Sony Headphones

Finally I get a rest day 2morrow. Not entirely true coz I still have to fetch worker to work as early as 6am morning 2morrow... crap. Let talk about some happy stuff then. I went shopping with colleagues after today's half working day. Since I got enough of new clothes for CNY already, I wasn't really shopping new clothes.

Since I don't have anything particular to buy, we randomly walked around the mall and I walked into a CD shop. They have this CD players that allows customer to listen to some of the latest CD available in stall and huge headphones are connected to the CD player. After sampling some songs, I really love these headphones~!! So I was on a mission to look for some headphones.

Saw some Philips and Panasonic headphones but I dun really like them. Finally I decided to buy a Sony one~!!



I tried them on with a mp3 player connected. It was really comfortable and the sound quality is not bad. The bass is not really good though but vocals were awesome. The design is not bad also.



So I bought these headphones in the end. SGD76.50 gone just like that. I know I'm gonna enjoy these headphones though. Life is short, just trying to enjoy as much as I can.

Continue my movie marathon first. :p

Next is Death Race. w00ts~!

Old Cucumber Soup

I cooked 老黄瓜汤 Old Cucumber Soup today. Although I have to work, I still manage to buy some ingredients to cook. Soup would be the most ideal for me as it doesn't require much attention to cook. Didn't really planned to cook actually but then I just couldn't stand eating outside food.



The ingredients are as above photo.
1. 1 Old Cucumber
2. 1 Carrot
3. A small plate of salted veggie
4. A small bowl of red dates. (Actually a estimated a handful of it)
5. Pork ribs/bones (U can also use chicken carcass actually... but I prefer pork ribs or bones coz it gives the soup better flavor)

I missed out tofu and dried stingray. T_T
It was a rush job gathering the ingredients. Was double parking also... hahaha... luckily no saman.

Preparing it is also easy like the Lotus Root Peanut Soup I posted few days ago.

First you should wash the salted veggie. Wash out all the salt and sand and soak it for about 15 - 20 minutes. It should be about time after you prepare all the items below.

Then u scrap out some skin from the old cucumber. You dun need to skin it. Cut it into quarters, remove the seeds at the center of the cucumber and cut them to about 1 inch wide evenly.

For the carrot, skin it and cut it into small pieces however u want to consume it.

You can cut the dates into half or slice it open so that the sweetness of the red dates will blend into the soup.

The pork ribs/bones just rinse it with water. My advice is as usual, get the butcher to cut it into small pieces for you. Dun get urself injured and damage ur chopper. Actually my mom would boil a pot of water and scald the pork for few seconds and take it out. She told me that would get rid of some smell present in the meat and it would also make the soup clearer. But I dun do that coz I think the nutrients would have been washed away.

The forgotten ingredient: tofu... just cut it into 4 quarters and throw it into the pot. Dried stingray u just need to rinse it and throw into the pot.



U can look above photo as reference.



After 2 hours plus of slow fire, THE SOUP IS READY~!!!!

Note: U do NOT need to add salt to the soup. It should be salty enough due to the salted veggie. Control the amount of salted veggie to put in. Ideal amount would be salty enough for you to consume the soup without further adding salt. However if you put too little and find ur soup is not salty enough, feel free to add in more salt.

This time I was able to take pictures of the soup b4 it was finished~! YAY~!!

I think the next soup I will make is either radish soup or Sai Yong Choi Tong.

Not So Sunday

I'm going to write 2 posts today. I'll write this frustrating one first.



There's nothing special about my Seiko watch here. It's there just to show that I have to work at this time on this very Sunday. Actually I could be home by 11am... but nooooo... The shipyard decided that they would like to perform bunkering on this ship for the very first time on this fine Sunday. *bunkering - The act or process of supplying a ship with fuel.*

The reason I have to be here is because my company is the sub-contractor doing the piping job for the shipyard. First time bunkering would require a representative from our side to ensure that there's no leakage at the pipelines and valves during the bunkering process. From the safety point of view, it's very dangerous if there's any leakage coz diesel is very flammable and we have a lot of hot work such as welding and gas cutting around the area.



As we need all hot work to be stopped b4 the bunkering process starts, we have to wait till 5pm when most contractors stop work after 4.30pm. Most workers are waiting to punch their time card and head home to rest already. I'm still on board the ship observing these people go home... T___________T



While waiting I took some pretty nice shots on board the ship. This is a crane barge doing some repair in the shipyard. Crane barge this big should be easily able to carry items as heavy as 500 tonnes.



Across the sea here we can see a land filled area here. I heard that there was nothing at all 9 years ago. Now there are warehouse, factories, workers dormitory and also shipyard built at that area. It's amazing that Singapore has done this much to expend their limited land in their country.

In the end, the bunkering process completed smoothly. 3000 liters of diesel was bunkered and there wasn't any sign of leakage. Left the shipyard around 6pm and I have to ferry the workers back to their domitory. My workers are sure damn lucky to have me as their driver to drive them back home. How I wish I have a driver to send me home too.

Frustrated

I have to work on the first Sunday of the year... Really frustrated...

Sunday was suppose to be the day I wake up early (not as early as normal day) and go to the fresh market. Dun think I can cook this Sunday. Sien leh... everyday eat outside food. Hope nothing much happen tomorrow and I can go home early. Really hate it when I have to work on a rest day.

Sienzzzz.....
-________________________-


ARGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH~!!!!!!

Lotus Root Peanut Soup

This is the first thing I cooked myself for this year~! Lotus Root Peanut Soup or 莲藕花生汤 is the soup I love most~! It's not hard to make it's really nice too.

Ingredients are simple. All u need is the following:

1. Lotus Root - Approx 500g
2. Peanut - Approx 200g
3. 1 carrot
4. Red date - a handful(u can borrow my hand if u need it)
5. Pork ribs/bones - approx 500g (I just asked for SGD6 actually... so dun really know the weight)
6. Salted dry veggie - 50g maybe... I just bought 40sens of them

The proportion above is for about 5 person's consumption.

Preparation is even easier. Clean the mud away from the lotus root and cut away the joints. Just slice them into the sizes of ur preference.

For the peanuts, u just need to wash them and dump it into the pot.

Skin the carrots and cut them into small pieces.

For the red dates, just slice it at the center of the date till u reach the seed. Dun need to cut them into half as u just need the sweetness of the dates go into the soup.

For the pork ribs/bones, u better ask the butcher chop it into small pieces for u. It's not that easy to cut. I leave it to the butcher as I dun wan to get myself hurt or get my chopper damaged.

As for the salted veggie, wash away the salt and any sand that may present. Soak it for about 15 minutes. Have to wash them if u dun wan ur soup to be too salty. I din put any salt as the salted veggie is enough to make the soup salty.

If u dunno wat size to cut the things into, just refer to my picture above (they are still raw).

After I done all my preparation. I threw everything into the slow cooker. Like the name suggest... the slow cooker is SLOWWW......Too slow for my liking... So I transferred all the ingredients into the stainless steel pot and cook it with slow fire (which is still way faster than slow cooker).

After 2 hours plus, the soup was ready.

AND THE SOUP WAS FINISH EVEN B4 I WAS ABLE TO TAKE A FUCKING PICTURE~!! ZOMGWTFBBQ~!!!
T_________T

Happy New Year 2009~!!

First post for 2009. I'll talk more about how I spent my last day of 2008. Many things happened today. One of the things is that this is the day where I first time been to Alexandra Hospital.



The reason I came here is to admit one of the bangla worker working in my company.



I brought him to the emergency ward cause he was already "unconscious" for nearly 1 hour already. First of all, he fainted while working on board the ship inside a compartment. Safety personal at the yard was alarmed about the case and was trying to wake him up. Nothing avail no matter wat we tried to do. We tried all method but we didn't give him a good slap though. This fucking idiot was faking being "unconscious"~! I didn't really know wat happened in the hospital but the supervisor called me while I was having dinner at Vivo City. Doctor told the supervisor that the idiot was already conscious by the time he arrived the hospital.

Actually we knew he was faking it all along but he just wouldn't wake up. We lifted his arm and released it when he was lying down. His arm just gently fall back to the floor. A real unconscious person's arm would just slam on the floor will a loud bang. This proved that he was controlling his arm muscle.

Then I tried lifting his head upwards. His jaw remained close. A person who is really unconscious would have his mouth open when the head is tilt upwards. This also proved that he was able to control his jaw muscle making his mouth remained closed when I tilt his head upwards.

I should have given him a tight slap instead of driving him to Alexandra Hospital but then I still drove him to the hospital cause if he was faking it, he has to pay for the bills himself. It's also a safeguard for myself in case something really made him unconscious.

I left the stupid idiot at the hospital with the supervisor and went to Vivo City with Sean and had dinner there. We had dinner at a shop name 店小二 (Dian Xiao Er). The price there is quite reasonable and the food was really nice.


Layout of the shop is very unique with the Chinatown decorations.


The 当归烤鸭 Dang Gui Roast Duck is one of the dishes I had. Looks nice ain't it?


Star Cruise Virgo was docking at Harbor Front. Brings back the memory of the days when I was having holiday at Star Cruise Gemini donkey years back.


Seeing all these crowd makes me wonder if those ppl really know wat they are lining up for. This line is easily 100 meters long. Seems like Singaporeans' favourite past time activity is to queue up for no reason.

Last year's experience at Esplanade Drive is already more than enough for me. I find that watching the count down on television is more fun than standing among the crowd getting sweaty all over.

Well, I headed home and that's it for my last day of year 2008.

HAPPY 2009 elibadi~!!