Penang International Chinese Book Expo 2012 and An Evening of Lights August 2012 @ Khoo Kongsi

On the last day of school, 姐姐 bring back a discount voucher for the Penang International Chinese Book Expo 2012 which is going to be held at PISA during the August school holidays. See, that's how they will drive more traffic to their event. So of course we have to go look-see. Quite a big fair, but not very interested. There's mostly China/Taiwan books. The few stalls near the entrance is full of people, but the ones further down is so empty. I didn't realize some of the people are stall minders as no one is in uniform and no one has a tag! They should make the staff wear badges and official t-shirts. Another part I didn't like is, most stalls didn't have proper price labels, except for the ones in RM1 or RM5 pile (with the big sign only). If the book is from China and had a China RMB pricing on the back cover, they will charge that in RM, before giving the marked discount of 30% or so. I cannot shop when I don't know the price clearly, so even though some books are interesting, we decided to forgo. Except 姐姐 just had to have something since she got the discount voucher. So I got her a princess sticker book (yet again!). To think we initially came because she wanted to get a Chinese-English dictionary for school.

Only 弟弟 took photo with 乐龙龙. 姐姐 said "I already know how to draw 乐龙龙, no need to take photo"

At the Astro 小太阳 counter, both 姐姐 and 弟弟 fill up a form to get a free notepad and 小太阳 stickers. Strange thing is they are required to have their photo taken by the Astro staff with numbered sticker(not sure for what purpose??). Initially 弟弟 got a DVD and 姐姐 got a notepad, but 弟弟 wants to have the same thing as 姐姐. There seems to be no such thing as sharing variety between themselves, sigh...  After surfing around Astro小太阳 facebook page, only I found out there's suppose to be games counter, just that the kids didn't ask to play :P

弟弟's photo taken by Xiao Tai Yang team

姐姐's photo taken by Xiao Tai Yang team

At night, we went to check out An Evening of Lights @ Khoo Kongsi. Organized by Penang Global Tourism it's part of the events for last Friday, Saturday and Sunday of the month. Usually there's an entrance fee visiting Khoo Kongsi, but for this occasion it's free. However only the courtyard is open, the temple and museum is closed. There's Chinese cultural music for August 2012. We thought we'd just watch a few performance and go for dinner later, as the event is suppose to be from 7:30 - 9:30pm. We reach after 8pm, but the show has not started. It only started around 8:30pm.

Khoo Kongsi temple in its lighted glory

Oops my attempt is not good

爸爸 has takes better photo, I have to admit :P

The arduous climb to stand on the edge of the temple :P

弟弟 is that a grin?!

Oh dear, 弟弟 is making face

This looks better

No, no, children, it's not a slide. I hope you don't get into trouble for doing this!!

The stage. See, no performance yet.

Trying to be artistic here :)

After photos, we ordered some satay to try while waiting for programme to start. There's satay, char koay teow, hokkien mee and drinks stall around the courtyard (and trinkets stalls too). However even after finishing the plate of satay, 弟弟 keep pestering us for more food, and we had to cut our visit short. Only in the newspaper the next day we saw there are more shows and dances. Too bad we missed it!  We just saw the first performance of Chinese instrument ensemble :P

More photos before we leave, can't resist :)

The lion statue, there is actually a pair, but people are sitting around so not able to take with the pair

Cannon Square

Later we went to China House as a few friends mention the fun atmosphere there. Hm, they were full to brim so not able to try. The staff that attended to us recommended to make a reservation for next time. Since no one's going to cook this weekend, we ended up at US Pizza :P All the big hawker centers we passed by at Weld Quay and Sungai Pinang looked so crowded!

We took one photo at Lebuh Ah Quee, night mode. Can you imagine there's still tourists trying to take photos of this painting still?

Lebuh Ah Quee at night