I’ve been in England for about three months accumulatively and only just had my first party night out on Saturday.

That’s partly because I’ve developed an aversion to hangovers, but mostly because it’s been too cold in England to be out gallivanting in little party dresses in the middle of the night.

Even during the dead of winter, girls walk about the streets in tiny black dresses, high heels and little handbags. No coats, no scarves, no gloves. And the temperature would be about 0°C.

They would hang around in the cold, outside clubs and pubs, waiting for friends or just being seen, I don’t know.

I would see them while walking home with Piers after a late night movie. I would be bundled up in 5 layers of clothes, face hidden in a hood and scarf, and freezing, and think that the party girls must all be robots or vampires or crazy.

Seeing as it would be uncool to go to a club looking like an Eskimo, but there was no way I was going to subject myself to hypothermia otherwise, I never said yes to a night out.

Until last Saturday, that is.

Piers’ best friend’s sister’s best friend was having a farewell party because she’s going off and getting married in Scotland.

So we went out and had a party in her name but the darnedest thing was that, the entire night, I only saw her once for like half a minute because Piers doesn’t really know her that well.

It was about 10°C that night but warm indoors. I brought a coat to put on during the times we had to walk about, like getting from Club A to Club B. It was cold even then.

We had originally planned to eat out and then go to the party but Piers had a craving for dumplings when we went to a Korean supermarket in the evening.

We ended up getting a huge bag of groceries because he said, “Get anything you want cos we might not come back here again for some time.”

So I got tofu and and luncheon meat and rice. Yes, NORMAL rice. Fortunately, they have small bags of Thai jasmine rice in the store. We also got kimchi and raspberry wine and the dumplings.

On the way home, I said, “Where shall we go for dinner, then?”

And he said, “I don’t know. All I feel like eating now are those dumplings.”

So we went home and cooked.

We didn’t go to the party until almost 10 pm.

It was great. I got to meet more of Piers’ friends.

And I discovered the people who had been making fun of Piers in my blog comments. Piers had suspected it was his friends but they had vehemently denied their mischief until recently.

I find it all quite funny, though. We had suspected it was someone he knew, very likely his close friends, because it was just the kind of thing they would say to each other in real life. I think slagging your friends off for fun is a great British past-time.

So, this is them, the naughty people.

(From left: Rich, me, Sarah, Piers, Jamie, Stan)

They were really nice and friendly to me but I wasn’t surprised because I’m sure Piers wouldn’t hang out with nasty people.

Yeah, but now their secret is out, they can’t make fun of Piers anonymously anymore.

The night life here is very much like in Singapore. Just a lot of drinking and dancing and yelling in each others’ ears.

Piers and I also spent half the night getting drinks because the bar was neverendingly busy and you had to wait ages to be served. We were drinking cocktails all night so finished them fast and had to keep going back for more.

It was a nice night out. But I would probably be happier partying during the summer when I don’t have to worry about hypothermia.

Maybe one day I will get used to the weather and be able to walk out into the cold practically naked like one of them robot vampire party girls.

Hard to imagine that ever happening because I so hate extreme cold, but who knows?

I ate the strangest tasting rice last night. I never knew rice could taste so weird.

I know some of you are going to say, rice is rice, it all tastes the same. (It doesn’t, actually.)

But this ang moh rice I had last night was Really. Weird.

We bought it at the supermarket and cooked it in the rice cooker.

The grains are twice as big as the ones I’m used to. The taste is a bit smoky-bitter, a bit malty, with a funny aftertaste that reminds me of barley.

Maybe we should buy rice from the Asian supermarket next time, or maybe I should bring some from Singapore.

I had to densely populate my rice with crispy pork floss (which I’d brought from Singapore) to mask the funny taste.

So we essentially had pork floss rice for dinner. I also made a garlic omelete and that was not too bad.

In the bigger scheme of things, though, it makes me worry how ang mohs are buying weird-tasting fake Asian food at supermarkets and cooking them and eating them and maybe thinking that Asian food is funny.

There’s this Indian curry meal that Piers really likes, from the supermarket. It’s pre-cooked, so you just heat it up and make your own rice to go with it.

I think I should give that a try one day to check whether he’s been eating AND liking rubbish Asian food.

But I guess he’s okay. I’ve been to the Asian restaurants that he likes and they serve quite good food.

And I’m quite proud of him because his spicy tolerance is about as high as mine!

Anyway, the funny thing about Asian restaurants in England is that they are all confused.

You see signs outside restaurants making such proclamations:

Thai restaurant: We serve the best authentic Thai cuisine!

Chinese restaurant: We serve the best authentic Chinese cuisine!

Vietnamese restaurant: We serve the best authentic Vietnamese cuisine!

Etc.

Then…

You walk into a Thai restaurant and you see on the menu… vegetable tempura.

You walk into a Chinese restaurant and you see… tom yam soup.

You walk into a Vietnamese restaurant and you see… chicken satay with peanut sauce.

It’s all mixed up.

You could walk into one restaurant and see four different cuisines on the menu.

Not that it’s a bad thing. Quite nice having a buffet of different Asian cuisines. I just think it’s very misleading.

It’s false advertising and they confuse the ang mohs. Like, for example, many think that plum sauce and hoisin sauce are one and the same.

And what in the world is with Singapore noodles?

You see Singapore noodles in every country in the world EXCEPT Singapore.

How is it we know nothing about what is supposedly our noodles?

The first time I tried Singapore noodles was in Australia. It was disgusting and like nothing I’d ever eaten.

I brought from Singapore some of my favourite instant noodles. I think they’re better. :P

Oh, sorry, I’m talking about food again.

I mean to stop blogging about food so much but can’t seem to help it because food is such a major part of our lives.

I’ll try and do something else next.

For today, I will sign off with this delicious New York cheesecake because I just ate it and it’s so good.

Hmm, I wonder if they eat this cheesecake in New York.

We all know that being in love (or being married, or living with our partners) makes us fat.

Piles of research and scores of articles have been done on it.

But it’s a really obvious phenomenon; we don’t need articles to tell us the hows and whys of it. Eating with a loved one is such an enjoyable activity that you center your life around it. You squeeze in as many meals and snack times as you can humanly endure and you often end up overeating.

So maybe having a long-distance relationship is a good thing.

Piers and I plan to see each other about six months a year (because that’s how long visitors are allowed to be in the UK) plus a bit more when he visits me in Singapore (which will be limited because of his work commitments).

It gives me time to diet when we’re apart.

I try to eat sensibly when I’m here with him but it’s an exercise in futility. We both enjoy food too much. We try to eat wholesome food as much as possible, but after, say, we’ve had a bowl of shredded wheat for breakfast, we feel like we need to reward ourselves with a bacon and egg bagel.

It gets to the point where we’re constantly counting down the minutes till we’re somewhat hungry (or not full anymore) and can eat or snack again.

It’s okay when the weather is cold and I can hide excess bulge under layers of clothes. But summer is approaching and I want to wear cute, sexy outfits without looking pregnant.

Piers is of the annoying species of primates who can stuff whole horses down their throats and not gain an ounce of weight. After some major binges during the first two months I was in England, he ended up just the same as when I’d first met him.

Me, I had to quit wearing a couple of my pants because they were squeezing the life out of me.

But it’s impractical for me to get a gym membership when I’m in each country only six months a year, alternate months. I would like to be rich. Then I wouldn’t have stupid concerns like that. I would have a gym membership in every major city in the world.

I don’t know who the idiot was who said money can’t buy happiness. It so can. With a regular income, I’ve been a lot happier in the last two years than I was five years ago when I was so broke that I had, like, a shopping budget of $100 a year.

But we’re talking about food. Food is very hard to resist. Especially when you can afford it. Especially when you’re in love.

Maybe some couples fall out of love after helping each other gain weight because they’re not attracted to each other anymore, which is quite tragic.

So, I’m eating a lot of marinated olives now. I just discovered I love them, and they’re readily available here and a plate of them are infinitely healthier than, say, a Big Mac.

No. I’m not eating them as meals. Just for starters. But maybe they will balance up the Big Macs a bit.

Okay, I don’t really know what I’m going on and on about. I only know that I just won a two-hour battle with my will over a chocolate bar and now I am waiting for Piers to come home and take me out to dinner.

We’ve decided to eat out at a nice place tonight because, for lunch, we ate two-days-old leftover Thai food. I heated them on the stove and he drove home from work to eat them.

I don’t know what we’re going to do about this getting fat business. Or, rather, I don’t know what I’m going to do. Piers doesn’t need to do anything. He has a metabolic rate equaling that of the speed of a fighter jet.

Speaking of which, I realised early on that he is a human radiator (probably because of his metabolism). I mean that literally. Hugging him is like hugging a radiator except softer.

It’s very good for winter. Maybe not so good during the summer. I wish he’d turn into a human air-conditioner during the summer. But he’d hate bearing any similarities to Edward Cullen.

On the bright side of things, he bought me a fan!

Don’t laugh.

This is a very big deal.

English people have never heard of electric fans.

When it gets warm, they remove their clothes and open the windows.

So, I was very touched when he bought that tower fan just before I arrived because it was getting quite warm here and he knows Singaporeans likes their interiors cool, if not arctic.

Oh, I’m sorry. I digressed when I actually meant to end this entry.

Here’s a bigass photo of me to distract you.

Is it working?

Anyway, Piers is almost home and I need to get ready for dinner now.

Don’t think my food posts are going to stop any time soon. =P

Tonight, I’m staying at an estate where once a medieval palace stood, the site where King Henry VIII (the one with six wives) met his first wife, Catherine of Aragon.

The palace is gone, but there is now an 18th Century Georgian manor house which has been converted into the Four Seasons Hotel Hampshire, in which I am now sitting as I type this.

I’ve come along with Piers, who is here to attend a private retreat hosted by this organisation called Citywire, for people in the financial industry. All delegates are given a one-night complimentary stay at the hotel and allowed to bring their partners.

How very nice!

Piers keeps worrying that I will be bored because I have to be stuck in a hotel alone for two days while he attends workshops and talks and lunches and dinners.

He’s crazy, right? How could anyone possibly be bored in a beautiful hotel with five-star facilities and fun activities like horse riding and clay pigeon shooting?

Actually, I don’t even need activities. Just give me my iPad and 1000-thread-count hotel bedding to snuggle in and I would remain in ecstasy for days.

Four Seasons Hotel Hampshire is a true retreat. Meaning that no one will come here unless they want to be shut out from the rest of the world.

It’s located in a remote country estate with no major attractions nearby (Stonehenge is an hour’s drive away), although there are some small art galleries a bit of a drive away.

If you’re willing to fork out £300 a night, you can have a really idyllic holiday here. You wouldn’t use this hotel as a base for sightseeing, but you can come here for peace and quiet and enjoy countryside views and activities.

We arrived around 9 am so there was a lot of time for me to enjoy the hotel. Here’s a first look walking towards the hotel from the car park.

And here’s Piers dragging my little pink suitcase. :P In front of him is his colleague, David.

The reception:

The official check-in time is 3 pm, but they allowed me to check in early, so Piers took me up to our room quickly, then he had to rush off to his thing.

So sad. :(

But our room is so lovely, so that kind of makes up for him having to be away most of the day. :P

So beautiful and luxurious.

I always feel it’s such a waste to book nice hotel rooms and then only get to be in them for a short while because you spend all your time outside sightseeing or shopping.

Fortunately, there isn’t much sightseeing one can do in these parts, so I get to stay indoors most of the day without feeling guilty about it.

So.

First order of the day was room service breakfast. I was very hungry and ordered the Hampshire Breakfast, which is a really big breakfast priced at £24.50 before tax and service.

I’m not sure if Citywire will pick up the tab. If not, Piers will have to. :P

My food took under 30 minutes to arrive after I ordered it. OMG it was humongous. It came on a large table wheeled into my room.

It was by far the tastiest full English breakfast I’d ever had (not counting the breakfasts that Piers makes for me. :D).

I read the papers while I ate my breakfast because I was pretending to be some important business person having breakfast in the hotel room. (I hardly ever read the papers to be honest.)

I sampled all the liquids (tea, orange juice, water) but I can never get used to having so many different beverages in one meal. I don’t understand why Westerners have so many things to drink all at once. When do you drink what? It’s too much for my palate and my minute capacity for liquids.

But my entire breakfast experience was glorious, the only thing missing being Piers. I took an hour to finish my food, then pushed the table away and jumped into bed with my iPad.

Such bliss. I spent over an hour playing on my iPad and almost fell asleep because of the full breakfast, the incredible comfort of the bed and because I woke at 6:30 am this morning.

It was really tempting to take a nap. I so love luxury hotel beds.

But I managed to resist the call of the sleep siren. I decided to go outside and look at the scenery while the sun was still up and blazing.

Speaking of which, you can order a picnic hamper at the hotel and take it outside to eat on the rolling countryside. There’s so much green space surrounding the hotel I don’t know how people choose a picnic spot!

The weather was really nice. 17°C and sunny. That means nice, cool air but with the warmth of the sun caressing your skin. I was able to take a walk around the hotel grounds wearing just two thin tops and a short denim skirt without feeling cold.

And here are the lovely views around the hotel:

And a few photos indoors:

Love everything here. If we were here longer, I might do some horse riding or canal boating. They’re quite costly, though. I’m really quite happy staying in the room and playing on my iPad.

Room service is great. All the staff address me by name (Ms Shen) automatically, whether on the phone or when room service comes. It’s really awesome.

Most people I know seem to hate room service meals. I don’t know why. Is it because it feels pathetic eating in a hotel room? Is it because the food is bad and/or overpriced?

I can’t really understand it. I love eating in my room. So much peace and privacy and you can slouch if you feel like it.

Dinner was room service again.

My dinner looks small and pathetic compared to my breakfast but I think that’s because all the drinking vessels at breakfast took up half the table, making it look impressive.

Dinner was french onion soup, gammon ham and toasted cheese sandwich. and freshly squeezed carrot juice.

Didn’t feel like eating a huge meal. Even this was so filling I couldn’t finish it all. :(

But it was really delicious. I usually think of hotel food as just pretty decent. So far, my two meals here have been superb, so I’m surprised and quite delighted.

I might have one more room service meal tomorrow before we leave because Piers will have his hosted breakfast and lunch. He is going to be so shocked when he gets the room tab. :P

Okay, he won’t, because he’ll read this before we check out.

Oh, wow.

It’s really late now, almost 10:30 pm. Didn’t get to do much after all. Spent most of the day writing this post and eating room service meals, lol. Piers will be coming back from his dinner soon, so I shall finish up here and prepare for his arrival.

Okay, nothing much to prepare, but I will stop here anyway.

Have a great weekend! :)

After an extended long weekend, Piers and I have now settled down to the familiar rhythm we had established the last time I was here.

In the morning, he goes to work at the office while I stay home and work on my blogs and stuff. He gets home at 5:30 pm and we spend the evening together, eat out or cook, watch a movie at home or at the cinema, or go to Wing Chun, or play on our iPads, or sit on the sofa and chill out to nice music and candlelight, during which he inevitably falls asleep on me.

Yesterday we celebrated one of our little “anniversaries”.

You know how new couples always find all kinds of reasons to celebrate all the time, silly things like “1st monthiversary” or, “50 days since we first held hands”, etc.

From Urban Dictionary:

Monthiversary: Similar to anniversary, but occurring every month. For people who are overzealous about a new relationship.

We also do “weekiversaries” but we don’t go crazy about it. I think it’s just a way to mark the passage of our time together on a regular basis to remind ourselves to appreciate each other.

Weekiversary: When a couple has been dating for a week and the girl finds it necessary to celebrate. However her boyfriend doesn’t remember so he gets himself into some deep shit.

Contrary to the Urban Dictionary definition above, Piers actually remembers more weekiversaries than I do, which means I couldn’t ask for a better boyfriend.

A friend recently challenged me to name 10 things I like about Piers, thinking I would find it a struggle, because he’s a bit doubtful about interracial couplings. But then he got bored (or maybe sick) and changed the subject when I was only halfway through my list.

I hadn’t even told him all the little things like how Piers always makes sure there are tulips in the apartment because he knows I love tulips.

I found these sitting in a vase awaiting my arrival on Saturday morning:

There’s also the fact that we both love food. Especially junk food like burgers and pizza and döner kebabs and popcorn. I can always count on him not to groan when I suggest having dinner at McDonald’s.

Recently, though, I acquired a taste for more premium burgers, so we celebrated my arrival on Saturday with a juicy beef burger at a nice restaurant.

So much to celebrate.

Last night, we went to a restaurant near his place which doesn’t have the best food but which we like for the romantic ambience.

(It’s hard to find romantic restaurants in England because all the tables are packed so close you can’t have private conversations.)

We took the short walk to Alcatraz Brasserie at 8 pm and got a nice corner table.

Unfortunately, near to summer, it’s a bit hard to have romantic dinners because the sky doesn’t start to darken until after 9 pm. And it doesn’t get full dark until maybe about 10 pm.

There was candlelight but there was no darkness to set it against.

I had marinated olives for my starter. Piers had cocktail prawns.

He always insists on us having two starters to share so we can have more varieties of food to pig out on. Sometimes, starters are as filling as main courses so we end up killing ourselves with food.

Piers is by now very used to me taking photos of our food before eating, and he always waits patiently, and sometimes helps me hold up my little pocket light when it’s too dark.

Won’t have any light problems now, since it’s always still bright when we have our dinner.

My main course was steak. I hurriedly took my photo so I could do Piers’ next. I always feel bad making people wait so I don’t spend a lot of time arranging and photographing my food like professional food bloggers do.

When I photographed Piers’ pizza, I included him in the shot, to his chagrin.

“Why am I in the photo with my pizza but you’re not in the photo with your steak?!” he protested.

“Because,” I said, “Pizza is so boring to photograph.”

Which is true. There are only so many ways you can photograph a pepperoni pizza. (We always order pepperoni.)

So we ate and drank and got a little bit drunk. We walked home, put some music on and slow-danced to two songs.

Then we sat down on the sofa and promptly fell asleep.

Our lifestyle, I’m afraid, is rather bland.

But it is only when food is bland that you can taste its true flavour and characteristic, isn’t it?

This life, bland or not, I could do for a long, long time.