Ramadan in Turkey

Whirling Dervishes in Istanbul

Croc along

I must admit I find the footwear from Crocs Inc absolutely hideous. But I couldn't resist trying on the ballet-inspired version -Prima and boy are they comfy and oh so light! Would love a pair in silver but I'll probably be getting a black pair for work. :)

Cappadocia: Goreme Open-Air Museum

This is one of the highlights in Cappadocia. Helps to have a good guide along to explain the frescoes in the early cave churches. We had an interesting time but I can't quite remember the details though! Oh well...enjoy the pics! :)

Cappadocia: Where we stayed

Ha! I am just too lazy to do a write-up on our Turkey trip. :P
Will post random pics every now and then instead! Enjoy!


Kelebek Pension: Highly recommended!


Check out our cave room! Cool eh? :)


View from the dining area. Lucky Kitty!

Restless

That pretty much sums up the way I feel since I submitted my thesis (results still pending). I've had my fun in the past weeks - I got to catch up with friends I've neglected for a while...hosted a chocolate fondue cum pizza party at my place...watched a dance *dreamy sigh*...shopping,shopping and more shopping! (Really gotta watch that spending!)...laughed ourselves hoarse at the one night stand bar and comedy club...attended the wedding of my ex-boyfriend (together with hubs, mum and granny and we got to sit with the relatives! *hehe*)...and I also fell really sick for the first time in years on Deepavali. Food poisoning - puked my guts out and had to spend the entire day confined to the bed and the sofa. *ugh!*
NOW, the restless bit comes from work. With time in my hands again, I start to re-examine my life and goals and suddenly, I find myself in want of a career change. No, it's not that I don't enjoy my work but I feel that my career has reached a plateau. Am thinking of dabbling in some full time admin or teaching for a change - view things from a different perspective perhaps...
Oh well, I don't know...just restless...

Hot air ballooning across Cappadocian skies

Bloated Tomato: Oh...it was absolutely amazing! I'm so glad we did it! :D

"You girl...want to come home with me?"

That was the pick-up line a FIVE year old boy used on me at a wedding dinner this evening (hubby by my side.*ahem*). That after he insisted that his mum handed me his share of mango sago dessert. *haha*
I cannot for the life of me figure out what the little boy saw in me!
Two possible explanations:

1) I look like a kid
2) I look like his mum

Hmmm...I really don't know if I should be flattered or embarrassed...

We're back from Turkey! :)

But only to be greeted by this...


*Bleah*

Anyhow, we had a wonderful time in Turkey! Will update when I'm done with all the washing and the cleaning. :)

Conversation with the taxi driver

On my way to the baby shower yesterday...

Taxi driver (looking in rear view mirror): Are you a student?
Me: No, I'm working.
Taxi driver: Are you sure? You look like a student.
Me: Yes, I am sure. I've been working for x years.
Taxi driver: What?! you sure or not? Did you start work straight after primary school?
Me (#@&!): Uncle, you think I sell drinks one, issit? (wanted to say something a little more inappropriate but I managed to exercise some self restraints. heh.) No, I worked after I graduated from uni.
Taxi driver: Wah! I really "siao kan" (underestimated) you. So...it must be very difficult for you to get promoted looking so young, hor?
Me: #@&%!

14 ladies and one very pregnant woman...

It's TL's baby shower today! Sniffing out "chocolate poop" from diapers, force feeding one another with baby food (it was damn gross...can't imagine putting my baby through that kinda diet!), making diapers out of toilet paper and identifying celebrity baby pics were some of the fun stuff we did today! And of course what is a baby shower without the baby gifts! The only thing is we do not know the baby's sex so shopping for the baby's gift was particularly difficult- I kept gravitating towards the baby girl's section. It was pot luck as well and we had a nice spread of food. I only wished we hadn't played that yucky baby food game before we ate though -it really killed my appetite. *puke*
Anyway, we had loads of fun today. Can't wait to meet the little one soon!:)

"Be gentle. It's my first time."

I've been contemplating on having my hair permed for a really long time and today I finally mustered enough courage to walk into the hair salon (Shunji Matsuo) and ask for a perm. I wanted a Japanese perm initially but after consulting the hair stylist, it was decided that my hair texture was probably more suited for digital perm (wah...very expensive leh! $360 + $65 for director's cut! But she was nice enough to waive off the haircut fee. It was after all just a trim!) So I spent a good half a day having my hair fried at the salon and trying my best not to fall asleep.

The verdict:
Hmm...am still trying to get used to the new look. The curls are mainly at the bottom and I suspect they may straighten out a lot sooner than the estimated 6 months. And I am actually looking my age for the first time in my life (which may or may not be a good thing :P). Well, but hubby seems to like it, so good lah! :D

I'm loved!

Flowers from hubby to brighten my day! :D

Keep dreaming, guys!

(click to enlarge)

Ripped this off Middle-Age Man's website. *heh*

Hubby suggested that I consider becoming a full-time homemaker after reading this(solely for his benefit, of course!). *haha*

One of my favourite songs

Just felt like sharing...:)

Now I really should be getting back to work!

"This is what it sounds like..when you snore at night!"

I made hubby listen to a 60 sec recording of his snoring this morning.

It was loud and it had kept me up all night! :(

Ordinarily, I would have nudged, pushed, turned his head to one side and even resorted to pinching his nose just to have a good night's sleep. But last night, I could not bear to wake him up from his sonorous slumber since he had a really rough night call the day before. So I laid there wide eyed for most of the night. Cranky? You bet! But thank goodness, his snoring only comes on occasionally when he is really exhausted.

Well, guess I'll try to catch up on some sleep this afternoon! (I am officially a student again for a month!:))

Less than a month....

...to the submission of my Master's thesis and I am suffering from major mental block!!!! *Arghhhhh!*

I am in big doodoo. *sobs* :(

Practicality and familarity Vs stylishness

About a year ago, hubby had gotten me a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX7 in replacement of my Canon Powershot A60 that had gone cranky. The Lumix is very sleek, comes in my favourite colour (blue) and has a lovely wide screen which captures the scenes beautifully. But for some strange reasons, it simply does not gel with me and the pictures have not been turning out right especially in lowlight settings. I was rather upset when my pictures for our recent dinner and dance turned out with a distinct orange hue. Maybe it's because I haven't ploughed through the user guide sufficiently (I hate reading manuals!) but I've never had any issues with my Canon Powershot (my virgin digital camera). I decided I wanted my good ol' Canon Powershot back. Yesterday, after seeing the promotions in the newspapers, hubby and I dropped by Courts (didn't want to squeeze with the crowd at Comex) and got me this...



See the huge grin on my face now? :D

Drama at work

My patients seem to have conspired and decided that I needed some excitement at work. Was assessing a patient with lung infection the other day when I realised that his resting oxygen saturation was only 46% (norm: 98-100%) and he was drowning in his secretions! I did a quick check of his pulse and blood pressure to make sure he has not collapsed, got a student nurse to inform the medical staff and went on to perform chest physiotherapy on him. After half an hour of aggressive chest physio and suctioning [to remove the secretions] with the help of the medical officer, we finally managed to bring his oxygen level up to 90%.

On a separate day, I had just stepped into the intensive care unit when I heard the alarms coming from one of the cubicles. Went to check and was horrified to discover that the patient had yanked out the tubing connecting his trachy to the ventilator. There had been 2 new admissions that morning so the nurses were busy attending to them and weren't able to respond to the alarms as quickly as they normally would. In the next few minutes, I was actually engaged in a tug-of-war with the patient - he simply refused to let me hook it back on! I was worried sick that he might end up pulling out his trachy which would have resulted in a medical emergency! Thank goodness he calmed down after a while and allowed me to reconnect the tube. *phew!*

Seriously...I can do without all these drama at work!

10 km Sheares Bridge Run

My thighs. My gluts. My big toes.

They hurt. :(

We were also drenched from a sudden downpour of rain halfway through the run this morning! But it was quite fun lah!

Quite an achievement for me considering I haven't trained one bit for it! *heh.heh*

Next event in line: The Standard Chartered Run (siao on already!)

*Note to self - Must start exercising regularly. Must buy hip looking shorts. (no more looking like a primary school kid!)

Our first major fallout...2 weeks ago.

A manic depressive week.

Myriad of emotions with outbursts of anger, crying & laughing (mainly from moi).

I packed my luggage. I left. And I returned (the very next day :P).

Rules are set and the boundaries (of our marriage) redrawn.

All is well now...(and our mundane life resumes with a bit of spice *ahem*) :)

Mother Nature is not pleased!

The wind around my area is so strong that I've always feared my windows may shatter to a million pieces one day...
Well, that didn't happen but this poor tree suffered the brunt of nature's fury yesterday...

Not good.

The Lake House

Convinced hubby to go watch it with me at Plaza Singapura last night. Have not watched Il Mare previously so I went in with no expectations. Overall, it was ok...one of those feel good movies you will forget very quickly. Hubby was of course going on and on about how illogical the movie was...*heh.heh*

Gone to a better place...

A patient whom I've been treating for months in the intensive care has finally passed on today. I know it was not what she had intended. She had a strong will to live even though the odds were against her. She continued to cling on the hope that she might return home one day to be with her family...but I guess her body would not allow her to fight any longer.
It may sound insensitive but I am actually happy for her.
In medicine, sometimes it's not just about saving lives - we need to look at QOL, the insurmountable costs of sustaining someone on a ventilator for the rest of his/her life...and then there's the issue of carer stress - how could we expect the family to provide the 24 hr care that she required?
There would be no happy ending to her returning home.
Sometimes we just have got to be realistic and let go...

I Want.

We're going to Turkey!

Hubby has a conference in Istanbul this September and I'll be tagging along! *yippee!* I've been made to plan the itinerary since I'm on leave this week. Managed to find a useful travel planner online, along with lonely planet, to help me with the planning. This being my second time there (first time for hubby), I'll definitely try to squeeze in a turkish bath (freaked out the last time when I realised the masseur was a huge naked woman! Scary...) and watch a whirling dervishes ceremony if possible (we chose to watch belly dancing instead years back). Can't wait! My much much needed break! My Master's thesis should be completed by then, I hope! *Keeping fingers crossed* :D

Friday dinner at Wasabi Tei

A cosy little Japanese eatery tucked away on the 5th floor of Far East Plaza. Big servings with affordable prices ($23 for two of us). One major drawback - an extremely short tempered boss! He snaps if you don't respond fast enough or if you take too long to order. Would have loved to take a pic of the food and place but I was afraid to get scolded. *haha!* Ok, maybe not so cosy but I would certainly return for the food again.:)

Carrot and tuna salad

Based on Harumi's recipe.

Just finished making this for tomorrow's potluck lunch. This is the first time I'm attempting anything edible for the department. Hopefully there will be no casualties... *muahaha!*

Getting Oriented

Have been avoiding using my laptop since it threatened to conk out on me last week. In the interim, I've gotten myself an external hard disk to back up all my data (actually, it's more like I forced hubby to buy the hard disk and back up the data for me ;). Hubby has also graciously offered me the use of his laptop till I get mine fixed. Am still trying to get used to the new interface and configure the settings to my preference at the moment. Think it's going to take forever (at the rate I'm going)...

Refresh button

I wish I have that function incorporated in me. To push a button and feel absolutely rejuvenated again. But alas, I am only human. Took a day off from work today to recharge my dying cells. But it is hard to rest when there is a ton of things to do: Worked on my research in the morning (ya lor, still must go to workplace!). Came home. Showered. Slept for 1.5 hours. Read the newspaper. Washed 3 loads of laundry. Scrubbed the toilet. Mopped the kitchen floor. Cleaned up my computer desktop. Surfed the web. Panicked when my computer screen started flickering (unlike my hubby who is computer savvy, I have zero backup for my computer data. :P). Thankfully, flickering stopped when I restarted the computer. Started uploading pics to Kodak gallery just in case. Prepared dinner. And now, I wait patiently for my man to return home....(followed by more washing, ironing...yada..yada..yada..)

So much for recharge and unwind hor?

What I need is a real holiday...

He tried.

Decided to remove the previous post since my man has cleared the bin and tidied up his army stuff.

Gracias.

Sparrowhawk II

Am so not looking forward to working in full PPE (N95 mask, full gown, gloves, goggle..the whole works) - especially in the "C" class wards. *suffocate. die*
Fly away bird....fly far, far away.

In the miso soup

Can someone explain to me the significance of the swan feather at the end? Please? *scratch head*

Me and my two left feet

Sis called last night to ask if I could join hip hop class with her. Err...no thank you. I can't even pace to basic aerobic steps for goodness sake! Anyway, not to miss a chance for some sisterly bonding, I agreed to consider any other dance that does not require much coordination and sweat (if there is such a dance).

I suggested:
1. Contemporary - Sis refused. Claims it is an ugly dance with spiderly movements. But I like!
2. Jazz ballet - Okay, this one is tough but I'm seriously considering picking it up one day.
3. Argentine tango - The man leads in this dance so not much thinking required here. Not sure hubs will subscribe to the idea of some man dancing in such close proximity to me though...
Or perhaps we could try out some exotic dance like belly dancing or pole dancing instead. *heh.heh*

Any other suggestions?

Random moments behind the wheels...

Err..interesting structure?


My bodyguards *ahem*


Sunset at West Coast


Mr slimy on my windscreen

Hit by the sleepy bug

Have been walking around in a daze (puffy eyes and all) for the past 2 days. Feels as if I've not slept in days.
Wonder why... *yawnz* @@

Behind the scenes

A work of art, don't you think? ;)

In case you can't figure it out, well, let's just say the morning-after pill will not be necessary for this newly wedded couple. And the embedded alarm clocks will ensure that they go at it all night long...*ahem*

When the cat is away...the mice come out to play!

Big boss has been away for about 2 weeks now and life has been goooood. *sheepish grin* Have been arrowed to attend 2 multidisciplinary meetings this week but no major follow-ups required so far. *phew!* Everything else is moving on autopilot. Wonderful feeling to have only output on my part and no new things to process (it's temporary, of course. *sigh*). Boss returns to work this Wednesday. Give her one week (or less!) to adjust and then we can expect more work again. :P She is one super duper efficient woman, I tell ya!

Now to tie up a couple of loose ends before she returns...

We almost went to heaven

We were this close to getting smashed to a pulp by a trucker this morning. We were driving on the extreme right lane when this huge truck that was in the next lane decided to close in on us without signalling! Hubby's immediate response was to speed up but we realised the trucker was making no attempt to slow down! *shrieeekkks! Honnnkkkkkkkkk!!! Honnnnnnkkkkkkk!!!* That momentarily stopped the truck from inching that much closer to us and probably crushing me to an instant death.
And that freaking trucker had the audacity to flash his lights at us after. Bastard.

"Train me like an exotic animal"

That's what my husband asked of me. Seriously.
He even sent me an article from NY times for consult!

What a funny man. :)

Procrastination is the name of the game

I've been sitting here for the last 10 minutes wondering if I should bring my sorry ass to work or just spend the day cleaning up my now very filthy home. The one week break hasn't done me any good. In fact, I feel more tired out - it's the need to "squeeze in more work because I have more time" but then I ended up feeling "hey, why am I not getting anywhere with these stuff?!". It becomes both a physical and mental torture and I'm just completely drained.

To summarise what I have achieved in the past week:
1. Recruited 7 patients for my study and spent an afternoon going through patients old notes to sieve out additional infor I needed.
2. Went shopping and bought hubby some casual wear and a birthday present for Ms GYM.
3. Bought myself a dress and a pair of sports shoes (I've been coerced into running the Safra 10 km marathon this August).
4. Spent a morning at Ikea looking for lamps but ended with only bookends and a storage box.
5. Spent a whole day with Ms GYM for her birthday followed by henna party at AJ's.
6. Met up with an old friend on Friday for lunch. Congrats on the baby! :D Went home after for new bookshelf delivery and spent sometime reorganising the books on the shelves.
7. Did the laundry.
8. Wedding dinner last night. (Am having another wedding dinner this Saturday. Gonna be dead broke.)

What I haven't done:
1. Finalise details to my database excel spreadsheet.
2. Buy a lamp for our master bedroom.
3. Sew on buttons that have fallen off hubby's shirt and my pants.
4. Clean the apt and iron the laundry.
5. More work that boss has happily piled on my plate.

Hmmm...looks like I probably should stay home today and finish up points 1, 3-5, right? *pouts*

Getting organised.

This storage box from Ikea really made my day!
No more messy entanglements and misplacing of important connectors and wires. *yay!*

Henna night

No, not hen's night (that we had on Saturday. Details another day. *ahem* ;)) It was henna party last night. My first. Very festive - like a typical Indian house wedding celebration you would see on TV. The bride-to-be had henna done on both the front and back of her hands and legs by the more professional of the two henna women while the rest of us lined up to have ours done by her assistant. Check out my henna!
(Decided on a more conservative location. Didn't think it was appropriate to go to work with artwork all over my hands.) The evening ended with the house dancing to bhangra music! Very cute to see the older men and women having so much fun! :) I wished the bride wasn't so cranky though. She wasn't feeling too well and was extremely irritable (& irritating). A (her!) happy occasion and she spent half the time snapping at her friends and relatives. *sigh*

Early morning snack

Haven't been able to get to sleep since hubby's on-call phone rang at 3 am. So here I am blogging and munching on pringles in the wee hours of the morning. Am on leave this week but I'm still waking up early to send hubby to work so that I can have the car. Am still going back to workplace daily to recruit patients for my study (40% and climbing!) and I'm squeezing in a bit of shopping time in the afternoons. It's after all the great Singapore sale and I've yet to do any proper go crazy in the malls all day long shopping. Does help to know that hubby just had a huge bonus deposited into his account this month...*Muahahaha!* ;)

On a tiny island south of Malaysia...

Integral
by Pet Shop Boys

If you've done nothing wrong
You've got nothing to fear
If you've something to hide
You shouldn't even be here

Long live us
The persuaded we
Integral
Collectively
To the whole project
It's brand new
Conceived solely
To protect you

One world
One reason
Unchanging
One season

If you've done nothing wrong
You've got nothing to fear
If you've something to hide
You shouldn't even be here
You've had your chance
Now we've got the mandate
If you've changed your mind
I'm afraid it's too late
We're concerned
You're a threat
You're not integral
To the project

Sterile
Immaculate
Rational
Perfect

Everyone has
Their own number
In the system that
We operate under
We're moving to
A situation
Where your lives exist
As information
One world
One life
One chance
One reason
All under
One sky
Unchanging
One season

If you've done nothing wrong
You've got nothing to fear
If you've something to hide
You shouldn't even be here
You've had your chance
Now we've got the mandate
If you've changed your mind
I'm afraid it's too late
We're concerned
You're a threat
You're not integral
To the project

Sterile
Immaculate
Rational
Perfect

Om....

Fancy some serious meditation?

Bella Figura - Nederlands Dans Theater I

Such precision and fluidity of movement...
it's almost magical. *dreamz*

*Beep. Beep.* "Are you awake?"

I tend to be at work rather early and my colleagues have the habit of smsing me first thing in the morning if they're sick or coming in late. I must admit that does annoy me a little considering that it is my personal phone they are contacting me on for work. But nothing can beat the earliest sms I received last Saturday - at 4.30am! (Yes, you heard right. It was 4.30 am!) She was sick and was wondering if I could cover for her?! And she smsed me not once. Not twice. But three times!!!
Don't ask me why I even bothered replying her. But who in the right mind would sms people at that kinda time unless it is an emergency emergency right?!
So I ended up sleeping really badly for the next few hours, got up, went to work for 4 hours and remained cranky for the next 2 days.

Moral of the story:
Never leave your handphone on when you go to bed(!)

Father's day celebration

Lunch at Si Chuan Dou Hua Restaurant was a pleasant experience. Food was yummy and seeing the traditional tea servers doing their wushu thingy was rather interesting.
At the UOB plaza branch where we were, you can get a lovely birdseye view of Singapore. Very nice!

StrawberryNET.com

This Hong Kong based online company provides free shipping worldwide for beauty buys at very reasonable prices. Purchased this Biotherm product selling at $70 in the mall for only $57.50 online. First discovered the site through amazon.com and it has provided pretty reliable services so far.

So, what are you waiting for?

Play on earth

A novel concept and potential for lots of possibilities.
Unfortunately, transmission was bad and it was difficult to follow what was going on after a while. A real disappointment.

There's a skeleton in my closet!

Well, literally.

Georgie (as I've so fondly named it) has guided my hubby through his med school years. And an excellent teacher he was! Rumour has it that he was probably 1) Indian 2) abandoned by family and his body remained unclaimed for a very long time. And he has unknowingly donated himself to science...for the good of mankind.
But now he lies all packed up in a styrofoam box uncertain of his future.
To tell you the truth, I was quite happy to leave him nicely packed away at my in-law's place. But they're currently doing some renovation to the house and have insisted that we migrate him over to our place.
So here he is now. (No, I'm not ecstatic about having a skeleton in our home in case you are wondering.)
What should we do with him next?

A strange kind of bond

The maid of a patient whom I've treated only once came looking for me yesterday in our satellite gym and handed me her photo with her address and handphone number scribbled on the back.

"I go back to Indonesia next year. You call me when you come to Indonesia to travel. I will take you walk around. I work in farm when I go back and I will turn black. I give you photo so you can remember me."

Weird, don't you think?
But I'll be sure to look her up should I ever decide to visit her homeland. :)

"You'd better not turn up in black!"

So I've been warned.
I've yet another wedding reception to attend tomorrow evening. Apparently, Indians (similar to us Chinese) are rather particular about guests turning up for their happy occasions in mourning colours. And I've just spent the last one and a half hours changing in and out of my limited range of
evening wear to find that my little black dresses are still my most versatile and flattering. *Sigh* I seriously need a wardrobe makeover.
Anyway, I finally decided on a pink dress which I was planning to wear for my girlfriend's wedding this July. And she will be there for the reception tomorrow as well.
Looks like I will have to hit the malls again soon!

Dinner tonight

Tissue prata. Banana prata. Egg prata. Aloo prata. Cheese Prata.

With close to non-existent triglycerides and extremely desirable LDL cholesterol levels, I am entitled to some unhealthy food. No?

I love health screenings. *grin*

On Meditation.

"Purge your mind of all thoughts....feel your tummy move up and down with each breath...and every now and then when you feel your thoughts wander [and they will wander]...focus and try to gather them back"

That coming from my man in a half [baked] lotus position.

It's just twisted.

The wedding

The video of childhood pics & wedding album played to ad nauseam.

The dinner that never starts on time.

The march in.

The cake cutting.

The champagne pouring followed by the yum seng! (aka the toast except that we do it in a loud and less refined manner :))

The second march in.

The photo taking.

And finally the thank you and goodbye line up.

The wedding dinner I attended on Friday was just like any other. And yet, there's something about weddings that never fails to make me feel all mushy inside...*sigh*

Congratulations to the newly weds! :)

Playing over & over

Eres
by Cafe Tacuba

Eres lo que mas quiero en este mundo, eso eres,
mi pensamiento mas profundo, también eres,
tan sólo dime lo que hago, aquí me tienes.

Eres cuando despierto lo primero, eso eres,
lo que a mi vida le hace falta si no vienes,
lo único, preciosa, que mi mente habita hoy.

Qué mas puedo decirte, tal vez puedo mentirte sin razón,
pero lo que hoy siento es que sin ti estoy muerto,
pues eres lo que mas quiero en este mundo, eso eres.

Eres el tiempo que comparto, eso eres,
lo que la gente promete cuando se quiere
mi salvación, mi esperanza y mi fe.

Soy el que quererte quiere como nadie soy,
el que te llevaría el sustento día a día, día a día,
el que por ti daría la vida, ese soy.

Aquí estoy a tu lado y espero aquí sentado hasta el final.
No te has imaginado lo que por ti he esperado
pues eres lo que yo amo en este mundo, eso eres,
cada minuto en lo que pienso, eso eres,
lo que más cuido en este mundo, eso eres.

A new breathing space

It was getting a little claustrophobic for me in my other space. Too many voyeurs I was not comfortable with sharing my life with any longer. And hence the move.

Well, welcome to my new home! :)