Melbourne Trip 2009

Day 1: Touched down Melbourne Airport at 12:30am and quickly went over to friend’s house to unpack our stuff and rest. Woke up early the next morning to visit some wineries and a historical town nearby Melbourne named Bendigo. Felt a little tipsy after few rounds of wine tasting and it was definitely a good experience. We ended up bought 2 bottles of red wine that cost us AUD20 each.



Day 2: Woke up early as it would be a long day tour to the Great Ocean Road. It is Victoria’s most spectacular route and is recognized as one of the world’s most scenic coastal drive. No doubt that it was a wonderful driving experience with magnificent scenery along the way. And the famous Twelve Apostles are one of the largest limestone rock stacks in the world. It was a cold and windy day but luckily all of us wore enough clothes. Dropped by at the nearby town called Warnambool for dinner before drove all the way back Melbourne.



Day 3: A day tour to Melbourne Zoo. Met up with friends at Victoria Market for breakfast and took a tram to Zoo. Bought a daily tram ticket cost AUD6++ with unlimited ride throughout a day. The zoo was quite packed with families on weekend, and it’s very well designed and maintained. It was my first time experience seeing Kangaroo and Koala bear.



Day 4-6: Planned to visit Philip Island initially, but we cancelled the trip due to some circumstances. Therefore, we took our own sweet time with city and shopping tour for the next 3 days. Nothing much in Melbourne city itself apart from some gorgeous cathedrals, art center/theatre, Federation Square, Library, Town Hall etc. Had a day shopping at Victoria’s Market though I didn’t buy much due to the high exchange rate of Aussie dollar.



Nothing much to shout about the Melbourne city itself apart from the magnificent Great Ocean Road. Anyhow, what matter most was the great company I had along the trip. I believe we had gone through enough along the whole trip that had definitely strengthened our friendship.

1st Baking Experience

20 OCT 2009: Baked my 1st cake over the weekend. Friends advised me to start with the basic butter cake, but I baked a marble cake instead. With a baking book beside me, it didn’t take me too long to prepare all the ingredients. While the whole experience itself wasn’t as tough as expected that it took me less than an hour to get it done. Baked the mixture in my new oven at 180C for 40 minutes, and the cake turned out a little burnt on 1 side. Well, I would say it looked and tasted “Not bad” for a 1st time baker me.

My next target will be egg tart!!!



I’ll be flying off tomorrow (21 OCT 2009) for a week holiday vacation. It’ll be a 7++ hours of flight to the South. Till we meet again, wish you all a wonderful week ahead.

And guess what, this is my 100th posting!!!! Hooray!!!!!

Happy Deepavali

15 OOCT 2009: Being in holiday mood as company declared replacement holiday on tomorrow (16 Oct) due to Deepavali celebration.

Deepavali is a festival of lights for our Indian community. Still remember whenever 2 major racial celebrations clash with each other, we would give it a special name like “Deepa-raya” and “Gong Xi-Raya”. Wondering what happen if Deepavali clashes with Chinese New Year someday? Will we name it as “Deepa-Fa Cai”? Or “Gong Xi-Vali”?

Wishing all my friends here a Happy Deepavali and enjoy the holiday.

Happy 1st Anniversary

13 OCT 2009: Checked back my archive and found out that today is my 1st anniversary of blogging. I started this blog on 13th Oct 2008 to share my own stories with some oversea friends. But it caught me by surprise that I’ve got to know some real good friends through blogging.

From the archive of 97 posts for the past whole year, I wouldn’t say that I’m an active blogger especially these few months where my office workload and gym routine have taken some of my blogging time. Anyhow, I’m glad and proud that I’m still surviving here and thank everyone for visiting this blog.



Hooray……Happy Anniversary!!!

Ekiden Relay Run 2009

4 OCT 2009: Went for the 4th Ekiden Run 2009 at Putrajaya with the usual marathon kaki. There were 10 of us in 2 different teams. I was the team leader that of the team named H5N5. What a dramatic name given.

The run started officially at 8am where it was a relay run that each of us had to run for the distance of 3km. I was pretty stressed as 1st runner. Everyone ran at a very fast pace for the 1st 1km. I pushed myself a little faster than my normal pace in order to keep up with others and completed the 3km within 17 minutes. Not too bad I guess as a 1st runner with less than 20 ahead of me. Finally, my team finished the run within 1 hour 20 minutes at 50th. Well done team!!!

It was a fun and well organized event. However, the organizer shall locate more remote toilets at the interchange section as I saw lots of guys did their business around the bushes. Kind of disgusting and I bet it wasn’t something proud to be shown especially to foreigner.



Who is interested to form a team of 5 for next year? And a fancy name for the team?

Annyeong haseyo

1 OCT 2009: Went for Korean dinner with friends few days back at Seoul Garden in Kuchai Lama. Ordered some BBQ stuff and some Korean famous dishes as usual, and the food was pretty OK la. However, the restaurant was empty most of the time except us and 2 more tables for the whole night. I couldn’t help but wondered how could they survive with such a bad business. Perhaps it was weekday though.

Anyway, the weirdo me isn’t a big fan of Korean food. But what I like most are those small and colourful side dishes. Love the kim chi, pan cake and anchovies.

How much do you like Korean food? And what do you like most?



And today is my niece’s 2nd birthday. I’m thinking to put on a small celebration for her. Perhaps a simple KFC meal with a ladybird cake from Secret Recipe.