Intercontinental Kuala Lumpur, September 2017

Lasts September 10-12, 2017, I stayed at InterContinental Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I attended the Economic Freedom Network (EFN) Asia meeting and conference 2017. Grand hotel, I like it. Below, the hotel lobby.

My bed, wide and very comfy. I don't remember what floor I stayed.

My work area, I like it, big wide table. Flat embedded tv on the black wall in the middle. Internet is complimentary, fast.

Breakfast area. I boycotted the bread, veggies, salad area then I devoured the high fat, high cholesterol food. :-)

Outside the main resto, an artificial waterfalls. Cool.

EFN Asia meeting 2017, at one of the many meeting and function rooms.

EFN Conference on trade and US-China leadership. At one of the ballrooms.

I liked my stay there. Next month I will stay there again for another meeting and conference.

Tamarind Springs Restaurant, Kuala Lumpur

On my last day in Kuala Lumpur, April 23, flying back to  Manila the next day, IDEAS CEO and friend Wan Saiful Wan Jan, brought me and fellow panel speaker Prof. Cris Lingle, to this very beautiful restaurant in a suburb of KL, the Tamarind Springs. IDEAS hard working staff Yogi and Amir joined us. It was after our panel workshop at the ASEAN People's Forum (APF) 2015, then a visit at IDEAS office.

It is wide , rolling and spacious, surrounded by  many big trees. The place is in a high-end suburban residential area of KL. From the carpark area, one must walk about 60 meters to the resto proper. Nice water fountain.

With many freshwater turtles, cool.

A golf course below the resto.

Some of the big trees on one side of the  restaurant.

From where we  sat on the  2nd floor, this swimming pool  is visible.

But it seems no one is using or  swimming in this  pool, moss and small fishes inhabit  the pool. This view is opposite where I  took the photo above.

No need for air-con, just a silent ceiling fan.

The bar. Buddha in red lights.

I forgot to take photos of our food, but it was sooooo delicious. I was not feeling well that afternoon actually. After slurping the soup, it was like magic, I immediately felt better. So I took more soup and the yummy fish.

This pathway from the carpark to the resto is lighted by those small scented candles at dawn until evening. Here the candles were already laid. Really nice and cool place.

Thanks again Wan, Yogi and Amir, for that great and memorable panel discussion then dinner.
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See also:

Yummy Korean Food, July 12, 2013

Food of Penang, Malaysia, September 14, 2012

Le Apple Hotel, Kuala Lumpur, May 30, 2015

Le Apple Hotel, Kuala Lumpur, April 2015

I went back to Kuala Lumpur, April 22-24, 2015. I attended a panel discussion organized by the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (IDEAS) and the South East Asia Network for Development (SEANET) on April 23, one of the many panel discussions/workshops under the bigger ASEAN People's Forum (APF) 2015.

IDEAS put me at Le Apple Boutique Hotel (dark building in  this phoo) at the city center, about two blocks from the famous Petronas Towers (to its left). It is also beside Corus Hotel, where  I  stayed in 2005 when I  first visited Malaysia.

View of Le Apple, Petronas Towers, not far from WISMA CMA, the venue of the conference, about 5 minutes walk  from my hotel. Corus Hotel at the right.

View of Petronas Towers from my room at Le Apple. Afternoon and early evening.

Another view from my room, further lefft of the tower.

And view at the right side. I do not know the names of the  neighboring buildings.

My room. Modest and clean. Wifi is free/complimentary.

The hotel lobby, at the 2nd floor. Ground floor is the hotel restaurant and main entrance. When I took my breakfast on my 2nd day at the hotel, I learned that almost all staff of the restaurant -- cooks, waiters, waitresses -- are Filipinos. Good to briefly chat with them.

One downside of this  hotel -- we experienced power outages. Not once, not twice, but thrice  I  think. The back up power came to provide basic lights in the room but no air-con, no lights at the toilet, no tv. And even the elevator was affected.

When the electricity went back, the wifi would come on and off. I hope those were just accidental glitches and not regularly happening. Good hotel location but not good power back up.
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See also:

Kuala Lumpur International Airport, September 07, 2012

Food of Penang, Malaysia, September 14, 2012

Food of Penang, Malaysia

It's been four days since I left Penang, but I can still savor in my mind its delicious and often spicy food. Before I went there, a number of my friends were telling me that "food there is delicious", so I was curious to see it for myself. I was in Penang last September 7-9, 2012, for our seminar-workshop on "Promoting Markets in Healthcare" sponsored by EMHN-London and IDEAS-Malaysia.

Our hotel was the Red Rock Hotel, a modest one in the city. To its left is this complex of many small food stalls. I walked here around 7:30pm on Day 1 (September 7) and though we have a scheduled dinner at 8pm somewhere, I could not resist the temptation of tasting one noodle soups there, it was nice at 4 Ringgit.

That night, our local hosts, Wan Saiful Wan Jan and his staff at IDEAS, brought us to this Indian restaurant, Kapitan. I was intrigued by this long line of fried chicken, upper right. Hmmm, yummy.

Lower left, some of the different viands that we ordered. The prawns and those fried chicken were not included in this photo. Lower right, not in this resto, from a food stall somewhere, frog meat for sale, cool.

Around Kapitan restaurant is a district of many Indian shops -- clothes, music, bags, jewelries, etc. And not far from it are old mosques. Nice place.

On our second and last night in Penang after our workshop ended in the afternoon, Wan brought us to this famous Malaysian restaurant, "Cina Muslim Restaurant". This is several kilometers away from our hotel.

Haaa! Really yummy food -- chicken, vegetables, grouper, I'm still salivating until now. Lower right photo, that's durian desert, mmmmm.

I think Wan ordered 3 or 4 orders of grouper ("lapu-lapu" in the Philippines) and they were all wiped out by 14 hungry tummy :-)  Tea and another juice complemented our yummy dinner. I kidded Wan that I needed to walk at least 3 kilometers in order to hasten digestion of my food intake that night.

On our way back to the hotel, Wan toured us to Georgetown proper, lots of interesting places there. Then not contented yet, Wan brought us to another Indian restaurant, "Pelita" for some drinks, tea and black coffee (above, lower right), bread and desert. Another round of delicious food.

The food list, they are not expensive, and yet delicious and clean. I noticed that many food shops are open until midnight or even early morning even on a Sunday night. Many locals, I was told, prefer to eat outside than cook at home (do groceries frequently, wash the dishes, etc.), as it is not time consuming and not costly at the same time.

From Indian food, Chinese food, Malaysian food, to a combo or mixed of those cuisine, there are many food choices and restaurants or food stalls to choose. 

I liked Penang. Thanks to Wan and his friendly, hard working staff at IDEAS being great hosts.

Kuala Lumpur International Airport

I landed at Kuala Lumpur International Airport this morning to get a connecting flight to Penang in the afternoon. I am writing this in my hotel, Red Rock Hotel, here in Penang, about 45 minutes by plane from KL. I've been to KL three times before -- 2005, 2009 and 2011 -- but it was only today that I took many photos of the airport. So as usual, I'm shrinking them three photos in one frame to minimize space.

It's definitely a modern airport, comparable to the huge and modern airports of Singapore, Hong Kong, Seoul-Incheon, Tokyo-Narita, Bangkok, etc. Glass and steel structure, silent walkalator that have sensors, meaning they move only if there are passengers using them.

But unlike the airports in HK, Singapore, Narita, or even Manila, there are not too many planes and passengers landing and taking off at KLIA. I noticed at the planes monitoring station, there is a take off every five minutes on average, and consequently, a plane is landing every five minutes too on average, for both international and domestic flights.

In HK for instance, I think a plane is landing every 30 seconds, In Manila, despite the small airports compared to those in its Asian neighbors, I think a plane is landing every minute or so. That's mainly because there are may domestic flights. Our country is an archipelago.

Colorful decorations. This is after the immigration going to gates for domestic flights.

I landed at KLIA from Manila around 11:30 am and my connecting flight to Penang left around 2pm. So I was at KLIA for two and a half hours, I did not notice too many planes nor too many passengers. Middle photo, nice replica of different airlines.

This is the gate I boarded this afternoon for my Malaysian Airlines flight to Penang. It's huge for a domestic flight, so passengers can practically roam around the departure lounge. I think on number of passengers per sq. meter of airport terminal, Manila's terminal 1 (the terminal used by foreign airlines) has probably 10x that in KLIA. Meaning Terminal 1 is too small relative to the number of passengers who are flying out and arriving.

Nice monitor for departing planes from different airlines. This is where I noticed that a plane was taking off about every five minutes on average. Below the departures monitor, are maps of the domestic and international concourses.

There was a cultural presentation in one side as I roamed around the airport this afternoon. Nice performance. Some guys were distributing a Malaysian flag and cookie to passersby.

Photo above, I took last year. I think this was at the main arrival area for international flights.

On toilets and drinking fountain. I don't know how much is the terminal fee at KLIA that is incorporated in the plane ticket, but at least there are plenty of clean toilets and many drinking fountains. In Manila airport, we pay P550 (nearly US$14), was P750 before, terminal fee. and the terminal does not even have one drinking fountain. Passengers have to buy bottled water if they get thirsty, even if they have paid a high terminal fee.