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The Sequel of Source Code

And here the sequel of source code begin….

Featuring Marlyn, Elle, Gordy and Wesley

Hahaha! Started at Zeitgeist during the kick off of Christkindlmarkt aka Christmas Market.

We were suppose to meet at 6:30 but me and Gordy arrived earlier at Zeitgeist due to the reason I was super hungry before the xmas market and at the market it will only be snacks instead of proper food so we had proper dinner first before we swayed to the backyard for the Gluhwein 😉 Gordy already had 2 cups of gluhwein on the restaurant, I just had Schnitzels and the gluhwein will be on the market. The market was nice and surprisingly full for the first day…well maybe because it was on Friday, it was hard to walk without spilling your gluhwein no matter how careful you are, you just can’t haha

Gordy was the one that super prepared in terms of thematic sweater, it’s still the 30th November but he already wear a xmas sweater with a xmas tree on it and it is so match with the real/fake xmas tree in the middle of the market haha. Many people took selfie with him just because of his sweater, I really think it’s a good investment to buy that sweater haha 😉

In the market, they have chicken something, pepito pancakes, bratwurst and friends and honestly speaking I had my gluhwein so I need to take off my glasses to drink it otherwise it would be dewy, so I can’t see anything clear about what kind of food there haha I just know there was also some stalls that selling earing, candle, nuts and etc etc. Elle was so persistent on having a pretzels and then at some point she saw a kid holding pretzel walked passed by and without any excuse me or so on she just said (read: a bit scream) “where did they get the pretzels?” and to her surprised the kid replied “it’s from the restaurant” and Elle said to me “I didn’t expect that the kid would actually reply” hahaha Wesley got his chicken something but I don’t know what was going on with him, we went to the chicken stall, he looked at it and somehow we walked all the opposite way to the other side to see some skewers and Wesley said “I want a chicken” and I said “You mean the chicken on the other side?” and he said yes, so we have to walked all the way back there, carrying our gluhwein that was already spilled anywhere just so that he can get his food *facepalm.

Gordy met many of his friends there, but me and Elle also saw a very interesting guy that looks like an assassin! like in every movie kind of assassin, sleak hair with a very clear hairline, sharp eyes it’s very like wow! I need to look up for a sniper or something because they must have a code between each other…and the code was…. a rose!

OMG we were so nervous what can we do with the rose, so we put it on the nutcracker statue so Elle should be undetectable by the assassin 😉 hahaha *fiuh just save the day ahahaha, we lost the assassin. That’s need a cheers!

At some point, we somehow lost Gordy, well….not lost but he was talking to his friends so the three of us were walked around and waited for the food and while we finished, we came back to where he supposed to be which is next to the tree but he wasn’t there! But yeah we couldn’t lost him anyway so we tried to take a selfie with the tree, and then here he is! the blurry guy on the background, while they have “where’s Waldy?” we have “where’s Gordy?” hahaa

Elle got her food, Wesley already finished and now it was Gordy who still wants to eat something so he also ordered the same thing as Elle if I remember it correctly. While waiting for the food, they put a Christmas songs or a song that all of us know so we talked about songs quiet a lot but I don’t know why they can’t catch the song that I sang pffff guys 🙁 ahaha #begging me for mercy, yeah yeah yeah

While it was about 10PM, they already closed down the market, they stopped the music even earlier so that we have no other options other than to leave. Elle and Wesley got a day trip the next day to somewhere in Suzhou where I don’t even think they know either hahaha.

But as the night goes by, the code about the assassin getting more and more clear, so who is this? What I know from all the movie I watched, the characteristic of an assassin should be:

  1. Very careful,
  2. Isolated,
  3. Always reveals incomplete clue.
  4. (Read: Not always) mostly guy.

And who that can fit to those three (or maybe four) basic categories?!?!

I mean, Gordy can’t be because he’s not careful at all as he spilled the gluhwein the most, clearly not isolated especially with his sweater where he became the attraction of the xmas market. So crossed him out, it means only leave to Wesley! *shocked face…..

Verdict 1: Wesley did very careful on the market, he paid attention to every gluhwein that he might spill to his shoes! he doesn’t want any spot on his shirts or shoes.

Verdict 2: Speaking of isolated….well, sometimes picture speaks thousand words 😉 He doesn’t want to eat around people!

Verdict 3: Another proof that pictures speaks thousand words… well, maybe in this picture, it will only speaks few words.

Unfinished line!

Me and Gordy was waiting the next message from Wesley but it was never came!! *facepalm

By this so called failed detective analysis, the assassin might be ehmmm ehmmm again, I’m not gonna say the brand ahahaha but in the end everything went safe and sound, no one get hurt 😉 #this the season to be jolly lalaalalalalallala

As I won’t see you for this Xmas sooo…for now….happy early Christmas then! I’ll see you in year 2019!! HO HO HO!

Have a good holiday guys!!!

 

 

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Arthos, porTHOs and araMis

Here it is! my two favorite people!

The A(ggy)rthos and porTHO(rben)s ahahaha get it? everyone? 😉 as November almost finished and on December I will be barely in Shanghai, Thorben will be in Germany for 3 weeks and Aggy hmm….she should be in Shanghai hahaha so I requested a dinner date for 3 of us 😉 before all of us reunite again on year 2019!

For this date, I prepare myself hahaha *wink wink 😉 I’ve never done any hairstyle whatsoever for anything, not even for my birthday I’m too lazy to do that haha! but yeah I spent quiet some time on youtube to find what to do with my hair, and when the girl on youtube showed it to her hair it looks good on her but when I did it to mine…. I look like a 5 years old! *facepalm hahaha

They both had archery so I came slightly before the game was finished, I watched from the side, I saw both of them playing for the same team and I knocked from the glass cages whatever its called to make sure that they see “hellooooo look what I did with my hair! haha” John got out to say hi to me “Hi Roomies” and then I went in to hug Thorben and John said “What? Thorben is all sweating and you hug him and not me?” hahaha roomiesss! you didn’t choose me to be on your team! #just kidding 😉 and I did hug John after that!

I asked many people “What do you think about my hair” and the reaction from almost everyone was “Did you cut it? Is it a different style?” hmmm “No, I put a hairband” and they were like “ooowhh” Bohai, Fredoy and Brendan were one of the guys that didn’t realize it. Miguel kind of realize it, Aaron realized it and so did Tim. I asked Tim “Do I look like 5yo with this hairband?” he said “Yes, well before you look like 12” hahaha I said to him “I’ve got a date tonight” and he said “with Aggy?” ahahahah! is it that obvious?! 😀

I kept telling everyone (apart asking for my hair) that I got a date and Andy said “Did Thorben approved?” hahaha Thorben said “the date is with me and Aggy, we will watch Marlyn while she’s having a date” and he said to me “Marlyn, we set up a tinder profile for you and now you have a real date” and Aggy said “Yes, we will sit some distance and watch her, like no hands under the table” ahahaha and Andy said “Can I also be on the date?” I said “No, it’s exclusive for 3 of us” and he said “I will buy my own table and then watch Thorben and Aggy watching you on a date” hahaha 😀

We went to Pie Society which is just around the corner from Cages and from Aggy’s home, the place is wayyyy too bright, the food was good but we ordered too many and we couldn’t finished it. We ordered 4 types of pies. Tim warned me that “do not try to steal their food while you’re on a date” and I just “hmmmmmm” Well Tim, report, I didnt steal their food, in fact they were quiet surprise when I said I’m full hahaha

When we ordered (well, Thorben and Aggy did) I just looked at the menu and the pies, it is a dry pie instead of the pie with gravy and so on it’s different from the picture and I kind of told them “But it’s a different pie from this picture” and Thorben said “relax Marlyn, it will be enough food” I still hesitated and he continues “do you want to go somewhere else?” and talked to Aggy “I think I feels like a parents that go with a kid” and Aggy is such a tiger mom she said “No, I will say eat whatever on the plate” and I kept showing the picture on the phone to Thorben and he said “put down your phone” 🙁 phewwwww but yeah in the end I got what I wanted with gravy, sauce whatever it’s called hahaha

Thorben was sooo sleepy during the dinner due to someone went to a party the day before haha. Look at his face, he barely opened his eyes and just yawning the whole time haha sorry Thorben but I caught you in a funny face and feel that I will be too selfish to not share it here 😉

Due to my effort of making my hair, I insisted to take a selfie and Thorben was like nooooo, he’s on the movember look so he’s got to keep his moustache till the end of this month haha but I think the moustache is not that bad…..hmmm

When it was time to pay, I asked how much it is and will transfer it to Thorben but using red packet and the funny thing is me and Aggy wrote almost the same meaning hahaha!

I once watched one of the video from Simon Sinek and it really has a good meaning, he once said in the military they have brother and sister, that’s how they think about each other and if anything from the outside showed up they’re looking for a unified front. He also said sth about courage, that its not something inside of you and you dig down and find it, it just doesn’t work like that, courage comes from external, it’s the support we feel from others. And when I heard it, the first things that popped out in my mind was the obstacle race that we just did few months ago, where Thorben and Aggy was very supportive, they became my courage source even though in the end Aggy had to cancel the race but it was really because of these two I got all the things I needed, I know that I got my unified front already.

Also when I mentioned the guy name that we never heard before Thorben suddenly acted as a protective big brother, it was so funny that he even spent 20 mins looking for a sticker with a guy looking through holes in a newspaper but unfortunately he couldn’t find it so I have to just imagine that haha 😉 so if any of you have this sticker please send it to Thorben’s hahaha so that he won’t waste 20 mins of his life again 😀

What I know for sure if my life would sucks without you <3

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Stay tuned for more stories of Arthos, porTHOs and araMis in year 2019 😉

 

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We No Speak Americano

Guess who’s back? Back again? haha it’s the Food Nerds! It’s all started when Thomas posted a Thanksgiving Dinner options at Zeitgeist, followed by Claudia posted also another Thanksgiving Dinner at Le Bouchon. Which one to chooseee *confused

We were 8 people and Christian did the calculation of which one is cheaper 1180/8 VS 1188/8 and we only pay 1RMB more but we got fatter turkey at Le Bouchon haha so easy peasy! We chose Le Bouchon 😉

Claudia and Sara arrived first, and the door at Le Bouchon is very tricky to open, I cannot even smoothly open it ahahaha and need to waiter to opened it up for me, please excuse me Ms. Praseli wants to get in ahaha. Followed by Christian, Giovanni, Thomas & Nora and we wouldn’t even try wait for Fiona because we suspected that she will arrived at 9 ish while the dinner was at 7:30 sharp! haha but turns out Fiona wasn’t that late, in fact she was pretty on time, sneaky smart! she arrived when the Turkey was about to serve, she doesn’t even need to wait ahahaha. While we were waiting for both the Turkey and Fiona to arrived, we took a lot of pictures, but due to Claudia quote from her “wasn’t in a good day for taking pictures” therefore from many pictures that we took, she only sent one hahaha and here we are looking so natural 😀

Then the turkey came with the Chef Charles ( I suppose it’s his name..or? hahaha) he helped us to serve it but before he cut it, we were so insisted to take picture around the Turkey but in the end we didn’t do it because it’s just too 麻烦 haha

We just stood around it and admire the Turkey in front of us and all the side dishes *drooliingggg

Then there is a what I called domino’s picture but somehow the domino doesn’t effect Gio, he was the only one that stand still hahaha We were slightly debating of who will got it first, and Gio stood next to the chef and he said “start from the biggest to the smallest” and I gasped! and Christian said “then start with me” (because he’s the tallest) but Gio said “no, it’s the biggest” (because he’s the ……….hmmm hahaha) but I got the first one! yeayyy! and Gio said “OK Marlyn, this is only for the picture” hahaha

The turkey was sooooo great, I like the stuffing, baby cabbages, potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, I don’t really like the chestnut not because the chestnut was bad or sth, I just don’t eat chestnut in general. I had the second round, I think most of us make it through second round. And by the time we were on the table eating the turkey, I just realized that none of us are from the States hahaha, we came from either Asian (Indonesia, Hong Kong and China) or European (Germany, Spain and Italian) hahaha we don’t even have a thanksgiving celebration but yeah we participated in glorifying the Turkey! haha Sara’s was the one that prepared so well, she wore one size bigger skirt and at the end of the dinner the skirt fits her perfectly hahaha!

After we glorified the Turkey, Gio insisted to have a dessert as what he said “I just need a spoon of sugar” we were so reluctant to have dessert due to we were full already but Gio got support from Thomas and they ordered the chocolate volcano and creme brulee and 7 spoons hahaha (Christian already bounced at this time).

But then when the dessert came it was just like a war-zone, all of us except Gio were so fast to get the dessert and it’s gone as fast as the speed of light! The dessert was placed in front of Gio and he was the last one to taste it hahahaha and he said “Who’s the one that doesn’t really wants dessert?” haha 😀

We still have food left there and Gio said “we can take it for Diego and Java” and I was like “who is Java?” and Java is Fiona’s dog. and I was like hmmm yeah Diego and Java? on the same level hahaha! #sorry Diego just kidding 😉 Sara took some for Diego and also for lunch for her and Claudia, and Fiona took all the bones for Java, he must be very happy and I bet he wouldn’t be able to jump to the bed ever again hahaha.

Somehow the conversation went to fake teeth, I don’t know how it goes nor that I want to know how can we went to that conversation and Gio said “I need to take care of my fake teeth” and I was like “do you have fake teeth?” and he said yes! haha he said “I’m already old, you can call me Shu Shu” 😀 He thought I was the youngest but no, it’s Nora who is the youngest among all of us.

I hope everyone had a good digestive system as for me, it was such as struggle to sleep yesterday due to my stomach is sooo full and I’m afraid that I could throw it up if I lay down hahaha.

Funny how I can meet my families in Shanghai, I met my bro Thor and sis Gy and now I just found my long lost shu shu Gio! hahaha

Happy Thanksgiving and I give thanks to all of you 😉

 

 

 

 

 

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The Man Who Rejected My Chili Sauce

This is a story about a chili sauce named Belibis,

Dinner time, we gather up…

knock knock knock on the table (need to sing faster on this word)

It’s time for Schnitzel, perfect sauce…

It’s you we’re all waiting for…

Then I go, “Isn’t she lovely? This chiliiiii (need to sing longer on this word) sauce?” And Wesley said “I don’t eat chili” *crackkkk!!! the whole song was ruined” hahaha Elle, I bet you know what kind of song is this 😉

Finally, after more than 2 weeks of waiting for the All You Can Eat Schnitzel! I’m still heartbroken by the fact that we are not having BOGO pizza deals so Gordy had an idea of this all you can eat Schnitzel and he said “Do I need to explain what does all you can eat mean? its not BOGO this is unlimited number of Schnitzel” ahahaha somehow that Thorben would say “mass eater” haahaha 😉

We, well, I did the countdown 48 hours before the Schnitzel deals day which is Tuesday at Zeitgeist! Heloooo free shot Jagermeister please, I’m doing promotion here for Zeitgeist 😀 haha! I even had a plan in my mind that I won’t eat heavy lunch so that I’m keeping myself for the dinner HA! seems like a smart move 🙂

The dinner is here, Elle and Wesley were the one who arrived, and then me. Elle was become a really good host by offering me “Do you want the grape?” haha directly from the garden!

Gordy was late so I guess he rushed to Zeitgeist and while we want to took a selfie to send it to him to make him hurry up and there he arrived, just in time before I pressed the click button. He just came back from Thailand for a soccer team so he’s got a bit of sun burn and Wesley like “what happen with your face?” haha

Zeitgeist has a good membership deal that he will give you a beer glass and you can write your name on it and they will keep it and when you come you can drink beer from your own glass, Wesley was interested about it and he asked for how much the membership will be and so on, so people just FYI it starts with 2000 RMB, 5000RMB and 10000 RMB, and how much did Wesley choose? stay tuned till the end of this story 😉

We obviously eat the Schnitzel as this is the deals!!! It has cranberry sauce and also potato salad which is goooddd *drooling but I still put my Indonesian chili sauce. Elle and Gordy also tried it on their second Schnitzel but Wesley didn’t! My chili sauce got rejected! 🙁 hahaha I thought you put the spicy sauce on the BBQ last trip…hmmmm…how could you reject this sauce *puppy eyes*

For the drinks, we had ciders for Gordy, gin and tonic for Elle, Brander something for Wesley and Brander Urstoff- the friend’s wife’s uncle’s beer from my German friend Dennis haha- (supposedly for me) but then the waiter mixed up between me and Wesley’s beer, so I had brander something (first one on the menu, just like Wesley’s said) and he had mine haha The surprising facts about our drink is that the ice cube of Elle’s gin and tonic was not melted the whole night! the ice cube survived for the whole dinner time! and the taste of gin and tonic is not watery hahahaha what was the scientific reason behind this? we thought that maybe because it’s cold now, winter is coming so the ice cube won’t melt hahaha well, well does this scientific approach make sense? #teachers? Albert Einstein? Isaac Newton? anyone? hahaha

Gordy has definitely 4 Schnitzels, I forgot if he stopped after the 5th or the 6th Schnitzels, Wesley either 3.5 or 4.5 (the other half was from Elle because she couldn’t finished it), I got 3, Elle got 2.5. And after we finished eating it, because Gordy knows one of the owner of Zeitgest, we got free shot of Jagermeister! wohooo

It’s actually taste pretty good, considering that winter is coming, I don’t even feel the cold of the days when I ride back home under the drizzle. Gordy said I should have Jager shot everyday then ahahaha.  And not only that, because Christmas is coming, why everything is coming? haha winter, christmas, Elle’s parents hahaha anything else people?! 😉

we also gootttttt a free ticket for their Xmas Market, at first they only gave one ticket for each of us, but then we cheered and she gave the second tickets for each of us and we cheered again but Gordy said to her “Do not give her the third one for the sake of this place, otherwise she will explode” hahaha 😀 We will go to this Christmas market on the kick-off day! the 30th November! haha

The night somehow has to end because our belly already super full and the waiter asked us if we want to buy the membership deals and what Wesley chooseeeee…… we didn’t buy it ahahaha! in fact Wesley was about to take one of the wood decoration from Zeitgeist hahaha! just in case if the wood stock getting lower and lower it might be ehmmm ehmmm I won’t say the brand ahahaha

During the dinner, Gordy talked that *spoiler! another ads is coming haha The Westin had a pretty nice brunch deal (read: expensive, but full of entertainment) until 3PM they have opera, orchestra, Alaskan crab, caviar, cheese, a stations for desserts! Elle seems interested about that 😉 she just wants to check the cheese, desserts and orchestra and it already fulfill her requirements! haha this will be the whole day brunch, maybe next time 😉 as all of us are still feeling the Schnitzel in our tummy until now and not sure if we are ready to feel the Alaskan crab on our tummy haha what type of feeling would it be *hmmm interesting 😉 maybe we should really try this whole day brunch be in mind it’s a maaayyyyybeeeeeeee even though it sounds an overly excited maybe ahahaha 

We did many ads yesterday! Including the one and only hungover games! me and Gordy somehow will sign you up for the game and all you have to do is be ready!! haha Wesley was also thinking about joining either rugby team or soccer team. Well, in that case our life will be balance, eat and sports, we won’t feel so guilty about the amount of Schnitzel we just had or the amount of Alaskan crab that we will have…someday…hahaha

Meanwhile… another countdown…Gluhwein is calling kring kringggg 😉

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The Mathematical Formula of Raining

Me and Miguel supposed to run on West Bund on Thursday, be in mind that it’s ON Thursday, not EVERY Thursday haha we are not so dedicated in running, we just run because we realized that we need to do a bit of sports. Miguel play archery more than I do so with this running exercise that we are planning to do “every two weeks” it should be enough exercise already haha. It seems only theory to do run every two weeks 😉 however we were trying to be discipline, but….. there will always be an exceptional “but” hahaha 🙂 yesterday both me and Miguel has a bit issue with our knee….however, for the sake of our own commitment we still trying to keep our running plan untilllll!!! the Universe has spoken! hahaha it was rain yesterday hahaha! sooo we took it as the Universe way to protect our knee from getting injured as we both have archery on Sunday 😉 hahaha

So, we need other plan! which is tararaarammmm! Miguel always talked that his fav bread place is Pain Chaud and I’ve never try it before so I suggested him that we go there. And somehow I remembered that the meaning of Pain Chaud was “Fat Uncle” so I typed “Let’s go to the fat uncle” and Im afraid that he didn’t get it, so I said “The meaning of Pain Chaud is Fat Uncle, right?” and he said “No, it’s actually a hot bread” and I was like whaatttt how come I remember it so wrong! not that I never remember anything wrong in my life ever, but this one is wayyyy too far.

And turns out he did say the way to pronounce it is similar to pronounce fat uncle in Chinese which is 胖叔 (Pang Shu) hahaha and I couldn’t help my self to crack laughing when I realize it 😀 This was very funny and seriously I cannot hold it anymore but I can’t be the one in the office that suddenly laughing because of 胖叔 so I need to excuse myself to the bathroom just for laughing hahaha *face palm. Miguel was also giggling and he was so exposed so he cannot hide anywhere haha.

And after I finally able to calm down which is took a lot of time, he started again with typing 胖叔 and even when I’m writing this I still find it funny in some way hahaha 🙂

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And then there’s a time when we met at IAPM and we went to YongKang Road to see the 胖叔.

But then I realized that it’s not the same 胖叔 as I want, because I want to go to bigger and fatter 胖叔 but it was already sometime close to 8 and the 胖叔 need to rest and it will close like 9ish maybe?! and 胖叔 is not a place for dinner as it’s only bread and cakes. So we decided to go somewhere else and then came back to 胖叔, after a 10 attempts of different restaurant, we ended up to gave up the idea of 胖叔  hahahaha I thought of Thorben’s place though because he always have food *wink wink 😉 but in the end we go to Beef & Liberty.

In this Beef & Liberty, I saw my long time friend that I haven’t met, so I said to Miguel that I want to say hi to my friend, and I did came to Julia to say hi and to my surprise Julia said:

J: “There is Agnes there”

M: “Who’s Agnes?”

And then Agnes is the one and only AGGY!! hahaha and I brought her to Miguel and he said “Is this your friend? I also know her” ahahha

What a random day from planning to run but then the Universe has spoken to no 胖叔 and yes to burger. This is a good mathematical formula then haha

Raining = No Running + No 胖叔 + Yes to Burger 😉

Raining = (-) Running + (-) 胖叔 + (+) Burger

Raining = (-) + (-) + (+)

Raining = (+) + (+) = Double Positive!

Me and Aggy doesn’t want Thorben to be left out so we sent the picture to him so he didn’t missed out the news hihihi and I’ve told him that I thought about his place and he said “But I’m not a restaurant” ahahaha *face palm. And another good news is Miguel will be neighbor with Thorben and he has a piano! so Steak at Thorben’s and piano at Miguel’s haha perfecto! wohoooooo

Btw people, me and Miguel really did run before, not so dedicated but at least we’ve done something sporty hahaha.

And if the Universe let us to run again, we will! haha *determined face! (just imagine that) 😀

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The Triumph Of Making New Friends

After being turned down by Thorben and Aggy- they chose to do archery because they both will play on the league wohoo then the one that wasn’t get drafted for the league which is me and Gordy we went with one of travel agency to do a day trip to somewhere located in Suzhou… supposedly (I mean, I don’t even bother to search where was the location and nor does Gordy hahaha) to do “paint ball” BBQ and “hike”.

We were about 27 people on the group and I only know Gordy and so does he and he asked me on the bus “Are you ready to make some new friends?” and I ‘enthusiastically’ said “yeahhhh” ahaha then we both know what does that “yeah” implies to 😉 therefore we have kind of our own competition of how many new friends can we make, not that the numbers matters the most but at least we will try haha

The ride took us for about 2 hours, and I was so sleepy because I am on the way to get cold, I got runny nose and I sneezed every time and Gordy he went to KTV the day before until maybe around 2am, he said he was sleepy but I don’t think he sleep on the way. I mean this is not a sleepy person would do… pffff…

And then we arrived to the “paint ball” and BBQ place, the weather was awesome! I was able to only wear a shirt! This place was kind of hill or something, you can walk around or you can play the paintball which is what we do but it’s not the real paintball like I was expected. It was only bubble water gun, no color and even if you got shoot you still can play it just pretend that you don’t get shot, and we don’t even wear the full body costumes, only the body protection and a color shirt to differentiate which team we are playing. So this wasn’t exactly what I signed up for but yeah we already there anyway, and while on this hill there was a plant that when you touch them they will stick to your pants, so…. after the game I got this seeds all over my sports pants which is not very favorable 🙁 but I still had fun in some way 😉

Then it was a noon time, it’s time to eat! In this BBQ I met Elle and Wesley! Elle and I bonded because of the seeds that was all over my pants haha, she’s helping me to pick it one by one aawww 😉 but me, Elle, Wesley and Gordy we didn’t really do proper BBQ because the smoke was everywhere! like we need a gas mask to do so haha so we just put our food and then go behind the tree or somewhere else to hide from the smoke.

When the tour guide said that we can add some more food then we add more bread, corn, beef from the so called pantry andddd! while I was eating my corn, I saw something wasn’t quiet right, and I asked Gordy “Gordy, what is this? Is this what I think it is?” and he said “It’s a bug”, Wesley and Elle did what a supportive person would do especially when they were not the one that ate that “It’s protein, it will be healthy for you” and I stopped eating the corn after that 🙁 but I continue by eating the other food ahaha. From all 2 hours of our BBQ time, Elle only made one bread haha that she was very determined to cook it by her own because she was so busy hiding from the smoke 😀

Next destination is only 5 minutes by bus from this hills, we went to what so called “hike” but I know it wouldn’t be a real hike, more like a brisk walk with steps and so on. Gordy was expected it to be less people but I think the people on the hike was OK, not super crowded. Two guys was trying to talk to Gordy but because they can’t speak English so I had to translate it in between, and when he asked “帅哥来自哪里?” Gordy said “加拿大” and they said “Oh your Chinese is so good” while to me they just said “Yours are OK” I was like heloooooo, I was the one that doing translation the whole time, he just said one word! and I said mannnyyyyy….. pffff white privilege hahaha and with this it’s motivated me to go hike either faster or way slower to make some distance from them hahaha and long story short we lost them 🙂

The hike was actually pretty good and when we reached the top the view is amazing! and the temple itself its very nice decorated! thumbs up! When we kind of reach half of the top, I tried to sing “The Climb” from Miley Cyrus but then Elle said “It took me a while to realize what song it is” haha I know my voice is not like Mariah Carey but pleaseee hahaha

I was soooo happy when I arrived at this temple, and after the tour guide said that Gordy can use his drone then this is when he had his bonding time with Wesley haha and the picture from the drone is amazing, this temple is surrounded around the greens! *Slide for more awesomeness!*

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On this drone video, you can see that Gordy caught a group of birds flying around the temple.

Well well well, then it is the time for us to ride back to Shanghai, I think most of us slept on the way back. When we arrived we wanted to have dinner at Bar Centrale because it was BOGO pizza but we need to wait for more than 1 hour so Gordy decided to go to Barbarian and I was so heartbroken that I cannot eat the pizza 🙁 but the food at Barbarian was so good as well, me and Gordy had the proper BBQ skewers while Elle and Wesley had a burger, Elle said she doesn’t want to have BBQ again and she ordered a salad as a side dish just for her dignity 😉 haha.

In the end, Gordy revealed the question to Elle and Wesley, a question that “Will we make a new friends from this trip?” and they were laughing. Gordy, I think we did make new friends with them 😀 and this make the whole drama of eating corn with worms, getting seeds all over my pants, the torn was stuck on my finger, the very uncomfortable feelings on my leg was worth it 🙂

Gordy won the what I called “moment of truth” we need to see whose the one that got added on wechat first haha and Wesley added him first but he was humbly enough to say “it was my drone that won the moment of truth game” Way to go, champs! 😀

 

 

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“Masterchef” In Action

HA! The cooking days finally arrived! After so soo sooo many days of planning and 3 of us keep changing the date, finally 27th October is the day where me and Aggy will cook Indonesian dish for Thorben. I mean, after 4 times steak, it’s time to pay back ahaha but since it will be my first time to cook this dishes then it will only be a “trial” dishes therefore I won’t invite anyone else. And if we failed well….. this is the halloween dish haha 😀

Thorben has been very German since Tuesday,

T: Ok, what’s the plan for Saturday?

M: Aggy and I will come to your home and we will cook.

T: What about the ingredients?

M: Aggy and I will go to the market in the morning and then bring it all to your home.

A: Thorben, Marlyn kept saying “Aggy and I” but in reality she didn’t consult it with me.

M: Aggy, we need to stick it together all the time! haha and relax Thorben, this is Indonesian style we will do it only few hours before.

T: I can’t, I’m German I need to have some plan.

Meanwhile between me and Aggy we were like “OK lets go to carrefour to buy the veggies in the morning blablabla” and in the end we met at 2:30 and just go to wet market near Thorben’s haha

I came to Thorben’s home carrying a bag and many plastic with all the ingredients and also halloween costumes insides because after this dinner we will go for halloween party and so does Aggy and we unstoppable knocked the door and Thorben bumped the door from inside haha and I was “tarammm we are here” and we went to his kitchen and put all the stuff on his fancy kitchen set.

The menu for today is bistik, tempe (from fast season food-not from scratch), perkedel, gado-gado (also not from scratch). I was actually more nervous because Thorben made such a good steak, and my dish will be sweet and he can’t really eat sweet stuff and when he took out the tenderloin beef and I smashed it he said “did you just smashed the best meat from the whole cow?” 😀 hahaha Thorben, it has to be like this!

Aggy was sleepy at that time, she was trying to fall asleep on the sofa but she felt bad so she helped us to cut the onions blablabla

because actually Aggy’s part was making the gado2 which is the lasssttt part as it is such a fast salad haha but she helped me to cook the meat because it’s easier for me to explain how to do so and so in my own language although Thorben said “hey, English” 😉

I need to put the sweet ketchup all over the meat and Aggy said “Thorben, I’m sorry there is no medium well option, it will be only well done and Marlyn just ruined the whole good meat, don’t see it or you will get hurt” and I just laughed hearing that but honestly nervously laughed because I don’t think Thorben ever saw somebody pour out sweet sauce over a tenderloin meat haha 😀

There was a slight issue with this meat which is the cutting way it wasn’t as thin and as wide as what my mom said but Thorben said that I should have told him earlier if the meat should be so thin and he can’t cut it thinner especially after I smashed the whole meat for 20 minutes haha

I tried the meat and for me it wasn’t sweet, for Aggy it’s sweet and for Thorben it was too sweet haha so we put salt on it to make it less sweet for him. We need the vegetables for this dish which is carrot and potato, and Thorben cut it, I’ve told him how to cut it, but it still slightly different than my mom’s and he said “did I cut it wrong again?” haha

Thorben kept saying “OK, what else will we make? There are a lot of things on the table”

I said “Well Thorben, we will crash your kitchen, I’ve told you before” he was slightly nodded haha did we really made your kitchen dirty? *puppy eyes*….. but we also cleaned it!

Next is the “tempe” which is directly from the package but Thorben fried it idk too long or less oil or sth like that so the surface is seems like a burnt tempe but still the taste was good! 🙂 , this one wasn’t really impressive to him because we don’t need to do anything else hahaha we just directly open it from the package. Next we made “perkedel” we made a team, at first me and Thorben made the perkedel for the size of small pancakes (that’s how he said it) but then we improved, we became more systematic, I made the perkedel size and Thorben fried it. Ha! efficient German 😉

Then… Aggy and Thorben had a little bit of back and forth conversation of how to make the rice, we said in Asia this is how we make it but Thorben kept changing the way to how he made it in Germany anddd in result we got burnt rice 😉 hahaha! Well, I can’t say anything about the rice because we are suppose to make coconut rice but I forgot to bring the coconut ahahaha

Then Aggy made the very fast gado-gado which also too watery because Thorben apparently pour out more than 150cc of water hahaha but the peanut sauce still taste great! according to my opinion haha everything is great!

While I opened the chili sauce from the packages, I accidentally touched Aggy’s shirt hahaha and Thorben spray some cleaning things so it feels like Im washing Aggy’s shirt, she kept saying “it’s OK, it’s a work out shirt” but when she looked at the chili sauce stain she said “oh, this is quite a lot” hahaha sorry!

I guess, deep fried the shrimp crackers aka kerupuk was Thorben’s favorite haha. Me and Aggy kept saying the oil wasn’t enough but Thorben kept saying he already put many oil and in order to fry this kerupuk, Thorben need to keep back and flip it otherwise it will wrinkle and he said “Jesus Christ!” haha in the end he was using two tools to make this kerupuk, and we need to do it one by one because the kerupuk will get larger and larger.

Aggy kept saying “that’s enough kerupuk” but we insisted to fry more because we like it (and I need to put random facts that Aggy hasn’t showered since morning! because her hot water miraculously stopped working) so Aggy said “Can I take shower now?” Thorben said “Yes, please!” hahaha and while Aggy was in shower, we kept frying the kerupuk knowing that nobody will complaint 😉 hahaha

Finally, the whole cooking episode was finished! tadadaadammmm tarammmm,

But Aggy was still in showered, Thorben cleaned the kitchen and I started eating the crackers and Thorben said “stop eating it, I can hear you” haha and we shouted “Aggy, dinner is ready, hurry up” and then we start to eat and there was a moment when Thorben said “I like the beef” and both Aggy and I was “Thanks God” hahaha

I need to have a pride moment of picture of this day haha, Thorben said “one of you are happier than the other” 😉

Thorben said “so now, we can invite more people to make this” and I said “well, Marina, it’s already more than 3 people” hahahaha *wink wink* 😉

 

 

 

 

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Once A Friend Will Always Be A Friend

Friends…many stories behind, many gossips around, many places visited together, a little bit of misunderstanding 😉 ,sometimes rather annoying XD but still, once a friend will always be and when we meet again no matter after how many years we were apart, we still laughing at the same joke 😀 , we still laughing at the same situation, at the same teacher, at the same people it’s like nothing has been changed but yeah we grow older *face palm*

Thanks to Cepi that drove 3 hours away from Bandung to Jakarta just to have lunch with me. Just spoiler so you know that we were talking about you while dinner with Eddy and Darren and me and Eddy didn’t really get it why Darren was laughing when he knew that you drove away against all traffic from Bandung to Jakarta 😀

We were again had lunch at the mall hahaha! Jakarta is always mall, and besides it’s easier to meet because Cepi drove from the highway and then get out of the highway and there is the mall 🙂 . We had “ayam penyet” and “iga penyet” as lunch, but the standard chili was 15 pcs of chili but I am not sure if I can handle 15pcs of chili so I reduced it to 5 at first I wanted to reduce it to 3 but then Cepi said than it won’t be called as a “penyet” haha And he also gave me a ghost, I don’t know why he gave me the ghost haha but it’s a cute ghost that was painting and maybe suddenly he’s dead haha!

Dinner time! Back again with Eddy and Darren, Darren chose the place and it’s not in a mall! haha it’s somewhere close to my home and it’s a restaurant semi cafe, a small one but very cute.

Me and Eddy arrived first so we ordered and when Darren arrived, I said “this is such a good place and the food is also good” he said “well, this is because I have a girlfriend so I know what the good restaurant is, if not I won’t go to this kind of place” and Eddy said “if you are single, you will only eat fried rice everyday” hahaha. Eddy and Darren always eat fried rice in Bandung, especially behind Bandung airport, I think Eddy was exaggerating when he said “When you eat the fried rice there, you will feel chills because it seems like the airplane will crash you, the noise was sooooo loud” is it??? 😮

Follow up by seeing the mothers! Erin! the beautiful mother 🙂 some people at UNPAR said that I really look like her, once there was someone that kept shouting Erin! Erin! while I walked so that I stopped and I turned around, and he said “hi Erin” I said “Marlyn?” he kept saying “Erin” and I was like…… “I’m not Erin” and he said “OMG you look like her, are you her twins?” …. hmmm people, do I really look like her?

Baby Nina, you’re a blessed child to have Erin as your mother, what a beautiful and smart mother and also! Nina, you have the “Angelina Jolie” type of lips 😉 look at your lips and your cheeks haha your cheeks already fell down soooo cute! and I don’t know why but baby smells really nice 🙂

Continues with mother Monique, but her kids already become a toddler but still very smart and sneaky kid, I bet it’s the genes from Alvin instead from you, well… that’s what you always said haha! maybe you also have a sneaky side 😉  We were having lunch, Indomie was one of the best instant noodles ever! and we had the modern indomie shop and I can’t leave without tasting it, but…. I choose the wrong Indomie so it wasn’t my favorite 🙁

I came to her home to see the kids, her second kid suddenly just grabbed my hand and took me over to see his brother’s tent ?! I mean…..it’s your brother’s tent…. haha why you didn’t show me something that belongs to you?! 😀

And Abraham, you grew up so fast! Smart boy, still more calm than Matthew but you talked a lot already 😉 good job boy!

Monique, you are a very dedicated mother, I really believe in you that you could open your home-school preschool, you have all the curriculum and gosh for sure I would not be able to teach my kid as patient as you *4 thumbs up! 🙂

Like all holidays, it needs to end and back to work…why? Because I have bills! I gotta to pay! so I work, work, work everyday! I got mouth, I gotta feed so I’ll make sure everybody eats! hahaha

Adios Amigos 😉

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Dede with Mom and Dad…. and other relatives

I’m coming home, tell the world I’m coming home. The world?!?! pffff that’s so exaggerating haha 😀 Yais, yais, yais! I’m coming home finally for 13 days minus the flight, so I was at home for 11 days actually.

Crazy Rich Asian was so hits! and I haven’t watch it in Shanghai therefore I was so happy when I found out that it still air in the cinema here, I watch it with my mom. I was extremely happy to see Asian face in Hollywood 😉 Spoiler: I really like the soundtrack of one of the scene at CRA which is Cant Help Falling In Love, covered by Kina Grannis, OMG! that was such a very touching scene! And from CRA followed by watched Searching, gezzz! Searching is sooooooo awesome! not only because it was also another Asian face but the story itself is soooo unpredictable! 😮 My sister was the one that very very very keen about Searching, because it was aired for 1.5 months ago so she was afraid that the movie already taken down and she was right, it was almost taken down but we still managed to watched it! highly recommend!

My parents wasn’t so update about what kind of movies that new released, of course they know about Mission Impossible or another James Bond movie because these are the Hollywood Hollywood style of movie, but for the one that starred with Asian actress they don’t really know. My father didn’t watch CRA, only mom but she likes it, the three of us watched Searching and all of us like it a lot! Me and my father like the movie that was based on a true story, so I downloaded Hacksaw Ridge and watched it with them, and I also asked them to watch Lion. And maybe tomorrow we will watch Venom at the cinema haha! Yes, we watch many movies 😀 But I also learn how to cook Thorben! haha

I brought my HSK 6 book with me because in theory I will learn the HSK back home but in fact I didn’t even open that book! hahaha 😮 gosshhh I think I will have to postponed the test otherwise it will be the same as I’m tossing RMB 650 registration fee to the window hahaha

First weekend, I met the family from my mother side (not all only 2 uncles with their family) and OMG my cousins all are grown ups already! These 3 are the ones that still shorter than me but I’m sure next year they all will be taller than me huaaaa 🙁 but yeah what do I expect anyway 😀 They were 10 yo, 15 and 16yo….. and me… 27! haha!

We went to Abuba steak to kind of celebrate my birthday

But honestly speaking, it was nothing compare to Thorben’s 😉 and I’m serious!

Fast forward to the next weekend, we were at the mall and yes! We as Indonesian went to mall often haha something that maybe European or American cannot relate to that *face palm* and my father saw an orange squeezer on discount to only Rp 20,000.00 which is around RMB 10 and my father said to my mom that this is on discount, let’s have a look on this shop. And we bought that orange squeezer and my mom bought something for the bathub and while we want to pay to the cashier inside, we found out that all the furniture there was also on discount! I mean BIG SALE! and my father just asked the shop assistant “Are you getting to close down so everything were on discount?” anddd! She said “Yes, this is the last day, we will close tonight!” And suddenly out of nowhere my father got all the energy to checked the furniture hahaha! and in the end we came home with a new dining table + 6 chairs, and a new shelf 😀

At first, the reason why we need to buy the new dining table and shelf so that our home will be more neat because everything will be on the places, but not long after they finished assembled it and they started to put everything on the table and I was like “The table and shelf now is bigger and indeed has more space but you will also put more stuff so in the end it will be the same always full and not so neat” hahaha *face palm* it will be full sooner or later as my mom will bring her collections somewhere from the boxes to put it on the shelf haha 😀

Another family meeting! We met 1 aunt from my father side 🙂 we went to Central Park (also mall! don’t get deceived by the name Park and Central) we had lunch there. She was my most realistic aunt! She said she just had a high school reunion, for about 40 years they haven’t met each other and she said all of them they still recognize her, without a doubt, while everyone was still guessing who is who because all of the changes that happened within 40 years but to her, everyone could guess it was her. And I was a bit confused of why? she said because when I was in high school I was already 62kgs and now I’m 70kgs so it was only small differences, while the other was 35kgs and now become 80kgs of course nobody would recognize them. HAHAHA! I was laughing so hard, she said it very relax XD.

And I remembered my highschool, I was between 40-42kgs let’s see in 40 years how much weight I will be 😉

Next family meeting is my uncle from my father’s side but I only meet his kids which is my cousins. They are the youngest cousins from my father side which is 18 yo and 15 yo and kids…. you grown so fast! haha I’m the smallest one then 🙁

Out of the sudden this is the last weekend I’m here 😮 and I’m flying back to Shanghai again on Tuesday morning another 😮 Also, I will see next time I’m coming back home again, how full our shelf will be 😉 haha

Stay healthy and happy Mom and Dad! ‘Till we meet again, hopefully next time we will have full Praseli’s clan 😉

 

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Blessed The Food… I mean THE CHEF!-Part 4

And here it goes the quadrilogy of Thorben and Marina’s dinner!

This time we almost had the full house except we miss the handsome Fredoy 🙁 so we were 7 people with Julia and Frank haha my guess about your name was right 😉 , and then Tim and Ben. Ben is always bring something for the host but he was the last one that arrived. Me, I was the first haha I don’t think you don’t need to ask about that but I wasn’t so German, I came 5mins late from the German dinner time.

Marina made the appetizer of salmon and ham rolled by spinach? or something I don’t know but it’s just soooo good! at first I thought it was kind of sushi but nope it ain’t sushi, and we also had bread! and some special things for the bread which I don’t even give attention to the name because I just busy eating it, but I remembered this things came from Marina’s garden or sth like that mwahaha 😀

Thorben made a different style of steak, mashed potato, different cutting of carrot style, still the same mushroom and salad. But spoiler! none of us touch the salad! huaaa poor salad 🙁 my very honest reason was….. I’m not a rabbit hahaha I need meat! 😉  He texted me and Aggy while he still prepares for the feast, he took picture of the ingredients and it was so tempting already. Cooking for 7 people indeed needs to start waayyyyy earlier.

Ben brought wine with him, and since it’s white wine so I had it as well. He bought it somewhere close by Thorben and Marina’s apartments and he ran into Italian people that asked him to have a drink but then he said “I was actually 15 mins late for a German dinner” and Ben said those Italian were like “Then go, go, hurry up” haha and we were just laughing there.

Frank actually ate quiets a lot. And it was so funny when Tim said “Actually we still have salad that we haven’t touch and I’m not even planning to touch it, there are so many good food here, I’m sorry Thorben” and I was totally agree with him haha! So I think it was Thorben that ate most of the salads hihihi!

Then, the desert always the jackpot! Marina made 30 cheesecakes! She said “Relax everyone there is enough cheesecake for everyone” and she made the new one was the one with nutella and oreo gezzzz! that cheesecake was seriously EPIC! * 4 thumbs up*

This house has EVERYTHING! Once second Ben said he needed tissue and then BAM! Tissue was there, I mean what you don’t have there Thorben? hahaha

We definitely need to play the Ben’s game, up until now I don’t even know what is the name of the game haha. I was using my name, obviously Marlyn and I guess it was Frank and Ben the first one that used the name of Also Marlyn and Not Marlyn and then somebody used the name of Marina, and Marina was “Who’s Marina?” haha. Ben didn’t stay up for long, he left after a while.

I was not the winner of this game that night! huhuhu the winner was Thorben all the time! besides, we all were so sucks at drawing so in the end we decided to play another game.

The second game was faster because we don’t need to draw, we just need to answer the questions. Two people will get the same question and we need to choose which answer we like, and the username of Frank and Tim was: Not Marlyn, Super Marlyn and then Very Marlyn haha!

I don’t know how there was a question like this:

If MARLYN had an underground club, the secret password would probably be……. hahaha I was confused and also wanted to laugh when I read the question 😉 I wanted to choose “Yes, I will cook steak for you” but then it’s too long for a password, so I choose STEAK and all of us chose it and Thorben was like “WHATTT?” hahaha turns out Thorben wrote the second answer and all of us commented because it was too loooonngggg 😉

And it was the best answer so far during the game 😉 If I’m not mistaken, Never Marlyn was Tim? ya? Just like the previous trilogy of the dinner, we always left their home about midnight because it was soooo cozy over there so I personally don’t want to leave 😉

I know there will be a time where I need to cook Indonesian dishes……well, let me put it this way, it won’t be Indonesian dishes but it will me my mom’s signature dish 🙂 So you will have to try the food that I grew up with 😉

Of course I am having a bit of pressure because Thorben’s dinner was and always epic! Therefore we agreed that on the first trial, I will cook for a small group of people to try and to calculate the time that we need to cook. And yes it’s a “we” instead of an “I” because first, Aggy will help and second, Thorben will also help haha! I cannot do this on my own but I will bring all the ingredients from Indonesia because me and Aggy never really cooks so we don’t know if we can buy the ingredients here which I do believe we could… but yeah I just want it to be like more dramatic that I’m bringing all the ingredients from back home hahaha!

Maybe the pentalogy edition will be my dishes..who knows! Meanwhile…… to be continued 😉