Eunos Harmony Trail to Kuala Lumpur and Kuantan Day 1

25 July 2008

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3

At 6 am, 322 Eunos Grassroots Leaders and residents gathered at their respective Residents' Committee (RCs) Offices and the Community Club (CC). 200 females, 122 males, with age ranging from as young as 6 years old to 81 years old. They were present together with Mayor Zainul Abidin Rasheed, Adviser for Eunos Grassroots Organisations, Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Mayor of Northeast CDC for a 3D2N tour to Malaysia.

My RC, Eunos Zone 3 RC, took a 44-seater bus no. 7 came late due to a tire puncture. We would later encounter many happenings with the bus. We set off immediately and reached the Tuas Checkpoint.

Some of the old folks had problem with the new electronic gantry at the checkpoint. Those that could not get pass the gantry had their passports retained by the staff and they had to join a queue to manually clear their passports.

Then, something went wrong. A participant of the Harmony Trail actually left the checkpoint with her passport still held on by the Immigration staff. How could someone get across the Immigration Checkpoint without her passport, even when there had been a recent lapse in security issues at checkpoints?

Anyway, we proceeded to the Malaysia customs where we changed our bus to a bigger and more comfortable one. We were joyous until the bus started to leak when it rained heavily.

After eating our breakfast at Yong Peng's Lucky Garden Restaurant, we changed our bus again. It was good that the organising committee had prepared a spare van and bus for emergency purposes.

At about 11am, we reached Ecolite Biotech Manufacturing Sdn. Bhd., a Bird Nest production factory. There was a grand reception where lion dance troops welcomed Mayor Zainul.

There was a tour into the viewing gallery which was a simulated bird nest house. From it, the participants can see how workers process bird nest.

According to the tour guide, Malaysia is one of the few countries in the world that has 2 capitals, the federal capital at Kuala Lumpur and the administrative capital at Putrajaya. Putrajaya is named after the first Prime Minister of Malaysia. The districts within Putrajaya can be distinguished from the different patterns of lamp posts. We settled our lunch at Putra Jaya Seafood restaurant.

One of the main objectives of the Harmony Trail is to promote racial harmony within fellow Singaporeans through visiting different places of worship and understand the different religions. So our first MAIN stop is actually the Putra Mosque.

The Putra Mosque is one of the biggest mosque in the whole of Malaysia, able to accommodate over 10,000 worshipers at one time. It has a distinctive pink colour dome. The participants were warmly received and watched a video at the underground theatrette. The Mayor then exchanged gifts with the representative from the mosque.

Following up, the participants went to Berjaya Times Square for shopping! Here, I found a Batman standee and took a picture with it since I'm wearing a Batman-themed shirt. My family and I then went to Sungei Wan to buy some goodies before coming back to meet the rest of the group.

For Dinner, everyone had a sumptuous dinner at Royal China Restaurant. Managed to get a copy of the menu back home:

• Braised Fish Lips Soup with Eight Treasure
• Steamed Live Patin in Village Style
• Pan Fried Tiger Prawns with Supreme Sauce
• Deep Fried Pork Ribs Marinated with Preserved Sauce
• Sauteed Ostrich Meat with Hong Kong Kai Lan
• Stewed Mushrooms with Gluten and Fish Paste
• Sauteed Deluxe Mixed Vegetables
• Sauteed Assorted Seafood in Assam Sauce / Yong Chaw Fried Rice
• Sweetened Sea Coconut with Ginseng

At 9pm, we were surprised and honoured that the Foreign Minister of Malaysia, Dato’ Seri Utama Dr. Rais Yatim, joined us for a while. It was only decided on that day itself that he would be coming.

At about 11pm, we went to Grand Seasons Hotel for a 1 Night stay. I guess many of the other tourists at the hotel lobby might have been shocked by our crowd which flooded the entire lift lobby area, waiting to rest for the day and anticipate for a much exciting programme for the next day.

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3