting Taiwan again in few years time but... Malaysia Airline gave us early Christmas gift: we managed to hunt return ticket to Osaka with just... RM189

So, spent another total RM7000 in this trip. All in.

We were pleasantly surprised with all the five places in Japan. Each of them have their own uniqueness.

Osaka: a city with historical places to visit, various food, even more shopping than Taipei

Kobe: peaceful city ... Lots of European style buildings and... Kobe beef.

Kyoto: city of temples. Extra nice if you visit during autumn leaves season.

Nara: city of deers. Where deer > human

Hokkaido: RAMEN AND SEAFOOD! You can't go wrong with those two (er... Skiing wasn't part of the plan so can't comment)

Hokkaido is unique on its own. They have many products produced and sold only in Hokkaido (maybe a marketing strategy, but still feel exclusive) and their airport sells seafood and fresh corn (!!!!??)

When we were back home, my parents stopped mentioning about visiting Taiwan in near future.

My mum kept the Japanese yen asking us when are we going to Japan again.

And the couple spent the next one week revisit the photos taken in Japan.

If you have visited Taiwan, try Japan. You won't be disappointed.

This post is about a restaurant that we visited, 4 years ago in Vienna, Austria.

The reason I posted it now because Francesco challenged me if my memory is better than his. this restaurant is (or was?) cheap and good.



We ordered 2 pints of (local) beer, 1 Centimeter Sausage (which is actually 2 x 1 metre of sausages), and three plates of Schnitzel . (I wonder why I smiled like a weirdo)


Me and my sister ate 2 x 1 meter of sausages, and shared a plate of Schnitzel


Yes, that means 2 metres of sausages and they were tasty


We ordered salad cos my mum said we were having too much of meat.


Random shot


Result? Very filling and it was like... (if my memory serves me well) 30-40Euro.

When I read the article online, before I posted this, I found that this is one of the "busiest" branch - we waited about 30 minutes for the food while some other people waited for 45 minutes!

Those people would recommend Centimeter III instead.

Info:
Centimeter II
Address: Stiftgasse 4/Ecke Siebensterngasse 1070 Wien
Tel. 01/470060642

Conclusion: A cheap place to hang out for local food - but not for people who are hungry
Rating: 3.5/5

I have fond memory of this town. Some part of the city is still well preserved - I felt as if I sat a time machine, went back to old time.


Apart from the nice food, the old building and surroundings slowed down my pace.


Which made me wondered at the time: "Why would people in KL rush like no tomorrow?"


Here, I felt as if the time was frozen

This trip was purely a random trip. The whole family randomly found our way to Sungai Petani, randomly chose a hotel to stay, I randomly took a photo of the sky..


..just before we visited a drawing school - where the kids were having Father's Day Draw-My-Father's-Portrait with their father as their model.


I asked my sis randomly, to take a self-portrait photo with me, she gave me a =_= look.


My father randomly took a photo of the clock tower in the city centre


Then we went to Kuala Muda, a fishing village. I randomly took this photo...


...before we went to this fish market. The people there would whisper their price to the seller. The highest bidder will get the fish. Random.


Random shot of the fishes-on-sale


Random shot on the fishermen returning from sea


Random shot of a lotus flower, beside a paddy field, on the way we left Kedah.

Last Tuesday I drove my grandfather and my uncle to Ipoh to visit my aunt. She's the youngest sister of my late grandmother.

She is suffering mental illness since young age and she's currently staying in old folk's home after her mother (i.e. my great grandmother) passed away in year 2004, and she is under control with medicine.

After the visit, we also visited some temple in that area.

Ipoh is a place with a lot of hills (with particularly rock hills). Therefore the temples there are like.... what we hear/imagine as those in the folklore?


Ling Xian Dong 灵仙岩 (front entrance)


Ling Xian Dong 灵仙岩 (inside)


Ling Xian Dong 灵仙岩 (surrounding)

We visited Nan Tian Dong 南天洞, which is just beside the Ling Xian Dong. Unfortunately, the temple is closed (i.e. we didn't visit at the temple operational hour）


Me and my grandpa


My uncle and his father

They are small temples so it didn't take us a long time to visit.

Oh, back to the topic, so from KL -> Ipoh, it takes about 1 hour 45 minutes.

So during the long journey, inevitably, we will talk. (of course)

So when we talk, we'll talk of the latest topic.

Then we talked about the food price, that's when we started whining.

Some short summaries:

1) The fuel price dropped, but the food price didn't
2) So did the goods price
3) Instant noodle that cost RM2.50 half year ago is now nearing RM4.00
4) The retailers claim that they couldn't drop the price earlier because "they haven't sold out the stock they bought at the higher price"
5) Few months down the road, it's still the same.
6) It is so, oh, not worth it to live in Malaysia
7) Why do we need to drive?
8) It's expensive to drive
9) Cars are very expensive
10) Why is the public transport no good?
11) Why is the road not in good condition?
12) The highway with toll is a pure blood-sucker. They take money from citizen as well as government
13) Why is the road sign not clear?
14) Oh the hills in Ipoh are losing the trees
15) No wonder the weather is getting hotter and hotter nowadays

Etc.

Apparently, whining can get everybody together, and also bridge the generation gap ;)

Went to Tanjung Sepat last Sunday with the family.


On the way to Tanjung Sepat (we're not taking plane btw :P)


Seafood bahkuteh - one of the nicest I've eaten so far :-)


At the beach nearby


Pantai Morib


Cute little crab which was in defensive mode when I approached it.


Fly (uncle Charlie) kite


On the way back


I always love the sky - the cloud shape is always unique and the evening sky is so amazing.

Overall, a relaxing one day trip.