FIRST solo adventure

[UPDATED: 14 December 2012]

I am now sitting in a cosy corner of Coffee Bean at Wisma Merdeka which is in the city centre of KK, writing out this post and watching the city get more busy, with increasing population and cars on the road as people commute to work. It so happen that I wanted to go out to sightsee and do a little shopping, but my aunts are all working so, I'm left to wander around on my own. Since most of the shops are only open by 10AM, I'm taking my sweet time at Coffee Bean having a Smoked Salmon Norwegian Sandwich with a cup of Hot Double Chocolate for my breakfast. I'm now too full to even have my lunch on time. 

I was woken up early by my aunt to get ready so that we can leave together. Well, since her workplace is in the city centre also, might as well. Anyway, today would be the very first time that I'm going around in a foreign country alone (even if KK is my hometown - my birth place and my dad's home, I grew up all my life in Brunei. So, I can consider KK as a foreign country?). There's always a first for everything right? 

The last couple of days, since I arrived in KK has been great. The moment I got out of the airport, my aunt brought me to eat my favourite dumplings at this coffeeshop at Hilltop. I have also met up with my other aunt and cousins over a Korean dinner at City Mall yesterday night. 

I'm going to walk around the nearby shopping malls a little later to see if I can grab any good shopping deals and enjoy the solitude. My first solo adventure begins now. :)

All by myself,

Hannah

p.s. I shall upload pictures of my trip a little later when I have the time :) 

FIRST solo trip

I'm really excited today!! Finally, the day has arrived. I'm going on my FIRST solo adventure!! There's many FIRSTS going together with my trip. I'm excited yet nervous for the yet-to-comes. I'm actually going back to my hometown - Kota Kindabalu (KK), Sabah, Malaysia, for a short getaway and yes, I'm going by plane.

As this post is published onto my blog, I would be hundreds of feet up in the air (because I scheduled this post to be published around the same time of my flight :P). It'll be my FIRST time riding on a plane alone. All by myself. And this is coming from me, a person with  anxiety issues. For the past couple of days, some scenarios flashed across my mind. What if I forget this? What if I that? Would I get into trouble for this? What would happen to me if that? However, despite all those, I'm just going to place myself in God's hands. I'm sure that I'll be okay and I'll reach KK safe and sound :)

It's also the FIRST time that I'm going back to my hometown alone. Usually, I would go back together with my family or my aunt. But this time, it's just me who's going back. I can't help but feel a little nervous and scared because this time round, there's no parents who's gonna look out for me or siblings to help me or entertain me. I guess this is what growing up is like. Although I'm staying with my aunts and grandma in KK, I still feel like this is an independent trip for me.

There's actually many more FIRSTS to come when I'm in KK, but I shall blog more on those at a later time. Until then, goodbye Brunei for a little while and HELLO KK!!

Flying solo,

Hannah

Summer Escapades 2.0

Okay, some might wonder why I've titled this post with a "summer" in it since Brunei has no 4 seasons at all but only a hot and wet climate most all year round. But due to it being summer in most part of the world, also how I've named my previous post similarly and how the international schools here in Brunei are all having their "summer" break now, the summer part can stay. :P

And so, I've spent my week full and hectic but I did manage to squeeze out some time to chill for a little and socialise with a few of my friends. Something that I will miss very soon when I start my full revisions and preparations for my upcoming mock exams which is in 3 weeks. I'm pretty scared for the upcoming exams because I'm not quite ready but hopefully, the situation will be able to change for the better in the course of the 3 weeks.

Monday:

After school, Amy and I went out together because we wanted to go check out the Ramadan Stalls which is happening outside the National Stadium. The urge to visit the ramadan stalls was caused by the many nice food pictures that both Amy and I have seen in many of the SNS (Social Networking Sites). But before that, the both of us kind of detoured to the nearby shopping complexes aka Times Square and the Airport Mall. We went to try out the latest food craze which is the ice cream mochi from Belluno Gelato Mochi. I liked it a lot because I love both ice cream and mochi since like forever however, the expensive price tag may be a reason of my unfrequent visits.

We also went to ShareTea together to try it out. They have pretty interesting flavours such as drinks with rock salt and cheese. It might sound a little gross but hey, it does taste pretty good. The milk tea was nice too. It has this nice, milky, tea fragrance that I adore plus, it's not too sweet too. I love milk tea and I can't forget the milk tea I had in Hong Kong. Mmmmm.. the taste, oh-so-fine.

Amy suggested that we pick up a friend from the airport who's there to send a friend off for further studies. So, in the end, it was the 3 of us going round the ramadan stalls. The food that I bought that day was only okay, in my opinion. A little disappointment with some of the food but maybe it's because of my high expectations to it due to the high ravings of them. Hmmm.. a lesson learnt perhaps to not put expectations too high?

Wednesday:

I had a busy Tuesday, full of homework and hence, no appointments made. But on Wednesday, it was decided that Sophia and I would go to do a little gift shopping for a friend's birthday. After we bought what we wanted, we went to pick Zee and then go to the Ramadan Stalls again because Sophia and Zee wanted to go to have a look-see. So, I kindly accompanied them since I had some free time. I only bought cakoi or youtiao (a popular asian deep fried dough snack) this time round and it tasted really good. HAHA!! Maybe it's my big love for cakoi. 

I remember my grandma bringing me to the morning market on Fridays in town when I was a little girl with my brother. If we were behaving well, she would buy us cakoi as a treat and I have always loved cakoi ever since. Cakoi and I go way back. However, due to the high content of flour and oil used to make and fry it, it's rather unhealthy to have it often. I don't eat cakoi frequently hence, this cakoi was a nice treat to myself. :)

Sunday:

I spent the morning sleeping in after a midnight show watching the 3 stooges. I didn't really like the movie except for the last few parts of the entire movie, maybe it's just me not that into these kind of movie genre. Went to have a delicious chicken rice lunch then off to church for the afternoon.

I went to a Sungkai (breaking of the fast for the Muslims) Buffet at Excapade Sushi. Oh boy, were there a big crowd. The food was great and the plus points was that there is a free flow of sashimi and there's also snow crab legs!! My family enjoy eating seafood so we had a glorious time savouring the crabs. Hehehe.. our dinner was made comfortable with the 2 waiters whom we're on first name basis. If there was some kind of "Best Employee" or something, I would have definitely give the award to the 2 of them in a heartbeat. They are so ever nice and it's a pleasure to have them serve and entertain us. They are the kind of waiters that will make us, the customers, crave to go back there. :)

In a nutshell, these events have actually made my week better at some point after having a couple of really down-in-the-dumps moments. It's gonna be another public holiday tomorrow today (a past midnight post on a Sunday) in lieu of the Nuzul Al-Quran in the nation. So, I'm looking forward and praying for a nice day tomorrow.

Good night,

Hannah

Summer Escapades

I haven't had the time to sit down and go online hence, no new post since the last one. I could actually do a quick post or so but let's just say procrastination got the best of me. My week has been wonderful as it was full of fun and a few outings for me which I enjoyed a lot. I don't think I will be getting much relaxing time after this short weekend break due to the start of Ramadan, the fasting month. Oh, Happy Fasting to my Muslim friends! :)

I shall do a short re-cap on my outings for this post so I can actually remember these times when I look and read back on all of my post. Tuesday was a normal, typical school day. So, nothing on that. Let's just start off with Wednesday. :D

Wednesday:

I went back home after my classes in the morning. There was a hang-out session planned between Eia, Amy and I because Eia is going to leave soon. Amy came and picked me up from home and we went to the Thai Restaurant nearby my house to get Mango Sticky Rice for Eia since she was craving it a lot after seeing Amy's Mango Sticky Rice post on instagram. After buying the Mango Sticky Rice, we headed to Eia's house. 

We were really blessed because Eia's grandma has graciously made us some food for lunch. Oh my.. the food was amazing and totally delicious! Her grandma made chai-kueh (steamed veggie dumplings) and Lo Mai Gai except it was without the Lotus Leaf but in a steel container. The food has the potential to make a person really homesick. We just chat (like what girls would normally do when they're together) the entire time about the things under the sun. 

Oh, in the midst of all the talking, I got lectured and nagged at by Eia and Amy about my serious negativity on life and my studies. Yeah.. they said that's what they, my big sisters or as I call them my che che, are for. They said they nag and lecture me because it was for my own good. Well, it did kind of kick some sense into me so, I guess all of their nagging didn't go to waste. You guys happy now? HAHA! We even took a mini road trip to send Eia to her next schedule. There was a jam because it was peak hours as people just knocked off work but we still enjoyed the jam because we get more time to talk. There's just never ending talks between girls eh? It's going to be really sad when Eia and Amy leave which will be very, very soon. I'm going to miss them a lot.

Thursday:

Thursday was suppose to be another typical school day but my afternoon class got cancelled and there was supposed to be a compulsory function in school that I was supposed to attend in the afternoon. I cancelled my piano lesson just for the function however, the function is cancelled and postponed. So many cancellations.. but then, Sophia had a movie outing planned for the afternoon, so I decided to join her. 

There was a big group of us for the movie outing. 2 girls and the rest were boys. Sophia and I were the only girls but we didn't mind. HAHA! The boys were very accommodating to us the entire time. We watched Batman: The Dark Knight Rises. I usually don't watch action movies because it's just not my type (I'm more of a chick flick and rom-com person) but I just went for it and guess what? I actually liked this movie! I love the actions (believe it or not), the story-line and the actors. Hey, how bad can a movie go with Christian Bale and Anne Hathaway in it? I also like the Bat-mobile or whatever that's call because I like how the tires work. Hehehe. The movie was really nice that we and the other people in the theater actually applauded when the credits rolled.

We hung out, took Polaroid pictures together and ate ice-cream sundaes. It was just a nice, fun afternoon with my friends. Fad, a friend whom I haven't seen in the past 1 1/2 year joined us for the movie. It was nice seeing and talking to him again. I was glad I didn't make a mistake to go watch the movie and join them because I actually enjoyed my afternoon. Thanks Sophia for inviting me along. Big love to you. x

Friday:

Dad texted me and asked if I'm actually around his office area. If I was, I could help him get coffee. Haha! I actually went out with Jess to the area after the text. How nice of a daughter am I? My brother came and joined us after his gym work-out session then we walked around the shopping centres of the area, ate some Frozen Yogurt and had Taro Pearl Milk Tea from ShareTea. It was my first time trying Sharetea and it wasn't a bad experience except for the long queue. I had dinner with the family at a Icebar & Cafe which specialises in shabu-shabu. I will do another post on this soon. ;)

Saturday:

The day isn't officially over but it'll do. I and the whole nation of Brunei get today off work and from school because it's the first day of the fasting month. I slept in and woke up at 10am because my biological alarm woke me up. We had a Care Group Family lunch together at Thiam Hock, a famous chinese restaurant in town. It was a nice lunch and get-together with the whole care group because it's not always that we can actually come together and relax over a meal. Usually, we will have to rush off for something but we actually had a good 2 hours of food and talks. The lunch was for Brother JC who's leaving for further studies in a couple of days.

These are just the little bits of my escapades for this week. I'm really grateful for all the fun and love I received. It's amazing! I enjoy every bit of it. :D

Enjoying my Saturday,

Hannah