Risen from momentary sleep mode.

NOPE! Haven't abandoned this writing space just yet! Work is taking up almost 75% of my time right now, and the past trip had been terrible and awesome at the same time. Terrible because my phone broke, AGAIN... and I left all my credit cards at home and was forced to survive on 150 SGD and leftover NZD from my previous trip. Awesome because I spent 11 days with the craziest crew thus far.

More soon!

#overlyattachedcrewmate

Friday, 15 November 2013

We came out to a beautiful, sunny Gold Coast that morning and despite being completely exhausted, Zahra, Mazlan and I decided to spend some time baking at the beach. Gold Coast is easily one of my favourite Aussie destinations and we were extremely fortunate to have our hotel so conveniently located at the Surfers Paradise.

The waves were epic and reminded me of the waves I saw in Koh Phangan, Thailand and the water was blissfully cold. Zahra was trying her best to tempt me to get into the water, but with all my might, I managed to plant my ass on the sand and not get my denim shorts wet.

Note to self: Always pack swimwear in the luggage. 

Slept through the storm and woke up when Mazlan called and asked if I wanted to join him in checking out a pizza place down the road. Despite being bleary-eyed and would rather spend my evening in bed surrounded by pillows, I relented. A night out in Surfers Paradise was always an interesting scene. Besides, it's Friday night... and we had to work the next day. Sobs.

Saturday, 16 November 2013

You know what sucks more than working on a Saturday? Not working when half of the team is working on the same plane you're sitting leisurely on. Don't get me wrong, I was very lucky to have the 'day off'. But sitting in the cabin for more than 9 hours doing nothing makes time crawl ever. so. slowly. So I spent a quarter of my time sleeping, the next quarter eating, the next staring into space and the last accompanying Mazlan at the back.

First night in Osaka was short. We were both exhausted, so we got some takeout from the convenience store (because we arrived too late for anything to be opened) and settled in my room for a movie marathon. So much for a movie marathon. This was what I found after I was done ironing my uniform, just 15 minutes into the first movie.

Sunday, 17 November 2013

Osaka ROUND 2 - STARTO!



I've been to Osaka twice this month, and both times with Mazlan. Apparently he thought so too, because he commented, "Wasn't I here just a few weeks ago... with you?"

Unlike three weeks ago when our pockets were brimming with money and went out shopping like there was no tomorrow, we were completely broke. Settled for a nice lunch of omelette rice and covered the shops we didn't managed to see the last time. There was a bagel cafe nestled in a quiet corner of the outlet stores and every single time we walked by it, he'd go "Sesame bagels.." with a cheeky grin on his face. Every. Single. Time. Sigh. Pie.

 27.10.2013/ 17.11.2013 - Same store, same cap, same two people, different clothes, different days

We decided to head back early because, yet again, we had to work that evening. This was getting old, and honestly, I can't wait to go home. Upon reaching our hotel, we noticed a white sheet of paper sticking out from under Mazlan's hotel room door. With eyes wide and terrified, he pointed... "Do you see this?"

Crap. I hurried to my room which was two doors down and saw nothing underneath mine, much to my half relief and half oh-no-he's-going-to-be-shipped-off-somewhere. And we were right. This flight back to Gold Coast tonight was going to be the last flight we were going to have together. While everyone's heading to Melbourne and then home to Singapore, he was heading to Sydney then Bangkok.

Oh wells. Luckily we had time to relive our deprived childhood by waiting a long long time just for a big cloud of cotton candy.

Monday, 18 November 2013

Remember this picture? This was taken after the first flight when he was heading to Gold Coast, while the rest of us... Sydney. All good things must come to an end. It's only fitting to take a final picture before going our separate ways. So here's one to end our trip.. he to Sydney and everyone else to Melbourne and then the following day back to Singapore.

Why #overlyattachedcrewmate
Even though we're working together on the same aircraft for 8 days, we weren't usually assigned in the same zone. When I am at the mid, he's at the back... and when I am at the back, he's up front at Business. But didn't keep us from annoying the crap out of each other. We were virtually inseparable.

We'd always find excuses to be in each other's zones. Mostly to annoy each other or to have a laugh, or to exchange stories like we haven't seen each other in ages. I braved myself past the biz class to visit him when he was placed up front and from what I heard, he'd always ask our manager if he could go out to the economy class.

When he was working, and I taking it easy to Osaka, I accompanied him at the back while the rest of the crew were resting. My attempts to get back to my seat and leave him alone to do work failed when he says, "Don't go lah. I'm alone here."

On the last night when I didn't expect to see him much throughout the flight because of the completely different zones we were in, he found every opportunity to say hi to me at the back. Be it to rest in the economy class when he could stay up at business, or to steal crew snacks from the back... which earned a yelling from yours truly... It was nice to be entertainingly annoyed during the quiet nights.

And when we're finally working in the same zone, I told him that I was going to the back to say hello and he whines, "Don't leave meeee." To which I retorted, "We're in the same zone what. Be right back lah." And I trekked up to the back to find him standing right next to me a few seconds later with a smug look on his face. Look at my overly attached friend.

Off the aircraft, we're always together as you can see from the pictures above. He's a real awesome shopping buddy, I swear. He'd tell me if the shirt I was contemplating on buying sucked, or forced me to buy the leather jacket he found attractive on me. He's also very game to do anything I suggested, no matter how exhausted he was. We get along so well, we get the same question asked by every new crew who joined us... "Are you two batchmates?"

Every. Single. Day. And the answer is... "YES, WE ARE."

It's rare that we'd be put in the same roster pattern, but the trips were never boring with this boy around. Lemme get past being bored of seeing your face first (a total of 16 days is no joke, baby), then... HOPE TO FLY TOGETHER AGAIN SOON!

xx

#badluckmazlan

Ten days without a post, yikes. I really need to do something about this long period of absence from blogosphere. It's not about dry spells or zero ideas for a post. I have tons of things to share, just have no time to do it. Things aren't going to be better in the coming month, but I'll try harder to post regularly.

In the meantime... here's a story about my dear friend Mazlan. The past seven days with him around had been a total blessing. So I thought we might entertain you with the silly happenings of the past week. I've broken our week up into two parts (in hashtags that were very much used during our trip), to keep you from falling asleep. :P

Monday, 11 November 2013

It all started with me finding something of his while packing up for work. When I told him I'd put it in his folder in the office because it's almost impossible to see each other because of our schedules, that was when he said, "I'm flying with you tonight."

And I went, "Eh?"

I was prepared for an uneventful trip. I packed my Macbook, movies and a few books to keep me entertained during the nights (or mornings, depends on what time we get in) but with him there, I know we're going to have some fun and mischief up our sleeves.

Tuesday, 12 November 2013

Unfortunately, upon our arrival in Melbourne the next morning, we found that Mazlan didn't have a connecting flight with the rest of us to Sydney. He was to fly to Gold Coast and be on standby out there, on his own. Well, so much for having a batch mate on your trip. So with a lot of teasing and a heavy heart, we said our goodbyes, and while he got on his plane, the rest of us were stuck in the terminal... waiting to board our delayed aircraft.

I woke up from my sleep that evening to find a text from him, saying that he'll see us again tomorrow. Happy that he's gonna be on the team again, and a little disgruntled that he's not going to work on the extra flight, I geared myself up for the very long day ahead.

Wednesday, 13 November 2013

Flew from Sydney to Gold Coast, bumped into Ash and his team who were heading off to Osaka, swapped aircrafts that'll take us to Narita and waited for the two crew members who hadn't arrived. Mazlan came onboard and the whole team went, "WELCOME BACK!"

I still don't understand why people up there didn't just let him stay with us throughout.

Narita was fuh-reee-zing when we arrived. Bundled up in our semi-winter wear and headed out for sushi. The walk was long and the weather was bitter cold but we were kept entertained by ghost stories and other gossips. It was so damn cold, I literally felt my cheeks defrosting when I stepped into the sushi place. I don't know how Mazlan managed to walk in the cold with his toes exposed.

Tried crab brain sushi, much to the rest of my friends' horrors... they came in pairs and they were as revolting as they looked. At least I could say that I've tried!

Thursday, 14 November 2013

Mazlan and I had our own little adventure working around the shuttle bus timings to get to a nearby shopping mall. Narita is seriously inconvenient to get around if you're not street smart. Thankfully, I had an excellent partner in crime.

He grabbed a crepe while I waited around for my ice cream soda. I am not usually a fan of sweet stuff as they drive me crazy, but when I took a bite out of his parfait crepe.. I wanted one of my own. For those who are heading to Narita, the crepes are located on the second floor of Aeon Mall. They were the best things ever.

We headed back pretty early to pack and mentally prepare ourselves for the flight back. The weather was perfect for sleeping, and we were so bummed that we had to work that evening. We were both so sleepy, and I really needed to psych myself for the night that awaited us. Lucky for all of us, the ride was smooth sailing.

Two zombies (among others) flying back to Gold Coast that evening

Why #badluckmazlan

I learnt from him that being on rostered standby sucks. There is no certainty in how many days you work, and who you'd be flying with. They could call you and take you away from the team you've grown comfortable working with and make you go elsewhere. Then there was a mysteriously funny case of him losing ALL his luggage tags. God knows why, but he'd always get his luggage out from the conveyor belt sans tag. He even had to borrow mine when we went separate ways because I was going home and he, to Bangkok.

x

Destination: Shibuya

On October 1st 2013, my lifelong dream of setting foot into Tokyo came true. Nothing could describe the excitement I felt the moment the plane landed on Japanese soil. I WAS FINALLY IN JAPAN!

The whole experience being there, albeit short, was like no other. We had fun trying to navigate our way from our hotel in Narita to Tokyo city itself. There were so many trains, I can't even begin to decipher which one goes where. The food was marvellous, I had a great time ordering food from a vending machine before even stepping into the restaurant. Oh yes, there were vending machines EVERYWHERE selling all kinds of things from cigarettes to hot drinks to onigiris (rice balls). 

Tokyo city was bright, colourful, loud and beautiful. There were people everywhere you turned, and they are generally nice and always happy to help with directions even when they couldn't speak English very well.

I spent hours in Tokyu Hands, a seven-levelled building selling craft stuff, homewares and other awesome stuff. They had a wideeee collection of washi tapes that I loved, so it took everything for me to keep myself from buying them all. There was the popular 100-yen store, Daiso which had a wide array of things we don't actually need and is cheaper than Singapore's.... Oh, it was a shopping haven.

Though we only managed to barely cover Shinjuku and Shibuya this time, I hope that my next trip would involve heading to a shrine or the museums, especially the Studio Ghibli museum I'm DYING to see. 

What is a trip without any unanticipated adventures? It involved us missing the last train back to Narita, forcing us to stay out all night because the taxi back would cost us an arm and a leg. But that's a story for another day, I promise.

My obsession with colourful, paper craft tapes.

I am super in massive love with these craft tapes. They come in all sorts of colourful patterns and they're so versatile! These could be used to decorate stationery, stick on letters to your penpal, pimp your notebooks and phone covers etc. An ex-colleague at our old workplace had her work keyboard pimped like the picture above! I used to have them on my MacBook too, but I peeled them off because they wore off and now waiting for new tapes for new designs. Unfortunately, these tapes are so expensive! Priced at a minimum $4, these tapes are a luxury I can only afford when it calls for a special occasion (e.g. retail therapy when depressed, maybe).

The factory where all these pretty tapes are produced is based in the western part of Japan. From what I read, the tour experience is simply MAGICAL. Visiting this factory definitely goes into my Japan bucket list (along with Tokyo Disneyland, Studio Ghibli, Pokemon Center.. and the soon to be opened The Wizarding World of Harry Potter theme park, among others). 

WHY ARE THERE SO MANY COOL THINGS IN JAPAN?!

But, BUT. A washi tape expo will be in Singapore a week from now! I was told that it's the closest to being as good as a factory tour itself, thus I CAN'T WAIT!

26 July 2013 - 11 August 2013

ION Art Gallery

2 Orchard Turn, Level 4, ION Orchard

Nearest MRT: (really Singaporeans? this is a no-brainer)

P.S: Government cheese of $500 crediting into the accounts of most Singaporeans on 1st August.... which means.... HEHEHEHEHE. Gosh, I am so obsessed.