CNY traditions, old & new

CNY traditions, old & new

Width of smile is proportionate to the amount of alcohol in this family.

My family is not too big on Christmas and New Year's, but when it comes to the CHINESE New Year, boy, that we're super big on. I secretly suspect it's Mommy favourite festive season of the year. We go on a crazy mission to rid the house of every speck of dust, decorate the entire house (which includes but is not restricted to the lift lobby) in red and gold, plaster posters of the favoured animal for that respective year on the walls, cook enough to feed an army or maybe two. I always describe my CNY as nonstop action-packed!

Being my mother's daughter, I am crazy enough to add new traditions of my own to the list and make the fullest of the festivities to meet up with all my loved ones! Of course, it starts at home with a huge reunion feast, prepared with so much love by Mommy, topped with copious alcohol. It's always a battle between Daddy and I, to see who loses the war with the Z monsters after. Hahaha.

Then it'd be a trip to Glenn's, usually on the second day, to bai nian to his parents and extended family. And I tell you, his extended family really redefines the meaning of "extended". There are so many aunties, uncles, grandaunts, granduncles, cousins, nephews and nieces! And man, you definitely do not want to mistake the niece of your boyfriend as his auntie. But luckily, or should I say unluckily, for us, his nieces and nephews are actually all little enough for me not to make that kinda mistake.

I sincerely hope no one mistook our relations. It must have been a such a shock.

This year, with Glenn's jiejie being away, we were in charge of taking the little tots down for a walk. Man, this walk in the park was definitely not a walk in the park. And these are two people who did not have much sleep the night before due to mahjong kaki duties. We were up till 6am and went to bed just before sunrise! I even have a Hello Kitty toy to prove my visit to McDonalds in the wee hours (the only hour when any 22yo dares to order a Happy Meal and ask for the toy, really)!

And of course you'd totally expect me to have friends who love the festivities as much as I do and celebrate as religiously as I do too. It's been an annual gathering at Phuay's since we were in JC and we've been keeping it up every year since then! It's always like JC reunion, except better, with pineapple tarts and angbaos!

Then it's our annual pig out session at my place with the closest and the oldest friends, who all love my wonderful Mommy more than they love me. Yes, over the years, they have sort of given up on hoping that I'd inherit some of those culinary skills. I've been declared a lost cause in the kitchen. Hahaha. This year I invited some of the touch girls and mixed up the group a little and everyone enjoyed the new dynamics very much! What friendship can't be forged over a pack of poker cards and some loose change from the angpaos?

See, I really wasn't kidding when I said CNY is nonstop action-packed for me. How was yours? (:

double deux

double deux

I was actually going to blog about my birthday celebrations on time, but I was waiting and waiting for that birthday dimsum with my family, which never quite happened because we couldn't find a free day! We even postponed it all the way to late April, so that Mommy and I can celebrate together with my brother, but even then, we couldn't find find a good Sunday morning to do dimsum! I think we're waiting for my dad's birthday now, which is in September. Hahaha. Fingers crossed. But before you go away tsktsktsking at what a terrible modern busy family we are, let me assure you we've had countless dinners together, enough to celebrate 10 times over. :D

So anyway, because I love celebrating birthdays, I've had 3 celebrations this year! :D

On the day itself, with Glenn: 

Check out the wall murals and G's birthday card for me. 

Fake lomo. Hahaha.

We headed to Greenwood Avenue for the famous pizza, and boy, was it worth getting lost for awhile! I thought it was unnecessary to make reservations for a weekday night, but it turned out that I was completely wrong. The place was packed, even at 8pm! So we hung around, and played the "Shall we be nuts and order the largest pizza?" game before we got a table and decided not to. Haha. But one day I will go back and have that hugeass pizza, I SIMPLY MUST!

Over the weekend, I celebrated with some of my oldest friends:

Dinner at the underlit Overeasy.

Lovely skyline calls for a long stroll and many photos.

The girls (and boys) and I had breakfast food for dinner at Overeasy, One Fullerton. Not a bad place, with an awesome view of the MBS! It was so dim inside that if I weren't such a breakfast food lover who cannot wake up in the morning, I'd have had a hard time convincing my stomach to down the breakfast platter. I love how the girls managed to get me a cake in secret!

The next day, a very late brunch with my touch girls:

Finally, happily seated.

Really, who needs dinner food??

 

  Camwhore in the ladies!

I really, really wish Wild Honey would take reservations because the queue is CRAZY long. Bless Nana for reaching early to get us a place in the queue. It was my first time at Wild Honey, and honestly we waited close to 2 hours for a table and no surprise, yours truly wasn't very pleased, so I gave them the dagger eyes while Karen smiled her ever-so-charming smile and somehow they presented the birthday girl with a birthday cake on the house on top of some complimentary muffins they served to prevent us from fainting from hunger. In conclusion? We had a lovely, lovely taitai brunch! I totally want to be doing this 10 years down the road still. :D

So yes, I did have a very, very happy birthday. (And yes, I am still waiting for that family birthday dimsum meal to materialize come September. Haha.)

macbeth in the park

macbeth in the park

Macbeth in the park was the first thing I did to celebrate the end of third year in university! It's the best way to kickstart summer. (Even though neither internship nor holiday is confirmed. Haha.)

As you know, I've always loved picnics and all things artsy fartsy, so Shakespeare in the Park was probably one of the best thing that could happen in Singapore for me. I was pretty bumped about missing the previous one, A Midsummer Night's Dream, so I was all hyped up when Shan asked me if I wanted to catch Macbeth!

We were blessed with great weather, especially considering that it'd been raining almost every other afternoon. The evening was breezy and cool, although the climb of 1345 steps to Fort Canning was anything but that. When we finally got to Fort Canning Park, boy, were we glad to be finally nestling on our mat, drinking Moscato from the bottle and munching on sandwiches from Provence. We thought our picnic was thrashing everyone else's, until we saw people drinking champagne from proper glasses. Dammit!

I think Macbeth is showing till the 22nd, so go catch it if you'd like a picnic with Shakespeare too! Just take the route that starts behind the national museum. Where there are escalators that will spare you the torturous climb.

on my turf

on my turf

The people living in the west of Singapore are always complaining about the lack of good food. We don't have Katong Laksa, Changi Village, Bedok Bak Chor Mee, Geylang street food and Pulau Ubin Monkey Brains. We are always venturing to the far ends of Singapore, scouring the island for food, food and more food. Sometimes all we want is a nice little restaurant, tucked away from the crowd, and have a lazy weekend brunch or a romantic dinner. But the west side is a mass of HDBs with no such things! Unless you count my favourite Jurong Point. Hahaha.

Since the girls came back, we've been hanging out in our hood alot. We've discovered some real kickass hideout's, on par with Dempsey and Geylang. From all-day brunches to full-course dinners, the west side has 'em all! The touch girls will love this list because most of the restaurants are actually near Turf City - therefore my cheesy title. Hahaha. Please excuse me. And I was really kidding about the monkey brains.

Picotin - Turf Club Road.

Kais had her 21st birthday dinner here, and all of us loved the ambience. The bird cage lampshades really got me. The food was pretty good, with impeccable service. Perfect for avoiding town crowds during the holidays!

Hatched - Evans Lodge.

This cute little place serves ALL DAY BREAKFAST, EVERYDAY. I love it to death. My one pleasure living in Canada was being able to eat homemade (okay, self-made) breakfast at any hour of the day. I also fell in love with eggs, cooked various styles. You can see why Hatched is my kind of place. And the price is a real steal because there's no GST and service charge! One last thing - they have the best mash ever. It's the white lump of thing in the food photo, second from the left. Must. Eat.

Durian Place - near 6th Avenue, along the main Bt. Timah Road.

You will not miss this place when you drive along Bt. Timah Road. It's near the stretch with Ritz Apple Strudel and the Salvatore Italian restaurant. They have Mao Shan Wang and D24 and all kinds of durians and other fruits that you can imagine. And they even have hand shields for you to eat the durian with! Hahaha. The Mao Shan Wang was the price of dinner for 3 at Hatched, but totally worth the money.

Rider's Cafe - Saddler's Club, Eng Neo Avenue.

All the jokes about having to bring your passport when you travel to the West? They must be talking about all the rustic countryside charm. We felt like we were taking a mini road trip driving into Fairway Road, where Rider's Cafe is! Lovely scenery, huge portions of food. I will get up early enough one day to try their famous breakfast menu. Look out for horses sauntering right below the balcony, and the wafts of their manure that might come through in the breezes!

Whoever said there are no nice dining options in the west again?

girls are home

girls are home

I love how easily we fall together every time we meet, each time 6 months apart.

This friendship is so good, so good.

happy CNY 兔 you!

happy CNY 兔 you!

Reunion steamboat at home. (Beginnings of overeating)

Reason for overeating. CHECK OUT THOSE CUTE RABBITS! Mommy made them by hand, from scratch!

Culinary queen at work.

The task of doing up the house falls to me every year (under Mommy's supervision of course, but let me claim whatever credit I can, please. There really isn't much. Hahaha). I really quite enjoy putting the red stuffs all around the house!

Always a time for family and friends. And angpaos! :D

Happy CNY 兔 you!

best memory: december 2010

best memory: december 2010

Steamboat, old friends, sangria, a round of never-ending pictionary with heaps of laughter, pitting brains against brains at bridge, waking up to love in the new year. The best memory of the month is seeing the end of 2010 and the beginning of 2011 with the oldest and the dearest.

best memory: october

best memory: october

Cup noodles and Paddlepop icecream after training. 11.11pm wishes and peeking. Being the last souls alive in school in the middle of the night, filling the crisp cool air with our jokes and laughter.

best memory: september

best memory: september

Friends coming home. A surprise from Phuay when she flew back for 5 days. I always miss my girlfriends terribly during term time, and the phone call from Aussie bringing the news one night followed by tea at Dempsey a couple of days later totally made my recess week.

Or just people being in the same place at the same time. It just feels like everything's falling into place. I was so happy to meet up with my exchange friends when Pui and Robert came over to Singapore together! :D Ping, we missed you!

grief on a rainy afternoon

grief on a rainy afternoon

The rain, grey and heavy, falling.

The grief, dark and swollen, breathing.

The love, warm and present, smiling.

For the girl with her father's smile -

the rain will clear,

the grief will ease,

but the love, the love will always live.

my fav girls in nus

my fav girls in nus

Ever since I left JC, I've been increasingly lazy to make friends. I think I've evolved into a social hermit in university. I go to class, be nice and civil to everyone, make a couple of precious good friends, and then run off to hide somewhere with these few close friends I've made. And really, there have been precious few classmates who became close friends.

So, if it weren't for my touch team, I'd probably be a social outcast in school. Everytime I think about my time so far in NUS, these girls are always close to heart. Nothing in the world really replaces girly afternoons spent laughing over nothing in particular, or smearing mud off each other's faces after trainings.

We've recently finished our SUNIG season and came in 3rd. I thought I'd be more disappointed with our final standing, and I was surprised to find out that I wasn't. It's been a special season for us as team. We grew closer, and pulled each other through tough times. When we came together, I do feel we gave our best under circumstances. That's not to say we played our best because we know we play better touch than that. That's a pity, I can't deny, but more important than results on paper, I think our team won a bond that no medal can replace.

So this one's for my favourite girls in NUS. I'm so glad I decided to stay on in Year 1 and hung on till now. It wasn't always easy (eating mud and collecting scars and cursing refs), but we made it through. We made it to become a real team of friends. I love these bimbos!

From lazy Starbucks afternoons,

to silly antics at carnivals,

to taitai Sunday brunches,

to ultimate camwhoring sessions,

to playing sparklers after trainings.

Alf, before you complain about your absence from this post, I dedicate one whole photo to you okay.

And of course, Karen, the best coach we could ever have. (:

korea photologue

korea photologue

Because the crazy schedule of school does not allow for time to write a huge deal, I shall do a simple photologue of the Korea trip with the Touch girls before the memories start to collect dust, like the Europe, America and Canada ones are doing at the moment. I promise I will finish those travelogues one fine day. Some day. Haha.

And for now, I've put together a couple of collages to tell a quick story of our very exciting Korea trip. Of course, with our plane caught in a typhoon then being diverted to Japan en route and then almost getting ourselves killed by trying to walk ON (not even along) the train tracks, Touch girls are always full of surprises.

We had to pose for a school photo (despite them not giving us a single cent) in that less-than-pretty orange thing, with Shena Na sending us off. I simply refused to wear it onto the plane. It will kill ANY chance of being upgraded to biz class or first class. Hey, a girl needs to keep her dreams alive yeah?

Because we flew Cathay, we had to stop over in HK. None of us complained because that only meant one thing... FOOD AND SHOPPING! Okay fine, that's two things. We were happy girls with the yummy dim sum and dessert. Never mind that it was actually Crystal Jade that we ate. We did have the kickass authentic dessert!

Oh, that's us in Osaka, Japan for an afternoon because we were caught in a freaking typhoon when we were trying to touch down. We were caught in SEVERE turbulence for a good 20 minutes, and I saw my life flash before my eyes and rewind and play again and rewind and play again. We were all pretty sure the plane was going to crash and so thank God for insurance. The only good thing that came out of it was a comfy Hilton hotel stay in Osaka and an hour to explore the area around our hotel!

We hit the food right away the moment we finally got ourselves to the correct country - KOREA. Indeed, food never disappoints. Ginseng chicken, authentic Korean BBQ... I can't even begin to remember what else we ate because we were constantly at it, but oh yum.

And of course there was the shopping! Oh my, these girls are the craziest shoppers I've ever met. They just shop and shop and shop and they never get tired! Me, I got sick and tired of the same old things and the bargaining after the first trip that I just never really dragged myself to go a second time. It was only when I saw everyone's purchases that I went like, Hmm maybe I should have shopped a wee bit more. But still, I managed to score a huge stack of face masks and some great steals.

The other thing that stopped me from venturing out for a second shopping trip was the PEOPLE! Omg, Korea is so not my country. "Excuse me" does not exist in their vocabulary and bumping their way through crowds is a way of life. When I thump on the umbrella that was threatening to blind me, the man holding actually sniggered at me. What kinda person sniggers at a poor soul whose eyeballs he almost pierced? Oh good Lord, just based on that, I was pretty happy to leave the country when it was time to.

Touch girls being sports girls, of course we went to Korea with a sport to play - an international touch competition held in Seoul every year. This year, there wasn't a women's cat, so we played in the mixed cat, and came in second. Everyone's jaws hit the ground when we won the first game - simply because we were girls. But these same people were SO rude during the finals! We kept hearing comments like "Oh yeah, of course the referee is biased, he's hoping to get lucky with one of the girls."

HELLO EXCUSE ME?? If we're good, we are GOOD. Take your men's pride home and stuff it up your sorry little arse. Sickening MCPs. I was completely taken aback at how sexist and childish they were. And mind you, these were fully grown adults. Probably with degenerative brains. How else do we explain their behaviour!

Oh, and to add to all that excitement, I just have to tell you this - we barely made it to the tournament. Shan insisted that she saw a woman walking ON THE TRAIN TRACKS towards the competition grounds. After 3 steps, common sense got the better of us and we turned back. 2 minutes later, A FREIGHT TRAIN CAME WHOOSHING BY. And that's how we almost made the Seoul headlines.

I surprised everyone by opting to go to the Palace with Karen and Zuozuo on the second last day! I even dragged our resident little monster along. :D I was actually more interested in the cultural stuff than the shopping this time round. And I was so disappointed we didn't see any girls in the traditional costumes dancing around the palace! Ah wells, maybe I'll give the other parts of Korea, like Jeju Island, another try another time. As for now, I'm pretty damn happy to be back in the land of "excuse me's".

best memory: august

best memory: august

PMS, in order. (:

Dinner with BOTH of my oldest best friends, a first since I came back. We've all been so busy, and attempts to meet up failed at least 3 times. I'm so glad it happened this time, and we sat chatting in the restaurant till it closed.

best memory: july

best memory: july

Attending Fran's 21st birthday party on a kickass cool yacht the day after Sports Camp '10 (which I attended the day following our return from Europe), and staying up all night to catch up after the party ended. Quoting her, I do wish we permanently lived in the same country.

Post-script: Kais, we missed you!

surprise for the 24yo

surprise for the 24yo

For Glenn's 24th birthday, I decided to go ahead with a 'first' for both of us. I decided to plan a little surprise party for him! Now, as all of you know, we practically spent every single cent we had in our bank accounts, and therefore, this party had to be BUDGET.

Fancy dinner parties were out. Anything that involved the booking of a location was out. Even an elegant Sunday brunch was out. All the kind of parties that I usually throw or attend were all out of the question! That left me to think up a free public space and food that doesn't require us to pay 10x the cost price. And here's what I came up with: picnic at the Botanic Gardens!

The initial plan was a no-brainer - throw together some food, grab the old beach sarongs and bring a set of poker cards or something. But halfway through, the prettyist in me took over. (Prettyist as in perfectionist, you know? Perfectionist strive for prefection. Prettyists strive for well, pretty.) There was a sudden, urge need for the whole thing to be pretty. The prettyist demanded "It's a BIRTHDAY. We CANNOT have mismatched sarongs and random tupperware sitting around. We must have a GLAM-A-ROUS picnic!"

So off I went around looking for cheap but colour-coordinated picnic stuffs. The picnic mats should match the cups which should match the serviettes, while the fork and spoon should match the food containers and blah bah blah. Dear Internet of Singapore, you will find it easy to find cheap picnic stuffs. You will also find it easy to find colour-coordinated picnic stuffs.

But when you combine the two criteria, IT IS NEXT TO IMPOSSIBLE! I went to Spotlight, then I went to Daiso, then I went to the party shop at Holland V, then I went to NTUC, then I went back to Spotlight again, and finally I bought some of the party stuffs in plain view of Glenn because there just wasn't time for me to make even more trips. Hahaha thank goodness the boy isn't too observant.

And in the end, we did have a rather pretty colour-coordinated picnic. I even decorated some trees, and I can't thank my bimbos enough for coming all the way down to help me out. I was real embarrassed to ask for help at first because this was how it had to go "Hey, can you help me set up a party that you're not invited to? That's totally not offensive right? You will still invite me to all your parties right? And I am still your best friend right? RIGHT???" Precisely because of that, I'm really, really thankful to my lovely girlfriends for offering to help. :D

My minions for the day and I, abusing the trees.

I think it turned out real pretty. (:

Glam little picnic!

I went COMPLETELY crazy with "glaming up" the picnic. I suddenly decided that there should be a centre piece in the middle of the picnic mats, and therefore I needed to get the sushi mat thingie. And I also decided I didn't want to deal with any leftovers, and since Glenn was very much amused by the noodle box we saw in Europe, I went hunting for some noodle boxes for the food.

And because the noodle boxes were so pretty, and I bought some twine to decorate the trees, I decided that I needed to tie some serviettes with them. Then because the fork was white and the spoon and blue, I had to add something blue to the serviette, so I bought some blue tape to personalize the cutlery.

Finally, I decided we should have some wine (the very word itself already sounds glam!) to make it REALLY glam. So I went to buy some disposable wine glasses, and at the last minute decided I should tag the wine glasses so that people don't mix up their glasses, and so that, well, they can match the cutlery sets.

I know, friends, I know. WHO ON EARTH tries to colour-coordinate a PICNIC? I just had to indulge the Martha Stewart in me for a day.

I wasn't very far away from stabbing myself in the throat with that fork halfway through tying the serviettes. Hahaha.

And Glenn, oh Glenn is the funniest person to surprise ever. The cover story was this: I was celebrating my very belated 21st birthday with Sarah, Peiyan and boyfriends and he simply HAD to be there. I even went to the extent of having a little fight with him about the clash of dates! Haha. Then I kept pestering him for the details of celebrations with his friends (who were all in cahoots with me to turn him down). The poor boy was so sad when everyone basically ignored his attempts to plan his own celebration! Hahaha.

So when I met him at the entrance and led him to where the whole party was waiting for him, he actually thought that his friends met up without asking him along! The silly boy only finally realized it was a surprise when I turned his head towards the decorated trees. Hahaha. Too funny!

"EH! What are you guys doing here!"

God bless this boy for matching my colour scheme.

I would have dyed the noodles blue if I could, believe me. Hahaha.

The birthday boy cutting the cake.

When all the food were wiped out, we had a little game of Pictionary. It's such a classic, and it never fails to entertain at gatherings and parties. Especially when you have friends who draw a single flower, and declare "That's all I can do, the rest is up to you guys to guess." when the word was ORCHARD. Hahaha.

See, the prettyist even demanded I decorate a jar for markers.

Desperately trying to draw a "tramp". Haha.

And finally, I just hope you had as much fun as I did, despite your total oblivion to my very important colour scheme. Haha. Happy 24th birthday, darling! (:

Photos stolen from Jun.

You can see her whole album here!