It’s a rainy end-of-month Friday public holiday.
When it rains, everyone drive to the mall.
At the end of the month, that is, after payday, everyone drives to the mall.
On a public holiday, everyone drives to the mall.
So, on a rainy end-of-month Friday public holiday, there are a lot of cars parking at the mall.
The perfect time to block a car park exit and create unnecessary congestion. So that’s what they did this morning. Brilliant planning.
They have been working on covering the open water drain along the eastern side of Northam Road aka Jalan Sultan Ahmad Shah. The plight of pedestrians is not considered, so one is forced to walk on the road among fast-moving vehicles for short distances.
They appear to be covering the open drain with concrete – and don’t know what the final plan is, but am hoping (probably very optimistically) that it could become a bicycle lane. Some photos over the last week or so:
Being very near the sea, and growing plants mostly in pots it’s not so easy, but gradually we’ve been able to learn to grow food and some medicines at home.
There’s also aquaculture and vertical gardening to look into sometime, but the former costs more for the equipment, and both probably need more or less daily maintenance.
Here is what we’re growing at the moment:
tiny eggplants growing
tiny eggplants – great in curry – they taste a bit like bitter peas, but they are generally about 50% bigger
Pumpkin vine growing – no pumpkins yet this year,but we got quite a few previous years
crepe ginger sprouts growing
I collected a lot of sprouts this morning – good raw sprinkled on salads or curry
passion fruit on the vine – so far this season the squirrels haven’t attacked them, so I can let them ripen on the vine
a few ripe passion fruit
passion fruit growing
lime and neem
lime
neem
small limes
neem – to deter insects
pandan – use for wrapping food
a medium size lime
keffir lime – both the fruit and the leaves are useful. The leaves for mojitos and baths, the fruit for shower gels
papaya
roselle – jam etc.
lemon grass – tea, in baths etc.
basil – in pasta, stews
aloe vera – to drink and to put in home-made shower gel
rosemary – in stews, pasta etc.
more lemon grass
Yes, at 68 Kelawei Road – the right side of the road – you’ll find a new chocolate outlet, selling Malaysian made chocolate. Plenty of parking out front. And when you enter they give you a sample size chocolate drink, plus at least 10 samples of the other chocolates they sell, as you move around the shop on your guided tour. They are Malaysian size samples – that is, very small. But you can certainly taste them.
My favourites were white sesame chocolate, and dark durian chocolate.
You can buy in gift tins, packets, and in economy plastic packets – the latter being better if you’re just eating them yourself.
A few photos:
Harriston Chocolates
Harriston
handmade chocolates
in the shop
in the shop
in the shop
economy packs
sample of curry chocolate
in the shop
I learnt yesterday that CIMB will not open new accounts for non-Malaysians unless their MM2H deposit is held by CIMB. Even if you have existing accounts with them. You can continue to operate existing accounts, though.
As far cheaper peer to peer banking looks to replace the several hundred year old central banking model in a few years, making banking more difficult would seem to be the last thing a bank should do.
Tropical Expat 