I have always been fascinated by different kinds of pop drinks.  When I saw this clip about soda pop obsession at Chow, I was thinking that only in US can find independent soda pop bottlers.  I was surprise when I came across this Melaka made soda pop from Long Chan.  There were 5 flavors, and all are not bad.  It does not have that much gas (carbonation) in it and was rather sweet.  My wife told me that this company have been around since she was small, and for this independent soda pop company to survive so long is amazing.  However, this drink cannot be found at restaurants, nor can it be found at hypermarket.  To get this drink, you will have to go to the local coffee shop (ah pek style and not Old Town style) or the local roti canai shop here in Melaka. 

The new Aeon Melaka Mall house the first Papa Johns Pizza outlet in this state.  With so many pizza shops in Malaysia, and having Pizza Hut, Dominoes and Shakey’s concurring almost every city in the country, I wonder how does Papa John’s fare in this crowded market.  My first impression was that this is another Pizza Hut like restaurant.  The restaurant feel and menu are also similar.  However, after tasting the fresh baked pizza, it is far from similar, infact, it rank 1 among  it’s competitors. 

Value for Money – Average

The prices of Pizza, sides and drinks are comparable with the other Pizza outlets in Malaysia.  During my visit, there were two promotion going on, first is Citibank Card 50% off for 9” pizza and Jusco Card RM5 for second 9” pizza.  With these promo, a party of 5 only spent RM80 for 4 9” pizza. 

Taste – Excellent

The pizza was great.  The dough was not oil soak like Pizza Hut, nor it powdery like Dominoes.  It taste fresh, and with the free fresh tomato paste, garlic butter & marinated chilli, eating the crust of the pizza was not as painful as the other pizza outlets.  I could taste the fresh abundance toppings, putting Papa John’s Pizza #1 among the competitors in Malaysia. 

Overall – Great

In comparison with Pizza Hut, Dominoes and Shakey’s Pizza, no doubt Papa John’s rank #1 in taste.  In term of value, it still trail Dominoes which has the royalty card that gives buy 1 free 1 large pizza.  To-date, nothing can beat this value. 

We were at Jusco supermarket shopping for Lamy abc that was on sale when I came across this new range of Unicorn Colors Notebook.  It first caught my attention with the range of attractive colors mini notebook.  Ranging from Bright Pink to Refreshing Green, all imaginable attractive colors are available.  I spotted the Black Large notebook that looked like a Moleskine.  Picked it up and the hard cover felt like a mole.

Currently I could only find this notebook at Jusco, despite my numerous attempt to contact the company Unicorn for more details, I dont seam to find this notebook being sold elsewhere.  The notebook came with an Expandable Inner Pocket like a typical style moleskine and it has an Elastic band holding the entire book tight.  The book has 96 plan 80gm paper and it responded quite well with my Lamy Safari.  There were no smear through at the reverse side, nor were they any bleed through to the bottom sheet. The notebook was priced at RM19.90, much cheaper than some of the competitions.

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1Malaysia seams to replace Malaysia in every print, radio and TV advertisement.  The other day, the news over the radio was referring Malaysia as 1Malaysia.  So, I wonder, has our country change it’s name?

First, Maxis Called me, telling me the iPhone 3Gs I’ve ordered will be delayed till Tuesday next week.  I was suppose to pick up the phone at launch tomorrow.  They did not have enough units for all the subscribers, and so they decided to give what they have to the people in KL.  Folks like me from the north will have to wait till next Tuesday.  I thought it would be better to give based on who ordered first.  Those buggers from KL who ordered on the last day would get first than me… does not sounds fair to me.

Ok, someone screw up somewhere, those who pre-ordered from the north will not get the phones tomorrow.  If like this, why get people to pre-order and promise to deliver on 31st July? Now, its been delay, only ‘I’m Sorry’ from someone who was not responsible does not seam to be comforting enough.

Fine, the unit got delayed, what can we do rite, so that’s that.

Then, at dinner time, I got another call, oh, its been delayed to Wednesday, instead of Tuesday… wow, seams like this is getting worst by the minute.  Ok, this time, the Maxis guy  said they are working some ‘Mystery Gift’ out.  Oh, if you are giving me some merchandize with your logo on it, I am not interested.  An original iPhone accessory would only do justice.

So, ok lor, delay already, another day push out, what can we do at our end.. I was already starting to be depress…

Then, when I check my mail just now, I got a mail from Maxis.  I thought they were nice to send me a mail of apology of the delay.  Oh wait, my name ain’t Ng It Cheng… Another screw up.

They can’t get the date right, now they can’t even get my name right, well, they mix up me and other customer.  That’s Maxis for you… And they are going for IPO?

Oh by the way, Maxis says, it is worldwide shortage, so it is because of Apple late delivery…

I still thought Maxis should have handled the ‘crisis’ better.  Firstly, offer apology and offer something nice to the customer for the mixup.  Secondly, if you are going to commit a new date, make sure it is right, and not to push out again a couple of hours later.  Finally, get your customer name right.

Update:

Finally on Aug 2nd, I got a call from the collection center to come collect.  Got my unit, got yellowish tint as reported by many Low Yat forumers and no crack on the white body.  The collection process was about 45 minutes without hassle, just need to wait for the guy to do his thing behind the counter.  Confirm the package, the unit, confirm the Imei number, lock it in and unbox the unit.