Part 1: Desa Sri Hartamas

I had to go to this part of town because part of a tooth had freed itself from its moorings, and I needed a dentist. The one my colleague recommended operates out of Desa Sri Hartamas.

Apart from the dental results (easy short-term fix, but severe pain on the long-term horizon), it turned out this was a delightful little place to explore. Tree-lined streets, and low-rise buildings, arranged around little squares. A multiplicity of Korean and Japanese enterprises (apparently to suit the demographic), and gazillions of attractive cafes and restaurants.

This time (note how I'm gloomily anticipating another visit...) we picked BreadFruits, and I was really impressed with my Spanish pork belly and pumpkin. They describe it as "paprika marinated pork belly harmonized by the sweetness of roasted pumpkin and creaminess of harissa sauce and sunny side up", and it comes with roasted cherry tomatoes, rocket, and crispy toast. It's a really fabulous combo, with each element executed perfectly. And it went very well with a juice made of beetroot, orange, banana, and carrot.

Catching the bus home proved to be a little taxing, as the spot where the buses all gather is not marked, and there were in fact no gathered buses the first time we swung by. But by dint of following a bus (yes, really...), and waiting at the first visible bus stop, we got ourselves ferried to this mysterious meeting spot, and then had a very nice ride home, via a route that lets you experience all the contrast of Kiara condominiums and kampung conviviality.





Part 2: The MPO

Last night we had a Frenchman's take on flamboyant Spain (Ravel's Alborada del gracioso); a Russian's ambivalent take on Soviet Russia (Prokofiev's Sinfonia concertante, with its ludicrously difficult solo cello part and its convoluted history); and a Russian's take on a very fluid "Middle East" (Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade).

The latter was especially lovely. It's full-on Orientalism, of course, with its "exotic, Middle Eastern-sounding melodic solos" and its "snake charmer" qualities.

But it's quite mesmerizing. That poignant theme, played by solo violin... Those harp chords... And those final, silvery notes. So quiet and ethereal it seems it's all been a dream...

Scheherazade is a story-teller, of course. But actually in each piece of music, "it's all about the story"... "To be alive is to possess the ability to tell a story." And those amazing mortals who can tell that story in music are -- well, no longer mortal.

We don't know the precise origins of The 1001 Nights. But for me (on the basis of no evidence whatsoever), it has to be Iran, which is quintessentially the land of story-telling...



Part 3: Terengganu

At the Bank Negara Art Gallery at the moment, Chang Fee Ming takes a long look at the small towns and beaches and kampungs of Terengganu, his home state. His eye lingers lovingly on local lives, and without glamorization, succeeds in portraying the everyday routine of laundry and fishing and playing as both beautiful and moving.







"To travel and see and paint is for me a way of learning, part of my life philosophy," he says. Amen to that...

And the sunlight, the bright patterns of the clothing, the fish, the wayang kulit, the wooden houses -- all these things reach out beyond Terengganu to a much wider region, a region that I love with all my heart.



Coda: Assam laksa

In one of Chang's watercolours, a child stands on a beach, some fish at his feet. The painting is entitled something along the lines of: "Mum, how about fish soup for tea?" I bet what he wanted was assam laksa... Which I've now had twice recently, and still consider one of Malaysia's finest achievements. Today's was from Onde Onde, and was rich and hearty. But the lighter one from Kluang Station at Quill was not at all bad either.

I'll leave with one of our memories from Terengganu, back in 2012: