Curtains and Cendol


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Swiped from williamnyk.
A little bit more of my CNY recap. It's still not Chap Goh Mei yet (go throw
bananas into Tasik Taman Jaya
), so I'm allowed. For years and years, CNY would always involve a trip to Teluk Intan. However, instead of north, we headed south this year. For winter. No. To visit my nomadic uncle in Tangkak. So early CNY2, my mum, my bro and I got up early and drove down the PLUS highway. Reached it in under 2 hours and thank God there are no trunk roads to ply. The exit is near enough the town. QUite an impressive place really. I expected just one main road, but it actually has several. Banks aplenty. 7-11s aplenty. Even has a thriving textile business. Food is bloody cheap. RM2.00 can get you a big bowl of curry noodles. And when I paid RM1.00 for a dhosa, I got RM0.40 change (was a little stunned). My uncle met us for breakfast and later brought us to where he crashes. He actually lives above some shoplots in a makeshift temple. He's the caretaker- makes sure the oil lamps don't go out and that the incense stays lit.

After some small talk, we left for town. My mum wanted to visit the textile shops..... argghhhh. It's quite peculiar, all the shops congregate at the same area. So much competition. And they all look the same. Same architecture. Same layout. Makes me wonder whether they're all owned by the people. The ground floor usually sells the cheap stuff. Baju kurung material, tudung, bedsheets (Single Bedsheet = Cadar Bujang = Bachelor Bedsheet = Semen resistant material?!) etc. Horrendous patterns. Flowers. Loud colours. But then, whatever sells. Most of the salesgirls would be Malay. Upstairs is where the curtain cloths are. Usually manned by the Chinese staff. The lady bosses. Prices are quite ridiculous. The price tag says RM24. But in reality, it can go right down to RM12. Goodness. We spent a couple of hours there, and mum left with several pieces of curtain and table cloths.

Since Tangkak is not far from Melaka, we decided to give my sister a visit. We exited at Ayer Keroh and headed down to Bukit Baru. The jam was horrible. No thanks to the stupid zoo and other attractions located near the highway exit and the obsene number of traffic lights along the way. The crawl extended all the way to Bukit Baru. Upon reaching my sister's mother-in-laws coffee shop, we were greeted by........(drumroll)....... Malaysia's Largest Inflatable God of Prosperity. (Cymbals). Not impressed? Oh well. Neither was I. The coffeeshop was teeming with customers (it was 4:00pm!). The increased price seemed to be no deterrent. Seeing that we arrived, my sister's in-laws were quick to serve up their famous chicken rice and spicy dry pan mee. Yummy!

My sister and her husband used us as an excuse to escape the hustle and bustle of the shop by driving us into Melaka town to see the sights. First stop-- the Stadhyust (typo kot?). Huge crowd there. Ho-hum. People taking photos with an albino phython. I was more interested in the tastelessly-decorated trishaws and a paragon lala mui who was being photographed by her boyfriend. Soon after that, we left for Jonker Street. It was my first time there and I was impressed. Many shutterbugs around to capture the old world taste of Jonker. We stopped at Hainan Lao for very good Cendol, Curry Noodles and fried stuffed beancurds. Emmm... A myriad of interesting shops around selling creative crafts and quaint cafes with special themes. One Restoran Famosa even has an opulent Forbidden City interior decoration. Let's say just two notches below Curse of the Golden Flower. And that's saying a lot. Just pay RM15 to have your photo taken as the Ching Emperor. After that, we headed over to Plaza Pahlawan to do some shopping. Left for dinner with the in-laws without buying a thing. We left at around 10:00pm. By the time we reached home.. bateri habis, but it was definitely fun. Melaka is quite a town.

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Comments

Little Prince said…
sounds so exciting!!! all i did was shop during cny... so little ang pows... sigh sigh...
Jason said…
its amazing that you're so skinny with the amount of food you consume.. makes me wonder what is your secret????? :)
just me said…
A good trip, good food, with loved ones, what more can one ask for ?
famil said…
they said malacca has the best cendol.. do u know where?
William said…
@Daniel:
The bulk of my ang pao came from generous older siblings.

@Jase:
Bulimia? *wink*

@JustMe:
True, true. But I would have asked for a chauffer. Hehe.

@Famil:
Not sure. Tan Kim Hock?

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