I have seen some spectacular beaches in my time. Langkawi, Krabi and now Waikiki. The hotel that we stayed in was just across the beach. The last time The Laney was at Hawaii last year, he described Waikiki as Orchard Road across the beach. This is extremely accurate. The rows of stores, hotels and restaurants were situated just opposite the beach.

For three days in a row, I would get up, slather myself with SPF and fasten on my bikini (I brought three there). The first day, I purchased a mat from the ABC store downstairs the hotel. ABC stores are like 7-11s, they are everywhere and sell everything imaginable, from food and drinks to souvenirs. Including tanned Hello Kittys wearing a flower in her ear instead of her usual red ribbon. With my trusty Oakleys (which are scratched badly after this trip), cowboy hat (squashed in my suitcase), sarong (which tore a little) and lots of water and magazines, I sat in the sun, during the harmful hours from 12 to 3 or 4, determined to be tanned.

The sand is soft and loose. Walking on the sand is a feat, you have to grip your toes in and my way of walking brings a spray of sand behind my feet with each step I take. But the sand is so hot that you do have to wear your slippers. The heated mantle of the sandy ground reminded me of the Archie comics when Archie is hopping from blanket to blanket to soothe the burnt soles of his feet. Fire walking anyone?

The water is crystal clear. Sparkling in the sunlight, like what you see in movies. The waves are Huge. The surfers and body boarders benefiting greatly from the wind. Even I managed to bake properly without getting too impatient due to the intermittent breeze and watching the Bay Watch-que lifeguards. Have you ever seen 8 packs in real life before? Well, now I can say I have. Those boy lifeguards with TV drama worthy bodies made the long flights to Hawaii worth it.

People watching, reading magazines, watching the Hills on my iPod and listening to music, it was a time for contemplation but more of veg-ing out. I did wish I had put my mind to it to ponder about the real things that were running around in my mind but how could I concentrate when I was just trying to contain my amusement at the brown wrinkled Japanese man lying on his blanket wearing only a green tiny speedo thing.

Recounting the Hawaii trip will take a little time and a few posts, to kick it off, above is a picture of me on Big Island waiting for nightfall to see the lava glowing flowing into the sea. Yes, the key word is Waiting.

The flight from Singapore to Narita was uneventful and so was the one from Narita to Honululu. Though the former was less packed (understatement) than the latter one as the Japanese accounted for 90% of the passengers on the JAL flight. I reckon I will always fly the Japanese airlines from now on. Purely because they hand out tiny packets of rice crackers that end up being my meal. I do not see a point in paying for ’service’ when flying. I will never pay to fly Singapore airlines. Even before the ex person. Anyway, yes, I was delighted the second I caught a whiff of that oh familiar smell of rice crackers, they do rank among my choice junk food.

It was Sunday morning when I touched down (not sitting on the same flight as The Laney), I love time differences. We did fly on Sunday morning too. Off in an expensive cab ride to Park Shore Hotel. The beach was just across the hotel.

Next up, the beach.

Hello Darlings, I am back. Jet lag is a pain in the ass.

I will miss the hot sand and the cold water. I will miss sitting on my sarong alone contemplating life, thoughtful and also hoping to turn a darker shade of pale. Because Waikiki beach is not here. Here makes me sick. I want to run far away from you.

Awful will:
* Go wild at the Lesportsac outlet
* Go to Pearl Harbour
* Visit a WholeFoodsMarket
* Do yoga
* Run along the beach
* Go wild at Lululemon
* Tan and watch The Hills and The City (amongst other guilty pleasures)
* Visit the fishies at the Wakiki Aquarium
* Roam
* Go Big Island to see the Volcano

Awful will eat at:-
* Bubba Gump
* Chris Ruth’s Steak
* Cheese Cake Factory
* Jap BBQ place where Missy Teo says got cute Japanese waiters
* Is there Pink Berry or Jamba Juice there?

Truth to be told, I have not done proper planning and packing for the trip. Maybe it could be that my plane ticket has not been confirmed. Perhaps because I have been busy prepping for my bikini bod? Lulu says only 3 more Muay Thai classes to killer bikini bod. 3 more?!?!?!?

So far I have only bought sunblock (SunKiller), hand sanitizer and the latest Harper’s for my trip. Have not purchased new bikini, new hat, new sandals, heh. Go there and buy?

I am so excited that it’s Friday today!

I am so excited that I am a concert whore this month:-
1. Kumar at the Explanade on 20 March (with the work girls)
2. Duffy at Indoor Stadium on 22 March (with Jupes and Shue)
3. Coldplay at indoor Stadium on 23 March (with Missy Teo and Cherry Bomb)
I would have watched 3 concerts in the span of 4 days! Granted Kumar may not sing but he is a performance in his own right.

I am so excited that I may finally be going to Hawaii. If it happens, I will work every Saturday and Sunday and save every penny until my ass gets on that plane to Hawaii en route Narita.

Hello from Beijing!

I am staying with the Pig and my mother’s friends here and it is fabulous. Expatriate life is indeed exciting and very agreeable. The place here is located in sort of an expatriate village and developed by a Singapore company. The house has three storeys. Auntie J has a own driver and that is the coolest thing ever. Imagine stepping out of your house to be chaffeured to wherever you want and when you are done at whatever place, the car will be waiting for you outside.

We went to the Forbidden City yesterday. The area is FREAKING huge with lots of Chinese. The good thing about being Chinese is that you can travel within the country for vacations. Like we go to Malaysia. There are like one gazillion rooms and palaces and chambers and what nots, mostly not maintained though those that are maintained are gorgeous. We went to the Imperial Costumes exhibition, the porcelain musuem and the clock musuem. I think knowing Chinese history would have made the place more interesting.

This morning we got up early to go to the Great Wall. It is Great indeed. It is fascinating and incredible. I greatly enjoyed taking the cable car up at Baling Shan (Er, maybe the name of the place is Wrong) and walking ‘down’ in the cool morning air. With the other Chinese of course. Walking down is like bullshit because there is upslope and down. The steps if there are (mostly they are) are uneven in height and sometimes very very steep. The Great Wall was fun! The view was impeccable.

We visited the Giant Panda Exhibition at the Beijing Zoo. Auntie Judy advised us not to visit the other areas of the zoo. The Giant Pandas were very cute and lazy. Dirty too. Did you know they weigh 12 kgs when they are half a year old? No wonder they move like ants. But they are really damn cute.

Uncle CL got us tickets for the athletics events today at the Para Olympics. It was an once in a lifetime experience and truly an eye opener.

I am about to drop. More when I get back.

Well, I am back. Phuket was alright. Rested well, I think. Here are the pictures.

1. What I brought to Phuket. My standard beach stuff that I usually never wear when I am not near a beach. My one remaining boardshorts (the rest got too small for my hips). My Guess KIDS dress. Yes. I had this dress since I was twelve. I know. I did not really grow, especially in the bust area. I love being flat. I do not know why but it agrees with me. I cannot fill out certain tops or dresses but that does not matter.
2. BIGGGGGGGGGGGGG bed.
3. Bathroom that is almost perfect (perfect if there was separate bathtub and shower), with two sinks.
4. First food stop: roadside noodles. Mine is Pork without vegetables. Love the soup glass noodles. Thai Char Siew is the same.
5. Waiting for food to come.
6. Awful no likes wait.
7. Coconut shake, euuw.
8. 6 Dunkin Donuts: For lunch, tea, dinner, supper.
9. More food.
10. Japanese food bento = 200 Baht = Singapore 8 dollars.
11. Random Thai bottled drink that they made up to be Jappy.

So much for 31 July. I must have only slacked on Monday. When Tuesday rolled around, I was back in full force. I did not even have time for yoga, just clocking in one weekday session on Tuesday. I had meeting after meeting on Thursday and Friday, burning me out. Thursday was the crabby dinner in which 9 of us shared 6 crabs. It was a remarkable feast that should e repeated perhaps on a weekend night so that we have more time and perhaps I have more energy to be sociable. Sharonie’s last day at the work bee hive was a quiet affair as half the office was on leave, TOIL and even the usual MC and FC. She fed us Donut Factory donuts. We will miss her dearly. But of course she knows that so we will not indulge her that much yet. Saturday was Hot 1 with C and then work and running to see the fireworks around One Raffles Quay. I have not ran for a long time. Surprisingly, we went in around 4 something and time flew so fast that before I knew it, it was 9 something and I had to leave though I still had so much work undone.

Our dear dear Chiam informed me that she would be returning to our little island soon. I am so so so so so excited. I miss her so so so so so much.

So I am in Phuket. I was up last night last minute packing until 3am. As usual, I brought the most unnecessary items but it is my holiday and I bring whatever I want to. Random items include a yoga mat, The Laney’s mac book (to watch yoga podcasts on and there is wifi here, that is how I am blogging), pretty much that, the rest are essential. Like my Nitendo DS Lite, a mat (to lie on), 3 bikinis, my new hat (which I wore on the plane ride here), 5 magazines and 1 book (I read like a speeding bullet), a toiletry train case full of liquids (some not necessary) and my new Eastpak backpack. Heh.

The plane ride was surprisingly quick, though we sat in the row before the emergency exit which resulted in non reclining seats (that is SO Wrong). The dude that met us outside the airport spoke very good Mandarin but I was not as impressed by him as I was with the Korean tour guides who spoke mainland Chinese equivalent Mandarin because he keep trying to sell us the tours when all I wanted was to look outside the window in peace.

The resort Budasari is really unexpectedly luxurious (C did tell me about it, having stayed here 2 times previously). Nothing can beat Banyan Tree of course but this really comes in a good second, even beating the J.W. Marriott in Bangkok though the Bangkok one was not a resort. The bed is remarkably Big which is very good and the shower though not separate from the bathtub (that is how I rate hotels) has a rain shower head which is aligned to spa-like. There are rooms that have a little patio outside which opens into the pool which provides for easy lounging by the pool but not much privacy. Which is still very cool nevertheless and makes me wish we were staying in one.

We walked around Patong Beach after figuring out the safe deposit box (one instruction was missed out and we had to trial and error). This place is unlike Krabi, with Krabi being more peaceful and not so shark like touristy. Though I do like this place because there is all sorts of angmoh food (my love) and Thai food is like practically rare. We did manage to find a roadside stall that sold noodles. My bowl of pork ball, char siew and unidentified fish cake things with glass beehoon was yum yum in my tum tum. The soup had delicious garlic.

We followed that with a walk to this HUGE shopping mall called ….. er, I forget. Anyway, it had Carrefour inside so of course being ME, we went to get Thai Junk food (i.e. Thai flavoured Lays that you can only find in Thailand, Thai Cheetos, Thai Glico products). I Love Thailand for the pure fact that I can buy like 8 packets of various junk food and one bottle of water for 195 Baht. Part of Heaven should be like that.

We walked back and I wanted to eat again so we found another roadside stall. I ordered Phad Thai and was presented with those glass bee hoon instead of my favoured glass noodles (flat one). However, they gave little tiny prawns that The Laney likes. You can see the tiny eyes on them, I think it is akin to eating little aliens. But yummy ones. The peanuts were not finely diced but Whole Ground Nuts. Abit weird. We ordered Tom Yum Goong (spelling), they gave us this ambiguous soup thing with green vegetables, egg tofu and tang hoon, obviously NOT Tom Yum. I was quite disappointed.

We will go into the sun tomorrow to bake. I hope I last. A golden tan would be nice. Selftanners are too difficult for my little mind to work.

The heaviest thing in my suitcase when I travel is my toiletry bag. Which is pretty ironic because I do not wear any make up. Must be the Contact Lens Solution and all that saline that I have to lug around. Awful four eyes.

For the past few trips, I have been pretty good with bringing the bare minimum clothes on holiday. But that relates to not very exciting holiday outfits. So the question now is since the Phuket trip will be a short one and actually articles of clothing are quite light, should I just go overboard and throw caution to the minimum packing wind?

The question is for a 4 day and 3 night trip, should I bring:
* 3 bikinis (okay, I’ll just bring 2. One to dry if I do go swimming)
* 3 coverups?
* 2 hats and 1 cap? (my new hat is just pure vanity, it is too holey to be practical, so one proper hat and a cap?)

Haha, with the expanse of time I have now, I have very much time to dwell over such boliao decisions.