Jots

I'm so happy today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To you, thanks sooooo much. That email really meant a lot to me. Even thought of printing it out and putting it on my desk so I could read it everyday. :) Can't believe you said that, after all those complaints about me not being a good friend. I'll be coming after your invitation next April! ;)

And there's a Happy Hour on my birthday next week! Yay yay. I'll NOT drink like how I did in St. Louis. What stays in St Louis, happens in St Louis. Nope, that's not a typo. It's our version. I was kinda forced to drink in St Louis, so can't count that against me anyway. :P

One of my good friends is coming to celebrate with me. Whoop dee doo. And if all our plans go the way they are supposed to, maybe TWO of my good friends will come to Louisville next year! Wah, that would be sooooooooo fun. Maybe I'll get an apartment close to them, then we can play mahjong during weekends. Hehehehe.

Feels good to be on the other side

I went for a recruiting event last night.

5 university seniors and 5 full-time employees. We went bowling first and then had dinner at a pretty fancy restaurant. I couldn't understand almost half of the menu. Picked fish in the end since it's usually a pretty safe choice. The tiramisu was heavenly though. Not as good as the one I had in St. Louis. But still delicious. I love all tiramisu. Mmmmmm.

It felt a bit strange at first. For the past 1.5 years I've been the one going through the interviews, meeting full-timers for dinner, digging for good questions to ask them. All that while being nervous but trying to smile, be outgoing and friendly at the same time.

And now I get the questions thrown back at me. "How long have you worked here?" "How do you like working here?" "How's the city like?" "How's the study program?" I don't even remember what I answered.

It was so fun! I mean meeting all these soon-to-be graduates and seeing them all excited (and nervous maybe). Makes me feel all excited too. I can't even imagine why I was nervous last time. Because I was definitely DEFINITELY not out to pick bones with any of the candidates. I doubt any of us was. Then again, it's understandable for them to be nervous. My future's not on the line anymore.

I hope whoever gets an offer will accept it. All of them seem really nice. Meanwhile, I'm gonna see if I can ask to join more recruiting events. :D

Exhausted!

I'm so exhausted!

I went for a trip to St Louis during the Thanksgiving holiday last week. Met up with a bunch of friends from Drake. All 15 of us. We rented a humongous 15-seater van. So fun to drive around in such a huge vehicle.

I had a lot of fun last Thursday to Sunday. We went to quite a number of places and ate A LOT of good food. I am NOT going to eat any more meat for the rest of the year.

Came back yesterday around 4 pm. Slept almost right after I got home and didn't wake up till this morning. Still felt very tired today though.

Will be getting photos from the others soon. Maybe I should write a travel journal for St Louis. Then again, I said I would for the last California trip and it's been a year.

An Encounter with Colonel Sanders

I met Colonel Sanders last Thursday! You know, the man behind (and in front of) every KFC.

Ok lah, not the real Colonel Sanders. I googled and found out that the real one passed away in 1980, even before I was born. So unless I can see ghosts...

But seriously ah, this guy looks EXACTLY like the KFC man.

See what I mean? (That drawing is a bit off-looking though.)

Hehe no lah, I didn't get a photo of him. Paiseh to ask. But the one I met looks just like the guy in the photo. Just a bit more friendly and grandfatherly looking. He was wearing the white suit, black bowtie, all white hair and beard and walking with a black cane! If I ever want to mimic someone famous, I'm going to go all out like that too.

I met him when I was walking around downtown towards the bus stop. He was strolling along, other people around him didn't even notice or care. I think I was the only 'suaku' around, stared a bit at first because I seriously wasn't expecting anything like this. I mean people have said sometimes we can see Muhammad Ali walking around downtown. But Colonel Sanders?

So far this is the closest I ever got to anything KFC-related in Kentucky. I've only seen one KFC restaurant since I got here. So enough with the jokes that the best thing to do in Louisville is eat KFC. Hmph.

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I think my vegetarian plan is not going as planned. But I don't care!

I've been eating quite a lot of good food recently. First went to a Chinese buffet with my colleague one day after grocery shopping. It's the typical Chinese buffet with quite a lot of seafood. They had prawn salad, which is one of my favorite ways of eating prawn I don't know why. Mmm.. and the cheese-covered mussels were pretty good too. I couldn't eat too much of it though because the cheese made me feel quite 'jelak'.

Then after that my colleague had a birthday party at her place. She and a few of her friends cooked. So good. The soup was especially nice. White carrot spare ribs soup. Mmmm.. just like the one my mum makes. I miss my mum's soups.

Friday we had a Thanksgiving potluck in the office. Everyone had to bring a dish. And since there's over 60 of us, you can imagine the amount of food we had. I don't normally fancy American food, but this was pretty good. Probably because my colleagues (or their wifes) are good cooks. I think dorm food is a bad way to introduce foreigners to American dishes.

This Sunday I had SiChuan food. Went with 2 friends I met at my colleague's birthday party. It was delicious. I wish it was spicier though, I was so afraid it was going to be super spicy but I ended up not having to drink water at all. But it was still good. Had a lot of leftovers too so I don't have to cook before Thanksgiving trip. :D

And today was the best of all. I had.......... Japanese food! Woohoo! And it was GOOD Japanese food too. Can fight with the restaurants in Chicago. I went out with one of the principals and 2 other colleagues. Actually I wasn't supposed to go, but one of them fell sick so I 'ganti'ed. Hehe so lucky for me.

The first dish was the best, called Fire Roll. They put the sushi on a small plate, which is placed on a bigger plate. Then they started a fire on the big plate, so the flames burn the sides of the small plate which crispifies the sides of the sushi. It was so pretty too, the flames were blue colored. I was going to take a photo with my new phone, but then realized I didn't bring my phone. Haih. What a waste. Next time I'm going back there to eat so I can take a photo. And also because it really is very very very very good loh.

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Lots of things happened since last Wednesday (which was the last time I blogged). Went for another happy hour. Watched Casino Royale. The movie is quite nice, I recommend it. I know Craig Owen doesn't look like the typical James Bond, but in the movie he was very good. Plus he has the bod too. Hehe.

Going to Saint Louis this Thursday for Thanksgiving break!

Best Meal Yet in Louisville

Hi dear colleague! I'm flattered that you are reading my blog. And I'm super curious to know who you are. Mind telling? :)

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I just had one of the best meals since I got to Louisville!

Last night my colleague invited me over to her place for dinner. Her parents-in-law were in town last weekend and they made a lot of yummy dishes. I mean tons.

It was sooooooooo good. We had 卢/炉牛肉 (I still can't figure out which 'lu3' is correct) which is beef cooked in a spice mixture specially brought over from China! We also had 红烧猪肉, pork with a layer of fat boiled with some herbs. And then there was cabbage spicy style and 豆腐干 (dried tofu).

My english translations don't do justice to the food. But rest assured it was delicious! Authentic home-cooked Chinese food! Can't get any more authentic than this.

The beef was most yum-yum. I kept eating and eating it, with all thoughts about me being a vegetarian thrown out the 1st floor window.

I wish I have photos to show. Wanted to take photos of the food but then I didn't have a camera or a camera phone with me. Speaking of phones, I just got my new phone today!! Yay!! Will write more about this next time. :)

After dinner we went to watch our department's softball tournament. We play every Tuesday, but for some reason it rained every Tuesday for the past few weeks. I think maybe God / Kwan Yin doesn't like softball.

You know hor? I think everybody looks younger when they are not wearing work clothes. Last time at Drake, we looked so much more serious in our 'interview attire'. Kinda weird at first to see each other dressed like that. As though seeing a different person. Now it's kinda the same way with seeing colleagues in casual dress.

Breakfast

Guess what's my favorite breakfast right now?

Siu long bao!!! (aka 小笼包 aka mini buns with pork/shrimp inside)

I've been trying out different types of breakfast for the past month.

Started out with bread and jam since it's the easiest and cheapest one. Bad idea. Especially since I don't like bread in the first place. Have to throw out half a loaf of bread each time because I can't finish it before the expiry date.

So because I don't want to waste food (and also because it's yucky), I switched to... waffles!

Waffles are quite nice. Put in the oven for about 8 minutes and they come out hot and crispy. It's not like the big A&W waffles, I'm talking bout the Eggo small waffles at Wal-mart. Add some butter and syrup on it.. yum.

Then after I found out about the humongo asian market, breakfast became... 水饺. I don't know what that's called in English, but it's good stuff. It's still not as good as...

siu long bao!!

Mmmmm.. I steam a few while I wash my face etc. Then when I'm done freshening up, it's ready to eat. Tiny buns with pork filling. You know how there's quite a lot of juice inside. When I bite into one, the juice will flow out and into my mouth. Wah.. so incredibly delicious. Mouth watering now just thinking about my breakfast tomorrow morning. Yum yum.

So far I can't think of any other breakfast that can top this one. Maybe someone will Fedex roti canai to me? *hopeful*

Howl to the Moon

After work today, my department went for Happy Hour in a bar called "Howl to the Moon". It's on a street called "Fourth Street Live!", which is where my office is at too. I've been wanting to post photos of the street but never got around to it. I will show it someday because it's solid proof that Louisville is not, I mean NOT a boring 'suaku' place ok?

Anyway this entry is not to prove that Louisville is all fun and hip, which I have to admit is not true also lah. Most people here are friendly and laidback, they are so helpful when they find out I'm new in the city. It also feels a lot safer than the major big cities. Granted with all this laidback-ness, there's no supermodel wannabes walking around, unlike Los Angeles. But I say: the less competition the better. Heehee. Just kidding lah. You think I very desperate now meh? :P

Back to Happy Hour. My first time to a bar since I came to Louisville. We were celebrating the end of the actuarial exams, well at least the people who took the exams were celebrating. Good thing mine's too far away (Feb '07) so I don't feel the urgency yet. There were a lot of people. The place was packed by 6-6.30 pm.

There were some pretty interesting things going on. They had "The World's Most Dangerous Piano Duel" starting around 6.45 pm. 2 people on the piano playing any song requested. Seriously any song, pop songs, country songs, Beatles, 80s' music, dirty made-up songs (I think it's made up)... it's amazing how they can remember the scores and the lyrics for all those songs. When there are 2 requested songs at the same time, people can bid up the price for the song they want. The song with the highest price wins.

Then there's the "Word of the Day". Basically the first person to submit the word (or phrase) of the day pays $1 and then one of the pianists writes it on a huge wall mirror. The next person who wants to change it must pay $2 and so on. Our group paid $7 to wish Happy Birthday to one of my colleagues. The pianist had to write it in Chinese too, he was copying what my colleague (different one) wrote on paper, so it was quite funny seeing him write it with the stroke sequence all wrong. But the end result was very good, almost exactly how it should look.

I didn't drink a lot tonight. Not like I do drink a lot anyway. :P It was nice to hang out with my colleagues. I'm starting to know my co-workers better, it takes me soooooo long to feel comfortable and be myself around people I barely know. I know for a fact that I'm a lot quieter and serious at work. Don't like!!