Today, we actually had a mission to accomplish - a formal family portrait photography session. After breakfast, we all dutifully got dressed in our colour-coordinated outfits and headed off to the studio.
Admittedly, photography trends have changed significantly, and the photographer was much less directive about how we were standing and sitting. 2 hours went by relatively quickly, and we were soon ready for lunch. Of course, we couldn’t resist taking some candid shots of ourselves with our phones.
We finished up and it was time for lunch. As usual, food is everywhere in Malaysia, but we were mindful that we had younger family members who would get hangry, so we opted for somewhere convenient.
A little eatery that specialises in Hainan chicken rice. I love the traditional wooden name plaque of the shop and the green ceramic tiles providing decoration and ventilation to the interior.
There’s a little china lion with a festive red silk ribbon ball greeting customers at the threshold of the entry way. The doorway has a traditionally raised threshold. One has to be careful in entering - this would be an Occupational Therapist’s nightmare. It’s almost a foot in height.
This was something I had never noticed previously. It is common for the servers to arrive with an enamel mug or china bowl filled with hot water. At first, I was quite puzzled as to the purpose of this. Now I know. It’s for customers to dip their cutlery into before using them. How sensible. No disposable stuff here. Everything is still served with chinaware and stainless steel spoons/forks and wooden/plastic chopsticks.
Even the concrete road bollards are pretty.
Check out the spiral staircases at the backs of the shophouses. These ones have been painted in pretty colours.
A very typical neighbourhood grocery store - “Chap Huey Tiam” in the Hokkien dialect. Literal translation means “shop of odds and ends”. Sure enough, you can find anything from sweets, toilet paper, baby formula, cookies, preserved snacks to cigarettes and cold drinks. Many shopkeepers even act as part-time dealers for local lotto syndicates. The shopkeeper is a trusted local repository of neighbourhood gossip and when I was a small girl of 5 or 6 years old, my dad would often take me with him to our local shop and I’d run around with the shopkeeper’s kids while he chatted with the other men who’d finished work.
Big family dinner with cousins, uncles and aunties tonight. The ubiquitous condiments of a Chinese restaurant - light soy sauce, vinegar, chopped garlic, chopped red chilli and pickled green chillies.
FOOD. FOOD. And more FOOD.
The restaurant had a beautiful feature wall made up entirely of a mosaic landscape, in the style of a traditional Chinese inkwash painting, I’ve once done a mosaic workshop before. There would have been HOURS and HOURS of work, precision and hand dexterity + strength that’s gone into this wall.
Magnificent.
Good morning and good night, Kuching. Thank you for a very hospitable whirlwind stay.
Tomorrow I head to my hometown of Johor Bahru.
