Qingdao
You stupid Asian, what are you doing in my country? Get the hell out of here! Do I look Asian? Yes.. Do I look stupid, maybe but chasing me out from your country? That is way too much.
Travelling in foreign countries are not always fun, you get hiccups from time to time. That line was quoted from my travel diary back in 2005. I always wonder what will happen to the whole idea of globalization when there is a small community who still lives in the state of denial.
I felt sorry for them but hey, my journey still continues until today. If I stop then, I will not have a chance to see Fatema Indian Restaurant in the middle of Qingdao, China.
This restaurant is not in a shopping mall. It is by the roadside about 15 minutes from Qingdao Olympics Sailing Museum. The restaurant is decorated with authentic Indian decor with spices as background smell.
If you are physically in Malaysia, I don’t think you will find this restaurant interesting. If you are away from Malaysia for long long time, this restaurant will remind you of mamak stalls.
Finally I get to try cheese and garlic naan and roti prata after craving for it for so long. Not to mention, you get to try different type of Nasi Beryani too..
Let me try to recall what I ordered. If I am not mistaken (in clockwise from top left).. Vegetable Curry, Mutton Curry, Prawn Curry and Chicken curry.
Bear with the lousy photos as I took with my lousy phone in low lighting condition. The presentation of the food is not so good but the tastes of spices are marvellous.
Like many good food around, the portion come in small size. With that, it gives you opportunity to order more. So, I take my chance to maximise my order for second round.
With not a single glass of water yet, I ordered tofu curry, fish curry, potatoes curry and beef curry. Considering the place I am in, all these curries are considered great except the fish one.
Lastly, as for drinks, I ordered mango yogurt and teh masala. Mango yogurt is like a normal yogurt drink with mango flavour but the teh masala is kind of special.
It reminds me of the genuine teh masala that I used to drink when I was in India but slightly bigger cup than usual. I forget how much does this meal cost but I tell you it is not cheap. The price is almost comparable with Little India in KLCC.
Fatema Indian Restaurant
No. 10, Gutian Road,
Qingdao, China.
TEL: +86 137 3099 4178, +86 532 8300 6655
Email: shamimcy@yahoo.com
GPS:
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Yawn.. Did you know I never like to read? Reading is like my sleeping pills .. I used to complain to my mom, I hate reading and why should I study. That was right after my first day in kindergarten.
History is never my favorite subject but I was so good with the first 2 pages on my text books because right after that, I was in my dreamland and when I awake, I restart the whole process. The cycle continues.
BUT did you know I love to visit museums and historical places? Am I contradicting myself? No..absolutely not. Visiting historical places makes me travel back to time “mentally”!
I experienced the same feeling too when I visited Zhan Qiao, 栈桥 (or loading pier) in Southern Shore of Qingdao where the octagonal pavilion is viewed as symbol of Qingdao.
What so special about this place? For Tsingtao Brewery Museum, the structure that was constructed in 1930 is a label of their beer bottle. For me, it means much more than that.
Apart from shopping on top of dead coral reef, this is the place where I saw a real fisherman casting the net with my own eyes. You can call me cityboy but this is another serendipitous finding for me.
The entrance ticket to this octagonal pavilion is only RMB 4/person (~RM 2/person). As soon as you enter the building, you are greeted with this mysterious black rock. Yea, it still remains mysterious until today.
I don’t think there is any significance about this place except they sell a lot a lot of creative souvenirs at “tourist price”
One of the creative souvenirs that I saw is burned art on wooden sheet. Considering my mom was also a tourist, she bought this as a souvenir for my sis at the price of RMB 50 each (~RM 25).
I did not spend much time here as we have tight schedule to follow but this place is worth to pay a visit. The place might not be as interesting as it is but the hawker stalls by the roadside around this vicinity are VERY attractive.
Zhan Qiao, 栈桥
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Did you know that beer is the world’s oldest and widely consumed alcohol beverages? No? I bet history book back in high school did not mention anything about this. Your online universities may not have mentioned it, either.
Considering alcohol is illegal for some of the religion and underage like me, we have restricted access to the traditional and modern processes of how it is made and where it came from.
The answers that you are looking for are finally here! If you are in Qingdao, Shandong Province, spare some time to pay a visit to Tsingtao Brewery Museum. The place where past, present and future emerge.
Recently, Tsingtao Brewery just celebrated 100 years of success. This brand started of with a small dinky factory, providing drinks for locals and now, this brand managed to make a dent in the world.
This is not an ordinary factory visit but rather a big compound filled with both modern and historical architectures. Over here, the museum is separated to few different sections.
Starting from boring history lesson, to ancient and modern beer brewing process, free drink tasting and lastly, souvenirs corner. What impresses me a lot is the gigantic beer fountain! No.. it is not filled with beer..
Time machine hasn’t invented yet. If you plan to travel back to time, this section is kind of awesome. It shows all ancients events, posters, artifacts, old documents etc.
As you know, I am not a big fan of reading so this section took me only about 10 mins. 5 min to walk around and another 5 min to stop by to check out the phonograph. NO.. not pornograph.. but gramophone in other worlds. You will be surprise that they still keep the old records.
If you are patient enough, walk to the other building where they display the traditional brewing method together with interesting sculpture and ancient man made equipments
Most of the equipment are not functioning now but it gives you a good insight about what happen in the past and how they create a miracle drink. Maybe I have a sensitive nose but believe it or not, I can still smell the malt and yeast here
Like any museum, you got to be there to see everything. This has no exception. Beside walking through the old factory, you will come across a modern functioning processing plant that shows how the beer was made, can/bottle, packing etc.
Not only that, with only RMB 50 (~RM 50)/per person, you get to claim for your free drinks at the bar with a packet of beer peanuts. If that is not enough, you can later purchase more ‘drinks’ and souvenirs before you exit the museum.
Tsingtao Brewery Museum
56号 Dengzhou Road, Shibei,
Qingdao, Shandong, China
TEL: +86 532 8382 0705
GPS: 36.079573, 120.34934
Website: http://www.tsingtao.com.cn/en/, http://www.tsingtaomuseum.com/
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Do you ever have this mouse cheese fantasy before? Mouse cheese? Oh yea.. the fantasy of every mouse that will die for a bite of cheese. Talking about mouse and cheese, I never see Mickey or Minnie Mouse go after a slice of cheese. Did I miss something?
Forget about Disney fantasy as I am craving for a nice Taiwanese meal now. I am so craving for the food that I am an inch away from dying for it. Is it that bad? Definitely! By thinking about “Siu Long Pau” (Small Dragon Dumpling) already enough to make me drool!
While browsing through my photo albums, I come across DinTaiFung, a famous Taiwanese Restaurant that literally exists around the world. What’s so special about this shop?
Nothing special to me from the first sight despite they received various awards from famous food critics and appeared in major newspapers. All I know is the restaurant has a very cute dumpling mascot holding Siu Long Pau to welcome you.
The dumpling must be the signature dish and I am very positive that I will not be disappointed with it. Browsing through the menu makes me more hungry especially when comes to broad choices of food.
Not only they serve dumpling but various type of Taiwanese cuisines as well starting from variety of appetizers, meat dishes, vegetables, soups, desserts and drinks. Maybe I was just too hungry at that time.
I ordered the signature siu long pau, the original version and with crab eggs as my appetizers. A set of 5 pieces only costs about RMB 23 and RMB 29 respectively.
Although the taste is one of the best in Chinaso far but I still prefer siu long pau in Dragon-i @ Pavillion, KL. To me, the dumpling skin is still thick and I am not so impressed with the crab egg version!
Then I ordered traditional chicken soup, braised duck and wonton soup noodle. All these are world class quality. The herbal soup really soothes my throat and the potion is just nice for one person.
The braised duck is my favorite especially when it dips with the BBQ sauce. Normally, duck will have a very strong duck smell (..duh) but this one don’t and the meat is soft! Wanton soup is so so only and I ordered this just to ease my wanton cravings 
What amazes me is this, “Eight Treasure Glutinous Rice”, a very unique dessert. It consists of kidney beans, red dates, lotus seeds, red beans, gingko and 3 more ingredients (which I forget … hehe). I am not a big fan of this but the presentation is totally impressed me.
After the dessert, I realized that my stomach still have empty space. So, before I leave this place, I ordered steam pork bun. Like usual, anything with pork always taste good. This one has no exception too!
All and all, I just paid about RMB 260 which is approximately RM 128 only. I do not mind paying extra if the food is delightful. This place is reasonable to me and I will definitely try other branches too!
DinTaiFung (Marina City Branch)
No.86, Aomen Road, Shinan District,
Qingdao, Shandong
TEL：+86 532 6606 1309
GPS: 36.060154,120.39321
Web: http://www.dintaifung.com.tw/
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How do you shorten your travel duration? You can either choose to fly, find alternate routes or teleport. The later one is not a joke if you can invent it. If you got one, tell me! I am more than willing to be the test guinea pig.
If you read my post on Jiaozhou Bay Bridge and Qing-Huang Tunnel, you probably aware that the travel duration shortens to 10 mins from Huangdao to Qingdao instead of 1 hour 30 minutes. What’s so significant?
Nothing really unless you are staying in Qingdao or Huangdao. To me, I see light at the end of tunnel too! Yea.. I have a chance to experience the Qing-Huang Tunnel lately while on my way to Qingdao Olympic Sailing Center.
By paying about RMB 30/trip to cross the tunnel, you are a step closer to a famous tourist spot back in 2008 during Beijing Olympic or even until now.
If you are interested in sailing, water ski, boat ride, this is the perfect place for you. If not, don’t get too upset as you still get to enjoy all international flags from the 2008 Olympic. Try not to be funny by asking me if they ever wash the flags!
The weather is a bit misty, windy and cooling. So, don’t get too upset if you fail to snap nice photos. Not far from here, there is a Olympic Sailing Museum which publishes pictorial footstep of Beijing 2008 Olympics Games.
The building is not as grand as the “Bird Nest” stadium but definitely astonishing and worth while to drop by.
While westerners busy inventing monocycle, China invented two-wheeled electric vehicle for leisure. Tourists have a chance to try it with only RMB 50 for 10 minutes.
Don’t have driving license? Don’t fret! It is as easy as 1, 2, 3. A joystick (batang gembira: direct translation from Malay) is used to maneuver the vehicle. It has self timer so you won’t get to go more than 10 min (smart Chinese isn’t it?)
4-wheeled cycle? 2 Seaters? 4 seaters? All you need is just cash to experience it. Rather than paddle by one person, you can opt to paddle with your partners too! Cool isn’t it?
Make sure you have regular exercise before go for this. I tried it for 1/2 hour and gosh, I cannot feel my leg anymore after that. All you need is just RMB 50 with deposit of RMB 200 for 1/2 hour ride.
Try the human cylindrical hamster ball floating on water. It looks fun but unfortunately, it has age restriction, only for age 12 and below. If you are over 12 like me, you can choose to play water at the man made fountain.
Before leaving this place, I managed to walk around various souvenirs shops. All souvenirs are very cheap ranging from RMB 5 – 50. At the end, your negotiation skill plays an important role here if want to get a good deal.
Tiring but loads of fun! That is how I describe this trip.
Qingdao Olympic Sailing Center
Aomen Road, Shinan,
Qingdao,Shandong,China
GPS: 36.060297,120.394063
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Why you didn’t update your blog on time? Why I rarely see you in Twitter? Am I lost in virtual world? So many why and I also wonder why?
To cut the explanations short, I do update my write my blog on regular basis. It is just that I do not have a stable internet connection to upload it. The biggest struggle here is to get access on twitter as I need a dedicated VPN to break the China Great firewall. Lost? Neh.. it is more like I don’t have access at all.
Where am I? I am in a small place province in China called Huangdao. Proly about 1.5 hours drive from Qingdao before this before the launching of Jiaozhou Bay Bridge and Qing-Huang Tunnel on 1 July 2011.
If you are bad in geography like I do, put the coordinate in Google Map and I am sure my best buddy can help you up.
What is Jiaozhou Bridge and Qing-Huang Tunnel? You seriously ask that question? You didn’t read news? That is the longest bridge in the world. Yes, another man made wonders in China.
Still not too late, I have included a photo of the opening ceremony to keep you informed on what is happening in the world .. marvelous isn’t it? I mean the bridge.. hehe..
You might not be able to see the undersea tunnel. If you do, I will be very amaze. So, I decided to get a snapshot on what exactly I am talking about tunnel when all you see is just the bridge.
Honestly, I do not feel the “grand-ness” of the tunnel as it looks like any other tunnel to me unless it is made by transparent glasses. No leak observed so I am pretty sure it is safe to travel.
Like many other mega projects, this bridge was built with monstrous sophisticated machines. I am not too interested in the construction bid of it but more interested in what it can do.
However, I am really curious on how they made the tunnel. Honestly, I have no clue except they will be working in a very dark and cold environment. Hehe.. poor hard worker or machines maybe?
If you really lazy read, forget about it. Just enjoy all the nice photos then and here is the last one..
Jiaozhou Bridge and Qing-Huang Tunnel
Huangdao,Qingdao,China
GPS: 36.1234556; 120.245639
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If you are holding a DSLR, you are prone to unnecessary attention. Is it cute girls asking you to take their photos? Neh.. not that kind of attention but people tend to have a bias views on you.
It is rather hard to hide your skills especially when people thought that you are paparazzi, private detective or maybe you are a nerdy photographer. Not knowing the real you, they will just stopped you and said, “Sir, you are not allowed to take photos in here”.
Hello, I have not even turn on my camera or open my lens cover yet. Duh.. Should I laugh at their ignorant or appreciate their courtesy? This is not a joke, k? This is based on true story that happened when I was in Golden Lounges in various countries.
To avoid superfluous embarrassment, my wife a.k.a iPhone will normally come very handy. What I normally do here is sneaking around all “business” men and catch them with their silly stunts . Some caught sleeping with drooling effect
Beside free food and drinks, free internet, free bla bla bla, there is a spot which I fail to take photos, the massage room. I really wonder if there is a pretty masseuse on action or just a robotic massage chair?
Remember all long queues before boarding the plane? It is not happening this time. Lucky me because I get to go through the priority lane like any other aging man, pregnant lady or those with kids. Yea I am pregnant and still like kids
Not to mention there was an air stewardess stopped me and said, “Sir, you have to queue up in economy lane” and stunt later after saw my ticket. Before the plane board, I managed to camDUCK myself in golden class.
Yea.. I didn’t dress up smartly when I travel, normally with only t-shirt and jeans. Sometime I didn’t even comb my hair or with my unshaved moustache. Why need to dress up? I thought we suppose to travel comfortably? Besides, I have no one to impress as well!
Why I like to travel? Free food! And in-flight entertainment. Before they served me with appetizer, an air stewardess approached me and asked for my age. She claimed that I am very young.
That conversation is not related to this post but would like to emphasize that she claimed “I am very YOUNG” hehe..
There is nothing much to talk about in-flight appetizers. Why? The portion is too small and I finished it before it can activate my taste buds.
But the main course is different! Absolutely different! Most of the time, you get a few choices, Western, Asians or local food. I managed to capture all main courses that I took from all the flights that I board recently.
Of all, there is one special one. Bim Bim Bak. This is a traditional Korean rice with mix vege, meats and pickles (see photos above – the bottom one). I called it “rojak” rice as you need to mix everything in on bowl before you dine it.
All taste equally good but a meal is never complete without dessert. Strawberry Haagan Dazs was served as dessert. Once I tried it, I want more.. hehe.. ice cream always makes me happy and that is why I label it as happy food.
What I do next on the plane? Watch movie and sleep laa.. What else I can do, right? Err.. Ok.. I was disturbed by a group air stewardess as usual.. Not I disturb but being disturbed instead.. wonder why but I am going to censor that in here.
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Vandalism is a societal epidemic that slowly creeps in communities’ nerves. It is an incurable virus that exists for as long as prostitute is made as profession.
China is a well known country that full with thousand years’ history. For as long as history is written, no hard evidence can prove vandalism can be eradicated, not even until today.
A very beautiful shopping street in GaoTang Lu, Qingdao, China also suffers from this act. Personally, this will portray a very bad image to the country as many poor tourists like me will nearly lost in this area because the road sign has been vandalized.
Okok.. before you fall asleep with my vandalism thought, GaoTang Lu is almost similar to Petaling Street or Chinatown in Malaysia. They sells bag, clothes, watches, soft toys and many many cheap stuffs. It is also a heaven to train your great bargaining skills.
We heard about 3D.. what is 4D then? It is almost the same like IMAX that you need to wear a 3D glasses but you will be seated on a moving device. The device will simulate all the motion effects. Oh yea.. this is almost the same like Motion Master in Genting before.
Fun? Absolutely.. No doubt I will go back again as the effect is really marvelous. It is also an eye opener for me as I never expect that I will get to experience 4D in an ordinary shopping mall. GO go go.. go try it yourself if you have a chance to be here..
Again, I consider myself as lucky as DiJing Square just officially launched last week. Besides shopping, I love this newly designed shopping mall. A very impressive way to decorate the place with fiber optic lightings, creatively arranged photograph and very cozy ambient.
I am not sure if you been to Qingdao Shopping Mall before. Most of the shopping mall is quite warm and a bit stuffy. But but but.. this new shopping mall is fully equipped with functioning air-cond.
I just travelled through time to Mesozoic era, deep underwater, space and in the middle of erupting volcano. Do you believe it? No? I think it is time for you to put a little faith in TikkoSS. By only paying about 50 RMB, you get to experience all that I have just mentioned for as long as 15 min.
You don’t need to travel to Florida, US to experience 4D Theater. Trust me, this is as good as Florida and more importantly it is very new. Probably you are the first few batches of lucky ones that get to experience it.
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