To the Family Gathering of the Year!

OK I’m feeling restless. The day is finally here. Less than 12 hours and I will see mum and dad… in the next 24 hours I’m going to meet bro and sis-in-law and princess Aurelie.

Surprisingly, office has been forgiving this time (or it’s me who has developed new attitude towards work). I used to stay in office until 1am or even 6am for the last day before holiday. This time, I didn’t even have to stay until 12am for any day and manage to leave office before 10pm on last day (new achievement unlocked!)

There is nothing much apart from my normal activities. My boss took sudden leave on Wed, Thurs, Fri and left me clueless. How am I supposed to do handover when he is not even around? I felt like calling him but don’t feel right to disturb people on their off day. In the end, I managed to make him come for half a day on Friday for the handover without me calling him :p ha. Power of escalation.

This Saturday, I started back with Badminton (before again going for a break) at Jurong West Sport Complex. There were at least 15 of us playing! Good that Juli helped to book 3 courts. After badminton and lunch, Inche and I complained about our hair and we decided to get a haircut. My second haircut in Singapore after being here for more than 7 years! Hahaha.. We went to Boon Lay and tried out a small saloon just beside the MRT. Guess how much is the cut? SGD 3.8 Nett. Cheaper than KFC! So I can’t complain much about the style… :P at least it served my objectives – removing the dried ends and reducing shampoo usage :P

Back home, I did my usual laundry and get addicted to Tiny Tower until dinner time =.=’’ For dinner, we went to Malacca Celup for my third buffet of the year! Haha… We purchased the vouchers from Groupon couple of months back, and I have been waiting for the day ever since! Unfortunately, I must say that the food is a let down compared with the real Malacca’s Satay celup, and it’s not even meet up to the standards shown in its own website. The satay sauce was diluted, the satay choices were so few, and you have to pay separately for the drinks and seafood. Yet, I must say that the service is excellent. Overall, I’m ok to take it as one time experience. If there is a next satay celup eat out, that will be at Malacca itself!


Malacca Celup – basically all the choices available

After the filling dinner, we took a direct bus to Vivo and had our dessert at Honeymoon Dessert. I tried the dessert with green tea ice-cream… The icre-cream was surprisingly very good! The green tea flavor is really strong and I loved it!


Grass Jelly in Vanilla Sauce with Green Tea Ice-cream – SGD 4.5

After the nice dessert, we decided to call it a day and go back home… for a movie! First we wanted to go for Zookeeper. Then he showed me a preview of “Secret” as I said I never watched it… in the end we watched it till the end =__=’ I quite like the movie… 8 out of 10! Has been a while since the last time I watch romantic high school movie. The other movie we watched last week was “Love, Wedding, Marriage”, starring Mandy Moore. The story depicted was quite realistic and that’s why I like it =D 7 out of 10! Somehow I remembered Mandy to be better looking than the way she is in the movie… Anyway, not important.

Today is the last day of the 7th Month in Chinese… it means no more scary story about wandering late at night… it means that wedding months are around the corners (already 4 invites for Oct)… it means 5 more months until the end of bunny year! :p (Don’t know since when I become so superstitious)...

Oh, today, Singapore also got a new president. Welcome, Mr. Tan. I’m not in politics really, but I’m impressed how all the candidates are in their 60s and 70s but still look so fit. Respect!

Ok I better go iron my cloths now before flying off… Till then!
ED

Costa Sands Resort Gathering!

OK… It’s 12.30 and I just finished watching a movie… then remember by all means that I haven’t blogged! As it’s very important for me to flush my memory for next week use, here comes my 5 minutes speed blogging!

Weekdays & offices: Nothing much – exercises ticked! Love the evening runs and yoga =) Stayed late in office on Friday but it was paid off with a wonderful evening =)

Movies watched: The Whistleblower (7 out of 10 – the movie was all good but I wasn’t satisfied with the ending) and Pirates of the Caribbean On Stranger Tides. (8 out of 10 – Johnny Deep is good, but the story is mediocre)

What’s this week:
1. Costa Sands Resort Gathering! Special thanks to Henny for all the continuous reminder, updates, and thorough planning throughout the 3 months. You’re the best organizer we can ask for (and I love your new hair style, lots! :D)


The all own-creation satays!


Once upon a time at Costa Sands Resort Pasir Ris Room B-02


The Family Pic after a hearty BBQ!

2. Mid Autumn Festival at Takashimaya – went for free sampling of over 30 famous hotel & restaurant mooncakes. Love Blueberry mooncake by Grant Hyatt the most, and most amazed by the red mooncake by TWG.


Mooncake- improvised

3. Ippudo Ramen: Adding to my list of Best Ramen Restaurant tried. The noodle is quite unique, but I still love the Miharu Sapporo Ramen best. And this restaurant is way too commercialized! 4 bucks for a cup non-refillable green tea?


The TOOOO Commercialized Ippudo Ramen - $15


What’s next week: The Return of Badminton, Buffet of the Quarter, Visit of Parents, and.. holidays!

Nites and Welcome Monday’s Blue.
ED

Lazy Weekend

Since I fell off on Monday, my knee has now 80% recovered. Only left with some small bruises and skin cracks. I have been using my knee as excuse to skip yoga, running, even badminton... and now I feel sloppy. To make it worse, I was eating all the sinful food like nachos, McDonald, western food this week ^^; It’s so tough to start the exercise and food control all over again… I tried to sleep early to wake up early this Sunday… in the end I woke up only at 10am =___=’’

Alright, it’s two weeks to my holiday and I really start panicking now. I even forgot that I need to exchange some Aussie dollar and HK dollar and Macau dollar…. I haven’t started packing… and what about work handover report to my teammates when I’m gone? Plan, Erlin… you have to start planning!!

I felt quite uneasy in office this week. A lot of chasing and following up, but not much progress so far :’( I hate this kind of feeling… and it was especially so frustrating last Friday when no one wants to take responsibility of anything. Person A asked me to phone Person B asked me to call Operator C said that it’s not his responsibility and give me a phony phone number. What’s wrong with the people??? Alas, I don’t even know who to start escalating to. Does my mood is somehow affected due to Hungry Ghost Festival? :p I rather believe so, at least it has an end date to it.

I was really glad when weekend came. Despite a holiday on Tuesday, I found myself counting down slowly to weekend. On Friday night, we watch Charlie St. Cloud, which coincidentally related to ghost and stuff =___=’’ I was focused in watching Zac Efron until the end, but someone else fell asleep complaining there are not many pretty girls in the movie. Lol. The movie piqued my curiosity, but I wasn’t particularly inspired by the ending.

Saturday, I slept until 10am, woke up, completed my weekly episode of “Surviving High School”, showered, and then went to Clarke Quay for lunch. We intended to go for Sinar Pagi, but well… it’s closed on Sat during fasting period :( After another hour of wandering, we decided to go for Manhattan Fish Market. The moment we ordered the food, we noticed that there was 1-1 promotion for one of its main course. Too bad the waiter said that we couldn’t change our order anymore :( I don’t think it’s fair to connect everything to 7th month, yet I can’t help but feel so!! Hahaha…

After lunch, we took bus 106 from Dhoby Ghaut to Marina Bay Sands – quite nice, the bus stop just infront of the hotel. We went through the hotel main door… and I can’t help but notice how crowded the hotel is. Good success, consider how arrogance all the staff there! (ok I’m generalizing, but 3 bad experiences out of 3 sort of lead me to that conclusion).

We strolled from hotel to the shopping area to the museum. The museum was quite empty, and we got our free entrance to Shipwreck Exhibition without a single minute queue. Finally some good things! :p but then again, I noticed that I forgot to bring my camera T___T so all we have is iPhone Camera. We enjoyed through the exhibition and different galleries for around 2 hours, then walk around before taking our dinner at Kyo-Nichi, Marina Square to satisfy my craving for Ramen.


Entrance to Shipwreck Exhibition


Origami – Do it yourself Belitung Ewer – Compliment from Artscience Museum


Spicy Ramen with corn @ Kyo-Nichi - $11

Back home, I did my laundry, then continued watching Justin Bieber – Never Say Never, before went to bed early.

Sunday is the 15th day of 7th month, where people are burning incense and money paper more than usual. Being superstitious, I decided to stay at home and got myself addicted to a new iPhone game: Tiny Tower. I spent at least 4 hours in the game today T_T I HAVE TO STOP!


Tiny Tower with its Bitizens. They even have Bitbook! ^^;

It’s almost 7pm now… time to take a shower and get some nice dinner =)

Two more weeks!
ED

Happy National Day, Singapore!

The National Day Holiday marks the end of the longest no-holiday period this year. It’s indeed something worth celebrating =)

I can’t remember having a public holiday falls on Tuesday before, but I can tell that I’m loving it. You woke up on Monday feel that it’s a Friday. Even better, people are taking day off and office is half empty and quiet. Everything was perfect until I realized that I have a call from 9.00 to 10.30 PM O.O !!

In an attempt to console myself for spending public holiday eve in office, I sneaked out from office at 6pm for a quick jogging at Labrador park. Alas, it didn't end well. I was 3 minutes away from office when I somehow toppled over a crack and had myself kissing the pavement (I didn’t know I love Singapore so much) I injured both my knees, and a bit of blood on my hands, but thankfully nothing on my face. Talk about wandering around during Hungry Ghost Festival. Hahaha..

So after the run, I ended up searching pantry for First Aid box, putting some medicine and plasters on my knees. I doesn’t look that bad on the first day, but it bruises really ugly on the next day x_x I hope that it will recover before my parents see it. No plan to tell them a single thing about this.

I reached back home at around 11.30pm after the call, and my holiday mood was so high that we decided to watch a movie: The Shawshank Redemption (1994). It’s voted (and still) no #1 movie of all time in IMDB… and I must say that I loved every single minute of the movie. The main character is so smart and I love the perfect ending. Director should make more movies like that.

I slept at almost 3am after completing my COD game for the week. So much about normalizing my bio clock.

On the National Day itself, I woke up at 10am. My plan to swim was put down the drain due knee injury :( I connected to office for 15 minutes to send a report then went to City Hall to enjoy the rest of the day. We had lunch at Osakatown, then eight of us went to Asian Civilization Museum (ACM). It’s having the special exhibition: Terracotta Warriors for this month. The best part? The whole gallery and exhibitions are FREE (u.p. $10), only for today! (Thanks Boly for the info)


Cheese "Something" Ramen - Osaka Town, Raffles City ($18 for set)

We reached the museum at around 3.00pm. The queue was super long but it was alright as we chatted throughout the waiting time. I must say that the event organizer did a splendid work. It’s true that we queue for almost an hour, but the moment we got inside, the crowd is really well scattered that we can still enjoy the exhibition fully. We went to all the galleries, took some silly pictures in different places, and came out at around 6pm, just nice for dinner.


Asian Civilization Museum - Terracotta Warriors Exhibition

My favorite shoot at West Asia Zone

We had dinner at the famous Song Fa Bakut Teh (first time for me!) rest for a while, then went back home. We reached at around 8pm, just nice to watch the NDP fireworks from TV =)


Song Fa Bakut Teh, Clarke Quay ($10)

It has been a really nice public holiday. I had fun and ready to go back to work! 3 more days to weekend! Just please, I hope that the series of unfortunately event will stop. Right here. T_T

Superstitious,
ED

Hi August

I got my own preference for each month in a year. Jan is identic with New Year, Feb is identic with CNY and Valentine, Mar to Aug are hard work, Sep to Nov are holidays and slower work pace, while Dec is the master of all slack, food, and celebration.

Following that kind of mapping, August will be my last "tough" month, and anything afterwards can just get better (keep fingers cross!) There is a public holiday coming this Tuesday (Oh how I miss public holiday), and another one near the end of the month. My parents already called me up yesterday and reminded me that we’re 3 weeks away from my long (18 days) vacation! It somehow reminded me also that… I haven’t planned a single thing to do for those 18 days! I got the air tickets and accommodations ready, but that’s about it. I need to start planning, which is hardly my expertise :’(

So I spent couple of hours of my precious weekends looking at things to do at Sydney, Melbourne, Hong Kong, and Macau. I swear I would have never picked Free and Easy if I’m given an option T_T Why can’t we just leave the planning to the expert and let them surprise us with what they have? There are too much information on the website and I don’t know which to filter @.@

After sometime, I raised my white flag and asked my brother to pick whatever he wants =p hope to sort out the itinerary for Melbourne within this week.

Istana is opened for public this Sunday, so we went to take a look (credit to Cit for the info!) The garden was pretty massive, but the palace itself was a bit small compared to the one I saw in UK (ok it might not be a fair comparison). We paid $2 for the tour inside the ground level of the palace, which was completed within 10 mins T_T The inside has 3 sections: dining section, exhibition section, and meeting room section. In the exhibition room, they displayed the gift from various countries to Singapore, which all look so luxurious! We managed to spot some ship miniature and keris from Indonesia too. Unfortunately no picture is allowed, so none taken :( The guard there was pretty rude and I was scolded just because I took out my camera outside the palace. Hix!


With Singapore National Emblem!

The palace looks like a typical olden days hotel, covered in white paint with crystal lamps and centralized aircon. Even though I believe that it gets the first class maintenance, I got the “old” feeling more than “posh” inside the Instana. What to do, it was built on 1869, which is almost 150 years ago! Anyway, the overall experience was OK!

Nothing much for the rest of the week. Had my normal exercises. Had my monthly KFC on Thurs, Pizza Hut for Fri, and Spize Star Burger for Sat. Haha.. On Sunday, I got a super nice cheese cake dessert from Cit :D Thanks a bunch, Cit :D


A Cheese Cake which worths spending calories on

Other than that… oh! I met Sabrina for dinner on Wednesday =) =) She got her master degree and now taking a break before starting to work again at London. Congratulations, Sab!! It was my second time having the Standard Chartered Jumbo Promotion Deal, both within a week ^^;


With Sab - It has been a year and she didn't change a bit!

Talk about work, look what I got in my letterbox this week! Now I’m officially FREE from any bond! Well, not that it changes anything ^^; It just makes me feel old.


MOE - Discharged from Tuition Bond Letter

There were a small “series of unfortunate events” this Sunday. It started with me setting up the wrong alarm which made me cancelled my morning run, then the strong wind and rains which blowed my pillow case to nowhere for like zillions time. Afterwards, I missed my direct bus to Istana, and had to wait 5 mins for MRT. There in Istana, I got scolded by the guard for no apparent reason. Back from Istana, I had 4 hours nap, which make me writing blog at 1am in the morning now ^^; Can't remember the last time I did this.

OK OK, I hope to switch back to my normal bio clock soon, so will try to sleep now.

Nitez!
ED

Random screenshot: Just find it a bit funny - advertisement of Samsung Galaxy S2 in iPhone. Haha..