Keisuke Ramen, EL Welcome Tea (Try pub quiz questions)

This week hasn't been good.


Firstly, Monday started off with the worst meal I ever had in my life. ._. This is the bowl of sour&spicy noodles from the new Sichuan hotpot stall in Upper Deck. PLEASE DON'T EAT IT. If you know how I am with regard to meals and all, you'd know I'm easy when it comes to my food choices - I often go for the shortest queue in the canteen. Of course I appreciate good food, but in school, if I'm rushing for time, I'd just eat basically anything. However, I genuinely draw the limit at THIS. 

._. I'm not even kidding.

The noodles were so chewy that it felt like I was gnawing on bits of plastic. And the soup had a metallic taste to it. It was terrible. When Yihan first saw it, he immediately went "That looks so unappetising!" WELL IT TASTES BAD TOO. After two mouthfuls, I gave up and bought my trusty yummy waffle instead. Jian Gang, unfortunately, has tried other items from the same stall as well and we, both not fussy eaters, concur that that IS our limit. TRY IT AT YOUR OWN PERIL.

At least I had great company for lunch! Spent it catching up with Yihan (: it's always nice to spend time with him. We had a mini disagreement about celery and cucumber, it was hilarious.

Interactional Discourse seminar 2 went well, too! Discussed a bit about ethical behaviour and what would be considered important when doing transcriptions. For anyone who's interested, here're the classes that I'm taking this semester:

Level 4 EL4252 Interactional Discourse
Level 4 EL4253 Gender, Language and Text
Level 4 EL4221 Narrative Structures
Level 1 GEK1046 Introduction to Cultural Studies
Level 1 GEM2901 Reporting Statistics in the Media

I've given up on attempting a sociology minor because the modules are really expensive. I've instead dedicated this semester to doing the EL honours modules that I'm passionate about (all the EL classes I'm taking), doing something I'm interested in (GEK1046 - We've done comic strips so far! Haha) and doing something which is S/U-able i.e. GEM2901 LOL.

So far classes have been good though, even GEM2901. Melcher, Jian Gang and I have already made it through our presentation for Gender class, with Melcher putting on a brilliant performance at transgressing gender norms. Our presentation was on telephone sex operators. It was interesting, heh.


Also bumped into Jesslynn after class! She was my junior in secondary school choir. (: It's quite nice to meet juniors around school though they're reminders of how much I've aged heh (this cutiepie is 3 years younger than me!)


Hung out with Bryan before going for dinzx at Reedz Cafe. Am wearing Nars' Funny Face on my lips by the way; colour is probably truest to that in the first photo of the entry!


Reedz Cafe's iced lemon tea is pretty yumzx

Was famished and trying to compensate for my lousy lunch, so I got a cream of broccoli soup on top of carbonara!


This was just okay, B finished most of it. Hehe.


The carbonara was pretty good! The Cajun chicken slices were a little too salty for my taste but the cream sauce was nice.

On my way home:


Was attempting to channel a really summer-y look haha. Bright yellow top's from h&m and floral hotshorts are from ASOS!


On my lousy Tuesday (which I'd blogged about - the fiasco of leaving the home and getting to school), I also crashed an engineering class for the first time in my 4 years of college life! It was the Engineering Electromagnetics class ._. I really didn't understand anything so I just spent it doing my readings.


Took this and sent it to Boss to show him I was there


And he sent this back! After spotting where he was seated at, I then spent the rest of the lecture staring at him alternate between leaving his jaw slack while paying attention and back to yawning. Ha. I miss Andy Phua so much HELLO BOSS CAN YOU PLEASE MEET UP WITH ME.


Bryan and I checked out Ramen Keisuke Tonkotsu King Four Seasons at Bugis as well. At first we had a little difficulty finding it - me: "IS IT AT FOUR SEASONS HOTEL OR SOMETHING?!?!" -- but we managed it with Google Maps :D

The man behind this restaurant is called Keisuke Takeda, and the first ramen place he opened in Singapore is called Keisuke Tonkotsu King at Orchid Hotel. There are two other branches with different concepts started by him as well: Keisuke Tokyo-SG at Millenia Walk, which has crab broth, and Tori King at Amara Hotel. I'd first tried the Tori King ramen before anything else, and the special thing about it is that it's made with chicken stock and has a huge chicken thigh in the ramen! Though I prefer pork, I was really impressed with how tasty and flavourful the broth was. So when I tried the Black Spicy ramen at Tonkotsu King at Orchid Hotel, I WAS MINDBLOWN. Somehow the stock is just sooooooooo yummy.

So I was really excited to try the ramen at the 4th outlet!


Following advice pasted on the wall, I tried the Summer ramen...


Which has spicy minced pork! I don't like seaweed much so I only got the flavoured egg. (:

And Bryan went for the King:


Which has stir-fried pork!


Beansprouts are complimentary (:


You get to grind your own sesame seeds and smell 'em as the oils are released from the husk


Hard boiled eggs are complimentary as well!


My Summer ramen arrived! I was in the mood for something spicy, so this agreed with me. It's really yummy but it may be too spicy for people who don't take chilli well! Of course the broth was excellent as usual.

But B's King ramen was sooo much yummier than mine. The broth is just so good!! The pork in his ramen was really tender as well.



I wasn't too impressed with the piece of meat in my ramen though, it was a little too dry for my liking.


Check out Keisuke Ramen outlets, I think they're really worth it. Santouka ramen is my favourite, but I haven't been there in really long so I think a check is in order heh. If not I'm going to have to change my opinion on this! Looking forward to try the outlet at Millenia Walk as well, anyone up for that? (:

Passed out upon returning home due to satisfaction from eating awesome ramen.


Daddy gave me a lift to school again on Wednesday! (:


Makeup was slightly pin-up girl inspired, because I was up really early attempting to complete readings online which somehow turned to watching makeup tutorials on YouTube instead *-* On my lips is No.7's Showbiz!






After Gender class, spent some time hanging out with Jian Gang at Deck over dinner and we had a good talk before heading for the EL Welcome Tea! (: Brought Thom to school to capture the first Welcome Tea EL majors had in years


With two of the organisers, Divya and Albert. Love Divya's dress, it's so cheery!!


With some of the other EL majors, mostly year 4s! (:


And Amanda!!! :D


Jianrong had to be draaaaaaaagged just to take a photo with me


Favourite senior (: (: (: When I was in year 1, Jianrong REALLY helped me A LOT in everything - not just EL related, but other stuff as well. He always advised me on which modules to take and I could always count on him to provide good advice! If through Linguistics Society, I'm able to provide a bit of such aid to incoming juniors, and also hang out with EL majors more, I'm up for it :DDD I love hanging out with EL majors a lot, everyone's just very nice and fun :D


Some discussions going onnnnnnnnn


Prof Sato giving a comprehensive introduction to linguistics!

After that, we had a pub quiz!!!!! Well sort of, we were in a classroom instead of a pub but Bert was using that concept (: We were asked 35 MCQ and short-answer questions which had a mix of EL questions (well, duh right :D), general knowledge stuff, and NUS stuff!

MY GROUP WON!!!! Okay maybe it was because Divya was in my group and she knew some of the answers but I'd like to think I helped too HAHAHAHAHAH. We were asked stuff from Psycholinguistics and I'm proud to say I remember what a garden-path sentence is hehe.

Some questions we were asked:

1) What flower is featured on the (old) $1 Singapore coin?
2) What was the name of the first chimpanzee who learnt how to speak American Sign Language?
3) Which dictionary describes itself as the "definitive record of the English language"? Spell out the entire name.
4) How much does a small cup of iced milo cost from the Deck?
5) When did Nanyang University merge with the University of Singapore to form the National University of Singapore?
6) What is the capital of Canada?
7) What is the name of the dot on top in the letter "i"?

I'll provide the answers at the end of the entry, check them out if you're interested!! :D

Went out of the room for refreshments and took a few more photos!


Bert, Jiexin and I! :D Was so happy that Jiexin said she liked my eyeliner from that day. (: I always feel happy when people notice small differences in my makeup and compliment me!


With Bert again!! :D


Took a group shot with the remaining people but quite a few had left! So had the professors, I feel bad that we didn't manage to take photos with them ):

Went home and took a shot in front of my dusty mirror:




Outfit was kinda Rosie the Riveter inspired!! Bert said I should have worn a red bandana but I don't own one.  Haha


I quite dislike wearing jeans in Singapore's heat but I like this pair because of the high-waisted design! :D

On Thursday, Prof Talib made us question whether things like sponges and starfish could be characters in narratives:



Went to meet Ms Neo and Gannuer at The Marmalade Pantry and I had a slice of cinnamon spiced apple cake with cream cheese frosting!


Was moist and just sufficiently sweet!

Didn't really speak much during dinner because I wasn't really feeling like myself... Left the two of them to happily talk about politics.






Whilst waiting for the train





On Friday, I waited for Bryan at Utown for our gym session! It was my second time to the gym.




Bryan's microprocessor thingy which absolutely confounded me heh. Could only tell where the switch was


Gym gear!!

Did so much more this time as opposed to last time, because I was really overwhelmed (partially amused because of the beastfaces made by the guys) the previous time but I was determined not to say "I can't do it!!!" until I gave it a go. Did squats, leg curls, free weights, pull downs among others! My upper body is really sore now. ._. Thanks Bryan for being really supportive again!! He kept pushing me and made sure my posture was correct.

After:




Was walking to AS7 alone in the evening when the tranquility hit me and I took a photo:


On Instagram, captioned it with "It is dusk; the sky is cast with a tinge of cyan. Walking around alone on campus after most classes have ended makes me appreciate NUS for its quiet moments (not that I do not its busy ones), and its hidden areas; this walkway to AS7 is one I am particularly fond of. Perhaps I'm getting sentimental as it is my last year in college, but I feel as if I ought to slow down and take in these moments - savour them like matured cheese. Because though my participation in college life is kept to a minimum, I thank the close bonds and friendships that have been gifted to me, the professors who make me push and push and push and strive to question more, to yearn more and the laughter and joy in general. So here's to one last year of fully making use of my college life."



On that note, I end my entry. I don't feel alright but people around me tell me they'll be here with me to walk with me on this journey. I had told Jian Gang "Don't worry, i ain't got the balls to kill myself." His reply really stuck with me.

He'd said,
"it's more like
you got the balls to live on."

.


Here're the answers to the questions from above !

Labels: EL Welcome Tea, EnglishLanguage, friends, intrinsic motivation, not giving up, Outfits, Ramen addict, Ramen Keisuke, Ramen Keisuke Four Seasons, school life

;2:19 PM

Go later!

Go earlier!