Jap Restaurant

We finally found a Jap restaurant near our place tat serves SEMI decent Jap food.. BUt leh, at a high cost lah...

We discovered it by chance when our fren WL brought us to a fruit shop to try an interesting dessert called Mango Cream:P
Here is the sushi that they served Ace. That's like $6.50 sing for just two pieces of sushi lor...


japanese salad.. I just love the jap salad sauce...

My udon noodles with soup.. unfortunately the jap chef was on leave tat day. So alot of things not avail. Like there was no inari.. and so they replaced my udon noodles inari with fried toufu.. but the taste of it was ok still i guess:)


We ordered this brinjal thing which turned out to be some deep fried brinjal thingy... is quite good if I may say.. just a little bit oily.. but hor, I am thinking maybe we just baked it instead might taste quiet good.. anyway, i twas just miso paste on top of the brinjal that was deep fried... I really hope to get my hands on some authentic miso paste here.. currently I am using the bean paste I find in Chinese supermarkets... but this bean paste is i guess only good for making soup as miso replacement.. can seem to do the other things as it does not have the nice after taste of miso paste... rather has a smelly smell of the beans....


But all the money you paid means got freebie lah.. we got this free dessert and a free cup of fruit punch:)

Max says must take photo like tat then look nice...

Anyway i am recently sort of "researching" on japanese cooking. I always loved watching the japanese variety show called 25 hours.. they always have those apparently fast and good receipes to make good food but they are always too fast for me to follow.. by end of the show, I can't even remember 10% of the steps...

So since I am free here in Dubai, I have been going online to find episodes and transcribing the receipes tat interest me... so far have about upteen receipes... tried out about four of them (dandelion fried rice with egg, bean sprout pizza, okara chocolate cake, ice cream french toast) and only the bean sprout pizza failed.. and it is mostly cos unlike the other reciepes, they did not show the full list of ingredietns and amounts to be used and I had to guess... the rest were simply delicious! I din have all the ingredients in my kitchen so I just replaced or never add... but they were still delicious:) I thank my japanese teachers in NUS...hahahaha.. thank god for them, the internet (cos i forgot most of the katagana characters I learnt and had to use an online chart for reference) and my best buddy, GOOGLE TRANSLATOR:) hahaha.. couldn't have done it without them.. cos the show was in jap.. with chinese subtitles but all the reciepes were still written out in japanese!

I am still wondering if i should posts these online since I think they have so many good ideas, I was wondering if anyone else is like me and keen to find out about the receipes and have proper records so that they could try them...

PS: I was inspired by the jap dish of brinjal tat i tried out this new fried brinjal receipe (top left hand corner of pic) and it worked! very yummy! yipee! Happiness.. one more dish to add to my daily meals...

Previous Post: Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween

Schooling here is a little different.. Back in Singapore, only the teenagers are happy about halloween and only adults and teenagers are

Initially, he wanted to be a monster.. and then he kept changing his mind... when we finally found a shop tat sells all sorts of costumes, he spent 20 min inside JUST TO DECIDE what he wanted to buy but leh, end up also no surprise..no prizes for guessing wat outfit he opted for in the end....

He is so excited that immediately upon reaching home, the first thing that he wanted to do was to put on his outfit.. and afterward.. everyday after school he would play with this policeman outfit...

When the day of the party came, he was super excited lor.. the moment he reached home, he went to bath! Usually you have to ask him to bath like 3 times before he will really go.. hahahahha..... and once he is ready, he keeps asking me when daddy will come home to fetch us to the party...



One more pic before we go:)

The school was quite nicely decorated, there were ghostly balloons and pumpkins all around...

They even did up the play area and made cobwebs and coffics, hanging ghosts etc using watever they have in the school!:)


The nost popular costume for girls is a female vampire.. I am not so sure if it is because of the popularity of all the vampire related movies and books.. the boys leh, alot of them are like this little boy.. just in their own clothes but with cuts and blood painted on them:)

And so, there is nothing for us parents to do there but WAIT AROUND.. so we camwhore lor:)

Witches and Fairies are the second most popular outfits for girls:)

Some of the parents who came to help out were dressed up too:)

Guess what game is Ace playing?

The little boy in front of ae in black dracula robe is Ace's classmate... Ace looks like he is 1-2 years older with his height:)

Instead of Pin the Donkey, they let you pin the face onto the skeleton:)

I camwhore adn take pics of Max so he asked me to STOP:) hahaha...

Ever since Ace found his classmate Dominic, he just stuck to him and basically plays with him and stick to him all the time.. and then we disappeared from his world.. cept when he needs us to help get him a drink or wat... so since we very bored, I took pics of some interesting costumes they had:)

The skeleton brothers:)

Many people just rip their old uniforms apart and put fake blood on them and wear them.... this is the girl's version...
This is the boy's version in school PE attire... But actually, my main focus of the photo is the Super Mario lor.. look like the real mario right?:P hahahaha

Someone dropped a bloody finger??:P Wonder if it is the MIDDLE one.. wahahaha...

This "Tinkerbell" even sprayed her hair green:)

Note the height difference again.. Ace seems awkward around them.. but he just loves to play with them:) I noticed that he very pally with them and is quite a touchy feely person.. he will put his hands behind their back and to get their attention back to the game, he will hold their arm.... no wonder he wants to hug hug at home all the time... hahahaha:) I think Ace's language of love is TOUCH:)

This is the boy's fav game.. you just dip your hand in and get a free toy.. everyone gets a prize and you can play N times.. so he went and got two jellys, two lollipops and one white spider...

I nothing to do so ask Max to pose with the spider:) hhahahah



Then they had a best dressed competition and made everyone go up and do catwalk on stage.. these are the younger kids...

I love this spiderman lor.. he is so petite but the muscles so big... VERY CUTE! :)

This is nmy neighbour Audrey... now my best fren in the building now cos she loves my iphone and the Angry Bird and Talking Tom... wahahahahaha:) She is only two years old..

Another toddler... so cute.. too bad he was moving so fast i cannot get a good pic:)

There was this best dressed family.. wah.. really put in so much effort lor.. Dunno where they get their costumes.. I figured.. this is how Elvis Presley would look like if he were a vampire..wahahaha.. and what did they win for all the effort? One SMALL bar of kit kat.. wahahahah...

Happy to win two lollipops.. Ace said the white skeleton one is his.. he gave the other heart shaped one to me... But today as I was writing this, he found the heart shaped lollipop and said he wanted to eat.. so he said he wanted to take it back liao... hai...:S

Ace and Dominic eating lollipop...

A sneak peek into Ace's classroom...

Let's take some photos before we leave:)



The school catered dinner for the children.. It is made up of a piece of pizza, a packet of chips and a packet of fruit juice... I think in SGP, they would have gotten like bread or something with a drink like ribena or yakult without the chips.. Later they even recieved a donut as a snack...

The difference between ang moh culture and asian culture.. the ang mohs were just happy to sit around and picnic on the school grounds....

While the asians (phillipinos, indians and chinese-that's us) were all huddled round the tables:)

This is the "we are so hungry look" :P

They had leftover pizzza but we wanted to eat something else so we declined:)

It's quite a pleasant experience though...

We ended the day with a wonderful dinner at a Korean restaurant.. YUMS!

PS: On a different note, I just wanted to mention this cos it is not long enough to make one entry in the blog... Ace broke my fav hairband and when I asked him to say sorry and accepted his apology with "Ok, now go and brush your teeth.." he started sobbing and saying how sorry he is again for breaking my hairband. I hugged him and told him it is ok.. he can buy me another one if he really feels that bad and he cried even harder..."I got no money..." he sobbed. Wonder if he is crying over the possible loss of money.. hahaha

PPS: We went to outlet mall and I saw a beautiful hairband and asked Ace if it looked nice and if he could buy it for me as a replacement for the one he broke.. he looked distraught and tried to run away and kept saying, :"But I got no money!!" Max says maybe we should give him some pocket money to learn how to manage money... one of which is save up to replace mummy's hairband.. wahahahaha;)

Previous Post: My Little Arabic Teacher

My Little Arabic Teacher

In Dubai, all schools are required to teach Arabic as an extra subject.

One of my worries about Ace is that he might not be able to catch up on his Arabic since this is his first year in school. What made me worry even more is that he would come home and exclaim excitedly that there is arabic lesson today... but when you asked him what it meant, he wouldnt really be able to answer you..

My own understanding of the arabic language is merely limited to 4 phrases "asamalekom" (good day) and "inshallah" (if got permits) and "shukran" (thank you).. and "halas" (finish) and so, I was not much help either;) Max, having worked here for a year and a half is also half a pail of water lor:)

There were weeks where Ace came back with some sounds like "La too ti... ta too ti" but ask him what he means and he shakes his head... wahahahaha:)

But well, since it is not like a subject requirement in Singapore and that he seems to enjoy his lessons quite well.. i left it at that lor..

About a month later though, he came back from school one day and told me that he knows how to say Mother and Father in Arabic.... According to Ace, the word Mother is "Omi" and the word Father is "Abi'...

So if you say my mother, you say "Ma Umi", and my father would be "Ma Abi"

And then about a week later, he told me that he found out that arabic words actually go from right to left instead of left to right.. gee, that is something I never noticed despite seeing countless signs and subtitles on TV in arabic...

And then yesterday, my son came home and told me he knows how to write the word for DOOR in arabic.. cool huh:) He can even sing Happy Birthday in ARABIC.. steady boh??:P

Here's a video of him singing the birthday song in arabic:


So we have given him the post of Arabic teacher in our house.. wahahaha;)

PS: ANyway, in case you are interested in the arabic alphabet song that Ace was singing at the start.. here is a youtube video of it... Ace cannot remember the whole song.. just the first four letters.. hahaha:)


Previous Post: The Fire Drill...

The Fire Drill...

Last year, when I visited Max in Dubai, were were staying in a different apartment. In my 5 weeks there, I have only encountered the fire drill once and it happened in the middle of the day when me and Ace were just hanging out in the living area....

The drill was quite serious one lor.. got security guard come up to our apartment and knock the doors one by one shouting.. "Firedrill, fire drill... please gather downstairs..."

But leh, I was really wearing my at home nua lok kok clothes and so i decided to continue to stay in the apartment.. wahahahaha.. pretend we were all not at home.. hahahha... so it was sort of an non event...

Now, we are actually staying in a NEW apartment.. one tat is newly built according to Max... and I dunno if it is because we have overzealous security guards or that they just like to press the firealarm bell for fun because in my 7 weeks in dubai, I have already gone through like 4 fire drills!

The first one happened in the middle of the night at around 12 mid night lor.. Ace was zzzing, max was out drinking with his kakis and I was suddenly shocked right awake.. cos I was just almost drifting into dreamland when the bloody alarm rang.. and it is this really shrill sharp beeping that actually hurts your ears...

The best part is, my good son slept through it all.. never moved a muscle throughout.. Just to be safe, I went out, opened my door and waited to see if there is smoke or anyone giving any news... to my surprise, all my neighbours were doing the same thing as well... and so, this is the very first time that I see all my neighbours living in the same storey... there are 7 families here and really, other than the girl who goes to Ace's school.. I havent really met any of the other families...

I now know tat directly opposite me is an elderly indian couple (no wonder always got curry smell)... on my left side is indian family with two children.. one of them is baby and the mummy is a tall slim, pretty lady.. opposite the indian family would be the girl who goes to Horizon School as well and their family.... and then furthur down the hall are two more pinoy families.. one with kids, one without kids... and right at the end is another indian family... so we are sticking out like sore thumbs.. being the only chinese in this whole building:) (the maid of the family who goes to same school as Ace actually told me that she thought we were PRC... gee, most of the time pple think we are pinoys or japanese..:))



Anyway, the tall slim lady on our right called the guards and found out it was a false alarm.. the elderly couple got so upset they went downstairs to scold the guards.. but seems like their scolding is not effective lah..

The very next day.. the alarm rang again... this time it rang at around 6pm.. and i was having a nap together with Ace since it was weekend and i was all tired from my late nights... initially when I heard it, I was thinking why is my alarm ringing and I just ignore it and continue to sleep.. (that is how tired I was...) and then the shrill ringing really got to my ears and I finally woke up when it rang again for the second time...

I opened the door and there my neighbours were again..

Anyway, somehow whenever it rings, Ace is sleeping.. it rang again one day over the weekend while Ace is taking a nap.. and as usual, my son is still sleeping.. i still open my door to check what is happening but so far, I think that is the most anyone will do.. i think they fire alarm so often tat one day if really fire hor.. we all sure burnt to death...cos it is like story of boy who cried wolf...

Today, the alarm rang again in the afternoon and Ace exclaimed to me, "What is that, mummy.. so loud ah.." I laughed out loud and told him it is a fire alarm.. i reminded him that even though it is loud, he slept through it 3 times! hahahahahaa....

Anyway, based on my observation, there is this pipe at the ceiling of the carpark at level 1... and the pipe is always leaking.. the whole ceiling around the area already showing signs of leaking water on the ceiling, there is a whitish thing coming out of the pipe like a staglamite... and there is a permanent small pool of water where the pipe is dripping water... I wun be surprised if one day the pipe burst or the ceiling give way.. that is likely more cause for concern than a fire.. hahahaha... So much so for a NEW building....

Previous Post: Go The Fuck To Sleep