Category: Travel

It’s our first visit to Kota Kinabalu. In every trip to other places, I like to see their local specialties as well as the food there. Walking around KK town, we found out that there are so many things we share in common and yet, many more not. The town was quite developed but still you can find slow growing paces or underdevelopment in it.

The market of Kota Kinabalu… It’s a very interesting place where you can find different types of goods sold. Fresh veggies, fruits, snacks, dried food and even clothes on the second floor…

A vegetable stall in the market…

Look! Dried seahorses… believed to have strong medicinal value…

Dried seafood… and look at those large dried scallops…

My best friends… chillis…

I found these colourful chocolate pastilles in the market. Can you still remember them?!

Some local delicacies found along the way… The small stalls actually reminded us of Jogjakarta / Bali… This is what I mean by underdevelopment within development…

Guess what are these? They are tapioca powder. I’m not sure how to eat/cook them though… 😛

Skillful tailors in the Philippino market… Notice that most of them are men… I think I only spotted one lady tailor while others are all men…

Colourful bands sold in the handicraft centre…

Do you know this was made from real frog? Yikes!!! Who dare to use it?

Creative corals and shells… The stall owner actually forbids photo taking… This was a result of pure ignorance… bluek!

For almost a week (6 days to be exact) from 31 March – 5 April 2011, we traveled Jogja. It was a great experience in the land of Java. We met great people, saw beautiful places, smelled the fresh air, what else could we ask for?

Gunung Merapi being covered by thick clouds…

Feast of a King for us EVERYDAY!

The stay in  Malioboro Ibis Hotel was wonderful. It’s decent, comfortable and conveniently just besides the busiest street of Malioboro and a shopping mall. The spa experience there was eventually relishing but it could be better if we were placed in the actual spa room instead of one of the hotel rooms. A dip in the swimming pool at night was great too. 100% relax and work-free!

The lobby of Ibis Hotel

Been to one of the wondrous temple, Borobudur. The architecture was really amazing! You need to see it for yourself. Anyway, my favourite place was actually the whole stretch of Malioboro street. You’ll never feel bored strolling along it every night! (That’s what I did there).

The busy street of Malioboro

A day before our trip to the Borobudur, its main connecting bridge fell and collapsed by the volcanic rocks that flow down from the river. We had to walk across another bridge to get on a van to get to Borobudur. I am definitely praising their government for their prompt action in making sure tourists can reach their destination in such a situation.

Borobudur behind us…

Other places like The Water Palace, Mendut Temple, Parang Tritis beach, The Solo Palace, Pasar Beringharjo & the Gembira Loka Zoo were one of its kind too! Pasar Beringharjo is a market where you can find any types of souvenirs you want to bring back home. The animals in Gembira Loka Zoo are suffering and they seriously need help. Can someone please help them?

Mendut Temple… wait til you go inside…

Parang Tritis beach… BEAUTIFUL~!

A stall selling “Bak Piah” in front of Pasar Beringharjo…

Gembira Loka Zoo – animals there need help!

Special mention : our guide, Mr Roy from Pusaka Tours, has done a wonderful job and we are really grateful for him to be such a responsible person and made our trip a memorable one. To us, he is a 5-star guide! Thank you, Mr Roy. We will definitely come back to Jogja.

Thank you for your great job! Applause!

We were kids again when we were in USS. All those cartoon characters and movie heroes and villians were so familiar as you always see them on TV. Don’t forget to take the ride in the “Egyptian-themed” park. It was extremely breath-taking but definitely worth a try. Took a lot of pictures with the mascots and Betty Boops was the best one. She praised us as we were great posers while taking photograph with her. Hahaha!

Another memorable experience was in the Donkey Live. I’ll share about that in my coming post!