Ramen, and the Rest of It

Please click the photo above to play the daily videoA sunny start, which after the week's steady grey felt like the city had remembered it had another setting. Everything looked better lit. It's remarkable how much of a mood is simply a question of what the light is doing.

Anita was out with friends today — a continuation of the birthday, which has by now stretched comfortably into its own small season. I approve of this entirely. A single evening never seems quite adequate, and she has the sort of friends who treat a birthday as a standing invitation rather than a fixed appointment.

Once the morning's work was behind me, I drove straight to Bukit Bintang. No particular reason beyond wanting to be somewhere with people in it. Ramen for lunch, which is a decision I make roughly once a fortnight and have never once regretted. There's something restorative about a bowl that demands your full attention — you can't check anything, can't half-do it, you simply sit there and get on with the business of eating. Twenty minutes of enforced presence, delivered by broth.

Afterwards, a short walk around the area, mostly to let the ramen settle and partly because it seemed a waste to leave immediately. Bukit Bintang in the early afternoon is a strange, pleasant thing — half the crowd is tourists moving slowly with their heads up, the other half is people who work there moving quickly with their heads down, and the two streams flow through one another without much friction. I walked without a destination, which I do far too rarely, and noticed several things I've driven past a hundred times without seeing.

Physio in the late afternoon. Necessary, useful, and conducted in that brisk, unsentimental manner these sessions have, where you're praised for something you didn't know you were doing and corrected on something you were certain you'd mastered. I came out feeling loosened and mildly humbled, which is presumably the intention.

Dinner at Bangsar Village, alone, and unexpectedly enjoyable for it. Eating on your own has a bad reputation it doesn't deserve. Nobody to consult about the order, nobody's pace to match, and a perfectly good excuse to watch the room. Bangsar on a bright evening is good watching: the shopping-bag brigade, a few families negotiating with children, the usual cast of people who appear to have been sitting at the same table since noon.

Then home, and prep for tomorrow's talks. That's the part of the day that always takes longer than the estimate, because the material never behaves the way it did in your head. You read through what you've prepared and find the joins, the bit that doesn't quite lead into the next bit, the slide that seemed clever on Tuesday and now seems merely busy. I got it into decent shape. Not perfect — nothing is, the night before — but decent.

Tomorrow will be a talking sort of day. Tonight was a walking, eating, stretching sort of day, and that seems a fair way to have earned it.

A Rearranged Sunday

Please click the photo above to play the daily videoSundays have their own liturgy, and mine began, as it usually does, with football — though today's offering was more passable than gripping, the kind of match you watch out of habit rather than genuine appetite, coffee doing more of the entertaining than the game itself.

Ward round followed, and mercifully it was a smooth one — everything in its place, nothing that demanded more than the usual attention. A good ward round has a way of setting up the rest of the day nicely, like a well-tuned instrument before the concert actually starts.

The concert, in this case, was meant to be a photowalk, plans already half-formed in my head for wherever the light looked best. Dayabumi had other ideas — car park closed, no explanation offered or particularly wanted, and just like that the whole itinerary needed rewriting on the spot. There's a specific irritation to a plan undone by something as mundane as a barrier and a padlock, though I've learned by now that photography days rarely survive first contact with the actual city.

Bukit Bintang absorbed the reshuffle happily enough. Ramen at Lot 10 for lunch, which did the job of resetting the morning's minor disappointment rather effectively — hot broth has a way of putting things back into perspective. From there, books at Starhill, a browse that needed no justification beyond its own quiet pleasure, and a stop for coffee where I tried a Kulai blend — fruity, interesting, and priced as though it knew exactly how fruity and interesting it was. Worth it, probably. I'll decide on the second cup.

Then the rain arrived, as it does in this city with theatrical suddenness, and the mall did what malls do best in such circumstances — became a holding pen for anyone without an umbrella or a plan. I wasn't fighting it. There are worse places to be marooned than somewhere with coffee, books, and air conditioning already accounted for. Anita, meanwhile, was over in Gombak, the day unfolding along two separate tracks that would eventually reconverge over dinner.

That reconvening happened at Ali Cafe, a meal that asked nothing complicated of either of us after a day of rearrangements and rain.

The evening closed on two very different registers. First, finally starting Star City, the For All Mankind spin-off I'd been meaning to get to for weeks — a quiet, unhurried way to ease into the evening. Then the rather more chaotic pleasure of the British Grand Prix, which delivered exactly the sort of late drama Silverstone does so well. Charles Leclerc took the win after the race finished under the safety car, a result that had rather more to do with late misfortune for others than dominant pace of his own, but a win is a win, and he'll not be troubled by the small print.

A day thoroughly rearranged from how it started, and none the worse for it.

Another Blue Hour

It was a post-call afternoon. Irfan had just returned from his week away in Gopeng for school trip. Anita insisted on getting him his favourite. That would mean a drive to Pavilion in Friday afternoon traffic ...

The famous fountain in front of Pavilion, captured at f8.0

I decided to have my own dinner as soon as I arrived. Rather than rush back home - Irfan had already had something else to eat then - I decided to take my camera gear out and enjoy the blue hour ....

The sky was clear and Bukit Bintang was buzzing. A perfect time to mingle about.

I took a walk towards Lot 10 and crossed the famous intersection there, walking further towards Low Yat. The place was full with a band playing in the background. From afar, I could see Arab Street being filled with people having dinner and enjoying sisha. A lot of tourist in KL this time of the year. With nice afternoon weather, I might as well join them and enjoy. Rainy season was coming .... enjoy it while it lasts ....

Sunday Ride

Anita asked me to take Grab. I was never very keen. I prefer MRT. And as I was planning to attend the Malaysia Coffee Fest at 1Utama, I decided to do just that. Rather than order Grab, I parked my car in town and take the MRT.

The entrance at Bukit Bintang StationNice and clean once you enter the stationThis is Malaysia's longest escalatorAnd the platforms were on top of each other ...I left my car at Pavilion this time as I planned to go to Low Yat later. So, after lunch, I strolled along Bukit Bintang and started my train ride there.

Arriving at Bandar UtamaAll mapped outVery convenient. Before long, I was already up in open air as the train emerged off the ground near Semantan. The weather was gorgeous and there were hardly anybody on the train on this Sunday afternoon.

An enjoyable ride indeed. Arriving at Bandar Utama stop, I then walked through the One World Hotel to reach my my venue. And the party was already at full swing as the aroma of freshly blended coffee bean hit me as I reached the 1Utama main lobby.

Time to head back into town ...Smooth ride both over and underground ...And the weather had been gorgeous all day ...Let's sample some beans ...

The Talk of the Town

After I casted my vote, I had the whole day in front of me. I wasn’t in the mood to stay home and Anita and I decided to have lunch outside.

We went to Pavilion which was quite. Parking was straight forward, and we had a nice Arabic meal together. Anita did some shopping while I took a stroll towards Low Yat to see what was going on.

There were two groups of local people there. Some with inks on their left index finger - which were about half - while some did not. Many of the workers at the stores told me that they were taking turns to vote and hopefully those going later had time to do the voting.

Bukit Bintang area were filled with flags as you would expect but compared to years before, they were a lot less. Many of the candidates target the voters directly on social media rather, with most of the voters going to them, rather than they coming to us. Having a big social media presence was imperative in this day and age.

The sun was great but we had to leave early to listen to the news and prepare for the night ... the results were coming in!