Come On la...Fren!

Much have been talked about using the English language in schools & etc but looks like there's still plenty to work on, and I don't think it could be anything worse than this

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How to fren u like dis?

Vietnam : Tour NO Duty...

My first experience in a foreign land where English is considered invalid....
English = Leave it in hotel, Sign Language Required.

Welcome to Ho Chi Minh City.

It's such a relief to know that my Vietnam friends could converse quite well in English.

The city is buzzing with bikes and never-ending honkings...

Being really nice host, they so kindly obliged to my request on going around town endlessly covering every street and letting me press on the horn for fun sake! *LOL

And off we go the very next morning to eat fur... ('Pho') a.k.a Beef noodles

Here's riding with my chauffeur, Bryan, joining the crazy traffic going places around the city throughout the day.

First stop is the Notre Dame ...... built in the 1800's by the French.

Located right in the middle of the city's Central District 1, this church is still being used and it's also a common place for wedding photo shoots. I was told that there's on average, 2 weddings every weekend!

Just right beside, is a park in the middle of the city where everyone hangs-out.........to drink coffee =.="

Seriously, I was being offered coffee for breakfast, mid-morning, lunch, tea-time, dinner and supper!
It's just something interesting in Viets that coffee is a MUST HAVE.

Here's us at the park

My Vietnam buddies




Youth Centre

Vietnamese teens gather here at nite and over the weekends for their extra-curricular activities. I was in there checking out some bands and while walking past a classroom, I overheard an English tutor 'lecturing' some students and he went like "U must let heart english SPEAK.. heart let out SPEAK engrishh" ....OMG!

Anyway, just a few blocks away was another tourist attraction

Ho Chi Minh's General Post Office



The interior of the post office with it's retro 1940's architecture and unique half-pipe roof design. Reasonably priced souvenirs are sold in here.





If there's any place that one shouldn't miss while touring HCM, its gotta be this:

Ngon Restaurant

Featuring the Best & Finest Vietnam cuisines. It's a MUST visit for every tourist and dine-in is only possible with reservations.





At the other part of town is this ice-cream parlour which serves ice-cream in all uniquely-delicious ways possible.

As seen in this pix, I was having this dessert served with fresh fruits IN a coconut. Not sure if there's any of this in KL, but lemme know if u've had any around town =)

Will be checking out more on the interiors and Hanoi on my next trip to Vietnam.

There's only so much for now, more pix in my Facebook album (click!)

Let's VAIO!

Casually walked around in Mid Valley on Merdeka day, somehow went into Sony Centre just to look-see..........


and came out with this:





Totally no plans on getting a laptop, moreover an overpriced VAIO ...but it's Full HD specs was just too tempting to resist. xD

Packed with loads of junks media softwares from Sony, this baby lives up to every expectation of a Sony product.

It's definitely my first ever most crazy unplanned purchase!

MERDEKA!

My once-in-a-year patriotism is back........

Have a fabulous long weekend people!

Herbie and Friends

It's the annual 2009 VW Bug Fest @ Summit

Brilliantly restored bugs lining up in a row

While checking out the tons of well restored Beetle's, I bumped into

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HERBIE

You would know who's Herbie if you've been exposed to something called the television... It's the car with plenty of emotions and it's own character

Pity his bum on that piece of burning hot metal

'Rat look'; The paint and it's condition are done on purpose for this dirty image.

Or as how the chinese would say, "cheap got-cheap play ma"






On the better side of things, here are some really fancy VW's :

A colourful 'Combi' van





And some radically airbrushed Beetle

Here's the major drool.....

The Blaupunkt Velocity amplifier that I used to crave years ago...

was FOUND in this Beetle!

Talking `bout In-Car Entertainment, the owner of this Combi van has really gone the extra mile by installing

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An ASTRO decoder!

Seriously....it was showing the Animax channel via a projected 40" screen in the inside





As things was getting really HOT out in the mid-day sun.....I spotted a TOPLESS

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California Bug






and also an extremely RARE model

Through the windows of a 1964 VW Combi





Here's something for a good cause.........

It's the Telur Rangers to the rescue against the selling of turtle eggs.





A pix with Patrick; The CHAMPION of the most ORIGINALLY RESTORED beetle

Patrick's home is a dedicated museum to the Volkswagen Beetle......

To check out Patrick's extreme and in-depth love for his car go here

It's definitely a pride to be an owner of these classic VW's against the modern motoring era of today

A Weekend Down South

Headed down south to the most notorious city last weekend for a short getaway.

Thanks to CK, it's all paid for! We checked into Thistle, Johor Bahru; which was formerly Hyatt.

One can expect lots from the service and deco if it's something from Thistle, and they sure do know how to impress their guests.

Classy-simplicity is what I would label this hotel .

Lobby@Thistle

The next day, a friend took me out galavanting JB City and later, I went to check out the most happening place on a Saturday afternoon.

Well, though some say it's City Square, but I'd say it's City Harvest Outreach JB that's happenin' !

Joining Jon and his friends there, the service was simply amazing as it has all the excellence traits from the City Harvest family.

Empowering message by Ps.Chee Kiang

Cell members of JB-4





Later that nite, I was made a VIP guest of a Freedom event, which Calvin and his team put together at Disc0very, Holiday Inn Plaza

DJ Soul T from Australia spinning tunes from the genre of Hard-Trance

Some dancer also from Down Under which costs a whopping $20k



Though I'm not really into clubbing, what's coming up next really impressed me.

See those lines that is being 'drawn' across the board?

It's something new in the lighting arena called, Mapped Projection.


Controlled via software, the projection areas were mapped before hand and thus the image accuracy

Happy clubbers showing off their dance moves



The man behind it all, my long-time buddy, band mate, school mate, church mate, Calvin.

The brains behind events like these, Calvin, who works for JTI is responsible in the marketing sector of things.





Managed to take our first ever public bus ride from Larkin Bus Station into Singapore the next day, we ended up having brunch in Paragon Mall at Orchard.

Some dim sum and siew-loong-pau

Don't let this pix fool you, the food SUCKS! I can only taste nothing but flour in that bite.



Anyway, we headed to Swee Lee Music; The MOST important place in our itinerary this weekend.

I would call this place the Toys 'R' Us for every musician.

Check out all the synthesizers and stage piano's

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

Calvin's a happy man after splurging over $1.4k on the stomp box and case which comes with power adaptors and other necessary input/outputs.



We then met up with Josie, another long time friend who is now working for SIA

Josie took us to this nice Jap restaurant at Raffles City Mall for dinner.

Only here that they serve..well...food that actually HAS some flavor to it.



As usual, Josie's talk of a short-walk became like an hour on foot around the city.


Seen here is the Singapore F1 race track along Nicoll Highway






The annual Vertical Marathon is held in the building on the left:

Very true!




We walked and walked till we end up at Clarke Quay

More on Clarke Quay's happenings when we're back here to celebrate our birthdays in October!