oof cramps.

ahhh. just had the worst cramps since I got to aussie. ): Skipped dinner, but my lovely mandy and min brought some to me. Thanks my babes!

So anyway, after writhing on the bed for a while, trying to catch my breath.. finally fell asleep. (can never figure if i faint from the pain or fall asleep lol) Took about an hour or so of napping. Felt way better after (: Been watching America's Next Top Model cycle 6 in my room. As you can see, i'm quite bored. ahaha. Just about to watch the final episode after I type this entry.. Just feel so awake even though it's now 1:09am. feeling empowered after surviving the pain just now. gah. AND am excited cos i promised myself i'll head out tmr, even if it's just somewhere nearby. (:

Let's see.. I baked the peanut butter chocolate chip cookies with my babes' help yesterday. Very soft cookies.. but not too bad. Probably gotta add less butter next time tho hehe.

on a random random note, my head looks so small in that photo, i'm wearing a HUGE L-sized guy tee. haha. love it. changed into it cos i freaked out at the huge tyre that used to only be a small muffin top when i wore a fitting top. rahh.

and 2 days ago, i revamped my entire room by organising all my shelves and even my table. Miraculously managed to clear up all the wires flying everywhere on my table.. which is awesome. my room looks great now yay! just need to get the cleaning lady to help me vacuum a little heh. i'm only showcasing my closet shelf here. may not look so diff in photo. but it sure looks finee in person. hehe. and a whole lot more "functional" too. (easier to get whatever i need)

Before

After :D

bakin cookin goodness!

As far as boredom goes, shopping is a good remedy. But baking and cooking is quite a different thing. Just as effective, and potentially cheaper. A lot tastier too. But no good for the triacylglycerides(AM I RIGHT?!) in the adipose tissues. gah. (simply fats!)

So anyways, Mandy, min and I have been planning on baking after exams. 3rd South (where Mandy stays) bought an oven and since SHE doesn't really bake, she figured she could use the help of Qimin and I to make full use of the money she paid for the shared oven. lol.

We went grocery shopping after brunch last Sunday, and I bought a whole buncha ingredients for awesomely cute cookie monster cupcakes. I'd planned on big bird and Elmo as well, but they had no suitable icing and frostings needed.. On that same day, we managed to actually produce them too! Just in time before Gen and Jerilyn left for home (already!)...

Chocolate Muffins Before

Cookie Monster Cupcakes after!

Amazing I know! ;) Thanks to the false fire alarm that went off for the 3rd time that day, we couldn't stick around long enough to realise that the first batch of muffins caved in in our absence!! Which was a terribly devastating ordeal to say the least, cos that meant we didn't have enough "batter" to make enough muffins for everyone, that is including ourselves. SOOOO... we ended up making it for all of our other 12 friends, leaving us with none. Boohoo. We did eat the caved in ones tho, without frostings.. and they were so darn good. So we can only imagine how the cookie monsters really tasted. I absolutely love how there's a mini cookie sticking out of each cupcake! I'm also awesomely thrilled since this finally adds to my collection of baking recipes that I've tried and worked! So watch out for more oreo cheesecake and muffins! (and i'm gonna be trying peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. how awesome?!)

On to some cooking...

Beautiful Boiling Bak Kut Teh :PThe indoor picnic in my room: Bak Kut Teh, Char Kway Teow and Lor Mee.

I cooked the Bak Kut Teh with a bit of help with garlic peeling, can-opening and washing from the girls.. Ana, Ling Chi, Mandy.. Qimin went out so she missed it. I must say it was fantastic! haha. 2nd time cooking it, and this time I added lettuce, mushrooms and quail eggs. Oh my, it was yummy! SLURP!

Peach strudel: Min's masterpiece.

This peach strudel looks professionally-done, except for the slight charring. In fact, it was a very very simple recipe but turned out really great! Min did most part of it, but it's good for all the puff-lovers. (:

That's it for now, I'm planning on the cookies in a few days!

Shopping is always agreeable with the bored.

With exams out of the way, it's been pretty boring around here. Most of my neighbours have gone home, and bits of shopping is done. But mostly staying home and watching series/ movies... one after another. (Which reminds me of the big VOID because we've exhausted all the How I Met Your Mother -HIMYM- episodes we could lay our hands on. sad.)

Aaanywayyy, to the main focus of this post... SHOPPING! Gonna showcase some stuff I bought here in the months.. might be that they're nice or cheap. or different. Also, stuff that i bought recently online. Yes, I've been joining so many SG sprees.. and having my dearest gege (who is btw, not really my bro, nor really a dude. but HEARTS.) receive them for me. excited to be back to collect them from her. heeheeeee.

Denim Vest from Jeanswest - Just bought this at my latest shopping trip at DFO Essendon. Got this at a steal!! Been lemming forever for a denim vest, and I absolutely love that "Braided" border look! It's a tad big for me, but hey! More room for me to grow into. Not that I hope to. Besides this point, I'm also looking for a denim skirt with those exposed zippers? Or perhaps a denim dress with exposed zipper. That'd be yums!

Nude faux snake skin/Patent heels from Target- Now I gotta say, it's hard to find shoes at Target for me. There're usually many on sale, but the designs that I fancy usually do not have it in my size. Which is ALWAYS disappointing. These, however, fit! I love the faux snake skin bit. Just gives that bit of an edge. And hey, I do not have any nude coloured shoes, so this is something. Plus, they were like.. less than $10 I believe. Haven't worn these out yet though. Just not the weather, and not the occasion. In fact, wondering if I should bring these back home.

Bambi long tee/ mini dress from Supre- One of the quirky finds from Supre's sale earlier this year. Am loving it even till this day. Have always worn it as a dress, but wore it as a long tee with shorts here, and I gotta say it looks even better that way. A little sheer, but otherwise, simply too adorable for words. And that isn't a really flattering photo. But i've gained weight. sooo.. shrug!

Koala tee from JayJay's - Much much love. Bought this some time back, love at first sight! The hot pink, hearts and koala. All so me! Gotta check out JayJay's. Funky spot with cool apparels and accessories at affordable prices. Best part is, JayJay's can be found anywhere! The down side is obviously, the not-so-originality due to beforementioned reason.

What else? Spreed for 2 bottles of OPI, a purple - "It's all Greek to me" and an orange! - "Tangerine Scene". Also got a tiny bottle of the poshe quick dry topcoat. Convenient. I'm mighty excited about my orange polish, can't wait to try another bright shade. I wanted to get a nice bright green, but it was sold out. Till next time. I shall be patient.

Among other things, I also spreed for clothes, a whole buncha beauty stuff, wetlook leggings (just yesterday!), rhinestone heart earphones (excites!!)...etc.

Oh yea, i found a site selling GEO lenses in Aussie - Melb, I know they don't sell them anymore in SG. http://www.shoppingnspreeau.com/ So lucky me. Cos i brought my honey wing and blue tricolour lenses here and for some reason hungered for more. Bought the Ash wing (grey) and Black ones which just make my eyes look like strange googly marbles. oh but i kinda like them. LOL! The seller is very friendly and efficient btw. It's still cheap for permanent lenses even though not AS cheap as before when you could get them at $14/pr in SG sprees? that was a tad crazy, admittedly.

See, there's me with the black lenses. Can't really tell yea? (yea right, i'm sure ur getting nightmares now that i told you and u realise the iris just gets bigger with every second of staring lol) Oh, and that was taken on the last day of exams! Happy me went with rainbow hairband just to be as cheery as possible ha.

Oh yea, I'm craving this bag!! I think it's special heh. I got this from http://cleocat-fashion.com/ btw. Wondering if I should start a spree so that I can get their stuff (incl this bag of course). But i'm not sure it's worth the trouble... although I AM gonna be quarantined. so maybe i will have tons of time to manage a small spree when I get back? I also really want the MIU MIU inspired coffer in baby pink I saw.. darn. think i'll just... seal my senses and ignore the callings.

On a totally random note. but completely seriously, I gotta lose some weight. First. not eat that much. Second. EXERCISE. oh for the life of me, why do i feel so crummy now. rah.

rant about melbourne.

Quite often recently, I can be heard saying (surprisingly, explained later) that I made the right choice in coming to Melbourne to study. Well, technically it wasn't a statement that was made specifically pertaining to Melb, more like.. being overseas.



Before coming over (earlier this year), I've always been very very much a homebody. (read: likes to stay at home all day. would rather hermit at home than travel the world altho that'd be nice) Didn't really cross my mind that perhaps I'll be out of Singapore for years at length just to obtain my degree, the thought of it scared me even. Being away, alone, or with people who potentially do NOT like you.. for any reasons; valid or not. I knew too, that I'd miss friends and family, especially my grandma. (thought of her being lonely at home.. seems even worse than me being alone)

So anyways, having been here for a while now. I find it refreshing, the freedom, independence, responsibilities. Oh, and the new culture, meeting new people, being exposed to new things.. and I VERY much enjoy the slower pace here. Sure it gets a little wayyy tooo slowww here, but I'm not complaining cos to me, slower is better than too fast. That's just personal tho. Basically, I think i'm growing up here.. and hey, i'm making friends with all these people i could imagine I'd NEVER have otherwise known.

Yea well, all that aside. I still miss home: the efficiency, night life, food, security. The handling of H1N1 here hasn't been exactly.. effective? in fact, the news headlines are *surprise surprise* NOT H1N1 updates at all. It was at first, and then it was all quiet. I have to hear what's happening in Melb from Singapore. that's just quite ridiculous. And there hasn't been much precautionary measures/warnings given here.. Basically, I don't think they handle many epidemics, and more importantly seeing as this is not fatal, they couldn't care less. Nobody instills that one should protect ourselves/ our community from spread. So everyon'es like "oh bother!"

As a result, Singapore's now much much affected by H1N1 from Melb visitors.. but to be fair, is now spreading from internally. RArgh. In any case, I have to self-quarantine when I get back!! There goes precious 5 days or so! Didn't have many days to start with... oh great! >.<

Wellll. rant's over. more day to day stuff to come!

1 more paper to go and i'm blogging.

Didn't think I'd start out my first post in the middle of exams. But apparently things happen!

So anyways as starters, I'm an undergrad at La Trobe Uni. Doing a 4 year podiatry course, but currently undergoing a common first year (CFY) which is a newly established thingum that like its name suggests, common for all first year health science students. (yea regardless of the discipline we're enrolled in, e.g. speech, physio...)

We just had our most content-based paper today - HBA (human biosciences), and one more to go on Friday.. Seems like people are taking exams as pretty much over. Amusing, particularly because nobody really has a clue as to what to expect for the next paper. Let's just say that unit is.. not very "concrete", it's pretty abstract and the "topics" seems to all revolve around the same thing. Funnily enough, it's also the only paper that is not completely MCQ... now what shall we write in the exam on friday? I don't know, but i'll update :P

I am still developing ideas as to what direction this blog should take. Currently, it stands at "rojak" (which back in Sg is known as a dish that's mixed with all sorts of ingredients), so in this case I mean, the blog will be multi-faceted. But probably will have a majority of vanity / frivolous posts. (Think self-shots, fashion, shopping) Oh, but I could put the fluff away just a tad bit every few. I hope.

There, I conclude my virgin post on daphattack*. xo