Kuching, Sarawak - Day 3

Day 3 in Sarawak was pretty much the same as Day 2.

We agreed to have a good night rest the day before and suggested to go out for breakfast at 9.30am. Being early risers, we were all up by 7.30 or so and feeling restless I called the other rooms to check if they have woken up. They were up and we were out of the hotel by 9am. Magaret, the person operating the snack counter in the hotel told us of another good place for breakfast. We wanted to eat mee jawa this time.

We used the back way and had to passed by Topspot (we had dinner there the night before) again.

We passed by the cat statues opposite Tun Jugah and came to another cat statues with a mini tower. I'm not sure whether Margaret calls this the Great Cat or Sze-En invented the name for this tower.

Breakfast was at this restaurant diagonally opposite the Sarawak Plaza, very near to AirAsia's shoplot.

The mee jawa was disappointing, the chow kuey teow was alright and the Sarawak laksa was the best so far, according to Aunt Chirs. They have also ordered "poh pia" and "woon chai koh." No comments on that.

Taking pics with the Great Cat.

On the way back, we got separated again. Esther, the kids and I went to the Popular bookstore in the Tun Jugah shopping centre. We spent quite some time here. We didn't know what else to do and was very glad when Rachel's friend, Bob called Esther to set an appointment for lunch at 1pm. Since there were 8 of us, he and his girlfriend came in 2 cars and took us to a chinese restaurant.

I don't know how to read Chinese but I can recognise my surname here. :) They pronounced it as Ting. Not sure what dialect. Most of us had beef noodles. Only Aunt Chris and Bob had pork noodles. There had a special name for it but I can't remember. The kids had spaghetti. The food was alright, and would have been better if we weren't so full from breakfast. I didn't finish my noodles too. Such a waste.

After lunch Bob said that he could leave us at the Textile Museum and from there we could walk back to our hotel.

Bob said that this is the place where they show you how to make textile. No entrance fee and no cameras allowed. Um, a word of caution - if you are easily afraid of mannequins DO NOT enter this building. The place was quite spooky with all the dark mannequins with untidy hair and unsmiling faces. My mom went in one of the rooms and got a fright. She refused to go any further. Sze-En who was once very afraid of departmental stores mannequins must have gotten over that fear because she spoke to one of them and got a good scolding from my mom.

We left the place quickly and did some shopping again along the shops opposite the waterfront.

We passed by SinggahSana (yellow and orange building), the inn which we wanted to stay earlier but the rooms we wanted were fully booked.

In the evening, we went for the Sarawak River Cruise. A good experience for the price of RM60 per adult.

Then as usual lah.. we went to Topspot to have our dinner. This time we ordered from the first shop again. The service there was good and the person taking our orders was very friendly. This time we prawns, asam fish curry, vege, tofu, oyster and midin, the paku-pakis vege.

After dinner, we didn't know what to do. We didn't want to walk at the waterfront again but we didn't want to sleep so early too.

I thought of a way for the aunties and my parents to play card games. The 2 nights before, we were thinking of how Aunt Chris could be in my room (or my parents' room) to play cards without disturbing Brian who would then be fast asleep when she returned to her room. Aunt Chris shared the same room with Brian and Tune Hotel only provide 1 key card and if Aunt Chris is in my room till late at night, she would have to wake Brian up when she goes back to her room. They ended up not playing cards for the 1st 2 nights.

The 3rd night, I explained the situation to the receptionist and asked whether they could help us open the door later when they were done playing cards. They said they could do that.

Since they wanted to play in my room, I gave them a time limit. They can only play till 12midnight. I reminded them that we had to get up at 6am for breakfast the next day.

They played till 12.15am and when Aunt Chris was ready to go back to her room, I went downstairs to ask the receptionist to open the door for me. She gave the master key to the security guard and we went back upstairs to open the room. He tried once, twice.. but couldn't open the door. The light at the door was blinking red. It seems that Brian had activated the "do not disturb" button and the guard couldn't open it with the master key. Aunt Chris had no choice but to wake Brian up. We tried calling Aunt Chris' handphone which she left with Brian, but he didn't wake up. She called knocked and called softly to him and he woke up. Hmm.... Aunt Chris, I think Brian only listens to your voice leh...