Thursday, February 27, 2014

Offically Married!

I'm here to announce that I'm offically married! :)

I'm still feeling surreal and smiling whenever I think back of that moment, the moment when we said our vows and we were pronounced as man and wife.

I've too many people to thank for helping me throughout the whole planning journey, and not forgetting those who have helped us in one way or another on the day itself. Especially those who dolled me up from head to toe, and the few angels whom I last minute approached for help and they willingly agree without second thoughts.

婚姻是一辈子,我们的友情也是一辈子的!

I'll be back to do a proper blogpost once I've received the photos. Stay tuned :)

Ending this post with a non-edited photo out of the many shots we took that day..




Monday, February 24, 2014

Singapore Airshow 2014!

I was given a chance to visit the Singapore Airshow 2014 during the trade visitor days all thanks to my company!

I've always wanted to go to the airshow, but it's too far from the west and it's very crowded. So in the end, I gave it a miss after considering all these factors.  I was quite excited because it's my first time attending the airshow! :):) I've prepared my shades, umbrella and sunblock just for this event.

Not forgetting, I'm crazy over the show Triumph in the Skies II, So I was hoping to see some Jayden-alike pilot in the show. *fan girl mode on* #thinktoomuch

The trade visitor pass allows us to go on all 4 days(Tue-Fri) but we only went on the last day, which so happens to be Valentine's Day too.

Other colleagues who went on the previous days have warned us about the marked up food prices there, hence I brought in Mcdonalds Breakfast. While on the shuttle bus, I've already finished my breakfast lol! The journey from Expo to Changi Exhibition Centre wasn't really that near, but with the amount of vehicles on the road, especially during the peark period, the traffic is quite slow. We reached there around 9.45am. 


There were the usual bag scans and security checks at the entrance. 

The F-35 Lightning II.

Many were queuing to go up to sit inside and have a feel of the plane. My colleagues and I did went to join the queue but gave up after that because the queue was moving too slow. We spent the time walking around to visit the other planes on exhibit. 



We decided to just take photo with the plane by standing near the plane, instead of queuing up for it. 



#OOTD. 

The weather was pretty hot, and it's best to be in our most comfy wear but also not too revealing lol! I was quite afraid to get tan(because my ROM is just a week plus away). so I've applied maximum sunblock that I can to prevent it. #preventinguglytanlines

We went to see other planes on display before the airshow start. 


Qatar!


All these planes are so small till I think pilots have to maintain their size if not they can't fit inside.

The airshow started at around 10.25am. We were prompt to go over to the big open area to watch the airshow. The airshow lasted for around 1/2 hour, it was the shortest airshow among 4 days because it was the last trade visitor days. But better than nth ba! Afterall, pilots have to rest too and prepare for the public airshow. 

We were first greeted by the F16, All this planes shots were so hard to capture because they are flying at a very fast speed. And it was really sunny and they are really far away, I can't really take proper photos. But I'm glad I've still some decent photos at the end of the day for keepsake purposes.

F16

The Australia's  Rhino

And last but not least, the highlight of the whole airshow is the Black Knights! Love all the aerobatics they did even though they sky was quite cloudy! 







Because it was Valentine's day, they drew a heartshape in the sky for us. But sadly, there were dark clouds hence the heartshape can't be seen properly. :( I do still appreciate their effort, so sweet of them! haha! 

After the airshow, we cheong-ed to queue up to sit inside the F16. We actually don't really care which plane to take photo with, as long we manage to take a mandatory shot. There were 2  F16 and 1 F15. Logically, the F16 will be faster and the person on duty suggested us so we went ahead.



Mandatory shot done! 

Btw, I was not the only one having a hard time getting in because all of us had a hard time. We were not allow to touch anything except the back of the seat. You'll have to resist touching the other parts of the plane while getting in and out of it. -_-".

Since I'm getting married soon, my colleagues gave me a mission to take photo with the guy on duty. The photo turned out to be pretty dark because the background is too bright. I've to edit the photo to the maximum to see his face because he's sooo tan.

Mission accomplished! 

Anyway, my shoes came off while I was getting out of the plane, he was kind enough to picked up my smelly shoes and returned it to me. #embrassingmax

Last mission of the day, was to take this shot below...

We were trying to pose like charlie angels..


Not bad right? Got at least 80-90% similar? Except the height difference lol! It was all karen's idea and nian qing was really sporty and agreed to it. Whenever I see this photo, I'm still laughing at it. I'll probably blow this picture up big big on my actual wedding day. 

A normal shot with the ladies! 

Last picture of the day..

A close up shot of all of us!
My hair looks really razy that day because it was really windy.

I will highly recommend everyone to go to the airshow at least once in your lifetime to experience it yourself. All those stuffs that you see at the airshow, are not things you see daily or on the tv, not even on NDP, do make your trip down if you have the chance as it doesn't happen every year :)

Friday, February 21, 2014

Early Valentine's Day Celebration @ The Tiramisu Hero

We had an early valentine's day celebration @ The Tiramisu Hero. Because everywhere will be so overpriced and crowded on valentine's day. 

Thus, we decided to have an early celebration then :) To us, it's just another date night then, every date can be valentine's day to us! 

The place is located pretty near to our office and there's a straight bus there. It isn't that inconvenient because this place is of a walkable distance from Lavender MRT station. 

We reached around 7pm and there wasn't much crowd. I've called in advance to see whether there's a need to reserve but they assure me that there will be sufficient seats  

The owners/creators/bosses behind The Tiramisu Hero are none other than famous blogger, Peggy and her partner, A. :) 


I love the exterior of it. It has such a garden feel~ 

Peggy was actually sitting there while I was taking photo of it haha! I'm too shy to take photos with her so I skip it. 

There were plenty of seats inside, but those seats at the very inner side of the cafe are not so well lit. So when we saw a table empty after the couple left, we quickly hopped over to a more brightly lited seats.

The waitress handed us the menu and we are suppose to order our food from the counter :)


Hello Sir Antonio! 


Some photos of the interior which were all drawn by the bosses themselves! I'm really impressed by their art works because you can see how much effort they have put in. 



Spotted the  Sir Antonio's head which we have fun with later on!



Both of us ordered the same mains(so as to be fair) because we are both prawn aglio olio lovers. We topped up for their mushroom soup and their drinks. 

The mushroom soup was pretty good :) 

The Prawn Aglio Olio :) 

Mandatory shots  as below..




I love the prawns the most. Though I know it's frozen prawn, but the q-ness of the prawn is woo hoo! Other than that, the dish can be furthered improve by adding in more garlic and spices. It's a little more to the bland side, perhaps those who prefer not so strong taste aglio olio will love it. 

We ended our dinner with the tiramisu from them. What's a trip there without having to try their tiramisu? :) We ordered the original flavour, they have all kinds of flavours and you can the whole list on their website. 


:) 

After trying it, we still prefer the tiramisu from rounder's bakery. The main difference is, the tiramisu from Rounder's Bakery are more milky and has a pretty strong taste :) 

A couple shot outside The Tiramisu Hero, thanks to a passerby who help us take these photos. 


Happy 8th Valentine's Day! 

And not forgetting, we did play around with the Sir Antonio's Mascot. 


Perfect place for #OOTD if you are bare face that day :) 



Ending off with a collage of us... :) 


THE TIRAMISU HERO CAFE
Address | 121 Tyrwhitt Road Singapore 207548
Contact Number | 62925271

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Marina Run 2014

I just completed my first run of the 2014 last weekend! I can totally feel my engine has rust and I'm trying to get it back on track. -_-". The fitness level has gone with all the festive seasons. Oh well, a new year, time to get the engine starting because there's much more race ahead this year :) 

A week before the run was the race pack collection, the queue for the race pack collection was horribly long because there's only 4 counters. 

Honestly speaking, I've never been to a race pack collection with just 4 counters. The queue was moving real slow until I can't take it and went to get coffee for Derp and myself. That was a few days before my teeth whitening, so I'm enjoying coffee while I can! haha! 

My 10km race was scheduled to start at 5:30pm. My phone went crazy and I can't unlock it at all. So no pictures at the start but somehow it went back to normal after that so pictures were all taken after the race.

We wasn't early enough to join in the queue, so we were pretty far behind. But there was only 1 wave so not so bad la. At least they don't make us keep waiting and waiting. There was around 3000 runners for the 10km run. The congestion wasn't that bad for the first 5km, it only got worse after it loop back to tanjong ruh area. The roads wasn't not even, some of the time we had to run on grass and it was narrow.

At that point, I was too shag out to care whether people is blocking my way or not. I will just keep on moving be it walk/jog. I just need to complete it. 

The wind was a plus point because we were running against the wind most of the time. So it's extremely tiring can? At those times, I will just stop and walk till the wind stops, before I continue lol! 

There were 2 misleading 9km markers(probably 1 for the 21km runner and 1 for the 10km runner, you got to look at it really carefully, if not you will think your last 1km never comes), and at the end of the day, many runners said that the race route was more than 10km, it was 10.4/10.6/10.8 km! I've been telling Derp, it's really longer than 10km, but it do sounds like excuses for myself to stop and walk lol!
Alright pictures time! 


The queue for collecting the bags were extremely long too. This race is all about queuing, from queuing of  collection of race pack to queuing for collection of bags. 

I'm thankful for the welfare at the finisher's tent, there were bananas/apples and drinks. But it's a little sad that there wasn't can drinks, the drinks were all poured in a small cup. Both of us gobbled down a few fruits while waiting to collect our bags, we were totally famished by then. 


:) 


Derp was peeling the sticker off the apple haha! 

Me and my tired out face. 


First race of the year, and our last race as Mr and Miss. 

I'm praying my next race, which is a all female race to be more smooth in the end. I don't really expect myself to do well or what, I hope at the very least there's lesser congestion.

I better start praying hard for my Sundown. I've zero confidence at all, and best part it starts at 12:30am. It's a mental challenge with the sleep god and my body! Fighting!  

Monday, February 17, 2014

My New Flat: Checking the Defects & Having Them Rectified.

After we have collected the keys, we used 2 weekends to check the defects and at the same time submit the form. Honestly speaking, we are not those hardcore checker who will go to the extend of taking leave, to go down to check the flat from day to night. We took like 3-4 hours of out time out per day to check the defects, if not our neck/back will probably break by the end of it. 

You are supposed to check your defects within 7 days after your have collected your keys, or 1 year from the date you collect your key. As long as the renovation has not started, any defects can be charged under the HDB contractor, and you have the right to ask them to rectify it :)

We are lucky enough because our block was the 1st to be ready for keys collection. It's like 1.5 months difference from the next block keys collection date. In order for the rectification to be done fast, it's better to submit your defects form just before the next block collect their key. If not you can wait up to months just for the defects to be done, especially when more and more units are ready by then.

Some photos taken during defects checking day..

Our block! 


The view of the hockey stadium and abit of the sports stadium from our masterbedroom. 

We spent 1 day doing up 2 of the rooms and another day doing 1 room and the rest of the house.


We don't really have much issues with the kitchen, windows and etc. The main bulk of the problems comes from the room tiles. We divide the job up, so 1 of us settle 1 room and another 1 settle the another. 

After I'm done, I will asked Derp over to see whether the defects I've marked out are reasonable/justifiable. and vice versa. We don't want to appear to be some unreasonable couple because you never know what the contractors will do to your house if you are being nasty. Always be kind to them :) 

We taped the area around the defects with masking tape, draw arrows to show where exactly it is. As for the defects form, we only can write the type of defects generally because it's too hard to describe it. 

We went down the following weekend to submit the defect form. The supervisor came up with us with his ka kia(assistant), and Derp went around showing them the defects to be rectify, and see if it can be rectified anot. The supervisor kept saying "yes can", "can can". I went like O.O? So he 'can' all the way and within 5 minutes they are out of the house. 

We gave them a padlock key and also the form, and they left. They smile and "can can can" all the way lol! Okay, at least they never blackface us, or probably tsk-ing us from the bottom of their heart.

We were praying that they will do a good job for the rectification and not hating us for letting them do double job, we bought drinks for the contractor to have it while they do the rectifying. 


My #OOTD that day on the defects form submission. 

The whole living room is best for taking #OOTD shots now! lol! Brightly lited with white walls! 

We did some packing after the contractors left, throw everything into the living room and we never went back there till 3 weeks later. Yup, the whole rectification took 3 weeks because of the CNY break and etc. 

A random shot taken of the nearby park near our house..:). Gonna love that park very much! lol. 



Anyway below are the lists of things we brought in to the new flat, so as to assist us in defects checking:

1) Unwanted rags and scotch brite to help you test whether stains can be removed.
2) A few scrappers to scrap off those dried paint everywhere. This also helps you to see whether the particular stain/or whatever can be removed
3)  Dustpan and Brooms. Yes the house is damn dusty, best if you bring masks along especially if you have sensitive nose.
4) Any type of charger so that you can test the electricity supply at each of your sockets. 
5) Chairs. After a few hours of checking, you just want to take a seat, unless you don't mind sitting on the dusty floor lol.
6) Garbage bags because you won't want to keep walking in and out of the house to throw rubbish.

Alright, that's all I can think of for now! 

Oh ya, if you are wondering about the power and water turn on procedure. Here how it goes, the power supply and water supply are already turned on before you collect the keys. This goes the same for all new houses. So actually, you need not schedule an appointment to ask the power supply person to come down to turn it on for you.

All you need to do is to set up an account with Singapore Power and ta dah you are done! However, when you are creating that account, the system will auto allocate you a appointment for the person to come down to turn on. How smart is the system isn't it? -_-". 

I did called them up to say, I'm very sure the power has been turned on, if they want to come down by all means, because no one will be at home. The person really came at the end and called me up to complain that actually he no need to come down, but he understands is not our fault(yes is the stupid system fault)and blah blah blah. So at the end of the day, it seems to be a wasted trip for him. 

Okay enough of my stories, they called me up after 3 weeks or so to inform me that the defects have been done. I will need to go down to collect back the padlock keys.

I embarked on my journey down there myself since it's just half an hour away from my work place, and I released from work before the peak period everyday.

More pictures taken and this time with my new phone! :)


The stadium which is located just a road across my block.

Some photos of the rectified floors, I must admit they look much better now. 





There were some uneven floor tones at the masterbedroom, seems like it's much better now too.

Anyway, I did spot a few defects which were not rectified properly. But oh well, I'll be bringing my ID down this coming week. Who knows if my ID have some ways to resolve it for us, then there's not a need to go back to the hdb contractor again. 


There's still some stains left that's not being get rid off properly. Sigh! 

The next update of my new flat will probably be on finalizing of quotation and start of renovation :) 

Just in case you are wondering what are the things to check for in your new flat, below are the lists of things you can look out for. 

1. Check that all your keys opens your main door properly. Don't forget your letter box key.

2. Turn on all the lights (if it comes with), make sure they're working perfectly. Make sure none of the lights are blown or any of the starters are faulty. If your wiring are hidden as some new flats are, pray that everything is wired properly.

3. Turn on all the taps, faucets, showers and let the water run. If water chokes in your sink, something's in it's way. Could be plaster etc.

Since BTOs do not come with showers installed, bring a hose along with you, stick it into the sink's tap and flood your floor. If water collects on the bathroom floor and takes forever to drain, your floor isn't slopped properly to encourage proper drainage.

4. Taste the water. It might sound silly, but it should taste... clean, and free from corrosion. Not that stainless steel pipes corrode easily, and this being a new flat and all. But just because the pipes are newly installed doesn't mean the pipes are new (they're not). Bring along a clear drinking glass. Fill it up and see if there are any unnatural particles.

5. Open ALL the windows to their fullest. Check to see if they function properly. Pay attention to the handles to ensure they're not loose. Also check that they all turn and lock properly. If you have to force the handle into lock position, the handle will loosen up within a short time. This is a problem because most handles are dead bolted onto the frames. And once they are loose, there's nothing to be done but re-bolt them onto another area, leaving unsightly holes on your frame and your handles will not be level with your other windows.

6. Use all the toilets. You don't have to leave behind a souvenir ;) Just flush them and ensure they work properly. Don't just walk away - see how long it takes for the water tank to fill up and flush again. Faulty water tank plumbing may hinder replenishment of the tank's water. Nothing's worse that having a flushing system usable only every 30mins after a night of fish curry, beer and mayonnaise.

7. If your unit comes with a fancy accordion pole hanger for drying clothes, play around with it to ensure everything is bolted properly and its mechanisms are functioning smoothly.

8. If your walls are tiled, take a thick (50c works) coin or marble and start tapping on each of them to check if any of the tiles are hollow or loose.

9. You won't be able to confirm this within 7 days, but be on a constant look out for water leakage\damage on your ceilings after your upstairs neighbor has moved in.

10. Always remember that just because it's a newly built flat doesn't mean everything in it is new. That means piping, gates, windows etc. Check for rust, LISTEN for defects, look for cracks (on the toilet bowls and sinks), and ensure window rubber linings are not dried or rotten.

Source: http://launchpropertysingapore.com.sg/news/entry/what-are-the-things-to-check-in-the-new-bto-flat-after-collecting-keys.html

I did everything above except number 8, because that's super crazy. I only merely use my hands to feel the unevenness. Oh and also my flat comes with the toilet sanitry fittings, so there's not a need for me to bring the hose in.

To read other posts about my new flat(Balloting of flat all the way till keys collection), you can click here :)