A Culinary Adventure with Cmingo

After a crazy exhausting night.. sleeping when the sun had risen, i awoke...
Unable to return to sleep, i went grocery shopping...
I assumed Ray, Ming, Jay, David, and Shirley would be fast asleep with Pok Chien sneaking off back to Leeds alone... haha
Later at about 4 plus i went over to send Shirley off.. a bit of unecessary travelling because i went to the city and then had to go back to the boy's place (THE ROYALS).. .
The send off was.. simply standing at the corner of the street and puting them in a cab.. haha
There was nothing to do after... Cmingo volunteered to cook dinner!@!@!@ haaha... that was gonna be interesting...
I kinda wanted to go home because i didn't wanna deprive the boys of their food~!... They had 2 packs of chicken and there were 5 of us (Ray, Sandev, CHia Ming, Jaycen and ME)
But, nonetheless, i stayed.. decided to nibble.. haha.. (actually i ate lots... hehe)
Soon, Chia Ming was in action chopping, dicing, stirring, mixing and marinating man~!~! He put the marinated chicken drumsticks in the oven and cooked the other bit of chicken with the vegetables (celery and carrots) and another chinese style veggie.. the "pak CHoi".. am i getting the spelling right here..
He didn't really want anyone hanging over his shoulder while he cooked but i was interested to see wat he was up to so i stuck around hoping he'd forget he didn't want anyone in the kitchen or reside to the fact, i was harmless sticking around..
I realized that he really liked cooking. . . well experimenting. . . haha..
The results..
It smelt so good...It tasted good..
My favourite was his chicken with the celery and carrots...:) yummy...
All an all it was a culinary adventure with the ming man and i wonder what he will have in store next:)
Thanks boys for dinner!!!
Come over to my place next week, i'll cook.. we can eat and go for our OSCE practice sessions..~!~!

Glasgow, Leicester and a dash of Leeds

It was the weekend and we were due to get our guests. Shirley (Miss Glasgow), David (Mr. Leicester) and on the next day Pok Chien (Mr. Leeds) were to arrive.
It was nice to see them all after quite a while... well actually Shirley is the one i haven't seen in ages where else David and Pok Chien have been down a couple of times.
On Friday night, after a chinese dinner (as usual... but i'm not complaining)... which had really tiny serving portions and a chicken head on one of the plates, we headed off to find a place to entertain our guests. After wandering the streets for a while with the excuse of showing them about, Raymond, Jaycen, Chia Ming, Sandev, David, Shirley, Yvinne and I settled in Yatra Lounge. I've mentioned this place before in my blog, it is almost the equvilent of Red Chamber in Bangsar, Malaysia. It's a pretty cosy place. We discussed a whole lot of rubbish...
Not to forget, My Friend the Racist was there and thie weekend would actually entail part 3, 4, 5, 6... and all about the comments this boy makes. But it is all in good humour.
The next day we had dim sum, the compulsary trip for all visitors to Manchester "TAI WU" dim sum. There was food, laughter and a cigarette which was dipped in chilli oil. (disgusting huh?)
After wandering about aimlessly ( again trying to show them the city), it was time for the England versus the Rest of the World match. We considered watching it in the city but somehow ended up back at the boys' place.
I wished we could have got tickets to go, what other time in your life would u be able to see so many of these people in real life. The people i would have really like to see is Robbie Williams, Maradona, and Giafranco Zola. Tickets were pretty cheap as well, just 15 pounds but they were all sold outtttttt
Being the pig i am, i was hungry even after the dim sum, so i had bought mac and cheese and my addiction (coffee) before coming to the boy's place. The game started out quite interestingly and funny with a bit of falling and a lot of clumping. BUt it got to be a drag after the first half, .. and i was asleep.
Our guest were then whisked of to be wined and dined.. err.. in KWOK MAN. I restaurant here which really reminds me of Malaysia. The greated thing about this place is that it serves food till pretty late. We bumped into our fifth year seniors there which was nice but made me start thinking about the OSCE examination. . . wow.. i'm worried again now.. i should be studying darn it!@~!~!~! why am i such a procrastinator???????
It was time for drinks, talking and games later than night back at the Royals, a site for many drinking parties. Armed and equiped with their Smirnoff Vodka, JD, Coke, RIbena and their 4 shot glasses. Btw, we've got to get them more glasses~~~
Pok CHien introduced a new game to us. I'll explain the game if any of you want to play it with your friends. I have a video of the explanation, i'll put it up later.. (malas~!~!)

THE GAME
Basically there would be a pile of cards in the middle and everyone would be sitting in a circle (duhh!~!~!) . Everyone would take turns opening a card.
Here's what each card means

Ace - you pick one person to drink one shot
2 - you pick 2 people to drink a shot each or you could be mean and dump it on the same person
3 - you drink 3 yourself (ouch~!~!)
4 - you gotta touch the floor, the last one who does drinks
5 - reach for the sky and of course the slowest drinks.
6 - chicks drink
7 - dudes drink (pok chien refered differently, think about it)
8 - make a rule ( something like, you can only call the person by their last name)
9 - never ever have i .... those who have done that gotta drink
10 - category, name a category and we go around the circle naming things
Jack - Rhyme.. say a word and people say another word that rhymes about the circle
Queen- Only say things in the form of a question. You say a statement, you're drinkkin'
King- this was the killer. The first king, someone fills this cup with alcohol, the second follows and the third does so as well. Unfortunately the person to get the last king drinks the whole thing.
An option was extended, those who weren't into alcohol can still play but were offered a pint of ribena. And if that person were to get the King card, Chia ming imposed a toilet ban for 3 hours.

It was hilarious. David found my surname Pius quite troublesome to call and kept asking if he could call me "PIE". The girls tried to get the guys to drink by giving very feminine categories.
David drank quite a bit and turned so very very red. The boys did try to get us into trouble by giving categories like blizzard games.. WHat???? The only thing that came into my mind was a game with a lot of snow falling.. ."stupId"~!~!
It was actually computer games by bLizzArd. I think Chia Ming actually asked for brand names of ping pong Balls. haahaa... people finished naming those at the third person after him.
The thing that was causing most people to drink was talking to much. They kept calling each other by their first names instead of their surname and getting punished.. something like "haha, raymond drinks"
In rhyming, contestent singh or tan actually said newspaper which was followed by a list of idiotic answers including mine.. blue paper.. haaha (green paper, white paper)..
As time went on, people gave up. . . and went to sleep.
I stayed in the living room.. the whole time... i managed to sleep during that time.. with the noise the boys were creating. The last remaining people in the living room were Pok Chien, Sandev, Chia Ming, Raymond and me. I was outta the game.. i decided to observe them...
I fell asleep and woke up to here one of them .. (no names )... was lying on the ground on the top of the staircase.. haha..
At 5 am, it was time to head home.... 5 am`!~!~! well, that's at improvement, the boys have done this till 9 am before.
What a night~!!!!!!!

My Sunday

Well, after my previous blog on San Carlo. I started craving for their food again so i made it a point to make a reservation for lunch for Sunday. I was thinking about the food. I think from this blog everyone things i eat like a crazy person. Well, i do enjoy my food and i eat well. So, the reservation was for 1 but it was raining so heavily and the tram was so delayed due to the Manchester Marathon i made it there at 1.30. Thank goodness i still had my reservations.
So, now the food. We decided to have the special San Carlo appetizer. I was amazed at the size and the amount of meat on the platter.

me and the giant appetizer platter. . .

the platter up close. . .

For the main course, i had steak. I have personally never really enjoyed steak. I did try one of the best restaurants in Manchester recommended for their steak called the Gaucho Grill but somehow it wasn't to my liking. Maybe others would enjoys it because it certainly was packed but i didn't. However at San Carlo, it was wonderful. I had a side order of some vegetables. It was all buttery and herby. The vegetables at San Carlo are really really good. I'm recommending it to all of u once again. The steak had a delicious smell and taste with a juicy bite and a burst of flavour into my mouth. Wow~!

I had to stop for a picture but i wanted to get back to my food.

my lovely sirloin steak which i was working my way through. and my delicious vegetables below

i do love my food. . .

Okay okay, enough about my delicious lunch. After that i went to meet up with Siok Lee (our guest from Dublin, Ireland) and the other Mancunians at the Arndale Centre. After that, we headed to the Dutch Market which was taking place in St. Ann's Square. They had the cheeses, the candy, the pancakes, beers and more. I was too full to indulge in any of that.

It was drizzling all day... of course there were moments of sunshine. So well, after the Dutch Market, we went to Yatra Lounge. I lounge that is quite similar to Red Chamber in Malaysia in this alley in St. Ann's square area. It's a real comfy lounge with a modern day jukebox. Or at least we made as a modern day jukebox. They had a plasma screen (i think) with the windows media player on it with a mouse (duh~!) where u could select ur own songs. See, a free modern day jukebox. There is a nice VIP are there which would be pretty nice for parties but this time none of use braved to go there. Haha, there was a couple getting hot and heavy in there. We knew that because one of us (not mentioning who) stumbled upon them.

Since Siok Lee had not seen the curry mile of Manchester yet, we took her there to "Pink Garlic" for dinner. It was a yummy dinner. from my previous blog, MY FRIEND THE RACIST,

here's : MY FRIEND THE RACIST (part 2)

In an indian restaurant. Once again he said his joke about the indian and the bucket of shit. You can view the joke in "My friend the Racist (part 1). What a dinky headed boy.. that's another clue for u. Clue number one was in the first part. To narrow it down to enable mystery solving of the case of "My friend the Racist", i will let u know the people who were there at dinner

1. Jason

2.Siok Lee

3.Raymond

4.Charlene (me)

5. Mikael

6. Sandev

7. Stephanie

WHO DO YOU THINK IT IS???

Missing persons:-

Raymond was taking the photo. Chia Ming was in Dundee and Yvinne was at home.

Barcelona Easter Break 2006

BARCELONA

Whilst the rest of the Manchester gang (Ray, Ming, Jay and Yvinne) were bar-hopping and bed-hopping (hopefully not) in Amsterdam, i had gone to Barcelona, Spain ( a trip i had planned for a very long time). I faced the normal problem of budget airline tickets. A late arrival and and an early departure. But i did fly the best budget airlines - FlyMonarch. I wanted to travel directly to Barcelona from Manchester.

So, i arrived in Barcelona, checked into the hotel and was in Placa de Catalunya by 8.30pm on a Sunday night. For dinner, we decided to have some tapas in the most brightly lit restaurant in the area. The owner helped us with our ordering and brought us an array of tapas he thought would be to our liking. The food was delicious, it was all seafood. . . yum yum

After that we wandered the streets of Barcelona before calling it a night. We had to make the most of our trip after all. We stumbled upon a Bar...called Ba Ba Reee Ba. Once again.. another brightly lit place... which we were drawn to. In our greed for Spanish food, we ordered some Seafood paella to take back with us. Believe me, this was the best paella i had the entire trip. I ate every little grain of rice there was is the plastic takeaway container.

Ba Ba Ree Ba, Barcelona, Spain

After a good night's rest, it was time to visit Barcelona. The first destination: La Sangrada Familia. A church which involves the work of Gaudi. It was a beautiful structure. Very impressive. It is more beautiful form the outside as the inside is still under construction. The doors to enter La Sangrada Familia were very unique. It had a lot of writing on it. The stain glass that was found inside the church was beautiful. I have always like stained glass in churches. I've admired them since i was young. In La Sangrada Familia, you could take a lift and a walk along a scary narrow spiral staircase to reach the very top. It was incredibly narrow. But it was worth it because what a view it was from the top.

By the time we finished visiting La Sangrada Familia, my feet were starting to kill me. In an attempt to be a stylish tourist, all i had brought with me were gorgeous heels. They lasted about a night and then started to blister my feet. At this point, i was desperate to buy another comfortable shoe. Any shoe would do. To my horror, nothing was open. All stores were closed as it was Easter Monday. So I had to just carry on my journey...

Next destination : Park Guell

Park Guell was another work of Gaudi architecture. Another train ride and we arrived there. I was horrified to find out that Park Guell was a great distance from the train station itself. . . or maybe it seemed that way to me because of my aching, blistered feet. I dragged my feet as we walked there. And suddenly.. there it was... an open Chinese shop selling all sorts of things. I rushed in and was trying to explain "slippers" to them but they seem to speak spanish. wow~!!!

When they understood me, they guided me to the section and lo and behold, there they were "japanese slippers". It wasn't the classic white and blue ones but a slightly more funky one which would do. After getting my slippers, i happily .. practically skipped to Park Guell. It was a very interesting park with quite a bit of structures and delicate work. There was this sandy area which overlooked Barcelona and there was an edge that was made to appear like waves with a lot of seating areas for visitors. I managed to catch a quick cat nap for about 20 minuts because i was so comfortable at the park. Then, i continued walking around taking it all in.

After Park Guell, it was already time for dinner. So, we headed for Port Olympia or Olympic (confusion) for a seafood dinner by the beach. There was an entire row of restaurants there and we had great trouble deciding which one to pick. At each restaurant there was some sort of promoter encouraging us to come to their restaurant to eat and throwing in all sorts of deals. Finally we decided on one. He offered us a set dinner including appetizers, desert, a main course, wine and more. The food was alright but the quantity was great and the atmosphere was pretty nice. A couple of interesting things happened that night. One was that there was this group of people going around collecting money from people at our table for someone from their group to travel back to somewhere. We didn't really understand them but we we gave a little bit of money and we were cheered on when we did. Later the man returned to the table again and tried to explain to us about it. At one point we thought maybe they were collecting money to sponsor our dinner. . . stupid thought. At the end of the dinner, a man who appeared to be tha manager brought over two bottles which were very similar to the bottles i have seen in my secondary school chemistry lab except that this bottles were not even labels. Along with this bottles were shot glasses. Finally after a peculiar conversation with him we figured out that it was some form of alcohol. We were very suspicious of it because we were the only table being offered this free unidentified alcohol. One of the boys at the table was smart. He was Pak Seng. What he did was to offer a shot of the alcohol to the manager himself and see if her drank it. Once he did, the rest at the table started to have their shots of the wierd concoction. After having had the shot, the manager started bring bottles of alcohol to the table. Not the wierd kind but the "sold in stores, labelled, available in bars for a price" types. It was strange. Nothing in life was free. At some point we returned the bottles to him. We were never charged for it. Soon it was pretty late and we headed home to get some rest so that we could have a fresh start the next day.

The next day...

The only thing on my mind that morning was shopping. I love ZARA as all of you know and i was in SPAIN. I'll get to the shopping later. We had to have breakfast first. So we headed to what we were told was a seafood breakfast market. In no time we were at the market "Le Merqat la Boqueria". It was colourful, exciting and full of the hustle and bustle of the local spanish people. After all it was their market. It was the first time in my life i had seen such a clean market. Although as any other market it was full of raw mean and seafood, it did not have any bad smell. There were a couple of stalls where people could have a spanish breakfast. I never every thought i'd be able to eat in a market.

Before sitting down to have breakfast, i walked around for a bit enjoying the sights. The pictures explain it all. I couldn't resist taking a photo with the chillies because of my love of chillies and spicy food. The fruits was so yummy looking and colourful as were the vegetables. There even were rambutans. However, they were indeed the saddest looking rambutans i had seen, they were shrivelled and almost de-rambuted. haha.. I think i even saw a dragonfruit. There was more seafood that meat on display. It was all so fresh. I even think the eggs are larger in size.

Soon, i sat down at a little stall. It was actually a bar in the market and they even served beer for breakfast. I had an expresso. I was determined to try many different coffees there. Having already had the cappucinno, it was time for the expresso. In my coffee madness. ANyway, i had breakfast. It was many little plates of many little prepared food... tapas again i guess but the selection was different it being breakfast and all.

After filling my tummy up, it was time for shopping. There were quite a few ZARA's and MNG's it being Spain and all. We went to Passeig de Gracia, the main shopping street in Barcelona carrying all the great brands. It is a very beautiful street and i would love to live there. I actually saw this apartment complex called 15, Passieg de Gracia. What a thrill it would be to live there. You walk out and it's shopping central. Anyway, back to my shopping, I went to MNG and to the biggest ZARA i could find and many other shops. I also couldn't resist taking a photo outside LOEWE. I first heard of LOEWE in Malaysia and i had started using their perfumes then. Not many people had heard of it. When i came to Manchester, i had great difficulty in purchasing it. When Lena, Esther and Pei Kheng and gang went to London i actually asked them to pick it up from Harrods. Now i have found the one store that carries it in Manchester but yeah, in Spain, i couldn't resist being a tourist and taking a picture outside LOEWE.

shopping in MNG Barcelona in Eurossss~!~!

ZARA

As i was wondering around the shopping street i stumbled upon a tourist attraction site i was meaning to visit. The Casa Milla, another work of Gaudi. It was an apartment complex with an extremely unique design. For the purpose of tourist visits, they had preserved some of the apartment complexes with all the antique decorations and furnitures. It was quite interesting to see that. But the greatest thing was the design of the rooftop area. The structures and the view was simply breathtaking.

beautiful structure of Casa Milla

Next destination : Barcelonata.. a Beach in Barcelona!!!

I was so excited because it has been more than 6 months since in set foot on a beach. When i arrived there, the weather was perfect! It was warm and sunny with a mild crisp cool breeze. I instantly rolled up my jeans and headed for the waters thinking "why didn't i bring my swimming attire??" But as soon as the first waves crashed around my calves, i changed my mind. It was freezing cold. I couldn't believe it. After a while i got used to it and within minutes my entire jeans was wet. I wanted to dry off and lounge at the beach so i had to get some chairs from the guy who was renting them out. I knew i had to get em because a wet jeans and sand on ur bottom combo is a no no. While relaxing, we noticed a bunch of other Malaysians. They went ahead and got themselves some chairs and sat down because the " boss " who was renting chairs wasn't around so they probably didn't know they needed to pay for it. The when the "boss" came back and asked them to pay, they returned the chairs instantaneously. haha. Relax people, enjoy yourself, you've paid so much to come for a holiday. Enjoy urself. ANyway, after drying up i went back to the water. Then, i saw in a distance, the Malaysians had started sitting in our chairs again.. the nerve.. my goodness. When we returned, the reluctantly moved off looking particularly sore. I just don't get some people. All and all the beach was marvellous.

fun fun fun

me in a wool jacket on at the beach.. haha cool breeze

After the beach, once again i was hungry. So we went wondering about the many restaurants along the beach on a quest for food. We settled at this little restaurant which once again i can't remember the name. I had a seafood platter! Must enjoy that seafood in barcelona. It was quite cheap as well... a grilled seafood platter.

my grilled seafood platter

After the beachside afternoon, we headed back to the city centre to Placa de Riyal for dinner and Flamenco dancing. We had dinner in this restaurant that was recommended by the other IMU folk who had been there. The food was pretty good in a very nice surrounding but i was way too full after my platter.. whoopsie.

all of us after dinner

Then we went to watch some Flamenco dancing to complete the experience of spain. It was absolutely AmAzing~!~! The speed the music. It was pretty cramped and dark in the place were with a small crowd in a small place but it was so much fun. The girls are so good at dancing.

flamenco dancing

After that, we called it a night... I was going back to Manchester the next day. i just couldn't resist going to La Merqat De Boqeiria before going to the airport and so i did. I went to have some churros and choclate which was so delicious i'm craving for it this very minute. I was so sleepy though but i forced myself. You can see by the puffiness in my eyes as i dip my churros in my hot hot thick chocolate.

me, my churros and the hot thick chocolate ur supposed to drink once ur done dipping ur churros

Still trying to take more of the food in Barcelona, i went back to the breakfast bar and had some spanish ommeletes and all sorts of other assorted goodies. Then it was time to head back but i took a couple of pictures along the way at Placa de Catalunya.

at the underground rail

Placa de Catalunya

Soon enough, we were back on a plane to Manchester. Barcelona was a great place to visit. However i think 3 days are not enough. 4 or 5 days would have allowed me to cover more places. Before leaving Barcelona i did not forget to get my Barcelona FC shot glasses. It was an awesome trip. I can't wait for my next trip:)

St. Mary Magdalene

St. Mary Magdalene

The movie the Da Vinci Code was released in cinemas yesterday. I went to watch the movie with some friends. I had not read the book because i always thought there wasn't much of a point in reading it. But, time and again i saw many people become very taken up by the book. I am a Catholic and i would see it in a different light ... a clearer light because i was brought up catholic.
I have bought the book and started reading it. Many say that the movie did not do justice for the book. I don't know about that just yet.
One thing that people need to know about faith is in Hebrews 11:1 which states "Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen". God is there for us. The movie claims many things. There are many people questioning things they still can't understand. None of us are theologists and even so, people interprete things very differently. The book is fictional. The storyline used is gripping and thrilling to many but very offensive to the catholic religon in my opinion. However, to see things the way everyone else sees it, i had an open mind while watching the movie and did not allow myself to judge it knowing what i know.
Let me share with everyone some information about St. Mary Magdalene.
St. Mary Magdelene was called "the Penitent". The feast day for St. Mary Magdalene is the 22nd of July. St. Luke records that she was a notorious sinner, and had seven devils removed from her. At Our Lords' Crucifixion, she was there with Joanna and Mary, the mother of James and Salome, at Jesus' empty tomb. Fourteen years after Our Lord's death, St. Mary was put in a boat by the Jews without sails or oars - along with Sts. Lazarus and Martha, St. Maximin (who baptized her), St. Sidonius ("the man born blind"), her maid Sera, and the body of St. Anne, the mother of the Blessed Virgin. They were sent drifting out to sea and landed on the shores of Southern France, where St. Mary spent the rest of her life as a contemplative in a cave known as Sainte-Baume. Her only food was the Holy Eucharist given to her daily by angels. She died at age 72 and was miraculously transported just before she died to the chapel of St. Maximin. There, she received her last sacrements.
When Mary Magdalen first met our Lord, she was a very well known sinner. Someone who was very beautiful and very proud. After meeting Jesus, she no longer felt very proud and beautiful but instead she felt great sorrow for her evil life. When Jesus went to supper at the home of a rich man named Simon, Mary came to weep at His feet. Then with her long beautiful hair, she wiped His feet dry and anointed them with expensive perfume. Some people were surprised that Jesus let such a sinner touch Him, but Our Lord could see into Mary's heart, and He said: "Many sins are forgiven her, because she has loved very much." Then to Mary He said kindly, "Your faith has made you safe; go in peace." From then on, with the other holy women, Mary humbly served Jesus and His Apostles. When Our Lord was crucified, she was there at the foot of His cross, unafraid for herself, and thinking only of His sufferings. No wonder Jesus said of her: "She has loved much." After Jesus' body had been placed in the tomb, Mary went to anoint it with spices early Easter Sunday morning. Not finding the Sacred Body, she began to weep, and seeing someone whom she thought was the gardener, she asked him if he knew where the Body of her beloved Master had been taken. But then the person spoke in a voice she knew so well: "Mary!" It was Jesus, risen from the dead! He had chosen to show Himself first to Mary Magdalen, the repentent sinner.
I hope the information i share with you all will enlighten everyone about St. Mary Magdalene.
My interpretation of this is simply that the Lord loves all of us. Even though sometimes we sin, as long as we know that we have done wrong, feel sorry for what we have done and try not do it again and last but not least LOVE the Lord, the Lord will always love us and bless us. It is never too late to change for the better. It does not mean once you have wronged, the Lord will never want you. We are all His children.
May Almighty God Bless you.

*the information i have shared with you if from a catholic.org*

San Carlo, My Dessert and Me...

the dessert

me

San Carlo, Manchester

San Carlo Dinner

I tried out a restaurant in Manchester the other day. It is a very highly recommended italian restaurant in Manchester called San Carlo. I has delicious food, and a beautiful environment and it always has a full house.
<--- That's me and my starter... it was asparagus roasted with cheese and sun dried tomatoes, it was so delicious~!~! my mouth's absolutely watering thinking about it... (for all of u out there who don't like vegetables, try this and you will fall in love with it)

Then, there was the main course, i picked something .. wait a minute, i can't even remember it now. But it was chicken and it was some sort of traditional dish... it looked very plain on the big white plate but it was very tasty. It came with a side order of bacon and potatoes cooked to perfection. The chicken was sitting kinda perfectly in the sauce... (yes the creamy sauce) but as the waiter put it down, it kinda slid in the plate... hence the sauce trail and imperfection of the photo.... (goodness i'm so hungry now)

Next i moves on the to desert... it looked so beautiful, i don't think it was to be eaten. It should have been frozen and kept on display. However i felt about it, my appetite preceeded me and i ate it all.. (haha)... and i i've been saying about the food in this place, it was delicious...

I can't wait to go back there for a meal again... and if any one of you come down to Manchester and wanna try it out.. gimme a call, i'll take you there... and we can have a meal... :)