Back to Green Belt...

Manila - It was wake up @ 7:30am and then for breakfast at Paseo.  This is Mandarin cafe that offer breakfast buffet - they have a wide selection for breakfast.   Their fried chicken is tasty, scrambled eggs was good.   Their tim sum selection does not taste good - har kow skin was thick and not succulent.  Char Siew Pow was OK.  For the fruits section, I tried the Chiku (which was not sweet), Custard apple (the first fruit I tried was bland, but the 2nd fruit I choose a good one and it tasty very sweet). 

Off we went to our customer for training and spent the whole day with them.  We had Pizza ordered in from Yellow Cab Pizza.  

Lesley and I walked around Green Belt many restaurants and we finally settled for a Japanese Shabu Shabu restaurant located at the 2nd Floor of Green Belt 3 - Thousand Cranes Resturant.  The food is fresh and reasonably priced.  Worth visiting again..

We walked to our hotel to have some drinks @ the Martinis and the band was playing oldies tunes from beatles and Elvis and called them the Bloom Brothers.   They have a facebook - http://www.facebook.com/thebloombrothers

Young band with lots of energy and good voice and had an enjoyable time and left only when they decided to invite guests to sing on stage.  It was a total disaster when it because karaoke and the guest were singing out of tune.  It was really bad and thus spoilt their reputation.

So strange...

Manila - I think once you start to record things you will find that 'humans are in fact creatures of habit'.  Lesley asked me whether I wanted to start at the same hotel again and I decided hmmm, let's change to Mandarin Oriental Hotel.  I thought I have not stay at this hotel before, but I did exactly last year 2010 in July - how strange....

I knew that Mandarin Oriental is part of the KrisFlyer programe so I asked for the room to be credited with 500 miles and was told that my room is below the point crediting status. So, I asked what is the point level to be given the miles and it was 6,000 pesos.  My room  rate was 5,999 pesos - so I made a big fuss that because of 1 peso the hotel is not allowing me to get the 500 miles.  How stupid can they be?  Maybe I should not stay here again...the front desk need to check for 5 pesos whether I can get my 500 miles - what a joke?

Of course, I will get it.

Dinner, we went to Fely J's Kitchen @ Green Belt 5.   Unlike staying at New World Hotel, we had to walk about 500 metres to Green Belt.

Website: http://ljcrestaurants.com.ph/fely-j/
This restaurant serves Filipinos cuisine and it's delicious. 

The waitress are friendly and very knowledgable - such a contrast of service in Singapore even though served by Filipinos.   The waitresses are paid so much more in Singapore but their service is 10x worse than in Philippines - why?

We had the Relenong Pusit - which is actually sotong stuffed with prawns and pork, Lechon Kawali - 3 layer pork fried and their FJ delicious rice; which came in a huge plate with fried anchovies.  The food is really but we could not finish the rice.

We were tempted to try their desert - Tequila Chocolate cake (very nice...) and Sikreto Maria (literally means Maria's Secret, which turn out to be rice pudding, mangoes topped with vanila ice cream.

Go Karting in Singapore

Singapore - I took my channel partners to Go Kart around West Coast area @ Kart Right track.
http://www.kartright.com/

Yukiko and Lesley - Go Cart racers

Racers...

Traditional Thai Restaurant

Bangkok - Our channel partner took us to a Traditional award winning Thai restuarant - Ruen Mallika.  This is a difficult to locate restaurant as it was deep within one of the soi (lane) in Bangkok.   This famous resturant is located @ Sukhumvit 22 - http://www.ruenmallika.com/ - telk: 02-663-32112.   The food is very fresh and meticulously prepared.  On that particular day, the air-conditioning was not working too well and I was sweating like in a sauna.   I had to persuade the waitress to bring the air-condition temperature down.

So Hot! in Manila

Manila - Arrived from Singapore in the afternoon and the 1st thing that hit me was the extreme heat...wow so hot is the weather.   After clearing customs, I headed straight to the meter taxi queue and waited for my turn.   Took the yellow airport taxi and he told me that he is going to charge me Php500 which not knowing I agree to it - this is daylight robbery - he seems polite but he is a sneaky.   The ususal taxi ride is around Php200 - 250.  That is almost double the price.

I stayed at New World Hotel and this is the first time I am staying there.  A nice 5-star hotel.

Just opposite of the Hotel is called Green Belt which is one of the upper-end shopping mall in Makati.   We had dinner @ Italianni.   The mussels was not good, the Magherita Pizza was so-so and the Spaghetti vongole was OK - for the price they charge - it's an over-priced Italian restaurant.

Exchange your money in Manila - you get better rates than @ Singapore airports.

Quan An Ngon - # 1 restaurant in Hanoi

Hanoi - I planned to have an early dinner with good fresh spring roll before leaving for home tommorrow.  So, I headed downstairs and asked the concierge where the best fresh spring roll are - he was not sure but directed me to Quan An Ngon.  A popular restaurant for both local Hanoi and tourist.

The taxi fare cost 28,000 dong and the restaurant is located @ 18 Phan Boi Chau.  It was crowded when I when at about 6pm, waited for a while and was given a seat with 2 joint tables.   After a while, a group of 3 Japanese came and the waiters split it into 2 tables.  A while later whilst I was eating my fresh spring roll, the waiters gave the seats in front of me to 2 local vietnamese - how rude I thought these waiters are?

Even in Singapore, we asked permission whether anyone is seating before taking the seat.  
I was very uncomfortable throughout my seat - it is like paying for restaurant food but in a glorified hawker centre.   In actual fact, it was there were many Hawkers all around the restaurant in an open concept.

It is a once a visit experience and never to visit again.

Nha Hang Ngon in Hanoi

Hanoi - This is the sister restaurant of the one I tried in HCMC.  This time for lunch, I was a bit adventurous and tried their fried spring roll wrapped in cabbage and bamboo shoot noodle.  I really do not like the Bamboo shoot noodle the extremely strong smell of the bamboo shoot was a turn off.

Located @ 26 Tran Hung Dao Road a short walk from Hilton Opera Hotel