Harry's Singapore Chilli Crab...NOT.

Before I start, let me say that I went to Harry's a week ago. And it took me a week to write to post. Not because I didn't have time, but I needed a week to calm down and let the fury within me die down a bit. Anyone of my friends on facebook would've experience the wrath of my fury on Saturday night and I didn't want to unleash that to the rest of the world just yet.

I was so SO looking forward to going to Harry's Singapore Chilli crab ever since I found out about it a few years ago. Its around the corner from Spice I am and I've always wanted to go, but have always been tempted by thai more. When Amz said she was organising her birthday party there I did a little cheer inside me. Especially since PP had visited Harry's a few times and always said it was good and would invite me the next time.

We arrive at the restaurant and we're seated at a table for 10 even though there's 8 of us. Usually I wouldn't complain, but they didn't have a lazy susan on the table. Meaning we had to practically climb onto the table to get anything on the other side. This is also why I there's not many photos as it was impossible to get decent photos from the other side of the table.

Most of the people weren't huge crab eaters and only wanted 1-2 pieces to taste what Singapore chilli crab tastes like. We ordered 2 mud crabs at $64/kg. This is after I had to convince the waiter that no, we don't need 4 crabs. We want TWO crabs. TWO. NOT FOUR.

We ordered a few other dishes as well so the non-crab eaters didn't starve.

San Choy Bao - $5.20 each

This was.....disappointing. A good san choy bao should be dry and crunchy with a lovely breath of wok aroma. This was soggy and sloppy. The fried vermicelli noodles they added had turned to mush. They also put the filling onto a very wet piece of lettuce which basically watered down the whole dish and causing a huge mess when eating.

Chicken and vege with cashew nuts

We had a few other dishes that came out before this. Salt and pepper calamari was nice, but nothing to write home about. This however, is something to write home about. In blood. This was.......wrong. The vegetables, carrots and celery, was bitter. It also had a tough chewy texture which is usually the result of using old leftover veggies that have been sitting in the fridge for too long. The carrots weren't peeled and had a dark skin on it which further confirms my "bottom of the veggie bin" theory. This dish wasn't touched much. And if it wasn't $20 for this, I wouldn't have forced myself to eat it. I would actually rate this dish BELOW food court food which has been sitting in the bain marie for too long. BELOW.

"Singapore Chilli crab"

OK, this was the only decent photo of the crab I could get from my side of the table. Compare that "Singapore Chilli Crab" with the Singapore Chilli Crab I had in Singapore:


1. Notice the lack of sauce in Harry's
2. Harry's sauce contains NO tomato sauce

Not only was the sauce NOT Singapore Chilli crab sauce, it was OVERLY salted. There was 2 taste in the sauce. Salt and chilli. This was a huge disappointment, especially since we had invited people hoping they get to try authentic Singapore style chilli crab.

We had ordered 2 serves of Roti because they told me they had sold out of the Man tou that you use to dip into the Singapore Chilli Crab. And honestly, what place that serves real Singapore Chilli crab will sell out of Mantou at 7:30pm on a Saturday night?

The waiter convinced us to order the roti instead, which we did. $5 for 4 serves. Or rather, $5 for 2 pieces of roti cut in half. And it wasn't even fresh made roti. The roti, although crispy, was dense and compact. The exact same texture of the frozen roti we buy from the asian grocery store.

Ontop of this, we had ordered 5 bowls of boiled rice (As they only serve them per bowl) at $2.80 a bowl, thinking we wanted something to soak up all the sauce with.

1. there was no sauce.
2. they only gave us 3 bowls.

When I asked for the other 2 bowls, the waiter said he had already given me 5.

Me: "Errrrr.....no. You gave me 3 bowls."
Him: "No, I already gave you 5 bowls."
Me: "No. You gave me 3 bowls. 1. 2. 3." *pointing at the only bowls on the table

He gives me a look as if I had hidden the other 2 bowls. I was so close to screaming that he only gave me 3 bowls and I didn't shove the other 2 bowls down my top. My boobs really do look like that!

I was so angry by this stage I didn't even want dessert. ESPECIALLY when I saw that they were charging $9 for a fried ice cream. I basically had the mentality I didn't want to let them earn another dollar off me.

My friends went ahead and ordered fried ice creams and chocolate cake. The order was, 5 fried ice creams. 3 with caramel 2 with chocolate. What came out was 3.5 caramel and 1.5 chocolate. Yeh. They had put caramel onto the 4th order. And instead of going "oops! lets make another one or atleast scrape the caramel off", they proceeded to pour chocolate ONTOP of the caramel which resulted in topping overdose.

Then there was the ice cream. Or what we though was ice cream. It looked like a banana fritter, but when you cut into it, the whole thing collapses and starts oozing white stuff. The batter itself was incredibly doughy and chewy, almost like stale chinese fried dough sticks.


And just to make the night worse, the people eating the fried ice cream started digging up corn kernels.

Corn...in a fried ice cream!?

Chocolate cake

Our friend had ordered a chocolate cake, was starting to think he was the only one to get out unscathed. That is until he realised the $10 slice of chocolate cake he ordered was from Coles! It still has the ridges from where they peeled the baking paper away from the cake.

By the end of the night, most of the table was a ball of raging fury from being so openly ripped off. For 2 crabs, 4 main meals, 5 bowls of rice, roti, soft drink and dessert, we paid $420.50. And that is exactly what we paid. $420.50. No more, no less. I then wrote on the receipt that "THE ICE CREAM IS CRAP!!!" and handed it back to the waitress. I probably would've written a much harsher note had there been room on the receipt.

I can't remember the last time I have ever walked away from a restaurant feeling so angry and ripped off. If you think this post is harsh, you should've seen how I was saturday night and will understand why I didn't blog straight away.

How it has such a "good" reputation I don't understand. I guess being endorsed by The Veronicas might have something to do with that. And the wall of photos with celebrities visiting will probably contribute to that. But I can tell you, none of the celebrities were asian and must never have had an authentic Singapore Chilli crab. Because if they have, they would not endorse this place.

I will NEVER, EVER go back to this place. EVER.

MasterChef Prediction?

There's been sooooooo much talk as to who will win MasterChef the last few days I thought I'd give my own 2c. There's quite a few people that I know who wants Poh to win. From their point of view, she's a great cook and creative with her dishes. From my point of view, she's playing the asian card well. A lot of the asian dishes she cooks that impresses the judges does not impress me at all.

Why? Half of them are very standard Asian dishes presented nicely. I.e. her "funky century egg" with congee is you stock standard century egg and pork congee every asian household knows how to make. You walk into any yumcha place and they also serve this. Yet the judges were blown away by the dish simply because they've never tried century egg before and automatically labelled it as "inventive", "daring", "creative" and a fantastic dish. I can bet any money that if you took that dish and gave it to an Asian person, the reaction would be "Oh, that was nice". Not "OMG THIS IS THE BEST FRIGGIN THING I'VE EVER EATEN! HOW DID YOU COME UP WITH THIS IDEA?!".

Another example, her "mochi" dessert with ginger milk pudding. The "mochi" is actually something we make at home every few weeks. Its something you can find at yum cha. Its also something you can buy frozen at the grocery store and found on every corner in Hong Kong. The same goes with the ginger milk pudding. Its a poor version of the dessert that is found everywhere in HK.

If she had cooked an asian dish and I went "Oh hang, that's actually a really good idea! Why didn't I think of it" then I'll give her points for creativity. But so far, a lot of the dishes are very typical asian dishes. The only reason she's got such a raving from the judges is because its something that a non-asian will order at a restaurant, or its home cooking that you won't find at a restaurant. And I think that's a real unfair advantage that she has over the other contestants.

So by default, I want Julie to win. Actually, I wanted Chris to win, but since he's out, by default I want Julie to win. But I think Poh will probably win. *SiGh*

Finally we're getting somewhere!

We've been sooooooooooooooo lazy about our Europe Trip. With less than 1.5 months til we leave, we've barely booked anything except our plane ticket and tour! So me and Moishii got together on the weekend and spent the whole day planning our trip.

Maybe because we've been on holidays so many times, and we know how disasterous it always is. Or maybe we're just getting old. But searching for accommodation in Paris took us almost 3 hours! THREE HOURS! We used to pick up a book, look for the cheapest price and just went with it. This time, we went on 10 different websites, looked at over 50 hotels, cross checked the website with other websites in terms of price, reviews, photos and location. And even then, we umm'd and ahh'd over which place we wanted to book. In the end, we basically went "Screw it! Just book XYZ. I don't care how much it costs or where it is anymore! JUST BOOK IT!".

Ahhhh.....our famous last words. "Just book it". How much trouble has these 3 words caused us EVERY TIME! Lets see what happens this time. Especially considering the notes we made on our "shortlisted" accommodation. Of course there's the usual notes, price, location, free internet, breakfast included etc etc. But with most hotels offering similar facilities, it all drilled down to the following:

"Reception looks like a porn set"
"Room has pole for pole dancing"
"Dining room has chairs that looks like it'll poke an eye out"
"Hotel has weird metal wall thing we should get a photo with"

I won't tell you what hotel we booked, but porn set and dangerous chairs featured heavily in our decision.

By the end of the 3 hours, we were both exhausted! We don't know why, but it was tiring! I guess we try to think too much and plan too much. There's no point really. No matter what we plan, how many back up plans we've got, shit still happens! Things will get cancelled, we'll get ripped off, stranded somewhere, freaked out by weirdos, things exploding in our face. I guess we realised this when we were faced with trying to find accommodation in Madrid.

Moishii had sent me a link to some Palace in Madrid ages ago. We were faced with 2 choices. Book his PALACE, or spend another 3 hours researching Madrid. I honestly couldn't care by this stage, so the Palace was booked! Woohoo! 2 down and...how many more to go? *Sigh*

Atleast we're making progress! hehehe Now, should we go to Ibiza or not??? It'll be our new Mykonos, but our schedule is really really tight. Hmmmmmmmm.....

If anyone has been to Ibiza or knows of a good cheap accommodation in Barcelona please let me knowwwwwwwwwwww!! Thankies! :D

Will and Grace does......Europe maybe??

For the last 6 months, I've been talking with Will non stop about what we should do for out 2009 trip. We both decided to cancel out January Gold Coast trip to save more money and leave to have a proper overseas holiday together this year. December and January was insanely busy with relatives visiting. February, which I was hoping to be quiet, is extremely busy for work, and it looks like March might even be worse.

With the lack of time for us to plan anything together, I was a bit worried as to what is happening with our holiday. We've discussed broadly what we want to do, which was what the dinner at Efendy was for. Go over travel brochures! It narrowed it down a bit, but there are still too many places we wanted to go together. (Honestly, the best way is to take 6months off, but neither us can afford to do that!)

However, I get an email from Will today with a brief 10 point plan and some links to research he's done. After about 2-3 emails, I think we nutted out most of what we want to do! Now its a matter of sorting out how much leave we can both get, and actually pick the right time to go! Then we can get into the nitty gritty details. Where to stay, what to do and what to eat! There's still work to be done, but we've got a lot more structure to work with now instead of just "lets go on holidays together".

We're both hoping this will be the best trip yet! We're trying to combine touristy sightseeing in the big cities, relaxing in small country towns, harrassing locals with a whole heap of partying thrown in! Oh, and of course get up to the usual Will and Grace shenanigans! Basically shit that only us 2 can get into! And probably jokes that only the 2 of us will get and laugh at for the next 10 years! It really helps when you get someone just as insane as you, who thinks exactly the same as you! This will be Will and Grace does Europe......with a big bang!!!!

So someone stole my photo...

I was browsing the net tonight, when I stumbled across Melissa Leong's food blog. Browsing through her posts, what did I see but my own photo, posted on her site... without my permission. Don't believe me? Here is her post:

http://fooderati.blogspot.com/2008/05/tsukasa.html

Here is a screenshot of her post:


Here is my post:

http://sormuijai.blogspot.com/2007/03/musashi.html

Here is the photo that I blogged:


Here's the photo I uploaded onto Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sormuijai/437451277/

Look similar? Very similar, except she had edited my photo to blur out some of the background. And she had used the photo for a completely different restaurant. This photo was taken at Musashi, using it for a review for a different restaurant is a bit misleading, no??

Apparently the review was also published in the 3D World magazine, so I have been in contact with the editors to ensure they stop using my image now and in the future.

This is not the first case of one of my photos being stolen, which is the reason why I had to start watermarking all my photos (long story). However, I've literally uploaded hundreds and thousands of photos, do I, or SHOULD I, go back and watermark everything?

Some of my friends have commented that the watermarking actually ruins the photos. Yes, I agree. But that's the least I can do to protect my own work? Yes this a small blog that is a personal project, but it doesn't mean that I don't cherish my own work. Maybe that's why the photo was taken? Because it is a small blog with few reader? And one thing my friend noticed, why are most of her photos watermarked, but not my one??

Honestly, I love taking photos, and I love looking back on all these photos. I hope others can enjoy it as well, but to a certain extent. I have been contacted many times through Flickr and even privately about the use of my photos on websites and other media, which is something that should have been done in this case. You know, I would have even been happy had she linked it back to my blog/flickr page like what a lot of other people do.

I have contacted Melissa to ask her to remove my photo from her site, lets hope there are no other instances of copyright breaching. Incase you haven't noticed, both my blog and flickr is copyrighted?

SoRMuiJAi current mood: Not happy Jan.

I'll be back...

So much has happened since my last entry. I've started my new job, which is good so far. The department seems a lot more willing to spend money based on the jars of chips, cookies and other snacks stockpiled in the kitchen. My working hours have been unstable as we're trying to work through a few things at work. Hopefully once its settled down, my hours will be more consistent. The people are really nice here, but it doesn't look like a team that will appreciate my flying screaming monkeys. Not that my old team appreciated them that much either.

A few weeks ago, my Grandma had a fall. Not just once, but twice in an hour. Since October last year, she has been falling more and more frequently. I purchased a phonealert system, where you have a waterproof pager that she could wear 24/7. When she needs help, all she has to do is press the pager, and the phone will automatically make an emergency call to all the phone numbers I've set in. This time, she set off the alarm twice. Luckily, I was at home both times. The second time she fell, she must've hit her head on her walking frame, because her head was covered in blood. She had basically tore the skin on her forehead and there were massive gaping wounds on her head. We immediately called an ambulance which arrived within 10mins (We're only 2mins drive from the ambulance depot). I hop into the ambulance with her so I could translate and we're driven to the emergency room.

Now I know that public hospitals are stretched for resources, and given a choice, I would have gone to a private hospital. But private hospitals don't have an emergency department so we had to go public. This was the start of a 4-5hr wait where my grandma basically got ignored for the entire time. 3hrs wait in, a nurse comes in and draws some blood and checks her blood pressure etc, then she disappears again. It wasn't until about 1:30am that a doctor came to check on her, and it was only then that they bothered changing her bandages properly. She's 94yo for f*cksake. A little more attention would've been appreciated.

We left her in the hospital for more tests throughout the night and basically she stayed in the hospital for over a week where they did test after test. And the conclusion to all of that was a recommendation that she should go into a nursing home. We kind of expected this as it is getting harder to ensure her safety at home. You basically need someone at home 24/7 to look after her incase she has another fall. We've been lucky in the past that everytime she's had a fall, she hasn't broken any bones and was concious to press the emergency pager, but we're not always that lucky.

My dad and sister has spent the past 2 weeks looking at nursing homes, hoping to find one close to us, is mainly occupied by people who speak cantonese AND has room for her. We eventually found one about 5 mins drive away, is fairly small so she gets more attention, has predominately cantonese speakers and is quite spacious. Under the hospital's recommendations, she was discharged directly to the nursing home. They basically recommend that she doesn't come home for a few months until she settles into the new place. My grandma has been living with us even before I was born. Its going to be a big change without her around.

When she was in hospital, I went to visit her with my parents, sister and youngest nephew. As we were visiting her, my nephew started acting strangely. Next thing you know, he's telling us that he can't open/close his jaw. I noticed his face was kind of swollen, but everyone thought he's just put on weight. Then he started telling us he was having problems breathing. My sister immediately rushed him to the emergency department, which was only on the floor above us. Luckily we were already at the hospital, because my nephew's face and throat started to swell, cutting out his oxygen supply. It looks like he was having a slow allergy reaction to a new medication he was taking so we had to keep him there overnight to monitor his condition.

Like I said, a lot has happened since my last entry. Hopefully things will calm down soon so I can do some mego blogging.

Homemade BBQ Pork (CHAR SIU!)

Its been a good 6 or so years since my parents have sold the restaurant. And for the last few months, I've really been missing our "restaurant life". I've also started my own recipes book (Yes I know I don't follow recipes). But its not really a recipe book of stuff I usually cook, its a compilation of recipes our family cooks. Specifically the comfort food my mum dishes out, and our secret recipes for some dishes we used to serve in the restaurant.

I know some dishes will never ever taste the same as they did when we cooked in the restaurant. Partly because we can't get the same ingredients again unless we buy wholesale, we're also more conscious of using MSG, oil, salt etc. But its also because the food always taste better in our memories. And unless I go back in time, I'm going to have to settle for my inferior replicas of our favourite dishes.

One of my favourite memories would be BBQ Pork (Char Siu) day. Every Saturday, my parents would make up a few kilos of BBQ Pork which we use in many of our dishes. And every now and then, my parents will call us about 30mins before the BBQ Pork is ready, to come to the restaurant for lunch. So we'd hop into the car and drive 10mins to the restaurant and sit there waiting for the final basting on the BBQ Pork.

When the pork finally comes out of the oven, dripping with the sweet caramelised basting, we'd elbow each other out of the way to get the pork with a pair of scissors each. Why? We were both after the best bits. What's the best bits? It would be the end bits where the meat, where the honey has caramelised it until the was slightly charred and crunchy. Armed with a pair of scissors each, we would pick up every chunk of BBQ pork, and snip the ends off onto our plate of steaming hot rice. We'd load up our plates with the best bits of BBQ pork, drizzle over a little of the juice that we caught in the pan during the roasting process and add a little soy. We load up the plate with plain boiled vegetables so we could taste the juicy BBQ pork.

The restaurant is gone, and my brother is living overseas. We also don't have a gas oven anymore to give it that extra charred flavour. But when I was visiting Singapore and I made BBQ Pork with my nephews and niece, I taught them what was the "best bit". Suddenly, I had someone to fight with me over the best end bits. Food always taste better when you need to fight for it. ;) With that memory in mind, I decided it was time to actually try out the recipes I've been collecting. First up, BBQ Pork:



It certainly doesn't look like what we used to serve in the restaurant. Mind you, I didn't add any colouring at all, which is what all restaurants used. Plus, my one was baked in an oven rather than dangled over flames like we used to. But I think its an alright effort for my real first attempt. I would definitely make it more charred next time, but I kind of forgot about my pork and didn't want to grill it anymore in case I overcooked it. But in fact, it was perfectly cooked and sooooooo tender and juicy! Marinating it for 24hrs really did the trick ;) I can't wait to try it again!

I'm going to smell his sweat!

For the past few years, everytime the Good Food and Wine show is on, I've been overseas. This year however, I'll be in Sydney when it is on. I got an email yesterday for presale tickets (No it wasn't an april fools joke) and they have a special special guest this year. GORDON RAMSAY!!! I assume he's here to film "Hell's Kitchen" Australian version for the new restaurant he's going to build in Melbourne?? I went into a frenzied panic trying to get the best seats to his 30min cooking demo. I pulled a few tricky moves and managed to score FRONT ROW SEATS! Literally! ROW A!! WOOHOO!! I couldn't stop giggling like a happy school girl getting tickets to her favourite pop idol's concert! I would be even happier if it was Jamie Oliver, but hey, FRONT ROW TICKETS! I'll be close enough to smell his sweat! hahaha My DSLR is going to come in handy!

A ray of sunshine through the storm

Things have been really hectic around here lately. People are leaving every day and we've having about 2 or 3 farewell drinks a week. I've been getting calls and emails from recruiters and friends have been sending me whatever leads they have. The whole daylight savings thing on the weekend has confused the hell out of me, and I don't think I'm fully recovered from the jetlag yet! (Old age does this to you). Infact, I completely forgot that Moishii had booked tickets for our next holiday when I was overseas! (I know, planning another holiday whilst I was on holidays.....). I was checking the daylight savings thing hasn't messed up my calendars when I realised I didn't have the dates in my calendar, infact, I didn't even know the dates full stop. Moishii had organised everything for me! LOL Atleast it put a smile on my face when I realised that I've got another holiday booked!

Lets hope things calm down soon. Actually, it will calm down soon. April 10th is D-Day. April 11th will be VERY VERY quiet at work for those of us who are staying...

The bottomless pit

Less than a year ago, when I decided that I was going to get a DSLR, I went through all the options with my camera buddy. The different models and the different lenses. I decided on the DSLR I wanted, and also made the big leap of not buying the stock standard lens that comes with it. Instead, I decided to pay twice the price for a lens I really, really wanted. Infact, the lens cost more than the camera itself! My reasoning is, this is the all in one lens. This lens will last me atleast 1-2 years before I would even CONSIDER buying ANYTHING else. Within 6 months of buying my DSLR (And less than 2 months from getting back from Europe) I had gone and bought myself 2 brand spanking new lenses, an external flash plus 2 camera bags (With each bag costing more than any of the handbags I have ever purchased!!).

After all that, I can't believe I'm about to say this. I want to buy another lens. AND it may cost more than my first lens.... This is bad. This is REALLY bad. Ontop of that, I've decided I want a new camera bag. I laughed at my camera bud when he first told me he's gone through more camera bags than his wife has gone through hand bags. Now I understand why. Actually, I know I'll need another bag in the near future, which will bring the count up to 4. My kit is building up, and I need a much bigger bag to store everything in. Especially if I'm going to buy a tripod. That's right.... a tripod. I'm really trying to hold off on the tripod, but the aussie dollar is so strong right now. And it doesn't help that I've got a little devil at work that constantly tells me new funky things I should buy to go with my collection. Infact, we're both debating whether we need a lensbaby. It's basically a lens that blurs out the whole image except for one focal point which you can set. It's really a toy lens more than anything, its not that expensive (Well, compared to the rest of the gear I've bought), but I could be putting that money towards a more professional kit.

I should've listened to his advice before I started, its a bottomless pit. But then, why bother buying a DSLR if you're not going to bother using it to its full potential? Its like using it to shoot in auto and not editing the photos afterwards. If that's the case, why not just use a bloody point and shoot? The whole reason I got the DSLR is because I want more control over my photos. I want to be the one to set the focus, colour and lighting, instead of letting a computer decide. I want the ability to take extreme closeups to portraits to panoramic shots to macro shots. And to do each of those things, I need a new lens. And to use some of those lenses, you need extra gear like a super steady tripod, reflectors and extra flashes. It seems a bit extreme, but if I'm going to use a "stock standard" lens to get mediocore shots, then it's a complete waste of the camera. With that said, I just need to be able to draw a line to say when I have enough gear in my kit. Right now, that line gets redrawn every few months...

Day 25 - Mykonos - Partying like there is no tomorrow

UGH. I'm pretty sure people are getting ready for their siesta by the time we got up. All I remember is guzzling down a litre of water in my sleep. The massive bottle of vodka and shots we had last night didn't help. Luckily we had our pita roll, otherwise I'll be in a worse condition. We get ready and immediately start doing our rounds up and down the streets of Mykonos. We somehow ended down at the port, and after 10mins of walking up and down and teasing all the waiters, we picked a restaurant by the water for breakfast. Well, breakfast of toast and jam for Moishii, and pasta for me. I mean.....it is like 3pm:

Spaghetti Nepolitana

After breakfast, we started our laps again. And again. And again. We also stood outside the $40 woman's apartment for 10mins hoping she'll come out. Somehow, we ended up in this surfer shop to look at board shorts. The minute I walk in, Moishii turns and starts whispering to me "Camera!! CAMERA!!". My natural instincts took over, and suddenly we've got a photo of her:


Don't ask me why, but Moishii thought it was a photo opportunity. And we know from experience, photo first, questions later. I guess that's the same reason why we took this:


and this:



and this:


This guy, despite being homeless, is forever wearing nice fashion gear. Every day he has a change of pants, or some funky hat on. And yes, he's homeless cos we've seen him sleeping on the streets many times. Our theory is that he goes and steals people's clothes from the clothes line when they're out clubbing or passed out.

And after about our 15th lap and stalking the $40 woman again, we decided to head back to Mex Cafe for a sit down. I mean, its been almost 2 whole hours since we woke up! So what do we do? We hit the bottle:


I even dashed across the street to a tiny shop to buy myself a small bag that I can sling over my shoulders that can carry my camera, mobile and a small bottle of alcohol into Scandanavian bar. Somehow, the shopkeeper became our next prey for the next hour:


As we're sitting there watching the shop keeper, this old woman walks towards the shop and starts pulling his suitcases apart and knocking stuff over.


The classic moment was when she went outside the shop and started climbing all over the shop to see the suitcases only to stack it and fall on her ass. Suddenly, we became obsessed with her. So obsessed, that we sculled our wines and started following her around town.


After stalking her for 10mins, we gave up and did more laps around town. We even walked all the way up to the Windmills, which is the first time we've been there in the past few years. Shocking isn't it? Its not like we're busy. All we do is WALK UP AND DOWN THE FRIGGIN STREET EVERYDAY!!! And now our latest thing? We stand outside the $40 woman's apartment, hoping she'll grace us with her presence. How sad is that??


Since we were so close to our apartment, we decided to head back for a nap. This is like 3 hours after we woke up!!!

Waking up from our nap, we get up and again.....start walking the streets and checked on the $40 woman. We do about 4 laps, each lap checking on the $40 woman, before we decide on grabbing some dinner. We spotted a seafood restaurant next to our bake lamb and pasta restaurant that looked good. I mean, after all our savings in Italy, it was time to splurge in Mykonos!!

The start to any meal. Alcohol.

Our favourite Greek Salad

Fried seafood platter

Double Greek coffee for me

Complimentary dessert wine!!!!!*

* When we had our baked lamb and pasta meal, we were disgusted that every other table was getting free ice blocks and shots when we got nothing. Not that we wanted it. But they should've atleast offered!! So it was our mission to get free stuff!

As usual, after our meal, we walked, checked out the $40 woman. And walked. And walked and checked out the $40 Woman's apartment. During one of our laps, Moishii turned and went "Did you know that chick just checked you out?? That is so hot!!!". hahaha Well I WAS wearing my open heart surgery top... Anyway, we keep walking and ended up at our apartment in time for Je T'aime. I think this is becoming a regular show for us. We fill up our water bottles with vodka orange juice, hid them in our bags and off to Scandanavian bar we go. Honestly, after last night's debacle of being thrown around, I was entirely looking forward to it. But then Moishii started screaming at me that we needed to break last night's record. Which meant we couldn't go to bed until about 4:30am!

We walk in, and I immediately have to hit the bottle. Its barely 12:30am and the place is getting packed out. There was also this guy who showed...ALOT of interest in Moishii. He wouldn't stop touching him and talking to him. The thing is, he has a girlfriend. Or maybe she was a fag hag. But he was acting like he was a gay guy and was ready to jump Moishii's pants!


I even convinced him to flash his butt for a photo!

EWWWWWWWW!! HAIRY!!!!!!

I was really starting to get the shits by about 1:30 when I was getting elbowed and groped left right and centre. Suddenly, Moishii grabs me from behind and practically drags me onto the podium. OMG...... what is this sensation? Is it... is it.... air...? OMG! THERE'S AIR IN SCANDANAVIAN BAR!!!!

Standing on the podium, not only gave us some air to breath, it also stopped the groping, the elbowing AND we got a full view of the club! Damnit! I'm not getting off this podium! Once the shoving stopped, we suddenly started having alot more fun. Infact, we went OFF. My camera wouldn't stop taking photos. I wasn't even looking at what photos I was taking anymore. And neither was Moishii. Which is why I was shocked when I saw these photos

The partying Italian Stallions

Partying hard!

Partying.....WTF????????

Omg.....that just looks SO BAD. I mean....is he grabbing his crotch? Is he readjusting? Or is he.....errrrr.....enjoying. And is that a.....sweat patch on the crotch by his thumb? OK. I'm telling myself its a sweat patch......

Anyway, as it got later, I suddenly noticed this bunch of chicks standing just below the podium. A few of the guys dragged the girls onto the podium and started dirty dancing with them. One of the girls was actually quite drunk, so she stayed on the dance floor. However, her friends dragged her onto the podium, and then left her with this guy who was completely feeling her up. I know people come to Mykonos to party, and they want to get down and dirty like her friends were doing. However, this girl was so drunk, she couldn't get away and her friends weren't helping. To make it worse, the guy was bordering on sexual harrassment the way he was groping her. She happened to stand next to me, and on quite a few occassions, I asked her if she was ok and if she wanted to leave. After a while, I managed to get the guy away from her. She was so drunk she couldn't even stand and I had to hold her up. The poor girl was almost in tears. Meanwhile, Moishii decided to film us:

The guy who was groping her

Next thing you know, her friends wanted to leave. They all jumped off the podium and practically dragged her onto the dance floor. I don't know what was said, but they yelled something at her and left the club leaving her behind. She kinda stood around disoriented for awhile when I noticed her limping to a chair in the corner of the room. She was REALLY REALLY crying by this stage and looked in terrible distress and pain. Girls look after girls. So I did the only thing I could think of. I told Moishii I'd be back and jumped off the podium and pushed my way through the crowd to where she was.

Within seconds I knew something was wrong. She had basically stepped on broken glass and her foot was bleeding. I had some tissues in my bag and tried to help her stop the bleeding, but the poor girl was so drunk she couldn't really do much. This is when this guy passed me his mobile with the message "You need to take your friend home. Seriously". I tried to explain to him that I didn't know the girl, and somehow, I convinced him to help me carry her out of the club. So with his help, we managed to get her through the crowds. When we go to the door where the security guard was, you'd think someone would help. No. So it was me and this other guy trying to carry her down these narrow stairs that barely fit 2 people. To make it worse, I was walking down the inside with no hand rails. I almost tripped the last few steps and had to grab onto a guy who was standing there. When we got her downstairs, her friend's suddenly barge on over going "She's our friend. She's ok. We'll look after her". But they said it in such a way as if to dismiss me. Like WTF? The poor girl is standing there with her skirt hitched up to her waist, which I had to help her pull down because her bitches of a friend was busy telling her off. WTF? Seriously, I was so close to slapping some sense into them if they didn't walk away. I even tried to explain to them that her foot is bleeding and they didn't give a shit.

With friend's like that, I seriously don't need any enemies. Not only did they know she was really drunk and didn't take her home, they SHOVED her into Horny Mr Octopus that groped her like they were having sex. THEN, they left her. They left the club without her. If I knew my friend was drunk, and we were leaving, my first instinct will be to make sure she got out ok. Girls look after girls. FRIENDS look after friends. They LEFT her behind. And when they find out that she was bleeding, they were pissed off that they had to look after her and that she "spoiled" their plans then they started yelling at her. The more I thought about it, the more pissed off I got. Seriously, if that ever happened to me, I can tell you, they will never be my friends again. NEVER.

After this incident, I went back into the club and found Moishii still on the podium. I joined him again and gave him a brief summary of what happened when suddenly the DJ cranked up the music.

Now let me tell you about this DJ. Mykonos became a popular party island when alot of famous DJs were discovered there. Suddenly everyone went to Mykonos because the music was fantasic. And this guy was fantastic. Although he plays the same songs every night, he KNEW how to get the crowd rowdy and partying. He knew how to get everyone dancing. HE WAS FUCKIN FANTASTIC!! Plus he was pretty cute!!

The DJ's usual look.....with a bottle of alcohol!

And he was drunk. I mean, I reckon the bar pays him in alcohol. The whole night, he's downing glass after glass of alcohol. HE'S FRICKIN AWESOME!! By this stage, it was 4am. I was starting to get tired, but Moishii started screaming "WE GOT TO BEAT LAST NIGHT'S RECORD!!!". Every few minutes, he'll turn and scream that at me. Ok. So the goal was to stay up past 4:30am. When 4:30am came, I wasn't feeling that tired. I think it was the bottle of vodka talking. I couldn't feel my feet anymore. So even though they're probably swollen to twice their normal size, I couldn't feel it. That's when Moishii suddenly started screaming "WE NEED TO STAY TIL THEY CLOSE!!! WE NEED TO CLOSE SCANDANAVIAN BAR!!!". So close Scandanavian bar we did. The place went from this:


To this:


To this:

5am!

Suddenly, the music went from DOOF DOOF DOOF to slow ballads. The bar tenders started sweeping the floor and cleaning up. The lights became brighter. The DJ shoved a CD in and went for a break. Hell, even the security guard left and we STILL refused to leave! Suddenly, all the lights came on, and the music went off. OMG. WE STAYED TIL SCANDANAVIAN BAR CLOSED!

The security looking at us like we were idiots

The next challenge? Leaving the damn place. Now that the alcohol has worn off and our biggest mistake, we took a seat. It was one of the most painful things we had to do. We were barely able to lift ourselves off from our butts and practically tumbled down the stairs. We walked about 2 blocks before we had to sit. I couldn't walk. I was in unbelievable pain. After 20mins, we finally had enough energy to make it to the closest pita place for our pita roll cure and 1.5L of water. That's right. I drank 1.5L of water in 10mins.


After our hangover prevention, we started stumbling back home. This is when I noticed that the sun was coming out:


Omg.....I've never been clubbing until the sun was about to come up. When we got to the apartment, we had to climb the stairs. By this time, my knees had completely locked up. I could not bend my knees. I'm not kidding you. I ended up on all fours trying to get up those frickin stairs before I collapsed into bed to the sounds of chirping birds.

This is going to be a hectic month!

Things have been hectic for me, and its barely started. My sister and the kids are here from Singapore, meaning I'm pretty much going to disappear all of December. I've still got events in my social calendar for December, but I certainly won't be taking the responsibility of organising anything else (Which for some reason, always gets passed to me). I was going to write some nice blog posts and throw in some photos I've taken, but here's a quick summary as to what's happened in the past few weeks:

- CookieJar girls night in - Mey kindly offered her place for a bit of a girls reunion. Which involved make-your-own (MYO) viet summer rolls, a bottle of delush Chianti red wine and fondue (amongst other junk food). It started off with a bit of girly banter, which turned into a full of bitch-fest that resorted in dirty jokes! As it always does! After stuffing ourselves until we could barely breath, we settled in for a perving session of Jessica Alba. Good Luck Chuck. Now I found this movie HILARRRRRRIOUS! People think Jessica Alba is just a pretty face, but I can tell you, she's fantastic as comedy! Plus she's HOT! Like H-O-T. I've said this many times, even at one work function (Yes, bad move) that I WILL TURN GAY FOR JESSICA ALBA! God that woman is hot.

- Moishii's 27th Birthday - This was held in Bexley North in some dodgy joint called "Ruby Lounge", and the Greek Night was called "Caramela". The restaurant was attached to some dodgy pub that even the locals don't frequent. The good thing was that the drinks were super cheap! Hellooooooo Vodka! $4 a vodka is pretty darn good IMO. The bad thing for the restaurant was, because they made us wait til about 8:30pm before we could go in (even though they're supposed to open at 8pm), we found out about the cheap drinks. So when they charged me $7 for a vodka, and others $4.50 for a straight OJ, we just decided to hit the pub instead. Which we ended up doing because by 10pm, all we had was dip and salad. And poor gus didn't even get a bread roll and had to share with someone else. So after about 3-4 vodkas at the bar, we headed back into the restaurant at 10:30 get a platter of unknown meat and some chips. After 5 mins of eating that, most of our table gave up on the platter leaving alot of the food untouched and hit the pub again. 45mins of drinking, we all head back inside only to find out that for our $40, there's no dessert, tea or coffee included. With that, a few of us decided to leave. Some headed home, whilst me, Cherry, and voice of an Angel headed off to Burwood where we ordered mass amounts of food and dessert before calling it a night after 1.

- Fisherman's Wharf Seafood Restaurant - I took my parents to the new seafood restaurant that has opened in the top level of the fish markets for Yum Cha. We were pleasantly surprised by the quality of the food. Infact, alot of the people we saw at Yum Cha, usually frequent the various yum cha places in Chinatown. Looks like there is stiff competition out there.

- Sydney FC vs LA Galaxy - After David Beckham saved our lives last time, I decided that I had to go watch him play when he was in Sydney. We actually had pretty darn good seats for the price we paid! I brought my DSLR along to get a few action shots, but in my eagerness to take photos, I didn't check my settings properly. I accidently changed the mode whilst taking my camera in and out of my bag and when it mattered the most, the shots came out blurry!! *cries*

- The Malaya - Our once-every-3-weeks lunch with my workmate found us at Malaya again. After hearing me rave on and on about the Sze Chuan eggplant, we went back and ordered the set menu for 2 people. I was a bit hestitant at first, simply because I hate Otak Otak. I've tried it many times in Singapore, and regret it every time I get it. But the ones at Malaya were TO DIE FOR. If Otak Otak tastes like that in Singapore, I'd order it more often! We paid $50 each for lunch, but the food was so unbelievably good, it was worth every cent!

- Pizza and Party - We had a farewell lunch last friday for a workmate and ended up at the Australian Hotel for some beers and pizza. No photos here because we were all busy eating. And I decided to lay off the alcohol at lunch as well. Not because I was being good and cutting back on the alcamahol, but because we had our work xmas party that night and I didn't want to be sleepy for it! Our xmas party this year was at GPO. At first I couldn't understand how they could fit a few hundred people into the place, that is until I found out that we booked the entire bottom part of the GPO. All the usual restaurants (Post, Prime etc) were closed. In the underground section, all the bars were stocked with all you can drink beer, wine and champagne. There were pool tables and heaps of arcade games (Daytona and pinball machines!!!!!). We also had the dancing head thing where they put your head onto these digitally created bodies and generate a music video clip for you.

Unlike last year, which was heavy on alcohol but light on food, this year was a perfect balance. There was food EVERYWHERE. We had a sushi bar, an oyster bar, a pizza bar ontop of all the trays and trays of finger food that included fish and chips, spring rolls, vegetable crumble pies, meat pies, quiches, calamari and the most DELUSH rare wagyu beef rolls. By 7pm, I was screaming I was full! By 7:30, whilst shoving another spring roll down my throat, I was still screaming I was full. This continued until about 9pm, when we all abandoned the food and hit the open bar for some much needed vodka. Next thing you know, I was on the dance floor. By 10:30, when people started getting sufficiently sloshed, they brought out more pies (after the dessert already came out) to help with the alcohol munchies! HOW COOL IS THAT! So everyone started eating again before we hit the arcade games, where I am the reigning queen of Daytona. 4 out of 4 races! EAT THAT!

I also complained to my workmates that I've never been kicked out of anywhere before. So one of my workmates stayed with me until EVERYONE had left and we were surrounded by security asking us to leave. Woohoo!! Ok, well I wasn't FORCEFULLY EJECTED from the venue, but I finally lasted until the party ended! So to celebrate that little achievement, we headed off to the metro for more drinks before I stumbled home at 2am.

- The Kids - Now that I've semi caught up, my sister and the kids are here from Singapore. I've got a few days off here and there in December to spend more time with them. We're currently planning on going fruit picking again and possibly to the Blue Mountains. I was also planning on doing the Bridge Climb with my brother and my nephew (When he arrives), but I think its going to be hard to get a date that will suit everyone. So I might forego that and use my day off to watch my nephew compete in the tennis camp again. We'll have to see what happens.

So if I'm very quiet in December, I'm not ignoring you, I'm just busy with the kids. I'll try to update this post later with a few piccies. And as for the rest of my holiday posts, that's going to have to wait. I think its becoming a pattern. I can blog my heart out, but once I get close to having to relive my Mykonos experience, everything comes to a screeching halt....

A quick update for now...before the enslaught!

I know I'm way wayyyy behind in my blogging on the trip. I promise that will come soon. Once I work up the courage to sort through the 4000 photos that I took (Not including the photos that Moishii took!). In the meantime, here's a quick update to my life:

- Been sick for 3 weeks, I think I am finally starting to recover (After the chemist gave me the strongest of everything they have). The jetlag ain't too bad. I just don't want to work!
- My Manager is now gorrrrrrrn, so I'm managerless for awhile. Woohoo!
- MnMs is in town, meaning there will be lots of food posts eventually. God, all we ever do is eat!!
- I rocked up to volleyball the day I got back from OS. Got there early, so I parked my car opposite the sports hall and sat there next to a van. There was a guy in the van. 5mins later, I see a head bopping up and down around his lap....he quickly shoved the head down with his hand....Another few minutes later, the head finally emerges and I see something being errr...spat out. EWWWWWWW!! Apparently they're cleaners for the office blocks around there. How do I know? They got out of the van and grabbed their cleaning gear from the back to head off to work.....
- I have yet to unpack.

Achoo!

It seems everytime I go on holidays, I get sick one way or another before I go. But mind you, the last 2 overseas trip I took was in winter/early spring, so its not THAT surprising I guess. Its just sucky! And bad timing! I could've gotten sick 2 or 3 weeks ago and I would've recovered by the time I go overseas. But NO. I had to get sick literally days before I go overseas!! Lets just hope that its a slight cold as opposed to a full blown flu. Luckily I'm stopping by Singapore for a few days, hopefully the heat will cure me. I know the last few times it has. Fingers crossed.

Need or want?

I can't believe I did this. Less than a week before I go on holidays, I've gone and treated myself to a new mobile phone. Well, its not a "treat" really. Its more of a necessity. The battery for my old phone is a complete piece of poo! I knew the battery life was bad when I purchased the phone, but it was pretty and it was supposedly scratch resistant (I managed to scratch the phone....don't ask). But it came with a spare battery and I didn't think it was a problem. However, it got to the stage that I was charging my phone every single day, and I would even have to charge it at work if I was going out that night. If I was overseas and I needed emergency help of some sort, and my battery dies on me, that would be BAD. So you see, it was out of necessity. For my own safety you know....or so I tell myself.

So what did I get? A brand spanking new Nokia 6110 Navigator with built in GPS and 3G capabilities (2 cameras so I can video conference!). It was a toss up between the E65, N95 and the 6110 Nav. The E65 had no GPS, but was soooooo sleek and pretty. The N95 had the GPS and a frickin awesome built in 5mp camera (Which is perfect for trigger happy me). However, the phone was the chunkiest out of the 3, AND it has a poor battery life meaning a recharge every night. HA! I'm not falling for that again. the 6110 Nav has GPS, 2mp camera (Not the best, but good enough), is inbetween the E65 and N95 in terms of chunkiness and 11 days standby time! So thats my new baby! Now I can carry that with me into the Scandanavian bar! Woohoo!

5 days to go! I need to pack!!!

(Oh, Moishii also messaged me that Its going to be 52 degrees in Turkey. 52!!!)

I welcomed the unwelcomed call

So I got a private number call on my mobile last night in the middle of my cooking crisis. (Crisis as in the food wasn't cooking fast enough and I was starving). I answered, ready to rip off someone's head when I found out that it was Moishii callilng from Turkey! OMG! We had a quick chat when I suddenly dawned on me. 10 days until I go on holidays!!! OMG!!!!!! 10 days!! And it didn't help that Moishii kept cursing me saying that I won't make it overseas! Then we had another crisis to deal with, we're meeting up in Rome, but we don't know where to meet up! Looks like I'll have to drag out all my documents to find out who arrives when and what the flight numbers are. Otherwise I might be waiting at the wrong arrival gate! OMG!! 10 days!!!!

Whoa! Slow down!!!

I can't believe how crazy work has become over the last few days. Thursday last week things were still ok. I had completed my project way ahead of schedule with only a few other tasks that needed attention. So I was asked to jump onto another project as peacemaker/cleaner-uper. Basically, poo hit the fan, there were conflicts and heated arguments, and I was thrown into the mix to make everything better. I finally managed to settle everything down and was ready to put my head down and charge along with the actual work, when at 3pm, my old project manager came up to me and said "When you get a chance, like in the next 2 hours, could I get you to have a catch up with so-and-so for a handover? You're our new test lead on the project and will be taking over everything, and so-and-so is also going on leave and today is her last day". Talk about advanced warning!

Ontop of trying to finish my 2 existing projects, I now have to take on another project which is HUGE in comparison to my current ones. I was always meant to jump onto the project, but my focus was purely on the technical component and I was also supposed to "do my own thing" as we're in the middle of revamping all our work processes. Instead, I now have to do both the technical component and worry about the main body of work. This is ontop of the interviews I have to go to. No, I'm not looking for a new job, only looking at hiring other people to help me out. Oh, I've also been roped into all our process improvements which are just eating away at my hours. PLUS, I've been "volunteered" to give a presentation on my experience on my last project. If that goes well, my PM would also like to "volunteer" me to do a company-wide presentation. All of this needs to be done before I go on leave which is just 4 weeks away! And if we do find a new person by then, I'll need to train all of them up!

It seems everytime I'm about to go on leave, work just explodes into craziness. Infact, I felt the first twitch in my face just then. Not good. I should really stop looking at my calendar. I think in my 7.5hr working day, about 4-5hours are purely for meetings. OMG! HELP ME! I'm definately going to need my holiday in a months time.

Its already begun...

I've got less than 2 months before I embark on my 3rd overseas trip to Europe. I've been looking forward to this for so long! No overseas trips in 2006, save all my leave for one big perfect holiday. There was plenty of stress and lots of money spent, but its all done and I'm ready for my trip.

Today, my workmate asked me when I was going on my holiday. Then I started discussing about where I was going, what the plans were etc etc. And how I am SO OVER looking through travel books. Ever since we booked the last thing needed, I haven't looked at anything related to the trip. I needed a break from it all.

So as I was rushing home from work today, I walked past Flight Centre and saw my travel agent, poor Jessica, sitting at her desk. I thought, what a perfect time to go remind her I need to pick up my tickets soon!

As I walked towards the shop, her eyes looked up and saw me, then practically popped out of the sockets.

Jessica: "Oh my gosh! Just the person I want to see!!"
Me: (Thinking she was being sarcastic) "Are you sure about that??"
Jessica: "You must be psychic! I was just thinking about you! I've got news for you"
Me: "Its bad isn't it......?"
Jessica:"Unfortunately yes.......I just got a fax and your tour has been cancelled...."
Me: "Oh. Ok."

I wasn't even SHOCKED. I didn't yell. I didn't cry. I didn't kick up a fuss. Infact, Jessica was more upset than me! (But I think that was partly due to the fact that she knows she has to see me more often again!!) And its like I KNEW something like this would happen. And I don't think anyone who knows me will be shocked by this news either. I know me + Moishii = Bad News. But come on. This is ridiculous!

Before I booked the tour, I called up the tour company and asked what is the likelihood of the tour being cancelled, and would I be better off taking the next tour (Which departs 7 days later) that is guaranteed to run no matter what. The answer I got was this:

"To be honest, this is our most popular Italy tour and has run every year. In fact, in the history of running this tour, it has NEVER been cancelled before."

*Sigh* When it comes to us, history means jack all. Now its back to the drawing board. To make things worse, that was the perfect tour. Not only did it take us to every place we wanted to see, but it also operated in the opposite direction of EVERY SINGLE OTHER TOUR across all the companies. And it worked perfectly for us because it allowed us to leave the tour early and do the other cities we're both dying to go to. THERE IS NO REPLACEMENT TOUR! ARGH. I need to do some research and stress some more.

I'm not overseas yet and its already begun.....all bets are off for this year......

Pointless rant about volleyball and photography

I had an exhausting weekend. Usually after my 1.5hrs of beach volleyball, I go home, shower and passout. This week, after our class, we commandeered a court and played a few games with the other people in the class, plus a few stragglers on the beach. So after about 3hrs of beach volleyball, I get home, shower and sleep. Surprisingly, I didn't sleep the entire night away. I managed to drag myself out of bed after an hour nap, which was sooooooo hard to do! All I wanted to do was sleep! But then considering the past week, the earliest I've gone to bed is midnight, beach volleyball may not be the cause of my zombification.

I finally got to sleep in on the Sunday (First time in agesssssssssss!) and decided to take my camera for a spin at the Auburn Japanese Gardens. I haven't been to the Japanese Gardens in YEARS! I used to go there all the time with my family for BBQ. The last time I went would have been......10 years ago? And the time before that would have probably been about 5 years? I was quite disappointed when I got there yesterday. It seems to have lost all its glory. Of course, I was going in Autumn, and all their Cherry Blossom trees are bare or missing. The wandering peacocks also seem to be missing. I remember as a kid I could wander through the gardens and see a dozen or so peacocks roaming around. Yesterday, all I got was a few swans and ducks. Quite boring photography subjects to be honest. But then, to make a shot interesting, its up to the photgrapher more than the subject itself.

I'm quite lucky to have a workmate who is a top notch photographer. He's the one who's been convincing me to get a DLSR for about a year now! So when I finally caved in and took the plunge, he promised that we'll go out one day and take some shots together. Of course that hasn't happened, and the little photography tutorial he was supposed to give me, hasn't happened either. But me, being the curious beaver that I am, has been a little obsessive about photography lately. I've been fiddling with my camera whenever I have free time. Turning this dial and pressing that button to learn what my camera does. So without any proper instructions, I took my camera out to the Zoo the other week and went nuts with the camera.

When I showed the photos to my workmate, he was impressed that I took so many shots all in Manual. He had guessed that I would be using the Auto function until we get a chance to take the camera out for a spin. But why spend so much money on a camera, only to use the Auto function? If I was to do that, I should just use a Point and shoot. And even then I don't use the Auto anymore on it! My philosophy is that you need to take a lot of bad photos, to take a good photo. Yes, initially a lot of my photos are going to be crap, but I need to learn WHY they're crap and improve on them. Taking photos in Auto is just the easy way out and I'll never learn how to take better shots. Photos in Auto would be "good", but considering the money I spent on the camera, I want them to be "F**kin awesome!!". Of course, sometimes you just have to use Auto, like when the scene is just too hard to take (Cloudy, sunny and raining all in one go) or when you're drunk. :D

The other thing I've noticed since I got my camera is that I am addicted to Flickr. Not only are there thousands and thousands of awesome shots that you can use for inspiration, but its a chance to get feedback on your own shots as well. I've also used it as a backup of my photos. When I spent the long weekend battling a stupid computer virus, there was a 10min window when I tried to reboot and it said "Disk Failure". I had seen something like that previously, when my computer got fried. I felt the blood drain from my face when it looked like I had lost everything on my computer. Lucky it was a false alarm. So for the past week, I've been uploaded a whole heap of my photos onto Flickr. I've even upgraded myself to a Pro account so I can have unlimited storage. For a trigger happy person like me, I need all the backup I can get. Plus, I figured it'll be a good way to post up photos of my trip without completely killing this blog with the 234452353 photos I post up!

Anyway, you can check out my photos if you're bored.

Weekend recap

Friday:

I did absolutely nothing. I slept in, I ate, I messed around on the computer a bit, I watched A LOT of TV and I recovered from Thursday night with about 4L of water.

Saturday:
I woke up at 6am and it was POURING down with rain. I woke up again at 7am and it was only raining heavily. By 8am, it was reduced to a drizzle. When Moishii finally called at 9am, the sky outside my window was a nice clear blue. Decision was made and we're off to Taronga Zoo! I jump out of bed and quickly shower, grabbed a bite and before I could even pack most of my gear, Moishii was at my door. I rush out with my brand new Lowepro Slingshot bag and my baby Nikon D80 and we were off to the Zoo! 2 blocks from my house, it started raining. The next suburb away, the sun was shining. Another suburb away, we had the windscreen wipers on full blast. It looked like it was going to be one of those days.

We stopped by Toby's Estate for the best coffee in the world to prepare us for a long day at the zoo. After a relaxing coffee which we sculled down (Not because we were in a rush, but because the coffee was at the perfect temperature you can't help but gulp it down!) we headed off to Taronga Zoo. It looks like whether it was going to rain or shine was a suburb by suburb thing, so we thought we'd risk it and rock up the zoo and see how we go.

Well, it was pissin down rain. We were standing in the rain, with all our gear, waiting to get in. Why didn't it occur to us to go home? Well, it did, but since we drove all the way there, we thought we might as well go in. Within seconds of going in, we had each bought a poncho. This was a real sight......I had a massive hump on my back from the backpack, a massive lump on my chest from the camera. My head could barely fit through the poncho hood, and I was choking myself with the weight of the camera and the bag! Plus, the sleeves of the poncho was too short so we had to hold an umbrella to stop our sleeves getting wet! All of this whilst trying to take photos in the rain!! It didn't help that we were taking photos of animals that wouldn't keep still!! GDI!! Plus, it would go from pouring rain, to hot hot sunshine in a matter of minutes! AND I was trying to do everything in Manual Mode! Manual focus, aperture, shutter speed etc etc. Anyhoo, heres a few photos from the day. More can be seen at my flickr page:

We ended the night at Broadway, having more coffee and a movie session of Mr Bean on Holiday. We definately needed a good laugh after an exhausting day!! Little did I know that I was to have a long night ahead of me.

I got home ready to transfer all my photos to the computer, only to find out that I had a virus on my computer. I spent the entire night trying to kill the sucker.

Sunday:
Sunday morning was a real pain in the butt. The virus was still on my computer, luckily I had my laptop to use in the meantime (And yes, I isolated my desktop so it doesn't infect my other machines). I had to go to the cemetery early in the morning for our twice a year ritual. We then rushed home around lunchtime to grab a quick bite before dashing off to the driving range with my brother in law and the kids.

I was sooooo proud of myself! I haven't been to the driving range for over a year, but I was consistently hitting 100m with a 7 iron (For those who don't know golf, a 7 iron can only hit a ball to about 100m). My dad was saying he should take me onto the green. Over my dead body! I only like the driving range because I get to hit the ball and not have to chase it! Besides, I suck hitting with a wood.

After an exhausting session at the driving range, I headed home to work on my computer. I then proceeded to spend a good 6-7hours cleaning my computer of all infections. I was 30mins away from completely reformatting my machine when I found the little bastard and exterminated it. Then I had to fix my dad's computer because my nephews had gone and deleted all his bookmarks and changed all his settings! ARGH!!!

Monday:

I woke up in absolute agony. Everything was hurting from golf! It was like "OMG just rip my arms off NOW!!". I managed to drag my ass out of bed and slowly started processing my photos. I need a newer machine if I'm going to try and simultaneous edit 50 photos.......but I did get a few photos done despite my struggling computer.

Around 6pm, I had to drag my aching, creaking body to Volleyball. Its been a good few weeks since we've played indoor Volleyball (We've only been playing beach volleyball) and because we don't have enough people to form a team this season, we've asked the organiser to put us into a team. It was interesting playing with different people, but it also made it quite enjoyable as there is no expectations on the team. We did really well considering it was 5 people vs 6. We managed to take a set off last seasons first runner up team, so I'm happy.

Now all I want to do is just crash. When is the next long weekend??