There's something magical about Causeway bay. The neon lights and the endless buzz. It's a mix of old and new. You have brand name shops scattered in the vicinity, and small market stores mere meters away. If any country knows how to mix the new and the old, Hong Kong is the place.

We had a heavy dim sum breakfast that day, so for dinner we just got street food! First up is this Waffle like egg shaped pastry. It comes in Original, sesame and chocolate. You can have it in any combination. We decided on the original and sesame mix. C got us curry fishballs too! It was rather springy, though the flour content was a bit too high for my liking.

 Remember I talked about how long the queue was for the bus to stanley? Here's another line for the public light bus!

It was a rather scenic bus ride to stanley island- I did get bus sick as the road was pretty windy but we finally made it! Stanley is a rather touristy place. We spent the first part of the afternoon walking around the market. I didn't get much except for a few scarves for the mother and sister and some leather woven bracelets. 

Many stores had pets in them. This cat happy sat there watching the world pass by. We also found the cutest umbrellas; They came in japanese doll containers! I was tempted to get one but I figured it wasn't the most practical of things.

We headed out to the broadwalk to take a stroll along Blake Pier. It reminded me of the time we were in Whitby together. Clear blue waters; ice cream trucks; pubs and bars. It had a very western vibe to the area.

After our stroll we ended up at Murray House -It is a Victorian-era building in Stanley. Originally built in the present-day business district of Central in 1844 as officers' quarters of the Murray Barracks, the building was relocated to the south of Hong Kong Island during the 2000s.In 1982, the historical landmark was dismantled to yield to the new Bank of China Tower. Over 3,000 building blocks were labelled and catalogued for future restoration. 

Our adventure ended at Stanley Plaza where they had this great idea. Dog parking. You leave your dog there while you pop into the supermarket and the Dog gets to make friends with other dogs parked in the area. We called it a day and headed back to Causewaybay for dinner.

It's been awhile since I've been updating this space and it's time to get back at it. Life is not exactly a bed of roses- I'm struggling with many things at the moment. But after all, Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. I needed a break from it all so I booked a flight to Hong Kong to visit 2 of my best friends from University.

They were such dears and planned the entire itinerary for our weekend together in Hong Kong. I wanted to do what the ordinary locals do - to really soak in the culture and enjoy life like a regular Hong Kong resident. I met them at 11am on Saturday for Dim Sum at a regular dim sum chain, called New Star. Dim Sum is one of my comfort food - I love Char Siew Baos. Piping hot Char siew baos with soft and fluffy skin and barbecue pork that melts in your mouth. Just a little piece of Heaven. We ventured through the markets before getting to the Light Bus Stop to hop on a bus to Stanley.

I don't ever go to the wet markets in Singapore, so here I was- Wandering around the market with my H50 and snapping away.

 As much as it might smell, outdoor markets don't ever lose their charm. Someone everything seems a bit livelier and fresher then shopping in a supermarket. Another thing I liked about the area was the grafitti that dotted the walls. It just adds so much character to the place.

The queue for the bus was pretty long. Each public light bus can only take 16 people. But that meant we would definitely get a seat. Plus for 9.6HKD, it's really affordable.

Manicures are expensive and don't really last unless they are gelish polish, so a while back I decided to use the nail polish I already have and come up with a fuss free design! I just pained the whole nail with a clear nail polish, and the tips with my glitter nail polish. It's good because you canlet the nail grow out and it's not very obvious , and the tips just makes it more fancy and magical.

This was the end product!

I was pleased with it and got it done so quickly! Shall definitely do this again at some point in time!FYI I used the face shop clear polish and their glitter polish. It's quite affordable too and very pretty:)

It's been awhile since I've been baking and this is the first time I've made cupcakes in Singapore! It was important to get a simple recipe that was somewhat fool proof and could be done without an electric mixer. I searched the web and decided to use a good old trusty bbc food recipe. For one it's in a metric system, making it easy for me to know how much of what to add without doing any conversions as opposed to using an American recipe.

The cupcake itself was fairly easy! Just preheat the oven to 180 Degrees. In the mean time, cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until pale.For this step it's very important to make sure the butter is soft enough if not you're going to have a hard time creaming it. Leave the butter out for about 2 hrs and that did the trick for me. Beat in the eggs a little at a time and stir in the vanilla extract. Fold in the flour and add 1 tablespoon of milk and voila, you're good to go! I was a bit too busy baking to document that process but maybe next time!

The icing bit was really easy too. Just icing sugar and butter and a bit of milk. whip it together and pipe it. I choose a rose pattern for icing as I love cakes with roses all over and this was my first attempt! It came out quite well and I was pretty pleased. I tweaked the icing recipe, by reducing the icing sugar used to half the recommended amount. For 8 cupcakes - Use about 110 g and 125 g of butter instead of the recommended amount.

The recipe is as follows! This makes about 8-10 bigger cupcakes but it depends on the size of your cupcake paper cases. So if it's slightly smaller it'll be good for 10-12 cupcakes! 

Ingredients

• 110g/4oz butter or margarine, softened at room temperature
• 110g/4oz caster sugar
• 2 free-range eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 110g/4oz self-raising flour
• 1-2 tbsp milk

For the buttercream icing

• 140g/5oz butter, softened
• 280g/10oz icing sugar
• 1-2 tbsp milk
  
  
  Check out the recipe here! http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/cupcakes_93722
  
  

I met S, my excolleague for an afternoon of girly time after I was done with the gym with M. We decided on Ion as I go the the California Fitness and Ngee ann city and it's convenient enough. It was about 2 by the time we met up, and we walked around the mall for a bit and decided it was time for tea, so I suggested Paul's as I love their fruit tarts and tea. We hiked through wisma, which was full of people, and half way through, we saw this exhibition. Firstly I saw many kids dressed in the formal wear of Anglo Chinese School (International) and found it kind of odd. When I was still in school that was reserved for formal occasions like founder's day or graduation. Turns out, the school had sponsored part of the exhibition in support of habitat for humanity. Back in Year 5 I remember we slept in a cardboard box in a field for a night to understand what the homeless go through everyday and I was well pleased to see that the school was still continue to partner with Habitat for Humanity to raise funds and awareness to help homeless people.

We stopped and decided to play our part and each paid for a brick in which the proceeds go to materials for building new homes.

It was quite fun just colouring and chatting and I thought that was a very engaging idea as opposed to just getting people to donate $2 and then just walk away. By the time we were done and left to go to Paul's, there was an extremely long line outside so we decided to head to Jone's the Grocers instead. We were both famished by then and decided on the Egg Benedict and the french toast topped with berries. I love the combination of smoke salmon, avocados, with the prefect poached egg topped with hollandaise sauce on top of an english muffin.  

We decided that we would share each dish so it meant one serving of eggs benedict and 2 slices of french toast for both of us, which was the best idea ever! I love having both savoury and sweet elements in a meal.

The berries were very fresh and the cream was also light, and not overly stodgy. It was perfect with the maple syrup drizzled over it ^^

Perfect way to end the day out with S!

Date nights have been rather quiet affairs as of late. We tend to hang out at his place and just watch movies and laze around and have his mum will cook for the whole family. Did I mention I love home cooked meals? :)

So instead of going to orchard, I suggested heading to bugis instead. After all I haven't been to bugis + since it has opened. Let me warn you that bugis + is definitely for young people, from the mix of shops and restaurants to the entertainment outlets. We were going down the escalator and I commented how we must have brought the average age of people in the mall up significantly, he laughed at me and pointed out at really old man in front of us. 

We got off the escalator and I found this. A fix it felix machine!! We had just watched the first half of wreck it ralph a few weeks ago, so I was pretty amazed that such a machine existed. The bf being the skilled one finished the game rather quickly but I perserved and completed a level. We walked around a bit more and decided to grab dinner so we headed to ma maison. I've never tried it but it apparently has pretty good ratings so I figured, why not?

We got there pretty early so the restaurant was really empty, which was nice because the service was good and staff seemed rather attentive. The decor is quite interesting, kinda like a really cosy family home feel. 

We decided to give the buttered escargots a try. I guess I expected it to be nice and buttery as the name suggest but well it tasted normal,

I got the squid ink pasta. Way too oily for my liking and I started regretting it soon after but oh well.

The highlight came after that when we walked around and found a kids arcade. It has some really old school games and this is one of those! Feeding Big Bessie is one of those things that my sister and I used to do so it was quite fun playing it with the bf. Just that at this age we're significantly taller to get the balls in properly. We played a few more games, a fun drum one, hitting moles with hammers... And we managed to win a grand total of 75 tokens! I chose 3 sets of stickers to redeem because I figured my Primary 1 sunday school kids will appreciate it :) 

We walked around the mall for a bit more and headed back to his place soon after, it was an easy fuss free date that was fun. I'm on the lookout for more easy date ideas!