[2015 Food] Fresh Legend (Ice Restaurant)

My friends invited me to go to eat one of my favourite food item - Shaved ice.

Taro ball series #3 with red beans, taro balls, pearls, and peanuts

grass jelly series signature with grass jelly, vanilla ice cream, taro ball, and taro.

As a Taiwanese, I honestly cannot resist ANY icy foods. Ice cream, shaved ice, slushes, etc.

I'm not lying when I say Taiwan has some of the best icy food products in the world!
This dessert place was where I went last night for my delicious shaved ice.
If you can't eat ice or don't like icy foods, you can choose the hot version (red bean soup with all these good toppings).

Taste ★★★★☆ 

 Portion ★★★★☆ 

 Service ★★★★☆ 

 Cost $$ 

Recommended - Good on all aspects. Add to my favourites

I didn't expect much though, from a Canadian place. This place, surprised me. The toppings are made well and taste quite good. Taro is especially delicious. The only 2 reasons people would dislike the things is if

[2015 Food] Mega Sushi

As you know, I am now doing my rotation in Steveston, Richmond. My friend recommended this place, so I decided to try it out.

Taste ★★★★☆ 

 Portion ★★★☆☆ 

 Service ★★★☆☆ 

 Cost $$ 

Recommended - For its creative special rolls and Mega Tower. A bit on the pricy side with minimal service (busy).

Make reservation! This place is very busy at dinner hours.

I got there at around 6:15 and the restaurant is full throughout until around almost 8pm. That's on a Wednesday night.

I ordered a Caesar to drink

[2014 EU Trip] UK - London

I've wanted to do this for a long time - my travel diary, but laziness got the best of me. It just takes too much time to upload all the photos and go through all the details lol.
I guess, I'll just write as much as I can remember one year later today and maybe add to it whenever some things comes to mind.
I recorded some day trip details using my phone and facebook, all is not lost (yet).

I spent my first day and the last three days of my EU trip in London. I missed a lot of things and all my electronics were out of charge on the day I did the most of my London tour (major attractions like the Parliament building). London is one of the city I would definitely have to go back and visit again.

First day, when I landed in London, I honestly ...

[2015 DIY] Window Screen

Difficulty: 3/5
Time: 3 hours each if done alone (Even a kid can do this. My crafting skill and familiarity w/ hardware is literally elementary school level)
Budget: ~$50 for all three of my big windows (larger than 20"x 40" each) including all new materials (knives, etc.) -I'm probably over estimating it.

Since the beginning of last month, my apartment had been stable at around 30+ degrees Celsius - which is killing both my sister and me. Fans did not help much, because the air circulating indoor is too hot... Window screen then become our next step to cooling down our place.

The cost to install metal or plastic custom made window screen by a professional will take around $100+~400 depending on the size of the window. Our windows are relatively large- I've estimated it to cost more than $500 if I were to install the screen on all three windows in my house. So, I asked the handyman in my church, Eric for help.

Special thanks to:
Eric for the idea and brief outline of how to do this. 
My bf who helped me got all the materials needed to complete this project and helped me start the first parts.
My sister, for doing NOTHING. =_=

Detail steps:

Pharmacists: What do we do, why we are needed, how much do we make

Pharmacists: What do we do, why we are needed, how much do we make.

Dear All,

I am a UBC pharmacy student just finished my 3rd year of study and going into my final year. I accidentally discovered this thread and felt the need to create this post for pharmacists’ voices to be heard. I had worked in corporate pharmacies, franchised pharmacies, and independent pharmacies as pharmacy assistant throughout my studies. As I have some time on my hand right now, I thought I would do this instead of doing other things. Please feel free to correct me if any information written below has errors or needs clarifications. Experienced pharmacists’ opinions are also greatly appreciated.

I wrote this on RFD, I thought I'd share it on my blog. Hope this post reaches more people who would like to know more about the profession and students who wish to pursue this career.

Index:
I. What do we do? – responsibilities, services, and challenges
a. Daily tasks and job description (with time factors)
b. Expanded scope of practice
II. Why are we needed – our place and purpose as a health care professional
a. Importance of pharmacists in patient health care
b. Health care system problems in countries without pharmacists
c. Challenges of being a pharmacist
III. For future pharmacy students – wage, requirements, future prospects
a. How much do pharmacists make on average – BC focused
b. What does it take to become a pharmacist
c. Future changes in the profession
IV. FAQ – updated as needed

[2015 Movie] SPY and Mad Max

I watched Mad Max like last month and SPY last week
I know I always post articles that are wayyy too long. So I'm gonna start making them short :P

Mad Max:  ★★★☆☆
Action packed, full on car-chasing war. A bit too much car racing for me.

SPY: ★★★★★
Funny, Awesome, lots of plot twists (unpredictable).

[2015 Movie] Avengers 2: Age of Ultron

Hello, blog, and everyone reading it- I know I don't have a lot of readers here, but then I'm also lazy... so ... we're even hahaha.

I watched the Avengers 2 today... There are many plot lines running in this SUPER LONG movie. It's a decent action movie with lots of actions and CG (computer graphics). Many epic (ish) landscape, high-tech laser filled actions and flying objects. I would've appreciated some more martial art styled hand fights, but I mean... no one does that nowadays? It's still worth watching given the well-loved cast and the decent plots. Watching in 4D might have been exciting, because there are many flying and dropping scenes. 3D wise, I didn't think it's that great. I didn't feel like it's epic enough :P. There are some (quite a bit) comic relief here and there, but I don't like how they all felt like they were forced in there. Many of the jokes weren't really worth the time.

(The rest of the articles shouldn't have spoilers, either- there wasn't much to spoil anyways= =)
My fav Marvel hero?

[2015 Food] Parklane Chinese Restaurant - Dim Sum

HEY~~
I'm back~~~
All my final exams ended on the 28th, I took a few days to catch up on my work and sleep.
Finally, I can start blogging again :D

I still have to write articles for my dine out exp. about 4 months ago (time really flies...)
Don't think you wanna hear any of my stressful life stories, let's just go on with the food~
Today, I want to start with the Dim Sum / Chinese Restaurant I went on April 5th.

Taste ★★★★☆ 

 Portion ★★★☆☆ 

 Service ★★★★☆ 

 Cost $$ 

Recommended - Wait was not long, price was fair, taste was decent. Service was pretty good. Overall, a really good experience.

We went there on Sunday noon- couldn't find a place for dim sum without having to wait more than 30 minutes, so we were recommended to this place. The interior of the restaurant is quite nice (middle-upper class for Chinese restaurant). It is fairly large with many spaces for large groups of people.

Here are the items we ordered:

Dim sum order-sheet and our orders

6. Steamed Beef Ball 山竹牛肉球 - This seems to be the dish all people love to order at dim sum places - I don't fancy it too much. They had cooked it really well here with good soup.

2. Steamed Minced Pork Dumpling 飛魚子燒賣 - I love this! I love shao mai (the yellow skinned dumplings like these). The meat(grounded pork) was nicely cooked. The soup leaks out when you bite on it. Fish eggs on top add to the aesthetics, taste & texture.

1. Steamed Shrimp Dumpling 百樂鮮蝦餃 - I don't think I need to say much. Tastes great. If you love shrimp, you can't miss it. The gelatin-like dumpling cover did not have weird taste and is just the right hardness/softness.

42. Steamed Dried Shrimp & Green Onion Rice Roll 蝦米蔥花腸粉 - I always order this at dim sum places. Eat this with the sauce they provide (sweet and salty). Tasted good. Don't think you can mess this dish up anyways XD.

34. Steamed Egg Yolk Buns 黃金流沙包- This is sweet with liquidy egg yolk nicely enclosed in a bun. I am not a big fan of sweet dim sum dishes, but this was very tasty. 

10. Steamed Pork with Liver 懷舊豬潤燒賣-  I love this dish! Tasted great. Good soup, liver didn't have the stink. Pork meat ball did not lose its taste and scent in the soup.

32. Steamed Duo Crystal Dumpling 鴛鴦水晶包 - This is a sweet dish. Its got fillings of red bean (dark red) and green beens (white) sauce/paste in them. Really great for dessert if you like Chinese styled desserts. 

For 4 people we ordered the above + 2 extra orders of #2 & 10 and reordered additional lunch special (8.95) dish of fried noodles. The portion is decent for a dim sum place (they are really meant for side dishes, according to my Canto BF).

I think this was a good place to dine- plus, it's close to the Brighouse & Landsdowne skytrain station. Commuting is easy enough. Great for a large group of friends for a dim sum outing!

Alright, next restaurant. ttyl

Bye Bye~ ★

[2015 Food] Sura Korean Restaurant

Today's my foodie day again~ went to two different restaurant (one for lunch and one for dinner). Both were pretty good. I will take the time to write about them throughout the week - I do have to prep for finals...

Sura is the place I had passed through multiple times when I was trying different restaurants on Robson. It's another Korean restaurant on this Korean block :D. This is a really popular restaurant which does not take reservation and often has ~30min line up at meal time.

Taste ★★★★☆ 

Portion ★★★☆☆ 

Service ★★★★☆

 Cost $$$

Not Really Recommended. It's nice for a well-prepared/ cooked Korean meal, but the line up/ wait and the portion killed the deal. The lunch set menus could be worth it if the wait isn't long.

Taste
The food was nicely prepared here. They've put effort into presenting the food, so they all look pretty savory when they came up. Most of them are on the sweeter side while the food I had in Korea were all more on the salty side -  it's still authentic and nicely cooked~ so it's just my personal preference. Honestly, I don't think there's anything you can order wrong on the menu, the menu has all the pictures and they all look really great and just like the way they will bring it to your table (almost). Except in smaller portion than on the picture :P.

The taste here did not surpass my favourite Korean place in Coquitlum, but I believe, in downtown Vancouver, this could be the best.

 Side dishes:

Sea weed - salty and sweet

I still didn't figure out what this is, tasted like fried yam in some sweet sauce - I like this side

kimchi - I actually love their kimchi - not too spicy and it's sour and salty - tastes authentic.

Dishes: 

#19 Bossam = Sliced Pork belly simmered in Herbs: The meat is cooked to just the right softness and the sweet BBQish sauce on top brings out the sweetness of pork. It didn't feel fatty when I was eating it. The combo with the sides - the spicy bean sauce they provided, the raddish (flower like one and kimchi ones in the can) as well as the veggie matched really well --> LOVE it.

#42 Japchae - stir fried potato noodles in sweet sesame oil with beef and mixed veggies  : My must-eat at any Korean restaurant. This is not the best I've had, but it was decent. Tasted great, sweet and salty, with enough veggies and some beef slices in there. The noodles are cooked so that it retained its strength, not too soft, not too hard.

The size of their rice is slightly small - but if you've ordered noodles or rice, you won't really need this.

#38 Soondubu Jjigae - Spicy tofu stew (seafood): you can choose beef instead of seafood, but we chose seafood. There was shrimp, octopus, and I believe clams (?). And lots of tofu lol- the soup is nice, not too spicy, seasoned just right. Tastes even better with kimchi

 Drinks

Pineapple Soju Cocktail: I didn't take a picture of the yogurt one, but it just look more milky orange. My friends prefer the yogurt one compared to this. I really love pineapple, so I liked mine. It's even got real pineapple fruit in there (so the straw was useless, I just drank from the jar. It's a bit too small in portion though... didn't think it's worth $7. It tasted like pineapple can + Sprite + soju ==> can make this myself :P

Portion
The portion of each plate is on the smaller side for the price. I wasn't that hungry to begin with and by the end of dinner, I was just full. Three dishes filled 3 girls' stomach, I guess it was still fair, but I can see how it will NOT be enough for guys. I don't know if we can refill the kimchi (side dishes), but I I felt like we had enough.

Service
When you entered the restaurant, make sure to have your name put on the list by the host - and ask him how long the wait is, if he forgets to tell you. The food came in reasonable time- oddly, our drinks came after all the foods were on the table. I don't mind that actually, but it was unusual - the server apologized lol - I was like, I don't mind. They do clear the table (almost) right after you are finished and give you the bill after asking you if you'd like anything else. The server said he didn't mean to rush us, but I do realize they have a bunch of people still waiting by the door- so we quickly got out. Overall, their service was good. I have nothing to complain.

Cost
This place has fairly economic lunch sets for $15 or $20 and you get a variety of different dishes. The portion is not really that big here, though. I went with 2 other girl friends and all of us were just filled with 3 orders of food. We also each had a cocktail soju - so the cost for each came to $25/ person. - which, is quite fair, I guess, given the atmosphere and the food quality/ presentation.

Overall, it was a great dinner experience, I just didn't think the wait was THAT worth it. Maybe downtown is just not the place to look for Korean food :P the best ones are still in Coquitlum~
I will write about my other restaurant experience later in the week.
ttyl

Bye Bye ~ ★

[2015 Food] Fish On Rice - My past favourite Japanese AYCE

Ever since our discovery of this place like almost 10 years ago (when I was in grade 9). Our family has frequented this restaurant and it has been our favourite for the first few years. After the management/operation tactics/ cooks changed a few times, we just settled for it, because we couldn't find any other place better or more convenient than Fish on Rice...

It used to be a very popular restaurant - without a reservation, even on weekdays, it was hard to seat 4 people. I paid more than 3 visits to this place over the past 3 months and it has certainly dropped in popularity over the years. It was quite noticeable, though, they have just changed management this month. The menu, pricing, items, and the actually food has changed quite drastically this time compared to my last visit (in mid February).

Without Further a due~
Fish on Rice

Taste ★★★☆☆

Portion ★★★★★

Service ★★★★☆

Cost $$ 

Not Recommended. An ok AYCE place if you'd like some sashimi (raw fish), but you can't expect the quality to be that good.

The actual restaurant might be harder to find for first timers- it's diagonally across from Crystal mall on the Kingsway side. The mall beside it has Market Place and Shopper's Drug Mart. It is upstairs of Earls. Just enter from the entrance for the building beside Earls - the door is not locked. (I forgot to take picture... sorry ~"~)

The decor of this place is quite good, nice Japanese sushi ya sort of style - they even got tatami-like rooms for larger groups (usually > 4 ppl).

From the food and portion plus the marketing thing they're doing (if you upload photos to social network with their address, you get 5% off), we are sure they've just changed their management team. The foods' quality and taste were also different (got worse) so I'm sure they've changed the cook, too. The service this time is more attentive and they've got the wireless credit card machine. This is the only improvement (quite important, though).

They do offer a la carte (order single items) menu, but we always go for the All You Can Eat (AYCE).

 Here is the menu (Chinese + English 1 page- double sided): I forgot to take picture of the order sheet (English) - you'll see a pencil at the side of your table and you just put down the quantity of each item you want to order. You will get 2 sheets = 2 rounds of order (usually, but today we only got 1 sheet - we always order the same things now, so we didn't need another one anyways)
It's all you can eat, so you can try a little of everything then order more the second round if you need/want.

 The salad that we love the most - Green salad
Sour and sweet orange sauce (not sure what's in there) with cucumber, carrot, lattuce 

 On the right - the Cone (temaki) - spicy salmon and spicy tuna. Their scallop one is also decent. This has always been our favourite item
On the left - sushi - hokkigai sushi (some sort of shell fish?) , avocado sushi (my mom wanted, apparently avocado is super expensive in China), and dynamite roll (fried prawn)
The size of the dynamite roll sushi had decreased so much O_O it's almost a 30-40% reduction. But, whatever- it's all you can eat - order more if you need to lol

 Beef ribs- also one of our favourites - sweet and salty, the beef is a bit dry, but it's BBQed pretty well

 Teriyaki - vegetable and chicken. Their teriyaki is pretty decent. It's a bit more on the sweet side, but it's as good as any other Japanese food place could offer.

 The main reason why we love this place - SASHIMI!!! As you can see, we love the salmon one more LOL
There's a limit of 6 pieces/adult. - which is why I can get a lot when I bring my sis or BF w/ me hahah (neither of them eat anything raw).
Today's sashimi were so small... they kept decreasing in size... it's getting to a point where I can't really say is acceptable...
This time, the salmon one didn't even taste that fresh. It's not that noticeable for people who doesn't eat sashimi often, maybe- but I noticed it O_O"
Tuna sashimi today was great! (should've ordered more pieces) it was fresh and melt in my mouth :P yum~~

 Tempura - Yam (yellow), vegetable (carrot - red, cucumber- green, pumpkin- yellow/orange)
Their sauce (for fried food) was more salty this time.
The yam and veggies had been cut too thin... = = I mean, really?!
It's decent - just no longer that good.

 Lemon chicken - this is new item - Chinese food items added onto the menu.
My mom said it was decent. I never really liked sour and sweet meat anyways- so I didn't like it.

The bill came to $31 (including tax and tips) for 2 people (there's a price increase- again). Which, considering both of us were really full and don't have the appetite for dinner- it was of good portion (well, it is AYCE). We didn't order round 2, though, cuz we didn't think the food was good...

I'm sad to see that Fish On Rice can no longer delivery good-enough taste and quality to continue to be my favourite Japanese place. Maybe I will give them a try again - but I don't think that would happen any time soon...

No more Japanese food for a few weeks, I guess~ gotta study for finals (?!).
ttyl

Bye bye~ ★

[2015 Pharmacy] Time to write about some school?

I just realized, I haven't blogged about school, yet.

I think that'll not be the norm, though, since my hell-ish school year (3rd year pharmacy) is about to be over!!! YAY!!!

My oral exam is on Monday, basically it's an exam where everything you learned in the past 3 years is fair game and they are going to test you on the way you present the your answer (orally) and the way you solve questions (written). 

Because I'm in the first class (Monday class) we have the quiz right after on Tuesday, too, focusing on 3 cases that we did not get assessed on. 

All my life, my central focus has been school. Watching TV had been my passion since I could remember. Singing and Music had always been the talents/habbits I tried to keep. 

It's sad, but normal for girls my age to know almost nothing outside of school - especially in Asian populations. Good thing in my generation, we have all the informatic technologies accessible to us - so I lead a much sociable lives than I would've if phones were the only means of communication. 

As to what I study, I study pharmacy. It's NOT mainly about researching and developing new drugs (pharmacology, biochemistry). It is more focused on the clinical side - we become pharmacists, the " licensed drug dealer" lol. We study very hard to safe guard you from bum head physicians who does not know what the different drugs would do to you. In many cases, our existence can help you manage side effects, save you money, save you time from extra dr.'s office visits, and even deaths. So, I gotta say it's a pretty important role that we play in the health care system - and your daily lives. I mean what other health care profession can be accessed this easily :P -  just walk in, maybe line up for a bit and you get someone who studied 5+ years in the university about every common drugs to help you - and it's free for you (you only pay for the drugs, we get set hourly wages).

No matter how much I complained about the shifts in our profession to a more corporate/ retail nature, I still highly value what I will be doing and glad that I made the choice of coming to study all common medical conditions and their drugs down to the drug structures and how they react with our bodies.

Now, I think that's enough school talk... I need to focus in class instead of typing irrelevant posts LOL. ah,
ttyl

Bye bye~ ★

[2015 BD] Steamworks Dinner Celebration

Yeah, yeah, I got busy, so I didn't write about this till now lol.

I haven't had such a big, nice birthday celebration since ... I don't even know how long, since my parents left Canada, I think. And I haven't been celebrating it with friends much anyways :P

I love making friends and I am quite a welcoming person, so when I was inviting people I see on a daily basis as well as people I hang out with a lot, I got like 2X people in the chat O_O" Apparently the social butterfly method that didn't quite work out in highschool for me, somehow worked out this year. - Well, I've started making efforts to hang out, so I guess that is quite nice :)

The first big challenge was finding a place that will actually be able to host around 15 people. During my chat with Lillian and Karen at Tap and Barrel near Science world, I decided Steamworks is the best choice - it's transit accessible, big, and food was said to be quite good. (plus, they brew beer :P)

Quite some people bailed on the day of, but I don't blame them, they have their reasons... it saddened me a little, though, but like my friends said, be happy for I am still surrounded by a bunch of friends on this day :D. AND I know although they have other commitments or situations, they still love me and wishes me a happy BD :') Thanks, everyone <3




It is quite a popular restaurant that has a capacity of 700 people, but is always quite booked O_O- so reserve early if your group is more than 4! They are located in Gastown right outside of the Waterfront station which made it quite a tourist hot spot. Especially in the summer. (info from the waiter)

Taste ★★★★☆

Portion ★★★☆☆

Service ★★★★☆

Cost $$$

Recommended for nice dinners with large group of people. Not really if you value CP value (=money to quality and quantity ratio). 

The food was pretty tasty, none of the dish I've had my hands on (which was almost everyone's except the burger Yi got LOL - but they are known for them, so it should be quite good.
Pricing is one notch up from Cactus and about the same as Milestone. Check their menu from their website (http://steamworks.com/brew-pub).

The must try my friend said was the "Fish Bowl" (which on the bill it says "bird bowl") whatever, it's basically just like a pretty big cup of cocktail - I don't think there's enough in there though hahaha - but that's just me, it is about 2 cups of cocktails I think, you have choices of Sangria, Snapps w/ Rum and another one I can't remember. Ask the server for details hahaha

Bf got the lobster ravioli, I'm not a big fan of ravioli as pasta. He loves lobster ( I think lol) he was gonna get mussels, but we just had that not long ago at Milestone... The lobster shreds in this was kinda small O_O. The taste is pretty good, though, creamy but not too rich. Portion was a bit too small though, he was not filled.

Because there were too many choices, I went with a safe bet - Sirloin Steak (Yes, that would be me in the picture). The steak was very thick and cooked just right (for me, medium rare) red inside, slightly crunchy outside. I think it was really good. Might have been the best steak I've had all in all (about the same as Milestone steak). The mashed potato was cooked with cream, milk and garlic for sure. Tasted really good.

My bestie ordered this appetizer "Baked Spinach & Crab Dip", it was too creamy and cheesy to have alone, but served perfectly as a shared dish. :D I really enjoyed this dish

I did not try the hamburger or fries, but I could assume it was decent :P

Their salad looks really good (and healthy) think the beef salad comes with blue cheese, be sure to ask your server about what is actually in there- my friend didn't want blue cheese hahaha. The one in the picture here is the chicken one- Karen had to be specific that she wants her chicken hot (as in heated) hahaha :D

My birthday gift/perk from the restaurant was a dessert of my choice, being me, I'd choose ice cream over cakes any day :P although cakes might worth more O_O" This is their chocolate sundae with brownies.

Side story, Bf choked on the fake/marinated cherry from the fish bowl, so I had the cherry. It actually isn't as bad as it normally would be lol

Decent Yam fries with what we assumed to be plum sauce on top :D

Last but not least, thanks to Jenny for a wonderful BD gift :D - next year, we will start our No Gift Policy ;)

P.S. No Gift Policy - it is a deal I made (or most of us assumed) about NOT gifting each other on BD so we'll never have to worry about gift shopping hahaha. The only requirement is that we are good enough friends <3