My Cameronian Diary

The house's internet connection just gave me a scare just now... I thought I wouldn't be able to update my blog before I go back to KL! Arhhhhh!!!!!
Luckily it is back to normal now! Yay~! :D

Ok back to the real business... Remember last July where Deardo Wong and I bet on a World Cup match in which I won because the Netherlands beat Brazil in the match? Okay, you probably won't remember anything but to me it was an important win for me! As the winner of the bet, I chose for Deardo to bring me to Cameron Highlands for a trip, simply because I've never been there before in my entire life!
But yea, it took us almost a year to finally realize that trip. I guess it was more to my fault because I'm most of the time the busy woman at work. So finally after a few crazy weeks with some insane number of events, I've finally taken some days off to visit Cameron Highlands for a short 2 days trip! Finally~ Phew~!
Much to my disappointment, it wasn't a great start as I fell sick the day before the trip. I took Panadol and my allergic to it made my eyes so swollen! :S Just to give you some clue of how I looked like...Arrrhhh~! I looked scary~!!!:S
So yea, it wasn't a good first day at Cameron Highlands although I tried hard to push myself up a bit. But I was quite tired to even walk!
Anywayz, here's my Cameronian Diary...

Lunch @ Boh Tea Cafe
Gosh... I just typed 'Lipton' instead of 'Boh' just now... Ish... Sensitive, sensitive!
We actually made a wrong turn and went into the old one first, then we realized eh the cafe doesn't look quite the same. So after another journey, here we are!Gorgeous scenery!!!
Woohooo~~~ As a tea person, it actually made me so excited by only looking at the tea plantations! And the fresh tea smell was awesome too!
Since it was time for lunch, we sat down to have a light lunch there with Boh tea and some light snack. Time to warm up the body a bit while pretending not to know someone is taking pic of me! :p
Damn Deardo Wong posed better than me! He stole my limelight!
Aih... Sad to say, the tea was done with the all-in-one packet of tea and the food really sucks! I mean, they spent the money making such a beautiful-looking cafe, why can't they also make the drinks and foods a bit more high-end? I mean, to be honest, the Tuna Sandwich we had was GROSS~! Yet!!! The price isn't cheap okay???
Anywayz, we continued to walk around and snapped some pics with the tea leaves! LOL!Act cute~!
OMG, so beautiful... The background!
Now you can see the very pretty-looking Boh Cafe at the back!
One with Deardo Wong! :D

Before we checked into the hotel, I couldn't help but stopped by at the road side to have a Jagung Bakar!
I always do that! Thumb-up before even trying it!
Nom... Nom... Nom...
See! He posed better than me again!
Needless to say, Cameronian (I seems to like to use this word, hmmm...) corn is still sweet, crispy and yummy~!

At night we had some charcoal steamboat for dinner. It was not too bad but I totally forgot the name of the restaurant. Ah well, they are all over Cameron and they are all same price anywayz, so just pick one for yourself!The super-long 'chimney'! LOL!

Cameron Highlands is really a dead town after like 8pm? After dinner, all we can do was to walk around the more happening Tanah Rata and in front of our hotel before we call it a day and spent the rest of the night watching HBO!

Breaky @ Oldies & Goodies Roasted (?) Restaurant
We seriously didn't know where to have our breakfast...
So not too far away from the budget hotel we stayed at Berinchang is this restaurant which sells all kind of roasted meat. Yeah... They claim that their restaurant is roasted too, but Deardo Wong and I didn't find it very roasted lor. No roasted smell also!We ordered roasted chicken and duck for two and a stir-fried water cress (water cress is so hip in Cameron Highlands) to go with our rice. The chicken and duck were nothing fancy, but the vegetables was damn yummy! I think it's just because Cameronian vegetables are extra fresh. Even the vegetables and mushrooms we had at the steamboat place were damn fresh! And the oily rice was also pretty yummy too!
But then again, I also found their food pretty pricey lor! And the restaurant has very cool light bulbs!
Okay lar, quite a wholesome and satisfying meal before we bid goodbye to the boring town.








WHAT? THAT'S IT???
No lar, Cameron Highlands can be boring but hey, I didn't miss the Cameronian(that word again, lalalalala~) strawberries!
One of our two final missions in Cameron Highlands is to go to a Strawberry Farm! See, I didn't even remember which one we went to. So many of them lar, we just randomly picked one which allow us to pluck our own strawberries at RM20 for half a KG. Fasten your seatbelt! Time to shop!!!
Since I felt better that day, I was all excited to do the plucking of strawberries! Yee~Haaaa~~~! I really enjoyed the fun of choosing, plucking and even curi-makaning! Ha~! I LOVE STRAWBERRIES~!!! :D
I looked so HYPER~! Blek~!
Deardo Wong picking the right fruit seriously...
Wooopsss~ Caught on camera!
Ah~ I reckon this is my favourite pic of all taken in Cameron Highlands!
I must say visiting a strawberry farm is a must if you were to visit Cameron Highlands!

One last mission! KEA Farm for some Cameronian vegetables and fruits! Oh, fresh mushrooms too! (And the strawberries there are only RM10 per box! ==|||)I was the most fashionable 'See Lai' there! :p
Spot me???

We cooked some of the stuff I bought there already for dinner!Long Song Choy was yummy! Something like Sayr Paku lar, damn nice lor!
Our typical dinner! Sho... Healthy, right?
Another healthy one! If you can spot some oyster mushrooms here, they are also Cameronian mushrooms!
And this afternoon I asked Mamo to cut the Crystal Jambu to try. I told her I'll keep the other one in the fridge for her and Papo and she went "Aiya, don't want lar, at home nobody will eat, you better bring it back to KL with you!" But minutes later she yelled from the living room... "Eh, Ping ah, that Jambu of yours don't need to bring back d... Hehehehe..."
Yeap, that's my cute Mamo... And the Camoronian Crystal Jambu I bought!

Overall, my first ever trip to Cameron Highlands was not too bad, though not fantastic. To be honest, the Boh thingy was a big letdown, especially the cafe. Strawberry Farm was possibly the best experience of all. Choices of restaurants are so limited and food and vegetables are quite pricey too though damn fresh lar! And it's quite a boring town too, no night life, not many happening restaurants, cafe or even pubs...
I would go there again just for the weather but not for anything else.
BUT! I thank Deardo Wong for the trip! Appreciate it that he actually brought me there although he had been to Cameron Highlands a few times before this! Hey, but Deardo Wong! I'm sure with me around, it was funnier right? :)

Hello from Taiping~

Hey all~!
I've just came back from a much deserving short holiday from Cameron Highlands and had just checked into home in Taiping this afternoon! :D
SHIRLEXIA IS ABSOLUTELY IN A HAPPY MODE!!!
Now sipping Mamo's homecooked Ginseng Chicken Soup while typing this, I've also came out with a 'to-do-list' during my short 2 days break at home. Well, to be honest, I'm not very positive about completing all of them, but I shall try! Actually, if I could, I would also love to go for a facial and massage but that will surely take up a lot of my time... :(
Anywayz, a tick for 'blog 1' there! Hehehehe...

The rest of my Singapore trip

*Yawn~~~~*
Just woke up from a very short afternoon nap after another long day at work (yes, on a Sunday...). Been extremely busy with loads of events for the past one week. Thankfully all of them went on smoothly~! :D Another week to go before I can hopefully take some days off from work to RELAX a bit!!! Can't wait!
So... Before I actually drown myself into my work again, I gotta really conclude my Singapore trip before it is outdated!!! So here's a post to sum-up the rest of my Singapore work trip...

Dinner @ G7 Fresh Frog Porridge & Seafood, Geylang
That was actually the first night in Singapore when my colleague was like dying for this Geylang Frog Porridge. I had the Chinatown Frog Porridge during my last trip to Singapore with YY, so Geylang's one was really my first try. At G7, they also have a whole range of seafood dishes and I saw a lot of them having crab dishes! But my colleague and I, with our agent, who is an American, went for some normal food...Fresh Frog Porridge, which we ended up having two pots of them!
Ginger and Onion Frog.
Sweet & Sour Prawn.
Claypot Tofu.
Fried Kung Fu Mee.
Well, honestly speaking, I find the frog porridge nice, but not really fantastic. If you ask me to choose, I'll probably tell you the Lor9 Frog Porridge I had in KL is actually better. The Sweet & Sour Prawn was unexpectedly my favourite of the night whereas the Claypot Tofu and the Fried Kung Fu Mee were just really so-so.

Cool Ice-Cream @ Raffles Creamery
Like I said in my earlier post, my trip to Singapore was all about visiting hotels. So I actually had my first meal at a Japanese restaurant in a hotel which was not really impressing at all. And nobody from those hotels actually offer to buy us even coffee or tea during our visits! So I think it is pretty true that my colleague commented that Singaporeans are a little stingy in that case! In fact, come to think of it, they didn't even offer us some plain water! WTH!
When I was at Raffles Hotel, I couldn't resist but to dig my own pocket to try the very famous ice-cream. And my apologize, I couldn't remember how much that scoop of ice-cream cost me already...
Now the ice-cream here is pretty unique. You choose your flavour, they will get a scoop of ice-cream then sort of 'fry' the ice-cream like teppanyaki with some shaved ice. And then if you want your topping to be crushed together like me, they will add that in for you. That boy teppanyaki-ing my New York Cheese ice cream...
My New York Cheese flavoured ice-cream with Oreo and chocolate sauce was just plain YUMMEEEYYYY~~~!!!Okay... You don't need to remind me how fattening it is! Arrrhhh...

Dinner with 'The Gang' @ The Mushroom Pot, Singapore Indoor Stadium
Now, if you know me well, you will know I'm a 100% mushroom lover. So when XT told me about this Mushroom steamboat buffet I got really excited. The buffet deal to me, is pretty good. It's about S$27 per person if I'm not mistaken (many thanks to Kelvin, who paid for me, that's why I can't remember how much it is) for the steamboat where we can choose 5 side dishes and order whatever you want and however much you want from the menu for your steamboat.
Looks like XT and Kelvin are our Papa and Mama, isn't it?
Okay, don't get me wrong... That doesn't mean all stuff you have there are just mushrooms! It's just that their specialty is the mushrooms boiled soup base! I wouldn't say the soup is super yummy, but it was refreshing! Very sweet and a little pepperish, tasted very healthy and soothing that makes you easily addicted to it. It is definitely better than those random soup base you get from those random steamboat outside! :)The mushroom soup and the spicy soup steamboat we had.
I also love some of their side dishes in which some of them are made of mushrooms as well! Very interesting scallop dish.
Ohh... I love the Calamari and the Wasabi dip! Nicey~!
The Deep Fried Mushroom salad that doesn't taste like mushroom at all!
Some mushroom spring rolls kinda stuff was good too, just a little oily.
Because I didn't take beef, pork or lamb and I dislike those fish balls, pork balls or whatever balls, with the soothing mushroom soup, I actually felt really healthy without much guilt after having the mushroom steamboat buffet! :)

And last but not least...I envy Singaporeans for having low fat chocolate milk and papaya milk in their 7-11! Aaarrrhhh... Malaysian 7-11 are SO BORING!!!
And their Burger King has loads of coffee choices like Mocha, Latte and stuff. And they even have Espresso flavoured Sundae! SO UNFAIR!!!

Well, overall, the 'work' part of the trip was half fun and half not up to expectation. But the 'catching-up with friends' and 'food' part was awesome! I especially appreciate the long and detailed chat at the airport with KK and YY! I can't even remember when was the last time we had such cool chat where we share loads of secrets of our lives like that! If only I'm also working in Singapore, I'm sure I'll be happier hanging out with them sharing stories more often! I mean, with them all in Singapore, I don't really have close friends left in KL, how sad?! :(

Ah well, life must go on. Let's pray that I can handle all my work coming up next week!

Cute Lunch @ Ma Maison, The Central, Singapore

Despite its smaller size, Singapore is actually a small island with loads of nice food. And according to my observation, it's very Japanese. Try walking into a shopping mall, you will find whole stretch of Japanese restaurants, be it fine-dining or fast food! Even my first meal as I arrived in Singapore was a Japanese meal in a hotel!
Needless to say, I also went on to Orchard Road to search for one of mu favourites, MOS Burger and ended up noming my Kakiage Rice Burger happily alone at the fast food chain which I've always hope to see opening in Malaysia. OMG I can still remember the smell of my Kakiage Rice Burger!!!
Aaaahhhh~~~ I'm satisfied~!

Before I left Singapore, XT and KK (and YY joined us later) came to have lunch with me. As we were walking aimlessly near Clark Quay and The Central Shopping Centre, I picked Ma Maison to try because 'Japanese Western Food' sounds pretty cool to me!I absolutely love the deco of the tiny restaurant! It's like this old school American-styled deco with flowerish table cloths and pots and pans hanging around! Damn cute lor!Pretty cute and cool deco makes the restaurant so much more attractive!
Great opportunity for us, the posers to camwhore~! Yay~!
They have like a lunch time menu, which is just a one-page thingy with about 10 set lunches for you to choose from. Well that really left us with very limited choices really. We were like huh? Is that all???
In the end, of course each of us chose different sets so that we can taste each others' food...The one-page-only menu.
Here you go...The Meal of the Day with some chicken with some sweet and sour sauce or something with some olio and potato salad.
XT had the Tomato Rice with Omelet with Brown Sauce.
KK's Beef Stronganoff with Omelet over Rice.
And all sets comes with a drink, soup and salad too! It was Clam Chowder with bits of Bacon in it! Yumzzz~~~
A very colourful bowl of fresh salad.
And bread for us to share too!
We topped our lunch up with a Chocolate Brownie with Ice-cream!
I think the food were reasonably good. My don't-know-what chicken with Spaghetti was the best of all three I guess. I especially love the gravy of the chicken and the potato salad was yummey~! I didn't try KK's Beef Stroganoff but XT's Tomato Rice with Omelet was to me, pretty nice too! Hmmm... But isn't it very easy to make it at home? But I wish I could make omelet as nice as theirs! KK was right about their chocolate brownie, it was just too soft a brownie.
And I realized Japanese Western Food is actually quite a good idea! Perhaps I can try some cooking similar to this at home! Ah... Remember my Japanese Curry Chicken with Spaghetti??? :)
With the cool deco, a river view, cute and quality food at reasonable price (I mean, my set was just $12.90 ler), plus getting served by a real tiny typical Japanese-looking Manager, Ma Maison is under the 'worth another visit' category of mine.

P/S: Work is still EXTREMELY CRAZY. Let's hope that I really get to have a short break after all these havoc! :S