LASIK: Post Op

Having almost a perfect vision now ;) The few days post surgery were the darkest moments of my life (read: hibernating in dark rooms and shades), in the good sense! :D

I donated specky away at the clinic. Hopefully the 750, 800 could be of use to someone else as *erhemz* shortsighted as me. Can you believe it? It's 6/6 now! and the feeling's fabulous!

But nothing quite beat the *exasperated I have nothing to do!* feeling over the healing days. I finally realised the importance of teevees and computers in our lives! Thank God for LADIO invention!! I had my trusty Ipod music blasting beside me the whole time whilst I drift off and woke up from slumber to drop the antibioticss. 

My first 4 days were spent

LIKE THAT

Awwwww....what can I do without my little angle? He was curious about mummy's indoor shades and was just beside me the whole time! I ve got nothing to complain already!

And LOOK what I see when I get up from bed? 

PERFECT (yes! 6/6) view of The Dog!

No more scrambling of the specky! Mur doesnt get woken up in the process!

And I get to SEE the cutests moments! awwwwwwwwwwwww... he was doing his usual cutie doggy stretch in his sleep....

well... I did have some fun on Day 5 though...

1 week no gym, no pilates, no yoga, no run....I kinda asked for permission to climb trees and do flying fox and Doctor was a-okay! :D

So there I was! Flying-foxing across the Bedok Reservoir!

With a teeny weeny bit of secret: Guess where I put my 2-hourly eyedrops?!

In the cleavage!!! pocket of the sports bra :D

It's been 13 days post op and I AM LOVING IT!!

Rabbit Year!

Ushering in the Hoppy New Year!!

Having grown up a little more each year, I begin to realise CNY isnt just about collecting ang bows, snacking on the table-ful of goodies and falling asleep in front of the teevee while the parents caught up with the adults over MJ. It is about loving, caring, respecting the elders, giving and catching up with close kins you have never had the chance to meet up (much/at all) during the year.

We took the chance to announce Our Big Day.

It is also a good time to remember the less fortunate - We cleared out 3 big bags of clothes and brought them to The Salvation Army on the eve. We used to just dump them at the void deck and wait for the bulk collection truck from the Town Council.

We saved the table that is older than me from going down to the bulk collection point. It became the focal structure in the balcony, together with some greens Mom and I put together for the festive season. Daisy was fuschia! 

Did up all final CNY shopping. Kaypoh Murphy checked all out.

The new range of charms for the Rabbit Year! 

N got me my crocodile 

Kidnapped Murphy's playmate home before reunion dinner on the eve.

Day 2 of CNY was spent at 2nd aunt's house. New addition to the household!! Mommy displaying her nannying skills. Seeing how the new mummies around me fluster over their babies, find it troublesome to bring their baby out, I think my mom did a terrific job bringing all of us up! I was 5 when she had the 2nd sister. I was 8 and xian was 3 when she had our 3rd sister. And those days, without a car, she SINGLEHANDEDLY brought all three of us out to gaigai when dad was at work!! Getting old makes you emo over such things. bleah.

Alot of such feastsssssss + lou hei awaited us at EVERY house we visited. I visited 7 houses over the past 4 days. Make that 3 days, cos 3rd day was actually spent snoozing from 6AM - 2PM and 6PM - 8PM cos we did an overnight MJ the day before.

O_o"

Traditional Lou Hei to toss the food high up into the air while saying good blessings at every toss. The higher, the better.

And the louder, the better.......

We were so noisy that we shocked a baby....

('O') What are the adults doing?!?!?!?!

Happy Chinese New Year!!!!! :) 

Excuse me, who are you?

10 years down the road...I might wake up to this fei zai beside me...face puffed beyond recognition...

N assured me this will be in 10 years' time... :S

Simply because we have been pigging out A LOT. Weekdays and weekends. And when things start to get a little less active for us, I cant imagine the worst!

alot of chinese foods these 2 months! yummmmmeh!! Cant hide chinese roots!

Tunglok Signature (Vivo) - 15 Dec 2010 (Wednesday)

Forget the lobster. Aint worth the moohlah$. Mango sago served in young coconut with a vanilla icecream is worth returning for... we went back the following week ;p

Tunglok Signature (Vivo) - 22 Dec 2010 (Wednesday)

Their bamboo clams are LOVES!! They do it better than NO SIGNBOARD, and cheaper too!!! :) And of course! the dessert! :):)

The Asian Kitchen (NEX) - 9 Jan 2011 (Sunday)

With sooo much praises for this place that N&I repeatedly go back to.. brought my parents to this outlet near homeland to try. Now i have got 3 must-order dishes from this place!!

1. salted egg yolk french beans

2. the danghoon that is named ants climbing up the tree (directly translated from chinese). Dont be fooled by its cheena pok name. It is super yummy!

 3. Crispy garlic sweet sour pork!!! (NEW)

Nonya and Baba Peranakan (Vivo) - 6 Jan 2011 (Thursday)

Over at No Signboard last week and was surprised by the crowd - mostly ang mohs! I think thats the default place most hosts would think of bringing overseas friends to for a local feast anyway... I think most locals would, like me, prefer the usual kind of chilli crabs served in any kopitiams and which gives a better value for $$$ (more egg-y).

I wonder what's for dinner this week :):) Definitely an-hour long bike session later this evening! huffpuffhuffpuff! All in the name of moooore food!

Dont Stop Movin'

To neutralise our horrendous pig-out sessions that claim at least 50% of this space, here is one of our active weekends!

A virgin experience - lack of which denies me right to exclaim my pride of being Singaporean!

I dont know why I have never had the chance to venture into this island that is only a 5 min (or rather, a S$2.50) boat ride away...;p Additional S$1 if you BYOB (bring your own bike)

The ride was a lil bumpy, a lil muddy (i was whining about the new adi shoes!) and with a lil bit of mozzie attack and a lot of killer upslopes! But it was all worth the bumps and burns and bites cos it feels soooooo good after! :)

Feels so good. FEEEEEELS soooooo good to have the wind in my face! And to be sooo close to nature!!! :) It's good to do this in a huge group. Witnessed the one-people team spirit. ;p

We spotted a cute lil furball..

Awwwwwwwwwwww!

Awwwwwwwwwww Awwwwwwwwwwwwww

Getting Close

...to NATURE...

Sunday was a No Dive day for us as we were flying off the following morning. Trips like this make you a lazy bum. You dont plan ahead. We could always fall back on the sun, sea and sand to slowly while those hours away.  

There is also the default choice of sleeping in, watching the numerous funny hongkong shows on the satellite TV in our room, binge on chips and colas. Yes. We are such lazyasses! :D BUT we are on holiday!!!

We woke up early though, and got to send the other couple off on their 2-hour drive out to a muck dive spot. Since we were up so bright and early, and had a looong day ahead, I decided to google a bit on "What to do in Manado". Lonely Planet did have some good suggestions :)

1) TAMAHON - a market that sells produce which may make you squirm. Bat meat and dog meat. I knew what I was going to see but I insisted on going anyway. Regardless the love I have for dogs and the righteousness I feel against dog-feeding, this was after all just another kind of meat in another country. What I didnt expect to see was a cageful of livestock piled on top of one another at the entrance of the market. AND they were yelping helplessly and staring at you with those emotional eyes. I couldnt bring myself to see more, much less take any photo.

2) TANGKOKO - A nature reserve about 60km from Manado, about a 2-hour car ride from our resort. It is said to be the habitat to one of the unique monkey species - the Tarsius Monkey. We were offered an alternative suggestion to a zoo-like place which is much nearer and has guaranteed sighting. But we chose to do things the harder way.

Foreigners have to pay about S$12 each to enter the nature reserve. It's perhaps a token payment for the maintenance of the only toilets erected at the entrance, the wear and tear of the orange ribbons which serve as path guides within the reserve. I assume the staffs (rangers and guards at entrance) are paid by the government since they must have been employed by the government. Other than that, there is nothing much to maintain in a nature reserve. The walking paths are left au naturale, broken trunks are left to rot by themselves, there are no shelters inside for tired feet or peltering rain, no toilet or water stops, no fanciful bridge across the canopy...So I have no idea why we were made to pay such a big token sum. After all, well maintained nature reserves are FREE FOR ALL in SINGAPORE!!

I italicised foreigners because we saw a bunch of locals making merry by the beach inside, but the registration record (also the payment record book) only showed that there was only 1 more german couple before us that day.

But I really wanted to experience a nature's walk to hunt for the tarsius la.

So off we went! Remember we are on holiday! So no GRUMBLING!

 The resident tarsius(s) live in this tree.

 Oh ya! S$12 also paid for a bottle of 3 live grasshoppers as baits!

And we saw one of the cutestest monkey!!

 There was another species of the black monkey living inside there...

What was most special, was it BUM!! :D

Naked bum!

We sure went back sticky but happy and got ready for dinner night out!

Nasi Kuning - this is a specialty of Manado. We are lucky to have a Manadese friend who brought us to the real deal! Alternatively, the airport will also have (but doesnt taste as nice!) 

The last thing we must eat at the airport.

 And we confirm it doesnt taste as good. But beggars cannot choose! And if you havent tried those real yummy ones, this would perhaps fare better!

Back in Singapore, we also did a nature's trail last Sunday...man made bridge over canopy, clear road signs, water and toilet stop, and alot of easy sightings of monkeys!

And best of all....

FREE OF CHARGE!!!!

To both locals and foreigners!!!

***Presenting our HSBC Treetop Walk***

***with these people***

we saw a sunbathing lizard

 and a mama and baby monkey pair

 The bridge over canopy

 Thorn among the roses - twig among the foliages?

 Sometimes life is all about how you choose to live it, and how you choose to see things.

Go Malay I

I think N and I are quite adventurous when it comes to food. We would travel places, hunt down the tiniest corner and go to the deepest wilderness to get our food. When one meets our expectations, we would bookmark it, and be return foodies forever :)

However, we really do love to have great company on these food trips sometimes..

We really miss the presence of the Japs :(

The Original River Valley Nasi Padang

Listed as one of the CEO's choice in Business Times! This Nasi Padang stall is right opposite Great World City, one of our frequented paktor haunts now. Hence, we made a trip over one Sunday afternoon.

There are no names for our selections. Just choose whatever rocks your socks when you are there. They are bound to be yummy! The only bad thing is, food is not kept hot... So expect to have some warm or cold, but still yummy food!

Fried chicken in chilli

Fluffy telur!!

Beef or mutton rendang!! - I must learn this dish from N's mum!

Sayur!

we asked for a bowl of curry

and heapsssss of chilli!!!

it was a tongue burning, heart warming afternoon

Would be great if the food was hot

Guess we ll have to go there in the morning!

And on another occassion, we went back to this verrrrrry frequented stingray stall in Jurong West :p I still dont have the exact address, cos N drives me there everytime! Not that i dont want to share... Join us in our next rendezvous! Satisfaction guaranteed!!

And we also headed on to Geyland for some dinner + supper. The famous dou hua you tiao now has new taiwanese menu!

Verdict: the xianlongbaos sucks. Dont bother. It's not juicy AT ALL.

On a sidenote: N and I just found a common understanding to each other's parenting style because of baby J.

Go Indian (Part II)

We have an exotic food fetish lately. Wanted to learn about and try out more of such local delights that are easily available in our multi-cultural society. 

Continuing from our first Indian food expedition from HERE, N got hooked on the NAANS and we decided to venture into another Indian restaurant at Race Course Road (somewhere in the heart of Little India) on Thursday night.

 Delhi Restaurant - Race Course Road

They will usually start you up with the appetizer. The very scarce piece of cracker when you order nasi briyani. It is called the

PAPADUM

Repeat after me with a 2 head shakes left and right ;p

So next time, when you go to any indian stall to order, please do not make the same mistake as me. It is not called the Keropok... :p

The sourish green dip for Papadum.

Then came the mains. They sell an assortment of NAANS - garlics, onions, cheese, butter, plain (i think there are some more on the menu, but am with unfamiliar indian herbs). That will be the carbs if you are not ordering rice/noodles.

We chose 2 flavours of NAANS. Garlic and plain. It took me quite a while to learn to appreciate these fluffy stuff that look almost similar to roti pratas, yet not as savoury.  

To eat these, you must order some dishes with gravy. Most of the indian meat and vege dishes are cooked in gravy of some sorts. If in doubt, ask the waiters/waitresses.

We ordered the Chicken Tika Masala. Chicken Tika would be just the fried chicken, without gravy. The masala is the gravy. :) So dont order the wrong one if you need dips for NAANS! :)

Chicken Tika Masala

The vege menu spoke to us in a weird language. So we told the kind waitress to recommend us something good. When the COTTAGE CHEESE was mentioned, there was no need for further recommendation. We settled for that almost immediately! 

Spinach in Cottage Cheese 

I was quite amazed by the way Indians eat their vegetables. All mothers with fussy eaters should try this at home. The vege was grinded to nothingness. It was almost like we were eating cheese with spinach gravy, instead of the other way round.. :)

We have just upped another level into our cultural food tasting. And will definitely be back there for more! On a weekday! :p

You know, when the roads and the open fields are less crowded..