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Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Why I'm probably gonna change telco service companies... again

In about 2009, I switched my number from Hotlink to DiGi - I "inherited" my then-phone number from my sister, and it came under Hotlink because, well, my mum's number was under Hotlink/Maxis. That year, I switched because I got a boyfriend and he used DiGi and texting was mad expensive because fees in between telcos were ridiculous.


I bought a Maxis number in 2011, because I got another boyfriend and he used Maxis, but I kept the DiGi number active... until recently, when maintaining it was ridiculous because I just didn't use it that much. In other words, I only have my Maxis number right now.

The confirmation text I got 3 hours after I sent the request. The text is marked 14:20, but it arrived at 17:27.
I'm no subscribed to any data plan, so I only apply for a one-day internet pass whenever I need it. I get 100MB of data for 24 hours, for MYR2.


Ever since I got a mobile phone, this was how I categorized the 3 main telco companies:
  • Maxis/Hotlink - for the typical public
  • DiGi - for the young and rebellious
  • Celcom - for the people who do business

Now I understand why the young population prefer DiGi. Because DiGi isn't a douche. As much as the "I Will Follow You" theme and the fat yellow guy annoys me, it's what I consider the better choice.


I would always get texts when I get a missed call, but recently, they started to go haywire:

Continuous texts...
... for hours and days on end.
The delay in texts aren't a problem, so are the spamming messages (hurrah to awesome message tones). But the delayed text messages become a problem when it involved my credit. I'm subscribed to a prepaid plan, so a lot of my accessibility to other people depends solely on my credit, which is why I'm usually always uncomfortable whenever my credit is anywhere below MYR5.


I didn't mind that I had 3 hours of data time wasted (I seldom actually use all 100MB of data within 24 hours), but I was furious when this arrived late:



MYR10 sapped up just like that. Maxis/Hotlink sends you a warning text when you've used up 80% and 100% of your data limit respectively. I didn't receive it until my internet pass expired and was charged more than MYR10 for data that I didn't know was being used.


Sure, could be my fault too for not turning off mobile data, but for me, receiving the notification texts only after charging me... nope.


Time to invite the yellow man back into my life LOL.

Saturday, April 26, 2014

Me vs. Materialism

I usually make do with what I have - need a bag? Get a cheap one from a generic store. A wallet? Cute one from a street vendor or mall booth. Need clothes? PLATINUM MALL, BABY! My current Longchamp is MYR10-15 from Bangkok. Most of my clothes are from Bangkok. Most others are gifts and/or hand-me-downs (including my current wallet).


As long as it's usable and looks nice, I don't really mind. This makes me proud to tell people two things: 1. I don't need things to be branded; and 2. since I don't have many branded items, one or two branded items under my ownership makes me feel glam already.


But sometimes... Just sometimes, seeing other girls with Pandora accessories and pretty Chanel or Michael Kors bangs, or just Charles & Keith shoes makes me crave for them. Do I need them? No. But do I want them? Hell, yes.


I draw the line in between need and want here. I don't need them, but I crave them. Materialistic? Yes. But this doesn't contribute directly to my survival. I have what I need, but humans usually want what they don't have.


I don't have bags that cost more than my tuition fees per semester. I don't have sandals that cost more than my allowance for a month. I can count the number of clothes that cost over 10 pieces of clothing from Bangkok.


Not all girls are materialistic bitches who was born with the cash chromosome, but we do like to be pampered. We like pretty things and to make our friends go green with envy with our limited edition items. We like how we make people's heads turn with that brand new branded bag.


I'll get that in due time. Right now, I'm happy with my baby Neo, my fake Longchamp, and my noisy rubber flats from Bangkok.

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Betty's Midwest Kitchen, Aman Suria Damansara

NON-HALAL


There are just those few food or coffee places that EVERYONE goes to - almost literally. You'll see geo-tags on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter that checks in to the same place almost every time. Betty's Midwest Kitchen happens to be one of the places frequented by modern city youngsters, much like how they frequent the nearest possible Starbucks anywhere (and yes, I'm stereotyping).


The deco is a breath of fresh air - red, blue, and white dominates the main deco items, with woodsy walls and counters. On the left wall are frames and frames of pig art, and American deco everywhere. The staff greet you wearing a blue T-shirt that screams "IOWA" - literally.

Oozy, cheesy deliciousness!
The main attraction is that the place serves actual American food, like burgers, pork chops, and fries (not to be confused with fast food), and it's famous for it's "dog food" - fries drenched and topped with melted mozzarella and cheddar cheese, served in a metal dish. At MYR12 a serving, it's the perfect side dish for sharing.

It's the kind of burger that I'd eat separately
Sexy cheesy!
The recommendations included the pulled pork burger (which is delightfully juicy) and the baby back ribs, but I opted for a more budget-friendly option, and that was something I saw on TV a while back - the Jucy Lucy: a grilled pork and beef burger stuffed with mozzarella cheese burger served on a bed of fresh hot fries.


All that was washed down with a large glass of a traditional Stewart's root beer float - you can have the root beer as it is, or you can upgrade the root beer to a float for MYR0.50. As opposed to some other root beers I've had, this isn't as carbonated, and it doesn't completely numb your taste buds with sugar.


If you're craving for some good American food, Betty's is the place to go. It's a bit pricey, which is why I personally wouldn't go there too often. =)


Location - 6 / 10
Atmosphere - 7.5 / 10
Food quality - 8.5 / 10
Price - 6.5 / 10
Service - 8 / 10


BETTY'S MIDWEST KITCHEN
A-G-40, Jalan PJU1/43,
Aman Suria Damansara,
47410
Petaling Jaya, Malaysia.

Sunday, April 6, 2014

4th April 2014

It was one of those days that I woke up excited, but had this bad feeling in my gut (which I routinely ignore because my intuition is almost always off the mark). My babes and I had a day planned out - lunch, a surprise belated birthday celebration, some assignment work, then perhaps some hookah or drinking later in the night.


So Jasmine and I left a little earlier than the agreed plans to get the birthday presents for Jeanna's belated 21st. I seldom ever take the initiative to get presents for anyone, partly due to the fact that I can never come up with something sensible enough for their liking, and also due to my really limited budget.

Caviar Mini Bar Volume 2 from the caviar manicure brand

I like the packaging.
The beauty junkies will probably know that Ciaté is the manicure brand that is the brand for caviar manicure kits. I purchased it from Sephora, Sunway Pyramid, and it happens to be the most expensive birthday present I've ever purchased in my 20 years of being a human. We also got her something from Victoria's Secret, and a pretty cake from Komugi.

Stripes.
We were to pick Jeanna up from around Paradigm Mall before proceeding to Betty's Midwest Kitchen for our girls-day-out lunch, when stuff happened on LDP.


If you're familiar enough with the section of the highway, the right-most lane of LDP around the PKNS Football Club always slows down (for whatever reason). On this day, it did slow down as usual, to around 30-40km/h, then suddenly down to 0.

Chain reaction a.k.a domino effect - what happens when you're driving in a distracted state.
Jasmine hit the breaks in time and stopped a few inches shy of the car in front, but the few behind us weren't so fortunate. I wasn't able to absorb the full impact of the situation, because I almost got thrown out of the vehicle. LESSON: always wear your seat belt. By the time I came to my senses, Jasmine was already out of the car, and I followed with a phone camera.


After some discussion, we agreed to report the incident, and we spent almost an entire afternoon at the police headquarters at Petaling Jaya. Surprisingly, the one with the least damage taken was the one who made the biggest fuss.

Let the feast begin! And I've learned to have my meat with the super fresh eggs!
hen all was done, all of us were craving for lunch. Jeanna was in the mood for sukiyaki buffet, and so to Suki-Ya we headed to.

Sakura (raspberry) layer cake from Komugi. The lightly sweetened layer cake is coated with raspberry-flavored chocolate and decorated with additional chocolate.
15 servings of beef and lamb in total, and a few squirting beef balls (and some icecream) later, we headed to Jeanna's place, where we had more laughs than any other girls had, and had some delicious raspberry layer cake~


Even after going through so much shit through the years, laughing with these girls are always effortless. We can be crazy together, share pretty much everything with each other, and spam each other with love! Pretty sure I'm not gonna ever let go of this bunch - friends mean the world to me, because family has no choice but to put up with you, but friends go the extra mile a voluntarily take your good and your bad. =)

Little Pantry, IOI Mall

NOTE: This is a really OLD post.


This was one of the days where we didn't know what to eat, even when we've scoured the entire mall for a decent restaurant with decent pricing.
 
Garden princess-y.
We approached the restaurant and had a seat at the circular couch area, somewhat central in the restaurant. I would describe the place as a restaurant designed for princess-y gatherings and functions, because most of the furniture was of pink and white, with either generic white-painted wooden chairs, or princess chairs, complete with the floral cushions.

Garden porch-like setup.
It was like an indoor garden party set-up, and the walls were decorated with balloons and assortments of glasses and vases, complete with rattan and wrought iron screens painted in white and some little potted flowers here and there.

Beyond gigantic.
The menu was the stupidest menu I've ever seen - not in terms of content, but in terms of size. Even the waitress herself had much trouble trying to handle them.

Mushroom soup that comes with the sets.
Variety was good, especially when it offered both Western and Asian options on both the a la carte and set menu, but the prices weren't to my liking. The set menu offered better value for money (naturally), providing an entree, a soup, and a drink; the cheapest set being around MYR12.90, and that excludes the taxes.

Basil beef rice - delightfully fragrant.
Black pepper chicken chop that was super-tender.
Portion size wasn't too bad, and the quality surprised me a little. Restaurants with fancy fixtures and decoration usually disappoints when it comes to the food quality, because they've spent more on the appearances and the food suffers, but the flavor of the food itself was really good.


Location - 7.5 / 10 (it's in Puchong, 'nuff said)
Atmosphere - 8.5 / 10
Food quality - 9 / 10
Price - 8.5 / 10 (it's still expensive to me, but you pay for the quality of the food)
Service - 8.5 / 10


LITTLE PANTRY
G02 & G18 Ground Floor,
IOI Mall,
Bandar Puchong Jaya,
47100 Puchong, 
Selangor.
TEL.: 603 8070 8527

Complications

Meeting up with my ex-lecturer earlier today gave me an epiphany, or a serious realization - my human relations, especially with guys, are a complete mess.


I pretty much document everything that happens in my relationships - start point, end point, all the key points, how other people relate to them, how they're involved with certain organizations and such. Which is why a lot of things around me remind me of someone, one way or another.


With my close friends who have been putting up with my bullshit for years, it's pretty commonplace if I get "inappropriately" involved with a guy. Blurred lines existed in almost every relationship I've ever had - almost, but not yet, or not ever.


And the best thing is, all of it pretty much happened within the same time frame.


Heck, just within the 3 months of my internship, all hell broke loose - I drank myself flat out drunk for the first time in my life, actually heard him say he wanted to break up (through voice message) for the first time, and cried my eyes out in the middle of a hookah bar.


It's easy to tell people about how many boyfriends I previously had, and that number doesn't even come close to the double digits.


The list of guys whom never really drew the lines clearly, or were categorized as "special cases" spans from the North Pole to South Pole. For a less exaggerated representation, more than any girl of my age and demographic should have.


Whenever I talk with my babes, or people I meet on a daily basis, it's easy - I've had x number of blurred-lines relationships, bla bla bla... But talking to someone I almost never talk to... I never thought I'd ever say this, but it's beyond embarrassing. In the traditional Chinese terminology - dishonor, a disgrace.


While I say I have self-respect as a person and a woman, my actions say that I compromise too much. Too many times I allow myself to become an option for some, and a source of boredom cure for some. Those who actually care for me or actually desire me for a long term purpose are usually continents away, or have been semi-cruelly rejected and friendzoned.


It's something I proudly boast about to people in the past; but it's something I cringe at now. How the hell did I get to this point?


While I felt any self-value slip away very, very discreetly, I can sleep soundly knowing that I've never been those drunk girls in clubs stripping for every guy to see and letting everyone have their share of my cake.


And I've also come to realize that it's almost impossible to be as clean-cut as I want to be in relationships - I thought of relationships like a simple factory process: it starts at A, ends at Z, no loose ends. While I don't think exs can ever get along ever again (because one or both parties have fallen out of love with each other, and one shall not mess with free will), it's like I tied a knot and didn't cut off the remaining loose ends, and they slowly frayed and frayed.


If I were to adopt the typical societal mindset, I would blame the media for giving me unrealistic expectations for relationships, and it actually has - a little. The movies are all about the cuddles, kisses, the sweet parts - I pretty much expect too much of that, which leads to a lot of problems, which I've painfully learned from the hard way.


Having said that, it's still pretty painful to know that something perfect swept through my life for a few moments, but had to stay just beyond my fingertips for the rest of my life - like I'm destined to see everything, observe everything, and notice everything, but never getting to get anywhere near it. At least I can rest peacefully knowing that I had the fortune that many didn't have to experience such perfection.


Sorting out this mess is going to take some time, but at least I've already ejected some of the useless crap that's been lying around for not too long, but has affected me enough to render me almost non-functional.


Then there's that dilemma.


Have you ever come across the situation where you have actually a million things you wanna say, but when the time comes, you just don't have the balls to utter a single word?


That's me whenever I get into a confrontation with my mother over coming home later than curfew time or the time that I said I'd be home. There are so many things I'd want to say every time an suggested accusation is thrown at me, but I keep my mouth shut like I had my tongue cut out.


I'll just take all the damage then lick my wounds in a corner when I have less than the safe amount of emotional HP left.


It's largely because of the reactions I get that I'd rather not reveal where I'm going. "I prefer that you didn't" is a very twisted way of saying "hell no you aren't going to".


No.


"Hell no" means "no". Saying that you prefer that I didn't means I still can because it's an opinion. You'd flip anyhow - regardless of whether I let you know before or after. I'm always at the same few places, with the same few people - college, home, or that mamak that I always go to, and you would know if I'm going somewhere else.


C'mon, I could have a short trip to the beach in between classes for all you know. How many people could I possibly share 100% of my life with? Probably no one else has more information about me than you do, and even if you did know where I was going, I doubt that you'd be anywhere near accepting about the general activities planned there.


As much as you may dislike it, I have my preferences that would inevitably clash with a lot of other people's opinions - my relationships with various guys being one of them. I prefer roadside mamaks to an expensive cafe; I'm satisfied with MYR4 mixed rice than having to pay over MYR10 for about the same thing.


I'm so used to being said "no" to that whenever someone offers me something, I get impossibly embarrassed and guilty - it's like already a habit for me to not expect to get anything that I want unless I work for it myself entirely. Presents are like miracles to me because they rarely happen at all, and when they do, I feel illogically guilty for accepting them.


You want me to live like a hermit? Sure. Why not. But don't confront me for acting like one in the future.


Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Library Coffee Bar, Avenue K, Jalan Ampang

The coffee culture is pretty much a thing in the mainstream world, and as I mentioned in my Coffee Cottage post, coffee bars and cafes are mushrooming all over Kuala Lumpur.


The Library is a popular chain of bars among the modern city night-life - it's in many hip areas frequented by the young and trendy. They've come up with the Library Coffee Bar at Avenue K, replacing Stage club along with Johnny Rockets. It's a coffee bar where the baristas don't wear Starbucks-esque aprons, but smart vests with a shirt.


Memories came flooding in when I stepped out onto the foyer - in 2012 I waited here for Miyavi, and that was one of the best nights of my life. I could visualize where the stage was, where the VIP area was, and where we headbanged all night to Miyavi's performance... *sigh*


My friend from high school Erwin works there, and I've been wanting to try out the place for some time. And I did, along with two guys, on the day that Erwin wasn't working. Which wasn't too big an issue, and I got to try out the stuff there anyway.

BOOKSHELF. And le people =D
You'd be a little bit confused, because there's a Johnny Rockets podium right outside (both Johnny Rockets and Library Coffee Bar share the same entrance), but once you get past the bright colors representing Johnny, you'd be welcomed into a rustic cafe and the delicious aroma of waffles cooking behind a glass divider.

Sound-proofed walls dominates the upper floor, highlighted with dim lights.
There are two levels to the coffee bar, both dominated by a hipster-ish bookshelf. The lower level is brighter, giving the place a more lively atmosphere; while the upper level, with an actual bar with bar stools, small arm chairs in a corner, and some couches oozed a more laid-back and cuddly feel. It isn't as mainstream as a Starbucks joint, but it was definitely reminiscent of a Starbucks joint - I would say the difference in atmosphere, as the Library Coffee Bar definitely oozed more class.



We ordered a drink each. Well, I ordered drinks for the both of us. My regular would be a green tea soy frappe at Starbucks, or a Pure Vanilla at CBTL. I ordered a hazelnut white coffee for him, and I tried out the pure vanilla. The prices were pretty much like Starbucks or CBTL, but I preferred how deliciously creamy yet light the pure vanilla turned out to be!

What our dates usually looks like if we're not puffing away or talking.
We were later joined by Ronnie, whom I haven't seen in ages and refuses to post a shot of his sick robotic arm tattoo. I didn't get a shot of his macchiato, which came in an espresso cup.


I need to rant about my obsession with espresso. Not the coffee itself - heavens, no, it's way too strong for me; but with the word itself. Espresso is the Italian word for the strong shot of caffeine that's used in a lot of coffee-based beverages now, and it is NOT to be confused with EXpresso. You neither spell it nor pronounce it as expresso. ESPRESSO is the way to go. The Italians and I will thank you very much. End of rant LOL.


Location - 6 / 10 (central, but I wouldn't drive all the way to Avenue K just for a cup of coffee)
Atmosphere - 9.5 / 10 (I love rustic, homey, snuggly atmospheres)
Beverage quality - 8.5 / 10 (I can only rate for the pure vanilla - hazelnut is not really up in my hood)
Price - 6 / 10
Service - 9 / 10 (friendly, efficient, and professional)


LIBRARY COFFEE BAR
Business hours: 8.30 a.m. - 11 p.m.
Lot G-8B, Avenue K,
156, Jalan Ampang,
50450 Kuala Lumpur.
Tel.: 603 2181 6077