weekend home in london.

the end of the first semester is quickly drawing to a close and i type this, i just realised i haven't blogged much at all about my second year of uni. it is different to say the least. for one, the work load is nearly double of last year, and living with 6 other people in a house is not easy particularly when you have a bad landlord and no one likes cleaning.

anyhow, i got the chance to be back home for the second time this semester. i remember last year i was back to london within 2 weeks of starting uni, but i've only managed to visit twice these last couple of months! i guess work and this new house just got the better of me. and as much i love and miss my family a lot, i'm not as home sick anymore.

i arrived on friday evening, and by saturday morning my parents were keen to take me out for lunch in kingston. we explored the christmas market then ate at a japanese-korean restaurant which served sushi and korean bbq. and lucky for us, they were also doing 50% off promotion as they are a new restaurant, so we got the chance to try out a lot of their funky dishes and desserts.

we started off with a selection of their sushis - which, by the way, were very very tasty. bombdigalicious.

as a side to our korean bbq, we got an eel dish served with veg.

our meal then ended with some dessert - we got their coconut ice cream served in a coconut shell and a selection of black sesame and green tea ice cream mochis.

simply yumbo jumbo. i love that asian desserts are light and not too sweet. i swoon over anything green tea too, so this dessert sealed the deal for me.

we walked off our full bellies along the riverside and admired the sunset and red skies. it was actually freezing that evening, so we didn't spend that long outside.

we popped into this cute tea shop on the high street which sold amazing looking teapots and teacups (wayyyy out of my price range too). after sniffing some tea, we popped into the christmas markets to snag some christmas gifts for our relatives including a chocolate paintbrush which looked too real to be edible!

i love that i was able to dive into the christmas spirit with my family. i mean, that's what christmas is all about right!

kensington gardens.

before i left for a little under a month to korea, i met up with etain to complete some girly tasks aka shop. we stopped by oxford street to grab some 'essentials' such as new sunnies and a few shirts...and also at carnaby street where i picked up the cutest playsuit from brandy melville for my upcoming holidays.

we then dropped by kensington after a hefty tube changes to especially check out their branch of nyx in boots. i swear we are their biggest fans and we can talk about their makeup for days. nyx, feel free to hit us up and send us some goodies! 

 for lunch, we grabbed a fancy mcdonalds with a £1.99 voucher and headed to the posh ends of kensington gardens to absorb the summer vibes, pick out the people who are hunting for pokemons and people watch (big time).

etain mentioned that there was a japanese garden somewhere in the park and so we set foot to find it. unfortunately, it wasn't as easy as we thought it would be and google maps turned out not to be our forte. after wandering about for half an hour and losing hope as i had to rush home to pack for korea the next day, we stumbled upon the garden.

and man was it worth all that hassle. the garden was 100% zen and this mini waterfall was definitely the centrepiece of it all. 

if you are ever in these ends, you must check out this hidden gem! 

my next post should be about my travels and experiences in korea, so keep a look out!

summer food travelling.

ikea dates with loklok

shibuya in soho after church - shaved ice

the great summer barbecue

doing smores the right way.

grilling them marshes

homemade egg tarts which disappeared within minutes

the most expensive and standard popcorn you could buy at the cinema.

-wa-ha-ca-

after church on a sunday we always have difficulty deciding where to go for dinner. on this particular day, we walked into wahaca for some delicious mexican street food.

i absolutely love the way wahaca designs all its restaurants - all of them have such funky lighting and wall murals. i remember the first time i went was with kelly after a photoshoot two years ago. the moment i stepped in, the word 'instagram' was all i could think of.

loksze and i ordered a set meal to share - and wow did it fill us up. wahaca brands itself almost as mexican snacks so unless you get a burrito with some sides, you can't really make a full dinner out of it without paying a bit more.

nonetheless, it was a good time chilling with all our church friends in a relaxed atmosphere, though some of us ended up going to mcdonalds later for a touch up.

we passed this cool set up in waterloo on the way home. and if you pass waterloo regularly, you would realise that this prop has long been set up and taken down, and that my posts are in fact incredibly behind schedule (no shame, my summer has been incredibly fun-packed!)

the fantastic four.

when it comes to describing our friendship, 'the fantastic four' might just be the perfect phrase.

we are so brilliantly different making us compatible and a joy to be around each other. i'm just so looking forward to growing up with these guys and still meeting up like this even after 10 years.

it's always difficult finding a convenient time for us to meet as we go to different uni's and have different holidays. being back home for the summer also means you have a tonne of people to catch up with, friends and family to see. despite all that, we persisted and finally found a day to have lunch together. etain and i met the boys after doing a spot of shopping on oxford street and we all ate bibimbaps (korean rice) in the blazing heat.

back in the days, the four of us would always be jamming in hyde park with our skateboards and enjoy the park life, and so we decided to bring it back. this time with bikes. 

eug, being a grown man of 19, still does not know how to ride a bike (embarrassing right), and so we took him on a spin on the borris bikes.

unfortunately due to the popularity of the bikes, we only managed to get two of them. we took turns and nevertheless had so much fun! once eug got the hang of it, he was speeding around in no time!

feeling the sweats, we decided to chill at a cafe by the restaurant. being london, the food and drinks were so overpriced we just decided to sit there and spill our tough jokes at each other.

etain and i, being britain's next top model made the boys take some 'candid' shots for us. not bad right - at least they're instagram-able!

^ aesthetically pleasing details.

does it appear to you that this lad here is having a good time chilling with his beer? look carefully cos he's holding a bottle of malt vinegar.

as it was monday, lok sze had to be home for dinner with his family. he happily invited us however and as etain and i went to play with his new kitten, he and eug proceeded to play fifa.










what a happy day God has blessed us with!