Assalammualaikum wbt,
We departed from KLIA 2 at 6.30am and reached there about 10.30am. This is my first time to actually be inside KLIA 2 and boy, it is hugeeee! I've read that you should be at airport at least 2 hours before the scheduled flight and I couldn't agree more. The journey from one places to another (Immigration check, collect luggage etc is far), I'd even lost when I got back jeeeeez. As usual, we flew with AirAsia, and I forced myself to eat Nasi Ayam on the flight even I couldn't finish them. Well, you have to, because it is so difficult to find Halal food in Macau so you gotta stuff yourself!
A little introduction of Macau/Macao. This city is part of China but has its own currency and government. If you been here, most of the locals will be speaking in Portuguese or Cantonese. Their city is largely influence by Portuguese culture because it was colonized by them until 1999. That is why, most of the roads..not most, but rather all of the roads name are in Portuguese. Even their name aren't Chinese and most of them are Catholic (that explains why there were many churches here). Macau is also known as Asia's Las Vegas because the main activity and sources of economy is coming from gambling. There are casinos literally everywhere! It also one of the richest country in the world. Well, it's quite obvious because you can see many luxury boutiques just by the roadside.. I was surprised there are many Burberry booths (Like a pop up booth not the store, again I stress the word BOOTH!) in every hotels we went and you can even spot Pandora store at their pasar malam site.. Unlike us, most of these exclusive luxury boutique will only be at popular spots like Pavillion, KLCCand Starhill.. People buying Burberry scarf like they are shopping for fabrics from Jakel. I'd even seen one girl carrying like 3-4 Tiffany's big sized paper bags! oh dear..do you really buying like 10 big diamonds or does Tiffany sells biscuits now that I don't know about to earn you such big paper bags? From my own personal opinion, Macao attraction aren't so much on the view or historical places (there are but not so much) but rather on the indoor activities. I read there are many attractive performances/theaters/studios but you gotta buy the tickets to those shows and they aren't cheap. Since we are poor like that, we didn't go to any. Lame I know. Haha. I think, to really enjoying Macau, you gotta spend dearly (for indoor I mean). But don't worry, for cheapskate people like us, Macau really got something to offer ;) The people here are friendlier and less garang compared to Beijing last time. Hahaha. Serik!
We were told that Macau weather to be like Genting/Cameron Highlands and even when we checked the forecast, it should be around 15-19 degree. Thus, we packed lightly: light sweater, light jacket, shawl etc. The moment we stepped out from the plane, we have never been grateful of the sun! The weather was freeeeeezing!! To the point that we should've bring the winter gear! Not only it is freezing but it was windy heavily!! Oh my, how are we going to survive here?! We weren't prepared at all. We asked the hotel staff there, it turned out that Macau is facing a sudden temperature dropping.. Well, the weather is quite haywire now, almost everywhere even in Malaysia we had an iced rain. Yeah..the earth is dying..
We checked in to our hotel, Galaxy Macau, it really is a huge hotel! ..and luxurious too I would say. Galaxy Hotel is one of the famous and largest hotels here. It also consists of few more hotels: Banyan Tree, Ritz Carlton & JW Marriot and of course, a huge casinos. The ground floor of this hotel is high-end shopping stores: Chanel, Dior, LV yada yada. Yes, the cheapest store would be H&M (-___-). Although the room rates is rather pricey but this hotel provides free bus shuttle service to all major tourist places in Macau. It is so convenient that you can save money from taking taxis. But the best of all, this hotel and even the bus provides free wi-fi wohoo! These are some of my room pictures. Jill is so cool to get us room with a spectacular view overlooking Macau city. Love you sis!
These refreshments are FOC but after they have replenished them, the hotel will charge you. I didn't eat the Ramen, not sure about its Halal status.
Since the room is not ready yet, we leave all our luggage and headed to the San Ma Lao town. This is the main and most popular town in Macau thus the line for the bus was long! Imagine we have to wait outside in the long line for the bus with minimal clothing in freezing temperature? It is literally suicidal attempt! I didn't even wear my socks because they were in my luggage which was.....great.
Us. Cramping in the bus. Bus is comfortable, they even got wi-fi and heater :)
The first thing to do when we get to the town was to get myself a thick sweater. We walked separately and just make sure we waited for the bus at the same place it dropped us. We went to store after store but most of the shops sold yet again another high-end brand. I am not that desperate to get a Kenzo leather jacket to warm me.. After wandering around like hours, I finally settled down at Bossini and managed to get a thicker sweater with quite a reasonable price HKD$150 which is equal to RM89.90 when I checked my credit card statement later (-__-) I wanted to get even a cheaper non-branded sweater because I have one back home and I won't be wearing it in hot sunny Malaysia.. But I was desperate and too tired to look for more cheaper stores. Even the jacket couldn't save me from the cold, so I got myself a HKD$149 thick scarf from H&M (which will be in the closet for a long time..) and lucky enough my colleague gave me one glove which she bought 3 pairs per set from H&M. For money exchange, both Hong Kong Dollar and Macao Pattaca (MOP) are accepted here but for us, it is advisable to use HKD as it is easier to change them back to MYR. Be prepared to get the notes in smaller change because most of the shops here will return the change in MOP. Be sure to request for HKD change because some of the cashiers will not inform you and will return the balance in MOP. They wanted to keep HKD as much as they can because of its higher value.
We were wandering around the town aimlessly because it is our first day and we wanted to get familiarize first.. I didn't shop much today because my main point to get a sweater first before anything else! I don't even want to take pictures because I was freezing. There were so many people mostly Chinese and most of them were seen carrying a luggage to shop. Must be for the Chinese New Year. But, I caught 2 or 3 people buying bundle of stuffs from Guardian and I peeked few of luggages contained their shopping for Darlie toothpaste! Yes..they bought like 5-10 boxes of toothpaste!! Why do you need so much? To eat with your bread?!
Oh man, I looked like Nyonya here (-__-)
Then, we headed back to our hotel and walkabout the shops inside. Yeah...we even entered the casinos! It is my first time being in there and I am a bit jakun to see all the roulette tables, the slot machines which I only seen on the TV before. I feel like in the movie set of 21 (stars the sexy Jim Sturgess and Kate Bosworth). The table attendant even invited us to play hahaha. I saw that most of the games start with HKD$200, to let you guys know, just in case.. We even scout for Saffron (Thai restaurants) in the directory and when we reached there, without even looking the menu or made it to the entrance, we took a turn back hahaha. The place is so posh! We can tell even by the elegance door. No way we could afford that, even McDonald here is freaking expensive! Must be because it located in the grand hotel..
You are not allowed to take pictures in Casinos but hopefully they don't find my blog.
Since this is quite a luxury hotel, most of the Chinese people here are so posh!! I just couldn't help myself to stare at their accecories, and they way they dressing themselves from top to toe, all were designers! I felt like a lowest rank in the society with my Longchamp. They were all so pretty and handsome too, they look very polish, tall and I can tell their blood is mix. They are really like coming straight of out movie. They are carrying a Hermes bags, Chanel, YSL.. And oh, but still, they know little English (-___-)
Back to the room, I made myself Maggi and heat my Nasi Himpit with Brahim's chicken rendang. What a life savior! 1 nasi himpit to be shared with 6 people...and eating in a glass/mug. So classy..haha. Definitely an experience. Until the next post.
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