Return to the east

I went to Expo on Friday for Popular Bookstore sale. I went to a similar event only once and that was perhaps 8-9 years ago when I was still in JC. The only thing I could remember was that it was very hot inside. I spent $5 for an illustrated Da Vinci Code book (yes, that popular book by Dan Brown). I still keep the book until today as it has hard cover and numerous photos of the locations mentioned in the book.

I was expecting something similar. Of course I did not get what I expected. Singapore Expo is fully air conditioned now. In fact, I was surprised that Changi City Point shopping mall is located opposite the MRT. With a shopping mall in the vicinity, I guess Expo is no longer as quiet as it used to be. Sadly, I went home empty handed. None of the book caught my interest. I was interested to get Vision of Escaflowne TV series DVD for a mere $3 but after seeing the payment queue, I just could not be bothered. Haha...

Yesterday I went to ECP for cycling. Boy.. it is almost 7 years since the last time I went there during RCIY camp. I did not enjoy my JC days but surprisingly there are a lot of memories with the school, ECP, and Siglap areas. Yea.. there were good times at these places too which I think count more than my dislike towards my ex-classmates.

Anyway ECP is no longer a fun place to cycle. Now they have these family bikes which are damn slow and obstructing the road. Haiz.. Near the food centre, people were walking without regards to the road. Bleah.. A friend teased me why on earth someone would be cycling with a black face. Haha..

Although it was a nostalgia trip, it made me rather emo. Bedok Jetty would definitely be a camwhoring place and there is a reason why I don't take selfies. My face looks terribly round, fat, and ugly from close T_T Perhaps not only my face but all of me in general :(

Finally!

After so many months, a few attempts and requests, several transfers, and many people come and go, the day has finally come for my turn to leave :) Yay!!

I deliberately wrote something that ambiguous to trick my friends that I am changing job. Haha.. Actually I am just changing workgroup at work. Basically it is just a change of portfolio, or change of admin duties, or change of things that I need to nag on.

I can't hide my joy for finally able to get out of the customer service workgroup. Despite the perks of relatively much slacker workload and a very motherly chairperson, I just cannot champion something I don't believe in. It is not that I don't believe in good customer service. I just don't agree to the idea of customer service that the rest has. In my opinion, customer service is something very human and thus it is very natural that nice people beget good customer service while nasty assholes get black face. After all, how do you expect people to put on smile while the customers are being rude and abusive?

However, the thing that I hate most is the people. It seems that since we are in something called "customer service", everyone becomes a hypocrite during the meetings. Ideas are thrown without much thinking how staff at the ground will feel when these are implemented. Myself, being someone more negative and more vocal, consistently becomes the irritating voice of dissent. Some examples: 

1) Who seriously gives a damn about proper telephone greeting when most organisations use automated answering machines at this time and age sia? Although I am obedient enough to enforce the so-called telephone etiquette, I just don't believe on the idea behind it. Phone calls are such a distraction at work. People who are working also feel the same and thus it is difficult to enforce this as this does not come naturally.

2) Expecting staff to SMILE and to use salutation to every single customer. Imagine doing that for 8 hours every day. Smiling, being friendly, saying Mr/Miss/etc should be something natural and it is a joke trying to enforce that for every single person! Jeez..

There are still so many examples which I am just lazy to write. But in summary, I just don't subscribe in where we are heading to. We do things for the sake of customers but not thinking at all about the staff who have to do all the additional bullshit at work.

It feels so good to finally leave this sia.. I can't imagine how sweet it will feel if I am finally able to find a new job. Someone please offer me a better job leh T_T I am still very very sore about my appraisal as I think my negativity is shown the most on these customer service meetings when a lot of ideas that I disagree upon are thrown. Despite my negativity, they should at least realise and give credit that my branch is one of the 2 or 3 that passed both customer service audits last year hor!

Yoroiden Samurai Troopers / Ronin Warriors

Yoroiden Samurai Troopers (or Ronin Warriors as it is known in the West) is one of my childhood anime that I never managed to complete because of my tuition classes. Lol.. It has a similar concept to Saint Seiya and Shurato with boys donning magical armors to fight evil. Ironically, it pales in comparison to Saint Seiya which is still enjoying great success even up to these days. After watching the anime, I know why. In fact, Shurato is still many times better than Samurai Troopers.

Samurai Troopers has a very weak plot that cannot engage me. It took me more than 6 months to complete 39 episodes of the anime. The story begins with the Netherworld, led by Arago, which suddenly appears at Shinjuku to take over the mortal world. Arago is accompanied by 4 Warlords (and countless drones called Soldier of Doom) are opposed by our 5 Samurai Troopers. The first half of the series bores me to death with countless battles of any of the Warlords vs any of the Samurai Troopers. Each of them only has 1 special attack which keeps being repeated and somehow the 4 Warlords keep losing despite donning similar armors. At the end of the first half, Arago is successfully defeated when Ryo Sanada (the main character) is able to summon a new armor, called the Inferno Armor or Kikoutei, by combining the powers of all Samurai Troopers.

What happens on the second half is beyond imagination: the Netherworld is back with Arago still alive. What the heck -_- Other than the 4 Warlords, Arago has several powerful henchmen who are much stronger than the 4 useless Warlords but mysteriously never appear or even being mentioned on the first half the series. How lame. So it is a rinse and repeat for the second half on how Samurai Troopers will defeat Arago for the second time.

Characterisation is equally weak with bland personalities of the characters. Despite each person is associated with certain virtue (Ryo's is righteousness, Seiji's is grace, Toma's is wisdom, Shin's is trust, and Shu's is justice), these virtues are not clearly depicted in the characters' personalities. Okay, perhaps only Toma who is depicted as the most level-headed and "wise" one. Nasti is the girl among the main cast and I am quite surprised that she is not a damsel in distress. She is very useful as she provides a lot of information with regards to the history of armors. Jun serves as an irritating little boy who I don't know why he is even included as the side kick. Byakuen the tiger also does not seem to play a crucial role. 

As the story develops, it is revealed that many thousand years ago, Arago was defeated by Kaos who split Arago's armor to 9 armors. 5 armors are those donned by Samurai Troopers while 4 are corrupted and are used by the 4 Warlords. Basically Arago wants all these 9 armors to fight one another and gain strength because that indirectly makes him stronger as these armors are him afterall. The 4 Warlords used to be good and each also has a virtue. This makes them somewhat equal to our main Samurai Troopers and it does not make sense that the 4 Warlords keep losing. 1 of the Warlords, Anubis, repents and take place Kaos' place. Without the armor, Anubis surprisingly becomes much stronger than he used to be when he was a Warlord. It seems that when you become a good person, you will somehow be much stronger o_0

Anubis dies in the end and hands over his armor to Kayura who is Arago's strongest subordinate. Kayura is revealed to be the last descendant of Kaos' clan who is brainwashed by Arago. That explains why she is so powerful. In the of the TV series, Kayura and the 3 surviving Warlords decide to remain in the Netherworld to rebuild it and prevent it from attacking the mortal world. Literally what the fuck ending the whole series.

After the TV series, there are 3 OVAs: New York Gaiden (2 episodes), Kikoutei Densetsu (4 episodes), and Message (5 episodes) which are still unable to salvage the series.

New York Gaiden takes place in New York. Seiji is kidnapped by another random enemy who misuse his armor to attack civilians. This act is caught on TVs and the 4 Samurai Troopers fly over to New York to rescue Seiji.

Kikoutei Densetsu is the most exciting part of the whole series and OVA although in the end, the story also does not quite make sense. A new character, Mukala, is introduced. He comes from Africa and has the black Kikoutei. He can teleport to Japan as he aims to destroy Samurai Troopers' white Kikoutei. It is revealed that Kikoutei is so powerful that it can annihilate the whole world. These armors seem to have their own desire to keep on fighting, grow stronger, and in the end destroy the world. This OVA ends with both Kikoutei armors fight and destroy each other.

Message introduces another character, Suzunagi who wants to control the 5 armors, summon Kikoutei armor and destroy the whole world as revenge. Message begins quite interestingly with Seiji finding a book which tells stories that exactly resembles all the fights that Samurai Troopers have gone through. This makes our heroes rather emo as they are wondering whether their lives have been foretold according to this book. A little of flashback brings us to Suzunagi's childhood when her whole family is killed somehow because of these armors and that is how she wants a revenge. I honest don't know what is going on but in the end, Suzunagi becomes good again after being reunited with her mother's spirit and the Samurai Troopers get new armors. Does it make sense? I think it does not. Lol..

The final reason which makes Samurai Troopers suck is how lousy the armors are. Saint Seiya has cool armors based on the various constellations and Shurato has cool armors based on Hindu mythology. Samurai Troopers armors are based on elements such as fire, water, wind, etc but the design of the armors do not even incorporate any of these elements. The armors look boring and too generic. I believe Samurai Troopers is intended to be a shonen genre for teenage boys who will not be impressed with boring action stuff: only 1 attack per person and recycled fighting scenes.

Truthfully, I regret the 8 months I spend to watch this crap, man! Haha.. Having said that, I am still interested in getting their action figures from Bandai. Too bad they are limited edition and the prices are not justifiable. There are a lot of great artwork but Samurai Troopers does not even have a proper artbook!! Jeez.. Damn irritating.. I bought a lot of Samurai Troopers artbooks and most of them are screenshots from the anime. So where do those awesome pictures online come from sia!!

The Maze Runner

Let me start this with a warning for spoilers as this movie will only be released in the West on the 19th September. I am quite lucky to be somewhere where the movie opens on 11 September. But wait... 11 September is tomorrow. How could I be writing a review today on the 10th? Aha! I actually watched it yesterday.

To celebrate its 7th birthday, Golden Village (GV) held an event called The Maze Runner Great Escape. On top of early screening of the movie, participants get to enjoy pre-screening activities/games, hot snacks, drinks, instant photography session, GV goodie bag, and complementary movie pass for the upcoming Book of Life. All of these just for $25 which is reasonable considering a movie ticket cost $8.50 on a weekday.

I have never participated in this kind of "premiere" event so I was quite curious to attend this since I am also quite curious to watch the movie thanks to the trailers played before X-Men and Guardian of the Galaxy earlier this year. I was expecting merchandises related to the movie from the goodie bag and the games/activity. Alas, it was disappointing as all the freebies were rather rubbish. The first station dubbed the "Fear Factor" which was basically an instant lucky dip with crappy prizes of either a canned food or a free digital copy of 8days magazine -_-. The second station called "Break the Maze", I was supposed to solve a paper maze with a prize of Soy Energy Bar. Totally what the crap.. The food was 5 pieces of chicken nuggets and more pieces of potato wedges and they did not taste like nuggets or potatoes. The drink was canned drinks called ok ok which despite having a huge colourful banner of 10+ flavours, there were only 4 flavours available. The instant photography was also rubbish as it was taken with a handphone and the main purpose was for publicity as we have to tag and post it on instagram or something. I was expecting something cool to keep as a memento of this event. The ultimate bummer was the goodie bag which only contains GV popcorn-shaped small pillow and GV popcorn container. So basically NOTHING related to the movie merchandise as what I expected.

The learning point is that if you want to for this kind of thing, to make it worthwhile, you have to join the stupid game onstage. Then you can win things like movie poster, more free movie passes, etc. Anyway it was a rather bullshit event. Despite the movie was full house, 90% was disengaged from the activity. Just before the end of the pre-event, participants were asked to go on stage to take a photo with Mr Popcorn, who is basically GV mascot, to celebrate the 7th birthday and only like 20 people were willing to take picture together.

Moving on to the movie itself now and I am writing from a movie-watcher perspective entirely as I have not read the book yet. The story is quite intense: in a dystopian future, young boys (1 boy per month) are mind wiped, abducted and sent to a place called the Glade which is surrounded by giant maze. The only way out seems to be through the maze but the maze is inhabited by creatures called by the Grievers who roam at night. The maze entrance will close at night to prevent these creatures from entering the Glade. The boys (they call themselves the Gladers) have their own tasks to sustain the community and a group of them called the Runners have to enter the maze every morning to map out the maze in order to find an exit. They have to return before the maze closes in the evening and nobody has ever survived a night inside the maze, presumably killed by the Grievers.

Things start to change with arrival of the main character, Thomas, who basically speeds up the whole story in a ridiculous pace. It was revealed that the other boys have been trying to map the maze for 3 years and have not been able to find any progress towards the exit. After Thomas arrival, the maze is solved and we reach the ending of the movie in like 3 days?? What the??

While the overall theme sounds engaging, how the story progresses does not quite make sense. One day, Minho and Alby enter the maze. Alby gets stung by the Grievers and Minho has to carry him. Because of that, they are unable exit the maze before the end of the day. As the maze is closing, Thomas decides to enter the maze. You will be asking "For what??". He just arrived so what he could do in that situation? Bleah.. Because of Thomas, the 3 survive the night in the maze and even manage to kill a Griever.

Then a girl called Teresa was sent to the Glade which causes a big ruckus as no girls has been sent to the Glade before. She holds a note saying that she would be the last one sent ever. Thomas suggests to re-enter the maze to analyse the dead Griever to get some clues. With a canister obtained from the Griever's body, he somehow manages to find the "exit". For no reason, after this discovery, the maze no longer closes at night and the Grievers attack the Glade. Not knowing what to do, Thomas decides to stab himself with one of the Griever's metal parts as getting stung by a Griever seem to initiate the process called the Changing which somehow brings back the memories before one was abducted and sent to the Glade. Again this move does not seem to make sense because people don't seem survive the Changing process. How is Thomas sure that we won't die by stabbing himself? Bleah..

As the main character, he survives the Changing and he reveals that both Teresa and him are actually employees of the company who sent the guys to the Glade. He has no idea why the 2 of them eventually got sent too. Realising that there is something out there, the climax is when they all decide to re-enter the maze and get through the "exit" somehow. The ending is a cliffhanger and despite exiting the maze, the survivors still don't know what is going on.

I think there is a lot of potential with the story but eventually there are too many plot holes and unanswered questions. They have so many Gladers and yet only 5 or 6 play prominent roles. I feel that they can make a better story with utilising more characters. In addition, because there are too many people in the crowd, I can't really be bothered when some unknown got killed by the Grievers. It takes away some of the potentially more heart-wrenching part. As the only girl, I expect Teresa to play a special role to solve the maze. Well, she does not so I have no idea why her character is even introduced into the whole plot in the first place. By the way, no romance or love stories to warrant her presence too.

Nonetheless, the action scenes are quite intense and enjoyable too. As the title suggests, there are plenty of running and the running and shouting are quite believable too. The lack of make up seems to help too. All the pores and imperfection on the actors' faces are pretty obvious which is quite sensical because you can't possibly be looking pretty and perfect when living under such harsh environment. And by the way, I think Kaya Scodelario (who plays Teresa) really resembles Kristen Stewart (Bella from Twilight series).

If I have to rate it somehow, I think that this is just a so-so movie. Perhaps 3 out of 5 stars. Yet, one thing which I find very interesting is how the whole setup resembles our real lives even though we are not living in a dystopia. You stay and you remain in the shit place. You escape and you are simply thrown to the next shit in life. So yeah, our life is like The Maze Runner indeed.

Mid-Autumn Festival

I always thought that Mid-Autumn Festival would always be on a weekend but that is not the case. Today is the Mid-Autumn Festival. No mooncake for me this year because I am already very fat. Haha.. Alas a colleague brought some mooncakes today and I shamelessly ate quite a lot. Lol.. Sadly, I missed out the green tea one which I believe was the most delicious since it was the first one to go.

Today is the start of the school holiday and my expectations were pretty high for a quieter day. It was indeed quite quiet in the morning but it still ended late in the afternoon. Sigh.. I decided to eat McD today since it has been quite a few months since my last meal there. Too bad that the new twilight menu was not as special as its name or its look. I bought the classic twilight and it tasted rather generic like other McD burgers. Bleah..

Rainy days.. 7th months.. Tiredness... I never run out of excuses to start my jogging. Bleah.. I signed up for Standard Chartered Marathon later this December and it is just a matter of time for me to start training for it. I don't aim to win. I just aim to complete the run without shaming myself. Despite the name 'marathon', I am only signing up for 10km run. Haha.. Sinful fattening meal was another tactic to drive me to jog tonight but it almost failed again as I was too tired on my journey home.

Then shit happened.. Just mere seconds after I entered my room, my phone rang. I knew I should not have answered it because it was about my pharmacy fridge alarm being triggered! Shit! I am the 3rd in the contact list and obviously the person could not get the first two on the list. Bleah.. Since I answered, obviously I could not say no so I had to come back to office. Haiz.. As expected, it was a false alarm. Ironically, it was good that it was a false alarm, at least I did not need to crack my head trying to rescue those insulins and vaccines.

So hurray.. because of the fridge alarm, I returned home hot and sweaty and I decided to just jog. That was the first time in more than half a year. I have not run since I moved house o_0 As expected, my stamina was crap. I could only run for 5 minutes at a time before 'resting' by walking. It is going to be a gargantuan task trying to build up the stamina to last me 10km.

I feel like chickening out of the marathon T_T

Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno

The first Kenshin live action movie was a huge success that justifies more live action movies. The awesome Kyoto arc is chosen and the story is long enough to be split into 2 movies. With the same cast members and production team, the good and the bad are not too different from the first live action movie.

I am not going to write about the plot as it is similar to the anime and manga. Kyoto Inferno runs almost 2 and a half hours and obviously it ends on a cliff hanger. The movie ends somewhere after burning of Kyoto and despite the title as such, there is very little burning in the movie.

The cinematography for the mass fighting is still awesome and I am quite surprised that the rating is still PG-13 despite the splashes of blood everywhere. I was expecting plenty of exciting duels and I am disappointed because all the duels suck except for Kenshin vs Soujiro. Both are light-weight fighters whose techniques rely more on skills and agility, rather than brute force, and they depict these spot on. Sadly, despite the numerous duels, there was only 1 "special" technique featured when Kenshin defeats Cho.

Ironically, despite this being a second movie, there is not much improvement in characterisation of the old casts. I guess I am sort of used to them as I could bear with them. Takeru Satoh is still unable to nail the funny side of Kenshin but he is quite awesome when Kenshin goes into the killing mode. I am quite angry that Sanosuke (my favourite character) is somewhat relegated to comic relief. He is not as strong as Kenshin but he is strong enough to be Kenshin's sidekick but this is not what depicted in the movie. Kaoru still feels as distant to Kenshin as in the first movie and Yahiko only has 1 cheeky line in the whole movie. That is so unlike him.

The good news is most of the new characters in this second movie is awesome. Shishio, Aoshi, and Cho are crazy and sadistic as how they are supposed to be. Although I dislike Hojo, this guy playing him is awesome to capture his diabolical character. Misao's cheerful and outgoing personality are spot on and she is pleasant to watch. Soujiro's seemingly friendly but dangerous demeanor is also perfect. However, personally I think they should choose someone cuter to play Soujiro. In the anime and manga, Soujiro is still likeable despite being an antagonist. This guy playing Soujiro makes Soujiro irritating with his fake smiles instead of like-able. I am looking forward to Yumi but she is very ugly here T_T Her thick lipstick is a trademark but on real person, it makes the actress have a Joker smile instead of making her pretty. Bleah.. aah and that kimono should fall lower on the shoulders sia... Haha...

In the end, I still left the cinema as a happy fanboy. It was the same feeling that I left the first movie. Although there are parts which are not up to my expectations or imagination, overall it is still an enjoyable movie that does justice to the original manga and anime. It gets me excited to wait for the part 2 this October but it is not good enough to tempt me to keep a copy of the movie with me.

Brother-sense

Have you ever felt jealous but happy at the same time? A good kind of envy? As weird as it sounds, that is what exactly I felt today when I knew that my younger sister has a boyfriend now. Hurray! I am still single, or I choose to still remain as a bachelor for now, but I am not jealous because of that. The first thing that worried me was if this guy is more good-looking than me. Lol.. Haha.. Yes, that is how narcissistic I am. After I see how the guy looks like, I feel a sense of relief. Phew... The jealousy disappears and only the happiness remains. I even told some my friends that my sister is attached now. Don't ask me why I am so happy about it.

It is said that brothers get protective over their sisters when their sisters find boyfriends or going to get married. Honestly, under normal circumstances, I will not use the word "love" about my feelings towards my sisters. But after hearing this news, I guess deep inside, I am a loving brother. I just hope that this guy is not an asshole, will take care, protect, and make sure that my sister is happy. Woot.. I am saying as if it is her wedding day tomorrow.

I chuckled when she told me how worried my parents were when she was still dating past 8pm or when she went dating over the weekends. If I am already feeling like that as a brother, I can imagine how much more my parents will feel, especially fathers. Haha.. I can imagine their "jealousy": last time my sister devote the whole time just for them but now she has a divided attention.

Perhaps she will not ask me to travel with her anymore.. Perhaps we will not be to do our stupid role play with our toys anymore. Kinda sad but that is just a circle of life.

Now I am more interested in how it all began but I am too shy too ask. Haha.. Darn! I better thicken my skin a bit. I am quite surprised that my parents already know about it and my sister even said "If you come home, don't be shy when I introduce my boyfriend ok!". Hmm... no wonder my mum and my sister have been nagging at me recently asking when I will be home again. Am I supposed to do some QC? Lol..

Weekend getaway to Bintan

Over the last weekend, I went to Bintan with 3 friends. We were all studying at the same junior high school in Jakarta before fate separated all of us to different countries during our higher studies before being united again in Singapore for work now. Funny how life works eh?

All of us had seen beautiful pictures of resort in Bintan although none of us had been there. Thus, we just anyhow chose the location to give it a try. We chose the cheapest package we found at groupon. The resort cost $99 and after all the +++, each of us paid $184. The +++ is not that bad because the return ferry trip would easily cost $44 and the fee for car rental at Bintan was $15 per hour or $80 per day. I guess $85 for the ferry tickets, the lunch, the tour guide, and the car was not too bad.

Our ferry departed at 0840 from Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal. Because it was considered an international journey, it works similarly to international flights in airport that we had to check in at least 90 minutes before. It only meant that we had to be there really really early! The previous time I took ferry was when I was very very small. Although I did not have any seasickness back then, I was quite worried for this journey. Phew... thank goodness I did not experience any, I was expecting that the ferry journey would be uncomfortable but our ferry, operated by Sindo Ferry, was surprisingly very comfortable. In fact, the aircon was super duper cold.

I thought Singapore-Bintan journey would only take 1 hour so it was kinda worrying that our journey took close to 2 hours. After arrival, we went for chartered City Tour and the guide informed us that there are 2 ferry terminals in Bintan. The one at the north, where those great resort pictures come from, is the one nearer to Singapore and the journey will be about an hour. We arrived at Tanjung Pinang Terminal at the south and the journey around the island to reach the south was what made us took 2 hours.

Tanjung Pinang is the capital of Bintan but it still feels very under-developed. I am actually very glad that I am born and live in Jakarta, despite all the shit things about it. Tanjung Pinang is even less developed than Pontianak, where my dad comes from, which I already find very boring. The first stop of our tour was Bintan Indah Mall. Before alighting, the guide told us that we could find branded goods here. Hearing branded goods + mall, you know what sort of things you would imagine. But what we saw really shocked us.

Bintan Indah Mall

It is just 2 rows of shophouses with a roof above it. There middle road, as you see above, is also a parking lot. There is no aircon. The 4 of us was not impressed and the thing that we could be bothered about was only the small minimarket there. Lol. We had our breakfast (Mie Pangsit or dumpling noodle) at the roadside near there and we were ecstatic. Haha.. Finally something very good for our tongue. The serving is considered generous, plenty of meat and 4 dumpling, for Rp 17000 or less than $2 only. Haha... Can't get any shit with that price in Jakarta. I also bought a char siew bao for Rp 8000 but it was not as what I expected.

Next stop was Ramayana Mall. After the first mall, we did not get our hopes up and we were glad that we did not. Haha.. The prices at the department store are not exactly very cheap so we spent the whole time doing grocery shopping. My friends even bought feminine pads and detergents for stock back in Singapore.

We had Ayam Penyet for lunch which I did not really enjoy as I hate eating things with bones. Then we went to a temple which was only 5 minutes drive away from the restaurant. The temple is big and amazing. With so much available land, it is not surprising that they could build something this grand. I wonder who are actually coming here as I did not see many residential areas nearby. At the side of the halls, there are giant statues of the deities. I don't know them but I think it is awesome if you know them. One thing that struck me was the similarities with Catholicism. In the Church, we can also find statues of the Saints.

Avalokitesvara Temple

Most of us fell asleep on our journey to the resort. Haha.. The van was too warm.. Sadly, the few months long of eager anticipation just evaporated when we saw the resort. It was nothing like those pictures we saw. Huhuhu... That's the result of not doing proper research and just bought the cheapest thing we could see. Those great resorts (Nirwana, Lagoon, Banyan Tree, Club Med) are all located at northern part of Bintan while our resort is in the east! Bleah...

Bintan Spavilla Beach Resort

There was welcome drink and the room was hotel standard. Outdoor slippers were provided too! I had to mention that there was a pretty large gap at the door. I was worried about mosquitos and insects coming in but that did not materialise. 2 of my friends went for massage while another friend and I decided to walk around to take photos. The 2 of us just did not like the idea of strangers touching our body. Haha..

We were not too pleased with our discovery. It took us only half an hour to walk to the other end of the resort, taking photos, and then back to our room. The beach is very narrow and not the clean white sand type we expected so say bye bye to swimming. One great thing about the beach is that it is not very wavy. So it was kinda relaxing to just look at the sea.

View from the balcony of my room

Can you see the volley net and the soccer goal posts?

Random trees

Not a beach we were looking for

When we go to a resort, of course we want to do the activity. However, it is a problem when the check in time is 3pm! Let's say we want to do snorkelling, it will take a minimum of 2 hours and it would be sunset and dark by then! I did not know where the other people were as we saw nobody and no activity around. If we saw some people do this or do that, we might be able to see what interesting and what not. But nothing was going on. Bleah..

After the massage was done, the girls went for jacuzzi but I was too shy to be shirtless and show off my flab. After that, we spent the rest of the afternoon playing billiard, table soccer, and dart. It was ironic that the table soccer was the most enjoyable part of the trip. We played, shouted, and screamed like mad. It was hilarious as we did not really know how to play. When we put the ball at the center, it was a position not kick-able by both teams. We were so eager to play and broke into laughter when it was so lame that none could kick the ball.

For dinner, we went to a local restaurant just next to the resort. We were told about the existence of this by our tour guide. It was a short walk away but it was very terrifying to walk at dark. It was really a village area that there was no street lamps. When we reached the restaurant, it was also rather dubious as we did not see people eating. It was Saturday evening.. weekend... how could it be so quiet? I was actually more worried about the freshness and hygiene of the food. In the end we just ordered the fully cooked meal. The fried squid was awesome and in total we only spent Rp 152000! That was about $16 for 4 people. In the resort, a BBQ of 6 pieces cost $29 per person. Holy crap! One memorable thing that happened during dinner was a giant lizard which dropped from the roof. I am not scared of house lizard but this lizard was gross: not only it was big, it was also black! Hiii!!!

We retired to our beds early as we were hoping to wake up early to see the sunrise. I woke up early but sadly it was cloudy and I did not see the sun rising from the horizon. Although I did not witness the sunrise, I still felt glad that I woke up early as I realised something great about this resort. When it was low tide, the beach was dry up to the far island that we saw from the beach!! No wonder one of the attraction listed in the resort was "Walking in the Sea". I was alone so I could not have any picture in this amazing landscape T_T Sea is really scary as within 15 minutes, the water rose again to the normal levels. Wew...

The boat is on the sand. Compare it with the picture above where the boat is on the water.

You can literally walk to that far island

Breakfast was not very exciting although I sat throughout the full breakfast period. Haha.. My friend and I were waiting for the other 2 who were still sleeping. We wanted to get the waffle but did not think that we could finish them so we waited for the other 2 to share. After that long wait, the waffle was quite disappointing. Haha..

I borrowed a volleyball for a bit of exercise. We walked to the volley net but after 2 serves, we decided to call it a day. Lol.. We were too full to chase after the ball and after 1 of my serve went a bit off, we were so worried that the ball would go to the sea. Haha..

On our way back to the ferry terminal, we were awake and we realised how secluded our resort is and how under-developed the area is. It is kinda sad to see how people are actually flocking to the resorts and paying big bucks while many parts of the island are so poor.

And that was the end of my trip. I did not sleep at all on the journey back and as a result, I was so exhausted until yesterday. That was why I could only finish writing this today. Haha.. Yeah I am old and it took me 3 days to recover. Lol.. I have not even uploaded the photos on facebook because I am still lazy and tired. And I don't know if I should publish the photos as I look damn fat in singlet. Huhuhu... 

$50

Sian.. Today is a bad day. The first thing I noticed in the morning was a missing $50 note from my wallet. I withdrew $800 on Saturday and I paid $700 for my rental. I did not buy anything else on Saturday, The only thing I bought on Sunday was breakfast and I paid it the exact amount.

I did not check the amount dispensed by the ATM so it is a possibility that the machine dispensed less. It is too late to do anything with the bank today. Haiz.. The other possibility is I gave my landlady $750 instead of $700. Again this is very unlikely because I remembered having checked the cash properly before handing it to her. In addition, previously there was a time that I gave her an extra $50 and she returned it to me immediately. I doubt she would be dishonest this time.

Another possibility is I dropped $50 instead of $10 for mass offering. I did not really see the note I took out from my wallet but I am very confident that it was $10. I remembered clearly that I used my finger to feel the plastic texture and there is no $50 note in plastic. $50 note is also too big to hide within my grasp.

So seriously, where did my $50 go?? :(

Swarovski Disney's Peter Pan and Title Plaque "Peter Pan"

Save the best for the last or rather save the most expensive for the last. Haha.. So this will be the last of my Peter Pan loots I bought a few months ago. They are 2 separate items and not a set. Truthfully, I know Swarovski has released Disney-related figurines from many years ago and I am never interested in buying because of the pointy edges. I guess it is difficult to cut crystals to a round or roundish shape. Or perhaps crystals have to be cut with pointy edges to give sparkles because otherwise they will just look like a glass figurine.

Resemblance to the original characters is another issue although the newer figurines (eg. Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Winnie the Pooh) are much much better than the figures of these same characters released many years before. Peter Pan is a human whose features are obviously different from animal-based characters that Swarovski figurines are mostly about. Although this makes him unique, I am not too keen because of his facial features which are not very visible (the sculpt of the facial features are there but they are difficult to see because of light reflections) and that makes him feel less a figurine to me. 

Traditionally, Swarovski items are always colourless crystals but Peter Pan has green crystals (his clothes) and red crystal (the feather on his cap, belt, hilt of knife). This definitely caught my attention because I am used to colourless crystals. My mum actually collects some Swarovski figurines and her whole display detolf is all colourless/glass which I find very boring. Lol.

Anyway, let's start with the big guy first. He sits 10cm tall and his box measures 15cm (L) x 15cm (W) x 9.7cm (H). He also comes with the certificate. Below are the pictures. Honestly, I don't know what to say because there is nothing much to see. Furthermore, Swarovski is Swarovski so the quality is up-there. Lol.

The box, the figurine, and the certificate

Peter Pan

The title plaque is approximately 3.7cm (I don't know to describe this as height, or length, or what because the way the plaque stands) and it comes in a cylinder box (is there such a word? haha) measuring 8.4cm in diameter and 6.5cm in height.

No certificate :(

 I don't know how to display it nicely to show everything about it

360-degree view of both:

My room is quite dark and it is obviously not the best lighting condition to view gorgeous crystals. In fact, they look like glass figurines in the pictures above. My apologies.  

I guess I am buying this out of impulse "Since I am buying other Peter Pan items, I might as well get this and have a Peter Pan collection". You may also wonder why on earth I bought the title plaque. Although these are 2 separate figurines, I bought it as a set. Including the shipping, I paid only about USD 300 which I consider a very good bargain considering the retail price. I remember seeing this in local Swarovski showrooms for $500+.

Retail price USD 325

Retail price USD 60

There is another piece of Tinker Bell which I am still considering to buy or not to buy. Tinker Bell comes in 2 versions: regular (wearing green dress) and Christmas limited edition (wearing Santa's dress and hat). I want the Santa's version as I think the red colour will contrast well and look very nice with Peter Pan's green. However, the limited edition is at least 100 bucks more than the regular. Haiz.. I don't really like Tinker Bell because she is very irritating lol so I don't want to buy the regular one just for the sake of completion.