another day

Picking up from where I left off in my previous entry (2 months ago!), my first time in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam was in March '15 and second time in May '17 for work. Office was about 2-hour drive from HCMC. Left for office when the sky was still dark (about 7ish AM) and only returned back to hotel when the sky has gone dark. But it was only 6.45PM. Got the weekend to kinda jalan-jalan around town and do some shopping at Ben Tanh Market. Overwhelmed with the amount of Vietnamese coffee available. Definitely bought way too much. It's 2018 now, and there are still 1.5 bag of coffee in my freezer, which I use them as smell absorber in new cabinets and wardrobe now. On a side note, I wouldn't mind another visit to HCMC but for leisure to have a proper time visiting the city and also taking a tour at the Cu Chi tunnel. Hope I don't suffocate or develop claustrophobia in that tight space.

Like I mentioned in my previous entry, how to cross the roads like that!
The central post office in HCMC and a framed picture of Ho Chi Minh himself.
On my 29th birthday in Aug '15, headed up to Penang for a weekend getaway, with my then boyfriend, Kok Yee. It was also the same weekend as the "actual day" of the Hungry Ghost Festival so many of the food places were closed.

 The boy's first time gracing my blog and it has gotta be a picture on what he does best. Noms.

Visited Bali, Indonesia in September '15 with my then boyfriend. We engaged a great driver who's really funny and quite accommodating to our hours. Didn't really enjoy babi guling (we tried it at Babi Guling Ibu Oka). It's a confusing dish or maybe we didn't order correctly? Our driver took us to Sate Babi Bawah Pohon and we had the best satay babi ever. Yummms. In Nusa Dua, we had the crispy duck at Bebek Bengil. It was rather dry. Crispy, but dry. Do drop by the water blow which is just walking distance from the restaurant. And be prepared to get a little wet or more wet, depends on how far out you wanna stand. Really quite something. In Ubud, we did a light hiking on Campuhan Ridge Walk in Ubud, thanks to Julie's recommendation. Even our driver hasn't been there before and he also hiked up with us. Good place to have a nice view of a little bit of Ubud. The Naughty Nuri in Ubud is really just by the road side in a sheltered "shed". Not even a shop unlike the franchise in Malaysia. They barbecue the pork ribs right in front of us (by the road side) and serve straight. The ribs meat literally fall off the bone, melt in our mouths. Yasss. We didn't drop by any tegalalang (rice terrace) because it was quite far out as we were only taking a day trip to Ubud from Seminyak.



Our Airbnb - private pool villa on Sunset Road.
Visited Sungai Lembing, Pahang in May '16 with the Hawaii gang. Short but fun trip. Trekked to the Rainbow Waterfall.  As the weather wasn't too hot on that day, the rainbow wasn't too apparent.

The very faint rainbow, if you can spot it.
In October '16, I was assigned to Melbourne for a 1ish-week work trip. Spent a weekend with Jun Ling for a light hiking at Point Nepean, great weather and catch up sesh. And oysters at South Melbourne Market. After which I extended my stay and was joined by my then boyfriend. Again, thank you Maggie and Kai Mun for taking us in and save us on accommodation. Did a day trip with Ee Von, Maggie and Kai Mun to the National Rhododendron Gardens at Dandenong Ranges. Pretty flowers and greenery everywhere! It was Kok Yee's first time in Melbourne and we rented a small orange coloured car to get around. Great Ocean Road, which I think I can never get enough of; Phillip Island, the return journey back to the city was scary and crazy and funny because the road was so dark and we tried to follow closely an Avis van which we think was heading back to the city too but up to a certain point, the driver pulled over to let us pass. We think that he was afraid of us, maybe we're trying to rob them or something. LOL. And of course, Yarra Valley too where the boy got on one knee to propose with a bling in a Poké ball. I promise to elaborate more on the proposal in another entry. Because it deserves one on its entirety.

 Posing for an indie band album cover. Tsk tsk.



Signed up for the Westin Langkawi Recce in May '17 organised by The Wedding Notebook. Oh, so beautiful and St. Regis was even more gorgeous. The intimate wedding set up, the flower arrangement, the handwritten menu on acrylic, the food, oh, if only it was within our wedding budget! My photos din't do the place any justice so you'd be better off looking at The Wedding Notebook page for the beautiful photos! See if you can spot us in the photos! LOL.

Penang in June '17 for work where we literally got carried away with some Kate Spade splurges.

So apt.

Part 2 - Livin' la vida loca (maybe not?)

I'd say I'm probably a 30% traveller and 70% tourist. There is a difference between the 2, which I've come to learn in recent years. This site gives a simplified illustration of that. Anyway, over the few years, I did manage to do some vacationing/travelling to new cities (which I hope I'll be able to continue doing, maybe not as frequently as I wish, but somewhere is better than nowhere!).

I went to Australia in June '09 with my parents and aunt because June was my only semester break which coincide with Dad's schedule.  visited Melbourne again in the middle of winter for the second time in June '12 because it was off-peak period at work. But this time, I went with Sim Mei and 2 other friends and bunked in at Ee Von's and Maggie's. Thanks for taking us in and we saved a whole lot on accommodation. First time going for a musical at the Regent Theatre. Annie was soooo awesome. Took a day trip to Yarra Valley and had wine tasting. Took the choo choo train along the Dandenong Ranges on the Puffing Billy steam train and visited some zoos, which I've forgotten the names. I skipped Phillip Island because I've been there in '09 and opted for Ballarat and Sovereign Hill day tour instead. Tried to mine some gold. Clearly I couldn't find any to get me rich as I'm still working my ass off to pay my bills. Haha. Couldn't forgo Great Ocean Road though. The view was still breathtaking. Overall, it was a great getting to spend time and hang out together which we don't get to do much when we don't live in the same city, let alone, country.

An impromptu weekend trip to Bangkok in June '13 with Lorraine and another friend. It was a quick trip mainly for shopping. But we did manage to squeeze in a visit to Wat Arun on the last day. Just 2 days before departure when I realised my passport had less than 6 months on it. Damn. Rushed to Putrajaya at 6am from Klang with Mom and luckily got it renewed in less than 2 hours. Phew. 


Like I said June is really quite off-peak, a week after BKK, Mom and I flew over to Singapore to join Dad on his business trip because he had a big corner suite. Yay. Don't mind being the lamp post (me). But just 1 day after our arrival, haze decided to pay SG a visit. it was pretty bad and we stayed indoors for most times. So it was more of jalan-jalan in shopping malls, going for movies and stuff. Not my first time in SG, so it was alright. But luckily Gardens by the Bay is indoor! Flower Dome and Cloud Forest are just beautiful.


In 2014, I visited a couple of cities. Johor for Legoland and Hello Kitty Town (only went into the souvenir store because the "town" was not age appropriate for me. Haha) in March with my parents. Again being a lamp post. It was super hot and Dad commented that they should have Legoland indoors like Gardens by the Bay. I second that!


In May '14, Lorraine and I took on Hong Kong and Macau. I can speak Cantonese but sometimes pretend that I can't just so that we can play ignorant to some of the waiters' rudeness. Hongkies really walk super fast especially during peak timing (going and finishing work) in the MTR stations. My first time at a wax museum. Madame Tussauds had a good mix of Asian and Western celebrity and famous people. Even got Amitabh Bachchan. There were also Marvel and DC comics like Hulk, Iron Man and Spidey and cartoon characters like Astro Boy and Doraemon or Ding Dong as the Hongkies call it. Too bad Hello Kitty was still work in progress. Took the cable car up to Ngong Ping in Lantau Island where the Tian Tan Buddha (The Big Buddha) statue is situated. It was also where I got a picture of my "baby bump". It was a little chilly but nothing a shawl can't handle. Unless it's raining. Which it did when we were almost done with the place. In Macau, we tried to visit most, if not all, the casinos. Taking pictures of their interesting decorations in the lobby and entrances/surroundings.


My first time to Boracay in June '14 with Ice and other friends. 6 girls in a dorm room with 1 bathroom. Total chaos I tell you. And the amount of hair on the floor. Haha. Tried some water activities which I've never really dared to do although I can swim; Flying Fish (one girl was super afraid of water and kept screaming "F*king fish!" and a whole lot of F words), helmet diving, cliff diving at Magic Island (jumped off the 2nd lowest diving board at 3 meter and I couldn't go up any higher) and snorkeling. Tried ATV riding which was pretty okay. I went quite slow I think. But Sky Cycle at Happy Dreamland Theme Park was quite intimidating. It's 15 feet above ground and I kept getting worried that Ice and I will get off balance and it will drop off from the track or some bolts got loose and everything will go crashing down. But we managed to return to the start/end point in one piece, each. LOL.


Celebrated my 28th birthday in Cameron Highlands and visited the Mossy Forest and the Boh Plantation. It was my first time at Mossy Forest and I forgot to pack a proper long pants. So I was in a red shorts and heart print leggings, which kinda made me look like Mickey Mouse. FML.

Returned to SG in October '14 for Hello Kitty Run! Thanks to Lorraine who was willing to accompany me despite not liking Hello Kitty all that much. It was supposed to be a 5km "FUN" run. But it wasn't all that fun because weather was bad and raining heavily almost as soon as the run began. And the organisers were quite terrible and not well prepared. Overheard a lady with a baby in a pram asking the organiser for the umbrella which he was holding (it was a cheapo kinda umbrella, like will spoil after 1 use) for her baby but that idiot refuse to give it to her and said that he could sell it to her instead. OMG. And I think it wasn't a full 5km too. And when we reached the end, they didn't have enough medals and informally told people to collect the medals few days later at a specified location. Which wasn't possible for us because we would have left SG by then. A kind Singaporen girl heard our woes and gave us her medal instead. And later we managed to get 1 more when the organisers finally decided to bring in more medals because clearly there were many other overseas "runners" too.


2015 to 2017 was mostly travelling outstation and overseas for work like Johor, Penang, Ho Chi Minh City and Melbourne. The hustle bustle of HCMC is no joke. So many motorcyclists. You just have to brace yourself and cross that road otherwise you will never get across! I did do some "leisure" holiday, which I'll elaborate more in another post.

P.S. I must have been crazy thinking that I could've summarised everything in just 3 entries.

P.P.S. Here's a bonus for reading /scrolling until the end. A picture of my "baby bump" in May '14. LOL.

How do I even begin? It has been too long that I've properly blogged since I put my original blogspot in lock down circa 2010. Along the years, I did pen down some thoughts/rants here and there: new blogspot (which is this page), Facebook, Tumblr, Dayre, Twitter; and in the recent years, Instagram and Insta-story. Like they say, a picture paints a thousand words.

I've actually been thinking about it for some time now (months, if not years haha), but the procrastinator in me kept saying, "later-lah". And the site looked too old school anyway and it takes up too much time to edit the template. So finally, after finallyyyy, I got around to changing the template after many hit and misses with the html codes (they suck), it's a tad nicer now. At least the site looks like something from 2018 rather than zaman kuno (ancient time).

The reason for the comeback?

I miss having a platform to write down about my everyday boring life for my future boring self to read about my previous boring days. LOL. Also, to save my English writing skills (which has gone down the drain along with all the vocabs that I barely have a chance to use. My only form of writing these days are reports on audit findings. Meh).

The real reason?

I'm more matured now (I guess) and come to realise that I should care less about certain things and don't be afraid to give my 2 cents. I'll get back to this.

So, here we go.

A lot has happened and didn't happen in the past 7+ years. Decided to summarise it in 3 parts: work, life and love. It will probably be all mixed up at one point because not everything is clear cut anyway.

Part 1 - In the corporate world

Joined one of the Big 4 in the late 2010. That was when I decided to keep my posts from my Form 6 and college/uni days in lock down. Mainly because I was worried about how my childish writings may have affect my "corporate image". How can I remember all that I have written all those years ago.

Learned a lot in my 4 years+ stint there. Met some really nice colleagues which turned into good friends. I'd say I was quite lucky because I was part of a somewhat close knit team and there wasn't much office politics that I needed to deal with. The best advice I received was to be confident. And if I'm not, just fake it until I got it.

Managed to convert my ACCA Affiliate status to Member status smoothly since it was a recognised employer. Now, I just have to continue paying the fees in GBP and complete 40 hours of CPD until I'm six feet under. No biggie.

Of course working in an audit firm, one can only imagine what the hours are like. Late nights (or early mornings) during peak period. Had 1 major accident in one of those many late nights on the way home where I crashed into the back of an Unser. It was 2 am. The takeaway from this incident was to never, never get out from the car when you are alone. Especially if you are a female driver. And in the middle of the night. Just wait in the car until your husband/boyfriend/father/brother/uncle/guy friend (in my case, my guy senior!) come for your rescue.

As good as it lasted in the firm, I knew that it was time to move on. Not a partner material anyway. And Mom has always been nagging about the long hours at work and not having enough time for personal life.

2015 seen some big changes in all 3 parts. Work, life and love. Haha. We'll get there for the other 2 parts.

In that same week, Wednesday I was going to work at one place and Friday I was going to work at a new place. Nobody paid for my New Year's Day public holiday though. Bummer. New environment and new industry for me. Thought that I'd just give it a try and it was wayyy nearer to home. Mom's happy. Guess what?! I'm still here after 3 years. When I first started, it was kinda difficult to adapt to the work culture difference. Truly understood the meaning of "work is work and colleagues are colleagues". Had to slow down my pace. But it has started to pick up in the past year. Hope for the best.

That said, there were some new experiences I gained here. Like having to perform in Chinese New Year luncheon and year end Annual Dinner. My last on-stage dances were at least a good 18 years ago during my tambourine years at church. Getting to travel outstation and overseas like Vietnam and Melbourne was quite okay, despite the fact that they were actually work trips.

P.S. I can't figure out how to add in the "Read more" in the post entry. And I have no idea why the font is sibeh (very) tiny after the pictures.