of cny eve dinner, jogoya and karaoke no.3

Female artistes' songs I am currently lovin' - "If you seek Amy" (Britney Spears), "Reach Out" (Hilary Duff), "Fly on the Wall" (Miley Cyrus), "Sober" (Pink) and "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield).

Haih...I am so in love with Seungri, the youngest member of Big Bang as he makes his solo debut in an a la Justin Timberlake video.

-linkie-

___________________________________

I was looking through my camera's memory cards and found some photos that I had forgotten to upload into my laptop. These are pics taken with my family on Chinese New Year's Eve, the must-have reunion dinner.

-the array of exquisite home-cooked dishes-

-minus my uncle the chef who took this photo-

Date: 23rd February 2009

Venue: Jogoya StarHill

Activity: Buffet dinner with roommate

A few weeks back, Beng Beng or BB, my roommate, had a BUY ONE FREE ONE meal voucher for Jogoya. Since both of us had never been there and we did not want to waste the voucher, we decided to head on to Jogoya on Monday night, after classes.

It was my first time attempting to drive to the Bukit Bintang area from Setapak. Although I can drive, I am absolutely horrible in remembering roads. Until today, I still do not know the name of roads, except roads that I lived in or where my schools are. Other than that, I am in a complete blur.

So after making a few wrong turns and U-turns, we finally made our way to Starhill and to the Relish floor where Jogoya is situated.

After paying RM114.40 for 2 pax (I was told by BB that it originally costs Rm101 per pax), we made our way inside. Eventhough the name sounds Japanese, I heard it was actually owned by a Taiwanese. And the food there isn't 100% authentically Japanese, as I soon discovered. There were Western-style, and also Chinese-style cuisine. So good news for the non-raw-food eating type.

-snapshots of me and BB throughout the night as we attempted to try all the food-

Good thing about the buffet here is that they do not charged you for leftovers, unlike Sushi Station. BB was so funny because she only like, took one bite of her food and then threw the rest away because she wanted to try all the food. But she only did it in the beginning, and she finished up all the food she took in later helpings.

-these are some of the food we tried. We could not managed to try everything because there were too much and let's face it, we both are not huge eaters-

We originally took the food pics for our other roommate, Suz M, who did not want to join us due to money constraint and her dislike of Japanese dishes.

-dessert! my favourite, yum yum! I once told someone I did not care what food the buffet offers as long as they have varieties of desserts!-

-secretly took this photos of how Jogoya looks like inside. lol-

-other pics of me and BB as we enjoyed ourselves in Jogoya-

We both also stopped by Pavillion to take some photos after we left StarHill.

-Pavillion is celebrating its 1st anniversary-

Needless to say, that night, me and BB ate to our hearts' contents. So much so that we both were feeling a little sick the next day.

Date: 25th February 2009
Venue: Green Box Sungei Wang
Activity: Karaoke session with housemates

My housemates and I had already planned have a karaoke session after the mid-sems week. Luckily, Ah Wei and I had no lab practical that day, so together with our Biomed housemates, we went on our first karaoke outing.

This is my third time going to a karaoke joint despite rejecting numerous invites before this.

-the five of us-

The reasons I seldom visit these singing joints is firstly, those who always invite me are Chinese-ed, meaning they will sing a lot of Mandopop songs, which I don't mind because I listened to them too. The only problem is that I do not know how to read Chinese characters, hence I cannot sing along. Secondly is because, I am so paiseh to want to sing in front of people, because to be honest, singing was never my biggest strength. Yes, I enjoyed giving critiques to those singer wannabes on "American Idol" but in real life, I can barely hold the mic and sing. So I always found my karaoke outings to be quite boring and a little wasting money-lor.

But this time around, I did enjoyed myself. Why? Well, firstly, I was not the only English-ed in the room. Hehe. My roommate, Suz M, is also a banana like me. So that made me feel not so isolated like previously. And then, the night before, Ah Wei helped me to look for pinyin lyrics online so that I would not be left out when they sing those Mandarin songs. Like me, Suz M also had a collection of pinyin lyrics so together, we both could sing almost all the songs they picked that day.

-a collage of our fun time in green box-

From the mesh-up above, you can spot me and Suz M holding up song lyrics. Lol. Then there was the "Sarawak S.H.E.s" -MeiChen, NgiikLing and Wei2; Suz M trying to give those very fake natural poses (she is such a poser =.=!!!) and those funny faces that Ah Wei always gives.

-yay!!! we sang for 3 hours straight!!!-

And so that ends my week filled with activities to relieve those stress after mid-sems. However, it was also a week burdened with so so so many assignments. So many that I keep forgetting who my group members are because we were divided into so many different groups for each assignment we had. Not to mention, those pain-killing lab reports whose results I have to modify type.

If you don't believe me, just go ahead and see the msn. Every of my Pharmacy coursemates will write something with the word "assignment" on their personal message. Haih...

cny 2009: days one to six and fifteen

I feel so guilty that I did not back-up my files before this. Now when my little buddy asks me for previous assignments, I had to borrowed from my coursemates. Lesson learned: BACK-UP your files!

___________________________________________

I am going back to Setapak tonight. How fast time passes when one is not studying. But before I go back to school, I want to update my Chinese New Year 2009 post first.

Well, this year's celebration is no different than previous year. I had just one week break, but in that one week, the first six days were kinda busy (with lots of food!).

~DAY ONE~

Venue: Grand uncle's house in PJ
Activity: House-visiting with the family on my late Grandmother's side. After that, movie with cousins.

-photos are taken in my uncle's house, just before we went together to PJ-

-like last year, cousins and me went to catch a movie. This time in Leisure Mall. We watched "All's Well Ends Well 2009". I thought it was really hilarious-

~DAY TWO~

Venue: Grandaunt's house as well as my kau mo's side of the family in Serdang
Activity: House-visiting and lots of mahjong

-photos taken in my house and my uncle's house-

-my uncle and his wife whipped up a scrumptious meal-

-in one of our gambling rounds of blackjack where my cousin Deric is the dealer, all three of us girls (Vivien, Sher Li and myself) ended up with blackjacks and he had to pay double to all 3 of us. Can you imagine that, 3 out of 4 are blackjacks! What are the odds of that happening?-

~DAY THREE~

Venue: Mid Valley
Activity: Watch movie with Mom

-Mid Valley is full of people and CNY decor-

Mom and I had lunch at Dragon-i, finally trying their very famous "siu long bao" and I must say, it was really good. I also tried their "la mian". Although it looks like a small portion, but as they say, looks can be deceiving. I was so full after lunch.

Mom and I took a look at their exhibition because I wanted to take some photos. I was particularly fascinated by the stall vendor selling antiques. The old-school Shanghai-esque advertisement posters were my favourite.

We watched "Bride Wars" movie. I guess I was too hyped up about the movie because it sort of felt under par, in my opinion. I was quite underwhelmed after the movie. I guess, all this wedding dreams and playing tricks on one another seems a little too juvenile and infantile for my liking.

~DAY FOUR~

Venue: Hou Hou Mei Curry Fish Head restaurant
Activity: Dinner with family

How we ended here was actually a misunderstanding between myself and Mom's part. You see, Mom wanted to treat the family dinner. Before this, she had tried curry fish head in this restaurant in Setapak and she enjoyed it very much but she could not remember what was the name of the place. And not too long ago, I myself had curry fish head in Setapak. So we both thought it was the same place. But it was not. So we ended up going to the same place I went for my Pharmacy 2nd-year reunion dinner.

-we also had yee sang, my favourite-

-after that, we headed to my uncle's house where I had more mahjong with my cousins-

~DAY FIVE~

Venue: Friends' houses and Kang San Ea restaurant for dinner
Activity: House-visiting with BF Classmates and then dinner

Thanks to Ah Len and Phon who planned everything, this year I was able to be part of the BF Classmates CNY celebration. We went house-visiting starting at noon all the way till night when we had dinner in Korean Village.

-kianti, eileen, soo ee, len yi, phon, li ling, waiyin and myself. vincent and phak hoe joined us for dinner afterwards-

So we went to everyone's houses with the exception of eileen's and soo ee's. Lots of angpows. Lol.

-in kianti's house, we entertained ourselves with "jinami" and karaoke-

Wanting to try something different, we had dinner in this Korean BBQ restaurant which serves really authentic Korean cuisine. Brings back memories of my 2005 Korea trip. One day, when I have enough money, I will definitely go back there again.

~DAY SIX~

Venue: My mom's cousin's house in Gombak.
Activity: Dinner that my mom's cousin cooked on her own. She is a splendid cook!

My mom's cousin is a very good cook. I over-stuffed myself with her food. Played some blackjack where I only won RM2 after playing for like, 3 hours!

-Mom and I went purple. Haha-

~DAY FIFTEEN~

Venue: My uncle's house.
Activity: Chap Goh Mei dinner

Whilst my housemates went to Tong Jieng restaurant for their own Chap Goh Mei dinner, Mom picked me up to have dinner in my uncle's house.

-the bevy of delightful dishes that my uncle and his wife so wonderfully crafted and decorated-

-and that marks the end of my CNY this year. Cannot wait for next year's!-

the comeback: i was on a nineteen days hiatus

Recently my Mom went to a fortune-teller who said that I was not right for this science-based Pharmacy course as I was more inclined towards Arts. My opinion: I am a Scienart. Why can't we all get along now?

_________________________________________

Yessss, I am finally back in front of my laptop and blogging. Have been itching to do so for such a very long time, not that there were much going on in my life during my short hiatus away from blogging.

After the one week Chinese New Year break, it finally hit me that I had an enormous amount of notes yet to be dissected and that is when I made a drastic move to not go back home for the upcoming weeks until my mid-semester exams are over. Bye bye television, bye bye radio, bye bye my internet line and bye bye my comfy bed. Hello to lots of coffee/caffeine every night, and sleep deprived nights. Yes, that was basically my student life, preparing for exams and trust me, I was not the only one.

I made a conscious decision at the beginning of this year that I would do my very best to improve my grades. No more procrastination and definitely no more last-minute studies. It was way too stressful last semester when I had to cramped everything in. Not to mention the fact that everyone else seemed so well-prepared except yours truly.

Hence, I did not blog ever since I returned to Setapak. Just finish my exams yesterday. Still a bit groggy from all the lack of sleep but cannot resist, have to blog!

Mid-sems was a killer. Very very very difficult, hands down. Period. No need any more elaboration. Now all I can think about is to really give in more effort for my finals in May.

Yeahhh...finally I finish uploading all my CNY photos. Will blog about it soon. Best thing about CNY? Getting to wear new clothes!!! I kinda set a record among my friends for the amount of brand-new CNY clothes, but it is only because I went on a shopping trip to Bangkok. Ok-lar, I admit I have quite a fetish for shopping. But so do most of the female population ok?

I realized there were some photos in my handphone that I had wanted to post but kinda forgotten. The collage above are taken in Setapak's Old Town Kopitiam. I think it was the Friday just before the Chinese New Year break. Out of the seven of us, only four of us remained in Setapak that day, yet to return home. MeiChieng, AiLi, WeiWei and myself. So we decided to give ourselves a treat that night and had dinner in Old Town. The girls didn't want to take pics because they said they were not dressed in nice attire. Just basic T-shirt and shorts, lol.

This was taken at the Plaza Prima carpark (except the photo on bottom left). When we returned home one day, Ah wei and I saw this newlyweds car with such a cute snoopy decor in the front. So what we do? Take photo with it lar, of course. The other photo was taken when ah wei secretly, without all of us knowing, went and dyed her hair. Gave me a shock when she came back. Last sem, she permed her hair. This sem, she dyed her hair. I wondered what she will do next sem. Only Tze Im and I remained as the "natural hair" duo, as we aptly called ourselves. We have never done any hair straightening, perming or any dye jobs as of yet.

Now, taking about carparks, it makes a really depressing topic for me. You see, during this three weeks time of absence from this blog, I encountered lots of problems regarding my car park in Plaza. The worst thing was the fact that the people involved were my very own coursemates. It is sad that sometimes, the most difficult thing in this world is sadly, not exams, but PEOPLE. Negotiating with people is definitely not my biggest trait. But thanks to Wai Kuan, Ah Wei, my roommates, BB and Suzane, who helped me fight for what I feel is my right, now everything is settled.

I hope those people I am referring to, do not read my blog. I am sorry to KS and her housemates. I know I said I wanted to rent their carpark at first but they were being so unreasonable and difficult to talk to that I think it was wise to not rent from them because I do not want any more akwardness with my own coursemates. I hope they understand and do not hold any grudge against me.

But I am definitely not sorry for YX and her Physio housemates. I am so sorely disappointed in these people for backing out on their words and making me go through such a troublesome ordeal for something that was obviously not my fault. All I can say is one is one, and two is two. Once you make a deal with someone who gives you profit every month, you just cannot back out on your words once you start the business deal. If you have anything to say, just say it before I give you money. How can you start coming up with all this terms and conditions after you took someone else's money. You guys may not be fat physically, but really fat liars.

But I am all over it already. I am glad they finally caved in, which I think they should have done right from the very beginning. If they did not, I would probably boycott them and blacklist them. It is people like this that makes my life so miserable. Thank you very much to Wai Kuan, my good friend who stood for me during this entire ordeal. I really feel guilty for putting her thru this.

Okay, now that I have vent out my anger, here is something totally on another note:

I HAVE FINALLY WATCHED "BECOMING JANE"!!!!!!!

And by george, James McAvoy is so freakin' hot. I have wanted to watch this movie ever since I found out that James is in it. Then, Jagdeesh, my good friend, who is also a huge "Pride and Prejudice" fan (of the book, not the movie) highly recommended me to watch this movie. Tried to download it but took forever, Speedy don't have it so finally I just bought the pirated DVD.

Based on the life of Jane Austen, it tells of her own romantic love story, and the events leading to her writing one of the most well-known literary novels of all time, "Pride and Prejudice". This movie makes me want to pick up my own copy and re-read it again.

I absolutely lurve the whole English setting of this movie as well as the quirky dialogues and the original storyline. It also gives a sense of women empowerment as Jane was very outspoken and rebellious despite women during her time were condemned to be meek and obedient.

Right, one last thing. I finally changed my blog's layout and header!!! Yup, have to make my comeback somehow more memorable. But really, I would prefer to do an original layout like Denise but now is not really the time, as I am still very busy. Maybe during the holidays, I will finally take some time to go learn to design a layout.

Thanks to Ah Wei, the A-5-5 bloggers have caught the Picasa bug. I decided to start doing photo collages to minimised the length of my posts. Although it can be quite tedious, I am happy with the outcome. Me is satisfied;)

bangkok trip: part III # i am a shopaholic!

I wanna go Hong Kong and meet all the TVB HK stars!

____________________________________________________________

This is going to be the last part about my Bangkok trip last Christmas.

I went there to shop for some new CNY togs and thanks to Li Ling, who showed me some cool places with really good bargains, I got more than what I had hoped for.

So the following are the few shopping places we went to in Bangkok and what I loved in each of these places.

(Note: 10baht is approximately RM1.00)

1) Platinum Wholesale Shopping Mall

This is the first place we went shopping in. Made up of 6 floors filled with clothes, shoes, bags and accessories.

Here is what you should know: Platinum is a great place to shop for clothes because they have really, some of the trendiest-looking clothes here. Clothes you won't normally be able to find in KL, you can find it here. And in a fraction of the price too. Of course, if you want to buy in wholesale prices, you need to get a minimum of three pieces in different colours (or same). My trick? Since I don't want to get 3 pieces of same design, I usually share with friends.

Although the clothes are relatively cheap, the other stuff like bags, shoes and accessories are pretty expensive. The bags are really really nice and stylish but I couldn't find any bags I really like because I was hunting for smaller bags but here, they sell a lot of oversized bags. Unlike me, I think my shopping buddy, Wai Yin, got a lot of great-looking bags.

As for the shoes, trust me, if you live by the motto, "Beauty is pain", then you will love the shoes here. If not, there are also lots of nice-looking flats available.

The accessories, on the contrary, are not cheap, even in wholesale prices. Which makes us assumed that they are probably imported from China or somewhere. But nevertheless, the earrings and necklaces are really pretty.

A tip I would give is that, eventhough the 5th floor houses the accessories sections, there are other shops downstairs that sell same items but a little bit cheaper. For instance, waist cinchers selling for 150 baht downstairs rather than 180baht upstairs and headbands for only 19baht downstairs, better than 70baht upstairs.

-a mascot we saw promoting magazines-

-picture source-

-one of my favourite buys is this dress for only 130baht (wholesale price)-

-I saw these belts online selling for RM25++ and I got them for 150baht each-

-picture source-

-online boutique selling exact same ones for RM26-

-I also bought this edgy cotton LBD for 16obaht-

2) Wholesale markets around Pratunam area

First Hotel was situated around the Pratunam area. A short walk away leads us to this road lined with many wholesale shops. I tell you, I was like a little child in a candy store here. Everything was so so cheap and I wish I could buy everything if it isn't because I had a budget to stick to.

Bags and shoes are also pretty cheap here. Love love the T-shirts. Shorts are also cheap but because I have a big butt and cannot try (because they are by the roadside) so dare not buy. If you are XS, S or M, then it is practically shopping haven for you.

-the roads are pretty narrow and crowded with lots of people-

-everyone went crazy for the huge stack of printed cardis (50baht!) and various tank tops of all colours (30baht)-

-picture source-

-I bought this butterfly-printed one, which I later saw in Times Square selling for RM10-

-I also love Bangkok cute T-shirts. Only 50baht each. WaiYin bought so many to last her whole year-

-my favourite shops were selling these candy-coloured tops and dresses. I picked 3 of these for the wholesale price of 100baht each-

-picture source- and -picture source-

-I saw my yellow dress online selling for RM27 and RM30 respectively but Times Sq is only selling for RM20-

3) Siam Paragon Shopping Complex

On the 3rd day, after going to Chatuchak, we took a train to Siam Paragon just to have a look. It is like the Pavillion in Kl, only much much bigger.

-our first time embarking Bangkok's own version of our M'sia's LRT-

-we passed by Victory Monument-

-we had to count the stops because we couldn't understand the language-

-decked out in gigantuos Christmas decor outside-

-need to go through scanner just to go in-

4) MBK Center Shopping Mall

A short walk from Siam Paragon brings us to MBK Center, another shopping mall which kind of reminds me of Sungei Wang Plaza. It was here I saw my Big Bang original cds selling for only 230baht. A few months ago, I was looking for those very same cds. After going to several music stores, I gave up and downloaded the whole album.

Because we were really tired and carrying loads of plastic bags of clothes, we didn't walk much but there is one shop in particular, I think is a great bargain shop - all bags for only 199baht. I saw same exact one in Chatuchak for 250baht. So had to get it and Li Ling bought one as well.

5) Wholesale stalls around Baiyoke

-rainbow building-

Just outside Baiyoke Sky is this whole area that have wholesale stalls operating in the morning and at night. Here, you can get even better bargains. But these stalls are only there for a few hours, until about 10.30am before they start closing. Only thing is, it is also very crowded so very difficult to get a good look at the clothes.

It is here I have the biggest regret. Saw this really pretty satin dress for really cheap price but WY and I decided to called Li Ling and Pearl, who are eating breakfast in hotel. When 4 of us returned to the market, it had already started packing.

-this stall selling so so so many pretty skirts for only 90baht each. Li Ling bought dozens-

-my best bargain, thanks to Li Ling. Only 65baht for this houndstooth trenchcoat. She saw it first but because it was too big for her, she told me about it-

6) Chatuchak Weekend Market

Coming to Bangkok, you must take a visit to the famous Chatuchak market. Even if one do not want to shop, it is great to come here and take a look.

-aboard the tuk-tuk that brings us to Chatuchak-

-a map of humongous Chatuchak-

As you can see, Chatuchak sells a variety of knick-knacks. From food, to leather items, magazines and antiques. These are just a few of the amount of stuff they have in this market. And the thing is, these pictures are taken outside the market, we have not even stepped inside the compound yet. When we took the train from Chatuchak to Siam Paragon, we could see the overview of the entire market, and OMG, we were definitely overwhelmed by the size of it.

-also very much crowded, although mostly by tourists-

-these are taken inside the market-

They were also selling so so cute pets. The hamsters and rabbits were all dressed up in cute dresses but too bad, they don't allowed us to take photos.

-after a hot day, we hydrate up with some yummy ice-cream-

-some of the stuff I bought-

I absolutely lurve the heels. They looked a tad similiar to oxford booties, with the shoelaces and all. I think oxford booties are really nice but too expensive, considering the fact that I know I won't wear it as often. But these gorgeous shoes only for 199baht, also much cheaper than the exact same pair I saw in Platinum.

Sunglasses usually go for about 100baht here. But luckily, I saw this small stall near the main entrance that only sells them for 50baht! There are of course, not as many choices but who can passed up such a great bargain?

Cloth headbands for 20baht each. I saw same ones in Platinum for 70baht.

-other stuff I bought-

I have a thing for printed shoes. I think they look good when you paired with just T-shirt and jeans. The leopard-printed flats and purple&gold sandals, I got from a small stall that operates in Pratunam market at night. It sells lots of really nice flats for really cheap. I think us girls gone crazy for that stall. We went there two nights in a row.

Finally I finished this post. ALL other posts will have to wait now as I will be busy in coming weeks.