Where Irfan and I had lunch sometimes after school

Where We Used To Eat

Ain did not venture into Pandan Indah the last time we were here. So, this time, we thought we would take a look. Specifically, we drove by the restaurants we used to frequent when we lived here. The entire suburb was busier than ever. But as you can see some of old regular restaurants are still there. Except for Restoran Lima Bintang. RIP Lima Bintang.

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Ilham Bestari

The Place Where He Grew Up

The day after Aidiladha we thought we would head into the city to check out the borough of Pandan Indah where Irfan grew up. It would literally be a balik kampung for him even though the kampung was Kuala Lumpur. Born less than 10 klicks away as the crow flies in Kuala Lumpur Hospital, he knew no other home other than Pandan Indah before we moved to Perlis nearly four years ago. From Nia’s house all the way south, we travelled up north via the MEX and inserted ourselves into the MRR2. We thought we would visit Wan Cik who took care of Irfan from when he was 1 year old until he enrolled in pre-school. It was Nia’s first time at Wan Cik’s house too. Wan Cik had expanded her house since the last time we were there. Irfan caught up with Afzan who is actually his uncle. Soon […]

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At Pandan Capital

A Return To the Tenth Floor

It’s the Labour Day/Wesak Day long weekend. We were unsure if we were able to travel 500 klicks plus change to the old house back on the Tenth Floor in Kuala Lumpur. We had planned on departing at 3AM, but because we were exhausted we awoke at six, and after gearing up were only able to push off from Kangar at seven. Twitter warned us of slow traffic on the highway ahead of us, which forced us off and into the state roads near Selama toward Taiping. Soon we decided to stop at Atok and Opah’s in Sitiawan for a brief rest and Friday prayers. We resumed our journey at 3PM and reached Kuala Lumpur by nightfall. It was a strange feeling, returning there after five months away from the city. I don’t believe we were ever away from the city anywhere near this amount of time. The strangeness was […]

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Nooo!!! Not another Gamera attack!! There goes Sunday morning!

Gamera Moves Into Town!

And there goes the neighbourhood in Pandan Indah. Well, not really. Recently, I had Irfan’s Gamera toy with me in the car, so wherever I drive and I find a photo opportunity, I’d take an impromptu photo of the toy in forced perspective with the surrounding buildings in view. So, here’s what I’ve managed to come up with so far. The image captions are text from the original tweets when I posted them live.

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Back to School in 2011

Also, the first post of 2011. [[image:2011-01-03-school-opens02.jpg::center:0]] This year, Irfan began his proper Islamic classes; three hours in the morning, ending about two and a hours before regular afternoon school starts. It was not as difficult as I thought it would be for him. He appeared to like going to the new school, and several of his regular school friends are there. But that seems to be the way of things normally anyway. Here in Pandan Indah, he has more friends and acquaintances than his parents considering the number of other students he socialises with at school. [[image:2011-01-03-school-opens01.jpg::center:0]] He calmly underwent the short interview with the headmaster – a friendly fellow – who asked him some questions to see in which class he would be placed. [[image:2011-01-03-school-opens03.jpg::center:0]] The following day, upon dropping him off we saw him immediately lining up with his class for morning assembly. He appeared to be […]

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The gang at Pak Ya

Breaking of Fast With Atok and Opah

Most of our breaking of fast at sundown during Ramadhan – known as iftar – were done at home at the dinner table. But once in a while we do go out to dinner, but only after Maghrib. Last weekend, Irfan’s grandparents were also in town a-visiting, so Sunday night we decided to eat out. We tried out Pak Ya’s place at Taman Cempaka, which is to the north of and right next to Pandan Indah. When the food arrived, we came to two conclusions. One, we have to take photos of our orders. Two, we will have to take Ayah Cik, Cik Dik and Yaya to dinner here when they next visit. We didn’t take photos of all the dishes, unfortunately.

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Sure it's flooded, but let's eat!

Wrath Of Diabolical Water Elementals!

While picking up Irfan from school in the very late afternoon, we were hit by a great, big thunderstorm the size of a big thunderstorm. There was a point where there was no delay between lightning and thunder. Driving to school, the windshield, which thankfully did its job keeping the wind out failed to ensure the rain slid off fast enough so we can see through it. Even the wipers were useless. On the way back, we had to cross Pandan Indah central to get from the school on the south side to our house on the north side. We discovered that we couldn’t because of flash floods. All the primary, secondary and the secret routes had a foot or so of water.So, we drove went to a mamak restaurant for some roti canai and warm drinks. Below, we can see some water on this side of the main road […]

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Dinner With Irfan’s Tok and Opah Unggai

Irfan’s grandparents are here from Sitiawan and have been spending several days with us. Tonight they will be heading for Middletown where they will spend the next two months with Vin, Sila and their upcoming child. On Saturday, Irfan’s great-uncle and great-aunt, designated Tok Unggai and Opah Unggai arrived all the way from Taiping to spend the night at the Tenth Floor. We were soon joined by their daughter and son-in-law, designated Cik Da and Pak Long Fadzil. Opah Unggai recently had a promotion and had decided to treat us for dinner. Ain and I thought the Thai restaurant in the Pandan Indah sprawl close by would be great for the dinner. Night fell and we headed for the restaurant where we had sweet and sour siakap, steamed siakap, kailan ikan masin, kerabu mangga, tom yam campur and telur bungkus. [[image:opah_unggai_belanja01.jpg:The ones belanja-ing in the foreground:center:0]] [[image:opah_unggai_belanja02.jpg:Ain uses a holographic […]

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10th floor by night 01

From the Tenth Floor At Night

Atok Irfan took some fantastic night photos from the balcony of the tenth floor here, something I couldn’t have done without a tripod. You can see the Menara Maxisegar and the Menara MPAJ in the first picture. Click on the thumbnails for larger images. Thanks to Irfan’s grandfather for the beautiful photos.

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Satellite Photos of the Tenth Floor

Once upon a time I checked what the Google Maps‘ satellite photos had of Kuala Lumpur. They weren’t pretty impressive at low resolution. Today I checked them again and I found that this is no longer the case. It’s possible to even see individual cars on the highway. Click on the thumbnail below for a picture of our apartment building and its surrounding environment. [[popup:satmap01.jpg:(thumbnail):Pandan Indah and such:center:1]] Take a look below for a close up of our building, which is the one on the left. You can even make out the swimming pool on the left side of the building. [[image:satmap02.jpg:I’m mooning the satellite, can you tell?:center:0]]

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Pandan Capital 3

In Front of Pandan Capital

So the other day I walked from the house all the way across Pandan Indah to the MPAJ (Ampang Jaya Municipal Council) building to pay property tax over the counter. One weird thing about this house is that the mailing address has it in Kuala Lumpur with a KL postcode. The phone line is part of the Cheras – Pandan Jaya local prefix, which also puts it in Kuala Lumpur’s network. But we have to pay property tax to Ampang Jaya, which is part of the state of Selangor. Meanwhile, behind us is Cempaka, which is Ampang, and in front of us is Pandan Indah central, which is also Ampang. It seems like we’re trapped in a thin peninsular of Kuala Lumpur, trapped between alien territories. Anyway here are some photos I took of the street in front of the MPAJ building. Here’s the view up the street toward the […]

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New problems too

Haze: Returning With a Vengeance

One of the things I hate most about living here is the periodic invasion of unhealthy particulates that floods (and I mean floods) the entire region, known in local jargon as haze. Once I thought why not call it smog cause that’s what it essentially is, but know I know that such an evil, soul-sucking phenomenon should have its own unique name. Now, I’ve reported this before back in February but that old thing was nothing compared to what we’re experiencing now. This haze should have been declared a major disaster, starting early this week. The haze and I go a long way back. The last major haze activity occurred in 1997, but that was caused by burning in Borneo to the east. West-blowing winds smogged up the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia, which bore the brunt of the onslaught. Of course I had to be working there at the […]

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