TL;DR: We are terrible tourists

• Aisha got injured when a table in the hotel room fell on her foot so we had to cancel a trip to Entopia.
• Ayub had a terrible case of food poisoning, puked all over the hotel bed, diarrhea non-stop so we had to cancel plans to Georgetown.

My company retreat was in Penang this year, and it just so happened to fall on the last few days of my maternity leave. So I decided to go and bring the whole family. First family holiday with four kids, including an itty-bitty, teeny-weeny, 2-month old. Homai. No more babies. I am done.

Day 1

Travelling from KL to Penang in like 6 hours because we had a poopy 2-month old and a potty-training 3-year old

Aisha did great. Ibrahim was pretty great too. Mostly just slept in his car seat with his chubby cheeks jiggle-jiggling the whole way. We stopped once or twice, I don’t even remember anymore. But I do remember the food was terrible and expensive and we were all sad.

Penang is special to us because it’s where we had our first family holiday ever! Aisha was 9 months old. It was her first time trying swimming. She did not like it. Aisha started crawling for the first time during our Penang holiday. Special place. Special memories. Love Penang.

The newly renovated PARKROYAL Penang Resort was purrrty

Two years ago, we stayed at the same resort. It was under renovation and the walls and floors were not so pretty. There wasn’t a proper lobby. Now it’s all done and super pretty and colourful and wonderful and I love it. I don’t know why I didn’t take any pictures. But I didn’t take any pictures. Sorry.

We checked into our room. Look at our room:

Family Seaview (One Bedroom) Room

Room Size:38sqm

“Ideal for a family of four, our Family Seaview (One Bedroom) Room offers views of the Strait of Malacca from a private balcony.”

Price starting from RM940.00 night when you book on their website.

I booked on Agoda and paid around RM1,500 for two nights. So definitely recommend NOT booking through the official hotel website omg. It came with one king size bed and one queen size sofa/day bed. They brought in a baby cot for free.

Overall it was great but there were little things that weird not so good. Like the layout of the room was strange. In front of the king bed was a TV mounted on the wall. And in front of the day bed was another TV mounted on the wall. So you had TWO TVs mounted on the wall basically next to each other. Why?

Then the mini bar/fridge was in a super awkward position in the cupboard. I can’t remember if it was super high up or super low down. But it was not user-friendly.

And if you wanted to use the hairdryer, the closest plug point was under the TV, which was like 3 metres away from the mirror. I dunno if you can picture that. The layout was flawed haha.

PARKROYAL Penang Resort
Address: Batu Ferringhi Beach, Penang 11100, Malaysia
Telephone: +60 4 886 2288
Website | Facebook | Instagram

Company retreat stuff

So the whole reason why we were there was because it was my company retreat. Ibrahim and I went to do company retreaty stuff while the other three went swimming.

Hi Ibby bb, say cheese!

We did some stuff and blah blah blah and then we took this picture spot me and the baby huhu.

Company dinner and the first night in Penang

Huh. I didn’t take a single picture of the company dinner, nor did anyone take a single picture of me. So here are pictures of the kids getting ready to go for dinner:

They were starving after spending the afternoon and evening swimming in the hotel pool. The big buffet dinner started at 7.30pm. It was honestly so underwhelming and disappointing. Or maybe it was just too much of a struggle trying to eat buffet dinner outdoors at night with terrible lighting and four young kids including a teeny weeny baby. We should have brought the stroller. We didn’t. So Mr Ninja and I took turns carrying the sweetest, chillest, most easygoing baby in the world.

Anyway, the food was so-so. It was barbecue. Lots of meats. Not enough sides. Not enough flavour overall. Really strange salads. I like the desserts.

It was still a super fun night because everyone performed and Gowri was Hit-Me-Baby-One-More-Time Britney. I’m rambling bye.

We are a family of 6 now omg

That’s so many people. I have no idea how we’re going to go on vacation after this. It’s just so many humans.

Mr Teeny-weeny was not too happy to be in a new cot at the beginning and kept calling to be cuddled. Eventually he settled down and slept like 5 hours straight before needing his boob again.

The big boys crashed almost instantly. Ayub, of course, had vivid dreams and made a lot of noise and kicked and freaked out while he slept. Always happens after a long, eventful day. He was ok. Business as usual for him.

Aisha super crashed. Didn’t move from that position all night. K.O. That’s the end of day 1 woot woot!

Day 2

Aisha gets injured so we cancel plans to Entopia

I really really really love Entopia. It’s one of the best, if not THE BEST, park in Malaysia. It’s a butterfly farm and so much more. Like an insect haven. I like bugs. Ayub LOVES bugs. Mr Ninja and Sulaiman are scared of butterflies. Aisha hasn’t really formed an opinion yet.

But we all enjoyed Entopia the last time we went. (Except for Mr Ninja, he ran away screaming, I’m not even joking.)

Entopia by Penang Butterfly Farm details:
Location: Jalan Teluk Bahang, Teluk Bahang, 11050 Penang
Opening times: 9am – 5.30pm, Monday – Sunday
Read my review here!

Anyway, since it was so much fun and Ayub loves insects and Aisha was so little the last time we went, I really wanted to bring the kids again. That morning in the hotel room we were all getting ready to go when there was a crash and a scream.

I look over and the huge wooden table had fallen on Aisha’s foot and she’s stuck and she’s crying. Ayub ran and lifted the table up so Aisha could get out. She was ok. Foot was sore. Couldn’t really walk. And that was the end of our Entopia plans.

Aisha would later explain that she was trying to get the big shiny coin from the top of the table. It was actually part of the tabletop. So when she tried to reach for it, the whole table just tipped over and fell on her. Very badly designed table I gotta say. It was already wobbling because the legs weren’t even. The round table, you see?

Spending the morning at the PARKROYAL Penang Resort swimming pool

After lots of cuddles and foot rubs, we decided to scrap the Entopia plan and just chill in the hotel for the morning. The kids were happy because the pool is awesome and that’s really all they wanna do on holiday. Play in the swimming pool.

PARKROYAL has two pools. One boring pool for old people, mostly filled with mat sallehs huhu. And another fun pool with two big slides and a water volleyball (that’s not a thing is it) net, plus waterguns and balls and floaties.

So of course we were at the fun pool for the whole morning.

1. Ibrahim living his best life

2. The fun pool

3. The stunning view

4. My sweethearts

5. Amazonia splash zone

We staged a little photo shoot for the fat one who turned 2 months old that day

Auntie Jenna trying to get Ibrahim to smile. He was not impressed by her peekaboo skills.

Tiny baby fell asleep. You can see Aisha in the background shooting Mr Ninja with a watergun. They were playing zombies.

Tired zombie-hunter is tired.

Nasi kandar lunch far far away lol

Ok. So. This is our third time coming to Penang as a family and Mr Ninja and I were like lesdothisthing. The thing being having nasi kandar. It’s so hard with two fussy eaters. And I don’t want to queue up for hours in the hot sun with kids. Or sit by the roadside in the heat with them. It’s ok if it’s just Mr Ninja and I, ya know? It’s different with babies.

Anyway, this time we were like whatever it takes. So we ended up in Kayu Nasi Kandar in Bayan Lepas lmao. It was like an hour drive away from the PARKROYAL Resort.

But it was air-conditioned and comfortable. No queue. Pretty much empty. We used to go to the Kayu branch in Kota Damansara regularly when we lived there. Tbh I like the food from Original Kayu Nasi Kandar Kota Damansara better than the Penang one huhu.

Prior to this trip, Ayub had been suffering a pretty awful bout of food poisoning after a bowling birthday party. He was ok. Then we had nasi kandar. And that night he was not ok. I really think it was the nasi kandar that did it.

Anyway, I’ll get to that later. Come see my food:

Mmmm…

Aisha and Ibrahim fell asleep in the car so I ate lunch like this.

Original Kayu Nasi Kandar
Opening hours: 24/7
Address: 15, Lebuh Nipah, Bukit Jambul, 11900 Bayan Lepas
Website

We are terrible tourists, I’m sorry

We didn’t do any touristy things so there’s no much to say really haha.

Here’s everything we probably should have done but didn’t do:

• Line up for super awesome delicious Penang food
• Go to Georgetown
• Take pictures with the street art
• Enjoy a theme park/adventure park/butterfly farm/ride the tram etc

After lunch we went to Queensbay Mall because Aisha woke up and was hungry. We got her McDonald’s. Walked around the mall. The kids bought toys at Toys R’ Us. Then we went back to the hotel.

Playing on the beach

Aisha has never been to the beach before. This was her first time. She was very excited. Ayub buried her in the sand much to her delight.

Our last night in Penang

The kids were too tired to go out for dinner, so we ate in the hotel. They had a buffet dinner and the staff asked us to join. Mr Ninja and I looked at each other and using our married psychic powers said, we’re too poor for buffet dinner.

Then the hotel people were like, the kids eat free!

So Mr Ninja and I were like, oh. How much per adult?

And they were like RM98++. Lol.

So we ordered á la carte.

And not just á la carte. They have a separate menu where there are like 5 dishes half the price of the normal menu. So we asked what was the difference, and the waiter said the portion is half the size of the regular priced one. And we were like, ya that’s ok.

So we ordered 5 half portion/half priced dishes.

Then the waiter asked what we wanted for drinks. And Mr Ninja asked if they have teh o ais. The waiter said, it’s not in the menu but we can make it for you. So Mr Ninja asked how much it was. And the waiter was like, same price as iced lemon tea.

It was like RM19 lmao.

We ordered 5 glasses of free water.

I think the waiter took pity on our broke asses because for the rest of the night he kept bringing us things from the buffet spread. It started with popcorn, then keropok, kuih, ice cream, bubur… We were so full. Had to roll our fat asses out the restaurant afterwards.

A night of food poisoning

Unfortunately all that food triggered Ayub’s food poisoning. And he vomited on his bed in the middle of the night. A bed he shared with Sulaiman.

He spent the next few hours in and out of the toilet with diarrhea. Poor dude.

Housekeeping came at like 4am to change the bedsheets and bring water. It was a rough night. And a tough morning. We were nervous to drive home with a sick Ayub. But everything went well until we were 3 minutes away from reaching our house. That’s when Ayub hurled all over himself and the front passenger seat of the car. Omg. It was bad.

Day 3

Bye Penang

We had plans to meet up with a friend and have a nice brunch. But Ayub got sick so…

Yeah, that’s it. I’m too lazy to write more. It was good. I love my kids. Nothing went to plan and we still had a lovely time. Well, a memorable time at least.

The end.

Ibrahim