Today was an excellent day for many reasons:

1) I've had my first episode of die - a - rrhoea! Yes! Now my Malaysian experience is complete! Now I can finally go on to doing other things having ticked this one off my list. (It actually hurts, owww... it's so painful.... arrrghh.... why does it have to hurt so badly.... make it stop, Mummy...)

(addendum: if you're in your home country on holiday and you get diarrhoea, does it count as traveller's diarrhoea? I mean, technically, you're at home, right?)

2) Seeing My Sister! Mum and I took a leisurely drive down to M to visit my lil' sister who was studying for her exams... it was awesome seeing her after all this time, and yes, you have lost weight. And no, those shoes don't make you look fat. (They make me look gemuk apparently, hee hee!)

It was a really pleasant drive down to Melaka to visit my sister. We took the lovely drive down the highway, and had music playing in the background, just like the good old days when the whole family would squeeze in the car and then drive off along the highway with the Abba, or the Beatles or even James Galway to keep us company all the way up to Ipoh or Penang.

And then seeing my sister after so long - a long hug and then we set off to pick up her boyfriend who I was seeing for the first time. He was quite a nice guy, well mannered and funny with a good common sense around him as well.

We drove to the town, and passed by the lovely remnants of the clay red A F, with the ghosts of the Portuguese still very evident in the town. We even passed by some people refurbishing an honest-to-goodness ship which speaks of this town's seaport heritage. And we're not talking yachts, or cruisers. We're talking armada ships, the kind people put together piece by painstaking piece in little bottles as a hobby. Yeah,  the life sized version of that one.

We had lunch at a nice enough Nyonya restaurant, where I had the most bizarre deep fried squid ever. It looked smaller than small onion rings, like these were made from little squiddie dwarves. It was like eating deep fried rubber bands. The small rubber bands.

But that was all than made up for with the lovely assam fish and the fried belachan paku pakis and the chicken kapitan. But the tour de force, the piece de resistance, the most amazing thing that we had in that shop was the chendol.

For the uninitiated, the chendol is a Malaysian delicacy where you fill the base with red beans and chendol - these long green wormlike things made up from long green worms (okay, so it's green flour, allow me a little Calvin-esque grossness) - and then you put some ice shavings on top ala ais kacang, and then you pour on the evaporated milk and the gula melaka.

All the difference in the world was in that gula melaka, which originates from that state, and it was beautiful. I rarely italicise that word, so please believe me when I say that it was like the first bite of the perfectly made Giorgio's Sticky Date Pudding, it was like the first kiss of a lover returning home from a long trip overseas, it was like taking the red pill. 

I have never seen chendol in this light before, and I'm not sure I would ever eat our KL variety again without longing for the sweet brown sugar that is the gula Melaka.

We had more than one helping, of course, and then made our way for some nice small town shopping before saying goodbye, too soon, to the both of them, but promising to see each other again soon. See you back soon, little sis!

3) The Drive Home. I've never made it a secret that I love driving along the rolling highways of Malaysia, and this drive home was made all the more pleasant as I had Mum for company. I love hearing my Mum speak sometimes, and I know that there are friends whose parents are the quiet Asian stereotype, so I'm really starting to appreciate Mum for who she is.  

We ended off the drive with dinner at the KFC near our place, and I have often said this and, I will say it again - Malaysia has the best KFC in the world. Hands down. Many of my friends will agree with me, and if you don't believe me, then just come here and enjoy the huge chicken pieces rolled in the golden batter cooked to perfection, and then you have the privilege of unlimited sauce. Tomato, chilli and Thai sweet chilli.

Unlimited sauce. I'm going to say that in my sleep. That, and gula Melaka.