Nuzul Quran Weekend

I have been wanting to visit Semarang for some time as I wanted to see its colonial buildings. As AirAsia no longer flies there, I decided to fly to Jakarta and make my way to Semarang from there. I could of course take the train but I’d have to travel into the city and train takes too long anyway. So after having making my research, I bought Batik Air flight to Jakarta before buying KLM ticket (costs less if you don’t check in your bag and there’s inflight meal too) and then searched the airlines flying to Semarang. I had almost bought Batik Air (somehow it cost lower than Lion Air) before I remembered to check Garuda Indonesia and guess what, it cost lower than Batik Air. Batik Air then changed its flight time from KL and then gave options to passengers so I opted for a refund.

 

Wednesday, 27 March 2024

 

I left office during lunchtime and made my way to the airport. I missed the 13:52 KLIA Transit train from Putrajaya so decided to performed prayers while waiting. I reached KLIA at 14:39 and immediately went in. I was a bit surprised to find that I have to go to the Satellite Building but I guess it’s because the KLM flight was from Amsterdam. I haven’t been to the Satellite Building since end-December 2019 when I came back from Pakistan. I followed the signs and went down the escalator to ground floor where the buses were.

 

Many shop lots were closed so after a quick walk around, I made my way to the gate. As I was carrying cabin bags, I had to declare my liquids and I had already prepared for that.

 

We took off on time as passengers were punctual. There were a few empty seats and had I not been chosen a window seat and had my bag in the overhead compartment, I would’ve been tempted to change seats. The inflight meal wasn’t much to shout about but it’s better than nothing which was what I would’ve got on Batik Air. We landed around 18:00 local time. The airport Wi-Fi wasn’t great at all but I managed to access it near Customs (we need to scan QR code and declare our items to the Customs before we could exit).

 

After breaking fast, I made my way to the domestic parking area. The hotel I booked (which I booked mainly because of its complimentary airport transfers) had informed me to wait there. I stopped en route to perform prayers including tarawikh and witir prayers (I still had some time so I might as well). I reached the waiting area near the domestic parking area at 19:40 and sat down to eat the rice from my inflight meal. It was just adequate and nothing to shout about at all.

 

I finally asked a Grab driver if I could borrow his hotspot and messaged the hotel. I was not amused to find a message asking where I was. This after I had arranged and reminded the hotel when I needed the shuttle (shuttle is every two hours)! I ended up waiting until 20:55 for the 20:00 shuttle. Simply outrageous! I was fuming.

 

It took almost 20 minutes to reach the hotel and immediately after checking in, I walked out to find restaurants or convenience store or supermarket but there was none. Zilch. Nothing. I went to the hotel restaurant and was told it had closed for dinner but I could order room service (room service prices are higher than restaurant prices) 24/7.

 

Thursday, 28 March 2024

 

I woke up at 03:45 and rang the room service. I had to ring it twice before anyone deigned to pick up. Imagine my displeasure when I was told there was no one to cook as they were busy with the ‘breakfast’ buffet. I had to get dressed and go down to the restaurant. And yes, pay buffer price for a plate of rice. Oh and the hotel didn’t accept cash so I reluctantly had to pay by card. Definitely NOT going to return to the hotel ever again.

 

I returned to my room, showered, performed prayers and finished packing. I went down and checked out at 05:45 and just before 06:00, boarded the hotel bus to the airport. The transfer was better than the evening before and we stopped at Terminal 1, Terminal 2 and last but not least, Terminal 3. I was the last one out as my flight was at gate 5 of Terminal 3. My bag weighed about 7 kg and I decided to bring it on board. However, just before boarding, I was told to leave my bag (because many people were bringing their bags on board too) and that it’d go into the cargo but that it’d be among the first ones out. Nevertheless when I sat down, I saw that the overhead compartment could still fit in cabin bags.

 

We took off on time and landed just after 09:00. I dozed off during take-off. My bag came out early and I made my way out to Trans Semarang stop across the street from the exit. The ticket cost Rp4k and I sat down to wait. The bus came 30 minutes later. I was told to change buses at one of the halts and had help from the staff there to board the right bus for ibis Budget Semarang Tandean Hotel. The halt was only metres away from my hotel, so convenient! Unfortunately, the bus service starts only at 06:30 so I couldn’t take it back to the airport for my early morning flight back to Jakarta on Saturday.

 

Trans Semarang

After leaving my bag, I set off and walked in the general direction of the Old Town. I stopped at two hotels to ask for directions before I arrived at the Old Town. Despite it being a sunny day, it didn’t feel too hot. I spent some time walking around the Old Town before taking Jl. Pemuda back in the direction of my hotel. I stopped first at Paragon Mall. Mind you, it’s nothing like the Singapore Paragon or Siam Paragon. I was appalled when I saw covered girls eating openly in public. I mean, why announce to the world that you couldn’t fast? And even more disturbing are the families who sat down together to have meals with covered girls and men. Don’t you have respect for Ramadan at all?

 

Mberok Pumping House

 

I returned to the hotel to check in but I had to go out again when I couldn’t charge my devices. I cut across Novotel Hotel to get to Paragon. It turned out my charger had gone kaput so I had to fork out money to buy a new charger. Arghhhh! I had spotted a hypermart in the basement floor so went there to get some groceries. My, things are not cheap in Indonesia. Sunquick for instance cost more than RM18 and a small bottle of isotonic drink (not even Pocari Sweat) cost more than RM6.

 

I went out again in the evening to find food for my predawn meal. I finally found a restaurant across from Paragon and bought fried rice to go.

 

Good Friday, 29 March 2024

 

I woke up early for my predawn meal and stayed up until after morning prayers. I was too sleepy so succumbed to sleep. I woke again at 08:00 and left an hour later for Lawang Sewu which was quite near the hotel. This magnificent building was the head office of the Dutch East Indies Railway Co. and is owned by the national railway company. I paid Rp30k for my entrance ticket (foreigners pay more) and spent some time there. And there were a lot of cats in the grounds! Sleeping, prowling, minding their own business.

 

After that, I walked to Kampung Pelangi but after climbing up to some cemetery, I made my way back down. Today was hotter than the day before and I didn’t want to exert myself.

 

I continued on my walk to Sam Poo Kong Temple, passing florist shops and small nurseries on my way. I reached the temple but decided not to enter in the end so I turned back and walked back to my hotel. Performed prayers, rested and had a shower before going out at 16:00 for a massage at a place nearby. I had a hot stone massage followed by face massage. Then I crossed over to Paragon and had a small bowl of soto for iftar at the hypermart. I stopped at the restaurant where I bought the fried rice the evening before and bought another pack of fried rice to go for my predawn meal.

 

Saturday, 30 March 2024

 

I woke for predawn meal, showered and performed prayers. I had just about finished packing when I got a call from Maxim driver. I was surprised to find another driver with another vehicle waiting. I had agreed with the earlier driver to come at 06:00 (I initially ordered a car for 05:50) and because Maxim or the driver changed drivers, I had to pay for waiting fee and I was not happy with this. Why should I bear the cost when Maxim or the initial driver changed their plan? And passengers also have to pay for parking? Or was it entrance fee to the airport. Annoying!

 

We boarded on time and landed at CGK at 08:20. I dozed on and off during the flight. I dropped by the prayer room and performed dhuha prayers before finding my way out and up to departure area for my Citilink flight back to KL. Turned out my bag was 7.4kg with water bottles so I told the counter staff that I’d bring my bag onboard. I gave away the water to a family with toddlers then went in to clear security and immigration. I had a while to kill so I browsed some shops before settling down to read.

 

The flight took off on time and unlike the Citilink flights I took to and from Dili, this one didn’t serve complimentary inflight meal. We landed into a wet KLIA at 14:30 and I was dismayed to find that we landed at the Satellite Building because I had to walk from the gate to gate C5 to get the bus back to the main terminal. I missed the 14:52 KLIA Transit train so performed prayers first before making my way home. So, I finally managed to visit Semarang. Alhamdulillah.

Trip With Schoolmates

This trip was mooted back in early December 2023 and after some interests, withdrawals, revision of itineraries, we finally met up at KL Sentral on Friday morning, 1 March. The bus left at 08:00 and we drove to pick a few more members at Sungai Buloh R&R. This was the first I joined any trip with my schoolmates.

We drove to Batu Gajah where Galeri Lat is and browsed his history. Suddenly, we turned and saw the man himself! He hardly grants interviews to anybody and yet that morning, he was sporting enough to give us an animated brief background and told us of his life and career journey. Then we took some group photos with him and he also signed our Lat comic books, notebooks, bucket hat, hand phone covers. After that, we drove to Kellie’s Castle and walked in and up the hill to the mansion. We spent some time exploring the mansion and even went up to the rooftop in the hot sun and took pictures. A few mates opted to stay behind though.

 

After that, we drove to visit a friend. She stayed with her mum and there was also a caregiver for her mum and some fifty cats (including kittens). It was an old bungalow filled with beautiful furniture and I remembered thinking how high the maintenance cost would be.

 

We then had our very late lunch at Red Brick Kitchen, enjoying the Bukit Rapat views with our meal. After lunch, we had the usual inevitable phototaking session before leaving for Mirror Lake. We boarded the inflatable boats, about seven to a boat, and went into a tunnel and emerged to this peaceful lake. We were told the ideal time to come was 10:00 thereabouts and then one could really see the lake being mirrored, hence the name.

After that, we drove to Impiana Hotel and checked in. I lingered at the front desk as I wanted to get the first room card. Aha!

We assembled at the lobby at 20:15 and drove for dinner at Hainan Chicken Rice, stopping en route at a mall for some to purchase some toiletries. Our Ipoh mate had reserved the upper floor of the restaurant and we had it all to ourselves. There was even a birthday cake for one of our mates whose celebrated her birthday that day.

On Saturday, we left after 08:30 and drove to Taiping. We picked up our tour guide who gave us a brief background of the town which is celebrating its 150th year this year, a shout out to Taiping! We drove to the Lake Garden and admired the 1000-plus year old rain trees with their sprawling branches. We then drove around town and I was so glad I had taken the train before and visited the town properly because the town has many beautiful colonial buildings. We then bade goodbye to the tour guide and drove back to the Lake Garden for photo sessions.

We finally dragged ourselves away and drove to Sajian Panorama for lunch. It is located by the Perak River and if it wasn't so swelteringly hot, I would have walked abit around the grounds. We had lunch indoors and a good thing too. There was a choice of fish head curry and fish cooked in tempoyak, along with other dishes.

After lunch, we drove to Victoria Bridge. We had to make a turn and took another route due to a detour as our bus couldn't clear the barrier. The bridge is one of the oldest railway bridges in the country and it was built as a crossing over the Perak River to serve the local tin mining industry. I crossed it with my mates and with my heart in my mouth. Yes, I walked along the track on the adjoining footbridge and walked the 1,000 feet length of the bridge and back again! We had more photo sessions after that and some of us treated ourselves to some Malaysian ice cream too.

Next up, we drove to Istana Kenangan and spent some time there before driving to Masjid Ubudiah for prayers. After prayers, we drove to Gerai MPKK by the Perak River and had some laksa and drinks. Some then proceeded to the nearby shops to browse and spend. I was interested in the labu sayong water containers but knew I wiuld have problems carrying them back so I didn't buy anything and walked back to the bus. And in time too for it started raining shortly after. We drove back to the hotel and reached it just before Maghrib. Dinner was had at the hotel restaurant where we had breakfast.

On Sunday, we drove to Concubine Lane after breakfast. Most of my friends went shopping but I didn't really find anything much to tempt me. We then had some drinks at Plan B before boarding the bus. Lunch was had at Nasi Vanggey Greentown. We then drove back to the hotel to pack and perform prayers. My Ipoh mate had requested for a late check-out and the hotel was kind enough to oblige us. Ipoh mate also packed some soya drinks and taufofa (soyabean pudding) for us to enjoy on the bus, and a mini tepak sirih container as souvenirs. What a generous and thoughtful host!!!

We left at 15:00 but stopped at a pump station to fill up before joining the queue to enter the highway. Traffic was expectedly pretty heavy seeing it was school holidays and Sunday. We stopped at Tapah R&R to use the facilities and my, there was a loooonnggg queue to enter the washroom. Some shopped for fruits so we were further delayed. We finally reached KL Sentral after dropping off a couple of mates at Sungai Buloh R&R (and another brief washroom break) at 20:10. I went to perform prayers first before taking the train back.

And that was my weekend and trip with my schoolmates. I'm satisfied that I finally managed to visit Kellie's Castle and Victoria Bridge, Alhamdulillah. May our friendship last, insyaAllah.