Susie's: December 2013

Hello everyone, how's your Christmas celebration? This year celebrations for me was so-so. The gifts received was meh only. I'm not those that wish for expensive present but some sincerity in getting the gift should be put in (at least). But some people just used free/unwanted stuff and wrapped it. Is like what-the-hell right?! Okay, forget about those unhappy stuff.

My boyfriend gave me the best Christmas present, a short getaway to Batam. Don't ever blame yourself not able to give me the best because I think all this you have gave me are the best of the best already. I'm one happy girl in this world.

So I was there in Batam for 2days 1night. Stayed in Harmoni One hotel located 5minutes away from Batam Centre Ferry Terminal and Mega Mall. There is no transport from the ferry terminal to hotel so the only way is to take a taxi. There is no way you can walk because from what I see there is no pathway at all! (FYI. The charges for taxi is fixed so don't bother trying to lower the price. From Mega Mall Taxi Stand to Hotel is 50,000RP)

We had lunch at Black Canyon Coffee. Meal was so-so but for the sake of WIFI. Password is milkshake

First look at the picture, it gives me the very grand feeling and my expectation was so-so because I didn't dare to much hope. Afterall, it didn't disappoint me at all. I really love the hotel!

What you see from the picture is what you get.

Check-in was available after 2pm and we arrived at the hotel at about 2pm. My advise to all that are traveling to Batam. Mega Mall opens at 11am so booked the ferry ticket that arrives after 11am or else you will have to rot around the ferry terminal.

The view of my room.

Booked my hotel through booking.com and it is cheaper than the website itself. Please take note that it may state that booking.com will not charge your credit card but the hotel will hold your money till you check-out. I wasn't informed about till I checked with my bank.

As Harmoni One Hotel is new, you would expect everything to be in good conditions. I didn't take a picture of my toilet because boyfriend and I were urgent so we rushed to the toilet right away. Don't worry! The toilet looks damn grand as well but the bad thing is we didn't soak ourselves in the bathtub because there isn't any hot water :( As in the hot water wasn't hot but cold! Everything else is okay to me.

They do provide free shuttle bus services to 3 Shopping Malls ( Mega Mall, Nagoya Hill Shopping Mall and Batam City Square shopping Mall) It starts from 4pm and limited seats available. We managed to book the slot to Nagoya Hill Shopping Mall but there is no seat available for the return trip. Nagoya Hill is worth going because the choices of food are much more than Mega Mall and more stuffs to look/shop around. Before the trip I googled about eating and found out Kengan Cafe. The salted egg chicken attracted me so we had dinner there.

So here's the meal for 2pax and costing about $6 per person. Very cheap!

Wifi is available. Password: kengan123

This is the BOMB! MUST ORDER WHENEVER YOU GO BATAM! AVOCADO JUICE <3

After dinner, we walked around and shop a little gift for ourselves! No picture because the item is with boyfriend :) And since we didn't get to take the hotel shuttle bus, we took a taxi back which cost us 70,000RP (FIXED PRICE). Back to hotel, showered, watch tv and sleep!

Breakfast was a little disappointing but the service was good. After breakfast, I had a nap before we check-out. Check-out was like shit. We had to queue to check-out instead of dropping key like some hotel. They need to walkie their staffs to check on our room before they could let us go.

WIFI Password: americano

Booked 5.30pm ferry back to Singapore, so we had time to spare before heading to ferry terminal. We chilled at Starbuck and play arcade. The arcade there is super cheap but the conditions of the machines are sucky.

Had a quick dinner before I rush back to Pasir Ris to attend one of my closest Secondary School's friend birthday party! I'm so glad I make it back to sing Happy birthday song for you!

Alexandra's 21st birthday party <3

Cutest Birthday Cake I ever seen!

Thank you for inviting me to your birthday party and I'm glad to meet you. Have a blessed birthday and I hope your enjoyed yourself. Sushi loves you

So here we are on the last month of the year 2013. Time flies! I started off my first day of December bad because I was caught in the rain the whole afternoon yesterday while at work. My uniform and jacket was soaking wet and my staff canteen has aircon. I was shivering while eating. My lovely colleagues got me dry jacket and towel so that I will feel better. I was so touched by their move :)

So today, I slept so much that I woke up in the afternoon. Went over to the bank in the evening and also to meet boyfriend. We planned to have dinner at Sushi Express which was newly opened at Tampines One. We were expecting long queue since it was dinner time so we waited awhile before we got our set. It was stated outside that you only have 40minutes of time to have your meal so that others waiting get a chance to eat too. After getting our seats, we were served by this staff and he was explaining to us since it was our first time. I was rather pissed because he assumed I could understand chinese. Yes, I do understand chinese but my chinese is rather weak. He speaks so fast and I didn't really get it. I even replied him in English and he still speaks to me in Chinese. No, I believe from his accents, he is not from China.

I was expecting the food to be good because I read many comments about it. But it was disappointing. The quality of food was bad. Boyfriend took Tuna for his first plate and it's actually placed on the belt for a long period. I think they should take note the amount of time the food was placed on the belt. There was shortage of stuff like chopsticks and cups. I had to ask them to top up it in order to start eating. For your information, they do not served any other drink, other than hot green tea. Don't even bother asking the staff because they do not attend to you for any orders. So if you do not drink green tea then too bad! We didn't had much choices of food so had more of salmons than anything else. We sat there for 40mintues and most of the time spent waiting and choose the better quality sushi. Total paid less than $30 for two. I wouldn't recommend anyone to dine in at Sushi Express. Sakae Sushi is not much better than Sushi Express. #Sigh