Boing boing bags

I really really want a quilted bag right now [said that in my extra whiny voice].

Quilted reminds me of old armchairs from the professor's house from the Lion, Witch and Wardrobe production set, of armchairs in Starbucks on a cold rainy day, and, of the Godfather's armchair.

And fashion-wise, you can't get more vintage than quilted when it comes to bags, I feel. They add a dash of much-needed cute ah-mah seriousness to any outfit you're wearing.

Current favourites:

Smythson's Nancy. From an attas British stationery shop. So dressy, and I love how there're no logos on the bag. Look at the oversized buckle. The bag just looks unbelievably well made. Soft calf skin leather. Super Granny chic. I can carry this until I'm 85.

Chanel's 2.55. The original. But I refuse to pay so much for the bag. It's a crime. Delicate Lambskin

Balenciaga's Matelasse. Love the sponginess. This is my favourite. It manages to look a little modern too. Made of scrumptious hardy goatskin.

The Errant Nail: A little drama

My fingernails do not generally give me trouble. They're well behaved nails. The cuticles self-groom themselves. They are not weak, and do not snap under pressure (such as when opening soda cans).

Well, the unimaginable has finally happened, and it must be a foreboding sign of aging or at the very least, calcium deficiency.

One of the nails strayed from the normal course. The nail had split a little on one side, and it didn't/couldn't heal. And it got worse, the split deepened. I couldn't execute normal tasks like hair shampooing with efficiency, and have a constant fear of the little split getting worse. I even have hair strands caught in the split when conditioning my hair. So gross!

One week after the split occurred, I couldn't take it any more.

I was at Parkway Parade, and so I stepped into the nearest manicure salon, and got the bad nail overlaid with an acrylic nail with enforced gel protection. It is now thankfully out of sight. The manicurist assured that that the fako is strong, can withstand my carrying any household chores (but to be on the safe side, I shall NOT do chores for three weeks). The nail cocooned under all those layers of protection can now grow without further agitation, and I can clip off the split part in two weeks' time, and have a fresh new split-free nail. Yayaya!

Can you tell which is the fake nail? I think it's really obvious. Even though it's not exactly plastic surgery, I feel a little unnatural with the acrylic nail. But overall, I feel relieved.

Siglap before the fall of Night

View of Siglap at Dusk from Siglap 24-Hour Medical Clinic.

The father caught a cold a few days ago, so the entire family (Mother and I) accompanied him to the clinic. Didn't want to wait inside the crowded clinic filled with unhappy sick people emitting millions of viruses/germs every second, so I stood outside with the resident cat for company, and played with the camera phone's panoramic function again, it's so handy!
Siglap is pretty picturesque, I've not appreciated that before.

It's been a few days, the father is feeling much better. He normally misplaces medication or stop taking them after a short while, but the Mother noted that he has finished most of the cough syrup. Hmmm, me and the Father have the same taste in medication. We both love cough syrup!

Rain tree outside Clinic main entrance. There were lots of bird squawking sounds coming from the trees, but thankfully, not bird crap fell on me.

little bits here and there

I'm signing up for a 10km Nike run, which takes place on August 31, but as I do not run well, I will be walking instead. Hope I don't turn up last. Nowadays, you can't rely on the old folks to take the last positions. They are extremely fit, and would probably win the run instead. I hope the tshirt that Nike's giving out is pretty and not some gaudy blue colour crap.

And yeeek! A friend called me an Ah Lian Accountant! I didn't even know how to respond to that.
Let me put it on record here that I'm NOT an Accountant. I'm not certified. I don't even have a major in Accounting. I just have a better understanding of accounting compared to the average person. As for the Ah Lian comment, aiyah, I don't think I'm one, but that's a matter of opinion.

I'm going out to the Frankel Avenue coffee shop for lunch today, it's a very important lunch trip.
Recently, I notice the Won ton noodle store has very irregualr closing hours. The store used to stay open until 2:30pm, but recently the lady boss closed the store pretty early. I'm quite worried she will ultimately close her store due to family emergency or other problems. Her store is very very important to me. That's where I had out of the world delicious won tons for the past eight years. Her soup is fantastic, no MSG, the won tons are slurpy sweet and smmoth. I spied her using ikan bilis to make the soup stock. Her prices are also very very reasonable, I even asked her to raise her prices so that she can cope economically and make the same profit margins, as prices of raw ingredients have all gone up. Got to go now and check on her won ton business.

A little mystery solved

I wondered why J's son insisted he's 22 when he's actually 4.
It just hit me, he's into NUMEROLOGY.
2+2=4.

How to not interact with a kid.

My friend J's son is now 4 years old, and is very expressive and opinionated. When I last met him two years ago, he was very shy and concentrated on scribbling in his book. Now, he is a little sunshine boy. He claims he's 22, but doesn't want to work, and only sing and play the whole day. He's either mature for his age, or we all have the mentality of a four year old.

He categorizes people: if he likes them, they are the three little pigs, if he doesn't, they're the Big bad wolf.

How did I interact with this little boy today? No good start. I frightened him.

I picked up mother and son from the train station and proceeded to our Jap lunch destination. I was trying to get the car into a Parkway Parade lot and couldn't get the elusive right angle to turn into the lot properly.
J then commented that a car is coming up behind me, and he might steal my lot. I roared out a war cry, "If that person dares to steal my lot, I'm going to freaking KILL HIM!!!" J's son at this point stopped singing and there's this Silence in the car. OOops!! I turned and glanced at him, and he, in turn, at me with startled eyes. "My son is a little timid" Joy said.

Things can only get better. "The only way is Up", Yazz sang.

During the meal, we discussed colours that can be found on our lunch table. I taught him the word Transparent to describe items with no colour and have see through properties. I was encouraged by his enthusiasm in identifying all the transparent things, so I took things a little further and tried to improve his appreciation of colours. For instance, Emerald instead of just Green, or Cornflower blue instead of Blue. He got confused.

Well, I had a fun lunch. Catching up with J was good. I hope J and son had a good time too. Maybe, next time, I can show Mongkut to the little boy. I heard he likes cats.

The mom has not reverted on whether I'm one wolf or three pigs. But I note that he refused to hug me when his mom asked him to. I think he's just Shy.


He loves light soya sauce. Would carefully press chopstick ends into sauce, then bring to mouth and taste.

Edit: One day after: J responded to my sms. Yay! The son likes me! I'm pigs!
His favourite word now is Transparent.

One of my dreams from last night.

When I do dream at night, I'll have, and remember, a series of dreams, about three to four on average.

Last night, I had a strange one that was even kookier than my usual ones.
I dreamt of an ugly light grey fish with pronounced thick lips floating leisurely in air, specifically outside my old Bedok Reservoir apartment balcony. He was about 1/2 the size of Mongkut, which would make his weight about 2.5kg. I don't recall eating this kind of fish before.

The glass balcony doors were closed, and locked. He saw me peeping from behind the curtains at him, and floated nearer for a closer look. I made a monkey face/sneered at him and he got pissed. Things got ugly very quickly. He smashed his body repeatedly against the balcony door which shook under the impact. And where he body-slammed against the balcony door, there was a print made of yellow putrified pus.

When he realised that he couldn't break the doors, he floated (with a purpose) with mean glint in eyes to a hanging plant in the balcony (money plant?) and vomited like three times of his body weight of yellow pus crap, also putrified, into the plant, gave me an evil grin and left (floated away). Somehow I knew that his vomit would cause a pungent stink that induces fainting spells and nausea, and worse still, is permanent.

Could anyone interpret this for me?

Acne Bloos.

Today I went to Holland Village to visit Dr Low at Sloane Clinic. Just got back from Holland now go to Holland V, like very Gian.

The doctor is gorgeous! She is a walking endorsement of her aesthetics products, and she talks very very fast. I surveyed her patients, they are all like me, drabby normal people. Not the doctor, she was wearing a skirt which is pencil-style, but made of some shiny soft material, a crisp white shirt, topped off with a huge gem ring and a bracelet made of strings of jade pearls (I think). Very well put together. I could observe her entire wardrobe as her consultation desk is made of glass. I bet alot of her patients harbour secret dreams of looking like her, glamourous and gorgeous. But let's go back to my problem.

I have an uncontrollable permanent hormonal-based acne problem which occurs when I have stress, when the weather gets a little hot, when I sleep irregular hours, or any other reason my body system can latch on. For this visit, I was prescribed topical treatment which are acne preventive medication, and after, when the situation is under control, I was recommended to go for chemical peels or microdermabrasion. Nothing too abrasive. I liked her, she was upfront and told me she could do nothing much for my hereditary eye rings problems. Stuck with them for life.

After the consultation was over, her nurse brought me to another room where they cleaned my face and took shots of my face from three angles, which was fed into a laptop. The nurse then pressed a button and my face shot came out. Then another b/w shot came up. The second shot was horrendous! All the marks, wrinkles were all accentuated, and pores enlarged on the face. The computer program has projected pimples on the Entire surface area of my face, I kid you not. The nurse explained that if I don't treat my face, I'm going to look like that in five years. BullShit!!!!

I understand it's her job to encourage patients to take on skin care packages, but it's hard to keep a straight face as she proceeded to point out every flaw and make a big deal out of every single one of them. "Wah look at your eye wrinkles! And look at your enlarged pores, they will get even bigger, you know. You have oily skin..." I tried to remain as polite as I can, asked her to read the doctor's diagnosis on my skin, explain that it's already done by the former and please don't give me conflicting advice, refused to sign on packages, and paid for my products and left.

Let's say the amount I blew on my consultation and medication is not a small amount, but as a friend assured me that positive results would follow, it would be all worth it. Because You're Worth It!

I walked past the Holland V hawker centre on my way back to the car, and visited my current FAVOURite tee shirt store. Yay! the deal is still on. First tee at $18, second tee at 50% off. I selected two designs and asked the SA for size, and he told me with a straight and earnest face that there is only one size, but not to worry, these are Magic Tees which will fit any person of any size. Rrrright. I laughed because I did find it ludicrous, but honestly, do I have a gullible face today or what, everyone is trying to smoke me. But still, I bought the shirts and we chatted about incoming fall season colours. Violet is going to be hot, and they are also bringing in Violet tees, due to arrive tomorrow. Too bad, new stock should have arrived today for me, a deep purple tee sounds cute though.

I left with two tees (a green & a dark blue) in my bag and had a YaKun black coffee in the car while the air condition cooled the car to a decent temperature before I head back to the east.

June Ugly Bag of the Month

I like Takeshi Murakami, but the new LV collection, nah.

weightier now

Pig knuckles, potato, BEER, sausages, and cheese all contribute to my 1.5 kg gain in weight over two weeks. I thought I walked it all off during the tour but I guess not! My tummy is jet lagging too. Around midnight Singapore time, it demands for a second dinner.

On a more positive note, my fringe has finally grown to a decent length. Yayay! Don't think anyone would call me Ah Wang the retard anymore.

Kolner Dom at Cologne (Koln), Germany

Very old church. Construction first started 600 years ago, stopped, started, stopped again and finally completed in1880. Houses THE three wise mens' relics. Built in the Gothic style.

It's not my camera - the church is really this dirty looking. Church exterior has not been cleaned for a long long time. Water could not be used to blast the walls to clean them, as the church may fall apart. Interior of church is gorgeous.

OK, this is one very Modern-Art Rose Window. Gorgeous, and somewhat appropriate.

Amsterdam Canals

Three main canals semi-circle around the Amsterdam city, and are pleasant to walk along, however, if you happen to step onto the cyclist's lanes that run alongside the pedestrian's anywhere in Amsterdam, be prepared to be run over or sworn at, they are very expressive, these cyclists. "I HATE ZHE TOURISTS!".

Basically, when crossing a street, it pays to turn head fast both directions many times. You will be crossing a lane for trams, a lane for cyclists, and a lane for cars, all in two directions, so that's six lanes. After two days, we were lao shous (old hands) and road cross like the locals.

Traffic boo boos, Jit F wanted to press a traffic button so that the lights will change in our favor, and it was awhile before we realized she was pressing on a small acrylic traffic light meant for cyclists' sight instead.

The drivers sit on the left hand side of the car. I forgot. When we arrived at the airport, we got a taxi and I promptly took the driver's seat. Everyone was amused...parents, taxi driver, people standing in the taxi line, the taxi line guide.

The Rijksmuseum is located at the end of our B&B street. It's undergoing renovations so only major works were shown, which worked out for us, I LOVE Vermeer's use of colours. Rembrent, OK Lah. But Vermeer, I like alot, maybe because of Colin Firth. I was disappointed that the Girl with Pearl Earring painting was not shown. Maybe the museum doesn't own that specific painting.I really liked the paintings at this specific museum, not alot of religious art, but instead, tons of stuff which showed how the extremely wealthy and the bourgeoisie led their daily lives and their fashion in the 17th? or 18th century. The ladies sure liked their pearls.

P.s. in Vermeer's The Kitchen Maid, the lower side of the painting showed old Dutch kitchen tiles. The same tiles can be bought at the 9 streets for Euros 35 up.

We visited the Van Gogh Museum as well. Again, disappointed that Starry Night painting was not displayed. Perhaps the museum doesn't own a copy of it. (Googled: there's one at MoMA, NY, and another at Musee D'Orsay). The Van Gogh museum was informative as it shows the then contemporary influences on Van Gogh's art. Theo was a good brother.

Well, we know what happened to VG, he cut his ear off and shot himself in the chest only to pass on two days later. Rembrent died poor. Vondel, also poor, ended up as a pawn shop doorman. I conclude alot of prominent Dutch who later became tourist attractions had tragic lives. Anne Frank comes to mind as well.

We are family.

The ultimate highlight of the trip was that we get to meet up with Sam & Jit F.

Come to think of it, the only times when we sat down together to chat as a family was when we were waiting for the food to be served. All other times, we're busy resting or walking non-stop through the city.

We had a particularly long sit down at a restaurant which was within walking distance of our hotel. The waiter wasn't too efficient and had the disgusting habit of scratching his hair, and with the same (bare) hand, reach for ice. I shall stop here, it's too disgusting.
I have just discovered the panoramic option on my camera phone on this trip.

Me & the Sis. Same smiles. I like this pic because my face looks smaller here, but in real life, my face is a little bigger (Sam judged).

Baby Me

Mom was doing some spring cleaning and found one of my baby photos which was torn up, by me, when I was a toddler. I apparently tore up alot of my own pictures. I had serious baby issues.

This photo doesn't appear torn as it is cropped.

Amsterdam Sights

Anne Frank's & Westerkerk church. Now we want to read the book.

Now this is the Dam Square, where the palace and an old church are. Since summer is approaching, the Dutch turned the square into a giant sand pit so they can play beach volley. Seems a little wrong/irreverent somehow.

The BloomMarket. Lots of flowers, but we missed the Tulip Season! We got some lotus seeds.

Holland fishing village.

The printing group organizer brought us to a (previously) world renowned fishing village, now a picturesque tourist trap. I have certainly never heard of it, I forgot what it's called, and I couldn't find any fish there.

But, I did see some birds there, so the next two photos are dedicated to the sister, who loves birds (though she prefers them in a more natural setting). When I asked her to help in locating good hotels in Amsterdam, she managed to find the OWL hotel.

So strange right? Go to FISHING village and end up taking pictures of Birds instead.
I peeped into one of the villager's back garden and spotted some pretty chickens. Note the owner also has a Ewok figurine, located bottom right of photo.
There are Two Birds in this (good-value) photo. One flying, and one posing for picture. Again, no fish found on this boat, though fishy smell is everywhere.

9 Streets

The nine streets sign. May be a little too small to read but that's what it reads.

Cat sleeping in the display window of a vintage shop. Every cat reminded me of Mongkut, when I got home, he looked at me with disdain until he remembered who I was, about six hours later. I think he suffers from protein deficiency, his brain is not working too well.

A florist at the nine streets.

My expectations were built up, I expected too much, the 9 streets was a shopping mecca in my mind, I envisioned lots of quirky Dutch stuff to buy. None at all. One shop was promising, but the three fitting rooms were monopolized by local frenetic clothes-horse fanatics who pretended to be blind and not see the others hopeful for a shot at the fitting rooms.

Anything remotely interesting was out of my budget. We came across a shop near Ledseplein which carried bags and jewelry designed by the shop owners. Their workshops were also located in the store. A leather handbag costs about 350 Euros. Sigh.

We went away with smoked cheese and two handmade ceramic plates, and a very last minute purchase by Mom, a gorgeous lambskin violet bag.

Bought the ceramic trays from this pretty shop.

While leaving the nine streets, we saw this bored dog lying nonchalently on the floor. When I took out my sony ericsson mobile, he turned to look at me and started posing. Responded to all the coo-ing sounds we made, this little doggie is bilingual like most of the Dutch, comprehends English too. Or maybe the coo-ing sounds are universal. It's the Tone, not what you Said.

So Manja!

where we sleep at night in Amsterdam

We loved our bed and breakfast! We found ourselves making rest stops back to the B&B in the middle of the day to recuperate from all that walking, we're not very efficient tourists, but the rest stops are so restful that no one objected.

The hotel was nothing fancy, but Very Clean. Good breakfast, fresh croissants and juice, the croissants are hot and ran out pretty fast, so we made it a point not to sleep in for too long and be late for breakfast. Amusing owner, we couldn't tell at times if he was sarcastic/mean to us or just trying to crack a joke or two, until we realized he was the same with all the guests.

Located in a quiet neighbourhood, the major museums are one street away. The only times when it was noisy were when the kids were let out of their kinder schools. NO kidding, pun intended, they are on steroids and play hard.

The other guests are mostly American, the hotel was highly recommended by tripadvisor, which I suspect alot of Americans used in their hotel search. I used that website too, so that could be why we all ended up in the same place.

There was one guest that looked amazingly like the Paul Frank monkey. Nice guy who smiles alot and kindly took our family picture outside of hotel. There were also two visitors from the UK who had the old-man nasal accent, they did the UK old man thing and were lounging by the reception area (just like how they would lounge by the pub, by the garden, or by the tobacco shop), they were friendly and informed us that we missed our taxi to the airport.

All the older Amstgerdam houses are long and narrow, this was because in the distant past, house owners were taxed based on the width of their houses. As a result, alot of the houses are extremely narrow, and creatively expanded upwards. The staircases are correspondingly narrow. When we first arrived, we were told our rooms were on the second and third floors, which was ok until we got our first glance at the staircase. Narrow and steep. Lugging luggage was going to be a real pain in the ass, until the hotel employee mentioned there was an elevator. We were relieved for about 5 seconds until we realized the elevator was small and claustrophobic for anyone bigger than a dwarf. We got used to it quickly though, so it was ok. Tall Sam avoided it politely.

As the houses are very narrow. All big furniture are transported to the higher floors from the first via the pulley system. Hooks were attached to the roof, and the big items are pulled up. Almost all Amsterdam houses come fitted with one hook each.

a walk in vondelpark

Amsterdam is not a city filled with historic or tourist must-see landmarks. There are a few, but other than that, Amsterdam is a city best experienced by walking through its cobbled streets and checking out little things here and there. For instance, Tokyo is a huge shopping city, so is Paris. But Amsterdam is not. There are some shopping, but nothing that took my breath away and trigger my buy instinct.

We also arrived at a time when the weather was good, lots of sun with a little chill, so we spent some time at Vondelpark. It's a big park at the fringe of the city, very near where we sleep at night at Hotel Fita. Lots of locals and their dogs hung out there. The dogs were having a whale of a time at the park, dragging little logs in their mouths. I watched out for dog crap and thankfully didn't see any.

We rested a little on the lawn. Sam took out a book the size of a telephone directory out of his haversack and read up on Nixon. I read a very intellectual tourguide book. Can't remember what the sis read. There was also a impromptu band playing nearby, and a rag tag football team as well. Girls in their bikinis. Mother ducks and their babies. Lots of cyclists. They are everywhere in the city and rule the roads.

Pictures taken at the Vondelpark while lying down.





The park is named after Mr. Vondel, notorious poet from the times of Rembrendt.

Holland Countryside and Cows

The countryside looks foggy romantic, from a Great distance on the highway. Any closer, can smell the animal BOs. I have a perpetual fear of stepping onto cow dung and spoiling my shoes.The requisite windmills. The netherlands is really a great engineering composition, windmills to garner energy to dig out dirks to reclaim land from the waters.

OH look cows! We don't get to see alot of them in Singapore, so whenever I travel, I always get pretty excited when I see them. When they noticed me looking at them, they'll give me a sideways look, assess and decide I'm harmless and continue chewing grass. The more suspicious ones will assess longer. Maybe they don't get to see alot of Asians in that part of Holland.

"Oh look! Miniature cows!" They are goats instead. Goats will evil horizontal satanic iris eyes.

While we were in Amsterdam city in the expensive museum quarter on the last day, Parent 1 exclaimed "Oh Look! Someone is taking his cow out for a walk!"
Parent 2: Rubbish! We're going to walk closer so you can see!"
The three of us crossed the road, stood by the canal, pretended to be really interested in the murky canal water, then swirled and examined the animal when it passed us by. It's a really big dog with black and white cow markings. It's bigger than Rocky by about two times.

bon voyage to myself

My hypochondriac tendencies are coming out. I'm going to Europe for a two week trip, and the first thing I pack are medications for all ailments: cough, cold, eye irritations, tummy aches, gastrics, sinus.
Half my luggage space is also taken up by full-size toiletries and moisturizers, and heavy chargers. Let's hope there's enough space for clothes. I would love to bring my laptop along, but the thought of lugging it across two countries is a bit daunting. I will try to suck up to my mysterious roommate and get her to lend me her laptop every day for 5 minutes to do a quick email check.

Yippeeeee! Can't wait.