I made my bed for the first time in two months and it is lovely.

Joey is so excited to see Whitney of The City!

I just bought buymylifestory.com.  BOOYAH!

Lianna on a toilet.

William Safire died a few days ago and I didn’t find out till today. I was an avid reader of On Language. I shouldn’t be mad at school, but I am.

I’ve officially moved to LA.  I still can’t believe I live here because it feels like a really long vacation.  In an effort to integrate myself into the LA culture, I’ve taken a number of steps to get myself well situated in my new life.

• I bought a car.  I was really bummed about this because the responsibility of having a car is overwhelming, but I get kind of excited when I think about the road trips I’ll be taking over the next couple years.
• I bought a bunch of camping gear.  I was REALLY excited about my massive purchase at REI.  I didn’t realize how easy it is to go camping here until I actually did it.  I’m hooked.
• I played beach volleyball.  I told myself that I have to take up one warm weather and one cold weather sport while I’m in CA.  I’ve decided that beach volleyball and snowboarding will be those sports, and I’m pleased with my decision.
• I eat a lot of salads.  It was a nightmare trying to find a decent salad in Boston/Cambridge, but it’s so easy here!  Two words: cheap avocados.  Nuff said.
• I drink two liters of water everyday.  Actually, this wasn’t an active choice.  It’s so goddamn hot and dry here, you have to drink about two liters to not feel like crap.

I completely agree with you, Stanley Fish.  Also, read part II. (both @ The NYT)

Malacca is about 2 hours from KL and I would write more about it, but I’m so far behind in my blogging that I’ll leave you with the link to the Wikipedia entry if you wish to learn more: Malacca.  Sonny and I drove there with his friend so we could check out some antiques stores and eat chicken rice balls (two things Malacca is known for).  The antiques were not that great, but the rice balls were DELICIOUS!

Here are a few pictorial highlights of the day:

We visited a couple temples.  They were beautiful.  My favorite part was leaving with the scent of sandlewood in my clothes and hair.

We passed by a cobbler who still makes tiny bound feet shoes.  Bound feet are absolutely horrifying, but the shoes are amazing.

We ate cendol for dessert and Sonny insisted that I take a picture of the shop.  He said, “You have to take a picture of this!  This is so Malaysia.  You’re eating Cendol in a dirty shop with a typewriter and a broken pot.”

Sonny LOVES sticky rice and kuih.  This tray was full of both items, but we weren’t sure what was which so he insisted on opening one of each.  Sonny was out of control.

Very neat antique shop!  The houses in Malacca are super narrow and long.  All the light comes from the front and back windows of the house and huge cutouts in the middle of the house that go right to the ground floor.

100 Plus is an isotonic sports drink/soda.  I can’t describe it, but it’s pretty good.

This was one of the highlights of the trip.  Sonny bought some bird’s nests which are used for medicinal purposes usually in the form of soup.  It has the consistancy of crunchy gelatin after you cook it.  The nest is made from the spit of Swiflets and is considered a very expensive delicacy in Asia.

This particular meal was so EPIC it deserves its own post.  Since arriving in KL, my family has made it a point to feed me endless amounts of food while wagging a finger at me saying, “You must try everything, girl!”.  I’m not easily overcome by large quantities of food, but I’m on the verge of being broken.  Anyway, Sonny took me (along with friends and family) to eat steamboat (aka Shabu Shabu) one night.  Typically, the steamboat meals I’ve enjoyed in America have been pretty tame consisting of dainty plates filled with nicely chopped and sliced veggies and meats for a rather steep price ($20/person).  The steamboat meal Sonny took me to was OUT OF CONTROL.  It was all you can eat for the mere price of 18 ringgit which is about $5.  You pile plates with meats, seafood, veggies, tofu, noodles, etc. which are contained in huge refrigerators and tables.  There are no less that 8 sauces to accompany your meal and you end your epic feast with watermelon, pandan cake, and an ice kacang bar.  Because my family is super hardcore, we had two huge pots of soup heated by propane tanks sitting under the table (surely that would have been some safety violation in America).  Sonny, determined to get the most out of his meal, consumed what looked like 4 lbs of food.  He shamelessly ripped crabs apart with his bare hands, attentively stirred the steamboat with the intensity of a chef, and vigorously wiped his hands with the table cloth declaring that a mere tissue would not suffice.  Right when I was about to throw in the towel, Sonny brought over a bowl of ice kacang he made for me and nudged me towards the ice cream freezer.  I was broken.

Even though this is the first time I’ve been back to Malaysia in over a decade, everything is still so familiar and some of the people still remember me (!).  My Auntie Suzanne still uses the same taxi driver to come pick us up from the family house.  His taxi still has the same wonderful scent of worn, but clean seat cushions, car air fresheners, and a little humidity mixed with air conditioning.  He remembered the time he drove my cousin and I to Sunway Lagoon which is this cheesy water park in the city.  Crazy!  Anyway, here are some pictures I took of day 3.

After Sonny and I walked around the neighborhood, I cooled off my feet in the pool and watched the sunrise.  You can’t tell from this picture, but the sun looks like a HUGE grapefruit chillin’ in the sky.  It’s quite nice.

Sonny and I went to one of his favorite breakfast places in town and he insisted on ordering Char Keow Teow with a side of fish balls.  Fried noodles is a heavy breakfast, but it doesn’t feel that bad and you work/sweat it off within a couple hours.  My dad was worried that I wouldn’t be able to handle the heat so he asked for the non-spicy version.  Come on, dad!  Obviously, he’s unaware of my obsession with Sriracha.  For dessert, we ate Kuih which are these gooey, jiggly desserts.  The one on the left has a layer of salty, coconut flavored goo on top of a layer of sweet green goo made from pandan leaves.  Sonny greatly enjoys the one on the left, but he prefers desserts that incorporate red bean.

We spent the day with Sonny’s best friend from the good ol’ days.  That’s Sonny on the left.  They’ve been best friends since age 6!  They spent the day lying to me about stuff and telling stories about how they camped out on the beach when they were kids and killed cobras that slept under their backpacks.

Then we went to Petaling Street which is the main drag in Chinatown.  It didn’t always look like this.  Back in the day, it was very dirty, a little hazy, and didn’t have that fancy covering.  Thankfully, a lot of the old haunts are still there.

My aunts buy all their herbal medicines here.  You can’t tell from the picture, but this store sells all sorts of crazy stuff like dried seahorses for improved eyesight, edible pearls for a more youthful complexion, and all sorts of dried barks for general health.  Back in the day, they would give me little packets of Goji berries to eat while I waited.

Kim’s Soya Bean is the BEST.  Every time I went to Petaling Street which was at least 3-4 times a week, my aunts would buy me a big ol’ bag of soybean milk sweetened with brown sugar syrup.  He now serves soy milk in a plastic cup, but he’ll give it to you in a bag if you’re on the run.  This business has been in his family for three generations.

My family has been going to this flower shop for years and years and years.  When my aunts got tired of lugging me around Chinatown, they would deposit me here with a bag of soybean milk and their many purchases so they could finish running their errands.

This is the temple Sonny used to visit with his mom.  This was the first time I went with my dad.  My aunts usually take me.  One of the best part of Malaysia is that there are Buddhist temples scattered around the city.  They are absolutely beautiful and have this incredibly rich and intense smell from all the incenses.  The combination of the humidity, heat and scents creates this hazy environment which feels very spiritually and calming.  It’s quite relaxing stopping at one of these temples to pray and meditate during the hottest parts of the day.

Then we went to Central Market which is basically a huge craft market and major tourist destination.  Central Market wasn’t that much fun, and I felt tired and overwhelmed by all the shops, but I did visit the jewelery store I got my ears pierced at when I was a little girl.  The best part was that the woman who did the deed still works there and remembered me!

Lunch time!  According to Sonny, this place has the best beef balls in the city, and I think he’s right.  It’s very important to get the beef balls separate from the noodles which have their own beef gravy so as to not mix the flavors.  I take all my meals with sweetened barley water.  Sonny takes his without sugar.

We were all tired after our walk through Chinatown so we decided to go home, but we couldn’t end the day without a big bowl if ice kacang (aka ABC).  So we drove to the old part of PJ (Petaling Jaya) to get our ABC fix.  Ice kacang can be prepared in a lot of different ways with different ingredients.  Basically, it’s shaved ice with brown sugar syrup and evaporated milk on top of a mixture of various jellies, peanuts, red beans, and sometimes, fruits.  Sonny watches his diet and shows great restraint around desserts, but he can’t hold back when you put a bowl of ABC in front of him.