Intercontinental Manila

Daytime View from the room. Eventually I want to take the same shot at night to try work on my exposure settings

Changi Sunflower Garden

This has got to be my most favorite airport. The facilities (most are free) are great and any layover passes very quicky. Here are some that I've tried

• Massage chairs
• WiFi
• Roof top gardens
• Banana lounges

This time round I went up to the Sunflower garden at the top of T2 terminal and took this photo as a reminder.

Kickapoo Joy Juice

I was looking through the drinks section of the Cold Storage store when this drink caught my eye. I flipped over the can to confirm that all the ingredients were wholesome and then bought a can to try. You can read more about where the name came from here. The liquid inside looks like mountain dew and tastes like a very sweet sprite.

Click the photos for a high resolution image.

 

New Bugis Street

This is not to be confused with Bugis junction which just a regular shopping mall. So when you get off the MRT you will generally end up in Bugis junction but make your way to street level and find the intersection of Victoria Street and "New Bugis street" aka "Albert Street". Google maps make the name disappear when you zoom in too close. You will then see the entrance to New Bugis street.

This is a good place to shop for cheap clothes and other bric-a-brac. Its also a good place to buy $5 watches which look very good but probably won't go the mile. You can even select the blank face / watch and they will fit the clock mechanism on the spot.




Parkview Hotel

Sim Lim Square

This is the mecca for electronic gadgets. If you can think of anything this place probably has it. Another mall with similar reputation is Funan mall but now-a-days I just skip this place in favor of simlim. Funan is just over priced as it has big multi-national chain stores. If you really wanted to shop in places like this, then shop at home.

Sim Lim has six floors full of shops selling electronic goodies. Some dodgy and some not so dodgy. When you get there for the first time its just mind boggling and my advice is to take the lifts straight to the top and circle down floor by floor.


There are some tips when shopping for big budget items.

1) Pick your item / model number before you get here. If you ask the store attendant for his recommendation then what ever he has on hand is going to be the best. Alternatively go and talk to the shops in funan and then buy from simlim.

2) Do not under any circumstances purchase accessories that you don't already know the price of. These will be overpriced and you could probably purchase them online cheaply.

3) Tax refund. Only some stores participate in this and make sure you ask them and get the appropriately completed forms from them. If they cannot give them to you then either walk away or understand that you will not get the tax refund at the airport. There are only two tax refund schemes so read about them online

4) Make sure you check all items before part with your money

Bargaining is the best part of visiting simlim. Just work your way from store to store and ask them to give you their price and then mention what deal the other store is offering. This tends to drive the price lower. Also make sure the number they give you is "inclusive of all taxes". Some stores will give you one price now and when you go back they say it was missing the tax. Stay well clear of them.

Once you have found a price you like ask them to show you the goods. Then inspect all items and if you are happy with them part with your hard earned cash. Yes cash, plastic cards are fine but then be prepared for surcharges which vary from store to store.

Some of the stores i've come to rely upon over the few years I've been travelling to Singapore and SimLim are:

Alan Photo - for cameras and the like
Bizgram - computer accessories
Furwell - computer accessories

Here are some links to get you surfing

Sim Lim Sq
Online price lists

Just a short walk east along Rochor canal road is New Bugis steet where you can buy cheap clothes and tourist memorabilia.

Designer Shopping in Singapore

Orchard Rd is "the" place to be if you want to designer clothes shopping. A walk along Orchard Road from Tanglin mall on Cuscaden Road up to Killiney Road is just littered with brand names like LV, YSL, DG, Channel, Prada, Gucchi. It gets particularly busy on the weekends with everyone trying to grab a bargain.




Ion Mall is probably one of the largest malls along this road and has a maze of interconnecting corridors in which you can get easily lost. The basement has this amazing food court with good food. My favorite is the guy who makes the roti channi / murtabak and he is easily identifiable because he's tossing around the dough like a pizza maker.


If you are otherwise inclined the hard rock cafe is just off cusaden road and opens till late and has some great live music.

Is this a resort?

I can't believe the amount of trees and plants that seem to grow out of nowhere here. I took this particular shot to check if my camera was still working. I had spent the whole day in an air-conditioned office and when I stepped out into the hot humid weather with my SLR water started to condense on it almost immediately. There must be a better way to handle this?

City lights on Orchard

This is the view out of my hotel window. It took a while to setup the camera but I think its still a bit overexposed. The intersection is where Orchard Blvd empties onto Grange rd.

Sinagapore food

Here's a few photos of the beautiful food available in Singapore's Hawker centers.

Mulsim Food (why is it called that?)



Bento Box


Komal Vilas - cone dosa

Making Passport Photos at Home

This procedure assumes that you are using Photoshop CS3

1) open original photo
2) clean up as required
3) click on the square selection button
4) pick style as fixed ratio
5) set width to 4 and height to 5
6) Select the amount of image required
7) The centre of the selection should generally be on the bridge of the nose (ie where the glasses should sit)
8) crop the image (image -> crop)
9) set image width (Image -> Image Size) to 4cm (the height will automatically become 5cm)
10) note the image resolution (and units)
11) create a new image of size A4 and set resolution and units marked in step 10
12) paste the image into this new plate as many time as required
12) print!

BBQ

We just finished a BBQ at work. We are luck that the new office space we rented as a nice internal atrium and a BBQ to boot. I made some tandoori chicken which was quite a hit.

Vege Sushi

This weekend we made some vege sushi which turned out quite nice. There was some left over which I just polished off for lunch.

I still need to work on my macro photo skills!

Bus Lanes

I've only been in Sydney for a year or so and most weekdays I spend sitting on Epping Road in the mornings and evenings listening to music and general chit chat. The left lane of this road has a bus lane which is reserved for busses, taxies and the P platers who have better places to be.
 
After only a year of commuting even I've realized that high traffic on Epping road, before the university, means only one thing: Police are patrolling the bus lanes. Once again this theory holds true and the number of the Ps picking up tickets was quite high. This is guess means less money in their pockets for after Uni drinks. Get your priorities right guys....

Lets give this a go

I've started getting used to a Wiki environment at work and am finding is refeshing easy to use. However it lacks some of the "I've finally finished" effect. Normally I would update a document and then email the relevant partied and for a brief moment I have some satisfacation that one task was complete.

With a wiki page you can just edit and redit, It never feels like the work is done. Today I spend most of the day working our how to easily document ACLs so that a complete novice could follow the traffic flow. I think i've hit on a workable solution and will post a screen shot later