Turkish Invasion

The main lobby at Pavilion was filled up with an exhibit last week. It was by the Turkish Tourism board, complete with cultural dances and artwork demonstration.

Despite being a work day, the place was filled with shoppers curious with what was on show. A belly dancing routine prior to that certainly had something to do with the number of crowd gathering.

In the 15 minutes I was at the lobby, I saw a glass blowing demonstration and well traditional painting done by artisans. They were also serving free Turkish coffee and ice cream.

Quite a well executed program I thought ....

Home Furnishing Expo

Anita and the boys were only to join me after dinner last Friday evening. The boys had to attend their Quran school before coming over. Therefore I had a spare couple of hours looking for dinner after work that evening.

A quick net search brought me to Mid Valley - which was only 5 minutes away from the apartment. There was an Expo going on. And it was on home renovation and furnishing. A good excuse to have a look.

It was held over the weekend - the last day being on Aidil Adha - at Mid Valley Convention Centre. As it was just after 6 on on the first day, the crowd was still pretty light. Less crowded meant more time to have a close look around.

The front entrance. What? No photography?Started off at the bedsThen some home appliances, such as this self propelling vacuum cleanerSome cute LED lightingI was looking for a couple of specifics. A good mattress - even though I've already had my eyes on one somewhere else but it was good to compare the prices - and outdoor furniture for the verandah at the apartment.

There were a few but none caught my fancy. As usual, there were a few interesting stuff. The first one was a new padlock with a built in shrieking alarm. It goes off everytime you try to pry it or cut it as what usually happened during break ins. A nice idea. It looked the same as the usual padlock and unlocked using using keys. But the moment you temper with it, all hell break loose. Nice! And it wasn't particularly expensive.

The alarmed padlock I mentioned earlier. It looks like a normal padlock, until it started to shriek!This man tried to charm me into buying a food processor. Not interested.Then there were the usual suspect. Some of the sofa were damn nice to look at and to sit on. There were going on offer of course, but we didn't need one for the moment. That would come maybe next year after we figure out what to do with the main sitting area.

Then it was sofa ........ and more sofaAll in all, it wasn't half bad. The majority of the show floor was filled with home automation and kitchen appliances. Nothing new. Price-wise it was difficult to judge as I wasn't aware of the standard pricing. The vendors would always point out to prove cuts, but how true that was remained to be seen.

A good way to spend a couple of hours and build your appetite for dinner.

Tokidoki is Italian?

Passing by Fahrenheit the other day, I couldn't help but notice some cute characters at the front entrance. I then ventured inside to find this collection of cute anime-like characters. I swore that they were Japanese.

When I reached home, I started reading about it while I was uploading the photos onto Flickr. They were created by an Italian designer, heavily influenced by the Japanese cutesy anime drawings. And they were extensive.

The one which caught my eye was the appropriately named Adios the Grim Reaper. On one hand, he carried an apple and on the scythe, he had a strawberry. Don't know how to make sense of that one, but cute none the less. Other characters also followed on the same vein.

There were unicorns, donuts and monkeys to describe a few. Best to just read about them on the web. It would make more sense there.

They had original arts and merchandise on sale at the foyer. I should have brought some but couldn't be asked to carry the purchase about. Maybe next time ...

Batman!

The old adage of “the best camera is the one you have with you” strike home big time yesterday. Straight after my Sunday Morning ward round, I headed out to Pavilion to settle my bills and pay my credit card fees. Something I do on a monthly basis, kind of my down time. I usually carry my camera with me, to do a bit of street photography, or anything which took my fancy.

Alas, I didn’t have anything with me yesterday. So, I strolled into Pavilion, and the main foyer was transformed into an exhibition site for all things Batman. One of the local credit card provider sponsored the 75th Anniversary Batman exhibition there. Plenty of stuff to see, including the Batmobile and the bicycle - or whatever you called it.

The place was packed, and I wished that I had my camera with me. My boys were not into Batman - they were more into X-men for the time being.But I was sure they would appreciate it if they saw it …

Luckily, the iPhone 5S with Litely app captured some of the scenes pretty well. It could’ve been worse …

I stayed for quite some time looking at the artwork from years gone by, how the costume and even the Batman logo had evolved. I was sure the Batman movie did wonders to promote the comic, one of the more successful spin-offs.

What? No Catwoman?

Not sure how long the exhibition would go on for, but it was certainly worth checking out.

Metals by Ming

I got to know Ming Thein from Flickr and over the years had became a fan of the work of this remarkable man. The word got out that he had some of his work on show at Centre for Asian Photographer over at Jaya ONE. And since Anita and the boys wanted to check the place anyhow, so I thought I could hit two birds with one stone.

Why not?

The Centre was a lot smaller than I thought. Privately funded, it had a cafe at the lower floor and you take a step on the top floor of the duplex unit to see the exhibition area.

Ming had around a couple of dozens of prints on display. The theme concerns metalwork. People working with metals and fabrication. Quite literally.

The prints were gorgeous, but I found that the walls were too crowded. And the lack of narrative to take me through the photos were disconcerting. Maybe I was used to exhibits being of a certain look. This certainly was a slight departure to it.

None the less, the works would be something to be proud of. Something worth looking at, both the work and the centre.

The centre is located on the second floor of the newly reopened Jaya ONE.