Jeju-ing (Day 3, Sep 26)

It's been a long day...am still up sorting seating arrangements for dinner tomorrow night.



Stocked up at breakfast, today we opened registration and there was a steady stream of arrivals at the hotel. Had to tend to some last minute requests from Chinese customers and staff to provide hotel confirmation letters as they were departing their airports, so we just made our own!



The translators arrived today and Phil held meetings with them, along with some of our presenters. I hovered at registration mainly, and prepared our survey forms.

In the afternoon, there was another round of food tasting, this time for the gala dinner. We went with safe dishes, a scallop and prawn appetizer, pumpkin soup, pasta course, grilled chicken and chocolate orange cake. Everything was yummy, though the cake could afford to be a bit more moist. The vegetarian main course was a stuffed puff pastry, very nice!





Most of our colleagues arrived today and I had to catch my MD to run through the dinner seating plan. All the surrounding food places were closed so we ended up meeting a few guys at a nearby 7-11 for cup noodles! It was freezing out there, temperature must have been about 18 degrees or less.



I got a gist of how he wanted the seating done and am still awake now trying to sort through it, it has to be ready by tomorrow for vetting! My eyes are so bleary from squinting at my tiny fonts on the printouts!

Jeju-ing (Day 2, Sep 25)

Phyllis arrived last night and we met for breakfast this morning. Had some free time so we wandered over to the next door Shilla Hotel for a bit, their grounds were really nice. There were pink wildflowers growing on a patch overlooking the sea, very pretty.




Had a meeting with the hotel sales person Daniel to run over our final requirements, we booked dinner for Tuesday night and cancelled Mint officially. Spent the afternoon tying ribbons onto our guardian statues and there was a gorgeous sunset today, love the view from my room!



Met with Phil, Germaine and Daniel from Hyatt in the evening for a food tasting session for our Day 2 canapes. Was full from the canapes so I skipped dinner. Spent the evening running through updated rooming lists and re-printing agendas and packing welcome kits. Tomorrow we open our registration counter.

Jeju-ing (Day 1, Sep 24)

Our APAC customer conference is just days away and here I am in Jeju, Korea making the final preparations.

It's been a week of overtime at work as we dealt with last minute registrations and sorting out rooming lists and logistic requirements...the rooming list was a real pain, changing every 5 minutes as attendees updated their itineraries and asked for all sorts of concessions.

Phil and I took the overnight flight from Singapore to Seoul last night, then took a train to Gimpo domestic terminal to board a Korean Air flight to Jeju. Before we checked in at Gimpo, I bought some Face Shop stuff, just in case we didn't come across anymore stores in Jeju.


Upon arrival at Jeju, we were met by Germaine and her crew member Shan. We all took the airport bus to our hotel, Hyatt Regency which is home for the next few days.



I have a really nice room, in fact it is a suite which faces the ocean and it's a pity no one tagged along to enjoy it with me. Hardly had time to freshen up before venturing out with Germaine and Shan to scout for souvenir chocolates and dol harubang statues for our guests.

Was reunited with Mr Won Mon, the driver we used last time and he took us to a hypermart called E-Mart near the World Cup stadium where we ended up having lunch. Didn't buy the chocolates there but proceeded to Jeongbang Waterfall where the Jeju mandarin chocolates were going at 3 for 10,000KRW. We bought over 100 boxes and also picked up the guardian statues.




Since there was a bit of time, Shan and I went to see the waterfall, it was my second time but the weather was nice and sunny today and Mr Won helped to take lots of pictures for us!


We went back to the hotel to pick Phil, had a food tasting session lined up at Mint, the restaurant on Phoenix Island we had earmarked for our gala dinner. Unfortunately, as our taxi sped along, it became evident that the journey would be too long for our customers considering we would be using coaches.

Mr Won took 1 hr 10 mins, a bus would be at least 90mins and Phil felt that would be too long. When we had initially booked the place, some people had told us it would take 45 mins but that's quite impossible unless you speed.




Nevertheless we proceeded with the food-tasting, arriving just in time as the sun was setting. It was really a lovely view and the colours were amazing but we could sense Phil getting edgy about the distance and timing and by the end of the main course, he had more or less decided to cancel the venue.



On to plan B which is to have dinner at Hyatt...thank goodness we know the space is available, just need to check on the kitchen's capacity because it's so last minute! Oh well, Murphy's law at work and I expect more curveballs in the coming days.

P is for...

...Porn's.

No, not that kind of porn but a restaurant named Porn's!



It's been on my list of places to check out and since it is nearby the boy's office at Liang Seah Street, we met for lunch today. I found the prices on the high side for such a casual place, the bill came up to over $50 for the two of us.



We shared a fried rice, had some prawn cakes, a green curry and a tom yam soup, which was way too salty. I've had much better Thai food for cheaper here so I don't think I'll be heading back to Porn's anytime soon...gimme Thai Express any day!

A walk in the park

Took the kids out for some fresh air at the Botanics, they have been so sick with Nat just recovering from a chest infection which needed a course of anti-biotics. Poor bubba, she had x-rays and blood tests done, Sasha had the same bug before her but Nat fared worse. Gigi too kena-ed so they have missed quite a bit of school.




We spent some time by the pond, feeding the fish and spotting dragonflies. At one point Wendy even caught a dragonfly so we could inspect it up close.

Headed to Great World for lunch and ended up at Jack's Place. For some reason, Nat loved her meal there and I think Jack's Place is her new favourite restaurant!

H&M is finally here!

Now I don't have to seek out H&Ms when overseas, we have our own store finally! It opened on 3rd September and I wanted to wait till the crowds died down before checking it out for myself.

Made an attempt yesterday, Sham had rented a car for the weekend and she, me and Swana went to town for tea, parking ourselves at Oriole Cafe nearby (the chocolate cake was to die for!) but there was a queue to enter the store and we had limited time so I gave up.



Couldn't stand the suspense for long though and ventured during lunch time today. No queue to enter but the fitting rooms and cashiers had long queues. I 'die die' had to buy something and ended up with some undies for Nat and a silver tee for me.

Prices for some items appear to be cheaper than even Europe, there was a maxi dress I remember seeing in Italy for 59 euros at least, and around $120 in Tokyo but here it was 79 SGD. Can't wait to go back and browse properly!

Flea fie fo fum

The resident's committee organised a neighbourhood flea market this weekend and I managed to secure myself a stall.



At $5 I didn't have much to lose but I didn't sort my stuff out till the last minute and I have to say I could have done a lot better if my display had been more inviting. I had low expectations, anything above $5o bucks would be a bonus and I was counting on the Filipino residents to appreciate my clothes, bags and shoes, and they did to a certain extent.

Things started really slow, I was resigned to not selling anything at all in the beginning but it picked up from lunchtime. Some fellow stallholders commented I had nice things but I think my prices were considered high. But a lot of my stuff were either brand new or hardly used so I think my prices were justified.

Some bargain hunters recognised quality when they saw it, snatching up a Coach small hobo for $30 and then asking me whether I had more of the same. I offered to bring another Coach bag from home for an interested party and sold it to her for $90 later in the day. Swana came to visit and brought a couple of bags of her own, and found a buyer for a large Coach tote, it was a steal for him at just $1o0, considering she paid over 400 USD for the bag and only carried it a couple of times.

I also sold a small Christian Dior bag for a ridiculous $20, something I bought on eBay and never used because it was a little worn out. In the end I made over $250, not bad for 5 hours work! Got to meet and interact with some of the neighbours too so overall it was a good event, and I hope they do it again because I have more stuff to get rid!