Our Last KL Trip

Was extraordinary... A pretty "eventful" one..

On the first day in KL, we didn't shop.  We did many things, but shopping. 

To start with, I made a big big mistake of online booking a hotel too rashly.  Especially for someone who's very fussy.  Guess hubby & I weren't in our right mind when our flight fare jacked up by almost $50 in a mere 10 mins of delayed booking (waiting for Con & Ivan)!  So I thought better settle the accommodation before the price increased.  Originally wanted Parkroyal but Con mentioned about hoping to pay cheaper so I thought she'd wanted elsewhere.  Then after the airfare shock, we rushed into booking the hotel - Fahrenheit Suites.  I only read online reviews after making the prepaid reservation for all... & they weren't good ones, except the excellent location.  So we preempted the Lims. 

Upon arrival at Fahrenheit Suites early morning, I was in complete shock.  From the lift to reception, the environs of the apartment, the lift from reception to rooms, the corridor...... we're all beyond astoundment, or at least for me.  I'm all to blame for landing all of us in such a place.  As it's too early (@ 9am+) to check in, we left our baggages there & walked around.

Breakfast at Dome, Pavilion

After a slow breakfast, hubby & I went in search of hair salon while Con & Ivan walked around.  Hubby had a haircut & I did hair treatment which took 2.5h.  By the time we're done, it's time to check in (& we got really nervous, ha!).  Ok, the rooms were alright as they're being refurbished mostly.  Ivan & Con were ok with the room.  While hubby was also fine with it, he let me decide if I wanted to change hotel.  Initially I wanted to stay on as didn't want to waste money but I was really unhappy & very bothered... so a tough decision was eventually made - change hotel!  My understanding hubby was supportive of my decision... didn't chide me for wasting money.  Well, who on earth can take me better than my dear hubby!? 

It's just nice that we're snacking at Pavilion.. so we went near Dome (why Dome? because we got their free WiFi that morning) & made online booking with my One X ;).  Once done, we went back to Fahrenheit Suites to pack up & go!  Con & Ivan were napping so we didn't disturb them.

Can't wait to say goodbye to this place.

Waiting for the lift, which looked exactly like cargo lift

So we moved to Parkroyal.  And we only had the time to put down our luggage as we're meeting Con & Ivan at 5pm for early dinner.  They're pretty surprised that we're so quick in our action.  They'd no intention to move... it's actually very good that they could make do with it... frankly I wished I could too.. it'd have saved us $200 (as the first booking was prepaid, totally non-refundable).

Satiated ourselves with the good food we've been craving for long... especially the 辣子鸡 & 流沙包!

After dinner, we went back to hotel & changed room as the first room was infested with ants.  What a day..... we'd been busy with such extraordinary activities. Hmmm.  Then we quickly got ready to meet Con & Ivan again for drinks & we're already running late.

Drinks at @live.

  A nice chill-out place with entertaining performances.

For this trip, one of the disappointments was not being able to eat Meng Kee char siew as it was not opened :((   But we're all happy that we had a great dinner at Jalan Alor instead.

All the dishes were delicious including chicken satay that's not in the picture. 

Jalan Alor street stalls.  It's a new experience for me too as it's quite different from my last visit there, which was 大排档 style.

The 2nd night, we went back to @live to finish up our bottle.

Very crowded even on a Sunday night

A bottle of Glenmorangie shared by 3 of us (Con drank something else) & we took 2 days to empty it... The 2nd night's was a killer.  Guess I drank too much & too fast :(

Nice dim sum at New Shanghai, Pavilion.  But also got me instant sore throat :(

Our Shopping Loots from KL

Got quite a few cheap & nice items from this trip :D

All my RM25 purchases except the grey piece, which was @RM19. I wasn't allowed to try them on so very happy that they all fit well :)
My recent craze is long tops to match my skinny/tight pants & jeans. I especially love the orange 1 with a see-through lacy back (original price @RM69).. Like the black dress too (last piece), been wanting to buy a casual dress like this. @S$10.50, it's a steal!

The grey shorts @RM25 too & the denim one @RM10 (S$4.20 only!!). And yes, it fits.. hee.

I love the black jacket from Times Sq. At first I didn't wanna buy it as it's relatively more ex (@RM65). But I missed it much... so hubby brought me back the next day to get it :)). The slouchy cardi in grey @RM25.

I finally found the 'Volume Hair Base' (at the top of the pic)! I tried to search in Spore but unsuccessful... & found it in a very small shop in Sungei Wang instead! And guess what?? It's hubby who discovered it when we walked past the shop! So cheap.. bought it @S$5.50 after a 20% discount. It's selling online @US$15!


Some nice shirts for hubby

The cutting of these 2 pants from Times Sq & bermudas fits hubby really well :)

Exchange rate: S$1= RM2.39

The 1st Family Trip

It's a great one. There're family bonding moments & personal time for shopping :) We'd much fun... so noisy that my parents in-law took up the role of "discipline master & mistress" - they'd go "Shhhhh..." whenever our volume was too loud. Haha.

This in fact was also my 1st family trip. As for my side (of family), the 1st & also the last one 6 years back was close enough but bro & family didn't go... so it wasn't complete.

Though the trip was only to KL, it's the time enjoyed with the family that matters :)

A Short Family Trip

To KL, with my inlaws.. the whole family.

Hubby & I are looking forward to it :)

Stock Take

For this trip, my shopping was controlled... but I still bought more than I originally planned to (exchange rate - S$1 = RM2.45):

• Redken Vivagen Treatment: approx S$28 vs S$38 in Spore
  
• Levi's Patricia Ultra Skinny Jeans: S$93 vs S$150 in Spore (lowest @S$100 during last month's promotion of 2 pairs for S$199)
  
• Vichy Total Pore Resurfacing Essence @ S$35 vs S$49 in Spore
  
• 1 pair of FOS skinny jeans @ S$18
  
• 1 pair of flip-flop @ S$10
  
• 1 pair of sandals @ S$15
  
• 2 tops @ S$10 each

As for hubby, he bought very few items as he'd prefer to keep the money for my shopping (my hubby's really great!). His:

• 1 GAP tee @ S$10 (I love that it's in a gorgeous pink, with nice graphics)
  
• 1 Seed office shirt @ S$12

Besides the above, we bought 5 pairs of slippers from Times Square, each pair @ S$4 only! The 4 of us had a spree at the stall as all of them looked so nice & cute... hee..

The water melon is hubby's, the cat belongs to me... & we're wearing at home now... so comfy:)
The pair of cherry slippers is mine & hubby chose the one with 2 lil tortoises.
Bought the same cat slippers for sis.

I like the 2 tops I purchased. The grey 1 goes very well with all my skinny pants (& jeans too) & the white tiered top is flattering on the figure :)

I could have bought a few if we weren't on budget especially after the extra S$350+ spent on air tix. Hmmmmm....

And I realise that this is a good way to keep track of when I've bought what... always referred to my past entries when I needed info ;)

Our Trip

We've been back from our short trip for more than a week but I was too busy with some other stuff to update.

The idea of going to KL together came up out of the blue... guess all of us needed a break. Very quickly, we reached a confirmation & booked our tix with Tiger Air, that's a month before our trip. Morning (0720h) flight for us as we like to start the day early while Con & Ivan chose to leave on a noon flight.

On the day of departure, we reached the Budget Terminal @6. But the lady at the check-in counter referred us to the Customer Service section after taking quite a while on our booking. Then this was what happened at the CS counter:

TA staff: "Sir, are you sure you've booked this morning's flight?"
Us (worriedly as with this question asked, we knew something's very very wrong....): "Yes ..."
TA: "I've got bad news for you (looking at both of us)... you're not on this morning's flight."
Us: "Are you sure!?"
TA: "Yes. And the worst is... you've missed your flight, that is, yesterday morning 17 Sept..."

That's the nightmare for any traveler!! Upon hearing the bad news, I wanted to faint...! We'd doubts in the said mistake as when booking online, we're talking to Con/Ivan to confirm on the dates. And 2 pairs of eyes (mine & hubby's) checked the booking details. But the staff said it's in their record & our fault was that we didn't print a copy of the booking. Our printer at home was spoilt & we saved a soft copy in our PC (& our PC is now in the warehouse). Hubby thought of printing a copy from his office's printer but lately he got so busy at home & at work that he'd missed it out. I was wrong for not reminding him too :(

The staff was quite helpful though. He told us that it'd be costly to get on that same flight by then (S$400+ for 2) & that the cheapest walk-in fare would be by Air Asia. We thought of giving up the whole holiday plan, just forfeit a night's accomodation but eventually decided to try Air Asia since we're already all prepped for the trip. Then we paid S$7+ for a cab, just to move from BT to T1 where Air Asia is. Sigh! Air Asia quoted S$360 for both of us including all taxes & an additional 15kg for checkin luggage. We took it. The only consolation was the departure time wasn't too far apart from Tiger's.. @ 0750h, meaning we'd still arrive early morning. We also had to call our driver in KL to change our ETA timing :( So we paid a total of S$525 to fly Spore-KL & return. We just got to think "Ah Q-ly" that it's still cheaper than taking SQ, ya? Such a dramatic morning..... I've never met such screwup in my life of traveling so far.... :(

By the time we arrived in KL, we've kind of got over the unpleasantness.

Checked in to the Orchid Club room @ Parkroyal.
All thanks to the Prestige card we have, we paid only S$107nett/night while Con & Ivan paid S$94 for a deluxe room. But frankly the deluxe room was nice enough, newly renovated with an open concept... unlike the one we got during our previous trip.

Ready to shop! Before that, have a dose of hubby's fav Green Tea Latte :)

We spent the afternoon in Sungei Wang... got the items in my shopping list :)

Back in the hotel... redeemed our tea & cake for 2 (1 of the vouchers we'd from the membership package) while waiting for the arrival of Con & Ivan. Their flight was delayed for 2 hours & adding on to it, it started to rain since late afternoon which led to heavy traffic.
By the time they finally arrived, which was 3 hours later than original plan, they're already quite lethargic.
When Con called & informed us from Singapore, we told them their situation wasn't the worst :\

As it's raining since late afternoon, we'd dinner at a noodle house in Sungei Wang followed by shopping.


We shopped till almost all the shops were closed. Then returned to the hotel to freshen up before meeting up again for drinks.

Club Quattro @ Avenue K is the latest club in town, which is located just across the Twin Towers. A cool place to chill out. It carries the name of 4 seasons - Spring (Lounge), Summer (Restaurant), Autumn (Club) & Winter (Bar). Interesting.

Having drinks in Spring :)



Happy happy after a few drinks ;)

Nearly 2am... all of us were already quite intoxicated by then. Wanted to check out the popular Autumn Club... but we're not willing to pay for cover charge (patrons from the other 3 'seasons'
weren't exempted) as told by the waitress. For some fun (under the influence of alcohol I guess), we wanted to try again at the entrance with receipts we chalked up from the drinks. Con & I talked to the 2 ladies at the door.... & yep, the 4 of us managed to get in for free! We're so proud of it;) Who says girl could only charm man to get her ways, huh? Haha.
It's really crowded inside.. so we left in less than half an hour & after some dances to try to work the inebriating effect off.

3am. Having supper nearby...
It's been a long time I haven't drank like this... not a lot (2 mugs of beer, 1 vodka+cranberry & 1 Kilkenny) but already got praises from hubby.. hee... as nowadays I'd usually doze off after a bot of beer at home, in front of the tv. So he'd try to not let me drink when we're watching something interesting. Haha.

Looking fresh again the next morning!

Brought Con & Ivan to our much craved Char Siew. And this was our 2nd visit for this trip. They liked it too! ;)

While Con's doing mani in Sungei Wang, we went for foot massage just a level down, the 1 I went during our last trip. Hubby doesn't enjoy massage, so he waited for us. Quite cheap... @ RM35 for 40mins.

Krispy Kreme!

A pretty fruitful shopping trip @ Times Square. Were looking forward to the 大排档 dinner. We're greedy, especially when we didn't get to eat the previous night due to rain, & planned 2 stops in a night... opposite Ritz Carlton (our usual treats of the delicious 鸳鸯, yong tau foo & 蜜糖金吉 drink...) & Jalan Alor. But very disappointingly, it rained heavily again. So we proceeded to Pavilion instead to have an early & light dinner, then street side hawker supper later.

Dragon-i Restaurant, Pavilion.
Very nice Shanghainese & Szechuan food yet cheap (for restaurant standard)... eg. a big bowl of ramen was only @ RM12. We ordered so much that it wasn't a light dinner anymore....

Clockwise from top left:
- The only dish I didn't really appreciate.. beacon wrapped veg?
- 四川担担面. Looks spicy but actually not. Nice... like the peanut soup.
- This dish seems intimidating with the number of dried chilli outnumbering the meat. Con thought it's too spicy for me but nope.. I don't find it so at all. Hmm... My (chilli intake) level has improved huh :) Anyway, the deep fried chicken was crispy & tasty.
- This hubby's & my fav! Deep fried prawns coated with salted egg paste. Very special & yummy!
- Very good 小笼包 @ only RM8
- The french beans with minced meat was as delicious

In the end, we didn't have supper. There went my 鸳鸯.... Sobs~ Hubby hit the bed straight after returning as he'd been having headache for the whole day & got worse at dinner. I stayed up till 2am as I was too engrossed in battling with my mobile phone game :P Only the next morning I got to know I was actually the last 'surviving' party as Con & Ivan couldn't beat the exhaustion & slept @ 10.30pm, all 3 of them went to bed without showering. Hmm... Quite a hangover they having.. Hee..

Breakfast on the last day. We missed the previous day's due to the boozing.
Can you see the heavy-weight couple in the background? They're really good... I first noticed the girl when she's busy digging in a mountain size of rice & meat. Just then, she got up leaving their table, totally full of food including a plate that contained 5 pieces of danishes/crossaints, to get some more food! The guy had similar capacity as he busied himself with the food on their table as well as the spread out there. From their conversations, they're most likely Singaporeans. Hmm.

Holiday is always nice. But I'm not very contented with this trip... we paid S$300+ more but unable to enjoy the usual indulgences (if not more) whenever we're in KL.. the big one gotta be sans 大排档.

KL, here we come !!

We're having a 3D2N trip to KL next weekend.. hee!

There'll be the 4 of us... Constance, Ivan, hubby & me :)

Really looking forward to the short break as it's been pretty stressful for us recently because of the move......

Our lil Getaway

When we planned for this trip, we booked our accomodation online. Just a few days before our trip we're contacted by the hotel as they wanted to sell us their annual membership - Prestige. Initially we're resistant but eventually took up the package @ RM428. Glad we did.....

Upon getting the membership, we're being offered:
- pay the price of a superior room & be upgraded to a deluxe room
- pay the price of a deluxe room which would then be upgraded to a Club room
To save about S$29 (anyway the rooms would be the same & we wouldn't need facilities/services), we opted the first.

And now, about our short holiday:)

Guess what time we slept the night before our trip? 9pm.

Our flight was 6.30am & I woke up at 3.15am! Kind of funny as on some Fri nights, that's the time we get to bed! Left home at 5am & reached airport just in time - 5.30am. Phew!

We reached hotel just past 9am & were so glad to be given an early check-in when we're mentally prepared to leave our luggage at the concierge. Good service!

But I wasn't happy with the deluxe room once I stepped in. They said they've renovated but it still looked a bit tired. So changed our mind & wanted to take the 'Deluxe to Club Floor' offer instead when I called the reception & been told the rooms would be different. Upon receiving our request, the reception gave it to us as another complimentary upgrade. Really nice of them!

Our Orchid Club room. Nice!
Like the see-through bathroom.
I was happy the moment I stepped in. The difference between the 2 categories was big but the price difference was only like S$29?
But anyway, we didn't have to top up!:D

Very zen ambience in this new premium wing opened a year ago.


Access to the Club floors by this private bubble lift.
Like this all glass lift... so transparent that you can even see the staircase behind!

After settling the accomodation matters, the 1st stop was of course to treat ourselves to the much missed about char siew at Jalan Tengkat Tong Shin;) Then started shopping in Sungei Wang/Bukit Bintang. As our hotel was conveniently located in the midst, we went back every few hours to take a break from the hot weather.

Had our afternoon tea in the club lounge & chilled a bit before heading out again.

Jackie Chan's Cafe in Lot 10

At night, we were already craving for the yummy 鸳鸯 but was full house! And it's just past 7pm:( So we went across to another 大排档 which we'd also visit whenever we're there & took Ampang youg tau foo + fried kway teow instead.

Filling up our stomach for the time being...

Thereafter walked to Pavilion. This place is massive!! But we're already very exhausted by then... so were quite overwhelmed by the size & didn't really walk around much. And importantly, we're still missing our 鸳鸯... hee....

Voilà! The streetside stall where we went back after Pavilion & bought our 鸳鸯. There's no variety offered here, only a few staples like 鸳鸯, lor min ... but it's still so popular.

Our tapao-ed supper!:) And we must give them 2 thumbs-ups for the great service.
I thought the food would be too soaked with gravy by the time we reached hotel but it's better than not having it.
Then when we got it, we're so impressed that they took the initiative to pack the gravy separately.
We've never come across this kind of good service in Singapore (I mean hawker). Sometimes even when we requested, they'd tell you "we don't do that"!

So are you thinking.... what, on earth, is 鸳鸯? Here it is.....

It's half kway teow, half bee hoon.

Think the popularity of this stall is because of its gravy... very tasty. And the deep fried bee hoon was still very, very crispy! And it's cheap! Only RM6 for a big portion like this :)
Just looking at it now makes me drool.... I miss my 鸳鸯!:(

We rest early that night, @ 11pm. Too tired after a long day.

Then, it's my birthday! We woke up early for breakfast so we could start the day early. The breakfast buffet spread was good but I preferred the second morning's as I still like conventional items like baked beans, hush browns, bacons etc over some special international breakfast. Yes, they changed variety every day... that's why Parkroyal KL's breakfast was quite raved about by the hotel guests. It's included in our room. Otherwise we could also use our membership card to pay for just 1 person @ RM48nett.

Then went to KLCC. Disappointingly this time round, the shopping wasn't fruitful... I only bought a pair of shoes. We spent less than 4 hours in KLCC including a lunch @ Dome. Better cut our losses by leaving the place fast since nothing's to our fancy there. Back to Sungei Wang, I got a treat from hubby - a foot massage session as my legs were aching from all the walking. And it's cheap... @RM38 for 40mins:) It ended just in time for our dinner. We'd made reservation the night before at the hotel's Chinese restaurant - Si Chuan Dou Hua. Dinner was GREAT! I've been craving for Peking Duck & finally got it on birthday:)

It's a big bird, and yes... we're having it all by ourselves!

Feasting @ Si Chuan Dou Hua.
Just the Peking Duck served 3 types of dishes - (1)the skin, (2)the meat fried with 生面 & (3) salted vege duck soup. Then the one in green is (4)8-Treasure soup (with sharks fin, fish maw etc).. looked weird (think they pound the spinach to derive this greeny look) but tasted delicious.. just like sharks fin soup. Yummy! We also ordered (5)half a roasted chicken & (6)broccoli with crab meat. We got so much that shocked the waitress.

The birthday meal was sooo good.. the food was delicious... but of course, we couldn't finish all. And we'd a very pleasant surprise... the bill came up to S$13.75 (RM33) for the whole dinner! We'd a RM100 cash voucher from the membership pack & we could still use the card for a 50% discount. But we didn't expect them to half the total amount first then deduct the RM100 cash voucher. They're generous, aren't they? ;)

A pic before leaving, with a bloated tummy

After dinner, we'd a drink at the lounge, complimentary as using another voucher again.

Quiet on a Sunday night

Then the last thing before my birthday's over..... my BD cake, with compliments from the hotel.

The dark chocolate cake was nice but we're too full to enjoy. We took only 1/4 & gave the remaining to the housekeeping.

The next day... our flight was 8pm & the hotel was kind enough to allow us a late check-out @ 4pm. After breakfast, we went to Times Square Berjaya.

An ice cream treat before leaving KL. I love Baskin Robin's Pistachio Almond. Too bad they're no longer in Singapore :(

Look... Krispy Kreme is coming to KL!

The 3D2N trip was too short. But it's a very good trip. We didn't shop as much this time round, more on eating... so much so that I came back with gastric flu :( Thank God I only started to feel unwell in KLIA, while waiting for our flight back. Blame it on the 2 big dumplings we ate before checking out. I was not hungry then but guess I was too used to eating..... hehe.

All that we've purchased:
- I like this dress & it's cheap... approx S$18.60?
- Hubby's pants & shirt was cheap too after a 70% discount :)
- 2 pairs of shoes for me & 1 pair for hubby
- a "men's cut" jacket by one of the local designer
- a cardi that's priced @ RM20
- 2 bottles of nail polish @ RM10.. should have gotten more :(
- 1 eyeshadow

I must say the Prestige card was a really good buy for us. Even if it's for 1-time use (we're not sure when's our next trip). All in all, we're enjoyed almost double of what we paid for. And the hotel offered excellent services, even much better than many of the 5-star hotels. However, the whole good impression we had on the hotel was sort of stained during the checking out process mainly due to some communication breakdowns.

Yep... we paid RM768 for everthing that worths RM1,360 ;)

I always don't see the relevance of staying in a club room as I've never made use of the facilities. But not for this hotel. I'm sure hubby will be very contented to stay in a normal deluxe which was already renovated/refurbished... but it's me (as always...). For our next trip, will still choose Parkroyal KL & go for the Orchid Club room... and we still have some vouchers not utilised.... ;)