can you peel it

This deserves an actual post on its own because it made our stay in KL so memorable. We spent our days and nights in KL buying and drinking this whenever we can. If Singapore has its Old Chang Kee that became our favorite, I think in KL’s case, it’s a nice cold pack of Peel Fresh! The company has this funny tag line too: “Any fresher, you’ll have to peel it yourself!”

On nights when we are all tired and hungry [why eat and rest when you have a ton of things to see and shop for IN KLCC, like shoes, bags, tuxedo, and chocolates (Beryls)], and we just want to go home and lie in bed while eating a subway sandwich, it’s a huge carton pack of Peel Fresh that accompany our meals to satiate us. It’s not the best tasting orange juice in the world, that I’m sure, but it does satisfy.

Kampung Boy

Since our hotel is of walking distance (no need to take a cab, or rent a car and worry about auto insurance quotes) from one of KL’s major malls (Sogo), we agreed to have our breakfast there. My wife and our friends opted to play safe and ordered something familiar, as you can see in the photos

and I ventured into trying out another kopi tiam, this time named Kampung Boy. I would have wanted to know why they called it Kampung Boy but the language barrier prevented me from asking more, as ordering my kopi and kaya toast resulted into more finger pointing than actual conversation.:)

The kopi was quite good, very strong, as in most kopi houses. The kaya toast on the other hand, while looking so plain and simple, must have been one of the best kaya toasts I’ve ever tasted. Nowhere near those sold in kaya kopi houses here. It took no time at all for me to finish my order. Soon enough I found myself back in Kampung Boy’s line, pointing to another serving of kaya toast!

Tune Hotel

There are a number of accommodations to choose from in Kuala Lumpur. Most hotels pride themselves with pools, entertainment centers, and spas. But what made us decide to book this one was probably because it has 7-11, Subway, and Kopi Tiam all on the ground floor. All good and affordable food! We will surely never go hungry.

The bus drops us off near Central Market. From there, we took a taxi. A word of warning though. Most taxis in KL are like the taxis we have here in the Philippines. They don’t want to use the meter and will instead negotiate for a fixed fare. It bodes well for travelers to know how far they are going and what the basic taxi fares are. It took a while for us to get a taxi because most would only accept 20MYR (1MYR = Php14). I know for a fact that it only costs from 5MYR to 7MYR. I was able to persuade the nth taxi to take us to our hotel for 10MYR. Not the ideal fare, I know, but there’s four of us and we’ve been standing under the sun for quite a while already, plus we have our bags with us.

Our hotel was beautiful! Not as luxurious as many others, but you must know that we are on a budget travel. So for a budget hotel, this looks good.

This is the reception area. Very simple.

This is the guests’ lounge area. Further to the left is the 7-11 store, in the center is Subway, and in the far right with the chairs all stacked up is the Kopi Tiam. This was taken late one night and the Kopi Tiam was already closed. The Subway is also about to close.

The hotel’s hallway is also adorned with flower graffiti, which they also carried to the rooms.

bus transit to KL

Going to the Singapore’s neighbor Malaysia is quite easy. There are a number of ways one can go. You can either take the bus, the train, or an airplane. We opted to take the bus because it is cheaper. Back here in Manila, while preparing for our trip, KG saw this promo of a bus company offering 50% off deals for bus seats located in the back. Of course we booked that! We were actually expecting a full bus. we arrived early for our bus trip so I waited inside a room with modest office furniture and talked to one of the staff to confirm and arrange our tickets while the ladies grab a bite to eat for breakfast.

We were surprised to see upon boarding that that there were only three other people beside us travelling that day. So what we did was transfer to the middle seats and settled for a long trip.

As you can see, though the seats look old, they were very comfortable. The seats are like La-Z-Boy sofas, and you can adjust/recline it to suit your needs.

The bus has two immigration stopovers, one for Singapore and one for Malaysia, and one long bathroom break at a local bus stop. We just spent our time sleeping and eating our MOS Burgers.

For more info on traveling to Malaysia, KG has provided some helpful links.

bald spot

As I was browsing and picking pictures that I’ll use for my next posts about our Kuala Lumpur trip, there were these shots of me looking at a giant map in Bukit Bintang where you could very well notice my thinning hair! I actually got more conscious when an officemate noticed the thinning hair when she saw me in the office canteen a few days ago. Desperate to save myself from balding, I asked around for hair loss treatments and hair product recommendations. And last night, Riza and I were able to drop by a Mercury Drugstore outlet in BF Homes after a little sojourn in Ruins. The shampoo is called Pregroe. And like all hair products, it promises a lot of things. I tried it last night and it smelled pretty good. Let’s just hope that it can do more than make my hair smell good.