Good Eats!

1. Wolfgang Puck Cafe

From the name, you know it's an expensive restaurant but I was so excited to eat good food at Downtown Disney (famous for its pleasure island-pubs), I walked into this restaurant right away and Justin was like "You pay ah!" Ok lah, I paid lah...

We sat down at the sushi bar and ordered 1 california roll, which of course was the cheapest of all. I thought it's taste okay cos the rice is not very soft and also I thought I make better sushi. Haha! Then we ordered 1 calamari and 1 BBQ Chicken Pizza. These are AWESOME! The calamari is fried right and came with their specialty sauce - some curry greenish stuff. The sauce was marvelous and we thought it's unique compared to ranch or honey mustard and we finished the whole plate. The pizza was thin crust which we like and the cheese was hot and chewy and pulley(when you eat, it pulls you know...) . I thought it was made perfect unlike those big chunky thick crust pizza w/o much ingredients on it.

So the total came out to $41.38 + tax. Well, I thought it's reasonable for a good and famous restaurant. Well, it's good to dulge once in a while, hehehe! And then, before we left, the chinese chef at the Sushi table said "Kamsahamida" to me..ermm..I just smiled back lor..dunno how many times that we both had been mistaken to be Koreans.

2. Taste of Hong Kong

We had Seafood crispy HK style noodles and Beef w/ black bean sauce flat noodles(hor fun) the first time we went there. I was thrilled to have authentic chinese food. And the most satisfying is the pot of hot Chrysanthemum Tea. Wow!

We had dim sum the second time we went. The shrimp cheong fun, fried radish cake, chicken feet (according to Justin cos i don't eat), har gao, and steamed ribs are delicious. The siew mai wasn't soft enough and the black egg porridge (Suddenly cannot remember the egg's name) and lian yeung Bao (Lotus buns) are not bad. We'll try char siew bao and egg tarts next time. Hehe! Oh! And we had the pot of hot Chrysanthemum Tea again.... Mmmm..Satisfying!!

We're pretty broke now so we've been eating home cooked food or whatever junk you can find in our home. After saving up some money, I'm treating Justin to delicious Hawaiian food on his birthday on Oct 10!! There're so many restaurants here and we don't know what to choose. I still want to go to the Japanese Teppanyaki and try some other Chinese restaurants and therefore, I need to work harder.

Roadtrip to Florida part II

Day 4 (8/20/2007 Monday):

From Chattanooga, we set off to our final destination - Kissimmee, Florida where our motel is located! It's about 10 mins drive south of Orlando. We drove for about 2 hours and arrived in Atlanta, Georgia for lunch. We actually saw many students attending their 1st day of fall school at Georgia State Univ. in the downtown and we went in and walked around. They probably thought we were one of them, haha! There were many restaurants outside the campus and we went to this korean/jap restaurant. I had Pork katsu don and Justin had this spicy seafood noodles soup. He loves anything that's soup or seafood so the combination of both makes it perfect for him. The korean boss thought we were korean and spoke to us in korean until we said we weren't. haha! We actually enjoyed our trip at Atlanta downtown cos it's huge and pretty. CNN is there and it's the state of Coca Cola! Also, lots of African American! This is the best city we've seen throughout our drive! How come there are no restaurants like that right outside BYU huh? Sian ah! Then we drove all the way to Kissimmee, Florida and when we arrived there at night, I was like: "This is my new home now and I love it!" Because there are so many lights and restaurants! It looks like a fun place to live at!

Day 5 (8/21/2007 Tuesday):
We went to Busch Gardens today. It's located at Tampa, Florida, which is about 1 1/2 hours of drive from Central Orlando. Tampa is at the western part of florida. It was a hot day man! I was glad that it didn't rain. This place is full of big and fun rides. The 1st roller coaster already made us dizzy as it kept spinning round and round. The best ride would definitely be "Sheikra" which is the newest ride i think. It stops at a 40 ft high and suddenly goes all the way down 90 degree vertically! It was awesome man! Justin described it as "tiao lou" (jumping off the building), hahaha! I think i'm braver than him cos he admitted that he closed his eyes while I opened mine! (Check the pic on the right!)

Also, I took this overturn pirate ship alone (which I din know that it would overturn lor until i was on it). Justin din want to take cos he doesn't like pirateship and he was laughing at me downstairs while I was hanged up there! The necklace i was wearing almost dropped and I had to hang on to it. I'm really not afraid to take roller coasters or whatever scary rides by myself because I'm a big fan of theme parks and I totally love taking them. If Justin doesn't dare to take, I'll still go ahead and take one lah.. Joyce rules! haha! Anyway, we'll be reporting to Disney the next day so here ends our roadtrip but we'll continue to have fun man!

Roadtrip to Florida part I (I can't finish cos i'm going to disney theme park now, hahaha!)

Day 1 (8/17/2007 Friday):

We wanted to leave Provo at 8am, but we left at 9am instead because we were out late at Denny's the night before with the rest of the Singaporeans - so called our last gathering, but I didn't really feel so. Anyway, we drove for about 8 hours and arrived in Denver, CO. We were happy to see trees, which is hard to find in a desert like Utah. Surprisingly, it was raining in Denver and we had to bring our umbrella out, but we saw a very prominent rainbow. It's so beautiful! See pic below! I could say I like Denver so much more than SLC because it's green, beautiful, has nice buildings and more bigger shopping areas and restaurants. We visited the 16th street mall and I thought it was a nice place. We had dinner at Chili's and I would rate it 5.5 out of 10. The servings is huge and my corn on the cob was cold! Dang it!

Day 2 (8/18/2007 Saturday):
We left at 7:30am to Kansas City, Missouri. We drove through the state Kansas, which is between Colorado and Missouri. Rachel Tan called me while I was driving and I told her this place is super boring. There's only fields and fields. Ash told me it's only fields and tornados, haha! I don't understand how can people live in this kind of place! It was a nice drive though because the road was not mountainous. We arrived Kansas City, MO in the evening, central time and we drove through downtown. We visited the Crown Center and the Union Station. It's the city for hallmark too! We were so surprised to see so many ah pek and ah ma at the Crown Center and the food are so cheap. I guess it's a city for them lah, haha! I didn't want to eat there cos it's their territory even though the food's cheap. And the shops all closed early too! In the end, we bought our dinner at Wendy's and went back to the motel to eat, haha!

Day 3 (8/19/2007 Sunday):

We left at 7:30am again to our 3rd destination this time - Chattanooga, Tennesse. We knew it would be a long drive this day - about 10 hours plus. Along the way, we stopped at St. Louis, MO downtown for lunch at TGIF. I had the strawberry chicken salad and it was awesome! TFIG is so much better than Chili's. Then we continued our drive and arrived in Nashville, TN at about 5:30pm to look around. We were too full to have dinner that early and everything was closed in the downtown and so we continued our drive all the way to Chattanooga which is at the very south of Tennesse. There were so many motels there and different car plates. I guess it's a place for people to stopover and rest and then continue our travel the next day. Guess what we had for dinner since we arrived like 10 something there (because we din realize that it changed into eastern time at Chattanooga)? We bought our dinner at the nearby restaurant and it's Wendy's again! For goodness sake! I bought the same JR. Bacon Cheese burger and I promise myself not to eat Wendy's for the next few months. Pic L: St. Louis, MO. Pic R: Nashville, TN.

Tired and stressful

Why? Because we're moving to Orlando, FL in 24 days! We're both doing an internship with Walt Disney World! Justin is working for merchandizing dept and I'm working for entertainment productions. We hope we could have a blast and wonderful experience!

Anyway, we need so much money to move there. Imagine the cost of renting a big truck with the car mover, the gas, the motels we are staying, and the food we need, the total price cost a lot!! We're taking 4 days to arrive there. We'll stop by Denver CO, Kansas City MO, Chattanooga, TN, and lastly, Kissimmee, FL to stayover. We'll also drive by places like St. Louis MO, Nashville TN, and Atlanta GA. Well, we'll just take this as a road trip.

Apparently, we're working 2 jobs to save up for this trip. That explains why we're both tired and stressful. Well, we'll just xin ku a bit for the 1st year and then when we move back to Singapore next summer, we should have a more peaceful life since we already have a condo back home!!!
Hehe!

I'll update pics and our lives when we move there. Hopefully I don't slack lah.. haha!

Love,
Joycey

Finally Graduated after 4 years in U.

At my school of fine arts.

Picture taken w/ the theater and media arts director, Rodger Sorensen.

Keep Moving Forward....

I just watched a beautiful movie yesterday with Justin..It's produced by Walt Disney Company "Meet the Robinsons" 3D.

Don't be surprised that a cartoon could contain such meaning message. I expected this movie to be funny and lame, but it's isn't about how funny it is because it's actually not. It's about how we should not keep having nostalgic memories and looking for the past, blame our past and find faults in what we have done, but we should believe in ourselves, in our talents and abilities, never give up and just keep moving forward.

I didn't laugh my whole heart out, but I was still engrossed to the storyline till the end. At the very end of the movie, a message appeared. It says something like we all have doubts and uncertainty about our future, but we should not give up and just keep moving forward.......Walt Disney Company. Oh my gosh, at that moment, I cried under the 3D glasses. Heavenly Father has answered my prayer and doubts through a movie. I've been whining a lot about why our future is so blur, but the bold words have given me strength and power not to give up in hoping. We might have trials in our lives, but we should just keep moving on and stop blaming about what had happened. Who knows what's going to happen to us next time right? Just like the kid in the movie, he never knew he would have such bright future, but he learns to stop blaming about his fate and move on. I want to learn from him.

Yeah, who knows what will happen when we keep moving forward to work with Walt Disney World in August. Ironically, we already saw the message is brought to us by Walt Disney Company. Haha! So I believe we should keep moving forward in Walt Disney Company..haha!

Later, we watched TMNT(Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), our childhood favorites. I really love this movie. The story is pretty dramatic and like an typical asian action movie. Then i found out one of the producers is a Chinese. In fact, there were many Chinese people involved with this movie. We heard Zhang Ziyi's dub in one of the characters. If you have time, catch this movie too but Meet the Robinsons is my #1 choice at the moment! It has helped to gain my testimonies...Catch it!!!

Can you imagine that Singapore is turning into a big tourist attraction?

Yeah, it's true!!! I just found out yesterday online!!!

In 2010, we'll have UNIVERSAL STUDIOS SINGAPORE on the sentosa island along with 6 hotels, some museums, water parks, and festive walks (a street of entertainment).

Genting casino won the bid because they imposed a family oriented theme. They are going to bring in ex-Cirque du Soleil performers to create a new show called La Vie, not too sure about the name, but this is awesome!

Anyway, check out the website which has cool model pictures: http://www.screamscape.com/html/universal_studios_singapore.htm
Also, check out this website for more information about the rides on the theme park: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Studios_Singapore
It's their fifth theme park and i'm so glad that they are opening in our homeland!!!

I'm super more excited because with my internship experience in disney world in florida, it will help me to get a job in Universal studio Singapore since they are both corporate theme parks and might do the same kind of entertainment productions. I also heard rumors of disney talking w/ the govt about opening a disneyland in Marina. I can totally see why God wants me and justin to go disney now.....how exciting.

Most likely, we are leaving on 8/18 to florida. Anyone interested to come visit us, email or call!! I could get free pass into the disney parks! heheee...

Remember our Chinese wannabe, Benji?

Hello, if you still remember Benji (the Chinese wannabe who performed in the Asian Festival last time), he's pretty popular in Shanghai now. Check out his blog: http://blog.sina.com.cn/benji

Haha..actually i'm proud of him lah...trying to break into the China Market, but he's doing BYU a good name. People there know that he doesn't smoke and drink...well..i just wanna say, good luck to him!

I think he's doing some hosting...

Joyce