Day +528 : Fruits at home town

I am fine today.

I would like to introduce to you some fruits that we have in here.

The Pomelo (柚子) – very tasty and juicy, better than the Pomelo in West Malaysia. My third sister purchased 20kg for us to consume in the kampong and I plan to bring at least 50kg to KL after the holiday. It costs RM1.80 per kg only.

The delicious Pomelo
A heap of Pamelos
There are many coconut trees surround my kampong house. They were planted by my brother Richard many years ago.

No one in the kampong has the motivation to pluck the coconuts. So the fruits are left to ripe, dry and drop :-) I took the initiative yesterday to harvest the coconuts and we managed to pluck 53 coconuts from 3 coconut trees. There are still many coconut trees left unharvested.

The coconut tree.
Everyone worked as a team to pluck the coconuts.
I was working very hard to chop off the bunch of coconuts - more than 10 fruitsJoseph was given a chance to climb the ladder
It was Daniel's turn now
The harvest - 53 coconuts
Coconut - zoom in
I cut open 8 fruits after the laborious harvest - really tiring :-(
The coconut water was very sweet – as sweet as the one found in the town with sugar added
The flesh especially the young one was delicious too. As the reason given to me for not harvesting the coconuts was that they were not interested to eat the fruit, it was very strange to see my family members in kampong enjoyed the fruit so much after I cut open for them :-) This led me to suspect that they are "lazy" to pluck the fruit instead of not interested to eat the fruit :-)

I purchased the following fruits at the town market this morning.

“Maowan” – didn't eat this type of fruit for more than 20 years
Local Olive – not available elsewhere except Sarawak. Just soak it in the warm water for a few minutes before serving with soy sauce and sugar.
Cempedak – RM4.00 only per piece. It weighs more than 4kg! I used to pay RM4.50 a kg in KL.
Soursop – RM1.50 a kg only :-)
Kedondong or “Mangolong” – 6 pieces for RM1.00
See you next post :-)

Day +527 : Eating at Bintangor Town

I am fine today.

There is still no way for me to reach Sibu today and I found out that the Pathlab in Sarikei town was already closed for business. This means that I have to wait for the flood in Sibu subsides first before doing the blood test.

My wife and I went to Bintangor town this morning. We had breakfast and lunch at the town. I would like to introduce to you what we had today :-)

The small town – could not find a single traffic light in the town :-)
The best hotel in the town owned by Ting Pek Kiing (陈伯勤). The hotel bears his father's name if I were not mistaken.
Wantan Soup (RM2.00) - my wife’s breakfast
Kampua Mee (RM2.00) - my breakfast, this one is the best that I had since I came back for the holiday
Fried Mee (RM2.50) - my nephew’s breakfast
We had clay pot Mee (RM3.00) for lunch. I haven’t eaten this type of noodle for more than 20 years. My third sister who works as a dental assistant in the nearby hospital always brought us for lunch whenever we go to town, but she didn’t ever know the existence of this type of noodle. She said she would bring her children for this type of noodle later.
Miring - my wife's favourite dish
Wife’s Biscuit (老婆饼) - not only for wife, also good for husband :-)
Dousa Biscuit(豆沙饼) - my third sister always buy this type of biscuits for me to bring back to kampong whenever I go to town
Li Biscuit (礼饼) - there was a story behind this type of biscuit
We had this Fried Kueh Teow the other day. It costs RM2.20 only. The shop owner told us he would like to keep the price at RM2.00 but due to pressure from other shop owners, he had no choice but to increase the price. People scolded him stupid for not increasing the price.
The Restaurant that was reluctant to increase the price of noodle
See you next post :-)

Day +526 : Sibu is flooded

I am fine today.

While I was on the way to Bintagor town yesterday, my second sister Sie Kiong called to warn me not to go to Sibu because many areas in Sibu were flooded. Many cars were trapped in the flood and part of the the Lanang route which we always use to travel to Sibu was also flooded.

The flood worsens today in some areas with flood water as deep as “one person (5 metres) ” height :-) Many houses and shops were flooded and this incurred huge losses to people here :-)

It is perfectly fine for me not to travel to Sibu for the next few days as we have plenty of things to do in kampong. The only thing that I need to adjust is to find an alternate place to do my blood test which is originally planned to be done in Sibu. Most probably I will go to Sarikei for the blood test as my third sister told me there is a Pathlab there.

We went fishing again today and the score:

Sie Heng : 5 fishes
Heng Hew: 3 fishes
David : 2 fishes
Daniel: 1 fish

A type of fish that we catch when the tide is low A catch of the day
A mud skipper at the stream bank – not many in the town get to see it. It manages to hog on the water surface :-)
My niece in the kampong said that her sister who once stayed with us in KL told her that I cook delicious spaghetti. So I demonstrated to her the way I prepare spaghetti sauce this morning and everyone had spaghetti for breakfast.

In the afternoon, I tried a new dish called Lemon & Honey Meaty Spare Ribs (西柠蜜汁加厚骨). The outcome was not very satisfying because I could not find imported yellow lemon here. The local green lemon that I used as a replacement gave a bitter taste :-)

The dish.The dish (zoom in)
The local greeen lemon
See you next post :-)

Day +525 : Miscellaneous photos from home village

I am fine today.

I went to Bintangor town with my nephew this morning to buy fishing hook and to visit internet café to update my blog.

In the evening, we went fishing again with the following score:

David - 6 fishes
Heng Yew – 4 fishes
Joseph – 1 fish

In the morning, I cooked Fried Kueh-Teow in Creamy Egg Sauce () for the first time. As the dish was not available here, most of my family members were eating it for the first time. Even though I didn’t use squids as I could not find it at Bintangor town, the taste was still not too far away from the one that we eat in restaurant :-) We managed to finish 2kg of Kueh-Teow for the breakfast.
My wife and Daniel were learning to make "Black and White Cheese Cake" from my niece. The cake was quite simple to make. It consists of alternate layers of ordinary and chocolate Marie biscuits "glued" together with cheese or peanut butter and chocolate pastry. No baking is necessary for this type of cake; just keep it in the refrigerator for one day after preparation before serving.

Chocolate Marie biscuits sitting on top of peanut butter.
The ingredients
My wife and Daniel busy making the cake, with happy Adriel popping up for a photo shot only
Heng Hew and Daniel busy at work

Small white fish (白鱼仔), it looks big here; actually it is small.
A beetle

A type of small crab that is widely available here. Though it is edible, we rarely eat them. Daniel said this crab was his life finger ring :-)
A moth

See you next post :-)

Day +524 : Finally we managed to go fishing

I am fine today.

We went fishing in the evening at a stream within 3 minutes walking distance from our kampong house.

As we expect to catch small fish (白鱼仔) only, we used the smallest fishing hook that was available.

The score today :
Heng Yew – 4 fishes
Daniel – 1 fish

All the rest scores zero fish :-(

The stream where we fish Happy Joseph and Daniel Daniel Joseph Aaron also join the crowd My eldest brother – Sie Heng

Heng Yew – Sie Heng’s second son (Heng Chiek’s brother)
Cat fish

Small white fish (白鱼仔) – though small but very delicious. It costs RM20 per kg here. My eldest brother told me people here use transparent plastic bag to catch this type of fish. The bait – earth worm

See you next post :-)