Two Firsts...

As the title implied, today had two first experiences by meeting up with my JC gp of friends.

Again I am 'destined' to go out cos by the meeting time of 4pm, the rain had stopped and the sky was kinda sunny.

Lemme backtrack a bit to talk about this 'destined' thingy. I met up with Tab on thurs, where she remarked that the rest of the uni gang had tried to jio me out during the week to no avail. At first Quetzal tried on Sat, where I replied her, staying home to maple. On Monday, Tab came back and tried. My reply was similar. On Tue, Candle tried, my reply was again I intend to stay home to maple and cos it was raining, so hesistant to go out. Finally on thurs, I came out for Jap and it wasnt raining at all. It was the only sunny day in the entire week of rain. Hence I was 'destined' to come out to air the mouldy self in the sun.

So back to the story, I met up with my JC gp of friends for SeaFood dinner. We had agreed earlier back on 18th Nov, the wedding of one of them, to do so. To eat some good seafood. K, hence we met up in Clementi central. What a great change of meeting place. So near to mine, instead of always being in town. Partly cos all of us stayed in the west, from Holland V, Clementi, Jurong East up til Bukit Batok. Hence hanging around the west is more convenient for all of us. We headed to my newly-wedded friend's place to check it out. It is located very near Central. We hung around a bit, half talking about the show on SCV about Guns, Artillery, Warships, half discussing about places to eat for the dinner, half talking about 'Zen Hu' and the pay, half talking about the websites to visit to watch anime, canto drama online.

Later we headed to Holland Village to one of the coffee shop with that XO-Crab bee hoon thingy to eat 'Zi Char'. We ordered Chilli Crab, 'San Wei' Prawns and Baby Kailan plus StingRay. It is to be my first official Chilli Crab ever in a Zi Char place. (this excludes the Chilli crab offered by those 'Za Fan' stalls)(I had never eaten Chilli crab b4 in a zi char place cos my dad absolute refuse to order it. He will say the chilli taste will cover the original taste of the dish, hence he only occasionally order Pepper Crab or Steam Crab) It is nice, though not the heavenly-type where one taste and I will be transported to another realm much like those animes I've watched. The prawns are very good but the portion a bit small.

An interesting comparison now exists when I compared the 2 main group of friends I go out with.

1) My JC friends all earn higher than me (now got 1 is below) vs My Uni friends where my pay is like the average pay.

2) My JC friends will gather to do more activities eg Karaoke, Pool, Movies, BBQ birthday, BoardGames@Settlers, eat Zi Char at coffee shop types, drink coffee at Coffee bean/Coffee Club, sit at coffee shop to drink tea, coffee, milo vs My Uni friends will meet up to eat at non-cheena restaurants eg Cartel, Fish n Co, go for occassional expensive restaurants eg Black Angus for birthdays, shopping, drinking coffee at cafes, drinking alcohol at pubs, now into Boardgames@Pitstop.

3) My JC friends would meet up once about every 3-6mths vs My Uni friends we meet up weekly on most weekends and even on weekdays for dinner.

4) My JC friends dialogue can be intellectual about some serious discussions about some issues, interests, pursuits, work (anything under the sun) or be trival about mundane stuff vs My Uni friends tend to talk about work, attached-status and trival stuff.

An interesting contrasting picture and I enjoy the company of both groups. Just wish that the JC group we could meet up more often. Often we will be talking non-stop about different issues and things until the moment we part. Hmm maybe could organize something more regular.

Anyway I noticed this sharp contrast in Pt 2 when we reached the Coffee shop and ordered Zi Char to eat. We ate the crab with our hands. Its something I dun experience much with my Uni friends. When me and my JC friends each found permanent employment about 2 years back, we took turns to give lunch/dinner treats and organized it into our outings. There were times we ate at Zi Char dinner at a coffee shop, another at Merchant Hotel buffet, another at Coffee Club dinner and the final dinner at some Indonesian restaurant at Clark Quay. A different experience each time, kinda unique and refreshing. Think I enjoyed it cos I really like to do something different and new. Dunno if its an Aquarius or AB+ thingy.

After the first Chilli crab, we walked around Holland Village to first check out that Ice-Cream place that was featured on HDB-TaiTai. As one of my JC friends stayed at Holland Village, he led us to the place. I looked at the pricing, reasonable - S -$4.50, M -$6, L-$7.50. The inside of the shop is mainly white and nicely air-conditioned. You can see the person 'frying' your ice-cream to mix your selection of ice-cream, if u picked more than 1 flavour, and the toppings thoroughly well. We didnt try, just took a peep and headed to Ya Kun. Another first for me.

Yar I have never eaten nor drunk at Ya Kun yet. The reason mainly is I didnt even go with my Uni friends to the place. Partly most of the time, we meet to eat dinner so no chance to eat toast/drink coffee/tea. Orchard dun really have much Ya Kun too. The nearest is Far East. I drank the tea, nice and ordered the butter n kaya toast. The verdict is the toast is nice when dipped into the tea as it is very thin n crispy. The amount of butter n kaya though is a bit little. A first bit into the toast, cant taste much of it, cos its spread more in the middle portion of the toast. Hence a bite into the side, one encounters more of the plain toast. In Segamat, there is a very very good Nanyang coffee shop with godly toast. Important not to be too stingy with the butter n kaya and to spread it evenly. Nearing ten, we all headed back home. Its a nice meeting, glad that one of my friends is staying so nearby. Was joking that I'll bunk over if I've missed my bus.



A side add-on unrelated to this post.
The Hellbound Ranking of the various flavours and types of Pocky

There is this supermarket, Yamakawa Supa at Central. It sells lots of different flavours of Pocky as well as an array of Japanese tibits. Everytime I go in, I'll end up buying lots of Pocky, chocolate sticks as well as Green Tea flavoured chocolate.

OMG, the Green Tea flavoured Pocky is heavenly.
Hence No 1 is the Green Tea with Chocolate Swirls Pocky.
A close No 2 is the Green Tea chocolate with Macademia nuts (Think not Pocky but still oiishi)
No 3 is Green Tea Pocky.
No 4 is the very nice Double Twirl type Pocky, vanilla one (very light)
No 5 is the same Double Twirl type Pocky, double chocolate (too sweet...)
No 6 is Pocky chocolate crush with Almonds
No 7 is Pocky chocolate crush with crush cookies

Man I really love the Green tea Pocky and the double Twirl vanilla ones. After eating those, the chocolate crush just went straight to the bottom of the list. Hmm when am I going there to stock up more again? Almost finished all the Pocky with family. Cant show the pics cos the boxes got thrown away liao... so sad.