Road Trip!

It all started in Starbucks. We all had coffee one day, celebrating Super Mart's return from Okinawa. The hubs suggested driving down to Malacca for food and to test out Beamie, his new toy. Law who could not wait to show off his car obviously agreed. Super Mart spun an intriguing story on his dad's place in the jungle and invited us there. And Bam ! a road trip was in place.  

We left the island around 9pm Singapore on Friday evening via the Tuas checkpoint. Traffic was pleasantly smooth. I expected worse for a Friday evening right before Diwali. 

Here's us looking happy at Restoran Jejantas thinking we would be wolfing down A&W Coney Dog and slurping Root Beers but we returned disappointed because it was closed. 

We stayed a night at Law's place in USJ. The hubs tried to make Beamie look inconspicuous. 

The next morning, we made our way to Mart's place. We were told to keep the location a secret, so can't really post a lot of photos here. Suffice to say it's tucked in a jungle and we have to drive Law's dad's truck to reach the place. 

Hubs and Yuan firing up the grill. 

The 2 Singaporeans in Malaysia. Fructose and Jus Manga (inside joke)

The happy family who were our hosts

And finally the trip wouldn't be complete with a visit to A&W!! Can we bring it back to Singapore please? 

All in all it was a successful trip; we ate too much and laughed a lot at the expense of each other. Even bites from annoying mosquitos and a speeding ticket couldn't get us down. I can see another road trip coming up soon.  

Love you guys much!

The Big Apple

We landed in JFK on Tuesday morning, checked in the hotel at Upper West Side, dropped our bag and took a bus over to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The hubs was excited to check out the mummies and stuff in the museum but I was more excited in checking out the steps famously featured in several episodes of Gossip Girl. We spent like an hour there before heading back for a snooze but slept right through dinner till the next morning! Jet lag is a bitch. 

We spent the next few days visiting the usual touristy spots, watching Broadways and pigging out at random restaurants. We caught Phantom of the Opera and Avenue Q. Calv prefers the former, and I the latter. Also managed to catch a standup at Caroline's on Friday evening. I thought that was probably the highlight of the trip. Too bad the hubs wasn't around. 

For meals, we went to Capital Grille (Midtown) for steak, Blue Ribbon (South Village) for sushi, Good Enough to Eat (Upper West Side) for brunch with Gerry and somewhere in the West Village for dinner with Gerry + bf. Can't remember the name of the last restaurant now, man. Also visited Little Owl (West Village) to take picture of the facade of Monica Gellar's apartment. All were pretty good. Calv thought Little Owl was a rip off though. Hah. 

Photos below are in random order, taken a week before Hurricane Sandy aka Frankenstorm came along. Boy am I glad I left for home when I did. 

Central Park - Managed a jog around the reservoir. Many were training for the NYC marathon and Michael Bloomberg confirmed it is still on despite Sandy. 

Wall Street - NYSE

Monica Gellar's apartment (from F.R.I.E.N.D.S)

9/11 Memorial

The Empire State Building - Remember King Kong?

View from the Empire State

Caught Phantom at the Majestic Theatre

Grand Central Station was surprisingly clean! And obviously we stopped for oysters here. 

Time Square - We kept coming back here! 

Cute cab. Wait, it's a cab right? 

Legoland at Time Square

Last but not least, I got to mention our hotel. We stayed in Days Inn Broadway at 94th Street at Upper West Side. Location was great as it's just a few blocks down to Central Park and steps away from a subway station. The room was clean but very basic. There were no roaches though, for which I was thankful for. The lifts are rather old, and our door latch doesn't work. But no big complain as we only paid about $200 per night. 

All in all we had a great time in NYC. And for the little planning that we did for this trip, I thought we accomplished quite a lot. Till next time! 

Two Strikes

They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. And so in my attempt to be the dutiful wife, I started cooking dinner for the hubs. Unfortunately, the results haven't been great. My first attempt was scoffed at (not by the hubs but my colleague) as not much of an attempt; it was a mushroom salad with chicken. 

My second attempt was egg noodle with lemon grass, which was rather bland and tasted nothing like lemon grass. Worse, the hubs outdid me with his Emperor Chicken. Argh, I got to step up the game.

But here's to me trying...

Are We There Yet

Transiting at Frankfurt.. It's 1 degree Celsius outside and I see a hint of snow. Yawn.. What a long flight home. Can't wait to see the hubs!!

Taken at The Little Owl @ West Village

Hello from the Big Apple

At JFK now, waiting for my flight back to Singapore. There is a 3 hour layover so I'm just sitting at the lounge and reflecting back on the past 2 weeks.

My journey to the States started in NYC. The hubs was free for a few days so he tagged along and played tour guide as it's my first visit. NYC was amazing! We did all the touristy stuff like going up the Empire State Building ( not as romantic as Hollywood made it out to be), the 911 Memorial ( really touching and sad), the Mets and Wall Street (Yay to touching the bull's balls).

And somehow amazingly despite our lack of planning, we managed to catch 2 broadway shows in a span of 4 days. Phantom of the Opera was too opera for my liking although the hubs enjoyed it thoroughly. Also caught Avenue Q which got great reviews when they came down to Singapore. Can't remember why I missed it. Ahh.. I love Broadways! Almost wanted to watch Wicked again.

Calvin left a day earlier and I had an evening to myself. Instead of just staying in the creepy hotel (story for another time), I caught a standup at Caroline's at Time Square. Chris Delia who was up for the night was pretty funny but it's the same old poking fun of homos, women and Catholics. Good fun for a Friday evening though!

The next day i even managed a jog at Central Park which is just a few blocks down from the hotel. Caught up with Gerry (Calvin's childhood friend) at a quaint cafe at the Upper West Side before I made my way to JFK-Boston.

Pictures to come next week!

All in all it was a great trip to NYC.

Sadly it was also in NY that I got the news of demise of a friend's wife. Was reading her blog documenting her spiritual journey through the sickness and I was touched in many ways I cant even verbalize and explain myself. She was extraordinary and definitely inspires me on my own spiritual journey. Read it and be inspired.

Psalm117.blogspot.com

Beautiful view of Central Park taken at the reservoir

Way Back Into Love

Jamie is a friend everyone loves to have. He is kind, sweet and everything good. Sometimes he can be an ass; but only if you deserve it. Always a hopeless romantic, Jamie would make a great boyfriend and a fantastic husband <adv>.

Joey is the pretty one who always speaks her mind, regardless of how preposterous she sounds. She has a great sense of adventure and is almost up to try anything new. She broke the hearts of many when she got engaged recently. 

Me... I am just awesome. As you can tell, we are worlds apart and nothing alike. 

Working in Capital, we found ourselves hanging out, going away on vacation and even managed a brief period of fun partying. Our weird quirks brought us together, but what really kept us together now is our love of music. I have since left Capital and we don't meet up as much as we used to. Despite that we still hang out together occasionally to catchup and jam. And we're still trying very hard not to butcher Justin Bieber's songs. I guess music does bring people together.

This is Joey and Jamie putting up an special item during our wedding dinner. Enjoy. 

Btw Joey is the gal, and Jamie is the dude. In case you are wondering.  

Of Hipstamatic and the Gardens

The Gardens by the Bay opened beginning of the year. We have been itching to pay a visit but alas got caught up in the business of wedding preparation and work. 


So we finally found time on a Friday evening to head down and check out what the hype is all about. It was a cool breezy evening, so we had a nice stroll from the office. The Gardens was impressive to say the least. Weirdly enough, it was the architectures of the Gardens that were the highlights rather than the wide array of flora. 



This is us playing with the Hipstamatic app with the iPhone 4. Ah... loving the life of newlyweds. 

The balloons that decorate the Gardens

View from the Marina Bay Sands

The Super Trees in the evening

The Super Trees

Trying to be artistic here

View of Marina Bay Sands from the Gardens

View of Marina Bay Financial Centre - on the way back to the car park

Taken with a Samsung Galaxy S3