the bells are ringing out for christmas day

MY PORRIDGE IS DA BOMBZZZ :D

This is Comfort Food — Chinese Mushrooms, Ikan Bilis, Dried Scallops! Tastes of HOMEEEE (truly, where I know I must beeee (and where Kwek is now). A cure for a gloomy (it's true what they say about the depressing effects of the Scandinavian winter) and completely unproductive day!

I knew thought the day would come, but, I think, for the first time in my life, I'm Homesick. Even though I love being in Europe and know for sure that I would be devastated when I have to go back to Singapore come summer '09, I miss my friends (love!), my family (even my dear mother who refused to send me a CNY food package pffft) and the food.

Food really is a big part of being Singaporean. Never quite realised that till I got here, and spent my first day in Copenhagen ooh-ing and ahh-ing over the wide array of familiar brands (Lee Kum Kee! Dodo! Milo!) and assorted foodstuff (pandan! frozen durian! tangyuan!) they have in the Chinese and Thai supermarkets.

But no, it's not just the food I miss. After all, there are these well-stocked Asian supermarkets and not-too-bad Asian restaurants in Copenhagen and I have 2342042 packets of Prima Taste pastes — everything I long to eat can be found or whipped up, if I really wanted to.

Apart from, and above the food, its about the memories (argh I hate the word, sounds so melodramatic) that we have, of us eating. Of friends across tables discussing how to classify ngoh hiang, driving across our tiny island to eat prata at 3am, navigating the roads of Geylang trying to find the 126 dimsum stall (near the gigantic 3d durian), our disappointment when we thought that yonghe doujiang had closed down (thank god they merely moved), nights of catching up while slurping down milopengs and chugging down pratas, taking brief breaks from studying by going to eat Nasi Briyani at Sixth Avenue, ending off drunken clubbing nights eating bak kut teh at mohd sultan, barbecues on my rooftop followed by a soak in the jacuzzi after, recess in the bright airy SN canteen gossiping over orange bowl and fried wantons, skipping first period to have yongtaufoo for breakfast in the NJ canteen....

Food from Home may be what we seek solace in, but it really is the Company I miss :(

The Eternal City

Am back in Copenhagen! (: Today was meant to be a day of rest, before I embark on conquering those books — exams are in 1.5 weeks pffft. But no, instead of catching up on the thrashy shows I unfortunately am glued to (and missed on this long trip to Central Europe), I have decided to be productive! In the sense that I've uploaded photos (albeit just of Nottingham) and I'm going to blog about ROME. Which we went to (more than) 1 month ago, yes. HAHA.

11 October 2008

Arrived in Rome at night. Rome was where it all started — the incredible gelato-eating competition, the traipsing around the city entirely on foot (with Josh and his tripod), the meals consisting of only pizza or pasta and wine (: Our first night — Josh dragging us around Rome exploring, and starting the gelato-count by wolfing down 2 megacups of gelato haha.

12 October 2008

This is the day we conquered THE SIGHT — The Colosseum. Which I remember, from the audioguide, did not take its name from its size haha but after the colossal statue of some Emperor nearby haha.

Anyway. This is dear Des with her acid-washed jeans. Haha the woman, while biting into her delicious chocolate pastry, sprinkled powdered sugar all over herself. Nice job haha.

View from atop Capitoline Hill of Piazza del Capidoglio. The Italians and their piazzas — the first piazza, out of the 23472134 piazzas we will eventually see in the next 10 days haha.

Went across the River Tiber for lunch, for the THE BEST PASTA ON EARTH. (Anyway wah lao I miss those early autumn days, when it was still warm, sunny and toasty. When we still could be bare-legged without freezing our asses off, not like now when we cheer when its anything more than 5ºC pfft.)

THE BEST PASTA I'VE EVER EATEN.
Like, seriously. You must go to Le Mani in Rome to eat this impossibly amazing pasta in red wine sauce!!!! It really was motherfcking shiok :D

THE SIGHT which every tourist goes to Rome to see (and which is on every single souvenir) — The Colosseum. Which, despite all its hype, was still pretty much amazing, considering how the ginormous thing was built like close to 2000 years ago (or something), and (the audioguide told us) they actually built a retractable roof. How high-tech is that sial hahah.

The Arch of Constantine — "built to honour Constantine's victory over his rival Maxentious". If there's one thing I realised about Roman architecture, it's that they loved building arches like this, and that it's purpose was always to celebrate someone's victory over something. Which is interesting, since, we don't quite do that anymore, do we. We build memorials, but usually nothing celebratory.

Walked around Palatine Hill. Which really wasn't anything much, after you're seen the magnificence of the Colosseum, unfortunately. Also because there were just tons of ruins which we couldn't identify haha.

The Roman Forum... which I guess was more interesting than Palatine Hill, but haha I guess by then we were quite sick of ruins haha. Rome really was full of ruins haha. Anyway a passing tour guide (Rome is flooded with tour guides holding umbrellas tied at the end with a colourful scarf high up in the air haha) told us (indirectly, because we were cheapos eavesdropping) that a Forum means a "public square" and that the Roman Forum was the center of political, commercial and judicial life in ancient Rome...

Dinner was at Baffetto, where we queued for damn long :/ But it was worth it because the pizzas were DAMN SHIOK. We shared so everyone was supposed to eat their own share of each pizza and then pass it around, but because Josh being Josh, he basically lapped all of us and stressed Des and I out by his speedy rate at which he was devouring those pizzas haha. Then gelato to end the meal, of course (:

After all that food, at Josh's command we had to walk it off haha. So we walked to see the Pantheon. And the Trevi Fountain! Which although gimmicky, is really quite theatrical. As in, you're walking through the windy streets, head buried in your map trying to locate the stupid fountain, and suddenly, you hear it before you see it, the sound of the torrential water (:

Anyway, apparently the custom is to throw a coin into the fountain to ensure one's return to Rome, and then a second coin to make a wish. So obviously, being the tourists we are, we did. The only thing, we sat there for 5 mins figuring out which of our coins of the various currencies had the smallest value :/ Doubt our wishes will be granted lah, seeing how unfortunately Singaporean we were haha.

12 October 2008

Vatican City! The World's smallest state (can you tell I'm obsessed with facts haha). Piazza San Pietro in the early morning, already crowded with 234824029 tourists. After surveying 43023942 postcards of Piazza San Pietro in Rome, I have concluded that its impossible to take a picture of the place without having a tourist in the picture at all haha. Only if you come in the dead of the night, I guess... Rome is just perenially swarming with tourists I guess.

The interior of St Peter's Basilica is MADNESS. I swear, once you've seen this church, all the others just look shag compared to this one haha. Not only is it immense in scale, hello, the dome is designed by Michelangelo leh (the guy is impossibly talented). My god, I just wikied this place and it says that "you can fit the Statue of Liberty (93m), underneath the dome (interior height of 120m from floor to top of dome) with room to spare". Haha I thought it was huge, but I didn't know it was thaaaat huge.

Below, the statue of St Peter! Haha his foot really has been worn thin by the millions of tourist and pilgrims who just keep queuing up to touch and kiss it. It has become shiny, really haha. And the Swiss Guards, with their damn cute uniforms (and high socks) haha.

Then we went to the Vatican Museum! Which was ridiculously huge haha. It took us what, 3 hours to walk to the Sistine Chapel. And halfway through, we, the apparently young and energetic, even had to take a break haha (while Desiree napped haha).

Random art students sitting around, drawing. That was till the couple in the middle started making out, in the middle of their art class, just like that haha. Should have taken a picture haha.

Anyway we walked and we walked and we walked. We saw a lot of damn amazing art, but after like 1.5 hours we were all just damn zzz. Not because the art ceased to be damn amazing or what, just that there were signs after signs telling us that we were approaching the Sistine Chapel (which is what people go to the Vatican Museum to see), but we just kept seeing those signs and never seemed to reach the damn Sistine Chapel, argh.

Seriously haha it took us DAMN LONG. Towards the end we weren't even looking properly at the stuff, apart from the Raphael rooms...

So of course by the time we got to the Sistine Chapel (they should really make it the first one you go to), we were damn damn shag and quite zzz by the tautings of the neverending signs. But but but the Sistine Chapel was still DAMN AWE-INSIPIRING. Like, even though we were not in the best of moods and just incredibly tired.

Michelangelo really was a genius, I swear. We basically just stood there staring at the ceiling, trying to take in everything (whilst Josh and Ben tried to recognise the biblical charaters and tell me the stories behind the frescoes). Everything was damn life-like, almost popping out, if you stared at it long enough. I guess that comes from him being a sculptor as well? No idea man. But anyway, it really was damn damn amazing, was really worth the frustration of the trek there haha. It really is the best piece of art I've ever seen, and probably will ever see.

Anyway. Sorry but there are NO pictures of the Sistine Chapel :/ They had guards (bouncers really), ready to acost us if we even dared to whip up a camera. But then we should have sneakily taken some lah, on hindsight haha. So I guess, the best we got was a picture of a poster depicting the Last Judgment below.

After we got out of the Sistine Chapel, everything else just looked damn blaahh haha.

All museum-ed out, we left for the the Spanish steps (: Which really is nothing much except for a place for people to sit around, eat some gelato and chill. And for some of us (i.e. Desiree), to take a much-needed nap haha, while Josh and I went window shopping along Via Condotti.

Of course, before leaving Rome, we had to see The Colosseum one last time (: Actually I think it was because Josh just wanted to take a nice picture of it, without any tourists swarming the background. And we succeeded! (: Haha actually, it kinda looks better at night, no?

Okay finally, the end of a damn long entry! :/ And on a random note, I had the most shiok dinner — mushroom scallop porridge! Ultra ultra comforting in the cold weather.