10 things you do before getting married

I stole this off M's Senses. I liked it. So here goes. Seriously though why is everyone getting married already? Only yesterday cs told me that he is attending yet another friend's wedding on 20th Sep. She is a former ex classmate of our back in college. (Shirley, remember Pei San?)

Anyway.

Supposedly you should not marry someone until you have accomplished these few things:

1. Go on a vacation somewhere far away with your partner.
Amy: Does KL count for both of us cos that's the only place I can afford plus the only place my mum is content that we two can go off together. I quote mum: "but u two are like going on a honeymoon together", when she knew that we were planning to go to Taiwan together. Sigh. She was pretty upset, why I don't know. Cos remember mum when you were 25, you had lil old me!! I'm old enough to go on vacation with my bf, remember?!

CS: We went to Kl together few months ago. Not tat far but it was fun because we've never been to some other places together. We can do whatever we want without any worries about curfew etc.. Miss that feeling.. Lets plan something again. =)



2. Visit the library together. Read your own reading materials and don't talk until you come out of the library.
Amy: We have been to the library together, supposedly to study but I think we ended up talking to each other, and then later went to feed the fishes by the lake, and then buying snacks from the cafeteria. This was years ago.. Seriously though, I can spend hours reading, while he would probably watch me read. Or sleep.

CS: Sorry i cant spend hours reading unless there are some interesting magazines for me to read..


Case in point. I read while he sleeps..

3. Prepare a candlelight dinner together. It doesn't matter who does what. Get a bottle of red wine and take your time without worrying about the dishes.
Amy: We've cooked for each other but very simple stuff such as instant noodles, hot dogs, eggs, fried rice etc. Those don't count. From those experiences, I know that I'm the controlling one in the kitchen. I instruct him to boil the water, step aside, wash the dishes etc. He has no clue what to do in the kitchen and he looks so cute when he just follows my instructions. Also, he looks so bewildered in the kitchen when I get angry or scold him for not following instructions.. About washing dishes, most of the time I wash either at his or my house cos it looks better if I wash at his house to please aunty and uncle, and when I wash at my house, its cos I know how mum wants her stuff organized..

CS: We've no time and place to prepare a candlelight dinner by our own since we are still living with our family. What we can do is have a candlelight dinner with champagne in hotel room. I did it for her..




4. Buy a toy together. Give it a name and bring with you on vacations.
Amy: A toy? Sex toy can? vibrator is a toy...and yea we bring it on vacations..hahahhaa

CS: Kids play with kid's toys; adults play with sex toys. Makes sense right??

5. Go clubbing together. Pretend you don't know each other and meet each other for the first time. And don't laugh (as in laughing because of your pretense).
Amy: Well we have been clubbing together countless times. I would like to do this, i.e. pretend we don't know each other but I think some guy would hit on me. Then cs would just get upset at the guy staring at me. hahahhaa..

CS: We've never done this before in a club but i think we will end up laughing...lol..

6. Visit places you and your partner grew up in.
Amy: Done. We go over to each other's houses all the time. My family are so used to him already, and even ah boi ignores cs now..

CS: Done. I've moved to Kuching for more than 17 years. So Kuching is the place where i grew up..

7. Make a wish together under a shooting star.
Amy: We made a wish under the stars together before.. Does that count?

CS: We made a wish under the stars few years ago before we get into this relationship. My wish was to bring her happiness if i could. Haha I never told her about this.
(Amy: awww...baby)

8. Make an anonymous donation together at an orphanage or an old folks' home.
Amy: I'm not trying to be stingy here but I barely earn enough for myself. I do buy biscuits from old men selling by the roadside. I give donations when i can...err..that should be ok.

CS: Yea we do buy biscuits from old men. Is this counted??

9. Look after a plant or pet together.
Amy: We look after ah boi (my dog) together. We feed him snacks and let him out to use the toilet. Cs buys him snacks when he is abroad or when we go to the supermarket. So yea, ah boi counts.

CS: Yea we have cute little ah boi. I bought some dog biscuits from Hongkong which cost me about RM50 per small box. I do care for ah boi..

10. Fart loudly in front of each other. If you can't do it, then it's difficult to last forever.
Amy: Yesh we both farted in front of each other..easier said than done. hahaha

CS: We farted in front of each other but that is not the loudest one. I can have a louder fart. I'll try again next time k.. hahaha...

These days

It has been a long weekend due to public holiday Monday! Tomorrow its back to work..The highlight of this long holiday has to be cs falling sick on Sat. Thus, we get to stay home most of the time where I force feed him to drink all types of herbal tea, and whatever cooling water, in addition to his meds. Unluckily for him, I haven't got the patience of a saint. Luckily for him, I get over the anger pretty fast by myself without much persuasion from him heh.


All bundled up and happy.

Btw, we turned 8 months last Friday! Time flies by so fast..I suppose that working makes the time goes by extra fast. Working 5 or 6 days a week, rest one or two days, and routine continues. Before you know it, a month has gone by, then two months. Then half year. Pretty soon its a year gone by again. This month, I look forward to mum's birthday (spend $$), and Hari Raya (2 days public holiday!!).


Happy anniversary! We've never celebrated before this. Surprisingly neither one of us remembered or bothered to do something. A few days ago, I reminded him about it. I made a card for him, while he bought this cake for us to share at home with my family. God we are so boring.

Random photo of ah ong and his wife nana. Don't they look alike in this pose?

Hahahaha..caught unaware.

This was on Sat night, we went to Pending for dinner. The food was alrite, cheap and nothing outstanding. Oh wait there is something. They win the award for taking the longest time for the meal to arrive. God I was starving while waiting for the food to arrive!!


They also win the award for the seafood restaurant that serves the most "chang" (spring onion) on a piece of orh chien (oyster pancake).

Sorry the photo is blur but by the green dots, you can see that its not normal for oyster pancake to have so many of it, right? That aside, it actually tastes not bad. But then again, I was starving by then so I really couldn't afford to be picky about the food..


Ugly photo but a post without vain old me? Not possible..

Later during the night, we went to Lounge 2. I think this has become our regular haunt nowadays. I like the ambience; not too noisy. Occasionally there is a live band that plays but they sing songs such as Alicia Keys - No one. Also, the crowd is less noisy consisting of less college kids and more working adults. The alcohol is slightly RM2-3 more than your average Soho. Nice place basically.







On Sun and Mon, cs and I spent most of the time at his place facebook-ing, youtube-ing, talking crap, eating each other in his bedroom, having sex sleeping..yeah...pretty uneventful.

Rakutei

On my birthday eve, cs brought me to Rakutei, a Japanese restaurant located on the ground floor of Crown Square/Towers. Opposite Mr.Ho's. It was rather dim inside so photos all turned out very dark:


We ordered salmon sashimi. It was quite late by then around 830pm and we ordered waay too much food for two starving people..


Also shared a small bottle of hot sake. Sake to me, tastes a bit sourish but in a good way. It goes down well with the food when its still hot and warm. Is it strong? I don't know..It heats up my throat going down sort of the way bailey's does. Hmm..I don't know if that is a good comparison?


The portions were quite big. Definitely not what we expected. This is California Maki, very filling..


The service was pretty good there, nothing much to complain about. The place was pretty empty and quiet on a Wednesday night. I don't think Rakutei is a new restaurant right? The food is quite pricey but reasonably priced as the portions are definitely more than enough.. But if the place is still open with Kuching people's rather stingy spending habits, Rakutei should be pretty much a hit right? Our meal came down to around RM160, I think.


Baby ordered some Bento dish main course with a potato salad, grilled chicken, grilled eggplant, and some fish I think. Don't really remember and photo is too dark to tell anything. This came with a bowl of rice which was literally untouched.


I love soft shelled crab.


Some unagi thing. This thing is larger than life and so filling.. Yum. Oh yea, I choked on a piece of the unagi bone. Normally the bone is soo tiny that most people just swallow it, no problem right. But obviously I am a freak with a small throat opening. Stupid tonsils. I gagged and had to force feed myself rice to make myself swallow the tiny bone. Hate it when this happens. I remember the first time I choked on a fish bone back home during dinner time. Dad was the only one who was worried about me, forcing me to swallow huge mouthfulls of rice in between my gagging. My siblings were rolling around laughing, literally choking from laughing at me. Evil people!


The spread on our table. Greedy people ordered too much. We were starving by that time and randomly ordered everything that looked good thinking that we would of course finish everything. Some more Japanese food portions were always tiny, right??

At the end of the night after stuffing our faces with food..


No, I am not naked. I'm wearing a black tube dress..

Good night.

Don't stop raining

1) I think I need a break. Or a long weekend. My body is telling me to slow down..

Take me away..

2) I am so looking forward to this weekend: no-working Saturday, and public holiday Monday. Yes! I badly need it. I took a half day off from work today cos my body refuses to listen to me when I tell it not to be sick.


One holiday a year is waay too little...blame it on my low pay and cs' working hours. Which reminds me, I need a new job. I don't know what I want. I just know I need something new..preferably something less boring/mundane/dead.

3) Random photo of two miniature Eiffel Towers. Why do so many people want to go to Paris? When I went there, I thought of Paris only as a French-speaking version of London. Everything else is almost the same. To me lahh..



4) The accident that changed everything. I've probably never told the story of how this accident brought cs and I so much closer together. Might as well share now since I'm free and bored. On the morning of the day of the accident, I was on the way back from an interview at Merdeka Palace. I knew it didn't go well, and I was very unhappy and upset, so I stopped by MJC to look for cs for a chat. I was happy to spot his car in the parking lot. Parked my car beside his, and decided to surprise him at his office. Walked into his shop without looking at anyone, i.e. his family cos they all don't know me yet.



To my disappointment, he went OUT!! Noo..and no one knows when he'll be back. I called him again and again, but he didn't pick up the phone. Noo..after around 30 minutes walking around aimlessly waiting for him to pick up the phone, I decided to leave.

Before leaving, I circled the area in my car very err carelessly I must admit. My eyes weren't really on the road. Of course, before I knew it, BANG! I rammed into another car. Obviously I thought I was wrong cos even I knew how recklessly I was driving. To my surprise, the other guy got out and said its not my fault. He took an illegal turn. Passers by told me its not my fault too. Hmm..seems like I could get off easy with this one.

However, to make matters worse. I had an expired driving license that day. I forgot to renew it since I got back from London. I had to call my dad. He wasn't angry until he heard I had an expired license! Screw. How to make a police report with an expired license? Bro arrived and honestly he wasn't much help. He didn't know much about negotiating about the car prices etc, who is right or wrong etc. Neither did I.

Finally! Cs called me back. I told him I got into a car accident in front of his shop. He said Oh. Is it serious? I said no, its ok. We hung up. 2 seconds later he called back to say he's coming to see me. He was actually at lunch with 2 other friends at Sekama. According to his friends, he was dazed after hearing I was in an accident and practically forced them to fly through every red lights and cut through every other car to reach MJC asap.

Lucky that as soon as he arrived, he started screwing the other driver for making an illegal turn, that its his fault, no question etc etc. Then while bro and the other guys went to the police station to make a police report, cs rushed me to the post office to renew my driving license then drove me back to the police station.

What I meant to say was, the both of us were just friends before. But somehow something changed that day. Why did I have to talk to him after I was upset over the interview? Why was he so worried about me throughout the accident? Why was I so upset when I couldn't find him? Why did we both react so naturally towards each other? Have we always been hiding our feelings to each other? We've talked about this many times, and both of us agreed that (choi) its a good thing I got into an accident that day..

What I know is, from that incident onwards, we were more open about our feelings. Like we could embrace a relationship with each other..A step further from just best friends..

5) Random cute dirty photo of ah boi


Aww..Cute nonetheless.

6) Mum's birthday a year ago at VA. It shocked me to realize that its her birthday next Friday! Gasp! Where has the time gone?!



My mom is cooler than your mum. She dances and sings better than me. During high school, my friends who saw that my mum was smoking told me: Wow! Amy ur mum is so cool. This was from the guys of course. They said: I wish my mum smokes too, then she won't stop me from smoking wtf! Now that my mum stopped smoking, the girls tell me: Wow Amy your mum is so cool! She can quit smoking after 20+ years? Amazing! Screw.

7) Mooncake festival. Dad has started buying mooncakes at home already. Dad is so predictable and kiasu. Before any festival/occasion, he would be one of the first to buy the food. Such as chinese new year cookies, pineapple tarts, crates of oranges and bak poh for chinese new year. And all types of mooncakes (lotus, pandan, durian, red bean etc) for mooncake festival.

I wonder what the group is planning this year.. Last year they made this. Or rather, several of these:


And lit them at Friendship Park, at Damai, and at Kota Samarahan (one of their houses)


It was quite a success.

8) I miss Burger King fries. McD and KFC fries cannot compare. Come to think of it, I don't recall the last time I had KFC fries in Kuching. They just don't offer them with the value meals. The meals come mostly with wedges/cheesy wedges. Hate cheesy wedges btw. They cheese and mayo cover the aroma and slight crispiness of the wedges by itself.

McD fries are waayy too salty. Crazy people put one full shot of salt on a basket of fries. I used to get reprimanded by my manager for not putting one full shot. Cos it is the protocol. Always put one shot of salt on the fries. Me, I do it when the manager is watching. But I get crap from customers when I do. They always try to stop me when I shake too much salt on the fries...

Routine

I'm sick again. On Sunday, I was seriously wondering do I have swine flu or not? I sat there in front of the computer reading and rereading the symptoms of normal flu vs swine flu here. Its the article titled: An Apple A Day. Anyway, on Sunday I woke up to an aching and painful body, despite no exercise the past few days. Ignored it. Quickly decided that my fever is much more worrying. Quickly tested my temperature. Shit. Confirmed Fever. Took 2 fever pills, and found no antibiotics at home. Cough is getting worse, and damn I have flu! My cough is the dry cough, with no mucus. And double damn I'm freaking shivering non stop.

Then I tried to delude myself into thinking I'm fine. Reason being, I'm more worried about getting scolded by mum rather than falling sick. Yesh mum is that scary..

Ahh..my parents are not dumb. Obviously my face gave it away. And the cough and flu. After getting myself and cs scolded and nagged for going out too much, not enough rest, weak body etc etc etc...whew..the worst is over..

Or so I thought. This morning I went to the doctor and got back these:


A buffet of meds. Sigh. This will take a whole week to finish..


The doctor and nurse left me alone with my phone.

I'm scared of the meds. I think they are too strong for me. They make me so dizzy and so blur. I feel faint most of the time, and have to quickly sit or lie down again. Some more my hands are shaking terribly; these got me scolded by dad for being too weak!! I could barely hold my spoon properly. Obviously the meds are doing their job of killing the bacteria/germs/viruses whatever inside me, and leaving me weak and shaky what. Happens to everyone no?

Now I'm fine cos the drugs are mostly off already. But I seriously dread taking them before sleep. And how to take them in the morning? How to work?!

Btw mum thinks I have swine flu and I should quarantine myself from work. Sigh. Doc gave me a day off tomorrow as well. Should I infect everyone in the office? Or stay home?

To tempt Shirley back to Kuching...

Sooo... it is August again. The main events in Kuching to look forward to in August, for me, are: Kuching festival, my birthday and 31/08 (It is Sarawak's Independence Day, hence public holiday!!) Kuching Fest is a three-week long festival where all the food in Kuching are displayed and for sale..So, basically everything is here. And some harder-to-find food such as the fried ice cream that some people like Winnie eat once a year only at the Kuching fest.


Fried ice cream. The outside is deep fried and hot, and the inside is well..ice cream. Sorry I suck at describing. Actually there is nothing particularly special about this. But in freaking hot Kuching, this is probably quite special...hmm..

This year, there seems to be especially more teochew oyster. A lot of stalls are selling this..


This is teochew style oystew omelette/pancake. Obviously I stole the photos. Everytime when faced with this thing, I stuff my face first then oh shit. I forgot yet again to take a photo..


This is the normal Kuching oyster omelette you get in Kuching. When you order at almost any restaurant in Kuching, they would give you this. It is supposed to be crispy by the sides, and most of the oysters are in the middle, where it is a little soggy. This photo, also stolen, is probably the more unappetizing type of oyster omelette. You can tell. The oysters are so small, they look like oyster fetuses. Arr..oh well..

The difference with the teochew style is that teochew style, there is no crispiness. The whole thing looks all sticky and gooey but it tastes damn good. I don't know how to make it, so I don't know what they use to make it all sticky and yummy. Btw, Taiwan style oyster pancake is also the wet type like teochew. Only it has a lot more soup. The whole thing is swimming in soup of a little tomato-y base.


Like this.

Ok. Moving on.

I had quite a lot of this this year. It is some coconut jelly thing. A thai dessert, if I'm not mistaken. Yum.


I don't know about other people but for me, every year I eat the same stuff. This is pandan chicken, something I eat every year as well..Again, photo stolen. Sorry I'm a lazy blogger. I steal photos off google images.


It is wrapped in pandan leaves, and the inside is roasted/grilled(?) chicken, sometimes with a bit of corn. Who hasn't tried this before? If you're reading this, make sure you try this if you come across it..Good stuff..


Also, every year there is a stage for performances. Local groups and individuals singing and/or dancing. Its boring: note, the empty chairs. hahahhaa..


Winnie and some cheese thingy. Does not taste good so no need to elaborate..


Baby and I near the lake behind the stage..

I thought that since I am already stealing and uploading photos from google images, might as well steal more while I'm at it..The photos ahead are mainly to tempt my best friend, Shirley who is away in London. Will these food cheer u up or just make you annoyed at me?? Haha..I tried ok!


Kuching famous Kolo Mee. I wonder is Kuching the only place you can get Kolo mee in Malaysia? Sorry that I'm so ignorant if your place aka Sibu, Miri has it. Sorry in advance..


Sarawak Laksa is BETTER than Penang laksa or anywhere else. Sorry Nifer! I still don't think laksa should have sardine fishes, or cucumber in it. Weird!!! haha..come to Kuching and I bring you to try Sarawak laksa..


Cha kueh. I think this is called carrot cake in English. This is the salty version, fried with egg and some salty thing (God I suck, I don't know what its called)


Yew cha kueh. This is normally what people in Kuching eat with Bak Kut Teh soup! Its a soup cooked with pork and herbs. But you can hardly taste the herbs. Just the yumminess of pork. Anyway has anyone tried this with laksa?? It is good! Trust me!


This stolen photo of Nasi Lemak is so small. Basically nasi lemak consists of coconut rice, half a boiled egg, some curry chicken with potatoes/ or beef rendang, with sambal and ikan bilis (small salty fish), and err cucumber. Sorry I haven't had nasi lemak in ages. This is a typical Malaysian food. Can be found anywhere in Malaysia..I suppose it varies each state, I don't know..


Chicken rice.


Hokkien mee. I miss this. God I should find this sometime this week. Err..I don't know how to describe this. It looks exactly as it should.

Err..to my non-Malaysian friends reading this, you do understand what I'm talking about right? Come visit me and try the real thing!!!