Living in China for almost 7 years give you the advantage of having 2 times to set your New Year’s Resolution, just in case the first normal New Year didn’t go as you expected you can always make a new one on a Chinese New Year 😉
One of the resolution that I always have is: I need to have a routine exercise! On Zero Gravity pole dance studio, they had a new sport called “Aerial Hoop” I had that class once before Christmas but back then the instructor-Cleo went away for having Christmas and New Year’s holiday, but on the first day of the CNY I had another class with different instructor.
There was only 3 people that joined the first year of the rat class 🙂 Me, Joasia and Joy and ofc our teacher-Sia. Joy and Asia was much stronger than me so they already went to different moves while for me I kept practicing my own moves mwahaha they went from movement 1-6, I just kept “perfecting” my first 3 moves haha!
Joy
Asia
And mine! Well, for the purpose of taking pictures I will hold all my strength and hide the hurts with the smile 😉 Asia said “think for your instagram” 😉
I never had a class with Sia before because she only teach the instructor so imagine how dead I was when I got her as my teacher!
I hope the virus will be over soon so Zero Gravity can re-open and we can be hoop-hoop-hooray soon!
The first month of this special year 2020 has been the longest January ever! Bombing in Iran, bush fire in Australia with a special hail that only last for 30 mins in Canberra yet successfully destroyed my sister’s car pffff, flood in Indonesia and Covid-19 in China… what a tough month indeed!
I witnessed the easiest order, within 15 mins we collected over 3000 pcs mask N95 but our lovely Taiwan factory only have 2080 pcs left and we took it all, delivered by air freight and the next day we got it. This was 1 day before the Chinese New Year so it is indeed the best present 🙂
It really strikes me when 24 hours before we all just had lunch together, drawing a mouse in the red paper to welcome CNY
and the next day it was mandatory to wear mask, the following days after that we were advised to not go out unless its necessary. How things can change within 24 hours?! #I may sound very dramatic now but it’s either I am over-react or the condition is really not good. I really wish that I was over-react and laugh about it later.
Few days after wasn’t bright either, restaurants started to closed mainly because they want to celebrate CNY and secondly because of the virus. So what did I do? I cooked! I managed myself to get back to the kitchen again #proud me! but I did what everybody else do which is stocked up some snacks! At that time it was still around 4-5 degree Celcius in Shanghai and quiet rainy so going out was kind of a hassle therefore snacks is definitely necessary!
Besides that we also need to equipped ourselves with mask, see my mask-volution 😉
However, with my new home, my stock of food, my mask and my laptop I think I’m ready for the situation. But…. one major issue that I still need to face is the IELTS test that I will take on 9th of February. On 27th January, I received the official news that they cancelled the IELTS test in China for the whole February and March but I need to do it in February therefore what should I do? I decided to fly back home and do the test in Indonesia. And yes, I am heading home the next day. It is indeed a very spontaneous decision.
Indonesian, my country mate, no need to worry, I declared myself as healthy because I did my self-quarantine for 14 days and I’m clean! Yeay!! Also thank you for my friends that texted me to make sure that I still alive (read: Eiman, Frida, Arana, Tabitha, Elle, Dennis, The Bejes- Revina, Erin, Marissa, Cecil, Memey) You guys can’t get rid of me yet 😉
How long will I be here? probably longer than I expected, my plan was no longer than 3 weeks but almost a month now and will still be here for another as the official cancelled flight to China until end of March.
I have a mix feeling, of course I am sad that I leave Shanghai unexpectedly but also gyms and restaurants are mostly closed until who knows when so I’m still glad that in here I can eat and still go out freely without anyone measuring my body temperature and so on.
Owh well, this is life I guess, we as the Player One of our live need to be ready to expect the unexpected.
Wish the very best for China to fight with this coronavirus, 中国加油!
On Saturday morning, as morning as 8 AM with 4 degree Celcius, what is the better way other than to snuggle in your bed under an electric blanket? Phewww lame! Ofc there’s something better, that is to be in other side of where you are, read: Pudong, specifically Mandarin Oriental Hotel, precisely Zest Restaurant.
Our friend from Zero Gravity pole dance, Riccinni, she and her husband have a tradition every month to buy 16 portions for a breakfast. Even though I’m Asian, I can’t do the math, they only 2 people what was the reason to buy 16? And there is only 4 weeks in a month and 4 x 2 equals to 8 not 16? Anyway Riccinni was so kind to invite all of us to have a free breakfast there yeay! Please keep this tradition 😉
At first she wanted to have breakfast at 7:30 AM, I think she’s a follower of “Early bird catch the worm” kind of idiom and it’s challenge for me since I live in Puxi to be there at 7:30 but for a fancy worm, I’ll wake up! Gladly, in the end she decided to start at 8 AM which gave me more time to snooze 😉
I’m happily arrived there, Marina, Echo, Stacey already there and Riccinni’s husband already eaten so its gonna be all girls yeah I think I know the reason she moved the time from 7:30 to 8 😉
Marina took some food and we were on the egg and Indian curry station and she said to me “You can take the food and I’ll follow you” then I have a smart slash efficient plan “Why don’t we just double everything so one plate for both of us, then we don’t need to come back and forth” and at that point she agreed. I took the Indian curry and she said “Marlyn, not everything everything just everything” hee? I don’t get that instruction, anybody does?
Chandni arrived after that and she said “I cant believe they provide curry for breakfast its just too heavy” Marina ordered egg benedicts idk how she found it because its not written anywhere but I ordered the same! M following the other M.
Btw need to be mentioned here that she didn’t even touch the curry that I took! Think about the hungry children Marina! Beni came the last but she left first, she is so efficient, come and eat and vanished, her purpose is done 😉
We were just talking and eating until Riccinni said hi to one of the waiter, be in mind people, she and her husband already live in Mandarin Oriental for 2 years, in other way, the tradition has been going for 2 years so they know all the staff there. He is from Spain, I cant even remember his name must be Ricardo something she said “Hi Ricardo” after saying hi she turned to us girls with additional info “He is single” like how?! How do you know that and how do you ask him? “Hello young boy, do you have someone back home?” Or how how how?!?! This doesn’t add up and she said “Its because I’m old so I can ask this things”
On top of that, later on she even took picture together with him, like all of us plus him and Riccinni will always be so nice “This pic is so good Ill send it to you” and I said to her “Yo, creepy mama, you even have his wechat”
I think Ricardo was a bit reluctant to come to our table again because I have 2 plates that he didn’t pick up and I had to ask other waiter to clean it up. After many hours of eating its time for dessert, I had an ice cream and Chandni again saying “I cant believe they even have ice cream for breakfast?” Yes Chandni we live in an unbelievable world 😉
I am so happy to have this wonderful breakfast and catch up with another pole dance students 🙂 thank you Riccinni for thinking of us and no need to feel sorry because its early as you have a living proof of how much people would travel for a free food 😉
You have your whole squad to finish your breakfast vouchers for next and many more months to come 🙂
I always like Christmas, the atmosphere, decoration, carols, the gifts, not all I want for Christmas is you song and so on and so on. The gift is not necessarily important it’s just a feeling of getting a gift and opening it that is so wow to me. And while most people are away during Christmas, make sense, it’s a holiday season after all, I had the privileged to spent Christmas with Elle magazine and Wesley Bear on their Shire 😉 I am so happy that they are staying here during Christmas and they invited me to celebrate it with them. Up until now I have no idea what is Shire haha
The menu was listed like two weeks before Christmas and I was a bit of a complicated person as I don’t eat lamb, fish, fatty pork so I messaged her privately about food restrictions that I can’t eat but I totally clueless that she still need some help on the option 1, 2 and 3 haha yeah I forget the word assist is the synonym of help # excuse my clueless, not native speaker here 🙂 overall, FYI I don’t read between the lines, either tell me exactly what to do or else I won’t feel it haha
Turns out it wasn’t only me that was clueless as Tash and Ira wasn’t responsive as well mwahaha I’m getting some groupies here 😉 but Elle, for sure you know that we didn’t mean that because on the D-day it turns out well! 😉
Then fast forward to less than one week before our dinner plan, Elle herself posted a bunch of restaurant that do Christmas deal like really? I thought we all set and since we all are clueless so we had to put into a vote of where to eat etc, even the votes went to second round really people? Presidency votes only went once and to choose a restaurant we need to vote two times?! I see the priority here and in the end the result was stick to the Shrine wohooo! #now you know what my vote was 😉
From the first time I met Elle and Wesley I always know they stayed at Lou Shan Guan Lu metro station so I was just chill as it wasn’t far from where I live so I asked her again what is the exact address and she said it was on the flyer and they moved to near Shanghai South Railway and I was like “Whaattt???” good that I asked otherwise I will go to a completely wrong direction.
It was a rainy day on Christmas but I like it because I had the chance to wear my rainy boots for the first time ever! I arrived in front of their gate, I was clueless on how to ring a bell for sure I pressed the right number but the intercom didn’t want to call her room, I thought she heard my frustration and opened the door for me, when I arrived Tash was already there. I got welcomed by the very amazing blueberry cheese, bread, ham, chips, champagne and the gift! #thumbs up
Then Wesley arrived, followed by Ira that only stay with us for less than one hour due to she need to catch her flight to Beijing.
Wesley noticed that my front camera wasn’t so bright and
both of us are iphone 10 user and we did comparison test but I think my iphone
was still brighter than his and Elle said my Huawei is better and we were “this
is iphone yo” hahaha
Does Wes looks like the UFC fighter Mc Gregor?
Or all white people with beard looks the same?
Wesley had this amazing skill of going through express vpn by configuration #something that I don’t understand, due to I don’t use express so he tried to set it up on Tash’s phone and I don’t think it went smooth at the beginning and Tash was nervous if she won’t be able to connect vpn later on mwahaha I have a bit faith in Wes, I don’t think he’s totally clueless 😉
Then our lovely host Elle brought the mushroom soup which
she knew for sure that it taste great because guess what? She tasted it! But
she had no idea about the main food because she didn’t taste it haha! “So, just
remember that the mushroom soup taste good when the chicken arrived” quoted
Elle and yes I will remember it 😉
Before Elle serve the food, she asked Wesley to cut the
chicken and for some reason she needed all of us to gather on the kitchen to
see how Wes did it. She said she fell in love with Wes when she saw he was
chopping wood so…..
Can’t see that this is the reason though 😉
I have a special non-fatty pork yeay! And we were back to the Shrine’s living room, we were enjoying the food until Wes told us a story about a series that he watched? And he watched a psycho man killing cat and then moving on to killing person, why on earth we talked about that on a Christmas day? #not that we can talk about it anyday, it’s just when Christmas the expectation was getting high 😉
We also gossiped about co-workers and stuff, up until the
point Elle said “It’s Christmas why are we gossiping?” haha the night is not
even late but our conversation was going all the way. Unfortunately, we had to
say goodbye to Ira because we won’t let her miss her plane even though before
she fly we talked about plane crash etc haha why we did that to her?! I wanted
to say that you do missed a very clueless topic of conversation from trying to
get permanent residence of other country and Wes will learn Spanish and Tash
thought Spanish was just English ended with “o” like spoon to spoono uh uh no
girl that’s not how Spanish sounds like.
Elle asked me at least two times if I was in a hurry and no, never, you have to kick me out to let me get out from your Shrine, just a reminder again that I don’t read between the lines 😉 Wes was trying to maybe give some “cue” which I don’t follow obviously by asking “does anyone wants to have a coffee?” and Tash said “maybe later when we have our desert” and magically the desert appears and he asked again about the coffee until Tash asked “are you hurrying us up, Wes?” haha and Wes told us deliberately about an advertisement of a candle and the flavor of the candle was “get the he$# out of my house” and even with this we totally clueless what was the meaning did Wes really want us to leave? Hahaha No, just kidding, I know you won’t mean that #wink wink 😉
Due to we still have some food left so Elle packed some for
me for the next day yeay! 😉 and at some point me and Tash left the Shrine
because it’s getting late, turns out me and Tash live not so far away,
awesome!!
Thank you Elle and Wes for welcoming me, thank you for Tash and Ira, I’m happy to meet you all. Thank you for the dinner, the gift and the fact that you were so environmental friendly and wrapped it with a used newspaper 😉 Thank you also for my own gingerbread house #drooling. Hope we all happily entering year 2020 and everything that we planned disregard of how clueless it seems tonight will all turn up well 🙂
Well…well…well never had I ever thought that I will have
sequel of “nightmare” before Christmas. Good news is this time I didn’t almost
miss the flight or anything happened somewhere near the airport. It happened
right on the city center of Julu Road, Dodu restaurant.
Few weeks before Christmas, me and Courtney has been texting and asked each other if we will be here on Christmas and yes we both are. We didn’t plan anything until 23rd of Dec when Courtney said let’s meet up on 24th I said yes to her and we started to look for a place to have dinner, we didn’t want to be a fancy deal dinner, there were some places that we were interested in but in the end we chose Dodu at 7:30pm. Courtney made the RSVP and we all set for the next day.
On the day, I had to take the wrong direction so she had to
wait for me, she said “it’s ok because we didn’t get the table yet” until I
arrived which was 15 mins late we still didn’t get the table but we were not
complaint about it, we understand that restaurant was busy. The only table
available was the one that directly in front of the door, originally we didn’t
want to sit there because it’s cold….but anyway we chose that table for a
while. We ordered “roasted cheese” and “half roasted chicken”.
We both kept talking until I realized some guest from upper
floor already went home, so I talked to the Chinese guy-let’s call him the
manager- that I want to move upstairs and he said “No, upstairs only for 4
people” heee??? What is that? He can’t separate the table into 2-2 or what? And
I turned myself to Courtney and said “Courtney, as white people to another,
please talk to this white guy, he seems to work here” and she did, the white
guy was peeking to upper floor and said to the manager “yes they can move
upstairs” I think the manager tried to be funny by saying “yeah, you can move
upstairs if you want, actually it’s colder there” yeah for sure it’s colder
there. #weird feeling number 1
When we were upstairs, the table that been set up by the white guy wasn’t really convenient but we didn’t complain about it, within few minutes we saw another table of 4 left so we just moved there, the waitress- I assumed she’s a Filipino separate the 4 table into 2-2 and sitting next to us was a couple.
Our first dish arrived, which is surprisingly not the cheese but the chicken, not a biggie, we were hungry anyway, it came with the sides and since the table is small so the food was kind of consumed all the space on the table.
Then our cheese arrived but the waitress gave it to the couple next to us and I said in Chinese and Courtney said in English that “this is ours” the girl heard us and move it to the next table of 4 and I said to her “that cheese is mine” she said “no, they also ordered” Courtney said “but we were here before them” #weird feeling number 2
Anyway we continued eating our roasted chicken, I think it was not more than 5 mins the manager came to me and asked “did you order roasted cheese? We didn’t mark it and now it sold out” and we both said “that cheese was ours but she gave it to their table” well the manager done what every manager would do which is he gave us a pate as a compensation.
Even after the pate we were still hungry and thinking about
dessert until the food of the couple arrived which is half roasted chicken and
their portion was bigger! Turns out they mistakenly gave our order, they gave
us quarter of a chicken! No wonder we were still hungry! #weird feeling number
3
I had a habit of taking picture of the food and I called the manager to talk to him and he said “I can’t see the difference in the picture” hmmmmm you can’t see the difference? Like HOW?! They have 6 pieces and we only have 4?
Ours
Them
Anyway the white guy was around and Courtney talked to him, he was quiet surprised and I asked him “are you the manager here?” he said “I’m the boss here” I continued “Good, can you see this picture and the food that this couple had?” but the way me and Courtney talked to him wasn’t complaining, we just informed him about what happened and he took our report seriously than his staff. I said “I’m really sorry but I won’t write a good review about this place” and he was so wise by telling me “It’s OK do what you need to do”
Then we went downstairs to pay and the white guy still there and he said “OK, we will charge for the quarter of the chicken and please wait here I will give you something to compensate” and guess what he gave us??? A complimentary voucher of a free quarter of a chicken! Yeay!! And when he handled me the voucher he told me “Now you can write an OK kind of review right?” haha! I asked him what is his name, he is a Hugo Boss and we really appreciate him for his behavior but we warned him that the attitude of his staff is not good at all.
We left Dodu in searching for a dessert place, while we were walking we got a bit calmed and able to think clearly and we find it funny that it seems like we got the food for free due to this voucher 😉 and we just laughed when we realized that our Christmas Eve dinner was only 78 RMB mwahaha bottom line is it wasn’t really a bad thing after all.
The voucher was written valid until 31st Dec but
Hugo crossed it until March and I said to Courtney well actually we can use it
now and said to them “Hello, we’re moving on, we’re still hungry and we both
demand our free quarter chicken now” haha but we didn’t do that we stick to our
dessert searching.
I ended up having ice cream at Garcie’s and Courtney having crepe at Odelice!
As the night is going late…. We had to say goodbye but both of us will come again to Dodu to see if the service has improved or not and for our free food obviously! Haha! Turns out this wasn’t a total “nightmare” before Christmas but I don’t mind to not have this kind of moment again for next year, please don’t let it become a tradition!
Merry Christmas everyone, hope you all had a nice Christmas
Eve and Christmas day 😉
Marina gave me the info about free walking tour in Copenhagen and I joined all 3 of them. Please note that I did give them tips 😉 haha thank you for the link Marina!
After joined the first day of the free walking tour in Copenhagen, one of the tour guide Daniel recommended a restaurant called 1001 Hygge and they have the open face sandwiches. The reason why I want to go there is simply because CPH is very expensive! But! If you went to one of the free walking tour you can get a 15% discount on the food so I took picture of the flyer and get ready for the next day breakfast.
I looked on the address and its located not so far from my hostel so there I was, super ready to have the sandwiches, I followed the GPS and stuck into a building like an office building that doesnt look like a restaurant at all…
I had to ask somebody and one person walked by, I just called her and asked. She was patiently put up with me and showed where is this 1001 Hygge located on her map which is different from mine. We always take “Stereo Bar” as our benchmark.
She said… this is the Stereo Bar, so the place is on the other side but somehow you just need to “fly” haha or ask somebody and she said but this place is open at 11AM while at that time we were not even 10AM and I stopped her while she was on her way to do an English test #facepalm
After few minutes figuring the way on the street, she said to me that she wanted to grab a coffee and obviously I wanted to join her and she treated me with a yoghurt! Wohooo Grazie Bella!
# Good Samaritan Numero Uno
Name: Michela Country of origin: Italy
But after she finished her coffee and cookies she need to leave because she got to arrived to her test place earlier, I wish you nailed the test and I wanted to see your creation on your jewelry! #Thumbs UP 😉
Moving on to the day where I suppose to take my flight to Germany, since my flight was at 2PM and I gotta check out at 11AM so I was just wandering around Nyhavn area.
When you’re a solo traveler, having an appropriate picture is you need to rely to other people and since Im such a picture person I always find somebody to take mine 🙂 And I needed to have a pic on this Nyhavn sign
so I looked around and stopped another guy and there he was. I was making a conversation with him and turns out he was on a transfer flight to Portugal from Okinawa and his flight got 6 hours delay. So he was very unprepared for Copenhagen, no gloves, no scarf which is a big no no haha
Since Ive been here for 2 days and our flight is kind of at the same time so I took him around to show the things that is closeby, but since I wont be back to hotel after showing him some place so he helped me to carry my luggage haha Obrigado Eduardo, somehow it rhymes! And we we went to of course Nyhavn picture spot, Round Tower, Stroget shopping mile, Bishop Absalon Statue
We said good bye after we visited Rosenberg Castle, he still have one more hour to be in town while I need to go to Airport.
#Good Samaritan Número Dois
Name: Eduardo Country of origin: Portugal
Then, after Germany I went to Copenhagen again due to my round ticket is SH-CPH. On the last day, my iphone charger was broken! Great! Since I stayed in a hostel so there was other people and I asked if she has Iphone charger but turns out is a no because shes using Xiaomi, but she was very helpful to find out where was the issue was it the cable or the socket and we find out it was my cable issue so I need to find someone that has iphone…
From this issue we started to talk and I found out that shes currently studying in Spain and just went to CPH on the weekend and because our hostel has a 20% off for a magic ice bar then I asked her if she wants to come with me and she said yes! Wohooo
We went to the first floor but it was already after 9PM so we missed the happy hour but she was so smart to decide to come the next day so we can get the happy hour price which is 62.5 dkk and including one drink, great! We got each other IG and went together the next day!
The magic ice bar provided a poncho but we dont want to wear that and we found that we were freezing inside haha
Then we both went to Tivoli at first she didnt want to go in but since we saw how beautiful it is from the entrance and she decided to go in with me 🙂
#Good Samaritan Número Três
Name: Mariana Country of origin: Brazil
Thankyou for all 3 good samaritans that were able to cope out with me 🙂 good luck for all of your study and your work! And since I got contact of the three of you, do let me know if you having a plan to go either to Indonesia or Shanghai and I believe you’ll always be a good Samaritan everywhere!
Well well well, Halloween is something that I should say it could be improve, I don’t really like the idea that we have to dressed up as certain characters and than that outfit will become a waste in our wardrobe, I always want to wear sth that I already have or even if I need to buy new stuff, I still could wear that after the halloween. I actually don’t have any plan and don’t know what to dressed up as, I’ve done pirates, superwoman, athena and I really have no clue what I’m gonna be next, until our German friend-Andreas asked me few months before even Halloween “If you’re a Disney pricess, what are you?” and hmmm that question really stayed in my mind for so long, I even listed who are Disney princess out there but none of them got me, not Frozen, not Rapunzel, not Snow White etc until!!! Princess Venelloppe from Wreck-It Ralph showed on my screen laptop!
Yep that girl is a Princess!See, she has a princess dress
But I ain’t wearing that, I choose her normal green outfit because I already have green jaket and black skirt, not exactly the same but as long as the color match it won’t matter. So, even few months before Halloween, I already know what I will be 🙂
However, I didn’t wear it as a Halloween celebration. I wore the clothes though…just not on Halloween on……. #wait for it 😉
As I already forgot about Halloween and prepare that I won’t celebrate it this year, another flyer just came on the Hungover Games group chat and that is a flyer that our Russian friend-Nikita sabotage.
His real birthday is exactly on Oct 26th but since people had Halloween plan etc so he moved his party to the following week but using the same exact poster as what Cages made.
I was thinking, as my costume won’t be exactly the same like Princess Venelloppe, I need to team up with the other character so I will look like somewhat similar with her. I need to team up with Fix-It Felix Jr and Wreck-It Ralph itself!
For Fix-It Felix Jr it’s easy, we have friend named Felix so he should be it and Felix’s outfit is not that hard, only blau. The trick is to find Ralph and I had to sabotage Nikita’s original idea and asked him to be Ralph haha
Lucky me! They both were agree to be Ralph and Felix, for Felix it’s not be a problem, he just made a shirt with his name, cap with FF logo. For Ralph, Nikita was quiet frustrated as he can’t find the correct outfit and I was worried if he wasn’t Ralph then we are missing the main character so it doesn’t really work. But really thanks to Nikita, he found the similar one and he was willing to take my advise and be Ralph on his own birthday.
And here we are “Wreck-It Ralph 3” DIY version 😉
Some people are really on the other level, the amount of time they spent on make up on their face, hair style and outfit itself, just amazed me! Thorben wore his 550 RMB costume twice so yeay! now he can say that his costume price was 275 RMB and sounds more make sense 😉
Happy birthday and thank you Nikita for letting me sabotage your tarzan or fat Thor idea and chose Ralph instead. FYI people, it’s Nikita himself that said he wanted to be fat Thor, so don’t blame it on me 😉
Two years ago, on October holiday I went to an underground repelling trip and I met a girl, her name is Lexi. While other people bring their friends or family, we both went to the trip by ourselves and we hit it up quickly. It is pretty common that people hit it up during some events or in this case during the trip but when we continue to keep our friendship after the trip was over, this always feel so special to me and this happen with me and Lexi 🙂
We met again in Shanghai, she introduced me to her boyfriend Yoann and we played tennis together with his friend named Alex. That time was the first time I ever tried tennis, Alex was the best among all of us… I guess… this game is very unprepared, I didnt have any sports clothes with me so she borrowed me her tennis sports shirt and sports bra which obviously none of them fit haha
We played in kind of rooftop of a gym or sth like that and after I threw away 3 tennis balls off the rooftop to the ground we call it quit for that day Haha hope it didnt hit anyone! And it was the last time I played tennis 🙂
We changed the game to the sports that I know better which is badminton! Yeah Im pretty good on that!
One day she invited me to a group chat called Hungover Games. I was very skeptical about this name, I asked her “is it a group for people to get drunk and do stupid shit? I mean… like how you get your smiley tattoo when you were drunk?” And she said “No, its a group for doing archery sports like Ive told you on the trip” and I remembered that she asked me if I like to play archery and I said that I can try, never play it before but yeah why not…then I joined this group 🙂
Fast forward the story, Lexi and Yoann moved to Wuxi for I think 1 year or so and I havent met them since… We did meet when they came to Shanghai but I never came to Wuxi, until the time for their farewell arrived 🙁
They are leaving in 3 weeks to Prague and I knew right away when I saw the poster that I need to be there! Yoann was really nice and caring, he knows that apart from them I didnt know anyone, mostly they are either French or people in Wuxi so he helped me to asked his friends so that I can take the same train with them #thanks Yoann! And those friends were Ossian aka Ocean and Octave 🎼
Three of us arrived Wuxi and went to the place called Mojar bar 么哈 #饿了么的么and 哈哈的哈 #wink to Ossian and Octave. We arrived French late at 8:03 while the party starts at 8pm.
Baptiste was there already, I always see his name on archery list and I think I saw him before but this time was the first time I finally talked to him. Fun fact about Baptiste is he was the first one that know hungover games! He said to me “I brought Yoann, Yoann brought Lexi and Lexi brought you, so you can thank me!” Yais Baptiste! Merci beaucoup!
The party started with a speech of Yoann and at some point his voices changes as he get emotional and awwwww little that I knew it was first proposal that I witnessed!
Love is in the air <3
or… should I say Love is in the 么哈 😉
Okay Baptiste, dont be so upset that Yoann didnt mention your name on his speech but he did tell me that the day he met Lexi, you wrote that date on QC black board plus a sentence “Yoann met the love of his life” see he didnt really forget you! 😉
Then, the dinner finally started…after a lot of delays 😉 Me, Ossian and Octave had our own winking bro code against one Italian guy that has many “moms” everywhere #wink
We also need to write some words for Lexi and Yoann because their Wuxi friends prepare the photo frame but Ossian and Octave treat it as if they were writting an exam 😉
Ossian and Octave
Our host is very very talented, they also became the waiter and gave us all the food because somehow 么哈kind of messed it up
At some point I need to leave first as it passed my bedtime 😉 and they gave me the key to their apartment and an instruction of how to get there, where Simba will be, how to open the door to the main entrance using a spoon that is on my right side, how to find my bedroom, how to find my sleeping shirts that is located on their wardrobe 😉
Lexi said that she prepared all new stuff, toothbrush, clean bed sheet, new towel and its really new she even still have the tag on it hahaha! Thanks Lexi!
She made breakfast for me too! Bacon and egg, banana smoothies and lasagna 😉
Btw, this farewell also a birthday celebration for Yoann as he turned 26th years old 🙂
Please note that the voice that you hear singing happy bday song, thats not my voice 🙂
Hear that voice? surprisingly it wasn’t me 😉
I personally want to thank to Lexi that introduce me what is Hungover Games and you need to know that you are my game changer in Shanghai, my life would be totally different if you didnt introduce me to them and I’ll forever thanks to you.
Last but not least, I am so grateful I went to that trip and met you. To Lexi and Yoann, I am happy for both of you and wish you all the best on your new life as husband and wife. Lots of love from me <3
Soa Bajawa airport is tiny! They only have one belt for the luggage and not in circle so if sb didnt take his/her luggage it will just pile up. The airplane also small one, the one that is still using wing and it really match with the airplane that we flew with, wings 😉
Santos and Maggie picked us up and we checked in in our “hotel” and I guess we went for lunch first but because we were in such a weird time like around 2:30ish so not all restaurants opened we need to hop on to the 3rd restaurant that let us had our lunch there!
After that we went to Bena village (not getting in, only the front of Bena village) and we started trekking to Tololela village, it took us around 1.5 hours. Santos explained this is cinnamon tree, cocoa etc etc. Tololela is quiet unique, the village has front side and back side. In the front there are 4 clans and on the back is 3 clans of family.
Theres a altar for sacrifice usually they will sacrifice buffalo, pig or chicken. On the roof theres also a symbol of a guy, a house (which means its a women’s house) and no symbol. I found this village is beautiful, the donation or Id rather say entrance fee is IDR 10k.
Then we went to Gurusina village there was a cultural event to mark the day that they will start to rebuilt the village. They used to have 33 houses but due to fire they only have 6 houses left and for the cultural event they sacrifice 27 buffalos, 27pigs and many many chicken, they started the event from morning. By the time we arrived it was already like 6ish so we didnt see the dance or the way they killed the animal (not that I want to see it) but we have to eat sth as a respect to them. They put a lot of rice for us and the first meal was the pig with coconut sauce and sth else and I couldnt see because on the village 6ish is very dark! But Im happy in some way that its dark because me and Marina cannot eat the pork, Ive told Thorben and he said “you can slowly moved the pork to my plate” and there I moved mine and he also said “you can take Marina’s pork too and give it to me” so I did that too 🙂 good job Thorben!
We need to go back to hotel immediately as we will climb Inerie at 1AM! So off for some snooze!
For the second day, after we climbed Inerie, I asked Santos to go to hotspring first because first I was soooo dirty with all the dust from the mountain and second my leg couldnt handle it anymore! I need to chill on the hotspring before we continue to Bena.
We went to Manulage hotspring and I think we stayed there for one hour ish, it was soooo good! To have a rest in a mix of hot and cold water, from the same place if we go more to the left the water is cold and more to the right the water is hot hahaha we also met another travelers Lusi, Arnau and Mark 🙂 Santos was fall asleep on the stones and on the part of the water that is hot!
Then we are ready for Bena! This village is the biggest, they have 9 clans but even after the hotspring I still very tired and that time it was midday so the sun was at it strongest, my leg couldnt handle it anymore so we just take a quick look of Bena and went for lunch.
The entrance for bena is IDR 25K and they gave us the scarf for us to enter the village. The view is better than Tololela imo because the position is higher but for some reason I like Tololela more. I think seeing 2 villages in Bajawa is enough unless you wanna become village expert 😉
We had lunch in heaven’s door where we can see Inerie mountain, Lusi and Arnau was there too! This is such a place for tourist 😉
After lunch we went back to hotel for a short rest maybe like 1 hour before we go to see sunset at Wolobobo. I think the sunset at wolobobo is very nice, the line of the pink cloud is so beautiful! However it was very very windy! I had to borrow Santos’ orange “Laskar Jaramasi” jacket but it stills soooo cold!
With Santos and Maggie
Well well thats our trip we fly back to Labuan Bajo to have few days to chill as I cant walk properly anyway now haha.
We didnt expect that the real deal was the trip in Bajawa, I thought Bajawa is more cultural village and not much to see but nope I was wrong! I was more tired here other than in Labuan Bajo even if I didnt fall down on the swimming pool and do the snorkeling I still think that Bajawa trip is more tiring than LB’s and most important is whenever you’ll go preparation and planning is very important, maybe German way is still better after all 😉
Allright allright, fell down on the pool got under control, how to take a picture to make my bandage less obvious is also under control this mark that we are ready to start our boat trip!
When I arrived on the boat from east cruise komodo the boat crew was very concern because of my big bandage, he asked “what happened?” And I said “I fall down on the swimming pool” to my surprise he didnt even asked am I ok or how or what not, he replied “are you staying in La Cecile?” Oh yeah news spreads quick in this island! I feel like I am the headline of the news story! Do you need my signature? Want a pic with me and my wound? Haha anyway I still like the crew they are all very nice and when I want to get off they reminded me “watch out your head” as they dont want me to hit my head again and they make sure that I don’t snorkling because they want my wound to dry quickly. Nice people!
First stop is Padar Island, Thorben got up in like 15mins, me and Marina was like hmmm 40mins and I have to sit down like 5 times haha its the sun! We were there like 9ish so the sun is quiet strong and I need to find the shade, drink water etc. Our Padar view is different from Marina’s sister because they went in April so they are more green while we went on Sept so…. its quiet dry…. but I still like it!
There is no stopping sign so actually its a never ending hike but since we only have 1 hr so we stopped at the good view spot and return 🙂 on the way to our boat we saw a bunch of deers!
Second stop is Komodo Island, I was asking Marina and Thorben if Im bleeding, they kept saying no, dont be so dramatic hahaha as the common knowledge is Komodo smells blood! Look at this beautiful Dinosaurs’ ancestor!
Third stop is Pink beach which from far away its just a white sand but when you got off the boat and come closer, it is pink! Yeayy, Marina and Thorben did snorkle there, me…. Im just watching them from the shore 🙁 and swimming but kept my head above the water.
Fourth stop is Taka Makasar and the sand is even pinker than the pink beach, the boat crew said you cant really snorkel because there is nothing on the bottom, only sand, but I like it because it is ocean-sand-ocean so they dont really have a shore as the sand is in the middle.
Fifth stop is Manta Point which I didnt go because you can only snorkel there, Thorben and Marina went and they saw 4 mantas very big one but Marina said the current is very big, without a life jacket it will be hard to go back to the boat.
Last stop is Kanawa island, I did swim again on the beach because I dont feel like I swam enough but even I always careful to put my head above water at some point I need to stop because the water already on soaked by my giant bandage.
And thats the full day trip! They picked us up at 5:30am and we came back at 5:30pm, we took shower and had dinner on the hotel and went to bed! Zzzzz I had dinner with my PJ’s and Marina said “I didnt know PJ was an option” see dinner with PJ is awesome!
Bandage on my forehead, medicine on my hand and jammies!#I’m getting better!
