Land of a Thousand Smiles

The last time I was at Bangkok was probably last year. So this will be my very first trip to the land of a thousand smiles this year.

This time round, my younger sister, my parents and my elder sister together with her hubby and their 2 little kids will be going along too.
It will be like a family event. Guess my mum got hooked on travelling after her trip to Hong Kong a few months back.

When the coup happened in Bangkok, she was like asking if we are still going as the news reported that everything is okay.

We made quite a last minute booking on air-tickets and accomodation. The accomodation was a headache, we tried so many bookings before we managed to get us any. We settled finally in Arnoma Hotel. A new hotel this time round. I usually stayed in Asia Hotel when I went Bangkok as it is very convenient but it was like fully booked after we asked around 1 agent and 3 websites.

Our flight was at 1.05pm and we took the SQ flight this time and it costs us $289 per pax. Usually we took Tiger Airways or Jetstar but the price difference this time round was not much and we get to have in-flight entertainment and food and not forgetting the kiddy package on SQ for the little ones. Look at the spongebob toy my niece is holding.




1st day in Bangkok
We reached the new Bangkok International Airport - Suvarnabhumi Airport around 3.30pm local time. The immigration process went on quite smoothly. The baggage collection was pretty good as well although we had to wait for the baggage. I was actually pleasantly surprised at the smooth immigration process after hearing stories of hiccups during the opening days earlier in september.
That's our baggage claim belt.

The airport is huge, it was like Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 combined into one. The only thing is we had to go down to the first floor to catch a taxi and it seems weird that the taxis were not located on the same level as the arrival halls.

We had to split into 2 different taxis on our way to the Hotel. We reached the hotel around 5pm but the rooms were not ready so we left our bags with the hotel and went to Central Zen (used to be called World Trade Center). Went to Naraya and Isetan and bought quite a bit of stuff.

Went back to the hotel thereafter.The room was ok, not fantastic but looked pretty alright. We took a little rest and quickly went to Siam Square where we headed to Macway's tailor to custom make some shirts and pants for hubby. My Dad made 2 pair pants, my sister made 2 shirts and my brother-in-law made 3 pair of pants and 3 shirts. These are the shirts and pants I ordered for hubby.

We ended the night with dinner at the food court at MBK 5th floor. The food court concept was like Marche where each of us has a card and paid for our food using the card. Look at the food we had.



2nd day in Bangkok
We started the morning bright and cheery with breakfast at the Hotel. The spread is pretty normal. Today we brought our parents to the Grand Palace. It was a really hot day. We took the taxi to grand palace and our taxi went a long way and via the expressway and in the end, we paid twice than what the other taxi paid.

After the grand palace, we decided to walk to the Reclining Buddha which is supposed to be 10 mins stroll from the grand palace. But it's so hot and we couldn't see the place after walking for a while that we decided to give up and head to Chinatown.

An "artistic" photo i took of a flower pot in the grand palace.

Wanted to go to Canton House in Chinatown but couldn't find the place so we ended up at Hai Wai Tian for lunch with sharks' fins and birds nest. The portion at Hai Wai Tian has shrunk so much that it's really no longer worth it to eat there anymore. After lunch, we went to Sampeng market where i picked up some earrings.

At Chinatown, there were some celebrations going on which I believed is some celebration of the ninth emperor in heaven or something like that .

We went back to the hotel after that where the kids slept and my sister and I went to MBK for more shopping. We met up later and went to a restaurant called Thai Thai near Patpong for dinner and thereafter went to walk a bit at Patpong and then to Naraya again to buy stuff we can't find in the Naraya at World Trade Center.


3rd day in Bangkok
My sister and I started the day early as we wanted to go to Chatuchak market whereas my parents wanted to go to the Aquarium with my elder sister and the kids.

We reached Chatuchak around 9.45pm and within an hour, we already grabbed jeans, tees, shoes etc. We eventually left the place around 1pm and rushed to the tailor for my sister to do some fittings for her shirts. The guy at the shop told us that the temperature is about 38deg cel these few days. Very hot. Had lunch at MBK at my favourite restaurant. I can't remember the name of the restaurant but they served the streetside food in the restaurant. You can always see those stalls selling "fishball" noodles and they have that too in the restaurant. Its located at the end of MBK at basement near the cinemas side.

After that, we went to Platinum Fashion Mall where I bought some accessories and then to City Square where there are wholesale clothes for sale. The bad thing is I can't find anything suitable.

My feet are killing me and we headed back to the Hotel where the rest are leaving for dinner. I just had to rest my feet and didn't go for dinner with them.


Fourth and Last day in Bangkok
After breakfast, my sister and I went to do some last minute shopping at Big C whereas my parents and my sister's family decided to go to Central Chidlom. I bought a skirt and pants followed by foot massage. Finally letting my feet have some relaxation. After checking out, my sister and I went for lunch and had roast duck rice, shrimp dumpling soup and siew mai with drinks and all these for just 200 baht.

After that, it's time to head to the airport. After checking in, there are quite a number of shops in there and we spent the time walking around till it's time to board the plane. There is this grand centerpiece in the airport after clearing the immigration. I have no idea what it is but it looks pretty nice.

Good bye Bangkok and I will be back....perhaps next year.

Finally

Finally I updated my year long blog...frankly, i backdated all my blogs here as I have no time to write so many stuff and upload the photos after every event. So i painstakingly do it over the weekend when i am down with flu.

And please visit the link - Parfait D'Amour. It's a little web shop I set up with my sister to provide wonderful, beautiful and meaningful gifts to wedding couples. Please help to spread the words around.

I sprained my ankle

Went gym a day after I got back from China and fell down when walking down the stairs after gym.

Initially, i thought it was okay and went to play some pool. The next morning, it was hurting so much and swollen.

Went to a chinese physician and had my ankle all bandaged up.

My Second China Trip

My Second China Trip with the company. As the meeting is starting on Monday, I flew to Shanghai on Sunday morning.

The immigration was terrible.I waited for more than an hour just to clear the immigration and it took another hour to get to the hotel from the airport. After checking in and resting for a while, I headed out to this Teppanyaki restaurant next to the hotel. It costs RMB150 per pax and the food is free flow. It was really good and I love the beef teppanyaki.

After that, I brought my vendor who came from Singapore with me and who was in China for the first time to the Bund and Nanjing Road.

Met up with two other Netherlands guys from my vendor company on Monday and brought them to Xin Tian Di and had dinner at the Din Tai Fung. The dinner was not cheap. It costs like RMB620 for the 4 of us.

The next morning we started early as we need to go to the Suzhou Plant and it was a 2 hours drive from Shanghai. When we reached there, we start off the meeting with a tour of the factory and understanding how the production works etc.

The site manager took us for lunch at Yang Yang Jiao Zi Guan and the lunch was nice. We tried this fish that was only found in the River Hwang. For dinner, I brought them to Guan Jian Jie and had dinner in this "Pink-lighted" restaurant. The food was pretty good and it was really cheap. It was only 170RMB for the 4 of us. Next, we proceed to Haagen Dazs for ice-cream and then had some coffee before ending the day with a glass of mai tai for me at the hotel lounge.

The next morning I went and bought 2 boxes of Moon cakes from the Hotel and it has the normal white lotus flavour as well as the XO flavour mooncake. After that the company driver took me from the hotel to the Shanghai airport where I departed to go back Singapore.

Beautiful Bali

After talking so much about Bali then came the bombings and bird flu and tsunami, we finally decided to go ahead with the trip.

We will be spending 4 nights in Bali - 2 nights in Ubud and 2 nights in Kuta.

Tried to get the SQ tickets but after being on the waiting list for such a long time, we decided to go with Garuda. It was a bad choice. We need to transit in Jakarta airport and the flight was delayed for 2 hours. There was absolutely nothing in the Jakarta airport. Just sit around and do nothing.

The flight was scheduled to reach Denpasar at 2.20pm but we touched down only at 4.30pm. It was an hour's drive to the Ubud resort. We will be staying at the Tegal Sari Accomodation. http://www.tegalsari-ubud.com/

Wanted to book the Duplex but it was taken so we took the next best one which is the super deluxe room. Was pleasantly surprised at the hospitality of the staff. Our room is situated right at the end of the whole place. The room was clean and neat,much to my surprised. That's our unit, first one from the left.

Look at the people working on the padi fields just right in front of our accomodation. Cool,isn't it?









Take a look at the pictures. There's even a sitting area, isn't it spacious?









We went to this famous diner called Dirty Duck Diner. The place is nice. There are a lot of pavilions surrounded by little ponds and stone sculptures. Tried their famous crispy duck. It was nice but the portion was a little small. I tried their rice wine drink with barley but it tasted horrible. I ordered another coke instead. The picture shows the surroundings of the diner.









The meal was not cheap. Costs about the same back home. Took a leisure walk back to the Hotel after the dinner. Started the next day with breakfast at the hotel. Philip took the Mie Goreng while I took the pancakes. It was not bad especially the Mie Goreng. We scheduled a spa session for today at the Ubud Sari Health Resort. http://www.ubudsari.com/index.html

We took a package that comprises of Traditional Bali Massage, Candlenut body scrub, Flower Bath, Steam Bath, Jacuzzi and finally Bali Facial. It costed us US$33 each. Was that cheap or what? The environment was nice. It was set in nature surroundings. The ginger tea served by the resort was very nice too considering the fact that ginger was never my favourite.

After the spa and feeling rejuvenated, we decided to walk back to the hotel while enjoying the various sights and shopping along the way. Outside the spa, a stone carving of monkeys was in progress. Look at the picture. Pretty amazing,isn't it?

Ubud is famous for its arts and cultural activities. We walked into Ubud Market and you can find stone carvings and various oil paintings etc. We bought 3 oil paintings in total and continued on our way to the Ubud Palace. There's basically nothing much in the palace but interestingly, there are people living there. Besides the palace, there is this stall that sides suckling pig or Babi Guling. It's supposed to be a famous stall but as we saw the queue quite long and I wasn't sure if I could take roadside stall. We decided to give it a miss which we realised later that it was clean and good. Well, an excuse to go back Bali again. Hahaha.

We stopped by at one restaurant for lunch and I had Nasi Goreng while Hubby had Nasi Campur. I loved the Nasi Goreng in Bali. Really tasted good. In the evening, we went to the Bali Kacak Dance. I realised that I have actually seen it before in Singapore WOMAD. Some pictures of the Kacak Dance.

3rd day in Ubud and it's time for us to say farewell to Ubud and contiune our journey to Kuta. The journey from Ubud to Kuta takes another hour as well as Kuta is pretty near the airport. The hotel we stayed in Kuta is called Ramayana Resort and Spa. http://www.ramayanahotel.com/

The hotel looks nice from the exterior and even on the way to the room. But the room sucked. Pardon my language. It was run down and old and falling apart. Never will I stay there ever again.

Ventured outside after checking in for lunch. Had lunch at this asian restaurant. No nasi goreng but it's ok. Hahaha. Walked along the street and went into this huge shopping center. Nothing interesting. Just another shopping center kind.

In the evening, we went to HRC for dinner. The portion for the food was huge and we can't finish it. Bought some stuff from the store and walked back to the hotel.

We went for another spa session again. This time the place is called Secret Garden. http://www.secretgarden-bali.com/. This time round we had java lulur scrub, followed by a massage, Flower Bath, Facial, Mani and Pedi and ending with a hair cut. All these for about 620,000Rp for both.

After the spa, we walked to the beach. The beach is not crowded at all.

We had lunch at McDonald's which is pretty standard and normal.

For dinner, we went to another famous restaurant called Made Warung which is opend by a Balinese and her dutch husband. Guess what I had? Nasi Goreng. There's a long queue and we had to wait for some time before getting a seat. After dinner, we walked back and stopped for Haagen Dazs ice-cream. It's expensive. We bought some chips and Bintang beer from a convenience store outside the hotel.

The next morning after breakfast, we checked out around lunch time and did some last minute shopping for sourvenirs. We took the hotel's transport to the airport and as we need to do a transit at Jakarta, the driver took us to the domestic airport. The counter personnel told us we need to go to the international airport and we had to walk to the international airport. Thank God, it's not that far.

So it's goodbye Bali. The airport in Bali had so many stores,unlike the one in Jakarta which is pathetic. It was a relaxing and interesting trip. Will definitely go back again....for my Nasi Goreng and the Babi Guling that I missed. I must also remember to buy back some pre-packed Nasi Goreng mix as well. Hahaha.

My China Trip

My first business trip to China with the company and my third time to China.

Reached Pudong airport around 1.30pm and quickly hurry through the immigration as I happened to be on the same flight as a colleague so we are taking the company car to Suzhou together. It's my first time to Suzhou and it's a 2 hour drive from Pudong airport to Suzhou Hotel.

We will be staying at the Sheraton Suzhou which my colleague says it's a very nice hotel and indeed it was very nice. It's like a mini forbidden city or the Yu Yuan in Shanghai.

Look at the pictures. Isn't it nice?









This is the view from my room.









Walked around Suzhou city on the day of arrival. Went for dinner with the site manager, his family and my colleagues.

Meetings start early the next morning at 9am. No time for lunch and had to eat take away in the meeting room and continue with the meeting at the same time. Ended the evening with a dinner with the financial controller and my vendor.

The next morning we took the car to Shanghai office for meeting. Again, lunch was taken in the meeting room again. But it was a good trip, meet up the users and conveyed the message to them.

Checked into the hotel and the hotel really sucks. Will never go back to this hotel ever again.
Went for dinner in the evening with my vendor. The whole place was in smog. Look at the TV tower.












The last day in China. Went to the vendor's office, did some last minute shopping and rushed to the airport. That concludes my China Trip.

My Dream Home....a year later

This is my place...almost a year later. All the messy bit starts to kick in..hahaha

This is my dining area. My luggage is there because I am packing for my business trip to China the following Monday.

Second pic is part of TV console. I am trying my new Lumix camera...heee

Third pic is my TV console taken at night and the last pic is the view from my living room.

Land of Tulips and Windmills and SEX???

My first business trip with my new company. This is supposed to be a team building trip with my team as well as the vendor and then a series of meetings are lined up as a form of introduction to the way things work in Netherlands.

I was due to take the plane on 25th March, 11.30pm flight, am taking KLM and will reach Schiphol Airport on 26th March at around 7am. The flight is about 14 hours and I thought I could spend my time on the plane watching movies but guess what? The in-flight entertainment system was spoilt...and only in the business class. So i have to spend my time playing with my puzzle book and trying to sleep.

Finally reached the airport and waited for my boss's flight. His flight was delayed for 2 hours and I was practically doing nothing in the airport for over 3 hours. Walked around and had some food at Burger King. I had some nuggets and a coke and that costs me Euro6. My goodness.

One of my colleague came and picked us up from te airport and we travelled to the hotel where we are going to have our team building. It's the Hilton Hotel. http://www.hilton.com/en/hi/hotels/index.jhtml;jsessionid=5SS4OO0QEPGJ4CSGBIU222QKIYFC3UUC?ctyhocn=SPLSOHI

The hotel seems nice on the website cos' it's summer time then but when i was there, there is no green grass, even the golf course is brown in colour. Checked into the Hotel and had lunch at the hotel. Ther service there is really really slow.

After that, we decided to drive to Amsterdam. The roads there are like stone roads and my poor shoes spoilt just after one day of walking there.

I saw the largest bicycle carpark ever there and it's like 2 storey high. The roads are pretty inaccessible and cycling is definitely better.

Bought some sourvenirs and stopped by a pub for some beer. Ventured into the "red light district" of Amsterdam but it's only 4plus in the afternoon so the curtains are all drawn.

Don't go into a "coffee shop" in Amsterdam as it's a place where people smoke port etc. Drinking joints are called cafes.

Went around some churches and some streets along the river. Some of the houses there are crooked and slanted to one side. Interesting.

27th March - Start the morning with breakfast and got to know some new faces. Finally met my team as well as my vendor's team from USA and Netherlands. Definitely good to put a face behind the voice. I was the only asian and chinese girl there. My current boss is a female but will soon be replaced by a male one and I will be the only female in my team. Meals were organised in the hotel and it was quite an enjoyable time.

28th March - 2nd and last day of team building. Had more work to do today as we had discussions on the way we are working now and how to improve on things. However, it lasted only half a day and we left for Noordwijk in the afternoon.

The hotel in Noordwijk was near the beach and it was a really nice hotel. We had mexican food around the place and after dinner, we walked around the beach. It was very very windy and freezing but really nice. www.hotelsvanoranje.com

29th March - My first day at Sassenheim office. Hmm...there is no common office area where we had in Singapore or China. Everyone has a room of their own. Cool,isn't it? Went for several meetings today and trying to get to know more people in the office as well. Left office about 5pm and went back to the shopping area near my Hotel for some shopping. The shops closed at 6pm. Bought some more sourvenirs and cheese too.

That evening, my future boss brought us all to his hometown for dinner. We had indian food at a restaurant and it was quite nice.

30th March - More meetings today and had a major problem with China while I was there. This evening my colleague who lives in Amsterdam has volunteered to bring us for a canal cruise followed by dinner.

The canal cruise was interesting. Went past the science centre, some nice bridges, maritime museum etc. Went for a beer before our dinner with 2 more colleagues. Then we drive to the new part of Amsterdam and had dinner at a restaurant called Blok 4. The menu was all in Dutch. When we finally finished dinner, it was almost 11pm. We were then arguing whether to go for some drinks. Finally decided to do so. We drove back to Amsterdam to a place near New Church Street. Had a drink for me and a couple for my other colleagues and eventually went back to office to pick up my colleague's car before heading back to the Hotel. By the time, i washed up and got ready for bed, it's like 2am.

31st March - Last day in Netherlands. So far didn't really see much tulips blooming as it's still very cold. About 8deg celsius and not many windmills too. Had a meeting early in the morning and then back to office. Brought my luggage to the office as I will be leaving office for the airport.

Left office about 5.30pm to go to airport. Walked around the airport for a while, had dinner at Delifrance and then my boss and colleague left. My boss is scheduled to fly back tomorrow. I can't get any flight for the next day so I had to take this early flight. My colleagues keep asking me to extend my stay or come early next time.

Was at the lounge area where there were drinks and food available and i nearly missed my flight. I think I was like the last one to go on board. Thank God, there's inflight entertainment this time. I nearly don't have it as someone was sitting at my seat when I was there. And his seat's inflight entertainment system was down.

Finally back to Singapore on 1st April. It was a good trip in all.

My Dream Home

After rectification of the defects we submitted the last mth, we submitted another round of defects. Finally started reno and some pics of the renovation on going.

Keys to my House

Finally gotten the keys to my own place...after a long wait of almost 3 years.
Spent the whole day yesterday sticking tapes on all the defect areas.

Now we have to wait for the defects to be properly taken care of and start looking for a designer for our place.

Cheese.. Chocolates .. Alpines

We arrived about 7pm local time and the briefing for our Switzerland Cosmos tour had already started. We introduced ourselves and the group was quite big. We had 8 Singaporeans including us 2. A Malaysian couple and some others are from America. 4 of the Singaporeans will be leaving halfway to join in the other tour. We had a group dinner at the hotel. There’s nothing much around the Hotel and it’s quite quiet. The room was big and clean.

We were up early next morning to start our adventure in Switzerland; we stopped in Appenzell to see the old town centre with its Town Hall. Then we traveled further east to the minute principality of Liechtenstein where it’s really a country on its own. You can even have a “stamp” on your passport for souvenir sake.










Later, we took a scenic drive through "Heidiland" to the Rhine Valley before starting the ascent of the mighty Julier Pass. It was snowing when we were there but we didn’t feel cold instead we felt comfortable. We stayed for the night in St. Moritz, the place is beautiful. It’s at the top of the mountain and we need to walk a long way down to the lake, beautiful and quiet lake.



We had dinner at one of the restaurant and guess what we had? White asparagus, yum yum. But that meal cost us quite a bit.

We began the next day with one of Europe's most spectacular train rides beginning in St. Moritz and it took us across the lofty Bernina Pass via the Swiss Poschiavo area to Tirano in the Italian Valtellina. Look at the Bernina Pass we went past, looks like a winter wonderland and the heavy snow.










And yes, we were back on Italy again. Interestingly that we were so near to Italy that the border is just a train away. After some time in Tirano, we rejoined our coach for the journey to the shores of Lake Lugano. Lake Lugano is very very nice, the lake is wonderfully quiet and the whole place just seemed so peaceful.

We started our next morning in the town of Lake Lugano which was small but you can find big labels there such as Louis Vuitton.

After that, we drove to a chocolate factory in nearby Caslano. When you are in Swiss, must definitely try swiss chocolate right? Afterwards we returned to Italy again to visit the luminous atmosphere of Lake Maggiore. Another beautiful lake again but this time is in Italy. Then we traveled back into Switzerland via the scenic Simplon Pass and spent the night in the village of Täsch. We had a room just overlooking the magnificent Matterhorn.










The next morning we started with an excursion by train to Zermatt, the famous resort beneath the Matterhorn. We ascended the gornegrat and there we had pictures taken with Tina, the St. Bernard. A very lazy dog but huge and cute. I built myself a snowman too.

In the afternoon, we motored through the vineyards and apricot groves of the lower Rhône Valley to Lake Geneva before arriving in Lausanne on its northern shore. The hotel in Lausanne was very nice. It’s a very expensive hotel and the rate was 450 swiss francs a night.






The next day we visited a local cheese factory in Gruyère, where we learned about the various types of cheese and of course we bought some cheese and cheese fondue as well. We visited the Gruyere castle and found out that the creator of Alien used to live there and there was an alien museum there as well.




Then on to Switzerland's beautiful capital, Berne, a charming town with arcaded shops, carved fountains, and towers. They said that it’s a sight when the clock striked every hour and we were sitting there waiting for something to happen and none. We found the Albert Einstein museum as well but we didn’t go in. We stopped by the Bear Pit and the poor bears were just inside walking around and letting tourists take photos.

Then we traveled by way of the shores of Lake Thun to Interlaken. We dropped off 4 of our members who will be joining another tour that had about 7 days in Interlaken. After that, we continued over Brünig Pass to Lake Lucerne.
The hotel in Lake Lucerne was situated in a small village and we walked to a great waterfall we past by while on the bus. The waterfall was magnificent. The air was fresh and it felt good to be staying in a swiss village. You can see goats grazing etc.


Lucerne - One of Switzerland's finest cities nestled amid its snow-capped Alps, surrounded by its lake, and embellished by the clear mountain waters of the River Reuss. We climbed the towers that used to guard intruders to the city, and believe me, it's tiring to climb up narrow stairways. You wondered how people managed to do it last time.

We took an excursion to the Stanserhorn and took their traditional swiss food for lunch which turned out to be cheese macaroni with potatoes. In the late afternoon we took an easy drive back to Zurich but stopping at the Lion Monument before returning back to Zurich.




We explored the Zurich city when we reached there and found some nice stuff on sale but the watches here are not much cheaper than back home.

We woke up the next morning and wanted to explore the city of Zurich and guessed what? It’s a public holiday - Labour day and not even the trains were working. So we walked all the way to the city centre. We walked around the place, nothing much in the city centre. Some of the shops were closed. Had cheese fondue,the liquor taste was so strong that I can’t really finish everything.

We walked towards the Lake and found that there were demonstrations going on, think it’s labour-related stuff. Riot police were there as well. We stopped at the lake and just sat around and enjoyed the breeze before taking the long walk back to the hotel. Last night of my whole honeymoon and everytime that happened, you feel so sad. Have to go back to reality again.

We were at the airport the next morning and the feeling was just so sad. Well, it was a good trip and we both really enjoyed it tremendously. So its goodbye Switzerland and Europe and Singapore here I come.