Cafe Hopping: Lola's Cafe @ Kovan & Wimbly Lu @ Serangoon

Visited Lola's Cafe for the first time after roller blading along Punggol Waterway with CSH. We actually bladed all the way to the cafe from Punggol Promenade. Exercising before enjoying the food. Hahaha.

It's a small cozy cafe located along 5 Simon Road, which is approximately 5 minute walk from Kovan MRT station. The food here has been highly recommend by cafe hoppers & food critics. Eileen also recommended the food but haven't had the time to travel so far for food. So since finals is over (WHEEEE!) , plus the fact that we were already at Punggol, we decided to try out Lola's after blading for approx 5 hours.

Punggol Waterway Park Connectors

Travelled all the way to Punggol from the West to go roller blading along Punggol Waterway with CSH on Thursday! Pretty excited to head there since it's my first time visiting this park connector in the North-East.

I took a train from Clementi, change to the circle line at Bouna Vista and changed again at Serangoon to North-East line to Punggol. The whole journey took about an hour. From Punggol bus interchange, we took bus 84 and alighted at Punggol Promenade, after the bus made a U-turn.

We got down and saw these really interesting Wagon-shaped cabins and decided to explore. Turns out, these cabins are actually chalet-like accommodations! How interesting!

  

Walked a little further in and we found the horse stables! I was sooooo thrilled to see the horses! Reminisced about the time I did horse riding in Korea...

Product Review: Essential Sleeping Hair Mask

Look what came in the mail! I received my sponsored Essential Sleeping Hair Mask from SampleStore.com about a week ago but was too busy doing revision for my finals to do a review on it :/ So I tried to squeeze in time to complete this review!

For those of you who haven't heard of Samplestore.com, it is the leading online try-vertising platform in Singapore. You get to try out skin care & hair products etc. before buying the "full-sized" product. This idea actually intrigued me when I first received their flyer in the mail recently. I used to purchase many products which I ended up not using because they don't suit me or didn't live up to their claims. So for those of you who don't want to end up wasting money, try this out! All you have to do is register on their website, select 4 samples you want to receive and wait for your free* samples!

*Do note that they charge a fixed price of $5.99 for shipping and handling fee unless you pick all 4 samples from the "Sponsored Samples" Tab.

So here's the two products I received from SampleStore.com.

On the right is the Essential Sleeping Hair Mask and the left is the Essential Leave On Serum.

For those of you who are tired of wake up with frizzy and unmanageable hair every morning, look no further, here's a product that actually works to tame that lion mane of yours! So what actually causes your hair to become frizzy the next morning when you wake up? When sleeping, tossing and turning causes hair to rub against the pillow, creating friction. Such friction caused by the pillow is called Pillow Friction. Pillow Friction causes the hair cuticles to open up unevenly, resulting in rough, frizzy or prone to tangles hair. These hair damage caused by pillow friction are known as Pillow Damage. As a result of Pillow Damage, bed hair occurs (or "lion mane", as most people would call it).

To solve this problem, you usually have no choice but to wash your hair in the morning. Washing your
hair ‘resets’ the uneven alignment of hair cuticles and makes hair smooth and manageable again.
However, by having to wash hair in the morning, you would have to wake earlier and sacrifice your beauty sleep. Now here's an alternative solution to the bed hair caused by Pillow Damage: Essential Sleeping Hair
Mask. It protects each hair strand and minimizes Pillow Damage when you toss and turn about when sleeping.

So does the sleeping hair mask actually work?

 The top of my head is quite frizzy and it gets worse later on in the day ):

But because I did hair rebonding a year ago, it's actually still quite smooth and not that frizzy at the bottom. Though I have quite a lot of split ends, it can't be seen in the photo :/

Tulipmania 2014 @ Gardens By The Bay, Singapore

"I'd rather wear flowers in my hair, than diamonds around my neck."

So, finals began yesterday & I've got 3 remaining papers coming up next week. But since it's Labour Day today, gonna spend some time blogging about our visit to Gardens by the Bay.

Took time off revision last Sunday to spend some quality time with my family. It's been a long time since we went out as a family. Since Mothers' Day is around the corner, I suggested visiting Gardens By the Bay as Tulipmania was ongoing. Mummy has been talking about making a trip down since forever but we keep postponing the trip. I actually feel guilty about it :/

Though finals was only a few days away, I thought that I should take a break from studying and relax for a little too, since it was rather productive the past study break. So we made the trip down to Gardens By the Bay early in the morning, wanting to beat the crowd.

Got there by MRT via East/West line from Clementi station and made a transfer to Downtown line at Bugis.

 

The reserve seats on the Downtown line are too cute!

We reached Bayfront MRT station at around 9am and made our way to the conservatories. There was already a queue by the time we reached but it took less than 10 minutes to get our tickets. Ticket prices are at $20 for 2 conservatories for Singaporeans/PR (adults) and OCBC card members get additional 15% off ticket prices. So we paid $17 for the entrance to both conservatories per adult. Do check out Gardens By the Bay website for more ticket prices as well as the different on-going discounts & promotions available. (Do note that Tulipmania is only ongoing until this weekend!)

We went into Flower Dome first to view the tulips. As soon as you enter the conservatory, you would be able to smell the fragrance of the tulips. We immediately head down to the bottom level to view the field of tulips. It was a splendid sight! What better way to brighten up your morning by looking at these vibrant flowers?

Picturesque view of the field of Tulips

Last day of Year 1 Semester 2

Had my last day of lectures and tutorials for year 1 yesterday. Didn't really have the mood to really study yesterday though. "last day of school = play" :P But sadly there's still finals coming up in 13 days. WOAH. 13 days. Seriously, time to start studying...

But since it's the last day of school, we had to take some mandatory photos to conclude our first year in uni! Hahaha. So we went to ADM Rooftop just before Linear revision lecture. We thought we were going to get sunburn because the sun was so strong! Despite the complains, we still made it up the roof. Hahaha. Luckily there was a shaded area there. So we camped there most of the time hehehe. All photos are taken by iPhone 5. Everyone loves the chrome effect hahaha. It makes the photo so much better! Though we did use Camera360 for the group jumpshots. It was a good exercise for me cause I was the one setting the timer and the timer only allowed 3s setting -.- So well, it tested my shuttle run speed hahaha.

And here are some of the better shots we got!

This shot was meant to be a "fight scene" but it seems like we're doing a couple dance instead. Hahaha

Brunch @ Artistry Cafe

Went for brunch @ Artistry Cafe with my ex-colleagues. Reached there around 11am and there were still seats available. Probably because it was a rainy morning, so it wasn't so crowded. But the crowd started coming in as soon as the weather turned sunny.

First look at the cafe, the decor was nice even though it was smaller than what I expected. We got a corner seat at the cafe. It was more of a coffee table so actually it was quite hard to eat on that. Besides the point, we ordered a few dishes to try. Starting with the Belgium Waffle that received quite a good review online and the Big Breakfast. Ordered a double scoop of ice cream to go with the waffle which cost $12 in total. The big breakfast was approx $20 which was abit pricier. But the good news is that this cafe doesn't have GST or service charge! *yay* 

Cheap thrills in life.

Note to self: 20 more days to the start of finals. 

Despite that, spent the afternoon yesterday after calculus tutorial with my uni girls eating waffle ice cream at NTU Canteen 12/13. Had the sudden craving for waffle ice cream since Tuesday. $2.80 for a double scoop waffle ice cream, why not? I was really satisfied. 5 of us shared 2 double scoop ice cream waffle. Hehehe.

Then we went to another canteen to try the western stall Fish and Cheese cause Fel said it was good. Somehow my appetite opened after eating the dessert. So 3 of us shared a serving. Just had to try it since we're there. And I totally didn't regret trying it cause it was NICE!

After a long Hiatus.

It's been a long time since I last blogged. Hahaha.

I'm approaching the end of my first year of studying in NTU. Each semester seems to pass faster than the previous. Made new friends whom I can definitely rely on and some whom I'll probably not keep in contact with for long. I guess you call the latter "acquaintances" rather than friends. But I'm grateful for having my girls. They've been there since the first day of school. We met through SPMS Buddies Orientation. All of them didn't take part in SPMS Freshman Orientation Camp (FOC) so we were like, "the loners stick together" cause everyone else seem to know everyone else. Hahaha. But I'm glad I attended the Buddies Orientation. Else I'd be even more lost than I already am when school started! At least with them, we update each other of what we needed to do etc. It's more than just coursemates. We are Friends. 

For all matriculating student, I urge you to attend as many camps as possible. Get to know more people, widen up your social circle. Entering Uni is the best time to increase your connections. I'm not saying to make use of people or any of that sense, but it's never harmful to know more people right? And it should be made compulsory to attend FOC! & yes, apply for hall if you're able to! Just try it for a semester or a year. Just for the experience. I truly regret not doing the two important things I mentioned above...

But I did made a right decision by joining a CCA under the persuasion of  Jia Hui. Haha. We both joined ODAC Trek Subcommittee in the hopes of getting to know more people and making new friends. On top of that, we were so excited we get to go on overseas trips. But little did we expect our parents to react negatively to the news. Both our parents weren't supportive of us going overseas. They kept going on and on about how it's dangerous trekking in Malaysia's rainforest etc. Parents being parents, we understand their concern but it was really the experience we wanted. Persuading my mum to let me go for the first overseas subcommittee trip really tested my perseverance and how much I wanted to go for it. It took me months. Only on the day itself, she texted me while I was studying and told me I could go. Such drama. But I was still really elated and thankful. Went on the first ODAC trip with the rest of the subcommittee members and had a blast. It was my first time trekking and I didn't have any form of exercise before going on the trip, so it was actually physically demanding for me. Despite that, I made it down alive. Hahahaha. Ok I'm exaggerating just a little. But I'm glad I made it for that trip.

Anyhow, so first semester of school was HECTIC. No kidding. We were all still trying to get used to uni life in the beginning. It was so fast-paced all of us had a hard time adapting. Especially my two friends who were from poly. They were both from business and the last time they encountered math was in secondary school. It was definitely a stressful period for them. One of them actually considered changing course because she was feeling so stressed up. But in the end, we all made it through semester one. PHEW.

After a few weeks of break during December, school started once again. This time, we were all prepared for the hectic weeks ahead. Things started out smoothly and we're getting hang of Uni life. Few more weeks before finals and we're finishing up our syllabus of the courses soon. Let's push on!


Work hard for the things you believe in.