The Johor Bus Terminal at Queen Street

The Ban San Bus Terminal (also known as the Queen Street Bus Terminal) is an anachronism in Singapore. It’s located in a relatively inaccessible and inconvenient location bordering Ban San Street, Rochor Canal Road, Queen Street and Arab Street. There are practically no offices in the immediate vicinity. It has been around only since 1988,…

Angry Birds and Arabian Souk at Komtar JBCC

Next to the popular Johor Bahru City Square Mall is the Komtar JBCC a new shopping mall opened in end 2014. It looks nice and clean. But with malls proliferating throughout Johor Bahru how does one differentiate itself? Over at Komtar JBCC, they have two attractions unique to the region. Whereas City Square Mall has…

Food around Johor Bahru, a Second Look

Johor Bahru has many good food surprises. You can check out the articles here, here and here. So it didn’t take long to cross the causeway to get somemore food. IT Roo Cafe (Jalan Dhoby) They won the a statewide competition to be named the best Chicken Chop in town. The old 1950s stall front…

Parallels – Cafe Culture in Johor Bahru

Just like in Singapore, Penang and Ipoh, JB has a growing a cafe culture. While commentators write about the future of cafe culture in Singapore (here, here and here), such debate is still nascent in JB. In fact the cafe culture hit Johor only around 2014. You can see cafes sprouting up all over JB…

A Day of Eating around Johor Bahru City

Most people speak of Penang Island and Ipoh (and here) as the meccas of good food in Malaysia. So when this article came out on the Malay Mail Online, I raised an eyebrow. No one has ever made that connection, is she for real? But JB’s easier to get to than either Ipoh or Penang….

Little Singapore in Johor Bahru

I’ve written about Little Manila, Little Thailand, Little Burma, Little India, Little Vietnam, Little China scattered throughout Singapore. Let’s flip things around and write about Little Singapore instead. There are individual days in some major global cities when the Overseas Singaporean Unit brings the Singapore Day to town and Singaporeans from all over (sometimes a…

Getting from Singapore to Johor, a primer

I mentioned in the previous post that Johor was extremely near to Singapore. But even though it’s so near, it’s still a different country. So how do you get into Johor and where will you end up? Here’s a primer. By Car There are two bridges linking Singapore to JB. The more popular one is…

Johor Bahru, the Southern Pride of Malaysia – An Introduction

Ask a Singaporean to travel to Jurong (in the West of Singapore) and they will complain that it is too far. Ask the same Singaporean to travel to Johor Bahru (the southern most city in Peninsular Malaysia) and they will complain that it is too near. Unless you stay in the north in which case…