Cologne Day 2 - Schokoladen Museum

Day 2 in Cologne went by in a breeze. We only went to the Schokoladen Museum, walk around the town for a bit before leaving to catch our bus to Amsterdam. 

Amsterdam to Cologne - 8/11/2013 - 9/11/2013

After being away from 'civilisation' or rather a city with more advanced technology and efficiency, I was extremely looking forward to this trip!

Pre-conclusion

Hello!

I can't believe how long have I been away from this space. My 2013 ended with a bang with my engagement with my favourite boy together with wonderful food, beautiful sights and new experiences. Exchange plays a major part of my 2013 and my life will never be the same again. I'll do a conclusion post on my 2013 when my exchange officially ends. 8 more days to go and my last paper will mark the end of this wonderful and yet arduous journey. As for now, I just came back from Sintra and visited all the remaining amazing sights of Lisbon. I am all ready to leave this place without regrets. I can be truly confident to tell people that I have both lived and travelled Lisbon extensively to no regrets. I am glad that I have decided to explore the Western part of Europe and fell in love with all the rich culture and food (especially the Spanish culture). I'll definitely be back again since I have been looking up on Portugal again and that's so much that I have yet to see (more sights started to be discovered and it's a rising popular travel destination now) and my boy has never been to Portugal.

This will summarise my exchange journey for now:

I am not sorry. I have done and experienced things that no one will expect me to. Multiple mixed bed dorms, lugged luggages on my own without anybody's help, live in accommodations without warm water, live in accommodations without water, live in vomit smell hostels rooms, travelling and navigating on my own, getting lost, ride a camel, camp in the desert at night at negative temperature with only 2 thin blankets, being alert and keep my belongings safe, washed up in public toilets to catch overnight bus and trains, camp at the airport overnight,... The list is never-ending. The guys even said that I am not a girl anymore. Haha. Man up! Sometimes I feel that I am more man than them in terms of getting ready and packing speed;) These less than 8 days might be the last few days that we are gonna spend time together as well. PX commented that the next time he sees me, I'll be probably married and carrying kids to our lunches-.- That's his idea of engagement. Retarded. We definitely need a JB foodie when we get back. Good food deprived over here in Lisbon *waves waves*

2014 is here far too fast! I didn't really have time to reflect on 2013 and write out what I want to achieve in 2014. I shall do a really brief one now:

1. Exercise regularly! Hopefully morning runs with my favourite boy before work or after I get the hang of my internship working hours, back to school gym. I want my thigh gap back, ahem.
2. Discover my career path and find a job within 1 month of graduation. Yes yes. I would have never dreamt that I will be in this situation but sadly yes. I think I am gonna graduate without securing a job but I'll see how my internship goes!
3. Read extensively. I love reading so so so much. Now that school is going to be out... really soon! I have to indulge myself in all my books.
4. Save up. If not, how to get married, get a house and put furnitures in the house?
5. Master Spanish and finish a Spanish novel by the end of the year.
6. Master Korean and being able to converse in Korean during our grad trip (with HH)!
7. Stay cheerful. I have been blessed in so many ways, what's not to be happy about anymore? :')

Lisbon-bound

Hello people! I haven't wrote a proper post on my upcoming exchange. I will be going to where I pointed in the map - Lisbon, Portugal, for a 5 month exchange. This is my second time applying for exchange. I didn't get what I wanted during the first time I apply when I was in year 2 and I rejected it. I didn't get my desired choice in the first round this time but was lucky to be offered this placement in the second round.

I was really unhappy that I couldn't go on an exchange with Huihui given that there was 10 places for that particular university. Some seniors told me that it was almost impossible to get an exchange placement if you rejected an offer before. I totally gave up on the thought of going on an exchange until the email for the second round of selection came. The leftover European universities were very very limited. Didn't have any high hopes and tada... I got the Lisbon placement and I accepted it:D The only problem with this offer is that I will be the only SMU student going. There's none from NTU but probably some from NUS but so far, NUS Business school friends haven't heard of any. Do let me know if any of you have friends heading to Universidade Nova De Lisboa/ Nova School of Business and Economics. That will be a great help! :)

The minute I found out that I will be going to Lisbon by myself, I quickly call the office to ask for more info but they refused to help me until I officially accept the offer. Sighs. So I did a Google search for people's blogpost on it and that returned nothing. Luckily I found 3 seniors who went to this university while searching for some reviews about this school on Facebook. Hehe. 2 of the SMU seniors are super helpful (ahem, in general all are very helpful normally but if you are unlucky, you'll probably meet the rude ones in this kind of situation) and tell me almost everything I need to know. So in general Lisbon is rather safe and cheap as compared to the rest of the Europe. They gave me contacts to rent apartment too. Felt so much more assured after that. So I think I am good to go :DD Everyone I asked kept telling me to go, that Lisbon is really beautiful, the university is beautiful, Zara and related brands are cheap there and blahblahblah... Here are some photos of Lisbon I found on Tumblr, to be honest, I didn't heard of Lisbon before exchange application:

The place looks promising. Hehe. I'll probably spam photos of the cute buildings for the first few weeks that I am there. I have already started to make a list of which clothes items I will bring over (I have a bursting wardrobe right now that isn't timeless. I probably wont wear them again after I come back 5 months later), what to buy when I first got there and what to buy in Florence when I am coming back ;) I just hope that I can have some NUS travel buddies so that I can travel before school starts. I have to come back when the sem ends at mid Jan. No chance to travel after that. Hopefully there will be NUS peeps going! Prays! So far I don't know where I'll want to go except for the MUST-VISIT London, Edinburgh and related ones and to Florence when I am coming back. Kiruna is super expensive to go from Lisbon and might not be lucky enough to see the Northern Lights. Hmms.

Bangkok-Aonang-Phuket

Pretty taken aback by the KPMG's aptitude test just now and I suddenly regained my mood to blog. HAHA.

Our honeymooney II:

Bangkok! We reached Bangkok at 6.30pm Bkk time. The boyfriend figured that there will be a jam so we took a train. The trains in BKK are so new now and it looks like SMRT trains! It's a good alternative of transport during peak hours. The jams at BKK can get really horrible.

When we got to Baiyoke Boutique, there weren't enough Deluxe rooms so they offered us Baiyoke Suite hotel instead and ask us to come back the next day we are like huh?! No way! So after much consideration, they gave us free upgrade for a night! The superior room.

I personally prefer smaller hotel rooms. A big hotel room with few people makes me scared especially in Thailand. Haha.

Oh ya! We took Scoot to BKK. Their seats are so much more comfy than Airasia and Tigers(Y).

The first night we just went to have a nice Thai dinner at The Centralworld shopping mall and watched Step up 4: Revolution in 3D! Awesomeeeeee.

The next morning we went to Platinum mall for breakfast and speed shop a lil before heading to Chaktuchak. I didn't get anything from Chaktuchak. The boyfriend bought so many teeshirts and stuff.

Then I brought him to the Noodle soup store Wilfred, Angelina and I went last year. Yummy!

&& I brought him to try my fav yummy coconut ice cream!

Dinner back at Platinum Mall food court!

We explored the new shopping place! Night market with bars at the riverside -Asiatique.

Asiatique is really a great place to hangout and shop. It's so beautiful too. Filled with bars, restaurants, nice small lil shops and food court...

The next morning we had to checkout and go shopping with our bags cos at night we were going to take a 12-hour sleeper bus ride to Krabi:( But it turned out to be okay. It's just that I felt that I haven't got enough time to shop in BKK. We had Macbreakfast that morning! Love's Double Sausage Mcmuffin!

We tried to go to the bus terminal early at 6.30pm when the bus is due to leave at 8.00pm AND we got stuck in the jam for like 1.5 hours++. We were soooo nervous and was total giving up on catching the bus but... surprisingly the bus driver actually waited for us. Phew.. The taxi uncle told us that Monday is the busiest day of the week and the jam is also the worst out of the week.

The 12 hours bus ride is so bad cos of the super strong air conditioner. My destroyed nails after the bus ride...

Our receipt for buying bus tickets from the Krabi bus terminal to Aonang.

Finally! Aonang Buri Resort.

Me just plain exhausted when we reached the resort.

Off to explore the Aonang beaches.

From Aonang you can see beautiful sea but no powdery sand and sooo we went to look for long tail boat to go to other beaches! But the long tail boat will only leave if there's > 6 customers so we went to have lunch first while waiting. Awesome pineapple rice!

Exploring the shops and bought a mat!

Hello Kitty tutu!

Awesome waterproof bag the boyfriend bought in BKK I got myself one in Aonang too. Useful and reasonably priced!

On the long tail boat to West Railey Beach

My strong Sally Henson nail polish. Unharmed for months.

Cheap BKK manicure that couldn't last 1 day

We went to explore the East Railey Beach next... Only to find nothing there. It's full of mangroves! Nothing special...

Sunset

A restaurant near Aonang Buri Resort have 20% off!

The super delicious Thai Springroll

The next morning we had a scare by this 'spider'...

Which turns out to be just thread-.-

While waiting for our tour! The 2nd day in Aonang, we booked a White water rafting-elephant trekking and ATV tour!

Phang Nga for white water rafting. 

We didn't have any photo of us on the raft. They tried to sell us photos as usual but it's such a rip-off. 300bht. No way.

Phang Nga Waterfall!

Huge fishes but really nice water

There was animal show too. I personally didn't like the animal shows cos the animals look so pitiful. This monkey has got really cute teary eyes.

At night, back to the same restaurant for dinner!

Huge tiger prawns

Watching Olympics to sleep. LOL.

3rd day in Aonang - Phi Phi island tour! Fav part of my entire trip. We couldn't decide if we were to extend another night in Aonang or go to Phi Phi for a night before heading to Phuket at first. But after looking at the possible options to get to Phuket, we decided to extend another night in Aonang. Don't have to shift our stuff everywhere, me likey! End up it was a good choice cos Phi Phi is SOOOOOO CROWDED.

On the speedboat to our first stop -Bamboo Island!

The boyfriend is like saying that you could wakeboard on these waves.

Mr crab!

See how happy the boyfriend smiles with his crabby friend!

We snorkeled at Bamboo Island. It is a protected island with only forest rangers living on them. The boyfriend actually explored the option of camping there initially before the trip:O

Look at how clear the water is!

We snorkeled near some really pretty coral reefs. Clown fishes and many other cute and colorful fishes~

Sea urchin!

The workers extract bird nests from this cave~

Maya Bay. This is main aim of our trip but it was pretty disappointing cos it was sooooooo crowded with tourists, especially the Chinese Nationals... got what I mean?

Lovebonito Crochet bikini. Hehs.

Fatty!

Hugeass speedboat we saw near Phi Phi Island.

Another stopover for snorkeling?

Olympic diving champion. Hahahahahaha.

Jellyfish!

This grandmother came with her daughter, her maid and 2 grandchildren. When I saw them trying to board the speedboat with a stroller I am like HUH?! End up the kids are rather nice natured. They don't make noise when the boat gets bumpy and all. They even let the maid snorkel with the mother. Pretty nice family.

Disgusting looking sea cucumber

Back for a lil rest at the Aonang before heading out for dinner and spotted this clinic. Seriously?!

The black and white kitty just slept freezing in that position.

The Maya Bay cocktail

Last day in Aonang! Tattoo Cafe for breakfast.

This is one of the best English breakfast I ever had.

Back to West Railey Beach to chill for the last time.

We took a ferry to Phuket. We didn't had a good start. The ferry ride was good but Phuket is horrible. Bad traffic jam on our way to Patong beach and the driver didn't know where is The Belle Resort-.-

Our beautiful hotel room

Really good western food here! Famous restaurant recommended by The Tripadvisor and the Chef is really friendly!

Melt-in-your-mouth garlic bread!

Really awesome pasta

We just briefly explored the nightlife in Phuket but the whole street is so complicated and awful. Russian girls in windows and Thai girl shows. Horrible. Not a place for ladies. && One the Tiger Discotheque just caught fire a few days ago. It was in yesterday's paper.

Next morning! Breakfast at Sabai Sabai restaurant. Another good restaurant. Recommended on by people on Agoda.

Parasailing! I don't like Phuket but it's the only place for Parasailing! We came here for Parasailing and the boyfriend argued with them and got a good deal for both Parasailing and Jetski.

My turn!

The weather in Phuket was soooooo soooooooo sooooooo hot so we kept going to shopping malls and decided to stop at Au Bon Pain for a snack.

Back to the same restaurant for lunch

Getting ready to leave The Belle Resort. They are really nice. They actually provide bathing facilities for customers who have already checked out.

Tada. That's my best holiday so far...