Showing posts with label locals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label locals. Show all posts

Friday, February 20, 2009

...to Verdi's house for dinner

I expected to stay home and do the powerpoint for the group presentation next week, but Verdi's invitation to dinner extended to me too! It was impolite to refuse so Amanda, Lois and I got a ride to his house in Costa Mesa.

It was not a sit-down kind of dinner, but the stand up and cook and eat and drink at the same time kind. Like those they have in Turkey, where Verdi comes from. Good music in the background (Maroon 5, James Blunt, the Beatles), good conversation, and a nice viewing of pictures from the others' Yosemite trip. The whole thing lasted about 4plus hours, til 1245am!

Menu (so you can see that my appetite has increased):
-Guacamole
-Tortilla Chips x many many
-Tomato and Cucumber Salad x muchmuch
-DIY Burrito x 2
-Fish steak x 1
-Leftovers Soup x 1 bowl
-Wine/Orange+Mango Juice x 2 glasses
-Herbal Tea that was mostly an Oregano infusion x 1 mug

Amanda making the guacamole

Lois preparing the tomatoes for the burrito

Verdi making the fish
Busy in the kitchen!

Food!

My first burrito.

My second burrito.

making the burritos.

The wine we drank.

Soup made from the leftovers of the food cos we couldn't finish all of it!

Thursday, February 12, 2009

...to project groups and racism.

Thank God for my project group mates, without whom I would be very lost and have to spend more time studying. We make up study groups too, which makes studying wayyy easier than if I had to study alone. We all concur on that point I think.

For my Coercive class, my group's quite focused on getting good grades, and they seem like driven people. Lilian's the head of a dance group, something like Dance Blast, and also of her sorority. Like how busy is she. Daaman just got back from exchange to London and she did an internship at Sacramento (capital of California). When we get together, we talk a lot about Vietnamese and Indian culture (cos that's what they are) and the assimilations and impact on American culture and stuff like that. Even though we always meet after 10pm.

The other group for the Homeland class amuses me to no end. Maybe cos we usually meet in the afternoons so I'm more awake. The guy who's Armenian is a "hater", in his terms, and always goes on about how popular he was in high school despite being fat and wearing glasses. He thinks he's pretty perfect and has "natural talent" in everything. I quote his exact words! The girl on the other hand, is my partner in "hating" the guy, and we totally bond over insulting him haha! She's so funny.. I think if she could be more confident and daring and not think herself dumb, she'd be kind of a high flyer. When the guy starts going on about how Mexicans are all illegal immigrants (the girl's Hispanic) and how "blonde" (dumb) the girl is, and insisting that all Filipinos eat dogs (when he found out I was one he started insisting I did that), all she says is "your race has Kim Kardashian" and he shuts up. HAHA!

Sophia and Raz at one of our weekly meetings.

We had Verdi over for dinner today. Amanda and Lois go on hiking trips organised by him and his group (while I stay home and study blah). He's Turkish and about 50 I think but he's really nice and helpful and hospitable, even in our house! He said I have an American accent that sounds like it was exposed to other cultures. I was amused.

Then William and Kingsley came over to fetch Amanda to study, and I entertained them for awhile while she got ready. They're like so excited and high and crappy.. I was the one being entertained by them in the end. Even though they kept dissing black people in San Francisco. William offered to drive me to the airport in a few hours but he was so tired from sleeping only half an hour last night, I passed.

Maybe it's cos of their (Americans in general) accent and the way they talk, but they seem so enthusiastic about every topic which could be like about.. bananas? and it would still sound exciting.

What if we got them into Rhoc..?

Just a thought, haha.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

...and caught the Superbowl on TV!!!

I'm like waiting in the library for my study group mates cos our midterm's on Wed (yes, on a sunday night no less) and here midterms seem to be as or even more important than the finals. the library and student center is completely full of people. It's just crazy. And they're not replying me so I don't know where to meet. Which is bad cos I need a ride home!!

Apart from that, I just watched the Superbowl XLIII on TV! American football has many things in common with rugby in terms of tackling and touch rugby in terms of strategy, so I wasn't that lost. There's even more rules than Netball and 1 min can seem like an eternity.

MAN WAS IT EXCITING OR WHAT??!?!?!

Pittsburgh Steelers 27-24 Arizona Cardinals

The long runs, the tackling, the near-misses. WOW! And the score is so close!! I bet for a moment there all the Steelers fans started crying and praying really hard, cos their prayers worked and they won in the end. What a game.

We watched it in place of having Bible Study so there was Korean food and a 57-inch HDTV and 2 yappy dogs and great company. Thanks to Elias for his house! His roommates are something else. The big, tall, busty, bimbo-looking party girl type. But their bathroom is really really clean! With a hello kitty soap dispenser and a pink pig mug.

Upload photos when I can.

Meanwhile, my housemates went to Joshua Tree National Park for the weekend to climb real rocks so I had the whole weekend to myself! They came back with bloodied and bruised limbs. I wanna go too!


The apartment was just next to Saddleback Church's main campus.

Jennifer Hudson singing the national anthem.Food!!


Elias' dogs. They kept wanting to eat the food.

Nancy, Soo-young, Jo, Julie


Elias, whose house we were at, and Frances


Final Score!


Sunday, January 25, 2009

...and went to South Coast Plaza!

Left the house a bit late and made the bus driver wait for us to cross the road to get to the bus. Terrible. Missed the stop and wanted to walk all the way back to Alton (10 mins by bus, 1 hr by walking) but Kenny saved us! Kenny is this guy who went on exchange to Thailand so he was being friendly by offering to drive us to South Coast. By then we had already made our way to 99 Ranch where we had BUBBLE TEA. (Lippy they call it Boba tea here and it's like $4, so ex!) He picked us up and called his girlfriend Sarah and his buddy Brent to meet us at the..

High class, Takashimaya-like shopping centre! that was Indoor! Check out some of the stores. Xiaoyun, wish you were here? I got an A&F bag! Then lost the mood to shop. Even though Aldo was having 70% off. Zara 50%.
Yam Milk Tea.

Abercrombie and Fitch where I got an $80 bag for $24.90 (without tax)
Said bag.
Paul Frank store.

H&M

Zara
Banana Republic

Xy's fave shop. Ted Baker.

My future fave shop - Burberry


Where we had lunch. Mexican food! It's called Wahoo cos that's what you say once you eat the food.

My wet burrito in front (meaning drenched in sauce and cheese!), Lois' taco with rice behind.

Altogether now!

The rest of the people starting planning their quarter-end trip to various locations in the states while I bought my ticket to San Francisco, back at our apartment. Then we watched Family Guy and South Park for some comedic relief. Dinner was yesterday's leftovers.
More crabs! and soybean milk!

Of course, this can't compare to what's happening at home right now. I got a calling card and have been trying to use it but it only connects to Canada and not to Singapore! ARGH!

check for backdated posts of the many dinners I had this past week.

Friday, January 23, 2009

...and had dinner at Debbie's house!

Remember the people we met at the Christian Students booth? Debbie and Grace are housemates and they live in this townhouse at...Columbia Court? somewhere near school anyway. the people who live there are all Christians and go the same church. Yvette and I got invited over for their weekly Thursday house dinner!

Apphia and Yvette! Apphia grew up in Singapore but her father's American so they came over. Good choice. Instead of getting stuck in ACJC.


Jasmine, Debbie, Grace. Jasmine's husband's a prof at UCI. They're from China.

Top: Grace, Debbie, Me, Jasmine.
Bottom: Apphia, Yvette, Johanna
The artwork on the wall behind is done by them, on Painting Night.

Me taking a photo of Debbie cos she didn't wanna join the photos.

There's Nancy! She was taking the group photo. She ran all the way around the table just to hug the rice cooker and be in the photo.

Carrots in ORANGE JUICE.

Casseroles, Singaporean Carrot cake, Kung Pao Chicken and Spring rolls for dinner.

Clearing up after.

Doing homework on the floor.

Their house is a nice place to live in, although I don't know how I would react to the bursts of loud laughter and giggling that seems to occur every 5 mins or so. Good times, good times.