Still lost in transit.

mood awake

Everyone Needs a Reality Check Once in a While

Tonight is such a quiet night. It's only 1130 and Wayne and Maysan's doors are already closed, with no more light seeping out from beneath. So quiet. A little not used to it.

I'm feeling somewhat sombre tonight, for reasons I cannot explain.

Anyway, just thought I will upload the pictures of our dinner on monday, which Wayne cooked.

Wayne is a potato freak. So far I don't remember a single meal he has cooked which doesn't have potatoes in it. And I am definitely not complaining. Mashed, sliced and baked in cream, mashed and pan-fried, you name it, he's cooked it. He can eat half a plate of mashed potato by himself, and I believe he hallucinates about potatoes too when he is drunk.

I have finally met my match!

Anyway the dish was some mustard pork fillet on aubergine, with sauted yellow squash, snow peas and mushrooms. And of course, mashed potatoes. The pork fillet was really juicy and tender! I think it's got to do with the cut, and how he baked it. Anyway, I was never really a fan of brinjal, because the brinjal dish which I have seen so far always involve it being cooked with gunks of chilli until it acquired some sick grey vomit colour and gooey consistency. But this time it was actually really nice :) I could even do with a second helping haha.

Anyway, we are going to Byron Bay this weekend and also to go climb Mt. Warning. It is about 1400 metre high and including the journey down, it's going to be a 5 hour hike. I sure hope that I will come back in one piece and in as glam a state as possible. *flicks hair*

mood sleepy

Currumbin Pictures!

Ok this is a super long overdue pictures from last week's trip to Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary. I know, I know.. Meet yours truly the queen of procrastination. It's just that it's such a pain, y'know.. resizing the pics one by one and then uploading them. OH.. the uploading..

Anyway! The Currumbin trip was great. Wayne's friend gave us a discount coupon and so we only paid half price for what was otherwise AUD$30pp admission fee. The first show we caught was the lorikeet feeding. Apparently all these lorikeets are not in captivity and absolutely live in the wild. They just fly in at the show times to get fed. What free-loader birds they are! But then again, there are so many wild lorikeets here in aussie. There are a few who always come by our place in the morning, frolicking around the tree outside Wayne's bedroom window, sometimes fighting over food and making such a ruckus that in his grouchy days Wayne contemplates chopping down the whole tree altogether. haha.

For the feeding, you just have to stand there. You'll be given a tray of bird food (some cloudy, watery thing) and the birds will just come to you!

There is really an abundance of wildlife here in Aussie (or should I say Gold Coast), unlike the cosmopolitan city that is singapore, where kids grow up in highrise building and the closest some ever get to knowing animals is by keeping a guppy in a plastic container. The lorikeets are really not afraid of humans. Check out the birds making a pit stop on the birdman's arms and head!

Anyway, approximately 5 seconds after i turned around to pose for the camera while holding that tray, the birds flew off! And the sudden lifting of weights caused the tray to topple and spill over my pants. See that dark patch! Grr..

Next we went to see the koalas. Quite disappointed because it wasn't a "close encounter" show kind of thing! I was so fascinated at the prospect of finally being able to see koalas up close that I must have taken 10 over pictures of them in different pose. Chewing leaves, climbing trees, sleeping, looking left, looking right. Oh look, koala butt!

We saw wombats too. Very fat and clumsy looking animal but i think i forgot to take a photo of them!

See that koala at the back! Maysan and I on the little train that takes us around Currumbin. Saves us the walking.

This was taken at the "Naturally Wild" section where there were all sorts of creepy crawlies, snakes, frogs, turtles, small alligators, and some nocturnal little animals. The second picture is a picture of the remains of a snake which just shed its skin. damn gross-looking. Didn't mama teach you to clean after your own mess??

Turtles, alligators, and tree frogs. Cute little shiny gree tree frogs!

An echidna, which kept wandering about and sticking its snout (snout?) here and there so couldn't take a picture of its face.

A dingo, which looks like a normal dog really.

This was after a birdshow, and some of the birds were still wandering about. This little guy was following me! At one point it made a sheepish move to nibble my shoe. I didn't want to move too abruptly and scare him away, so I had to do a bit of acrobatic posing to fit into maysan's camera's viewfinder.

These were at the "Close Encounter" show, after which we could take photos with the animals. This was me asking the guy whether the lizard bites or not while half cringing because the lizard was so scaly and motionless and COLD. eeekkhh...

Maysan looks happier with hers.

The greedy possum who was munching on food the whole time of the photo-taking session. Apparently possums are considered a pest in New Zealand because there are about 5 million of them, resulting in quite a large possum : human population ratio, and they destroy trees and all. So all the new zealanders are on an mission to eradicate as much possums as possible. But they are so cute :(

The alligator show. The poor baby alligator was as still as a stick and was being transferred from one hand to another for like one hour of photo-taking, not to mention that its snout was tied up so it wont bite. The poor guy must be damn sian. He looks like a piece of sausage on my hands. :D

Last stop was the kangaroo enclosure. The kangaroos were EVERYWHERE! They are like dogs, man. just roaming about, lying around on their bellies, snooping around for food (you can buy kangaroo feed for two bucks from the vending machine), totally oblivious to the entourage of human intruders. They are so lazy and fat! And you can touch them and all. seriously, just like dogs! I wanted to hug the kangaroo to take a picture but he was smelly so I changed my mind. Anyway there were tonnes of them hopping around. Very exciting, though I cant say the same for the kangaroo poo that littered the place which I ended up stepping on. urgh!

We rushed back after that to go to Yatala drive-in theatre to catch Ghostrider and Casino Royale with Wayne and Nathan. It was my first drive in and it was really cool! People bring their quilt and pillows and lie in the boot of their cars while watching the big screen on the grass patch. We, on the other hand, brought beach chairs (and potato chips) because the boot is too small for 4 people. Then you gotta tune in to a certain radio station in your car to listen to the sound.

Came back slightly over midnight, totally beat. But it was a weekend well spent. :)

mood sleepy

Sunday is gone!

I am feeling slightly miserable now, not just because one more weekend has passed, but also because last weekend was an absolutely wasted one. Yesterday we went to Gold Coast Convention Centre just to check out the travel expo in the hope of finding some good bargains for the domestic flights, but was sorely disappointed because it turned out to cater more for people looking at overseas trips. Wayne, on the other hand, spent squintillion hours going from booth to booth finding out details for his upcoming Sarawak & Sabah trip. Maysan and I sneaked out to check out the bakeries across the road, sat down and had a meat pie each, took a stroll back, and found him still at the exact spot where we left him. haha.

We came back after that and veg at home. The weather was sweltering hot yesterday and it made me a bit woozy so i ended up taking a 1.5 hr nap, woke up feeling guilty because maysan had already fixed dinner during the time that I was comfortably holed up between my bed sheets and pillows.

I felt really bad for wasting the weekend like that, and it only just started sinking in. Wayne was telling me that "here you are, planning for melbourne trip when you really should be planning for this Gold Coast trip!" And it's true :((( *smack self*

Only 9 more weekends left. So precious.

mood fuzzy
listening to The Hardest Part by Coldplay

Couch Potatoes Rule

Yesterday was TV night again. Bollocks! What has happened to my literary and intellectual self who would normally rather spend the evening reading Shakespeare than glueing my butt to the couch watching the noise box?

Anyway, yesterday we watched RPA, with its many cringe-worthy moments as usual. There was this guy who had his chest opened up on the operating table while the camera zoomed in on his furiously beating heart, and then there was this lady with bunion, and the doctor had to dissect her right foot and practically drill through a toe and then proceed to happily dig out some bones and do some rearrangement. And the most disturbing part was that the doctor looked so at ease, like how he would solve a jigsaw puzzle in his own living room. halfway through the show I thought I was gonna be sick. HONESTLY.. I don't think I would have made it through even 15 minutes of the show without any company or some kind of moral support. But I figure that if I watch 4 month's worth of RPA I may be able to actually overcome my fear of blood. Check with me again in May.

And then as though that wasn't enough, there was Amazing Medical Stories and yesterday's episode was on boob jobs.

PARENTAL ADVISORY for the next paragraphs okay? Kids below 16 please exit this page, go do your homework and sleep!

Anyway it was a damn bizarre TV experience to see this woman prancing around topless in front of the camera in the attempt to tell a story, and then having two farting dome-shaped plastic thing stuck to her boobs. And then there was another lady who attempted making fake boobs with rice-filled stockings, complete with fake nipples and all. And do you know that apparently in UK there is actually this online organisation where men can donate money to women who wants to get a boob job. These women can register for accounts (a bit like friendster or facebook. *shock shock horror horror*) and then tell their stories on the net to make men understand their predicament and better emphatise with women with mini boobs. But if im not wrong, they have to give their photographs in exchange or something. Makes the whole thing sound so darn perverted.

AND THEN. There was this woman who managed to raise $4000 from the donations she got, and they showed footages of the actual surgery where the doctor jammed hugeass silicon globs into her boobs. There was also the post surgery, where the woman was wheeled out of the theatre still wonky from the anaesthesia but somewhat delirious when she saw her new DD boobs.

Very educational.

Anyway today me and maysan just bummed around at harbourtown (again) doing groceries and that's about it. I so wish that I know how to drive.. AND have a better sense of direction. That way travelling would be heaps easier :(

Ok I'm gonna go get my chicken fillets now. haha private joke.

mood tickled

Your head is a box full of nothing.

Catch My Disease by Ben Lee

My head is a box full of nothing
and that's the way I like it
My garden's a secret compartment
and that's the way I like it
Your body's a dream that turns violent
and that's the way I like it
The winter is long in the city
and that's the way I like it

So please baby please
Open your heart
Catch my disease

I was backstage in Pomona
and that's the way I like it
She drank beer with coca-cola
and that's the way I like it
She told me about the winds from Santa Anna
and that's the way I like it
She told me she loved me like fireworks
and that's the way I like it

So please baby please
Open your eyes
Catch my disease

They play Good Charlotte on the radio
and that's the way I like it
They play The Replacements on the radio
and that's the way I like it
I hear Beyonce on the radio
and that's the way I like it
cos that's the way I like it
and they play me on the radio
and that's the way I like it

So please baby please
Open your heart
and catch my disease

mood random

Cloud number nine looks like a four-legged octopus

The other day I was sitting in the car while we were on our way back home from work and was mindlessly looking out of the window when I saw many giant lumps of fluffy clouds floating above me. I discovered that cloud-watching is actually quite a therapeutic thing to do. You just need some imagination, plenty of free time, and a strong neck muscle.

Anyway, yesterday was Thursday. And after seven weeks in Gold Coast, Thursday has acquired some kind of a familiar routine which comes in the form of work, badminton, plenty of TV, cabbaging on the couch, late night, and oversleeping. In that exact order. This morning we were supposed to leave home earlier at 7.05am (as opposed to the normal time of 730) to collect Wayne's car at Ford. However, at 7am there were still no signs of movement from Wayne's bedroom, and after some very courteous knocking, he finally emerged bleary-eyed and grouchy, obviously as a result of pressing the snooze button too much. Needless to say, we didn't make it to Ford. :D

TV is baaaad...

Yesterday maysan bailed so I went for badminton all alone. Wayne was there of course, but that doesn't count because he is a serious player and is too pro to accomodate my amateurish court ettiquette and dismal badminton skills. He asked me to play a game with him in a double and I tried so hard to squirm my way out of the situation that he had to resort to blackmailing, threatening to make me walk home if I refused to play. Thankfully! Jimmy came to my rescue and came in just at the right time with his kind offer to send me home on his way back to Tambourine if Wayne really did choose to be mean (WHICH I HAD NO DOUBT HE WILL, being the meanie that he is!).

So anyway, the badminton session turned out not too bad, because Jimmy was there, and that alone was enough because he was such a good fun, and his secret weapon in winning the game is always to distract his opponents by making them double up laughing on the floor with all his strange and rather sissy antiques. I was in stitches practically half of the time, couldn't do proper serves as a result.

Travelling is great, because you get to meet many interesting persona and you get to keep the memory of the camaraderie even when you leave the place for good. I think I will really miss this place when I go back.

Meeting new people could really be a great deal of an eye opener. Jimmy was sharing with me that he was actually a Buddhist monk living in a monastery in Thailand before he was adopted by an OZ couple when he was 23. He also told me about his travel experiences in Vietnam, how it was a really beautiful place and how the trip to Hoi An made him wish he had a girlfriend because "the little boat trip was very nice and it just wasn't fun going with parents". haha.

Then there was Kwong, this rather cocky middle-age singaporean born on Christmas Island. I never knew they speak chinese and malay on Christmas Island! Apparently it is quite similar to an Asian settlement, not angmoh like what I thought!

I find it a bit intriguing that I seem more at ease around people here as compared to when i'm back in sg. I can completely chat up an old grandfather and just talk about the weather without getting a weird look.

Dropped by Macs on the way back where Wayne bought his unhealthy dinner and I caved in to a fattening lump of soft serve ice cream. Next time remind me to keep an arm's length distance from wayne whenever I have an ice cream in my hand, because barely three steps out of Macs, an ice cream war ensued and half of my ice cream ended up on my face, on his elbow and all over my fingers. ARGH!

mood contemplative

February, would you stay a little while..

I have unknowingly found myself in a point in life where I just want to throw stability out of the window and get myself all whirled up in a chaos of changes. I want to trot around the globe, camp under the stars, ride on camels and swim in the Nile. I want to eat tamales and salsa in Mexico, date Italian men (just joking, YANG!), scale the Pisa Tower and feel the rush of adrenalin knowing that maybe if I jump up and down vengefully enough, it might just topple and become dust.

A wistful feeling came over me this afternoon, because dammit it's end of Feb already! Isn't it stupid why time chooses to fly when we have fun? have you ever questioned why the law of nature couldn't be reversed just to make us mortals a tad happier? :(
I know, I know, as what the cliche saying goes, you either choose to look at the glass half full or half empty, but now I am just staring at the surface very hard hoping that it will turn to beer and start frothing all the way up to the rim and stay like that forevermore.

Speaking of beer, yesterday --- Oh yes, HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR EVERYONE! pardon me, here in OZ during CNY the town is equally dead really, so try as i might, I just couldn't get in the mood. Not much angbao to take also! saddened :(

But I digressed. Speaking of beer, yesterday our bosses (who is this singaporean couple) invited us over to their place for a Chinese New Year lunch. There was plenty of food, and what excited me was that in the tray of CNY goodies (you know, those sour plums and all), there was a pile of Ferrero Raffaelo chocs! For the ignorant, Raffaelo is Rocher's relative, but it is coated with white chocolate and coconut shavings instead of bits of nuts, and it has white chocolate cream and hazelnut in the middle. It was heavennn...
Anyway, all in all, other than the foods, I also had half a small bottle of Carlton Lager, one full glass of Woodbury Shiraz, and 7 Raffaelos. Wayne still won hands down though, because he had 2 bottles of beer and 4 glasses of wine and was still many shades lighter than me, who by then had already changed colour, so much so that i had to wipe off my blusher just to lessen the effect. I so need to exercise now before I become humpty dumpty. Beer is nice :)

On saturday we finally went to Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary! I was rather disappointed at the end of it cos I didnt get to cuddle a koala :((( We were separated by this fence and we could only look at them while they slept and slept like the lazy snoozing bears that they are. Apparently you have to pay money to take a photo with them and even then it was a shoot-and-go kind of thing. So one of these weeks we may go to Lone Pine Koala Santuary. I absolutely refuse to leave Australia before I hug that grey furry thing!

Anyway, I dont think I will start posting photos of the trip yet because some of the photos are still with maysan. However, before I go off, here is a picture of a horribly obscene kangaroo having a nap, dreaming about I-dont-know-what. :p

mood tired

Amateur Photography

Last saturday's visit to Q1 and surfers' didn't do my Yashica justice because it almost literally didn't see the light of day. Taking black and white photos really proved to be quite a challenge especially to a greenhorn like me, because I suppose it takes some experience to be able to picture scenes in black and white and visualise the texture, tonal composition and all.

Since I didn't manage to seize enough moments to snap enough BW photos, I did a bit of meddling with some of the photos I took with my digicam, essentially digitally converting some of them to black and white just to see how they would turn out and to gear up for the next photography trip (yea!) Me thinks some of them actually look quite decent :) Also did a little of highlighting and minor editing just to get a more contrasting tone. I think if I use filters I can achieve the same kind of effect too. So exciting! Want to go and buy some filters *boink boink*

To end off this post, some photos of monday's yummy dinner. courtesy of wayne of course.

Next time when I'm rich, I'm going to bribe Wayne into working as my home chef so that I can eat good food 24/7. muahaha.

mood calm

Q1

Hi all! I'm a bit of a lazy ass today and don't really feel like writing today. You know, it is the sunday syndrome. The dammit-tomorrow-is-monday-so-I-shall-spend-my-last-day-of-the-weekend-cabbaging syndrome.

Anyway! Just for the sake of documenting, yesterday maysan and I went to Q1 observatory tower at surfers' paradise. It is this 78-storey tower that just got completed less than a year ago and is supposed to be taller than the Eiffel yadda yadda sort of thing. From the 77th & 78th storey you can see heaps of great view and on a really clear day you could apparently see the whole of brisbane city all the way to Byron bay. Yesterday was a sunny day, albeit not that clear so we didnt manage to see Byron Bay and Tweed heads that clearly. What excited me the most was the stunning view of this whole massive body of water which spanned almost the full length of one side of the building, it was of such a beautiful colour of azure blue and I have really never seen such a humongous piece of water just before my very eyes like that. Because Q1 is at Surfers' Paradise and is just a short walk from the beach, the view of the ocean was particularly clear and magnificent.

It was totally awesome.

I'm really excited about black & white photos now. Yesterday I lugged my Yashica along to do sightseeing with me and boy, it really is tough to visualise things in black and white. Did a bit of research today and it got me all pumped up for next week. Can't wait to take more BW photos! And I wish photoshop is easier to learn so next time I can do up all my photos nicely with captions and all. tough tough.

mood hungry

It's Friday I'm in Love!

Had quite little sleep last night because Friday is an arsed day where we go to work an hour earlier than we normally do. And coupled with staying up late into the night (talking about, in retrospect, actually nothing), is making me a little grumpy now. It is somewhat a snowball effect, because waking up slightly later than usual resulted in me having little time to prepare and not being able to eat as much brekkie as I would have liked. As such, little sleep + little food = sleepy + hungry = grouchy!

Today is quite a boring day at work. There was some kind of product reformulation being done and til now, Wayne is on the verge of pulling all his hair out while Kim has been going around in his unabashed singlish glory, "headache ah.." "wah today I stress ah.." So as they are still kicking up a fuss and having a debate over the consistency of satay sauce, I am left to my own devices with a tiny bit of time to kill.

Anyway, here in Australia, I really feel like a different person. In a very warped way, sometimes it is easier to be yourself with people you don't know. I guess that is why everybody wants a getaway, because in a faraway place with noone who knows you adequately enough to pass judgements, you can be a complete monkey or make a fool of yourself and noone you know would look at you the next day and think "That's the twit who paraded around the street in a superman suit."

Also, right here my stomach seemed to have somewhat stretched to three times its original size. On normal days I have an appetite probably as big as a dinosaur, much to the disbelief of maysan and wayne. And hence, speaking of big appetites, the real reason I am blogging is becauseeee... some of the staff in the company are bringing us out for dimsum tonight. and I AM SO EXCITED!!!! Oh my God... I am so craving for chinese food now. It's a bit funny because all along Rudy has always been the more oriental half, while I am always the one browsing food mags and webbies for the newest angmoh eateries that we can try, much to the ill-concealed lack of enthusiasm of my accomodating boyfriend.

But here, I have discovered, that at the end of the day, I am really just a chinese girl who at this moment just wants her siewmai and egg tarts.

mood okay

Grass are green because you make them out to be.

I have ants crawling out of my keyboard. WHY? maybe i dropped biscuit crumbs into it. I sure hope not though, because I dont want to wake up one day and discover that ants are building an empire out of my Fujitsu parts and planning the next coup d'etat to take over my room.

Anyway, this week is an okay week. Was in the lab the whole time, which is not bad because at least I get to relax my muscles a little. Today we did two products and both were sweet chilli sauce, rounding up to 17 cooks in total. Nearly went mad because they took so bloody long to cool down enough for the Bostwick test and I was huff-puffing in and out of the lab doing testing, getting sensory approval and doing weight and temperature check on the production floor. And when they started filling the 4 litre bottles I nearly went into fits because then I had to carry 9 kilo worth of sauces to and fro the lab *faints*

I am feeling somewhat frustrated at this point of time because I am lacking mentally stimulating conversations and intellectually challenging activities. So much so that I am beginning to talk to my pillows and discuss calculus with my sandwiches. Maybe it is routine? Lack of adrenaline? Maybe I just need a good book. There are not many good blogs to read nowadays. But then again websites and blogs are sprouting everywhere like mushrooms so maybe I am just not catching up fast enough. Show me!

Why is it that sometimes we just never get contented?

But then again, what's wrong with asking too much?

When I was much younger, I used to enjoy going to school quite a fair bit, because at least I was good at it. I still vividly remember the rush that I used to get every time teachers looked at me in disbelief when I finished primary school maths test in 5 minutes while my classmates were still at number two. Don't you just love it when you know you are good at something? If your answer is no, you are lying.

Random.

I am 80% convinced, that the reason I am sometimes not happy with my photos, is that I dont have a wide angle lens.

Anyway, moving along! on monday Wayne cooked a feast for us! Not sure what was the reason for such an extravaganza of a dinner on a weekday, when everyone else are still drowning in monday blues. But I sure am not complaining! Wayne made a veggie quiche with feta cheese, crumbed lamb cutlet, and yummy potato salad. We also had the coleslaw that Eileen gave us from KFC haha. The quiche was damn cumbersome to prepare, and while fixing his quiche and juggling between preparing different batches of fillings and boiling potatoes, Wayne was like, "why am i doing this?". haha.

It is funny how he makes it all look so easy. hrmpfff.. Anyway the end product looks like this:

Anyway, I am feeling depressed now because I have run out of scotch fingers to nibble. There is nothing to eat here! :(

But right now, what i really really really want to eat, is crystal jade's xiao long bao. Oh I can brave a cyclone to get to one tray of those juicy little pouches of meat.

mood piggish

5th weekend at Gold Coast

Today was New Zealand's Waitangi Day and there was some sort of celebration going on at the Carrara stadium, so Wayne brought us there to take a look-see. It was kinda like last week's Australian Day but on a smaller scale somewhat. They had little booths selling New Zealand ethnic goodies, some band concerts, dance shows, and the highlight of the day was this traditional New Zealand food called the Hangi, which cost ten bucks. It was a darn hot day, and the temperature was hovering between 32-34 degrees. *sweat*

Anyway, the reason we were there was because Wayne is actually a New Zealander (who have eversince turned Australian), and even though he claimed that he wanted to go for the celebration because he wanted to get in touch with his roots, the real reason was really because he was lusting over the Hangi which I believe he has been drooling over in his sleep for a few days. Hangi is this meat and vegetable dish wrapped in banana leaf which was buried underground underneath some hot coals and left cooking for a few hours, and is apparently very yummy.

And the reason I said "apparently", is because we never got to trying it, much to wayne's utmost disappointment. This is because they must have overestimated the power of mother nature and so, even while the people were already making a bee-line to get their Hangi, those meats and veg were still halfway between raw and cooked, baking down under, and would not be ready until another two hours. So impatient people like us ended up getting our ten bucks refunded.

But really, it was very interesting because on our way out of the place we saw them getting the Hangi ready over at the grass patch. There were people shovelling about and smoke billowing out of this giant lump of soil where the Hangi was baking. So funny how they have to dig through the soil everytime they want to check if the meats are cooked. Praise the Lord now we have slow cookers and electrical stoves with easily removable lids, amen?!

So maysan and I left the place rather disappointed and a little hungry. Wayne, on the other hand, was absolutely crushed, because he has been been dreaming of getting his hands on those juicy meats for the whole week.

Wayne is now a little wary of my camera, and every time I sneaked a shot of him looking stupid, he will go "Am I going to be on your website again?" haha.

Anyway after that, Wayne drove us (as usual) to Harbourtown where we did our groceries while he went to his mum's. Harbourtown is officially my favourite place in Gold Coast so far, because it is full of factory outlets like Adidas, Nike, Jayjays, Cotton On, with many things to see, and they have quite a dizzying array of fruits and veg at this shop called Fruit Barn, at really bargain prices. There is also an Asian grocery store, where we could get things like beehoon, taukwa, Indofood cooking sauces (yay!), Lee Kum Kee sachets, so on. That shop is actually quite a rip off because they sell taoge (beansprouts) for AUD$2-$3 a bag, which you normally could get from a wet market in singapore for... 50 cents?? And also Hello Panda for AUD$2, which is SGD$2.40, and 1.5L Yeo's green tea for AUD$4. Damn, I am so craving for Hello Panda right now, but for AUD$2, my purse is screaming bloody injustice. But yea.. since it is the only place which sells Asian foodstuff, we all just unwillingly let ourselves get ripped off :(

Here in Gold Coast, if you really do some exploration and figure out the bargain places, grocery shopping can be really cheap, even cheaper than singapore. I love Fruit Barn because they have all the essential fruits and veg at really reasonable prices. I particularly love the yummy juicy white fleshed nectarines which cost quite a bomb in sg, but here they are only $1.50/kg! A medium head of broccoli was 60 cents! So it is fruits and veg galore! Here I come, healthy living and good bowel movement! :)

It's quite dumb I know, getting excited over fruits and vegetables. I'm turning into a grocery junkie. So before I start sounding like an auntie, better move on... (but it was really great, that Fruit Barn!)

I haven't been taking that much photos here in Gold Coast, because it is kinda hard to get into a shutterbug mode when your travelling companions are not quite as enthusiastic as you are. It made me really miss those times of travelling in Melbourne with Keerling, when our cameras were in our hands 24/7 and we took pictures EVERYWHERE. Under the toilet signs (haha), beside the lamp post, on the benches, riding on escalators, in front of the mirrors, under shop signs, road signs, in front of fruits, vegetables, fitting rooms, carrying gawdy bags, wearing furry coats, funny hats, in supermarkets carrying juice bottles, seriously everywhere. It was so much fun. Whereas over here, as you can see, most of the pictures have everything except my face in it. Babe, I miss you :(

Anyway, the stupid wound on my leg was throbbing the whole of yesterday, and I felt stupid cos I couldn't even walk without looking like a grandmother on crutches. And the wound didn't even look like that big a deal but it was so damn uncomfortable!