day out with kiddo

so today went out for xmas shopping/lunch/window shopping/sale-checking-outting with Jia Wei. my best bud from pri school. its great that we still go our regualrly even after 4 years. usually its just the two of us (today we had her youngest bro, the very adorable shane tag along cos he was bored at home) and we go to the most unusual places like ikea, just for fun, but usually we end up in the orchard area.

we were supposed to get dim sum at crystal jade something but ended up having jap food at the foodcourt in the basement of taka instead. miso soup tastes REALLY interesting. haha. sorta like watered down wasabe with a lot of salt added. the rice was just enough to fill us up and still leave space for gelato. yum yum in my tum.

then we went to Mango, Topshop, a toystore, a book binding store which looked real posh, an upscale arts and craft place in taka,borders, the photo exhibition(with some of the best aerial shots of nature and its wonders i've ever seen) along orchard road and Spotlight in PS(thats plaza singapura).whao.thats a helluva lot of places, now that i think about it. i'm sure i missed out something. we spent like 4 hours in town.

mango and topshop have lovely things but its always nice to have my mum around when i'm there so that she can pay. half the time dont have enough :P i mean dude, is a hairband really worth $9?? i dont think so. yeah in (sterling) pound its 3 bucks and that sounds attractive and all but in SGD its ridiculous. messed around with some boleros and kimonos and ballet pumps and tweed jackets. very fun :D

the toystore in taka was selling loads of things that i saw in germany but at ridiculous prices. like these lil wind up musical boxes which play beatles songs and other classics. and these pop-up wooden toys, one of which i got jiawei while in.. frieburg i think.

the book binding place was full of ridiculously expensive stationery. a small A5 size notebook is NOT supposed to cost $24, whether its made in sweden or not. if ikea can sell things at such reasonable prices, i dont see why their bookbinding swedish counterparts can't.

the store called art friend looked like the sorta place neil buchanan would shop. haha.the sales assistant was very knowledgeable about what kinda markers could be used effectively on fabrics cos jia wei was having obe of her brilliant handmade gift ideas. these are the kind of people i like to have around when i'm in a shop.any shop.

nowadays cos all the o level kids are taking on post-o level jobs, half of them dunno diddly squat about the products available in the place where they're working. like in taka. the fella didnt know where the beanie baby toys were. and borders. i asked one of the borders dudes where i could find "catch 22" and he was all blur and ï dunno".i mean, isnt there some sorta database they can check or something? its Borders for pete's sake! i expect the best!

had a bit of a laugh in spotlight about white tshirts and manbras ;) and abraham(instead of alex). while shane played on his gameboy. the coolest thing i saw in spotlight were these chinese food takeaway boxes like you see in hollywood movies. they were empty lah..as in foodless. guess you could use them as props or something. yeah spotlight is a prop haven.

yeap.really hope that we still go out like this for years and years to come.and eventually we can invite each other to our weddings haha.that'd be really cool.