Heraklion

We visited the biggest city in Crete for half a day. I was tempted to call Heraklion the capital of Crete but Crete was not a country.


There was a public bus that stopped by the hotel to bring tourists to Heraklion, also known as Iraklion. For the return trip, we were restricted to take the bus at 2.30pm as that was the only bus heading back to hotel.

We spent our 4 hours walking towards the old port and the old fortress. After that, we walked up the main street and visited the cathedrals before having lunch in the central square dominated by the fountain of the Lions.

After lunch, we headed towards the Archaelogical Museum of Iraklion that housed most of the Minoan findings in Crete. When we arrived, we were told that the museum was under renovation and only one room with the most precious artifacts was under exhibition.

The room was indeed small but impressive. I spent 30mins viewing every item with attention. Most were discovered at Knossos and created between 1000 to 2000 years before Christ.

I just loved the vase below. Its description said "libation vase (rhyton) of rock crytal with glided ivory discs on the neck ring". It was made around 1500 to 1450 BC. I find it really delicate and exquisite.

When we reached our hotel at 3.30pm, it was back to the sea deck. :)

Peninsula Hotel in Crete

Seb and I had a good week of rest at Peninsula Hotel in Crete, Greece. The weather was sunny and the sea was really blue and clear. Apart from an afternoon visit to Iraklion; the biggest city in Crete, a day trip to the National Park of Samaria and a day of driving around visiting other cities, we spent our days lazing around the pool and sea deck.

As we were on half-board, we had breakfast and dinner at the hotel. There was always a wide variety food and the food quality was not too bad. We had read in Tripadvisor good comments about this hotel and I was not disappointed. One negative point had to be our room. Though we had a sea view, the room was really basic. Only two bars of soaps were provided. No shampoo, shower cap etc...
The hotel was built along a cliff and everyday we had to descend many flight of stairs to get to the seaside. I preferred to swim in the salt-water swimming pool while Seb preferred the big blue sea. I am not a strong swimmer and felt more comfortable in a confined parameter. I feel safe being a gold-fish in its fish bowl. Seb, however, is like a dolphin who loves the caresse of the gentle waves and the depth of the sea. He could swim for hours in the sea. Well, I did manage to find distractions while lazing around on the deck chair.There were these two middle-age couples who were at the sea deck everyday. The men would snokler around the rocks and corals and picked up sea urchins. They showed the curious sun-bathers how sea urchins could be consumed. I joined in the conversation and had a taste of the sea urchins. They said that sea urchins tasted better than caviar.

Only the female sea urchins were harvested and once opened up, we could see five custard-like, golden sections. These were what we ate. They tasted really fishy and salty. Yeah, what would one expect? Still, it was an interesting discovery for me.

There were many french and retired couples in this hotel. In the evening, there were activities organised like Bingo, Karaoke, Disco, Dance lesson and a Greek Folklore evening. We attended the karaoke night and went back to our room to watch TV after listening to only three songs. It was terrible. Claire and gang could sing much better.

I do not mind coming back here as the staff were helpful and friendly. They seemed to be working round the clock. I was told that the hotel closed during winter. So the staff members only work about 8 months a year. The standard of living in Crete is lower than in France and I dare say lower than Singapore's as well.

Another interesting thing I saw was this sign in every toilet. What did "any paper" mean? Toilet paper as well? My curiousity got the better of me and I finally asked the receptionist after four days. She confirmed that toilet paper should not be thrown into the toilet bowl as the latter would clog up easily. I tried to respect this sign but some habits were just too hard to kick off.

Daylight robbery

When Claire was here visiting me a few weeks ago, she had her bag robbed in my car. I was driving and stopped at a traffic light. Suddenly, I heard Claire screamed and as I turned my attention to her, I saw that the passenger's window had been smashed and a person was grabbing Claire's bag. My first reflex was to switch off the car's engine and gave chase. Claire joined me but the two boys were much faster than us. As I ran, I shouted hoping to get help. However, there was not many people in the streets and I remembered an old man just watching us passed by.

We lost sight of the 2 boys after they turned into an open air parking. A lady who was on her way to work saw us and helped to call the police while we tried to catch our breath. A delivery man who was leaving the parking offered to try to catch up with the boys. Claire and I had some minor cuts from the broken glass and my lips were bleeding. As I had left my car right in the middle of the road, I decided to park it properly while the kind lady waited for the police to arrive. The incident happened so fast that I wonder if any cars noticed it. If so, why didn't anyone help?

After parking the car at the nearby gas station, we went back to the parking to wait for the police. A middle-aged lady who heard the commotion from her office came down to offer us help. She herself had been a victim of such incident. When the police car arrived, we described Claire's bag and its content. We then headed to the nearest police station to make a police report. We waited to file our complaints and in the end, we spent 3 hours there.

After the police station, we went to the nearby car wash to vacuum and clear up the broken glasses. When we came home, we were tired and shaken out. As Claire had my key in her bag, we were scared that my apartment would be the next target. To make matters worse, Seb was away in Sweden. He did help me find a locksmith to change our lock in the evening. Still, I was not able to sleep the whole night.

We were suppose to go Chartres to have lunch with my granny-in-law but that was cancelled. Normally, I do not take this road but on that day, I needed to drop by the post office. I already know that such incidents happened as I had friends, a neighbour and ex-colleagues (all females) who had their car windows smashed. These robbers usually ride in scooters so that they could get away easier. They target single women who left their bags on the passenger seat. Once the car stopped, the robber would strike. I did remind my friends to be careful with their bags and to keep it out of sight. So long as the bag could not be seen, we would not attract attention. What I did not know then was that these robbers could be on foot as well.

I felt bad for Claire as this incident spoils her holidays. Claire felt bad for me as we had to change the door lock and the car window. In the police station, the policeman confirmed that there was about 10 such cases each day. They were committed by youth gangs and even though half of them were caught, they would be let off easily by the judge since they were minors.

So far, nothing had been recovered except for Claire's red pull. She lost her digital camera which contained many photos of her trip. The good thing was that she did not bring out all her cash, her handphone and passport. We decided to brush this incident away by heading to Paris right after cleaning up the car. To lift up our spirits, Anca invited us out for dinner. We did have a good time. And of course when Seb was back and the car window repaired, we made it for lunch with my granny-in-law.

What a start for our vacation

Normally, Seb and I should be on the plane heading towards Crete, Greece for a week of sun and beach. But here we were in our impersonal living room with the shutters shut. We had placed all our plants in one room without closing the shutter to ensure that sunlight got in while we were away. Without our plants, the living room seemed cold.

Seb and I left home in the early evening for our 8 pm flight. While checking in, we were informed that the plane would be delayed by about 6 hours. That meant that the plane was to take off at 2.30 am. I was pretty disappointed as that meant 7 days, 7 nights instead of 8 days, 7 nights. We would be tired when arriving (just in time for sunrise??) and would probably waste a good morning sleeping.

But it was a blessing in disguise. At the check in counter, the officer asked for my french ID card. He told me that my passport was not enough to get me into Greece as I did not have any visa. That really surprised me as I had checked in the website of the Singapore Foreign Affairs Ministry and no visa was needed for visiting Greece within a period of 60 days. The officer told me that he had previous experiences with two other singaporeans who left without a visa and upon arriving at the Greece airport, was told to turn back to France. They had to pay for their air tickets back to Paris. With my french ID card, I could go to Greece without a visa thanks to the Schengen agreement. I did not have my french ID card as I always travel with my passport. So far, I never had any problem travelling to other european countries with my red passport.

With the flight delayed, Seb and I had enough time to come home to get my french ID card. The officer was kind enough to give us his phone number so that we could call to confirm about the flight timing. So here we were, playing Mario Kart on WII. I just called Ronan who was catsitting Bao Bei for the week to make sure that everything was alright.

This was just the beginning of our holidays and I really hope that the rest of it would be smooth. I hope to be back in a week's time with a nice tan and a memory card full of beautiful photos.

Note: I would really like to check if my french ID card is necessary at the airport.

Nicole and Balcony updates

I came back from Luxembourg on Friday evening and Nicole arrived at the same train station as me but 2 hours later. As I was too tired from my work trip, I did not waited for her.

It had been a year and a half since I last met her. Gosh. Time flies. I met her up yesterday with Alexandra and we had a good catch up. We first had sushi dinner in the Opera area, followed by a Ben and Jerry ice cream at St Germaine des Pres. Our last stop was of course at the Irish pub Coolin's. Nicole made me discovered this place four years ago and each time she visited Paris, we would have a drink there. It's tradition!

Nicole will be heading back to Frankfurt this evening. I promised her that we would visit her like the last time we did in Munich. We had so much fun then. I am just amazed at our long distance friendship. I am glad that Germany and France are not that far away.

Other than recounting my constant visits of the month, I would also like to update about my balcony. Below are some lovely photos I took this morning. My lavendar plant had survived the winter and is again producing lavendar flowers.

About a month ago, I went to buy more pots to line up my long balcony with flowers. Here are some of the blooming flowers.

I am also glad that my geranium had survived the winter too. Last winter was not that harsh and cold. They are blooming really well.

Being ambitious, I tried to grow cherry tomatoes and chillis. I also bought a small coriander plant. With the good weather, they are growing so well that my flower pot is getting too small for them. I guess I would need to transfer a few to an individual big pot.

On the table, I also grow mint leaves. I was advised to put them in an individual pot as mint plants grow very fast and can invade all space given destroying other plants around them.

Now, when I cook chinese soup, I could have fresh coriander leaves and when I make tea, I could have mint leaves to go with it.

By september, I hope to have some cherry tomatoes from my "garden" to add to my salad.

Luxembourg again

After a long break of not travelling for work, I started my first work trip of the year to Helsinki in the middle of May followed by Luxembourg. This was my second time to Luxembourg and this time, I took the TGV train. I would prefer taking the train as there was less hussle. No need to be 30mins in advance at the airport, no check-in, train stations location are right in town.

For lunch, my client brought us to this little italian restaurant. The deco was very 1920s and it was a charming, cozy place with beams along the ceiling.



As it was the season of asperagus, we could find meals with this vegetables being offered. I love asperagus and naturally ordered the baked pasta with asperagus. It was indeed good but too big a portion for me.

The next day's lunch was recommended by a user. It was at La table du pain. Initially, I wanted to do a take-away but the decoration was so nicely done up that I decided to eat there. It had this really country-home atmosphere with big farm tables. Don't you agree that the place looks nice?

Musée des Arts Décoratifs

I had been waiting to visit the Museum of Decorative Arts since a while back. But I waited for Claire to be here as I know that she would appreciate it as much or even more than me. I thought that we could at the same time visit the Musée de la Mode et du Textile since they were housed in the same building. However, I was not aware that the fashion museum only held temporary exhibitions. When we were there, the museum was closed and undergoing preparation for the coming exhibition; Valentino - Thèmes et variations. Claire was pretty disappointed as she was so much into fashion.

Still, we did enjoy the decorative arts museum. It brought us through the early stages of religious arts from the Middle Ages to the present day.

Above were statues representing the four seasons. Can you figure out who is spring, summer, fall and winter?

The above picture shows an 18th century furniture in the rococo style.

Alessandro Mendini from Italy designed this arm chair. It was an amazing piece of art with great fabric and colours. I would love to own one though I doubt Seb would accept it in our living room. The vases around the armchair were painted by various artists.

On the last floor of the exhibition, we were greeted with various chairs. Some were familiar to us and others were unique. On decorative arts, I figure that chairs are the most flexible and common object to design. Tables can only take limited shapes as table top with legs as support. But with chairs, designers can vary the forms so long as one can sit on them. If you have a fetish for chairs, this is the place for you.

MIA

I know that I have been writing less. I have been so so busy these past weeks.

I am right now in Helsinki. My fourth trip in less than a year and come to think of it, I actually know more resturants here than in Paris.

This was the month that I had been doing 'aller-retour' at the airport. We sent Ivan and Belinda to the airport after dinner at our place on 30 April. The next day, we went to the airport to fetch Claire and Jill Wong. A week later, we sent Jill off at the airport. Last Sunday, we sent Claire off at the airport. The next day, I went to the airport to take my plane to Helsinki.

While Claire and Jill were here, we three had fun. Claire's holiday was hugely spoilt over a mishap when she was robbed in my car. Details will come in a later entry.

On Sunday, after sending Claire off, I met up with my blog friend from Daily Affairs. She was visiting Paris with her family. I got to know her recently and it was the first time we met. It was a quick meet up but we hit it off right away. Singaporean girls are amazing. We can warm up to each other so easily. Other recent experiences include Sharon, Sandra and Jill.

With such a busy month of meeting various singaporeans, I thought I could have a good rest in Helsinki. But the 4.30am sunrise wakes me up each morning. Even with the curtains pulled, sunlight managed to peep through. It is really werid to have daylight even at 10pm.

For this weekend, Sam, the globe trotter may be dropping by for a visit. I will be hosting him and cooking dinner for him. However, I won't be his tour guide. I had enough for this month.

Ladurée

I have been busy keeping company my 2 guests from Singapore. Claire is still in Paris while Jillian has left on Sat. As usual, with each new visitor, I discovered new areas of Paris.

One of those new discoveries is Ladurée. I had heard of Ladurée famous pastries; especially its macarons. But I had never tried it. I am not a pastry person unlike the Misses Wong. So, a pilgrimage to Ladurée is a must for them.


Each of us ordered our beverages and our lovely piece of cake. The cakes were indeed heavenly. The taste was exquisite and we enjoyed our "tai-tai" style of afternoon tea. I said "tai-tai" because a tea cost around 6.50€ and a piece of cake 7.70€. That was really an expensive tea break.

If time allows, Claire and I would drop by again at Ladurée. With one of my best friends in town, Ladurée just seems to be the right place for a priceless afternoon chit-chat.

On a side note, the weather here has been really warm this past week. When Misses Wong arrived, it was still cold but now, the temperature stayed at 25 degrees in the afternoon. We spot a tan already.

Ticket restaurant

In France, most companies give “ticket restaurant”(lunch tickets) to their workers. However, if a canteen is available in the workplace, the workers will have subsidised lunch. Hence, they won’t have the benefits of ticket restaurant.

Seb’s workplace has a canteen so he does not have the lunch tickets. Depending on luck, it can be a good or bad affair. In his case, the canteen serves lousy food so it is better to have lunch tickets instead of being confined to the canteen for subsidised lunch.

For me, I always have lunch tickets. The lunch ticket is allocated for each working day in the office. If we are on customer’s site or on leave, we would receive a ticket less. Normally, we received a pack of about 20 lunch tickets a month.

These lunch tickets are not free. The government set some guidelines and depending on the company policy, between 40 to 60% of the value of each ticket is absorbed by the company. The value of the ticket varies as well. It can range from 6.10€ to 8.40€. The above figures are based on my experiences and may not be the exact figures. Example: a ticket of 8€. The company contributes 60% and pays 4.80€ for each ticket while the employee pays 3.20€.

In general, we use these lunch tickets during lunch time. We can also use them for dinner. Almost all eateries and restaurants accept lunch tickets. It helps their business as almost every workers eating out are given lunch tickets. At some supermarkets with offices nearby, we can also use lunch tickets to buy microwave food, sandwiches or salads.

Depending on which area of the city you work in, the value of a lunch ticket is usually equivalent to the price of a lunch meal. So, we can always use up the total value of our ticket. Employers are smart enough to give us “just enough” for lunch. However, if we do eat less than the value of our ticket, we can get back credit note. Seldom do eateries give change in cash. This is to ensure that we return to use the credit note and eat at their place. There are of course times when our bill is more than the lunch ticket.

The lunch tickets are transferable. I can give it to a homeless guy along the street or pass it to Seb for his coffee kick at Starbucks. Note: Starbucks do give change instead of credit note.

I hope the above explanation is clear on this little guide about France’s lunch ticket. Any questions?

A person’s a person, no matter how small.

Last week, I watched Dr. Seuss Horton Hears a Who!.
I enjoyed the movie. Horton the elephant was sincere and faithful. I wish more people could be like him. When I was young, I read A Cat in the Hat and remembered that I enjoyed the poems that rythmes. Here, just leaving you with what Horton taught us:

A person’s a person, no matter how small.
--------------------------------------------------
I meant what I said,
and I said what I meant
An elephant's faithful,
One hundred percent.
--------------------------

Vélib' - free service bicycles

It has been about a year since the city hall of Paris launched an innovative project, Vélib'. Dotted all over Paris, you will find a row of identical bicycles with a kiosk.

This is how it works. You register yourself at the kiosk. It cost 1€ a day or 29€ for a whole year usage. After that, you choose the bicycle you want; detach it from its stand and ride. The first 30 mins of usage is free. For every extra 30 mins used, an euro or more is charged. The whole idea is not to hog onto the bicycle to visit around Paris on two wheels. The mayor of Paris is encouraging people to cycle in Paris to get from one place to another. If your destination takes more than 30mins, you can dispose the bicycle half way at a station; wait for 15 minutes before getting the bicycle and continue your journey. It is free. For a day usage, you just pay 1€ for as many 30mins ride as you like.

Seb and I finally tried it yesterday. After church, we were supposed to meet Anton at Saint Paul's station for lunch. We decided to walk from Concorde to Saint Paul as we were 45minutes in advance. Taking Metro would take us only 10mins. After 15mins of walk, we realised at the pace we were going, we would be late. It was further than I thought. We passed by a Vélib' station and I suggested to Seb to give it a go. The weather was sunny and it beats taking the underground. We went to the kiosk and using our transport cards, booked ourselves each a bicycle. If you have no transport card, you could use your credit card. This is in case you do not return the bicycle, 150€ will be withdrew.

As it was a Sunday, there were not many cars and it was really nice to cycle in Paris. In 25mins time, we reached Saint Paul's station but we could not parked our bicycles as there was no free stand available. As time was running out, we checked at the kiosk the next nearest Vélib' station and cycled to Pont Marie which was 2 minutes away. Fortunately, there were free stands at that station and we were able to park back our bicycles before the 30 mins run out.

Seb and I agreed that the bicycles were too heavy. Seb found the bicycle too small for him and he was not comfortable on it. But we enjoyed the ride in Paris so much that Seb was thinking of getting a bicycle now. When I spoke with my colleague this morning, he explained to me that we could have registered ourselves at the Saint Paul's station for 15 mins of grace. We could then wait for someone to pick up two bicycles and liberate two stands for us.

The cycling culture in Paris can never be compared with that of Delft, Netherlans. Still, I find that it is a good start to a healthier living and less polluting environment. I leave you with this amazing bicycles park at Delft train station.

Bao Bei

Time flies. There are so many cute photos of Bao Bei.
Here, she was 2 months old.
This was the second day she lived with us.

At the age of 7 months, she was sterilised as required in her adoption paper.

Here she was on Seb's leg.
Her favorite position during weekend's afternoons.
Age of four.

Bao Bei's birthday

It's not an April Fool's day joke though I had already tricked three friends this morning.

It's Bao bei's birthday. She turns four today. We really enjoy her presence with us and love her a lot. She likes to stay in the same room as us. And each evening, she will ask to be cuddled by Seb. Each morning, she will come to me to be cuddled. At night, she sleeps at our feet. She is part of the family.

Back to 1st April, it is really celebrated by the french. In the online papers, false headlines were published. When you clicked on it, it would bring you to a page with a fish. Today is poisson d'avril in french. April Fish. One of my colleagues came to office and checked if anyone sticked a paper fish on her back. My colleague's daughter was asking if she could trick her dad to believe that year 2008 was over. Even an English consultant played a trick on us informing us that there was a need for a major change in our program. He just emailed to tell us it was a joke! Seb did me a little trick too. The day is not over yet. Let me see if I can play a trick on him too. ;)

I was at Disneyland

I always thought that Disneyland was for kids. So whenever someone suggested going to Disneyland, I would say no. This time round, I agreed to go when Irene suggested going to Disneyland. Irene had been to France three times and visited many places. I guess it was not right to let her go Disneyland alone.

We really enjoyed Disneyland. With good preparation, we made the best out of our day. Here I shall share some tips with you.

The tickets are cheaper if you know 5 days in advance which date you are going. I bought the tickets via internet. It cost 29€ for a ticket with a date printed while an open date ticket cost 47€ for a park. Add in 10€ more if you want to visit 2 parks within a day. As each park is big, it is better to concentrate your full day on a park. We chose to visit the Disneyland Park instead of the Walt Disney Studios.

Once the tickets were bought, I printed them myself. Having the tickets printed and sent to your home will incurred delivery fees. At the entrance of the park, we avoided the long queue to buy tickets and also the long queue to validate our tickets. There was a separate queue for internet tickets and only a handful of people bought their tickets in advance via internet.

Avoid going on a weekend or Wednesday if possible. These are the days where Disneyland will be very crowded. We chose to go on a Thursday and as it was during the low peak season, there were not too many people. We usually waited less than 10 mins for each ride and attraction.

There are many restaurants in Disneyland and most of them sell the usual fast food style sandwiches, beverages and dessert. We made sandwiches in the morning and brought fruits, water and titbits. There are benches all over Disneyland. We did stop for hot beverages before the parade and the queue took us 30mins. It seems that everyone had the same idea as us. Have a hot chocolate while waiting for the parade to start. The parade started at 4pm and by the time we had our hot chocolate in hand, we could not find a good position to watch the parade. Suddenly, you would realise that there are really a lot of people in Disneyland. I could not imagine how it would be on a summer weekend. If you like parades and have kids, go find a place along the kerb way, way in advance. If you do not like parade, take this time to go do the rides. There would be fewer queues.

We arrived shortly after the opening of the park and left when it closed with a candle celebration at 7pm. We started at Fantasyland with the boat ride of 'It's a small world' (wished I had the time to do it twice) and continue to discover the Discoverland, Adventureland and Frontierland. For major attractions with high demand, we got a fast pass. It is actually a ticket giving you priority (direct access) at a given hour. So there was no need to queue. We could do other attractions before our fast pass appointment.

At the end of the day, we were dead tired. We were glad that we came by the RER train instead of driving. RER cost about 6.50€ one way from Paris to Disneyland. Car parking for a whole day cost 8€. However, after a long day, none of us would like to drive. Also, there are rumours that traffic is always slow during the rush hour to Paris.

I had fun at Disneyland. There were little girls dressed up as princesses. Robes can be found in the boutiques. They cost around 45€ each. The boutiques sell the usual Walt Disney stuff. Irene got a lovely Mickey in Paris mug. Though the weather was not that great that day, we still enjoyed ourselves greatly. It is really not difficult because there's a kid in every adult.

I have no answer to this question.

Often I have friends asking if I can recommend any cheap accomodation for their friends who are visting Paris. Well, I could not offer any help as I had never stay in a hotel in Paris.

If my friends are coming, they would be staying at my humble place. That is if they do not mind the big sofa bed. However, I decided to offer some websites I found recently regarding alternate accomodation in Paris. There is no big grand hotel mentionned. If you can pay 200€ per night, ignore this entry and just go to Yahoo! or Google and type in "hotel in paris".

I have never tried out any of the lodgement in these sites. You are at your own risk if you choose to contact them. Still, there is no harm checking and deciding for your own. Irene, I hope these are useful for your friend's aunties who are coming in May. And Ivan, I hope this is useful for you too. Sorry, my place is booked already for May.

http://www.paris35.com Low cost Hotels Hostels Apartments Bed and Breakfast in Paris for just35€

http://www.escalea-paris.com/en/ custom apartment rental service for short-term stays in Paris

http://www.paulinesbedandbreakfast.com/Bed and breakfast in the 18th district

http://www.2binparis.com/ Bed and breakfast in Paris

http://pour-vous-paris.com/index.htm Stay with Parisians at their homes. Need to be a member of this site.

Waiting for the King's Bounty

I like to play games. There were a few computer games that I really enjoyed. I loved playing WORMS 2 with my brother. It was so cute trying to kill each other with bazooka, homing pigeon, napalm strike, baseball bat, shotgun, handgun, punch etc.... Yeah, I said CUTE. You really must play it to understand it.

I liked building with SIM tower. I preferred that to SIM city. Recently, I was addicted to Mario Galaxy and had finally rescued Princess Peach with my WII console. With great graphics, Seb had managed to convince me to change our TV set to a flat screen one.

Yet, my all time favourite game is the DOS based King's Bounty (see picture above). I guess it was more for nostalgic seek but I do really enjoy this simple graphics game. From time to time, I would start a game of King's Bounty. Seb would be puzzled. He would recommend me to get new games. But no, I just like it. A new 3-D King's Bounty is going to be in the market soon. I really look forward to getting it. But nothing will replace the original one.

Maid to order

The other day, I was explaining to my colleagues about the family nucleus in Singapore. In an ideal singaporean family, there is a young married couple with a kid and a house maid. Usually they would be staying near one of their parents.

I started explaining the unique situation of having a house maid even for the middle income family. The maid's salary was low and these young girls from under developed countries were often greeted with culture shock. There were cases of girls falling down from high rise buildings while hanging out the clothes or cleaning the windows. I remembered my granny's maid asking for wood to start a cooking fire the first day she arrived. In the newspaper, we read about maids being abused and also abusing maids.

Out of curiosity, I started to search for the low wages of the maids and I found this interesting paper written about the work condition of maids in Singapore. I think the study was rather one sided as it highlighted only extreme cases. I know of a few maids who were really happy working for my friends and my relatives and were treated like a family member. However, as the title said "Workplace Abuses in Singapore", what else can you expect from this report. Read more in: http://hrw.org/reports/2005/singapore1205/6.htm

It is really long but worth reading. It highlighted the working condition and missing labour laws to protect these maids. With no off day for Indonesian maids, with no fix working hours, with no min wages, some maids entered into salvery without leaving the house, without having enough sleep, without being paid. Really sad stories really happening in Singapore.

Fitness Center

I joined a fitness center recently. I never like the idea of running on a threadmill nor having to follow the steps of an aerobics coach. However, I no longer joined the badminton club and I had been too lazy to go swim. With age catching up, I felt weak and lethagic.

A few months ago, a fitness center for ladies-only opened just two blocks from my office. A few of us went on a free trial session and we were satisfied. Now on every tuesday and thursday, my three colleagues and I would head down to the fitness center for 30 minutes of exercise.

In the fitness center, there were a spa machine, a suntan bed and the usual fitness equipements. There was also a TV room where we could do stretching, aerobics etc following a video. What interested us was the coaching class. Each day, there was a different theme. It could be toning, silhouette, slimming etc. We had a pretty coach and during 30 mins, we would be working out on different equipements. Every 1 min, we would change equipement. The coach was not demanding but encouraging. She guided us to tuck in our tummy and reminded us to breathe. She showed us how best to operate an equipement. It was never boring as the music and sequence of workout changed often.

We had been regulars since a month. Each time we did the chest theme, our arms and underarms would be aching the next day. I like this fitness center as it catered only to ladies. I noticed a number of Muslims women in the center.

My goal is to be able to carry the grocery bags packed with milk, juices and fruits.

Chinese New Year

Today is Chinese New Year's eve. This is the year of the Rat.
I am in office working. Seb will be back from Spain tonight and we shall have a simple dinner togather.
On Sunday, we went to Chinatown and it was jammed pack with cars and asians. We were desperate to get out of Tang Féres. There was hardly space to manoeuver the trolley. I grabbed the essentials while Seb joined the parking queue.

These were what I bought from Chinatown.

I wish everyone a prosperous chinese new year. Got to get back to work.

Talk of the town

Remember how Singapore was suddenly made famous by Nick Leeson in the financial market about 12 years ago? Well, someone out did him. That someone was a trader working in the second biggest bank of France, Societe Generale. He made his bank lost $7 billion (5 billion euro) by conducting rogue trading. This is definitely the hot topic in our office. See, we are a financial risk-management software company. And we are trying to figure out how this trader managed to cover and snow-ball his errors until this moment and at this amount. Most of us know of someone who is working in Societe Generale. Well, there goes their bonus as the bank lost a further 2 billion euros because of the sub-prime mortgage crisis in US.

On a brighter note, we were really glad that Jo-Wilfried Tsonga made it to the finals in the Asutralia Open. He defeated Nadal in 3 sets. Though I am no big tennis fan, we do have cable TV in the office common area. Everyone was pretending to get water, coffee, orange juice so as to catch a glimpse of the action. When it was the final set, most of us were glued to the TV. Tsonga was not known. His ranking was 38 and he managed to defeat the number 2 guy in tennis. We really hope he would do France proud as it had been many many years since a french made it to the finals of a Grand Slam.

Note: When I mentioned we, I was referring to my colleagues.

Today, there was a strike with the public service workers like teachers, nurses etc..... Against increase cost of living and low pay. Sarkozy promised to increase french purchasing power during election period. Now, he avoided talking about this subject in his speeches. The news were just speculating if he had secretly married his girlfriend. Yeah, the ex-model who had dated men around the globe including father and son. In BBC, there was an article on the dilemma of India for the visit of Sarkozy and his girlfriend. Should they share the same suite? What is the protocol for a visiting president bringing his girlfriend along? The president's communication team did a good job to steer more pressing issues aside for some juicy gossips about the president's personal live.

To end, Singapore Prime Minister came visiting in Paris. Reading from the news site in Singapore (sadly, I did not read about this in French site), he met up the president, foreign minister and prime minister of France. He invited all of them to come visit Singapore. This morning, I read in the free papers given at the metro station that Lee Hsien Long visited the Quai Branly museum with the ex-president Chirac. At last, Singapore is mentioned. How rare to hear about this small country over here.

Endives

In France, there are seasonal vegetables and fruits. In winter, I find that there are less variety of fresh vegetables. Courgettes, aubergines and green beans are mostly imported from Spain or Marocco and they cost much more than in summer. Still, I managed to find a vegetable that is becoming my favourite greens. Okay, it is not exactly green in color. It is called endive. Endives have a bitter after-taste and most of the time, it is served as salade. I do not like raw veggie and prefer to cook them.
My mother-in-law made me discovered endives a few years ago. She baked them with ham and creamy sauce. I like it but find it hard to get the sauce consistent.

Other ways of cooking endives is to boil them in water with sugar to remove the bitterness for 15 mins. Remove them from the pot and dry them. Dash some lemon juice over them, sprinkle some herbs and put them in the oven for about 30 mins. That is a simple way.

Another way is to wrap bacon or ham around the endives after they are boiled. Sprinkle chesse and pepper over them and grill them for 15 mins. Grilled bacon and crispy melted cheese with endives. Yummy!

Both dish taste good and are defintely ideal as a no fuss, no frills week-day dinner.

Of needles and hems

I need to shorten the curtains I bought. As I had no needles at home to mark the length, I went to the supermarket this afternoon to get a pack. Guess the price.

It cost me 5.50€ for a pack of simple needles. I had no choice but to take it. But I am sure that in Singapore, I could have bought 10 packs of needles for SG$11. Well, one pack is enough to last me a lifetime. Sometimes, the things in France are just outrageously overpriced!

Another example is to find a tailor to adjust the length of the pants. In Singapore, I did it for SG$3 in the wet market. Over here, most charge around 10.50€. I am still looking for one that cost around 7€. I know it exists but I forgot where it was since it was 3 years ago that I did it.

Galette des Rois

During the month of January, a special cake can be found in the bakery. It is the galette des rois (King's cake). This puff pastry usually has frangipane filling in it. In each cake, there is a little figurine hidden in it. The person who gets this figurine will be the king of the day. He will have to wear a paper crown for the entire day.

This cake is to celebrate Epiphany when the three wise men paid homage to baby Jesus. In the old days, a bean was used instead of a figurine.

Well, for the whole month of January, we would be eating the galette des rois for dessert. It is like eating moon cake during the 8th month of the Lunar Calendar. When dining with friends, we would have galette des rois. In office, usually a galette des rois party will be organised.

I had mine with my company last week. Each part of the galette had to be randomly distributed. Being the newest in the company, I was asked to name who should get the galette without looking. I had to make sure that everyone was named. We had 5 galettes and ended up with 3 kings and 2 queens. If you do come to France in January, do try one from the bakery. Some bakeries make galette for one person. You will be sure to be the king of the day.

Thanks giving 2007

Looking back on 2007, I count my blessings. God had been good to us. Seb and I changed jobs and had no regrets. We moved into our apartment and our last furniture finally arrived on 29/12/2007. We are very comfortable in our new place. Both of us are in good health though I was recently down with gastric flu and Seb with a big cold. These are annual affairs when our immune system is weaker during winter.

In 2007, we travelled often. I discovered various parts of France and due to work; I discovered Finland and Luxembourg as well. Seb had his share of travelling too. Our lives are pretty much the same as before – still loving each other. We made efforts for each other. We called each other before leaving office to go home. We did grocery shopping together. We shared house chores. Simple things like that should not be taken for granted. Over all, we have no complains for 2007. Thank God!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On the first day of 2008, I decided to clear space in the big red box which contained cards I held dear. I would like to throw old cards to make space for new ones I received from the last few years. I was the sentimental kind of person when it came to cards. I kept cards given by friends. As e-cards got more popular, I received fewer cards. I in turn sent less cards too.

So, I spent hours looking and reading the cards. Most were Christmas cards, some wedding cards, a few farewell cards. There were also birthday cards, postcards and of course; cards given by Seb. We gave each other cards on valentine’s day, wedding anniversary and birthdays. It was difficult to decide which card to keep and which card should go. I tried my best. If a friend only sent me a card, I put it back in the red box. Even though one might reasoned that we had already lost contact and this card no longer held any meaning to the friendship. I prefer to think that at one stage of my life, I was good enough to receive a card from the sender. Our paths had crossed and this card was the evidence.

I received the most cards from Claire. Our friendship dated back 9 years ago. We communicated often by emails and phone. Still, it felt so good to receive a nice card with thoughts of the day in it from time to time.

My little possible-to-keep resolution for this year is to send out cards to family and friends. Emails are quick and cheap. But cards filled with hand written words and travelled slowly by snail-mail add delight and surprises to the receiver! Don't you agree? *hint hint*

Strasbourg and Colmar

Seb and I went to Strasbourg by TGV 2 weeks again and we spent 4 days there. Strasbourg is famous for its christmas market though there are many christmas markets in France. Seems like the tradition started from Strasbourg.

The journey took us 2h20min and as we bought the tickets in advance, we travelled by first class. At the price we paid which was similar to second class, these tickets were not exchangable or refundable.

The Strasbourg train station looked newly renovated with an extension from the old building made up of glass. This fusion of old and new complimented each other really well.

During our 4 days, we went to watch a basketball match between Strasbourg team and Toulon team. On this occasion, we took the tram from the uptown to the stadium. We like cities with tram ways. It makes the city looks more ecological and less polluting.

And we saw a Singapore Shop. Looking inside, it was just an Indian bazzar shop.

There were many Chirstmas markets in Strasbourg, each with different themes. This year, some craftmens from Quebec were invited to participate in the Chirstmas market.

Apart of visiting Christmas markets in Strasbourg, we visited the nearby famous city, Colmar. Colmar was also known as the Venise of France. It was a little city full of charm.

We also visited the different area of Strasbourg, like the Petite France.




As it was a very cold week, we had to look for warmth after short walks in the streets.

We visited the Alsacien Musuem and also the History Musuem of Strasbourg. They gave us insights to the lives of the strasbourgeoises in ancient times. We enjoyed the museums a lot.

Each part of France is so different. Strasbourg is in the region Alsace. Alsace itself has its own costume, food culture and language. As it was really near Germany, there were many people speaking German.
I am glad to have finally visited the eastern part of France. I hope to visit the mountains in France for my next short getaway.

WII

We bought a WII for ourselves. :) As there was a shortage of stock this year in France, I was so happy to get it over the weekend.

At the end of the year, our companies gave us gift vouchers as a token of appreciation. We waited to receive this voucher to use it for the WII. So when we finally could buy our WII, it was already out of stock in Paris. We tried our luck in Chartres and there were a few left.

In England, it was selling for about 320£. Some english even came to France to get it since it was much cheaper at 250€. I have no idea what caused such a big success of WII this year since it existed already in 2006.

Anyway, I had fun playing with the games. Seb said that WII is really for the Asian market and I think he is not wrong. I am always an arcade addict in Singapore. Wish my ka-ki Tim was here. We could have a smashing good time boxing each other.

PS: Ka-ki = buddy in Hokkien

End of the year is coming soon!

We are going on a long weekend to Strasbourg tomorrow. Strasbourg is about 500km from Paris. With the new TGV line opened, it would only take us 2h 20 mins to get there. I have never visited the eastern part of France so this will be a great occasion since Strasbourg is famous for its Christmas market (marché de Noël).

The weather is starting to get really cold this week. At least the weather forecast is pretty positive for the next few days. There will not be rain.

When we return, it would soon be christmas. Each year, we bought a bigger christmas tree than the last. We started with a 50cm christmas tree and I am happy to have a 1.2m christmas tree this year. My company will organise an afternoon party next friday. And on Saturday, we will be heading to Chartres to spend our christmas with the family until 26/12/2007. As one of our directors comes from the region Alsace, we do not have to work on Boxing day as it is a public holiday in the Alsace region.

During this festive season, Jessie is here in France to spend Christmas with her in-laws family. She had kindly bought some food stuff for me from Singapore. I am looking forward to meeting her next Tuesday; not just for the food.

And there is also Sharon whom I have never met who is coming to France for the same reason. We planned to meet on 30/12/2007. It would be great to see the real family after reading so much about them in her blog.

That pretty much wraps up the end of 2007. Gosh. It will soon be 2008.

Some photos of the market before it burnt down

Leave benefits in france

It has been more than 5 months since I switched jobs. I do not think I ever wrote about the work benefits in France. I will just mention about the leave benefits here.

In France, the annual leave is 5 weeks. I think this is a standard for all workers. Everyone I know who works here has at least 5 weeks of leave. My company is kind enough to give everyone an extra week. I have 6 weeks of annual leave. On top of that, I have extra days off. In France, the general weekly working hours is 35 hours. Depending on the company policy, workers are compensated with extra off days for extra hours of work. In my present company, we work minimum 39 hours per week. To compensate for the extra hours, we have a day off for every 9 days of work. That is about two off days per month. This day off cannot be accumulated as it is meant to be a day to rest for working extra hard. Of course, there is always an exception for new comer who does not have enough annual leave to go on holidays.

In total, I am paid 54 working days a year for not going to office. This is a big bonus compared to my previous job where I did not have off days even if I stayed back late because I was on 35 hours working week and had only 25 days of leave.

Not everyone has this chance like mine. It is really rare to find such an employee social company. Seb used to work for one such company. But now, he is working for a multi-national company where he has 5 weeks of leave and 12 off days per year.

Days off are really useful in this country where public offices and certain banks are not open on Saturday. Any administrative paper work has to be done during the weekdays and it can take up the whole day just queueing and waiting for your turn. As a foreigner in this country, I do have lots of paper works to be done. Of course, during the strike season, people took a day off to avoid getting caught in traffic.

In my opinion, having so many days of leave does not reduce work productivity and effiency. In contrast, it boosts worker's moral and after a good rest, we are even more motivated and effective in our work.

I remembered that in Singapore, the weekly working hours was 42 hours and yet we worked up to 60 hours when the dateline was near. I had 18 days of annual leave. After we delivered our project, we usually had a day off. I thought I was really fortunate then.

Neverending strike?

I am in office at 7am this morning. I am not an early person but I had no choice. France is crippled by transport strike since a week. On this tuesday, almost everyone is on strike. Teachers, judges, lawyers, France telecom staff, electricity company workers, university students, Air France stewards and hostesses and most important of all, public transport workers. 1 out of 5 metros are working. Suburbs trains are greatly reduced. Millions of commuters in Paris and its suburbs resorted to cars, bicycles or walking. There were 250 km of traffic jams reported last week. Now you know why I left home at 6.20am. To avoid the 1.5 hours I took when we left at 7.30am yesterday.

Last week, I was in Helsinki and did not face the strike. While the temperature there was less than 1 degree, the indoors were always warm. I even found the hotel room too hot. It was nice to have a little snow. The main street in Helsinki had a hot water pipe running underneath it to prevent it from freezing and being slippery during winter. Most of the time, we walked through shopping center and underground tunnel to get from the hotel to the client's office. I was not out in the cold that much. From the month of November, cars in Finland had to change their tyres for the winter. By 1 December, all cars must have their winter tyres fitted.

For the moment, my working trip is confined to Finland. As for Seb, he was in South Africa just a week before me and it was 25 degrees there. When we compared our photos, it was amusing to see the differences. One of green trees and lovely swimming pool with bright sunshine.The other of beautiful lights with a snowing background.

The first family breaking up

Nicolas Sarkozy. If you have never heard of this name, it is okay. I can understand that you are not living in France or you do not care about politics. This guy’s name is everywhere that even the Americans know about him. He is the president of France and a friend of George Bush. He is the guy mentioned DAILY in the local news.

He is also the first president to be undergoing a divorce. Aha, did I get your attention now? Ok. I am doing a tabloid entry here.

Long ago, when Nicolas Sarkozy was mayor of Neuilly (a wealthy commune just beside Paris), he conducted the marriage of Cécilia and Jacques Martin (a TV host). Jacque Martin was in his fifties and his bride was 26 years old and heavily pregnant.

A few years later, Nicolas and Cécilia divorced their respective partners and got married in 1996. The marriage was on the rocks when Cécilia went to New York in the company of another man in 2005.

During the presidential campaign, all the candidates tried to make their family life look good. Nicolas was no exception.

This divorce was not that surprising as Cécilia did not make an effort in her role as first lady. Something was already amiss. Like in the recent picnic lunch with George Bush and family, she was absent and announced sick. However the next day, she was seen shopping in full health. In US, this news might shock a lot of people but in france, the common people did not really care. French tends to keep to their own business. It is the opposition party that criticise Nicolas for creating a fake family image. I think what is important is how Nicolas manages this country where companies get richer but there are 7 millions people living in poverty.

More gossip starts at : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9cilia_Sarkozy

Adieu, burnt down market

A while ago, my brother informed me that the market near our old Ang Mo Kio home had burnt down. I just dismissed this news without much thought. Today, I happened to see some photos taken years ago of the hawker stalls. Suddenly, I got awoken. I am a visual person and these photos brought back much valued memories. This market had been a huge part of my childhood and even adulthood. For nearly 20 years, this was the place where we spent most of our family time together. We had breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper there. Food at hawker centers were cheap and when mom did not cook, the most convenient way was to head down to the market for a no frills cheap meal. If going to the hawker center was considered an outing, then it was the place I visited most with my father.

Stall number 1 was the mixed veggie rice stall which used to sell Yong Tau Foo. I love the braised pig trotters there. There was also this white chicken rice stall opposite the community center. I remembered having lunch there on Saturday in between band practise. The last stall sold fish soup with fried fish eggs. Yummy. Beside it was the fried oyster which was heavenly sinful.

For breakfast, we usually shared nasi lemak with prawn mee soup or laksa. Sometimes it was the fried mee hoon with porridge poured over it. It’s not yucky. You should try it. The fresh soya bean drinks was a must despite the long queue. Each of us had our own task to do. One to buy the drinks; the other to queue for the food; another one to grab seats. It was such a normal affair that I never stop for a moment to reflect on this until now. Now that I am no longer in Singapore. Now that there is no hawker center in France. Now that eating out is usually eating in a restaurant on a less frequent basis. Oh what sweet memories of this burnt down market!

For supper, we would get fried hokkien mee and also satays. I better stop talking about local food since there are no plans to go back Singapore for the rest of the year.

The stall holders were hard working people who would start from early morning until late night; sometimes selling different food between lunch and dinner. I wonder how they were affected by this great loss. I read that the government will not rebuild the market unless the stall holders contribute money as well. As the sum was huge, I doubt many would continue. Truly, if the market had not been destroyed, I guess I would never have such strong nostalgic thoughts right now.

I better clear my thoughts fast because I wanted so much to hop on a plane for Singapore and hug my family telling them “I love you all and thanks for the meals we had together at the market.” Bisous.