I survived Toronto earthquake 2010

Everytime I go overseas to earthquake prone countries like Japan or Taiwan, I would worry that I may encounter an earthquake, and always thought about what I would do if I do encounter one. Never would have thought that one would hit so so to home.

Yesterday after lunch at around 1:40, I had my first (and hopefully it'll be the last) experience with an earthquake. Sitting at home in my chair working away, I begin to feel my chair shake, and then my desk, and then things on my desk. I didn't really know what was happening at first, thinking that maybe it's a paranormal encounter, I put my feet down and felt the floor was shaking too. Then I realize maybe it's not paranormal activity, maybe it was heavy machinery rumbling through my street as there have been a lot of construction/renovation my neighbours are doing, but I didn't hear any noises that would be associated with heavy machinery. Only then it hit me that maybe I'm sitting through an earthquake.

After the earthquake, I started to ask coworkers whether they felt it ground shake, just to confirm that I wasn't dreaming or going crazy. Everybody felt it too.. Whew!! I must say that I was pretty shaken up during and after the quake, so much so that I wasn't able to concentrate all afternoon. Though thanks to G20, I got to work from home all week. I wouldn't know how I'd react if I was working at the downtown office in a skyscraper. I could only imagine that it would have been much more scarier, as the building would probably sway much more than my house.

Found out from the news that we were hit with a magnitude 5.0 earthquake with the epicenter that is about 60 km north of Ottawa, luckily it was a moderate earthquake where no severe injuries or damages were reported.

獨食難肥之 Sushi Deluxe @ Taro's Fish 篇

To minimize the rumbling in my stomach and the pain from my appointment today, I decided to go to Taro's Fish for their Sushi Deluxe.

Today's selection from left to right, top to bottom -
Maguro (Tuna), Kanpachi (Amber Jack), Salmon, Hamachi, Awabi (Abalone)
Ootoro (Fatty Tuna Belly), Uni (Sea Urchin), Ikura (Salmon Roe), California Roll

The ootoro was stringy, ikura was a bit on the fishy side (mind you I was never a ikura fan to begin with) and uni was lacking some flavor, but overall it was still pretty good. Yes, I am a tough critic, especially when it comes to Japanese food.


I guess it's $25+tax is well spent, no more rumbling tummy and the pain from the appointment disappeared.

我的合味道杯麵

While offloading my pics from my latest HK trip (to be exact it was the HK trip 6 months ago), found some long forgotten pics that were worth a blog....

During our Osaka trip, my parents and I went to the Instant Ramen Museum.

Statue of the inventor of instant noodles outside the museum (Momofuku Ando - who was a Taiwanese)


Small Collection of instant noodles


After a quick tour of the museum (really small museum), I arrived at the most important part
of the visit: My cup noodle factory!!!

Instructions for the customized cup noodle experience:


1. Buying the cup


2. Customizing the cup with your own design (my horrible drawing skills - this cup was for Mr. Man!)
Started drawing with the thick-tipped markers they provided, only to find out that there's a fine tip on the other end of the marker after I finished drawing!


3. Dropping the noodle in the cup
Turning the wheel 6 times will make the noodle drop into the cup and flip the cup right side up


4. Pick your ingredients and soup base
For my own cup, I picked Salt soup base with BBQ pork, naruto (slice fish cake with mascot on it), garlic chips and the special limited-time ingredient: chicken!


5. Sealing the cup


6. Shrink-wrapping the cup


7. Putting the cup in a bubble bag to prevent crushing

同場加影:
我的合味道杯麵 (Customized by my mom!!!)

Front


Back

Highlights of the first week in HK 2009 (Dec 1 - 7)

Day 1
Sat on the plane with a chinese senior 2 seats over, didn't know English and kept asking me to navigate to the movies for him.

Day 2
Arrived in HK, needed to adjust to the pace of things. Seems lost, confused and out of place.

Day 3
Went to dim sum with grandparents. Jetlagged and stayed at home. Went to get the egg tarts that Chris Patten loves. It's not bad, the cookie dough one is pretty crispy.














Day 4
Woke up with woozy, high fever, very painful sore throat and pretty much the works. Fearing that it may be H1N1, went to see a doctor right away. Turns out I probably caught something on the plane and have to take antibiotics for the sore throat. Couldn't resist the sushi temptation and went for sushi, despite I was pretty sick. Stayed at home for the rest of the day.

Day 5
Went to Admiralty for lunch. Had a udon with chicken, the udon was very 彈牙 and chicken was tasty and the skin was crispy. Lotus root cake was good too!



Went to the peak afterwards, thinking the weather's pretty good and the smog is gone.


This is all we saw:



尖沙咀 turned out to be too smoggy to be seen.



Went to 尖沙咀. It so happened on the same day there is fireworks to celebrate the East Asian Games. Good view points on both sides of the harbour has been blocked off with barriers and police/tv station crews can be seen everywhere.

Dinner: 板長 @ LCX
Highlights from that meal


From top left (clockwise) 板長蝦, 珍寶帶子, 火炙魚背
The scallop was so good, thick and juicy.... the 魚背 was a bit on the fatty side but was good since it was thinly sliced, it paired up with the rice


In the lower corner of the plate with the lime wedge, 火炙佐賀和牛


天使蝦


Fireworks - not sure why HK people still get excited over fireworks. Fireworks happens like 3-4 times a year. There's nothing really special about it anymore. As we were walking back to avoid the after show rush, you can hear the people on the street going oh.... and ah.....

Day 6

Went to 橫綱食拉麵. I arrived at the place at around 11:45am and there were a few people already lined up to have ramen.



食咗個味玉拉麵 w/ 粗麵. Soup was a bit on the salty side but acceptable. Noodles were just right, not overcooked or too soft... The highlight of the meal was definitely the egg, as this restaurant is so famous for. Egg white was soft and the yolk was cooked just right.

Day 7
Went to Wanchai/CWB. Stopped by 龍門大酒樓 to take some pics since it'll be demolished soon. A middle age guy came by and asked me if I can take some pics of the restaurant for him since he doesn't have money to buy a nice camera. As reluctant as I was, I agreed to his request and took some pics, and he gave his email address for me to email the pics to him.

Afterwards, I walked around Wanchai looking for the 藍屋, 橙屋 and 黃屋... unable to find it, I did find the old Wanchai post office. Also stumbled upon a 茶餐廳 which is famous for their iced milk tea (pre-made and chilled before serving, no ice added). Personally, I don't think it's my cup of tea, didn't think the milk tea was that good...



Sushi count: 3
Ramen count: 2
Egg tart: 2

Conditioner

I read V's blog post last week on buying conditioner and had a good laugh about her incident at Walmart. I was thinking to myself that's so typical of her, to do something like that.
Post Here

Only yesterday did I realize that I did the same strange thing she did, but instead of conditioner, I bought 2 bottles of shampoo.

I was trying to come up with a explanation as to what has happened (maybe the contents on our bags got mixed up, since both bags were in the same car?). Thinking to myself that this mistake could not happen to me, I went and checked my receipt, and to my surprise, I did buy 2 bottles of shampoo!!!!

Sadly enough, I'm probably getting the same condition she has, whatever it is.....
But I must admit, it's pretty funny...

雞排飯

有一間台灣外買店想試了很久, 一直都沒有時間去, 而且營業時間超短 (11:00 am - 3:00 pm)...
今天襯放假去試試看...
店舖不是很大.. 大概有四張小摺枱

原本貪心想叫個便當加鹽酥雞, 但因為怕熱氣同油膩而放棄了這個念頭...最終叫了個雞排飯
便當除了主菜, 還跟了三種配菜, 我選了蕃茄炒蛋, 炒西蘭花同炒椰菜...
其他配菜還有滷蛋, 炒豆干, 豆腐等等, 有九種左右...
仲有湯或汽水... 六蚊樓下..
雞排飯唔錯... 配菜都好味... 下次去會試其他野....

Team Dynamics

Things I've learned today:

1. I've been beating myself up endlessly all these years
2. Expectations on other people are really my expectations imposed on them
3. People I hate/have yet to forgive is not worth my time/energy, so forgive and forget
4. Essentially everything you do is for yourself
5. Nothing/No one can make you think/feel the way you do, only you can think/feel the way you do
6. "IT'S ONLY A JOB!!"
7. You can have expectations of other people, but that doesn't mean other people will do whatever you expect them to do
8. Other people cannot motivate you, only you can motivate yourself. Other people can influence you enough for you to motivate yourself
9. At the end of the day, nothing really matters
10. People behave the way they feel, they feel the way they think
11. 何必太執著?