Afternoon at Teluk Kemang

Every time we went to PD, we tended to spend some time walking around at Teluk Kemang beach. I soon realised what the attraction was about. It was the colour and the sea breeze. The place tended to be jam-packed during school holidays. Earlier this week, we made sure we went there early to avoid the traffic. I brought my iPhone this time around rather the EOS 7D, and snapped away spontaneously.

Breakfast at La Bodega

A couple of months ago, Anita went out with a friend who was holiday from the UK and ended up having breakfast in Bangsar. After looking around, they decided to try La Bodega. It was a well-known tapas bar chain, and I did not realise that they serve breakfast. She could not stop raving about the breakfast there and since I was free this morning - while I was still on holidays - I decided to try it.

The interiorMy egg BenedictEgg Benedict no moreMy God, it was great. I ordered egg Benedict with smoked salmon, with sauteed mushrooms, and had a double expresso to go with them. The egg was well-cooked, the bread toasted just the way it should be, the smoked salmon was succulent and the mushroom was gorgeous. The expresso certainly added zing to my morning.

Should you guys visit Bangsar during the morning and was wondering where to have breakfast, do give La Bodega a try. They certainly know how to serve breakfast.

18-1 Jalan Telawi 2, Kuala Lumpur, Bangsar - 03-2287-9468

Catching up with an old friend

It has been a while but I bumped into an old friend @Elviza at Starbucks in Bangsar earlier today. It must have been a couple of years since my wife bumped into her, and we stopped to chat for quite a bit.

The boys got up early following an early night last night. I managed to wake up at 5 am to catch the second half of United's match against Stoke. After getting the boys settled down, we went for breakfast at La Bodega in Bangsar. More about that in my later post.

On the way back to Bangsar Village, we bumped into @Elviza. She was trying to stop smoking, and we had a long chat about that. Apparently she had a friend who recently passed away due to a suspected heart attack at the age of 36. That clearly shook her. She managed to go cold turkey a couple of times before but picked up the habit due to friends. My feeling was, it was all down to determination and how badly she wanted to quit. She should take a lesson from her friend's teeny passing to motivate her.

I was actually back at Sri Utama waiting for Puan Anita. She dripped by to see how Idlan was coping for lunch. I think she was worries for nothing, but hey, I'm only the Dad.

School's Opened

We went to bed early last night. The boys were already tucked by 8.30 pm, all in preparation for an early start this morning. Today was the first day of school year for the both of them, with Idlan going into Year One. But the unexpected happened. Both Idlan and Irfan woke up at midnight, and Idlan only managed to go back to sleep at 4 am.

We managed to get both of them up by 6am and ready to leave the house just after seven. Amazingly, Idlan not only finished school at 3 pm without a fuss, he went to Sekolah Agama from 5 to 7 pm. Plenty of energy this boy, and not only that, he played a round of Wii after dinner and only just now went into the bedroom. Irfan was already sleeping at 6 pm and hopefully, he wouldn’t wake up until the morning.

The boys were excited with their new school friends. Irfan had 21 students in his kindy class, and according to the teacher, it will be split in the next few days. As for Idlan, there were 15 in his class, most of them new friends. The class division for Idlan was rather confusing in the beginning, but it was sorted out by the end. We have already got their books last week from school, so that bit was already organised. The main fuss on the day was the fact that the canteen was closed, and for the term, food will be served in class. Since Idlan was be fussy eater, Anita was worried, and sure enough when we asked him today, he hardly ate anything for lunch.

Irfan finished his class at midday, so while waiting for 3 pm, we went over to IKEA to pick up some more stuff for our newly renovated room. While there, we sampled the famous Swedish meatballs, and finished them off with some ice-cream - Irfan’s favourite. Then it was time to sort Idlan out. He was all excited with school today and couldn’t stop talking about class and his new friends. Surprisingly, he was still up for the Sekolah Agama, where most of his schoolmates from kindy still goes to.

Harimau Malaya Reflection

It has almost been a week since the nation was hit by the Harimau Malaya fever. A very potent strain this, and no antibiotics can keep the heat down. TwitterJaya was abuzz, the mass media was in full swing, and of course, the politicians put their own spin on things. I was in PD during the first leg, and couldn’t believe it when we scored the third. All the fuss then was about the laser-gate! With the return leg in Senayan coming just three nights after, one can expect retribution from the Indonesian. Everybody was anxious on how things would play out.

Yes, it was a great night for the nation. So much so that the power that be thought that the nation deserved a day off. That reminded me of the time in school, when the headmaster in his closing speech during the annual Sports Day, would announce that the day after would be a holiday. And everyone rejoiced!

I had different take though on things. Well, a couple of things. The first being the underestimated togetherness amongst Bangsa Malaysia. Or at least on twitter. The majority of the players were Malay. Despite this, most of the buzz on TwitterJaya were coming from my non-Malay friends. How I wished that this phenomenon can be studied and formulated into a plan to garner in the new era in Bangsa Malaysia. Should Najib wanted to take credit for it, I would be sure he will name it Bangsa 1Malaysia, but that was irrelevant.

Similar spirit was observed when we were playing at the Thomas Cup. Imagine if we were to beat China and got into the Finals - another public holiday I was sure. But I was sure, members of the fairer sex would complain, as should Chong Wei won the match, they would denied the sight of Lin Dan doing the half-naked dance in the middle of the court!

Malaysians love their sports, and when it come to sports, everyone forget if they were Malay, Chinese, Indian, Punjabi, Iban etc. We all become one Bangsa.

Another thing I observed was how sporting the Indonesian were. Some of them even saluted our players and stayed behind during the prize-giving ceremony. Would we have reciprocated? Instead, all the news were about some Indonesian supporters camping outside the Malaysian hotel, interrupting their planned training session. Even during the games, at certain point it could have turned nasty, but all the players seemed to manage to put their emotions in check. Considering the stakes, the game as played with great sportsmanship. I think the Indonesian deserve some credit for this.

Well, that’s my two sen. All this got me thinking about what would happened should we made it into the World Cup Finals. Will it be a whole month holiday?