A visit to the Zoo

It was Lilian's birthday and we both took leave. But instead of going for her favorite Steamboat treat, she decided to bring Xavier to the Zoo instead. So off we went to MacDonald's for breakfast before heading to the Zoo.

As Xavier knows how to express some of the animals traits when we call the animals out, I wanted to get a video of him doing them all. This video is pretty close with him doing the elephant's trunk, the tiger's roar and the rabbit shake.

Brought along my camera for photo taking but didn't manage to use it much, partly because Xavier is at the stage where he can walk on his own but now wants us to carry him. We actually saw this other couple close to our age or slightly older and they were with two kids (looks like twins), a baby, a twin stroller, a single stroller and that guy had a Canon 5DmkII camera with the big white 70-200mm lens. Hats off to him for being able to handle the three kids and still take photos.

Anyway below are just a few shots taken during our visit. Enjoy.

Xavier pretending to be the evil teddy bear.

One of Xavier's favorite area, where he can see the squirrels running around in close distance.

My mum has taught Xavier that 亲亲 means forehead touching forehead. Well, when he saw the statues, he went to 亲亲 with them. Its one of those moments where your heart just melt and you would just go, "Ohhh, ssooo cute!". The last shot is one of our favorite shots.

Marina Barrage

The weather has been crazy lately. It could be so sunny one minute and pouring the next. Last Sunday the weather was pretty good for outdoor and we decided to check out Marina Barrage, as both of us haven't been there before.

Its a pretty big place with many water features and a big area where many people were flying kites, having picnics or just chilling out. Upon entering the place, an elderly woman asked if we wanted a short introduction of the area and the amenities available. She was a volunteer tour guide. She told us that Marina Barrage is currently Singapore largest reservoir which was new to me. I thought it was still MacRitchie Reservoir. Below is a picture of the Pump House.


Xavier was already eyeing the children play pool where many other kids are playing. As we were not prepared, we only let him play with the water from the side. Nonetheless he had heaps of fun. We literally had to drag him away from the area...



We took a walk around the "spiral" grass area up the top of the Barrage and looking up, the whole sky is littered with kites. Looking ahead, you could see the Singapore skyline and the soon-to-be-completed Sands IR just was the sun was setting.

And our day ended with a surprise visit by MM Lee.

More photos available at my Flickr.

Handyman Xavier finds iPhone fun

We were are Uncle Jeffrey's place and Xavier got dressed up as a handyman complete with helmet and spanner. So cute, Lilian had to take a picture for memories.

Anyway as many of you may know by now, the supposedly Apple iPhone 4G was leaked out by an Apple employee who unintentionally left behind the prototype in a bar. One year ago, I was still snubbing iPhones and wondering why people are going crazy over it. Well I now a happy iPhone user and I can't stop telling people how good and easy it is to use. If I had known how good they were one year ago, I would have bought Apple shares. It was about USD120/share one year ago and its now over USD260/share.

An example of how easy it is to use iPhone?

It's so easy that even Xavier can browse the photos on Lilian's iPhone with ease. So will I ever go back to a normal phone? No. I'm an iPhone convert now.

Uncle Leong Seafood

Had these photos since Dec '09 and totally forgotten about them. Well it was a Saturday evening when my parents came over after buffet lunch. They were too full from the buffet that they didn't really want dinner. Hence I hatch the evil plan of asking them along for crabs, so that they can help look after Xavier while we satisfy our long awaited and very duly missed crab craving. Afterall, there is no way to bring Xavier along and enjoy crabs if its just the two of us.

Uncle Leong Seafood Restaurant is situated a coffeeshop below the HDB block. And in front of it is a very large carpark. Interestingly at the adjacent corner of the large carpark is another coffeeshop where Mellben Seafood is. I was told before that the owner of both restaurants are brothers but I am not sure if its true or not.

Anyway I have always rated Mellben to be better than Uncle Leong. The food is just better. But the wait is a lot longer and crazier. As we only wanted to satisfy crab craving, I decided on Uncle Leong as the queue was more sane. Afterall, you cannot be waiting for over 1 hour to have dinner when you have a baby with you. The baby will probably drive you nuts.

Ordered the Crab Beehoon, Chinese Spinach with Three Eggs (Century Egg, Salted Egg and Egg), and Wu Xiang. I can't recall how they individually taste but overall it was average, nothing to shout about. Maybe that's why I can't recall the taste as it was forgettable. :P

So would I go there again? Yes if I'm not picky on taste that day and just want to satify craving and not queue for long.

Uncle Leong Seafood

Blk 233 Ang Mo Kio Ave 3

#01-1194

S(560233)

Tel: 65543453

Xavier doing the Step Exercise

Xavier finds the stairs a very fun place to play. We adults however don't find it fun. Below you see him going up the stairs and making victory shouts.

Here you see him going down the stairs and not really looking at where he is going.

Here he shows us how the elephant digs his nose.

And how he covers his ears asking us to stop asking him to do the elephant.

Resort World in Black and White

We went to Resort World last month while both of us were on leave last month, just to check out how an Integrated Resort looked like. So we were both acting like tourists, with a camera around my neck and pointing and saying "Wow!" to every little things we saw.

Sadly there were not much to wow about. The four hotels look identical from outside and they looked more like four star hotels. We were most interested in the Hard Rock Hotel as Lilian likes Hard Rock collectibles. Think partly could be that Universal Studios were not open for business yet. Actually I'm not sure if I would go to Universal Studios Singapore when it opens. I mean, the weather is either too hot or too wet to have fun in an outdoor theme park.


Anyway below are some shots in black and white I took over there. Enjoy.

The big Casino sign greet guests as they enter from the carpark entrance.

Nice ceiling decorations in one of the many hallways.

Another nice ceiling decoration, this time resembling the human eye.

"Diamonds are the girl's best friend." Unfortunately, its only crystals here.

Fresh Macaroons anyone?

In the memories of Micheal.

This way to Hard Rock Hotel.

Love all. Serve All.

Path to Hard Rock Heaven.

Poolside chill out hotspot.

Decorative wall of a Restaurant.

Adam and Eve...

Double Bentley for the VVVIPs.

Glass art, like the one at lobby of Bellagio in Las Vegas.

This is the Lake of Dreams. Its in the middle of the FestiveWalk, where most of the dining restaurants are.

Yet to be opened Universal Studios Singapore.

Gigantic Hershey's Syrup bottle. These are actually coin saving bottles.

Earphones in candy packaging. Yummy.

Blackboard drawing inside Chili's Restaurant.

You can see the photos in colour at my Flickr.