Lunch at Oki Oki Japanese Restaurant

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Pork Ramen (gotta love chasyu!)

No surprise that this is what I ordered. When it arrived and I saw the sheer density of those veggies, and how they covered all the noodles from view, I knew I’d be giving half of those veggies to the boyfriend. Haha. After getting through the veggies, it was finally time for me to start eating the noodles and chasyu. And oh boy what a treat! I think this is my favorite ramen place to go to. =)


Sutamina Ramen

The boyfriend had the Sutamina Ramen, which is boiled pork with egg and veggies. I would’ve asked to taste it, but it had spicy soup so pass!


Asupara Bacon Maki

How could I NOT order this?? Ever since I first tried asparagus wrapped in bacon at Kimono Ken, it’s become a favorite side dish for me. Plus it’s a cheat on veggies. XD


Uni Gunkan

I’ve only had sea urchin once before and I liked it. I asked the boyfriend if he ate sea urchin before ordering. Luckily he does. =) If this order had more than 2 pieces, I don’t think we would’ve been able to stand up after eating. So full!

And what’s great about Oki Oki is that you really get more than what you pay for. The total damage done:

205 for the Pork Ramen
215 for the Sutamina Ramen
175 for the Asupara Bacon Maki
185 for the Uni Gunkan
——————————————–
780 for the whole meal

Which, given the current exchange rate, is roughly $17.75 (not bad, eh?). Definitely going back again. DEFINITELY. Oh, and I’m very lucky that the boyfriend reminded me to take the photos before digging in. I almost forgot! Low E.Q. and food this good definitely make it difficult to document. XD

Ramen Dinner at Nagomi

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I’ve had a cold for the past few days (I still kinda do), so I really wanted some ramen. My officemate recommended Nagomi for some authentic Japanese food. So when Wil asked if I wanted to go out for dinner, I jumped at the chance! I figured I’d invite my brother since he likes ramen as much as I do.

We each ordered ramen, and shared an order of korokke, and salmon skin roll. I failed to take a pic of the korokke and salmon skin roll. XD


My Chasyu Men (6 slices of chasyu!)


Wil’s Gomoku Ramen


My brother’s Shoyu Ramen
(w/c is essentially the same as my chasyu ramen, but with substantially less chasyu. LOL)

Ristras: Godzilla Burrito

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The Godzilla Burrito!

That hunka hunka burnin’ love up there is Ristras’ Godzilla Burrito; 2.5 kilos of heart-stopping goodness!!! This baby is a tray long (yup, that thing under all that foil is a standard tray. The kind you use at a cafeteria) and costs 1,200 pesos. My friends and I ate that monster and were so stuffed that we wanted to walk around just so our tummies wouldn’t be so bloated. 5 people were full to the brim. Just imagine ONE person eating it. And that is the Man vs Godzilla Burrito challenge!!!

If you can finish the Godzilla Burrito in 1.5 hours by yourself, it’s free! The prize? A full stomach and a shirt. XD And I am proud to say that my crazy-awesome friend Carlito still holds the record for the fastest time at 29 minutes. HOLY. SHIT. I still can’t believe it. I wish I’d have been there to see how he paced. Haha!

Gotta love Mexican food!

My Baby Boy, Snoopy!

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Beagle puppy =)

Received this little guy yesterday evening. =) He was pretty quiet at first, but come bedtime he was so noisy! I tried calming him down by putting him beside me on the bed. I woke up when Snoopy started whining…and licking my face. I couldn’t get him to calm down immediately, so I stayed up for quite a while. It was that moment that I realized why there are parents that shake their babies (no, I didn’t shake the puppy!). It can get pretty frustrating.

And now I have a major headache due to lack of sleep. Snoopy falls in and out of sleep now. I just hope he’ll stay asleep later tonight. He turns 1 month tomorrow.

Carboloading at La Crêperie

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The boyfriend and I ate lunch at La Crêperie at Eastwood Mall yesterday. He needed to carboload for the Run United 3 run (he registered for 32k), and I’ve been wanting to eat at La Crêperie for a while now. So yesterday was the perfect excuse to order lots of food!


Mozzarella Sandwiches

My lack of E.Q. when it comes to eating shows yet again! The boyfriend and I started digging into the mozzarella open sandwiches coz they looked just scrumptious! We even started munching on the salad on the side. XD Luckily I remembered to take a photo before we finished everything off! Haha!

The sandwich had tomatoes underneath the cheese. I normally don’t like eating tomatoes but I really didn’t mind it in this dish. Everything just went so well together! And the bread was nice and crunchy. =)


Pesto Cream Carbonara with Ham and Mushrooms

This was my pasta dish. I’m a real sucker for carbonara so when I saw it on the menu, I just had to order it. At first I wished that they would have used bacon instead of ham, but then the ham was delicious! Add that to the fact that there was a generous serving of both ham and mushrooms. So no complaints. =)

Oh, and the bread was perfection!


Shrimp Pomodoro

When the boyfriend saw that there was pasta with shrimp on the menu, he immediately knew he wanted that. I tried a bit of it, but it wasn’t really my thing. I’m more of a white sauce pasta person.


Croque Monsieur

I made the mistake of ordering this since I saw the description (ham and cheese!) and thought it wouldn’t be such a big serving. Haha my bad. Don’t get me wrong, it was heaven! But I was so full from the mozzarella sandwich and pasta that I couldn’t eat another bite! Actually, I had a bite or two. But the boyfriend ate most of it. Thank goodness for his belleh! =)

And last, but certainly not the least, the pièce de résistance!


Mango Peach Nutella Crêpe w/a scoop of Vanilla Ice Cream

So I said I couldn’t eat another bite, right? But there’s always room for dessert. Especially if that dessert is as sinfully good as this! The serving was big enough for sharing. The boyfriend claims he could eat one by himself…and I believe him. Haha! There were so much fruits inside that they were slipping out. The mangoes they used were perfectly ripe (sweeeeet) and the amount of Nutella! *droooool*

And to top off our delicious dining experience, our server was very polite and accommodating. He’s the one who suggested that we add the ice cream to our crêpe. We’re definitely going back here for dessert. =) And soon!

2012 Giving Journal

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Today marks the start of Operation: 2012 Planner! Bought an Original Ice Blended drink (Pure Double Chocolate!) during lunch. Good news! They decreased the number of stamps required! From last year’s 24 stamps, to 18 stamps! Yaaaay!


The card.


The mechanics.


Stamp area.

I’m sure you can’t read the mechanics from the picture so I’m going to type them here! Aren’t I nice? XD

Mechanics:
1. A minimum single-receipt purchase of any Original Ice Blended, Coffee-based, or Tea-based Beverage, or Frozen Swirl, qualifies a customer to get a stamp card and one (1) stamp.

2. Each card consists of 18 boxes, with corresponding drink assignments. These are as follows:

1 Original Ice Blended (any flavor, regular or large)
1 Tea Latte (any flavor, regular or large)
1 Red Velvet Hot Cocoa or Red Velvet Ice Blended (regular or large)
Any 15 Regular or Large Original Ice Blended, Coffee-based or Tea-based Beverages, or Frozen Swirl
A purchase of 1 box of CBTL capsules (any flavor)= 2 stamps.

3. Stamp card must always be presented so that a box may be stamped whenever its corresponding product assignment is purchased.

4. Once all 18 boxes are stamped and completed, customer will be able to claim The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf 2012 Giving Journal at any The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf branch. Combining of stamp cards is not allowed.

5. The completed stamp card should be presented and surrendered to the branch where The Giving Journal will be claimed. The cashier will punch the stamp card to prevent reuse.

5. Promo period is from November 7, 2011 to January 31, 2012.

6. Giving Journals may be claimed all throughout the promo period until 60 days after the promo has ended.

*Combining of stamp cards is not allowed

Aaaaand we’re back to me. Yes, there are two number 5 mechanics. I’ll try to take some pictures of the actual Giving Journal and post them here. =)

Dream Job (?)

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Recently, I’ve been entertaining the thought of working abroad. Specifically, I’ve been thinking about working in Singapore. A number of my former co-workers are now working in Singapore, and they seem pretty happy. Originally, my plan was to work abroad for a couple of years (just long enough to save enough for a house and lot, and maybe a bit for my future children’s tuition) then come back here. But seeing as Singapore’s population is an aging one, that got me started thinking about actually starting a family there.

But I digress. The point of this post is the dream I had a few days back. I dreamt that I was working in Japan. I think this is because a lot of my co-workers are in Japan at the moment, and that I miss it. After the dream, I started weighing working in Japan as another option. It’s closer to home, and I really like Japanese food. Haha! I’m kinda iffy on the language barrier though. I think a higher percentage of the Singaporean population are English-speakers than the Japanese population.

I have a while to think about this.

BPI vs Citibank for Minimum Amount Due

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Here are total amounts due and the minimum amounts due of my BPI and Citibank cards, respectively.

BPI
Due: 1,900
Min: 95.00

Citibank
Due: 3,526.16
Min: 3,381.42

I find this really strange. BPI was only requiring me to pay 5% of the total amount due, while Citibank required almost 96% of the total amount due.

If I were a swipe-happy person, I’d definitely choose my BPI credit card since I could buy all the things I want and not worry about not reaching the total amount due since the minimum will always be within my reach.

This is good for the bank since they’ll be earning from the interest, and good for me if I don’t have enough money to pay the total since I’ll still be paying just enough to keep the bank from harassing constantly calling me.

I guess I know what card I’ll be using more this holiday season. XD