the land of french

Reaching Montreal at 3am after a short detour to see the gorgeous stars by the farm at the border between USA and Canada, we felt the hunger pangs nudge our tummies. So our host, Chef Annis whipped up sausages + instant noodles at her place and Voila~ our supper at 5am in the morning. Really delicious! Slept with a full tummy and woke up at 2pm :/

Had brunch at De farine & d'eau fraiche which means 'of flour & fresh water'. Shared an awesome panini with Xiu and had a huge cup of au chocolat for myself. An awesome, quaint cafe worth visiting. One thing I noticed about Montreal was that people enjoyed seating at the terrace - with the extreme weather conditions sometimes, will appreciate it heaps when the sun does emerge!

The inside of the cafe - I tried my luck at French to the lady at the counter.

After brunch, we headed to the biggest library in Montreal - it was H.U.G.E. but amazing nonetheless :D I love books and I love libraries. I wouldn't mind being locked in the library with all these books - but downside is that most are probably in French!

Love the snapshot below as I was walking down the street. One thing I like about Montreal is that it's so rich with culture, interlaced with modernism and history dating back centuries. Something which you can never experience back in Singapore. Oh how I miss you already!

Random graffiti art:

Me with the five stone ring Xiu bought from the National Museum of Singapore - green polka dots! Love the combination, I have a skirt of the similar color and design.

For dinner, Pat brought us to the Japanese place where she used to work part-time! We had sashimi and lotsa yummy makis :D

A quiet end to the first night at Montreal, but the start of many more memories to come ~

boston-montreal-new york & many more (1/5/13-13/5/13)

After 4 years (haha it's the number 4 again!) and we finally made it to Montreal to visit our dearest Candian pals Pat, Math and Allisa!

Started with the four of us from Singapore, onwards to Boston, camping over at Montreal to meet our Canadian pals, before our last stop to New York City.

(Wouldn't be complete without my airplane shot as we were landing in JFK, NYC)

After transiting over at Doha (sat on Qatar Airways), we finally landed at NYC 24 hours later. Trust me, the flight there was an experience on its own and my friends can vouch for that. So we took the car and drove for 4 hours towards the land of oysters.

By the time we reached Boston, it was nearly 10pm so we ate at Island Creek Oysters Bar - the lobster noodles was too die for, cooked in portobello mushrooms and veal ragout.

We only had one day in Boston, and we had to cram in whale watching, freedom trail, etc. Unfortunately, we were a couple of minutes tardy and missed our ferry to go whale watching - so what other better way to spend your morning by taking a stroll around the marina en route to a big brunch?

Absolutely breathtaking - clear skies and calm waters. Couldn't resist taking photos of the different yacht and boats docked outside the apartments.

Tulips season in Boston! Wherever we saw a bed of tulips, we just had to stop and snap a shot.

After a 20 minute stroll, we finally arrived at Theo's Cozy Corner, situated in a tiny corner in Little Italy. Chanced this place on Yelp which had really good reviews. The female owner was really friendly and the portions were HUGE. For two petite asian girls, we each had a drink, eggs with corned beef for me, gnocchi for Xingy & french toast to share. Despite knowing about the huge portions, but of course, we didn't learn our lesson and ordered based on the whims of our  stomach.

Breakfast by the road - closest to what we could get in Italy! My dish consisted of 3 sunny side eggs, 4 slices of toast, a dollop of roasted potatoes and a chunk of roasted corned beef beneath the eggs. Coupled with a hot chocolate drink :D

Headed to Boston Memorial after the killer breakfast, and were once again welcomed by red tulips - below is a tulip-y shot with Trinity church at the backdrop. Very pretty!

After Boston Memorial stopover, we went to the start of the Freedom Trail to meet the Xiu, Xling, Pat & Annis! Saw this squirrel frolicking in the grass and I trailed it until it took refuge on a tree - its expression was unforgettable. Look at the way it's lounging on the tree, posing for the photo!

Started the freedom trail, one of the stops at the cemetery which had pretty tulips!

Hungry Annis decided to grab some famed lobster rolls & clam chowder at Quincy market!

Another stopover at this quaint little cafe - loved our candid expressions! Another making of the Boston Tea Party?

After that, I think it started to rain so we quickly finished the trail and headed back to our hotel to collect our trusted car - onwards to our next destination - Montreal! (:

celebrating the weekend in boracay (28/6/13-1/7/13)

Has 4 years swept by so fast?

When I was chilling in Boracay, I suddenly remembered this blog and thought of reviving this travel blog - hoping for many more adventures to come ;)

So my girl friends and I decided to take the weekend off to relax at an exotic island - and since we heard so much about Boracay from our Filipino colleagues, we booked our flights & hotel and zoomed away to the island.

Touched down at Kalibu airport after a domestic transfer at Manila, which we squeezed in our first meal of Jollibee - the palabok was yummy! Something similar to our mee siam, BUT instead of bee hoon, they used keng woon!

As per every trip, there will always be an airplane shot (: - couldn't resist as the clouds were absolutely fluffy.

We decided to pamper ourselves and stayed at Ambassador Paradise Resort which was located at Station 1. A 10 minute walk to Station 2 where all the restaurants and shops were, but it was fantastic because we had our own private beach. Really thankful we chose this hotel as it was more reclusive and the sand was definitely softer on our end!

When we reached Boracay island at around 3-4ish, we were welcomed by the blue skies and white sand - absolutely gorgeous! We were prancing around the beach like school children, squealing with delight.

And while we were walking along the beach, I saw this man paddling with a sort of surfboard and couldn't help but singing "dayung sampan" - a very pretty sight seeing different people doing the multitude of water activities available on the white sand beach.

And of course, the amazing sunset we were welcomed to on the first day of our trip (: Absolutely gorgeous.

The weather wasn't good to us over the weekend, so at my request, we decided to visit 7 Stones Resort (which I didn't know it was at the other side of the island!) We braved through the rain across the "less rich" area of Boracay - and the scene reminded me a little of Hainan Island and Siem Reap. Sharing with you a couple of pictures below.

En route, we got a little lost but a nice local led us the way! Good thing about Philippines is that they can all speak English. So we had to walk through this narrow walkway which was partially flooded.

All in all, we managed to reach 7 Stones Resort safely (:

The next day, we headed out to do island hopping and snorkelling and were astounded by how clear the water was! Can you spot how many starfishes there are in the photo below?

Braving through the flooded streets after the thunderstorms... unfortunately we couldn't head to Ariel's Point for cliff diving.

And on the last day, the weather was perfect! Fluffy clouds, blue skies, majestic sun and of course the white sand! Really love the shots I snapped.

Especially love the shot below, #nofilter. Think this was the best shot of my whole trip (:

Oh my - we're getting to the best part of the trip - food! Since the weather was being barmy and sprouting showers and occasional thunderstorms, the next best thing we could do was to stuff ourselves with the local (and foreign) delicacies.

*Disclaimer: beach photos are not edited - that's how nice the white sand beach really was! No kidding. I've heard some proclaim that Boracay was 'too touristy' or 'too crowded', but honestly, I think it's one of the best beaches I've ever been too save those in Greece. If you are afraid of the crowd, stay where we stayed in Station 1 where you have access to your own beach.

FINALLY BACKK (:

Yes, I'm finally back home - back to good food and cheap deals. My flight back go delayed by 1 hour from Bruxelles to Londres. So my luggage wasn't checked into the plane from Londres to Singapour. Hence, I only received it today. But, man, I really didn't expect my luggage to be so heavy. Had Xingyan and Xiuli help me packed my bag before I left, but when I reached the airport, guess how much it weighed --> 41 freaking kilograms!!!!!!!!!! Of course i had to repack, and I almost missed my flight after missing 2 trains to get to the airport. Thankfully, the check-in staff were very kind and helped me repack. I had to shed 9 kilos from my big luggage (damn those books) and in the end, I checked in my backpack and took out another bag to stuff all the books from the pink luggage. So I had 2 duffel bags and 1 laptop to handcarry all the way from Brussels to Singapore, AND 5 coats. It was so, very heavy I nearly died. Luckily, I met nice people along the way who offered to carry my stuff. Thanks to the Vietnamese lady and the Belgian gentleman (:

So now, I'm back in Singapore, and I'm working on my way to pig out for the rest of the holidays! But first, gonna get some rest first. It's good to be home, even though it's really hard to adjust to the sudden climate change. And now, I see everything in EUROS. Gosh, how can things be so cheap?

je pars.. :(

omg omg omg!

je pars, je pars, je pars!

i'm leaving i'm leaving i'm leaving!

it's too fast, 6 months passed by IN A FLASH. omg. my room is totally empty now. all my kot mates have left. i have the whole apartment to myself but it's EMPTY! :(

i hate to say it but i'll miss this place. even though it's small, dreary - it holds memories I will cherish. gonna take 22h to fly back to s'pore - boredom. hopefully they'l allow me to check in my baggage. oh ya, exam just finished this morning too! (:

i'm really gonna miss my little hole here.

je ne veux pas partir LLN :((((

:(

I'm really gonna miss you guys...

titles are boring.

And so, just came back from luxembourg today, je suis très fatigue. BUT BUT BUT I shall continue and finish with the greece trip. It is tough trying to pick like 20 photos out of 1200+ photos which I took, to publish it on the blog. Ack.

Ok, after Mykonos, we headed to Delos Island to check out the ancient ruins. The ferry ride was approx 35 mins to head there, and we only had one half hours to finish the whole thing (which we obviously couldn't), so we had to rush through the sights and in the end we missed alot of good ancient ruins. :(

Above is the Terrace of the Lions, which was dedicated to Apollo by the Naxians at the end of 7th century B.C. You can imagine how long ago that was. The lions, technically were in considerably good shape considering how they spent more than 2 milleniums subjected to the heat and rain, etc. Also, you can see that their mouths are half-open in an eternal roar.

Taking the first ferry out as we had to rush to catch our other ferry heading back to Athens. The boat had no more space left in the enclosed area, so we had to resort to sitting on the deck(?), and the waters were really choppy and occasionally crash into the boat. The old age must have really rusted my agility. Since I didn't move away fast enough, I got a little wet, but really, it was nothing of a big deal. Kept my burning skin cool (:

Above three photos were taken in Athens, as part of the archaelogical ruins.

icky mosquito

There is this irritating mosquito which keeps biting me! Argh! :X

Now i have more bitemarks to add to my collection gotten from Greece.

Wait and see you little black insect, once I see you I'm gonna smack you too oblivion. You'll be slobbering at my feet begging for mercy.

I hate mosquito bites, they itch. Boo.

greeeeeeece.

Bored of studying finance + REALLY tanned from greece + urge to update blog, hence my new entry after so long:

Only just returned from a 6 hour journey from greece near midnight, had a few hours of sleep, met chelsi in the morning to send her off in berlin, shopped around in delhaize, and then headed back to my reclusive hole to work on "Bond prices and Bond yields". Watched a bit of slow streaming korean drama (Queen of Housewives), and now contemplating whether to jog around the lake or listen to music and blog.

Cant believe it. Greece was my last holiday and destination of SEP!! And it was utterly amazing. The heat was blazing for every day that we were there, so now i'm as dark as a herbal chicken. It's amazing that i'm not burnt, and i'm thankful for it! (: Ok, so onwards is our journey in Greece. We had such an amazing time on the plane: yes, we sat on swiss air, SWISS AIR!!! (it was expensive, but the cheapest alternative) and wow we got snacks and drinks and we were like totally "OOHing" and "AAHing" after many months of enduring ryanair flights. Brilliant start to our trip.

And so, we landed in Athens, and embraced the heat (35 degrees), a drastic change from LLN's 20 degrees with chilly breezes. We decided to scout around the port for the first day, and then headed over to the city centre on the second day. We stumbled upon Athen's flea market and bought a few keychains here and chatted with the shopowner who was in his 60s and actually sailed to Singapore when he was a teenager. It was pretty cool, and he was nice, cuz he gave us each a "greeky" necklace for free, as a souvenir, cuz we were, as in his own words"too beautiful".

Athen's famous flea market

Lunch: Moussaka - yummylicious (:

The purple flowers cascading onto the floor was gorgeous (:

Journey on to Santorini on a 7 hour cruise, it was nearly excruciating because I had a minor scare with my duffel bag, the zipper totally flew off! I was nearing despair, but thank goodness xiuli fixed it for me (: hehe. This picture was taken on the deck when we were scouting around the ship cuz we were too bored.

Yeah, and we managed to catch the sunset too. Of course, my pictures wont do it justice.

Day Three: Santorini, Perissa

Vulchida Beach - black sand.

HAIYAH!

Us in our rented car for only 25€! Haha we took turns driving. The aircon was amazing (: And who ever thought you'll get a car with only a quarter of a tank full?

Oia: land of whites and blues.

Sunset in Oia. Haha we spent a bomb sitting in one of the restaurants just to watch the famed sunset in Ia. But it was well spent, cuz we ate for like nearly 2 hours and entertained ourselves throughout the whole sunset. The food was only so-so. But the experience was amazing (:

More of the after-sunset shots featuring the ever famous windmills. wheee. really really pretty.

Moonlight reflecting on the seawater: doesn't it look eerily like a scene from a scary show? I love the effect.

The next day at Perissa Beach. We stayed at Anny Studios Perissa Beach, which was rated the best hostel/hotel on hostelbookers. And I could see why, 'cuz the service was good. Only think I dont understand about Greece shower system is that 1) No shower curtain; 2) Tiny enclosure for you to shower, effectively wetting the whole toilet. And only in the islands did we have salty water. So, we had to survive on mineral water throughout the whole trip.

Our pathetic bunk cabins on the 1st night in mykonos. reminded me of OBS and camps. my ants were crawling with ants and there were insects darting in and out of our cabin as our door couldnt close tightly. Also, water was FREEZING COLD. Thank goodness they had a "bunalow" to squeeze in 4 people so all we had to pay was an extra 8€ for our own ensuite: WITH an aircon (lifesaver) and hot water.

We stayed in Paradise Beach, which is apparently the most famous beach in Mykonos 'cuz of the nightlife. And on the first night, there was a full moon party and here is a glimpse of the moon making its first appearance into the night. At first, we thought it was a parachute but then we realized it was the moon. Sheepish.

This house is lovely. Love the shade of green (one of my favorites) - it's hard to find such a nice shade on a house! <3

Little Venice on Mykonos! (:

Walking through the city centre of Mykonos. It's really very quaint and nice to walk down!

ACK! Apparently there's a famous legend behind this pelican. It was wondering alone near the Little Venice area and in this shot, he is flying down so that he could drink water from the tap which is below from where he is perched.

Braving through the heat, we decided to walk from Mykonos town centre to the new port... ... BAD IDEA. we were so repulsed by the heat after 4 days of soaking in the sun, that we had to take constant rests on benches along the side road. Xingyan & I tried to hitchike, to no avail. Boohoo. :(