Damn, it's been five weeks since I was last able to update the blog. Well, you know the drill - work, commitments, yadayadayada. Let's get the show on the road with this latest piece on my newly purchased four-disc Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut Blu-ray set. I received it in the mail from Amazon two days ago, and only managed to catch the 215-minute long cut of the movie last night. How does it fare?

I thoroughly enjoyed Watchmen when it hit the big screen earlier this year. Sure, it was very very dense and many of the nuances of the story as well as the storytelling techniques possible only with sequential art were lost in the translation to celluloid, but I thought director Zack Snyder (along with screenwriters David Hayter and Alex Tse) did a bang-up job with this adaptation. Click HERE to read more about my initial thoughts on the movie eight months ago.

Did I like the extra long Ultimate Cut? The answer is yes! The extra length allowed the story room to breath, although the movie still felt very dense. I had some trepidations with the inclusion of the Tales of the Black Freighter animated short to the movie would be weird, moving back and forth between live action footage with traditional 2D animation, but the transition was seamless and worked every bit as well as it did in the original comics.

I had not seen the Director's Cut, released on DVD and Blu-ray months ago. Along with the fact that I had only caught the original Theatrical Cut once eight months ago, I am hard pressed to tell exactly which are the new scenes, but the overall movie watching experience with the Ultimate Cut remains an enjoyable one.

This four-disc set is comes in a handsome and sturdy thick cardboard box, emblazoned with a pirate version of the Comedian's famous badge. I always thought this was an odd graphical choice, but I can see the economic and legal reasons for not using the smiley face. The rear of the box is adorned with more pirate imagery amidst with Rorschach's calling sign.

Opening the package (it was kept closed with a hidden magnet clasp) reveals an attractive graphic of the main heroes, and within the package is a cardboard slipcase housing three discs, with the Motion Comic disc stashed aside in a traditional Blu-ray clamshell. I suspect it is just leftover stock of the original release dumped here.

The cardboard slipcase features portraits of Ozymandias, The Comedian, and Nite Owl. Inside it are two Blu-ray discs (one each for the movie and the special features), and a DVD-ROM disc containing the Digital Copy. The passcode to download the license for the Digital Copy of the Theatrical Cut is found as a loose slip of paper.

Most of the special features from the previous Blu-ray release is included here, along with new audio commentaries by Zack Snyder and Dave Gibbons. Missing is the much acclaimed Maximum Movie Mode, which had Zack Snyder basically hosting a video tour of the movie and behind the scenes footage. Tales of the Black Freighter is not available as a separate feature as well, although thankfully the Behind The Hood mockumentary is included.

The VC-1 video encode looked superb on my 40" 1080p panel, although the Dolby TrueHD track was rather soft, the same problem I had with the DTS-HD MA track in the Big-Screen Edition of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Beyond that, there is precious little to complain about the A/V presentation of the movie and it is comforting to know that even a 215 minute movie with a high resolution lossless audio track can fit on a 50GB BD-50 disc. Overall, I am very happy with the purchase and well worth the RM130 spent.

Perhaps it's karma, but after the awful experience at Hongkie/Boston the previous week, I found myself caught in an almost as bad lunch situation at Island Red Cafe in Gurney Tower. (Interestingly enough, Firefox threw a security notification when I tried to go to the site - click here to check out the Google Safe Browsing diagnostic page for this site).

As I was in the neighborhood over the past week for training, myself and a couple of friends and colleagues descended on the outlet for a quick lunch. Unfortunately quick would be the opposite of our dining experience.

We arrived at roughly 12:40pm or so, and between the three of us we ordered spring rolls, vegetarian spaghetti, chicken rice served with mushroom sauce, and nasi lemak. The spring rolls were intended as appetizer, but the nasi lemak was the first to arrive after roughly 20 minutes. 20 minutes was a long enough wait for a relatively simple dish (by restaurant standards), but it would be another 20 minutes of waiting before our spring rolls arrived, and another 15 minutes after that for the two remaining dishes to show up.

Throughout this time, we had complained to the waitress who was assigned to our table for updates on our food - but that did not help at all. It was absolutely bizarre that we had to wait an hour for our food to show up as the place was practically empty. Plus, it was very obvious that all the dishes were prepared with ingredients one would typically find in the frozen foods section in your local supermarket.

The customer service was absolutely atrocious, the food was passable at best, and they even had the gall to ask us to spread the news about the place and distribute a stack of flyers to friends and family. I did all of that of course - with a warning to everyone I know NEVER to visit this establishment.

Avoid at all cost!

This is a story about relatively decent food, deceptive advertising, impolite restaurant management, and hopefully the power of the Internet. This event took place yesterday (1 October 2009) at the eGate outlet of Boston (what was once Hongkie Kopitiam), when myself and two colleagues decided to have lunch there.

The restaurant staff was courteous enough (despite a pedantic grasp of the English language, but that's neither here nor there), and when we were seated we spied upon a flyer promoting free coffee, milk tea, or ying yong (a combination of both) with any menu item order. We were happy to see that, and proceeded to order such drinks to go along with our lunch.

Lunch was pretty good, and being the thirsty kind, I was the first to finish my glass of ice coffee. I requested a refill from the waiter, and was informed that the free refills is valid only for hot drinks. I was perplexed by this, as the flyer (see below) did not mention anything about this promotion being limited only to hot drinks. In fact, the graphic adorning the flyer definitely showed cool glasses.

Annoyed, the three of us requested to speak with the manager, who came to our table to repeat pretty much the same thing, adding (in a rather unfriendly, arrogant manner) that the management reserves the right to change the terms and conditions of this promotion at any time.

From a legal point of view, they were of course in the right. But this was simply bad customer service, and an obvious case of false advertising, as the flyer was designed and written in such a way to deceive and inveigle unsuspecting customers. Rather angry now, I threatened to bring this up to the CAP (Consumer Association of Penang) as well as posting this up on the Internet in whatever personal capacity possible. The facial expression of the manager very quickly changed to one of fear and worry, and she immediately offered to not only refill our drinks, but also give us each a jug of said drinks. We stuck to our guns, declined her offer, paid the bill, and left the establishment.

I do not know if this is endemic amongst all Boston outlets, or if it is only the eGate Penang branch that is so messed up. Nevertheless, I urge anyone reading this post to boycott them and spread the word. This is sheer arrogance and obscenely terrible customer service from a restaurant, barefacedly deceiving their customers with false advertising.

Please spread the word to your friends, and your friends' friends, and feel free to reproduce this blog entry (mention of original source is welcome of course) any way you like. We should not have to tolerate such eateries. Imagine the embarrassment if this happened to a tourist!

Setting up the new system is a breeze, although it took an hours' worth of research to get my legacy CanoScan N340P scanner to work on the new system. Long story short - the TWAIN drivers required by the scanner aren't compatible with Windows XP, and it took some finagling around the BIOS settings and direct access to the local administrator account to get it going. And even then, it is moving at only the slow ECP S connection, verses the speedy ECP H connection I had on my old system. Oh well, this is but a minor inconvenience at best.

Overall, I am happy with this new system and the 23" Dell widescreen display has surpassed all my expectations. Now to finally scrape enough cash to upgrade my iMac G3 to one of them newfangled Intel iMac systems.:-)

Oh hey, a new episode of Charlie the Unicorn! AWESOME! :-D Find more hilarious videos at the FilmCow YouTube channel.

I meant to post this much earlier, but I literally bedridden for the past two days, and had only recovered earlier this evening. Anyhow, this entry is when my friends and I decided to have a buka puasa (breaking fast) dinner, since it is the holy month of Ramadhan. And somehow we wound up at Passions of Kerala's New World Park outlet. Unlike the other Passions of Kerala eateries, this has a more upscale decor and appearance. It is a full-fledged restaurant, rather than just another eatery. Sure, it looks fancy and all, but is the food any good? Let's find out!

The first good news is the prices on their menu is identical to their Service Lane and Brown Garden outlets. It's awesome that they managed to retain their affordable prices despite the more upscale appearance and location. The base menu is identical, meaning they serve rice on banana leaf accompanied with three vegetarian dishes and papadam. As with the other outlets, it is the accompanying dishes that are slightly different.

basket of papadam

a closer look at the accompanying veggies

As there were four of us (two of us being rather big eaters), we ordered five side dishes - fried chicken, fried calamari, mutton masala, fried okra, and fried bitter gourd. Yeah - there's a lot of unhealthy stuff there. :-P Oh - there's only four photos below because I forgot to snap a pic of the fried bitter gourd.

My favorite is definitely the fried chicken. They call it McNair's fried chicken, and it's pretty darn impressive. Crunchy on the outside, and very juicy on the inside. The chicken chunks are very fresh, and the chef really knew his stuff with just the right amount of marinade and frying time.

The fried calamari is serviceable, but hardly the best I ever had. I still haven't found a place that can beat Hammer Bay, located next to the Gold Coast apartments near Queensbay Mall. The mutton masala was a major disappointment, with miniscule, gooey chunks of mutton slathered by an overly thick and salty masala gravy.

Lastly, the fried okra and bitter gourd were very good. The okra was deep fried with tasty, savory onion slices that lent an additional aromatic kick to the dish. The bitter gourd was sliced very thinly before being deep fried. It is not too oily, and while I prefer batter fried bitter gourd, this is a very good alternative. I can't say how healthy they were though, since they are deep fried.

I forgot what the total bill amounted to, but my share of it was pretty reasonable, so it couldn't have been that expensive. Overall, I would give the place a seven out of ten. It is much better than their Brown Garden outlet (which has degraded significantly over the years - but I still go there quite often simply because it is less than five minutes' drive from home). IMO, the best Passions of Kerala is still the Service Road outlet. Nevertheless, this was indeed a good dinner and there is certainly no reason to avoid it at all.

OK, so my actual birthday isn't due until sometime next week, but since qinyen was in town, the Geek Squad decided to just drop off their birthday gifts with me earlier today. I have to admit that it was completely unexpected and a welcome surprise for today, but that's not even getting to the sheer awesomeness of the gifts this year.

Technically the birthday celebrations started yesterday when deniseho treated me to a wonderful steak dinner at The Harvestn Inn last night. I ordered the sirlion steak, and this was one of the best steaks I've had in Malaysia! The chef really understood the definition of medium rare. The steak was juicy and succulent, and is right up there with the steaks I had in the US and in Costa Rica. This was a welcome change from the other so called 'medium rare' steaks I've had in the country, which was closer to well done than I would like. Excellent stuff!

And on to today's gifts! Bern got me a copy of The Art of The Matrix hardcover, which was something I had been coveting for awhile, but always postponed in picking up due to the rather high price point. This voluminous 487 page coffee table book is definitely a sight to behold, containing the storyboards and design illustrations by Steve Skroce, Geof Darrow, Tani Kunitake, Warren Manser, Collin Grant, and the Wachowski Bros. Also included is the complete shooting script for the movie, along with scene notes and delete scene excerpts.

qinyen got me a copy of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Century: 1910, which is autographed by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill! I was actually on the phone with our mutual friend Seet Yan when she was there for Alan Moore's signing at Gosh Comics earlier this year. I had no idea an extra copy was set aside for me. SQUEEE!!

Last but not least is this adorable, impromptu sketch of the Teen Titans Go! version of Robin qinyen doodled while we were hanging out.

Thanks guys for the awesome gifts (and dinner)! Maybe turning 30 ain't so bad after all. :-P

Argh, this is so late! I actually went on Wednesday (2 September), but only managed to write about it now. :-( Anyways, on with the pictures and my not so witty remarks. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera with me when I was the bazaar (the one in Bayan Baru, behind the Sunshine Market hawker center). The food photos were taken when I got home.

I usually avoid curry puffs, unless they are famous premium super expensive ones packed with meat, but my curiosity was tickled by the store selling dinosaur shrimp curry puffs! At RM1, I had nothing to lose. Unfortunately, the dinosaur shrimp was a complete misnomer, as although the curry puff itself was quite large, it was packed with potatoes and the only shrimp in there was so pathetic! It was smaller than my pinkie! Dinosaur shrimp indeed!

Now, this is awesome! Ayam percik (barbequed/grilled chicken coated with thick, sweet sauce) is a no-brainer when visiting the Bayan Baru Pasar Ramadhan. This admittedly bad photo fails to convey and awe, wonder and majesty of this awesome chunk of poultry! (OK, so maybe I'm just exaggerating a tad) It's always worth the RM4.

This is new to me - nasi ayam perap. The chicken is steamed and fried simultaneously, similar to the pressure cooking method employed by KFC. It's delicious, tender, and succulent. Unfortunately, it was only a tiny morsel and although it's an amazing dish, I have to say the RM3 price tag is rather steep.

this popiah is really tasty, with sweet juicy turnip chunks inside. Only 80sen for two pieces!

assorted Malay kuih-muih, agar-agar, and pudding

Last but not least, we have serabai. This is an uncommon delicacy, usually found only during the month of Ramadhan. I was first introduced to this a couple of years ago, and have been in love with it since. It can best be described as traditional Malay pancake. It's supposed to go with kaya. The conventional version has a slightly sourish taste to it, but this year the stall had a variation made with gula melaka, which made these pancakes even tastier than ever! I will have to make an effort to look out for this variant of serabai.

Overall, I am sorry to say that the quality of the foods sold in the Bayan Baru Pasar Ramadhan has taken a nosedive. Maybe it's the less than stellar economy right now that's causing the sellers to cut corners. I hope things improve next year.

Words fail me. Please watch the entire video, and the excuses espoused ringleaders of this demonstration are absolutely sickening. And look, somebody brought their kid there. Another thing that made me curious was the absolute zero presence of the police. And there's nary a mention of this in any of the mainstream Barisan Nasional controlled media at all. I guess everything's fine and dandy when it is a anti-opposition demonstration.

It's disgraceful that these people are doing this in the sacred month of Ramadhan. And after Friday prayers no less. Worst is this whole thing reeks of political manipulation chicanery. As an Atheist, I am nevertheless shocked at the utter disregard these so-called Muslims towards Islam and Hinduism. Yes, I said it - these people have shown disregard against their own religion simply by their hatred fueled action. Does not the holy Quran itself say, and I quote, "You may fight in the cause of GOD against those who attack you, but do not aggress. GOD does not love the aggressors" (verse 2:190) ?

This is the future of Malaysia under our Crime Minister Najib Razak, and his corrupt band of thieves, murderers, rapists, and intellectual midgets in the Barisan Nasional. I fear this is a losing battle and as the days go by, the future of the country is getting dimmer.

But this is just my 2-cents. Read more about this event here, here, and here.

Well here we are, the final part of my adventures around Georgetown on 25 July 2009, celebrating the first anniversary of Georgetown's listing in the UNESCO World Heritage list. Click here, here, and here for the first three parts.

After a hearty lunch, Cheryl and I took a ride to various spots in Georgetown, as highlighted by the Penang Heritage Passport, a booklet made to commemorate the occasion, sold at RM8 around town. :-) First stop was the St George's Anglican Church. The oldest Anglican church in Malaysia, there was unfortunately little to see as it was closed for repairs. :-( Also located in the compound is the Francis Light Memorial.

Taking a short stroll down Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling, we found ourselves at the Goddess of Mercy Temple, also known as the Kuan Yin Temple. Across the street was the Arulmigu Mahamariamman Temple, one of the oldest Hindu temples in Penang.

From hereon in, we could see the preparations taking place for that evening's festivities as part of the Georgetown Heritage celebrations, but that was actually a good thing as the roads were closed off to traffic, making it easier to take in the sights. Next up was the street's namesake - the Kapitan Keling Mosque. Despite its modest size, this is an exquisite piece of Islamic architecture. And there was an ever present cool breeze around the mosque, a welcome relief from the sweltering afternoon heat.

A quick turn down Lebuh Chulia, and we were at the Hock Teik Cheng Sin Temple. Truth be told, up until that day, I had not heard of this temple but it definitely has a colorful history that reads like a crime noir story, what with numerous name changes and formerly underworld origins over the past 100+ years. Read all about it at the link above. We actually spent quite a bit of time here, compared to the earlier places and took lots of photos.

Last but not least is the Acheen Street Mosque. Unfortunately our timing was less than fortuitous as the noon prayers was going on at the time, so an exterior shot was all we could get. :-(

And with that, thus endeth the day. No, we did not manage to see all the sites listed on the Heritage Passport simply due to the overbearing heat and our rapidly depleting energy levels. It was a quick bus ride back to Weld Quay to pick up my car, and that was the end of my day. Cheryl would actually return to Georgetown that evening for the proper celebrations and even got to meet our Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng. Maybe she'll blog about it one of these days.

Right then, onward with the rest of the updates on my walkabout town on 25 July 2009 when Penang celebrated the first anniversary of Georgetown's listing in the UNESCO World Heritage list. Click here and here for the first two blog posts respectively.

After walking around the Weld Quay area (and a short but fun boat ride), it was soon afternoon and that means time for food! Having paid RM3 for full day's parking across the road (as well as hesitancy on my part to brave the Saturday afternoon traffic congestion in town), Cheryl fortunately agreed with me to take the free hop-on buses for a quick ride to town for lunch at Keng Kwee, one of the coffee shops dotting Jalan Chowrasta, and apparently renowned for it's char koay teow and assam laksa.

cheryl's bowl of assam laksa - which was unfortunately very watered down

my plate of char koay teow - it's darn good and well worth the almost 30 minute wait

some sampling of the local loh bak stall, which had some deep fried chunks of fish. It's OK lah, but nothing to shout about

and for dessert, a bowl of cool, refreshing cendol!

After a good lunch, we were hopped (pun unintended) back on one of the free buses and made our way across the rest of Georgetown. More in the next post!

Saw this as a Facebook alert from SY, and I thought I'd pass it along by mirroring it here. The original post may be found HERE, which was originally posted October 2008. I highly recommend reading the original blog post first.

Long story short, this asshole (see photo below) parked his Honda (license registration BJD 8282) right in between two disabled parking lots in McDonald's Shah Alam. It boggles the mind that such ridiculously selfish and inconsiderate this person is. Not only does he mind parking in a parking spot reserved for the disabled, he had the temerity to occupy TWO of those lots.


click for a larger image

click for a larger image

And of course, shortly after he vacated the disabled parking lot (roughly 15 minutes later), two equally inconsiderate idiots driving BHW 262 and WMB 4425 decided to park in the aforementioned parking lots.

click for a larger image

Tsk. Is this what Malaysians have devolved to? Absolutely shameful. Please feel no shame in giving these vehicles hell should you see them on the road.

Continuing my posts walkabout in Georgetown as part of my celebrating its first anniversary as part of the UNESCO World Heritage List, this time we focus on what I was up to while waiting for my turn at the boat rides in Lim Jetty. After studying the map printed in the Georgetown Heritage Passport, Cheryl and I decided to check out the nearby Yeoh Kongsi and Han Jiang Ancestral Temple.

Yeoh Kongsi was just a quick stroll across the road. Hidden around the corner of Victoria Street, it wasn't the easiest place to find. Despite it occupying a large corner compound, it was well hidden from the hustle and bustle of Weld Quay with its high walls.

Further down the street towards the Mydin emporium was the Han Jiang Ancestral Temple. This was an easier find, as it has been cordoned off by traffic police for that evening's events. Again, stepping through its exquisitely ornate doors is like going to another world. Although it was situated directly in front of a busy intersection, it was quiet and serene inside.

Due to time restrictions, we were unable to fully explore both of these places as we had to get back to Lim Jetty for our boat ride. Next up - lunch! :-)

Last Saturday (25 July 2009) was the penultimate day in the two-week long celebration by the Penang State Government of Georgetown's listing in the UNESCO World Heritage list, and I decided to make a day of it with Cheryl by taking a boat ride, and checking out the various historical and culturally rich sites around Georgetown.

First stop of the day was Weld Quay, where the Lim Jetty (one of the many clan jetties dotting the area) is offering free boat rides. It's been well over a decade since I was last on a boat (the architectural tour down the Chicago River in 2007 notwithstanding), and it would be a fun way to start the day.

We had to register with them to get our numbers (and complimentary bookmarks printed on recycled paper), and it would be roughly 50 minutes later when we get out turn on the boat. While there wasn't a huge turnout, there was quite a number of people there - both tourists and locals alike.

and off we go!

the crew of this nearby boat was kind enough to pose for our cameras

and roughly 10 minutes later, we are back at the quay to disembark and allow the next group to take their turns

Despite the relative short length of the boat ride, I have to admit that it was very fun having the cool sea breeze blowing at my face whilst aboard a rickety boat that had a tendency to tilt to the right. It's not often one sees Weld Quay from sea, and it is a treat seeing the various houses and small temples that dot the jetty.

Next up - temples and kongsis and other historical buildings!