Bernie’s Blog

We took a fun train ride today with Rebecca. Another first for the little one. First we took the MRT, the bigger of the two trains, to the LRT station, then switched to the LRT, made a loop around, then got back on the MRT. It was my first time taking the LRT as well.

One innovative feature of the LRT train is the side windows. They are made of special glass with proximity sensors that switches from opaque to transparent depending on where the train travels. At areas where the train goes apartment buildings, the windows turn opaque to keep the privacy for the residents, and back to transparent at the stations. Pretty cool in my opinion.

It sure was a little risky doing two exhausting outings back to back, since we were still recovering from the Sentosa trip the day before. However, Rebecca seemed all energetic when she woke up this morning, so we decided to do it.

The Singapore Zoo isn’t a very big zoo, but I really like the “open zoo” concept. Since my last visit to the zoo, I’ve been to the zoos in Hawaii, San Francisco, and even the San Diego Zoo, I just didn’t feel the openness in the other zoos compared to Singapore. I might be a little biased, but you definitely need to visit to make your own judgement.

The elephants might have been Rebecca’s favorite animal, as she was so excited when she saw them. We saw lots of primates, watched a sealion show, visited the Australian Outback, and saw the White Tigers. I think we missed the otters and the lemurs, maybe next time.

Click to see pictures of our Zoo Day.

The sun, the sand, and the sea. It was a beautiful day, perfect for an trip to the island of Sentosa. There are many ways to get there, by bus, train, cable car, or car. We chose to drive.

We spent most of our time along the beach, where Rebecca played with the sand and the dipped her legs in the water as it rushed ashore. There was a bird show too, but that was pretty boring. After the show we walked across a narrow suspended bridge towards a smaller islet said to be Asia’s closest point to the equator.

There were so many attractions there that you couldn’t possibly see it all in one day, especially with a demanding toddler, so we’ll just have to leave the Luge, and the Merlion for another visit.

For dinner we drove back to Vivocity and met up with Rebecca’s cousin Charlotte for some Peranakan food. We then let the kids run wild in the toy store, and playground, and then headed home.

Whew this had definitely been one of the most tiring days of our trip.

Click to see all our Sentosa trip pictures.

Another first for Rebecca – meeting someone younger than her. I’m glad that she was friendly to baby Tricia and even shared her Thomas the Train toy with her.

I just love this picture. They both had their cheeky smiles on.

In her two years, Rebecca has never sat in a bus. We have always driven. So today was special – she got to take public transport! Check out the look on her face in this picture. I would say its a mixture of awe, curiosity, excitement, and cautiousness. When we got off the bus she even said “Bye, Bus!”

With the number of times I’ve had Yusheng on this trip so far, you must think that I’ll get sick of it. Let me tell you now that threshold has not been reached. Still loving it!

The weird thing is that Rebecca loves to “Lou” (pronounced “Low”) – lifting the stuff up with your chopsticks to mix the ingredients. The higher you lift, the higher likelihood that what you wish for will come true. People generally wish for good health, prosperity, good school results, and good luck in lottery.

Maybe it makes her feel like a big girl.

We went to a nearby mall called IMM, where we had Hong Kong style lunch, and took Rebecca to the park that was located on the 3rd floor.

I don’t like putting cases over my gadgets, but when I put my iPhone into my handbag, I worry about the screen getting scratched by my wallet. So what I needed was a pouch-like bag to put my iPhone in while in my handbag. This pouch by Animob looked pretty cool, and it fits my iPhone like a glove. Only S$3.95.

Happy Valentine’s Day! Doug and I were trying to figure put where to go for dinner. One of our first choices was a restaurant located on the 60th floor in downtown Shenton Way, but it was fully booked for tonight. So we decided to go to Vivocity and just see what they have there. There were lines at every restaurant, some longer than others, we just had to pick one. After moving from line to line, we settled on the restaurant called Dian Xiao Er, a Chinese restaurant serving roast duck. The line moved pretty fast, and the food was good. We had duck, pork, fish, soup, and bread. I liked the place.

Delicious curry and spices at Samy’s Curry at Dempsey Road. Loved the Curry Fish Head. Squid’s good too.

When I got my iPhone, I love everything about it, except for the fact that it can’t be unlocked, and the other thing – ringtones. The “right” way is you have to spend about two dollars before you can get a ringtone for your phone. I don’t want to do that because I want to have the flexibility to change my ringtones as and when I want to, and buying ringtones from the iTunes Store isn’t going to cut it. Thanks to a little Googling, I found this neat site that gives instructions on how to get ringtones onto your iPhone, for free. Just tested it and it worked! A couple of additional points to note – make sure your ringtone is no more than 30 seconds long. I made a mistake of syncing a one minute file and spent a good half hour trying to figure out why my ringtone didn’t appear in the Sounds preferences on my iPhone.

Click here for instructions.

Dinner with two of my best friends at Ah Hoi’s Kitchen at Trader’s Hotel.

We had dinner at a Japanese Restaurant called Hanabi. You can’t beat free flow of sashimi.

Rebecca had a fun time chasing and being chased by Grandpa.