A Bento surprise from Buddy

My colleague gave me and Janet a surprise this morning. She has painstakingly prepared breakfast for both of us today. We are so touched by her gesture. Thanks Helen! :)

Gathering at Watami Singapore

J and I met up with Flo on Tuesday evening after work.  It has been some months since I last seen her.  We decide to meet at Watami @ Raffles City Basement.  It's the first time J and I tried the Japanese food there.

The ambience was great and we noted that there were long queues outside the restaurant after 7pm onwards.  In fact all the eating places in Raffles City Basement have long queues - probably due to the large crowd of Christmas shoppers.

Watami @ Raffles City Basement

Unagi with Seawood & Chives

A mini 'rice-cooker' - I have to wait 20 mins for my rice to be cook.

Pan-fried Scallops - to share

3 types of Sushi - to share (Salmon, Scallop & Prawn)

J ordered Sliced Pork Soba Soup

Rice is still boiling.

Rice is cooked - added the seaweed and chives

For dessert we decided to order the Brownies and Ice Cream to share.  It's very nice but the ice cream melted far too quickly.

Dessert

It was a nice evening, catching up with each other.  Our dinner was marred by a young waitress who suddenly asked if we are 'ready to leave or continue to drink our tea' !   We were shocked by her statement.  Flo, who has been to the restaurant a couple of times before, was shocked by the waitress's question.  She said this is the first time she heard something like this from the staff!

Other than this minor incident, the evening ended quite well.  We had enjoyed our interesting meal.

Watami has a couple of branches.  The one we went to is located at:

252 North Bridge Road, #B1-06/07,
Raffles City Shopping Centre,
Singapore 179103
Tel: 6336 2425

I am back from Japan

I'm back from my vacation in Japan.  Visited several cities ~ Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Fukuoka, Kumamoto, Ibuski, Kagoshima, etc.

It was a tiring trip.  Morning call was 6.30 am everymorning but I woke up half hour earlier (ie. 5am spore time = 6am japan time).  Breakfast at 7am, bus leaves at 8am. Gosh .. was quite a busy ride.

We stayed in some nice hotels while the other wasn't that fantastic.  We even had a toilet (in Osaka hotel) that is like a space capsule.. because we had to climb up to get into the bathroom.  The toilet base is at our knee level.  It's quite a feat to get into the bathtub to take a shower.  Unbelievable..!

We told ourselves to lower our expectations after day 1.  Becos' at day 1 we stayed in a very nice hotel facing Tokyo Bay - the Hotel Nikko.  It has a wonderful view of Tokyo Bay at night.  The shopping centres and Nikko Hotel are linked by the "rooftop" .. so we don't even have to go to the road level to go from one building to another.
 

We took some rides in Disney Sea and Universal Studio.  As the sun sets at 5pm, many places and shops are closed early.  We didn't do much shopping, due to the early closing time.
 

Taken over 500 photographs, some are not that fantastic.  My Canon Ixus was giving me some problems while "shutting down".  The lens jammed when I turned the camera off.  Luckily it still worked or else.... !  It's due to the dust/sand/grid that has lodge between the lens barrel.