Friday Work Lunch

We had a special lunch get together at work today. It was a quick yet warm lunch with flavours from India, Italy, Lebanon, Scotland and Australia - delicious meals cooked by fellow colleagues. Our work place is truly international :) I got snap happy and here are some of the pictures from the work place.

All in a row - plates full to the brim

Chocolate rum balls covered with dessicated coconut

Fresh home made tabouli

Fresh home made Italian Bread

Tomato chicken with feta cheese

Indian Onion rice

Indian Beef curry

Homemade strawberry tarts - very visually appealing!

Yummy chocolate cupcakes - also visually stimulating!

Quick shot while going 2 floors down in the lift

Our workplace Monday-Friday

cheryl

Pharmacy Ball 2009

Last Friday was a night of celebrations for the Masters of Pharmacy students at UCanberra. The ball was held at the Hellenic Club and it was a pretty awesome night. It was a formal event themed Gold and Silver. Lecturers, students and their partners made up most of the participants that night but there were some specially invited guests who had kindly sponsored the big prizes of the raffle draw that night. The second prize were female products by SonFx while the biggest prize was two flight tickets with Qantas to select destinations within Australia. Too bad we didn't win it! Another short weekend away would fantastic :)

The dinner was organized by Caspa the pharmacy society at the university of which Alex was the out going president for 2009. I went as Alex's partner (naturally..) and we certainly enjoyed ourselves.

Here are some pictures of the night.

President and 'First Lady' :)

Alex making his speech for the night

A picture with the Andrew from Qantas Link - the sponsor for the main prize for the night

The bar from which drinks were served from that night.

Much action took place on the dance floor-everyone showcasing their moves and grooves

2nd year Master students

There was a guy taking photos for OutinCanberra. Out in Canberra is an independent restaurant, fashion, entertainment and bar website that offers news, offers and latest discounts of popular spots around Canberra. A part of the website holds social photos of people caught out and about in Canberra. We got our picture taken by the photographer and here it is :) Yay!

cheryl

Canberra SkyFire21 2009

I had such a lovely time tonight at the Canberra SkyFire! SkyFire is an annual event organised by FM 104.7, a massive show of fireworks even bigger than the one at New Years Eve and it’s held at the centre basin of Lake Burley Griffin. It’s a great picturesque setting for the event. Imagine the serene shores of a manmade lake surrounded by green slopes and national monuments on each side.

What's a description without photos to add to the imagination? I took some pictures before the sun set.

Old Parliament House with the current Parliament House in the background

Federation Place with its slopes filling up with party goers

Another side of Lake Burley Griffin with Australian War Memorial in the background. See the little people dotting the shoreline?

There was a short aerial show while we waited for the sun to go down and the show to begin.

Parachutists displaying their aerial skills with colored gas tanks

Helicopter ala 'Air Wolf'

We got to our chosen location at 5.30pm and we could see that all sides of the lake were jam packed with people bar our side. Hallelujah! I was told people had started arriving to secure a good vantage point as early as 12 noon and the show was only to start at 8.30pm! We quickly secured a good spot and plonked our picnic ware on a tarp on the ground. Alex and I recently invested in some outdoor foldable seats for occasions like these and they sure were comfy.

Our blue tarp with a flowery centre mat

Our comfy green seats - comes with a cup holder.. and only for AUD 8 each!!

We were about to sit down when two lovely ladies in red outfits came up to us and offered to take a photo of us for free. They were sponsored by good ol' McDonalds and with the free photo came a voucher for buy one get one free breakfast at McD. Freebies always make my day!

Two red ladies armed with SLR

Our complimentary shot

I took the shot below after the sun set. Federation Place has a lake side front with some world flags lining the walk. The night breeze was blowing nicely, making the flags look rather majestic against the dark skies. And of course, the seeing the Malaysian flag flying high sealed the shot.

The first of the fireworks

Second shot

The show this year was fantastic. I recorded the whole event to share it with you guys. Do click pause after clicking on the link to allow for the entire clip to load before you watch the video. Do look for the short appearance of boxes and hearts midway through the show. I thought that was such a surprise. And I love the finale best. Enjoy!

cheryl

Valentines Day - 14 February

It's that time of the year again! One day of overpriced flowers, expensive meals, sparkly jewelry and excessive consumption of chocolates. But happy is the lady who gets all of that on this special day of the year. :)

Flowers = Bragging rights at the workplace (maybe not out loud but men, if you are reading this.. sending flowers to your lady's work place scores you major points. Just make sure you send the right kind)
Meal = Full on cocktails, entree, mains, dessert and coffee
Jewelry = Tiffany's maybe?
Chocolates = Elevated mood

How did we celebrate our first Valentines Day after getting married? It was a simple, understated affair. Yes, I did get flowers. No, I did not get Tiffany's but I do have my eye set on something from there of which its purchase will wait till we are in a better place financially to get it :) Can't justify splurging right now when the economy is so uncertain. And finally no, I did not get chocolates cos we have enough chocolates in our pantry to last us till January 2010.

What flowers did I get? Beautiful stemmed purple and white orchids.. reminds me of the tropical weather back in Malaysia. The orchid is the national flower of Singapore and (for those of whom this thought crossed their mind) no, Alex could not get me the hibiscus because there were none at the florists :)




I know that flowers eventually die so I'm glad I can use the pot! :)


Our dinner reservations were made at Peppered Prawn. It was a lovely place, small, cosy and warm, tucked in a corner easily missed if you don't stay around the area. It's at the Sky Plaza Apartments, right next to the Southern Cross Club.

A change in menu on Tuesday

The kitchen area

Here are pictures of our meal that night with our comments to boot.

Cocktail: We ordered the Chinese Whisper (The presentation was not much to whisper about but the alcohol content did deliver a kick)

Entree: Seafood Tasting Plate - Grilled scallops, drunken oysters,crispy prawns, cajun calamari & sugar cured ocean trout ( This was quite good except they have to do a better job cleaning the oysters. Mine had sand and grit in it)

Mains: Duck Confit - Slow roasted free range duck, seared sea scallops with cauliflower puree, spinach, duck jus and a hint of truffle oil (This I thought was rather dry for a duck cooked in its own fat. Maybe there was less fat because if was free range? The puree was beautiful though)

Mains: Surf & Turf - A cut of sirloin with grilled prawns and ocean trout served with fries. ( The sirloin was a little more cooked than we would have liked although Alex did request for medium well. Taste wise it was good though we would have appreciated a bigger portion. The poor guy was still quite hungry after the meal. His initial choice was the Seafood Medley but swapped for the Surf &Turf, a decision which I think he regretted when he saw this plate)

We did not manage to order desserts or coffee. We had a movie to catch so we bought McDonalds Chocolate Sundae on the run as a quick substitute. We would have loved to have taken a look at the dessert menu but our mains took nearly 30 minutes to be served so our time was cut short.

It was a sweet and simple Valentines for us. And photos make good memories even better!

cheryl

Cirque du Soleil - Dralion!

Familiar yellow blue tent tops. The big one in the background is the Grand Chapiteau.

Cirque du Soleil! Alex and I bought tickets to the show 2 months ago and after a long wait, we have finally seen it! Dralion is the theme of this years show and its a mix of traditional chinese circus traditions and the avant garde style of performance done by cirque du soleil. The show draws on influences of the east and west, hence the name Dralion. Dragon for the east and lion for the west

Concessions stalls selling Dralion souvenirs

The show was an explosion of colors, the story revolving around the quest for harmony between human kind and the 4 elements of fire, water, air and earth. It is quite unfortunate that cameras are not allowed so I only managed to take shots outside the grand chapiteau, some before the show started and a few at the end. Lighting was dim and I could not have the flash on so my shots are blurred. I did my best to steady my hands...

I loved it when performers would appear and disappear discreetly on the performance stage thanks to sliding holes on the floor. Their disappearing act was so smooth that I had to make sure I didnt blink just so I could catch a glimpse of the gap before it closed up and looked like a regular stage again. I was also very impressed by the body contortionist who twisted her body so many ways while balancing herself on one arm atop a high pole. Some other acts which got lots of claps from me was the trampolinists and the group of boys jumping through metal hoops.

At many points of the show my eyes were tired from trying to keep up with all the movement coming from all areas of the stage. I was working them hard, trying not to miss a single movement. Its not possible though. I guess in that sense sitting further away from the stage is a good thing. We got a better panoromic view.

An empty stage before the show began

The finale : Performers and crew on stage for a big round of applause

All in all we had good fun watching the show.

Rating: 6 out of 10.

cheryl

Canberra Airport Open Day - Qantas Breast Cancer Awareness Flight

Alex is a big fan of commercial airlines. Today was the Canberra Airport open day and there was no way he was going to miss this opportunity of being up close to the big birds. You would think with all the travelling he does every year he would be less interested but nope, the boyish glazed look of joy still shows itself when the prospect of being close to a plane presents itself.

The crowds at the Open Day

Naturally I wasn't quite as keen and asked to be dropped off at the Direct Factory Outlets to do a spot of shopping while waiting for him to be done. Little did I know, the day was going more interesting than shoes, clothes and accessories.

To cut the story short, Qantas (Aus carrier) was doing its part to support the breast cancer research fund raiser and had organized a mystery flight for the day. Alex booked us a spot on the flight and off we went. It was AUD 50 for 50 minutes in the air with refreshments and all. I reckon it was a pretty good deal with the plus of it being for a good cause.

Our flight tickets. It actually says Mystery Flight!

The plane chartered for this fund raiser was a Qantas Dash 8. It was all done up in pink to commemorate the breast cancer campaign.

The plane only ascended to a max of 10000 feet and that gave us a great view of the landscape. We flew over 5 towns outside of Canberra, them being Yass, Cowra, Cootamundra, Young and Wagga Wagga.

View from the plane: River flowing into a dam

More landscape

The Qantas logo from our window

We were given pretty nice refreshments for a 50 minute flight. In our box of goodies were a nice pink muffin, macadamia chocolate, some tomato crackers and olive dip. Coffee and tea included.

The pilot conducted the flight without the aid of the usual navigation systems. We believe the old school method of maps were used hence the flight path was a really different ones, giving us some really good views of places we otherwise wouldn't normally see from air. This also gave us great views of Canberra as we landed. We flew over Belconnon, then the city followed by Woden, Tuggeranong and Queanbeyan.

Canberra

At our seats

All in all it was a good day. Good fun, a nice change from the repetition of weekly activities.

cheryl