Been wanting to immerse myself in indie music since I got back from London last year (Sept) but I have barely started. I like The Temper Trap - Sweet Dispositions so if you're interested, have a good listen!
I've heard so much about the Laneway Festival from my indie music loving friends, Sid and Candice, so when FIJI Water contacted me to give me a pair of tickets to attend the festival, I immediately said YES.
The line up is super exciting and this is my first time attending a music festival in Singapore!
~ ALT –J ~ BAT FOR LASHES ~ CLOUD NOTHINGS ~
~ DIVINE FITS ~ GOTYE ~ JAPANDROIDS ~ KIMBRA ~ ~ KINGS OF CONVENIENCE ~ NICOLAS JAAR ~ ~ OF MONSTERS & MEN ~ POLICA ~ REAL ESTATE ~ ~ TAME IMPALA ~ YEASAYER ~
Thereafter, I checked Laneway Festival's Facebook page and found that I had even more friends going!! What's a festival without pals who enjoy the whole atmosphere and love the music right?
Not to worry about lugging bottles of water to the event because FIJI Water will have 4 stations well-stocked with bottles for your convenience!!
Check out some of the pictures taken at last year's festival, credits to FoodNews PR.
PLUS, on that day itself, there will be a photo competition held by FIJI Water, where representatives will roam the grounds with special props that festival-goers can pose with for their photos! Just tag your pictures with #FIJIWaterLanewaySG and you might just win one of the 10 autographed Laneway photos!
For those who can't make it for the festival, FIJI Water will be holding a pre festival giveaway on Twitter with 10 exclusive Laneway Festvial T-shirts. Simply follow and retweet @FIJIWaterSG for a chance to win!
Awesome because you can have a blast AND not worry about being dehydrated because FIJI Water is there to save us from the heat.
Thanks FIJI Water and FoodNews PR, am so excited I'm going shopping for some indie street style clothes this weekend hehe. I am also going to create a playlist to loop songs from the bands to prepare myself for next Saturday!
Enough of HUUUUGE birthday parties. That's just for my 16th and 21st. As I got older, I wanted to just spend time with my closer pals, because they've been with me through thick and thin, no matter how long or short the friendship.
I already had one for my blogger pals, so here's the post for my closer friends. I also had separate dinners for those who couldn't make it, or for smaller groups of friends who didn't know my colleagues etc. Ah, let the pictures do the talking! I just wanted a really small group of friends so that we could chill in the heated jacuzzi.
Oasia Hotel has 2 pools, one (8th flr) closes earlier than the other, so I picked the Club Lounge (22nd flr) to hold my jacuzzi party. It's a private section for club members and has a fantastic view overlooking the surrounding area!! Pictures of that in a bit.
Check it out!! That's the normal pool in the background, and the heated jacuzzi right in front of me. I was so excited to give it a try!
Oasia Hotel is a great place for a staycation too. I could have a drink at the bar, have a swim, look at the landscape, hit the gym, steam in the sauna... ooh did I mention that the lifts and room smell of pinewood? The wood all around me was calming and made me feel like I was transported to another place... worth checking out!
In the club lounge, you're welcome to have tea and coffee, and there's a cocktail hour, where drinks are complimentary for club members!
Honestly, I was chatting with some friends, if I were a tourist in Singapore, instead of paying extravagant prices living in a hotel in Orchard road or City hall, why not choose Oasia Hotel, and take the train 2 stops down to town instead? You save WAYY more money this way, and get to see more of Singapore's normal hustle and bustle.
Let's clear the food pictures first, shall we? The staff were always, polite, efficient and greeted me with smiles.
Cheese starters, anyone? Nothing like some cheese on crackers for a chill night party.
These Proscuitto wrapped Asparagus were splendid! A little salty because of the proscuitto, but the asparagus balanced it out. Had many of these.
Smoked Salmon Tartar, this was also good, was feeding them to my friends at one point and dropped the spoon though. It broke. Oops. Well it ain't a party til something is broken, right?
Fried rice and satay for that local flavour, now who said that I didn't have Singaporean blood in me?
Fried wanton and beef meatballs. Don't tell anyone, but after a while I just used my fingers to eat the wanton's hehe.
Didn't really tasted the cheese in these, it felt like strawberry creme brulee custard though. Still good nonetheless and was a hit with my sweet-toothed friends.
That ball in the middle... is a meatball k. I will recommend this place to anyone who wants to throw a party or events!
Three bottles of wine for the night. Gotta get everyone a little happier and higher before they start to unwind, you know?
Oasia Hotel is super conveniently located next to Novena mrt, and there's going to be an MRT link to the hotel opening soon! Cab rides to Orchard are only 10 minutes away! (If there's no jam, of course)
I could stay awake, just to... look at this. With a glass of wine in hand, of course.
If you get bored of the scenery, you can people watch in the condo next door :X
On days like this, I don't think of migrating or working in another country. How could I leave this behind?
Played music from my ipod and blasted David Guetta through the speakers. If you want to hold your birthday party here, everything will be set up nicely for you! I was really impressed by the professionalism and little I had to do except enjoy the night!
After a while, DJ Candiceb took over and played one of her mixes. Top 40's yo!
The girls filling their tummies with food and wine.
So my friend DARED me to jump into the pool, and he in return, he agreed to jump in with me if I actually did it. In his full get up. Well, I think he learnt that he shouldn't dare me :P
Don't worry, he managed to drown- I mean dry, off. Shortly after.
Here's a snap of me after I jumped into the heated jacuzzi. It was too cold!!
Everyone in this picture got into the pool. With some persuasion. Hahah.
Successfully threw her into the pool and it was captured!
Alright I have something stupid to share. That night, after a few glasses of wine, I was pretty high and happy, was conversing with my friends in simple Japanese, bowed a little too energetically, and basically smashed my face into a wine glass.
My first instinct was to touch my lips, because lips normally bleed easier, to find that it wasn't bleeding. Yay! I thought everything was fine, until one of my friends pointed out that my forehead was bleeding.
I was about to touch the area, when another friend grabbed a serviette and handed it to me. I didn't even freak out from the blood, just laughed at myself and asked if it was big. Scars are ugly :(
You may laugh now.
Thanks guys for coming! Til the next party ;) and thank you Oasia Hotel for making my 23rd birthday a dream come true!
I even left my ipod at the sound system, the staff were so helpful to retrieve it back for me! When I went to collect it, I had to verify that the ipod was mine. This was the tough part... or not?
I described my screen wallpaper in detail (Shinee's Onew and Taemin), even told them the videos they could find (acoustic videos), before they finally believed that I was the owner of my ipod. Hahaha, I guess it's all good?
We headed to Balaclava after, for more drinks. I didn't know that they shifted to Ion's carpark. Really exclusive entrance at the carpark, but they closed really early. Like 1am or something? Went to Shu's place after for some Rose Moet, Haagen Dazs Ice cream, and... Shu's first attempt at cooking instant noodles.
I had the most splendid 23rd birthday party held at 2fifteen Kitchen last week. It's tucked in a little corner of Rochester Mall, a short walk from Buona Vista MRT. Only accessible from its own entrance, so you have to follow the signboards to find it.
It's a REAALLLY new mall, so some shops aren't even open yet! Want to be at a place before everyone else finds it? If you want a quiet, homely, place for a romantic dinner or lunch where you get 100% attention from your partner, this is it.
(PSST! Read on to find out how you can get 15% off when you dine at 2fifteen Kitchen!)
I lovedit.
Let me briefly talk about my past 2 birthday celebrations, shall I? If you don't want to read about this bit, just skip ahead until you see the pictures of the food, they were phenomenal!!
On my 21st birthday, I booked a room The Chevron's, which is all the way at Jurong East, but it had a great room!
A stage, a pool table, and enough capacity to fit 70 pax. On that day itself, I realised I could even afford to invite more people because there was so much food left over and there was so much space to even fit 120 people. I even sang on stage (albeit out of tune, but this wasn't a competition right), and my friend bought me a little adorable tiara! Went to Marina Barrage after that to release balloons into the sky, spent midnight there and then went to Zouk after.
My fabulous cake was from St Regis. It was a great 21st! Whoever travelled all the way to Jurong East just for my birthday got mega brownie points. Lol!
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Last year, on my 22nd bithday, I spent it... in Germany with my relatives and distant relatives. I got to experience a German birthday!!
All the relatives did a canon and sang happy birthday to me in German, while forming a semi circle in front of me. It was surreal... and surround sound. Haha! Pretty awesome.
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Which brings me to this year. I wanted a small dinner with my blogger pals to thank them for everything and a separate small one for my pals! I only started this blogging scene (events and such) about a year and a half ago, I've learnt so much and got to experience more than I ever thought I would. So when Walter recommended this place to me, (I hold a high esteem for Walter's taste), I just had to check it out.
This is what you see when you've found the right place. With a gorgeous chandelier on top!
I liked this place already.
Since it was my birthday, I decided to spice it up and decorated the place a little. Bought 12 balloons to hang on every chair, made some placards, and got some Smoulder lava cakes to place on the table in case my guests wanted to nibble on something before everyone else came.
The team at 2fifteen were so kind to prepare a menu for the night! A great touch, as you know, bloggers like to know what's in store for them, and know what they're eating. Haha! Here's some photos of the setting after some magic.
We even had a hashtag for the night on twitter and instagram! #clairesflair but I think most stopped using it after a while haha.
Printed these online, coloured them with colour pencils like a primary school kid, and cut them into little pieces! #effort
Me all smiles and writing the names on the placards. Peach lace dress from H&M in HK.
The staff, all smiles and ready for the night!
Pretty, right? I couldn't have done it without Christine and Jordan's help, and 2fifteen *hearts* Thank you! Okay let's go right to the food!
Smoulder 's bite sized lava cakes for everyone! Each box had different flavors.
What I love about Smoulder is that their cakes are prepared
daily in nine unique flavours with premium
ingredients and no preservatives!
I just HAVE to list all 9 flavours out for you. Here you go.
Signature Dark Chocolate, Intense Dark Chocolate, Dark Chocolate Black Forest, Milk Chocolate Mocha, Milk Chocolate Rum & Raisin, White Chocolate Matcha, White Chocolate Raspberry, White Chocolate Pistachio, White Chocolate Lemon
Address at the bottom of this post!
2fifteen Kitchen's menu creations are made lovingly by Kenny Yeo, who has helmed renowned
restaurants in Singapore and Taipei including a 3-star Michelin hotel in
France. Plus they only use quality ingredients to pamper their guests ;)
We were served some bread, and I was impressed by the presentation already! The bread was arranged nicely and even the butter, cut into little rectangles with a zigzag design.
The first out of the 5 for the night.
Hot seared Duo Watermelon with Foie Gras, Basil Oil and Feta Cheese.
Incredibly generous portion. Everyone was so impressed by the dish that no one talked until it was half devoured. Hahah. It was Sarah's and Christine's first time trying Foie Gras, and they agreed that it was really good!
You might think that the fruits and cheese might be a strange touch but it complimented the flavours wonderfully. The fruits were cut in a perfect cube, and the effort gone into this dish could be tasted as well as felt. *thumbs up*
Carrot Puree soup with Clam jam.
What IS clam jam anyway? The clam portion was cold while the carrot puree was hot. Blend them together and you get a hot/cold mix. This is definitely an acquired taste. I never had Clam jam before, so it was different for me. I preferred the carrot puree, blended but didn't lose its thickness and sweetness.
Prawn Capellini
The prawn was really fresh and juicy, and the chef Kenny asked us if it tasted like Hokkien Mee. Lol? I didn't think it was similar though, but this was really tasty! How Kenny made the noodles into a rectangular shape, I do not know.
Confit of salmon roulade with wild rice, hazelnut oil and poultry jus
This. was. h e a v e n l y.
I have NEVER tried anything like it. The salmon, though it looks raw, is actually cooked for hours under really lowwwww fire. It literally, MELTS in your mouth. A must try!!
Wow, the dessert platter. Bean curd cheesecake, granny smith green apples, vanilla ice cream and a cherry tart with pistachio nuts :D
My grin and smiles were wider after a bite of this. Soooo good.
My favourite dish of the night is the foie gras, but it was very hard
to decide between the foie gras or the salmon confit. In fact, I am
planning to go back just to have them again! :)
Just when I thought things couldn't get any better than this...
2fifteen surprised me with a birthday cake with hazelnut, biscuits and vanilla!! YUM!! One of the most ostentatious cakes I've ever eaten. And it was no ordinary candle...it was a SPARKLER. A really high one!!
In the middle of the courses, we played some games to pass the time and get the bloggers to know each other better!
Every one is assigned a celebrity, and has to put the card on their forehead for the rest to see. Then they have to ask a series of questions to try and figure out who their celebrity is.
So William was given Paris Hilton, but he couldn't guess it. So we changed the rules again and tried breaking the words into two to help him. "What is the capital of France?" "The place where Eiffel Tower is?" "That hotel in Orchard road that's next to Forum?"
After that, we chose Britney Spears for William and Hong Peng to guess. They had no idea, so Jessie and I incorporated the titles of her songs into our conversation.
"She's very Lucky! And Oop's she did it again and hit her baby one more time!"
Fun stuff hahah.
A slice of goodness for everyone :) The staff cut my cake into slices for me. Good idea because I probably would've messed it up hahah.
Continuation of the games: Sarah was so cute, she wrote me a celebrity to guess, and it was HER! Hahaha I guessed it really quickly *hearts* I picked Blake Lively for Sarah and she also guessed it! Awesome.
Jessie decided to come up with some games of her own (Yay!) and she told us to find a cat at the back of a $2 note. Can you find it? Hahaha take out a SGD $2 note and try to find it, if you think you've got it, leave a comment!
THANK YOU
Thank you my blogger friends for coming, for making this so memorable, the 2fifteen team (Kevin, Jolene and everyone!) and Walter for making this party a sweet success!
Thank you Nicolette for lending me the photo frames!
Also, thank you William for letting me use your food pictures!!
Thank you Kenny for the mind blowing, indulgent meal! I loved every single bit of it and there was nothing more I could ask for. It was perfect.
2fifteen will unveil a brunch menu in November in two sessions, 11am and 2pm on Saturdays, Sundays and Public Holidays! It's an ala-carte buffet with hors d'oeuvres before ordering your main course.
$38 per adult, and free for kids below 4 years.
Once the party was over, we went outside to play with sparklers and lightsticks that I had brought. When I came back from the toilet, everyone pointed at William for releasing two balloons by accident ahahah.
After playing with the sparklers, William came up with this super sweet idea of using the lightsticks to spell my name! That was completely unexpected.
An extremely happy birthday girl ^_^
Watch this video to see the lightstick presentation :')
Watch this to see snippets of the entire dinner! William made this for me!! Hi girls please snag him up already. *hearts*
I am so, so, happy, grateful, and thankful right now. It seems like there are rainbows and just happy thoughts everywhere.
Also a shoutout to Smoulder, thank you for the lava cakes! They were fabulous, just like I remembered them to be. The pistachio and intense dark chocolate flavours are my favourite! Everyone should just make a trip down to Raffles Place just to try them. If you're working near by, be sure to stop during lunch time!
Smoulder
Location: China Square Food Centre,
51 Telok Ayer Street #01-04,
S048441, Singapore
Phone: +65 6225 6422
Hours: mon-fri, 8am to 8pm
sat, 11am to 3pm
Once, I accidentally pre-heated it for too long and it came out as a cake instead. Still delicious though, but remember to keep the timing very carefully!
Just make a reservation via email to 2fifteen@epicurean.com.sg with the subject header "Claire's Flair" and you will be awarded with the discount accordingly. The discount is applicable till 20 December 2012.
Once again, thank you 2fifteen! This year's birthday was simple, superb.
Claire.
loves exploring what life has to offer.
A personal lifestyle blog of all things captivating, alluring, enchanting, indulging, sophisticated and pretty.
Contact me at
Eternamente[at]gmail.com
