2nd Day in Kuching

After waking up, we had breakfast and waited for Boon to arrive. He was to be our driver for the next few days. The waiting process took so long that by the time he came, he’s already taking us for lunch. I later learnt from him that punctuality is not to be expected of Kuchingite.

Sitting in the car, I get to see Kuching for the 1^st time. Last night it was too dark to see clearly. Not that they are so uncivilized that they don’t have lampposts, don’t misunderstand. They have lots of them. It’s just that even with lampposts, I cant get a good view of the city at night. So this was what I noticed about Kuching:

1. They don’t live on trees there, unlike what Yee Hong thinks. In fact, their houses are even bigger generally than peninsula houses. They also do not eat from banana leaves.
2. Kuching looks like Ipoh. It even feels like Ipoh.
3. Kuching is VERY clean. So clean, in fact, that you will be inclined to litter just to make it feel more Malaysian.

After a while, we arrived in a Chinese restaurant in the town. The others were already there, sitting around at least 4 tables combines together. The restaurant was like any normal Chinese restaurant in KL, with a lot of stalls selling different kinds of food. The foods are not Kuching-specialty-cant-find-anywhere-else-in-the-world foods. Except for the Kolo mee. But the noodles that I ordered was not bad.

After finishing our meal the usual chit-chat started. Suddenly, Yeam asked, “Sze Ching, can you help me take a group picture?”

Being such a nice guy, of course I said ok. But right after I said, “Ok everybody look here!” cries of “Wait!” came from a lot of people and I stared in dismay as more than 10 cameras were passed to me. Oh well.

Pre-Ka Shin group picture

Half-way through taking pictures, Boon who disappeared mysteriously after we got here reappeared with Ka Shin and Ka Shin came to the rescue. Ka Shin is a friend whom Boon dragged along to be a driver. (Boon: Don’t say drag along to be a driver la make me sound so bad. I ask him out to have fun together…)

Ka Shin

So, Ka Shin took over. He seemed to be a bit embarrassed shouting “1,2,3” and have people in the restaurant staring at him. Pity the guy.

Post-Ka Shin group picture

Next stop: Waterfront. This is supposedly a famous place in Kuching. Its called waterfront coz its located in front of water, that is, the Sarawak River. The river isn’t clean (water is brown in colour) but its not as dirty as Klang River. At least there’s no rubbish clogging it up. There were a few sampans with roofs to bring passengers across to Fort Margarita (I don’t know how to spell). I found the advertisements on the roofs of these sampans amusing and wondered how much we need to pay to advertise there. We walked around, took pictures and took more pictures coz that’s all there is to do there.

Group picture. Whenever there's a group picture we'll have to pose for berbelas-belas camera.

Then, surprise! Daphne came with her friends, Gloria and Jodie (I think). Gloria is Hannah Tan’s sister. Guess Daphne wasn’t exaggerating when she said she knows Hannah Tan’s sister personally. We took more pictures.

We went across the road to Main Bazaar, which is a row of shops selling souvenirs to us tourists. While other people went hunting for souvenirs straightaway, smart people like Chao Wang and I searched for icy-cold beverages to drink while we walk. It was a really hot afternoon. We found this bakery that sell drinks. Some are quite unique. Besides ice shake, they also have snow shake. Intrigued, I ordered 1. It turned out to be something like ABC but with much much finer ice and no other stuff but juice on ice. But the ice has a milky flavour to it and taste like ice cream. Together with the thick strawberry juice on top and the hot weather, the snow shake taste excellent. Only RM2.50.

As I stepped out of the bakery, others looked at my snow shake jealously.

Next mission: souvenirs. After spending a few hours at the shops, I bought a few bracelets, a whistle and an ashtray for my friends and family. We took more pictures.

We stayed till the evening and crossed the river in those sampans to fort Margarita. Like every other historical fort in Malaysia it has a gate, statues, cannons and watchtowers. However, it also has jails and one of the statues had been sexually harassed.

The river

The Fort

The sexually-harrassed statue

We then went to Boon’s house to rest before going out for dinner. Boon’s house is a corner lot terrace with PS2. The keyword here is PS2. That means fun.

At around 8, Ka Shin came and we went out for dinner at a steamboat restaurant called Hornbill’s Corner. I’ve only been as full as I was then after the McD buffet last year.

Then we went back and watched DVD and slept.