Week at a glance: 18-22 Nov

We accomplished quite a bit this week! According to the original plan, we would have already handed back the house to the landlord on 23 November. But we postponed the date due to an earlier twist of events, so here we are, still staying in this awesome house that we called home for the past two years. 

Just much more a tad messy with the packing. Heh. 

18 November 

The dining table was the first to go! Sobs. It held so many of my anyhow-styled kitchen creations. Now the space is transformed into a packing 'warehouse'. 

19 November

Bye bye to... the bed frame. Thank God we still have our mattress to sleep on. Panda's colleague E is buying over our mattress and she's cool with us using it till the last day. It's actually kind of cosy sleeping on the floor. Hmmm... Why did we buy the bed frame in the first place? 

Housewives' lunch at Flora's! We have been spoilt rotten by home-cooked food these past two years. I hope I will continue with this habit of cooking meals when I return. Yes to steamed, stir-fried, oven baked goodness. No to oily, MSG-laden hawker food. 

Oh yes, throw out the canned food too.

20 November

Received news that Grandpa is in the hospital. The doctors found a 8cm x 6cm tumor in his abdomen. Cried buckets because I was suddenly afraid that he might just go. Please be strong and healthy like you've always been, yeye. I am coming back soon!

21 November

A cold, rainy November day. Perfect for staying indoors and continuing the party with boxes, bubble wraps and masking tape. Halfway through I got worried about my new bicycle, stranded on the patio in the heavy downpour. Made a feeble attempt to cover it with my poncho. It wasn't easy trying to secure the make-shift cover while juggling the umbrella between my cheek and shoulder.

I just hope the humidity doesn't get to the chains too much.

Just a while more, bicycle! You will have a shelter in our new old place.

22 November

French Club farewell party organised by sweet Kia! We had food, forgot about the wine which I put i the fridge (oops!) and played Taboo in French (after wrestling the cards from baby V who was chewing on them). We also raided Kia's lemon plant before leaving. Such a fun afternoon with the ladies.

Merci beaucoup, tout le monde. Restons en contact, d'accord?





Night out in SF city with the gang. Crystal Jade Jiang Nan just opened in the Embarcadero Centre and we paid a visit to support this Singaporean chain. The food is great, but I'm so not a foodie, as one can tell from my disinterested description of food ('great', 'awesome', 'good', 'yum') I was really there for the company, and that rock!

Singaporeans United in SF!

Week at a glance: 10-14 November

We have started the one month countdown to our departure.

Saying goodbye is hard when you are leaving behind great friends! Although we would surely see one another again in Singapore, we could never stay together in this FC community again. Supermarket trips, pot lucks, strolls by the park in superb weather... Memories to stay for life.


10 November

Took my new Public C1 bike for a ride along Beach Park Boulevard toward Redwood Shores, where Panda's office is located. The trail has the San Francisco Bay on one side, and residential houses on the other.

Along the way, I saw a couple of jackrabbits bouncing around the field. America - the land of freedom for animals too.

After saying hi to Panda at the office, I rode on to Redwood Shores Library -  my favorite hangout when I first came to US. I had a lot of free time then because I didn't know anyone yet! Relived my first month by spending a full afternoon at the library's alfresco area writing.

Attended my weekly French Club gatherings in the evening. I have grown used to meeting new people every Monday. But of course, there are the regulars - Renee, Mary, Jeff and me. We turn up almost every week, and I love chatting with them. The topics were sometimes well beyond me (I know nuts about opera), but I still enjoyed listening in to the discussions. They were very patient with me the Singaporean, too.

We were supposed to fetch Jo and Vic from the airport after my meeting - they were returning from Singapore. While waiting for their activation call to drive to the airport, we decided to stop by Safeway to stock up on our supply of ice-cream. Haagen Dazs and Ben & Jerry's cost a bomb in Singapore. I'm going to eat till I burst before going back.

11 November

Was supposed to meet Wendy and little Z for a picnic in the park. But I totally overslept and woke up half an hour late! Oopsie. Luckily, Wendy texted to say that it was too windy to do a picnic anyway. We ended up at Kenta Ramen with Jo and Vic.

We had loads of action in the evening! Attended my first NBA game (Spurs vs Golden State Warriors) with Panda, Kevin, Rick and his friends. I finally get to wear my game jacket - Panda bought me that more than a year ago!

And we had a little beer accident. Kevin was trying to help us take a photo while balancing his burger AND beer on a tray. The juggling act didn't work. He was drenched as his lost his balance. Total damage: $30 for a new shirt. And a beery wet, smelly jacket.

You've gotta love Kevin's professionalism though. He still clicked on the shutter as the beer cup tipped. Our priceless expressions.

12 November

Ladies' brunch.

Pizza, baked pasta, garlic bread, cheese and crackers, cheese cake, chocolate cake. I am going to miss these girls so much! I hope we can still gather in Singapore like this, some day in the future.

Dinner was home-cooked nasi lemak at Wendy's place. My request for our last pot luck together as the FC family. Sobs. Yes, we can have all the nasi lemak we want when we return to Singapore. No, it isn't going to taste the same. Nothing would beat our home-cooked goodness!

And that's why I forgot to take photos. I was too busy eating. And I got a little emo when Wendy gave me a collage of photos. Great times spent together. Awwwww....


13 November

Morning beep from Wendy: Lunch alert! I have gotten used to checking my phone the moment I wake up in case Ms Bogeyman is looking for lunch companions. I needed to finish some vegetables anyway, so we had instant noodles at my place.

Normally, I would clean up the house before she comes, because she has a high standard of cleanliness! But she would forgive me for the messy house, since I am in the midst of moving.
This time round, I just express wiped the table, kitchen, and toilet vanity top. Also pushed all my loose packages to one place so that it looked tidier. By the time the cleanliness inspector came, the house was decent (I thought). It was impossible to 'clean' a house during packing. My lame excuse.

In the evening, we headed to Aileen's place for dinner. I wanted to learn how to photograph the night sky from Kevin and Nik - something that I should have done before going to Bryce Canyon. We climbed up a small hill behind their house to get away from the light. Oh yes, there is such as thing called light pollution.

Alas, the sky was too cloudy that night and we couldn't capture the Milky Way the way we would on a clear night. All we had was a hazy photo with light specks here and there. But at least I learnt a few Lightroom editing techniques from Nik.


14 November

Our last trio lunch at Joy Restaurant. More sobs. We are the FC musketeers!

I was also glad that I got to say goodbye to Uncle Stick before I go. Uncle Stick (my nickname for him) used to work in the Hong Kong cafe near our house - one of our regular lunch time/high tea hangouts, but he has since moved to work at Joy Restaurant. I love disturbing him while he worked. Too bad he didn't want to take a photo with us. But at least I got to tell him I am returning to Singapore for good. Not like Uncle Manager, who has disappeared and there's no way to bid farewell...




Last FC family dinner outing in the evening. This time, at Erawan Thai Restaurant, Redwood City. The food was SO GOOD. I had no idea we have such an awesome Thai restaurant near us. We always go back to Mini Mango at Napa Valley.

We wanted to get beer at a nearby German pub after than, but Jo and I forgot to bring our IDs and Little Z could not enter after 8pm. So we went back to good, old BJs at BridgePoint.

Two good years in US with two great families. 

Like what little Z asked, "When will I see you again?"

Les lettres des enfants de Toguiron

As part of the French Club activities I signed myself up to do French-English translation for primary schools. Kids from African countries write to their pen pals in America, and we have to translate these letters to English.

A real challenge is their cursive handwriting and spelling mistakes. I got to look up the dictionary and search online for words and phrases which I don't understand. Some are plainly illegible or just don't make sense. Makes me wanna ask the teacher, you sure you are teaching them good writing skills? :(

But I had fun nonetheless, learning more about the African culture especially their daily staples - rice, fonio, cassava, mangoes... The children's letters are quite cute, mostly talking about their family, their favorite animals and food.

Still, I'm glad that I took part. Even more glad, for the chance to keep the language alive in me.

Some drawings are pretty cute too!

A picnic with fellow French lovers

I haven't been attending the French Club gatherings for a long time because of the Stanford course and the 3-week visit by SILs. So I'm quite glad to have joined them again for a picnic at the San Mateo Central Park today.

It's a surprising 23C weather today (read: hot!) Kia was waiting for us when we arrived and I noted that she has decorated the place with a nice big sign, a French flag, and a bunch of paper flowers. Nice.

For the potluck picnic, we had pasta salad, sandwiches, brownies, nachos, fried bee hoon (by me) and a home-made strawberry tart. The picnic was somewhat disrupted by a homeless man, who kept telling us about his Chinese wife and made loads of comments about the food we offered him. But it was overall enjoyable, and we had such a great time talking to the lovely folks.

After that, we were divided into pairs and introduced to the game of bocce. In order to win a point, either one of your team's balls must land closest to the smaller yellow ball. If both you and your partner's balls are closest to the yellow ball, you will win double point. The game is actually so much more difficult than it looks, because you need to roll your ball on all kinds of terrain!

In the end, Panda and my partnership worked - we emerged champions of the bocce game even though it was the first time we played. Les bleues sont les gagnants! Merci a tous!