Scribbling Around

#12 501st Legion

2010-02-23T12:09:00.003+08:00

Darth Vader (that photo came out blur :/) and his troops shopping and posing around in clothing store. -taken with Sony Ericsson W705

Jang Tur @ lau par sat

2010-02-23T11:41:00.006+08:00

Another backlogged post from last year.

There is a reason why you should never eat korean/japanese cuisine at hawker places.

rice cake in spicy sauce

I cannot recall the price but it wasn't that cheap. The rice cake is pale in comparison to its delicious counterpart that I consumed in Korea.

spicy pork on hot plate

This dish is too spicy. What was the chef thinking when he cooked this? Not recommended.

#11 Deep Contemplation

2010-02-23T11:38:00.002+08:00

Bakerzin's All Day Set Menu

2010-02-20T11:02:00.003+08:00

Ham and Bacon Penne with Cream sauce

Arrabiata Penne

New York Cheesecake

Backlog from last year. Not sure if they still have this offer. Comes with:

# bread selection
# soup of the day
# selected main course
# soda

The cheesecake happened to be on 50% discount. It wasn't too bad, unfortunately, my taste buds has been spoiled by the delicious home-made cheesecake. I will recommend the Arrabiata Penne. The Ham and Bacon Penne with Cream sauce is boring and forgettable.

NSFW: Hilarious Chinese Song

2009-10-16T00:38:00.006+08:00

A song all about the boy in Ju-On. It's just a plus that those words happen to be a curse word in Hokkien.

Almost Famous - Cult to Culture

2009-10-08T13:40:00.004+08:00

Jonnyfyy uploaded a 50m minutes documentary on cosplay in Japan. It was shown on CNA two Sundays ago. Extremely informative for those that are interested. More videos under the read more link.

I remembered the time where cosplay in Singapore was portrayed in a bad light by the media. The media at that time often implied that the cosplayers were disturbed. Now with the proliferation of major anime con such as the AFA, there has been increasingly positive reports on cosplay. I can't help but to compare the situation then to the situation that cosplayers in Japan still face.

Amirah's Grill: Get the Special Set Menu

2009-08-27T23:07:00.004+08:00

Hummus & Baba Ganoush dips with Pita and Garlic bread.

Amirah's Grill is a restaurant that sells middle east and western cuisine. They offer a lunch set buffet from 12pm to 4pm which is actually quite worth it. However, on Peaz's advice, I decided to try the Special Set Menu at $25.

The Special Set Menu comes with the following:
1)Choice of chicken or mushroom soup
2)Pita and garlic bread
3)Hummus and Baba Ganoush (dips)
4)Any one main course
5)Any cold or hot drink
6)1 scoop of ice cream, french cream caramel or Egyptian basbousa

I made a fatal mistake of taking the chicken soup (No photos. They are too terrible! It did not occur to me to use flash until the main course). I advise anyone who try this set menu to avoid the soup. There is a lump of jelly coagulating; evidence of flour not mixed well in the soup. Aside from that, there is shredded egg but few bits of chicken. In my opinion, the mushroom soup with its variety of mushroom is a better option.

For the drink, I chose banana shake while peaz took the mango juice. Both are decent. Next up, Hummus and with the pita and garlic bread (for the soup!). This is the first time I have eaten middle eastern cuisine so I wasn't quite prepared for the Hummus (Chickpeas). I didn't really like it and preferred the Baba Ganoush (eggplant) while Peaz liked the Hummus. I suppose it is a matter of personal taste.

Beef tenderloin Kebab

For my main course, I tried the beef tenderloin kebab. The meat is tender and juicy although there are lumps of fat for some parts. I also chose roasted potatoes over rice. It prove to be a good decision as the potato are yummy.

Norwegian Salmon

Peaz ordered the Norwegian Salmon, a big meaty chunk which she claims to be delicious (I don't know. I hate salmon) but drier than before. She also finds the mushrooms in this dish to be too salty. Having tasted some of her abandoned mushrooms, I concurred.

French Cream Caramel

Finally we have the dessert where Peaz made the wise choice of picking the ice cream. While I have never eaten the French Cream Caramel, I do not know how it is suppose to taste like but it is too sweet for me.

Amirah's Grill is a good place to try middle eastern cuisine. The set menu is quite worth it and comes up to $27.50 after 10% service charge (no gst). For any photographers: the interior of the restaurant is quite dark and not conducive for photography unless you use flash.

Amirah's Grill is located at 14 Bussorah Street.

Ah Chew again

2009-08-23T00:49:00.003+08:00

Honeydew Sago with Mango Ice cream

Yet another overdue post. I'm afraid I have plenty from last month and this month. For this post, Ah Chew Dessert takes the spotlight.

The Honeydew Sago costs around $3 (forgive me if it's wrong). It wasn't bad by my friend's standards, but I can't comment since I have yet to try it.

Fresh Milk Steamed Egg with Red Bean.

I ordered the above which have to be the best steamed egg I have eaten. It is very smooth, sweet and has no strong egg aftertaste unlike the egg puddings at Food Anytime. Perhaps this is due to the addition of milk? I made a mistake of ordering it with the red bean. The red bean is too strong. The exquisite taste of the steamed egg is covered up when eaten together. At $3, you might as well go for the original which costs $2.50.

Ah Chew Desserts is located at #01-11 Liang Seah Place

Caramel: arty surrounding

2009-08-21T22:07:00.001+08:00

This is a severely overdued post on Caramel, a really nice cafe and salon located at Shaw Towers. I have completely forgotten how much everything cost.

Caramel is one of those small little cafe that you wouldn't mind going over and over again. They primarily sell dessert and drinks though they have a daily lunch set.

Wafu Spaghetti with Mushroom and Seaweed

While flavourful, I found the combination of seaweed with the sauce too salty. Portion is also not very big.

Creamy Spaghetti with salmon topped with cheese

Rather creamy. Liked it but the salmon were so small!

Double chocolate cupcake and banana with chocolate cupcakes.

I recalled that I preferred the banana with chocolate cupcake over the Double chocolate cupcake. Did not remember any other thing about it.

Vitaplum

Vitaplum is their signature drink. With bits of sour plum and vitagen mixed together, it has an unique taste that everyone should try.

Caramel is closed on sunday and public holidays! I went there once not knowing that it was close. Total waste of a trip. It is located at #01-50/52 Shaw Towers.

Don't order this at Ichiban Sushi

2009-08-21T21:56:00.001+08:00

Having been to Ichiban Sushi a few times, I decided to order some items that I have never tried before. It was a huge mistake that I will not make again.

Hotate Cheese Yaki

I have only one word for this dish: Shit. This is the worst scallop with cheese I have ever eaten in my life. I regretted ordering this atrocious Hotate Cheese Yaki which turned my appetite off completely. Now, there was nothing wrong with the scallop or the cheese (which taste reasonably aright with some squeezed lemon juice). Covered up by the cheese, cole slaw actually covered up the bottom half of the dish. One bite of that pathetic store-processed mayonnaise and vegetable and I didn't even feel like eating. Do not order this unless you wish to torture your taste buds.

Crispy Lobster Salad

I also ordered this Crispy Lobster Salad. It was another decision that I regretted deeply. Not only did it took forever for the salad to reach my table (when all they did was actually to lift it from the conveyor belt), I really should have realise that it will be oily. Cold, bland and oily, I did not enjoy the lobster salad. Do not order this unless you do not mind the oiliness.

Gyoza

Fortunately the gyoza was appetizing. It was cripsy and flavourful with sauce and save me from leaving on an empty stomach. Needless to say, I will not be patronising this Ichiban Sushi branch again.

This meal is eaten at Ichiban Sushi, IMM.

#10 Spiderchild

2009-08-18T22:18:00.003+08:00

As a child, spiderman was already swinging around with a camera.

STGCC 2009 or I am broke after getting my hoots

2009-08-16T11:34:00.005+08:00

STGCC

I missed the Singapore Toy, Games and Comic Convention last year. I regretted it so much that I rushed over to STGCC this year after a brief stop at the AMK Methodist Church Fund Raising funfair. This had consequences - my camera battery died sometime after I reached STGCC - and I was unable to take photos of some rather awesome cosplayers. I really should have taken more shots of the Blythe dolls as well. Oh well, this will teach me to bring my spare battery next time.

I met some of my idols that I have been longing to meet for a long time. Mainly Zemotion and Troy Chin (I wished FSc will set up a booth at SGTCC). I acted like a total ~~stalker~~ twit around the both of them.

Ahem. I was there mostly for the comics (will probably post short thoughts and feelings at Preposterous Writing) so don't expect me to start yakking about the figurines.

The particular booth is located at the Artist's Alley - where I spend most of my time at - and they sell some rather cute products. I didn't buy anything from here...

Located at the Artist's Alley, Wanton Doodles sells T-shirts and pins and erm stuff. I didn't really notice since I was too busy ogling at the T-shirt. I eventually bought one for $20. (`･ω･´) They packaged the T-shirt into small boxes which you can see at the background of the photo. I liked the chair Mas Shafreen illustrated on but I do not think it's for sales. (´；ω；`) You can only see the legs of it in this photo.

This booth has some nice stuff as well. But what I liked was the interesting composition pasted on the walls.

Located at Booth C14. They sell copies of artbook, purse along other things. They also give a really sweet promotion plastic fan.

Finally we reach the artist who has to be the most in character cosplayer in the entire event. Meet Race (A29), who happens to be dressed in the Joker's (Dark Knight) nurse outfit. He was way better than the other Joker I saw running around the con. Talk about creepy...

The guy did some awesome drawings which I did not photographed. In any case, the above photo should show you his quirky works.

This got to be best business card I seen in the con. I mean, handing Fuck off!!! to people? Awesome. I was half dead by then so I didn't really look at Sun Wahyu's booth. Totally regretting now.

Other artists that you might be interested in:
Gunawan Lo located at A31. Nice shirt designs.
Munkao at A15.
Roomism at erm I don't know what booth they are at.
I-Ming, Morgan and Chin Yew at the 30dayartist.com of A27

Some other photos I took...

Domo-kun in various colours.

I don't know what this is.

A clone trooper look upon the battle between two kids.

they see me emo, they hatin'

I have other photos but this post is too bloated. Aha. And yeah, didn't post my hoots here since half of it are gifts to people. So broke now.

Edit: posted a short review for Shawn Yap's Jack Doe over here and for i see so many butterflies.

#9 why so creepy

2009-08-15T22:57:00.002+08:00

Dolls are creepy to me. But Blythe Dolls are really creepy. Judge for yourself in this series of photos taken at STGCC (Singapore Toy, Games and Comic Convention). Organised from creepiest to cutest.

I'm in your nightmare haunting you.

Shall we go somewhere alone?

bring me home...or else

Just a cute white doll.

Sweet little thing.

#8 Popiah

2009-08-15T22:49:00.000+08:00

Incredibly delicious popiah, bought and eaten at Ang Mo Kio Methodist Church Fund Raising Fun Fair.

#7 Central

2009-08-14T01:40:00.000+08:00

There is something wrong with this photo but I cannot tell what.

Gusttimo Di Roma: 3 flavours

2009-08-11T23:58:00.001+08:00

Rice, Caramel and Vanilla Cake @ $5.90

Though expensive, I quite like Gusttimo's gelato. I am a new fan of the caramel gelato. Not only does it complement the vanilla cake flavour well, it tastes fantastic. The vanilla cake isn't too bad either with bits of chocolate sprinkled in it. They are a little too sweet together. If you do not have a sweet tooth, try not to order that. That aside, I shouldn't have paired the rice with caramel and vanilla cake gelato. It's rather strange when eaten together. The rice flavour is quite strong and may not be to everyone's liking.

While I was there, something happened. The lady in front of me asked for two flavours. I laughed. I could not help myself after hearing the disbelieving "pardon?" when the server informed - in a rather resigned tone - the lady that there MUST BE THREE FLAVOURS. There, I highlighted in bold and caps. So don't go ask for 1 flavour and make the poor staffs frustrated when it is the management that is weird.

The compulsory 3 flavours per cup is strange but it is not as irritating as compared to the high chairs in the dining area. Not only is it child unfriendly, it is also extremely easy to drop your bag when you are trying to enjoy your gelato. I was not the only person who dropped a bag when I was there. Another woman beside me dropped her bag onto the floor as well.

$5.90 is quite expensive but I'll probably return to try more flavours.

Gusttimo Di Roma is located at #1-15, ION Orchard.

#6 Contrast

2009-08-11T23:25:00.002+08:00

Faded dull photos of families wearing the rich fabric of the hanbok lined up at the edge of the window. Below the window, the old lady waits for her next customer.

Photo taken in Korea. A hanbok can cost from hundreds to a thousand dollars over.

#5 Anti-Mould Campaign

2009-08-11T22:45:00.000+08:00

Say no to pesky moulds! From the store that has almost everything, Daiso. I hate moulds so much.

#4 Palette

2009-08-11T09:01:00.000+08:00

What do you do with that many colours?

R Burger: Not worth queuing

2009-08-10T21:50:00.004+08:00

More and more local artiste seemed to be joining the food industry. R burger is a so-called healthy fastfood originated from Japan and brought to Singapore by Adam Chen.

R burger actually has a nice concept. A healthy burger (with marine collagen!). Here lies the question, is it worth it? I would have to say no.

A burger set comes with salad, a drink and potato wedges. Sounds healthy isn't it? The salad is indeed very healthy but not appetizing. The Potato wedges is just a small step up from french fries; I don't think it has any less oil. Finally, while the R burger has an interesting taste with the Shiso leaves, it isn't what I called exceptional.

I have to admit that the R burger tasted better than the Chicken Ume burger. For some reason, the sweet ume sauce just couldn't match with the chicken patty for me. I really don't find it good.

Perhaps the reason why I did not enjoy the food as much as I should have is because I waited 30 minutes for the food. In additional, the clueless (I think it's her first day at work) cashier gave my burger to another person who ordered a different burger. They did rectified it immediately so I wasn't that pissed off. Just mildly irritated.

My verdict? For $8.80, it isn't worth the money. Especially not if you have to queue for 30 minutes for the burger to be served. Go try the R burger (don't order the combo meal) only if there is a short queue.

Edit: Added more details in.

#3 Do Not Climb into this Exhibit

2009-08-10T00:00:00.003+08:00

Who cares on such a hot day!

Mr Curry@Central

2009-08-09T23:41:00.004+08:00

Hamburger Doria, $12.80

The mixture of baked rice with curry was excellent. It did helped that the hamburger(pork and beef) went well with the dish.

Crab Omu Rice, $12.80

The crab omelette was bland for me. Thankfully, the curry was flavourful and saved this dish.

I patronised Mr Curry at 2.15pm on a weekday. Hence, I did not face any long queue/waiting time. Service was fast and quick. I advise people to choose a higher level of spiciness. The original level has no 'kick' to it.

Mr Curry is located at The Central, #03-84.

#2 Cloudy Day

2009-08-07T00:36:00.001+08:00

Cottons floating in the air.

#1 Are you taking a photo?

2009-08-06T17:15:00.001+08:00

Mew.

2009-03-20T11:40:00.001+08:00

For anyone who actually reads this blog.

I'm not going to blog until June. Come back in June for a total revamp.

IT Show: Crowds and Bacon Salts

2009-03-12T22:02:00.004+08:00

It may have been Thursday afternoon but it was still quite crowded. There were parts in the hall where I couldn't move at all.

Still, at least for most of the time, I could get from place to place so it wasn't that bad yet. Saturday is probably going to be the worst.

Photo taken from here
I was mostly going around Hall 6 as the items I wanted were sold there. It was there that I saw this strange tiny counter tuck at one corner of another booth. Selling earphone sets with bacon salt as free gift.

So unique! The earphones are actually CrossRoads MylarOne Bijou and it has not just the bacon salt but also an amplifier and oink earphones as free gifts for 70 dollars. In the end I didn't get it as it was over my budget (under $50 please!). For those who are interested, it's sold by Jaben at booth 6501, right corner.

After much deliberation - and squeezing around - I bought a low end audio-technica ear phone for $36.50. The free gift? One lolipop. Boo Hoo. I am starting to regret not getting the CrossRoads.

I also bought a multi-purpose card reader for $9.50. Yes, I know it's expensive, but I couldn't be bothered to hunt for a cheaper one. Not after I walked around looking for a single SDHC card reader and couldn't find any! So I just grabbed whatever that didn't looked like they would break down in 1 week (which is surprisingly hard to find).

Oh, if anyone feel thirsty or hungry, they should head to the Singtel and M1 booth at floor 2. You may get some free gelato and coffee if you are lucky.

来来红烧牛肉面

2009-03-12T10:03:00.000+08:00

I almost did not try the food at Lai Lai Family Restaurant (来来红烧牛肉面). If it wasn't for the fact that the restaurant that I wanted to go to was too expensive, and my friend who accompanied me recommended this, I would not have thought to step into their premises.

I ordered the medium size which goes for $8.90. It isn't cheap but the size is certainly bigger. I was surprised by the amount of beef in it. The beef are tender and soft. The soup is quite delicious with mild spicy taste and strong beef flavour. However, it also made me quite thirsty.

They don't provide water; you will have to order drinks. Thankfully I am a master of enduring so I can tahan until I went to carrefour to get bottled water. I will probably return to eat again but not before I try other beef noodles at the hawker centres.

More Food at Family Gatherings

2009-03-11T09:21:00.012+08:00

Mushroom with Broccoli

I believed I mentioned before that there is always loads of food at my family gatherings.

The photos posted here were taken on the first day of Chinese New Year when more than 20 people thronged my house for dinner. My poor mother had to churn out dishes after dishes to keep with the huge appetites of my family. I suppose I should thanks my stars for not knowing how to cook or I would be rooted in to help out as well!

What do you call this? Anyone?

Fried Crispy Prawns

Tofu with mushroom, carrot and prawns

Vietnamese Spring Rolls that no one dared to eat (and not made by mum!)

Sweet and Sour Fish

Abalone with mysterious sauce and chilli; Salted Vegetable and Duck Soup, my mother's speciality

My mother cooked double portions of all the food here (except for the abalone and the Vietnamese Spring Rolls that someone bought) and they were completely cleaned out. Even the dessert (the typical longan with almond jelly) did not have any leftover. I really wondered how my family can eat so much! It filled with me some (undeserved) pride when everyone praised my mother's cooking, especially the soup.

Just to inform everyone, even I, her daughter do not get to drink Salted Vegetable and Duck Soup more than once a year! You lucky people!

Red Mango: Another Frozen Yoghurt

2009-03-10T21:26:00.001+08:00

A very popular brand in Korea and US, this frozen yogurt is really not bad eh! I bought this $6.50 special strawberry favour that comes in a large cup with fruity cereal, logan, peach, fresh strawberry and kiwi. The server was also very powerful; initially I had not wanted to get this special cup if not for her convincing me.

The strawberry flavour is quite nice but I have not tried any of its competitors's version either so I can't really make a comment except to remark that it is not very sweet. I would definitely try Red Mango in Korea just to see if the standard is the same!

Red Mango is located at 3 Temasek Boulevard, #01-140G, Suntec City Mall

Malacca: Teo Soon Loong Chan

2009-03-08T10:53:00.009+08:00

Last year December I went to Malacca with my family (we booked an entire bus) for a shopping and eating trip. One of the best place we ate at was this Teo Chew restaurant. It might have something to do with the fact that it served the most fabulous Ohr Nee (yam paste) I have eaten in my life.

Teo Soon Loong Chan

Teo Soon Loong Chan looks like a run down shop from the outside. You actually have to enter from the kitchen. It's a family owned restaurant that served great Teo Chew food and has great service. So I was quite surprised when I read online that it has bad service and seafood that is not fresh! When I went there the food was extremely fresh and tasty.

The (in)famous oyster mee

Though some people complained in their blogs that the oyster was not fresh, I felt at that time it was fresh and juicy. I have never eaten oyster mee before so I cannot judge properly but everyone around me loved this dish. For me, the noodle isn't too thick and it tasted excellent with the bits of garlic and the sauce. This is also one of their signature dish.

One of my favourite dish for that night, second only to the Ohr Nee. I do not know what the name is. The crispy outer skin covers the egg inside it, creating a nice balance. This is a must try.

Tau fu with Minced Meat

Shiock ah! I noticed that their sauces are all really good! The Tau Fu and the meat with the gravy is so good that I wanted to finish my rice with it.

Stewed Pork ribs with Bitter gourd

The bittergourd is smooth and soft, the meat is tender and the sauce is heavenly.

Chee Cheong Fun

After all those dishes, this is almost a let down. It has one wanton and crabstick.

Steamed Pomfret

I thought this fish was really fresh. When one of the staff saw how much trouble we had, he came to our table and helped us cut it.

Some vegetable dish that I don't really remembered.

Ohr Nee

And finally the Ohr Nee! This is the best Ohr Nee I have eaten. It's not watery like most places would have it nor too thick. So smooth and yet not too sweet. The pumpkin and ginko nut are at the side for you to place inside your yam paste. I only regret that my grandmother could not enjoy this dessert (she is too old to travel). This is a must try! You can't visit this place without eating their Ohr Nee.

Mango

We also had some fruits after the dessert. By that time we were almost too full to eat it!

The owner

He's over eighty years old and entertained us (or rather the older family members) while we were waiting for the food.

I know that this place is considered only reasonable for Malaysians. But for us, it is extremely value for money as we paid about $10(? forgive me if it's wrong) per person for a 8 course meal. I would totally return there for their Ohr Nee alone.

Teo Soon Loong Chan is located at 55 Jalan Hang Kasturi, Malacca.

意难忘

2009-03-07T10:52:00.004+08:00

意难忘 has very nice songs.

Watching Taiwanese Hokkien Drama is one of my secret pleasure. I watched through all episodes of 台湾霹雳火 (Fiery Thunderbolt) , 阿诚 (Ah Cheng), 日正当中，and other shows that show before 日正当中 that I forgotten the names.

But for the past few years I have been watching 意难忘 (The Unforgettable Memory). Typical of such shows, 意难忘 is a show with over 800 episodes. It has been showing since 2006 on Singapore's Channel 8 and it is finally ending.

What is 意难忘 about then? A family: 王家. From the 1970s to the 2000s, you will see how the the family turn from rich to the eventual near collapse at the son's hand. (what happens then, watch yourself!) It doesn't just involve this family, there's also the 林家. The plot gets quite complicated when 王胜志 falls in love with 林大中's girlfriend(?) 赖素绫 and when he makes an enemy of 蔡进炮, the main villain of the show for at least 400 episodes.

意难忘 suffers from the usual Taiwanese Hokkien drama symptoms: Too long, too draggy, too slow, plot repeats itself from time to time and introduces too many characters. Nevertheless, it has a certain charm to it that makes you watch it. Not to mention, the plot progress slow enough that you can miss a few episodes and still understand what happens.

One of the scene from the Drama. Spoiler alert for people who are watching the Media Broadcast. The show still have some way to go before this confrontation.

And this. BIG SPOILER ALERT. Watch at your own risk.

麗珠 is my favourite character. Her son is a 败家子 (wastrel) turn gangster. Her husband only knows how to listen to his mother. Her brother-in-law hates her for well, everything. Her mother-in-law hates her for being a former hostess. She is one of the strongest and most capable character in the show.

With the show finally coming to the end (in singapore), it may be too late for people to start in it unless you can wake up early in the morning.

MediaCorp is showing a repeat at 4am to 6am, monday to fridays. The latest episodes are showing every weekday 4.30pm to 5.30pm.

Slumdog Millionaire: An intense movie

2009-03-06T09:27:00.000+08:00

I went into the cinema only knowing that it was about a man arrested for knowing the answers of Who wants to be a Millionaire and that it won some Oscars.

So I got a rude shock within 5 minutes of the movie. The main character Jamal is looked down by everyone for being an uneducated chai-wallah (tea boy) and daring to join the show. The scene quickly switched to him being interrogated by the police. The question on everyone's mind: How did the chai-wallah know all the answers to the questions?

It's from there the story really begins. This movie weaves his story from the questions asked by the game show. The answers that he knew came from his own life. I am not going to spoil the plot here but this is also a romance story with parts that are sometimes unbelievable. Or as one would say, a fairytale-like story.

The movie also built up the tension in its scenes, something that most movies had failed to grasp of. And whenever the tension was too much the movie switches back to the police or vice versa or placed a humourous scene. Even though I had guessed what was going to happen next, I still feel tensed. The acting in this show is also notable. In particular, the child actors who I believed won over everyone's heart.

Perhaps the only thing that I did not liked about the movie was the magical way that the characters learned english when they stayed in the slums. Otherwise, it's a lovely movie that you should not mind spending 2 hours for.

Rating: 9/10

For Murakami's fans

2009-03-05T21:07:00.002+08:00

Dinner with Murakami is a documentary about the famous Japanese author's books and his readers. It will be shown on the 8th of March 5.30pm as the opening film for this year SIDF (Singapore Indie Doc Fest).

Tickets are sold at the substation and at straits records.

Edit: It seemed that I bought the last pair of ticket yesterday at the substation.

Royal China: Very Royal Indeed

2009-03-05T18:42:00.024+08:00

Complimentary "birthday buns" from the restaurant that all Chinese birthdays ought to have. Nothing special, at least the one at Lei Garden has salted egg.

My family celebrated our grandma's 80th birthday last Saturday. Due to the worsening economic crisis, we had to downgrade from Lei Garden to Royal China especially after Lei Garden increased their price.

I believed many people before me have waxed lyrical praises on the pale blue walls of the restaurant so without further ado, let's get on with the food.

Crispy aromatic duck roll

Trying to eat this made me exceedingly aware of my inadequacy with chopsticks. The duck roll was deep fried with vegetables, duck meat and lovely sweet sauce inside it.

Roasted Pork

We also ordered another dish not included in our special menu. The roast pork, (my grandma's favourite) had this special mustard sauce that you can dipped in with sugar. It was sweet and mildly spicy at the same time. Despite not being in the menu, this was one of my favourite dish for that night.

Double boiled shark fins soup with chicken in claypot

The chicken soup comes in a claypot with the large chunk of shark fins on a special dish. They will stir in shark fins in front of you. In spite of the amount of chicken meat and shark fins, this pale in comparison with the doubled boiled soup from Lei Garden. This soup also gave a very bad impression of the service in this restaurant (see below).

Steamed pink garoupa in light soya sauce

Plenty of bones in the fish which I can endure but! The fish wasn't very fresh. I am not impressed.

Sauteed Caral Clam and Scallop with asparagus

Most of the people seated at my table hated the clam. Personally I loved the chewy texture of the clam. Acquired taste? The scallop was only slightly above average fare though.

Deep fried ribs in special sauce

A western dish in a chinese restaurant? Probably because Royal China is originally a London restaurant. The sauce of the ribs was too special for me. Or should I say, too salty. The result was a forgettable salty experience.

Braised sliced abalone with mushroom

The abalone was tender and chewy. The mushroom was huge and juicy. What more can you ask for?

Braised Prawn Noodle in Ginger and Shallot sauce

The prawns were succulent. The same cannot be said of the thin yellow newspaper strips that they were nested on top of. However, there were people who liked those noodles. I suppose this is another case of acquired taste.

Chilled Chrysanthemum and Apple jelly with diced Aloe Vera

Probably the most interesting of all dishes in the entire 8 course dinner. Eaten with the bits of sour plum and walnut, the dessert was a deviation from the usual Chinese dessert that were typical of such restaurants.

At around $100 per head for a 8 course meal, it is not worth it for the food or for the service. Firstly we waited a long time in between for our food. In end, we spend almost 3 hours in the restaurant (7pm to 9:40pm++). And despite the number of staff for our two tables, the service for my table is atrocious. The staff actually removed our shark's fins coup claypot without informing anyone after serving anyone a bowl. This would be fine if it wasn't for the fact that the other table had second helping! Are you telling me that our claypot had no more soup even though the size of serving should be the same? Or did the staff took the soup for some other reason?

To be honest, even without that incident, I do not feel that Royal China is value for money. The best and cheapest chinese restaurant I have eaten before is at a small shop located at Malacca. This doesn't even come near to it.

Will I return to this restaurant again? Probably not, unless it's for the dim sum which I heard is good. And even then I will think twice.

Royal China is located at #03-09, Raffles Hotel

Where's my food?!

2009-03-03T14:22:00.002+08:00

Someone asked me why I stopped posting. To be honest, I do not know. It must have been somewhere when I was shoved exam notices under my nose and when I started reading epic romances to avoid something. What is that something? I can't seem to remember.

Instead please take a look at my photos I took at Crystal Jade@Bishan some time back.

Spicy Tofu

Scrumptious Roasted Duck

Broccoli with crab roe and meat. Bland.

Sweet and Sour pork. Definitely good.

Standard Vegetable.

Crispy Seafood Mee. Don't order this. Trust me.

台剧

2009-03-02T16:00:00.001+08:00

我想要看 《真情滿天下》和《娘家》.

台剧万岁!

OK. I lie. I only want to watch 《真情滿天下》 and ogle at 李政穎 in 《娘家》.

Because this is too awesome

2009-02-26T10:21:00.005+08:00

The Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney keyboard Medley. Ahh, it makes me want to steal my sister's keyboard and play the music. Especially Swimming, Anyone?

And here is a guitar's version of Turnabout Sister. Ahhh. Awesome sauce. This guy can fight with the Orchestra version of it.

Dating Violence Awareness week

2009-02-14T18:32:00.002+08:00

Today is the last day. Better late than never ne?

Today's Dinner: Instant Curry with Rice

2009-02-06T19:25:00.001+08:00

Instant japanese curry is so easy to cook that anyone can probably do it. You just need to place the bag into boiling hot water for 5 minutes, remove it and empty the contents into your rice. Fast, easy and stomach fulfilling. But one of these days, I'm going to try making real japanese curry myself. The chicken meats in these instant packs are so small.

Today's Lunch: Frikadellen and Pasta

2009-02-03T21:43:00.005+08:00

I decided to cook Spaghetti Bolognese and Frikadellen for lunch today with my sister. Spaghetti Bolognese is really easy to make. Even a person like me can cooked a reasonably delicious bolognese. Although I admit I cheated by buying ready made sauce.

The Frikadellen (German Meat Patties), however, was a failure. I think it was because that I left my bread soaking in the water for over 15 minutes - I was busy frying the onions - and that it was the first time I tried to pan-fry anything that is not onions and mushrooms.

The result was a sad lump of beef that couldn't stay together. My sister (no thanks) steadfastly refused to consume the brown mess. I have to say that I was mildly surprised that it was actually edible and did not taste too horribly for a first attempt. I'll probably try to cook this agian. But only when I have the money to buy more minced beef. Beef from NTUC is really expensive.

Food Review: Lava Rock

2009-02-02T16:21:00.001+08:00

I discovered recently that there was a western stall in a coffee shop offering express lunch set of Fish and Chips for $3.90. The fish was fresh and crisp. As I do not like tartar sauce, I feel that the Fish and Chip could have tasted better with other more savoury sauce. The french fries were normal. I find them bland despite the light dusting of chilli powder.

Lava Rock gives me an impression of Botak Jones and Astons. But only time will tell if this store will ever make it as big as the other two.

Lava Rock is located at Blk 681 Hougang Ave 8 £01-853 Guan Soon Cherng

When family gatherings make you fat

2009-02-02T15:53:00.001+08:00

Chinese New Year is always the period where everyone in my family will gorge themselves with food. A typical family gathering is frightening. But a Chinese new year family gathering is nothing short of horror. The amount of food seem to double and no matter what you do you just can't keep yourself away from the food. What a ~~delightful~~ nightmare.

Stirring and messing up the Yu Sheng while screaming broken chinese phrases is always a great deal of fun. Note to self: do not place the fish in the freezer.

After Yu Sheng it was time for the main course! Being descendants of Peranakans, we had to have some Nonya food for the reunion dinner. Please don't ask me the name of this, I have no clue.

Chilli Prawns! Seafood is a must for CNY dinner. Since there was no steamed fish, the prawns had to be included.

Roasted Pork and char siew.

Nonhan? I don't know the name. My aunt did a good job for this though it still pales in comparison to my mother's.

Roasted Duck. Bought from some stall.

Leeks. Any teochew family ought to have this in their dinner. We used to have Fa Cai in this dish. But the spiralling cost of the moss and the environment harmful harvesting methods have made ask ceased to have it for part of the reunion dinner.

With fish naw, scallops, fuzhou fish ball, handmade meat ball and etc. Sweet? You bet.

Some other stuff not pictured in here. Dessert, Brown Brother white wine and choya.

Mini-Reunion dinner photos

2009-01-26T00:00:00.003+08:00

The Steamed Fish. Very fresh and delicious.

Yesterday, my family had a mini-reunion dinner since we are having the actual dinner with our extended family today.

We had mostly simple teochew dishes of steamed fish, leeks and of course, shark fins soup.

Leeks and prawns

Shark Fins soup. We only drink this soup one new year and my grandma's birthday (and of course, weddings' dinner).

Ji Ji Wanton Noodle Specialist

2009-01-23T10:59:00.003+08:00

I went to tried the wanton mee at this famous stall a while ago. the main attraction of this wanton mee is the size of serving for at cheap prices. For $2.50, you get 4 wantons and a nice amount of char siew. Overall as a whole I find the dish to be palatable and rather worth it for it price. There is also a $2 option but obviously I do not know the amount of serving for that.

What I did not like is the dirtiness of the tray. I'm been told by the stall owner that the cleaners do not wipe the trays when they collect t back from the customer. Argh.

Ji Ji Wanton Noodle Specialist is at Hong Lim Food Centre, #02-49

Star Wars: Retold

2009-01-18T10:47:00.002+08:00

Star Wars as described by someone who has never seen the movies. This is extremely hilarious. The Bar planet? The Bar planet? *ded*

Akinator, the Web Genius

2009-01-16T09:20:00.001+08:00

I am quite amused by this website where it will try to guess who you are thinking of with a series of questions. It actually managed to guess correctly Kurama (lol!) and Lee Jun Ki (can't wait for his new show ;3). Though I defeated it with Miles Edgeworth (Ace Attorney).

And not surprising, a lot of people tried Obama and themselves.

Book Review: The Wind-up Bird Chronicle

2009-01-12T13:03:00.000+08:00

Haruki Murkami's The Wind-up Bird Chronicle is truly an abstract and surreal piece of work. With my friend's raves about the author in mind, I set upon to read my very first book by Haruki Murkami. What I expect I did not know. But I certainly did not prepare myself for such a strange book.

Toru Okada is the poor protagonist of this book. At the beginning of this book he was directionless and aimless. His life changed when his cat when missing and he received strange calls. In a way, the book is about Toru's struggle for a path that he could walk. On this journey, he met various people who he changed their lives and in turn changed his life. This summary of the book is extremely shallow but I can't write more without spoiling the plot.

I will not claim that all parts of this book is enjoyable. There are parts where I feel that there has been far too many repetitions, part of the book whereby the story could have been better if they are cut. You also should not expect a clear ending where all the questions are resolved for they are not.

As I mentioned, there are too many loose-ends. We never knew exactly what happen to some characters or who they really are. Whether this is deliberate I do not know. It certainly adds on to the mysterious feel of Murakami's writing. It certainly had an effect on creating some of the more crazy characters I have have seen.

The Wind-up Bird Chronicle has two missing chapters that are not included in the English translation of the book. This may or may not have an effect on the overall enjoyment of the book. Regardless, I enjoyed this book, particularly the parts about the world war. I recommend anyone to read it. The book may be a little slow in the beginning, but it is definitely worth it to read it the end.

I feel Trippy

2009-01-11T12:38:00.001+08:00

I blame it on the music.

Yesterday's Dessert: Kaya Cake

2009-01-11T11:13:00.001+08:00

Some famous Kaya cake.

Today's Lunch: Cha Soba

2009-01-08T18:29:00.001+08:00

It's rather to easy to cook your own cold Cha Soba. No more Fair Price instant noodles for me again!

100 days protest against Nintendo

2009-01-07T00:29:00.001+08:00

Bob took 5 years to create a Nintendo DS game. To fulfil his dream to publish his game, he contacted Nintendo US for a developer kit, SDK. However, Nintendo has not replied to his request and he decided to have a 100 days protest in a room "locked and barricaded from the outside".

Watch this video with the annotation on.

You may feel inclined to sympathize with the guy. Until you realise 1) the game doesn't even look that nice, 2) there is no demo of said game, 3) Bob named the game after himself, 4) he has one huge ego and is a bloody jerk.

Frankly, he just did the worst thing possible. He dissed the company. If I was Reggie, I sure as hell wouldn't respond to him. And judging from the responses, most people are not impressed.

You can watch him protest at his site which sprouts nonsense of him proclaiming that he create the greatest game that cannot be revealed to anyone. Fantastic marketing, Bob. Now if only you ain't that crazy.

后悔

2009-01-07T00:03:00.000+08:00

突然对中文有兴趣，有点后悔中学时没认真学习。

就连打个字都很困难。

我这些年在作什么?

Turnabout Prosecutor Trailer

2008-12-29T18:47:00.000+08:00

I just got hooked to the Ace Attorney series. The games are really great! Although I was completely spoiled for the entire series. T_T

Turnabout Prosecutor is the spinoff of Ace Attorney, featuring our favourite prosecutor, Miles Edgeworth. The game play for this game is completely different from the rest of series. From the information I have seen, Turnabout Prosecutor seemed to be of an interactive adventure where you try to find the murderer and the evidence to convict them in court.

It will be nice to finally see the prosecutor's side of the game. And of course, to see Miles Edgeworth who has sadly been left out of Justice for All.

The game is coming out in Japan, spring 2009.

Christmas Feast

2008-12-27T12:37:00.001+08:00

Every year on Christmas day my family gathers at my aunt's house for gift exchanges and food. The food has been getting better and this year definitely is the best.

We have appetizers:

Biscuit with cream cheese

Fruit tarts

And some tomato with wasabi + other things sauce.

The main course:

Sushi from Kuriya

Ham that I didn't try

Chicken Pie with nice and delicious potato and some cheese. It could be less milky.

Baked Pasta with sausages on top

Something Rice which I didn't try

Roasted Chicken with stuffing. Waited forever for this.

At this point I stopped taking photos except for the chocolates below.

Ferrero Garden Chocolates, pretty good

We ate three rounds of desserts. Some cheese brownie from Baker's story, apple strudel, and an entire pot of tao suan (spilt mung beans) with you tiao (fried dough) cooked by my mum. I think there was supposed to be log cake but I guess everyone was too full.

There was also plenty of red wine served. I surprised myself; I drank very little wine this time round. Oh well, I can make up for this on New Year's day.

Christmas Cards

2008-12-25T23:29:00.000+08:00

I made some mini Christmas Cards along with my gifts. I think next year I'll buy cards; It should be cheaper than making them!

DIYing Chirstmas Gifts

2008-12-25T14:43:00.007+08:00

So for this Christmas, I decided to DIY some handmade gifts. It isn't hard to to make gifts for people. However lots of time, effort and some money are needed if you want to make something that is presentable.

Items needed (Click on the photo for more details):
1. Boxes or anything you want to decorate and give as a gift for.
2. Mod Podge - a type of adhesive (with protective matte or gloss finish)
3. Ruler
4. Pen or pencil
5. Easer
6. A hobby Knife (be careful when you use it)
7. Cutting Mat (the green thing in the background)
8. Scissors
9. A range of papers (I buy mine from Made with Love)
10. Rub-ons and stamps
11. Old Unwanted Brush

Optional: Paper Cutter if you can't cut straight lines

Overly Simplified Steps for making a simple gift!

Step 1: Outline your item to the paper you are going to use

Step 2: Cut it!
Step 3: Use the Old Unwanted Brush to apply mod podge onto the item to stick the paper
Step 4: After the mod podge is dried, use markers, rub-on, stamps to decorate the item
Step 5: Use the mod Podge to give it a matt finishing
Step 6: wait for it to dry

You are done!

If you have some paper sticking out, use a hobby knife to remove those little bits BEFORE you apply the final layer of mod podge.

You can apply these steps to Alphas (see here and here), boxes (see here 1 & 2, here, here and here), photo frames (here, here and here) or any other suitable items. I'm still quite noob, my sister is very good at this.

Dinner at Waraku

2008-12-23T22:32:00.005+08:00

Waraku has been offering ladies night on mondays. With a group of at least four women, you can enjoy 50% off your total bill.

Here are some of the items we ordered:

Yanagawa Set

The beef is nice. Some care is needed to not overcook the beef. I still like the potato salad that comes with this set.

Hotate Kaminabe (Scallop)

It has a total of 7 scallops. However, I felt that the soup is a bit bland. Perhaps choosing another soup base other than wafu would have been better.

Agedashi Tofu

My cousins liked it. I don't. Still, it's far better than the tasteless oily mess I once ate at aijisen.

Waraku maki

I loved the sushi from waraku. This scrumptious maki has avocado, cucumber and roe as the main ingredients. Totally worth it.

Ebiten Maki

One of the more delectable maki I have eaten. With fried prawns in the middle, it is blissful to eat it with some wasabi.

Shiratama Macha Ice cream

My cousins love it. I felt that it's alright.

Raspberry Cake

I don't find anything special with this dessert. It is good but not extraordinary.

We also ordered the Tonpei Yaki (I forgot to take the photo) which is better than I thought. Food is served generally fast although it takes a while before the sushi finally arrived.

In total we ordered 8 different items which after discount is $41.55. This offer is absolutely worth it. You still have one last monday to enjoy the offer and if you're going, please go there early for there is a long queue after 7pm.

Snack from Paris

2008-12-19T13:23:00.003+08:00

Google and babel fish translate chocolat suisse as Switzerland chocolate.

My sister came back from London and Paris a week ago with luggage filled with tea, snacks and chocolate. One of those snacks was Casino Delicès's Pièmont. The snack is surrounded by slightly bitter Switzerland chocolate with some almond to give it some crunchiness. The second layer of the snack is some wafer. This is followed by more chocolate. Overall, it is not very sweet and delicious.

Today's lunch: Sushi

2008-12-18T18:19:00.001+08:00

California Maki and Salmon Maki

Compare to the other supermakets, Isetan's California maki generally have more roes. I feel that the maki from Liang Court's supermarket do not have as much roes. Though Isetan still loses out to restaurants. The salmon maki is pretty good too.

Sushi makes good lunch.

Returned from Trip

2008-12-17T09:00:00.004+08:00

I just came back from my Malacca. The food there is cheap yet tasty. I don't think you can find good food at that price in Singapore. I'm still processing my photos, meanwhile, take a look at the Christmas gift I bought for myself.

Away

2008-12-14T22:41:00.000+08:00

I'm going away to Malacca for the next two days for a food trip.

I Can't Draw

2008-12-14T17:02:00.006+08:00

Drew in Msn with Rien [my feet are killing me]. I think I need to practise more? Click for full view

The Twilight Before Christmas

2008-12-13T17:55:00.000+08:00

Whether you like Twilight or not, you got to see this spoof.

Dragonball Evolution Trailer

2008-12-12T20:39:00.000+08:00

Hollywood, can you please stop raping my childhood? T_T

Comic Spotlight: AXIS POWERS HETALIA

2008-12-07T13:19:00.002+08:00

I'm so sorry for not posting comic spotlight for so long! Real life got to me... (Oh I hate database!) This post's focus is on a webcomic by Himaruya Hidekaz which has grew so much in its popularity that it is now a manga and a soon-to-be screened anime, Axis Powers: HETALIA!

Axis Powers: HETALIA is a japanese webcomic poking fun at three Axis Powers during WW2 (but not exclusively confined to it). The japanese word, hetare, means useless. So when you add Italy with hetare, you get Hetalia.

APH is really hilarious since it makes fun of all the countries' stereotypes. For instance, Italy likes pasta and pizza, Germany likes beer and sausage, America thinks he's a hero and is oblivious to everyone else (the other countries) and so on. To cut thing really short, APH takes historical stuff and portrayed it in a really exaggerated manner.

But this has also caused the japanese netizens to be quite concerned about APH's reception to the world, in particular the Koreans and Chinese. In fact, there were some discussions in a korean forum where they flamed the comic. I have no idea how the chinese netizens will react when they find out about APH...

The trick to enjoying Axis Power is to not take it seriously. If you take it too seriously, some of the humor just falls flat. You will also need some history knowledge to enjoy it to the best.

This is my favourite short strip: China Melancholy. Poor China. T_T (and I totally loled when I found out that China's boss is a dragon)

I highly recommend people with a sense of humor to read Himaruya Hidekaz's controversial webcomic. Please do not view if you do not know what slash and yaoi is though.

Warning: Contents may not be worksafe.

Original Webcomic site
Profiles of the characters
Translated chapters: Chapter 1, 2, 3, 4

For other short translated strips please view here.

Fish Supreme and Soya Drink

2008-12-05T10:24:00.002+08:00

Apart from the beef hotplate, I also tried the fish noodles with soup from Fish Supreme. From the little piece of fried fish that I had eaten, I was in total agony for not ordering this cheaper option for lunch! The soup was yummy and taste of the milk wasn't too strong for me. The fish was fresh and was generally above the standard fare that I ate near my house.

I also ordered a soya drink from Yong Soon You Tiao. Can't remember the price but I did recalled thinking that it wasn't worth it.

Fish Supreme and Yong Soon You Tiao is located at Food Republic, Suntec.

Seoul Yummy Express

2008-12-04T20:23:00.001+08:00

I just realised that I have forgotten to post a lot of food entries here! Here's one of them eaten at food republic, Suntec.

I ordered this beef hotplate set (around 7.60?) from Seoul Yummy Express. I been hearing good stuff about the Seoul Yummy restaurant but frankly I don't see anything great about the food. That is, assuming the food served in the food court is of the same standard as the restaurant.

There was a healthy serving of lettuces which I liked. The beef was generally aright. Nothing special. As a matter of fact, I prefer the korean beef/spicy chicken etc hotplate I have eaten at the former Le Meridien hotel. The korean stall there should also be cheaper? I need to return again for the xth time to eat!

I do have a question. Are all korean soups suppose to taste bland and unappetizing? It's been quite some time since I last eaten any korean food with a serving of soup. But the soup provided at Seoul Yummy is really unsavoury. Urgh.

Rating: 5/10

Seoul Yummy Express
Food Republic
Suntec

This gives a whole new meaning to Chemistry

2008-12-03T09:21:00.000+08:00

An enjoyable video about the the rules of chemistry.

Why the lack of book review is prevelant

2008-12-01T22:28:00.009+08:00

First of all, I am dreadfully sorry about the lack of review last monday (and the masquerading of a review on book fairs as a replacement for the book review the monday before that).

Ahem. I just finished reading China Rises: How China's Astonishing Growth Will Change the World, one of the books I bought from the MPH sales. And that's one down and many many more to go!

The next book I'm starting is 血薇 (Xue Wei), a wu xia novel written by a female novelist when she was in high school. Since my level of chinese is extremely low, I will probably take a month or so to finish reading it.

This means there will not be any more monday book reviews for an undetermined amount of time. Erm. I will try to smuggle out some time to write a review on China Rises. Erm yes. That will be all.

Photo: Deep blue

2008-12-01T09:19:00.000+08:00

Deep Blue sky. Please Click for bigger view.

Photo: Sunset no. 3

2008-11-30T23:15:00.001+08:00

I took this on the same day as this photo. This is the vertical version of it. Which do you prefer?

Kamboat Dim Sum Kitchen

2008-11-29T21:36:00.004+08:00

I was looking for a restaurant at Marina Square when I remembered that Kam Boat Kitchen has a branch there. As we were both poor students, my friend and I jumped at the chance to try their special dim sum lunch set at $13.80.

Food
The lunch set comes with 5 different dim sum. Each person gets to eat one of the two dim sum.

The steamed prawn dumpling and the char siew bao came first instead of the soup. The har gau was very nice.

I liked their char siew bao as well too.

The soup of the day was some carrot soup which was rather tasty.

And here's the crispy chicken spring roll and deep fried beancurd prawn skin roll. The crispy chicken spring roll was bland. However the deep fried beancurd prawn skin roll is definitely one of the best I have eaten. It's almost the same as my mum's but less salty and with more prawns!

The mushroom was interesting but I didn't like the siew mai. Neither did Rien.

The portion for the stewed noodles with sliced meat and golden mushroom was small. As we had eaten all those dim sum before that, we weren't really that bothered by the amount. However, the noodles was dull. There wasn't much flavour.

We were given several choices for the dessert such as gui ling gao. We chosen the mango pudding which was lovely and of the right texture.

Service
There were plenty of staff around and they filled up my tea quite often. But I am not very happy that the manager removed my mango pudding when I had not finished it. Overzealous?

Ambience
The restaurant is quiet. This is probably due to the various empty tables in the restaurant. Overall, I find the place to be good for chatting slowly with your friends while enjoying your food and tea.

At $13.80, this lunch set is pretty affordable for those who are easily full. This lunch set is available if 2 or more people ordered it. With dim sum that hit and miss, people who have high standard for their dim sum would be better off ordering their ala carte main course dishes (which are fantastic at their shaw branch).

Rating: 6/10 (minus for overzealous managers)

Kam Boat dim sum kitchen is at 6 Raffles Bouleverd, #02-05, Marina Square

Photo: Sunset no. 2

2008-11-29T20:21:00.003+08:00

Another photo of the sun setting. Really like this shot. Please click for bigger view.

Liquid City Book Launch

2008-11-27T23:55:00.002+08:00

Liquid City Book Launch
29th November 2008 (Saturday)
2.00 p.m. to 4.00 p.m.
Kinokuniya, Takashimaya

Liquid City is a comic anthology from South East Asia. This includes works from Sonny Liew, Ken Foo, Troy Chin, FSC, and Kuanth among others. Meet the people behind it (and grab their autographs) at the launch.

Please visit their website for more details!

Random musing from this blogger: I want to get the book since it has some of my favourite artists but it's expensive (or cheap considering that some of the comics are in full colour), I'm seriously broke and there is a small error in the book. Arghhhh!

My head broke

2008-11-26T11:30:00.004+08:00

I just read some parts of Breaking Dawn by Meyers and my head broke. How can such a piece of mary sue fanfiction crap be published and is so fricking popular?! I haven't read the first three books (only read some questionable quotes) so I'm going to give Twilight (first in the series) a chance.

The book better got to be good. Or I swear I'm going to burn it/draw horrible stickman comics for wasting my very limited amount of time allocated for novels.

More Twilight Spoof

2008-11-26T00:34:00.000+08:00

Twilight is coming soon to the little red dot. While you are waiting/peer pressured/forced under gun point/have no bloody clue what that shit is, why not watch and read some of these spoofs.

This will make more sense if you have watch the trailer but don't let that deter you. This trailer spoof would have been perfect if Edward has sparkles.

Pirate_eggie on livejournal did a wonderful short comic that summarises the entire plot of Twilight. I'm not sure I want to laugh or be horrified that the books actually have sparky vampire. And here's part 2.

Twilight: The people have spoken

2008-11-24T22:06:00.001+08:00

When USAweekend conducted a poll a few weeks ago to decide whether Harry Potter or Twilight series were better, they did not expect the flurries of response by Socrates, Jane Austen, Karl Marx, Dean Winchester, Al Gore, Darth Vader and many famous others condemning travesty that was Twilight.

When the men of Athens read Twilight, they sentenced me to death.

Posted by: Socrates

Twilight is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

Posted by: Karl Marx

The more I see of Twilight, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all its characters, and of the little dependence that can be placed on the appearance of merit or sense.

Posted by: Jane Austen

Twilight made me do it.

Posted by: Darth Vader

So this is how braincells die-- with thunderous applause.

Posted by: Padmé Amidala

The 66th seal is broken. Lucifer has sent Twilight into the world.

Posted by: Dean Winchester

Twilight is responsible for Global Warming.

Posted by: Al Gore

I chose Twilight because its female lead makes me look competent and smart--not to mentional a leap forward for feminists in comparison! Gosh darnit!

~*~*~*Sarah Palin in 2012~*~*~

Posted by: Sarah Palin in 2012

And finally,

I, in fact, single-handedly killed the Cullen cult; Renesmee was a bit tricky to handle, being biologically impossible, but with a bit of ingenuity and my dazzling smile, she was easily taken off! You can read about my exploits in my latest book (including how Bella tried to seduce me, but I don't blame her, most women act like that around me) "Culling the Cullens."

Posted by: Gilderoy Lockhart

Photo: Sunset

2008-11-24T18:05:00.000+08:00

Photo of the sun setting from my house. Click for bigger view. Please comment and criticise?

Anime Festival Asia 2008

2008-11-23T12:01:00.003+08:00

Domo-kun did not made me spend any money

AFA 08 was good, but not fantastic. The $5/$8 would have been worth it if I had stayed for the concert but I wasn't (and neither was Rien) prepared to stay so long at the fair.

But first, I would like to apologise to Rien who waited for me for an hour due to some miscommunication. I am also sorry for being an insane Gundam fan squealing at all the Gundam Models.

The highlights of the event has to be the Kunio Okawara interview. Being able to see the Gundam Designer up close was truly a humbling experience. Many fans sat on the floor (when the chairs were filled) to listen to the peaching of the Great One. Fortunately I was with a Gundam hater, and was able to pull myself from my worship.

Gundam Exia (Trans Am) Sold out before 11am

The entire event seem to be a great Gundam masturbation fest. The amount of space allocated to the Bandai was bigger than any other series. Of course, as a Gundam fangirl, I was most happy and natural in this habitat. I was found drooling at the models and resisting the intense urge to donate money to the Gundam cause.

Gundam Exia VS Gundam Exia

For a brief amount of time, I thought I was seeing doubles. There were two Gundam Exia! As it turned out, the Exia with glowing eyes is a wonderful cosplay done by the master of mecha cosplay, Clive Lee. Poor Mr Lee was hounded by the Papparazzi every where. Even when he was resting with his head gear off, the cameras refused to stop flashing.

One of the IFS display work

Apart from the gundam fest, there were several smaller collection of booths such as the Imaginary Friends Studio (IFS). I was quite excited to see them and their works were as good as I expected them to be. However, they also came with a hefty price tag.

Encore Films Pte Ltd

Encore Films were also there with some of the Japanese films that they have distributed in Singapore. May I suggest to Encore films to take on some of the Japanese drama series? I do not mind paying more for a good DVD release with eligible subtitles and which do not crash my DVD player.

Apparently, this was an anime themed Japan Tour booth. I am not very sure since the intimating tigers in the background send me scuttling off like a frightened prey.

One of the main reason that I paid $5 was to see the the Shouen Jump World Tour booth. However, my high anticipation lead to a high disappointment as there were only some pathetic Death note, Bleach and Prince of tennis works. There were also some original Dragon Ball Z 'manuscript' that were submitted to the editor before being printed in the magazine.

Why was Lancelot featured here with Suzaku? Lulu? Where are you?

There were also 6 'experience' booth of the Code Geass, Skip Beat, Casshern Sin and the other series showing on Okto now. I really liked the booths and I would liked to think that it convinced Rien to watch Code geass.

And course, we have the figurines section. Rows of figurines one after another, in a showcase of toys from the various toy companies:

Life sized Reborn with Leon. This must have cost a bomb.

Hatsune Miku with parts of Fate in the background

Haruhi Suzumiya Cast with blocked Yuki's head

Rei Ayanami. I still prefer Kaworu.

I enjoyed the event since they managed to control the crowd entering the place unlike a certain cosplay event. I did like the booths for Sky Crawler and Lamb, Animax Asia's anime. It would be nice if we have more of such booths. For events, there was no interesting events apart for Kunio Okawara stage appearance and the sky crawlers trailer on Saturday in the afternoon. This is another aspect that they need to improve on if they want to attract people next year.

Cosplay of Soul Eater

To be honest, the attention paid to the Gundam and Mecha series were higher than the other series. They should be more booths of other popular series such as Soul Eater. In additional, most of the merchandises sold there were of mecha models. It was of no surprise then that KKnM ended up with a long queue of people waiting to see (and buy) non-mecha products.

I am also slightly annoyed by the small area allocated to the artist alley. Only 4 tables?

AFA08 is not a bad event organised for the first time. But if they really want to attract people from the region, they will need more than this.

Food Safari Photos

2008-11-23T09:43:00.001+08:00

I kind of forget to upload the photos from Food Safari 2008 last weekend at Suntec Convention Hall. Please C & C the photos!

Taiwanese Meat Ball Soup from one of the booth. I find the soup a little salty but It was generally alright.

I must have seen at least four different Kebab booths. All Kebab booths enjoyed high patronage.

I can't remember why I didn't buy the Turkish ice cream.

A random booth selling frozen food.

QQ Rice's booth. Their purple rice ~~of doom~~ looks awesome. I didn't dared to try it though.

I'm disappointed by myself. Most of the photos I took turned to be severely blur and out of focus. I am still an amateur in photography.

Damages at BookFest@Singapore and MPH Sale

2008-11-17T17:22:00.003+08:00

In lieu of my usual book review on Mondays, here's a full account of the bookfairs.

Colourful cats bags at the stationary section

In a rare show of coincidence (competition?), we had two food fair and two book fairs occurring at the same time at two different places. Phew that's a lot of twos. Anyway, I first thought MPH sales was nothing much - I was proved wrong later - so I went over to bookfest to get my chinese novels.

Towels decorated like food

As my cousin who came along with me does not like chinese books, I had a limited amount of time to browse through and obtained only two books, 血符(xue fu) and 暗杀(an sha). As per last year, the range of english fiction books was sadly limited with no major discount. I believed all chinese books are subjected to a 20% discount.

Yes, even the hard covers cost $8

On sunday, I went to the MPH sales after reading about the cheap deals on a forum. To my great surprise, most of the books were relatively new and I even saw a couple of non-fiction books published this year going at $8. Cost of the book depends on the size of it. Smaller paperback books cost $5 while bigger books regardless of the cover cost $8. I'm really glad that I went to the warehouse sale; Thirteen new books on my book shelf!

My total damage for both fairs are $111.30 (including stationary) or an average of $7.45 for each book. :D

Once More at Astons Specialties

2008-11-16T15:44:00.004+08:00

Raining and lunch hour makes Aston Specialties an extremely packed place. The branch at Cathay is just too small to accommodate the amount of people coming for lunch. The rain reduced the tables further - you can't dine outdoor!

The long queue resulted in us waiting a while - 20 minutes - for seats and and even longer duration - 25 minutes - for the food. Thankfully the food is palatable and we have plenty of time to waste.

Food

Grilled Fish with Herbs

Not the best grilled fish I have eaten. While I previously disliked the overpowering mushroom sauce on the steak, I find the herbs sauce is not strong enough. When eaten with the grilled fish, it just tasted bland. The french fries is the same as before. The limited amount of chilli powder does nothing to improve the taste which is a far cry from Ma Maison.

ieat Super Burger

As expected of a super burger, the size was huge. With layers of tomatoes, lettuces, thick beef patty, fried onions, cheeses and bacons, it does wonders for a famished stomach. The bacon was especially good. The thin bacons strips is well grilled and crunchy. However, the same cannot be say of the beef patty. I find it too dry. Fortunately, the taste of the grilled beef remains though my partner commented that it taste like burger king's burger (-_-lll). Nevertheless, the burger is better than the burgers at fast food joints due to the thick patty, crispy bacons and generous serving of the golden brown onions strips.

Service
In my previous visit I noted that there seemed to be an excessive of staffs doing nothing. The staff are still not doing anything but this time it's because of the slow output from the kitchen. While I won't say that the service is atrocious, I noticed that hey squeezed a group of 6 pax into two tables for a party of 4. If you have been to the branch at Cathay, you would know that the table is extremely small. I can't imagine how that group of guys managed to eat together.

The burger is definitely worth the price at $12.50. As for the grilled fish, the price is only alright. I will advise people to avoid eating at Astons Specialties at peak hours. The food isn't that good to warrant such a long wait.

Rating: 6.5/10

Astons Specialties, Level 4, The Cathay

Not Othello!

2008-11-16T12:16:00.003+08:00

Your result for The Which Shakespeare Play Are You? Test...

Othello

You are the Tragedy of Othello: the Moor of Venice. Set in the beautiful "city on the sea", Othello tells the story of a Moorish general and the disastrous consequences that arise from jealousy and lies. What your score tells us about you is that you are most likely a very cunning person, who is able to get people to do what you want. People come to you for sage advice, and to confide in you their deepest secrets. Always the opportunist, you may, however, exploit this fact if an opportunity presents itself for your own personal gain. You're not all bad, though. Like Othello, you are probably very devoted to your friends and family and most likely very courageous. While a bit of an outsider, you are able to gain people's confidence and admiration. We certainly admire you!

Take The Which Shakespeare Play Are You? Test at HelloQuizzy

Erm. Hello? Why am I Othello? I hate that character! Though I did studied the play for school. I have to say I love tragedy. There is nothing that I hate more than Hollywood style happy-ever-after ending. Gah.

Chinese cuisine at Mayim

2008-11-15T16:01:00.003+08:00

Beef Brisket Noodles ($6.30)

Mayim is a restaurant located at West mall that sells (mostly) Chinese and (some) Japanese cuisine. I have been there before - when I haven't gotten a camera - and find the food to be of a rather good standard. Oh the beef and bamboo shoots! This time round, we didn't order a la carte but tried the dim sums.

Dumplings Noodles ($6.30)

Being poor students, we ordered noodles with stewed beef brisket served in soup and noodles with fresh prawn dumplings served in soup. Phew. What a mouthful. The beef noodles with soup is only okay. I have ate better at Din Tai Fung. But the dumpling noodles with soup are fantastic. As seen from the photo, the dumpling is big! Each dumpling has 3 fresh shrimps. In fact, I kind of regret not ordering this.

Xiao Long Bao ($2)

Apart from our 'main course', we also tried their dim sum. The Xiao Long Bao costs $2 for a basket of 3. Each of this baos is presented in small little aluminium cups. When bitten, the skin of the xiao long bao is thick. The soup inside the little baos has a oily and sickening feeling when drank. I do not recommend you to order the Xiao Long Bao - which is ironically listed in the menu as a hot favourite - here.

Siew Mai ($2)

We also ordered the siew mai which also cost $2. The siew mai has two fresh shrimps and mushrooms in it. It was a real joy to nibble at the siew mai. It isn't dry at all. While I won't say that this is the best siew mai I have eaten, it is delightful to me.

Service here is substandard. The waitress threw us a dirty look when we called for her as she was delivering food to the other tables. That was still ok since she was busy and by right should not attend to us but ask another waitress to help her (which she did). The main thing was not being served any water! Is plain water charged? Or was it that they saw that we ordered one glass of barley and decided not to serve a glass of water? Humph.

The restaurant is like a cheaper cousin of Crystal Jade Kitchen. Like those restaurants, the background noise is high. The price is slightly cheaper than Crystal Jade Kitchen for its ala carte and is a good alternative if you are sick of Crystal Jade (I know I am!). Service can be improved greatly though.

Rating: 6.0/10 (marks docked for the lack of water!)

Mayim is located at level 2, Westmall, Bukit Batok.

Bookfest@Singapore 2008

2008-11-14T11:34:00.003+08:00

Bookfest@Singapore is here once again!

Date: 14 Nov to 23 Nov 2008
Time: 10am to 10pm
Venue: Suntec City, Hall 601 to 603

Floor Plan. Taken from Great Deals

Bookfest offers one of the biggest collection of Chinese novels in an exhibition. It is reputably the biggest bookfair in South East Asia. However, the English selection was rather limited when I went there last year. I also recommend grabbing some stationary and notepads at a discount.

For me, I'll probably be going down on either on Saturday or Sunday to browse through the Wu Xia novels and maybe look for the published online chinese novels; I really hope they bring in some of them this year! Here to me hoping that they sell Faber Castell's excellent highlighters.

Ma Maison: Eat the Hamburger Steak

2008-11-14T09:01:00.003+08:00

Following His Food Blog's advice, I decided to dine at Ma Maison for a special occasion. I had heard a lot about Ma Maison's hamburger steak with special sauce that apparently takes hours to stew. Being the glutton I am, I ordered the hamburger steak.

Food

Baked potato gratin

For appetiser, I ordered the gratin. While I wouldn't say that this dish was a disappointment, I didn't really liked it. The taste wasn't to my liking. To do it credit, the layer of cheese was thick, the shrimps were succulent and the small potatoes are nicely baked with broccoli. Maybe it was because I do not like the cheese. I do not know.

Sizzling Hamburger Steak

As stated before, Ma Maison is pretty famous for their hamburger steak. I ordered this from their special menu. It's the same hamburger steak but on a heated plate. As the sauce is poured onto the hotplate only when it arrives on the table, the waiter will ask you hold up a napkin to prevent the sauces from spraying on you. The sauce waa salty but it was good. I also liked the fact that it did not dry up like the sauce at Waraku (which, to do it justice was kept warm under a small flame).

The hamburger steak is served on top of some herbs and beansprouts with a small pathetic serving of carrots and broccoli. What happen to a balanced meal of vegetables and meat? The hamburger steak was indeed delectable. With a nice half-cooked egg - my favourite! - on top of the steak, I enjoyed it greatly However, the best part of the meal was the french fries. It was crispy and the sauce complement it perfectly. Definitely one of the best fries I have eaten.

Sudachi Hamburger Steak

I'm not too sure what to make of the dish. Served on a hotplate, the sauce is sweeter than the normal hamburger steak's. I find that there are too many conflicting elements in this dish. The mint leaf combined with the radish, the sauce and the steak just taste plain weird. Without the leaf though, it was lightly better. The hamburger steak is also seated on a piece of gourd (not very sure). According to the person I thought was the boss, this dish is newly introduced into the menu and is a popular way of eating hamburger steak in Japan.

Ambience
Ma Maison boasted a fairly romantic atmosphere. The waiter went around lighting up candles when night fell. However, the evening was partially ruined by a kid moving and shaking around in his seat; he happened to be seated on the same connected bench as I.

Service
I went there on a Sunday, so I was highly surprised that the restaurant was not packed. The waiter do come round filling up the water though I wasn't there for too long top find out how often. The waiting time for the food was also slightly long especially since it was not packed.

Price
The food is actually rather expensive. The baked potato gratin is not worth its price of $5.80 to me while the Sudachi Hamburger Steak is of a small portion with no side dish at 19.80.

All in all, Ma Maison offers good fusion food though some dish may be expensive to those on a budget.

Rating: 7.5/10

Ma Maison is at #02-51, 200 Victoria Street, Bugis Junction

Duck Meat and slightly burnt pasta

2008-11-11T10:27:00.005+08:00

Every few weeks, my maternal side of the family will assemble in my aunt's house for a family gathering. Food takes as much focus as the family in these gatherings. For the particular week shown in this post, there was so much food I thought I was going to explode!

This was bought from a factory. However, it was so salty that everyone went bleh at it. I guess we wouldn't be buying roast pork from them any time soon.

The duck meat. While the roast pork was just plain bad, the duck meat was alright. Coupled with the duck sauce, it was better. It still didn't come near to some of the better hawker fare though. In addition, the tough meat at one of the erm, parts totally killed my desire to eat more. Man 1 Factory 0.

Well, my aunt actually cooked beehoon and pasta. People who did not like pasta could choose to take the beehoon instead. Since I liked beehoon, I had to take some to savour.

The Seafood Pasta. Despite its unappetizing appearance, it was actually delicious. Pity about the burnt mozzarella cheese though.

And this was how the pasta really looked like when you removed the offending burnt cheese. Oh yummy!

After main course was of course the fruits! I always find that I ate way more fruits at my aunt's house than I have ate in an entire week. Honeydew, grapes, apples and pineapples were some of the fruits typically served on a good evening.

Photo stolen from Peaz

The dessert is in the form of cedele cookies. It was cruel to break the smile face into pieces but our cruelty was justified when we ate it. I always find that the Short Bread from Mark and Spencers was too thick. This cookie solved that predicament. It was thinner; each bite was enjoyable. The eyes were actually peanuts m&m. A nice complement with the yummy butter cookie.

Lastly was Choya! This is not a frequent sample in the family gatherings. But occasionally we do have dessert wines, red wine and everyone's favourite, choya. We mixed it with some ice cream soda. It's a perfect drink for family gathering if there are kids around.

Well actually there was still another dish left. Chinese dessert: Ginko nut with beancurd skin, made by my mum. I hated this but everyone else loved it. With that, the feast was over. Until the next gathering of course.

Book Review: Cute Stuff

2008-11-10T19:32:00.004+08:00

Let's make Cute Stuff by Aranzi Aronzo is undeniably cute. I supposed that is the goal of the book: to induce you into making cute adorable items!

Aranzi Aronzo have other books on making dolls but I feel that this book has to be the best. It shows fully illustrated step by step instruction to assist you in making that lovely bag. Apart from bags, you can make book cover, hair bands, card holder, tissue cases, and even water bottle holders.

Aimed at beginners, the book make use of materials that can be easily brought (felt cloth can brought at daiso). Though some of the projects (bags!) require a sewing machine; not exactly beginner friendly. Nevertheless, I highly recommend anyone who has never sewed but eager to try, to get this book. Or at the very least borrow it from the library!

Mango Sago Dessert: Can you cook it?

2008-11-09T09:58:00.002+08:00

Let your mangoes sunbath under the warm sunlight

I chanced upon this website (which is no longer updated... what a pity) offering a recipe for mango sago dessert. As people who know me can testify, I loved to eat that dessert. And thus, I, who has a history of burning porridge, maggie mee, and curry (lol. don't ask) took on the challenge cooking something edible for once.

Way too much sago pearls for a portion of 3 people

To make things easier for myself, I decided to reduce the portion of the mango sago; the original recipe allows for a serving of 6 to 8 people. I used only one mango and forgo the Fruit Tree mango juice.

Boiling the little pearls

As the preparation of the sago pearls is the longest, I cooked as per the instruction first. This is where I made my first mistake. I do not have a weighing machine so I estimated the amount of sago pearls that is needed. Let's just say I wasted a lot of pearls.

I must also emphasized the fact that the pearls will harden and lump together if you leave it in the fridge. To solve this problem you'll have to add in some water and use a spoon to stir and separated them.

Remember to drain the sago pearls carefully!

After preparing the pearls, the rest of the steps are pretty easy. Boil some water and sugar and add in tapioca flour. You will need to cut the mango in cubes. At least that is what you should aim for. I sure did not succeed at it since my 'cubes' are mostly rectangles.

Cube the mango!

Since I used only one mango, I reduced the numbers of cubes and use half of the mango for the mango purée. I recommend using a spoon to scrape whatever flesh that you cannot cut from the mango. I used 40ml of water rather than 100ml in the recipe and blended the mixture.

Blend the mango! Don't add too much water if you want it to be thick.

Finally I dumped everything together before adding only 3 1/2 tablespoon of evaporated milk as my family does not like the taste of it. The end result was surprising good though my mum complained that it was not sweet enough (I reduced the amount of sugar too). So there you have it. I can cook Mango Sago Dessert!

This Blog is Neutral

2008-11-08T15:46:00.006+08:00

GenderAnalyzer is a pretty interesting tool that determines whether a certain blog is written by a man or a woman. Feeling curious, I decided to test it out, only to discover that Scribbling Around is gender neutral with a slight preference for male.

Gossiping Gaming, on the other hand, had a 85% chance of a man as the blogger. What?!
I'm pretty sure that the tool actually checks for certain words that are associated with a gender. So words like football, games, mmorpgs are more likely to trigger a result of male blogger. This is my speculation. What is the result for your blog?

Comic Spotlight: G.T Becks

2008-11-08T12:05:00.002+08:00

This week's spotlight falls on one of my favourite online comic, Mazscara. I've been following this particular comic for close to a year. While I first thought that the summary is totally cheesy, comic is FABULOUS. There's ton of action and fighting, the art is relatively good - apart from some weird faces - and there's actually a believable plot!

Mazscara is set in a world where devils, imps, fallen angels seduce people into committing sins and eventually, suicide. The guardian angels can do nothing partly due to the corroding moral values in the 21st century world but also because people do not ask for help from God. Along comes Victoria Starfield, a beautiful actress who committed suicide. Her death resulted in chain suicides among her fans. Resurrected and brought back from hell, she has to stop what she has started.

There is also a sub-plot about her needing to protect 5 important children as part of her terms of getting out from hell. However, there has been no mention about it since the first book. I suspect this will be particularly important later on but for now, Victoria's story far more fascinating! As of book 5, we still do not know why she committed suicide (argh I got spoiled) though much of her past is already revealed.

Tung, Vicky's nemesis

I highly recommend people to read this if you enjoy a good supernatural in modern world with heavy action comic.

Mazscara is rated as mature for gore and suicide scenes. Read Book 1 and 2 here. Book 3 to the latest pages can read here. It is updated every monday, Singapore time.

Borrow double the books you want!

2008-11-07T14:09:00.002+08:00

Well, I just went to the library and discovered that our National Library Board has launched their DEAR promotion again!

Ordinary members will be able to borrow 8 items while deluxe members can borrow 16 items!

Promotion will end 31 Jan 2008.

Interesting? Hell Yes

2008-11-05T10:25:00.002+08:00

With Obama leading 195 to 76, the race is currently far more exciting than any of the mediacorp dramas. The Twitter for Election 2008 just keep jumping with a large majority there supporting Obama. The younger voters seemed to be pretty enthralled by Obama as evidenced by this.

As I watched now, Obama just won Pennsylvania and McCain expected to win Georgia. There's live news on the internet (I'm watching BBC), the race is definitely more exciting than any election in Singapore. This is the type of election what I - and probably a good many Singaporeans - want to see in Singapore; a credible opposition with credible promises.

Unfortunately, there are no credible opposition and hence no party to draw Singaporeans from their political apathy. There may be plenty of people who go to opposition rally but many do not vote them due to their outrageous promises and mere criticism of the policies.

If the opposition wants to be a threat to our ruling party, they need someone with charisma. Just like the democrats has Barack Obama, the opposition needs someone who can charm and not all talk and no action. I hope the our opposition is watching the US election now. Please, no more walkovers in 2010.

Avenue Q

2008-11-04T11:20:00.003+08:00

Avenue Q is a popular musical on the Broadway which has won acclaim overseas. From 30th October to 16 November, the Filipino production will be performing it in Esplanade Theatre.

Last Sunday, I went to see the musical at our beloved national durians. It was every bit as entertaining as I thought. Avenue Q tells the story of a fresh college graduate, Princeton who is looking for a cheap apartment and inadvertently discovers Avenue Q and its group of wacky characters.

Avenue Q is wonderfully entertaining. A parody of the Sesame Street, the characters are a mixture of puppets (Nicky, Rod, Tekkie monster, Kate Monster, Princeton, Lucy the Slut etc) and actors (Brian, Christmas Eve and Gary Coleman). Much laughters were generated from the obvious dig at Tekkie Monster (the older version of Cookies Monster with porn addiction?) and the best friends, Rod and Nicky (reincarnation of Bert and Ernie?). However it is most definitely not for kids (our government has imposed a NC-16 label on it), with plenty of sexual innuendos (The Internet is for Porn) and one full puppets sex scene.

It is crude but fun. Still, the catchy songs can't stop one from seeing the flimsy plot. The first half of the musical was great with plenty of musical numbers and the various sub-plots were nicely brought out. However, they were so perfectly resolved in the second half. I also could not hear some of the actors properly, in particular, Christmas Eve's fake Japanese accent. It was hard to hear some of her lines.

Nevertheless, Avenue Q is great musical for all puppets and humans as long as you are above 16. Now will the songs please stop playing in my head?

Book Review: Savings and Debts

2008-11-03T10:00:00.001+08:00

Published by Penguin Books, Saving and Debt are two little thin books that are simple to understand. These are books meant for the ordinary people who do not know anything about heavy financial jargon. They are also illustrated with colourful graphics unlike other boring and stuffy financial books on the subjects.

Saving by Juliane Otterbach

Saving covers stuff such as social bankings, mortgages, loans and even insurance. It is basically a all-in one book on how you can take control of your financial. In particular, I find the section on mortgages to be tremendously useful.

Debt by Juliane Otterbach

Debt begins by analysing why and how people get into debts. Do look out if you have one of the spending behaviour listed there! What I liked about the book are the sections on student loans and credits cards. It showed the various loans that a student can get. Unfortunately, it is mostly for UK students.

However, both books are written in a UK context. If you are not from UK, some of the contents of the books will be useless. Nevertheless, the books are still useful for as the basic idea of savings and debts are universal. These are the perfect books for anyone who want to know more about the above two topics but are daunted by the typical financial books.

Dancing around Nanowrimo

2008-11-02T08:54:00.006+08:00

It's that time of the year again.

Yes. That.

Nanowrimo is here again. And I have failed to join it for the 5th year running. And probably won't be able to join the next year since I have two major projects or the year after that as I will be working.

Meanwhile as I danced through the house like a psychotic manic, ideas are filling my brain to the brim: A seriously screwed up family. A pair of twins who loved each other so deeply that they will do anything for each other. A periodic story of a thief who is swept into a palace intrigue when he steals the king's purse. A man seeking for the perfect girlfriend even if it means plastic surgery.

Argh! Stop it you silly brain I only have 28 days if I want to join ~~Nonowrimo~~ Nanowrimo. I must procrastinate. procastinae.. procastina...

A Hard Task

2008-11-01T23:29:00.003+08:00

Blogging daily is hard. I have been trying to blog everyday but real life in the form of readings, essays, and mini projects, takes up a lot of my time.

Some blogs managed by an individual are updated everyday with meaningful entries. It depresses me to see that. Or maybe they don't have a life. I prefer that reason. Still, I try my best to blog everyday for a week at least. And it seemed as though I just barely made it for today. Woot.

Comic Spotlight: Sei-ji Rakugaki

2008-10-31T12:10:00.001+08:00

The Comic Spotlight is a new addition to this site where we will be looking at comic illustrators weekly. Today's spotlight falls on Sei-ji Rakugaki. He isn't really a comic artist though.

Sei-ji Rakugaki is a brilliant illustrator based in Singapore who does political illustrations. As far as I know - and can find on google - he's the only person in Singapore who does this online.

On the Severance Package

Sei-ji Rakugaki has been around since 2006, posting in his blog, My Sketchbook. His works give a satirical views on contemporary issues in Singapore and pokes fun at the foot-in-the-mouth speeches that our government is fond of making.

This includes speech by our Minster Mentor:

Summary of LKY's Mating Speech

And our economics woes of the ever increasing ERP gantries:

ERP expanding

Visit My Sketchbook for more of his humorous works. He also has another site where he posts drawings.

Food Review: Soyako

2008-10-30T10:05:00.001+08:00

Since ladyironchef was recommending Soyako fervently, I decided to try for myself just how good was the beancurd.

Glutinous rice balls with beancurd was smooth. It wasn't too sweet yet smooth, as far as my inexperienced taste buds (with beancurds) were concerned.

The beancurds came with three glutinous rice balls (also known as tang yuans). Two of tang yuans had sesame fillings while the last remaining tang yuan had peanut fillings instead. The tang yuan was tasty though it made me extremely full!

The cost of a glutinous rice balls with beancurd is $2. An ordinary beancurd will set you back by 80 cents. I recommend people to get their beancurd instead unless you are in the mood for tang yuan or are famished.

Rating: 7/10

Soyako is located in Bukit timah food centre, #02-166.

Food Review: Tom's Kitchen

2008-10-29T09:49:00.002+08:00

I was recommended this western food stall at Bukit Timah Food Centre. Since I was in the area for school, I just had to try it!

The Grilled Chicken with black Pepper Sauce was a little too peppery for me. The grilled chicken was done rather well. It was delicious though the serving is a little bit small. However, I felt that the strong pepper sauce ruined the grilled chicken. It might tastes better without the excessive pepper. The cold potato salad was sweet. Personally, I like it but there may be people (eg. my partner) who might not.

The Chicken Cutlet was crispy but salty. You can choose either rice or french fries. The rice comes with little bits of fried eggs. Both dishes cost $4.50, a standard price for western food.

Rating: 6.5/10

Tom's Kitchen is located in the Bukit timah food centre.