asam tempoyak: Winter Trip

I'm sorry for the extremely late update on my winter trip. Actually the blame is all on the internet at my apartment. Somehow, it doesn't want to cooperate with me. Well, where to start with. My winter trip was 2 weeks long including two days in Dublin before catching a flight to London. Spent 8 days in United Kingdom then another four days in beautiful Spain.

London was not really awesome for me. Its an old city, historic looking and there's too many people. Crowded and havoc. Frankly, we don't really enjoy London. I guess we are too indulge with the peacefulness of Galway. Hehe.. In London, we stayed in an apartment which quite a distance from the city. Nevertheless, it was worth it cause it was really comfy and the owner, Liz was very friendly and nice. I met my friend, Illiany at the Oxford Street. Oxford Street is a famous shopping heaven where you can find many Malaysians there. Trust me, there's too many of Malaysians! Personally, I don't think the price are cheaper unless the brand is really originate from this continent. Like for example, Long Champ brand that is amazingly famous in Malaysia now has a price difference of almost RM500 per bag. Well, you can save a lot but if to compare the price of the ticket. Hurmm, just forget about it. But the designs are different here, so I think somehow it is worth buying. There are too many things to be explored in London especially the musuems and galleries. But in term of cleanliness, its not as clean as you would imagine a Western country will look like. What I mean here, since I was young it has been installed in my mind that those countries are extremely clean but apparently it wasn't. At certain places, to some extent I felt that Malaysia is way cleaner. Owh, and one more thing about London. Halal food is easily available at a very cheap price. What I mean by cheap here is in comparison with the one that we have in Galway/Dublin. Even, if you compare relatively to Malaysian Ringgit (do not convert it) it was still cheaper.

The highlight of London trip for me is London Central Mosque. We were lost in Reagent's Park searching for the mosque and after an hour we finally made it. When we entered the mosque, it was Asr azan. And I cried. Only Allah knows, how much I miss to hear the call, to solat in jamaah in a mosque. Not to fear of anyone looking at you like you are some kind of alien. The feeling was urghh..I cant describe it with words. How I miss Malaysia at that time, because from my house I can easily listen to azan for every prayer times unlike in Galway. I have to install it in my laptop so that I can hear it. Huhu..

After performing Asr prayer, we went to St. Pancras Station to catch our train to Nottingham. To be continued...