Birthday Dinner

Went to a French restaurant at Balestier Road for dinner. The name of the restaurant is Le Troquet. There were 9 of us, D, DT, Irene, S, StupidGenius, SW, V, XY and me. I was on half day leave, so went to the restaurant by myself. The rest, except SG and SW, all came from office, squeezing into DT's car. I was early, reaching at about 715pm. The restaurant looked small, and there was only one group of people dining inside when I came. Not sure how's the food though and they don't provide a menu, the list is just written them on a chalkboard. The people from office came at about 730pm.

Each of us ordered a main course. And some starters like the Escargot and Panfried Foie Gras. I like the Escargot, but pity the portion is very small. Some of the main courses that we ordered includes Duck Confit, Lamb Shank, Truffle Chicken, and the Rib-eye Steak.

Overall the food was not too bad, a bit salty though. SG joked that there is no cheese cake restaurant nearby, so no cakes for me this time :(. But its ok though... ... ...

Dinner ends at around 930pm or so, then SG and SW wanted to go DT's place for the match between Germany and Argentina, while D and I tagged along DT's car to a more convenient place. In the end, the guys all went into DT's car while the ladies took cabs home.

Have to thank everyone for the sumputous dinner treat!!

The King and the Clown

The story is about King Yongsangun, a cruel and licentious character in Korean history, who falls for a court jester. The latter had been performing with his partner in front of the king. The plot of their performances mainly was mocking the king, but the king was not offended and was instead greatly entertained. In between, the king tries to eliminate those court officials who had opposed him or had a hand in the killing of his biological mother, including 2 of the late emperor's concubines.

The movie was touching at times but also entertaining at others, especially when the duo are performing the skits. Didn't know that long time ago they were also going into this theme liao... wahaha...

Konggil, the clown, was played by Lee Joon-ki. I can't help but think that he is actually a female when I saw the movie poster for the first time. He has such nice features overall, and looked very 秀气. No wonder the men in the movie were all over him... :P ... And this guy i so hot now in Korea that his popularity even surpass that of Rain. The king was played by Jeong Jin-young. And I think he played the role well as he got this really 'perverted' look on his face which really suited his character.

Overall I think this show is worth your time and money.

ESC Lunch (June 2006)

2 months has passed. Once again it was time to have our bi-monthly ESC lunch. We went Purvis Street the last time round. Irene missed the lunch today due to work at client's side. Today we went to Curry Flavor / Moonriver at Stamford House. Have been there a few times and the food was not too bad. Each of us ordered the set lunch.

Discussed about the activities for the retreat while having lunch. This year's planning was quite rush as we only have about 2 weeks left. The location was confirmed only last Friday and until now the flights and hotel is still pending. What's more, we gotta plan the activity for one day. SF is going BKK this weekend, and so we could ask her to recce a bit.

As we were about to leave, S found that she did not bring the VIP card which entitles a 10% discount. In the end though, she called GC who has the card and would be passing by the restaurant to go to the MRT station. After lunch went Raffles City to but cakes for the monthly birthday celebration. Celede got a cake promotion where the second cake will be on a 50% discount, which was just nice for us.

Fifa World Cup 2006: Quarter Final

Round 2 is over. Finally got time to rest as there would be a 2-day break, not that I have watched a lot of matches though. Not much surprises in round 2 where 6 of the 8 group winners go through.

Of the 8 teams that are still remaining, Brazil and Germany certainly looks good. However, this could not be said of Italy and England, who only managed to scrape through their game by a single goal. Portugal might have a problem with players missing through suspension after having 2 men sent off in round 2. France did perform better than in the group stage, but still got a lot of work to do if they want to progress further. Ukraine might be the surprise package of this round, but their inexperience might cost them against the Italians. And Argentina might have peaked too early.

So my prediction for the quarter final (teams in bold to progress):

Germany vs Argentina
Italy vs Ukraine
England vs Portugal
Brazil vs France

Dinner @ Togi

Went dinner at 土-ogi restaurant @ Mosque Street again. The first time I went was last month, and it was full-house on that occasion, may be because that day was Friday. This time with uni friends DL, HW and JG. HW just back from Taiwan last saturday and will be leaving again on Wednesday, so gotta catch him before he flies off.

Done our usual catching up over dinner as the foods were served. The topic was of course work and the World Cup. Food served up pretty fast and the 4 of us wasted no time in finishing them all. And we were already done after only 1 hour ++. Although it was still early, we can't think of anywhere we wanna go. So in the end, decided to go home.

PS: HW had forgotten to bring the Twins CD I asked him to buy in Taiwan. So gotta get it from him only next month when he comes back.

World Cup Facts #1

Only one non-European team has ever won the World Cup held in Europe.

Brazil won the cup in 1958 for the tournament held in Sweden when the beat the host 5-2 in the final in Råsunda Stadium, Stockholm.

So will we see a second team this year?

Fifa World Cup 2006: Round 2

The World Cup is going into round 2 today. Not many upsets so far, perhaps only one or two, e.g. Sweden held by T&T and maybe Ghana beating the Czechs. Haven't been able to catch all the matches, in fact only watched a handful. I don't think that there will be many to come in this round as well.

Here's my prediction for the upcoming fixture (teams in bold to progress):

Germany vs Sweden
Argentina vs Mexico
England vs Ecuador
Portugal vs Netherlands
Italy vs Australia
Switzerland vs Ukraine
Brazil vs Ghana
Spain vs France

The Spear and the Shield

This story of the spear and the shield:

Long Long time ago, there was this man selling spears and shields. He claimed that his spears are the best and can pierce through anything in this world and also that his shields can block off any object that come its way. So someone asked: Can you use your spear to pierce your shield?

Sometimes I feel we are contradicting. We know that certain things are not right, but still insist on doing it. Or we say one thing, but end up did not do what we preach, or worse still, do the opposite. And I admit I am one of them. Not that I wanted to, but sometimes certain things are hard to control... ... ...

X-Men: The Last Stand

Can't really remember what happened in the X-Men 2 already, and didn't catch it when it was shown on TV the other day. This last part of the trilogy is about the cure for mutants and Jean Grey. Jean Grey resurrected and somehow took over by her dormant dark side, the Dark Pheonix; The mutants were led by Magneto to rage a war against the humans; And of course, the X-Men, led by Professor Charles Xavier, were sandwiched between the mutants and humans, in an attempt to restore peace between the two.

I think the 110 minutes or so was rather too short. Somehow I feel the flow of the story is too fast. But still I think this movie is worth watching even if you are not an X-Men fan.

On a sidetrack, the Jaggernaut is played by a certain Vinnie Jones. The first time I saw this guy on TV, he was not acting in a movie, but playing soccer for the Crazy Gangs in the EPL. He was known as a hard man in the league and was sent-off on numerous occasion in his footballing career. This was not the first time I saw him in movies, but somehow still felt a bit funny seeing him act...

BK no Breakfast?

Thought all fast food chain served breakfast. Maybe not for BK... Or was it only certain outlets serve breakfast? Apparently the BK at Raffles City doesn't when I went there this morning. It was closed... -_-"'

Silent Hill

This movie is based on a horror video game series, presumably of the same name. The story is about a young girl who had this bizarre illness, including sleepwalking. And she often dreamt about a town called Silent Hill. Her mother, in an attempt to find a cure for her daughter went in search of Silent Hill. The majority of the movie revolves around the happenings in that town, so I will not mentioned too much here. Only that when the siren sounds, darkness descends and the action begins...

As a horror flick, I think this movie is pretty decent, with quite a few jump scares. There are some gory scenes as well. However the plot and the flow of the story left me with a lot of question marks. Like there is a monster with a triangular thingy on its head which I don't know where it came from. And there appeared to be two different dimensions existing in the movie, one for the main actress who is in Silent Hill and one for the rest of the cast in the film. Maybe those who had played the game before would know what's going on here.

So only watch it if you are into horror flicks or you have played the game and would like to see how its like in the movie.

Grace's First Month Celebration

It's yet another first month celebration. Attended another one roughly a month ago. This time it was our beloved Chairlady's (LY) turn. Her little girl is named Grace. Grace was a rather heavy baby, weighing 3.1kg at birth. And how time flies, it seems like I've just attended her wedding not so long ago...

Went LY's place after attending another of our classmate, SH's solemnization ceremony at ROM. YY and I were first to arrived from our class at about 2+. Then found out that KT (LY's hubby) just had an operation a few days ago on his knee after an hurting it while playing basketball. Then now LY gotta take care of two babies at home... :p. We took a brief look at Grace, who was sleeping at that time, before grabbing some food.

C came after a while. The three of us sitted at a corner chatting away, while the busy mum was entertaining other guests. Soon after HT arrived, followed by Lucky and SC. Then we decided to go take more photos of the baby after she has awaken from her sleep.

Grace was like a superstar on the day, everyone wants to take a picture with her. And I was one of them... :D

To round off the day, all of us gathered for a group photo.

SH's Solemnization Ceremony

The event was held on Sunday afternoon. Only got to know that SH was having the ceremony today when YY asked her to go for LY's baby's first month cerebration. So YY and I, plus XW who was one year our junior from MFSS, meet up and went for the event at ROM.

We reached there a bit late at around 1225pm and the ceremony has already begun. The couple only came out just before 1pm, after which we passed them out gift and took some photographs wtih them.

Night Safari

Went to Night Safari for the first time since it was opened in 1994. The admission fee was $20 but there was a school holiday promotion whereby there was a 50% discount on the admission fee.

There was 3 walking trails in the park, which takes about slightly more than an hour to cover them all. I had reached Night Safari just before 7pm but the trail only opens at 7. As it started getting dark, some of the animals could not be seen. And flash photography is not allowed in the park.

This was one of the animals that I saw at the Night Safari.

Had to complete the walk in time to go watch the Creatures of the Night animal show at 9pm. The staff said that in order to get a good seat for the show, gotta be at the amphitheatre some 35 ~ 45 minutes before it begins. True enough, at about 830pm, there was already quite big crowd waiting to watch the show. Luckily I was there 15 minutes earlier. The show had better be good, I thought to myself.

The show was not too bad albeit a bit short at only half an hour. Went for a slow tram ride after the show. The whole journey took about 45 minutes. By the end of the ride, it was already around 1030pm and it was time to go home.

World Cup at Chijmes

After the dinner at Shaw Towers, I went to Bobby Rubino at Chijmes to catch the game between Spain and Ukraine. As I was finding the pub / restaurant, just caught a glimpse of the score of the match, which was 1-0 to Spain. Then before I managed to find the place, Spain scored another goal. But I was glad that they did... hehe...

Anyway I reached 20 minutes into the match with the score at 2-0. CK, DRQ, ET, Newbie and StupidGenius were already there. KB arrived shortly after me. We ordered a total of 2 jugs of beer. For the match, Spain were really dominating and it was no surprise that they won the match 4-0 in the end. It was nice to be able to watch the game together with friends and cheering the team on. Newbie was quite sian after 20 minute when Spain scored the second goal. He had just lost his bet on the game.

As for me, I've managed to made a small winning from this game, going for Spain. This was the first game that I bet on since the World Cup begin and it was a good start... :P

Dinner @ Shaw Towers

Met AG, Ben and Sam for dinner on Wednesday. As it was still early, I went to Sam and AG's office at Golden Mile Complex to meet them. We then walked down to Shaw Towers. Had dinner at a restaurant called J K Don. They sell Korean and Japanese food here. Ben was late so we ordered our food first. Each of us ordered a set meal. AG seems to know the boss of the restaurant really well. Our set meal comes with a free green tea but the boss offered to change it into any drinks of our choice.

I ordered a BBQ beef set. Besides the beef and rice, the set also consist of salmon sashimi, salad, steam tofu with century egg (which I think is really nice) and a slice of water melon. It also comes with a miso soup and a free chawamushi. All I can say is that the set meal is really value for money at $12.90 (no additional service charge or GST). Felt really full after the meal.

World Cup Tee

Saw this shirt at Raffles City Robinsons on Thursday during lunch time. It was on a 20% discount. Had wanted to buy it then but thought I could use my brother's Robinsons card to get a further discount. Luckily I waited. On the very next day, there was an additional 15% storewide discount (bar certain brands of products). This goes on over the weekend. And I've wasted no time in getting the shirt. At least it saves me enough for a meal over lunch... :P

Cars

The story is about a rookie racing car, Lightning McQueen, who got lost (though not exactly lost) and stuck in a small town called Radiator Springs, while travelling to California for a race. There he found an old racing legend, Hudson Hornet, with whom he learned a trick or two. There was also a bit of romance brewing between Lightning and Sally, a pretty blue Porsche lawyer.

This is the movie one should watch to unwind. It has a high entertainment value. Certain scenes will make you laugh off your seat. Certainly good to watch after a day of work. And all this are contained within 116 minutes.

Miss Clarity Cafe

Went Miss Clarity Cafe for lunch today. The cafe is situated at Purvis Street. It was quite empty when we arrived, but by the time we were leaving, it was almost full house. Each of us ordered a set meal. The set meal comes with the soup of the day, drink and a dessert. So it was a rather heavy meal. They had only 2 waitress serving. And when the lunch crowd came, they were very busy.

My meal came first, but after like 15 minutes, there were no sign of the food coming for my colleague, who ordered a stew chicken.

After checking with the staff, he said that the food needed some 20 minutes to be done. From the way that the staff speaks, he didn't sound like he was apologetic... such good service. The staff could have told us earlier, at least we would be prepared to wait... My colleague was quite pissed at his attitude. Then had to call the staff 3 times before they finally served us the dessert. However they were very fast when we called for the bill.

On a Shopping Spree

GSS is on right now. So I went shopping at Orchard today. Bought a total of 3 shirts (so unlike me...), 2 at Tangs and the other at Takashimaya. All the shirts were pretty cheap IMO, which was why I had no qualms buying them... :P

Not sure if the spree will stop here as GSS had just started.

The Omen

Watched the show on midnight of 6/6/06 at The Cathay. This is a remake of the 1976 classic (and I wasn't even born then, hehe...). The story is about a young boy, who is the son of the devil, trying to take over the life of his father, an ambassador in London.

This show is classified as a horror movie. But, in truth, there weren't many horrific scene, just that the film maker delibrately flashed out certain scenes with a loud background sound effect to make the atmosphere more intense. Some of the scenes of the people that was killed were quite gross though. Other than that, the rest of the movie was pretty decent, at least I did not fall asleep during the course of the show... :p.

PS: And 6/6/06 ain't the end of the world yet

Charlene's Wedding

Today was Charlene's wedding dinner @ Marina Mandarin. Her wedding dinner was the third that I've attended from our class, the first was Sri's then LY's. And she had invited some of our classmates from Mayflower Sec, enough to fill up a table. Some of those who came includes, Sri and hubby, Mrs Lim (our form teacher) and son, tsoty04, SP, YY, Camoranesi, P (NPS) and SH. Then we got into the usual process of catching up and updating each other of our current status. Heard from YY that another of our classmate YL's wedding dinner is scheduled for 2 days later at one of the restaurant in IMM. But YY was the only one invited from our class (heard from Mrs Lim that there were some history between the two... hmmm...).

The newly-wed had been dating for quite a long time liao, 7 years if I remembered correctly. And from the montage shown, they were both from TP and their student number differs by only one number (the last digit, was it fated?!). The groom is a NS regular, a captain from the Guards. And not surprisingly, the march in of the couple was accompanied by his comrades. And I could tell that most of the guests invited were from the army.

This time around Mrs Lim's son was more subdued, unlike at LY's wedding dinner where he brought almost everyone around the revolving restaurant. And luckily he sat beside tsoty04, and so seldom come "bother" me... :p. Then the dinner commences at around 830pm. Not much unusual stuff occurred. Dinner ended at nearly 11pm. Then took the train home with Camoranesi, SP and tsoty04.

Next one coming up, probably another lady's wedding dinner I suppose (both SP and SH scheduled for next year).

Poseidon

Finally get to watch the show after almost one month since it was opened. S wanted to watch the IMAX version, so we went to the Omni-Theatre for the show. The show is starting at 8pm but StupidGenius did not arrive on time. He took a bus from his work place but alighted at the wrong bus-stop and had to walk a distance to get here. By the time he reached, we were 15 minutes into the show.

The was a typical disaster movie. The whole show was about how the people attempted to get out from the sinking ship. In between, there were some scenes illustrating relationship and family ties. And sad to say, many people died from the disaster.

Time passes very fast while watching, maybe because of the pace of the show. And I certainly don't feel like a 100++ minute show when it ended.

Why Like This?

This gonna happen just when I wanted to watch a show on TV.

Why why why?

ESC Dinner

Had a dinner with last year's ESC members at Funan Swensens with =.=, CK, S and XY. We had missed the last bi-monthly lunch for last year, so we got some Swensens gift voucher for that and also in appreciation of the efforts for the year.

=.= was late. He said he almost couldn't make it as he slept on the bus on his way back from client side. By the time he reached, we almost finished the starters and some of our main course were already served. =.= ordered his favourite chicken sandwich. As it turned out, the turkey becon inside the sandwich was not crispy at all. It looked like ham to me. And so he asked one of the staff who said they had a new menu which just started today and this could be a different way of preparing the food. Not a very good answer I thought. Meanwhile =.= was looking at the menu which contains the phrase "crispy turkey bacon". This means that they should served him the sandwich with the crispy bacon. In the end they took back the dish and came out with another one, with a slightly better turkey bacon. But =.= was still not satisfied.

I ordered the new Salmon and mushroom pasta which I thought the portion looked very small. To make it worse, it didn't taste very nice as well. Luckily S offered me her pasta and in the end, I took almost 2 person's serving of food. Later on we ordered the dessert, one of which is called "White Chocolate Blondie" if I remembered correctly. It comes with a frying pan which was pipping hot, and they pour some maple syrup and nuts into the pan to mix it up. I like this very much, it was especially good to be consumed while hot.

Finally just before we were leaving, the manager of the outlet came over and =.= complained to him about the bacon that was not crispy. Then the manager offered to prepare another sandwich for =.=, but he declined and requested only for another piece of crispy bacon instead. After a few minutes, the manager really came with 2 pieces of bacon served on a plate. This time the bacon was crispy enough but still, =.= felt it tasted different from the last time he ate.

The crispy turkey bacon

Finally there was still some drama while we went to settle our bill. We were using gift vouchers, and on top of that, there was a 10% discount when we pay for the bill using credit card from 2 particular banks. We asked the staff if the discount was given to the overall bill. But the staff said that the discount was given to the balance of the bill after the vouchers were used. This was different from the last time when some of them came. So we spent a few minute trying to clarify this. At the end of the day, after we took a look at the bill, found that the discount was still given to the bill before the wouchers, GST and service charge. So that was pretty ok, hehe...