June 30 to August 31

This has been an unusually busy year for me. Wedding (not mine! Ah girl and Matt's), travel, work, ... as I looked back, I now realize I have traveled closed to 90,000 miles.

While some may think this is cool (as I once thought), it's rather tiring. Jetlag, lack of appetite, homelessness, loneliness, etc. Of course the upside of heavy traveling means top status at hotel chains, airlines, etc. With the latest trip to NY, I finally made Emerald with oneworld alliance, allowing me to check in at first-class desk and use their lounge even when I flew heavily discounted economy class. ;-)

After attending the wedding in late June, I rushed back to NY to get ready for my ultimate move to Hong Kong. Attached are some pictures taken since June 30, that provided some insights to my life over the past 2 months:

New York

View from my apartment rooftop

Movers packing up my “stuffs”

With a Platinum status at SPG, I was able to score some nice upgrades during my stay in NYC:

Room with a view at the W Union Square

A suite at W the Court (that's bigger than my previous apartment), with a view of the Chrysler building.

Multiple suites at the Sheraton NY, with a small view of Times Square and Central Park. Also received a bottle of wine and fruits after an issue that came up during my stay.

I have stayed in NY for many years, with the last five years at my beloved new apartment close to Times Square. So it absolutely crushed my heart to leave NYC for an extended period of time.

Enroute to Hong Kong

Since CX introduced flat seat in their business class last year or so, I've been fortunate enough to be on them on numerous occasions. The flat bed was quite comfortable, but the food was not that good. I missed the good food and excellent service on JAL.

Hong Kong

Upon arriving Hong Kong, I was put up in a temporary service apartment in Lan Kwai Fong. Apartment size was good, but no where close to the 1,000 sq ft they claimed!

Since I needed to get a new cell phone, I decided to go with the iPhone offered by “three”. Couldn't get the 16G phone as there's a waiting list. I am not a very patient guy, so 8G it is.

Bangkok

In exactly a week, I had to go to Bangkok. Attached was a view from my club room. I loved Bangkok, and their Thai service. But what I enjoyed most was the mangosteen in my room! After having one, I couldn't resist but went out to get a bunch more from the wet market that night.

Singapore

Singapore had changed a lot. In fact, I really enjoyed my short time there as well. I was at the Fullerton Hotel so it was a very short walk to the Merlion. The exterior of the hotel reminded me of Hotel Excelsior in Rome (shown in the third picture).

Hong Kong

The Chinese food in HK was mouth-watering delicious. I have found my new favorite dish ... the “flying goose” of Yung Kee. I also had to take picture of the T-shirt of Tsui Wah since it reminded me of NY.

Equestrian Event

Since the Olympic's equestrian event was held in HK (Shatin), I was able to go watch the jumping event.

Enroute to Tokyo

The next morning, I left for Tokyo. I was able to fly my first international first class ever due to a very unique situation. Cathay's first class was truly amazing! And, what surprised me was that the seat was really at the front of the airplane. I wondered if the pilots were up on the upper level? CX's first class had the most beautiful airplane restroom I ever seen, with a few windows looking out to the blue sky when you fly.

Tokyo

None of my pictures of Tokyo came up good enough to be posted here. But I did enjoy the Tokyo Conrad, which had good service and a huge room.

Enroute to New York

This was the highlight of my trip. I was very excited to try out JAL’s new JAL Suite in their First Class. Service, as expected was impeccable. I changed into the relaxed dress provided before the plane taking off and was able to truly relax my flight. When I was ready to go to bed, the flight attendant would come make my bed. They would bring along a tempur-pedic mattress to put on top of my flat bed, and along with that a down duvet and another down pillow.

While the experience was superb, I found CX's first class suite to be better designed than JAL's. I was suprised I would come to this conclusion.

New York, New York!

I didn't expect to be returning to NY this soon. I always love New York!

Taipei

I spent last week in Taipei and fell in love with the country. Its people were very friendly, and the food was cheap and good. I stayed at the Hyatt by Taipei 101, so I couldn't help but took a few shots of the world's tallest building. I also frequented 3 different night markets.

On my way back yesterday, I ran into street demonstration, so I snapped a shot from my taxi cab.


Back to Hong Kong

Now I am back here .... and still suffering from jet lag!

Mendocino

This past weekend Matt and I went on a last trip before the summer ends. We went to a coastal town up north called Mendocino. The scenic view of the Pacific Ocean on US1.

We stayed at a very cute Bed & Breakfast - Whitegate Inn. The building was built in 1883, and carries the old time charm and elegance. One can get a good view of the Pacific coast from the garden on a good non foggy day.

Our room is called the 'Enchanted Cottage', and it has a private deck and entrance to the room through the French doors.

Here are several pictures of the flowers found in the garden.

Gamble Gardens

After repairing the camera lens, on our way home, we saw Gamble Gardens and remembered this is where Ah Girl and Matt took their wedding pictures. So we stopped and took some more pictures with our newly repaired lens...

Enjoy...

Sequoia National Park

Derrick invited us to Sequoia National Park along with Matt and Chin Ping a couple of weeks ago. It has been many years since we went camping. It was lots of fun. We camped at Stony Creek campsite. We didn't book the campsite, fortunately we got the last walk-in site. Turns out for the better, because we camped where it is most secluded.



Since the campsite is next to Stony Creek, we went fishing. Derrick is the one to catch a trout where we have a BBQ trout for dinner. Derrick's parents helped prepared the food for us, so even without the trout, we would still have fried chicken for dinner.

Then Matt and Derrick caught a few more trouts the next day further downstream. But our camera is broken, after Pei Sun fell after taking the following picture.



Last weekend, we spent some time repairing the broken lens. Looks like it is somewhat fixed. Picture looks fine, here is a test picture taken right after the repair in the lab. Anything looks bizarre in the picture?

Little monk look

Sleepy toro

Winston in backyard

LOST

...and FOUND!

OK, here’s what happened about Winston… the short-legged Munchkin cat. :)

He typically meows and follows me around quite often in the morning asking for food (which he rarely gets it), doing some yoga stretches, and have a lonnngg afternoon nap on the Ikea Poäng chair. Then he follows us around occasionally, and sits on the window sill. When it’s about two hours before 9pm, he starts meowing for food. At night, there’s the endless scouting on the window sill while we sleep... usually until 2 or 3 in the morning then only he wanders onto our bed and sleeps with us. What a life!

The unthinkable happened on June 27. As I was about to leave the house to post office around noon time, I decided to look for the cats, Toro and Winston, and make sure they were okay. Somehow, Winston was no where to be seen. I searched the entire house. Nope! No Winston. Fear and panic washed over me. I searched the entire house again and again, to no avail and no sign of cream fur anywhere! Only our sweet as a snuggly bunny overweight Toro sitting on the Ikea Poäng chair in the living room alone. No wonder I didn’t hear any meowing this morning. I then realized one of the window screens in our kitchen had fallen out onto the yard waste cart, and the window was wide open!! That explains why all of us heard a loud banging noise in the kitchen while we were sleeping. He finally snuck out of the house! Hm… he probably fell out from our kitchen window as he leaned on the screen. Argh! Or is it that his hunger and some instinctual catlike behavior drove him outside to hunt for girlfriend?! I called daddy & mummy immediately as they were still strolling around our neighborhood, hoping that they would see Winston somewhere out there. I called Choon as well and told him about the unfortunate incident... he planned to come back home earlier to help searching for Winston.

My trip to the post office was delayed. I walked around our neighborhood, talked to our neighbor whenever I saw anyone who’s hanging out in their front yard. I then came across this guy who’s washing his car on Lori Ave., with a fluffy long hair golden brown tabby sitting on his porch; we named him ‘The Lion’. He hangs out at our back yard occasionally, which always drove Winston nut. His tail would puff up and he would stare out from one window, and run to another, and another. Anyways, I talked him about our missing short-legged cream color cat, Winston. Guess what!? He recognized the short-legged cream cat! According to him, Winston had a fight with his next door neighbor’s cat, and another “Rafiki” tuxedo cat from across the street. But that was around 7am or so!! 5-6 hours had past! He could be anywhere then... :(

We printed tons of flyers with photos and post it around our neighborhood. We’d been walking and walking… My legs were tired. I was sure daddy’s and mummy’s too (thanks for your help!) So, we took a break; drove around our neighborhood before heading to the post office to mail out the jackets that were left in the motel by Shawn. On our way back from post office, we drove around our neighborhood again. Ten minutes later, I was out there walking around our neighborhood again... shook his treat, I even brought his feather toy with me thinking he would come out to play. Nothing! A few hours had passed... Choon was back around 3:30pm. (That was darn early from work! But I was glad; another helper.) ...printed more flyers... Then, a group of kids from our neighborhood came to ring our door bell, we thought they’d found Winston but it wasn’t. They had been helping us to find Winston too! They took our flyers and went around our neighborhood door to door asking about Winston, calling out his name… I was moved. I love our neighborhood!

A few hours had passed, around 6:30pm... no Winston still. However, a biker from our neighborhood came to our house. He told us that he saw Winston around 6:50 to 7 in the morning! Winston was in a fight with a couple of cats in the middle of the street on Lori Ave. He rode through them to break the fight. All other cats ran away except Winston. He stood still in the middle of the road looking at him. What a naive sheltered house kitty! He probably thought that he won the fight!

I later started realizing the odd behavior of Toro during the day. She seemed sad. I think she knew Winston was gone for a while. It was getting close to eight in the evening. Toro didn’t meow for food at all, and was still lying on Winston usual spot - the Poäng chair.

It was dinner time. Choon, mummy and daddy reluctantly gave up looking for Winston for the day. Winston was still outside in the great unknown. Raccoons, rodents came to mind, as did cars especially in the dark and the numerous neighborhood bully tomcats that watch him jealously through the windows. Despite being told by Choon and parents that Winston would find his way home, I felt terrible. I was afraid to break the new to Rhea, the previous owner who gave us Winston. So I decided to walk one last trip around my neighborhood for the day. It was getting closer to Winston’s meal time anyway; he must be hungry and should have stopped checking out the surroundings.

There I went again, started from the street/houses behind ours on Lori Ave. I passed by the house of the fluffy ‘lion’ cat again, hoping that his owner would see Winston again, but no one’s outside. Suddenly, I saw a light brown cat sitting on the side of the porch... took a second look, *sigh* not Winston. It was the ‘lion’; wish he could talk. I walk further down the street, about 2 houses down... ah ha!! Another light brown cat, much lighter in color, was squatting/kneeling by the corner of front yard, on the side of the house and under some bushes. “This one looks like Winston. I think it is!” I thought. I called out Winston, the cat didn’t response. When I walked closer toward him and called out Winston again. “Meow~” I knew he was mine! :D He looked very relieved to see me. I was torn between kissing him and smacking his bottom. He smelled like dirt instead of shampoo, with his dirty brown short legs with gray paws instead of the usual cream short leg with pinkish paws. Spider webs and some small dried leaves were stuck on of his whiskers, his forehead were all grayish instead of the pretty cream color...

Yay! After some agonizing 8 hours looking for Winston, he is back at home now. When I brought him back, all of us were very happy and relieved. :D Toro licked him immediately. Winston allowed her to do so... for the longest time. Guess what after that, Toro started meowing for food constantly!! Of course, Winston got a quick bath...

Well, now the whole neighborhood knows about Winston. And he did get his freedom for approximately 16 hours. He better not be ‘planning’ another great escape ever! The final straw though, he is going to be fixed and wear a collar that has a tiny jingle bell and our phone number on it just in case he ever gets outside and lost again! Oh... and he’s getting a microchip too! (wish there’s GPS on it but it’s not availableL)

Winston drove my legs into a state of exhaustion. They were aching for a few days! And Daddy said, “For the next few months, if you see any short-legged cats around the neighborhood, you know what Winston had done!!” :P

Beautiful Moorea

Where is Winston?

Making Roti Canai

Wedding Cake Tasting Grand Finale

We found the perfect wedding cake at Satura Cakes in Palo Alto. I always have a good experience eating the baked goods from this bakery. It is a Japanese European bakery, so the cakes are not as sweet, yet the flavors are still really intense. Plus, the presentation of the cakes are really nice. Once, I went with a friend, and she said the cakes almost look too pretty for consumption.

This was by far the most professional cake tasting experience that we had. We went for our appointment, and the catering manager brought out a big plate with 11 different kind of cakes. The attached picture is not taken by me, I found it on Yelp, but I thought it gives a rough idea of the crazy amount of cakes that we got. She gave a description of each cake before the tasting, and the order of the cakes start from the lightest to the richer flavors towards the end (again, the order was a bit different from the picture).

1. Strawberry shortcake
2. Shortcake with mango-passion fruit cream and red currants
3. mango coconut mousse
4. green tea cake with vanilla cream
5. chocolate cake with caramel-mocha cream
6. chocolate cake with chocolate cream
7. carrot cake with cream cheese frosting
8. red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting and fresh blueberries & raspberries
9. triple chocolate raspberry with raspberry preserve
10. classic chocolate - rich chocolate sponge with light & dark chocolate mousse
11. yuna - rich chocolate cake with bittersweet whipped ganache (gluten free)

I enjoyed most of their cakes, except the chocolate cake with caramel-mocha cream because I don't like both caramel and mocha, and the yuna, just because it is a gluten free cake, and hence left a strange after taste and the texture was a bit odd. However, it was definitely one of the best gluten free dessert that I ever tasted.

My all time favorite from Satura is the Strawberry shortcake - the sponge cake is light and fluffy, and the fresh cream and strawberries are just to die for. Matt loved all the chocolate cakes that we sampled (no surprises there), but our favorite was their classic chocolate. The chocolate sponge was moist, and the milk and dark chocolate mousse gave it a more intense flavor, plus the toasted almonds on top added a nice touch to the cake. One cake that we both really liked was the green tea cake. The green tea flavor was subtle, and the combination with the vanilla cream worked really well. You first taste the vanilla, then later you can taste the green tea. These are our top three choices, and will be the flavors of our wedding cake. I am very happy with our pick, and hope everyone will enjoy the cake on our big day.

Overall, the wedding cake tasting experience was pretty good, but I am glad we finally made a decision on where to go. How can you complain when you get to eat all these cakes, right?

Wedding Cake Tasting Part II

2 weeks later, we ventured out to Icing on the Cake in Los Gatos. First thing you will notice when you walk into this store is the strong sugary aroma that just lingers in the air. Since they have 2 complimentary wedding cake tastings every month and they do not take reservations, you can imagine what a mad house this bakery was when we walked in. We had to wait about 30 minutes before we got served. While we were waiting in line, I got a chance to look around the bakery. The decor in the bakery is defintiely cute, and and not only do they sell cakes, cookies, cupcakes, they also sell cute little plates, mugs, cupcake holders, etc.

The tasting here was somewhat different than at Prolific Oven. There, the cake manager just brought out the flavors that they have for us to taste; here, they give you a sheet with their different cake flavors (8), fillings (8), and icings (7), and you pick which cake you want with which filling in the middle, and what icing on the top. So theoretically speaking, you can have a total of 8x8x7 combinations. However, certain cakes only go with certain filling and icing, so if the manager thinks that you have created a strange cake, he will advise you otherwise. We actually did very well, he only changed one out of the 6 cakes combo that we picked out.

Below are the flavors we tried (cake+filling+icing):
1. Chocolate buttermilk+chocolate fudge+white buttercream
2. Chunky carrot+cream cheese+cream cheese
3. Fresh banana+chocolate fudge+cream cheese
4. Classic white+raspberry+white buttercream
5. Marble+almond buttercream+almond buttercream
6. Marble+mocha buttercream+mocha buttercream

The first reaction when I took a bite into the cake was - jeez, the icing is extremtly sweet! After several bites, I think I adjusted to the high level of sweetness in the icing. I love the texture of the cakes here - they are just right, and absolutely moist. I think if I were to eat their cakes, I will just scrap off all the filling and icing, and I will be perfectly happy just eating the chocolate buttermilk cake. One of their icing I really liked - the almond buttercream. The marble cake with the almond buttercream was my absolute favorite that day. Between the 3 of us, we picked out 3 of our top choices - chocolate+fudge+white buttercream, marble+almond buttercream, and white cake+raspberry+white buttercream. I must say the white cake and carrot cake here pales in comparison to the one at Prolific Oven. Matt prefers the Prolific Oven to Icing on the Cake, but I think Icing on the Cake actually has better cakes than Prolific Oven. Plus, the designs of their cakes are much better that at Prolific Oven. However, Matt being Matt, said that he will be fine with either of the choices. I on the other hand, still find these cakes too sweet for my palette. I never understand why a lot of these American bakeries put so much sugar in their product that it just overwhelms the real taste of the cakes. Plus, the buttercream icing is just heavy, I want something lighter. So, I am still on the quest to search for the perfect wedding cake.

Wedding Cake Tasting Part I

For the past month, we have been cake tasting. The first place we went to was Prolific Oven in Palo Alto. We tried a total of 6 different cakes - carrot cake, chocolate rum cake, chocolate mocha cake, orange almond cake, white cake with raspberry filling, and a chocolate orange almond cake. In general, the cakes were decent, although I do find them to be too sweet. Matt didn't seem to have any issue with the 'too sweet' part. Plus, the texture of the cakes is a bit more 'crumbly' that what I normally like. One nice thing is that we can pick to have 3 different cakes for the 3 tiers of our wedding cake. Overall, our favorite cake from the Prolific Oven is the carrot cake. If we were to order our cake there, we would have picked the chocolate rum, orange almond, white cake with raspberry filling, and of course the carrot cake. The designs of the cakes were alright, nothing really caught my eye. One thing that I really did not like is that they usually freeze their wedding cake after they make it, so the cake will go through a freeze/thaw cycle, and I find that a bit disturbing since who knows how much that will affect the texture of the cake. Oh, and since this was our first cake tasting, the 3 of us gobbled down all the cake and was on sugar high the rest of the day, hehe.

After that, I went to Sheng Kee, a Chinese bakery, since I really like light fluffy spongy cakes. I asked if they offer a cake tasting service for wedding cake. The lady behind the counter looked at me as if I have gone nuts! She just pointed at the cakes they sell, and said - pretty much this is what you will get - vanilla sponge with cream, chocolate sponge with cream, or orange sponge with cream. So I ended up buying these cakes and brought them home for our self made cake tasting session. I have always love Sheng Kee cakes because they have a great light texture, and the flavor is not overly powerful, plus the dosage of sugar is actually reasonable. Matt said that although they were delicious sponge cake, they were not fancy enough for a wedding cake. I do have to agree, plus the ability to get 3 different cakes did not seem to be an option at Sheng Kee.

So the hunt continued...

Video of Catching Squid in Ko Lipe

Our visit to Ah Yi

On our way back from KL to Penang on 30th of March, we learnt that Ah Yi is now staying in a nursing home in Sungai Dua. So we made a detour to pay her a visit.

While we are sad that Ah Yi has to end up in a place like this, we believe this arrangement is good for her for the time being, as she is recuperating well.

Apparently, she was quite sick before admission, but her condition is much better than I imagined. Her general condition looks good, except that her knees had degenerated badly. She can't walk by herself now.

Hopefully, she will get better soon, and be able to discharge and stay with her daughter.

This is where she stays now, "Comfort nursing home":

Entrance to this nursing home:














Ah Yi with a big smile ;)














Choon Ping showing her Ah girl in her wedding dress.
She is so happy to learn that Ah girl has graduated and getting married soon.

Choon Ping showing her Ah Bee's photo

We were so sad to learn that Ah Pek is also staying in the same nursing home, only 2 doors away.

He is bed ridden and situation is quite bad :(