absolutum dominium

with the aid of some photos...

on tuesday i spent the morning with my dad helping him pack his office and clear out his comp of viruses, adware and the like; he brought me for my bi-annual dental checkup, and we had a nice lunch of curry mee and char kuay teow.

and then it was off to tcc @ plaza sing to meet diana for coffee. yay! first time i met up with this girl since tt day we watched her run from the check-in counter to the departure gates at the yvr airport. hee hee. but she looks great, is doing great (okay, anyone doing better than i am at this current moment is doing great), and it was fantastic to talk to her again (although i spent more time pouring out my woes to her than actually catching up. sigh). and still-not-fully-recovered ben dropped by.

i introed them to the dark devotion - formerly known as the warm lava chocolate cake - my all-time fave dessert... and this being ben's first time, he was so enthralled tt we finished the first in under 30 seconds, and he'd ordered a second one from the waiter before diana and i could even disclose the price to him.

YES! my chocolate cake has won over yet another fan. hee hee.

coz diana had bought her 60 gb ipod, we decided to show her the apple lifestyle concept store tt we had discovered at cine, and we did spend a good amount of time there. after tt, we went to crystal jade la mian xiao long bao at scotts (the only crystal jade @ orchard tt we know with... no queue... yippee!) for dinner. diana and i ordered the spicy minced meat noodles; ben ordered the chicken soup with noodles, and we shared a plate of shanghai xiao long bao and wantons soaked in chilli oil. yar lah. damn yummy lah. sinful, but yummy. hee hee.

and this is...



me and diana.



and ben and i.

my face looks like a pie. or the moon. i think so lah.

after tt, it was an almost mad rush down to holland v to meet my bro, chris... after a reeeaaally long time of not seeing him since... i left for vancouver.

so we met for coffee and heart-to-heart at the tcc at holland v (yes, yes, i love this place), as well as some mini mushroom vol-au-vents and a frozen royal chocolate mousse.



my bro and i (finally, a nice photo of the both of us tt is not tt a) 5 year old taekwondo photo on my friendster; and b) tt 4 year old prom photo on yours.).

ben dropped by close to midnight and we went for a drink at upper bukit timah.

unfortunately, the night ended with a 24 hour saga tt is... the battle with the parents.

on wed morning as per planned, we met for breakfast at boon lay to go to jurong bird park. i had a very nice 20-min screaming match with my mom, who questioned me on why i wanted to go to jurong bird park. and why i had to go at this time. i told her tt i wanted to see the birds and tt it is impossible to see anything at night. nope. sh wasn't particularly happy about tt, or about anything else tt i said or did not say.

i had another 6-min death...i mean screaming match with my dad in the aptly named "world of darkness", while watching curious snowy owls look out at me from their exhibits and cursing the noisy screaming kids to unimaginable doom.

but tt being said, jurong bird park was still pretty enjoyable - parents nonwithstanding. we took the panorail from the main station to the lori station where the parrots were.



so this is both of us on the panorail, me with my pie-shaped face. hee hee.



and here is a hornbill pair. the hornbill aviary was tt we visited at the lori station.



and speaking of loris, this is ben's hand and a lori. ben is trying to trick the lori into believing tt he is offering food. ben does strange things with loris. and other birds. i think in the southeast asian bird aviary we were chasing a pheasant by walking after it. it just walked faster.



tt's me at the lori aviary. i don't do strange things with or to birds, thankfully.

after traumatising the loris, we headed off to see the birds of prey.



this is a great sea eagle. it is indeed very large.



this is a bald eagle. this is the eagle tt is native to alaska, and because it is so big, you could easily spot it from your car or boat or on foot all over the state of alaska. but of course in singapore... only at the bird park.

after the birds of prey, we came to the flightless birds section. where we discovered tt ostriches are indeed very curious creatures.



this female here looks new to the bird park. from the way she was gawking at us, it seemed as though she had never seen humans before. hee hee.

we also saw emus, rheas and cassowaries. cassowaries struck ben as lazy creatures.

but never mind tt. from there it was on to the pelican lake.



and the pelicans.



this is a sleeping pelican. just so you know.



this is a sign tt is um... being upgraded. whatever tt means.



and this is south east asia's largest man-made waterfall at the waterfall station aviary. at 30 m in height, it really is impressive. it's hard to believe, walking into the aviary, tt something so natural is all man-made... even the forest mist is mad-made!



of course, tt doesn't stop the usual "look ma! here we are!" photos.



it also doesn't stop the smoker from smoking. hee hee.



final stop: it's off the see the penguins (happy feet happy feet)!

then it's away from wonderland and back to reality.

but reality came and went and inspite of everything, nothing has changed.

today my pupils are dilated and i can't see near objects. most interesting, being both legally blind (yes i am) and slightly long-sighted at the same time.

man it must suck to be old.