KL & Malacca Malaysia 17/09 – 19/09/2010 Day 2

Blessings Homestay interior

Upon checking out from Blessings Homestay at 0820 hrs, we headed for Sri Petaling area where we had breakfast.

We decided to have dim sum food for breakfast and went to Pan Ki Dim Sum. The food was not too bad and the char siew pao (barbeque pork bun) was quite good.

Dim Sum food

More varieties of dim sum food

Stomach satisfaction

Yummy buns

Next stop was AA Pharmacy where we managed to buy some medication. We then met our friend, Michael, again and he brought us to Lembah Azwen Resort in Kajang area to check out the venue for our future events.

Lembah Azwen Resort Malaysia

A nice and secluded area out of the city with lots of greenery, this place offers training facilities as well as team building facilities and is mainly used for groups.

We then made our way to Malacca and arrived at our Malaysia Malacca accommodation, Arenaa De Luxe Hotel, at 1630 hrs.

Arenaa Hotel Lobby - celebrating Hari Raya

Hari Raya decoration at entrance door of Arenaa

After checking in, we quickly made our way to Topic at Melaka Raya where we had made our reservations for 90minutes Chinese massage for 1700 hrs.

Chinese Massage Centre

All four of us had the same massage, but somehow, three had the hot stone massage and one did not. Upon checking with them at the end of the session, they mentioned that we could ask for the hot stone if we had wanted it. We realized that the service was not very consistent and a few of the masseuse were not too experienced.

At RM79 for 90 minutes of massage, the price was slightly higher than a few other outlets along the same stretch of road. At the same time, most of the masseuse were from China and could not speak English, which makes it difficult if one is not able to speak Chinese. Also they have a habit of asking you if you want any extra services, such as the ‘kua sa’ (Chinese scraping), cupping, etc… For aromatherapy oil, add RM15.

Holiday travel tips:-

If you are intending to try the massage at Topic Healthcare Centre, be prepared for upsell of services.

After the massage, we went back to Arenaa De Luxe Hotel to meet our friend Edwin for dinner. We proceeded to Amy Heritage Nyonya Cuisine Restaurant, a wonderful place for authentic Nonya food where, as usual, we enjoyed the great attention to detail that Amy, the chef and owner, puts into her cooking. Costing RM102 (USD32.80) for the five of us, it was really worth the price we paid. If you are intending to visit Amy and enjoy her labour of love, do call to make your reservations first.

Our dishes... yummy yummy

Anticipating our delicious nyonya food for dinner

After dinner, Edwin wanted to let us try some nonya satay. However, the shop was closed. Instead we ended up at Sunday Ice Café where we tried the laksa and the Nonya ice desserts. A nice and refreshing end to our day!

Nyonya ice desserts

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Malaysia Kuala Lumpur And Malacca 25/8 – 29/8/2010 Day 4

Arenaa De Luxe Hotel cafe area

Our fourth day into this Malaysia vacation, we met our new friend, Lucy, in the lobby of Arenaa De Luxe hotel, a beautifully furnished Malacca boutique hotel at 0900 hrs for breakfast.

This morning, we decided to have dim sum for breakfast at Low Yong Moh Restaurant near Jonker Street. Heading to Jalan Tukang Emas, we stopped by the dim sum shop directly opposite the mosque.

Open from 0600 hrs, this place can be packed and finding a table to sit at may be a challenge. As such, be prepared to wait for a table before you can sit down and enjoy the great tasting breakfast dim sum.

Low Yong Moh Dim Sum Restaurant - packed at 0930 hrs

Order from the many varieties of dim sum available. Most will make your mouth water and salivate as not only do they look nice and dainty, they also taste super yummy. It was a wonderful breakfast and cost RM54 (USD17.40) for the five of us which is a very reasonable price for breakfast dim sum.

After a slow and most enjoyable dim sum breakfast, we returned to the hotel before making our way back up north to Kuala Lumpur once again for a warrior gathering organized by Success Resources. It took us about 2 hours to drive from Malacca to Cititel Hotel in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia.

Richard Tan of Success Resources addressing the group at the warrior gathering

We had a wonderful time connecting with other warriors and non-warriors though the turnout was small. However even with the poor turnout, we managed to make some awesome connections as well as re-connections.

Cultural demonstration at MidValley Megamall

After spending the whole afternoon at the warrior gathering, we spent a little time walking and shopping in MidValley Megamall before heading to Seremban for the special authentic marmite crabs.

At Seremban Seafood Village, we ordered 2 large crabs, sambal kangkong (water spinach fried with chilli), sambal sotong (cuttlefish fried with chilli) and pork ribs. Needless to say, we enjoyed the food here once again and it was a great dinner. Moreover, it set us back by RM122 which is a reasonable price considering we had 2 large crabs.

Seremban Seafood Village - well known for its marmite crab

Taking our time to savour our crab dinner, we then drove back to our Malacca boutique hotel, Arenaa De Luxe Hotel, where we stayed another night.




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Malaysia Kuala Lumpur And Malacca 25/8 – 29/8/2010 Day 3

Malaysia homestay

This morning, the 3rd day of our Malaysia Kuala Lumpur trip, we went to have a tour of Blessings Homestay, a great and cozy Malaysia homestay accommodation with a truly Malaysian feel.

After saying our goodbyes soon after 0900 hrs, we made our way to Klang which is famous for their bak kut teh (pork bone soup). We tried the one just below the bridge, also popularly known as Klang Bak Kut Teh (under the bridge) at co-ordinates:- N3 02.612 E101 26.895 which we found to be quite tasty and fragrant. At RM42 (USD13.53) for the three of us, it does not come cheap.

Klang bak kut teh

Yummy bak kut teh

We started our drive to Malacca at 1040 hrs. However we had a hard time getting out of Klang even with the aid of the Garmin global positioning system as the roads have been changed and our map was not fully updated.

We finally started our journey to Malacca at 1100 hrs. Taking a slow and easy drive, we stopped by Ayer Keroh petrol station to fill up the gas tank before exiting at Ayer Keroh.

Before going into Malacca, we stopped by a few hotels for site inspection to see if we could use the venues for our upcoming "The Opening" event in Nov:- Puteri Resort, Ayer Keroh Country Resort and D’Village Hotel.

Puteri Resort pool

Kampung (village) house

Meeting up with Maria from Puteri Resort

Ayer Keroh Resort - beautiful flowers welcome you

Ayer Keroh Resort room

Ayer Keroh Resort surroundings

D'Village Resort room

D'Village Resort hotel

D'Village Resort chalets

After the site inspections which took a total of 2 ½ hours, we made our way to a Malacca boutique hotel, Arenaa DeLuxe Hotel in Ujong Pasir. Having stayed in Arenaa once before, we love the place for its beautiful furnishing and thus booked this boutique hotel once again.

Arenaa DeLuxe hotel lobby - classy looking

Arenaa DeLuxe Hotel - lovely furnishings

Arenaa DeLuxe Hotel - where black and red meets

Upon arriving at Arenaa De Luxe Hotel in Malacca, we took a rest whilst waiting for hubby to join us in the hotel. Dinner was with our Malaccan friend, Edwin, back at Delicious Home Taste Restaurant where we enjoyed the food before and made it a point to go back there to savour the delicious food once again.

Delicious Home Taste Restaurant

Dinner was great as usual and we had a great time connecting with Edwin once again and sharing ideas.

We returned to Arenaa De Luxe hotel and enjoyed the lovely furnishings in the lobby whilst chatting with Edwin further and discussing places of interest in Malacca as well as yummy food joints.

After talking for some time, a friend of Edwin returned to the hotel and Edwin introduced Lucy to us. We ended up going for Satay Celup (steamboat satay) supper with Lucy at Ban Lee Siang @ Jalan Ong Kim Wee. This is an interesting concept where you select your food on skewers from the refrigerator and dip into hot peanut sauce to cook.

Eagerly waiting for our food to be cooked at Ban Lee Siang Satay Celup

Another popoular Satay Celup shop is at Capitol Restaurant located along Bukit China. However, be prepared to queue as the seating capacity is smaller than Ban Lee Siang Satay Celup.

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Genting Highlands, KL & Malacca 4th July – 7th July 2010 Day 3

This morning, we checked out of First World Hotel at 1000 hrs before heading to Theme Park Hotel to pick up our friends and made our way to Kuala Lumpur. It took us approximately an hour to reach Sri Petaling area where we met our friend or ours, Gina, at Secret Recipes. We introduced Gina to Lionel and Lisa and had a good chat about what each and every person are doing and how we could help each other especially in the area of The Opening, an awakening enlightenment meditation retreat that we would be holding in November 2010.

Drinks at Secret Recipe

Meeting up with our friend Gina

Next was shopping at AA Pharmacy next door, a shop which had become our most popular shopping destination whenever we come into Malaysia due to the friendly staff as well as the great prices.

After paying for our purchases at AA Pharmacy, we made our way to Bandar Mahkota Cheras where we headed to Kafe Passion to have our lunch and met up with old friends of ours, Fong and Jacey. We were all pretty hungry as it was already almost 1600 hrs. Maybe that was why we found the food absolutely great tasting!

Great tasting Malaysian food at Kafe Passion

Great food at reasonable prices

Snow Ice for dessert

Mango flavour snow ice

We left Kafe Passion in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia just before 1800 hrs and made our way to Malacca where we would be staying for one night before making our way home to Singapore.

We had arranged with another friend of ours, Edwin Wong, to make a reservation at the Arenaa De Luxe Hotel where he was helping to manage. Located at Jalan Ujong Pasir, we managed to locate the hotel without much difficulties with the help of the Garmin global positioning system. By the time we checked into the family room, it was almost 2000 hrs.

As we refreshed a little in the room, we waited for Edwin to call us as he had arranged dinner for us. Meanwhile we were admiring the décor of this boutique hotel and taking lots of pictures.

Chair with 'bright red lips'

Edwin called us before 2100 hrs and he drove us to a little shop just five minutes away in Jalan SP 3, Taman Semabok Perdana, known as “Delicious Home Taste Restaurant”. The food was truly delicious and not oily at all. If you wish to enjoy home-cooked style Malaysian food, this is the place to go to.

Delicious Home Taste Restaurant for great tasting Malaysian food

A husband and wife team manages this restaurant where the husband is the chef in the kitchen and Susan, the wife, takes the orders and settles the bills. As the husband is the only one in the kitchen, they are not able to handle too many customers at the same time. This is definitely a restaurant worth trying. Take note that they are closed on Wednesdays.

Holiday Travel Tips:-
If you wish to enjoy the wonderfully delicious home-cooked style Malaysian food here in Malacca, it is best to call Susan Loke at 012-6389488 to place your orders before visiting the restaurant so that you will not be disappointed at being turned away. Or else, expect to wait a minimum of thirty to sixty minutes for your food if you are patient enough.

Clear & tasty soup

Well-fried egg omelette

Some vegetables

Belly pork with buns

Wrap the pork in the buns for a great dish

Beancurd dish

More vegetables

Susan, checking to see that all is satisfactory

Not only did we enjoy our sumptuous dinner, we also had a great time catching up with Edwin and discussing more on how he can promote Arenaa De Luxe Hotel.

Edwin then drove us around Malacca showing us the various Malacca Malaysia attractions as well as places of interest to the food connoisseur. As Edwin is a trueborn Malaccan, he was able to point out the best places for food here in his hometown. Alas, most of the places happened to be closed already by the time we reached, thus we did not have the chance to try out any further Malaysian food that night.

We did however make our way to the Jetty next to Holiday Inn Hotel and explored the area. It was interesting to walk along the approximately half a kilometer long structure that extends far into the Straits of Malacca. Abandoned shortly after it was built more than 10 years ago due to the shallow seabed, the Jetty now houses various food outlets such as Casa Dessert, Bali Café, Satay Celup Jeti, Straits Restaurant and others.

You can even enjoy a soothing foot reflexology or massage at El-Care along the Jetty. Or sing your lungs out at the GoGo KTV Box Family Karaoke. Or just sit at the outdoor pub area accessible via GoGo KTV, enjoy the music and the panoramic views of the sea as well as the sea breeze.

The Jetty

Foot Reflexology

View of the jetty

The unique pub in 'deep waters'

We ended our visit to the Jetty with some dessert at Casa Dessert Café by the entrance of the Jetty before we made our way back to Arenaa De Luxe Hotel where we were brought on a tour of this beautifully decorated boutique hotel. A lot of detail had gone into each and every corner of the hotel with plush furnishings, voile and velvet fabrics, and modern French inspired design.

Chatting away

Desserts:- herbal jelly, chendol and almond beancurd

The Presidential suite was simply fantastic! The red and black colour scheme with the soft inviting surfaces caused us to fall in love with the whole hotel. Each of the 82 rooms has its private balcony and high speed broadband internet. You simply must try this hotel when you are in Malacca. This is simply one of the lovingly furnished hotels Malacca has that I have personally seen and enjoyed.

Arenaa DeLuxe Hotel, Malacca

Arenaa Hotel Lobby area

Invitingly plush sofa to relax

For more pictures and information on Arenaa De Luxe Hotel, visit Arenaa De Luxe Hotel, Malacca Malaysia.

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