HK Island

I thought this is one of nicer shots I was able to take on the ipad. It's no hi res but thumbnail looks pretty crisp haha 

There are so many lights from so many buildings - this tiny little island is just packed, over-populated and over-developed. Mesmerizing though at times. I think this part is the nicer section, if I walk further east, the buildings were not as nice or interesting. 

And here's a crisper one taken by Nokia Lumia. There was one nite when we had outdoor dining at BLT steakhouse which overlooks the harbor, they shone green laser from one of the buildings which was really awesome.

First Impression of Shenzhen

My colleague and I took a bus from Tsim Tsa Tsui all the way to the border, went thru immigration and bus drop us off at the station. Our driver was waiting for us at the parking lot. And the first thing that caught our attention was this - meats hanging or drying by the fence in a quite busy area since it's close to the station and all. Perhaps the dust and traffic pollution give extra flavor...

DimSums in SP and HK

Gotta say our SP dimsum is not so bad compared to the ones we have in LA or even HK. Actually some dimsum places in LA, especially those outside of Chinatown really sucked.

The one in SP, mom and papa took me to his friend's establishment near the swamps. It doesn't look much but we were stuffed after we were done, and owner came to sit and chat with us - it was a week before CNY and there weren't too many patrons. He offered us the sweet stuff for dessert. The char kuih kak was out of this world! Every bit reminds me of how much I love char koay teow

While in HK, my colleague took me to Din Tai Fung for lunch/dimsum. What I noticed a common theme between the two is there are no more carting around to offer you food. Everything is made to order, well I should say heated to order.

This was shared between two people and we were stuffed. Everything was really good especially the spicy shrimp wonton. I just love all the noodles in HK, they taste so fresh, flavorful and delicate than the ones I'm used to.

Ah Ma's Baked Beans

I've always been a big fan of Ah Ma's home cooked food and baked beans are one of them that I am able to replicate because it's really easy.

Brought to work many times and it's become a fan of co-workers. So whenever I make one, I'd bring to work to share with them. Proud to let them know that it's my Ah Ma's recipe. Ah Ma's version usually use ground pork but I use ground chicken these days and I love lots of eggs with mine.

Good great with toast or rice!

2nd batch this week due to demands :)

Limekiln Trail

Haven't gone hiking for ages - used to go almost everyday after work with JP and also weekend. But now that we have planned our two weeks vacay in Mexico, time to get into some sort of decent shape hah!

Saw this after one of the hikes, grabbed my phone and snap away. Beautiful colors, isn't it?

Samba Brazilian at Universal Studios City Walk

This past Sunday was our last weekend to use coupon for Samba. It's all you can eat Brazilian BBQ within 2 hours. Regular price if I'm not mistaken is $42/person. Coupon was 50% off. We've purchased a similar coupon about a year back and it was a fun experience since the restaurant itself is in universal city walk.

We made a reservation at 4, and decided to take the bus to universal, however we over estimated the bus service and called to change the reservation to 4:30. Upon reaching the last bus stop, we'll still need to cross the road and catch the shuttle bus to the park itself which comes by pretty frequent, which worked out perfectly.

We found the restaurant almost right away and got seated not too long after. After the server verify our coupon, we helped ourselves with the salad bar - not much to boast about but the cheese roll was awesome. I also got some salad, rice, mashed potatoes, couscous, some sort of pickled carrot salad and the mushroom salad was disgusting.

The servers would visit each table with the skewered protein and a knife. They started us off as follows - from bottom right with pork sausage, pork tenderloin, steak, beef rib, garlic toast, sirloin, garlic steak, more pork tenderloin, chicken leg, turkey wrapped bacon, cheese ball, grilled fish, and finished off with lamb. 

The servers will continue to come to your table as long as the indicator has green side on top. About an hour in, we had to put a stop since we were full and we've tried all the meats they have to offer.

A lot of the meats were over-seasoned with salt which made me chug too much water which in turn made me full sooner which in a way, helped me not to over-eat. The last visit, we were entertained by scantily-clad exotic dancers, I guess this time around it was still early for them to make appearance.

Walked a little around the City Walk to help with digestion and then catch the shuttle and bus back.

Alcohol and Empty Stomach

This past Thursday was JP's birthday. Organized an impromptu gathering with a few colleagues to surprise her at her house for dinner. Only had breakfast (nasi lemak) and nothing else until almost 6, when we were ready to eat. Colleagues went to get Smirnoff ice from the grocery store, I grabbed apple flavor and it didn't feel alcoholic at all. Hungry and thirsty, I downed half a bottle and started eating - we brought Persian food.

I went for second and grabbed another bottle screwdriver since I shared the first bottle with Tal. After eating and chatted for a while, I suddenly felt hot and head became really heavy. I felt like I needed to lie down, so I got out of my chair and tried to head to the living room, but the next thing I heard was my concerned colleagues asking if I was ok as they guide me to the living room.

Apparently, I blacked out for a second, standing up haha That has never happened to me before. I felt so much better as soon as I lay my head down. Tal propped my legs up and they gave me a bag of frozen veggies for my forehead. 

Alcohol on empty stomach does not go well at all!

CNY Cookies

So happy that I got to go home for pre-CNY this year - not only that I got to see most of my family and handful of friends but also to re-kindle my taste buds with all the food that I love.

I also managed to smuggle a few containers full of CNY cookies, surprisingly, most of them were still intact even after taking three different flights - PEN-KUL-HKG-LAX.

Four weeks after my trip, these are the only cookies left... literally, for the sole purpose of this entry and of course after photo is snapped, they instantaneously vanished out of plain sight!

Clockwise: bak who wrapped in kuih kapit shell, sesame chew, flower power, peanut cookie, green pea cookie and cornflakes cookie. As you can probably tell, I don't know the exact names but I sure as hell love to eat them.

Cookies that didn't survive thus far:

- Kuih kapit (lasted 1.5 week) 

- Ribbon kuih (gone almost 1st week)

- Sambal hae bee in crunchy mini cigar like roll (OMG so good)

- Pineapple cookies (made by Jesse's mom)

During a short layover in HK, I felt bad if I have to share any of these cookies with my colleagues so I bought three boxes of tea cookies which cost me a fortune but definitely a win-win for all :D

Macau

Visited Macau on Sun, Feb 1. Took the ferry at Tsim Sha Tsui, trip was around an hour and not eventful. Well, mainlanders are real interesting to watch but to be involved with.

Kinda disappointed with Macau, in a nutshell, yes it's Vegas of the east, but nothing close. The casinos are scattered all over the place, only the Venetian looked nice. The others Grand Lisboa and Lisboa are just sad looking, at least from the outside. In Vegas, you'd be able to play slots and win some, but not here, and it's not only me, I've heard from others that you can't win here playing slots.

Venetian has awesome food court with restaurants providing wide arrays of food ranging from Singaporean, Indian to middle Eastern and hamburgers. We opted for Taiwanese where Tal had Hainan chicken with ube boba and I had fried oyster. The place doesn't take CC, bummer and we spent all our cash at the slots. The currency is Potaca MOP, almost same rate as HKD.

Colleague gave really good tips - hotels provide frequent shuttles at the ferry terminal. The downside is most everyone know this and the lines are long but move swiftly as busses are frequent, best is free wifi on board!

We visited Venetian first and was there till noon, after lunch and headed back to ferry terminal to catch another bus to visit the ruins of St Paul cathedral. Based on map, the closes hotel with available shuttle is Grand Lisboa but boy the line at terminal was crazy long. I looked hard at the map on my ipad, and Wynn is just situated across the street and there wasn't any line for the hotel and their busses were more frequent.

So we hopped onto the Wynn's bus and sure enough, we could see Lisboa from there. Wynn looks like their Vegas counterpart, just wasn't sure if it's as big. And apparently they have water fountain show because outside the hotel, there's this huge pond... But didn't see such thing.

According to the map, it should take us about 15min walk to the St Paul ruins. There were a lot of people on the streets, most don't pay much attention to traffic lights. And there weren't too many signs to guide us to the righ direction, so we tried to walk north-ward based on what we remember seeing on map. 

A few long minutes later, we bumped into this square where's it's nicely decked out for CNY. There's an insane amount of locals and tourists.

From there, we start noticing signs to St Paul, but bumped into St Dominic church first.

From here, it took us about another 20mins to get to St Paul because of human jam! It was packed like sardine, we had to stay real close to avoid getting separated. There were a lot of restaurants, deli, bakeries but with so many people it's just impossible but I always extend my hand out for free bak kua samples.

And finally, at the end of this tunnel, we caught a glimpse of the famous landmark. Upon reaching the top, it realized it is literally that front layer of cathedral is left standing, not spectacular or anything but looked nice from afar, would have been nicer if the steps were empty!

We hanged out for an hour at park nearby, catch a nap. Weather was gloomy, but sun tried to peek through the heavy clouds a couple times. 

We traced our way back and stopped at the square because we saw smaller hidden shops out of the main view and decided to check them out. So glad we did because they were really hidden gem! Tal bought a really nice military green jacket and only cost MOP69 without haggling, well, he tried to haggle, but it was the only style/color/size available and all fits perfect, so no haggling needed. He found same style in different color at another store but didn't buy because worried of luggage limitation, after all, it was only his 2nd day in HK. Now we regret that we didn't purchase it. What a steal!

At another corner, saw a flurry of people lining up to grab some grub. After taking a closer look, they were all innards... I'm no big fan of organs, but I've learned to eat tripe and begun to love it, only if it's prepared correctly which is cooked a few times until the off smell is gone. Surprisingly, I did not smell anything off and tempted to try some the stuff they have brewing in a big pot. So, I asked for a small cup and they squeezed two different sauces into my cup and the result:

OMG! This was so fudging awesome!

We were early for our ferry ride back to HK - the return ticket bought was for around 10PM and we got to the terminal around 6PM. My colleague said that we could get on an earlier ferry as long as it's not later than the ticket. We were surprised to see a long line formed for standbys. We waited about 45mins because the first ferry was filled. We managed to get into the second ferry fine and it wasn't as packed as the first one. The ride back was really choppy, so glad we arrived safely.

"Homemade" Nasi Lemak!

Even though my visit home was short - 5 days and was a total surprise to all, Tua Ee managed to whip up nasi lemak ingredients for me to bring home. I've had the wet ingredients refrigerated for 3 weeks now and yesterday I thought it was time to mix them up so I can enjoy one of my favorite foods.

I made brown rice in the rice cooker, cut up some Persian cukes, boiled some eggs and segregated some peanuts and ikan bilis in a small baggie for next day's breakfast and lunch.

I was already halfway eating the lunch portion when I remembered I should snap a photo to reminisce ...... there should be enough left for at least 10 more meals (I hope).

HK Breakfast

After lunch on the first Friday with my colleagues in HK, I asked them about buying ferry tickets to go to Macau so they walked me to the terminal and ticketing office which was just across the street from our office (our new office is actually on the same building now). I had to get tickets for Sunday since Tal is arriving on Saturday morning. For some reason, we didn't check the tickets and when I got back to the hotel, I realized they were for Saturday departure!

Horrified, I walked to the terminal building hoping to have them correct the error but the counter was closed already and will only reopen at 6 the next day. I was disappointed because the departure time on our ticket is at 730 so I texted my colleague to see what other options I have.

She felt bad and wanted to come with me tomorrow in case they won't exchange the ticket for me and said she'd help to sell the tickets. I felt bad for her to come all the way to Tsim Sha Tsui because she said it takes 40mins for her commute, it would be too early and worse it was Saturday and a day off. 

After an hour of back and forth, I agreed to meet her with condition that I buy breakfast for her. Turned out the ticket agent was kind enough to exchange with no question. We were there early and not many were open. We went for the closest option which is just right next to the booths. 

I overheard the guy in front of us ordered lo mai kai, so I ordered the same thing and I could add another entree and drink for just HK59 if I remember correctly so we went for the century egg porridge and horlicks, boy I haven't heard or tasted horlicks for a long long time.

The lo mai kai was not bad, it's just that I unwrapped it the wrong way and I'd usually drench it in chili sauce, but a nice and hearty breakfast to start an awesome weekend!