The Daily Grind @ Bangsar Village

Went to Bangsar Village today, my occasional hangout on Friday lunchtime. I would have lunch here, than proceed to the mosque next door for friday prayers and then walk around the shops for a bit.

I noticed a new place on the lower ground level of Bangsar Village (old wing) today, The Daily Grind. Claiming to be a "Gourmet Burger Diner, my interest was piqued. It was rather empty at 12.45pm so I'd thought I'd give it a try.

The menu looked interesting - a whole range of beef burgers AND chicken burgers. I try to avoid beef as much as I can as I have a medical condition that is not red-meat-friendly. Still, as I love burgers, I do occasionally say "what the heck" to my diet and have my occasional jumbo burger at Carl's Jr.

Coming back to The Daily Grind, as I walked in, I was ushered to a nice table in one quiet corner of the diner. Going through the menu, I discovered that there was a salmon burger which contains a salmon patty made from FRESH salmon! It sounded interesting, so I ordered it.

The salmon burger came with a buttered and toasted bun, lettuce, red cabbage, cream cheese, and jalapeno peppers. The order included a pretty large bowl of fries.

How was the burger? Well, let's just say that it tasted as nice as a salmon burger could. Fish in general lack the rich flavour of beef so it was a bit bland and the jalapeno and cream cheese did not raise the flavour-factor one bit. The result taste-wise was only so-so. Well, that didn't stop me from finishing the whole burger!
Service was kind of slow - I was practically the only customer for a while but they took about 20 minutes to serve my burger (OK it's a GOURMET burger diner, not some fast food joint! Jeez, what was I thinking?! Yea, right!).

Maybe I'll go back to try the other items on their menu someday.

At the moment, still in love with Carl's Jr Portobello Mushroom, Guacomole & Chilli Cheese Burgers! Currently, in my opinion, the BEST burgers in the whole wide world! Carl's Jr RAWKS!!

Read about my 2nd visit to The Daily Grind here.

Ciao!

Amir Fuad.

Christmas in Putrajaya & Kuala Lumpur

Christmas day is also my brother-in-law Iskandar and my niece Camellia's birthday. Camellia's elder brother Faris' birthday is in January. Their mother decided to have a triple birthday party at the Putrajaya Lake Club's Kafe Putra at around 4pm. June & Iskandar's family and friends attended the function.


Dayana, Jasmin, Dahlia, Faris & Hilman,

June & Rayyan.

Hilman & Joe.

Julina, Rayyan & Hilman.

Faris, Iskandar & Camellia cutting & blowing the cake.

At about 5.45pm, we excused ourselves as we had a barbeque to go to at my sister, Lela's place in Kuala Lumpur. As we drove from Putrajaya to KL via the Sungei Besi Highway, it started raining and it got progressively heavier throughout the journey. Anyways, we arrived at about 6.25pm. Managed to help with some barbeque-ing. Besides the usual suspects (my siblings, spouses & kids) there was also my uncle from Singapore, Pak Umar, my cousin Lin from Gombak & my cousin Liza from USJ.

We ate out in the garden. As the rain had already stopped when we started to makan, it was quite cool outside. Surprising, there were no mosquitoes too!

Spiderman Adam with his mouth wide open.

Pak Umar, Arif, Mansor & Dayana.

Ikan pari bakar (barbequed stingray).

Satay.

Doughnuts and cinnamon rolls courtesy of Liza.

Went home at about 10.45pm. Very tired....yawn!

I am working tomorrow (darn!).

Ciao!

Amir Fuad.

My blog...in Arabic

While going through MyBlogLog statistics, I noticed a particular referral from google that linked to this blog. This is was what I found when I clicked on it.

As you can see in the picture, what I saw was an "automatic translation" of a page in my blog into Arabic, probably viewed by someone who speaks Arabic.

Having used the automatic translation feature from other languages into English when viewing non-English or non-Malay/Indonesian webpages, the translations, being automatic are never grammatically correct and I'm sure the Arabic grammar here is not 100% correct either.

Still, it's cool and a little surreal seeing my blog in Arabic or any other foreign language for that matter.

Ciao!

Amir Fuad.

3 Days & 2 Nights @ Avillion Port Dickson

Hilman, Dayana & I at the family pool on our last day there.

Just came back from a 3-day 2-night vacation at Avillion Port Dickson. It was one of the best family vacations we ever had. We stayed at the hotel for a the entire 3 days & 2 nights without even one single quick trip into Port Dickson town for meals or anything else. Initially I wanted to book one of the water chalets over the sea but alas they were "fully booked". So I settled for a "Beach Studio", the 2nd cheapest room available but it wasn't too bad at all. It was just nice for my family. There is a master bedroom (with a king-sized bed) with an en-suite bath and in the adjacent main area there is a toilet(no shower), small dining table, a planter's chair, a coffee table TV and a daybed - where my 9-year old daughter Dayana slept.

Judging by the cars that were parked there the guests were mostly Malaysian and Singaporean families with one group from a company gathering.

The part of the living room in front of the TV by the almost full-height windows. Note the daybed and the very, very comfortable planter's chair.

This is what you see when you open the room door, slightly beyond the toilet. Note the console table with small dining table. The dining table made it more comfortable for us when enjoying our "in-room dining" the first night we arrived. I ordered the chicken sandwich, Julina had the Beef Burger while Dayana had the spaghetti Bolognaise (shared with Hilman). The food was really good!

The view from the master bedroom window - the water chalets.

The outdoor seating at the Crow's Nest restaurant where we had our lunch on the 2nd day we were there. The food is quite good although it is a tad pricey. I had the Nasi Goreng kampung (nice), Julina had the Hainanese Chicken Rice (shared with Hilman) and Dayana had the spaghetti Bolognaise (again!). The food was again quite lovely.

The water chalets as seen from the "Riau" beach area. At the Riau beach, guests can indulge in water sports (kayaking, boating, jet-skiing, etc.) There was also a "December carnival" going on where guests can participate in activities such as darts, face painting, batik painting, sandcastle making, etc.

The corridor leading from the main block to the restaurants. I like the water feature placed on both sides of this corridor. Nice!

Hilman in the "Kids' Cabin" playroom. Lots of toys and brick games for toddlers and pre-schoolers. For the older children, there are 4 PlayStation 2 sets. There is also a TV with videos for the children to watch. Baby-sitting services are also available for kids age 4 - 12 years. Just outside this playroom, there is also a small playground.

After checking in and resting for a bit, this is what we did. We went to the beach and made sandcastles. Dayana & I made one each but Dayana destroyed hers before I could take a photo of it.

Anyways, here is my masterpiece.

Not wanting to be left out, Julina made this one the next day.

Dayana at the "Riau beach" collecting seashells.

After making sandcastles, we then went to the pool. Dayana & Hilman had a wonderful time playing in the pool. Here's Dayana going down the slide.

Hilman, my 2-year-old daredevil son, would walk all the way to the top on his own and even go down the slide all by himself unaided. There were actually other kids there older than him who were too scared to use the slide! Way to go, Hilman!

On the 2nd day after lunch and a short nap we decided to do some karaoke! So we proceeded to the Jungle Fringe Karaoke Bar. The room rental is pretty reasonable (RM 50.00++ per hour) although the beverages/snacks came with the usual expensive hotel-style prices. Song selection is a tad limited but we managed to have lots of fun! We sang "Uptown girl" by Westlife THREE times and Spice Girls' "Wannabe" TWICE! I did a P Ramlee & Saloma number (doing BOTH P Ramlee AND Saloma's parts), "Sedangkan Lidah Lagi Tergigit" and I must say I did a pretty awesome Saloma voice! Hilman can't read the lyrics off the screen but somehow managed to make his own contribution to the numbers that we belted.

The "Temasek beach" at dusk. While walking here we actually saw a couple posing for wedding photos.

Dayana at the "Temasek beach" area.

Another view of Temasek beach at dusk.

We went through their "Nature Walk" which included things like an mini zoo, a spice garden, a replica of a traditional Malay bullock cart and a small aviary. Nice and educational for families with small kids. Here is Julina and Dayana sitting on a replica of a bench commonly found in old railway stations throughout Malaya.

Hilman (holding the toy garden fork), Julina & Dayana posing with the bullock cart. Once Hilman got into the cart he refused to leave and we had to practically drag him out of there.

The bird feeding platform - part of the Nature Walk. Good for bird watchers I guess. Apparently there are about 50 species of birds that can be spotted within the hotel premises.

The mini zoo or "Pet Farm" as they call it. There are feed a pet,touch a pet and other "a pet" activities that kids will enjoy.

The white birds. What are these birds called? I don't know! Who cares, anyway??

Chickens, rabbits & tortoises.

Rabbits- which my son, Hilman tried to coax by calling out, "meow, meow, meow!". Poor sod, he thinks that these creatures are cats!

I'm ignoring you because you are calling out "meow, meow" to me. I am a rabbit, you twit!

Some kind of bird.

I really love chickens. Especially when they are fried or roasted.

This is me in the family pool.

More swimming on the last day before checking out! There are three pools for you to indulge in. One is a children-only pool with a slide (adults are allowed to be in to supervise the kids but not allowed to use the slide), the other is a family pool for adults AND children and thirdly an adults-only pool. The adults-only ("Cochin Pool) pool is quite nice. It is quiet, lots of privacy, no noisy kids splashing about and 25 meters in length so the more serious swimmers can do laps in peace.

As I have said earlier, we really enjoyed our stay here. The room was lovely, the food great and the service was also very good. The staff were friendly, attentive and prompt in meeting our requests. This is a nice place especially for families with small kids as there are a lot of family-friendly facilities. There a lot of things which I did not manage to check out, e.g. the gymnasium, spa, steam/sauna room, water sports activities, etc but then again I did not have the time.

A slight drawback is parking. Parking is free BUT parking within the hotel premises is limited. There is parking across the road for guests, also free, except that you will need to cross a busy road to park your car. But since we stayed in the hotel the entire time, I only needed to get to my car once (to go back) after parking in the car park across the road.

That's all! Ciao!

Amir Fuad.

The AirAsia Story

Who isn't interested in the AirAsia story? It is the ultimate Malaysian dream! A guy buys over a financially ailing airline undergoing a management crisis for RM 1.00 and transforms it into the most successful low cost carrier in Asia within a period of less than 5 years. A period which also saw the airline industry suffering the after-effects of the Asian economic crisis, 9/11, SARS, terrorist attacks in the region and escalating fuel costs.

This book by business strategist, Sen Ze and business journalist, Jayne Ng draws the history of the airline from its inception, business strategies, the obstacles in its path to achieving its current success and its future plans. There is a disclaimer stating that "This book is not created, authorised or endorsed by Air Asia Bhd" so this book is very much an outsiders' opinion.


A man, fuelled by his passion for aircraft and flying, Dato' Tony Fernandes left a promising career in the music industry to set up a low cost airline based on similar business models in USA (Southwest Airlines) & Europe (Ryanair & easyJet). AirAsia was then transformed from a domestic carrier - a sort of a 2nd national airline to Malaysia's first low cost carrier. Others in the region have set up their own budget airlines after AirAsia's success but they are nowhere near in duplicating AirAsia's results.

This book also delves into the mind of Dato' Tony Fernandes and how he views the airline industry. It gives the reader the insight into the love-hate relationships he had with the Malaysian government, Malaysia Airlines (MAS) and the Singapore government in his bid to continuously expand AirAsia's business. Discover how he uses the power of leveraging and branding that has made Air Asia the internationally recognisable Malaysian brand that it now has become. You can also learn some business principles on how low cost carriers reduce their operating costs that allow them to sell their seats at much cheaper rates than a full-service carrier like MAS.

The book is written in a style that practically anyone who understands English can understand the message conveyed. Terminology used in the aviation industry is also explained in a glossary at the end of the book so you won't be scratching your heads over terms like "fifth freedom rights" and "available seat per kilometer" (ASK). I personally enjoyed reading the book and can't help but feel proud as AirAsia is a true blue MALAYSIAN success story. A real Malaysia Boleh story which should help inspire many budding Malaysian entrepreneurs to succeed.

On the whole, the book is fairly well written. However, there are a few spelling mistakes that actually cause some sentences to be grammatically incorrect. Subang Airport is also referred to as "Subang Airport" in one sentence, "Sultan Aziz Airport" in another and "Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport" in another sentence. Sigh...! All this could be perhaps be avoided with tighter editing and proof-reading.

My rating: 4 out of 5.

Message: It is a good read for those interested in the airline industry, entrepreneurship or anyone just curious as to what the AirAsia hype is all about. It is a bit pricey (RM 39.90) but since I got it as part of a "3 for 2" promotion (Buy 3 selected titles and get the cheapest one of the lot free) at Borders, I actually paid less than that for this book.

Ciao!

Amir Fuad.

For One More Day by Mitch Albom

I have just read yet another Mitch Albom book. Why? His books are easy to read, about 200 pages only, the subject matter light yet thought provoking and takes lazy readers like me at the most 2 days to finish.




I consider this book to be the best out of the 3 books of his that I have read (this one, The Five People You Meet I Heaven & Tuesdays with Morrie).

The story is about the life (or death?) of Charley Benetto, a former world series baseball player who has become an alcoholic nobody. His alcoholism has caused his marriage to fail and things spiral downwards. He turned suicidal after getting a letter from his daughter that she has gotten married a few weeks earlier. Upset with the unsatisfactory explanation from his ex-wife and the alienation from his family, he decides to end his life by returning to his family house and killing himself there.

On the way to his family house he gets involved in a bad accident but managed to crawl out from it. He then jumped of a tower and passed out. When he woke up, he managed to go to his family house, enter the door, only to find his mother (who has died many years before) preparing breakfast in the kitchen!

Read the rest of the book for the details. It is a story about reconciliation with past mistakes, re looking at past events and relationships from a different perspective and getting a second chance. There a few surprising twists here and there. Like Albom's other books, there are some very touching moments. If you have been reading the author's previous books, then the style may not quite surprise you.

My rating: 4.5 stars out of 5.
Message: Go out and buy it! Nice read - It took me just one day to finish it.

A TV movie based on this book has just been released in the US sometime this year.

Ciao!
Amir Fuad.

Just Follow Law

I don't normally watch movies that are not in English. Occasionally, I have watched non-English movies e.g. Malay, French, Italian with the latter two on DVD. While browsing through a DVD shop, I noticed this particular movie being played. It seemed interesting, so I bought it.

Just Follow Law is a Singaporean production by Jack Neo. Gurmit "Phua Chu Kang" Singh & Fann Wong play the lead roles. This movie is almost entirely in Mandarin but being Singaporean, you will hear Singlish (colloquial informal Singaporean English), English, Hokkien, Malay & Tamil spoken throughout the movie. Non-Mandarin, non-Hokkien, non-Malay and non-Tamil speakers need not worry as English subtitles are available. Heck, even the Singlish is subtitled for the benefit of those who are not so Singlish-savvy.

Ah Ziu (Gurmit Singh), a single father, is a technician in a Singaporean government employment agency and his immediate Boss, Tanya (Fann Wong), a sexy single lady, is the manager of events and promotions in the agency. Tanya is a highly educated and ambitious tightwad woman who always "follow law" while Ah Ziu is the opposite. He is laid back and prone to creatively circumvent rules/regulations to achieve work goals set by his bosses.

The agency, WAS (Work Allocation Singapore) was about to be visited by a Singaporean Minister and a Minister from China. In preparation for this visit, the company decides to spruce up its premises. After cleaning up the office, they realise that they have a lot of junk in the office car park that they needed to "hide" from the visiting ministers' eyes. The temporary solution was to cover the mess with plywood boards. At the last minute, Ah Ziu and another technician, Bamboo (Suhaimi Yusof) discovered that they have run out of nails to complete just one more board. Ah Ziu comes up with the idea of holding the last piece of board up with masking tape.

The ministers' visit went well until the last moment when an old lady requested a group photo with the minister. The minister obliged and the group proceeded to pose in front of the boarded-up car park. While jostling around to group the people for the snapshot, the Singaporean minister fell through the one board that was held up by masking tape. This scene was rather hilarious.

Somewhere in the movie, the two main characters were involved in a motor-vehicle accident and upon regaining consciousness, these two persons souls were in each others' bodies (you know, like Freaky Friday).

The rest of the movie was quite interesting. It is quite amusing to see how the director interprets Singaporeans' view of their civil service employees, bureaucracy and office politics. True to the title, it relates the pros and cons of the "just follow law" mentality or the blind conformance to rules/regulations/law that many Singaporeans perceive their society to be. I'm sure Malaysians can relate to many of the issues here.

There are some visual computer graphic effects a la Ally McBeal, nice car chase and cool accident scenes. The humour is hilarious in some bits but fell flat at others . On the whole, it was quite an enjoyable watch. I don't think it will win awards at international film festivals, but then again, who cares?

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Message: Watch it for a laugh when you don't have much else to do. Borrow/rent the DVD if you are too much of a cheapo to buy it yourself.

Ciao!

Amir Fuad.

A busy Saturday

Yesterday was a busy Saturday for me.

Went to work at 8.15 for the Saturday's UMSC. It was a busier-than-usual Saturday UMSC session as I had 4 CT Scans ( As they were brain/chest/abdo/pelvis -2 cases, a chest/abdo/pelvis and a chest/abdo, it was more like reporting 8 cases). There were 3 ultrasounds and 1 MRI case and 3 plain films to report. Managed to finish everything by 1pm.

Stopped by Groupbase Restaurant in Sri Damansara for lunch at 1.40pm. Had rice with sweet & sour fish, beancurd + vegetables and sambal. Then I went home. Julina made some "cokodok" and had that for a snack.

Had a nap. Woke up and got ready for the wedding at night.

The wedding was that of Julina's colleague(Hasnah)'s daughter, with another of her colleague (Dr Norazni)'s son at Dewan Jubli Perak in Shah Alam. Many of Julina's colleagues from UiTM's Academy of Language Studies were there. Also met my cousin, Abang Ghani & wife who we discovered are Hasnah's neighbours. Small world!

The theme of the wedding was green - so the decorations, family members, committee members, drinks, etc were green. Very good food and entertainment. Departed the scene at about 10.40pm and arrived home at 11.15pm. Slept.


Ciao!
Amir Fuad.

Miss Triumph Street Party @ The Curve

Went to The Curve after work and rendezvous-ed with Julina & Dayana (wifey & daughter) there. They were there earlier to watch the 2.20pm screening of "The Golden Compass" at the adjacent Cineleisure Damansara.

I met up with them at Borders. There I bought 3 books - For One More Day by Mitch Albom, The Air Asia Story by Sen Ze & Jayne Ng and Winning by Jack Welch. Might just review them in a few days time in this blog.

Anyways, we then pushed off to HSL to buy a water heater/shower system to replace the broken one in Dayana's bathroom. That done, we then went around The Curve. Very nice Christmas decorations. After walking around a bit, decided to have an early dinner at Little Penang Cafe. I had the Lam Mee, Julina had the Curry Mee while Dayana had the Chicken Nasi Lemak. It was hard not to notice all the things that was going round at the "Street" of The Curve. It was the Miss Triumph Street Party! There were many booths with games, selling of thongs which can be personalised, fake tattoos, "arm slimming" treatment (they put some "Tiger Balm"-smell-a-like thing around the arms and cover the arms with cling wrap), etc.
There were clowns, street-performers doing juggling, mime, and stilt walking. Fly FM DJs - Phat Fabes and Rina were there. There were supposed to be performances by Dayang Nurfaizah & Daniel Lee among other things. And of course, a fashion show showcasing the latest Miss Triumph underwear (oops... I meant intimate apparel).

Julina decided that we should have some dessert at Empress Cafe and sit at the tables outside so that we will have a good view of the show. We all shared a chocolate cheesecake and an apple pie a la mode.

The show started with the Fly FM Djs giving away Triumph vouchers. Then there was the Capoeira performance by the Bantu capoeira group which I really enjoyed. Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian martial art. The musicians play some percussion and string instruments while chanting in a foreign language (Portuguese?). The capoeira performers are dressed in white pants and the men are shirtless. They form a circle, clap and sing and take turns to go to the centre of the circle to "fight". I say "fight" because they use knives and sticks but the "hits" seem feigned. I saw the same group perform at The Curve a few months back and enjoyed it and am glad to catch it a second time.

Next was former contestants from the TV Show "So You Think You Can Dance". Dayana thought the dancers were "awesome".

As it was approaching 8.30pm, we decided to go home as it was getting rather late. So we missed the fashion show -DARN! Well, may be next time...(And I'll make sure I come alone and bring my camera too).

Then we went home and rested.

I have UMSC to do tomorrow morning and a wedding to go to the same night.

Ciao!
Amir Fuad.

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

Just finished reading this book. Of course, a good 10 years after it was originally published. Having read "The Five People You Meet in Heaven" (T5PYMIH) about 2 years ago when I was on sabbatical leave, I naturally wanted to read the author's slightly less famous book - this one - soon after but somehow ( like all sorts of things in my life) never got around to doing it until now. I enjoyed the fresh perspective on his life that the main character in T5PYMIH had (in death) when he meets 5 people who he has met in his own lifetime, in heaven (If that sounds a little confusing, go read the book yourself).

This book is a true story about the author who met up with his sociology Professor, Morrie Schwartz many years after he graduated from university. He was rather close with Morrie even in his varsity days, taking up his courses every semester and also spending time with him as he did his sociology thesis under Morrie's supervision.

The author spent the last couple-and-a-half months of Morrie's life together every Tuesday, where the professor shared his thoughts on life, love & relationships, etc. This happened soon after Morrie was diagnosed with a rare and fatal neurological disorder called Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), a condition that also affects Stephen Hawking.

Without fail, every Tuesday, the author went to Morrie's house where he recorded his conversations with him ( which he describes in this book as "classes". He also refers to this book as his "2nd thesis"). As time passed, the deterioration in Morrie's health became increasingly evident and he eventually succumbed to ALS. Despite that, he did not seem to lose his spirit and fed the author with his take on life.

You have got to read it to experience the "feelgood" and the "afterglow" that many say they experience afterwards. I felt this certain peace and contentment about my own life after reading the many opinions Morrie had about life and how he felt one should see and live it.

No wonder it was an international bestseller.

My rating: 4 stars

Message: Go and read it if you haven't already. It doesn't take long - something anyone can finish in a day or two easily.

Ciao!

Amir Fuad.