I have officially been in Chicago for a day now. My apartment is unfurnished but YES, I have my internet and laptop all set up. Compared to Melbourne, Chicago is HUGE! I’m living in a pretty convenient place though. There’s a McDonalds in the building, although I am not entirely sure that that is a good thing at all. There’s also a few other restaurants and a supermarket. I have read some bad stuff about this place though… so we’ll see. I’m staying in a studio apartment but compared to my studio in Unilodge in Melbourne, this apartment is like a mansion.

Anyway I wanted to talk a little bit about the Icheon International Airport. I took Korean Airlines so my transit stop was in Incheon. This airport is ranked number 1 this year, ahead of Changi (Singapore) and Hong Kong. This airport is in fact very pleasant and convenient. The security check for transitors is simple, just scanning hand carry items, and additional manual bag checking for those travelling to US. I personally didn’t have to take off my shoes but I saw some people did have to. The airport features a host of shopping outlets, food courts, lounges, free internet, and even some R&R activities (for a fee of course). The airport is busy but not over crowded and is in fact very quiet, and fairly clean. Toilet cubicles are a little small though, I would prefer is you were able to drag some bags into the stalls. There’s also Korean culture center where passengers waiting for flights can participate in some traditional Korean activities like fan painting for free and you get to keep the fan.

Side note – I was amazed how easily I got into the US. Immigration was a breeze, they didn’t detain me or anything just needed my I-20.

Here are some photos from my last trip to Melbourne for my graduation.

The Melbourne Aquarium

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I’m not really that into chocolate, especially when it’s a whole lot of it. Between Lindt Cafe and Laurent, I prefer Laurent.

Chocolate tart from Lindt Cafe (more crust, less chocolate please…)

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In my 4.5 years of studying in Melbourne, I had never been on the Great Ocean Road. So I decided that it was definitely something I should do during this visit. And because I didn’t want too drive, we went with Go West. The tour was as I expected it really… I’m not really that into seeing rocks and stuff, but it  provided some nice scenaries.

Bell’s Beach

The Go West tour bus

The start of the Great Ocean Road

Koala spotting

Apollo Bay

12 Apostles

Loch Ard’s Barge

London Bridge

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Visit to the Werribee Open Range Zoo. Worth it to fork out a little more money and go for the open vehicle safari rather than the free safari.

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Delicious (and cute) mini cupcakes from Little Cupcake as mentioned in my Brunch-ing entry (Clockwise from top left: chocolate with cream cheese icing, cookies & cream, chocolate mint, coconut, raspberry with white chocolate icing (center))

So, I have officially graduated from my Bachelor of Commerce degree. I was a rather turbulant 4.5 years but in the end I rather enjoyed my course especially the marketing subjects. After all this time I had come to grow fond of Melbourne although there are also a lot of time that I found Melbourne rather boring. Nevertheless, I take with me many great memories and friends. I hope that the next phase of my life will be even more enjoyable.

For those of you who don’t know who Yasmin Ahmad is, she was  a Malaysian film director, writer, and screenwriter known for her work in the movie Sepet and Petronas commercials during the festive seasons. I personally have never thought highly of our local entertainment industry but Yasmin was, in my opinion, truely gifted and a talented writer. Her works never fail to touch the heart of its audience with it’s humour and it’s ability to transcend cross-cultural barriers. Most of my generation would have seen her movie Sepet and debated over the meaning of the end of the movie, and most Malaysians would have seen at least one of her Petronas commercials for the major holidays (they were always my favourite ones). Her works always portrayed a sense of unity amongst the people of Malaysia or what we Malaysians call “perpaduan kaum”, but not in a cheesy way. She was only 51, and even though she may not be as well-known as the late MJ, I believe this is a great loss to Malaysia. Rest in peace Yasmin.

Craving for Korean food? HGG is the place to go in Melbourne. For me, HGG will always be the number 1 – undisputed – Korean-Chinese restaurant in Melbourne!! For one thing, they have THE BEST gan jjajang (jjajang myun) EVER. Just thinking about it makes me hungry. Also I like the banchan they serve there. My other favourites deep fried Korean dumplings, ddukbukgi, kimchi chige, sweet & sour pork, sweet & spicy chicken, spicy octopus rice, and grilled pork belly. If you ask any Koreans where is the best place to go for Korean in Melbourne, most of them will say HGG. For what you pay, you will receive a generous portion of a delicious dish (unlike some other restaurants…). The staff may not be the best English speakers but they are very competent.

Han Guk Guan

13A, Victoria Street

Near the corner of Exhibition Street. The restaurant is quite hidden so you may have to keep a look out for it.

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I also recently had dinner in Hwaro Korean BBQ. This restaurant is in a sense quite the opposite of HGG. It’s modern, chic, and fashionable. The food is pretty good but the portion is really small for the price they charge. Although the lemon shouju is really nice. The staff is friendly and food came pretty quickly so I can’t really complain.

Hwaro Korean BBQ

562 Little Bourke Street

Near King Street.

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There are also a few good ones on Victoria Street near Victoria Market. Hallah, a modern Korean cuisine restaurant, has a really nice soy chicken but the food there is pretty pricy (well actually Korean food is pretty expensive).

One of my all time favourite things — “rain drops on roses and whiskers on kittens” — is going for brunch. It might sound a little luxurious but believe me it’s not. I’m not talking about doing it every day or week, but now and then – it’s really fun AND SATISFYING (when it’s good of course). I wished I had started this brunching thing earlier but Fi and I only started last year and then we started dragging Annie along, and sometimes Grace as well. There are so many to visit and so little time. But anyway, so far I’ve only got 3 that’s worth talking about.

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Number 1. The Quarter, Degraves Street (off Flinders Lane), Melbourne CBD.

This is the usual favourite place. It’s simple. It’s convenient. It tastes good. The Quarter is your good ol’ fashion cafe that serves breakfast and lunch. Their breakfast menu has all the basic breakfast favourites like bacon and eggs, eggs benedict, omelet, buttermilk pancakes etc., and also some less conventional ones but I don’t really look at those. My usual choice at The Quarter is eggs benedict with (extra hash brown) which uses a toasted turkish bread base instead of the traditional english muffin base but the turkish bread is exactly why I have these eggs benedict, nice an crispy!  I’ve also tried their big breakfast which was ok but nothing special, and buttermilk pancake which Fi loves but I think they weren’t actually all that great – it was a little heavy to me, I prefer my pancakes light and fluffy. I’ve also had lunch at The Quarter before and it’s pretty decent. Overall the food is acceptable, the service is decent, the coffee is not bad – an overall dependable place to have brunch.

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Number 2. Auctions Rooms, 103-107 Errol Street, North Melbourne.

I’ve only been to this place once and I have mixed opinions about this place. Food was pretty good. First thing you should know is that their menu consist of original recipe type dishes, but you can still pull together an order of bacon, eggs and toast. I can’t remember the name of the dish I has as it’s name after auction terms but it’s basically baked eggs with chorizo, and potato and carrot hash – it was pretty good. But there is one thing you should really try from Auctions Rooms, their pancake! Trust me, this is no ordinary pancake. Despite it’s size, it’s light on the inside and crispy on the outside, REALLY GOOD. Service was ok but it was really hectic. Let me put it this way, a place can be busy but still offer smooth service, but here the service was really hectic. Although the staff was really nice, so I guess I can let that slide. The down side was the coffee. Very, very disappointing. The coffee wasn’t hot?!? According to Annie, she revisited the place and asked for very very hot coffee and it can as just (maybe) hot enough. So I guess they need a new barista. But honestly, if you don’t order coffee, the food is pretty good. Plus I kinda like the layout of the cafe itself – it has an open kitchen, a back patio, and even though the place is quite cramped it feels open.

*To get to Action Rooms, catch the 57 tram from Elizabeth Street towards West Maribyrnong. Get off at stop 12 (just before the tram turns off Errol Street). Keep walking up Errol Street past Queensberry Street, it’s not far from the stop.

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Number 3. Gattica, 223 Carlisle Street, Balaclava.

Amongst the 3, I would give this one the highest rating even though I’ve only been there once. The food is good and comes in a generous portion and apparently the coffee is just fine (I didn’t have coffee). The thing which deserves the most mention is their homemade hash browns. I had the hash stack with chorizo, homemade baked beans, crumbled feta, and fried free range egg. The other thing is that the 3 cafes essentially have the same price range but the portion in Gattica is the most generous. They also serve really nice homemade jam with their toast, you just have to ask for it. The food is indeed very good. Even though it’s a little out of the city, it’s really close to the train stop so no worries.

*To get to Gattica, take any train that stops at Balaclava Station. Get off there and turn right coming out of the station. It’s right next to ANZ.

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I have to mention this when mentioning The Quarter. If you walk along Degraves Street towards Flinders Street, there is a little shop that makes and sells THE BEST cupcakes in Melbourne. It’s called Little Cupcakes. If you like cupcakes or anything along those lines, TRUST ME, you will want to stop by this place.

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Another place worth mentioning, as it turns out not a lot of people seem to know about it, is Laurent, a French patisserie located at 306 Little Collins Street (between Swanston and Elizabeth). Forget Brunetti (mediocre and overrated) or Greco (average and terrible customer service). Here the pastries are actually good and none of the staff think they are better than you. However, be warned that the pastries are a tad bit pricy.

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These are the few things that I can remember that I wanted to blog about. Until next time, itadakimasu.

Ok, so I know I haven’t updated my blog in a long long looooooong time and I’m pretty sure that no one even bothers with my blog anyway. However this has been mentioned a few times by my good friends Shal and Ash, so I’ve decided I will make a come back. At the moment I am preparing for my exams, most probably the most important exams so far, so technically this is just a pre-return post. But I am determined to bring my blog back to life! Stay tuned everyone… I’ll be back!!

This is actually a long overdue entry. My housemates and I had decided to try out Supper Inn after hearing good comments from others about the place as well as from the internet. However our experience there was not as pleasant as hoped and has left a rather bad impression on us. Firstly it was rather surprising that there was a minimum charge to book a table so we decided to not do that. However there was still a minimum charge even without the booking but I guess they are not the only restaurants that do that. The food itself was actually pretty good, I was pleased with the quality of the food. However the service was something left to be desired. The waiter/waitress that had served us was not very responsive nor showed much empathy. There were 6 of us there that night and 1 had decided that she wanted to have congee instead of sharing a meal with the rest of us, so rice (which is ordered seperately) was ordered for 5. It came in a little bucket so we had assume that the bucket was for our table to consume as we liked. So when we had quite a lot of leftovers, we asked the girl who had chose to eat congee to try the dishes and have some rice. When the waitress saw us doing so, she came over and told us that that was not allowed as we had ordered rice for 5 people even though the bucket was more than half full, and that if she wanted to have some she had to pay extra. Not only that but she immediately snatched the bucket of rice away without even asking if we were done. I thought that that was extremely rude and we were all outraged. What made it worst was that it was obvious that they did not behaved the same way with the other customers, namely the Chinese speaking Chinese and the Caucasions. It was obviously discrimination! And by people of my own race. Even though the food was good, I have to say that I will never spend another cent in that restaurant ever again.

Well it’s now coming to the end of week 2 of semester 1 of uni… This semester is definitely going really quickly… especially with my service audit project!! Anyway so since being back, I have furnished my bedroom and unpacked, and those were not easy things to do since I have loads of accumulated crap… We’ve also had a house warming bbq… went to the Melbourne Motor Show… and the Moomba Water Festival… Every year I go to the Moomba Festival and see everyone holding a toy they’ve won and I’ve always wanted one and this year, I finally got something… yay!! It’s been a crazy few weeks… so much to get done!!

So I’ve been back in Melbourne for a few days now and it’s good to be back… I’m still settling into my new place and updates on that later… It’s actually been quite hectic and I’ve had very little sleep… Yesterday… Tjia Wen came into the city to have dinner with Ash, Siew Peng and myself in conjuction with her birthday which was actually awhile ago but she was nice enough to wait for me to get back… hence Ash and I made a cake for her… the cake tasted good but there were some unfortunate circumstances, although Tjia Wen said she liked it so I’m glad. There’s still loads to get done before I can get fully settled in like buying some furniture and cleaning the place up. Fortunately, I have time this semester… or do I?!