A Postcard to Home

Closure of Blog

2007-02-21T10:52:00.000Z

Ok.. finally I've finished backdating all my posts! For everyone's (including my own's) convenience I've linked all my travel exploits as below.. from the very first visit in Stockholm to my final city in Prague. Enjoy!

6th September

Stockholm

11th September

Norway

31st October

Halloween Party

2nd November

Dublin

5th November

Scotland

6th November

Carlisle

11th November

Nottingham

23rd November

London

28th November

Belgium

1st December

Amsterdam and Liverpool

9th December

London Again

18th December

Zurich

20th December

Interlaken

21st December

Geneva and Lausanne

22nd December

Florence

23rd December

Pisa

24th December

Rome

28th December

Paris

19th January

Prague

Well.. that pretty much sums up my SEP experience.. other than the studying part of course. This blog captures my wonderful memories made in those 4 months.. all of which I will never forget for life.

Till we meet again, Europe.
Ciao.

Transiting in Bangkok

2007-01-23T10:20:00.001Z

2 hours more before my flight back to Singapore.. could have been 3 hours or more.. but thanks to the delay of the previous flight for more than 1 hour.. shortened my waiting time here in Bangkok.

The 12 hour flight was faster than expected. First time in my life I slept for more than half the flight.. think staying up overnight with the kids the night before was a good move =)

Mixed feelings now.. When the warm humid Thai air hit me I immediately missed UK weather.. but the smell of impending rain and the dark clouds here brought a warm sense of homeliness that's so comforting.

So now I'm sitting on the floor plugging into one of the secret hidden power plugs outside the transit lounge and riding on some unencrypted wireless network trying to kill time as people race past me via foot or travellator to catch their flights.

Update once more when I reach home finally.. and definitely will backdate all my past overseas trips.

Cya.

天下无不散之宴席

2007-01-22T14:27:00.000Z

Less than an hour before I take the bus to Heathrow airport.. sigh.

Heavy hearted leaving this place.. especially after such a memorable Prague trip. I don't know what this feeling is but.. it's intense. Maybe it's the I'm-never-coming-back-to-this-part-of-the-world-again feel.. maybe it's coz what the kids have done for me.. with me... *sigh*

Maybe a few episodes of Prison Break and the smell of Singapore air will cure.

Bye bye UK, Europe, and all my friends.

Thanks for the wonderful memories.

Prague

2007-01-19T23:59:00.000Z

My final European destination, with the best friends that I’ve made this season. How much greater can this experience get?

19th Jan – Off to Prague!
Going to Prague itself is a very special event for Manhon and I.. coz we missed the previous flight there. Haha we were even joking the other time that we had higher chance of missing this flight coz we had more Singaporeans in the group this time (the girls missed two trains to Germany during the last period of time that we were supposed to be in Prague haha) So the whole trip this time was meticulously planned out. I was still not sober from the previous night’s drinking and was struggling with my anyhow-packed bags (checked out of my Leeds room that very morning) as we hobbled to the coach station at 4am in the morning.

Reached London at 10am or so. And the plan was to have the ever famous Bayswater Four Seasons Roast Duck for lunch. The rest of the crew went to queue up at Bayswater while the Kid (Manhon) accompanied me to Martin’s place to dump my bags.

Ah but due to time constraints we didn’t eat at Bayswater itself in the end. We dabaoed the duck rice and ate it at Victoria Coach station itself. Mmmmmmmm and it was still so DELICIOUS!! Whoa really I think it was the fats but the duck just melted in my mouth and the meat was so succulent and tasty and wooooh. Kid said that it tasted much better at the shop itself. Oh well, guess this was the next best option for me.

Once again, I boarded the Greenline Coach 757 to London Luton Airport. Really Kid and I have a love-hate relationship with this bus service. Was a cheaper way to the airport but at that time we only arrived 15 minutes before the plane took off. So along the way we were reminiscing about our past experience.. re-analyzing what we could have done blah blah blah.. much to the irritation of Sarah and Yingying sitting in front of us.. haha.

Not hard to tell that actually getting on the plane itself was an achievement for us.. Arriving in Prague was truly celebratory. I was damn happy that we were finally there. Kid was too. Haha guess this gives the trip a happy start.
Blah blah blah.. checked into the hostel and we immediately scouted for food. Prague is literally quite a dead city at night. Shops all closed.. no people around.. but we still managed to find a few eateries around that were still open. And we ultimately decided on 1 that blatently displayed their ‘Best Café 2005 and 2006’ award right at their door.

So-called traditional Czech food is all about meat, meat and more meat. I ordered this huge meat platter dish which had a bit of what everyone else ordered. Not something to eat on a bad stomach (haven’t recovered from the previous night’s drinking) but I just needed the kick of eating lotsa traditional Czech food.

20th Jan – New Town, Old Town
The day wasn’t very cold.. but it probably didn’t start well for Sarah.. coz she stepped on dog shit. Bwahahhahaaa! So naturally she became today’s Joke-of-the-Day.

Map on hand.. I navigated to the places of interest as indicated on the map while the Kid with the guide book explained in his dyslexic English what the hell those sights were.. Henry Tower.. Powder Tower.. blah blah blah.. The rest of us just took photos. Neub was the official photographer simply because his camera was the best. Haha.

Probably one of the nicer places where we snapped a lot of photos was Wencelas Square.. Paid to go into the National Gallery and obviously none of us were particularly interested as we walked out within an hour. Sian la.

Lunch was at Café Lourve which Samuel recommended. And lo and behold – it was ‘Best Café 2003 and 2004’! Food was good. The hot chocolate I had was a demonic concoction of pure chocolate aimed to worsen my loose bowels (but it was darn good). The toilets were good as well haha.

Turning out of the National Theatre we hit the river.. it was then when I realized why Prague is named the Most Beautiful European Country. The scenery was truly comfortably beautiful. Maybe cos it wasn’t as built up as the Seine or the Thames river.. or cos it was bigger than the Florence or Pisa rivers.. or it simply had the right mix of beautifully scattered old buildings, bridges, trees and birds minus hordes of tourists who have diminishing effects on its rustic feel. An excellent place for the many group photos that we took here =)

Yah and Kid being the kid he is started taking out the bread that he kopped earlier and throwing at the seagulls around the river. Didn’t take long before the rest of us joined in and Neub took many excellent photos of the birds in action.

We saved the crossing of the famous Charles Bridge for later/tomorrow and headed into the Old Town for a walk. It was souvenir shops galore as we kept on stopping to see what we could get back home. From old communist caps to Russian dolls going down to the most minuscule sizes to puppets to traditional wooden Czech toys, these little gifts were hot stuff as they were by far the cheapest things to buy as presents in all of Europe that we’ve traveled.

See this photo? Totally unposed. 3 cheers to Neub for catching this very good shot of the day!

Took a few steps more before we stumbled on the next must-see destination in Prague – the Astronomical Clock. It’s an interesting and clever contraption.. every hour the clock will chime with the figurines on the clock moving their little actions. It’s like a toy magic box just that it’s now huge sized and placed in the open subject to the battering of the weather and it’s a wonder how the mechanisms survive till now. Apparently the 2 faces of the clock can tell lots more information then just the time.. but also daylight hours, moon blah blah blah. Real clever invention.

Nearby was also this Jan Hus statue which was often featured in ‘Lovers in Prague’.. a typical dumb Korean series that the Kid and I watched the whole thing in 1 night to psyche ourselves up for our previous Prague trip. In the show the "write your wishes on paper and stick on the statue and it will come true" legend was utter rubbish.. haha. The actual statue was a clean slate! But still worth a photo moment.. after all it’s featured in the show…

Only 40kronos to go up the Old Town Hall Tower.. for an old tower it has a surprisingly futuristic lift
And we were greeted by the breathtaking sights of Prague!

I personally like this photo a lot. Some ang moh took this photo and he said “Say SEX!” which we all spontaneously did. See everyone so happy?

Didn’t take long for the sun to set. Night-time Prague is equally mystically spectacular.
So after dinner our dear Sarah did the navigation to bring us back to our hostel. She ODAC one leh.. Ok lor.. so I kept my map and we guys just followed behind. After all Prague is so small can’t get that lost…

But keeping tabs on my compass tells me we were walking in the wrong direction for quite some time already. So secrectly I took out my map and started to figure out where we were.. But I just can’t find the street name that we were on on the map.

Then I heard bursts of laughter when the rest of them stopped at the end of the street facing a big open area.

“I can’t seem to find where we are. Can you help me find out where we are?” I asked them, most of whom who were still laughing away.

Neub then pointed to something that looked strikingly familiar…
The Jan Hus statue.

BWAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAAHAHAAA!!! I think all of us were rolling on the floor laughing uncontrollably while passers-by just gave us weird glances trying to figure out what was wrong with us. It was hilarious!

So our dear Sarah became the joke of the day today. Even after the guys bathed we had to write ‘GPS’ and ‘Astronomical Clock’ on the bathroom mirror to remind the girls of our (mis)adventures when they bathed. Hahaa!

Teckie’s birthday was past midnight.. but we were yet to plan a ‘surprise’ for him. The birthday cake Sarah painstakingly dragged from Old Town was residing happily on the free refrigeration on the window ledge. We forgoed our episode of Prison Break and went to sleep.. and the plan was 15 mins later we would all sing Happy Birthday together.

Think I really fell asleep hahaa.. but I woke up in time and yeah.. it was Happy Birthday Teckie! Now he as old as me already hahaa

21st Jan – Charles Bridge, Prague Castle
Yep. The next morning we went back to take a photo of the place we stumbled upon the night before.. How can we forget?
Probably the most famous thing in Prague would be the Charles Bridge.. quite obvious due to the fact that it has an overwhelming number of tourists on the bridge itself as compared to anywhere else in Prague. So wad about this bridge? It’s a stone Gothic bridge that connects the Old Town and Malá Strana. Its construction was commissioned by Czech king and Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV and began in 1357. In charge of the construction was architect Petr Parléř whose other works include the St. Vitus Cathedral at the Prague Castle.

Due to the kid’s horrible pronunciation of his Eyewitness travel book.. I took over and read out all the descriptions of the statues along the bridge as we passed by them.. while we took silly pictures in front of the them. Seems like a common interest among all of us. Haha.

It was a loooooooong way up to Prague Castle. But as usual, after every long climb up, we are treated with a magnificent view.
Though I must say Prague Castle itself was a tad disappointing. With all it’s hype I would expect it to be some lavish magnificent castle with lots of photo moment. Turns out to be like Skansen in Sweden.. a big compound with small buildings that turn out to be little museums featuring life in the Castle compounds. Yah come to think of it.. it’s more like 紫禁城 in China rather than any of the European castles featured in all the other neighbouring countries.

Well.. lunch was on me that afternoon. It was the last meal we would be having together. Thought that was the least I could do after all they have done.. for my birthday.. for the farewell =)

Squeezed some time before heading to the airport to shop at the marketplace.. hoping to grab some last-minute gifts and to clear out all of Czech dollars.

There was only a one hour+ buffer between arriving in London-Luton and everyone’s National Express bus back to Leeds. All had lessons but Kid’s First Aid lesson was especially important as if he missed it he had to re-take the lesson for £200! So we took all precautions we could NOT to miss our flight back to London.
Everything went fine. We were at the airport so early we had to sit down doing nothing just to wait for our gate number to open so that we could check in. We even had time to really spend our combined amount of 300+Kr on some crappy dinner. And of course we boarded the plane on time.

Whoa but 谋事在人、成事在天! The plane could not take off because the airport at Luton could not detect our plane on the GPS! Whoa how sway can that be?

1 hour waiting in the plane.
We arrived in London at 2300+hrs. Takes about 45 minutes to get back to Victoria.
Their coach back to Leeds was as 2330.

We attempted to camp in Victoria train station but was chased away. It was freezing cold outside so we tried our luck at Kings Cross station instead (coz Zuther checked online it was a 24hour train station).

But it was closed too! Luckily Teckie managed to comtact Weilun who was in Imperial so we spent whatever’s left of the night at his place. Saved from the cold!

Kid’s train was at 6am. Expensive train back sia.. think it was about £40+ with Rail card. No choice la he had to attend his lessons. Sent him off to the train station. Yep, that was the last I saw of him. Hai…

Headed down to Victoria Coach station to send the rest off at 8am too.

And that was the last I saw all of them.

Thanks for all the memories, dear friends.

What a way to end off this trip… this whole SEP.

Last 2 days in Leeds

2007-01-18T05:00:00.000Z

It's the wee hours of the night and I'm like almost done packing my stuff ready to check out of my room in St Marks. As the rain patters outside and the music plays from my laptop, the incessant ringing of unbearing and reluctance lingers within me. This is it - SEP has come to an end.

The elation of submitting my final exam script in Leeds was short-lived, as it was quickly overcome by the fact that I'd be leaving this place for good. The next batch of exchange students arrived today and I took them for a short walk around Morrisons the supermarket. Didn't bring them around much though.. coz it was 5pm already and everything was closed.

Met up with the Singaporean peeps for dinner at Red Chilli's - this nice spicy Chinese Restaurant down the road.. for my birthday dinner. They treated =) Haha partly because I had no pounds left. But the most touching thing was that they actually baked/made an ice-cream birthday cake for me. Really appreciate all their effort but I couldn't find any other way to express my gratitude other than 'Thanks', 'thanks' and 'thanks'.

Hai, it's stuff like this that makes my second last day in Leeds more heavy-hearted.
Thank you Manhon, Sarah, Yingying, Nic, Zuther, Sherrie, Edmund and Teckie. And Yuanjing for the present. I'm really going to miss you guys a lot a lot.

Tomorrow the Singapore Society's going to organise a pot-luck farewell party for Yuanjing and I. Whoa lao eh, just want to make me cry only la.

It is a blessing to receive warmth in the world.

Last Burst of FIRE

2007-01-16T13:09:00.001Z

This moment marks the start of ultimate mugging coz my last paper is Transfer Processes aka Fluid Mechanics which I absolutely suck at. Knowing that people have failed this module doesn't really help.. screwing up my previous 30% assignment makes things worse..

Past few papers have been fine.. if not fantastic haha.

Thanks Hiroko Martina, Yu, Yuanjing, Fion, Eric and Manhon for the card =) and again Fion Yuanjing Yu Manhon for the small celebration =)

Heading to library to camp now.

CHEEOOONNNGGGG AAAHHHHHH!!!!!

iPhone

2007-01-12T12:28:00.000Z

What made me go "Wah! Wah! Wah!!!" in the library.

Makes my iPod look like crap.

Cheong to the end!

2007-01-11T01:02:00.001Z

Studying is so sian.. Can't wait for the exams to be over so I can end my days camping in the library.
At least studying here is not as shiong as back in NUS. Wohoho last night I still could afford to watch all 6 episodes of Prison Break with the stupid neighbour of mine. Yes, I only have 6 episodes kopped from Chye's hard drive. I need all the other episodes!!! Who has??

Another paper in 9 hours time. Going to hit the sacks soon.
It's going to be 5 consecutive days of exams.. Yeah going to be over soon!

Paradoxes

2007-01-08T03:27:00.000Z

So this is the beginning of the end. Exams officially start tomorrow. I seem prepared for it but it feels strange that i only studied this module for less than 2 days. Argh anyway I already did a 50% essay for this module so see how tomorrow la.

10 more days to end of exams. I don't feel nervous or anything.. dunno why. Keep on thinking about going back to Singapore. Feels sad that this whole episode is concluding.. yet can't wait to see all that is back home.

Thank NUS for the intensive-study training.. camping in library with food with Yuanjing mugging our lives away.. managed to revise almost all my 6 modules in a week. Don't see a lot of pple in the library though.. wonder where they mug.. or if they even mug at all... And because the slackers at the library closed at 5pm during the weekend, we found a nice spot to mug.. Civil Engin LT!

Oh actually the LTs quite high tech one..

That's Sarah the kantang Ah Lian.. lawyer-to-be.. aiyoh...
Had dinner with the Singaporean gang at my place. Celebrated Zuther's birthday. And then they started talking about renting their own house next year and where their place is going to be and paying more for a nice cosy place and blah blah blah. So fun right? A house with all your friends staying together. I was about to ask for an invite to their house warming.. but then it struck me that I won't be around...

Gosh I'm going to miss these kids lots lots.

Anyway.. I just realised how terrible mess my hair has become after 4 months of not cutting. Took this photo after bathing.. no gel.. no beannie.. original disgusting hairdo
Wa lao the 1st thing I do when I get back is to get my hair in order.

Hai.. ok la. Going to sleep already. Wish me luck for exams tomorrow.

Happy New Year of the Bond!

2007-01-01T00:00:00.000Z

Boy I was glad I was there! Happy New Year folks!

Bye Bye 2006

2006-12-31T00:29:00.001Z

Last day of 2006.. what a turmultous year this has been.. from Block Head woes to my 1st Biathlon to the drowning of my laptop to Chingay to Maple Craze to Daily Express to Stepping Down to SEP. Can't say this is the most smooth sailing year of my life but it is definitely the most eventful. SEP alone stretched my horizons so much that I can't describe how wonderful this experience is.

Well, in France now.. transferring photos into my iPod and kopping Chye's Prison Break haha. Morning flight to London later in the morning and then it should be countdown by the London Eye with spectacular fireworks! This Europe trip has been wonderful.. though the overdose of Museums and Churches are starting to put me off. Don't think I'll be blogging about the trip as coming 2007 I'll be intensively mugging for the exams. Prob only after returning back to Singapore ba. But photos will be uploaded soon though =)

22 more days to returning to Singapore.

Happy New Year everyone!

Paris

2006-12-28T23:59:00.000Z

All the trains to Paris were full! Serious.. We couldn't get a ticket in Rome.. we couldn't get a ticket in Nice.. so we had to take from Nice to Marseilles then to Lyon then a first class ticket to Paris. Expensive sia! Oh well.. as long as we get to Paris. Makes up for the accommodation by bunking in with Chye (who ironically isn't around.. haha)

28th Dec - Paris Disneyland

The happiest place on Earth! Oh well.. not comparable to the one in the US.. but the visit to Paris Disneyland was much needed break from all the museums and churches and the artyfarty stuff that we were exposed to the past 2 weeks. Though it was foggy and extremely cold and the rides were disappointingly unexciting.. the feeling of being a kid again shopping around Mickeys and Donalds was stress-releasing. =)

29th Dec - Eiffel, Arc de Truimph, Louvre
Our spate of good weather seemed to have ended in Paris.. Predicted fogs over Paris meant that we would have made a wasted trip up the Eiffel Tower.. hence we decided to take a chance to ascend the Eiffel on the 3rd day instead (when it was predicted to rain).. No Eiffel = more sleep.. coz if we wanted to scale the tower we would have to go early to beat the crowds

Oh but it turned out to be sunny! Ok not exactly blazing sun sunny but at least there was sun amongst the fog. Yeap so a minute change of plans and we headed for the Eiffel Tower instead.

Whoa the queue was terrible! There were 4 queues into the 4 entrances into the tower and they were all snaking around the underneath of the tower making some sort of a swirly pattern if seen from the top. We queued for like 2.5 bloody hours before we managed to scale to the 1st level by lift)

What's fascinating about the Eiffel was its construction.. but I wasn't able to understand/appreciate it haha.. just know that scaling Eiffel was one of the must-dos in Paris itself.. The view on top, just like the view from any high point, was great.. though it could have been much better if the weather had been good.

Sent postcards from the Eiffel. And we went down without continuing up to the 3rd and highest level coz the queue at the 2nd level was simply too long. Regret.

Well, we continued on to other sights like Arc de Truimph.. where I broke contact with the rest of them (again) while trying to snap a shot in the middle of the photo. Haha.. wasted a few SMSes trying to locate them until we decided to meet at Notra Dame.. which we did.

One of the great things about being a student in Europe is that students get to enjoy extraordinary perks.. like free entry into the Lourve on Friday nights! The queue into the home of Mona Lisa was long but fast moving.. and we entered in no time.

I must admit I wouldn't have enjoyed the Lourve at all if not for the existence of the Da Vinci Code audio guide.. which Weijie and I shared. Interesting walk through of the Lourve explaining some artwork related to the story.. some with Mary Magdalene inside.. the scenes in the movie.. Mona Lisa (which is surprisingly small) itself and of course.. the "blade and the chalice" as described in the book.

Mona Lisa was really a hoo-ha. It was small! Probably about like A2 size? But it was well protected by THREE security guards and a bullet-proof glass! It was exactly like what you will see in posters and postcards.. except that the very fact that I am looking at the real thing itself.

30th Dec - Paris Opera House, Notre Dame, Sacre Cour, Moulin Rogue
Paris just had too many things to see.. Fangxi wanted to visit Chopin's grave, Summer wanted to see the Catacombs while I, still being the crazy Phantom fan like I was 12 years ago, would want to visit the home of the Phantom of the Opera - the Garnier Opera House. So how? Split up lor.

Went to the Opera House just in time for the guided tour. Initially I thought the guided tour will include lotsa stuff about the Phantom.. or even visit the legendary river below the Opera house.. but no.. it was all about the guy who constructed the Opera house.. how he was 'accidentelly' chosen to build the Opera house for the Emperor.. how he created the 'new' Napoleon style.. how the Opera house was actually never completed after the emperor was captured by the Germans during the war, how the Opera-watching culture was like in those days.... Though the only mention about the Phantom was the visit to Box No. 5 which is, according to the story, only reserved for the Phantom, the excellent guided tour was surprisingly good enough to ward off the initial disappointment.

Met up at Notre Dame again.. Summer and Caiping didn't though. So the 3 of us continued into the home of the hunchback.. Rented the audio guide.. same old information about churches.. blah blah blah..

Then we went on to Sacre Cour and Moulin Rouge.. our last 2 stops in Paris...

Hence ended our visit to Paris. I must say Paris is one of the places I'll definitely visit again.. in Summer.. coz I'm sure I didn't get to see Paris at its best. After all, it's the most romantic place in the world.. =)

To thank Chye for bunking us in.. here's a little video that we made for him haha.

Rome

2006-12-24T23:59:00.000Z

Rome probably is the city with the most to offer.. Though it's still a lot on Christianity.. I kinda liked the ancient Roman parts of the city best.. after all.. it's like what you always hear in stories and watch in movies.. and now I'm there to experience it all.. =)

Christmas Eve
Our first day in Rome was Christmas eve. Checked in to this hostel full of Americans. In fact I would think that most travellers into Rome are Americans coz there are full of them on the streets (recognisable by accent)

With Lonely planet on hand, we visited the typical famous Roman sights like the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon.. and of course, Weijie didn't miss the chance of making his Travel Video..

Trevi Fountain

Piazze Colonna

Pantheon

Why Christmas Eve in Rome? Coz the Pope would be giving his Midnight Mass.. thought that this would be the real way to celebrate Christmas at the heart of Christianity itself.. Whoa should see the queue at the St Peters Basilica where the Mass would be held man.. it was already like more than 200m long worth of people at around 6pm! There were big screens at the square outside the church so we didn't pay the 100euros to get in.

We went for dinner first. Found this nice little steak house at the corner of the road near the Vatican City serving affordable cheap steak.. a nice way to celebrate Christmas. But we didn't eat the steak haha.. had pasta.. with red wine.. while we waited for midnight to come.

By 10pm when we got back the queue had almost encircled the square 2 times! Crazy! But the square was still relatively empty though. Went around our usual routine of taking photos while waiting for the Mass to start. Cold sia! Wasn't as freezing cold as Switzerland but standing around in open space doing nothing was chill-inducing. The girls paid frequent trips to the toilet just to use the heater! hahaha..

Surprisingly we met fellow Singaporeans in a foreign land.. Gabriel my OCS buddy and Clement from KR! They flew all the way from UPenn (where Weijie is now).. so coincidental!

So talk cock all the way until midnight where the Mass actually started.. oh but it was in Latin (or wadever language it was).. and about 15 mins after it started it was so unbearably cold and tiring that we left.

So much for Christmas eve at the Vatican City. Haha. Heard that the previous Pope organised live concerts before the event to celebrate Christmas. This new Pope, however, well.. more religious ba...
I guess I very much prefer the commercial Christmas rather than the religious one.

Looking forward to Christmas celebrations in US or in Finland.... I wonder how many years from now....

Christmas Day
Woke up late today.. Met this Hongkong girl while cooking breakfast in the hostel and she suggested tagging along to see the city.. Strange request.. but ok lor... since we fellow Asians and she was alone...

And at the reception while waiting for the Hongkong lass to 'take money to pay for her stay' I met this American dude called Chris who happened to tell us about the Pope giving his Christmas speech at the very same place at Noon. Ha looks like we have somewhere to go now.. though it was the same place haha.

15 more mins to noon so we went to the Vatican City again.. Roman style.. by squeezing in the crowded Roman bus there. The girls probably didn't find it too amusing but I thought it was quite an experience!

The square outside St Peters was much more crowded compared to the night before.. and the Pope was standing on the small balcony giving christmas wishes in every language possible! Serious! Even in Japanese (クリスマスをおめでとございます) and Chinese (圣诞节快乐)! And of course it wasn't hard to tell where the different groups of people were from based on the cheers everytime he spoke in a different language.. i.e. the Spanish would cheer if he spoke in Spanish and the French would acknowledge when he spoke in French.. We were joking that he left out Singlish.. which would probably be "Ok la ah.. Merry Christmas ah!" Haha

So after the hooha we went into the St Peters Basilica to take a look.. after all.. it was build at the very site where St Peter was buried.. and the 2nd largest church in the world. As usual I couldn't really appreciate it that much coz I'm not Christian.. but still a nice place to visit...

Then the 6 of us (Chris included) headed on to the Colosseum to take a look. Passed by the Roman ruins, which, under the setting sun, looked magnificent. Too bad the Colosseum was closed on Christmas day.. kinda disappointed the we didn't get to go in...

Here are the photos on the 2nd and 3rd day in Rome...

Boxing Day
While the rest of UK are scurrying around with Boxing Day sales.. we were taking our loong looooong queue outisde the Vatican Museum waiting to go in. Yes.. the queue was so damn long.. about 500m like that.. but luckily it moved quite fast.. so we went in about half an hour later of queuing.

The museum was huge! And we could spend our whole day there... could la.. but I couldn't haha.. by about 2pm I finished walking the entire place already.. coz nothing really interested me.. not the arty farty stuff.. not the Christian stuff.. probably only the Sistine Chapel where many of Michaelangelo's frescos that we always see on Postcards covered the walls was interesting...

We were supposed to meet at the exit of Vatican Museum at 4.45pm when the museum closes.. that's 2 hours more! So I headed off alone to the Colosseum again hoping that it would be open!

And it was! I paid 20euros I think for this guided tour that would allow me to skip the horrandous queue into the Colosseum and have 2 guided tours into the Colosseum and the Palentine Hills as well. Quite worth it la I think.

The Colosseum was much smaller that what I expected.. not like what you see in the Gladiator. Though it's very much in ruins now but still can see the internal structures.. where the animals and prisoners and fighters were kept.. where people sat around to watch others fight.. interesting.

If you noticed the photos above.. the photos in the Colosseum were much lower quality than the ones outside. Yah.. coz I was using my camera phone to take the photos. That's the bad thing about sharing camera.. aiyah who ask my camera to spoil.

Next stop was the Palentine Hills.. also a guided tour. Very very nice view what used to be a little garden of the Roman Emperor. What's left are ruins of the structures there.. but the guide was good.. explaining what they were and the little stories about what happened here blah blah blah..

And ending off with a spectacular view of Rome from the hills, again against the setting sun, was a sight that I will never forget =)

Met up with the rest back at the hostel.. cooked dinner.. talked to an ABC from Canada.. funny guy.. then we went off to catch our train to Nice.....

Pisa

2006-12-23T23:59:00.000Z

It was FANTASTIC weather with clear sunny skies! So from Florence we took a day trip to Pisa to.. guess what?
Take corny photos with the infamous Leaning Tower of Pisa la!

There were signs all over the place prohibiting people from entering the grass patch but when we arrived the grass patch was full of people taking photos! So we joined in the illegal activity as well! Haha.. luckily the police only came to chase us away after we took all the photos we wanted =)

And weijie started on his series of travel videos hoho..

Florence

2006-12-22T23:59:00.000Z

The overnight in the train wasn't too bad. At least there was breakfast given to us before we alighted at Florence itself.

Didn't take long for us to locate our hostel.. only to find out that the hostel doors were locked! Despite waiting for more than half an hour outside the hostel knocking on the doors, blasting the doorbell and ringing the reception, no one attended to us.

A neighbouring hotel receptionist told us that the hostel owner is probably sleeping. This has happened to other travellers before us.

Whoa.. ok lor.. finding no other way but to wander around as much of Florence as we can with our heavy backpacks until later in the morning when we hope the hostel will be open.. we did just that. Luckily it took us only a few steps away from the hostel when Weijie called the hostel receptionist again thank heavens, someone picked up the phone.

It was a one-woman-show hostel. Yup. She did everything there was to be done in this small hostel.. from settling our rooms to cleaning up to cooking breakfast for the rest of the guests. And my my was her breakfast fantastic! She baked some extra muffins for us and it made up for everything that ever happened in the morning.. coz her baking was WONDERFUL! Added on to her jovial nature and taking the initiative to explain how to get around viewing all the sights in Florence, this hostel began to feel like it would be the best hostel that we will be staying in.. And it indeed was.

So, without our backpacks this time, we started to explore our first stop in Italy. A bright sunny day so I didn't hesitate to don my Oakleys haha. Things in Italy were relatively cheaper than Switzerland.. or in any case UK.. and there were quite a few street markets for us (especially the girls) to satisfy their shopping cravings. Other than that.. we just visited the main churches and the Piazza della Signoria which used to be the Florence town centre and houses many (replicas of) famous Italian sculptures.

Though Florence was an arty-farty place to be.. we still had our dose of nature after climbing up a small hill with brought us to a spectacular view of the city of Florence. Breathtaking.

Come to Italy how can don't eat pasta? And yes, we struggled with Italian with lotsa hand gestures in order to place our orders of different varieties of pasta for lunch.. which was, delicious =)

Perhaps the most significant part about Rome would be visiting the very famous Michaelangelo's statue David. It was only after seeing the statue for real that I understood what all the fuss was about - it was really magnificent.. a piece of work that none other replica could live up to. The amount of detail that went into the sculpture and the flawlessness of the gaze on David's eyes were unparalleled. Applause to Michaelangelo.

Geneva and Lausanne

2006-12-21T23:59:00.000Z

The initial plan was to stay in Interlaken for 1 more day.. but.. considering that we did not have the budget so ski.. and scaling another mountain would probably mean seeing the same, though still breathtaking, sights of the Swiss Alps, we decided to change our plans and make more use of our Eurail Pass.. and see the other Switzerland cities..

Geneva
The first half of the day was spent at Geneva. Not a very exciting place to spend the day.. considering that the UN headquarters were very far away and the Red Cross museum was closed.. and we couldn't meet the timing for the free Lake Geneva Cruise. So it was just walking around the city.. bearing chilling winds..

Lausanne
Lausanne was our next stop in the afternoon.. and thankfully for it's beautiful lakeside, we spent more time there taking rubbish photos. Wanted to see the sunset but was too cloudy already. And since Lausanne was the designated City of the Olympics, how can we miss visiting the Olympic Museum? Haha but that was all we did.. stood outside and took a photo.. as well as send some postcards.

We wanted to try Cheese fondue before leaving Switzerland for good but we were chased out of 2 restaurants for only ordering 2 pots of cheese fondue for the 5 of us! Haha. In the end we settled on kebabs for dinner.. of which proved too spicy for the rest of them.. especially Weijie haha.. Luckily I asked for no chilli in mine as usual =) Spent the night walking around the old town.. spending our last swiss francs eating rubbish at the pasar malams around.

Stocked up food, and we headed for our overnight crouchette train to Italy!

Interlaken

2006-12-20T23:59:00.000Z

I must say Interlaken's probably the best part of the trip. I arrived earlier coz we kinda broke off while rushing for the train from Zurich. It was a peaceful quiet town to walk around at night.. The hostel was great (though the staff kept me waiting like half an hour before I could check in) and the best part was Weijie joined us the next morning! Haha though his plane was delayed and he couldn't stop recounting his horrible experience spending the night in the cold at the train station...

Waking up to see Interlaken set amidst all the mountains was a fantastic experience. Thank the skies for brilliant weather.. we decided to go up to the famous Jungfraujoch via a very expensive train ride. But it was all worth it because the view enroute and especially on top of the mountains was BREATHTAKING! and of course the best part was it was the first time I got to see, and touch, SNOW!

Spent the night in the in-hostel bar playing Spades.. and the next morning we woke up to COOK breakfast.. even though we had catered breakfast.. even though we had an early train to catch.. ALL BECAUSE WEIJIE WANTED TO EAT EGGS AND BACON FOR BREAKFAST! Hahaaa

Zurich

2006-12-18T23:59:00.000Z

It was the first stop of Le Grand Europe Tour. Took a plane to Bern.. settled some of our train tickets.. then took our first train ride using our Eurail to Zurich..

Zurich turned out to be a nice small city but a bit disappointing.. coz there was really nothing much to see. The hostel was expensive as well.. which triggered our decision to go Interlaken slightly earlier than planned.. But seeing the Rhine Falls aka the biggest waterfall in Europe as well as the short free cruise around Lake Zurich was good though =)

Here's a video on the Rhine Falls... nothing much though

And yes.. here are the photos..

Before Le Grand Europe Tour!

2006-12-17T20:45:00.000Z

I wonder if anyone still checks this blog now... well this is the 1st post after so long that both blogs have different posts...

So much has happened the past week.. Came down to London on Sat.. supposed to go Prague from Mon-Weds but Manhon and I MISSED OUR FLIGHT! Damn result of dillydallying.. both of our bad habits. So in the end we spent the whole week in London. Haha.

Manhon. This guy is like a younger brother to me now man. From fellow singaporean cum neighbour to cooking buddy to 双天至尊 and House M.D. buddy to travelling buddy.. Sigh I'm really going to miss this boy when I go back Singapore.

So yah.. here are our photos of our exploits in London. Mainly we went into this mega fun Toy Shop 3 times and walked along the streets of London and the most significant thing we did was to tune our watches to Greenwich time accurate to 100th of a second at of course, Greenwich.

My parents came over as part of their Europe Tour as well and went to Buckingham Palace, Tower Bridge.. amongst the other common touristy places like London Eye, Westminister, Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, Chinatown... No photos coz my camera screen cracked for no reason. Damn. Will be leeching on Fangxi's camera this next trip.

Watched the musicals Mama Mia and We Will Rock You and Billy Elliot the past week. And I must say they were all FANTASTIC! Probably will put up a post comparing all the London Musicals that I've watched before..

20 mins more and I will be heading for the airport towards Switzerland. Then Italy. Then France. Fun but I can't help thinking that I'm actually not very prepared for my exams when I ultimately return from the trip.

Oh well.. ciao for 2 weeks!

Amsterdam and the Last Week of School

2006-12-08T00:20:00.000Z

Finally finished all my assignments due this semester. Feeling is quite shiok.. especially finishing way before deadline heh. Need to catch up on readings though.

Backupdated my post on the 27th Meetup we had. Either scroll down or click here to read i or view pictures. Well.. slowly slowly update the other weekend outings ba.. Halloween, Dublin, Scotland, Nottingham, Belgium... (whoa looks like a lot)

Yes, it's officially the last day of school today. Last week of school is rather slack here.. the people that pon lessons this week is outrageous. Most lectures I go to are like 1/4 full. And the lecturers are equally in a Christmas mood as well. Damn should have gone overseas haha. Still thought that the lecturers will give exam tips or what. Bleah.

To celebrate the last day of school (or rather the last day of commitments) for most of us.. the Singaporean gang went to have sumptuous Chinese buffet at Wokmania! Sorry no photos of the wonderful food.. coz it was an adhoc thing. Never bring camera. Ha. And yeah.. plans to to Copenhagen after our exams are on the way. Need to whack one last country before I leave Europe for good.

Last weekend was spent at Liverpool/Amsterdam. And it turned out to be the most exciting weekend yet... =)

Liverpool - 2nd December & 4th December

Why Liverpool? Well simply coz the plane I'm catching to Amsterdam will be from Liverpool airport.. so since I'm there might as well take the chance to explore the place before/after the flight right?

The trip to Liverpool was rather unprepared.. struggling with essay deadlines before the trip = no research = aimlessly wandering before figuring out what to do. For one thing the city centre was hard to find without a map. But heng I managed to find a tourist information centre in time to kope myself some maps and what-to-do-in-Liverpool brochures.

Liverpool is a port. A port with terribly unpredictable weather. Tamade it was bright and sunny when I came but by the time I finished my £1.99 full English Breakfast (egg, sausage, bacon, hash brown, tomato, mushroom, baked beans) it started drizzling! So I braved the cold rain to the port called Arthur's Dock to explore.. damn the weather. So cold.. and cannot take good photos.

I'm not an arty-farty person.. but I had to strut into the Tate Liverpool (art gallery) with the highly cultured look to seek shelter.. and yeah.. see the art pieces as well lor. Nothing much to comment... except that it's free. Ha.

Whoa by the time I came out it was bright and sunny again. Siao one. So yeah.. after snapping some photos of the sea and the dock I went to probably the only museum that caught my interest - The Beatles Story Exhibition.

Again I'm not a particular great fan for the Beatles.. but I haveta admit their songs rock. And which other museum blasts good music throughout the whole time inside? Haha.. it was rather enjoyable not only for the songs but after 24 years of my life hearing about this legendary band then I know how they are formed.. what they did and how they disbanded. Cool. How many bands nowadays can start from teenagers and still get support from fans even when they become uncles with mustaches?

After that I made my way back to the city centre again.. filled my stomach with rubbish from the Christmas market before meeting up with Summer. Liverpool is really another bustling city.. (Why are all cities bustling other than Leeds?) Even at 6+pm the streets are thronged with people.. even though some of the chaokeng shops will still close at 5pm. But I like this type of a-lot-of-people scene.. beats walking along cold lonely streets.

Ok, soon enough, we headed towards Liverpool John Lenon International Airport. So much for Liverpool.

Amsterdam - 2nd & 3rd December
How long I spend in a country is dependent on how cheap the plane tickets are. So this time, I only had a total of 2 nights and 1 day in this city.. so Summer and I carefully planned out which tourist attractions to whack. And I'm quite happy we went to all the right places!

After touching down we headed to the Amsterdam Sexmuseum. Whoa! No prizes for guessing what this museum is about. Pay 3 euros and you enter a building with 3 storeys of porn, porn and more porn. Oh but it's after all a museum.. so the people inside are not supposed to look horny though I think most are.. just look at porn as.. ART. Yes, and at the same time dealing with Summer's squeals as naked men and women get thrown in her face.

Didn't take long to find our hostel. The receptionist was nice too as we asked him lotsa questions on how to maximise our one day in Amsterdam. =)

Hoho and did I mention that our hostel was just a stone's throw away from Amsterdam's world famous Red Light District? Haha.. yeah so after resting a while we headed down to take a walk around. And the experience was just crazy. Being a saturday night the streets were filled with (horny) guys and their version of fish tanks = each fish got their own tank. How does it work? The girls will strut their stuff inside their rooms by the window while potential customers walk by and do their window shopping. Interested? Just open the door and negotiate prices. On then go in and close curtain. Maybe we went late.. so lotsa curtains were closed. Haha. So it was two streets full of window shopping both of us went. Haha. Can't take photos though. Can't put it in words properly too. Haha so too bad for you guys. The only thing is: All guys MUST come to Amsterdam RLD once. =)

It was an early start the next day as we took a train out of the city to this little, albeit too touristy, place called Zaanse Schans to see windmills. How can come to Holland don't see windmills? Yah, and it turned out to be exhilarating to see them! Like finally I get to see windmills in Holland! The scenery was beautiful.. the air was fresh.. and summer and I just went around photowhoring. The only windmill that was open was a paint mill and we were allowed to go in to explore. Cool.

Just nice in that place got cheese factory (or so they claim.. though i think most of the cheese they sell is manufactured elsewhere) and clogs shops. Yeap, clogs are the Dutch way of life.. last time.. and the number of designs for the clogs they have are simply crazy! Feel tempted to buy one for myself but managed to stop my insanity. I don't want to die of blister outbreak on my feet.

Pressed for time, at noon we rushed back to Amsterdam central to head to our next destination. Damn the stupid weather but it was drizzling. Coupled with the countryside strong winds was no joke. Freezing like hell.

On the way to the next destination we took a walk around the tulip market. Not a good time of the year to visit the tulip market coz all the flowers were non-existent. The only flowers that were there were the wooden aka fake ones. Haha. Too bad la. Should have come in spring/summer.. then can see the flowers in full bloom. Anyway, I'm not particularly a big fan of flowers.. so yeah.. didnt affect me much heh.

Drenched and cold, we finally arrived at the Heineken Brewery.

Well, at first was a bit reluctant to go the Heineken.. after the disastrous waste-money visit to the Guinesses Brewery in Dublin. But between Heineken and Van Gogh Museum, both of us decided on this. Well, we wouldn't be able to appreciate Van Gogh's art anyway. Furthermore, the only art piece by him I know is the Sunflower, which is in London hoho.

But Heineken turned out to be so much more fun than expected! Content-wise it was crap.. just telling you how beer is made and all their advertising strategies and how they market their beer. Oh but the fun part was the high amount of interactivity of the place! There's even this thing where we could make videos of ourselves haa...

And with the entrance fee is 3 pints of beer! I only drank 2 pints la.. kept the 3rd token as souvenir. Though that was not the only souvenir that we got.. after exiting the place we were given this cool bottle-opener-in-the-bottle thing. (compared to Guinesses's lousy paperweight) Yeap, all-in-all.. Heineken was fun! (though I don't like beer still)

Van Gogh Museum was nearby.. so we just went out there to take photo lor. Haha cheapskates.

Next up, we went to the Ann Frank House. Yea.. that was the house where she wrote her famous diary. Cool to really experience where they lived while hiding during the Holocaust.. but it was harrowing as well.. to learn of her story and to be standing on a piece of history. Sad. Nothing much to say here.. just read her diary ba.

Lazy to cook.. we went around hunting for food. Things were expensive sia.. until we bumped into this ulu Chinese restaurant that served buffet for 9 euros! No need to think, just whack!
Oh but the food sucked.

That night we headed to a local 'coffee-shop' near our hostel and tried Amsterdam's Space Cake. Space Cake is just this little gardenia muffin thingy with 0.2g of hash peppered around it. Yes, taking drugs is legal in Amsterdam. So we ate our space cake while the rest of the people in the coffee-shop smoked Weed. Smelly like hell. Anyway I think the Space Cake was a rip-off. No effect one leh (luckily). The only thing I felt was similar to drinking 1 pint of beer. Ok la for the experience la.

And guess how we spent the rest of the night?
Walk around RLD again! Haha.. Sunday night got less people.. but still a lot. And more curtains were open so we just got to see different exhibits lor. Haha.

Went back.. sleep.. wake up.. rush to airport.. we boarded the plane like 5 mins before take off! Heng ah! And so that was bye bye Amsterdam!

After describing so much.. here's a treat: (photos)

Oh well... gotta sleep already. It's officialy the last day of school and I have to go for my last lesson in Leeds. How fast time flies... only 45 more days. Booked my train tickets back to London to catch my flight on the 22nd already. *haaaiiiii*

Ok la.. hope that I update soon haha. Next weeks' more travelling.. London.. Prague.. Switzerland, Italy, France.. =)

Cya!

A very sad birthday to come

2006-12-01T02:07:00.000Z

Taking a break from writing another 2000 word report on Environmental Management Case Study.. it's due next week but I just feel like finishing it off before flying off to Amsterdam this Saturday.

52 days, 6 hours and 7 more minutes to my flight back to Singapore. Suddenly I'm getting all nostalgic here and 舍不得 to leave this place... BTW, the provisional examination timetables are out:

08 Jan 2007
14:00
16:00
SLSP102001 Sociological Thinking

11 Jan 2007
09:30
11:30
PREN109501 Environmental Management

12 Jan 2007
09:30
11:30
LUBS206001 Contemporary Ind Relations

15 Jan 2007
09:30
11:30
PREN101001 Intro to Engineering Materials

16 Jan 2007
09:30
11:30
PREN5350M01 Process Modelling & Simulation

17 Jan 2007
14:00
16:00
PREN231001 Transfer Processes 1

Seems like a pretty decent well spread-out timetable for an exam, though it doesn't help that my 2 worst papers are at the very end and my last paper is an afternoon paper on my 24th birthday itself. Considering that the sun sets at around 4.30pm nowadays.. ending a paper at 4pm is equivalent to half my birthday spent mugging.

And my 24th birthday will mark the last few days I'd be spending with all my friends here.. my flatmates.. the Singaporean and Malaysian gang, Yuanjing's flatmates... I haven't had enough of this place yet (no not UK but Europe in general).. and who knows when I'll ever ever ever come back to this part of the world again in my lifetime?

Teckie was proposing going to Copenhagen from 18th-22nd Jan. Sounds like a good last-ditch attempt to visit another city 12 hours away from home. But now I'm seriously considering spending my last days with friends here instead.

SEP's really a good retreat and a fantastic hideaway from all the problems back home. Much as I wanna see my family and friends again, going back to Singapore still = going back to sucky NUS = worries about results, IA, Specialisation, FYP...

Sigh. The best thing I can hope for is that my exams will end earlier. (Notice I said provisional exam timetable?) Knowing that how cockup English system is anything can happen until the final timetable is out. *cross fingers and pray*

I hate goodbyes. Especially goodbyes-for-good like this one. Wanna run out there and give everyone a good hug before leaving.

Wa lau what happen to me? So gu niang. Haha. Must be the cold rain at 2am in the morning.. adds to the nostalgia.

Ok la back to my essay. Uploaded photos on my Visit-Kinyew-in-Belgium trip on Flickr already.. need some time to come up with a post (yes, and all the other posts on my past few weekends). In the meantime, to all Harry Potter fans, here's what I found at London's Kings Cross train station

Going to Hogwarts, anyone?

=)

Belgium

2006-11-28T23:59:00.000Z

Since Kinyew is in Belgium.. might as well meet up with him right? Just so happens that Eng Kheng will be visiting him at the same time too! So coincidental! So here's to the land of fine chocolates and waffles...

Brussels
Decided to conquer the capital of Belgium on the 1st day.. Oh well.. but as Kinyew had lessons most of the time EngKheng and I were walking around on a route Kinyew drew out for us not knowing what the hell we were seeing. So we went by Engkheng's rule - Take photo first, google later. (I never bothered to google haha) Probably the only thing I remembered was the Mannequin Piss (an overrated small statue symbolic of Brussels) and the Grande Place.

Visited the comic museum.. but too bad everything was in Dutch (or was it French?) Haha.. but both of us agreed the only part of the whole museum where both of us understood was the Erotic Comic part haha! guys...

We went back to Brussels again the next few nights... because it happened to be this Sablon night where the high class streets had 'open houses' and we could walk in to have free samples of.. HIGH CLASS CHOCOLATES! On the first night it was by accident when EK and I were given the best hot chocolate in the world for tasting. Then it was a whole night of acting atas and trying out the best chocolates in the world.. yum yum...

Bruges
By this time Fangxi joined us. Yeap after her last missed flight to Brussels I jiooed her to join us and she managed to come here by bus/ship. So we ventured to Bruges.. a nice small town where we took lotsa photos and only remember a bustling marketplace with an outdoor ice-skating ring. Oh yes.. and nice cheap chocolates =)

Antwerp
Didn't know Antwerp's the city of Diamonds until now. Went to the diamond museum then walked along the streets lor. The only think i remembered was the wooden escalator. Haha.

London

2006-11-23T23:59:00.000Z

Was going to visit Kinyew in Brussels.. via train from London Waterloo station.. so decided to pay Martin a visit as well (as well as bunk over at his place hahaa) Lucky was his free day so he brought me on a one-day tour round London.. visited the main sights.. and thankfully there was FANTASTIC weather!

Area Cleaning!

2006-11-23T05:14:00.000Z

I have to blog this coz it's the most significant thing that ever happened ever since I moved into my room... AREA CLEANING!

Yeah.. wa lao our place was in such a mess.. especially so when I came back from Nottingham 2 weeks ago there was litter all over the place and everything was like a war zone. 我的邻居就是真的没有清洁的观念- 垃圾随处丢、饭后不清洗碗碟、厕所和洗澡室脏兮兮的。搬进来的前几个星期我还会好心帮忙清理，哗过了几个星期我真的是懒得去管。不过这次真的是忍无可忍，我就向大家提议来一个大扫除！

We were supposed to clean up last week but I wanted everyone to do it together. I mean, 1 or 2 pple can clean up the whole place but how long will it take for the whole place to be dirty again? At least if everyone cleans up together there will be the sense of satisfaction and ownership of the place.. and hopefully it will last clean for a longer time =)

And it worked! I guess everyone really felt good that the place was so fantastically clean after the whole clean-up. Haha. (ok la there are 5 of us 1 guy siammed dunno where he went to)

Anyway I was backdating typing my post on the 27th Meetup many weeks back but I think no time to continue already. Haa gonna catch my coach to London now. This weekend is Belgium weekend to visit Kinyew! So till I come back... Tata!!

Updating Blog

2006-11-20T09:28:00.000Z

Yay I just finished my 2000 word 50% Sociology Essay! So happy!
Yes that's why I haven't really been updating this blog. Too busy with work (and travelling haa) Now that I've gotten this load off I guess have some free time to catch up with my other 'obligations' like this blog and ShAMCast which I owe Adrian for more than a week already!

Oh well.. when Cherlene (my senior that came to Leeds last year) told me that I wouldn't have time to update my blog I didn't believe her. Haha.

I'll update past events as Previous Posts so constantly check back!

Some interesting stuff I saw at the supermarket some time back

And an update of the tree outside my window taken 1 minute ago.. BOTAK!

Nottingham

2006-11-11T23:59:00.000Z

Nottingham Games is the time where all Singaporeans from UK get together to meet up and see each other again.. too bad Leeds didn't participate.. so the 1st 2 days Manhon and I just spent the whole boring time walking around the small boring Robin Hood town.. 2nd day went around with Fangxi and friends to some park and some windmill. Oh well.. luckily there was 双天之尊 to entertain us at night haha.

Carlisle

2006-11-06T23:59:00.000Z

Had 3 hours to spend in transit while travelling back from Glasgow to Leeds... so might as well take the chance to explore the place?

Carlisle is the small city between England and Scotland. Visiting the Carlisle castle somehow completed the story on the whole Scottish experience =)

Scotland

2006-11-05T23:59:00.000Z

Flew from Dublin straight to Edinburgh. Met up with Fangxi and Summer and it was a great trip laden with cockups..

We booked our day trip tickets to Loch Ness only to be informed the morning itself that the trip had to be cancelled due to lack of people joining in the trip! So we wasted the whole morning planning to go to see the monster ourselves...

We had to take a bus/train down to Inverness.. then a 2-hourly bus to Drumnadrochit to where the lake actually is.. but the timing just couldn't work out. It's either we couldn't get there in time to catch a tour or we could not get a trip back to Glasgow.

Not till 20 minutes before the next Megabus trip when I called the day tour agency and he informed us of a tour that could fit within our timings! Voila! Immediately we went ahead to book our Megabus tickets..

BUT IT WAS FULL!!!

Whoa.. desperation almost drove us to take a 80 pound taxi or even rent a car to drive up to Inverness.. but luckily we didn't.
So we went up to Glasgow instead to spend the night there. Went to Inverness from Glasgow instead.

And so I thought the bus back from Glasgow to Leeds was at 2330hrs. Rushed back from Inverness, picked up our bags from Zhiyang's place and hailed a cab with Summer to the coach station.. only to find out in the taxi that the bus was at 2300hrs! We missed it!

What to do? Stay one more night at Zhiyang's place and take the next morning's bus back lor...

Summer kena caught for using my National Express card.. had to pay the balance.. wa lao so sway.

But it's things like these that make the trip memorable =)

Dublin then Scotland!

2006-11-03T18:45:00.000Z

Haha I'm in dublin now I have less than a minute to type this post. Going to scotland tomorrow. Haven't got time to update blog
Check my photo page at Flickr!

Cya!

Dublin

2006-11-02T23:59:00.000Z

Ireland.. the home of fantastic Irish tap dancing and songs and of course.. Guinesses. Dublin's a place I will remember for it's great nightlife.. as contrast with boring Leeds (or UK in general).

Halloween

2006-10-31T23:59:00.000Z

Went to cheong at Oceana to celebrate Halloween! Bought a crazy mask and though was still half sick.. still enjoyed myself a lot =)

27th Meetup!

2006-10-30T00:03:00.000Z

Since I travelled so far to this part of the world I told myself I should meet up with old friends.. also taking the chance to travel around visiting everyone hee. Rongxuan suggested meeting up in Bath, and so we did =)

London - 27th Oct

Travelled down to London on 27th Oct night first.. since Martin and I had to catch the 7am bus to Bath. Was supposed to stay at Martin's place but his accom cock up so both of us went to stay at Adeline's place instead. Sounded like a better plan actually, since she couldn't join us for the Bath trip.

Oh I was totally overwhelmed by her place! Her apartment was HUMONGOUS.. it was like she had a whole condo to herself! Overlooking the Thames River some more.. whoaaa.. And what's more overwhelming was that she prepared dinner for us! And both Martin and I had a huge sofa bed to sleep on!!! Whooaazzzz..

It was a great catching up session. I think 3 of us chatted till about 3am in the night about godknows what stuff.. then when Adel went to bed Martin and I talked till about 4am before dozing off...

And Adeline's father (who was there) was so nice! He actually woke up especially early to prepare breakfast for us IN THE DARK! Whoa luckily we realised in time so we helped out in the breakfast-making. So 感动 that we took photo with him. Haha!

Bath - 28th Oct

So Martin and I took our coach to Bath. Dunno whether heng or suay but the coach broke down even before departure so the journey was delayed. BUT the replacement coach had TV! Haha so just watch lor. Wanted to sleep one to make up for the lack of sleep the night before.. but ended watching TV the whole way ha. I'm such a sucker for TV.

Daniel was there already (coz of the coach delay) and Rongxuan will be late.. haha President leh! So we 3 guys just walked around the streets of Bath while we waited for her to come...

Bath is SOOO BEAUTIFUL! When I mentioned that Cambridge was 'stuck in time' in the previous posts, Baths was like taking a time travel machine back into time. The buildings were all similar and so ancient. Seems like all new buildings had to be built with the same Bath limestone that the old old buildings were made of too, to preserve the city's image....

Well.. after Rongxuan came (she was wearing some Jap-lookalike attire haa) we went for lunch at some restaurant lor. Expensive sia. But well worth it =) Again there was lots to talk about.. but strangely we talked about serious stuff.. hoho.. Medicine.. future.. politics.. whoa.. can't believe that i actually engage in such conversations haaa

There was nothing much to do in Bath really.. so we just roamed around rather aimlessly. Daniel brought his video and we made some silly video hoho which should be shown to the rest of the 27th during Chrisco.. so keep it under wraps for now ha.

Dan and I went to the Roman Bath Spa.. about the only touristy thing to do there.. £10.. Martin and Rongx decided to give that a miss (after they will have the chance to come here again) so they went Ben and Jerrys haha. Well.. Bath Spa was cool.. standard historical stuff though.. but it's interesting to see how the Romans developed the hot spring so well even in the past.. hoho and the hot spring was still working! Not availiable for public though...

We snapped up some photos before dark.. and by 6pm.. we took the train to Bristol. And yes, I managed to bring across my 英国人是笨蛋 theory to them.. which they seemed to be convinced.. haa by how 2 single train tickets can actually be cheaper than a return ticket (how dumb??).

Bristol - 29th Oct
Dinner was the first thing on our minds so Dan and Martin the lao chiaos of Bristol took us to this Chinese restaurant for goooood chinese food. It was a long wait though.. coz it was seemingly popular. Food was good.. and we can't finish the roast pork so we had to dapao it haa.

Martin broke off from the gang as he had other agendas.. to shift his stuff from Bristol to London where he's studying now. Rongx and I headed to Dan's place (which used to be a WWII hospital!!) to spend the night. Whoa his place is really scary la.. the corridors are dark and gloomy and the toilets are spooky wonder how he manage to live there haaa.

Rongxuan was begging to drink! Haha strange ah.. 2 bottles was what she challenged herself hahaa.. and she got what she asked.. Dan popped out his red wine and we drank through the night.. It was a nice night to drink.. coz it was drizzling outside and his room was nice and cozy and warm. Watched videos of Rach, Jiamin, Isaac and him in NY and listened to their recordings.. very nice! Whoa the killer was when he played the mp3s of Hwachong songs he sung with Wendy.. so sentimental and so nice.. nostalgic until can cry......

3 of us downed 1.5 bottles. Rongxuan was 'poisoned' by then haha.. so we hit the sacks.

Thanks to Daylight Saving Time (clocks turned back 1 hour) we had 1 extra hour of sleep! Particularly fantastic for me coz I didn't get to sleep much in Adel's place the night before. And the weather was superb! Sunny skies.. Dan said that was the best weather we could ever get in Bristol. So heng! So hiao me happily popped in my contacts and donned my Oakleys! Whoa hardly get to wear oakleys here ok??

Bristol is a hilly hilly hilly place.. though it's just like any other UK city... except maybe near the sea the buildings look slightly different. Went to this suspension bridge which had a nice view of the river than ran through Bristol (and Bath). Interesting fact: lotsa wires around the bridge to prevent people from jumping off.. ha as suicide rates are high there. There're even Samaritan's Care signs to tell people... don't jump. Ask for help.

Lunch was at this little cafe where we had Sunday Roast. Again here's a little incident which proved my 英国人是笨蛋 theory:

We were there at around 12.20.. the sign outside the shop explicitly stated that Sunday roast would only be available from 12.30. Fine. 10 mins difference only wad. So I decided to order food 1st. After all, we were the only ones in the shop.

Me: Can I have 3 lamb roasts?
Waitress: Sorry, lunch orders can only be taken at 12.30.
Me: Well, that's like.. in 5 minutes time?
Waitress: Yes.
Me: (diao) Can I just place my orders first then? Since it's only 5 minutes. That would be 3 lamb roasts.
Waitress: Oh no sorry. The machine won't start working till 12.30.
Me: (wa lao 3 lamb roasts to hard to remember meh??) Ok, then can I have a coffee please.
Waitress: Sure.

So she made me mine (ok Dan's) coffee.. and I happily brought it back to our table. Put the coffee down and oh! it's 12.30!

Me: Can I order my lunch now?
Waitress: Sure. What do you want?

WA LAO! Faint on the spot.

Lunch was good. After which we just explore Bristol lor. Walk walk. Went to Dan's university which was supposed to be very nice but it was unfortunately under renovation. =( Walked all the way to the river front (even Daniel didn't explore that much of Bristol in his 2 years here) and went to the Bristol Industrial Museum.. which was it's last day of opening before closing down for renovations. Oh well.. but by then we were so tired of walking we just went in to sit down. Haha.

Went to this nice chocolate place for guess what? Chocolate. I had this potent chocolate drink which whoa.. kept me damn full! But we headed back to Dan's place to cook anyway. Remember last night's roast pork? Haha yah it was left outisde the window and just had to heat up! Natural refrigerator! Got vegetables and rice... nice simple dinner. We were saying can't imagine last time we all siao siao councillors now doing domestic stuff like gathering to cook and eat. Haha.

So by night it was bye bye to everyone. Coach to London then from London back to Leeds. Long bus rides.. but cheap mah. Haiyah sway I was sitting beside this fat lady so my whole 5 hours journey i only occupied half the seat. Damn. So uncomfortable.

Oh well.. it was a great weekend. One of the best weekends so far. As Rongxuan said, the places were so-so but the company was great. Whether in Singapore or overseas.. council has forged my best friendships. Really, 27th was the best thing that every happened to me =)

27th Weekend!

2006-10-27T15:50:00.000Z

I have 10 minutes to type this post before I gotta go catch my bus to London later on... This weekend is Meet-Up-With-Council weekend haha so exciting! I'm bunking over at Adeline's place tonight.. together with Martin who is homeless now.. then tomorrow we are going down to Bath to meet Rongxuan and Daniel there. Yingting supposed to join us but she had a £400 medical seminar on Sunday so she said she has to prepare for it. *bleah*

Still dunno what we are going to do in Bath.. but that night we'd be going down to Daniel's place in Bristol to bunk over haha so Sunday is Bristol-Day..

After which will be my looong looong bus ride back to Leeds.. reaching at 5am on Monday morning!

Anyway this week has been a little better than normal.. with Yuu cooking haha. Will update more when I get back...

Of Tough Luck, Nice people and the Place That's 'Stuck in Time'

2006-10-24T17:45:00.000Z

Went winter-clothing shopping on Saturday. Whoa for the first time in UK I see things that are considered cheap haha. It was a place called Castleford, 2 train stations away from the city centre.. and it's a nice outdoor cluster of shops.. mostly factory outlets or warehouse sales. And so check out how Singaporeans reacted to cheap stuff...

Haha.. and we had lunch at KFC. Interestingly the staff looked quite perturbed when I ordered 'whipped potato'. Until I realised that they don't have whipped potato.. just the gravy (which is considered a side dish.. quite bo hua hor?)

And here's what I bought..

Call it engrossed in shopping.. or just damn sway.. but here's what happens when you don't arrive at the train station early enough...

Sway = I saw the 1527hrs train zoom off back to Leeds right before my very eyes.
Heng = Some kind people at the train station told me I could take the bus back to Leeds at the bus station outside the shopping place.
Sway = There was only 1 bus stop and I should be at another bus stop which I don't know where.
Heng = I met an African kid who brought me all the way back to Leeds. Changed 3 buses.
Sway = I missed my National Express Coach to Cambridge, which left at 1645hrs. Oh well, actually it was the coach to Milton Keynes where I had to change another coach to Cambridge at 2105hrs.
Heng = There was another coach to Milton Keynes at 1800hrs. It would arrive Milton Keynes at 2050hrs, just in time to catch the next coach.
Sway = The stupid bus driver (out of chaokeng or kindness or wad) decided to take a half an hour hot-food break along the way. I hence reached Milton Keynes at 2110. Yeap. I missed the coach number X5 to Cambridge.
Heng = According to the notice, X5 operates every half an hour. There's another coach at 2135 hours.
Sway = I boarded the coach only to know that it's going to Bedford instead of Cambridge. The last bus to Cambridge was 2105. So screwed up right? Oh well, I just decided I should just inch my way as close to Cambridge as possible. Yingting said that a cab there would cost £70+!!
Heng = I managed to get a cab that charged me only £32!! Whoa immediately jump in and take! The cab driver was quite nice.. but when he knew that I had only been UK for a month I could almost hear the wa-lao-I-should-have-qiao1-this-noob-for-the-cab-fare in his tone haha.
Sway = Yingting lived in the bushes la! Her place so hard to find! I felt so paiseh for the cab driver who had to drive me all the way to another city which he's not familiar with.. and of course.. charging me so little.
Heng = We found her place at last.
Sway = I only had a travellers' cheque with me. Yah I had lotsa travellers cheque which I decided I should use instead of cash. But obviously the cab driver can't accept travellers cheque.
Heng = Yingting saved the day! Whoaaaa home sweeet hommmeeeeeee...... (not my home.. but it was the 1st time ever first arriving in Leeds that I had this feeling)

Check out photos of Cambridge!

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

Cambridge was awesome! Just so happened it was the annual Apple Fair and more so it was the 10th Anniversary! It was held at the Botanical Gardens and the whole experience was fantastic! I had never seen so many different types of apples in my life before! There were all the apple products as well.. apple cider.. some apple and spiced elderberry drink.. apple toffee (like 糖葫芦 like that.. but instead of dates it's apple) and.. cheeze. Ha not apple cheeze but just cheeze.. just that I swakoo never see cheeze in it's original form before.

And there was apple tasting. It was A WHOLE ROW OF APPLES! And every apple not only looked different, they tasted different! Like all my life I only thought there were 2 types of apples - the ang moh type like Royal Gala apples and the Asian type like Fuji apples. Real eye opener. At the end of the fruit-tasting row I actually felt full. Haha.

Though it was autumn.. we settled our lunch English style aka Picnic! With Yingting's friends from Cambridge medicine.. and they were a Fantastic bunch! All very sociable, friendly, great people to talk to and there was this Malaysian couple Peini and KunHiang that stayed with Mok and I all the way so they could do punting with us. (punting = this boat ride thing where you move the boat using this long stick that digs into the riverbed. Characteristic of Cambridge and Oxford) So nice of them!

But sadly I didn't get to punt. Bad weather. =(

So Yingting brought me around Cambridge to see all the colleges. Oh and the experience was exhiliarating!

Well you see, unlike stupid NUS or Leeds or most other universities in the world which goes by the modular system.. Oxbridge goes by the Collegiate system. Think Harry Potter now. So there are over 30 colleges in Cambridge, and each college is like a House in Hogwarts. The students have their lectures in the main university campus, but go back to their Colleges where they stay to have their tutorials. So they actually live and study at the same place! How cool is that! It's like I go for lectures in Engineering and go back to Sheares Hall where all the Chem Engineers will gather and have tutorials in Hall. A waste of resources for the University.. but the concept is just so cool. And as Yingting said, she feels so much for Cambridge and identifies herself with Claire College where she lived in. As for me? Haha NUS Sucks.

And the colleges were beautiful! There'd always be this big lawn where the buildings will surround.. somehting like a parade square of grass.. and the interesting thing is No One Is Supposed To Step On The Grass. Some of the colleges even have ducks wandering around and even COWS! And they all look so cosy and warm and so conducive for studying.. well probably amplified by the fact that the weather was drizzling and cold where I was standing looking at the majesty of the buildings. What's even more interesting is that each of the colleges have their own identity.. like some colleges are leftist, there's the richest and poorest college and there's even the gay college as well haha.

I was telling Yingting that I definitely will send my son or daughter to Cambridge. But that again, I have my brother. That's why when I called back home I told him to get himself into Cambridge or Oxford!!!

So that I can go again and do punting. Haha. No la. I will definitely go Oxford to punt one of these days. =)

Anyway the streets of Cambridge were very quaint. Yes, again, as Yingting described it was stuck in time. Not like Leeds or Birmingham or London where it's somewhat modernised, Cambridge is still very old-English. Nice, peaceful and happy place. I like!

Oh I'm so glad to have Yingting around. She seemed to be so experienced tour guiding me around haha.. must have practiced a lot in her 4+ years here already. And even better coz she's a student we could get into the colleges for FREE! Yes, some colleges charge admission fees for entering the college. So commercial.

So all in all, Cambridge was an unforgettable experience. I left feeling fully satisfied even though I didn't get to punt. The only regret I had? Was that I didn't study hard enough in JC to get into there myself. *sigh*

Just yesterday I decided to be adventurous and cook fried rice for dinner. Made a lot of rice in the afternoon and let it dry in the fridge.. figured out that I cooked too much rice so I invited the girls over for dinner.

Whoaaaaa it was VERYYY NICEE LAAAA!!! Haha either fried rice is damn easy to cook, fried rice is naturally nice, I miss fried rice too much, or I'm just a damn good fried-rice-cooker haha.

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

Ok.. I'm off to do my homework now. There's nothing else to do anyway.. And for the first times in my life I'm the only one who turns up for class with all my homework done. Felt so cheated the first few tutorials when I spent so much time reading the Soci readings, doing my Chem Eng tutorials, only to go to class hearing most of them say like "Oh I can't find the book in the library" or "I read but I didn't understand anything in the book". Bleah. The Chem Engineers even said they don't know how to start and asked to have another session to go through the tutorial. The whole class say they didn't know leh. Wa lao it's just smack in the notes la.. of course need some thinking with a bit of CEP and ESS concepts. And some more they are Postgraduate students lor. I'm just a freakking undergraduate still.

And I start to take back what I said about how good the lecturers are here. The Transfer Processes lecturer is an ah neh and he is damn ngeow la. He wastes time in lecture scolding people for stupid things like whispering and even looking out of the window. When the students genuinely don't know some maths equation, though simple, he thinks they are joking with him. Wa lao, what kind of lecturer is that? Ask question kena scolded. And last lesson he took lesson individually because he suspects that some of them were signing in for other students in the previous lesson when he passed around the attendence sheet. Like hello? You only have 1 hour of lesson don't waste time on these stupid brainless stuff.

And the Postgraduate module I'm taking (Numerical Simulation) lecturer is an ah tiong and he just rattles on all the irrelevant stuff and doesn't teach. Like just now during the make-up tutorial he just sat down there and asked us to go ask him questions personally. Whoa so I had to save the day by asking out loud "Is this the way to do the question? Blah blah blah..." out loud in class so everybody will know how to do. (like I'm the only one that did?) The last lecture was on MATLAB and he just brought us to the computer cluster and gave us a set of notes and told us to play with the computer programme ourself. And the notes sucked la. NUS gave so much better notes than his. I was totally bored coz I already know the basics of MATLAB after PDC and Process Lab last sem. He couldn't even explain why must put the ; at the end of evey command. Bleah I had to explain to the guy beside me after he left.

Means 4 things

NUS is damn zai
NUS teaches too much
Only native lecturers are good. Just like Singaporean lecturers in NUS and ang moh lecturers in Leeds.
If you are here just to do reasearch, DON'T TEACH!!

Ok. Going off le.
I don't think I know any Muslim friends reading this blog.. but Selamat Hari Raya Adilfiltri anyway.
Oh, Happy Deepavali =)

Sushi Party

2006-10-21T02:55:00.000Z

At such an unearthly hour there are still so many people (Italians I guess) standing outside my window gathering there.. talking.. so noisy.

Just came back from another gathering at Yuanjing's place. This time was a MASSIVE gathering of like 38 people squeezed in a tiny kitchen.. It was supposed to be a sushi party.. where we make the sushi ourselves.. which is essentially making popiah but using seaweed as the skin, rice as the filling and topped with wadever was around - carrots, eggs, salmon, cucumber, crabstick..

It was yum yum. And after that we were treated to Chocolate Fondue! Wow!

After everything a few of us wanted to go down to the clubs in town.. but along the way the Taiwanese girls decided to go for Karaoke instead! Heng the karaoke not open tonight.. and the only one was open was those type have to sing to everybody and malu yourself one.. so after a loooooooooooong walk around the city we decided to head back.

We walked Karen, this Taiwanese girl, back to her private accomodation. Wow and it sure was cosy.

This was the common room.. her room had a nice cozy Queen Sized bed and attached bathroom. shiok.

Going to Castleford Shopping centre to buy winter clothings tomorrow.. followed by Cambridge! Before signing off.. show you 1st something interesting..
What they call ATMs here...

Early in the morning

2006-10-20T05:53:00.000Z

Oh yay.. I just struggled to finish my assignment for this postgraduate module which was supposed to replace CN3421 Process Modelling and Numerical Simulation.. I was like forced to read through my CEP (Chem Eng Principles) and ESS (Equilibrium Stage Separations) notes to be able to figure out how to do the assignment.

Working at night here is so shiok.. like it's really quiet and it's cool.. I guess I found the right balance between how much I should open my windows and how high I should turn on my heater. Haha. Which means.. I'm turning into a night animal again.

My new Japanese neighbour 悠う is fantastic haha. At least he's one more person around that practices open-door policy.. and last night I was in his room watching some Japanese arty-farty movie. Very nice show.. though.. I fell asleep at some parts oops ha.

But still I'm starting to miss Manhon.. just for the fact that I miss coming back from lessons and get to talk to someone in rubbish Singlish. Though I still chat to everyone back home on MSN... but well.. You won't believe it.. but it's actually very streneous trying to speak perfect English (even without any accent) all the time. Try it la! That dumdum will only be back in November.. argh.

Ok I'm going to hit the sacks now.. I feel so relieved now that I finished all my work haha. (though there's still a pile of sociology readings that I borrowed from the library and have yet to read). Oh well.. I'll just read them on my loooooooooooooooong ride to Cambridge this weekend.

Yeah.. and Sushi party tomorrow. Hope my diarrhoea doesn't act up.

お休みなさい！

96 days more!

2006-10-18T00:29:00.000Z

While Singapore's suffering from the Haze.. look what shrouded Leeds this morning...

THE FOG!

Just finished my lunch of super-salty noodles. Tried to stew chicken and potato but think added too much soya sauce haha. But now am so full I can vomit a cow. The weather is sooo cold and the fog's making it worse. Glad the heating is up.. means ah.. can go and sleeeeeeep soon haha.

96 days more.. to going back to Singapore.. The countdown timer on my desktop finally went past the 100th day mark... much as I wanted to blog that day.. I.. lazy. Haha. Was busy these few days though.. doing my tutorials (when I realised no one in the class did!) and reading my Soci readings (and I realised half the class didn't read!) and soon I should be doing this online assignment which is due on Friday...

So the past 2 weeks just zoomed past like that.. and the most exciting things that happened were probably planning all the weekend trips and our December Europe tour, which we would probably be visiting Berlin, Interlaken, Venice, Pisa, Roma, Chamonix and Paris. And of course the next few weekends will be spent in Cambridge (punting with Yingting!), Bath (27th meetup!), Bristol (Bumming with Daniel!), Dublin (with Elibirdbird and Teckie), Scotland (with Fangxi and Summer) and Nottingham Games at well, Nottingham. Oh Nottingham games is this sports events where ALL Singaporean and Malaysian students from all over UK will meet up in Nottingham for sports! How cool is that? Haha.

York - 7th October

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

It is said that of all the UK cities, only York's and Bath's architecture were not destroyed during the WWII and hence retained a lot of its Roman Architecture. Yeah quite true. It's really different from Oxford and Leeds and Bradford.. Buildings are much older.. and more rustic. As we went with MASSOC (Malaysian and Singapore Society), it was a massive group of people which was really hard for the organizers to coordinate.

So the tour started off with the Railway Museum.. Just a lot of trains lor. Nothing particularly interesting. Saw some that looked like Daily Express. Teckie was particularly excited though. Yea coz some looked like KR's KRonos. I forgot to bring my SD card in my camera.. so just snapped around with Yuanjing's camera instead.

And after that we walked along the York Wall to the York Minister.. one of the must-sees of York. I could only appreciate the architecture to a certain extent.. coz it was after all, a church. So how? Just take photos lor. Haha.

There was a 1 hour lunch break and we walked around before settling down at this shop that sells cheap crepe roll thing. Not that filling.. but they had free-flow drinks.. something very well appreciated when the weather was chillin cold outside. Oh and they had a buy 4 get 1 free promotion.. so the 5 of us just saved 50p each on our lunch. Just nice =) The shops along the streets of York looked somewhat like those in Sweden though. And yes, EXPENSIVE.

After lunch we split up into small groups and visited where we wanted to. So while Teckie, Elibirdbird and Yuanjing went to the Viking Museum, Manhon and I took the boat ride down York River. Thought could take the drive-yourself boat.. but we ended up on the guided tour boat instead. After which we walked around.. and out of sheer tyconess we managed to get into the Castle Museum for free! Nothing much though. Luckily didn't pay!

And if you ask me the most interesting thing that happened that day was when we came back to Leeds.. for there was this cool high-tech game machine that projected a huge screen on the floor.. to play 4-on-4 virtual soccer! Yeah once you stand in the area the motion sensor could sense you and you just have to kick the virtual 'balls' into the other 3 goals while defending yourself. Haiyah. Got video but lazy to upload. Go figure out from the photos yourself! Haha.

Blackpool - 8th October

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

Not wanting to spend a Sunday slacking in Leeds, Yuanjing and I decided to head down to nearby BlackPool to check it out. Why Blackpool? Simply coz it was in my 'Rough Guide to England' that it's a Must-Go. So we go lor!

Turns out that it was just like a Genting Resort by the black Irish Sea. Yea the Irish Sea was surprisingly Black. Not nice and blue under the sun but dark and ugly. It was high tide when we arrived the the waves were lashing at the shore. Very nice.

So of course the main highlight was the Blackpool tower.. which was a blatent copycat of the Eiffel Tower.. shorter of course. It was even explicitly stated that the Blackpool Tower was inspired by the Eiffel. Bleah. No originality. But since we were up there.. just climb up lor. Got lift.

We got our Bird's Eye View of the city.. which was quite ugly coz it just comprised of many short buildings of the same colour. Only somewhat far away can some greenery be seen. The view of the sea and the shore was much nicer. And since it was sunny we stayed there for a while to let the sea breeze chill us out for a while before going down.

At the lower levels of the Tower there are other 'attractions' like the Dinosaur Ride, Ballroom, Circus, food.. We took a walk around the city instead of staying in the Tower. There were many many other attractions around like the Theme Parks, Sea Life Museum, Wax Museum all of which needed exhorbitant entrance fees. So we just took photos outside the attractions haha.

Guess what? It was low tide already.. and what was lashing waves a few hours ago now reveled a nice flat shoreline peppered with families and their children and dogs running around playing. And donkeys. Yeah correct, donkeys. It's surprising how many children were sitting on the donkeys who were made to stroll along the length of the beach. But the view was so beautiful.. the clouds.. the sea.. the sun that I just took photo after photo after photo...

We took the 6pm coach back. Would have stayed for the night if we could.. coz the night view of the place was going to be spectacular.. with the tower in lights and the big ferris wheel lighted up also. But the last coach to leeds was at 6. So too bad lor.

At least we managed to find stamps and posted back postcards from the top of Blackpool tower =)

Birmingham - 14th & 15th October

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

In the weekend that passed Fangxi, Yuanjing and I decided to pop down to Birmingham to visit Summer and Lilian. While Yuanjing went for her mega dive exhibition.. the rest of us headed down to the Cadbury Factory (or Cadbury World for the kids) and had a WillyWonkaChocolaty lotsa fun! It was all for kids.. and the whole tour was about how chocolate was discovered.. how cadbury was founded.. their work ethics.. how the company grew.. blah blah blah.. the best part was being immersed in the smellll of chocolate the whole time. And of course.. the free chocolate bars.. free chocolate samples that were given out. Whoa by the end of the day ah.. we were sick of chocolate already.

Then we took a loooooooooooooooooooong walk to this park called the Cannon Hill Park. Through Birmingham University.. discovered the Sheares-Hall-Lion-minus-the-Book logo on a lamppost.. discovered a place that looked like Singapore! Check out the photos for details.

Yea the park was a nice place.. lotsa ducks. Didn't really take many photos though.

Summer's and Lilian's Japanese flatmates cooked for us! So nice of them. We helped out a bit though. Haha. And Fangxi and I were struggling trying to converse to them in Japanese.. but ah.. just cannot make it la haha.

The next day Summer and her Japanese flatmates went for a charity run.. so Lilian brought us to this shopping complex called Bullring. It was like Taka.. huge shopping centre with lotsa small shops inside. And the highlight of the day was.. eating Krispy Kreme Doughnuts!! It was expensive though.. a dozen doughnuts for £7.99! Oh but it was heavenly...

Blah blah blah walked around.. went St. Martin's Church.. Chinatown.. wanted to go to Art Gallery but was too far away...

Interestingly when we went into Bullring again we were surprised to find out that Krispy Kreme were giving out FREE doughnuts! Of course we went to grab ours but we stood there for very long looking perturbed.. figuring out why they were giving away so many free HOT doughnuts.. they weren't deformed.. they still tasted great.. and they weren't going to close shop anytime soon. Turns out that it's a promotion thing.. when the red logo on top of the shop lights up.. they will give out FREE DOUGHNUTS! Aiyah shouldn't have bought just now haha.

This pretty much concludes the Birmingham trip.. but for me the best part of the trip was reconfirming that Summer Alamak Pan is essentially.. a bimbo.

On visiting Hamburg and Frankfurt
Summer: Oh Frankfurt! I like to eat the hot dogs!
Me: Oh yah in Frankfurt all the buildings are tall and thin. Some of them are a but curved. But in Hamburg all the buildings are short and fat and round. Got 3 layers.. the middle layer is darker colour..
Summer: Really ah! I wanna see!

On cheonging in Singapore
Yuanjing: But in Singapore you all cheong until late at night meh? Take taxi go home very expensive leh.
Summer: Oh we don't take taxi. We share cab.

On where we are going to travel
Summer: (looking confused) Wait wait wait.. so confirm we are visiting Paris and France?

Got lots more.. but these are the classic ones that I remembered.

This post sure took long.. haha I typed half of it then cannot tahan went to sleep then I woke up.. went to the Japanese Society gathering for free sushi (haha so gian beng) but it wasn't much anyway. So now I'm back to complete the post.

Yeap and finally I see something about halls here that is similar to halls in Singapore

Haha IHG! Finally something other than cheonging.

And to end off.. a check on how the leaves of the tree outside my window are shedding away...

Nice ah.

Ok la.. end off already. Hope that I update soon.

Ciaoz.

As Winter Creeps In

2006-10-06T02:16:00.000Z

Whou.. it's been really long since I updated this blog.. lazy la.. haha.

Having internet in the room for almost a week now.. and have come to realise that it's really impossible to use 25gB in 1 month! So now I'm spamming my bandwidth to make my money's worth.. uploading photos.. listening to streaming radio from Singapore stations (I downloaded this cool widget that has all Singapore radio stations!) Too bad my internet speed sucks so much that I can't watch ppLive. But I've survived so long in hall with no TV.. so it's all right for me =)

At least I'm kept in touch with the world by listening to radio.. I just heard my 1st piece of news in ages on Power 98!

The weather has turned freaking cold the past week.. Signs of winter settling in fast and furious.. And I noticed the leaves on the tree just outide my window change colours.. A phenomena I've seen for the 1st time (come on Singapore the trees whole year same colour one la).

Oh.. i need to mention that on a cold night like this.. I'm so glad to have hot curry beside me.. courtesy of my neighbour ManHon =)

Studying in the University of Leeds
It's been almost 2 weeks of lessons now.. and I've sorta settled my modules happily. Doing 5 core modules with 1 Arts GEM.. a sociology module. It's really a whole new education experience here.. i mean other than the super-slack timetable.. Lectures by the ang-moh lecturers are surprisingly interesting.. Dunno it's the way the speak or wad.. and they actually do engage the students during the lectures. So unlike in NUS where lecturers just rattle off their notes or powerpoint slides.. lecturers here seemed more committed to TEACH.. explaining to students their queries and making sure they are understood before the lecture carries on.

With more time on my hands I feel like studying more haha.. ironically. I mean after all the playing and cheonging when there's really nothing to do I'll just flip out my assignments to do or readings to read.

Oh it's worth mentioning that I did a very British act of sitting in the park under the warm sun.. cool breezes.. hot coffee.. listening to iPod.. reading my readings!

Photos taken on my phone so quality no good ah.. but while back in Singapore we always see the black birds and sparrows (and mosquitoes and chameleons and ants and spiders) in our parks.. the animals that I see very often on the lush green grass are... Squirrels! Will try to catch them on camera some day... =)

Fangxi Visited Leeds
Nottingham hasn't started school so bored Fangxi popped by last Friday to visit. I must say there isn't much to do in Leeds so we took a 30 min coach ride down to Bradford to visit the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television. And it was a fun place! Too bad our coach back was 3pm so we couldn't spend more time there.... Check out these photos!

And watch the news!

Ok.. and so we finally caught the so-called "Best Fish and Chips in UK" since 1960.. though what I read on my Rough Guide to England recommended a shop in Whitby as having the best F&C. But still it was fantastic fish and chips! Yummm..

Went to Royal Armouries Museum again with Fangxi on Sunday.. and it was definitely a more fruitful trip this time.. coz there were better shows which I did not get to catch the week before.. including the falconry show where they showcased birds of prey strutting their skills in getting their dinner...

And I managed to catch this street performance on Briggate (Leeds' answer to Orchard Road.. but much shorter).

Self explanatory photos yea?
The bag he held at the end was for donations. And I thought I'd only see such things in Period shows!

Singapore Society Chinese Dinner
Met up with the rest of the Singaporeans in Leeds. Felt so at home suddenly.. and could whack out all the broken English and lahs and lors without having to consciously make an effort to speak perfect English (with or without accent) haha!

The surprising thing that we were treated to a FREE dinner at this posh chinese restaurant. Whoa when the dishes were laid on the table I couldn't believe my eyes! Sutff that I won't even eat often back in Singapore! So much so that I even mumbled to Teckie.. "Whoa.. what did I do to deserve this?"

So how to describe the dinner?
SHIOK LAH!
Haha

After the dinner we were strolling along the Millenium Square where I caught this exhibition of photos of animals..

I must say they were really stunning photos. Wouldn't hesitate to buy the photo collage if they were on sale...

Swiss Dinner Party and Halo
For something more recent.. Just yesterday Martina and Doreen (Yuanjing's neighbours) invited all of us over for a Swiss meal.. it was just potatoes fried with flour and cheeze and it was seriously delicious! and filling as well. But of course.. the best part of the Swiss meal was that it ended off with... CHOCOLATE FONDUE!!!

Just so happened that there was this SMS spreading around which allowed us free entry into Halo and so we conveniently popped down. Reluctant as I was.. how can I miss 'visiting' this nightclub which was once-upon-a-time a... CHURCH! Haha I've heard so much about it even before coming to Leeds!

Ok from now on I should update my blog every day at least.. otherwise I'd be losing all my readers haha.. And yes I still owe my Sweden/Norway travel article.. still slowly writing la.. but if you all want to see photos.. all are uploaded in my Flickr website.

That's all for now.. hope your computer doesn't crash by the number of slideshows I've put here haa.

Ciaoz!

Last day of no-internet-in-room

2006-09-28T22:35:00.000Z

Yeah guys can cook too!
Originally uploaded by clementchio.

Not that I wanna always put up pictures of food but that's the only thing I do at night.. haha other than tonight when I'm in the library with my flatmates using the computer.. and the past 2 night I popped down to the pub just a stones throw away from my flat to watch soccer (and drink a bit) with my flatmates.

I randomly upload photos to http://www.flickr.com/photos/clementchio/ under 'Leeds Random Photos' so go check out the photos since they not always are uploaded on the blog. I think flickr can do cool stuff like make comments on parts of the photos or wad so just play around!

They finally installed the wireless points all over my hostel and I am receiving the signal but I can't connect! Only after spending 2 pounds on a 4 minute phone call to them then I realise that the internet will only be up tomorrow.. or so they promised.

It's £21.99 for 25gb of data per month.. works out to be 1gb a day.. how much is that?? Been using unlimited internet in Singapore for so long I can't gauge how much information that is man..

Anyway since my timetable is so damn slack I enrolled myself in a French crash course! I think i'm crazy now that I'm taking 7 modules but my shiongest day is only a 4 hours of lectures! Dunno if NUS will recognise my French module but oh well.. even if they don't.. it's a something worth killing my time here.. since my neighbour speaks French and I should be going to France during December to practice and there are no written exams only speaking and listening...

Ok ba.. that's all for the short update.. Fangxishenmedongxi is popping by from Notts to visit tomorrow. Till I go online IN MY ROOM..

ciaoz

The past week in Leeds

2006-09-25T20:28:00.000Z

Oh well just realised I haven't been promptly blogging.. partly because of the lack of internet in my room. Now I'm in the Engineering buildings which is just a minute's walk away from my apartments tapping on their wireless internet.

So for those who are curious about what my apartment looks like...

Anyway.. the 1st week of school was no-lessons and all the intro fairs so all I did was just walk around the campus soaking myself in UK university life. The weather has been great.. sunny with cool breezes.. check out these photos of what's happening in Leeds Uni!

Following that night where the 4 Singaporeans tried out cooking our Hainanese Chicken Rice.. me and Yuanjing decided that it was our turn to cook after 2 nights of Italian food. It turned out to be quite a big thing.. the Japanese girl invited her Japanese friends over.. the Italian girl invited her Italian friends over.. and there were friends from France, Germany, Switzerland, UK all here to try out our cooking haa

Didn't turn out that bad though.. But there's one thing about Europeans.. they don't seem to like eating meat with bones. I notice them deboning the whole chicken thigh before starting the meal. I think the sight of bones may be rare for them.. so paiseh.

No wonder the chicken with bones are so cheap here. hehheh. Good for me.

We overestimated the amount to cook and so we had another TWO days of leftover chicken rice... Haha!

Day 2 of Chicken Rice
Day 3 of Chicken Rice!(it was chicken fried rice actually.. fried with chicken, ham, veggies and tofu. Tasted more like Lor Mai Kai)

Garlic Bread!This is when I realise my 2 years in Block Comm turned out useful after all.

Characteristic of the English University culture is cheonging.. they people here CHEONG EVERY NIGHT! It's an expensive habit actually. And dangerous too.. as the drunkards will just wander around the streets shouting and screaming. But of course how can we miss cheonging sessions ourselves? Here's photos of a cheoning session in a pub at the Union building (yes, there are 3 pubs in the union building at the very heart of the campus itself!). And that Friday night was the Fruity Night!

The next day was a Saturday.. just so happened that the Malaysian and Singaporean Society had a City Tour organised so we just went for it! So much for it being Malaysian and Singaporean.. 3 of us were like the only Singaporeans around la.. the rest were all Malaysians. Bleah. But it was a great tour.. coz I thought I knew the city centre arleady.. but then I realised there were so many short cuts around! Especially to the Chinese Supermarket.. which is so near now haha!

And on the 1st boring Sunday we were cranking our heads on what to do so we just decided to pop by the Leeds Royal Armoury Museum. Whoa turned out to be not bad after all! It was a rather big museum.. with lotsa displays and even live drama performances! Too bad we went quite late so we missed quite a few shows. Oh well but what the heck.. I'm definitaly going again.. especially when friends come to visit. Moreover.. it's FREE!

Check out photos!

Anyway yeah.. today is my first day of school and there's like only 1 hour of lecture (yes 1 hour of lecture per week for 1 module!) Tomorrow's a shionger day though.. but still manageable. Hai.. but of course still having some problems coz timetable clashes and NUS didn't approve some of my newly mapped modules and the silly admin gave me some trouble earlier on (all of us here agree that I'm a victim of her PMS).

And I'm still working on my Brit accent to get myself understood whenever I talk. Whoa I can't seem to keep up more than 3 sentences with the proper accent. How does Rongxuan do it? Ha.

Yuanjing conveniently took the 1st week of school off to visit Paris with her friend so most of the time I'm hanging around with my new Singaporean neighbour Man Hon (who is doing Medicine full time!). Nights are boring here coz I don't hope to cheong too much. Just pan friend chicken drumsticks with noodles with MH and it was yum yum yum! Though I threw away lotsa food I bought last week coz they all didn't last till the expiry date.. =( Guess I was too excited and greedy on the 1st visit to the supermarket.

So for now it'll be more nights in the Engine buildings using the internet.. until my apartment gets it's own connection.

Hope this entry makes up for the long absence in this blog.

Take care all those back in Singapore.
Cheers.

NO INTERNET IN MY ROOM!!

2006-09-20T21:59:00.000Z

I've arrived in Leeds like for 4 days already and if anyone's wondering why I'm MIAing from the net for so long.. yeah.. THERE'S NO INTERNET IN MY ROOM!! At least not for the next 1 or 2 weeks when they are still installing the wireless adapted.. grr...

So now I'm in Yuanjing's place using her internet.. her neighbours are really cool.. they cook every night and I just chup in to eat their dinners.. haha.. Though dinner just now was cooked at my place by the other Singaporean SEP pple Elizabeth, Teckie and Yuanjing.. and we ate.. CHICKEN RICE!!! yum yum yum.. Singaporean food....

Chicken Rice!!

SEP in Leeds!!

There are lotsa things I wanna blog right now but I can't get my thought sorted yet.. not without using my own computer having my own sweet time in the comfort of my own room. It's only strange that the English kids do NOTHING but party EVERY NIGHT and it gets a bit sian to keep going to choing. That's why all the international students tend to hang out together.. but I've great friends from all over the world now.. Japanese.. Italians.. Germans.. Africans.. Argentinians.. Swizterlanders.. cool huh?

Ok la.. more photos and updates in a weeks time I guess =)

In Bergen

2006-09-14T20:53:00.000Z

It's been long since I last posted.. wanted to post/upload photos before leaving Stockholm at Sipei's place but fell asleep before I could do so.. Now using a shared internet terminal in the dorm in Norway so can't blog much.. will do so when I finally reach back to Leeds in 3 days time.

And yes will do a good writeup to do justice to my Stockholm-Oslo-Bergen experience.

Sigh.. I miss everybody back in Singapore.

Norway

2006-09-11T23:59:00.000Z

Norway would be our second country in our pre-SEP stint.. It was 2 girls and a guy now after we bade farewell to EngKheng and made our way to one of the most expensive travel places on Earth!

Arriving in Oslo and the National Museum
First impression of Oslo was the rate of high-techness the city was in... albeit it being cold and metallic.. with reference to the airport and the express train to the city centre. After checking into the hostel, we went around to Karl Johans Gate for a walk only to find the place strangely sleazy.. though it was supposed to be a main shopping street. Sensing that it was not wise for 3 young asian travellers to be wandering around a foreign land at night.. we grabbed our exhorbitantly expensive (already the cheapest we could find) meal and headed back to our hostel.

Our roommates were these 2 German girls who were students as well. Had a nice talk with them and that was when we found out that Karl Johans Gate was an infamous Red Light District at night. Haha.

Wasn't feeling too well.. so popped Paracetamol and headed to bed.

Daytime Oslo was much more peaceful. The buildings were characteristic and quaint. Was marvelled by the architecture.. probably coz it was different from Sweden and was still enthralled by the whole European-architecture thing. So we took photos as we made our way to the National Museum which was a rather long walk away.

Took the free tour guide who did an excellent job in explaining how all the murals around the Gallery.. all of which were painted according to Norwegian history. Turned out to be a rather enjoyable tour coz the art weren't too abstract.. haha.. means I understand what was drawn!

Folk Museum
Took a boat to one Peninsula where all the Museums were congregated.. one of which was the Folk Museum. The place was kinda like Skanson of Sweden. Nothing really interesting. Few photos also.

Viking Museum
Ancient Norwegians were Vikings.. and the boats were mainly used as burial sites. That's all I can remember haha. My brain is like a net.. wadever I read in Museums will just flow out through the holes. So er.. just see photos lor. Haha.

Vigeland Park
Norway's most visited attraction with over 1 million visitors every year. Approximately 200 sculptures by Gustav Vigeland (1869-1943), who also designed the layout of the park. A monumental artistic creation with a human message that is well worth seeing. Popular recreation area.

Yeap.. and it was real nice place to chill out.. sit in the grass.. under the warm fantastic weather.. The whole place was full of naked sculptures. Oh well.. this is art!

We were at the Internet point at the train station happily using internet when his (rather good looking) Chinese guy came up to ask if we were Singaporeans. Haha! Meeting a Singaporean in this part of the world is always exciting. He's Adrian.. studying Geography in LSE.. same course as Jilyn. Hohoho. Coincidental yeah?

Norway In a Nutshell
The best part about our Oslo hostel would be it's FREE CONTINENTAL BREAKFAST! Yeah the breakfast rocked.. with hot sausages, scrambled eggs, potato wedges.. FRESHLY TOASTED BREAD.. cheese.. yum yum yum.. so naturally we had to take this symbolic photo of our last meal in the Hostel before we headed on to Bergen.

Norway in a Nutshell is this famous ride which took us through the sights of scenic Norway via a train from Oslo to Myrdal.. then onThe Flam Railway, from Myrdal to Flam.. where we took a boat ride through the fjords to Gudvangen.. where to took bus up steep slopes passing by towering waterfalls to Voss where we finally took a train to Bergen. Watch this video here to really understand how wonderful this trip was.. where even my photos won't do justice to...

Bergen
Our second city in Norway and our final stop before heading back to our respective universities in UK. Bergen turned out to be a nice little fishing village with characteristic pointed-roofed houses. Walked around.. took photos.. then we took a bus out of the main city to Troldhaugen to visit the hometown of Edward Grieg.. a famous Norwegian composer.

It was a looong walk into Troldhaugen. The blazing heat from the sun didn't help either. Though it did bring about one of the more interesting happenings during our whole trip.

We were on our way back to the bus stop after visiting the place.. the sun was equally hot and 3 of us were damn tired from walking. Jilyn even wanted to faint on the spot so we could get and ambulance to send us back Haha. One of the girls did mention something like "I wish some kind soul will pick us up."

And almost immediately like a wish-come-true a car stopped by and the driver asked if we needed a lift. Under normal circumstances we would have kindly rejected.. after all.. we were vulnerable travellers in a foreign country. But that time wasn't a normal circumstance. So we hopped in.. me in front.. the 2 girls behind.

Turned out that the driver was a pianist himself doing some recording nearby and he often gives people lifts out to the bus stop! What a kind soul. The mere fact that he was a pianist probably got the girls smitten with him already haha..

Kind people do exist after all.

Second Day in Bergen
Started off by visiting the Hanseatiske Museum.. learnt about the Bergen fishermen's lifestyle blah blah blah.. then we took the Furnicular up to Mount Fløyen to see a spectacular view of Bergen!Walking around the park was refreshing.. took a lot of group shots. Weather was great. And guess what's interesting? We bumped into Adrian (the Singaporean guy at the Oslo Internet Joint) again! Haha.

We wanted to celebrate our last day in Scandinavia by feasting on Norwegian Salmon.. but was oh too expensive.. so we settled on Pizza Buffet instead. Whoa eat until can die.

Just so happened that it was the Cultural Feste in Bergen so we decided to feast ourselves in the cultural mood. From street dancers to outdoor bands to puppet shows.. what a great ending to our Scandinavia trip! Met this cute little Norwegian boy who I gave my carrabena to.
We intended to spend the night in the airport but we realised that the airport wasn't 24 hours! So we just stayed illegally in the hostel common room till it was time for us to head to the airport.

What a trip! Good bye Norway.. Hello UK!

Halfway through Stockholm

2006-09-07T23:26:00.000Z

It's now past midnight in Stockholm.. Fangxi and Sipei are both sleeping now while I catch some time to blog on her comp while uploading photos.. It's kinda freezing outisde now but the view from her room's fantastic =)

So.. about Stockholm..
The past 2 days weren't exactly fruitful.. but it's was fun exploring this beautiful city... I'm a bit tired now to blog in detail so for now just enjoy the photos

Don't worry I'll make up for full description of Stockholm when I'm more awake..

Stockholm

2006-09-06T23:59:00.000Z

6th Sept - First Day in Stockholm

It was a short night at Rongxuan’s place.. considering that we only reached her place at 10+ and had to leave at 5+. It was the first time that we experienced the freezing cold of the UK mornings. So, we caught the 2nd bus in the pitch dark and made our way to the Oxford Gloucester Green Bus Station to make our way to Stansted airport.
Yes, at the Stansted Airport we ate our first very expensive meal that cost me £7.70! (S$23!!!)

And we arrived in Stockholm!
Fangxishenmedongxi and I were lucky to catch an airport bus immediately after we went out of the airport. But we could not sit together coz the bus was almost filled up. I even had to sit on the makeshift seat just beside the driver. But oh well.. the bus drove through the suburbs to the city and it was a great scenic ride. It was a refreshingly beautiful city. But of course the 1st thing on our minds was to meet up with Jilyn.. which we eventually did! (after 2 international phone calls)
Again, we were lucky to meet Sipei along the way to the student hostels so we just chucked our backpacks at her place and went to have dinner. Oh my gosh Eng Kheng brought us to this ‘cheap’ (nothing in Stockholm is cheap just that this place is cheaper than normal) place that served HUGE pizzas… check it out

There was nothing much to do at night… but it just so happened that there was a choinging session at a student pub nearby and Sipei highly recommended us to go.. which we did.. along with her flatmates.. a British lad, a Finnish gal, 2 German guys and of course.. 3 Singaporean kids. Whoa chionging there was really boring man.. just had to buy beer and stand around and talk. The rule was if you finished the drink in your hands you’d have to get yourself another one. And the guys all drink beer here.. no such things as Tequila Shots or Burbon Coke no no no… But a good thing is that beer is not expensive.

Of course there was the dancing part. The music was terrible. But of course the fun part was watching the drunkards make a full of themselves.
Strange thing was the whole party ended at… 1am! Haha that was ridiculously early to end a party. And all the drunkards were shouting and singing at the top of their voices as all made their way back to the hostels.
way back to the hostels.

7th Sept - Foiled Plans
There were a few outdoor places we wanted to visit this day but was postponed because we woke up to a light drizzle. Hence, the more exciting indoor thing to do was to GO TO IKEA!!

One interesting thing was that while on the bus to IKEA, the 3 of us were just chatting and yakking away when suddenly this old man beside us tapped us and said
“Excuse me, are you from Singapore?”
Haha.. whoa the Singaporean slang is so recognisable! Turns out that this old couple were a retired businessman and businesswoman couple and had been traveling around Europe too. Took a photo with them =)
And ikea was HUGE!!! It was a 5-storey building that sold lost of Ikea stuff.. stuff found in Singapore and of course lots more stuff not found back home. I bought myself a nice orange umbrella (which is spoilt already but you still can catch it in the Stockholm photos) and a cheap pillow for myself.

The highlight of the day turned out to be… MEATBALLS!

Whoa having authentic Swedish meatballs in Ikea was really shiok. The girls were absolutely sure that the meatballs here were much nicer than back in Singapore… well, I think they taste the same. If anything were nice it had to be the potatoes.. truly soft and buttery it could just melt in your mouth. Yummmmmmmmmm……

We went to the City Hall hoping to catch the guided tour but we missed it. We went to the Royal Palace but it was closing soon. So we ended up taking useless photos and shopped for groceries (which were freaking expensive)

Dinner was simple pasta with minced meat.

8th Sept - Skanson
Skansen is like a miniature Sweden. The old farmsteads and houses have been brought here from all over the country. They are seen surrounded by gardens and cultivated patches that are typical of the time and place. There are wild animals, mainly from Scandinavia, and rare breeds of farm animals. There are also trees and plants here from all parts of Sweden

Ok I copied the above paragraph from the Skansen info brochure. All in all Skansen is just this place build up to show what old Sweden was like… the buildings.. the roads.. they even had callafarres stationed in some buildings to explain to us what the building were for last time and took photos with us.

The only 2 regrets I had about this place was I didn’t go into this part of Skansen (had to pay) where they featured strange Scandinavian animals. Seriously they were animals that I never saw before!
And secondly was the horrible weather unsuitable for an outdoor excursion like this. Fangxi and I were just freezing in the cold winds and light drizzles such that by the afternoon we couldn’t wait to get out of the place to somewhere warm. The eateries had mostly outdoor seats so naturally they would be closed. Bleah.

So here are the photos for Skansen.

Vasa Museum
Between four and five o’clock, the great new warship Vasa keeled over and sank. A few short lines about a major disaster were written in this book on August 10, 1628. For a magnificent ship that sank on her very first voyage, this could have been the end. Instead, it was the beginning of an adventure that is still in progress. The Vasa was found almost intact, standing on the seabed, after three centuries. The ship was salvaged and is now one of the foremost tourist attractions in the world.

Again that was excerpted from a book that was given at the museum haha. Yes the whole museum was built around this big ship but I think it’s an extremely well organized museum. Definitely one of the more interesting museums I visited in this whole trip.

Since it was our last night in Stockholm we decided to cook a great dinner for ourselves! It was really a good good homecooked meal. Satisfying…

9th Sept - Royal Palace
We started the day with a TEN SCOOP ICE CREAM!!! What a splurge… but it was really worth the money
Then off we headed to the Royal Palace. And it was just in time to catch the changing of guards ceremony. Or so we thought. The moment the band was heard everyone rushed to the parade square and we were squeezed all the way to the back. So all I did was randomly take some photos and raised my camera in the air hopefully to take a video of the Parade. Bleah it was nothing much at all. Quite boring actually. Thus we had our share of fun by stealing shots with the guards in charge of crowd control ha.

We headed into the Royal Palace. Couldn’t visit the whole place though.. coz we had a cruise to catch after that. It was lucky we caught the guided tour in the main part of the palace so it didn’t reduce to wandering the palace aimlessly.

Surprisingly, the cruise after that was rather luxurious.. considering that it only cost S$50! Check out the ship
Just like all cruises there was absolutely nothing to do. Except to take photos, enjoy the sea breeze and take more photos. As we are all poor students, dinner was our usual unflattering Swedish crisp bread with spread in our little bunk.

We just spent the night by the live band playing Bridge. The band was cool. But didn’t last long.

The ship was going to dock at Finland at 2.30am. Sunrise would be at 6am. We planned to sleep a bit and wake up for these 2 events.

Oh we didn’t. Haha.

10th Sept - And we were in Finland!

This was the first time we realized that we didn’t need to have our passports checked whenever we travel within the EU. We just stepped onto Finland soil without stamping our passports!

It was a quiet Sunday morning and it was reeeaaallllly quiet. There were no cars on the street. There was not a single soul around. We walked to a little town centre and all the shops were closed. The air was refreshing but the walk was generally boring.

So hungry/greedy us headed back to the ship for BUFFET BREAKFAST!!

Gosh that was a great meal after scrimping and saving all these while!

When the ship docked at Sweden again, we said goodbye to EngKheng as the UK gang took the airport train to catch our plane to Oslo, Norway.

In Oxford!

2006-09-05T23:50:00.000Z

I'm in UK!!

Finally after a 2 hour flight to Bangkok.. waiting 3 hours in the transit area and an ardous 12 HOUR FLIGHT across India-Europe to London and a 1 hour bus ride to Oxford where Rongxuan came to pick us up..

Actually the above description did no justice to what I just went through.. it was the longest "day" of sunlight in my life.. from 8am in Singapore to 6pm London time sunlight was crawling through the windows of the plane all the way. And to my abhorrance there was NO personal tv set throughout both plane rides as well!! It wouldn't have been so bad if they didn't show lousy movies throughout the 12 hour flight.. though I still watched them anyway.. nothing to do ma.. haha.

So far so good.. today was a good day coz everything happened as planned.. no cockups wadsoever.. Didn't spend any money too! Haha.. of course la.. travelling in the plane the whole day ma.

Thanks for all those who SMSed.. wrote cards.. and especially so for all the ~deeBlockers who came down overwhealmingly to send me off.

I'm getting very sleep to carry on typing.. long day tomorrow again.. in the meantime.. check out photos!

6 hours more..!!

2006-09-04T17:58:00.000Z

Anxiety didn't really set in until I started talking to Rongx.. She was actually waiting for me tonight when I would be arriving at her place tomorrow! Whoa luckily I caught her online now..

Everything seemed to fall in place today.. the emart pple came with my snugly fit NewBalance shoes.. luggage capacity increased to 30kg.. got all my clothings.. currency.. documents.. bought a UK travel guide.. charged all my electronics.. called the Leeds Accomodation office to settle my accomodation which isn't settled yet.. and haha I recorded a lame voicemail to update the outdated run-over-by-cars one...

The only not-so-good thing is my silly haircut.. me and my big mouth to ask her for something special.. so now I look like

Haha..

So lemme share with you my schedule for the next 10 days

5th Sept
Travel to London.. Bus to Oxford where Rongxuan stays

6th Sept
Early morning travel to Stansted.. where we take a flight to Stockholm (Sweden).. and meet Jilyn!

7th-8th Sept
Dunno what we are going to do in Stockholm haaa

9th Sept
MAF Brothers Day! And we're celebrating it by going on some S$50 Cruise Eng Kheng's school organised...

10th Sept
Back from the cruise.. rush down to airport to catch flight to Oslo (Norway)

11th-12th Sept
Free and Easy in Oslo.. really dunno what we are going to do there too.. haha photostated the guidebooks but.. haven't read.. ohohohooo!

13th Sept
There's this tour called Norway in a Nutshell where we'll be travelling from Oslo to Bergen and see all the majestic scenery.. Fjords (glacier like stuff).. and take lotsa photos!!

14th-15th Sept
Free and Easy in Bergen.. Once again.. we'll decide what to do when we're there.

16th Sept
Early morning flight to London.. then a rush to Oxford where I collect my struff from Rongxuan's place.. then I'll have to bid farewell to Fangxi, Jilyn and Rongxuan while I travel alone down to University of Leeds.. yea.. the cool thing is someone will probably fetch me from the coach station. =)

Ok typing all these is getting me excited!!!
To all well wishes who called.. MSNed.. SMSed.. tagged.. Thanks for ya love =)

Time to do a last minute check on luggage.. Cya!

1 DAY MORE!!

2006-09-03T20:49:00.000Z

Didn't blog the past few days partly coz i was too busy settling my stuff for the trip.. and i must say it's almost done already.. let's see what i did so far..

Photostated the books on Norway (though haven't read yet)
Bought new clothes
Started packing my bags
Printed out all my travel itenieries and airline tickets
Did my health checkup
which was like a Maple quest.. went to YIH and the nurse told me I had to give her a form which I had to download online.. searched for the form finally only to be told to come back after YIH lunch hour.. did blood test.. urine test.. had to go Clementi for an X-Ray.. wait 1 hour.. then come back for final consultation with the doctor! So how many EXP did i get for that?
Collected my passport photos
Applied for the International Student Identity Card
Changed money
Bought more clothes, toiletries and cooking stuff
Went 观音庙to求平安
Packed 90% of my stuff!!

Tomorrow's going to be a packed day again... I have to..

Get my winter clothings from Kaiyuan
Go Thai Airways main office and beg them to increase baggage allowance since we are students
Go Maju Camp buy New Balance Shoes and white socks which I ordered from eMart
I came back on Sat just to wait for them to deliver to home but NOBODY CAME!
Cut really short hair

Good bye to my long pigtail which I grew for so loonggg

I guess all these warrent me a good, though short, sleep now.

Tomorrow's gonna be a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong day.. my last day in Singapore...

10 More Days!

2006-08-25T06:15:00.000Z

Welcome welcome!

Since I'm at home the whole day with nothing to do I've spent the whole day doing up this blog to commerate 10 MORE DAYS to flying off! (I've even set the time of posting to the flight timing to make it really 10 more days haha..

I haven't started packing.. though I guess I've settled most stuff.. except getting a medical checkup and booking coaches around london.. Hai.. I really must catch Adel or Mich online to solve luggage in london problem!

Oh well.. wad an apt blogskin I think.. if you're passing by.. TAG!