a Swee Choon dinner

For a dim sum place that's open till 0400 on most days and weekends, I've never actually been here beyond 2245. :)

 

Not once.

 

Not once at all.

 

If I'm here, I'm here usually because I'm making a trip to Mustafa, which is five steps away along Syed Alwi Road, or because I'm just coming out from it.

 

And because a trip to Mustafa means that I'm either uber hungry after all that walking from one end to the other, or that I'm fueling up to walk from one end to the other, I'm just so glad the dim sum here at Swee Choon is filling, tasty, has plenty of variety and is all at a great, great price. :)

 

I love their yam puffs. 

 

Inside each one they've got a bit of green pea, they've got a bit of carrot cube, it's light and crispy on the outside and it's all mushy and tasty on the inside.

 

 

Best part, their yam puffs are a staple here, and save for one time, they've hardly run out of them.

 

Which is a very good thing, because yam puffs are sort of a staple when it comes to dim sum, but it can be like a hit and miss at many places where they're permanently on the menu, but "very sorry, dear patron, we've run out today." 

 

Hearing that can be a wee bit of disappointment.

 

Especially when staple dishes are such a huge thing when it comes to dim sum. It's a cultural perspective, an element that you recognize as being dim sum no matter which part of the globe you are at. You could have it in Hong Kong or China or Australia or US; just the sight of bamboo baskets, steamers, woks, tea pots, small plates and staple orders tell you that yup, you're having dim sum.

 

Most places do have their signature dishes; stuff that you won't quite find elsewhere cos' of the resident in-house shifu and all, and it's no different here at Swee Choon where you've got banana prawn fritters, you've got super deep fried pumpkin balls with salted egg custard warm and gooey inside, and you've got mee suah kueh.

 

I love their mee suah kueh.

 

It's really good. 

 

Kind of reminds me of a bowl of d*** solid mee suah molded into a rectangular shaped piece of kueh, lightly covered with egg or flour or something, then deep fried to this glistening golden brown, so you get it crispy on the outside and then meltingly soft and just that little bit chewy on the inside.

 

Mee Suah Kueh

Makes a nice inclusion to a great meal for a weekend evening. :)

 

Weekends are the most crowded here. 

 

Maybe because there's a bit of cha chan teng vibe to the place.

 

And there's a bit of that neighborhood coffee shop feel, like the one you go to when your mother interrupts what you're doing to "can you go downstairs and tapao dinner.." 

 

It's not just in the fluorescent lights, the tables or the crockery. It's present amongst the staff too. Efficient, friendly, no-nonsense, remarkably observant, and also, kind. We were there one time and a staff switched seats for an elderly so that she could eat more comfortably on a lean-back chair than have to crouch on a narrow stool.

 

Little Plates, little Foods

It is this vibe, this atmosphere, together with their offerings, that probably define the long queues, and what has their customers coming back, whatever the day, whatever the time.

 

For me and my dining companion, what keeps us coming back from time to time, are the staples. 

 

They're so comforting. 

 

Like the cheong fun, the char siew or the prawn, rolls of steamed flour bathed in sauce soft and mellow and rounded and smooth on the tongue. We eat up everything, including the sprng onions. 

 

And the ubiquitous char siew pau, fluffy, warm, sweet and comforting, and which, on this day that I tried to take a picture, somehow managed to make the paus glow in the light of an early evening sun.

 

And of course, the prawn puffs, deep fried, slightly chewy, slightly crunchy pastry over one big juicy prawn. 

 

cheong fun

 

Shadowy Paus

Prawn Puffs

 

Fish burger Tales

Not everyone has a story to tell of when it comes to fish burgers.

I do. :)

Not from McDonalds

See, I didn't really eat fish burgers when I was younger. Not because I couldn't afford to, not because I didn't like breaded fish fillets or tartar sauce, but because I didn't think I needed to. See, I'd always had hamburgers or cheeseburgers at McDonalds, and they were good and fine for me, so much so that the McChicken and Filet-o-Fish and Chicken Nuggets might as well didn't exist to me.

And they didn't, really.

At a friend's birthday party at McDonalds, the birthday planner instructed us kids to raise our hands to show her what we wanted from the menu. When she called out 'hamburger', I raised mine. Later the Parent said I was silly. I could have tried something else that I usually didn't take. Like a Filet-o-Fish.

I wanted to tell her that I liked the hamburger and that it didn't really matter to me.

But I didn't say so. :)

The Parent still doesn't know why either.

What The Parent does know is that I'm still one heck of a stubborn these days. That when I find something good and great and fantastic, I stick like glue to it and I don't let go. If I think it works, if I think it makes me happy and is helpful to me and doesn't harm me, I'm a loyalist- hopefully- till the end. Like Glitter Nail Polish. Like the Hallyu Movement. Like Coffee. Like Popcorn. 

And if I so feel like trying something new, well, hey, new discovery! Otherwise, it doesn't matter very much whether I stick to what's comfortable for me, does it not? I like being in my comfort zone. :) And so far it hasn't done me any bad.

Then again, when there's the risk of danger, or when there's the presence of abuse involved, staying in the comfort zone is a no-no. Absolutely not. Yet, more often than not, it is easier said than done.

We humans have a tendency to cope and adapt to whatever situation that presents itself in front of us, and regardless of how ugly, how helpless, how hurtful, how confusing, how awful, how painful, how uncertain it might all be, we still remain, relying on inner resources and coping mechanisms to deal with the mental, emotional and physical trials that befall us. And when we feel like we're screwing up, we look to memes, encouraging words, motivational phrases, our own pride and stronger-than-us icons to keep us going forward.

It helps, I'm certain of that, for the day to day.

But I ask, what happens when that icon you look toward and cling on to, hurts you, destroys you and abandons you? What happens when that icon- who isn't some worldwide iconic figure like Jack Ma or Richard Branson or Nelson Mandela- but is someone closer to home, makes you worship him or her in one beat, and in the very next, seeks to destroy you, and because you're in your comfort zone, because you want to continue in your comfort zone, you decide that better be this, than to have none at all?

Here's another story associated with a fish burger.

Not this one either

But really not a very pleasant one at all, this one. 

Because how could she, this lady, have known, that with just that one consumption of a fish burger for dinner, she'd subsequently have her life irrevocably changed?

How could she have known that, having finished eating it, that there'd be physical consequences which would then lead to emotional consequences which would then lead to a gradual, torturous abandonment by the very iconic figure whom she'd so admired and trusted? 

And how could she have known that the same iconic figure, having left her to fend for herself would cut off, slowly, limb by limb the connection they once shared, leaving her entirely to herself, and after that, turn around in spite, hatred and evil, to make attempts to harm her, hurt her and destroy her wholly and completely, taking away not just her dignity, but also, her sense of self-esteem, decades of dedicated love and more importantly, her years of life lived?

Never obvious, never certain, never absolute this all was, and whether she should have known, or whether she should not have known, that's no longer important to her anymore.

It's just gone. 50 years of her life, poof, gone up in smoke and ashes, leaving behind nothing else but tears, despair, lingering regret and questions, questions and more and more questions.

Right after that one, normal, everyday thing of a damn fish burger.

the Skin of the Salmon

So since I've got a couple, (okay, just three actually) of pics of salmon skin from here and there, great idea to plonk them all into a single article, no? :)

Yes, I do funny stuff sometimes.

 

Deep fried fish skin or salmon skin isn't new in the market.

 

You get it at most seafood restaurants where you can order one big dish of it as appetizer to munch and nibble whilst they cook up your already-ordered crab in sauces of black pepper, chili, salted egg or bee hoon. But it's the combination of salted egg flavoring over fish skin and salmon skin that seems to have gotten it out from the seafood restaurants into jars, into sealed packets, onto our shelves and into our stores.

 

Not to mention that now you get to have the snack, salted egg or no, at (other) places that offer fish prepared many ways and any way, and wherever there's seafood.

 

So there you go. :)

 

From Nihon Maru

Fish & Co

and Fish & Co

 

the Nihon Maru plates

Bright, lovely colors!

They've got an promotion going on at Nihon Maru now. For every ten plates of sushi you order- each priced at $1.60- you get a cute looking little lobster with sauces that you can choose from. There's Mentaiko and Yuzu and something else. 

 

We usually go for the Mentaiko.

 

Honestly, I don't know what goes into the sauce. :) It just tastes good, kind of sweet, kind of salty, kind of a little bit of everything, which goes really well  with the nibbles of lobster that I carefully pick out with my chopsticks. 

 

Rules stipulate that one must have ten plates on the table first before they bring the lobster, so by the time the little fella comes, we've more or less munched through a portion of our meal.

 

Our orders vary. I've tried the Californian maki. I've tried the soft shell crab maki. I've tried the scallop maki. They're all good. I've tried three little deep fried fishes that reminded me of some sort of sardines. I've tried the fried salmon belly. They've got fried oysters. They've got karaage, the little  deep fried chicken pieces that make for a great snack. And I think they've got tofu, and they've got lots and lots of other dishes that offhand I don't really recall but are as appetizing as the ones I've tried.

 

It's easy to keep eating and eating and eating over here.

 

Maybe it's the atmosphere. They've got an open-concept feel where you can see your fellow diners across the conveyor belt, call across the aisle to the opposite table and ask them if the ice cream's good and hear the cheerful chat and laughter emanating from all sides. It's casual, it's fun, it's Gen Z inside and out. 

 

Their Tables ^_^

Or you could feel like you wanna eat and eat and eat because of the conveyor belt. Really.

 

Their Belt ^_^

I mean, there you are sitting, patiently waiting for your orders to come, and then right by your head, they come, brightly colored plates of gunkan, maki, appetizers and dessert sitting pretty on the belt, as if giving you a friendly wave of greeting and a friendlier wave of goodbye.

 

How not to keep wanting to take and take and eat and eat, like that? :)

Control is key. Seriously. Two people can easily finish twenty or more plates down here, and I've seen a group of six consume thirty plates over. Me and my dining companion, we've built our personalized menu of favorite staples.

 

Like there will be a portion of sweet corn sushi.

 

One kernel by one kernel

Sweet corn sushi that I specially pick out from the conveyor belt because yellow corn and mayo make this a fun gunkan. The bright yellow and kernels cheer me up at dinner time and because I treasure memories of buying an individually wrapped piece of sushi for $0.50 from my school's in-house convenience store two decades or so ago.

There will also be salmon sashimi. A few portions in fact, five or six plates, thereabout, served to us sometimes lovingly arranged, sometimes looking like a heap, but a very nice looking one. :) Nice enough that we immediately grab our chopsticks, quickly spoon out the wasabi, dribble the soy sauce and dig in.

 

Good-enough Salmon

And then there will be the salmon skin. Call it an appetizer, a snack before dinner, whichever, it just whets the appetite, and gives you something to nibble on whilst you wait for the rest of your orders to come. Crispy, crunchy and slightly sweet.

 

Salmon Skin!!!!

 

the Christmas tree

We're less than 100 days to Christmas.

 

I know, because on Facebook I've got friends who are just as eager for Christmas as I am, and they've begun the Christmas playlist- a mix between Mariah Carey and Frank Sinatra- and the annual day-to-day countdown.

 

I know, because the lights in Orchard Road are already going up, ION is constructing its tree, Wisma is catching up with their tree and very soon we'll have Ngee Ann City and Paragon and everyone else and the whole street will be lit up glimmering shining and bright . 

 

And I also know, because Daiso, in true Japanese efficiency, has brought out all the Christmas decorations that are going for $2 each and they are such cute, charming lil things.

 

I've not started preparing for Christmas 2017.

 

That will come a few weeks from now.

But I won't forget.

 

Because somewhere, someplace, not too far away, there's THIS to remind me that the season is finally here.

 

a very Blessed Tree

She's a very special tree, this one.

 

She's a tree that has, from the first day she was brought home, stood tall, confident and proud. She's a tree that has, for a whole of eleven months, illuminated that very space with her twinkly blue lights, never stopping, both through the day and through the night.

 

She wears few Christmas decorations, this one, only a couple of metal balls here and there that hang from her spindly branches, but she doesn't mind, because many an other decoration has she on her, from the card of a Lunar New Year to the lion soft toy of Easter to a card from the Mid-Autumn Festival and even a little gift for National Day.

 

People get surprised by what she wears, she knows, but she doesn't care. Because she knows that Christmas is, and can be year round, and as long as she fills those that surround her with a sense of home, warmth, love and light, that is all that matters. :)



little Spaces of Green

Rare is it that after a meeting I find my mind free from intensive thoughts and clutter. There's usually all that post-meeting self-analysis going on right afterwards. Rarer still, however, is it when it happens in a place that lies close to nature, and so when the chance hits, well, there you go. :)

 

Pictures!!

 

I was at Dempsey that day. Up where the camp blocks are and where you've got to go round and round searching for the one particular block where the meeting was. :)

 

We walked down afterward, and glad I am that I got the camera with me that day. Otherwise there'd be no pictures of a church-chapel sitting pretty on top of one of the hills there and which, in the late afternoon sun, made me think of quaint-looking parsonages that dot the moors and meadows of the English countryside.

 

And made me wish that we too were blessed with a wee bit of the UK weather to balance out the heat and humidity of which I was positively melting under.



 

English Countryside, much?

And another day I was somewhere near Thomson Road.

I'm not here often.

In fact I hardly pass by here in the daytime at all.

Which made this opportunity to see some green a wonderful one not to pass up.

 

For this is a place where buses trundle up and down along the road to town and back up north. This is a place where MRT lines are criss-crossing so heavily that any space of green, however tiny, however in-between, however small, is very much welcome.

 

And what makes it even more mesmerizing is that all these trees, all this green just sat there so naturally at the food of the hill, just behind the bus stop, unaffected by urbanization, undestroyed by infrastructure, a presence of the past, a belonging in the future. 

 

A little Bit of Green

Canopy Chill and Cool

 

food Fun

The Breakfast Tray

The Dinner Tray

All these pictures happened because I got bored after our meal(s).

 

Simple as that.

 

And if you don't want to look at your phone, and you don't want to look at other fellow diners, and you don't want to study the menu on the wall again after you've munched everything up, what do you do?

Get creative.

 

Play with boxes, papers and utensils. Stack them up. Make towers. Use forks to make ladders to the top of the tower. Arrange the boxes and the wrappers to form patterns. Play with chili sauce packets and have them standing sentinel.

 

Basically, satisfy the OCD in you.  

 

We were at Burger King at two separate times.

 

One time for breakfast, where we had a rectangular shaped piece of scrambled egg that reminded me more of an omelet, a very narrow piece of turkey bacon, some sort of croissant sliced into half that we had with butter dipped with jam, a little round meat patty and a packet of cute potato buttons.

 

The other, for dinner, where my dining companion and I split a small, small mushroom swiss burger exactly into half, ate fries squished over with a wee bit of cheese sauce one fry by one fry, gobbled down a boxful of nuggets just to satisfy some two-day long nugget craving with barbeque sauce, plus a taro pie to close for dessert.

 

Just because. #junkfood #happyfood

 

Nuggets in a row!

Fries and Cheese Sauce

 

i'm 'More' than a Job

No reason whatsoever, but for the past couple of weeks, from time to time, I find myself wondering what happened to the young business acquaintance whom I met several times the year before.

 

A Millennial, he was highly enthusiastic, very passionate, very definite of what he was doing and very determined and dogged about the goals that had been set to him by his superiors.

 

I found that admirable.

 

Given that he started part time work at the youthful age of 14 and has held a couple of jobs and in all, he hasn't quite stopped working since.

 

Except that it got me a lil confused as to whether he was doing a job, or whether he was not doing a job.

 

He said he wasn't doing a job.

 

He said that he was doing more than a job. See, he showed me, he had all these contacts, he had all these important peeps on the platform that he was offering, he had all these goals, all these achievements to unlock, all this progression... and that he, together with his fellow team mates, were going to unlock the keys of the new economy, grab as many drifters and loners (that's us) and together, this entire thing- this whole business that he was going about- would change the world.

 

What he was doing, he maintained, was not just any normal role that his peers were doing. He was doing something very important. In his role of Business Development, he was every day waking up to plans, plans, more plans, meetings, meetings, more meetings. He was having conferences, he was catching up with people, he was having cafe-style meetings with his colleagues working out strategies that would change everything.

 

All fine and well, I thought, made sense too...

 

Except for one thing.

 

Who set those goals that he was passionately trying to meet? Who paid him out the commissions from those meetings that he successfully closed? Who set the system in place such that he could emulate, follow and adapt for his day-to-day tasks of which he was springing out of bed eagerly, or not even sleeping, for? Who created the material and the techniques and the guidance and mentorship and opportunities that he said would bring benefits to my course of work and ease up the hunt for opportunities?

 

Maybe I belong to the 'old-school' Marketing type where the business settings were mostly corporations and conglomerates.

 

But essentially, despite everything he said, despite all the fluff that emblazoned his purpose in living and filled him with positivity, what he said he was doing still felt like a job to me.

 

Which, and here is where the problem lies, it was a clear hint on his side that he was despising those who held jobs. They were 'just doing a job lor" and were simply following an executive career path with mundane responsibilities, dead-end corporate climbs, no significance, no progression, nothing, merely collecting a salary whilst following instructions from their superiors and thereby amounting to nothing in the present, and would amount to nothing in the future.

 

What he didn't realize was that, in fact, he was also holding one down like the rest of them, albeit with a slight tweak to his responsibilities.

 

we're all straws in a single cup

 

 

Or rather, his sense of ownership.

 

Because whilst he had all the figures and slides and platform and video channels and all that talk and advice going on, everything he was saying was basically a lead up to the formula and direction that his mentor/boss had set.

 

It wasn't something that he drew out on a piece of paper and set it out for himself. Neither was it something that he'd worked with a couple of people to get it pat down and then produced an end result from all that discussion. He had a variety of methods of which all led to the same purpose and the same goal.

 

What difference is that, I ask then, from sales? And if you're doing business development, then whose business is it that you're developing? Your own, or the platform that you work for? If it's the platform that you work for, then hey, that's a job. Don't s*** it because it's not corporatized. Whether or not it is, the fact lies is that there's a hierarchy and which you're part of it and which you have to follow, because you're just not good enough to strike out on your own and create something completely different off the beaten track.

 

Perhaps this might be off board for me, but honestly, after a couple of meetings, it set me wondering what the heck was so wrong with holding down (just) a job? Was holding down a job, and maybe seemingly going nowhere so big a sin that it deserved to be looked down upon? Was the choice to take a job instead of going the 'alternative' route so wrong? And did it make someone who'd decided otherwise superior because of his alternative career path?

I don't really have an answer.

Especially for someone who does what I do, but really, it is all about the choices one makes.

Some of us have had to hold down jobs because we have responsibilities we wish to fulfil and we don't wish to up and go do something bombastic just like that.

Some of us hold down jobs because that is what we trained to do and we're just wanting to max out our education by earning something back from it for our parents, our families, our loved ones.

Some of us start with the job, continue on with it and let it form beautiful memories for our lives, and should it leave us, we hunt around and create new opportunities and memories.

Some of us start with the job, grab as much fun as we can from it, look around, repeat.

What does it matter? 

Just as there is nothing wrong in wanting to make something out of your life, there is also nothing wrong in holding down a regular job in a regular office with a regular pay and regular colleagues and a regular boss and a regular life.

That's how it is. Let's not look down on others who have made their choices and believe that they're wasting their life. That's not fair. And if you ask me, it's not right either.

Because it is a very real irony that whilst the young man harped on and on about the fact that he was involved in something more critical than his peers, and which enabled him to grab life by its balls and live it to the max, whilst he was going on and on about the particular platform that he was hard-balling for whilst saying that those who didn't join him were, you know, just normal, he was using a laptop, he was wearing a shirt, he was presenting to me with a particular software, his platform was presented in an office space in a very exclusive building, made no less exclusive than the presence of the security team in the lobby downstairs. and who, pray tell, I wanted to ask, kept those things running like clockwork?

A single person trying to grab other people so as to change the world together?

Nope.

People holding boring, mundane, dead-end jobs in Microsoft, Acer, Samsung and that factory that made the very shirt you're wearing on your back.

a Kopi at Hans

I lurrrrve the kopi here.

 

I love it so much that I'm going to come to their outlets as often as I can, and hold as many meetings as frequent as I can. It's good money paid out for a good cup of coffee that's ubiquitously local (they understand americano, they'll just give it to you kopi-o), fragrant and large enough for the duration of a single meeting. :)

 

they always give me kopi-c

The price works out to a $1.70 for a kopi-c.

 

Which is a very good value when you're doing meetings and for work versus $3.70 or more elsewhere.

 

I love it that their outlets are pretty conducive for meetings or when you need to bang out an email.  If you're at the Central Library, you've got it alfresco, complete with wind and natural sunlight and lots of open air swirling about. If you're at Chinatown or at Tanjong Pagar or any other indoor outlet, there're enough people around you having casual chats and meetups that you won't feel awkward or alone.

 

And if it's a lunch or dinner meeting, or a tea time one, hey, can do, no problem. They've got a pretty extensive menu. I've had their sandwich of egg mayo. I've had their fish and chips, I've had their scrambled eggs with a chunk of spam (that they call ham) and I've had their omelet, which I think is one of the fluffiest, fullest and wobbliest I've had for a price of $10 plus.

egg mayo toast

fish and chips!

 

the omelet

But what marks Hanis (Hans? Han's? Hanis?) out from other casual cafes is this: Their distinctive customer demographic.

See, if the Millennials have their Starbucks and their indie coffee cafes, the Silver Seniors have their Hanis. 

More than once I've seen them, and trust me, it is a very, very charming sight.

Maybe it is the fact that they are Seniors coming together for no other purpose than to preserve the connection forged over years long ago and celebrate the memories that brought them together whilst telling each other about what they do now and what's happening in their day-to-day.

It doesn't matter how they turn up. Some of them come in neatly-ironed shirts and suspenders. Some of them come in polo shirts and cargo bermudas. Some of them arrive walking slowly with walking sticks and some of them come with their caregivers.

What matters is that they're there, they're healthy enough to turn up, they've got their wits together and that this Hanis is one place where they can be youthful again, where they can chill like their children and grandchildren do, where they can be themselves as senior citizens, come together, open up the newspaper, point at articles and discuss and shake their heads wondering what the world's coming to.

What matters is that there is a go-to place like Hanis where they can come when they want to meet up with each other for a cup of kopi or teh and talk and catch up and poke at their mobile phones and swap memories whilst sharing a packet of chocolate coated soft biscuits with marshmallow filling that one of the party bought from the store further down and specially brought for all to share.

Because they are our Pioneers.

What they are or how they are, the fact that does not change is that they've been there before the Formation years, during the Formation years, right through the Merger to the Separation to Independence and to what the country of Singapore is today.

And I hope that Hanis will continue to be their Hangout for many more years to come. That they can continue to come together, all ten of them, dressed for the occasion, pull tables and chairs together, greet representatives from other associations halfway during their meetup, that they continue to speak really loudly to each other, enjoy a cookie together and be just as what they are.

Silver Seniors of the 21st century millennium in Singapore. :)

chip of the Sweet Potato

Air-flown!

Anything and everything to do with sweet potato, I like. Chock full of health benefits, got that beta carotene thingy, very happy color, hint of sweetness, I like. Makes the usual potato a wee bit more happening too. :)

So when I got this, a lovely, lovely, thoughtful gift from someone brought all the way from Taiwan, I was like... "Awwwww!!!!!" Because it is a huge, huge blessing when someone remembers that somewhere in your posts and your life you've said you lurrrve sweet potatoes.

Thank you, to you; receiving it means a great, great deal to me.

Also, extremely embarrassing, because we hadn't said anything about exchanging gifts and so I hadn't prepped anything that day other than getting very excited cos' hey, gals do what gals do.

I finished it in one sitting, by the way.

Opened the bag, brought out one piece, crunched on it. They're really crisp, yet somewhat light. And I did it over and over again all through the game of Monopoly that I was playing. Snacks really do make you think better and play better. :) 

The last time I played with my game partner, I sustained heavy losses. Broke, asset-less, house-less.

This time, with the aid of the crunch, the layer of taste over each chip, that powdery, powdery feel on the tongue, the hint of sweetness that combines natural sweetness, a very light touch of something tangy and bright, and the fact that I could chomp happily on pieces big, small and very small, I did better. Got a waterworks, an electric company, a couple of land parcels,  a house or two, collecting rent from the game partner, and could still mortgage a couple more land parcels for more land. :) :)

The wonders of what snacks, and favorite ones, can do for you.



Strolling Sights: Keppel Bay

For the first time in a long while, I felt like I needed to see some water. A pond, a lake, a reservoir, a body of water, something, anything... 

 

I don't know why.

 

Maybe it was because whilst trees and sky and wind are great but the sight of rippling waters and calm seas give me that sense of serenity and peace. Seeing it, I'm reminded that I'm not alone, never alone and I'm part of this big, beautiful world. :)

So I hopped across to what is the most accessible outlying island off the mainland.

 

Sentosa.

 

From Vivocity, where locals will remember a time when instead of a mall, there were all these huge warehouses that had book exhibitions during end year school holidays, and where to get across to Sentosa, we had to take a ferry ride to the Sentosa Ferry Terminal opposite and which has since been reclaimed on which Resorts World Sentosa stands. 

We don't do the ferries anymore. We can hop onto the lil train, or we can walk across.

Which I did (cos' free entry and I like RWS), going via the Boardwalk and its long, long travellator basking in the intense heat of the late afternoon and the glaring light of the soon-to-be-setting sun.

 

I soooo needed this!

Shimmery Light

 

 

And a bright, too bright Glare

 

 

Twenty Pages

One voice. Twenty-eight pages.

 

I know, I know. It's stunning for many wrong reasons. It's not supposed to be. It's going to be a piece of s***.

 

I'm just going to say that it is still RAW and that it can be ripped apart, started over, delved deep and reshaped and molded to something that is palatable, something that is acceptable and something that is good enough to see the light of the world. :)

 

I'm also going to say that if I hadn't started it this way, I would be getting nowhere. There'd be nothing. I'd be with three paragraphs, or four paragraphs and then the whole thing would be ripped apart and stuck and put on creative hold and I'd be back to square one, which, judging by circumstances, ain't got the time anymore.

 

So twenty over pages it is, with key scenes done, and we're on to the next voice. :)

Strolling Sights: Chip Bee Gardens

So I've decided that besides Bus Ride Sights, I'm gonna do a Strolling Sights as well. :)

 

I'm looking forward to it.

 

Particularly since there are (rare) times when I've the camera with me and I've time to wander about, and it seems a pity to not snap off a few shots.

 

I was at Holland Village this day.

And after plonking up and down the shops and seeing what was new and what was not, I decided I'd take a gander over at Chip Bee Gardens which, to me, is one of those quiet, lovely, serene housing estates where large trees still stand by the road, shedding leaves and twigs and branches, where bushy-tailed squirrels scamper from one branch to another all times of the day and where you can hear birds singing in the mornings and evenings.

They've got a Heritage board there now, describing what this estate used to be and what it is now, and ah, no wonder, there's that vibe. Chip Bee Gardens used to have lots of trees and used to house military personnel from the British Armed Forces a long, long, long time ago.

 

where Mediterranean Sin is

 

the road behind

there WAS a very pretty sunlit shadow, but..

I didn't go right into the estate today. There was no time.

But from the looks of it, little has changed from the time I remember it. The houses are still as neat and structured as ever, their occupants house proud. The gardens are neat, some with chairs, others with trees and plants and flowers. Cars are still parked here and there outside the homes. The balconies range from the heavily decorated to the sparse, where there might be cloths and towels draped over one balcony, to another that is as empty and bare as it can be. And from time to time, there's always one house that stands empty waiting for new occupants, and these houses appear to be so totally filled with sunlight where you can literally look through the hall windows right through the whitewashed walls into the backyard and beyond.

I've got memories here.

First I had a schoolmate who used to stay here together with her fellow course mates and back then I often wondered how they made their way to school. Later, when it came to my turn where I oft had to pass through here on an errand basis, I found out. It was a ten, fifteen-minute walk from Holland Village through this estate to the housing blocks behind and this place was particularly beautiful during Christmas time where the families would set up Christmas trees in their living rooms and some would decorate their gardens with lots and lots of fairy lights, making Chip Bee Gardens pretty, festive and lively.

neat homes of the suburb

 

a Barashi-Tei surprise

This is one of the most challenging articles I've ever written. Either my brain's not thinking, or that I'm trying to adopt a sort of formula that's been utilized, to no little success, by reviewers and bloggers and food review sites.

I've typed up four paragraphs, erased three of them. And I've finished half the article, deleted it, started over again.

This is the fourth time.

And I'm still getting nowhere.

Why, I don't know.

How difficult can it be to write an article about good Japanese fare and about Sashimi and Sushi?

How boggling can it be to bang out a couple of lines about my amazing, very surprising experience at this little cafe-restaurant in Elias Building along Middle Road?

Why, I've even got the pics!

Here's one of the Salmon Belly Sashimi that my dining companion and I ordered that day.

fresh...

Lovely, isn't it?

Looks good, isn't it?

Then why in in the high heavens am I not able to write about it?!

Why is it so hard to write about something that is so skillfully sliced, when it has got delicate patterns nicked on each slice, when it is served cold, chilled and absolutely, absolutely fresh, when it is garnished with a slice of lemon on the side and was so smooth and so good that I didn't need, and didn't want to have it with the soy sauce and the wasabi and I just ate it all on its own?

Look, here's another pic! :)
 

and chill and cold

Lovely, isn't it?

It shouldn't be difficult.

It shouldn't be difficult at all.

Because Barashi-Tei is one of those places where they surpass your (normalized) expectations.

Like when you order a shiitake mushroom Yakitori and it comes to you neatly skewered, tasting precisely what a grilled mushroom should be, chewy, soft, mushroomy and very, very smoky. SMOKY.

Or when you order grilled beef and you think that it's going to be served to you like grilled beef elsewhere, but hoh, you're in for a surprise, and you're so gonna repent of your preconceived notion. 

Because here the grilled beef is expertly cut into cubes and skewered so tightly onto the sticks that I couldn't tell that they were actually cubes when the dish arrived until I took a bite and it came off the skewer easily, and then it was all smoky and sweet and had teeny tiny onions  scattered all over it, and it had a bit of marbling and melted with each mouthful, so much so that I took my portion of cubes plus another cube meant for my dining companion which I refused to share.

Okay, it looks like I'm finally getting somewhere. :)

It's nearly ridiculous all that wasted time, you know! 

Especially when I realize that Barashi-Tei is super unique on its own.

Preconceived notions will tell us that because it is not a franchise and neither is it in a shopping mall means that it's going to be compromised. Or that it's going to be just bleah because it's not in a five-star, six-star hotel, but on the ground floor of a shop house along Middle Road in the Elias Building near the Short Street corner and which is so quiet and unassuming on the outside that I'd have probably walked right past it if I weren't seeking it out.

But that's precisely why this article is titled "Surprise".

That's what Barashi-Tei is. :) A Surprise.

Expensive? No. It's actually pretty good for the price. Mediocre food? By now, you'd know, heck no, not at all. Cookie-cutter dining experience? Heck no, no, NO.

Need another example to prove a point?

Here you go. The Spicy Salmon Maki.

looks pretty, tastes pretty.

Why?

I'll tell you.

Because I ordered Spicy Salmon Maki and I thought yep, I'm surely gonna get spice, salmon and maki. But guess what? Nooooo. I got more than that. I got ebi tempura. 

One damn solid piece of crispy ebi tempura cocooned within the maki itself and that was beside the single slice of salmon gently layered on top of each maki with the just-nice serving of creamy mentaiko that wrapped each bite of maki into a single, wholesome, rounded palate that was not too spicy, not too creamy, and not overwhelming at all.

SURPRISE!!!!! :D :D

the Sides of Chic-a-boo

I have a love for fried chicken.

I have a love for fried chicken skin.

looook at the SKIN

And here at this diner where the vibe is warm and homely like the backyard of your grandmother's house, where the atmosphere is fun and welcoming with the spirit of a proper sit-down, fork-and-knife meal, the chicken is pretty good. Tender and tasty on the inside, crisp, and crunchy on the outside.

i can do Insta-worthy also

Between my dining partner and I, we usually get four pieces of the hot and spicy. Two thighs, one chicken breast, one chicken drumstick served alongside with two sides. We share the chicken breast. Keke.

What I'm really here for, though, are the Sides.

 

Really lar.

They're meant to be the complements, but for me, here they're the star. Because it isn't every place that I can have a list long enough to choose happily from. Normally I'm given the choice of either coleslaw, mashed potato or fries and that's just it. But here they've got something else. You can go for the familiars, no problem, they've got them. But you could go for the sweet potato fries, the corn, the soup, the onion rings, the vegetables and the like.

It makes a meal a meal, I'm saying.

A very inclusive meal. Like if you're sharing the chicken with someone, say, an elderly someone, and said elderly prefers thinly peeled strips of chicken along with something soupy (and creamy!) for the day, well, there you go. You got it. Or if you want a brighter, more colorful visual element to your already very delicious-looking meal for the Instagram, well, there're the carrots and broccoli for ya. Or if you're like me, just wanting fried, fried, fried all the way... there's the onion rings and the sweet potato fries.

You see them up there, the rings of onion. And you see them too, the fistful of sweet potato. :)

But I've also gone for the corn and the coleslaw and the mashed potato and the regular fries.

I'd say they're pretty good. All of them.  

The corn's slightly buttery, so it's slightly salty with a burst of jagung sweet. The coleslaw's cabbagey and cold and the entire heap swims about in a pool of white salad sauce. The onion rings are big and floury. The mashed potatoes are shaped somewhat like a volcano with its brown sauce floating about in its crater. And the sweet potato fries are orangey and crisp and yum and full of what is beta carotene. :)

sweeeet potatoes!