Philly events

I have been quite lazy recently in blogging. Even my hubby felt so. This was partly due to me being occcupied with other stuff and also partly due to my own procrastination. For a start, I should try to blog about some of the major events in Philly in the recent months.

2008 COUNTDOWN

While there were plans for us to go to New York to take part in the countdown to 2008, we decided against it as the weather was too cold and apparently, we would have to stand in the cold from 6pm to get a good spot at Times Square. Hence, we spent 31 Dec 2007 in Philly, as we heard that the celebrations were equally good. On New Year's Eve, we joined the crowd for the countdown to 2008 and the fireworks at Penn's landing. The fireworks was awesome, a full 45-min worth of viewing pleasure. Furthermore, we found a good spot and were able to get a good view of the fireworks which was literally right above our heads. In fact, some soot from the fireworks fell on us! Here's a video clip of what it was like.




NEW YEAR'S DAY-MUMMERS PARADE

On New Year's Day, we went to watch the Mummers Parade which was apparently, one of the oldest and largest parades in US. In fact, the people who were participating in the parade came from all walks of life in Philadelphia, mainly the working class. For them to put up something like this is really commendable, these working adults would have to sacrifice their after-office hours to rehearse for the event. They even made their own costumes which was really funny. The Mummers Parade is a whole day event. Although it should start at 9 am, the actual thing itself did not start until noon due to a slight rain. We managed to catch the comics section of the parade along Broad Street before heading to Chinatown for lunch (which,by the way, is probably where restaurants stay open even during all major holidays in Philadelphia). We love the fun-loving nature of the people who took part in the parade. They would come up to us and joke with us. In the evening, we managed to get a seat among at wooden benches set up at the main judging area(Don't ask us how we did it) and we joined the crowd to watch the string bands. However, we finally succumbed to the cold as it was freezing and we decided to head home to watch the rest of the parade on TV. If I get a chance next year, I would watch the fancy brigades at the Convention Center next time, where it is indoors and and there are comfortable seats. Here are some of the photos taken during the parade, one of which is a funny shot of pigeons which were forced out of their territory and had to watch the parade from a distance.

Eclipse

I can't believe that I actually got to see a rare sight, a total moon eclipse, last night. I was actually waiting for the bus when an old lady came up to me and told me about the eclipse. The moon was right above me and it was starting to be covered in the shadow of the Earth. What a sight! Apparently, the next total lunar eclipse will be in the year of 2010. How lucky I was to have witnessed something so rare! Here's a picture that I snapped using my cellphone camera.

Year-end holidays in Las Vegas

Finally, my hubby had an almost 2-week break. After exploring the option of visiting South America or Mexico, we decided to abandon our initial plans to visit those places, as the air-tickets and hotels were too expensive. Instead, we decided to spend our vacanes in the US, given our limited budget. Hence, we ended up in Las Vegas as none of us had visited the place before and we also managed to find a relatively cheap package.

Off to Vegas we went. Our friends who had visited Vegas before gave us some tips before our trip, therefore, we were quite prepared for the trip. For example, we were not surprised to find that there were slot machines at the boarding gates and the baggage retrieval area in the airport. We were also not surprised when our hotel told us that we would have to pay $15 per night to borrow their coffee-making machine. While we like Vegas for its cleanliness(the streets are much cleaner than those in Philly) and spacious sidewalks, we were appalled at some of the prices of stuff. For example, a bottle of drinks can easily cost $3 at the convenience store in a hotel or a theatre.

While we were there, we watched two Cirque du Soleil's shows,'O' and 'Mystere', though I prefer the former to the latter. Mystere seems somewhate lacklustre, especially so after we watched 'O'. We felt that we should have gone for KA(which seemed somewhat more spectacular on the promotional video which was screened on the TV in our hotel room). We also managed to catch the David Copperfield's show. While I was not very impressed by the magic and the scale of the theatre(perhaps I have seen most of his best performances on TV), I found that he was really funny and he could really make the cut for a comedian.

Besides being famous for its show, Las Vegas is also famous for the many buffets in the hotels. We tried the buffets at Bellagio and Planet Hollywood(Spice Market) and we must admit that the latter is so much better in terms of quality of food. The range of food is much better at Bellagio but the cooking is so-so. The buffet at Bellagio also cost more.

On Christmas, we went a Grand Canyon tour. Initially, there were plans for us to rent a car and made a road trip. However, we decided against it as it would be too tiring to drive there 4 hours and try to make it back to Vegas in another 4 hours, all within a day. We wanted to relax and take things easy so we left the driving to our coach driver. He was very knowledge and funny too, so we were glad to have gone on the trip. Grand Canyon was really impressive but it was cold there(afterall, the viewing areas were located on higher altitudes). The next time we visit Grand Canyon, we would make a trip down to the bottom of the gorge and explore it from below. On the way back to Philly in the plane, we actually managed to see the Grand Canyon from above. Here are some of the shots along with photos of Las Vegas Strip itself.



Aerial view of Grand Canyon












The snow on the rocks at Grand Canyon
















Nightview of the Strip

Thanksgiving

Last week was the Thanksgiving holidays! Finally, hubby managed to get a break from his hectic schedule. On Thanksgiving, we had dinner with our friends at S' place and there was so much food that we were all knocked out by the end of the dinner. Here's a picture to show the amount of food we had.

Dinner was real fun 'cos we cracked funny jokes, made stupid comments and even shared on the origins of Thanksgiving, albeit with a little twist to the actual story.

After dinner, some of us played Wii. It was my first time playing Wii but I must admit it is really a good work-out if anyone is thinking of slimming down. The boxing game is so tiring that I felt that I could have another round of turkey. I also realised that Wii can be addictive and dangerous too for it is easier for one to damage the TV screen if one is not careful.

Later on in the evening, some of us decided to do the crazy thing for once in our life, i.e. join the crowd in midnight shopping on Black Friday. Therefore, we drove to an outlet mall about an hour away from city. There were people who were even crazier than us 'cos many cars have arrived before us and we had to wait for another hour before we actually got into the car-park. Nevertheless, we had fun, playing games to kill time and keep our driver, E, awake while he waited to park the car.

When we finally got into the mall, it was about 2.30am and we shopped for about 2 hours after that. Perhaps it was the fatigue of waiting, or pehaps it was the fatigue of having spent many hours preparing for Thanksgiving dinner, we decided that we really could not carry on shopping anymore. When we got home, it was 5.30am and really knocked out by then.

Nevertheless, at the mall, I overheard other shoppers that they were going to check out the sales which start at 4 or 5am in other malls. I wished I had their stamina....

Singapore from another perspective

I've been really busy since I went back to Spore for a short holiday. Even after I returned to Philly, so many things have happened that I just do not have enough time to even blog about them. Perhaps, let's talk what I noticed during my short trip to Singapore.

1. Singapore is very crowded now. It is literally impossible nowadays to get a seat on public transport, such as the buses or trains. Even if it is late at night, there are always many people around. (I miss having a car when I was back...)

2. The thing that is hot now in Singapore is property. Everyone is talking about making $ from selling their houses or apartments. I even have real estate agent calling me to ask if I wanted to sell my place. Such things would seem impossible a few years back as no one wants to live in a ulu place like mine.

3. Singapore is clean! Indeed very clean, as compared to other parts of the world, especially Philly. At least, I feel happy if I were to walk on the streets wearing expensive shoes because the shoes will still be relatively clean.

4. Singapore is warm now compared to Philly which is very cold(near 0 degree). I miss the days when I can wear camisoles, short-sleeved shirts, bermudas and slippers.

5. There are now many new structures in Singapore. Well, at least, the Ferris wheel is almost ready. When I left for Philly a few months back, they were still trying to put in the cabins.

6. Many old condominiums have been torn down to make way for new condos(What a sad thing though 'cos I really like the architecture of some of the older condos.)

7. Some of my students have grown taller(indeed taller than me now)!

8. Many changes at my former workplace, ex-colleagues leaving and new staff joining the team. Sad to see some faces go but I wish them all the best.

9. My apartment in Singapore seems somewhat bigger and cozier. My bed back in Singapore apartment also seems different now that there are some changes to it. I miss my own apartment. The feeling for a rented apartment is somewhat very different from those when you have your own apartment.

10. People seldom use "Hi! How do you? Nice to meet you." in Singapore. Perhaps, it is just my own feeling. Somehow, I have met so many people in Philly that I tend to use this even when I was back in Singapore.

Crimes in Philly

I seem to be hearing more stories about crimes recently. To list a few, these are some of the recent happenings:

1. Robbery & assault at 7-11 store in centre city which is very near my apt!
(check this out: http://video.nbc10.com/player/?id=188766)
2. Shooting somewhere at 22nd & Sansom (Hubby was at a restaurant nearby 30min before the shooting!)
3. A woman who was sexually assaulted by someone who invaded her apt located at University City
4. A fatal shoot-out in a food establishment at 38th and Chestnut.
5. Taxi-drivers who worked with robbers to rob passengers

This is freaking crazy! Why are crimes so out of control here?

Thanks to all readers!

Thanks to all who have been reading my blog faithfully! I am going to take in your comments and put in some changes. Besides a note on some of my grammatical mistakes(ahem.. you know who you are), I have also received requests to put up a tagboard and more photos. For a start, I will start with the easiest task of them all, i.e. to put up some photos. Here are some photos of New York which I visited recently. My apologies if the pictures look fuzzy 'cos this was taken with hubby's cellphone camera, as the usual forgetful me has forgotten to bring the camera along on this trip.
















Times Square-heart of Manhattan













Our hotel room in the Westin Hotel-our 2nd time there and we still like the place very much.