a new cosy cot

I bade farewell to my old mattress today. And the new one sorta came as a surprise.

Apparently my mum and dad went out shopping 3 weeks ago because Seahorse had a 50% off for all mattresses. They wanted to keep it as a surprise so none of them mentioned anything until earlier this evening when I got home and saw the old mattress in the living room.

Initially they had only wanted to get one just for me. However, the free delivery is only entitled to purchases over $700. So they ended up getting one for themselves as well. And a couple of mattress covers and protectors along with it.

Well my first reaction was actually feeling bad about it had they bought just my mattress. I felt better when my dad told me that they got one for themselves too. At least, they get something for themselves too and not always about me, well.. that's how i felt.

Come to think of it, i had been sleeping on the old mattress for the past 15 years or so. Perhaps that's why i felt so nostalgic about it since it had been with me for half my life so far.

I won't say i'm not appreciative of what my mum and dad had done for me. I'm feeling rather grateful right now. Can't wait to try out the new Seahorse brand firm mattress.. haha!

The feeling is weird, I can never handle surprises very well.

Running away... again

i feel it is perhaps for the better, to avoid and run away... again.

To turn tails and just cut off contact with everyone else involved/related.

I always find it difficult to face up to this. Something so intangible that I can never have a good grip on it. Perhaps doing things on my own for so long had worked it's way into the system. Or it's simply because of those other reasons that are holding me back.

Once again, what I'm resisting is the very thing that is persisting. Am I just confused about what I should do? I guess I am. Then perhaps isolation is the next possible option I can try. Though it could be a double-edged sword working on me. I might end up thinking about it more.

Interestingly I say that emotions rules the body, yet that is not how i react to issues. Ironically, this is an emotion issue that i need to deal with, but yet I'm analysing every single feeling i am experiencing before I react. I remembered a friend who spotted right on about me when I needed a listening ear, or rather, a guy's point of view. And i was thankful for the insight.

Obviously, I is confused.

I suppose love to me isn't all about excitement and the adrenaline rush anymore, but rather simply enjoying the companionship of that someone whom I can connect with physically and mentally.

Shanghai Day 04 - Cheng Huang Temple & Bund

Shanghai Day 02

This morning we travelled over to Hai Lun Road and then on to Tian Ai Road (Sweet Love Road). This area was one of the zones marked out for foreigners who were in Shanghai back in the 30s. Thus the architecture around this area was more of a western influence.








Anyone wants a 100 trillion dollar bacnknote? Only RMB$45.. Hurhurhur...



Because of the western designs, many young couples also like to have their wedding shoots done along that area. Hence the name Tian Ai Lu. We managed to chance upon one couple having their wedding photos taken.

More of Day 1 adventures can be seen here.

Thai grilled pork spring roll lunch

Today's lunch was something different (finally!) from the usual selections in the school canteens.

One of my colleague's wife brought back some spring roll packages from her Thailand trip recently. And my colleague treated us to it today. Nothing fancy if anyone has tried this before in the local Thai restaurants. But today, it was special as we get to wrap our own rolls.


In the box are all the contents enough to prepare rolls for 4 persons. There are the dried rice paper "skins" or flat noodles as my colleague insisted. They have to be soaked in warm water before serving.



Lettuce leaves, mint leaves, lemongrass leaves and the pork sausage rolls were included as well. Also included in the package were sour mangoes, green bananas (small sized ones) and some fresh green chillis. Seems that all these are to be wrapped into the rolls. Not forgetting the sweet chilli sauce dip and grounded peanuts that are to be added to it.




We all chipped in to get all the ingredients prepared and in about 20mins, this was lunch!




Ideally, the finished spring roll should look like this, all nicely wrapped up with everything (or most of them) inside.



But then, what the hell, we all greedily eagerly dug in and helped ourselves to the wrapping and munching of it all.



PS: The dudes in the office all can cook! Muahahahaha!

Word processor

Most of the time I think of what i wanna write about waaaay before so that when i get the chance to log in and blog (be it reaching home at the end of the day or reaching work in the morning) i would have my content ready.

And then as always, either i get caught up doing something else, or i forget what i wanna blog about, WHEN i log in to blogspot. Ok, fine... there're also those nights that i got too lazy to log in. Most of the time i would probably say that I'd have nothing worthy interesting to write about.

Strange, isn't it? There was an ex-colleague who said that it's rather impossible to have nothing to blog about. There will be some days where there should be something interesting that happened. Surely?

I guess so. All i know is that I process the thoughts before i plan to write. And that is perhaps a tad too efficient that I kinda internalised all entries i planned to publish here.

Well... that's a rather techinical reason to really say i'm plain lazy.

The day Orchard Rd flooded

This was the visibility on the road the morning it rained so heavily that Orchard Road flooded.

Singapore morning and Shanghai - Day 01

A month later, i finally hauled ass found time to write about my 16-day trip to Shanghai for the World Expo.

Gone over to Shanghai with my colleague, her hubby and Angel. We took the midnight flight over on the 15th so we could have a full day ahead to explore. We (Angel and I) encountered our first 'roadblock' even before we left Singapore. So there's this thing about visa permit, which we totally forgotten about. We all ASSumed that Singapore and China has good relations and thus all travellers heading over to China have a default 30-day visiting pass. It turned out we have only a 15-day visiting pass and anything more we'll need to apply for a visa permit.

Dang! Never checked that before we left. And the best thing... we'll be there for freaking 16 days! Just a day MORE THAN we are allowed to stay without visa.
-_-; Well... I'm sure there is a way to get by all this....

So while all of us were waiting in the transit lounge, we checked up the internet for alternatives. So the tentative plan was to get out of China/Shanghai for a day and come back in and, Voila, the "number of days in China" will be reset to zilch again. And the nearest country we can get out to is Hongkong and for perhaps a day or 2.

Among that, the other plans were to
a) Apply for a visa permit at the immigration when we reached, or
b) Change the return flight to a day earlier.

Hoping that flights from China to HK would be cheaper than from SG to HK, we were looking forward to the possibilty of that option.

We landed in Shanghai, Pudong International Airport in the morning about 6am. Taking a cab ride to the main city district took us about 45mins. My colleague's sister was kind enough to let us stay in her apartment for the duration of our trip. That saved us quite a bit on lodging already.




Images of some caretakers at the entrance of the apartment ground and the apartment block.

After we had settled in a bit, lunch was with my colleague's sister and the parents. The good thing about having lunch in a big group is the opportunity to try a bit of everything and not worry about leftovers.



We had a good spread of food. What i liked best was the bbq duck with DIY wraps, somewhat like crepes. Second was the black fungus with ginko. That was called a cold dish, appetizer of sorts. And there were also some veges, fish soup, braised tofu, and shrimps (another fav!), etc. And the thing about leftovers in China, it's fine if one can't finish the food. There is always the choice do takeaway of the leftovers. The waiters would gladly bring about those styrofoam boxes for you to pack up the food. Mostly are self-service though.

Went back to town again after lunch and visited a catholic church in the area. We managed to reach just 5mins before closing time. Nice gothic interior i would say. Unfortunately no photo taking was allowed in there.

Shanghai noon

Well, ok, it's about 1pm already.

Fifth day in Shanghai and taking a break from all the sightseeing and exploring. The plan was to start visiting the World Expo today, but we're all kinda beat.

Somehow the ISP here block out Facebook, Youtube and Blogger. At least some of those sites which i frequently use.

Thanks to my colleague who suggested using NTU's VPN, i manage to tunnel thru the ISP!

I reckon I'll have time to update now that i have access. Now's lunch time!

Letting Go

A few days ago, my colleague told me a parable.

There was once 2 monks, a master and his disciple. This disciple had been with his master for many years, and had learn much from the old master. Among the many wisdom and knowledge the young monk learnt, was the simple purity of thoughts from the material world. That is, purity of mind and body from lust, greed, jealousy, envy and among other things.

One day, the master and disciple pair were on their way to a village, and to get to the village they had to cross a river. As the river was not too deep, they decided to cross it on foot. So they walked along the river looking for the narrowest part to cross, and there they met a young lady who also wanted to cross the river. They found that the lady dared not cross the river and was hesitating by the riverbank. The old monk offered to help her by carrying her across. To the horror of the young monk, for he always remembered the teachings of the old master about purity of the mind from lust. And yet, his very own master offered to carry the young lady across! However, the young monk kept quiet as they all made their way over to the other side. After they had crossed, the young lady thanked the old monk and went on their separate ways. The young monk was disturbed by his experience as he saw how tightly the young lady held on to his master. And began doubting the teachings from him.

For hours through the journey the young monk kept quiet but looked seemingly disturbed. Until the moment he could no longer keep quiet he burst out asking his master, "Master, didn't you teach us all about being pure at mind and body and never to engage in lustful actions?"

"Yes, I did. And that is always our core beliefs. Why did you ask?" the master replied.

The young monk asked again, "So back when we were crossing the river, why did you hold on to the lady so tightly, didn't you commit a sinful act then?"

The old monk stopped and looked at his disciple, and said, "My son, we crossed the river hours ago. I held her tightly because she was afraid to fall into the water. And that was all. I had put that lady down the moment we reached this side of the bank. As for you, why are you still holding on to the lady in your mind until now? Who hasn't let go of the lady yet?"

Somehow, i recalled this parable strongly today mainly because of what happened at work. Some things didn't go quite smoothly in the morning and it left me feeling pissed for most of it. "WTH, I DON'T have to put up with your harsh words!" was running through my mind after i was put down while what seemed to be poking my nose into something that's none of my concern. Well the thing is, that's the temperament of my colleague, and that how objective he is at work. Well, he couldn't have piece his words any better.

But anyway, as I was seething back at my seat and ranting to my colleague over MSN, I told myself that I should have let go the moment I left his office room. In the same manner as the old master monk, some things happened or are said for that particular moment so when it's over, I should have put it down and move on.

I thought I had, but I guess i haven't complete put it down, have i? Otherwise I wouldn't have blogged this down now.

Comfort food

One of my fav foods... Fried Wu Xiang and prawn crackers!

Well, never a healthy option since most of the items are fried, dough cracker with prawn, wu xiang, chinese sausage, sliced squid pieces, century egg... Anyway I suppose it doesn't hurt since I have this probably like once every 2 months?

Wu xiang prawn cracker has officially made it to my list of comfort food.. something that I'll take to reward myself with at the end of the day.

Not forgetting to wash it all down with a nice cup of milk tea!

Yum...

It's been a while

Hello, how have you been?

That seems to be an appropriate greeting after so long.
Guess it's been ages once again since I last came over.

This was once a place I came to rant, and a place where I unload all my troubles. It's somewhere I can share my joys and thoughts with close friends who come by for a visit once in a while.

This had been where I recollect my day and put it down as a written memory. It has served me for a good 6 years now. And will still be the place I come back to, even it may be just on occasions.