Taiwan 2018

yessssss i am going taiwan again next year during the june hols! already bought the air tickets. flying by china airlines again, which is taiwan's national carrier.

going with darling, yuanze, darling's parents and darling's meimei. xuanxuan's family still TBC because it all depends on her dad's schedule and can only wait until after CNY then can confirm. i really hope they can go. it will be an epic trip!

i am going to list down my wish list for food once we are there!

西門町新開的馬辣頂級麻辣鴛鴦火鍋(漢口店)！

美好年代(西門店)！隱藏在電影主題公園內的復古餐廳！

西門町超頂級燒烤吃到飽-上禾町燒肉吃到飽！和牛、帝王蟹、烏魚子、三點蟹、鮑魚、天使紅蝦通通吃到飽！還有壽喜燒跟火鍋，啤酒無限暢飲！

The Staycation

we did a staycation from 17 Dec to 19 Dec at Ritz Carlton. this is the best staycation experience so far. because of the super big room. and the super wonderful view from our room. 

we did staycations before at marina mandarin, hotel Re!, intercontinental, marriott at tangs plaza, jw marriott, pan pacific, fairmont and grand park orchard. 

in my honest opinion, ritz carlton is ranked first, followed by intercontinental at second, and marriott at tangs plaza will be third. 

even though we did not get to travel overseas during this dec holidays, this staycation is good enough for me to recharge. and it really heartens me to see yuanze and enxuan play together so happily. 

one thing that amazes me is that when the lift reaches our hotel floor, yuanze will always turn at the correct direction to go to our hotel room. but of course he do not know which one is the door of our hotel room. if like that he also know i will be even more amazed. 

ok here are the pics! 

the very majestic christmas tree at ritz carlton

全家福！

play here need to pay 10 dollars for an hour. what a rip-off. 

i must say that enxuan looks very good in this yellow dress. 

the mothers and children

dont you think they look like 姐弟? :)

and i told darling that after staying at ritz carlton, there is no way am i going to stay at other local hotels anymore. ritz carlton has set the benchmark. hahahahaha. 

The Student's Wedding

must document this in my blog because i have the honour to be invited to a student's wedding. and it is the first ever student wedding that i had attended. this shows that i am in the teaching line long enough. 

i was sin ling's pe teacher in 2008 for 6 months, when i was still a contract teacher at the previous workplace. i remembered that she is a well behaved student and she dont really like pe hahahahaha. 

one or two years back we found each other on instagram and we followed each other, leave comments on each other's posts, and a few months back, she invited me to her wedding! to be honest i was really quite surprised. 

but still, i am very happy for her! congrats sin ling! i got a shock that she has been in a relationship with her husband since she was sec 3 (OMG!!!). and her husband's hairstyle at that time was... OMG. machiam like those japanese anime characters where the hair is more than the face. (think uchiha sasuke if you watch naruto)

i need to give special mention to this student, sock kuan. her parents open a famous wanton mee stall at tampines round market as well as another one at the coffee shop opposite my previous workplace. sometimes when i go to the coffee shop for lunch i do see her hanging around at the coffee shop. anyway must specially mention her because she is the only student who dun find it awkward calling me by my name (she calls me YY zzzzzzzz). but she is not a rude girl lah. hahahahaha. and very happy to catch up with mr kenny tan and mdm lim. mr kenny tan taught at my previous workplace for 5 years and left the education service in 2010. now he is a lecturer at temasek poly. he is one of the most passionate liverpool fans i had ever seen. and he is one of the most hardcore drinkers. he told me when he was a baby and he kept crying and his parents do not know how to stop him from crying so his mum got desperate and tried putting vodkha in his milk and he always sleep peacefully after that and that is probably why he can hold his liquor so well. 

happy to see some of the students again and catching up with them! :) 

anyway when i was leaving the hotel i took out the cashcard because i have a complimentary parking coupon. and when i drove out the hotel i forgot to put the cashcard back in and to my sheer unluckiness i drove past an ERP gantry. @#$%^&*

and a few days back i receive a letter from LTA saying that i drove past an ERP gantry without a cashcard. the charge was one dollar. so besides paying the one dollar, i have to pay another 8 dollars as admin fee. so i have to pay 9 dollars. seriously man. i really got the urge to scold all the vulgarities and profanities that i have stopped scolding since i became a teacher, but nvm, i shall keep my cool.

i thought of appealing then when i went to the website, the website say that majority of the appeals do not go through, and if i am penalised solely because of a lapse in the ERP system, then the appeal will be successful. true lah it was my mistake for not putting back the cashcard so i obediently paid the 9 dollars and still scold the vulgarities in my heart.  

Wedding Anniversary

today is our 2nd year wedding anniversary. #061217

2 years ago, we got married at Tim Palace Restaurant. i can still remember that day very clearly. so happy to walk down the aisle together with darling, with all the guests standing up and applauding us. and so happy to receive well wishes from our family, relatives and friends. 

1 year ago, we celebrated our 1st year wedding anniversary at taiwan. we were at taichung, if i remember correctly. 

this year, we celebrate it at Joie, together with our beloved yuanze. :)

Joie is another establishment of Dozo, which is a japanese fine dining restaurant at river valley road, and unfortunately Dozo had closed down already. i really love going there, and i went there four times to eat. 1st time with my family, 2nd time with darling, 3rd time with my colleagues and 4th time with the 10.11.12 gang to celebrate my birthday. 

Joie is at Orchard Central, on the 12th floor. all the dishes are vegetarian, and they have set lunch and set dinner. the 6 course set lunch cost $38.80++ and the 7 course set dinner cost $68.80. the 7 course set dinner have a cold dish, that is not available during the lunch course. 1 cold dish cost 30 dollars?! #raiseEYEBROW 

ok without further ado, here are the pictures of the food that we ordered! 

starter: chef's selection of assorted platter. the waiter recommended us to start with the sashimi in the middle, followed by the seaweed cracker and finally the raspberry sphere, and the whole sphere must put in the mouth because it will burst. 

side dish: bailing mushroom on paper hot pot

side dish: tempura platter on mash (charcoal coated yam, eggplant, apple, banana with japanese sesame dressing). this one is a must order! 

cold dish: dragon fruit lotus with truffle vegetable garden. (yes this is the cold dish that cost 30 dollars extra)

darling's cold dish is the Transparency of Pear (layered pear tataki with apple mozzarella and basil dressing). this one is also a must order! ok lah maybe that one is worth the 30 bucks, because of the wonderful food presentation and the special taste. sorry that we didnt take any picture of that dish and i cant find any picture of that dish online. :p

 soup: infusion of cepes with truffle (cepes mushroom with white truffle oil and black truffles)

soup: clear tomato soup with garbanzo (tomato broth with orzo pasta and garbanzo served with spinach dumpling)

main: duo ravioli platter (duo of pumpkin and spinach ravioli, flower emulsion, cream sauce). i like this alot! is also a must order for me!

main: grill summer mushroom steak on "pu-ye" hot stone. (grilled monkey head mushroom on lava stone serve with truffle mash potato). also a must order! 

i also told the restaurant that we are celebrating our 2nd year wedding anniversary and they prepared something special for us! 

taaa daaaaa. thanks for the cake! :)

the waiter told us to do cheeky face hahahahaha. 

side note: our yuanze grow so big already. :)

and this is a wedding anniversary present for myself and darling. lover's collection couple watches from gshock and baby g. specially chose them because they are white in colour, and our first march-in song is westlife's 'Beautiful In White'. :)

happy wedding anniversary darling~

Prom Nite 2017

my current workplace held the prom nite in school. 

some schools held their prom nite at hotels. some schools do not even hold the prom nite, because the school leaders think that prom nite may be a distraction for the students. or probably because they held prom nite at hotels previously, and the students caused many problems which deter the school leaders from holding prom nite for the future graduating students. 

what are the problems? for example opening the hotel's beer tap. after the prom nite, still stay at the hotel lobby until very late and refuse to go home, despite several demands from the teachers and even the school leaders. the most ultimate i heard of is a boy book a hotel room (he asked his elder brother to book it for him) and invited his female classmates to the room, and even brought alcohol. 

to be honest, if want to give a prom nite for the graduating students, probably holding it inhouse will still be the best option. price is another determining factor. hold it at hotels, probably must pay about 80 dollars. in-house, just 20 dollars will do. 

this year is the first prom nite that i been to at my current workplace, because i am a form teacher of a graduating class. i shall not mention the programme because there is nothing much to be mentioned. hahahaha. so i shall just share the pics! 

 my form class, 4E1!

my secretary, jovin

 my co-chair, jiayi

 my dance club president 2016/2017, jiaxing

 my dance club president 2015/2016, jiahui. she graduated last year and came back to help in decorating the school hall for this year's prom. 

my ict rep, lynst. he is also wearing my wedding suit! hahahaha. fits perfectly on him isn't it. i was so slim last time. hahahahahaha. 

the 3 dashing boys (shawn, o jing and sufi) from my form class, who are also in the student councillor exco, and also hold key leadership positions in their respective CCAs. they will grow up to be great men. 

birthday post

the birthday celebration started with watching Thor Ragnarok at gv gold class at great world city. and if i remember correctly, this is the only movie we watch together for the year 2017. the last movie we watched together was Dr Strange in 2016. 

movie was good. i like the humour elements inside this movie. watching at gold class is even more good. although is very expensive. hahahahaha. 

i wanna introduce to everyone my birthday cake! darling chose the birthday cake, and the birthday cake was bought and collected by my FIL. :)

(pictures taken from danial food diary)

from danial food diary:

D’Pastriez by Bread Fresh
Osmanthus Onde Onde Cake

Locations: Fusionopolis One, Telok Blangah Crescent Blk 9, Ang Mo Kio Ave 4 Blk 629, Bangkit Road Blk 257, Fajar Road Blk 445, Gek Poh Shopping Centre, Ghim Moh Road Blk 19, Yishun Ring Road Blk 103, Bukit Batok St 31 Blk 376

Oh, this was a surprise.

I would not have expected beneath the glossy (almost mirror-like) cake glaze, was the local favourite of Onde Onde (flavour).

There are three layers to this dessert. The exterior has a cooling osmanthus jelly, the main portion onde onde inspired cream, with a base comprising of caramelised roasted coconut sablé.

The familiar yet out-of-the-expected combination of pandan and coconut should make this a family favourite.

I totally agree with him. It is worthy of a family favourite. Approved by my mum. My mum is a baker at marriott and she dislikes cakes that are too sweet. If my mum says the sweetness of this cake is just nice, that means this cake got distinction already. hahahahaha. 

photo credit: FIL (wah so coincidental both yz and xx wore pink hahahahahaha)

birthday celebration part 2 was at derek's house, where he invited me to his house to celebrate my birthday. upon reaching his house he confessed to me that celebrating my birthday is secondary, the primary reason is that both his twin kids wanna eat cake. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. 

presenting to you, the 4 heavenly monkeys. #四大天猴 

what a confrontation between wilson and xiaoyun's daughter (ria) and yuanze. hahahahahaha. 

the kids totally not interested whether isit my birthday. they more interested in the cake. 

thank you everyone for coming down to celebrate my birthday! my heart is filled with love. :)

and the final round of birthday celebrations is at my tampines home the next day. my parents prepared teppanyaki steamboat! 

look at the spread omg. the meat and fish marinated by my dad. the tray of lamb chops is from cold storage cost 25 bucks, and is my birthday present from my little sis. hahahahaha. teppanyaki lamb chops taste really good, just that need quite a long time for them to be nicely cooked. 
  

look at that fish. so fresh. and so nicely cut. is cut by my dad. omg my dad's 刀功 is out of this world. worthy of a professional chef. 

finally, some creative birthday present and wishes to share. :)

wooo hoooo blackberry from my lovely wife! :) 

from my colleague, miss sylvia lim, who has a crazy thing for turtles. 

and the above 4 photos are done by the super creative Mr Fen! thank you so much for the effort! :)

the most creative birthday wish for this year is from my tpss colleague, mr felix yap. he is a musician and he used his trumpet or trombone or whatever you call that to blow the tune of happy birthday song for me. thank you mr felix! love you many many! :)

i also want to thank all my students, colleagues, friends, relatives and family for all the birthday wishes. thank you so much, i am truly blessed.