thim@florida

Read me

2006-05-16T01:33:00.000-07:00

Like all computer stuff there's always this geeky readme first to address certain possible bugs or issues. Ok there are no bugs or tricks to this.. I just wanted to say a couple of words to aid you in reading this blog...

This blog is entirely dedicated to my Florida Trip. It is photo intensive (or I try to be :P). Hope you guys have a ball of your time seeing the things I saw, reading the things I did... hehe .. I will try to post it in such a way that only 1 day's worth of post will show up at any one time.. to read what you want.. just click on the relevant post.. This is to reduce to make sure that your computer doesn't crash when it loads like what.. 7 days worth of entries and photos! Ain't I so sweet? Haha! Use your back button to get back to the first page to navigate!

Anyway enuff of crap.. enjoy!

10th May 2005 - Fort Lauderdale

2005-05-23T13:38:00.000-07:00

Fort Lauderdale is a place for retirement and it really lives up to its name! Too slow paced for us, we should have stayed one more night in Key West, but nonetheless, since we were there, we decided to explore around.. We came here because we were flying off from the fort laud. airport as it was cheaper.. and we have gotten a night at the hotel in this area already...

While walking around.. we suddenly saw curry puffs! Ok, curry puff look a like... feeling a little nostalgic, we decided to go in to grab one, in hope of feeling like it's home away from home...

This is the uncle, aka the baker... but apparently even though we were all hyped up, we realised that the ang moh curry puff cannot match up with Old Chang Kee back at home.. far from it.. it simply tastes like dough and some filling.. the fillings don't even fill up the whole puff... air filled it up! Sigh... I must eat some curry puffs when I get back!

Saw this pub.. took it down in honor for Goat kor... haha

We later went to this place called the swop shop.. it's like a pasar malam... hrm... surprised to find pasar malams in the US? :P

Didn't really find anything I liked there... Don't you think it reminds you of a pasar malam??

On our way out.. we saw this really ugly car ... look it its really ugly hub cap... YUCK.

We decided to go straight to the airport, nothing much..... while waiting at the airport.. I accidentally sat on some white thing... like dried up sun block... yuck.. my butt was stuck to the chair for a little while....

Eww.... stained pants... oops.. i have a fat ass :P but wat ever lar.. not my most flattering pair... the rest of my jeans are gone.. the dryers in the US spoilt it... hehe but never mind... *shrugs* anyway this pretty much sums up the florida trip... This vacation was a good one :)

9th May 2005 - Key West

2005-05-22T19:24:00.000-07:00

Today, we all kind of slept in a little because we slept a little later.. Our hotel was at Holiday Inn Marathon, it was awesome... 3 stars. We decided to go for lunch and then snorkelling. It was my first attempt and I was quite excited and a tad nervous about it.

Ting and Sheena out side the seafood place that we had lunch at..

Ramya and I.... I love my pink cap.. thank you ivan korkor :P

Look at what sheena and ting are eating.. Mahi Mahi.. DOLPHINS! OH my GOD i wanted to flip when they ordered that. I refused to order and in the end I got a hot dog. I don't want to be eating fish and then going snorkeling with the fishes later...

Really plain for a hot dog eh? At least my conscience felt good... heheh but i think i better cut the 2 girls some slack.. mahimahi isn't dolphin but it is a fish that looks like a dolphin or some distant relative of the dolphin. hehe so i kinda exaggerated.. Oops.

After lunch we went on board snorkelling, it was crazy, the waters were so choppy and when I jumped in, I took a few big gulps and I thought I was going to faint or something. Yes, the once competitive swimmer was going down. But no I didn't, I quickly pulled myself together and followed my instincts, got used to the snorkel and went on my way. Ramya got hit the hardest though... she couldn't take the choppy waters and she wasn't confident with swimming and so she stayed on board... poor thing. But then again, she had cute Tom entertaining her and wise Rusty the captain talking to her. Hehe, I wouldn't mind that.

We bought an underwater camera and took a couple of photos. Will try to post some stuff up sometime when I get a chance to develop them. After the traumatizing snorkeling trip, we then drove down to key west town. It was about an hours drive.. all the way southern most point of the US.. 90 miles away from Cuba.. Key west is awesome people.. you guys should come... here are some pictures...

Just bridge and sea...

Interesting broken bridge that we passed by.. legend says that a long time ago.. there was a famous bridge in the key west and a hurricane destroyed it all. Florida then built a new bridge and repaired the old bridges to make them look like what it was in the past.. just that people don't use these bridges anymore. It's heresay for me.. don't quote me on it...

Sheena and I ... me with my grumpy chick tshirt and large sunglasses. I love such sunglasses... tell you something funny.. after the snorkelling trip, as we had no more hotel to return to (we have checked out), we went back to look for toilets to bathe, but apparently the only place to bathe is within the hotel room itself of which we don't have.. and so we went to the swimming pool and swam in it :P after that we showered at the open air shower and dressed and continued on our way! haha

Conch Republic... where we had dinner..

Oysters.. all for me!

extra large chocolate cake!

Key lime pie.. they say that the key lime in the keys taste different cause they use a special kind of lime that is only grown in the keys...

The southernmost point.... yes it is this structure that sits on the southernmost point of florida...

This really dark photo was Ernest Hemmingway's house.. yeah we were outside it and I put my camera above the wall barricade and took a random shot in.. hehe interesting eh... I hope I did get some inspiration on writing from ernest hemmingway...

We were walking along the street when suddenly I felt that something was weird.. I turned to my left and I saw paul frank! I immediately stopped in my tracks and I gasped! My favorite brand! hehe... seems like my radar always picks up such stuff...

This obscured photo is actually a shot of the police car. The blue thing is the lights on top of the car and i took this shot secretly. Yes, we got pulled over at 2 am in the morning because we were supposedly speeding. We didn't know that there was a speed trap and kept thinking that the speed limit was at 65 when at that road it was at 35... oh man! It was pitch dark and the mata was just waiting to pounce on anyone. Grr... 180 bucks fine... damn! But nonetheless we made it safely to fort lauderdale at 4 a.m. in the morning and just crashed into bed... hehe

8th May 2005 - Miami to Key West

2005-05-22T11:41:00.000-07:00

The next morning we woke up with a start at ... 1 pm! OH my god! we were supposed to have checked out by 11am but we apparently were dead to the world and only woke up at 1pm when the cleaning lady's were banging down the door. Gave me a damn big fright. I was in a frenzy and we dressed and called the reception to let us off at 2pm. We were lucky and they didn't impose any penalties. Oh my god.. don't sleep at 6am during a holiday.. you won't wake up... before we left the hotel, I took a couple of photos of the room..

The room in a mess.... seems like a boring chalet like room eh? Wait till you see more...

Amazing view of the beach that we had... Miami beaches are unforgettable! Goodbye Miami for now... we are heading down to Key West!

After leaving the amazing hotel room (out of 200 rooms, only 20 faced the sea and we got the room!), we drove towards miami downtown. We wanted to explore the town a little before going down to Key West as it was still early.. here's ting, our mummy who was driving the mini van

We drove around and realised that all the we had to pay to visit all the state parks.. we managed to find some obscured park and we went down for a photo stop...

Look at the swampy beach.. ewww hehe.. so miami isn't all nice after all

THat's me.. trying to look glam but not glam... we then took a pit stop at IHOP - Internation House of Pancakes.. it was yummy! I had my favourite eggs again...

Here are some random shots of us at IHOP

Ting and Sheena

OK don't mind my distorted body and bad figure...

IHOP! After a full lunch at 5 pm.. we carried on towards Key West.. it was a really scenic drive.. awesome..

It was this really long strip of road built on top of the sea.. connecting all the southern islands in key west... NICE

Nice??

See the white thing behind me? It's actually Sheena sleeping at the back of the car.. hehe...

7th May 2005 - Miami

2005-05-20T23:46:00.000-07:00

We drove from about 7 pm the day before and reached Miami Dezerland Spa and Resort at around 1 am in the morning. We didn't do much but decided to just chill out.. sleep early.. relax for a lazy day at the beach tomorrow. Ohhh beach, and that means hot naked people! Yeah yeah :P Our hotel wasn't at South Beach, instead we were at North Beach and it was good because it wasn't as crowded and we got to enjoy the beach. I'm so not a beach person but I felt that I so needed some injection of sunlight into my life.. and so I decided to tan. I went down at around 1pm and came back up at about 5pm... check out the photos! :P

This is a picturesque picture of the beach that ting took. Beautiful isn't it?

I think I took a pretty nice photo.... a little fat though but I managed to get a pretty good angle to look slimmer...

So like a shampoo advertisement..

Nice? I like this photo

The beach was just awesome ...

Ok.. enough of beachy stuff... after the beach, we decided to go out for dinner.... some cuban food as suggested by Ramya and we were strolling happily to the car... we got into the car only to discover that it was vibrating very oddly... we got out of it and discovered...

1 flat tire! and we thought that was it... until.....

we saw the second flat tire! oh my god... we thought it was foul play.. but the hotel insisted that we could have drove onto something that slashed our tires.... we thought we were in deep shit...

2 flat tires at the same time... this sucks.... we were quite at a loss until I told ting to try calling the car company cause I suddenly remembered that they have a branch nearby.... she did and then we were wondering how they could help us... and then suddenly they told us that they were going to send a new car over! That's because we bought insurance and everything's covered... oh mi... Remember in my previous entry where I mentioned that we almost didn't get the insurance? We were so lucky that we did. PHEW

We waited for about 1 hour before the trailer and the new car came.... hey at least there was a new car for us to drive! Remember people.. always get insurance! you never know when you'll need it...

After that, Ramya wanted to go eat Cuban food but we couldn't find the place, we ended up near 14th and Washington Street and ate at this fast food like place that sold comfort food (think long john silvers, KFC, mcds etc)

We walked on a little and then ting was itching to go clubbing but sheena and I were totally un dressed for it....and so sheena and I just walked into a shop and bought chionging tops. It's one of the craziest things I've ever done in my life man! We looked hot!

We walked around and we found this club.. "Crobar" that natalie (the argentinian) mentioned over the Kobe dinner. Wow, there was a long queue and we wanted to find out how much it costed. Ting went up to them and asked how much was the cover.. the bouncer took a look at her and let her in for free! Fantastic! So Sheena and Ting walked in while I followed behind. They checked my passport and let me in but then they checked Ramya's passport and realised that she wasn't 21. They rejected us and pulled me out from the entrance. Oh my god. I thought that florida was 18 years old but apparently not! Then Sheena and Ting were told to leave the club.

We then decided to walk to other clubs and asked around and realised that it was indeed 21 to enter. This was south beach, no longer orlando. Damn! In the end we sent ramya back to the hotel and we drove back to the club at 2 am. We tried again (cause they already attached the crobar pass on our wrists) and they let us in, no questions asked... weird...

While inside, it was the most happening place ever, so many people, I got a vodka sprite and flirted with the bartender a little haha then we explored upstairs. We found this restricted area where members only were allowed but we decided to try our luck. We flashed our wrist bands and they let us through.. we then realised that we had a somewhat VIP like pass for the night and we were free to go anywhere! Oh my, this is what star treatment vaguely feels like and it was awesome. I never get such treatment when I go to zouk.

We took to a corner and started dancing. Then I realised this really cute guy kept coming up around us then he suddenly came into our group and asked us if we wanted drinks. I immediately thought of drugged drinks and I said no. Ting and Sheena said no too and we continued dancing.

After that, he asked ting if she wanted to dance with him but she said no and we continued to do our stuff. I observed him from the corner of my eye and saw that a lot of hot babes (think supermodel figures) were chatting him up and giving him kisses while the 3 asian chicks just kept in our circle, ignoring him. The bouncer at this point of time walked past us and him and he went up to talk to the cute guy and somehow pointed at us. Something seemed wrong at this time.

Suddenly, 2 guys (one fat, one ugly) came up and pulled Sheena and I away from Ting to dance. While we were pulled away, the cute guy once again asked ting "so now do you want to dance?" and then she did. It got quite sleezy with the fat guy trying to get cosy with me but as usual, I'll do what I need to do and keep his hands at where it needs to be. Lucky for the tummy, I didn't have to feel too much genitalia. Ewww. Sheena got the bald and flirty guy, poor girl. Anyway, from the corner of her eye, sheena saw this other girl who kept giving the cute guy a "throat slashing" gesture, signalling for him to go for a meeting. He didn't want to leave cause if he left, he knew we would go. What he did was to ask his 2 side kicks to continue dancing with us, while getting the other guys to dance with ting.

Sheena knew that this wasn't a simple guy and we decided to go. However the bald guy didn't let her off and she was really freaked out. Sensing her signals, I immediately told the fat guy that I really needed to go and gave him a customary peck on the cheek. (not the kiss, the friendly "smooching sound" when you put your face against the other person) I pulled the girls and we were gone.

Why were we so freaked one would ask... well according to Sheena's analysis, prior to dancing with us, cute guy popped something into his mouth, he has all the other girls falling at his feet, he was chummy with the bouncer and he knew a lot of people at the club. Furthermore which booboo would be asked to go for a meeting at 3 am in the morning and has a string of body guards / sidekicks except for a mafia's son? We concluded that he was one and the fat and bald guy were mere his 2 side kicks.

Quite at adventure I must say, but ting got the best deal of it all with the cute mafia's son... I must tell you, he was definitely one of the cutest guys around... *swoon* but then again, it was a dangerous night... Scary but exciting.. hehe... only just this once.. no more no more... anyway enough of this verbal vomit for a while, good that you managed to last till here... here are some photos for you!

Our "fast passes" aka as the priviledged passes...

Me looking weird in my chiong top.. supposed to show tummy but i stretched it down to cover my stomach... I was wearing my bikini under it... so yeah no boobs. :P

Ting.. after being picked up by the mafia's son.. but still looking damn good...

Sheena's chiong top.. quite chio... but apparently I couldn't fit into it.. so I didn't get that...
After taking the photos, we decided that 5 am was too late for any more activity and we just fell into a deep slumber...

6th May 2005 - Universal Studios

2005-05-16T01:16:00.000-07:00

The legendary Universal studios! You haven't been to Florida if you have not been to Universal Studios! The day was good and we had hell lot of fun! Check out some pictures..

OH before I go into my entry proper for universal studios.. check out our car! We got a dodge mini van! Ting charmed the guy at the counter and he upgraded our compact car to a minivan for free! we didn't want to get insurance initially cause it means 20 bucks extra a day but somehow we relented and decided that yes we should just get the insurance from the car company... Anyway,It was like 4 girls to a 7 seater car.. ... Made us think of the guys who went a week earlier.. 6 guys in a compact car :P bwahahaha Ok I'm being evil... but I must tell you that this florida trip was a real lucky one for us... read on!

We arrived at Universal Studios at 12, after getting the car, sheena and ting managed to charm the people at Guest Services to give us a slightly cheaper ticket :P and so we got in! Here's a picture of me on the travelator.. yes, it is so huge that there are travelators strategically placed around Universal Studios!

I look very different here.. slimmer tho :P but you know me, I look so different from my photos.. I'm just photogenic...

The universal studios globe!

Don't I look like some delegate from miss universe delegate from Singapore

tadah...the entrance of universal studios... after walking around a little.. we saw marilyn monroe and I had to take a picture with her.. I told her I wanted to do something cute and she said to blow kisses :P

You guys like the flintstones? I sure do like them.. We lined up to take this fantabulous shot!

Check out the Hollywood backdrop! It's a superimposed picture... awesome

We went for a couple of shows and rides then we saw this breakdancing group in the crowd... I got a crush on this breakdancer called Josh and I actually went up to take a photo with him after the show...

DroolZ... his arm is so huge.. hehe makes me look small in comparison... but damn.. his stomach is so taut.. ok enuff .. on to the next part :P BTW he's mine ok

We saw turkey legs and decided to get them. They are HUGE.. check out sheena's fist vs the turkey leg. The leg is bigger! My goodness!

Nope if you were wondering.. I didn't finish everything myself.. we shared it among Ting, Sheena and I the only 3 non vegetarians in the group of 4 :P haha trying to be politically correct to ramya, the veg...

We went on for more games like the M.I.B where we shot at characters.. I was the top fragger and ting, ramya and I managed to have such a high average score that beat the group of 6 that we were against.

There's a certain ride called the Mummy which you guys must absolutely take. It's a roller coaster modelled after the mummy set. If you remember the movie, the mummy.. you'll remember certain scenes .. the RC basically brings you through these scenes and you can feel fire, water, excitement everything! I don't want to do a spoiler.. just take it.. you'll be rewarded.. Sheena drained the blood out of my arm tho :P haha

Basically it was a good trip.. Ramya and Ting who usually don't take rides actually managed to be convinced by yours truly to go for the rides. I'm a daredevil when it comes to these and I keep my eyes open as I take the rides. :P I'm crazy i know. But I have a phobia for walking down the stairs.. oxymoron isn't it...

Anyway the day was good, countless rides, shows, pictures... here's one more to end the entry..

I love shopping.... nice store isn't it? Teehee...

Thanks kor for the billabong cap.. it really shielded me from the damaging effects of the sun! Till the next entry!

5th May 2005 - Orlando Disneyworld

2005-05-11T20:17:00.000-07:00

Thursday, 05 05 05, we decided to go to Disneyworld Magic Kingdom. Hey, how can one not go to Disney World when they are in Orlando?! I've been to Tokyo Disneyland, Paris Disneyland, DisneyWorld Magic Kingdom! I'm only left with LA disney and Hongkong disneyland! I must I must complete them all! Ok I'm getting delirious, let me carry on with my 'report' on florida...

That's me with Mickey the bush at the entrance of Disney world. Just when I thought that yes! I'm in disney.. I looked around and realised that I couldn't see the magic kingdom castle at all... basically I was just surrounded by water. That's weird.... then I saw....

a boat! yeah you have to take a boat across the river to reach the magic kingdom! oh my...
Interesting isn't it... Here's a shot of us with the boat and Mr. Popeye...

Look out of the ship and see Magic Kingdom Castle in the background.. it was amazing as we inched closer and closer to Magic Kingdom itself, the splendour of the park greeted us and we were enthralled...

Here's a shot of me trying to act cute in front of the park..

Apparently 050505 is a special day and there were shows, media, celebrities perhaps around us... whoa... hehe

This is a coin minting machine where we put in 2 quarters and a penny ..we mint the penny into pretty prints, it's beautiful.. I have collected quite a bit of pennys from everywhere, you guys should remind me to show you my pennys when i get back...
Basically Disneyworld, like all the disney theme parks in the different parts of the world have almost the same layout... there is the distinct castle which will form the focal point of the park.. here's a shot of me with the castle

Nice isn't it? Just that there are a couple of tents because of the media people who were there to cover disney's 50th anniversary (if i'm not wrong)
We played on many rides such as the Splash mountain as well as Space mountain and Sheena was totally freaked out... she's someone who doesn't really take rides.. she's been to Tokyo disneyland one million and one times but she has never taken the space mountain! We had to liberate her!

Hehe she was screaming her lungs out and draining the blood in my arms dry (by squeezing them too hard) too bad I didn't really take photos of it.... I still remember when we were at space mountain, sheena was talking to this little girl who was teaching her how to overcome her fear. "Keep real still and quiet. Put one hand on your stomach so that you don't feel sick" Hehe great advice!
Hmmm enough of wordy stuff, let me post more photos! What's the disney experience without Mickey and Minnie?!?! So we went to queue up with the little kids to take photos with the characters! (Ok we didn't really queue up, it happened to rain and we took shelter in this place where we can take photos with the characters)

I just love Mickey and Minnie.. if only Mickey kissed me :P

Check this out.... A crystal replica of the castle.. absolutely stunning.. at a hefty price tag of USD $1020 before tax. URGH... but I would love to own it... maybe when I'm like real rich next time...

One more last look at the magic kingdom and the overcast skies. Yes you see our purchases... I stuffed everything in my bag though.. but I spent 90+ USD... no that's not a lot compared to (shift your the focus of your eyes to the white plastic) Sheena :P At least $300 bucks. Haha ... ok sheena don't kill me...
Anyway after one day of Disneyland.. we decided to go eat at Kobe! OH man! I've always wanted to eat Kobe beef, thanks to my Ivan korkor who influenced me a long time ago :P Hehe, I went for the teppanyaki and it was fantastic. I ordered beef, scallops, appetizers and a glass of shiraz. Yes that meal costed me USD $40. Gourmet gourmet people... (ok I must take focus off from the gaping hole in my pocket)

Here's a picture of Sheena and I at the Kobe grill....
see the two ladies in the background? The lady in white is the mother of the lady in black. Sheena made friends with the daughter of the lady in black (she's not in the picture)... it was so interesting, we ended up chatting with each other around the teppanyaki table.
These ladies are from agentina and they stay at miami! The white lady cannot speak english at all and it was the young girl (the one sheena made friends with) who interpreted everything. The girl is only 5 years old.. we chatted, exchanged toasts, "Salus", and goodbye kisses. Sheena also exchanged contacts so that we can call her when we are in Miami or Agentina... Friends from all over the world.... priceless :P After dinner.. we went back to the hotel to sleep... to get ready for.... Universal Studios the next day! :D

May 4th 2005 - On the way there...

2005-05-11T18:12:00.000-07:00

10.40 pm flight on US airways. At 9.45 p.m. we were still at home. Usually people board around 30 minutes before departure time but apparently the few of us were still at home at the point of time. Sheena had trouble getting leave from work, all the way till like around 9.00 pm that night, ting had to go pick her up from the office. However, ting took a really long time to park her car because she couldn't find any parking.

it was pretty stressful. I checked in on line at home and waited for ting to come back. At 9.50pm we called for a taxi and boarded it, reached the airport at 10.10pm and the counter people told us that the gates are going to close soon and told us to run... you have no idea how much we ran. We just ran and ran and ran and finally we reached the gates at 10.20pm and we thought we were so going to miss the flight. But by the stroke of luck, the flight was delayed by 30 minutes and so we managed to catch our flight. The attendant said "we apologise for the slight delay" but we thought to ourselves... "thank god for the delay".. phew.. and then we were whisked off to florida on the plane...

Here's Ramya and Ting looking shagged out after the run.. ramya had a really nice hair cut in the morning

Sheena and I, almost dying from the run. We are UNFIT.

I ordered fresh orange juice on the plane and it came in a can.. how fresh can that be? Well... at least there was a drink..
After the drink, I decided that I was really tired and I just concussed until I touched down. When we got down, we were wondering like lost bees. 2 a.m. in Orlando with no transportation cause our car only comes the next day. We walked for a short distance and this guy called Tony came up to us. He drives the shuttle bus and he got our butts over to Orlando Lake Buena Vista Comfort Inn. The entire ride set us back by 50 usd. Whoa. An expensive ride wasn't it?
We checked in at 3 am in the morning and flirted with the reception guy to expedite our checking in... I mean you can't blame us 4 girls.. we were really tired and the next day was a real long day! :P anyway here's a picture of our hotel room. Not too bad for a 2* hotel...

Did I mention that Orlando is really hot and humid? When I first step foot into the airport, the first thought that came into my mind was... this is so SINGAPORE! Haha, the girls all agreed with me. We enjoyed it for a while and decided that we were missing Philly's weather. *Shrugs* The grass is always greener on the other side huh?