flea market @ lucky plaza

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had my first ever flea market today!!! i was really looking forward to it for the passed few weeks cause i think it will be quite an interesting experience.... i shared the space with 2 of my friends & we never expect what we were in for.... the whole thing was not as fun as i imagined it to be & it was definitely tiring.... to make things worse, the place was quite chaotic so we had a shock of our life... as a result, i didnt manage to take any photo so i had to kope pictures from other blogs just to emphasize some of my points....

queue to enter the flea market area, photo taken from here....

the flea market area is located on lucky plaza 6th floor, just opposite the famous jollibee.... we applied for our slot here, it cost like $100 for a slot on saturday..... since we are only make-shift sellers, we wont have a slot allocated to use, you have to chop the table based on first-come-first-serve basis... hence, you will see a queue outside the area... people will start queuing about 10am & you can enter around 11am+ & here is where the shocking part start..... from the instructions online, we were not supposed to start selling outside the allocated area.... but once we joined the queue, many Filipinos flocked to us & rampaging our bags...  literally rampaging like during war time.... i understand they want the first look & chop the best items but seriously you need to order..... since my items were cheapo clothes, rampaging was still "acceptable" but my friend had some brand new branded items to sell & can you imagine people damaging the stuff? heart pain man..... since we were all in a shock, my hubby had to tell some of the people off to stop snatching..... so word of advise, you had to be mentally prepare for the "war" once you joined the queue.... but the real nightmare start once you enter the place....

table for flea market, photo taken from here.....

once you enter the area, you must run & snatch the best spot cause the place get filled out in seconds.... & you can see from the picture, each table was pathetically small.... i think it was like 1m x1m table... i was expecting a 2m  x 1m table since we paid like $100 for that..... naive me initially thought of neatly aligning our clothes & maybe sectioning them according to prices but hell NO!!! people practically pour their clothes onto the tables..... once the table was loaded, people will flock around & rampage..... so we had to join in the war....

crowd inside flea market, photo taken from here....

you can see from the pictures that the whole place will be filled with people almost instantaneously.... i would say 99% of the patrons will be filipinos so be sure to be in for bargaining.... one very important lesson we learn was that, people at flea market didnt care about quality.... most of our clothes were still in good or even brand new conditions so we started with pricing like $10 for a dress & $5 for a top.... we told them the  items were new & all but seriously they dont care, once we told them the price, they were turned off.... so lesson learn, you have to sell cheap & in quantity in order to cover the rent.... we saw our surrounding neighbours selling like $2/items or even cheaper towards end of the day... so we had to bring down our items prices & sell them off at really cheap rates.... patrons will also bargain with you, so be prepared to give discounts.... thankfully another fellow flea market seller bought quite a number of my clothes so i managed to get rid more than 90% of my items.... after the rental, think i managed to earn a profit of about $150.... i believed i spent more than $1k for all the items that i sold but is better to get  back some $ instead of throwing them away.... but honestly speaking, we think it wasnt really worth to do a flea market if you are expecting to earn some profits.... cause you had to spend so much time & kind of taxing for your body.... you might not even earn back your daily pay.... but for me, it was more of trying out new experience so i think it's ok to give it a shot =)

here are some of my advise if you intend to start a flea market:
1. bring lots of things to sell & prepared to sell at cheap prices.... some of them even think $1 is too expensive for a good condition dress?!?!?! seriously!!??!?!? another note, like my friend said, filipinos LOVE bags, all sorts of bags..... for clothes they prefer sexier style & something  more mature....

2. bring masks..... since people sell second hand stuff in flea market, items conditions will be old & kept for long time so the whole place was super dusty.... my friend started sneezing in afew minutes & i joined in after about 1hr... so prepared some face masks for yourselves....

3. wear comfortable clothes & footwear.... be prepared to stand the whole day, you can always sit on the chair but it will be hard to keep track of your items so we end up standing for like 7hr straight....

4.eat a heavy breakfast cause you might not have time to get lunch

5. bring enough fluid to replenish yourself.... since you will need to bargain & shout around to attract people, drink enough fluid or else you will get sore throat...

6. prepare loose change.... i think this is quite understandable since you will need to give changes to people since not everyone will pay you in exact

7. CHECK payment amount.... i encountered a person who gave me $10 instead of the agreed $12, luckily i checked the amount or else i would lose $2.... sometime it could be a miscalculation cause they might paid in small notes but sometimes they want to try their luck to cheat afew bucks if you dont check the amount... so be extra careful with payment

8. take care of your items, be it for selling or personal items.... since the place was so chaotic, you have to be vigilant.... items might dropped on the floor when people rampaging through the pile or even steal them when you not looking.... 

YiLi PaoPao Ice @ orchard central

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after going to my friend's wedding lunch at holiday inn, i met up with another friend for tea.... we went to try YiLi PaoPao Ice @ orchard central, i think she bought some groupon deals so it cost $4.95 for 2 cups of dessert... deals here....

YiLi PaoPao ice

this store came from taiwan & this kind of paopao ice thing is pretty popular there especially during summer... i didnt manage to try when i went to taiwan cause it was during winter.... i would say this paopao ice thing is somewhat like combination of sorbert & ice cream... it had quite a fine & smooth texture....

paopao ice

for the deals, you can choose 2 different flavours... i choose strawberry + milk with egg, my friend had mango + milk with egg + additional nata de coco..... when we had the first bite, we think it tasted awesome!!! very smooth, just like eating frozen yoghurt & the milk with egg flavour tasted like  creamy custard... but after afew more spoon then it got too sweet.... & the ice melt pretty fast so towards the end you will be like drinking syrup water from the cup..... personally i am not a fan of this paopao ice, it was too sweet for me.... perhaps i just gotten the wrong flavour, maybe those more citrus flavours will be a better choice....

before i end of the post, let me share this cute little cookie from TCC....

TCC bear shape cookie

we had many meals at TCC before but this is the first time they served such a cute cookie with tea.... it's actually a pineapple tart with a bear face.... lovely piece of dessert =)

review: wedding lunch @ holiday inn orchard city centre

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went down for my friend's wedding lunch banquet at holiday inn orchard city centre today ... my jiejie also held her wedding banquet there almost 10yr ago and i didnt have much recollection of the place but mama always told me that the food wasnt as nice as what we had during food tasting.... we shall see how their quality fair after 10years

location: the hotel is located behind cuppage, at somerset area so i would say location is pretty good & convenient.... you have to do a little walking from the station to reach the hotel, probably about 10min or so...

ambience: the ballroom was at the basement, same as where my jiejie had her banquet, she had her reception table just in front of the stairs, but my friend had hers besides the stairs which i thought it was worse cause there was even lesser area... there was barely 1.5m gap between the table and the stairs so people had to squeeze through to sign the guest book.... didnt really like that.... since i arrived slightly late, i didnt snap pictures of the ballroom but it was much smaller than what i remembered.... i read online that the maximum number of tables is 22, honestly if you have more than 15 tables, the place would be too cramp.... i remembered jiejie had like 30 tables so probably they partitioned the ballroom to a much smaller place.... another thing is that the ceiling seem pretty low which kind of makes the ballroom even smaller....

food: we had a 7 course meal & i would say the food was just average... i think the starter & duck were better compared to other dishes....

menu

i didnt take picture of the food cause i was seated in a "stranger" table, i only know 1 of the girls so not very nice to take photo of every dish.... & i think the portion was alittle bit small.... our tables had 7 girls & 2 kids, the portions were just enough to go around, pretty hard to go for second serving other than the duck... normally i would feel super bloated by the end of the meal (usually i finished about 80% of the food) but this time i felt just ok after lunch.... so if the table had more guys then maybe the portion wont be enough

service: i guessed there wasnt even staff cause we had to remind the staff quite afew times before we got our drinks served.... i felt the banquet manager was abit sloppy in terms of punctuality...... the cocktail reception start at 12nn and lunch supposed to start at 12.30pm... i arrived close to 1pm & i thought i would have to sneak into the ballroom but to my shock, all the guests were still outside... quests only start to enter the ballroom about 1.15pm... i understand not all the guests have arrived by 12.30 but i felt the manager should start requesting the guests to be seated... i would say more than 50% of the guests arrived by 1pm, all just hanging around.... as a result, the lunch only started about 1.30pm.....

price: the price i gotten online was $788Nett for weekend lunch banquet... price wise i think is quite attractive

conclusion: overall, i think holiday inn quality dropped even further compared to 10yrs ago.... i wont recommend people to hold their wedding at that ballroom if they intend to have more than 15 tables UNLESS the room can expand.... i think my friend had 15-16 tables & the space was pretty tight.... food & service were just average but i think the place is still attractive due to the relatively cheap price..... & if i am not wrong, most couples get 2 complementary nights at the suite instead of the normal 1 night... so i guess that's a bonus =)

tony roma's

went to town for dinner with hubby recently & decided to try tony roma's new outlet at orchard central... compared to their suntec outlet, the one at orchard central is relatively smaller so there tend to be a long queue if you have your meal during peak hour... so kiasu us decided to have our dinner at about 5pm cause the restaurant was almost empty & also cause my feet hurt from wearing high heel.... it has been quite some time since we last ate at tony roma's & we really looked forward to the onion loaf!!!

some tropical mocktail

onion loaf

hubby ordered some tropical mocktail which was really sour & bitter.... but highlight for us was the onion loaf!!! it's actually onion rings but stack up like a tower which i guess made it look like a loaf of bread, hence the name.... the beauty about this onion loaf was that it's made with real onion, not like those processed food you got from fast food places.... & when you dip it in the special ranch/bbq sauce, amazingly good!!!! but the loaf was really oily so do eat with caution....

rib + steak combo

for main, we ordered the rib + steak combo to share... technically this set was meant for one person but look at the portion!!! seriously!??!?! 1 person can finish that??? you must be really hungry.... i am not really a steak person but the rib was AMAZING!!! the meat really just separate from the bone when you peeled it gently... the meat was juicy & tender too.... DELICIOUS!!!! really lift up to their name, signature rib.... another thing worth to mention was the ranch beans.... it's not the normal can baked beans, they added in some special sauce which made it so tasty....

apple pie

to end off the meal, we ordered apple pie but it was more like an apple crumble to me... i didnt really fancy the dessert, it was too sweet for me.... on the whole, the meal was yummy..... the bill was $80+ so average about $40/pax.... pretty pricey i would say but i think still worthy for the price.... i guess is ok to indulge once in awhile =)

panasonic bread maker

today i am going to share this new machine that mama bought about 1 month ago = bread maker!!! mama had been wanting to buy one for quite some time cause mama felt that the ready made bread contained alot of chemical & preservatives so she prefers something healthier & more organic.... i saw a couple of cheap ones (average about 6000 yen ~ SGD70) in japan but they were not fully automated & really small so i didnt get them.... & then one fine day, mama just decided to get it from OG.... she bought panasonic brand & it cost $299 after 10% discount... mama actually surveyed many places & she felt panasonic is the best cause it's fully automated & not the most expensive in the market...

panasonic bread maker

the machine

so this bread maker i would say is about the size of a rice cooker but much taller.... the machine comes with a simple recipe book to teach you how to make simple bread... & it's really simple... just add it all the ingredients (flour, butter, salt, sugar, water & yeast), select the bread options & tada, your DIY bread will be done in afew hours....

interior of bread maker

this metal tray is where you put the ingredients to bake the bread.... for this machine, you will get about a standard loaf of bread

container for yeast & nuts

the advantage of getting a automated bread maker is that you can add all the ingredients in one go... after a certain time, the container with yeast (the black hole) will be opened & the yeast can mix with the dough... if you want to make nutty bread, just put the nuts (chopped) into the grey container & it will be dispensed into the dough.... the machine also has a timer function, meaning you can set the machine to start work 10hr later, which means you can have freshly baked bread when you wake up in the morning =) enough said, lets show you guys the final product....

final product

DIY bread

freshly made bread

tada... yummy looking right!?!??! the bread crust is abit harder than usual soft bread, the hardness is somewhat like baguette but inside is really soft & light.... my nieces loved the bread so much that we finished almost the whole loaf in minutes!!!!

i think this bread maker is a good investment only if you eat bread often & you have the time to spare... cause each time, it will take at least 2hr+ (depending on the type of bread you making) to bake a loaf of bread as it takes time to knead & rise the dough....  of cause you can still use the traditional oven method to bake bread but the bread maker will save you the trouble of preparing the dough & baking..... & i would think that this is quite a lovely "toy" for those who likes to bake stuff =)

new year shopping in tokyo

FINALLY i have finished posting about my first laps of japan trip, tokyo.... we spent 4 days there: day 1, arrived in japan; day 2, walk around central tokyo; day 3, harajuku sales & kinki kids concert; day 4, shibuya sales, you can read about them & see for yourself how amazing new year sale can be ....... it was tiring 4 days since we were rushing to places & carrying lot of lucky bags but really fun, at least for me =)