November 5th!

Coffee and a Chocolate Bomb

not sure why but this morning i tend to wake up with a happy mood. Haven't been that happy for days or was it weeks. It could have been the weather. The sky is grey, it's windy and the wind is chilling. Hmmm....has winter just arrived?

After watching one episode of SATC (my rerun is up to S5 now), i pack up and go to work with a plan to stop by at Starbucks for a cup of its daily brew and hopefully a donut. Although there's no donut but it did have this bun called Chocolate Bomb. A bit hard but still satisfied my indulgence moment.

Oh...and Four Seasons has started building its huge christmast tree. Winter did indeed arrive!

My First Real Encounter

If the movie Encounter of the Third Kind was about alien, I wonder what is the first and second kind? It's 5.45am now. About 30 minutes earlier, i had my first real encounter with a ghost. Although I do believed in the existence of ghost but i have never really experience facing it before. And scientifically, ghost are basically energy being or essence of energy.

Here's what happen. I kinda woke up on the couch and decided to move into the bedroom. Hence i was lying on the bed, not fully asleep but just lied there with my eyes close. After a while or not sure exactly what time but i did hear something and felt it too. I could felt someone just get onto my bed, i did heard the sound the bed made. Since i was sleeping on a side position, i could feel the chilling effect on my back. the goosebumps, the hair raising a bit.

It is very clear that something was beside or in this case behind me. I was in a dilemma of whether to turn or not. In that particular moment that i decided to turn, i felt a 'being' on top of me. Not really heavy but it was having a whole body lying on top of me and i just couldn't turn. I tried to yell but all it came out was just a tiny shriek. Then my sight became blurrish or like seeing things in some kind of weird dimension. I felt a bit light headed, hence i decided to go with the flow and relaxed. A few seconds later, i felt the 'essence of energy' on top of me gone. I cannot felt its presence anymore.

I lied down for a few more minutes just to be sure and then I turned. It's gone...for now.

I was not scared but panic, yes i was. Hmmm...i wonder what it was looking for.

Falling Out

Am I coming back to KL too frequent that this simple question arise on the eve of my departure (back to Bangkok)? Me and my bro were discussing about some finance topics and one thing led to another, that my brother pop out a familiar question, which is when am I coming back for good? My reply has always been the same; “Why?”. While some boring rationale have exchanged, yet this is the first time that I brought up the following response: “Can I not stay here if I came back?” and that’s when the night started to fall out. Mom was questioning the Whys and giving rationale of finance, of only can moved out upon married, blah blah blah. This is not getting anywhere near my ideal goal at all.

Of course, prior to the fall out, I just utter something in English, not to my mom but to my bro and ended the night conversation by going up to my room.

Borrowing the lyrics from Don McLean’s "Vincent":

“She would not listen, she’s not listening still, Perhaps she never will”

Generation Laptop-ers

It was kinda late, and I have yet to finish watching Pirates of the Caribbean 3, which was quite a lengthy movie, indeed. And then my friend arrived. To find a relatively nice place to hang out at night around my place is not that easy but also not too difficult. And since I’ve been planning to make a visit to this restaurant called Old Town for some time, I made it a point to take my friend there.

As we reached the place, we found that the ground floor was already crowded with people, young and old, properly dressed and ‘jinjang-ish’ dressed. Fortunately, the first floor still has some empty tables, but not a lot.

To my surprise, there are people with their laptops in this place. I mean, one will normally find these people in Starbucks…but a modern ‘kopitiam’? Hotspot available? I’m impressed!

Come to think of it, was it the place or was it the trend? Generally, to support the trend of the ‘laptop-ers’, the place need to have the right ambience and image, else one will be quite standout. But then, when the trend setters make it an acceptable place, then the trend will just simply be adapted.

Old Town White Coffee (the name of the restaurant) is not really a bad place but with its modern ‘kopitiam’ image, I still couldn’t accept it to be a place for us, the laptop-ers. Being a modern ‘kopitiam’ doesn’t mean it’s Starbucks. Or was it that I’ve been staying in Bangkok for the past few months, that I’m just getting outdated with the KL trend?

So, when has a modern kopitiam becoming a trendy, technology-friendly café? When has Old Town became the New Town?

Taking the flight out

Taking an early flight out have a few advantages…one of it being a fast trip to the airport without any traffic jams and it only cost you 200baht via a non-highway route.
The disadvantages being the concern of waking up late and missing the flight that one would rather stay up the whole night. Couple with the fact that I have a team outing which involve dinner and bowling (plus two Bacardi Coke) and the fact that I have not fully packed my stuff yet.

Upon reaching home at 11.30pm, I start to sort out shirts and stuff which required to be pack and at the same time played Sex and The City Season Four. If I was to watch any other movies, I believed I would have fallen asleep within minutes (one good experience being Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest).

There I was switching between watching the series and packing, and lying on the couch until 3am that I finally took the much needed shower, dressed up and packed up, locked the luggage and continue with SaTC until 4.30am that I decided to call the cab.

I still remembered my first experience with the morning flight of which I woke up at 5.30am (fortunately I was fully packed), get out of the building within 5 minutes, took a cab and reached the airport at 6.10am, just one of the last few person to check in before the counter close. That was a close call and of which I tried to stay away from morning flight after that. Which is why I decided to stay up the night and feeling cranky, hoping this dripping black coffee from Starbucks would help.

If there is any specific topic that I was planning to write, I have totally forgot about it. It’s 6am now…I better get into boarding gate since the crew told me today’s flight is FULL.

I'll Be Back!

Having some troubles getting into the net at home...so will try to update the blog once i get back to Bkk...in the meanwhile, cheerioz!

Out Of Stock

Do you know that coming up with a title for the entry is so damn difficult. Anyway, just like how it came suddenly to me in Hanoi, it also suddenly went away last week. Or the IT guy in my office decide to disable my wireless card again. Can anyone help? I’ve tried the properties, checked this and that, yet it seems to be okay but I just can’t detect any wireless network! This is so frustrating.

Oh...one of the dangerous of going to Chathuchak market is that one will end up buying stuff not because it is really cheap but the stuff there are just within the expected budget and look above average too.

So I visited the market this afternoon. Has been at least 2 months since I last went. And today the weather is so nice that it will be crazy not to go. Anyway, I ended up buying 8 shirts. EIGHT! That’s not even within my plan. I would have purchase more if it’s not because the shop ran out of stock. How sad. EIGHT!

Before I head home, I decided to visit the café and give its Lemongrass Tea a try. And believed me, it was fabulous. If you are visiting Chathuchak market, make sure you make a stop there. It’s called Café Nice or was it Café Ice? It’s located near the Art Gallery section. The shop have two special tea, the Lemongrass Tea with Honey and the Ginger Tea with Brown Sugar. Since I don’t think I’ll enjoy ginger tea, I decided to give the lemongrass a tried.

While it cost 80 baht, it came in a large pot, roughly about 3-4 cups. The only thing I would advice is to don’t put too much honey in it, else it will be too sweet. It was really a cooling drink. Give it a try.

Still Ridiculous

While there are restaurants trying its best to satisfy the customers, there are also restaurants who try its best in annoying the customers.

Yep, it's still the ridiculous restaurant which I nag about recently. I was late to work today, so decided to stop by McD to grab myself a mocha. It was almost 9am, still considered to be peak hour, no?

Anyway, there was only one customer at the counter, and by the time i reached the counter, the customer has already left, so there's no queue. I order my mocha with low fat milk and paid the cashier. Then i start to notice something...the staff who's preparing my mocha have no idea how to prepare it. Firstly, she asked the staff manning the counter if the milk she's holding is the right milk (HELLO! the pack obviously stated low fat!) Gee-bus. Then she was also asking something else, which i could not recall.

I went to the receiving station and saw a supervisor/manager explaining to another staff how to prepare cappucino. Hmmm...i thought McD should have a separate place for training the staff and all staff should be trained before sending them to work in the outlet. And furthermore, you don't train your staff during peak hour which will slow down the production and very well annoyed the customers. It's peak hour...people are rushing to get into the office.

Fortunately, the supervisor/manager is being very professional, where she smile and keep contact with the waiting customer, telling them it will be ready soon, etc.

Not very ridiculous but still ridiculous.

Another Kraving Episode

B: Where are you going?
A: Out
B: Why?
A: I'm having a k-raving
B: A what?
A: A K-raving!
B: a craving.
A: No..not just any craving but a K-raving.
B: Whatever...so what are you craving for?
A: Chocolates
B: You are gonna buy some chocolate bars?
A: No. Ice cream and milk.
B: But I thought you are craving for chocolates.
A: Yeah...so I'm getting a chocolate ice cream and chocolate milk
B: why two?
A: Well, one's frozen and the other's a liquid
B: And...
A: I'm gonna put the ice cream into the milk
B: But both are chocolate milk anyway...
A: (eyes rolling) yeah i know. But I'm K-raving.
B: It's raining
A: It's drizzling
B: You'll get wet
A: I have an umbrella...

It's Funny That Way....

I wanted to write but can't remember what i'm supposed to write...

only recalled the following words:

Alone...Love...Hate

can't seems to find a connection...

I guess it's just too late...

LOL!

Life Can be funny at times....

It's 1am and normally i would have been sleeping but not tonite. Not sure why, i'm not feeling sleepy at all. Was it because i have too much sleep yesterday?

Anyway, a colleague of mine ask me to play a simple game, you know those name 2 people, name numbers and stuff. And I'm also supposed to name 4 songs, of which I suddenly have this song in my mind. It's Carole King's It's Too Late. Actually, it was Dina Caroll's version. Not sure why this song all of a sudden? That is, until an hour ago...or half an hour ago...

HBO is showing The Lake House, one of my favorite movie. And halfway towards the show...a familiar music...the song..the song I suddenly recalled this afternoon. Hmmm...funny. Coincidence probably...but still funny.

so, here's the first verse & chorus to the song:

Stayed in bed all morning just to pass the time
There's something wrong here
There can be no denying
One of us is changing Or maybe we've just stopped trying
And it's too late baby, now it's too late
Though we really did try to make it
Something inside has died and I can't hide
And I just can't fake it...

Ahh...London-ers!

Read this news in the paper today and find it so amusing that i just have to post it here...


Thai chilli dish causes terror alert in London!
When a noxious cloud sent shoppers running in panic on the streets of London, emergency services feared the capital was under chemical attack.

Wearing specialist breathing equipment, fire crews sealed off the area in Soho on Monday afternoon and began a three-hour hunt to find the source of the eyewatering stench while a hazardous area response team stood by, fearing the worst.
Three streets were closed and people evacuated from the area as the search was carried out. After locating the source at about 7pm, emergency crews smashed their way into the Thai Cottage restaurant in D'Arblay Street only to emerge with a five kilo pot of smouldering dried chillies.
Baffled chef Chalemchai Tangjariyapoon, who had been cooking a spicy dip, was amazed to find himself at the centre of the terror scare.
"We only cook it once a year - it's a spicy dip with extra hot chillies that are deliberately burned," he said.
"To us it smells like burned chilli and it is slightly unusual. I can understand why people who weren't Thai would not know what it was but it doesn't smell like chemicals. I'm a bit confused."
Staff at the restaurant had already been evacuated by the time the dip was discovered. Supranee Yodmuang, a Thai Cottage waitress said: "The first we knew about it was at about 4.30 in the afternoon when the fire brigade came. They led us out to where the streets had been cordoned off and we waited there for about three hours.
"They said there was a chemical smell and I remember saying to someone that maybe the smell was the chillies but then we said that was not possible.
"When we came back at 7.30pm we saw the door had been smashed and there were fire brigade and police waiting outside. I was a bit scared but they were very nice about it."
The spicy dip, which is a speciality at the restaurant, is made from charred chillies, garlic flakes, dried shrimps, palm sugar, shrimp paste, tamarind and vegetable oil.
The restaurant, which has been open for 17 years, is considering putting up posters to warn the public during future chilli cooking sessions.

Amusing.