Trip to Japan - Day 2 - Part 3

After a while... pretending to be fine tourists who appreciate Venetian glass and the Picasso collection got to us. And we decided to hop into another Japanese "wooden" place to have lunch! =)















<-- Even the tea pot is YSL!

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Then Nobuto said that he'll take all of us to an "onsen". ahhh.. we thought, finally, we're gonna experience the hot bath, the Japanese way! I silently chided myself as to whether I would have the guts to strip off every piece of clothing I have in front of my friends and the many other strangers.

"Nawwww.... I don't think i can do it"

"Do it... and besides, what they have, you have too rite?"

And you know what... gawd, we never did it. I just..couldn't! I was ready (or so I thought) to strip, but then i saw boobs of all shapes and sizes and bushes / forests...

and then they got more and more.. it was like... *head throbbing* Noooooooo! I don't think i can do this...The Japanese women (and the men too, I'm sure!) are so comfortable with being naked around each other! It's one thing to soak yourselves into the hot baths with only your necks and heads above the water..

... but it's another thing to see women sitting down on rocks and talking to each other, stark naked!

*throbbing in the head gets worse*

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Such a traumatic I had at the onsen... I was only glad to have that personal trauma remedied, albeit much later, by a cool glass of beer..

Trip to Japan - Day 2 - Part 2

It was nearly 10am when we left the lava spine to head towards Lake Ashi.

<-- Lake Ashi - the crater lake, famous for its views of Mount Fuji, with boats and ferries providing scenic views for tourists. It was here that we had our first meal of soba in Japan.














<-- That's my soba 2nd breakfast, with scallops =)

This is followed by our visit to the Hakone Glass Forest, where we visited both the museum which contains glass sculptures and various other glass art exhibits, as well as the Italian Garden, which has Venetian influence. While we were there, people were allowed to don costumes (ala a masquerade) and walk around the garden and the museum to take pictures. But erm, we weren't too keen - lah...

<--And check this out wei... the types of jams on display can rival any shop there is in Australia!

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Our next place of visit was the Hakone Open Air Museum - where loads of weird-ass sculptures were on display. Ok-lah, they're not weird. In fact, according to this website I read, "The Hakone Open Air Museum (Japanese: Hakone Chokoku No Mori Bijutsukan), successfully attempts to create a harmonic balance of nature and art by exhibiting various sculptures on its spacious grounds in combination with beautiful views of the surrounding valley and mountains. Besides the sculptures, the Hakone Open Air Museum features various indoor galleries, including a sizable Picasso Collection, consisting of paintings, prints, sculptures and ceramic creations."

Sigh... we probably didn't have the interest nor the knowledge to appreciate these art pieces. Nevertheless, we acted like fine tourists =)

<-- Yea okaaay, except for that last picture there.... we probably jumped higher on the egg than any other kid there! But hey...it would be a while before we stepped foot into Hakone again.. so.... *grin..

Trip to Japan - Day 2 - Part 1

This is a long overdue post. I thought I'd get down to it - I gotta do it.. before I forget where I visited in Tokyo, Hakone, Kobe and Kyoto!



We were up pretty early on the morning of 29th March 2009. A three-hour car ride from Tokyo to Hakone awaits us. Being the caffeine junkie that I am, it's only fitting that the first place we stopped was an equivalent of a 7-11, where i found... *gasp! mini Starbucks!!
Gawd.. I love Japan already!











Along our drive up to Hakone National Park where the views of Mount Fuji are apparently what they call "Spectacular, Spectacular!" Or maybe there aren't any other places to catch the view of Mount Fuji? I don't know.. but as I now know, the view was really "Spectacular, Spectacular!"

Lee Na and I came down from our car a number of times to catch a photo or 2 of all the "wooden" places of Japan. The air was fresh..the streets are clean. Gawd, did i tell you I love Japan?







Ah... that view of Mount Fuji. Check out the side bar for more pictures.














It's amazing, the discipline of the Japanese and the tourists visiting Japan (including us, of course). They say take off your shoes, and waddaya know... we take off our shoes!! Wow..

And we don't see bratty kids jumping around on the benches.. or people sitting around lazily on the words "eating and drinking prohibited" while eating and drinking. I'm just surprised that's all. We somehow see this sort of scenario and loads of rubbish everywhere here in Malaysia.





And that's me - standing on the bench, without my shoes of course, with my back facing Mount Fuji














On the way up along the "lava spine" called "Kanmuri-gatake". The steep lava spine was formed by the squeezing out of magma through the roof of the solid shell of the Kamiyama dome 2,900 years ago. Kamiyama is the highest peak in Hakone. The last magmatic eruption of Hakone took place as the lava spine, Kanmuri-gatake appeared and the explosion crater of Kamiyama was formed 3,000 years ago.

The unpleasant smell which comes out from the lava spine is due to Hydrogen Sulfide gas.






We didn't care that these eggs came from a "lava spine" with "hydrogen sulfide" gas. It was chilly and hot black eggs are good! =)

Trip to Ipoh

Another simple post..

Our aim of taking this camera up to Ipoh was to take pictures of factory sites. Look what we came back with. No pictures of factory sites.. instead.. we have a whole load of pictures on FOOD!

Going up to Ipoh is fun! =)



Breakfast in Ipoh... dim sum @ Ming Court is so good =)














Somewhere in Ipoh.. there's a cafe named after our Boss =) She now refers it as "my cafe"













This deliciously awesome dish at Pasta Zanmai in 1-Utama... I love it so much I forgot the name.. It's one of the thin pizzas they have there.. with seafood..














Another closer shot... yummy!!
*SLURP...

Cousins' steamboat dinner

First things first... Huay Yin has climbed to the top of Mount Kinabalu!! Woo hoo!! I finally understood Leonardo DiCaprio's feelings when he yelled "I'm on top of the worlddddd!!!" More on Kinabalu later...

For now, Neighbour, I promise I'd blog about the Parts 2, 3, 4, n of Japan, but oh no, i realised that the external hard drive which contains my pictures is in office!! Gee.. that addiction to work and office needs to be addressed.. fast. If I don't kick this habit fast enough, I might just kick the bucket sooner than desired.

Anyway, I thought, instead of leaving my blog empty and void of a new blog post..I'm gonna show that "It's still ALIVE!!" (Yay!!)

This is a pretty simple one.. a cousins dinner at Yuen Steamboat in Sunway Mentari on the 28th June 2009. I try not to be too ambitious (in terms of blogging) after going on a 1-month "break" =)


Our constantly full steamboat. Delicious!! Too bad we don't have pictures of our chicken wings... or did it go off before someone could even yell "get the camera!"?











L-R: Chai Lee (oops, sorry head got sliced off a little), Chai Leng (amazing appetite this girl!) and Bob (who bought us dinner that night..thankeww!)

Ohh..there's a glimpse of that chicken wings in front of Chai Leng!







The sisters - Chai Lee and Chai Leng














The boys - Bob and brudder











Wait.. how come there's no picture of me ar?

Happy Mom's Day and Happy Dad's Day

(For more pictures, check out brudder's blog)

So brudder and I are back in Melaka for the weekend. We are celebrating Dad's day one week earlier (yes, the rest of you, don need to stress okies.. we're early! You didn't forget) cos papa won't be around when the real Dad's day arrives, which is *ahem* NEXT Sunday.

Mom's Day and Dad's Day are just about a month apart. Erm, wait.. actually no, it's about 1 and a half month's apart. Which erm, actually shows that I have not been back in Melaka for the past 1 and a half months (-_-).

There really is not much difference between Mom's Day and Dad's day:




Mom and Dad happy on Mom's Day

Mom and Dad (more?) happy on Dad's Day

Fat brother feeling sick after dinner on Mom's Day

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Fat brother feeling sick after dinner on Dad's day.

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Brudder feeding himself on Mom's Day

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Oops.. caught in the act again on Dad's day.

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Brother-sister Retard Act 1 on Mom's Day

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Brother-sister Retard Act 2 (and 3 and 4 on Facebook) on Dad's day

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(New York) Cheese cake on Mom's Day

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(Apple Crumble) Cheese Cake on Dad's day

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See what I mean?
Mom's Dad and Dad's Day are not so different after all. There's the fat cousin, there's the fat brother, there's (the no-longer-fat) me, there's the moms, there's the dads and there's the other cousin. I wanna say "being fat is in the genes", but i'll probably be made to be sorry for that statement for the rest of my life.

Now where's the Children's Day?

Federer wins Rolland Garros!

Ah..so Roger Federer finally wins Rolland Garros! Woo hoo! It's an amazing win I tell you.. for that one whole week after i got the news that "NADAL LOST!", I was excited beyond belief!

Never mind that Roger Federer doesn't know me. Never mind that I haven't played tennis in a while and my stamina has probably dropped to 4 (out of a possible 10). I say 4 and not zero because i have been going, erm, hiking.. (HAHAHA!) Stop laughing! Idiots. I'm gonna show you. When i finish climbing Mount Kinabalu.

For that 1 week after Nadal lost (such GLORIOUS news!) I started paying attention again to the French Open. I gotta admit, after watching him steal Federer's crown at Wimbledon and AGAIN at the Aussie open, I didn't want to watch the French. This is like his home turf.. never mind that this is in Paris and he's Spanish.. but he has won 3 finals in a row.. sigh... dowan... I swear, i boycott the French Open.

And then Robin Soderling became my hero! Nadal lost in the 4th round..and then Murray loses in the quarters. Double woo hoo! The crown was Federer's to lose. I diligently came home early every night after that.. (it was like American Idol season once again!) just so that I could watch the French Open. And he finally did it. I was so happy I could cry!

Gengs.. you missed a FABULOUS moment there!! What a night to go watch movie!

That 14th Crown. Ah.... *grins*

I don't know you.. but..geez.. FINALLY!

Warning: bimbo post ahead!

Ok Ok..So I have not been blogging, sigh.. I have perfectly valid reasons!

The most valid of them all is that.. work is piling up...like serious shit. I am even going back to work on Sundays again. Like wtf rite? How lame is it spending your glorious weekend, at your cubie, listening to your winamp, while looking at a draft prospectus.. This sounds like audit all over again! And some people tell me, "well.. at least u have a job to bitch about"
Okaaay... I shuddup..

And then, there's that part about doing the DRs and CRs for our national cheerleading association. I can tell you this - I suck at accounts. I don't know how I lasted 3 years as an auditor. God forbid, I need to tie my balance sheet for December 2008..And up till now, I'm still out by approximately RM 5k!

And then, there's this part about Mount KK. Yea yea, close those gaping mouths. I'm climbing up Mount KK in July! I'm so proud that after the weeks(?) of planning, Kaggom, Dan, ChoonPing, Iona and I are climbing mount KK! Which reminds me now, I have to put aside an amount between RM400 and RM 600 - just in case I need to pay a porter to carry me up to the summit (and they charge by the kilos!) and just in case I need to buy my cert. I promise I'll let you know if my cert is fake.

And because of Mount KK, I have been going hiking more often now. The most recent being yesterday up Bukit Gasing. I was panting by the time i reached the top. I hope I didn't look like a psycho huffing and puffing up the hill while talking to myself - "Huay Yin, you can't do this? You can't do KK!" We're heading up Frasers next.... I hope I don't tergolek to the bottom..

And then Mei Har is back from Adelaide..Whee! Had a coupla drinks at Souled Out and hopefully there's more to come at Alexis this Friday...

And then our Aaron Ng celebrated his 20-something birthday with all of us singing a birthday song dedicated to Ah Beng. Carol got spared that night as Nick decided to let Lav have it this time. Some girl flirted with Aaron and all of us ended up getting free drinks! Whee.. More girls should flirt with Aaron.. but here's something that didn't change - I came out of that party STILL owing him a lap dance..

And then we've been having a CF-do 3 Fridays in a row now...with a lot of drinks and very fattening food..our management trainee must think we're one helluva happening bunch of people! But then if I were our management trainee, I'd also be helluva broke by now.

And then there's the awesome summer movies. Well ok, Wolverine wasn't that good. But Hugh Jackman is still a hottie. And then there's that Spockism that I'm still glad to have weeks after watching Star Trek. And then, waddaya know.. Angels and Demons turned out to be pretty good!

And then... and then..
oh wait.. I think i'm done!
Yayness... =)
Time to go sleep.... ZzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Trip to Vietnam - Saigon City Tour

I will update soon on my trip to Japan.
In the mean time, I have re-arranged the posts so that my trip to Vietnam is described in chronological order, i.e the Saigon City Tour -->Mekong Delta --> Cu Chi Tunnels --> Water Puppetry & Shopping =)
Enjoy!
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30th April 2009 (Thursday)

Barely 1 month after I got back from Japan, I found myself in Ho Chi Minh City, or more popularly known as Saigon, in Vietnam. This wasn't that same impulsive trip that Japan was. In fact, this has been (excitedly) planned ahead since December! I landed in Saigon and immediately, it was like a rude awakening. What happened to all the polite people I saw in Japan? It didn't help that just upon landing, I realised to my horror that I didn't have Joanne's number AND her address in Vietnam! (Well done, Huay Yin)

The guy at the immigration gave me a hard time, as I tried HARD to explain that I do not have with me any of my host's details in Vietnam, except, well, her name. I don't know why i bother - knowing that he can only probably understand 10 words of what I'm saying - but hey, effort counts rite? I was so glad that he finally placed a stamp onto my passport and angrily ushered me out of his booth. Phew.. I said a hurried thank you..and boy, was I so GLAD when i finally saw a FAMILIAR face at the airport! =)

We got a cab and my mouth hung open when Joanne spoke to the driver:
"huang yu kun te, chung ke hak ba"

Huh??? Babe.. YOU SPEAK VIETNAMESE NOW?? It's only what.. 6 months?
"Babess.. that's my ADDRESS ok. If I don't know that, I'm screwed!"
Ah... me see...=)

The day was so full of activities, so many places to see, so much food to eat - but unlike Japan, I didn't fall in love in Vietnam right from the start. I mean, seriously, it was difficult to fall in love with a place where the heat and humidity can sometimes be overwhelming, the language rather coarse, the people relatively unfriendly, and honks blaring at every corner of the road. But like Japan, Saigon seems to always be in the hurry. The noise and crowds are a little difficult to bear with at times. I constantly had to remind myself that Vietnam was no Japan and that for the next 4 days, i shud stop hoping to see canggih-fied toilets with heated seats! :P

As unbelievable as it sounds, the first place Joanne brought me to was PricewaterhouseCoopers, HCMC, haha! =)
Guess I'll never be too far away from PwC, will I? With me still referring to myself as "part of PwC"

As Nick once told me, "babe... us (pointing to him and some other current PwC staff) is "we". You (pointing at me), not part of "we". You are part of Ambank now."

Saigon Central Post Office. It is situated just next to the Notre Dame Cathedral and was constructed when the French were still in Vietnam. The inner decor and the architecture is very much influenced by the French.











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The Saigon Notre-Dame Basilica, with a statue of the Virgin Mary in front. It was truly a shame that we couldn't enter the cathedral as its gates are only open on certain days for church service. Like the Stadthuys in Melaka, it's Saigon's version of the "place to take wedding / pre-wedding photos at". Beautiful! =)









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Reunification palace. How apt that we visited it on Victory Day (April 30th), a public holiday in Vietnam to commemorate the fall of South Vietnam to North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. There's even this big tank on display at the lawn of the palace grounds! It's apparently the replica of the tank that crashed thru the gates of the palace way back in 1975.




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Outside the place where Joanne and I had "che", Vietnam's cendol. Melaka's cendol still wins hands down! Pictures of the "che" (pronounced "chay") is in the picture album on the sidebar.








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Night view of the Saigon City Hall.








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Night view of Saigon Opera House.
L-R: May Ting, me, May Yin











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Check out all of the pictures of the wheres, whats, whos and grins in Vietnam at http://picasaweb.google.com/lhyin29/TripToVietnam#. Link is also available on the sidebar.

Trip to Vietnam - Mekong Delta

1st May 2009 (Friday)

The last time I heard of Mekong Delta was in Geography waaaay back when I was, what, 15? It's not hard to remember Sungai Mekong when the teacher keeps on drilling in your head that it's the longest river in South East Asia :P

(Side-tracking for a while:
Ok, this is gonna be a potentially bimbo moment, but did we not learn that Ho Chi Minh was the capital of Vietnam? Or did I get it wrong and we actually did learn that it was Hanoi?)

Anyway, back to this whole experience of cruising down Mekong. I wouldn't say that it was awesome cos it would most likely depend on how u define awesome. But it was definitely an experience - sitting on the boat going down Mekong River, stopping at Unicorn Island to enjoy tropical fruits and traditional music, getting onto a sampan while wearing "water-proof" straw hats and then noticing that your shoes/slippers are all ruined by mud - haha, yup, definitely an experience. It really depends on how you see it. The heavy rain as we sat in the sampan going through the river definitely added on to the ambience! =)

Along the way, May Ting, May Yin and I met a Dutch couple who are currently both taking long breaks before pursuing their Masters in their respective fields. I can't remember their names but it was fun travelling, talking and getting to know them a little - even for that just one day.

**More pictures available in the picture album on the sidebar.

Trip to Vietnam - Cu Chi Tunnels

2nd May 2009 (Saturday)

Without a doubt, I would definitely recommend a visit to the Cu Chi Tunnels (pronounced "Ku Chee") while in Saigon. For Joanne, it was her third trip to Cu Chi as she has brought each of her visitors to Cu Chi (me included). The Cu Chi tunnels which we visited were part of a system of tunnels which were used by the Vietnamese guerillas during their war with the Americans. It was unbelievable what used to go on in these tunnels - people used to live in here! We complain when there's a power shortage, but in there, these people lived in perpetual darkness. I can't imagine the insects, the dust, the heat, the illnesses! *shudder



The system of tunnels in Cu Chi. This display item summarises in detail what goes on in the tunnels, the booby traps, movement in the tunnels etc.








Emerging from the tunnels. My facial expression definitely concealed how scared I was having to duck-walk (or sometimes literally going on all fours) in the dark in the tunnels.

Our guide told us to be brave and go thru the tunnels as there would be exits every 30 metres - I guess it's for people to chicken out at any time :P

I did 60 metres!! =)

I went into the tunnels with this Aussie guy whose Canadian partner has ditched him due to clautrophobia - I guess this experience isn't for everyone? Being just 5-ft-2, it was relatively easier for me to "crawl" in the tunnels as compared to the 6-footer Aussie! Lighting was so poor in the tunnels - our passage was only lit by very dim lights at the bottom of the walls. Thank goodness for the Malaysian guys in front of us who helped light the way for us using their mobile phones. Phew...

Huay Yin went into a "hole". This leads underground into the tunnels. The depth of this hole was nearly 5 feet. It's so embarrassing because I couldn't get myself out after going into the hole, hahaha! Damn it... and then, butt heavy somemore, I had to get 2 guys to pull me out!!
*puts a plastic bag over my head*

Thank God no one (aside from Joanne) knows me there!










Joanne insisted I had a chat with the Vietnamese "soldiers"

One of the many booby traps in place in the system of tunnels. This booby trap had bamboo spikes.



Joanne and I relaxing while still having a taste of "life as a guerilla" - having tea and tapioca












Shoes made out of tyres
Quite cool isn't it? It looks so hardy - I could have bought it to climb Mount Kinabalu! =)















Rice paper put out in the sun to dry.














One of the most disgusting things I saw at Cu Chi. Snakes in Wine. Geez... It apparently has medicinal qualities

-_-"











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This is not entirely related but on this trip, we met this American dude with a Hong Konger wife who was so at ease with speaking cantonese and reading from a Mandarin version of the Lonely Planet guide that he puts me, as a Chinese to shame! Suddenly I felt that urgent need to go back to Am and pass that Mandarin class!

Trip to Vietnam - Water Puppetry & Shopping

We ended our trip by catching the water puppetry performance at the Golden Dragon Water Puppet Theatre on our last night. Although we couldn't understand a word of the performance, I found it an interesting part of Vietnamese culture. Apparently this was how the Vietnamese used to entertain themselves when there were floods.





The Ben-Thanh Market - this is a very popular place for tourists looking for souvenirs! Make sure you're armed with good bargaining skills =) _____________________________
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All-in-all, I had a fantastic 4-day weekend trip to HCMC, largely due to my amazing "tour guide" who could explain stuff better than our tour guide in Mekong and Cu Chi, haha!
(Babe.. you really can consider this as a part-time job)
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We had so much fun going places, eating food, taking pictures of anything and ahem.. shopping! There was so much stuff to buy!! It was really good that they accepted USD in those shopping places - like the Ringgit in Malaysia, the dong is practically worthless anywhere else except in Vietnam.

I came home with a fantastic and modern looking ao-dai and a demure looking cheongsam.
I am so set for Chinese New Year, baby! =)