Music in my life....

Last week, I went for a dinner and came back with a ear fatigue.... Sounds odd, but rest assured it is very true. I had dinner with my mum then and since she was rather reluctant to go home immediately, we decided to stroll into the That CD Shop on the same level as the restaurant.... By the time we walk out, I had ear fatigue...

As you know That CD Shops has this row of speakers where they play some music to promote their series of compilation, and they were playing one of them then, and it basically a 'boombox" as they were playing some music that has lots and lots of bass in it, just like house music - not sure if it was in that category. Anyway, since Josh Groban released a new album recently, I thot it's a good opportunity to test it out (and see if it's worth getting). Boy was I wrong!

Now in this particular shop, the players which were available for testing were place opposite the speakers, although not directly. Furthermore, the headphones they had was some AKG headphones with a cloth covering over the ear area. I am not certain if the headphone comes like that or they place the cloth over it, but at that particular time, they actually turn up the volume of the "boombox", thus making it impossible to hear anything in the headphones (as it does not cover your ears properly, thus unable to insulate the sound - due to that piece of cloth).

Most of the time, I would listen to music via headphone at a level of at most 2 knots from no sound, because of the noise, I had difficulty in hearing, thus I had to turn the volume up to half the max level. However, with this setting, my ears are being bombarded with very loud sound. So by the end of it, I simply felt pain in my ears, and unable to assess the possibility of buy the album.

Immediately walked out of the shop and got out of the way from all the noise... Sigh... I cannot simply comprehend how people can turn up the volume of their players (ipod and knots) so much that the music can flowout from their earphones and, I can hear it clearly by standing next to the person. Don't they know that they can go deaf?!?!?!

So... Did I get the album? Nope... Yes, it's Josh Groban and I did buy his 1st album... But lately I think I am becoming more discerning in what I am buying... Not just because it's this so-and-so and I did like their previous (ok, may be previous-previous) album, does not mean I will like it... I mean, if you look at what I used to listen to you would might just understand where I stand.

I think I am a person who listens to different kind of music depending on moods... Of course, I would not listen certain category of music at all (like most of the metal music and house music), but I think I can say I did listen to almost all of them.

I started listening to music when I was very young... Now if you remember the predecessor of cassette tapes, most probably you are around my age... In those days, the tapes were 3/4 of the dimension of the VHS video tapes. Huge and chunky but contain songs from the period, and my mum used to play them in the car (when she did have a car then). However, at home, she would have quite a collection of LPs. So I grew up with songs from The Platters, Skeeter Davis, and even Tracy Huang. I also remembered every Christmas, she would play this LP that has those nice Christmas songs sung by this deep calm male voice whose name has skipped my mind. I used to love those songs, but I think I ruined the LP with the tip of a paper clip - but that's another story altogether....

Then, when I was in Pri 5, I got my own transistor with the familiar cassette tape player, along with 5 ABBA cassette tapes. Of course at that time, ABBA was at their peak, and thus started my long journey with different categories of music. I also remembered listening to country music cum rock and roll, due to the influent of "Donny and Marie Osmond show". Remember the "A little bit of country and little bit of rock and roll" song??? Then it was on to The Carpenters - which my mum would dispute that as she would say she listens to them, that's how I know of them... But well, maybe... Anyway... From there, it was the 80s with the electronic wave, where I was listening to Howard Jones among other artists, which include Level 42, Air Supply, etc. But I have to say I don't really follow any of them, just their songs that I like.

During this time, being a bookworm as I was, I had spent most of Saturdays in library and they started a video section. It was this section that introduced me to musicals. I got to watch musical movies like Grease, Sound of Music, My Fair Lady, Mary Poppins to name some... I believe it was around this time that Phantom of the Opera raises it's curtains in London. However, I was not introduced to it till very much later, but I had tapes like Chess - the musical by Bjorn and Benny of ABBA fame. The very 1st Andrew Lloyd Webber musical that I saw on video was most probably "Cats", curtsey of the video library.

Then, during my time in polytechnic, I was introduced to heavy rock and I would say heavy metal music - one of my coursemate introduced me to it and he played it over and over again during those in-between classes. I clearly recall Def Leppard (I still like some of their playable ballads), and even Metallica (think they were the one who did Sandman); however that fadeout very, very quickly. I was also introduced to artists like Enya, George Winston and Yanni. I still have a few of Enya's album in my collection...

Anne Murray was the one who brought me back into the country music arena, which was followed by Grath Brooks, The Judds and Reba McEntire. Then Shania Twain came with her "Come on Over" which I had heard during a trip to HMV. I had a very good laugh over the lyrics in that album, and promptly bought the album... But no, I am not a fan of hers. It was just an album so out of the norm that I just had to have it.

I believe it was Sarah Brightman that got me started in the vocals arena. However, if listening to her albums, I cannot figure out where she fits. She had one album which was very classically linked - which give us the famous "Time to say goodbye" with Andrea Bocelli. Then it was onto a drama thematic "Eden", followed by "Luna" which I have no idea what, and then most recently, a very Arabic/Indian influenced "Harem". Of course there others like Laura Fygi, Susan Wong, Emi Fujita, and even Diana Krall.

There was also a period of time somewhere where the radio channel in my car was set to 92.4FM. Yup, classical music... Of course, there were those chessy remix done by Louis Clark and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra where, most would remember, giving us a few albums where they re-arranged the music to combined and given a basic rock drum beats to combine the entire arrangement together. I remember we even had school events dance choreographed to those music. In this era, the one left the most impression (and the only CD) I have was Tchaikovsky's "1812" Overtune. I suppose it was those cannon sound mixed into the music that got me interested - I have to say the version by Erich Kunzel & Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra with their digital cannons sound was the best I have heard so far... By the way, if you do play those music, it will sound familiar to me... Just don't expect me to know all the names... I might get the composer correctly, but not the names... Unless it's "1812" Overtune!!!!

I am certain by now, whoever knows me and read this would go... Ah ha! No "teng nang" music mentioned... Well, yes I am not a fan of Jay Chou or any other band/singer/whatever you have... That does not mean I don't listen. Heck, I think most of you (younger ones) would not have remember Fei Yu Qing, Gao Lin Feng, Liu Weng Zheng, Tian Nu, Yu Tian, etc... The thing is - as with the other music, I don't follow the artist, ok, other than ABBA and Carpenters; I just listen to individual songs. I do listen to them, in fact I have a couple of Danny Chan's CD, Jeff Chang, Sarah Chen and even Wang Jie's. But, I have lost interest in the newer market as somehow it does not appeal to me. But if you play whatever is on the CD in your car or home, and I am there, I will listen...

So... Where does that leaves me? Good question... I have no idea but I guess if you sit in my car, just be prepared to be "bored" if you don't like what I listen to on that day... I would have no idea what it will be... Just whatever strikes me as appropriate... I already had colleagues listening to country on one day, and vocals on another... I think I had classical recently, but not sure if anyone sat in the car then....

I recall this one incident on Tehpeng & Miz Snooze's wedding day at her parent's place before they had the tea ceremony:-
Tehpeng: Which group sang the song "Final Countdown"??
Me: Erm.... Europe.
The rest (Jie meis): *stun look* How she know?!?!??!

Penang.... Or rather Penang food... :P

Because of my ties with Penang (majority of my relatives are there).... Most of the time I have been ask what to do in Penang or where to go, or even what/where to eat in Penang... So, since I received an sms from tehsi saying that she might be going to Penang in Dec and asking about the place... I thot, well, maybe I should just write about the place... But then again, I don't do touristy places while in Penang... So, I guess I can only suggest some places that it's famous for, but seriously... When I am in Penang, it's basically visitation and eating!!!!

I guess to start with, we should start at the point where you would get to Penang... It's either via bus or plane.... My preference is the plane - somehow, no matter how much they had "improved" on the bus transportation, I still cannot see myself taking a "fridge" for 8 hours, trying to make myself sleep, like me taking an 8 hour flight, where you get the road/bus noise - similar to plane noise, with the only difference where the bus needs to make some stops for people to relief themselves - which we would often do due to the coldness in the bus... I mean even the plane is not that cold... I thot I was sleeping in Artic condition... Ok... Maybe Artic would be much colder... And arriving in Penang not in a "good" condition, and then scramble from the bus terminal to my aunt's place... Nope. Taking the plane is a better choice - reach there within an hour with less hassle of carrying your stuff across the immigration at the Causeway/Tuas Link.

Anyway... Back to topic... At the Penang International Airport.... You will need to pay the consortium a fix price for your trip to town, unless someone is picking you up from the airport... The furthest was Batu Ferringhi which cost about $40 - $45 (Can't quite remember, since my trips are usually to Gurney for official trips or someone will pick me up at the airport). So just queue for the payment and ticket. Hop into the "limo" and you are driven to your destination... Just to add... You will find that majority, if not all, the taxis/cabs you find in Penang are fixed, not running on meter. Despite the recent campaign by the Govt, they are still running on fixed prices... So please check with them on the pricing and see if you could get them to price it a little lower than what they demand... In the last trip, 2 rides from Gurney to Paya Terbong range between $20 - $25. I had my aunt who bargain for it to drop to $20 in 1st trip and going solo on the other, I was not that persuasive enough to get it dropped to $20...

Ok... Places to go... Well, it depends... Most of the places, other than Penang Hill and Botanical Gardens, are with some religious connection as Penang has a lot of Chinese influence and thus most of the places to see are mainly temples... There's the snake temple, Reclining budhha temple, the famous Kek Lok Si temple where there's a huge statue of Godess of Mercy. There is also a famous mosque somewhere in Georgetown. The others that may be of interest would be Batu Ferringhi where the beaches are supposed to be... But if you have been to beaches in Surfers, or California... The beaches in Penang (and in fact in Singapore) are nothing compared to them., well, other than you are able to get a tan 365 days of the year... Batu Ferringhi, and some part of Tanjong Bungah, has stretches of hotels, where most of the tourists stays. For photos, maybe the old shophouses/warehouses along Penang Road and near Swatow Lane would be of interest... And if you believe the locals, there is this giant footprint, that was supposedly of Admiral Zheng Ho, somewhere in Batu Maung.

There are shopping malls in Penang, with the oldest, which happens to be the tallest building in Penang, Komtar complex. You used to be able to take at trip up to an observation deck in Komtar building (if I am not wrong, you have to pay for it...), but I have not been back in Komtar area, so I am not certain if this is still available. Next to it, there is a newer cousin, Prangin Mall. Then there is a newer Gurney Plaza, and Island shopping mall which is quite near to Gurney Plaza. On the other side of the island, there is a Bukit Jambul shopping mall... But I don't shop, so it does not really matters... I have seen enough shopping malls in SG. There are also pasar malam just outside those hotels in the Batu Ferringhi/Tanjong Bungah stretch which opens in the night... Nice drive-by if you have nothing to do....

Now food... ah, that's my topic... Now, let's see...

Firstly, Fruit rojak, which consist of slices of cucumber, turnip, pineapple, sour mangoes, jumbu ayer, perhaps some cuttlefish, and slices of crispy you tiao, mixed with the prawn paste, chilli, perhaps some lime juice and sugar. Yummy! The one that I usually eats is in Gurney drive food stalls, just outside of Gurney Plaza. it slip my mind the stall no. but I think it's 76 or 77. They are that popular that they are now selling their prawn paste in small tub for people to bring back...

Laksa, to be specific, Assam laksa. To me, when people say laksa, this comes into mind, not the lemak curry version which sells in Singapore. I have to confess this - I never did like this dish when I was young... I remember my aunt had to cook something else for me, or I would not have anything to eat, whenever her mood strikes her to cook this for meals... Now, I pester her to cook this, as I can't get enough of it... Anyway... The one that is an old favourite is of course the famous one in Ayer Itam market, near the Kek Lok Si temple. But recently, I found that the one in Penang Road, coffee shop just next to the famous cendol food stall, is just as good, if not better. However, since my relatives live far from Georgetown, I found the Farlim version is as good... So, any of those will do. Some other people swear by the stall in Lorong Selamat, as well as the Balik Pulau version... Whatever, it depends on what you like... But any of these area would be good enough... Just try not to eat those in Gurney drive - Seriously... I had only "ok" versions of it and some are even not "ok"...

Apom. This is a snack which mainly sold by Indians. The version they have is nice and crisply on the outer layer and then a nice thick layer in the middle. In the last trip, my coz has been chomping on this, like biscuits... Not that it matters on where to get it, but I think you rarely get this in SG nowadays, so it's a snack to try... The other would be the mein chang kueh, er, chinese pancakes(??). Flour layer and in the center youget peanuts and sugar - in Penang you can get sweet corn in the center as well. The version that I like is the very crispy one (no sweet corn), and the only place I know in Penang that you can get this is the food centre at Jalan Trengganu, near Free School. They are totally cripsy and it can keep for 1 day!!!! Pity that I don't get to eat this that often, unless someone volunteer to go there to buy it... Thinking about it makes my mouth drool.... :P~~~~

Another thing to try would be the chee cheong fun. Now the version you have in sg are mainly the HK version where it comes with something in the middle as part of the dim sum thingy, the shanghai version where there is something in the middle, but with a different sauce and finally the 'normal' wet market version. Well, for this comparison, I'm talking about the wet market version. I don't eat them in SG as I find it's not appealing to my taste and the sweet sauce somehow turns me off this dish... Now in Penang, their version is rather different, mainly because the sauce they use is different... The version they have do not have the sweet sauce, but a sauce somewhat similar to prawn paste, a bit thin. Now I might not eat it in bulk, but I don't think twice if it's place in front of me. I used to have this for breakfast as my aunt tends to buy them.

The other famous food would be the char kuay teow. The most famous one is in Lorong Selamat. I think that's the two sisters' stall, and it's crowded. I don't really like it, as their version is really oily, but everyone I know swears by it... It's different and lighter in colour and in sweetness as compared to SG version. They are supposed to be lighter in the oilness but not the one at Selamat. Of course, I would prefer penang version as it's not as sweet, but it's not high on my eating list... Heh...

Next would be the wanton mee. Most of the sg version contains tomato sauce; with some following the Hk version which is based on light sauce. Somehow the version in Penang is also different. Now, previously, I would have a favourite stall to get this (and somehow, my mum and relatives, knows him quite well, cannot remember the connection, most probably they lived in the same kampong when they were young), but he had sold his business and moved to KL to be with his children. So, the next one that was quite good is the one in Ayer Itam market. By the way, the reason for the difference, somehow the noodles that is used plays an important part in the overall taste of it... The versions we had in sg, mostly comes too soggy or soft, which is not that great. The version that stall has was different; the noodles was not too soggy nor soft, with a right "qu qu" crunch to it; add in the different slight sweet sauce, yummy!

Cendol. Ah.. This coconut based ice dessert which is another food which I don't touch in sg. Somehow the ingredients in penang seems better, especially the green, er (dang, i forgot the name of that green stuff, which is like noodles), "noodles". The most famous would be the stall off Penang road. I still cannot remember the street name where the stall is at, but, if you are there in Penang road, you can always ask for directions - Everyone knows that stall. The other would be ice kacang - most famous was the Swatow lane version. The stalls are still there and now, the ice kacang comes in different variety, that it's no longer the sweet pink colour ice mountain with only huge kidney beans... Now you have it with different colour jelly, as well as whole kernel of corn as well as scoops of durian placed on top ofthe pile of ice... Great to cool off during a hot day!

Of course there are other food stuff... A recommended food center is 2 coffee shops in New Lane (off Macalister Road, very near Sunway hotel). They got lots of food stall there, and one of the famous one, and yet most elusive one, is the deep fried pig intestine porridge. It's sold by this old man who does not operate the stall like clock work. If you are lucky, you would find the stall open in your trip there, if not, like the past 2 trips I made, he closed his shop even before the peak period starts. But the porridge, my mum and aunt swears by it...

Basically comes to food, you will find it literally everywhere in different nooks and corners, which does not goes very well with my waistline...

Enjoy your trip...

Oh.... As for stay... er... I guess Northam Suites would be a good choice - I know Shuttlebug stays there everytime I hear him heading there... I stayed in Evergreen for my official trips, and the prices are similar, and at times, he could get it cheaper than those in Evergreen. As for budget... Hmmm... That's a problem, as I usually have places to stay... So, it's kind of hard for me to recommend... Got to ask my coz... I really have no idea...

Account of Penang Trip.... Heh....

Ya! I'm back for at least 3 weeks, but have been so busy that this blog has been neglected....

Had an ok time for this trip.... Had headache for the 3 days in a 5 day trip... How much can u enjoy with that??!?! Arrive in the night, so had my 1st food session - late dinner. It was just the food centre outside the streets where my aunt lives... Had a bite of Koay Tiao Thing, some Apom, a few pieces of BBQ chicken wings... I am sure I had more but could not remember...

Spend half a day on friday at my coz's shop - got a hair cut by her husband and facial by her - just for the wedding... Then because of not enough "presentable" clothes, had spend the other half in Gurney Plaza looking for clothes.... It's a long story - to make it short, I had 2 dinners to attend instead of the expected 1; other than the "prepared for the wedding day/dinner" clothes, the rest of my clothes are just t-shirts and jeans.... Bought 2 blouses (my mum would have been proud of me!!! :P) However, my coz, who was also in the same predicament, could not get anything.... Oh had Fruit Rojak at Gurney Drive where it was supposed to be the best (got 8 bottles of the rojak sauce, 5 was requested by my coz's friend) - they now sells their sauce at the stall... Also shared some assam laksa (not really that fantastic) and soya bean milk. Then it was ba ku teh for dinner - started to have a headache by then...

Sat late morning/afternoon was spent looking accompanying my coz to get herself some "presentable" (as her mum calls it) clothes... we had some cheesecake, which was supposedly to be the best in penang, but it was a tat too chessy for my liking... Then it was the drive to Butterworth for the "unexpected" dinner.... Stayed over at my uncle's place in Sugei Petani that night, and apparently there were lots of activities that I think they all left at 2am, thank goodness for my coz's (the one to wed) new house somewhere near my uncle's place... Took some shots of the activities there - if you know all the traditional pre-wedding night activities, you will know what it encompass. Had a chance to sleep early, and in aircon room!!! Headache still persist... had to pop 1 panadol tablet before I left the house...

Sunday, the "big" day.... Woke up early, bathe and quickly went back to my uncle's place... By then, there was already a large group there... preparing - not sure for what... Had wanted to pop 1 panadol tablet before the activities start, but an aunt persuaded otherwise and she did some massage of my head.... it eased off a bit, so started to take shots of the day... Then it was time to drive to "collect" the bride... More photo taking... Basically the whole morning was just the wedding activities and more photo taking... By the way, just for record... The wedding there is slightly different from Singapore... Especially the customs... Oh, did you know that the "sisters" of the bride are all from Singapore!?!?! Interesting fact... Heh...

Back at my uncle's place for the tea ceremony (and a long one too), finally pop the tablet as the headache was vicious by then... No doubt fed on the irritating smell of the incense that they used... and finally rest.... Night came and it was to the dinner... And then back to Penang again...

Monday... Went for curry mee breakfast, and then back to another coz's place.... Watched one of the cantonese DVDs... er... something on majhong but thename of the movie slip my mind.... Anyway, it was a typical no brainer, noncensical movie that occupied your almost 2 hours of time... Then it was back to Gurney Plaza because my coz wants to buy something from there... Meet Shuttlebug and Ms Clover there... Watch Shuttlebug got his haircut, and gone for dinner at Gurney drive (another long story there... wanted Seafood but the place they wanted to have dinner was closed for a private function....) Oh, my aunt wne to Penang road to get some spices (as per request of my mum) and I got to eat cendol!!!!

Tuesday... Wow... Time flies... 5 days have gone and I am going be flying back at the end of the day.... What did we do that day... well... another eating session... er.. Had Wanton mee at Ayer Itam market, oh... had this old man came over to do some massage - my coz and family wears by him, and well... it was painful... then lunch... and then went back to pack our bags... Had an early dinner... and flew back...

So... it was quite an ok trip... I think could have been better if not for the headache... My pics shows that I have not touch my cam for awhile as I seems to have misfocus in some of the shot and the others, some did not turn out as I sees it... Oh well....

Anyway... it's slog time till end Nov... Hopefully Dec will be a peaceful one....

Oh my...

Wow... I just realised that I have not been blogging much lately... Exactly 1 month (plus 1 day) since the last entry....

The last entry mentioned something about 2 days of leave... Well, this entry is also at the eve of another bout of leave taking. This time, however, I am going to be out of country (Yeah!) Yup, taking a nice (eating frenzy) holiday to Penang. Ok, maybe throw in a to-attend-wedding - my coz is getting married - into the mix, which happens to be more eating session, so took this opportunity to take a break, leave all the work behind. Pity that I cannot leave my stomach behind, as I just realised that even my "extra size" pants are getting tight lately as well....

While working on the details, found out that shutterbug is also going to be there during the same period - now talking about timing.... He is there for a wedding as well, but he is the photographer for that wedding... and no, it's not the same couple... Heh... Anyway, got onto the SQ's $188 per person flight ticket special that they were having and found out that in the end, including taxes and surcharges... It's bloated to $309 per person!!!

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Had a team dinner yesterday night - to celebrate the sign-off from 2 sites - one of which was the reason why I was hired in the current company. Anyway, we had it at Senso, down at Club St. It's an Italian restuarant, and between the 17 (I think) of us, we had a meal costing about $1400, which includes 5 bottles of wine... We had Carpaccio, Mozzarella Senso and Caprese for appetizer and for mains, we had orders of Lumache, Fettuccine, Linguine Senso, Branzino Senso, Merluzzo, Manzo, Agnello and Ossobuco Senso. Finally, for desserts, it's Tiramisu Senso, Cioccolata, Semifreddo and Pera (maybe not this dish). Had a great dinner, chats and laughter - absolutely nothing on work! I tried taking some shots of the food, but it did not turn out well as I was taking it with my Treo650's cam which is not very good for those lighting conditions...

After the dinner, most of us proceed to Suntec for a bout of Karaoke at KBox (and crinched at some songs where they butchered it with their singing). By the time I got home, it was 2 am... Which explains why my eyes are "complaining" at this moment as well, they did not have much rest yesterday....

So... Time to rest... For it's holiday time!!!! Well, almost... less than 24 hours more to go!!!!

Rest....

Finally after so many months of constant pressure of work and stuff, I am getting some rest... Yup, I am having a 2-day holidays after a hectic week of go live support and the constant barrage of issues and things to do. You can tell that it's too much when you feel headache by just looking at some requests that you need to reply to... and feeling your blood pressure goes up when trying to answer them....

As much as I would want to make a trip somewhere just to take a break, it did not work out that well, due to dates (yes, another intensive 2 -3 months ahead again!!) and also the lateness in planning (as well as the discovery of not having enough $$$ to pay for the trip...) So, the holiday trip is postponed and hopefully by then would have save enough... Setting Spain as the next target around next year CNY period.

Kind of weird to be not working... Am resisting the temptation to download emails on my laptop to see what has been filling up my mail box... However, I also realised that, even with days off, I still had some housekeeping things to do... Like getting rid of old papers which includes bills and accounts info, etc (way back to 1998) and looks like a long proccess... I am only going through the 2nd bag and I think I have about 4 more to go....

Meantime, since I have change to a new car, I just realised that the insurance for the old car has not been cancelled and due to the hetic schedule, I had left it out till today... Going to make a trip to their office tomorrow to see if they can refund me from the time the car was sold, instead of notification time...

Oh well... Back to the grind on Wednesday... Have to make sure I enjoy this break...



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What Your Soul Really Looks Like

You are very passionate and quite temperamental. While you can be moody, you always crave comfort. You are a grounded person, but you also leave room for imagination and dreams. You feet may be on the ground, but you're head is in the clouds. You see yourself with pretty objective eyes. How you view yourself is almost exactly how other people view you. Your near future is calm, relaxing, and pretty much what you want. And it's something you've been anticipating for a while now. For you, love is all about caring and comfort. You couldn't fall in love with someone you didn't trust.

Inside the Room of Your Soul

A beautiful save... NOT!!!!

If you have been listening to the radio lately... You would have heard the recent ads by Esso-Mobil. Where the customer handled over the smiles card just before the totaling of the bill... And the cashier went... "A beautiful save, sir....'

I thought the last delivery of the Amazon package was like that... According to the US Postal Service, the package was delivered on 7 Aug, at 3pm. Which by right would be at least, more that 12 hours before TehPeng and wife checks out of the hotel to drive to LA. So, they should received the package... Right?!?!?

Well, according to TehPeng... He checked with the front desk for packages on 7 Aug night, and was not given anything... So when he checked out of hotel on 8 Aug, he told them to reject the package...

So how do they reject a package that was supposedly already delivered???!? So where the heck is the cock-up?!?!?!?! The postal service or the hotel?!???!!

Most importantly.... HOW THE HECK AM I GETTING THE REFUND!?!??!?!?!

Darn... This really spoils my day.... ARGH!!!!!!

Now I had to start sending emails out to the hotel and Amazon.... This is too much...

Another blog entry at 2 am..... On Jap Food!!!

Of late, I have been blogging at 2 am... Perhaps it's because of the video... Yes, still not happy with it, especially after viewing on my TV via DVD player... So I am in the midst of rendering again after some adjustment...

Today I had dinner with my mum at Sakae Sushi. She had this 1-for-1 Sashimi Classic thingy, so we had dinner at the Tiong Bahru branch (nearest one I guess)... We did not really enjoyed it, as we started to compare it to the Ichiban Boshi Jap Restaurant (with Kuriya Fish Market) in Great World City. Somehow we found the seaweed that they (IB) use for Temaki was better (same price), the Chawa Mushi was also better (but more ex), even the Sashimi was fresher (and I think it's cheaper, from my mum's calculation). I guess that's why I started to go there instead.

We had gone a long way since our first introduction to Japanese food almost 20 years ago... Not sure I had blog about it before, but, it's kind of funny that we hate our first bite. Perhaps it's the restaurant that we went to, but everything we ordered, it tasted the same, and it's all taste of the miso. We had never like the taste of miso, and still don't, and because most of the food that we had ordered then came with that taste, it puts us off Jap food for a long time; till I had my first sushi in Gold Coast (of all places!) years later. Perhaps it could be the cooking of those time, where miso is the taste...

Anyway, it was in Australia that I found out not all Jap food have miso taste.... Thus the adventure of learning more about Jap food starts... After I started working, there used to be a Jap restaurant (Asuka) that I discovered in Tiong Bahru and was opened by a Jap lady and her partner. Almost every month while I was out at site in Central Plaza, I would have at least 1 meal per month at that restuarant. It was good, but a bit pricy. I was such a regular there that they gave me their discount card and the lady could recognised me, along with the captain and the sushi counter chefs. It was a pity that I had to stop patronising it as I was no longer around that area. Not sure what happen to it, but it has since been long gone from Tiong Bahru Plaza.

So now, my mum got hooked on it as well - Well, not as hooked as I am... But she nows learns to appreciate it... Oh, the place to go for Jap Udon? Waruku at East Coast Park (Same car park as Long Beach Main Branch). Mother had the udon there and she loves that version (nice and slighty springly)... She also tried the Ichiban version and did not like it... Since then, she decided not to order that at any other places... Next location to try would be the Kuriya at Shaw Centre; by the same company - infact, they own chain Jap places like Kuriya Fine Dining at Great World City; Kuriya at Shaw Centre; Ichiban Boshi at various locations; Fiesta at various locations; and even Kuishin-Bo at Suntec...

The other place which I had quite good Jap food is Matsuo at Goldhill Plaza. It was mentioned, by this Jap guy that was interviewed for the Hokkaido Food Fest in Tampines Mall, in the Sunday's Life. Stumbled upon that restaurant while I was at customer site near Novena. Only issue was the place has this strong smell of fish, so if you are not comfortable with it, don't go there... You are warned... I guess the mark of a good Jap place is how many % of their customers are Japs... In Matsuo case, it's quite a high percent, especially dinner time, but then again, I had not been back there for a while, so I am not certain if it's still as popular as before....

Since then, I had Jap food in Malaysia, Australia (especially Melbourne, the seafood there is superb), Germany (eeks!) and even US. Now... If I could just get to Hokkaido, it would be great... Especially their fish market.... If I recall correctly, you could get fresh and good sashmi right at the market for a great price!

Talking about it makes me salivate again... Heh...

Ok, 30% more to go and it would be done....

Finally.... The Video is Ready! (Almost)

Yup... Finally the editing for the video to be used during the Cambodia photo exhitbition is over... Now my PC's CPU is using half of its resource to render the video for the final touch in creating a DVD.

I am currently using Sony Vegas to do this video... Been trying it out since the last Cambodia trip and I am still learning something new about this software. Of course, it's rather powerful, but in my hands, it's definitely not working to it's full potential! But as long as, occasionally, I can get some video out of it, it does not really matter to me anyway. Will be using the DVD Architect to create the DVD as well. There still so many such software in the market, I kind of wonder which one would be considered as the "de facto" for such situation (Like if we mention graphics, Adobe Photoshop would come into mind).... Then again, which one is Hollywood using... Ok, maybe not Hollywood, but George Lucas's choice would be great... :P Heh....

Mean time, you can see that I have not been blogging, if I did it's usually the nonsensical ones and so far, no more posting of pictures... Well, I have been so rooted to home country that I have not travelled since Feburary... I guess the reason could be my boss has been doing all the travelling instead of me.... Don't get me wrong, it's a good thing as I was literally not home for almost half a year, but after a while, kind of getting a bit restless if I don't get to travel.... So, now, I am looking for places to go for holiday.... No travel for work... Travel for fun! Heh....

The Canadian trip with coz is out of the question as her friend does not want to have someone not so familiar to her travelling.... Good thing though, their budget was like 6k for that trip and since I recently changed my car, that's out of my budget.... Canada will have to wait...

Anyway, I have to search for alternative... Good thing that a friend of mine is also looking for some place to go as well... Current target location seems to be Hokkaido.... Let's see how it goes... But not to fear.... I got a Penang trip coming up in Oct... A coz of mine is getting married then, taking the opportunity to visit Penang again (and to eat those favourite Penang food, of course).... Hmm... That reminds me... Got to start blotting the schedule and alerting my boss, before she pull some schedule that would be in conflict.... Yes, time to drop hints of leave taking.....

Looks like Russia is the "in" place to go.... First was a friend of ours that was there for almost 2 weeks, and now naniecheng is also going there... What more it's a paid trip... Of course it means you got to work while there... But think about it... It's a good way to travel... At least you get to be there, and I am certain you will get to see some sites while you are there.... I am certain she is reading up what to look out for while in Russia.... Now, if only my company does sell the products that I support there... Then again, I might not be the one being sent there...

Oh well... Let's see what's in store for the next half of the year... Soon it will be Christmas time again.... And then dawn of a new year.... Time flies, especially when you are trapped with lots of work....

Nothing better to do....

Your Birthdate: November 19

You are resilient, and no doubt your resilience has already been tested. You've had some difficult experiences in your life, but you are wise from them. Having had to grow up quickly, you tend to discount the advice of others. You tend to be a loner, having learned that the only person you can depend on is yourself. Your strength: Well developed stability and confidence Your weakness: Suspicion of others Your power color: Eggplant Your power symbol: Spade Your power month: October

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Your Heart Is Green

Love completes you, but that doesn't mean you seek it out. When love comes your way, you integrate it peacefully into the rest of you life. Your flirting style: Laid back Your lucky first date: Walking around aimlessly and talking Your dream lover: Is both enthusiastic and calm What you bring to relationships: Balance

What Color Heart Do You Have?

The Keys to Your Heart

You are attracted to good manners and elegance. In love, you feel the most alive when things are straight-forward, and you're told that you're loved. You'd like to your lover to think you are optimistic and happy. You would be forced to break up with someone who was emotional, moody, and difficult to please. Your ideal relationship is lasting. You want a relationship that looks to the future... one you can grow with. Your risk of cheating is zero. You care about society and morality. You would never break a commitment. You think of marriage something you've always wanted... though you haven't really thought about it. In this moment, you think of love as something you thirst for. You'll do anything for love, but you won't fall for it easily.

What Are The Keys To Your Heart?

You Have a Melancholic Temperament

Introspective and reflective, you think about everything and anything. You are a soft-hearted daydreamer. You long for your ideal life. You love silence and solitude. Everyday life is usually too chaotic for you. Given enough time alone, it's easy for you to find inner peace. You tend to be spiritual, having found your own meaning of life. Wise and patient, you can help people through difficult times. At your worst, you brood and sulk. Your negative thoughts can trap you. You are reserved and withdrawn. This makes it hard to connect to others. You tend to over think small things, making decisions difficult.

What Temperment Are You?

What the....... Are we using our brains?

Well... It comes to this... Recently I had ordered some DVDs through amazon and sent it to my colleague who is currently staying in the hotel, so that he could bring it back when he returns...

The good part about amazon is that they have tracking systems that you can check on to see when your parcel is arriving and making sure that he received it before he leaves this Friday (or Sat, he did not stated very clearly...) Now the other thing about amazon is that sometimes they have this Free shipping sales that once you spent above USD25, you get to ship it free within US/Canada. So, taking this opportuntiy, that's what i did...

Ordered 5 DVDs... Most of them you can't get it here (people dun like such movies???), or it's rediculously high price here, qualify for free shipping... Wopee... It got shipped and it was close, but good thing is that it's shipped and would reach within the same day.... Well, if done correct that is...

The thing that irks me was.... The tracking system came back with this "Parcel was send to the destination, but recipient was not at home"!!!! Duh... It's a PO box number for goodness sake!!! And the PO Box is just next to the hotel as well!!!! Can't they do some linking and get it send to the hotel front desk instead!?!??!?! I mean, it's written So and So, C/O Hotel name, PO Box etc, etc, etc....

No... instead they left a message there... Right, as though the hotel people knows what to do with it??? And when I ask him to ask them, they say no post???? Er, so what happens to the message then???? Who did it get to? ARGH!!!!

Then, searching the website of the hotel.... I saw this... Shipping address!!! Ok, so ... I send out an email to amazon and ask if there is a way to inform USPS of the shipping address.... I got back an email saying that they were sorry da the da.... Oh, we can't do anything about it as it's shipped!! Ask them to check with the local post office.... Er... hello... This guy is a guest in a hotel and is not US citizen and not even staying in US, how would he knows where the local office is??? And if the person still can't get it, please use another url to do a change of address!!!!

I could now only hope that the hotel staff are kind enough to help clear this out.... If my colleague do approach them... if not... Not sure what will happen to the packages then...

ARGH!!!!!!! I GIVE UP!!!!

I wonder... Is this an issue of sticking to rigidly to some policies or we just don't use the gray matter between our ears anymore?????


I did all the best I could, email to my colleague - imploring him to check with hotel front desk to see what they can do to help since he has the tracking numbers; send email to amazon (receive such replies) and finally emailing USPS through their website and see if they can change the delivery address to the shipping address with the tracking number in the email...... Crossing my fingers...

Something not quite right.....

You know that something is not quite right when you start having snickers almond bar after every meal this week.... Yup, that's what I am having... It's like I need some sugar rush.... Perhaps it's the stress/headache of the current project that I am involved in... The tension is just too much that I need this to help me through... In fact, I still have a single Mars bar in my car - which I had promptly forgotten and dump into my car boot.... Bought it today, as a just incase, for I did not have any dinner yesterday night because of the early morning presentation we were to have... It was eventful as things suddenly stop working... You are feeling hungry, tired and irritated as it worked while the system was in the office... Now, it's not working anymore... Yikes!

Oh well... One more week to go... Before I can kick this out of the way... Hopefully by then, I would not have gain much weight from the "extra ingredient" in my diet....

Stress Time

Yup... I have not updated my blog for almost a month... That's because it's the stress time at this moment... Stress from work.... Starting to feel stress for the mission's video as well.... Everything would gather momentum to June... Looks like it will be another few stress months to go...

Ok... After looking at Bali's photo from MizSnooze blog... I WANT TO GO FOR HOLIDAY!!!!!

Now... Destination... Unknown....

Er, time to call my coz... I heard she is thinking going to Canada.... Hmmm..... That could be a good place to go....

Meantime... Back to work...

In Times Like These...

In times like these, you would wish you had someone to "ter" to... Shivering at the cold feet and cold fingers, with a body temperature of 38.4 degrees celcius (according to the doctor), an occasional cough here and there as well as the ever threatening sore that would just break out any time on your throat as well as a sudden influx of muscles aching all over your body... Yup... Having the full blown flu effects - although medically we would not term it as flu, but who cares... You and I know what I am talking about... Somehow, you would wish to have some one or some companion whom you could be a "baby" to and cuddle up with the person and feel that warmth and love...

Kind of hard if you are currently away from your parents and being alone, these are the times where it would hit you hard... You would at times, wish somehow the circumstance are different, even though being with someone does not mean heaven on earth, and at times it could mean hell on earth... Still there is always this wispful feeling and slight tinge of regret...

Yet, when this is all over, it's just another chapter in your life, a very small 2 days of misery due to an onslaught of flu... And you are back on your feet, bouncing up to face them squarely in the eye...

Haiz... Meantime.... Let me curl up in my corner of bed and feel pity for myself...

Weird Feeling...

It's kind of weird to be up and watching DVDs at 4am. Not that I do not wish to sleep, but this week I am doing graveyard shift for a site 'going live'. Thus....

You get to sit in a room, having your lappie in front of you, with not much stuff happening that needs your attention and you get to surf all you like since most of the time, you are left alone to concentration on supporting the site... So what you do? Bring your arsenal of DVDs, and meticulously goes through them one by one to help you to pass the time by... Sounds good for some, not that good for others....

The bad thing about it is that you have already gone through at least once for each and every DVD that you have bought... And of course you would rent some, but working in this shift makes it harder to bring yourself out to the rental shops to get it... On the other hand it would be great chance to enrol in those rental schemes where they mail the rented DVDs over and you can drop it off the post office once you finish them... On the other hand, it's a monthly payment thingy IIRC, and well, its only for 1 week... Not really into it as well, unless they have R1 or R2 DVDs available, instead they usually only have R3 DVDs, which most of them do lack in the extras to the DVDs... Except maybe the more recent DVD releases, like Narnia - apparently the only difference between R1 CE and R3 CE is that R1 has DTS track...

Anyway, it's back to DVDs for me... Hmmm... Maybe I should rewatch the Battlestar Galatica Season 1 DVDs.... Which is not with me at the moment... Yeah... Maybe... Meantime... It's Yesterday Once More...

Yummy....

It was just another night where I had no idea what I was going do on a Friday nite as well as where to go for dinner. It seems that Friday nite has become another makan nite with my mum lately... We had Japanese dinner at Great World City and today, it was Ivins at Binjal Park.

After dinner, has this craving for ice cream, and since it's a short hop from my mum's place, decided to call my ex-colleague(turned friend), who is staying near the place... It happened that I was in luck, I caught her just before she took the flight back from Jakarta, so she did not have anything on tonight... We met up at The Daily Scoop, where it is becoming a favourite place of mine for ice cream. She was the one that introduced me to this particular shop as well as into the world of Made-In-Singapore ice cream places. One of my particular favourite flavour from there was the Lychee Martini, where I have only recently learnt (via yesterday's Urban) that it includes vodka!!! The other recommended flavour would have to be the Durian Durian, and finally, Simply Chocolate is heavenly!!! I bought a pint of Lemon Sherbet for my mum as well...

Interestingly, because of this shop, I am beginning to be weaned off the American brand ice creams such as Ben and Jerry, Haagen-Dazs, etc. It seems that I am becoming more picky about the type of ice cream that I am having... It also start an interest in learning how to make ice cream - just that I never did have time to even experiment (and who is going to help in washing the equipment/bowls/etc???)

Hmm... Maybe I might have to start watching my waistline... Heh... Then again, the type of ice cream that they make... It's not as creamy as some other brands/location which is what I like about their ice cream... Light, nicely flavoured, and with chucks of the real stuff at a price that is still less the other named brands... Perfect!

It has been a while....

Yup, it has been a while since my last blog... Nothing much happening, except that I have been busy playing and trying to get my new phone up and running nicely... Since it's also a PDA, I was also trying to get it to the state where I left my previous PDA...

Finally after 3 years, I have changed my mobile to a new Palm Treo 650 - mobile cum PDA together in 1. I was quite resistent to such convergence till recently when I was travelling a lot and I really had to carry so many gadgets (my own mobile phone, office mobile phone, PDA, camera, etc)... It was so much of a hassle and with Treo being more stable than when it first launch, I decided to venture into the convergence phone.

I guess the 1st question someone would have is... Why Treo? Why not O2 atom or O2 mini... Well... I guess I am very comfortable with Palm OS, since my previous PDA was a Palm Tungsten T and having to deal with so many Windows OS at work and my PC... I would prefer a switch... It's very much like those who would prefer an Apple machine rather than a Windows machine... I like what I am having and I don't see why I should struggle to familiarised myself with another system where you have to rely on their rather unreliable activesync (I have been approach to help some of my friends to figure out why their sync is not working as it is supposed to...) The other is the contact list have to come from either Outlook or Outlook express which I don't and will not use, whereas Palm do give you a choice between the Palm desktop or Outlook...

So... By now... I am quite comfortable with the amount of stuff I have in there, and now when I travel... I have 1 less gadget (and accessories) to carry!!! Yet, I have all the stuff that I need...

Meantime... Need to research more... Like backup applications... Which one to use, etc...

So... Time to surf the net (sites like TreoCentral, SPUG, PalmInfoCenter, etc)...

(Finally) Photos!

Yup, finally had the time to sort through my photos for both Germany and Melbourne trip. So here they are -

Germany - Mannheim

Germany - Freiburg

Germany - Freiburg's Saturday Market at Munsterplatz

Germany - Merdingen's Sunday Fasnet (procession)

Melbourne City

The only reasonable IR shot that I could get in Melbourne and it was like in late afternoon, thus the sun is at an angle.

Ok... That's all I have... Well, not that these are the only shots I took... I took around 100plus shots for the Fasnet, but I don't think I should be showing all of them here... So I guess these are the "better" ones in my opinion.

I'm flying home tonight! (loosely used)

Yup... I am currently at the SIA Airline Lounge in Melbourne Airport. This is the first time that I am using the Lounge (courtesy of Gold KR status) and I get wireless access for free! Nice....

Well, time flies and it's Friday! I am flying home in the 12.50am flight so technically it's a next morning flight... Oh well, who cares... Just that I am finally not flying anymore till early April - unless got to fly to KL... That's another issue altogether. At least no more long hour flights for the time being...

Amazing that 5 days have gone since stepping into Melbourne. Came here to give a technical training on a product to the Aus colleagues and I hope they could understand what I was trying to impart to them on the technical side of the product such that they can do the installation of the product themselves... I forsee that I will still have a trip to Brisbane for the next installation as I have no idea when the apps person will be employed and trained for this product.

It's kind of a long hour trip as I have not got my materials ready (half of it is because I just came back from training myself and had to scramble to get some ppt slides up), so I have been burning midnight oil to get the slides ready for the next day... Think I am using up my numbers by now... All I want is a few days of at least 8 hours of sleep per night till I feel afresh!!!

But amist all these, I had the opportunity to retry my hands at IR Photography, using the grass (green colour) as the custom white balance, thus without any post processing, the preview in my camera, the sky looks brown!!! Did not have Photoshop on my laptop, thus will have to download the pictures once I get home. Will post the pics as well as my Freiburg pics once I get a chance to do my selection and processing....

Hmm... Time to pack and get going... Should be boarding soon... and (again courtesy of Gold KR status) should be able to get on the plane before the crush...

Till the next time....

Hmmm....

Hmmm.... I still having issues in getting myself checked-in via internet... This is amazing... Darn... I am trying to get a good seat but even with upgrade, there seems to be some issues in checking-in via internet...

Haiz.... Let's see what happens tomorrow... Well at least now it's slightly better, this morning I can't even log into the site...

Well... It's my last night in Freiburg... Just as I get used to the weather, I am leaving... Figures isn't it?

Oh well, at least I will be getting my photos out of my cam... Not sure if I will be able to get it in here before I fly again...

Meantime... Should start packing... Had quite a few bottles to pack... Hmmm... Wanted to add something but it just hover somewhere behind the mind and refuses to come out... Nevermind...

P.S. - Looks like SIA's website is not the only one that I am having issues with... Even the clubsnap's website is out as well... Weird!

What? A week has gone???

Cannot believe this... But it's Sonntagabend, and I wonder where has the week gone... It's just an ICE train where all of a sudden, a week has gone... Spend the Saturday walking in Freiburg, walk thru the old town area (or city center); went pass the Munzterplatz where there was a Saturday market - bought a bottle of Honig Schnap (Honey liquor - 35% of alcohol, 200ml) and then 200 ml of Apfel Schnap as well (Apple liquor - 45% alcohol, well, in this case, may not be liquor anymore - don't ask me why there is a difference, I have no idea).

From there, with those 2 bottles in the backpack, I walked to the cable car to take it up to Schlossburg. But that's only like half the way, you got to walk up again till where the tower is. Man, I am so unfit that I had about 3 rest stops before finally I reached the tower. Walked up the steps almost to the top, the wind was so strong that I decided to stay at the 2nd lookout that it has - It's high enough to take pictures of Freiburg and it's surroundings. Meantime, you can feel the wind is trying to blow you off the tower. Good thing is that the weather was holding that day that I don't have to worry about the shutter speed. Had wonder if those 2 bottles had added some weight to make it even more difficult to walk up the er, ... hill? mountain? whatever...

Anyway, it's much easier to walk down to the cable car area than to walk up. However, could be the climb, my left knee seems to be wobbly and had to do some compensation using my right leg... So, it was then to look for a place to have lunch... Went to a restuarant that does not have English menu, so we tried our hand at ordering... Did not do that well - since we are not ordering the usual meal, instead we were looking at appetizer/sandwich/salad type of food... We did get something like that, but it was all meat - smoked bacon (without a better word to discribe it... The word they use here is even worse - raw ham, but it's not really raw...) 2 to 3 pieces of bread and 3 half tomatoes, and some pickle.

After that, my colleague wanted to get some wine for her husband, so we went wein hunting. Found a wein shop and she got 2 bottles of red wein and I got 2 bottles of eiswine. So it seems that I have run out of the permitted liquor... Can't get anymore stuff, except maybe 3 can of beer???

Then had dinner at a colleague's place - she's a Thai working as an apprentice at the german office while studying at one of the University in Germany (not Freiburg Uni). So, we had her version of Thai food. She has tampered the spicyness of the dishes so that we don't have to worry about it. That was like heaven to my colleagues as they had not have much asian food and the sushi we had was not really that good.

So... That's how the saturday went. Sunday came.

Slept late thus by the time I was really, it was 10 am. Could not decide what to do, was actually looking at going to Titisee, but since it's winter, and Sunday, there wasn't much to do there (knowing that all shops close on Sunday in Germany), I could not even have a chance to look at the cuckoo clocks that Titisee is famous for... Thus decided to do a short walk around Freiburg and get some pictures in, especially since at this time, it's very quiet and not many people are around... Like I say, the only places that are open on Sunday are the churches, restuarants and hotels; and at that time, somehow everyone seems to be napping at home or is making their way to the churches. Had some pictures which makes it look like ghost town due to that reason...

Then it was time to take a tram/bus to Merdingen where there is a procession held. It's an event where they dress up and wearing wooden masks (According to what I can gather in internet - it's call 'fools guild', like court jester) and walked down the streets - giving (throwing at times) out sweets as well as throwing paper confetti at people as well as stuffing some of it down some unexpecting spectators. Took quite a fair bit of photos but not sure how good it will be... Will be working on it once I get back (So... photos got to wait..) Was not that lucky as I got paper confetti thrown at me a few times, and there was this fellow who gave sweet on 1 hand, and the other held the confetti where he promptly rubbed on my head!!! Had to brush off from my hair quite a few times...

By the end of it, the streets were filled with the paper confetti as well as some candy that was not picked up by the kids... You would also find empty bottles of either beer or wine on the street (and even window ledges). Had some trouble in getting back to hotel as the bus did not appear as it was stated in the busguide. Walked a big round trying to find the taxi stand... Till we saw some taxis at a section... Turns out taxis could only stop there and not proceed further due to the closer of road for this procession... Problem was the taxis had left and we had to wait further... Waited for another 20 mins when a taxi came and we were back at the hotel...

So... That's how we spent our weekend. Oh... Before I forget, had eiscream again today... which brings my count of eiscream for this trip to 3!

Ok... Time is running out... Need to close this... Hmm... Going home in 2 more days... Don't think I am looking forward to it...

What to do on a Sat in a weather that is not helping?

Yup... It's Sat (Samstag) again... Well almost... It's still Freitag nacht (Friday night if you haven't got it by now) in Freiburg. Just got an sms 2 hours ago saying that I got my upgrade, and need to call back by 6pm Singapore time to confirm (issue voucher) it. I am still thinking, should I or should I not... Since it will be night by the time I get on the plane and all I want is sleep... Well, and the Noes Joux movie... ARGH... It's so tempting to upgrade for the way back... Darn, darn, darn... Tough decision to sleep on... Got to call by tomorrow morning (morgen) by 10.59am.

Meantime... Well, I did not managed to take pics of the skiing event... Turns out the rain came, thus making it cold and difficult to take any pics... Also, the place was not very well lit, so in the end, only had fun playing with snow balls... Could not even find out how to play with the slides...

Sigh... It's seems to be raining every evening... Rain yesterday evening, rain again this evening... Well, got to figure what to do tomorrow... Wanted to go Basel (Swiss), but then, what's there to see in Basel? So, maybe will be going up to Scholossburg and then the market at Munzterplatz... See if there are some chance of taking pics...

Meantime... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not... Should I, should I not......................

Valentine's Day (in Freiburg)

14 Feb 2006

Frankly... There is nothing special about this day... The day started out like yesterday, waking up at 7 am, getting to breakfast by 7.30 and then out to office via tram by 8 am.

Had a full day training session in office and some "sideline" work issues elsewhere, other than that, it's just a normal day except my day happens in Freiburg, instead of being back home...

Had some lunch which had turkey meat supposedly cooked in kebab (doner) style, but there were no pita or the warp, instead it was this huge bread that is sliced and the slap some huge amount of sour cream on it along with some vege and the turkey meat. Had some soup (suppe) today but does not taste like any type of soup we would have at home... I am not even sure if it's corn, although it looks like corn (you know the yellow based colour...)

When to Martin's Breu for dinner today. Nice! Was there once 2 years ago when I first step into Freiburg, for another training of the same product... I think then I had the 3 types of sausages (if I remember correctly, or it could be some other colleague who had that...) and this time, I had their Lamb chops. It was great as it came with lots of green vege (long beans) and bake potato. Had their brew of beer. Seems to be having lots of beer in Germany, I guess they are famous for the numerous amount of locally brew beer, so what more to do than to taste a couple of them!??! Oh, guess what... At a temperature of 7 degrees celcius this evening... I had a 2 scoops of Häagen-Dazs ice cream while walking back to the hotel!!! Feel kind of weird (and cold!), holding the cup with a gloved hand... Heh...

Anyway, so I am now back at the hotel, typing this (and pasting the other days events into the blog) and finally able to surf, surf and surf (for next 1 and half hour before the time is up!)

Till tomorrow then!

Oh... I am looking forward to tomorrow as tomorrow, there will be a skiing competition in the german office... So I will get a chance to try out flood light skiing photography!!!!

Greetings from Freiburg!

Finally! Took me 2 days to figure out what happen and to get myself on the hotel wireless and be connected!

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11 Feb 2006

What a way to start a trip... Upgraded myself on to the Business class for the flight from Singapore to Frankfurt - it was on a 747-400 plane and I took a seat on the upper deck. However, this upgrade almost did not happen - was informed to call back once I received the SMS by the day shown in teh SMS before 6pm, but was not informed I had to ask them to issue an upgrade voucher before it could happen! So I called back, the person who attended to my call did not also inform me that I had to issue a voucher for it as well!!! So I thot fine, I called back, and it was confirmed, so done. Well, it's a good thing that I tried to check in on Friday night when I could not figure what happen to my upgrade as the confirmation number for that disappeared (check it on Thursday and it was still there). After a few calls and finally sorted that out and good thing there were still seats available! The lady who took my call was kind enough to pick a nice seat, which apparently is one of the best/popular seat on the deck - 17A, a window seat next to the emergency exit.

Anyway, I have to say this - after this flight, I think I will be treating myself to 1 upgrade per year for my trips. Will have to pick out which one though. I guess to maximised the miles exchanged, I guess it will have to be a long haul flight except for the direct flights to US - that I think the seats are good enough to stay at economy (think they call it deluxe economy). And if this year's travel is as much as last, I will have that opportunity to upgrade again in 2007. But I seriously doubt I will be travelling that much this year, not unless new stuff is coming out and it's a must to attend the training overseas!

Let me get back to the topic again... So what's the difference... Well, of course the seats are different (let me digress further on this later), I guess the significant thing would be, they do make the effort to remember your surname and call you by that, instead of just madam/sir. Then again, comparing between 20 (in the upper deck) seats in Raffles class and 313 seats in economy seats, this would be expected. You will have space on the side (for the window seats) to store stuff, which could be anything like a book, magazine, even a camera (I left mine on it while waiting for the sunset... Sad to say was not able to get a good shot of it...)

You get a welcome drink before you fly (and if you want, they do serve champaigne); Another drink to start off the serving of meals (asked along with the main course you will be taking) - can be cocktails, wine (including champaigne), different type of teas, and the usual softdrinks. You get towels as well, before and after meals. Your meals are served individually, such as starters (and a new glass of wine to go with it if you want), then followed by mains and finally dessert, along with coffee and tea - you could have some port or liquer to finish. There are also space to place a permanent cup of water (which they refill whenever the level is low or empty) throughout the whole flight.

The seat. Well, the seat is spacious and comfortable. You can extend it just enough to enjoy the movie that is screening (and yes, the screen is slightly larger), or you can extend it to the max and sleep like you would do on a bed. Only thing is that it's not totally a flat level, so you may feel that you might just slide to the ground... Of course there is a flap that your soles will be against to stop that slide.

So, on that flight, I watched Pride and Prejudice which I have to say, the Darcy character was good, infact far better than Colin Firth. However, I still prefer Elizabeth Ehle's Lizzy than Kiera Knightley's. I guess because it's a movie, they had to cut short a lot of different scenes and thus not having the story developed as it would have as a mini-series.

Watched another 2 movies, The Greatest Game Ever Played (on golf) and a dutch movie 'In Orange' it's about this boy's ambition to be in the Dutch under 14 national team, and the trials that he went through before he got there... I think I watched another movie but I cannot remember it.

One thing that I did not find it good was the noise cancellation phones that they had. It was by this Nasaco company and I don't really find it effective. The only time where it was effective was when you extend your seat further such that the pillow became a cushion the side of your head where suddenly you can't really hear the usual plane noise.

Sigh... It was quite enjoyable that it was a sad thing when we landed. Of course by then, I think because of being inactive for 11 hours other than going to the toliet, I seems to have developed seat sore!!!

So there... My boss wondered why I did not do it for the return flight instead, but since it will be a night flight, I will be too tired to bother about anything else... I am certain I will be sleeping most of the journey (except when they wake you up for meals!!!), so I see no point of doing the upgrade then.

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12 Feb 2006

Woke up very early this morning. Had only about 5 hours of sleep as I slept at 12 midnight last night. Looked at the clock, went to toliet and then lay on the bed again and then had broken sleep till 7 am. Took shower and packed my bags again and went for breakfast.

I have to say I find the method of finding a table at the breakfast area of the Sheraton Frankfurt is quite amusing but yet a bit stressful. They do not have assigned seats, so you go there, and you find seats for yourself. Why is it stressful? Well, for one, if you are alone, and you are taking your food from the buffet table, how would you know if someone else will take your seat while you are away? So it's quite amusing to be sitting there, having your breakfast and seeing people try to cope with this system and find some seat to have their breakfast. Some ended up sharing the tables.

After that small drama at the breakfast area, I checked out and went to Mannheim to walkl around. Dn't ask me why I chose Mannheim. I am still wondering about that myself. It seems that most of the cities closes on SUnday (Sonntige). The only places that are open are the churches, restaurants and shops at the train stations (Hauptbahnhof). So I walked, and walked, and walked, to different areas like the churches, the different platzes, the Mannheim University and had my lunched at a restuarant that specialises in pork knuckles and roast chicken. Nope, I did not have the pork knuckles thinking that it will be too much but half a chicken, that's quite a lot as well...

So decided to head back to Frankfurt. Turns out that I was wrong in remembering the even number timing for direct connection to Freiburg. It seems that it's the odd number timing. It's a good thing that I checked the board and found that the next direct connection to Freiburg was at 3.54pm instead of 4 plus as I originally had in mind. Then I check the timing on the printout I got from the ticketing office was a 5.57pm timing and had a mad scramble to get my luggage from the baggage storage in Sheraton and run back to the train tracks. Managed to hop onto it and now heading toward Freiburg as I am typing this. By now, I'm just 30 mins away from Freiburg. The sun has seems to have set, and now the place seems to be covered with snow as compared to areas near Frankfurt and even Mannheim where there were no snow. It's pity that the sun had set for it would have made some nice photos to keep with all the snow... I kind of wonder how Freiburg will be like? Snowing as well???

Oh well, time to keep the laptop. Arriving soon at the train station, 20 mins more to go...

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13 Feb 2006

Wow... It's cold in the morning like 8 am while walking to the tram station to get the office. Even with the new warmest glove that I have, seems to be not enough. Wonder if that can hold for the skiing (happening on wednesday). Anyway, it was a slow start with introduction to the new stuff in the product... Skiping thru it... No work to be discussed here...

Went into the city square area to have dinner... And out of the cusines that you can chose, we had dinner at this sushi bar (not surprising as I always find no matter where Japanese goes, they tend to try to find their type of cusine in the city they visit... not sure if this is a generalisation, but so far, even in Melbourne or Brisbane, I usually find them in Japanese restaurants). I can only say - try not to do that in smaller towns/cities. Somehow the rice seems different, they had, like in Singapore, done some modification to the sushi and localised it a little, so it's not really "Jap" food in that sense.

Anyway, was back in hotel and tried to get on to their wireless. Well, not successful - there were a few wireless access point around and I just could not get online. Gave up after 30 mins - could not believe that it's so difficult to get on wireless...

One of my favourite past time - FOOD!

Yup, People's Park Food Centre is back in business! Had my dinner there yesterday at TianJin Fong Kee where I had ordered Hot and Spicy soup, "Zha Jian" noodles and 20 pieces of dumplings (jiao zi). Before any questions raised on the amount of food - I had my mum with me; in fact it was her suggestion that we go there for dinner!

This store has always been famous for their dumplings and the other Northern Chinese cusine dishes. Apparently, it's so good that they have their own website (where you can even ask them to cater for your functions)! What I did not know is that they have 3 different stores including 1 store in Serangoon Gardens Food Centre!

Anyway, coming back to the food - somehow it always happens, and it's happening to this store as well. The Hot and Spicy soup is no longer that delicious and felt a bit watery; and the noodles was ok, just a bit salty to my liking. The saving grace was the dumplings, it is also the star of the dishes for that store IMHO and still is! I think I had about 13 out of the 20 pieces of the dumplings. We even sms my aunt, who is in Penang, that we had that... Somehow, we tend to go for some interesting food when she is not around... I guess it's easier to decide for 2 person instead of 3, also the $$$ spend would be greater! ahahahahahhaah

Talking about that... We also had a good dinner at Pontini on Sat nite (and yes, I think my mum sms her about it as well!) where I had one of their signature dishes - Linguine with Maine Lobster. Starters was this seafood soup which was great as well and finish it off with warm chocolate cake (which was a bit of disappointment, as they seems to be less generous with the amount of chocolate... I mean you would expect chocolate to be oozing out when you get to the core of the cake rite?) Slurped! Mother kept it safe with a sea bass dish and even she finds the soup delicious! The best thing about the dinner? The cost is reduced to only approximately 72 dollars - to share between the 2 of us.... (Yes, there is a catch of course... You got to be on this A la carte program)

Oh well... I am very statisfied with the food I had this weekend... Wonder what will the next bring... Especially when I will be in...... Germany!!! Yup, flying into Frankfurt and taking their Bahn train down to Freiburg...

No... It will not be giantic frankfurters/sausages and pork knuckles!!!

The Bag Quest Goes On....

Today, I had spent about 4 hours at John 3:16, trying to figure out if I should or should not buy the Tarmac Velocity 9 camera bag. I came back empty-handed as I still could not persuade myself that the Tarmac is right bag to get - as, currently, I have 2 bags that I am using. The Lowepro StealthReporter 400 (aka SR400) and Urban (the poor cousin of Crumpler's Farmers Double).

The Lowepro one is nice, with lots of room and space for the gear (which contains a D70, kit lens, 50mm prime len, 75-300mm len, SB600 and other smaller stuff like the omnibounce, etc) as well my wallet, PDA and house keys. However, the only issue I had with it is that it's a shoulder bag, so one side of my shoulder is overloaded, and had to get a waist band to ensure the bag does not bounce that much against my side when I walk. This is also not the bag that I would use when I travel overseas.

The Urban one I got is the one that I uses during my travel trips, and I just bought it recently. The old bag that I was using was getting old and felt a bit unsecure using it. This allows me to carry my laptop and camera on board the plane as a hand luggage. Only thing with this is, I don't carry my 75-300mm lens with me for this - it will not fit. This bag will do fine if I am just bringing the D70 with kit lens and flash.

So now... I am looking at CompuTrekker (so that I can bring all my lens and laptop as hand luggage) and the Tarmac Velocity 9 (this is more of a "replacement" for the SR400). I still could not decide if the CompuTrekker is the right bag to get for that purpose as normally, if I am walking around the places, I would lock the laptop in my large luggage, and just walk round with the gear in the Urban bag. It serve it's purpose but since it's a backpack, it's quite difficult to get the gear when you want to take any pics. Somehow, the pros of the bag still does not tempt me enough to decide to buy. Am still looking at other brands of bags for this purpose. The other bag that I saw was this Thinkphoto bag which is not available locally so that's out of the window - just that it looks good...

As for the Tarmac, well, i had tried to stuff it with the same gear and tested the bag out. Thanks ot J316, I did not have to bring my gear down, instead, since they have stock - except for the 75-300mm len which is no longer produced and had to subsitute with another lens that is about the same weight; I stuff the bag there and tested it out. At first I have to say it feels good, at least I don't feel the drag, but as time goes by I had a feeling that it may be an issue similar to the shoulder bag but this bag has the waist belt that can be tucked away. So the jury is still out on this bag - but I heard quite a fair bit of people are now looking at this bag.

Of course the other thing on my list is the wide angle lens - I definitely cannot afford the Nikon 17-55mm f/2.8 lens or even the 12mm one, which means I have 2 other choices - 12-24mm f/4 Tokina (which I am still eyeing) and 10-20mm Sigma lens. Having said that, the forums or reviews of the Tokina seems to be a 'ok' lens and nothing fantastic about it... So I am still undecided, however, with the new purchases, like the camera bag and other stuff, I seems to be putting this in the wish list rather than the to get list.

Finally, since I am not willing to pay $600 just for a Gitzo super lightweigth CF tripod and a ballhead, I had to find other methods to ensure I could take photos at a lower speed, like 1/4 of a second in places where I would normally use a tripod back home. The one that I was looking at was the 345 Manfrotto tabletop tripod. Like the 12-24mm lens, this is on a back burner. Still undecided yet.

Oh well... I guess another trip there next week is in order before leaving for Germany.

Should I Change the Blog Title to be Travel Blog???

As I reviewed what has been written in the blog... I started to wonder if I should rename this blog as a travel blog... So far, the most number of entries are basically on my travels... It gives a trace of where and when I was away from home... As well as the photos that came out of those trips....

Anyway, I just return for, yet, another trip. This time it was a last minute trip as I was not supposed to be traveling this week, but my colleague was not feelling well and they needed someone there, so I was penciled in to replace his presence. This time it was a 4 day trip to Aus again, 2 days in Brisbane and 2 days in Sydney... It has been almost 12 years since I have stepped into Sydney - somehow I don't really miss it and it does gives me a feeling of misery as the weather was as gloomy as London's! Somehow the rain decided to appear when I was there, thus there were lots of clouds and rain in the evening... But somehow I managed to get some shots in (and a visit to the aquarium but not much chance to get shots there), including the finally managed to get some IR shots done! Yup, finally after some help in Clubsnap, I managed to do a custom whitebalance for the IR filter. Although the instructions says to use the bright grass, I did it with the blue sky instead! So, the IR photos somehow changes to brownish kind of feel when it's supposed to be green.... But at least now I know how to get it to work!!! Heh... The other thing was it's not very sharp as I did not bring a tripod with me for this trip, so I have no support except for some railings and in some cases, the window pane at the hotel room!!!

Oh well, here's the selection of shots...

Nightshots

Day Shots







Sydney Aquarium











IR Shots


My first IR shot but blur due to no tripod!!!










Looks good except for that overexposed spot

Feel rather happy to have some shots... Just no time and correct weather to try out different custom WB and places.... Quite surprise to have a fair bit of photos this trip... Heh...