Pavilion Restaurant

This was my first time eating umm… modern Chinese cuisine. I’m not sure if it’s actual fine dining, but it’s one of those restaurants with large plates, relatively smaller portions and has their food arranged elegantly and artistically on the dish.  You know what I mean. We were here because my aunt had vouchers to make use of since she knows the owner of the restaurant.

In short, the food was amazing. I don’t know if it’s partly due to the ambience or to the chefs cooking skills. I gather it’s a combination of both, plus the fact that the food is served and garnished nicely on a plate for you. Food just tastes so much better that way.

We went on a weeknight so it was quite empty and quiet. Very optimal surroundings for enjoying, really savouring your food, and for talking without needing to compete with the crying toddler in the next table. Also, I was saved from having to hear noisy footsteps of waitresses because they didn’t need to rush around and yell out orders. If there’s one thing I hate about a lot of Chinese restaurants, it’s that.

Crisp-fried Shiitake Mushroom glazed with Wasabi Mayo, Mango Salsa

Even though it says that the radioactive-looking green glaze is wasabi mayo, it’s not spicy at all! It reminds me of deep fried shrimp in egg yolk, albeit a lot less salty and greasy, and also without that ‘sandy’ egg yolk texture. So addictive.

Grilled Baby Lamb Rack in Red Wine Sauce

Swoon-worthy times ten. I have a new love for lamb (meat). And this is what I mean by elegantly and artistically arranged food.

Steamed Atlantic Cod Steak with Crispy Bean Crumbs in Superior Soy Sauce

You can never go wrong with cod! Fresh, succulent cod with haebeehiam-like crumbs on top. Cod, cod cod! *dances around the room merrily*

Peking Duck

It came served with lots of cut cucumbers and spring onions/chives, and a small pot of sauce (Mmm… the sauce!). I tend to stuff mine with the chives because I love how strong it hits your tastebuds. Other stuff the whole thing into their mouths, but I like to eat it in two bites – you get to savour it better that way.

After we were done with the skin, we asked for the duck meat to be stir fried. It was amazing. I’m not usually a meat person, but I just couldn’t stop taking yet another piece of the duck. Even after being roasted and stir-fried, it was still so tender. I also love how they were so generous with the leek.

Wok-fried Honey Bean with Dry Scallop

At first I thought that this was snow peas, but then I realised that there’s a bit of a difference between the two since snow peas are flatter. It’s crunchier I guess, and slightly sweeter.

Braised Bai Ling Mushroom served with Spinach and Homemade Beancurd

It looks like a spaceship, doesn’t it? Oh the yummy-ness of a large muchroom drizzled with sticky sweet sauce on top of vegetable-crusted tofu. *licks lips with satisfaction*

Fried Fragrant Rice with Crabmeat and Egg White

My brother’s fried rice. How restaurants get that wok hei without getting it all greasy like zi char stalls do I will never know.

Sauteed Mee Sua with Seafood

Usually you would expect the noodles to be in abundance with one or two measly pieces of shrimp, but no. This was filled with seafood, FILLED.  There was still a lot of mee sua, of course, but every spoonful yielded a chunk of shrimp or scallop (yes!) or fishcake or mushroom. Every noodle lover’s dream!

Double-boiled Snow Pear with Almond

The only hot dessert we ordered.

Chilled Avocado Puree with Vanilla Ice Cream

This is hands-down one of the best desserts I ave ever eaten in my life. It’s better than a sundae or a mudpie or even cake with ice cream. There’s something about avocado, when sweetened and pureed into a cream, that makes it so addictive. It’s sweet of course, but it also has that slightly salty vegetable taste that doesn’t make it sickly. And I guess I also liked it because it was in such a pretty green colour  :P

Chilled Mango Puree with Vanilla Ice Cream, Sago and Pomelo

I tried this after eating the avocado puree and it couldn’t possibly compete. Compared to the dessert above, this tasted really bland. Still bearing the fresh fruitiness of mango and pomelo, but definitely not as flavourful.

Winter break 2011 Part I – Spass to the Max

I know that we don’t have winter in Singapore, and no one calls the December holidays “winter break”, but I just like calling it that. It makes me feel like I’m more connected to the rest of the world rather than sitting in tropical, non-seasonal isolation.

This winter break did me a lot of good. I had some of my much-needed rest and met up with some friends for some major catching up. It feels good to see those familiar faces.

Because Mel wasn’t coming back to Singapore, our usual foursome was missing one person. We still tried to camwhore, and had a lot of fun, but somehow it didn’t feel the same. We miss you, Mel!

 

Christmas Tree number 1!

We took this photo because Mel likes to photograph flowers and we thought that the flowers on the side could represent her XD

 

Christmas Tree number 2!

Our initial plan was to try to take photos with as many Christmas trees as we could, but it started raining so we ran into Orchard Central for shelter…. And that was where we discovered these awesome hot pink camwhoring spots. 

Men-Tei Ramen

I make it a point to eat comfort food during the exam period because I need the warm, fuzzy, nourishing feeling it gives me to get through the week(s). This is yet another restaurant in the CBD because I had dinner there after studying.

It’s a pretty narrow and small restaurant, and was completely empty at 6pm. Because it was empty, and the silence was just what I needed after the hours of studying. Also, I love how they only serve four different kinds of ramen – tonkotsu, miso, shio and shoyu (with the tonkotsu and miso having spicy versions), so indecisive people like me don’t need to deliberate for long before ordering.

(We chose the Tonkotsu Ramen and Shio Ramen since it was recommended.)

Tonkotsu Ramen

Creamy-white pork bone broth with slices of tender, melt-in-your-mouth chashu, seaweed, Japanese fishcake, bamboo shoots, some greens and half an egg (you can’t see the egg in the photo but it’s there). The ramen was delightfully soft and chewy, which I slurped up eagerly partially because I was really starving. It tasted like they’d made it fresh rather than took it out of a packet. The warm soup was more than welcome in the cold rainy weather and tasted homey – thankfully not too rich and flavourful, and not too salty either. I also loved how they make their eggs kind of soft-boiled, with a mushy, semi-runny yolk.

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Shio Ramen

The Shio ramen came with the exact same condiments, just in a different kind of soup base. This clear soup was a lot saltier, but a lot more appetizing, actually. The noodles went better with this soup, but the eggs tasted better when dipped in the Tonkotsu broth. I tried mixing half a spoonful of the Tonkotsu and Shio soup together and it actually tasted pretty good!

I wasn’t actually craving ramen before this meal, but now I like it even more. Comfort food does that to you. Noodles are the ultimate of Asian comfort food for me.

Christmas wishes and reflections 2011

This is going to be a post about Christmas. Why? Because it’s a festive celebration you can’t ignore. Not with all the painfully cheery Christmas music in the air, the turkey-and-ham promotions flooding the newspapers, and the ostentatious lights decorating the length of Orchard Road. By now you can tell that I’m slightly annoyed. I don’t understand myself, either. Why can’t I enjoy Christmas like normal people? It’s almost like a fear of Christmas that I have now. I just want to avoid it, pretend that it’s never going to happen.

—start of rant—

Maybe I’m annoyed because the stores are blatantly capitalizing on the “heart-warming”, gift-giving tradition of this occasion. Or maybe I’m more annoyed because I can’t believe that most of us, including me, are actually falling for it despite knowing what they’re doing because of the great discounts. I like shopping, far too much to keep my eyes off the sales rack and take a stand against consumerism, I’m sad to say. 

The way I see it, we just use it as an excuse to party and pig out, so that we feel less guilty for doing it since there’s a(n) tradition/event “obliging” us to engage in such merrymaking. I’m not sure why we would feel guilty for wanting to party and pig out for nothing, but maybe its because we know how shallow it sounds when there’s no special occasion tied to it. By providing a justification for our desire to party, it transfers the responsibility of such partying from us to that of tradition, if you know what I mean.

But hey, feel free to disagree. I disagree with the above myself. I don’t really believe that people are that shallow. This is just the general feeling I get from the media, how they like to portray Christmas. I have utmost faith in humanity that we will continue to find real meaning in it no matter how much superficiality and consumerism clog the wheels of society.

I’m rambling a bit here. Forgive me if I have angered you. I just feel really bitter this year because I cannot travel. I don’t actually hate Christmas. I just hate how it’s not magical anymore. Christmas seems stripped of its meaning and magic now. 

—end of rant—

On another note I do have a few Christmas wishes, some of them are material, some experiential, others plain weird. Don’t judge. This is my place to rant.

Experiential wishes

1. To have dark chocolate, lebkuchen, fruit cake, stollen and red wine on christmas eve night for dinner in the quiet of my own home. And maybe some yummy pastries like pain au chocolat. I’m not craving for savouries this year and I’m a little sick of cream-rich cakes, to be honest.

2. To travel Italy by train. Obviously this will not be fulfilled by Christmas but I hope to achieve it with some faith, research and luck sometime.

3. Great hair. Shiny, smoother, frizz-free, slightly wavy hair. Like that’s ever going to happen without hair serum, cream and designing jelly.

4. Winter in Singapore. ’nuff said.

Material wishes

(Since I’ve already admitted that I like shopping, I’m not even going to bother hiding the fact that I do have things, actual things, that I want. Most of them are clothes. *coughs and turns away in embarrassment*)

1. A floral flared short skirt in dark pink, with small florals. Preferably with some ruffles, or tiered. Something more laid-back, casual, feminine and whimsical-looking rather than flashy and trendy.

2. A simple, translucent buttoned blouse in light pink, lilac or dark green to pair with a white tank top underneath. I saw Lily wear this in HIMYM and I thought it looked really cute.

3. A T-shirt with Gustav Klimt’s painting ‘The Kiss’ printed on it.

4. ‘The Lake of Dead Languages’ by Carol Goodman. Kinokuniya doesn’t stock it D:

5. Nail polish! I just discovered the joy of painting my nails and I need yellow(canary or mustard), green(light green but not lime) and blue(midnight or baby).

At this moment, I can’t think of anymore things that I want. Not off the top of my head, anyway. But by now you can probably see why my Christmas wishes usually remain wishes. Even the clothes I want are so hard to find because I already have such specific requirements, and this isn’t even considering the fact that most shops stock sizes that are way too big for petites.

Fou de Fafa

I went to this quirky little cafe a week ago. My mum suggested it because she passed it by a few times and thought that the pizzas looked intriguing. We decided to lunch there since I happened to be studying in the CBD that day.

Fou de fafa. The counter.

It was so colourful! So un-business-ey and non-formal and just plain fun, so unlike the no-nonsense air of the CBD.

It was the lunch hour so I obviously didn’t expect it to be quiet or empty. But it was surprisingly not crowded. It was filled with people, but not packed. Because the cafe itself is small, there weren’t that many people inside anyway, so the background chatter isn’t noisy enough prevent you from having a conversation during your meal. I guess the only discomfort I felt was from it’s cramped layout – but seeing as the shop is already small enough, I guess it can’t be helped.

They won me over by putting this quote on the wall. 

Pascal’s Pizza

A salad of wild rocket leaves, sliced sausages, bacon, tomatoes, cheese and walnuts tossed in a light vinagerette, all on a super thin and crispy pizza base. It felt like a light appetizer-ish dish that evolved into a main course. It’s not a melt-in-your-mouth, warm-and-gooey pizza. It’s more like a disc-shaped cracker (think Skinny Pizza) rather than a thin-crust pizza. I love the crunch of the cracker, though, and how you feel ‘clean’ and ‘light’ after eating it; it doesn’t make you feel super bloated or full.

When I read about this cafe online, some people were complaining about the lack of flavour and sauce, and suggested that they should slather tomato sauce on the crust. I, however, argue that that idea is also not feasible for the simple reason that it will make the crispy cracker-crust soggy. Also, the crunchy, cracker-thin base goes better with the light topping rather than a soft pizza base would. Please think about that.

(I actually tried to make my own cracker pizza at home a few days later with some kind of cracker I got from Swissbake, coral lettuce leaves, ham and brie cheese. It turned out awesomely yummy, not to mention a lot cheaper.)

Pancake Lasagne (chicken)

It’s not a real lasange. It’s more like a pancake sandwich, haha. Three thin slices of pancake (not like fluffy McDonalds hotcakes, this is thinner, more savoury and less sweet), and sandwiched between them is shredded chicken in pesto sauce. It’s then drizzled with tomato ketchup and mayonnaise.
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IMO, this is a very college-student kind of dish. You slap a few common, simple food items together, add some sauce, and it’s turns out pretty yummy! It’s not gourmet yummy, not mind-blowing, omg-this-is-fantastic yummy. It’s that yummy you feel when you come home from school starving hungry, and make yourself a grilled cheese sandwich, then sit down to savour it while surfing the net. A comforting, home-y yummy. Simple, tasty, savoury, everyday yummy. That’s the kind of yummy this lasagne is. Perfect comfort food.

…

Mushroom soup

I don’t remember soups very well, alas. I just remember it being not too salty (unlike canned soups), and also enjoying the crunchy croutons

Germany – Wiesbaden, Hessen

We were in Wiesbaden mainly to pay a visit to the Parliament of Hessen (or the Hessischer Landtag) because they were so kind as to let us participate in this exchange programme with a German school. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos of the parliament because photography wasn’t allowed (I think) and I don’t remember much about it other than watching a debate in the parliament that I didn’t understand.

After the tour of the parliament, we were left to roam the streets of Wiesbaden for lunch. We mostly stuck to the Christmas Market because it was the most identifiable area.

(This is the last city I visited in Germany, so the following Germany posts will be umm… food-related)

Streets and buildings

Closed Christmas market stalls in the early morning before we visited the parliament

Marktkirche

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Weihnachtsmarkt

The Christmas Market in Wiesbaden was decked in a light blue, white and gold theme. It was also pretty spacious and less crowded than the ones in say, Frankfurt or Cologne, but large enough to wander around in.

Germany – Wetzlar, Hessen

I think that out of all the cities I visited, Wetzlar is my favourite. There’s a kind of nostalgic beauty here that comes off more strongly than in the other towns/cities. Some of our buddies lived in Wetzlar.

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Streets

The main square of Wetzlar. I like how one of the buildings looks like a tied present.

Very pretty streets. I love the colours – burnt orange, mustard yellow, sienna brown, grey-blue…

This sign says that Goethe (the famous German writer) lived here in the Summer of 1772

Pretty Christmas decorations

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Christmas Market / Weihnachtsmarkt

The Christmas market in Wetzlar was a lot cosier and smaller than most others we’d visited. They were enclosed by a canopy of roofs made of plastic sheeting, for one, and the ground was layered in straw. How is that not cosy?!

Viewed from outside

Viewed from inside – it’s somehow lit in yellowish lighting inside

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Lottehaus

We also visited Lottehaus, which is a house that the lover of Goethe resided in. The furniture was pretty small because apparently, people then were much shorter.

Outside of the house

Taken in the surroundings of Lottehaus

Attempting a jump shot with the pretty backdrop of a German town

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We also found this structure of columns and pillars and went crazy with photos.

Germany – Solms, Hessen

We stopped by this town on the drive to Wetzlar (will blog about it in a later post), mainly to pay a visit to the visitor’s mine. It was a fantastic experience, there’s a certain sense of risk and adventure that you feel when you visit enclosed places like caves and mines.

Grube Fortuna (visitor’s mine)

At the entrance to the mine. ‘Gott segne den Bergbau’ translates to ‘God bless the mine’

We had to don yellow helmets before we took the cranky elevator underground.

Walking through the mine (and camwhoring)

After taking the elevator down, we still had to sit on this buggy-train contraption which whizzed us through darkness of the mines to the main visitor’s area. That was my favourite experience.

The buggy/train

Some of the equipment used in mining

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Surroundings

The area outside the mines was just so scenic and picturesque. We couldn’t not camwhore.

Yellow hemet-y cuteness (hahaha)

We attempted a jump shot at the Christmas tree, with the help of our teacher

It was such a scenic, peaceful place we couldn’t stop taking photos

Germany – Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia

My buddy’s mother had warned me beforehand that Cologne would be really really crowded with tourists. 500 tour buses go there a day, apparently. *gulps*

It’s a massive, massive tourist zone and was packed with people – not just tourists but locals as well. There were tourist souvenir shops at every corner, tour buses parked along the road and the streets were just filled with people, filled I tell you.

The only street photo I managed to take of Cologne

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Cologne Cathedral / Kölner Dom

(Warning: I am about to spam photos)

Cathedral from the outside – it was windy and cold, and I was awestruck at its size

Inside the cathedral

I love the way the sunlight filters through the windows, so beautiful.

And I love the way the light hits the pillars

The floor

And yes, we camwhored while we were supposed to be listening to an explanation of the cathedral

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Roman-Germanic Museum / Römisch-Germanisches Museum

We continued to visit the Roman-German Museum to learn about the part of history when some areas in Germany were occupied by the Romans. Pretty interesting stuff, and we had a great guide. I understood everything he said.

Remnants of buildings…

… and items (cups, chalices, jewelry)

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Christmas Market / Weihnachtsmarkt

The Christmas Market was crowded as heck. We didn’t really explore it that much because I was trying to find the Hard Rock Cafe in Cologne (and failed because the streets didn’t seem to have clear signs and there wasn’t enough time). That made my experience in Cologne kind of suck-y, but I suppose the place isn’t to blame, it’s the time constraint that proved to be the main issue.

It occupies a massive area around the cathedral

Haato & Co.

I’d been craving ice cream and waffles for about A MONTH, so it was about time I satisfied that craving. I read about Haato & Co. from ladyironchef (love that blog!) who claimed that it served the best waffles in town, and since my mum had been wanting to go to Central to look at shoes for awhile, I took advantage of this opportunity.

Waffle with Green Tea Ice-cream

(I love how it looks wonky and puffy, rather than like a perfect circle.)

Their waffles were near perfect, and I only say that because I believe that perfection doesn’t exist. It was served soft and fluffy, warm enough to ooze comfort, but not piping hot that it emanated heat and caused the ice-cream to melt rapidly. The thing I loved most about it was that it wasn’t crispy and brittle, because crispy things tend to fall to pieces and spray crumbs when you use a knife to cut into it. This one was nicely firm and obediently split where my knife cut it. The chewy, spongy waffle soaked up the ice cream readily, which I thought was just so wonderful because you really need porous waffles to go with ice-cream.

I realised that I’ve neglected the ice-cream. It’s just that the waffles were so good that it stole all the limelight and the ice-cream merely played a supporting role. The green tea ice-cream was good as most green tea ice-creams are. Smooth, soft, a hint of bitterness from the tea, and not too sweet. It also went surprisingly well with the waffles, a combination I was initially skeptical of.

Black Sesame Ice-cream

In contrast, the black-sesame ice-cream had a rougher texture (you can see how grainy it is from the photo), which I thought went better with its taste than a smoother texture would have. It tasted like black sesame paste, albeit a lot less sweet and jelat (thank goodness for that). I scooped bits of it from the cup to spread onto my waffles and it went just as well with the waffles as the green tea ice-cream did.

….

I’m putting my opinions on the ambience last because I don’t think it’s fair to judge this shop for the ambience when it’s not really a restaurant and is situated outdoors, so they can’t control much of the noise and lighting and so on. It wasn’t crowded when I was there, but tourists kept walking past, which was a little distracting. It was also quite hot that day, but like I said, neither are really the shop’s fault. All in all, the ambiance was pretty alright. I don’t think I cared much about my surroundings because my satisfaction levels skyrocketed after tasting the great waffles, haha.

(Now I need to try Gelare’s waffles. Yes, I haven’t tried Gelare’s waffles. I’d go on half-price-waffle Tuesdays, but my lessons coincidentally end late on that day so I have to shelf that idea for the moment.)

Germany – Braunfels, Hessen

Over the second weekend we spent in Germany, our buddies decided to bring us to one of the more famous castles nearby – Braunfels Castle (or Schloss Braunfels). I used to think that one country would only have one or two castles, but apparently, castles are pretty common in towns in Germany.

My buddy’s mother drove us there, and I remember, while stepping out of the car when we arrived, that it was freezing cold. FREEZING.

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Weihnachtsmarkt / Christmarket

The castle was a short walk away from the parking area, so we had to walk through the Christmas market in the town to get there. It was a very cosy Christmas market though. Unfortunately, it was so so cold that we went into a corner shop and hid in its warmth for awhile.

Behind me in the distance, you can see the castle

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Schloss Braunfels / Braunfels castle

We then started walking into the castle, passing many interesting features and structures along the way.

Us walking in

A bell tower?

One of the “tunnels” we had to pass through

Whimsical, romantic and very beautiful stairs and buildings, almost fairytale-like IMO

We made our way into a part of the castle where the ticketing booth was and got tickets to visit the castle, along with a tour guide to explain some of the history to us. Photography inside the castle was not allowed though, so I couldn’t take any photos. I remember walking into a church built inside the castle, and visiting various rooms, one of which was a semi-museum with displays of swords and knights’ armour.

Walls in the castle

When the tour ended and we went out of the castle, this was the sight that greeted us.

Blurry, badly taken shots of the castle exterior

Germany – Frankfurt am Main, Hessen

We finally got to visit Frankfurt am Main. It was quite strange suddenly being in a huge city again after a few days of walking around small towns and greenery. The city didn’t really appeal to me that much, though. Although there were a lot of tourists, it still had the vibe of a large financial centre. The Christmas Market, of course, oozed warmth and festivity, but it couldn’t eliminate that cold, crisp atmosphere of a CBD.

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Paulskirche / St. Paul’s Church

We didn’t really visit St. Paul’s church, to be exact. We simply walked past it and listened to a short explanation of it by one of the teachers.

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Marketplace

We were dumped at this marketplace to get our lunch. It’s kind of like an indoor wet market, although they also have some delicatessen and cooked food stalls.

View from top (it has two levels, the second level has a few casual restaurants)

Fruits and Vegetables

Some of the things they sell

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Weihnachtsmarkt / Christmas Market 

And of course, what’s a visit to a city in December if you don’t go to the Christmas market? It was really crowded, more so than the ones we’d been going to anyway. The Christmas market was also a lot larger.

It was so large it stretched across the street

Us after having bought chocolate-coated fruit

At a merry-go-round

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Streets and buildings

Buildings near the Christmas market

Colourful and interesting buildings at the Christmas market

These are the (duller) streets and buildings outside the Christmas market

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Because we were given quite a lot of time to wander around, we reached the meeting point with about an hour to spare. And because we’re also students who have no money, we did the only fun, free thing we could do was to camwhore right outside St. Paul’s church.

We even dragged a policeman into it, no kidding!

The mandatory jump shot

L O V E

d L for deutschLand

And then we tried to do a catwalk but somehow ended up with this really candid shot 

Germany – Bad Vilbel, Hessen

This post on Bad Vilbel is going to be completely un-touristy because the only reason we went there was to visit a radio station while on our way to our real tourist stop, Frankfurt am Main.

Radio Station

The exterior of the radio station with the signs of its three channels

The radio station we visited is home to three radio channels – Hit Radio FFH, planet more music radio, and harmony.fm. Hit Radio FFH is apparently the most trendy/hip of the three stations, playing all the music that teenagers like to listen to. harmony.fm, if I remember correctly, is more for oldies.

A picture on the wall

We went in and were welcomed in this big lecture-theatre-like space, where we were given a brief introduction of the radio station and its channels.

The map of Germany and location of Bad Vilbel in the place where we were introduced to the radio station

Then we went on a tour of the radio station. Our host (her name is Nadine) gave us a demonstration of how the DJ would manipulate the various controls during a normal radio show. Then she gave us an opportunity to speak into microphone to record our own “radio show”.

Nadine giving us a demonstration

Photo with her

DJs doing their stuff

The office

Their music collection

Pho House

Every so often, I chance upon restaurants that I consider to be ‘hidden gems’ shoved out of sight by the hundreds of franchises and food chains that plague our tiny island. It is when I dine at these restaurants that I experience that rare sense of satisfaction. The satisfaction that comes not only from a delicious meal, but also from a kind of happiness that many other restaurants fail to give me.

On a Sunday afternoon, I had a strong craving for Pho Bo that I just could not ignore. So I went to Pho House which is tucked away at the third level of Suntec City and sits in the shadow of the popular Kuishin-Bo buffet.

(Photos were taken with a phone camera so pardon the quality)

The ambience was very satisfactory. I was there on a Sunday afternoon and the restaurant was extremely empty and quiet. Our seat was beside the glass railing that overlooked the atrium below, and the whole area was lit in a natural white light (which is a whole lot different compared to those glaring fluorescent lights). For claustrophobics, the high ceiling of Suntec couldn’t have been a better design. I felt so calm and relaxed and not at all pressured to make my menu choices in the quickest possible time. This is the kind of environment that you need to be able to enjoy your meal. No need for fussy decorations or scented candles; silence and simplicity works just as well.

Salad roll

These are the famous Vietnamese rolls of vermicelli, fresh prawn and mint leaves wrapped in a rice paper roll. Pho House’s salad rolls were bulging with vermicelli and served with two sauces; fish sauce and a kind of blackish-brown paste (that my mum said was made of prawns, like rojak sauce).

‘Pho Bo’ / Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup

Flat rice noodles in a broth with a hint of sweetness, and a generous serving of beef balls, beef brisket AND beef slices. It would be a great injustice to the rice noodles if I likened them to kway teow. These rice noodles are soft and chewy, and firm enough that they don’t fall to pieces unlike too-soggy kway teow that sometimes do.

………………..

And the beef; oh my, where do I start! The beef balls were so large and juicy and tender with the insides left a little raw so it wasn’t tough at all. They are completely unlike those processed ones you find in the frozen section. The beef brisket simply melted in your mouth. The beef slices were a bit tough, so I recommend that you just get the brisket and balls instead of all three types of beef (yes you can choose, awesome much?).

You are also given a plate of raw beansprouts and vegetables to add into it if you want to, and dipping sauces of the dark paste and chili sauce. IMO the beef tastes much better without any kind of sauce.

There’s just something about Pho that makes me so contented. I feel like I’m eating something really nutritious and yet not missing out on taste. Plus, I must mention that the bowl of Pho is huge, and I mean ginormous. We ordered a set that cost $13; consisting of the salad roll, the bowl of Pho and Vietnamese drip coffee to share between the two of us. We left STUFFED (and happy). Thank goodness we didn’t order any other sides.

Germany – Krofdorf, Giessen, Hessen

Once again I am backtracking and blogging about a place I visited within Giessen. Sometimes, I don’t realise that places I visit are not actual cities on their own, but part of a larger district.

On the second day I was there, my buddy brought me to Krofdorf, a town/village about half an hour to an hour’s walk from her village. We went there primarily to take a look at the Christmas market, or Weihnachtsmarkt. The walk there was wonderfully scenic and peaceful, filled with green pastures, the silent woods and smiles from friendly passers-by on the path.

Walking there

Wonderful greenery all around, so calm and untouched

Beware of deer!

Woods in winter

I see cows

Krofdorf in the distance

Weihnachtsmarkt / Christmas market

My buddy took this photo for me, I was too short to manage such a shot

A stall selling nuts

Locals lapping up the festive atmosphere and buying deliciously hot Gluhwein

Streets

A brewery where they make Giessen beer (I was going to buy a bottle home but I forgot)

Streets of Krofdorf

Germany – Marburg, Hessen

Marburg was one of the first places outside Giessen that we visited in Germany. Because we also had lunch at the cafeteria of the University of Marburg, I suspect that it was part of the plan to show us how university life is like in Germany and to encourage us to consider German universities for higher education.

Marburg from above (isn’t Germany just so beautiful)

Elisabethskirche / Church of St. Elizabeth

Elisabethskirche viewed from above

 

Exterior of church

You have to forgive me for not remembering much about the attractions we visited because it was almost two years ago. All I remember about thus church was that it’s gothic, named after St. Elizabeth (well, duh) and has the tombs of St. Elizabeth’s relatives inside.

Interior of church

St. Elizabeth

Altstadt / Old City

We then continued to take a walking tour around the old city in Marburg. It was really really cold that day, but the altstadt was beyond pretty. *instant nostalgia*

Streets

Statue of St. Elizabeth

In front of a sign that says “free” in German. Now that’s a word that Singaporeans are attracted to!

Marburger Schloss / Castle of Marburg

And AFTER the walking tour, we were still NOT DONE. We continued to climb a long path up to the castle of Marburg which was not easy at all because of the uneven stone ground, and because it was so cold.

Camwhoring on the way up makes the climb easier

Castle of Marburg

A building beside the castle

The super epic shot where Mel, Eliz, Kim and I were attempt a jump shot and unknown to us, Warren, Lucas and Raimie crashed our jump shot behind. One of the best photos ever.

On the way down (yes we camwhore everywhere)

The River Lahn

On our way to the University of Marburg, we passed by the river Lahn.

So beautiful!

Blogging about Germany just made me miss the times I spent there so much. I’m so nostalgic I could cry, urgh. I miss my German class, I miss going to a different German city every day, I love how the buildings seem to take me back to the past. I would think that if not for the anticipation of these rare, savoured moments, I would have little motivation in life.

Germany – Hofgut Friedelhausen, Giessen, Hessen

Remember when I said previously that that was the last of the Giessen posts? I made a mistake. It turns out that this other place we visited called Hofgut Friedelhausen is a farm in the town of Lollar (which is STILL in Giessen, as it turns out) which employs disabled workers. I think that the idea is to let them also contribute to society in their own way, because they are always seen as dependent on state welfare.

I don’t think it’s a very well-known place, even in Giessen. I remember asking my buddy what/where on earth ‘Hofgut Friedelhausen’ was and she told me she had no idea.

 

Getting there by train

We took public transport there, so exciting!

At the train station

‘Richtung’ means ‘direction’

Oh my word, this is not as easy as the MRT at all

Camwhoring with Eliz even when the train is arriving

On board!

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Walk through woods

We got off at a secluded, countryside-looking station and walked along a path with bare-branched trees. The ground was mushy and wet and it was pretty chilly, but the woods were so picturesque that I would have gladly endured an hour’s walk just to be able to be in such beauty.

To Friedelhausen we go!

Very pretty woods. Give me woods over the beach any day

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Hofgut Friedelhausen

We finally arrived at the farm. From the main gate, it just looks like a bunch of cottages and huts with a large open space in front of them.

Gathering in the open space for an introduction by a representative

Huts and cottages at the farm

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After the introduction, we were brought to see some of the farm animals in the stables and pens. It really stank and the ground was even muddier than ever.

Stables housing calves

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Calves, pigs and ducks

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After meeting the animals, they took us out into the real farmlands for quick walk-around.

Farmland. Is it impossible for Germany to look plain? Even a farm oozes so much nostalgic beauty it hurts to look at photos at reminisce those times.

Camwhoring is possible with anything! (You can tell by how the backs of everyone else is turned that we were supposed to be paying attention to the tour but we decided to camwhore instead)

A pretty beige rose I saw hanging from a wall

Compost. It didn’t stink, it just looked gross

We spotted a guy trimming a tree

Store of logs, kindle and wood

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After a tour of the whole farm, they took us to meet the disabled workers who were working in a workshop. Their job was to make things out of wood, like tiny toys and such, including painting the colour on them.

Us walking back through the woods. The reason why there’s a photo of us in this picture is because our teacher had to wait for us to finish camwhoring (and okay, she helped us to take jump shots too) and she happened to also be the photographer with a DSLR. So it was by no coincidence that we were in front of her when she took this photo.

Germany – Giessen, Hessen (Part IV)

This will be the last of the posts on Giessen, until I manage to dig out some other photos that I forgot to include in any of the four parts. The next few posts, which will be about other towns and cities I visited, will be more interesting, I think.

Rathaus

A Rathaus kind of means something along the lines of the town hall or town parliament. We visited it on our first day during the Giessen city tour and it was actually pretty empty. We even got to enter the “parliament” room to camwhore and sit at the meeting tables.

 

Exterior of Rathaus in Giessen

 

Inside the Rathaus

The “parliament” room

 

Camwhoring outside the “parliament” room

Stadttheater Giessen

We also went to the theater in Giessen to watch a play and to have a backstage tour.

Stadttheater Giessen

 

 

I love how the ticketing booths look so un-modern!

 

Leaving our mark

We watched this play called Motte & Co. Motte means ‘moth’, so its literally moth and company. It’s quite a childish play, and I don’t blame them for picking a children’s play for us teenagers to watch because it was probably the only one which language we would have understood. I don’t think it would have matter actually, because most of us fell asleep, myself included. The seats were so soft and comfortable, and we had just entered the theater from the cold, windy outside.

 

Inside the theater.

 

The moth and her bug friends

After the play, we went on this backstage tour, where we were showed the various rooms where different departments each had a role to play in contributing to a show.

Packing up after the play

Make up room, I think. It had loads of wigs.

  

Art and scenery

 

Building the props

Something inscribed on the pavement outside the theater

Germany – Giessen, Hessen (Part III)

Part III of the Giessen posts are dedicated to the educational attractions we visited, namely a laboratory of a famous German chemist and a Mathematics museum.

Liebig Museum

Liebig Museum is the laboratory of this German chemist named Liebig(duh). There’s even a scary life-like statue of him somewhere inside the museum that freaked me out, so I didn’t take a photo of it. We walked into the museum and entered a laboratory-like area with a lot of seats for an audience. This chemist then greeted us by spraying a piece of plain paper with some kind of chemical, giving rise to a chemical reaction that said welcome.

Then, he started explaining a little of Liebig’s contributions to chemistry, which I understood none of. I’m not sure if it was because I didn’t understand his German well enough or because I just find it impossible to understand Chemistry in general. I prefer to believe the latter, since my classmates all went “Ohhh, so its THIS theory!!!!” in excited hushed tones while I remained confused and passive.

The floor plan of the laboratory

After the introductions, he conducted a series of fun “experiments”. I wouldn’t call them experiments exactly, because most of them were just for show, to entertain us, and not so much to explain any of Liebig’s work. Or maybe it was related to Liebig’s work just that I didn’t understand the chemical processes going on.

Making the “bottle” glow

Blowing flames high

Sparkles

Coloured flames…

… and coloured, umm, liquids

We also went on a tiny tour of the rest of the laboratory, which resembled an actual laboratory more. It’s quite interesting to see the environment that scientists worked in one and a half centuries ago. You recognise things like the test-tubes and pipettes and intruments to help you hold your bottles of solutions up above the flames and such, but they all look so ancient and rusty.

We left our mark

Outside the museum, under a pretty tree

Mathematikum

 

The Mathematics museum was fun fun fun for all the wrong reasons. *shamefaced* I think we loved it more for its endless opportunities it created for camwhoring rather than for its educational insights.

Posing with life-size puzzles (none of which we solved)

One of the many puzzles on the wall

Having fun with their contraptions (yes that is a bubble we’re enclosed in)

Camwhoring even more with the digits of Pi and the Vitruvian Man

Eventually trying to do something mathematical (we ended up making a pretty heart shape!)

Really, you can camwhore with anything, anywhere

Spass to the max forever <3 I remember that the Mathematikum was where our favourite phrase was coined!

Germany – Giessen, Hessen (Part II)

I initially wanted to include the content in this post in Part I, but there were simply too many photos and too many things to say so it looks like I’ll have 4 posts just on the city of Giessen!

Homestay

Part of the point of the exchange program was also to experience life in a real German home. I won’t post photos of my buddy’s house here, but here are some photos of the village she lives in. She lives in Wissmar, a village near Giessen.

Pretty view from her bedroom. Love these picturesque German towns.

The street she lives on. It’s so wonderful to be able to walk on the roads and not have to keep a lookout for vehicles in front of and behind you.

The bus stop where I took the bus every morning.

The road out of Wissmar (we were driving to another town at that time).

 

School / Herderchule Giessen

Needless to say, I spent most days in the school which we had our exchange programme with. It is quite an old school, with confusing passageways. While most Singaporean schools have open-air passages, the ones Herderschule Giessen are all indoors (making it all the more confusing to navigate). I’m sure it’s due to the difference in climate, since its so cold in winter.

View from outside

Some of the passageways

They also have two eating areas; one for snacks and the other for proper meals.

The canteen where you eat proper meals; the servings are huge.

At the snack area (in the early morning).

And of course, what would an exchange program be for if we didn’t attend their lessons? I couldn’t understand most of it because firstly, it was in technical German terms that I never learnt and secondly, because even if I did understand the terms I would never have understood the subject even if it was taught in simple English anyway. But it was still good fun, especially when no one was expecting me to speak fluent English during English lesson. *win*

Geography lesson. They were learning about either urbanization or industrialization in the German city of Essen, I think.

Biology lesson on genes. I had no idea what was going on at all.

We also had this school tour which showed us the different rooms in the school. It’s pretty standard; mainly what we would have in Singapore as well.

Science laboratories

Staff room

Some kind of resource room