It’s the early
morning of my 1st day of holiday. My family and I woke up very early
fill with excitement and anticipation of what to come. After whole night of
packing our luggage yesterday but we do not feel tired at all. Then my mum makes
a call for taxi to take us to the bus station at Pudu Raya.
When we reached the bus hub, 3 of us (mymum,
brother and me) carry our heavy luggage and slowly walk up to find our depart
station thatwas filled with people like us with the excitement to go back to
their hometown. We found a spot to put down our heavy burden and then hustle to
Sri Maju counter to ask for our bus number plate and departure area. I go down through
long scary stairways and as I reach the end I can smell the smoky smells of
carbon monoxide and dust around the air while I checked for any sign of our
bus.
After that, we started to find a place to
fill our empty stomach. I ask “What you want to eat ah?Let’s eat wan tan mee la
“, I replied to myself. Then we take turns to walk around to buy some snacks or
magazine for us to kill our time in the bus other than just sleeping or
enjoying the scenery along the way. Pudu have snatch thief cases happens once
in a while so we were very cautions when guarding our belongings there. I get a
car magazine, my brother get 2 packs of Twisties and my mum brought few piece
of breads and slices of cakes. We were all set to start our 3hour journey to my
hometown Ipoh.
When the bus arrives, all of the bus
passenger will go down to the boarding area with their luggage and line up to
go up to the bus. My mum will take out the ticket and let us know what the
number of our sits is. We put some of our luggage at storage area and carry
some with us to our sits (mainly our magazine and snacks). Everyone will be
squeezing their way finding their sits and keeping their luggage above their
respective sits. This time we bought VIP ticket (1 separate sit and 2 sits
together) so we will have more space and not sharing sits with stranger. My
brother and I picked the window sits so my brother went to sit alone just
beside 2 of us. I immediately take out my snacks and magazine put in front of
me, and plug in my headset to my hand phone and started listening to songs.
Along the way I look at the scenery and cars at the highway. After 1 hour of
journey the bus stop by a rest area, and most of the passenger including the
driver went to do their business in the toilet. Some of them will stretch their
self, smoke a cigarette, and some will top up their snacks supply like what I
and my brother did. After around 15 minutes at the rest area, everyone get back
to the bus and the driver sidekick (assistant) counted the number of passenger
and move on to Ipoh.
The
bus turns into Simpang Pulai exit and drive to Ipoh from there on. Along the way
the bus stop once in a while to drop of some passenger and we get to see some
old and ancient buildings when using old roads instead of highways. Finally we
reach the final destination of the bus which is Ipoh Sri Maju station which was
located just beside a roundabout. I can see the smiling and relieve expression
of every passenger including the bus driver itself when the bus stop and open
the door for us to exit. We find for silver Waja and spotted my aunty who is my
mum younger sister. We smiled and waved to each other from afar then we
immediately rush towards the silver Waja and keep our luggage behind the car
boot.
1st
question my aunty asked was, “Where you want to have your breakfast?!” in a
cheerful and exciting manner. Then we came up with a lot of ideas but in the
end she would decide for us because we could not make up our mind. I love
taking photos in Ipoh everywhere I go because I knew in many years to come,
Ipoh will be develop and it will not be the same as before. My aunt bring us to
a old but happening hawker stall and we immediately had a good feeling that it
will be a very satisfying and adventurous breakfast because she never
disappoint us when comes to introducing great food.
After we find our sits, my aunt informed
us which shops and what foods are recommended and famous here. We immediately
decide who order what food so we can taste each other foods that we have order.
I order the Wan Tan mee despite at ate just now cause it is what famous here.
The different of KL and Ipoh WanTanmee is that the mee is more wet and slurps,
can easily finish them within minutes comparing to KL thick and sweet sauce. It
has nice sesame smells and opens my appetite as I downing them through my
throat. Why Ipoh food taste is great is because most of the hawker stalls here
are family inherit business and have been passing down from generation to
generation.
After filling our stomach with Ipoh’s
delicacies, we went back to my grandmother house to unpack our luggage and get
some rest. 1st thing I do is to look around my grandmother mini
garden and lots of self made fish aquarium and ponds. Every time I came back,
she would have more new fishes and more varieties of plants and flowers into her
collection. My grandmother was a retired nurse so she is very healthy person
and has infinite knowledge about medicine and sickness. The house is a very old
house and has black flooring on entire house and wooden flooring on every room
and roof. This house and the surrounding always give me a nostalgic feeling. It
makes me feels belong here and is cosy and comfy as well. My grandfather had
passed away leaving my grandmother alone taking care of 4 children, so I always
admire her and look up to her. She is now in her 60’s reaching 70’s but she
only looks like in her 50’s.
As I walk into the dining area, I spotted
few box and plastic bag on the table. I opened them and realize is some snacks
and delicacies from morning market that my grandmother had bought this morning.
There had glutinous balls, egg tart, fried sweet potato ball, Soya bean, and
some cakes and breads. My all time favorite is the egg tart. I could not find
any egg tart which is as good as this one. They always made fresh early morning
and sold out very fast as well. That’s why my grandmother always goes morning market early in the morning to grab some for me when she
knows that I am coming back. The crust of the tart is brown in colour and the
egg in the middle is bright yellow. As I bite it, I can feel the crispy and
smooth texture of the brown crust spilling the nice roasted baked aroma into my
nose. Then the sweet and juicy egg in the middle flows around my mouth and down
through my throat. The combinations of these 2 elements are perfect and are
priceless.
( To be continue … )
I wrote too much hahaha
When I was young, my family
does not have their own house. So we used to stay at my grandmother house at
Ipoh. After my dad bought a house at Kuala Lumpur we all move there and we went
back Ipoh only once or twice a year. Sometime we are so busy until we might not
have time to go back at all. When I was in secondary school, when we have a
long holiday we would go back and enjoy our vacation at Ipoh.
The crispiness of the skin and freshness of the
content exploded in my mouth. I ate few more in a row without hesitation. Then I
take a gulp of soya bean and continue to search for the next food. The soya
bean is fresher and smoother in Ipoh (Maybe my mind fool me) and I love it.
Then I saw a plain white box inside a plastic bag hanging on the cupboard
holder. At haste, I took it down and open, there is my all time favorite egg
tart that my grandmother always buys for me. The crust is dark brown slightly
gold in color and the egg is natural bright yellow. The moment a part of egg
tart enter my mouth, the flavor and texture of it flown all over my mouth and
ignite my taste bud. That is why everyone of my relative in Ipoh knew this was
my favorite food in Ipoh.
