Overlooking the obvious

We tend to overlook what we see everyday; as we look far and beyond, we undervalue the ones right before us.

The one who can fry the best sunny-side-up just the way I like it; the one who makes being-the-last-person-I-see-every-night-and-the-first-I-see-every-morning meaningful.

Well sometimes, you really are a bloody pain in the ass; but I know, everytime I see you, that I love you immensely, no matter what.

(=

Bad Brew

You know.. I don’t usually do this.

Went Essential Brew for dinner with the BGS peeps yesterday to celebrate Yukina’s bday. (Photos up later). I just wanna highlight how downright lousy the food and drinks were; not to mention, how crazily overpriced.

First, the diced tomato on top of my bruschetta was tasteless, and with little seasoning. And the tomato wasn’t properly drained, so the entire mixture was too watery. The baguette seemed soaked with olive oil.

Next, another starter which was called Vegetable Stack or something. You’d expect slices of hearty vegetables oven baked or stir-fried and then stacked together. But nope, it was more like diced red pepper, green pepper, and tomatos, cooked in tomato sauce, served on a piece of iceberg lettuce on a square saucer that couldn’t have been bigger than my palm. No variety of vegetables, absolutely atrocious way of cooking. And they’re charging me $5.95 for that few cubes of vegetables, what’s more, it’s a chef’s recommendation.

And I tried Joan’s chicken pasta. First taste that you get once the pasta was placed in the mouth wasn’t the aroma from the fried garlic in olive oil, instead, it was the pungent taste of expired oil. No amount of black pepper or chilli flakes that were on it could mask its offensive taste.

My drink was called Scarlet Frost. It’s supposed to be strawberries blended with jasmine tea. The strawberry garnish that they put in the drink was absolutely sour; and there’s more sugar in the drink than there were strawberries or jasmine tea. It tasted like those 10 cents ice sticks that we used to have when we were kids, in strawberry flavour. In hindsight, those ice sticks tasted better.

I’m not a person who’s overparticularly picky on the food I eat, as you know, but the way food is served at Essential Brew is an insult to the culinary scene in Singapore. Nice and flowery names for all the items on the menu, but served to receive utter disappointment.

The only things that made up for the food were the friendly wait staff, the ambience and an absolutely great friends.

Little somethings

Sentosa outing two Saturdays ago with the Hospi peeps.

All the myriad of facial expressions.
Jane: Hehheh.. Let me be the extra
Kaijun: What does Jane think she’s doing?
Alvin: Arrr.. Faster…
Louis: Let’s see what model face I wanna give.
QQ: Ok.. this photo is taking a little long to take

Volleyball. Not a sport I’m remotely good at.

Hospi guys = Find fun in anything possible. In this case, it’s turning yongguang around in the hammock without him falling out.

Girlies

Sigh.. Jason the pollution

All of us

More photos: http://renikaeth.multiply.com

 Saturday mornings are usually spent..
here at National Sailing Centre. Just that we’re windsurfing instead.

Waiting for surf time. Check out our spanking new spiderman look-alike rashguards.

Placating days

I write most frenziedly when I’m feeling waves of surging emotions, like the pen and paper are my tranquilisers. Since I haven’t been writing this way recently, I guess I’m feeling rather placated.

Sitting at the office desk all day is not really my cup of tea at all, especially if I’m doing accounting related whatever; but optimistically, at least, I’ve got a job (essentially ka-ching), and a huge desk to myself, and the liberty of bringing my own laptop for personal use. The perks of working with a relative.

This is Lao Chek. The man who is the closest to being a grandad to me as anyone will ever be; the man who has cradled me since I was a baby; the man who brought me to MacDonalds for Happy Meals to appease my childish tantrums despite his obvious distaste for fastfood; the man, who was an important influence on my impressionable childhood, will never fail to buy sticks of durian ice cream that I will finish within a day and made sure that I had duck for every meal everytime I stayed over (I love to eat duck, er.. sorry Joann, to have you to read this); the man who read to me, who watched documentaries with me.

He possess the most magnanimous heart, loving and kind. His importance in my life didn’t hit until now, when I’ve gradually stopped being an ignorant adolescent, and I love him.

Annd.. there’s more!

More from the web album. Posted more here because I know many are lazy to click on the link. (=  

The Bayon in Angkor Thom. Another majestic temple. Angkor Thom means the big city, and it is really like a city of temples. Cool eh. The Bayon belongs to a certain era of construction, and they have giant face sculptures facing North, South, East and West. Entrances to most temples are on the East, I would think because that’s where the sun rises.

And how did I know all those information? From this trusty reference book that I bought outside The Bayon, of course. My nose was practically stuck in the book as we walked through all the temples. Lots of history and beliefs are brought to this modern era, without knowledge of the temples, visiting them will be doing them injustice.
Resting outside a library. Every temple has at least 1 library, though I don’t know what for. To safekeep relics, maybe.

Climbing down the steps leading to one of the towers that some king built for his wife. He had 12 wives, so you can guess how many towers were there.

Devoured by roots. Tree roots are only particular to this temple. The trees just sit atop the temple.

Scanning the vast landscape

The very very hospitable lady at the guesthouse called Last Home. The name reminds me of those horror movies where people goes in and never gets out [that's why "Last Home"] but it’s exactly on the contrary. She gave us huge hugs before we left, and kept waving as our transport drove off. And called us her son and daughter. haha.

At Kampot. Addoooraable little puppy on a pile of rice stalks. Poor little thing, I woke him up from his sleep, and stuck the camera into his face. He got so affected that after patronising me a little, he went back to sleep in his corner, with his tail facing me.  

Kampot. Ruins of the once magnificent Black Palace. Black because it was furnished with black wood panelings, which is a very precious type of wood. But the magnificence has long since wore off, what’s left is the ghost of a building.

Kampot

Back at Siem Reap. Drinking our cocktails and watching the boisterous dining crowd.

Well this was taken in Phnom Penh, with the central market in the background. It was composed by, of course, hy, and we’re both supposed to look lost while holding the map. I couldn’t stop laughing, and there was this persistent tut-tut driver who wouldn’t let us off, so I was a little paiseh to pose.

In short, Cambodia was a huge eye opener. A little bit of culture shock but nevertheless, the Khmers trace their roots way back. The temples are magnificent, to me, like pyramids of Egypt.

“Why Cambodia,” many people asked, with faces scrunched up. How we decided on Cambodia was purely from the Lonely Planet guide on Cambodia that we found for $8 at a book sale. That’s how the planning started. We’ve always wanted to discover Asia, so Cambodia is just the start of it all. The Cambodians have came a long way from history, and the country relies on its tourists, which is why they were attracted to us like how leeches are to blood. There’s more to offer than merely Angkor Wat, contrary to many’s perceptions. Each little town has its own distinct flavour, though they retain their humility and eagerness to please.

What I remember of that country.. Dust, lots and lots of dust; history; humility; cheap cocktails; long bus rides; very hospitable people (though, some with hidden agendas).

Finally.

 Yes finally, I’m done with the photos from last December’s Cambodia trip. Feast, please.

 
Bye Singapore. Flight was at 5 in the morning, if i don’t remember wrongly, anticipation always works better for the early riser.

Ruins of an old religious city

The doorways to the temples look like photoframes

Quenching the thirst. Stopping for lunch whilst temples visiting.

THIS is apparently their perception of how stairs are, so THIS is how we climb up to most of the temples we visited in the 2 days. Think they like to build their temples as tall as possible in those times, and in tiers. So there’s always a tower on top of a tower. Good workout.

Rest.

Shielding the morning sun from his eyes. At Angkor Wat.

You know what, temple hopping is SO tiring. Both of us were exhausted from all the climbing up to the temples.

I’ve a thing for butterflies

I bribed them with a small bar of chocolate, to stop them from bugging me to buy stuff from them. Fun kids, jumped at the opportunity to take a photo, and gave me little pieces of papers that they drew on; guess they must have hated having to sell things to tourists.

Ankor Wat in the evening. That water body is actually a moat, and the dome shaped thing is just the gate to the temple. The temple itself is that 3 pinnacle shaped things in the background. It’s supposed to be 5 towers, symbolising Mount Meyon (I think I got the name of the mountain wrong, all I know is that it starts with the letter M), which is a sacred mountain to the Cambodians.

Squashed on the back of a pickup truck on the way to the jetty to take a boat to Phnom Penh.

Phnom Penh’s roadside market. They’re selling raw meat. For that, meals for the rest of our trip was more or less vegetarian.

Dusk. At the centre of Phnom Penh

En route to Kratie to see fresh water Irrawaddy dolphins.

Maize fields

Kratie doing the dolphin watch. That’s the best I can get for the dolphins.

At Kampot, on the back of a scooter! No I’m not driving the scooter, there’s a guy in front of me driving it. And no, it’s not an up-sized scooter with longer seats. That, you can’t get it in Singapore.

If you look closely, his speedometer is spoilt. The needle is still pointing at zero.

Stopped over at this shack by the roadside for lunch. Had cold noodles that reminded me of chilled laksa. Tried not to think about the flies trodden noodles swishing about in my stomach after I went to the kitchen. This puppy belongs to the owner, and what a playful little thing.

Planting rice is never fun, bend from morn till the set of sun.

Silkfarm at Siem Reap. It’s really one of the highlights of the trip. A single silkworm cacoon, unbroken, can produce 100m of raw silk, and 300m of fine silk. That’s a darn lot for such a small little worm.

I also have a thing for ladybugs

Dirt cheap cocktails at Siem Reap’s Holland V’s equivalent. For happy hour, which stretches for the entire night, cocktails were going for.. USD5 per cocktail, and it’s one-for-one. So changing back, it’s SGD7.50 for 2 cocktails. Great for me.

More photos on www.renikaeth.myphotoalbum.com > Travels > Cambodia Dec’06