Stop at MATIC

“Interpretasi Hitam Putih Jalanan”. That was the title. Enough to intrigue me and on the sunny Saturday afternoon, I decided to go and have a look.

It was a local exhibition on street photography, all in glorious black and white featuring local photographers with a number of international contributors. Well curated and well presented. The venue as MATIC, in a purpose-built room ideal with such exhibition with plenty of natural lights and cool ambiance.

I found some of the featured photos intriguing and at the same time familiar. There were plenty of KL flavours in them and some of the landmarks were easily recognisable. Certainly the theme being black and white, made the photos contrasty and gripping. I always preferred narration and again I struggled to grasp the overall direction of the exhibit. But that does not mean that I did not enjoy what was on show.

I wished that the exhibition was better publicised. I only learned of it from Facebook. There was no dedicated website, and the mention on the MATIC webpage was only nominal. The exhibit will go on until until the end on the month - 30 March 2017 - and it was certainly worth a visit.

Parking was an issue if you were driving. I got duped into paying RM10 as I was told that I was suing a private parking. To encourage local visitors, they could have made the parking cheaper at least. Usually I would’ve parked at KLCC and walked, but with Anita coming along, it was too much of an ask for her to walk across. Again, local authorities conspired to make those who wanted to explore KL that much more challenging ...

The 500px Route

The instructions were given. The group photos were posed. Breakfast was done. So, it was time to get on with the walk. So, how was the route?

Put it this way, if I was the one organising the walk, I would've picked this particular one. To put it mildly, it was uninspiring. It was basically one round loop, with clear instructions to only venture off once we met up at the end of the formal walk. I could have finished the route in 30 minutes, and we had close to 4 hours before the designated rendezvous. Too much time to kill.

So, I explored MaTIC itself for a start. Neat colonial building and this early in the morning, there was hardly anything happening there.

I then took a left along Jalan Ampang to the Jalan Sultan Ismail turn opposite Renaissance Hotel. A bit of street work, building site and architecture. The Bukit Nanas Monorel Station had a bit of colour.

Next up, we walked along Jalan Sultan Ismail, passing by Hard Rock Cafe and did an anti-clockwise turn joining Jalan P Ramlee walking towards KLCC passing by a few more buildings.

The whole group then congregated by Laman Standard Chartered, a nice little piece of greenary smack in the middle of town next to KLCC. First time discovering this place, it was actually quite nice and tranquil.

We then noticed that the air quality dropped and the haze started coming in. I escaped towards Suria KLCC, with the plan to have a quick cup of coffee. I walked towards the famous fountain at KLCC Park and the visibility had dropped considerably by then.

Since I parked the car there, I decided to split and drove home. Might as well spend the rest of the morning with the family. There would be another photowalk coming next weekend, so I might as well just safe my energy for that one ...

The combination of uninspired route, poor air quality and too big a crowd put me off in the end, but it didn't mean that it was the fault of the organiser. I was sure that they did their best. I route around Bukit Bintang, Chow Kit, Masjid India or Kampung Baharu would have been better I guessed. Looking at the snaps, it wasn't that bad. And photography was all about creativity. The real talent was making a scene appeared inspired. After all, anybody could pick up a camera and press the shutter!

500px Photowalk

It was the time of the year - early fall - when plenty of photowalks were organised worldwide. I got 3 in the coming few weeks alone - the 500px event, followed by Scott Kelby walk in a couple of weeks and Canon one after that. Great times to catch up with friends but it looked like the weather would be conspiring against us. The haze is back!

I attended the 500px Worldwide Photowalk yesterday, organised by a local photographer. 120 shooters turned up, starting at 8 in the morning. SOme commitment that!

It was still during the Aidil Adha break for most people - myself included. So, I packed my gear early, left the apartment at around 7.30, parking my car at Suria KLCC before taking a brisk walk to the meeting point, MaTIC along Jalan Ampang 10 minutes away. The weather? Holding. Vsibility was still good - at least I could see the top of the Petronas Twin Towers.

Registration took place near a mini theatre at the entrance of an exhibition hall. It was then that I learned that 120 people converged, and I gather that even the organiser was surprised!

It took nearly half an hour before we could get on with the introduction and the obligatory group photos. We said our hellos and I got to meet old friends and some new ones. More about the route later, but first - let's get some breakfast .....

Sunday Walk

I was on call on Saturday and ended up finishing the post-take rounds at noon on Sunday. Missed a conference I was meant to attend that morning despite rushing to get things done. Got to the apartment just after noon, picked up the boys and Puan Anita and headed back to Gombak. Left the boys there with the maid, and Anita and I went out for a lunch date. We overate!

The actual programmeStill there were a number of visitors, and there was a wedding going on at the nearby Saloma BistroMight as well make use of the fair weather

With our tummy full, Anita decided to go for a walk. The sun was not to bright - in fact it was threatening to rain later in the afternoon. I read on the web that there was a festival at Matic, around 15 minutes walk from Suria KLCC where we had lunch. Off we went.

The place was deserted! Apparently the had a regional arts festival which opened at MATIC, but the actual weekend events were scattered at various venue around town. Sigh!

Trudging back to KLCCAlmost there ....That hit the spot! Big time!

We mingled around for a bit before strutting back to Suria. Time for a cold drink by the time we reached back …. Best to check out the event thoroughly before going. But then again some of the information was not forthcoming.

MaTIC. Have you heard about it?

The Tuanku Abdul Rahman Hall - the main building for the centerAnita was really eager to fill up the boys time during this school holidays. She was determine to start early. Therefore we went out yesterday afternoon to inject some 'culture' into the boys. Idlan was not interested. He has been grumpy all morning. Therefore, we left him at home and brought Irfan along. First stop, MaTIC - the Malaysian Tourism Information Center - for the KL Sunday 1 Malaysia Family Fair ......

The colourful rows of stals greeting usEntrance to the Cocoa BoutiqueHmm! Sounded a mouthful? It was either that or having a look at the Dukethon. Unfortunately, we woke up rather late. Apparently there are hot air balloon and stuffs over there. But it was scheduled to finish by midday. That's done then.

MaTIC is a renovated colonial building built in 1975. It was converted in 1988 and the main building was renamed the Tuanku Abdul Rahman Hall. It was beautifully maintained, and the Saloma Restaurant was right next door. The building is along Jalan Ampang, opposite the Renaissance Hotel, right next door to Zouk. We heard about it from surfing the net. Thought that it was intriguing since we planned to go on holiday at some point and we prefer to spend money at home rather than abroad. We wanted to see if there were informations and good holiday packages on offer. The Fair itself was held at the Center's car park. There were ample space. There were activities for children mainly, karaoke, facepainting, bouncy castles and clowns. I counted there were about 20 families and around 40 stalls.

The stores mainly sells local wares and food. There were also sections on local holiday offers which we went to have a look at. There were mainly homestays. The offer were pretty nice and reasonable. We were eyeing for a few in Kedah, but with the flooding at the moment, maybe we will look at it for some time next year. Since it was past midday when we arrived there, there were more retailers than visitors. We found out about the place through the Net. I am not sure if there were other publicity about the Fair. Maybe it was more crowded in the morning.

We then visited a chocolate shop next to the main hall called the Cocoa Boutique. It was a shop selling locally produced chocolate. There is a small exhibition center in it with chocolate-making demonstration. There were about 4 buses with tourists from India arriving at the place when we entered. We ended up not buying anything since the queue was so long. If only there is a nice cafe around there for us to grab a quick lunch. It started to drizzle by then. So we had to split. We headed to KLCC for lunch.

Lunch at KLCCLate afternoon tea at Tapper's Cafe, CapsquareQuick stroll before heading homeThe next destination was Capital Square, or Capsquare. Been there a couple of times before but it was only the first for Anita. It was surprisingly quite for a Sunday. Most of the shops were closed while the rest were unoccupied. A sorry sight really. There were a few bars which looked to be opened at night. As for yesterday, a few restaurants were opened and we had some tea at Tapper's Cafe at the ground floor. It was a typical kopitiam but the food were reasonable. The main attraction seemed to be the cinema on the top floor.