Finally after 3 months of disappearance, I am back. In case many of you are wondering where I have disappeared to during these 3 months, well, I went to Mars and got lost there. Fortunately, I managed to find my way back here safely and am blogging now. Ok, I am just kidding and know that it's a lame joke :D Did not update the blog because of several reasons :

1. Laziness & Procrastination

2. Writer's block / Nothing to write about
3. Too Busy ( ok, I know this is an excuse...but who cares...it's the truth anyway)

Just touched down from Milan this morning and am now embarking on my week long annual leave. A short break though but gonna be filled with activities to the brim. No time to rest at home I guess.

Talking about Milan, many of you may go 'WOW MILAN!!! MILAN!!!'. When I know that I will be going to Milan, my reaction was the same. However, there's actually nothing much or fantastic about Milan. Be honest, I prefer Rome. Due to the very short stay there, we did not manage to explore out of Milan e.g. Venice, Lake Como. However, we did mange to visit the much talk about place/icon - Duomo. Let the photos do the talking ...

Lunch @ Pizza joint near to our hotel

Cheese & Tomato Pizza with Rocket Leaves

Sphagetti Carbonara

Guess how long we waited for our food to be served ??? Almost 2 hrs....yes almost 2 hrs and we were freaking hungry and angry. We reached the small restaurant at about 1:15 pm and the poor waitress managed to get our order only at about 1:45 pm and our food only arrived like 2:45 pm ? No doubt the restaurant was crowded ( 70%) but the real reason why the food arrived so late was because they placed us on the last priority. When I asked the waitress what took them so long to serve us the 4 plates of pasta, her reply was that they decided to serve the food to those people who need to go back to work after their lunch. This is even so if they arrived at the restaurant much later than us. As for us, as we have the time to wait, so we will be served after them. What the... So if the patrons keep coming into the restaurant, does that mean I will have to wait till the shop is close before I get to eat my pasta ??? I mean if I have the time in the World, I will wait. The fact that we were so freaking hungry and the fact that we still have to get to Duomo before the sky turn dark at 5 pm made me freaking pissed off. They served breadrolls to other customers but not us. So I asked the waitress why we were not serve any rolls. She said she had none left and will get me some shortly. One word to describe the whole incident: Discrimination. I still prefer the one in Frankfurt...much better service and food can be served much much faster ( within 15 minutes ). Try using that kind of service here and see what you will get in return. I thought its based on first come first serve and not selectively.

Fortunately, we managed to finish our pasta fast and get to Duomo via the Tram before 4:15 pm.

Direct Tram service No. 12 from our Hotel to Duomo ( approx. 30 min )

Duomo :

Really a nice to place to enjoy a sip of coffee and watching the World go by :D

That shall wrap up my less than 24 hours stay in Milan. If I have a chance to go Milan again and have a longer stay, I will definitely make a trip down to Venice, Lake Como, Verona as well as Florence.

Just a couple of weeks ago, managed to meet up with Alan and Fion in Taipei. What a rare chance to see each other overseas! Although we only have a night to spend together, we made full use of it.

First we had dinner at this Toilet Restaurant in Ximending.

Welcome to Modern Toilet Restaurant.

Food in Toilet Bowl while Drinks in Urinal or the Urinal container. And I am not kidding, the food is really nice.

Toilet Bowl Chor Peng - Wonder how long this person haven't been 'shitting' :O

Even the name of the dessert are associated with well...erm... Toilet :P

Shopped around Ximending and had our favourite Ah Zhong Mien Sian before heading to Shilin for yet another food eating expedition...hahaha.

Shilin Night Market

Reliving our Childhood days. Think we managed to catch about 8-9 angel fish & guppies using 4 paper nets. A great achievement :D

Did not know that besides dogs, cats, rabbits, fish and rodents, people also rear PIG as pets. Interesting eh.

Anyway, managed to meet up with Alan again few days after our Taipei trip. This time was in LA. If not for him, I will be bored in the hotel room. Did not venture anywhere except having our supper or rather early breakfast ( abour 2 am )at Denny's and shopping around Downtown Disney.

A very unique traveller shop - love its deco

Build-a-Bear

World of Disney

Lunch with the Gorilla @ Rainforest Cafe - Delicious Food with a unique dining experience.

Just burned a big hole in my pocket :(

Reason : Bought a new laptop and a new camera.

While in Taipei, my laptop bag dropped from the top of my cabin bag and there goes my Fujitsu Lifebook which has been with me for more than 2 years. I have no choice but to get a new one for I really cannot survive without a laptop. I need my MSN. I need my Internet. I need my Entertainment. Went to scout for laptop at Funan the moment I came back from Taipei. I already have a few models in my mind - basically I have set my mind on this Sony Vaios model. However, the salesman managed to convince me to get the HP Special Edition laptop which is cheaper than the sony's one and has better specs. I knew that they are trying to clear the stocks but still I decided to get it in the end. Not sure why. The art of salesman talk. The worse is as I was about to pay for my sony laptop at the cashier, another salesman managed to talk me out of it and get the HP one instead. Afterall, HP is more specialised with computers compared to Sony eh. Anyway, I have no regrets for I am quite happy with my HP laptop at the moment :D Since I am already getting a new laptop, why not get a new camera too. So I got one myself - Canon IXUS 960IS. That's it. There goes my money. Gotta work hard to earn it back eh.

Alright, I think I shall stop here...will update more regularly. Anyway be bringing my parents to Hong Kong this Monday for a short well-deserved break. Promised to be back with tons of photos. So stay tune :D