the end of summer

the end of summer

3 weeks into summer and I realize that this is the last long summer holiday that I'll ever have. Penultimate year. Internships. Friends and boyfriend graduating. Other friends going away while time allows for long trips. I'm slowly beginning to realize that life only gets faster from here. There'd be no more lazy weekday afternoons for shopping, swimming and just hanging out; no more waking up at noon everyday; no more having the whole day to yourself, just watching Gossip Girl and reading a book.

For most of my life, each year has always been marked with a long summer break. A time for us to take stock of the first half of the year. A time for us to chill and find drive for the next half of the year. A time when days melt into one another and summer becomes one long hazy memory that's so mellow and sweet, like the dollop of honey that goes a long way in sweetening your cup of tea.

This summer, I found myself industriously hunting for an internship and when I finally land myself with one, I feel like someone stole my jar of honey - summer's cut short. No more languid afternoons. No more spontaneous day trips. No more "let's just pack up and leave" attitude.

Now I think I'm beginning to understand why people just quit their jobs and become wayfarers for awhile. It's because they've kept summer in their hearts all along. I hope I will too, when I finally leave school next summer.

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.

I left my heart and soul…

i left my heart and soul...


New York. Montreal. Paris. Rome. Venice. Santorini. Amsterdam. London. Glasgow. I think I left my heart and soul all over the world. It’s been three weeks, and every other night I find myself dreaming of all these places, dreaming up new homes that could have been or better still, could be, sometime in the near future.

It’s a funny notion though. Home was always been a fixed entity to me. But in the past year, I’ve spent nights in so many different rooms, slept on so many different beds and called 2 cities in separate continents home.

I miss the complete freedom I had in Montreal. Living alone and arranging everything around nobody else but me was liberating. I decide when I want to do the laundry. I decide what time I want to go to bed. I decide that I can have breakfast food for lunch everyday. I decide that I can live alone.

I loved the one-month old home we had in Glasgow. The long, long evenings, the daily walks along the river, the colds nights of us falling asleep next to each other, and then the simple act of drawing the blinds up in the morning. The redundancy of scheduling dates because we come home to each other. The thought of us, just us, living and building a life in another part of the world.

And then there were those days where we fall asleep in one city and wake up in another the next day. Those were the days where we live and breathe a whole new culture every single day. Those were the days we stood shoulder-to-shoulder on an unknown street corner, trying to read an unfamiliar map.

Those were the days… And now, back in Singapore, all I really want to do is to dive right back into those gorgeous photographs and relive those moments. Slowly, I find myself looking at cities in which we might build ourselves a home. Suddenly, I can’t wait to grow up. I can't wait to pack up all over again and find those pieces of my heart.

I don’t know if they’ll call this widening your horizons or withdrawal. I’d call it finding a new dream.

one big family

one big family

Glenn's little sister turns 18.

This is how it is at every celebration with Glenn's family - everyone takes time off and comes together. This is when I start to miss home and family - grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins. This is when I realize... big groups are nightmares for waiters-turned-photographers - I don't understand how the waiter missed Glenn altogether TWICE; he was sitting on the far right, NEAREST to the waiter. So I photoshopped him in. Hahaha.

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.

falling for you

falling for you

Why I fell for G - too much food at Marché.

I spent this Valentine's being late, setting a new record for speed-shopping for presents and ogling at Natalie Portman at Black Swan. Later in the evening, I made sure Glenn remembered this day well and good - I broke my good old sturdy swivel chair while leaning in to give him a kiss, and fell onto the floor with a loud "blop!". He broke out in fits of laughter while I tried to glare at him. Yeahyeah, a very romantic Valentine's Day to you too.

I remember Hamburg

I remember Hamburg

I remember Hamburg. And I want to write a song, or a story, so that you will remember Hamburg as I do.

The strange woman we kept running into, in her queer dress. It wasn't loud and flamboyant, nor was it anything striking to remember by. It was stark and stern, her face without a smile. We were placing our orders by a roadside cafe, smiling and gesturing to the waitress who didn't speak the same language. The strange woman was tall and alone, marching on with her eyes set on a horizon we couldn't see. I remember her roaming the streets of Hamburg. I remember my backward glance at her as she walked on. I remember Hamburg.

The blue lake with its white boats. The blue sky with its white clouds. We talked and laughed and built castles in the sky. You held my hand and I smiled in secret, dropping a coin on the pavement, making a wish by my own tradition. I close my eyes now and I can feel the German breeze in my face and hear the song of ducks splashing in the water. Small white petals floating in the air, dancing, like fairy dusts, like it was snowing in spring. I remember my fascination and endless questions. I remember you laughing. I remember Hamburg.

The dark, Gothic buildings looming on the opposite shore, beckoning. Landmarks of a strange land. It was a destination, a terminus for tourists on a pilgrimage. It was a long walk around the lake. We stopped for pictures, framing the city as we remember it. The buildings have names and stories, but I don't quite remember them. Yet I remember the pair of friends who walked by as we crossed empty streets to get to the aged cathedrals. I remember being the only ones in the quadrangle, as if Hamburg belonged to us. I remember Hamburg.

The bright orange that decked the streets, people cheering. 11pm and the sky was still bright. It was a nation at war, eleven warriors in black against eleven others. We marveled at the roar of the city. I bought a flag, striped black, orange and yellow, an emblem of my transient loyalty. You holler with the boys, the patriots, the vagabonds and the uniformed men. I remember the old gentleman, with his white hair, black suit and brown walking stick, smiling with a gap in his teeth and wrinkles around his mouth as we gave our seat to him. I remember the Ghanaian on the subway, the loner wayfarer in a foreign land, standing by his homeland. I remember the rest of Hamburg smiling at him, a city celebrating its country's victory, embracing all who have come to Hamburg. I remember Hamburg.

I remember Hamburg. Do you?

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!