Racoons!

Half the time when I’m there, I couldn’t believe that I’m actually there, you know? The weather was balmy and breezy, kinda like mild version of the Bruneian weather. The sky was so blue, you wouldn’t believe and the sand was so soft. To think I was actually there seems kind of surreal now.

People there were really nice to me and eventhough we were advised not to roam around, we couldn’t help ourselves. We wanted to try exploring some near by strip malls. Well…they seemed more like run down shop building to me but hey, sometimes you dunno what gems you might find in all that dirt.

Victoria Secret. Where I got a bag, a blusher, a lipstick, a couple of card tags... and underwear. Hee. Very secshee. Sorry, cannot see. I'm shy.

Plus my blog insurance doesn't cover mental trauma caused by images.

So we strolled down one lane looking for dinner. Didn’t know what we would find, nor did we have the faintest idea what dinner we wanted. It was a fresh sense of adventure exploring the unknown in a foreign country. It was funny to think of me now looking at a laundramat and all the time feeling like I wanted to try it out, you know, washing the laundry at a laundramat. Hehe.

There was a family of racoons living in the bushes near the hotel. So we fed them some pizza. One wanted to sneak up to me to steal my tiny tub of Hagen Daaz chocolate ice cream!

Lets see…we ended up at a pizza place called ‘New York Pizza Place’. It was a tiny place tucked away at a corner and I felt kind cozy there, waiting for my order, watching people come in and out. They would place an order for a single slice and coke. Then gobble the whole thing up while standing. There was a middle aged couple, a tiny woman and a large man, both chatting over the counter with the staff. Dangerous? Well, maybe, I mean our neighbourhood was in the industrial area but it seems pretty alright with me.

I went to Aruba Restaurant where they serve really nice bread and yummy nachos. It was close to the beach and so we strolled around, taking pictures, testing out the water with the tips of our fingers. (I didn’t know we were gonna be going to the beach or else I would be wearing something else.) The girls and guys sun bathing there were hawt and I mean HAWT. *phew*

When we were leaving the place, we saw a plane flying the banner behind it with the words, ‘COLLEEN WILL YOU MARRY ME?’ which was the most romantic thing I’ve ever saw.

Then my sense of humour had to spoil it.

It kept thinking things such as

*What if Colleen didn’t see it?*

*What if Colleen was in the loo?*

*Or Colleen was in the middle of dumping the guy?*

*What if Colleen was in the middle of screwing with another guy and she thought the OTHER GUY was proposing?*

My God, my mind was falling down into a dark dank well at a funny farm.

Food For Thought

Ft. Lauderdale is more of an industrial/business area so all the tourist parts are a bit far off. Taxis there are bloody expensive mind you. A trip half an hour would easily cost you $45 - $50. Oh but the food was amazing. Whatever I had, I loved it. Well, except for rice. Their rice was terrible.

What did I have? Omg, my mouth is just watering already thinking about it. I had turkey (they just finished with the thanksgiving hols) with mashed potatoes along with a serving of mac and cheese. Heh, mac and cheese, how American can one get?

I had roast beef with sweet potatoes (that’s an interesting side dish, I mean I seldom see mashed sweet potatoes served with meat.) Their sandwhiches put ours to shame. Just rolls and rolls of beef/ham/chicken slices between burger buns, wholewheat bread or wrapped in tortia bread.

Of course got to try some of their pasta as well, oh god, the portions were just huge!

Even when I’m in the habit of polishing off whatever was put in front of me, but this time I just couldn’t finish everything, there were just too much! I was so full that I didn’t even savour their dessert selection no matter how tempting it looked.

Pizza! Spagetti and meatballs! We had them for dinner one night and the slices are just huge. So huge in fact that we saw several customers come in just to order a slice or two and eat them standing up right then and there.

There’s nothing like visiting an actual diner to have apple pie, a glass of milk and a hot fudge sundae! Felt like Archie and the gang were gonna walk in any minute! XD A shop full of candy! Sweet tooth heaven and a promising future for cavities!

Then there were the typical American novelties that I had to try, like candy apple (there were chocolate apples too! I didn’t try them but they looked delish!), gummy bears, jelly beans, gum balls and beef jerky. I got my brother some beef steak jerky, he was estatic. Ding dongs and pop tarts were really sweet and I think ppl just make too much of a fuss out of them.

Nothing like having a fun night out in Miami’s South Beach, however a meal there for 3 people were USD$180! I nearly fainted. All we had were some pasta for 3 ppl, alligator meat appetizer and two pina coladas. The service charge alone was around USD$30. Outrageous. Well I guess that’s Miami for ya.

I stole some Miami sand in retaliation and will distribute them amongst my friends when I can find those tiny glass bottles. Yes! You hear that Uncle Sam? I stole some of your precious American soil! Take that! Ha! See la! That’s what you get when you drop a bill with seriously overcharge service tips on the lap of a Chinese woman. Want a tip? Here’s a tip, next time give us tourist a warning when you’re gonna rip us off under the pretense of ‘service charge’, alright? Bloody real time robbery.

Oh but I had some nachos with cheese at Aruba restaurant at Ft.Lauderdale beach and they had salsa dip too. I would kill someone for those nachos right now. Mmmm, nachos…

Finally the final meal was juicy steak from Outback. Seriously the best steak I ever had. I’m a meat lover. I just sleep better when I had my meat for dinner. Sad but true. Oh, but that hunk of bovine was absolutely divine. *sigh~* I was smitten.

Oh, but the most disappointing was Taco Bell. I mean, having heard so much about it, I thought there would be a reason why it’s so popular. I can basically sum it up in two words, tasteless messes. That’s that.

OK! OK! Enough about the food! I’m hungry right now as it is. Gonna go dig up something to eat. *sigh* I had to blog about food, eh?

To be continued~!

And I'm Leaving In An Airbus ~ ~ ~

The trip started out ominously enough for me. I stayed up until 4 in the morning packing and doing last minute check ups on everything. So no surprise that I ended up feeling like a zombie the next day at the airport.

My brother sent me to the airport and stayed there with me until it was time for me to board. It was actually nice having my brother around once in a while, especially when he’s not being extra dumb.

New airport rules now states that we cannot carry any liquids in our hand carry. All liquid-ish stuff has to be under 10ml and in a zip lock sandwhich sized plastic bag. This means no bottled water or other kinds of beverages can be hand carried into the plane which sucks for me cuz I need my water. *sigh*

Travelling from Brunei to Bangkok took roughly 3hrs of travel and we had only 1hr to switch planes. Luckily we managed to catch our flight to LA.

The 14hr flight was not kind to me, I tell you, cuz it was cramped, dark, and cold. For some reason my ear piece wasn’t working properly. It was the most miserable 14hrs of my life. I tried to sleep and couldn’t because there was a baby sitting in the row before mine who kept on crying every few hours.

I tried to read but the lone light glaring at my book while the rest of the plane was dark just made my eyes sore. So I tried watching movies but with my ear piece not working properly, I couldn’t make out what ½ the stuff Catherine Zeta Jones was saying. I’ve even requested new ear phones and they turned out the same. It must have been something wrong with the socket or something. All in all, I was glad that we finally landed safely in LA.

Rush, Rush, RUSH. Go, Go, GO!

I swear we rushed from one terminal to the next. The place is huge and kind of confusing. Thank gawd we didn’t get lost.

Still we missed our connecting flight to Ft.Lauderdale. Argh! The nice lady at the check in counter put us in the next flight out of LA to Miami, which is about an hr from Ft.Lauderdale. Beggars can’t be choosers.

When we reach there after 5 hrs, it was good that our driver managed to find us.

It was already eight in the morning. We had like an hour to change, shower, and freshen up before our first day of training. One problem though, our luggage somehow ended up flying to Chicago of all places. WTF?

It will only arrive later that day around noon... *swt*

So Monday training, our American colleagues greeted us in our mucky, icky, grubby selves wearing the same clothes as we did 22 hrs ago. Nice.

By the end of the day, I just showered and KOed in the hotel room. I didn't even bother with dinner. Gawd bless the Westin, their beds are SOOOoooOOO comfy.

More to come ~! To be continued ~!