Good Day

Started the day early, waking up with Jie and accompanying her to work.

Her office building, One Raffles Link, South Wing lobby

The big water wheel in front of her office lobby.

Well ok, I didn't go for nothing. I went for gym. So now I can do the nice blog on my gym which is long overdue.

The gym and pool is in the round open-air area. below is one of the wings of Marina Square.

The Pool, with lots of nice pool-side lounge chairs for sun-tanning.

The gym is in the background, behind the glass windows.

Well why do I love my gym? numerous reasons. You can go for gym without bringing anything. They provide properly washed gym wear, tops, bottoms, socks, shoes, small towels, big towels, shower towels, whatever. most things you need for a workout, they provide it. The only exception is swimwear, which makes sense cos u wont wanna wear someone else's swimwear no matter how clean it is.

In addition, they provide the latest issues of most magazines you can find on a newstand, and papers from Japan, Korea, States, and I don't know where else but I see around 8 different papers. Of course they expect you to return it, but some people don't but I'm sure they can afford it. There's also free green apples replenished every single day with fresh ones.

And then, there's the cost. It's only open to members and hotel guests - and neither the membership nor hotel stay is cheap, so you don't have to squeeze around with the majority of the corporate world a la California Fitness, First Fitness, or stadium gyms. It's a price to pay of course for such prestige. Plus I love to rub shoulders with respectable people. Today I've met a motivational speaker who engaged me in a nice philosophical discussion on the social machine. I'm hoping too that some day I'll knock into one of Jie's superiors and end up being good friends, it will help smooth her way up and allow me to be a rich "tai-tai" house-husband.

No I'm kidding I'm not that low in aspirations.

But the best reason I love it, is the view I get when I'm swimming. Here goes.

Of course, there's the hotel itself towering right in front of me.
with the nice glass elevator by the side, and restaurant at the top.

pan right, and there's The Oriental hotel.

And then, Marina Mandarin.

Next is Swissotel Stamford, and Suntec Convention Centre

Suntec Convention centre (the arm), Tower Five (thumb) and Towers One and Two (first two fingers). Too bad the other two fingers of the Suntec City Hand are blocked by the next building.

The culprit blocking the 2 Suntec fingers is Conrad International Hotel

Beside it is Centennial Tower, where Citibank HQ is, and beside it is half of Millenia Tower, half-blocked by Pan Pac itself. Pan Pac also blocks out Ritz Carlton, but it is visible from some angles in the pool.

So that's my gym. What a blessing to be given a membership here as a gift. Ever grateful for it.

Yes, you all saw the dark clouds, they gathered as I finished bathing. It will start raining soon, but at least I got to swim and run off before that happened.

Lunch was at Kuishin-bo with Jiefang. The last time we went in mid-April, it was 3 days after Xwan went, and amazingly it was under renovation. In fact, they renovated just the day after Xwan went. Anyway, it reopened a few days ago. So we went for the 60 min buffet cos of 2 reasons:

1. It is damn worth it for me, as you all know that I am super-fast at finishing food.
2. Jie only has an hour for lunch anyway so we cant sit around and relax anyway.

That's the entrance beside the Suntec Sky Garden.

That's the interior. I can't remember what it looked like previously so I can't tell what changed. Doesnt matter as long as the food is just as good, or better.

Nice Jap food galore. It's much better than Suki Sushi, as in it's slightly more upmarket.

This is what I mean when I say I can survive on nothing but Salmon Sashimi. What you see is a pyramid of Salmon Sashimi, with 3 layers in total. Jiefang + me cleared 3 plates like this other than the rest of the stuff we ate.

Jiefang demonstrates how to pull out a full escargot, unlike me who always leaves half of it behind. She's been eating these things since she was a kid, the seafood maniac she is. So first, you poke as deep as you can and make sure you pierce the flesh firmly.

Then, you go thru a swirling motion around the shell, pulling the meat out gently.

And eventually, the whole thing with the tail comes out. This one is about to break; seldom happens for her. Too bad this was the last one, so I didn't take any pix of a complete one being pulled out. Anyway according to her, for different species, there are different parts that cannot be eaten, so do go read up before you eat, you don't wanna swallow a part of it that makes life difficult for u in e toilet.