It's end of week 10...

I am seriously neglecting blogging. my last post was a month-plus back!

I just finished my mid-sems about 3 weeks ago and in 4 weeks' time, i will be having my final exams and I used to think that only secondary school is so exam-orientated.

But my much-needed one-week midsem break was indeed GOOD! Cooked quite a bit, read way too much food blogs, stuck to the laptop screen watching KHUNTORIA in WGM and went for my first road trip(sort of) to Sunshine Coast!

Made this Lu wei "tau eu bak", very simple cooking but took around 2.5 hours of simmering to achieve the tender juicy fatty pork rashers! YUMS

The beaches along Sunshine Coast were simply awesome. the super fine powdery-like sand and clear water

As much as I think this We Got Married series is unrealistic, I have to admit that I'm obsessed with KHUNTORIA! All their episodes that I've watched so far are so so FUNNY & CUTE!  In short, these episodes portray a What-a-girl-wishes-her-boyfriend-will-be-to-her kind of scene!

That was my one-week break. Trying hard to get back to my mood of studying though i've been sleeping quite a lot...

 Have a good weekend, people!

into Week 4 of semester 2 2011

hello people! back with another post after a month!

Winter break back in Penang was great. In a month's time a few of my buddies gonna have a fresh start in UK unis.

This semester i am living with a French girl and 3 Americans. Yeah no luck with Asians. hahahah! Luckily the French girl clicks so well with me! we have the same wave length in communication and she hates people partying more than me!

I am trying to expose myself to more activities other than just studies. I missed the times in high school in which I was able to juggle so well with my studies and extra-curricular activities! Boy, really wondered how i did that. Cos' i totally the opposite in uni, that's BAD!

That's all for now. To Adrian Eu and Patsy, hope you two will adapt well to your new college and uni respectively =)

Hakataya Ramen, Sunnybank

Hakataya Ramen
Shop 27B, Sunnybank Plaza
Cnr Mains Rd & McCullough St,
Sunnybank QLD 4109

The first time I had this ramen was in Gold Coast, it straight away reminded me of the awesome ramen I had during a family vacation to Japan a few years back(we ate 4 bowls of the ramen on the 2 nights when we're in Osaka).

Last year, the shop finally has a branch in Brisbane and I wanted to try it so badly. So wet with jie and wah, it still tastes so awesome. It's pretty oily but it's okay to indulge in this once a while.

So when Daddy and Mummy came here last December, we took them there for lunch and they love it!

The ramen is so good and the soup is so thick!! The cold vege dish goes well with the noodles too.



I usually pick out all the fatty parts of meat but I just put all these pork slices into my mouth and they just melt in my mouth!

Do ask for additional ramen. The first time is FREE!

So far, I've only tried the Char siu ramen($13) and the nagahama ramen($10). They are the same thing actually, just that the char siu ramen has more pork slices while only about 2 slices for the nagahama ramen.

Do give it a try when you're visiting Gold Coast or Brisbane!

Loving myself for knowing how to cook!

Yes, I'm in love with cooking. Sometimes i think i spend way too much time in the kitchen. Even when I'm studying, i will think of cooking and recipes. I make lists of what to cook each week and sometimes end up reading cooking blogs for way too long (supposed to read them only as a 15mins time-out from my studies )

I do go out every week, for GROCERY SHOPPING mostly, i've never been to the city for like window shopping so far ever since i came back here. Every week, Jane and I would check Coles' catalogue and see what hot deals they have for the week. LOL, so aunty right? But both of us are loving it, i guess cos all these cooking and grocery shopping are very new to us since we lived in a fully-catered accommodation last year.

I'm loving Urbanest, cooking what i want to eat(instead of all those processed food at IH, and i've extended my contract till december =)

took us alot of time to fry this in batches. reminds me of KFC fried chicken.

We made this sweet and sour chicken using the Lee Kum Kee sauce.

I'm just too lazy to write up recipe post etc. so just a few pictures here and there on fb =)

Currently, can't really cook much cos it's the mid-sem exam seasons. Second year of uni is getting tougher..

Healthy food to a healthy life! eat well people!

my 20th birthday

I've come to realise that so long as I'm not in Malaysia, i won't be able to celebrate my birthday with my family and high school friends. the last birthday i spent with my family and 'lao peng yous' was 2 years back when I was in HSC, it's as though i knew i wont be celebrating my birthday with them for a long time after that, so i requested for a birthday celebration at home..

My 19th birthday surprise was planned by my beloved sis with a bunch of IH people celebrating it for me, some whom i don't really talk much at all already, hahaahha! but there are a few whom i grew much closer to.

This year, everyone was sort of like separated since we're not staying in IH anymore, i thought "hmm, i shouldn't be expecting anything special whatsoever" but another side of me was like "hmm, maybe they will have a surprise for me?" Lucky me, my second thought came true. Erm, I did have a random guess like how the surprise was gonna turn out to be etc.. but Jane was really clever in covering it up.


*fast forward*(happened 2 days before my birthday) 2 days be  When i followed Jane to her kitchen to take my food, suddenly i heard "SURPRISE!!" i practically shouted and was surprised!! LOLOL!! They baked choc chip cookies and made a colourful card for me =) Most importantly, I got to blow birthday candles and make birthday wishes. To me, that's two most important thing that a person should get for his/her birthday. no need big celebration/surprise(though it'll be an added bonus), just let me blow my candles and make my birthday wishes, i'll be satisfied.


Later that night, we went for dinner at Madtongsan 2 for korean cuisine. i celebrated my birthday at madtongsan 1 last year, hahaha! I enjoyed the dinner with all the gossips and laughters. Other people were looking at our table cos we talked and laughed so loudly!

On my birthday itself, i did not do much since i already had an early celebration. received a call from Janice at 2am in the morning, i was already ZZzzzz like a pig d. Just replying to the FB wishes one by one. got wishes from people i don't really talked too, oh well, they're FB friends..hahahaha! Jane bought me my fav Japanese cupcakes, that came unexpected as well .

End of birthday video calling with my parents! =)

all my buddies who planned the surprise



Present from Jane. Jap green tea cupakes from 2in1 bakery! YUMSSSss



all the sweet birthday messages up on my board!

Now I have a big number 2 in front of my age already, no longer a teen! but still is one at heart..

p.s. thank you to Mone, Janice, Angelin and Kp for the birthday sms-es all the way from Malaysia!!

some IH things

The things i do in my room besides studying and sleeping and facebooking...



I take pictures of clouds using my electric blue Sony camera. the formation of clouds i see through my windows. i'm mesmerised by clouds for some unknown reasons..

i take pictures of almost everything. the Uncle Toby's bars, my night-time biscuits, my favourite Nissin instant noodles( u know, in malaysia i always eat either chicken flavour Cintan Mee or the korean noodles) but here, i got a vast selection of flavours to choose from =). i cook instant noodles in my room. how? hahaha, just pour hot water over it, don't even have to use the stove and pot.

I eat in my room as well. these are the packed lunches i had when i have my 12-2pm lectures. egg sandwiches/ham, cheese and mustard/ pesto chicken and mesclun sandwich with one packet of Arnott's biscuits, a banana/apple/orange and a box of Just Juice drink.



i find these candy wrappings special, which was why i bought the whole packet and collected them. but after taking pictures of it, i threw them away d and i'm sick of Minties d, a result of overeating them. hahaha!

try and guess what these pictures are trying to convey.

Malaysia's Independence day

so tmr is Merdeka day, public holiday in Malaysia =) bet most of you will be using this day sleeping till 12noon ( i'll be doing that if i'm back home)

i'm not really a patriotic person so why am i even writing this post?! well, i have to voice out my opinion about something related to Hari Merdeka.

i have friends in Fb writing stuff like " sang Negaraku in adelaide, fell proud but sad" and "let's sing our national anthem together tmr"

And guess what they get for their replies? "why so patriotic? if you're so patriotic, you'll be studying in malaysia and not aussie." and "are you f***ing serious? scr*** malaysia."

i really don't understand why they need to make such mean comments. if you hate malaysia so much, that's your problem. Just shut your damn mouth or migrate to other country. you don't have to stop others from expressing their love for their country.

For me, malaysia has been a place where i had a memorable childhood and great high school years. nothing much to worry about. so, i really 'pandang rendah" on all those people, they make these comments without having the thought that malaysia has actually provided them with a safe and happy place to live for so many years already.

i guess people make such comments because they are associating it with the politics in malaysia.( as in they hate all the orang besar in malaysia's political world)

malaysia is really a nice country with all it's places of attractions ( the islands, highlands..) and rich culture. it would be a great place to live in if there is less corruption( which means we need a clean fresh government), more environmental-friendly( government policy and malaysian's mind set), and lower crime rate( again this depends on the government).

Malaysia is still where my HOME is......


to those who are reading this post, i hope you are not one the brainless people who makes the nasty comments.

malaysian food for you: my favourite roti canai!!

and roti tisu

my personal favourites are the ones from Goodall Food court in Penang

(opposite PCGHS high school)

the roti canai is so so yummy and the roti tisu with banana slices is SUPERB.

i will take a photo of it when i go back to penang and post it up!

Melbourne part ONE

I had a 4-day(5th to 8th of July) trip to melbourne with genny and fay during our semester break. As we were busy revising for exams when we booked for our flight and accommodation, we did not get the best deal offered.
Jetstar Return flight: $171 (everything included)
Hotel Enterprize: $88per night for one room

this trip to melbourne was all about sight-seeing and exploring the melbourne city. initially we thought of going to the Great Ocean Road but it was too pricey and all we see are rocks formation and scenery plus it's a 3-hr long journey to get there.

on the first day, as soon as we reached Melb, we went to check-in into our hotel. by the time we were done with the hotel and luggage, it's already 4pm. so there's nothing much for us to do. with maps in our hand, we decided to go to Chinatown( Bourke Street) which is about 25mins walk from the hotel. You can't really get lost in melb cos the roads are wide and properly planned. our first meal in melb was quite bad. warning ppl, don't go to this shop by the name "Empress of China". after dinner, we were walking around the city, taking pics. tht's the end of our first day. so boring right?

second day: we went to Queen Victoria Market in the morning. bought a slice of french vanilla, yummy but jelak. after that, we went to Lygon street(the so called lil' Italy) wanted to try the award-winning gelato Il Dolce Freddo but we were so 'sui', the shop was closed for winter break on the day we went.haihs...then the whole day we were walking around the city. we walked ALOT. went to Cook's cottage, melb museum(did not go in, just took pics(sadcase eh), Imax, Uni of melb, Flinders Street station, Federation Square, etc we explored almost every corner of the city. there were many times we just stand at one corner of a street, stoning and not knowing where to go,

 my melb trip doesn't sound exciting right?! hahaha, one reason is because,we are all very 'kiam siap' ppl, we won't go to a particular place of attraction if we need to pay for the entrance fee. plus i was quite 'fan' to decide on where to go, what to eat...

i think i'll have lots of fun in melbourne if i were to go with my family as i wouldn't need to spend!! plus my dad loves to try various types of food, so i will definitely get to eat what i wish for..LOLOL... oh well, I gotta learn to go for holidays with friends.. here's some of the pics, to see more, just go facebook.

melbourne is a city with rich architecture and designs

there's graffiti everywhere in the melb

one of the 'tak sedap' dishes from "empress of china": stir fry beef with rice

outside the state library

wanton noodles:  any roadside wanton noodles from penang is tastier than this

okay, this is not bad, but still worse than dragon-i and Young heart restaurant in Penang

Queen Victoria Market

Chicken teriyaki don: DonDon, swanston street. this shop is famous for their amazingly fast service. you get your meal the minute you pay. it tasted alright.

Burek from Queen Victoria Market.this is yummy and cheap=)

There are a lot more photos but i'm not going to upload it as it will use up alot of my internet quota, yet to receive the free 10GB quota.  That's all i'm sharing for this time!

Orientaion Week at International House: Part 1

this post is supposed to be written way back then..hehe, i just can't find a suitable time =)

Sunday, 21st February:
My parents last day in Brisbane but i did not get to spend time with them for the O week for IH has already started. First time had lunch in IH alone. I really don't know where to sit after taking my food. Knowing that i have not much choice but to open my mouth and say hi to people, i courageously approached a Chinese guy and say "Hello". there goes all the introduction and stuff. then later i noticed there was a girl beside me so i said hi to her. Her name is Genny from the Phillipines. You people should know she's quite close to me by now through all the FB photos.

Monday, 22nd February:
First day without daddy and mummy in Aussie. Participated in the first IH activity- Speed Dating. We have to play a game to find our date. i don't really know how to describe it but i had fun coz i was being carried by several guys for several times! hehehe..i was quite scared they would injured themselves carrying me. so found a date. so the guys are supposed to pick up the girls for dinner in their respective rooms with a small gift for his date. I got 5 candies as a gift =) later that night, there was a "circus" themed party but i did not go coz i'm still not used to the environment.

Tuesday,23rd Feb
Fire alarm woke us all up at 6.50AM!! the sound of the siren was so squeeky and i practically just jumped of my bed with my heart pumping like 100XX faster. It was fire drill. Right after that, we were forced to go for a morning jog in whatever we are wearing. Some were even in their towels only! The was a very long and tiring jog! gosh, luckily i did not puke.LOL. Came back, showered and washed my hair.
At 11.ooAM, went for IH Amazing Race in the city but it's seriously not a race at all( we were taking our own sweet time completingthe task) Came back, bathed and washed my hair again. At 8.00pm, we had to run around the super hude UQ campus to take pictures of us in certain buildings. my teammates were all running from one place to another. i had a really difficult time catching up, really felt like crying there man! the activities are all sweaty wan. Came back, showered and washed my hair AGAIN for the THIRD time! Mom called and i was in tears complaining about all my running! hahaha! Never in my life have I run so much before! However i was proud of myself that i could complete all the running  instead of giving up half way through.

Wednesday. 24th feb:
It's UQ Market Day. Lots of clubs set up stalls along the corridors and a lot of freebies and food. So my friends and I had free ice creams and Bundaberg(it's an aussie brand) drinks. Genny and I chatted with handsome guy at dinner. He's a mix of Canadian and Malaysian Chinese. So I'll let you do the imagination. Nothing much in the afternoon but i went for Coffee Crawl in the night. It's basically just visits to a few famous cafes in Brisbane, drinking cafe latte, cofee, teas and italian hot chocolate. After that, we proceeded to Mt Cootha for night view of the city from the lookout platform. I had a good night!

                                         beverages we had during Coffee Crawl. i love the latte art!

Italian Hot Chocolate: it's really thick!

At the Mt Cootha Lookout

32@The Mansion restaurant

Location: 32, Jalan Sultan Azlan Shah, Penang, Malaysia  (Just type the name of the restaurant using Google Earth and you will get the location)

Went there for Mummy's Birthday last December. i thought we have to wear like super formal since the facade of the mansion look so expensive. but i was wrong. You don't have to.

very nice interior and ambience. love the place we had our dinner.

can't really remember the exact names of the dishes though

fresh bouquet of flowers at the centre of every table

House Special Salad

-fresh greens with a soury sauce has a combination of lemon, lemongrass and other herbs

 

Chicken cutlets seasoned and coated with cheese served with fettucine(or linguine?) and tomato sauce

Fish with some kind of creamy sauce and pine nuts

BBQ Chicken and duck on sticks. the duck was not really cooked, don't really like it.

hot chocolate brownie cake with vanilla ice-cream topped with almond flakes

Freshly baked apple pie with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream

the side entrance

Other dishes not displayed:

Crab Bisque:

a very creamy soup with a very 'crabby' taste. suitable for those who love the very dense crab taste. very easily "jelak". The Wild Creamy Mushroom Soup suits most people.

Garlic Bread:

One of the nicest I've tasted so far

Mom's Codfish & Mussels with a type of sauce ( from the Chef's Recommendations Menu):

taste better than the fish with pine nuts

Homemade Brown sugar Ice-cream with coconut sauce:

Quite a refreshing dessert and it's the cheapest in the desserts section  =)

taste of all dishes was okay, not very very yummy. however i need to compliment on the presentation of the dishes(after all, it's fine dining mah) and the whole dining atmosphere.

IELTS

IELTS prep course + exams = FUN

okay the exam part was just okay, not exactly FUN.. but the prep course course at Brittish Council was fun =). the reasons?

well, it was the first time being taught by 'ang moh' teachers ( Emma, Emily and Simon- You guys are great). they have great sense of humour. some of you might say they would of course treat you well cos' we have paid for it but to me, i guessed it was worth paying the fee to attend the course. secondly, I had got great compliments from them for my essays which made me real happy. meeting people from different backgrounds whom many were older me. Mehdi from Iraq, someone from Yemen, Kenny who is studying in Uni of Tasmania, Sin Yi a friendly working lady from Butterworth, Nazrin JPA scholar, Maziah a nice kakak to me, Yin Huey from Taiping the other girl who is also 18 like me and some others. the short course lasted from 1st Dec to 4th Dec,  6pm-9.15pm.

Exam 5 Dec 2009

the night before, came back from class, ate supper, went through my papers till 1am. next morning.  was awake by 5.30am but toss around on the bed till 6.15am.

 headed straight to Cititel Hotel by 7.30am.

Registration started at 8am. Given a small piece with my name, candidate no, ID, and 1st language code printed on it. my candidate number was 000777. what a nice number =) my speaking test was scheduled at 4.50pm! wth Got to wait for such a long period after finishing the rest of the papers.

Exam ( Listening, Reading and Writing) started at about 9.15am and ended around 12 noon. it was freezing cold inside. part of my brain and hands were half-frozen already. To those who are planning to take the exam, do rememeber to bring along your sweaters. Like HSC exams, time management was relly crucial. My HSC friend Li Chen was there too so we went out for lunch together since her speaking test was scheduled at 5.10pm.

Returned to the hotel and both of us sat there doing nothing, almost bored to death. Sms-ed janice and mone coz too bored d. told them there's a tall and good-looking ang moh guy. Jan replied telling me to concentrate in my exams. hahaha. suddenly he came and stand opposite us, i was like " go and stand other places ler" i don't know where i should look. LOL. Later the teacher called the guy and li chen and I were shocked as he was actually not an ang moh. his name was elija sadam. probably from the Middle East. sweat case right?  typical me...

waited till like 3.50 for the speaking test. i was the second last. saw the uncle who supplies books to CGL and he recognised me. his wife was one of the examiner! so coincidentally, i was examined by her. trying my best to recall the questions.

Part 1:  asked for my full name, where i was from, any sports played, erm can't remember the rest

Part 2: Questioon on the prompt card: what course would you like to take if you have the time? well, i did a practice in British Council on that similar question so i was able to answer the question, but still had some long pauses. ish. of course i replied a course on baking and cooking! hehehe..

Part 3: more general questions and opinions eg. do you think those who are guided by teachers will be more successful than those those are home-schooling?

the entire exam was pretty smooth except having to write and think as fast i could in a freezing cold hall!

~the End~

left hotel at about 4.45pm. bathed and headed to Kampachi in Equatorial Hotel  for japanese buffet for family gathering which at the same time served as my post-IELTS celebration. lotza pictures taken and had a fun night.

 

Ocean Green Restaurant

Location: 48F, Jalan Sultan Ahmad Shah, 10050 Penang (It is hidden from the main road, behind the old Paramount Hotel)
Tel No: 04-2262681

Serves lunch and dinner but usually my family goes there for dinner..So what's nice there? Lotza yummy dishes.. sadly, i do not have great photography skills so i had to use pics from other websites along with some of my not-so-nice shots of the dishes. Of course we ate all those dishes on separate visits, not all at once....

Four Season

Shark's Fins Soup

Crab with Salted Egg ( the prawns with salted egg is recommended too)

Spring Chicken

Geoduck and 'Dong Gui" soup( along with some green veges, shitake mushrooms, tofu)

- We ate geoduck without knowing what it actually was, so i Googled and found that it was actually a type of clam..a gigantic one...the testure of the meat was chewy and frnakly i don't really like it..it's like a sort of exotic food to us but it was a nice try!! however, THUMbS UP for the soup, it was very very nice and fragrant!!!

Two Flavour Fish ( part of it was deep-fried and the other part was stir-fried)

 Cheese-baked Crab (my all-time favourite)

called "Siong Thong Heng Cai" in Hokkien...a type of vege with soup filled with dried scallops and sautéed garlic cloves)

Crab stir-fried with mihun ( the mihun has taken up all the sweetness of the crab, NICE! would be nicer if the mihun is a bit more moist)

Steamed Tapioca with Coconut milk ( it was yummy but we ate that once only, a few years back coz they don't serve this often)

Only 4 out of the 10 pics were taken by me due to my horrible photo-taking)
therefore, credits go to all these bloggers and websites:

@ Eileen Eu, my dear cousin who takes much much better shots than i do
@ Eileen's Mummy, my ah chim who blogs quite a lot about food
@ what2see. Best of Penang Food!
@ Life Thru the Lens

Bravo Italiana

Location: i-Avenue (01-01-11, Complex I-Avenue, Medan Kampung Relau 1, 11900 Bayan Lepas, Penang.)

serves great Italian food

that suits Malaysian taste buds

dishes worth your money

took only some pics of the dishes yesterday

to have a look at nicer pictures 

visit Steven Goh's Penang Food

Soup of The Day: Broccoli soup

Hawaiian Pizza RM29

it's different from the ones by Domino's and Pizza Hut..1000x yummier=)

Catch Carribean RM23

Salmon Simone RM28

it has a orange-flavoured sauce which was quite different from what i usually have

Ocean Catch Cleopatra RM22.80

this fish dish is the best compared to the other two above