Bridges of Life

A Beautiful Parable

A Half-Day Visit to KKB & Sg. Selangor Dam

A pose in front of Sg Selangor Dam

It all began with my forwarding to some friends and e-buddies an email from my neighbor regarding ‘durians batu’ found in the jungle belonging to the Orang Asli that grow at the foot of the tree. 

My most learned e-buddy Dr. JB Lim responded and suggested to take a drive to Kuala Kubu Bahru (KKB) to find wild jungle durians from the Orang Asli during the durian seasons, to feast for the beautiful scenery along the rural roads towards Fraser’s Hill and pay a visit to the scenic Sungai Selangor Dam.

This prompted my curiosity and interest to visit KKB as I have never been to this town before, although it is not a durian season now.  I have obtained the concurrence of my friend cum morning-walk partners Terry Yip and his wife Jenny Lee to join my wife Soh Ai and I for the trip on Wednesday, September 17, 2014.  Terry was kind enough to be our chauffeur too.

Before embarking on the trip, I searched the internet for information about KBB and its attractions.  Among other things, I found that ’kaya puffs’ (kaya means coconut-egg jam) sold by a certain Teng Wun Bakery & Confectionery are the most sell-able snacks there and pre-ordering is necessary to avoid disappointment for being sold out.  I called up the shop on Monday and pre-ordered 30 pieces for myself and Terry, and my wife booked yet another 10 pieces later for her friends.  

On Wednesday 8.35am, Terry and Jenny came to fetch us to have breakfast in our residential area. We left at about 9.00am for KKB using the North-South highway.  Traffic was quite smooth and we reached KKB town at about 11.00am.

KKB is said to be an old town about 80 years old.  The town was quiet this day probably due to school holiday week, but there were many cars found parking in the middle of a 2-way road.

The first thing we did was to visit Teng Wun Bakery & Confectionery which was easily found at the main road Jalan Dato Muda Jaafar.  The shopfront is really unimpressive and it is run by an elderly couple only. 

I bought 30 pieces of kaya puffs (RM1.20 per piece), 1 packet of 6 no. cup cakes (RM5) and 2 no. wedding biscuits (RM5), while Terry bought 10 pieces of kaya puffs and 6 no. cup cakes.  Out of the 30 pieces I bought, 10 were for my wife's friends, another 10 were given away to my two SGM friends (Mr. Koe TH and Mr. Yong YK).

I noticed there were already a few customers buying cakes there just as we visited the shop, and a few more walked in (also asking for kaya puffs as I overheard) as we were leaving.  Business seemed to be quite brisk.

After buying kaya puffs, we took a stroll in this small town, passing by a market (‘pasar awam’), bus and taxi station (‘kompleks perhentian bas dan teksi’).  At that time, most of the stalls in the market were closed, and I was a bit surprised for not seeing a single bus in the bus station.  As expected, no durians were in sight.

We left KKB town at about 11.40am and proceeded to visit Sungai Selangor Dam about 6km away from the town along Fraser’s Hill road, after passing through Kuala Kubu New Village.

As we arrived at and stopped by the road side of the dam at about 11.50am, a few tourists (including an elderly white man) were about to leave with a taxi (presumably traveling to Fraser’s Hill).  There were no other visitors except four of us.  The scenery of blue hills and green waters was indeed beautiful, tranquil and serene except that this dam was observed to be quite dry and the water level was low.

Later we drove off and proceeded to the nearby SPLASH office compound for a look at the water catchment plant.  We met a middle-aged Malay man carrying a guitar and a bag of duku langsat at a rest kiosk.  He told us that he wanted to find relaxation and relief of work pressure (he owns a used car company with a Chinese as partner) by enjoying the beauty of the dam and hills.

We finally left Sungai Selangor Dam at 12.15am for home.  We initially wanted to have lunch at Rawang but finally settled at Balakong.  We returned home at about 2.35pm.

A glance of Kuala Kubu Bahru town

Wall painting in KKB

The shop that sells kaya puffs and other types of cakes

Newspaper articles giving good testaments on the wall of the bakery

Price list of the various cakes and snacks

Leaving the bakery after shopping

A view of KKB town

Market

Bus and taxi station.  So quiet with no buses found!

Driving towards Fraser's Hill direction

Sg Selangor Dam covering 600 hectares of land with a storage capacity of over 235 million cubic metres of water

Dam is so dry compared to a photo taken by Dr. JB Lim in 2011 at the bottom of this post.

A pose with Terry Yip

Terry Yip and Jenny Lee

Soh Ai and I

Another view of road towards Fraser's Hill

Water catchment plant

A Malay man relaxing in the rest kiosk facing the Dam

Soh Ai and Jenny

Lunch at Balakong

Yummy roast duck, char-siew and other food

The kaya puffs from KKB are indeed crunchy, flaky, fragrant and tasty and live up to their reputation. 

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Dr. Lim Ju Boo posing in front of Sg Selangor Dam in 2011

Two relevant emails from Dr. JB Lim are reproduced for the reading pleasure of those who may be interested:

Saturday, 13 September, 2014 8:21 PM

Dear Learned Sifu TO Lau,

Thanks.

If you want to eat wild jungle durians from the Orang Asli, I suggest you take a drive to Kuala Kubu Bahru (KKB). You can drive to Rawang, and go along the secondary road towards Rasa and Tanjung Malim. KKB is about 25 km from Rawang along this state road.

From KKB town, drive another 4-5 km along a lonely jungle road that joins the new, lonely, beautiful but short expressway (no toll) where the beautiful and scenic Selangor Dam is located.  Further than the Dam, the new highway ends with jungle road once again towards Fraser's Hill.

Between KKB and the new highway along this lonely jungle road, you may find orang asli selling wild durians during the durian seasons. It is just 3-4 km from KKB town towards Fraser's Hill. I was told by a helper of the orang asli, the orang asli took the durians from the deep jungles and with difficulty they brought them to the roadside to sell cheaply - poor thing their hardship.

I have brought back a car-load of these wild jungle durians during the last season. Else the cultivated durians sold in KKB town are also very good.

A slow drive there is worth the trip, not just for wild durians, but also to feast the beautiful scenery along the rural roads towards Fraser's Hill from KKB.

It was very, very pleasant drive. It was so scenic, with blue-green hills along this KKB to Fraser's Hill highway, especially towards the Dam. It is so tranquil, serene, lonely and quiet all the way.

The Selangor Dam is also very scenic, with blue hills and green waters to feast on for hours if you wish.

Attached are just a handful of hundreds of photos during my last visit to Selangor Dam, before going up Fraser's Hill, and down again for wild durians.

regards

jb lim

(The above 5 photos are by courtesy of Dr. JB Lim)

Sunday, 14 September, 2014 6:11 PM

Dear Learned Sifu Ir. Lau,

Yes, what you sent me about KKB is true. For example, KKB has a shop somewhere in the middle of the main road (there are just a few streets in KKB) where they sell kaya puff which I have tried and brought home.  Somewhere one or two shops away near this kaya puff and cake shop is a coffee shop which I usually go.

Along this same road where buses from Rawang to Tanjung Malim and back run, is where they sell KKB durians in a corner fruit shop, and also along the road junction further up nearer the bus station.  The durian stalls by Chinese and Malays are just about 30 metres from the bus station. KKB durians are quite cheap and are not bad.

However, I cannot promise you if you can get durians if you decide to go there next week as there are certain seasons for them.

There is a newer Chinese restaurant (upstairs is a hotel) located just one street behind (left as you approach the bus station and a Catholic church) on the main road, where you can have lunch and dinner. That is probably the only Chinese restaurant that is open all day till night, since KKB is a very small town with just a few streets – all within walking distances of just 30 minutes.

On the other end (right) of the main road there is an ‘ancient’ Indian restaurant where their curry is not bad too.

But I suggest if you go to KKB, don’t just visit the town.  It is much more worthwhile visiting the very beautiful Selangor Dam which is just about 5 km away towards Fraser’s Hill.  This Dam and the surrounding hills are so enchanting and gorgeous that you just can’t help remaining there for at least an hour and taking hundreds of photos as I did.

In fact I was so enthralled by the scenery that I wrote an “engineering” article about this dam into my blog:

http://scientificlogic.blogspot.com/2012/02/can-selangor-dam-be-hydroelectric-power.html

Unfortunately this article is more about mathematics and physics of the dam from data I gathered there, than an artistic one. I am not good in art subjects.

Kindly visit this article and I shall be very happy if you can comment on it as a professional expert engineer. 

Of course I am a bogus engineer as you know when I should be writing on food and nutrition sciences, about food technology, analytical food chemistry, on food safety quality control, about health and medical articles instead. Unfortunately I like astronomy, physics, mathematics, aviation and space science better. My interest now is on spiritual matter which is many steps beyond science into another dimension. 

A few visitors of this blog article have already commented including a Malay hydro-electric engineer. I would like more feedback – good or bad, does not matter.

Thanks and kind regards.

Lim juboo