Just RM8.0 away (via teksi) from our hotel is Chow Kit. This is where the overwhelming modern urban KL seems to soften a bit. This area is just the ordinary wet market where one would find cheap produce, meat (unfortunately, if you’re looking for pork, this is not the place). Filipinos like us will surely find ingredients to cook our favorite adobo.
What makes this place great though, is that the people here are good and nice to talk and deal with. One store even gave us free chicken asses (or what they call tongking. At least it’s what it sounds to me) when they saw me got a bit surprised that it was separated together with the head (they said that both are sold separately and mostly cooked as kebab) from the poultry we bought. I’m an ilonggo you know, so I love these asses (no pun intended). Back home we call it isol. Yummy!
After buying all the ingredients that we need and after we decided to buy a box of mineral water (beer is expensive, but so is water in KL) which surprisingly kuya Noel gladly agreed to carry on his shoulder, we hurriedly went back home. It’s time for our 1st home-cooked meal. And time to exploit the nice kitchen at the hotel.
The hearty lunch of fried fish (which left the whole room smelling fishy for the next few days), adobo and ampalaya with coconut milk which the whole group cooked (except me. I’m just the dishwasher) got us into lazy mode. So there’s no other activity to match that but to monkey around. Literally.
We discovered that just right outside and below our room’s balcony is a rich monkey habitat. We spent almost several hours just observing them and at some point offered banana slices which they eagerly took and ate. They’re not alone though in these trees and foliage. There were also squirrels and some endemic birds gliding back and forth along the branches.
By nighttime, we decided to go back to Petaling Street. The decision was worth it.
Chinatown was busier than it was in the morning. It was more beautiful and colorful as well. The red rounded Chinese lanterns dominating the area and the neon signs glowing with Chinese characters made me feel like I was in one Travel Channel or Adventure movie scene. This time however, I’m not. I’m really at the scene. The sight of beer drinkers (mostly expats) in front of the restaurants added the sense of delight…and thirst. I keep reminding myself though, “that beer is expensive”. So I grabbed my beers instead from the nearest 7-11 store.
My shopping-addicted companions finished with their haggling just on time for them to accompany me to buy a 1GB Sony memory stick at a mall before it closes. We’ll need that memory size tomorrow.
Filed under: Food, Travel | Tagged: beer, Chinatown, Chow Kit, isol, Malaysia, monkeys, Petaling
