ahh...back to blogging after procrastinating for a few days...

yesterday, it was charmaine's 18th bday so Ying yi, Jiahui, Allen, her and me gathered at Orchard MRT. the time was supposed to be 12 pm but as you know about singaporean punctuality, i arrived at 1215, and some of the others later. so we started walking towards takashimaya shopping centre at 1245.

we got a seat at crystal jade pretty easily. its not too bad on a friday afternoon...compared to the weekends...where u have to get a queue number...similar to those u get in hospitals and clinics. i ordered century egg porriadge, ying yi had chicken wanton noodles, and we ordered the usual prawn things in the wooden baskets, xiao long bao, chicken feet, egg tarts...etc. sumptuous. i haven't really checked out much tim sum places in melb. gotta make a trip to boxhill someday. i hear its good there.

after that...we hung out at kinokuniya for a bit....didn't have much to buy so i ended up getting some gifts from the stationary section. they've got all those nice jap stuff with nice designs on em.

allen was patient enough to follow me to make a pair of prescription shades at capitol optical in lucky plaza. its a haven for filipinos and indian nationals! there was this indian guy in the shop bargaining so loudly with the lady boss...he was like, "PLEASE...PLEASE...!!! SELL TO ME AT THIS PRICE!!" I've never seen anyone bargaining with such passion and fervour! Serious! He sounded like he was very desperate to buy the pair of oakley shades. According to the lady, these people from India are kind of loaded, but unfortunately for them, many of these products are not available in India, hence, when they come here on shopping sprees, they really shop till their heart's content.

which leads me to the conclusion that if i were loaded, i'd very much prefer to stay in singapore, than, let's say...melbourne. melbourne's great, with lovely weather, but there's more stuff to spend your money on in singapore. lots of great restaurants to check out, lots of shopping areas, lots of imported goods, its a haven for electronic goods and computers and IT products too. u hardly get such a wide variety in melb.

jonathan aow was kind enough to give me a complimentary ticket to this musical put up by Singapore Management University (SMU). He was playing the keyboard in the orchestra. It was the opening night and the guest of honour was Claire Chiang. I must say the standard of acting was really impressive in view of the fact that this was a university production! The music was apparently composed by an external source but the actors and actresses really did put up an outstanding and convincing performance!

Met alvina during the reception. It took me a while to recognize her! wow....its been almost 3 years since i last saw her! She's still that elegant, eloquent and classy young lady with the makings of a future businesswomen. I can just imagine her in those business suits making presentations to her clients, at them with that set of piercing eyes. She left me her name card, which looked pretty impressive...President of SMU Broadcast Entertainment. and in return, i left her my contact on a piece of scrap paper, or flyer.... see what 2 years of NS has set you back by!

George, Jon and I headed over to Bugis Junction for a drink and to chill out. Its been a long time since we did so. We wanted to sit in the lounge of Hotel Intercontinental and enjoy the jazz band but it was full house. So we just settled for a dogdy cafe in Parco. George was telling us about some gruesome operation that he witnessed....like extracting the kidneys from a brain dead woman with internal cerebral haemorrhage. Apparently, organ extraction is a messy and tricky business and not nearly as simple as a layman would imagine it to be.

I got home at 1230 am and had to walk quite a distance thanks to my missing the last bus. Thanks to my voracious appetite for food, I was so hungry i just couldn't go to bed and did not relish the idea of satisfying myself with instant mee since i have heaps of that in melbourne. So, jiawei, being the only person on MSN at that time, and I agreed on going to Geylang! Yes! Geylang! The red light district of Singapore...for some good beef hor fun!