Rackets is not my game..

With the tournament over, we now have plans to head north out of London. Before we left, we went back to the Queens Club to see a rackets match. It was pretty impressive with 4 people in a closed-in space, hitting the ball really hard and still not manage to injure each other!

Rackets is new to me. We haven't got a court to play in in Australia, so in between our real tennis matches, we arranged for a lesson in rackets - just to experience it. It's played in a room with walls like squash but the court is much much larger, rackets are longer and the ball travels extremely fast. We were given protective glasses to wear which I appreciated. I was hit by the ball on it's forth bounce, the the sting lasted about 30 seconds! It turned a swollen blue spot soon after!

Unfortunately, I didn't take to the game well. I found the racket way too long and kept getting too close to the ball (similar situation when I switched from badminton to squash). Of course I kept missing it and only managed a few hits in the hour of lesson! Howard Angus, our coach was extremely patient :) - thanks Howard. Jeremy on the other hand, was pretty good and had a few good rallies with Howard.

If you are curious enough, follow this link to find out about rackets.

Black-tie event

After 3 days in France, we were back in London - aah, it was rather nice to be able to understand what people say! And all the signs are in English - yay!! I'm not so lost now...

The tennis tournament ended with a ball in Hurlingham Club. We arrived in London at 4 pm and scrambled to glam-up for the black-tie event. This is the best we can do - see picture below.

Picnic lunch - yumm!

We stopped at one of the small towns near Moulin du Bechet to buy meat from the local charcuterie for lunch. There were loads to choose from and we bought 2 bits of terrine - pork with foie gras and pork & duck - and some sliced smoked meat, all extremely delicious. We bought a chocolate moose for dessert, which was surprisingly light and enjoyable. We also stopped at a nice little patisserie and bought a crunchy baguette (this is fantastic - crunchy on the outside, soft inside) for lunch. Here is a photo of Jeremy enjoying lunch at a picnic spot we found in a little village - doesn't he look happy?  Who wouldn't be with such good food!

 

It was funny going thru the small villages; they were sweet little places with old buildings and small roads, but they were all rather quiet and I often wonder where everyone was.

3 days in France

We saw the Eiffel tower, the Louvre and a number of famous buildings in Paris... Unfortunately we only saw these buildings from the car navigating our way back to the train station at Gare du Nord in our hired car.

We went to France for a 3 day visit by train from London to Paris. We picked up a car in Paris. Navigating and driving is in Paris is a nightmare. Driving on the left  or to me the wrong side of the road in a country where all the road signs are in a foreign language is certainly not easy. I was never sure if the roads signs refer to upcoming towns or rest stops, or rivers for that matter. And after I have looked at the name of a place, I forget what it was the next minute. It did not help that we arrived just in time to join peak hour traffic. There were lots of highways crisscrossing each other and navigating out of Paris in peak hour traffic on the wrong side of the road was not an easy task.

   

We headed to Normandy and the Loire Valley, and we made it there safely and back. On the first night, we found ourselves in a little place called Moulin de Béchet, a B&B in an beautiful surrounding (pictured above), in the lovely village of Croisy-sur-Eure. It has a river running though its grounds with tall trees and lots of flowers, including tulips, which I love. They were larger that the ones that we see in Australia.

Veronic from the B&B spoke English and recommended this wonderful restaurant called La Ferme de Cocherel for dinner. There was only one waiter and only 2 tables were occupied. We had the most beautiful french dinner. The waiter spoke only French - thank goodness Jeremy recognised some words :) and we had a guide book with some useful food words. We had loads to drink and to eat. The most memorable dish for me was the lamb (3 different parts of lamb cooked in 3 different ways). The waiter guessed that we love food and gave us a book on French restaurants. It was from this book that we found the place for our next culinary experience.

L'Orangerie du Château is situated in the heart of Blois and is a posh place with a number of young waiters. The food was great, but not as stand-out as the first restaurant. It was cute that when the young waiters bought our food, they went on to explain to us the dish that was served in French. I wonder if they knew that we had no idea what they were saying but went thru the motions anyway. As before we had too much to drink and to eat and found it rather difficult to get through dessert which as a colourful array of little stuff, beautifully presented (bottom left). We also could not fit in the cheese but they have a rather impressive selection (see bottom right)

We had a scary experience thinking that our car was locked in the underground carpark when we left the restaurant. It was dark and there were gates across all the entrances. We checked all the entrances and exits but did not come across any that were not locked. We thought that we would have to take a taxi back to the hotel (that is if we could find one) and come back for the car the next morning. We went to the restaurant to seek help and the staff at the restaurant explained to us that we could get into the carpark using the ticket to open the gate. Love the differences that different countries present but it would have been awfully inconvenient to be locked out.

Get out of London if you are looking for real English cultural experience...

My last trip to London was in 2000. It was a brief trip as part of my backpacking journey to Europe and the US. It's nice to come back to London - after 7 years, I now have a new appreciation of the city.

With not much time to look around the city we have only managed to go to a few restaurants in search of food, and some galleries. We went to the TATE Modern, the Design Museum and the V&A Museum and had a great time. I only wish we had more time and energy to see more.

What I notice about London this time round is how it has become more culturally diverse. I hear different accents everywhere, not only from tourists but from those working in hospitality. I'm told that they are many eastern Europeans working in London - I have met 2 men from Hungary, who told me they have many friends from Hungary who are working in London. London certainly is from what I remember it to be years ago, where the hotel doorman was all serious and English (in a good way), and I thought I got a real English experience then in London. Now London is a melting pot of English and European cultures. Mmm, perhaps when we go outside London after the week of tennis, we will be able to get some real English cultural experience.

We did not do well in tennis, unfortunately

Here is a picture of the Melbourne Kookaburras (our team) taken at the Queen's Club, where we played 3 of our 4 matches.  My partner on court, Suzanne and I did not win a single set. Other partnerships in the team had some wins but unfortunately they were too few. On the whole, the team did rather badly losing all 4 matches we played in.

On the brighter side of tennis, we played at some fabulous tennis locations. Our matches in the tournaments were at The Queens Club and Lords (the picture above is taken in Lords). Jeremy and I also arranged for a couple of games at Hampton Court Palace (see my previous blog).

After the last day of our tournament, there was a friendly match between the Australian ladies and the English ladies. This was in another beautiful location, Hardwick House which is situated in a lovely English village outside London - getting there by train (top 2 pictures) was half the fun. It was a close match, with both sides winning 3 sets each. Our opponent, the English team was extremely hospitable. They organised the entire event and prepared a scrumptious lunch for us. We took many photos and everyone had a nice time.

Real Tennis at Hampton Court

We played real tennis at Hampton Court Palace yesterday! It was such a thrill - I haven't taken any photo of the palace but here is one from wiki. Pretty GRAND, isn't it!!

According to wiki, the royal (real ) tennis court, was built for Henry VIII of England, who played there from 1528. Read more about the palace plus other photos : click here

Our games were at night so unfortunately we were not able to look around. I had a nice game with Sarah at 9 pm and Jeremy played with Scott at 10 pm. I did manage to get some photos of Jeremy on the tennis court though. Not very good photos but here's one anyway.

 

If you are thinking that this isn't what you thought a tennis court looks like... this is real tennis, not lawn tennis. So what is real tennis? Again, this is from wiki: real tennis is the original racquet sport from which the modern game of lawn tennis, or tennis, is descended. Real tennis is still played by enthusiasts on about 35 existing courts in the United Kingdom, Australia, the United States, and France. Click here for more info.

Photograph of a courtyard

I'm haven't been the typical tourist who takes loads of pictures... and am leaving photos of famous places to the pros. The image above is of a little courtyard outside a church tucked away from a main road. It's a quiet place, a nice contrast to the hustle and bustle of busy London.

More food adventures

We have no luck with good breakfast places, a least not the first time round. We went to Simpson's-on-the-Strand today, but they were not open. We were surprised - Londoners must not like breakfast on Sundays... maybe they only have brunch or late breakfasts... Anyway, I wrote the first time round because we did manage to eat breakfast at The Wolsely the second time round (see my previous post re The Wolsely). We arrived the the door on 8:40 am even before they were open for business (yes, we were keen!). After walking around window shopping in the bitter cold for 20 minutes, we were finally allowed into the restaurant. The food was good but not something that you can't find elsewhere, but having a nice breakfast in a nice elegant surrounding, with superb service is a great way to start the day.  After breakfast, we went away happy :)

Since I am on the subject of food, I had my first Yorkshire pudding today. It came with our Sunday roast at the Kings Head (see my previous post on the pub near our hotel). I'm told that it's bread with drippings of meat sauce while cooking. I don't think eating it on its own would be nice but it went rather well with the roast.

Day 1 and 2 in London... it's freezing! plus more food adventures...

Compared to Kuala Lumpur, it's FREEZING in London! Single digits on the mercury wasn't what I expected, and I simply did not bring enough warm clothes. So after braving the cold (miserably) for a day, we found some nice warm cashmere jumpers, a warm funky wrap for me and a nice cashmere lined soft leather gloves.

Arriving at 6 am in the morning means that we had to kill time until 2 pm before we were able to move in to the hotel room. Besides the cold which made me rather unhappy on day 1, hay fever also wore me down and made me rather unsociable.  We played real tennis at Queens in the afternoon and by 9 pm, we were both weary from jetlag and the lack of sleep...

There is so much to look at in London. Old buildings seem to be  everywhere and many are magnificent. With large columns and intricate details, they are grand (These 2 buildings shown in the photo on the left is connected by a slightly slanted section in the middle - I found that interesting). Then there are the designer shops - it's extremely interesting walking along Bond Street -  over the top jewelry, clothes, watches, etc. There is just some much to see and to be amazed at. The goods at Fortnum & Mason were amazingly well made and beautiful, and the interior of the store was  sophisticated.  I felt extremely under-dressed in Harrods. Perch up on the stool having lunch, everyone seem to look beautiful and well presented...

We surfed the net for great places to have brekkie. We decided to go to the Wolsely but on arriving, were told that there was a 40 minutes' wait - it's not even weekend!! We ended up going to a nearby patisserie which was rather nice.  More people watching... an older man came into the cafe with an extremely young sexy looking girl. He was obviously smitten by her, and they looked into each others eyes. Then she pulled down the top of her low-cut blouse to show him her jewel-studded bra. They continued talking and looking into each others' eyes.

On the way back to the hotel, we decided to stop at a pub for a drink. It was a good find - it had a nice happy atmosphere and there were nice touches to the place. For example, the words on the door of the gents, located in an obscure corner says "Congratulations - you have found the gents". I was impressed with my first ploughman platter - cheese, vegetable, apple, ham, baguette and chutney. I had a strawberry lambic which was so easy to drink that I could easily have mistaken it for soda. An hour later, lightheaded and contented, we made our way to the hotel for some much needed rest.

Head to Wai Sek Kai in SS2 for another fantastic culinary experience

SS2 - that's where every visitor should flock to for dinner at least once. My estimate is that there are over 300 hawker stalls (not exaggerating) that sells a variety of food. Street food that is. This includes all sorts of noodles, rice, snacks, etc. We had roasted stingray from the ikan bakar (literally means roast fish) stall, har mee (or prawn mee, which is yellow or wheat noodles served in a broth cooked with prawns and condiments), and a number of other types of food. This is a street where many stalls congregate and later became a hawker centre. The locals refer to this place located in Petaling Jaya, a suburb just outside Kuala Lumpur as Wai Sek Kai meaning Eager to Eat Street!

A true authentic Malaysian experience

We had roti for breakfast yesterday - it was fabulous. Roti for breakfast may probably be weird to some, but in Malaysia, it is a common breakfast (as well as anytime) food, normally eaten only with a light curry or dahl (unlike in Australia where roti is usually a side order to a main meal). There are many varieties including roti telur (roti with egg), roti sardin (roti with sardine) and other savoury types. Then there are the sweet variety such as roti pisang (roti with banana)! 

Roti literally means bread in Malay, but it's different from the bread that is widely available in shops. Roti is made from wheat flour. The dough is left to rise slightly and then stretched and layered while cooking on a flat pan. As a result, there are many silken layers, and the good ones are crispy on the outside and soft inside.

I love roti telur - cooked with a beaten egg between its layers - eaten simply with fish curry (no fish, just curry).  Yesterday, we had one roti and one roti telur between us, with teh tarik.

Teh tarik is simply tea and condense milk. Tarik means to pull. The tea is poured from one container to another with the containers as far apart as possible, as if the liquid is pulled...  this mixes the contents and gives the tea quite a bit of froth. It is usually served hot (but on a hot day, some people ask for the cold variety). It is an extremely popular drink. It is very sweet, so we usually say "kurang manis" (i.e. less sweet) to the waiter when ordering and they usually oblige. Drinking teh tarik is a popular activity to catch up with friends or just to have something to pass the time with.

Jeremy (pictured above) seems really happy with his brekkie of roti and teh tarik, eaten at a local mamak (indian muslim) shop. I think this should be on the to-do list of anyone coming to Malaysia.

Home in Kuala Lumpur

My niece, Azalea is six and enjoys drawing. She's learning ballet and piano. While I spent time talking to Mom and reading and doing nothing much at home (home is currently at my brother's house in Kuala Lumpur), Azalea has been playing with some imaginary friends - she had handed out menus at a restaurant, shown friends to their tables and offered them chocolate cheesecake for dessert.

I have been taking photos. The picture above shows ingredients being prepared the traditional way for a local assam soup with fish. It was amazingly hot! I could feel the heat in my stomach long after I had the soup, but it was yummy. We also had stir-fried jicama, tofu with soy sauce and steamed free range chicken all cooked by Mom.  Aah, these are the food I grew up eating in Malaysia.

Melbourne to Singapore to Kuala Lumpur

It seem to have taken forever to get to Kuala Lumpur to see my family and friends.

Firstly the flight was delayed for 2 hours leaving Melbourne. We arrived at Singapore Changi Airport close to midnight and had to be patient in the long queue for half an hour at customs.

The hotel was nice and the staff was pleasant. We got a free upgrade to a suite, which did not matter really for the few hours we were going to be there. The next morning,  we got up early to the sound of tropical rain - I loved it. It felt refreshing and familiar! (The picture on the left is taken from the hotel room window.)  We left for the airport soon after and had breakfast. Then we were on the plane again to Kuala Lumpur where we will stay for a few days.

So far, the food experience is a bit lacking, and I found the food in Singapore a bit bland. But that is not to say that the food in Singapore is not nice, but because we have not had a chance to seek out the good food that Singapore has to offer. Maybe next time.

Dinner Party - new artwork

This is a new piece, just completed and uploaded today. It's titled "Dinner Party", and is a sneak peak at a dinner guest.

Click here for a larger view.

Love to hear what you think, so do leave your comments.

Till next time, E