Jingle bells~ Pre-christmas outing!

haha i wanted to do a post on my zoukout experience but my friend hasn't sent me the photos and i didn't get much on my camera so i guess that will have to wait. in the meantime, i'll do a feature on last night! it's some kind of tradition for the few of us since secondary school times to have a christmas outing. doens't have to be exactly on christmas day but ya you get the idea. alright let's start form the top.

ok, yesterday was my dad's birthday so i took him out for breakfast, or rather brunch. it wasn't anything fancy but i guess it's the thought that counts? hee hee. after that i went to hit the gym at hougang. ran on the treadmill and did some training with jac when he came (my colleague and my new gym buddy. haha). aching all over by the time we were done. (for some reason my lats are still aching.) went home to shower before heading down to raffles city.

so i managed to reach raffles city early. (trust me, this doesn't happen very often. lmao.) when everyone (except shuyi who was late) arrived, we went into our dinner destination: shokudo food bazaar. honestly i'd say the food is a little pricey (especially the drinks) but the quality still ok la. (at least it's more edible than the shokudo pasta at cineleisure) we waited for shuyi before we went to get our food, so by the time we got our stuff we were obviously famished. the girls left us in awe when they ordered hordes of food (i think they ate more than us guys). when they saw our faces, they said something like "it's christmas. it's ok to eat more once in a while" wow, ok.

something more interesting about the place than the food and the seating areas with different themes were the people who cleared the dishes. they were like ninjas. nope i don't mean they dressed like ninjas but they are sure trained like ninjas. they lurked in the shadows when we are eating and once you finish, *poof*, they appear and ask if they could clear your dishes almost instantly. we came to the conclusion that this is part of the restaurant's strategy to make you lose track of how much you've eaten so you'll order more food than you know it. smart right? anyway, after we finished our food, we decided to hang around a bit more to camwhore.

alright, it's time to finally show some faces on this blog so people won't say it looks like a blogshop anymore. haha. so here goes! (warning! large pictures!)


that's momo with his oyakodon (rice with chicken and egg)


aileen showing off her 自拍 skills.


hungry simin (i'll have to say it's a very nice shot by ed)


the girls


the guys


guess who won?

haha. so after feeling all stuffed we went to have a look at the christmas tree outside raffles city.



then we walked over to the esplanade. they had some of those white balls which you could write your new year wishes so we shared one. they will put the balls into the river so u can see hundreds of white balls floating on the singapore river when they are done. quite a wonderous sight i can imagine.


writing on the ball with shuyi


my new year wish. do pardon my poor grammar (or lack thereof. lol)

after that, we went over to cafe cartel because it was after 9pm and the cakes were at 50% off (such sinful indulgence. gotta work extra hard at the gym tomorrow)


waiting for the cakes to be served


ed going in for the kill!


trying to look like i don't like cakes (who am i kidding?)


mmmmmmmmmmm.......

then we did our usual christmas gift exchange. the girls unwrapped their presents with lots of anticipation as usual. after that we had one more surprise!
.
.
.
.

there's one for everyone! supposed to put it on your keys.





and finally.....a group photo!


yup so that's how we spent our sunday evening.

whoa it's getting late. gotta work and gym tomorrow. hope to update soon. until then, bye~

Realization. Putting a Foot Foward...

before i get to the gist of the post just want to share a movie i caught today:



it's a movie called cape no.7 (海角七號). it's a taiwanese movie and apparently it was quite a big hit there. well the cinema was quite full so i guess the response here isn't too bad as well. watched it at the cathay with ed and momo (a.k.a sheng chao. another of my buddies). it's pretty hard to describe. the spine of the story is that there's going to be a concert at the beach by a japanese star (kousuke atari), but one of the resident committee heads kicks a big fuss and manages to convince the organisers to put in some local acts. and so an audtition was held and a make-shift band was formed, led by the committee head's son, Aga (portrayed by van fan). but the true nature of the movie is romance. whilst there were many different situations faced by the different characters in the movie the main ones were the blossoming romance between Aga and Tomoko (portrayed by tanaka chie), interlaced with the love story between an unnamed teacher and yet another Tomoko which took place in 1945. the 1945 story is cleverly unravelled through 7 letters the teacher wrote to kojima tomoko during the 7 days he spent on the ship home to japan.

i wouldn't exactly say it's a movie that tugs at your heartstrings and make you want to cry like 881, but it is a beautiful movie. the scenery of the beach is very beautiful, the local taiwan flair makes it very beautiful. the movie ends with no particular endings to certain characters' situations. but i guess there's perfection in imperfection. sometimes things are beautiful because there are flaws. sometimes in life, things are like that. they may get better or they don't. at least for that moment in time. and there's still room for imagination. very nice movie.

....okok time to get to the gist of my post but before i say anything else, i want to say what i have got to say from this point on has nothign to do with the movie. it just happened to dawn upon me today ok.

i had a realization today. there's really no point in being so 花痴 (if you don't understand i also don't know how to rephrase. chee hong? despo?). i mean, romance will come when it comes. it's not something you go around looking for. i guess the person will just appear when the time is right. no point pining for it and wasting your energy just longing for it. there are better things to do with that energy and by not focusing on just that one thing, you can actually appreciate the other things you have around you.

i don't know, recently i've just been making quite a few different realizations causing different parts of me to change. i feel that i've been growing a lot recently. kind of like a growth spurt. not physically la, not like i've been getting much taller since secondary school. more of me as a person. it's not something that others can see but it's something that i can feel and that i know. i guess this is part of growing up? i'm not saying i'm totally matured as a man now but i know i'm taking one step at a time. i know i'm slowly leaving some of my childish thoughts and behaviour and wilful ways behind.

at this point of my life i've come to understand that there are certain things that you've just got to figure out yourself. some things just can't be told to you by others and you have just got to explore your own views and principles in order to reach the next level.

i want to be less self-indulgent. i really mean it. take things slow la. don't expect me to change totally tomorrow but bit by bit i want to change. looking back, i have come a long way from the shy little boy i was. slowly gaining experience, slowly getting more confident. but i don't just want to stop here, i hope to continue growing. overcoming my own insecurities.

haha, also don't know why i'm so philosophical today. maybe it's the cool breeze getting to my head. oh well, that's all the time i have tonight, still got work tomorrow. looking foward to another day at work. though the work may not be really interesting, the people are and i do enjoy their company even though i don't really talk to some of them (some female co-workers). and tomorrow is gym day! haha. if you guys haven't realized, i love going to the gym. the familiar smell of the air freshener just puts my mind at ease for some reason. okok, really got to go already. nitez~

Surprise! I'm Back~

haha bet you guys didn't expect me to be back with updates so soon eh? well, neither did i but i had some time and the mood got to me so here we go!

ok i'll start with some of the stuff i bought from my trip!

got this from....you guessed it, hk disneyland. haha. wanted to get a souvenir that i will actually wear when i saw this. hmm...i think it goes better with lighter coloured bottoms....

next, a pretty basic abercrombie polo?:



hmm...got this shirt and cardigan seperately but thought it looks nice together. the shirt was really a steal. managed to get it at a really unbelievable price. haha.



remember the pair of jeans i mentioned in the earlier post? well, here it is. the shop i got it is a HK brand called Chocolate which has 2 lines, black chocolate and white chocolate. white chocolate has a more retro feel whereas black chcolate is more of casual wear. the jeans is from the black chocolate line.



ok la really got too much stuff from the trip. i think i'll feature more as time goes by if got the chance.
how about some stuff i got in Singapore?

actually got this pair of shorts before the trip. it's the kind that ends around your knees and has a skinny cut. got it at far east so it was quite affordable.

(haha i know it kinda blends into the background)

hmm...i decided i should pick up a new scent. the first one i thought of is Hilfiger from Tommy Hilfiger which i managed to get a whiff from the november issue of men's health. (they are really smart nowadays and the advert actually has a flap where they binded some of the perfume into the glue. i know it's pretty hard to visualize) but when i got to the shop i found it a little to musky for my liking. so after taking a few samples, i decided on this:





it is slightly lighter and has nice citrus notes.

there was this grey nike polo that i saw a while ago at starthreesixty once but never saw it again. then yesterday when i went to the nike by B.I.R.D at cine i took a little dip into their sale section and voila! i fished out the same polo only that it's in red. it's still nice and i've haven't got anything in bright colours in a while so i bought it.





apparently it's made from organic materials. wow i thought organic foods were good enough. now fabrics must also be made from organic plants? hardcore~~ oh ya in case you haven't noticed i've made my photos bigger than before so you can see it more clearly, thanks for the feedback.

hmm...recently been in the mood to listen to some retro songs. anything ranging from dancey- songs to jazzy tunes, from the 70's to just a couple of years ago.
speaking of which, i wanna go mambo~~~ but now that i'm working it's practically impossible. sigh. oh ya, it's zoukout next saturday! it's gonna be partying throughout the night!! i even got my tickets. thing is...i don't know who to go with. or rather, to be put more bluntly, i have no one to go with...(like totally what the.........) how?? it's only 6 days away and i haven't found my kakis. help~~~

which reminds me....today i was so lonely and hungry...*sob* i tried to find people for dinner but they either had wedding dinners, already had plans or just stayed too far. so i went to the gym in the afternoon and i came back still determined to find some dinner kaki but to no avail. the best ones were those who totally ignored my sms and did not even reply. (if you people are here reading this you ought to be ashamed of yourself. can't even be bothered to say not free/not interested?) ended up going to the kopitiam nearby for dinner by myself. got very annoyed because the auntie refused to come take my drink order despite me purporsely making eye contact a few times. obviously i wanted a drink la, if not i want to seduce her ar. in the end i finished my fried rice without any drinks. bleah~~

sigh~~ it's christmas season and i've been listening to this song "my only wish" by britney spears. it's from a couple of years back when she was still (appeared) pretty innocent and sane. the lyrics really speaks for me.

oh yeah yeah...Last night i took a walk in the snow,
Couples holdin hands, places to go,
Seems like everyone but me is in love
Santa can you hear me?
...
I want my baby, baby
I want someone to love me, someone to hold,
Maybe maybe, she'll be all my own in a big red bow
Santa can you hear me?
I have been so good this year
And all i want is one thing,
Tell me my true love is here
she's all i want, just for me
Underneath my christmas tree
I'll be waiting here
Santa that's my only wish this year
...

(i took the liberty to change all instances of "he" into "she" for accuracy. ok la, no snow la, took a walk down orchard road can?)
sigh~ when will someone special appear in my life? the other day i was just telling yu chuan (a.k.a ed, edwin or chuan. for those who don't know, he's my 死党) how i'm actually quite happy with the current state of my life. working is actually spending time rather constructively rather than rotting at home doing nothing. i get to earn money and time really passes faster. getting to know more people too. and i still have time for the gym. also have friends i can count on (or so i thought the other day). only thing missing is somebody to take that place in my life. sigh~ longing to love and be loved. it sucks to be a helpess romantic.

anyway, my mum and bro just came back from yet another holiday (3rd one recently including the one i went?) and brought some mini sized tau sar pia from penang. pandan flavour one. quite nice. but, nah, i won't gorge myself to distract myself from my woes. ok la i don't really believe in santa so i hope God can answer my christmas wish instead. haha. guess i'll have to keep looking harder.

oh well, until next time. do wish me luck in my love life. bye bye~~

Busy Busy Busy

oh man been really busy with work. barely have any time left other than work and gym. sorry for the lack of updates ar. so far work has been pretty good though. definitely a more constructive way to spend my time rather than rot at home doing nothing. my colleagues are very friendly too. getting along very well especially with the guys. the only thing is i'm probably the youngest there....alright give me some time to regroup and i'll be back with more updates? sorry sorry. haha, do continue to expect more exciting updates ok?

Memoirs! Journal of my China and Hong Kong trip (sightseeing version)

okok, technically Hong Kong is part of China. but who cares. more importantly, i'm back~~ sorry to all my loyal supporters who didn't get an update last week because i flew off for the trip. i'll try my best to make up for it ya? what better way to put my c905 to test than by giving it the all terrain field test overseas! so, i'm glad to inform you all the the pictures you'll be seeing (with the exception of the 2 marked with *) were shot entirely on my c905! alright alright let's jump right in!

DAY 1 - 15 Nov 08

we flew off in the wee hours of the day from the budget terminal (yes, we took budget airline for this trip) on tiger airways and reach Macau airport sometime in the morning.



we wasted no time and made our way to the Venetian. the Venetian is the new super grand super big hotel cum casino cum shopping centre with a venetian theme (like duh) which was opened last year. after leaving our luggage at the counter we took the lift to the 3rd (?) floor where the shops were.





yup this is all indoors. they even have a "river" with boatsmen who sang if you paid them. but this place isn't really good for shopping because it only had all the high end boutiques (think ngee ann city but with even more boutiques which are very high end) so we had our lunch at the food court (which charged restaurant prices i might add), took a quick visit to the casino and left promptly. we then went to visited the local tourist attraction which is just the remaining wall of some old church. boring. didn't bother to take any photos. then we went back to collect our luggage and took a ferry to our next destination which was on mainland China, Zhu Hai (literally "pearl sea"). got there checked in, then went for our dinner. we went to some restaurant near the hotel. one of our uncles who travel to that area a lot for work starts acting like the boss and orders a lot of food. and it's all seafood. oysters, clams (more than 1 variety), roast pigeons, hairy crab and whatnot. it was a huuuuuuuuuuuuggggggggeeeeeeeee feast. so it was a good thing right? not really. thing is i hate being "force fed" and personally i had something against this particular uncle. i shan't divulge his evildoings here but if you are interested enough you can contact me personally ya. haha. anyway, so i gave him my signature "pissed look". of course he doesn't like it. but too bad. and hey, it's not like we are making him pick up the entire tab. bleah~ *sticks tongue out* after that we went to do a little shopping which was pretty rushed. shops there don't close too late so we went back to the hotel and called it a night.

DAY 2 - 16 Nov 08

being rather unfamiliar with the area we decided to join a day tour. we went to various places which i can't really remember so i'll just touch on the few more significant ones.

(WARNING! wall of text!)
we went to this tourist attraction which is a statue of a maiden with a pearl in her hands. according to legend she was a daughter of one of the 4 sea dragon kings and she particularly liked this region and came to bless the area. eventually she fell in love with a local fisherman. some evil witch in the area (somehow there are lots of such characters in the small region) got jealous of their love and told the fisherman that the maiden (who's supposedly some mermaid. with legs? i don't know) is not human and will revert to her evil spirit form if she takes off any of her 8 bangles (heavy leh). so the fisherman grew suspicious and asked her for a bangle in order to prove her love for him. she got very upset and told him she would die if she removed any of the bangles but the blockhead (don't expect too much from fishermen) insisted that she did. so, reluctantly she removed a bangle for him and true enough she died. the fisherman was devastated and distraught over his lost love. then the wise village head told him there is a way to revive her, which is to give her some revival herb from the mountains. the thing is, the herb was still too small and the fisherman had to take care of it and make it grow by watering it with some of his blood everyday. after many many many days the plant matured and he used it to revive his love (how come the corpse never decompose?) and she got revived as a normal girl, the prettiest in all Zhu Hai. one day while she was frolicking at the beach with some gal pals they found a humungous peral and she decided to offer it to the village head with gratitude, hence the statue with the pearl.

that was a super lengthy piece of folklore. when i was about to take a photo of this forementioned statue, busloads of pageant queens appeared! of course i'd take the real girls first right?





okok, the statue (finally):



after that we went to take a cable car up one of the mountains there.



a shot of the mountain scenary:



on the mountain stands a statue of the fisherman aka the mermaid's husband:



a nice view of the city from the mountain:



what's a trip to china like without some engrish?:



there was also this rock where couples would put locks that had their names engraved on. supposedly these couples will be blessed by the fisherman and the maiden (who are mortal? or eventually became dieties?):



after the day tour we went to do somemore shopping at the undeground shopping centre. some stuff can bargain while others were pretty much fixed price. we went for dinner at some japanese restaurant and "the boss" ordered tons of food again. i thought if i saw another fish i would have puked. and he made the statement "ah, we're eating fish so there's less meat than yesterday". what, since when is fish considered vegetables? what kind of retarded statement was that? *roll eyes* and it's not like we are not paying for it (ok technically my mum paid for my bro and me).

DAY 3 - 17 Nov 08

my mum arranged for some driver to bring all of us to He Shan (somewhere in Guang Zhou) to visit some distant relatives. the driver went on the highway and it took around 1hour to get there. mind you it's supposed to be a rural part of china.





not as shabby as i would expect though. they grew rice in the region and it was harvesting season. they lay all their freshly threshed grains on the roads (where cars drive over them and people just trample on them) for them to be dried out by the sun:



some people in the fields (the one in blue is actually some distant relative of mine. hmmm...fortunately i don't see any resemblence):



a water buffalo in the fields:



ok, i dub this village "the village of sleeping dogs" because whenever you turned your head, there would be a sleeping dog in the alley. amazing.

we went back to Zhu Hai after dinner there (another hour of traveling. ugh. toilet~~) went back to the hotel and just slept. (apparently some air of resentment was brewing but it didn't involve me. don't care. sleep.)

DAY 4 - 18 Nov 08

the morning started with something going on between my aunts and my mum. don't really get them la. it's hard to tell why 3 women hitting menopause get cross with each other.

we took a ferry to Hong Kong (finally). some confusion with the HK cabbie caused more unhappiness in the air between the 3 women. we checked in, wasted no time had a very decent lunch at those HK style cafes (i had roast goose rice. it tasted pretty much like duck.) and took the MTR (not MRT) to this Nv Ren Jie (literally "woman street"). it's pretty much like bugis street style but they sell totally random things from fake prada to doraemon underwear.



after that, for some reason, things got really ugly between my aunts and my mum and they started seriously PMS-ing each other. hey, how u expect a guy to shop when caught in the middle of 3 PMS-ing women? (ok it's more like my 2 aunts vs my mum)

then my mum insisted on taking the MTR to take some escalators to some mountain. with unhappiness still in the air we took the train and got to the station. after around 20 minutes of going up one escalator after another we reached the end of the escalators which was at the mountain mid-level. it was a truly stunning view
.
.
.
.
.
.
.


...of course we were stunned. there was NOTHING! talk about a total disappointment. needless to say this brought the bad atmosphere up one notch and we cabbed to the mountain top.

managed to get a nice mountain view of HK at night:



after that we took the tram down the mountain which wasn't fantastic either because we moved backwards. (bad atmosphere up up up) after that my mum insisted we went to catch the laser show and the walk of fame. but by the time we reached there it was too late (needless to say you know things are getting beyond nasty). did get a nice river view though:



a statue of Bruce Lee:



Jackie Chan's handprints:



we had macs for dinner. i really wanted to get a pair of jeans i saw which i couldn't get because they were PMS-ing so i started giving my signature pissed look and made a lot of noise (heh heh 3 PMS-ing aunties + 1 cranky guy) surprisingly my 2 aunts offered to go back to Mong Kok (where Nv Ren Jie was) with me so i could get my jeans from one of the shops (no, not from the roadside stalls). i think they just wanted to get away from my mum. the great thing about HK is that shops don't close even at 1130pm! and it was a weekday! so my mum dragged my bro along with her to wherever her planned adventures led her. went back to the hotel and slept.

FINAL DAY - 19 Nov 08

this is the day we went to Disneyland! woohoo~ we cabbed there with all our luggage.

some bridge on the way:



i see disneyland!:





when we got there, my mum went to settle the tickets while my aunts settles the luggage. do i even have to mention how totally mundane things trigger off PMS-ing women?

the tickets!



so we went in and took the rides and watched some shows. it was quite a lot of fun.

high school musical HK style:



my bro's pizza:



my seafood baked rice:



some attractions:

*

*

we got some souvenirs and went out only to find my aunts already waiting outside. we got kinda lost along the way and apparently they've been waiting for about an hour for us. honestly they were way too early (even the 3rd, non-PMS-ing aunt said so). regardless, this is the final straw. the 3 women just shouted at each other all the way to the airport (poor cabbie). after that, my aunts just stopped talking to my mum completely. they are still currently not talking to my mum. haha. God knows when their menopause will end. but i definitely made it a point not to get affected by their bad atmosphere. expenses paid trip with lots of buys. nothing much to complain about. (other than the stupid uncle. fortunately not related to him by blood, he's the 3rd aunt's husband. ugh.)

i decided that if i included the stuff i bought, this post would be way too long. so i decided to split up the shopping and the sightseeing into 2. hence the "sightseeing version". look foward to the alternate version! until then, bye~