Ya Kun Kaya Toast is a famous chain for traditional toast and coffee in Singapore.
The food and drink there is alright but there are other places where you can get a cheaper deal.
One day D told me about the Ya Kun Kaya Toast branch at China Square. It’s supposed to be really retro (even more retro than the fake-retro which they have in other branches).
Another selling point for the China Square branch is that it’s run by the descendants of Ya Kun the man himself! OK, I’m sold.
The shop is rather difficult to find because China Square is in the middle of the CBD. Google Map’s not really that helpful because the buildings are too tall.
It was raining when we went in search of Ya Kun Kaya Toast. We managed to find it in the end without getting soaked.
Ya Kun Kaya Toast China Square branch deco
OK, the shop was quaint but only because we’re in Singapore.
The floors looked like they were scratched from chairs and tables.
The kitchen was sort of an open kitchen concept.
We ordered the usual Kaya Toast set which comes with two pieces of toast, coffee and two soft boiled eggs.
When our food arrived, the lady who served us brought the soy sauce and pepper shakers to us. She ordered us to put the condiments onto the eggs and eat.
I think this is the first time I’m mistaken for a tourist in Singapore. I’ve been here 7 year already, lady!
We ate our food in peace. (Almost, we were instructed how to eat again.)
Later, I saw that the shop was selling petit cups as souvenirs. I took photos of them.
Then the lady swooped down with the TOURIST SET.
She looked at us expectantly before leaving us. I took a photo of the set before it was too late.
Have you been to the China Square branch of Ya Kun?
When I was in the first three years of university, I flew from Kota Kinabaluto Johor’s Senai Airport on AirAsia. From the airport, I usually take a private cab into Singapore for a princely sum.
Of course I had a choice of flying directly into Changi Airport but it was an expensive choice of SilkAir.
When AirAsia finally flew from KK to Singapore directly, I was ecstatic. I remember saying “goodbye” to Senai Airport, adding, “We’ll never see each other again.”
Unfortunately, I did see Senai again.
I took an AirAsia flight from JB back home to Sabah during the Christmas break. It was more than S$100 cheaper per trip compared with flying directly to or from Singapore. (RM284 [SG$115] vs ~S$250).
Compared to 4 years ago, AirAsia has made it convenient for passengers in Singapore to go to Senai. There’s a 2-hourly bus from JB’s CIQ to Senai. The bus journey is about 40 minutes and a pleasant ride.
AirAsia Sky Shuttle
When I was on the way to the airport, I asked the driver about the number of passengers who have taken the shuttle. He counted in his head and said, “13. And that’s a good number. It’s the weekend, you see.”
On the way to the airport, there were 3 passengers. On my way back to JB, there was only me. I have a feeling AirAsia might cancel the shuttle any time.
Since I had the chance to experience flying to Senai and to Changi, I will list down the pros and cons for you to decide.
Pros and cons of Senai and Changi
Cruel fate
Senai Airport
Pros:
Tickets are cheaper than flying directly into Singapore
Marry Brown fast food at airport
Less crowded at airport
Free transport to Senai and CIQ
Cons:
Extra travelling time to JB or Singapore (depending on traffic)
If you are still undecided, here are some factors to take into consideration when buying your JB/Singapore ticket:
Total price difference (Remember to count in transport fees from Senai into Singapore. It doesn’t make sense if your transport fees are similar to airtickets savings.)
Time to travel to airport (You will probably be travelling for an extra 2+ hours depending on your SIngapore location.)
Wait for SkyShuttle bus (Buses come 2-hourly)
Getting to location in Singapore (Do you have too much luggage? Do you really want to drag them from Malaysia to Singapore?)
Have you flown from JB airport instead of Singapore? How was your experience?
I like Arab Street for its food and the pretty Sultan Mosque.
But whenever I am in the area, the sun is shining too brightly and I feel dehydrated from walking around. There is just too much noise and people–the tourists with their gigantic cameras, cars waiting for the green light and shops laying out their wares on the sidewalk.
It’s sometimes a little too much to handle.
One day, I had the chance to visit Arab Street early in the morning around 7am. It was a different Arab Street without the people and the cars.
It was a little surreal but I liked it. The sun wasn’t out yet and the people were still away.
Multi flag deco at Arab StreetEmpty North Bridge Road in the morningDeserted pedestrian street in Arab StreetSultan Mosque, Arab StreetAlley of Arab StreetAlley 2 of Arab StreetTeh tarik, Arab StreetOld facade
My favorite place for afternoon tea in Singapore is Fosters, an English Rose Café at Holland Village.
Tea set for two
Even though the scones are the leading characters in the set, the Devonshire cream steals the limelight EVERY SINGLE TIME! The rest of the spread is so so.
The white cream comes in a small tub, the top in a cute swirl. It doesn’t taste of cream but of coconut. Can you imagine? Coconut bread spread that doesn’t taste like fake coconut.
Choice of coffee or tea
My history with Fosters
Setting of Fosters, an English Rose Café. Menu opens like a paper
When I was in university, one of the bus I take always passed the restaurant. It looked posh. With my university allowance, I didn’t think that I could afford going there.
So, one of the first things I did when I got my first pay was to visit the restaurant.
I was curious about its Devonshire Cream Tea Set. Back then, the set had two scones, four finger sandwiches (2 cucumer–eek–and 2 ham), 2 fruit cakes.
Today, there is only 2 sandwiches and 1 dried store-bought fruitcake. At least, the one coffee or tea remains the same. The breadspread is the same: strawberry jam, butter and Devonshire cream.
It’s only available from 3 to 6pm which is a tricky timing since lunchtime passed not so long ago.
The restaurant is decorated quaintly and makes a good place to chat with friends. If there’s only two of you, you can sit at the two sofas near the door where a suit of armor guards. Yoko-chi is hungry!
It’s the last day of 2012. For today, I am recapping the journeys I made in 2012, along with a few related entries.
(Some of the cities do not have related blog posts because I am working on a really limited internet connection back home in Sabah. I’ll follow up with the posts once I reach the land of high speed internet–Singapore.)
In case you find this entry a little TL;DR, I want to wish you a happy 2013. May the new year be filled with (productive) travels.
Ciao!
-Yun Qing
January 2012
Seremban, Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia Seremban
In a nutshell: The Seremban which D and I visited was sleepy. There wasn’t much going around as it seems like most of the people prefer to look for a living in Kuala Lumpur.
Port Dickson, Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia Port Dickson
In a nutshell: The reason I dragged D along to PD was to wash my feet in the ocean. My family has a ritual of stepping into the ocean when the new year comes to “wash away the bad luck”. PD wasn’t as fantastic as what my primary school sample compositions tell me. I much prefer the beaches in Sabah.
Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia Kota Kinabalu for the Chinese New Year
In a nutshell: Back home for Chinese New Year which is the most important festival for my family. I didn’t visit any new places while in Sabah.
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Kuala Lumpur
In a nutshell: Impromptu trip to meet up with Nguyen in KL. It was great fun meeting her again after my trip to Saigon after graduation.
Yogyakarta + Solo, Indonesia Yogyakarta
In a nutshell: Back in Indonesia after D and my first trip back in 2009. It was great seeing the ancient monuments in Borobudur and Prambanan.
Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia Ipoh
In a nutshell: Finally back to crossing Malaysian states off my list. Ipoh will forever be remembered as the town with great food (almost as good as Penang) and a “castle” that is not really a castle.
San Jose, California, USA San Jose
In a nutshell: On a business trip to cover an event in San Jose. I had the chance to visit Cupertino and see the Winchester Mystery House. I didn’t get to see much of the city because I was stuck in the convention centers getting my bills paid.
San Francisco, California, USA San Francisco
In a nutshell: Side trip from San Jose after the business trip. I had planned to visit Napa Valley for a night but decided to stay in SF for the whole week. I saw two great shows, visited many fine museums and cycled a little.
Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia Kota Kinabalu
In a nutshell: Back home for a classmate’s wedding. didn’t get to visit other areas since I was back for only the weekend.
Hoi An, Vietnam Hoi An, Vietnam
In a nutshell: A 5-day trip to central Vietnam. I had planned to visit another historical town, Hue, but decided to spend all the time in Hoi An. I ate a lot, drank a lot of coffee and cycled a lot.
Jakarta, Indonesia Jakarta
In a nutshell: A short weekend trip to the capital of Indonesia. We weren’t caught in traffic jams as we took the TransJakarta public bus. I didn’t do a lot of research so we ended up walking aimlessly.
Tokyo + Kamakura Japan Kamakura, Japan
In a nutshell: A day trip to historical Kamakura on the day I reached Tokyo. I love the little town with its little big Buddha and quaint streets.
Tokyo
In a nutshell: A 4-day business trip but I pre-extended the weekend before work. I had the chance to overnight in Ooedo Onsen Monogatari and catch Gintama Land before it was over.
Alor Setar, Kedah, Malaysia Alor Setar
In a nutshell: State 9 of my Visit Malaysia project. A small town where our fourth prime minister, Dr Tun Mahathir, was born. Visited the Alor Setar tower, the second tallest TV tower in Malaysia, and saw a bird’s eye view of the town.
Padang Besar, Perlis, Malaysia Padang Besar
In a nutshell: State 10 of my Visit Malaysia project. Went to the market bordering Thailand. I was a little disappointed that the market didn’t straddle the border with stall owners on one side accepting ringgit while the other baht.
No major travelling for the month. It wasn’t as bad as I expected because I had other things to busy myself with during the weekend. For example, reading Web comics, watching Youtube, eating, reading things online etc.
December 2012
Kudat, Sabah, Malaysia
In a nutshell: Back home for the Christmas holiday because of forced leave implemented by the company. Went on a roadtrip with Mom to the north of Sabah. We read a lot, ate a lot of fruits while at the hotel. Also visited the “Tip of Borneo”.
Have you eaten yet? Sorry for keeping you hungry with this late #FoodFri post.
I was watching Rurouni Kenshin (good show by the way) and returned home late. I also had a cupcake before I writing this post so that took up another 5 minutes.
Let’s get the show started.
Today’s #FoodFri is the famous chicken rice from Chatterbox. It’s not your regular hawker center chicken rice, but a S$28 set served in beautiful ceramic (I can’t tell my plates) on a Japanese lacquer wood-like tray.
Featuring a spread of local heritage cuisines, Chatterbox was the first hotel restaurant that made local food famous both locally and worldwide. Feast on the legendary Mandarin Chicken Rice, which has become a household name around the world and remains as one of the most desired Singaporean dish among celebrities, ministers and connoisseurs for 40 years.
Chatterbox chicken rice
While the dish was too pricey, the drumstick which I ordered was smooth and tender. It was like biting into soft boiled chicken (not the tough breast meat).
The bowl which the chicken was served in was deep and the yummy soy sauce was left down the bowl. I had to set the chicken aside before I could scoop the soy sauce to go with the rice.
The soup wasn’t the regular clear water with a drop of sesame oil and some scallion. Instead, it tasted faintly of peanut.
The rice wasn’t very fluffy and felt like it was slightly undercooked. Despite these little faults (aggravated by my high expectations), I finished every thing in my plate except the raw cucumbers. Eek.
Well, now that I’ve tried the world famous Chatterbox chicken rice and ticked an item off my bucket list, I don’t think I will return to have it for a second round. I do prefer having 10 plates of $2.50 chicken rice to this one set.
Disclosure: I had this meal during a business lunch. I try not to take photos of the food served at business lunches but this was just too good not to miss.
Singapore’s not the most budget friendly destination in Southeast Asia. But it’s one of the most popular transit points so it means that you, as a traveler, might need to spend a bit of time here.
If you want to save money in Singapore so that you can stretch your penny in Thailand/Vietnam/Laos, look no futher. I’ll be featuring a few cheap meals that can save you money while in Singapore.
For today, I recommend the S$2.50 breakfast set from McDonald’s.
McDonald Sausage McMuffin $2.50
The set includes a Sausage McMuffin without the egg and a coffee or tea. If you are eating in, there’s free refill at the corner where they put the sugar.
Whenever I have morning duty which requires me to reach the office around 8am, I usually buy the set. It’s quite filling. The coffee also gives quite a good jolt for the morning.
But beware that the set is only available on weekdays, until the end of breakfast hours which is 11am.
Stay tuned for #FoodFri next week where I feature another cheap breakfast in Singapore
Let me start off this book review with the back cover of Adventures of 2 Girls so I do not need to summarize what happens in the book.
Just kidding, my photo’s too small to be read anyway.
Adventures of 2 Girls is the travel memoir of Singaporean women Pam and Ning who took a career break (and family break) to travel for 9 months.
To put things in context, the two ladies are not ordinary people who decided that they want to cross off many items from their bucket list. They were already famous even before their trip: Pam is a journalist (which she does not stop reminding us of in the book) and Ning is a professional magician.
Still it’s rather rare for people from the region to take career breaks. Legitimate career breaks are things such as furthering your studies so you can climb higher up the career ladder or marrying into a rich family that only requires you to have male babies for them.
As you can see, taking time off to travel is not one of the legitimate options for a career break but Pam and Ning did it (which I applaud). The two ladies put together S$100,000 (the heck, I can’t even save $50,000 if I starve myself for 20 months) and went on a journey to many places, including a stop in Paris where Ning did a Cordon Bleu course.
“Fun read”
adventures of 2 girls cover
The book’s layout is different from the other travel memoirs. Instead of a long continuous story about their journey, the book is divided into independent chapters with standalone stories–similar to how Indonesian blogger/traveller Trinity organizes her The Naked Traveler series).
While the book spices things up by including perspectives from both ladies, I couldn’t really tell who’s who without points of reference, such as “I looked at Pam”, because the editor seem to have turned the two voices into one tone.
Overall, the book is a fun read. It’s fun to see how the two BFFs put up with each other through thick and thin. (I’m pretty sure BFF meant “best female friend” and not “best friend forever” as it seems to be commonly known these days.)
There were a few laugh out loud moments and I give credit to the authors for not lazily stuffing the book full of photos to pass off as a travel memoir.
However, the short chapters weren’t satisfying. Perhaps I am too used to long rambling travel memoirs where the author describes fellow passengers in detail and brings us along every turn of the street.
Another part of Adventures of 2 Girls which I’m not a big fan of are the areas where religion is pushed into my face–it’s a little like how I wished the section about seeking spirituality in India would finish quickly when I read Eat, Pray, Love.
I would recommend borrowing the book from the library because I believe that most of the content are available on their blog.
I feel like I do not write enough about Singapore so here’s an introduction of a nice cafe in the peaceful neighborhood of Tiong Bahru–Drips Bakery Cafe.
I found out about the place from J who has impeccable taste when it comes to nice food.
My breakfast platter #2 (S$15.80++) was gigantic. I especially love the buttered toast. The bread was sweet and the butter salty but creamy.
The sausage was a little unfortunate though. It was limp and the sausage skin was too tough to saw off with my knife. :( Drips Cafe brunch
The caffè latte was normal and it wasn’t burnt, which to my untrained palate is good enough. Drips Cafe caffè latte
Setting
Enough about the food (Wait a minute, is this not #FoodFri?), I want to show you the rest of the cafe. Interior of Drips Cafe
The cafe is on the ground floor of a shophouse. In the front are the counters for food and drinks, the middle is where the table and chairs are while deeper inside there are couches. View from inside Drips Cafe
At the coffee section, there was a sign saying: “TRAVEL”. I was wondering why it was there. I think it’s because the romance of travelling. Drips Cafe–Travel
The walls were decorated with paintings that were available for sale. Most of them were semi-abstract and priced too high for me to support the artist. Paintings for sale at Drips Cafe
Bonus tourist attraction
Temple of the Monkey King
There’s a temple dedicated to the Monkey God from the Chinese classic Journey to the West at the corner of the road.
I wasn’t sure why Sun Wu Kong would be deified since he’s a made up character. At the altar, there were figurines of the Monkey God.
Directions: Drips Bakery Cafe is at 82 Tiong Poh Road, #01-05, S(160082).
The nearest MRT is at Outram Station (green line) and it’s just a short walk away. Checkout gothere.sg’s map.
It looks like a jelly made out of squid ink. It tastes like bitter Chinese medicine, even when you drown it with the sweet syrup shops provide.
The only consolation is that it’s good for your health. In Chinese tradiotional medicine speak: It is good for “cooling” the body.
I didn’t like Guīlínggāo when I was a kid. It was too bitter. But now that I’ve grown up, I quite enjoy the bitterness and its contrast with the honey-sweet syrup.
If you are ever in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and China, try a bowl. Go on.
YQtravelling 