For the past week, had always been raining during the evening period & there's no exception today! Juz as i wanted to leave my house, a torrential downpour came along & delayed my date wif Denise... Luckily, the rain stopped at 6pm & I decided to travel via MRT to City Hall...The peak hour train was really maddness, heng my journey on the train was 10mins only!
At close to 7pm, we made our way to check out the new mall in town ~ Parco Millenia for its japanese eateries. Both of us wanted to try something new! When we arrived there & checked its directory, realised that all the eateries were on level 3. We were surprised by the long Q at one of the small ramen shop, gosh! We were really hungry & din feel like joining the long Q... So we walked one round & checked out the respective menus. I told denise to decide between the tonkastu rice or prawn miso ramen restaurants, cos there was yet a Q at these 2 outlets!
Denise opted for Keisuke, which specialise in prawn miso flavoured ramen. When we stepped in, was still pretty empty & got a corner table. I was astonished that their menu was juz a plain white laminated sheet wif printed text, how come there's no photos of the food? When the waiter came to take orders, he bent down low, albeit half-squat to explain to us the menu. Cos we were curious abt its most expensive ramen ~ Ebi Ramen Special ($19 bef tax). He explained that it contained all the items listed as side dishes on the menu & some of the side dishes r served separately + huge portion! We were both tempted to try, so we changed one of our choices to that & I ordered another Ebi Miso Ramen.
The ramen arrived shortly & our eyes nearly popped! Not due to serving seize, but the chicken pieces on the ramen! Never once had we tried having 白斩鸡 together wif ramen lo! After snapping some shots, we sampled the broth....both of us shared same comments, ''the taste is weird'' , ''hard to describe, cos it's a fusion of hawker prawn mee soup + miso''. Then, i tasted the tamago, which failed the usual tamago standards, cos it's yolk was too hard. I prefer the soft & raw type, thou i usually hate yolks! The ramen itself was ok & a huge portion, if i say is alot, then confirm is alot leh! Best part, we tot there would be at least a prawn inside the soup & u r rite, there's NONE! Only denise's special set, came wif 2 prawn wantons & she shared wif me. I think we really preferred the traditional tonkatsu ramen vs this fusion style! At the end of the dinner, both of us left feeling disappointed by our ramen tasting & dissatisfied! But again, if dun try will never know, juz that we would never return again lo!
Next, we strolled back to City Hall station to catch a train to Marina Bay for our photo-shoots. Denise had always wanted to visit the Marina Barrage & i never knew that till i suggested to her, cos i had been there 1 year ago (1st visit) & wanted to test my dslr here, hehe! Denise had checked the shuttle bus schedule fr the website & I also scanned it... i memorised one of the bus timing as 8.40pm, but knew we missed that. So we re-checked at the station & saw next trip at 9.15pm. I remembered the shuttle bus stop was juz outside Marina Bay MRT. Both of us stood there for half an hour & were amazed how fast Singapore is developing, wif the Marina Bay Sands IR plus all the on-going construction in that area....
At 9.20pm, the bus was still not in sight & i suggested that we try to walk over....As we strolled to the sbs bus stop, we saw a bus schedule there. Juz as we were scrutinising it, a construction worker told us, the shuttle bus svc had ended at 7+pm!!! WAT?! Then, we realised how blur we were, cos he told us there's 2 colour codes on the schedule, the ones highlighted in blue ref to the SBS 400, yellow ones r the free shuttle! OMG! We asked him how long if we walk, he said abt 4 to 5 bus stops! Oh no, we felt that the distance were too far off....it's really so near yet so far, haiz! We both wonder how come our evening seems so unlucky!
The bus timing was erratic & once it arrived, all the construction workers dashed up the bus! Then, i realised the inner route housed their dormitory & finally we caught sight of Marina Barrage, yeah! We saw 2 bus loads of students arriving there too! The whole place had quite alot of visitors but the main fountain's spurting waters were switched off :( I led Denise to the small fountains area & set up my tripod. Discovered a creative angle which i like, that's to frame The Flyer using the rounded metal structure! In fact, i even got denise to try pop her head from behind the structure, but the effects was bad. So i abolished the idea wif US inside the circle! 
Next, i got her to pose at the fountains & really love the vibrant colours....juz as i wanted to join in for the shot, the fountains were turned off!!! ARRRG! Why so early on a friday nite? It's only about 10pm or so, the area still had numerous visitors! Meanwhile, i got denise to unwrap the bday pressie i gave her, keke! Glad that she likes the soft toy! Earlier during the dinner, i told her this will be our prop for photo-shoot, wahaha!
I carried the tripod up the slope to view the Flyer & Marina Bay Sands IR... kept adjusting to find a nice angle. Finally, i found a pretty view, which showed the water reflection of the Flyer! But abit dismay that the Flyer was not really brightly-lit tonite! We even waited till the colours we like, before i pressed the shutter. I told denise to bend down & hold her pressie on the rail, haha! Anyway, later i came up wif a name for the pressie, named 希希 (means Hope, aka Hei Hei in canto). I tot his smile looked like when emoticon do 'hehe' laugh! So here we were, oblivious to the other ppl around & did whacky poses tog! When i whipped out my scarf, denise kept laughing at my vanity! Actually was humid & hot, but i wana look better in my photos! ^o^ (oh ya, luckily my styled hair not messy too, keke!)
At 11pm+, we saw someone took a cab in & hopped onto it back to Raffles Place station. We felt tired & hot & finally the mac ice-cream i had was a great relief! Now, we learnt our lesson, we shall visit on a wkend next round! The rewards for the nite ~ nice shots & happy time spent wif a buddy! Denise, thanks for helping me share my tripod load too!
Dreamer's Photography Tips: Turn off your image stabiliser if set up with tripod. Set your camera's timer function to prevent any slight shake to your camera when u press the shutter. Keep on practising to improve your photography skills!
