Happy Birthday Singapore!

I am always procrastinating when it comes to blogging. I would only blogged about stuff/events eves or even months after it happened. Have to admit that I haven't been very diligent about blogging but I am trying my best to keep this space updated albeit the busy schedule I have. Recently, I have picked up photoshop so I can have more pretty pictures to post. Since I am in advertising, I feel like I have to put in more effort to make my visuals more appealing. 

New Fat boy diner bar just right below our office, farewell lunch for one of my creative art director. You can get chunky juicy filling burgers at Fat's boy, you can't go wrong with burger and fries here. Other than occasions, my lunch is pretty boring. I am missing those days where I packed food to work.

Side track, Patrick the starfish was a new addition to the family and my creative decided to dress him up hahaha, so adorable right!

So yes, I decided that I shall blogged on how I spent my National day before I start to procrastinate again. I remember last year national day I spent my evening jogging while A. and his brothers were playing soccer. This year, I managed to spend more quality time, which includes my brunch dates, some exercise and family time. Woke up and head out for brunch with sissy and the boys. I am so happy to be able to catch up on my sleep after a crisis thursday night where my colleagues and I had to work over the night to churn out 90 artwork. Most of them went home at only 5am.

We visited the Sunday Markert @ Lim Tua Tow road which is pretty near to where we stay.

          

Tucked along Lim Tua Tow road, it is a well hidden cafe along the row of shop houses. When we walked into the cafe, we saw plants/flowers and bicycle parts used as decorations. Its vintage decor such as the brick walls and chandeliers gave us a cozy ambience. I was particularly intrigued by what they pulled together, kinda mixture of everything, living to their name 'Sunday Market.

    

Skinny wings and truffle fries for $6.90- I enjoyed the strong truffle taste(at least I could taste it better than I could smell) and crispy wings.

Fried Chicken waffles for $11.90- Savoury waffles does look interesting however I find it a little dry without any sauce to go along. A tad boring for the palate.

Sissy ordered an organicjuice imported from New Zealand, refreshing and spells healthy!

    

Next up, I ordered the smoked salmon and cheese on buttered toast-$12.90. I am always after salmon but this dish is not exactly pleasing. It really depends on individual, I prefer my scrambled eggs to by more fluffy. Cream cheese was mixed in chunks, gelat on one bite if you happened to taste the cheese. Salmon wise I could see quite a fair bit in the mixture but I still prefer big slices of smoked salmon served instead of mixing them with the scrambled egg. Now I lost the salmon and its smokey taste.

Eggs benedict $12.90- Classic choice for brunch food, well-poached eggs soaked on their hand made toast.

I was actually craving for some duck and influenced A. to order the pulled duck sandwich-$13.90
We all didn't like this dish, smoked duck was a little dry to begin with. At least A. likes its thick handmade buttered toast. I wasn't a fan of its thick and unfluffy toast though but will definitely keep you full easily.

Sunday market serves pocket friendly dishes. It is a pretty new cafe in the seangoon/kovan estate. For those who couldn't bear the wait (at least an hour on weekends) at Lola's cafe, perhaps you can consider Sunday's market down the road.

Sunday Market

22 Lim Tua Tow Road

Singapore 547772

Monday - Friday: 1pm - 10pm

Saturday - Sunday: 11am-11pm

Deliberately dressed in red and white coordinates with my new Nike shoes. I am very proud of my new running shoes. I love the colour and I can wear it out as sneaker as well.Got it below my S$100 budget, ka ching, great accomplishment here.

   

After brunch was work-out time! Sissy and her bf have been playing badminton regularly. When we were much younger, our weekends will be over at granny's and play badminton with my cousins. I am so rusty now. A good 1.5 hours of badminton and thrashed by the older couple. Going to brush up my skills after my Sept dance concert.



After working out, we fed ourselves with desserts at Sunday Folks. Our affinity with Sunday Cafes. Opened by the same group of people who created Creamier, Sunday Folks concept is slightly different from the usual ice-cream spots around. Its concept is towards minimalistic with an open kitchen concept to show how their ice-cream and cakes are made. It is a few doors away from Bakers & cook along the shop houses at Chip Bees Garden estate. You probably won't be able to spot Sunday folks from a distance with its small and almost unnoticeable signboard flagging.

Soft served ice-cream with limited choice of flavours, you are void from being fickle at the counter to try all the flavors available. We went ahead with Summer Berries and Earl Grey Lavender, waffles.  The latter is a unique flavour and in A's words, it taste like the Lavender toilet spray, GUYS tsk. Sis and I prefer summer berries to Earl grey lavender, berries hardly goes wrong. As usual, their waffles did not disappoint, light and fluffy. I would love to go back and try their signature Pistachio in cone (black cone).

    

Ordered a glass of Homemade summer Iced tea, refreshing and goes really well with a sweet dessert.

My sis always looking so sweet and I am just a glutton that cannot hide her excitement.

 

Spot me still in red and white coordinates, such patriotism!

Sunday Folks
44 Jalan Merah Saga, Chip Bee Gardens #01-52 
Singapore 278116
6479 9166
Tue-Sun: 12pm-10pm
Closed on Monday. 
http://www.sundayfolks.com

Dinner was at A's place. When we arrived, his mum was preparing dinner and unusually volunteered to stay in the kitchen and helped.  Highly possible that I had ample rest and wasn't tired from badminton session earlier. Usually I will be very very tired over the weekends after my dance rehearsals. I LOVE PH!

Cheeky A thought it was a very rare scene and video-ed it down.

Really love holiday like this when I can chill and relax.
XOXO,
Smileybrows.

#Brunchdategirls to go Taiwan- High Speed Rail to TaiChung | Day 2

Started our day pretty early on day 2 because we were traveling out of Taipei City! While we were walking to the train station, we came across this small eatery selling Taiwan 小吃 so we decided to   have our breakfast there.

Oily rice, 油饭.

Sweet Tempura 甜不辣.

Oyster mee sua 面线.

Our initial plan was to visit the Yong He Dou Jiang near our place. The cab driver from the night before told us there was one outlet near to where we stayed, but google map failed us. Lucky we visited this small eatery and the owner was very friendly and helpful. One of her old time customer stopped by to chit-chat and found out that we wanted to try Yong He Dou Jiang. She chased after us (we bidded good bye and left after this selfie) and recommended us some snacks that we should try and things we should do in Taipei. It was quite a long walk, but she was super nice and friendly to walk us all the way there.

Yayyy! Some of us were really excited to try Yong He because we really love the soya milk and bean curd we had in Singapore branch, located at Geylang. Sadly, this branch in TW doesn't sell bean curd.

This is located right outside Yong Chun Station Exit 4.

After getting more food, we embarked on our journey to Tai Chung.

We got our ticket at Taipei main station via the ticket machine which was really easy and hassle-free. You can also check the train timing or pre-purchase your tickets on their website. We were really lucky that the train frequency is quite frequent.

Second round of breakfast:

I love the 豆浆, soy milk!

Yanning is always read for photos. 

We took the express train which only stopped for two stations before arriving at TaiChung, the journey was slightly less than an hour. It was an impromptu decision to head there. So after arriving, we had to ask around before we could figure our way.

We could either take another rail train, cab or take bus 155. We chose the cheaper alternative, I can't remember how much was the bus fare but it was relatively cheaper compared to the other two options. We boarded bus 155 from one terminal to another. The journey towards LiPhao land, 麗寶樂園 was about another hour with smooth traffic. It will be a lot faster if we take the train and then hopped on to bus 155 for a couple more stops. We wanted to save the hassle for the transfers so here we go. 

Putting on the shades to prepare for nap time!

Photo-bombed Wenhui's 'candid shot' haha!

June season was the Typhoon/raining season, when we were there, it rain every single day. When we arrived at Lihpao land, it was pouring very heavily and we were so worried that it will be a wasted trip since most of the outdoor rides will be closed. While waiting for the rain to stop, we hid at this small arcade stall and played the toy catching machine. #Thingswedotokilltime

We were really lucky, after about a good half an hour, the rain became smaller and we went ahead to buy the entrance tickets. Initially, it looked really quiet and we thought it was closed. I guess there wasn't much crowd on a weekday and school just started. Anyway, for those who have watched 5566(TW boy band) entertainment show, they had this outdoor show whereby they visit theme parks and had to complete some challenges while on the ride. They visited this theme park to conquer the craziest roller coaster, you will know why in a while.

As it was still drizzling, we decided to go indoor and play our bumper car. I love pong pong car when I was a kid where they set up a small driving area at Parsa Malam. 

We had a lot of fun laughing and chasing each other, ignoring the other drivers.

Station 2- Sonic Circle. This looks really harmless and we didn't know how does it work since it was really empty and most rides wasn't operating yet. 

After getting on the ride, we realized it was actually pretty exciting because it started spinning faster and faster that I almost flew out, and Wenhui who is super afraid of rides was screaming like mad behind us. HAHA and just when we thought it was about to stop, it started reversing and travel backwards. I wonder if I have watched 5566 played this ride on their show before.

My adventurous kaki-Candice who sat all the rides with me! Again, we didn't know how it works and decided to just try since we are here. Got to make our tickets value for money. So this was how it looks like when we arrived, one thing for sure, I knew it was not going to be kid friendly.

The water raft ride which took us almost abt half an hr to decide if we want to get on it. Most of us refuse to get on because it will get us drenched. We saw how the other riders came down totally drenched. After contemplating for the longest longest time, 4 of us went up the ride. The only reason why I went up was because these was odd numbers so I sacrifice to go up, risking being drenched. Hahaha wenhui on the other hand is not afraid of getting drenched but terribly scared of height. She made us hook our hands(interwined) so she would feel safer hahahahaha! To be honest this is one of the higher water raft ride, pretty steep slope. While the raft was inching up the slope, the girl beside me cannot stop screaming and shouting😏

   

I call this the washing machine ride. It spins 360 degrees like a washing machine, helped us to spin dry after the water ride. The guy beside us was posing weird faces for the gf hahaha but I think he really look hilarious.

It was still drizzling and we wanted to take a break so we went to catch an acrobatic cum dance show, honestly it was quite disappointing because we could tell the dancers were just marking their steps. Nonetheless, a chance for group shot.

Can you see this crazy ride where the track is disconnected. 180 degree hanging before we plunged down. When the ride started, it went straight upslope to the highest point and I was screaming like crazy. The anticipation is really not funny lor and I had to sit on the ride alone because we had odd numbers. Bravely volunteered to sit alone, why did I... But it was really quite fun, except that I got off the ride feeling dizzy and had to take a break.

Scared 到！

My stiff smile before going for the craziest ride ever!

You can watch the clip of the ride here:

Walking to another part of the theme park where the rides are friendlier!

    

The child-friendly roller coaster, similar to enchanted airway in USS but slightly faster. We went on the ride twice continuously because the guys behind us asked for one more round even before we could get down. Without a choice, our dear Wenhui was scared to death when she had to go through the ride once more.

      

Our attempt to selfie with the ferry wheels in the background but clearly failed.

Then some friendly taiwanese volunteered to help us with a photo, but also failed to capture the ferris wheel.(lol)

I had no idea why all of us simply walked in without thinking that we will get wet. Funny how we took half an hr to get on the previous water ride and was only slightly splashed while all of us got wet butts and back from this ride. 

The huge air dryer to help us dry our body. They also provided hair dryer after the ride for people who wants to dry themselves, but is pay per use basis.

On this circular boat, we never know who is going to get wet. Lucky enough, all of us got down with wet butts.

The mission to go on Merry-go-round. Took us very long to finally find this ride. This sums up the end of our day:)

         

 I looked so happyyyyy! Weeeeee

          

Super tired after the adrenalin wore off, we skipped lunch that day and only got some snacks to share. Since there wasn't many food stalls around and also we didn't wanted to attempt the rides with a full tummy.

It took us more than 1.5 hours for the bus journey back to the station and our dinner plans got delayed. We were all starving by the time and had to get my fav croissant before boarding the HSR back to Taipei.This was life-saving! I love croissant, toasted plain croissant, chocolate croissant, with layered yeast leavened-dough. I guess partly because I was just too hungry. 

We went back to the apartment to freshen up and prepare for the night activity-CLUBBING. Our virgin experience of Taiwan night activities at LUXY club, used to be the biggest dance club in Taiwan but recently I think their standards might have dropped with better clubs coming up.

Cheers to an awesome time in TAIWAN!

 

Selfie in the posh girl's toilet. They even have like a huge area with mirror specially designed for selfie moments and at the other end with a victorian style sofa. The toilet might be my fav area of Luxy!

All of us put on different shades of red lipsticks, love how different we all looked. 

We had some good music while we were at the dance floor and in between they had dance performances, which helped to  get the crowd high, (mostly the zai nan). For the party goers, you will definitely love Taiwan nightclubs, lets get the party going!

XOXO,
Smileybrows