This time round was rather last minute. My Lovelies and i have been trying to get together for a holiday this year. The last time ALL five of us traveled together was… Bali 2008. I don’t think i’ve felt it as much as the others cos i’ve managed to go on separate holidays with each of them (save Dhanya) – went to Bangkok with Aps for Vampire Weekend, went to Acheh with Steph, went to Bangkok with Cammy… but it’s been a long time since THE FIVE of us have been away together. Somewhere. Anywhere!

We took WEEKS to pick a 4-day stretch where we could all go away together. We’ve got such different schedules that we couldn’t even find dates to go away. So we thought, worse comes to worst, we’ll go for a WEEKEND. I’m sure we can find a weekend right? Even THAT was so difficult! We ALL finally got away last weekend. Left all our boyfriends/husbands at home and ran away… to Awanmulan (luckily we got the room we wanted even tho it was so last minute!)

Each of us brought food and drinks to share. Dhanya brought a bag of food so big, security guards were staring and i was toppling over with laughter. It’s like she brought the whole market with her and i love her so much for being a foodie like that.

Yolanda and Aps

From the moment we unpacked all our food, we started eating. Well, i started eating first cos i hadn’t had lunch yet and was well starving. I tapau-ed a char koay teow and got an extra so they wouldn’t take mine, heh. Besides that i got RM15 worth of siew yoke from the chicken rice man.

Dhanya brought rojak

Obviously not born to be a model

Cake orgasm

I thought Steph was crazy to get eight pieces of cake from Souka for us to eat in 24 hours. But they are seriously yummy and it’s going to fulfill my cake cravings from henceforth.

I was pretending to be a kite

Pink fan, pink havaianas, pink pareo, pink water bottle

Stephy

With Mr Teng aka Uncle Awanmulan

That’s a proper scratch picture

Lazy people resting while Dhanya and i prepared dinner in the kitchen. Okayyyy in the end everyone was helping out.

“That’s a big mole.”
“I’m not a mole!”
“It’s a talking mole in denial!”

All the refrigerated food we brought

Dinner from top to bottom:
1. Aubergine pasta that Cammy’s mom cooked
2. Salad made by Dhanya
3. Potatoes in goose fat by me
4. Pigs trotters courtesy of Auntie Anne aka Aunty Awanmulan
5. Egg yolk crab also from Anne
6. Seafood soup cooked by me

I know it’s a bit scary how much we eat. But we don’t do this pig out session often… probably once a year! It just gets out of hand because each of us gets excited about eating and it ENDS UP being a pig out session.

Everything was amazing. At one point i couldn’t decide what to put into my mouth next, and had to stop and breathe cos i just kept on eating without air passing through my nostrils!

After dinner #1 (cos Dhanya and i had a second session later), we joined two beds together so we had a large soft space we could all hang out on. Slumber parTAY!

I was going to write Cake #3 and #4 or something like that, but i can’t remember anymore! It’s like we were constantly stuffing cake into our mouths. But they were all so gooooooood. My personal faves from Souka are the carrot cake and the strawberry cheese cake.

We were going to play Scrabble… till cake distracted us.

Cammy and Steph stretching out the food. We all danced around a bit, but felt like that was just being dangerous with digesting food so we stopped. Even sitting down seemed uncomfortable for awhile and we caught ourselves in a scenario of 5 girls walking aimlessly in a space because standing up felt better!

There was a discussion whether ‘diss’ should be allowed. In the end Dhanya the referee said it should be, and noone argued.

Steph

We were feeling reallyyyy sleepy before midnight and i jolted up saying, “NO! We came all the way here together, i REFUSE to pass out! Come on. It’s time to start drinking!” We started playing games we made up using scrabble letters and finished two bottles of choya. After more made-up games (i’m scared to look at our scribblings in my notebook), we decided that we did okay and were not being too aunty by passing out at 2am…

Aps fried bacon for all of us, and Cammy scrambled eggs.

Gouda + fantastic bread + bacon + eggs = WINNING IN THE MORNING

After breakfast was dessert, of course

And wine…

After that crazy weekend of eating, i went for dinner at my parents’ house, and ate EVEN MORE. Oh and teatime Sunday i was chewing on leftover pig’s trotters on the sofa. Clem was appalled at how i was still eating and i just replied, “I’m just so used to eating something every 3 hours now!”

Argh. So much for being body beautiful for Tioman.

I spoke to Aunty Anne on the phone when we got back to KL.
Anne: I hope you girls enjoyed yourselves!
Me: Oh we did… we ate so much.
Anne: I know! Zee came to tell me, “Ma! Do you know how much rubbish they have?!”
Me: Ohhhhh so embarrassingggggggg

I have all these ideas that i want to blog about. Topics, styles, etc. But i don’t do it, or get to do it cos i don’t have time.

I keep my time balanced between life online, and life in person. And my life in person is of utmost importance to me. It’s no point i be this online persona, when IRL i don’t keep relationships proper. So i make a lot of time for my REAL life. And… i also feel i’m bluffing myself when i don’t make time to record all these things down on my blog like i used to and want to. So i don’t. I procrastinate and forget about it. And then i feel regret when i think of all the things i WANTED to share , but didn’t. These are a culmination of good and bad things. The bad things i’ve hid to myself cos sometimes i’m embarrassed or afraid of what people might think.

Another thing: I always portray happiness.

The main reason i do that is because i don’t want to bitch and blab on my blog like i used to do in college, cos it’s all menial. And at the end of the day it comes to nothing. I just want to project positivity.

In the end, i held myself back from writing how i really feel.

I’m not purposely gonna complain about my life. I know my life is great. In someone else’s words: “You have a charmed life.” Which led to a long explanation on how some people’s lives mirror that of “The Pursuit of Happyness”. I KNOW i’m lucky okay, so i’m not gonna say any more how much i KNOW i’m lucky.

It’s just that i know i can MAKE IT MORE. MORE of than what i have now. I feel it in me. I know i have it in me to make something of myself that is a lot more than NOW.

I have been pretty miserable in a certain aspect of my life. And it’s been taunting me for months. Clem has been suffering from it, and i know he wants to see me take a step to change it. But there’s nothing he should or can say to make me do it. I have to do it myself.

I feel like a hypocrite. I’m always the one telling people, “There’s so much i can see you doing! I don’t understand why you’re so scared of it. You already have the desire and knowledge to do it, just do what makes you happy.” And yet i don’t do the same. How ironic.

A friend recently told me: “If the Universe wants you to go a certain direction, It will make it easy for you. All the right doors will open at the right time.”

I haven’t been going with the flow of the Universe for a while, but i’m trying to play to its melody now and hope i start dancing to happier tunes of my life.

forest print dress; beautiful disaster
shoes; topshop

I LOVE having so many animals on one dress! My favorites are the badgers and rabbits. My hearts for them stem from reading The Children of Willow Farm when i was little.

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

I wore this for Claudia’s birthday drinks cos i can envision her wearing the panther top too.

silk panther top; beautiful disaster
floral leggings; copenhagen

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

polka dot dress; doublewoot

I wore this dress to work cos it wasn’t too short, and i found the stitching and cut FAULTLESS. I think i got like, ten compliments on my dress that day. I couldn’t help comparing it to high street brands with dresses four times the price. Please don’t judge me if you see me wearing this again soon. It’s too nice to keep in my closet and needs to come out and play.

The dress comes from online blogshop Doublewoot and is priced so reasonably, i had reason to judge its quality. Besides already being in its price range, Doublewoot is giving an additional RM5 discount off any of the items to all my readers this month!
Just type in this discount code: DoublewootKinkyMay

“Aunty Cammy! There’s a poo poo on your back!”

As if wedding dinner wasn’t enough, Mattrena treated us all to a glorious seafood dinner KK-style.

Clem is such an auntie sometimes.

Ohhh i loved pulling out the grilled siput (sea snails) with a toothpick and eating them. Such simple grilled seafood that tastes great.

Our hosts did all the ordering and it was brilliant. We had egg yolk crabs, mantis prawns, snails, prawns, vege, fish head curry and coconut pudding. My favourite dish that night were the mantis prawns – its flesh is easier to get to than crab, but i believe it’s more springy and tasty. I’m making myself salivate as i type that. Another new thing we tried was this coconut pudding. It was so fresh and yummy, some of us did extra takeaways…

We went to: Welcome Seafood Restaurant
Address: Lot G15-18, Ground Floor, Kompleks Asia City, Phase 2A, Jalan Asia City, 88300 Kota Kinabalu.

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Mattrena opening wedding gifts

And YOU call *me* crazy?

For breakfast on our last day before our flight home, we went for this famous KK beef ball and spare part noodles i was dying to try. I’m a HUGE FAN of animal spare parts. In fact, i just had some girl friends scold me for wondering out loud how particular creatures taste like. Of course, the only way we knew about this place was thru Serena and her family:

Ahmygad it’s so good. I wish i had a shop selling this just where i live. I’ll be happy forever.

Kah Hiong Ngiu Chap
> 2-0-10 Kolam Centre Ph2, Ground Floor, Jalan Lintas Kolam Centre, Luyang, Kota Kinabalu.
> Blok B Lot 14, Tkt Bawah Kedai Plaza Grand Millennium, Jalan Pintas, Donggongon, Penampang, KK.

Our driver had the BIGGEST toy decoration hanging next to him. I’m plotting how i can put something like this in Clem’s car and get away with it. A lost bet from his side i suppose.

At the KK airport, there’s one frozen seafood shop selling fresh fish, prawns, scallops and dried anchovies and prawns. They even have a special machine to properly wrap your purchases to hand carry on the flight home.

A few in my group were swearing how this is the best thing to buy back, how cheap it is, and how great it tastes. So i buckled to peer pressure and bought a large fish.

I didn’t even know what fish i was buying nor how to cook it. Just thought i’d get one for my mom and she can cook it hee hee. I didn’t which one to choose… so i just chose the most expensive one  -_-

Turns out i got a red garoupa for RM56 (it was rather large, i don’t remember the weight cos i fail). My mum said it’s expensive fish and seemed quite pleased when i gave her it.

Semangat KK-loving family at airport!

The most visually constant reminder of Mattrena’s crazy wedding weekend.

Clem was horrified. I said, “You know… it’s your fault.”
Clem: “It’s MY fault?!”
Me: “Yeah… you should have taken better care of me. *GRIN*”
Clem: WHAT

It’s always your fault, never mine, and i am always right.

Matt looked nervous. “You look like you’re gonna throw up,” I said helpfully.

me, Helo and Clem


Clem thought it was unnecessary i asked for a picture together when we first arrived. My answer: “You know what’s gonna happen later? We’re gonna get DRUNK and not end up with a picture together…” I was right. Neither of us took a picture together after this one.

Double rainbow = extra lucky!

Mummy Eve and Dylan

Najwa has the most exquisite features.

Little Frenchie and Chinky children! AWWW

Father of the bride, and beautiful bride!

Yiu Lin & Deb. I stole some shade under their brollies cos it was drizzling lightly and i was protecting my dress and bubbly.

<3

I remember the first few times i met Matt was when Serena and i were hanging out at events and he’d join us cos he wanted to see her. And i was thinking, “Oh, another guy going after Serena la la la.” And then it got serious ;) After some time, i accidentally met Clem through another friend. We got together. And i found out that Matt actually helped Clem get his job in KL cos they were both in the same uni in France. What a really small world.

My fave pic of Yiu Lin while the sun was setting behind her

When Serena was getting ready to throw the bouquet, this cat above made a face and shielded herself with the brollie. Oh i couldn’t stop laughing.

Serena’s dress and shoes were made specially for her by Sonny San of Eclipse

Click to read more

Clem & Lucas

Dylan was first to pass out

Tubby and Noreen

Cammy’s on the phone cos Kenny is missing in the picture!

I loved all the speeches. Short and funny. Especially the speech by Matt’s mom, who’s English. “Until he was 22, he was embarrassed to speak English to me! And now, he’s getting married to someone he has to speak English to.”

YAMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Priscilla Patrick was coerced into saying a few words. After trying to avoid it, she graciously said in that nation-famous voice, “It’s smooth all the way.”

Clem, Kenny and Carl

Ming did Serena’s hair extensions and make up for her wedding. He’s gonna fly off to be boy london soon.

One of the little French boys did a Michael Jackson dance for us. Ming and i were ooh-ing saying he’s bound to be a superstar. Takes a lot for a kid to dance like that on stage!

OK i remember the speeches… and forcing myself to eat a plate of food but it was just TOO MUCH FUN to drink and party instead of EAT.

Random impulsive picture of Tina, me, Cammy and Elicia in the bathroom. We had a moment in there. That was quite early in the night… i dunno, maybe 10pm? I have NO IDEA. We all partied and played till i FORGOT TO TAKE A SINGLE PICTURE. It’s like BOOM. No picture from 10pm till 4am. Just woozy memory. Erm. Very bad memory. I ended up losing a number of items at this wedding… my Toywatch (bye favourite watch), my thirtyfour headband (bye favourite headband) and an article of clothing (bye thing that shall not be named).

Oh and i fell down a lot. According to Cammy, we were holding hands and running (?!) towards Kenny when she felt her arm being pulled back. Looked back and saw me kissing the ground WHILE still holding her hand so i ended up pulling her down with me. She fell on top of me. I got up. And blamed her for making me fall down. Sounds a lot like college Joyce.

Hmm what else do i remember. We were dancing on the beach. Some of us threw up on the beach. The music went out (it must have been late) and i pulled out my iPod and X-mini speakers (which i’m SO GLAD I DECIDED TO BRING) and played music while dancing around and drinking from a bottle of Moet. I remember this middle-aged French couple dancing rock and roll on stage while some of us took a rest… and they both suddenly fell OFF the back of the stage. The strings of lights were shaking while we were like ‘oh no!!!’ Then they got back on the stage and CONTINUED dancing. Bravo! We cheered them on like crazy.

We thought we’d take the party to the hotel bar but there were a bunch of English guys in there watching football. So the French were annoyed and Clem did his explanation using his hands to tell the manager that “this is football” places horizontal hand at stomach level, and “THIS is wedding” puts other hand above his head. In the end the hotel gave us the ballroom to continue partying in which was a lot better. I vaguely remember harassing Ming and dancing with Deb. And urm what else. Serena said she saw Clem pulling me out of a bush cos i walked into it.

Ok then my memory came back when we were chilling in their room. And my camera came out again.

Cammy passing out

Bride passing out. What i learnt from Cammy and Serena is that brides don’t get to eat ALL day during their wedding day.

And then we went home as the sun was rising.

WHAT A WEDDING.

I’m the most last minute person when it comes to traveling… I pack last minute, i’d call Taxifoo to come just an hour before check-in closes, and i’m sometimes late for both those things cos of work or traffic. Clem hates it and tries to book the taxi earlier now, and i call him an uncle for being so early. But because i pity him stressing out, i made sure THIS TIME i packed and was READY at least 30 minutes before the taxi came. It felt really weird. Never in my life have i got ready in time! In the end, the taxi was 30 minutes late! So i sat on the sofa for an hour doing nothing. Maybe i’m just not MEANT to be early at the airport.

Looking down on a beautiful scene like this makes me love Malaysia so much!

Clem and i were on the same flight as Lucas & Helo, so us four grabbed a taxi and joined everyone else who was at a restaurant bar called Cock & Bull. With all our luggage. I kept on checking on my bag lest someone walked away with it without anyone noticing. Though i must say that a few hours later… i completely forgot about checking on it -_-

After dinner, the bride and groom and most people left. I thought we’d pace ourselves seeing the wedding night the next day would be havoc, but noooooo some of us just don’t know how to GO HOME AND REST.

Kenny, Clem, and Brandon who took the wonderful wedding pix. I was enthralled by stories of gangsters, bodyguards and drugs; something different from my world of beaches, holidays, clothes and care bears.

William and Cammy

Well. We ended up going to bed at 4am. Before that, i felt so hungry after all that drinking, but thanks to Cammy’s foresight, had takeaway crabs to eat from their dinner woohoo! So we sat on the couch in the 3-bedroom apartment we rented and gnawed away at egg yolk crabs which seriously felt like heaven right then.

Next day we miraculously woke up at 10am. We = minus Clem. We went for this local pork noodles brunch that Serena describes as “eating fluffy clouds” cos the koay teow and pork is really soft and flavourful. I’m not sure whether clouds are flavourful but i like her description of it all the same.

No picture of fluffy cloud pork koay teow cos i just didn’t THINK OF IT. Blogger fail.

After brunch we went to this massage place that Kenny claims is the best in our area, having tried out 5 places. He was right tho. And it was crazy value too. I paid RM80 for a 2-hour massage (1 hour foot, 1 hour body). The masseuse was extremely precise in pressing the muscles and it felt soooo good. I couldn’t help tipping her RM20 cos i felt she deserved it. Two days later they told one of us that their wages were RM500 per month with 2-4 days off/month. Gosh! RM20 must have been an extra big tip to her then!

Massage place we went to is called: De Lanna. C-02-02 Warisan Square, Jalan Tun Fuad Stephens.

After the massage Kenny and i caught a taxi to Pan Pac Hotel where the rest were hanging out by the pool. Everyone was eating and i ordered percik chicken wings that i had thrice during the 3-nights i was in KK! It’s so good. I still think about it till today. I love you Pan Pac percik chicken wings!

Helo hee hee.

Next blogpost is long one on wedding night!

I went out drinking in the evening (an unplanned event) and at the end of the night, i found myself talking to one of my closest girlfriends about something that i didn’t foresee us bringing up.

Death.

Loss.

I just had to throw those words out there before you read anymore.

From happy inconspicuous things, we tiba-tiba shifted topic to fathers. Then suddenly she started sobbing about her dad… and i felt at a loss. I never guessed she felt this way about her father’s death because she merely never showed it to us.

She admitted to how her father’s death affected her. How the man she felt would show her the way through life suddenly disappeared. And i was hit at how much she’s being going through without us noticing. I know of another girlfriend’s father passing away recently… and it made me appreciate my father with me alive right here right now a lot more. But this, intimate revelation of emotions… completely threw me off guard.

The closest i’ve ever come to this tragedy is imagining what my friends are going through. What they must be without their father. What *i* would feel if *my* father died. And a little part of me died temporarily inside too. And at that time, i was just imagining! What if it was really happening?! What would i do?! What would i be?! What would happen of me?!

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. The pain in me is just a pittance of what my friends are feeling.

So the only thing i could do was cry. I cried and cried with my friend. I cried for her pain. I cried for her loss. I cried cos i was so sad so fucking sad for her. And nothing we could do or cry for could ever bring him back. And she felt sorry. She felt sorry that she’d made me cry that night. But i said, “Please. This is nothing. You only make the rest of us who still have our father realize how lucky we are.”

And we are.

So don’t forget to appreciate your fathers.

You never know when the Universe might suddenly decide to take them back. And it will hurt us, all of us daughters, so much.

Not-so-great picture of Justin and i. We had a Japanese dinner before going for the event, having learnt from the previous week’s mistake by not having dinner and getting way too drunk. Guest of honor that night was actress Shu Qi, whom i just about managed to get a glimpse of.

Someone eyed me up and down and asked, “Is your skirt from BCBG?”

I clasped on to my champagne, looked down at my skirt to recall, and lightly replied, “No. It’s from Topshop! Four years ago.”

Haha.

I’m wearing
sheer shoulder white top; azorias 
fluoro skirt & fuchsia wedges; topshop
studded bag; reiss
necklace; sportsgirl

Johan (did i spell that right :p) and Alia
Alia and i chatted heaps about books and movies. I need to email her to get all these names i have forgotten now.

Aaron & Justin

Omar, me and Alex

Just couldn’t control my face cos Dik said something really lame as pic was being taken

I would like to see Kyan more.

To enter, click on the Facebook app *HERE*

I forgot that previous BBQs there had to be paid for… so i satisfactorily stuffed myself with lamb and chicken that afternoon cos it was FREE heh. Clem asked whether i was trying to eat more than everyone.

Cupcakes and Heinekennnn

AH XU

This was just too cute. A daddy DJ bringing his kid out to gig.

Now we know how prams can be utilized well.

A tapau-ed cupcake and my car deodorant panda.