Lazy saturday night.

It's been raining the whole of yesterday. And a few days last week. I wonder who was the shithead who said that it only rains 5 days a year in San Diego. I was so depressed with the weather that I stayed in yesterday and watched dvds the whole night.

I caught this Singaporean movie called "Perth". I was so excited when I saw it at Blockbuster, simply because it's incredibly rare to find anything Singaporean in that store! It was kinda surreal watching it though, listening to the familiar Singaporean accent and Hokkien swear words in my room here. I wun recommend the movie though, it was kinda depressing towards the end.

Had good Mexican seafood at this really popular restaurant called "Casa Gualaranja" in Old town.


I had this dish called the Seafood Chimichanga (talk about cool names), and it's pretty much a fried burrito with lobster, fish and shrimps, coated in a jalepeno cream sauce. I can't put it to words, but the different tastes blended in very well, and it wasn't as oily as I thought the description would sound.


We also had the ceviche. For those who don't know what a ceviche is, it's pretty much fish preserved in vinegar and spices. It was pretty good, and leaves a very clean taste.


We had the deep fried ice cream, which I felt a little cheated at, just because I'm used to the truly deep fried green tea ice cream in japanese stores, and this was simply vanilla ice cream coated with deep fried cornflakes. It was alright. Will not order it again.

In short, get reservations if you decide to try out this place. And the margaritas are really good too!
Very happy people, as usual. :D

Do not stand at my grave and weep

I teared when I saw this bereavement poem...

Do not stand at my grave and weep;

I am not there. I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.

I am the diamond glints on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning's hush

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circled flight.

I am the soft stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry;

I am not there. I did not die.

Extremist

I am an extremist. I wonder if that's good or bad.

1) I like my water either very cold or hotter than lukewarm. I think lukewarm water has a funny taste to it.

2) I either eat a lot or eat almost nothing at all, hence my gastric condition.

3) I like to party the night away on certain nights, but if I decide to study, no one can nudge me from my armchair.

4) I like to get off work either early at work, or very very late. Getting off very very late can feel very satisfying sometimes.

5) If I like a certain dish from a certain restaurant, I can go there almost every day for the next two weeks until the server knows what I want (and this has happened pretty often. Ha.)

6) I like to be very happy all the time. Of course, life isn't all cotton candy and everything nice, but if I'm sad, I indulge in getting extremely depressed.

7) I like to wake up at extremely late hours. My friends should know this. Ha.

Okay, that's all I can think of right now. If I think of something else, I'll add onto it. These days, work in the lab has been very taxing, coupled with classes. Urgh. Sometimes, I hate grad school.

Chicago-bound!

It took the girls less than two days to convince me to go to Chicago for my birthday weekend. Ha.

Which also happens to be Chinese New Year.

Gonna meet Wenqi (plane) , Yvonne (car) and Nicole (train).

I was wondering if I should just save the money to get a nice birthday present for myself (aka a new bag! Heh.) but well, it's the experience that matters right?

So if you girls are reading my blog, you'd better make my birthday weekend good! Hohohoho.

Man, I'm so broke.

I wonder if I can get an advance on my allowance... Hmm.

I have to say though, Chicago is my favorite city of all cities in the states. It's like New York, without the filth and the slums.

Looking forward to it... :)

I-know-the-answer!

I was talking to Dev in class today, and he reminded me of a comment that Mike made the last time we went for lobster at Ole Madrid. We were talking about possible business ventures I think, and then Mike suddenly burst out saying " We should make a doll called KeiraDoll. She'll have a drawstring at her back, and when you pull it, she'll raise her hand and say "I know the answer !"

-___-

Okay this is pretty random, but I wanted to put it down cuz it's pretty amusing and annoying at the same time. Ha.

Speedy tour of SF, and jetlag

I must be getting old.

I didn't use to get sick after my long flights, but this time round, I got sick both times I got off the plane.

Sucks balls.

Anyways, been pretty jetlagged. It's 9ish on a Sunday morning, and people who know me know that it's almost a 0.01% chance that I will be awake at this hour on Sundays.
And I've been up since 7am too. Sigh.

Anyway, I have a secret to share. Beer!

The last time I got this scratchy throat/fever nonsense, I was like "fuck it" and proceeded to down 4 beers. The next day, I was absolutely fine! It's amazing!

So I had to try it this time, just to ascertain my observation. Lo and behold, I woke up today feeling so much better! The fever's gone, and so is the sore throat!

Leana, I tried to convince you to do the same thing, but alas, it fell on deaf ears. Ha. :P See, it works! I'm telling you. :)

Went to this hole-in-the wall beer place (Jose's) at downtown La Jolla last night. There was a lot of older pple sitting around drinking beer, but we had such a big crowd, it really didn't matter.
Noel and Meredith. Noel was obviously gone at this point. Apparently the guys have been drinking since 130 in the afternoon cuz of the football games going on.
Val and John. For once, John doesn't have the asian flush cuz he couldn't drink. Ha. Mike in the background with a weird expression on his face.
Tom has this signature point pose, so we were trying to imitate him. Not very successful.
Apparently the guys think they can do it better. Ha.

It was nice hanging out with them again. It's been a long time, especially with Meredith. :)

Met a friend on the plane, who took me on a whirlwind tour of San Francisco during my 3 hr layover. The last time I was in SF, it was pouring all 3 days and I didn't get to see shit. :( Took a lot of pictures, so tadaa!
I was excited for a while until I realized this isn't the golden gate bridge. It's the Bay bridge. The fog was so bad that I didn't end up being able to see the golden gate bridge at all. AGAIN! I must be cursed. :(

Apparently the trams are a landmark of the city.
Fisherman's Wharf
Some random pier.
Palace of fine arts. This place is soooo romantic, what with the pond and Roman architecture.See what I mean about not being able to see the GG bridge. This is supposedly the viewing point to see the bridge. WTF.

I love my cousin. :)

Looking back at the pictures, I have to mention something.

I love my cousin Mark! He's 17 this year, and we used to play together ever since we were kids. We would role play as Power Rangers, and play video games. Good times.

It was a pity that his whole family migrated to Melbourne, and I remember being bummed out about it.

Thinking back, it was probably a wise decision, because he has turned out well.

The young kid last time has turned into a charming, gentlemanly, witty, caring young adult, and from the looks of it, getting a lot of attention from the girls. :P

Hung out a lot with him the first week I was back, and it felt like we never left each other. The care, the concern is still there, and if anything, we've turned out more similar in terms of character and thinking than before!

Love you cuz. Hang in there, the 2 years of NS that lies ahead. :)

Notice!

Hey everyone, I finally could upload the pictures from my phone, so I posted an extensive food blog entry, marked Dec 25th. Being the computer idiot, I don't really know how to alter the date on it to be today, so if you're interested, please scroll down for it! :)

New year in Singapore...

Sorry for not writing in for so long, been busy with hanging out with my loved ones before I leave.

Anyways, as promised, pictures from the new year celebration!

YH, Yvonne, Wenqi, Qihui and I chose Angus steakhouse in Taka for our new year dinner. Angus steakhouse is a Japanese steakhouse which specializes in using miso-based sauces for their steaks. Been there before and I loved the steak, FYI for all you steak lovers. The medium rare steak I had was perfect, and the miso sauce will leave you salivating.

Anyways, back to the new year dinner. It was a five course dinner, and I even took the liberty of snapping a picture of the menu. Tadaa!

One look at the menu and you know the Japanese aren't exactly experts at sentence construction, but man can they cook!


The ocean trout tastes like salmon, for some reason, but the broccoli and garlic mesh at the bottom was helluva good. The mustard sauce wasn't overly creamy, and the caviar on the top was a good accompaniment to the trout.


The cream of potato soup with mussels wasn't spectacular, but it was tasty. And the mussels were tender and not overly cooked, which usually happens to mussels.


I wasn't too impressed with the duck liver mousse, maybe because I have such high expectations for pate, and I felt that the fish flakes on it distracts the taster from the duck liver flavor. I ended up eating the fish flakes separately from the mousse cuz I was quite fed up with the clash of flavors.

The steak was still bloody good, albeit a little dry (which I think is due to the high influx of customers on this day). It was tender, still juicy and bursting with flavor. Try eating the steak with a thick dab of butter for extra oomph!


The dessert fell a little flat for me, just because the "peach" yogurt only had a hint of peach flavor, and clashes terribly with the chocolate coating.


Five very contented people.


Went to butter factory after that, and we counted down on the platform. It was really heartwarming to celebrate the new year with close friends and doing our traditional group hugs. :) Hopefully next year, we can do this together for the third year in a row. :)

On a random note, I just realized that the famous Hokkien mee at Orchard's Food Republic opened a stall at the Hougang Mall. It was pretty good. The noodles were very flavorful (lies in the stock), though the prawns wasn't that fresh. Good overall, not great.


Also, I went on a photo shoot of sorts! Well, my friend is a photographer and he needs a subject for his abstract shots, so I agreed to help him. We went to Arab St, and I found quite a few charming spots. :)

I took this shot because I was wondering why people put dried leaves under their signboard. Any ideas?
I thought this was a very pretty lamp in a very desolate spot. Just looking at the colors makes me happy. :)
One of my photo shoot "set-up"s. :)
My friend was taking pictures of my legs, so I decided to take it too, though it was prolly not a very good angle. Ha.

On another random note, I went to Akashi at Paragon with my dad to get dinner, and I have to say, the food sucks. I wonder how they can charge such exorbitant sums of money for something so crappy. I had the tempura udon, and
1) the udon doesn't taste like udon, but some version of soba.
2) the tempura batter was overly oily and hard.
3) the tempura vegetables were kinda hard too.

I rest my case.

Went to Zouk with Lier and Coral. Lier and I have been clubbing buddies for a loooong time, and it was the first time we were clubbing together this break, so naturally I was looking forward to it. :) I had a lot of fun, just that it was too bad that she wasn't feeling well at the end of the night. :/ I love ya babe! :)
Cam-whoring. Sorry I cut a little of your face out Lier. Heh heh. Adds to the sense of mystique, don't you think? :D

Last but not least, I think Singaporeans are full of love this festive season, even the graffiti are showing hints of that. I was thinking about all the vulgar graffiti back in the states, and thought that this was funny. Ha.