A big part of the “fun” of being quarantined down in a small room for the next 14 days without anything much to do is to watch for the 3 meals of the day that will be hand-delivered to the small table just outside our quarantine room. Of course, one also needs to be prepared with standby food of their own – in my case, 3 in 1 cereal, biscuits and packet drinks.
The next few posts will be on the meals that were served to our quarantine rooms during our 2 weeks stay there.
Read Part 3 here
When we registered and gotten our keys to the room, we were also given the rules of the room during our stay and one of the items on the rules card was the timing of our meals.
Breakfast starts at 7 am
Lunch starts at 12 pm
Dinner starts at 7 pm
The reason I mention the word “starts” is because the frontliners at the hotel have to deal with hundreds of rooms and that too on different floors. So although the service starts on the dot, the time when the meal actually reaching the room differs from one room to another. We totally understand that and appreciate the effort by the frontliners to get the meals to the rooms on time.
No complaints from anyone except for 1-2 sensitive idiots who mistaken the 14 days of quarantine with a 5-star holiday trip. They were demanding and complaining about every single minor thing. Even coffee packets without creamers caused these idiots to raise a string of complaints to the frontliners.
As it was way past lunchtime by the time I was able to settle in our rooms and unpack, I was content with the fact that my next meal would be at dinner time. Good thing I was more sleepy than hungry at this point. However, I was surprised when I got to know that lunch was being served and imagine my surprise when I saw it was nasi minyak, chicken (ayam masak merah) and sizable salad. The portion was not enough of course but it was a nice gesture from the frontliners after a tiring day.
I lost track of time after the late lunch as I went off to sleep, waking just in time for dinner. I was still drowsy from not enough sleep but since dinner was served, I did not want it to go to waste. Besides, there was no point of going back to sleep as I still had some work to finish. Dinner was a bit more simple but not was disappointing. The vegetable and the fish was perfect and went well once I have mixed it with the plain rice.
The frontliners suppose to ring the bell of our doors once they have delivered the food but I must have dozed off after a very tiring day the day before. I woke up around 8 am and was waiting for the bell to be rung which did not come. Someone raised the question on whether breakfast has been served on the quarantine group Whatsapp and someone replied in affirmative.
I slowly opened the door and found a nice pack of breakfast, fruit juice and fruit was waiting for me on the table next to my room. The omelette with fries surprisingly was good and delicious. I used the small portion salad to scoop up the red beans and kept the tiny sausages for last. The fruit and fruit drink I kept in the minibar in the room for later.
For lunch, there was a change of “scenario” with Malaysian meal replaced with a Western one comprising of steamed vegetables and fish, mashed potatoes and what looked like some cream for the fish. Although it was “eatable”, it was not my cup of tea and was not filling enough. Perhaps being a Malaysian, a meal for lunch without rice is probably unthinkable. No wonder the foreign tourists find Malaysian food to be one of the best in the world.
To be continued in Part 5