Last Bank Holiday of the Year

Started off my bank holiday with some shopping at Covent. Dropped by Camden Market before that to check out a stall which is suppose to sell some japanese clothes. Only managed to buy two tops from a boutique in Covent and a dress from Warehouse which was on sale - 20 quid off :). Strangely central London wasn't that packed as usual, maybe its just because of the bank hols. Later, had dinner at Imli - second choice to Yalla Yalla which was closed for the long w/e. I'd say the tapas in Imli are quite spicy. The naan is so-so, just normal naans, and I only remember I like the aubergine masala more than any others we ordered.

Was down in Portsmouth on Sunday for the International Kite Festival. Got there around 1ish. There were a lot of different shaped kites at the festival and there were some kite "performance"ish thingy going on where they make different formations with the kites. The weather was not too bad but it was quite chilly and windy. After lunch, we walked back to the festival ground and bought a "pink octopus" kite to fly. Portsmouth looks like every other seaside town. There are quite nice houses around and the Spinnaker Tower is quite impressive.

Had a lazy Monday doing laundry, cleaning my room etc and planning Sweden trip. It seems to be harder and harder to do planning having three ppl living in three different countries, with different time zones, and pouring each other with a lot of different ideas and opinions on where each wanna go etc, trying to go on a trip together! LOL. Hmm just wondering if I should start getting worried since we haven't actually have a proper plan where to go yet and thus no accom arrangements made yet. Anyway, I'm sure we'll come up with something that works soon!

Work day again tmr...sigh...happiness level dropped to below zero again. I think I miss home. Reason I'm quite definite about it is because I'm starting to get bored of almost everything. I know it's not the first time I'm rambling about this. But just can't stop myself. Hmm. Ok so it seems this year is a record year - almost more than a year I've not gone "home". The bank holiday weekend seems so short. Well, you must be thinking who wouldn't want longer holidays. Hmm but it seems different, even though I have some holidays coming up, "they" are just not enough to cheer me up.

p.s. I've started using Flickr again - http://www.flickr.com/photos/nicocsm/ .

The Perfect Brunch @ Lantana

After reading good reviews one after another on other foodies' blogs, I tried out Lantana for brunch today. It was gorgeous! Flat white is even better than the one from Flat White itself and Milk Bar! Although it's quite relative since standards vary depending on a lot of other conditions. They serve really generous sized portions, very rare in London! The kiwis know their food definitely! Highly recommended!!!

http://www.lantanacafe.co.uk/ OR http://scramblingeggs.blogspot.com/

Quotes of the day

Quotes of the day

...A good photographer makes everything seems so much more beautiful...

...Nothing in life is worth doing unless you are going to be serious about it....

Days after Bristol and NYC

I came back from my Bristol and NYC w/e with so much more holiday planning to do for the rest of the 2009. Just managed to book my flight back to KL via Alitalia (luckily the journey from Rome to KL is on MAS) through Lee's Travel for £600 (cheapest I can find for Dec!). But the agent mailed me today to say they couldn't get the transaction through. Sigh, need to call them up tmr.

Had dinner with the girls at Cinnamon Kitchen on Thurs before saying farewell to the gals who are off to South America for their exciting adventure. The food was REALLY good. I had the seafood broth and lamb curry and some random lychee and rice kheer dessert. Curry was soooo yummy. Definitely one of the top choices for Indian! Bill came to about £21 per person - about right since the 3 set menu was already £21

Watched The Time Traveller's Wife on Sat. It was such a well written story, very interesting yet funny and simply sad. Hmm I would imagine the book to be really good and probably much better than the movie. I am yet to read it.

Spent most of Sunday planning my Sweden hols at Sept and couldn't yet decide the places to go. Anyway, just need to sort my accom and train journeys at the mo.

Next in the list to plan is Cambodia in Dec. Can't wait! This is so bad - I really look fwd to trip back home but just felt depressing time flies, so fast, too fast that I just can't accept the fact that I am "aging" so fast :P.

Oh oh, I saw ONE of the perseid meteor on Sat night, approx. @ 23:58 lol. I was so happy that I did. It was really fast, almost a fraction of a second, but I managed to capture it clearly in my mind. Didn't quite expect it until Carman asked me to stare and the sky and just wait. Such a good lesson - patience is all you need to let things happen. And such a good motivation to think that you will get what you've longed for when all you need to do is go and get it yourself! The past two nights were quite cloudy, not even a single star in sight. Sigh...I guess I can't be so greedy...I am contented with just one :).

A packed 2nd w/e in Aug

It seems like yesterday, but it had already been a week plus since my hectic schedule of Bristol and NYC.

06/08/09 - Half day at work. Got off work around 12 + and head down to Hammersmith where we started our journey to Bristol. Managed to catch the last hour of Bansky vs Bristol Museum. There was a bit of a queue but we got in, although we had to literally rush our way around the exhibits. After that, off to the Balloon Fiesta ground. It was the Special Shapes Launch @ 6pm. Disappointingly, there were only 4 huge balloons - Up, Monster, Churchill and Harvey Nichols and none of them were launched. Hanged out around the fiesta ground where there were a lot of different stalls set up selling random stuff from lollipops, hog roast to sunglasses etc. @ 9pm, the Night Glow started. It was basically just making the balloons light up coordinating with the discoey music. Was great fun. Drove around Bristol at night searching for some places to get a drink and ended up at a boat pub. Slept in the car that night to maximise time since we need to be at the balloon grnd again @ 6am. 07/08/09 - Woke up @ 5am and drove down to the balloon grnd again. Got ourselves sorted and waited for the Mass Launch at 6am. The launch was awesome. So many balloons!!! It was simply amazing. How I wish I could be up on one of them! We left the place at around 8 ish. There were much less people compared to the night before. But there were so many people with such cool camera equipments. Had a yummy breakfast at the Boston Tea Party - nice latte :) and then sneaked in to the Banksy Exhibition again to cover off the top floor galleries. We had to sneak in because the queue was just unbearable. Unbelievably long - does ppl in Bristol has nothing to do than Banksy? Left for London arnd half 10. Said goodbye to the gang and took the tube to Heathrow for my flight to NYC.

Continental Airlines was better than I excepted. But then again, I had quite low expectations before this since it was the cheapest flight I can find. The seats didn't recline that much (-10). The food sucks - so much carbo (-10). The personal screen is pretty good (+10). So there you go, it's still a negative rating :P.

Reached Newark around 8ish and got to Hilton arnd 10ish as I eagerly awaited for Amy's arrival. The first thing that caught by attention as I walked from Bryant Park (42nd St - where the bus stopped) to Hilton at 54th st is Magnolia hehe. Thought of stopping and getting a cupcake, but didn't at the end. Next thing was that there was a Halal Food stall in front of Hilton. It's not the food that attracted me, it was the queue. It was superrrr long. Never had I ever seen so many people queuing for a 5 dollar bowl of rice and halal food. After checking in, we head out for some late night food and ended up at Friday's (of all places lol)

08/08/09 - Due to my jet lag, woke up quite early but linger in the hotel room till around 11 before heading out for my first day in NYC. Had brunch at La Bonne Soup - yummy Mushroom, Barley and Lamb soup. Started at Disney Store @ 5th Av and walked (shopped as well) all the way down to Broadway at 30 odd st. Had dinner at Sakagura - very yummy uzaku and sake. Went to 230 @ 5th Av rooftop bar for a couple of drinks. This place serve quite a few malaysian dishes! Nasi Lemak is one of them! Weird! Continued drinking at the hotel bar after Amy thinks it would be safer if 3 of us got drunk, the hotel room is still close enough within reach, lol.

09/09/09 - The day was not sunny but very stuffy. Just like the sky is about to burst in tears. Had brunch in Kyotofu - such a lovely place - loved it so much :). And then head to B&H Photo to witness the chaoticness of this place. Didn't buy anything since I think I need more time to consider which lens I should invest in. Walked around Macy's etc but shopping wasn't fruitful at all. By the time I bought the Coach bag my mum requested, our legs were too tired to continue further. Randomly popped into a restaurant and ordered some refreshing juices before we decide where to eat for the night. Went down to East village to find the vietnamese place we wanted to go weren't there anymore and so went to a fusion Thai place - The Elephant which serve decent pad thai and calamari salad - satisfied. Had drinks @ the Salon De Ning - another rooftop bar at the Peninsula. Cocktails were quite expensive at $22, but all worth it, nice chilled venue and yummy crackers :).!

10/09/09 - Went out to Greenwich early morning, had breakfast @ Sweet Revenge. The chocolate and peanut butter cupcake was superb! And then basically walked almost the whole of greenwich, soho, china town and nolita. Saw a lot of pretty dresses, but can't really afford them unfortunately. Got back to the Hotel around 5 before going out for dinner at 6 and then back to the hotel, pack and get ready for flight back to reality the next day.

...I think I am so much more an explorer now and want to do more and more of it!

p.s more pics @ my picasa web gallery

It's August

Past weekend spent on sorting myself out, i.e. had a hair cut, dyed my hair @ J Moriyama and went for a facial @ Pacifica Spa, Nottinghill with a Ottolenghi's blueberry and crumble muffin breakfast b4 that :)). And also, watched Coco Chanel - really good movie, so inspiring and went to have lunch around Spitalfields Mrkt. Was so tired the whole weekend, don't know why since all the stuff I did was supposedly to be relaxing...hmm.

Anyway, need to pack for Bristol Balloon Fiesta and NYC!!!

I need more sleep!

p.s. I finally can justify why I would spend a few hundred quid on a camera lens instead of a designer bag - that is - Looking back at the pics I've taken makes me so much more happier than showing off I have a designer bag on the street! :)...ooo can't wait to tell that to my MUM :)))

Another Chilling Weekend Well Spent?

Woke up unbelievably early today and made myself a healthy breakfast smoothie. It is really good detox...found out after having Innocent Super Foods Smoothies a couple of times!

And so I have been making smoothies quite frequently these days. The Innocent Smoothie recipe book has pretty good recipes.

Made good use of the mini blender I bought a couple of weeks ago as well. The only downside is that I don't have a juicer for the apples.

And therefore need to live with crunchy apple bits in my smoothies. Juicers are quite big though. Not quite sure whether I should invest in one.

Pics - left: the day b4...1 apple, 1 orange, 1 banana & a bunch of cherries...; right: today...1 grapefruit, 1 apple, 1 banana...

Got to central arnd half 11 and went straight to LA Fitness @ Holborn. Not a member myself but just to help Annie complete her weekly gym swipe ins. Not that big a gym. The one in Hertfordshire Sports Village has more equipment and way more spacious. I guess it's just London that is. Spent about an hour there and then hit Covent to look out for the final bits of summer sales, just in case they put out the good stuff towards the end of the sales season. End up not buying anything.

As I continue on towards Waterstones Pic, decided to drop by Nordic Bakery and bought a Cinnamon bun. Really sticky and cinnamony bun. But I can really say the bun can almost fill my stomach for the whole day!!! Quite filling that is. Pic courtesy of flikr...

Spent a good few hours in the book store looking for travel books so as to plan my holidays for the next couple of months. Also bumped into the "You Are Really Rich" book. A quick read, finished it in the bookstore. Wonder why anyone would wanna buy it? There are a couple of things in there that is quite funny and quite true and meaningful too. The book is actually about measuring richness without using money as a metric. Every other thing in life make us a lil richer...this is exactly the message I try to convey to my mum everytime she tries to convince me money is everything and very important.

Quotes:

• "...life is worth living just for the sheer physical beauty all around us...". And so it says even though one's out of job, one's partner walked out or even one's house burnt down and lost everything, there is still a very valid reason to live on happily, just because of the beauty of everything else arnd. We just need to look through a painter's eyes.


• "...Mondays are terrible way to spend one seventh of your life...but mornings can bring with it a huge sense of promise and change...today everything could be better, today everything could be fantastic. Believe it and it just might happen...". I know it's Sunday night, but keep on believing Nico!!!

When it comes to touch on Happiness Quotient and Optimism, I remembered the time my mum told me how she was trying to reverse her car from the parking space outside our house and nearly hit the neighour's maid and kid (or is it a dog...) because her mind went blank for a few minutes and although she knew the car is still moving backwards, her mind somehow failed to communicate the right message to her legs to press the brakes. She kept saying how lucky she was that she did not hit the maid and kid (...or maybe it is a dog the maid was with...doesn't make a diff here). After I heard the story, I realised how optimistic my mum was. She claimed it was lucky no one's hurt and did not even worry about why she didn't press the brakes immediately! If it was me, I would start worrying why I didn't react asap as I needed to. Such an optimistic mum! I guess that makes her so much more happier than people who are just not contented about what they already have (like me? hmm)