Merry Christmas 2011

Merry Christmas!!

This year Christmas falls on Sunday so the following Monday is a public holiday. Due to predictable bad weather, we decided to stay in Singapore during the long weekend.

On 24 Dec, we visited Maritime Museum, RWS. This musuem showcase the history of a famous voyage by Cheng Ho & the story around the places he passed by.

Maritime Museum

Cheng Ho's ship in the background

In the evening, we had Verve Pizza at Marina Bay. A band was performing Christmas Carolling at the open space for FREE. After dinner, we took a stroll and only then we realized how bustling MBS has become.

Christmas eve dinner at Verve Pizza

Strolling by the Bay

On 26 Dec morning, we head to Gardens By the Bay, East. This garden is next to Marina Bay Golf Club. Overseeing many landmark, including MBS, Singapore Flyer, Marina Barage & new conservatory, therefore officially the best 拍拖胜地 in Singapore. Perfect for couple to spend quality time. One little set back, this place is not accessible by public transport.

The toilet behind is quite cool

 We stopped the car and kinda nuah inside for a while before moving on for lunch.

What happen between Oct 07- Sep 09 - Apr 2010

I better blog this down before my memory fails me

Oct 07 Fly to Munich by Thai Airways
Mac 08 Went Paris with dorby using Air Berlin
Aug 08 Came back to Sin
Sep 08 Fly from BKK to Muc using LTU
Jan 09 Went to London for a short trip by Lufthansa
Mar 09 Fly back from MUC-KL by emirates for ROM and Internship at BKK for 3 months
July 09 Fly back to MUC to finish the thesis
Sep 09 Fly back to SG via Emirates
Nov 09 Wedding ceremony KK-KL
Jan 10 CNY
Mac 10 Home renovation
Apr 10 Move into Clementi

Exiled to Togo for 1 month

I was on a biz trip to Togo for a month. The living condition there is quite bad. Its hot and dry, the air is polluting and the streets without the traffic signal. The Ibis hotel here is pathetic but its consider very good in Africa standard. There are lots of mosquito here. Long waiting time at CDG for Lome-Paris-Sin (A380)Transportation is not convinient and its hard to walk under the hot sun. Lucky there is internet here but slow connection. At least I can give my wife a call. Weekend in Togo is really boring, I would rather be in the office. The main language is French and it's hard to communicate. Things here are pretty pricy since its peg to Euro. A can of coke cost about EUR 0.40 if you buy it from a supermarket. But supermarket are far in between. This place feels like KL in the 1950s.  I would like to go home as soon as possible.................

The BEST hotel around. Ibis!!

I look so depressed

OpenNet is still open

When is fibre coming???
Installation has been postponed several times
Mar 2010
Aug 2010
Mar 2011
Aug 2011
Nov 2011 argh...

In the end we got the hou liu Mio Home 6 mbps on oct 2011 for sgd 49.90. hehe... now got HD entertainment at home although internet still not very fast at 6 Mbps. In dec 2012 we upgraded the mio home to 10mbps. In march 2013 i bought a samsung smart tv.....
Cheaper than my first sharp tv bog during feb 2010

Open net finally installed in june 2012. What a long wait for fibre. But fibre subscription of 100 Mbps is going to cost SGD 69.90. Fibre is getting cheaper by the day now 200 mbps just sgd 39.90.

 In 2013 I subscribe to starhub cable broadband with free hd setup box for 25 sgd for 30 Mbps. The speed was slow because of too many device connected to it. After Oct 2015 I terminated the starhub and no more hd content to watch. 

In the end got m1 fiber 100 Mbps for 29 sgd in Jul 2014. Not very fast but it will do for now until 2016. upgrade to  fibre 1 Gbps for 39 sgd in june 2016 ... Hehe big speed jump. Stick to m1 for 1 for 1 sunday movie at shaw

Hangzhou free & easy... Is not free & not easy

Once again we got ourselves a good deal. Return trip to Hangzhou is like S$430 for 2 pax on Jetstar. But there is a set back. Flight touching down Hangzhou Xiaoshan Airport at 11:35pm. OH NO! It's another midnight flight. There will be no public transport out from the airport. Should we book a limo cab like what we did in Taipei?

This time we really have to plan our itinerary. So many ???? in my mind. Where to stay?? China is very big. I want to eat Xiao Fei Yang.

Mar 1 (Thu)
Most likely leaving office at 3pm. Just in time to catch our flight.
Touch down at 11.35pm. Navigate a little around. Must figure out how to get out from there.

Mar 2 (Fri) Hangzhou
Morning - check in and rest
Afternoon - Take a train to Shanghai
Argh... How to take bus? Should we just take taxi?


Mar 3 (Sat) Shanghai
??????????

Mar 4 (Sun) Suzhou
??????????

Mar 5 (Mon) Shanghai
??????????
Night - Back to Hangzhou

Mar 6 (Tue)
Morning - Roam around Hangzhou.
Night - Reach airport by latest by10pm to catch a midnight flight back to Singapore

Mar 7 (Wed)
Flying~~~
Return home by 6am. I want to sleep for the rest of the day. Don't intend to work.

Hall of Fame for My Hard-working Husband

My 熊 is a lazy husband. For the past 1 year living together, he has cooked.... once.

By the way that's chili crab. Impressed? Left over doggy bagged from restaurant.
He cleaned the fan a few times...

But he sleeps all the time...

and he loves to pretend hard-working. I should keep a list of that.

1. Refuse to wash dishes after dinner but offer to do it before dinner.

2. Offer to clean the fan using the toilet spray nozzle and ended up flooded the whole house.

3. Almost unload a new packet of white rice into a container without cleaning the container.
4. There are only 3 electrical points in my kitchen for fridge, rice cooker & cooking hood respectively. He offer to boil water when I was cooking & all the electrical points were being utilized.

Taipei, The Place Where We Experienced Surplus

Day 3
Today is a lazy day. For the past 2 days we travelled outside Taipei City and avoided the torrential rain. Keep our finger cross and let's stay in the city for just 1 day.

While walking to the nearest bus-stop, our hope to eat the delicious 葱抓饼 (NT$30) is shattered again. Since Day 1, we couldn't forget the taste of a simple egg bacon prata fried by the road side prata lady. This prata lady only works 5-day. This prata doesn't come with any curry but a little bit of home-made sauce. It is so good.... There are many hawkers in Taipei. You can find them anywhere. I think any hawker food is delicious!

MRT network

Bitan
From Jingan, we took a ride to Xindian to see the famous supension bridge.

Tired. Need a rest at Mr Brown Coffee.

After taking a long break, we took MRT to Zhongxiao Fuxing station and WALKED to Taipei 101. So far, ticket to the observatory deck is the most expensive item I find in Taipei (NT$400). I pass.... but I am more willing to buy a fridge magnet (NT$150). I also find many resemblance between Taipei & Tokyo.

I have long heard about Din Tai Fung being much better than Singapore branches. So I tried to burst/ prove the myth. The restaurant was very busy. Waitresses walked in and out non-stop attending to customers. My cup is always filled. Although we got a queue number, we were served within 5-10 min and that's amazing.

Shopped at SOGO. Can't find anything affordable. 1 dress costs NT$6000. So crazy. Then roamed to Taipei City Mall (equivalent to Sg City Link Mall). This place is quite crappy yet I got my NT$299 shirt and NT$150 pants. Pants cheaper than shirt! Cannot believe it!

Day 4
Today is the last day in Taipei. We extended our check out time to 3pm so we had the whole morning to visit the famous National Palace Museum (NT$160). It is very accessible by public transport. The nearest MRT is Shilin. This museum is so far the best museum I have ever visited. During my visit, I saw some bronze artifacts, pottery, jades, calligraphy & painting. The collection very huge. Even though the musuem is rotating it's display every 3 months, one can take 12 years to see everything.

The most amazing art pieces are

and many many more. No photography is allowed in the museum.

After walking for 3 hours in a museum, we felt asleep at MOS Burger at Yongan Market. After that, we had Din Tai Fung again at SOGO.

In the evening, we use of hotel gym facilities before leaving for Taoyuan Airport.... for bathing only lah. After a 40 minute taxi ride (NT$1100), we reached airport. There is absolutely nothing to eat. Eateries such as BK or Mr Brown closes at 9pm. The only way to spend our last NT$ is to buy more biscuit. We somehow concluded Taoyuan Airport is the most disasterous among the 4 Asian Tigers (or Asian Dragons). It's undergoing a ~50M$ renovation. Hopefully it will be transformed after that.

DMM ranking,
1st - Hong Kong (HKG)
2nd - Incheon (ICN)
3rd - Changi (SIN)
4th - Taipei (TPE)

The flight was almost full. On average 1 passenger carry 2 bags on board. By the time the plane is half load, overhead compartment is almost fully packed. So much for a so-called "strict hand carry luggage policy". That's all BS. A 4-hour flight without much leg room and absolutely no entertainment is somehow horrendous. But for the love of globe trekking, I'll probably do it again.

Taipei, A Place More Affordable Than Singapore

Thanks to newly added flight schedule, we were lucky to snatch 2 return tickets on Jetstar for S$540 all-in. ALL-IN. Inclusive of convenience fee S$32 by paying online. Felt so cheated by budget airline nowadays. Book online gotta pay convenience fee. Book through call center gotta pay service charge. We could have paid offline at 7-11 or post office or S.A.M. and save $32! I'll bear in mind the expensive lesson learnt.

This trip was quite rush so not much planning was done. But overall, it was fun.
Our flight was in the evening. Reached Taoyuan Aiport at 11:40pm.
We have out grown the age of backpaking or hostel-staying tour. So we tend to spending a little bit more on lodging to get comfort plus peace of mind in exchange. Why not? So Four Points by Sheraton turns out to be a pretty good choice.

Day 1
Public transport network in Taipei is very good. And the fare is cheap. It is very easy to navigate with a EasyCard on hand. Just need to top up when the value is low. Similar to ezlink card (Singapore) or suica card (Japan).

easycard 悠遊卡

ezlink card 易通卡

suica card (スイカ)

After breakfast, we head to Yangmingshan Park. We took bus 260 from Taipei Main Station. I didn't know how. So the bad bad ung reproached me again like a chatterbox. Yangmingshan is nice & cooling. It's like Owakudani in Japan without the black egg store. There are many walking trails good for exercise. Contradict to what we have planned, our lazy bum decided to travel round the park in bus instead.

Prata look alike 葱抓饼

Fat dog sleeping in convenient store

The weather was hot. I can't stand walking under the sun at Thamshui Fisherman Wharf.

While waiting for sunset, we took a rest at Fullon Hotel lobby pretending to be a guest. By the way this hotel opened for business since June 2011. Very new.

Dnashui Fullon Hotel

龙虾饼

Danshui Fisherman Wharf

In the evening, we went to the famous Shilin Night Market for dinner. According to Taipei News, Shilin Night Market will be gradually shifted undergournd from Nov 2011 onwards. This place was voted in an unofficially survery the number 1 tourist destination. 49% of taipei tourists choose night market as the must-go destination followed by Taipei 101, National Palace Museum etc. And Shilin is the first choice for those who voted night market as #1 destination. I personally think that it is overrated. The place is too crowded for a proper sit-down meal. But we did buy some cheap and tasty 水姑娘 cookies for our friends & colleagues.

Shilin and KFC (not in Shilin night market)

Day 2
Keelung, a port city in the northeastern part of Taiwan, is connected to Taipei by rail (NT$41). He always likes to travel by train. So we took a train and connect to a bus and head to Yehliu Geo Park. Bus 1022 from Keelung train station is a local bus that terminates at Jinshan (NT$64). Nobody alight at Yehliu so we conveniently missed the Yehliu bus-stop and ended up in Jinshan. Had our goose rice lunch then took the same bus on return trip (NT$25). Bus driver was quite unfriendly to an ang-moh onboard who didn't tap his card properly. So maybe that's why he deserved to be scolded. Hehe....

It took us a while (at least 40min) to reach Keelung by train. Then we are supposed to take a public bus to Yehliu. But Smart Alec in action again. We ended up in Jingshan. Overshoot by almost 7-8km. Good thing is that the goose rice we ate was actually quite tasty. That stop a potential eruption.

Coming to Yehliu Geopark in the afternoon was a mistake. But if we back out (打退堂鼓) we will regret forever! The Geopark is a cape extended into to the sea by ~1,700m. It is famous for the sea-erroded landscape. Under the attack of wave and weathering, rocks form many intersting shapes. You need to queue for at least 15min to take a shot with "The Queen's Head". Besides, there are tofu rocks, fairy shoe, ginger rocks, gorilla rock etc.

Queen's Head

weathered rock

Spot me

Spot me, again

Ginger Rock

Yehliu Geopark

This place is really amazing but walking under the sun for 3 hours drained my energy too fast too furious. A sumptous seafood treat (including 好鲜甜的 NT$560 濑尿虾, tasty mantis shrimp) is definitely a must (NT$840). In the evening, we took a straight bus to Taipei (NT$96). The ride is long and winding. It put me to sleep for 2 hours.

In 2009, Zhao Genda, a PRC tourist vandalise the gift of nature. He crafted his name on the stone. Taiwan Government recently passed a Zhao Genda Bill protect the heritage against vandalism. Any tourist caught vandalising, the tour guide will be fined as well. I'm not sure how is it going to affect the tour agency.

At night we are back to Taipei looking for food again. At Q-Square, we had Cold Stone Creamery ice cream and Karen Teppanyaki (NT$220). For the first time he bought himself a pair of pants (NT$98)