Zürich - Day II

Day 2, Octavia and I didn't wanna waste our last day hibernating in the hotel so we decided to take a walk to the city.




Curious dog


Crowne Plaza is around here

















For lunch, we had kebab and Corona beer. Then it was back to hotel, and back home...


Next up...

Ahmedabad

Mahatma Gandhi

5 December 2008 - Zürich

Zürich Day I
As promised, this post is all about Zürich. Zürich is a beautiful city - old and rustic with a lot of history, just like most of the other European cities. It is also where I had my first experience with snow. I'll never forget when I first stuck my tongue out into the freezing air to taste snowflakes haha.

And the tour we've decided to go on was Mount Titlis that claims to have snow all year round. Luckily it was winter anyway so snow was in abundance!

In the tram on our way to the pickup location for the tour

Judith and Octavia(hmm...notice how this post is similar to that of my Paris post)

The rest of the pictures there on was a blur because they were all taken from the bus. But this is a nice clear-ish shot of of a 'cottage' on the way up to a little town called Engelberg where Titlis is.

'Cottage'


so excited to see snow!

From Engelberg, we took a cable car up the mountain. The weather got worse as we ascended. We were told that the temperature would drop as low as -17°C outside!!

Brrrrr!

As we arrived, there were a few places from which we can start. This is the glacier tunnel. Apparently the temperature in here never goes higher than 0°C. Hence the glacier stays frozen and the tunnel remains even during summer. See this little column I'm leaning against? There are buttons on top of it with names like "Disco" and "Pop" ...etc. Press on a button and the tunnel is instantly played with the choice of music. As for me, I pretty liked the "Yoddle"!

Yoddle-lay-hee-hoo!





Surprisingly, the particular tour company we decided to join that day had us and two other people only...

This is what happens when you set FOUR cameras on timer to go off at the same time

Later on, we put our sustenance towards cold to the test and out we went into the blizzard!

Dense!




What's a snow experience without snow angels?

Lunch time. The best thing about the cold is you get to sip chocolate at its best - super hot and frothy! Mmm mm! And by the way, that meal there was heavy on the cost, literally! They charge by weight up there so you really 'watch your weight' when you eat, mind the puns!



Leaving Titlis

I love this picture because of its background. Stunning mountains nice pine trees. It's as if God was coating His Black Forest Cake with icing sugar...sweet :)


Next, the tour took us to the city of Luzern (or Lucern)for a little souvenir shopping, in case we didn't get enough of them at Titlis.




Back in Zürich Central Station, there was a night market made especially for Christmas. There were pushcart stalls everywhere selling decorative items and everything Christmas. They even had stars projected on the ceiling!


And there stood this huge Christmas tree with white glittery things all over it. A closer look and we realized these white things are in fact...



...Swarovski crystals!

-n-

Paris - Day II

Long delay there from Day I to Day II. Mostly because I was so lazy...and photobucket was giving me upload problems. Anyways this is Day II of Paris:

Day II, I set out to explore Paris on my own since none of the rest wanted to leave the hotel. I rented a bicycle from the self-help bicycle stands available in many parts of the city, pretty convenient stuff.


Panorama of Paris


The French Statue of Liberty by the Seine

Then of course there were brands like these:




And these are just some of the nice scenery taken which look very postcard-ish...




I finally arrived at Notre Dame, the iconic landmark of renaissance Paris. This is where Quasimodo the hunchback bell ringer came from!!! Haha

Infront of Notre Dame, which means "Our Dame" or "Our Lady"



Here are the people who helped me took a picture of me in front of Notre Dame. They were doing a bit for some TV channel or university video project...


They say Paris is the most romantic city in the world where one finds love and falls in it, I say it is also a weird city where one finds strange encounters:

A car is parked outside a church...


The police spotted the car...


The police woman takes a look at the car...


Is it just me or is the car damn weird looking. So is it because it was parked at a no-parking zone or were the police as amused?

The day was short lived, I had to report for work in the evening. I had late lunch after my day around Paris and what an expensive place to live in. A plate of steak with a glass of apricot juice cost €14, that's MYR70!


So there you go, Day II at Paris. Sorry I have to keep the posts concise and limit the number of pictures since I'll have tons of posts coming up.


NEXT UP - ZÜRICH

Paris - Day I

It's been exactly four months since I first step foot into Paris. It was my birthday when I arrived. I can still remember the thrill when I peeked out of the aircraft window. And just before I disembark, my colleagues gave me a surprise birthday bash with cake and all - business class style :D

Here's just a summary of events
The next day, Cass, Cherry, Karen and I decided to tour Paris:


That's chez Clément restaurant - quite a posh place. Le Meridien(where we stayed) is just a few doors away.

We headed down Avenue de la Grande Armée towards Arc de Triumphe. There we had breakfast by the street - French omelette with sausages and a hot cup of chocolate, coupled by the cold autumn(near winter) weather <- This is my dream come true, man!
Rue Saint-Ferdinand


Arc de Triumphe

To go to Champs Elysées, we have to go through an underpass.

Champs Elysées

From Champs Elysées we took a train to the Louvre.



The infamous glass pyramid of Louvre


The Louvre is situated in a huge courtyard where there are statues everywhere. Cass is with one here hehe

Outside Louvre there's a pond for ducks and gulls to feed. While I was attracted to the birds, this little French cutie caught the girls' eyes. Her dad was kind enough to share some bread to feed the birds




We continued our journey to a shopping mall called La Fayette. On the way we stopped by a little shop for some crêpes just around Place de la Concorde

Place de la Concorde


Crêpes!

After crêpes, we were off to La Fayette to shop. Louis Vuitton? Anyone? Not me!
On the way...


Lost?


Crossing Rue Duphot at Boulevard de la Madeleine


...found a church - The Madeleine


Inside Madeleine


The National Music Academy

After a couple of hours waiting for the girls to get their LV stuff, we could finally go visit the Eiffel Tower!



Down by the road just before the tower, there's a working carousel and a few snack stalls. This particular stall looked very amusing...

...dizzy...

The sign says Churros bien chaud. Churro is a spanish pastry very much like doughnut but is deep fried. Read more about it here
This is how it's made. First the CHURROMAN squeezes the dough out of the machine, which molds it into an long 8 sided star like PLAYDOH. He then cuts the dough into desired length, right into a hot pot of oil.

Churros bien chaud - Very hot Churros!

Once the churros are cooked to golden perfection, he tosses them with sugar and voila! It's done. :D


A 'pyramid' of churros cost 5 euros and with and addition of 1 euro, you can have nutella chocolate for dips!

yummy!


Just in time for a group photo after some yummy churros

Being under the Eiffel tower was surreal. I remember having to see pictures or watch movies(like this one here) of the Eiffel tower and think "how I wish I were here", and here I was it was right under my nose...in a way.



The queue at the tower was tremendous! We waited for almost an hour to get our tickets. To go all the way up to the top of the tower costs 12euros but it was worth it after all. The view was breath taking even though it was freezing up there.


A view from the top indeed!


North, South, East and West pillars





Later that night after returning from sight-seeing, we went for a feast of mussels at Léon de Bruxelles near our hotel.


That's all for Day I in Paris. In Day II, I will be out and about in Paris alone, on a bicycle!

Hoorah!

I have finally decided to get off the couch and start posting some pictures here. Yippie! There are tons of pictures coming up. Here's a teaser :P

Taman Pertanian

A couple of weeks ago my sister, Kelly and I decided to go have a look see the very 'famous' Taman Pertanian in Shah Alam. I've been there when I was a little boy but only remember passing by the padi fields...and that is all. Since Kelly's dad would take his morning jobs here every Sunday, we decided to bump into him that day.

As we approached the entrance of the park, there were multiple sign boards that had different names to the park, which was pretty confusing. Once there, there wasn't much amusement to it. It was just a normal park. I remember the crowds of people cramming on the little tar road to see the park when it was newly opened. Here are some pictures taken there.


Here is a monument at entrance of the park (where you pay to enter). It's some sort of concrete monument that signifies a tree that bears all fruits. You can see concrete durians and mangosteens here.


Kelly and my sis, Suan pose for the camera. Here is where we waited for the park to open. We had free sausage McMuffins for free courtesy of me!


Heard what the parot said? No. The parot made no noise. The myna bird on the other hand can make motorbike honks!



Just in case you guys don't know what a myna is, this is it. I didn't take this photo.


It's like a little zoo here. There are so many animals!


There are porcupines!?


...and a domestic cat...


God knows what this turkey is fussing about!


Lizard. Spotted it when I was taking a picture of myself by the lake.


The most fun thing to do while you're here is to cycle. Once you're tired, the next best thing to do is to take the bus.

There were lots of flowering plants too but I didn't get to take most of them properly. Here are some:


Here using macro, my favorite styles of all, I took a bed of fallen mango flowers.


If I were 75, there would have been countless pictures of Bunga Raya just like this.

After the whole morning on bike, we resorted to taking the bus and had a final view of the whole park without having to walk. It's really relaxing to just sit back and enjoy the view...

... and some good'ol fashion ice cream!!

'Ais Krim' served old school style! Yummy!!

Last Day at Work

Towards the last day of work, my colleagues and I planned to have a little feast to celebrate since three of us are leaving the company, Alright I know it's a little late, my job ended 30 April which was almost a month ago, but a post is still one if there's a story to tell.

So one fine Friday, we decided to makan at Italiannies in 1utama. It was my first time there.

Here are all the people who were there, including myself of course

There are a handful of Italian food to choose from but most of us had Carbonara. The carbonara there was wonderful. Just look at it!!

Carbonara


Lasagna("la-sa-nya")


Macchiato(that's "maki-ato")


Veggie Pizza

All the food here is scrumptious...but you don't have to take my word for it. Just look at Paul. Pictures indeed tell more than words :D

And for dessert....

Ice Cream Cake!

So there we go, all three of us Paul, Elvin and I leaving - Paul is with Public bank now, Elvin is in Maila (Manilla) and the team is now left with James and Sunny and two of our supervisors...sigh. Well, leaving or not leaving, I wish you guys all the best. May the force be with you.

It's Black! It's White! It's Micro Jession!

There are a lot of names to this drink. Some call it Hak Bak, some call it Cham, others just say soya bean cincau (cincau = leong fun = seaweed jelly). Whatever I you we they he she it call(s) it, it's a white colored drink with black jelly strips.

Lunch time. My supervisor Yong, guai lan colleagues James, Paul, Sunny, Elvin and I squeezed ourselves as usual into a car like self-packing sardines and chose Taman Megah as our lunch spot that day. We'd usually go there for the Gu Lou Yok (Old fashioned pork) rice. There, the drinks man would come and greet us and take our orders in English and Hokkien.

"SHAMONE!!" (that's Paul in the background...)

That day, the man's daughter (or so I pressume) came to take our order. I had a sudden craving for soya bean cincau and I didn't know what they call it here so I just said "soya bean cham leong fun" and hoped that it would be 'standard' enough for this area.

"OK, one Micro Jession" said the lady.

I had no idea what she just said. Confused, I turned over to look at James...

"Yala, Michael Jackson mah" he said, that soya bean cincau is called Michael Jackson in this area.

I was dumbfounded. And since Sunny always gets Michael Jackson and Lambo (Rambo) mixed up:

Soya bean + Cincau = Micro Jession @ Lambo

Anyho...

I finally own a laptop after so many months of waiting. I stated before in my previous post that I was considering only HP Compaq Presario V3700 series and also DELL Inspiron series but ended up buying something else. I've been told that it's not the best deal in town, but I'm loving it anyhow. Call me superficial if you may but I looooove how it feels - so solid!! So berqualiti!!

The Y410

A closer look

So here's the specs:

Lenovo 3000 Y410
Processor: Intel® Core®2 Duo processor T5550 (1.83GHz, 667 MHz, 2MB L2 Cache)
Memory: 2GB DDR2
Hard Disk: 160GB (5400rpm)
Graphics: Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator X3100

Everything else is standard: Bluetooth, Wifi, 6 cell battery, integrated 1.3MP web cam, 3 years extended warranty and insurance.

Everyday since I got my lappie, I can't wait to go home to it. And now I'm waiting to leave the office!