BELGIUM

I have half an hour to post this because i am going to Paris soon, and tonight, to Amsterdam... Wheeeeeeeee! It's a big group and we are ALL EXCITED! :D



Brussels - the administrative capital of the EU.
and that's it. Haha.... There really isnt anything much happening in Brussels, other than the fact that there are a lot of bars and chocolate and Let Petit Julien - The Manneke Pis (the pissing boy)It is the national symbol of Belgium and is as small as the country is compared to its large neighbours of France and Germany. When I say small, trust me, it is REALLY SMALL. Basically we just spent the whole day bugging KinYew to bring us to the chocolate places and waffle places... :P

Voila! Our waffles! I tried the real Brussels waffle which was square and there's sugar on top (slightly fluffier) and the others tried the Liegois one which was round and had sugar baked into it. We tried the Strawberry jam (me), white chocolate (Rosh and it was damn jelat for her), chocolate (Shuz), whipped cream (Fang, ya... she's thin la, can afford to) and Kinyew just leeched on everyone's and got us all cackling with laughter when he keeps getting whipped cream on his chin and cheeks. hahaha. :D

Bruges, another city in belgium, on the other hand is SO GORGEOUS. it really looks like it just came out of a postcard. with canals (not singapore smelly kind), boats, swans and lots of flowers around... Yes, even horse carriages! As you can see from the photos, it is not my camera, but the scenery that is soooooo wonderful. If only it wasn't sooo freezingly windy, otherwise we would prolly just sit by the river and have a cup of coffee. We did, however, sit on a bench and just gossiped while eating chips and Fang's 1 day old cheeseburger. :D So the point is, if you wanna visit Belgium, DO NOT just stop over at Brussels and end there because there are other cities that are more gorgeous than that (i.e. Bruges and Antwerp)

Went into the Choco-Story museum in Bruges and learnt about the history of chocolate. As singaporeans, we even asked for an extra chocolate during the chocolate making presentation... hehehe.... oh well. :D but it really seemed damn easy man, just fill it with choco and freeze it. haha. i also can make. :P Pictures include the chocolate alcohol (which i guess prolly taste like Baileys), chocolate jam, chocolate everything... There was even an exhibition on myths of chocolate. I.e. WILL CHOCOLATE MAKE YOU FAT? Ans: If you are slim, you can, for example, eat a plain chocolate and you will be fine. If you are overweight, slim down first, then you can reintroduce chocolate into your diet. If you consume in moderation, you will not get fat. damn funny right!!! haha... Also i found out that my FAV chocolate - the white chocolate contains 0% cocoa and instead is just made purely out of cocoa BUTTER and powdered milk and SUGER. I am soooo dead. :( But still, i like. :D

Fries, Mussels and Beer! Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmy.

Moving on to Antwerp, the city of Gays. In just one drinking session with 3 guys in a suuuuuuuuuuper nice hostel, i found out that they were ALL GAY. and not related at all. haha... one was a veteran gay who worked as an intern in a fashion house (Antwerp is just like Barce... soo many shops!), one was in denial (he said he was straight, but the other gay told me his radar told him he was gay) and the last one whom i got the closest to (shopped with him and heard all his stories...) was a newbie in the scene. :D sooo it was really fun to listen to their stories, learnt a new phrase (one-hour-fax... think one night stand, but shorter), and realised that men are just men, be it straight or gay. all they want is sex. oh well. nevertheless, he was a really nice person and hopefully we can keep in touch. haha... PS: Chimay beer is dammmmmmn nice! I love dark beer now... Namaste peeps, can we go drinking when Fang and I come back???

And lastly, friendships forged in belgium. This trip was SOOOOOOOOO MUCH fun because of the people... I am sooooo glad Shuwen found me on facebook and we got together after 5 years of no contact, and that she brought along Kinyew, our resident tourist guide who was soooooooooooooooooo much fun!!! (I'm still crossing my fingers you can come to Ams with us!) The jokes shared and the loads of laughter... The beer drinking and semi-highness from 9.2%... The counting of mussels and sharing of waffles... It's too good. We HAVE to meet up again! :D

All in all, Belgium was really fun and in fact it's one of our best trips yet. :D

i love bruges and antwerp!

Dear all

i am blogging this from this real nice hostel in antwerp and i love it! the bar is nice and cosy and the owner is juuuust TOO funny.... :D brussels was oooook but Bruges was soooooooooooo gorgeous! i took like 200 photos today and i just adore the place so much... if you are only going brussels, it is NOT ENOUGH because these 2 other cities just redefined belgium in my dictionary. more pictures later but for now... i am going to enjoy a nice cup of tea, write in my journal and listen to very nice belge music. exactly what an exchange should be, i think. Great city, great hostel, great friends to enjoy it with; Kinyew, shuwen, rosh and fang; YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST. ok going going gone.

PS; it just snowed and there was HAIL. hhahahahahahhaha ;D

Headache

I don't know who reads this blog. But if you have gone for an exchange before or if you have been to Europe before, i need some advice.

I have 15 days. Should I
1) Travel to Italy only and extensively.
2) Travel to Italy for 10 days and Greece for 5 days. Is that too little and too rushed?

5 days to Athens and Santorini only seems sooooo little. Maybe i should keep Greece and Turkey for another day. But im greedy and i wanna go everywhere!!!

h.e.a.d.a.c.h.e.

My favourite Rouen girls...

People: Fang. Alvi. Wanling. Rosh. Cherysa. Shujun. Me +
Food: Pineapple rice. Sushi. Cauliflower curry. Ginseng chicken soup. Salad. Chicken Porridge +
Drink: Apple cidre. Sparking wine +
Fruit: Mango +
Drunk Bimbo: Fang
= LOTS OF FUN!

Wah liew, the party was damn fun la! Wanling, please send us the food pictures! My gosh, it was suuuuuuch a slumber PJ party at 8pm la!!! Where we bitched about celebrities, thought that Prince William's fiancee is not very pretty, painted nail polish, sang boy bands songs (not me, bleah), laughed over bed bugs and all sorts of bugs, moaned about graduation in one year, said all sorts of nonsense and laughed at Fang for her true-blue bimbsness. Hail the Queen! :D AND the walk to Le Plaide to send Wanling back was soooo good! Ahhhh, cold but cosy. it's such a great feeling! Love you girls... :P

PARIS - the city of lights and romance

This is REALLY outdated, since my Paris trip happened twice - 27 Jan with the usual gang and 17 Feb with Rosh, Viktoria and Ann-Mari (From Sweden and Finland)

We were actually planning to go to Spain that weekend, but because of flight cancellation due to heavy fogging (it was still winter then), we changed our plans to Paris instead!

From here you can see the Paris metro tickets which cost 1.40 euros each, Rue Hermel which INSTANTLY reminded me and Rosh of HERMIEEEEEEE, on our way to Sacre Coeur (which means Sacred Heart, refers to Jesus i think...a beauuuutiful place where we can see a panoramic view of Paris, as we sat down on the stairs listening to people jam, it was a real bonding session that evening...), how artsy Paris is with the numerous art galleries and paintings and most significantly, that Parisians or rather French in general have DAMN SMALL cars and they park super damn close to each other. Fang and Alvi were lamenting about how pro the french's parallel parking skills are, although we did notice that MOST of the cars had bumps either at the front or back or both. :D

Lourve: Where we spent more than 7 hours walking around and listening to the audio-guide. it was a really good 5 euro investment cos it allowed us to understand more about the artworks, instead of just walking around aimlessly. Art isnt really art unless you know its history. :D And this brings back alot of memories because the last time i stepped in here when i was 12, my Da-jie brought me around and SHE was my audio-guide (she graduated with a fine arts degree) and i guess to a large extent, she was the reason why i had to come to France for an exchange. to experience it all again. i love you Da-jie! ok, emo aside, we managed to walk around quite abit and might i say, i think i finished everything i wanted to see. :D special mention to the french large paintings and the egyptian sculptures which rosh and i abbbbsolutely adored. :D

Dinner at the foots of the hill of Sacre coeur. loved the dinner and the company. :D

Monster Ivy decided that we should walk! haha, so i made my poor friends waaaaaaaaalk all the way from Sacre Couer to Champs Elysee... heyyy, and with that, we made our discovery: Paris Red Light District and Moulin Rouge!!! I think we're not attractive enough because no one tried to hit on us.. hahaha. Went into a Sex Shop called Sexodrome where the first level was merchandise (think lots of porn dvd, sex toys, blow up doll with blond pubic hair, and 12 channels of porn. haha), 2nd was strip tease, 3rd was spa, and 4th was PRIVATE. hahahahha. :D

Notre-Dame of Paris. Contrary to belief, there isnt only ONE notredame in france. in fact, there are MANY. one in each city (I saw one in Lyon, in Paris and in Rouen).

And to end off this entry, Lourve at night. Beautiful isnt it? Rosh and I decided to come here a 2nd time to do the Da Vinci Tour. It was AWESOME! the music and the pace of the recording was exactly what we would have done, so when the recording said "turn left and you will see a window", we turned and we SAW! haha... i love roshni, i think if i were an indian (or even a chinese man) ill like her. :D too bad i have isaac, hahahahaha. :D and the last bit of the tour brought us to the Holy Grail. where we took ALOT of pictures. :D it felt so good to relive the book which was awesome and the company made it even better. :)

I doubt this will be the only time i'll go to Paris, but the next times will not be with these best buddies. :D So this pic is for them. :D to remember the good times we had in Paris, talking to ducks and eating cheap biscuits and clementines. and thanks for sharing the Fanta. :P

THE FLEA MARKET @ ROUEN

I declare today one of my best days in Rouen. The sun was purrrrfect, the company was fantastic, and it felt just soooo good to walk around, laze around and just enjoy simple pleasures of going to the market to choose the best chicken, photo-whoring with beeeeautiful spring flowers, walking with my best buddy Rosh and neeeearly got lost (which was perfectly fine by us, we were imagining all sorts of CSI images, dead bodies etc), having a great dinner conversation with my darling roomie Ying (who thought the risotti she bought were wantons, oh well, pity. but they tasted real good in chinese soup!) and to top it off, EIGHT episodes of Ugly Betty. Exactly how i imagined my exchange would be like! Who cares about clubbing and getting drunk? :D

This is the flea market at Rouen. It only operates at full capacity on Sundays till 1pm. So early birds catch the worms! They have furniture, old postcards, porn dvds, fresh veges, bags from China, cooked rabbits (alvi said so) and very pretty flower stalls. This is like a family hangout where the old people congregate to buy groceries and the younger people chill out at cafes lined around it. Pictures include the freshest strawberries that we've ever seen (and bought! yummmm, the biggest cheese, and the man who sold me my delicious dinner of potato and chicken and tomato for 4.5 euros!

Then we decided to photo-whore at a look out point near our hostel. Cos we stay on Mont Saint Aignan (mont = hill) sooooo the view was soooo good! And cos it's spring and we luuuurve the weed flowers that can be found EVERYWHERE, we decided to pose with them! haha... pardon us, 3 girls looking preeeeetty in our sunglasses and flowers. :D


This was yesterday where the girls had suuuuuch a great time doing all sorts of girly things. :D Sharing galettes, crepes and apple cidre in Le Tarte Tatin, a reeeeeeeally yummy restaurant. Smart of us to share the lunch menu for which we only paid 5.4 euros for a very very full lunch! The Tarte Tatin (apple tart) was sooo good! -drool- Later on we also had ice cream! Mine was strawberry and banana, which tasted sooo gelate... Fang's Caramel and Shujun's Hazelnut were sooo good too! :P ohhh i definitely want to have it again! Then we went to Saint sever (rouen's shopping centre) and shopped! Like the girly girls we are, we spent so much time in the cosmetics and beauty shop which was 50% discount storewide! (Tout le magazin!)I bought hand cream for 1.75 euros! cheeeap! We then went to the shops where Ivy decided to give up her shopping queen crown to Fang who had a shit load of stamina. but of cos, i only had 3 hours of sleep the night before, can't help it. bahhh.

The best place where we had super lots of fun was in... the toy store! posed with soft toys, lamented about our age and how lame we must look to the frenchies and their kids for trying out hula hoops, looked at kids' make up box, played with the toys, and decided that dinosaur toys are lame. (PS: the spiderman costume had ABS. seriously. padded ones. hahahaha. and there's actually a ninja turtle costume. who would dress their son as a turtle??!)

Mummy, it's Cherry Blossoms!

I love Spring and Rouen...

and all my friends here. love you all!

ROUEN - My home

Well, many of you may wonder where exactly is Rouen? Pronounced as "Who-on", with a slight Frenchie accent. :) And when you say, "shall i visit you?", sometimes i don't know if i should be nice and say ok! or be honest and say, er, there's really nothing much here actually ( i welcome you! just that there really isnt much here la). buuuuut if you ask me, it's a really nice home, because i love my room, i love my roommates and i love the fact that everytime im tired after travelling, i have a HOME to come back to. and truthfully, we never fail to miss Rouen whenever we travel, even if it's only to Paris.

As you walk through the historical centre, past half timbered houses, discover architectural treasures for example Gothic monuments like the Notre Dame Cathedral, St Ouen Abbey, Saint Maclou Church and the Palais de Justice or Renaissance style monuments like the Gros Horloge, Saint Maclou Ossuary and the Bourgtheroulde Mansion.

As you can see from the pictures, Rouen is largely focused on its half timbered houses and its very own heroine Joanne D'Arc where she was tortured here and then burnt at the stake. Rouen Cathedral - A very large cathedral that i told myself i would go every week to admire its architecture, but i've only been there 3 times. :) The universities here are generally not coordinated like Duke and hence, buildings are all over the place with different designs. but places like Carrefour, Mexicoop and Place Corbert are definitely ones that i will miss (they are all supermarkets) haha. :D


My room is a hell of a mess. it WAS neat, but somehow, it just became messy. or rather, it just became ME again. haha. :D i love it! although i think isaac will shake his head in resignation if he ever sees it. oh well. :P my clementines are a must have, on my table, as my fruit of these 6 months. ultra juicy and cheap and my precious source of vits. 2 bottles of wine sitting lonely on my table, wondering WHY their owner only drank so little here. strange eh? haha... apple cidre is the drink Normandians prefer, and we actually really think it's nicer than wine. My coco-pops, milk (breakfast), my nail polishes brought from Singapore, my bag of accessories, my stash of food and precious pastes and i think that pretty much makes up my room. ohhh, and the most important 2 items: my colourful basket and my greenish blue floormat. rosh and i bought these when we went on a shopping spree to decorate our rooms. never regretted buying them cos they make my room look less hostelish and more like MY room. :D

Chris Zhuo says I write too much in my blog, so i shall end here. but Barce photos are definitely on its way. i just need to transfer them from Fang, Alvi and Rosh.

After all the excitement, the BOO-BOOs

If only I am rich.

I will be able to go to Loire Valley as I planned. But now, there is apparently NO hostel there. SO it is only a good place to go if you want a romantic honeymoon (by staying in a real castle, cos that's their only accomodation there) or if you are f-rich. for me, neither applies. so there. poof. ill be staying in rouen this weekend. and i have tonight to find out WHAT i can do here. $#(*%@)(#

I will be able to book an expensive hotel in Amsterdam because ALL THE SATURDAYS ARE FULLY BOOKED. @!($#*@& I think people only go to Amsterday for a Saturday day trip to smoke weed and be merry for that ONE day. cos i wanna go from Thur to Sunday, I CANT BOOK! they need a min of 3 weekend nights to book. but with ALL the saturdays gone, i have no 3 weekends! = i cant book even thur or fri or sun on their own. @&#(@!*$ A word of advice to anyone who wants to book amsterdam, book 3 months in advance. seriously. the only person that is keeping me sane now is Cherysa (thank you darling!) for accompanying me to find the best solution. which may be ... (for your entertainment on seeing how desperate we are)

Shelter City CHRISTIAN Hostel - where they are reputed to preach to you at any opportunity they have
1) Thur: 6 beds: sleep comfortably with one person to one bed
2) Fri: 3 beds: sneak in at midnight and try to share bed.
3) Sat: 0 bed: camp at their commons room and pray that they dont know we don't stay there anymore "technically"
pengz. seriously. cherysa and i are really thinking about it.

Read conversation between us:

Cherysa says:
why not say we will read the verses with them also on sat night
Cherysa says:
hum maybe they will be nice
ivy:
quote the bible
ivy:
and get high on the psalms right
ivy:
we can sing choir for them on sat as payment for sleeping in the common room
Cherysa says:
lol
Cherysa says:
promise u wil preach 2 ten ppl lor
Cherysa says:
u can BS quite a bit
Cherysa says:
omg
Cherysa says:
u can totally quote one of the ten commandments
Cherysa says:
thou shalt not turn away a brother or something

To all Catholics and Christians, we are joking. about the preaching. very serious. about camping in their commons room and sharing the bed. do you think they will try to catch us?
HOW HOW HOWWWWW?

Plans fresh from the oven!

10-12 Mar: Loire Valley (think chateaus and wine.... mmmm)
17-19 Mar: Belgium (chocolate!)
22-25 Mar: Netherlands (Amsterdam... coffeeshops...red light district)
26 Mar: Paris cos Ade is coming! YAYYYYY
27 Mar- 3 Apr: Poland
4-6 Apr: Rouen and I'm also going to bring Ade to places around Rouen. Maybe Normandy Beach? Fang what did we plan ah? I cant remember now... Anyway, somewhere near Rouen. :)
7-9 Apr: a break from all that travelling
10- 22 Apr: Mummy and jie jies are coming! Think Nice, Barce, Grasse, Monaco, Giverny. :D Hopefully they will pay for everything... hehehehehe.
23 Apr - 6 May: Breathe. Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Salzburg, Munich. In that order. Hermie, wanna travel from Vienna to Munich together with me and Rosh? that's roughly between 29 Apr - 6 May.
9-13 May: a couple trip with Fang Fang to Stockholm and Finland... Maybe we can take a cruise or something. Or even see Santa Claus Land! :D
Then I wait for Isaac to come visit me. :D Then we'll go to Switzerland, Italy, Greece and UK. YAYYYYY!

Trust

This post is for a friend, whom i hope will get to read this soon. I stumbled upon it while blog surfing and i think it's pretty nice and succinct.

Before you decide to give everything up and feel that life is hopeless, please remember that you have friends and family who will support you and be on your side, no matter his side of the story (which as i said before, i dont give a damn). Read this babe, because everytime i talk to you, i never know how to dish out the best "advice" or claim to know what you've been through because i don't. But I hope that this few paragraphs can let you understand better what we've been trying to say so far and can touch your heart a little deeper than what we can do.

And if all else fails, you can still talk to me on msn or call me ya?

"I think when you are deciding if you can trust someone, you need to look back at all the ways that person has made you feel. There should never be any pressure, there should be no hurtful lies, there should be no belittling. The person you trust to put you in a helpless position should never have made you feel bad about yourself and they should be concerned about your safety too.

I know it is often hard to see the ways you have been manipulated until you can see it in hindsight and that often by then it is too late. At least it is that way for me. I have put myself into dangerous situations without being able to see that the man involved was only looking out for what he could get from me. Only later have I been able to look back and see that the he in question was always pressuring me to do things that I didn't want to do, that he would withhold affection until I gave in to give him what he wanted. It was only in hindsight I could see that he was always making me feel bad about myself to the point of making me believe that I was lucky that an unattractive fat slob like myself was loved by someone as good as he was. He made me believe that I was unworthy of him. So I know how hard it can be to be able to see an untrustworthy person for what they are.

So how can we trust ourselves to know when someone is trustworthy? If I knew the answer to that, I could make a fortune selling the secret to those of us that suffer from lower self confidence. All I can say is that if at any time you feel like it is something you must do to make him stay in love with you even if it makes your tummy feel ill, trust your gut and walk away before it goes too far."

Procrastinating and Bored.

1) I need to do my french hw. SERIOUSLY. bleah.
2) I need to buy groceries because i am happily living off my roommate now.
3) I need to decide where to go this weekend and next weekend because i refuse to be bound to Rouen just because i have ONE exam. which i only plan to study er... maybe 2 days before the exam. There really isnt much to do, considering we don't have past year papers and practice questions. SO all i have to do is to read the notes. and make my cheat sheet. :D why didnt i bring coloured pens to Rouen?!
4) Please make Brussels, Loire Valley, Amsterdam, Germany, Czech, Budapest, Austria, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Finland happen within the next 2 months. :( I don't want to be stuck in Rouen!!!
5) I'm so bored. argh.

Dear Zee

I hope you are feeling better now. :( I'm so sorry i can't be there with you, like we always share with each other for the past-i-dunno-how-many-years. but i know that you have a lot of friends with you who can be with you through all these. As long as you can take care of yourself, that's the most important thing. cos u're damn pretty and u'll be able to find someone real soon. and if you decide that i'm THE ONE, i promise to marry you. (that is, if im not married and you're not married by er... 50?) love you babe... biiiiiiig hug.
PS: i dont have alot of photos of u and joyce leh. how come ah? u never send to me izzit? this photo is HOW OLD LA!

NEW YORK NEW YORK

New York is bloody cold. YA, i actually proclaimed that i'm cold. but seriously. it's damn mother f-cold. even when the temp says 6 degrees, which i can endure usually, it's the WIND that makes it so cold. soooo cold that i regretted not bringing gloves. yes roshni.. LAUGH. i actually layered my clothes (didnt even do that in France), nope not with 5 tubes. just 1 tube + 1 long sleeve shirt. haha... only rosh and adrian will understand that. anyway, the good thing is that i have my boyfriend's hands, which were just about the other thing other than my trusty Zara trenchcoat that kept me warm. AND my brown cap. there were even BLACK snow on the floor (not the ones that just fell, the blocks of ice that were there since a gazillon years ago that refuse to melt) but i still think that Europeans generally dress better. in boots and trench coats. the americans mostly wear winter jackets (wind breakers... very practical) and sweat shirts. so kudos to Zara and Mango and Topshop for contributing to the stylo-ness of the average European. :D
Some quirky things i saw on the streets of New York. These are random shots la. But there's a bloody huge M&M shop that if i bring my nieces and nephews there they will go OUT OF CONTROL. cos there's M&M cushions, M&M toys, M&M stationary, M&M in all colours u can imagine... alot of squirrels, i see them alot in Duke also. SUPER cute. an artistic shot i tried to do with the woman standing beside grafitti filled walls (i think she's an employee of some store, but she looks damn hookerish with her cigarette and standing in that pose) and the weirdest is of this round head that wants2bsquare, and proceeds to chop of the sides of him to make it a square. damn bizarre.
Wall Street. Sigh... Reminds me that i have NO internship this summer. other than the fact that most of the banking ones are for Ops (bleah) and that i have no time to do internship anyway, cos i'm only coming back in late June. BUT i shall learn driving. DA JIE, do u want to sponsor my driving lessons? PLEASE? i'm damn broke. ER JIE, if you want you can help to contribute too!
5th Avenue
Isaac told me i should have done some Audrey Hepburn pose in front of the Tiffany and Co. Regretted not doing it man.. but there was this damn excited girl who was posing with her new little blue box and her bf was taking alot of "model" shots for her, so i couldnt bear to seperate her from that sign. WHERE's MY BLUE BOX? hehe... the best thing is that i never dared to enter the store in Taka. but i actually went into the 5th Ave one. hahahhaa.. cheap thrill.
THEN i bought Abercrombie jeans for 70 USD. I know its damn ex la. but it REALLY fits me to the T and reminds me of my trusty cheap jeans that i bought from malaysia for S$20 that i wore for 4-5 years. may this pair of jeans live up to the last pair's legacy, even though it's so many more times more expensive. Adrian i thought of you! nearly called you to ask if you wanted Aber shirts, but i thought of my phone bill and gave up that thought. oops. :S ohhhh but the models wearing the shirts were damn hot. Super good body and damn tanned and very very pretty. but we realise that service is inversely proportional to hotness. the hotter the people, the lazier they are to serve you. so the fitting room staff are not as pretty but better service. oh well. that kinda explains life in a sense right. bleah.
42nd Street: Times Square
I declare this my FAVORITE place. going to Times Square makes me SO EXCITED! there's so many stores and they are all soooooo damn big and the neon lights just make the place come alive! Wish I had more time to explore all the stores though... but if you wanna come to Times Square, devote a WHOLE day to it please!

Entertainment in New York
Chilling at a Cafe in SoHo for very very long... having my New York Cheese Cake, super cheap pizza, super expensive Chicago B roadway tickets (YAY! It was damn good! Thank you baby for sponsoring the tickets, i promise i'll pay for more things when you come to Europe ok?) Super good sushi kindly sponsored by Isaac's dad as part of Isaac's b-day present (Thanks Uncle!) ohhhhhh how can i forget Village Vanguard, which is the place where alot of very good jazz players perform in. Entrance was USD35 EACH though. very expensive. wished there were vocal jazz tho, it's more my kinda jazz. but this is a must go for all jazz lovers... :D

Favorite place in NY: that little cafe in SoHo where we just read magazines and ate cheesecake
Favorite food in NY: the dan dan mian in the chinese restaurant. i miss chinese food!!!
Favorite place in Duke: Isaac's room which is sooooo nicely decorated
Favorite food in Duke: McGriddles! (Hotcakes + Egg McMuffin combined! YUMMMM)
Favorite travelling buddy: Isaac. Of course. :D

DUKE UNIVERSITY @ Raleigh, North Carolina

Duke University is where I stayed for 1.5 weeks. Met alot of good friends (Gordon - super nice guy/ McGriddles buddy, Nachos - going with him to find his gf in Suisse in May, Tanvi - who looks like Lydia REALLY, Donnie - who is suuuuch an ass :P, Taylor, Joe, Megan, Lacey, Eric, Andrew Cheesman - who is damn cool and promised not to corrupt isaac with his alpha male thoughts, Amy, Kim, Tracy...) I really think that i socialised alot more there than i ever did here in France. some excuses can be that we're not supposed to leave our doors open cos its not safe, the canadians and mexicans group together like colonies, the senagalis cant speak english, we cook in our own rooms, the corridor is not condusive to mingle... oh well, there's alot of reasons i guess. but also i think it's because the people in Pegram (isaac's dorm mates) are definitely more open to meeting people, i go to their men's toilet to bathe so theres some form of er... bonding? haha, we congregate either at the corridor listening to gordon's sad stories or isaac's room. and i always feel compelled to just go into one of their open rooms just to say hi. so it's very different. and MOST importantly, people have dinners together. SIGH. that never really happens here, expect for gatherings between me, rosh, fang and alvi. :( that's why i've decided to make an effort to talk to my roommate more (she's from ShangHai and she's reeeeally nice) :D ill be cooking for her tonight.. i can't wait... deprived of that in Duke cos the supermarket is too far/ the organic market is too expensive.

anyway, to sum it up, Duke is NICE. i wish smu was like that. but then again, they pay a shit load more school fees, so i can't complain. and looking at them mug, and then compare it to the french people here who don't study at all, i'll rather mug. ahahahhahaha. (should try to come back to this statement when i start school next term back in good old smu)

Visited: Nasher Musuem of Art/ Sarah Duke Gardens/ Ice-Ball/ Pegram/ MarketPlace/ George's Garage/ Chapel's Hill/ Duke Chapel/ the Loop
Pictures featured: Isaac's cake baked by Amy and Gordon (Awwwww), Duke Chapel, the Gardens, Duke surroundings, a damn posh car to show how rich the kids are (they can drive BMW just to go from one side of campus to the other), Salad (the girls there are crazy about it, while i gorge down pasta, cereals, thai food, sausages all in one meal) and sushi takeaway!!! yummmmmm. i miss Igen (in Siglap, closed down)... :S

ISAAC

When a part of his old home merges with his new home for 2 weeks.

It's the first time we've spent suuuuch a long time together and i bet he was damn worried that we'll be sick of each other, i'll mess up his room so badly that he wouldn't recognise it, i'll eat up all his food points (he made me eat a club sandwich to save on food points, only later he realised he's actually damn food-point rich), and that i'll be too bored. but turns out that i had a FANTASTIC time sleeping in all day long (20 hours everyday) and for the 4 hours i'm awake, i actually clean the room. (actually it's fake. ill never do that again. hehehehehe) and the ice-ball was damn funny. (think alot of american teens making out on the dance floor, dancing to rap in nice pom pom dresses, this one guy even SPREAD OUT HIS LEGS. seriously. oh well, kids.) ohhh, that little orange lily is significant, cos part of my housework is to clean out the pollens which will apparently stain something. so once a flower bloom, i clean it up. that's my "housework". and isaac CHECKS every night.

ok enough gushing about him. next post will be on duke university. :) i'm still picasaing my pictures. :D Does anyone know how to add a comment box?

Bimbs ALERT!

Actually the only bimb is Fang la... the rest of us are damn intelligent. I decided that i would just introduce my closer friends here. before contemplating in what order i would blog about US, Lyon, Paris, Madrid and Barce. SOOO. there's Fang, Alvi baaaaaaby, Rosh my loooove and a Mexican girl that i super like. Loren. she's the one in the middle with damn big eyes. All mexicans are hot la, dammit. annnnnnd of course Isaac, who took care of me, fed me tooooo much and hopefully missing me now in US. :) (er, he's not in this picture)

PS: I still miss you babes! Come back soon!
PPS: I am definitely not forgetting my girlfriends back home: Ade, Zee, Joycey, Yi, Wendy, Adrian, Jo, Cheryl, Hermieeeeeeeee and Chris Zhuo ( i HAVE to put your name here) hahaha.

FRANCE!

Dear all

this is the official FIRST entry of my long-awaited blog. SERIOUSLY. choosing a name is damn tough. and henceforth, i have procrastinated it for a gazillion years. names like ivyandhergoldheels (which is damn bimbo), ivyandcobbledpaths (rosh says someone used it) and ivy-in-france (which would be like anyother singaporean on exchange. i dont care, it has to be special). soooo as i was telling joyce, and now you all, DON'T laugh at my blog name because i decided today that i would not take TOO long to think of one. bleah.

Anyway, i'm in france and some people (SO HAPPY!) have asked me when im EVER going to write a blog. so here it is. a taste of where i've been and maybe and hopefully it'll be detailed enough for anyone who wants to come to europe for an exchange. since i have also read many friends' blogs to find out where to go what and when. (thanks to Gerald and a few others, Rosh's friends...etc)

Love you all!

PS: It's Spring now and the cherry blossom tree outside my window is blooming very very nicely.

Finally, a blog from me.