Category: Travels

Discovering the world through my travels.

Great Indian Food in Leeds [en]

[fr] Maliks Restaurant est un excellent endroit où manger de la nourriture indienne à Leeds.

Besides telling you about an excellent place to eat Indian food in Leeds, let me try my hand at using the hReview plugin.

ew, it breaks. Maybe it doens’t like Markdown? help?

Maliks Restaurant


11 Merrion Way,
Leeds,
LS28BT,

+44-1132-246-8828

place

Best Indian food I’ve eaten since India!

Maliks outside

I went to Leeds Market this morning with my Dad, and we had decided to go and eat some Indian food. The places he remembered were (un)fortunately all closed, and we ended up having a meal at Maliks, just behind Merrion Centre.

Well, let me tell you — this is the best Indian food I’ve eaten since I came back from India! We chose the lunchtime buffet, a real deal at £6.95: two delicious starters (fish and tandoori chicken wings, really yummy), vegetables and two choices of meat which actually tasted like they’d been cooked in India. I ordered a naan to eat my meat with (extra but really worth it), and I wasn’t disappointed: huge and fluffy.

Maliks first floor 1

There were two choices of dessert included in the buffet: Rasmalai (perfect, not chewy at all) and rose-flavoured rice pudding.

Unlike most Indian restaurants which tend to be a bit dark and stuffy, the inside is modern and well-lit. It’s a nice change. I mean, “exotic Indian” interiors are nice the first few times you go and eat Indian food, but one can get fed up of them.

We talked a bit with the owner at the end of the meal. He told us they’d only just opened. I asked him if I could take a photo with him on it for my review. He also showed us upstairs — there’s a huge room there if you’re thinking “reception”.

More photos:

Maliks Restaurant in Leeds: here it is! Maliks Restaurant in Leeds: upper room Maliks Restaurant in Leeds: location

My rating: 5.0 stars
*****

Arrived in the UK [en]

[fr] En Angleterre. Contente de voir que ça se calme un peu côté SarkoWeb3, et que je vois maintenant surtout des billets constructifs.

Just a note to say I’m safe and sound in the UK. I’m going through the latest on LeWeb3 and I’m really glad to see the mob has somewhat calmed down and I’m starting to see some very constructive posts popping up. I’m sticking stuff in del.icio.us as fast as Flock can synchronize my favorites.

I’ll write more on my views about the whole mess in the coming days. For the moment I’m recovering from too many weeks of madness.

Agenda [fr]

[en] Will be in Paris for Le Web 3 and in London just before Christmas. If you're anywhere near Lausanne end of november, come and listen to us (Café-Café) sing.

Serai à Paris pour Le Web 3 les 11-12 décembre. Fin novembre, venez m’écouter chanter (avec le reste de Café-Café bien sûr), entre autres à l’Auditorium Stravinsky de Montreux.

Avant Noël, petite expédition en Angleterre (Leeds pour voir mes grands-parents, puis Londres avant de rentrer).

Short Post-SHiFT Note [en]

[fr] SHiFT est terminé. Blogtalk commence.

SHiFT was really nice. Interesting things, writer’s overflow, but not writing. Check out Suw‘s notes on Strange Attractor: talks by Dannie Jost, Stowe Boyd, Martin Röll, Kevin Cheng, Euan Semple.

Suw’s talk was great, I’ve finally understood what ORG is about — and a bit worried about the situation in Switzerland.

Kudos to the SHiFT team for being so proactive in asking us for feedback during the closing party. Conference organisers everywhere, geek girls would like girly-shaped T-shirts, please! (Reaction to men-shaped T-shirts, however cool: oh, good, another one to sleep in.)

Many things not mentioned. My apologies.

I’m in Vienna now, with a cold, for Blogtalk reloaded. Looking forward to talking with John Breslin tomorrow, and hoping to get a chance to catch danah and Matt too.

Scattered Lisbon Travel Notes [en]

[fr] Quelques notes en vrac au sujet de Lisbonne. Résumé: ça se passe très bien.

This post will be updated on-the-go. Come back.

  • Big city. Really big. Jorge, my kind host, says 3 mio inhabitants. If my memory is correct, that’s roughly three times as big as Zürich, the largest Swiss city, and a half of Switzerland’s total population. I had no clue. IIRC Pune had 3 mio inhabitants when I lived there.
  • Praça do Principe Real: very nice and calm square. Lots of benches to sit down, and even tables!
  • Stairs. More stairs. Hills! Lausanne doesn’t even come close.
  • Red and green lampposts.
  • People queue for the bus, “UK-style”.
  • Beggars, some maimed. I’ve seen lots of beggars in India of course, but maybe they just came in as a bundle with the rest of the culture shock, which is why I never had the feeling I had been particularly stricken by the amount of people begging. Here, I am. People sleeping on doorsteps.
  • Hot. Summer-hot. “Where’s the shade” and “can’t we just live naked” kind of hot.
  • Colourful. Day and night.
  • Two classes of kindergarten kids. One with yellow hats, the other with blue hats.
  • Mad drivers. Not the Indian kind. You can’t just jump in the middle of the road and expect them to swerve around you or slow down. You can’t start walking on pedestrian crossings like in Switzerland, secure in the knowledge that you have right of way. I regularly find myself hoping that the driver headed right for me doesn’t consider me expendable.
  • Healthy helpings in restaurants for the moment.
  • Nice supper last night at the Granja Velha, Rua dos Douradores 200 (Baixa).
  • Nice “nouvelle cuisine” style lunch at Porco Preto, just off Praça das Flores. Complete with warm cheese and strawberry jam.
  • My next digital camera will have integrated GPS-based geotagging.
  • Mir. de S. Catarina has a nice view. Unfortunately it seems to be the haunt of a bunch of guys who try to strike up conversations with tourists. I realised that I’m pretty good at playing deaf, or at pretending that I don’t understand English (or French, for that matter). I just tell myself I only understand Hindi 🙂
  • Seriously thinking about not over-doing it, hence this little expedition back to my “couch” before I head out again at the end of the afternoon. It’s too hot outside, and I also need to take a break from new things, or I’ll overdose. I’m also here to relax, and I think I’ll enjoy it more if I don’t spend my whole time walking through the town and playing tourist.
  • More photos on Flickr.
  • The flight of stairs to my host’s appartment just keeps getting longer and longer each time I go up.
  • Weird magic locks (turn three times to the left, once to the right, jiggle the key, do a little dance and the door will open). Well, not quite, but it did take me 10 minutes and a phone call to get in.
  • Lots of francophone tourists.

In Lisbon! [en]

[fr] Bien arrivée à Lisbonne.

Safely arrived in Lisbon. CouchSurfing rules. Photos on Flickr.

Lisbon by Night 02 Lisbon by Night 04
Lisbon by Night 11
Lisbon by Night 20 Lisbon by Night 17
Lisbon by Night 41 Lisbon by Night 37

A l'étranger jusqu'au 4 [fr]

[en] Off for Shift and Blogtalk. Be back on the 4th. Catch me by e-mail or SMS if you need to communicate.

Comme prévu, je serai absente jusqu’au 4 (conférences Shift à Lisbonne puis BlogTalk à Vienne).

Pour me joindre durant ce temps, e-mail et SMS sont les moyens les plus appropriés.

Petite anecdote dans le genre “j’y crois pas”: train Lausanne-Genève, 9h du matin. J’ai enlevé mes tongs et je me suis roulée en boule sur le fauteuil pour vaguement faire la sieste. Le contrôleur vient gentiment m’expliquer que je ne peux pas mettre mes pieds (même tout roses et fraîchement douchés) sur la banquette sans utiliser un papier de protection. Il est sympa, il a amené une serviette en papier et la dispose sur le siège au bon endroit.

Par contre, mon sac de voyage qui a traîné sur des sols plus que douteurs, il n’a pas besoin de papier de protection, lui. J’ai fini le voyage les pieds de retour dans mes tongs.

Who Wants to Share a Room at Shift? [en]

[fr] Je cherche quelqu'un avec qui partager une chambre à Lisbonne pour Shift, dans dix jours.

I’m late, I know, but I still haven’t booked my accommodation in Lisbon for Shift in two weeks’ time.

Is anybody in the same situation, and willing to share a hotel room with me? I do clutter up the hotel room with my stuff a bit, but I’m reasonably easy-going. I’ll be arriving Monday night and leaving Saturday (doesn’t matter if your dates are a bit different).

Send me an e-mail or leave a note in the comments. If we don’t know each other, thanks for giving me a little information about yourself or a link to your blog.

Travel Plans [en]

[fr] Prochains voyages: Lisbonne puis Vienne à la fin du mois de septembre, et peut-être l'Inde cet hiver si j'ai les sous.

  • (25)26-30th September: Shift in Lisbon, Portugal
  • 1st-3rd October: BlogTalk in Vienna, Austria

I’ve more or less got the trip to Lisbon and the return from Vienna sorted out. I’m in trouble for getting from Lisbon to Vienna during the week-end without emptying my bank account. Anybody else doing this? Got ideas where I should look? (Trains, planes, coaches?)

I’m also tempted to go to India for two months over December-January (get back here in time for Lift early February). The problem there is finances: I don’t know yet if I’ll be able to afford it. One idea would be to try and get some consulting work over there (Delhi, Pune, Bangalore…) — if the rates in the industry are worth it. Anybody know what opportunities a videshi bloggy consultant might find there?

Do speak up if we’re going to be in the same place at the same time!

Blogmeet in Basel [en]

A week-end in Basel, and a blogmeet there. Thoughts, links, and comments.

[fr] Compte-rendu de la rencontre de blogueurs suisse-allemands à  Bâle. C'était chouette!

Matthias calls it the biggest blogmeet in Switzerland, but one of the journalists who were there counted 14 bloggers. Only fourteen?! Hey, we were 14 last month in Lausanne! (A long year ago, we were only 13 to meet in Vevey…)

Anyway, leaving numbers aside, I spent a nice week-end in Basel and a nice Saturday evening meeting some Swiss-German bloggers. I’d been wanting to do that for some time (you know how important languages and language barrier issues are to me), and the occasion seemed perfect, as it was during the school holidays.

My first impression was that the webloggers present were on the whole older than the bunch of us who meet up in Lausanne. I think it’s a good thing. (I felt like a “young ‘un” there.) Maybe it’s because I couldn’t follow all the conversations (my German is way too rusty), but I got the feeling that the atmosphere was less confrontational and more collaborative-cosy than what I’d experienced until then.

Three journalists were present, and although I don’t mind speaking to journalists, I did find that they stole the show somewhat (I plead guilty, by the way). The focus shifts way too easily from “meeting other bloggers and talking with them” to “talking with the journalists”. It’s normal, nothing wrong about it, but it makes me think it would be wiser to keep journalists out of blogmeets (especially when they are small blogmeets), and maybe organise “bloggers meet journalists” events, if there is need for such a thing.

While I’m at it, this is an official request for a Matt-meet. I know Heather and Ben were looking forward to meeting him. As for me… heck, I’ve been trying to meet the guy for years!

So, Matt — suggest a date?