July 22, 2010

Bangkok Dangerous!

YES! Extremely dangerous!.. especially for shopaholic freaks like me..! Beware of your spending because you never know what you've bought or how much u've spent for the things there are just SO cheap! I was there on a shopping spree with my bestie Xeing, my beloved sis and my little YY. 4 girls there-on a mission-to S.H.O.P-till we're B.R.O.K.E!! .......... honestly, i was the only one who was broke.. i changed RM800 = 8000baht for shopping, food, and transportation fees. I thought it was enough.. but it wasn't.. at all! Because when i came back n re-calculated my expenses i realised i've used up to a total of RM1200. Yeapz.. RM1200! I over used another RM400 extra minus RM140 from credit card. Do NOT ask me where the extra cashes came from.. all i have to say is; i love my sis!

We were there for 5days 4nights and stayed at a budgeted yet super convenient "First House Hotel" The appearance of the hotel looks old; the fact is it is an old hotel.. but they've already renovated it once. It might not be any big grand hotel with big rooms and big beds but their rooms are definitely clean and bigger than those rooms in First World Hotel. Search the net and u actually see that the hotel also has a nickname - "Haunted Hotel".. it was said that many years ago the hotel was burnt down and had quite a number of casualties. Therefore it was somehow nicknamed as the haunted hotel properly due to some netizens who had experienced some supernatural bizarreness n spreaded it through the net. Creepy huh? But so far i have been staying in that hotel quite frequently and has never experience any. *touch wood* I chose this hotel because of it's super convenient location. It is only a 5minutes walk to The Platinum Wholesale Mall, 10minutes walk to a superb massage centre, 30mins to Chaktuchak by cab, 20minutes to Suan Lom Nightmarket, 7-11 located just a few shop blocks away, and in the morning the whole stretch of street is filled with cheap yummylicious local Thai food stalls. The whole trip was meant to be a budgeted trip for we wanted to save more and spend more on shopping. Breakfast was provided by the hotel; made sure we eat until bao bao coz can tahan longer thus lunch can haf a light one (save more also) wtf! kiamsiap on the food but not on shopping! That's the way ah-ha ah-ha i like it.. ah-ha ah-ha! Usually we'd splurge more on dinner; we go around looking for the cheap yet tasty food. Few of the places we went for dinner are actually quite well-known among young tourists like us.

Since we went by Lufthansa Airline (the official airline who flew the whole Germany WC team to and back from South Africa), the first night was wasted as we arrived Bangkok near midnight. FYI Lufthansa Airline is doing a super cheap 2-way air ticket promotion to Bangkok for only RM400 and best of all; their given weight is already 20kg! Imagine how much more we need to pay if we need to upgrade our luggage weight in AirAsia. But.. a promotional thing will always has its cons; Lufthansa Airline only fly to Bangkok at a certain schedule: Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday and the time fixed is departure 9.15pm and back from Bangkok 4.15pm. Promotion valid until end of August 2010, available for booking throughout the rest of the year. Terms&Conditions applied. Interested? Call Bestour: 03-21421313

Ok.. end of advertisement.. continue my shopping story.. lol! Our flight schedule was arranged to hit the weekends just so we could go to Chaktuchak the weekend market. As pre-described, the market is only open during weekends and is so far the largest market in Bangkok. They have over 6000 shops and covers not only fashion, but all kind of stuff there! Accessories, potteries, plants, furniture, antiques, old school collectibles, anything! I actually quite dulan the place; i've been there thrice! ok.. thrice! 3 times!! and still i cannot bladi find the pet section!! WTH!! I've looked through their map over and over again and even asked the locals where is the pet section. They pointed me west to east, east back to west, west to south, south go back to east.. blardi everywhere lar! And i still CANNOT find a single store that sells pets stuff..! WHY!? Anyhow walking in Chaktuchak is like the 'tong sam chong' and his monkey team walking through the 'Valley of 9 suns' - H.O.T!! P.A.N.A.S!! HOU LAN YIT AR!! You know it really takes quite an effort to make me sweat coz i'm the type of person who seldom sweats.. even when i'm in the gym (i dunno maybe i din do it right) but walking at that market for a short 30minutes works so much more than running on a treadmill for 2hours! I bladi sweated like a pig! Throughout my self-observed point of view; the fashion styles in Chaktuchak are slightly less eye-catching; they have more on decent dress, tops, funny quoted tees, and also alot of those local designers' creations. While price wise; they're also slightly more expensive than Platinum. It's nothing much of a surprise really, Chaktuchak targeted more on the foreign market; tourists guailous.. (some thing i don't understand; why always is the guailous who fall into prey of this 'waterfish' scam? Must be their currency value.. kesian them go any country also kena leok kao kao one) while Platinum has more locals. Tips: the safest is to go shop at where the locals will shop and eat where the locals will eat, hence u'll confirm save alot! Although they'll definitely mark up a little upon seeing a non-thai but it'll still be 98% more cheaper than buying from those commercialised places. Trust me. So basically my shopping destination was: Sunday-Chaktuchak, monday, tuesday, wednesday - Platinum.. hahahahahahaha! wtf! YY even said "If people asked me so u go Bangkok got go where anot ar?.. i'll say erm.. Chaktuchak lor.. and then.. platinum platinum.. night market.. and then platinum." WTF! She's so funny!

One of the nights, we decided to go to the infamous Suan Lom nightmarket.. 3-4 years back, i followed my company's tour group there once and my flashback memories projected a shopping haven, when i went back to the same place 4 years later; it became a shopping HAVOC! I'm out of words to describe the current condition of the once-used-to-be-damn-packed nightmarket. There were basically NOTHING to shop nor see already, 50% of the shops are closed down and the remaining shops sells basically all the same things. The only lively activities they still have there are their massage centres. What we heard from the people there is; the place had deteriorated after the red shirts' riot (if u did follow the news they did camped outside the nightmarket for a short period of time) many shops were destroyed and most of the shop owners had quickly closed down their shops. Perhaps the remaining ones are the ones who are not afraid to die.. or is so rich they don't mind those red shirts people destroying it.. i dunno.. Words has it that they're all slowly moving to another new night market 10km further from the current location. Not sure how long more will the new nightmarket be complete nor know what is the name of it.

The only con about Bangkok is the taxi drivers! In this trip, we got conned by 2 different taxi drivers. The first one was when we wanted to go to the weekend market. The usual rate according to their meter, from our hotel is 80-100baht. Then this taxi driver came up to us and said he can take us there for only 40baht.. waddha hell it's like 50% off the cheapest meter rate! We asked alot of times if it's really 40baht and he said yes yes yes, so we got in his cab lor.. halfway there he started telling us to get this dunno what voucher and dunno what chop in order to get that 40baht rate. And he also said something about gas station, so we assumed that he's going to drop us at some gas station to get this voucher and chop but we were wrong! He drove us to this gem factory and asked us to go down. We were all like wtf are we doing here?! and we saw him parking one side already. There were these hostess at the front door who kept on saying "Welcome! Go in see see" After a long duck and chicken conversation only we found out that we just need to go in and walk walk, pretend to be interested in those gem jewelries (wtf do we look like rich people who can afford those bladi gems?!), come out and get back into our cab and continue our journey to our destination. Just because that bladi taxi driver can get a chop out of each customers he conned there and i think they earn some commissions out of it too. He was still tolerable since we don't need to fork out a single cent; we just assumed we've visited another tourist spot in Bangkok. The one we met later in the night one was totally intolerable! Really felt like slapping him and smashing his head on the windscreen! At night, we wanted to go to Central World for some tomyam and salted grill fish. This idiot taxi driver who was sitting outside our hotel entrance asked us where we're going and we said we wanted to go Central World. Then he said "Central World no more! Fire no more!" So we said "No.. we want go there eat" He still insisted "Central World no more.. what you want to eat? Chinese food? Japanese? Thai? Seafood?" We were like "NO NO we want go there eat tomyam!" He nodded as if he understood, gave us a reasonable price, so we got in to the car in which we later found out it doesn't belongs to him! From that moment we had a feeling we went up the wrong cab again. He was friendly and was talking to us throughout the way, soon we realised the road was not the usual route we used to take to Central World. He suddenly signalled wanting to turn into this seafood restaurant and YY started panicking. She was like "This is the restaurant where we got leok-ed!! Die lor.. don't go down!" Of course we won't go down! WTF we wanted to go CENTRAL WORLD not some stupid seafood restaurant! The stupid taxi driver stopped us at the restaurant's entrance and said "Here seafood very nice" and then this person opened our door with the welcome shit again. To hell with them! We just sat inside the cab refused to get down and demand that taxi driver to drive us to our actual destination. He then kept quiet, face turned sour and starting speeding. We were still so naive to think that he'd actually drive us to the mall but we were wrong again! I found out that he actually tried to drive us back TO OUR HOTEL!! Upon seeing a Mcd in front, i quickly asked him to stop us there, bladi hell have to pay 50baht for no bladi reason, and quickly get out of the car. That jabroni even scolded us when we went down! He said "Next time want eat Mcdonald don't say tomyam" WTF! Seriously if it's back here in kl i bladi wing chun kao him adi lor! As if it's our fault he drove a big round for nothing! It's a good thing we paid u u idiot taxi driver! After all the hassles we finally made it to our destination on a meter-running cab. Moral of the story is: NEVER go on a cab who negotiate the price with you. Walk further and get a meter-running cab! For your own safety sake.. and also, if the taxi driver seems a little too friendly-beware also! Friendly taxi drivers are no good thing! Those who are quite good in english are actually those who are out there ready to con tourists like you all, and us! But overall, Thai people are friendly people and Bangkok is still the superb place to shop!


First up! i would like to introduce u to our small comfortable room.. =)

The cheapo yummylicious food:

This is the food stall next to Central World where we had such a hard time trying to get there. It is well known for its tomyam and salted grill fish. There are actually 3 food stalls in a row selling the same thing so u need to know which one is the best - the second stall! Their tomyam is dha best!

Yea.. although MCD is so commercialized but i only want and will introduce 1 particular burger from the menu. Samurai Pork Burger!! Super delicious max i can eat 2 if i wan! Even more delicious than any pork burger u can find in those HK-style cafes. And their chili sauces are not the normal type of sauce we have here; they have their own Thai chilli sauce! The type you can find in KFC but 10times yummier!

Super cheap pork noodles found at a food stall opposite 7-11 in the Baiyoke Night Market. It's only RM2 per-bowl.. i think it's the soup that made it so yummy.

Black Canyon's Thai Ice Tea - not bad.. i'm sure i could find a cheaper nicer Thai ice tea but Black Canyon is the only place where i can chill out after shopping in Platinum.

Seed Coffee - the most aromatic coffee i've ever drank in my entire life so far! And it's cheap! Only RM3 for a regular size cup. They use roasted coffee beans and the owner will personally blend the beans for you when you order. F.R.E.S.H! I visited his stall everytime i'm there and he can recognize me already; he even said "Oh.. you cut your hair!" when he saw me. lol! Above pic is the boss; super friendly person

Some places i went:

The infamous four face Buddha located in Erawan.. i took the initiative to pray there everytime i go visit but this time due to my aunty visit i can only go see see look look..

A huge bearbrick outside Erawan's entrance.. actually the real reason i was there was because of the shop on the left.. but it was close.. =(

Suan Lom Night Market.. Oh yea i also found a pet shop there.. selling quite alot of good quality pet clothes. I bought a few for my babies and inside the shop they have 2 yorkshire terriers:

The girl girl... and

the boy boy.. wanna know why he looks so comfortable lying on my bag?

because he was secretly biting my mr.pooky!!! wth!! Yet he was so adorable i never bother and continue let him bite.. lol!

The girls i went with:

Xeing and YY.. both i heart so muchie!

and my lovely saviour sis..! double the love!

Our one and only group photo was taken at the airport.. XD

again i love my sis!!

My fruitful shopping goodies:


Last but not least...

managed to take some pics before the plane took off.. i always love those white cotton candy clouds.. =)

Getting comfortable during the 2hours flight back to KL.. can't sleep coz too happy can see my dear already.. =p

July 1, 2010

Bukit Gambang

Last week, our company organized a team building trip to Bukit Gambang. The place is located in Kuantan and it's a 40minutes ride to the city; the place is quite deserted though, it's more like a private place by it's own. The surroundings are nothing more than just trees and hills.. it'd be quite a place for relaxing.. except for the place is.. erm.. d.e.a.d! There's not even a single shop to be seen (i know i'm a shopaholic freak and i'd never shop in such place as well.. i'm referring to convenience stores like 7-11) and if u'r there with by bus there's no way u could get out of that place unless u drove there and u need to, like drive almost an hour to go to the city, hang out, and then drive another hour back to the resort-just by thinking of it u'll just eventually give up the thought of driving!
The big land consist of 3 main thing: the resort (the only place u can stay 'coz there's no other resort there), the waterpark, and a place for outdoor activities called 'Active Academy' (lame!) - all by walking distance. We were there for 3days 2nights and trust me, it's more than enough for such a place! The first night was wasted for we reached the resort by almost midnight, the rest of my colleagues continued with their steamboat+drinking party while me and my dear went K.O in our room. Our itinerary for the next day was packed! Morning after breakfast, go to waterpark until 12pm, then back to resort for lunch, rest for awhile, treasure hunt at 4pm until 6pm, dinner at 7.30pm and then free at leisure. Of course, plans could be change according to situation, thus the timetable was all messed up.
Me and dear only spent i think less than 2 hours inside the waterpark. I was honestly quite disappointed with it because it's the worst local waterpark i've ever been! The perimeters are SO small and the water rides are SO retarded, i just don't know how to describe it. The waterpark is approximately the size of Sunway Lagoon's surf beach only.. very the small 'big' right? Then, the rides are 95% for children only, the other 5% is the 'adult' rides - which consist of 5 slightly taller water slides only. And since it's located slightly higher above ground, we have to climb the bladi stairs to get to the starting point of every slides. And don't make me start on the damn stairs! The entire area was so smelly due to the watery mud it feels as if i'm playing in a construction site! While the kids area was full with monsters screaming and running about (it was extremely crowded because it was the last week of the school holidays) the chronicle ambience made me so headache and mang chang i was in desperate needs to go back! Thus, we went back way earlier than the rest, lepak2 in the room, had lunch, and then head to the "Active Academy" earlier than the expected treasure hunt time for we wanted to visit the Animal Farm there.
I think the only place worth visiting there is the Active Academy. They not only have a rather-sad-looking Animal Farm, they also have ATV rides, paintball, and also jungle trekking. Yes, i had my first jungle trekking experience there too, but let's talk about the Animal Farm first. The entrance fee to the farm is RM3, although there's nothing much to see inside but we were lucky enough to have some private encounters with the wardens' own pets. I can actually summarized it to u how many animals they have at the farm: a pond of boring-looking turtles, 3-4 cages of rabbits, 1 adult musang, and 2 big lizards and 2 no-where to be seen snakes. Sad right?? There were only the both of us there and i think the wardens themselves are bored also; they came to us and asked "nak tengok ular tak?" n i said "eh the ular show bukan start pukul 5 ke?" and he said "tak apa lar bagi u tengok lar.. itu ularman ada sini mar" then we were like "kewl...!" Then the ularman went into the 'show' cage and opened up a box n pulled a king cobra out.. the cobra live inside that box!? wtf!? dear started to stick himself and drooling on the cobra while i turned to another warden n asked "apsal rabbits korang semua kurung dalam sangkar?? kenapa tak kasi diaorang lari2? takleh i nak sentuh" *pout* then he said "Oh u nak pegang rabbit ke?? ada ada nanti i gi ambik.." and ran off.. i was like ooohh.. got rabbit touchie touchie?? The warden then came back carrying a super fluffy baby rabbit.. it was super omg-licious cute max!! n tame!! The fella told me that 1 of the rabbits inside the cage just gave birth and he took one for himself.. and he also suddenly got so excited and showed us another batch of new-born babies inside the cage.. no fur 1! purple colour geli sial! Dunno why the 2 wardens were so eager to show us around and giving us even more upclose approach to the animals. The ularman, too, went disappeared for a while and came back with a BABY MUSANG!! it's the first time in my life so far seeing a baby fox and in such near distance!! normally i see those fox at the zoo also is blocked by a glass n i can't touch them.. =( He told us that he was out in the jungle hunting for snakes when he came across this baby musang who was lost inside the jungle.. he worried bigger animals might harm him or mayb even eat him so he took it back home n took care of it. Seriously the baby musang was so damn cute and it wasn't afraid of human..! i cuddled him in my arms and he felt asleep on my arms..! awww! Dear wanted to bring it back home so badly he offered rm1k to the man, but he rejected because he said "Boss sudah mau baby (yes his name is BABY!)" =(((
We loitered around the farm playing with the baby rabbit and baby musang for almost 2hours until we realised we have to meet up with the rest for the treasure hunt already. Upon leaving, the peacock pulak opened up her tail! Lucky us! Dear wanted to take a picture of the peacock but being as lansi as she looks, she avoided the camera. The warden said this peacock doesn't like camera and will avoid kena ambik gambar. Dear don't believe and dai dai also want to take the peacock so he went inside the peacock's cage and had a little merry-go-round game with the peacock while me and the warden stared at them like some kinda show. lol!
After the treasure hunt, all of us got heated up and wanted to play another round of outdoor activity. Dear was whining to play the ATV but the person in charge told him that the ATV was already close because it was already 5pm, then they decided to play paintball; since we got such a big group, but the fella told us it's too late for paintball too because they need time to set up and by the time they're done with the setup the sun is going down already, thus it left us with no choice but to go for the jungle trekking. I was so blur at that time and i just agreed when they said who's up for jungle trekking. I haven't done all this before so i thought it would b just a casual stroll in the forest and it won't last more than half an hour. Boy was i oh-so-wrong! Jungle trekking was HARD! Suffering and torturing! And there's hell lots of mosquitoes too!! We had to go through all kind of obstacles built by the people there and luckily, some of which we can choose not to and walk pass it. Overall it was a fun experience (minus the mosquitoes! i've donated more than enough blood for them!), a fun ONE-TIME experience 'coz there ain't gonna be a second one!!
We were all worned out by the time we got out from the forest, and after dinner, we secara tak malunya conquered the most of the tables and chairs that were laid out in front of a big projector for the people to watch football. We brought all our liquors and crackers and have our own party there. Before the football match starts, there were a magic performance by this skinny dude who called himself 'Ejik'.. many from our group were called up on stage to help perform some stupid magic; including me >.< and his magic tricks were mostly tipu budak kecik 1 lor.. one of my colleague even accidentally terexposed his trick but luckily not many saw it.. if not he sure kena throw rotten eggs already.. wth! We went back to KL the next day with sore muscle pain and zombie look.. wat a trip.. =p

not knowing i was on a highway to hell yet.. can still see my dear kacau-ing at the side.. both still on happy mode.. =p


Then we stopped by a restaurant by the highway for dinner cause from what i overheard on the phone, the resort provided us a not-fresh dinner buffet thus we decided to pay and eat better.. the restaurant was DODGY and the path to it looks like this:
The food better be good.. or else..

Look at their super old-skool teapot! While waiting for the food to arrive i explored and kaypoh a little on their displays and found out:
that they were featured on a chinese newspaper once..! Ok.. then i'm not so scared adi..

This is one of their signature dish and thank god! their food were fantastic! and the seafood were fresh too!

The next morning, i was greeted by this fairytale like horse carriage that was parked at the resort's lobby.. n they're charging RM20 per ride.. who dha hell will pay rm20 for this?! ambik gambar cukup lar..

horsie horsie!! i wish i haf their eyelash.. =p

still look happy despite not knowing the situation inside.. yet...

the only picture i have inside the waterpark, steal from people's camera somemore because i didn't bring my camera 'coz it's not waterproof.. =.=

Me and dear were separated in the treasure hunt group and his team emerged second while mine got third.. well.. still top3 wat..

The sad-looking animal farm.. inside they have:

Sad looking tortoise pond with a bunch of motionless tortoise sun bathing on the rocks.. and dear was trying his best to make a happy face for the picture but it turned out pretty fake...

A few cages of these rabbits.. quite skinny though..
This particular rabbit was super friendly and was not afraid of us.. it even came so close to us that dear could almost kiss him.. lol! maybe he thought we got food..sorry bunny better luck next time.. =p
Super fluffy cute max kao kao!!!! Reared by one of the warden here, such a pretty girl!~

This is a full grown adult size of a Musang Tempatan.. She was captured in the wild too and was given a home there in the farm... noted: NOT friendly

While this, is super tame and manja giler babi sial!! The baby musang i mentioned earlier.. damn cute right?! His name is Baby (=.= wtf i noe) and he got so comfortable in my arms he felt asleep.. see he sleep until so syok..

I think this super giant size Iguana is dead.. coz he wasn't moving the whole moment i stood there..
A small version of the super giant size Iguana..

Introducing.. *drum rolls* Mr. King Cobra....!! *clap clap clap* Notice the box in the first pic? That's his 'house'.. sad.. it was also captured in the wild by the ularman 2weeks ago and is now under training for shows.. good luck mr.ularman!

Super lansi peacock... i like u... u got attitude.. >.<

Last but not least, the path to the jungle walk.. looks creepy..

Ok.. then inside the jungle trekking journey i had to go through obstacles such as:

Walking on a thin rope while trying to balance myself on another slightly bigger rope.. and dear was there to guide me rope-by-rope.. hehee! I'll definitely won't take risk if he's not there to catch me when i fall lor... <3
2nd: Walk on those stumps according to the colours.. the colours that i followed were too far for my short legs to reach thus i main tipu and just cincai walk.. ngekngekngek!
THIS one was blardi hard! i nearly fell into the sand.. =( and u can actually see my dear laughing while trying to catch hold of me.. hmph! and.. hope u guys dun mind my terkangkang pose.. ahhahahahahha!
Walk walk walk.. complain complain complain.. then someone said "eh stop ere take picture" so i just turned over S.M.I.L.E.. ok.. continue walk walk walk.. complain complain complain
Know why my dear's face looked so scared??
Because we have to climb down this 90degree slope with just yet another thin rope!!! wtf!! and there's no other way besides going down! You dowan? then u go U-turn and walk all the way back to where we first started.. so.. it left me with no choice..
All i heard is just "Don't look down and u won't be scared!!" if i don't look down i fall how?! And seriously this pic looked as if someone just kicked on my there and i'm kepit-ing my legs in pain.. like how those poses are when someone kick a guy's crotch..

Finally, our night ended with a magic performance by this MJ-wannabe magician "Ejik" i tell u he's even more skinny than me lor.. no joke! Yes, and he sings too.. dunno what chapalang magic show is this..
I was also called up on stage by him; doing a trick which threaten to chop my hand off.. tipu lar oi!!
Then he walked down and flirted with my dad..
And Melvin, our IT man..
After his show ended, i think he was damn happy because we were such great audience, he came over to our table and performed a lil private card tricks for us only.. lol!

-N-