The City, Twice
Saturday, May 30, 2026 at 9:22PM 
Please click the photo above to play the daily videoThe long weekend announced itself properly — rounds started early and wrapped up by noon, which is exactly the kind of Saturday morning that earns its afternoon. With the rest of the day wide open, I took Anita into the city, starting at Central Market.
There was a bittersweet errand first. Nala, the outlet in Kasturi Walk, is doing a closing down sale. It's always a shame when a place you've browsed happily over the years decides to fold. You don't realise how much a shop has become part of your mental map of a place until someone announces it's leaving. We paid our respects in the way one does — by buying things at a discount and feeling vaguely guilty about it.
Lunch was at Pak Jen, quick and unfussy, the kind of meal that exists to refuel rather than linger. It did its job admirably.
Afterwards, we wandered across to Bangunan Sultan Abdul Samad, mostly on a whim, and found ourselves genuinely surprised. The new wing was open — something I hadn't expected — and it's been fitted out with a cluster of restaurants and cafés that give the whole building a completely different energy. Heritage architecture with modern tenants. It works rather well.
We tried Tannin Hill, a tea house that offered a tasting menu. The concept was lovely, the execution generous — perhaps too generous, if we're being honest. By the fourth or fifth steep, we'd crossed the line from pleasantly caffeinated to faintly overwhelmed. There is, it turns out, such a thing as too much tea. A sentence I never expected to write.
We walked it off, exploring the rest of the new spaces, and somewhere during the stroll the idea formed: we'd come back this evening with Irfan. The place deserved a second visit, preferably with a different stomach.
So that's exactly what we did. Dinner at Jibby Chow, because Irfan had his heart set on dim sum, and Jibby Chow delivers on that front without argument. Idlan was too tired to tag along, which is the quiet prerogative of anyone who's had enough socialising for one day. No judgement. Some evenings you simply don't have a second outing in you.
After dinner, we returned to Bangunan Sultan Abdul Samad as planned. The building looks different at night — the lighting picks out details you miss in daylight, and the whole precinct takes on a more relaxed, almost European quality. We stopped at Niko Neko for matcha, which I'll describe diplomatically as an acquired taste. Irfan seemed more convinced than I was. I suspect matcha is one of those things you either feel strongly about or simply endure politely while waiting for someone else to finish theirs.
The walk back was the best part, really. The city at night, properly strolled rather than rushed through. KL rewards you when you slow down, and tonight it was in a generous mood.
#ExpoNegaraku Part 2
Part 1 of the entry can be read here.
Dome 2 housed the urban transport infrastructure the Government had planned for the coming decade. All the new LRT connections in the works - with no mention of the exorbitant cost of course or the fact that it would be built using China money. Quite a fun read although the audiovisual presentation that had was more on the lame side. Something I would expect my children could come up with for their school project. But it conveyed the message to the viewing public. And that was what mattered.
The rest of the domes dealt more with the environment and communications services. All in a very comfortable surroundings with good crowd flow control. The presentations were Malay-centric, and it was clear.that the target audience were Malaysians visiting KL during the school holidays.
I would definitely recommend visitors to see the expo. A couple of hours well spent, and if this was the kind of expositions we were to expect in the future the quality was definitely there. Shame that despite being media savvy, I only learned about the exhibition when I physically stumbled across it. The expo would run until the 15th December.