I grew up not drinking soda except rarely, and do not enjoy colas - not Coke or Pepsi or RC (which was a big thing when I was a kid). I like root beer, my grandfather used to make it for us, but it wasn't ever anything that I really craved. To be very clear, I know how terrible soda is for the human body; we used a can of coke once to unclog a toilet in college. But once I tried Dr. Pepper, I found it delicious. Plus, it was terrible for my body, so it felt like a rebellion of sorts...a vice. Plus, most restaurants don't seem to have it on tap, which made it more elusive and if possible, more special. It wasn't ever something I'd drink daily, but once a week on a Friday or Saturday.
Over the years, as our grocery budget expanded beyond student-level bare necessities and I was able to purchase the soda myself I determined that the full-calorie versions tasted extra sweet, so I switched to the diet version. Also, as I was trying to lose baby weight, I never wanted to drink my calories, I wanted to save them all for ice cream, so diet dr. pepper became my special drink...until I discovered cherry diet dr. pepper, and now cherry dr. pepper zero.
Dr. Pepper (not diet, zero, cherry or otherwise) is not a thing in Malaysia. It's not to be found in the expat grocery stores (we've checked 4 different ones), and definitely not at restaurants. It was also difficult to find online (without a local bank account, I can only shop at one online site called Lazada). I finally found some that I could order, imported from Poland. The pictures online all showed several cans lined up, and of course, as a non-scientific American, when it said that the order was for 330 milliliters that seemed like a lot. Yes, I'm terribly embarrassed.
When my order finally arrived (in the reused Konjac Jelly box) with one can only, I was pretty sad. I don't crave it as much as I wanted something to remind me of home on the days when everything was unfamiliar and uncertain. I haven't opened it up yet...I'm waiting for a day when I really need a pick-me-up.
Food ordered through Grab (which is like DoorDash and Lyft rolled into one) is delivered in these delightful little packets of butcher paper with very little labeling. In our temp housing, they have a basket out front for food deliveries, and once I received a text that my food had arrived, I popped down to the lobby and grabbed the plastic blue sack that I was expecting to have my nasi ayam goreng (chicken fried rice normal).
When I opened the sack in my apartment, I discovered multiple packets and unwrapped one to discover that there was no chicken fried rice, but something that was 100% unfamiliar to me. Luckily, the lobby called then to let me know that someone had taken my order, and I had hers.
The food comes served on banana leaves which is traditional - the leaves act as a great insulator to keep the food warm and moist. Although honestly, its hard to imagine any type of food drying out here.
I've never been a great judge about how much time it takes to heat something up, but it's skewed much farther here, since their microwaves seem to work a little bit differently.
Grocery shopping continues to be an adventure. Remember the Crispy Fish Free Fingers picture from last week? They were sampling them at the store, and I didn't really understand what the store employee was saying (her accent was thick) so I tried one. The fact that it was 100% plant-based should have been more comforting to me, but the sort-of fish flavor was decidedly unpleasant.
Erik is making the face of the red fish, who isn't feeling very lucky.
The rainy season has started, and as a result the view out our windows is of a gray sky and gray ocean. I love it when we have storms, but the grayness is still not my friend...and I have to keep focusing on all the positive things, like how much cooler it is when it is raining or the fact that the clouds don't tend to hang out all day long. We do get some spectacular sunsets as a result, and once we get to move to our permanent place I will miss getting to see them in such a dramatic fashion (we won't have the same ocean view as we do now).
no filters!
the sunset is reflected in the windows of the high rise to our right
Had our first church activity last night (family games + dinner). We started off with a game of all ages musical chairs, but they forgot for the first three rounds to take away any chairs. Which is good since our congregation here (called a branch) has a significant number of 80+ year olds, and I was really afraid someone would break a hip. We played other games too, pick the tiny red beans out of the tiny green lentils with chopsticks, throw plastic eggs into egg cartons by bouncing off a table, and then from far away, and using a garbage bag to "snap" balls into a bucket. Then the little kids made Chinese lanterns using actual burning candles (something not allowed on any US church property) - this pic is of an expat family from Hillsboro.
The people here are warm and friendly and so happy to meet new people. The branch is incredibly diverse, a lot of Chinese, Indians, Malays, and Americans. It was so fun today when they announced that we had transferred our records in the branch (officially moved our church membership from Oregon to Penang) I felt genuine happiness from so many people. Looking forward to more adventures - the next branch activity is learning line dancing...can't wait to see Erik put on a happy face for that!
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