I went to Sarikei (about 1 hour from Sibu) just to eat this Asam Tom Yam Big Prawn Noodles in a Coconut. I always try to go when I’m back. I asked the chef if I could film him cooking and he was kind enough to say yes. He even cleaned up his workstation! Thanks Chef Huang! He’s been doing this for 16 years too.
I think this is the best video I’ve done thus far – took me two days (not continuously of course) to edit, while I usually just stitch and cut in a few hours in Premiere CC. I also added a few new effects and some music, although the music seems a little hyper for driving. It’s my workout tunes, I’ve been listening to it while torturing myself every day so I got quite attached to the song.
Turn on CC for English subs, the video is in Mandarin.
Yeah, I tried to eat the entire menu of Aloha Cafe’s Sarawak laksa. It’s probably the best in Sibu – or at least I haven’t found a better one yet. There is the Small (RM 5), the Big with Large Prawns (RM 7), and the Big with Huge Prawns (RM 10). The last two is the same size, only the shrimp is bigger for the latter. I had a guest this time, who ate one bowl. Someone asked me why my teeth look like that in Facebook – those are actually made so my Invisalign aligners has something to hold on to and push my teeth straight. Speaking of which, I need to drop by Imperial Dental Bangsar for my next set when I’m back in KL. I’m still wearing them, but obviously I take them off to eat meals. That’s one of the best things about Invisalign, the fact that you can take them off.
I’m going to Sarikei tomorrow to do one on Glory Cafe’s Tom Yam Big Prawn Noodles in a Coconut. I’m just going to eat one though so it’ll be more like a normal mukbang instead of an eating challenge. I don’t think it’ll be nice to try to eat large amounts coz it takes so long to get through the large prawn that it’ll take ages to eat 2-3. It’s also a soup dish so the same noodle expanding problem might come into play. I already have a vision of how I’m going to do the video, so let’s hope it turns out the way I imagined it. I like doing this, I think I’m getting better each time.
Yeah, I was pretty surprised to hear about it too. It was posted by a fellow Love Liver earlier today so I immediately drove down to Avenue K to check it out. I later found out that the gashapon machines were brought in by Shojikiya. It’s one of those dangly things which you can hang on stuff – the available characters are Chika, You, Riko, Dia and Kanan. Each roll is RM 15 (RM 5 tokens x 3) – if you’re not familiar with gashapon machines, they are novelties or collectibles stored in a plastic “egg” which is then cranked out of a machine. What comes out is random, you can’t choose the one you want, so it adds an element of chance (and gets collectors to spend more).
I wanted to get 1 of each girl but my limit was RM 150, which gives me 10 attempts. I did manage to get one of each but it took me till the 9th try (RM 135) to get Riko. I also had a brain fart and kept on referring to her as Ruby in the video. To be fair, she has a similar hair color but as a Love Live fan, I shouldn’t have made the mistake in the first place. Oh well. It did give me a chance to try out moving text though. I want to challenge myself to add a new effect that I learned into each video or make it better somehow. I’ve also been trying to add a lot of energy but I think this is a bit too much. Haha.
I was actually quite hyped up and on a lot of caffeine since I was about to start my daily torture exercise regime before I rushed down for this.
I ate this monstrous amount of food and managed to finish everything. The Jumbo Platter has 4 packets of Indomie + 4 toppings + 2 eggs. It’s quite a lot of food. I didn’t think I’ll be able to finish it since I haven’t been able to put down 4 packs in a long time…much less with sides. However, after a significant amount of preparation (actually, I just skipped breakfast and lunch) I successfully ate everything on the plate + 2 milkshakes.
People have given me some great feedback about my YouTube videos and I’ve been told that I have been slightly wooden in past videos. This one has 30% more genki/pep. It’s just coz I’m feeling a lot better now – the previous Big Hug one was filmed when I was still feeling a significant amount of Suboxone withdrawal. I was not myself. I’m still not fully back to normal but it’s very close now, I’m feeling better and better each day! I apologize for the blurry focus at the beginning – I had set the focal area to a wrong part and only fixed it in the middle when I went to check.
There are also 3 cuts in the video but I’ve learned a few tricks since so it shouldn’t be too visible. I used the new morph tool in Premiere CC to make the transitions better. I had known about this before filming and arranged each cut as I was leaning in to take a sip of the milkshake and go back to the same position as I went back. It sounded like a good idea but in reality Premiere needs your full face to be in for better results. I’ll remember that for next time.
It was a bit of a challenge to finish everything too. I asked one of the friendly waiters if he could turn on the lights and turn off the stereo so I could record. Now I know why all the mukbang people say doing on-site videos is hard, you sometimes have to impose a little so I try to go during off-peak hours. It was still full on one side then so I couldn’t sit where I wanted. I did move a few tables for better lighting though, so it takes bit of coordination to do these things better.
I know, it’s early. Elichika’s birthday is actually on the 21st of October but the Malaysian Love Livers celebrated it early last Sunday at Alpacasso Cafe @ AEON, Midvalley. I’ve always seen people on reddit celebrating various waifu birthdays and I thought it sounded like a lot of fun. I’ve just never seen any locally until I met Anson via the COSFAIR event where I filmed the MilkyWay girls. It might sound strange to celebrate a 2D anime character’s birthday but it’s actually a lot of fun to hang out with like-minded people and share something we’re all interested in. I think the fellowship comes first, the character’s birthday is just the pretext of meeting up. That’s the best way I can explain it to someone who doesn’t understand why people do this.
I’ve never quite gotten into Eli Ayase (the character) but I do like the seiyuu (voice actress). Nanjou is one of my two “best girls” (an anime term denoting your favorite) – the other being Pile (voicing Maki). I even started listening to fripside lately, the songs for A Certain Scientific Railgun are pretty good.
I just finished editing and putting together subtitles for the video of Eli’s birthday celebrations with the Malaysian Love Livers. I know my Chinese isn’t very good, and some of you might be surprised to learn that Mandarin is in fact my first language – I just can’t read or write. I also can’t speak it very well especially when people start using harder words so the subtitles might not be 100% accurate. I’m a little puzzled why I don’t understand the harder words too since I spoke Mandarin until I went to New Zealand to do high school at 15. 15 years is a long time to pick up a language! I think it’s mostly coz I never immersed myself in Chinese culture – I don’t listen to Chinese songs etc so I never had any reason to go beyond simple conversational use.
I still wanted to do the narration in Chinese though coz I like the idea of bilingual videos. However, I encourage you to turn on CC for English subtitles since they’re probably more accurate and conveys what I mean better. I wrote the text in English first before attempting to translate it verbally into spoken Mandarin and needless to say, it took a lot of takes.
Someone even brought a Kit Kat + M&M custom made cake for Eli’s birthday! We were the ones to eat it though. Haha.
Okay, it’s no secret that I’m trying to get more YouTube content out there. It’s something I’ve always been interested in, I want to do documentaries and maybe even a movie so I have to start learning shots, editing, things like that. I got a video tripod the other day so I can have stabilized videos – one of the comments I got was that the captures were very shaky from holding the dSLR using my hand. I also know the audio isn’t very clear and I’m shopping for those battery powered voice packs they use to wire up people before a show. That’s the next thing on my list that I’m going to purchase, hopefully before Sunday as there’s something I want to do then.
I’m also moving house so tomorrow I’ll go and shoot my new place and show the changes as I get the contractors in and what the condo is like. It’s not going to be super furnished since I’m on a bit of a deadline to move in (have been putting it off due to Suboxone withdrawals but I’m so much better now and getting 2-3 hours of sleep NATURALLY each night). I’ll write more about my new place when I start moving, I found out that it’s actually quite near a lot of interesting food places.
…and that was how I found this place. Big Hug Burger is in SS 15 and I actually went over the weekend but I thought I’ll go again when I went to get my condo keys since it was just around the corner. I brought my tripod and dSLR and made a mukbang – the staff were kind enough to turn down the music while I filmed. The burger is HUGE and at RM 24, very worth it. The bill was RM 31 coz I added RM 7 for fries and free flow drinks.
I love how they carry Coke Zero here. A lot of places, even McDonald’s and mamaks don’t carry Diet Coke or Coke Zero and that’s bad. I think the awareness of sugar is lacking in Malaysians. Don’t look at me like that, I’m not one of those SUGAR IS EVIL tree huggers, I just think you shouldn’t consume calories in drinks. Sugar is very calorifically dense e.g. it will make you fat. Why would you want to *drink* sugar when you can eat it in the form of chocolates, desserts etc. I much prefer to eat my sugar so all the soda I drink nowadays is calorie free (yes, these diet/light sodas are actually zero calorie so you don’t have to feel bad about drinking them).
Knowing that, I can’t go back to regular Coke or regular sodas. The sugar content just puts me off coz I know I can get a similar (close enough) taste without having to consume that much sugar. Again, sugar isn’t bad or evil, it just makes you fat, so why drink your calorie allowance? Wouldn’t you rather eat an ice cream instead? I have to admit that I’m not immune to the charms of a sugar packed Iced Milo with lots of sweetened condensed milk but I’m trying to get into better shape now and to have a nice body, you need to give up certain things. Sugar is one of the things I’m giving up so it’s only zero calorie sodas for me from now on! It’s good stuff, I actually prefer the taste of the milder sweetness level.
Yes, I’m calling it a documentary coz I’m being pretentious and I spent 12 hours editing it. I was actually quite lucky coz I never read my emails (sorry guys but it’s true). It just so happened that I couldn’t sleep (see previous post) so I was going through all my stuff and I found a flyer about a cosplay event by Evolve Mall. I went to the event page and came across a promo video featuring the MilkyWay girls.
I thought it was really good. I’ve been watching a lot of cosplay dance covers by Love Live groups coz I want to make my own and also to improve my video editing skills. I creeped on the MilkyWay posts and found a girl called Vicky, who turned out to be one of the leaders. I messaged her the night before (yesterday) and asked if I could tag along and film them, not just their performance, but also shadow them and eat with them and interview them.
I gave her my number and she said she’ll discuss it with the other group members and got back to me 20 minutes later saying it was okay with everyone. Thus, I went there this morning to film them. They actually had two performances but I only managed to get the first one since I had to leave at 3 pm. It was a really fun experience since I’m a huge fan of Love Live and it’s always nice to see a local group do so well.
I have been trying to make more YouTube videos lately – this is my second one specifically for this purpose. My better half and a LLSIF friend told me the first one was ultra shaky and barely watchable and I took that feedback to heart. This time, I spent 12 times the amount of post-production work on the video. Well, it probably won’t take so long for a pro but I just installed Adobe Premiere CC a few days ago!
I did learn a lot of things about video editing too, and I found out that I really like doing it. I like talking to people and getting good video and I like arranging the sequences to make a cohesive film. The music sequences in this one isn’t as good as I want coz I didn’t have a tripod with those swing/tilt/stabilize things. I’ll need to get one so next time I do something like this, I’ll have one static camera pointing at the stage (like how the music video is) on tripod while I actually hold the second camera.
I did have a second one today but I couldn’t operate both. The idea is the static one is for wide screen whole stage shots while the one you’re holding (with stabilizer) goes for close ups. Thus, I can focus on the trio who’s currently singing and this will allow me to cut from the full stage shot to a close up. Also, in the interview segment I had a lot of trouble deciphering the words.
That’s completely my fault coz I didn’t wire everyone up. I also didn’t have 9 microphone units but they’re actually quite cheap so I’ll definitely get some if I want to explore more on doing videos like this. When you record something with external sound, it gives you a lot of flexibility especially with B footage and the voice overs can even go on unrelated stuff, which I wish I did for editing ease.
Also, my Chinese isn’t very good. I can understand conversational Mandarin but once you get to difficult words, I’ll be totally lost. I went to New Zealand at quite a young age to study and I didn’t learn Chinese in Malaysia anyway. I had to puzzle out the meaning via context (very useful) and a bit of guesswork so I hope the translations are somewhat accurate.
I wanted translations and closed captions for YouTube coz the video is almost entirely in Chinese. YouTube is a very English-centric medium, unlike Nico Nico Douga or Youku so English subs are necessary. I want it when I watch the Love Live Sunshine radio dramas and skits anyway, wouldn’t be able to understand otherwise. Turn on CC if you want to read the English subs, I also spent a few hours writing them.
I’m getting a lot better in many ways and even though I’m very frustrated at not being able to sleep (the insomnia is killing me) at least I’m learning new skills and doing stuff that I love. Thanks to Vicky and the rest of the MilkyWay cosplay group for letting me hang out with them today! It was a really interesting experience and I’ll see you all at the next event.
I’ll be concentrating more on YouTube videos now so let me know what you think – feedback and criticism is always welcome. Cheers!
I have watched this new restaurant with interest. It wants to be a higher end steak house but the menu items have a decidedly local twist to it. The Dataran Sunway F&B scene is very competitive and many restaurants have tried and failed to make it big here. I have a seen a very promising new entry this year (a pho place) but this one doesn’t look like it’s going to be successful. It didn’t help that the restaurant was empty all the time.
I walked in this evening to see what they’re all about. They have plastic dishes on the front, so I know it’s all steaks but I wanted to try it for myself. Moment Cuisine feels like a steak house for local palates and even has the definition of rare, medium, medium well and well done on their menu. The interior looks a lot like a budget hotel trying to look classy, with linen covered high back chairs flanking glass topped tables.
Banana Milkshake (RM 10.90)
I was interested to see they have a range of real milk shakes…meaning, milkshakes made with real fruits. I opted for banana and was pleasantly surprised to see it’s made with real bananas and not the nasty artificial flavoring from a bottle (looking at you Monin). It’s pretty good. I nearly ordered another one when I finished mine, but at RM 11 per glass, it’s a little on the high side.
Moment’s House Grilled Australian Ribeye Steak (RM 43.90)
I ordered the house specialty, which is a ribeye from Australia. It comes with 3 choices of sauces – black pepper, mushroom and something called “Aromatic BBQ Sauce”. I went for the last one since I’m not very keen on the first two localized ones. The steak was very high quality. I was surprised – it’s all good meat with no gristle.
I had it rare and it came out rare. This is the most expensive item on the menu. The ribeye steak was juicy and tasty and goes very well with the apple barbecue sauce.
Moment Cuisine Steak House surprised me. I expected them to do localized bad steak, and while the first part was correct (it is indeed tailored to local tastebuds) the second bit wasn’t. The cuts of beef were high quality and I enjoyed eating the steak. The cold sides could do with more work though. I don’t think they’ll do very well here since it’s neither here nor there but I’ll like to be proved wrong. It’s targeting Chinese customers e.g. the food isn’t halal and they serve pork chops too. Problem is, Chinese traditionally don’t eat a huge amount of meat. I don’t mind dropping in for another juicy steak, though at RM 63 for dinner, it’s not going to be a daily thing.
Grand Taipei is a relatively new cafe, restaurant and tea house (that’s what they call themselves) in Sunway Giza. If you thought it looked kinda familiar, you’ll be correct. There was a place called Taipei Taipei inside the mall a few years back. It didn’t do well and closed permanently. The old Taipei Taipei has been relaunched as Grand Taipei but the chopstick covers still has the old name.
This spot seems to have bad feng shui or something. There has been a lot of different bars and restaurants at this exact spot which shuttered and got replaced by a new one. The latest to try is the ex-Taipei Taipei from inside the mall. The interior looks really nice – there’s an old movie projected to the walls, vintage furniture, jukebox, and a small stage.
Taiwanese Style Pork Chop with Rice (RM 15.90)
This is their signature dish! Grand Taipei does a mean pork chop rice. There’s a large slice of savory and delicious pork chop on top of a mound of rice. The rice isn’t just plain rice but mixed with minced stewed pork (what the Taiwanese called kou rou). There’s also a triangle of vinegar tofu which balances out the dish with a bit of acid, as well as vegetables. It’s pretty good, reminds me of the food I had in Taiwan.
Brown Sugar Red Bean Milk Tea (RM 9.90)
This is Taiwanese milk tea but with red bean instead of tapioca balls. They have a tapioca ball style bubble tea version for RM 8.90 too. It’s better to order the “RM 8 Business Lunch Set” which allows you to choose a drink and provides you with a daily side dish (pickled cucumbers shown above) so you save between RM 1 – RM 2 on your drink and get a small side.
Grand Taipei will have familiar food if you’ve been to the old Taipei Taipei. They specialize in pork chop rice and they’re pretty good at it. The pork chops are fried to order and it’s served hot. I like how they have multiple sourish sides (pickles, tofu) coz the oily pork chop can be a bit hard to stomach after a few bites and the acidic dishes help cleanse your palate. Lunch for me cost RM 23.90 which isn’t bad for the amount of meat they serve.
I want to eat bahn mi, my better half told me. “Pan mee?” I said, aghast. I hate the stuff. I had misheard. She meant the Vietnamese sandwich inspired by the French. We were at 1 Utama coz she wanted to look at mooncakes. O Bahn Mi is located on the ground floor and I thought I had been to one of their branches before (turns out not, that was quick bites). It also serves other Vietnamese street food.
The place was packed on a Sunday morning which is surprising since the other F&B outlets were practically empty. O Bahn Mi is a popular destination due to their extremely quick turnover and relatively lower prices. You order at the counter and the food gets delivered to you a minute or two later. Besides bahn mi sandwiches, they also have pho and broken rice – one of my favorite Vietnamese dishes in Melbourne.
Grilled BBQ Pork Sandwich (RM 10.90)
O Bahn Mi actually has a wide range of bahn mi sandwiches. This is one of their most popular ones. It’s served in a Vietnamese baguette about the size of a 6″ sub. I’ve been to Hanoi before and eaten this. We’ve also had bahn mi in Cambodia during our trip there. It’s a great option for breakfast, it’s sold out of carts in Vietnam and people eat it in the mornings. The one here is pretty decent too.
Combination Beef Pho (RM 14.90)
I didn’t feel like eating bahn mi so I had their pho instead. The pho at O Bahn Mi is awesome! The soup is beefy and has tenderloin, brisket and meatballs inside. The also serve lots of herbs and aromatics on the side, including Thai basil. You really need this to make the pho better. A lot of places skimp on the fresh herbs and it’s not the same without it. This place makes it right. Delicious!
Caramel Flan (RM 5.90)
I love crème caramel. It’s actually a very common desert in the 80’s in Malaysia but not everyone knows that. Our house had a box at all times and in the past, coffee shops would serve this. Nowadays it’s very rare to find it while eating outside except at Ramadan bazaars. I’ve only seen it once when my dad came over to visit. We went to a random place and found it on the menu. The sprig of mint on the dessert adds a lot.
I didn’t realize it at the time but they only charged me RM 1 for the Vietnamese coffee by upgrading me to one of their meal sets instead of charging it separately, which would have cost more. The meal for the two of us cost RM 31.60 at O Bahn Mi. It’s very reasonable compared to our usual brunch bill. The food is pretty good too. There are so many pho places nowadays compared to a few months back and there’s no one happier than me by this development coz I love pho!
