The whirlwind KL trip was truly exhausting. However, the exhaustion was only strongly felt when I lied on my bed on the night of return. The shopping, the food, the sight and the sound and the party pumped up our adrenaline. We were kept high even with an average of about 5-hour of sleep on consecutive nights.
My weekend after the return was spent mostly on my bed catching on my much deprived sleep. I needed as much sleep as possible to rest my body and my mind in preparation of the long week ahead.
I will say no more. It’s my bedtime again. Yawn.
Showing posts with label Travel - Kuala Lumpur. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Travel - Kuala Lumpur. Show all posts
May 25, 2008
May 23, 2008
KL - Home Sweet Home
3 days passed in a whirlwind. It was time to say bye-bye to KL.
Before lunch, L and I decided to head down to Times Square for a last minute shopping. She wanted to get some T-shirts which she had seen another colleague buying the day before. Too bad, the shop was not opened. We had to head back to the convention hall for an early lunch and a closing message before we departed.
Finally, I bought a necklace while L bought a necklace and a bangle at the same place. At least, my trip to KL was not entirely empty-handed.
After a quick and light lunch, we were on the road again back to Singapore. We slept all the way as all of us were simply deadbeat. Yet, it was still a good trip. A break-away from work and quality time spent with my colleagues. It was almost like an excursion but instead of with classmates, it was with colleagues. :-)
Before lunch, L and I decided to head down to Times Square for a last minute shopping. She wanted to get some T-shirts which she had seen another colleague buying the day before. Too bad, the shop was not opened. We had to head back to the convention hall for an early lunch and a closing message before we departed.
Finally, I bought a necklace while L bought a necklace and a bangle at the same place. At least, my trip to KL was not entirely empty-handed.
After a quick and light lunch, we were on the road again back to Singapore. We slept all the way as all of us were simply deadbeat. Yet, it was still a good trip. A break-away from work and quality time spent with my colleagues. It was almost like an excursion but instead of with classmates, it was with colleagues. :-)
May 22, 2008
KL - More Shopping on the 2nd Day
We reached the breakfast area about 15 minutes before the start of the morning seminar at 8am. After a quick gobble down of the food, we headed to the seminar to talks and more talks when our minds were clearly in day-dreams from the lack of sleep and the planning of where to go for more shopping after lunch. One of my colleagues were arrowed for some presentation after lunch. Poor girl, she would not be able to join us for shopping.
After lunch, we decided to just shop around Berjaya Times Square since we only had a couple of hours before the start of the D&D. My room-mate decided to head off by herself to Sungei Wang again to get things that she had not gotten yesterday. The rest of us were simply too tired to brave the walk to and back from Sungei Wang and decided to just hang around Times Square. Afte two hours of aimless walking, we decided that we had enough and wanted to find a cafe to sit down and talk. It was the Old Town Coffee Shop. Old Town was a famous brand of white coffee in Malaysia. For fear of losing sleep for the night, I skipped the coffee and opted for the silk hose tea (Sit Mut Milk Tea) instead.
After the 'tea-break', we felt better and decided to walk around some more. With a stomach filled, we seemed to be recharged and had a better shopping mood. Hence, the shopping was more successful for some of my colleagues. Again, I came back empty handed except for the almond flake cookies which my sister asked me to get. According to my sister, this cookie could only be found in the KL's Famous Amos. Well, she better not lied to me, because it was not exactly cheap and I had to hand-carry it lightly for fear of crushing the biscuits into crumps.
Soon, it was time to head back to our rooms to prepare for D&D. Well, as this year's theme was cartoon theme, we were just going to dress in black tops to avoid being too outstanding as we were only the invited guests for this trip.
The night started off already on a high mood with excellence awards being given to deserving individuals who had gone the extra mile. The high ambience was maintained with the numerous lucky draws and bingo numbers announcement. The emcee for the night was also extremely witty with his comments and jokes. The performances by the business units competing for the best performing business unit awards also kept us entertained - with enactment of star wars, drag queens and cheerleading stuns. The highlight was when the different business unit heads danced to the crowd under the game of "Deal or No Deal".
The climax is certainly not over. The next part of the program was the business unit heads dressed as the cartoon characters in the games - with Sun Wu Kong from Dragonball, Zhu Ge Liang from Romance of the three Kingdoms, Chun Li from Street Fighter, Super Mario from Super Mario, Hitman and Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. We were bowled over by the spontaniety of the leaders and their make-overs. The leaders I know in the past are not as sporting to don such costumes and to act out the characters. However, the leaders here truly led by examples by going all out in whatever that they were doing. This drew greater respect from the team.
Amidst all the laugher, we forgot about the time. It was close to 1 am when the event finally came to a close. Despite the ending of the event, our mood was still bouyant and high. It would be difficult to fall asleep immediately. Again, when we retired to our room, my room-mate and I continued chatting about the event and about other things. I went to sleep at about 2 am while she slept at around 3am. For this entire trip, we were sleeping at an average of about 5 hour a day.
After lunch, we decided to just shop around Berjaya Times Square since we only had a couple of hours before the start of the D&D. My room-mate decided to head off by herself to Sungei Wang again to get things that she had not gotten yesterday. The rest of us were simply too tired to brave the walk to and back from Sungei Wang and decided to just hang around Times Square. Afte two hours of aimless walking, we decided that we had enough and wanted to find a cafe to sit down and talk. It was the Old Town Coffee Shop. Old Town was a famous brand of white coffee in Malaysia. For fear of losing sleep for the night, I skipped the coffee and opted for the silk hose tea (Sit Mut Milk Tea) instead.
After the 'tea-break', we felt better and decided to walk around some more. With a stomach filled, we seemed to be recharged and had a better shopping mood. Hence, the shopping was more successful for some of my colleagues. Again, I came back empty handed except for the almond flake cookies which my sister asked me to get. According to my sister, this cookie could only be found in the KL's Famous Amos. Well, she better not lied to me, because it was not exactly cheap and I had to hand-carry it lightly for fear of crushing the biscuits into crumps.
Soon, it was time to head back to our rooms to prepare for D&D. Well, as this year's theme was cartoon theme, we were just going to dress in black tops to avoid being too outstanding as we were only the invited guests for this trip.
The night started off already on a high mood with excellence awards being given to deserving individuals who had gone the extra mile. The high ambience was maintained with the numerous lucky draws and bingo numbers announcement. The emcee for the night was also extremely witty with his comments and jokes. The performances by the business units competing for the best performing business unit awards also kept us entertained - with enactment of star wars, drag queens and cheerleading stuns. The highlight was when the different business unit heads danced to the crowd under the game of "Deal or No Deal".
The climax is certainly not over. The next part of the program was the business unit heads dressed as the cartoon characters in the games - with Sun Wu Kong from Dragonball, Zhu Ge Liang from Romance of the three Kingdoms, Chun Li from Street Fighter, Super Mario from Super Mario, Hitman and Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. We were bowled over by the spontaniety of the leaders and their make-overs. The leaders I know in the past are not as sporting to don such costumes and to act out the characters. However, the leaders here truly led by examples by going all out in whatever that they were doing. This drew greater respect from the team.
Amidst all the laugher, we forgot about the time. It was close to 1 am when the event finally came to a close. Despite the ending of the event, our mood was still bouyant and high. It would be difficult to fall asleep immediately. Again, when we retired to our room, my room-mate and I continued chatting about the event and about other things. I went to sleep at about 2 am while she slept at around 3am. For this entire trip, we were sleeping at an average of about 5 hour a day.
May 21, 2008
KL - First Day Itinerary
After we checked in to the hotel, the first day was free and easy for everyone. The real work would only start the next day with seminars in the morning and D & D from the evening onwards.
Sungei Wang
Our first stop at KL was to head off to Sungei Wang. Apparently, Sungei Wang was famous for the cheap shoes. My room-mate was dying to get shoes since she has not bought any spare pairs for D & D the following night except for her Birkenstock slippers.
There were about 8 of us who headed off to Sungei Wang. However, at the first store, we have already split out and decided to meet later for dinner together since it would be difficult to shop in a large crowd. In the end, 6 of us still shopped together for the entire trip.
Sungei Wang was similar to what I remembered from 6 years ago - my last trip to KL. The mall was filled with boutiques selling clothes and shoes. The shoes and clothes were at affordable prices and young looking. Some of the brands could be found in Singapore, such as Factory Outlet Store (FOS) and Vincci. We used to be able to find one of the most famous clothes chain in Singapore - Seed. However, it seemed that it had already moved out of Singapore about 2 years ago.
My room-mate was already very well-known for her shopping proweress even before the trip. She really lived up to her name by emerging as the person who has bought the most items among the few of us. All of them bought at least one pair of shoes - with some of them buying as many as 3 pairs. I was the failure among the group with no conquests at all in this shopping trip.
Pavillion
Time flew during happy times. Soon, it was time for dinner. We headed to Pavillion - the newest shopping mall along Bukit Bintan for food. The bright lights and the glass panels resembled any high-end shopping mall along Orchard Road. The variety of shops were familiar names in Singapore - from the branded Ferragamo to the famous food chain - Food Republic. We settled our dinner at Food Republic. The price was almost as expensive as Singapore foodcourt when your converted to Sing dollar equivalent. However, in ringgits, it would definitely be too expensive for the locals.
Bintang Walk
After dinner, we started our long walk back to the hotel. Although it was close to 10 pm, there were still many people crowding the streets, with the partying and drinking crowd in front of Hard Rock Cafe and other pubs around it. Across the road, outside Sungei Wang, youngsters were doing street dance to the passerbys. The night was certainly still young for the Malaysians.
A&W & Baskin Robbins
A&W was a familiar fastfood chains alongside McDonald's and KFC during our primary school days before newer chains such as Mos Burger and Carl's Junior wowed the Singaporeans with their Japanese and American burgers. A&W could no longer be found in Singapore.
Hence, when we spotted an A & W outlet, we needed to relive those fond memories and decided to buy our burgers there for our lunch in the bus. I had the Marina Fish sandwich. It was sweeter than the McDonald's version.
We had Baskin Robbins ice-cream after our dinner. Each of us ordered a scoop and share. I chose the "Very Berry Strawberry" flavour. Each scoop came with two pieces of small cookies. After trying Strawberry cheesecake, tiramisu, and a few others (which I could not recall what), I still preferred the tiramisu.
We all sounded like we were old people trying to relive our past by eating foods which reminded us of the past and which could no longer be found in Singapore. By the time, we headed back to the hotel to retire for the night, it was around 1030 pm. It was time to sleep early for a full-day of activity the following night. However, just like young kids going on holidays, we were too excited to sleep early. My room-mate and I chatted for a while before going to bed at close to midnight.
Yawn. The next day would be a longer day. We had to wake up at 6 am for a 8am seminar. Sigh!
Sungei Wang
Our first stop at KL was to head off to Sungei Wang. Apparently, Sungei Wang was famous for the cheap shoes. My room-mate was dying to get shoes since she has not bought any spare pairs for D & D the following night except for her Birkenstock slippers.
There were about 8 of us who headed off to Sungei Wang. However, at the first store, we have already split out and decided to meet later for dinner together since it would be difficult to shop in a large crowd. In the end, 6 of us still shopped together for the entire trip.
Sungei Wang was similar to what I remembered from 6 years ago - my last trip to KL. The mall was filled with boutiques selling clothes and shoes. The shoes and clothes were at affordable prices and young looking. Some of the brands could be found in Singapore, such as Factory Outlet Store (FOS) and Vincci. We used to be able to find one of the most famous clothes chain in Singapore - Seed. However, it seemed that it had already moved out of Singapore about 2 years ago.
My room-mate was already very well-known for her shopping proweress even before the trip. She really lived up to her name by emerging as the person who has bought the most items among the few of us. All of them bought at least one pair of shoes - with some of them buying as many as 3 pairs. I was the failure among the group with no conquests at all in this shopping trip.
Pavillion
Time flew during happy times. Soon, it was time for dinner. We headed to Pavillion - the newest shopping mall along Bukit Bintan for food. The bright lights and the glass panels resembled any high-end shopping mall along Orchard Road. The variety of shops were familiar names in Singapore - from the branded Ferragamo to the famous food chain - Food Republic. We settled our dinner at Food Republic. The price was almost as expensive as Singapore foodcourt when your converted to Sing dollar equivalent. However, in ringgits, it would definitely be too expensive for the locals.
Bintang Walk
After dinner, we started our long walk back to the hotel. Although it was close to 10 pm, there were still many people crowding the streets, with the partying and drinking crowd in front of Hard Rock Cafe and other pubs around it. Across the road, outside Sungei Wang, youngsters were doing street dance to the passerbys. The night was certainly still young for the Malaysians.
A&W & Baskin Robbins
A&W was a familiar fastfood chains alongside McDonald's and KFC during our primary school days before newer chains such as Mos Burger and Carl's Junior wowed the Singaporeans with their Japanese and American burgers. A&W could no longer be found in Singapore.
Hence, when we spotted an A & W outlet, we needed to relive those fond memories and decided to buy our burgers there for our lunch in the bus. I had the Marina Fish sandwich. It was sweeter than the McDonald's version.
We had Baskin Robbins ice-cream after our dinner. Each of us ordered a scoop and share. I chose the "Very Berry Strawberry" flavour. Each scoop came with two pieces of small cookies. After trying Strawberry cheesecake, tiramisu, and a few others (which I could not recall what), I still preferred the tiramisu.
We all sounded like we were old people trying to relive our past by eating foods which reminded us of the past and which could no longer be found in Singapore. By the time, we headed back to the hotel to retire for the night, it was around 1030 pm. It was time to sleep early for a full-day of activity the following night. However, just like young kids going on holidays, we were too excited to sleep early. My room-mate and I chatted for a while before going to bed at close to midnight.
Yawn. The next day would be a longer day. We had to wake up at 6 am for a 8am seminar. Sigh!
KL - Checking In to Berjaya Times Square
Yawns and more yawns. It has been ages since I woke up so this early.
At 545am, I was in the showers.
At 645am, I was out of the house.
At 720am, I was in the office lobby, signing myself in, getting my dinner allowance for the day and all my passes for the next 3 days.
At 800am, our bus finally departed from the office building towards the Tuas checkpoint. The wait was necessary as there are 20 odd buses leaving for KL, fetching a total of about 700 people at one shot.
Hopefully, I would be able to catch a nap in the 5 hour bus journey to KL.
Hmmm. The bus seats were wide and comfortable. At least, there would be enough leg room for our legs to be stretched out for a nice snooze.
The committee was well-prepared in keeping us comfortable during the journey with green tea packet drink, bottled mineral water, twistie packet and other crackers being distributed to prevent us from feeling hungry. Mid-way through the journey, Sudoku and Anagrams were also played on the bus. Sudoku was certainly tough. My 'neighbour' and I gave up when we were not able to undo the wrong numbers we have put in and decided to continue our nap.
By 145 pm, we finally arrived at Berjaya Times Square. We helped ourselves to the light snack while we waited for our room keys. By 330pm, all my colleagues have gotten their keys to their rooms except for my room-mate and me. We decided to give up and bunk in our luggages in another colleague's room and headed to the malls for shopping first.
We decided to try our luck one more time before we left for shopping. Alas, we finally obtained our keys, but we could only go to our room after we came back from our shopping trip as the rest of the gang were still waiting for us.
When we retired to our room for the night, we were surprised by the spaciousness of the room. There was a living room section while the sleeping bed was separated from the living area. The bathroom was also split into 2 - with an adjourning door that could be closed and separate the toilet from the shower area. What a brilliant idea! When my room-mate was showering, I could still use the toilet and vice versa. The King-sized bed was more than enough for the two of us since we were both quite 'stationary' when we slept. Hence, we would not end up kicking each other.
(Our bedroom with the King-sized bed)
(Living room which we have used for put our things and luggage)
(View from our room)
May 20, 2008
All Set to Go!
We are counting down weekly and then daily. Last year, we were supposed to be going to Malacca but we were pulled out before the trip to help in one of the new system UAT. One year later, we are now going to KL. Until the day we set off, I still prepare myself mentally that we may not get to go because of work.
Nevertheless, going to KL continues to be one of the topics most discussed among the team - what is the latest exchange rate, what should we wear for the D & D, are we bringing an overnight bag or cabin trolley? Despite numerous discussions, we are never tired of talking about it again and again.
We have selected our room-mates at least a month before the trip. I am bunking with L. Although we have worked and talked before, but we were after all in two separate teams. She was more supporting segments reporting while I was more of a product analyst. When she first asked me to bunk in together, I was certainly surprised by this suggestion. I was already felt with trepidation of sharing a room for 2 nights with a colleague and this feeling was strengthened when I was to share room with someone not directly in my team (ie we report to different bosses). Anyway, we were both Capricorns, so I thought we should be able to get along fine with each other.
KL, here we come.
Nevertheless, going to KL continues to be one of the topics most discussed among the team - what is the latest exchange rate, what should we wear for the D & D, are we bringing an overnight bag or cabin trolley? Despite numerous discussions, we are never tired of talking about it again and again.
We have selected our room-mates at least a month before the trip. I am bunking with L. Although we have worked and talked before, but we were after all in two separate teams. She was more supporting segments reporting while I was more of a product analyst. When she first asked me to bunk in together, I was certainly surprised by this suggestion. I was already felt with trepidation of sharing a room for 2 nights with a colleague and this feeling was strengthened when I was to share room with someone not directly in my team (ie we report to different bosses). Anyway, we were both Capricorns, so I thought we should be able to get along fine with each other.
KL, here we come.
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