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Give Paella The Fourth Chance

Finally this time we were having Paella for lunch! And the menu was pork ribs Paella. We were 6 people and Diego’s colleague Carmela brought a Chistorra. Yes we had a starter this time!

Like the Sausage so this was our starter! #yummy! While Diego prepared for the Paella and he said that we can start to make the sausages and Thomas suddenly remembered that he has bread! But still very frozen so we need to postponed the sausage for about 30 mins as we need the bread to be on the oven first

Idk what happened with Thomas kitchen because he can only turn on one stove on so they were kind of “OK, stop this one first and use the electricity for the oven and then continue” and they had kind of changing cable situation on the kitchen mwahaha

Thomas and Diego kept opening the oven to see if the bread got warm as they or should I say everyone wasn’t that patient to wait 😉 and when the bread kind of warm enough they started to make the sausages and eggs and here is our starter 😉

While the boys busy with their own cable and starter, me and Sara was busy on ordering a cake. Last time it was Dutch Pie, this time we need to give other bakery a chance and I suggested that we ordered from Cake Home, the famous Russian bakery 😉 and there was a tie between carrot cake and red velvet cake so we ordered half and half. I asked the cake home guy to write “Happy Birthday Sara” but he said “No, only happy birthday” and I was “what is going on with this guy? He can write Happy Birthday but he cannot write Sara?” and he said “when you receive it you’ll understand” okay then! Make the cake and deliver it to me and let’s see if I can understand 😉

I still hold my previous job as tasting the salt but Carmella and Thomas also had this job so there were a different opinion regarding the salt and the cook choose they opinion instead of me booooooo mwahaha but it still turns out good 😉 Here’s the pork ribs Paella!

And then our dessert arrived! Cake home had a really cute box which is a pink ribbon and turns out the “happy birthday” was a sign so that’s why they can’t add Sara on it and yes I understand 😉

When we received it we were doubting is that even carrot cake? or Tiramisu? I know their carrot cake is not like typical carrot cake but it is!

Unfortunately they were running out of candles! So Thomas took out his best candle which I am so reluctant to put that candle on the cake because it doesn’t really match but Gianna just put it like bam! Here’s the candle haha

Happy Birthday Sara! Hope your thumb heal very soon! Hahaha I think that’s the most realistic wish ever 😉

I think that time was already 5-6ish and Carmela had to leave first so there was 5 of us left at Thomas’ and somehow we keep talking about random things until suddenly a big brainstorm idea came hahaha it was about opening a Taekwondo class but the teacher will have to be Diego, he just need to go back to Spain to earn his black belt and come back hahaha. At first I thought Thomas and Gianna was just joking just put this as an idea but then the conversation getting more and more serious and they were really tried to convinced Diego to be the teacher and Sara said she can teach Flamingo dance and what can I do? Hmmm I can be the admin! Hahaha Thomas and Gianna can be the investors 😉

This was going on until it’s about dinner time around 8-ish and we went to eat Pizza and Fiona joined them for after dinner and Thomas and Gianna told her about their plan of opening a Taekwondo class and she seems to be on board also haha I didn’t know that you guys are serious about this, it’s just so funny watching you brainstorming without any written agenda, Gianna said “it’s all on my mind” mwahaha Well, well, well, let’s see how it goes… Meanwhile, everybody get back to your own job 😉

Even though we had Paella as a lunch this time but we ended up until late evening haha the same things as if we had Paella for dinner 😉

Thank you Diego for making the Paella but my fav still either the rabbit or seafood and Happy Birthday for Sara! and really hope your thumb get fix soon so that we can start doing Via Feratta!

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FAQ Needed!

Jovita prepared this brunch since like a month ago, she has been asking if everyone will be available on 27th April at 12PM for ages. She will bring her polaroid cameras, prepare games and specific topic to discuss, she asked everyone to confirm with the brunch menu one week before the actual event etc etc, full of preparation style. Even she prepared the flyer! Once someone organized something and there is a flyer you know it’s another level of brunch already 😉

Beautiful flyer

The brunch place was at Fogo, the restaurant is in 6th floor but I entered on a wrong door so I had to walked up stairs only to realize that the door was locked and I was like “Damn it!” and went to 5th floor opened the “back door” and the guy looked at me in amazed (read: confusion) “how did you get in from that door?” haha they showed me where is the elevator to go to 6th floor and there I was, on a very elegant place called Fogo. Jovita booked the terrace for us which is unbelievable! The terrace was super nice! the sun is there, the wind is there and what else? haha table, chair, the decoration was just perfect.

She even prepared the “game” (aka Gin game-as the specialty of Fogo is their Gin) I’m not a big fan of alcohol drinks but one glass is fine 😉

Eiman got her gin which is elephant gin, I got my London Dry Gin and Veronica got sth with tea or so. All of our gin’s were very special, just… Eiman was better 😉 and now she will request gin with cheery and apple every time she goes to a bar.

and Jo also hired the photographer that documented the whole brunch. Eiman wanted to punch the photographer on the face because he didn’t stop taking pictures of all of us, he took his job very seriously which rare in these days, it calls dedication Eiman! hahaha

After one glass of gin and tried the other person gin’s we moved to the brunch table, time to eat!

We had 12 amazing women (me included)! #wohoooo we had our self introduction before we moved to our brunch table. The presentation of the food was outstanding. I ordered charcoal grilled chicken tandoori, banh mi and bread and pudding. Turns out the charcoal grilled chicken tandoori was a ceasar salad, I don’t mean to complain but when the guy gave it to me I said “I didn’t order the salad” I mean salad yo on this very cool place? I need to have meat! but yeah turns out it is a salad, he didn’t make a mistake because he’s got all the list of what we want to eat but it’s still good anyway so I’m not complaining 😉

  • Behave for the purpose of the picture
Can’t wait to eat!

The bread and pudding was amazing, they even had a scoop of an ice cream on the side, I spread the ice cream on the bread and Eiman asking me “what were you doing?” I said “isn’t it how you suppose to eat it? with an ice cream” and I saw Jo also putting her ice cream on top of the bread and pudding and I said to Eiman “Look at Jo’s she’s also putting the ice cream so I didn’t do it wrongly, she only did it in a more graceful way than I do” 😉

We were keep eating and talking and the sun was perfect but at some point I need to clean up my sunglasses and that’s the time when I took it off and I was “WOW! this is very shinny” I don’t know how Veronica, Jovita and Lauren handle it as they don’t bring their sunglasses haha

I really enjoy the conversation going on when everyone started to share some stories about everything, their diet plan, the unstoppable brunch or free flow deal that exist in Shanghai, the coffee enegma things that Mable did. The conversation went randomly to a Filipino ayi mwahaha completely other directions from diet but yeah we’re women, we love to talk 😉

I especially like the story when Jovita’s did her skydiving in New Zealand and after that specific moments, she decided to quit her job. She said that when you jumped out of the plane, you see everything from the top and there was some moments where your life flash before your eyes and you can make a clear decision afterwards. Similar with Jo’s, Veronica’s friend also did a skydiving before she decided to went back to Australia and somehow this is such a must before made a decision 😉 knowing that not only Thorben and Marina did skydiving makes me and Eiman want to do it also! Eiman, I will have to go before you! otherwise I won’t jump out of the plane 😉 It will be super cool if the next meeting with these wonderful women was on someplace to do skydiving hahaha!

The afternoon went just like the speed of the light suddenly the food was finished! oh nooo… and we moving on to our “discussion table” the topic that Jo asked us to research was about endocrine system but in the end we discussed about sth else which is feminity, and Mable gave us the tips and tricks about how women need to behave in a certain way on a workplace, just wish that I will be able to behave like that someday…or probably never! hahaha

Finally there was no photographer around us anymore, Eiman must be so happy! hahaha but at some point we need to leave because it was already almost 5PM I guess? and we all either had something or the weather were just getting more and more windy, I mean we were on the terrace yo so it’s cold! hahaha

Thanks Jovita for organizing this brunch and gave me the opportunity to feel how superstars are with a photographer around 🙂 thank you for all the preparations that you made for this brunch, I mean look at this name tag this is not made from a shitty paper kind of things, this is a serious name tag, if I zoom in the picture you could actually see a pattern on the name tag! Eiman reminded me to take it home for the next event, so Jo pay attention, Eiman has her name tag and she need to brings it to the next event 😉

Thanks for making the food deals for us I know that me and also Eiman! we are complicated “can we just order ala carte?” “we don’t want to take the free flow drink”, “where is the place?” I mean we basically asking many many questions frequently, you might need to make an FAQ next time mwahaha

Last but not least, it was very lovely to meet another 11 women! <3

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Give Paella The Third Chance

All equipment are sets since last time Diego cooked Paella and such a waste if we only used once, due to Thomas already did a “big investment” for it then we (read: Diego) need to use it again and again and again 😉 Yesterday- Easter Sunday, 21st of April was our 2nd time of successful Paella dinner! (out of 3 times trying)

Diego insisted that Paella is for lunch, not for dinner and Thomas supported this thought due to last time we did it on dinner time and he need to cleaned up and it took him a loooooonnngggg time to do the cleaning, sorry Thomas! but…. someone (read: Gianna) couldn’t do that so for this time we will also do it on a dinner time but we all will help Thomas with the cleaning #determined and then Thomas agreed! well, Diego need to agree as well, he need to adjust his thinking (again) that dinner in Shanghai is equal to lunch in Spain 😉

The cook- Diego and Sara arrived first at Thomas’ and then me! then Hanna and Elena (Idk how to spell your name, sorry if I spelled it incorrectly) followed by Gianna and last but not least Fiona. We miss you Christian, get well soon! and hope that you’ll learn from the fact that one beer always lead to another 😉 hahaha

This time, Diego made a seafood Paella, Thomas did the cutting, me and Sara did the garlic sauce… well basically I just put the egg and garlic on the blender and the rest was Sara haha but I still made a contribution to the Paella! I also put the ink and became the salt tester 😉 I tasted it even when Diego didn’t ask and at some point he said that I need to stop otherwise we won’t have enough soup for the Paella #ooopppssss

While Diego and Thomas doing the cooking, we, the girls were just chatting 🙂 The topic was Sara’s thumb injury that still need 6 more weeks 🙁 huaaa but hope that this really the last 6 weeks you ever needed! also her story when she came back from Singapore to Shanghai and at 5AM ish, she’s been followed by a guy #woooo spooky! nope, not spooky at all because the guy made sure that Sara knows that he followed her by spitting all the time gezzz! also her neighbor that played the piano at 6AM on the weekend! and mind you that her neighbor is not playing some kind of Beethoven or Mozart but more like practicing which is only do-re-mi-do-re-mi #poor Sara and Diego! and we, girls were creating a story of how to stop it, maybe we need to buy Sara violin or cello so she can also practice it at 6AM on the weekend 😉 hahaha

Btw the boys really did a good job!

  • Looks
  • YUMMY!

Fast forward to around 8-ish, Diego said to me “Marlyn, it’s getting ready, I already covered the Paella” and good good! Diego and Thomas was worried that it won’t be enough and we were thinking maybe we need to order pizza etc but Thomas got even a better idea, he said “If it’s still not enough, we can order Dutch Pies” and me and Sara were just “woooooooo” sooo do we ordered Dutch Pies in the end?! let’s see but first take a look at the final Paella 😉

Perfection!

The chef reaction….

  • It looks good, Chef!
  • It is!

And the eaters…

  • Our belly is as happy as our face

We killed it all! I had many prawns while Diego only had 1 maybe mwahaha I realized it when I need to put the prawns not on the plate and the other people still put it on their plate, it means that I ate a lot and then I asked Diego “Did you eat the prawns, where is the rubbish?” and he said “No, I haven’t eat it” and I stopped eating the prawns hahaha

Sadly Hanna and Elena need to leave 🙁 the rest of us still there!

The Second Round Crew

After the Paella we still need to eat something and this is where the Dutch Pies begin! Sara ordered the surprise package wohoooo so we will have 7 different flavors since it takes one hour to deliver it so we continue with Gianna The Storyteller 😉 Being the longest time in SH which is almost 10 years, for sure she witness all the growth of SH, the convenient life and technology that we feel today, she didn’t get it 10 years ago but this is what makes her story interesting! Especially the story when she tried to corrected people on how to behave? yeah that doesn’t work girl, just move on hahaha! I really love the story when you wrote the “love letter” to the police haha that really was EPIC! followed by drunken Thomas and Giovanni in Hongkong, yo, taxi in Hongkong is not cheap! Thomas you wasted the taxi fare haha! and the story about you and Thomas’ mysterious friend that made me and Sara wants to meet him while Diego wasn’t around 😉

After so many times laughing, Diego kept saying “Thomas checked your phone” he became grumpy and all of us actually became grumpy, “Where is the dutch pie?!” but we cannot complain because from 饿了么 it’s written around 21:51 it will arrived, but then 21:30-ish the bell rang and we were “Open the door! that’s the Dutch Pie” and here it is our lovely surprise package 😉

  • TADAAAMMM!

At first we thought one flavor each but yeah we became barbarian and just pick it with our fork every flavor hahaha so we got to taste all flavors! and my fav goes to…. all of them except coconut and strawberrys 😉

The last moment the cake looks like a cake

What a dinner! and I did the washing! Gianna also did the cleaning, Hanna and Elena helped to throw the rubbish, Thomas uninstalled the equipment, I called it TEAM WORK! hahaha

Not only us that had a good food, Demon and Luna will also have many fish for his breakfast 🙂

We even have set up the Paella LUNCH! next month! finally it will be lunch 🙂 we all already write it on our calendar so…. it really should be lunch time. What will be the Paella theme for next month? Stay tuned 😉

P.S: Thanks Diego for cooking and also Thomas 😉

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Give Paella A Second Chance

Two weeks ago the nerdies was very excited to have our Spanish Chef-Diego as he would make us The Valencia Paella, the dish that he knows the most, even Sara doesn’t count as someone that knows how to make the real Paella 😉

The grand plan of the Paella started at CNY and Diego kept saying that we need to have the special pan with the diameter of 40cm, special stuff blablabla and Gio always said “Don’t worry about small stuff.. It’s easy to arrange, 小问题” and with the help of Thomas that miraculously order the things that we need the most which is stove and pan from Taobao where Thomas doesn’t even read any Chinese, I’m sure Nora helped him hahaha

Within the week, the equipment was “there” and I guess on D-day which is Sunday morning Diego reveal what we need for the Paella, and there was many conversation about who will bring what but in the end Sara was our unsung hero, she voluntarily bought all the ingredients 😉 up until…. when we were 3 hours away from the dinner plan, Thomas couldn’t find the connector for the special stove and the tube 🙁 so what did they do?

I was so sure there was about more than 100 chats on the group and I couldn’t even follow it anymore. Gio and Fiona checked from the shop near his home if there is any connector, Fiona suggested Thomas to go to B&Q to buy the connector there but due to Thomas doesn’t speak Chinese so he need to carry the stove as well to make sure that he didn’t buy the wrong connector. If B&Q doesn’t have it then no place will have it. Besides B&Q Thomas also wonder to several small shops on mobike with the stove ahahah 😀 and….. after wondering around the answer was a NO! We don’t have the connector!

Then how about the dinner? are we still going to make it? so Thomas went to Metro and he said “The decision needs to make now” haha therefore we postponed the Paella night and Thomas bought other ingredients and he became the cook for that night! wohoooo he made A Big Pot Chilli Con Carne 😉 and there it go, out of the sudden, potluck dinner was arranged and it went smooth! Sara brought cheese and Iberian chorio, Gio brought baguette, Fiona brought dessert and I brought Marina’s homemade waffle! Claudia kept taking out the chili from the pot so it wasn’t too spicy 😉

And right 30 mins before we suppose to arrive, Thomas found the connector on a different package from the 快递 guy pfffff after all this drama turns out the connector was at his home the whole time hahaha he just didn’t open it #facepalm!

Thomas said he never cut this much onions on his life ever and yes that’s a googles for cutting the onions hahaha

But the night went well, the food was good! and all of us were happy as always 😉

Well, I should say we learnt from the experience hahaha we became more prepared, rabbit was ordered for our Paella the following week 😉 and this time Nora made tiramisu dessert!

Diego started to cook since 6PM and we started to eat I guess at 21:15 hahaha and I had a very important role that night! which is to taste if it’s already salty enough 😉 this is the key role guys! neck to neck with the cook 😉 hahaha

Hola Paella!

Gracias Diego!!! I like the Paella, it was my first time eating rabbit and surprisingly I like it, I also like the burnt rice!

  • ALL
  • GOOD!
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Blessed The Food… I mean THE CHEF!-Part 5

New Years! New Menu! Thorben switched the menu from steak to pork! I am not a big fan of pork, like pork belly and stuff because I don’t like to eat fatty stuff but when it come to Thorben is the cook then I believe it will be worth to try and worth to put my “I don’t eat this on my diet” aside 😉

It all started when Thorben still in Germany, he brought all the ingredients from there, wohoo I will eat 100% imported stuff, finally! I feel like a King haha. He wrote us the things that he brought with him.

hihihihi

Thorben always so German, he started to cook 24 hours before the day hahaha on Friday he blanched the kale, the 6kgs of kale #shocked!

Saw that it was a lot of kale, I asked Thorben how many people will it be? are we having a full house (read: 8 people)? and he said 12, so we will have an overload house! but my mathematical side came out, oh 12 people and 6kg of kale so each people got 2kg, should be OK. Mind people, it was in the morning, and my brain doesn’t work well in the morning with math’s issue haha 😉 but somehow Thorben’s brain works well in the morning haha he still on jetlag mode but he’s still able to corrected the math #face palm!

I arrived first, obviously haha who else it’s gonna be 😉 followed by Yves and handsome Freddoy, Boramy, Aggy and last one was Luis and Ben. Yves brought the beer from Luxembourg, Luis and Ben brought a lot of 胖叔 cakes *droollinnggg. Freddoy become more and more handsome and I just squeezed and hug him a lot so cute! 😉

Due to the table only has 8 chairs so they have extension table but this table was low, they called it baby chair and they want me to sit there but nope nope nope, Marlyn Praseli ain’t sitting on that chair, I need to sit on the middle, the center of all the food 😉

Marlyn IS the center of the foods

Thorben gave the explanation of what is what, we had pork belly, pork neck, sausages and not real sausages because we can’t eat the skin.

There was wayyyy a lot of food for everyone but for the beginning, we share the sausages and since I was sitting on the middle, I helped well… Yves said to me that I need to do the cutting of the sausages….. (hmmm it doesn’t sounds right….) but yeah I cut it up until the point where Rich asked me “Is it your plate or is it the cutting plate?” haha

I like pork neck the best because it’s not that fatty, Aggy and Boramy like the pork belly the most, Yves eat everything 😉 and surprisingly Thorben also prepare the dessert! wohooo when he said “I also have dessert” Freddy replied “But Marina is not here” hahaha 😉 Marinaaaaa come back pleaseee! Here is Thorben’s dessert!

We had the pink and yellow color: Rote Grütze mit Vanille Soße, the snow white bread: Christstollen, Marina cookies and whole Pain Chaud 😉

I was really really full after the dinner! Syuke came after we finished the dinner, he came for dessert and we just spread around after that. This home has many games! Thorben just bought I guess 6 packs of Cards Against Humanity! but we didn’t play that, we played the game called The Mind.

This game is rather odd hahaha, Thorben explained it and me, Aggy and Boramy was putting our hand so fast and so loud and he kept saying “We don’t need to put it that fast and loud” haha but still it’s the fun. Long story short, we sucks at the game, only until level 4, idk how Thorben played it with his family until level 8 hahaha. how how how?!?!

Then we heard a story of Boramy’s grandma and I got a conclusion that she is a magic grandma because when she was 85yo, somebody tried to robbed her but they failed miserably! Her grandma hitting him with her cane hahaha idk if I should laugh or how but I admire the courage of your grandma 😀 I’d better be nice to her, because like grandma like granddaughter (if this idiom does exist anyway hahaha)

And some people gone to another farewell party or birthday party, I was staying and played Awesomenauts with Thorben’s and then when I became confident with my skill, we increased the level and we suckssss! we need help from Brendan haha Brendan came after midnight with Nintendo switch and with Brendan we won some battle.

After that we played Mario Kart, at some point three of us became team, the goal is not to get caught because if you get caught you will be put on the prison and need the other team member to free you up. When Brendan say it, Thorben looked at me as if I’m the one that will be caught, hey guys! I know I’m not good at Mario Kart but….. haha and then 3-2-1 HA! BURN! Thorben and Brendan get caught first! Suddenly I felt like I’m the hero that saved both of them #proud of myself 😉

Then we moving on to another game, Mario Smash Bros Ultimate. We also choose characters, I was Kirby but then Thorben became Kirby and I was Pack Man. I thought it was also a team of three of us, but Idk why Brendan was kicking Thorben and he said “Because he is kicking me” and then I realized that 3 of us were enemies and should attack each other hahaha

Then, after so many yawned, it was 3 AM! It’s time to go home, while we were getting out of Thorben’s, Brendan said that Thorben’s apartment is really good and really big, does he need a roomate?! and I said “HA! if he ever need a roomate, I will be the first one that apply! Brendan replied “He won’t choose you, you’re too intense!” well well, I don’t think he’ll choose you either! 😉

What a good food at the beginning of the year with the best people in town 😉

Thanks Thorben for the dinner, NEXT! HAHAHA 😉

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The Diary of Marlyn Praseli

The Diary of Marlyn Praseli only for Marina Kern! Yes, you Kern! hahaha I wanted to write “Yes, we Kern!” just like the photo frame on your home but then between me and you, the Kern is only you haha so I changed the “we” to  “you” got it got it? 😉

This is the things that both of us like! FOOD! *droollingggggg 😀 But of course sometimes I eat with the customer and I cannot really take picture ya because I need to behave! hahahaha so far this is the max pictures that I can documented 😉

Starter!!! We need to have Schnitzel! However, the first meal I had in Germany wasn’t German food but Turkish food as lunch ahahaha 😉 so I haven’t officially arrived German unless I had the Schnitzel haha but the Turkish food was good also, so can’t complain 😉 In Oberammergau I had some meat with potato salad, it should be a typical German food which is good also! So I don’t mind to postponed the Schnitzel until dinner 😉

Next! We moved to Poland, the city called Ustron. The highlight of Ustron was when I braved myself to eat someting called Osobuco which means knee haha and I tried the knee of the deer, I didn’t expect it’s gonna be this big!

I sent the picture to Marina and her comment was “the potato looks good” ahahha don’t you see the deer knee hellooooo lady?! Aggy comment was “It looks good, just like what we had back home, oxtail soup” Well, ladies and gents this is the moment you’ve been waiting for (hahaha suddenly remember one the soundtrack of this is the greatest showman movie) the taste was rather unique I will put it this way, but if I got a chance to do it again, I probably would choose other food hahaha so hope you got the point 😉 wink wink, no offence to all the deer knee fans out there #if there is any hahaha!

Besides this deer knee, we also had dumplings the polish name will be Pierogi which is good! The decoration of the restaurant itself is really good, it’s like the Victorian style kind of haha it’s not special in polish food but more like a fusion. We also had some polish  special shot kind of which sorry but I prefer Jagermeister more 😉 hahaha

In the office, we have Lukas that made a corn flakes with chocolate wogghhh Amazing! I always eat this when I was a kid with sprinkles and stuff so this is goood! and Julia made a vegetable train toottt tooottt! I thought its called hummus but its not, she searched it on linguee the translation of how it’s called but yeah I don’t even remember it haha.

We also had doner kebab like 10 mins driving from office, the portion is big and it’s owned by a Turkish guy (supposedly) hahaha but somehow I found the entrance to the restaurant looks like a prison haha and this is where Lukas hurried me up so he appeared on my pictures HA!

I had the very typical kebab doner with beef 😉 the decoration of this restaurant is very unique even though it looks like a prison from the outside but the inside is they have many ornaments of BVD football club.

As Christmas is around the corner so some restaurant has their own Christmas dinner specialty and I ordered the goose leg 😉 haha it was soooo good! After the dinner, our colleague order a very cute desert 🙂 the hearts and hats of the snowman was the most delicious one (hmmm sounds like a psycho 😉 ) and they also had pocky! my childhood snacks hihihi

Then before we visited Dortmund Christmas Market, we had Italian dinner, with Italian food, it really hard to go wrong. In this restaurant they had a very fancy sparkling water bottle haha, Italian, always with style 😉

And then at Xmas Market, I had Gluehwein but Julia got a Cocoa with some alcohol inside, if I’m not mistaken it’s called lamomba or something like that and turns out it’s better! I didn’t know it, I only know if on Xmas then Gluehwein is a must, maybe because they don’t have Cocoa with alcohol here so that’s why I didn’t order, but next time I know what I should order haha

After 2 weeks of Western food, the Asian part of me came out haha, we had Japanese lunch at Dusseldorf where then I bought my Yves Rocher cosmetics stocks for a year hahaha. The restaurant called Yasabe, it was a small restaurant but always packed! or maybe because the size restaurant itself is small? haha but anyway the food was yummy slurp slurp!

What is more surprising is that in Dusseldorf I found many mobikes around! but the style are different than what we have here in Shanghai, and I just wonder if I can open the mobike and turns out yes I can open it! But then I forgot the size of European and Asian are very much different, I already adjusted the seat to the very low but I cannot touch the ground, my foot was maybe 15 cm above the ground and it simply hard for me just to get on the bike itself 🙁 pfff I need to locked it again and it charged me 7.8 RMB I forgot that Euro is so expensive hahaha!

Before saying goodbye to Germany, I need to have another proper German food and the last meal that I had was a very nice beef! I google translate the main menu and it was beef something but it came with salad and so on and the salad came first and I was like “where’s the beef” hahaha I didn’t pay attention to the sides other than beef but then the beef came with potatoes, I just need to relax 😉

So Marina…. here it is! the food documents that are able to be documented, of course there were many snacks, beers and other food that I didn’t take picture of, I don’t want to surprise you with what kind of food and beverages I had in Germany hahaha.. but I’ll give you some sneak peek 😉 continue scrolling!

Then…. time to say…. Hello to Shang Hai!

P.S: I haven’t had cheese cake so far 😉

Cathay Pacific will take me back to Shanghai 🙂

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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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“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 😉