Saturday, March 15, 2008

The Cruise Trip

needless to say, it was loads of fun and both doo and i are missing the times we spent during those 4 days :( we took some pictures, but not many because the star cruises website has got tons of pics of the interior of the cruise so most of our pics were taken offboard. =)

it's lovely to be on Balcony Class because you get priority for certain stuff like the booking of seating at the Gala Dinner as well as being in a queue at immigration that's much, much shorter than the snake-chain formed by the rest.

Congratulations to us for finally arriving on the cruise after a 3-month wait!!! Pardon us for the nibble at the bottom of the heart, we're obviously amateurs at controlling the temptation to try out the cake before the idea of taking a picture actually came about. woops! :X

we embarked on Sunday, 9th of March and took pictures with some brazilian dancers and the penguin Star Cruises mascot :D and were offered drinks at the Grand Piazza (reception area). then we proceeded to the Mediterrenean Terrace for a buffet lunch, which wasn't too much to our liking, so we went to the Bella Vista (fine dining restaurant) for our 2nd round of lunch as well. They had yummy banana fritters with ice-cream which I had two lovely servings of, and were simply not enough! after which, we checked out our cabin, which was still in the "cleaning in progress" mode so we walked around the ship and got ourselves an airbrush tattoo each :)

I didn't get a pic of doo's, but here's mine.

we also went to do the necessary, such as the booking of our seating for the Gala Dinner, collection of the Romance at Sea vouchers, the booking of our on shore, land excursions at Penang and Phuket and then retired to our decorated with gold heart balloons room for the tasting of the heart-shaped, chocolate coated cake (with the word 'Congratulation' [?1?!?!?!?!] in our cabin. it was sooooooooooo nice for a chocolate cake, and i loved everything about it - the taste, the texture, the chewiness! a bottle of champagne was waiting for us as well, but till today it is still unopened. then came the evening, and we had dinner at the Bella Vista again I believe, which was surprisingly our most favoured place during the entire trip (and i usually avoid western food). When we were done with dinner, we went to catch a performance entitled "Street Life", which was a dance and acrobatic show that was extremely entertaining as they were really good and the costumes eye catching and shiny and bright! Basically, most of the dance parts were done by the dancers from Brazil and Belarus and the mind blowing acrobatic stuff were performed by acrobats from Guang Xi, China. It's so nice to see two troupes (one from the East and the other from the West) come together to put up a show together. I loved it.

The next day: 10th of March, 2008.

We woke up to Breakfast in Bed, an entitlement from the Romance at Sea package we paid for. sounds wrong haha, but doo says it really isn't breakfast in bed considering i have to step out of it, open the door for the delivery of my breakfast on a HUGE, HUGE tray and then find some space for it :X that aside, the American breakfast was perfect! we had scrambled eggs, toast, danish pastry, the longest sausage i've ever seen, bacon, ham, hashbrowns, tea, and mango and orange juices. i suggested we have our breakfast out in the balcony where there were two lounge chairs and a mini table. In my opinion, this was not just a Breakfast in Bed but a Breakfast in Bed at Sea. i couldn't agree more when doo commented that it is so nice to wake up with the sea beside you because my oh my, it just feels so comfy to be surrounded by blue water which stretched to the immeasureable end of the horizon and then you'd seem to feel like you have absolutely no worries at all. and even if i tried to remember whatever worries i had for the sake of knowing that i am still living in reality, i just don't seem to be able to recall any.

Before we got off the ship to get to the shores of Penang, there were another 2 mascots to take photos with (we could pick one out of the 2) and I chose to have my picture taken with a cutiepie pirate haha! I was so tempted to cover one of my eyes to mimmick the fact that he couldn't see with his left eye because he had an eye patch on :)

Well, this was the first day that we got onto one of the lifeboats of the superstar virgo, as our shipped parked itself in the middle of the sea (still within sight of penang of course). the lifeboats were responsible for ferrying us to shore for our tours and no prizes for guessing, i opted for a shopping one :) we ended up buying loads and loads of food, like 3 boxes of tau sar pia and 5 packets of nutmeg for our parents and some cuttlefish stuff for our colleagues.

we went back on board after shopping for dinner at Bella Vista again. This time, we used the Romance at Sea voucher which entitled us to two glasses of sparkling wine and a special dessert which was chocolate fondue XD! Several of the staff at Bella Vista had an "ooh! you're on the romance at sea package" reaction which was kinda funny because we didn't exactly see the big deal of it all.

Somehow, I can't help but wonder why is it that I sleep so well on the ship? I usually only sleep for 7 hours a day, or I'll wake up when the clocks trikes 630am. But on the ship, sleep never seems to be enough. Doo thinks star cruises might've invested in good beds. I think my body probably knows it's on holiday mode, because i'm back to "normal" now.

Some pics taken over both days (10th and 11th March) while we were on land at Penang and Phuket (actually 2/3s of the pics were taken in Phuket). the elephants pics were taken because i got bored at the jewellery store in Phuket called Wang Talang.

11th of march: We woke up early today and went for breakfast at the Mediterrenean Terrance because a buffet breakfast is always the quickest. we had to assemble at The Lido by 830am, but we were already there at 805am. -_- We didn't manage to board the life boats until approx 9am or so though, because the response for the tours in Phuket was overwhelming as compared to the Penang. Once again, I opted for SHOPPING haha because i wanted to get food for myself and my family. :D met loads of fugly singaporeans on the tour, as well as as very nice lady who was extremely chatty with me LOL and showed me pics of her grandson. after this shopping trip, doo and i ended up with 3 additional bags we had to carry home (inclusive of those from Penang) because i refused to bring another trolley luggage on the trip believing that i wouldn't have much to buy - but i proved myself wrong! anyway, phuket was nice - the sand on Patong Beach was super duper fine that i wouldn't mind stepping on it all day because it doesn't hurt to step on it like the coarse kind you'd find at Sentosa. also, the sand at Patong Beach in Phuket felt really cool - so cool that you could soothe your feet in it while the rest of your body'd bake in the burning sun.

that evening when we got back on board, there were loads of activities lined up for us. but before that came about, we had a mini dinner at the Blue Lagoon because i was hungry :X Anyway, the events for the night:

First at 715pm, the Musicians of Bremen musical at The Lido, where we get to catch another performance by the dancers from Brazil and Belarus as well as the acrobats from China. After which, we'd head over to the Grand Piazza where there's a phototaking session with the captain and co-captain, who amazingly have the same first name. I left that out for another time though. However, there were photographers throughout the area taking pictures of the attendees of this Gala Cocktail. I got bored and so we proceeded to Bella Vista for our Gala Dinner in my gold knotted back dress with black opaque stockings, and him in his suit and a red shirt. Apparently, tons of others had the same idea of going for dinner a little earlier, and so there was already a crowd with tons of peeps heading towards the same place even though dinner was only supposed to start at 9 -_- anyway, we were assigned table 135, which was by the window (not as if we could see anything out at sea at night), but the thing is, it's the same table as the first one we sat at on the first day when we first dined at Bella Vista together :) Oh, and the food again was great :X I ordered fish, but beef in a pie (Beef Wellington, as it was called) came instead. Silly me forgot until i cut open the pie but no regrets! it was simply fabfabfabfabfabfab!! the beef was so tender and the pie was crispy on the outside and oooooo-soooo-soft on the inside (that i thought it was coated with potato). doo felt slightly sick, and that was very likely due to the allergy he developed after eating a bowl of super king-sized prawn noodles (somewhere in Singapore, yes). he had ordered seafood that night and i guess it might not have been fresh enough for him because the kind of fresh prawns he needs to have are the kind that's used to make Ebi tempura :X Still, i'm glad we were able to sit through the whole of it, at least long enough for us to finish our main course and dessert!

Bella Vista always has delectable-looking desserts in store for me.

I was talking to doo about why loads of women cook but the best chefs are male. It's the same thing with tailors and hairstylists, and Ailay agrees with me. LOL. doo thinks it's all about the Math. I like to believe that more men have mathy brains than women, because i happen to be one of those women with a non-mathy brain (that's not to say non-calculative though). Well, doo says that when it comes to cooking, the amt of ingredients and what to put together must be carefully measured and planned (unless you're experimenting) and that's where the math comes in. For example, a tailor needs to be accurate in his measurements before he can alter or make a garment for you. With that, does that mean that with hairstylists, it's about precision? because sometimes it looks like they anyhow cut right? HAHA :X it's probably just me: i'm never able to figure out how good stylists can snip snip snip and voila! the person sitting on the chair suddenly has artistic hair. For that, doo says creativity (i seriously think he meant drawing/a part of art) can be learnt. There are certain things like the drawings (a chocolate butterfly adorned with coloured syrup/jam on its wings) on the plate of dessert which I was having which can be learnt, which I believe so - as in, one can always learn to draw. But to create your own design? Isn't that what creativity is about? I guess that's the tricky part, but somehow or rather i'm sure there are those who are mathy and creative at the same time :X those geniuses. haha!

Next, at 1145pm, we were supposed to be at The Lido for the topless, Las Vegas - styled revue show which was complimentary for us because of the Romance at Sea package:X. but damn it :( I fell asleep at 1105pm and i didn't know doo was going to hit the bed after me too. By the time he woke up to wake me up, it was ten minutes past midnight and with 5 minutes left before the show ended, we knew we had missed it and there was nothinig we could do about it. it was such a pity because i seriously wanted to know what it as going to be like. my curiosity wasn't satisfied :( and i'm sure doo wanted to catch the show too. ARGH!~!~ where on Earth (or in Singapore) could we catch another topless show without paying like hundreds? :X

12th of March: Our Last Day on board.

the name of this wonderful creation: "Pearl of the Orient" - which is also what Penang is known as :X I had this for breakfast at the Bella Vista as my dessert - ooh they had other fruits such as palm (sea coconut) and fresh longans (which i couldn't be bothered to peel :X) apart from the Jackfruit (as the Oyster). This idea came about when I noticed that one of the Jackfruit pieces I had on my plate resembled an oyster, so I took a little baked bean and put it right in the centre. weehee! I'm so proud of my creation that I just had to take a picture :)

This was the day i hadn't been waiting for. breakfast was at Bella Vista and i spent the rest of the morning packing our stuff, as we still had $160+ worth of dining credits to be used, we had an early authentic Japanese lunch at the Samurai Restaurant. The staff at that restaurant may be of different nationalities, some are filipino and others chinese, but they all speak JAPANESE! OMG how cool is that? no wonder there were so many Japanese dining there! (ok the food is bland like what jap food IS supposed to be and so i didn't like my "main course"). I had banana tempura for dessert and loved it :) a trio of ice cream scoops were included: Vanilla, Green Tea (matcha) and Yam flavours. It was lovely cos i had been craving for fried bananas ever since I had some at Bella Vista during our first lunch on board.

after lunch, we went to look at the pictures the photographers on board the superstar virgo snapped for us. the staff at the photo gallery could actually locate our pictures immediately upon seeing us, without us having to even ask (omg). haha. we didn't get anything though, even though we knew that if we came back to the same place 5 years down the road it wouldn't be the same. i guess $15 per photo really is exorbitant, and well, we do have lovely memories to bring back with us already.

the afternoon was spent slacking, and we went back to Samurai for my dinner dessert: Ebi Tempura (5 pieces for $36 + 15%) and was totally yummy plus my Banana Tempura again. The waitress there event commented that she noticed that i like it loads while i was floating in bliss. About the Ebi Tempura, it was extremely expensive but i know it was worth the price (if you have dining credits to spare, teeheehee). i usually dislike eating tempura in Singapore with its sauce because the sauce usually takes like salt+water or simple soya sauce by itself. I was also too used to eating tempura without the sauce, but with all the goodie tastes already mixed in the batter used to make the tempura. Samurai's tempura sauce however, changed my mind totally about well, tempura sauce itself. It proved to me that tempura can taste great even if its batter is tasteless, as long as the sauce packs in the punch. WOOHOO! XD! which Samurai's did of course ;)

after dinner, doo and i spent our last few tokens at the arcade, which seemed bigger than what i saw 8 years ago even though doo claims it's still of the same size -_- we played a "Spot the Difference" game which was so easy and had few stages.. and another foodie game where we had to locate some single ingredients (eg. different types of vegetables) among loads of other ingredients before the timer ran out. the labels for the ingredients were in Chinese, so poor me was putting my word matching skills to the test for the first time haha. well, once the arcade closed at 7, we carried our 3 bags of food (our dear, yummy loot from penang and phuket in recyclable bags like the one from novo haha) to the reception area (which is the point for balcony class travellers to wait at). we had settled our bill earlier on in the afternoon, so now it was time to slack away from the crowd because the majority of the people on the ship were at somewhere else. PHEW!

well, after departing from the ship, there was this long, carpeted walkway where some of the staff were making music and singing their farewell to us and another one of the staff plonked party hats on the heads of random peeps and the two of us, though walking some distance apart, happened to be two of those peeps. that cheered up my mood a little actually, because i was laughing at doo and i can't remember if he was laughing at me. and so now i have to say this though i hate to say it: the saying "All good things come to an end" is so true.. so true that i wish they could've invented another statement like "All bad things always quickly come to an end". :X

Now that the two of us are back on shore, we're feeling landsick. We never experienced what it was like to be seasick on board, but we're actually LANDSICK now! meaning, we feel as if our bodies are moving according to the way the ship moves (a slightly rocking movement) while it sails, even though we KNOW that they aren't moving that way in fact. also, i've got multiple cravings for dessert now, especially at night, because i've had dessert for every meal on board T_T!! and i LOVE desserts!

ahh and i can't believe it : tomorrow is SUNDAY and just last Sunday we were waiting to board the ship. T_T!!! i think it's time to start planning for our next holiday. heheh..

hmm and everyone seemed surprised when i told them it never rained on board until the last day when we were on our way back to SG. this is a pic that's taken either in the early morning or in the evening (i can't tell because they both look somewhat similar) and it's the view i get from the balcony. it looks cloudy, and that's about the cloudiest it gets. one thing i noticed when i was on board though: we could never catch sunrise/sunset! T_T! the time for sunrise/sunset was given every day but that orangey sight i was expecting never occurs O_O! so i always am puzzled about where the sun is.. maybe it was hiding behind the clouds (for all 4 days?!?!?!).

i'm abby the sailor girl
the cruise was a perfect world
i got a tattoo and i love my doodoo
i'm abby the sailor girl!

bee at 10:29 AM