.::The Pursuit of Happiness::.

May 20, 2007

Finally I have some time to rest and blog. I'm nursing a cough now which seems to take forever to cure. Must have been my late nights for the past 2 weeks, which have been exciting and interesting. Was out every other night and have been drinking on at least 5 occasions. But, I had a good time and that's all that really matter.

It all started last tuesday, when one of my colleague, Simon came down from Australia, His Blackberry Pearl was broken, so I issued him a new one and was intending to send it for repair the next day. Then, my self-proclaimed "supervisor" (I'm saying this because there isn't a hierarchy in the way we report to our boss; we do different functions, she's only more senior to me in terms of position), who just came back to the office after a couple of drinks, started questioning me why I issued to him and took it back from him. Anyways, I thought it was really stupid since I could have gotten a replacement for it anyways. No need to kick up such a big fuss. Besides, he is in our department, and not just any other user. I felt really bad but decided not to make an issue out of it.

Anyways, didn't think too much about it and went to Owen Seafood Restaurant later that night with some colleagues for Lydia's fareware dinner. She would be leaving ABN AMRO to pursue other opportunities. I wish her all the best in her future endeavours. Will really miss her a lot. She is a really nice and cheerful person and have helped me alot when I was new.

This is my second time there with this bunch of really nice colleagues. We had 6 crabs (what a feast), 2 chilli crabs+ fried & steamed buns, 2 black pepper crabs, 2 salted eggs crabs, drunken prawns, garlic bamboo clams and hokkien mee. Man.. it was really good. I love the food. I love the people. We really enjoyed ourselves and took like 2 plus hrs to finish. By the time I was home, it was already 11 plus.

The next day when to work, Simon seems kinda pissed with my "supervisor" and ignored her the whole day. Lame right? Later towards the day, he went to see Nigel and Nigel asked me to issue it to him so I just did as I was told. I never knew this will actually lead to bigger conflict and she got extremely pissed and banged her labtop and left when she found out. I was kinda unsettled as I'm kind of kind the middle person and indirectly the cause of it. I tried not to think so much about it as I thought she would be better the next day. Anyways, Simon asked me out to see SpiderMan 3 after she left since he got free tickets from our vendor AsiaNetComm. That's the good thing about our scope of job. We have lots of vendors and with vendors comes the benefits :)

So I went with Simon, Weng and Steve to catch SpiderMan 3 at Cathay Cini Leisure. I never knew there was a preview lounge in there. It was really cool. They have a buffet there, as well as beer, champagne and punch. Ate some, drank some then went to watch the movie. I think the movie was not bad but found it a little too complicated. I like movies with simple story lines. After movies, guys wanna hang out, so went to a bar nearby to have drinks. Weng was obsessing about the yagerbomb drink, so I had one with him. The other two caucasians had beers. The drink was strong, with jagermeister and redbull. If it knew it's contents earlier, I probably wouldn't have take it. Shots shouldn't be taken with redbull unless you want to get high quickly. But I was fine and got home by MRT.

Next day after work went bowling with the ABN AMRO bowling club people. I kinda build up a clique by asking people to join me. Now, they are all like: Are you going tonight? when previously they couldn't even be bothered to go. I'm happy I've got a group of regulars now ;)

Friday night after work, went to W/I/N/E Collection with Kevin to have light dinner and a couple of drinks. Nice place. Many people buy wine from there. It's said to have the cheapest and largest selection you can choose from. I loved the cheese pizza. I think it was delivered from the Italian Restaurant nearby. They couldn't have their own selection of food, or at least something decent for dinner. I had also red wine and pasthes (i think it's spelled this way). I don't even know why am I having wine so often nowadays. The pasthes comes on nicely when it is light and mixed with water. You can taste the mixture of herbs in it, but too much of it, it is actually hot.

The next day, slept in late, woke up late afternoon only to eat. Was intending to slack the whole day to catch up on my sleep. Then Simon beeped me to have dinner with him. I thought alright, no harm having dinner with a colleague, never have been.

Met him at the lobby of Fullerton Hotel then went to Palm Beach Seafood Restaurant by the Merlion to have dinner. I never knew this restaurant has won so many awards before. We were lucky we could get a seat since we didn't booked beforehand and it was on Mother's Day eve. The view there was really nice, overlooking the Singapore River, the Cavenagh Bridge and the Merlion. I knew noticed the Merlion was there before. It was really a nice sight at night. Many tourist and expatriates were gathered around it to take photos. Then it suddenly baffled me when Simon asked me, what's so special about the Merlion.. why is it such an attraction? I have never tried to explained the signifiance and symbol of the Merlion to anyone before, especially a caucasian so it kinda struck me in the head while I tried to recall the legend.. Lol, it was funny.

Anyways we had some appeitizers, creamy(butter) crab with fried bun, kai lan w garlic, normal fried rice and a bottle of white wine from Hunter Valley. I'm a little surprised he actually take kai lan, somemore with the garlic but never under- estimate the caucasian ar.. haha.. It's my first time having butter crab. I've had chilli, black pepper and salted egges crabs before, but not butter crab. I was supposed to join a couple of my colleagues for butter crabs on one of the mondays at the popular seafood restaurant at ang mo kio but fell sick on that day. Lucky me got to have a taste of it at Palm Beach Seafood Restaurant and I loved it. It was really really good. It will have you licking you fingers after you finished it. Fried rice was average, maybe even a little hard, but I've heard cacausian loved their fried rice so never take it away from them. I had like 3 glasses of wine and still felt perfectly fine after that (i was really surprised myself).

After dinner, we decided to go to one of the nearby pubs to chill. We took the outdoor seats since it was much quieter and overlooks the river with a nice serenity. We can see the dancers inside dancing to the house music and there's this guy who gives a really good rendition of Robbie William's 'Feel'. Always a good song to listen to. We both had two glasses of 'Cosmopolitian'. It's a nice refreshing cocktail made up of vodka, cranberry juice and lime juice. Which means I actually had two shots of vodka. I didn't felt the effect until into the second glass. We had some good conversation until I dunno whether he was drunk or what, and started to say weird things.. shall not go into details. I myself wasn't very well after that (I coudn't feel my head) but was definitely better than him.

Then Sunday was Mother's Day, as everyone would have known. I definitely have lost my appetitie, what's with the drinking and stuff. But went to Suki Sakura for dinner. Got to see grandma and all my aunties, uncles and cousins. It has been a while since I last saw grandma, on new year's day.. was glad to see her. Anyways, nothing special. Never really liked the food there since I have it too often.

Then come tuesday after work, met Simon at Wan Yang foot reflexology at The Concourse for foot massge. Yes, this is my first time having a foot massage. I thought it was going to hurt like fuck, but it was alright, only hurt at times. But I wasn't really comfortable with the foot reflexologist being able to tell what part of your body is wrong just by massaging your feet. But having the company of Simon is good enough; he's really funny. My feet definitely felt lighter after the massage so it was well worth the experience. Then after that, went to Pizza Hut to have dinner. This is probably one of the smallest outlet I have seen. It's supposed to function mainly as a delivery outlet. Weather was nice. Shared some personal anecdotes...

Next day after work, had dinner with him at Haru Dining, the Jap restaurant beside Palm Beach Seafood Restaurant. I kinda feel bad that we stood out on Weng but he really wants my company so I obliged. The inside of the restaurant is really cosy, with a candle on every table and pebbles to serve as chopstick holders. He's like obsessed with soft- shell crabs or something. He ordered soft shell crabs and soft shell crabs sushi.. haha, I wonder who actually does that? and yes, we have cucumber handrolls.. weird that people will actually go for cucumber in sushi as I personally would prefer something more meaty like eel or something. Had lime vodka and him Spring cooler. I think I should have taken that instead or a sake. Don't really like shots.

The next day, I was being thrown tons of things to do, but what to do, just do lor. At least after work, I'll get to chill. So after work, was all set to go bowling with my usual clique, then last minute Nigel asked me and Brenda if we wanna go to PostBar for a drink to bid Simon farewell since he will be on leave the next day. I think it best not to decline this kinda thing so I obliged; Brenda declined, but oh well..

Poor Weng was forced to come along. I think he's gotta meet his family or somebody for dinner and kept looking at his watch. Lucky he has got his 'Mojito' to keep him company. He's a guy that loves his drinks. Simon got a free drink from last night while both me and Nigel had two glasses of white wine. Nigel was happily rattling away about his weekend, his nights out with the guys, blah blah blah. Anyways, I think it was a good choice I made to join them as I got to learn more about Nigel, his drinking habit, what he does, their ongoing projects and there was even talk about my contract renewal. I was going to go back to join the guys for bowling but decided against it after the drinks as what kind of wine is that that Simon ordered? It's damn bloody strong. The strongest I have had so far.

Had a relaxing half day on Friday, chilling out, doing nothing, just lazing around, watching cable and had a good talk with him.

That's the end of my exciting 2 weeks, gonna rest for a bit for now...