Homesick..?
Been sitting at home at day, playing neopets.. =X Ok, what
an introduction, but it�s the fact anyway. Supposed to go for potluck later,
but not feeling all-too-great to go for it.. Sorry Yeap Shen..
Listening to music at the same time. Qing Fei De Yi, by
Harlem Yu (I�m typing this in Microsoft Word, and the red and green lines are
popping up everywhere). Images related to the song visualizing in my head.. I remember
the first time I heard it was when I was in secondary school, we had to sing it
for Newpaper�s Project Y at Scotts Shopping Centre. It was pretty fun, though a
little scary, since it was my first time performing as a group of 5 people in
public. I remember there were other CCA groups performing then too, like NCC
where they were performing the rifle-throwing thing, and I remember Yan nearly
dropped his rifle but got it back smoothly in one flex of his arm.. And there
was Zhangyi�s group, they sang a cappella, and it was then that I fell in love
with one of their songs, Last Christmas.
I remember Yan likes to sing Qing Fei De Yi too, during our
breaks at the Project Y.. Well in fact, everyone likes to sing it, because it
was the �hit song� back then. I remember my family came to support us (at that
time, family includes dad..) and one of my IRC friends (wow.. IRC era..) told
me he went there to watch too.
IRC days.. Haha.. I used to talk on the phone with some of my IRC friends. Can
you believe it?? =X Interestingly, it was on IRC that I got to know a few
people that I continue to keep in touch with, like Justin a.k.a. my gramps now;
Ken, whom we send emails to each other annually during our birthday period, and
not forgetting my boyfriend whom I got to know via IRC too. (Ok, this is a
complicated story, bug me and I�ll tell u all about it another time.)
Secondary school days, do you all miss it? I do.. Especially
my sec 3 and sec 4 days.. Memories of us planning birthday surprises, eating in
class, I won�t forget them.. I remember how Meixing and Jocelyn bring cookie
monster biscuits to class, and pass them around during breaks.. I remember how
we baked a cake for Liesl�s birthday at Cherlyn�s house.. I remember how the
guys go down to the canteen during breaks to buy siewmais and baos for us,
hiding the food in their pockets because we�re not allowed to eat in class, and
you could see them running and hopping because of the hot food in their
pockets.. They would pass the food around, each person takes a bite.. I really
miss those times! Life was so carefree back then, isn�t it? =)
Just before I came over, I met up with the bunch of them
again.. Jocelyn, Komui, Liesl, Weehon and Yan.. Though a bit sad that some
others did not turn up, but it was still pretty fun catching up with them..
Wish I�m back in sg now.. I wanna meet up with my lovely friends again!
I don�t think I posted those pictures up, so here they are!
This is Yan and I at the MRT station, while waiting for the rest to turn up..
From left to right: Me, Komui, Jocelyn, Liesl. We're at NYDC at Suntec City, waiting for our food to arrive.
Look at that! The Meatball that ate Manhattan. Hahaha.. Yeah, and we ordered a pie, wondering how we're gonna split and eat it.. =X
Pizza!
This is a different pizza from the one above. Hawaiian, my all time fav.
After a while, Weehon came, by then we had our dinner already.. Too late! So we went to Carrefour, where he bought this sushi set at a super discounted price!
Just in case you can't see the price tag, here is an enlarged version. $6!
Here's the 4 girls again.. Hee.
And here, we have a group photo! From top left (clockwise): Weehon, Yan, Liesl, Jocelyn, Komui and me!
Yan and Komui modelling for my camera. Hahaha..
Yan's feeling pretty bored, so he took photos of us!
Komui and me!
We parted ways.. Actually it's only Jocelyn and us parting, because she takes the north-east line, while the rest goes east.. So we were on different escalators going to the different platforms at City Hall station, and I took a shot of her on the other escalator!
Ok, he's not my AHS classmate, but he's a friend anyway. Old friend, since primary school! Very animated guy by the name of Ryan, been classmates with him since Pri 3. I will never forget how we were drumming our fingers on the desk to the tune of our piano exam piece, and found out that we were actually playing the same piece! And for that short while, we became the attraction of the class. Ended up in the same JC, but hardly bumped into each other. Great guy anyway!
Last but not least, my breakfast for today. Haha. Gosh, looking at it makes me hungry again. It's toasted bread with macaroni salad on it! When I first made it, I was wondering if it would taste alright... Well, no it doesn't taste alright. IT TASTES YUMMY!!! I love it. Haha.. Better than the usual toasted bread with jam and butter. Whee.. (Oh, I just noticed that you can see my reflection on the spoon. Hahahaha..)
Yeh, I'm hungry.. Time for dinner! Miss you folks back in sg!
Barossa Valley Day Tour
Tour starts at 7:45am where the Groovy Grape bus came to pick us up from our accomodation. Right in front of The Village! How cool is that! Saves me the trouble of walking towards God-knows-where in a state of blur-ness. I just realised that I forgot tto take pictures of the bus. Oops. Sorry!!
Our first destination is to............. The Biggest Rocking Horse! WHEEEE!!
Ok sorry, I over-exaggerated. It's actually not as big as I imagined it to be, and gosh, why did they even think of putting this as an attraction on the itinerary?! It looks alright from the picture I guess, but... If given a chance to choose my destinations I would give this a complete miss.
And so, the sign here talks about the rocking horse, and the Toy Factory that is just next to it..
Tada! That's me on the mini rocking horse. It looks less |||-_-0 than the bigger one.. Nice pose huh? ;) Oh. Forget about the shoes.
This is a picture of the sauce holder in the cafe behind the rocking horse. Cool huh? Made from the toy factory. It looks much nicer like this than the gigantic one....
Our next stop: JACOB'S CREEK! So here you have it, this is their visitor centre as you can see..
Jacob's Creek sign.
I thought the grapes look juicy, can't help taking a photo of it.
The beautiful view from Jacob's Creek Restaurant.
Time for wine tasting! Yeah, it's really early in the morning alright... She taught us how to taste wine. Haha. Pretty fun..
Another picture of our first bottle.
There you go, the first bottle: Sparkling Rose. (just a side note: I bought the bottle stopper. It's so pretty!)
Cheers! We took this photo, just to uh.... prove that we were really there. Haha.
Look at this! A bottle of Port! I heard that they don't sell this for exports. Aw... It's pretty nice you know, I've not tasted a wine like this. A little sweet actually, but it's different from red wine and sparkling wine. Quite refreshing to try something new. I like it! That's until I get sick of it. Haha. I don't know when that'll be, since I didn't buy any, and I don't know if Singapore sells them..
The 9 different wines that we tried at Jacob's Creek.
From left to right: Jacob's Creek Sparkling Rose, Jacob's Creek Semillon Sauvignon Blanc, Jacob's Creek Riesling, Jacob's Creek Chardonnay, Jacob's Creek Shiraz Rose, Jacob's Creek Cabernet Sauvignon, Jacob's Creek Reserve Shiraz, Orlando Liquer Port. (I'm not sure if I got the names right.. Sorry I can't see the years on the bottle, but quite a number of them are pretty young wines.)
Hm.. Maybe I'm not so drunk after all?
PORT!!
After Jacob's Creek, we were going through our lunch menu so that the hotel could get the food prepared, and I saw something that amused me very much! Beer battered fish. Wahahahahahaha.. Look at it's description!
Our 3rd stop: VINECREST!
Was a little bit unstable, so I decided to walk around and take a few photos of the interior..
This is the guy who served us during the wine tasting..
Wineglass with "Barossa" printed on it.
Another picture of the interior..
Interesting huh? The different sorts of wine and their description, characteristics, etc.
The awards they won.
Another Port! Hee.
So here we have another 7 bottles of wine.. I didn't get the names on the bottles.. Sorry..
4th Stop: RICHMOND GROVE!
These are the small barrels that they use nowadays as compared to the....
..... 1000L big barrels that they used in the olden days!
Don't know what this is? Read/look on..
Tada! Here's your answer.
Wine press.
Woah.. Look at those tall and big containers.. I can't imagine how much wine goes in there..
I can't remember what this is about.. =X
See the black cat on the wind vane? There's a bottle of wine named after that cat.. Black Cat Shiraz
The wines we tasted at Richmond Grove. By then, I'm really trying to hold my hand steady... Even anti-shakes don't work anymore. =X (another bottle of Port! The very first bottle.)
Very bar-looking place. The wines here are quite ok.
Eh.. The driver (by the name of J.R.) told us that the toilets here are really beautiful and clean.. He wow-ed about it, but I think the hotel toilets are probably a lot better....
Our next stop: LUNCH!
Cherie and lunch!
Let's take a closer look.. Kangaroo meat!
Our nth stop (Sorry, I lost count, and I can't be bothered to scroll up..): BETHANY WINERY!
A couple of people who were part of the same day tour as we were.
It's too easy to guess what this is.. Haha. Yep, right on the money. It's another port!
Breath-taking scenery from the top of Bethany winery.
Another view..
And another view..
And another view again..
I like the steps.. Nice place to wear a wedding gown and take photos.
We were there! (The wind was so strong it messed up my hair!!!)
J.R. and us
On our way to Whispering wall, we saw this trees.. SO CUTE!!! J.R. said that somebody told him that the trees were trimmed to look like wine bottles. Haha..
More wine bottle tree!
Here's the vineyard, specially for Jacob's Creek Riesling.
A closer look!
Our Next stop: Barossa Dam a.k.a. Whispering Wall
Description about the dam
The water's on one side of the dam.....
..... and you get the dry part on the other side of the dam!
Yeah, we tried it, and woah, spooky man, you can really hear people on the other end of the wall! Not really magic though.. =P
Another picture of the river
I guess this explains why it's called whispering wall!
End of tour!