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Ave Maria I: Pilgrimage Passage to Portugal

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Being the only Catholic in the family besides mum, I really could only say "yes" when my mum asked me to join her on a tri-country pilgrimage in Europe with emphasis on the sites of Marian apparitions. A rare chance to go on a long holiday with mum. At the same time, KH asked me to go on a Hokkaido road trip with him, but I'll talk about that later. Since the trip was organised by a Kuching-based tour agency, 80% of the participants were from East Malaysia and were heavy duty Hakka and Foochow speakers. I didn't start packing until a few days before departure due to a shitty work schedule. My CEO was pursuing a deal with a local bank and was going all out to spin his proposal. So I guess it was lucky that I could escape it for two weeks. Will think about the shit after I get back. My flight was on Monday evening but we had to arrive at the airport pretty early to meet up with the main group. Mum fried some noodles and I ate that at 5:00 PM. At 6:00 PM, I had so

Gin & Tell

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Deciding on Sunday lunch keeps getting more challenging. I made the random choice of Sushi Kame at Atria Shopping Gallery. When we walked in, it was kinda deserted. The reason dawned on me after I went through the menu. I would give it a rating of $$$. Since I was there, might as well order something more premium to gauge the quality of its food. From the picture, the Ladies Set didn't look like much. It was actually served in a course. For MYR55, one got an appetizer, salad, chawanmushi , sashimi , grilled gindara , chirashi don , stewed pork and a bowl of  udon . Add that to my oyako don ( MYR28 ) and you get two very full customers. As usual, there was a function going on at centre atrium and mum sat down for it. Gintell had an opening ceremony for their new shop and it was officiated by their brand ambassadors, Amber Chia and Datuk Jalaluddin Hassan. The ceremony included a lion dance with eight lions. Sitting there for hours wasn't a total loss as mum got a heart

Doiffee, Dinner, Drinks

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My last visit to Doiffee , Taman Desa was in August 2014. After more than a year, they have diversified their menu as KH and I discovered. Under their signatures items, I chose a cup of Classic Cham, cafe culture meets kopitiam chic. Truth be told, I wasn't impressed with that drink. Not worth the money. Also tried one of their waffles-- Gorilla Cravings. Why the name? Bananas. In the evening, KH organized a big dinner with my family, Apollo, Apollo's mum and QueerRanter-D. The dinner was at Hai Tian , Equine Park. Apollo's group was early by half an hour while my group was thirty minutes late. The poor fellas had more than hour to look at the menu. But it worked out because there was a line for walk-in customers by 7:30 PM. The braised long ribs looked more like Dong Po meat than ribs, but it was yummy. Little Monster nearly baham -ed all the mantou s! BIL's favourite was the salted egg bitter gourd. And as usual, KH brought wine to celebrate. Asked the kid

Uber

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The 31st of March 2016 marks the day I lost my UBER virginity. And it was all thanks to RapidKL. On that day, there was a failure on the Ampang Line. KH and I discovered the platform to be overflowing with passengers, yet no announcement was made. Did some quick checks on Twitter and found many angry comments directed at @myrapidkl and @askrapidkl. No point waiting there like idiots so we went to have dinner at Leboh Ampang. Found a table at Restoran Kader and ordered a rava thosai with some butter chicken. Waited till 8:00 PM and RapidKL still could not give a definite answer on service resumption. KH suggested that we take UBER home, so I downloaded the app. My first experience was in a Toyota Vios with a Chinese fella who so happened to live in my neighbourhood. Small talk revealed that he would pick up one passenger every day on his way back home. He is a vegetarian marathon runner who actually invited me wake up at 5:00 AM on Saturdays to join him. Thanks, but no thanks. Over

Holy Week 2016

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Pictorial for Holy Week 2016: Palm Sunday, the start of Holy Week: Jesus comes to Jerusalem as King -- Matthew 21:1-11 Maundy Thursday, Jesus washes the feet of his Disciples --John 13:12-16 Hot Cross Buns. Our Lord's Passion --Matthew 27:11-65 Empty holy water fonts after Holy Thursday till Easter Vigil. Service of Light on Easter Vigil. Baptism and Confirmation on Easter Vigil. Christ is Risen! --Luke 24:6-7

BFF at Koyaku

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I arranged a belated birthday celebration for KH with the BFF at Koyaku , Taman Desa. During the BFF's golden age, birthday gatherings were 'our thing' and would be a great chance to get together. Now our gatherings are much smaller with fabulous fall-outs and some of us living away from Kuala Lumpur. Alexander the Gay is in Singapore, Savante and Legolas are in East Malaysia. DanielH is in the Philippines. Among those who turned up were Jaded Jeremy, Bunny, Janvier, BeautifulMale ( he came although he was down with fever, really bagi muka ), Khatijah, JL and of course SK. Additional VIP guests were SimonLover and Sharky. We were given a private room that we shared with another party but we pretended that they weren't there. Haha. With Janvier around, sake would definitely be served. Once again we plied Sharky with drink as he always gives the most adorable of facial expressions. At the end of the night, we cut the cake and tried to get the ultimate group photo by st

March Filler

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Sometimes my mum skips Saturday marketing at OUG. On such days, the only concern would be to decide on a breakfast venue. Nothing fancy, just randomly chose a neighbourhood wantan noodles stall. Although we did not go to the OUG market, doesn't mean that she won't do any grocery shopping at the neighbourhood market! Did a quick stop at the newly-opened Hero Mart, one of the many grocery shops in the area. Very stiff competition really. They sell everything from poultry, vegetables and seafood, to canned food and small electrical items. Heck, they even have extra strong beer. Never knew such a thing existed. I was due for a haircut, so I paid a visit to my stylist at Bandar Park. A quick cut to get things short and neat. By the time I was done, it was time for lunch. Mum wanted fish head noodles so we went to Woo Pin at Taman Desa. The price increased again, but its not so bad cause mum and I always share one large bowl. Felt like melting after our lunch there so we we

BirthDate

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In the early stages of our relationship, KH and I had not much chance to celebrate each other's birthdays. Now that we're working in the same city, we try to make up for lost opportunities. KH celebrated his 35th birthday on the 10th of March. Since the exact date was a Thursday, we decided to postpone the celebrations a day late. No fun celebrating with an impending work day over one's head. Early on Friday morning, we took the LRT to Hang Tuah station and had breakfast at Sarang Cookery ,   where we ate roti jala with kapitan curry chicken. We were quite impressed with the food and might return for lunch one of these days to explore their full menu. Obviously with VCR Cafe just next door, we had our morning coffee there.Spent most of our morning there talking about this and that. For the first time, I noticed a whole bunch of Malaysia Barista Championship awards at the counter. 1st Runner Up for Latte Art but I never got anything remotely award-winning in my cup.