Malaccan Fun (17-19 May 2008)

I was in Malacca last weekend to attend the wedding dinner of my second cousin. Thankfully it was a public holiday on the Monday and so we were able to spend two nights at Equatorial with sufficient time to do abit of everything including a hairwash at the Mall just before the wedding dinner, ate dim sum for brunch on the day we left, also spent some time with colleagues who were also there on the same weekend at the same hotel. Here's some pics.

went to this village in Tengkera where they made fresh local kueh kueh. Think you can imagine how excited Mama was when she was there, hehehe

Spent some time at St Paul's Hill, a touristy attraction that makes Malacca so rich in historical value. Since the early 1400s', Malacca saw the occupation of three European countries, namely the Portuguese (known by locals as the white bengalis) for 130years before it was surrendered to the Dutch. The Dutch later gave Malacca to the British to prevent it from falling into France's hands. This is one reason why I'm so in love with Malacca.

Attended morning mass at St Peter's Church. Notice the dutch-inspired tiled flooring that is dated from 1710.

dance dance on !

muahaha.... me and sulyn met up Friday night for dinner at Raffles City and decided to head to NAB (new asia bar) for drinks being the start of the weekend. Having not enough fun there (as the music was kinda switchy), we headed to Attica for some good music and danced the nite away!

We had fun!

Hong Kong 28-31 March 08

I did it again. Yet another impromptu travel decision and this time to Hong Kong!

FOOD

The food was fantastic (dim sum, meals at the cha chan tings, etc). I also tried the mango dessert they had at Mongkok, apparently its known to be quite popular wid both locals and tourists. Must eat at their tea houses, equivalent to our coffeeshops but smaller scale. Foodwise is good but not necessarily cheap. My bowl of wanton noodles was at Hk$28 (S$5) and it didn't come with char siew, only meat dumplings.Anyway my last meal in HK was at the airport where I ate at the foodcourt from a stall called Shanghai Lao Lao. I ordered a bowl of beef noodles, 3pcs pan-fried pork dumplings and 3pcs steam shrimp dumplings. The lady who took my order must have thought I hadn't eaten for days cos I ordered so much for one. The food was yummy!

TRANSPORT

Alot of walking though but it was all good. I'm impressed with the public transport there. I had the oppt to try out the MTR Train (HK$5-HK$8.50), Ferry (HK$2.20) and public light 16-seater bus(HK$5.50). My fav mode of transport? The ferry. The ride there was just kinda theraputic and had calming effect wid the gentle sea breeze blowing, it was soothing.

On the Ferry

On the MTR

Things to do or places to go would be:

MongKok - Bcos of its name, it kinda makes me think of Bangkok (even tho i've never been there! hehehe) Ladies market with tons of bags, shoes, clothes, belts and other stuff to make you go wahh... Then down the other street, there's a wide range of electronic goods.

Lan Kwai Fong / SoHo/ Mid-Levels - Its really more of the sights here than anything else. The lil shops lined up the hilly roads and alleys, things here aint cheap, its more of boutique shops and bars, pretty much an angmohs hangout

Central - This is a MUST GO station to get off and walk around. For one, you need to exit from this station if you wanna go to the mid-levels, SoHo and LKF. Secondly, they had a store called H&M there and the clothes are very much like topshop and dorothy perkins but at a way lower price. I found my perfect workpants there and tons of other clothes.

Causeway Bay - I wasn't overly excited abt this place where they had the Times Square Mall cos its very upmarket and carry brands like Prada, Gucci, Lane Crawford, Marc Jacob, etc. Like helloooo. Of cos they also had some other smaller shops but i just wasn't into this place but its just one of those places you gotta go so that you can tell people you've been there, hahah. lol

Will I go back to HONG KONG again? Hell yeah! =)

Dinner @ NY,NY

Had dinner tonight with some frens of mine. We had a good time catching up and making fun of each other. haha. miss times like these.

Malacca Trip, CNY 8-10 Feb 2008

Spent the CNY hols in Malacca. Most time were spent on visiting relatives, both from mum and dad's side of the family. Here's some pics to share.

Me with my Chinese Grandma

My other Grandma reminiscing the past with some very old b/w photos

My many cousins and relos from Malacca

Steamboat dinner at Godpa's place

Visit to Amityville brought back some happy memories making us sad after that...

This used to be our playground...

The price we paid for visiting Malacca

Curly Wurly

Here's a pic taken of the all natural curly wurly ponytail belonging to cuz J.

Genting Trip 12-14 Jan 2008

Took a 6-hr bus ride to Genting Highlands, Malaysia for the weekend. Karen and I were expecting a nice quiet semi-posh hotel, we got quite a Willy Wonka's Colorful Factory-type of hotel resort. We thought it wld be nice and quiet as it was off-peak but we had to get through a sea of people at the First World Hotel lobby which was as big as a train station. First impression of our holiday? Horriday. I checked into my room only to find the beds not made from the earlier hotel guests. It was just disgusting. Anyway overall, being with family made it an OK trip. However it'll be a long while before I head back.

Me and Aunty Nancy on da bus.

Meimei Faith wid Grandpa.

The very old unmaintained hotel. I had to take this shot to show you what I mean. And this view reminds me of a scene in the game of Silent Hill.

Wld you drink from this water dispenser that's rusty on the outside? Can you imagine how it must be like on da inside?

Then things got a lil better when I saw my best friend, Mr Starbucks

And we got crazy wid all the rides, both indoor and outdoor.

This was where we ate most of our meals at, The Hainan Restaurant

Going Home. Daniel Boy wheeling mama's luggage