Chronicles of me and my company

But first, I want to make a thank you speech. Thank you all for the video!!! Haven't got many presents this year at all for my birthday; think this's definitely one of the best! Love the voice-over by Pengy!!! It was hilarious; I laughed till I cried. Hehe. Thank you Pengy too for your card.. also your really sweet SMSes!! And of course the Mathgeek blog. Haha. Special thanks of course to Daffy for being the 'proud representative' presenting me the video, and for all the daily Sticky notepad messages... Loving the late-night chats we have each night - they are times of good sharing really.

Okie I better get on and update you guys on our travels thus far...

15th Dec

My flight was delayed so I made Daffy wait for 2 hours at JFK airport =P Was elated though when I saw her; felt like it's been ages!!! (Actually it HAS been AGES! So he 2 hours were nothing really. - Daffy) So we boarded the subway; my first subway ride saw me sitting next to a schizo guy who made funny hand signals and worst of all, got up periodically to scratch his groin (and his pants were apparently unzipped!!!! He was facing Daffy so guess who was the one who noticed...). (Yeah, he wore white underwear. Luckily not bright pink or something! Lucky he wasn't talking or harrassing Shutch, or else I'll whack him. -Daffy)

So we arrived at the 114th Street apartment which's really cosy. Most of all we have a very high queensize bed to ourselves!! First time in my life I see a bed so elevated; it makes Daffy feel short each time she enters the room. Heh. (And Shutch is shorter than me... so. Hmm. -Daffy)

After lunch we headed for Times Square:



First store we went into was *drumroll* Toys 'R' us! We found a really cool geography toy - it's a globe which you can rotate (by manouvering a plane) to locate the place the toy wants you to! We were there playing with the thing for like 20 minutes. Heh. Oh then we noticed this moving toy bear in a pram but guess what? It's actually a baby wearing an animal bear cap which's so cute!! Anyways Daffy then found another car she likes and started driving it around, only to find that it cannot make turns!! Here's us with her new-found car:



And me helping King Kong scratch himself: (She actually looked like she was seducing him initially lor! -Daffy)



We walked down 42nd Street browsing the stores and ended up eventually at Hersheys! Yum Yum. No free samples were supposed to be given but we still managed to knick some to eat. Haha. Saw the world's largest Hersheys choc bar and loads of Hersheys merchandise. Resisted the temptation to buy any though. Instead we took photos with the bears...



I was freezing my arse off (didn't know yet then that I was actually hatching a cold...) Daffy blamed it on my thin clothings so we went round hunting for warmer clothes pour moi. Ended up in GAP where I fell in love with my hot pink hoodie (kids one!) but they didn't have my size!! =( Daffy likes this yellow hat:



We were told we would never get lost in NYC but well we still did =P Happily we would hop on the subway without checking the direction it's heading, until a few stops down then Daffy went 'Oops!' Yea so then we have to get off, head up again to the cold outside and cross the road to access the opposite platform (only to realise later that you can actually access the opposite platforms via underpasses...) I have to confess I've been pretty much a walking zombie; she's been the streetsmart one although of course she still needs my gems of wisdom occasionally to get to the right places =) (Yar rite! -Daffy)

Met up with some of my other friends in NYC for dinner at guess where? Seoul Garden. Hoho, not like the one in Singapore of course. But having had 3 Korean meals in 24 hours beforehand, I was really trying hard to find something to eat at the restaurant. It was a nice place though, and Daffy had her spicy soup without breaking a sweat whilst my friend was spiced till she couldn't speak....

Our first night together on the same bed and this's what Daffy showed me... (I was being nic and trying to grab clothes for her so that she wouldn't freeze lor... without getting off the humongous bed! And this is what she does... Haii... -Daffy)



16th Dec

Was feeling ill so wanted to boil some water to take medicine. Put the lovely red country kettle on the stove to happily boil away. 10 minutes later, still no noise. 15 minutes later, I lifted the kettle lid to check the water inside - and I discovered it was empty!!! Ended up melting the plastic lid of the kettle... =S

Spent the entire morning making plans for our post-NYC leg. Checked out car rental, routes, etc. Found out that booking from NYC costs $100 more per day coz of the under-age surcharge (which neither of YOU TWO will have a problem with!!! =P), so smart Daffy thought of booking from Boston instead. We were rather discrete then about the planning, coz I still haven't yet had 'the talk' with SX yet.

Finally went out for lunch.. couldn't find anything nice till we walked 9 streets, and ended up at a Texas grill! I had lunch next to a cow:



And in front of a duck:



We decided the weather was good enough (yar rite) to walk so we kept on trekking from 97th Street to 59th Street. Along the way we entered the lovely grocery stores to ogle at wholesome foods. Ohoh and I finally found my leash for her in a pet shop!!! (Yeah take a duck for a walk. It's the new "in" thing! - Daffy)



We finally found a GAP kids which sells my jumper!!! Woohoo so I bought it =) I walked out of GAP looking like a chicken-zang (coz of the chicken I ate for lunch) coz I was wearing 5 layers of clothes. Yet I was still cold!! (obviously something wrong with my body liao..)

59th Street's in fact Columbus Square. There's a really nice posh shopping centre there, with rather interesting statues (I wanted to hug one of them... a big fat (naked) man... but I was as tall as his butt and so when I get to his butt I went YUCK!!). (And you wonder why she wants to hug big fat NAKED man! - Daffy) Yea so well we walked into Borders wanting to get our road maps, yet we actually bummed into the friends we had dinner with the night before!! Apparently Singaporeans love to congregate at shopping centres and especially Borders! Even in a big city like NEw York!!



We thought perhaps posh people don't pee so we weren't harbouring too much hopes of finding the restrooms. When we did, we were indeed disappointed at the spartan-ness of the restrooms compared to the rest of the mall... Ohoh the real highlight is the gourmet supermarket in the basement!!! Though we were running late for our next appointment we still went in and had a good tour of the mart which sells organic foods... from fruits and veges (see Daffy with the apples below in their assemble of colors!!) to hot food to yummy desserts to cereals to gourmet coffee to branded (Neal's yard) cheese, etc. etc... Everything's just so wholesome and yummy!!!!



We then packed ourselves onto the subway and experienced the sardine effect. Wanna know how the sard in the sandwich feels? Come NYC and take the subway =) our destination was Columbia Uni's bible study for asian/asian-american students. Apparently the chicken in our stomachs didn't run around as much as we did so they left us no space for dinner. When the talk started, Daffy fell asleep (what's new?) so she could only remember the speaker talk about how wrestling makes the entire body ache (when the talk's about Jacob's wrestle with God).

Went for late night cheesecake (yum yum!!) before coming back... to a late night girly chat till 3 am before we had a pillow fight (with Daffy's silly inflatable pillow which she keeps using to whack me!!!) No prizes for guessing who got more hits =(
(I WIN!! -Daffy) (HMMPH!! - shutch)

[Daffy takes over the blog here as Shutch goes for a shower]

17th Dec

This is another attempt to compete for the longest blog ever.

We headed down to Chinatown for lunch. Dim Sum! Yes. We wanted to experience what the other half of the company would be experiencing... so we ended up at this rather authentic cheena restaurant... the kind that traditional Chinese wedding banquets are held at. The most amazing thing to us was probably the long long long long escalator which took us up to the restaurant itself. The food was okay... we din order much... and Shutch finally knows what ee fu mian is! Well, Shutchie Hot Mama was feeling a little too hot, so we had to send her home to rest. So much for travelling all the way to Chinatown! hahah! Not that it realy matters lah... her health is more important.

So while she went upstairs to rest her unwell self, SX and myself went grocery shopping. He wanted to make porridge, and I decided a fruit salad would be good cos of all the vitamins and nutrients... and it helps perk one up. Fruit prices here are exorbitant! (Organic or not...) There was cantaloupe, grapes, oranges, apples, pears, kiwis and bananas (yes, nua nua ones, Pengy jiejie... cos they are organic and they SUCK! For once. Heh.) Had a fun time peeling and slicing them. Felt like I opened a fruit stall! Hee.

This is how the fruit salad turned out:



In the process of preparing dinner, Shutchie started making reservations for hotels on the computer and I think we were too blatant about it, especially since she had yet to have "the talk" with SX. And I could imagine how he was feeling. I felt so guilty. But luckily there were unrelated topics to talk about during dinner, like organic foods and agriculture. (I learnt quite a bit though. Hee.)

Anyway, the wonderful thing is that God answered our prayers! He made Shutch well again!! =) Woohoo!! Praise God! She was so well that she entered her obnoxious mode. Wah buay tahan!! For instance, I invented this game to balance on this big yoga ball without your hands or legs touching the ground and she would go "I can definitely do better than you." (but she would suck. Hahahah! Ooops.) Heh. We have videos on that. They are hilarious!

And I noticed that her PINK (ew!) jumper was on the sofa beside green pillows. And the first thought that entered my mind was "So Neh (Ah-bu-neh)" and then I started pretending that the jumper was a person hugging the pillow. Later we improved and dressed up Mr Platypus. We thought it super amusing and hence entertained ourselves for almost half hour! Achery he looks quite scary hor?





Then I went to shower. I vaguely heard SJ and SX engage in "the talk"... so I had another shower. And tried to do all things possible so that I could lengthen the time in the bathroom. But soon I got bored, so I emerged and darted into the room and plugged on my ipod. After "the talk", we had another late nite chat. "I'm lovin' it!"

18th Dec

Wow this blog is sooo loooonngggg that it's as tiring for us to write as it is for you all to read! But treasure it lah... we won't have constant internet access very soon.

[Shutch takes over the blog here as Daffy takes her shower]

Daffy slept in like a *snort* whilst Shutch woke early to inform her friends about the outcome of "the talk" the night before. Around noontime Daffy - finally woken up - presented me the birthday video! (It was planned! Noon is exactly midnite in Singapore time! - daffy) It's both heartwarming and hilarious at the same time - esp the voiceovers by Pengy!! Excellent! (Shutch 2005) I think it's a wonderful video of our past 3 months as a company too! Corporate video sia? Haha. Oh yes I gave Daffy a big long hug. Wish you two were around too so can share the hug!!!

Headed out wanting to see Brooklyn Bridge first but ended up at South Ferry Terminal instead. (That's cos some smart person mistook the red line for the green line! Talk about imparting some smart genes to the streetsmart one... haii... and to think I trusted her! -daffy) For lunch we had our first NYC hotdogs and pretzel (which's so huge it looks like a handbag!) Hopped on the ferry to Staten Island to take photos of the city along the way.

Hotdogs!


Handbag!






When we came back to Battery Park, we stopped to chase a big bird, many small birds (seagulls) and watch some baskers perform dance moves.




After that we began our long and arduous (oops I mean adventurous) journey to Brooklyn Bridge! Stopped by Southside Pier which looks like a ski resort!! Daffy bought me Haagen Daaz Bailey's shake which was yum =) but ex. heh.





I had remarked earlier that the bridge was 'so near ah??' By now I had begun to swallow my words. We ended up having to climb over roadside barriers, only to end up on the wrong side of the bridge so cannot get onto dear ol' Brooklyn!! We became major jaywalkers, walking in the middle of the roads, crossing here and there to finally get to the right side!! I guess it was all in His perfect timing though, for as we walked on the bridge the sun was slowly setting, gradually changing. It was really beautiful.. the sky, the sun, the stars (and plane), the bridge, Manhattan and its city lights, cars zooming past beneath our feet, seagulls flying above our heads.. (It was my favourite memory of NYC, and to be able to relive it again with Shutch was awesome. Aww... did I really mean that??!! - daffy) So romantic. Haha. So we took some romantic photos:







By now we are both experts at taking the subway *green grin*. But in a way we're both getting a little saturaated with NYC... the people (many of whom seem very angsty), the pollution (esp the noisy trains!!!), the skyscrapers and lack of nature... Geography of fear? Romanticism of the 'natural' landscape? Hmm.
Went to Redeemer Presbyterian Church's christmas service which had really good songs (performed by really good singers!) and a really good sermon (by a really good pastor!!!) And Shutch would really know that cos she's a really good sleeper! Hmm... and who commented on "what is new?" when I slept in bible study?? And to think that this was a sermon by a famous pastor!!) (HMMPH!!! - shutch)

Ended the evening with Chinese dinner which wasn't terribly exciting although the portions still never fail to amaze us!!! Alas then the no-life us have been here in front of the computer for three hours. It's now 1am NYT and so it's time to say goodbyeeeeeeee.... So long, farewell...