No tea at the high tea

Remember this?

Juli and I were supposed to have lunch together at the Cafe Vienna but changed our minds when we saw the amount of people who were already queuing there at 1.30 pm. Just look at the amount of people!

From the entrance :

To the outside :

The line only ended here by the music centre in the building next to it.

We decided to have lunch at Far East Plaza instead and then spent the day shopping.

I found out that Juli had a lot of stamina. After about 3 hours, she was still energetic and trying out dresses while my knees were already screaming out in pain.

Perhaps the reason for it is that she was more enthusiastic than I was. Most of the times, clothes shopping isn’t really fun for me. As much as I love and admire beautiful clothes, there isn’t a lot of stores here which are right for me.

I don’t think I am so large. Am I?

We spotted a clothes shop. It had the loveliest pink dress and we both gushed over it. It was a princess cut dress with pearl buttons. It looked rather royale.

I had to try it on.

Me : What size is this?

Salesgirl : Its free size! Want to try?

Me : Yes

Excitedly I went in the changing room. But when I tried it on, I found out that it was such a chore. I could slip the skirt part easily, but when it came to the top part, I had to take a deep breath, do a few yoga techniques, and worm my way into it.

Finally I managed to wear the dress. Juli wanted to see.

Juli : It looks very interesting

Salesgirl : That looks very nice on you!

Me : I-cant-breathe.

Disappointed, I wormed my way out of the dress and walked around the other shops on the floor.

By the time I explore the entire floor, Juli was still at the same shop, trying out other clothes. She looked great in this 70’s looking dress.


Something like the purple dress, with a boat neck.

Since I have already seen all the shops on the floor, I went down and explored. And when I was done, I went down another floor, and another and another…

I must have walked through the entire Far East Plaza Building and finally found myself at the basement when I texted Juli to ask her where she was.

It turns out that she was still at the same level!

But I did manage to stumble upon this lovely dress while walking and was admiring it and went in to try it on.

It was so nice. Finally a dress that fitted! Almost. Its was slightly tight at the chest, but I could reposition the buttons and sew it back.

So I got it and now I have a nice dress! 🙂

I do like shopping at Far East Plaza. There are nice clothes here at affordable prices. My dress cost me about $50 dollars. Dresses are usually priced at $80 and above at other shopping centres.

At length, we were both done and decided to walk around the city area. It was lovely to see the city at night, with all the lights and the decorations. I saw streets of trees wrapped up in red and white cloth and fairy lights around them.

That’s when I saw three girls walking around in a bridal dress with a long train. Isn’t it going to get dirty with all the traces of dirt from other people?

They were promoting this Nina Ricci perfume.

The three snow whites and the not so white.

I think the perfume was shaped to symbolise a fairy tale? But why were they in bridal gowns and not in snow white costumes then? Or maybe have wings behind them to represent faeries.

I’m confused about this advertisement campaign.

And look what we found while walking. A true Salvator Dali sculpture! I enjoy Surrealist Art and Dali is one the great fathers of them all.

This is called Space Venus. And in typical Dali style, there is a liquidated clock (on her neck) Spiders (on her hips) and there’s a big egg (above her groin) supposed to symbolise fertility.

There are other Dali sculptures in the city area. I would have liked to see them all. Hopefully I’d be able to see them the next time I go there again. 🙂

I-sore


I look miserable, but my skin looks good .. hehehe

Me : My eyes hurt.

Mum : Ah, a bump! You must have been peeking at someone in the bathroom.

Me : What? No! What a scandalous accusation!

Mum : Then you must have been peeking at someone making out.

Sigh. I wish *I* was making out.

During the weekend I noticed that there was a little bump on my eyelids and by my vision was starting to get blurred. On tuesday though it wasnt painful, it was quite uncomfortable trying to blink.

The doctor said that it was acne and that it was not an uncommon trait and he gave me some eyedrops and a eyegel with tetracycline in it. I should use a warm compress to ‘ripen’ it and when its big enough, he’ll use a knife to cut it away.

Yikes!

You know what?

I think I should just wear an eyepatch and become a pirate.

ARRRRRRR!!! SHIVER ME TIMBERS! AVAST ME MATIES! VERILY TRY NOT TO SCRATCH ME EYES LEST ME BE BLIND!

Singapore Big Bike Fest 2006

Clark Quay was alive with the the roarings of motorcyles as it saw the ‘Singapore Big Bike Fest’ yesterday. There were so many bikes to see that it can be quite overwhelming.

After much contemplation, I finally decided to join the Vesporean Club October outing just to satisfy my curiosity on how it would be like.

I brought my brother, Nazry along. I thought he would be interested as he was currently trying to get his motorcycle license too.

We took the AYE highway to get to our destination. While we were riding along, there was a guy riding a green GT. He noticed us, gave us the thumb up. I flashed him the peace sign and he rode away in the traffic.

We reached Maxwell Food Centre and looked for the Vespa club members. It was hard to miss them. They were prominent, standing around an array of scooters in all shapes and colours. It was like a mini convention.

We walked up to the group and I said hello. One of the lady turned around from her conversation

Hi. You are?

I’m rinaz.

Oh rinaz! Hi! Glad that you can make it! I’m leonids. (points) This is beary, that is precious and this is un-sith. 

Would you like a tee shirt?

Hey, aren’t you the one I passed by on the AYE?

I looked around to see the different types of Vespa scooters. There were so many colourful display. There were some modified ones – Different paint-jobs, different cover seating …

I noticed a purple lx scooter with embellishments. A lady told me that it was said to be designed by Britney Spears. But how true it was, we both weren’t sure.

Another scooter that caught my eye was an et8 which had a flowery sticker. The lady tells me that it was a winning scooter sponsored by coke.

Soon after we were told about our itinerary and we got ready to move off together.

There we were, in two rows riding off on the roadside.

Nazry quipped:

This reminds me of a time long long time ago …

Huh? What are you talking about?

Sigh …

Oh, are you talking about your cycling days?

Yesssss …

We’re on a different convoy now 😉

It was so nice riding together. I’m sure that we were a lovely sight to see. Then I noticed a lady and was transfixed at her footwear. It was high heels! Never did I thought that I’d ever see a lady rider wearing heels in real life.

We reached Clark Quay and rode one by one through the display area letting everyone admire our beautiful procession.

We parked our scooters together in a row. There were so many different group of bikers parking together. (Nazry called them clans) The Honda Waves, the Hayabusas, The Harley Davidsons, The Ducatis and others.


Thank goodness the white shirts weren’t around!


I want this band-aid sticker!


Hayabusa


Interesting paint job, but not for me.


This isn’t for me either

And we entered the area. There were so many different motorcycles, it was mind boggling.





This was an interesting bike as we didn’t see the speedometer, or fuel or any display at all.

Many of these bikes had extremely powerful cc’s – This Ducati went to 992cc. (My GT was already a powerful machine at 198cc)


This Harley went to 1548 cc. I started to wonder why anyone would get such an extremely powerful machine for the Singaporean road since the maximum speed on the highway was 90 km/h – definitely it was more for the image than for practicalities.


And this Triumph Harley Davidson was 2200 ccs! That’s faster than a car! I was perplexed. Nazry on the other hand, was transfixed at how its engine vibrated showing off its power.


2200 cc! That’s crazy!

There was a loud roaring and vroom-ing that we went to investigate.



Babe-alicious babe on a bike.

It was the Harley Davidson convoy arriving and we went to see their procession. Harleys are possible a chick magnet, aren’t they? All of their pillions were females.

But the person standing next to me did tell me that there was a female Harley biker which I missed.

We left about two hours later. It was an interesting event with loads of cool looking motorcycles see. I still prefer my scooter though 🙂


Not mine, but I vote this the best looking Vespa, ever.

The only thing that’s real is food

Lonelygirl15 isnt real, Emily isnt real … Julie isnt real … Who knows whats genuine on the net anymore. Regardless, they all made entertaining viewing.

The thing is, that the lines between reality and fiction now being blurred with companies using personal mediums such as blogs, myspace and youtube to bring their conception to life.

Sometimes its easy to spot out some of the idiosyncracies but in time its possible to have a work of fiction that seems to be so realistic that everyone would be confounded.

Maybe *I* might turn out to be a marketing concept too. Its possible right? 😉

In other news …

Anyone interested to go to the Cafe Vienna with me? 🙂

Going to the arts house

Mr Chandran, my literature lecturer, approached me to do a photoshoot of a play that he was directing. It turned out to be a really interesting and facinating experience.

I was to be at the Arts house in the Old Parliament road. After riding on the road for about a month now, I had very little problem getting there as i was a little more used to the different roads (with a little help from Streetdirectory.com).

I reached the arts house in the late afternoon and was amazed at how beautiful the entire area was. this was strange to me because I often walked around the parliament road, but this was an area that I’ve never really spend much time at. There would always be nook and cranny that I’d miss.


A couple of my kids from my previous school at the Parliament House

I tried to find some place to park my scooter, and after riding around the area I couldnt find any. Not wanting to be fined by overzealous parking attendants, I went to seek help. I saw a couple of men in uniform. They were valets on the job.

Me : Excuse me! Hi! Do you know where I could park my scooter?

Men : Well, you can park it here (by the roadside) We’ll take care of it for you.

Me : Wow! Really? You are so kind. Thank you so much.

I approached the Arts house. It was gorgeous. It was like a palatial building with all the lights and old charm decorations. There were people lounging and sitting around artily on the seats outside. They were probably waiting for a play to start.

I went upstairs to one of the rooms where the actresses were putting on make up and trying out their costumes.

Hi everyone! I’m Marina. Nice to meet all of you


Diane (in white) helping to apply make up on a fellow actress

I noticed a familliar face. One of my classmate from night class, Diane was there and we talked excitedly.

Diane : What are you doing here? Are you acting too?

Me : Oh yes, I’m acting. I’m playing the part of the photographer. Heheheh.

I met this gentleman called Goon, the assistant director for the play and he tells me what type of shots he wanted.


Mr Chandran and Mr Goon, you cant miss him, he’s got a huge silver earring on his left ear

Goon : I want mood shots. These images will be used for the website.

Me : Will it be used for posters or brochures?

I was concerned about the dark lighting which will impair the images. Printed images needed a high resolution for it to look good.

Goon : It’ll only be for the website for now.

Me : Awesome. Thats great!

I saw them play-acting some parts and I found out that the title of the play was called ‘Horse Face’. The gist of the story was about a village of girls in India, trying to find a husband. A potential man arrives. The girls try to different ways to get him to notice them.

It was facinating looking at the girls. They were so pretty! Some of the girls looked fit to be a model. The costumes eccentuated their allure.

Mr Chandran and Goon were discussing director-y things with the girls and we wrapped up about an hour later and some final shots.

The play will be opening somewhere in October. How exciting! Come on and give support to the play, if you can 🙂


Look at me … Too cool for wind-blowers

Link to the event here

Ikea is fun




Anyway, I’m liking my new chair

Its easy to assemble and quite comfortable. Trying to juggle this on the scooter is another story though! 😉

How getting my helmet stolen makes me love auctions

My helmet got stolen recently. It made me extremely upset when I came down to see it missing.

I was at my friend, Narima’s place after a friend’s wedding. We spent the time talking, laughing and watching tv together. I noticed that it was getting a little too late, so I said my goodbyes and went off to the parking lot.

When I rode off, I realised that there was something missing. I wasn’t wearing my helmet. Where was it? I left it on the seat, now its gone! I freaked out.

Granted that it wasn’t very expensive. But the idea that someone would be so heartless enough to steal it was extremely upsetting to me.

A quick phone call to Narima soothed me a little.

But there wasn’t anything that I could do. A police report? My helmet was generic and did not have any special markings on it. Nothing much could be done anyways but to be more careful in the future.

Though I had a spare one, I still needed a helmet for my pillion, so I decided to go to Yahoo Auctions to scour for affordable helmets online. It has been a while since I last done any online auctioning. I remember that I had a blast of a time rummaging around for hidden treasures, then buying nice things and selling off of items.

After a few minutes of browsing, I found a relatively good and affordable one and bidded on it. After much anticipation, the rush of winning was there again. I saw the name of the top bidder – I won the bid!

The dealer suggested to do a meet up at the Caltex Petrol kiosk along Bukit Batok for the transaction. So we agreed to meet after my night class.

I usually filled up my scooter at the SPC Petrol Kiosk so I saw for the first time how it was at Caltex. It was impressively larger. In the cool night air, the place shone like a drive in movie theater. I saw men with suds, washing cars by hand and I went in the mart. There was a place where I could sit down, and have a cuppa. And I waited.

I didn’t have to wait too long, the dealer came soon-after. The transaction was done pretty speedily. I checked the condition of the helmet and handed him the money and we left.

Pretty easy.

I remember the things I used to get from Yahoo Auctions, things like the unused Fancl Facial Set, the Levi jeans, computer books which I used while studying computer science back then. All these would be more expensive if I bought it first hand.

Using that as a justifiable move, I could buy more items like a polarizer filter for my camera. It would be nice to take a nice, crisp blue sky instead of the grey shots that I keep getting. I wonder if I could get a suitable prime lens too.

And on that note, I could sell away some items too. Like the Estee Lauder perfume that I bought on impulse while attending their makeover session. I keep wondering why I bought it … I don’t even use perfume!


Anyone wants this?

Too bad I cant buy a new throat on Yahoo Auction

*cough cough cough*

A new throat would be nice.

I’m not advertising

Somewhere in Singapore, the full moon shines and gazes down peacefully at the view beneath her.

But the peace and quiet is soon broken …

What will our heroine do?

Never fear! Nin Jiom Pei Pa Koa cough syrup is here! With 15 natural herbs to blast away those sore throat and coughs! Recommended by all chias worldwide!

So drink your Nim Jiom Pei Pa Koa today!