lunch @ element

it's our traditional birthday meal for the birthday boys, gordon this month and belatedly for ky. ky suggested element cafe at amara hotel.

the spread is reasonably good for the price although i wished there were oysters. :P

as usual my enormous appetite raised some eyebrows although i didn't really think i overeat today. hehe...

dinner and drinks

doris wanted to meet up with the guys and suggested having dinner at pasta de waraku. as usual gordon is late. kind of expected liao. :P

it was a rather long wait for a table of 5 and ky joked that we should have told gordon that the dinner plans are changed to drinks and desserts since a smaller table will be more readily available. haha...

fortunately, doris made a reservation at tcc next door and we didn't have to wait again for our drinks and desserts. it's a very small outlet but warm and cosy with an intimate ambience. as with most tcc outlets now, the look is posh.

pulau dayang

it has been almost 1 year since our last dive trip, after much to-ing and fro-ing, we managed to settle on a date which all 4 of us can make it. and much to everyone's surprise, gordon's coming along too!

for this trip, i got my wet suit and marine case for my lumix. had great fun 'trying' to take pictures underwater. boy, it wasn't easy to keep still in the waters. guess my bouyancy control is not quite there yet.

ky helped us to refresh all our diving skills and drills.

as usual, heavy medication saved me from embrassment and feeding the fishes. there weren't many divers this time round. maybe because it's nearing the end of the season? or there was a long weekend just the week before?

to our amazement, gordon said he enjoyed the break on pulau dayang even without all the 5-star luxuries. the guys and doris also enjoyed themselves 'torturing' this small school of baby fishes by the beach. :)

glad we made time to go diving! yeah!

crystal jade lamian xiaolongbao

met up with an ns pal, ts, together with gordon and ky for dinner.

we queued for more than half an hour at takashimaya. this outlet is always so popular. i guess the food taste better when you’re hungry.

haha… just kidding! their standards are usually consistent even among the various outlets.

my favourites items?
1. suanlatang lamian
2. xiaolongbao
3. hongyou chaoshou

i especially like the texture of their freshly-made lamian and how it’s always cooked al dente.

slurp.

ikoi @ miramar hotel

made the reservations for the restaurant 3 weeks back. and yet i couldn’t get a table for saturday night dinner. it was already fully booked! so it’s really that popular...

settled for today’s lunch instead. just as well since it’s gordon’s birthday today.

ikoi is a rather small restaurant serving an ala carte buffet. $30+++ for both lunch and dinner.

ky and me were mainly interested in the sashimi. had quite a few servings of sake, maguro, hamachi, tako and kajiki sashimi. very fresh indeed, no fishy smell at all.

besides sashimi, we had salad, temaki, california maki, chicken teriyaki and ebi tempura. the food is generally of good standards. we were also served 2 soups that were not on the menu: teapot and seafood soup.

we had to wait for a while for the food to be served after ordering. wonder how bad the waiting time will be if there was a capacity crowd.

overall a good dining experience.

ippt

the dreaded 4-letter word for every [unfit] nsmen...

gordon finally cleared his ippt today after 2 attempts. he had some problems with clearing the 2.4 km run under 13:00

think i better start training for my ippt soon since my ict is coming up next february… need to work on my pull-ups and running liao…

drinks @ km8

how did we ended up here?

well, ky is driving and doris don’t feel like going home earlier so we decided to check out the beach pubs @ sentosa.

by the time, we reached sentosa, it was already past midnight. a party was on-going at siloso beach near coastes that was organised by fashion tv for some bikini babe competition. but km8 was nowhere in sight.

so we decided to go over to tanjong beach… and lo & behold, km8 is there! :)

quite happening for such a out-of-the-way location at almost 1:00 am.

most of the folks were casually dressed for a beach party in tees/bermudas or tank tops/beach shorts and slippers. those at the dip pool were in swim wear even. wonder if they’ll catch a chill in the cool midnight air.

ky commented that there’re quite a number of caucasians.

i also don’t know what do you call the type of music that’s played there. but it’s danceable with no vocals. not house definitely. i’m so out of touch with the clubbing scene. old liao!

gordon was spacing out while ky didn’t drink because he’s driving. since nobody in our group danced that night, we didn’t stay too long.

when we adjoined to fong seng for supper, gordon made his escape. hehe…

dinner @ sakae

had intended to eat at sun with moon @ wheelock but because we didn’t have a reservation, kl & mx went to queue for a table at sakae instead.

in the end, the whole lot of us made it for dinner. ky, gordon and thomas too.

sakae is celebrating their 8th anniversary. so there’s a 2 red plates for $8 promotion plus privilege card members get a generous 18% off the bill. very good value, right?

and then we went to sun with moon for desserts again. :)

this time round, i had the matcha bararoa and a orange vitamin cocktail.

nice!

lunch @ kuishin bo

actually kuishin bo wasn't our first choice for ky's birthday treat since we've already tried it before but i couldn't get saturday dinner reservations at the other 3 that were written on in the straits times a few weeks back.

for sun lunch, it is $25.80+ for a spread that includes sashimi, sushi, prawn tempura, cold crabs and of course the signature kaminabe [paper pot]. quite good value i would say. gordon says it's better than a more expensive japanese buffet that he had in kl.

the sashimi spread consists of sake, maguro and ika only. there's a selection of sushi and maki. you can also order your preferred temaki. besides these, there're a couple of rice dishes and meats for teppanyaki.

another section consists of the cooked/fried items like shishamo, soft-shelled crab and grilled salmon. my favourite potato salad is available too. desserts are morsels of cheesecakes, cakes and konyakku. there's soft-serve green tea ice-cream and fruits too.

too bad kl couldn't make it 'cos he has to decide on his floor tiles for his home renovation starting on tuesday.

stuffed myself silly with sashimi and drank too much green tea. didn't have space for the kaminabe or the teppanyaki, think i getting old liao... :)

burp.