Dim Sum @ Tai Thong

We went to Tai Thong Imperial City Restaurant at Cheras Plaza for dim sum breakfast last Sunday, just to see how big-time Tai Thong differs from our regular small-time dim sum haunts.

Although the restaurant is air-conditioned, we were seated at one particular corner, which felt stuffy and warm. Interior is well decorated, not unlike any other big-time restaurants. Decor so classy oso cannot eat, so this point is not on top of my list. It is of course, the fooood that matter most...
In terms on dim sum variety, Restoran Yi Poh in Taman Connaught (they've recently change name to dunno what, but the dim sum served is still the same) wins without breaking a sweat!
The siew mais (pork wrapped in wantan sheets) are a bit small in size, although the meat damn solid (in other words, it's chewy and not lembik like the siew mais the pao seller sells). Har gao (each got 2 prawns inside) also rocks! The transparent membrane is tough and not easily penetrated, a bit too thick for my liking.
Yue mai (fish paste made into a ping-pong ball), according to my mom, is good. But she claimed she can make better ones. The ones mom make are small-time fish balls, not yue mai...
The roasted duck is goooooooooood! Strong herbal aroma, and served piping hot! Shiok! Chicken feet also not bad. But other than that, the rest of the dim sums can be found elsewhere at a much cheaper price, and better too!
The Minced Pork with Century Egg porridge is definitely not the best I've ever tried. Taste so so only. The fried toppings are so hard, nearly powderise my teeth chewing it. But the thick consistency of the porridge is there la.We didn't have much of the fried stuff. Not that we are a family of health-freaks who don't ingest anything fried and oily - the reason is the cart housing the fried oily dim sums came only when all of us had already stuffed our tummy full.Conclusion is, don't waste your money going to big-time restaurant like this. The dim sum not say very special also! Har gao got 2 prawns in it only mah, no big deal geh. Make ownself put 10 inside also can. Seriously, I think Restoran Yi Poh wins Tai Thong hands down - in terms of variety and economical. In term of food quality, Tai Thong wins.

But still, if you're a stucked-up big time businessman/consultant-of-the-year who had just won your Nobel prize, and have loads of cash, here's the location. Don't forget to call me along!

TAI THONG IMPERIAL CITY RESTAURANT
Ground Floor, Cheras Plaza
(next to Cheras Leisure Mall)
Jalan Manis 1
Taman Segar
56100 Cheras
Tel: 03-9132 0118

New Paris Restaurant

How often do you see a two-storey Chinese ("dai chao") restaurant? Not common in smaller states, but quite a number in KL right? Well, this New Paris Restaurant in SS2, PJ, has not two, not three, but FOUR levels of dining fantasy!

Rachel recommended this place as she's been there before. The place was super crowded when we visited last Saturday. We had to climb up to level three as the first two floors were fully occupied. This restaurant is definitely not the same class as the upmarket Tai Thong, Teochew Oriental, Spring Garden, The Hakka Restaurant, and the shits alike. It's a normal restaurant serving normal Chinese food with it's four storey air-conditioned building and an army of staffs and chefs and swarms of hungry customers and hard-to-get parking spaces.
One thing I find peculiar is the way they serve their rice. Although there were only two of us, they gave us a potful of rice instead of the normal per serving norm. We were charged RM2.00 (RM1.00/person?) for that pot of rice. I guess this is good, as some people are just "fan-toong" (someone who eats a lot of rice) and thus can scoop as much as they want as rice is kinda like free-flow in New Paris.
We ordered their Specialty Tofu, which are lightly fried on the outside and soft like tao-fu-fah on the inside, topped liberally with minced pork and pickled veggies. This dish is good. Liked the texture, tasted like egg. RM7.00.
Steamed Tilapia Jeong-Jing style. This dish is the first that arrived on our table. Can you believe it? Just 5-minutes after ordering, it pops on our table. I think they pre-steam this fish and keep it heated, till when there's an order, the hot chili paste is poured on top of it and served. This fish is crap. The flesh is mashed up like tao-fu-fah, not a good thing on fish. Signifies it's dead for a bloody long time. Bad tilapia, and costed us RM16.00.
Veggie was Stir-fry Lettuce with Pickled Tofu (what's new!). This dish is very ordinary, have tasted better ones elsewhere, nothing to shout about. RM6.00.
And for meat, we had the Guinness Pork Ribs ("hak beh kuat"). This is good according to Rachel, but seriously I've tasted pork ribs that's very much more superior than this, in a small state called Kulai in Johor. The ribs here are fatty. The sauce is fragrant with a tinge of bittersweet, which is tasty, but it's too starchy-thick! If I were to grade this with a scale of 1 to 10, I'd rate this dish a 7. This is RM9.00.
Dining here is like a fast food experience. The waitress take your order the moment you're seated, and expects you to blabber your brain out instantaneously too. No pictorial menu provided. They expect you to know all their specialty dishes since they are so successful. Food came real fast too despite the number of customers. Not a surprise if you see their kitchen...
There's really an army of chefs inside the kitchen. All working in a synchronous harmony. I bet you don't see this in McD or KFC!
Food were mediocre at best. Simple basic Chinese food also can be so like so-so only, I guess their better specialty food cannot differ much lah! But having said that, I'd like to go again and try out their other dishes. Provided someone is willing to belanja lah!
If you wanna experience the incredible success of Restoran New Paris, dining with many many other strangers in a busy air-conditioned multiple-floor restaurant which has a funky western name, point your GPS set to:

No. 62, 64, 66, Jalan SS2/72, Petaling Jaya. Tel: 03-7955 9180/0186.

W880i Accessories

Was walking in 1Utama when I saw this handphone accessories shop called Novacell. This shop is located at the junction between the old and new wings of 1U, which is a few steps away from the GSC cinema. It looks more like accessory shop for young ladies, with all the bling bling what nots hanging around.

I've been looking for a silicone casing for my W880i, but to no avail. And I was happy to find it in this shop, and bought it for RM25.00 without much hesitation. It comes with a "free" screen protector too.Since the W880i is notorious for it's thinness, I wasn't keen on carrying it around inside my pockets. The rubberised back panel seems susceptible to easy lacerations from keys, coins, bumps, etc. So I've been carrying it with a Dr. Ion case I got from Kinokuniya Bookstore, KLCC.Now, it's fully protected with a silicone layer! No scared of scratching no more! I even did a free-fall test (accidentally lah) with the phone in the silicone casing and housed inside the Dr. Ion case . No damage done! It fell on my toes, then tergolek off and landed on marble floor. It survived!!!Can't believe they could actually manufacture the silicone casing with such perfect fit, with all the details of the phone thrown in to increase usability. In fact, wearing the W880i with this silicone jacket did not interfere with any functions at all.There are small windows, cut exactly to the shape of the phone, for the microphone, speaker, memory card slot, charging slot, camera lenses (back and front), the details are amazing!However, this silicone case attracts dust, although it's called an anti-dust casing. The keypads are difficult to press, I need my fingernails to punch in SMS-es. Darn! But that's the trade-off I'm willing to pay for safeguarding my gadget loh!If you're planning to get this from the same shop, the silicone casing can be had for RM18 sans the "free" screen protector. I found this out when the salesperson asked me whether I still need the screen protector since mine already had one installed. I thought, might as well get one for back up juz in case. On the other, if you're lookin for a screen protector for the same model, it's RM7 although they put the price as RM15. That's more than double! Be sure to ask for price reduction yeah! You can quote my blog if they refuse to do so! Heh heh...

Location: Novacell, Lot S202, 2nd Flr, 1 Utama. Phone: (03-7729 6181)
Related: Unboxing W880i

S.M.A.R.T. Tunnel

The recently opened SMART Tunnel is gonna be toll-free till June 14, 2007. Wondering how smart this tunnel is, I decided to try it during the past weekend. I was travelling from PJ, headed towards my home at Ampang.

The entry point is at the TUDM at Sungai Besi along the North-South highway. I had no idea where it ends exactly, but had a rough idea the exit would be somewhere around the Davis Roundabout (Bulatan Kg. Pandan).Was thinking if the exit is somewhere near there, I'd take the usual Kg. Pandan route back home. But I was wrong...Anyway let's have a look at the tunnel. First thing first, driving thru the tunnel is a bumpy ordeal. At least for my lowered Wiralution RS. Benz and BM's sure no prob la. You see the photos also can feel how bumpy the ride was. Even with Sony's SuperSteadyShot image stabiliser also cannot remove the vibration. How smart! I think they purposely make the road rough so as to prevent accidents, 'coz since you cannot take clear picture while driving you wouldn't bother to take any.It's a narrow two-lane motorway. I didn't see any motorcycles - SMART Tunnel can filter bikes and lorries from entering it. How? Already told you it's a blardy smart tunnel lok!There are some stretches along the tunnel's motorway which seems smartly dangerous to motorists. Some corners/chicanes sweeps real tajam, exit point also a bit cacat clever. If you were travelling on the left lane and enjoying the marvel of concrete art, you'd suddenly realise that the lane leads you to Bukit Bintang towards the end of the tunnel. If you travel in the middle you'll collide head-on with thick concrete dividers. Right lane exits to Jalan Tun Razak.Since my Wiralution got power steering, I managed to swerve to the right just in time to power-slide into the lobang that said "Jalan Tun Razak". Nifty!The speed limit for the tunnel is 60km/h. You can see that I'm abiding the speed limit while snapping photos of the tunnel. Scared what, there's no CCTV in the tunnel. Nobody know I'm driving less than the limit of 60km/h also! So at some instances I slowed my car down to 40km/h, just to see if the tunnel got collapse or not. Since if car travel slower, the weight applied on the tunnel is longer. So more wear and tear. That's why they say limit is 60km/h, cannot less than that one!

So the tunnel ends at Jalan Tun Razak (or Bkt. Bintang), way off Bulatan Kg. Pandan. I had to travel home via Jalan Ampang. Lucky no jam! Damn smart lah the tunnel... Malaysia Boleh!

Carnivale @ 1Utama

This photo was captured at the 1Utama new wing. 1Utama was having a carnival-like event to promote their new loyalty card, called the OneCard. Colourful isn't it?

26.05.2007 @ 2125hrs by T30.

Fellatio reduces incidence of Pre-eclampsia?

Fellatio, or "blow-job", is oral sex performed on the penis (as if you did not already know!). I was browsing the net and came across this journal that claimed fellatio with subsequent ingestion of semen reduces the incidence of pre-eclampsia.

But before you strip your partner's southern region naked, you must be wondering what the heck pre-eclampsia is. Pre-eclampsia is a condition of hypertension (high blood pressure of 140/90 mmHg and above) during second half of pregnancy, typically accompanied by proteinuria (passage of relatively high amount protein in the urine) with/without oedema (bodily swelling).The cause of pre-eclampsia remains unclear, although aberrant trophoblastic tissue and immune mechanisms have been implicated. Untreated pre-eclampsia can cause foetal death, maternal multi-system organ failure, vaginal bleeding, and seizure. Conventional treatment of pre-eclampsia is to admit the mother into a hospital, and medication given to control her blood pressure. Ultimately, the doctors would have to deliver the baby as delivery is the only way to bring the mother's blood pressure back to normal.But what if there's a way to prevent this from happening in the first place? No needles, no tablets, no surgeries, no pain, and most important of all, comes packed with erotic fun and pleasure with your partner!

The study by Koelman et. al. titled "Correlation between Oral Sex and a Low Incidence of Pre-eclampsia: A Role for Soluble HLA in Seminal Fluid" found that oral sex and swallowing of sperm is correlated with lower incidences of pre-eclampsia! Neat discovery aye?!Before you rush to get hold of that therapeutic fluid, the last line of the study abstract also stated that "An extension of the present study is necessary to verify this hypothesis". Ooops did the warning came too late?Bet you didn't know blow-job has health benefits (provided safe technique is observed). There's always a risk of sexually-transmitted infection, mind ya! You wouldn't want your oral cavity to look like our mate in the photo above, so say no promiscuity aight?! Should anyone wanna find out more on fellatio, you know, how to improve your fellatio prowess, there's a book written on it too:Imagine, if further studies verify that fellatio and sperm-drinking actually reduces incidences of pre-eclampsia, O&G specialists will go around telling patient "Give your hubby a blow-job and make sure you swallow his cum, twice daily for a fortnight before attempting conception". Or, "Drink a tablespoon of your husband's sperm everynight before going to bed". Eww, *shudders* I feel disgusted already.

Just in case the links to the study mentioned above didn't work, here's the study abstract by Koelman et. al.:

The involvement of immune mechanisms in the aetiology of preeclampsia is often suggested. Normal pregnancy is thought to be associated with a state of tolerance to the foreign antigens of the fetus, whereas in preeclamptic women this immunological tolerance might be hampered. The present study shows that oral sex and swallowing sperm is correlated with a diminished occurrence of preeclampsia which fits in the existing idea that a paternal factor is involved in the occurrence of preeclampsia. Because pregnancy has many similarities with transplantation, we hypothesize that induction of allogeneic tolerance to the paternal HLA molecules of the fetus may be crucial. Recent data suggest that exposure, and especially oral exposure to soluble HLA (sHLA) or HLA derived peptides can lead to transplantation tolerance. Similarly, sHLA antigens, that are present in the seminal plasma, might cause tolerance in the mother to paternal antigens. In order to test whether this indeed may be the case, we investigated whether sHLA antigens are present in seminal plasma. Using a specific ELISA we detected sHLA class I molecules in seminal plasma. The level varied between individuals and was related to the level in plasma. Further studies showed that these sHLA class I molecules included classical HLA class I alleles, such as sHLA-A2, -B7, -B51, -B35 and sHLA-A9. Preliminary data show lower levels of sHLA in seminal plasma in the preeclampsia group, although not significantly different from the control group. An extension of the present study is necessary to verify this hypothesis.

Family Gym @ Jalan Rasah

Ever since UAV Gym mysteriously wind up business and close shop without prior notice early this month, I've been going to this "Family Gym" along the main road of Jalan Rasah. No choice lah, got to maintain muscle mass and prevent fat build-up mah. Once I stop weight training for 3 months, my body would revert back to a "fei chai" body.

The gym is located above Public Bank. The gym signage is old and faded and is easy to miss. In the photo below, the red arrows point to the gym at 2nd floor, while blue arrow points at the gym entry.The gym must have been operating for quite some years now as the equipments are either rusty or squeky or malfunction. As you can see from the following photos, the weight machines are from the yesteryears.The PVC that wraps around the cushions on the machines are cracked and some have huge holes exposing the hardened sponge underneath. While new gyms provide more ergonomic machines which movements when executed targets specific muscles, the machines here at Family Gym causes premature osteoarthritis.Weight machines are scanty; the gym doesn't have enough machines for specific muscle group workouts. Weights are rusty and dirty. The handles on the weight bars are rusty too - that shows the usage frequency and the number of gym members.Notice there aren't any gym freaks in each photos? It's been like this during my past few visits. There was only one or two members everytime I left the gym around 6pm.The lack of business is understandable, as the gym equipments are old and rusty, and seriously lacking in variety. Those machines are so basic! And old (did I just mention old again?). Old! Period.Not only old and rusty, some machines are labelled "Out Of Order" the first time I stepped into the gym, and till now it's still not being fixed. I was struggling to refrain from adding the words "... Forever and Ever" to that piece of note.And the biggest fault the gym owner committed is making the membership fee so bloody high as though Family Gym is equivalent to California Fitness. I mean, come on lah, set the fees so high but let members carry rusty steel. Where got attraction right?I've been here a few times before, asking for the membership fees and checking the place out before I joined UAV. They just refuse to lower the fees despite me hinting on their lack of equipments and their stuff appearing aged. Their student rate is for secondary school students. Yeah right, as if secondary school students would frequent their gym. The students would be more than happy to take KTM down to California Fitness at Mid Valley and ogle at ang moh chicks!One thing that make this gym better than California Fitness is the provision of lockers with actual locks and keys so that members won't need to buy small padlocks (heh heh I know this is lame).I enter the gym by per-entry basis - RM68.00 for eight bloody entries. That worked out to RM8.50 per entry. Sibeh expensive right? If you don't buy this 8-entry coupon, you'll need to pay RM12 for one entry! 5-entry coupon is RM48.00.I'm starting to wonder why don't they switch name to Los Angeles Fitness or Hawaiian Fitness or something similar. At least when people complain about the fees being high, the owner can brag about being classy and all. "Aiya, where got ex?!! We are Los Angeles Fitness maaahh!""8 Sessions of Body Shaping and Toning"?? Sounds blardy sissy aye?...