slosh down the pepper!

I say, take my hand…

2011-02-14T04:32:00.005+08:00

… and swing it into the air. It is much about the freedom than others believed it to be. We shouldn't be one step nearer to the tombstone of love, but instead, be buried together in it. It takes courage and boy, aren't we glad that our hearts were thumping away to propel us in this direction?

I see skies of blue and clouds of white interweaved like our fingers locked in each other’s. Funny the entanglement may look, but it speaks of a tempting urge to begin a new life together. It is no wonder that the lips smacked in agreement!

This is perhaps happiness. Blue skies are always packed with fluffy white clouds and dreams, they do fly high.

Happy Valentine’s Day, my dear one.

Tip.Toe

2011-01-24T23:59:00.014+08:00

You are taller and I am obviously shorter.

You wear shoes but I am barefooted.

You are suited in sombre black while I am dressed in lively blue peppered with perky shades of purple.

You are the man who appears, to take me away from the free-spirited world I was used to.

I am not complaining; on the contrary I reach up to meet your lips with mine. My entire weight rested on the ten little toes and they pressed hard against the coarse wooden planks. I think I almost stop breathing as even little gasps for air will un-stabilize me. And this is when Alex shouts: "hold it there... hold . it there...". Gosh, for him, nothing else should matter in this moment. He continues to hide behind the huge 3kg camera but his intent is obvious: concentrate on the act. be like the wind that tugs unyieldingly at the tail of the gown (and my hair).

*Click Click Click*

Phew... Hiak! Hiak! Hiak! :) Of course lah, the original raw shot does not appear as sophisticated as this one. Still a good shot, but it is his photoshop skills and artistic eye that impresses us. Healing brown patches of scars on my right leg were cloned out, color filter added to increase saturation, photo cropped and sharpened to create long cinematic effect etc. Perhaps the picture was also deliberately tilted a little over the left to compose a dreamy buoyant effect, representing the "uplifting" moment.

I am glad that it turned out fun after all :)

The 1st Session - 14 Oct 2010

2010-10-14T22:12:00.007+08:00

My second root canal, after 4 years. I didn't even realize it was that long ago before the dentist reminded me. In my memories, it was done in 2008 (instead of 2006) and it was a rather painless affair. I still remembered myself staring into the big LCD TV above me and dozing off at times.

Today, the same LCD TV was there. The same dentist. The same dental nurse who attended to me 4 years ago. And probably a lot of other things that were unchanged. But the experience, at least from memory, were far from being the same.

He started with some light chats. It was the first time I saw his face in full view, mask-less. Heh, he really resembled Uncle T, in looks & shape. Of course, they are brothers. But back then, I thought they looked vastly different. I thought he was skinnier, fairer and with rather good complexion. He didn't talk that much then. But today he appeared in good spirits and even joked: " this should be the last time I see you... after that, you are going to take care of your teeth right?..." Sigh, but I doubt, not at least after my 3rd root canal.

So he moved on to check on the teeth that required treatment. There were 2 of them - the upper second last molar on the left jaw, and the lower last molar on the same left jaw. He looked at the teeth, poked it, knocked it, tested it with some dry cold ice-like thingy, took x-rays and decided that the lower molar was more in need of urgent treatment. Not only did it have a decay near the root chambers, but it also had a lingering pain as it was hit by the "ice".

He moved on to apply a orange-pinkish balm around the gums and tooth so that it will numb the area a bit before he injects the local anesthesia. 5 minutes later, he took the large needle and started his injections... quite a few of them, at least 4-6 shots. :-s I am not sure if it serves as consolation but this part of the procedure is actually the most painful & scary one. I kept imagining that he injected the long needle into the side jaw and then kind of twisted it like some acupuncture needle. Ewe...

As usual, he rubbed the area almost immediately as he withdrew the needle. I think that's actually a rather useful technique that all dentists should learn. Somehow, it felt less painful. It's just like rubbing blue-black spot to soothe it.

And so the usual begins.

Step 1: Anesthetize

Step 2: Put metal ring around tooth to isolate & protect tooth

Step 3: Put rubber dam and a green plastic over my mouth (hee, think green surgery cloth over the body with just the wound being revealed)

Step 4: Drill (probably to remove the 'cap' of the tooth & reveal the nerves)

Step 5: Remove pulp (some stinging sensation and slight pain)

Step 6: Twiddling within the individual chambers to remove residual nerves (involves drilling, looking into the microscope, x-ray & some small bendable wire)

Maybe I am imagining (again), there will be an alert sound whenever the small wire 'found' some nerves. Then I will feel some slight stinging again. But I don't see the wire bei

ng connected to any computer or machine.. weird.

Step 7: "tsk, your tooth is very challenging.." (Twiddle harder)

He showed signs of frustrations as he repeated his words twice... he even removed h

is front mask (the transparent one to prevent water/decayed tooth bits spraying into the eyes / face) to take a closer look into the tooth. My jaw was really tired and aching by then. It was 1 hour into the procedure already. "2 more minutes..." He tried even harder. He finally gave up. I think he also felt my irritation as I kept closing my jaw when he turned his back to take a different instrument. :-(

Out of the 3 root canals, he only managed to do up 2.5. The 3rd one is mini and he had difficulty accessing it. I am glad that he said that he will try again at the second session instead of "that's the best we can do... let's hope there's no complications". Well...

Step 8: Put temporary filler.

Step 9: Collect medication & make payment.

Step 10: Make appointment for second session

Total time spent: 1.25 hours on the dental chair & 0.25 hour on the couch waiting for medication & payment.

Overall impression: high tech clinic - imagine a dental chair equipped with x-ray, microscope, light, and even small cushions on the chair for the back. I didn't have to move out of my chair at all! And of course a big LCD TV, probably even bigger than the 32" I have at home. Soothing music in the background. X-rays gets uploaded to the computer immediately and up pops a large picture of my teeth. Cool~

Long and dreary entry eh? For $560 (1st session only leh!), I have to document my experience!!

Feedback session

2010-03-17T01:13:00.004+08:00

I told EW that I want work-life balance.

I told EW that I am toying with the idea of quitting and looking for another place that can provide work-life balance.

I told EW that I don't look forward to being promoted and work 15 hours a day.

I told EW that I also don't look forward to work 15 hours a day without getting promoted.

I told EW that I hate KR.

I told EW that I won't grow under KR or under her since she's under KR.

I told EW to keep a look out for me on opportunities outside the bank.

I told EW to keep a look out for me on opportunities within the bank.

EW is my manager. KR is EW's immediate boss and my big boss. Throughout the 30-minute session (intended to review my objectives for the year), she kept encouraging me to see the bright side of things, that I should take the chance to pick up ISDA negotiation, to learn the full scope of work, to be nicer to KR, to at least be diplomatic with KR because he is one who remembers!

In the end, I told EW that I will give myself one year to learn the whole of collateral management from her, then I will seriously consider leaving this overly-talented team (for a less-intelligent one so that I can be the star player, work 8 hours a day and get promoted all the same). This shall be my work objective for 2010 till KR wields his stupidity and cuts short my patience to put up with his ridiculous antics. I am a racist when it comes to this type of lazy, petty, loud-voiced Indian man. Hmph!

i..*ouch!

2009-12-28T12:16:00.006+08:00

I realised I gotta get this only after I saw the actual thing. It was smaller than it looked when it was in the box. It looked like it fitted the "bitten apple" very well when WH was holding it. Then, I knew that was my 'perfect' one.

Me and Tempest first saw the ipouch at Challenger in Vivocity. It was retailing at $35.90 for members, which Tempest was one. The material was suede-like and soft to the touch. That I liked a lot, but it was somewhat big-ish so it didn't fit exactly what I had in mind. So I hesistated, and he didn't insist it long enough. We walked away. I was confident that we can find the 'perfect' one - same soft material with a cleaning function, pouch-like preferably with no drawstring or flipping cover, sleek, nice color, and reasonably priced.

The next day, after I made my decision, we went to the Challenger at Tampines One. Oh damn, they didn't stock the pouch! We walked around somemore, only to find it selling at $39 at nubox, some Authorised Apple Reseller. Sheesh! How I hated myself! In my pursuit for perfection at a bargain, I lost $3...

It is cool to have an iphone.. I had fun fiddling with the widgets and admiring the responsiveness everytime I swipe to move a page. Tempest had fun downloading games every weekend we meet up. All at an upfront cost of $438 after $100 trade-in, and now with added cost of $21.90 for 2 pieces of anti-glare screen protector (who wants to buy the other?? :p) and a $39 Terahedron-made phone pouch. Total of $498.90, for now.

The first 2 weekends of November

2009-11-16T02:37:00.005+08:00

I have been attending quite a number of social gatherings this month. Given that I am an introvert, it is rather impressive :p

The first event of this month saw me swinging down a 450m long zip-line in Sentosa with 7 other adrenaline junkies! Touted as Asia's steepest flying fox that reaches heart pounding speeds at 50km/h, it was really not as scary as its advertisers make it out to be. In fact, most of us agreed that the 4-storey high vertical para-jump was more frightening. Other than me and Tempest, the remaining group of 2 girls and 4 guys are Tempest's classmates, and friend. It was quite cool that the group hit it off pretty well, even at the very beginning. Perhaps it was due to the equal mix of people, with half of them extroverts and the other half introverts. Fun-filled day. Kudos to Tempest's planning skills :p I was somewhat surprised when he managed to gather such a big group of people to pay $59 each to go through a tiring day of climbing ropes, para-jumping and flying fox!

The next day, we were off to visit one of Tempest colleagues in NUH. My, looking for her ward was already a challenge on its own. Turn after turn we took, before arriving at Wing 2. It was quite a modern building from the outside, but looks the same as any local hospital on the inside. But the single-bed ward was pretty cosy. Coming with a desk, tv, and a day-bed by the window, it looked just like a hotel deluxe room. The only reminder of it being a ward was the hospital bed. The patient was an Austrian lady. Her boyfriend of Indian descent was also present. Though it was a brief half-an-hour visit, it was still pleasant meeting new people especially foreigners (a rarity in Singapore!). She and her partner are pretty humourous and friendly beings, which made it nice talking with them. It also gave us a chance to buy flowers :p It is just the thing to do when you visit angmohs. Singaporeans will much prefer fruits and food, i guess.

This Sat, we visited G and her month-old baby boy. Nice feeling meeting up with old classmates. Just nice hearing numerous updates on people you have never met for months.. It appears that many of them are moving on to the next stage of their lives, and some already to the next next stage. Makes me wonder if I should be happy being able to stretch this stage of my life *eyes looking up*

Today, I attended my manager's wedding at The Legends. Well, speaking liberally, this guy is an amazement! He fast forwarded stage after stage of his life, all within 7 -8 months, and he's going to be a Daddy April next year. He might be a very 'J' person, wanting to complete everything in one shot! Haha. Anyway, the special-ness in this was that I actually attended the wedding. I am not a fan of such social ocassions normally. If I can avoid it, I definitely will. For this one, I just feel it important to attend, to 'show face' for I am almost on the verge of being labelled as "anti-social" by fellow colleagues. For a while, it seemed to be my own wedding when alcoholics in my table kept toasting me and urging me to finish up the glass of red wine I had. Hahaha.. Overall, I give it a 7.5 out of 10, for the pork ribs with raisins, sharks' fins and mango pomelo dessert., and the portions for we only have 7 in a table. One embarrassing moment though, there was not enough abalone slices to go around for the table next to us, and the waiter popped over and took away one of ours! Heh, perhaps the waiter should have left the guests to pick their own food, rather than distributing the portions equally.

2 weekends, 4 activities. I wonder what I will be doing in the next...

Running along with 111 years of history

2009-09-14T11:16:00.008+08:00

I got my first pair of Saucony shoes last night! $152.10 after a 10% discount with Citibank card. This is one of my fastest buy even for a pair of shoes. My initial thought was to look-see-look-see in Running Lab, taking the advantage of having a free consultation on the type of shoes that fit my shape of feet. But the friendly salesman "Ruixiang" had taken the efforts to check my foot-type, and pulled out 5 pairs of shoes for me to try on. I felt a little bad to walk off without buying anything, even as Tempest was egging me to buy the Gel-Kayano at Queensway.

I thought it was a pretty good buy, as compared to forking out $200-ish for a pair of Asics Gel-Kayano. The latter offers better cushioning at both the forefoot and heel sections, but it comes with a tighter fit around the midfoot, and a low side-rim that kept jabbing at my left ankle as I walk. It was tolerable but I was afraid it would turn bothersome upon long usage. Plus, Running Lab didn't have size 7.5 for the cheaper blue-colored version. All things considered, I opted for the more roomy, less beautiful, and cheaper Saucony ProGrid Guide. More importantly, there aren't many retailers who carry this brand, so there are less opportunities for price comparison. I can be convinced that I got a good deal. :-)

Trivia:

Saucony was founded in 1898 along the banks of the Saucony Creek in Kutztown, Pennsylvania.. Heh.. sure didn't sound American to me, just like Asics didn't sound Japanese :-p The Saucony logo represents the endless flow of that waterway, along with its boulder-strewn creek bed, depicted by the three distinct dots within the brand’s “river” mark.

Where's my cup of tea?

2009-09-08T01:37:00.004+08:00

How do most people define 'success'? My parents are likely to equate that with the size of the paycheck. Most of my friends will see the same, with some of them placing emphasis also on the rank or title held. A manager earning $4,000 is probably more successful than an executive that earns $5,000. A handful of them might say: "As long I am happy with enough to spend, I am more or less successful". Nowadays, I am inclined towards the latter thought. I yearn for a good quality of life, with time to spare for activities I enjoy rather than immerse in long hours of work that does not even result in a sense of satisfaction 80% of the time.

I reckon that I can do the same as long as I treat my job as simply a job; quickly finish the work, and go home. Yet, the corporate culture does not tolerate anyone without an ambition to progress. Perhaps it's only my workplace that promotes such an aggresive working attitude. Everyone is encouraged to work hard, suggest improvements, handle projects, all on top of the normal workload. Work passed on from the top to the lower rungs are considered a chance for the normal executive to showcase their ability to rise up the ladder. Then when everyone is being pushed to work as hard, one has to work even harder to even think of getting an average or slightly above average performance grade at the end of the year. In retrospect, I am on the verge of regretting a job switch from a friendly family-like environment to a concrete fast-paced skyscraper. I used to go to fancy celebratory dinner treats with the entire department, and heartlander-style outings such as ktv, dinners, bbqs. Now, there are only invites to drinks, drinks and more drinking sessions, of which I only attended once, and that was because it was to celebrate the Boss's promotion. It was just so not my cup of tea.

For the past 6 months or so, I have been thinking of alternatives to get myself out of this corporate challenge. Never has the desire to do something different or start something new been so strong. I had to think of a work that provides sustainability, reasonable income to maintain at least my current standard of living, and yet flexible enough such that I can do it whenever and wherever I want to. So there were the options: 1) start my own business, 2) patent something, 3) produce something that earns royalties.

Heh.. Tempest and I had a discussion some time ago on profitable activities. And he thought writing children's stories is a good way to earn money. Parents are so willing to spend on loads of books for their kids. Writing a story isn't really too difficult, especially some ridiculous fairy tale with talking animals. That's almost a breeze :p But neither of us know how to draw, and kids' storybooks rely on colorful illustrations to make a point. So there goes the wonderful idea...

Too bad I ain't savvy in investments, otherwise I could hole up in my bedroom with my laptop, alternating between playing facebook games and trading equities on POEMS. Whatever said, it's all empty talk till now. Sometimes, I also wish that I could just leave here and start anew elsewhere, maybe in a European country where life is more relaxed and people do enjoy taking time off to sip coffee and watch the crowd pass by. I could be serving expresso in a al-fresco cafe, or working with volunteers n a non-profit organization, or take up courses and turn into a professional yoga teacher! Or simply any place that does not boast of a structured hierarchy. A big place often comes with huge politics and unnecessary aggression.

Sigh.. I hate the state I am in now.. neither motivated to strive and earn the 'Best Employee' award nor sufficiently enthusiastic to pursue a new direction. Argh!!!

The crazy little adventure trip to Mt. Bromo - Part III

2009-08-13T20:01:00.024+08:00

Mt. Penanjakan:

3am, the hostel staff knocked on our room door to wake us up. What personalised morning call! Hehe. Hoo.. it gave us the chills when our bare feet touched the cold floor. We were glad for the rented jackets. Midway up the steps to the waiting area, Tempest felt a twang in his stomach and had to return to the room to use the toilet. I continued my way up; it's too tiring to climb up and down in the cold dark morning. I saw quite a number of guides waiting for their tourists, and another group of tourists and guides waiting for their jeeps. Udin was there too! He was to bring 2 other angmoh females to Bromo. While waiting for their jeep, Udin took chance to play with his dog and introduce it to us. 'Jacky' was a medium-sized mongrel with black and white patches. Apparently it had been up to the observation point with Udin on several occasions!

Shortly after Udin and group left, Tempest arrived, but yet had to descend to our room again to take the flashlight that we purposedly bought for the sunrise trip. Hehe.

Our driver was late for 20 minutes! And for the first 15 minutes of the jeep drive, that young guy probably in his early twenties, was almost always talking away on his handphone! Luckily it was kind of flat ground we were travelling then, otherwise we might have fallen over the edges of the volcano. He was probably slow in his driving too, as quite a few jeeps overtook us. Argh!! The second half of the journey was much faster and smoother when we travelled on well-paved roads. Following that was a 15-minute trek uphill to the observation point. Along the way, we saw several touts selling sock caps and renting thick jackets. There was also a stretch of shops selling hot drinks, snacks and souveniers. We were particularly caught by the smell of grilled sweet corn sold by a roadside stall, but we had no chance to even think of buying it since our guide was already ahead of us.

By the time we reached the top of the observation point aka Mt. Penanjakan. it was crowded with tourists, most of them caucasians. They, not only have the natural advantage of being tall, but were also hogging the front rows of the viewpoint!

The entire place is structured like an amphitheatre, with rows of benches on cut steps in progressive elevation. With the "stage area" already packed with tall westerners, we had to settle for a standing space on the first row of steps. Even that only got us a partial view as the angmohs started to either sit on the railings or stand on the ledge leaning against the railings. One guy even went as far as to sit on top of a short stump of block, effectively blocking most people of a full view. Really annoying!

The sky started to brighten at about 5.15am. We waited for 10 minutes or so but there was no signs of the sun rising. Some of the spectators who got favorable standing area began to leave their hard-earned lots and moved away to take pictures of the volcanos (located further east) which were beginnning to be unveiled as the mist dispersed. Just as I was resigned to an unsatiable sunrise viewing experience, 2 ladies got off the bench seats at the row behind us. Woohoo! Another Asian man also saw the opportunity and was trying to shout for his partner; seeing that, I quickly stood on it before calling out to Tempest. At times like this, you gotta be aggressive! :) And I was well-rewarded with an awesome sunrise at full view!

My first seeing the entire process!
OOH-LALA!!!
I am so happy that we made it for this trip! :-)

Tris wanted to bring us downhill to take a closer look at the volcanos. I strongly rejected his invitation while Tempest eagarly trodded along. Dunno why, but the slopes appeared daunting and I doubt I could make it without falling over. On hindsight, I should have gone down with them; the photos Tris took of Tempest were quite nice (like the one below). Hee, but they did bring back a bunch of mountain flowers - edelwiess and some herb that stops nose bleeding (Tris mentioned some latin name that I can't make out) and a handful of sourish wildberries! They looked like blueberries, just smaller.

The one sprouting smoke is Mt. Bromo. And the tallest one in the background is Mt. Semaru, the most active volcano of East Java; it is said to have small eruptions every 10 minutes. In the foreground is probably Mt. Batok, an already dormant volcano.

Tris was also telling us that Mt. Bromo erupts every 5 years and it last erupted on 8 June 2004 and killed 2 tourists (one Singaporean 13-year old boy and another local). So that means it could erupt any moment now! O_O BUT upon arriving home, I checked up the web and some sources recorded its last eruption in 2007, but I couldn't find any details on it. *puzzled* But if the 2007 eruption holds true, then it's pretty scary when the guides were not aware of the latest information and were saying the wrong things to the tourists. Hmm..

On our way to Mt. Bromo, Tris brought us up a ridge for some photo-taking (while most other tourists were contented to stay by the road). It is a good thing that he used to like photography and often pointed out good places to capture nice pictures. The one at the blog header was his idea. Hee.. really nice!

Another one!

Mt. Penanjakan is quite a good place to view all the prominent volcanoes. We even saw a couple taking wedding shoots at the ridge. Pretty amazing that the bride could make it to the more rocky areas with the gown and stuffs. (As she lifted up her gown, she revealed her pants..ahh.. so that was how.. now I wonder what shoes she was wearing...)

Sea of Sand:

He also stopped us in the middle of the Tengger caldera floor (aka Sea of Sand) for again some photo-shooting moments. In fact, we were the only jeep that stopped there.

Tempest: "Hai.. too bad we don't have a container to carry the sand home"
Me: "But this is a national park... we are not supposed to.."
Tempest: "They have so much sand here!"

Oh well...

Mt. Bromo:

It took a short 15 minute or so drive to Mt. Bromo, where our horses were waiting for us. We reached the base of Mt. Bromo via a 10-15 minute horse ride across the caldera floor. Here, we dismissed the idea of bringing back any volcanic ash/sand... the entire floor was covered with blobs of smelly yellowish poo of the horses. YUCK!

Look at the number of horses and their guides waiting for the return of their riders! There's the Hindu temple at the far back. We didn't bother to stop there for photos since it looked pretty empty.

Meet the hunchback of Bromo Land!

250 steps leading to the crater rim. Look at how well-prepared we were.. N95 mask! Most people we saw were using scarves and paper masks. It was not as smelly as Mt. Ijen as the crater is much smaller. It was more to ward off the sand that flew about as the wind rose. Oh, and the hunch, that was our North-face daypack hidden underneath Tempest's jacket. He did that cos Tris was telling us to take care of our belongings back in Mt. Penanjakan.

The not that impressive Bromo crater.

I was a bit sad that I didn't get the white horse instead. Come to think of it now, maybe the guides assign us to the horses according to our color of our attire. Haha.. The brown one that I was riding was in fact foaming at the mouth. Tempest also noticed that the animal pooed a large blob of shit and fell out of the bag that was strapped underneath to hold the shit. And his stupid horse stepped over the poo. Wahaha!

The horse guides were also very blatant in asking for tips: "maybe you can give something to the horse.." So Tempest flipped out a $50,000 RP note and handed it over to my horse guide. "For the 2 of you," he said, pointing to his own guide as well. Back at Lava Hostel, Tris also reminded us to tip the jeep driver. We were a bit reluctant actually, after all the driver was paid to do his job, and he didn't provide good service either! Still, to keep things happy, we tipped a $20,000 RP note to the driver. And of course, another $50,000 RP to Tris. He was quite a good guide, bringing us to ulu scenic places, taking photos for us etc.

And that was it. Back to Lava Hostel for our "buffet breakfast".

The young man at the counter would ask how you would like your eggs to be done - scrambled, omelette, or sunny-side up. Other breakfast items include local fruits, toasted bread, fried rice with no ingredients, butter, jam, coffeee and tea. Truly basic, but enough to fill the tummies.

After some packing, we were ready to check out and return to Surabaya city by 9.30am.

Bambang said he would bring us to 2 places including visiting the mud flood. Driving out to the city took about 4 hours and we arrived at a roadside restaurant for lunch. This time round, the menu at least had english descriptions. The previous restaurants we went to only had menus fully in Indonesian, and we had to rely on our guides to recommend dishes.

The usual bbq Gurame fish, fried kang kung with shrimps, and my favorite tahu telor! Their version is flattened, unlike the towering ones sold in Singapore. This one even has the peanut dip by the side. Really tasty!

After lunch, Bambang drove us to the mud flood. If not for the factory roofs that were still showing up, I wouldn't have realized that the entire village had been submerged. Ewee... imagined being drowned in mud...

The mud flood was caused by excessive drilling of the gas pipes which resulted an eruption of hot mud from the gas well. To think I thought it was some mud volcano.. heh.. There were some motorcylists who claimed to be victims of the mud flood; one even showed me some kind of pass they had been given by the government as proof of their identity. These guys were selling vcds of documentaries of the mud flood, and even offered to bring us to the site of the eruption for a small fee. When we rejected the offer, he then requested us to "give us some rupiah or something".

I was pretty glad that Bambang didn't add stuff like: "maybe you will like to give them something.." :P

After that, Bambang brought us to some open plaza with statues depicting the nation's struggle for independence. It was hot and boring, and got him to drop us at some shopping mall instead. It's very much like those in Singapore, even the shops and brands they carry. Nothing too fancy or extraordinary. We could have stayed back in Lava Hostel, and relax till check-out time at noon, before going straight to the airport. Bleh..

Nonetheless, it was still a very memorable impromptu trip! A lot of firsts too - first time riding in a jeep, first time riding a horse, first time watching sunrise, first time climbing a volcano, first time seeing a crater lake, first time wearing a sock cap, first time flying with Silkair, first time wearing a N95 mask.. hee..

Of course, our parents were not very approving of our methods. Visiting a volcano is considered dangerous enough, what more joining a tour package with just the two of us and a total stranger guide! Frankly speaking, we were quite glad that we didn't meet with any danger. :)

Total expenses: $216 nett airfare with Silkair; USD200 for a 3D2N tour with Global Adventure Indonesia (covers all lodging, meals, entrance fees, horse rides, jeep ride, return transfer to Airport); about SGD 50 for tipping (the most we have spent on tipping so far!)

I need more of such crazy adventures!!!

The crazy little adventure trip to Mt. Bromo - Part II

2009-08-13T16:06:00.022+08:00

Bondowoso - Mt Ijen:

We checked out of Palm hotel at 4.30am for our 3-hour bumpy drive to Mt Ijen. In fact, the journey would have been much shorter if not for the lousy roads which was full of sand, small rocks and potholes.

At Ijen, Bambang initially wanted us to trek up the 3m to the crater lake on our own. But I thought I wanted a guide. So he arranged for Bak-Im to bring us up. This was a tanned and skinny man about my height. He sprouts only a few english phrases and taught us bahasa indonesia along the way up. I distinctively remembered "pelan pelan" (I thought I heard "blan blan") which meant "slow slow". He was quite nice and helpful, finding us walking sticks, pointing to us the good trails to walk on, and holding on to me by the arm when he saw that I had problems going down slopes. He would say "pelan pelan", "no problem" whenever we lagged behind him. Also a very environmentally conscious being, he was constantly picking up rubbish and sweeping away loose twigs off the foot path. We could also tell that he was quite popular among the workers; he was almost always chatting with the continous stream of workers (who were carrying as much as 70kg of sulphur!) going downhill, and greeting foreigners of other groups. One angmoh even offered Bak-Im some cookies.

Ever since I worked the London Shift begining late April this year, I hadn't been visiting the gym often. So even thought it was only a 3km hike uphill, I found it strenuous and taxing on the knees as we treaded down slopes.

What was encouraging and demoralising at the same time were the markers along the journey to the crater. 2 HM (hundred metre), 6 HM, 18 HM, 27 HM.. and finally the lake...

As we approached the lake, the sulphur smell got so strong that it was choking. I was quite surprised to see some workers even having their meals and smoking and resting nearby. Frankly, the lake looks better in the pictures. I think 70% of the time, the lake is covered with the sulphurous smoke. So I didn't really catch a view of the full lake without the 'mist'. But luckily Tempest did, and captured it with his canon.

Nonetheless, half a view of the turquoise lake is still "ooh-lala", as Bak-Im called it. Coupled with the sulphurous smell, sweat, panting and exhaustion, it was no doubt an authentic breath-taking experience!

Bak-Im advised us to quickly take a few photo shoots and go back, as the smell is "no good". The trek up took us about 1.5 hours and the downward return took 0.5 hour less. We were glad to stop by the cafe at the foot of the mountain for drinks before returning to the car for yet another bumpy ride downhill, followed by a long drive to Mt. Bromo.

This is Bak-Im, who can carry up to 90kg of sulphur on his shoulders! Hee.. Tempest also had a go at the 70-kg load (above), but couldn't lift it an inch off the rock.

Mt Ijen - Bromo Area:

We had a new passenger joining us for the ride to Bromo - Udin. This is yet one other short little man, muscular, tanned and very cheerful, nonsensical guy. Weird, the shorter guys in Surabaya are always more interesting and funny than their taller counterparts. Udin was a fellow employee from Global Adventure and had just ended his tour on Mt Ijen. He would be starting a tour on Bromo the next morning and thus took a lift from us. This Probolinggo-born local entertained us with his singing, jokes, stories during the car ride. He would point out coffee plantations, tobacco plants, glue trees to us along the way. I had a really bad tummyache midway (probably due to the 3 slices of bread packed by Palm Hotel), and he was nice to buy a bottled drink from a village shop lady so that I could use their toilet as a favor to us. He also advised that Bromo could be quite cold at night, and it was best to have a thick jacket along. Upon learning that Tempest only has a pullover, he assured us that we could rent jackets at the hostel.

Lunch was not as elaborate, but still good and cheap. A grilled whole Gurame fish is only 32,000 rupiah, equivalent to SGD 4.60! This time round, Bambang and Udin ordered their own individual portions, while me and Tempest ordered the fish, kangkung and tahu telor to share amongst the 4 of us. Earlier on, we found out that Edy doesn't take chicken. Now we realised that Bambang likes egg, but doesn't like fish. Hehe.. and Tempest doesn't take vegetables. I also ordered a hot ginger drink which was sweet and spicy - good for the 'injured' tummy. I suspect our entire meal, including the guides', cost less than SGD 20.

We re-traced our route from Bondowoso to Jember to Probolinggo, then to Cemoro Lawang, and past Ngadisari village to Lava Hostel or Cafe Lava, as it is more popularly known.

The road up to the mountains was really scenic, with lotsa greenery, deciduous-like forestation, fields planted with all kinds of food like padi, maize, watermelon, banana etc, and huts and houses built at all types of precarious-looking grounds.

It was almost similar to Dalat, but the bigger variety of plants and long mountainous range add color and magnificence to the picturesque region. Comparatively, Dalat looks a bit ugly with its ruggard slums at hilltops; its huge population of coffee plantations also dull the scenary. What's even more lacking are the mist and intense blue skies that lends Bromo area its fairyland characteristics. Oh, and I forgot to mention about those cobbled stone walls that the Indonesians used to fence their houses. Cute, like some cottage in those fables.

SO we reached Cafe Lava at about 5.30pm, and checked in to Room 209. Again, pretty basic lodging facilities, but it does come with hot water, TV, and thick quilts. No air con is needed since the cool mountain air is chilling enough. The entire lodge seems to be built on wood, giving it a traditional Balinese feel. Room is considerably clean, but maybe the lights were quite dim despite having quite a few of them, so I can't really spot the dirt. Just one thing about the "heater". It uses gas to ignite fire and then boils the water that flows through the tube. So within the heater, you can see the fire burning away! Like those bunsen burner flames we see, albeit bigger. Be sure to wait a while after the first user, for the gas is used up after 15 to 20 minutes of usage, and needs time to be refilled.

A quaintly hilltop resort standing against a backdrop of mountaineous range. The cobbled paths particularly gives it a neat, manicured look!

I wanted to walk to Lava View Lodge, the higher-end cousin of Lava Hostel. But it was located within the Bromo National Park, and we needed to pay an entrance fee. Thus we gave up that idea and went back to the cafe to take an early dinner at 6pm. We were assigned set meals by our tour agency. There was a bowl of vegatable soup, a plate of palm-sized grilled chicken breast with boiled vegetables and french fries by the side, and mixed fruits which we exchanged for the Javanese fried banana for dessert, and tea/coffee. The the skinless chicken breast was a tad too tough, but the fries and fried banana were good.

Goreng pisang drizzled with chocolate sauce - yummy and filling!

We were seated next to the windows, so while we were eating, we constantly see the locals waving sock caps woven with the words "Mt Bromo" from outside the cafe. Since we already have ours, we waved them off :p Then this tall dark muscular looking guy came forth and introduced himself as Tris, our guide to Bromo the next morning. He went through the itinerary and informed us that the cafe staff would provide us with a "morning call" at 3am, so as to prepare us for set-off at 3.30am. Tempest was a little worried that it was a scam and we could be left at the top of the mountain with no transport back; he forgot that Bambang had told us that we would be assigned a new guide to Mt. Bromo. So back to the room, he went ahead to make a call to Edy to confirm this change. He fiddled with the phone numbers for a while before getting through to Edy who assured us of this arrangement.

With all things done and a peace of mind gained, we took a quick shower and shuttle off to bed at 9pm.

The crazy little adventure trip to Mt. Bromo - Part I

2009-08-13T11:36:00.018+08:00

I am back from Lavaland, unscathed!

It started with Andrew's photos on Facebook. Though less than 30 of them, each photo boasted of clear blue sky, lush green vegetation, volcanos shrouded in misty-looking clouds... it's all very surreal.. and that sparked my thoughts on visiting Mt. Bromo. With the long National Day weekend, it was the perfect timing!

So during the 10 days before our departure on National Day, me and Tempest hastily bought our air tickets from Silkair (quite a bargain at $216 nett, made even so with its early outbound and late inbound flight), booked our tour from Global Adventure Indonesia (chosen over Lintang Buana Tours for its slightly lower prices for 2 pax, responsiveness and friendliness over yahoo messenger), and then made last-minute purchases of LED flashlight and sock caps. Woo hoo! We are ready for our most impromptu adventure by Sunday :-)

Singapore - Surabaya:

We were met by Edy Siswanto, the founder of Global Adventure, at Surabaya Airport. It turned out that he ran out of staff, so he had to hire an external driver and meet us himself . When we first checked out of the departure hall, we couldn't find anyone who was supposed to be holding on to a sign with my name prominently displayed. Then a little man no taller than 1.55m approached us. He had longish hair, wore a ketayap kopiah (Malay woven headwear), and was all smiles when he held up a plastic folder with a piece of paper printed with my name, our flight details and contact numbers. That was Edy. He made a quick introduction of himself, collected USD400 from us, and led us to the car that was already waiting in the carpark opposite the airport. In comparison to most guides we met, this little man spoke pretty good english. He was to drop us at the hotel in Bondowoso, then pass us over to another of his team member who would accompany us for the rest of the 3D2N tour.

Mapping the route of our travel... we spent nearly 24 hours driving around!

Surabaya - Bondowoso:

This is one of our first long car drive, almost 7.5 hours including stopovers for lunch and phototaking. Nothing spectacular along the way till we reach the suburbs and villages by the sea. We stopped by one of the restaurants lining by the sea. Lunch was pretty elaborate; Edy ordered several small dishes - oxtail curry, stir-fried potato, vegetables, fish curry, fish head curry, mutton rendang, chicken curry, eggs in curry, fried chicken wings, fruits and a couple of other stuff that we didn't touch. We had joined several local land tours in other Southeast Asian countries, and this was the first time the tour guides joined us at the same table for meals. Maybe this is the indonesian style of fostering a more personal interaction.

The vastness of the Bali Sea is overwhelming, but we were too absorbed in waving off the flies that were attacking our food to admire the view.

We made a quick stopover at Pasir Putih aka White Beach, a short distance away from the restaurant. The place is akin to east coast park, albeit shorter, where locals will while their weekends away swimming, having picnics, fishing. The beach is not free for all, visitors have a token fee of few thousand rupiah to use the facilities which really ain't much, just a few shops selling food and stuff, and renting fishing boats. Honestly, I wasn't impressed; I thought our very own ECP is a lot much better. But Tempest was taken over again by the vastness of the sea, which comes "clean" without the big tankers, boats, cruises etc that we will find lining the horizon every single time we overlook the one at ECP.

There was a local who was rattling away in bahasa indonesia, trying to rent us the fishing boats. We weren't properly attired for any fishing, and I wasn't keen to wet myself on the first day, so we just smiled and walked away :-p

After another few hours of drive, we finally reached the city of Bondowoso. But our driver couldn't find the hotel! So Edy had to make a few phone calls, got off the car a few times, asked around before we managed to locate Palm Hotel at 5.30pm (Surabaya time GMT +0700). He then arranged for us to check into our room, introduced us to Bambang (our driver cum guide for the next 2 days), went through the itinerary, helped us to choose our dinner before leaving.

Parting shot.

Hotel room was considerably clean and comes with heater, aircon, small TV without satellite channels, bottled water and tea. It could be a 2 or 3 star hotel as it comes with a swimming pool, and a roof top area for KTV. There was also chargeable Wi-Fi at its lobby. We did a short stroll around the hotel, took pictures, and headed off for dinner at 6.30pm.

Dinner comprised of local stuff of reasonably big servings - gado gado, chicken satay, stir-fried shrimps, Hawaiian smoothies and rice. Oh, yes, and a what it looked like a dead fly amongst the shrimps. Truly disgusting!

Amazingly, we shrugged it off without a really big fuss and cleaned out the plates sans dead fly. I had a stomachache the next day but I doubt it was due to that fly since Tempest was perfectly alright. Without much to do, we took a hot shower and went to bed at about 10pm.

Tying up

2009-07-07T11:20:00.003+08:00

My brother still doesn't know how to tie a tie. He's probably the only guy I know who can't do the knotting. Anyway, so I will help him to tie the tie, and he will take care not to undo the knots for a long period of time till the next wash. This has been going on since his JC years. It's also kinda weird that he didn't bother to learn to do it himself. What's gonna happen if he undid his tie in the office accidentally and needed to wear it on the same day? Heh, maybe he already had a few spares in the office, that's why he bought several ties.

I have always known 2 ways of tying - the half triangle and the full triangle.

I used to do the full triangle for my brother. I remembered asking him his preference in the past and he chose this style rather than the simpler half-triangle. Personally, I prefer the latter. It may appear lope-sided, but it's exactly this asymmetry that lends it a stylish look, with a hint of casualness. Thus for the past 2 times, I did the lope-sided version for him. He didn't complain, or maybe he can't see the difference. :-p

Tempest didn't share my preference. He likes the traditional full triangle, also touted the windsor knot. It is supposedly more formal and meant to be worn with wide spread collar shirts. With his broad build, it is probably also more suitable for him. Kinda reminds me of 'Dr Simon' in "Fighting Spiders" - retro .. hehe

Today, I googled and learnt that there are actually 4 ways of tying a tie:

Four-in-Hand Knot

The Four-in-Hand Knot is the most popular type of necktie knot and easiest to learn, probably over 80% of tie wearers knot their ties with this. The knot is long and straight but slightly lopsided.

Half-Windsor Knot

The Half-Windsor knot is a medium triangular knot that is considered more formal than the four-in-hand. Also my favorite!

Windsor Knot

The windsor knot is a wide triangular knot that is usually worn for formal occasions, this type of knot should be worn with wide spread collar shirts.

Pratt Knot-Shelby Knot

The Pratt/Shelby knot is Semi-wide knot, when beginning to tie this knot the tie is turned outward.

Oh, and it's necessary to have a 'dimple'. I like those intentional creases. Read more abt it:

The Dimple
A good knot should always have a dimple. The dimple is the little indentation right below the knot of your tie. A good dimple is made before you tighten the knot. You start by putting your index finger in the fabric directly under the knot while lightly squeezing the side of the fabric as you tighten the knot by pulling down on the wide end of the tie. The dimple should be centered in the middle of your knot.

I may not have done a perfect job, but it ain't too bad either!

Big D-isappointment

2009-06-28T18:50:00.011+08:00

Bus 48 stops outside the famous Holland Village coffeeshop selling XO fishhead noodles. I wanted to get some lunch for Tempest and myself, so it was pretty convenient to grab some food from this coffeeshop, instead of my initial thoughts of going to the hawker centre within the Holland V arena.

Scanning through the few stalls - XO fishhead noodles, braised duck rice, Big D's Grill, economical vegetable rice, soups - I somewhat fixed my attention on the western food stall. Tempest likes western, and we had eaten at Big D's at Bedok before it shifted here. The food wasn't too bad. It was the same big tall, bald guy at the helm. He handed me over the menu and patiently waited for me to make my orders. After some consideration...

Me: "I will have a fish n' chips, and a grilled boneless chicken leg. Takeway please."
Big Guy: "Sure. There will be an additional 50 cents each for takeway. Is that alright?"
Me: "Ok".
My thoughts: What else could I have said??
Big Guy: "Please take a seat. I will deliver it to you when it's ready."
Me: "Ok".. and walked away to find some seat not too far away from the stall.

I must have waited for about 10 minutes or so, or maybe even longer as the old man seated at the same table already finished his meal of braised duck rice. Maybe I was back-facing the stall or what, Big Guy did not deliver the takeout to me. I happened to look over and saw a neatly packed plastic bagful of food and decided to check if my order was ready. Indeed, the food was just sitting there waiting for me. What happen to Big Guy's words? He promised to deliver it to me once it was ready! And Big Guy disappeared to nowhere.

Never mind. I asked the Malay chef if there were any utensils packed in the plastic bag. And he said yes. After a few steps, my intuition got the better of me, and I checked. None! I walked back to the stall and asked for the utensils. Guess what? "We ran out of fork, spoon can?" OMG! I ordered fish n chips plus chicken chop. Does he think that those can be eaten easily with just a spoon?!

Me: "No, I need forks."

He then walked over to the next stall and got me 2 forks.

Downright horrible service. It's not as if they were busy with customers. It was 2.30pm with only a third of the coffeeshop filled. I didn't even see anybody else eating western food! The signboard was plain white, with "Big D's Grill" in large black fonts, and the single 'D' in red. It was not even lit up, unlike the rest of the stalls. Kinda pales in comparison. I even thought that the stall was closed until I walked up and saw the chef busying with some stuff at the stall.

Still, I was determined not to let that incident get me down. I was feeling satisfied from the gym workout earlier. Not that I expended large amount of energy, but being able to return to a fitness regime after few months' break is indeed invigorating! So, I crossed the road and waited for bus 95 which dropped me off at Lower Kent Ridge Cresent, just before Yusof Ishak House. And sprightly walked 1 km under the burning hot sun to reach Engineering Block.

It was almost 3.15pm when I reached Tempest's lab. He was eager to have his lunch. Afterall, breakfast was ony a couple of siew mai and half a big bun at 10am. But, I just have to stop him and take the following pictures. I needed them to emphasize my complaints!

They dared to charge me 50 cents for an over-sized paper bag??!! A ridiculously high cost to recreate a teeny weeny bit of the authentic feel of ol' english fish n chips.

2 large pieces of beer battered fish with no hint of beer. It could have been pretty crispy if eaten immediately after being served. The fries were good - long and chunky.

Palm-sized chicken chop. Nowhere did it resemble a chicken leg to me.

Tempest had a fairly good time devouring the slightly charred skin; he gave it a thumbs up. But I thought overall, the chicken was a tad too dry. The fries had also turned soggy from being soaked in the sauce for 40 minutes. The baked beans were cold, so not very nice. One commendable thing though was that they added small pieces of bacon to it, giving it an extra bite.

Given the portion of the foods, $8.90 each seems a bit too expensive, especially so with the likes of Aston and Botak Jones serving equally tasty stuffs, maybe slightly bigger portions (at least for BJ) but at slightly lower prices.

Anyway, ieatishootipost had a pretty good review of this stall, mainly of its high-end stuffs like kurobata loin, and wagyu beef. Actually their pasta didn't look too bad. I saw its chef cooking up a dish for himself - the thick sauce clung on tightly to the pasta. If you like the dry sort of pasta, you will probably give it a thumbs up.

For me, the lousy service spoils everything.

Puzzles

2009-06-23T11:02:00.003+08:00

Everytime I sit on the MRT, I will see someone with a book of crossword puzzles or sudoku. They are usually ladies; but yesterday afternoon, I chanced upon a middle-aged man who looked very serious in his crossword puzzles. That was the part that amused me. Most that I saw casually outlined the words. But this guy even used a ruler! Heh, maybe he could have used a highlighter instead. With the advent of highlighter erasers, there is no fear in highlighting the wrong words anymore. Plus, it's convenient and he can still do his puzzles neatly without getting a seat on the train :-p

Now and then, I also like circling words out of a maze of random alphabets. My brother and I used to have a couple of crossword puzzles lying around in the house. We probably got them cheap at a dollar or two in some book sale. When I am bored with nothing else to do, I will pick up those books and while away an hour or so. Strangely, sometimes I just feel like doing those puzzles.

At a glance, it seems like a mindless activity. But somehow, as I squint my eyes and try to uncover each word, I derive a sense of satisfaction from finding strings of letters that are purposely spelt backwards, diagonally, diagonally backwards.. Such concentration isolates the mind. It forces away fleeting thoughts on studies (in the younger days), work, friends, the future, the past, hopes and disappointment. Sounds like I got a troubled past, haha. Far from being the truth though. I simply enjoy a mind-numbing activity now and then.

The birthday that started and ended at work.

2009-06-17T02:25:00.011+08:00

16 Jun, 12.30am:

I left office after clearing my personal mailbox and mailing a copy of the leave calender to my yahoo mail account.

16 Jun, 2.05pm:

I left home for work.

17 Jun 12.15am:

I left office after deleting my sent items in my personal inbox. It's really frustrating not being able to send out emails because the mailbox is full.

I had the above thoughts when I was crossing the road this afternoon on my way to the office. This is not the first time I am working on my birthday. I don't really feel the need to take the day off unless it falls on a Friday or before my leave or before any public holiday (which is impossible for me since Singapore doesn't celebrate any festival in June).

I have had cakes and department celebration in my previous employment as well. In D-bank, there are 20 - 30 of us who would crowd around in the pantry and sing a birthday song with the cake the AVP aka our manager had bought. Some other colleagues who are closer to each other would then pool together a sum of money and get a gift for the birthday boy / girl. The bad thing is we relied on the AVP to get the cake. Somehow, someone will inform the AVP that somebody's birthday is coming and the latter will get the get somewhere and on someday in the birthday month, we will sing the birthday song together.

In M-bank, it's pretty much similar. Except that there are a group of managers now co-sharing the cake. There are also about 20 of us in the department. No gifts though, but they will buy one cake each. So if there are 2 people born in the same month, we will have 2 cakes on that day of celebration. If it is the birthday month of the Boss, then the birthday cake will be huge with definitely some picture of Winnie the Pooh, and most likely a lunch spread of pizzas, chicken wings, tze char, beehoon etc, compliments from the Boss who thinks that we put in a lot of effort plannning her birthday celebration. It is also almost a tradition to have Mr Yip singing the cantonese version of "Happy Birthday". We just loved to hear him sing; not saying that it sounded fantastic, but it is definitely entertaining and refreshing~

Now, in B-bank, there is the cake, and there are also gifts! Things are more upmarket here. Let's talk about the cake first. Mr. NQ who was nominated as the social & welfare committee this year always delight the group of 13 with his selection of exotic, fine-tasting birthday cakes. Last month, we had a ultra-rich chocolate cake by Cova (the high class Italian cafe that boasts of a great house brew). Today (or rather last evening), he got me and another birthday guy a triple chocolate cheesecake from Canele, again some high class chocolate patisserie.

Yea, it looks exactly like the picture above, less 2 non-blowable candles!

Hear the mouthful of description:
Walnut chocolate fudge cake, chocolate chip cheese cake and dark chocolate chantily.
It costs $78.00 per kg!

It was nice of him to search for that cake when I told him I felt like having a chocolate cheese cake :p Oh yes, I am his appointed deputy committee member who would source the gifts for female colleagues while he does the guys' and of course, the cakes. He always asked me what cake I would like whenever he needs to buy any for the office. Cool!

I got a Billabong sweater and cap! Thanks to EW & BL who went to Raffles City to get the gifts.

The sweater was in cream color. in 80% cotton and 20% polyester. It fitted rather well, and is quite soft,and comfortable. It may not be very thick, but it sure is heavy on the hanger.

The cap is 100% cotton and looks cute with its slightly squarish top. Short at the sides, it looks like some kind of Recruit's cap when I wore it. Upon googling, I found that these are termed 'Railroad Caps" or "Engineer Caps".

Of course, each one of us has to 'donate' $10 - $20 each during each birthday month, depending on the number of people celebrating it at the same time. T's birthday fell on 13 Jun and mine on 16 Jun, so it was really a good timing to celebrate it. Due to some data entry error, where T's was entered as 16 Jun, we had the celebration today instead. Haha.

At about 9pm when NQ was leaving the office, I had a quick chat with him over birthdays. I was telling him that most of my friends (even my family) don't do gifts and cakes anymore, and ironically, I only get such stuff in my workplace, past and present. He said he will cook up something himself and get everybody to celebrate for him if nobody does that, hehe. Anyway, subsequently he sent me a SMS which stirred my emotions:

In verbatim:

"I think there is some truth in perhaps when u grow older, pple celebrate things like bdays less. But just to let u know, I was particularly excited when i got u the cake and pple like EW n BL were all excited about getting u the gift n all :) I would be very happy if got so many pple celebrate for me liao haha. Happy bday! Savor the last few hours."

For the record, this guy's a married man who loves his beer and humor at all times. On getting his msg, I decided to express my thanks once again to him, EW & BL who went through the trouble to make the event a memorable and tasty one for me! It's nice having wonderful people around me, and I ought to learn to appreciate them. A word of thanks may not be much, but that's the beginning!

Taking a step back, I still have good times with my friends. Though we only have dinners and no cakes, it was still emotional to know that I have friends beside me and who will lend a helping hand when I am in need. Birthday celebrations are more of a ceremonial practice to get together to chat over meals.

As for Tempest, I always have great times with him. He never fails to surprise me on my last 3 birthdays I had with him. I am waiting to see what he's up to for the 4th one :-p

Weekend feeding frenzy

2009-06-16T01:46:00.012+08:00

It was a weekend of eating!

It started with Saturday afternoon where I met up with the girls at Manpuku@Tampines One to celebrate G's & my birthday. Somehow, our appetites got smaller as we grow older. Between the 4 of us, we shared a bowl of miso cha siew ramen with extra corn topping, a plate of mushroom curry rice, a plate of omu rice accompanied with a slice of pork katsu, an okonomiyaki with prawn fillings, one banana caramel tart, one strawberry tart, one grapefruit tart, and 4 glasses of drinks. The bill came up to only about $90, much less than what I would expect to pay for a birthday treat.

I still remembered our first treat held in Marche. That already in itself was $70-$90. At a time when we were all poor university students, it was quite a meal, at least in cost. The birthday girl will get a gift in return. I can't recall how we had this idea of celebrating birthdays. And the birthday girl is actually the one giving the treat, in contrary to most friends' of which we heard.

10 years down the road, this practice developed into something simpler. I think it started with me asking for angpow instead of a gift. Rather than taxing on the girls' brain power to guess and think of what I really wanted, I gave them an easier time by getting the money instead. Initially, they objected strongly to the idea and insisted on giving stuff like clothes, bags etc. But gradually they ran out of ideas of what to get for me, and relented. :-p

Now, everybody's adopting my preference. It sounds like a convenient excuse to not think of a suitable gift for your dear friends, and convincing ourselves that the person would much like to receive the cold hard cash so that they can get their favorite toy at their own sweet time. Indeed, it sounds a bit sad that we can't even find time to meet up one another now to shop leisurely together to get gifts, and so the demise of the 'top-up' scheme (for example, I top up $10 to the $80 angpow I get in order to buy a $90-worth object). Then again, it seems inevitable as

each of us has different priorities and more responsibilities now. I am just happy to meet them regularly, and share tidbits of our life over tea and snacks.

Next, I travelled to Boon Tong Kee situated next to Boon Keng MRT to meet up my parents for a Father Day cum my birthday celebration. Even more amazingly, 5 of us (3 females and 2 males) eating only half a white chicken, one small plate of stir fried kailan, one small plate of deep-fried golden bean curd, and a bowl of rice/porridge each! The entire bill was only $40! Super cheap.

I took the porridge since I was already full from the Manpuku lunch. It was awfully bland and watery. Not nice at all. I ought have taken the rice if I knew they served chicken rice. The stir fried kailan was surprisingly crunchy and green. And the beancurd is quite tasty, with a really crispy crust holding within it soft smooth cube of curd. The chilli dip and dark soya sauce are also thick and not the watery stuff you get in most hawker centres.

I got a feeling that everybody else wasn't entirely full due to the minimized portion. Yet my brother didn't want to order when asked to. Too bad Tempest had to attend a wedding, dinner else we could have dared to order more varieties or bigger portions.

This place is still worth a second visit since there are so many other dishes that I haven't tried. And most of the dishes are quite reasonably priced. Overall pretty satisfying.

The next day, I managed to pull Tempest out of his bed to go jogging at the gym. Though it was only a half an hour jog (maybe less), we assured ourselves that we had done enough to deserve a buffet. Afterall, we hit our target weight for the week, and it was my birthday, and Tempest got a new job...

We called up S & GZ about the durian buffet they kept inducing us to go. Yet unfortunately they can't make it. Therefore we ended up at Hanabi at Katong Mall.

The anticipation we had were far greater than our appetite. Not that the food was lousy, some were quite tasty, like the yaki niku (stir fried beef in some sauce), salmon sashimi, prawn fritters with wasabi mayo.. I also gotta give special mention to the tako sashimi - it was coiled around lemon slices so that when you bite into the thinly-sliced chewy meat, it had a refreshing zest to it! It's quite sad when they didn't do the same with the other sashimi, not even placing lemon slices by the plate they serve in.

What surprises me as an after-thought was that Tempest only took 2 tempura prawns! Usually during buffets, this guy would chiong for the prawns, mussels and anything that swim in the sea. We had a total of 3 rounds - serving size for the first 2 rounds were alright, but the 3rd round's appeared slightly larger, especially the prawn fritters maki. We were told that there would be only 3 pieces, but each piece is as good as 2 pieces! The tiny prawn was surrounded by a thick layer of sushi rice! Tempest was reminded of the same thing happening when he had the buffet at Tung Lok. We therefore concluded that it must be a ploy of the restaurant to stop us from eating further by packing larger servings and making it saltier.

Comparing this to the times we had kuishin-bo buffet, this was probably only 50% of our usual food intake. No more the "shiok-ness" of eating mounds of food! Not a bad idea actually, when we were trying hard to shed the extra fats and flesh hugging tightly onto us!!

Rucola = Rocket

2009-06-03T11:47:00.005+08:00

I first tasted this herb in Spizza, along Jalan Kayu. Interestingly, their pizzas were all names of Italian women, from A to V. Maybe they are reserving W, X, Y and Z for new creations :p

Me and Tempest had a 'Katrina' if I remembered it correctly. For sure, the pizza comes with tomato, mozzarella, rucola salad, shaved parmesan and some kind of ham. Using their online menu as a guide, I think I must have had a "Katrina".

We asked the chef what was rucola. I thought Tempest was disappointed to realise that it was a vegetable, and not some kind of exotic meat. "Some people like it, some people don't" The chef reminded us that the herb is an acquired taste. And I liked it! I don't specifically recall the taste except that it was slightly bitter, and was perfect companion to the large slices of thinly-shaved cheese.

Anyway, I found a description of the herb which could give it the desirability it deserves:

NATURAL ENERGY
Very common in ancient times, rucola (often called rocket in English) was a staple component of the Roman diet. This is borne out by poets like Horace who credited his friend Martial, who spoke of it as a magical herb, with having discovered its aromatic and flavoring properties. When allowed to grow in a wild state, the plant can reach a height of some 50 cm, producing leaves with a sharp flavor that is augmented as the acidity of the soil increases. When cultivated, rucola tends to be milder and more delicate than the wild variety, and much more tender, as well. Currently rucola is used in cooking as an herb, a side dish to accompany meat dishes and as a topping for first courses. It is also found in herbalist's shops thanks to its medicinal properties. It lends a slightly pungent tang to pasta dishes; it is added raw to sauces and is generally combined with tomato and garlic. It should be tried in such dishes as Tortelloni con Prosciutto Crudo with rocket and almonds or Farfalle with peppers and rocket. Energizing and rich in vitamin C and mineral salts, when combined with other vegetables it adds a lively zest to fresh salads. Creating a "bed" of rucola has become a classic way of enhancing the presentation of delicatessen products, meats and all sorts of cheeses. Distinguished by a slightly bitter aftertaste, it is a favorite ingredient for dressings and mousse preparations with butter and ricotta. Once dried, its roots are used to prepare excellent digestive infusions that take advantage of its aperient and diuretic properties. Rucola, as a natural emollient, is also used in cosmetics, in scalp treatments and moisturizing, toning lotions for the skin. It provides a bracing shot of energy, promoting a restoration of psycho-physical vitality. It is a great way to overcome spring asthenia and the accompanying sense of lethargy and fatigue that so many people suffer from at the end of winter.

How I missed it when I saw a lady discarding the rucola and only attacked the salmon in a dish of norwegian salad in Cafe Bar. Such a waste! And rucola, often refered to as 'wild rocket' in supermarts, are quite expensive compared to most other herbs and vegetables. Tsk tsk tsk!

I should return to Spizza again, if not for the 'Katrina', then for the so many others that sound so tasty.

Get reel.

2009-05-26T02:45:00.011+08:00

I have been playing Restaurant City in Facebook for a number of weeks. This game is easy; get ingredients on a daily basis, upgrade the menu, build a productive and effective workforce, increase the popularity, expand the restaurant, and repeat the cycle again and again.. Very simple but pretty addictive. I could spend a few hours a day just feeding my team of 7 employees, actively trading with fellow restaurateurs, and half the time staring at the cartoon characters moving abouts doing their everyday chores and duties.

Check out Fatty Sling's at Restaurant City!

Tempest, on seeing my enthusiasm in the flash game, offered to download a copy of Sims 2 as soon as I got my Sony Vaio VGN-FW35G last week. He convinced me that I will grow to like the relatively complicated bundle. Indeed, in the first hour, I couldn't manoeuvre my characters fast enough or as smoothly as Tempest would like it, and we got into quite a bit of squabbles, further causing me to dislike the game.

Heh, that didn't make him give up. He silently copied the game from his PC to a portable hard disk and transferred it to my laptop. He booted up the game, inviting me to start building my own family and slowly hooking me onto the game.

I don't have a good sense of spaces and directions. But the game locates the family in a 3D house and allows the player multiple angles to view the members at work. In fact, being able to shift the camera angle agilely aids in quicker decision-making, and possibly a more joyful experience when one is able to zoom in and out of the characters whenever wanted. He tried to teach me to use the shortcut keys on the keyboard, but I couldn't get used to it and reverted to moving the mouse around furiously. The only key i frequently use is "P", to pause the game and input the actions for each character before resuming the time factor in the game.

It is such a delight to see them getting promoted, achieving new levels of skills, and buying new items in the house! I derive joy from watching the family progress onto new stages of life. But for Tempest, I believe he is having more fun designing and building the house. The distinct differences between an INTJ and INTP!

The humble abode

Hours of gaming from 11am to 2am (today), with intermittent breaks for lunch, dinner, toilet breaks, drinks etc is proof of my addiction. Somehow the game caught onto my emotions as I imagined myself and Tempest living out the dreams and motivations of those characters. In the game, I was Sling who took up the 'slacker' career path that sees me moving on to different jobs with odd hours. This is akin to the real life now as I do the London shift at work. There are few opportunities for me to interact with Tempest unless he sacrificed his sleep and waits for him to come online at 1 am, resulting in him sleeping at unearthly hours. I do feel guilty for messing up his biological clock, but it is a compulsory evil... Let's hope this won't last beyond 9 months...

If I really exist in The Sims, I probably will be quite happy. Sling doesn't have a problem in studying hard or working diligently to achieve the next level of competence in skills like creativity, cooking, cleaning or repairing stuffs. It's taken for granted that you will learn it once you spend the stipulated amount of time practicising or reading up on the relevant materials. No such thing as 'talent' or 'stupidity'. There may be fire hazards, but strangely, toddlers that roamed around the house at night don't drown in bathtubs, knock against the furniture, or drop into the toilet bowl. People don't get sick either. :-) Or maybe that's in another expansion pack. Till then.

Back, with a vengeance!

2009-05-21T11:47:00.009+08:00

After a hiatus of almost a year (well, with a few posts intermittenly), I was toying with the idea of restarting my blog yesterday. I relish those moments when I had to search within myself for the rationale behind my behavior or thoughts, those times when I googled and wikipdia-ed just so to ensure that I got the right facts, and those days when I ran through my posts to remember the events that happened in the past.

It brings back a smile as I scroll down to the entries that detailed our travels to Bangkok, Hanoi, and recently Ho Chi Minh (which I didn't have the stamina to progress past Day 2), elaborate birthday surprises, and even little things like cutting Tempest's hair for the first time, eating a specially-prepared-for-me breakfast etc. With a blog to immortalise memories, those good times spent with loved ones are made even better :)

Anyway, the strongest motivation to restart blogging on a regular basis results from my rotation to another team at work. We refer that to the 'London Shift', working from 3pm to 12mn. Following the GMT wasn't too bad since I get to sleep late and wake up late (something that I always do during the weekends), save for the cruel fact that I shall never meet my friends on a week-day evening. I can't go to the gym after work cos it closes at 11pm, and I don't feel like going in the mornings simply because I don't feel like it.

Sigh.. In the end, I spent most of my free time in front of my laptop, staring at Restaurant City and aimlessly net surfing to kill time. It took 3 weeks of repeatedly doing this before I feel motivated enough to do something else, something more constructive and exercises the brain. Thence, the thought of blogging again. I'll see how long I can sustain this habit. For now, welcome me back :)

On the trail of the Saigon Travellers 1 Jan 09: Chapter 2

2009-01-13T13:12:00.026+08:00

It has become a must to do breakfast when we visit Vietnam. Most hotels offer free buffet breakfast and they charge it to the total cost of the accommodation. So, why not?

For unlimited servings at USD 2.50 per pax, it seemed like a bargain when you compared it to a baguette with ham which cost 10,000 dong.

The below is about 80 - 90% of what I can remember:

Coffee
Tea
Diluted orange juice
Fresh milk at room temperature
Diluted apple juice
Cereal
Muffins
A tray of sliced baguette
A tray of Sunny side-ups
Sliced watermelon
Sliced pear
Bananas
Some kind of pie made with eggs, bacon and cheese (like a very eggy version of quiche)
Some kind of pie with a hard crusted base topped with bacon and cheese
Sliced ham
Pan-fried fish
Some vegetables
Some kind of clear soup
Some noodle soup with pig's blood and beef-like cubes
Fried rice

We took a lot of baguette and eggs. The sliced baguette is crusty on the outside and fluffy inside, making it easy to eat without the crust biting into the gums, unlike those we find in Singapore. The only pity was the lack of a toaster oven; it could have tasted even better if it is warm.

Breakfast is served from 6.30am to about 9.30am. We quickly took ours by 8.15am and took a short 2-minute walk to MTV Travel.

There was only one westerner, and one other couple waiting. We were told that our bus would arrive soon, and the staff, warmly invited us to take a seat inside their shop. There were several tour buses parked across the street and the angmohs who were waiting with us were directed to one of those aircon buses. "They are going for the half-day tour to Cuchi Tunnels..", the staff explained.

We stood around for nearly half an hour, but there was no indication for us to follow anyone to a bus. One of the staff had earlier confirmed with us that we were not the couple they were supposed to pick up from some hotel. This was followed by a couple of phone calls, and constant flipping of their customer schedule log. Tsk tsk, the first signs of bad planning.

Luckily, we didn't wait in vain. Tempest even thought that we might have to postpone our tour if our bus forgot about us. The staff seemed to have noticed our anxiety and kept telling us that there wasn't any problem; the bus was late due to traffic jam. Then, a dark, scrawny looking middle-aged man walked into the office and we were told to follow him. This frail looking hunchback took us across a few streets to where the bus was parked. I was a little surprised that he could walk so fast and so effortlessly!

The bus we were seated in looks average. There were probably about 30 of us in the tour group, with 70% of them Caucasians and the rest Asians. 5 minutes into the journey, the guide started introducing himself as 'Minh' and gave an overview of the day's program. His english was understandable, though I can't make out 10 - 20% of what he was saying. Maybe it was just me. Tempest managed to figure out from his speech that he used to work for the American air force as a translator during the war.
Temple of Cao Dai

It took 3 hours just to reach Cao Dai Temple. The first half an hour was bearable and I took pleasure in seeing the street life. But the slightly bumpy ride had a cradle-like effect, rocking me to sleep.

Like all tours, we had a stopover at some arts and crafts workshop supposedly set up for the handicapped to make a living for themselves by selling crafts work to tourists. Each piece is set at an exorbitant price, like USD 2 for a small key chain that can be found in any market.

Lacquered pieces of art made with egg shells, or seashells. Some items like a cupboard with 4 drawers can go up to USD 2000.

After the half an hour tour, we carried on with the un-interesting bus ride. The mass starts at 12pm everyday and last for about 45 minutes. 15 minutes to 12, the bus driver was honking away in this last stretch of the journey. The guide also tried to do a hurried introduction of Caodaism. Alas, we were still late and missed the part where the procession enters the Temple. It was about 12.15pm when we arrived.

Visitors are required to take off the shoes before entering the temple. There were quite a number of followers, mostly females dressed in their religious white robes, directing visitors. The temple structure is organized into two levels. The first level is where the mass takes place. The second level holds the band and singers. We were directed to walk up the steep steps to the corridors on the second level to view the mass.

This is the band that supplies the live chanting and music. They are located on the second level. Only 6 girls singing and their voices are able to be heard throughout the temple!

The rest of the followers sitting in the first level seemed to keep silent and have their hands cupped in a particular manner (right over left, with right thumb tucked into the pocket of the left fist). Those people wearing the colorful robes are the seniors, given the rank of Monks and Nuns. The men are seated on the right and the women on the left. Most of them look either old or middle-aged. Very few are in their twenties.

Can you tell if this is the left eye? O_O

"God is symbolized by the Divine Eye, specifically the left eye because Yang is the left side and God is the master of Yang." - Wikipedia

We ceremoniously took pictures of the building, the procession and the compound. It was a very short tour that lasted barely an hour. The highlight of the tour was only the mass and procession. We already missed the strolling in of the followers, so I insisted on watching them strolled out when Tempest was eager to move on and look at other parts of the compound.

Kinda reminds me of those Ali-Baba palaces.

The guide rushed all of us up onto the tour bus shortly after the procession was over. He wanted to move on to lunch and the rest of the tour. We were brought to a home-run restaurant (similar to those found in Malaysia where tour groups enjoyed a 10-course seafood lunch) selling a variety of local food. I am not sure if it was the price or the food itself, but many of the angmohs went for the cheapest omelette fried rice (30,000 or 35,000 dong) of which they liberally sprinkled in lots of light soya sauce. Me and Tempest each went for the pan-fried sotong and beef with rice respectively (50,000 dong).

Cuchi Tunnels

It was another 1.5 hour of bus ride to the Cuchi Tunnels. We watched a video about the Vietnam war and were rushed on to the famous site for tourists to take pictures.

Demo by the guide at Cuchi Tunnels. Standing behind is our tour guide, Minh. This was an unaltered tunnel and can lead one to the other entrance 100m away.

Well, nobody tried since it was too small for most of us to go through. We were given about 15 minutes to go midway through the hole and take pictures. Tempest was pretty keen to do it but the guide was already rushing us off to the next site. Miss.

Minh also brought us to view many man-made booby traps by the guerillas. Most of them involved spikes like the below:

Meant to immobilize paratroopers, who upon landing, falls right through the slab of 'ground' and steps into the spikes.

There was a lot of 'sightseeing' - booby traps, wax figurines depicting the guerrillas' lifestyle, tanks etc, so much that one angmoh lady was wondering if Minh were ever going to allow us to go through the much talked-about underground tunnels.

Before we went down, Minh emphasized that nobody should stop midway in the tunnels as it was hot and stuffy. So we should go through it as fast as we can. Heh, it was a very short route, only about 100 to at most 200m. But tiring no doubt! Imagine walking half-bended all the time. It was much worse for the westerners and those who are above 1.6m. It was a pretty rushed tour, I felt for most of us couldn't go through the tunnels more than once.

Finally, there was the shooting stuffs that interested again some angmohs. There were different types of guns, most of which I can't remember their names. The shooting is charged by the bullet and there is a minimum number of bullets to be bought, so it can add up to quite a huge cost if you were planning to play with one of those machine guns. At that cost, my interest was killed. Furthermore, there was no target; it was plain shooting into the air. Tempest already had his shot at some of those guns during NS, so we sat around drinking red bull and admiring scorpions in bottles.

Overall, it was still an interesting albeit short excursion (2 -3 hours). The tunnels and booby traps made up for the long bus ride. I am not sure if it would be more fruitful visiting the Cuchi Tunnels on our own. Though they have their own internal guides (dressed in green communist uniforms), they seemed not to speak English. Minh explained snippets of the Vietnam war, the structure of the tunnels and even demonstrated how some of the booby traps work. I doubt we would get to see that if we were walking on our own.

However I am not so sure about Temple of Cao Dai. Indeed, it was a nice structure, but nothing spectacular, and certainly not worth the long bus journey. If given a choice again, I would have just opted for the half day tour to Cuchi Tunnels.

Dong Khoi

This is the Orchard Road of Ho Chi Minh City. Hotels, restaurants and shopping centres lined both sides of the street. We only chanced upon one cinema which I would have gone in to catch 'Twilight' or something if it didn't resemble the Yangtze Theatre in Chinatown. I supposed the locals prefer watching satellite TV than to spend money in theatres.

We walked up and down the street, following the addresses of recommended eateris in Lonely Planet. Oh my! 80% of those given in the book have closed down! In the end, we settled for a not-so-expensive Monacco Pizza at some quieter corner off the main streets of Dong Khoi. It's only our second day and we were already feeling a little low on cash!

Crazy Traffic! Those motorbikes stopped in the middle of the road to take pictures of the Christmas trees!

Bac Dang

Tempest was in the mood for ice cream again and in we went to Bac Dang, a local brand frequented by locals.

Some strange tasting water served to us. Tempest's guess was sandal wood, while I thought it was jasmine. Then he said it might be some soluble disinfectant. It didn't taste that bad till he mentioned that. Yuck!

Literally servied in a fresh coconut, the icecream came with tropical fruits such as strawberry, dragonfruit, watermelon etc.

We ate up everything, including the coconut flesh! Many of the locals who ordered this same coconut icecream appeared to leave the coconut untouched. What a waste, we both thought, for the flesh was silky and subtly sweet. Haha.

On the trail of the Saigon Travellers 31 Dec 08: Chapter 1

2009-01-08T23:53:00.031+08:00

We are off to Vietnam again! This time, to Ho Chi Minh City, with a side trip to Dalat.

Armed with a three-quarter filled 40 liter backpack each, we arrived at 6.30am at the Budget Terminal (thanks to Tempest's Dad who gave us a ride), just one hour before the flight via Tiger Airways. There was only a few restaurants, and no fast food. We settled for average noodle fare, compulsory nonetheless, for food aboard the plane is often served at exorbitant prices.

Check in via the automated system was no hassle, and we were off flying soon after! It was a pretty short flight, about 2 hours, thankfully.

Arrival

Tan Son Nhat airport seems to have progressed significantly since our last transit 2 years ago, when we were off to Hanoi. Now they used flat screen monitors; but the immigration officers still appeared slightly unfriendly. It was a smooth 'check-out'. Our first instinct was to visit the foreign exchange counter. There were a few adjacent to each other, and only one of them showed a more favorable rate of 17,300 (the others had 17,200+). Tempest noticed that the lady at the next bank peeped at the digital board of the counter which had a long queue and subsequently adjusted her rate to 17,330. Heh, of course we defected. I made a mistake of only exchanging USD 100 to dong. It appears that things are cheaper if you pay in dong. Locals generally apply 17,000 or even 16,000 exchange rate if you choose to pay in USD.

The coldness of the indoors was soon overcome by the hot and aggressive atmosphere of the outdoors. Taxi touts lined the entrance, constantly waving at tourists and shouting "Taxi?". Many of the touts quoted USD 8 - 10. Having had a first experience in Hanoi, we decided to walk around and bargain for the lowest rates. I even tried USD 6, but to no avail. Maybe they have no problem getting business; people here are less interested to compromise. We had no luck in reducing the rate and decided to go back to the information counter to seek advice. "8 dollars or 140,000 dong". Same rate. We were told that the taxis had to purchase some ticket to the airport, thereby adding to the cost. Alternatively, we could take the local bus 152 to the city. That was a bad decision. We waited almost 15 - 20 minutes for the bus but it stopped at a different location from where we were standing, and it didn't even stop when we flagged it! Horrible. We had to settle for a cab at 140,000 dong.

Hong Thien Loc

The ride to Pham Ngu Lao was about half an hour. That was the infamous backpackers' area akin to Khao San of Bangkok. With so many hotels in that area, we didn't think it necessary to reserve or book beforehand. Furthermore, we wanted to have the opportunity to view the rooms before making any commitment. It was high season and new year's eve, thus many of the hotels we went to were fully occupied.

Most with average rooms quoted a rate of USD 18 - 25. The difference between standard and superior / deluxe rooms lie in the presence of a window and slightly bigger room area. Most of the windows are facing rooftops of other buildings, besides the bulk of our time will be spent touring the city, so there is really no point in spending the extra USD 5. Most also claimed that they would issue a discount if they discovered that you are only staying for one night. But I hardly think that is the case, for we extended our stay at Hong Thien Loc for the same rate as the first night.

Most of the bedrooms we viewed either have old-looking mattress, stained walls, or small bathrooms with no separate shower partition. There was no specific one that met my expectations - spotless room with a clean bed and bathroom with shower partition.

I think we went to about 10 hotels before settling down at Hong Thien Loc. Neat room, with a large TV, satellite channels, and importantly, clean bathroom with bathtub. It even comes with a dressing table, hairdryer and bedside switches - very convenient for lazy bums like us who had to play scissors-paper-stone to decide who gets off the bed to switch off the lights at night. At USD 35 (inclusive of breakfast), it was quite a good deal (even more so as I realized later).

One strange happening though was the red ants (luckily only a few) that kept appearing on the bed. Not sure if it were the skin flakes that attracted the ants or some dead insect near the bed.

Pho 24

Along the same stretch as Hong Thien Loc was Pho 24, the noodle chain that was a recommended stop on the tourist brochure handed to us at the airport.

2 bowls of beef pho in clear broth, accompanied by a glass each of iced Vietnamese coffee and soya milk.

The noodles were thin and very smooth; and the soup thick with beefy taste. Tempest hates the bean sprouts and green garnishing that is present in almost every Vietnamese dish though. I love them, save for the mint-like flavored leaves. Overall, it was pretty good quality pho, much tastier than the ones I tried at the PGP canteen.

The simple meal didn't come cheap. It costs 118,000 dong, equivalent to SGD 10.

North Face

With a 70% filled tummy, we strolled along stretches of shops in search of a day-pack - an extremely useful item for excursions (the day pack carried our Frommers, Lonely Planet, maps, tour brochures, water, camera, wallets, handphones etc).

There were lots of cute little North Face bags, all going under USD 10! Very likely chiong stuff, but still functional and looks like the real deal. 2 shops quoted USD 7 or 8. The third one asked for only USD 5 or 80,000 dong. (See, as highlighted earlier, things are cheaper if you pay in dong.) Cheap! Ha.. but I still tried to bargain for 4 dollars I think.. The shop owner turned it down flat.

It can even be strapped onto our backpack. Definitely a worthwhile buy, and turns out to be the first and only buy of our 8-day trip.

MTV Travel

Hospitable staff, but lousy service. Even somewhat dishonest, I feel. We signed up 2 packages:

Day tour to Cao Dai Temple and Cuchi Tunnels (read about it in Chapter 2)
Open bus ticket and accommodation in Dalat (see Chapter 3)

There were tons of tour agencies that lined the several streets in Pham Ngu Lao area. We went to a few near our hotel, and given the cost and proximity, decided on MTV Travel, which was less than 5 minutes walk from Hong Thien Loc. Another consideration of Tempest was the friendly girls who constantly smiled at him. He falls prey easily to friendly people. Personally, I prefer the more established Sinh Cafe which was a few streets away. But unfortunately, we were a little put off by the distance (it was a 15 minute walk from the hotel), the thought of crossing the roads and battling with the traffic, and having to queue and wait with the large number of tourists crowding the shop. Urgh!

Food Hunt

Searching for good and cheap food has always been one of the activities on any of our tour itineraries. Guidebooks recommended Quan An Ngon, and we enjoyed it at its Hanoi outlet. On our way there, we stopped by a roadside stall and bought a small plateful of steamed glutinous rice doused with peanuts. They also had other colored varieties - green, orange and black. We both love peanuts, and I didn't know then that I could ask for a mixed variety, so we went for the peanut version.

Sprinkled with salt, sugar, coconut shredding and coconut milk, the warm tasty snack costs only 10,000 dong! It even came with the orange small disposable spoon.

It was dark and we kinda lost our way. Coupled with the drizzle, we ended up at some cafe known as Com Tam Moc, serving Vietnamese broken rice. Initially, I thought the rice was purposely pounded to make it broken into smaller pieces, thus stickier and more starchy like glutinous rice. Then I read in the net that it was just a lower grade of rice which was broken during harvest, and therefore cheaper.

Tempest's plate of Com Tam, served with a palm-sized piece of BBQ pork, minced pork pie (on the left), shredded pork skin fried with thin pork slices (on the right), and pickled vegetables. 30,000 dong.

I had a similar version less the pork skin for 26,000 dong. The portions are not big, but sufficient to tame your hungry stomach. The barely charred BBQ pork was sweet, and tasted even better with some fish sauce. Likewise for the minced pork pie. I didn't like the fried pork skin; it had a pretty strong indescribable smell that even the fish sauce couldn't help to enhance the flavor of it. Tempest did not seem to mind it though and gobbled everything on the plate, even the pickled vegies. The clear melon soup that accompanied the rice was mildly sweet and helps to cleanse the palate after the meal. The thinly sliced green-colored melon strips (or maybe it's cucumber) was boiled till soft and makes for easy chewing and swallowing. Overall, the meal was worth a try.

It was new year's eve. The large compound across the street where our hotel was located was packed with people getting involved in the celebrations, either by indulging in the local food (fried sparrows, skewered crocodile meat, coned ice cream, beer etc) or standing by the river watching staged performances. It looked like a huge pasar malam or one of those river hongbao performances we had back home. We weren't that adventurous in trying the exotic stuff and went for the grilled corn instead. It was only our first night and we took care to ensure that we eat only fully cooked hot stuffs.

Look at the huge corn! The lady broke it into 2 easily with her bare hands. I was holding the lower half of it. Corn was doused with oil and chives. Sweet and succulent. 10,000 dong.

The locals seem to love ice cream. There were a lot of stalls selling ice cream cones likewise those we saw in McDonald's. Not to mention several ice cream cafes we noticed around the city - Fanny's, Bud's and the local chain Bac Dang. Tempest caught on the Kem (ice cream in Vietnamese) fever and insisted on eating at Bud's, which was somewhat near Pham Ngu Lao area.

It was a two storey building packed with locals. We selected our icecream - pineapple and mango sorbet in an icecream cone, topped with blueberries. According to the menu, we were supposed to choose 2 flavors, and an extra topping. The cone is to come with ready toppings - jimmies, cherry, and some other stuff. But the waitress didn't understand us (or their own menu), and came with 2 servings instead, one plate of 2 scoops of mango / pineapple sorbet, and another cone with vanilla icecream topped with strawberry syrup. Sigh.. I am glad I didn't further complicate my order by telling them not to put in whipped cream.

The mistake.

Expenditure till date:

Exchange rate in use:

USD / SGD: 1.46
VND / USD: 17,000

The FORMULA

2008-09-29T02:25:00.000+08:00

It seemed so perfect. Fantastic location, great timing, good people. We looked almost set to drive home with the Pinnacle.

But like everyone who watched Massa's extraordinary twist of fate at the F1 last Sunday, I pity the loss. It looked like a stupid technical error, but conveyed the necessity of being 100% accurate and quick so as not to incur a miss. Tempest behaves like the Ferrari pit crew who grew more cautious at Massa's second pit, flagging off the driver only after confirming that the fuel pipe was fully off the vehicle. It probably cost them half a seond loss but what's that to prevent a worse-off penalty drive-through? Rather than working crazily hard or frantically scrimping on every cent to cope with huge monthly payouts, it could be safer just to forgo the opportunity and await an even better one.

Then again, it may just slipped you by. Kimi worked hard to inch his way back up to the top 5s after losing ground in the first half of the race. It was almost optimistic that he could squeeze into the top 3 positions. .BUT! He had to lose his wheels at a turn in his attempt to overtake. He was already in his last few laps! SIGH! How unsympathetic the unknown forces were, to push him out of the league. I fear I would face the same undesirable fate, having to sit around and struggle with a mis-calculation.

Would the second choice do better than the first? Nobody could say Massa performed better than kimi even though he finshed all of 61 laps, albeit being last.

Alas... I hope I could do an 'Alonso' and reverse totally a seemingly hopeless situation to a winning one. Looks like I still can't get over the Pinnacle. :-(

Credit Crunch

2008-09-17T00:47:00.003+08:00

The recent downfall of Lehman Brothers and impending failure of AIG are causing me to stay back in the office till 7plus / 8plus in the evening. Let's hope the Federal Reserve convinces the big guys to help bail out this insurance giant. I don't wanna miss my dinner at Shin Kushiya this Friday wor..

*crunches*

BloomBURP

2008-07-24T20:52:00.009+08:00

Visited Bloomberg this afternoon for a short one-hour introductory course.

The course was not dull; I was really impressed with the numerous functions the Bloomberg Terminal has! Sleek screens, colorful screens and colorful keyboard that comes with onboard speakers and several shortcut keys.

The terminal I used this afternoon doesn't have the cool transparent-like stem that holds the dual monitors, but other than that, everything else looks just as good!

What really earns the "WOW" from most visitors is the pantry though. If there is only one word given to describe it, it would be: well-stocked! It's just like a mini super-mart. There is a long shelf (around shoulder-level tall) displaying racks of neatly placed foods like museli bars, mini MARS bars, mini M&Ms, Twisties, chips, biscuits, chocolates and sweets. Standing against the wall are 2 fridges (like those you see in 7-11) housing an assortment of drinks - Fruit Trees, Meiji milk, Magnolia milk, Yakult, Pokka coffee, canned Milo and many other types of soft drinks. For coffee addicts, there is also a coffee dispenser around the corner. There is also a space with tables & chairs for people to eat their food.

The pantry in Singapore resembles the one above. The differences lie only in the color of the shelf (SG's all white) and the color of the chairs (also all white for SG's).

Generally the company presents a pristine white, open environment with a rather casual ambience. In fact, the pantry is just next to the office spaces. There were also a number of LCD TVs hung on the walls and booming away financial news from BBC (I think). I can't imagine how those staffs work with all those visitors chatting and walking about, and the TVs blasting away.

Oh I gotta mention about their security too. The minute I step out of the lift lobby, I was greeted by a security lady. Since the office holds a lot of trainings in that particular level, there are a couple of security personnel on the floor, mainly ensuring that visitors had a visitor pass and guiding them the way to the appropriate areas. Very polite people, they are even dressed in suits & ties! In fact, they are the most well-dressed in the entire office! Haha. I was then requested to stand at the reception area and have my picture taken and printed on an ad-hoc security pass. One of my fellow attendees was even a little upset at having to return the colored-printed paper pass after the course :-p

For today's course, attendees were each treated to a O'Briens sandwich. This is the first time I had an O'Briens - Turkey Cranberry. Sandwiched between 2 slices of wholemeal bread were turkey slices, tomato, cranberry sauce and crunchy coleslaw. Quite delicious! Definitely better than Subway! With square-shaped breads & tightly packed stuffings, you won't be faced with dripping mustard sauce or soggy bread and sticky fingers! My choice for a healthy yummy meal in the theatres!!!

Baaaa.....!!!

2008-06-16T02:25:00.007+08:00

Another surprise!

This year was the biggest amongst the three I had with Tempest. I never expected him to do such a thing - plan a party. He always seemed reluctant to organize gatherings and very seldom initiate to meet up with his friends. Yet, this time, he actually managed to gather my closest friends for a BBQ!

Thanks SC & Al for being in the decor committee. SC even took the trouble to find out my favorite color and ensured that the balloons are in that shade. There was even a helium-filled colorful one tied to the 'dragon seat'. Haha. Oh, and that reusable "Happy Birthday" banner! My friends are really environmentally-friendly!

Thanks GZ for being the 'charcoal man' for the night. I heard he set up the fire and took charge of the cooking with Al. There were no 'chaota-ness' in my opinion but the self-critical GZ thought some of the hotdogs were slightly burnt. Ah, but there was a little glitch with the aluminum foil though. Small fire, no big deal.

Thanks to HB & KK for being in charge of food preparation. The chilli sotong turned out well. I saw how enthusiastically HB was in applying chilli sauce to a thick slab of stingray when she doesn't even cook at home. Thanks to Al, HB, KK & HJ for taking the effort to meet up and buy me a gift on a Thursday night after numerous hours of tiring work and OT. I appreciate it, and would try my best to try to use the bag :-p

Thanks to JJ who popped by to celebrate with me despite being busy and having to sacrifice playtime with her baby nephew.

Thanks to Tempest's parents who took the effort to buy so much hi-quality food! Ribs, huge slabs of stingray, huge bowl of salad with huge prawns, huge pot of fried mee with more prawns, sotong, many hotdogs, and many more chicken chunks!

And Tempest. Thank you for injecting so much surprise for a birthday celebration that I thought was already over when we had a buffet at Himawari. You probably ran up 10 flights of steps to put the pressie on my bed before running down again. I should have noticed something weird when I met you at the bottom of the stairs, but I thought you just went up to look for some cats. To think that you can manage to lie to me about the entire day! What skating with DL and playing daidee at your grandma's house. Gosh! I took them all in! Anyway, did you give my parents a shock when you suddenly appear at the door? I was truly surprised when I saw a big box lying on my bed when I reached home. I even had a thought that my brother gave me something! Haha.. But now, yes, I have confirmed that he would not do such a sweet thing.

So much for an evening . .

Baaaa...!!!

"How many cars are there in sg?"

2008-06-10T22:40:00.005+08:00

That was one of the weirdest question posed to me by an Interviewer in some established investment bank.

The other weird one, but at least could be mathematically derived, immediately that is, was:

"How many degrees is the hour hand away from the minute hand if it's 3.15pm now?"

*STUMPED*

Are they really out to test my IQ?

Goodman Tempest!

2008-06-04T01:58:00.004+08:00

Last Sunday night, me & Tempest went to the Play.SG kiosk outside Tampines Mall to rent a DVD. As usual, he parked alongside the road next to the kiosk. Seeing that there was another couple at the kiosk, I decided that he should stay in the car so that he didn't have to keep a constant lookout for the traffic warden while queuing up. I then got out and joined in the queue.

Five minutes later, Tempest got out of his car and I found him talking to an Indian man whose taxi was parked in front of him. The cab driver was skinny and sported a head of white hair. Apparently he had engaged Tempest's help to change his punctured tyre. He was lamenting that he was old and had no strength for such strenuous activity. I knew what he was talking about. I had seen Tempest & his friend changing a tyre at the Night Safari before. Tempest knocked into a curb and burst his tyre. Along with his friend, they took a good 30 - 45 minutes trying to figure out how to use the tools and doing the actual tyre changing. That was his first attempt. That night was the second. :-) He was considerably more apt and appeared more confident of what he was doing.

I chatted with the cab driver for a while and he seemed to hint that he was going to use the spare tyre for long term. O_O. Gosh, I prayed that his passengers would be able to alight his cab well and sound.

Anyway, the focus of this entry is on Tempest and his 'altruism'. Hahaha. That cab driver actually offered to pay him $10 for his 'service'. Tempest turned it down, of course. He sensed that it wasn't a sincere offer. Well, quite true, only $10 for all those efforts?! I bet he was trying very hard to save money by trying to engage the help of passer-bys and fellow drivers than to call the car garage. I am sure Comfort would have a few 'suppliers'.

Tempest asked if I would take the money if I were him. Heh, I replied that I would turn down at the first offer, and likely to accept it if that man was insistent enough. Tempest held the same thoughts. Though he was sweating profusely, I saw that he was really happy to have helped someone, even at no rewards. I know some of my male colleagues whose car tyre punctured and they refused to change it themselves, not only because of the lack of knowledge of how to do it, but also because they didn't wish to expend huge amount of energy on changing, then sending it to the repair shop again - double work. So, I am pretty impressed, seriously.

*Pats the big brown guy on the back*

Food for Thought

2008-04-19T02:33:00.009+08:00

Tempest brought my attention to this post in ieatishootipost. I made a note to visit this cafe for its Old Fashioned Red Velvet. [Initially I thought the red velvet was some sort of carrot cake, but after looking up wiki, it's just a type of sweet cake.]

And so it happened. I was on leave yesterday, and after an hour of beginner's pilates and half hour of jogging (an attempt to burn off the excess calories which I was going to pile on later), I trotted in anticipation to the cafe, 'Food For Thought'. I briefly recalled that it's located somewhere near the national library at Bugis. Failing to remember its exact address, I strolled around the library compound and even going through the levels inside the library! Just as I was about to give up and head to Han's instead, I peered across the road and yippee! It was there, so inconspicuous that it takes a trained eye, or in my case, a lucky sighting to notice it.

The inside of the cafe was as wide as its exterior. There was some sort of bar-like counter in front of the kitchen. Customers can seat themselves in those high chairs and watch the chef prepare their food. Next to the bar counter lined a row of round tables with 2 chairs each. Pretty cramped. I was hoping to read my book while I sipped coffee and eat cake, so I went on further and found myself a quieter corner.

Nobody attended to me from the moment I stepped in. I showed myself to my seat and was speculating how to make my order when I chanced upon a chalkboard sign saying: 'Please order and pay here'. I see... Like I promised myself as early as last night, I ordered the Red Velvet and a cup of expresso.

Aptly named 'red velvet', it boasts of a rich red colour akin to that found in beetroots. Accompanied with relatively thin layers of cheese, it's a pretty piece of food art.

Dense and slightly dry, the red-colored cake is mildly sweet and does not leave an oily lingering aftertaste. I could even taste the textured bits (dunno what they are). Though the cake portion can be easily separated from the cheese, it does not crumble in the process. The cheese is a pale cream color, somewhat like philadelphia cheese. It's of a smoother and softer texture than those found on traditional cream cheese carrot cakes. I even thought that I could taste a snatch of butter. Unlike its red-colored counterpart, this one is cloyingly sweet and has little hint of milk. Initially, it tasted quite nice, especially when mixed with the cake. But as I had more bites, i got the feeling that I am eating butter! I guess I prefer my cheese to be colder, harder and more milky. I would still rate it 3.5 out of 5 stars. For its bright alluring hues, at least.

Honestly, I was a little shocked to learn that my expresso came in a ultra mini cup (The pic below shows the life-size). I am used to having my coffee in bigger cups of at least a 100ml. This one is at most a mere 20ml. Probably one shot. No milk was given. Instead, I was given two types of sugar, brown and white. I hesitantly stirred in half a teaspoonful of brown sugar into that tiny cup, doubtful that it would help much to reduce its bitterness. I took a couple of tiny sips and decided to gulp it all down since it didn't taste as bitter after all, and it wasn't much to continue sipping. BUT i was wrong, the coffee liquid seemed to stick onto the tongue and wind its way into my tastebuds, as if punishing me for not being able to appreciate its bitterbitter aftertaste. I almost thought I would get a headache from it. I would rate it 2 out of 5 stars. For its sheer size, at least.

For the 45 minutes I was there, there weren't many eaters, probably because it was only 3plus. There was a lot of bantering amongst the staffs who concentrated in the small kitchen and bar counter. They were even making more noises than the visitors. Only a guy went around clearing tables. Not exactly a conducive place for reading. Plus the lights were pretty dim in the corner I was sitting.

I paid $2.50 for the expresso, $5.50 for the Red Velvet and 45 mins of my time trying to achieve a likable experience.

The cook surprises!

2008-04-17T15:34:00.005+08:00

Heh.. looks a little gooey and somewhat disgusting?

Yet this is one of the best toast I have ever eaten!

2 slices of white bread dipped into a bowl of beaten eggs, and then thrown into a hot saucepan, probably sizzling with a teaspoon of virgin olive oil.

Pan-fried till charred-brown, one of the crispy breads were then spread with thick chunky peanut butter jam. Generous portions of pork floss were also strewn across the peanut butter coated plain.

Cover it with the other slice of toast, and the treasures within are more than well-concealed. Top it off with a few spoonfuls of St Dalfour's blueberry jam. Finally, drench the squarish bundle with a trickle of condensed milk. Viola! Blueberry french toast.

Ought to eat it hot! Otherwise the condensed milk & jam would seep into the bread, and turned it into a soggy mess.

I extremely liked the crunchy peanut butter and the pork floss. The peanut butter serves well to stick the floss in place. Very rich combination. The bread was a tad too brown, that I thought it was wholemeal bread! After verifying it with the cook, I realized to both our amusement that it was the dark soya sauce in the eggs that gave the toast its dark brownish color. Haha.

Coupled with a home-blended coffee mocha, it made a very filling breakfast on a Sunday morning. Yummy! When are we going to have this again, Tempest? :-)

Freehold vs. Leasehold

2008-04-14T02:03:00.003+08:00

Eh.. no.. not buying a house.

Attended a lunch talk about coping with stress last Thurs at the office. In one of the statements made by the speaker:

"Kids are like leasehold. Once they reach 18, they would no longer be yours... BUT your spouse is freehold. Free to hold! Hahaha!!!"

So, place the greatest importance on your spouse who's gonna be with you for life, and not the kids with an 18-year lease.

Head-on collision

2008-04-07T18:03:00.003+08:00

I collided into a young girl at ECP last Sunday afternoon. She was moving towards me in her bicycle, and I was moving towards her in my skates. Both of us weren't really traveling very fast, but I suspected that she was moving faster than me. We saw each other from a distance of about 50 meters away. Tempest tried clapping using the slippers he had with him, to grasp the attention of the little girl. The girl seemingly saw me, then turned to look at her friend, then turned back to see me ramming into her. It was too late for Tempest to pull me away.

As we approached each other, I clutched on to her bike handles, and stopped the bike. At this instant, my left cheek knocked into her forehead. Then we both fell down. Tempest hurried to the little girl (instead of mine!?) to see if she was injured. The little girl's face was red and her eyes were brimming with tears, though she didn't cry. It must had been a hard knock for her. Her father another little girl who were traveling with her stopped to look after her, constantly asking if she was alright. But she merely kept quiet and murmured that her head got knocked into.

A patrol unit was nearby and also stopped to help. After a while, when we ascertained that the girl was ok, we continued along our way.

Sigh, it was the type of accident that I feared the most. A similar incident happened sometime back. I was riding a bicycle in Pasir Ris Park. I couldn't control my speed and direction very well then, so I was almost on the verge of ramming into a little kid about 4 or 5 years of age who was squatting by a corner. The kid saw me coming, and it refused to budge. I couldn't remember if I had to do a sudden brake or swerve to one corner and then fell off the bike.

Luckily this girl I collided into was not a puny little bundle. She was probably 10 - 12 years old, and riding a middle-sized bike. It was consoling to learn that she was on the wrong side of the road, making my case of not being able to shift to one side to avoid the accident less guilty.

OLDTOWN

2008-04-07T17:00:00.005+08:00

Visited OLDTOWN cafe at 'The Playground @ Big Splash' last Sunday. The service was lousy. Tempest was very annoyed at the lack of workflow. There was nobody to attend to us even when we were queuing up for 5 minutes, until I caught hold of one waitress and asked to be seated in the empty seats at one corner.

As soon as we were seated, we busied ourselves with the 'order list' placed in abundance on the table. We were supposed to choose and tick our orders before passing the list to the waitress. The system is similar to Cafe Cartel. Then Tempest noticed that there weren't any prices listed on the order list. That was when we noted that the menus were not given to us. We tried to look around with blank lost looks on our faces, but the waitresses paid no heed to us. The couple behind us must have seen our agony and handed us 2 copies of the menu from their table.

After we selected our orders, Tempest walked up to the corner where waitresses would key in the orders using some LCD screen. No waitress again! He had to stand around for 5 minutes before trying hard to walk to someone to pass the order list. Very lousy service.

5 -10minutes later, our food was served. That was pretty prompt. Probably cos' the manager was in the kitchen all the while, attending to the cooks rather than the customers. We noted that the waitress rarely talked to the customers, only amongst themselves. But at least they appeared friendly, smiling when they delivered the food. But some were a little bad-mannered; they threw the plate of toast onto the table top so hard that it bounced a little. And they anyhow placed the cutlery on the table, with no neatness or arrangements of any sort. Throughout the meal, Tempest was rattling off how lousy the service was, and how the manager should have taken care to train the employees and made himself available to the customers at all times, instead of holing up in the kitchen or behind the serving counter all day long. I was a little more tolerant than him when I remembered that the almost same thing happens at work. The supervisor is always expected to help and even do the most menial of stuffs like photocopying or in this case, emptying the spoons into the respective containers. Plus it is not easy to manage workers and get them to do it in the exact way you wish for.

Anyway.. to the food.

I ordered a bowl of 'Assam Laksa'. The soup was thick and brownish from the assam water. Pretty sour and spicy. The noodles were clear and smooth, often slipping away from my chopsticks. Instead of the usual tau pok (fried beancurd), bean sprouts, eggs, clams found in our local laksa, this one contained sardines and cucumber.

Tempest had curry chicken with rice. The keropok that came together was crispy and tasty. The rice had a bit of coconut scent to it. Very subtle. If it were nasi lemak, I would probably fail the rice :p The curry only had 2 little drumsticks. Tender meat, but very oily. The curry was spicy and saltish; I liked it.

We also took the french toast. It is like those thick toasts sold by HK cafes. What surprised us was the peanut butter spread in the center! It looked somewhat very similar to the picture on the right, except that there was no block of butter given.

I had an Oldtown iced white coffee while Tempest took the 'Kau' (thick) version. Both cost $1.90 each! The 'kau' version looks very much like a chocolate drink. The thick viscous fluid is sweet and full flavored. Got kick!

Prices are still reasonable; most main courses cost about $ 5 - 7 each. In total, we paid about $18 - $20 for the above. There was no GST, but the 10% service charge still applies.

FOOD: 3.5 out of 5
SERVICE: 1 out of 5

Need a refuel?

2008-04-07T14:57:00.007+08:00

Visit Pitstop Cafe. It's a game cafe located on the 3rd floor of a narrow shophouse situated at 14B Circular Road. A pretty easily accessible place from either Raffles Place MRT or Clarke Quay MRT. Pitstop was introduced to me by SY, whose friends were the co-owner of that games cafe. I think the establishment was barely a year old when she first brought the whole lot of us there. Likewise Mind's Cafe and Settlers, Pitstop offered similar games packages, but at a cheaper rate. It also offered a more friendly and homely feel with its non-cluttered yet bright furniture arrangements. At that time, the owners were constantly seen around the cafe, frequently going around to introduce games to players, or just simply to see how the gamers are doing . That light personal touch makes one comfortable.

Me and Tempest brought A, H and K to that cafe last Friday night. After so many dinners and movies, I thought it would be refreshing to do a change. Luckily A and H are not foreign to games cafes. And K is willing to give it a try. We once brought Tempest's friends over too. But the reactions from his friends were less than enthusiastic. Then there was G and J too, who weren't very fond of games. To make Pitstop an enjoyable experience, you sure need enthusiastic, loud-roaring players!

The first thought that came to me when I stepped into the cafe: it has become more commercialized. There are several helpers dressed in black polos bearing the Pitstop logo. Some of them are more friendly than the others. But some of them looked very 'green', and not very sure of how the games are to be played. None of the 4 owners we recognized were present till later. Even then, I don't see them 'patrolling' or chit-chatting with gamers. Instead, they were occupied at one corner with their Mac-books. In fact, you won't be able to recognize them as 'Pit Crew' since they are decked in their own home clothes, resembling nothing like the uniform their helpers wore. No logos or tag on their clothes either. Overall, I observed a sense of familiar commercialism that once was missing from the cafe.

Back to the five of us. We started off slow, taking time to decide on the food. Between us, we ordered fish and chips, chicken lasagna, teriyaki chicken and assorted finger food set. The fish and chips seemed to have shrunk and not equally distributed. We ordered 2 sets, one had a bigger portion than the other. The lasagna looked very small. The teriyaki chicken was alright. The assorted finger food came with an egg and rice; it didn't look very appetizing. Service level was at most 3 out of 5. They kept mixing up our orders with some other tables. They were also slow at preparing certain foods. We almost ate half of our dishes before K's arrived. We got all our drinks way before K's. But one thing I liked about it, it gave us half an hour allowance to finish our food and did not charge that into the 2-hour games package.

We selected generally easy-to-learn games for the night. We played only once or twice per game, probably also due to the fact that H can never play for long in a same game. Her attention span is pretty short. One of the more interesting ones we played was Guns n' Roses which came with foam guns. The rules were a little complicated and confusing that it took me 1 - 2 games to fully understand the strategy of the game. We had some kind of Win-Lose-or-Draw game; instead of drawing on paper, we were provided with cards that come pre-drawn with shapes. We were supposed to mix and match the cards to form a picture for the opponent to guess. It was a fairly difficult game for me since I can't draw very well. A is surprisingly good; he constructs concepts fast and makes good pictures. His Jack O'Lantern left an impression. Haha.

We extended for an hour and moved on to even easier no-brainer games like The Tower of Pisa and Jenga. Essentially the former is similar to Jenga, just that you are maneuvering little plastic boys instead of bricks.

An exalted cross!

My favorite was:

Jenga with a twist!

Good fun. =)

It was 11.30pm when we left Pitstop. K gotta leave for the night while the rest of us proceeded to Lau Pa Sat for supper. We ordered some satay; it was my first time tasting duck satay! Actually apart from physical appearance, I can't really taste the difference between the beef and duck. At the same time, we ran through a number of pictures from A's business trips to Berlin and Moscow, and Me & Tempest's holiday to Hanoi. We left at 2.30am, and Tempest offered to drive all of us home. Nice of you, dear one! *pats on the back*

CAPSULED

2008-04-02T23:20:00.004+08:00

The sky lined with gray looming clouds, threatening to add a touch of gloom to that otherwise peaceful afternoon. It was Good Friday, and we made plans to visit the Singapore Flyer. It was agreed that we should take the early evening ride, so that it would be cooling and yet bright enough to admire the surrounding scenery.

And then, the rain came.

I thought the rain was determined to stay on. It rained for almost 2 hours. Tempest mum was so annoyed at the lousy weather and called off the plan.

And then, the rain went.

Quite amazingly, the sky cleared up pretty fast and turned into a nice baby blue, decorated with candy floss-like clouds.

And then, we were on our way there!

Looks like a robotic praying mantis!

Beyond the cover

2008-04-02T22:07:00.003+08:00

I recently took to reading again. It started with Enid Blyton's adventure series, following Jack, Philip and their sisters around Europe, crossing mountains, exploring castles and rafting across rivers to expose some heinous crimes in happening. The books weren't too thick, neither were the fonts too small. The author had also carefully lined her stories with elaborate details on logistics, namely on the F&B department. It was a little difficult to imagine lemonade in a tin can at first, but I suppose that was how food was being processed in the early days. As I read on, I found myself absorbed in her descriptions of an assortment of foods, freshly baked bread, tinned pineapples, chocolates, ham, cakes, sweets and other sugary stuffs. I imagined that she probably is as much a sweet tooth as I am. Overall, the stories were easy to digest and came with pleasant endings as the good guys rounded up the bad guys.

Next came The Elenium, a trilogy by David Eddings. In a one-line statement, the story told of a fellowship of sort embarking on a journey to retrieve some powerful ornament-like stone so as to engage in a final battle against the evil one. Another one of his works, The Belgariad that I am currently reading also spoke of a similar objective and talked of a stone orb, albeit fitted onto the hilt of a sword. Very similar to Lord Of The Rings (and probably all other epic fantasies) in concept, except that the characters are made up mainly of humans (further segregated into races), humanoids, gods, supernatural long-lived beings with magical or sorcery powers, and huge ugly creatures. There were no mythical beings such as elves, dwarfs, gnomes, fairies or dragons. The closest were the Dryads, some kind of tree nymphs in Greek mythology, but then again, he provided those beings with a physical form and characteristic not unlike humans.

Eddings never forgets to inject emotions into his main characters, which was probably the factor that engages me in his stories. Each hero character is given a personality and special traits that made them likeable. There is the practical one who took care of logistics and able to devise clever apparatuses to work around the most tedious jobs. Then there is the witty and nimble one who is on the constant lookout for a good bargain and a chance to pass snide or sarcastic remarks. And there is the dense main hero who may falter occasionally but ultimately achieves his goal with the help of his counterparts. Of course, then there are the couple of ladies being inserted to provide balance to the male-dominated group. The interplay between the characters often churned out witty and humorous dialogues that were generously planted throughout the story.

Sometimes I feel that he takes it too far when he created The Tamuli based on the emotions of a supernatural being that creates havoc to the World simply because he cannot get the woman he loved. The Tamuli was not impressionable. I almost forgot the purpose of the adventure until I wikipedia-ed it. Maybe because there was no mandatory task to find a stone...

One good thing about his books is that he provides maps to illustrate the World he created for his stories. It helped to identify the different kingdoms and the routes undertaken by the party as they traveled from A to B, B to D en-route to C, then back to A. Very confusing and distracting. I got lost a few times when I tried to envision the journey and directions of their expedition.

As we know it, his epics ended happily. The heroes killed the evil ones and won the battle. The world was peaceful again and they lived happily ever after, or for as long as Eddings allowed them to be (before he packed them all into his extension series that he is seriously fond of.)

Apart from adventure and epic tales, Tempest tried to introduce me to amateur philosophy through Sophie's World. It was a story within a story. For those who watched 'Stranger Than Fiction' (starred by Will Ferrell and Maggi Gyllenhaal) would not be too foreign to that idea, even though it's not exactly the same thing. The author had skillfully built in a kind of contemporary fantasy story around philosophical concepts. I put it in this order because 60 - 70% of the book focused on explaining philosophical ideas since the beginning of Earth till today. I could probably rattle off more philosophers' names than before, but I still can't remember each of their respective theories clearly. I liked the parts where they linked religion to philosophy. I have never seen religion in that light before.

A refreshing departure from the previous books I read, BUT it's multiple times more tedious to read, remember and understand it. Ah, one more difference. It has an ending that is in part sad, in part sweet. Like I said there was a story within another; the outer story had a good ending, but the inner story (which forms 75% of the book) struck me as a little sad. The little girl was forced to separate from her mother as she ran away from the manipulation of the author, ending up in another realm that is out of the latter's reach. Perhaps she was better off, but to trade that for being away from a loved one? It seemed necessary for the story to veer towards such an ending to achieve a bittersweet dream-like effect. If I were a writer, I would also be inclined to employ similar artistry. Killing off the main characters or cornering them into a compromised situation would tug at the reader's heart and evoke a cry of pity or even a tear or two. Writing is after all, not just to tell a story, but to forge an exciting tale that would grasp the human soul. Then, money would come rolling in.

My dear one, it's a scheme! I shall summon up my will and draw you away from the evil forces!

Woe woe woe

2008-03-19T00:46:00.006+08:00

It's so hard to prioritize when the mind gives in to the heart.

I know meeting A is important. After all, it has been quite a while since we last met. BUT i feel like meeting B more. Even though I meet B very often. Argh!

* * *

Big Boss L loves to call people on the spot and questions them or asks them to do things, regardless of what the latter people are doing. And the latter people give in to her whims all the time and responds to her immediately. Nobody seems to dare to offend her. Or are they just giving her respect? After all, she does take care of those who wear pants pretty well, dinner treats, special treats, frequent treats and the like. Before I left for home, I saw R interrupting a discussion between K & D just because Big Boss L wants to check something with K. Me ain't jealous, me just can't stand it!

* * *

Jack did not give me my due share of drinks again! I am supposed to get 2 regular drinks per day (company privileges), unless I am on MC or leave. I went for a meeting this morning and returned only in the afternoon. Usually if I am not at my desk, Jack would just give me a packet drink. Today he forgot!

Jack is the uncle who would push a cart-full of drinks every morning and afternoon to distribute to the employees. Here, we don't have a vending machine. Pantry is simple a place for you to wash your cup, refill your water-bottle and store things in the fridge. If you want 'extra' (other than the 2 regular drinks given) coffee or tea or any drink, either bring your own or buy it at 'Jack's place'. Yup, Jack has a corner to himself where he and his mum prepare the drinks and desserts. He charges $0.60 for a cup of tea / coffee / milo and $1.20 for canned drinks and mineral water. Desserts also cost $0.60. The desserts are usually good, but the regular drinks, except the milk-tea, are often diluted.

This drinks business is family-owned. His brother takes care of the other office in town; the drinks are tastier. And they even serve Teh Halia (Ginger Tea)! :-)

The informal getup

2008-03-06T22:12:00.003+08:00

It's dress-down on Fridays!

We got the email this evening at 6pm. "With immediate effect", this means we get to come in our jeans or denim skirts or polo-tees tomorrow! After 8 months of donning semi-formal business wear 5 days a week, this is great news. BUT! They didn't talk about shoes. Oh golly, I'll risk it with my Nike Air Triax +10.

I simply loved those days where I strolled to work in khakis, polo tees and sports shoes...

A docent no more

2008-03-03T23:27:00.006+08:00

I just quit docents. This means...

1) I can't visit the zoo FOC anymore!
2) I can't enjoy 30% off Ben & Jerry's anymore!
3) I can't enjoy 20 - 30% off food and beverages anymore!

The time to part...

2008-02-25T23:25:00.002+08:00

The 'aroma' has gotten too strong. And it's time for it to go...

Six Roses
14th February 2008 - 25th February 2008

Where did the sizzle go?

2008-02-25T22:14:00.003+08:00

It was a post birthday celebration for J at (Toa Payoh) Sizzler's yesterday. Of Sizzler, I have always had a good impression of it despite only having done two visits. I remembered the huge-serving main courses, tasty soup with crispy croutons, wide selection of fresh salad and fruits. Prior to the meet up, I was already thinking of forgoing the main course and just hit the salad bar. Even Tempest the meat lover agrees. Anything with a "buffet" simply brightens him up. Thus, he was a little disappointed when he was not invited to the dinner.

I quickly moved to take a glance at the salad bar within minutes of arriving. It was a pretty small corner, loaded with a pretty decent selection of pasta salads, potato salads, fruit salads, fresh salads, three types of soups, spaghetti with 2 types of pasta sauces, Cajun potatoes, nachos, fresh papayas and watermelons, jellies, and an ice cream dispenser. Somehow, these stuffs no longer look as appetizing as they did before a few years back. They looked kind of gooey and messy, probably the result of too much salad cream. The clam chowder I had was too thick with starch and had a lot of crumbly bits, but few clams.

In consideration that the main courses might be huge, J had decided to order 2 main courses and 2 additional salad bar buffets since each main course already comes with one. J and me shared the ribeye with scallop sauce while S and G ordered the grilled chicken and dory. Both dishes weren't as good as it looks on the menu. And surprisingly small for the price we are paying. There were less than 10 strips of beef on the hotplate. It didn't taste as sweet or as well marbled, as a ribeye should be. One point commendable though, they laid capsicums beneath the beef, preventing the hotplate to heat up the meat quickly so that the beef remains tender and juicy. This was something that Phins and Chicago's sometimes neglected. I forgot to ask the other two about their chicken and fish. No complaints or praises, so I assumed it's average. The fries looked soft and thin (something like Burger King's but less crispy), unlike any of the western foods served at major cafes or restaurants. All in all, they need to improve at least on the presentation of the food. It should look generous, colorful and huge! Just like those served in Botak Jones, Changing Appetites, Billy Bombers or Buckaroo's!

For the amount and quality of food I get per dollar spent, I'll give 2.5 stars (out of 5). Maybe 3 stars if you are very hungry and willing to chomp on the salad bar.

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Maybe our appetites have become smaller; we no longer gorge indulgently at the buffet spread. Instead, we concentrated on updating each other with snippets of our lives till date. As expected, I didn't get the job at G's company; they have decided to hire a more experienced staff. G went to Hokkaido for her honeymoon and brought back lots of foods for us (partners included) :-) S is still looking for a job, and so is J whose contract would be ending soon.

The meet-up was short and sweet, a little less than 2 hours in total.

of SHOCKS & sUrpri$es!

2008-02-18T23:29:00.009+08:00

Surprise from the Valentine:

"Huh?! Why did you get me flowers?" "How much do they cost?" "Did you happen to pick it up from NUS bazaar?" "Someone sold it to you ultra cheaply?"

He feigned a hurt look and replied: "... UNROMANTIC..."

I couldn't help it. I don't hate flowers; neither do I like them. Strangely, it still felt flattering to receive one. I remembered that my first stalk of rose was given to me by KL, as a sort of "nice-to-meet-you" gift. That was in 2003/2004. I was shocked.

Come today, I am still not used to getting flowers, even from him. Cos he has never given me flowers before, not once in those 28 plus months!!! He kinda agreed that it was a waste of money to give flowers, especially to the ME who doesn't know how to appreciate floral beauty. So all the more, I am .

Speaking of surprises & shocks, it has been in our habit to ensure that the other receives his/her -gift in a most unusual and memorable manner. So far, the best was my last birthday. First came an SMS after he sent me back from dinner. "Quick! Check who's at your door!"

Scruffy, the cheeky messenger!

The doggy was the first lead in the treasure hunt. I had to search high and low for the next clue, only to find a tiny piece of paper in its little pocket where it keeps its little blue-colored bone (see doggy's right).

The clue read: "... Scruffy likes digging and hiding things and fetching mail.. you hear postman now? Quick Quick! Bring Scruffy there now!!!"

That clue had me run up and down the house looking for the "mailbox". I even had the thought that the 'treasure' was in my letterbox! But it was rather impossible to slot in anything into the new-style letterbox without the master key. I can't remember where I found it, but it was a book, which contains another clue. And that contains yet a 4th one! It was a long and tiring night. Haha, but the rewards were sweet.

He knew that I love surprises and he tried his best to create one at every opportunity. Lovely work, dear one.

Friday Foodie Finds

2008-01-07T15:03:00.000+08:00

Tempest and I felt a little more greedy and drove out to Upper Thomson Road for dinner. I was telling him about my lunch in Longhouse & Icekimos & the famous cheesecake brownie in nearby Baker's Story. We were fans of cheesecakes, brownies, and more recently, waffles. So the two gluttons figured out the way to Upper Thomson/Sin Ming Road from my office.

Cafes and restaurants, big and small, lined both sides of the road. We strolled down the path, passing by "Hooked on Heads" - famous for their fish head curry, "Oiishi Pizza", "Barnsbury" - some steakhouse, "Tangshui HK Cafe" - which my colleague said was lousy, "Zui Fairprice Live Seafood Restaurant", "Ms Clarity Cafe" and numerous smaller chinese/muslim cooked food shops.

We settled for "Ms Clarify Cafe" for one, we have never eaten there before, two, the food looks good and reasonably priced, and three, Oiishi Pizza is already closed for the day. I had the "Risotto Venere" - italian wild black rice cooked with sauteed prawns and artichoke chips. The wild black rice turns out to be similar to the sticky black glutinous rice that we see in pulor hitam. Very sweet and fragrant. Goes well with the saltish artichokes and prawns. Tempest took the squid-inked linguine with stewed beef and sauteed squid rings. The beef was tender and full-flavoured; the squid rings had a nice chewy texture but a tad too small. The linguine was erm black, and smelt faintly of 'squid'. Comparatively, I thought my choice of dish tasted better. :-p

Initially our thought was to have dinner in Ms Clarity and then hopped over to Icekimos to try their special promo item @ $5.90 - waffles sandwiched with durian puree, topped with a scoop of their special flavored home-made ice cream. And perhaps 'ta pao' the cheesecake brownie from next door Baker's Story for breakfast tomorrow.

But Tempest turned my attention to the 'warm bread and butter pudding with vanilla icecream'. That got me. I also succumbed to a moist chocolate lava cake. Very cute, it's served in a cup instead of a plate like most other places. Our guess is that it's meant to contain the liquid that oozes out so that it would be easier to scoop out every single drop. But because of the design, the icecream sinks and mixes with the 'lava' chocolate when we sink our spoons in. This cools down the warm chocolate and kinda coagulates the cocoa. The sponge was also too powdery and not chocolately enough. The bread & butter pudding faired better. Placed in a middle of a plate with a sea of vanilla sauce surrounding it, the raisin-covered rectangular pudding was warm, soft and moist. Maybe they could add more rum if they did (Tempest thought he tasted a tinge of it) put in any. Nice roundup to the meal.

Even better when we settled the bill. $39.60 nett. NO GST & SERVICE CHARGE. :-)

Sigh, the good feeling didn't lasted long. The parking warden left a $30 note at the windscreen of his car.

The blue hippos

2007-12-24T02:14:00.000+08:00

I was walking around Bugis Junction and came upon these stacks of familiar looking hippo-themed items in Watsons.

Looks familiar?

Absolutely! Refer to my post on Turkey Turkey Nite! Those 2 items (towel rack & tissue box holder) are what I have drawn for the gift exchange! And my! They only cost a total of $4.95! I spent a total of $8.10 for my gift and got back only $4.95. To think that I got another towel rack as a result of a surplus of gifts, if not, what? Only $2.475 worth of returns!

Gosh.. Those people.. didn't the email write MINIMUM $5 for the gift item? Oh yes, the blue hippo also ain't anyhow related to Pooh Bear.

Found... and lost

2007-12-21T00:45:00.000+08:00

We went to watch Alvin & The Chipmunks with A and HB at Plaza Singapura. Very cute show with lotsa singing and dancing. I didn't even know that the chipmunks already had albums way back in the 1960s! Their cartoon-ish looks resemble more like little boys than chipmunks. I like their look in this movie better; they looked more like rodents, or the Chip & Dale in disney's cartoon.

I used to like Alvin the best, cos he is the only one with an alphabet on his sweater. And he wears a cap. Simon looks nerdy with his pair of old-style round glasses. But he sure does look very cool with a pair of Oakley. Hehe. Now I like Theodore the most. Endearing, chubby and clumsy. He wears green too!

Hee, I googled the website and re-remembered the 3 female chipmunks - Brittany, Eleanor & Jeanette. A pity that they weren't featured in this film. Maybe a sequel!

After the show, we paid a visit to the toilets. And ta da! I found a purple-colored Samsung slider phone resting on the toilet-roll holder inside the cubicle! My first thought was that it probably belonged to the lady who just came out of the cubicle. That lady might be standing outside waiting for me to be done before retrieving her phone. But no, there was nobody waiting for me. I played with the thought of keeping the phone for myself. But alas, my conscience got the better of me and I reported the lost to the customer service counter.

That phone looks something like the one on the right.

Flashback

I lost my beloved W800i around the same time last year. It was nearing Dec (before we went to Hanoi) that the phone pouch dropped out of my pocket in one of the theatres in Orchard Cineleisure. Unlike the lady who got the phone back from me, I lost mine forever. That idiot switched off the phone minutes after finding it. I was terribly angry and upset; I paid $638 for the phone under a 2 year contract!

Anyway, Tempest and I got into a discussion that same night about whether to return lost phones or to keep it. He made a very good point about how distressed the owner could be if the finder just simply kept the phone. Especially now that phones are able to contain so much information. How not to relate to that when I just lost my phone? :-(

Now...

After our dinner, I received a call from an unfamiliar number. The lady whose phone I found gave me a call to thank me. Her accent revealed that she's probably from China. She even sent me an SMS wishing me a merry christmas and having good retribution for doing a good deed. Haha.. I really hope so. Like I told Tempest, "I wish that by doing this, I won't lose my new phone now..."

Turkey Turkey Nite!

2007-12-18T22:53:00.001+08:00

Theme: Turkey Turkey Nite
Venue: Singapore Recreational Club
Date: 18 Dec 2007, Tuesday
Time: 7.30pm

Gift exchange item: Pooh-related item.
Gift budget: $5

That's our department's Christmas dinner! Organized and entirely paid for by my boss. The country head, sector head, department heads were also invited, along with 20 odd members from System & User Support, my unit, a.k.a. SUS.

Food

Food was pretty good! Lamb chops with mint sauce, lemon fish with butter sauce, SRC's famous curry chicken, potato salad, fruit salad, fried rice, mixed vegetables, ham roll with asparagus, sweet corn, bread pudding, almond jelly with longan, pasta, chocolate log cake and of course, a nice succulent roast turkey with chestnut filling! Oh, there was the red wine too!

With such a spread, I chiong for the worthy items: lamb, fish, beef, turkey and the salads. The lamb was so-so, any possible hint of mint was probably overpowered by the thick brown sauce. Meat was tender though but not exactly very tasty. I took 3 medium-sized pieces. The fish was good! I took 3- 4 slices. The roast beef though tender, is not sweet. Maybe it lacks the accompaniment of raw salt! I took only one slice. The turkey was juicy, pretty appetizing. I took only a chunkful that my colleague cut for me. The potato salad was amazingly good. Mixed with a portion of fruit salad, it added sweetness to the chunky potatoes. I had 2 servings of that. :-)

Gifts

The theme was set to be pooh-related items. Most of us are guessing that it's because my boss likes pooh bear. She has loads of plushy pooh bears morphed in various shapes, sizes and patterns in her office. The big Pooh that was meant to be a lucky draw item was also "misappropriated" and now sits comfortably in her office. Instead, a hamper containing chocolates and other food stuffs was substituted with.

I went around Tampines Mall and Century Square scouting for a somewhat useful pooh bear item. No soft toys. No plushy handphone holders. No cups. I was telling myself not to get those. Firstly they are too common, secondly, they are not within my budget of $7 - 10. Alas! I went into Isetan and chanced upon a very pretty towel with Pooh Bear sewed on it. At $7.90, it matched my budget. Pretty common gift item too, but not so much in my dept. Heh. The biggest bargain I had though was the wrapping paper. 20 cents! And it had pooh bears on it! How much better can it get?!

A lucky draw was also conducted. The country head dipped her hand into a box filled with the names of all those who were invited to attend the party. The first name she drew was not present. The second name she drew was a guest from HR. Hehe, as guest, she decided to donate back the gift - pressure from the country head. Haha. The third name she drew was a young guy from our unit - nicknamed 'Xiao Di' (Little Brother). The second lucky draw item - the hamper - also landed in the hands of 'Xiao Mei' (Little Sister) from SUS.

Next was the gift exchange which took place in the form of 'lucky draw'. All the gifts were collected and labeled with a number. A box containing the same numbers were passed around. I collected No. 38 and this was it:

There were a surplus of gifts left uncollected. So another round of lucky draw. Hee, I was one of the more lucky ones to get hold of one of them. It was No. 37:

Hehe. Looks so similar eh? Of course, Watson's products. It must have made a pile from selling all these little gift items.

One additional thing worth noting: all those who got the surplus gifts all stayed around Buangkok!

Can't wait to get out

2007-12-12T01:32:00.000+08:00

I had been attending interviews for the past few months. Some similarity amongst them:
1) All 3 organizations were from the banking/financial industry.
2) All 3 positions were referred to me by my ex-colleagues.
3) I went through 2 interviews at each of the 3 organizations.
4) All 3 were located in the CBD.

I was rejected by the first organization, H.

B, the second organization said they really liked me, but can't wait for me to serve a month's notice. They interviewed me for 2 contract roles on separate occasions, and I lost both to those who can start work earlier than me.

S, the third organization, replied my email yesterday saying that they are still assessing other candidates and cannot provide me with an outcome yet. They have been assessing for 2 weeks already!

Today, my ex-colleague (SB) who is working in B now sms-ed me. She told me that her boss is preparing to interview me again for a different role. Not sure what role it is. Her boss wishes to speak to me first; the Brit doesn't want to reveal much to SB either.

I really hope that I get either the one in S or B.

Rare find

2007-11-14T22:03:00.000+08:00

I was lamenting the other day that I had not been picking up money from the ground for quite some time already. The most recent find I made was at Ikea Tampines, some months ago. I was playing with their lockers standing near the hot dog counters, turning the key holes. Then a dollar coin dropped out. :-)

Today, I had a better find on office ground! $2.

Whee!

unfitting ClubFIT

2007-10-31T22:00:00.000+08:00

It was already 7.05pm when I knocked off. It takes 10 minutes to walk from my workplace to Yio Chu Kang MRT station and another 20 - 30 minutes to reach Raffles Place, where Planet Fitness is located. A quick calculation tells me that I won't be able to reach home by 9pm for my chinese drama. So I decided to visit the SSC Clubfit gym at Yio Chu Kang.

I reached the gym, paid $2.50 and went up the 2nd level to the gym. The changing room and the lockers were both inside the gym. But I discovered to my dismay that I do not have two 20-cent coins for the lockers. Arrgghh.. So I had to go down to the 1st level to change the money. I went back up, register my entry, and then the guy manning the gym requested me to pull out my towel. Actually before I came up, I already noticed the signboard that informed all users to bring a towel or else be prohibited to use the gym. Arrggghh.. I had to visit the 1st level counter again to buy a towel at $1. Before I even started my workout, I had already climbed the stairs five times up and down!

As a community gym, it comes with the standard gym equipment - free weights, treadmills, two striders (or elliptical machine), one stepper, two exercise bikes, two rowers, quite a number of standalone weight-training machines and a couple of multi-installment weight-training machines.

The floor space is really small. It's probably only a third of one of the two-leveled Planet Fitness (PF) in Chevron House. It doesn't really have a distinctive area for stretching though there was a pile of black-colored exercise mats beside a pillar. The machines looked pretty old; some of them were already rusting.

The workout population can be easily divided into two groups: the men who busied themselves with weight-training and the women who occupied almost 80% of the elliptical/stepper/treadmills. This is so unlike the group in PF where almost all the women handled the weights (however short the duration may be) as frequently as the men.

I still had a bit of cough/sore throat and sniffles. Thus I chose the elliptical, thinking that some light exercise might do me good. After 10-15mins of striding away, I actually felt breathless! I was scared for a minute and decided to stop short of the 20-minute I had planned to do. I wanted to proceed to the weights, but seeing that they were hogged by an all-guys group, I felt shy to approach any machine. Instead, I settled on the rower. That was pretty good; the rower was also one of the newer looking machines.

After half an hour and 150 calories expended, I called it a day. I didn't really enjoy myself. At $3.50, it's definitely not worth it. In retrospect, it was a wise choice when I made up my mind to sign up for a 26-month membership at PF.

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HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Gutter ball update - 13/10/2007

2007-10-17T22:09:00.001+08:00

We did go for a bowling outing after all. After all the trouble of organizing, coordinating, canceling, re-proposing, and arranging of schedules. K had ultimately decided to bowl with SC & GZ, me and Tempest, despite her initial reservations about going out alone with 2 other couples. Haha, she said she was left with no choice. All her other friends are not interested in bowling.

None of us are regular bowlers, and K was a first-timer. Thence, being the more frequent bowler, Tempest took upon himself to guide me and K along. "Lock your elbow, swing your shoulders, move one leg behind and loosen up the back, don't stand too stiff and upright, roll the ball not throw the ball, look at the arrows, take aim with your thumb and fingers in parallel to the lines and arrows..." That was about all I remembered from the 2 hour session.

The first few frames were horrible. The ball either went into the gutter before it even reached the middle of the lane, or rolled near the sides precariously to hit only one or two pins. It was only after a few more 'rolls' that each of our scores improved.

To further increase our scores, we took to picking the 'lucky' brown ball which kinda lost its magic touch after being picked by bowlers from the neighbouring lane, imagining our most hated colleagues and bosses and people plastered on the 10 pins, stamping on the floor, standing more to the left or right side so that the ball will not roll into the gutter easily etc.

In terms of score, the big winner is probably Tempest, followed closely by GZ, then SC and myself, and K. From less than 5o in the first game to slightly over 90 in the second, i thought that was a huge improvement! :-)

In terms of value to money ratio, SC was the biggest winner no doubt! In normal circumstances as applied to the rest of us, the bar would lower itself to clear the fallen pins before allowing the bowler to do a second throw. For SC, the bar would not lower till she was done with two throws! Thus effectively, she got twice as many throws as each one of us!

Conclusion: Fun. We shall go again next month! If we ever get past the trouble of organizing it.

I am cooking a bowl of ‘rhapsody’ in the dark!

2007-10-12T00:53:00.000+08:00

I believed that I had thought it through and will stay in the Tiger's belly till perhaps the bonus month, which is end September next year, or at least after my probation. Besides, I am also looking forward to my leave days planned for this first half of the year. Just when I had finally decided to stay in the company longer, my ex-colleague smsed me. She told me that her company is hiring, and she could forward me the contact details if I want them. Ah. That roused my peace again.

Unlike most other organizations, the notice period for any resigning staff, be it under probation or not, is still one full month (others do with 1 to 2 weeks notice). And the most hated part of it all is that the staff must repay all benefits and leaves utilized if he/she leaves the company during the 6 months probationary period! I have taken one-day leave on 10 August, another one scheduled on 26 October, and 3 days planned for Christmas. My probation will be over by end December, so that means my confirmation will probably come only in January 2008. If I resign in January, I pay back zero dollars. If I resign now, I must pay back 1 day's worth of leave. What's worse is that if I resign in December, I have to pay back 5 days' worth of leave! That's equivalent to 25% of my salary!

Evil people.

Still, I do hope to get the position in my ex-colleague's company, even though it's probably only for a contract period of 6 months.

And many great thanks to Tempest who helped me with my resume.

Induction

2007-10-02T21:05:00.000+08:00

I attended an induction program yesterday, held on the 32nd level of the tower situated in the CBD. Almost 60 of us attended the full-day program, which is meant no more than an orientation for newbies. The irony was that 50% of the inductees had already been with the bank for nearly 6 months and beyond. Our HR facilitator revealed that there was no body else to do her job while she was on a 3-month maternity leave. I guess that more or less concluded the importance of us new staff in the organization.

The induction began by introducing us to the history of the organization. I was surprised to learn that the bank has established itself in Singapore since 40 years ago! I was even more amazed to discover that we have a company band and choir, and a song! We were even made to rise and sing the song!

The facilitator did away with the usual ice-breaker games, but she made us go through the efforts of presenting ourselves to the whole lot with our name, unit, previous employer, likes & dislikes of the current employer.

One common complaint was "slowness" of the bank, in everything, from the systems to the pace of working, and even the lifts and gates. It was said that the fast-closing gate scratched one girl's new car, and that was why the guards had resorted to slowing the opening and closing of the gate to prevent similar incidences from happening. As much as it is antagonizing, I believe it is this slower pace of working that led to better 'work life balance', the euphemism for "NO OT". That was one of the 'likes' mentioned by a lot more people who enjoyed their regular working hours. "Family-oriented" was also frequently quoted when describing the bank.

Lunch was not catered. So I went with YS, ZQ, J and K to Imperial Bak Kut Teh located along a stretch of shophouses. At $5.90 per set which comprises of a bowl of rice, a bowl of sliced pork soup, sides of preserved salted vegetables and braised bean curd and bean curd sticks, it was worth it. The sliced pork was tough and a bit oily, but the soup was peppery and not too dilute. The $1.00 homemade lime juice I ordered was disappointing though. It tasted sugary instead of being sour.

What followed after lunch was boring. Lecture after lecture on business continuity plans, anti-money laundering and IT security, none of which is new to me in fact. Except for the video where the bank simulated a scenario of a bomb blast and how the staffs reacted to the situation as per the business continuity plan, the rest of the 'lessons' bore me and made me dozed off.

The afternoon's refreshments were much better - pies, muffins, Malay kueh, cakes, and puffs - probably because the senior management was supposed to join us for the tea break. It was an informal session for us to meet those big shots of the bank, so that we would not embarrass ourselves if we chance upon any of them during our course of work. There was an incident where a branch staff had asked the Chairman to take a queue number without recognizing him. I quite agree with that, it is sad to realize that you do not know whom you are working for.

I was delighted when the induction ended at 5.30pm, half an hour ahead of the scheduled 6pm. This meant that I could end my gym workout (at nearby Chevron House) earlier and rushed home to catch the 9pm Channel 8 drama!

Gutter Ball!

2007-09-27T22:05:00.000+08:00

K told me this afternoon that she wants to learn how to bowl. I think her interest was probably triggered by some bowling competition that she chanced upon while lunching in Novena Square. I replied that I wouldn’t be able to coach her in the sport since I am not any better off than she is.

I attempted bowling only twice, during my university days. The first time was during the UCC chalet in Year 2. Some of the UCC guys were pretty good at it and they urged the girls to join them. Well, the initial few balls I rolled out went pretty straight and did hit the pins. My best score was 9 out of 10 pins down. As the game continued, my throws got more disappointing. It always fell short of a few feet from the pins before it got swung off and hit the gutter instead. That wasn’t all! I slipped and fell backwards, landing on my butt, as I swung the ball. Embarrassing! I didn’t know that lane was just oiled, so I happily thought that the nearer I move the better I can aim and knock more of those pins down! As much as I was still interested in the sport, I didn’t pursue it since not many of my friends then bowled regularly. Besides, it was expensive.

The second time I had a chance to bowl again was also in Year 2 - Genting Highlands. Though I did not fall down, I replicated my lousy score back in Singapore.

Just received an update from K. She decided to put the plan on the back burner. Looks like I won't have my third go at it soon!

Musings

2007-09-25T22:11:00.000+08:00

This is a year of the pig. A symbol of prosperity and fortune. Many of my friends and colleagues turned fathers and mothers as the year progressed into its ninth month. I saw in my previous company 4 baby piglets when I left in June, and another one more was born a month after my departure. The teacher whom I had religiously followed her blog for nearly a year gave birth to a pair of fraternal twins in that same period. A colleague in my present company was also promoted to the ranks of a father in early Aug. I discovered yesterday to my surprise that 2 of my JC classmates had given birth to a son and daughter respectively in that very same month! And there are 2 more baby girls due in Oct, one coming from M & J, and the other from G & A.

Staring at the friendster photos of the newborns and their parents, I saw blissful looks locked in every little and big faces alike. Heartwarming. It makes the once nearly inconceivable thought of being a parent myself a more imaginable notion. Maternal instincts at play? Not really! It's just more fun to build an idea than to realize it. At least for now.

A number of friends have tied the knot for the past 12 months too. It started with Mr. & Mrs. G, A & G, then SC & GZ, and followed by E & D, and SY & K soon to do so before the year turns 2008. It is always interesting and refreshing to listen to the stories told by newly wed couples and their endeavors to lead a life together. :-) Almost inevitably, in their revelations, attention will be turned to T & me. "When is your turn?" As much as love may be in the air, bread and butter aren't. So I can safely reveal that it won't be for the next N number of seconds! (I know some who may take forecasted figures too seriously; and thus I have resorted to taking the basic unit of time for my measurement. It> '> s not a hidden message! :-p) It simply requires too much courage to take the plunge. At least for now.

Sidetrack:

I met up with G, SC and J for lunch at Serangoon Gardens last Sunday. SC decided on the recently opened Mushroom Park, which I had mistaken it for Mushroom Pot initially. Following the concept of its predecessor Mushroom Pot, it features various types of mushrooms ranging from the ordinary shitake to the more exotic liver mushroom. Accompanied in each set meal were a handful of vegetables (Chinese cabbage & some green leafy ones), a plate of thinly sliced meat (pork, chicken or beef), a choice of 2 mini steamed buns or white rice, a cup of flower tea and a dessert.

The crockery used was largely ceramic and boasts of a not-so-flattering muddy green color. The restaurant attempts to provide a Zen-like dining experience with its fusion of contemporary Chinese décor and simple, yet nutritious menu. The staffs were friendly and helpful, albeit a little forgetful and slow at times.

At $29 per person, I find that it' s too expensive. The mushrooms, no doubt exotic, have the similar subtle flavors and aroma of the ordinary ones that my mum bought from the supermarket. The only after taste that lingers (and made me hunger for more) came from the saltish dried mushrooms and one other brownish shreddings that tasted a bit like pork floss. Oh, and they are refillable! If there was any satisfaction that I derived from the meal, it was the palatable company I had that afternoon. ;-)

Can I hear the tiger roar?

2007-09-03T22:21:00.000+08:00

I did not regret leaving my previous company. But I do regret joining my present one. Nothing of a ferocious tiger was manifested in the incumbent strength of 23. The bite of the beast was soft and reluctant, and soon felt like a nibble of a harmless cub.

I am growing tired from pushing and coaxing the animal to take on a more aggressive stance just so to satisfy my appetite for a bit of high-strung action. Maybe it does not want to entertain an amateurish attempt to provoke its temper; or maybe it could not detect my faltering efforts to excite its slumbering mood. It just lies there, watching my moves, occasionally nudging me whenever it feels like it.

Nothing that happens is truly eventful and more adventurous than my books of The Elenium, a three-part series that introduces me to epic fantasies and rebuilds my interest in reading. I prefer flipping through the pages of imaginary worlds than to engage in substance-less and mundane conversations with the group. Lunch is therefore an exciting one-and-a-half hour affair and one where I can enjoy some respite from office boredom.

It couldn't really agree with this hermit part of me though. It advocates group activities while at the same time emphasizing the need to be independent. I can't help but feel that it's another classic example of its confused and clouded state of mind.

It has already a past that boasted of projects completed in the most indecipherable manner, resulting in consequences that call for the most abstract of minds to understand and further the work done by their predecessors. How am I not to question its convoluted sense of logic when I discovered that step A is performed after step B, and step C is subsequently performed to replace or remove step B?

I decided that I have grown used to looking through standard operating procedures, which come in the form of flowcharts. The wordy manuals that my current employer adopts exposes its weaknesses in creating clarify and providing details in the same sentence.

Maybe I am just biased and too free.

Hanoi Escapade - Day 6

2007-07-17T01:02:00.000+08:00

DAY SIX / 2 January 2007, Tuesday

HANOI - SIN

The flowers! It was already the last day of our stay in Hanoi. Running through the list of places we had gone to for the past 5 days - Halong Bay, Hoan Kiem Lake, Old Quarters, West Lake - the last place I will love to visit but didn't have a chance to do so was the French Quarters.

"Lying to the south and east of Hoan Kiem Lake, Hanoi's French Quarter has grand boulevards and elegant French colonial buildings. These include the stately Opera House, based on the neo-Baroque Paris Opera, complete with gray slate tiles imported from France. One block east of the Opera House is Hanoi's Museum of History, an elaborate blend of Vietnamese palace and French villa, a style that came to be called Neo-Vietnamese. Trang Tien, the main artery of the French Quarter, is still a busy shopping street where you'll find bookshops and art galleries as well as cafés and hotels."

Argh.

Anyway, for completeness sake, the rest of the photos depicted the events that followed through our last day in Hanoi.

Last chance at eating my favorite dessert - the gingery rice dumplings!

Baguette & Chocolate - a confectionery situated next to Majestic Salute Hotel. Heard from Lena that their pastries are small, cute and cheap!

Nothing better to do at the airport. We were waiting for the ever-delaying flight back to Singapore.

And finally...

Hanoi Escapade - Day 5

2007-07-16T23:38:00.000+08:00

DAY FIVE / 1 January 2007, Monday

We loved the kebab so much that we ate it for breakfast again! This was the third time we bought the finely-cut grilled pork sandwiched between two pieces of freshly toasted bread!

Remembered that we couldn't locate Huy and group yesterday evening? We popped by their hotel in the morning again to see if they left any note for us. And indeed they did. We were supposed to meet them at the hotel lobby at 7pm for a final gathering before we part our separate ways; me and tempest back to Singapore, whilst they continued their exploration down Southern Vietnam.

It has become a habit for us to splurge on a good meal on the last day of our travel. Reason: we still had a lot of money unspent! Going for a buffet was one way we could utilize the unused dollars while maximizing pleasure. Before we set off for Hanoi, we found Brother's Cafe.

The restaurant boasted a buffet of over 30 dishes at the price of only USD $8 for lunch and USD $13 for dinner! We immediately took to the bargain.

Decor-wise, it had an ambiance that portrayed a subtle sense of tranquility. Food-wise, due to the many chinese and western influences, I couldn't notice the distinctiveness in Vietnamese cuisine save for their rice paper spring rolls. The buffet also did not feature many local fruits but displayed only the dragonfruit, even though jackfruits were in the season.

Honestly, I was a little disappointed with the variety and lack of uniqueness. Or maybe I just wasn't exceptionally hungry. However given its low prices, I must say that the quality and spread were reasonable.

One of another good habits we cultivated for our budget trips: relying on our two good legs to carry us to our destinations. It not only saves transportation costs but also aids digestion so that we can continue to eat what we want without putting extra weight during the trip!

Look where we had walked for the whole day:

Camellia 2 is our hotel.

From the map, our stopover station 2 is at Ho Chi Minh Museum (Camellia 2 is the starting point). To our dismay, the museum was closed! In the end, we could only satisfy ourselves with staring at the big doors.

We walked over to the nearby Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, hoping to see the embalmed body of Ho Chi Minh. Again, closed! Argghh!!!

It appeared a little weird to me that both tourist attractions were closed on a public holiday. On the contrary, in Singapore, similar attractions would be opened and packed to the brim during festive holidays.

Lena was telling us about the restaurants which she had enjoyed her seafood dinners along West Lake (Yes! We obtained huge loads of information on food from the Singaporean-Vietnamese cum Australian immigrant trio!). Heh, but we found ourselves some chocolates and little pastries instead of seafood or luxurious looking plates of exotic delicacies. It wasn't close to dinner time at all! Besides we were going to meet the trio that very evening; thus it was best to save our stomachs for who knows what could be waiting for us!

West Lake (Ho Tay) was not anything like the one in China. This one is big, but not as grand and scenic looking as the authentic Xi Hu 西湖. The swan rides resembled those in Chinese Garden, where I remembered sitting in one with my aunt & uncle when I was still in primary school. Tempest and I had to step foot into one of them numbered "67" to kill time!

Our legs were beginning to tire out from the long walks we had since morning. It was a deviation when we decided to ride a cab back to the hotel. Maybe I felt a little distracted by my weariness and started to stone away, immersed in my own little quiet world amidst the ever blasting traffic which boasts of rows after rows of motorists horning away. My blues appeared to catch onto Tempest too, for he remained silent throughout our short journey back.

The clock read 6pm when we reached the hotel. We had an hour to waste before meeting Huy and the rest in their hotel. And we conveniently blew into some kind of cold war out of a distressed mood of trying to find something to kill time! In retrospect, that was amusing. :-p

It was nearing 7pm before we broke the silence and headed towards Huy's hotel. We took a little walk to the street which sells weasel coffee and bought 2 packets, one for Huy & Kim, and the other for Lena.

Huy met us at the hotel lobby first. Kim and Lena were on the opposite street collecting their tailor-made clothes. The two ladies appeared 10 - 15 minutes later; Lena started complaining about the tailors' skills being not up to standard. She found some of the clothes made not to her satisfaction despite one to two rounds of alteration. Kim, on the other hand, was more easy-going. She did not mind the shoddy work and regarded it as a form a charity when she gave work to the tailors.

Huy brought us to this posh looking restaurant near the Hoan Kiem Lake.

This had been their second time dining here. I think we ordered some kind of set meal which comes with several dishes and a dessert. All I remembered was having eel soup, snails, some vegetable salad, and a little tangerine as dessert. Oh yes, and they gave us roses which me and Tempest found joy with the very next morning!

Kim seemed to adore Tempest very much, probably of the large resemblance Tempest has to her only son, Peter. Just at that moment, Peter sent an sms to Huy & Kim, telling his parents that he missed them. It was also then that they showed us a picture of their son topless and posing sexily in front of the camera. It seemed like a skinnier version of Tempest!

All three of them are very sociable people. They loved to share their experiences with us. At one point, we touched upon Christianity (all three are Christians), and they seemed eager, especially Kim, to encourage us to embrace their religion even they repeatedly assured us that they weren't. We also learnt that Huy & Kim are in the jewellery business in Australia while Lena, of course, is their customer cum neighbour cum future-in-law (yup, Peter is dating Lena's daughter :p). Apparently Lena also inherited her father's knack in spotting valuable antiques! Following her 21-day Vietnam trip with her 2 Vietnamese friends, she will be soon cruising away to Alaska! A truly rich tai-tai!

What followed next was most delightful! Huy, without even a word, paid for the entire meal! We put up a ritualistic weak protest, and gave in to their generosity in the end. Haha. This also meant that we had huge wads of dong in our pockets still!

Hanoi Escapade - Day 4

2007-06-27T15:57:00.003+08:00

DAY FOUR / 31 December 2006, Sunday

Since coming to Hanoi, we became more of a morning person. We woke up at 8am to watch the famous water puppet show at 9am! Breakfast at Camellia 2 was not not different from Anh Dao, not too spectacular. We later heard from Lena (the lady whom we met on the cruise to Halong Bay) at a dinner gathering on 01/01/2007, that her hotel, Majestic Salute, served excellent breakfast buffet! There was even a chef around to cook some stuff (forgotten what it was) on the spot! Sigh, they had wanted to give us the extra breakfast vouchers they had but we met them too late. So they gave them away to the chambermaids. :-(

On our way to Hoan Kiem Lake where the theatre was, we spent some time looking at the fresh market! I have always loved to look at the colorful fruits and funny-looking vegetables they are selling!

Look at that big durian! I found it rather amusing to find the stall only having one durian and it was put in a basket like any other small little fruit! We didn't get the chance to try the King of fruits but Tempest's dad who went to Ho Chi Minh said the durian tasted horrible! "You give it to me free I also don't want!" He said.

On the other hand, I learnt from my Thai colleague that Thais love their durian a bit harder and less pungent, unlike Singaporeans where we want them sweet, creamy and even bitter!

We had originally wanted to watch the water puppet show yesterday evening, but the seats were all booked for the night. That showed how popular this traditional act was with tourists! This was also the one & only water puppet theatre around the Hoan Kiem area.

When we entered the theatre, more than 80% were ang mohs. The rest were tourists from Asia; the two girls seated next to us were Japanese; a row of Chinese were behind us, and I thought I heard some Koreans too.

The 1-hour play was in Vietnamese. A lady was singing in the background with some members of the orchestra drumming and playing away.

We enjoyed ourselves with trying to differentiate one scene from the next by consistently refering to our english version of the programme brochure. Overall, the singing was good, and I did enjoy it. Try not to miss it! Haha, afterall, there is nothing much you can do in Hanoi. :-p

How could we miss a thorough visit round the Hoan Kiem Lake when we stepped into Hanoi? The lake is considered a major attraction for both locals & tourists. Locals can be seen jogging and 'pak tor'-ing in the parks while tourists tried to get their fair share of fun by strolling round and round the lake. We were one of the latter; we found our way to the entrance of some temple on the lake, which by the way, charges a token sum for entrance fees.

Not much of a sight to admire, but the red bridge is really stunning, especially with softened lighting effects (or was it the mist?):

There was a display of a giant turtle, the main character in the legend of the lake.

We chanced upon the statue of Emperor Ly Thai To on our way to the Post Office. Check out the link to find Vietnam's history - seems to be plagued by wars, one after the other.

I still remembered how CF, Emu, and myself were playing around at the Post Office in Brunei. Hehe, yes, it was pretty plain in Brunei too so we amused ourselves with sending postcards to each other's addressses in Singapore. We even joked that we might reach home faster than our postcards, given the slow mailing system in Brunei.

So happened that Tempest wanted to send one to his friend in America, we decided to have some fun to ourselves too. This time round, we sent it to each other's parents. And one to Lena, Huy & Kim at their Australian address!

A lady holding a bag of postcards approached us before we we walked into the Post Office. She showed us a variety of scenary-based postcards. Though the selection was not as great as the Post Office's and even looked a little old, the price was somewhat cheaper.

So we bought 3 smaller postcards at VND$2,000 (SGD $0.20) from her and 1 bigger one from the Post Office at VND $4000 (SGD $0.40). When we checked with the office clerks for the postage fee to America, Australia & Singapore, we discovered that different clerks gave different quotes. Sigh, we probably paid a price of VND1000 - 2000 for the wrong info!

On the Halong Bay Cruise, we often exchanges information about food with Huy & group. Like us, they planned their own tour and sourced info from the internet. As food-loving peeps, it was not difficult to get engrossed in a common topic easily. Huy recommended us to visit Quan An Ngon. The concept is similar to that of Marche or The Marketplace; there are varied stalls selling different foods, and there is common seating within the compound. The food was pretty cheap. We ate 6 - 7 dishes at only a total of VND 126,000 (SGD $12.60)!

Quan An Ngon - many locals love to dine here too.

With a full satisfied stomach, we trodded on to Van Mieu, Temple of Literature. The site used to house the first university of Vietnam, solely for the purpose of nurturing scholars. The temple was segregated into 3 or 4 compounds, with a lot of lush & greens.

We tired ourselves by walking back to Hoan Kiem Lake for dinner. Throughout the Hanoi trip, we relied a lot on our two feet. Most of the tourist sites and foodie places are within walking distance. The cooling weather made walking a breeze (unlike the sweltering one in Bangkok!) but the smoke & all the polluted gases stuffed your nose and throat all the time; very irritating!

Motorcyclists were everywhere, asking us to take a ride from them. They knew we were tourists because the guy usually does not carry any pouch or bag in Hanoi; realising that, Tempest happily passed the sling pouch to me. :-| True enough, no motorists bothered about us again.

It was difficult to buy souvenirs. We wanted something that is unique to Vietnam. Tempest and I weren't shoppaholics. It didn't help that Hanoi has few malls. We turned to their chain of stores - Hapro Mart - to purchase our 'souvenirs'. Vietnamese coffee & coffee filters! No haggling. No unreasonable mark-up. Satisfied! I also bought some chips which I thought was local and not found elsewhere, but they were actually being exported & sold in all NTUCs in Singapore. Felt so cheated.

Carrying 2 to 3 bagfuls of stuffs, we returned to our hotel to unload first before going to find Huy , Kim and Lena. We had made a promise to meet them for dinner when they came back from Cat Ba island. Majestic Salute, like its name suggested, looked much grander than the numerous little hotels that lined the streets. Bellboys at the door, big reception, nice sofas in the lobby. Well, for USD $50 a night, I guess the service and furnishings were justified. We left a note for Huy after waiting 10mins in vain for them.

Maybe we were over-reacting, but we thought there was a dubious character following us along a dark alley. The thin, dark-looking man followed us for some distance before he left, after we walked back to the crowded streets.

After our street side feasting yesterday, we were at a loss at what to have for dinner. More street side food? Not really; besides the seafood, I was put off by the hygiene in most of the noodles (Pho) stalls. Other foods in little cafes were either normal burgers or expensive french cuisine.

Initially we wanted to have the famous fried fish dish, Cha Ca La Vong, with Huy & group. As Huy & Kim are Vietnamese, we thought they were the best persons to teach us how to eat the dish. Hee, so we took to mimicking our neighbours:

Tempest finally found what he had been searching for: Weasel Coffee! As its name suggests, weasel coffee has been eaten and regurgitated by rare Vietnamese weasels! We bought 500 grams for SGD $3.00. Thus we supposed that it wasn't the real weasel coffee when internet sites showed the price of a small pack of coffee to be 15.95 POUNDS!) Nonetheless, no harm trying!

Lena told us about a stall that sells glutinous rice dumplings (tangyuan) that was selling at VND $5000 (SGD $0.50) per bowl! I was so glad that we chanced upon that stall near their hotel (Majestic Salute)! That was one of the best foods I had in Hanoi.

Packed with an oily dinner and refreshing supper, we walked down to Hoan Kiem Lake again! It was new year's eve; we could join in some of the celebrations! Besides, we had wanted to try out the Highlands Coffee, a popular cafe in Hanoi.

It was not easy to find a balcony seat in the cafe; everyone wanted to get a closer view of the acrobatic performances at the road junction right below the building.

Highlands Coffee is on level 4.

The traffic conditions worsened at 9plus as crowds thronged the stage area. So much honking around as motorists were unable to progress more than a foot long each time. The traffic only eased when the performances ended at 11plus.

Strangely, there was no countdown at all! We returned to the hotel, switched on the TV. There was a broadcast of some new year celebrations programme; likewise, there was no countdown party. Hmm.. suburban.

Hanoi Escapade - Day 3

2007-06-26T21:23:00.000+08:00

DAY THREE / 30 December 2006, Saturday

HALONG BAY - HANOI

BRRR.... freezing!

Haiz... the fog was heavy. No sunrise. It was terribly chilling to the extent that we had to squat behind the deck-beds in a weak bid to hide from the howling wind. We cannot tahan more than half an hour for such a torture and willingly resigned to the fate of not seeing the much-touted sunrise at the Unesco site.

After breakfast, it's canoeing! My first attempt. No guides. No training. Totally DIY whether you can or not. They only provide the canoeing equipment plus a life jacket.

Haha. I was trying very hard to listen to Tempest on how to steer a canoe and maneover the paddle.

15mins later, he kinda gave up. "Ok, you sit and hold your paddle up. I will do the paddling."

That was our last activity in Halong Bay.

Before Huy & gang left in another junk to Cat Ba Island, Lena gave us two banana-leaf-wrapped thingys.

Phuonc left with the group to Cat Ba. Another guy came along. We decided to tip the crew before we left the junk. After paying up all the items we had spent on the junk, Tempest made a count of the change and decided to give in all in as tips. It was VND $77,000, which was equivalent to SGD$7.70. We didn't think it was that big an amount for a crew of around 5-6. But the Captain was apparently ecstatic and gave Tempest a big hug! Hehe.

Lunch was at a seemingly well-furbished restaurant, though the food was similar to what we had on the boat, just a more generous serving and a better grade of ingredients. The next stopover was at Hai Phong City, at a little building which sells a variety of souveniers, local foods, paintings, ornaments and ice cream.

On our way back to Anh Dao Hotel, we visited a Vietnamese Airlines ticketing office to confirm our flight home. Deks Air had repeatedly reminded us to call up the airlines a few days before our departure lest there is a change in flight schedule. It was nearly 6pm; so the lady in charge told us to return next morning at 8am as the main office was already closed.

We walked back to Anh Dao, only to realise that they shifted us to one of their sister hotel, Camellia 2. No complains! Look at the bigger room & slightly better furnishings.

To dinner now! We set out to do a series of street food tasting.

We even had the opportunity to exchange a few words in Mandarin & Vietnamese with the waitress. She's currently studying Chinese in a local university. She had even wanted to exchange contact numbers, but we thought emails could be more appropriate. I don't want to end up with high phone bills too!

Hanoi Escapade - Day 2

2007-06-25T18:53:00.000+08:00

DAY TWO / 29 December 2006, Friday

HANOI - HALONG BAY

*Yawn* The bus leaving for Halong Bay will arrive at 8am. But we had to wake up at 7am! Why? Cos Tempest was eager to dive into the breakfast buffet spread. We chose Anh Dao hotel partly due to the free breakfast with every night's stay.

However the spread was pretty disappointing. Fried vietnamese spring rolls, plain yoghurt, bread, sausages, ham, butter, jam, pork pate, fruits, hard-boiled eggs, fried eggs, coffee, tea, orange juice, full-cream milk & some other local dishes that weren't memorable. I didn't think that the fruits were fantastically sweet but it kept attracting a stream of ants.

Nonetheless, we gobbled up the food (Remember the last entry? We were hungry!).

The bus took a while before it managed to swirl through the crawling traffic to reach our hotel lobby. In the meanwhile, we enjoyed ourselves with whatever we saw.

The sights reminded me of the computer game, Caesar, where the women will carry baskets of goods and sell to the nearby dwellers. Here, they sell anything! We have seen baguettes, joss sticks & incense paper, vegetables, fruit, flowers, peanuts, beans, peeled water chestnuts and dunno what others!

An old lady also tried to sell me boiled peanuts by passing some into my hands and asking me to try. I will love to buy some if the peanuts weren't cold or if we don't have a language
problem. The locals here just do not appear to be cheerful or friendly like the Thai.

The bus came & we trotted for another 3 hours before reaching Hai Duong, where we were to board the junk to Halong Bay.

Our guide, Phuonc (pronounced 'Fong'), procedurally brought us to the crafts centre set up for the victims of Agent Orange.

Which one is ours?

Finally! To Halong Bay!

<-- Left: Look how strong the wind is on board! We had a group of about 16. Apart from us, there were only 3 other Asians. Huy & Kim were Vietnamese who have migrated to Australia. Their neighbour, Lena, was a Singaporean who too moved to the great outback. Being the ever bubbly Lena, we quickly made friends with them. Phuonc took us around, island & cave hopping.

We learnt that Huy & group are going for the 3D2N cruise, which will include a night's stay at CatBa Island. Seeing that they are great company, and Huy's exclamation of the beauty of the island, we were tempted to extend our cruise. Unfortunately, Phuonc told us that the tour group is already packed. :-(

Dinner was a simple affair. No fanciful seafood. All I can remember is having white rice, a few prawns, and those vietnamese fried spring rolls, which I later found out to be almost present in every meal I had in Hanoi!

Our bunks were situated on the upper deck whilst the rest of the group had theirs in the lower deck. They got us quite a nice room with a double-bed and toilet facilities. It was reasonably clean but we decided against bathing since it was so cold and a bit rocky.

We got to bed pretty early, for we need to get up very early the next morning to see the sunrise!

Hanoi Escapade - Day 1

2007-06-25T14:22:00.000+08:00

The almost-forgotten entry... ...

DAY ONE / 28 December 2006, Thursday

SIN - HO CHI MINH - HANOI

As usual, Tempest reached the airport way before me. Our flight was scheduled to be at 1430 h. But due to the many changes Vietnam Airlines made, we decided to arrive at 1pm instead (me at 1.30pm though). Who knows, the plane might decide to land early after all the numerous change of flight plans to land at a later hour.

I ended up having to finish part of my lunch on the plane, thinking that we were going to be late. Then, the plane was delayed!

There wasn't much to do on the plane. No movie player. No music player. All I remembered was flipping through Today or Newpaper. Soonafter, lunch was served.

Pretty boring 3 hour flight.

The wait at Ho Chi Minh's Airport on transit to Hanoi was none the better. Clearing the customs was not as easy as were in Malaysia but seemingly just as bad as Bangkok. The communist-style uniform-clad officers don't smile, dilly-dally, talked amongst themselves, and looked listless. Not very friendly fellows.

It was another 3 hour flight to Hanoi. The only gain was the extra airline food we got on transit to Hanoi. So 1 food deal in exchange for a total of 2 - 3 hours of flight delay.

We reached Hanoi in the evening, at around 8plus. Our first activity was to look for a money changer. 1 SGD = ~ 10,000 dong. A more "profitable" method will be to exchange SGD for USD in Singapore, before exchanging the USD for dong in Vietnam. This is because USD is more valued in Vietnam (means you can buy more dong with the same amount of USD or SGD in equivalence), and provided that the exchange rate of SGD against USD is 'high'.

We read that the minibus travelling from the airport to Hoan Kiem Lake, where our hotel was nearby, charges only USD$2 per pax, and that the local cabbies aren't an honest lot who often collaborates with unscruplous hotel owners to trick tourists, we opted for the former. But as unlucky as we could get, the minibus was unable to go off without a significant number of passengers onboard. In fact, we were the only ones in the bus, waiting for 30minutes before we gave a sigh and went off to look for an at least decent-looking cabbie.

Two 'headmen' serving different cab companies (or maybe syndicate?) were trying to encourage us to take their cabs. "Choose one", Tempest said to me. I took the one on my right as his cabbie looks more "tood". Hehe. Indeed, he was sorry for trying to trick us and took only USD $10 from us. Read Tempest's entry here for the full story.

We stayed in Anh Dao Hotel which cost us USD $15 per night and came with free breakfast buffet. The hotel was small but decent. As per our Bangkok trip, we only paid for the first night; we thought that we could try to find other accomodation which might be cheaper and better! After settling down, we went out for a walk around the famous Hoan Kiem Lake. AND to get some food! Oh yes, and our search for hotels!

There were numerous little hotels around Hoan Kiem Lake, just like Bangkok's Khao San area. We made a few enquiries, and decided that we got a reasonably good deal in Anh Dao after all. We even chanced upon the Bamboo Hotel which Tempest's cousin recommended! It was a cosy & well-organized hotel; everything was in bamboo, even the bed frame! I quite like it, but Tempest felt that the woody smell was a tad too strong. So we moved on.... to the lake.

I was rather disappointed. The lake was neither clean nor stunningly big! It was just about the size of Bedok Reservoir, or so it impressed upon me. At a very leisurely pace, we easily covered the circumference of the lake in less than an hour.

Although New Year was approaching in a few days, there was no sign of celebration except some banners & red-colored material which wrote some "Happy New Year" lines or the like. Not exactly a spectacular sight.

Sigh... we found nothing to eat. There was no Mac or 7-11 like Bangkok. Upon returning to our rooms at 11plus, we munched on the little bun & butter which we saved from Tempest's pack of airline food. Heavenly!

The Spider and The Fly

2007-06-25T12:40:00.000+08:00

He treats her real fine, luring her with his "sensitive new age" act, mothering her when she needs to be mothered, anticipating her needs before she even knows it herself. His whole game being to control her and have her build her life around him...

BUT! Luckily there are many others that have changed for the better!

The little fly has found a cosy corner in the spider's spooky web.

Snip!

2007-02-17T22:51:00.000+08:00

It was a most ordinary saturday had it not been CNY eve. Me & Tempest had already finished watching "Down With Love" yesterday night (by Renee Zellweger & Ewan McGregor - a pleasant comedy with atmospheric settings likewise The Stepford Wives -- I like it!); There wasn't really anything to keep us entertained till 6pm. Then he suddenly turned to me, " I have no choice but to allow you to do it.."

As he spoke, he turned to pick up a little blue comb and instructed me to fetch the scissors from the dining table. I couldn't believe it! He really allowed me to play with his hair. Well, even though it's only a trim, it was a big step he took.

I happily took the equipment and dextrously snipped off the curly strands off his sideburns. Hee.. his worries were not unfounded. My first snip was naturally the worst as I stood at the starting point of the learning curve. It was still a neat chop, just that it was a tad too short at the top side of the sideburns before it met the bulk of the hair above the "ear-line". As a result, there was a stark "line" as if a razor blade just mercilessly ran through the sideburn on his right.

He was upset. "Oh NO!" Then he took over & try to rescue whatever he could. Gee.. I didn't think it was too bad what. Anyway, he relinquished control of the scissors after attempting to make it look vaguely better. "Now, you gotta make the left side the same as the right!", he grunted.

With my five-minute experience, the left side did not suffer the harsh outcome that its right counterpart did. And I skilfully shaved off the two "tails" that were growing behind the neck.

"Good! You could be a hairdresser now!"

*snip snip*

To Ma'am, With Love

2007-01-04T00:11:00.000+08:00

Look! He's giving me flowers!
Five stalks of red roses hugged by an abundant 'bush' of leaves.

Me, receiving them in good spirits.
My first bouquet of flowers in 2007!
My first bouquet of roses from HIM!
La Vie!

Beautiful?

ACTUALLY, the red roses were given as a compliment from Dinh Lang Thuy Ta restaurant where the 5 of us spent a million dong on our dinner!

The SPECIALIST's markup

2006-11-07T22:55:00.000+08:00

Emu showed me the website to the Singapore Dental Association's guidelines for the various fees for dental treatments.

Ok! Let's take a look at my own expenses at the "SPECIALIST" clinic and see how much markup I am being charged.

1. X-Rays - i had a total of 5 x-rays. They should be considered small x-rays since each one took less than a second.
Cost = 5 x $15 = $75

2. Consultation. Hmm.. He didn't exactly talked much to me. But well, he did spend an hour per session with me... so $65 each.
Cost = 2 x $65 = $130

3. Octagram - the ring that is supposed to hold the tooth in place while it waits for its 'crown'.
Cost = $35

4. Medication - normal off-the-rack painkillers with a brand I never heard of.
Cost = $10

5. 40-inch Plasma TV - BONUS

6. Charismatic doctor - EXTRA BONUS

5. THENCE, the remaining cost turned out to be = $1025 - 75 - 130 - 35 - 10 = $775 / 3 = ~$258 per canal!
Markup = 58/258 = 22.5%

Sounds reasonable! :)

Yet my MasterCard tells me, for a 99% painless affair, it's PRICELESS!!!

Endodontics 101 + 924

2006-11-06T21:04:00.000+08:00

Following the 1st part of the toothy saga on 14 Oct, I went through the 2nd part on 3rd Nov. Similar to the first, the most painful part remained to be that of the injection of the anaesthesia. After the shots, the dentist didn't wait for 5 - 10mins for the effect to kick in. Instead he proceeded right away to remove the temporary filling that covered the opening to the root canals.

Whatever pain there was, it was probably imaginery. I was more fearful of him accidentally knocking down the neighbouring molar, or even worse, the very one he was repairing. :-s Afterall, it has a large cavity which meant a weaker structure to begin with.

There were more exchanges of tools between the nurse and the dentist this time round. I can't exactly figure out what he was doing. There was the spraying of some acidic & pungent tasting liquid which would sometimes leak through the rubber dam and irritate my throat. Then there was the constant dabbing of a thin-like plastiky looking tube dabbed with some kind of greenish looking filling into each of my 3 root canals. Then come a bigger dollop of whitish filling to seal the opening of the canal.

The Sharp brand flat-screen HDTV was definitely bigger than I remembered! It looked one-and-a-half times bigger than my own 32-inch Samsung. Then again, as usual, I can't see what was going on in the black box since the dentist blocked 70% of my view.

The monotonous drilling & filling provided a very hypnotic feeling... and my hand unconsciously dropped from the chest area to the chair.. fwah.. how embarrassing! Yet the first thing that came to TB's mind was: "whoa, he's so good till you can fall asleep!"

I also took a total of 4 x-rays!

The end product:

I realised the bluish tint is not listerine. It is one of those funny liquids the dentist sprayed onto it. Observe the repaired tooth carefully and you will notice a dent in the centre.

Dentist continued to be not that optimistic about my condition. He explained to me that the cavity was located all the way up to the insides of the gum. The subsequent crown that followed the root canal treatment could only cover up to the top of the gum, so... possible decay could still happen! EEKS! I am praying very hard that it doesn't happen. Don't make my money ill-spent!

Total damage till date:

1st visit - $455 (inclusive of $35 for the "ring" & $10 for painkillers)
2nd visit - $570 (nurse never told me the breakdown)

There's still the crown & the follow up visit 6 months later to monitor the condition of the root canal. SHRIEKY.

FRIDAY the 14th too!

2006-10-15T03:30:00.000+08:00

Jinxed! We thought we jinxed out friday the 13th when everything went on right on the actual day where things were thought to be and would be uneventful. Who knows, it was in fact the american time zone that we were being caught in and haunted by the evil curse!

I was due for my root canal procedure on saturday morning. Tempest decided to be nice and send me there lest I be late for my appointment again. The clinic is in Mount E medical centre... it was a saturday morning... it is a shopping district cum tourist zone... therefore the carpark rates were simply exhorbitant! $1.80 for the first hour and $1.30 for subsequent half hour. That 's gonna turn out to be $4.40 just for 2 hours of parking! That was Cairnhill carpark, situated somewhere behind Citibank Orchard. It was certainly a right decision made when he dropped me off first before moving on to find carparks with slightly better rates. It was already11.30am (also my appointment time), half an hour after he dropped me off, before he settled for Shaw Centre's which didn't come cheap either at $2.10 for just an hour of parking. THEN, he had to drive out again to look for parking. $2.10 per hour for a poor student is simply too taxing on the thinning wallet. Fortunately there was available lots (cheaper too at $0.50 per half-hour) at an open carpark behind Cathay Cineleisure.

(Read below entry for root canal story)

After my dental procedure and a very unhealthy lunch at the Chippy's, Tempest received a missed call and sms from N. It was SOS! She didn't want to meet Y and her fiance, Mr. Turd. I was pretty excited actually, to meet up Y and Turd, especially Turd. I had to see how a thirty-old year man looks as if he was forty, and how irritating he can get. Yet as fate will not decree, Y's office in harbourfront met up with some kind of flood and they had to abort initial plans of visiting Settler's Cafe in Beach Road. Hai.. another uneventful event. Tempest had already tore parking coupons for the next 2 hours till 5pm. And we had already walked quite a distance (under the bloody hot sun) from the carpark to Shaw Towers where we were supposed to meet the group. Cannot just go home! In the end, we forced N to stay with us till we are bound for the night safari (with Tempest's friends).

It was very entertaining with N around. She doused us with loads of her funny stories and even more intriguing experiences in Bangkok. She and G did almost everything that I wanted to do in BKK yet couldn't. They visited Lumphini Boxing Stadium and suffered through 3 hours of boxing competitions while Tempest & me only saw a quietened dark empty stadium; they went right into the Patpong bars and cruised through 2 hours of Thai girl show while we rejected every invitation that came our way. Lounging in a cafe (TCC) is seldom so engaging. Good afternoon despite all the earlier jinxes.

What was really jinxy was the 1.5 hours before we entered the night safari. Tempest couldn't find a Caltex petrol station to top up his tank; I had to enter into a recurring argument with him over a matter that was supposedly to have been resolved one week ago; he drove into the night safari carpark meant for tour buses only and was charged $4.80 for entry; he knocked into a curb while parking in the right carpark and punctured his front left tyre; we had diffculty trying to figure out how to remove the equipment from his car boot; he had never changed a tyre before despite driving since army days... *gasps*

Heng heng things turned out better ultimately; his friend came along and helped him out with the tyre-changing; we got the refund of $4.80 back from the receptionist though their machine for reading the cashcard (required to verify that the car did mistakenly go into the wrong carpark) was spoilt; and erm... that was about it. We decided to end our night early lest more things happen. Enough!

Endodontics 101

2006-10-15T02:53:00.000+08:00

So.... I was off to the dental clinic.. alone. It was a nice clinic alright. Spanning across 3 units of floor space, it was pretty huge and nicely decorated with its warm yellow lighting and cheery nurse uniforms. Almost every uniform looks slightly different with its cartoony design on the blouse. Many of them seem to come from the Philippines & Indonesia - a pretty typical sight in the health industry, especially private clinics & hospitals.

What really took my attention was the dentist & the facilities they have. Placed at the ceiling was a huge 30" flat screen high definition TV! It could have been a really wonderful experience if the dentist and the dental operating lamp didn't block my view 80% of the time. Anyway, I guessed I didn't really miss out much since it was some Channel 5 program showing snippets of football matches, in muted mode. That was not the only flat screen around in the room. Placed on the right of the operating chair was a 15" or 17" LCD monitor which captures my xray! It's the first time I have seen my own tooth, enlarged up to 20 - 30 times! Really big hole by the side where it was impacted by the stupid wisdom tooth which I finally removed it on the 2nd of May, one day after coming back from Bangkok.

Oh, and the dentist was a dignified looking young man at his thirties. I thought he looked a bit like the man who acted as Taiwan's president Chiang Kai Shek (蒋介石) in the movie, The Soong Sisters. Very short hair, somewhat looking as if it's ready to bald once he hits forty, bright eyes paired with brooding eyebrows, fair yet shiny glowy skin. And he comes with a slight english slang! Pretty charismatic...

"Difficult", he commented on my condition, but luckily he said he will try anyway, to help me save my tooth. The seemingly excruciating procedure took about an hour.

Step 1: he dabbled the cylindrical cotton bud with a pinkish colored analgesic balm and rubbed it onto the affected area. It's got a sweet cherry flavor! I certainly appreciate the balm, if not for the added flavor. It helps to lessen my pain at step 2.

Step 2: he pulled out a long cylindrical needle and started jabbing my gums. That hurt a little, particularly when the thin needle teased my tongue accidentally. Oww! Hehe.. then he will go on his "sorry.. sorry" with his strong, rich-bodied voice. I also like it the way he rubbed the inside of the mouth as he poked at my gums. Simple little technique, but does wonders to minimize the resultant pain from the jabs. Other dentists should learn this!

Step 3: he took out a green colored plasticky thing called the 'rubber dam' and place it over my mouth, forcing open my jaw. "for your protection"; I was wondering about his words until I found out later that the dam is to prevent saliva from getting into the cleaned out canals.

Step 4: the drilling began. :-s That was a little painful; he was attentive to my frowning of my brows and stopped momentarily to jab more anaesthesia. One slightly more painful jab was when the pulp was exposed, and he threw in a big drop to numb the nerves before removing them. I couldn't really tell when or how he removed the pulp since I couldn't see it. The rubber dam, together with the goggles they made me wear also didn't help to make my movement any easier.

Step 5: the drilling stopped. He used an ultra thin ribbed wire-like instrument to clean out the root canals by manually pushing the wire in and hand-turning it rapidly. I could actually feel it when he did that. No pain at all. Just a little creaky sound and discomfort as he pressed the rubber dam against my jaw. He continued pulling the wire, pushing it back again, and then pulling it out again, tweaking it a little and putting it back again. Towards the end, he would attach the wire onto the drilling equipment and starting drilling at the root canal. He did that for more than 10 times, and only once did I see something whitish hanging onto the tip of the wire-like structure. Must be the pulp!

Step 6: patching up! He applied some sourish acid-like substance onto the teeth and it spilled into the mouth, causing to choke on the horrible tasting liquid! Yuck! Luckily, still painless. After covering the hole with a temporary filling, he went on to explain to me that he would place an octagram (bascially, a ring-like structure) around the tooth since it is weakened by the lack of an internal pulp. The ring will last me through the next few weeks till I get a crown done. $35.00 for that!
Take a real close look at the temporary filling. Looks like a piece of bubble gum stuck there... The blue dots are probably some listerine leftovers hanging onto the uneven surface of the molar... cool huh, my w800i!

Step 7: prepare myself for a follow up 2 weeks from now.

Step 8: made payment. $455 for the first visit!!! The joy at experiencing minimal pain from the procedure translated into a sharp agonising heart pain!

Take a further look! No no... not at the other teeth with a yellowish discoloration.. I dunno why too.. i just brushed my teeth leh! :-s
Anyway, focus! Focus on the octagram! It fits snudgly.

Teabreak... have an oreo!

2006-09-28T01:20:00.000+08:00

Look at the cookie in between the lotus paste! Like any regular piece of quarter-size mooncake, the lotus paste was sweet and the baked brown skin layer looked a tad dry and oily, but the nicest was the oreo! It still had a little bit of crisp in it!

Wonderful sin! 250 calories.

CLASH ! ! !

2006-09-26T22:54:00.000+08:00

FED UP AH!

Told my boss this evening that I was planning to shift my block leave from Feb 07 to end Dec of this year. She turned to her computer, type type, open some files, and concluded that I shouldn't take block leave then since there was another colleague taking it at the same period. Ok. Fine. Even when that colleague is situated at a different site office from me and doing different work from me.

Since that was the case, I suggested that I take 1 - 2 days off instead of a full two-week block. Before even asking me for the exact date, she forewarned me that it may not be approved depending on the dates I am asking for. Bloody hell! Only 1 or 2 days also must go through such tedious approving process! It's not as if there are nobody else in the office to do the bloody stupid work! What sparked the fury in me was her unsympathetic attitude towards the significance I put towards the potential travelling plans I might have in end Dec.

"Don't confirm your plans yet before confirming your leave with me. Don't book already then tell me that you cannot change your plans..." Rubbish lot! You think I am going to forego a good deal when I see one at the NATAS? Please lah! Use your bloody brain to think before even trying to convince me that your work is important enough to overtake my personal agenda!

"Are you prepared to absorb the cost if I don't approve your leave?" NO! Of course not lah! Who the hell will do that? It's my leave entitlement!

"Yes, it's your entitlement, but you can go ask HR and they will tell you the same thing: leave may not be approved due to work exigencies." Work exigency! How many times have people's leave been cancelled due to such bao-ka-liao reasoning?! Can find something more reasonable or not? Hello! I am not a slave of the company. I have already spent more than half my time in a day slogging at the office. What more you want of me? Mind you, I still have 28 days of annual leave to clear till the end of April next year! Ask me to take leave on other days! Hmph! As if it's as simple as said. People who wanted to go home to visit her parents in Malaysia still have to go through an excrutiating procedure of obtaining her colleague's "blessings" before allowed to go, what more me? I am just a local citizen with no immediate family and kids to take care of.. "so should be very free mah".

I am finding myself less and less tolerant of this workplace. Endless work, shortage of staff, long working hours, bosses who knew how to threaten staff with the supreme HR who built unfair terms into the employment contract (yar, "work exigency" is one of them).. It is as frustrating as having milo spilt onto my white tees for the past 2 mornings at work! SHITTY! I have been brewing milo for as long as I worked in this site office and none of such has happened to me before! Ominous.

I can only see 2 options lying in front of me now:
1) To forego any possibility of travelling outside the holiday stretch in Dec.
2) To give up my position and leave before my holiday.

NOW, I must be more enthusiastic and diligent in my job search. Must widen my scope to include even banking jobs, operations jobs, customer service jobs, any better-paying job that don't treat it's workers as slaves to the organisation. Only then do I not have to choose between any of the above options without feeling worse off. When this happens, I will give her (my boss) the bloody word!

ANGRY!!!

A surprise... or more of a shock?

2006-09-16T17:10:00.000+08:00

I received 3 surprises yesterday.

The first one came a little unexpectedly. Rather pleasant as it put a stop to all my guesses.

The second one was rather unexpected. Very pleasant.

The third one was silent yet abrupt. More of a shock. Not pleasant. When you most expected the truth, you get the opposite or at best a half-truth. Maybe I was too demanding.

How much will I do?

2006-09-16T15:53:00.000+08:00

I wonder just how much I will do for a friend.

This afternoon at 12.47pm, a friend called me but I was sound asleep and didn't hear the ring. I only managed to reply the call at 1.26pm, at half a sleepy tone, "eh you looking for me ah?"

"yar.. i am just wondering if you are with your bf now... whether if you are able to come pick me up... " She was crying as she was saying these.

This is the first time I heard her cry. To me, she is always the emotional yet independent & resilent woman who seems so strong yet fragile at the same time. I have always known that she had issues with her family. This time round, she made her word true when she packed her bags, carried her cats and took off to a friend's home. I was stunned and too lost for words that I could only acknowledge what she was saying during the brief conversation I had with her. I felt apologetic for not being able to pick up her call at 12.47pm. I wonder just how much I could do for her if I pick up her call at 12.47pm.

After putting down the phone, I begin to wonder...
Am I the first person she has called?
How did she feel when she couldn't get through to me?
Will I put her up at my place? If I do, where's she gonna sleep?
Will I help her to find a place to stay?
Or should I encourage her to return home?
Will I provide her with financial assistance if there's a need to?
How's her life gonna be with this change of events?
Should I tell our mutual friends?

Sounds kinda mean of me to think of the logistical arrangements and ripple effects it could have on me when a friend out there badly needs probably just my understanding and a listening ear. But I can't help it. I want to help. I feel complemented when people turn to me for advice or simply just for a grousing session. Herein is a friend who has fulfilled all my desires to feel appreciated, and who even promised me a shoulder to lean on in difficult times. I love the exclusivity zone that she has put me into. Now I wonder just how much of her definition of a "good friend" have I managed to stand up to.

Feeling right now: inadequate.

2006-09-06T03:14:00.000+08:00

I finally sent out my first resume! :)

It's all about her

2006-08-16T23:08:00.000+08:00

My boss said she didn't see all of us moving forward as a team.
My boss said she didn't see all of us doing OT to clear the backlog.
My boss said she understood that all of us have our personal lives.
My boss said she didn't expect us to do OT all the time.

What exactly is my boss trying to say?! To do more OT in a single day so as to produce the same number of OT hours without having to stay back in the office for 5 days a week?!

I was bloody pissed off after seeing her reply to my email asking for more resources last night. She blamed me for not pointing out the backlog issue earlier. She refuted my claims about the team being overworked. She scolded (or at least, in a scolding tone) me for not looking into the process and improving it instead of just asking for help. Hey! Bloody hell! I was there for only a month! Nobody really bothered to teach me anything! Even if they do, they tell me in bits and pieces on separate days which I have to glue it up only to form a half-broken picture! Tell me lah, how to look into the process without knowing the work (which she insisted it could be done)?!

Almost spoilt my dinner! I was wondering how were I to face her the next day when she comes into the office just to solve this issue.

As a background info, my company employs split operations, lest one site falls due to disasters, the other one can continue to handle transactions as per any regular day. I am situated in Dhoby Ghaut, my boss in Chai Chee. Boss only visits DG every Monday & Friday, or half the time just Monday or Friday, or sometimes not even once a week! I have worked barely one month into my new role as site supervisor for a function I have never touched before in my 2 years of service. Somehow I get the feeling that my boss is expecting me to pick up the job on my own, to practice proactive-ness, to seek and ask, to make improvements without really mentoring me. All I get was a few words of notes here and there. What I also hate most was the negative sentiments the rest of the team has. I sensed that they probably wanted me to be their voice, to express their unhappiness of being overworked to Boss. Yet when I did just that, I got shot by BOss! Infuriating!

Boss loves to shoot down people incessantly. Whatever statements or confessions we made, we merely invited more questioning from her: "Why wait till now to report? Why didn't you all sit together and think? Where's the team spirit?" Like that, how is she going to expect us to keep telling her stuffs or suggestions to improve any process?! What the team seeks is a effective, supportive and understanding boss! Not one who keeps thinking that she is effective, supportive and understanding!

Well, thence she returned to the office this morning. Booted up her laptop, sat there for half an hour, and got us all around for a briefing on her quick-fix solution soonafter. Ha! At the end of the day, we realised that her solution did not exactly lower the processing time! But we decided to upgrade her idea without telling her (if she didn't ask), afterall, we probably only get more shootings for shooting her idea down. I had to stay till 9.30pm to help clear the stupid backlog! And I had to bear in mind that today's only the first day! We got 16 days of backlog on top of current load waiting to be cleared!

Oh yea...
My boss is single.
My boss has no kids.
My boss is thirty.

AND today, we just received an email from Boss's BOSS that we are to cut down on OT hours. Laughable.

7 habits of highly effective people

2006-08-04T00:24:00.000+08:00

*points upwards* The course that took up my Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday of this week. Time well spent! Better off than checking report after report, signing papers after papers in the office.

Habit 1: Be Proactive
Habit 2: Think With The End In Mind
Habit 3: First Things First
Habit 4: Think Win-Win
Habit 5: Understand, Then Seek To Be Understood
Habit 6: Synergy
Habit 7: Sharpen The Saw

"If you want to make minor, incremental changes and improvements, work on practices, behavior or attitude. But if you want to make significant, quantum improvement, work on paradigms."
- Dr. Stephen R. Covey, from The 8th Habit: from effectiveness to greatness

Sounds pretty simple and inspiring eh? This is not your usual "Yes, you can do it! If I can do it, so can you!" motivational lesson. This is a workshop that aims to shape and tweak the natural 'habits' that already reside, but probably hidden or ignored, in you.

Well, at least after the course, I am acknowledging my continued ignorance of my inability to practice Habit 5. I didn't even think it was a flaw before this workshop! *points below*

I construct a reply before you can even finish speaking.
I construe to argue my point before you can even finish explaining.
I continue to talk before you can even understand my words.
I don't listen empathically.
I don't wait for you to finish convincing me.
I can't wait.
I don't listen.
I just want to win.

So very me... BUT I see this as a modified strain of gene that resonates with the need to be aggressive in order to survive! No no no.. this is not crap.. LISTEN to more. I forgot that the society is evolving too; the population probably uses different 'tools' and tactics these days... even humility and vulnerability could be seen as strengths, thence what's listening? The modern strategy to get things done, the new way to be nice yet scheming at the same time, the easy way to gain trust.. haha.

OK, no more skeptism after the full-stop.

7 habits, I am coming!

California "growers" style

2006-08-03T22:11:00.000+08:00

I did a body analysis at California Fitness last night. Whoa.. the results were depressing. 27% of fat in my body! Incredulous! Why then did my scientific oregon electronic scale with body fat analysis reported only 23% fat in that very morning?!

"$3000++ machine leh" TB gawked while maintaining delight at his own 19.6% (not that it's very fit/healthy, just slightly lower than his $30 scale reported). But my SO is almost $300, can! Cheated. Or maybe overtly enthusiastic California Fitness 'tries' to improve customers' motivation by tipping the scale a bit here and there?

That was just one part of the sales presentation. F, the little malay man who 'invited' us down to the centre once again showed us around the facilities with a more hurried, more skeptical fashion than the previous Saturday (our 1st visit following receipt of a 7-day VIP pass from SMRT challenge pack). "Procedures" to gaining a 10-day VIP pass, in coincidence with the centre's 10th year anniversary in SG.

The other section of the sales talk involved a pretty big-sized man who spent nearly 30-45mins trying to establish a very convincing argument.. "Buy one year get one year free! Additional 6 months free for each couple who signed up together... $56 per month for All-Clubs access", "10 persons per day are allowed this special offer only..". Yar.. then he topped it off to say, "doesn't mean that each day got 10 vacancies you know? we are also accomodating people who were rejected the previous day..." Ultra contradictory! Still so very special offer or not?!

TB decided to use his usual 'pendulum-style' of planting a check-mate by swinging towards the extremes: "If you ask me to make a decision today, I will definitely walk away." Ha! Fat fitness consultant got no choice now: "Of course, we definitely respect your choice of assessing the gym facilities and your considerations first. Let me give you a 2-week free pass. We will give you a call again in 2 weeks..."

Time checked. 10pm! Though not at all bought over by Mr Fat and the aggressive-looking fitness centre, glee was still written all over my face. Not exactly time wasted what! I stepped on a $3000 machine for at least 3 mins! Got free body analysis, doubled complimentary membership from 7 days to 14 days, and spent 1.5 hours in a aircon environment which otherwise could be aimless plodding down orchard road.

---------------------------------------

Tried out the gym this evening. Hmm.. not bad leh. Thought the treadmill was smoother than those in Planet Fitness. More resistance & weight training machines. So many patterns. And the hairdryer, wah! Big and powerful! But bad thing: gotta bring own padlock, no place to put shoes, dirty lockers since people probably put their shoes inside them when they bathe (just like me). Interesting stuffs: woman security guard stationed inside the changing room; perhaps of the amount of both actual and potential nudity present.

My cheque for Planet Fitness corporate membership is still not yet processed. I wonder when California will be coming up with its $1 per day offer again with my company!

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Body JAMMED!!!

2006-08-01T22:28:00.000+08:00

Wah, finally I have decided to attend group exercises after 4 visits to Planet Fitness (thanks to complimentary membership from DBS Cards). It stated on its schedule: Body Jam Clinic 6.15pm - 6.35pm. I read the program description again and again. It is meant to be an introductory lesson to beginners who wish to participate in Body Jam.

Oh! Body Jam is some kind of aerobic classes which incorporate dance moves with mtv dance tracks. [It's really a dance, actually.]

There were less than 5 ladies in the studio when I arrived at 6.15pm. "They usually come in around 6.30pm", commented instructor Amy, a young slim lady with a cherry smile permanently planted on her fair-skinned face. Quite pretty. A lot of vibe.

She highlighted that the lessons will be broken into 2 parts, of which the first consists of pop dance tracks, and the second half focuses on hip hop grooves.

The music began...

Whoa.. some of the aunties are really good and familiar with the moves! I was vigorously trying hard to mimick the slightly chubby auntie-like lady in front of me. Left left, right right, left right, front left.. bish! I just couldn't keep up to the rhythm.. kept missing my steps and nearly knocked into her a few times. I was unconsciously taking up quite a big space with my unsynchronised, messy big steps.

Face it! Arm-Leg coordination work just ain't for me. I gave up after 40minutes. *cough cough*, and I walked out of the room during the short interval between the change of tracks. Thinking back the lady I met before the class, "quite easy.." is really not that easy for me! The Jam Clinic certainly doesn't help at all lor!

How I regret not joining the yoga session instead. I am almost sure that I am able to perform those beautifully weird looking postures to a perfection that could not be achieved in the dance studio.

Be down to earth.. back to the machines...

Another week

2006-07-23T20:44:00.000+08:00

July 13, Thursday
Officially shifted to Haw Par Centre. Nice place. Funny colleagues. Lotsa reports. Lotsa checking. Near to town. More overtime. Less stressful. MANY MANY food places!

July 15, Saturday
Spent a night out at Plaza Singapura. "How much do you love me" - a french romantic comedy with exaggerating drama. Some parts of the show are rather confusing - did the woman hook up with her man's colleague at the end of the day? Hmm...

July 16, Sunday
2nd meeting of the SMRT challenge team! It was over breakfast at Suntec's Congress. Quality of roti prata seems to have dropped. Walked around Suntec for 2 hours after missing the hourly timing of the carpark charges. Supposed to collect football cooler from Sim Lim, but shucks! Out of stock :-( Ended up in Hougang Mall for dinner in a foodcourt with so-so food.

July 18, Tuesday
Worked out at Planet Fitness-Suntec for the first time! Pretty nice place. Free conditioning shampoo. Free shower soap. Hair-dryer facilities. Free towels. All the machines seem to focus on working the legs and thighs.

July 19, Wednesday
Had planned to visit Planet Fitness again. I got 6 complimentary free visits after all. But no time! No time! By the time I finished archiving those files in the office, it was already 9pm. Haix.

July 20, Thursday
Got the chance to leave office early again! 7.30pm! Yea! Ran off to Planet Fitness - Caltex House. Fwah! It was so difficult to find the place. Went down back and forth Caltex House & Hitachi Tower 4 -5 times before I realised that the gym is hidden within the office block! Must sign in at the reception to get in! Stupid! All Planet Fitness gyms seem to be stowed away somewhere; all so difficult to find. The one at Suntec too, took me and TB more than 20mins to finally locate the gym at a rather isolated corner of the mall.

July 21, Friday
Wahahaha, got to leave office at 7pm! Shiok! Decided to abort gym session and went walking around in Orchard Road instead. Met a rather bubbly well-spoken Prudential Financial Advisor in the disguise of a part-timer surveyor on the road outside PS. Hehe, since I got the time, I stood there for close to half an hour listening to her, arguing with her, and in the end told her I don't plan to buy. BUT I still told her that she's a good sales person; she speaks logically, coherently, and strategically. Rare for a FA!

Dinner was beef ribs at Cartel at Orchard Cineleisure. Gym efforts gone to naught. :-s
"Thank You For Smoking" - funny show!

July 22, Saturday
3rd movie of the week - "Pirates of Caribbean - Dead man's chest". Draggy. Funny though Jack Sparrow was a little too fast and slangish. Hehe, well, I slept through half the show. Not that it was boring. I am just tired :p

July 23, Sunday
SMRT CHALLENGE! Lost at 5 hours 23 mins! Haiz. The winning team had a final race timing of 3 hours 3 mins! How to beat that with scruplous means?! Hot and tired and sweaty and sleepy now.

BANG

2006-07-13T02:08:00.000+08:00

How exasperating it will be for you, if you need somebody yet couldn't find somebody?

Fast...!!!

2006-07-13T01:41:00.000+08:00

I'll be relocated to Haw Par office! And Haw Par Centre is near Dhoby Ghaut! And Dhoby Ghaut is on the NEL! And so is Buangkok! And I stayed in Buangkok!

Wahahahaha!

Life's beginning to take a better turn. For so long I didn't bother to stay back in the office despite work not completed, yet today, encompassed with the thought of shifting to the new office the very next day, made me work triply hard!

Too many things to do! Too many stuffs to tidy up! Too many people to say good-bye...

As I thrilled at the idea of shortening my travel time, I realised the difference I can achieve is only 10 minutes ( ie from 50 to 40 mins). Not only that, it has greatly messed up my jogging schedule. I used to be able to stop by Bedok Stadium which is 10 - 15 minutes away from my Chai Chee office. Now, I can't do so anymore! I gotta find a new place or be degenerated into a pile of bloody flesh. Ewwwee.. reminds me of Slither.

Urbanisation, it's an ultimate evolution.

this is my day!!!

2006-07-11T23:24:00.000+08:00

A good day today.. nice..

Started off in the morning when I arrived at the office at 8.15am, 15 minutes before the official working hours!

Spoken to my future boss R regarding my transfer to his section. Whoa! He expected me to go over latest by 24 July!

Current boss H came to see me regarding my transfer. She said that L (my top boss) wanted me to go over to R's side on this thursday, 13 July!! OMG. This is incredible. I only spoke to L one - two weeks ago and the next minute he's moving me over! Great!! Haha. Then I get to work in Dhoby Ghaut office, which is only a few mrt stops away from my new home in Buangkok!

Went for dinner with Call Agent Team (my previous team). D told me that L spoke to her on her last day with the company: "Will you keep in contact with your colleagues? You must speak to [me] before you leave. She's the most important person." WOHOHO. What does it mean? A promotion in the near future? A pay raise? A form of recognition? Maybe he just got the name wrong. O_O

Whatsoever, this is my day!

not so PETIT-E losses

2006-07-09T16:48:00.000+08:00

Almost exactly 12 hours ago, I lost $90.

It was a carefully crafted tactical strategy. Of all possibilities, the only one of two that will result in maximum losses gotta happen! Arrgghh!!!

PETIT! You bloody little idiot!

STAR WARS: teasing the carrot

2006-07-07T00:12:00.000+08:00

Date:	Sat, 1 Jul 2006 18:44:24 +0800 (CST)
Subject:	COMPLAINT: MAXONLINE + DIGITAL VOICE INSTALLATION
To:	"StarHub Customer Care - Communications Services"

It was already a difficult process to terminate my previous max-online. I didn’t think it will be even more tedious and distressing to sign and install a new one! This morning, the Starhub technician (Technician Code 893) appointed to my house said that he was unable to do the installation of the modem and digital voice because the signal in my flat remains unactivated.

It was due to the same above reason that I terminated my previous max-online under my brother’s account. I refused to pay for the $31.50 activation charges just simply because I missed the so-called activation date (please refer to my previous complaint). To circumvent the unfair treatment, I simply had to sign up for a new max-online which will grant me free activation! Yes, it is a very laughable process you have in place today.

I signed up at Starhub Parkway (Shop ID: GB4) with Mabel as the sales person who sold me the package – MaxOnline 6500 + Digital Voice. Under this promotion, I was supposed to be given the following: free activation of maxonline worth $31.50, as well as 15% off maxonline from the 2^nd month onwards. I had to pay for $42 to activate my digital voice. That’s fine. Still a better deal than a re-contract.

I shifted house on the 18^th June. I terminated my previous max-online on 19^th June (waiver of charges granted from 19^th to 30^th June). I signed up for a new max-online on 22^nd June. I was told that an appointment takes minimum of 5 working days to set up. Since I am working, I asked the technician to do the installation on 1^st July. NOW, he said he had to abort his installation just because the person who set up the appointment didn’t do it properly. The latter should have asked for a technician who could do both the activation of the signal and installation of the modems! Then, he proposed to set up another appointment which was 6^th July, the earliest he could give me. That is a Thursday and Starhub does not provide installation after working hours!

Has it now turned into my problem that I am unable to make it on a Thursday for the technician to do the installation? Has it now turned into my fault that the sales lady set up the appointment wrongly simply because I didn’t stress to her that the signal was not activated? Looking at the dates, I lost internet access ever since on the 18^th of June. If you do not understand the amount of distress caused by the lack of it, let me tell you that it’s extremely annoying and frustrating! I had to delay payment of my credit card bills, the changing of my address via internet banking modes, checking up emails only in public libraries which amount to extra costs etc.

The reason I continued to subscribe to Starhub was due to the competitive rates offered by your company. If you feel that I am not a worthwhile customer, please terminate all my existing services under Starhub WITHOUT ANY PENALTY CHARGES to me – Mobile & MaxOnline 6500. Not that I don’t understand the terms & conditions in whatsoever unfair contracts I have signed with you, but the service package that was promised to me has not even been delivered at all! Why should I then be subjected to the penalty charges?

Otherwise, please improve your processes and deliver what you are supposed to, and not at the expense of customer convenience and costs! I simply wonder why Starhub does not want to send down technicians who can do signal activation at the same time for new installations. Doesn’t it make sense to do so? How will customer ever realize that the signal in the flat is not activated as a new signup? If starhub can check that the block is cable-ready by simply keying in the postal codes into the system, why is it that they couldn’t check the activation signal at the same time? Don’t tell me about system issues. I am not a system analyst, I am a customer who’s only interested in getting whatever I have signed up for in the most prompt and hassle-free manner, which is obviously not in this case. I am most happy to extend my relationship with your company only if the following can be fulfilled:

1) A technician to be sent to my flat, after 7.30pm, by latest Tuesday 4^th July, to perform both signal activation and modem installation.

2) Waiver of the digital voice installation fee of $42. I feel no longer obliged to pay up for the service that I didn’t get in time.

If you feel that the company is able to make a better alternative offer than the above I have suggested, please inform me. I will be most glad to do any negotiation to reach an eventful conclusion.

SLINGWOOF
HP: xxxx xxxx

----------------------------------------------------

AND that was not all. After subsequent calls, I realised I have to pay a separate activation charge of $31.50 even though I am a new subscriber! Bloody hell! Ain't that back to square one?!

I have come to realise that big organisations only turn effective upon adverse customer feedback. After more scoldings and acts of anger spurts, I got what I wanted, well at least 60% of them. The technician finally came down on 5th July and I got $31.50 activation fee waived. Hooray!

BUT apparently they haven't got enough of me. THEY HAVE YET TO COME BACK TO ME REGARDING THE $42 ACTIVATION FEE FOR DIGITAL VOICE!

Time for another email. Please excuse me.

STAR WARS: the slash of the carrot chopper

2006-07-06T23:58:00.000+08:00

Date:	Thu, 22 Jun 2006 20:25:41 +0800 (CST)
Subject:	COMPLAINT: STARHUB MAXONLINE
To:	customercare@starhub.com

Dear Sir/Mdm,

I am writing in, on behalf of my brother, to request for:

(1) a waiver of my maxonline subscription fees from 19 June to 2 July 2006;

(2) termination of existing maxonline service under subscriber ABC, SXXXXXXXA.

Due to a relocation to our new address in XXXYYY, we are unable to use our existing maxonline services despite the building being cable-ready. This is because we have missed the date, 22 March, where the Starhub technician visited each flat to turn on the signal.

I dialed up 1633, only to learn from customer service officer Raymond that we have to pay an activation fee of $52.50 since we have missed the timeline stated on the notice, that is 22 March. It was further elaborated that we were one of those unfortunate ones to have collected our keys in February, before the notice was issued out, thus we have to pay $52.50. This should be seen with ridicule since we only shifted into the new flat on 18 June. Renovation works took place in April. Even so, we won't be at the new flat 24 by 7 to take note of any notice which looks just like any other brochure!

This matter was made worse with the fact that we still have to pay the subscription for the month of June despite us not being able to utilise the services at all. That is another $79.80 (or $31.90 on pro rata basis from 19 to 30 June), if I remember it correctly. I also found out from Tampines Starhub Customer Service that even if I terminate the service with immediate effect, the bill will continue to roll till the next billing cycle, which is 2nd of the month in our case.

What was even more laughable was the promotion currently offered to new subscribers! Not only do they get numerous items such as free wireless router, free installation, free activation, they even enjoy a discount of 15% from the second month onwards for maxonline 6500! If an existing customer doesn't even get the basic services such as free activation, what other reasons do we have to remain as one?

As such, please terminate our existing maxonline & waive all subscription fees on a pro rated basis with immediate effect. Please also cancel the service request on 26 June 2006. There is no more need to send the technician over to activate the signal. It is simply unfitting to succumb to an unfair charging system.

SLINGWOOF
HP: xxxx xxxx

Bloody fed up! Read on...

zippers creepers

2006-06-22T19:59:00.000+08:00

I didn't mean to keep staring at his 'sensitive' part. But I couldn't help it! It was dark brown or black with some greenish yellow strips on its body. Very hairy. Pretty cute too when it made an "ohm" sign as it progressed to wander around, though never far away from that zipper spot.

EEK! And it disappeared into the man's zipper! I stared so much harder... but it didn't come out again... I mean, suddenly there was a creepy crawly happily strolling around his zipper area, how could I resist my wonders?

Blog updated in Tampines Regional Library, 7.57pm.

ROCKET SCIENCE

2006-06-17T03:45:00.000+08:00

“Social events will not only be fun but will lead to beneficial introductions. Someone will say something that will influence and alter your life. Keep an open mind – changes will lead to greater enthusiasm.” – TODAY, “Your Horoscope Today”, 16^th June 2006

I hardly flipped the papers nowadays. My boss, who’s sitting next to me, asked one fine day: “Do you know of this blah blah blah fund MAS approved?” She continued to elaborate on the opportunities this fund presented since our company was the first to foresee such an outcome and went on to highlight how my colleague was complimented for assisting the internal business division in gaining a signoff from our top management to launch the product once MAS announced its approval. This means to say, our company could very well be the first in the market to sell it!

Then the following day, she said again: “You heard of the rate hikes?” “Ah?” I was a little stunned. “Oh, you don’t read the papers ...” She acknowledged my deficiency in that area as she continued to explain to me about the recent prediction of interest rate hikes. And today! She issued all of us our new Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) during our monthly section meeting. Yar, the new KPI is more definitive then the previous one but it sure makes a useless kid out of me in the entire team. I seemed to be the most redundant name on the payroll – little projects, always with a mentor in the back scene despite 6 months into the role, ignorant of the systems blah blah blah… Looks like my upcoming performance appraisal in Oct is going to suffer a big hit.

ANYWAY, since I was home by 11.45pm on a Friday night, I decided to do the stuffs I missed doing for a long time, that is, to sit down and watch a TV program without any distraction & to read the papers. And I really did! I watched Beautiful Boxer on Channel U – no internet, no snacks, no msn, only the occasional conversations with my parents – and ran through TODAY while performing ‘release management’ in the bathroom.

It was then I came across the above ‘citations’. Whoa! I was a little shocked! Very true. I just conducted a little meeting over dinner with our newly formed SMRT Challenge Team, comprising of K, A, W and myself. I knew all 3 of them. But K only knew W and myself; W only knew K and myself, and A only knew myself. It turned out better than expected! It was pretty funny seeing K and A misunderstanding each other as they talked about kungfu novels by Jin Yong. Definitely very interesting to see 2 experts in Chinese conversing to 2 idiots in the same language. Of course, needless to say, I belonged to the former category. I also uncovered a lot of myths regarding myself. I realised I was playing netball and basketball in secondary school, didn't wear socks, had an equal number of guy friends versus girl friends... and I guess my prior wonders about myself being non-sportive , sock-liking , had more girl friends had a conclusion that evening.

A little sidetrack, I was early for my appointment since I decided not to go back to Chai Chee Office after my course in Shenton. So I went on a little way around Bugis Junction while waiting for the others to turn up at the MRT station control by 7.15pm. Saw Giordano. Great! They have the comfy khaki pants that I liked and I went in for a fitting. 15% off for people who purchased items on their birthday! Immediately, I bought two. Then half an hour later, I discovered A gave me a Giordano black polo tee! Haha. A tad size too small though. And I got a free 'Firehouse' at Swensens too! The best part was the staff didn't even bother to verify my birth date! Wahaha.

I wonder how much was K irritated by us as we continued in a nonchalant fashion to engage in jokes she couldn’t catch, but I was sure angry over someone trying to stuff the extra copy of application form into my already bursting haversack! Yes, it IS genuine anger. Don’t blame me, I did forewarn that person, but the latter simply refused to believe it.

Maybe I am getting more and more temperamental. I am already amazed that I should get worked up over such a small event which was probably done out of fun. The power of a big group; the conceding of the un-armored self; the grousing of the defeated party.

Yes. This is a very long entry. Incoherently written too. But so what? Don’t make your problem into my problem even though I make mine into yours!

"Show me the proof"

2006-06-15T22:25:00.000+08:00

Tired. The number of hours spent sleeping at night no longer correspond to the level of alertness during daytime. 5 hours, 8 hours, 6 hours, I feel tired all the same. Jogging, no jogging, still as tired.

Funny people make ambiguous statements. My boss is one of them. My colleague is one of them. He is one of them. She is one of them. I am one of them too, apparently. As if my work is not difficult enough, they must issue me with weird answers that have its sense of truth in the same path as its sense of ill logic.

How many meanings are there to the word "activation"?

How many auditors are we unable to fend off when they shoot out "Who instructed us? Show me the proof.."

Why are there so many "exceptional handlings" when we told auditors we have a standard process?

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"This is life."
"Nothing's perfect."
"We need to protect ourselves."

I ought to agree with them.