I seen you before

We see this everywhere and it seem to increase during ramadan, a month where everybody is trying to do good or pretend to do good. See this makcik in blue tudung. Her leathery skin from staying in the sun for too long and her sad expression of what had happened in the past. Those who had a heart would drop a ringgit or two to help this poor lady. I was just wondering, how did the makcik get to this bank in Kajang town. This is because I saw her last Friday at UPM mosque begging for spare change. Did she drove here, ride a bicycle, took the bus, take the taxi or did someone or a group to took her here in front of the bank. I heard of this syndicated beggars where they go in groups or travel to hotspot places to beg, but this is the first time I saw it with my own eyes. I usually don't give them money unless they are doing something, like singing or selling something or if they are really2 handicapped. No, not those who maintained an open wound to beg but really handicapped. I saw a lady once when I was in Form 5 at Keramat, she had no neck, just her face and torso connected with one eye on the side and a small mouth. She was singing a song while sitting down at the local pasar malam. People actually stopped in their tracks when they saw her, including myself. Hmm.. things you see around you...

Natural?

Its that time again to dye my hair. No longer red, blond, purple or brown. I am kinda sick of the color and the stares, good or bad. Its time to be "natural".

Back to basic black. Easier to take care, maintain and those who don't read this blog will not know.

Vivi's New Clothes

Even on Raya, my Vivi has gotten new clothes. Here is the hood insulator to protect the bonnet from heat and suppresses the engine noise a bit. My mother said when my Viva is revving it sounded like a lorry.

Here they are installing the leather seat cover.

The finished product, leather seats that wont trapped dust and easy to wipe off and clean.

This arm rest is nice, although it covered the rear cupholders :(. Nevermind this is the theme of my car from now on. Red, black and grey.

New clothes, New hair, New Month

Its time to shop for raya clothes. I still be using last year Baju Melayu. So I need to buy just jalan2 clothes. My sister complain I only buy cheap clothes. Cheap as in under RM 50. She saids it just looks bad :( Hey I don't have that much cash in hand to get stylish stuff so I get anything that is comfy and on sale. So my family decided to pay for it, for something expensive and good quality and cut they say. Nautica had a sale off, so we decided to get some. I found out I know could get smaller size clothes, which fits my body prefectly.
This is great news, no longer I need to asked if this comes in a larger size :D.

I could fit into most XL now instead of XXL, even some L sizes such as this shirt, fits me perfectly. Lucky for my broad shoulders, my stomach does not protrude out as much. But the I have been losing some weight lately :). I can't wait to loose more and get more clothes :D

New hair cut is also in check for raya. I decided to go really really short without going bald or going skin head.

Also I ask the mamak to shave off all the so called facial hair I have and just leave my trademark side burn to my ear length. New hair, new clothes, and new life perhaps after this..

Santini Buffet

On Saturday, was my family and I had our berbuka at Santini KLCC. The buffet was reasonable at RM 39 per person.

I started out with a salad, with Samosa and Ayam Limau Purut

Then continue with Jambu Madu, langsat and a piece of cheese cake.

My younger brother and sister ordered this fries, twisty potatoes and wedges set with a delicious dip on the side.

I continue on with more desserts of Marble cake, bread pudding, chocolate cake and more cheese cake.

We ordered a basket of garlic bread, which was so good :)

I then took some pasta salad, beef rendang, chicken kerabu, sambal paru and more chocalate cake. Its was definitely very satisfying for all of us. What to do after a full stomach at KLCC? Shopping of course :D

Kuih Raya

Its time to bake Kuih Raya or Raya biscuits. My mother sent me to the near by supermarket to get some ingredients. She told me Tesco ran out of Buttercup butter so she told me to go to Econsave. I haven't been to Econsave for a long time, since Tesco Kajang open. I forgot why I like Econsave is that the store is small, but it has everything and sometimes its a lot cheaper.

They ran out of Buttercup butter and left only FarmCows. The reason Buttercup butter ran out so fast is because its rather cheap, about RM 2.65 per bar than Fernleaf butter which cost almost RM 5. The main reason for this is that Fernleaf is 100% butter while FarmCows and Buttercup are butter blended with vegetable fat (margarine).

Today we are making Kuih Gunting, one of my mother's favourite Kuih Raya. My sister helps with cutting the dough into small strips using scissors (gunting = scissors in malay).

My older sister will fry the dough into golden brown goodness.

Voila, Kuih Gunting ready to be eaten after berbuka.

Next, we have Kuih Siput (Shell biscuit), another of my mother's favourite Raya biscuits

These shell shape biscuits are also deep fried to perfection

I always seen my mom rolling the dough on the special tool to make the shell shape, but in the past I seem to not be able to do it, until today. At first my Siput end up looking like a caterpillar (ulat bulu) but as I gotten the hang of it, even my mother complimented that my Siput is turning up very well :D. Well next Kuih Raya will be Cornflakes and Semperit. Yum!!

A New "Baby"

Yup a new baby had arrived at our home 2 days ago. It was my dad's reward for working so hard overseas for a few years already. A new car was something he wanted for a long time.

What better car for him, then a brand new Honda Accord.

This is an executive car. In America, its considered as a large car. For Americans, who we know likes everything super sized and pick up's are still the best selling vehicles there, when they say the Honda Accord is a large car, it is really a large car. It has the same length and width of a Naza Ria, our family MPV. So you can imagine how big this car really is.

My dad, opted for the mid range version of the Accord. The 2.4 liter i-VTEC. The Accord comes in 2.0 and 2.4, in line 4 cylinder engine, while the mammoth 3.5 is a V6 engine. Basically i-VTEC is a mechanism that allows the engine to work efficiently at any speed. It can be really fuel efficient when cruising or when travelling at lower speeds or give that extra boost of power when you stepped on the accelerator pedal. He is loving this car because its pack full with gadgets such as paddle shifts like those on the F1 cars, in dash 6 dish changer, electronic stability control, and auto cruise to name a few. He has been driving this car everywhere since he will have to go back to overseas for his work. I teased him a lot that for the first 1000km, my Viva can go a lot faster than his Accord, because my engine has been run in already. It ticked him off that I said while I can go 140km in my car and out run him when we go back to kampung. He snapped back and said small cars should not travel fast, or it will fly off the highway when a lorry passes you by. Gee, he must be really pissed, I mean a lorry that chases my car at 140km, I think his Accord will also fly off too. Well its my fault for testing his ego.. Muehehehehe... Who cares I will be driving the Accord, once a week after he fly off. Cars need to travel longer than the a trip to the kedai runcit or problems will occur (at least that is what I heard, who cares, that is a reason to drive his car :D). Well we will take two cars instead of one MPV to kampung this year. My dad wants to show off his new cars, and my relatives want to see my Viva.

Permanis Factory Sale

Permanis, the company that produces Pepsi, Mirinda, 7 up and other soft drinks had its anual factory sale for Raya.
You can get fantastic deals here. 1 dozen of 1.5 liter soft drinks is RM 24 and RM 27 depending on the brand.

You just go to one of the representative and fill up the order form of the drinks you wants.

Line up among the crowds and stacks of drinks and then pay at the counter.

Stacks of drinks just waiting to be consume. I wanted to buy Frost Root Beer but they were sold out. After getting the receipt, you can either wait for them to take the drinks for you or do like we did we just took charge and take them ourselves.

After collecting all our drinks, I go take my car, show them the receipt and wait in line to load our stuff in

We then load our stuff in my Naza Ria and make sure we our drinks that we bought is enough

Muahaha half of a Naza full of drinks.. :D. I only bought 6 cartons, the rest of it are the ones that my friends bought. Raya this year will be a cinch since we don't have to contently keep making more drinks for the guest.

Buka Puasa at Alamanda

Yesterday, Amad and I had our berbuka puasa at Alamanda. He never tried this place before.

Manhantan Fish Market. I ate here (but not in Alamanda) a few times before and I like it.

They had a special buka puasa promotion, that we both like it. A set, with rose soya bean, kurma, starter and dessert. Yum!

We sat outside because Amad smokes. (Ms Jay would scream at Amad, "I need neck".. I am stenching my neck to show it.. it shows the jaw line and makes you less chubbier in the face :p, oh wait I did loose some :p.. don't matter if people can't see it, my pants, scale and mirror can :D)

This the lovely starter clams or whatever you called in a cheese sauce.. YUM!!! it goes well with bread.

We had the set where there is butter and herb rice, fries, flame prawns and deep fried (fish, squid and oyster).

For dessert we had tiramisu. YUM!! so good.

I just had to have ice cream after that, Baskin Robbin that is, in a chocolate waffle covered cup :D. There was two scoops of ice cream, one was Very Berry Strawberry and the other one was Mint Chocolate Chip.

So good, that you just have to finished off the whole cone :D

Budlee looses his mind.. again

Why is my face is powdery and dry

Gaaa!!! Its drying up..

I'm cracking, cracking, owh what a world what a world what a cruel world

*one must suffer for flawless skin. Pimples sprouted up here and there so its time to take evasive action. One must suffer for vanity :D.. BTW I was bored while doing this, it does not hurt one bit, but it made my skin less oily the next morning.