Home Sweet Home. Sep 22.

At long last. Touching down in Singapore after almost half a year never felt so good. This picture is (though the ugliest) probably the most significant one out of the estimate 2000 over ones we took throughout the entire trip. It embodies a hell lot of things, basically it's just how over-the-top happy we were to be home. Like seriously esctatic. Like excitingly chirpy and nonsensical blabberings.

It was a good whole 131 days spent.

A summer long vacation.

The treacherous journey

The thwarted farewell at Changi Airport before we left for the States at 6am.

The bridge/dai-di card games we entertained ourselves with throughout the 14 hr flight to Taiwan.

The 10 hr transit in Taiwan that almost killed us.

The domestic transit at LA to Cleveland.

The Greyhound bus that took us to Sandusky, dropping us off at some freeze ass place on a drizzling, cold and miserable day.

Upon arrival

The jet lag and confusion for the 1st few days, not knowing time/day and screwing our meals altogether.

Our orientation to Cedar Point, around the park, employees and rides.

Our squatter-like apartment (1106) with 16 ppl squeezed into it, dim lights, dubious toilets, ONE miserable fridge and the double deck bunk beds (insert laughter on cue from Geri/Pat/Agnes/whoever who's seen THE god damn video). U guys better not post it on YouTube or I'll sue for infringement of rights there, in any case it's full of vulgarities anyway so please, leave it out.

Fond memories of 1106E

Room E and its happy occupants =) Yvonne, Geri, Pat, Agnes.

The regular bitching/destressing/pigging out sessions in there with several others like Tai/Noy/Jade. And um occasional drop-bys from the other apartment mates, yeah.

Our junk food corner that never seemed to clear out till our very last day.

Our hot water flask that was responsible for our 2 day illness (I deduce that it should be the water poisoning, NOT alcohol)

Our friendly ghost who resides in the Pat/Geri corner and breathes loudly.

I juz realised our room was NEVER neat.

Housekeeping

The morning routine of brush teeth, bathe, eat breakfast while watching the weather channel/Saved by the Bell, running for the bus.

The nightly routine of sitting ard in the living room while ppl cooked, eating dinner and bitching, watching crap shows like NEXT.

Laundry. And playing sweet revenge to the Calvin Klein boxers guy.

Summertime

The crazy weather we survived - from extreme freeze ass cold to extreme sun scorched hot, hail (for the 1st time in my life!), nonstop rain.

Our super fugly tan lines at our ankes, neck, knees and arms. It was totally obvious - like black and white, or rather, dark brown and beige.

Quirky Sandusky

Countless Meijer/Walmart/Target trips (sometimes in the middle of the night) to get groceries.

The gallon-of-icecream box, the 2 for US$5 B & J/Haagen Daz, Krispy Kreme!

Red Lobster/Wendy's/Olive Garden/East of Chicago/Chinese buffet/Crackel Barrel/Chili's/Panera Bread/Cold Stone/SteaknShake and whatever else along Milan Road I really cant remember.

The mall - Rue21, Aeropostle, American Eagle, TJ Maxx, JC Penny, Victoria's Secret, Claire's, etc.

The very dead downtown Sandusky.

The park

The crappy food in employee cafeteria, the only edible food is Krispy Kreme.

That aside, the yummylicious but overpriced food sold in the park - Elephant Ears, Funnel cakes, Midway icecream, sloshees, frozen custard , caramel apples, cinnamon pretzels, Famous Dave, TGIF, Johnny Rockets, Breakers

The rides, Magnum being my favourite one of all. A pity I didnt get on the Millenium.

Admissions - Cashier, Season Pass, Group Sales, Ticket taking. The four gates - Main, Marina, Beach, Resort.

Soaaaaak City. No alcohol or outside beverage, shoes on before u enter the park, what other anal rules are there?

The soundtrack - Star-Spangled Banner and God Save the Queen every morning, RESPECT, California Dreamin and a whole lot of Beach Boys, Love Shack, This Kiss, Fun Fun Fun, and the one that goes "Cedar Point, oh oh oh, Cedar Point, get to the point, get to the point".

Days off at the park or the mall.

Fourth of July fireworks.

The clubs...

Club X and Louie's. Nuff said.

...and the drinks

Yager bombs, tequila shots, alcohol test tubes, screwdrivers, $2 beers, kahlua, bailey's, margaritas - pick your poison but minus the hangovers please. Omg juz thinking abt those times really amazes me that my liver's still in a good condition.

The crazy and censored antics we pulled/attempted in a semi sober condition, but always looking out for a friend's back.

Friends

The people we met from all over the world and the very INTERESTING phrases they taught us. Haha. I doubt I could ever use any of those when I do talk to ppl from these countries.

A particular Czech reason staying in the dorms. Ok stop ur complains now.

Roadtrips

Factory outlet shopping.

Amazing nature at Niagara Falls.

3D2N Chicago.

Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Cleveland.

Put In Bay.

1 month travel

New York.

San Francisco.

Los Angeles.

Sep 20

Check out the amount of baggage all 3 of us had. Not counting our laptop bags and hand carry bags.

Good thing there wasnt any excess baggage.

15 hour flight back home, transit Taiwan. The flight back home seemed much shorter than the flight there. Probably becos minus the 10 hour transit time in Taiwan when were flying to the States.


Obviously we need some caffeine boost after the 15 hour flight.


And again, Pat Yap was left unattended with my Canon ixus digital.

Last stop Los Angeles

LA Day 1 - Sep 17

It took us about like 5 hours via Greyhound to get from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Greyhound is really an experience in itself, especially when there're only 3 girls, each of us with a humongous bagpack on our backs, a laptop bag and lugging an almost bursting suitcase along. Gotta look out for slim-shady weirdos, make sure that we didnt leave behind any of our belongings, crossing our fingers that our baggage wouldnt exceed the Greyhound limit, on top of the fatigue (mental and physical) we were experiencing in the wee hours of the night. The month-long travel must have taken its toil on us now. 3 of us didnt really sleep well on the journey to LA in case we missed our stop. By the time we finally reached, we took a cab to our hotel and just collapsed in bed for like a few hours till it was almost dinnertime.

Car-handicapped, we took the subway to look for some food around the area. Captured the sunset from the station. The sun was really pinkish red but it's not that obvious from the picture below.

Took the subway down to Chinatown for some good ol Chinese food. It was a pretty quiet and small Chinatown, compared to the biggest-Chinatown-in-the-States counterpart in San Francisco. I say the best one has still got to be the one in New York, the non-stop eating and the great shopping bargains.

Ok this place really looks familiar, like it was the setting in some Hollywood movies/dramas such as Pearl Harbour, 24 and Speed. The interior looks a lot like the Philadelphia bus station setting in the movie Witness where the Amish boy witness the murder in the restroom.

LA Day 2 - Sep 18

2nd day was basically spent at Desert Hills Premuim Outlets at Cabazon, a nearby town. Did some last minute shopping and significant damage to the USbank account. Seriously, after 6 months and 5 factory outlet shopping, they all are the same to me. Most of the time I just end up tagging behind the others by lunch time and looking for chairs outside the shops to sit and space out. Let's do some factory outlet Math in the meantime:

1. Prime Outlets at Lodi, Burbank, Ohio

2. Aurora Premium Outlets, Aurora, Ohio

3. Chicago Premium Outlets, Aurora, Illinois

4. Prime Outlets of Grove City, Grove City, Pennysylvania

5. Desert Hills Premium Outlets, Cabazon, California

LA Day 3 - Sep 19

Probably the most travelled day of our time in LA. We started off driving to Farmers Market at the corner of 3rd Street and Fairfax Ave, which was but a mere 6 miles away from the hotel.

The place to get groceries, eat and shop. The place is a little like an open air Marche, with super lots of food such as bakeries, assorted nuts and candy, seafood, meat & sausages, steak & grill, coffee beans & tea leaves, and icecream and desserts. Amazing. Not only that, there's like heaps of fresh fruits laid out and poultry and everything. Best part - the shopping. Bath & Body Works, Forever 21, Victoria's Secret, so on and so forth.

After an entire morning at Farmers Market, we drove down to Hollywood Walk of Fame at Hollywood Boulevard/Sunset Boulevard. Driving past the mansions at the famous stretch of road, we were like half expecting to see some celeb walk out of one of the houses. As if we were gonna be that lucky, haha.

Anyways, we parked the car and got out to walk around the area.

Turns out that we were just next to a Gay & Lesbian Center. Funny how we didnt see any in San Francisco...

We reached this place in West Hollywood where we could take a really good photo of the trademark Hollywood sign. Ok apparently several decades ago, some actress jumped to her death from the letter "H".

Thereafter, the last stop of the day and the entire US work-and-travel trip. "In Santa Monica, in the wintertime, the lazy streets so undemanding I walk into the crowd. In Santa Monica, you get your coffee from the coolest places on the promenade." Savage Garden.

Santa Monica, coastal city in the western LA county, home to the Santa Monica beach.

Love the beach, love the waves, love the sand, love the sea-tinged breeze.

Trying to give Pat a kick in her head even though she's the elf and I'm the hobbit.

3 happy girls on vacation at Santa Monica beach.

Ok this so reminds me of Cedar Point, except the CP one is much bigger.

This musician really impressed me. How many ppl can multi-task so effortlessly? I think he must've been playing about 5 instruments, plus singing. How cool is that?

The Arthur Nakane one-man band.

The end of summer looms.

Santa Monica, also home to 3rd Street Promenade, an outdoor pedestrian oriented shopping district. Shopping was already like the last thing on my mind then.