Chap Gor Meh

We stayed overnight at the home of WC and SC last night. This morning, WC's mother brewed coffee for everyone and we sat down to breakfast comprising coffee and cake that I had baked and brought to their home yesterday.

By the time we arrived home, it was too late to attend the morning church service. As such, we decided to "take things easy" and have a simple lunch before attending the 2.30 pm church service.

I heated up the balance bak kwa that we had frozen earlier and used it to make bak kwa sandwich.

We complemented our lunch with bean curd tarts. The filling was very smooth and delicious.

Today is the 15th day of the Lunar New Year. Tradition has it that on this day, unmarried women would throw oranges in the river in the hopes of securing a husband.

We had dinner with FIL and MIL today at the Hong Kong Street Family Restaurant located at Eastwood Centre.

The restaurant was very crowded and we had to wait some time for a table.

This is one of the specialties of the restaurant - hae cho.

I hope that you had a wonderful Lunar New Year. May the year ahead bring forth roaring success and aggressive favour and grace for all of us.

Shaloam,

Dinner at the home of WC and SC

Late again

Now that the economy seems to be picking up, my days of working late are returning with a vengeance.

I had to attend a meeting today that started at 6.30 pm and was scheduled to last till 9 pm. As the meeting was not in my office, my colleagues and I planned to leave the office a little earlier in order to avoid any possible after-office traffic jam at the East Coast Parkway. However, I was tied up with work in the office and by the time I was ready to leave, it was almost 6 pm. I met up with my colleagues and we rushed to the taxi stand. We were fortunate to be able to hail a taxi very quickly and I am thankful that the traffic at the East Coast Parkway was slow but moving. As such, we managed to arrive at our destination with about 10 minutes to spare before the start of the meeting.

By the time the meeting ended, it was past 9 pm.

When I reached home, Da informed me that he had bought some sushi for my dinner. Initially, I did not want to eat the sushi as I felt that it was a little late to be eating rice. However, when I opened the door to the chiller in our refrigerator and saw two pieces of sushi with the sweet beancurd skin, I changed my mind. I love sushi with the sweet beancurd skin.

Da also bought another tray of 3 pieces of sushi for me. However, I could only manage to eat 1 of the 3 pieces before I was full.

Having said this, I like to end my meal on a sweet note. As such, I ate some Chinese New Year goodies to end the meal.

As I sat down at the computer to check my personal electronic mails, I logged onto facebook and saw a lovely photograph of the wife of my cousin, LSK. He has already registered his marriage with his wife but their customary marriage will be held in March 2010. His wife had posted some pre-wedding photographs that were taken by the wedding photographer and I especially like the one that was taken outdoors (it looked like they were in some forested area) and she was lying down and looking backwards at the camera. It was such a beautiful photograph. Welcome to the family, CL!

Shaloam,

饭 again

Just when I thought that I better cut down on my 饭 (that is, rice) consumption so as not to put back on the weight that I have lost in the past few months (no, I have not been exercising. I think that it is due to lack of sufficient sleep and/or interrupted sleep each night), I end up eating rice again.

Nowadays, I find that I am becoming more and more of a typical "need to eat six small meals a day" person. It could be that my metabolic rate is rising (after all, God renews our youth like the eagles, so it is no wonder that I am getting younger by the day!) or that I am somehow burning up my meals at a faster rate (due to stress, etc) but my meals do not seem to be able to last me till the next meal nowadays.

I recall that years ago, health experts were advising people that instead of having three large meals a day only (that is, breakfast, lunch and dinner), one should have six smaller meals instead.

Gone are the days when I used to be able to "go for several rounds" at buffets. Nowadays, I sometimes cannot even finish two rounds.

On the other hand, while I used to shy away from 饭 in the past, in an attempt to control my weight, nowadays even if I were to eat 饭, the meal will still not last meal till the next meal.

One thing remains constant, though. After all these years, I am still not keen to eat meat. This is not for religious reasons. It is just that I often feel uncomfortable after eating meat. It could be due to the fact that vegetables and beancurd are more easily digestible and I do not feel as lethargic after eating a meal with minimal or no meat.

I still like to end a meal "on a sweet note", though. What you see in the photograph below is a very yummy slice of cheesecake which we bought from Don's Pie on sunday, 21 February 2010. Although we bought the entire cheesecake (which was already pre-cut into ten slices), we only started eating the cheesecake today.

Shaloam,

A simple dinner... or not

Da and I both worked late today. As such, we ate a simple dinner.

Da ate duck noodles.

I ate char siew noodles with Chinese mushrooms.

Simple dinner... or so we thought.

Part two followed soon and started with Mandarin oranges.

And sweet Hawaiian papaya.

And goreng pisang (that MIL bought).

And cornflake cookies (that MIL gave us).

By the end of our meal, I sat back in my chair and wondered how a simple dinner ended up being so heavy.

Not to worry... I can start my diet tomorrow... I think....

Hmm.... I wonder what is for dinner tomorrow?

Shaloam,

Busy yet restful

How does one behave like a swan - calm (above the water) but peddling like mad (under the water)? Rest in the Lord and He will make us efficient and able to multi-task!

After an awesome church service, Da and I went to the Suntec City outlet of "Growing Up Gifted" to register Princess for their enrichment classes for babies. The classes are for babies from 8 months of age and the timing is perfect (only the Lord could have arranged this) because the next term starts in early March 2010 and Princess would have turned 8 months of age by end of this month. The classes are adult-accompanied (only one adult is allowed each time) and we requested for the 2 pm to 3.30 pm class on sundays, so we look forward to:-

(a) bonding with Princess (for the one accompanying her - we intend to "alternate duty" each sunday); and

(b) "me" time (for the one "off-duty" for the class).

Thereafter, we wanted to register Princess for church sunday school (for babies) but as there was still a queue at the sunday school venue, we decided to have our lunch first at Qi Ji. Princess ate Nestle rice with mixed vegetables while Da queued up to order our lunch.

Da ate mee rebus.

I ordered the nasi lemak. My Aunt SN (my mother's second sister) would have liked this set - it contains fish and chicken wings. She has ever ordered this set when she ate at Qi Ji with us when she was in Singapore recently.

After lunch, we went back to the sunday school and were given a registration form. We were informed that we need not register Princess today and that we can simply bring along the completed form to register Princess when we go to church next sunday.

After we left Suntec City, we proceeded to Tanjong Pagar area. We wanted to check out a baby studio that Da had come across recently. We were thinking of having some studio photographs of Princess taken and we wanted to enquire about the charges. The studio was closed but a male staff (who was in the studio premises) redirected me to a bridal studio located opposite the baby studio. According to him, the bridal studio was part of the same company.

I felt a little odd as I walked into the bridal studio. Da waited in the car with Princess as she was having a nap. It has been years since I stepped into a bridal studio. The staff was very helpful but I was a little taken aback when she informed me that passport-sized photographs would cost us S$120! When I hesitated, she told me that if we take up a photography package for Princess (the cheapest of which cost S$550), they would also give us passport-size photographs of Princess free of charge. Gosh, inflation indeed. I obtained the name card of the staff who attended to me and left.

When we reached home, I prepared some snacks for our teatime. For our beverage, we shared a mug of Ipoh white coffee tarik (with less sugar).

We were in two minds whether to have dinner at home or to eat out. However, the sky got rather dark by late afternoon and it started to rain. By the time we dilly-dallied, it was past 8 pm. After we put Princess to bed, I made a mug of hot tea.

I also prepared some sandwiches for dinner.

This is a bak kwa sandwich.

To complement the sweetness of the bak kwa, I added some Dijon mustard to the sandwich.

I also toasted open-faced ham & cheese toast. Da is not fond of bacon bits so I added bacon bits to my sandwich only.

Fortunately, we did not buy many types of Chinese New Year goodies this year. Nevertheless, we have been trying to finish eating whatever goodies we have at home. This means that each dinner at home ends with snacking on some of the goodies.

We also ate Mandarin oranges to end the meal on a sweet note.

I end this post with some food for thought (which was part of the message that was preached in church today):-

We turn to God and receive His unmerited favour. We receive all of God's resources that God gave to us at Christ's expense. We are righteous by the blood and not by our works. We are righteous with the righteousness of God in Christ. Those He called, He justified. Those He justified, He also glorified.

Shaloam,