The first of which is the Zen retreat below:
29th May (Saturday) - 1st June 2010 (Tuesday) Zen Retreat
27th June 2010 (Sunday) - Indian Day
We met up at 11am and took a bus to Little India. After arriving, we begin checking out the cakes that is displayed prominently on a shelf. We ordered a couple of which and tried it out. We find the milk favour to be very strong. I managed to finish all of which (as I am a regular milk drinker).
Next we have lunch at the Lagnaa. It is an indian vegetarian restaurant and the unique feature is that guests have the option to take a seat on the floor at the 2nd storey. Here is how it looks like.
We ordered the standard set meal below.
Here is our group photo (do we look like brother and sister?)
After lunch, we begin our adventure of Little India. Our first stop is Sri Veerama Kaliamman Temple. Next we move on to Gholia's Village and we walked along Buffalo Road. On the way to the flea market at Pitt Street, we stumbled upon the Mjd Abdul Gafoor mosque. It is actually an indian muslim mosque (that explains the unique architecture).
All visitors have to be properly dressed. Here we have AJ dressed in their traditional muslim garb.
We walked further down to Sultan Mosque at Arab Street.
Finally we caught a hindi movie (Raajneeti) at 3.30pm, Bombay Talkies. It's an interesting movie on politics.
That's all for the Indian Day. We took a slow walk and round it up with dinner at Clarke Quay.
10th July 2010 (Saturday) - Sentosa and Universal Studios
AJ suggested visiting Sentosa and checking out the night opening at the Universal Studios. I met up with AJ at 3pm, Shenton Way. We alighted at the Beach Station and walked around the beach.
The tickets started selling from 6pm, so we got ready to queue up. Here we are at the entrance of the Universal Studios with the big globe at the background.
As it is the World Cup 2010 season, Resorts World Sentosa is having a series of performances celebrating the World Cup.
Here we have the 4 tickets (2 entrance, 2 movie tickets)
Yes! We are finally inside the Universal Studios. The last time I came, I was stuck outside (as they have not implemented the night visit at that time).
Here is the movie theatre. They are showing Hotel for Dogs.
The fireworks start at 9.50pm. Here it goes.
It's an amazing spectacle.
17th July 2010 (Saturday) - River Cruise and Night Museum
AJ managed to get 2 free tickets for the national day fireworks river cruise. There were fly-through by the Singapore air force. The river cruise departs from Clarke Quay.
Here is our group photo while on the cruise.
And the fireworks begin.
It's splendid!
We walked to the national museum to check out the Museum Night Festival. Here is the silhouette image in front of the museum.
In front of the National Arts Gallery, there is an innovative human-size SMS message. Anyone can text the number and the selected ones will appear.
7th August 2010 (Saturday) - Cooking Tempura
AJ put forward to me a challenge to cook tempura. I have attended cooking lessons before and cooked frequently when I was in Europe and Japan. As I have not cooked tempura before, I roughly checked out the ingredients for tempura and get ready on the Saturday morning. It is important to get the freshest ingredients for the day, so I made my way down to NTUC Fairprice at my side for some shopping.
There is a wide selection of mushrooms.
Here is my shopping basket.
I bought the tempura flour the week earlier from Meidi-ya in Liang Court.
I have to wash and cut the vegetables to smaller pieces before I can fry them.
The tempura flour is also to be well-mixed with water. And here we are ready to begin frying.
Thereafter placing the vegetables into the frying wok.
Golden crispy brown tempura. It taste really good. I finally understand why chefs do not take their own food (as they will have sampled too many of it).
I shared with my parents the tempura and brought it to Marina Bay Sands for AJ and her parents to try. "passed!!" ^_^
7th August 2010 (Friday)
AJ got free tickets to the YOG opening and here we go.
Youth Olympic Games Opening
7th (Friday) / 8th (Saturday) August 2010
AJ's parents got free stay at MBS, and I visited them for the 2 days.
Marina Bay Sands
The month of September is a month we spent on Buddhist talks and other light activities.
16th October 2010 (Saturday) - City Hall Open House
On this day, I read about the Supreme Court and City Hall Open House and asked AJ is she interested in checking it out. And off we go.
Here is one of the main courtroom in the Supreme Court.
This is the Law Library.
Here is the foundation stone. It is said a time capsule is kept in there and is to be kept until the year 3000.
Here is our group photo. AJ and Me~ ^_^
