正当我还在巡班时,维俊告诉我这个星期五晚上华文班顾问老师,叶老师请了华文班理事一起吃晚餐,地点为 Station 1。一想到我这次的假期并没回家,我就爽口地答应了他。心想叶老师大概想与我们一伙儿一起提前庆祝新年吧。不过大多数的位委员都不能出席因为已经回家乡了。
星期五那天早上,我传了一则短讯给维俊,询问该间餐厅是否和回教 halal 的准则。由于我很少出去吃,大多数都是在大学内的食堂吃饭,因此并不是那么了解在外头的餐厅。更何况,伊斯兰教徒是比较注重饮食的,而且一定要是 halal 的。因此呢,对于事物的要求会比较高一点咯,嗯,就是那么的一点儿罢了。然而,我后来得知此餐厅有售卖啤酒,而且没有 halal 的执照。维俊了解情况后,决定换地点去
OldTown White Cafe。根据 Hayati,这儿应该是可以的。于是,大伙儿迁离到 OldTown那儿。
抵达目的地后,趁老师还没来当儿,大家忙着把桌子合拼以揍足十二个位子。不久老师与老婆大人到了。大家聊了一阵子,而我呢,呵呵,手痒痒就翻了翻此餐厅的菜单。哎呀,都是蛮贵的哟。简单的一碟菜就已经超过了十令吉,那些招牌咖啡也是价值不菲的。如果常来这里的话,尤其是对于我们这些还没开始工作的学生,算了,来一次就已经足于让钱包大出血了。幸好这次是由老师出钱,那我就不客气了,对不起啊老师嘻嘻。眼睛再次扫描了菜单,看看哪些合我胃口。哎哟,太多选择了。不知道该如何是好。噢对了,也许参考 Cyrus 一下吧。不过呢,他也似乎还在忙着寻找他的菜肴。随便啦,既然经常在大学里的餐馆都可以吃到鸡,那我就把所有与鸡有关的菜肴都删除。果然,轻松了不少。好吧,那我就点一盘海南鱼饭,听起来是有点怪怪的。哈哈。不过味道应该不错因为是蛮贵的一下。
对了,其实 OldTown White 有一个基金,叫做 OldTown Children Care Fund (OCAF),是为那些比较不幸儿童所成立的。
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| screenshot of their main site regarding the charity |
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| OldTown is helping the underprivileged children |
点好食物后,大家又继续聊天。这是很件很难的事情,大家都很难有空坐在一起谈天,由于不同的科系及宿舍也不同,大家都很难碰面。大家对即将来临的新年都十分期待。有些今晚回,有些则明天。心想只有我一个人没回家吧,突然发现 Hayati 也同样是没回家,但是忘了问她其原因。正当我们还在很投入于咱们的话题时,有位招待员前来询问是谁点了 E04 配套。原来在菜单上并没有 E04 这种配套。十二双眼睛顿时四周张望,寻找是谁点的。后来才发现原来纯粹是一场误会,应该是 104,但是被误会为 E04。哈哈。这尴尬的情况就这样的被笑声化解了。
等啊等,就在肚子开始开始示威时,终于我所点的准备好了。万岁! 我的海南鱼饭终于来了。在还没开始吃前,我请 Cyrus 帮我照了张相,还是他的相机比较好,我的相机拍出来的效果实在是太差劲了,不好意思刊登在此。呵呵。
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| 海南鱼饭 Hainan Fish Rice |
过后,大家所点的菜都陆陆续续被端前来了。还是医肚子为重,大家都享用美味晚餐。不知道为何,叶老师所点的竟然是最后才被端来的,而且是在大家都已经吃饱 了后才来的。吃饱后,叶夫人才透露集餐的用意,那就是为了一起庆祝叶老师的生日。哦,原来叶老师的生日是在一月三十日。招待员这次端来了一个水果蛋糕,上 面插着四根蜡烛。咱们一起为叶老师唱生日歌,过后突然有人建议唱英语版的,多后有建议唱其他方言版的。哎呀,我不会唱他所要的方言生日歌,结果在旁装傻。 哈哈。
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| 单据 receipt |
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| a group photo with Yek Laoshi |
最后,咱们来张全体照留念。谢谢着美好的晚餐,叶老师。生日快乐及新年快乐!
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While I was checking on the Mandarin classes on Monday, Wei Chun told me that the teacher in charge of HYB, Mr Yek planned to have dinner with the HYB committees at Station 1 cafe. I was an exceptance, I'm not one of the committees but since I've been a tutor for so many semesters, I was honoured to come this time. Since I don't return to my hometown, I agreed spontaneously. Perhaps Mr Yek decided to have an early Chinese New Year celebration with us, but I reckon quite a lot of the committees have returned back to their hometown by that time.
I sent a short message to ask for confirmation if the restaurant has
halal certificate. Since I rarely go out for meal outside of UTM, hence I don't really know much about the restaurants outside. Moreover, Islam is quite strict on the food issue, only
halal food is allowed to be taken. To be on the safe side, it's always better to check on the restaurant before hand. Later I was told that beer is sold in this restaurant too, so it's most likely that the restaurant doesn't have a
halal certificate. After understood the situation, Wei Chun decided to change the location to
OldTown White Coffee instead. According to Hayati, one of the HYB committees, this place is ok. Hence, we moved to OldTown instead.
Upon reaching the cafe, we arranged the tables to fit in 12 people before the arrival of Mr Yek. When the teacher arrived with his wife, we had a great chat with them. As for me, well, I browsed through the menu for a bit. Gosh, it's really expensive to eat here. Any dish in the menu can easily go beyond RM10, even the coffee here won't lose to Starbucks in sense of price. If I were to come here frequently, umm even if only once, it's enough to upset my wallet. Luckily all the meal is on Mr Yek's tab this time, so I'll just close an eye on the price this time. hehe. My eyes scanned through the menu again, ugh too many choices. Geez, which one should I choose. Maybe I should ask Cyrus who sat next to me, for some opinion. However, he seemed to be busy searching for his own food too. Oh well, whatever, I'll just make it quick. Since I can have chicken everyday at the cafe in my uni, I would just eliminate all the dishes that has chicken as main ingredient, Ah hah, suddenly it seemed a lot easier to make my choice. I picked Hainan Fish Rice, the name's a bit weird. hehe. But I guess the taste should be nice since it's quite costy.
By the way, in case if you don't know, OldTown has set up a charity fund for children, namely OldTown Children Care Fund (OCAF) to help those underprivileged children in Malaysia. Well, I only know this when I visited this cafe.
After made our choices, we continued to chat. It's been a pleasure to meet up with my friends in HYB. We don't get much chances to meet up like this due to various reasons like different faculty and living in different hostel. All of us are really anticipating the upcoming Chinese New Year. Some are returning tonight whereas others are returning tomorrow. I first thought that I was the only one who didn't return during this holiday, but little did I know that Hayati, one of the committees in HYB didn't return too but I forgot to ask for her reason that time. While we're so much into our conversation, suddenly a waiter popped up to inquire about the E04 meal set. It appeared that there isn't any E04 meal set in the menu. All the 12 pairs of eyes started to look for the culprit. Apparently, it was just a misunderstanding, someone misheard 104 (yi ling si) for E04 (E ling si). Everyone burst into laughter and laughed away this awkward situation.
Waiting and waiting, when my tummy has reached the limit and about to start grumbling, a waiter brought my meal over. Yay. Here comes my Hainanese Fish Rice. Before I sank my teeth into the food, I asked for Cyrus who sat next to me to take a picture of my food. Of course, his camera is much better than me, hence it's wiser to use his camera instead for the purpose of uploading them in my blog.
The meal for the others were delivered one after another, everyone enjoyed their meal to the fullest tonight, except for poor Mr Yek whose meal only arrived after almost everyone finished theirs. After finished the meal, Mrs Yek revealed the real intention of the dinner, that is to celebrate Mr Yek's birthday which fall on the 29th of January. Oh, I didn't know that, ugh am I really that outdated? A waiter carried a fruit cake with four candles stuck on it to our table. After lighted the candle, we sang a birthday song for our teacher. Later, someone suggested to sing the birthday song in English, then in another Chinese dialect, gosh, I don't know how to sing in dialect, so I'm just laughing that time. hehe. Before we end the party, we took a group photo.
Thanks for the memorable dinner, Mr and Mrs Yek. Happy birthday and Happy Chinese New Year too.