Jumping Bean Café @ Sunway Pyramid

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Jumping Bean Cafe

We just had breakfast this morning at this “Japanese style café”. My better half actually wanted to go have xiao long bao but I was craving for my morning cup of coffee and she conceded to go with my choice instead. <3 Jumping Bean Café sounds like a good of a place as any to load up on caffeine and I needed it for our 8 hour Chinese New Year shopping marathon.

Jumping Bean Sunway

The café was quite deserted when we were there and I know this particular lot in Sunway Pyramid has gone through a lot of management and café/restaurant changes. I thought it might be wise to eat here before it closes down. smirk This happens a lot with us, especially in the ultra-competitive Dataran Sunway area, a prime example would be Flaming Melt (shuttered up 3-4 months after opening).

Tanzania Kilimanjaro Siphon Single Origin Coffee

Tanzania Kilimanjaro Siphon Single Origin Coffee (RM 15)
A place called Jumping Bean better had good coffee and I wasn’t disappointed. I asked about their Siphon selections and was presented with a Brazilian roast, Guatemala Antigua beans (suspect this is the same one that Starbucks offers) and coffee from Tanzania Kilimanjaro. I like how they actually take the trouble to bring you the coffee beans for choosing.

Siphon Coffee

I chose the final one and it was a good cup of coffee. I would have preferred the Siphon coffee system to be done at my table but I understand the constrains of space would have prohibited that since we ordered quite a lot.

Turkey Cheddar Croissant

Turkey Cheddar Croissant (RM 16.90)
My dear had this buttery croissant filled with turkey slices and cheese. It’s rather good, the croissant is home baked. Also pictured is her order of Iced Royal Milk Tea (RM 12). The side salad is the same as mine, I believe they just make one large portion. Nothing special but the star of the dish shined.

Waffle Breakfast

Waffle Breakfast (RM 15.90)
This was my order. It was described in the menu as the “best pair(ing) in the world” and I’m inclined to agree. I do like sweet, fluffy waffles filled with savory items. Mine had turkey ham, cheese and egg. It was good, if a little small, portion wise.

Chicken Floss Honey Toast

Chicken Floss Honey Toast (RM 19)
We were supposed to have the “Japanese inspired” Mix Fruit Honey Toast (RM 19.90) for dessert but I wanted to try the unique sweet-savory chicken floss honey toast instead. It’s one of those home baked square of bread deals, with the inside cut out and made into 3 x 2 slices of “toast soldiers”. They’re supposed to cut it even smaller, into a 3 x 3 x 3 matrix (from what I gather from the pictures) and I thought it was sloppy that they didn’t.

Giant Toast

It didn’t taste as good as it could have, due to the thicker array of toast soldiers but I did like the honey and mayonnaise and chicken floss combination, especially with the creamy vanilla bean ice cream. The sweet and savory combination isn’t for everyone though – I ended up single-handedly finishing the huge dish – but it tasted nice to me.

Jumping Bean Sunway Pyramid

Jumping Bean Café is not a fully serviced café per se…there are paper chits on the table so it’s more like one of those chain kopitiam places, but since there weren’t a lot of people, the waiters came to our table to serve us. The bill cost RM 78.80 for the both of us. It wasn’t the best brunch we ever had, and it wasn’t the worst either. It was simply mediocre but saved by the fact that we were both really hungry. 🙂

20 photos from my trip to Kapit

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Kapit Boat

I went to Kapit a while back for a 2D/1N stay. Kapit is a town 3 hours from Sibu by express boat. There is no other way to reach it – you can’t drive there and you can’t fly in either, the river is the only route.

Sibu Kapit

This is a uniquely Sarawakian feature, there are a lot of random towns that is connected only via Rejang River and lacks the proper highways or road connections to civilization.

Express Boat View

The funny thing is that you have to fill in a form detailing your name and IC number so they know who’s on board. This didn’t exist before, it was the high profile express boat capsizes and accidents resulting in multiple deaths that initiated it.

Live Chicken

I meant human deaths, not livestock. 😉 You can find lots of interesting cargo onboard, including live chicken!

Kapit Sibu Express

Interestingly, they don’t overload the express boats anymore too. This makes it a lot safer compared to previous journeys. Previously, there would be people *on top* of the boat, hanging on to the side rails.

Kapit Jetty

We arrived in Kapit 3 hours later and had to disembark.

Sarawak Express Boat

You do this by walking along the side of the express boat. I’m used to it coz I’ve done it when I was a kid, but new people might find this disconcerting since the river is just beside you.

Kapit Town Square

Kapit is a very small town. You can walk around town in a matter of minutes and that’s what we did. We passed by Kapit Town Square on the way to our hotel.

Star Hill Inn

We stayed at Star Hill Inn, one of the best hotels there.

Kapit Hotel

I took a room and my bro Eddy took another room.

Kapit Shoplots

The hotel is in a shoplot, as you can see from the view.

Kapit Roti Canai Goreng

One of the highlights of the trip was eating roti canai goreng. This is a distinctive Kapit invention, they literally fry the roti canai inside a wok of boiling hot oil. Ingenious, and very tasty too.

Kapit Fair

We managed to have some time off the next day and went to see what was going on in Kapit Town Square. It turns out there’s a lot of games of chance, like an indoor funfair of sorts.

Fun Fair Games

I took a spin as well. You pay RM 1 for a can of soft drink and put it at a color of your choice. You get a 1 in 6 chance of winning equal odds e.g. you win 2 cans if you wager 2 cans.

Fun Fair

This works by throwing a tennis ball into a receptacle with 6 possible colors which matches the one on the table. You get unlimited tries, there’s no penalty if you miss or if the ball bounces back up. You simply try again until you get the ball into a color square.

Kapit Gambling

Behold! These are the high rollers of Kapit! smirk

High Rollers

Seriously though, these whales are betting cartons of 24 cans at once. We thought that was quite funny.

Durian Isu

I also managed to get some wild jungle durians to bring home. This is a native durian called durian isu. It’s very different from regular durians, it only has 4 segments. I’ll do a comprehensive review during the weekend.

Maggi Instant Noodles

We had a quick lunch of Maggi instant noodles at the wharf the next day before we departed…

Kapit Wharf

…and caught the afternoon express boat back. It was a really fun overnight trip with my bro Eddy. I haven’t been to Kapit in such a long time!

Titan Raga Moonlight Collection Launch @ Svago, KLCC

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Titan Svago KLCC

I have heard a lot of good things about Titan. They’re one of the largest watch manufacturers in the words (5th largest to be exact) and ranked among the top 100 luxury watch companies. Brought and distributed in Malaysia by Chronosoft Sdn Bhd, I’ve seen their timepieces around and when I heard about the launch of their Moonlight collection, I dropped by Svago in KLCC to check it out.

Titan Raga Moonlight

The Moonlight collection by Titan is inspired by the beauty of objects captured in moonlight. Mr Vijesh Rajan (Business Head International Division, Titan Company Limited) was there to share the stories behind the creation of each of the watches.

The Taj

I was particularly impressed by this one. It’s inspired by the Taj Mahal and features Swarovski crystals. This is called The Taj and is described as “a stunning illustration of the iconic monument, these timepieces draw inspiration from the awe-inspiring silhouette of the Taj Mahal on a full moon night”.

Mystic Luna

Mystic Luna is inspired by the moon goddess Luna and I like the beauty and elegance of the design.

Titan Moonlight Collection

Titan only uses Swarovski crystals exclusively in their Moonlight collection. The range is priced between RM 375 to RM 1,985 and there were models there to showcase the timepieces.

The Moonlight collection is under Titan Raga, which is a range of exquisite watches for the modern women. This leans towards the more mature and luxurious target market and often features precious stones and gems embedded into the timepieces.

Titan Edge

I also managed to examine their Edge range, which is the slimmest quartz watch in the world. You can see just how thin each one is. Amazing.

Titan

I also got a limited edition Titan watch!

Titan Watch

Titan creates a range of limited edition watches for the Penang Bridge International Marathon each year and this one retails for RM 525. They’re also one of the sponsors of the event and the official watch for the Allianz Penang Bridge International Marathon.

Watch

This particular watch has a large face with 100 meter water resistance.

Titan Penang Bridge International Marathon

It has the Penang Bridge International Marathon emblem engraved into the back of the watch.

Titan Watch Design

I like how there is a LCD display with digital timekeeping in addition to the regular chronograph and the day of the week is displayed as well.

Titan Men Watch

The leather strap offers a practical functionality and I personally prefer leather straps for versatility but you can swap it out if you want.

Work

I’ve been using this watch exclusively for almost a month now, both in KL and in my business dealings in Sarawak and I love the way it’s appropriate for both work…

Casual

…and play.

Titan Watches

Titan has a range of watches for both men and women and if you’re keen to hear more about it, drop by their website at Titan World or interact with them on the Titan Facebook page.

Dotty’s Café and Bakery @ TTDI

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Salted Egg Cronut

This is the home of the famous salted egg yolk cronut.

Dottys Cafe

We dropped by Dotty’s Café this morning after seeing that they were serving hot food for the first time this weekend. It was our Sunday morning brunch option of the week and we weren’t disappointed. I was actually a little apprehensive that the place would be packed considering its their “opening weekend” (of sorts) but it was quite manageable.

Dottys Cafe Bakery

Predictably, most people came here to take away boxes and boxes of their salted egg cronuts. I asked about the availability when we got there at 10:30 am and they were all sold out! I had to wait for the 12:30 pm batch. We ordered breakfast while contemplating whether to wait or not – part of me wanted to just wait for the hype to die down before sampling it but since my better half didn’t mind, we sat there until the next batch came out.

Doughnut Latte

Doughnut Latte (RM 14)
This is a really quirky item that Homer Simpson would absolutely adore. My dear wanted to try it and I was curious too after seeing it on their Facebook. It’s a hot donut that’s topped with ice cream with a pitcher of latte on the side. It works a little like an affogato – you basically pour the latte into the doughnut. This has the magical effect of partially melting the ice cream and making the donut soggy.

Latte Donut

It’s surprisingly good to wolf down bites of the warm coffee-infused doughnut with the colder ice cream as a contrast.

Salted Caramel Latte

Salted Caramel Latte (RM 13)
It’s pretty good but I would have liked the caramel to be saltier. I’m a huge fan of salted caramel and personally always tend to go more savory but there’s nothing wrong with Dotty’s implementation. They also have brews like Coconut Milk Latte (RM 14) which would be ideal for vegans, organic food lovers and hipsters alike. smirk

Baked Eggs

Baked Eggs (RM 26)
We shared this for breakfast. It was one of only three (3) items available on their menu today. I think most of them were sold out, I originally wanted a Salt Beef Sandwich (RM 26) but it wasn’t available. That said, the bread was simply out of this world! It should be noted that Dotty’s Café is also a bakery and all their bread is freshly baked. You can taste the wonderful bread here, there’s sour dough (which goes very well with butter) and slices of brown toast which went perfectly with the baked eggs.

Mixed Berries Pavlova

Mixed Berries Pavlova (RM 10)
I went to New Zealand to study high school when I was 15 years old and have eaten a lot of pavlovas over there. I’ve also eaten a lot in Australia but have always felt that pavlova is more of a Kiwi thing, they do it a lot better. This implementation is also good – there are just three ingredients, the pavlova shells, crème patisserie and berries and it’s a testament to their baking skills that these 3 go so well together.

Making Salted Egg Yolk Cronut

Salted Egg Yolk Cronut (RM 11)
We waited hours for this to come out and finally the floor manager (?) took one out before the 12:30 pm batch and served it to us. I thought it was nice of him to personally do that, and was a bit puzzled when he warned us that it’ll be hot and to wait for it to cool down. It wasn’t hot and I later found out the reason why – it can’t be hot, or the structure of the cronut will be compromised.

Salted Egg Yolk Cronut

The salted egg yolk cronut (which is a combination of a croissant and a donut, texture wise, just in case anyone has been living under a rock for the past few years) was really good. I can see why people would wait for this. The thick and generous amount of butter and salted egg appealed to me immensely – it was mouth-wateringly delicious!

Cronut

The beautiful thing about the salted egg yolk cronut is that the insides are filled with the butter-salted egg combination too. It’s very rich and creamy.

Dottys Cafe Us

The salted egg yolk cronut is something you have to eat at Dotty’s Café and Bakery. You can take away of course but I personally feel it doesn’t taste the same if left to its own devices for too long. They have a wide range of freshly baked goods (and salads) as well as hot food so we’ll be back again to have brunch another weekend to try their other stuff. The meal cost RM 75 for the both of us, which is cheaper than our usual brunch outings. Dotty’s is located at Jalan Tun Mohd Faud 2 in TTDI.

5 photos from Sibu Market

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Sibu Market

Sibu Market is a source of a lot of interesting products from the far corners of Sarawak. The traders come from places like Belaga to Song to sell their stuff. The wharf and passenger jetty is within walking distance so a lot of them just hop off the express boats (many towns are only reachable by boat) and come over to hawk their wares. I have acquired a few hundred dollars worth of local durians (called buah pekan and buah isu) and am compiling that for an upcoming post!

Kek Lapis

There are also quite a few people selling the famous Sarawak kek lapis here. Kek lapis is actually of Indonesian provenance but the Malay communities in Sibu and Kuching have claimed it as their own. You’ll find them in the Kuching Waterfront / Padang Merdeka / Lao Pa Sat (Old Market) area. The kek lapis comes in all sorts of flavors like prunes, Milo etc.

Telur Terubok

Ikan Terubok is a delicious fish that is currently only obtainable from Sarawak. The fresh ones are usually sourced from Satok Market in Kuching where they have dedicated terubok sellers packing whole boxes of them to be shipped. These are the dried version which I believe comes from Sri Lanka and Bangladesh – it’s not as good, but it’s cheaper. They also sell the prized terubok fish roe here.

Lokam Jellyfish

Lokam is one of the local clams that you’ll find aplenty in Sibu. One restaurant in town called Fisherman’s Restaurant is renowned for their stuffed lokam (they take the clam meat and mix it with pork before stuffing it back). It’s quite good if you cook it well. There’s also a lot of jellyfish for sale due to an old wives tale – it’s said among the Foochow that you have to eat jellyfish after a haircut so the hair can be digested (something about the juices in the jellyfish) so it’s common to slice this raw and serve with a sauce of lime and chillis after a trip to the barber. I’ve had it lots of times as a kid at my grandma’s place.

Ghetto Ice Cream

Ghetto ice cream! These are simply satay skewers that’s been inserted into a tube filled with either Milo or strawberry flavored milk. Both are watered down but it’s pretty enterprising of these young boys to sell them for RM 1 each. I bought one last time my better half and the kids were in town for them to try, the “ice cream” is made by physically turning the huge churn (which rests on a bed of salted water with ice cubes) which will slowly freeze the receptacles holding the liquid.

Honesty, integrity and respect for all people

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My dad is a firm believer in the rule of law. He doesn’t go against the system, not even for “victimless crimes”.

Mom Dad
My Mom and Dad

Let me give some context to this anecdote – this was almost 30 years ago, when we were living in Kuching. I knew the time and place coz the Royal London Circus had come to town and I was very keen to go and see it. We were living in Kuching at the time since my dad was posted there as a Nazir (translates loosely to Inspector).

Dad

He was on a School Inspector salary so we didn’t have much, but we made do. What my dad did back then was to go to schools and inspect the implementation of the syllabus and the state of educational institutions. If you’ve been to high school in Malaysia, you’ve probably seen someone like him – he was the guy that sat silently behind in classes to watch what the teachers teach and how the students interact.

Family
My family and I on a holiday – from left – my grandma, sister, me, my mom and dad

That’s not how he got his strong ethics though, that has always been there. He always told us to put our seat belts on, at a time when no one did (early 80’s). Since the circus was in town, the roads were jammed due to everyone illegally double parking. It was a long walk to the circus and we were going to be late and I was badgering my dad to just park and go.

He wouldn’t have any of it. With my late mom’s urging, he nearly caved in but he didn’t. Instead, he drove to a Shell station, which was really far away and nicely asked the attendant if he could park there. The attendant didn’t have the authority to say yes or no, so calls were made (this was before cell phones) and we waited almost 30 minutes before someone called back to say we could.

It was only then that we left the car in the Shell station and walked 30 miles (it could have just been 1 kilometer, but still, it seemed far back then) to the circus. My dad had been working all day and was tired and I could appreciate how hard it is to keep up with a young kid like me (I understand this better since I have kids of my own right now). I am all the more appreciative now that he didn’t go the easy way and was patient enough to wait till the proper authorizations were done before taking two hyperactive kids to the circus. I was grateful that they allowed us to park at the station premises after the circumstances were explained.

That incident made a long lasting impression of the good people at Shell.

Fast-forward to today, I always make it a point to go to Shell for my petrol needs. Not only because of the good impression that I have of the company, but because of their superior service. The attendants are very attentive to all their customers, and I can always rely on them to fill up my tank dutifully while I grab some snacks from the Select Store. To up the game – my fuel tank was once filled by the station manager – and she didn’t mind it a bit, even though she could have just asked the service attendant to do the job. This is customer-orientated service. No matter what position they hold, they are dedicated to making sure that customers are well-taken care of.

Grand Old Lady
In front of the Grand Old Lady site, Miri, Sarawak

Shell was the first company to extract oil and gas in Malaysia. The site of the first well producing oil is still here (although it’s no longer functional). It’s called the Grand Old Lady and it’s located in Miri, not too far from where I was born in Sibu.

Shell Station

Shell in Malaysia employs a significant number of people and contributes not just to the economy, but also towards road safety awareness, scholarships for Malaysians, and quality-of-life corporate social responsibility initiatives like the “We Care, We Share” community care programs.

Shell also has core values that my dad can relate to – honesty, integrity and respect for all people as their business principles. Tell me, what are your Shell #StationStories? #ShellKita

De Vulture Café, Sibu

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De Vulture Cafe Sibu

I caught up with my ex classmate Chew Yieng and her husband last night for dinner. I haven’t seen her in a while, I used to hang out at her house when I was 15 and back for winter break – she had a really awesome pool that we swam in at 2 am in the morning. Haha. It’s been a long time since those days, we were all in New Zealand back then.

De Vulture Cafe

I heard that she was back from China and based in Sibu now so it was good to catch up. We had dinner at De Vulture Café, which just opened a few days ago (!!!). I was quite surprised to see a lot of people here since it’s a little out of the way, but there’s a huge local community in the Ulu Sungai Merah area

Jug Orange Juice

The café is decked out like a ship with real doors and ports scavenged from a real vessel.

Grilled Lamb Chop with Yoghurt Mint Sauce

Grilled Lamb Chop with Yoghurt Mint Sauce (RM 19.90)
I had this for my dinner. I thought the portion was decent but it was the yoghurt mint sauce that I really enjoyed. It tasted good. They serve a wide range of “Western” dishes from the usual grilled chicken/beef/lamb to sandwiches/burgers/tortillas.

Fish and Chips with Tartar Sauce

Fish & Chips with Tartar Sauce (RM 15.90)
This was Chew Yieng’s order. They had come here the day before and wanted to bring me someplace new to try out. There has been a bit of a boom in the café/restaurant business in Sibu nowadays, heaps of new places have sprung out and even more surprisingly, there seems to be a market to sustain it.

Chew Yieng HB

The food at De Vulture Café is reasonable but not particularly impressive. I may be the wrong person to ask since I’m based in KL and there are so many options there which are better but I guess it’s pretty decent for Sibu standards. I liked their orange juice (RM 16 for a jug) and it’s a nice place to chill. It was awesome to catch up with Chew Yieng again, so much time has passed since our school days. See ya all when I’m back for Chinese New Year! 🙂

Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) 2016 Dinner in Sibu, Sarawak

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PKR Dinner Sibu 2016

I was invited to come along for dinner last night at Good Happiness Restaurant in Sibu and listen to the PKR politicians speak. This is (as I understand it) a fundraising dinner of sorts – each table has paid a minimum of RM 400 for campaign contributions. Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) is one of the opposition parties in Malaysia.

PKR Dinner Sibu

I’ve always been very transparent in my political leanings – I voted for DAP (Democratic Action Party) in the last general election and make it a point to go for Bersih gatherings. I thought it would be interesting to hear the speakers and see the 2016 Sarawak State Election lineup.

PKR Dinner 2016

Good Happiness Restaurant was very packed, they had the entire second floor with over 100 tables. There were provisions for halal diners as well with outside catering.

Foochow Fried Noodles

Foochow Fried Noodles
This was the first dish that came out. Good Happiness Restaurant does decent Foochow style fried noodles, I quite like it. I think almost everyone was hungry at this point so it was smart of them to start with a carb heavy dish.

Pork Belly Soup

Sup Babi (Pork Belly Soup)
I have honestly never had anything like this before! It’s pork belly and leg that’s been boiled with pickled vegetables and served as a clear broth. It’s a nice soup but the sheer amount of adipose tissue is staggering…the abundance of unrendered pork fat makes you feel a bit jelak after a few bites.

Sup Babi

Interesting execution though. This is a very Iban style of cooking – simple and wholesome (in the sense that it’s filling and slightly oily).

Curry Fish Head

Curry Fish Head with Steamed Rice
This was the third dish that came out. The menu for the night seems quite starch intensive, which I guess is appropriate for massive events like these. It’s nowhere near as good as places like Sheraton but it’s done decently enough.

Abalone with Mushrooms

Abalone with Mushrooms
This is a classic Chinese banquet dish with abalone slices and enoki mushrooms stir fried and stewed, surrounded by heads of broccoli. It’s not very tasty but food is beside the point here – people come for the politics, the food just serves as a backdrop and a vehicle to raise funds. It’s purely secondary and I don’t think anyone minded.

PKR Candidates 2016

This is the Central lineup for 2016! These candidates would be the ones contesting in the upcoming Sarawak State Election 2016 to be held in four (4) months or so.

Anwar Ibrahim Badge

I got an Anwar Ibrahim (leader of PKR) button for contributing to the campaign. There were people going around with donation boxes – these will go towards campaign funds so I was happy to give to the opposition coalition.

PKR Dinner Me

It was an interesting dinner. I felt that some things could have been done differently to make things more conducive e.g. less ceramah (political speeches) would be nice since everyone in attendance is in agreement with you, it’s a little like preaching to the choir. I also think more mileage could be had from getting the upcoming political candidates to speak to and connect with people at each table – perhaps next time eh? Good luck! 🙂

Acer Predator 15 Gaming Laptop Review

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Acer Predator Launch

I have a problem which I’m sure a lot of other games share. I own a relatively new notebook (bought it earlier this year) since I need a portable device to use for work when I’m out and about. However, I believe that notebooks should be dual purpose and it must be able to handle the games I play when I’m home too.

Buy Games

Unfortunately, that isn’t a reality for the majority of us with regular notebooks. I can’t play a lot of the new games for this very reason. I didn’t buy even buy Starcraft II: Legacy of the Void until two weeks ago coz I knew my (relatively new) notebook can’t handle the graphics on the highest settings and I *want* to play it on the highest settings.

Predator

Hell, I’ll even go so far to say that I deserve to.

Hearthstone

However, you can’t expect that in a normal notebook. There simply isn’t enough processing and graphics card power in a notebook format. Thus, I mostly play Hearthstone, a relatively non-intensive game. Anything remotely related to FPS (first person shooter) and MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) genres are out of the question. Games like Wolfenstein: The Old Blood. Alien Isolation, Heroes of the Storm just doesn’t run well on work notebooks.

Acer Predator Box

Enter the Acer Predator laptop. It’s a notebook that’s built to gamer friendly specifications. I was amazed when I scrolled though the technical details. The Acer Predator laptop all run the latest and most powerful NVIDIA GeForce notebook GPUs! The new NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M and 980M has been rated to run at up to 70% of their desktop counterparts.

Acer Predator Unboxing

That’s a huge figure if you know anything about notebook gaming. Previous notebook GPUs can only achieve less than 40% parity with their desktop counterparts. Finally, we have a gaming laptop solution which is almost equal to the most powerful desktop gaming machines (and definitely more powerful than most mid-tier gaming desktops).

Acer Predator 15

You can at last run the latest and greatest games like Call of Duty: Black Ops III on a notebook and get better performance than all but the highest end desktop machines, courtesy of the Acer Predator laptop series. I was lucky enough to get an Acer Predator 15 for review. This laptop is equipped with:

  • Windows 10 Home 64-bit
  • Intel Core i7-6700HQ processor
  • 16GB DDR4 RAM
  • Full HD 1920 x 1080 15.6″ display
  • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M with 3GB GDDR5 VRAM
  • 128 GB SSD drive + 1 TB SATA HDD

This unit retails for RM 6,999. You can also get 24 GB DDR4 RAM and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980M with 4GB GDDR5 VRAM and a 256GB SSD drive for RM 8,999. I can tell you that the graphics card alone is easily a third of the cost when you buy it from stores, this is not as expensive as you think, gamers spend this amount for GPUs all the time.

Acer Predator Gaming Series

I say this coz I heard a lot of people commenting about the price during the launch of the Acer Predator. I silently thought to myself “These people have never played a single game in their lives, much less know about GPUs and the price of the latest NVIDIA GeForce graphics card”. I didn’t say it out loud coz I didn’t want to appear to be condescending but that’s the point of the Acer Predator laptop series.

Acer Predator

It’s for GAMERS.

FrostCore Acer

There’s Predator FrostCore, the swappable fan design which injects this powerful gaming rig with extra cold to keep heat down and performance up. It’s additional cooling, the notebook is already cooled, but if you don’t need the DVD drive, you can swap out the bay easily by a switch via the back.

Predator FrostCore

Pop in the Predator FrostCore and you’ll see a noticeable change in your performance.

Watch Dogs

I found out that putting the Predator FrostCore in for games like Watch Dogs gives a 5-10 fps (frames per second) increase. This is on the highest quality settings with all the bells and whistles (4xSSAA anti-aliasing etc).

FPS

I also liked the Killer DoubleShot Pro technology. It basically uses BOTH your WiFi and Ethernet to combine and optimize bandwidth. You can use this by selecting the fastest one (which can differ according to circumstances) to dedicate to your game or select one to use for your game and the other for streaming.

Steam

This is perfect for Twitch streamers. You don’t need a lot for your games but NVIDIA ShadowPlay takes a lot of bandwidth so you can use the faster one (be it Ethernet or WiFi) for uploading ShadowPlay recordings to Twitch or YouTube Gaming.

Subwoofer

The Predator SoundPound 4.2 boasts four speakers with two powerful subwoofers and Dolby Audio surround sound. I was quite surprised at the fidelity of treble notes and the intensity of bass in a laptop. The Acer Predator 15 I had was LOUD!

PredatorSense ProZone

The PredatorSense intelligent gaming keyboard control and customization options lets you set up keyboard macros (essential for anyone who plays World of Warcraft and similar games). It’s quite useful for RTS (real time strategy) games like Starcraft II also. The Predator ProZone keyboard is insanely accurate and has four (4) customizable backlight zones and programmable macro profiles you can share. The backlight is very useful if you’re gaming in the dark and you can set the intensity as you wish – notice how the W, A, S, D keys are brighter than the surrounding ones.

You can use up to three (3) monitors including one NVIDIA G-SYNC monitor with the Acer Predator gaming laptop too so you can setup the most immersive gaming experience at your home. The features above are standard in all Acer Predator laptop series.

StarcraftII

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Acer Gaming

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Find out more at the Acer Predator website.

Roti Canai Goreng in Kapit

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Roti Canai Goreng

I first heard about this wonderful creation a couple of months back. Fried roti canai is a staple in Kapit and one of those quirky inventions that can only take hold in a small town. I decided then and there that I must personally investigate this dish and planned to go on a trip downriver. Kapit is a small town that’s only reachable by boat – you can’t drive or fly there.

Roti Canai Goreng Kapit

The journey to Kapit takes 3 hours via express boat from Sibu and I went down with my bro Eddy for a night. It’s not just to eat roti canai goreng, but that certainly was a highlight (at least for me). Haha. The stalls in question are located at Gelanggang Kenyalang (loosely translated as Kenyalang Court). It’s an assortment of stalls under one roof, an indoor food court of sorts.

Gerai Makanan Islam Sri Suria

There is one stall that’s famous for their roti canai goreng but everyone essentially does it the same way nowadays. I went to Stall #25 Gerai Makanan Islam Sri Suria and the kind lady manning the frying pan told me about how the roti canai goreng is made. I was quite surprised to find out that it’s not grilled first – the raw dough of the roti canai is slipped into boiling hot oil and fried straight away.

Roti Goreng Kapit

The same treatment is done for the roti canai telur goreng (fried roti canai with egg). The egg is folded into the dough and deep fried till crispy. It’s served Sarawakian style with curry chicken and a sweet sambal sauce. The latter is truly local, I’ve never had this saccharine sambal anywhere else except at home.

Roti Canai Kapit

The roti canai goreng costs RM 2 and it’s plain roti canai that’s been deep fried. The dough is cooked through, with a crispy exterior. You can taste the sweetness of the dough by picking up the sliced pieces and munching on them. It’s very satisfying!

Roti Telur Goreng

Roti canai telur goreng comes in at RM 4 and it tastes totally different with an egg. I was surprised at how distinctive the two are! This one has a pockmarked surface (from the hot oil) and it tastes a lot more savory than the previous one.

Roti Canai Goreng Inside

Here’s a look at the inside. The egg is perfectly cooked from the heat of the cooking oil. The funny thing about the two roti canai variants is that the egg version is rectangle in shape while the plain is round and circular.

Roti Goreng

Roti canai goreng has a distinctive texture that’s very moreish. I could eat several of them, although it’s probably not wise to do so as it’s quite oily and I feel that excessive consumption would probably be bad for your cholesterol.

HB Eddy Kapit

This is definitely worth a try. I’ll come again just to eat this! You can only find it in Kapit, so if you’re ever in Sarawak and looking for something different, take a boat here and eat their famous roti canai goreng! 🙂

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