hello thar

the occasional picture of yours truly.

at a store selling delicious pork cuts (char siew)

the mirror is kinda dirty, hence the white flecks.

My good friend Q recently met my other friend Potato Chip at a golf range and now she asked me if I'd like to go driving (golf) with her sometime. 

Hmmm, I might go. 

I like golf, I need the exercise and it's a great place to meet people.

I just pray that my body hasn't forgotten what it's like to do sports. 

lol

Bandung part three

C'était un jour férié mais j'ai travaillé aujourd'hui et pour rendre des choses plus mauvaises pires, j'ai regardé Super Junior's Exploring The Human Body show pendant trois heures.

I was really tired by the end of watching the sixth episode but I guess I had incredible abdominal muscle exercises from laughing so much. Exploring The Human Body is a great show! Two thumbs up because it's not only educational but the knowledge are presented in awesomely interesting ways! Also, I get to watch HC and SM in them. ahaha. What do I do without eye-candies, seriously.

Initially I planned to watch a few episodes of the Six Feet Under season 1 set that I just bought this morning but my body can't keep up with my mind and I fell asleep on the sofa in the middle of the first episode...woke up just briefly enough to go into the room and sleep on the more comfortable bed.

Three hours of napping later, here I am, blogging the latest and last installation to my Bandung post.

They are mostly pictures taken at the cemetery where my grandma was buried.
All pictures taken with my craptastic Blackberry Bold camera. OTZ*
Somebody buy me an Onyx, s'il vous plait.

This took place very early in the morning, by the way.
I woke up sometime past 4 (to my mom watching Hostel II on Cinemax, more about that next time), got out of the hotel by 5.30 and reached the cemetery around 7 AM.

 

helpers carrying the stuff needed for the memorial ceremony

 

  

Helpers spreading out paper money or sometimes called 'hell money'.

They are arranged in a neat circular pattern for easy throwing into the fire later on.

 

Lots and lots of money for my grandma so she can buy anything she likes in heaven.

Don't tell me everything is free in that realm because how would you know, right?

 

light mood

Joss sticks around the tomb to indicate the time my grandma will take to 'savour' the food we placed at the tomb's altar.

I tried to throw some paper money into the burner but the heat from the fire was overwhelming! My cousins had to tell me to step back so that my hair wouldn't get burned from the heat and to prevent me from accidentally throwing my Blackberry along with the paper money into it. haha. Some sense of humor they have.

 

Thanks to these kind folks who helped us burn the paper money~

My cousins tossing bright flower petals on the tomb.

 

Walking back to the car was quite a trip since more than half of the path was slick mud, wet from rain the day before. A helper tried to hold me when I almost slipped at a particularly steep slope but she ended up falling instead. I felt so bad because of it.

This is the first time I've been to a death memorial and a Chinese cemetery.

The grass around the entire cemetery are tall and abundant but some of the tombstones looked so lonely and neglected with weeds growing around them. I hope their families will come and visit often.

I didn't like the name Jeremy before

The past few days passed in a blur.
The only things I remember well are the weird and illogical dreams I had.
Dreams are usually illogical so that reassures me a little somehow that all's good.
I dreamt of Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Dillon a couple of nights ago. Matt's name was Matt McQuoi and he was a serial murderer who hitchhiked in gullible Leo DiCaprio's car in LA's downtown area. Leo eventually found out McQuoi's crazy side but he was a tad too late and got slashed while trying to escape like a frightened bunny.
Bizarre.
I realllly want to watch Shutter Island now.

My sis is back so I've been turning in earlier than usual - no doubt that's one of the positive changes I need to have at the moment.

The name Jeremy has been showing up a lot in my life. I seem to see it everywhere, especially in print and media.

Jeremy in You're Beautiful, as played by Lee Hong Ki of F.T Island.

Jeremy Young, the beautiful young model on the rise. I have a huge crush on him..So beautiful!

Jeremy in Savage Garden manhwa, whose death triggered the monumental turn in Gabriel's life. This manhwa is no. 1 in my current reading list so even though Jeremy's role in the story was cut short right in the first chapter, it still stays in my mind.

I'm definitely warming up to the name.

Jeremy Young's casual street style *love*

Have a good weekend, everyone.

Bandung part two

TA-DA!! What's this you asked? Well, there's this road strip in Bandung, lined on both sides with fashion outlets that mostly sell t-shirts, which use giant plaster statues of comic heroes as their store mascots for easy identification. 

For example,

tourist: "Where can I get this t-shirt?"

sales assistant: "Oh, at the Spiderman/Rambo/Superman store"

and you'll feel like the biggest dumbf--k if you ask "WHERE" again.

point covered.

I only managed to get a picture of Spiderman because I couldn't remember which side of the road Rambo and the rest are. Besides, the car was moving too fast for me to be able to get a snap of the whole cast. 

When my mom saw that I was taking pictures at Le Strip -that's what I call that stretch of fascinating road- , she lowered the window on her side (even telling my driver to lower the window on the front passenger seat asap too) and urged me to take pictures again......

meanwhile, car was still moving...

hence this picture right here...

LOL. WTF. 

Sorry, Spidey. Please believe me when I said that this wasn't my intention. I don't have the hots for heroes in spandex in a spread-eagle pose. Besides, your abs look abnormal here. Hmmms. And you look mad camp. period.

My fave mascot there is actually Rambo because I love the movies and it's so iconic at Le Strip. The store with Rambo mascot sell military-inspired clothing. Very fitting, eh?

and about these unauthorised uses of character designs? 

Uh, how should I put it...

This is Asia? 

Not much you can do about it, really.

Yeah, Asia. We gotta tighten up on intellectual property and copyright laws.

Just roughly a month ago, I watched this movie on tv which is an exact copy of The Proposal except the venue and all the romance happened in Bali instead of Alaska.

tsktsktsk.

I can't remember the title for it but the lead actor has a back and left arm full of tattoos (dragons and stuff (maybe he used to be in gangs?) and the lead actress is really pretty.

This isn't the first time such things happen, we all know it.

I had a late lunch at this cafe. I won't be typing out the name of this place in case the owner tries to google it and reaches this page. Mi madre told me that the owner was recently diagnosed with testicular cancer and that it probably happened because he is not married and thus didn't use his tool often enough. Yes, wtf, right? So TMI. She told me while I was having my lunch too! Anyway, is that even a valid cause-and-effect argument?

-__-;

I hope he's living happily wherever he is now. 

 

  

  

 

  

  

rice with mixed vegetables wrapped in banana leaves.

 

my plate. yummy :)

avocado with chocolate. My favorite juice.

 

stone 'guard' at the door of the cafe. one on each corner.

the restaurant opposite the cafe has such a lovely name and is spelled in old Dutch spelling. The new spelling would be "Rumah Kebun" (oe ---- changed to 'u') and it means Garden House. I have a soft spot for old Dutch spelling since my last name uses it too.

Sadly, Slumdog Millionaire wasn't such an eye-opener for me. None of the stories in it was new even though the movie dramatize and take them to the extremes.
Children here grew up seeing the harsh realities of the world, no matter what background they come from, so there is no excuse to say you don't know the ugly truth.

Well, "People are doing; Heaven is watching" is all I can say for now.

 

 

A touch of modernism here ~~ English

I also visited my uncle's house which has blue gate, blue roof, blue shades and blue everything else,
hence the lighting in these shots,

my reflections on the car window

 

  

  

No one to help me take pictures. Mom was busy doing something else...

My simple outfit to the cemetery. 

White silk blouse, green cropped pants and pink crocs, courtesy of my uncle who advised me to change out of my navy flats because the soil at the cemetery was wet from yesterday's rainfall.

Good thing I listened to him because the narrow path to my grandma's tomb was really wet and I almost slipped several times.

I used my Blackberry to take pictures at the cemetery so the quality of the photos are not as good as the ones above (these are not great either but still much better than BB Bold pictures). They'll all be in part 3 of Bandung post.

Thank you for reading my blog, by the way. I really appreciate it :)

Bandung part one

My mom and I traveled to Bandung yesterday morning to attend my grandmother's first death anniversary memorial today. Bandung is neighbor to Jakarta, about 2 hour drive by car and at least once a year, usually during Chinese New Year period, my family would travel there to pay respects to elders from my mom's side. When I was younger, the trip would take 4 hours but due to very high volume of people traveling to and fro Bandung-Jakarta, an expressway was finally built a few years ago to expedite this.

Since I was overseas most of my life up till now, I used to only go there once a year during end of school term break and each trip never lasted more than a couple of days. A lot of people from Jakarta go there for its diverse range of excellent food and various fashion outlets but I find that shopping in Jakarta is far more satisfying even if things might be slightly more expensive. Besides, due to the influx of tourists from Jakarta, prices in Bandung are inflated and no longer considerably cheaper than stuff in Jakarta anymore like it used to be. The only reason I go there was to visit my grandmother, who passed away in her sleep one fine day last spring.

I took quite a lot of pictures of this trip and for once, I actually felt nostalgic about the city.

the view from my car window

 

the clouds were gorgeous and the sky was so blue blue blue

  

Living at the foot of the hills

 street peddlers; school children

 

Although Bandung is the second biggest city after Jakarta, trademarks of a poor country are more evident out here than in Jakarta. The slums in Jakarta are cleverly hidden and overshadowed by silhouettes of tall skyscrapers and overwhelming opulence in some districts. It's so easy to be disillusioned about the country's economic situation when one tours the luxurious areas of the capital whereas Bandung appears to be more transparent and honest. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

 

clay goods basking in the sun

Becak, which is similar to rickshaw (except the jockey cycles behind the customer's seat), is the popular mode of public transport in Bandung. They are usually lined in a row outside of markets and small stores.

The hotel I stayed in is called Golden Flower Hotel. It's pretty new and strategically located in the city, close to major government establishments and the chinatown.

 My mom got the Deluxe room for the price of a standard room there as my uncle has a corporate discount at the hotel ;)

That's my baby bolster and my plush doggie called G-Dog on the bed. I bring them everywhere I travel not because I can't sleep without them. I just like the thought of having some companions who've been to the same places as me, hehehe.

 

Andy Lau & Shu Qi on the magazine cover. I think the mag is old. I see Daniel Craig and Quantum of Solace on one of the subliners....lol. The channel selection was fine though. i spent a few hours switching back and forth between Arirang (English-speaking Korean channel. hell yeahh), TV5 (french channel), V Channel and Cinemax.

I swear that all the male non-celeb presenters on Arirang sound like Kevin Woo of U-KISS (when he speaks English). They sound significantly different from him in Korean. During one of the Arirang programs, I closed my eyes and imagined Kevin Woo as the expert explaining the game and tactics of Go. Interestingggg. Except I dare bet my last dollar that the real Kevin wouldn't know any of those chess terms.

LOLOLOLOL. 

Kevin is such an adorable person though. I think he'd be perfect as a girl too. Woo~~~~~

The bathroom is really small and orange in color (yuck!) 

I've bundled a lot of pictures in one post. The rest will be for tomorrow and they are way more interesting. aha.

By the way, I gave some rarely played tunes on my ipod a spin during this trip and now I'm totally in LOVEEEEEE with In Our Bedroom After The War by Stars.

It's such an amazing song with very beautiful lyrics. Who else loves Stars? Hands up!