一月二十九日, 星期四, 晴

Counting sat and sun, I took a break of 7 days. So fast, 604800 seconds, times is up ! Whistle blown. No complains since no work, though nothing much constructive done. CNY eve dinner was good, it was still an home steamboat, the ingredients were fresh and making the soup real good.

I did pop by Grandma's place on Monday after a few years MIA. Cards gambling not really the interest anymore, and simply there is nothing much to do there, I left early. Later in the night, met up with friends, had Swensens and caught Love Matters.
Now you can say "I am so going to Swensen" on CNY day 1.

Day 2 was a stay home affair though my boss did jio me for mahjong in the evening, was last min, didn't feel like going out at that time. Parents went to Sentosa with my cuz, so it was a drama/movie watching, RTK playing day.

Wednesday, Safra opened, so went for a evening dip then dinner with friends at T3. No wonder T3 is failing as an attraction for shop and eat, the shops are limited and the food places, you can find at other parts of Singapore. And the carpark charges so high, $6+ for about 2 hrs+. Unless, you fetish "Airport", doubt anyone would come.

Today went to Victor's Kitchen for lunch. They shifted to a bigger and more straightforward outlet, just few units away. Their prawns fillings are generous and fresh, carrot cake is steamed and comes in a bowl with the special sauce, tasty but the sauce is really oily, at least 2 heart by-pass.

The glutinous rice is huge in portion, chicken chunks, sausage and salted egg are in it. The "qiong fun" fillings are also generous but the sauce abit too salty. The char siew bao was average, also the ribs too many chewy fat meat. The blll came to about $37, quite okay.

Notice a new competition from facebook from "SongsIWrite", "写给天王天后原创劲曲比赛", hope ideas and inspirations can fill my space and mind, so that I can send in a few composition ! And of course, the time to do that, May is the deadline.

幸福万岁

Good enough for some laughs here and there. The story is typical and doesn't excite. The movie was slightly more than 2 hrs, though towards the end, it seems it ran out of ideas.

Seng and Kelly married, has a son Benny, their god brother Jeremy lived with them.

As the guys tries to seek, experience, live their journey in love, the movie put jokes, funny one liner and innuendos around the story.

Seng wanted to re-energies his married life with Kelly, as they became less communicative over time, argue over small matters. His plot to "do that thing" with Kelly did succeed, though Kelly was not receptive initially. But he found out, he have problem doing that thing, blaming Kelly not able to arouse him.

It became worse. Kelly went on a nights out with her friends, ended up with Mark Lee, as Xiao Han, a male "duck". Though, she didn't do anything. Seng was even more screwed, as he got conned by a girl and her gang. They blackmailed him $100,000 RM if not reporting him to police, having sex with underage girl.

The son was no better, conned by Jennifer, the girl he loved. Got filmed dancing naked and video uploaded onto the internet. He got his revenge when he chanced upon the video of her making out with her bf. Jennifer tried to commit sucide, but Benny seems to talk her off that, but accidentally fell off ... onto something which saved her life.

Jeremy was somehow better, getting all the luck with his stint outside, getting almost every girl he wanted. Till he met Benny's teacher, MeiShi, it went well till the last part of the movie, where he met another girl from internet at a cafe, became unconscious shortly. Then he woke up, tied up, showing an ah ma wanting to castrate him off. Then it seems that the ah ma was Mei Shi mother and the girl was her sis. Not sure what is this scene for ... doesn't seem to gel with the story.

Anyway, just for the laughs. 6/10

Friday Lunch@7atenine

Unlimited servings of surprises. You won't know what you will get but at least it is within a menu. Not like supperclub where you really have no idea what you will eat. There are about 20 or more dishes from the tapas menu. It comes in tasting size, that is good, you can try out alot of stuff. But you can also keep eating the same item. You also get unlimited soft drinks, juices, coffee and tea.

The food just keep coming out, depending what the chef fix up in the kitchen, though there are some wait here and there but as not much people around, so quite okay. There seems to be other stuff which sounds so good but we didn't get to try ! Like baked scallop with xo butter, king crab sandwiches, churros, chocolate degustation, etc.

Anyway, most of the items we had also quite good. Parma ham with honey dew, eat them together, the saltish of the ham even out with the sweet honeydew. Cherry tomatoes salad with pine nuts, very nice, the tomatoes doesn't have the taste of normal "tomatoes". Then came smoked salmon and some kind of rice/sushi roll with an egg in it, crispy outer layer.

The next salad like dish was really good, some kind of potato with corns nibblets, the dressing was good, but it really didn't taste like potatoes, but the guy say it is. Next was anchovies on toast with some sauce which is quite sour, this item don't really like, the anchovies too fishy smell. But the next item made up for that, wasabi cod ! Not bad, cripsy on the outside, hot and mushy inside, the wasabi sauce not too choking, nice.

Tuna tartine was next. Looked very raw, but taste was quite okay. The so called soup that came after was abit too "not" for the mass maybe, it was cold, creamy and abit oily. Apparently, it was garlic soup. The tempura vege was normal, nothing fantastic, but the way it was presented, interesting. The one coming up was really good, beef, not sure if I heard wrongly, it was kobe beef. Very tender, and there was a syringe to inject some "juices" onto the beef.

Then came something which was a typical item in Singapore, chicken wings ! They called it sizzing wings, the marinate was very savoury and with the mayo like sauce, adds another level of savoury. The salmon that came after was quite nicely done, with no other overwhelming taste, only salmon taste.

The last item was baby lamb, don't have abit of the mutton smell. The mash potatoes was very smooth and fragrant. Desserts time !!! But no chocolate degustation .... Haiz. The chocolate brownie should be good enough to make up, at least for now. This brownie was more cake like ... doesn't matter, very good. It has huge macamdemia nuts in it, the vanilla bean ice cream have very nice 香草 taste.

The tequilia cake was the final item. Interesting enough, a white piece of cake like thingie with hazelnut ice cream with abit of rum taste. The cake texture was like a failed experiment to make the most silky tofu. Since it was supposed to be a cake, it taste quite good. At $37++, this unlimited lunch is really worth it if you are really to spend that amount.

如燕

愿意合上眼才能美梦无边 别让悔熏乌了从前
也许碎片才能让回忆展颜 何妨瓷花拼凑明天
谁带我寻获幸福的模 却自己谜中困锁
谁为我留下缱绻的天涯 信物是抹晚霞

思念如燕它飞舞舌尖 若是真爱配尝几分苦甜
意念婆娑时间里推磨 追随到何处才结果
燕如 针线在青空缝编 几幅女红将以泪缀点
誓言斑驳情雾只是经过 风雨中且让我盈步婀娜

赤壁 II 之 决战天下

This could be the end of such similar kind of epic war movie, whether based on 三国 or fictitious, or at least a break of it. The second part of the 赤壁 movie continued from where it left off. 曹操 camped near 赤壁 with thousand of warships and countless soldiers. It seems a inevitable victory for him since he also have 蔡瑁, 张允 which specialize in battle at sea.

But with 周瑜 and 诸葛亮 on the 孙权 side, their 智谋 increases the chances of an almost impossible victory. As 曹操's army took time to train and built up will, 周 and 亮 have some time to think of how to resolve their 2 biggest problem. First was not to allow 曹操 gain the obvious advantage of attacking at sea. Second, their lack of arrows. Both agreed to resolve one problem each, if not, will be executed.

Not sure how true these 2 events in the history books but it seems miraculous. 曹操 send 周's childhood friend to persuade him to serve 曹操. 周 used this to purposely divulge some so called secret, which was that 蔡瑁 was planted there to kill 曹操. On the other hand, 亮 carried out his plan, to have 100,000 arrows ... with no internet and credit card, it seems ... 'ma na wu ko leng'

亮 predicted heavy fog at sea and went in the direction of 曹操 with 20 boats filled with 草人. 蔡瑁, 张允 went out to attack, but with the fog, they beware of advancing. Thus, counterattack with arrows ... 100,200 of them to be exact. 曹操生性猜忌, beheaded both of them.

Also to mention 孙权 sister, 孙尚香, seemingly MI5 trained, who can BLL into 曹操 camp for days, weeks. Even can collect information and "sms" aka 飞鸽传书 with 亮.

Then 刘备, siting diseases in 孙权 camp not under control and left. 曹操 seeing this opportunity and the wind was blowing in the direction favouring him to do a 火攻.

But 亮, with wikipedia's help, confirmed the wind will be changing direction soon. There was a problem though, they need more time.

So 小乔 went to 曹操, with an objective to 拖延时间, apparently it worked.


This started the final battle, lasted quite long. The scenes makes you want to play RTK 11 !! 火攻 from warships, Incinerating arrows, Catapults, Ember Fire, Fort attack, etc. 黄盖's 先锋队 did most of the fire damage to 曹操's warships. With 赵云 aiding from land east and 刘备, 张飞, 关羽 from the land west. Mr Liu fake fake left so as to have a surprise attack later.

甘兴 kamikaze and blew opened the fort's gate with the explosives. 周's final wave went in and with 刘备's help reached 曹操's camp area. With 小乔 as 人质 also no use, Mr Zhao saved her but only ... as she fell from 2nd storey, confirm won't die. 周 flew in and caught her, similar to his super flight in the movie 色诫. 8/10

Friday Dinner@SupperClub

Wonder how long can this Amsterdam club survive, taking up a big space at Odeon. The selling point is you do not know what you will be eating, it will be a surprise menu, but you still can tell them beforehand if you do not like anything. At the entrance area, you get your hand stamped and know your table number.

But actually, it is really not a table. You eat in bed, everything in white. 2 rows of huge, comfy, industrial size sofa by the side with gigantic pillows. Dinner starts at 8 pm, though you can get drinks at the 2nd floor, bar counter. Most of crowd are ang moh and on a friday night, the crowd seems abit thin. Probably, SC is not new in Singapore and times are bad. At $65 for a 4 course dinner, it is expensive.

Appetizer
Raw cream salmon steak with sundried roma tomato and avocado, frisee/green beans salad, ginger toast and champagne vinaigrette

I like this. The frisee somehow very fragrant and the raw cream goes well on top of the tiny ginger toast. A must mention was the sundried roma tomato, first time trying it, very nice.

Starter
Parsnip.onion soup with parmaham, oregano croutons and chopped parsley

This is something different. Hot thick soup with onion taste and also the peppery which exploded when you sip into every spoonful. The crispy parmaham savoury, even out some of the onion and peppery taste. Quite like it, but 2 tables away, the 2 person just couldn't down it.

Main
Veal tenderloin, spanish tortilla, sauteed baby leek, shitake and red chili jue de veau

Quite thick but very tender and juicy. My shitake was changed into baby kailan from some tse char stall. The spanish tortilla, which is a fried potato dish, nothing special but was good.

Dessert
Banana/passion fruit millefeuille. vanilla thick cream and mint leaves

The millefeuille was very cripsy and with the sliced banana and passion fruit cream in between it. Though you have to "dismantle" them to eat it, still good.

It is a good place to chill out if you dun mind the "no crowd" and willing to pay the cover charge. Comfy bed and the music not too loud, not a bad place to relax, drink and tcss

www.flickr.com

一月十二日, 星期一, 晴

12 days into the new year, nothing seems new. But of course, new year doesn't mean new stuff. No resolution made yet, partly due to, probably I won't have any time to fulfil any. High chance will work through most of the 52 weekends, it doesn't help with one of our team mates leaving. Simple logic, less 1 people to share the shit and need to take his shit somemore.

The popular show 小娘惹 ended, though never really follow the show, did caught some epi towards the end. Anyway, the theme song 如燕 really nice. Miraculously, I found the chords on a website, nice !

Have been swimming quite regularly since few months back. Hope I can keep this up. And I went to Haato after my dip, black sesame ice cream, still can taste the black sesame. Their ice cream is smooth but somehow like lack the volume, melt easily ... didn't find any unique flavours also. Was thinking between chocolate banana or black sesame.

Ong Bak 2

Supposed to be an epic movie with Tony Jaa as an warrior knowing various martial arts set in ancient Khmer. Quite true on the martial arts part, no doubt this guy can show a really good fight with action stunts sequence not seen in other films.

It was so called ancient Garuda, assume is some sort of empire, Jaa as Tien is the son of diligent and loyal officer but his father and mother was killed by a scheming rat cha sei na. He then killed the King and put the blame on Tien's father.

Tien has to survive if not no more movie. But was captured by some bandits and thew him into some fight in some kind of "Kids vs Crocodile" performance. Another group of bandits lead by Cherchean disrupted the performance, killed the other bandits. Anyway, Tien killed the croc.

Then he was taken in by Cherchean, the leader of the Garuda bandits. Taught him all kinds of martial arts by the different masters. He grew and excel in the fights, began to lead the bandits in raids. But he still want to avenge his father death, he need to kill rat cha sei na. So he told cherchean his plan then he left. Either by MRT or bus, he somehow reached his HQ, palace, whatever. They are celebrating something, Tien became one of the performer. He charged towards rat cha sei na, who apparently has been using SK II and Lamer, didn't age at all. Tien slashed about 4,257,172,893 times on him, then left.

He returned to cherchean but found he was surrounded by mask men, almost all dressed differently. Tien was good but not that good, then as it revealed, Mr SK II didn't die, he was wearing at least 200 kg of titanium around him at that time. Then cherchean appeared, Mr SK II told Tien, he was the actual one that killed his father. Tien was hysterical but still can fight, anyway chercean was going to exchange his own life for killing his father.

Tien was captured and tortured bit by bit. Most probably he was send to Upper Serangnoon. 6/10

Transporter 3

First movie of 2009, not because it was that bad but it just doesn't excite. And the plot doesn't seems to make sense. It was the on and off action that kept the movie going, with some draggy parts. Jason Statham is like the A-grade in the B-list, can see why his transporter series already at 3rd instalment.

The plot kicked in straight with an audi driving into Paris and started a car chase scene with the Police. Then the next thing it crashed into Frank's house, literally into his house. The driver guy was injured, he found his id, knowing he was the guy who he recommended for a previous job. He got him onto the ambulance but knew too late that the guy got some kind of device on his wrist, which explode when too far away from the car.

Frank also found a girl at the back of the car but soon he was knocked unconscious. When he woke up, he got the same device on his wrist and the scumbag from "Prison Break" was telling him to do a job.

That was to transport a package to a destination, not known to Frank yet.

Along the way, the girl, Valentina, initially maintain a bo chup attitude towards Frank but after seeing him beat off so many men at the garage, somehow began to like him.

The so called evil plot was to take this Valentina as hostage and force his father to sign some contract with some company. His father was some head of environment agency of Ukraine, something which I can't understand, why don't get him sign immediately ... have to drag ... and transport her here and there.

After Frank shaked off men which Valentina's father send in a quite exciting car chase, he started to know more and scumbag knew he have to get the girl back and kill Frank. He did the first part and thought the did the second. With him and his audi into the river, it seems doom as either he drown or explode to pieces if leave the car too far. Miraclously, he did it, making the audi float above water.

Then the final showdown on the train, literally as his audi landed on it ... then in the train as his audi crashed into it. 6/10

NYE Dinner@Absolute Haven

Nothing haven about the food. At $48++ for the set menu, probably abit high on expectation. Since it was NYE, ala carte probably choices not really available at places, unless mass appeal outlets. There was appetizer, starter, main and desserts. In addition, a glass of "complimentary" sparkling wine.

Gazpacho was the appetizer. It is a thick soup that comes in a small glass, leafy green in colour and with some nuts in it. One thing is it is cold, not icy cold ... but it is not even warm, it is meant that way. Taste wise, since it is a vege soup, you get a very leafy vege taste but there is a additional unique taste to it, can't really tell ... overall it taste like chinese "liang teh". Then came the starter, crispy foie gras on a bed of puff. This one not bad, the quite 腻 taste of the goose liver seems to balance off with the cripsy pastry.



You get to choose either a lamb rack main or fish main. Lamb rack was the unanimous, grilled and coated with oregano, comes with mash potatoes and stew vege. The medium well done lamb was about average, though the coated stuff made it taste quite good, but either the cut or how it was cooked ... doesn't make the meat tender enough, though no bloody or "lamby" taste.


The dessert did make up abit, was like a scouffle to me, with chocolate filled in it. By the side, is a smudge of chocolate chip ice cream, not sure how was it brought onto the plate, because of the wierd shape it came in. The hot and cold of both goes well and chocolate could be better if it is more bitter.