Where Rex the dinosaur finds solace

Where Rex the dinosaur finds solace

By Stephen Ng

Peter Hoe Evolution and Peter Hoe Beyond have received raving reviews in both the New York Times and TIME magazine.

Even the Lonely Planet has featured Peter Hoe Evolution as a place where “original batik designs on sarongs, shirts and dresses are the main draw here but you'll also find many tastefully arranged Malaysian and imported Asian home goods, too.”

Few Malaysians know of these two lifestyle stores established since 1990. While Peter Hoe Evolution is easily spotted at the corner of Jalan Hang Lekir and Jalan Tun HS Lee, Peter Hoe Beyond is “hidden” on the second floor of the Lee Rubber Building – where outside, it is the unmistaken hustle and bustle of Petaling Street, but within, the concept home decor shop of 8,600 square feet and a café.

Relaxing and cozy

This is the place LiteFM’s announcer, Rex the “dinosaur” found to be cozy and relaxing. “It is interesting that foreign tourists know about this place, but not many of my fellow Malaysians,” said the 24-year-old, who helms LiteFM’s Smooth Drive, from 4pm through 8pm on weekdays.

“It was a fellow announcer, Non (Aanont Wathansin) who first introduced the place to me after the KL Rat Race in 2008 when he suggested that we have a cup of coffee at the Peter Hoe café in Lee Rubber Building. Since then, I have fallen in love with the place.”

Describing Peter Hoe’s Café as the perfect place to be in on a Sunday afternoon, Rex Musadek (who since the age of 19 had been on radio and known more by his alias, “Rex”) said he particularly loves the variety and the colours of things here.

“I get a new experience every time I come here,” he quipped. “I don’t have to travel very far to see everything. They are all here. These house décor items simply make the place come alive. Every item adds character to the place. Although these are not antiques, I like the authenticity of each item. The music is also something good for a change.”

Admittedly, Rex said he had had several dates at the café. “The place gives a nice and cozy atmosphere, where we can chat for hours,” he suggested. “I particularly like the coffee here.”

Occasionally, when he needed a place where he could get some inspirations for his show, this is the place where he would come with a pencil and a piece of paper. “Put it in another way, I come here just to broaden my mind. When I look at each item, it helps me to think out of the box,” he said, revealing the secret of how he obtained his inspirations for his daily show.

To host the show every weekday, Rex has to look out for interesting information on “everything under the sun,” whether it is the arts and culture happenings, entertainment gossip or food bits & bites.

For one whole hour from 4pm, he has his “Music Shuffle”, where he allows listeners to decide what music to play on air, followed by “Your Point Is…” (at 5pm), “80’s Take Shop” (6pm) and finally “Guess the artist” (7pm- 8pm), where he allows his listeners to figure out who is the singer that sings the "I" from a song chosen for the day.

The LiteFM announcer, whose theme song is “Born to Run” by Bruce Springsteen, is also an avid marathoner. His fans will once again see him in action this year, when he will run the 42-km Borneo Marathon on May 1 and again on June 28, in the First Ultra Marathon in Singapore where the marathoners are given 17 hours to finish a 100-km marathon.

“So far, my best marathon was the 42-km Borneo Marathon in 2010, where it took me 5 hours 4 min to complete,” he said, comparing it with his first marathon the year before where he took 5 hours 50 minutes to do the same distance in the Penang Bridge Marathon.

Meet the owner

According to Peter Hoe – the man himself behind the two lifestyle stores and the café -- there is so much history in this “loft like” on the second floor of the Lee Rubber Building.

Built in 1932 by a rubber magnate, industrialist, banker and philanthropist, Lee Kong Chian, who founded Lee Rubber Company, a well-known rubber plantation company in Malaysia, the Lee Rubber Building used to house Public Bank but now it is occupied by Popular Bookstore. It has been earmarked as a Heritage Building by the Heritage of Malaysia Trust.

“This entire floor which we occupy now had once served as the headquarters for the Japanese secret police during World War II,” he said.

Now, the place has come back to life again. “Products are tailor-made for us from all over South East Asia and China,” he explained. “I travel to these places and directly order from the manufacturers.”

To make sure that his wide range of home decors stands out, the store is kept very basic. Even the floor is not tiled, and the tables used for the café are somewhat simple and made of spare wood, but add character to the place.

Hoe had earlier served us his favourite Thai Chicken Salad, Garlic Parmesan with Walnuts and Spinach, and the Carrot Quiche. The quiche is originally from France but the ones served here, as well as all the other dishes, are Peter Hoe’s own recipes. Occasionally, Hoe himself waits on the table and personally serves his foreign guests, which he says, “as a token of appreciation” for travelling around the world to see his collection.

Directions to get there: Rex said he does not drive. For him, the easiest way to get to Peter Hoe Beyond at Lee Rubber Building is traveling by LRT to Pasar Seni LRT Station. From there, it’s just a short walk towards Petaling Street. Peter Hoe Beyond (03-20269788) is located at 145 Jalan Tun H. S. Lee, on the second floor of Lee Rubber Building (above Popular Bookshop), while Peter Hoe Evolution is located at 2 Jalan Hang Lekir, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (03-20260711). The shops are open daily, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.

UK FARM:

Shepherd boy for a day

By Stephen Ng

Some of us would have secretly wished to experience life on the paddock, when visiting Australia or New Zealand, but the amount and time spent with sheep, goats and the cattle, is somewhat of a deterrent for many, who would otherwise have enjoyed back-to-nature stay in the outback.

The idea of being a shepherd boy for the day no longer has to take a back stage, especially when it is now possible to bring the entire family to experience farm life, with some 5,000 sheep and other farm animals.

The children, especially those below 10, would definitely find the stay interesting because they too can enjoy feeding the lamb and the kids.

For the adults, spending an hour or two would be sufficient to feel what it is like to shepherd the sheep into then pen, with the help of some well-trained sheep dogs.

It is no wonder that a total of 146,000 tourists have visited the 100-acre UK Farm, between May, when the agro-resort first started, and December last year.

Located within the Modern Agriculture Project in the district of Kluang, the resort is an hour’s drive from Singapore, and about three hours from Kuala Lumpur, making it the latest attraction for tourists from the island republic. Singaporeans make up 45 per cent of his guests.

In fact, as its agro-entrepreneur and Managing Director, Goh Un Keng, 46, put it, the number of visitors to UK Farm (named after Goh’s initials) has, in fact, increased seven fold, from 5.587 visitors in May 2010 to 35,936 in December because of the school holidays in Malaysia and Singapore.

“One thing a lot of people will notice is the cleanliness around the farm,” he said, showing a posh and modern public toilet which has been recently renovated.

“We have tourists from overseas who are deeply impressed with our management of the farm,” he added. “Even our Taiwanese visitors said they were pleased with what they saw.”

The rest of the visitors are either local, or from Taiwan and China. Goh has recently signed an agreement with his partners in three countries to bring in 5,000 tourists from China, another 5,000 from Taiwan and 3000 from Hong Kong every year.

How it started

UK Farm first started in 2007, when Goh was invited by the Ministry of Agriculture and Agro-Based Industry to set up the sheep farm after demonstrating his ability to successfully manage the HACCP certified fresh goat milk production facility – the first in the country and one of six HACCP certified goat milking stations, at Parit Yaani in Yong Peng, Johor.

He first invested in 1,000 sheep for a start, but the number gradually multiplied to some 5,000 within a span of three years. The 100-acre land, which he leased from the government, was gradually turned into a self-sufficient integrated farm, with sheep, goats, ostriches, horses, passion fruits, pineapples, organic vegetables – and soon, by August this year, grapes and apples.

Besides the Ostrich Park and Passion Fruit Plantation, there is also a Herb Sanctuary, Mushroom Farm, Sakai Village, Lotus Pond, Deer Farm and a mini-zoo.

Visitors can take either the UK Farm “safari-style” bus ride or go horse carting around the farm. Instead of the car honks and screeching of brakes, here, one will enjoy and learn that the sheep “baa…baa….baa” (or rather, bleat) and the goats “neah, neah…”

For once, Old McDonald’s farm came alive. The green pastures, planted with high protein Guinea grass, make the farm most inviting.

For the feeding station, the pen houses some 15 species of sheep and goats from ten different countries, which allows children to learn how to differentiate the different species.

“Since our visitors especially from Singapore enjoyed farm life, we decided to turn this into an Agro-resort in May last year,” said Goh, promising that there will be many more activities for the entire family.

Goh has also urged teachers of schools and kindergartens to organize day trips to the farm as part of the children’s education, so that they will learn to appreciate the farm animals. This is also the best classroom there is to learn how to differentiate between a ram (male sheep), an ewe (female sheep) and a lamb (young).

In 2011, Goh hopes to bring in some 300,000 visitors to the farm. “We are confident that this agro-resort has the potential to attract both local and foreign tourists,” he said.

If visitors are keen, they can also learn the entire farming process in the Parit Yaani (in Yong Peng) station, starting from bringing the goats for milking, learning about the disinfection practices, inspecting the quality of the goat milk, installing the cup milker, pasteurization and bottling goat milk.

The Yong Peng branch was, in fact, Goh’s first agro-based project, where he started rearing goats for the milk in 2001. Here, he currently has 2,000 goats which produce milk to be exported to Singapore and Brunei.

Accommodation

Day visitor, M. Karuppiah, 55, who toured the farm, said he enjoyed the Sakai Village the most. “I find it intriguing to see the Orang Asli wearing clothes which they made out of the tree bark,” he said. “This is a culture which needs to be preserved.”

Karuppiah was also impressed with the tree house and the cage set up to trap the tiger. “I plan to come here to stay with my friends for a couple of days,” he said, after being shown around the entire farm. “I enjoy the afternoon breeze. It’s something that I can’t find in Subang Jaya where I live.”

Visitors are allowed to harvest the pineapples and the passion fruits, besides riding on some of the animals.

Groups of students can stay overnight in the dormitory, which can take up to 250 pax a night, while families can live in the chalets, which can take up to 40 pax a night.

To make sure guests can stay in touch with the rest of the world, Goh provides WiFi access to his guests. There is also a camp site of two acres, with space for 300 camps, and separate restroom facilities. Campfire, BBQ and roast lamb facilities are also available.

The success of this farm is due to the hard work of Goh, and his 60-men team, in helping to realise he objectives of the Core Policy Agricultural Development Programme under ninth Malaysia Plan, formulated to transform the country’s agriculture sector to become a modern, viable and competitive modern agriculture sector.

AN ENTIRELY HERBAL WORLD

AN ENTIRELY HERBAL WORLD

By Stephen Ng

Bougainvillea may be very common in most Malaysian homes, but probably not many people know that the flowers are considered a kind of herb.

The flower petals can be made into soup or cooked with omelette. This is in fact the way how Tiang Koon Cheong introduces visitors to the world of herbs, when they visited his herbal farm at Kilometre 10, Jalan Kuala Klawang in Seremban.

Tiang’s Indonesian maid prepared three dishes of omelette – one cooked with the flower petals from the Bougainvillea, another with the leaves from the Star of Alternanthera (known also as Bintang Merah or Bintang Langit), and a third from the Drooping clinacanthus (local name: Pokok Mulut Buaya).

Offering both local and foreign visitors a free tour of his 34-acre of herbal farm, where he has already grown over 700 species of herbs since 2005, Tiang is an ardent believer in the wonders of natural herbs.

Herbs as vegetable dishes

“In the past, people take herbs only to cure their illnesses,” he enthused. “What’s more important is for people to treat herbs as vegetables that they can prepare into dishes or soup for the entire family.”

In some countries, he added, herbs are gaining popularity as a vegetable dish. “For example, in China, one kilogram of Dry moglossu piloselloides can cost about Renmibi 6,” he said. “People are consuming it, because herbs are generally good for health. You do not wait until you fall ill before looking for a cure in the herbs. Prevention is better than cure.”

Tiang, an ardent believer in the wonders of herbs, emphasized again: “Prevention is better than cure.” This has become Tiang’s slogan for many years, whenever he has the opportunity to speak passionately about the herbs.

Tiang’s indulgence into the herbal world has an interesting history. The 70-year-old claimed that in 1967, he was very sick from some liver problems. On the advice from friends, he started taking herbs. Within a matter of months, his health condition started to improve.

Some herbs and benefits

According to Khoo, the herbs are grown here using organic fertilisers produced from vermiculture, where worms are used to compost food wastes in a bin. The farm does not use chemical pesticides.

Some of these species are processed into traditional medicine or served as tea or fried as a vegetable dish. “The benefits are simply too many to mention,” he said.

For example, the Drooping Clinacanthus (known as Pokok Mulut Buaya), he claimed, can help with pain caused by pyretic or inflammation of liver which usually leads to jaundice.

Some herbs such as the Asiatic pennywort known locally as pegaga (Centella asiatica (L) Urban ) are easy to grow. “The entire plant can be used as an antipyretic to reduce fever, or to treat sore throat, bronchitis, hypertension or injury due to bone fracture,” he added.

For people suffering from high uric acid, Khoo recommended the Cat’s Whiskers- Orthosiphon aristatus (Blume) Miq (local name: Misai Kuching). “The entire plant can also be used to treat kidney stones, arthritis, diabetes, rheumatism, diuretic and bladder stones,” he said.

The Gynura Bicolor, which can be fried and served as a dish, is good because it helps to promote blood circulation and antibleeding. “It is also antidote to reduce swelling, diabetes, cough with blood, abdominal pain due to blood stasis after delivery,” Khoo said.

For the diabetic, Stevia Leaves can be used to replace sugar in cooking or making coffee because it has a natural sweetness. Stevia leaves can also be eaten fresh. “However,” Khoo warned, “Stevia leaves are not recommended for women who want to have children.”

Farm open for visitors

The herbal farm, which is open for visit to tourists, is a partnership between Tiang and the State Department of Agriculture in an effort to cultivate herbs in a big way.

Over the past five years, Tiang has received visitors, including researchers from Poland, Egypt, Thailand, China, Singapore, Indonesia, Taiwan and India, as well as students from the local universities who carry out their research into herbs.

When the interview was carried out, his mobile phone rang, with two groups from Melaka and Kuala Lumpur wanting to visit the farm to learn about the herbs. Tiang or his assistant, a retired secondary school teacher, Khoo Kiang Lin, 65 take turns to brief the visitors about the goodness of herbs.

While Tiang can only handle Mandarin, Khoo is capable of explaining in both English and Malay. They have become a formidable pair, with Khoo now trying to compile a book on herbs so that it can benefit more people.

Almost without fail, every visitor would be served a welcome drink in the form of hot tea, made using the leaves of Star of Altenantherae, which Tiang consumes every day himself at the farm.

“This tea is good for anyone who is getting ready to undergo any heart operation,” he shared, passionately. “The herb is known to promote healing of wounds. It can also be used for people with kidney problems, heart diseases and is supposed to be good for the stomach.”

To benefit the most out of the trip, which is educational for the entire three hours, one has to be prepared with sport shoes, because it will include jungle trekking, where Tiang will show some of the herbs, such as the Tongkat Ali, are found in the wild.

For those who are more serious about herbs, Tiang has put together a one-day course from 9am through 5pm for a group of 20 people. For a fee of RM250 per pax, they will learn about the herbs, the uses and preparation. “There is also a course helping to develop herbs business entrepreneurs,” he said.

Apart from just an educational trip, herbs are an area where a lot of research still needs to be carried out although it has been used as traditional medicine for many generations. Neither the New Straits Times nor the writer will be liable for misinformation and readers are advised to countercheck with their doctors before consuming any herb.

Direction to get there: The farm is located at Kilometre 10, Jalan Kuala Klawang in Negeri Sembilan. From Seremban town, go past King George V secondary school and drive along Jalan Zaaba until you reach the junction where you see Bomba station. AT this junction, turn left into Jalan Dato Muda Linggi. Drive all the way straight along Jalan Pantai until you reach a junction that connects to Jalan Kuala Klawang. Drive along Jalan Kuala Klawang and you see the famous Ostrich Farm in Seremban. From here, drive a few more kilometres and watch out for a few signages which says, “Taman Herba” (Herbal Farm).