City Mall is a shopping complex located in the suburbs of Kota Kinabalu, within 5 miles from the city. It opened for business in the last quarter of 2006. Located in the suburbs, it mainly caters to the local population residing in along Lintas and Luyang area.
As the Christmas holiday season is coming, I brought my 2 angelic girls to City Mall last night. Christmas is always a special time for children, and we have always celebrated Christmas in my family. It is always fun to see the decorations and activities being held at the shopping malls at this time of the year.
Shopping and eating has always been the favorite past-time of the people of Sabah. While there are not very many branded retail outlets in City Mall, there are plenty to places to eat.
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Places To Shop
The main anchor tenant of City Mall is Giant Hypermarket, located on the ground floor. You will find this retail Giant in most shopping mall in Kota Kinabalu, and throughout Malaysia. While they are not the lowest priced retailer in Sabah, they have a wide variety of merchandise and their lay-out is well planned. Where you see Giant, you tend to find Guardian Pharmacy.
You will find Diamond Jewelery outlets, Health Products, Cosmetics, Toys and Games outlets on the ground floor. Clothing, footware shops and departmental store on the first floor. Popular bookstore on the second floor, gifts and toys outlets, an amusement centre and a food court. As well as a fitness centre, which my over-weight but making a huge income buddy is a member.
In the main concourse on the ground floor is for promotions and seasonal activities. We saw a girl performing on stage, singing Christmas songs while we were there. Including all-boys carolers, one of them playing a bag-pipe. I have to admit, I have never particularly enjoyed bag-pipe music, although it does score high in terms of noise.
Places To Eat
One of the reasons why City Mall is popular is because of the many restaurants there. If you like a taste of old style coffee shop fare, be sure to visit the Olde Station Kopitiam. With its rustic furniture and coffee, toast with butter and kaya, it is a fun place to eat. Especially if you like Nasi Lemak and Laksa.
Another local coffee shop is OldTown White Coffee, coffee and toast is both popular and traditional. In my opinion, they are the Asian version of Starbucks and San Francisco Coffee. But they cater for different market segments. Speaking of which, San Francisco Coffee is at City Mall too.
Hana Japanese Restaurant, good service, well-prepared food, nice decor and sushi. What’s not to like about it?
KFC and Pizza Hut are also here, and proving to be just as popular as ever. As well as some Chinese, or should I say Taiwanese style restaurant, serving the Asian version of fast food noodles and rice.
Big Apple Donut and Coffee enjoyed a packed house in the first couple of months they opened. It was unbelievable, people lining up for donuts from the counter to the glass door. Didn’t matter what time you went there, there was always a queue.
Place To Stay
Celyn Hotel in City Mall is a nice and cosy boutique hotel. They list 62 rooms, from standard, deluxe to family. The rooms are tastefully designed, and makes a nice little getaway spot. The hotel has a restaurant, but with the restaurants available in City Mall, where to eat isn’t much of an issue.
If you are from out of state, transportation can be arranged. Shuttle seervice to Kota Kinabalu city centre is also available.
There are no shops that can design the cloth that we want…at CityMall,any shop that can help us design our cloth?
@Nelson, design cloth as in batik or clothes as in suits and pants? If it is batik, try the souvenir shops. They don’t have this service but they might put you in touch with someone who can put a design on your cloth.
Unless it is a tailor you are looking for. I don’t recall seeing any tailors at City Mall, only in Centrepoint and Wisma Merdeka.
I had have dinners many times in Old Town White Coffee shop since they started business in City Mall. In past 1 year, I realised that their service was going backward and even some of my friends also having same feeling like me. Their waiters/waitresses (not all of them of course) tends to stand aside in group and chatting with each other and seems not noticing the customers entering their shop. Is that the traditional style of reception of Old Town White Coffee shop? (I wonder.) Some how rather I still bring my family to eat at this place simply because my two kids love their Ipoh Chicken Hor Fun even though I don’t think that’s the best taste after all.
This evening, I had an even worse experience at this place.
Four of us (my wife, 2 kids & myself) ordered 4 dishes of food. After about 10 minutes, 3 of the dishes & drinks served.
Left out is my food and my son’s drink. I used to be quite patience and so I wait. After 20 long minutes (my wife & kids have finished their food), I haven’t had my turn. WHAT IS THIS? I called for the waiter and he checked on the order list, then he went to kitchen and returned with a reply that I need to wait for another 15 minutes. I was very angry but I still kept my patience. At the same time I also reminded them that they had forgotten my son’s drink. That drink came 3 minutes later. Finally my food came, the Supreme Curry Mee!
It’s look was so tasty and delicious (I was stuffing). Just when I was about to have my first bite, I noticed that there was a big piece of chicken in the noodle and the colour of it doesn’t look normal to me. So I gently torn apart that chicken piece and looked into it. I KNOW IT! MY GUESSING IS RIGHT! That piece of chicken was not well cooked, it was RAW!
Now I’m really MAD! I asked the waiter to inspect the food and he realised the mistake. He apologized and willing to change a new bowl of noodle for me but, damned it, do you think I still have the appetite & patience? For god sake, NO!
To the management of Old Town White Coffee shop, please tell or train (or remind them if you already taught them) your staff at least must have INITIATIVE to check on customers’ order list from time to time ensuring all the ordered food have been served to avoid unnecessary embarrassment and also most likely preventing your customers going away and walk into the other coffee shops/restaurants, NEXT DOOR.
Wow, that is some screw up. Businesses have to realize that consistency rules and excellence cannot be achieved unless you are consistent. I guess we all have some horror stories about food establishments but we tend to expect (and we should) more from upscale restaurants.