What, you don't know?
Well, I dunno whether my blog here is cool enough that people from all over the world(read:those outside Malaysia) actually come and read my blog once in a while. Come to think about it, do they even know that I'm from Malaysia? Guess that reminds me that I still haven't properly introduced to the blogging community the who, what, where and when I ams yet. It's not like much of them will take notice anyway...
But back to business. Yeah,on 31st August 2007, Malaysia celebrated its 50 years of independence from the occupation of Britain...well, British people. Well, whatever. Every year, the date 31st August is welcomed by all Malaysians(since it's a public holiday, which means one day off your job) and is celebrated throughout the country(who doesn't want public holidays anyway?). There are parades held in the capital Kuala Lumpur, attended by the Prime Minister and his cronies, with colourful participation by the military and armed forces, students, supermarket mascots, and so, and so, and so....you know the drill...
However, since this year's significantly special, you could see that the same kind of stuff were happening again, except that this time it's bigger, brighter, flashier, longer, more colourful and whatever other superlative words that I was too lazy to type in. Parades are held in(if I'm not mistaken)all of the main cities in evey state, and many crazy stuff took off, like fireworks display competition in Penang, for instance. Hell, my uni (UTP) even tried to do its part my amassing a mountain of used diskettes and made a huge Malaysian flag out of it(it's not like the diskettes are useful for anything else anyway...).
But I don't want to talk about those things actually (The hell....I pretty much done talking about it already!).
During the Independence celebrations, my family and I went to Penang for a family holiday. It's been a real while since all of us got the chance to go on a family trip together, so I'm pretty much grateful that this year's public holiday came aroundback-to-back with the weekends, so all of us were free to go on a vacation. On 30th August, my family from KL went to fetch me at UTP before making it straight to Penang.
The first thing I noticed about Penang was how similar in development it is with Johor Bahru(my actual hometown), and how equally crowded it is. The trip through the Peneng Bridge alone took away about half an hour's worth of my life. Then, going around the main citywe made our way to the Penang Grand COntinental Hotel, where my dad has already booked two rooms for all of us. During that time, there wasn't much to look around in the city, except the iconic Komtar tower standing tall among the old shophouses and its inhabitants in the firework-coloured sky(wow....that's pretty artistic no?). So we made it to Grand Continental, get our bags to our rooms, bathed and prayed and then slept. End of Day One.
Day two.
A view of the city from my room window.It's my dad who's all hyped up to go there; my bro and sis and I didn't even know such a road esisted, but there you are. Lorong Kulit turned out to be nothing more than your average makeshift street market, selling stuff like pirated Pantene shampoos to handphone casings to drinks and shirts. There was really nothing special there, just your average market stuff. Either way, bought some drinks and after high boredom levels get the better of my dad(and much insistence from my mom and all of us), we went somewhere else.
Lorong Kulit.After Lorong Kulit, we went to several various places, but didn't stick around long enough at any one place. We went to Bukit Bendera, but most of us were too lazy to go up till the top of the hill. We stopped somewhere to buy some ice creams, then went to Teluk Bahang. We stopped at some beach which name I couldn't remember much, and later went further inland, and came up with...
A dam! The Teluk Bahang dam!
Sure, it's just a dam, nothing much to give a dam about. Still, it was my first time(as far as I can remember anyway) that I actually come up close with a dam, so of course I was a bit more than just jakun naturally.
My dad drove up till the top, parked and took some family pics. My sis and bro and I went camwhoring ourselves, now that we've got our Nokia N76s.
My dad taking our group pic with the dam front at the background.
Me with the dam as the background.
Another view of the dam.Man, the wind was so strong here, if I was ten times lighter than my current weight now, I could've flown away. It's like a scene outta Titanic, minus Jack, Rose, expendable extras, cheesy acting, stray icebergs and the Titanic itself.
After that, we stopped at yet another beach (or port, not so sure..) before driving back to the town. Dropped by at the Church Street Pier to throw small and large water(aka going to the toilet...hehehe) and later went to the supposedly famous Liner Clear 24 Hours Nasi Kandar joint to enjoy the delicacies it offered and perhaps get my cholestrol levels a bit higher or so....
The Church Street Pier front.
The Line Clear Nasi Kandar Restaurant
How the inside of the restaurant looks like.
Dunno who's this guy. Probably just a local celebrity around here...
Ginger tea aka teh halia.
That night, we went out walking around the Penang town, basking in its nightlife. I tried to find some Starz or Gempak mags but to no avail. Anyhow, we had a late dinner(supper) before going back to the hotel.
The next day, we were to go back to KL and JB(in my case, Tronoh). The initial plan was to stick around for another 24 hours, but for reasons known but forgotten, it wasn't so. We spent the cruel morning going to the Komtar, only to find our efforts futile as the place wasn't open yet.
Undeterred, we went to the pier to go out of the island and back to the mainland the way we didn't when going in - by ferry.
Damn!(No, I wasn't talking about the Teluk Bahang one). This was the highlight of this family vacation! This wasn't my first ride on a ferry(with both vehicles and people onboard), since the first one I had was when I went tot Turkey. Then again, at that time, it was at night, I was sleepy and surrounded by folks whom I am too intimidated to ask where the restroom is. This time, it was a clear morning sky, so I can see stuff away as far as my horribly myopic eyes can permit.
The vehicles that were on board the ferry.
A look of the Penang Strait from the ferry.
Me, on the ferry.
Back on the mainland, my dad hooked up with one of his accomplices so the guy could lead us to our final eat-out for this vacation, the restaurant at some place(details forgotten already).
Basically the eatery served you local Penang delicacies along with its main attraction - grilled food. They got pretty much all of the usual stuff here - beef, mutton, squids, fish, children(no they're not on the menu, but they're all over the place).
We ordered drinks and pretty much a little bit of everything. When the food was put on the table, I knew that this would be the moment which I will both enjoy and regret. For one, I'm enjoying good food with my family, a precious experience. Then again, I'm supposed to watch what I'm eating due to high cholesterol levels - and the only thing on the table that I could consume without having health complications here was the drinking water.
Should I eat, or not?
I was in a huge dilemma. A very huge dilemma. Even after all the food was finished and during the trip back to UTP, I'm still in a huge dilemma. Then, back on UTP, I realised that I've already devoured like a third of everything on the table, so I bought several 3-in-1 instant oatmeal beverages to hopefully counter the effect.
So yeah, those pretty much summarises my less-than accurate post on my family vacation. Like all family trips, this one was not without its downs, and mine had a fair share of anger, pissed-offs and dissatisfactions. Then again, what's a family would be without its own ups and downs? No I'm not gonna complain (much) about it being a lousy trip; hell, I suppose it's good enough that we actually had a family vacation together, even if it's not a perfect...
Now I'm waiting for my dad for a family vacation overseas....
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