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Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Salam International Restaurant. Muslim Buffet Restaurant in Guangzhou, china

In my recent trip to Guangzhou, China a client took to me to a muslim halal restaurant in Guangzhou.

Restaurant name was Salam Interntaional Restaurant

My chinese supplier took to me to this halal buffet restaurant.
the restaurant seemed popular with muslim customers as it serves halal food including turkish, middle eastern, afghan, indian, pakistani and chinese dishes.

Buffer price was around RMB 165 per head including drinks, mineral water, tea, coffee all inclusive.

Variety of Soups, salads, starters.
Full roasted mutton
Shrimps
Fish
Briyani / Rice dishes
Curry Items
Bread / Nan Items
BBQ Items

Green Tea
Black Tea
Mineral Water
Cold Drinks


All in all it was a good place to dine out with the ease of halal food and authentic arabic, pakistani, indian flavor.

Tajmahal (Eiman) Restaurant, Yiwu - Pakistan, Indian food in Yiwu

Yiwu is an international trade city and is very popular among arabs, africans and middle easterns.
This is becuase people can buy all sorts of items from Yiwu city which they can then sell in their own country.

You can buy minimum quantities from yiwu, hence it is becoming very popular among asians, arabs and africans, hence you can find many halal restaurants in Yiwu including pakistani, indian, turkish, arab, afghan and other arabian restaurants.

Tajmahal (Eiman) Restaurant is a halal pakistani restaurant in Yiwu serving pakistani and indian dishes along with some chinese dishes.

However, its main speciality is halal meat. You can try Nehari, Daal, tandoori bread and other pakistani and indian dishes.






It also serves breakfast like fried egg, ommllette. The taste is good which can give you the flavor of home.

It has option for indoor and outdoor seating along with bbq items.
However, you can find halal food restaurants around the area serving bbq, indoor and outdoor food.

Yiwu International Trade City - review and information

Yiwu International Trade City is like a big wholesale mall where you can find almost all items from a pin to aeroplane. The market is huge spread around in 6 buildings. Each building has around 5 floors.

Each floor specializes in a particular commodity.
Like ground floor will specialize in a particular category like toys - so you will find all toys related items in this floor.

The market is big, and you need to do your homework before coming as each building has its own speciality and its very huge and vast. Depending on the type of product you are looking for you need at least two days to search the market and analyze products and then place the order on third or fourth day.

Market is big with lots of variety and combination of the same product.
Most shop owners do not know english, so better take a translator or even better if you install translation app on your spart phone.

Most Google services are banned in china, so it is better if you install the language package before hand which becomes very handy.




Its better if you do your search and work before hand. Yiwu market has an official site which list all the shops and their products, so you will be in a better position to visit those shops directly for your order. The site is : http://en.yiwugou.com/

Over all the market is huge and you are surely to find the product you are looking for.


Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Ramada Katunayake Colombo International Airport - Review and Comments

I stayed at Ramada Katunayake, as it was provided by Srilankan airline as i was transitting thru colombo for 14 hours and as per IATA rules, airlines will provide accomodation if transit is greater than 8 hours.

The hotel is near to the airport, around 7 - 10 minutes drive.

If you are transitting thru colombo airport it is better that you take the airport hotel which is right inside the airport, else considerable time is wasted in going into the city as lot of time is wasted in immigration and then waiting for the hotel bus to take you.





Then the next morning the bus will drop you back to the airport around 4 hours before the flight.

The hotel itself is quiet alright, good for transit.
The room was quiet big with bathroom amenities and tea coffe making along with complimentray water bottles.

However, there was not dental kit, tooth paste / tooth brush.
When you are transiting you need to brush your teeth etc, which this hotel does not provide.

Wi-fi was $ 3 / hour or some thing like $ 15 / day, which we did not go for as it was too expensive.

Overall the hotel was good for overnight stay and some few hours sleep.

Serenediva Colombo Transit Hotel - Review

The hotel is part of SriLankan airline so major cusutomer are of srilankan airline.

I had a 10 hour transit between flights, and someone recommended me to stay at Serenediva Hotel as it is right inside the airport so i will not have to stand in long line of immigration and then for the hotel bus, if i chose another hotel which is away from airport.







I asked my agent to put the request for this hotel due to its convenient location.

The hotel is at the first floor of the airport building. Once my flight arrived I went to the transfer counter, where they issued me the voucher for the hotel.

The room was nice, with television (though i didnt watch much as i was just staying for less than 9 hours) the washroom was decent good with all amenities and toothbrush / paste
along with tea / coffee making and complimentray water bottles.

The hotel also provided free wi-fi which for me was super fast and streaming was good enough.

The beds were alright and no major complaints

WE were also given dinner vouchers for Palm strip restaurant (which is inside the airport)
The dinner was not that great.

We had taken our own snacks so we used our own snacks for the night.

We were not given our luggage so its better that you put your night suit and other essentials in your hand baggage which you may use at the hotel.

Also take some snacks for the overnight as the airport do not have many eateries and they all charge in US$.

On another note about Colombo Airport, which I think i should share:

Majorly all duty free shop, and restaurants charge in US$ and no other currency , not even Lankan Ruppee. So you are at a loss if you dont have US$ -

There are some convenience stores selling mineral water and other snacks etc

The smoking room is only in the departure hall, so if you have a transit flight and want to smoke right after coming out of the plane, you would have to walk towards the departure hall.
If the security guard is in good mood he will let you go to the smoking room , else he will tell you to do it outside after immigration.

Same is the case with muslim prayers. If between flight you have to offer prayer, the prayer hall is in the depature hall and you have to walk right at the end of the other end of the airport.
If security guard is in the mood, he will let you go for prayers, else he will ask you to go to immigration and offer prayers in the hotel.

These are few things that make the difference to international airports and srilanka airport needs a lot of work to reach to that level.