Girls Day Out - From Serious (Hospital Visit) to Fun (Yeah!)

I had a fun weekday with a girl friend, Sophia... and to 'celebrate' 05.05.11, we just went on an impromptu doctor's visit for her tummy pain - let's not get any details on that -- but after the hospital visit and arranging for further follow-ups, it was only 11am++ and the day was still young -- so when you put two like-minded gals together, with not much to do for the rest of the day, you get very random ideas of what you can do together.

Like really RANDOM!


At first, we wanted to find Sophia a job as she only moved to this part of the world earlier this year to follow her beloved hubby (sigh, sacrifices we women make when we marry), so we went back to my house to get her online resume onto my pendrive. Then I made some phone calls, and we decided not to go for any 'interviews' for the day, as it was already past 1pm.. and we wanted to enjoy.. so we closed the 'SERIOUS' chapter after 1pm.. and went for lunch.

We had like an hour chat over lunch where we had some girly talk.. man, nothing beats a womanly chat anytime! Vent, rant, vent, rant, complain, sharing, laughing, grimacing, emphatising.. laugh some more.. it was a great lunch date, girl!

Then I had this crazy idea to introduce this pampered wifey to public transportation, so I parked my car near the LRT (Train) station and we walked a short distance under the hot sun to the station and voila, Sophia had her first LRT ride in Kuala Lumpur.

Before getting on the train, ladies need to go to the ladies. :-)

With a camera in hand - we have to do what we ladies do best - camwhore - with the mirror in the washroom! lol - it's kinda blurred, but that's the very reason why it made it to this blog entry - cos it's blur enough for public viewing - lol - the clearer ones are in my personal fb page with privacy set, of course.

I insisted we sit down as there were available seats and had to literally make her sit as we had to stay away from the door once more commuters enter from the other stations we would pass by before reaching our destination. Rule No. 1 - be a little bit more self-centered and sit when it's appropriate. Pity your poor feet!

I decided on the spot that our itinerary would be to travel to MidValley so she gets to experience two train rides (one way tickets!).

We took the LRT to KL Sentral - which is the hub of transportation where you get four types of train services:

1. the ERL (straight to airport within half an hour, on the road, it is triple that journey time)
2. the LRT (Kelana Jaya line) - let's not go to the other line - kinda complicated and irrelevant for that day's and this blog's 'lesson' - Sophia and I took the Kelana Jaya line
3. the Commuter or the correct spelling is - KOMUTER - in Malaysia's national language - it is a commuter train that travels on the conventional railway track but not as noisy as the next type... - we took this one for only one-station-away-ride to MidValley Mega Mall
4. the KTM (the oldest railway system in Malaysia-based on the British railway system back when Malaya (now Peninsular Malaysia or West Malaysia) was still not even Malaysia and still under colonial rule) = the KTM (Keretapi Tanah Melayu) is an international train that takes you to Southern Thailand (up North) and also Singapore (down South)

Besides the trains - there are buses at the basement level of KL Sentral and they only cost a fraction of the taxi rides to the airport - like RM10 for a ride to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA, the big one) as opposed to a RM70 ride in a cab and RM8 or RM9 for a ride in a bus (which is really punctual and leaves every 15 or 30 mins, depending on peak or off-peak-hours) as compared to a RM80 ride in a cab to the KLIA - LCCT (low cost terminal) - or better known as Air Asia (the budget airline) Airport.

It is also at KL Sentral that you get to buy bus tickets (sometimes with cable car rides and themepark packages!) for a bargain - to GENTING HIGHLANDS. It is a place where you get to enjoy the cool climate up the highlands, developed by the late honourable entrepreneur Lim Goh Tong.

Okay - end of 'lesson' for KL Sentral's many functions - did I mention it is just beside two reputable hotels - KL Hilton and Le'Meridien. I am sounding like a marketer than a blogger now.. lol.

End of 'lecture mode'

Anyway, Sophia and I arrived in Sentral - and bought the one-station-away-ticket to MidValley - which only cost Sophia RM1 (I have my own Touch-N-Go card incorporated into my ID, so I just lined up to help Sophia buy hers, you can google that card and its function yourself).

We then proceeded down a level to Platform 6 heading towards Seremban direction - and waited about 8 minutes for the train to arrive - KOMUTER train, here we come.

There were many people and the crowd was trying to enter the first two coach, so we walked to the further end and saw the pink coach. PINK! Then I remembered the news I read earlier this year about KTM management introducing the LADIES-ONLY COACH -- totally cool!

Then upon entering the PINK COACH, true enough all are women and ladies and children - EXCEPT for one odd guy - a Middle Eastern Man who was pretending not to hear me saying loudly three times - THIS COACH IS FOR LADIES ONLY to his face - he concentrated on his very 'important' phone call TALKING IN ENGLISH - so much for 'thick-skinned face', huh? He kept his gaze low, and I told Sophia in a loud-enough voice that I was gonna snap a photo of him and I did.

This is 'the guy who couldn't distinguish Ladies-Only-Coach' despite being told loudly that it is so and stayed put in the coach. This man who cannot read, is pretending to 'read something', fully knowing I was about to snap his pix as I announced it loudly.

If you look closely enough at the background, you can see the ladies symbols plastered all over the coach. You can click on the pix to enlarge it - just remember to click to back button to continue reading. ;)

Anyway, let's leave it at that and continue this blogpost to the even more 'fun' part!


FISH SPA! - HERE FISHIES, FISHIES...

So we arrived at MidValley Mega Mall and another RANDOM idea came to mind - How about we try Fish Spa - limited to the feet for a first try! Sophia hasn't tried it either and had been wanting to try it so we both went!

Paid RM38 for 30 minutes (but we were given more time than that as there were no crowd when we were there, like maybe 3 or 5 other people at any one time).. I'd say we dipped in for about 45 minutes before being told our time was up.

Now -- the fun part -- we have never laughed and giggled so much for a long time.

For the record, for nearly 5 minutes when we first sit there, we could hardly keep our feet in the water - this is Sophia refusing to keep her feet in the water and make the fish earn their money's worth to nibble away our dead skin cells. Your tummy muscles must be working overtime that 5 minutes to keep your feet up, Sophie! lol

Then, I sat closer to Sophia and started chatting and showing her the shots taken on my camera and we slowly got used to the ticklish and Squemish sensation - we relaxed and actually enjoyed the micromassage by the small fishes.

After we have obviously sat longer than 30 minutes, I decided to be more adventurous to try the medium-sized fish pool. I dipped in and my, they were more forceful than their smaller brothers and sisters. Sophia joined me and we dipped for about 5-10 minutes (already running on overtime) before we finally left the spa.

We only tried the feet spa without any body massage and all but they do offer other conventional massages at Kenko Fish Spa = Level 2, MidValley Mega Mall.

Quite Hygienic too, so we are quite reassured - they have been around for the past five years or so (as I conducted a simple market research on the spa industry in my capacity as a Public Relations consultant, and heard of them before).

Then we proceeded to dry up and touched our heels... smooth baby heels. AMAZING! For me, I have been having cracked heels as I used to be a dancer (ballet and traditional dance) when I was much younger due to the many hours of being on my feet for the footwork training and they are an ugly sight - so I was pleasantly surprised to be able to have smooth soles for once in my life!

Pix showing fish spa in action - In the process of exfoliation -- Sophia's pedicured feet and my rough feet.

The End-Result after Fish Spa on our feet -- ta-da! Silky Baby-Smooth Soles and feet!

For a close-up of the fish in action - it does look at bit freakish, but trust me, they swim to you naturally and they claim it is how the royalty in Turkey or somewhere do their foot spa as the fish species originates from there.

That's my feet you're looking at. lol At first, when we're doing it, we both agreed NOT TO DO IT AGAIN - cos it was ticklish. Then after we saw the results of the smooth heels, I immediately changed my mine and told Sophia - I MUST DO THIS AGAIN! lol

It was nearly 5pm by the time we finished walking around - and we then proceeded to my current-fad-that-I-have-not-missed-once-a-month-treat - Ninja Joe at the Gardens Midvalley, which is just beside the MegaMall, they are even connected at the basement level and also with the overhead bridge at Level 1 (if I remember the level correctly).
http://suesanctuary.blogspot.com/2011/03/pork-burger.html
I blogged about it two months ago and I've been there that one time in March, another time in April - and now once more in May - I must be porkburger crazy or something. lol

Like them on FB - facebook.com/porkburger or follow them on twitter at @porkburger

If your name is Joe, you get RM1 off your total order. How cool is that for marketing?

We then parted ways after Sophia's hubby (coincidentally named 'Hun', his real Chinese name, as in shortform for Hunny in English) came and picked us up and I made my way back to my car in the train.

This is like the longest post of this whole blog.

I shall end this with warm thoughts and great memories of the Double Five (05.05.11) outing. Thanks for the wonderful companionship, Sophia! Let's do that again sometime soon! ;)