Espresso for a Woman's spirit

This was a long weekend and like many sydneysiders, i was planning a trip out to Dubbo with friends. However, there was torrential rainfall and storms in NSW this weekend too, destroying many people's plans to go out of town. It was quite scary - as we speak, the death toll is up to 9 and there are still floodings going on in parts of NSW. There was a section of highway that collapsed and sent a family of 5 down into the river and they all died. Watch this video. Someone said that this showed the wrath of God. http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/scp_v3/viewer/index.php?pid=16471&rn=248153&cl=2957725&ch=885604 So what did i do in the end? We had hotpot at April and Kenneth's place. with a little alcohol - or a lot depending on who you were. Just the right food for the weather.

Was in town on satuday when i chanced upon a roadshow for TVB in sydney. They were recruiting new customers for satellite TV broadcasting TVB programmes. As part of the performance, they had singers singing. The first one i heard sounded like Guo Mei Mei. I said sounded cos i couldn't see - there was a huge crowd of pp! There was another singer after that but i couldn't see him and i didn't recognise the song. Was tempted to sign up for the package. Then on sunday, Pastor preached about idolatory and about how some of us spend so much time in front of the TV worshipping it instead of reading the bible or a christian book. Then i thought, maybe i should give this some thought and prayer!

I spent the weekend with friends. It is amazing that when one is away and alone, we form new bonds with friends whom you may not be with otherwise when back home. The sense of bonding together when you are away from family and friends is just great. Saturday was spent in hunter's valley. There is a festival there called lovedale long lunch. 7 vineyards come together to organise a day of wine and dine. You buy a wineglass and then you can taste wine at all 7 vineyards and $20 for a main meal and $8 for dessert. You can hop from one vineyard to another either eating a main or desert or just tasting wine. There are bands outside playing and a whole group of people sitting under the sun eating and dancing. The atmospher is just great. I went with a friend from singapore and her 2 friends from college. After that we proceeded home where we had laksa and bah ku teh, all done by ourselves! And we ate with relish. Sunday was newcomers lunch at a elders' house. It was a great time of fe...

I am very excited about this new machine. I think it will add many hours of great coffee enjoyment. The metallic thing in the background is a milk/foam maker. and the little bottle is a chocolate shaker giving..... The end product.

It's been a busy weekend and i am feeling it now! Friday night was spent with friend in Chatswood. Having dinner and kangaroo meat which my friend picked up at the nearby supermarket. Then explored chatswood supermarket - miracle - a chain of chinese supermarkets here. but the largest i have seen so far. And i found kaya toast from Glory! and Qoo drinks. HM - you really can find everything here if you look hard enough. Sat- i attended a children's ministry workshop at sydney mission and bible college. It was an enlightening experience with many new ideas. A good take home point was that children's ministry should not be relegated to the most junior pastors but all church workers should take a strong interest in children's ministry and they should be treated as members of the congregation and not future members. It was an enriching day. I ended off the day with dinner at my friends'. Sunday morning was another good day for learning. We had a guest pastor at church pr...

Internet buying/postal buying is a big thing in Australia. You can get practically anything on the internet as long as you have a credit card (which i actually only have a singaporean one so it's a little tricky but i am working on an assie credit card). The first week i arrived, i bought a magazine which had this book sale thing in it. Where you could buy good book like - Cooking with Jamie Oliver, Neil Perry- the food i like, Kylie Kwong and another cooking book which i forget now for the very ridiculous price of 38. And you get a free luggage set. Sounds great right? and can return if you don't like it. Then the books came - in the mail some more(which you have to pick up from the post office cos of course it can't fit into the post box) And i find out - you actually have to buy 6 more books over 1 year if not they charge you the cost price of the books; which actually is not very bad but of course they didn't tell you when you first bought it. Then I recently went t...

I have not frequently cooked when i was at home. but here, food is so expensive that it makes logical sense to cook. For example, a plate of hokkein noodles cost $10 and probably doesn't taste anything like hokkein noodles. But cooking for 1 is tricky. cos i need to ration the amount of food cos if i cook too much, i'll overeat. also i need to think about things that i can keep for lunch the next day. cos lunch in the hospital is really quite crappy. But i think i'm getting there. I cooked for friends recently who came to visit me in sydney and they finished everything off! So i'm not bad! Will attempt some dinner parties next time. only problem is no tableware and no chairs! Here are some examples of what i've cooked. rice with fried egg and chye sim with mixed seafood fish porridge with fried beef and chives yummy? Another useful tip. lee kum kee black bean sauce and char siew sauce and oyster sauce taste good with anything!