lots have changed since

I’m back in Singapore now after a Singapore-Hong Kong-San Francisco-Hong Kong-Singapore flight and a trip back to KL. Lot’s have changed since I was last in KL during Chinese New Year. New government, new politics, new media, new car, new homelessness, new ancestry!

The new socio-political scene of course I knew about. Who didn’t? What I didn’t know was that my dad bought a new car and sold off the older one. This car is by far the most far-removed from my taste among the many cars we’ve ever had (nauseating purple coat of a previous car aside). My parents have also sold off our house and have nowhere to move into just yet.

The most interesting piece of information I got was that my mum’s birth parents were apparently Hakka. This means that I could very well be of a hundred percent Hakka decent (since my dad’s Hakka too). For some reason, this new knowledge has a rather profound impact on me and what I perceive as my identity. Half of my biological heritage has always been somewhat of a mystery to me but somehow I’ve been quite comfortable with this uncertainty. This revelation has been rather unsettling. I’ve always been quite “connected” and fascinated with my Hakka roots despite not being able to speak it. I’m quite sure that my inability to speak Hakka contributes greatly to this perturbation.

best burger in town

After so many months, I finally checked out my friend’s place, the cutely named Palate Palette. I had dinner there last night where I had the best burger in the Klang Valley: the Minimalist Burger, a burger without the frills and fillers, just the patty. It was utterly divine. At RM23, it wasn’t cheap, but it was worth every single sen; we even ordered a second. The Burger Ayam Special from the Ramly Burger stall outside the 7-Eleven at USJ 4 now trails far behind at second place. What is it about Ramly Burger stalls and 7-Eleven stores?

clean and fair elections

From an article in today’s Sunday Star, a newspaper owned by the Malaysian Chinese Association, a component party of the ruling coalition Barisan Nasional: “Contrary to the lingering perception that KL is a pro-opposition city, the Barisan has commanded the lion’s share of seats for several elections as a result of redelineation exercises by the Election Commission.”

wild kl

KL is one wild city. Like many cities around the world, it has its regular share of urban wildlife like birds, bugs, lizards, frogs, toads and small rodents including cat-sized rats, and of course there are lots of stray cats and dogs. But it’s also common to find monkeys, civets, treeshrews, monitors and snakes in your garden in KL. Not too surprising I guess, as these are generally small and generalist animals. What makes KL truly wild is the fact that you get tigers roaming in your neighbourhood, pythons and king cobras slithering in your backyard, tapirs wandering into swimming pools and getting hit by traffic, serows joining the morning traffic, leopards sprinting across race tracks and crocodiles swimming in rivers in the city centre. It’s a modern capital city alright, but it’s a jungle out there! Does anyone know of any other concrete jungle which supports such a gamut of wildlife?

what’s changed since…

I’m back in KL for the second time in four months. What has changed since? Two friends got engaged (to each other), one of them changed her job, a friend’s going to pursue his Masters, another friend now works for WWF, the Universiti Roundabout no longer exists, and there’s no more flat-rate parking at Mid Valley. Everything else seems pretty much the same….

a week off

I’ll be off for a week from the 29th of June. I’ll definitely be back in KL, but I’m planning to drive down to Singapore with boxes of stuff and driving back up to KL before taking a bus back to Singapore. This leaves me very little time to spend in KL, but that’s the plan for now….

back for good friday

Yay! Good Friday is a holiday here in Singapore. That means a long weekend and a good time to go back to KL. Unfortunately, it’s peak period and most of the bus tickets have been sold out, so I’ll be taking a shuttle bus to Larkin and trying my luck from there instead. If all works out well, I should be back in KL by Friday morning….

Posting on this blog has been difficult as I don’t have convenient access to the Internet and each time I’m actually online, I don’t really know what to blog about, since so much has happened in between I don’t even know where to start. I think I’ll have to start jotting down my thoughts on a notepad and refer to it eacxh time I have the opportunity to blog….

bijan mmm mmm

Had dinner in Bijan last night. The food was excellent, the price not so. Definitely the best Malay food I’ve had in a nice restaurant and the best Malay food in KL. The rusuk panggang at RM55++ was heavenly; it was almost like pork!