simply underwhelmed

Koko Black Hot Chocolate

2006-08-25T01:15:00.000+08:00

koko black hot chocolate
Originally uploaded by varf.

Loved this stuff from Koko Black in Melbourne. Just fabulous! Same goes for the mocha; I don't think I'll ever order another local "mocha" again.

Bolshoi baby

2006-08-01T14:09:00.000+08:00

bolshoi baby
Originally uploaded by varf.

SUN with MOON, and a pale reflection of

2006-07-02T22:53:00.000+08:00

The Reflection
It was perhaps unfortunate that we chanced upon Ministry Of Food / My Izakaya on their first day of operation, while hunting around for an afternoon snack in the newly, snazzily redone Marina Square yesterday. Their menu offered Japanese cafe-restaurant type food and desserts, so J and I decided to give it a try.

First problem - no baby chair. As this was their first day of operation, the waiter explained, they had forgotten to buy baby chairs. No worries, we said, we'll just carry the baby. And so we proceeded to order our food.

"I'll have the Shiratama Kurizen, please."
"That's a dessert, sir."
"Yes, that's fine." (Yes, I can read your menu perfectly well thankyouverymuch.)

J ordered a Tofu Avocado Salad ($6.80).

Our food took some time to come. J noted that the kitchen staff (the place had one of those long peek-into-the-kitchen service counters) seemed to be having trouble with a bento box that had been sitting on the counter since we arrived. Uh-oh. "Five minutes," J said to me, after we had waited for a bit. "In five minutes, if the food doesn't come, we're out of here."

My Shiratama Kurizen ($6.50) arrived shortly after, a cold combination of white rice-flour dumpling balls in a bowl of red bean, topped with soft-serve ice cream, like the kind you get at McD's. Exactly like that kind, in fact. Ummmm. As I dug into the dessert, a few things came to mind - the red bean was too sweet, the shiratama balls weren't very good, and the odd combination of sweet red bean and slightly-salty(!?) soft-serve left something to be desired.

J had this to say about her salad: "If I can tell you what they used to make the dressing, then I can make this at home. And if I can make the same thing at home..." Wasabi and mayo. Uh-oh again.

We decided to pay up quickly and leave, so we called for the bill.

"What cards do you take?"
"Which do you have?"
"Do you take Amex?" I ask, fishing out my card.
"Mastercard, sir."
I flip my wallet open again.
The waiter's hand glides down, hovers close over my open wallet and points to a card inside. "Maybe this one, I think."

Shell shock!

I signed the unevenly-torn charge chit haphazardly, still a little stunned at what had just transpired. J was busy feeding Ethan, so we had to stay put for a while.

The same waiter then came over with a tray and asked, "Can I clear your glasses?"

Not "May I top up your water?" as I was expecting.

Thanks for the unasked-for 15% discount, but I don't think I'll be going back to MOF.

SUN with MOON - The Real Deal

SUN with MOON Japanese Dining & Café
Originally uploaded by varf.

To make up for yesterday's fiasco at MOF, we decided to have lunch today at SUN with MOON Japanese Dining & Café.

J and I have been fans of Japanese cafe-style afternoon snacks, especially after sampling Tokyo's delightful confectioneries during a trip some years back. We've regularly taken advantage of Shimbashi Soba's (at Paragon, B1) special $5 afternoon dessert + coffee/tea offer, often indulging in their cream anmitsu that's normally worth $8+ during regular meal hours.

A couple of weeks ago, we walked into SUN with MOON at Wheelock Place for tea.. and were hooked. We were seated next to the window, watching traffic navigate the Orchard Boulevard and Scotts Road junction on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Ambience and service was great, and the Marron (Japanese chestnut) and Chocolate parfait I had then was definitely up to par.

Today, there was a 20-minute queue for lunch. J left her name and cellphone number with the reservations counter and we went off shopping until they called us. No physical queueing necessary.

Seating at the restaurant is divided into different sections, with distinctive styles in each section ranging from egg-cup chairs to booths to sushi-counter seating. There are a number of cosy tucked-away corners, perfect for chilling out with friends. Unfortunately, today we were seated in the dimly-lit section near the front, not exactly one of my favourites, but with today's crowd I'm not complaining.

I ordered the Komachi Bento set ($25.50), an 8-dish selection served in a basket: crab salad, tamagoyaki, tori karaage, two small sushi rolls, unagi kabayaki, grilled beef roll stuffed with mushrooms, agedashi tofu and a salmon and avocado rice paper roll topped with salmon roe. Accompanied by udon. Matcha ice cream and coffee came later. All good!

J had the Shogayaki & Tomato Salad set ($13.80), which turned out to be grilled pork slices in ginger sauce, with tomato salad, miso soup, rice and pickles. And a cup of tea after. I sampled a piece of the pork, not bad at all.

The food came quickly after ordering, as usual. It surprised me greatly on our first visit, that the food tasted as good as it did despite having arrived as quickly as it did. It's as if the entire restaurant functions like a well-oiled machine, effective and efficient without compromising on food or service quality. Superb!

And then there was one
Perhaps I'm making a very unfair comparison here. Granted that MOF is still extremely raw, while SwM has been around for some time and already has two outlets in Singapore (first branch is at Chijmes). But hey, these are two establishments with fairly similar offerings. And it's a cruel world out there.

Maybe someday there will be a rematch, but it probably won't be on this blog.

'Cos I'm recommending SUN with MOON to my friends.

SUN with MOON Japanese Dining & Café
501 Orchard Road
Wheelock Place
#03-15/16/17
Singapore 238880
Tel: 6733 6636

Pacing the train

2006-06-21T11:08:00.000+08:00

pacing the train
Originally uploaded by varf.

Racing just to keep up. Pretty much describes my last couple of weeks.

Fire panic

2006-05-23T00:44:00.000+08:00

For one heart-stopping, gut-wrenching hour, I thought my Mac's firewire ports had completely died on me. And I'd moved all my photos to a firewire-only external enclosure just a month ago.

Gaaah!

食源味 NOMIN Seafood Restaurant

2006-03-26T11:34:00.000+08:00

NOMIN seafood restaurant
Originally uploaded by varf.

Last Sunday, we made a reservation at NOMIN seafood restaurant after it was featured both in the papers and on the telly (Chnl U), though I'd neither read the feature nor watched it so I had little idea as to what to expect, other than that it was a cze char place.

NOMIN is just one of a slew of terraced eateries along Teck Chye Terrace, accessible from Tua Tow Road just off Upper Serangoon Road near the Upper Paya Lebar Road flyover.

Parking was horrible. Teck Chye Terrace is not a particularly long stretch, and is a one-way service road that fronts the row of shophouses; when we got there, both sides were lined with vehicles with the shophouse side double-parked all the way, leaving just a narrow channel for pick-up and drop-off traffic. We eventually parked at the tail end of the Serangoon Stadium carpark, and walked 5-odd minutes up Boundary Road to the eatery.

NOMIN was featured for its CPF (crab-prawn-frog) hotpot, but we'd completely forgotten and ended up ordering the other cze char dishes on the menu instead. I don't remember the exact names of the dishes, so please don't quote me if you decide to use this as a reference for what (not?) to order!

NOMIN: prawn floss and spinach in superior soup
Originally uploaded by varf.

The spinach in superior stock topped with prawn floss was an instant favourite. The spinach itself had a nice texture, well-cooked, firm but not crunchy, and the stock was deliciously rich (I wonder if they used MSG). Prawn floss worked well as a complement.

I didn't try the crab meat shark's fin soup, but my brother thought it was value for money. Don't remember how much it cost.

NOMIN: honey pork ribs 排骨王
Originally uploaded by varf.

The pai kuat wong (排骨王) was good. The pork pieces came thick, juicy and tender on the inside, sweet and fried crispy on the outside. One of the better ones in my experience.

NOMIN: prawn crispy noodles 生面
Originally uploaded by varf.

The prawn crispy noodles (生面) was well-received; J especially liked it. Sauce was thick and flavourful, noodles crunchy, eggs just slightly runny - nice. Prawns were well cooked and tasted fairly fresh.

But it went downhill from there.

NOMIN: stewed chicken with dried scallops 干贝鸡
Originally uploaded by varf.

The stewed chicken with dried scallops (干贝鸡) was a so-so thing, with the stew masking out the taste of everything else in the pot. To be fair, the chicken itself was tender and did practically melt off the bone, but I'd be fairly reluctant to order this again.

NOMIN: cuttlefish kang kong
Originally uploaded by varf.

I didn't try the cuttlefish kang kong since I don't like (1) chilli (2) kang kong, but the others felt that it was only so-so.

NOMIN: dried scallop tofu 干贝豆腐
Originally uploaded by varf.

The dried scallop tofu (干贝豆腐) looked fairly interesting. Impression from the first bite was decent, until the aftertaste began to set in - there was.. something.. that I didn't quite like. Rest of the family didn't like it much either.

NOMIN: butter prawns
Originally uploaded by varf.

The butter prawns, quite frankly, sucked. I usually like to load up on the crumbs for this dish, normally an intense taste explosion of butter and spices. But in this case, my spoonful of crumbs tasted like a spoonful of solidified cooking oil. Not pleasant.

NOMIN: prawn balls 虾枣
Originally uploaded by varf.

The he zhor (虾枣) was a disappointment. Over-fried, too crunchy and way too oily! That we had to wait quite a while for this dish due to some mix-up didn't help one bit. Yuck.

Clearly, there's some substantial variation in the quality of food at this joint. We do intend to come back and try their famous CPF hotpot. But if that doesn't meet the mark, then it's fairly unlikely that we'll be back for a third time.

食源味 NOMIN Seafood Restaurant
31 Teck Chye Terrace
Singapore 545731
Tel: 6286 3291

MIN JIANG at one north

2006-03-25T20:40:00.000+08:00

min jiang @ 5 rochester park
Originally uploaded by varf.

table @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

This entry is a little bit overdue, as I seem to have been putting it off for one reason or another. Better late than never?

We had dinner at Min Jiang at One North about two weeks ago. The original Min Jiang firmly established itself at the Goodwood Park Hotel; this new branch occupies one of the repurposed black-and-white bungalows of Rochester Park (which seems poised to be the next happening dining/entertainment row, with One Rochester Park already partying in full swing).

The parking area on the grounds was limited, so instead of surrendering my car key to the valet (I have had bad experiences with valets and my manual-shift car), I opted to park at the nearby multi-storey carpark and walked back to the restaurant. Although some diners conveniently parked along the road just opposite ACJC, flagrantly ignoring the road markings.

Seating is a mix of outdoor and indoor tables on the first floor, with intimate lighting and sufficient elbow-room. There's a bar counter on one side of the indoor setup, with stairs presumably leading to more rooms on the higher floors.

Min Jiang's proffered cuisine is Szechuan (Sichuan to some), one that I'm neither particular familiar with nor fond of because of its leanings towards spiciness. I wanted little to do with the dishes that appeared overly spicy, so there were some dishes we ordered that I didn't sample that night.

We started out with the drunken chicken, guo tie (锅贴) and xiao long bao (小龍包), all of which were pretty ordinary. Nice, but definitely ordinary.

I had the old cucumber (老黄瓜) soup, which was rich and tasty, if a wee bit pepper-ish. Though I guess I shouldn't have expected it to come with anything more than a single piece of old cucumber.

deep fried soon hock @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

The deep fried soon hock was well executed and tasted good, its skin crispy and meat still tender. Loved the presentation - not many places bother when it comes to deep fried soon hock.

camphor-wood and tea smoked duck @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

The camphor-wood and tea smoked duck was served Peking Duck style, placed with cucumber in a thin wrapper skin and brushed over with the familiar thick, heavy sauce. However, the sauce was overpowering and mangled the aroma of the duck, which stood extremely well on its own merit.

lobster pieces in salted egg yolk @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

Diced lobster "wong kum" style - though I'm sure that's not the actual name of the dish - went down quite well, despite the slight spiciness of chilli. Rich and chunky lobster pieces coated in salted egg yolk and fried; I can still recall its fragrant aroma and taste. J didn't like it.

dong po pork @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

Dong po rou is supposed to be mouth-wateringly tender, as a result of cooking the fatty layered pork over a slow fire. In this case, the fat did indeed melt in the mouth, but the meat wasn't quite as tender as I'd expected it to be. The sauce was thick and fairly spicy, so I didn't have much of it. Unfortunately, what I did experience was a fairly sharp nausea reaction after tasting this dish. My stomach has this strange sensitivity to certain foods, not exactly sure what triggers it. :(

hot and sour soup over crispy rice @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

I'm a fan of slightly-burnt rice (the cantonese call it fan jiew) and the next dish was something like a seafood hot-and-sour soup over slightly-burnt rice. But it was too spicy for me, plus my stomach was still reeling from the earlier nausea reaction, so I gave it a miss. The kai lan was pretty nicely done though, and helped calm my stomach's writhings.

honey glazed pork rib @ min jiang
Originally uploaded by varf.

Our final dish was the pork rib, glazed with some concoction of what seemed like honey and mango. This was supposed to have been served rather early in the meal, but there was a mix-up in the kitchen and we ended up having to chase for it after the other dishes had been served. The meat was succulent and juicy - my kind of pork rib.

Apart from the food which wasn't exactly outstanding and drew mixed reactions, service was fair but somewhat rough around the edges. Presentation and ambience were good. As for price.. definitely upmarket.

And given my personal disposition regarding spicy food.. I'd think twice about going again. What's the point if I don't really appreciate spiciness?

keeping ethan busy
Originally uploaded by varf.

MIN JIANG at one north
5 Rochester Park
Singapore 139216
Tel: 6774-0122

Strawberry Jellyhearts

2006-03-15T18:34:00.000+08:00

strawberry jellyhearts
Originally uploaded by varf.

My cousin dropped by last night with a box of Jellyhearts for us! A heart-shaped strawberry encased in strawberry jelly, over a thin cheesecake layer and base. Yummy :)~~

Sapporo Ramen Miharu 美春

2006-03-10T00:06:00.000+08:00

tokusen ramen @ sapporo ramen miharu
Originally uploaded by varf.

As it happens, last Sunday's 1pm episode of Japan Hour was all about Japanese ramen, which got us (brother, J and I) all fired up to get some for ourselves. So we dragged my dad (and Ethan of course, by default) off to Sapporo Ramen Miharu 美春 at the Gallery Hotel.

Miharu is one of those places that's been on my to-try list for a while. I don't venture into the area very often, and the last time I did it was closed (they rest on Wednesdays). The restaurant was fairly busy even at 2:30pm on a Sunday afternoon, but we managed to get a table for four fairly quickly, outside.

After perusing the menu for a minute, and with this being our first time there, it was pretty unanimous that we should try their default speciality: the tokusen ramen, $12.50. For another two dollars, the waitress explained, we could make that a large serving - one and a half portions of noodles. We eventually passed on that option (we were pretty hungry by then!) and ordered four bowls of tokusen ramen miso; one with extra cha siu (+$4) for Chris, and two with extra corn (+$1 each) for J and myself.

The extra corn turned out to be a mistake, and we were lucky that we passed on the upsize option, because the bowls were huge!

(Reminded me of one episode of Prince of Tennis that I watched recently, where Ryoma and Momoshiro were tricked into eating progressively larger portions of ramen in a winners-eat-free-losers-pay-double challenge by a sneaky restaurant owner.)

Some friends poke fun at me for being a Japanese food snob, at least in the context of not being Japanese, but I haven't had a lot of experience with ramen so I don't have a standard to go by yet (Ajisen doesn't count, yecch. Tenkaippin which I tried in Osaka, now, that was nice despite being a chain).

Anyhow, the noodles were okay, but the soup was a bit oily and the miso flavour not very distinctive. Honestly, it wasn't bad overall - it just wasn't very impressive. No complaints about the serving size though!

Would I go back for more? Probably not in a while, at least not until I get to try some other recommended alternatives like Ramen Ramen, or Noodle House Ken. Somehow I just don't see myself turning into a ramen fanatic any time soon.

Sapporo Ramen Miharu
76 Robertson Quay #01-11
Gallery Hotel
Tel: 6733 8464
Open 12-3pm, 6-10pm, closed on Wednesdays.

Wow, it's March already.

2006-03-01T12:36:00.000+08:00

Golden Gate at dusk, unprocessed
Originally uploaded by varf.

For my trip to the West Coast last week I took my tripod along, a lightweight Slik Pro 340DX weighing in at around 1.5 kilos. It spent practically all of its time either in the hotel room or in the trunk, but justified itself by allowing me to bag this shot of the Golden Gate bridge - a fifteen second exposure against a gusty breeze.

I hadn't been a believer in traveling with a tripod, but I guess I'm sold now!

lights out
Originally uploaded by varf.

In-your-face fatherhood
Sometimes it's still difficult for me to come to terms with the fact that I'm a Dad with a capital D. At least, during the times when Ethan is sleeping, since out-of-earshot means peace-of-mind for the now. But worry not, for Ethan is quick and eager to remind, alternating with toothless grins and a tenacious, ear-splitting wail. So I'm sure it won't take long for parenthood to etch itself into my eardrums.

A lot has happened in the past months that I haven't been blogging, but I'll dispense with racking my (really bad) memory for the details. Some memories were captured and uploaded to my flickr photostream, while others are destined to fade away, which is a pity really because I'm sure that many of them were nice memories, if only I could remember what they were. Ah, such is my lot.

Food-wise, I've tried a few places recently, but haven't found the strength to do any serious reviews. But do give the Galbiati Gourmet Deli a shot, especially their pizza, and let me know what you think. ;)

Galbiati Gourmet Deli
The Rail Mall
400 Upper Bukit Timah Rd
Singapore 678050
Tel: 6 462 0926 (call for reservations)

Merry Christmas!

2005-12-26T23:23:00.000+08:00

merry christmas!
Originally uploaded by varf.

A mostly quiet affair this year.

Caught the cold last week, and quickly followed it up with a rather nasty cough on X'mas eve. Still on medication now, which can't be much of a good thing.

Ethan's been fairly cooperative lately, settling into a somewhat regular sleep pattern at night. J and I have been taking turns falling sick, and it's a small wonder that he's managed to not catch any of our respective ailments. Atta boy!

I've been uploading Ethan's photos in bits and bursts, and I've managed to catch up to photos taken about a week ago. But the next stretch looks like it'll take some time - I just dumped 300 shots from my CF card, taken over the past week and during Christmas. Selecting photos for processing and upload is the most time-consuming part of it; I just can't seem to find sufficient trenches of free time at home. :|

Pooped

2005-11-19T21:49:00.000+08:00

Ethan's first month party today, in two sessions - for friends and for relatives. Planned to take photos but ended up being way too busy, gave up. Too tired to blog. Later.

To keep those monday blues at bay

2005-11-14T17:33:00.000+08:00

i surrender!
Originally uploaded by varf.

Keep on smiling! :)

Hope this brightened up your day.

Today

2005-11-12T21:23:00.000+08:00

Today, I spent a sobering afternoon visiting two private hospitals.

My unborn nephew, due early next year, was diagnosed yesterday with hydrocephalus, and the parents-to-be are understandably distraught.

We sought second, third and fourth opinions from various paediatric and ob/gyn specialists at both hospitals, and with each progressive consultation, one of the burning questions that kept bubbling to the surface was: shouldn't this have been detected much earlier by the first opinion? The last specialist consultant we visited appeared to be sorely tempted to drop hints about possible malpractice, but would not say it outright. J was particularly unhappy about how the first conducted himself.

Q: What is the prognosis?

The prognosis for patients diagnosed with hydrocephalus is difficult to predict, although there is some correlation between the specific cause of the hydrocephalus and the patient's outcome. Prognosis is further complicated by the presence of associated disorders, the timeliness of diagnosis, and the success of treatment.

Thankfully, scans so far show that my nephew doesn't seem to have any other disorders associated with hydrocephalus. The less to worry about, the better.

... Affected individuals and their families should be aware that hydrocephalus poses risks to both cognitive and physical development. However, many children diagnosed with the disorder benefit from rehabilitation therapies and educational interventions and go on to lead normal lives with few limitations.

There is a very real chance of development retardation - the accumulated fluid in the ventricles would put pressure on his brain mass and potentially hamper its growth. So the sooner the fluid gets drained away, the better.

At this stage of the pregnancy, unfortunately, my nephew's lungs are far from mature. To take him out of the womb now would guarantee at least a month in intensive care - a burden that would probably bankrupt the couple. The ob/gyns also advised that the chances of survival are higher if the foetus remains in the womb longer; ICU time (and hence charges) would also probably be lower.

But the killer question, then, is whether to leave the foetus inside and risk further damage to his development, or take him out early to get the shunt procedure done ASAP while risking the plethora of complications (and costs) associated with severely premature births? There's no easy answer to this one.

The case was referred to KK by one of the private ob/gyns, since in his opinion, their (KK's) multi-disciplinary team would be better equipped to handle the situation in case multiple complications arise. Also, the savings due to government subsidies will ease the financial burden substantially.

I pray that my nephew will be all right.

Today, I turn thirty, and I am very thankful for what I have been blessed with.

fd's Flickr Toys Calendar

2005-11-08T20:20:00.000+08:00

ethan november 2005 calendar
Originally uploaded by varf.

I just have to plug fd's Flickr Toys. The Calendar toy makes it soooo convenient to create a printable monthly calendar.

You don't even need to be a flickr member to use it - all you need is the URL to the picture that you want to use (usually the one ending in .jpg).

Got to figure out which photos to use to create a 'motivational' poster, or maybe a magazine cover even.

Fire in the sky

2005-11-07T23:32:00.000+08:00

fire in the sky
Originally uploaded by varf.

The view out of our window yesterday. With some colour tweaking.

Two weeks

2005-10-31T17:01:00.000+08:00

I've never really been a morning person, as those around me would attest. From the early years in school right through National Service to the laid-back-while-hectic days of university education, I've always been a 'late' person. The late mister varf. Ha ha ha.

The last two weeks with Ethan has changed all of that.

Not only have I been getting up early to start the day, I've also lost track of where all the time has gone. Between feeds and nappy changes, J and I have been struggling to wash and sterilize bottles, shore up on babyware stocks which we naively thought we had plenty excess of, and maybe shovel some food down while we're at it.

I couldn't even find spare time to process and upload his delivery photos until five days after - hence the delay on the last entry announcing his arrival. Thankfully things have calmed down a bit, to the point where I actually have time to sit down and select photos for upload.

As I key this entry in on the iBook, Ethan is sleeping quietly next to me on the bed, occasionally flailing his arms in an agitated manner - possibly to ward off some monster in a bad dream - before settling back down into a peaceful slumber. If only it was always so easy.

The first two nights were the most trying. Not getting enough sustenance from the precious few drops of colostrum with each suckle, Ethan's agitation was apparent, much to our dismay and rising frustration (and sleep deprevation). We had to resort to feeding him with glucose water and bottled formula milk just to tide things over. Much to our relief, J's breast milk came in on the third day, washing away much of our breastmilk-or-formula anxiety.

On the fourth day, the pediatrician diagnosed him with jaundice, and recommended re-admitting Ethan to the nursery for photo-treatment under the UV light for two days. J was heartbroken. For two mind-numbingly exhausting days I drove J back and forth between home and hospital, alternating between nursing him in one of the rooms in the ward and delivering bottled expressed breast milk to be fed to him by the nurses. He was discharged two days later, on Sunday.

The next day I had to go back to work for a whole week. Which finally brings me back to the mornings thing - I decided to shift my schedule to start work earlier each day, in order to get home early enough to interact with my son while he'd still be alert and aware.

I guess it helps that the irregular feeding hours in the wee mornings have kicked my sleep cycle out of whack. Having to shoot straight out of deep slumber to change a badly soiled nappy on a wailing and twisting four-ish kilogram dynamo does that kind of thing to your system. I've not shot a sunrise photo (that I can remember) before the one I've put at the top of this entry; the photo was taken early yesterday morning.

Going by some of the surprises in these first two weeks, the next couple of months will probably prove to be interesting at the very least, if not frantic and downright exhausting. But for now, I'm just enjoying the momentary lull in activity - and that contented look on his cherubic face, still happily sound asleep.

And then, there was light

2005-10-22T22:42:00.000+08:00

Ethan, the most recent member of our family, was delivered on Monday, Oct 17, 2005, after spending a full 40 weeks in his mother's womb.

We wish unto our precious son happiness and a fulfilling life ahead. Happy birthday, Ethan!

More to follow soon. It's been one heck of a week.

Overdue

2005-10-16T17:59:00.000+08:00

Let the waiting commence.

Making frames where the sun don't shine

2005-10-13T22:17:00.000+08:00

Shot a dinner event on Tuesday, a portrait on Wednesday, and a series of posed pictures today, all for various office-related purposes.

Recently picked up an optical slave unit for my flash, and a remote IR trigger to go along with it. Used them both to good effect for the portrait:

And also for the "six on a sofa" series:

(more)

Didn't need to do touch-up on the portrait photo at all. For the sofa series, I removed a couple of wall switches, did an auto-contrast on the photos with the even lighting, and pushed up the saturation slightly.

Going to hound the office folks for official budget for photographic equipment, wish me luck. :)

Dabbling in the dark arts

2005-10-10T00:30:00.000+08:00

dabbling in the dark arts, originally uploaded by varf.

Experimental self-portrait with an optical flash slave, a lightsphere, a remote flash trigger borrowed from Wantunn, repeatedly rushing to pose after triggering the camera's 10-second timer, and some judicious photoshopping for the red tone.

Who moved my mouse?

2005-10-09T23:31:00.000+08:00

Thursday night saw the team (and some cameos) in the new office, reconstructing our desktops from mover's boxes and testing cable points into the wee hours, just to make sure the network would be in some usable state come Friday morning.

Come Friday morning, the tech folks are tired and worn out, and the connection in the new office is still unstable to the point where, after setting up their personal work areas, most people pack up and head home for the comfort of their home broadband and VPN. That's what I presumed, at any rate, but it was a Friday...

We are now located in a swankier part of town (but not by much, IMHO) with a moderately nicer view (ok fine, quite a bit nicer, but could be better still). It's far less convenient than I'd like, morning/lunch/evening traffic is hellish and parking charges are almost double compared to the old place. I tagged some of my flickr photos related to the office move, you can find them here.

Still trying to figure out new food places and optimal meal timings, but I guess that will take a couple of weeks at best. So we went with an old food place for lunch instead...

bpp
Had a taste of lunch hour traffic on Friday as we drove out to Beo Crescent for Hainanese Curry Rice - affectionately referred to as bak par png (bpp), or pork chop rice, by the office gang. The drive from the new office, shorter in terms of absolute distance, definitely took much longer than from the old office - ouch.

But the trip was worth it. Good old bpp. Still satisfying after all this time.

Portraiture Workshop

2005-10-05T08:59:00.000+08:00

Attended the BootBOX portraiture workshop last Sat, where the focus was to try and break away from the ordinary "pretty smiling face, half-body, randomly blurred background" type of shots. Had some fun trying to break my conventional style, though old habits die hard and most of my attempts fell into the "regular" bucket.

The event itself was marred by bouts of stormy weather and bad logistics planning. The prearranged transport never arrived, and those of us with vehicles had to double as ferries for the rest. We started shooting late, rushing madly to capture something interesting before the sky turned completely dark.

One thing that I'm sure of - it gets messy with a large group of shooters. There were around 20 people shooting four models, and we kept getting in each other's way. I now understand the value of smaller organized shoots.

I'm just happy that I learned a couple of new things during the session, despite all of the hiccups.

Where did the week go?

2005-09-25T01:15:00.000+08:00

The week flew by in a snap.

Monday. Had dinner with friends at Miss U Cafe again. Finally got to try their Ham and Mushroom pizza... nice.

Tuesday. Tried Waraku at East Coast Park on Kerj's recommendation - not bad for the budget, worth going back to. Rained pots and pans.

Went to satisfy J's Awfully Chocolate craving: One pint of dark chocolate ice cream and half a kilogram of original chocolate cake. The Awfully Chocolate outlet at Joo Chiat was replaced by the one within Katong Mall.

Wednesday. Got hauled off to Ten-shin at Regent Hotel for dinner - hole-in-the-pocket pricy, serving refined (high-class) tempura. Great quality, great service, great big bill too - good thing I wasn't paying for it! Personally though, I still prefer Tsunahachi's (in Tokyo) no-nonsense approach to tempura, fantastic value there, pity about the need to fly. :(

Thursday. Mad logistics scramble at the office; had to step in to organize events for overseas visitors on short notice. Grabbed a quick bite at Mac's before dropping by to visit ducky's daughter who's down with pneumonia. Agonized over possibly having to cater for both vegetarian and no-seafood options for Friday's dinner with visitors. Worn out.

Friday. Meetings and more logistics scrambling. Roped Mozz and gang in to help with arranging the get-well delivery, and to think up dinner options. Finally found the chance to enquire about dietary requirements, just to discover that my vegetarian worries were completely unfounded. Settled on a Thai restaurant near the office for transport convenience. Realized too late that the dinner set didn't cater well for the no-seafood guest; had to make a special separate order. Note to self #1: ordering for twelve means way too much food for twelve. Note to self #2: Thai food, especially tom yum soup, is too spicy even for the Koreans. Completely knackered.

Saturday. Slept in late despite promising to try waking up for breakfast. Spent the rest of the day paying my rest debt buildup over the last two days.

I need a holiday.

Not that I'm going to get one any time soon. Especially not now.

Good service at Cold Storage, Katong Mall

2005-09-18T19:40:00.000+08:00

Tammy, our cashier at the Katong Mall Cold Storage today, warned us that the mop head and handle shaft that we wanted to purchase might not fit properly. She then tried to assemble the mop, and sure enough, it wouldn't fit together - the screw threads didn't match up.

So I went back to the household row and picked up another mop head which looked like it had the right type of screw thread, and was ready to pay for it, when Tammy pointed out that this one might not fit either - and it didn't. There weren't any other alternatives left, so we gave up.

Thanks for saving us from the hassle of having to come back and return the item.

Dim sum and chocolate ice-cream

2005-09-18T18:53:00.000+08:00

Okay, so it's not your typical combination of foods. It's also probably a good thing that we didn't try to consume them together. Anyway.

Dim sum: Victor's Kitchen
J was craving for dim sum, so we went to try Victor's Kitchen at Sunshine Plaza for lunch. Located inside the building on the ground floor, the place isn't very big at all. We had to wait for one of the tables lining the corridor outside the shop.

The oyster sauce char siew pau was filled with a pretty decent portion of chunky meat, only downside is that you get two buns per order (instead of three at most dim sum places).

I liked the lor mai kai (one per order), and the carrot cake was particularly good. Didn't really think much of the har gao and siew mai, but then again, I'm not a huge fan of those either. Didn't order the custard bun recommended by ChubbyHubby.

Overall a good first impression, marred only by the kids at the next table who almost knocked our table over and didn't bother to apologize. Brats. And what's the point in parents telling their kids to say sorry and then not following up when they don't?

Chocolate ice-cream: Awfully Chocolate
Took rien's suggestion and dropped by the Awfully Chocolate outlet in Katong Mall to try out one scoop of their chocolate ice-cream.

It's served in a small, kitschy-but-cute pseudo-chinese-takeout paper bucket. The chocolate taste is intense; rien called it "orgasmic". Very good stuff - J was sorely tempted to get another scoop. Heard good things about their chocolate cakes too, so we'll come back to check it out another time.

Koyasu no to

2005-09-15T11:21:00.000+08:00

koyasu no to, originally uploaded by varf.

Another shot from the Japan trip in May (original).

This pagoda dedicated to the Koyasu Kannon is located within the sprawling grounds of Kiyomizu-dera (清水寺) in Kyoto. Women visit this pagoda in the hopes of having easy childbirth (not sure if that covers conception).

Father and son

2005-09-11T23:57:00.000+08:00

This one's for Euch.

Wedding by the waterside

2005-09-11T16:51:00.000+08:00

Attended a wedding at Raffles Marina on Friday evening.

Never thought that I'd get to shoot a sunset-in-the-sea type photo in Singapore, since I don't really see much of the western edge of the island.

It was an outdoor wedding facing the sea, with round guest tables set up on the lawn, and buffet lines set up discreetly on both ends. The moored yachts doubled reluctantly as a quiet backdrop. A "main event" tent up front and center served as the stage for the evening, housing the solemnization ceremony and the entertainment that followed after.

The bride arrived in style..

..and so the celebrations commenced.

The biggest downer that night was the weather; the wind clamped its bellows shut and refused to cooperate, forcing sleeves to be rolled up and collars loosened. Throughout dinner, many retreated into the clubhouse for reprieve from the heat. Tough luck, but at least it didn't rain.

Parting shot of the marina (yes I don't get many chances to shoot this kind of thing so bear with me):

More photos from the event here. Didn't take too many pics this time.

Menotti revisited

2005-09-09T23:37:00.000+08:00

Had lunch today at Menotti with some friends. In contrast to the favourable reaction exactly three months ago, today's experience was downright disappointing.

Food-wise, my lasagne (the only thing I ordered) felt like an assembly-line dish, lacking punch and personality. Very quickly jelak. Service-wise, the waitress that serv^H^H^H^H attended to our table today was stormy-faced and impatient to the point of being rude. A request to delay the decision on choice of dessert for the set lunch was met with a grunt of disgruntled acceptance, accompanied by a disapproving frown-and-shake-of-the-head. Give us a break. Do we owe you a living?

Quite suddenly, I'm not so inclined to pay $19.90 for their set lunch anymore. One bad service experience is one too many for the price.

Buko Nero: Dinner

2005-09-09T00:36:00.000+08:00

The second hardest part of going to Buko Nero for dinner is deciding between the mouth-watering specials. The hardest part, by far, is having to wait out that one month or so from the time of securing the reservation to actually getting to eat there.

We've been visiting Buko Nero regularly since the restaurant's early days, and the Pasinatos have never failed to impress. I remember that during one of my first visits, they served up a zany citrus-flavoured pre-meal "refresher" drink in clear test tubes, all lined up on a shiny wireframe rack that could have come straight out of a science lab!

Before dinner there on Wednesday night we asked if I could take photos, and the reply was along the lines of "as long as you only shoot the stuff on your table, and absolutely no shots of the kitchen". Well, that's perfectly fine by me!

So here goes - this is what we had for dinner on Wednesday:

Mozzarella and tomato crostino topped with parma ham. I was totally blown away by the first bite - this innocent-looking bite packs a huge juicy punch that's literally bursting with flavour. Wow.

Porcini mushroom soup, laced with white truffle oil, and one of our all-time BN favourites. J was tempted to ask for an extra take-home serving.

The Tau Kwa Tower - Buko Nero's ever-popular signature appetizer is Mom's favourite regular starter.

My starter for the night: crab meat and fresh orange salad, with lemon dressing, and laced with tobikko - a very striking combination of flavour and texture. Unfortunately, towards the last few mouthfuls the citrus flavour became a bit overpowering. I probably shouldn't have tried to scoop up the last bits of tobikko floating around in the remaining dressing.

The beef ravioli in wanton skin that I'd raved about previously was available again as a special that night, and J jumped at the chance (with just a little nudge from Tracy). Yumm-y!

Spicy crusted cod with red miso dressing, another one of the specials available that night. Aunt S. had this one, and I forgot to try a sample. Doh!

Beef tenderloin wrapped with bacon and topped with a porcini ragu. I had a hard time deciding between this and the cod above, and eventually decided on the beef, medium rare. Which turned out to be very nice indeed; it was almost as if the bacon had been grafted onto the circumference of the tenderloin, keeping all of the juicy flavour sealed within. Fabulous!

"Like a tart, but with a cake-like texture," said Tracy about the banana budino. "It's topped with banana chips. Non-alcoholic." How could I resist? It had a moderately light cake-like texture, was sinfully sweet (but banana's good for you isn't it? so it's OK :P) and the banana chips added that crunchy bite (bordering a little on the hard side). Good stuff.

This, excuse the pun, took the cake. The rich chocolate panforte with vanilla coulis was scrawled on the whiteboard as part of the set dinner menu, but that didn't stop J from ordering it. And what a pleasant surprise that turned out to be - a dense slice of intensely chocolatey cake packed with nuts, complemented nicely by the rich vanilla sauce. An absolute winner!

There's a one-month booking window from the current date, but it's often filled up quickly by regulars, parties and events. It's probably easiest just to ask when the next available slot is, book it, then adjust your schedule (and guest list) to fit.

Buko Nero
126 Tanjong Pagar Road
Singapore 088534
Tel: 6324 6225

Snap me if you can

2005-09-07T00:20:00.000+08:00

snap me if you can, originally uploaded by varf.

Finally got around to pushing more photos from the Japan trip up onto flickr.

This one was a fun shot - the kid kept flashing quick poses at the camera as if daring me to catch one.. so I did. :)

Pepper lunch and birthday dinner

2005-09-03T23:00:00.000+08:00

and

La Braceria

2005-09-03T15:28:00.000+08:00

First impressions last.

And our first encounter with La Braceria's profitterol in July was so impressive that we were looking forward to enjoying it again during last night's dinner.

Finding the place is a mite tough the first time around, as it's tucked away in a small two-row shophouse enclave nestled deep inside the Greenleaf residential estate. By car, it would probably be easiest to turn into Maryland Drive from Holland Road, or work your way through Ming Teck Park from Sixth Avenue. Maryland Drive flows straight into Greenleaf Road; the entrance to the carpark appears soon after the downhill on the right-hand side. It's actually fairly difficult to spot the place until you're almost upon it, so go slow.

J and I were the first customers to arrive at the restaurant yesterday, just past 7:30pm (they open for dinner from 6pm). Mom and Dad had called to say that they were stuck in a traffic jam and would be late. Shortly after we arrived, we watched as an unlucky couple without a reservation was turned away, after being presented with the restaurant's business card and some advice to call ahead for their next visit.

Like Buko Nero, La Braceria is fully packed every night, with just five or six tables available. Thankfully, unlike Buko Nero, we didn't have to book a month in advance - we called just two days before.

(I'm not very good with remembering names of dishes due to lack of familiarity, especially Italian dishes, so please excuse me if I get them wrong or leave them out in favour of ingredient names.)

On our last visit we tried the eggplant, the homemade sausages and the stuffed portabello mushrooms for starters, polished off a spaghetti vongole (Dad's regular Italian restaurant order) and a great wood-fired pizza (forgot which) and maybe one other main, and ended off with the absolutely amazing profitterol on the waiter's recommendation.

This time around, we went for the Antipasto Braceria and a baby spinach salad as appetizers; rosemary lamb chops, fillet of beef tenderloin and a spaghetti vongole (no prizes for guessing whose order that was) for mains; and followed up with profitterol and a lava cake for dessert.

The Antipasto Braceria. Oven-baked scamorza cheese, topped with mushrooms. The cheese was like mozzarella but milder, chewy and soft. I liked the edge parts where the cheese was a little more cooked and brown.

J's baby spinach salad, which came with extra bits of avocado by special request. Topped with sliced almonds, cherry tomatoes, bacon and a light dressing.

Mom's lamb chops - she had them done medium. Juicy and succulent, with unhealthy chunks of fat attached to each rack. Very nicely done. Highly recommended by the waiter.

270 grams of mouthwatering tenderloin steak, done medium rare, and all mine! Well, most of it was. Also highly recommended by the waiter. The photo doesn't do the steak justice; it was fabulously done. Even J caved in and took some, despite the meat being fairly red (yum!).

Dad's spaghetti vongole. The quality of the pasta was amazing - the spaghetti held a beautifully firm texture without being hard, the gravy thick and intense, and the clams cooked just nice. Wow.

The lava cake took a short while to come as it baked in the oven. In the middle of the icing-sprinkled confection is a reservoir of sticky, gooey chocolate... mmmm. Great with a coffee.

What we'd been looking forward to - the profitterol. Four pieces of puff pastry stuffed with thick, rich cream, and topped with melted chocolate - heavenly! Unfortunately the first impression had stuck; it didn't feel quite as nice as before, perhaps because the chocolate wasn't warm and oozing like the first time. But still delish!

Cost-wise: the lamb chops and tenderloin were $32 each, starters are in the range of $16-18 and the pizzas go for $20-22-ish. But hey, you get what you pay for - excellent quality Italian food, and a good wine selection (taking Dad's word for it).

Cheers!

Service-wise: staff are friendly and helpful, and overall service is generally of a high standard. However, our empty water glasses went unnoticed for some time, and required some prompting for refills.

Second impressions either confirm first impressions, or shatter them. And our second experience with La Braceria was still as impressive as the first. It's a great place for a nice, upmarket meal.

La Braceria Pizza & Grill
70 Greenleaf Road
Ban Guan Park
Singapore 279356
Tel: 6465 5918
Open Monday to Sunday
Lunch 12pm to 2pm
Dinner 6pm to 10:30pm

And I thought it would never happen

2005-08-31T23:57:00.000+08:00

.. at least, not so soon!

J's been afraid of dogs (and cats and most animals) since being traumatized by one at an early age. We've been telling her that the best way to overcome her phobia would be to start off with a puppy.

So when she picked Jingle up and seated him in her lap, it surprised us all - J herself most of all, probably! Jingle belongs to our friend NeeCe.

Kazu Sumi-Yaki

2005-08-29T23:11:00.000+08:00

Kazu is a cosy little yakitori joint on the fourth floor of Cuppage Plaza, and is one of my all-time favourite restaurants in Singapore.

If memory serves, the owner-chef once worked at Nanbantei, one of the oldest established yakitori restaurants in Singapore, before striking out on his own many years ago. The fact that Kazu Sumi-Yaki is still packed to the brim night after night, year after year is a strong testament to what Kazu's regulars have known for years - here be good stuff!

The clientele is varied - after-hours execs, actors and actresses, European expatriates, Japanese families, yuppie jet-setters, tai-tais, party puppets, the lot. Of lounging space there's precious little. Even though the lighting is soft and cosy, it's hard to envision a Kazu dinner being romantic by any stretch of the imagination. It's also kind of difficult to feel romanced as the smell of cooking settles into your clothes, so save that nonsense for some other time and just enjoy the food.

Here's what we had for dinner on Sunday night:

Sweet japanese cabbage, served as a complimentary appetizer. Goes well with the brown yakitori dipping sauce (no picture, unfortunately).

Two sticks of shimeji mushroom wrapped with bacon, and two sticks of asparagus wrapped with bacon. Bite into the "heads" end of the mushrooms first; if you try it the other way the "heads" will drop out. :)

Ginkgo nuts, grilled and salted. The skin of the nuts is edible. One of my favourite yakitori/robatayaki items.

Skewered shiitake mushrooms stuffed with minced chicken, and garlic-on-a-stick, nicely browned. Takes the sting out of the garlic but leaves the fragrance.

Grilled eggplant stuffed with minced chicken. Juicy and chewy, it tastes much better than it sounds. :)

We usually have the grilled squid with teriyaki (?) sauce, but decided to try the salt-dipped version this time. Having tried both, I still like the sauce version better.

Two sticks of beef (a mix-up, we ordered beef tendon) and one stick of chicken with plum (ume) paste. The beef turned out to be pretty good anyway.

Chicken meatball (tsukune), dipped in sweet sauce. Like the kind that they sell at Tori-Q, but much better - chunkier and juicier. Another regular favourite. (Truth be told, the best tsukune we've had to date was at GAN-CHAN, a small yakitori joint in Roppongi, Tokyo. But Kazu's version is still pretty darn satisfying.)

Yaki onigiri, or grilled rice ball on a stick. The one in front is smeared with miso paste, while the one at the back is soy-sauce flavoured. You'll like this if you're a fan of slightly burnt rice (fan jiew in Cantonese?).

Four sticks of chicken wings, one stick for each of us. Best candidate for squeezing a lemon slice over. What's a yakitori meal without chicken wings?

Freshly-grilled foie gras, oozing flavour, defining indulgence and promising a cardiac arrest sometime in the future. The fragrant aroma hit the senses hard, long before this dish of sin-on-sticks physically appeared our table. Both sticks were snapped up quickly upon arrival, and seconds followed soon after.

Mochi (rice flour cake?) wrapped with bacon, and grilled slowly until the mochi expands. Somewhat similar to rice crackers, but imagine chewy and sticky instead of crunchy. J and Mom love this stuff so much (so do I, actually!) that we always pre-order to make sure they don't run out.

Small green pimento peppers (shishito), grilled and salted. I like these things. They're not very spicy, which suits me just fine since I don't take to spicy stuff like chilli. Go figure.

They brought the beef tendon after realizing the mix-up with the beef order. Dad says it's great stuff, but I think I'll just take his word for it.

This Japanese sweet potato takes a long time to grill, so it's best ordered right from the start (pre-order recommended). Goes very well with slabs of chilled butter.

Need I say that we like the food?

Service is usually prompt and attentive, but sometimes there's the occasional miss and mix-up with the orders when the place gets too busy. Tea is complimentary, but if you want drinking water you'll have to order it - no freebie there.

Kazu is one place that I absolutely have to recommend to friends. It may not be the best restaurant around, not by a long stretch. But it's definitely a long-run winner to me. Don't miss out!

KAZU SUMI-YAKI
No. 5 Koek Road
#04-05 Cuppage Plaza
Tel: 6734 2492
Open 18:00-23:00
Reservations recommended

Call of nature, force of habit?

2005-08-29T16:22:00.000+08:00

The current office spans two floors, both of which come with attached toilets. In the gents on both floors, there are two urinals - one at regular height and the other at a lower height presumably for accessibility reasons.

Coincidentally, both regular-height urinals have drainage problems; the poor sod that arrives after is usually treated to a nausea-inducing visual (and often odorous) experience. Good thing then that the lower urinals drain quickly.

Incidental observations of timing and residue indicate that certain persons insist on using the regular-height urinals when presented with the choice, despite the unpleasant consequences. And it's not like these persons are of such immense stature that it would require some serious act of contortion on their part to use the lower-height fixture - I mean come on, I'm around six feet tall and I can use it just fine.

Dorks like these should be clamped to the urinal until it drains completely. Along with the jokers that conduct loud mobile conversations while pacing around other people's desks.

Traffic-stopping commotion

2005-08-25T23:15:00.000+08:00

Heard some loud shouting coming from downstairs while we were having a meeting at the office. Wantunn put his head to the window to take a look and uttered an exclamation; in a heartbeat the rest of us rushed over to see.

Some weird guy with visible tattoos on his body was standing bare-chested right smack in the middle of North Bridge Road, right in front of a double-decker bus, making wild kung-fu poses and waving his arms and legs madly. It was evident that the bus had tried to get around him, and also obvious that he'd moved accordingly to block its progress. Traffic slowed to a crawl as other nervous vehicles attempted to edge past without attracting attention.

By the time Ducky and I managed to retrieve our cameras, the fellow had changed his target to the BMW in the shot above. With one foot planted firmly on the car's bonnet, he gesticulated wildly, dishing out intimidating poses and stares and refusing to budge, as if daring the driver to step on the accelerator.

weirdie and the BMW - more gesticulation, originally uploaded by varf.

After several minutes of impasse, the man inexplicably squatted in front of the BMW, cradling his head in his arms. He then slowly stood up and moved to the side to let the car pass, clasping his hands together and bowing like some Kung Fu/Shaolin monk who's just had the honour of dueling with a famous martial artist.

weirdie and the BMW - bowing out of the way, originally uploaded by varf.

The police came after a while and brought him to the side of the road for questioning.

weirdie gets taken to the lobby, originally uploaded by qoomonster.

Was it drugs or too much to drink? Or just pure lunacy? We'll probably never know.

Relaxation and relief

2005-08-21T21:37:00.000+08:00

I haven't felt such relief at passing solid motion in a long time. There wasn't much stool - not surprising given the porridge and soft food diet of the last six days - but at least it wasn't watery.

Saturday was terrible, as fever, fatigue and dizzyness set in despite frequent naps and being mostly inactive. Today, the headaches and temperature are gone, and my body isn't aching anymore, but with a couple of taps on the tummy J proclaims that there's plenty of gas left in my colon. I'd better go easy on the food this week.

Spent most of the weekend at home resting, catching up on One Piece from the beginning, and taking turns solving Super Puzzle Bobble 2 puzzles with J.

Speaking of which, I should do an entry on games soon just for memories' sake, before mine completely deserts me.

It started with a fish

2005-08-18T22:33:00.000+08:00

It started with a fish, just one miserable piece of under-thawed batter-fried cod fillet on Monday night.

That night, stomach heaved and gut churned, heralding the imminent arrival of the dread Dire Rear. I sought to contain it within the ivory walls of the Bowl, but even the combined powers of Harpic and The Glade could not entirely suppress its dark, miasmic presence.

"That stinks," said J, "if it doesn't get better, you'll have to see the doctor tomorrow."

"Yes dear," said I.

Ok, so The Glade was pure embellishment, but diarrhoea kept me grounded and clutching my gut for the last two days. Not quite so bad as last year's bout, but enough to pummel me into a bed-chair-sofa existence. The doc dealt out the usual cards - symptomatic medication, rest, water, no oily stuff, stick to plain porridge.

Damned sickness takes the wind right out of your sails.

Meow.

2005-08-08T23:43:00.000+08:00

meow., originally uploaded by varf.

Stray cat that just woke up from a nap on the rack of an old bicycle.

Miss U Cafe

2005-08-08T22:39:00.000+08:00

miss u cafe, originally uploaded by varf.

A couple of weeks ago, I'd read about the Miss U Cafe at Simpang Bedok and had wanted to give it a shot, but I'd forgotten to grab the address, directions or phone number on the way out of the house.

This time, we went with friends who'd been there recently.

The cafe itself is dimly lit, sporting a cake/coffee/ice-cream counter that serves New Zealand All Natural ice-cream, several comfy-looking sofas for lounging, two PCs in the corner which I presume provide quick websurfing access, and a good number of tables, two of which are already occupied as we are shown to our table, with smiles.

I was eyeing the ham and mushroom pizza, one of the menu's "star recommendations", but unfortunately they'd run out. So I settled for the Hawaiian instead, which surprised me by being laced with pesto sauce (I think). Not your everyday combination, but it did work rather well.

J ordered german pork sausages from the finger food section, sliced thinly and served with a mustard dip. Juicy, tasty and oozing oil, but a little bit too salty, would probably go well with beer. The other two guys both picked the lamb chops, which looked disgustingly good. I am so going to try that next time.

We'll be back.

Miss U Cafe (and Wine Shop)
14 Jalan Pari Burong
Singapore 488680
Tel: 6243.6266
Open: Sun-Thu 11am-12mn | Fri,Sat,Eve of Public Holiday 11am-1am

Opposing sides

2005-08-07T16:35:00.000+08:00

opposing sides, originally uploaded by varf.

Left and right, top and bottom, front and back, here and there, now and then.

opposing sides, duo, originally uploaded by varf.

Can't I smoke in peace?

2005-08-04T23:53:00.000+08:00

what are you looking at?, originally uploaded by varf.

Took this photo this morning with the recently announced restrictions on public smoking in mind.

Quick dinner stop: Imperial Treasure Teochew Kitchen

2005-08-03T22:20:00.000+08:00

Having formed fairly good impressions of the Imperial Treasure Nan Bei restaurant at Takashimaya, we decided to give its sister outlet at Suntec, the Imperial Treasure Teochew Kitchen, a shot.

Style and execution are hauntingly similar to Crystal Jade Kitchen (for good reasons, I am told). The menu is on one sheet of paper that doubles as your placemat. Your orders are printed out neatly on a slip of paper that is placed on your table for the waitress to check off against as she delivers your food.

We ordered braised goose meat, preserved vegetables with braised pork, and some hong kong kai lan. There was a bit of a mix-up with the goose meat - the wrong dish had been delivered to our table - but they changed it to the right one with minimal fuss.

The mui choi kou yoke was gooood, I'd recommend it.

I also tried the honey-and-watercress drink just for the fun of it. It didn't look at all like what I'd expected - it was clear and light yellow-green, not cloudy and deep green. It tasted a little bit like sugarcane, although the watercress taste was still distinguishable. A novelty drink; not something I'd want to order again.

Did I say that the mui choi kou yoke was good? J likes it too. Yummy.

It's pretty amazing how successful the Imperial Treasure restaurants have been in the short span of time that they've been open. Good food delivered in good time with good service at reasonable prices; a great forumla that's hard to beat.

Time pieces

2005-08-03T14:03:00.000+08:00

Last week passed by in a blurry recollection of late nights, frayed nerves, simmering tempers and red eyestrain. We actually made it for that ridiculous deadline without losing anyone, although that last bit involved some superhuman restraint on my end.

Last-minute changes seldom make people happy, harassed techies least of all.

Keeping time
If there's anything that acutely marks the start of a new work month, it's the monthly report for the previous month. It's like doing a timesheet, not unlike what lawyers do on a regular basis for time-based work; and like all reports, time-consuming as hell.

I'm told that one of the main reasons for this report is to determine which department pays our salary based on the time and effort expended on their account. Which makes me wonder, to whom and for how much should I attribute that annoying email which took one minute to read, half an hour to fume over, five minutes to construct a response to, fifteen minutes to remove most of the stings and barbs in said response, and an additional twenty-five minutes to cool down and get re-oriented to the previous, interrupted task?

I haven't even counted the amount of time it takes to recover from processing said report, invariably involving one or more of the following: imbibing a warm beverage, consuming food-not-amounting-to-a-meal, hitting a ball with a man on a stick (read whichever way you want).

Time passes
.. and we all get older. Other times pass, and we all pool together to get someone a gift that symbolizes the passing of time:

Time passes, and my wallet gets lighter. But what the heck; Happy Belated Birthday(s)! :)

Fab desktop fun

2005-07-26T22:27:00.000+08:00

Yahoo! recently announced the purchase of Konfabulator, and released a completely free version to the public, which we've been fiddling around with for the last couple of days. It's like putting a layer over your desktop, on which you can add useful (and some useless) mini-applications called widgets. Works on both Mac and Windows.

I have several active widgets on my desktop at the moment - a calendar widget, an analog clock widget, a stock ticker widget, a floating "where is it?" search box configured for quick access to Yahoo! Search, and a picture frame that pulls new photos from the main flickr photostream every minute or so.

Still looking for a good RSS reader widget. I found several in the widget gallery but none of them seem to do what I want. Guess I could look into modifying one of the existing widgets, but that's only if I can find the time. Maybe next month.

Blogging 001 - Spelig iz opshunl

2005-07-25T08:54:00.000+08:00

The latter part of qoomonster's latest entry is a list of "things people should know if they want to blog". Point #5 in particular struck a nasty chord:

The one thing missing from most blog publishing tools are a spell- and grammar- check

Not that I'm bothered about the occasional grammatical mistake or language error, but when someone's blog/email/comment turns into an SMS/l33t-fest, it gets annoying to say the least. In this day and age, we have the choice and convenience of online dictionaries like Merriam-Webster Online and Dictionary.com. Do everyone a favour and use them often. If you use FireFox or SlickRun, create a keyword shortcut - it saves tons of time.

Besides, you can still go wrong with a spelling checker.

Amoy Street Hawker Centre

2005-07-24T22:18:00.000+08:00

Had cze char for dinner at Amoy Street Hawker Centre at this stall named Quan Ji, which Mom insists that she'd brought me to before. Must have been too long ago for me to remember, since I didn't have any kind of impression whatsoever. Anyway.

Ordered four dishes - san lao he, kai lan, pai guat wong and prawn-paste chicken, all of which were fairly nicely done. Photos of everything except the kai lan:

Spotted while waiting: Two old men and their two friendly beers, Guinness and Tiger.

Reunion at twelve

2005-07-24T17:36:00.000+08:00

davin, originally uploaded by varf.

Our old JC choir gang had a reunion of sorts on Saturday. It was meant to be a send-off party for one of our number who'd be departing on a 10-month overseas stint with UNICEF, but mainly we just had a good time, catching up with one another on family and personal developments over the past twelve years since our graduation.

The kid in the photo is the son of one of our altos. Despite the lack of same-generation company, he had a fun time being passed around by the numerous uncles and miss/mrs/ms/messrs, and playing with the tripod that we used while taking some group photos for memories' sake.

Random rants

2005-07-24T15:52:00.000+08:00

On reckless roadsters:

There's this yellow Lambo with a single-digit 7 plate that frequents the stretch of ECP between Marine Parade and the Bayshore exit, whose driving ego justifies the typical bloody-rich-bugger-thinks-hes-the-king-of-the-road response from lesser drivers such as we. I had the extreme displeasure of having to brake hard for him as he cut into my lane without warning, several times; irate as he straddled both my lane and the next, blocking everyone else behind him; fuming as he tore along the road shoulder, engine screaming, to overtake a red Japanese car that had dared filter across his hundred-metre-long lane presence.

Obviously, the daft sod couldn't afford to install signal lamps after working out the cost of his jet fuel.

On pathetic produce:

We used to like the pies from Don's, Your Personal Pie Club, but the Shepherd's that we had today was downright awful. Over-spiced and over-potatoed, the filling was so peppery that I gave up after the second taste and dumped the whole pie. Granted that it was purchased on Friday and oven reheated today, but two days don't turn a pie into a pepper pot. At least their quarter Chicken pie was decent.

J's Shepherd's are soooo much better, her pies keep for at least a week in the fridge and still turn out nice after reheating. Can't beat the homemade stuff.

On draggy downloads:

Had to set up the in-law's printer this morning, and the driver download from HP was crawling at a mere 2.4K/s. It took an age to download a 5+ megabyte driver, during which my brother-in-law stepped out to buy lunch, and had already returned by the time the installation was done.

And here I am now, staring at the 39-megabyte HP Inkjet installer download for OSX that's been going on for the past three hours and has one whole hour left to go. F'ggin' A.

Of passing and the past

2005-07-22T23:23:00.000+08:00

Had a pretty rough week at work with crazy deadlines and numerous interruptions, but at least some relief came in the form of a friendly game of foosball with the ESPN folks on Thursday night. (How 'friendly' a 4v4 round-robin competition with 16 games to be played can be is left to your imagination; all I can say is that one game against the motor mouth in particular was especially gratifying.)

I reached home that same night to hear that one of my grand-aunts had passed away earlier that afternoon.

While I wasn't particularly close to her side of the family, that all-familiar sense of loss struck me all the same.

The news brought back memories of the departure of my grandmother, some eight (seven? nine? my memory is failing me) years ago. Grandfather often used to say that she came back to visit him in his sleep, until he, too, departed, five years ago on this very day. I miss them both.

At the wake tonight, I was sad and subdued. Paid my last respects, offered some incense, sat down for a while with the rest of my relatives. It felt kind of odd for a couple of reasons. Firstly, we were the embodiment of CNY relatives - we'd only get to see each other during the annual Chinese New Year visiting routine, so meeting up at a wake seemed slightly out of context. And secondly, most of them were having a good time - well ok, not good good, but certainly not wailing-weepy - catching up with the rest, cracking NKF jokes, peanut jokes, jokes about grandparents and old folks; the latter mainly coming from the grandparents and old folks themselves.

After a while I felt absolutely silly about feeling solemn and serious. You just can't keep a straight face with these old folks going heartily at it (and at each other, and everyone around). And that's when I realized that the beauty of a wake is not in the mourning of the deceased; it's in the celebration of the life that they led, of the strength of family support, and of the support of those around and close to them.

And then I left the wake, still feeling a bit sad, but not so subdued, not so solemn. And walked away with a smile.

I will miss my grand-aunt's gentle kindness, her warm smile, her green bean snacks and kueh pai tee that we'd always look forward to during Chinese New Year. May she rest in peace.

Locked

2005-07-19T23:43:00.000+08:00

locked
Originally uploaded by varf.

Took a photo of the rear of a truck parked near the office this morning, before heading to the usual haunt for breakfast.

I've been trying to get up earlier for work in the morning, beating the 8am ERP timing consistently for almost the whole of last week. Missed it yesterday because we went to have breakfast at Boss' stall in bizad, and today simply because we overslept a little. I ended up paying a hefty $2.50 on both occasions for entering the downtown zone just after 8:30 am.

The extra undisturbed office time in the morning is working out great - I can concentrate better since there aren't too many background (and in-my-face) distractions until later in the day. Especially since it's getting harder and harder to find uninterrupted stretches of concentration time due to the ever-increasing number of meetings, ad-hoc requests and shoulder taps.

Can't believe I'm actually becoming a morning-type person-thingie after all these lazy years. Will horrors never cease?

Kyoto JR Station

2005-07-15T22:51:00.000+08:00

kyoto station in mono
Originally uploaded by varf.

One of my favourites from the holiday photos. This is a section of the busy Kyoto Station, whose design attracted its fair share of supporters as well as critics.

Rainy afternoon

2005-07-15T14:48:00.000+08:00

rainy afternoon
Originally uploaded by varf.

Shot from yesterday.

Curiously enough

2005-07-14T23:44:00.000+08:00

A couple of old friends also marked their wedding anniversaries in this past week or so, though our respective weddings occured in different years.

Come to think of it, just a few years ago (I forgot how many, but should be either two or three) around this time of the year, I'd attended what seemed like a continuous stream of seven weekend weddings, of which three were scheduled for the same weekend. Even better, the two weddings that fell on the same day were held at the same hotel and in the very same ballroom - a lunch wedding followed by a dinner wedding!

July is probably a good month for getting hitched, or at least it seems that way for the folks that I know. :)

Afternoon date

2005-07-14T23:03:00.000+08:00

J and I took the afternoon off today to mark our fourth year together as husband and wife, wandering leisurely around Paragon and Takashimaya between lunch at Chikuyotei (unagi and tempura), tea at Shimbashi Soba (anmitsu daily dessert set), and dinner at Imperial Treasure Nan Bei Restaurant (cantonese roast duck and pan-fried sea bass).

We spent some time browsing the Straits Times 160th Anniversary photo exhibition in Paragon, admiring the images, exploring and recalling memories of past events - both happy and tragic - that had been dutifully recorded by the paper's photographers throughout the years.

J bought me a brownie from The Brownie Factory, one of the newer stalls in Taka's food basement. It's the gooey-chewy kind which I used to love as a kid in the States, and this one didn't taste bad at all, but stuff like that never seems to be as good as one remembers. (I guess it's near-impossible to compete with a treasured memory.)

We made a round through the food festival at the Ngee Ann City event hall after that. There's quite a selection of food in the aisles, ranging from delicate Kyoto sweets to hot spicy Korean kimchi, from mustard-dipped frankfurters to prata-rolled sausages, from refreshingly-cool ice kachang and chendol to sinful-looking, fat-free Italian gelato. Survived without buying anything, although we were sorely tempted on many counts!

Happy anniversary, J. I trust you enjoyed our day as much as I did.

Revenge of the mugged

2005-07-14T21:15:00.000+08:00

Sometimes when the decorating bug hits, the decorated hit back.

As for someone who was asking around the office for her mug, well, post-it victim #2 had this to say:

See the whole series from this morning starting at the first pic, with some notes added courtesy of the now-reversed decorator and decoratee roles.

Just another day at the office

2005-07-13T20:54:00.000+08:00

Wantunn and I found ourselves playing an extended game of post-it-hide-and-seek this morning after a freak cubicle-decoration storm struck overnight, similar to how glutton's desk was hit yesterday. It wasn't quite as comprehensively decked out as this office, but it did take me a while to discover that my water mug had also gone missing.

A nerf gun showdown with the perpetrator eventually forced out enough clues to locate the missing mug, but not until after a whole lot of ribbing and nerfing had been administered, inducing a steady stream of guilty giggles.

The post-it perp posing pretty, last seen in the company of victim #2 who stands at about 6 feet tall and is known to possess a pair of seriously sharp scissors.

Robatayaki Magome

2005-07-11T19:44:00.000+08:00

On our last night in Osaka during our Japan holiday in May, we asked the hotel concierge for robatayaki recommendations, and they made a booking for us at this place called Magome 炉ばた焼馬籠, a cosy eatery nestled along a stretch under the train tracks near the Hankyuu Umeda station (阪急線梅田駅). We found the place eventually after a bit of hunting around in the rain, thanks in part to our sketchy understanding of the concierge's directions.

(Click here for a map and a picture of the prominent "力" logo to look out for.)

As the sign proclaimed, every menu item cost ¥300 (sometimes ¥300 x2 units for the larger items). Over the next two hours or so, the five of us stuffed ourselves silly to the seat-rocking bass counterpoint of trains rumbling overhead, racking up more than sixty ¥300-units of food and beverages. Very satisfactory!

See all of the dinner photos here.

Pro at work

2005-07-10T10:35:00.000+08:00

Last night, we attended the wedding dinner of a long-time family friend of J's, at the Conrad. Expecting bad traffic due to the NDP rehearsal road closures, we drove to the hotel early, and spent some time strolling around Suntec before dinner.

The photographer for the day sported a short pale-blond ponytail, a pair of dark blue Oakleys perched atop his crown, and an outdoors sportsman's sunglass-protected sunburn. Dressed in a black polo tee and jeans, and fully decked out in a Lowepro S&F harness with an entire array of pouches around his waist, he went about his job quite efficiently, always preparing ahead - pulling up a chair in front of the stage to shoot the champagne pouring, getting the next table to start forming up for the group photo before going back to shoot the previous table.

Equipment-wise, he employed a Canon EOS 1D, a 5XX-series flash with omnibounce, and mostly swapped between a 16-35L and a mid-range L zoom which I couldn't identify. He'd use this interesting cross-hand grab - left hand wrapping around the front of the camera to grip his right hand, lens resting on his forearm - to support the camera for longer-zoom shots.

Interesting. I could learn from that.

Backstroke of the West

2005-07-06T10:39:00.000+08:00

Wantunn sent me this absolutely priceless screencap collection of bad translations. See it even if you haven't watched the movie yet.

Freespace frenzy

2005-07-06T00:52:00.000+08:00

While ploughing through a whole chunk of '04 photos, I attempted to be ruthless and discard photos that didn't make the cut, but that failed rather miserably. It wasn't difficult to be self-critical - I knew how bad most of those 'saved' photos were - but somehow I'd still hesitate to delete them, wondering if I'd regret not being able to see those pics again in future.

I did pick out a couple of photos that I'd long since forgotten about, though. Here's one:

So much for cutting down on the volume. Making two copies of each DVD-R, I ended up with a total of ten discs just for 2004.

The painful bit isn't that the DVD-Rs are expensive. In fact, they're getting a lot cheaper now - I just paid $54 for 50 pieces of Fujifilm 8x DVD-Rs (made by Taiyo Yuden in Japan, according to the store's boss).

No, the painful bit is that my setup takes about 30 minutes to perform the write-verify cycle for each disc, during which I can either (1) surf the web, (2) watch anime with really choppy playback, or (3) read a book. Out of which I usually end up doing (2), which just goes to show how much of a sucker I am for punishment.

The good news is that I now have another twenty-odd gigabytes of free space available for photos and processing, and it'll take a couple of months at least before I get hit by the space crunch again. Probably.

DVD writer + external enclosure = warm fuzzy feeling

2005-07-04T23:12:00.000+08:00

Not wanting to face the pain of not being able to cut DVDs at will again, I decided to pick up this nameless, brandless enclosure that could fit my Plextor PX-708A DVD writer (salvaged from the now-dead PC), $85 from MacLink at Sim Lim Square.

The first DVD backup disc burned OK without a hitch; the second has just finished writing cleanly and I'm watching as the verification stage progress bar chugs along.

I can back up my photos again. I feel a little more secure now.

Skies

2005-07-04T22:50:00.000+08:00

A series of sky shots taken during the ROM shoot:

And a kind-of self portrait:

Wet wedding

2005-07-03T23:40:00.000+08:00

No, it didn't rain, thankfully.

But shooting Saturday's ROM ceremony involved getting knee-deep into the pool. Which my silly cousin completely (and conveniently!) forgot to mention.

So there I was, clad in Shirt-and-Jeans™ and dress shoes, waiting for the hotel lift when the other photographer asked me: "Did you bring shorts? We might have to go into the pool to take photos."

Say what!?

After taking a look for myself, I quickly called J and got her to rush a pair of shorts down to the hotel. I guess it always pays to recon the event beforehand, but this one caught me totally off-guard. >.<

Here are the links to view the gallery or slideshow directly.

Update: In my haste to get this posted I left out a couple of things:

- The Justice of Peace that they engaged was the same one that J and I engaged to do our wedding solemnization;
- She was late for our wedding solemnization by almost an hour (caught in a traffic jam coming back from the airport); and
- She was late for this one as well (got lost on the way to the hotel).

The light would have been beautiful if it had started on time. But crap happens. :/

Oh the frustration

2005-07-03T22:50:00.000+08:00

I haven't shut my iMac down for so long that I'd forgotten where the power button was.

It all began with the harddisk running out of space thanks to heavy photo activity. While trying back up the photos from my cousin's ROM yesterday, I killed no less than six DVD-Rs and one DVD+R, all of which failed to write properly.

The error codes and messages returned were varied - bad media, verification failure, tracking servo failure. And the last one implied some kind of hardware problem. Some frantic searching suggested that drive overheating could be the culprit, quite likely given that the iMac is almost never off.

So I shut it down for a couple of hours' break this afternoon, and am now attempting the backup again. So far so good - the DVD-R is already in the verification stage. Hopefully it doesn't bail out like earlier.

Now I'm really tempted to invest in a good external firewire DVD writer.

Colour shift

2005-07-02T13:45:00.000+08:00

I wanted to shift to the new blogger templates sometime back because of the built-in commenting features and less wonky layout, but I'd put it off every time probably due to sheer reluctance to migrate my sidebar links and extras.

The flickr itch finally drove me to do it, just because I wanted to include the funky-looking flickr badge on the sidebar at the right.

No thanks to qoomonster and her new flickr addiction, now it looks like I might actually cave in and spend once more on online photo storage. Bleah.

I won't be using Haloscan for commenting anymore with this new template, but it was a great free ride while it lasted. Thanks, Haloscan.

Crackle

2005-07-01T23:52:00.000+08:00

Spotted today.

Pizza spizza

2005-07-01T23:35:00.000+08:00

I brought J to Spizza at Club Street once for dinner with a couple of friends. Ever since then she's been a convert; no more sucky Pizza Hut/Canadian Pizza nonsense for her!

Since J had several one-free-medium-pizza vouchers for the Spizza outlet at Harbourfront, we went there for dinner tonight (and for last Friday's dinner too). The voucher needs to be handed over to the staff before our order is placed, but it seems kind of silly because we'd get another voucher right back when we ask for the check!

J's favourite Spizza-pizza is currently the Victoria (minus chilli, plus olives). I find myself liking that combination too, but I've yet to settle on a personal favourite. Thus far I've tried the Juliana, Helena and Ginna (somehow I always pronouce this one a la siginah :P). I'm itching to try the eggs-and-black-truffle pizza and the pizza with fresh salmon, whose names I don't recall at the moment. Perhaps soon - we still have vouchers.

Picky picky

2005-07-01T23:04:00.000+08:00

I used to not like doing any manipulation on my photos past some minor adjustments like auto-levels, cropping and resizing. These days it seems like I hardly put up any photo without tweaking the colours here, or the curves there.

Maybe I'm getting more picky about what I produce, or maybe I'm becoming addicted to photo adjustment.

Maybe I'm simply desperate to make horrible pictures look passible.

Maybe I just suck.

Whatever.

Spent a lot of Life-Between-Work time in the past week adjusting photos from a wedding that I helped cover two Sundays ago. Although I did manage to squeeze time in to process a few more holiday photos from the Osaka Kaiyukan and vicinity:

Greenwood Fish Market & Bistro

2005-06-28T22:55:00.000+08:00

Often when the words "seafood" and "Singapore" are mentioned in the same sentence (or within reasonable proximity), several things quickly spring to mind - chilli crab, pepper crab and tiger prawns; Jumbo, No Signboard and Long Beach. Well, the Greenwood Fish Market & Bistro doesn't serve chilli crab, nor does it do pepper crab. But what it does offer on Tuesdays (and Wednesdays for UOB cardholders) are fresh oysters at a dollar a pop.

The Greenwood Fish Market & Bistro is tucked away in a quiet neighbourhood, just a couple of doors up the street from Shiro. (Not that it's easy to find Shiro, so maybe that's not such a great landmark to go by.) The area is accessible from Bukit Timah Road via Hillcrest Road.

As its name implies, the place consists of a seafood shop storefront with restaurant-style tables and lighting deeper inside. The few al fresco tables also seem to be popular with diners. The types of fish on sale depend on the day's stock, but often include Yellowfin Tuna, Mahi-mahi, Monkfish and John Dory, just to name a few.

The restaurant looks bigger than it feels, thanks to a strategically-placed strip of mirror lining the length of the dining hall. There aren't many tables but they've been fully packed both times that we've been there. Service was slow - we had to prompt for water and bread, ask after the soup of the day, and hijack a waitress to place our orders.

I was a little amused when my Warm Mushroom Salad With Boiled Egg came sans Boiled Egg. We poked at the veggie pile for the egg and confirmed it was missing, so they replaced it with a freshly-assembled bowl, adorned on the side with Two Boiled Egg Quarters, which Dad found even more amusing. Personally, I'd have settled for them just adding the missing egg pieces to my old salad bowl. Shrug, OK.

A batter-fried tusk fish, grilled red snapper, grilled pink snapper and some four dozen oysters later, the four of us just sat there reeling. I'm kinda glad that my fish came with even more greens, else I'd feel really guilty about downing so many yummy oysters. The pink snapper was excellent, the red snapper pretty good, and the batter-fried tusk fish wasn't bad (but I'd advise passing it over in favour a good John Dory fillet). I really liked their french fries - If you love Long John Silver's batter-dipped fries, you'll love the chips from the fish 'n chips.

Quick damage assessment:
- 48 oysters: $48 (whee!)
- mushroom salad: $13.95
- tusk fish and red snapper: $19.95 each
- pink snapper: $24.95
- bottle of white wine: $63
Nett after service/tax - $221.25

It's a nice place with great food, but the service tends to be hit-and-miss. Overall I'd still recommend this place for the fresh fish and quality food preparation, a refreshing departure from Chinese-style seafood.

Greenwood Fish Market & Bistro
34 Greenwood Avenue
Singapore 289236
Tel: 6467.4950
Hours:
Fish Market 11am - 10pm
Lunch 12pm - 2.30pm
Dinner 6.30pm - 10pm
Closed on Mondays and PH

Iro^H^H^HKorean Chef

2005-06-26T23:52:00.000+08:00

My mother has always been a huge fan of drama serials, usually from Hong Kong. Her latest craze is this DVD set from Hong Kong that she picked up recently, a Korean period drama titled 大長今, or Dae Jang-geum/대장금 (thanks, Yahoo! Search and wikipedia!), dubbed in Cantonese and subtitled in Mandarin.

J and I caught segments of it over several dinner visits. The subtitles don't always agree with the dubbing, which we kind of expected, but the show holds its own on the plot. Having watched in bits and pieces up to episode 20, several major plot arcs involve some serious dicing and slicing - of fish, meat, spices and vegetables, somewhat reminiscent of Iron Chef battles. Not particularly surprising since a large part of the story revolves around the imperial kitchen, but I still chuckle quietly when the camera zooms in to detail the food preparation. (There's also a bit of slicing and dicing of the non-culinary sort, but that hasn't happened much so far. Which is a probably a good thing.)

I've always been a bit of a purist (fascist?) about watching undubbed, original-voice anime, so imagine my surprise to find myself enjoying the Canto-dubbed, Mandarin-subbed Korean show. Who would've guessed? But I'll still take my anime undubbed, thanks.

Adapted from wikipedia: Dae Jang-geum has experienced massive success in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong and [even] Chicago, further continuing the South Korean cultural fever that has gripped Asia since the early 2000s.

Dae Jang-geum is set to air on Starhub Cable's channel 55 sometime soon, and Crystal Jade Ginseng Chicken And BBQ is looking to cash in on the Korean food wave that they hope the show will generate. Which it probably will, seeing as how the Winter Sonata fever launched the massively popular Korean Winter Holiday craze here and elsewhere.

Color woes

2005-06-26T23:13:00.000+08:00

I didn't realize how odd the Clarke Quay photo looked until I loaded the image in Firefox and put it side-by-side with the Photoshop image. The browser's image had a noticeable variance from the photo that I remembered editing - the natural deep blue sky took on a strong cyan tint, sunlight on the buildings had a warmer cast, reds became less saturated, and some subtle shadow details in the boats had gone almost completely dark.

A web search turned up several explanations but no real solutions. Apparently, the web browser (and many other programs) ignores the embedded color profile information, and displays the image in the default colorspace. Which unfortunately wasn't the colorspace that I performed the edits in. And so the resulting image looks different (at least to me) from the Photoshop image.

So far I've been unable to find a way to make the photo in the web browser match what I originally envisaged the picture to be. Search results seem to indicate that I need to do more research into color profiles and management.

Clarke Quay

2005-06-25T23:58:00.000+08:00

Taken with an Olympus IR-300 that happened to be handy.

More baby snaps

2005-06-15T10:47:00.000+08:00

Baby Z, younger brother to K, is just over a month old now. Z's birth was atypically risky due to several compounding factors, but the gynae's quick thinking saw him delivered safely. We stopped by over the weekend to see how Z, K and parents were doing.

Between drifting from sleep to feed to sleep again, Z does a fine job of drooling, stretching and turning all red in the face when flustered. His eyes flitted open occasionally, but stayed mostly closed under the drone of adult conversation.

K, on the other hand, is active, attention-sensitive, and happy to show it. At first she couldn't quite figure out where she'd seen me before, but she definitely recognized that big glassy round thing pointing at her face after a couple of snapshots!

K is starting to mimic the more flamboyant actions and sounds coming from her mother. Every now and then, K throws up an "uh-oh!" with a wide-eyed look that's just sooo cute. I'm glad she likes the toy we bought for her from Japan (she's fiddling with one of the pieces in the photo above).

Sex sells

2005-06-11T23:21:00.000+08:00

Sex sells; you know it's true. With a restaurant name like "Korean BBQ Sex Machine", how could you possibly go wrong?

Funky paint job

2005-06-11T22:54:00.000+08:00

When I read about some cross-processing actions from this thread, I just knew I had to give it a go with the photo above. Didn't turn out too bad, did it?

I've seen a pink flower-power-painted convertible going around downtown Singapore before, but this car that we saw in Namba, Osaka gets my vote for the coolest car paint job ever.

Warabimochi

2005-06-11T13:35:00.000+08:00

Still sorting through trip photos. I'm barely done processing shots from the first day, but I've uploaded some more to the Japan trip gallery.

This is one from the first day in Osaka, in a tea house called Bashouan where we stopped for some snacks at Takimikoji Village, a streets-of-old-Osaka recreation in the basement of the Shin Umeda City Building (Umeda Sky Building):

The stone mortar is used for grinding kinako powder from black soybeans, which is then sprinkled over the jelly-like warabimochi before eating. We were apprehensive at first, but the whole self-grinding thing turned out to be pretty fun.

The downside is that the menu didn't have any descriptions in English, so we had to fumble through the ordering by looking at the pictures and guessing. But the end result was quite satisfying! :)

Menotti

2005-06-09T14:12:00.000+08:00

Had lunch today at Menotti, Raffles City, run by the folks from Garibaldi at Purvis Street.

That seafood risotto in the picture looks great, but I didn't have it - I ordered the tagliatelle with scallops and pesto instead. Plus two scoops of delicious homemade gelato, and a hot Vittoria cappuccino.

Set lunch for $19.90 includes choice of pasta, choice of dessert and a hot beverage makes for a nice meal at a great price. What's there not to like?

Sorting trip photos

2005-06-09T00:47:00.000+08:00

... is a slow process. Even my mom has been harassing me about wanting to see the photos.

I guess it doesn't help that I shot a whole crapload (lit: load of crap) during the trip. Showing all of the photos would more or less guarantee glossy-eyed brain freeze after a minute, so I need to pick the best of the lot - which shouldn't really be that difficult since most of it isn't all that fantastic to begin with. And maybe do some tweaking while I'm at it.

Uploaded a few more here, but there's lots to go.

Shinsaibashi reflections

2005-06-06T18:07:00.000+08:00

Reflections of neon signs at the entrance to the Shinsaibashi Shopping Street and backlit fish motifs intermingle on this partition, a part of a long fence that separates the pedestrian walkway from the construction site beyond.

Owzers

2005-06-04T23:31:00.000+08:00

I seem to have strained (or sprained) my back. Went through the whole day with a knot in the left side near the bottom of the ribcage, gripping hard like a cramp every time my weight shifted slightly to the front, back, or either side. Or as I move to lay down.

Not fun.

I've also been trying to cut some backups to DVD-Rs, to make space for the trip photos. Three good discs and four DVD-R coasters - not a great record. Wonder if there's a compatibility problem with my iMac's Superdrive and TDK/Fujifilm media? Too bad my PC is down as well, else I'd have put the Plextor writer to good use.

There are just so many things to fix! Where has all the time gone? :(

Back from vacation

2005-05-31T16:02:00.000+08:00

Touched down sometime past midnight yesterday morning, slept a couple of hours, then headed straight back to the grindstone.

I don't think I can remember taking a vacation that didn't leave me exhausted after its conclusion. Maybe I only remember the tiring ones?

I guess getting my seat kicked and my hair pulled by the screaming kid seated behind me on the flight back didn't help, any more than the sudden bouts of extreme turbulence that the fighter-jockey pilot happily pushed us through in the middle of dinner did.

As with most family trips I ended up in the pathfinder role, mapping out routes and transportation options, and part-timed as a really inept restaurant-menu-translator and general-direction-asker with my wonky Japanese from Osaka to Kyoto to Tokyo. We made it through somehow though!

A couple of things I learned from this trip about traveling in Japan:

To open those tightly closed lacquered soup bowls, hold the bowl firmly along the lip on opposing sides, then squeeze gently inwards as if forcing the circular lip into an oval.

Anything bigger than a trolley bag is too big for the shinkansen - unless you're willing to sacrifice leg space!

Avoid buying guide books published more than 15 years ago (doh).

Took a whole crapload of crap photos, and as usual I need to find some time (and maybe some good Mac software) to go through them all. Coming up soon!

Centre stage

2005-05-15T23:30:00.000+08:00

Every once in a while, it's nice to shoot a wedding that doesn't follow the traditional Chinese wedding mold. More garden weddings, please!

Glass pebbles and rose petals

2005-05-15T10:12:00.000+08:00

A wedding is a tiring affair for all those involved in its execution, however rewarding.

Yesterday's was no exception. In all I'd estimate that the on-site preparations took about six hours to complete, involving furniture placement, sound testing, decorations and sorting out last-minute details, from the night before to the following morning prior to the ceremony.

Rain in the morning threatened to dampen the mood, but the weather cleared up briefly to throw a blazing noonday spotlight on the whole procession, muting down to overcast after lunch.

I'm still experiencing fatigue and body aches even after a good night's sleep. I wonder how those full-time photographers take it? Perhaps efficiency of motion comes with experience, and with it, instinctive energy conservation?

To bloom

2005-05-13T23:53:00.000+08:00

Some flowers to be used in tomorrow's wedding.

Pipe way

2005-05-05T23:04:00.000+08:00

One of the many things we take for granted daily. What would we do without taps and plumbing?

Long weekend food quips

2005-05-03T22:30:00.000+08:00

Peach Garden at Eastwood Centre, Saturday lunch. The roast pork was oily. Yecch. Their seafood hor fun, in contrast, was done pretty well. Verdict: Standard dropped.

Outback Steak at Millenia Walk, Saturday dinner for a party of 14. I'd rate the service we had at 2 of 5. Had a half-rack of ribs which were just decent. Their Chocolate Thunder From Down Under arrived with the ice-cream half melted, but at least the brownie part of it was rich and sinful. (I just had to try one to see what it was like after this comic strip. Yes, I'm a glutton.) Verdict: So-so.

Spring Court at Upper Cross Street near Hotel 81, Sunday lunch for a party of seven. Boy, was this a disaster! This restaurant moved in recent years from East Coast Road to where it is now. We were aiming for the 76¢ Peking Duck offer - valid with food orders totalling at least $76 - but the pushy female captain (short, bespectacled.. sounds familiar maybe? I wonder..) kept trying to upsell their expensive seafood, even though we'd already ordered quite a lot. Took a bit of doing to keep shaking our heads.

It took more than 40 minutes after the last food dish was cleared from the table, and after a whole lot of chasing, for them to serve the sliced meat from the Peking Duck. At which point our stomachs had already settled, and none of us could eat any more. We ended up bringing the duck meat home. The final bill? Definitely much more than $76! Food wasn't great, I'd give it an average or below expectation. Verdict: Not going back there!

Michelangelo's at Chip Bee Gardens, Monday (May day holiday) lunch for a party of four. Sistina Pizzeria - its sister restaurant next door - wasn't open for lunch, but her pizzas were available at Michelangelo's! The calamari was decent if a little too dry, and its accompanying wasabi tartar sauce dip too mild. The pizza - Sistina's Pizza - was fabulous despite the long-ish wait, loaded with toppings, a little cheese, and served on a gorgeous crust. It sure was dark in there though:

Verdict: Pricy but gooood.

Lei Garden at CHIJMES, Monday dinner for five. In an effort to make up for the poor showing at Spring Court above, we had another (far better) round of Peking Duck, double-boiled soup, another braised duck dish, claypot garoupa and fried string beans. The fish was great and the duck dishes were pretty good; everything else fared par for the course (expectations being much higher anyway). Verdict: Reliable but pricy.

Now you guys know why I opted for salad at tea today.

Tomorrow's dinner is probably going to be at Lee Kui (Ah Hoi). I can hear the cold crab and yam paste calling already... somebody save me!

Green valley walk

2005-05-02T23:29:00.000+08:00

We woke up fairly early this morning to head for breakfast, and after that to try out the much-hyped TreeTop Walk at MacRitchie.

Chickening out of the long walk through the reservoir park, we ended up driving up to the club's carpark. From there, the hike was considerably shorter.

There was a fair crowd along the trail today, to be expected since it's a holiday. Mostly families with children or groups of teens-to-twenties. (Why some people dress in ankle-length jeans, elbow-sleeved tops and strappy sandals in this hot weather, and bring baby strollers along for the hike, is quite beyond me.)

The queue to get onto the treetop walkway proper was thankfully moving quite smoothly, but there seemed to be far more than 30 people on the walkway while we were crossing it, moving along in the inchworm-like catchup game more commonly associated with caterpillar legs and traffic jams.

J almost became giddy from the rolling motion of the walkway as people trudged across it, left feet following right, the sum of which was causing the entire bridge to sway rhythmically left, right, left, right. The heat didn't help one bit.

I didn't think there was very much to see, but then again, we did make a fairly hurried crossing. With so many people on the bridge and more waiting to get on, stopping to take in the scenery didn't seem like such a good idea, so we moved as quickly as balance and other stoppages out front would allow.

Clear! But little did we know that the trail back to the club's carpark would be longer than the trek leading up to the walkway. A good workout for a lazy bum like mine.

Rainy day train

2005-04-30T03:40:00.000+08:00

The ground was dry and sky overcast as I left the house Thursday morning, but it was raining heavily at Tanah Merah MRT station when I snapped this shot, just three bus stops away. And later that afternoon it turned blazing hot.

Crazy, indecisive weather.

Of working relationships and farewells

2005-04-29T23:59:00.000+08:00

The time we spend at work - and consequently in the company of other office denizens - comprises a substantial portion of our waking hours. Over time, social relationships develop as a result of working together, sharing the same water cooler or by simply being within earshot.

It's no surprise then that we sometimes feel a sense of loss when people leave, especially after being comfortable around them for so long. Knowing that you can shoot someone point-blank with a fully loaded nerf gun, expect to be pelted in return with a half-dozen foam stress balls, and be all cool in time for coffee can be a very reassuring thing. It's these little things that add spice to daily cubicle life.

Some people just don't get it. Unfortunately some of those who do, leave anyway. Not that I can blame them.

Today, —
(Ok, so it's actually around 2am in the morning of the following day right now, but I've changed the posting date just to make 'today' and 'tonight' sound logical.)

Today, two such have-it people marked their final day at the office. Not surprisingly, a drinking session was arranged for tonight to commemorate the occasion.

To me, drinking sessions over the years have become synonymous with departures, since I practically never step into a bar for any other reason. Personally I think it's just another excuse for alcohol- and smoke-happy people to indulge themselves, but well.. meat, poison, whatever.

See you around, Big Bert (not pictured) and Aoki (spotlight above). Don't be strangers.

Also, of Oso
Joined up with my folks shortly after for dinner, at an Italian restaurant named Oso along Tanjong Pagar Road. We got there at 8:30pm but there was a delay in getting our reserved table ready, so I took the opportunity to fish out my camera for a quickie:

(This photo honestly looks much better when viewed at actual size, please click on it to see.)

The restaurant packs tables tastefully if a little too efficiently, placing sofa-bench-seated tables close enough to each other to peek at the next party's spread. The seats were well-cushioned and comfy, though the legs of my table weren't very balanced and kept rocking at the slightest hint of elbow pressure. Modern decor, subdued lighting and a good choice of diningware added to the comfy, slightly posh feel, though it was slightly spoilt by the volume of conversation floating across the room.

I had the sea scallop cioppino soup ($11), a polished tomato-based broth which was fairly good, and the sea bream al sale ($29), oven-baked in sea salt and filleted before serving, which turned out to be amazingly juicy and tender. Yummy. Also sampled the poached veal tonnato with fish sauce and capers, and J's risotto nero (squid-ink risotto), which held a firm texture and contained juicy morsels of squid. The risotto is definitely a winner in my book.

The warm dark chocolate crostata tart with milk ice-cream ($12) was a bit too sweet for my liking, but I polished it off anyway (no thanks to J and mother who both bailed after a spoonful each).

Wrap-up: great Italian food, above-average service, upmarket. Nice place for a good dress-up dinner.

Homeward bound

2005-04-28T21:07:00.000+08:00

Had to take a bus back to my parents' home for dinner yesterday evening. I'd gotten so used to driving to and from work that the thought of squeezing in with the rush hour crowd made me cringe in apprehension, but somehow I managed to grab the middle seat along the back row. With my legs stretched out along the walkway, the ride turned out to be pretty comfy, and the bus made good time.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm just one of the many irrational car buyers in Singapore. After all, why spend so much money on a set of wheels when we've got such an efficient public transport system? But rush hour traffic tells the real tale - we've got lots of cars!

In a nation where cars are disproportionately expensive relative to other countries, it seems sardonic yet logical that cars in Singapore look so sparkly-clean. After all, aren't we always touted as the clean country? Maybe it's just me, but almost all of the shiny cars I saw on the road trip to Malacca last week had Singaporean license plates on 'em.

Blah. Better stop ranting on about cars before I start up on another long stretch about daily encounters with annoying drivers (yet another reason to take public transport - no drive, no worries!).

More speed is always good

2005-04-28T00:37:00.000+08:00

And it's great when it comes at no extra cost!

Quoted from my local cable provider's website:

Enhanced upload speeds for MaxOnline 2000 customers!
Simply power off and on your cable modem to enjoy enhanced upload speeds of up to 256Kbps right away.

That's double of the old upstream bandwidth! A nice gesture from StarHub, which I quickly took advantage of to upload some photos from last Saturday's model shoot excursion.

They've also announced a new high-bandwidth cable plan, providing a whopping 25Mbps/1Mbps (downstream/upstream capacity) for just over double of what I'm paying now for 2Mbps/256kbps. Is this the beginning of a bandwidth war? I certainly wouldn't mind getting more network capacity for less moolah. (Wouldn't we all?)

Self-dissatisfaction

2005-04-26T15:30:00.000+08:00

Went along on a model-shoot trip to Malacca on Saturday, and returned with largely disappointing results.

About the food: lunch was spicy (nyonya food), which means I didn't have a lot to eat; the dinner place, unfortunately, allowed smoking - three smokers at the table effectively killed off most of my appetite.

Photography-wise.. I don't know. I had some really badly-focused/soft shots when using the 85mm f/1.8 at larger apertures (~f/2.2ish), and I'm sure it's all about my lousy technique, since focusing was spot-on in controlled testing. It didn't have anything to do with the dirty sensor, either.

(Geh-kiang me attempted to clean the camera's sensor the night before the trip, succeeding only in making it dirtier, consequently resulting in over an hour of frantic re-wiping/brushing/swabbing to restore it to a somewhat similar-to-begin-with state of filth. I sent the camera back to the Canon this morning to get it cleaned professionally, for 21 bucks and peace of mind.)

But what's worse was that nagging suspicion, as the photos marched across my screen, that I'm getting nowhere fast. Ignoring the out-of-focus, shaky-hand and otherwise technically faulty shots, when I looked over the photos I'd taken, I saw a whole lot of nothing special.

That's not where I want to be. And that's frustrating.

Over the past week
It's been mostly work, struggling between two projects that both require heavy international support and cursing the timezone and priority conflicts along the way.

Over on the food front, we tried this place called Family's Wok at North Bridge Road, courtesy of umami's food blog. Great food, hearty portions with reasonable pricing, definitely a go-again place. Unfortunately, that same night my parents' car was involved in a collision while looking for parking, which dampened the mood quite severely.

J and I had dinner at mezza9 the other night (she likes the fried rice), which proved to me once again that I simply don't know what to order there. After minutes of agonizing indecision I picked the lamb cutlets, which actually turned out to be quite nicely done. Pricey place. In retrospect, Pete's Place just downstairs might have been a better option, but done is done.

What else? I've been trying to get some people I know to try out Yahoo! 360, Y!'s new social-network-blog-photo-integration beta service. Will it be compelling enough? Will it go the way of Orkut? (Er.. whassat? Exactly!) Is it a question of too little too late? Even Friendster has been trying to get on the bandwagon, adding blogs and photo albums to their service.

Ping me if I know you and you want to give 360 a shot.

The Count of Monte Cristo

2005-04-17T23:30:00.000+08:00

I just finished watching the final episode of Gankutsuou (rougly pronounced /'gahn-koot-su-oh/), a 2004 anime retelling of Alexandre Dumas' classic, The Count of Monte Cristo.

One truly fantastic story, absolutely riveting with fitting music and a beautiful if unusual style of animation. (Though at times you feel like reaching in and belting out two tight slaps to the protagonist...)

Gankutsuou keeps the story as its central focus, delivering a concise 24-episode tale of love and loyalty, deceit and betrayal, darkness and revenge. I've not read the original novel - a mistake I hope to correct in the near future - but other reviews have pointed out that the plot stays mostly faithful to the text, apart from being set in an unbelievably retro-modern futuristic era. Quite unlike its Hollywood-made travesty of a cousin.

I absolutely have to recommend this anime. Don't be deceived by the first ten minutes of the first episode, it just keeps getting better.

Crash boom bang

2005-04-17T11:37:00.000+08:00

Yesterday's foosball session at the Beach Hut was an eye-opener. Not the foosball clinic - which covered stuff that I already knew - but the DYP (draw-your-partner) mini-tournament after.

The level of play was unlike anything that we've come to know in the office. My defense was hammered over and over by shots executed so quickly that I've finally come to understand the term "unraceable shot".

...
those kids were fast as lightning
and I guess it was a little bit frightening
...

There's a point where the speed of shot execution exceeds my reaction time - the ball is in the hole before I even start to flinch. As if my defenders aren't even there. I hardly need to worry about shots from the 5-man rod on defense; the 3-man shots are so deadly that shooting from the 5-man is abandoned totally in favour of a tight pass to the 3-man forward.

One thing's for sure: we need to get Tornado foosballs for the office table. The pace and speed of the ball are really quite different from what we're used to playing on the Dynamo.

Up or down?

2005-04-17T11:07:00.000+08:00

Up or down? You decide:

Stiff drink

In the grove

2005-04-16T00:40:00.000+08:00

One of the better shots taken during the recent family holiday in Perth. I ended up doing most of the driving bits and not so much of the shooting bits.

Relaxed time

2005-04-14T23:50:00.000+08:00

Relaxed time

I've been spending time on other distractions recently - the recent Perth trip, getting excited about foosball again, playing RPG games on my mostly-underused PS2.

Yes there are photos forthcoming, sometime soon I hope. I've committed to sending back a print or two of photos that I took of someone in Aus, and I really need to haul my ass off the chair to do that soonest.

Truth be told, I've been trying to realign my life's priorities recently, and time has suddenly become one of the things that I never have enough of. Time to do the things that I need, want and should. But old habits die hard, and self-adjustment doesn't come easily. Perhaps age is catching up? I hope not.