Hong Rui's Arrival.

Well, the title says it all.

14 July 2007

HR arrived on saturday evening after a screwed up 17 hours of flight. Power man, but the best thing was that I pulled him to club with me that very night itself! Haha, I was dying for some BLVD lovin' and the rest (meaning my melbourne phamalia) were either busy or sick or just didn't wanna come, so I was just pouting and whining the whole night through while walking and showing HR around the city. Hee..

Little did I know, the only guy that I didn't ask to club that night cause he stays in the suburbs, went to BLVD!! So I'm so thankful Jen msged me and asked me whether I was there, and off we went at freaking 1am!! Haha, the cover charge was 16 bucks, and BLVD closes at 3am, super not worth it, but nonetheless, I had fun at the end of it!


HR got to see why I loved the club so much. The music's AWESOME!! And to my dear Huilin, I kept my promise! No 151s that night. We were super good, didn't drink much at all. Actually, even at the dance floor, we were too sane, but with the music that good, it was fun! Wished you were there! A pity we took no pictures.

Oh! and one thing I must include. Haha, I think the friends HR made on his first day of orientation think he must be damn cool cause when they ask him what he did on his first day in melbourne. He told them, clubbing! Needless to say, they all had a shock. =D


16 July 2007

Last night, I went to watch Harry Potter with Jialin, Stacey and Hong Rui. We bought tickets at Nova Cinemas, which is the cheapest tickets we could find, and cause it was my first time watching at that cinema, we didn't know it was free-seating. So there we were 2 rows from the front, and for HR, 1 row. Haha, our eyes and neck were super pain after that! Especially for HR cause he's the tallest and he sat in the front row. Damn funny.

We went to eat at subway, Jialin went home, and Stacey, HR and me, went walking through the city pass Federation Square to the Yarra River, and then we saw the Ferris Wheel!! We didn't feel like going back home, or rather it was more of me la. I'm always so hyper, thats why they call me energizer bunny!


Tickets to the Ferris Wheel! Its not GIANT la, cause the people reading this will most probably be Singaporeans, and as usual Singapore has the BIGGEST ferris wheel in Asia, haha.

I like the shiny tint of the tickets!


HR posing with the tickets quite unsuccessfully.


Stacey stuck her hand out so far, we were scared she was going to lose it half-way by the passing carriages.


The wheel.


The 3 of us freezing our ass off at the top of the wheel. Super cold man. My lips and hands were numb.


The view from the top taken by my camera. A pity it can't take night landscape shots that well.


After that, it was just chilling at Lyncontro' til about 1am before we adjourn to the warmth of home sweet home.

Updates for the 3weeks I went missing.

First Week:

Remember I said my zookeeper friends came over for a conference? Yeah..it was a good experience! I miss them so badly!

I followed them on their first day here to the Melbourne Zoo. We had some of the local keepers bring us around, a real eye opener in comparison to back stage at Night Safari! I guess thats where the huge difference between Asian zoos and Western zoos come into play. We focus more on experience first, then knowledge of the animal. While western zoos, tend to not want "functional keepers", they want keepers with tons of knowledge on the animal, then experience can be build upon.

Also, conservation is a HUGE part of the zoos in western countries. They've got so much support from the government and the society, as I guess westerners tend to be more aware of environmental issues, and the need for conserving the environment and everything that lives in it from the insects to the animals to us.

Thus, due to the huge funding the zoos have here. Their facilities are way cool, and they take utmost pride in upkeeping back stage scenes. Whereas in night safari, ours really look like kampong. Its a whole new scene when you step from the city, right to the sections in Night Safari. I tell you, cycling from one section to another feels like Chinese New Year in the early 1990s in the villages in Malaysia.

Mr Wombat..He's so cute and HUGE!


Listening to Mr John tell us about one of their conservation projects with the Fiji government regarding that Fiji lizard he's holding. Totally forgot the name. I held it and it scratched me!! Now its about a month from then, and the scar is still on my thumb. Ow.


Mul is holding the Thorny Devil. The cutest lizard ever!!! If only you could see that fella's face, its got that "I'm so cute, please don't hurt me!!" face. Heehee, stupidly cute. I wanted to steal one to bring back home!


Oh. It changes colour if its frightened. Gorgeous.


The Philippine fin-tailed dragon. Another amazing and really tough lizard. Endangered.


The Rhode Island Stick Insect. Can you believe it!! Its actually a stick insect!! Very very endangered with only 25 left in the wild. Its noctournal, and when young, looks like a normal stick insect. Only reaches this beautiful armour of black when it passes sexual maturity.


You can hardly see this. So, we're considered lucky to have seen and touch this insect. Not that you guys would catch on. But its an honour man!


Orangutan 20 million facility. I think that zookeeper is so hot! She looks like Evangeline Lily!


Group picture!


And my senior from Night safari. It was good catching up with him! I took him exploring in the city. Brought him to all the dark alleys where its graffiti and cool pubs galore!

The Croft Institute reminds me of The Clinic at The Cannery. It reminds you of an old science lab.

The toilet even has a hospital bed.

And Greco was our last stop!! Haha, we had banana cake and vanilla chocolate chip...yumyum!!