2011 - NZ To SF - Day 65

Day 65: (17 July 2011):
- Go to the place famous for chicken ball. Have seen day before with queue. Arrive ~10[11am, no queue, but still busy. No menu, confirm I want Hainan chicken - turns out this is the “chicken ball.” Due to a language misunderstanding, I got a coconut for drink. Coconut & chicken: 4RM each. Chicken looks oily but not heavy taste. A bit tough, but flavour balance just right. Rice balls are a bit yellow, but light flavour. Hot sauce & soy sauce mix. Overall very good.
- At some point in morning, met with US girls, who are going to zoo then to old town area. I decide go to old town area & not join then to zoo.
- Walk to end of Jonkers & over bridge: nice view. Big lizard.
- Nice town centre. Lots of tourists.
- Spend most of morning in the complex of museums. Most museums bad: photos, replicas, photos of replicas. Lots of text: like walking through a website. Statues are mostly mannequins with clothes, sprayed in rock-coloured paint? Some bad items: damaged (even a guitar is damaged). Heat & humidity: splotches on paintings. Gifts from high commissions look better than most artefacts. No AC in main museum, but enjoyed escaping to AC in museums with AC. Nice coin collections from variety of countries. Some cute-looking coins. Many are donated from some people. Lots of museums require taking off shoes.
- Up to cathederal on hill. Only walls & lighthouse remain. Some tomb panels. Nice view. See the tower observation thing. Hot. Some hawkers.
- Walk to find Capitol Satay ~3pm. Buy magnet & ask direction. Poor English dirs. AC.e hotel person tell me where, but say only open at 6. See large traditional bld. No entry sign.
- Have baba laksa @ Jonkers 88 even with queue. Find seat. Share table. The fried puffs surprisingly good. One with fish cake filling? Durial cendol for dessert. Difficult, but found seat & ate.
- Stop back @ hostel. Internet. Find hostel, but no book, no 6 bed dorms left. Girls come back from zoo.
- Walk around with girls. Some nice small streets & along river on old side of town. Durian puff. Nice, but filling easily runs out & onto things.
- Meet back @ 6:30. Harry take 10 of us to restaurant. Mini tour on way.
- Drop 2 off at a famous Indian restaurant.
- River separating cafés & slums. Walkway in middle of river. Light curtain to hide slums @ night. Entrapment filmed here (with Petronas towers added in scene).
- Capitol Satay. Long Q. Harry say his record 1.75hrs. Buy drinks (soy milk for me) & teach girls to play contact. Time pass quickly with game.
- Signs warning of fakes restaurants.
- Pot of sauce, then add 4 big ladles of peanut & spices to it. Surprisingly thick.
- Lots of skewers. Cook & eat lots. Tiger beer for 7.5PM. As tipped, good seafood comes to table, large clams, shrimp, squid, abalone? All .80RM each. Refill sauce often. Volcano-like splattering. Crust on side of pot. Very fast counting of skewers. Only 17.5RM each, incl. beer!
- Find way back to Jonkers. Good Feijoa-like juice & unripe mango juice: tangy. Lots of ppl. watching live entertainment. Turns out is Karaoke. Songs get cutoff as soon as lyrics end. people get into it. Dressed up, dancing. Some creepy/awesome.