Saturday, August 30, 2008

Blue Alert!

Approximately 1 year after the Red Alert incident, history repeats itself again.

I think this is the 3rd day of "Paint Your Life campaign", started by no other than our infamous loan shark, yeah, you read it right, loan shark, my neighbour and paint of course.


But this time the loan shark decided to go colourful, adding blue for a change, and unfortunately, yeah, again, my car hit by some of it. 4 large drops, flowed down like a blue stripe, which looked kinda artistic from a certain angle.


2 stripes of the blue paint.


Despite my neighbour cleaned and repainted, it just happen too frequent to do anything. They even put some cover to minimize the damage.

The other neighbour next to this house, was unfortunately suffered some splashes, on his wall as well as his motorcycle. He has already put up a plastic cover over the fence, to prevent unwanted "artifacts" from their "campaign". I put one too over my car, but unfortunately, I was too late yesterday.


Soon it will be everywhere, I guess.

According to my source (my mum again), the husband has been missing for 2 weeks, leaving the wife and children to suffer this kind of threat. And the reason for borrowing money from loan shark is the classic gamble addiction issue.

Monday, August 25, 2008

The medieval town, Tallinn, Estonia

We took a cruise from Helsinki, traveled south, to Tallinn, capital of Estonia. It took approximately 2 hours by Tallink, 39 euros for a round trip ticket, plus 5 euros service charge, for a Sunday trip.


The Tallink cruise.

It was not a good start, because it started to rain after we boarded the cruise.

2 hours later, we landed on the soil of Estonia. We exchanged 20 euros of Kroon, bought a 6 hours Tallinn Card to freely access the museums and other scenery in Tallinn, and began to explore this foreign land.

The plan is to visit the old town.


The entrance we took to enter the old town.


Street along the town.


Seriously, I can't really name all these buildings.

With strong chilling wind and rain, the excitement was starting to die out.


Took from the top of the highest tower in the town.


Another shot of the town.


Old building structures in the town.


Some memorial stone I guess?

We had our lunch in a restaurant at the middle square area, the price is comparable with Helsinki, but the portion is definitely smaller.


Chicken pasta.


Pork chop with wedges.


Another church in the town.


The city wall.

Walking in this chilling weather, with most of your shirt wet, and tired, it's really not something pleasant.


Tallinn was a Russian city, so there's resemblance in their building structure.


Another tower in the town.

The town is awesome and unique, but with this kind of weather and temperature, nothing seems to be catching your eyes, and can't get any enjoyment which we suppose to have.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

A country side weekend, Finnish style

We had a local Finnish country side weekend at Pavel's house, food, sauna, snacks and lots of chit chating.


Trains at the station.

Boarded train H at the Central Railway Station, traveling at a speed of average 138km/h, we reached Jokela around 40 minutes.


Houses in the country side.


Infront of Pavel's house.

There were crackers, hot dogs, pizza, red wine and cola served. While chatting away the Finnish culture, we barbecued the hot dogs, drinking and eating.


A feast.

Under the bright sun, it was not burning hot at all, breeze and breeze of cold wind made the environment just nice, you can't do it in Malaysia I must say.


Hot dogs, I know it doesn't look good, but it's yummy, trust me.

We were playing darts, Frisbee, balls, nothing exciting, it just shows how simple life could be in the country side of the country.


The dart board, we played the famous "Killer" game.

Then Pavel prepared the sauna, and we had a mild Finnish style sauna. Finnish sauna, basically you are cooked in a smoky and steaming room at temperature 80 degree Celsius, after that, you run out of the room, jump into the icy lake, or roll on the snow, then you go back to the hot steaming room again.


For us, we just got it till 60+ degree, and there's no icy lake or snow, but icy cold water from the shower. Cooking at 60+ degree, steam and sweat had mixed together, you can feel your eyes like popping, you begin to can't feel your limbs, feeling numb, and your heart is pounding! It's such an amazing experience.



The sauna, photo posing courtesy of SumWai.


We jumped out here for cold shower.

After the sauna, it's tea time with pizza, different kind of German and Finnish cakes and food. We talked about the life in the country, and all sorts of interesting stories.


Tea time with local cakes.


Going back late.

We had such a wonderful day, thanks to Pavel and Olga! By the way, Pavel is Russian, and he likes Malaysia so much, for him, it's paradise, what do you think?

Saturday, August 23, 2008

Trombone Show, Helsinki Central Railway Station

Helsingin rautatieasema, or Helsinki Central Railway Station, we went there to check out the routes, and bumped into an open performance, at the entrance of the train platform.

With the words "Trombone Show" on their t-shirt, the Finnish were entertaining the passenger and passerby with continuous great peformance.


The peformance is at the entrance to the platform.


Great performance.


Wave and wave of soothing music were presented.


Expert in music.


The crowd surrounded the area.

After several songs, the vocal came in, living up the performance.


The vocalist, entertaining the crowd with his unique voice.

Some video I recorded:

Video 1 - Prelude performance


Video 2 - Musical



Video 3 - Performance recorded from the side



Video 4 - Vocal performance

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

The most expensive mixed rice, yet

This is actually a buffet style Chinese food restaurant. But for us, it looks more like our local mixed rice cuisine rather than a buffet.

Sze Siong has being out of the country for more than 2 weeks now, and his urge for home style food has gone to a new height, so we decided to fulfill his urge by eating here.


First round, black pepper beef, sweet and sour fish, mixed vegetable, with rice. Doesn't it looks exactly like mixed rice?


Layout of the restaurant.


Trays of dishes, I just can't get the mixed rice image out of me when I see this.


Soup, and salad on the other side.


The shop, Hang Zhou Chinese Restaurant. Notice the small note on the yellow notice at the left side of the door.


How much was it? 7.5 Euro, that's approximately equivalent to RM37.5. Hang Zhou Chinese Restaurant is located at Itäkeskus Shopping Center, next to Itäkeskus metro station, Helsinki, Finland.