Family Trip 2013 : Johor Bahru (Day 1)

Hi y'all!

Hope none of you are not bored with my travel posts yet, because personally travel posts are my favorite to write-coz i LOVE traveling so much! More travel posts=more travel, yes? Hehe.

I know i know, this one's even more backdated. I went to JB and Singapore (continued with Jakarta and Bandung haha) with my big family (17 people on total, i know i said 18 before-i forgot that my bro in law never made it because the tycoon was busy with his work, scrapping more than two international tickets WTF, why don't give the money to me instead? I can pay for all of my shopping that i did in this vacay with the amount they scrap for the tix!) for a summer vacation back in June (just now i even had difficulties remembering whether it was June or July!), before i even went to Taiwan with #Undecided haha. As usual, my writings couldn't keep up with my travels (just like my shopping) hahaha. 

And yes, i initially wanted to finish the Taiwan trip series first with #Undecided, but as you already know she's a very busy office lady so we don't always have time to blog together. It'd be too long and if travel entries are food then this one would be severely past its expiration date so i thought, why not write about my JB/SG and post them whenever i can, there's no rule that a blog aren't allowed to have two different travel posts series at one go, yes? Okay, now that we already get that out of the way...

This entry is about the beginning of the journey, Day 1 : JB!  

And just like usual, whenever i'm travelling with my mum... it's quite stressful hahahaha.  My mum's afraid of flying so she's always super fussy, annoying and fretful from (up to weeks) before the actual start of the vacation. I couldn't snap an OOTD pic because she was freaking out that we're going to be late FML. 

You know how precise i am and how i've never been late for any flight *knock wood*, but of course she didn't care! Everybody even left me alone upstairs (they were inside the car ready to go WTF) scrambling around trying to put on my brand new sneakers that i didn't know would be quite hard to put on *my other older pair of Nike was like a size too big so i can slip in and out of it with ease hahahah expected this to be the same but of course it wasn't!* and whenever i panicked (of course i began panicking already! They made me feel like i was running out of time FML!), it'd be double as hard for me to do whatever i'm trying to do! GRRRR!!! So do not freak me out if you want me to be swift, EVER!

Anyway, i finally got myself together and off to the airport we went!

Yes, that's all my family members hogging that lane hahahaha

My niece Au torturing her super strong little brother (who's like, 15 kgs lighter than her???) MT

Little Boys of the trip haha (Under 12 league hahaha)

But Baby Boy also belonged to another group, Baby group hahaha. That's my little niece G who's a year younger than Baby Boy

As usual, i got my nails done with gel polishes before any trip at Me-Nail. I opted for neon green this time, and based on that i decided to wear neon colored bag and sneakers! Au also had gel polishes on hers so we decided to take pictures :

Unfortunately like i've mentioned before, the nailist made some mistakes with the application that the gel polish (that usually lasts up to 3 weeks, even a month!) started chipping after the third day WTF! But of course, the lady boss (yep, cousin L) gave me an IDR 100.000 voucher to make up for it *that i used to do my next gel polish that i wore to Taiwan* so all's good! Haha. Gotta say that Me-Nail's very professional and responsible (yeah, i'm talking about the owner) so do not worry if you're planning to get gel manicures there!

I deemed this my OOTD pic hahahaha. Pink Wings (you'll see the detail later) jacket : online, Long loose Girl Face Tank : random FO in TP, Latex legging : Online, Neon Pink Bag : online, Neon Yellow Sneakers : League

I don't have to explain that everything on me were new, right? It started with the nails-and i already had that neon pink bag, then i bought a neon pink sunnies and i've already been eyeing this hot pink sneakers at the mall, but i went to several branches and none of them had them in my size *screech* huhuhu. 

Then i spotted these neon yellow sneakers and decided it'd be perfect with the nails, sunnies and bag *so the theme for this trip was neon, but only for the accessories* to add pops of color in my outfits because i unconsciously brought mostly monochromatic outfits! On a trip with my mother! I must've had a death wish!

Anyway, more silly story.. I ended up only wearing the sneakers for the whole day on the first day and then the rest of the trip i kept on wearing the baby pink floral flats *yes, the same one i wore to Taiwan because it's deadly comfortable, of course they're now half-dead and fugly due to too much travel in them!* hahahaha FML.

Oh yeah, i already mentioned this in past entries, hunny was stopped in the immigration check because of his discolored passport! He was threatened like "We dunno if they will let you in in JB! Might send you right back here!", but he said he'd take his chances. Obviously scared me to death and was obsessing over it the whole way to JB...

 

With my other niece, BB, at the lounge

And finally we're off! My family's not any less narcissistic than me and my friends really, even in the two hours flight we kept on cam-whoring :p. Eh not only me lah okay, KC, Au and others also kept on flipping out their cams and snap away merrily!

Hahaha, KC looking happy but actually he's not so happy coz he hates flying with budget airlines! Well, if you travel with me you'd most probably be flying budget! I'd rather spend the money on shopping!

See, camera out... I regret having these two sitting behind us, they kept on shaking the seats and disturbed us i really wanted to shake them 'til their teeth rattles *mean stare*

Totally forgot that we already ordered food online *mainly to be able to reach IDR 3.000.000 in total (oh yes, we paid less than 3 millions for five persons one way, that's why i love Air Asia...) so we can turn it into installment, but now RIP AN*, you sucks (read this to know why)*, we already stuffed ourselves in the lounge *yes yes, kiasu family, might as well change our last name to Kiasu right* zzzz.

Ultimate fave AirAsia in-flight meal, Nasi Lemak!

Was intrigued when i saw the commercial for Farah Quinn's Nasi Minyak for AirAsia, i really shouldn't order this since we all know she's known for her sexy look not her cooking

It sucks *HUEKKKKK*, so sweet and disgusting *shuddering*, now my suspicions are confirmed-i always wonder if she can actually cook (i mean she obvi could, but i was always doubtful if the result would tastes good, her techniques on TV seems very doubtful hahaha) and i don't think she can. I know she's not the one personally cooking this lah! But you get what i mean right? It bore her name so it should get her seal of approval right!

Ordered this for Baby Boy, supposedly a pizza but it's super thick and soft (but it tasted really good!) i think it's more like a pie/bread, of course the parents ended up finishing it

Hahahaha... Sound asleep. Baby Boy always fall asleep within minutes in any comfortable moving vehicle, he probably felt like was rocked to sleep?

A close up look to my nails (and sneakers :p), i love the color, too bad it didn't stay on long

Neon overdose!

As soon as we reached JB, i pushed Baby Boy to go through the immigration with hunny. My logic was, if he's traveling with his young kid, he'd be less likely to be deported right? I shouldn't worry so much though because everything went smoothly, to the point that the officer commented "Got waters on your stamps yah? That's okay, don't worry!" and went on admiring his Schengen visa hahaha. 

At one point the officer asked "Where's his mother?" and when hunny pointed me out she called me up next, and told me "You're his mother? Really? You're a mother? But you're very very young!". LOL. Yes, happens all the time. I proceed on telling her that i am not very young, i just look young! Anyway, i couldn't be any more relieved i kept on saying thank you, God-like a 100x. Screw Indonesian immigrations -___-. 

Baby Boy getting Lego Land's brochures straightaway and immediately obsessed over it

Did you notice how it looked kinda foggy even inside the airport? Yes, we went there at the middle of the haze craze. And what's crazier? That we had no idea. None of us even heard about it because it's not really reported in Indonesian news! We were really surprised and confused when we saw the condition there. And then became embarrassed when we were told that the haze came from Indonesia! 

The location of forest fires that causes those haze in Malaysia and Singapore were much closer to them than the Indonesian parts that we live in (Java and Borneo), we're not even slightly affected by it *no trace of haze whatsoever in both Java and Borneo*plus the fact that no local news covers it so we weren't in any way aware of this problem!

I am not going to go and talk about this stuff (because it's so controversial and this is not a topic i feel the need to debate to, read here for one of the controversy), obvi i felt embarrassed being an Indonesian and all (even though obvi we're not responsible for such things, blame the government not the people please) also felt very very bad for Malaysian and Singaporean!

I was there for less than a week and my health was already badly affected by it, let alone them who lived through it for months! I was already not very healthy a few days up to our departure and my condition only worsened because of the haze. My throat ache became so bad that i completely lost my voice and i developed a chesty cough that never really went away until very recently. Yes, i got sick for over two months. Thank God i am feeling much better right now!

Okay, enough of the heavy stuffs. You want to see my wings?

Hehehe... I LOVE this jacket, i have another one in black hahaha... i always am attracted to this kind of quirky things. I was pretty amazed that my sissy didn't make any comment (coz usually she's horrified by my quirkiness), i guess she's getting used to it :p

We rented a mini bus for the day to bring us around for a few hours *it was latter in the afternoon already when we arrived in JB*. Yes, big family haha.

That's my eldest sis-in-law CJ and G haha

Boys club, yes there were a lot of clubs hahaha

We've no plans for the rest of the day, and the last time i've been to JB was like, years ago so we had no idea where to go *we only planned on going to Lego Land and Hello Kitty Land, the rest we just kinda winged it lah*. I also already forgot how JB looks like, i went to KL so much more than JB! Totally expected it to look like KL but it's not lah hahaha. So much more quiet and no nice malls like KL's (that we went to) hahaha.

We asked the driver to bring us to a mall for lunch coz it was way passed lunch-time already. The driver said there were only like three big malls in JB and he's taking us to one one them called... Justco? The ones he mentioned sounded similar, Justco, Tesco hahaha. We went to a much nicer mall on the last full day in JB though (i cannot remember the name though!). JB-ers do not blame me if i wrote incorrectly okay, i only repeated what the driver said. I googled and seems like Aeon and KSL are nicer and bigger than those malls i mentioned! Oh, i googled some more and found the nicer mall we went to : Johor Bahru City Square!

He also passed by Lego Land (that we're going to the next day) and also Kota Iskandar. He offered us to stop for a few minutes and snap some pictures, and knowing us-we'll never say no to a photo op, ey?

This one's taken from inside the bus lah

One of me first :D

Ta dahhh

The whole time everybody was busy screaming to each other to hurry hurry hurry because it was really hot. But now after i've been to Taiwan in summer, i know what HOT really means so this was nothing lah :p.

Went to Justco next (i'm pretty sure it was Justco, anyone notice if it's not Justco please tell me hahaha) and straight to the food court. Now, i always find food in KL to be very nice and cheap, but i guess we went to the wrong place for lunch because the food was... MEH. Haha.

Baby Boy's roasted chicken rice with weird, sweet sauce. Ew. I almost spit it out when i lick the spoon for a taste. Ew ew ew

Hunny's claypot rice, also scarily sweet. Ew ew ew

My fried kway teow. The saddest looking but actually tasted the most acceptable!

CL went gaga over durians haha

Yoo hoo!

Went shopping afterwards. Malaysian fashion doesn't really interest me, and the shops there weren't very eye catching for me (except for Watsons and various local drugstore, awwww. I'm such a sucker for drugstores haha). Went to Toys R' Us to scout some toys to bribe Baby Boy in the future.

I only started shopping when we spotted HUGE Daiso *eyes lights up*, and we shopped like mad. Daiso's cheaper in Malaysia (and Singapore) than Indonesia, RM 5 or about IDR 17.000 (in Indonesia their flat price's IDR 22.500) and the collection's like 5x more complete. Spent almost RM 100 in Daiso! Can you imagine how many items we got?

I bought so much from their bath/beauty/body care section! Always heard great things about their charcoal facial wash (and masks but i only use sheet masks so i didn't get the mask) so i snapped a few (and a lot of other variants) to try. Super cheap and promises of good performance, of course must get as much as possible. Will show the haul in another (haul) post okay!

Then i gravitated towards the drugstores lah of course, and started shopping there as well as Sasa *yes, first day in KL i already ended up with tonnes of cosmetic haul FML*.. And i spotted this in Watsons!

Can you see what i mean? No?

Sariayu stand! Yes, in JB! I didn't even know that Sariayu's available anywhere outside Indonesia! Of course, Malaysia (or JB, coz i don't think i saw them the last time i was in KL which is like, last year, or maybe not yet?) is so close to Indonesia, but that's a step one into international recognition! So damn PROUD!

I bought my first SilkyGirl Soda Pop here, after debating non-stop with myself. I don't know why i was on defense though! I guess i was telling myself i didn't need any more lip products? But thinking back, that's so weird coz i knew i wanted the see through kind of lippies so badly! So maybe i was just thinking that i shouldn't get them on the first day? I do try to pace my shopping on holidays (tend to go crazy mad at the last days). 

In the end i had to ran back to the store selling it (coz i couldn't find them in Watsons or other stores in that mall) at the very last minute. They only had one flavor though (not to worry, i bought a lot more on the third day...). Wait for the haul entry lah okay :D.

I guess whenever i'm overseas no matter with whom i go, we tend to... eat nonstop hahahaha. Because after the mall, we decided to... have dinner. LOL. I was still very full lah so i didn't really eat, just finished the leftover from Baby Boy's plate hahaha.

Restoran Mana Lagi (Where Else Restaurant)? HAHAHAHAHA. I guess Malaysian are quite similar with Indonesian, likes to name their restaurants with weird names

The driver said it's a famous Nasi Lemak/Kandar (yes, our knowledge of Malaysian food are very limited, mostly we asks form Nasi Lemak lah hahahaha) in JB. It was really crowded too, so i guess the driver wasn't lying hahaha.

We eat at roadside stalls in Indonesia all the time, also in other countries as well. But it's the first time for us to actually eat in the middle of the parking lot!

No, i'm not kidding. It's quite scary whenever a car's passing by! You def cannot stand around and not pay attention coz you might get hit by a car!

Everybody said the nasi lemak was very good (but then everyday in our JB hotel, we're served nasi lemaks in rice packets that they claimed to be as good as this one, which CJ and CW kept on stealing and eat for lunch even dinner WTH LOLOLOL, those two took the word "kiasu" and amplified it by 100, in the end i guess everybody's good by not eating Nasi Lemak for another year or so :p) but i was still very full and i am incapable of telling whether something is good or not when i am full. Everything'd taste crappy for me haha.

Little G was asleep in her mummy's lap, and then my 15-year-old niece Au also wanted to sleep in HER mummy's lap.

OMG!

Then we're off to the hotel! To be honest, this is one of the main reason i don't really like going on a vacation with my mum *or any older people*. Coz 99x out of a 100 they'd be super unhappy with the hotel! I am always a budget traveler, like i said, i prefer to spend my money on shopping and other things! I always try to find a nice, affordable and CLEAN hotel obvi, you know how easily disgusted i am. But then again, when we go on a trip, we can't always be SURE that the hotel would be nice, yes? Especially if we've never stayed there before, we can only rely on the pictures the posted in their website/hotel booking webs, and we all know how misleading those pictures often are!

I so much prefer traveling by myself (i mean with hunny), or with people that have the same minds-set like ours. I can NEVER guarantee that the hotel would be nice, i can only hope it'd be! If it turns out to be horrible, if i travel with hunny only, then we'd just swallow our disappointment and DEAL with it. I dislike traveling with my family just because they tend to BITCH about it and start pointing fingers.

See it from my POV, i never forced anyone to come to a trip with me, and i never persuade them to stay in the same hotel as me. People like my mum or KC, expects 5-starred kind of hotels all the time. I must stress that i CAN afford 5-stars hotels all the time, but i PREFER not to. Again, i'd rather spend them on shopping hahaha. So maybe this is a warning for anyone who's thinking of joining me on a trip in the future LOL.

CL was the one who found this hotel coz i told her i'd stay in a budget kind of hotel. I gave her IDR 500.000 or less budget, why? Because i stayed in that kind of price ranged hotels in KL and they are always clean and very nice already. How was i supposed to know that the standard in JB's different than in KL? If any, i'd thought i'd get a nicer hotel in JB with the same kind of price than in KL, but it's actually the complete opposite! 

I am not like, super stingy okay *LOL*. But is it a crime for not always wanting to splurge on a 5-starred hotels in every trip? Especially if i go on a trip like, more than 5x in a year. I always try to find the middle ground, you know... Budget hotels that are clean and simple are plenty to come by, but like i said, one can never be 100% sure. You win some, you lose some. But from my mum's reaction you'd think it's a crime when the hotel you've booked turned out not as glam as she wanted it to be. LOL.

Yeah, you must get that my mum wasn't really happy with the hotel hahaha. From the start. Actually i found the hotel to be quite okay, they should've maintain the cleanliness better, and they faced the same kind of problem with our very own, dampness (due to no windows in most of the rooms) but it's not that horrible really!

We're staying at Bliss Boutique Hotel

Yeah, i forgot. We should've never stayed in a boutique hotel if my mum's around. She never cared for any of the boutique hotels we've stayed in before ahahaha. 

KC kept on saying that "This is a love hotel" LOL. I think i like love hotels then, their decors are always the cutest. Look at the butterflies in the ceiling!

The small lobby's immediately full when my family went in hahaha

Hello me in the mirror!

CL and i were attracted to this hotel because they have different designs for every room! I didn't take any picture of my room though, because we booked a family room *with two double beds-and two sinks hahaha* and share it with my 'rents (yes, that's the fate or the babies of the family and their spouses) and my mum won't stop complaining non-stop about the room that i didn't feel like taking pictures at all. I dunno why she's complaining so much since she's only staying for one night! My 'rents were leaving for Singapore the next morning and we caught up with them on the fourth day.

Personally i think my room's the ugliest lah because it's super standard (and CL's and CJ's too because theirs were very similar to mine) and got to window *hence the damp feeling*. It was also painted in lavender, which made the room kinda dark and gloomy *___*... They also only stuck stickers of cute fishes on the wall and called it decor. LOL.

I found this picture on Agoda but it's not as pretty IRL hahaha

Photo from Agoda website

The other rooms were so much more interesting! Actually this place's not so bad if you're on a budget trip, just make sure you book the designer boutique rooms though, they are only very slightly more expensive (we upgraded the room for the next two nights to the designer one since we didn't need a family room anymore because only three of us were staying in that room and had to pay very little for the upgrade) but a lot better than the standard one, mainly because they have (huge) windows so the designer rooms were a lot brighter and not damp. My only complain would be the bathroom, i hate it when the bathroom's so small that the toilet would be completely soaked when you're showering! I'm okay if the bathrooms are small but they separate it with the toilet itself (like in the family room or KC's room).

Now that i think about it, also never snapped any picture of our designer room even though it was pink (hunny was like, heyyy it's called Pink Dreams *or something*, perfect for you!) because i was too tired (and sickly) the next nights, plus having to deal with less than healthy and very fussy Baby Boy took a toll on me. Haish.

Okay, now will show you the other rooms instead haha!

Au and MT's room, pinky! With a comfy beanbag

CV and K (my other nephew, CV's little brother, BB's elder brother)'s room

This looked exactly like my next room except my room was pink

This one's not interesting, CJ's family's room (the one that looked just like mine), but you can't really see the room anyway since there were too many people haha.

But this one's uglier lah hahaha, no decor at all. And smaller because there were one double bed plus one single bed instead of two double beds

The best room of all? KC and CW's! It's called Boutique Suite and unfortunately only ONE available in the entire hotel! GRRRR. Of course, it's two times (or more) the price of the designer boutique rooms, but it's like... Three times the size of the other rooms so it's totally worth it. I wouldn't mind staying in that room if i ever go to JB again.

This open concept bathtub of course sets KC squealing again "This is a love hotel!!! LOVE HOTEL!!!". Not to worry, they have separate shower and toilet haha

Sun-tanning spot? Hahaha

Complete with massage chair!

If you open the window you can see the street below clearly, make sure to always draw the curtain before you change!

But the surrounding around the hotel was a bit suspicious hahaha... We went out for a little bit with KC and CL to find the spot to catch a bus the next day *to take us to the central where we'll find the bus to Lego Land* so we won't struggle the next day *but it turned out to be a different spot or something like that, we ended up struggling real hard the next day anyway LOLOLOL, always happens whenever we rely on CL as the guide :P. I won't complain since i am horrible with directions so it's better to have a bad guide than no guide, right?* and... we passed by a lot of... prostitutes. LOL. 

There were a lot of small, scary looking hotels around too, so i guess it's no surprise. But the Bliss Hotel itself is not a love hotel really lahh, everybody that we met in the hotel were family tourists so not to worry if you plan on staying there!

Anyway, that's all for my Day 1 in KL! Will blog about Lego Land next!

Toodles!
 

#Pink