Last Weekend of 2014

It is the last weekend of 2014. I realised that 2014 passed very quickly, too quickly for my liking. It could be because I was preoccupied and stressed with Marieann's PSLE this year. Hopefully we can relax a little in the new year.

Merry Christmas 2014

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas filled with family, friends and fun! :)

冬至 Dongzhi Festival or Winter Solstice 2014

Yesterday happened to be Dongzhi Festival (冬至) or Winter Solstice too. One of the more important activities of Dongzhi Festival is the making and eating of tang yuan or glutinous rice balls. My mother prepared a big pot of tang yuan in brown sugar soup which we could eat throughout the day. Actually my mother already cooked tang yuan in savoury chicken broth on Sunday. Eating tang yuan in a savoury broth is Taiwanese style as most, if not all Singaporeans usually only have their tang yuan in sweetened soup.

Penang 2014 Posts

I have finally written up the posts and uploaded all the photos for our Penang 2014 trip. Thank you for your patience! It is greatly appreciated.
For the ease of your reading, the links are available below.  Enjoy! :)

8 November 2014: Day 1 Penang 2014: We are in Penang!
9 November 2014(a): Day 2 Penang 2014: A) Lost in Penang
9 November 2014(b): Day 2 Penang 2014: B) Penang Street Art I & Georgetown Shops
10 November 2014(a): Day 3 Penang 2014: A) Found in Georgetown and Beyond
10 November 2014(b): Day 3 Penang 2014: B) Penang Street Art II
10 November 2014(c): Day 3 Penang 2014: C) Pinang Peranakan Mansion
11 November 2014: Day 4 Penang 2014: Shopping
12 November 2014: Day 5 Penang 2014: Free & Easy
13 November 2014: Day 6 Penang 2014: Going Home/ HOME!

Hopefully my blog posts of our Penang 2014 trip can give you some ideas of what you can do/see/eat in Penang. :)

PSLE Results 2014 Release Day

From 11am onwards, 42,336 P6 students (and their parents) were at their respective primary schools to collect their PSLE result slip. I was at SCGS just after 11am as I was engrossed in my work until 10:30am so I missed a bit of the principal's speech. Oops :P 
There was no crying, no disappointment, no anger with Marieann's results as they were within my expectations. Being the educator and educational researcher, I have some pretty hard choices to make, together with Marieann of course. Wish us luck. 

Day 6 Penang 2014: Going Home/ HOME!

We are going home today to Singapore. We are sad that our holiday is coming to an end. However, we should have a full stomach so that we have the energy to wallow in our sorrow about the end of our holiday lol. Juliane tried the Asian selection but it is Dim Sum today. I had Classic egg with toast again but there is an extra teacup of pineapple jam which was absolutely delicious. I was actually eating it on its own! :P Mariean had her French toast again.

After our breakfast, we just chilled and relaxed in our room. I checked our luggage again to make sure everything has been packed. We just lazed in bed, either reading or playing on the iPad or watched tv until check-out time 12pm. By the way, I promised to give you a closer look at the unique security for Noordin Mews rooms. :)

A unique security system at Noordin Mews. Really lock and key! :)

Once unlocked, we will leave the lock on the other side. Indicate to staff too that we are inside.

The security system from the inside. We were tickled when we first got to our room.

We will miss our Noordin Mews Upstairs Room, I

Check out was a breeze. As we were only leaving for the airport at 2:30pm, Noordin Mews kindly helped us to store our luggage while we skipped over to Prangin Mall for lunch. We tried this restaurant, Little Oasis. The food was not too bad. :)

The link bridge between 1st Avenue and Prangin Mall

After lunch, we walked back to 1st Avenue mall from Prangin Mall to get back to Noordin Mews. Marieann also did some last minute shopping at both 1st Avenue mall (wallet) and Noodin Mews (a fragrance named Georgetown which is actually quite nice). She used up the half of my emergency money and I had to activate my credit card too. Wah, she is really spending a lot! :S Guess shopping at the airport is out. Although we were technically no longer guests of Noordin Mews, we were still treated like one as the staff offered us iced water and ice cream. That is what I call service! :)
We took photos with the wonderful staff of Noordin Mews. Their wonderful service, attention to details, attentiveness to customers and wealth of knowledge have definitely won our hearts. We will most certainly stay at Noordin Mews again when we visit Penang again. The girls have already told me that they wanted to come back to Penang next year and they WANT to stay at Noordin Mews again.

We arrived at the Penang International Airport (PIA) early at 3pm. Our flight Jetstar 3K 676 departs at 5:20pm lol. By 3:30pm, we were checked in. By 4pm, we cleared immigration customs. When we were clearing customs, I also pick up RM$25 just before we put our carry-on through the immigration scanners. Lucky or what?! Lol. :P

With the last of my emergency money, close to RM$40, we bought some sandwiches and also local food products, e.g. coconut biscuits and waited at our departure gate A6 for boarding.

While waiting at our gate A6, we saw our plane pulling up and also dark storm clouds. :( A storm is coming...

It started raining heavily as we were boarding the plane. It seemed departure would be as scheduled despite the heavy rain. By 5:30pm, we were in the air. :) As I opted for Plus bundles on our return flight too, we bought light refreshment with our $15 F&B vounchers.

Bye, Penang

We are in the air!

Penang Bridge in the distance

A closer view of the Penang Bridge

Another view of the Penang Bridge

We were above the storm clouds

Sun setting

Our refreshment

The flight was smooth and we arrived on time to Singapore. However, due to the heavy storm in Singapore in the late afternoon, our plane could not land as scheduled at 6:45pm. Instead we had to circle in the sky to wait for instructions from the control tower for our turn to land. We saw a few planes in the sky circling around too. They were in the queue to land as well.

Another plane circling the sky

Landed!

Beautiful sunset

Home!

We finally landed around 7:05pm. At our baggage claim Belt 20, there was another delay due to technical issues with ground handling agent's equipment. We eventually collected our luggage at 7:45pm. During our wait for our luggage, we had company in the form of my colleague and friend, Azlina! She was at the airport to meet up with another friend who arrived back in Singapore slightly earlier than we did lol. It was quite funny that we were texting each other even though we were just 300 metres apart. My girls said we were so near and yet so far. Thanks Azlina for staying with us and even offering to drop us off at the train station to catch a cab as the girls' father was nowhere in sight.
We made our way over to Terminal 2 to get some dinner while waiting for the girls' father who was going to be really late. I saw Penang Culture and asked the girls wanted to have Penang food. They said unanimously "NO"! HAHA. I guess they have had enough of Penang food. :P We finally had dinner at a restaurant they had been trying to go to in Penang - Sakae Sushi!

Happy girls at Sakae

We reached home just after 9:30pm. We were tired but we were also excited as my parents were also back from their Taiwan & Xiamen trip after two months and that meant we would have presents! :) The girls were busy telling their grandparents about about our Penang trip. :) We definitely had a great time in Penang!! :)