Pretty flowers in the sky

Ps: AC was a major failure. Sigh. Will complain another time. 

Imagine when it is raining and exploding little specks of lights in the sky. Yes you got me. FIREWORKS!!  Everyone loves fireworks, 

It all happened one fine day when Lay Queen brought home an event brochure about happenings at Penn's Landing. Since we have an upcoming trip to New York soon, she was whining about how we're going to miss the independance day fireworks. But then I skimmed through the brochure, and saw that on the very Saturday there was actually a display of fireworks for no apparent reason. It was an event called Wawa Welcomes America. 

So off the 6 of us went, minus Joshua but plus Ivan (Aaron's brother), headed off on the long long long walk down 11 blocks towards Penn's Landing. 

Camwhoring while waiting for late comer Kim Loon. 

We went there on empty stomachs, and knowing there is a food fare there in conjunction of the event, yumm yumm. I ordered crab fries, water ice, and a pina colada shake. 

And here is the display of several nice shots of those flowers I see in the sky. 

So pwetty!!!!! I felt like a little girls happy with bright lights shining in the sky. 

Bimbo-ism 123

Sometimes I wonder what is it like to being bimbotic. You know how ignorance is always such a bliss, and perhaps if you think the world is sunshine, and people smiling at you means they are genuine, and when you can't do anything (because you're the bimbo remember) there are always loads of people willing to help you (bimbo once again - pretty face), and you don't once suspect their intentions because you're freaking bimbotic everyone in bimbotic world is nice and smiley. 


And you get great gorgeous blond hair and totally pull it off. 


Life is so great ain't it. 


Trust me imagining the bimbo world isn't all I day dream about. I wonder how is it like to be schizophrenic as well. To have the whole world think you're crazy, and judge you, and avoid you, just because you can't help being born this way (no one plans on being a schizo), and you can trust no one on earth because you don't know if they're real or they're your hallucinations. 


So scary.


And I definitely wonder what it's like to be rich. I could definitely use a self pampering spa from head to toe plus manicures and pedicures in my own lavender scented room. (My room is lavender scented at the moment - bought a reed diffuser with my cvs coupon which makes it end up to one buck which is rock cheap).


Well, sunlight and sea breeze spa tomorrow. Lets just hope there is a decent tree for me to sit under. 

If only beaches here as as nice as those in Lang Tengah.

Bimbo moment. 

Dua puluh Dua?

After one month in Philadelphia, the whole gang has already celebrated A LOT of birthdays. 1st it was mine, then is was Queen's, now its baby's turn. So many Gemini babies. Haha. Kept us all really busy and broke too, and really sick of cakes. Haha

At 11:59pm on the 7th of June, I was in my room getting ready to celeb with the birthday boy. I have gotten 2 yummy cupcakes from Reading's Terminal Market from the Flying Monkeys stall. (THE CUP CAKES ARE SUPER AMAZING!!). So when Ven said he wanted to go clean up. I lighted up the candles expecting him to be back within 5 mins. Manatahu the candles burn finish liao he still haven't return. Wasted two of my candles. (funny thing in American, the cake shops don't sell candles when you buy cake wan).

So, unfortunately, we all need to go to the hospital and the clinic for work on this special day for the boy, oops pass 21 years oldliao, its MAN. Haha. But but but, later in the night we all made a really long walk down towards west to have a lovely dinner meal at Devil's Alley.

The place is lovely, and also pricey. Haha. Apparently the best thing they serve there is the ribs. And so we ordered RIBS!! And wings too, because we wanted to try out other stuff too.

All of us plus Vi-Zanne

The verdict : Okay okay lerh. I mean, the ribs are really good. But I've tasted nice ones. Hehe. But still worth a go because its still yummy. 

Veb's childhood friend Vi-Zanne was also present. Cute little bubbly girl. She happened to be on her internship working at Market street hence she is actually very near to us. She came much earlier than the supposed planned time, and as usual, with the Malaysian timing and all, noone was on time, so I brought her to a little tour of our dorm. Showed her my room and Ven's room. Haha. 

So after much chatting and talking and being noisy, we headed to sweet ending for froyo. Its short for frozen yogurt. Actually, everyone says its a Philadelphia thing, but the 1st time I treid something lidet was when my sister brought me to times square to let me try some ice-cream thingi that just opened, and I was very sure its a Taiwan thing. Dunno who plagiarize who. Haha. 

Its works like that, you grab a cup from the stands, and then proceed to the big ice-cream dispenser which has a gazillion ice-cream flavours. Or rather soft yogurt flavours. Haha. You then dispense as much ice-cream as you want, and proceed to the toppings counter and put as much toppings as you like. But ultimately, they charge you according to weight. So you pay what you take. 

The birthday boy.

And when we all reached back to our dorm, the usual singing of happy birthday song and blowing of candles and cutting of cake and then the devouring of the cake.

+ tissue paper roll (zhor dang)

Okay that's the celebration with the group of friends. Next comes the lovely celebration between the two of us. We had dinner the following weekend at a posh place. Steak house place. It's called Del Frisco

Place is mad posh. Thank god I had the lady instinct of dressing up for the event. Made Ven dress formal too.

 Dress of the day.

Okay I didn't expect the place to be so OHMAIGAWD beautiful inside when I made the reservation. But it turns out to be so grand, its like dining in a museum (quote Ven) or to me it feels like I am eating inside a Hollywood movie. 

Ven ordered steak. 

And I ordered Seafood again! Classy choice. Rarr.

And since the place is so posh we need to be posh also. Ordered wine and liqueur. Posh max. Thank god I dressed well. 

That's my VIP drink (Its some pineaple soak in vodka for 14 days then kena squeezed out - thats how it was explained to me), and red wine. Forgot the year and brand and all.

So yay! Poshh dinner + good company = Great time. (Also = to big hole in wallet I think)

Owh, and since it was to celebrate Ven's birthday, we got free cake on the house. Haha. 

 Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you.

That's all for now. 

End it with my face for you!

Pizza Pizza

I like cooking and baking. Period. But I never had the chance to make a pizza before. I totally owned at making cupcakes, my tiramisu was a success, even the oreo cheesecake was lovely, not to mention the various dishes I've been cooking so far, my kulu chicken, black pepper chicken, soya chicken, fish with radish sauce, blablabla. Thanks to mommy-kins for teaching me everything, and thanks to the cook books as well. But I never had the chance to make a pizza before.


Untill one fine day Queen saw a packet in our usual supermarket.


And the chef in two girls sprang alive.

Pizza making 101!! We took out all possible pizza toppings we could ever imagine. And our pizza making still semi-fake cos we didn't make the dough our self. Super cheating.

Our 1st pizza was a trial pizza. Queen accidentally yanked the crust out too hard and the corners chipped off. Rarr. But still looks and taste good.


2nd pizza was a happy pizza. Because it is happy to be baked in the oven.

3rd pizza was no-named pizza. Because it was nothing special.


Pizza making 101 completed!

Credits to the two chefs!

=)

Of 720 and going strong

On the seventh hundred and twentieth day we've been together, we decided we needed a nice something to mark the year. So instead of going out on fancy dinners and making holes in our wallet, we wanted a quiet roop top celebration with candles instead. 


But that never happened.


The thing with our anniversary date is that, it always falls in between both our birthdays. And hence in the short 2 week period we have 3 things to celebrate about. Which kinda makes you go broke all the time. So since we have nice dinner for my birthday, we wanted something different, less expensive and save up for the next birthday, or else we wont even appreciate the nice food in front of us. 


But that never happened. 


We ended up in a restaurant having a meal together. Instead we did it American style, in which they call it brunch. (Although the menu items pretty much look like lunch instead of brunch except you get more pancakes as appetisers). 


The place is named Carribou and Ven found it cos its near and Zagat rated. 

We were given the choice of sitting next to the guitarist playing or sitting upstairs, we choose the latter (as noted from the angle in the picture) because its quieter and we can have our own romantic time camwhoring and doing our Asian thing of taking pictures everywhere without people staring at us. 


Ain't I proud to be Asian. *Kaching*


First thing I wanted to order on the menu was snails. Escargots to be specific. The snails were a super yum yum, but I still miss those in Jake's. Rarr.

And free flow of bread! If I wanted to be unglam and kiamsiap we could just order one meal and I'll eat bread till I'm full. Haha. Just a thought though.

So Ven ordered steak (meat hungry fella) and I have the classier option of seafood crepe. I only claim its classier because I can't eat beef. Haha. But I still think its classy to opt for seafood instead of meat during meals unless its shelled fish like crab because then you will need to mess your make up all over just to get the meat out of the shell.

Wanna see the interior of the place where we were seated? Haha. Its lovely.

So yea that's our 720 days celebration for you. Let me crack my brain to see what else we did. We . . . . . watched ice hockey as well. Haha. We . . . . . pretty much did nothing. I think. 


Owh, wait till you see the gift I have for my 720 day celebration. Its a lovely pink mouse. Matches my new new new Precieux (lappie)!! As you know how I do the girly thing and name all my gadgets, this cute adorable little rodent is called Pinko. 

Ven got the white one for himself. So now we have couple mouses. Haha.


Okay. This post don't have a picture with me in it, so Imma gonna put one unrelated pic of me with a huge ass strawberry.

 Tata!

City Tour Again.

Class has started for about 3-4 weeks now. And its been interesting thus far. The first few weeks we had was about integrating us into the system. More like letting us run through CSU sessions to see how the Americans do it, which is about the same as IMU's, and also how to take history and do a physical, which surprisingly IMU has taught us very very well. Only difference is that we need to be more clinical in looking for symptoms, instead of checking head to toe for everything. 


We were also thrown in a situation where we needed to break a bad news to patient's family members. And my oh my the standardized patients here can all go and win Oscars liao. They are super good at acting. There were two sp's for the 6 of us to practise on, which means on average each sp will have to act 3 times. And during the breaking-bad-news session, all of them cried 3 times. Real tears! I am so amazed. 


So as part of out orientation, we have Dr Majdan for two weeks where he taught us CSU skills and cardiology stuff. Well mainly because he is a cardiologist so he is very excited to teach us about the heart, so we get to listen to heart murmurs and read ECGs (which is so confusing by now I still can't grasp it although I've been taught like 4 times liao), and see chest X-rays. And at the end of the two weeks, Dr. Majdan brought us round for a City Tour!

This is the six of us plus Dr. Majdan, sitting at some diners place because the butter cake here is "too-die-for" (I was actually browsing throug my files to find a picture of the "dua-mati-untuk" cake but I can't find it, but pictures can't tell how yummy it was so nvm). Actually I am quite glad that our batch was filled all six spots cos now everywhere we go it is very "Re Nao" and noisy. Imagine only two or three people come it'll be so sad and quiet. 


Dr. Majdan took all six of us in his car and drove around Philadelphia. Because none of us owns a car, it is very difficult for anyone to travel any further than 8 blocks from where we stay.

Queen and Me

So one of the stops we made was at the three main stadiums of Philadelphia. One is a ice hockey aka basketball stadium, one is a baseball stadium, and a football stadium.

This is the icehockey/basketball stadium, also known as the Wachovia Center. Well apparently the Philadelphia's ice hockey team is like super good in the nation. So ever since I came here, all of us have been watching ice hockey on television supporting the flyers. And they have already won the eastern conference final now in the Stanley cup finals facing the Chicago Black Hawks. Okay this is all jargon to you but yea, it bonds us Malaysian together cos we will all sit in the lounge and scream at the tv. Super interesting.

And then, Dr. Majdan brought us to the boat house. Which is lovely. At first I thought boat house means fisherman boats kinda boats. But actually they have this boating sport which is something new and I've never seen it before. The boat is long and thin, and they use long long paddles. 

Okay I bet you never see before also. But the place is so scenic and beautiful.

And this is Queen and me jakun again

Oh, by the way, side track a bit, I am now wearing the SUPER NUDY CONTACT LENSE, which is super big big big big big. 

I look like an alien.

Okay back on track. The boat house is very very beautiful. I manage to capture a lot of scenic shots there. 

Okay this is Dr. Majdan.

Nicest man I've ever known!

Last picture!

This is Philadelphia, for you (and its taken by my sminky S90!).

Aged Another Year.

Happy 23rd Birthday to me on May 27th 2010. It's my very first birthday few thousand miles away from home, and halfway round the world. I have to say, it's a lovely one, but would be more lovely if I have all my family and friends around me from Malaysia celebrating with me, like how my whole life's birthdays been celebrated.


Not complaining though.


Lets rewind to a week before my birthday. Baby came into my room with a cheeky smile on his face, saying that my birthday present arrived much to early, and that he can't wait to show it to me.

Zomg super cute can! But I tak sedap hati to eat my own face and baby's face as well, and to eat all the love messages so I'm gonna keep it on my table as decor.


So on the 26th of May, I cheekily asked my resident, Jeff. "Er.We're on call tomorrow right? Do I need to be on call too?". I swear the other two third year students' jaw dropped. One of them called me "BOLD". Lalalalala. Don't care la this is orientation only not graded wan. Hehe. I eventually got released from being on call. And that very night, baby brought me to this lovely modern japanese place to have a lovely meal. Place name is "Fat Salmon".

Artistic shot by baby.

The sushi dishes are all fusion. So modernised till there isn't an authentic jap sushi dish on the menu. But its SUPER YUMMY so me not complaining. 

Drool drool DROOL!!

We dressed up for the night. Baby wore his new coat and I wore a nice dress I bought from AC and a lovely hairband.


Then later that night, baby suggested we go to Naked Chocolate for desserts. A place for chocolate lovers. He wanted to treat me more since dinner was much cheaper than he expected. <3 max.

Rows and rows of truffles.

What we ordered : Choc Pretzels, Green tea coconut truffle, Choc hazelnut, Choc Rasp , Mozart and some free sample truffle.

The crazy rich hot-chocolate. So rich till its impossible for one person to gulp it down alone. 

Because lighting was nice. 

The very next day, I went through the usual routine of going to the hospital, having essentially two person wish me happy birthday, having baby wish me happy birthday about 100 times, and having Queen turning up at my room door with a cute pink bag from Victoria Secret. 

Yea, that's what I thought as well when I saw the label on the pink bag. But trust me, it was nothing kinky. It was actually a strawberry body butter. 

So after dinner and everything (there was a dinner outing with the Martinians not-related to my birthday), I was in my room minding my own business, and I need to use the washroom, hence I left my room for a few nano seconds and when I am back, everyone hid in my room and turn off the lights and I see YinnCher's scrubs in my mirror and next thing I knew there was a choc cake with candles on it and people are humming the happy birthday tune.

See how big my surprised eyes opened until.

The choc cake with a raspberry truffle filling. More Choc!

The Gang. *hearts* everyone. 

And if you thing everything is over and done with you're forgetting the few very important people in my life. Mommy, Daddy and MeiMei even got me a cake I wish I could savour. Pandan layer cake!!! Yummy yummy. This celebration was so odd, I got myself a little choc mocha fudge cake from Naked Chocolate with a mini candle on it, and we sang a birthday song over the webcam. I think its such a sweet and warm thing to do with your family especially when you're so far away. Folks, try it!!

ps: I almost got a heart attack blogging about this because the above "print screen" picture was actually saved on baby's laptop and he go and REFORMAT it with my picture inside and its like my one and only birthday picture with my family HOMAIGOD I swear I can cry and go knock my head on the wall or throw all my porcelain plates at the door if its missing. Thank god THANK GOD THANK YOU om-ni-torh-foh and guan-yin that my sister actually asked for a copy of it right after the picture was taken. Like RIGHT AFTER. So it's saved afterall. SAVED!!!


What a wonderful fruitful one and a half days of birthday for me. I had loads of fun, and felt truly loved and everything. Yay!