A trip back to Suzhou

I went for a business trip to Suzhou, a place that I had stay for 2 years and a place that I had not gone back for 1 1/2 year.

Typically, heading to Suzhou, China is rather straight forward. Take a flight from Singapore to Shanghai, then a transport from Shanghai Pudong Airport to Suzhou. In total 9 to 10hrs will be good enough for a door to door tirp.

Unfortunately, this time round, due to the Chinese New Year peak season, I was not lucky to have a direct fly. I had a transfer at Hongkong, and overall, it took 12hrs for a door to door trip. And the worst is I had only 40mins upone the place arrival to Hongkong before I board the place to Shanghai. I had to walked real fast from one end of the terminal to the other end to catch the plane. The brisk walk was like army force march. Maybe, I am old, haha.

Suzhou was cold this time of the year. Temperature range from -3C to 5C during my stay of 3 days.

I was lucky to stay in one new hotel, Intercontinetal Hotel (苏州洲际酒店) next to Times Square. Everything was new. Room was big, curtains was motorised, LCD TV with news channels, movies channels, and local channels. Good spread of TV programs cater to all travellers. Free Internet was provided. The main lobby has WiFi too. Breakfast was great too. International buffet with soup noodles, porrige, Nasi Lemak, Tim Sum. All these come with a reasonable price of about 850rmb (tax included).

The hotel.

Day view of the Times Square from the hotel

Night view of the Times Square from the hotel

Suzhou has lot of new development after I left 1.5 years back. In the SIP, many new apartment, new neighbourhood centre, new shopping area. I did not manage to visit any of these due to time constraint but hope that I could do it again next time.

Friends in Suzhou did not change much. They are still as cheerful, friendly, hardworking as I left sometimes back.

In all, it was a good short trip and I would love to head back again in near future (if opportunities arises).

A day trip to (China Town) 牛车水

Last Saturday, after fetching my son from his dance class, we headed to China to do some shopping for Chinese New Year. Bought some Bal Kwa (not the super long queue brand).

As usual, the place was decorated for chinese new year.

A shop selling all the CNY decorative stuff. Most of the items are selling at $2.8 or 4 for $10. Reasonable price.

While heading home, we walked toward Chinatown Point, a shopping complex. There had a meet the "It's A Great Great World" Cast event going on. 3 of the casts from that show was present. They are Marcus Chin, Hui Ge and I think the "slightly" oversize lady is Ying Ying.



Nothing much, just another day.

Happy New Year

yet another year has past. time flies and everyone get older by another year, technology advances, more cars, more road, more cutting of trees, more disastrous all over the world. more pay increases, more sickness, well, what else.

anyway, wishing everyone who read this blog a Happy and Great 2011. Be strong, be brave, enjoy what you have and you will be happy throughout the year.

Recent activities

My family recently went for a wedding lunch at Top of UOB. Am I right, I think the place is called Top of UOB. Food was nice and grand. View from the restaurant was great and I took 2 pictures of the Marina Bay area.




On another weekend, we went to the open field area near Anchorvale CC. This is what we saw in the sky. Many different types of kites flying. I should get one for my son during the school holiday as well. Kite flying too high so too small to view... Click on it to view a bigger picture.



Singaporean favorite hobby. Eat...
Went to an industrial park canteen for dinner. These are the dishes we had. The green was very good. Not too sure how they did it but it tasted just nice. Not too raw or too cook. The most expensive dish was the stewed pork rib on the right. It was well cooked and it melt in the mouth. The taste was above average.

Mainland Singapore Last Kampong

There have been quite some talks about the Singapore Mainland Last Kampong recently. In newspaper, in forums as well as web blogs. So, I told myself, why not take a visit to that last Kampong since it is located 10mins drive away from where I stay, it is located at Lorong Buangkok.

When I reached the place at about 3.30pm, to my surprise, on top of those cricket and insect chipping, there is another louder sound. A woman was singing the karaoke. Those 1970s mandarin song.

While walking, I can smell the hot afternoon mud smell (土香味) and the road in is a little muddy. Well, what do I expect from a kampong right. I also saw a group of middle-age artists hiding under shade of tree and doing their best to capture the last mainland kampong. Sorry, I am quicker, I use my Omnia to capture it but yours will be more meaningful. Haha...

Here are a couple of pictures for your viewing.
This is the main road leading to the little kampong of about 20 houses.

A zinc roof house with the overhead power cable leading to the house.

Tapioca planted right in front of the house.

Hibiscus and the letter box

Nice foot path with coconut tree. Really hard to find this in mainland but lot of similar footpath in Pulau Ubin.

Saturday outing

feeling bored and no way to go. remember that there is a paranakan restaurant at katong. asked if wifey was interest for paranakan food, she was quite excited. as the lantern festival is arriving soon, we brought along 2 nice RWS lantern.

Katong has quite a lot of food chains. the only problem is parking. the parking space is very limited with less than 20 parking spaces along the main road. for those without must parallel parking skill, it is tough.

Let me show you the place and the food.

Ambience is great. There have about 10 tables that can sit 4 to 8 each. Not crowded during the 6pm to 7pm on a Saturday evening.

Ayam Sioh (Braised Chicken in Soya sauce). Taste a little sour. Not wifey and mine liking.

Babi Ponteh (lean pork). Normal, nothing great!

Ngoh Hiong, Meat roll. Sightly expensive but great food.

Sambal Kangkong. This is good. Not spicy but with enough balacan.

After dinner, we headed to East Coast Park since it is nearby Katong area. Setup the RWS lantern and Keith is enjoying it.

Evening Visit to Universal Studio Singapore

My friend Wee told me about this promotion that is going at Universal Studio Singapore (USS). It is a night visit to the USS without rides at a cost of S$5.00. Well, I thought it is a good deal since my family and I are not keen in taking the rides. So, we head to the place last Saturday.

Upon reaching at about 6:15pm, the queue was about 20mins wait, it is better than I expected. We were expecting at least 45mins to 1 hour queue time. We bought our tickets.

Look at the Queue, not too long but still substantial

The ticket to the USS

At it was not time to enter the park yet (7pm is the entry time), we took some pictures with the Universal Globe.




Keith always enjoy water fountain. he would usually get wet during such play.

After some times, we entered the park. IT was actually quite crowded with many taking pictures. We walked to the pond area where the Battlestar Galactica that is still closed due to a technical issue during the testing before the park is opened.

Here is the picture of the closed Battlestar.

The kids were enjoying taking pictures with the car. Even the one in the stroller.


More pictures of them.

Some night pictures of the park



A group picture of us taken at the Madagascar

We were rather surprised that only about 1/4 of the park is opened during the evening session but with the S$5 ticket price, I do not really complain much. Further to the reasonable ticket price, it comes with up close firework at 10pm.

If you are not keen on rides, it is worthwhile making a visit to the USS evening promotion during the Friday and Saturday evening. Not too sure when will the promotion end.

SengKang and Puggol Park Connector

Last year December, I showed some pictures of the SengKang and Punggol Park Connector along the Sungei Serangoon. This Saturday, I re-visited the place and took some pictures again. The same section had been completed but construction is still going on to beautify the place. It is still closed to public. I wish that this connector be open ASAP allowing Sengkang and Punggol residents have another nice track for jogging, strolling as well as cycling.

fire-cracker 鞭炮

i remember vaguely that when I were young, about 8 years old, I were still staying in those old attap house in a village. During Chinese New Year, we were still allowed to set off fire cracker. There were this one time when we were playing it. After the whole roll of cracker were set off, everything went quiet. After few minutes later, I were picking up one of those blind cracker (those that did not explored) and out of sudden, it explored in my hand. It was damn painful and I could fell the burning sensation, even now when I talked about it, I could still remember the pain. Anyway, fire cracker was banned in Singapore in early 1970 due to fire hazard particular attap houses.

Staying in China the last 2 years, I get to see or hear fire cracker very frequently after more than 30 years. The Chinese set off fire cracker whenever there are happy events occurred, such as marry, give birth, opening ceremony and many more. During the Chinese New Year in China, you get to see so many particular the eve as well as the 15th day. The best part is it is inexpensive. A roll such as this cost about 40rmb.

Keith posing with the roll of 5m long fire cracker.

where i stayed

I was browsing google map recently, noticed that it had updated it China satellite map. I started to locate the house that I stayed for 2 years. WoW! I manage to locate it (marked with a RED dot). Let me recap back the life staying in this house. Double stories with a garage to keep my 4 bicycle and a electric scooter. Wondering when would I be able to stay in such house in Singapore. Even can afford, the surrounding will be different. In China, the surrounding nearby has a lake and lot of green and open land. Maybe, I buy a house in China!

one year!

I was checking out some pictures that i took during china. noticed that time past fast. it has been one year after returning from china. woh! just can't believe it. I felt that it was like just yesterday.

some pictures to recap thing that were different from Singapore.

My first time riding mountain bike. This bike was a loan bike from the shop. We went to climb a mountain in Suzhou. It was May 2008. That time weather was rather hot. After this first time, i started to ride more mountain bike. Few weeks later, I bought my own bike.

holiday

keith's mid-year school holiday started on the 31st May and last for 4 weeks. we been thinking and looking for a place for vacation. finally decided for a short trip to Malaysia Desaru for a 2D1N full board fruit farm tour.

we were to head to Desaru by Ferry and back by Ferry. the ferry journey 35mins from Changi Ferry Terminal. The only issue is the ferry left at 7:15am in the morning. Thus, by 6:30, we are to reach the ferry terminal. Anyway, we made it and enjoy our trip to desaru.

In summary, it was a very good trip with good food. We got to have unlimited durian for dinner, unlimited fruits during most of the meal. One of the lunch include lobsters (though it is a little small). I put on weight after the trip. Damn!!!

Other high light of the tour include the fruit farm, Ostrich farm firefly. Enough of saying but pictures for your viewing.

Mediacorp Veteran Artiste Huang Wenyong was leading the tour.
Dragon fruit (龙株果)
Durian, my family favarite
Ostrich Farm
Feeding ostrich with corn.
Free flow of tropical fruit
Fresh Jack Fruit (好大的波罗蜜)
Durian
Aftermath. We had dinner and at least 10 durians. Look at the mess...
Butter crab
Lobsters
Resort
Resort
Beach