ABC Wednesday - 'O' is for Old Buildings in KL

I took this photo while standing at the junction of Jalan Tun H.S. Lee & Jalan Cheng Lock in KL's Chinatown area. This is a very busy area, with public buses and taxis plying the road. The buildings here are very old, as one can see the orange building where the famous Lai Foong Restaurant is located is over 55 years old. Lai Foong Restaurant is actually a coffee shop with many hawkers stalls in it. One of the stalls sell the famous beef noodle, well-known among KL-ites. The tall structure behind Wisma Fui Chiu is the Maybank headquarter.

What are the old buildings in your city like?

For other postings of ABC Wednesday, do visit the ABC Wednesday Round 3 portal hosted by Mr. Linky.

Rhythm Avenue All Ready Now!

Rhythm Avenue is the name of this construction project. This project has been abandoned for over 6 years and the developer was said to be missing-in-action. The high-storey abandoned blocks used to be a prominent eye sore as it is located by the side of the main road in USJ, i.e. Jalan Kemajuan.

Many buyers of these apartments suffered as they have paid deposits and took bank loans to purchase units of these apartments. They could not move into the uncompleted building and at the same time still have to service their loans from the banks.

Fortunately, another bank took over this project and completed the building. However, buyers had to fork out another 15% of the value of their unit to this bank and they were not given a car park each (as agreed in the Sales & Purchase Agreement when they bought their apartment). It's a case of you win some, you lose some, for these buyers. That means they have to fork out a monthly car park fee for the rest of the time they stay here! It's preposterouse of the new building owner to cheat the buyers of their car parks!

Carrefour, the French hypermarket, bought space on the ground level of these apartments to open its retail outlet. When it opens for business, hopefully the traffic jam along Jalan Kemajuan will not get worst. And for the residents of these apartments, hopefully they will not have further woes with bad traffic situation. They have already suffered enough over these years! From another point of view, they are luckier than buyers of Newgate Apartments (also by the same developer), whom till now can only stare at the abandoned project that they purchased!

Glow on Menara Hei-Tech Village

This is a building that is located at the crossroad traffic light of Subang Jaya and UEP Subang Jaya (USJ, in short) on Jalan Kemajuan.

I like the glow of the setting sun reflected on the glass of the building. This photo was taken in the evening, after office hour. As this is a major crossroad in our suburb, you can see the busy traffic starts to build-up here as road users leave USJ (especially from the industrial areas) to return home. The traffic jam in front of this building is terribly bad in the morning and evening. I was caught in a traffic jam when I took this photo. Thus, that gave me time to take out my camera and shoot away!

Putrajaya Bridge

This is one of the many beautiful bridges in Putrajaya. The others have more beautiful structure. We can see them from afar but we didn't know how to reach them. As it was past dinner time and we were all hungry, we gave up looking for the other more beautiful bridges. So, I hope you like this.

Happy Labour Day tomorrow!

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Added on 15 Jan 2009: This is the Seri Perdana Bridge, viewed from the Putrajaya Lake Club.

According to the Perbadanan Putrajaya official portal, this bridge is part of the protocol route, the 370m long Jambatan Seri Perdana is built across the lake of Putrajaya. The design is Islamic with 8 rest areas for visitors to enjoy the breathtaking scenery of the surrounding lake area that includes the Prime Minister's Office and Masjid Putra.

The bridge is made up of 7 central spans of 75m and 2 end spans of 55m. There are two separate carriageways over a two twin cell box girder. In the cross section, the overall width between extreme ends of two box girder is 23m. The foot path is flanked by railing and the roads median is lined by decorative street-lighting.

Putrajaya Mosque

Putrajaya is the new federal administrative centre for Malaysia. It is about 20 mins drive from Subang Jaya. We took a drive there to enjoy the beautiful structures of the new government office buildings, Prime Minister residence and Sultan palace. This photo shows a distinctive landmark in Putrajaya, located beside the lake, i.e. the Putra Mosque.

Found on a website introducing Putra Mosque:

"Incorporating Malaysian, Persian and Arab-Islamic architectural designs, the main entrance to the mosque is fashioned in the likeness of public building gates in Muslim Persia. Its 116-metre minaret is influenced by the design of the Sheikh Omar mosque in Baghdad, while the basement wall of the mosque resembles that of the King Hassan mosque in Casablanca, Morocco.

The mosque is constructed in rose-tinted granite which gives its desert-pink hue that offsets the cengal woodwork on doors, windows and panels."

KL Convention Centre

It has been a long while since I went to downtown KL. So when the opportunity arised last weekend, I can't resist bringing my camera along to capture some shots.

Here is the KL Convention Centre, located just next to the impressive Petronas Twin Tower. I was there that evening for the Malaysian Airlines Travel Fair. It was my first time there. I was first overwhelmed by the size of it and then the interior lighting mesmerized me! Look forward to attending a performance there in the future. Mmmm......wonder when would that be......

Have you attended any event in KL Convention Centre?

Sunway Pyramid's New Wing

This is the new wing of Sunway Pyramid Shopping Mall. I like colours of the lighting that creates a very warm ambiance in this mall.

Which is your favourite shopping mall in your city and why?