my lucky clover

Friday, May 30, 2008

Cultural Difference

yea! no tests for at least 2 weeks from now.. we r gg to resume our travel plans.. The last test really prove me tat we had to do consistent work here cos the last min cramming really drive my brain crazy.. imagine u still have many chapters to study on e day of the exam.. oh man..

Anyway, yesterday, to 'treat' ourselves for being so 'hardworking' in the study room the last 2 days, we went for a great dinner at Salad King, a Thai restaurant. The food was GREAT! The sticky rice dessert was especially good. Its sticky rice wif coconut gravy on it and with some mangoes (its hard and bit sour though) beside.. Cad$3.50 for it. Not bad =) And its being a long time since i had a meal wif lots of spicyness.. Cos the ppl here don't even know wat's chili sauce lo..haha.. there's this time at Wendy's Burger in Niagara fall, i asked for chili sauce, the girl stare at me blankly, then i said hot sauce, she still looked blur.. haiz.. We felt happy after the meal =)

The tasty tom yam soup:

Thai fried rice:

Lemon chicken rice:

The lychee and mango ice-cream (quite e usual though):

The food was so nice that any little piece of food was not left out:

Our satisfied face after the delicious meal =) :

Note: no pic for the fantastic sticky rice because Jiali do not have e chance to take a pic of it.. it was eaten up as soon as it was served.. haha.. lazy to upload e rest of the dishes also..

After dinner, we decided to explore Church Street for its Gay activity. There were many gay pubs there.. We didn't went in of course.. I don't noe y, but i don't really like e atmosphere there.. haha.. there were so many guys (gays?)! Few girls though.. no wonder its renowned for its gay pubs and not lesbian pubs. haha.. I spotted this angmoh (actually i didn't see much Asians there except us..) who dressed up as a FEMALE outside a pub.. 'She' was huge and 'She' wore this green dress and wif a wig. 'She' even put on makeup.. its so funny.. I really felt like laughing out sia.. but i contained it.. don't wanna get bashed up.. This street is quite interesting to walk.. But i think there will be much more to see during the Toronto Pride Week? Its an annual festival for gays and lesbians and it will be in june. we are all so curious and excited about it cos u can't see such event in S'pore..

After Church street, we decided to go to a pub that Meiqi recommend. Its on the 52th storey of manulife centre.. cool.. so we walked and walked and walked, then this sign appear at the lift there that there its closed for some private function.. sian..

So, too bad.. and then i met a strange guy here also.. i was talking to Ngian Xin when this indian guy suddenly snap his finger at my face.. so lame and crazy.. this is not the 1st time tat this happen to us.. Then as we were walking, a driver suddenly yelled for fun from his car as he drove past.. Gave us a shock sia.. especially me and ngian xin cos we were talking abt haunted houses and ghosts when he yelled.. haha.. I seriously think there is a lack of mental healthcare here..

Since that pub is closed for private event, we walked to Dominion supermarket at College's park there.. its 24hr.. and its huge.. i like the bakery section wif its variety of breads, bagels, pastry, pretty cakes and more.. oh ya, the cereal selection here is cool too.. many many many variety.. bought quite a lot of stuffs here..

Then at the pantry, i heard from Anne that Spadina Ave here isn't tat safe after all.. 2 murder cases happened this week.. so scary.. 1 of the case even involved gun shots.. This reminded me of the noises i heard the night before.. its 2 am plus and there's this girl screaming really loudly and a guy's voice who sounded like he's scolding someone.. the tone was really fierce and it lasted for quite some time really loudly.. i don't dare to look out of my window and moreover, im so so dead tired from the last min cramming for psych test.. I hope nothing serious happen.. Its been getting more noisy ard here in the night and more police cars (and fire brigade to compete wif me who cross the rd 1st) on the road also.. scary..

xoxo, clover ; 9:39 PM
j

Monday, May 26, 2008

Arhh.. term test coming and we are still travelling and exploring elsewhere.. i have been to Casa Loma, CN tower, music garden and etc places in toronto and the very spectacular Niagara Fall this past week.. no time to post these pictures yet.. shall do so after my term test for geo and psych this week.. really =)

xoxo, clover ; 11:01 AM
j

Monday, May 19, 2008

CN Tower (Canadian National Tower), harbourfront and music garden

Walked to CN tower today... The weather was super duper cold.. slight drizzle some more.. so we ate lunch in a pizza house 1st and wait for the sky to clear (so tat we can get our $ worth of the view from the top). The pizza here was huge. The small size is like our large size in s'pore.. The pizza here is cheap and nice =)

We get to choose the toppings ourselves:

At the CN tower, the view was 360 degrees.. not bad.. then we bought e tix to go to the skypod as well, which suppose to offer view much more spectacular cos its several storeys higher.. but to us, it seems no difference lei.. waste my $.. haha

Height at the main observatory tower:

Height at the skypod:

I can't really figure out where am i looking at most of the time though.. Toronto not my 'di pan'... haha.. and jus from the top, i can see that e cars here drove really fast on the highway.. and there's many many traffic lights in downtown toronto.. But most drivers here give way to pesdestrians.. especially at college there..

Some pics from e CN tower:

I think the water body is Lake Ontario.. :

It seems no difference to Singapore's CBD:

We actually had a hard time trying to 'climb' up to the 'seat'.. haha:

View of Anne's favourite music garden (the green patch) from the skypod, i like those yatches though:

I zoomed in wif my camera to the max upon seeing this cute boat.. looks like a toy from the top:

There's also a glass floor section where u can stand on it and look down so tat u will feel as if u are standing on air.. its suppose to be scary..

The glass floor:

We went to the music garden near the harbourfront there after visiting the CN tower. Its a beautiful place with 6 part film series inspired by Bach. It is worked by the reknown cellist Yo-Yo Ma and a group of other artists and they interpret the music in nature. cool. But the weather was too cold for us to 'tahan' so we end up drinking hot chocolate at 2nd cup.. Maybe we shall visit this music garden again some other day.. Anne took quite a lot of pictures here, can take from her ;)

Some pics i took with my frozen hand:

Perhaps this little wooden house is for the birds? :

Parking place for the boats or yatch.. wish one of them is mine =) :

There were many of these ducks here.. Mandarin ducks i think.. always in pair.. so sweet =) :

xoxo, clover ; 12:27 PM
j

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Casa Loma

Today we walked to Casa Loma. Its an estate by Sir Henry Mill Pellatt. I think he's a spendthrift.. and its dumb cos he has to leave his castle home after living there for less than 10 yrs due to financial problem.. Then the government bought it at a really low price... The whole place was really huge with many rooms.. We spent quite long there taking photos..

On the way there i spotted this sign we won't see in s'pore, i think our's is 'keep left'.. (Ngian Xin trying to 'qiang jing tou' wif her fingers):

At the entrance there its already very beautiful and windy :

A couple was there for their wedding photos shoot.. They wore those victorian costumes to blend in with the castle.. quite cool =)

Casa Loma:

The grand hall in this 'castle':

The rich man who built it: Sir Henry Mill Pellatt

One of the many many many huge bedrooms:

The room that i like best is the toilet of Sir Pillatt. Its supposed to be the most advanced at that time in Canada. Its quite interesting. especially the shower. It got 6 taps at the side so that the water can spray at him everywhere -_-"' Actually this feel like sth we have in the sci lab in sec sch in case anybody caught fire..

intro and sketch abt this 'super shower' thing:

I can't really confirm wat's this short short thing cos there's alr a toilet bowl which look abt the same as wat we use now:

We also get to climb this super narrow 1 way spiral staircase to reach the top tower of the castle. U have to wait to see that nobody is climbing down then u can climb up.. so its a long queue to get up and get down.. i don like tat staircase.. i think they discriminate against fat ppl cos
i seriously don think they can squeeze up tat narrow staircase.. But the view from the tower is not bad.. can see the city skyline.. but can't be compared to the view from e CN tower la..

Jiali and valerie getting down the staircase carefully: