LOOOOONG OVERDUE

Hey people! Yeah I know I went missing for a few days yadah yadah yadah. I wasn't exactly very busy to the point of exhaustion and neither was I free enough to make an update. But since I'm taking a breather here (can't bring myself to think of what I got to do later on), I might as well make an update!

Two Sundays ago, Mummy had her flight back to Singapore. I dragged her to Sunday service because I thought the service was pretty impactful on Saturday. And after service, we decided to have our lunch at Han's at Reading Cinema but guess what! They're closed. So we moved over to the restaurant next door, Griff's Restaurant. To our horror, it was the worst dining experience we've ever had in Perth.

1) They were under-staffed. For such a huge place, they only had 3 waiters, 1 boss and I don't know about the chefs. Of the 3 waiters, one was slaving away and 2 (females) were slacking 90% of the time at the cashier. Even the boss was more hardworking.
2) As a result of their lack of staff, tables are cleared only when new customers come in. Mummy and I not exluded. We were also not given drinks menus and it was REALLY difficult to get the attention of even those two dumb bums slacking at the cashier.
3)My iced coffee:took 25 minutes to come. So we asked for our food because we were obviously rushing for time because Mummy had a flight to catch and we told them that and they said they were going to check it out for us in the kitchen. True enough, they went in, and came out with no news. We asked the second time and the same thing happened the second time! By the 35th minute I was so pissed I just walked out with Mummy fearfully tagging behind me. Oh, I didn't touch the iced coffee, by the way.

Don't call yourself a restaurant if you're gonna have this kinda service, Griff's Restaurant. Pull up your socks before you lose your sales.

So where did we have our lunch? At the airport.Mummy had red rooster while I ordered pasta and coffee at Breakfast Lunch Dinner (BLD). The pasta was really bland. The beef stew thingy was pretty good so I mixed them together and it turned out nice! Coffee was. Oh-kay.

Sent Mummy off at the gate. Could tell Mummy was holding back her tears. I was more off happy, reliefed, in joy. Not because I don't have anyone at home nagging/controlling me. In fact, she never really nagged (if she did, the nags probably bounced off me) and never controlled where I went. We call that trust =).

I was more happy to forsee the good times my parents are going to have together back in Singapore. They may get quite impatient with each other but I believe them spending more time together will help with their patience and make them more loving. I really love the idea of going home into the arms of a pair of very loving parents. I feel the love already =D.

Past two weeks I've been spending most of my time with my new housemate, Daniel, and other freshies and not forgetting the dance practices =). There was one Tuesday night I skipped dance practice for cell core meeting and then watched movie with a few of the church members. IHeart! By Joel Houston!

It wasn't exactly a movie kinda movie. More of like a documentary of them going around countries to record the IHeart album. I'm looking forward to IHeart 2. A more proper movie. ^^

Went over to Fast Eddy's after the movie for some supper.Shared some pancakes with Adam and I downed two cups of drinks. First was iced tea, second was vanila milkshake. Was really thirsty but I only managed to finish about 80% of my milkshake haha.

Let Adam drive my car 'cos I was really tired and hey! I've found one extra person I can trust my car with. And the funniest thing was we got stopped at a road block and Adam found out he had to actually convert his license. Man. Police, go drink your beer.

Also brought Daniel to Subiaco Fruits Market for the first time with Eufei tagging along. Had lunch there as well. Eufei had the turkish gozleme. Daniel and I ate from the Vietnamese stall. Daniel had some beef ball noodles soup.I had what Mummy always had. Pork and spring rolls rice vermicilli. Ever since Mummy left, I took over quite a bit of her habits. When I was young I always thought Mummy and I wer linked via telepathy. Like I knew where ever she was and what ever she was doing. I think it was 'cos of the lack of time spent with her back then when she was constantly working that I was desperately in need of more time spent with her that made me fake how much I knew Mummy. I'm glad it's all different now =).

We went out for movies with the freshies again just this Tuesday that passed. Before that, each cell had their own dinners. My cell, together with one or two others, had ours at Ipoh Garden along Canning Highway.Ipoh hor fun soup.

Ipoh hor fun dry.

Beef watan hor.

I had the beef watan hor. Basically it just means fried hor fun served with beef in egg sauce. Totally awesome. Sauce and hor fun and everything. Beef could be a bit more tender, though.

At the cinema, a few watched Wanted, a few watched Dark Knight, a few watched some other movies, I (dragging Jim along) watched MAMA MIA! It was a stupid kind of funny. Not the type of movie I'd watch if not on offer. 50% of the time I laughed was 'cos of Jim's reactions lol totally hilarious. Had a great time.

Looking forward to learning more in my new cell. Not comparing cells and I love this cell as much as I loved my previous cell but I really hope I'll get more out of my current one. =)

signing off~DE XIN

WILL MISS YOU, MUMMY =)

Mummy has touched down safely in Singapore. Just webcam-ed with her and Daddy. Gah. Oh and my new housemate, Daniel, has officially moved in. And I didn't exactly have a very pleasant lunch experience. Plus I caught a camouflaging speed camera. Nasty.

ANYWAYS I'm here to blog about the past week or so. Mummy and I got back to Perth on Tuesday, 15/07, and on Thursday, 17/07, we went down to the city 'cos Myer had a MEGA sale. But before that we had lunch at Fast Eddy's.Mummy's cappuccino! Apparently it was good on first sip but it turned cold fast and then lost its taste.

Mummy's spaghetti bolognese. Eh. Super not al dente. But the sauce was good. I remember Mummy having spaghetti bolognese at Cafe Vero or something like that in Subiaco and the sauce was sour to the top!

My supposedly spicy nachos. Good thing they have a tray of condiments. Happily helped myself to the tabasco sauce and THEN my nachos became spicy.

This ice coffee can get me admitted to the hospital for diabetes if I drink it again. You got my point.

Myer's MEGA sale? So mega they ran out of the red kettle I've always wanted to get. So I gave them my details so that they could contact me when stock comes in. I didn't go back empty handed, though! I got a photo album haha for my Sydney photos. Bought watermelon+strawberry chiller from Icy Ice and then went home.

Nothing much happened the next few days except meeting Daniel and his parents for the first time, showing him around, then meeting them again on Monday (21/07) for dinner at Terrazza. OH! Orientation! We had coffee with the freshies on the same night, same place. So after the dinner, we went back, and then Daniel and I went out again to Terrazza.

Tuesday (22/07) Mummy and I decided to go down to Hyatt for buffet lunch since it was finally open. But seriously. Why does your website say it's CLOSED when I called and you said it's OPEN?!

Anyways. Ya. Photos.Cool new designs. But the chair is not as comfy as before. *notes*

The salad and fresh food booth.

Clockwise from crab: Crab, I-don't-know-what-but-looks-like-baby-lobster, raw salmon with some sauce and in the middle it's fresh tomato with cheese and a leaf.

The crab was so not fresh. The baby lobster look a like was REALLY fresh. Salmon was pretty ok. The tomato was good. Good combination, yes, including the leaf. Oh and guess what? They no longer serve fresh oysters. Only on weekend dinners. I felt like turning the table then and there when I heard about it. I mean, seriously.

Cooked fod booth.

Clockwise from sausage: sausage, a small little slice of pizza, mashed potato, beef stew (?), pan fried fish, grilled steak and in the middle chips.

The sausage was salty to the max. But then agin, all sausages are salty so I can't complain. That slize of pizza was not bad. THE MASHED POTATO WAS LIKE MELTING IN MY MOUTH! Super fine and smooth and I'm pretty sure creamy as well. Beef stew was not bad too. But I had better ones. Oh I mixed a bit of the beef stew gravy with the mashed potato and it was WAY BETTER than KFC's mashed potato. Pan fried fish TASTED good (brings back childhood memories) but it was still flaky. Like I said, buffet fish, always. THAT piece of steak was good but their later batches were crap. Totally.

Penne with pesto sauce and roast beef. Penne was al dente! Bravo! *applaudes* The roast beef was good too. Medium rare texture, was so in love with it.

DESSERT BOOOOOOTH! Sad to say they no longer have their super LOOOOONG table of desserts. I really loved that but oh wells. Renovated.

Mini pavlovas, tarts and slabs.

Fruits for the, uh, fruit deprived. I mean, really, you go all the way to a buffet place for fruits??

Ice cream and free toppings! Their range of toppings kinda sucked but mini marshmallows made me happy.

Apple crumble with apricots if you like. One of the red pans was for waffles (with maple/chocolate syrup at the side but not in the picture. The other red pan was for sticky date pudding with butterscotch sauce and cream in those two bowls.

This display was right smack at the entrance and it totally made me look forward to dessert. Sherry trifle, different fruit puddings, tiramisus, chocolate mousses, mini cheesecakes/mango slabs/chocolate cakes and tartlets!

Chocolate cake.

Peach upside-down cake. Yes, that's what it's called. Not 'cos there's a name displayed but 'cos I've seen recipes of this.

Talking about display of names. NONE OF THEIR DISHES HAD AT LEAST THEIR NAMES DISPLAYED MUCH LESS DESCRIPTION. What's up with that, man?

Apple strudel.

Creme caramal and, uh, burnt chocolate mousse? I don't know lol.

Clockwise from waffle: waffle drizzled with maple syrup, mango slab, mini pavlova, tiramisu cake, banana tart, custard tart.

The waffle was nice and crispy! Mango slab was ordinary. Pavlova was interesting 'cos it was my first time but it was a biiiiit too sweet. Tiramisu cake was oh-kay only, but much better than the one they had before renovation. BANANA TART WAS THE BOMB. Fragrant banana cream, fresh burnt bananas and chocolate tart case. Reminds me of the super duper artificial-to-the-max banana cake at Monterey's that had dried banana on top instead of fresh. Cheap. Custard tart was good too! Loved the custard.

Clockwise from creme caramel: creme caramel, peach upside-down cake, chocolate cake, apple strudel, sticky date pudding with butterscotch sauce and in the middle apple crumble.

Creme caramel was sweet to the spine. Yes, spine. Peach upside-down cake was good! Chocolate cake was like. I tasted more sugar than chocolate. You get my point. APple strudel was crap. The pastry was either too thick or super not fresh. Apple crumble was so-so.

Mango and macadamia cheesecake and tiramisu.

THE CHEESECAKE EXPLODED IN MY MOUTH! Super shiok. The tiramisuuuuuu. Why did they use, whiskey. Totally spoilt the tiramisu. AND there were no sponge fingers in there. Only plain cream with whiskey and chocolate dusting. Use kahlua, man, kahlua.

Ice cream! Lemon sorbet. Sourness was just right but the sweetness was crazy. Remember how I said Y2K Super Cafe in Sydney's ice cream was too sweet? This one was worse.

After 25% discount. Originally A$78. In my opinion? Over-priced. True, it's newly renovated but, hello? No oysters except for weekend dinners? Limited variety in cooked food? And such sucky desserts? This was a huge disappointment. It's not longer a place I'll recommend my friends to go. To think I used to go all crazy whenever I talk about Cafe at the Hyatt buffet. No more.

Wednesday after dance practice I went over Eunice's place to join them for freshies' dinner. Quite a number of houses were open so the freshies were spread everywhere. Eunice was (and still is) just next door so might as well.

Thursday. Uh. Dance prac?

Friday Aunty Lucy, Mummy and I went down to Subiaco. Then at night was combined cell. Was posted into Jeremy Low's cell! Ah crap. Can forsee the many insinuations coming my way.

SATURDAY! Went down to city again and FINALLY GOT MY RED KETTLE! Then rushed back to UWA area for service. Service messed me up. You see that music player there on the right? Play the song "Healer". Listen to the lyrics. I wasn't just in tears. I was pouring. It's like thunderstorm on my face, no joke. Mike Guglielmucci was, is and will truely amazing with his strength and ability to worship and priase God at such times. He wrote that song immediately after he found out he had cancer. Like hospital->results->rush home->hit record button in studio->burst into worship. He did not plan this song verses by verses, bridge by bridge or chorus by chorus. It just came out. Just like that.

I'll talk about food fest and Sunday another time. For now, I'm off! =)

signing off~DE XIN