Nostalgia

So what happens when you nap from 5pm to 6.30pm and can't sleep even though it's 2am? Listen to 90s songs on youtube with the Husband, of course! 

30 Days of Thanksgiving - 27/30

Wow I can't believe I haven't written about this yet. Today, I'm thankful for our first home together.

Since +3 isn't from SG, he's been renting a place since moving here. His first was a bedroom in Bishan, and eventually moved to a one bedroom + one living room + one kitchen + one bathroom place in Chinatown (fondly referred to as 201). He's been staying there for years, and I moved in with him gradually (a weekend here and there, which became more frequent till it made more sense for me to stay with him since my gu ma was staying with my parents). 

Soon we were living together and while we naturally had our teething problems, they got sorted out pretty quickly and we fell into a nice and comfortable routine. 

It was in this home that we became friends and subsequently fell in love. Where we had our first kiss, had fights and made up. Where we danced and made up silly songs and lay on the sofa watching movies. Where we invented meals and shared cups of coffee and tea, looking out the window at the trees outside. Where we grew plants and made aquariums and flushed countless of (dead) fish down the loo (with accompanying funeral trumpet song as well). This is the first place we stayed in together as a married couple. Where we found out we were expecting a baby. :) 

However, the management of the property didn't manage to win the tender from the government and soon everyone in the block got letters indicating that our lease would be expiring. We had about a month and a half's notice and everyone had to be out by mid-September.

By the time we got the letter, I was already pregnant. Our new home in Punggol wouldn't be ready till the end of the year or early next year, and it didn't make sense for us to look for a new place to rent for half a year. My dad suggested we move to Sengkang for the time being, and we gladly accepted.

Spent the whole month of July slowly packing up and making arrangments to have our stuff put into storage. We decided to move out by end July so that we wouldn't have to pay rent unnecessarily for September. 

We got boxes and organised our stuff (we being mainly +3 since I wasn't allowed to do heavy lifting and was exhausted all the time anyway from being pregnant in my first trimester). 

It's amazing how much stuff one accumulates. We donated our furniture to +3's eldest sis, who had a flat in Lavender that was still pretty unfurnished. In return, she loaned us one of the rooms in her flat to use for storing our stuff. We also gave away most of our books (there is a book exchange corner at the National Library where you could leave/take books) and old clothes (to nanny). 

We finally got the movers to move the stuff out, cleaned up the place and returned the keys. Such a bittersweet moment knowing that you are leaving your first home, but excited that a new chapter of our lives was about to begin. 

So, thank you 201, for all the memories we built in the past couple of years. 

Happy Birthday To Me!

It's my birthday today! And I realise that I have come to the point where I'm just outright lying about how old I am (18, 21 and 24 are my go-to ages, depending on who I am talking to). Lol.

Had a simple dinner with +3 last night after he got off work, and had a nice slab of cake from Awfully Chocolate after. Came back and was told to stay up till midnight by my sister, who was sweet enough to walk away from a work discussion in the office, and call me to sing Happy Birthday.

Of course, +3 was the first to wish me Happy Birthday, and sang me a birthday song (right before my sis called lol). Then my parents who said "haven't sleep yet ah" cos I had told them goodnight at about 10pm. Hehe.

A simple day lazing about at home today. Baby Chung is happily dancing in my belly, so I'm taking that he is doing a birthday dance for me. And dinner will be a simple meal with the family, followed by a carrot cake that I'm baking for myself. Hehehe.

30 Days of Thanksgiving - 26/30

There are lots of restrictions on what you can eat when one is pregnant. No alcohol, raw meats or fish, soft boiled eggs or high mecury fish. One should also limit the amount of caffeine intake up to 200mg of caffeine a day, which is about a cup or two of coffee a day, depending on how strong the brew is.

I do try to cut down on sugary stuff and have obviously avoided alcohol, and only indulged in some sashimi in Japan (it's Japan!) because the restaurant we went to had good reviews on quality. 

The one thing I miss though, is coffee and tea. I did try to have some chai tea latte from Starbucks earlier on in ny pregnancy but I think the size I usually get (the grande) was too much and left me with a little bit of heart palpitations. 

Of course, it never occured to get smaller sizes until I saw that there were short sizes inthe Starbucks shops in Japan. Something smaller than the small (tall)? 

So the couple of matcha lattes I had in Tokyo were short, and when we came back we asked the Singapore Starbucks outlet if they had short sizes. They do! They just never advertised it, the sneaky buggers. So now I'm thankful for my little indulgence whenever I go to Starbucks. Hehehe.

Our Last Day In Japan

One of my ex colleagues sent a post about some straw that Japan Macdonald's use for their milkshake that supposedly mimic the speed of breastfeeding (or something random like that), which inspired us to have breakfast at Macdonald's on our last day in Japan. Alas, we were too early and their milkshakes were not ready, but we went ahead and had breakfast there anyway. 

Something about Japan that I like is how they make you sort your trash into glass, plastic, paper and trash. The food packaging is also all paper (unlike Singapore's styrofoam packaging pfft). 

Walked about after breakfast trying to do some last minute shopping for +3's sister, and then went back to the hotel to check out. 

It was a rainy day, and the plan was to take the subway to Shibuya station where we would check our luggage in one of the lockers and buy train tickets to Narita International Airport. We found a large sized locker that fit both our cabin luggage, for only 600yen. Two tickets on the Narita Express to NIA cost a little over 6000yen (I forget exactly). 

We had till 4pm to kill, so decided to go to the Tokyu Hands shop and look for wallets and a bag that we wanted to buy. Bought a foldable umbrella (1300yen and the umbrella opened to 65cm!) and made our way. Stopped at a Pronto cafe to try their kit kat croissant (another recommendation from my ex-colleague. It was ok, not something one MUST try). 

Also checked out the 7 storey Muji store. Saw some wooden toys that we were keen to buy but decided that keeping them in humid Singapore for a couple of years before they can be used wasn't such a good idea. 

I really liked Tokyu Hands. This one that we went to was way better and bigger than the one we went to earlier at Takashimaya. +3 managed to buy some dried moss that he was looking for, and we also bought the wallets and bag we originally planned to get. 

Managed to get a tax refund for our purchases (yay more spending money!) and by the time we were done, we had to head back to the train station. 

Fast forward and after a quick nap on the train, we were at the airport. Checked in, had dinner, bought Tokyo Banana (wait till you are past immigration to buy, don't be dumbasses like us and buy outside immigration cos you end paying taxes), boarded the plane. It was a smooth flight back and instead of sleeping, I watched Back to the Future 1, 2 and 3! SQ in flight entertainment rocks. 

So we are back in SG and missing Japan. Now I know why so many people love the country and I can't wait to go back. Interestingly, I thought people would offer me seats on the subway trains, but 1. the trains weren't that full and we managed to get seats most of the time anyway, 2. when we had to stand it wasn't for long, 3. mebbe my belly isn't so obvious yet and they think I'm just fat. 

Ah well. 

Japan Day 5 (or 6?) - St Mark's Cathedral

We had breakfast at the basement of the Square Enix building (a mecca for Final Fantasy fans, according to +3)- a simple and not too tasty breakfast at Tully's Coffee. I think the public holiday was already over as we saw lots of office people heading to work. 

Didn't really have any where that we wanted to go, having covered most of the "popular" areas in the past few days. +3 mentioned a church that wasn't really a tourist attraction, but had nice architecture and since we like visiting churches, became our agenda for the day.

Did a bit of research on how to get there and found that we had to go to the Edogawabashi station, and walk through the Edogawa Park and through the gardens of Hotel Chizanso Tokyo to reach the St Mark's Cathedral.

I was getting rather adept at navigating the Tokyo subway, and soon we were on our way. The Edogawa Park was more of a little local park along the river, and wasn't as well manicured as some of the other parks we had been to. However, it had a nice character to it and we saw abandoned playgrounds, homeless people lying about and grandparents taking their grandchildren for a walk. One of the things I really liked about parks in Japan was how gorgeous they smelled, with lots of osmanthus trees planted around which let off a sweet floral scent.

The entrance to the Hotel Chizanso wasn't immediately apparent, and we had to backtrack when we realised that we were probably walking too far off. There was a small entrance with a guy standing there, and a tiny signboard which said Hotel Chizanso. 

We walked in and was greeted by the most lush garden grounds ever. Apparently the hotel lies on 17 acres of land and is a 5 star hotel managed by the Four Seasons. I'm glad that we had the chance to explore the garden grounds and we spent a long time enjoying the garden and taking pictures. Made our way to the front of the hotel lobby and across the street was the St Mark's Cathedral. 

The Cathedral was beautiful in the way modern buildings are beautiful with very clean, sleek lines. We took a moment to step inside and pray (something we try to do when we encounter a new church) and walked around. 

Explored the neighbourhood afterward. Not sure what the area was called but it had a nice quiet atmosphere which reminded us of a Bukit Timah vibe. There weren't any eating places (only a Pizza Hut delivery and a Domino's.. do they like pizza in that 'hood?) so we went to a supermarket and bought some snacks- buns, mochi, crackers and some drinks. Sat on a bench and ate before making our way back.

I think all the walking we had done over the past few days was starting to take its toll on me and I was feeling rather pooped. Headed back to the hotelfor a nap and slept the afternoon away. Woke up and went to the steak place near our hotel (same chain as the steak place we saw in Ueno but the service and food quality wasn't as good) and shopped at Don Quijote. It had started raining as well. 

Passed by a curry house on our way backand popped in for round two of dinner (pork katsu curry for him, a salad for me) which made up for our ok steak dinner experience. Then it was back to the hotel to pack and settle down for the night. 

Japan Day 4 (or 5?) - Shibuya, Roppongi Hills and Tokyo Midtown

Headed straight to Shibuya in the morning to queue up at the restaurant that was recommended by Ching. Located on the 4th floor of the Mark City mall's East Wing, Midori sushi restaurant already had a queue forming even before the restaurant opened.

We arrived at about 10.45am (restaurant opened at 11am) and our queue number was 30. Joined the end of the line and waited as more people streamed in to get a ticket. As we were chatting, a guy suddenly comes up to us to ask if we were 2 pax, and gave us his ticket number 19! What a stroke of luck. Turns out his friend had already come earlier and gotten ticket number 3.

With our smaller queue number, we were able to be seated soon after the restaurant opened, and even managed to get a counter seat where we could see all the sushi being prepared. We ordered one ultimate sushi set and one tuna sushi set which cost 2000yen and 2800 yen respectively.

The sushi was super fresh and so good, and we ordered extra pieces of sea urchin, salmon roe and also inari sushi. Sosososo good.

Stomachs filled, we made our way to Roppongi Hills. From what I gather, Roppongi Hills was in a more atas part of Tokyo. There was a Belgium beer fest happening at one of the atriums, and there was a good crowd attending the event. I was surprised to see that each attendee was only issued with one plastic beer glass and some tokens, and that participants would have to wash their beer glasses at various rinsing points scattered around. What a brilliant way to minimise litter!

Lazed in one of the parks / open spaces and then made our way to Tokyo Midtown. There was a park next to Tokyo Midtown that had a chill vibe to it. Lots of people were sprawled across the grass, lying on picnic mats and reading books or chatting with friends. We bought our drinks from Starbucks and spent some time lazing around on the grass too.

It was such a beautiful day and we took a much slower pace compared to the few days before.

Ended the day by checking out the Tokyo Tower and heading back to the hotel area where we discovered a branch of that outlet that sold tempura and soba. Yay! Dinner was settled.

Wasn't as exhausted as previous days but was tired from all the walking nonetheless, so fell asleep pretty quickly after my shower. Time in Tokyo is passing so quickly!