About two years back, we noticed this giant tap near Tesco Setia Alam. It’s actually a signboard for Puncak Niaga, a water supply concessionaire “operating, managing and maintaining 29 water treatment plants with a combined capacity of 1,942 million litres per day.”
About two weeks back, we saw…
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A few days back, I received an invitation to the opening of the Starbucks Coffee outlet in Setia Alam. I turned down the invite from the MPP Zon 21 coordinator as I would be able to make it back on time.
On my way back today, I thought I’d just drop by the outlet and see if the rest of the MPP Zon 21 committees were still there… And they were. So I ended up being a busybody and joined in…
I got to meet the outlet manager and had a chat with her. She told me that this is the 2nd Starbucks outlet in Malaysia with drive-thru! It is also the first Starbucks outlet in Malaysia with a pylon signboard. Besides that, this is also a Shared Planet Starbuck outlet. That means the construction and outlet operations is supposed to be eco-friendly.
Drive-thru business hours for the moment is from 0800 to 0000hrs on Sunday to Thursday and from 0800 to 0030hrs on Fridays and Saturdays. And for a limited time (until they run out of vouchers), all drive-in customers will get a ‘buy-1-free-1′ voucher.
Instructions for drive-thru customers
Starbucks shared Planet declaration
Enough about coffee… So, did I lose a tooth or grow a new one? Of course not!
Our babysitter told Mrs Tai that Gabriel is teething. We were surprised and felt bad that we never noticed it before! So this evening, we got Gabriel to open his mouth while we explored it… heh heh…
OK, it’s not as bad as I made it sound. Check we did and… Yes! We could feel something coming out from the bottom. Honestly, I never thought such events could ever be termed as ‘exciting’ but I really am excited about this new ‘development’!
I attended a preview session organised by the operator of the still-under-construction mall in Setia Alam called Setia City Mall earlier this evening.
It was an interesting (‘interesting’ is a real under-statement) session. It was a session of sharing — the operator, Land Lease, shared their plans on Setia City Mall and the few of us (mainly residents), shared our expectations and wish list.
My impression of the mall? Well… I’m definitely looking forward to the opening of this mall which is planned sometime late 2011 (Christmas) or early 2012 (Chinese New Year). GSC and Parkson is already onboard. We were told there are other big names coming in… BIG names but not the type that is going to be out of reach for most of us.
The mall’s probably going to be something like Mid Valley… Something for the average Malaysian family. What I personally like is that the mall will bring back the ‘family experience’ to shopping. It is something that I feel is lost in the modern malls. I can tell you that I can’t really remember the few times I went out with my parents to 1Utama but I can still recall the times we used to hang out at Asia Jaya and Jaya Supermarket some 20+ years ago! That’s the kind of ‘family experience’ that I believe Land Lease has in mind for this mall!
Why do I say that? Well… There’s a planned field aka play area outside the mall the size of a football field. We were told there’s be family-friendly features, etc…
If you are interested, you can keep up with the latest news and development on their website, Twitter and Facebook!
Here’s an artiste’s impression of the Mall taken from their Twitter update…
The two cucumber plants… Well, they are growing though they don’t seem very healthy. I think I have some bug infection. I see ladybird-like bugs eating the leaves… 
But I’m not getting the ‘effect’ I want. The cucumber plant is supposed to ‘green’ the whole section of the half-wall. I guess I need to plant more… Oh ya… We also saw this ‘ball’…
Gerger… She’s back with us now! With the half-wall done up, she should not be able to sneak out now. I think she’ll love it here in Setia Alam since we have a garden for her to run around. And we have got greens in the garden! 
…when you see this:
So, what was the first thing that came to mind? Do share… I’ll let you know what we thought in a few days time as well…
…everywhere. On highways…
Actually, what is the point of having an emergency lane if no emergency vehicles actually use it, or that broken-down vehicles can’t stop there?
Back to topic. At parking lots…
The way this vehicle parked has deprived another vehicle of a parking lot
Against traffic flow!
One way street? Apparently not!
Going over greens meant for pedestrians…
Permanent shortcut… Courtesy of inconsiderate motorcyclists.
You can take a person out of the kampung, but you can’t take the kampung out of the person.
p/s: some of the photos were taken in Setia Alam.
We live in Setia Alam. It is a place that many of our friends consider to be far… But we don’t think so. We don’t get stuck in bad jams (well, there are some areas with heavy traffic while we try to get on the highway) and it is just one highway to almost anywhere — Penang, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Damansara, etc…
More importantly, the township is quite well planned (I won’t say it is extremely well planned), there are lots of trees and the people there are very friendly. People smile at you at the park and mothers will just chat up with one another. Mrs Tai is sometimes still surprised by how friendly people can be — after all, it’s not often we see that in Petaling Jaya where we used to live.
A few days back, we were taking Gabriel for a walk around the neighbourhood. We saw this couple tending to a fruit tree outside their house (ya, we have a lot of neighbours who love to plant fruit trees — they are just everythere!). It was a tree that we could not really identify, so we walked over to take a closer look. We started to chat and the couple actually offered us some fruits from their tree. They even invited us to take a look at their place, etc.. Even I was shocked by the friendliness!
But yup… That is the difference between a house and a home… Home is where there’s abundance of love everywhere.
The fruit?
I’m currently working on another community project for Setia Alam. Not sure how useful it would be for others, but I for one, think it’s quite useful. It will be a news portal, business directory, etc… Everything about the township. Like SARA and SARA forum, it will also be FREE.
Previously, Setia Alam on Google Earth (which also means Google Maps and Wikimapia) would should up as a low-res blot of land. Well, not anymore… I was quite excited when I first heard about this from SARA forum. It meant that I could also now direct friends who use GPS to my place in Setia Alam.
Actually, not really… Seems like I have a perpetual cloud over my house!
This year’s Chinese New Year is especially different. It is warmer than usual… Maybe it’s the weather — it’s been quite hot lately. Maybe it is the lion dance that came to our house (courtesy of the developer, SP Setia). Or maybe it is the first time we’re actually celebrating Chinese New Year in Setia Alam. But I think it’s because this year, we had very dear friends dropping by to visit us.
On the second day of Chinese New Year, Steven & family and Jonathan dropped by for a visit. It was Jonathan’s first visit to our place. As for Steven & family, it was not their first to our place but we are equally happy and very touched each time they dropped by. It’s hard to see both of them since Jonathan lives in Singapore while Steven’s family is in Perak.
On the third day of Chinese New Year, we had Derrell & Su Fei, Dean & family, Kean Lai & family and Jude dropping by! Both Mrs Tai and I were extremely delighted by the visit! To me, visits from old friends are even better than visits from ‘Choy San Yeh’ (God of Prosperity). This year, besides the usual chatting and catching up, we also compared notes on being new parents — yup, Dean, Kean Lai and Derrell became fathers last year too (it’s the second one for Dean)!
Here are some photos of the lion dance (mouse-over the photos for caption)…
And here’s a photo with three of the babies — Katherine (Kean Lai), Matthew (Derrell) and Gabriel. But have to really look hard for the babies in the photo… heh heh…
Thank you everyone for making this CNY so special… And yes, I know there’s going to be another group coming this Saturday!
Hmmm… If you’re waiting for an invite, please don’t. As always, you dun need an invitation to drop by our place. We welcome family and friends all the time!