Spicy.....

Just created a new dish. I believed I put too much small chilli peppers with the dish. I was sweating like Brent Kwon within 3 minutes. Dripping from head. I thought I had sweated more tonight than my workout this aft. Haha...

Ingredients:
- beans
- garlic, chopped, lots
- obviously small red chilli peppers, chopped
- salt to taste
- a wok really hot with oil

My eyes were watering and I was coughing from the red chilli pepper fume. In the end, we didn't eat all the little red things. We pushed them aside in the dish.

Pasir Ris Park in Singapore

Pasir Ris Park was where we spent out last Sunday morning. It was toward the airport and can be accessed by the Singapore subway. It drops us right at the food step of the park. Quite big. People camp there. There's a mangrove conservation area - with garbage. Too bad. But overall the park is nice. A good place to spend a morning or a day.


Cartoon like explanation of plants in the Mangrove


Pictures from the park





OK, why did the leaders made the kids to play in front of all the garbage cans?

Our favorite Singapore restaurant

Yes, Original Sin is a vegetarian restaurant at the heart of Holland Village. A hip place in Singapore.

We have not been disappointed by this place. Food is expensive though. Meal for two is about CAD$100.00+. Of course, then there's the taxi ride going there and back. So we limit ourselves to only once per visit.

We actually opt for the Fortune Centre more. The whole mall is vegetarian. Food was very cheap. Two bim bim bhop cost about SIG25.00. I can take that. And the portion is big.

Give your head a shake

Round two on my HK company annual return. The address was 66 Queensway at Admiralty. For those that went to HK with me and toured the Shangri-la hotel and Hong Kong Park, that was where the building was located.

I went to the front, the main entrance. As with Hong Kong thinking, it only said the location was on the 14th floor - hill side. Huh? And the elevator only went up to the 5th floor!!!! There were no other signs suggesting how to get to the Hill side! There was no Information Desk at the Official entrance to the building! What, I was psychic? Good thing there was a delivery man. I asked and he said "follow me, I am heading there." So we traveled to the 5th floor on the "Sea Side". Walked thru this narrow corridor with no signs, thru several doors, then up another elevator - one floor! Around the corner, we are now at the lobby of the Hill Side lobby!!! Really! The main entrance was actually on a different Street and NOT on the Official address! Go figure. And who's the dumb ass? I have seen more dumb asses and poor planning this trip.... What happened? Even Shanghai makes them look stupid!

Once I got to the floor, there was no one there. I paid. Collected the receipt. Left. Total time: 3 minutes. The looking for the place and filling out the form took more time than the actual renewal!

Another 5K subsidy

from Macau gov't next year for all residents with qualified Macau ID card. Since I have one, I am qualified.

It was funny listening to people's feedback on the subsidy. All of them interviewed said they will not spend the amount as the gov't would have hoped for. They will save it. The economy is not doing well, spend less. Park more cash in the banks. Blah, blah, blah. The reporter that did this little TV piece said maybe the gov't should credit the amount to utility bills. Hey dummy, do you know how much it costs to do all those computer billing code changes to credit people? It's simpler to grab the qualified residents from the ID database and print cheques. Cheaper. Some reporter. Doesn't even know all the facts.

Today, I saw stores closed that were opened last time I was around. Things definitely are slowing down. Real Estate, forget it. Drop like an anvil. But today, when I was in the bank with mom and dad, there was this guy came in with MOP$3 millions in cash for deposit! No money counting machine was allowed. The teller had to do it by hand! The tellers were trained to feel the paper make sure it is not counterfeit money. We were there for 20 minutes and the poor guy was still counting.

Annual Filing

What a time consuming thing to do!!! I have to file my HK-based company annual return. Took me over an hour! In Regina, this would be only a 5-min job; done, via the Web. Here, I had to seek out the bloody website from Google. Read thru the not so English English. We have Sing-lish from Singapore, now we have Hong-lish! Just trying to figure out which form took me a while.

Here's what I have figured out. If I file within 42 days of the anniversary day, I pay HK$105.00. And I have to use AR-1 form for the first year. And then AR-3 form for the following year! You can download them as Word document or PDF. And you need to type them up. Handwritten form is not acceptable. But the instruction was at the last 6 pages. The entire document contained 18 pages. There were footnotes for each line explaining how to fill out. I have to use both the Chinese and English instructions to understand what I need to fill out. And the bloody silly part was, the footnote numbers were reversed in Chinese and English instructions. Took me a while to figure out! Not sure who was the smart ass.

What a show!

I took a flight from Singapore to Hong Kong today with Cathay Pacific. It's check-in counters were at Terminal 1 at Changi Airport. The oldest terminal out of 3. As I stepped into the airport, I thought I spell urine. Sure enough, it was from the Men's room right in front of the Cathay check-in counter. Either that or the guy in front of me had a serious leak!

The flight was full. I was glad I had my Marco Polo card with me. Was the first to get on the plane ahead of the tour groups.

There were two groups; one from Korea and one from mainland China. Both groups used Hong Kong as the transit airport. What a show I had for 3.5 hours in flight!!! My seat was located next to the Exit and a bathroom on a 777. I didn't think these people knew how to use the toilet door! I could not believe they didn't even know how to check if someone was in, or how to lock it or how to open the door after they were done with their business! It was so comical! I was saying there were people repeatedly having problem with the door. Same people! Thick skull I guess. And then there was this Korean walked up to the toilet door and just kept knocking to try to get in! From the judge of the group of Koreans on board, they must be farmers deep in the DMZ zone. Just coming out for a visit. There were people using the non-usable ashtray on the toilet door as a handle in attempting to open. Stupid!

But very entertaining. However, after a while I thought I was on a dum and dummer plane! Hilarious at first; then my A brain kicked in and my frustration set in. Wine please..... First Singapore HP, then watching this.