The chop

Well no, I didn't really get the chop.. what I did do however, was raid my mum's collection of wigs. And no she's not bald, she just decided to buy a whole bunch of them while she was in vietnam a few years ago lol. Odd, I know..

Trying on all those different hairstyles makes me kinda want to chop off my hair though, but I don't have the guts. Wish I did. I really do need a change though.. having the same hairstyle/colour for the past 3 years is really starting to bum me out.. I feel as if I'm this person that's changed but hasn't changed. Yeh I suppose that doesn't make any sense at all, but it's not supposed to..

Maybe after the new year I'll do something with it.. start fresh, you know.. a new me.

Well I really don't have the energy to post a long blog so I'll leave you with a few photos to amuse you with:

Really wish I could pull this off.. it's my fav out of all of them hehe

Curly with straight bits

This one actually looks abit odd.. actually, don't all of them?

Holy shit, I think my head got attacked by an out-of-control crimper

Twisted bits of hair

Boxing day madness and xmas fever

Every year, a madness hits the city of Melbourne where people act like they've never shopped before in their lives. And yes, that includes me.

I wait patiently for the year to pass on slowly, just waiting for that one day where I can act like a shopaholic lunatic going even more mad, yet still look normal amongst all the other shopaholic lunatics that come out on that day. It's like Halloween for shopaholics... it's when they all come out to play lols.

I still can't believe that Myer Melbourne opened its doors at 5am, and people had actually been lining up since 3:30am (sounds insane, yet the thought had crossed my mind...). It was crazy. I mean, it was still packed full when I got to Myer a few hours later.

The thought crossing through my mind was how the hell do I get inside.

Well, I somehow made it through the entrance only to find myself queuing for the fitting rooms, and then queuing again for the cash registers. I spent more than 30 minutes lining up to pay for my bras and stuff (lols). Was it worth the $40 saved? Well yes, every penny saved is a penny towards my trip to Japan. So bring on those queues!

Funny story:

So I went to line up behind this man right, let me set the scene for you:

So I went up to this man who looked like he was lining up and was busy texting on his phone, right. And I go to him, excuse me are you in the line? And he goes, yeh of course I am. So I lined up behind him. A few minutes later I notice that people are cutting in ahead of him where the mannequins were. I looked at the girl that cut in, and she defended herself by saying, I don't think that guy's lining up. So I turned to the man and asked him again for the second time, excuse me, but are you lining up? And he says, yeah I am. And then it clicked. Suddenly it all made sense, and it was all I could do to stop myself from bursting out into laughter and embarassing him in front of the entire store. The guy was lining up behind the mannequins. He thought they were people. How dense can you be! And how dense am I for lining up behind this idiot lols.

All in all, my first solo shopping trip in years was a success. I should do this solo thing more often, seeing as I never find anything when I go with another person. But then again, it's like with alcohol.. once you find yourself doing it alone most of the time, you know you've got a problem lols. Purchases of the day were:

• 2 x Elle Mcpherson intimates
• 1 x Kookai singlet
• 1 x Kookai skirt
• 1 x Bardot cami
• 1 x Pilgrim top
• Hosiery

The aim was to find shoes but of course, we all know that you never come home with what you were looking for, but instead you come home with plenty of other crap haha.

After that it was off to Springvale for the annual family xmas party complete with xmas games such as a team battle of 'rock paper scissors', robot controlled soccer, and pictionary. Very lame games but I love it all the same. My 'prize' for being in the winning team was a pack of waffle cones. Lovely.. now all I need is the ice cream.
Oh, we also had the annual $10 KK present tradition where everyone brings a $10 gift and then we take turns picking a number out of a hat to determine which present we get =)
It's always pretty amusing the variety of things you can get for 10 bux. Who knew, eh?

Waffle cones.. yum. Guess I need to go buy some icecream.

Awesome remote-controlled robot soccer

Me and my cousin Amy being all christmassy

My KK present - a set of glasses from Ikea

All this planning is driving me insane.

God, who would have thought that planning a trip would be so exhausting. There's all these details that you have to find out and it's driving me insane. Plus, for some reason, all the kuala lumpan and singaporean websites that I go to don't seem to offer email addresses to contact them on. I have plenty of questions, all of which I don't particularly want to have to make an international call for.

Also, it seems like we may have decided to visit more cities than we can fit in comfortably. I really hope our holiday isn't spent rushing around and moving our luggage.

--------------------

Ok so finally the itinerary is done. I stayed up til 3am finishing it off last night.. I just need to make sure that it's alright with the other girls. So for now, it looks like we're visiting:

• Tokyo
• Kyoto
• Osaka
• Nara
• Mt Fuji
• Hiroshima
• Miyajima
• Yokohama
  

.....all in the space of 12 days.

Now, onto the next big headache - hotels. I hate hate hate the fact that the aussie dollar is doing so incredibly shit at the moment.. everything now costs 50% more. If I thought I was going to come back from my trip poor, well now I'm coming back nice and broke.

Well, at least mother dearest bought me my plane ticket.. but I don't want her to give me any more money because she has her own stuff to take care of.

Ahh crap, I think I'm getting a headache....

Tasty hearts and Fusion

Why is it that my parents always have to try and trick me into eating things that I absolutely would not eat had I had a choice.

I mean, when I was over in Vietnam my mum was like to me here, have some of this, it's like chicken. Little did I know, what I was happily munching on was two frog's legs. But I admit, it was pretty tasty haha.

And THEN she even tried telling me that eel was really a fish. Eels are not fish. Eels are eels. Do I look 3 years old to you? Ok, scrap that. So wikipedia tells me that they're an order of fish. I don't care, I'm not eating it.

Anyway, here I thought that once I was back home in Melbourne I'd be safe, right? But no, my congee was mixed with some strange looking pieces of meat. So I said to mum, what's this mum, is it beef? And all I'm met with is silence. Now, I know that silence is not good. If anything, silence is the worst. It's evil. If anyone replies to a question of yours with silence, back away. Turns out she was trying to sneak pieces of animal heart into my congee. Like I wouldn't notice. I mean cmon, if you're trying to sneak stuff into my meals at least try not to put 20 pieces in there. Obvious much?

Ok, enough about food. I had my first real night out since I got back from overseas. We were planning on heading to seven but they were knocking people back (yeh screw you), so we headed on over to Fusion at Crown. I have to say though, the crowd sucked, and there were some minor dramas throughout the night, but all in all, it was not too bad. R&B room sucked though. You'd think that being in a club, they'd play music that you could dance to, not mellow stuff. Ah well, whatever.

Losing my smarts.

There's something that I've noticed, and I've noticed it for a while now.. my marks get progressively worse each semester. Why? That's a question I've been asking myself and the only answers I can come up with are:

a) I'm getting busier.
b) I'm getting lazier.
c) I'm getting dumber.
d) All of the above.

I think it's most likely d).

Now, I don't know about anyone else, but I have to send my marks over to my grandparents in france every time I get them. And looking at my results again now that I'm back from vietnam and out of my holiday daze, I kind of want to turn a 6 into an 8 in a few places, perhaps add a few H's somewhere else... My grandparents were commenting last time on how I should try not to get any credits come exam time again. Well, here's another two for you.

Now that I think about it, I'm glad I started off first year with awesome marks. Because if I'd started off the way I'm going now and got progressively worse, I'd sure as hell be in trouble.

Actually, I'm kind of tempted to open up a textbook right now.. but that would be insane, right?Well, on the bright side at least my vietnamese is improving (sort of). I now don't have to flick to the dictionary every 2nd word when writing or reading emails, but only every 4th word or so haha. Yeh, it's still terrible, I know. But it's better than nothing, right?

------------

Also, I just got back from a belated-birthday get-together for Max. It wasn't a huge gathering, well, i mean it was just me, Max and Tien haha. But it's nice to catch up once in a while, if not that often.

It was also a chance for me to discover that I do not do wine very well. Give me some bottles of beer, or shots of vodka, or anything that comes in a shot really, and I guarantee you I won't go red or even be that tipsy really. With wine however, half a glass and I feel it going to my head and my face turning hot and red. It's a mystery. Who would have thought haha.

Give me my shots any day.

Shoes, shoes, shoes!

Some early xmas shopping has been done this year (surprisingly), and my mother's xmas present has been taken care of. No worrying or last minute stress about what to get. Phew. This is why I like people to just tell me what they want. That way you don't wind up with some lame present that's going to be stashed away in the back of some cupboard, and then somehow becomes recycled as someone elses present (yes it happens!).

I heart Steve Madden shoes.. they're so nice. If only I could find some for myself... Here are the cute shoes I bought mother dearest:
Nice, right? Now on top of that, we went shopping again today and she bought two more pairs of shoes for herself from Zu! I'm too too jealous. I would seriously love a new pair of shoes (plus white shoes for Sensation as well). I have a feeling that come stocktake sale time, I am going to be very very poor.

I am totally eyeing a pair of shoes from Wittner.. they're gorgeous but they're $160 - more than what I should be spending seeing how I'm supposed to be saving up for my upcoming trip! Although, that's not to say that I wouldn't buy them if by some chance they were marked down some time in the upcoming week (*cough*boxingdaysales*cough). Now that would be one helluva christmas =)

Fooled by the scales, and memories of vietnam

I stepped onto the scales today, and for a split second my heart jumped for joy because I thought I'd lost some weight during my trip to vietnam. But no, that all came crashing down a second later when I realised that the scales weren't set to zero. Biggg sigh lol. Well, on the bright side, at least I haven't gained any weight after all that eating and sleeping I did on my holiday.

I haven't even been back 2 days yet and already the reality is kicking in, and the stress level is reaching high. What part of leave me alone is so hard to understand?

Oh, and here's an example of crossing the street in vietnam. I miss it. We cross the road too damn proper here haha =p



It's 2am and I'm not yet sleepy. I've really got to adjust back to melbourne time, but I can't (or can't be bothered). Well, guess it's time to catch up with my Gossip Girl XOXO.

Home, sweet home and tagged!

First of all, I've been tagged but I'll get to that in abit. For now:

I can't think of a better place to be than home.. but why do I have this odd longing to be back in vietnam? Do I really want to go back? Or is it just me not wanting to go back to the reality of doing the same old thing every day again.. I think it's abit of both.

I made some new friends, and met some old ones. And even though I only met them a few times, I feel like I'll miss the feeling of grasping for the right vietnamese words, making lots of hand gestures to get my point across, and giving them lots of blank looks when I don't understand something they've said lol. I really wish there was some way of improving my viet so I don't look so much like a blubbering idiot. Well, at least I've got a goal for next time and some good memories to look back on =)



I just got back to melbourne this morning to some really shitty weather, and a room that didn't look familiar to me anymore. It felt strange walking back into my room.. it somehow looked different but I couldn't put my finger on it. I mean, I've only been gone a month, what could have changed?

And OH yes back to the bit about being tagged. I've been tagged by Marlene so here I go:

The Rules:
1. Link the person who tagged you.
2. Mention the rules on your blog.
3. Tell about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours.
4. Tag 6 following bloggers by linking them.
5. Leave a comment on each of the tagged blogger's blogs letting them know they've been tagged.

1) I can be an organisational freak or a complete slob.
Most of the time (actually it's probably all the time) my room looks like a bomb hit it 3 months ago and no one's bothered clearing the mess. I had 20x20cm of clear desk space to work with all semester long until exams came and I somehow managed to stash my mess elsewhere. Half of my bed is to sleep on, the other half is to throw all the other stuff which doesn't fit anywhere else onto. Books, folders, clothes, bags, you name it, it's on my bed. That being said, I can be a complete organisational freak when I want to be (or when I can't help it). I label things, I go to Officeworks to get things binded, my novels are organised by genre and then alphabetical order by author, and when I'm organising/planning something - like my upcoming trip to Japan - I really get into it (refer to the discussion board I put up for planning our trip with seperate threads for accommodation in the corresponding city, seperate threads for things to do in each city, etc). Oh, and my wardrobe is organised by type of clothing (jeans, singlets, tshirts, jumpers, dresses) and then subdivided by colour. Not completely sure if that was because I couldn't help organising it, or if it was just simply the fact that I was fed up with my wardrobe being crammed full and not being able to find anything. Sometimes I think it's really determined by the flip of a coin. Heads, I'm a slob. Tails, I'm a complete organisational nut. I have no idea how else to determine which way I'll head.

2) I always carry a bottle of water and a packet of tissues with me.
No matter where I go I always have these in my school bag/handbag/whateverbag. I mean, you never know when you might need that sip of water. You could be walking down a street and suddenly get really thirsty, and there'll be no shop in sight. We're in a drought you know - you could die without that bottle of water right by your side. That, and I think my pink/purple Starbucks bottle is real pretty. You also never know when you'll get a snotty nose. Don't want to get caught out, do we? Oh, I've also been known to carry wet wipes around too. And hayfever tablets, stomachache medicine, panadol, etc too. Yeh I'm a real 'just incase' type of person haha.

3) I've watched Titanic the movie 38+ times.
Yeh, I lost track somewhere after 38. It was this weird obsession I had back in grade 5. I just kept watching it over and over again (and keeping count) until I could practically recite the whole damn thing - and I did a few times. Mind you, this was back in the VHS days so I had to keep rewinding the freaking tape. I lost it somewhere now, but that's okay because now I have the DVD. Oh, and I used to sleep with it next to my pillow. Obsessed much? Somehow, I think that now that I've put that up here for everyone to see, I'll never hear the end of it lol.

4) I save my used Metcards.
I have no idea why I do this, or what I'll do with them, but I can't throw them away. Perhaps I'll have enough some day to cover my entire wall.

5) I eat my hot dogs/sandwiches/breadrolls/pizza slices from the outside inwards.
Not entirely sure why, but I can't eat the above from one side to the other. If it's a hot dog or bread roll of some sort, I'll start at one end, then move to the other end, and then switch back and forth until I finish in the middle. If it's a sandwich or pizza slice, I'll eat in a circle until I reach the middle as well. I can't help it, it's just what I do, and mum tells me off for it all the time. I think it may be because I like to leave the best bits for last, and the outsides/ends are usually the worst bits (crust, bits of bread with no sausage/filling).

6) I like to dip my Maccas french fries into my soft serve cone.
Contrary to what some of my friends believe, I think alot of people do this one! I'm positive that I've seen people do it before, yet some people still think its weird when I do it. Tastes yummy though, and I've done it since forever.

Hmm so this has kinda made me realise that a) I'm weird, and b) I have no one else to tag since Marlene's the only person I know who blogs here.. actually I suppose I could tag anyone right? Like, even on xanga? Well, too bad if I can't because that's what I'm gonna have to do lols.

SO I tag the only other people that I know who blog: princesstrang, and j3n_ee.

And now, I think it's time for me to sleep because I am absolutely exhausted.

How fun it is to get ripped off...

The bad thing about holidaying in vietnam is the fact that you will most definitely get ripped off at one point or another (more often than not actually).

If you're a foreigner (i.e. white) you'll reallyy have a tough time here. Expect to be ripped off at least double the price. Especially at stores where they don't have marked prices. Even if they do have marked prices, expect to be ripped off anyway. The marked prices are sometimes not even the real price, and they're just there for you to feel like you've bargained the price down.

This rule of ripping people off doesn't just apply to white people, it also applies to viet kieu (vietnamese people living abroad) - i.e. me. The bad thing about me and my mum is that you can spot that we're tourists from a mile away. We don't dress like everyone here, and we're not yet black from the sun. My mum has red hair and trust me, as soon as I open my mouth to speak, the price of everything probably doubles because you can instantly tell that I ain't from around here. I really should have paid more attention in viet school. But even so, there's no way of hiding my english accent.

So anyway back onto my story of how we got ripped off. Me and mum were at the Ben Thanh market again yesterday and we saw this really nice set of a lacquerware bowl, plate and pair of chopsticks. The marked price was 180,000 dong for one set ($16 - bloody expensive for vn!!). So my mum was like cmon, what's the real price? The shop girl was like okay I'll give it to you for 150,000 dong. So then my mum was like well, what if we buy 10 sets? make it cheaper.. And after alot of bargaining and no, that's too expensive and just tell us the REAL price! we ended up getting it for about 110,000 dong or so for each set. We sure were happy with ourselves for getting the price down from 180,000 to 110,000 so when we went 3 stalls down and saw the exact same set, we were like hmm.. I wonder how much they are here. Imagine how shattered we were when the girl was like oh they're 85,000 dong for a set. And that was her initial price. Imagine what we could have gotten them for if we had had a chance to bargain with her.

So, the moral of the story is:
Shop around for prices before buying ANYTHING. Lesson well and truly learnt.

Oh, and what's with vietnam's xmas craze? Aren't the majority of people here supposed to be buddhist or something?

P.S. This giant snowman at my hotel is creeping me out.

Traffic in vietnam and other things..

Anyone who has been to Vietnam will definitely know the hazards of crossing the street here. It must be because of the insane tax on importing motor vehicles or something(think - US $70-80,000 for a Camry), but most of the population here rely on their motorbikes. According to my most reliable source (Wiki), there's about 6.5 million people living in Saigon, so you can imagine the insane amount of traffic especially during peak hour.

One thing to note about crossing the street here is that the people on motorbikes do not stop for you. So if you're standing by the side of the road waiting for the traffic to stop so you can cross, then good luck, and see you next year. I've figured out that the trick is to slowly edge your way across the road at a slow and predictable pace and simply let the motorbikes dodge you. Don't try running across the road or that'll be the end of you. Quite terrifying if you've never done it before. Luckily for me, this ain't my first time here lol.

Just from observing the people driving past, you can see a great deal of acrobatics going on - I mean, the number of people you can fit on a motorbike is really quite amazing. Let's say Dad's the driver, Mum's sitting behind him, toddler wedged between them, and another kid doing a balancing act up in front of Dad. That's four people.. on one motorbike. Thank god they finally introduced the helmet rule this past year. People also carry their sleeping babies on the motorbikes here. Honestly, I don't know how the babies fall asleep because if it were me, I'd be terrified lol. Here's an example (not my own pic btw - forgot my camera cable back at home):

One thing I've decided while I'm over here is that I'm going to start my own little doll collection. I want a doll to represent every country in the world. I also want the dolls to come from the actual countries. Abit ambitious, I know. But hey, at least now I can say that I have a hobby. Here's the first addition to my collection, bought from the Ben Thanh market (it's dressed as one of the hill tribes of vietnam and is made with sapa fabrics, or so I'm told). I'm also pretty sure I got ripped off considering I paid 100,000 dong ($9) for it.

Something that's going onto my list of things to do next time I'm in vietnam is to get an ao dai (our national costume) tailormade for myself. I can't even remember if I ever owned one, but I feel as if I should have one as backup incase I ever happen to err... need... one.. not sure at what time I would need one, but I still feel like I should get one! But I must leave this til the next time I'm here because I need to lose weight have no time to get it made. They're actually quite beautiful when you think about it and compare it to some other hideous national costumes out there (google England's 'pearly kings and queens' costumes).

And on that note, I feel I must mention the fact that I am a whopping size XL here. Going from a medium to an extra large sure is doing nothing for my self-esteem. Sigh. Well, I suppose it's not my fault that everyone here is stick thin and flat as a surfboard. Everywhere I go I feel like a beached whale. Even my size 7-8 feet feel like elephant feet seeing as no one has my size.

Quite depressing actually...

It's time to get down to it..

The changeover is complete! With everything thats been going on in my
life lately, I feel like I need a fresh start, and with it, a brand
new blog.

Goodbye Xanga (not that I've even blogged there in the past year),
goodbye facebook blog - you were really crap to begin with, so that in
the end I couldn't even be bothered blogging anymore.

After reading Marlene's blog (scatteredrecollections.blogspot.com),
I've decided to get back into it. You'd think that being overseas
would equal less time on the net, but no, I'm actually on more than
ever. I'm going to have major Internet withdrawal on the plane heading
back to melb.

So let's see.. how has my trip been so far? Well it was my fourth (or
is it fifth) time going to france - jealous? But really, you can only
visit the same monuments so many times before you end up having photos
looking eerily similar. Believe me, I'm even wearing the same jacket I
was wearing in the photos I took the last time I was there - minus the
scarf.

Same with Vietnam. This is my fourth time now, but luckily for me I
never took pictures the previous times so there's no doubling up here.
phew. Although I think that once you've been to a place too many
times, you end up spending more time in the hotel than doing anything
else.

Also, shopping is hard here. Sure, it may be cheap, but my perfectly
average AUS sz 7 feet are considered to be enormous elephant feet in
the world of size 5 feet. I've heard the sentence "I'm sorry but that
was the largest size" more than I'd care to hear. And I haven't had
the guts to try the clothes on yet.. imagine what I'd hear then. sigh.

And besides the size factor, there's also the issue with everyone
being obsessed with fake brands and tacky jewels stuck on everything
you could imagine - shoes, bags, belts, you name it. Its like a sea of
bling shining up at you every time you step into a store. Its also
impossible to find a bag without the words Gucci, Prada, LV, Chanel or
Chloe imprinted on the side in an obviously fake way.

AND. What is with those sale assistants that follow you around the
store?? They are 2 steps behind you the whole time, I kid you not.

Ok, ok, I know it seems like I'm complaining a whole lot, but I've had
a good time. Really. I love the insane traffic, the skill you need to
cross the street, the fact that it's possible to buy a meal for 4
people for only 15 dollars, going to the market, riding around the
city with no particular destination on the back of a motorbike (albeit
without the wind blowing in my hair anymore since these new rules
requiring you to wear a helmet). I just love the general atmosphere of
a bustling city. Melbourne, as much as I love it, has more of a
laidback attitude, and isn't quite the same...

Well, that's all from me for my first post. Time for me to go lie in
my hotel room and watch some tv.