Tag Archives: valentines

Back to Nature : Sekeping Serendah

It took me awhile to  get all these pictures sorted out which is why this post is about 20 days late.
As some may have already know, Fatty and I had a short getaway at Sekeping Serendah on our 14th months and also using Valentine’s Day as an excuse.

2 days before our short getaway, we went for grocery shopping because I want to/ have to/ need to bring our own food to this place called Sekeping Serendah which is located at Rawang.
Reason being is because Sekeping Serendah is not a resort and they do not provide meals.
It is a “Back into the woods” kind of thing so please don’t expect fancy restaurants all around.

As you can tell, I’m really fine with this fact for giving me a reason to get my hands dirty while preparing food.
I prepared two meals, cooked our lunch and marinated meat and seafood for dinner.

devein_prawn.jpg

Peeling and deveining prawn, as easy as ABC.
If you still don’t know about this, it’s okay because you’ll know 3 seconds later. Every prawn has this ‘black line’ at the back of the prawn and this ‘black line’ is actually called intestinal tract.
Most of the restaurants do not devein their prawns because it can be time consuming but if you intend to cook prawns at home, you should really devein it.
Not exactly harmful to eat but definitely better off without. Just use a sharp knife and cut along the “black line” (do not cut too deep) and you can easily extract it with the tip of your knife.
Tadaa! Learned this from my mom.

And as you can see from the picture above, the intestinal tract is full and disgusting!

kampung_fish.jpg

Hi Kampung fish.
Fatty hates dealing with chicken but I figured I hate dealing with seafood even more.
It just seems so ……. (not exactly disgusting)……..geli. Yes, geli!
What’s geli in English?

I asked my mom, what do I have to do with the fish.
And this is what you have to do.

fish_gill.jpg

Open up the gill cover and you’ll see red coloured gill waiting for you right there. Stuck in your finger and pull out the fish’s gill.
Once you pull it out, most of the unwanted intestine and what not will come out together because it is link together.
This part seriously scare the crap out of me. I stand by the sink, looking at the fish not sure how to do the first step.
Geli maximum!!

Almost on par with Mr. Squid damn it.
And here’s the bloody intestine, must share it with you guys!

Okay, enough for the food preparing session.

Back to Sekeping Serendah, the journey to that particular place is quite a pain in the ass when you have an impatient boyfriend (when it comes to driving) right beside you.

The traffic at Rawang is pretty bad and traffic lights everywhere did not help on the situation.
Fatty got more and more impatient because of this and keeps complaining.
He can be this annoying sometimes!  

sekeping serendah entrance

The whole journey took us about one and a half hour and this is what greeted us once we arrived.
Sekeping Serendah’s entrance.

You’ll see this big black symbol thingy after you passed through the entrance, right in front where you’ll park your car.
And yes, it was raining the whole day. ):

There are 3 different sheds you can choose to stay in Sekeping Serendah.
Glass shed, mud shed, or timber shed.

I booked mud shed from Agoda and it costs us about Rm400+ including the tax.

Rm400 for a night and just for the two of us is actually really pricey but at that moment there was no better choice so we paid anyway.
Expensive because it’s a Saturday and just the two of us. If you go on weekdays and you have more friends, it’ll be much cheaper.

sekeping serendah mud shed

The first sight that greeted us at mud shed, the living area and kitchen.

sekeping serendah mud shed

This wire chair is one of the thing that attracted me to choose mud shed. :D

sekeping serendah mud shed kitchen

There’s everything you need in mud shed’s kitchen. From utensils to kettle to oven and there’s also Milo and Nescafe sachets waiting for you.

sekeping serendah mud shed

A tree trunk in the house!! I love love love having tree trunk inside a house, just like the picture shown.
It’ll be totally awesome if I can have a tree trunk in my future house! :D

sekeping serendah mud shed

Mud shed can fit in 4 person. There’re bunk beds at the side and a queen bed in the middle of the room.

sekeping serendah mud shed

And a mosquito net that didn’t quite work because it’s too small for the bed but we used it anyway.
There was quite a number of flying insects and they’ll just land wherever they want randomly, so mosquito net to the rescue.

This is where we showered. :)

sekeping serendah bunk bed.

This is not the ordinary bunk beds we see everywhere. It’s a built in bunk beds so it’s really high up if you compare.

sekeping serendah bunk bed.

Took me awhile to climb up.

sekeping_serendah_dog.jpg

Out of the blue I spotted this dog with puppy eyes laying right at the corner.
Not harmful at all, so don’t worry. The dog just need some companion. :)

sekeping_serendah_lunch.jpg

This is our lunch, which I cooked. I might just do a recipe post next.
Sauteed mushrooms, poached eggs in tomato sauce, and garlic chicken with white wine sauce.

sekeping serendah mud shed

Oh ya, you actually share the living area and the kitchen with somebody else because there’s 2 rooms. Unless you book 2 rooms together then you can have it all by yourself.

sekeping serendah mud shed

It was just the two of us during noon and we kind of messed up the place a little, haha.

sekeping serendah swimming pool

After we had our lunch, we decided to go check out their swimming pool  area.

sekeping_serendah_pool.jpg

Shorty!

sekeping_serendah_getaway.jpg

It was actually drizzling but we kind of fucked it and walked to the pool anyway. Thank God we did because it rained the whole friggin day!

♥ :)

Crazy couple is crazy.

We threw in our bottle of wine and that’s Fatty acting funny with the wine.
I did not really jump in and join, I just went halfway.
The water was too damn cold for me.

I don’t know how to swim but I’m actually not afraid to jump into the pool. What I’m afraid of is jumping into a friggin cold pool.  Which is why swimming always is a pain in the ass for me.
Plus my asthma always attacked me if I caught a cold while I swim. It is also a phobia thing. :(
Trust me, I’ll be the first to jump in if there’s a warm or hot swimming pool. Pfft!

We were both tired and ran out of activities to do (IT’S RAINING), so we took a nap.
Sleeping with trees in the woods really has a significant difference compared to sleeping in an air-conditioned room in the city.
That nap and that night’s sleep was one of the best sleep ever which we both agreed.

sekeping serendah barbecue

After our nap, it was dinner time and the guy who worked there prepared the barbeque pit for us.
It is really easy to barbecue at Sekeping Serendah because all you have to prepare is just the food alone.
They have everything else already.

Fatty doing his job, barbequeing chicken, marinated lamb from jusco, prawns, and the kampung fish.

Prawn and fish tasted the best and they’re super easy to prepare.
Almost hassle free, just marinate the prawns with salt, pepper, and black pepper 10 minutes before you barbecue.
As for the kampung fish, what I did was chopped some onions and some garlics and then combined it with asam sauce or curry sauce.
Then, marinate the kampung fish with the sauce and tadaa!
You can basically choose any sauce you wish from supermarket. Those small curry packets or belacan packets which are made easy for cooking, take those.

Even people who cant cook can do this I believe. :)

After our hearty meal we went back into our room and tried to enjoy the remaining hours.
We listened to love songs, then clubbing songs. We danced, we cuddled, we laughed, and we talked.

And I played sparkling fireworks or ‘dik dik gam’ as we called it in chinese.
The last time I had fun playing with these was on 2009’s Christmas, which was pretty long ago.

I told Fatty I wanted to play sparkling fireworks and I want a few packs but he bought the entire box with I don’t know how many packs in it!
How can I even finish that, I’m not sure.

Maybe I should plan on doing another light painting with my sparkling fireworks since there’s tons. :D
I miss playing light painting!

After all the mini activities in our room, we showered and get going to Poh Juan’s birthday at Phuture.
Sigh, bad timing. We have to drive all the way to KL to club and then all the way back to Sekeping Serendah at 3am.
It was tiring!

Woke up the next day wishing that we could sleep longer but we cant because we have to check out.

sekeping serendah waterfall.

It was still early so we drove to the infamous waterfall nearby and there were lots of people enjoying their Sunday that day. Adults and kids having fun all together.

We could have done so much more if it weren’t for the rain.
Maybe in the future if my friends are interested, I will go again for glass shed.

This short getaway was  weird, with the rain and clubbing half way but I still enjoyed it.
It definitely feels good to take a break from the city and embrace the nature with the one you love.

No air conditioner, no television, no computer, no internet, and no signal!

Getting There

From Kuala Lumpur, take the North-South Highway (NKVE) north and exit Rawang. After the Rawang toll gate, turn right and head north via old trunk road. Pass busy Rawang town and head toward Serendah (10km). Turn right at 1st set of traffic lights after Serendah Police station. Next, print out and view the local map (600KB pdf) to reach the retreat.

Sekeping Serendah Retreat Homestay
Jalan Ipoh, Kg Orang Asli,
Serendah, Rawang, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Tel No: 012-3246552(Christina)
Email: bookserendah@gmail.com

Valentine’s : Greatest Love Of All

Here comes the very commercialized Valentines Day but who cares right, we all love to be lovey-dovey no matter you’re single and available or the other way round.
So, Happy (one-day-late) Valentines to every organism on earth. (:

Spending our second Valentine’s together this year, I hope there are many more to come.
Last year’s was great, despite being so many miles apart.
We enjoyed our date together through webcam. I know this sound insane but sometimes I miss webcam moments.
Because we get to sleep ‘together’ and the moment I opened my eyes, I saw him right there on my computer screen. (:

I thank God for making my so called long distance this short up till this very moment.
I know this wont last long, cause he’s gonna go back to Melbourne anyhow and I have to start the long distance all over again but I still feel lucky for having him here all these months.

This year, we skipped the typical Valentine’s dinner that most people are gonna go for.
We both want something different and Valentine’s dinner to us, are somewhat boring.
Instead of spending a few hundred bucks on dinner, we decided to go for a getaway instead.
We booked Sekeping Serendah, somewhere that I wanted to go since ages.
Due to work, we put our Valentine’s getaway on this coming Saturday plus it’s our fourteenth month.
It all make sense.

Since we’ve planned for a getaway, I thought we wont be really celebrating Valentine’s till Saturday.
But Fatty asked me what do I feel like doing on Valentine’s night.
We opted for music. Live music.
Wanted to go to Ampang’s Alexis at first because their music will be coming from a saxophone, piano, and drum. Three of my favorite musical instruments but the careless me mistaken the date.
It’s on Friday, not last night ):

My second choice was No Black Tie and it turns my night into a very memorable one.
Rm60 per person for the entrance fees. If you ask me, it is worth it but at the same time rather expensive too.
Expensive but worth it.


* With my Valentine’s date, my best friend.


* This is Rozz, a very very great singer and performer. At the same time witty and humorous.

Described as a performer who is “bold and a far cry from being generic”, audiences who have seen ROZZ in action have further declared his performances as “fabulous”, “hilarious”, “moving”, “captivating” and “utterly insane”, amongst others. Fascinating and commanding at the same time, one would have to see live performance to truly understand the phenomenon that is ROZZ. Expect the signature dramatic performance, amazing vocals prowess and witty humour for a great night out this Valentine’s with ROZZ.

He sang jazz and some other love songs including a few of Whitney Houston’s.
Of course, we all enjoyed him singing Whitney Houston’s song the most. I was captivated by the performance.
His singing send chills down my spine!


* A friend of Rozz went up and again, their singing are breathtaking. I like the guy’s voice, very sexy and his singing is just as great. Duet songs melt my heart.


* Thank you for the night Fatty!


* Took a picture with Rozz himself. I know this is confusing, so were we at the beginning. We were wondering if Rozz is a female or a male cause his voice sounds like a female but at some point sounds rather like a male too. Rozz is a male.
Go to his blog and you’ll get to hear him sing with his powerful voice. Trust me, it’s really really good!


* Fatty said, ‘You wore this dress on last year’s Valentine’s’. I didn’t even notice it myself and he can remember what I wore a year ago. He amazed me sometimes.


* My night was really memorable and I enjoyed every moment of it.

On Valentine’s eve;
Fatty: I actually wanted to give you a surprise.
Me: Huh?
Fatty: But I don’t have enough time.
Me: Huh? What? *smiling*
Fatty: I actually wanted to get you your cravings. I wanted to buy you Cao-cao lamb and the raw shrimp. I saw it on twitter that you’re craving for it.
Me: Awwwwwwww! *melts*
Fatty: But you said you wanna go to Caffeinees. So…… ):
Me: It’s okayyy!

How nice of him! Although no sight of my cravings but it’s the thought that counts.
This boy really knows how to surprise me, as I’ve said it’s not an easy task.
Love him to bits. (:

NO BLACK TIE (known for Jazz music)

Address
17, Jalan Mesui
Off Jalan Nagasari
50200 Kuala Lumpur

Phone
+603 2142 3737

With my love, before I die.

It’s Chap Goh Meh today for Chinese which means it is the last day of our Chinese New Year, also considered as Chinese Valentines Day whereby ladies will throw mandarin oranges into lake, pond, or rivers and guys will pick it up. The belief is that the guy who picked up the ladies’ oranges will be their future match.

Also, in a week time Valentines Day will arrive filling the air with love.
As we always said it, everyday is or can be Valentines Day for those in love.
Exactly! Valentines Day can sometimes be a little too commercial and to me at times I see it as a reason or excuse to have a romantic dinner or a romantic getaway.
Yes, I am a typical girl who cant say no to anything romantic.

Since this and next week will be fill with love for most people, I decided to add a little love into my blog as well.
I’d like to turn these pictures into a real scene one day with my love before I die.

Sometimes I wonder, what love can do to people.
Happy Valentines Day in advance, go get some love! (:

Saint Valentine ♥

Happy Valentine’s Day!
I’m back (:

Ben just left the country yesterday, flew back to Melbourne.
And tomorrow is Valentine’s Day :\
I remembered how he happily told me he extended his flight to 12th February and I just returned him a shock face.
He totally forgotten that it’s Valentine’s Day on the 14th but it’s okay.

Haven’t been celebrating Valentine’s for the past three years.
And if he’s here, I think I’d prefer staying in and have our own mini plan (:
We celebrated our Valentine 3 days earlier, just the night before he left.
Watched a movie and followed up with a dinner at Cafe Cafe.

Went there once during my 2007’s birthday.
Pictures are gonna be dark, I cant be using flash in such an environment. I don’t want everyone to be looking at me.


* Perfect interior but not spacious enough. We were sitting so close to both the tables beside, I don’t like it that way.
It feels like these people entered my comfort zone, I don’t have my own privacy. They shouldn’t have put so many tables there.


* My date (:


* Yours truly.

No pictures of food cause I really don’t wanna use flash.
We ordered half dozen escargot, foie gras, tiger prawn and lamb shank.
Tiger prawn and foie gras was goood! They gave some cranberry jam or whatever jam it’s called to go along with foie gras, really nice combination.
Escargot, I prefer The Ship and lamb shank is a disappointment.
Too dry, I prefer it to be juicier and the meat more tender.
Bill came up to Rm250+ and Ben likes this place. (:
Coming here on normal days will be good but I don’t think it’s a wise idea to come on festive days.
Big no no on Valentine’s, I don’t wanna have a dinner for six when I plan to have dinner for two.

Present him something that he really wanted (:
And also a box for him to bring back over to Melbourne with 47 different things inside.
Each day there’s something waiting for him in the box and by the time the box is empty, I’ll be by his side. hee (:

We’re having a date tonight. Candles, movie, music and everything else.


* That’s us, ready for our date. Yes, we even dress up :D
I know I’d have fun tonight. Feeling so loved even though he’s not physically here.

Happy Valentine’s to everyone out there be it you’re attach or single.
I waited long enough to have someone in my life to celebrate Valentines with me again.
If you’re still waiting, have a little faith. I believe God prepared the best one for you, just that he/she have yet to walk into your life.

Lots of love ♥ (:

reds and pinks

it’s chinese new year all over again.
say hi to red packets. long lost relatives. mandarin oranges. fooooooods and snackss. and little casinos.
chinese new year always lifts up the mood.
very much different from christmas, i feel more excited during chinese new year.
fire crackers and loud new year songs maybe.

DSC09687copy
* here to wish everyone a very happy chinese rawr rawr year. gong heii fatt dai choii ((:
fatt fatt fatt. *please let me win every time i gamble this year* wtf

and of course not to forget valentine’s day.
hah! bonus for those who aren’t celebrating valentine this year, like me.
because we have chinese new year to accompany us, bwaha.

DSC09709copy2
* happy valentines day to all lovers and to all singles as well. (:

my family and i will be having steamboat for our reunion dinner.
i’ve got no idea why my mom chooses steamboat when the weather is so friggin hot.
but oh wells..

oh ya! no red nails this year. ):
my friend told me that because this year is a tiger year and bla bla bla..
we shouldn’t paint our nails red and wear too much of red bajus. ):
must use more blue to neutralize whatever shit it is..
aih, chinese new year i like to wear red red one lorh but noww.. pfft

call me superstitious.