Petaling Street

Petaling Street holds a fascination for me. Also known as Malaysia's Chinatown, it's been transformed from a place of cluttered stalls selling various items to a place where, well, under the tourism industry, been refurbished with translucent roofs and fixed stalls. It is there you can find your bargain of goods ranging from Rolexes (pronounced as Loleks by the peddlers), Aerosmith and U2 shirts and even rare DVDs.

Finding for good food? Around the corner of Petaling Street, there's also a stall that sells the famous ikan bakar in tin foil. It only opens in the evenings and the queue is long, so you've gotta be there early or late, depends actually. Went there with mom the other time, and I was literaly licking my plate clean. Heheh, so much for modesty. Guess I'll give it another go next week though. Any tapaus? Bleh.

My mom mentioned about some really good wantan mee too, somewhere around the area. Wantan mee is good, especially those well made ones, not those with lots of ajinomoto or with undercooked noodles. Tell me about it. Been suffering from bad wantan mee shops around Klang Valley. Didn't have a chance to try out Ipoh's Menglembu's Wantan mee fresh either. *Sigh*, I pity my stomach, hehe.

Plus, they've a pretty good char siew siew yoke kai fan shop on the street as well. (you know what's that do you?) Food is cheap, or rather reasonable for KL prices. Good thing is, they don't give you fatty siew yoke, which is really a bane to eat. Eat more and you'll grow fat. Plus the rubbery taste of fats is really yucky!

Walking there the other day, I noticed it has changed a lot since the days of form 6 where I used to take tuition classes there. The streets bustle with more people, more variety of items, and of course those pesky DVD sellers.

Ah, those aggresive DVD sellers. One asked me if I wanted some 'hamtai', or known otherwise as pornographic movies. Knowing me, I wouldn't give him much of a response though. And then came a tug on my shirt with him shouting louder, 'Lengchai, hamtai oi mou? Hou leng wor!' Perhaps my skin was not sensitive enough to feel his saliva droplets hitting me. He must also have figured I was deaf or some sort. And looking up, it was just some kid around 16-17 years old that looked a tad scared as I glared into his eyes for tugging my well worn Giordano shirt.

There was also a beggar with some sort of spinal deformity, sitting in the middle of the road, staring down at the gravel pavements. At times, I wonder how can you spend your life away in oblivion? Just looking or staring at something with the hope of getting just enough to survive. Pretty tough that one. I would rather work than hope to get money while wasting my life away. On the other hand, beggars in KL earn around rm 3000-6000 on an average. That's much higher that the starting pay of an executive! Should I beg...?

Oh yea, looking at the flower shop, it has a chinese name with a chinese boss, but with lots of indian workers. Must be because they're cheaper to hire. Wonder how they're to converse to the customers though. Perhaps they go, 'A thousand apologies maam, but you want some flowers?' Hehe, I'm no racist though.

Thus, that's it about Petaling Street. A road with lots to see, lots to hear and perhaps, lots to buy too. Oh yea, lots to eat too! It amazes me to see them work so hard for a meagre amount of money, but then, that's the difference in what education can bring to you. Time to graduate!

p/s: Need to get a watch. Perhaps one of those loleks? hehe