A cozy spring afternoon in Sapa (Part#1) - Lunch at Viet Emotion

Princess Cheryl's thought of the day:- Business trip again next week. Never a month without flying since Jan'09... 2 more weeks after next week will be the QIC Regional Semi Finals in Cambodia!! Means flying again...BUT...Angkor Wat here I come~

Sapa is a small town up on the highlands of Hanoi. My first impression on Sapa was "Hanoi's Cameron Highland". Not very alike but just the feeling. People drink coffee in the cafe there while we drink tea in Cameron Highland. Spring time is one of the best times to visit Sapa, cozy weather, blooming flowers, even when the sun shines on my skin, I don't feel the burning at all. Soon after the 5km trekking, we were then ready on the go again.

Stomachs been growling since 11am... Now it's time to hunt for food. We walked through the market to another street.





These are Tzau tribe ladies if not mistaken. I can't really differentiate the tribes. There are just too many to remember!! Interesting to see the big 'pillow' on their head. Actually that's their hair inside the 'pillow'. I wonder how heavy is the burden on their head..



The Black Hmong ladies at business.. Honestly I love their handmade stuffs very much, but they're really expensive if you buy those in the open market especially at the tourist hot spots like this.



Our lunch spot - Viet Emotion. Under the name of the restaurant it's written there "We warmly appreciate the support of Lonely Planet". Oh, I didn't check on Lonely Planet at all before the trip. This was suggested by Thinh.



Cozy window view table for a relaxing lunch. Of course we gotta treat ourselves really nice after the exhausting trek to Cat Cat Village.




So since when I've become princess alcoholic...??? I think was about a month ago when I realized that I no longer suffer from rashes after drinking beer! =P



Local beers - Halida for him.



And Hanoi for me. I know this is not the right way to pour beer..



However I still managed to keep around 2 inch bubbles on the top layer. Heheh...



One of the things that I like most about Vietnam is how they garnish the soup.



Even though I'm not fond of pumpkin soup but how could I resist such an artistic bowl of pumpkin soup! I should learn to love pumpkin a little more, pumpkin represents Halloween, and no doubt I'm named after Halloween. HALLO-WEEN. =)



While waiting for my dishes to arrive, I saw something really interesting through the window. A Black Hmong girl combing her hair! Can you see how long is that?!



I do think they never cut their hair but just twist the hair and slot a comb through their hair to support it from falling loose. She looks like only ~20 years+ yet the hair is so long. I doubt that the hair length is 2x longer for the old ladies who keep their hair in a 'pillow' like the above photo.



Interesting huh. Even attracted some people to go near and take a closer look.



Finally lunch was served. A tableful of mouth watering food for only 2 pax! Vietnam cuisine is more to fusion style, probably because they're so much influenced by the French. Chinese never serve some creamy soup when the next serving will be stir-fry dishes served with rice. I found it quite awkward to drink sweet and creamy soup with breadcrumbs and then start eating rice..



Sizzling hot. Portion was very big but we finished all! So you can imagine how good the taste was. =)



Vietnamese rice, taste like Japanese rice but the shape is longer but not as long as the Siamese frangrant rice. Is this what we call “成块饭”? Hahha...really sticky.



Cheers to the travel couple.



...and to the new alcoholic babe.

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My lunch at Falafel's Drive In, San Jose CA

It's about foooood again~ This time -- a Middle East cuisine called Falafel.



Eugene and Jayant brought me to this Falafel's Drive In for lunch. This is a strongly recommended cuisine in San Jose according to them. Especially the falafel sandwich and fresh banana shake!




In Malaysia, people queue for char-kuey-teow and economy rice during lunch, in San Jose the people queue for falafels and salad! Even the dogs love it (it's vegetarian cuisine man!).



Eugene and Jayant helped me do the order...because I'm 'tall' enough to see clearly what's the menu on the wall.. (>.<)



And there goes my falafel. It's even bigger than the soup bowl that I use at home...HOW COULD I FINISH SUCH A BIG PORTION??!! Not just bigger than the bowl but I couldn't even hold them well with both my hands!



My fresh banana shake. Thick and smooth. I will never forget the taste. I wonder if McD could have something like this in their menu..



Some other people's banana shake. Look, it's really thick.



We love it with the spicy sauce, and this was one of the less ordinary times that I had messy meals.. I used at least 6 tissue papers while eating this huge falafel! Jayant said I had such a good control holding the falafel in my hands since I didn't drop any piece out of the pita bread. Heehee..



Kept pouring the spicy sauce into our falafels. We had spicy sauce all over our table. I was surprised when I found out that this super delicious meatball-like thingy is actually made of vegetables!! It's afterall a vegetarian dish. That really gives a big WOW~



Feels like I'm doing food review this time. Hahah..I would give 4 1/2 stars out of 5 for this falafel. By the way here's the map. Need I describe more? Check out the reviews, I think the fans had expressed what's on my mind.

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Stepping on the land of U.S.A

After the 28 hours flight, I finally reached San Jose!! It's my first morning in U.S.A the land of freedom. First day to start my work in the PLLC Headquarters too.



Due to Homewood Suites Hilton was fullhouse throughout the weekend, I had to share room with my colleague Sock Chin who was already there a week earlier than I did. I helped company to save cost instead! Well..actually I hate the hassle of check in and check out, so since I'd get my room 2 days later, staying with Sock Chin would be a better option.



This was the first time in my life that I wake up feeling the breeze of spring. Flowers everywhere!! Are those Sakura?!




The entrance to fill up my tummy~ Lovely wall lamp. I'd get one of these for my new house.




Too bad winter is over, else I can sit by the fireplace at night and barbeque some chocolate marshmellows.



The place where we had our breakfast and dinner.



We sat at this table almost every morning. Partly because I love purple. Some other tables were decorated with yellow or white flowers.



Typical breakfast in U.S. I've never consumed such high calorie breakfast for nearly a year. Thank god that I didn't put on any pound after a week in U.S. Every morning they served egg, cheese, bread, sausage, muffins, waffles...



And I had 7 tubes of this throughout my 7 days in U.S!! Couldn't help...I love cheese. I squeezed it on my salad, scramble egg, buns, sausages... Ooo...it's so damn creamy and I still miss it.



***End of pt.1 the morning version*** TIME TO WORK!!!



Meetings...meetings...meetings... Finally office hour's over and YES!! it's Friday~ Ah gu (Mooi Guan) fetched us back to his house and we had dinner together with his family. Due to daylight saving, it's actually only 5 something PM. The sky was still clear and bright, and my, I've never seen a sky so clear and so blue!!



Ah gu lives in Fremont. The mountain was still greeny, looked just like a painting. They told me that it'd turn into brown in another month or two when summer arrives.



Where his family lives in U.S, a house with a garage. The environment is so peaceful, you could see air planes flying towards different directions in the night sky.



His house even has a spacious backyard, nice place for BBQ. =) That was my first meet with his youngest princess Sharon. When they first relocated to SJ she was only 4 months old.



Now she's already 7 months old! Cutie little girl. Love this angle of mine too...Sock Chin's masterpiece. Don't you think this photo has so much of that Korean drama feel? >.<





Happily running around~ Dinner time.




We went for Vietnamese food. Most of my U.S. counterparts love Vietnamese food. I just came back from Vietnam a week ago...thus I did not have expectation on the taste. But surprisingly they taste great! Only that the portion was too big for an Asian.






What that attracted me was this...




Dip the sheets into hot water to soften 'em.



And then remove 'em from the water and wrap the vege andmeat into spring rolls. I enjoyed playing with my food, not really playing lah, kidding only.



After dinner we all went for shopping at Great Mall. Went there to get myself a jacket because it's always freezing cold in the morning and the one that I brought was not warm enough.



Now I'm missing the twilight of U.S...sky's always clear with bright stars. Like it just as much as I like the movie "Twilight". Can you believe that I watched it 3 times in my flight??!!! Don't ask me was it because of Robert Pattinson...I think most girls would say yes. >p

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"...you look like a movie star..." Yes we do!!

"Honey honey, touch me, baby, ah-hah, honey honey
Honey honey, hold me, baby, ah-hah, honey honey
You look like a movie star
I know just who you are..."

Finally the 4-month-well-kept-secret is revealed! On 28th March 09, 1400 people were laughing their lungs out while watching the 16 minute movie starring the so-called 7 PLLM movie stars. We had tonnes of surprises throughout the whole appreciation dinner but our slot was the biggest surprise of the night. Been pretending and showing the "I AM NOT INVOLVED IN ANY PERFORMANCE AT THE DINNER" face for so long and gosh...it's really suffering if you cannot tell your best buddies about something that you feel so excited over..



2 months before we spent a whole 10 hours for the movie shooting and got it done in a day! Man that's quite a miracle you know. Even the camera crew did not have confidence that we could finish within a day. Been travelling from South to North of Penang island for the scenes.



What's worse was we were in full disguise and wearing funny clothings. However I love my "wizard Hermioni" image a lot a lot.. Maybe I should really join the Halloween party this year, appearing as a witch.



Peter, who is the brainchild of this whole production handed over a copy to our VP Jascha right after the movie ended.



It was not an Oscar red carpet event but somehow we were called up to the stage. Thank you my A* fellowship members. I finally had a chance to fulfill one of the wildest dreams - be a star. Although it's short enough to have just one minute on the stage, but we had created something "never before possible" in the history of our company's annual dinner.



Good job, Peter, Scott, Wignes, Loga, Benny, Meera and Telly! Another play for next year's dinner?? Hahha...well, one thing that I'm very sure of right now -- teasing from the colleagues is not over yet!



Photos of "It's My Nite" - PLLM Appreciation Dinner '09

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