Month: January 2012

Day 6 – 02 Jan 2012 – Kuching

Last night I watched the last Pirates of the Caribbean movie, hope they don’t make another! The first three were great (apart from the bloody awful Keira Knightley), but this one did suck.

Breakfast included pomelo, a large fruit that was very much like a pink grapefruit in taste and smell with a similar texture, but a much thicker skin.

It was raining this morning, when I got up, but it was just a brief shower as the day was reasonably sunny again, funnily enough it was also hot and humid ! Alex had some chores to do so he dropped me at the jetty and I had my first few hours on my own in foreign climes. I cannot really count Singapore as being too foreign as most people speak English and it is very first world. BTW – I am not saying Kuching is third world ! somewhere in between I guess, in the main it is a normal first world city, power and water, some sewerage, lots of cars and traffic lights, shops and houses, some massive roundabouts, maybe it is  just a little run down in parts.

I took a couple of photos while waiting for the sampan ferry to arrive, the sampans pretty much only leave when they are full so I had  bit of a wait under a tree, the ride cost about 20c for the 100 or so metre journey.

The old Kuching Mosque, there has been a much larger new mosque built close to where Alex lives, but this one is better to look at.

At a guess I would say the ferryman lives on board, he has clothes hung from the back and a small boat stove and tea pot. He steers the ferry with the two oars and uses a small outboard for power. As the ferryman is up the front he has a long rope tied to the pull cord of the outboard starter.  As he is steering with both hands he has a string that he pulls with his toe to manage the speed of the vessel. All very clever and low tech.

The Sarawak state government building, the building is shaped like an Iban headdress – and must be a bitch to clean, it is huge.

I walked through the Indian section again and up to the mosque, surrounding the mosque is the old Islamic cemetery. Malaysia is officially a muslim country and the majority of the Malay people are muslim, this is not necessarily so for the tribes of Borneo of course.

From the mosque I wandered through some more street markets and saw this unusual t-shirt ! I am hoping that this is being sold in ignorance !

By this stage I was DRIPPING with sweat, the locals must have wondered what they had walking through their streets. I discovered the Kuching textile museum, what an awesome place ! No, I have not developed and interest in textiles, but the aircon was so sweet. I stayed for a wee while ! it is also a beautifully preserved building.

Kuching is the Malay word for cat, and there are a number of cat statues around the city, however it was not named so because of some bizarre cat fetish.

After another sweaty walk back from the cat statue I stopped at the James Brooke Cafe for lunch and a couple of cold drinks. I must remember that once away from Kuching I am going to have to ask for no ice in my drinks !  Lunch was a Kuching curry laksa and was damn good, I am also going to have to remember that noodles in a sauce can be messy !

The court house.

After lunch I had another small wander around town and then Alex and one of his friends picked me up and we went up to the Sarawak museum.  It was a small and interesting museum and it was good to see some of the local culture and
read a bit more about Niah man, which I will go and visit in a few days. After the museum we stopped for an ice kacang, a very sweet (read yum) local desert then went back to the apartment. The Sarawak Museum.

Walking for 2-3 hours in this heat really takes it of me, and I am wasted again ! popped out to the local mall for dinner I had Kueh teow and 3 sour drink. The kueh teow is similar to the pad thai and the 3 sour drink is a lime drink with a lime, a pickled lime and a pickled plum in it to give it some extra sour, and a wee bit of salt.

When we got back to the apartment I tried ramubans, another of the local fruits we bought yesterday, a bit like a lychee in taste and texture.

Shaved tonight, it has been a while so it was a bit of a mission ! So glad I don’t have to do that every day – well most working days at least 🙂

Day 5 – Kuching – New Years day

When I first thought about doing a blog, I sort of promised myself this would not turn into a food blog, day 5 and I have broken that rule. Today was pretty much about food, mainly looking at it, partly recovering from the amount consumed, and a wee experiment with something new.

Up earlyish again to another sunny and humid morning, cup of coffee for breakfast as still full from last night !

We set of at eight for the Kuching Sunday market to check out some sights and look for some local fruit and snacks for me to sample. The market was fascinating with lots of fresh fruit, fish and meat and home made snacks along with the usual market fare of cheap imports from China.  We sampled a few of the of the snacks, prawn fritters, curry puffs and bought some odd looking fruit to take back for me to try later on.

Dried chillies (it is Malaysia after all)

Fish (and flies) for sale – (go the Arsenal ! The Malay’s are really into football and there are a lot of English premiership shirts in Kuching, you have no idea how long I had to wait for the bloody Manchester united fan to get out of shot ! )and for eatingwhole chickens (the sun was shining through an orange canopy, so the chickens were a normal colour)Huge Jack fruitand a take away snack of rice baked in bamboo

After the heat of the market I had a wee lie down back at the apartment before we were picked up by a friend of Alex’s and his family and went for a swim and lunch at the Kebah golf club. I had a burger and fries, mmmmm first chips for a while and maybe last chips for a while. There is a McDonalds in Kuching, so assume there will be in many other places, but I really do want to not go there, local foods as much as possible !

I am pretty sure I have neither of these, but I thought that before I went to Hong Kong !

I spent the rest of the day mooching in the apartment, updating the blog over a couple of beers. After 4 days of walking around in the heat and not drinking enough water I was feeling a bit drained. As I am in no particular rush to be anywhere at any time I want to rest up every now and then, at least until I get used to activity in the heat and humidity. I did go for a wee walk around the block.

Alex’s apartment block,  from across the man made lake – the one on the left.

The first of the weird fruits, durian. apparently these are banned from many hotels in Malaysia due to the smell ! They are quite pungent. I had a couple of pieces, the first was OK, the second tasted like the smell, and was off-putting sadly. A quote from Wikipedia.

“The edible flesh emits a distinctive odour, strong and penetrating even when the husk is intact. Some people regard the durian as fragrant; others find the aroma overpowering and offensive. The smell evokes reactions from deep appreciation to intense disgust, and has been described variously as almonds, rotten onions, turpentine and gym socks. The odour has led to the fruit’s banishment from certain hotels and public transportation in southeast Asia.”

With all this food, I am going to have to be careful I don’t turn into a blimp ! Sucking down a whisky now, so I guess that isn’t helping much either 🙂

Day 4 – 31 Dec 2011- Kuching

Mystical and mysterious Borneo, a place I have longed to visit, primarily to see the orang-utans, which I am utterly fascinated with, but also as it is such a ‘new’ place. I have memories of reading stories about head hunters and lost tribes being discovered well into my childhood.

Kuching is nothing like that though ! It is the capital city of the Malaysian state of Sarawak and has a population of about half a million, predominantly a mix of Chinese and Malay. I am staying in a large apartment owned by a NZ friend Alex who is originally from Kuching. The apartment is on the eight floor of an eighteen storey building in a block of four buildings about fifteen minutes drive from the city centre.

Andy, one of my recruitment colleagues from the Hudson days has a sister, Claire, who lives in Kuching with her family. I am playing santa and have brought some gifts over from Andy for her kids.  To prove how utterly weird and small the world is, Claire lives on the fifteenth floor of the same apartment block !!

I was awake early again and watched the sunrise out the window of my room, it was going to be a sunny first day in Borneo, apparently it has rained for days. After a healthy breakfast of fruit and yoghurt Alex and I set off for a tour of Kuching’s old town.  Rather than taking the longer road into town we drove down to the Sarawak river and caught a small ferry boat over to the town, I failed to get a decent photo of this ! But took this one from afar later in the day.

As in Singapore the old town is split into small districts, we visited the Indian side of town first, with a good array of Indian dress and foods on display, unlike Singapore a lot of the food was not covered and there were a few flies around, hmmm. We walked through Chinatown and visited a couple of temples, stopping for a refreshing lime drink on the way through. The day was warm and humid and the chance to sit and drink an iced lime juice was most welcome.

mmmmm spices !

The entrance into Chinatown was guarded by dragon statues.

Hiang Thian Siang Ti temple. Originally built in 1889, and renovated in 1968. There are a number of temples in the china town are and I am fascinated by them all.

The old town from a neighbouring 8 storey carpark. The large building (monstrosity) on the far side of the river, is the new Sarawak state headquarters. We caught the boat from a jetty nearby.

A friend of Alex picked us in Chinatown and we went out to Foody Goody, a suburban Malay Laksa restaurant for lunch. I had the Sarawak laksa (chicken, prawns, vermicelli noodles) yum ! Alex’s friend had a kueh chap  which is basically boiled egg, pork and pig entrails with flat noodles, yuck ! The waiting staff were mainly lady boys, which was  worrying as I could not tell  which was which in some cases ! Next to Foody Goody was Sweet Babies, which also sounded like a food shop from the old days 🙂

kueh chap

After lunch Alex and I walked around the final sections of old Kuching and then went back to the apartment for a swim.

New years eve was spent with Alex’s parents and one of his brothers at their favourite Chinese restaurant. The food was very nice, we had a banquet style meal with multiple courses, green beans, with a minced chicken dressing, followed by steamed fish, chicken, tofu and finally a very nice prawn dish,  all washed down with chrysanthemum tea.  I could barely waddle when we left the restaurant, very full.

This “manucurist” was close by the restaurant we went to for dinner. Such a cool name 🙂

I went to bed pretty early again, missed seeing in 2012 !

A belated Happy New year to all – 2012, hopefully will be a good year for all – and not the end of the world !

I am having a photographic crisis of confidence at the moment ! Not sure why. I am not getting the photos I want, some are badly exposed and some are  out of focus (even when on auto focus !!) I am not sure what I am doing wrong and am getting disappointed ! more practise I guess, but I am missing my 5d !