Summer Weekend Warrior

Summer is coming to an end soon, or so the folks here like to remind me everytime the temperature dips like 0.5 degrees. For many many reasons, I prefer summers, and everything they represent:

1. I am a hot-weather person - Singaporean through and through. Aircon? Pfft. Wind through open windows and doors is best for sleeping. And I totally don't mind waking up to perspiring in bed.

2. Perspiring makes me feel like I am losing weight. By the litres.

3. I have too many summer clothes!! Shorts, tees, tanks, sandals, flats - what am I gonna do with them in winter??! I will have to layer 50 pieces just to stay alive.

4. I have too many summer clothes II. I need to show off the newly arrived carton of clothes. And since I am perspiring like siao, it means I can do many changes of clothes.

5. The trees are greener, the grass is luscious, the flowers bloom in a riot of colours, the birds chirp, the crickets err.. crick.. - you get the idea. Life is just funner in summer.

6. There are sooooo many songs about summer to dance crazily to at home. Belinda Carlisle's Summer Rain, Grease' Summer Nights,Gershwin's Summertime and so on... Are there any songs about winter? I don't think so!

In the spirit of living life to the fullest while it's still great summer weather, the recent weekend saw me in weekend warrior mode. In chronological order of my "hiyak.. hoo ha!" weekend:

Saturday
12:35pm Brunch at Dakota with Neo-neo who was visiting from Bonn/Hong Kong 

Alfresco the French way, facing the street.



Eggs ben done fabulously



 1:35pm Visit to xinlelu.com, a funky multi-label boutique hidden along 五原路

They stock Aijek, a Singaporean brand too. So good to see great-looking Singaporean clothes.

1:55pm Browse cool shops along五原路

2:30pm Meet an old secondary school friend, WanJun, who is also working in Shanghai for coffee at SunFlour, 安福路

4:30pm Bicycle shopping (!!) with Chen Ann and Shermaine, followed by a nerve-racking 40-min ride back home.

 

 

And this is my chosen ride. What a babe - the bike I mean.

7:30pm PJ Party in my newly cluttered home (see previous post)

Sunday

11:30am Bike over to Dreams Flea Market where a few of the folks are selling their stuff and works

 

Funky brooches by Grace. What does 萌mean? Have to buy one to find out!

Helpful assistants we tried to be

3:30pm Grocery shopping in preparation for "Penang Night" dinner later this same night

4:30pm Swim 25 laps in pool in bid to cool down

5:30pm Make way to Jas' home to prep for "Penang Night"

7:30pm Settle down to dinner

Chicken curry in the making...

All homemade - nasi lemak, assam prawns, curry chap chye,
lor bak, curry chicken, satay, her peow soup and for dessert, ice kachang!

10:00pm Bike back home...

A packed-to-the-brim weekend - totally pooped, burnt from the sun, knees hurt from the cycling, but exactly my kind of summer fun.

Xoxo,

Tracy

Need a good shave for summer you say?

The Empress' New Clothes

My shipment finally arrived in Shanghai FOUR whole months after I moved here. So what have I been wearing you ask? The same swan tee-shirt for casual outings and the same old dresses for work trips (a CK green silk one, a MBMJ pink printed one, a blue Zara one - yah, I can't go for longer than 3 days kind of work trips) and the same shoes (a pair of Ferra flats and a pair of black Peddar kitten heels that I wore out and had to throw away recently...sobs).  And no, this DOES NOT prove I can actually live on very little (as Edwin likes to point out).  In fact, what it proves is that I have a very high tolerance for suffering fashion-wise and silk dresses can take a number of dry-washes.



Before & After - Ahhh... my life is cluttered and complete again...

My stuff came in a total of 44 boxes.  And again, no, it isn't a lot, considering that they consist of my whole life (and some of Edwin's). Ok, maybe not my WHOLE LIFE entirely cos I still have clothes in Tampines, oh, and some shoes and bags. And I do have a few boxes of stuff in storage in Singapore still... ok this is a losing argument against myself. But whatever the case, it was a super pleasant surprise to find some of the fabulous dresses (many new!), the zillion shoes (finally filled up the empty shoe cabinet!) ... 

So glad I didn't waste a single bit of space!

my breakfast beverages (which are gonna expire by Dec so I am a heavy milo-drinker now, downing two packs a day)...

Me low on milo? Never!

and my old friends!

Meet the Labbits and their friends

I was so estatic about the stuff being in and my house finally looking more like my home, I invited the folks over for a "PJ Party" and here are the photos to show for it.

Cute mummy & son duo: Pin Fen & Gavin in his Angry Birds PJs



Chen Ann and his very decent and newish PJs



Mings & Jas, all ready for bed

 

The fabs couple - Grace & Vic - who accessorised just outside my door and
maybe frightened my neighbour while they were at it.

  

Shermaine in winter PJs, having pizza, the only food
at PJ parties, according to American sitcoms.



Mings and Val having a heated discussion outside my door.
Think it was about who ditched who at the reception and who got strange stares walking over.

   And finally, me and Neo! Front & back matchy matchy!   

I can't believe the amount of effort the folks put into the party - some bought new PJs, some brought bedroom accessories and all brave souls who WALKED over to my place from different buildings in their PJs. How cool ah? We partied real hard (eating pizza and watching The Dictator), so...

Ohh... Only in my dreams... As real as it may beeeee....

Xoxo,
Tracy

Send me postcards from Suzhou, signed with love forevermore

There is this café in the shopping centre (XinTianDi Style) near where I live called the Postcard Café. There are rows upon rows of postcards and cute household stuff – the kind of shop where I have to buy something everytime I go in.  Hence I’ve avoided going in.  Turns out that the original café is located in Suzhou and when Ming Ming and I had some free time on a recent work trip, we took a walk to the café.  Where the one in XinTianDi is airy and bright and located in a hip mall, this Suzhou one is located in a row of preserved shophouses in Pin Jiang (平江) road.  In the café, there are people chilling, some chatting but most are writing furiously on postcards.  The shop posts the cards on the date you want it to, up to five years later. Isn’t that amazing?

Pin Jiang - another old quaint street in the Jiangsu area.

Intense discussions on who deserves the trouble of a postcard going on in the Postcard Cafe.

We have all heard musings about how people don’t write anymore and how even when we do, short texts, emoticons and acronyms have replaced the romance of the hand-written word.  Maybe a postcard is all that is needed to get us started on writing to each other again? Oh, the anticipation of receiving something in the mailbox too!

So I got started, wrote to my mum and dad, wrote to the girls in China (Ming Ming who was seated next to me while I wrote her the love note, Valerie and Grace) and dropped one to Edwin for his birthday.  Maximum of 3 lines because the postcard is er, small, and because I can’t essay on short notice, and also because the pencils were blunt – difficult to write eloquently when the markings are fat and unsightly.  

The airwell inside the building. More people writing love notes.

Stairway up to postcard heaven.

Mezzanine level where we settled down to write our postcards from Suzhou, signed with love forevermore (sung to the tune of Joshua Kadison's Picture Postcards from L.A.)

I did think about writing to myself in 3 years' time, just as I am about to leave this posting to China. But what would I say? I am not sure if it is any different from how I have been living my life anyways which is basically to just have fun and try to do some work along the way (this was determined after a long watsapp discussion with Chew Wee and we also decided on the engraving on my tombstone along the same lines but that's another morbid discussion altogether).

Pick from hundreds of designs - like cats? Sure! How about cute sayings?

Buy a stamp, choose a date for the delivery of the love-note, put the lovely hand-written note in and a surprise will be in the postbox soon.

As of today (one week later), I’m still not sure whether my parents in Singapore got theirs and my postcard to Edwin (posted to my place in Shanghai) has not arrived. ARRGGGGGGHHHH…. But Grace got hers!  I am still waiting for mine from Mings because I emotionally blackmailed her into sending me one, ha ha…But I am sure when I get it in the mailbox, it will jump out amongst all the bills and flyers and it will be very treasured. 

Maybe I should start dropping my girlies in Singapore a posty once in a while just so they know I’m thinking of them.  Sounds so incredibly romantic … when I have time la!

Ceramic brooches - had to buy them of course!

Xoxo,

Tracy

Btw, I drafted the above post about 3 weeks ago. And so far, my parents have received theirs all the way in Singapore, but Ming Ming and I have not gotten each others! Girls in Singapore, looks like got chance!

Pretty birds drawn by our driver, Mr Zhang,
while waiting for us to complete our love-notes