[UPDATE] IOI Mall Puchong’s bowling centre is now closed. 

I haven’t gone bowling for seven years. 

The last time was with a group of high school friends after our graduation, to send Paul off to the States where he would be furthering his studies. So you can imagine how rusty I was!

Carmen randomly called me up one afternoon and asked if I’d like to go bowling with her over the weekend, coz she had to practice for a company tournament. And since there is a bowling alley near my house, I thought why the heck not? Beats being a couch potato.

We went to Superbowl at IOI Mall Puchong. The place is pretty old – they opened it when the mall was built, so it’s at least 15 years.

There are about 20 lanes in the alley. Back when I was still in high school, I came here a couple of times and the facilities were well managed. Now, all the screens where you can key in players names are busted.. so you have to do it at the counter. I made the mistake of leaning against one of the monitors and the whole thing came apart.

We were there around 7pm and the place was deserted. There was a promo going on where guests can buy 3 games and get 1 free (RM24) so we got that. We had to go look for our own shoes, which were in mismatched colours. I doubt they wash the shoes regularly; the stink of feet as we entered the area could have sent most people to high heaven lol.

The floor where the seats were was uneven, lazily covered over with cardboard and carpet. The seats were littered with garbage (you can buy snacks and chocolates from a nearby concessionaire); even though there was a garbage bin nearby. Sheesh, some people and their non-existent civic consciousness.

The balls were also greasy, like someone just decided to oil all of them.Carmen went around wiping each and everyone that she used with tissues repeatedly.

Somehow that entire paragraph sounded really wrong.

Game on! Look at how pro Carmen is with her stance lol. I never realised she was left handed because she always used to write with her right in school. Apparently when she was a kid, her parents made her use her right hand (it’s kind of a dumb superstition that using your left hand is bad, imo) so now she’s ambidextrous.

And then yours truly..

  

Straight into the gutter

 

It took me awhile to get the hang of rolling it into the center.

Yay me lol

Our lane’s sensor malfunctioned – it always failed to detect two of the pins. This meant that even if our ball rolled into the gutter without hitting anything, it always counted as 2. We never got a zero. Idk if that’s a good or bad thing..

I scored a couple of lucky strikes though 🙂

Halfway through my arm was getting tired lol.

By 8.30pm, the place was slowly filling up with groups of friends and family enjoying the weekend out.

Which baffles me… if the place is so popular and they’re doing good business, why can’t they spend a little to upgrade the facilities?

And the winner goes to… 😀

 All that rolling had us tired, so we stopped by at Lok Lok Street for some supper.

This place is filthy as sht, but people (I’m guilty too) still flock to it for the food.

The ‘street’ is basically an open air carpark with tables and chairs, where numerous lok lok lorries are parked and where visitors can cook food on skewers in pots of broth, on the spot. It’s definitely not the most hygienic place to eat at lol.

Pork balls and cheese sausage

I come here for the fried oyster mushrooms coated in tempura batter and chilli powder. An oily treat once in awhile.

 

Hope you guys had a nice weekend too! 🙂