August « 2009 « JEWELLE TAN

Dual Menu Restaurants

Even though we love discussing about the many Sungkai buffet offers, we have yet to actually go to one.

In fact, I cannot remember if we even went to any last year, or the year before.

For me, as much as I like the idea of food variety, I think these good and cheap food should be enjoyed more by those who fasted. Besides, I am not fond of crowd and I prefer to be served.

Still, on the subject of eating out – I am happy that starting this year, we now have 2 places where we can order from 2 separate restaurants at the same time in Kuala Belait.

It’s good for me because I love spicy food. So Buccaneer Steak House is one of our family favorite because I could order from their Buccaneer Thai Restaurant (which is next door) while the rest could have their western dishes.

The other place is the RMS Diner and Zaika (Indian) Restaurant, also next to each other. When we dined at the RMS Diner last month, I was very glad when told I could order from their Indian restaurant. Because as appetizing as these pictures may be – which taken professionally meant they probably look better than they actually are – I’d take curry any day.

In fact, I am having curry tonight. Sounds like I definitely need to know more about colon cleanse treatments.

30Aug

Cosmetic Recycling

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Another thing that I am thankful for with living in a small town is how rarely I take the time to visit the single Guardian Pharmacy store.

Less trips to this kind of stores meant less frivolous cosmetics purchases. Less unused stuffs on my dressing table and less complaints from the person sharing that table.

Still, I realised that I did have a few tubs of items which I never found the time to use. Anti-ageing, sebum control, acne treatment, whitening – and that’s just the skincare products! I know the list would have been longer had I live where I could easily visit this kind of stores as who can resist those beautiful bottles and tubs which promise so many things!

And like most woman, I have duplicate products from different brands meant for a particular purpose. And I see no reason why I should waste any products with a little creativity on their use.

That is how one of my face cream ends up on my feet – with visible results, might I add.

But I’m sure, I am not the only one who does this.

28Aug

Destination Library

Filed in Brunei Life | Thoughts 2 Comments

Once a week, my daughter and I had to hang around town while waiting for her afternoon activity to start.

We chose the public library and for the past several weeks, we have been spending a little time at the relatively new Pandan Library in Kuala Belait. I actually preferred Seria Library for their sofa settee in the adult section where she could lie down if she wanted to.

But once I brought her to the Pandan library, she insisted on coming here every time – for their small classroom chairs that she said are comfortable for her.

The good thing about this place is that the magazines area is just before the isolated children’s area. So I could easily get my reading materials and stay close to her.

There are a few computer terminals at the magazines area and when we were over, they were all occupied by kids playing violent shooting games. I wonder if their parents are aware of what these kids actually do when they are at the library. The children’s section was empty besides us and a couple of other girls who were doing their homework.

But it’s understandable that their interest were far from the books because even a book loving kid like my daughter found it hard to find anything that interest her. Not only do they need to increased their books budget, the books selection committee should also get different book suppliers to get more attractive and interesting books.

Besides this, I think it’s obvious that the place was not designed with a librarian in the design team, who would have understood the movement and needs of library users – because the layout was poor and not very conducive. What a pity.

Still, I enjoyed their magazine collection (although Seria Library is also better at this).

26Aug

Fasting And Buffet Offers

Filed in Brunei Life | Local Happenings 2 Comments

My daughter’s school provide snacks for their mid-morning break so I packed her only some biscuits in case she did not want what was offered. But last week she requested that I packed her some cooked food – like some of her friends and I thought it was a good chance to use this pretty container we bought from Jakarta.

On the subject of mid-morning break, she told me that her Muslim friends are all fasting – and asked me what it meant and why they needed to do it.

After my explanation, I told her to be considerate to them by not showing off her food, like kids like to do sometimes.

Speaking of fasting, probably the most looked forward to advertisement the whole of this month is the list of breaking of fast, or Sungkai as we call it here, offers from most of the restaurants in the country. Maurina who pain-stakingly compiled another list of all the Sungkai offers in the country, thinks that Bruneians love these Sungkai offers. I think that’s because we get the best deal here – most other reputable eateries in other countries charge at least double what we get here.

Just imagine, the most exclusive hotel’s restaurant in the country offers a Sungkai Buffet of only $28 – that’s around RM68.

Even for us non-Muslim, this is also the month to indulge in eating out and eating-all-we-can : quite frankly the best month to visit Brunei for food-lovers. The problem with us who feast without fasting is that while they eat to fill empty stomachs, we eat to fatten full stomachs – so do yourself a favour and read more on colon cleansing reviews after that round of Sungkais.

25Aug

On Foot Across Borneo

Filed in Good Read 2 Comments

When I borrowed this book from the Library, I didn’t start reading it until a week later.

It was my second daughter who was more fascinated by the cover – the eye of a man peeping through a folliage of leaves. I told her it’s a story of a man who lived in a jungle. She then christened it, the “Jungle man” book, claimed ownership by scrutinizing the cover for a few days and even putting the book under her pillow.

While she was enthralled by the cover, I was hooked from the very first paragraph of Eric Hansen’s “Stranger in the forest : On foot across Borneo” :

“When I was eight years old, I found a piece of bamboo in my parents’ garage. It was yellow with age and five feet long. It may have been and old rake handle, but from jungle movies on televisions I knew what to do. With my pocketknife I sharpened one end of the bamboo and made a spear.”

Having some idea of what jungle and jungle traversing is like, the account of a Westerner who decided to reach “Apo Kayan“, a remote highland valley in East Kalimantan, via Sarawak on foot by himself, equipped not with some gps systems but a map that was incomplete and decades old – is intriguing.

Imagine – eating the Kelabit’s version of meat preserved for at least a month in a bamboo, nearly getting lost in a valley of grasses taller than him days away from any villages, forced to circumvent a valley that the Penans believed was inhabited by a dragon and others.

Being a Borneon myself, these are familiar or at least imaginable scenarios. But his writing is so articulate and the humourous situations he included are excellently described.

He made it sound so easy and so much fun.

Although it did make me feel like packing up to explore the deep interior of Borneo, I think I’ll just have my jungle adventures in my head as I read this book – for now.

**Here’s a lovely album of pictures taken at Apo Kayan (Central Kalimantan) taken by Dave Lumenta.

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