Continuing from Kluang - Part 1, we woke up at 7 o’clock in the morning so that we could join Raymond to go back to his secondary school, Sekolah Menengah Taman Kluang Barat, for a forum.

The two hours forum was organized so that two of the top students, Raymond Lopez and Fadzlie Wong, would give some tips and pointers to the current students in tackling examinations questions, the proper way to study, time management and etc.. Well, that being said, everything they said was *coughs* useful and truthful *coughs*. Time table? Mind mapping? Three hours of studying per day? Ironic. Haha!

After the forum, we went to Kluang railway station for the original Kluang coffee. Yes, the original Kluang station, not the franchised and over priced one. As the name speaks for itself, it is located just next to the railway. Duh! It’s really loud and noisy whenever the train leaves the station, with the occasionally loud horn. Nostalgic, perhaps?

It was about 11am and just about the right time for brunch. Luckily, there was an empty table when we arrived and probably the best seat of all, which was right in front of the “water station”.

The guy or probably the boss is the one making all the drinks. One kettle after another kettle, he just kept making them non stop. One step to another, his movement was nothing but smooth, as if he was playing some tai chi moves. One part of hot water, two parts of coffees, nothing more nothing less. We chatted a bit, with him telling us a little bit of the shop’s history and some casual conversations with the locals (Raymond and Fadzlie).

Tea, anyone?

The price is awfully cheap. Nothing close to the franchised kopitiams.

We ordered kaya and butter toast bread with iced coffee. The bread, is not the usual squarish bread, but the soft and round bread. Slightly toasted on the outside, with a thick slice of butter and oozing out kaya, totally opposite of the stingy franchised counterparts.

Soft boiled eggs and iced coffee. Just nice for a light brunch.

We left the place and went to have chendol, the Indian style. The guy operates at some back lane facing the main road, wearing a beret, which reminded me of Jamie Hyneman of Mythbusters. You can see his glowing and shinning white teeth standing out and screaming for attention.

The chendol is the watery kind, full of coconut milk and red beans. Unlike the Malacca’s, flooded with gula melaka. It was about noon when we had our chendol and the icy chendol came at the right time to wash down the heat.

Well, that’s about it. We headed back home for lunch after that and left for Malacca at 6pm. We did stop at an organic dragon fruit farm and Muar for dinner but that’s another story. Moreover, I didn’t take any pictures when we were in Muar. Plain tired.

Road trip, came just at the right time. It was tiring and rather simple / boring, but it was satisfying nonetheless.

It’s always that exciting and am grateful whenever my ex-house mates turn up at the front door of my house. Their presence is equivalent to some noises in the house, not eating lunch or dinner alone, not feeling lonely for the mean time, fun filled activities and of course, laughters.

Gabriel Ho and Raymond Lopez were in Malacca for a few days to run some errands and chill out for two days before heading to Kluang (Raymond’s hometown) for the weekends. Well, I am skipping the Malacca part as there’s nothing much worth blogging about.

Since I have nothing on for the weekends, I decided to join them to pay Kluang a visit since I needed a short break cum road trip as well.

The journey from Malacca to Kluang took us roughly 90 minutes, with Raymond driving at 110km/h along the North-South Highway while I was frustratingly munching on a chili sauce-less MegaMac. Welcome to Kluang, a small town after Muar and Yong Peng and also the origin of Kluang Coffee Station.

I brought along my Samsung SGH-i550 to test the GPS, but I guess the town wasn’t big enough to be fully indexed in the map. It didn’t help much.

Our “hotel” was none other than Raymond’s house, with free home cooked food for lunch and dinner. Most importantly, the room we bunked in has air conditioner, which was the holy Saviour considering the insanely hot weather.

After our lunch, we ended up sitting in front of the idiot box watching Alien : Resurrection until evening time while Raymond went to town to run some errands. Came evening time, we took a walk around his housing area, which is not too far from the Kluang recreation and sports center. It has a rather huge but shallow (2m depth) and happening swimming pool in it. Nope, no hot chicks in bikini spotted. Moreover, I don’t have zoom lens.

I don’t know what Gabriel was doing, but he sure looked like he was posing at a bus stop.

The housing area is pretty calm and quiet. Although there are plenty of open fields, I didn’t see people strolling, jogging, walking the dog or playing football. Things are pretty laid back in Kluang, I supposed. It is definitely an ideal place for retired people, as Raymond’s mom said.

After the stroll, we headed out to town to buy tickets for Iron Man and settled for a drink at Old Taste Kopitiam. The shopping mall wasn’t that happening for a Friday evening.

It was the second time for both of them, but my forth time. I can’t believe I watched Iron Man four times within three days of its release. I watched twice on its first day (April 30 @ 12pm and 12.30 midnight), third time with Aprilcherrie, Brandon, Wen Jing and Damion (May 1) and forth show on May 2. Coincidently, all four shows were watched at MBO.

Well, if we had not watch Iron Man, we would have nothing to do. Not a single thing and being bored wasn’t an option.

To be continued…