Gong Hei Fatt Choy: Rawr! - Day (-1)

I think my stomach is going to rip my clothes off cleanly along the belly line -__-

I think jumbo servings of food, ought to summarize my Chinese New Year so far ;) Every night confirm feel bloated and difficulty in breathing cos all the food are stacked and stuffed up to the throat.

I've also captured close to 400 shots since the day before CNY till the 2nd, so I think it will be wisest to separate the posts, don't want to overwork myself on this supposedly long and relaxing holiday ;) Took me quite some time to edit each pictures and resize them zzz....

And my goodness, the HEAT !! Jeez.... it's almost like staying in an oven. You practically feel the damned heat wave whenever you just put a toe out the doorway. It's that ridiculous. Extremely hot days are synonymous to Chinese New Year and it's always true. No rain for at least 3-4 days.

Just edited a few selected photos (if you call over 100 photos few), so I am pleased to say I've got a lorry full of photos ;)

Pre-CNY Day
'Sa chap meh', literally 30th night is the night before the first day of the Lunar Calendar, also the time when the whole family comes together and feast on a reunion dinner.

Was up pretty early, had a simple breakfast (Papa made me oat + walnuts + raisins) for breakkie then afterwards headed over to Ah Ma's place for lunch. Just had some stuff leftover from the night before with probably an addition or two dishes. The heat was really unbearable, we had the front wooden door closed and hid in the comfort of some shade with the humidifier (or whatever cooling machine that shoots out water vapor is called) on.

Couple hours of nap later had me and Su En (or rather myself more) helping out with the preps for the dinner.

Grandma's limousine ;)

Steamboat pot out!

Sexy Granny

Looked like I was pooping kekeke. Cleaning and sorting out this netted steamboat ingredient.

Pickles' favorite place in the world, almost like her Disneyland

Su Jen later called ...

Su En being extremely helpful with the preps.

:D

Respect to the elders is a must before CNY!

More flowers in Ah Ma's garden.

A quick trip back home, showered and changed, waited for the rest of the family, then made a beeline back to Ah Ma's place. Couldn't get bigass pack of ice cubes! Cham cham... had to depend on chilled can drinks now.

Party's already started!

Yummy broth, yumz everything inside.

Made more yumz with

My absolute favorite chili padi *melt. I only love this type, small light-ish green. More spice I feel.

Sa Yi was being a tad adventurous and wanted to have a little BBQ on the side. But most of us were rather tired and apprehensive about having to deal with more work, stress and mess. I just buat tak tau hehe, while Boy was forced into helping to fix the stove up.

CNY Bounty

Fave shot of Ah Ma's horned orchid in the garden.

I wonder if I've blogged about my cousin sister Sean's wedding? Her wedding was in Dec 2008 and she has already delivered a very button cute baby girl, Isabel!

Ji Yi said little Isabel has very deep blue eyes. When she was just born, she has very dominating Asian look, chinky eyes, and yellow-ish Asian skin tone, but looking through the photos again, macam turning ang moh lor!

Damn sad la, now my only CNY gambling kaki is this blob of fat...

Sigh

First I won a couple of times, then he won a few times, then I won back my money, then he got back his, then last skali I won about RM10? -__-

Afterwards, Ping CC had her laptop on and connected to Sean CC, live from Spain! Angel and Baby were there too lol.

Yo, Ah Ma in da house, y'all.

As usual Boy hogging up the whole picture.

Chak! ;)
Poor Piku hiding under the table. Terribly scared of the loud fireworks. Darn irritating lor those noisy ones.... Noisy already nvm, not pretty at all.

Wine from Valencia. Love the white wine, the other one is rose wine, but the taste is a bit too dry or somewhat. Not a wine xpert but I sure didn't enjoy it lah.



Drink ang moh wine the Chinese way! ;)

Hehe


Mom demonstrates her Qi Gong hehehe.... Everywhere she goes also sure must demo wan... at Ah Ma's place, our house...etc... Wonder if she gets commission for each person signing up for the course hehehhe.

Piku manja-ing on my front.

And the last picture of the post!

Sar Yi's bday is on the day before CNY, so we had a cute teddy bear Valentine's Bday cake for her lol.

Okies, First Day of the Lunar Calendar up next! ;)

Gong Hei Fatt Choy: Rawr! - Day (-2).

Happy Year of the Tiger!

It's been pretty hectic since I left back up north to SP. I took half a day off from work on Friday and then a train to Subang Jaya to meet up with my cousin there. Initially my cousin wanted to leave as soon as possible as to avoid the horrendous jam that can only co-exist with all those balik kampung festives.
Mana tau, as I met up with her at Dorothy Perkin's, which is already close to 1:30pm, she had the nerve to shop and get in some last minute CNY clothes there. Then, only we headed over to Sakae for lunch. Lol, there goes our plan to have an early start on the road.

Digressing, while waiting for my cousin to meet up at Subang Parade, I broke my non-coffee puasa lolz. It has been a month (plus minus) since I'd last had a cuppa. It was a combination of having to wait for Elyza and also a slight headache that prompted me to order an iced Americano. *smack lips.
By the time we were leaving KL, it was already close to 3:30pm. Elyza will drive during the first half of the journey and I will settle the rest. Elyza just bought a smart tag, thinking that it would save her a lot of hassle on the road but dang! First toll the darn reader beeped us and blinking the message "Kad Tidak Sah". What an ass toll! Elyza was furious because she had just used the card earlier during the day and it was working fine, plus, she reloaded like RM200 in it the day before. Further checks with the customer service hotline (took us quite a few minutes to get through their number) had us informed to check with the PLUS office buildings nearby toll exits.

Traffic was pretty heavy but it didn't come to a total standstill. The worst one was during my turn to chauffer. Just after Auto City in Juru we hit the total traffic jam jackpot. Imagine the horror:

1. Hit the first gear
2. Press a little on the accelerator
3. Gather leeeetleeee bit of speed, hopes up,
4. Press on clutch, hit to 2nd,
5. Hit brakes.6. Repeat cycle from 1.

And yes, she drives a manual, thank you for your concern, yes my feet does hurt after that.

Finally we reach SP around 8:30pm, which wasn't bad at all considering a total of 5 hours' drive on a Friday before a major festive celebration. I asked Elyza to call Ah Ma to check whether she'd cook and if there are any leftovers but she nagged and replied that it's too mafan for Ah Ma to cook for us so forget about is, got out of the highway into Taman Sejati to a hawker centre.

I checked my phone there and see a few calls missed. First was Mom, so called her up quickly and before I could even say hello, she was hankering the whole way through, "How come didn't answer my call? Don't know how to call already ar? Blah Blah Blah." Told her impatiently that I was driving that's why didn't hear and didn't pick up the call loh. Mom said Grandma did cook a bunch of stuff and asked us to come over quick.

Luckily I didn't order yet, so we just finished Elyza's lor bak and lor mee and headed for Grandma's.
Yumz! Because that was also Ah Ma and the other Aunties went to pai pai at Ah Kong's humble condo, so there were the usual tu tor th'ng (pork stomach soup, ohhh melt*), jiu hu char with lettuce and sambal belacan, lor ak + hard boiled egg, (hungry d T-T) but I didn't take any pictures lar, cos I was too tired and blardy hungry d...

I applied for a whole week off work for CNY! Snapped a number of pictures but completely forgot to pack my camera cable together lol. We'll see if Elyza has a similar cable later so I can upload them.

Days (-1) and 1 of the Tiger Year up next ;) Till then, curi-ed this photo.

Eve's Belated @ Ole Ole Bali

Eve celebrates her 25th in Singapore la actually (here I can reveal her age cos it's still, erm, below 30 hehehhe). Mei Ying texted me to say that it's going to be at Ole Ole Bali at Sunway, and to meet her at the Bangsar station where she will pick me up around 6:30pm after work on Wednesday.

Knowing these friends of mine, even though I came out late from the gym, Mei Ying couldn't get off work early, same goes to Grace. So I called Eve-Lyn up and she said she'll pick me up from Kelana Jaya, although she's in Puchong! So she had to go through like a big round to pick me up and then go back Sunway, which is close to Puchong.

Halfway through the train ride, Grace called me up to tell me that she can pick me up from Taman Jaya, somewhere near Amcorp Mall. I immediately called up Eve to stop her from driving over but she said she's already entering the 'jam' area... lol -___- So I lamely asked her whether she still wants to pick me up. Eve replied it's ok Grace can pick me up while she finds a way out of the highway.

Super -___-.

Anyways, both Grace and I finally reach Ole2 Bali close to 8pm (the plan was to have dinner at 7, so no surprises there). Eve even more geng, she's been walking all around Sunway Pyramid since 7pm.

Anyways.


The girls took this photo with the intention that when Mei Ying arrives then it's like magic suddenly she's not there and suddenly she is -___-.


Ordered my favorite Lemongrass Mojito!


Those two had barley lime.

Love it so much that I had to put another picture up :D

We proceed to order without waiting for MY as all of us were starving. I could eat a whole horse.

Starting with an appetizer.

Balinese Grilled Salad
With Grilled Chicken, With Grilled Squid, served with Rempeyek, and Spicy Lemongrass and Shallot Dressing. Soooooo sedap! We poured the dressing whole and mixed everything up. Sigh...

Siap Megoreng
Deep-Fried Lemongrass Marinated Half Chicken with Sambel Tera. That lower right dish is sort of a mix of yambean, french bean and some sort of unidentified stuff.

Surprisingly, the place does not offer Babi Guling since it's supposed to be highly popular in Bali. Pooh u halal eaters.

Ole Ole Trio
It's a Combination of BBQ-ed wings, Sate Lilit and Cumi-Cumi Goreng, served with Sambel Matah, Sambel Terasi, and Tartar Sauce. I especially love the deep fried squid, dipped with tartar sauce and it is yumz!

But I wonder, how come most of the stuff has to be deep fried? The first main also had deep fried chicken and the ole trio had the same thing. Although it said BBQ-ed, I still feel like it had a bit of a fried taste to it. Everything is oily, for sure.

Belated Bday gal poses.

Mei Ying finally arrives when we were almost three-quarter done with the Grilled Salad lol.

Anyway we were discussing future trips, possibly to Malacca to try out the food there when Mei Ying mentioned Elephant Farm or something like that. All of us turned to her and she was like, what? I commented that I thought she's bit too bimbotic to go on trips like that lol. And she said mana ada. Grace even worse, said that she's scared of them cos they're furry.

Anyways, later on Mei Ying told us about this personality test thingy that makes you close your eyes and imagine stuff and describe what you see. The quiz came to a scenario where the question was, you come across a stream which is deep enough to swim over and also very special that you can walk on the water across. What do you do. On my part, I thought I heard walk/wade through, being a swimmer of course I'd rather swim and not hurt my feet (lol) so I chose to swim. Eve chose the same and when asked about it later, she said that it's not possible. Mei Ying shot at her that it's suppose to be a scenario where you can do anything so just imagine!

It was so funny and MY commented, look who's the bimbo hahahhaha. I told Mei Ying that sorry, looks like she's being dethroned and Eve's the new Queen. Eve so happy and made the peace sign and yay-ed.

-___________-

Now she's here...

Group photo!

Happy Belated Birthday, Eve!

Long Weekend Back Home

Four day weekend, Thaipussam + Federal Territory Day = Happy me.

Plan to head back, swim to my heart's content back in USM pool, eat truckload of home-cooked food, get my facial done (it's been too long!), spend some time with Ah Ma, Mom and Dad, and of course Pickles!

Some random shots I took and edited for fun:

Taken somewhere in Bangsar while waiting for Mei Ying to pick me up for dinner at a steamboat place in Sunway.
The place is called Tasty Pot hehehe. For roughly RM30 per pax, you are entitled to an all-you-can-eat steamboat buffet. There are loads of raw stuff to be picked from, vegetables, fungal of all sorts, fish and meatballs, tofu-based dry stuff and the highlight would be: endless supply of grilled crabs! And they are really huge too.... but too salty IMO.

Random shot of Evan in Starbucks for his coffee fix. Digressing, it seems like every other person is getting dependent on coffee! Oh btw, did I mention that I've been coffee-free for close to a month now? yay! I mean I won't completely isolate myself from coffee la, but it feels darn good that I don't need caffeine to function properly now.

Did went for a swim, though not exactly to my heart's content, more like to my legs' discomfort :p Later on had dinner at Chiu Cang Kha (literally Foot of the Tree). We had a feast... I think there was at least 7 types of dishes. Had my favorite salted egg soft shell crab, fried fish (3 plates of these babies) , stir fry mixed vegetables and spinach, tofu, bai kut ong, and so much more! Best of all the price only came to about close to Rm100 for 8 people I think.

After dinner (and multiple attempts to shake off the leech - this pesty kid that sticks on the group uninvited lol) we decided to pump alcohol into our bodies at Bed.

Played cards and fooled with more pictures.

Liquid gold.

Oh!
I am collecting these!

Su Jen, if you're reading these hor, can start collecting them Budlights and Budweisers yah. In fact I would love to collect only those that I drink from, at countries aboard so it's just too bad that I didn't keep any when I was in US last year. This interest is in fact very much new found.


Most of the time back home, I just sleep, eat and watch tv on the spanking new 42". On Saturday, Mom cooked lunch! Guess what she cooked... she used to love making them but stopped for a long time ;)

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Lol, okla not these. This is just something to whet ze appetit ;)
Mushroom and chicken soup btw.

Chicken chop!

...with mixed peas, broccoli and carrots on the sides. The gravy is yumz! Mom mixed some baked beans to the tomato puree. It's not bad lar but I think I would prefer them without the baked beans. Mom said that normally she won't put baked beans but would have green peas instead.
Finally, let's take a peek at the laziest resident of the house. The one who never offered to help, eats and sleeps without a care in the world.

Some more can laze around while Papa is hard at work... Papa is cleaning the house bigass carpet btw.

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*Poke
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2nd laziest person would be CTY... wakes up after all the cows also gone back home d.