Ashtari Restaurant and Lounge at South Lombok Island, Indonesia

After our 'suntan session' from the 2 beaches - Selong Belanak and Mawun beach, we were starving for food...traveling about 7km of winding road from the beach, we finally reached Ashtari Restaurant and Lounge (S8.88255 E116.26417).

Entrance of Ashtari Restaurant in Lombok

While I walked into the restaurant area, noticed one tiny signage nailed on the tree...took a closer look, it stated "Yoga Platform". Oh my goodness! Great! The Yoga activities within the nature! But I didn't manage to take a shot on the platform because it was not ready yet...

The signage to the Yoga platform, Ashtari Lombok

The restaurant is situated on a small hill, everyone of us enjoying the walk from the entrance up to the restaurant...

Ashtari restaurant

The first stunning view attracted all of us was the balcony which overlooking the Kuta town and the beach. It was a spectacular view!

The spectacular view from Ashtari Restaurant overlooking the Kuta town and beach

Let me show you around the restaurant...
By walking into the main dining area, the place is full of bean bags...new concept of a restaurant.

Main dining area...

Beside the bean bags area in the center of the restaurant, there are others different design of dining tables and chairs surrounded...

With the sitting areas above, I believe the balcony is the popular area. And yes! We chose the balcony too!

The balcony dining area of Ashtari Restaurant

The balcony area has the perfect panoramic view of the beautiful surrounding.

The friendly owner is Mr Priss, who born in Paris.

Mr Priss - the owner of the restaurant

Mr Priss was an architect and a designer who had few hobbies in cooking and music. He was a director of a restaurant and club in Paris, and also owner of a restaurants in France. Before he came to Indonesia, he did the architecture and design for the Arabian Palace in Dubai and Saudi Arabia. Mr Priss and his wife suddenly think of change their life style and decided to started a restaurant in Bali called La Plage in Legian area, the restaurant continued to operated for 5 years. Beside the restaurant in Bali, he also managed to designed and constructed 5 villas in Bali island of Indonesia. Now, Mr Priss became one of the partners of Ashtari Restaurant and he been running it now for a year.

Before our food serve on table, everyone was busy taking photo around the restaurant...some just mesmerized by the breathtaking scenery of Ashrati Restaurant...her name is Karen.

Mesmerized by the sunning view around - Karen

At first, we had some starter...

The starter before the main course...

Then followed by the main courses...
Most of us decided to try out their local dishes, so I had the seafood Nasi Goreng Kampung and other tour mates ordered the local seafood mee goreng, some tasted the beef burger...

Seafood nasi goreng kampung

Seafood mee goreng

Beef burger with side dish

Beside the main courses above, it's strongly recommended you ordered the extra local sambal (chili) for those who can take spicy chili, it was hot and marvelous! We all like it very much!

The recommended local sambal which went well with most of the dishes

The foods were really surprised us with the local and original taste! Provided with the different recipe which we had it in our country, and the portion was big enough to satisfied our hunger, delicious!

Dessert came after our meals, I tried the pancakes with Nutella and banana...oh man! Nice and not overly sweet.

The pancakes with Nutella and banana

The restaurant is also a perfect chilled out place for a ice cold beer while watching the sunset...

After we finished our wonderful meals, everyone was relax on the bean bags and enjoyed their drinks...

Because of our schedule, we cannot laying on the bean bags for too long...too bad...
We started our journey to the next destination...

* Strongly recommended restaurant, must visit at least once if you are travel to Lombok island.

Related post for Lombok island trip :-
*  Airasia media FAM trip to Lombok Island - Indonesia on July 2014

Ashtari Restaurant and Lounge

Address : Ashtari Estate, Jalan Raya ke Mawun Prabu, Pujut, Lombok, Indonesia.

Contact:+62-877-6549-7625

Email : contact@ashtarilombok.com / jeanmarc@ashtarilombok.com

Website : http://www.ashtarilombok.com/

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/AshtariLombok

Location map of Ashtari Restaurant and Lounge at Lombok Island

More than 40 Jewish Culture, etc, festivals each year in Poland!

Singer's Warsaw Festival, 2011

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

Readers of this blog know that each year since 2009 I have tried to put together a list of Jewish culture, music, film -- etc -- festivals that take place around Europe.

This year (so far) the list includes 40 or so, in more than a dozen countries.

My list is far from totally comprehensive -- I know I miss quite a few events. But I believe it is still probably the most complete list of such festivals Europe-wide.

Still, my list's incomplete-ness is borne out by a list of Jewish culture and other festivals in Poland, researched and complied by Agnieszka Gis, a young volunteer at the Krakow Jewish Community Center who this summer is working as an intern at the Taube Foundation in San Francisco.

Agnieszka's list includes more than 40 festivals, of all sorts. That's 40 Jewish culture, film, music and other such festivals in Poland alone -- a country whose Jewish community today numbers probably some 15,000 or so!

There are big festivals, such as the Jewish Culture Festival in Krakow and the Singer's Warsaw festival in Warsaw. But many are in small towns and even  far-flung villages. Most are organized by non-Jews and directed at a non-Jewish audience, perfect examples of what I have I described as the "virtually Jewish" phenomenon.

Click here to see Agnieszka's list in PDF form (you will have to enlarge it to read)

Discovered another beautiful beach at south Lombok island - Mawun beach.

Mawun beach (S8.90072 E116.22682) is located approximately 10km from Selong Belanak beach and the journey was only took 20 minutes from the previous location. The sandy white beach stretch about 1.5km, the sands are very fine and soft...it took around 15-20 minutes to stroll from point to point. The emerald lagoon is protected by two rocky headlands, and made the calm and peaceful water of the beach.

Mawun beach and our tour mates

The beach was not crowded at all, it was so relax while laying on the beach. The crystal clear water really made us want to jump into the sea immediately! Too bad we didn't prepare for the swim, it was a miss!

I found the right view of the beach look better maybe just because of the company of the rocky mountain...

The right view of Mawun beach

There were group of women selling souvenirs over there, but they were friendly and not really hard sell type...

There is no resort or hotel in the vicinity, the closer resorts you can get are from Kuta beach, Lombok.
Due to everyone was hungry, we left the beach after laying around for 20 minutes...and heading to the restaurant in our itinerary...

Cynthia and Hui Ying (Lombok tour mates)

Next destination will be our first meal in Lombok - Ashtari restaurant and longe...

Related post for Lombok island trip :-
*  Airasia media FAM trip to Lombok Island - Indonesia on July 2014

Location map of Mawun beach of south Lombok island, Indonesia.

Dare to Adventure

#INTERVIEW

I am very honored to have a short interview with HT Holidays and to be a part of their Dare to Adventure community!

For everybody's benefit, HT Holidays is Niseko-Hirafu's premier accommodation provider. Niseko is becoming the most popular destination for skiers and boarders during winter.

This is the link to my interview

This is the link to my interview

This is the link to my interview

#FoodHoppingSG - 1942 Alfresco @ Changi & War Museum

1942 Alfresco @ Changi    #ThePastBackToLife

I am always very psyched about going to a themed restaurant. The exterior of a restaurant definitely is a big point of attraction to earn my money. I came across this restaurant on facebook (someone reposted and appeared on my feed) and I am quite surprised that Singapore actually has such an interesting restaurant with history themed. I believe the owner of this restaurant survived the World War II.

This place is inaccessible without a car as it is located very deep in the Changi area opposite to Selarang Camp. It is situation next to Changi Airport where planes can be easily be heard or seen.

I googled the direction using its postal code 499550 but it led me to a wrong direction. We only managed to find the place by using "30 Cosford Road". Do not be another blur sotong like me.

The selling point is that this is only private war themed museum restaurant in Singapore and also seated in such a historically rich location where Changi was the site of Prisoner of war (POW) camp during World War II. Using this to the restaurant's advantage, it gives customers a chance to embrace the feeling of travelling back in time to the Japanese occupation period.

This is the interior of the restaurant. Do you see a man in blue top? I think he is the owner of this restaurant and he is super friendly. He told us to feel free to take down the weapons hanging on the wall, pose with them and take photo. He even took down one of the swords from the wall that he claimed it was one of the props in Lord of the Rings. #haolian

Wild mushroom soup (S$6) and pan-fried scallop pink snapper (S$22)

The prices do not justify for the quality. #nothingspecial 

We continued to explore the alfresco area after our lunch. 

Sandbags scattered around the alfresco dining area accompanied by machine gun, missiles and a very-simplified-version of missile launcher.

This is one of the rare chance we can enjoy playing with the restaurant's prop probably because nobody was there to judge us.

War museum next to the alfresco area. 

I went in alone. There was a speaker playing the noises of the aircraft flying across, the sound of the bombs exploding and voices of the Japanese soldiers. These indeed gave me a chilling shiver down my spine.

Tons of World War II related items on displays, even the mannequin are wearing soldiers' uniform.

Storyboards standing at the very edge of the premises..

enlarge and read if you are interested...

I would say this place is suitable for people with cars or live nearby (ok probably not) and for history buff / enthusiasts. I hope more and more themed cafes or restaurants start appearing in Singapore ^.^

1942 Alfresco @ Changi & War Museum

Web: http://pitstopfoods.com.sg/

Payment mode: Cash only

Opening Hours: 11:00 am - 12:00 am (closed on Monday)

30 Cosford Road, Singapore 499550 

Tel: 6542 4492

How to go by public transport: 

1) Board Bus No.2 from Tanah Merah MRT (85091). Alight 17 stops later. 

2) Board Bus No. 29 from Tampines Interchange (750059). Alight 14 stops later.