Be keen on something today and you'll be happier

a tiny B'z t-shirt

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 01:27:07 GMT

... for a tiny person due in early November! Well give or take 1-2 weeks, I hope, no more no less. This will be HER first B'z T-shirt. Absolutely the cutest smallest B'z T-shirt I've ever seen hehe.

During an ultra-sound last week, this little person held up HER chubby fingers and made a heavy metal sign. We were all amazed. Is this a sign of too much exposure of B'z concert dvds lol?

*editing the entry everywhere because we just found out today it's a GIRL!!" ^__^

after 4+ months

Fri, 17 Oct 2008 21:43:41 GMT

We have been eating veggies from the garden!!

Before photo: A small patch that later got expanded to accomodate more

After lots of hopes, disappointment, money and sweat(actually not that serious at all), being first time gardeners, I reckon it's not all so bad ^__^ The plants are everywhere (not in a neat row) because I usually started neat and after a while I just throw the seeds all in. Plus some died or didn't come out at all so planted something else in their places.

The Apple tree blossoming. Last year it produced hundreds of apples.

And my cherry tree finally flowered even though it's late spring already.

Thanks for looking guys!!

The long awaited Daffodils

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 06:23:40 GMT

Whew they are finally here. Well one stem of them anyway. But seriously, NO ONE told me that Narcissus/ Daffodils stink! They do! Next time I'd better tried the Hyacinth. They are apparently quite fragrant. Still I do love the look of these pure white flowers against the lovely dark green stems. I don't know how many flowers one bulb can produce but I can't get over how miraculous the way of nature is. I mean all I did is put a bulb around some stones and water it a bit and then watch nature takes over. This makes me think the world is not all bad news and it still has some hopes after all.

This and the BBC vegetable gardening program by some British lady called Carol Klein. I want to pick some lettuce already! But before that, I have to pass the difficult phase of preparing the soil. I haven't been able to bring myself out to do that just yet.

Our 3 years wedding anniversary

Thu, 01 May 2008 11:22:26 GMT

Yeah, time flies. So fast. Seems like a few entries ago that I got married... Wait, it was actually not that many entries ago lol.

Lately my interests have changed again towards more domestic stuffs like home decoration, renovation, furnitures and surprise surprise... gardening. I started this hobby about 2 months ago? It was definitely not something that I was ever interested in when I was a teen or in my 20s. But nowadays the thought of putting a stick, a seed, a bulb into the earth and then combination of earth, air, sun and water enable it to grow into flowers which are beautiful and fragrant or food that actually fills our stomach never ceases to amaze me. These days I'm constantly in a swinging state of frustation (little bit) or utter happiness when I see some green buds coming out of the earth or a bulb. Anyway, Q and I planted a few trees in the blank canvas that is our backyard. I hope they'll do alright for years to come. We are just starting though. We want to have many many constantly growing and green things around us, in and outside the house. The plants absolutely turned our house into our home faster than anything.

The Paperwhite Narcissus: click here for the stunning flowers I am hoping to see in a few months. I don't have nearly enough bulb though, perhaps I should add more =p

Below is Flowering Cherry Tree: I am hoping to do some Japanese-style Hanami in our backyard oh perhaps 10 years from now hehehehe. This tree is now still shorter than I am. The colour of the cherry blossoms is still a mystery!! Maybe I will update in spring when they decide to show up!

Below is Q-chan's tree: Seville Orange. After doing a search on net, we discovered that the fruits will be the bitter type suitable for marmalade jam not for eating straight from tree. Oh well... Next tree is the sakura (above). Behind is the compost Q-chan collected with pumpkin seeds burried all over it. We might see some pumpkins next spring!!

An impulse buy: Chilli tree which should live in tropical countries. Amazingly hot chilli. Looks nice anyway.

Below is the creek behind our house. We take many many hours of walks already there. In and around the creek live many wild lives: ducks, pukekos (swamp hens), eels, fish, rabbits, cuckatoos, all kind of birds.

A strange duck who likes to come close to us because we feed it French baguette.

Thanks a lot for looking guys!! I trust all is well with everyone?

And as 2008 is Tak and Koshi's 20th anniversary in the music business, B'z is releasing "B'z Ultra Pleasure" with 2 discs containing 30 super hit-songs. And if that's not enough, the limited edition comes with a dvd of 10, I repeat, 10 never-released before livegym performances throughout the years. We are talking about those missing years of Livegym 9th Blues, Livegym Eleven. I'm drooling!!! This is GOOD AS GOLD!

And there's more too!! Just like 10 years ago for "The Best Treasure", B'z is letting fans have a say on what songs they want to see in "B'z Ultra Treasure". So in short, you can go to this site and vote your fave songs. But seriously, HOW DO YOU DECIDE ON 3 FAVE SONGS of B'z massive discography??

For the record, I chose: TIME, Suna no Hanabira and Koubou.

And for more latest news, gossips and discussions, please watch this thread at B'z Net Party.

I hate moving

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 06:35:57 GMT

How many times does a person get to move in a life time? An article said a Brit person would move average 6 times in a life time. Well let's see. Excluding my parents moving house (coz I didn't help them being so little then) I have moved at least 14 times in 6 different cities. It is ridiculous. I hope this is the last time for a long long time.

Yeah, hopefully we can settle okay in our new house. Today we finally got keys after the bank and lawyers did their deeds. Much ado and more much ado. I am overwhelmed with the cleaning, fixing and more cleaning job to do in the future. And we still haven't even moved all our things in there yet. It's not that we got a terribly old and bad house. It's definitely not new and the people could have done a better job taking care of it. But I suppose with three very young kids, what can a Mum do? It is still quite close to what we wanted in a house compare to so many others we saw. I could really do without the smokers' smell of the house though. Both husband and wife smoke like chimney. I feel sorry for their kids.

Anyway, either YesAsia didn't send my "ACTION" two Thursday ago as they said they have, or the post office is having major delivery issue that everything is late, or my "ACTION" arrived and someone nicked it becoz it was just lying there at the front door. I don't understand how the postman can drop it there like that. Isn't he supposed to write me a note to pick it up at post office because he can't deliver it to me?? Gaaaah. I never had issues with YesAsia before, they usually delivered within 4-5 days. But this has been almost two weeks ;___;

Well the other thing that I was expecting arrive today.

It doesn't look as good as it did on my computer. Especially the graphic in the middle is quite faded in colour. I am quite disappointed. Q-chan's one s also not very good. I wonder if it is the whole RGB-CMYK dilemma. GOMEN NE, B-chan. I hope the mug looks better.

Ok, now we must go and do some more cleaning. Crap, I wish someone can do the moving for me. Aiyooooo.

B'z Anniversary Live-gym

Sun, 25 Nov 2007 12:33:52 GMT

So I was reading this post at M's LJ and it's true how being a B'z fan really linked many of us together. I mean, how could I have imagined it 5-6 years ago when Q, B, B2, M, TJ, Tamashii, Liv, Dave, K3 (and others) first chatted, e-mailed and discussed B'z like there's no tomorrow on internet.

And now years later, life goes on, we don't chat or e-mail as much at all. But interestingly, last week, three of the original NPers, B2, B and M who used to live so far away from one another could get together for a B'z event in L.A. becoz they all live there. And they got interviewed on TV and Q-chan and I watched them in youtube in Melbourne together... Life is indeed very strange. Not only that, we met Tamashii-chan in S'pore. I met Liv and the HK B'z gang in Hongkong. Such an awesome experience.

All these happenings really inspired me (plus I just watched Typhoon no.15 disc 1 again LOL)

I know many of you are making plans for B'z 20th anniversary Live-Gym. I'd really like to go too and Q-chan will be dragged along as well. But if I'm going I wanna make the most of it and go with the crowd. I need to know which venue are you guys aiming for? I want to meet ALL OF YOU in Japan!! Yes, K-3-san as well ne.

But we'd better get busy with the planning from now... KYAA. Any ideas how to get the tickets, you professionals?

B'z at Hollywood RockWalk

Fri, 23 Nov 2007 12:04:36 GMT

Oh yeah, it all happened alrite. So proud of Koshi and Tak and also my B'z Net Party buddies who made it there!! Here are some links to reports, videos and news.

Koshi and Tak's speeched in English as captured in the below video:

the transcript of the event

Loads of pics (Koshi with eyeliner!! like in Super Love Song pv)

NP-ers' LJ/blogs
eMu
B2
B-chan

And the RockWalk thread at NP

There are pvs of Junjou Action, Perfect Life available around but I'm refraining to listen/watch them because I want to wait to the last minute until ACTION arrives in December. Soon you will be mine!!

Priscilla Queen of the Desert

Sat, 10 Nov 2007 01:23:34 GMT

Uwaa M-I-L treated me to Priscilla Queen of the Desert The Musical last night at Regent Theater. I probably watched the movie (released in 1994) 5 times already. Really really loved it to pieces. For those who are not familiar with it, Priscilla is perhaps one of the most famous Australian movies (not many of them are famous)... It starred Hugo Weaving (Mr. Smith in Matrix and also Elrond in LOTR) and Guy Pearce (LA Confidential, Memento etc) who have had some success in Hollywood. The third character was played by Terence Stamp who is a prestigous stage actor who doesn't appear much in big movies.

Every time I watch this movie, I always find it hard to believe that Terence Stamp, Hugo Weaving and Guy Pearce are NOT in the least gay or transexual. Their performances are so convincing and so arresting that it's hard not to love them. I also love the bitchiness and the fast-furious tongues (in good nature) of these 'queens'.

When it comes of Priscilla, of course we're talking about outrageous amazing eye-popping costumes and very catchy-pop-dance tunes. Just like the movie, the stage version stays true to the story line. The backdrops and change of scenery and the dancing, the singing and the mandatory drag queens lip-synching. What a screamingly hillarious and lots of fun show. There wasn't a boring moment at all. The younger leading characters' voices even sound so much like Hugo Weaving and Guy Pearce. They even have The Mullet from Broken Hill Shirley and the manic pingpong balls Filipino bride Cynthia. I can't ask for more from a stage realization.

One of my fave scenes in the movie was when Felicia (Guy Pearce) sat on top of an oversized sequined stiletto which is placed on top of the moving bus in the middle of red desert of Australia, fully dressed with glimmering cape blowing in the pink wind, and miming to the aria from Verdi. The stage version is just as great and memorable!!

Only strange thing is they kept harassing Kylie Minogue instead of ABBA like in the movie. I heard that Kylie is the no.1 straight female idol for the drag-queens all over the world =p

I had such an amazing time, thank you M-I-L!! Q-chan is worried that I might get addicted to shows like this because it's expensive and we can't afford it at the moment =p Oh well I've already missed most of them (The Lion King, We Will Rock You, Miss Saigon, The Phantom of the Opera etc) but they will eventually return here maybe after 10-15 years? So that would be after we're more settled into paying for our house hehehe which btw, we are perhaps 80% on to it because our finance was approved in just 4 working days. CBA is pretty efficient people indeed!! I hope they keep it up throughout the settlement day.

the pink tree from before

Mon, 29 Oct 2007 10:45:18 GMT

Well we might actually have a place to grow a pink tree or two by the end of this year. Our first house in Melbourne!! Well, our first house anywhere really... Fingers crossed that all documentation/paper works/ finance will go smoothly and we can move in before Christmas.

Here are some very good photos of the pink tree which I (obsessed about) found in Flickr.com.

And here's some infos I found about it. So K-3san, perhaps you can tell your sister about it as well ^___^ Well, you might even be able to grow it as it originally comes from China, Taiwan, Japan anyway.
http://www.botanic.jp/plants-ta/chatin.htm

The Latin name is : Cedrela sinensis and English name is : Chinese Toom. This pink version is a "Flamingo" type. They are first yellow or or pink or bright red during spring time and THEN turn green. I really love the look of it!!

Mount Dandenong of Melbourne

Sun, 07 Oct 2007 08:38:58 GMT

Today we went for a tiny bit of bush-walking and some yummy food after it at Mt. Dandenong. But I've got a question. Does anyone know what this tree is?? I want it for my backyard of my future house!! The pink leaves are sooooo pretty!

Yep, bigger pics here:

We drove through here (well perhaps miles of it)

Usually thick dense mountain trees in Melbourne like this means water reservoir dams. In this case, it was Silvan Reservoir.

All in all, it was beautiful day, not so hot, in fact a bit cool. I felt recharged going to these places after weeks and months of disappointing house-hunting. Now, we've got some roast-pork in the oven waiting to be eaten!!

B'z Super Love Song PV

Sat, 22 Sep 2007 12:10:01 GMT

See this link, the PV is in the thread. Thanks to Katoukidsama at B'z Fansubs for the PV. Oh the B'z Fansubs also do subbings for B'z PVs and Karaoke so check them out.

Anyway, back to the PV. The song is great. But what made me 0____o and LOLed was the visual-keiness of the PV. It must be intentional! Koshi is wearing some eyeliners, I think?! And some blood-stuffs exploding all over white floor LMAO I find it really funny somehow. Good on ya' Tak and Koshi!! Aiyo I like it a lot lah.

B'z BUZZ

Fri, 21 Sep 2007 23:36:12 GMT

Well, if this is not like B'z!! A storm of activities to hit us soon!!

First, this news was announce on 19th anniversary of B'z career yesterday or what we call B'z Day 21st September.
Tokyo Graph
or
Japan Zone
which basically states that TAK AND KOSHI WILL BE IN HOLLYWOOD'S ROCK WALK ON NOVEMBER 19, 2007 TO HAVE THEIR HANDPRINTS CEMENTED!!!! Well, our L.A. stalker-team, are you ready??? (calling eMu, B and B2) I expect some really good photos of Tak and Koshi grinning ear to ear with their hands deep in the cement. And then lots of pics of the plates with their names, signatures and prints too. Whoah, this is still too awesome.

Secondly, with "Super Love Song" being released very soon (3rd October), the news of New original album is confirmed!! "ACTION" will be released on 5th December 2007. It has 17 songs. 17!!! 14 new songs if you count out the singles. When was the last time any album contain 17 songs!!! And the songtitles are really awesome. Thank you B'z!!!!

Thirdly, they will embark on B'z Livegym 2008 "ACTION" which has 49 dates starting from January to August.
B'z Official Livegym Site
And also, fourthly, the super duper gigantic mega huge 20th anniversary B'z Livegym is announced as well!!! Holy crap! Wahahahaha, even though they said, no more Livegym Pleasure from now on, but looks at the apt time to bring it back. This tour will be called B'z Livegym Pleasure 2008 which has 6 dates in 3 venues!! I'm surprised to see no Nagisa-en this time?? But never mind! ^___^ All sounds too damn exciting!! I bet the tickets will fly out the door.

So let us begin the countdown to 20th anniversary!!!

Now, if I can catch up with the updating of my site 0___o so many news. In the mean time, check out: B'z Net Party for more news about B'z

iro iro update

Sun, 16 Sep 2007 10:42:59 GMT

Well, B'z will release a single named "Super Love Song". The jacket design is really quite cute. It's a fast-paced, energy-packed rock song or so I think from the preview at the website YAY.

There were many rumors about new album to follow called "Paradise" complete with track-listing. But it turned out to be just a bull. That's OK. We've seen it all before. In an interview with Gibson USA, Tak said that at that moment, they already have about 23 songs recorded. !!! Does this mean double CD album like "The 7th Blues"?? If so, that'd be soooo rocking. B'z can release anything next year and I'll buy them all. Coz it will be their 20th anniversary yo!!

Btw, Gibson USA had a link to my website but after a while they realized their mistake and changed the link to B'z official site instead. Thanks to them I got a HUGE BOOST of visitors for that week. But I saw in some J-BBS, some Japanese B'z fans called my site faking to be official so don't trust the link. LOL, of course it's not official site. It's a fangril's B'z shrine! Weird.

My design studio gets rather minor projects and I've been absolutely reluctant to report my mini-income hence my payslips & bank account looked quite terrible. And that is a no no for mortgage brokers or banks. So to quickly fix that, I've been job-hunting. Hospitality was something that was easy for me to get with my experience. So I went to some selected interviews, got a few job offers which I tried and didn't like them enough to stay. I did French cake-cafe for two weeks and that totally sucked ass. I did food-catering which was very interesting to me personally, but it starts at unGodly hours everyday and I can't make it there on time with public transport. So I didn't stay either.

Finally, I got a job here. Right in the middle of City. Daytime work. Good pay good hours. They give meals and wash our uniforms. It's very comfortable position. And I still have enough hours to focus on designing after the work.

It's a members-only gentlemen club with 150 years of history. The building is a huge beautiful maze of doors and rooms with high ornamented ceilings, fireplaces, mahogany and oaks. All the finer things from the olden days. I still get lost in there a lot. This might seem like no big deal to people from Europe with thousands years of history behind them. But Australia hasn't got a long history at all and to see a building like this still standing and preserved and used well is really wonderful. Luckily, Melbourne has got many old glorious buildings like this (I had some pics in this post).

So the club's members are the only people who are allowed to dine and stay here. They are required to always behave in a traditional gentleman-like manner. Mostly, they are old men of course. Judges, lawyers, big wigs of the city. They cannot remove jacket and ties inside the building. Cannot bring female guests to dine unless it is after certain hours and in certain designated rooms. Cannot have coffee inside dining room, must move to reading room (like in the movies in old days 0____o). And always treat staff with respect otherwise their membership can be removed.

The staff are lovely people too. They are mostly late 20s to early 60s. The reception man (door man) has been there for 20 years plus and so has a chef. The rest of the crew are there to stay looks like. And I am told if there's in-house opportunity to move to reception or office (admin), everyone's welcome to try and they are more inclined to recruit staff they already know anyway. So that's another good thing about this place. If I get pregnant, I can work in the office!

I guess growing up in Asia and obviously from middle-class family, I am used to liking simple, easy to use/clean (hence usually) modern houses or buildings. I never liked Asian old houses because they are usually very outdated, inconvenient with scary nooks and rooms. I used to think new modern houses are great.

But I guess living with someone else who thinks totally differently and actually going to buy a house with that someone, I got to learn other options. In Western society, old houses are built to last and because of their value, they are usually taken care of and re-equipped with good plumbings, modern bathrooms etc. I learnt that old furnitures will look very beautiful if taken care of.

In short, our house that I am dreaming of has changed dramatically compared to a couple of years ago. Now I like some history in my 'new' house and furnitures. Which is perhaps good too coz I've taken into the habit of scanning E-bay for some antiques already!

Oh yeah, I also went for citizenship interview too and the lady told me "Well done". I'll get a letter "pass or fail" in mail in about 1-2 weeks. Then the waiting list for ceremony and then I will be Oz citizen and will get Oz passport.

About five years plus ago, I was still back in Indonesia, feeling quite hopeless about my life in general. And now, I am actually planning to buy a house (even cheap one at that) in Melbourne Australia with a husband and getting my citizenship. Life really does go on. And if I didn't come here five years ago, life would still have gone on back home but probably not moving at all. I have lost all confidence in that country so in the case that I am granted my Oz citizenship, I should have no regret in letting go of my previous one at all.

Gosh, this is so long. Sorry to bore you all who read through.

A grown up?

Thu, 12 Jul 2007 02:09:02 GMT

Sigh, I've been asking about mortgage, loans and we've actually been looking at houses... What a scary thing to do, buying a house. I guess one just has to do it eventually. Q-chan's Dad advised us to listen to him and jump on the merry-go-round now because based on his experience the price will never go down. Despite the ride looking pretty scary and fast and intimidating, we must jump in and hang on there. Besides, plenty of our friends and relatives did and they are doing fine. It's probably like what Q-chan said, that it's one of those things that you think is such a big step in life, like getting your first job, but once you are in it then you hardly notice it. Although I don't think we won't notice having to pay so much mortgage every month. The thought of having to earn that much money to cover that every month scares me.

Things are not going too well with my design studio. I'm definitely not a good sales person and I perhaps need a self-improvement lesson or a manager pronto. When I'm on the phone with client I can hear myself and think, why should I trust her? She doesn't sound very confident at all... I wonder if it is because of my personality or English being not my native language. I bet at least 80% is personality. I know some people who don't speak good English yet whatever they sell people would buy. Plus these days I just can't be bothered with other people's problems even though it means I won't get paid in the end. Therefore I can't be doing very well, can I?

I notice though, when things are slow (or basically come to a halt) work-wise, I like experimenting in the kitchen. So Q-chan's obento benefit from it. Well, I think I'd rather earn more money than doing that, but I guess it's a small consolation.

Whoah a Kara-age dish was made from scratch yesterday (without the J-instant powder) and I got a photo to prove it too! Tadaaa... Q-chan's obento for today was: Kara-age and rice, cabbage carrot apple coleslaw, bean salad, mayo in the red penguin container, chocolate and an orange.

Chicken Parmigiana

Sun, 10 Jun 2007 11:02:44 GMT

Haven't posted anything for a while... One of my first customer for the design studio was becoming more and more of an arsehole so I 'fired' him last week. I don't like quarreling or even arguing with anyone so it's a milestone for me. Although only through e-mails, it kept me awake some nights thinking that I'm an evil person. Or could I have endured that and come out stronger in the end. Yes, that would have been cool but I didn't have to take his shit really.

I worked my ass off for his project. He sent me a "Well done. That's what we wanted." And he paid. On to the next project. My very low price obviously didn't excite him. So he tried to say that he wasn't happy with my previous work to make me feel guilty (?) and drive down my price even further?? He said that he only gave me projects because I called him many times which means he pitied me (another of his strategy). He complained that I don't call him, that I asked him to call after work-hours. Which I never did coz I work somewhere else at night during which I cannot take calls. And the best one was I'm not a professional because I don't have proper office or studio. Well that's why I'm a freelance designer and why my price is lower than ad agency.
It's amazing the shit he came up with. So in the end, I e-mailed him with a demand to terminate the working relationship. I'm still waiting for him to pay me for the second (finished) project. But obviously the whole experience didn't exactly make me dancing around the room.

Anyway, this content below though, makes me rather happy. It was dinner I made tonight for us, seeing it's a long weekend and it's been cold everyday the past week.

A bit about this dish Chicken Parmagiana: It's a cheap meal that is usually served in Aussie's pubs. On certain day of the week as specified by the pub, you could probably get away with paying $10-$14 for a Chicken Parma and a pot (a glass of tap beer). And yes, the serve is usually gigantic and always with lots of fries and green salad.
Chicken Parma typically is chicken breast crumbed, deep-fried and topped with a slice of ham, napoli sauce and cheese. It is then grilled until the cheese is bubbly and brown.

I chose to use chicken thigh (doesn't get too dry and cheaper hehe), baked after bread-crumbed, no ham, herb wedges, plenty of tomatoes and parmesan cheese. See, I thought parma means parmesan, but apparently they usually use Mozarella 0____o Anyway, here are more photos.

In the oven

With the herb wedges and steamed broccoli

And to finish, a warmed-up home-made Apple Rhubarb Crisp with vanilla ice-cream, the ultimate winter dessert, plus black coffee YUM ^____^

Thanks so much for looking!

what's been happening?

Mon, 21 May 2007 00:10:50 GMT

Well, not much but maybe a bit more than usual...

Our 2nd housemate Michael who didn't like partying and living with guys his age, after 6 months living with us, decided that he probably does like partying and living with guys his age. So he moved out. Before that, he brought a steam-cleaner and did an amazing job on the carpet. Yay for Michael.

So in short, now we are looking for the next housemate again. Waaaah, it's such a troublesome, long-hauling work to do. Most of these people are very nice and it's always a difficult decision. It's been two great housemates so I suppose we are pretty good and lucky with our decisions so far. To live under one roof with someone terrible is really too awful. You don't need that after a day of hard work.

I still haven't found a proper full-time job. And I'm still continuing my current one just a few night-shifts.

On the other hand, my other ongoing project sorta worked a bit last week. Yep, my very own design studio was established about 1 month ago and since then I have been chasing customers for work. Last week, I had a go ahead on two projects. So they are my first customers so to speak.

But!! On the other hand again, after what seemed to be 100+ phone calls in those few days, and saying how he really liked my work and asking for invoice, one of my TWO customers seemed to have done a runner!!!!!! I mean, he hasn't contacted me since last Friday. Push the alarm button, call the police!! Aiyooooo. Oh well, I guess I learn something out of this, like get a full contact details for example T_____T. I'll report back if he ever contacts me again.

I tried to sell some stuffs through Ebay. One sold but I forgot how Ebay and PayPal charge fees so I almost didn't make money out of this purchase. Oh well, I learned some things about selling in Ebay, I suppose.

So anyway, here I am, not earning much money at all, saving the crumbs I can save. Trying hard to step into the next phase of life. I look around and saw friends and relatives who are younger than me, already owned their house (or houses even!), making more money than both of us combined and are pregnant or already had their baby (babies)... I do feel the pressure. Not as hard as I let it to, but I definitely feel it. I don't care about what other people think. This is mainly for myself. At this age, I do want to own my house and a running business (or at least a proper job) and start on some children.

Q-chan asked last night, "Is it just me? Or is life always such a struggle?" I think no matter where and what you are, provided you are not insane or retarded, life is always a struggle. Even those wealthy people. They struggle for something else, I'm sure. We both struggle so much but at least we are always well-fed, happy with each other and live in a lawful peaceful country. And if I see million others who suffer so, I should shut up and stop complaining. This is just life, isn't it?

Now if only my customer will ring me back and better yet, show me the MONEIS !!! Then I can be content for about 1-2 hours. C'mon man! In the mean time, I should start on the other project. GAAAH.

Hiyashii-chuuka

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 02:33:35 GMT

Or the Chinese-style Cold Noodles dish from Japan... lol so confusing. Well, the first time I encountered this dish was the Korean style one called naeng myon which is literal translation from Chinese characters 冷面 leng mian (cold noodles). This one however is a Japanese recipe. This box consists of: a layer of noodles (hidden at the bottom), cooked carrot, fried eggs (supposed to be cut thinly, but mine just crumbles???), cooked cabbage, julienned ham, red pepper, cold cucumber and on the very top, Japanese pickled ginger gari shaped like flower, my attempt to be at least a bit cute. Not pictured is the sauce in a small bottle. Everything is eaten cold.

I have been making Q-chan his sandwiches bento for every single workday. But last night, we ran out of bread. So I ran a quick check on the internet and found that I could do this one quite easily. I hope he likes. I have the same lunch!! high five!! hehe

And yes, I'm still using the same old blue bento. Quite like it actually. Perhaps will get a cuter one when our friend Mari-chan comes back from Japan. Not that she left yet lol.

*edit* Ahahaha I did an entry at bentochallenge, posted a bento I did today. Somebody stop me!! This is probably going to be a full-blown obsession soon, hopefully not expensive one. Q-chan and I have been eating more healthily recently because of this though.

Left-over photos

Tue, 17 Apr 2007 00:45:12 GMT

Aiyoooo I still haven't got good news about new job. This sucks. I can't wait to farewell my current job. Oh well... Bound to be better soon I guess. "Life is like a wheel, you will definitely go to the top after spending sometime at the bottom" (old Buddhism saying)... Yes, it is also unfortunately vice versa. I do think this applies mostly to the mood/feelings of a person and not really society/financial position etc. Of course if I have a good job, then I will be happy for like 2 minutes (ok maybe a bit longer) and then something else will bound to worry me again. However, I firmly believe that the happiness of getting it will be doubled/tripled the longer I wait. Ok, that doesn't sound very good, I don't wanna wait too long, so I take it back.

Anyway, my F-I-L visited over Easter. It was good to have him around. Definitely took my mind away from the job situation. He is a very sweet man, easy to please and generally can be found in good mood, especially if food and wine is nearby, and I made sure we had plenty of them hehehe. So during his visit, we showed him around and he said something rather interesting. "Melbourne is a bit like San Fransisco". Having been to SF and now living in Melbourne, I thought, he's probably quite right. Perhaps it's the trams and some of the more hilly parts of the city that reminds him of SF. He also said the city is the most beautiful one he's ever been to and that's pretty cool considering he's been to many in Europe and the US and A.

We also watched Ali G's interviews and Borat the movie . The next few days found us often chuckling over some happenings in the dvds. When I was watching Borat, I was more shocked than humoured but the more I remember things, the funnier I found them to be. So I decided I quite like Borat ^___^

Well, these are some SMALL-SIZE photos of Melbourne and surroundings. I don't know if it's the most beautiful city or anything, but I do know that depending on where you're looking and your mood at that moment, it could be a pretty city.

This is a shot tower where they made shot balls back in the stone-age. And this particular one is in Melbourne Central, a main shopping centre on top of train station in the city. It used to be Daimaru dept. store but they went bankrupt and since then it's been developed to this.

The bottom of the shot tower is a clothing-store and in there, you can visit a small shot tower's museum.

This is Melbourne Sofitel's 35th floor's Male Toilet. You don't really find it written anywhere in the traveler's infos or even in the hotel's own brochure. Kind of a public secret. The attraction is, if you are a male, you can pee on top of the world. Q-chan and F-I-L took this photo coz I couldn't go in, aab-vyuus-lee.

Some old restored buildings on Collins Street which are now 5-stars hotel (very near where I work)

Another one like it along the same street

Simply Chinatown, where good food with good value can be found.

In the Yarra Bend Park, a huge natural bushland in the middle of Melbourne, there live these creatures of the night. Part of city's attraction, the bats colony sleep here daytime and fly in hundreds and thousands across the city for food at night. We find them in our backyard's fig tree sometimes and we must be 20kms away. They are bigger than a fully-grown cat!

Maroondah Dam, back in 2005 when we first visited it.

Just recently (2007), after two years of continuous draught. It's scary to behold. Apparently all other dams are like this as well. We hope for a lot of rains. Rain is good for Australia. But not too much please... I don't have a dryer for my washing!!

Thanks for looking and reading to here, folks. To the loo!

I love ramen

Sun, 01 Apr 2007 09:58:24 GMT

I have been lurking (watching) bentolunch and enjoying every entry, every pic and recipe they have there. I'm inspired to make bentos as well and of course, Q-chan will benefit (or lose) from these experiments hehehe. I bought a cheap plastic lunch-box thingie (no Japanese type bento around here yet) but it worked out alright only it can't go into microwave =(. So below is my first Q-chan's bento sort-of. I'm also looking for a better job so when I do find one, I might pack bentos for both of us.

This one had: Katsu-currydon (leftover =p), coleslaw with mayo, two peppero sticks, small OJ and I threw in some green grapes as well.

And now on to my first attempt of making home-made noodles or ramen or LA MIAN!!

One of the big department of Chinese food is noodles made of flour, water and a bit of salt. From this base, you can make any type of noodles, wonton or dumpling skins. Some part of China (especially North-western) have skilled personnels who pull their noodles and hence this type is called "LA MIAN" 拉面 which literally means "Pulled Noodles". Btw, that's where the Japanese word RAMEN came from. Interestingly, dumplings are called "JIAO ZI" 饺子 in China but they are boiled/steamed. The pan-fried version are called GUO TIE 锅贴 (pot-stickers) or JIAN JIAO 煎饺 (fried dumplings). While in Japan, pan-fried dumplings exactly the same Kanji as 饺子 and pronounced GYOZA. The Koreans are a league of their own by calling their steamed dumplings MANDOO which came from Chinese characters 馒头 MANTOU and if you know MANTOU, these babies actually are nothing like dumplings, because they are white steamed buns without fillings about 5-10x bigger than a JIAOZI.

Anyway, the Chinese do many things with their dough made of flour, water and salt. If they pull it, it's called La Mian 拉面. If they shave it off into boiling pot, it's called Dao Xiao Mian 刀削面. I also know something called Shou Gan Mian 手干面 which basically means Handmade Noodles.

Now anyone who has had freshly made noodles/pasta knows that nothing beats it. Q-chan and I have been frequenting this 西北拉面馆North-western Chinese restaurant in Footscray. We just love it there, cheap and satisfying and yummy. I love their fresh LA MIAN more than anything. And then I saw an entry in in the bentolunch about making home-made noodles (I don't remember who or when though). So I got inspired. And below is my very first experiment of making LA MIAN. Or shall we call it QIE MIAN 切面 coz I used knife to cut it like pasta hehehe. There's no way that I could pull this dough man.

Basic La Mian dish ingredients: Chilli Oil/Paste, Sesame Oil, Soy Sauce, Oil, Salt, Pepper.
Some thinly cut lamb. Tomato, carrots, spring onions, garlic, cabbage (or any greens).
And the dough (2 cups flour, 1/2 water, pinch of salt) sitting in the bowl for 1-2 hours.

The final step is to stir-fry lamb and all prepared veggies, mix in sauces/spices and then cover the noodles in it. Above dish doesn't look that good but it was pretty yummy. Q-chan said he likes it better than original coz this one doesn't burn his tongue and stomach hehehe. I think it was very fun process altogether. Definitely something to do again one day!! Do try this at home ^_____^

An unforgettable night

Sat, 10 Mar 2007 09:25:28 GMT

It was the 3rd night of our NZ trip. Four of us, Q-chan and I, K (a Japanese girlfriend) and D (a Russian bf of K) were at Q-chan's Dad's cabin in Marlborough Sounds. Some previous entry I made before mentioned this cabin complete with some sunrise scenery pics taken from there. What I didn't include was an experience that I would never forget as long as I live... I hope I won't anyway.

After an awesome BBQ dinner and tiramisu, about 9pm Q-chan brought 4 chairs and wine outside and told us to turn off all lights and candles. We were like, "Oh yeah, what now?" So we sat there in the dark, sky-gazing. Sure enough, the sky looked lovely with so many stars that you won't see in light-polluted city like Melbourne. But once our eyes got used to the dark, nothing I have seen before could have prepared me for it. The inky black sky was not black anymore. More and more stars were slowly appearing. And behind them, soft colours of all imaginable hues shone through. The twinkling stars, the moving satellites, the whole slanting plate of The Milky Way, the shooting stars!! Now these guys were really amazing. We saw probably two dozens in about 2-3 hours. Some of them were short. The long ones spectacularly lit up the sky as they raced through above us while we all went so loudly, "WOWOWOOWOWOOWOOOWWW!!!" We busily made wishes but after a while forgot about it.

We sat there for about 2-3 hours. Time didn't matter. Words and wine kept flowing. We drank two bottles and said too much crap, unfortunately, due to the existence of D, an immature I'm-always-right-you're-always-wrong 20 year-old. But even he didn't manage to make me feel sad. The scenery I saw that night was too beautiful to bother. I did get annoyed in the end and left for bed lol.

Q-chan and I tried to take photos of the stars the next night when our companions have gone home. But it sadly didn't work. So I'm forced to take a photo off Frank Zullu's site and incorporate it with cabin's photo with Photoshop. At least I can remember what it's like now. But really, the real thing was absolutely beyond description. As I said before, I'm a city girl, therefore the wonder of nature never ceases to amaze me. I'm really grateful I had this experience <3 <3 <3

Back in Melbourne now

Wed, 07 Mar 2007 22:44:40 GMT

The last day in NZ, sister-in-law and I took care of dinner, which was sushi. It was a smaller plan to begin with but the ingredients get bigger and bigger... It was quite troublesome but still a lot of fun! The result was worth it!!

So now we are back in Melbourne. Many things sorta changed and caught us by surprise. We were not gone for that long of a time! Anyway, I'm doing much less work at work now because I'm trying to set up freelance work at the moment. It's hard and so far I haven't done much. There are so many different things I wanna do. Start to paint again, start to learn piano again, start to do some quilting coz they can look pretty darn cool as I have witnessed so far, start to be active with B'z stuffs again, start to do some business and make serious money, start to write a blockbuster novel or moviescript muahaha... Yeah, realistically, we should be starting to buy a house around here. That's the near future goal. I feel extremely small and inadequate and overwhelmed by my goals. How am I going to start? Why is life full with goals and will I be happy and content after achieving them? Maybe for like two minutes then I'll think of many other goals. A THOUSAND SIGHS......

the last few days of our holiday

Sun, 04 Mar 2007 09:30:22 GMT

Well, finally we get to the last days... A bit sad actually but I guess it must happen. And only by working like other normal people that you get to really appreciate holidays. We are going back to good ol' Melbourne on Tuesday morning. I hope our housemate hasn't peed on our carpet or destroyed the furnitures.

We went to visit Q-chan's childhood friend Michael who just happened to be in town with his family to visit his parents in their 700 acres farm. So Keen the city girl got to do 'wild adventure' like this =p I hope the Australian custom would not get too excited when I answer 'yes' on the 'Have you been on a farm lately?' question and then confiscate my shoes.

Me, on the back of truck around the farm. Michael was going 60km/hour but it felt like 120km/hour at the back. It's totally illegal of course.

Michael's Dad has deer as well as sheep and cattle.

We went to see the woolshed where the sheep are sheared twice a year. SOOOO SMMMMELLLYYYY!!! I wrote with chalk that Q-chan and I were there in '07 ^___^

Part of the farm-tour is to ride on this. Was FUN!

When we got home, my M-I-L already had a Chinese meal ingredients ready. So for the first time ever, I cooked a Chinese stir-fry dish on an outdoor BBQ stove. Was good fun here as well!

A day of baking and cooking

Fri, 02 Mar 2007 21:38:55 GMT

We are in Feilding now, at Q-chan's Mum's house. She is an excellent cook and she knows that I LOVE my food. You know how some people don't really care what they eat coz they just wanna feel not hungry. I'm not like that. I am not choosy and my food doesn't have to be expensive or complicated, but must be yummy. Lol that's not too difficult, right?

M-I-L has recently gone to Turkey and Greece therefore her food these days are influenced with it. She's been feeding us Turkish lentil soup, dishes and desserts. And yesterday, M-I-L decided to throw us a belated birthday party. So here goes in full colour what she baked for about 6-7 hours yesterday. Oh well besides the baking, she also had a roasted leg of lamb and veggies, potatoes, etc.

Well, this entry mainly is to remind me of the steps. Do click away if you are interested in the baking and stuffs like that ^___^

FOOD AND THE SIMPLE WHAT-TO-DO

BAKLAVA
On the base, 6 layers of filo with butter in between each filo. A mixture of blended walnuts, pistachios, almonds, sugar, cinnamon etc. And then another 6 layers of filo with butter in between each filo. Cut diamond shapes (or whatever you like) before baking. Bake in oven for 45 minutes (I don't remember temperature). Pour floral-sugar-syrup to the piping hot baklava. Leave it to cool. Cut again and serve. Small 5cmx5cm is enough for one serve, I think. It's criminally sweet.

Here's our birthday Mud-choco-cake. It was sooooooooooo yummy!!

And here's how she toast her muesli for our daily breakkie. In roasting dish, mix bran, wheatgerm, rolled oats, linseed, cinnamon, sugar, etc. Then she poured half oil half milk and crumbled it with hands. Toast in oven for 15 minutes, stir evenly, and another 15 minutes. Turn off oven and leave for a night in oven. After the mixture cools down, stir in all kinds of nuts and dried fruits. It's nicer than any brand of muesli we bought from supermarket.

Maruia Hot Springs

Tue, 27 Feb 2007 06:54:12 GMT

Seems like I'm bombarding my LJ with travel pics. I guess you don't have to click on the lj-cut link anyway. But before that, I must comment on NZ's mammoth coffee cups size. All are about 120% of Oz's ones. NZ small = Oz medium, NZ medium = Oz tall and so on. And to top that, they've got something called "Latte Bowl" here and it looks something like this below. It's for one person. Crazy! People who are not from this part of the world said that the Aussies take their coffee seriously. I guess they haven't been to this other side of Tasmania. My F-I-L takes triple shots cafe-latte and sends coffees back if he doesn't get it the way he likes.

The drive to Maruia took about 3 hours from Nelson. It was one that I regretfully had to sleep throughout because of the roads being so terrifyingly windy. I took travel-calm pills and missed the LOTR movie scenery. There's no easy way to stop somewhere and take photos anyway. The scenery being so breathtaking at every turn of the curves and too majestic/grand to be captured into photos, digicam some more. So you just have to believe me. This below was the flatter part of the drive.

The Maruia Onsen is run by mainly Japanese staff. It has a normal crap travelling-cafe which you always find on the road driving anywhere in NZ. They normally serve sandwiches, quiches, burgers, fries, wedges and charge sky-high price coz you don't have a choice and you must use their toilets. I hate these places.
But Maruia also has a Japanese restaurant that looks reasonable (expensive). It was unfortunately closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. But! What is it about onsen though, I felt that I MUST have miso soup and rice after I came out of the onsen?

This is the pic of the entry to the onsens: private ones, the outdoor rockpool and the Japanese-style bathhouse in which men and women are separated coz they can 'preserve the Japanese tradition' and go naked.

This is the private one that we used. It was unexpectedly stuffy and not relaxing. There was no soap anywhere.

This is the outdoor public rockpool. It would have been the most perfect one seeing how pretty the surroundings were. But we were bitten to death by sandflies and I'm paying for it today. We stayed there for like, 2 minutes. ZANNEN DESHITA!

By far, I think the Japanese-style bathhouse was the best. Although, men and women have to be separated so it is best to go with same-sex friends for company. The inside is like the private one, but of course, much much bigger. Hence you can see more of the scenery and it's not as crampy. There was still no soap anywhere.

Oh well, I finish my report of the springs. Now, I haven't been to the Japanese ones in Japan (seeing I've never been in Japan). So those who have been, please compare and tell stories!! Thank you for reading!

BBQ, beach, sunshine, seagulls

Sun, 25 Feb 2007 20:35:32 GMT

...the weather has been so clear blue sky, hot sunshine, no rain, mild cool nights, so much so that it's hard to believe this is New Zealand! I don't know why anyone would want to live in Christchurch with its awfully cold depressing weather all year long. Come to think of that, Melbourne is a bit like that too (minus a few months) and then we get the very very hot summer. When we get back, it'd be (hopefully) nice autumn days already. Not hot and not cold yet. Here's hopin'.

I really like this photo that Q-chan took yesterday on the beach ^___^

On Saturday, we presented BBQ to our gracious hosts. Q-chan handled the grilling, while I took care of the sides. Here we had Tandoori & Teriyaki sauce marinated lamb, chicken and beef. And with that, the steamed white rice. YUMMY da yooo.

Saturday was a big hit so we were asked to take care of Sunday's tea as well. Here we had Vietnamese sauce marinated fish and pork. With that (strange as it is), we had Lebanese pita bread, lettuce, plus tomato, pepper, apple salsa. It was OK. Perhaps if we switched the sides to Saturday one, it would have been much more of a match. But it was still good hehe.

Today, Q-chan and I are going to drive 2.5 hours to Maruia Springs to experience the NZ's Japanese style onsen. Yoohooo, spa, bath-house, too wonderful!!! I cooked fried rice so we're having that when we get hungry on the road. YEAH! ^____^