On Mother’s Day last Sunday, my family hopped on a coach for a one-day trip to Malaysia. I hardly travel to Malaysia even though it’s just a 2 hour drive away and the things there are much more affordable. Stories of highway car crashes or bus flipping on their way to Genting scare me. But I figured, with about 100 buses travelling the highways a day, a few crashes every now and then isn’t that bad?? It’s just like air travel, right? Anyway, my sister and I were probably the only ones with seat belts on. We didn’t want to take any chances, AND I was thinking, ‘ I sure hell don’t want to be rudely awaken from a nap flying through the air if the bus flips. ‘ My sister took it one notch further and said what if the bus dropped into the sea and we were the only ones who got trapped, strapped in our seats. Crap. Final Destination or what?

We started the journey at about 7+am in the morning, and after we crossed the customs, we stopped for breakfast at  a coffee shop. I was pretty excited to try the food from Malaysia as they have different versions of the same dish in Singapore. Interesting sights include a man carrying a tray around the coffee shop and peddling his ‘home-baked’ curry puffs. They looked so good too, except that droplets of rain were getting to them as he moved around.

I can tell you that breakfast was the most delicious meal I had in Malaysia.  I love their hawker food! Cheap and nice. Lunch and dinner was nothing fantastic and a little disappointing, which is why I did not take any photos of them.

Their version of chee cheong fun. I’m not sure if that’s how they prepare it, but I kinda like their fishcakes with the steam rice rolls. The sauce is sweet, but the fishcakes are savoury. Yin and Yang.

This is Sarawak Ko Lo Mee, a little similar to Singapore’s Minced meat noodles (Bah chor mee). I suspect the noodle is Maggie mee, but there’s minced pork and braised meat and the gravy was niceee. In love with this dish, why isn’t it available in Singapore?

Sweet chewy fried butterfly dough sticks. My mom had been to that coffee shop before and she knew we had to try this. True enough, it was a delight.

Aha, fried oyster and egg. More like fried egg and a few oysters. Lol, they use those really tiny oysters, unlike the fat ones we use here. But it was delicious. I realised that the Chinese food in Malaysia tend to be a little more savoury.

Next stop, we traveled for one hour to get to Desaru Fruit Farm. I thought we were gonna get a chance to pick our own fruits from trees/bushes, but it turned out to be just a shopping experience at their medium-sized provisions shop. Lol they sell everything from fruits to make up, bags to souvenir, notebooks to Crocs shoes. Part of my adventure was to check out the most random stuff they have to sell. My sister bought a sleeping eye mask, and my dad bought a pair of Crocs slippers.

Tourists purchasing fruits fresh from the farm.

The pond outside the provisions shop. If I’m not wrong, there’re a couple of restaurants and the pavilions can be booked for functions. It looks a little like our Bottle Tree Park, doesn’t it? I have more photos taken with the Ollcollp Lens and they’ll be up in the next post! :)

Then it was lunch time. This meal was supposed to be the highlight of the trip!!! BUT what a disappointment, they recently changed chef and the food was not only mediocre, the seafood was also not fresh. And it was a torture to eat with strangers at a round table – you had to fight for food, be the quickest to take the biggest lobster, otherwise everything would be gone in an instant.

Mom and Dad.

After lunch we walked a few metres to a bakery to buy tidbits and pastries. I like how rustic their shophouses look, there aren’t many of such kind in Singapore left.

A typical street in Sungei Rengit, also known as Si Wan Dao (四弯岛). I kept thinking that we were heading to an island, cuz the english translation literally means ‘four turns’ island. Turned out that it was not an island at all!! Very silly of me to have brought a whistle along in case I fell into the sea and needed help. Zzzz. I’m such a worry wart.

I was delighted to spot a tiny Marry Brown outlet – Malaysia’s equivalent of KFC.

Then we boarded the coach again and traveled along the town, to a temple. Took photos of the scenery while on the moving coach, and this is one of my favourite pictures of the trip.

It was noon and the weather was getting bright and sunny. But what I realised was that the weather in Malaysia was not the kind that we experience in Singapore. Here, I will perspire even when I’m wearing a tank top and jeans shorts, but over there, even when I had long sleeves, I hardly perspired. Not sure if it’s because there’re more trees and plants around.

Intricate carving of a dragon.

Empty vases neatly placed in a corner. I guess maintaining a water pump system got too costly for the temple as this ‘wishing well’ was dry!

Next up, it was the highlight of the trip, according to my sister and I. =D Shopping time!! We traveled for more than one hour to a leading shopping mall in Johor Bahru, Jusco. It was my first time visiting the mall and I was awed. It felt just like one in Singapore, except that the prices are lower. Didn’t take many photos cuz too busy walking around.

Bought this chocolate banana crepe from a pushcart. In Singapore, we don’t usually have pushcarts selling food. Most sell accessories or clothes.

For dinner, we headed to Jin Yu Man Tang Restaurant. It looked posh from the outside. We suppose it’s an expensive place to dine in Malaysia, but the food is really just satisfactory! Like I said, the best meal I had that day was breakfast! Yummy, I’m still thinking about it.

You must be wondering how we survived hours of travelling in the coach. We all sat until our butts were painful. But there was of course entertainment. We all played BINGO hosted by the tour guide! Hahaha such an old-fogey activity, but  I enjoyed it. And I won RM35 from a round! Gave my winnings to my mom cuz she paid for the slip of Bingo paper. Then my dad won about RM50 and my sister won RM23. Hahaha we were the big winners I think, cuz we only played 8 rounds of Bingo in total. Awesome luck that day! =)

Reached Singapore at about 9pm, we took so long at the customs that I fell asleep. Lol day trips are tiring.