It's official --- Bangkok is going to be THE city that I'll be visiting the most in my lifetime (aside from KL, but I didn't have to mention that right?)!! And I'm soooo happy that we managed to convert Alice and Raymond into Bangkok shopping lovers too! (We meaning Pauline, Tay and I). Somehow, us girls prefer roaming around Chatuchak, while the men prefer the convenience (and air-conditioning) of Platinum Mall. Either way, there's fun for everyone. :P

The trip was already off to a good start, with us getting our rooms upgraded for no reason other than us being lucky. Had this most awesome room for only RM120 altogether (shared with colleagues mah... it's actually RM120 per night). Shopping was good too, although I felt that I spent more this round, I found more "wearable" stuff than I did when I went in May. Kinda made a lot of mistakes shopping then --- too many dresses that wound up being too short, and a few ill-fitting button-down shirts. So this round, I made sure that the dresses I bought were longer than usual, no strange pieces, mostly basic staple type of tops. I like my haul this time around! And so many cheap accessories! If you see me more be-feathered, be-jewelled or be-anythinged more than usual, well, what to do. Only RM2 for each accessory, who wouldn't buy more. :D

Nothing much differed for my trip this round, except that we had less time because our plane landed in Bangkok later than before, and we had an earlier trip back to Malaysia. Oh well, no biggie because coming back early means that I could still make it for my gym night classes on Monday. :D And seriously, I had SOOOOOO much fun this trip. Thanks to Pauline for organising everything, Raymond who was our resident "terminator" and had to walk in front to clear the path for us WTF, Alice who is sooooo sweet and nice but can come up with random wtf statements that make us laugh (especially when the statements have to do with hentam-ing Raymond!) and Tay who came up with the worse joke of my life, something that the 5 of us just know as the "Squidman" saga. I might tell it here later, but no point because you just had to be there to fully enjoy the lulz.

Short entry cos I'm gonna be turning in soon :
Day 1 : check in to hotel and relaxeddddddd to the max. Tickled to find out that the premium room upgrade resulted in having strawberry condoms placed thoughtfully by the bedside. HEE HEE. The only bad part of the room is that the shower sucks! Totally low water pressure, which is a BIG issue for all of us. Who doesn't like a nice refreshing BLAST of water after walking all day in the sun? Besides, Pauline and I are big fans of bath products. Right after our first day haul in Carrefour (wtf... si lai stuff again! :P), we were dying to try out our new purchases in the bathroom right away... and the low water pressure just sucks the fun right outta it. *sob*

Beds. And yes, there's a random sofa set and table... which turned out to be great for the activities on our last night here. :D

Large tv + karaoke station + DVD player. And they supplied us with weird Thai CDs so that the only song CD we could play was some emo stuff called "Love Academy 2". Hmmm... which is why they thought the strawberry condoms would come in useful.

Hey, at least the hotel is charging cheaper than Boots. One box of this at the pharmacy would cost you 89 baht.

Anyway, yeah, after much relaxation, we went out to Carrefour to do our si lai shopping and to get "essentials" which usually means drinks, chips and bath products. Lol. :D Oh, and Raymond introduced the joys of 7-11's chili dogs to us. Supposedly staple "after clubbing" food for Thais.. it was perfect "anytime snack" for us, since Palazzo Hotel is located directly opposite a 7-11. We went there soooo often for the coffee, chili dogs and mineral water! Where's our customer loyalty card? :D

Chili dog and coffee from 7-11... hahaha. Best Thai food that we discovered this time around wtf!

Thai sausage and dim sum that I *love* in Carrefour. Dim sum eaten with vinegar and fried garlic flakes. V. good! Try it!

Chips for my colleagues... minus two packets over the course of the trip. So they only get 4 now.

I don't know if they sell this in Malaysia, but it made sense to get instant pad thai in Thailand.

All the beauty products I got from Carrefour... hehe. No shampoo & conditioner this time round though. The one shampoo that I really wanted to get was out of stock. It's hibiscus shampoo! From a local Thai brand... can't get in Malaysia.

Ate at this restaurant in Suan Lum night bazaar that was recommended by Alice's colleague. It had a live band that was not too invasive, not like the Suan Lum food court! There they had some weird live performances by a very sexy lady that couldn't sing.... and she sang stuff like Girl's Generation's Gee. It kinda embarasses me that I know about music like that, but Imma blame it on my team mates that are just getting younger and younger as I grow older and older.

I was still quite snap happy during the 1st day, so some photos for you :

Tay, Pauline and myself.

Me, Alice and Raymond.

Coconuts are always a must on a Bangkok trip.

Stir-fried "Chinese broccoli", tom yum!

Fried prawn thingy, stir-fried chicken with cashews. Altogether about RM15 per person, but doesn't matter because Tay paid! HEHEHE.

Fave photo of the night : Tay, Pauline and Alice bargaining over handheld fans. :P

These are hairclips made out of sweet wrappers... or what looks like sweet wrappers.

Pretty, pretty lights. Suddenly feel like throwing a garden party at night so I can hang this all around for my guests to coo at. Hmmm. Once again, I'm imagining a scenario which requires me to have a HOUSE.

Music tees, guaranteed to make you the ah beng that everyone will have their eyes on. Costs only 4AA batteries to run.

I thought of getting the dress on the top, furthest right. How ah. In Jolene's words - hit or miss?

Information overload.

Accessories... but I recommend getting 'em at Platinum Mall cos they are wayyyyy cheaper there, with less bargaining required.

Maxi dresses --- stuff that a 159cm person can never wear. *sob*

Wah, paparazzi Leech is getting better.

Stopped shopping for water refill... strawberry ice blended that I've always recommended. :D

Drinking my RM10 birds nest. :D With leftover coupon money that I actually had to beg/borrow from Tay and Raymond. Thanks for the treat! :D *pan cute smile*

Foot massage at Thaiway after that... RM25 for 1 hour, free head and shoulder rub as well. My shoulders are mortally wounded.... I can't stand anyone massaging them!

Haul from Suan Lum :

Very ah lian cap in the style of Ed Hardy, "Teamwork" shirt which is actually big for me, but I loves it (I think it's copped from Threadless though), "Killers" shirt that I bought for my brother, 3 dresses and 1 top which I already wore when I was in Bangkok and I love it! :D

Enjoying grilled squid with chilli sauce from my fav street vendor in Bangkok, hahaha! It's only 50 sen!!

Okay, I planned to do a light recap of everyday, but I've started blogging about this trip in earnest. So I'll just continue tomorrow. Gosh, want to wake up in 6 hours time for Danny H's class. Yes, I'm on leave again tomorrow! And I know I said I would continue blogging about London, but please lah... people writing for free, just take what you can get. Hehehe...

Time to compress the last two days in Madrid into one entry. As I said, we didn't do much there... so on our 2nd last day there, we walked around the Plaza Sol area, ate more tapas, drank more sangrias and watched a flamenco show. =) Although it is pricey, I think it's worth it... cos I like watching dances and I think the dancers were pretty professional. The place where we watched the flamenco show is one pretty well-known place (Corral de la Moreria), that boasts audiences like Mariah Carey, Nicole Kidman & Keith Urban and John Travolta among other luminaries.

Ben also found out that there's a Desigual store near us, so we did a bit of shopping. Or more like, we TRIED to do some shopping. Despite "Rebajas!" signs screaming in store windows, the products on sale turn out to be quite fail, or about 1% of the products are on sale, or even after sale, I still can't afford a plain tee. Sigh! By the way, Parkson Pavilion has a Desigual store, so maybe we don't have to get so excited la, huh. T_T"

Street Corner Symphony

Weekend market... hence, the activity.

Toro looks at me while I enjoy my meal.

Tapas again - olives and some kinda cured meat thing. I remember that it was pretty much inedible for me, so Ben swept everything into his stomach. :P

Ben's squid ink rice.

While I had some sort of meat extravaganza.
It was really good and one of the cheapest meals I had in Madrid. About RM25?

I'm quite happy though, with the shopping, because when we went into a music store, I bought TWO brand new CDs with a lot of Spanish songs inside. Er... cornily titled as "Ritmo Tropical" and "Baila Tropical" - it's kind of like a collection of songs from the Latin music genre. Hahahhaa! Ben says that I bought CRAP because the genre of music listed are akin to the Macarena or The Cheeky Girls. Whatever, I just like something that I can feng tau to. :P Oh, and while we were milling around the music store, they were playing Ricky Martin songs on the loop. :P However, aside from Carlos Baute, Ben didn't recommend anything else. Oh yeah, he did recommend some solo artist from Uruguay... forgot the name though. *random*

This is Colgando En Tu Manos by Carlos Baute. Don't know if you've already seen me Tweet it, but here ya go again:

Carlos Baute... up against the wall.

Leech the paparazzi!

Dang... need to drink sangrias in the sun again!

Some fantastic fish cutlets and a small seafood paella for tapas.
By the way, food and drinks are about 10% more expensive if you sit on the terrace. But what the heck, the terrace is the place to be!

Very strange ways to make money. The costumes are sooooo bad.

Cute store --- according to Ben, the name of the store is "Shut Your Mouth" or something like that. Too bad it's sooooo expensive. *shuts mouth*

Marketplace! Ben keeps saying we should eat here but I really cannot tahan this place. No doubt the food is cheaper, but it stinks. The seafood actually smells soooooo fishy in a bad way. I don't know how to explain. :O~

Inside the marketplace -- they have chocolate rings for sale. WTF.

More wine? Dull, we must have our wine party soon!! Come let's shop for wine at Jaya33!!

Dessertssss.

Ben's yogurt cake and some raspberry cheese thing that I had. Sinful trip... hahaha.

After the flamenco show on our second last night, we went to a quiet place to have dinner... where my steak and fries came in ginormous proportions. The only good thing about it is that the place gave me a tiny clay jug (now used to store my stationeries in the office) and the waiter apparently told Ben, "for the missus" WTF. But I told everyone in the office that he said, "this is for her because she is beautiful". HAHAHA. A plain clay jug for the beautiful girl... doesn't quite make sense huh!

Walking to Corral de la Moreria at night--- passed by Plaza Mayor again and took pics.

I think you need to make a reservation 2350234238 years in advance in order to get a table nearer to the stage. *sigh*

An energetic and fierce dance! Although not really much variety... still, it was an interesting experience and I enjoyed my night here. :P

Finding a restaurant at 11pm at night.

My dear friend, wish we can have dinner again some time soon. Looking at these photos make me miss your company! (And the food... the fooodddd!) Too bad you're now on a little island working your arse off. Heh.

Decor....

Pickled olives and onions for tapas. This was better... more edible. Sigh! It's only the really expensive restaurants that give you unique tapas. Otherwise, I hope you like olives and onions!

Ben's garlic and egg soup and this chicken consomme I had that tastes damn bland. It's like water and Knorrs chicken cube only ok! Felt so conned. Gah! Don't even want to remember the price!

I think Ben had a rack of lamb... *unsure. He was surprised at how huge the portion was, but it's supposed to be the restaurant's signature dish.

Had veal instead. Damn large portions, so it was pretty value for money. And damn delicious too... perfectly marinated and grilled. *salivating cos I didn't eat dinner today*

"For the Missus." "For the beautiful girl in the red dress!"
Please ignore the bottle of Minute Maid in this picture. It provided some lulz when I sipped on my "Naranja and Nada" and said, "I think this means Orange Juice and Lime. Nada means lime."
Ben : "WTF, nada means nothing lah!! It's orange juice and nothing else!"

On our last day there, we found Kukuxumusu, this store that sells a lot of quirky, cute stuff. Check out the website! The store has soooo many nice things to look at, but the guy manning the store wanted to shoo us out because it was time for siesta. T___T Couldn't buy more, otherwise I might've gotten a cup or two for close buds.

Funny randomness overload. I show you my Kukuxumusu shirt next time, very cute wan!! :D

Spent the rest of our afternoon walking around the marketplace again (yogurt cake!! was influenced by Ben to have MORE CAKE!) and having tapas. Sigh... although I bitched about not having much to do in Madrid, actually all this "free and easy" sangrias and tapas all the time is pretty damn enjoyable too. Hahaha.

This is in the San Miguel Marketplace again... meat for sale.

Breads... and just to randomly show you that you generally have to stand and eat. -___- I'm picky, so I wanna be sitting my arse down.

Yogurt cakeeeee.

Fruit stall and book stall.

Pretty sidewalk cafes.

Free raw cockles tapas, and this disgusting pig spare parts tapas that was supposedly the restaurant's signature dish, but it sucked so bad.

The veggie and prawn omelette was best. :D

The restaurant.

We found this free newspaper @ Kukuxumusu (called "Soft Secrets") and its actually a paper dedicated to...

How to grow your own marijuana. -___-
This is the letters to the editor page... where you could show off your plant. And your body. -___-
Is Photobucket gonna censor this pic too?

70% of the paper was dedicated to adverts selling fertilizer, plants, seeds, etc.

Travelling to the airport and back to London was pretty easy though. Cos we had taxi transfer arranged for us by the hotel. Ya ya, Hotel Meninas rulez. As we flew back with Ryanair again (all goes well, despite our earlier drama), Ben said to me, "Your trip to London kinda amazing hor? You arrived at Stansed airport in London. Flew back to Gatwick airport from Madrid, and when we go back to Malaysia, we are leaving from Heathrow." Hahaha! Ya, pretty damn amazing!

Next up : London Times! But don't check back that often, I'm going to be away til Tuesday! :D Yes yes, Imma be holidaying again. :D Had to work like mad the past few days in order to not DIE when I get back from this trip, but it's all worth it. I feel so happy!!!