Thursday, July 31, 2008

Its 5!!!

In the blink of an eye, Xiaoville has turned 5! It was on this day 5 years ago that I logged onto www.blogger.com and typed my 2nd post in the noisy and lonely computer room back in Bata Headquarters.

Yup I had practically loads of time back then while serving my internship and thank God there was Internet access. My companions back then were Yahoo auction, Singaporebikes.com, the other loafing interns on MSN and blogging!

Reading back, I realised what crap I typed back then. It don't even make any sense to me now lol.

Monday, July 28, 2008

Tampopo! Scrumptious!

I've found an alternative to Wasabi Tei for some great Chirashi Don! Tampopo! This restaurant is located at Liang's Court and its almost equally as popular as Wasabi Tei! But the good thing about this place is that they practice this queue number system something like what the Malay barbers use, and that means we don't have to be physically there to queue for our turn, just take a queue number! In the end we had to wait only for around 15 minutes for our seats. But we made full use of time before that by walking around Meidi-Ya and admiring the different kind of sashimi being sold in the supermarket.

This Tampopo restaurant is newly renovated and they actually have this conveyor system that is apparently the latest innovation in Japan. They claimed that they're the first to bring it out of Japan. It was interesting alright, we made our orders from the touch screen beside our table and our orders will be served right to our table by the conveyor belt.

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The touch screen where you order your food from

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Then you click click click

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Then your food arrives in style

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Admire it

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Pose with it

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Then pay for it!!

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A big reason why the bill came up to over a hunder dollars was because we ordered these 2 pieces of O-toro. Yes it really does melt in your mouth!

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Puss' black pig Katsu meal

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We ordered black pig ramen too. The soup is apparently cooked for 2 days!

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My 11 types of sashimi chirashi!

Woke up early in the morning today and found out that Mum's on leave too. So she suggested having breakfast first before I go to school for some mugging. We wanted to patronise The Rider's Cafe but was disappointed to find out that they don't serve food on Mondays!

We then ended up in Turf City's Scrumptious Cafe after a suggestion by sis. It was a quiet little cafe catered for the mothers and their children. They have story-telling sessions and even a pedicure section for the mums lol. But they do serve good breakfast there!

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I had the eggs benedict and it was great!

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Mum's eggs and dill

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And her coffee

Sunday, July 27, 2008

I need to start studying

Went for dinner at Meritus Mandarin Hotel's Triple 3 on Thursday with Mum, Sis and Kok Bin. Mum had the OCBC 1-for-1 special and so it wasn't all that expensive. Its actually one of the first few international buffet place that I've visited and it hasn't changed all that much since the last time I went there. Something did change though, the price. They charge $60++ per person now, an increase of $5 from the old price of $55++. We had a great feast still nevertheless!

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The food paradise!

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Myself, Sis and Mum

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The 3 of us posing with our spoils, with a carnation blocking part of my face

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How's that for a variety of desserts?

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Complete with a mountain of different chocolates

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More!

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And more!

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I had my fill

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Kok Bin looks satisfied

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So does Sis

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Mum looks bloated

Met up with Henry, Valencia and Poh San on Friday and finally caught The Dark Knight! Friends around me have been raving on how good the show was, how good Heath Ledger's acting was etc, it was time for me to judge it for myself. It turned out to be truely an action packed show, and yes I agree that the acting was fabulous! The same can't be said about the storyline and the flow of the movie though. But what the heck am I talking about? Its a movie based on a comic!

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It was practically stay home Saturday yesterday. Planned to use the day to do some studying but managed to crawl out of bed only at 6pm!!! And thats because I played mahjong at Meiwen's house with Henry and Valencia till around 6am the night before lol. Luckily for me, Channel 5 kept me occupied the whole evening! They premiered The Mummy Returns and Troy back to back and I managed to catch them both! No time for fun and joy for the rest of the week though, exam will be this coming Saturday, time to get back to reality Nick.

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Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Play and plays

Attended the Night Festival near the National Museum last Friday and was shocked to find the large amount of people gathered around to watch it. To be frank, I didn't know what to expect before arriving there because I didn't even know or read anything about it before that. It turned out to be a really arty farty festival, the crowd was gathered around the grass patches and pavements surrounding the National Museum trying to catch a glimpse of the dancing and movements by the the troope from Italy. I would have enjoyed it more if I had comfortable chairs and if there were less people around me. But the tiredness and the claustrophobicness got the better of me and I asked to leave early. Turned out I found many nice photos taken by others at the festival itself. Here they are!

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The National Museum was beautifully transformed by projectors

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Another variant

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And another variant

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They managed to get many of our very pretty Singapore girls to be one of these. I managed to see them up close!

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One of the many beautifully decorated giant balloons

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The water performance

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The fire performance

Was supposed to watch the play cum comedy Own Time Own Target end next month but was disppointed to find out just now that all tickets have been sold out! The moment I read about the play on Straits Times Life! 2 weeks ago, I wanted to watch it so much. I just had that feeling that I would be the one laughing the loudest and the hardest in the theatre since the jokes are on my company lol. Its a pity to miss it this time, but I'm sure it'll have a re-run again someday since its so popular!

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Tuesday, July 15, 2008

An eventful weekend

My weekend was quite a blast! I literally have events back to back. Although it was hectic and tiring, I find it kinda satisfying! This should be the way I spend all my weekends! (Less the amount of money spent of course)

Woke up in the late Saturday morning and joined Kok Bin and my sis for lunch at Little Part 1 Cafe off Jasmine Road just beside Thomson Plaza. Its a small cafe with ambience set to make you feel at home. Its kinda ulu, I won't expect many of you to know about it, but its worth a visit!

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Its actually not as glamourous as this picture made it out to be. It kinda gives you a homely feeling, with magazines and boardgames to keep you occupied as well

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Nick was there

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They serve Buffalo wings, and kept the drumlets for themselves

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When was the last time you ever saw such a plate? Your grandmother's place? You'll get to use it if you order buffalo wings.

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Sis had Shepherd's Pie

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Kok Bin had fish and chips

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I had chicken Schnitzel!

After lunch, with my stomach still kinda filled with food, I rushed down to join Sum and friends for soccer at Fico, a place similar to the one at East Coast Park, only that this one is located at ulu samy Boon Lay! Near where I work, but far far away from where most of us live! I managed only around an hour of kicking around before I drained out and went home. I then met up with Valencia for dinner, you guessed it right..at Wasabi Tei..again! We were supposed to meet at 6pm but I got a message from her at 6.10pm informing me that she has just woken up! Luckily I was late as well and so I was queueing on my own only for about half an hour before she finally rushed down at 7pm. But we still ended up having to queue for another 40mins or so before we could finally get in. I don't think I ever want to frequent the place for dinner ever again. Although the food is good, I don't really think its worth the queueing up! Its time wasting!

After dinner, we met up with Puss and we did a little bit of window shopping around town, had some desserts and drinks at Taka's The Coffee Club, and watched Red Cliff! The movie turned out to be simply quite awesome, it was a vivid visual depiction of the 3 Kingdom comic that I read not too long ago. A pity John Woo had to end the movie abruptly just before the big battle was about to begin, leaving us in suspense and wanting more. Am looking very much forward towards part 2 end of this year!

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The oh so delicious and huge muddy mud pie at The Coffee Club

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My Sunday was equally as packed if not worse! I first met with Valencia, Christine and her colleagues for Macs breakfast at Compasspoint before heading to Punggol Marina for our wakeboarding session! It was my virgin wakeboarding experience although I did try cable-skiing before. But instead of an enjoyable wakeboarding session that I visualised, it turned out to be more of a seawater drinking session for me! I think I managed to stand on the board for hardly less than 15 seconds in total, always falling into the water after only a short drag! Fancy paying $48 for 30 minutes of seawater drinking, with most of it going through your nostril making you feel shitty and all? The coolest part of the whole session though was being on the opposite end to where I was only slightly more than 2 weeks ago! Yup I was stationed at one of the observation posts along the coast then, being able to only envy those bikini babes and other wakeboarders in their speedboats whenever they pass us. This time I'm the envy of those poor dudes stuck there!

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The bunch of us, excluding Lawrence

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The seasoned wakeboarder Lawrence in action

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They all fared better than me, this is Christine with her awkward posture and constipated expression

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Valencia did well too. There's no picture of me wakeboarding, because I kinda didn't wakeboard at all!

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They took a picture of my frequently abused and mocked car guardian, Bend-e-Dick

With my lobster red face and rashes filled back no thanks to Christine's Nivea Sun Block, I went home and managed a short nap before going to Safra Tampines for a game of soccer! It was a terrific field, but I could only manage 1 half as a left-back before having to rush off for a very good friend's wedding dinner! We won 5-0 in the end though!

Yup the evening was reserved for Vicky's wedding! I turned up slightly late for the event but fortunately I didn't miss anything! I made it just in time for the grand entrance of the couple, video screening and also to look at the many babes that were present! It was a simple but enjoyable wedding at Novotel, with the food and presentation all rather excellent. Being an avid wedding fan, I've always loved being part of the joy and celebration and this one is no exception!

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Congratulation again Xiaoqing!