Curse Of The Prawn

Last night like any other ordinary night, a bunch of good friends planned a night out in Chinatown for dinner. Although there was some debate where we would go for dinner, in the end we decided to go to Ling Nam because The Nurse wanted to go there. The initial plan was to go to Dainty's for chilli chicken and chilli prawns, but someone came up with the brilliant idea of combining the two by getting take away from Dainty's and bringing it to Ling Nam. It does help if you know the owner.

As Siew Yum and I were returning to the restaurant after a smoke, we had to walk past the fish tanks and we were admiring the many live prawns daintily swimming not knowing their life would come to an end, probably that night. All of a sudden one prawn decides to end its life prematurely by jumping out of the tank! How funny that was, so much so that Siew Yum and I decide we would play a joke on Ball Breaker by placing it in her hand. The joke back fired cos being the Ball Breaker, a mere prawn didnt scare her one bit. Instead it started a whole revolution on cruelty to animals. Swing Sister and Princess Model were very concerned over the prawn's well being. They didnt appreciate how we were playing with a live animal and torturing it to death. Firstly, these animals were bred to be eaten, okay admittedly not bred to be played with. At the end of the day, or end of last night rather, the prawn would die a painful death in someone's hotpot anyway. Ball Breaker and Swing Sister had a very heated discussion over this and Princess Model was almost in tears. I was almost in tears too, from laughter. The whole scene was hilarious. Unfortunately Princess Model didnt fnd this amusing at all. Ball Breaker and her were screaming at each other over the pitiful prawn, who was by now catching its last breaths before retiring to prawn heaven. Poor Ah Sook had to witness our crazy performance, which nobody in this world would possibly understand. The funny thing was Siew Yum couldnt believe the fiasco she created and yet ended quite abruptly with Ball Breaker and Princess Model behaving like it never happened at all. That's the beauty of true friends. We should all be able to argue, fight and love each other all at the same time.

Discovered this morning that both Siew Yum and Ball Breaker felt sick last night with uncontrollable trips to the toilets. And so the curse of the prawn will live with us for many weeks to come. Maybe next time Siew Yum and I should have dinner ourselves! Less drama.

Shoya has Karaoke?

Ok, sad but true, I'm blogging at 3am in the morning. I dont have the luxury of doing this in the office anymore. Work just isnt a bed of roses like it used to be and I miss writing about a day in everybody else's life!

My good friend Big Boy is in town back from New York for Big T's wedding and I thought I'd catch up with him tonight. I didnt expect him to be at Big T's hen's night but he was. Well, there's history there I guess. Big Boy and Big T used to be a couple. This is going back many, many years ago. Big Boy has since moved to New York, gotten himself married and along the way still kept in touch with Big T. Now it's her turn to tie the knot. So, I guess Big Boy had to be part of the bridal party. He does look like a chook in some abnormal sort of way.

The hen's night was at karaoke in Shoya. Did anyone even know there was a karaoke section to this exclusive restaurant?? I certainly didnt. Ok, so the website actually says there's a karaoke bar upstairs. It's on the top floor of the restaurant and from downstairs, you would never guess it was up there. This place is pretty cool. Much the same as any karaoke bar with private rooms. You get to select the songs you want, when you want, via your own remote control. This place is definitely comparable to Chi Lounge in terms of cleanliness and how modern the room set up is. At Shoya karaoke, it's typical Japanese. You have to remove your shoes before going in to the private rooms. The place has a secret entrance (well it's no secret really - the door is next door to Shoya), but there is no signage anywhere to indicate that this place even exists. Maybe it's just me, perhaps everyone knows about it but me!

Well, I enjoyed myself and the selection of songs were not too bad either. Definitely a place to go again. After Shoya, I headed down to CK bar (it's actually called Shanghai 1930, but for some reason we still call it CK bar) with Louey and The Plumber. It was very packed and I only lasted in there for about 20 minutes, enough just to down 1 chivas/ green tea. Saturday nights are not a good night to go there. Too packed, too smoky and full of old men! The only other women there were the ones who work the tables and a table full of TB lesbians! I think I'll stick to drinking there during the week.

I hope to meet up with Big Boy again tomorrow to catch up on all the latest goss in New York and err.....it's definitely time to go to bed for me. Good night :)

Barcelona Architecture

Yeah, I went to Spain like 7 months ago but just never got around to writing about all of it. So far I've only covered Seville. Give me some time, I'm sure I'll get to all of it eventually.

Barcelona is the home to many Gaudi creations. His buildings are magnificent and unique in design. They are so unique that you wouldnt need a tourist map to be able to distinguished a Gaudi building from any other on the street. His gothic and individualistic architectural style is almost surreal in design. Looking at his buidings in print is nothing compared to actually being there in person.

His most famous building is the La Sagrada Familia which is still under construction after like 60 years! The icons, carvings and statues are simply created to perfection. A must see in Barcelona.

Another one of my favourites is Casa Mila. The rooftop terrace was like a playground from another planet. So unique and individual in style and design.

The Casa Batllo was one building we walked past and ony got to see from the outside. It was an interesting looking building. The little windows/ balconies were so unique and toy like.

We tried to visit all of Gaudi's creations, but unfortunately didnt have enough time in between all the shopping, eating and partying. Spain is definitely one of my favourite places to visit.

Christmas at The Full Moon Party

The Full Moon Party on Koh Pangan should be on your list of things to do before you turn 35! I spent a full week in Thailand with my lovable lesbian-ites and what a blast it was. Oh, and it hasnt bent me in any way which is rather disappointing! Hah! Our journey started from KL to Koh Samui. BBs was supposed to be on our flight out from KL but the silly girl had complications with her passport and had to fly out from Singapore. Babes, next time check your passport expiry date before booking your trip overseas. We did all our reservations via the Internet. Air tickets were done through Berjaya Air and accomodation was done through sawadee.com. We stayed at a budget luxury boutique hotel called First Residence. It was situated at the North of Chaweng Beach, away from the noisy night life in the central part of Chaweng, which was a relief. The hotel was brand new and I highly recommend it to those on a budget. It was clean, modern and has a pool. Only thing is it was a 5 minute walk to the beach. I've always been used to staying on Chaweng beach itself where the beach is outside my room. But this hotel was good value for money and I didnt mind the little bit of walking I had to do.

Koh Samui was nothing but a whole week of eating, drinking, getting massages, sun baking and partying. One of the best times I've had on holidays. November Cleo truly lived up to her reputation of being a party animal. She wanted to party every night till 6am in the morning! But I'm happy she made us do it, cos we'll probably regret it now. Despite the late nights (or should I say early mornings), we still managed to get our asses out of bed relatively early and made sure we didnt waste the sun filled days. Most days were spent on the beach at Samui. We did do a diving/ snorkeling trip to Koh Tao and Koh Nangyuan, which were both magnificent. Clear waters, bright sunshine and more importantly a bar on the beach. We were so silly, we took photos imitating Singha beer commercials. November Cleo gets the Oscar performance for her photo! Siew Yum did her thing in Koh Tao and Koh Nangyuan. She went diving out in the open waters. She didnt think it was that great though.

Our all time favourite hangout in Samui was none other than the Green Mango and its surrounding bars. We were at Green Mango every freakin' night! Siew Yum's highlight at Green Mango was the traumatic experience she had to endure in the ladies toilets. There was one night we were at the club and she needed to use the toilet. Nothing unusual there until some Thai hooker decided to join her in the same cubicle, then proceeded to do her business on the floor! Yes, the floor of the cubicle. I guess Siew Yum shouldnt really be too affected by the sight of another woman's genitals right??

Our nightly ritual after Green Mango was always followed with a bowl of noodles outside the club. This stall served by far the best tasting pork noodles on the island. We just couldnt get enough of it. I feel like a bowl now :-P

We got to meet a whole lot of fellow tourists, some of which were from Melbourne. What a small world. Met a group of guys from KL, one of which is a star in a local reality tv show called Cornetto Love Perhaps?. How interesting. We also met a group of Muay Thai fighters & trainers from the reality tv show Contender Asia - Muay Thai. That was our 2 second brush with fame.

Koh Pangan was definitely the highlight of the trip. It was funny when we got on the boat to Pangan. Can you believe the boat doesnt dock at the pier? And the pier was right next to the boat! Instead we had to walk out to the boat in the water! That was rather interesting. The full moon party was awesome. It was a coincidence that the full moon party in December fell on Christmas Eve. So we had a blast of a time celebrating Christmas at a full blown rave party on the beach. It is impossible to describe the party in words. The whole stretch of the beach was filled with different clubs and bars, all pumping out different genres of music. The beach was also packed with ravers from all over the world. Bars were serving drinks by the bucket. I kid you not, drinks were served by the bucket. We met up with a friend of mine from KL at Pangan and had a great time partying with him. It was a shame we didnt stay on the island over night and had to take a speedboat back to Samui cos we were all quite reserved with our drinking incase we got sick on the boat. I've been to Samui half a dozen times and this full moon party was a first for me and man was it good fun!

Back on Samui, we spent a day on a elephant trekking tour, watching a monkey show and riding ATVs (I sucked at it big time). We also went to a live Muay Thai show at the local Muay Thai stadium. It was amazing how the stadium was decked out with a bar that served food and alcohol. Can you believe we could also smoke in there while the kick boxers were fighting in the ring? Only in Thailand. There was one night we went to a night market and found a stall selling deep fried grass hoppers and other weird grubs. We bought a serve of each and took it back to our hotel for a tasting session, washed down with beer ofcourse. It was an experience alright. Cant say I would go all out for a dish of grubs anytime soon, but what surprised me was there wasnt much taste to any of it. They all tasted the same, like deep fried chips. But the thought of it is enough to make me go quesy all over.

To end our amazing trip, BBs and I took the plunge and went to get a tattoo together. It was honestly a lot less painful than I expected. Cant wait to get another one!

Nobu

Firstly, I want you guys to know that I hate writing up an entry with no photos attached. And I havent been religiously writing as much as I used to cos my camera broke and I cant take any photos at all. So I just rely on photos taken by my dear friends. I will have to wait till I go off to KL again to get a new camera so I can snap away happily.

So much hype has surrounded the opening of the much anticipated Nobu chain restaurant that I had to give it a go. And why not, since I managed to get my company to pay for it! I've been to Nobu twice in the last couple of months and I must say I really enjoyed it.

First time there, I was with my whole team of staff and let me tell you that most of them hadnt tried Japanese food before. The girls started to get worried when I ordered "exotic" dishes like sashimi salad, beef tataki and wagyu steak. So it was truly an interesting experience. Nobu's new style sashimi is so yummy. Given the fact that the restaurant is owned by Mr Nobu himself and Robert De Niro, the prices were actually quite reasonable. The servings were not terribly generous, but you pay for good quality service and heaps of eye candy. The waiters and bar tenders are worth the money! The beef tataki is unlike any other that I've tried at other Japanese restaurants. It's sliced to perfection. Very much like Flower Drum, how everything is sliced and cut to perfection. The difference though is that the food at Nobu is better than Flower Drum anyday. By the way, the signature dish at Nobu is the Black Cod with Miso and it's nothing really special except for a piece of grilled cod served with Miso sauce. Not very exciting at all, but a must have since it's the signature dish served in every Nobu restaurant around the world.

My second visit there was alot more fun. I went with Ball Breaker, Siew Yum and November Cleo for a girl's night out. Our waiter was so hot we didnt want to leave the place! Unfortunately, Ball Breaker wasnt too pleased with our choice of food. We ordered a whole heap of raw dishes and nothing that really whetted her appetite. Poor thing. Needless to say, she wont be going back there to eat again, but will certainly make a trip back there for drinks.

I recommend this restaurant if you havent tried it. I really enjoyed it and would love to go there again. And I must say the cocktails are excellent so even if I dont go there to eat, I wouldnt mind going again for drinks. Anyone want to take me?