my kuching trip (part 1)

kuching trip for 4 days and 3 nights, easily summed up just eating and sleeping. we did nothing much, mainly because there was nothing much to do, not much places to go.. and we were in too big a group (7 adults and 1 toddler) to actually plan everything down to a pat. besides, all everyone wanted was to chill and relax from the 2 hectic weekends of family activities/happenings so we pretty much did that.

us on the flight, outbound to kuching. baby was generally well behaved for the most part but there was a bit delay in taking off and he actually finished his milk feed before the take off so we distracted him with a lot of biscuits and yoghurt treats. mostly, he was squirming about from being confined by the infant seat belt (I can feel his pain since he’s usually hyper) but we didn’t get any meltdown from him so we are very thankful. papa however thinks he is quite a handful from all that squirming (his poor arms are aching) and I couldn’t help much because I’m such a wreck myself on plane rides because I suffer from very very bad motion sickness.

looking like an angel…. not!

daddy doing his feed.

we had the luxury of space with an extra seat because I very unfortunately booked an extra ticket for an uncle who wasn’t going and I couldnt cancel without paying a penalty that costed more than the ticket so jerry had a seat all to himself to sleep on.

we arrived on monday evening in kuching and by the time we settled down in our rooms, it was past 5pm.. and gosh. this place reminds me of aussie because all the shops surrounding our hotel are closed! we had to walk a distance to find an open eatery (shop house coffee shop style) with something to eat!

our hotel. I randomly booked this mainly because I opted for the apartments instead of the usual hotel rooms that came with a kitchenette so that I can prep food for jerry if required. in the end, we mostly used the kitchen for washing and cooking instant noodles and our dinners and having a microwave and a full sized fridge is very useful!

kolo mee. taste rather yum meh but its a tad too oily for my taste buds. I think this is the only local food I managed to eat. obviously not from anywhere popular though.

the bub in the Bjorn carrier. we spent the rest of the night supermarketing and cooking instant noodles for dinner. everyone was tired from all the travelling from the weekend so we didn’t go anywhere at all. I was more than happy to just chill around in our rather spacious apartment (slightly bigger then our 3 room flat) trying to recover from feeling sick.

the bud slept relatively well, I think it helps that I bought his sleeping companion (the eeyore plush) and his own pillow. smells of familiarity I’m sure.

day 2 was breakfast in hotel, trip to city center (nothing much to see except loads of touristy souvenirs) and the waterfront.

taking a family shot with the iconic statue of cats in the city center. if you didn’t already know, kuching is cat in the Malay language, but the town is named after a kuching river which stream’s originated from Cat’s Eye Hill (bukit Mata kuching).

we didn’t manage to buy anything at all and the place reminds me very much of jb/kluang with the malls mainly consisting of local brands. only other brands that were familiar were the cosmestic brands like lancome, estee lauder and sport brands like adidas and Nike and of cos fast food brands like KFC, pizza hut and McDonald’s. the malls are mostly dead towns. and it makes me wonder where all the locals hang out at. then again, we were there on weekdays so maybe everyone is working.

happy to be out and about.

the ‘gondola’ of kuching that cost RM0.40 to travel across the river. in the picture, I also caught a women releasing fishes into the water. I’m not sure if she is going a good deed or not because it seems like she is releasing some fresh water fishes.. and the moment they hit the water, they were being chased and bitten by the bigger fishes in the river..

the map and write up of the history of the town of kuching by the waterfront.

the tua pek gong (literally “granduncle” which is what one of the Chinese gods is called) temple.

the Chinese history museum. we popped in for a quick look and found loads of interesting sights.

very intricate stone statues at the door. pictures are actually not allowed without permission but I couldnt find someone to ask for permission, so all pictures here are courtesy of the Chinese history museum, kuching. I took great care to ensure there isn’t any flash when I took these pictures.

the museum basically details where all the Chinese migrated from to kuching, where they have all the various dialect groups – hakka, hokkien, Cantonese, teo chew, hock chew and some others that I totally am not familiar with.

well, in case you are wondering, i’m teo chew and mighty excited to see this.

this.is.exactly.how.my.grandpa’s.shophouse.look.like.when.i.was.growing.up.

yup. my grandpa used to run a grocery store in his younger days. my only recollection was selling the fruits and playing with the rice in the gunny sacks. there were also buttons on all the dialect panels with slices of conversations in the respective dialect with english translation in print which I found very interesting and intriguing, especially of those dialects that I have never heard of. the type of businesses the migrants do are also categorised by their dialects. teochews mostly run grocery stores, the hakkas run coffee shops etc.

soaking in all the information. that’s my aunt and bro.

listing of all the Chinese festivals and their origins/meaning.

and finally, a board of all the Chinese surnames available. can you find yours?

despite it being a relatively small museum, its quite well done and very interesting. the cool aircon was also very welcomed in the scorching heat! so its a good place to escape to if you can’t stand the heat in the city center! admission is free but donations are welcomed.

stretches of colorful shophouses line the streets of the city center.

rows and rows of cat souvenirs for sale in all the shops..

my baby doing some ‘shopping’.. and after some KFC for lunch, we popped back to the hotel as our shuttle came to pick us up.

back at the hotel, we headed out for some food in the vicinity and had these!

ayam penyat. I didn’t try it but my aunt says its tasted quite good.

Sarawak laksa. this is rather interesting, like curry noodles but with a tangy taste since I squeeze some lime into it that was served with the chilli. very refreshing.

we ventured to spring mall next. supposedly the biggest and better mall in the city, and we sat down to chill with Starbucks.

we tabaoed some food back to the hotel and I bought more groceries to cook hotpot for dinner. the grocery shopping trip made me think that we Singaporeans are really really blessed. our supermarket are super well stocked! I could barely find enough stuff to cook my hotpot.

and yup, that’s end of day 2! ending this post here. part 2 coming up soon!