Written 29/12/22, Set 28/12/22
Tonight, the sixth day in Penang brings me back to a place I can remember from so many years ago. Gurney Plaza has a special place in my heart as I’ve been here only a few times, say less than 20 times, but this shopping mall has seen my growth from so many years ago until now. What I couldn’t remember back then was the amount of time needed to drive from home to Gurney Plaza. Fast forward to today, and I’m appalled by the amount of time required to drive there. I was already supremely disappointed several days before, as this is our second trip to the Plaza. We had made the unfortunate misjudgement of trying to drive in during Christmas, so an hour later when we got there, there were some 100+ cars parked, stuck and waiting for any semblance of movement to get into the parking lot. It was bad to the point that the jam had leaked onto the roads and robbed motorists of one lane.
Bitter. It took about 10 minutes before we settled on giving up and driving in on a different day. Fast forward to today, we made it in with relative ease (Albeit still being stuck in horrible jams) and I would like to say that the mall is beautiful, but there has little to no change in construction.
Don’t get me wrong, the mall has a very high quality, but I’m surprised it hasn’t undergone some form of significant change much like how some Singaporean malls would change. There were new stores, but that would probably be the extent of any change. Lunch was good, we moved on to certain stores to buy or look.
Do allow me to drop some images taken today, some of which we may come back to reminisce on in the distant future.
Brand new Akko boards, I hear that they’re good so they’re within my shortlist of boards I don’t need.
Fresh(?) release of Tecware keyboards selling for 299RM, I must say, a silent, rather small and wireless cheap keyboard is exactly what I’d like to bring with me to classes.
Gigabyte laptop with a 3050 6GB and i5-11400H for 4099RM
Something I’ve not seen before; burago selling a Datsun 510; maybe this will let them compete with Hotwheels or Greenlight (No chance in rarity though…)
Keychron Q1’s and Q2’s up for sale; I have an interest in buying a DIY board but these are scarily expensive.
A quick tea break at Mac’s and some pretty decent Chinese food later, we picked up some last few groceries and headed our way back home.
Or at least, we would be in some distant time. Once again, a huge jam coupled by complete clowns unwilling to properly operate motor vehicles left everyone else, us included, in a free-for-all trying to make our way home without an accident.
Quite frankly, one imbecile of a BMW driver could not drive properly and saw it fit to try cutting us off in some reckless fashion. Due to a red light, we managed to get beside him and in our own infinite wisdom, give PPJ7773 a taste of the NPC trade. Two cars driving at identical pace on a two-lane road isn’t something fast drivers like, so this chap in his own infinite wisdom, once again cut us off. An eye for an eye, maybe, but an absolute bastard either way.
Now, reaching back to my relative’s house made me think over a few things. Namely, a Toyota Crown Comfort 3.0 Super Deluxe that we had looked at was, as told by my father to me, a gasoline-powered unit. Now, if you’re geeky enough to know all about thee ancient taxi and model, you’d realize that apart from a 3.0L diesel powerplant that was prevalent in the super deluxe, if not perhaps the Singaporean (and now a thing of the past) Toyota Crown Comfort taxis, you’d know that there are no 3.0L gasoline engines that were offered in the Crown Comfort range.
So what is it really? The curiosity led me to check back on the sales listing and, sure enough, it isn’t the original 3.0L diesel plant. No, no. Its even better. The bloody thing had a different motor, a 3.0L 2JZ-GE motor! That’s bloody madness.
Before you throw your shoe at me shouting what nonsense I’m trying to spew out, the 2JZ-GE engine is in the Japanese car and car tuning community as being one of the most legendary engines to come out of Japan. It is notoriously capable of being modified and tuned for thrice its factory output. Its highest factory output was somewhere around the 300HP mark in its Twin Turbo (2JZ-GTE) guise, so imagine that same motor stretching its legs with over a thousand. Its bananas.
This lump is not one of these gobsmacked builds, but a very civilized engine swap. This is the 2JZ-GE motor, missing the “T” in its engine code because this is a variant of the 2JZ that did not come standard with a turbocharger. It isn’t to say its a slouch, given in its Naturally Aspirated (NA) form, it still packs a modest 220 horsepower. Not bad if you also consider that the Toyota Crown Comfort weighs in at around 1300KG. Its rather light if you compare it with newer cars, and a pretty good power-to-weight ratio when you factor in this swapped motor. Oh, and the engine itself costs somewhere around 2,000USD, so worse-case scenario, this car can make back some money.
The next day, we’ll be looking at this car again and seeing
if its any good. I’d like to hope it is as our original and “desperate” choice, a very cosmetically ragged fourth generation Honda Prelude BA9 will not be cheap to restore. But then again, I feel that it is better that we purchase a vehicle that my family members and I can all agree on. Car’s not cheap either honestly, the Prelude was to be sold as is at 23,999RM (Listed was listed incorrectly at 28,888RM), whilst this Comfort is listed at discount as 26,900RM, and in person is listed at 45,000RM. Not very good. Worth a shot anyways, we will be seeing the car hopefully in the afternoon, so fingers crossed we can get a deal on this one!
That would be all from me for tonight, folks. One last thing for my mates who are into gacha games, namely Blue Archive.
I’ve received this notification in the late afternoon.
tldr; funny box is being delivered and it’ll probably arrive before or just after I return back home in Singapore. Here’s to several CD’s that I can’t use because I lack a CD reader.
~Efini
