Me, Myself and I

Here's a clip i made of myself...haha.... and some of the people closest to me. I looked so cute when i was a toddler....what happened? *Sob*

Oh by the way, today is my anniversary with Kenny. HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!

Fire!!!

I had just arrived home last week from work when my housemate sent me an SMS informing me of a forest fire just outside my house. Being the kay poh paparazzi ( puffyrazzi) that i am, i immediately went down to get a taste of it all.


The fire was actually burning on a hilly area inside so the firemen had to erect a ladder and trekked into the affected area.

My house was all smoky and the area had a hazy blanket during the day. At night, it got a little better probably as it had cooled down.

Ahhh.... hunky guys in uniform camping under my house....hohoho....

I went down again after dark to get another look....

And i got this photo from the stomp website... haha...there's my house!

QQ and the Tangerine

Ehhh? What the hell is that lying on the floor? Looks too wrinkled to be my toy ball. Hmmm.... let's check it out....

Oops...mummy says that i can't touch it without her permission. I shall wait...wait....wait....

OK! She gives me the go-ahead sign! Yummm...let me try to taste it....

Ewwww....it's sour and it's hurting my eyes.... *sob*

Heehee...mummy says that i shouldn't try to eat it. Instead i should hold it like this and say 'Gong Xi Gong Xi' during the lunar new year =)

Homemade Pineapple Tarts

Today i'm going to share with everyone part of my mom's pineapple tart secret. She used to make the 'open' version, and the pineapple was cooked from scratch but with less people helping her now, she has progressed to making the 'closed' version and buying prepackaged pineapple. Here are the pineapple balls which i made in the morning. The whole lump of pineapple paste has to be rolled into bite-size balls.

After lunch, my mom started preparing the dough for the tarts.

The dough was also rolled into bite-size balls, and the pineapple balls are stuffed into the dough one by one. This year i learnt how to perform this step, and my mom was stationed next in the production line where she used a pair of scissors to make little thorns on the tarts. My father, meanwhile, put on the last touch by placing the clove.

Here the tarts are ready to be placed in the oven. Their surface has been glossed with a layer of egg yolk for its shine.

Finally, the tarts are out of the oven. My sisters love these, hope they'll ultimately learn to make their own...haha....

Lab Coats to Cocktail Dresses

This year's annual dinner was held at Amara Hotel. Look at the transformation from lab coats to pretty dresses/outfits. What a rare sight that can only be seen few times a year. Last year was a failure because we didn't capture as many photos as we would have liked, but this year we compensated by taking way TOO MANY photos!

Some of the guys...judging from this collage, i guess i have a soft spot for guys who work for the alkoxylate plant....haha.... guess which one of them is my favourite?

Two old friends and two new friends! Soo Sun looked so dainty in her white frock... Anna and LK were smart in their black pantsuit attire while Sixian was looking absolutely radiant as well.

Some of the other girls...El was a dead wringer for Cleopatra...haha.... MJ was without doubt one of the best-dressed of the night =P

All the younger generations in the lab ( under 32s) ....Jianwen, what are you doing there??

Quality Control Cookie Monster

Agent LL : Ehh....? What is this? Grandma is preparing to bake something for us? Let me CHECK what it is...

Agent LL : OK OK...i know what it is now. Grandma's making Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies. I will assist her, as usual, being the good assistant i always am. Let me CHECK the recipe first.

Agent LL : OK, Grandma has placed all the ingredients into the mixing bowl. I'll have to poke around to CHECK if she's put in the right stuff.

Agent LL : Everything's going smoothly. The stuff is being stirred in the mixer. Wow, listen to the whirring sound.... i can't wait to taste it. Before that, just let me CHECK the progress.

Agent LL : Grandma, what are doing? I've done a check, everything's going according to plan.

Agent LL : Agent KK , your duty is to turn this big dough into smaller lumps. Do it like this, easy does it... just look at my demonstration. Don't worry, i'll check on you from time to time!

Agent LL : The cookies are done! Good job everybody...CHECK this out!

Day 10 - Bern and Olten

We woke up this morning and looked out the window to discover that it was snowing in Interlaken. After breakfast, we made our way through the snow to the train station only to find the trains were way way behind schedule (much to the shock of everyone, Swiss precision hardly fails on any occasion!). A professor from the University of Bern sitting with me on the congested train was translating the German announcements on the train for me, and also telling me he was already 2.5 hours late for work. It seemed that no one expected snow in October! Not even the Swiss Rail!

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We made our way to Bern and checked into the hotel. The temperature gauge in Bern Train Station read 2 deg C. From the first day when we landed in Geneva, we had air-conditioning in our room, till now the last day, we were actually using radiators in our room! After dropping of our stuff, we took a bus to Barengraben ( Bear Pits). Bears have been an integral part of Bern since their Bernese troops brought back a real bear in 1513, and it is said the Bern is named after bears. Much to the dismay of the onlookers, the bears were asleep in their den and didn't want to come out. I made a few snowballs and tossed them to wake them up but they refused to budge.

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So, we walked back towards the Old Town. Bern is more quintessentially Swiss than other cities. The inhabitants of Bern were often mocked by Swiss residing in other parts of Switzerland for their 'legendary slowness', but this has actually resulted in the beautifully historic town being left intact for years. The people in Bern believaed in leaving things alone.

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However, it was easy to get lost in the maze of the town, where all buildings and roads are almost of the same shade and design! We decided to keep on the main road with the trams which led us to Zeitglockenturm, originally the western gate when the medieval town was extended. This clock tower is the most recognisable landmark in Bern and the road leading up to it is decorated with many different fountains. The clockwork and figures on the clock tower begins to twirl 4 minutes before the hour and attracts many tourists daily.

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After walking around Bern looking at their quiant shophouses for another 2 hours, we departed on a train to the industrial town of Olten, just 45 minutes outside Bern. Wen Lee had done some research and found out that famous Swiss chocolate Lindt has a factory outlet there which is open on Tuesdays and Thursdays 2-4 pm. We reached Olten at about 12 pm, and promptly had lunch. We got lost for about an hour, as no one in Olten spoke English and we were lost. After all, this town is not exactly a tourists' spot! Finally we found a restaurant by the river where the waiter actually spoke English and he directed us to the factory. It actually felt like walking in Tuas ( albeit a very COLD Tuas), going to the factory. Finally we reached the Chocolate Factory and did our chocolate shopping.

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After that, we went back and combed the city of Bern some more, before getting into a small diner to have Crepes for dinner, along with Cafe Mocha with a dash of Bailey's Cream. Having satisfied our hunger, and longing for our warm beds, we went back to our hotel and packed our stuff.

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Early the next morning, we left for Geneva, about 2 hours away, where we were to fly to Amsterdam (Holland) for our flight home. ByeBye Switzerland.... Switzerland had been my dream country since i was a little girl, and finally i was able to fulfill my dream of visiting it, and it didn't disappoint one bit!

Click on the hd button on the right bottom corner for High Definition.

MOF Japanese Desserts

Now let's head for desserts! I haven't had dessert for a long time... longing for a good treat =) This MOF Japanese Sweets and Coffee in West Coast Plaza is its 2nd flagship store ( if i'm not mistaken ) after the one in Lot 1. After having dessert there, a colleague suggested that i try its coffee cos she said it was one of the better coffees she's had so i might just visit them again.


A waffle for my friend who loves waffles. The presentation was really nice, but they should've used a smaller plate cos it made the dessert seemed tiny.

Shiratama Kurian, it contained kanten jelly, supposedly a trademark of this dessert place. It is similar with those rectangular jellies you find in your ice kachang, only bigger and better-tasting. This dessert came with a brown sauce which had an odour like a cross between maple syrup and gula melaka.

A Mango Kakigori for my mango-loving friend and to match her yellow T as well....hahaha...the shaved ice was really fine, and melted in our mouths... it was like eating clouds... =P

Macha Kurian, a dessert with a very heavy green tea taste. Came with generous servings of ice cream, soft serve ice cream and fruits. Highly recommended! This place is one of the rare places i've been to in which the pictures in the menu were actually inferior to the real servings!

Heading home after a very fulfilling afternoon...bye~

Sushi Tei

After a lousy bet with my friends + delaying it for close to a year, we finally settled the score and celebrated by dining in the new West Coast Plaza's Sushi Tei. I'm not sure whether it's because this place is new and not fully opened or because the economy is not exactly flourishing, but the place was deserted on a Saturday afternoon!


Haha....those who were not paying looked the happiest, the semi-paying one was able to crack a smile. The one who was being hit in the wallet could hardly muster a grin =(

Caviar sushi! Nice eh? Classy look, but i couldn't say the same about the taste. Blech....

My favourite food which i'll order whenever i'm in a Japanese restaurant - Chawanmushi! There's something really comforting about Japanese Steamed Egg... everytime i have one i feel so good inside.

The highlight of the meal - Teriyaki Garlic Beef Steak ( medium rare ). Really tasty and appetizing, would recommend this to beef-lovers. The meat was tender and marinated well.

Dragon roll as suggested by LK. Very nicely decorated and a good dish to share with a bunch of friends.

Come on let's eat!!!! Oh my god, even the waiter was laughing at us...

Last but not least, a little soup to wash it all down. Sushi tei's kaminabe was really fresh, with its multitude of vegetables, tofu and crab. The supple glass noodles was chewy and went well with its miso soup.

Day 9 - Grindelwald, Jungfraujoch and Lauterbrunnen

When we woke up on Day 9, the rain had not subsided. We were quite taken aback, because we had planned for a visit to Jungfraujoch. We decided to still go, since there was nothing to do in Interlaken on a wet day, anyway.

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It was quite a pleasant surprise, when our train from Interlaken pulled right into the town of Grindelwald, it started snowing! Great! I've never seen snow falling before...We bought the train tickets to Jungfraujoch and walked around Grindelwald, soaking in the Christmas atmosphere. The town is right below the imposing Eiger mountain ( but we couldn't see it due to the snowfall), and was nicknamed the 'glacier village' for its proximity to two large seas of ice.

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After an hour in Grindelwald, we boarded our train to Klein Scheidegg, where we were to change to Jungfraubahn ( Bahn = Train in German). Along the way we saw multitudes of snow-covered pine trees and small huts with smoking chimneys...i really felt like i was in the land of Rudolph and Santa Claus =) The last leg of the train journey passed through nearly 10km of a rock tunnel. This tunnel took 16 years to drill in 1912 and it overcomes a gradient of 25%, covering an altitude of 1400 m.

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Midway during the train journey, the train stopped inside Eiger and Monch to let passengers down for a 5-minute visit to the viewing platforms. It was a very very very foggy day, so no passengers went down for a look. Finally the train pulled into the sci-fi Sphinx metereological station. Wen Lee and I tried to get outdoors but the wind that day was between 70-90 km/hr...i almost flew away from Top of Europe...!

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And so, we went to buy some postcards to post home from the highest post box and highest train station in the world! WooHoo~ With that done, we visited the Ice Palace within Jungfraujoch. There were a variety of ice sculptures and it felt like being in an icecube at this place... it was minus 8 deg C in Jungfraujoch, so you can imagine how chilly i was, considering the fact that i find even air-conditioned rooms far too cold.

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Later we took the train back down, not to Grindelwald but to Lauterbrunnen instead. It wasn't snowing in Lauterbrunnen, which was lucky for us because Lauterbrunnen has countless beautiful cow pastures and stone walls. We walked along the unpretentious town, towards its famous waterfall, Staubbach Falle. I was astonished when i saw the waterfall because instead of the gushing water i saw from the travel booklet i was holding, i saw a semi-frozen waterfall. Darn.... We had our late lunch/early dinner at a small eatery in Lauterbrunnen.

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We took a train back to Interlaken, and shopped in town. We purchased some watches, and the old man at the shop talked to us. He asked where we were from, and he surprised me by saying that he comes to Singapore/Malaysia for vacations frequently and named us the places he'd been too, including Kuantan! Haha... Hearing him rattling out the names ( Lumut, Kuantan, Melaka, Penang, KL, Genting Highlands, Kota Kinabalu, Redang, Kuching and his next intended destination Langkawi), this Swiss man has officially been to more places in Malaysia than i have!!

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As usual, we got back to the hotel just after sundown, with Wen Lee enjoying her beer. Beer there was cheap and she had been meaning to get a big can and so she finally got her wish!

羅志祥 撐腰

Xiao Zhu's latest MV, quite an interesting one. In the music video, he runs a marathon, thanking important people and places in his life. Among the people and places making cameo appearances (in that order) are his mentor, fellow host, Taipei Arena, Taipei Ximending, TV producer, drama director, previous co-star, duet partner, dance instructor, rumoured girlfriend, showbiz buddy, personal assistant ( who also happens to be his cousin ), make-up artist and lastly his mother at the crossing line. Haha...this MV is my favourite among all his other works. Happy Chinese New Year!

Day 8 - Interlaken and Bern

Today, it was bye-bye to wonderful Lucerne and hello Interlaken! It was raining...drat it.... In our train, we met this jolly old man from Zurich who was on his 3-day trip around Switzerland. He spoke to us in his halting English and took several photographs of us with his cellphone...haha...

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Interlaken , according to several friends who've been there, is a very outdoorsy kinda place. The view in Interlaken is incomparable, gazing at the Jungfrau mastiff from a distance with its icy peaks and a running stream cut right through the town. We saw nothing of that sort during our 2-night stay there, much to our disappointment. It was raining all the way, temperature was about 5-8 deg C and it was much too foggy to see anything. It was sad, cos i was looking forward to the stunning views in Bernese Oberland =(

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We checked in to the Chalet Oberland, within walking distance from Interlaken West train station. Our plan to visit Mystery Park was ruined when our receptionist in the hotel informed us that the place has shut down. I was getting hyped up about those Mayan temples, Egyptian Pyramids etc. and it all came crashing down. Fret not, we had a back up plan, to take a furnicular up Heimwehfluh near our hotel. We walked there in the drizzle only to find the furnicular has been closed due to bad weather. Bahhh.....

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We were left with nothing to do... anyway, we went to have lunch... i had Goulash Soup which was very soothing in the cold. Wen Lee and I discussed and decided that we should head to Bern , about an hour's journey away. We were slated to visit and stay in Bern on our last day, but our schedule for that last day was rather tight, and so we thought it may be a good idea to get some of our itenirary out of the way first.

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Once we were in Bern, we wandered around it's fairy-tale cobbled streets of its Old Town. Switzerland's capital is so proud of its medieval town centre, and it has been declared by UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization as a World Heritage Site.

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We spotted the Bundeshaus (Swiss Houses of Parliament) from afar. No one would miss this building built in an impressive Florentine style complete with a stained glass dome. Just nearby is a market on Barenplatz selling food and garments. This place is also dotted with cafe terraces.

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With the aid of a map, we managed to find the two places we were looking for just a street away from each other : Munster and Einstain Haus. Towering above the roofs of the old town is the huge Munster, an enormous church which took 150 years to complete. I stared in awe at the main portal , with its sculpture of the Last Judgement made so meticulously and detailed.

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As for Einstein Haus, it is a small museum which was the humble apartment where a young Albert Einstein lived with his family while he was working for CERN. I have always thought that Einstein was German, but from here i discovered that he renounced his citizenship and adopted a dual Swiss-American citizenship....hehe...yeah, i know...my general knowledge is pretty limited!

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The cold was getting to my bones plus it was getting late and we returned to Interlaken. We dined in the restaurant on the ground floor of our hotel. We had a Fondue Chinois meal, which came with a large plate of beef, assorted pickles, various dipping sauces, fries and a pot with a soup base. We wiped everything off our plates and almost died from overeating. After dinner, we were treated to live performances of traditional Swiss music which included yodelling, the Alphorn and a string quartet..

We went back to the hotel to rest. Speaking of the hotel, i love the heated floor in the bathroom and the three peaks on our hotel bedframe which symbolises the 3 famous mountains in the area : Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau.

Agent LL's Pizzeria Part II

OK, back to making pizza. The dough is out of the bread-maker....this part is the hardest work... kneading kneading and kneading. Then it's rolling, rolling and rolling.

Whoaaaa.... Pizza toppings! The best thing about making your own pizza is that you can choose your favourite toppings.

Just having a piece of chicken to try out the taste. MmmMMmmm....good... now i'll have a piece of pineapple...mmmMMmmmMmm...good.... what about the carrots? MmmmmmmmMMM good....and some of that cheese....MmmmmMMMmmm good.....oh oh oh, don't forget the mushrooms....MMmmmmMmm good....and....and....

Lastly, top the pizza....spread out everything as evenly as you can...

It's completed...now i'll just have it brought to the oven... ahh, i can't wait for the feast...

How does it look? Better than Pizza Hut's , i bet.... It should taste really good as well. Come on everyone...come and enjoy Chef Lele's home-made pizza.

I'll just have a slice...must stay slim. Now, where's my brother Kaikai? I'll save some for him...and QQ as well. I'm sure they'll like this.