MERDEKA! MERDEKA! MERDEKA!

And so it has come to past. 50 years of independence. 50 years of Merdeka, founded on the sweat and tears of our founding fathers. As far as we have come, as high as we have climbed, can we go any further? That my fellow Malaysians, is the question we all have to ponder as we move forward.

Sunny Merdeka morning

Taking advantage of the public holiday, I decided to drop by Key Hiong at Taman Megah for breakfast. Most of you peeps would be able to recognise the name as it's pretty well known for dim sum. I will let the pictures tell the story here.

The entrance! What wonders await us inside?

Stuffed brinjal. Fish paste stuffing was good.

Yam puff (wu kok in Cantonese). Now this was pretty average.

Siew mai. A must have. These were pretty good without containing too much fatty meat.


Assorted dim sum (based on siew mai). Tasty tasty tasty!

Now this has got to be the softest lor mai kai I've ever eaten. Melt-in-the-mouth texture!

Assorted fish paste based dim sum. Also tasty!

Har kau. Another must have. Unfortunately this weren't good.

Barely visible prawn, too much fish paste and thick skin do not make a good har kau!

The stack!

Chinese tea to wash down all the dim sum...ahhhhhhhhhh soothing!

Total damage was around RM47 for 13 plates of dim sum (RM2.60 per steel plate), two char siew (grilled pork) buns, two lor mai kai, two pieces of wu kok and tea for three. Pretty reasonable if you ask me, considering the fact that it's near my house and all. I know I know, better dim sum can be had elsewhere, but elsewhere usually means travelling to Sri Petaling, Puchong or even Ipoh! =P

I'd say this place rates a 7/10. The lor mai kai at this place is definately a must try while the char siew pau is pretty good too (for lean meat lovers). Dim sum is above average but not fantastically good, however the price is reasonable (compared to say, SS2). Do give their har kau a miss though as it's not tasty at all.

Key Hiong is located just opposite the famous Ming Tien foodcourt at Taman Megah. Pretty easy to locate no? The place is packed on weekends and holidays so come early to beat the crowd.

MERDEKA! MERDEKA! MERDEKA!

We run. We run for Subang.

It's time for the annual Subang Jaya run yet again. This year, in order to commemorate our country's 50th birthday (MERDEKA), the run was actually pushed forward from 1st July to a week before National Day. Just as well though since I couldn't have joined the run in July as I was recovering from participating in the KL International Marathon 2007.

My tag number for this year's run!

The day started with a SMS from Wei Siong (at 4.16 a.m) asking me to empty my bowels...but before I could act on his suggestion, I fell asleep again. Woke up around 5 a.m. and proceeded to do some exercises in the toilet before getting ready to go.

To my dismay, it was raining pretty heavily at that time. Wei Siong arrived at around 5.45 a.m. and I had to put on a jacket to keep away the chill. Luckily as soon as we arrived at MPSJ stadium, the rain slowed down to a very light drizzle and finally stopped. Wouldn't have been too healthy to run in the freezing cold rain.

Met up with Andrew and the three musketeers (minus Peter who was the poster boy for cheating in last year's event) was complete. The crowd started trickling in and we bumped into Andy, Rashid, Ija and a fellow Fitness First member from Subang...uh...whom I had no recollection of. After the whole visit-to-the-toilet and warmup session, we all crowded at the start line and waited for Datuk Lee Hwa Beng to flag off the run.

Pose first!

Happy faces before undergoing 10 km of agony...lol!

The gun went off and the horde stampeded forward. Wei Siong sprinted off and I lost Ija in the crowd. Andrew and I paced side by side, taking it easy down the first stretch of road before upping the pace when we turned the first corner. I took off, unfortunately leaving Andrew behind (he did say to up the pace) but he soon caught up and overtook me and thus we paced each other for most of the 10 km. Most of the time he was ahead by 5 runners or so though...lol!

Disaster struck down the final stretch (about a km or so away from the finish) when Andrew sprained his ankle. I caught up with him after the U-turn and we walked for a couple of minutes together until we were in sight of the stadium gates. The final stretch beckoned! I told Andrew "Let's do this!" and he said "DO OR DIE!" So we sprinted all the way to the finish line...to victory! YEAH!

I managed to shave about 10 minutes off last year's time, completing the run in 1 hour 14 minutes and 35 seconds. Sure I didn't qualify for the certificate or medal, but heck, just completing the race and creating a new personal record sure felt good. =D

We came, we ran, we conquered!

The only gripe about this year's Subang (Merdeka) run is the fact that they still never bothered to set up a water station at the 5 km mark. And there were two organisers specialising in beverages, namely 100Plus and Milo...so what gives?

A couple of different runners' perspectives here...namely Wei Siong, Andrew and Andy. See you all at Subang Run 2008!

PC Fair 2007, before and after

Oh yeah, despite what the title of this post might imply, there are no pictures of hot booth babes or cutting edge technology here. It was simply too crowded to take any pictures!

Yes, this is in fact a food post! Ahaks!

Before going over to the Fair, me and Wei Siong decided to have a good breakfast. We needed the energy to brave the crowds later...lol! Ended up at Feng Wei (I think) at SS2 for dim sum. It's located on the same row as another of SS2's famous dim sum restaurants (the one with the Great Wall mural) actually.

Can't run away from lor mai kai. Feng Wei's version was soft and delicious!

Siew mai was pretty average.

Another siew mai variation with crabstick. This was more juicy surprisingly!

Har gau (prawn dumplings). Nice crunchy prawns, but skin was too thick!

Mini yam ring. Now this is was good. Nice crunch yam + savoury chicken filling!

We couldn't leave without indulging in some stuffed chillies. Good stuff if you like it hot!

A good breakfast indeed. The dim sum prices average out to around RM2.30 a plate (ranges from RM1.10 - RM5++). Business seems to be pretty good with 3/4 of the restaurant occupied while we were there.

View of KLCC on the way back from KL Convention Centre after the Fair

After a hard day's worth of browsing, what better to ease the tiredness than a good dinner? We headed over to Summer at Sunway Mentari. It's a buffet steamboat-cum-grill located just opposite the famous Yuen Buffet Steamboat restaurant.

In the Summer, in the Summer...

Fried rice with curry chicken for starters

Raw material for the steamboat pot!

Grilled stuff. Crunchy cuttlefish, crispy luncheon meat slices and tasty burger patties!

It was good!

It's priced at RM19.80 per person. Steamboat is comparable to Yuen, albeit with less variety, but it makes up for it in the grill section with plenty of assorted meats, seafood and shellfish.

And thus ends the gastronomical journey for PC Fair 2007. =D

Dude! I'm getting a Dell!

Some of you peeps might remember the ol' "Dude, you're getting a Dell!" ad campaign years ago in the US. Well today, I made the plunge and ordered myself a Dell 2407WFP-HC LCD monitor.

Yes. 24 inches of pure viewgasm!

I gotta admit, Dell's call centre gets two thumbs up from me for being friendly, helpful and most of all, informative! Props to you Ms. Lee San!

It is really a far cry from the Dell booth at PC Fair (3 - 5 Aug) where there was nobody who could answer my technical inquiries about their monitors. Heck, the 2407WFP demo unit wasn't even connected to anything! But to be fair, their salesperson did admit that their booth at PC Fair was concentrating on their laptops and desktops. Oh well...

More pics when the monitor is delivered. =D

Oh yeah I'll just post the list of (relevant) Q&A I went through before taking the plunge. The information probably just applies to the Malaysian market though.

Q1. What is the current revision for said model?
A1. Revision A04

Q2. Does this model have an 8-bit panel?
A2. Yes

Q3. Is a DVI cable included?
A3. Yes

Cheap! Cheap! Cheap!

Now that's not the sound of birds chirping, but rather it's me going "CHEAP CHEAP CHEAP" upon noticing that the restaurant near my house is selling (meat) crabs for RM18 per kg! The restaurant in question is of course, Yat Yeh Hing (which houses the famous Kee Kee Chicken Rice in the daytime).

Yes it really is RM18 per kg

One fine evening, my parents and I went over to indulge in some crabby (valid use of said word?) goodness.

First we started off with some veggies, which were nice and crunchy!

Fried rice was next, but it was slightly burnt so it wasn't very nice

Fried sotong (squid) soon followed, too much flour so it was rather hollow

Sweet and sour sauce goes well with meaty fresh crabs!

Crabs with dry curry leaf sauce. This wasn't as good though.

The overall score I would award would be 7/10. The price is right, but a couple of things fell short of standard.

First, one of the crabs in the dry curry leaf sauce dish wasn't fresh.

Second, the deep fried squid should be renamed to deep fried flour with squid flavour because the amount of squid was negligible.

Third, the fried rice was slightly burnt.

Plus points are the price of the crabs (CHEAP) and the service which was good even though the restaurant was almost full. The total bill came up to RM6x which wasn't expensive. I reckon the three dishes (veggies, fried rice for 2 persons, squid) cost around RM8 each. Yeah, I don't have the exact pricing because it's 3.30 a.m. in the morning and I lost the receipt. LOL!

For directions, refer to the Kee Kee post I wrote earlier. Oh yes, do come by early because it tends to get packed around 7.30-ish on weekends. By early I mean around 6.30 p.m. eh!