more sign craziness

This was on a box for when we bought breakfast for the 145 conference team volunteers, and the Home Plus employees helped us box them up for transport over to the hotel. I still don't know what the middle one means.

culture shock!

Nothing's in english! everything's expensive! No one understands what we're saying!

The view from the hotel

Yup, that's fog. I like fog actually, not so much driving in it, but it's not something you get to see in Singapore. We're up on the 14th floor and there's not much to say about the subject of the view, but it's still a good view. It was rainy for a bit. The temperature was nice, cooler than Singapore but still warm, apparently it gets chilly at night, but so far, so good. That's home plus or whatever that place was called where we went for lunch + shopping (it's the shorter building).

view of Korean dawn

This is the view from our airplane as we were flying north-east toward Korea. We had an all-night (red-eye) flight + layover etc and arrived in Korea at 7am KST. Bleh. Not my favorite thing to do. But I was able to sleep decently on the flight and eat planty and the account of the rest can be found on my main blog. :) Beautiful, no?

Singapore Airport

Just in case the McDonalds pic didn't convince you. This is at dinner right before leaving for S Korea.

Yummy, droolworthy Buko Pie

Buko actually means coconut, the fresh, meaty kind. And Buko pie is (like Balut, Pandesal and Baguoong) a Filipino treat that I don't get often. My uncle actually brought us some from the Philippines since he was in Singapore for a conference thingy. mmm.

Green Tea Ice Cream

So, this green tea thing is so Japanese. It's a little stand-alone stall (with large, foam, green ice creams on top) and when you pick a flavor they take a tub of it out of their freezer and stick it in an ice cream machine that the vender girl then turns by hand and out comes swirly ice cream. The green tea tasted nice actually, strangely mild but not too bland. The spoons were cute too!

Hi, welcome to McDonalds!

Oh you may laugh, you may scratch your head in confusion but in Singapore, STUDYING IS A PROBLEM! :P Because students will literally spend the whole day in a park or restaurant (or the airport) studying. And when they're taking up the space, there's not room for customers (and the students tend to not buy anything or buy one drink per 5 hours of study). Do you know how much money the Singapore economy has lost to studying?! There are/were even "No Studying" signs at the airport (can't have tourists immediately reminded of school/work once they get off a plane!). Funny? Maybe. Have I done it? :P Yeah, at McDonalds and other places.

Party at my place

So the day after I got my wisdom tooth pulled (a week ago today, I'm trying to keep this blog updated, really!) I had a potluck, dessert-fest, Heroes Marathon! =) A decent number showed up and I really hope everyone had fun. I wasn't feeling well, and Chun was super tired, but we had 2 good surprises in Cherie showing up ("What are you doing in Singapore?!?") and April getting a birthday cheesecake ("April, can you come out here real quick?"). Thanks to Jeremy for the GLORIOUS chocolate-covered strawberries, and thanks to Sam for the GLORIOUS cheesecake (I need more...teach me O Samwise!) and many many thanks to Chun and Kate for the BRILLIANT (heehee) Birthday present ^^ I love it, it's so useful thank you so much!

It's a tooth!

So I got a wisdom tooth pulled today (upper left). :) I'm glad to get it over with, I'll get the other top one pulled after I get back from Korea. The bottom two aren't ready to be pulled. oh well. It doesn't hurt too bad and it's not swollen or anything.

shopping!!

Lots of shopping in the past few days, Vivo, Orchard, Pasar Malam... =)
Unfortunately one shop I was looking for was no longer there, but byegones!

Friday was Zoo day!

Ok, so I forgot to post the pic for the Zoo experience , mainly because I couldn't decide what picture to use. Highlights were the polar bear jumping out of the water to grab potted plants, the baby otters and the baby rhino. ^^ I got tons of pictures. As always an enjoyable day at the zoo.

Wedding

Raj got married! It was very nice that I was able to make it to his wedding, even though I don't really know him that well, he still led my church Bible study (only for a while before I left for the states) and he hosted a very heartfelt and memorable farewell party for me before I left. It was such a unique wedding! Translated into Tamil and with Tamil songs. The bride (who I hadn't actually met before) looked stunningly beautiful.

And after the wedding (and after sitting a long while at home) April and I went midnight shopping! I got a thing or two, but a lot of the stores that I like didn't participate in the event and some things that I hoped were there weren't. But it was good! I'd been feeling this urge to shop for the past half-week and so at least I feel like I'm getting 'some' shopping done. :)

PASTAMANIA!

That's right, pocket menu! I went out for lunch with Chun this past saturday (june 2nd). I had the marinara and it was gooooood. We ate and then wandered around Bugis villiage looking at things and eyeing stuff I might wanna purchase at some point. =D It was fun! but then I had to rush home, rest a bit and get dressed for [see above].

may 31st birthday party

So we all gathered at Chun's place, ate food, took photos and then hid in his room. And then did nasty things to a sleeping X, but I digress. This cake was heavenly! The icing was more like cream (and tasted like ice cream). We stayed there for like 8 hours I think :P Pretty much the whole colony was there (missing only Perlin and Cherie). And it was cool to meet up with Chun's cousins and his Aunt! Haha.

ROFL 21!!!

Singapore Blue moon!

Because best friends only turn 21 once in a blue moon. Happy Birthday. :)

wednesday, may 30

I went out for dinner with WeiDa (aka Queir)! We met up at bukit batok and then ran around West Mall for a bit. This is what I had (dumpling noodle) and this is how NOT to place your chopsticks. I never knew this till he got back to the table and looked shocked, and then took my chopsticks out and put them across the bowl. Apparently when you stick chopsticks in like that it means you're offering it to the gods. Oo I learn something new everyday! WeiDa learned stuff about me too >.< hushhush. After dinner we went window shopping and talked. and talked. and talked. :)

my lovely cake

This was my birthday cake! From my family...ok, is my birthday cake. It hasn't been eaten yet :X But I had a decent, quiet 21st birthday ^^

the 27th

So on my birthday, feeling like I was fresh off the plane, I went to Swenson's! The colony was in attendance and I had a glorious surprising of the Chun Fong. I'm very proud of myself. There's no better way to get to know all about current events and new fads than to listen to Ying Xiang talk to his friends for like, 10 minutes. In that one day I got myself caught up on all I needed to know to keep up a conversation. It wasn't a huge birthday celebration - hardly anyone knew it was my birthday, I sure didn't remember: it was more of just a small gathering of friends and family (cuz my brother came) to get together and have some fun. You can see the remains of our 'topless five' pictured above - we weren't brave enough to take on an earthquake. :)

hello Singapore dawn

View out of my bedroom window from my computer desk. As muggy as Singapore gets, it still has it's moments: when the sun is barely rising and the birds are singing. A cool breeze might be blowing, but the city is just begining to stir.