winter's near

Its snowing outside my window as I am typing this right now!! My flatmates came banging on my door earlier all excited that's its snowing and all of us just grabbed a jacket and rushed out doors.

We all got so caught in the moment that we'd forgotten that most of us were in our jammies and shorts! =D

Wowee... my very first experience with falling snow... nice..

see the tiny white specks? that's it!!

snow falling, people!

waiting for it to stay on my nose and eyelashes!

but for now, it melts as soon as it touches anything..

You must be thinking I'm all so jakun right? Being overly excited about snow.. Just so you know, it only snowed once in Aber last year and it was towards the end of winter. Its because we're so near to the sea, snow doesn't come around often..

To be able to see it now so early in the season, yay!!*smiles*

a cardiff raya

A slightly over due post. Took me awhile to compile the photos, and when I’ve finally got them, work load kept me a tad busy.. hehe.. For this year’s Hari Raya, a last minute invitation to an open house led me to celebrate Raya in CARDIFF!! In case you’re wondering, well it’s the capital of Wales and way bigger than Aber. Not that I regret coming to Aber or anything, but hey, after about a month, it’s good to go some other place just to see how ulu we are.. lol..

We (Mel, Aric and me) arrived at Cardiff on Saturday evening, chilled at a friend's place, had a wonderful dinner with Cardiff friends at Lee's Garden (Malaysian-owned restaurant, good food), visited a casino (my first time!) and finally got to Aliana and Amal's place (friends who were having the open house) right about midnight, where Mel and I stayed for the night.

As both them was just about to start the cooking, we were all having fun helping the hostesses prepare the food in the kitchen. There was quite a few dishes to prepare, and believe me, they made all of them from scratch! Both of us went only went to bed at about 5am, after not being of much help and snacking on kuih raya and the fried ikan bilis =D

Got up at about 8.30am and decided to go check out the city for abit. Obviously we headed for the shopping area, c'mon we're girls afterall! haha.. But only to find out that the shops only open at 11.00am =(

So, we decided to explore the place wherever our feet can take us. A short walk down Queen St, we saw this:

Ooh, a castle!

Cardiff Castle to be more precise

in Aber, we only have ruins of castles

See, an actual castle!

with a pretty clock tower

Here's a couple of snapshots of the castle grounds

Saw some peacocks wandering around, they weren't very proud ones..

this is prolly the prettiest..

.. and what i guess to be his mistresses cause they kept following him around

I shall own one someday.. *daydreams* =)

It so happen that day, a marathon was going on and the castle grounds was the finishing line.. There was quite a crowd.

After that we went for some breakfast at McDonald's, I had a breakfast bagel. Lingered on for awhile before hitting the shops!

I want one in Aber!

the row of shops that goes on and on..

my current favourite! look the the people waiting outside even before it opens!

Halfway down the street, we heard music and saw a parade!

the parade started with this..

.. and went on and on with little kiddies at the end!

We went back to Amal's place around lunchtime and had a spread of authentic Malay food! Pardon my excitement whenever I see Malaysian food nowadays because nasi lemaks, char kuey teows and roti canais don't come my way often.

happy happy.. there's sambal, rendang, nasi lemak, ayam masak merah, nasi tomato and even serunding!

yummy..

right on the mantelpiece for everyone to see

hostesses happy when guests started pouring in..

with our gracious hostesses in pink and HELP friends, super fun to see all of them once again!

It didn't take me long before I dug in!

I ate..

..and ate..

.. and ate some more!! hahaha.. hey its not often you see me going like 3-4 rounds at a meal k!

with their housemates, luckily the food wasn't too spicy for them..

In between my makan rounds, we took quite abit of photos! We stayed on as guests came by..

.. and left! We were there for about 4 hours till it was time for us to catch our bus back to Aber.

Thanks a bunch to Amal and Aliana for the invitation to a wonderful open house & also to those who met up with us! Really glad I made the trip up to Cardiff =D

one, two, cha cha cha...

Whew, it was a busy week for me.. Mostly it is due to the string of tutorials i had throughout the week, but it is also partially because of the series I've been watching... hehe... Been kinda hooked on 'Steps', the TVB Hong Kong drama that was showing on Astro on Demand (don't know if it still is), but i got super interested in it for the fact it involves dancing! haha.. Though its Latin dances, its still dancing.. nice! Now I'm left with 2 more episodes to go...

Oh, i did go out for dinner last night. My dinner pals decided not to cook and instead go to town and try out this restaurant by the name of Wetherspoon Free House that was by the train station. The bus wait to town was dreadfully long and it left us feeling cold, tired and hungry by the time we got to the place. To make things worse, the place was so packed that we had to sit outdoors and the orders had a half an hour waiting period. Boy, the cappuccino and heater next to our table didn't do much to comfort us.

After about a million yawns and my tummy grumbling loud enough for the next table to hear, the rack of pork ribs with barbecue sauce i ordered was HEAVEN!! It was gooood... There was also corn on the cob, coleslaw and chips on the side too.. haha.. We all dug into our food so fast that we didnt take pictures.. And it was also to down it before it got cold.. haha.. So sorry people for the lack of pictures.. =)

The weather this week is much colder than last week's. Even without the rain, its generally the temperature thats chilly.. Alright, to make up for the lack of pictures, i'll show the view you get from my room..

From the top most floor

this is when you look out the window and to your right

and that's is how close I am to the sea..

These days, you don't get to see the sun till about 9 and it sets at about 5 something.. Its bad, considering how it makes u feel constantly sleepy... And with the cold, you are hungry all the time too... Yerp, so all you do is eat and sleep.. Hahah!

Not forgetting, here's a shoutout to SALLY!! Hope you had a wonderful 20th birthday and a great year ahead! =D Lots of love to the birthday girl from aberwatever!