Pasar UTC Labuan | A MUST visit place

I have always been curious with local delicacies, hence it should not come with great surprise that I insisted to try or at least to look for my sayur paha-paha or pepaha (paha-paha vegetable) what some people claim to be unique to Labuan. Click HERE to learn about sayur paha paha as explained by the mak cik pasar. And because of this, I have been pestering Tourism (non-stop mind you) to take is to Pasar UTC Labuan – a so called ‘MUST’ visit place.

Finally, I got to do some local fruit/food hunting in Pasar UTC, and guess what… our guide Kak Kwa was with me the whole time. Not sure whether she is regretting it or not cos I asked plenty of questions as in P.L.E.N.T.Y! Told her she should be glad cos what I am doing is ‘membantu menyumbang pada ekonomi Labuan’ - I bought beras bukit merah, beras hitam, beras brown, beras bukit, ikan bilit mata biru, cumi-cumi, ikan keropok, cili putih and cili pandan. If they were to allow additional 30minutes, I would have bought the herba-herba mandian (this is so cool, will be sharing more). Or perhaps the whole pasar kot. HAHHAHAHHAAA…

I personally feel if you want to know the locals’ daily life/lifestyle, market/pasar or breakfast spot is the best place. All you need to do is sit down and watch or popularly known as people surfing. I will be giggling as I seeing them chit chatting; trying to understand the local dialect, watching them arranging their produce while cleaning the stall is like my personal TV Program. Do you know what I enjoyed best? Talking to them, and most of the time the respond is good and informative.

I started with buying my ikan bilis mata biru, I remembered one of my media friend told me to look for a stall with lesser tourist and when I asked why, he said ‘berbahagi rezeki’. I did just that here disregarding my friends asking me to purchase from the other stall, I said ‘takpe lah, berbahagi rezeki’. I felt proud. Ahaks.

After borong-ing ikan bilit mata biru, cumi-cumi and ikan keropok, Kwa the guide found me and told me she found THE paha-paha vegetable (vegetable = sayur in Malay language). I believe the right word to use is I ‘RAN’ to the stall… I asked the makcik how do the locals usually cook sayur paha-paha? And you know how a typical makcik will respond tight? She basically gave me the whole recipe, you can watch the REEL HERE… by the way, this vege is seasonal tau.

Next is the white and pandan birds eye chili. According to the makcik the taste is verydifferent from the usual red and green birds eye chili - click HERE to listen to mak cik. The spiciness kicks-in after. Apa lagi, beli lah kan… Not so sure KL ada tak. Video kat sini.

Then there bambangan jeruk that can be eaten with nasi panas-panas, sedap giler. A MUST MUST BUY tau!

From my observation, the market here is superbly CLEAN. And they pack everything beautifully, I even joked saying I don’t mind cooking everyday if the market is this clean in KL. Seriously (Eh! Korang percaya ke?). Click HERE for video.

Akar langir is used to mandikan mayat (to clean the corpse) as well as mandi pengantin (for wedded couple showering ritual) … This is sooooo interesting as this is the first time me hearing this. Apparently it is being practice by Kedayan tribe in Sarawak also, hence it is not unique to Labuan. I was made to understand by the makcik that you need to peel the langir root skin and boil it, sud will form and act like a soup thus camouflage the smell of the corpse. It is a custom that is not being practice as it used to. To view the video, click HERE.

And then there’s Kayu Patawali or Tinospora Crispa (Miers). It is good for high blood pressure and diabetes patients, the makcik said but I did not buy lah - see the mak cik HERE. My luggage is too full hahhahah…

And you must check out (to view the video, click HERE) the show herb - to buang angin, buang panas, lepas bersalin and etc.

Mind you, this is only a trip to the market. Next time, we go on food hunting trip pulak kay!

Labuan Geopark Media Trip is in collaboration with Tourism Malaysia, Tourism Labuan, Malaysia Airlines and all its sponsors.

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