Vaccinations and Medical Services from the Clinic Australia

Posted on November 15, 2011 by Curious Cat

photo of strip mall and Klinik Australia fascade

External view the the Clinic Australia

I needed a vaccination booster and so looked for a place to get such services in Johor Bahru. I tried the Clinic Australia, near Plaza Pelangi, and was happy with the results. The clinic is located behind the Plaza Pelangi in the strip mall that hosts a few popular restaurants including: Rosmarino (Italian), Warakuya (Japanese) and Mulligan’s Irish Pub.

The clinic is a small operation in a strip of shops. I don’t think you can make reservations, I didn’t anyway, you just show up and wait as people are taken care of. They offer vaccinations and check ups (for visa, pre-employment and insurance). They also offer flu shots.

photo of the waiting room for the Clinic Austrailia

The waiting room is half of the available space (I think).

Address: 37 Jalan Kuning 2, Taman Peangi, 80400 Johor Bahru.
Phone: 07-3319380
No website or email.

Getting a Voltage Transformer in Johor Bahru

Posted on November 11, 2011 by Curious Cat

As noted earlier, in trying to cope with the noise pollution at my condo, I ordered some devices to help mask the most annoying noises. One of the devices I ordered was sleep mate (which generates “white noise” mechanically). But in my sleep deprived state (from not being able to sleep with all the noise) I didn’t notice that it required 115 volts (this is used in the USA, but Malaysia uses 240 volts).

Ultimax voltage transformer 240 volts to 115 voltes.

In order to use a device that can only take 115 volts you need a transformer to convert the volts down from 240 to 115. Finding such a transformer in Johor Bahru was not easy, but I finally did at a little electronics shop. If you are looking for a voltage converter give them a call. I would try and get this same model – it was far cheaper than other options. And the other options required some additional wiring (the shop is more for electricians than just people wanting a transformer to plug in and use). The staff was very helpful.

Hitectrons store - lots of electronic components

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Growing Your Own Food With a Balcony Vegetable Garden

Posted on November 5, 2011 by Curious Cat

A few years ago I starting growing my own vegetables and I found it incredible convient. You can save money too, but my main purpose is to eat food that taste better and is better for me. I have started a vegetable garden on the balcony of my condo in Johor Bahru.

Front of the nursery by John Hunter.

First I needed to buy some supplies. I was referred to a great nursery two blocks from KSL mall: Skyt Perniagaan Ming.

The planting boxes they have are especially nice. Very light but made of strong plastic. They also have a divider to leave a bit of room at the bottom of the planter for water to drain and the ability to let the water drain out the bottom by removing plugs (if you use it outside). If you use the boxes indoors you can leave the plugs in and it won’t drain out the bottom. They have 2 sizes, I got the smaller ones, which are about 25 cm by 75 cm by 20 cm (deep). They actually suggested the larger size for growing vegetables so we will see if I made a mistake.

Plants inside the nursery

I never used fertilizer when I grew in my yard. I just used some compost and regular dirt. I am using some long release fertilizer at their suggestion for these containers. I barely need to water them as it rains nearly every day heavily enough to water the plants (Since there is a balcony right above mine, there has to be a fair amount of wind and rain for nature to take care of the watering for me).

I didn’t buy enough seed packets at first (the packets don’t have a large number of seeds – many of the types don’t). I have bought more seeds now but in the interim I also just planted some seeds from some peppers and tomates I ate from the grocery store. Those tomato plants seem to be doing great (though I am not sure they will work in these small containers (they are the large, regular, tomatoes).

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KSL Mall in Downtown Johor Bahru

Posted on November 2, 2011 by Curious Cat

KSL Mall is one of 5 fairly large malls in downtown Johor Bahru. The others are Danga City Mall, Plaza Pelangi, City Square (right next to CIQ) and Holiday Plaza Mall. The S1 bus will take you between all the malls and runs about every 20 minutes between 10 AM and 8 PM (and less frequently earlier and later in the day).

KSL Mall in Johor Bahru

KSL mall is the newest and has luxury condo towers still under construction. The photo also shows that the area surrounding the mall all has some shops.

Inside the mall there are many choices for clothing, food, and beauty salons. The tenants include Tesco, MBO Cinemas and Sleep to Live. MBO Cinemas is one of the better options for watching movies in Johor Bahru. I would estimate there are over 60 stores (not including restaurants).

Some of the restaurants I like: Sushi King, The Manhattan Fish Market (my one order so far was great and seemed more Malaysian than Manhattan to me) and BreadTalk (bakery). I would guess there are over 40 places to eat.

For the downtown malls I believe City Square is the most used by visitors from Singapore (it is so close to CIQ that it is very convenient). KSL Mall and Danga City Mall (especially for computer and electronic equipment) are the others with the largest amount of Singapore visitors. Though the majority of Singapore visitors go to several of the larger malls outside of downtown, I believe. The malls get very busy on the weekends, with lots of visitors from Singapore, and also others who are off work for the weekend. During the week the traffic in the malls is often very light. The sales staff seems to spend more time using their cell phones (to I am guessing IM with friends) than anything else, during the week.

As with all of the malls I have visited here they have space to let out for daily or multi-day events that usually include incredibly loud speakers. The speakers are often blasting out more than enough decibels to damage your ears anytime you need to get by that area of the mall. I would imagine this helps explain why loud noises don’t seem to bother people so much (once you lose hearing from exposure to lots of excessively loud noise you don’t notice it – because of hearing loss).

Mee Bandung at JB Station Kopitiam

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Curious Cat

There are several good restaurants on the bottom level of the Danga City Mall in downtown Johor Bahru. One of my favorites is JB Station Kopitiam. I have had at least 5 meals at JB Station Kopitiam, all have been excellent (and they have been under RM 10). A kopitiam is a traditional breakfast and coffee shop found in Southeast Asia. The word is a concatenation of the Malay word for coffee and the Hokkien dialect word for shop.

photo of JB Station Kopitiam at Danga City Mall

JB Station Kopitiam at Danga City Mall in Johor Bahru by John Hunter

I still don’t know the names of lots of Malaysian food, so one nice thing about JB Station is they have photos so I can find a picture of something that looks interesting. A decent number of restaurants do that, however, at the same time, a large number have no menu at all (especially the outdoor stalls, but also some indoor restaurants). I am not completely sure but I think the photo shows my order of Mee Bandung (a dish originating in Johor).

Mee Bandung, is a cuisine originally consisted of only noodles and eggs in soup made of the mixture of chilli, onion, spices, shrimp paste and dried shrimp. Over time the Mee Bandung recipe had been added to with the addition of shrimp, meat, fish cakes and vegetables. One thing I have noticed is the small Malaysian restaurants have a full or half hard boiled or fried egg on top of many dishes.

The lime juice is freshly squeezed and quite good.

photo of Mee Bandung soup and lime juice

Mee Bandun and lime juice from JB Station Kopitiam

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Johor Bahru Beach

Posted on October 23, 2011 by Curious Cat

Johor Bahru is not known for long sandy beaches. But it does actually have a beach, see the photo. This is over near the Zon (duty free area) where the ferry is. Singapore is visible across the water. Swimming might not be the greatest idea, though I did see 2 people swimming once.

Johor Bahru beach (you see about the whole sandy beach in this photo)

You can also find some people selling fresh seafood along the walk. It actually is a nice walk along the water. If the city did a better job of featuring it, it is possible to make it into something really nice. I don’t see anything about the walk in Penang along Gurnsey drive that is any nicer.

But if you really want a beach Malaysia has plenty of great beaches. Langkawi is the best beach location I have been to yet.

Bus to Jusco in Permas Jaya

Posted on October 11, 2011 by Curious Cat

I took the bus from downtown Johor Bahru to the Jusco (hypermarket) in Permas Jaya. From downtown you take bus number 123 which a passenger told me runs every 20 minutes. Of the supermarkets I have been to so far in JB that Jusco has been by far the best. I have tried a couple Tesco’s and a Carfour and one other Jusco (a complete disaster area, the store was a complete mess, the signs said things were 50% off then when you took them to the counter they said they were not – 3 different items from 2 different locations).

Inside of a Johor Bahru 123 line bus, by John Hunter.

The Permas Jaya Jusco store itself is very clean and orderly. The prices seem the best to me. The vegetables were great this time (the first time I really checked). A great selection and very fresh looking. And the prices were great. I picked up baby asparagus, peppers, potatoes, Japanese and “regular” cucumbers. I am not a cook. My cooking tops out at microwaving the asparagus for a few seconds, reheating some Indian food or putting peanut butter on a roll.

Unfortunately the Jusco is a bit out of the way for me. I want to get familiar with the bus transportation though so I will be taking some trips. I can’t find anything good online that explains the bus routes. If anyone knows of a good source of information please let me know.

I went to the Village Briyani Cafe today and had chicken briyani. It was great.

Salahuddin Bakery, Downtown Johor Bahru

Posted on October 5, 2011 by Curious Cat

This bakery in downtown Johor Bahru has excellent breads and great prices. It is downtown in the historic district. It is on the same block as the Masjid India (an Indian Mosque).

Bread at Johor Bahru Bakery

Muffins and breads

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P1 Broadband Wimax in Johor Bahru, Malaysia

Posted on September 20, 2011 by Curious Cat

Update: P1 is unreliable, do not consider them for anything but a backup. Once they provide historical and real time uptime and real speed data from a 3rd party then you can think of considering them. In 6 weeks they have been down multiple days for multiple hours. One day for 1 hour would be bad. Being down several hours in a month would be very bad. They have been that unreliable and down multiple weeks (I think 50% of the weeks) for multiple hours a multiple days. Extremely poor. They don’t even have bother to apologize and explain each failure (at least 3 long term very serious failures in 6 weeks). As I stated in the last update, that tells you enough them to avoid P1, if you are smart. And it also explains why they keep failing over and over and over (when they don’t even acknowledge the causes of the failures, maybe they don’t even figure them out).

Finding a decent provider isn’t easy, the reviews online make it seem like P1 is as good as any provider (maybe Unify is best but it is offered on in very limited locations).

I needed broadband internet for my condo in Johor Bahru. In looking at the various options they seemed pretty similar. P1 offers the highest speed I saw 5Mbps and 30Gb a month (for the RM 139 a month plan) and so that seemed best to me. They also offer a 7 day trial period which was nice. And you can use it in 2 hours (after some setup by their system to activate your modem), which is nice. You can check out if your area is covered.

My speed was pretty bad at first. I was able to get support through Twitter. After awhile they said they would monitor the modem from their side. Then they said they made tweaks to the modem and things actually do seem better. I really wonder what they do to speed it up? The speed is still not near 5 Mbps. If I average 1.5 Mbps I would be surprised. I have only had it for about a week now so I do need to get more data. Today it has been above 2 Mbps for much of the day so if that continues it could be good (I even had 2 tests where it was nearly 4 Mbps – the average today may well be above 3). But it does seem 5 Mbps is much more a marketing gimick that what you can expect. But I don’t know if p1’s difference from their marketing is any more exaggerated than anyone else. Also I probably need close to 30 Gb so that factor matters to. If I could average 3 Mbps and had very little downtown (99.5% uptime) I will happy.

I have had several 10 or 15 min times already where I was trying to get online and couldn’t. I am hoping that is maybe initial setup issues (though really that doesn’t make much sense which is why I am just hoping). p1 has been good enough that I am passing the 7 day mark without cancelling, hopefully I won’t regret it.

I think I would have gone with Unify. They are a land-line provider which should be more reliable (historically the problem with landlines has been slow customer service and high fees, Unify is meant to address these issues and seems to be doing better on those scores). Unify’s VIP 5 plan offers 5 Mbps download and 60 Gb per month. Really I think if I was smart this is what I should have done. It takes awhile to setup and I think the upfront charges are more. I might even get Unify on top of p1 (just because I am so reliant on the internet to do my job). I really can’t have outages or it can be a serious problem. Probably it would have been smart to get the Unify package and then the a cheaper p1 plan. Oh well, trying to do all the things I have to do to get setup has been pretty stressful, making a few mistakes isn’t so horrible. I’ll just have to earn more money so I can afford to add Unify (or maybe I’ll find just P1 is enough).
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Hotels and Accommodations in Malaysia

Posted on August 29, 2011 by Curious Cat

I have added a page on the site with links to good hotels and accommodations in Malaysia. At this time it covers 4 areas: Kuala Lumpur, Langkawi, Penang and Johor Bahru. Different people have different desires for a hotel room. And at different times even the same person does. In general I prefer to save my money by using discount lodging, but I splurge occasionally – especially if I can get a great deal. I did that, when I stayed at the Prince Hotel & Residence Kuala Lumpur and it was wonderful.

I also have found nice discount places and some in-between. I really nice place in Johor Bahru is Bliss Boutique Hotel that has very distinctive room designs. They also have great staff. If you don’t mind small rooms it is a great choice for Johor Bahru.

Beach, Sunset Resort in Langkawi, Malaysia by John Hunter

Langkawi is a wonderful place to vacation and relax at the beach. I stayed at the Sunset Beach Resort which had very simple and well maintained bungalows. One of the best “features” was a great Indian restaurant on the beach – right next store to the hotel.

A great hotel in Penang is the G Hotel on Gurney Drive.

Living in Malaysia

Category Archives: Johor Bahru

Vaccinations and Medical Services from the Clinic Australia

Getting a Voltage Transformer in Johor Bahru

Growing Your Own Food With a Balcony Vegetable Garden

KSL Mall in Downtown Johor Bahru

Mee Bandung at JB Station Kopitiam

Johor Bahru Beach

Bus to Jusco in Permas Jaya

Salahuddin Bakery, Downtown Johor Bahru

P1 Broadband Wimax in Johor Bahru, Malaysia

Hotels and Accommodations in Malaysia