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The Financial Times released a well-produced fifteen minute video last month on the present state of the Chinese economy. It’s entitled “The End of the Chinese Miracle.” It can be watched here.
I like the texture and flavor of contemporary China this video gives. It has long shots of factory life, daily life in urban areas, and scenes in smaller cities and rural outposts. There are also insightful uninterrupted narrations from the factory workers who’ve been the drivers in China’s economy over the past decade.
The most important point highlighted in the video is the difficulty that those who only just recently began to participate in China’s new economy over the past decade now face. Folks from the countryside who, during the low hanging fruit years of China’s boom, could easily go to a big city to find work now don’t have as many options. The big factories in Chinese megalopolises manufacturing goods for the rest of the world just don’t have the demand anymore for the endless supply of rural Chinese citizens. There are now millions of people throughout China wondering where their place is in the country.
In the long-term, macro view, there is still a lot to like about China’s position in the global economy. It is set up well for, I think, continued growth in its prominence and importance. There will be a tough transition coming, though. The explosive growth of the past twenty five years will not be able to be replicated. It will be a grind and serious test of the country’s leadership to continue to meet the demands of the population who has begun to taste the fruits of a higher standard of living.
I promised myself that I would get my blog updated with a new post right after I've done with trials so here I am now! I've just gotten my shower and I'm now sitting right in front of my laptop updating my little space. After a month of hectic studies, I can say that my head was literally going to explode during this period of time. Trials was really tough. A2 is really no joke. I've always thought to myself, hey since you can kick AS in the ass so you must be able to cope with A2 as well. Never. ever. think. like. this. If I knew that A2 could be this hard, I would have started studying earlier. *sobs with tears of regret* Anyway it's too late now to rant, I've still got one month's time left. I need to work even harder from now on. I ended my trials today and the last paper was psychology.
I'll only continue updating about my previous trip to Singapore in the next post. As for today, I'll be talking about the three places that I've been to this month. First up, Shabu Ten. I've never really fancied having steamboat as my meal as I'll always feel queasy after eating it. I just don't know why. During my exam period, my mum and sis went to try out the shabu ten steamboat restaurant in one utama and they told me that it was quite okay and they suggested that I might like that place since it's a buffet styled steamboat restaurant. The curiosity in me started to spark, I was craving for tom yam soup at that moment too so I thought it would be a good idea to try out that place. It was on the last Saturday afternoon that my mum brought my sis and I there and yeah, it was quite good as you get to order as many things you want and they have prawns! I mean, it's not really fascinating to know that they do have prawns but as a prawn lover, I was delighted to know that I can order as many prawns as I like, woah! :) However, their service needs more improvement..
Their steamboat ingredients were served on rotating magnet belts. One tip, if you can't eat a lot at once, don't take too many of it at once as they might charge for wasted food.
They had little cold dishes, curry fishballs, chawanmushi and cooked seafood cakes.
The sauce, noodles and etc area. At the end of the left side was the fruits and desserts corner.
Agemono corner.
Our selection of soups were the chicken soup and tomyam soup.
Curry or soup cooked fishballs and meatballs.
Cooking some of the ingredients.
The curry fish and meat balls tasted good!
Prawns and tofu.
They also serve fish maw there.
Oh yes, not forgetting to mention that they do have an ice cream machine there as well! :D
Matcha and vanilla ice cream.
There was a chocolate fountain too, but for dinner only I guess.
Looking at this makes me crave for chocolate marshmallows right now haha. :p
Then, on a weekday afternoon, I thought of trying out the smoothie bowl from rubberduck that everyone was talking about on instagram. The smoothie bowl looked super attractive due to its vibrant coloured fruits. It would also be great to have a cold treat during hot weathers like this too. Hence, I walked to the nearby plaza damas with Wei Wen to try out their smoothie bowl! Mine was the sunshine bowl which its main ingredient was mango.
The desserts counter.
This pavlova looks so alluring!
Here it is, the sunshine bowl! RM18 for one.
It was quite pricey to me as the portion was pretty small..
Nevertheless, it tasted quite good, it's also less in sugar as well! As you can see here, it consists of mango, granola, bananas, dragon fruit, coconut shreds, chia seeds on top and mango smoothie at the bottom.
Perfect treat for summer days like this.
Wei Wen had a plate of aglio olio. RM18.
Snapped a picture of their menu from afar.
Another place that was being raved about on instagram is slappy cakes! Slappy cakes is a pancake shop which serves both pancakes and proper meals. The reason why I was attracted to its pancakes was that customers were able to cook their pancakes by themselves on the skillet! The pancake batter was served in bottles for easier handling. Another thing about this was that the squeeze bottle made it possible for us to draw our pancakes while cooking it, how interesting! If I'm not mistaken, they have 4 types of pancake batters to choose from which are chocolate, pandan, peanut butter and the buttermilk. I personally prefer the buttermilk one.
Everyone gets their own spatula to cook their pancakes.
Buttermilk RM9 per bottle, pandan RM 11 per bottle, maple syrup RM3.50 per serving and I forgot the exact price of the strawberries but it's around RM2 or RM3 more expensive than the maple syrup.
As our mains, we ordered two breakfast sets as they were on a buy 1 free 1 promotion!
My breakfast plate.
Time to cook some pancakes!
When it starts to bubble up, it means it's ready to be flipped!
Mini pancakes of assorted shapes. :p
This is the prettiest one I've ever made.
Mini stacks of pancakes.
We were really full after that.
Alright, I gotta go now, see you guys in the next post!
Delicious chinese new year cookies, the sound of the booming fireworks, the smell of the loud firecrackers, receiving red angpaos (red packets).. the Chinese New Year season is here! Up till now, it's already the 12th day of CNY! Sorry for being this late, I was supposed to blog about this on Saturday but I've been busying preparing for today's maths test. Since the CNY celebrations are still going on, allow me to send you guys some good wishes here. May you and your family have a blessed chinese new year, good health and good fortune and may everything good be in your way!
Last week, my family and I had been busying visiting our relatives and as usual, we went to the temple for prayers and also went for reunion meals with our relatives during the day and night. The best part of this entire thing is that I got to see my baby niece who got back from Singapore last week. Well, she's back in Singapore now and I miss her so dearly!
I'm not done with my Singapore trip post yet hence I shall continue with it now. This time, I'll be blogging about the fifth day of our stay in Singapore. On the fifth day, we went out to Bugis street with my cousin and baby niece. The main intention of going to Bugis was to visit the Guan Yin temple and that place was quite crowded even though it was a weekday. From what I observed, the Bugis street is also a place where they sell lots of souvenirs, food and beverages at affordable prices. Later during the day, we went over to the Merlion Park.
We took a bus to the nearest MRT station and boarded the MRT all the way to Bugis.
Bugis is under the green line.
We've reached the Bugis street!
Heading towards the Bugis street.
It is super crowded here. This place is full of the locals and the tourists. There are many little stalls that sell souvenirs, snacks, food and beverage and etc.
Well, to be honest, for us Malaysians we might think that the things sold here are quite expensive due to currency conversion issues but for the Singaporeans I guess the prices may be reasonable to them?
Most of the fruit juices are only sold at SGD 1!
Bought two cups of lime barley and I've got to say that the price was okay (RM3.02 per cup) but the drinks were too sweet for us. We were literally sipping on sugar water.
I guess this was some kind of temple (?).
Little stalls selling flowers along the street.
We're here, the Guan Yin temple.
Joss sticks for those who would like to do their prayers.
A corner for everyone to light up those joss sticks.
People kneeling down for prayers.
There was also a Hindu temple called the Sri Krishnan temple.
Bugis+ shopping mall.
Next stop, Merlion Park. We took the MRT from Bugis to the City Hall and walked all the way there.
You can see lots of huge and tall skyscrapers/buildings around this place.
Amazing view.
Spot the Marina bay Sands towers! We're almost there.
Singapore national flags.
On our way to the Merlion Park, we stopped by this bridge to snap some pictures.
It's called the Cavenagh Bridge. According to Wikipedia, it is the only suspension bridge and is one of the oldest bridges in Singapore, woah!
For a second, did you think that these are real cats? I did! These are actually cat sculptures.
The Singapore river.
The fullerton hotels are really special. From the outside it looks really exquisite. Their hotels look like those buildings from the olden days. Or are they really buildings from the olden times? Hmm.
Sculpture of boys jumping into the Singapore river.
We're reaching soon!
The Fullerton waterboat house.
Typical tourist shot venue, the Esplanade bridge.
Around the Merlion Park were cafes and restaurants.
There were also cafes or food stalls under the esplanade bridge.
A mini merlion statue that shoots water.
That's the real Merlion statue.
You can get to see the singapore flyer, the lotus artscience museum and the MBS towers across the Merlion Park.
At first I don't understand what these white balls were for and what they are but after doing a little search on google, it says that these are known as the wishing spheres. The wishes on these spheres are written by the people during the celebration for the upcoming new year back in 2013.
Esplanade - theaters on the bay that shaped like a Durian.
The sad thing about our visit to the Merlion Park was that the Merlion was not shooting any water out of its mouth as it was under maintenance! How disappointing. :(
Well, at least I've gotten the opportunity to visit this place and to take pictures of the statue..
"If you've never taken any pictures with the Merlion statue while you're in Singapore, how could you say you've been to Singapore before?"
"来到了狮城, 如果你没有与鱼尾狮拍过照, 怎么算是来过新加坡呢?"
Is this a time tower or something?
If you look closely, you would notice that this mini Merlion is facing back-to-back with the real huge Merlion statue.
As the time passes by, the sky is turning darker and darker.
Stunning view.
Buildings that are lit up in the late evening.
Colorful artsy hippopotamuses.
Hidden colorful whale.
Oh, there it is!
This hotel is beautiful.
In the end, we waited for the bus and went back to cousin's home after that.
And here's a short video,
It was a great experience as I finally get to see the Merlion statue with my own eyes instead of only seeing it via tvs or the internet.
