6:00 AM - Thursday, May 21, 2009
I'm back!
Never tio quarantine leh. I was secretly hoping for a quarantine so that I can rest longer. But then again. there's a lot of things that they need help in my team. Coming back to work immediately is a good idea.
I'm not sure if I blog before about the
Dim Sum outing at
Toa Payoh I had with some of my Maple friends about a month ago. I just uploaded the photos yesterday though. There's
SiewTing, JunYing, Ken, Nana, Grey, YongJian, and of coz, my
Boyfriend. The outing was before I went to view houses at Toa Payoh with
Boyfriend.
The egg tarts can never be compared to hk's egg tarts. =\
Anyway, I felt really bad leaving my colleagues behind at this time, where everything is so hectic at work. At the same time I felt lucky that I took leave 2 months before my departure date. This is the only timing
Boyfriend can ever go overseas. He will be in study mode with no time to travel in the future as end of May his sch begins. Then again, in the future I wouldn't be able to travel too much too. Bug report will be handled mostly by me.
I tot back about the time when
Boyfriend told my in-charge to give me report to do coz I like to do reports. I like to do learn and do new things. Not just stagnant at a place where I need to commit. =\ Most probably my in-charge put me tied to reports coz
Boyfriend mention I like doing reports. The worse thing is, in charge of these reports means there's a lot of OT in the future. Like now I'm in the office, at 6.30am doing them. I will be tired. Will I be ready for this kind of commitment? Ahh questions to consider IMMEDIATELY after my holidays. When I'm still so in holiday mood. LOL.
Anyway, enough of work.
In fact, I didn't know how to start blogging about my trip. It's a mixture of
toy shopping,
Disneyland, and
fashion shopping. Quite messy as other then
Disneyland for one day, the rest of the days are mixture of everything.
On the departure day, we had
Alvin, Boyfriend's friend, to fetch us to the
airport. Actually there was a lot of cabbies everywhere at night around his area, but we just choose to book from a friend coz it's comforting to know we sure have a cab that will drive us to the airport. We only had 4 to 5 hours of sleep that night. Our flight is 6.45am in the morning, we reached the airport very early like around 2am to get piroity seats. Best thing is,
boyfriend didn't want to ask for it in the end, thus, we went there so early for
NOTHING. I was pretty pissed, but I didn't argue, as I didn't want to ask around myself. The staff there seems
unfriendly, like when I question them something, they gave me some weird looks like I'm talking
alien language that really turns me
off.
Ahem. Anyway, we had early breakfast there before checking in.
Our familiar Changi Airport at night. ^^
Calvin with the luggages. My luggage is the one in black. New one ok! Very chio black hor. :x
Both of us looked so sleepy.
Calvin looked like he has something in both of his nostrils. Click on the photo to see a bigger picture. lol
Anyway, nothing has changed in the airport but we get to try
OSIM's sample
uSqueeze while waiting for the gate to open. It was my first time using it and I kept giggling la. The massager is so ticklish! But felt really relax after you gotten used to the feeling. We found out that there's OTTO foot massager too, but we didn't tried it out as our gate was gonna open soon.
Jetstar took off on time at 6.45am and reached Hong Kong at 10.20am.
Pretty familiar with the place. At least I know where I am etc. I had trouble finding my luggage though. Probably it looks pretty common so I missed it a few times. Got myself worried thinking that it was thrown off during the flight. D:
With the swine flu going on in Hong Kong, I spotted quite a few peeps with masks. Things seems like it was calm around the airport.
We took a Hong Kong cab to our airport.
Metrol Park Kowloon. And guess what? The hotel is right across my previous hotel I stayed in Hong Kong la! I was so happy coz I knew how to walk to the train station MongKok from there. Everything seems so familar. I immediately felt comfortable. We had another trouble checking in. Seems like my agent didn't book our hotel room properly and we had to wait quite a while before they finally got us a room. :( Sad. We requested free upgrade for Honeymooners but the room doesn't look bigger to me. Haha it's ok, as long as there's air-con and a bed for me to sleep in, I'm fine, so is
Calvin.
The staffs are all wearing masks. Every single one of them. Almost everything is sterilized every 2 hours.
My room and the very small toilet. lol. Very very small.
Feeling 很 excited leh! Wahahah.
Anyway, first day is all about toy shopping as we wanted to explore our area. Toy shops normally opened at late afternoon, so we had a few hours to spare. Headed to
Ladies Street first. I wasn't impressed with the place as much as I did with my first visit.
Late afternoon soon came. I was rather shocked to realise one of the toy shopping area,
Richmond Shopping Centre (1) , was a shopping centre that I frequently passed by during my last trip and yet I didn't went in to explore the area! Anyway, that's the first stop we went to that day, and there's A. Lot. Of. Toys. It's so much, that we already spotted a few toys that we would buy.
Richmond has both of our toys, which we're both happy about. Explored the basement, 1st, 2nd and 3rd floor. Toys everywhere. Imagine our excitment when we saw toys that can never be found in Singapore. ^^
Picture of
Richmond Shopping Centre from the outside.
We started purchasing toys on the very first day. Spending money like water. :x Next we headed to
CTMA (2), where nothing really catches our eye. Probably nothing that is our interest though there's still toys everywhere. There's shopping for ladies wear as well. But weirdly, I was more interested in toys. HEHE.
Next was
Animate (6), where our research says that rare loots can be found here but with a price. And the price was really pricey indeed. I can say the toy store is big, you need to look everywhere before we could spot the toys we are looking for. And I was really lucky to spot really rare ones! Very expensive, but toys were in mint condition. Very well kept. And we can never find them in Singapore.
We made our purchases and headed to
Sino Centre (4) next. It was already nightfall, and we both were quite tried. Look through a few levels before we decided to head back. Of coz, we visited quite a number of major toy stores along the way (which is the rest of the numbers stated in the map) but I'm just blogging the major ones that capture our interests.
Look at our luggage after the first day.
Just some of the photos of the shops at
Richmond Shopping Centre when there weren't open yet.
There were two toys which I wanted very much but they wouldn't sell me. Why? Coz the shop was SO PACKED WITH TOYS THAT THEY WEREN'T ABLE TO BRING OUT THOSE TWO TO SELL ME. WHAT A
FREAKING LAME REASON THAT GOT ME SO
PISSED OFF LA.
Basically with not enough of sleep and extremely tired from ALL the walking, we fell fast asleep that night.
We decided to head to
Disneyland the next day.
Calvin told me other
Disneyland, it was always very crowded that they didn't get the chance to sit rides. I guess if one wants to sit any rides,
Hong Kong Disneyland is the place to be. We covered everywhere, including the parts where I left out in my previous trip. As it was my second trip, shopping didn't really fasinate me much, more of a place to buy gifts for everyone. I bought 2 pair of earrings and a white tote bag for myself. Took plenty of photos.
I just noticed he did the same pose for so many photos. LOL.
Anyway we visited the shops outside before venturing into the rides and everything. There's one place where they display a lot of figurines and explain how animation works overall. The figurines there are beautiful.
I love the Ariel statue.
Another shop was selling jewelery.
Sadly, "Golden Monkeys" was under maintainence. I caught it the previous time.
Calvin missed out the show of coz. We took the
Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyears Astro Blasters, and watched the show "
Stitch Encounter" at Tomorrowland.
Calvin love "
Stitch Encounter." The Stitch was interactive and extremely cute. We met Buzz too.
Space Mountain was a roller coaster ride. I scream like crazy. Look at me when I was sitting the ride.
You can only see
Calvin and my hair. LOL
After that was Fantasyland.
We sat the
Winnie the Pooh ride which wasn't really thrilling like the roller coaster "
Space Mountain." (I scream like mad btw.) But it was still cute nevertheless.
And we watched
Mickey's Philhar Magic!! It was my second time watching it and I still dun find it boring! We were given 3D glasses to watch the show, and the 3D was very well done. Breathtaking. MUST WATCH IF YOU GO DISNEYLAND OK.
We also took photos with
ALL THE CHARACTERS at
Fantasy Gardens. I even printed out the photos even though it's expensive. Memories ma. ^^
There are also new places like "
It's a Small World." I never visit that place coz we were really tired and I didn't want to miss the "
Festival of Lion King" which I missed the previous time I was there.
A picture of "
It's a Small World." Looks very Alice in Wonderland.
We watched the daily parade on the streets. I took fantastic photos of every one of the floats ok! :X
Nothing much at Adventureland except we managed to catch the Lion King Show.
Ahhh, lastly was the fireworks. Nothing was different, except I had
Calvin with me. Though he's super
not romantic, I feel at bliss can le. :D
Keke, that basically ends our day 2 at Hong Kong. I had a lot of fun, and thinking about it makes me feel hyped up again.
For the rest of the days, was all shopping for both of us. We didn't visit
Ocean Park and
the Peak which was a waste. But we managed to do lots of shopping. The stuffs there are extremely cheap. I managed to find my boots. And
Uniqlo there was like heaven. Everything was cheaper then Hong Kong la. I had Dim Sum twice during my trip. The egg tarts there is a must try. Far better then the ones in Singapore. AND IT'S REALLY FAR FAR FAR BETTER OK. I got the same instant food back for my brother. I remembered he love my instant food that he ate immediately on the first day I was back from my trip the previous time.
Oh ya, we visited
Aveune of Stars. Waited til night when the lights started playing and we left immediately after that LOL. It was really boring for
Calvin, and it wasn't interesting to me anymore coz it's my second time there.
The scene in the day and night.
A kind tourist helped both of us take this photo by the sea.
Introducing Roar Roar. Never mind if you dun know what it means. Inside joke between me and
Calvin.
Click to view a larger picture. Just some of the famous handprints at
Avenue of Stars.
The same pose with
Lee.
Eating there was funny at first. There was once when food was served but we didn't eat coz no utensils. We tot they will serve us the utensils until one lady came and pull out the drawer underneath our table.
One of the place we went to eat near our hotel.
Food was served.
Tada! We felt dumb la. =x
photos.
Well here are our daily loots.
And to narrow down... let me proudly present our toys. ^^
Ahhhh. I missed Hong Kong very much already. Maybe coz of the carefree life I spend with my boyfriend there. I wanted nothing more then that. I know my Hong Kong entry seems rather short, but I feel that the first two days of our trips are the most important ones, the rest were really aimless shopping at factory outlets and carefree time. I would love to travel with my boyfriend again. :)
Anyway, back in Singapore, like I said, I turned into a working zombie. Everything was hectic and busy. I barely could survive through the week I was back. Though busy, I still managed to catch "
Final Fantasy: Distant Worlds." The concert was f.a.n.t.a.s.t.i.c.
I was really really touched by the entire concert. I'm like really forunate to get the concert tickets early, as an Final Fantasy fan, how could I miss this concert if it's coming to Singapore. It was SOLD OUT soon after I purchased them. Best thing was,
Nobuo Uematsu was there. I didn't expect that the composer himself would be there. And he was very bubbly and cheerful. So different from what I expected from a gaming industry music composer. I guess in this industry will be very competitive and stressful, thus, protraying a serious and composed image. But he's so different from that. He even came on stage to give the audience some words and joined the stage choir for a song!
I can't believe it that I'm watching the concert basically. The audience were great. As a result, three extra songs were played. They have my favourite song from ff6, the first ff game I ever played. Opera "Maria and Draco." During the concert there's animation being played on the projector, which is one of the reason why
Calvin didn't fall asleep. :X And the animation played is like not those pirated blur quality, it's very clear, as though you are playing the game. I dunno why it amazed me that it's so clear, I mean it's a anticipated show of coz they will make the animation clear. But I'm seen images from a big projector before, and it's not very clear, more like pixelated, this is the first time I seen images from a projector so clear.
It's not taken by me, I searched it from google, but it's basically how it looks like at the concert.
There's merchandise sold too, and sadly, it the CD was sold out. Luckily
ChenHaw is going on the second day and he managed to get one for us. AUTOGRAPHED somemore. Weeee! We also got the art book where it describes a bit of the storyline from the first FF to the current FF. Thanks
CHENHAW!!
The concerted ended with the last song "Advant Children's Sephiroth" with
Nobuo Uematsu joining in with the choir. Really cute I tell you. He was standing there singing and sweying along with the music.
Overall, I'm glad I've attended the concert. 76 bucks is well spend.
That's basically all I have to blog for now. Hopefully work will not kill me and I'll be back with more updates.
If I sounded rushed in this entry, probably coz there's SO MANY TO BLOGGED ABOUT BUT I'M VERY TIRED LA.
ROFL
