Don’t Say Whocares When You Really Cares

I went to HCM city with cs.  It was a totally enriching experience for me.  Life in HCM is so much simple, its like back in the 70s, whereby all the people were living in very bare minimum conditions.  Their common vehicles are the bikes.. all the young and old, both boys and girls knows how to ride a bike.  Some rode with kids and babies, some carried baskets of stocks/comodities. 

The kids are born entreprunals from the young age of like 5 yrs old.  They went around selling their own products on the streets.  The familes are crowding around the stalls, selling food.  This is what one call, home business.

Cars in vietnam are cheap.  That is the reason why, even if the car bumped onto car, there won’t be any conflict/quarrel.  Petrol and rubber are the natural resources in vietman.  There isn’t any prices hikes to speak of too.. Petrolima is the one and only petrol station. 

There are a few businees, which are completely out:  Facial, coffee chains and schools.  We went to war museum to check out the olden history of war between vietnamese and americans.  The pictures are really gross and upsetting.  2 million were killed and 3 million were injured, which was a very heavy price to pay.  There is this instance when I was very afraid, that is the peek into the cellular of the supposedly male prisoner.  I eventually looked into it but i saw nothing. The thunder and lighting added on to the eerieness of the war museum.

The next day, i went to the cuchi tunnels, aka, the guerilla tunnels, used by the vietnamese soldiers to ambush the americans.  We went through the tunnels, and it was dark and abit exciting.  The tour guide was a 10 yr war vetern, who has been through this war.  He seems not over the past yet.  I really slipped by telling him that the other two tourists are americans.  He behaved in a more authorative and domineering manner, while decipting the history, after knowing the history.  It is important to be mindful of cultural sensitivity.  The vietmanese have spent 10 years to clear all the mines.  Heaven knows if the bomb will be rediscovered anytime on unknown mines. 

The weather has been very unpredictable, but we have managed to survive it.  There are alot of good people in hcm..  very helpful (with directions), guileless and treats people with kindness. 

Its such a beautiful memory, that I had of vietnam.

Ciaos…

..27082007..

Hi Guys,

I have spent some time uploading the 10 favourite photos from BKK.  Go check out at the friendster website!

..12082007..

Happy National Day Singapore!

What to say about this National Day?  Definitely more happy, relaxed and ableit 捨不得.

I went shopping with liew ern and annie.  Had a sumptuous jap lunch at "hao wei".  We chatted alot, laughed alot and shared alot and took alot of photos too.

In a year’s time, Annie will be married.. all our lives will change slightly.  Liew ern and I will probably still be "swinging" bachelorettes…?  lol…  hope she finds her Mr Right by then.

I will be selecting one of the photos for match.com.. not really sure when i will sign up for it.  Just another channel for me to know more new people.  (Although I’m not so in favour of using this channel.) 

In order of informing of my new offer:

- Rose (colleague cum good fren)
- Annie, Wencai, Hongwei and liew ern
- Jocelyn (colleague cum good fren), *Julia (my colleague but feels ok only.)
- Sharon, *Jacqui, Talia, Huiping & Sally
- *Charles

Only those in (*) doesn’t know where i’m going. 

By the way, there was a suicide at Tampines mrt station yesterday.  Refer to link:  http://forum.channelnewsasia.com/viewtopic.php?t=79016

It wasn’t publicised, censored from the press. 

Why do people have to resort to such grusome means to end their life?  Life is already so fragile, why make it more??

There should be security officers to station permanently at respective stations to prevent such suicides, like what BKK does.

No wonder god is fair, if you refer to what I mean, go back to my previous blog for reference

..09082007..

I went for a lunch at Merchant’s side - Park Palace.  What a sumptuous lunch it was!!  Went back and attended another meeting with SSC.  It was very bored.  I managed to confirm on merchant to take up a booth at U wellness event. 

After that, I went for a second interview at Amex.  I did have a good feel I will get the job.  I will see if the agency gets back to me or not.

I intend to take up phonetics course at British council to improve my language skills.

I shall continue my job search again

..06082007..

It seems that I can never have enough description of bangkok.

Day 1:

We touched down around 9.30am SG time (8.30 thailand time) at the new Thai airport (name forget liao).

Paid 400 thai baht to take a cab to Asia hotel.  We checked into Asia hotel around 10.30pm.  By 11am, we were out of hotel, roaming around.  The first thing that we are trying to do is to call BedSupperClub to confirm our appointment.  Little do we know that they only receive phone calls at 11am sharp.  We wasted like 7 thai baht calling up between 10.30am - 10.50am.

Initially, we wanted to take lunch at the Thai restaurant near to our hotel, but was told they only start serving at 11.30am.. duh! Got business also dun wan to do!  Unreluctantly, we headed to the BTS station and took train to National Stadium.  In the train, i tried calling BSC and succeed!!  Someone really picked up the call…  Finally, i confirmed it.  Its not really the card’s problem, its us, being too impatient liao.  The operator only start work at 11.

We had our lunch at one japanese restaurant in MBK, that serves ramen with very fat noodles and spicy flavour.  Strangely, they played chinese songs!  HP and i were quite amused   The "waitress" who serves us was quite courteous.

After lunch, we proceed directly to JJ market.  We took BTS to Mochit.  Over there, we were quite lost.  Stupid me, never discover the map.  Nevermind.. we went through alot of stalls and shopped for around 2 hours plus, before we ask a "police officier" to guide us out of JJ market.  I could have bought more things, if the stall owners had not been so non-negotiable.  Bye bye, mum’s apron, pretty skirt.. etc…  AT JJ market, i bought a mirror for jocelyn, probably no luck on tops and bottoms.  NOt a very fruitful shopping trip for us sign…. * actually the best is yet to come*

Dead tired from walking at JJ market, we went back to hotel.  Bathed… i slept for one hour… before we headed to BSC.  HP chided me that i wasn’t there to sleep..  lol…  by 6pm, we found ourselves in the Thai restaurant who don’t know how to do business.  We had alot of food….  tomyam gong, western pork chop, kuay teow and drinks.. all for the price of less than $10sgd!  We left on the table a 20baht tip before we went off..

Hail a cab to BCS, which cost us less than 40baht!  We gave the driver some tips…  As it was still early for us to enter BSC, we roamed around for half an hour before we enter.  We checked out the other areas, eg:  Playground:  

http://www.playgroundstore.co.th/index.asp   

Q Bar… (see see only, never go inside)

We went back to BSC around 10.15 sg time.

http://www.bedsupperclub.com/

We were received by handsome hunks, who spoke moderately good English.  They were dressed in white top and black pants.  Those hunky type with suave looks.  Killer.

We spent more than 270 baht per person per drink, which was quite ok.  Funny thing, they insisted that we go back to our orginal assigned seats when the place is not even taken.  By 11pm (sg time) we were way back to hotel.

Day 2

The best is yet to come   On day 1, we were lamenting about the lack of bargains at JJ market.  God know.. today HP and I seems to burst our budget.  We went to Pratuman Centre:  http://www.bangkok.com/pratunam/index.html

Siam Square, which we unfortunately did not manage to locate Vanilla Industry   We settled for italian food at Siam Discovery Centre.

We proceed for MBK after that.  AT night, we had our steamboat dinner at MK restaurant. It was located at level 2 of MBK, just next to Swensons.  Guess what?  Its only $6sgd per person.  Unsatisfied, we went to Mcdonalds for our supper.  Both of us, hungry like never eat so much in sg, took a set meal each.  Our 4th meal for the day.  We went back to hotel after that.  Damage was pretty lots for HP, she was practically a stall owner of clothes, clothes and more clothes!

ON the third and last day, we went to CHinatown, Yaowarat Road: http://www.huayinet.org/culture/culture_chinatown_bangkok.htm

Actual trip from hotel to destination is only 50 baht.  We were rather early, as the shops only open around 9.30 (sg time), and we were an hour earlier.  Hence, we roamed around.  Visited the Kao market, which is the wet market for locals and one ulu ulu shopping mall.  HP bought some doughnuts and tibits for her aunt.  We also stopped by a stall to savour the bird nest, which costs us 200 baht per bowl, with raw egg, and some "lian zi".  We took a cab back to place all our stuffs in hotel before going out to explore Central mall, which is at Chit Lom station.

http://www.central.co.th/web/html/foodloft.htm

Over here, we found Bread Talk restaurant dining concept!  We were so impressed by Mr Quek being able to expand to Bangkok.. hehe….  MOS burger too..  We settled for our lunch at KFC.  The chicken is spicy and they serves forks and knife.  No fingers’ licking good.  KFC adds spicy to your life.. 

At night, we were back to MK restaurant, which we decided to eat as much as we could.  We ordered so much that we spent like $22sgd per pax, which is still cheap, as we really really super kiasu.  I tink we really ordered too much liao.. One thing to note, we actually missed out the MK restaurant at level 2 and settled for level 7 instead.  I was half believing the locals, when they pointed level 7!  Did we really walk so much???  That was what went into our minds.  Nevermind, we were famished when we finally reached the restaurant.  We ordered alot of food and i requested for 3 bowls of rice and they served us 3 bowls of soup as well.. lol.. After that, we still proceed to dessert at Swensons.  Icecream is my Life, Happiness never melts.  I tink they have such meaningful tagline   We took turns to take pics of us with the background taglines.. where we look really "xing fu" with our desserts.

We went back to hotel after hanging around for another one hour.  

We were broke at the end the day…  third day of our trip.

Day 4

After breakfast, we went to check out around 10.30am (sg time).  It was very very relax and I sort of missed bkk.. sob sob…  Prior to that, we went to the swimming pool to take some photos.. I recalled a dream on 1st night that I have after I came out from the toliet. 

We realised that there wasn’t any need to pay the $500 baht airport tax as it was already included in the air ticket.  Hence, we took the money and had a good meal at Mango Cafe, which serve not bad tomyum gong.  After having 2 days of tomyum in a row, we decided not to take anymore after we returned to sg.  While we were going through the thai customs, the officer was quite funny.  He shown us our photos on how we look.. and he mention "mei li le"  which pretty amuses me.. super gei yan.

I tink overall, it is an extremely enjoyable Bangkok trip for me.  We were not really concerned about if the hotel is haunted or not, so long as we did nothing against our conscience..  so should be fine le.  Should that be a problem? nOt at all…   Was told hotel rooms that places bibles actually contains "dirty stuffs".  So scary to even think about it!

Merits of being in BKK these three days:-

- We chomp like pigs (ate alot la)
- We are very daring to explore the night scene in BKK
- We cheong the roads of Yawarat, where there are NO traffic lights at all!
- We walked like we never walked so much in our life in Sg…  3 full days of walking is such a torture to me!  I kept telling HP, 我不行了!  I felt like my foot super sore and gave way due to my lack of stamina..  HP was trained in sg to walk long distances in her shopping trips, that was why she can tahan for so long.  (Very good.)
- We witness the patriotic spirit of Thai, wearing yellow shirts throughout the day on Monday, which is one of their religious holiday.
- We saw alot of good-looking guys.  Eg:  sitting next to us, a "Alex Toh" pattern of Thai, while we are at Mcdonalds taking our supper; handsome retail personnel in one of the Optical shop, whom i happily seek enquiries on; A 斯文鄰家男孩 whom I encountered at Chinatown.  Wow.. 3 days in BKK, to compensate for my lack of handsome diet in SG.  What a Icy feast for us!
- Lastly, I have learnt to give aways smiles freely.. not sure abt HP??  Its a free comodity that brings smile to another stranger, which SGeans don’t give so readily. 

As a result, my mood have turned better now..  Having recharged after 3 days of intensive shopping, playing and eating.  What can you ask for after slogging so hard for the past 8 months?

Here i must thank HP and myself for taking this trip together.

Bangkok.. till we meet again.  Ciao!

..04082007..

Hi All,

I’m back from the extremely enjoyable BKK trip.  No riots, back safely!  My damage was $500.  All spent on shopping, food and some nice clothes.

Places we went to:

MBK, Central Mall (@ Chitlom), Bed Supper Club, Playground (but never went in).  Missed out Sirroco and Vanilla Industry.

What I have discovered from this trip:

- The thai people are quite friendly people.  They will smile at you even if they don’t know you!

- The stall holders at the JJ mkt are quite attitude.  Not all are so nice.  Maybe only a handful lot

- There is alot of foreigners at the shopping belts.  Most of the thais doesn’t really shop there as it is more costly.

-  As for the night spots, we visited nightsupperclub, which is at nana, more classy and for foreigners mainly. 

- During the past 4 days, i spent my time walking almost for 3 days, almost cannot make it already.  HP got a better stamina, of course, she have retrieved more bargains than me.  Overall experience was pretty enjoyable.

This is one of the most enjoyable and memorable trip i had in 2007 indeed

..01082007..