Penang Bridge Run 2013: The One & Only Pulau Mutiara
For my last run, I had joined it together with Iqbal & Rosman. Our another partner in crime for this run was Azam & his brother. So it seems that we have quite a crowd this time. In total, there will be 3 of us that will run for the 10km run & there will be another 3 that will be running the 10km fun run.
One of the reason that Iqbal & myself return to the Penang Bridge Run this year is much because that we're both from Parit Buntar, which is only an hour away from Penang. We also want to give some support to Azam, our brother in law which have been taking some interest with running recently after seeing Iqbal's magnificent running medal display. The last bit that we want to do is have a visit to our little sister, Imah that had a baby recently.
After a horrendous experience that Iqbal & Rosman experienced at the evening when they're collecting our running kits at the Queens Bay Mall, we checked in our hotel. It seems that this year the runners for the Penang Bridge Run increase again compared to last year. All the hotels were fully booked during the weekend. Since the bridge will be closed early in the Sunday morning, all the runners will need to spend the night in the island. When I was taking our luggage from the car, I had met a couple that came a long way from Shah Alam that unfortunate enough to come to the island at this time for holiday with their kids & not finding a room for that weekend.
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| Abah, Haziq & Iqbal in the lobby. Luckily we had bought the room earlier online. |
That night we decided to hit the restaurant in Penang. Dahlia suggested that we have nasi kandar. Even though initially Iqbal & Rosman reluctant to go with us after their horrendous evening, they relented at the end. We don't have any particular nasi kandar place to go so we just went to see the nearest restaurant that we could find. And oh boy, we didn't expected to find the 'original & only nasi kandar' place in Penang.
The first thing that I noticed when I was driving the old Corolla down the junction outside the hotel was how narrow the roads in Penang are. And how dangerous the drivers in Penang behave. Having the experience of driving in KL & also the JB, I always have the confidence of driving in urban roads. But it seems that Penang does gives you a different set of road challenges. Even with the narrow roads, the cars & bikes drives so fast that it seems that I thought they had been mistaken the roads with highways. Plus I was driving a 1992 Corolla with manual sticks + driving at night - so the difficulty level times 10,000.
After turning into several junctions, we found ourselves with a row of nasi kandar restaurant. I'm not really a fan of nasi kandar, so I just followed the others when they walked into Line Clear Nasi Kandar Restaurant.
I'm quite confused with the restaurant when we walked into it. From far, it seems like we're walking to a restaurant with the name of 'Nasi Kandar Dahlia' or something like that. But when we walked into an alley between shops beside the restaurant, it seems there is another restaurant smack dab in the middle. The restaurant have been made up with some tents between the alley. And it seems the locals are well familiar with the place because the seats was packed when we walked into the restaurant.
The first thing that I noticed when I sat down was the banner of restaurant. The owner claimed that their restaurant was the original nasi kandar specialist in Penang (or Malaysia?). With a bold claim like that, I thought they couldn't do worse. But they can. With some jumbled up English, I'm quite impressed with the owner's pride in promoting his restaurant.
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| Manglish at its best? |
Rosman, Iqbal & Dahlia picked the foods for us. When they arrived back at the table they bring back some chicken and a fish curry. It was a good dinner for us - the chicken was lovely even though for me the curry is too spicy for me. I can't finish my meal because of the spiciness but the others finished their meal quite well. Dahlia even took some of Haziq's portion. Like I said earlier, I'm not really a fan of nasi kandar.
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| All in their nasi kandar mode - Haziq included |
There was only one nasi kandar restaurant that I liked long ago - Salleh Nasi Kandar back in Parit Buntar. Even though its catfish was not a typical nasi kandar side dish - theirs was the best. The place was near the tuition place that Rosman went, so almost every time he will stop at the restaurant on his way back from his tuition. Sometimes we'll argue about the nasi kandar since Rosman always bought the meal only for him. It was one of the main reason how he transformed from a skinny little boy into the chubby man he is now - Bobohizan Rosman.
It was apparent that most of the people that eating in the restaurants were the Penang Bridge runners. It seems that everyone was enjoying themselves before the run tomorrow. Iqbal's colleague who was also joined the half marathon tomorrow, fancied himself with some seafoods with his family. This event is really a money maker for all the Penang people. 40,000 runners joined the run. All of them need to have accommodation in the island. All of them will need foods during their stay. Even if we factor in half of them will take their families to the event, the money flowed into Penang during this time will be in the millions.
Back to restaurant, there was a backdrop that depict the photos celebrities that had came to this place. Amazingly this restaurant not only attract local celebs, but also international one. The owner does have something to back up its bold claim as the original nasi kandar specialist.
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| Cedok kuah pun kena ada skill |
As tomorrow we need to wake up early before Suboh, we went straight to the hotel after the meal. As the night draws, it rained quite heavily throughout the night. As we found out next morning, we had a cool run because of that.
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| Haziq pun dah mengantuk |
As short as it was, I found that the Penangites were not some happy bunch that they should be. With the status of Unesco Heritage Site & their high income state status, it is in my opinion they are a far lot well off compared to other states in Malaysia (apart from KL). But I didn't saw much smiles from their faces. Most of the time, I felt quite suffocated with the stressed atmosphere in Penang. Even with millions of ringgits flowed in their doorstep that weekend, I didn't felt really welcomed into Penang.
When we arrived at our hotel & what we found was just that affirming.
Two runners arguing with the hotel personnel about their hotel booking. Apparently some confusion about their booking that the runners didn't have their rooms.
Penang - The one & only Pulau Mutiara.
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