Life is a Bowl of Noodles !

Yum yum ......

The curtain fell on my favourite kway teow dry at Ang Mo Kio Ave 4 at the end of January 2012. Two  weeks after the fateful day, we searched and sampled possible replacements for this void in our lives. You see, I am at a stage in life where calories cannot afford to be wasted :)
We tried fishball noodle and fried bee hoon at this food court but it does not bring the same sense of satisfaction. The yearn for a really good bowl of noodles is so strong that my wife and I have decided that we will no longer have breakfast at this Ang Mo Kio food court. Instead, we will proceed to another food court nearby (Jalan Leban Food Court) after our weekly marketing for the best (IMHO) fish ball noodle in Singapore.
This stall has fed 3 generations of my family :) It started out (probably in the 1960's) as a street hawker stall perched over a drain with wooden planks as a floor. Sometime in the early 70's, as the government relocated what they deemed "unhygienic" street hawker stalls to food courts, this stall moved to its present location at Jalan Leban and has been there ever since. The uncle who ran the stall retired last year and his children now run the stall. Just as he has seen me evolve (sideways), we have seen his children and grandchildren grow up as well. He is at his stall at 4:00 am every morning to start boiling the stock for his soup from scratch. By 6:30 am, when the stall is ready for business, the soup is tasty and flavourful. Truly to die for. He also prepares his special chilli for the dry noodles. Such dedication is admirable. It is all about quality and putting calories to good use.
It is more than a worthy replacement for the one we miss at Ang Mo Kio Avenue 4. With this arrangement, and all is well with the world once again :)

ahhh......shiok !

End of an Era

Every Saturday morning for the last 12 years, I have my breakfast at a noodle stall in Ang Mo Kio. My order is "Kway teow dry with extra vinegar" :) Yum yum. Each Friday evening, I drift off to dreamland in anticipation of the delicious kway teow dry breakfast. Yum yum....again.

The lady who runs the stall is about sixty years old (I think) and she retires this week to look after her grandchild. I am happy that she has prioritised her life to do the thing that brings her fulfilment. I am sure it was not an easy choice for her (she has quite a big following at her stall).

This has created a mini crisis of sorts for me. I really do not know what I will replace my kway teow dry breakfast. You see, I only eat at her stall and while there are other food stalls at the food centre, I know it will not fill the void.

I am reminded of another mini crisis when my hairdresser gave up her shop because of escalating rental. Although she is operating her business from another location, it is too far away for me to make the trip. She was more than a hairdresser. She was part of the gel (pun intended :P) in the community. While she cut my hair, she also updated me of the latest happenings in the neighbourhood. Once, she even told me about my brother's shopping habits ! Yes, she was that connected.

After agonising for about a month, my hair was badly in need of a trim. Reality eventually set in and one day, when I looked at my hair in the mirror, I realised that there really wasn't that much left and it was not like I would style my hair differently each time I had a haircut. I decided to try out one of those $10 haircuts. The ones where you stick $10 into a vending machine and it would dispense a card. You then took your seat with your queue number printed on the chair! The equipment (scissors) is kept in a sterilising unit, much like a dentist. The haircut was quick (10 minutes) and they used a vacuum to suck up the bits of hair on your head, around your ears. Oh, they even offer to give you the comb they used to cut your hair. It is a far cry from the barber shop of old where half the floor is covered with hair - black hair, brown hair, white hair, grey hair, straight hair curly hair. To add to the ambience, there was a whiff of rose hair oil in the air. The $10 haircut is best described as sterile and there is hardly any talking. It is coldly efficient but gets the job done.

Back to the noodle stall, I now have to push the envelop and venture out of my comfort zone to find a replacement for the kway teow dry. Will I find it? Will I enjoy it? Will I accept a replacement? Stay tuned for the next episode of  "Life is not a bowl of kway teow dry with extra vinegar" :P

Have you encountered a simialr situation where something seemingly mundane throws you off keel?

Cars

I thought I would dedicate this blog to a love of my life - my cars :p Each represents a phase in my life, and reflects an era gone by. This is going to be a nostalgic ride :)




This was my first car. I bought it when I got my first job. It was a two and a half year old Suzuki 800. It cost....several times less than the price of a COE today and I drove it till it was almost 10 years old and still got a decent amount of money when I scrapped it, thanks to the wonderful pricing system to control the population of cars. I am not complaining as I was then a beneficiary of the system :)

Back to the car - it had a 3 cylinder 800 cc engine with a 4-speed manual gearbox. The engine had a carburettor and contact points which had to be changed during each servicing. The engine had character because you could tell if all was well by listening to the drone of the engine. Yes, it was a simpler time. I owned this car from 1985 till around  1992. The car was a canary yellow when I bought it and I subsequently changed the colour to a graphite grey. That was the "in" colour then.

The car was basic and it showed. The cabin insulation was virtually non existent and it rattled in all the right places. Oh, and when it rained, the carpet on the driver's side got soggy ! Yes, that's character :)

Toyota Starlet

In 1992, the prices of cars skyrocketed, thanks again to the system I benefitted from when I sold my Suzuki 800. As a young man who had committed to the purchase of an HDB flat (yes, another great scheme which makes it easy for us citizens to own a stake in our wonderful country), I found myself unable to afford a car that was less than 10 years old. I therefore settled for a 12 year old Toyota Starlet..... and I paid more money for it than when I bought the Suzuki 800......hmmmm..... the scheme did not seem that great to me anymore. This was one of those cars which had exceeded its normal 10-year life span and had its lease of life extended through a COE. 

This car had a 1,000 cc engine with a 4-speed manual gearbox and was a true workhorse. It was virtually indestructible. It was comfortable enough and I made several trips to Genting without any problem! It had the cutest sports steering that was barely 30 cm in diameter.

The picture does not show the actual car but this was the model. When I bought tha car, it was a dark grey and I subsequently resprayed the car into a pearlescent blue.....yah....very "beng" right? Hahaha. I sold this car in 1996 (or thereabouts).



Nissan Presea



In 1996, I bought a car with an automatic transmission. It was a metallic brown Nissan Presea. It had a 1,600 cc engine with Twin Cam. It was an elegant car. Unlike the earlier cars I owned, this was fuel injected and the engine was silky smooth.

It had a beautiful dashboard with a blue coloured backlit speedometer. This car had a quirk where the engine would sometimes stall while the car was in motion - when your foot was off the accelerator! This would cause the brakes to be ineffective and the steering would sudddenly become very heavy. The recovery drill was to quickly restart the engine on the fly. This required a cool head as you could be manouevering a bend, making a turn or going around a circus :). The fix was to replace a $40 vacuum switch which was attached to the engine block. This was the archilles heel of the car. Thankfully I have a good friend who ran a car repair workshop. This car did not have the best brakes and you could feel it. That aside, I loved the look of the car but not the engine. It was an unusual looking car which looked almost the same from the front or the back. I sold the car in 1999.



Mitsubishi Lancer

 The next car was a navy blue Mitsubishi Lancer. It had a 1,600 cc engine with a 4-speed automatic gearbox.

It was a typical family car that served me well. I would have driven it longer if not for an accident in 2001. It was a close shave where I was side-swiped by a taxi at a traffic junction (taxi's fault). Fortunately, my son and I were not injured. The car was less fortunate - the entire right side of the car, rims and steering was wrecked. The car was in the workshop for a good 3 weeks. There was a dispute between the workshop and the taxi's insurance which resulted me going to court to make a civil claim. The car did not handle the same after the accident and I decided to look for another car in 2001.

The next car was a BMW318i. I bought the car 2 weeks before 9/11! .... Talk about bad timing. The events following 9/11 led to economic turmoil and my company cut my salary by 20%! ....Ouch ! Needless to say, the value of the car also dropped. Regardless, I loved the way the car handled. It was perfectly balanced and could negotiate bends and corners with confidence. By all accounts, it was a very comfortable car with the right balance of power and poise. I was so facinated with the car that I bought a book about BMW to learn more about the company. The 3 series is supposedly the best balanced car with a 50/50 weight distribution (front/rear). The quirk about this car is the battery is in the boot of the car.....that's the extent to which BMW went to to achieve a perfectly balanced car. The engine also had alot of plastic parts to reduce its weight. Even the radiator had plastic components. It was a car that handled well but required close attention. It was loaded with so much electronics that no fix was simple :)

One Chinese New Year, the central locking on the door gave us an "ang pow". It decided that it would only open the driver's door and not the other three! Well....my wife and son had to crawl into the car through the driver's door. If this were a Japanese car, it would have been a simple $100 fix to replace the central lock. Instead, I had to send it back to the agent. They took 2 days to inspect the car and called me to tell me they could not find anything wrong with the car. What the %&%@! I almost begged them to just change the central lock system but they insisted that their diagnostic system told them there was nothing wrong with the central lock....sigh. In desperation, I told them to park the car under the hot sun for a while and try to unlock it. Thankfully, it worked (I mean the central lock did not work :p). They promptly changed the "control box" and I became $600 poorer, excluding taxi-fare for 2 days :)

This car was also prone to overheating. During the 7 years I owned the car, I changed the radiator twice! Despite that, I still loved the car....I must be a sucker for punishment. The handling was awesome and all things considered, it was worth the trouble.....yes, it was that good. It was truly "The ultimate driving machine."





Subaru Legacy GT

In 2006, I decided to look for a car with real power and grunt....Grrrrrrrrrrrr :) I found that in the Subaru Legacy. It came with a 2,000 cc turbocharged engine. Equipped with 240bhp, it covered 0-100 km/h in 6.5 seconds. It was a very different car from the BMW. The cabin insulation was not as good but the power was awesome. It was a very nippy car which handled well and could easily take on any non turbocharged 3,000 cc car :) ...guaranteed :p

I would describe the car as "good power and value for money". The consumption was decent if you drove it in a civil manner. However, if you are naughty, you would be lucky to get 7 km per litre. My wife managed to get 10 km per litre ! This car is a brute in sheep's clothing. I loved it because it was subtle (unlike the WRX or STI) and had abundant power on tap when needed. Vroom! Vroom ! I like the "hole in the hood" which gave it character. To make it a little more unque from the other Lagacy GTs on the road, I got the eye-lids for the headlights and later installed 18 inch rims and a HKS exhaust system...oh, all legal of course. I got it certified by the LTA :) I was the lucky owner of this car for 5 years :) The circumstances leading to my selling the car is a story for another day...funny enough, it also involved Chinese New Year...hahaha

Oh, this was the first car I bought "brand-new". I will never buy another new car because I cannot afford the depreciation :)

In 2011, I went in search for another car. I wanted  something different and set my mind on a car with a 6-cylinder engine. (Yes, the engineer in me took over). Why 6-cylinder, you may ask. Well, these engines emit a wonderful "whirr" when the engine is revved). I test drove a BMW 525i XL and was sold on it. It has a good balance between power and comfort. When the transmission is switched to "Sport" mode, it is awesome......pick up is almost as fast as the Legacy GT, thanks to the extra 500cc on tap. The interior comes in a light brown upholstery and at night, a warm red glow illuminates the cockpit. The "angel eyes" headlight is also a sight to behold. It comes with adaptive headlights (automatically turns on at night), adaptive wipers (turns on when it rains) adaptive steering (stiffens when speed increases) ...... a tech geek's paradise. Sometimes, I switch off the radio so that I can hear the whirr of the engine.....yah...mad right?

It handles well, thanks to the 18 inch 225 mm front tyres and 245 mm rear tyres.....yah, really fat tyres :) I love this car.......it will be hard to find another car to match this when I get the itch to change the car.

(The opinions expressed are based on personal experience. If anyone is offended, I have this to say, "If the shoe fits, wear it !")  Hahahaha



Paris !

We went on a Parisian adventure with some family friends and it turned out to be quite an eye opener .... for me at least. Weeks before our trip, I was agonising over which of my cameras to bring on the trip....I wished I could bring all of them for the various photo opportunities during the trip. I eventually settled for one that I felt had the best balance of weight, picture quality and convenience.

Unknown to me, our travelling partners were agonising over a different matter.....how big and how many suitcases to bring along for their shopping trip !

Our host in Paris was most gracious. She is a family friend and offered to put all 5 of us in her home! It was wonderful as we had the opportunity to experience what it was like living like a local. Our first adventure was to the local Sunday market and these were some of the more memorable pictures.



Tomatoes



Capsicum & Egg Plant


















Cabbage







Nice Flowers

Horse Meat, anyone?

Our friend lived by the river and the walks and bike rides along the river were absolutely wonderful. It felt like we were living in a picture postcard!



These trees have a flat-top crop !

While my travelling partners were busy with their shopping, I slung my camera like a typical tourist and went about looking for photo opportunities in the city. These were some of the more interesting shots.



The best macaroons can be found here



Is that half a car?



No trip to Paris is complete without a cruise on the River Seine and a visit to the Louvre.

My immediate thought was "Da Vinci Code"

So this is what it is about



She's looking at you



Notre Dame Cathedral



We also made a short trip to London. Some of the more memorable photos are as follow:

Caught this ominous looking shot from the train

Picadilly Circus ..... is that the same ominous cloud?

Gorgeous looking Tower Bridge

Big Ben

Love the silouette shot

Dawn

Dawn is a special time of day for me. It holds the promise of what the day will bring...like a present waiting to be opened.
I have always been a morning person. When I was still schooling, I would arrange mini adventures with my cousins and neighbours at the break of dawn. I got a big kick out of waking at 5:00 am and going fishing, jogging, cycling or simply kicking a soccer ball in a nearby school field. The smell of the morning fresh air was enough of a draw of get me out of bed.
These days, my morning adventures are a little more sedantry and mostly confined to photography..... specifically photographs of sunrise.
Taking photographs at sunrise is an interesting experience. You have to get ready before the sun pops up from the horizon and when it does, you only get about 5 minutes to capture the magic. After that, the magic is gone.

These are some of my favourite photos. One was taken at Seletar Reservoir and the other was taken at Sembawang Park. Enjoy :)

Series 1 : Seletar Reservoir

Seletar Reservoir


This photograph was taken just before dawn broke. I love the serenity in the air. I can almost smell the fresh air when I look at this photograph.


The Light Up








The sky starts to light up in an ominous manner.

The sun breaks through





After the sun broke through, I manage to catch this photograph. I was rather pleased with the gentle texture of the tree line.

A Ray of Hope

 



Moments later, the rays of the sun beamed across the horizon.









Series 2 : Sembawang Park


This guy is not fishing :)

While I was admiring the sunrise, this guy stepped into the water. I must say that the picture turned out better than I expected....I love the ripples that formed around his feet.

Sunrise !

 




As the sun rises, it lines the sky with an orange tint and outline.

Bukit Timah Railway Station

I decided to visit the old Bukit Timah Railway Station on 15 October to check out what had become of this segment of the railway line. This is what was left of it.


Bukit Timah Railway Station

 Locating the station was a challenge. Thanks to google map and some helpful information on the internet, I found it without too much difficulty. The access from the main road was easy enough to find. I had never been to the station, so I did not know what to expect.
As I approached what appeared to be an inconspicuous lone building with a short segment of track in front of it, it dawned on me that this was the station. There was lush greenery all around. I think they call this a green corridor. I was disappointed but only have myself to blame for not making the trip sooner. Anyway, better late than never :)

I then headed the other way towards the iconic black truss iron bridge spanning Bukit Timah and Dunearn Road. There wasn't much left so I decided to take some pohotographs as a tribute to a time gone past.


Rustic Lamp-post



This lamp standing by the platform showed the way for travellers for decades. Today, it stands forlone, as a visual reminder of a time gone past. 



The iconic bridge which spans across Bukit Timah Road



The serenity is a stark contrast from the busy Bukit Timah Road below.



Railway Bridge



This bridge is neither big nor spectacular, but it has character. I hope that it will be preserved as part of the green corridor. I see a condominium being constructed on the opposite end of the bridge and hope the urbanisation does not "invade" this bridge.

4D ! Huat Ah......





Bridge Number 1871 - Not the year it was built. I forgot to buy 4D :p

Check out the rivets !



What a beauty. I guess these rivets were formed manually. I hope the folks who worked on this bridge realise that they played a part in enabling trade between Singapore and Malaysia.








This took the load of the trains



Imagine the load these rails carried while the trains were in operation. They are now retired :)



Call it abstract art !



I saw these "appendages" hanging from an overhead electrical cable and thought it would make a good picture. The backgorund is a little busy and distracting though.