Went to see The Boy And The Heron today with Bruno. He didn’t quite get it but I think I did. Oh well I have my own interpretation at least, lol.
Initially I was still deciding between Mastodon and Threads to post my daily feelings. But I guess I’ll use this instead. More privacy… Don’t think anyone will be visiting this blog anyway. :P
Don’t think I’ll continue with hand writing journals on my iPad either. It’s nice and all but it’s quite difficult to lug the iPad around everyday, especially now when I have an ink reader to carry as well.
Went for a movie “marathon” last Saturday, at the spanking new GV Paya Lebar, with “nation’s first laser projectors”. Yes, the images were really sharper than other cinemas, but to be honest, once you are immersed in the movie, you really don’t go and take note if the images are “sharper” or not. At least I don’t focus on the sharpness when I was watching the films…
We caught Geostorm (I won’t ever miss any natural disasters movies!) and Mary and The Witch’s Flower. Geostorm wasn’t as bad as what most reviews said it was. I quite enjoy the movie actually. Of course, as with all movies, just leave your brains at home and stop questioning if it’s scientific or logical or what-not. Despite all the disaster scenes to be purely CG (obviously), the state of CG really takes my breath away every time I watch such scenes.
Mary and The Witch’s Flower is very Ghibli-ish (after all the studio’s under Hayao Miyazaki’s favourite student), but the story telling direction is quite different from Ghibli. I like the colours, I like the art – there are only very few parts where the animation/expression doesn’t really fit (Ghibli really does them better), but otherwise I enjoyed the animation too.
I realise I’m easy to please – especially when it comes to movies. LOL.
We met again on Tuesday, because I had to clear my ethnic half day leave since I didn’t take it on Chinese New Year this year. So off we went for lunch at the newly opened Ramen Nagi at Suntec, and that was a bad decision. Despite only 2 hours into operation for that day, they told us they “ran out of eggs”. So um, okay. Ramen with no egg. As if that’s not bad enough, their soup is laden with MSG. I was so damn thirsty for the entire day, geez. Never again.
After lunch, Bruno accompanied me to TCM where the doc helped me adjust the medication a bit because the TCM medicine she gave me was giving me insomnia and heat flushes again. After that, we had to go down to SGH to collect extra medication for my that. A 60 tab box of medication cost me S$134.40! Geez… heart medication is freaking expensive.
After that we lingered around Chinatown for a bit, before we head to Ming San for dinner. We were celebrating our friendniversary in advance, so we were more generous in terms of the dishes we order, and honestly all their dishes taste so good!
Aburi Salmon Maki
The Aburi Salmon Maki ($11.00) is just so good! Aburi Salmon is usually partly torched (top), and bottom half is raw. I honestly have no idea how to describe the taste and texture of it, but I swear to you, it felt like I went to heaven and back whenever I put a piece of that in my mouth. That’s HOW GOOD it is.
Unagi Tamago Yaki
Next, we ordered the Unagi Tamago Yaki (S$18.00). It’s grilled unagi, with some mayo, wrapped in warm half cooked omelette (almost like scrambled eggs), topped with more mayo, terayaki sauce, dried Japanese shrimps and pieces of fried fish skin. End result? A harmonious blend of tastes exploding in your mouth – allowing you to taste the unagi, the egg, the mayo, and a bit of saltiness and crunch from the dried shrimps and fish skin. I was half worried that things will fall apart when I picked up a piece with my chopsticks, but even though it looked that way, nothing dropped / fell apart while my chopsticks move it from the plate to my mouth. The chef is just so amazing at putting things (not just the tastes) together!
Grilled Ika
We were kinda worried that the above two dishes will not be enough to fill our tummies, so we ordered a grilled Ika (S$8.00). This dish, compared to the above two, is a lot more plain. Nothing much to shout about, but it’s fresh and perfectly grilled, all the way to the tip of its tentacles.
Garlic fried rice
Last but not least, we ordered a garlic fried rice (S$13.00) after eating all three dishes above, because we felt that we were still a tad hungry. I really couldn’t see any pieces of garlic in it, but oh boy, the garlic taste simply exploded in your mouth with each mouthful. It’s so amazing. And the best part is there’s no garlic after taste at all! What sorcery is this?!
The total bill adds up to S$55.00 (with two drinks, not in pictures), a price which we feel is totally justifiable, considering how good ALL the dishes are. We’ll definitely be back for the Aburi Salmon Maki and Unagi Tamago Maki! =D
Back from Hong Kong, actually. Haha.. my annual pilgrimage! Btw I’ve already finished up the Japan blog – you can read it here. It has all the links to the various day-posts. The write up is a little hasty, but hope you’ll at least enjoy reading and viewing the pictures!
Now that I’m back from Hong Kong, I wonder if I should post up another travel post regarding the Hong Kong trip. I have been there so many times already though! I’ll think about it, haha.
Came back on Thursday, and worked my ass off on Thursday night to clear my work as for the first time, I did not work while I was on holiday. I continued clearing my emails and invoices on Friday, before heading to meet Bruno in the evening for the movie John Wick: Chapter 2. Not a bad movie, not bad at all. Actually all the action and stunts are very believable. I was quite impressed. :3
Went to TCM today and then straight to office to finish up my work again. Argh tired as hell. Tomorrow meeting Bruno again to watch DOTA 2 SLI Starladder season 3 finals. No rest for the weary. T_T
I noticed this documentary trailer on Golden Village’s website months ago. I got the chills from just watching the trailer. I must admit that I’m not a fan of sushi or sashimi – I don’t eat anything that’s raw. Nevertheless, I’ve heard of this fish market Tsukiji in Tokyo since forever. There are tourists who would get there at 3am just to watch the auctions, to go for sashimi or sushi breakfast at the small eateries just there at Tsukiji. Initially we also had plans to go Tsukiji, but at that time Tsukiji was planned to be relocated to another place in November 2016. And also the fact that we would need to wake up really early to see any action there, kinda threw our plans out of the window. We both ain’t fans of raw food, so it’s not that great of a miss for us, I supposed.
However when I watched this trailer, I thought to myself – this is the documentary that can open my eyes to how Tsukiji works, without being there! I was so excited, only to get super bummed when I found out that tickets were fully sold out in all the three cinemas that they are showing the film in, and each cinema gets only one time slot for one day for this documentary. Yet they kept advertising this.. showing trailers everywhere, sending me mailers about this movie. I was so mad at one point – it’s already fully booked, why did GV still trying to market this?! It wasn’t until I checked the website again on Monday, that I noticed they sneakily added time slots for this movie! The additional time slots were during weekdays, but I’d gladly sacrifice my resting hours after work for this! I immediately called Bruno and asked if he was interested. Even if he wasn’t, I would have gone for it myself. He said yes immediately, because he was very interested in this film as well, and was also disappointed initially when it was all fully booked.
So we watched the documentary last night, and boy it was good! It was so informative, and we get insights to how the market works, what goes through the minds of the people who work at Tsukiji. The feel-good vibes, the short witty moments from the people being interviewed/featured, the super famous chefs at world renowned Japanese restaurants in Tokyo (god I would never see them in person because I don’t have the money to dine in their restaurant)… I’ve never really enjoyed documentaries that ain’t related to natural disasters, so this is really the first one that I love. L-O-V-E. I even shedded some tears at some inspiring words from the people who work there. I would gladly get this on DVD if it’s ever released.
Go watch it, if it’s ever released in your country. Go watch it, you won’t be disappointed, I swear. Here’s the trailer:
Spent last Saturday with Bruno, as usual. I went over to his place and we caught a bus together to Sembawang Hill Food Centre. Unfortunately the kway chup stall had closed for the day, so he settled for laksa while I settled for an unassuming mixed veggie rice stall, which turned out to be quite delicious.
Then we took another bus to Thomson where he grabbed his Bakery coffee, and we kinda just walked around Thomson Plaza a little (for the aircon) before heading to Bishan to catch the movie Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children. I have to say, this is almost the first time I’ve watched “typical” Tim Burton movie. The only other Tim Burton directed movie that I’ve watched was Planet of the Apes, which wasn’t quite “Tim Burton-ish”. I resisted the urge to google for the movie plot and ending before the show, so this is the first time (in many years) that I went into the cinema with zero idea what I’m gonna watch. And I have to say, the movie was quite nice! Nice enough for me to rate it a 4.1 at least, out of 5. Although it’s kinda like a “kid’s movie”, I still quite enjoyed it. It was a little annoying to keep hearing someone snoring in the cinema though… there’s a Dad sitting next to Bruno who snored halfway through the movie. -_-
After that we went to Canopy Garden Dining, where we had a dinner reservation. We ordered a sausage platter to share, and he got himself crabmeat aglio olio while I had a mushroom burger with fries. The mushroom burger looked plain, but it was still rather good. The fries had a right crisp to it, but unfortunately it was a tad too salty for me. Bruno loved it though. After that we walked a bit around Bishan Park, where Canopy Garden dining was located at. But it was really dark at some parts of the park, and we kinda “interrupted” a few couples who were lying at the reclining chairs there doing… you-know-what. It was kinda embarrassing yet hilarious.
We were supposed to go to Gamestart Asia 2016 yesterday, but we both kinda fell slightly sick on Saturday evening when we were on our way home. He was feeling slightly feverish, while I was feeling the onset of cold (was sneezing and having running nose). So we decided to call it off and just rest at home, despite the tickets already bought. We caught most of the StreetFighter V SEA Major action (that was happening live at Gamestart) on stream, so it wasn’t that big a loss to not attend the convention.
Aaaaannd, it’s another new week. This is getting so tiring. Wish I can have a break…. though the next vacation is like two months away. That still seems horribly far though…
I’m really tempted to go without titles. It’s so silly to have to keep thinking of titles whenever I want to post something. I just want to blog! Why do I even need a title when I’m just rambling off about stuff that’s happening?
Right, so, Bruno and I went to catch Sully in the cinemas last Saturday. I thought it was a pretty solid acting (as usual) from Tom Hanks as Capt. Sully. It was a good story telling from Clint Eastwood. I like the replays, the flashbacks… and the background music was on point. Bruno seemed to think the movie was just okay-ish, but I kinda like it. Wonder if I should buy it off iTunes….
Dota 2 roster shuffle is killing me. The shuffle is locked, so the teams are fixed. PPD and Fear is no longer in EG, so I’m unsure whether should I keep the #BleedBlue hashtag or just stop supporting the team. The new lineup still looks pretty strong, with Universe, Sumail and Zai still in the team. Cr1t is an interesting addition and as the new captain, I’m kinda curious to see how he can manage the talents he has on this team. RTZ is… RTZ. There’s no need to say anything more about him. *insert rolling eye GIF here*
Miracle is now in Liquid (yay), but Bulba is also in Liquid (boo). I have nothing against Bulba, but he really doesn’t seem to be that strong of an offlaner, and much less of a support in Liquid now. I haven’t seen him play support position, but I have my doubts and reservations. It’s difficult to support Liquid now that Jerax is not in there anymore. =( But it’s difficult to support OG (where Jerax is) too because Fly is still in there. >_> Gah.
I don’t really have a favourite team to support anymore………… and this sucks. =(
Played WoW together with Reko again yesterday. It’s been a while since I last partied together with someone in the game, so it’s like… something to get used to again. He’s still as accommodating as ever to my play style though – which was nice. Boosted my shaman to level 100 – something that I was regretting a little… but well, maybe it won’t be that bad. Resto shaman prolly needs a group to level efficiently, so it’s probably the right choice. My druid can level alone just fine – good damage, decent healing. Resto shaman has bad damage (lol – worse than my disc priest, really) and relatively bad healing (burh). It’ll be amazing if I actually can manage to heal decently as a resto shaman, you know. Maybe once I do that, I can be godly in healing on my disc priest and resto druid. *insert rolling eye GIF again*
I jerked too much on my W4 cable, and the right connection broke off internally I think. No choice but to buy a new pair of IEMs – and I went for W30. It’s odd but even though it’s a downgrade in specs (W4 has four way drivers while W30 only has three way drivers), it actually sounds better than my W4. Weird.
I finally signed up for Friends of the Garden membership – that will allow me unlimited entries to Flower Dome and Cloud Forest at Gardens by the Bay! And immediately upon collecting my member card, I went to the Tulipmania exhibition! Very nice exhibition this year, way better than last year’s! Got a couple of photos posted up on Facebook, but I’ll post more here when I have the time.
Na’Vi is back! China doto is back! Too bad I can’t catch tonight’s SLI GF as it’ll be way too late when it starts and I have to work tomorrow. But I’m still hoping for a Chinese team to win it. Asian pride, kappa! :3
Caught a couple of movies this year already – didn’t really have the chance to list them all down. Caught The Jungle Book yesterday (not too shabby, but the child actor was pretty bad – not much facial expressions at all actually). Maybe I’ll do it in my next post or something… but gotta go soon, meeting up with Bruno to catch Huntsman: Winter’s War.
But yeah that’s about it!
PS: Hate the horrible hot weather lately omg. I’m perspiring as I type this… even though there’s a fan right behind me. -_-
