Movie on delivery...

About 2 weeks ago I got a pleasant surprise package sent to my office from a friend. He was recommending that I watch this Japanese movie called Crying Out Love, In The Center Of The World (yes quite a mouthful and must have good memory to memorize name).

I was warned that it's a movie that'll require a box of tissue meant for tears (guess the title of movie kinda hinted it quite loudly). I wasn't quite ready for a sad movie and not sure if I preferred to watch it alone and bawl like a baby, or cry silently next to someone and pretend that I'm unmoved. That's why I have not watched it. Maybe I'm just making up excuse to not watch a sob-sob movie and feel all sad afterwards.

Once I watched a movie called Forever & Ever about a mother caring for her teen child who suffered cancer. I like touching movies but I hate the after-taste of feeling sad when it was really just a movie. But out of curiousity and also not to put my friend's effort to waste, one of these days I will gather the courage and sit through it.

When less is more

Last night I decided to make instant noodles for dinner because I was lazy to go out, and I didn't want to miss the 2nd last episode of a TV program too. Then I noticed the ham in the fridge and the loaf of bread. An idea struck me. Make all my favourite easy-to-make stuff and put them together - bam, a sandwich!

Got the eggs, beat them up and added chopped onions to them. Did a slow-fire fry on them and my omelette was looking good. Then did the chicken ham too and it came out all oily but I could afford a bit of weight so what the heck.



Buttered the slices of bread and topped it with the omelette and ham and my dinner was all done! Sat in front of the TV like a couch potato and gobbled up the whole sandwich. I love onion omelettes and it was like killing 2 birds with one stone just putting everything together. Hmm...maybe that's why most of the stuff I cook aren't very appealing to everybody else. Maybe less is really more...

No cake but plain old pasta

Weekend came and went. My plans to bake the Austrian coffee walnut cake didn't take off because I couldn't find just the 1 ingredient. But the desire to cook was still within so I decided to make a simple dinner dish of spaghetti.

I bought all the ingredients I need - mostly my favourites: zuchinnies, eggplants, button mushrooms and ham. I got all excited about making an olio spaghetti but since I haven't fully recovered from a bad throat, I thought I'd leave the chilli oil out.

And as I chopped garlic and onions and the rest of the ingredients, I was wondering what else I need besides the olive oil to give it taste and fragrance. I decided nothing much else and so started up the fire and heated the pan.

In went the oil and the food stuff. Boiled the spaghetti and chucked those into the pan to saute with the rest of the vegetables. Busied myself sauteing them so that they don't get stuck and then burnt on the pan. Finally everything that needs to be cooked is cooked and I dished them out on a plate ready to be served.

The result - blend and nothing worth mentioning! I need a recipe for this!!! It proves my own made-up recipe won't work. Next time I'll try it with the chili oil, and maybe get an extra fragrant olive oil. And something definitely needs seasoning!

Are shopping mall's security guards allowed to direct traffic?

Last weekend traffic at 1U was a horror. Most entrances to the car park were closed and security guards of the mall stood on the road side directing motorists to drive on instead of trying to drive through the cone barriers to enter the parking. Or at least that's what I thought they were trying to do because it was obvious that the entrances were closed and people would have to drive around to find the next opened entrance.

Cars were parked along the road side and not to mention far from the complex. How people were willing to walk in the hot sun for meters just to get into the mall. I was lucky, managed to get in after making a second attempt at the same closed entrance. I even found a spot to park in less than 5 minutes after I got in! Talk about my parking angels.

I didn't spend much time at the mall. After looking for what I wanted and only to find out there isn't any stock left, I decided to leave the crowded mall. Upon exit, I came up to the junction that had a traffic light at each juncture. There were 3 security guards from the mall, evidenced by the security vest they wore, standing in the middle of the junction, directing traffic like traffic policemen.

I wonder if that is legitimate? Could anyone just stand in the middle of a junction and direct traffic and ignore the traffic lights that were working perfectly? Not that there was a jam in sight. Imagine if every mall was to do that, the government would save quite a lot of money not putting up traffic lights in those areas :) Maybe that'll save the taxpayers too!

Austrian coffee walnut cake for the weekend!

I've not put my "cooking skills" to much use for a long time now. Since last week I've had a sudden inspiration to start clanking the pots and pans. After much thought, I decided on baking. And so happens that I found a long lost recipe of a cake (from Delia Smith) I had made and liked from years ago. So I'm storming up courage and effort this weekend to bake it!

I'm gonna start digging up the utensils and the baking trays and equipment. Sounds like a busy and exciting weekend! Now someone gotta start praying that I don't burn down the place. Maybe I should alert my neighbours and have them chip in the prayers too. After all, their houses are the next in line if anything burns up at mine!

It's also shopping time! Gonna start looking into supermarkets for the ingredients. I hope the calories are worth it.

Mid Autumn Festival

Walked about in the mall and it's so charmingly decorated with stalls selling mooncakes and chinese lanterns, in anticipation of the upcoming Mid Autumn Festival. Though most stalls are dimly lit with orange lightings, the colours of the paper or plastic lanterns bring out the oriental charm.

The mooncake packages get better each year. Sometimes I wonder if people buy a certain brand because of the packaging or because the cakes are better. I have a feeling it's the former. Most cakes are probably produced by the same manufacturer anyways and branded differently afterwards. I'm thinking maybe the packaging costs a lot more than the actual cakes.

Along with the trend of boxes that these cakes come in, the cakes themselves have a steady stream of growth in the flavours they come in year after year. Nowadays it's quite the norm to have pandan, chocolate and yam flavoured mooncakes. This year I've seen some cakes that come in multiple layers of different colours. Probably a mix of a few flavours.

As for the lanterns, I just love the paper ones. They make great decoration pieces if nothing else. I don't like lighting the candles in them though since I'm bad at it and might end up burning the entire lantern. The wonderful thing is that I still get to enjoy the beauty of them when my neighbours light up and hang up lanterns in their gardens!

Desperate for chicken wings!

Last night I was at Yuen's Steamboat having a pleasant dinner. Patrons of the restaurant know that the barbequed chicken wings there are fabulous. It is not an exageration to say that once the chicken wing refills are brought out from the kitchen, they will all be gone within a minute. Actually, it is less than a minute and the tray of chicken wings would be empty. People actually rush to the buffet spread and crowd round to gather up as many pieces as they can.

While we were there, we kept a lookout for the chicken wings to be brought out from the kitchen. In our first try, we didn't get any despite being in the crowd to snatch up the wings. We noticed this guy who came and towered over others and grabbed a plate full of wings without giving a care that he was so rude.

After some time, we noticed this same guy waiting at the spread for the chicken wings (notice the guy in red shirt?). He had his empty plate and pincers ready. He stood there licking his fingers and watching the kitchen keenly. We noticed he also had a friend sitting nearby, also eyeing the kitchen. They remained there for a long time. Finally the wings were carried out of the kitchen and his face lit up with excitement. The kind of expression you see on a sportsman, ready to beat his fellow rival at all cost.

Here's a closer shot of the chicken wing desperado in his bright red shirt, and the small crowd gathered at the spread that finished the whole tray of chicken wings amongst themselves.

His friend joined him in grabbing as many chicken wings as they can on their plates and they both left happy with their treasure. As they walked past our table, I looked directly at him perhaps with an expression of disgust. He looked none the guilty of his behaviour. How inconsiderate some people are!

No doubt the chicken wings are great, but I can't comprehend people who act like they've not eaten for a whole year!

A real home can't look like this!

Yesterday I went to see some show houses with friends. It was far and we only had a map and thankfully a reliable description on how to get to the area, provided by the developer's website. We drove in a rain and having paid quite a bit of toll, wondered if it was really worth the visit. We were also rushing to get there in time before they close. We got there about 10 minutes before the stipulated closing time. The sales people were busy talking to other potential homebuyers and no one paid us much attention.

So we wandered off on our own to what they call a Show Village. It was a large land plot with many units built in various designs. Armed with just a brochure of the many home types offered, we entered the units one by one, awed by the nicely furnished homes, complete with charming interior designs. We were also quite thankful that the workers did not close the units right on time, so we managed to see a lot of units way past their closing time.

As we saw more and more units, each looked better than the last. Then we came to the more expensive and posh house types. They took our breaths away and almost everywhere we stepped into, we exclaimed in wonderment at how large, beautiful and unbelievable they are. Some were done up in Zen style, some in Balinese theme, and one even with Peranakan finish. I couldn't help but snapped a few pictures although they were not allowed.

The cul-de-sac style of the show village resembles the Desperate Housewives setting. The weather was also cooling after the rain and it gave us a very nice feeling, as if you were in a different country all together. As we rounded off our walks, we decided we needed to return and take more time to admire them again. We covered the place in about an hour and it clearly wasn't quite sufficient. I'm looking forward to going again!

The grand home on the exterior. Behind the plants is a tempting pool!

The Zen-styled entrance to the home.

The luxurious living room.

The dining room exudes an air of class.

The romantic, not to mention HUGE master bedroom, with a glass room within it used as a baby's room.

3D chat

I recently caught up with a cool IM technology, chatting 3D style. IMVU, the 3D IM, allows you to create an image of yourself through an avatar. This self-representation is viewable by all members of IMVU and you can pick whoever online to have a chat.

Instead of chatting in a window, the chat is held in a private "room" in the setting of a coffee outlet, a sunset backdrop, a room, etc. The conversations appear in bubble forms. This is the part that is difficult to keep up because they disappear upwards and you might just miss some parts of a conversation if you don't read the messages before they find their way off the screen.

Some very innovative things you can do while in the chat is to make your avatar do some actions like nodding along, clapping, doing some flips and dance moves. You can also interact with the other avatar you're with, doing stunts like punching and kicking each other, or a friendly handshake to a romantic hug and kiss scene. It's real fun to watch the actions.

You also earn points as you have more chats and whenever you invite someone to join IMVU. These points are used to do virtual shopping, buying all sorts of outfits for the avatar like tops, pants, shoes, hairstyles and even make-up. Pets are available too! This buying scheme is innovative in itself. There is a "Try card" to be purchased by cash in order for your avatar to try on the items before a purchase. Other purchases that require actual cash transactions are purchases like extra points and adult content. I think this is a clever business model by whoever created this.

As with everything, there must be a downside. The program slows down the use of the computer once in a while. I think it is not quite stable as it crashes sometimes. For beginners, it is also quite complicated to use as there are too many terms to learn that are not found in our normal IMs like Yahoo! and MSN. Anyway, through a lot of exploring, one could easily find their way about and enjoy all the features.

For now, I'm happy to just play around with it as a source of amusement. Below are some moments I've captured - a picture of my avatar and all the naughty things she's been up to.


This girl sure knows how to pose for the camera, huh?! Her name's RoyalPink.


That's RoyalPink and HugoAgogo at Buckstars Coffee, having a romantic moment.

XXXXL anyone?

Yesterday I was downtown at a shopping mall. Saw something that I liked but they were out of the size that I want (which is a very good thing, saves the purse). While I was flipping through all the pieces hung up, I couldn't help but notice that the line of clothes actually had sizes from Small to XXXXLarge!

I'm not being inhuman or rude to people of bigger builts, but I found it to be rather odd that such large sizes were offered. At the most I've only seen the sizes go up to XXL. Then again I think it is a good thing to give equal treatment to everybody.