2006 is coming. Happy New Year!!!!!

Today is Friday, December 30, 2005. Two more days to 2006 and we’ll say goodbye to 2005.
For 2006:

1) I wish that I can be the luckiest person is the world
2) I want to do one design project for this year
3) I want to buy a house
4) I want to live healthily. Priority!!!!


There are more “I wish” and “I want” in my mind but I’d rather keep them to myself. Selfish huh…..Don’t care

So, what is your New Year Resolution?

Maisurah gets 8A for her PMR!!!

My lovely sister got 8A for her PMR. I’m happy for her success. She deserves the recognition for her hard work. She’s a naturally gifted person and is good with numbers but not so successful in language, at least that’s what I think.

Anyway, congratulation my “whale”.

Kakuro Craze

Kakuro is a numeric crossword puzzle. It is considered more challenging than Sudoku. I think it is more fun to do Kakuro and it is addictive. At laest it get my rustic brain moving. I started out at the kid level and slowly progressing myself.

If you say you can sudoku, then you should kakuro as well.

Check out this website of Kakuro:
http://www.kakurolive.com/

My beloved beaver

My full name is Beaver. My nickname is Mat Berg but people call me Berg.

I don't like people taking my photo as I'll always look fat in it.

Gulai Lemak Siput

Have you ever tried Gulai Lemak Siput Sedut which can loosely translate to Snail in Coconut Gravy? I know some of you might cringe on the thought of eating snail but this one taste quite tasty. It is considered a local delicacy and you cannot easily find it in normal restaurant as even the snail seems hard to find nowadays.

It is used to be a laborious work to cook this dish. Nowadays, you can buy the snail readily clean and prepared – ready for cooking. You can even buy the herbs from the supermarket. All you need to do is blend them together and add in the snail. Let it simmer for a few minutes and the meal is ready. I always love my mom’s version of this dish. She’ll put lots and lots of Daun Kadok and chilies. The dish tasted divine with thick creamy coconut milk and the most important thing is the snail is cook to perfection, not too chewy.

Here is one of the recipes that you can try out:

Ingredients:

1/2 kg snail, cut the end and clean it thoroughly
1 cup of water
1 turmeric leaf
3 slices of asam gelugur
3 cups of coconut milk
Daun Kadok

Blend together:

5 shallots
3 cm fresh turmeric
2 tsp dried prawn
1 1/2 cm shrimp paste
Red chilies/Bird eyes chilies depending on your tolerance
How to cook it?

1. Add in water, turmeric leaf, asam gelugur, daun kadok and the blended ingredients into a pot. Let it simmer for a while
Add in coconut milk and salt to taste. Keep stirring the gravy to prevent it from “curdling”. Once it boiling, add in the snail. Cook for a while and turn the fire off. Try not to cook it for too long as it cause the snail to become chewy.

It’s a scary drive back home

Friday, I reached another chapter in my life. I’ve never could imagine myself driving in a heavy rain and foggy environment along the East West Highway. Driving back from Penang to Kelantan with my sisters and a friend, I feel like entering into a white zone. I can barely see the road and only rely on the middle divider line as my guide. The visibility was so bad. The farthest that I can see is about two meters ahead. The road condition that deteriorates over the raining season makes the situation worse. I hit the deep holes on the road few times. Sometimes, I try to avoid the hole in the middle of the road only to end up going into the one on the left. My heart seems to stop every time the tyre hit the hole. Poor baby. The meter barely touches 80km/hour. The winding road seems like an endless journey. I keep praying that I won’t hit anybody or being hit by somebody. I can see landslides at some stretches and that scares me.

Normally, it took me one and a half hour driving through that stretch but this time it took me longer than that, I think about three hours. What matter most was we reached home safe. I wish that I’d never have to go through that experience. Once is enough for me. The whole experience about driving during heavy rain in a deep fog along a winding and bad road teaches me to be tough. That’s what I call a challenging ride and I survived it.

Thank You....

I'd a closed brush with death today, or so I thought. It happened in front of the Toyota Showroom in Sunway Tunas, Bayan Lepas. As I was walking out of the showroom to my car, a grey Satria sped up. There were only few centimeters between me and the car body. That's damn closed.

My heart beat profusely. The driver honk and I stop immediately, unhurt. That area is so narrow and the Toyota people put up a tent that actually covers the road making it narrower and cramped. Yet, how could that guy cruise that narrow strip at 60km/hour????

I feel blessed that Allah still loves me and take care of me. I'm still shaken by the incident.
Deep inside my heart I keep saying thank you for His care. I don't know what will happen and don't want to think about it.

Whatever it is, I know there is somebody watching me and I feel so small under His watchful eyes... Thank you

Ayam Masak Merah…

I had to admit that I’m not a health buff when it comes to food. For Saturday’s dinner, I cooked Ayam Masak Merah which literally means Red Chicken. It tasteddevillish and I ate it with Nasi Beriyani (Spicy Rice). The heavy dish was tamed down with slices of fresh cucumber

Triple New Year

Does anybody realize that we'll be cellebrating triple New Year this January.

Chinese > Year of Dog, January 29th
Muslim > Awal Muharram/ Maal Hijrah, Janury 31st
Malaysia > NEW YEAR , January 1st

I've read somewhere that the triple New Year will only occur every 32 or 33 years. So, the next triple New Year will be in 2039.

What is your resolution for this coming New Year?

A happy day in Cameron Highland

From left Intan, K Cik, Surah and me.

Cacti in Rose Valley

I took these photos during my visit to Rose Valley in Cameron Highland. I cannot imagine myself fall onto those thorny cacti.. Ouchhh...

Butterfly Farm

We spent about half an hour in the Butterfly Farm, Cameron Highland. The place is quite small and there are not many butterflies around. It costs RM3/adult and open from about 9am to 6pm.

Rose Valley... Cameron Highland

One of the many type of roses in the Valley















Strange looking flower.. looks like a bird

White and Yellow Swans

Me and Intan in the Rose Valley. Our shirts matched the swans' colors. Hehehehhe....

Cameron Highland Strawberries

Fresh Strawberries bought from the market

Refreshing Strawberries Lolly - RM1/piece

Deep Fried Kimchan and Oyster Mushroom in Batter

So crispy....

A weekend trip to Cameron Highland

Last Thursday night, I packed few clothes, bundled my sisters inside my car and off we headed to Cameron Highland. Taking the North South Highway from Penang, the night driving took me about 2 hours. Not too bad….The traffic was good.

By the time we reached Ipoh, it was already 9.30pm so we’d decided to overnight in Ipoh. As a budget conscious traveler, our obvious choice would be a cheap motel that can provide us with basic necessities. Easy parking space would be an added advantage to us. We ended in Faremount Hotel for about RM70/night. The motel was very basic but the cleanliness was quite disappointing. I’d prefer if the toilet is cleaner but since I’m too tired, I couldn’t; complain much.

We left for Cameron Highland at about 8.30 am the next morning and took the Simpang Pulai exit for a scenic and pleasurable drive. The drive up took me about 1 hour and the scenery is breathking. We stay for two nights in Jasmine Hotel in Brinchang at a rate of RM85/night. This hotel is quite ok except that it doesn’t provide fresh towel. It’s lucky that we brought our own.

We went to few places such as the Rose Valley, Butterfly Farm, and the Strawberry Farm.
The cute cacti always capture our attention whenever we stop at the market. I ended up buying about ten of them.

The fresh strawberry lollies were so nice. At about RM1 to RM1.50 per piece, the lollies were one of the sought after items for us. We ate lots of them. I love the dried strawberries as well. It made a good goodies to give to others back home.

The night market was packed with hawkers and also tourist. Lots of stuffs are available here such as souvenirs, strawberries, cacti, fresh veggies and fruits, and honey. Not too mentioned food and we tried the Kimchan and Oyster Mushroom Deep Fried in Butter. It was so nice we bought lots of them to eat in the hotel.

We left Cameron Highland on Sunday morning with heavy hearts. We’d made plan to come again in the future. Maybe I’ll venture further to explore the famous Mount Brinchang or going for other nature trip that we missed this time.

Pesta Pulau Pinang

It has been quite sometime since I write anything to this blog. I’ve been quite occupied with my works and also with my two sisters that are currently in Penang visiting me.

Pesta Pulau Pinang has just started and it’s a great opportunity for me to bring my sisters around. The last time I went there was in 2003 and the ticket price was just RM2. I think they’d increase the price since last year to RM4. We went there just for fun since they’ve never been to one.

There is nothing interesting there. It’s more or less like the Kota Bharu expo except that it has better booths. There are games and some entertainments for the visitor. I was hoping that they’ll showcase on the Penang famous food, culture or anything that Penang is famous for, but all I see is the exploitation of some commercial goodies that we can buy with a cheaper price outside the Pesta. I wish the state government will do something to improve the Pesta Pulau Pinang quality.