Returning

I'm back in Copenhagen again after a month plus of working + eating+ shopping + 'holiday-ing' + meeting friends & families + Chinese New Year celebration in Penang. Time flies isn't it? Everything in Penang is still vivid but I'm already back in the cold cloudy Copenhagen, leaving the hot humid bright Penang behind.

Haven't really have time to compose what I've experience in Penang for sharing...too little time yet too many things to be done, didn't manage to blog. So the subsequent few blogs will most probably be about Penang.

Half year apart, not much changes in Penang (geographically) except it has received a Unesco World Heritage Site recognition. Grandma's turning into 80, some friends are getting married, some just 'upgraded' to be parents for the first time, some broke up with their 'other half' but most of them stay the same.

Finally get to drive again (and beating the traffic) after 7 months. *I don't drive in Copenhagen, can't afford a car. Got a new hair cut, bought 4 pairs of shoes, tonnes of masks, eat lots of good food, watched some movies in cinema with only 1/4 of price I paid in Copenhagen & able to understand all the language spoken around me and also able to speak a lot, really a lot.

Most importantly, it is great to be with my parents again even for just few weeks to take care of them (or are they take care of me instead? hmm) & just spend time with them. Simple as dining with them at home is enjoyable...I never felt so emotional when I was staying in Penang. Too bad I have to work the first 4 weeks I'm in Penang...really looking forward to just be home on holiday where I can spend most of my time with family.

The only down side is I have to answer the same questions over and over again (eg: how long will you stay? when are you going back? how much money are you making there? etc). Perhaps when I go back again next time, I shall record a template answer up front & play them when 'template questions' are asked :p

Thai Lessons

Time for some Thai lesson + food introduction. Went to a hill top restaurant which serves authentic Thai food in Penang, called Bukit Genting. The restaurant is owned by Thai (I guess they migrate to Malaysia) & known among locals for its beautiful scenery (on clear days) with reasonably priced food of relatively good quality.

The road up to Bukit Genting (direct translation calls for Genting Hill) is challenging with some steep slopes & narrow road where one needs to be aware of coming cars. Certain part of the road only permits one car to go through at a time, so it's really a test of driving skill. Luckily I never bump into worst case scenario :)

So, lesson 1: Meng Kam (or Mieng Kham / Miang Kham)

- 7 ingredients (limes, garlic, spicy chili peppers, cubed gingers, roasted peanuts, roasted coconut & small dried shrimps) & a special shrimp sauce served with fresh betel leaves but how does one eat it? With a fresh wrapping leaf in hand, fold it once across the bottom then sideways to form a pocket. Place about 1 teaspoon roasted coconut in the leaf together with a small amount of each filling to create a bite-sized quantity. Spoon the sauce on top, pop in your mouth and enjoy!

Lesson 2: Pucha (I'm not sure if this is a Thai word)- minced chicken meat stuffed crab, served with Thai chili sauce. I used to thought it is a mixture of crab meat & minced chicken meat but I'm not so sure because I can't taste the crab meat at all. Taste lovely, with crab meat or not :)

Lesson 3: Pandan Chicken (sorry, this is definitely not Thai term)
- Pandan is the name of the leave that wrapped around the chicken. Commonly available in Malaysia but I haven't find any in Copenhagen. Dried pandan leaves can be found in London though. Chicken is marinated, wrapped with pandan leave & deep fried. Yummilicious!

Lesson 4: Deep fried vegetables

- cool huh? Use some local green leave vegetables, coated with seasoned & spiced flour, then deep fried. Garnish with some garlic cubes & dried shrimps. Crispy, crunchy & not too spicy. Definitely a must for Thai food.

I enjoyed my food very much that day & I hope you at least enjoy reading this :)

'Monkey Business' @ Monkey Beach

Another colleague of mine (who is much much more senior) is travelling to Penang for the same business purpose as me. While he's here, we took the chance to sneak out & relax during weekend.

Penang is an island with a lot of beaches but most of them polluted or over-crowded. The only few clean beaches left requires hours of hike or boat trips to reach. Since I strongly object hiking 2hrs to go to a beach (and another 2hrs back to 'civilization'), we rented a boat to go to Monkey Beach.

What happens when a tourist landed on Monkey Beach (and there really is a lot of monkeys) with some drinks in a paper bag?? Here's a pictorial explanation:- The verdict? Of course the 6ft tall tourist (a.k.a. my colleague) win. His shoe is strategically utilized as 'weapon' to defend our drinks against the agressive monkey. Poor monkey, it must have been its bad day to attack my colleague. After losing, it still trailed us for some distance before giving up on fighting for the drinks. I didn't know Coke can be so attractive :p

It was relatively rough with small waves (the sea is normally calm) which makes the sea colour turns muddy, but it's still acceptable. So, I spend a hot afternoon, under the tree with sea breeze blowing & listening to the sound of seawaves. If my colleague can turn into Hugh Jackman, I'm sure I'll be the happiest person in the world! Too bad...

Good Old Japanese Food

Penang is a Japanese food heaven. For a small island like Penang, it won't be exaggerating if I say one can always find a Japanese restaurant within 1km radius. Sometimes even a few Japanese restaurants in the same neighbourhood.

Most of the restaurants are owned by locals but there are also quite a number that's own by Japanese. Some Japanese were here as expat, ended up staying here permanently; some are making Penang their second home and started some business.

I went to one of the Japanese owned Japanese restaurant in Penang with my colleague for lunch. Picture (from top left, clock wise), teppanyaki saba, grill eel (unagi), white tuna sushi (my favourite fish, yum yum) and soft shell crab. White tuna is hard to find. Most of the restaurants serve yellow tail fish instead of white tuna but the quality & taste is just different. White tuna is more expensive but worth it :)


As if we can't have enough Japanese food, we went for Kampachi in the evening for more. This time, we has the restaurant's special sushi - Dragon Roll (sushi with tempura prawn & coated with prawn roe) as starter, yosenabe (seafood hot pot) with udon as main course & finish with deep fried ice cream. The ice cream is really ichiban! Perhaps I should go & eat again before I leave...

Seafood @ Bali Hai

What do one eat in an island filled with fresh seafood? So very logically, when I'm back in Penang, cheap & fresh seafood, here I come... I've always like Bali Hai in Gurney Drive, this round, I'm going with my colleague to there as well.

Typically seafood can be picked from the aquarium while they're still alive. The unlucky one will be cooked with different preparation method (steam, grill, fried, with special sauce, sashimi style etc). Confused with which seafood to pick or what style to eat? just ask the waiter / waitresses for some recommendation based on your preference, they give good advice ;)

Seafood takes some time to prepare so some chicken satays were ordered as an appetizer to save us from starvation. It was really good with the slightly spicy peanut sauce. Very good. Satay is typically grilled on top of charcoal grill, I tried to made it in Copenhagen with oven (grill function), they just don't taste the same :s

We go for fried crabs coated with salted egg yolk & some curry leaves. Super high cholesterol but also finger licking good. Got a teochew style steam fish (slightly sour with the sour vegetable & tomatoes) in clear soup, very soothing. Perfect with the fried rice that we ordered.

Pic (top): salted egg yolk crab; (bot) Teochew steam fish

'Kam Heong kapak' is one of the cheaper & very local. The clams used to cost next to nothing but since restaurants start to use them in their menu, suddenly they are worth 'something'. This one is really spicy (or perhaps my spicy tolerance has reduced), I was almost in my tears when I accidentally bit one of the small spicy cili-padi.

Luckily I have a fresh coconut juice to save me & put out the 'fire' in my mouth. Spoon is given to eat the coconut flesh which is still attached with the shell (inside, of course).

Busy

It's been some time since I last update my blog, been busy with work in Penang. Also because my Copenhagen colleaugus is with me on this trip, I have to be a dedicated driver + part time tour guide, so even on normal days that we don't work late, I ended up home late. No time to blog.

I need a proper spa session to relax & a facial treatment to repair my lousy complexion due to Denmark's dry weather & Penang's late night work. I was very keen to try out fish spa which is blooming Penang, it can be found almost everywhere now & only range between RM28 - RM36 for a 30minutes session. Unfortunately my courage is gone after I tried to put my hand into the 'aquarium' of dr.fish. When the fishes nibble my hand, the feeling is 'unique' enough that I instantly pull out my hand :s

According to the shop manager, it is a normal reaction. Typically after 1-2minutes, the 'nibbly' feeling will fade away & one will get more relax. I'm not sure if I can sustain the first 2 minutes, so fish spa? Maybe...let's see how it goes. As for facial treatment, guess I can only do it when my colleague go back (when I have time).

A you tube video on a fish spa available in Penang (maybe I should just force myself to try this one, the fish looks smaller):-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qn4VH9CLpY

Another Day Out

Another day out that ends with nice dinner in Penang.

My skin become very dry when I was in Denmark. If I didn't apply any facial cream after cleansing, wrinkles are clearly visible when I smile. It freaked me out so when I'm in Penang, it only make sense for me to buy a lot of beauty products (at 30% of Denmark's price). So today, I ended up with lots of masks, eye patch and face serum.

Also got some polo-Ts and a shirt, belt, keychain, handphone cases, handphone decoratives & a mini cute Japanese kokeshi doll.

Accidentally discovered a nice eating place for dinner. I ordered a curry fish head (yes, fish head) but they had the fish cut into pieces so you can't see the whole head anymore (you can still find the eye though :p). I miss it so much, it's hard to find lady's finger in Copenhagen to cook this dish. I plan to bring some lady's finger seed back & try to plant in Denmark, wonder if it'll work.

Some other smaller dishes I had are salted fish stir fried kai lan (a type of vegetable); stew duck; sambal petai (very very Malaysian, I wouldn't recommend it to any foreigner. Don't want to create new enemy); and nam yu fried chicken wing.

When I finish my dinner, I'm amazed with my eating capability as well. Seems like I have trained myself to eat a lot well in Denmark :p

Chinese Desserts

Proudly introducing some of the most typical chinese desserts in Penang:

1. Si Ko T'ng (四果汤) - typically contains lotus seed, white fungus, red beans, dried longans, atapchi etc in a clear sweet 'soup'. Usually drank / eaten cold in hot country like Malaysia but it can be consumed hot as well.

2. Almond tea (very thick, sweet) with you char kway (the ddep fried, brownish 'bread sticks' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youtiao). I don't like almond tea, smells like cockroach but I like to dip the you char kway into the almond tea and eat it while it's still a little crunchy, suddenly it becomes acceptable :)

3. Tau Hua http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douhua

4. Bird's nest with papaya in rock sugar syrup.

5. Bird's nest & hasma (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasma) cooked in almond rock sugar syrup.

I don't think I can give much good explaination about these desserts without going through endless round of translating between chinese & english + some wikipedia search. So if you're interested to find out, all the important terms are listed...help yourself :)