Lunch Outing With The Kids

“Buffet Lunch Promotion”, the advertising banner says. Over 70 different types of food available to choose from, at only RM15.00. 30% discount for children and free for 3 years old and below. This is at the Park City Everly Hotel, Bintulu. A four star rated hotel, the only one ‘classy’ hotel in town. This hotel was the Park City Beverly Hotel when it started operations about eight years ago, but sometime over the years they dropped the B in Beverly. Why I wonder. I remember seeing raised eyebrows or that cynical smile on people when the name Beverly Hotel was mentioned. Perhaps that is one reason the name was changed or maybe there has been a change in management.

We went for the buffet lunch at the hotel with the kids. The restaurant was quite full and there were children running around. We had reservations, so there was no problem getting seats. The two kids were given fancy balloons each by a dressed up clown at the entrance to the restaurant. They kept playing and clowning around with the balloons. We were seated at the centre region of the restaurant, quite close to where the food spreads were and the hot drink dispenser was the closest. Haziq or Dedek seemed to like playing and running around close to the hot drink dispensing table. Mini had to keep reminding him not to go too close to the table saying that the drinks there were hot. Each time he will move away and said “sorry mummy”. When he kept going back there Mini finally said, “Haziq! Do not go there. Its hot. Afterwards you knock into it and it will catch fire.” He spontaneously replied,”Oooooh! Fireeeee, fire. Call the fire truck to wash the fire mummy” while running away from the table. My my my, children, you just cannot get angry with them.

As the ad says, there was a very wide selection of food, but the usual types you get in a buffet, and nothing extraordinary. However, I found that the choice provided and their preparations were good and most of them complement each other. A wide selection of salads, a variety of main dishes, and a selection of rice, noodles and breads, and tasty too. I tried not to forget to take only a little each of what I fancied amongst the spread, lest I overindulge, which was so easy to do under the circumstances. It is very easy to overeat at buffet meals. One tends to want to try every dish offered. After all, buffets are meant to be ‘eat as much as you like’ or is it ‘eat as much as you can??’. And you can always see people, gluttons rather, heaping up foods on their plates. It is ok if they are all eaten up, but when they are left uneaten in the plates and thrown away ……. that cannot be excused. It is a sin …………

MKI Ramblings Unlimited
Bintulu