wishlist

Wanted. A person who:

- loves to travel to random places, like me. Places that the main crowd will never be interested in. Because it doesn't have much to offer. And not by car, not by driving nor cab. We walk, take local transport. We stand at a junction, fumbling with a map, making wild guesses, asking directions from old shop-owners.

- doesn't mind getting lost with me and finding our way again. This is a screwed up logic, but I believe that the best part of an adventure is the risk of getting lost. When you're lost, you see who you're really with, you see who you really are.

- has like 1% of knowledge in photography but claims to enjoy it just because they own a huge-ass camera that apparently can do wonders. Like me. I'd crawl or lie flat on the ground if I think that it's the perfect position to take a picture of something. Someone who I can take pictures of, and can capture great candids of me too.

- loves food, and is particular about what they put into their mouth. Intolerable of crappy food, capable of enjoying expensive, fine cuisine, and also cheap street-side noms. Understands the difference between honey and maple syrup, Valrhona and Cadbury, Mascarpone and cream cheese, Brioche and Massimo. Loves cendol made by an Indian man by an alley, and yam cakes from the Sunday market. Who wouldn't want to order anything that has been overly-processed or fried in a pot full of oil.

- appreciates the efforts behind good interior design. Hopping from cafes to cafes, we need not order anything to eat. Maybe a cup to share, and just explore, then sit and talk, taking in the view, wondering what it takes to be a genius that thought of it all.

- is a friend. We spend time together because we haven't seen each other in a while, and we want to know what's going on in each other's lives. We gossip, laugh, talk about memories, as if time never passed. People are so scattered all over the place now, I miss the feeling of seeing somebody and be like 'gosh it's been ages'. The feeling when you know you belong, and you know you can drop all the reality crap and giggle with your mouth full or rant about something that's completely ridiculous because you know that they won't judge. If you're acting like an idiot, they tell you that you look like an idiot.

- can leave their phones untouched for hours, because they think that I'm more interesting than a block of metal. 

- is hilarious and tells great stories, and at the same time, value silence. Silence doesn't have to be related to boredom or disinterest. Silence means that at that very moment, no word is required. A  moment that is wonderful by just existing. It is not a form of emptiness, but a sign of satisfaction. If something is perfect enough, why add any redundancy to it?

- listens, with optimum replies and reactions. No interruptions, no advice, no telling me what I did wrong and what I'm supposed to do. Just take in what I have to say, and be on my side. Or just be neutral. No bombarding me with a million questions. I've had enough of exams and tests, I'm tired of them, really. 

- talks to me and expects me to listen too. No asking for opinions, no waiting for a response, no demanding of an answer or solution. Just talk because it was necessary to get it off the chest, and because I'm worthy of a little trust and faith.

- reads. And has great books to add to my list. Who can do sonnets and chick-lit's. Who can explain a poem so vividly and enchanting that I would want to recite it. Who finds senses in words, and persuade me that Jane Austen can be quite romantic (3 unread Austen's upstairs).

- understands music. Unprocessed music, recorded with just instruments (that don't run on electricity at all) and microphones. Can tell the partitions, and make me regret for not trying harder in music. Agrees that contemporary , pop, can never replace the orchestras.

Yes, I'm constructing this perfect companionship in my head that can never exist.

Time to sleep.

Maybe in my dreams.

Light is the visible reminder of invisible light

Dear world, a month into my post-college life, and I'm proud to say that I feel quite accomplished really, although it seems that I didn't do much.

Things I did:

1. (Finally) Took my IELTS

2. Decided on my uni course

3. Paid for my uni course

4. Toured Queesland

5. Caught up with (some) people

6. Stopped being obsessed about what should and shouldn't eat

7. Bond with the family

8. Be maid/ butler/ chef/ driver/ shopper for the family

9. Read

10. Finished the photobook for Aussie trip

Things to do:

1. Catch up with (more) people

2. Read (more)

3. Find accommodation for uni

4. Class trip

5. Bake a damn good banana bread

6. Play the Turkish March without stumbling

7. Shop for uni

8. Learn how to reverse park

9. More gatherings

I have exactly 2 more months of free time. And I don't really know what I want from it. I want it to last forever so that I'll never have to go through study stress again, I want it to end soon so that I'll be more productive and learn new stuff. It feels weird to not be constantly gaining knowledge everyday. Yeah, I do learn from lots of other sources but of course none of it is as dense as what lectures have to deliver.

I like how flexible my days are right now.

One phone call and I'm on the way out to get something or meet someone.

Go to bed at dawn to watch football because I can afford to sleep in.

Spending an entire day on Tumblr because I don't feel like doing anything else.

Following my  mom to run errands and taking my siblings to their classes.

Okay maybe my holiday shall take its time.

No rush.

No rush at all.

Brisbane - Cedar Glen farmstay

9th June 2014

Some random house near Curreh's house.

The houses in Brisbane are quite hipster. It's like they have no rules, no nothing. You are free to design your house according to you liking even if it looks hideous or strange.

A very cool cul-de-sac opposite Curreh's house.

This cafe (bistro at night) was open when I walked past it at 6am.

Maybe Australians aren't that lazy after all.

We walked along the river, to the Brisbane city. It was quite a walk, but the weather was so fine I didn't mind at all.

Brisbane river.

This fruit juice stall sold really really good fresh yoghurt with fruit puree.

We tried the passion fruit one and a large cup of berries juice.

Best thing ever.

Aussie version of Burger Kings.

Just a normal fast food joint to me. Their McDonald's serve very good beef burgers though. It's called the Grand Angus or something. It tasted like those overprices gourmet burgers here.

An out of place church in the middle of Brisbane city.

So after some roaming around the city, we took the ferry  back. It's called the CityCat (cute right?), and drove to Daisy Hill for a BBQ get-together with a few of my dad's friends who migrated to Queensland.

It was the Queen's birthday (but they don't have a queen so I have no idea what the deal was about), and apparently people in Queensland all go for BBQ's on public holidays lol.

Our venue was in a koala park, but we couldn't spot a single wild, free koala. Just a lot of kangaroos and wallabies. But they had this koala centre at a corner of the park with 2 super active koalas. I imagined them to be very lazy and slow creatures, but they were literally climbing everywhere.

My dad says that koalas look like Australians (wth?!), and I don't really know what he meant by that...

The park was basically surrounded by tons of trees, with picnic tables and BBQ pits, and a huge field at the centre of it all.

Our night was spent in a Malaysian restaurant run by my dad's friend's sister, and we had steamboat... with... Wagyu beef lol. And lamb.

It's tough job to not get fat there, since the food quality is so good and raw food there is considered quite cheap. I guess food in restaurants is expensive because they pay a lot for workmanship.

10 June 2014

Shopping day :)

Walked to the chemist (pharmacy) after breakfast and got a whole lot of... uhh... I don't know what my mom bought. I was just amazed at the variety of supplements they have. And the way they sell protein powders in buckets.

Then we went for groceries in Coles, and boy, I was in heaven.

Coles, is like Ben's Independent Grocers, with much affordable pricing and more variety.

I cannot begin to describe how fascinating it was shopping there.

The week after we came back, my parents and I head to Jusco to stock up on food, and we were like... not interested to stop and slowly glance through the products, because there was nothing to glance at.

Best example: Kit Kats.

They have milk chocolate, dark chocolate, mint, hazelnut, white chocolate, caramel, peanut butter...

We have original. Period.

And their bread section.

This was a bakery outside Coles.

And the bread section in Coles is like triple this. Imagine.

A fruit shop beside Coles. This is like two-thirds of the shop.

Imagine.

And the variety of cheese they have. And their yoghurt rack. And milk. And beef.

We bought a whole trolley full and the bill was only 120 dollars.

WTH??!!!

Even after conversion it was still cheaper.

Mind you, we bought 5 days worth of breakfast, 3 days worth of lunch and 4 dinners. And dessert. Lots of dessert.

How is this fair???!!

*bangs head on table*

After lunch we drove to the outskirts, Beaudesert, for our 3-day farm stay.

It took quite a while because the roads just kept getting narrower and my dad had no idea if he was even going the right direction. We just relied on a very rough description my mom found online. But the drive was amazing. The view throughout the entire journey was... wow...

(My brother and I saw a pair of cows mating in the middle of a field with tons of other cows and horses watching but this is not the point.)

This was our cottage for 2 nights. It was quite small and cozy, and it had a fantastic view. On the right, where my sister is standing in the picture, was a huge field with horses roaming free all day. 

Every morning, someone will ride up the hills in a truck to call them down for breakfast, and you'll see tons of horses galloping down the hills towards our cottage.

And also a lot, a lot of wallabies lol.

The other side was all hills and fields and trees.

We had breakfast out here on our last morning there.

We didn't do it before that mainly because it was too cold. Yeah the temperature there was slightly lower than Brisbane's. But a plus point there is that we could see thousands of glittering stars at night.

I realised I forgot to take a picture of the bedrooms with the camera.

They're all taken with  my phone. Don't ask why.

Oh yeah, and they welcomed us with a jug of super creamy fresh milk in the fridge and a jug full of homemade cookies on the kitchen counter.

(Best service ever.)

11 June 2014

We woke up, and went straight to feed the animals.

And to milk the cow.

Breakfast by yours truly.

And after that we went for horse riding.

The entire trail normally takes an hour but there were 5 of us and none of us knew how to ride horses so they took it really slow. We took 1.5 hours, around the farm, up hills, across creeks, across herds of cows and goats. It was quite  an experience.

At about 4pm, Nigel, the farm owner drove us up to the peak of the tallest hill there in a 4WD to watch the sunset. With complimentary champagne lol!

(orange juice for the kids)

The sunset was quite stunning but it happened so fast.

I need to learn how to capture sunrises and sunsets, without a tripod.

Can't seem to get the gradients.

Dinner: lazy ready-made pasta casserole from Coles, stir fried asparagus with A LOT of bacon, salmon and anchovies spreads on cucumbers and plain crackers.

Bliss.

12 June 2014

Last morning in Cedar Glen (oh yeah it's called Cedar Glen lol I forgot to mention), breakfast on the veranda. Scrambled eggs with Turkish bread, granola with fruits and yoghurt, coffee and tea. And milk.

I can't normally stand drinking milk on it's own here, except for Goodday and Farm House.

But I really didn't mind just drinking cups of milk for breakfast there. Okay fine maybe I do, but you get the point.

A random fire spot with fire woods beside our cottage.

That mountain behind.

We checked out and left for Gold Coast after breakfast.

This was the first and only signage we got. After like 16km of nothing-ness along a one-lane country road.

shine

(I have no idea what are these strange durian-like structures hanging from the tree but they remind me of snowflakes.)

" I'm not going to be one of those people who sits around talking about what they're gonna do, I'm just gonna do it. Imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia. You spend your whole life stuck in the labyrinth, thinking about how you'll escape it one day, and how awesome it will be, and imagining the future keeps you going, but you never do it. You just use the future to escape the present."

- Looking for Alaska, John Green

KL - Goldcoast - Mount Tambourine

8 June 2014

My first time stepping out of Asia, my first time being surrounded by so many natural blondes and brunets, my first time flying with Air Asia (chuckles). 

My flight was on 7th June, 9.10pm, and we reached Coolangatta Airport at 7.10am, 8th June. Oh yeah, my first time having to walk across the runway from the plane into the airport. They should've warned us or print it on the ticket or something, so I wouldn't wear shorts. -.- 

The runway was so windy and it was still early so the temperature was like 15 degrees. And I, was in shorts. I almost died.

The mom with the jakun brother.

I'd post a picture of the meals but they were so bad I didn't even care to bring out my camera.

We arrived on time, and spent forever at the custom and baggage check, then spent another lifetime walking by the roadside looking for the car rental place, with a map, pulling three luggage bags behind us.

Got the car, pumped some gas, and we drove north towards Mount Tambourine.

The view was gorgeous.

We had the urge to stop by every farm we came across, only to realise later that almost all the Aussie country roads are as mesmerizing. 

Our first stop was the morning market that happens every fortnight. 

My dad and I sort of went a bit overboard with the strawberries, and all the other berries we came across in Australia actually. But throughout the 1 week stay there, the strawberries we had in Mt Tambourine were the juiciest and the sweetest. It wasn't exactly very cheap, but they were so satisfying I had half a box for breakfast.

We came across this tiny stall that sold homemade desserts and pastries.

So we bought 5, one for each, but ended up passing everything in a circle so everyone had a bite of everything.

This was my favourite.

Passionfruit poppy seed cupcake, with the smoothest and creamiest cream I've tasted as fillings.

I hate cream, hence I only like dense cakes like cheesecakes or brownies, and the only bearable frosting to me are creamcheese and chocolate ganache, but the cream in this cupcake was heavenly.

Not captured on camera were chocolate, lemon and passionfruit eclairs, and a lemon cupcake.

In my brother's hand was the crunchiest air-popped popcorns that costed two large TVG caramel popcorns.

The market had loads of handmade crafts and goodies but they were super expensive and we were too hungry to hunt for cheap ones, so we basically ate our way through.

There was this stall that sold jams and compote.

Figs, berries, pear, apples. dates, mangoes, apricots, peaches...

And they served the jams on crackers with fresh cream.

SO GOOD.

And they had an area in the centre of the market with picnic benches and tables so we sat down and had another round of food.

Okay maybe not exactly another meal. We shared a huge German hot dog drenched in mustard, a few cuppa and some really good hot chocolate and this:

Proffertjes are mini pancakes, wiped with fresh butter, sprinkled with icing sugar and you can shower on whatever sauce of your choice. They have maple syrup, strawberry syrup, chocolate syrup, honey and I can't remember the rest at the side of the truck.

Yes they sold this from a truck, just like those mobile pancake or hot dog or ice cream trucks you see in American movies.

The so-called makan spot.

Pony rides.

Australians are brilliant at making money out of the randomest things. They had this, and some smarty-pants set up a small fence-surrounded area and made their own petting zoo.

They fenced up guinea pigs, dugs, geese, hedgehogs, baby goats... And gave the kids little baskets so they can toy with the tiny rodents.

Genius.

Should be the weather.

Aussies have really really pretty dogs.

Like GORGEOUS dogs with clean, smooth, thick fur.

This husky was humongous. It looks small here because you don't have anything to compare it to. But trust me, it was big.

We left the market and dropped by a viewing bay on our way to a vineyard to see glowworms.

A super hot, blonde mom-of-two took this picture for us. She was wearing skinnies and a crop top. It wasn't even a crop top. It was like an undersized tank top just enough to cover her boobs. And her husband was hot too lol. Her two little boys looked like Beckham's kids.

This was our waiting place to wait for our tour into the glowworm cave.

The background is so beautiful it looks kinda fake here.

My sister and I wondered around a little and stuck into their vineyard and private properties.

If this was my home's driveway.

<3

After the glowworm tour we drove to some gallery walk on our way down.

It was basically a very long road, with individual shops by the sides.

All the shops were really uniquely designed, I felt like snapping a picture of every single one of them.

a.k.a. candy store

Fudges are mainly sugar.

And flavours.

But damn they're addictive.

And I had my first ice cream there.

They were just cheap Nestle nice creams, but gosh.

They were better than BR and HD. Not kidding.

This shop sold grandfather clocks and cuckoo clocks. Adorable.

Had my first real meal in a cheap cafe.

The food quality in Australia is so superb, that it made me feel like I've been eating garbage all my life. Everything is so well controlled, and the consistency is always there. And it's actually very very affordable if you don't convert the dollars to Ringgit. I mean, you can never convert because our currency is kind of non-existent when you compare it to dollars. Whatever dollar. You just can't convert.

After our late lunch, we drove north to Brisbane and spent the night in Carissa's future home.