Continue from My Spirit Of Penang - Part I…

Another 40 minutes to 11.30AM and the marshall would blow the whistle air horn to signify the end of the elimination round. Whichever teams that clocked in later than 11.30AM would be auto disqualified and ended their journey for Spirit Of Penang. Thinking that Turtle Rocks Evolution would have clocked in by then, I walked back to the flag off point (Esplanade).

Upon reaching, I couldn’t see them (Ivan, Clement, Chia Hur and Pelf Yeen.) I found a shade and waited for them.

10 minutes…
20 minutes…
30 minutes…
39 minutes…

10… 9… 8… 7… 6… 5… 4… 3… 2… 1!

“HHHOOONNNKKK!” (The marshall sounded the air horn.)

The sound of the air horn also implied that Turtle Rocks Evolution didn’t make it. Hence, my presence in the team and Spirit Of Penang was useless insignificant. Honestly, I was a little disappointed. Nonetheless, I believed Turtle Rocks Evolution had tried their best.

It was another 30 minutes later when Chia Hur spotted me standing under a shade. I walked towards them and all I could see was exhausted turtles. I knew how it felt like after running for 3 hours, it was painfully tired.

“Very slow lah you all.”
“We got lost while finding the stations.”
“……”
“We only completed 2 out of the 5 tasks given.”
“……”
“At the last station, the marshalls fetched us back here with a van.”
“……”

-smacks forehead-

Nevermind. Better luck next time.

We left the place and found ourselves a place to sit down and catch our breath. We had to discuss whether we would like to stay for another night in Penang or head back to KL right away by catching the next earliest bus. After discussing for like 30 minutes, we decided to stay for another night.

The problem of staying another night was that all the rooms in Continental Hotel were fully booked for the weekend. We had to find another place to stay. We called a few hotels but all were fully booked. We decided to try our luck with City Bayview and there was a standard room (2 single beds) available. We paid for it but we could only check into our rooms after 3PM and it was only 1.30PM.

Hence, we sat at the hotel’s lobby cam whoring while drinking the free orange juice provided by the lounge.

After resting for an hour, we walked back to upper Penang Road to have our lunch - Asam Laksa and Penang Road’s Chendol. Someone once told me the coffee shop next to the Penang Road’s Chendol serves good Asam Laksa. Hence, I sent a SMS to Domestic Goddess for verification, but she wasn’t too sure either.

The coffee shop is called Joo Hooi Cafe and they charged you RM0.40 if you sit in their shop but don’t order their drinks. Cunning, I know. True enough, the coffee shop was packed to the brim and we had to wait for 15 minutes before we got ourselves a small table. Not only it was packed, the coffee shop is quite a small shop lot yet they tried to stuff in as many table as possible for maximum profit. It was warm inside as well due to the lousy ventilation. I was sweating and I wasn’t eating my meal comfortably.

The Asam Laksa, although it didn’t taste as good as the one that I had near Kek Lok Si Temple, it wasn’t that bad either. The soup is thick and fragrant due to the various herbs and spices used to boil the soup. Not to forget, the amount of fish meats are 10 times more than the one I had in Gurney Drive. We also ordered a plate of Char Kuey Teow which was totally disappointing.

We ordered Chendol and Ice Kacang from the outside stall, which later the coffee shop owner charged us RM0.40 for just sitting in the shop.

We walked back to Continental Hotel, collected our langguage and then checked into City Bayview Hotel, room 1137. Our room’s view was splendid. We could see Komtar and Penang Bridge.

We took turn to bath while I helped myself with a box of Tambun Biscuit that I bought while walking down Penang Road. After all, a Penang trip will never be complete without a box of Penang’s Tambun Biscuit, right?

Pelf Yeen, Clement and Chia Hur took their nap in the room while Ivan went out to meet his friend and I went to the nearby beach to take some photos. (I will post the miscellaneous pictures later in another post.) 7.30PM, we (without Ivan) hopped into a cab and headed to Gurney Drive for our dinner. The first thing my friends and I will go for whenever we are in Gurney Drive is the “Mua Chi 麻芝”. Finely chrushed toasted peanuts, with a dash of fried onions to go along with the soft glutinous rice. Heavenly.

Honestly, food in gurney drive is over rated. Enough said. By the way, the table picture was our second table / round.

Another round of cam whoring before lights off. Every picture also got Pelf Yeen. Cam whore kaw kaw.

Woke up 8 o’clock in the morning for our breakfast before we took a cab to Penang’s bus station.

Ivan and his Kit Kat chocolate ice cream.

We boarded the bus around 10AM, to my surprise, which was very punctual. Throughout the journey, they all went to sleep while I played with my camera. The bus driver was pumping this Cantonese song that made me nearly laughed out loud. The whole song was about “你收皮啦! (Lei Shao Pei Lah!) 你吃蕉啦! (Lei Ngak Jiu Lah!)”. -lol-

It was about 2.30PM when we reached Puduraya Bus Station. I bought my bus ticket (4PM) back to Malacca before we walked to Petaling Street for a quick lunch before we bid each other farewell. Pelf Yeen suggested to have Wan Tan Mee for lunch at Koon Kee Wan Tan Mee, in Petaling Street.

It tasted quite good actually, minus the rubbery Char Siew and tasteless chicken meat though. The meat dumpling (Shui Gao 水绞) was good, but I forgot to take a picture. I know, its so not me that I actually forgot to take picture of the food.

“Sssllluuurrrppp…”

After a rather late lunch, we bid farewell to each other as all of us had to go different directions. I boarded my 4PM bus back to Malacca and by 6PM, I was back in my room already. Home sweet home.

Thanks to Turtle Rocks Evolution, I made a rather impromptu trip to Penang, which was very fun indeed. Although the team didn’t qualify for the top 20 and thus, cost me RM200 for nothing, I sure had lots of fun walking around Penang and savouring the delicacies. Not too bad for a 3 days 2 nights trip. -wink-

Once again, introducing the Turtle Rocks Evolution team of Spirit Of Penang…

Ivan Cheong,

Clement,

Chia Hur,

and Pelf Yeen.

Thanks peeps!

Related posts:

1. My Spirit Of Penang - Part I
2. Spirit Of Penang, In Pictures
3. Marshmallows By Mei Mei