Before we went to Bali, looking for the accommodation was the hardest part. Why? Because 2 of our friends must have TV in the place and also making sure the place have no bed bugs! While Googling, I accidentally came upon Kuta Town Houses Apartment, and damn, it would be great if we found that earlier because the place is really nice. On our time of booking, the place was almost fully booked for the period of our visit to Bali, so we only get to stay at the place for 3 nights.

It was already early evening when we arrived in Bali

I have always been amused to see all those names at the airports before, and this time, I got my name (blanked out to protect the author’s privacy lol!) on that piece of paper! And I was amused even more

The guy who came to pick us up was really friendly and a really good tour guide! We ended up adding him as a friend in Facebook He is also a very skillful and careful driver, to be able to maneuver the vehicle in those narrow roads in Bali, skill is a must to go by it without scratching the vehicle. If I were to drive in Bali, I think I might as well prepare myself and get auto insurance quotes beforehand - or I’ll just stick with hiring someone to drive me around.

We only managed to get the Standard Apartment for the first night since that was the only one available at the time of booking. A Standard Apartment has one bedroom,  one bathroom, full kitchen & lounge.

The lounge. Odri & Shalidz trying to figure out how to open up the sofa bed LOL!

The bed - very comfortable indeed!

The bathroom

The Kitchen

The balcony

The following day we moved to Deluxe Apartment as per our booking and stayed there for 2 nights. A Deluxe Apartment have two bedrooms, two bathrooms, full kitchen & lounge, and also a balcony. We knew about this from the web page, but we did not expect it to be THAT big!

The lounge area is so spacious. Dining area and kitchen is at where I was standing to take this picture.

The rooms are a little bit bigger than those in Standard Apartments simply because it has its own bathrooms. The fridge was also bigger, too.

The view from the balcony. That’s the pool next to the restaurant.

Another pool. This was actually a view from the Standard Apartment.

After the 3rd night, we switched to Adi Dharma Hotel. It was old fashioned, looks and smells old and our first room stinks that we requested to be transferred to another room. I did not even take any photos of the place. But it was closer to the higher end shopping area.

We are definitely going to Bali again, and Kuta Town Houses is going to be our first choice to stay at. Even though we had a rude response from the marketing personnel during our booking, we were glad that the staff there were actually really friendly and helpful. From the info that we got, this place is always occupied with Australians. While we were there, it actually felt as if we were having vacation in a part of Australia since we were surrounded by them. It was fun! LOL!

Kuta Town Houses is highly recommended if you are going in a group of four or so. Even the Standard Room is good enough for four. Forget about Adi Dharma Hotel though. I can almost smell how awful was the smell of the pillow before we got it replaced for the night! This reminds me, I have yet to do my bit on the TripodAdvisor review

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In conjunction with the public holidays, Wesak Day last Friday & Kaamatan (Harvest Festival) for yesterday and today in Sabah, most of us are now still on a very long weekend. It’s such a bliss! I spent most of my time experimenting with cheesecake baking among other things and enjoyed every second of the long holiday. Doing absolutely nothing and something at your own time, ahhh… it’s a luxury that does not comes by often. ?The downside? The cake baking experiments does not help me with my weight gain, having an elliptical would sure be great. I’ve make an arrangement with my cousin to go jogging every morning before starting this week. But only when I’m back to work though, I still want to enjoy getting to bed very late at night

Let me sort out some more photos to post and I’ll get back to you again soon Wishing all Sabahans Kotobian Tadau Tagazo Do Kaamatan and to the Sarawakians, Gayu Guru Gerai Nyamai. We all celebrates these respective holidays anyway The beauty of Malaysia - lots of Public Holiday! LOL! Have fun, enjoy your holidays and be safe especially when you’re on the road. Aramai tii!

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Sometime in early January, I was trying to make a decision of the venue for my vacation this year, between New York and Bali. It is now decided, I am going to Bali in May with 3 other gals! Yeah! So trip to New York is postpone until further notice, yet again. But as my friend, Alesya, is planning to come back here for a month long vacation, I hope she really can make it this time. The last time I saw her was in 1998, the year she left for the States. Damn, woman, you haven’t been back for more than 10 years!

Back to the Bali trip, we are now in the middle of booking our accommodation there, and heck, it is not easy finding a good place with reasonable rates and good recommendations from tripodadvisor.com and AVAILABLE during our period of travel We have secured a few places, except for the first night there. Well, we did, but somehow, 1 of us read that there are bed bugs in that hotel *sigh* At another hotel, 2 of us have already secured a room for another 2 nights, but the other 2 have yet to get theirs secured. Still waiting for the credit card processing to be done since their booking was done through email, not through the booking page, which was not available anymore once mine got through.  I just hope we would not have any unfavourable bumps during our actual vacation then. *fingers crossed*

Will be staying at Kuta, Bali during this upcoming vacation (Map extracted from http://mapsbali.com/areas/kuta.php)

I am really looking forward to this vacation, my much need vacation. Will be planning the itinerary for the trip soon. But for now, work, work, and more work, first …..

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It’s Saturday, it’s Chinese New Year’s (CNY) eve. The handing over of the baton from the Ox to the Tiger. The Chinese would be having their traditional grand family reunion dinner tonight; ah .. the food! Nevertheless, since this year’s CNY’s falls on a Sunday, the rest of us gets to enjoy a long weekend too! As for the eateries and restaurants, they’ll be expecting booming business this weekend for tomorrow is also Valentine’s Day…

To those that is not celebrating CNY, what have you got planned for this long weekend? Nothing much planned on my side except enjoying the days of leisure. Winding down from all the work stress for the past 2 months. Digging the DVDs I bought a while ago but never got the the time to actually watch the movies. I am so looking forward for this long weekend, especially after the disappointment of NOT getting any bonus to be used for splurging on a Dell Inspiron Mini 10V netbook.  Anyhow, whatever your plans are, be extra careful especially when you are on the road. Have a safe journey to and fro to your destinations. I am sure that even the motorcycle accident lawyer would want to enjoy his/her long weekend too with the family Give them a break

Wishing everyone a year roaring with good health, greater success, peace & abundance prosperity. Gong Xi Fa Chai!!! To all my married, Chinese friends, ang pow na laiiiiiiiiiii!! LOL! Leaving you with a photo of a roaring tiger to mark the beginning of the Year of The Tiger …

Ahhhh… not you Tiger Woods, your drama is over… give way to the real roaring tiger

May the Year of The Tiger Roars Your Life With Fantastic Health, Pure Happiness & Growing Prosperity

(photo extracted from the animal photo archive)

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It’s Christmas Eve!!! I’m one of the people who aren’t on annual leave, working in a quieter-than-usual building on this day. Parking space? Lots of them But the route to my office was clear from any traffic jam today, so much that I arrived to the office within 15 minutes when usually it takes about 45 minutes.

Everyone is not in the mood to work, chit-chatting, sms-ing, on the phones or clicking away on their own PCs and lappies. Yeah, totally in holiday mood! These coming day-after-holidays would be the employee screening moments by the HR departments for companies that operates on Saturdays ! LOL! Emergency leave, MIA are to be expected at such time as this.

What have you got planned for this Christmas Eve? Grand dinner with family and friends? Or you’ll be saving that for Christmas Day and go to church tonight instead? Whatever your plan is, I’m sure it’ll be merrier with your loved ones around you. For those who have Christmas presents under the Christmas trees waiting to be opened, ahhhh.. I can just imagine how excited you are at this moment

To all readers, friends and family members near and far, enjoy the holiday and here’s wishing you …..

A Blessed, Joyful, Merry

Christmas 2009!

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