And Now Back to the Cold
Sunday March 2, 2025
It’s been a wonderful but busy eleven weeks - eleven weeks! Gone by already! - and as I leave Aotearoa, my home of 30 years, I’m full of gratitude for all the people I got to see and the food I got to eat.
When I went down to Wellington last month, I was reminded of the great lifestyle I had while I lived here; the great eateries, the walkable city, the beautiful night sky, the lush greenery and the sounds of native birds chirping in the trees. But as my friends have slowly left the city for the suburbs or even completely new cities, the vibe has changed and even I know deep down that my heart is in Toronto. Wellington will always be special to me, and I will be back in the future.
In amongst my usual weekly activities like Thirsty Thursday and Spicy Food Thursday, I also attended Owen and Bea’s wedding in Waikanae, literally on the other side of the world from where I had seen them last. It was nice to chat with people and explore Nga Manu Nature Reserve, but I was home early enough to catch the Dragon Dance and Chinese New Year fireworks at Frank Kitts Park. Today, I played piano at Central Baptist, a lovely reminder of my roots and a tribute to the community that has helped me so much.
Back up in Auckland, I was at Sam and Chara’s wedding with a bunch of my old friends from my church in Kelston, catching up with people who I hadn’t seen in over five years. My stepmum, who had been badly injured from a fall and surgery for a fracture, but is now in much less pain and discomfort than before, also arrived back from Malaysia. I caught up with Deanna, elusive Chief Cookie Officer of Moustache and got a private behind-the-scenes tour of the new premises. There were lunches and dinners with ex colleagues and old school mates and Uni friends, a Chinese New Year dinner with the all-important yee sang salad that we decorated with a snake made of cucumber, we celebrated Dad’s 70th at Lilian with a fantastic meal and exquisite cake, and William’s 39th at his place with a hilarious slapstick comedy about beavers, and three Jeremys. There was Auckland Pride, weekly badminton (my physio had told me I could play if I took it easy but still managed to evade injury after going a bit competitive), and a trip out to Muriwai with Alfie who was visiting from Toronto/Hong Kong.
Last weekend, I took my parents out to New Plymouth for a couple of days. My sister had recently been with her family over New Years, and after seeing the photos that they took, my parents decided they wanted to go too. The scenery and weather was fantastic. There were beautiful gardens to walk around, as well as the coastal walkway where the Wind Wand was. There were some magnificent views of the mountain, Maunga Taranaki, especially from Paritutu Rock, which was a steep climb on stairs for the first half, and then rock with a chain to hoist yourself up. I was impressed that Dad made it up there, and he was surprised by his own ability too. We caught the sunset up there on Sunday evening and the colours around the sky were majestic as they contrasted against the silhouette of the mountain.
The food was pretty decent too. On the first night, we went to the Orangery, famous for its tableside flambé menu. We had a great breakfast at the Arborio in the museum, and some nice Japanese-style bites for dinner at the Snug Lounge. All in all, it was nice to get away from the big city and enjoy the scenery in the countryside, and it really goes to show just how lucky Kiwis are to have this in their backyard.
In my final week here, my parents cooked abalone from Japan that had been dried and stored for 40 years. Dad had brought it to New Zealand from his father’s shop in Malaysia and I suppose it was finally a good time to eat it. The next night, I took them for an exquisite Middle Eastern meal at Advieh and had an amazing experience. And finally last night, we celebrated my birthday with a family barbeque. It’s been amazing. But unfortunately it’s time to return to the cold lingering winter of the northern hemisphere; but I’ll be back another day.
Posted by Jeremy at 12:19am on Sunday March 2, 2025 :: 0 comments :: 
Been a While
Saturday May 28, 2016
Things have been insanely busy, as usual. Where do I even start? So much as happened since the last blog post.
Doomsday Clicker has been performing well, and we managed to hit all our deadlines - but not without some troubles along the way. The v1.3 Android release saw a torrent of negative reviews reporting the game would not boot properly, and since we were lined up for featuring, it was of utmost priority to fix the issues. The Game Sync implementation wasn't as robust as we had initially tested, and pretty much my fault, so we scrambled to build stability around all those systems. Thankfully, things came together in the end, and we secured our featuring on Google Play and the iTunes store. I've had a lot of feedback from friends who have enjoyed the game - especially the amazing and catchy soundtrack.
In honour of its successes, the PikPok 19th birthday party was completely Doomsday Clicker themed, with an amazing volcano cake with Monkey and the Red Button on the top, and three cocktails and two shots bearing the names of some of the doomsdays you can cause in the game. The atmosphere was fantastic and it was good to see heaps of people there. There was arm wrestling - we even managed to convince Mario and Tyrone to go head to head. There was dancing and shenanigans but all in all, I think lots of people had a good time.
There was an exciting thunderstorm a few days ago, lightning illuminating the night sky just after midnight, with some heavy rain accompanying the storm. I would have counted 30 flashes of light in the five minutes I was watching, some strikes being very close to the city itself. Wellington's geography means it doesn't get many thunderstorms, so it's always such a delight to see them - as long as you're indoors and warm.
Mat was down last weekend for some 30th birthday parties. We met up with Tim for his at Spruce Goose, and afterwards Mat went for board games with that crew while I went to Phil and Will's for their flatwarming. They had moved into their new place over Anzac weekend - I helped them shift a lot of their bulky furniture and drove the truck for them. Mana and Vix rocked up with some ingredients for making mulled wine, and what a fun time that was! I didn't realise it was so simple - create your syrup first with a little bit of wine, sugar, cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, orange peel, lemon peel, and any other spices or fruit you want to throw in. When the syrup is the right consistency, pour the rest of the wine in and let it warm without boiling, or the alcohol will evaporate. Easy!
Strawberry Fare's last day is tomorrow. It is truly the end of an era. They have decided to close their doors while the owners look to focusing more on their other restaurants. The past couple of weeks have seen hundreds of loyal fans trying to get the last desserts, myself and Mat included. They weren't taking any bookings, so I decided that I would try going at 11am on Sunday morning to secure my final Devil's Dream Cake. Sure enough, no one was stupid enough to have dessert for breakfast except for Mat and myself, so we enjoyed our final meal at Strawberry Fare forever. You could say that it was...a bittersweet experience.
At the start of the month, I was in Auckland for Mel and Jarrod's wedding - number four of seven this year. The weather was stunning and the location was picturesque. I was on parking warden duty, so had to be there early, but with my swanky haircut and sharp suit, I was exuding confidence and style as I greeted the guests and directed them down the driveway. The wedding was really nice, given they had only a month to plan it. Everything fell into place and it ran smoothly. The next day was Mother's Day, so we went out for yum cha to Sun World in Newmarket, and then back to my sister's to see my two nephews. They're growing up so fast, especially the little one. He's not as moody as he was the last time I saw him, so it's good to see him being more sociable and having more fun. So cute!
There's been karaoke, Andrew's 30th at Five Boroughs, NZIF shows - Eli Matthewson of Jono and Ben fame, and Taking off the Bird Suit - we had hotpot, Ghibli movie nights, Iron Giant at the Embassy, Formal Friday at work, Dianne's birthday and Vix and Tessa's flatwarming. There's been plenty of Louis Sergeant desserts, lunch at the Crab Shack and a massive seven-tiered rainbow cake for Keir's farewell. I need to remember to blog more often or I'll forget all these memories.
Posted by Jeremy at 12:16pm on Saturday May 28, 2016 :: 0 comments ::
What a Weekend
Sunday March 2, 2014
The weekend started out with a few drinks and pizza at the Sprig and Fern, and some healthy discussion on mildly controversial and polarising religious opinions. Following that, we headed back to the Greenhouse for some delicious black forest cake to celebrate a non-descript March holiday which happened to coincide with World Civil Defense Day. I had my suspicions but I was still pleasantly surprised and a little embarrassed with the attention, but the night was thoroughly enjoyable.
On Saturday, we had the PikPok Family Day Barbeque at the Mt Victoria Bowls Club. Though the day was a bit windy, the sun was glorious and the atmosphere chilled and relaxed. Charlie had found out about the aforementioned non-descript March holiday and had brought in some candles to stick in the cupcakes, it was very sweet. Thanks to a sign she had written, people well-wished me as the day progressed, again very touched by the sentiments but a little embarrassed with the attention, teehee. It was awesome to spend the day with cool people doing cool things, just out in the sun chit-chatting and playing bowls.
We ended up at the Gryphon Theatre at 8pm to catch the final night of the Fringe at the Gryphon, with three improv shows: Brooks and Brown in Literally Anything, Sketchual Healing and Here's a Thing. Mind-blowingly funny, absolutely amazing performances by all involved and just damn entertaining, capping off what was a brilliant day.
I've been house-sitting at Charles's place too, with his two kittens Hugs and Kisses. Adorable but so mischievous! They like following me around the house and they're extremely playful. I left the pantry open and they snuck in to have a look around; they got stuck in one of the large drawers in the kitchen as well. They'd go into my room and I'd try to carry them out, but since there's two, I'd get rid of one only to have the other sneak in, and repeat. Still, heaps of fun to play with, and I think they liked the attention too.
I've also been following Twitch Plays Pokemon, a social experiment giving 60,000 people the chance to control a Gameboy Emulator playing Pokemon Red. After 16 days, they've finally beaten the Elite Four and Champion but spawned several memes and a joke religion - Lord Helix the Omastar, Bird Jesus the Pidgeot, Flareon the False Prophet, so on and so forth. Highlight of the Elite Four battles would be level 36 Venomoth (nickname ATV, or All Terrain Venomoth) versus Lance's level 62 Dragonite. Due to some questionable AI programming, Dragonite kept using Barrier and Agility as they were "Psychic" attacks super-effective against Venomoth, and Venomoth had managed to Disable Hyper Beam and Poisonpowder Dragonite. Totally epic, and absolutely fascinating to watch the whole game unfold at the hands of thousands of people like that. A new adventure begins in just over two hours - what could it be!?
Today I was at church for the final in the series of "Things I Wish Jesus Never Said", and then out to Lyall Bay for Ekim Burgers with Jimmy and Charlie. After a solid afternoon nap, I was at Laundry with Jono, Andrew and Wei for dinner, then Fidel's for dessert.
My weekend has been super busy but full of amazing friends and fun times. Thanks guys, you rock.
Posted by Jeremy at 8:45am on Sunday March 2, 2014 :: 0 comments ::
Um. What?
Sunday January 26, 2014
I went out to Lyall Bay this afternoon to teach Mitchell how to drive. The area is full of learner drivers because the roads are relatively quiet and most importantly (in Wellington), it's flat. We stopped by the side of Onepu Road and swapped seats, just as a torrent of rain hit the area.
As we were about to leave, a very confused and worried woman beckoned me to wind the window down, and as I did, she frantically bleated "Help!! Please help me!! I need $10!!!!" She's a little out of it, and has a bad stutter, and it's clear she has a problem but whether it's a cash problem specifically, I am unsure. Anyway, I am a bit apprehensive, and I tell her that I don't have cash but we can drive to the dairy down the road to get some for her. Again she repeats, "Please!! I need $10!! It's life or death... I can pay you back $20 tomorrow...." and again I tell her we'll go to the dairy to get money. She asks to hop in the car and Mitchell and I quickly tell her she can't. Then she asks for Listerine ("It's $7!! I need Listerine!!!!") and I say to her again we'll meet her at the dairy. She starts walking away and Mitchell hits the central locking on the car and we wind up the windows and call the cops.
We drove round the block a few times and we spotted a police car driving away from the dairy where she had been waiting. Hopefully she'll be alright - but boy, what a strange encounter.
We've had a few birthdays this week; on Wednesday night we tried to go to Gasworks in Miramar for Jono's birthday, but they were totally full and Jono hadn't booked, so we ended up at Lonestar instead. We would have been indulging in the all-you-can-eat $20 ribs at Gasworks, so we substituted that with the famous Lonestar Hoisin and Mandarin Ribs (Large Stack). Greedy as ever, I also got the Jack Daniels and Chocolate Self-Saucing Pudding for dessert. Yummo.
I was at Sprig and Fern for a few drinks with Paul for his birthday, where we had some lively conversation about iTunes and choices, and Wei and I also taught the guys how to play Mahjong. Yesterday after badminton, I was at Strawberry Fare for lunch to catch up with Jono and Karlyn, back from their overseas travels, and also Jono's recent birthday. After that, I saw Frozen (would recommend!) and then met some workmates for dinner at Pan de Muerto, before heading back to Joe's place to play Machine of Death.
Looking forward to Chinese New Year next week - Year of the Horse 2014!
Posted by Jeremy at 7:21am on Sunday January 26, 2014 :: 0 comments ::
March Misadventures
Wednesday March 6, 2013
A year older, a year wiser?
The days are shortening and the southerlies are definitely more noticeable. Summer has paved the way for autumn, though we may still see some more of that warm sunshine that we were blessed with this year.
Comet Pan-STARRS has been supposedly visible in southern hemisphere skies for the past week or so. Always in search for an adventure, I recruited Mitchell, Chloe and Hayden (while he was down here) and we went out to Owhiro Bay to see if we could spot the comet. No such luck, as we presume the southwestern hills around Red Rocks were in the way. We headed out to Titahi Bay, but still no luck. Today, we drove to Makara but there were still hills in the way; we decided we weren\'t going to leave without a quick exploration of the area, so we followed the track to Opau Bay and the wind turbine farm for about 15 minutes, putting us just over the western ridge of Makara beach and giving us splendid views of the Tasman Sea. As night fell, we gazed aimlessly at the stars, watching the brilliance of Jupiter in the north and seeing the Milky Way arching overhead. Then, in a moment of sheer magic, we caught two shooting stars streaking across the northern sky!
But no comet. Oh well.
Last weekend was pretty busy for me. Mark\'s last day with us was on Friday, and we had a \"final\" game of Battlestar Galactica. With Rob\'s horrendous dice rolling putting the humans dangerously low on population count, it looked like Team Cylon - Mark and myself, and Mitchell, kinda - might have clinched victory, but some sweet blind jumping from Jordan netted a destination 3 card which put them on the home stretch. Not about to be outdone, I shot Rob in the face and caused Tim to die in the same turn, but sadly that wasn\'t enough to pull morale down to 0. It all rested on a final dice roll, and Team Human took away the victory with a strong 8 roll. Epic!
After our regular Saturday morning badminton, I met Damon, Joe, Chloe and Mitchell for some hot drinks at Milk Crate, and we relocated to Caffe L\'affare for brunch. Afterwards, the group minus Damon visited Jos and Ian at Garage Project headquarters, before heading home to find Smudge - with little success. We trekked over to Central Park to play on the swings and flying fox, but there was some kid\'s birthday party going on and it felt awkward just shoving them off the playground, so we went our separate ways. I met up with Damon, Joe and Mitchell again for dinner at Oriental Thai, and we joined Alan and Aaron at their place by Chaffers Docks, right where Homegrown was on. Rocking times!
We had an \"autumnal celebration\" barbeque at the Treehouse, full of fantastic meats everywhere - my kilogram of roast pork that I had purchased from Yan\'s was very popular. There were sausages and skewers and steaks to be had, and for dessert, Charlotte\'s scheming resulted in a deliciously moist and rich chocolate cake with fancy sparkly candles, decorated as if it was someone\'s birthday celebration.
It\'s going to be a busy month, with both my work and social calendars full of events and deadlines to meet. Looking forward to time off over Easter, then the South Island trip early next month!
Posted by Jeremy at 10:33am on Wednesday March 6, 2013 :: 0 comments ::
May Birthdays
Friday May 28, 2010
I've been to two birthday dinners this week, and boy am I stuffed. First was at Cinta with Charlotte, second at the Flying Burrito Bros with Ritu, both with lots of people and food and delicious moist cake. Ritu's cake was from Cha, which surprised me because I heard the Cha cakes were traps, but apparently not. The cream does taste rather artificial though, so as long as it's in moderation, it's okay.
I'll be burning off all that food at the badminton court tomorrow anyway.
Last night at 1am, the couple in the apartment above me decided it would be the opportune moment to have a domestic argument, firing F-Bombs every second word for a good 30 minutes or so. Being in the semi-conscious state I was, my first thought was "oh geez I hope I don't have to call the cops" followed by anxiously waiting for gunshot sounds. Sigh.
My horrendously bad Starcraft II streak continues. FML. I'm pretty sure I'm the worst player at work :(!
The weather has taken a turn for the worse, with bitterly cold wind and rain attacking the city for most of the week. Today was the first day I had to wear my polyprops. I have to say, the awesome jacket and gloves I bought from Hong Kong have definitely come in handy! I don't know how I survived last winter without something as snuggly and warm.
Posted by Jeremy at 11:37am on Friday May 28, 2010 :: 1 comment ::
June Birthdays
Monday June 30, 2008
Last Tuesday, the company had the Speed Racer premier at Reading Cinemas. While most of us concluded that it wasn't as bad as everyone said it was, it was certainly...epileptic and corny in some places. Overall, it was entertaining and had some action-packed shots, but I wouldn't say it was fantastic-fantastic. Oh, there was an after party too, and that was pretty good. I got to play the game for the first time (I highly recommended it) and got to hang with some workmates, so that was pretty cool.
Amy was down in Wellington again, selling dumplings at Pak n Save, again, so we met up for dinner on Wednesday. I took her to Great India where we had some awesome curry and some not-so-awesome Indian dessert dumplings. We went over to Strawberry Fare to make a booking, where I saw Sunni and Raewyn. I told Raewyn that Amy was on the Jet program as well and the two couldn't stop talking. Go figure.
Anyway, we met up again on Thursday night with Peter and Laura, and we had dinner at this place called Piccolo on Vivian Street. It was small and empty, but the food was pretty good and the owner was really friendly and talkative. I advised everyone to eat less because we went to Strawberry Fare afterwards YAY. Between the three of us (Laura had to leave), we shared a Jaffa Tower and a Lemon Chocolate Cheesecake.
Friday night it was time to head to Auckland. Due to bad weather, the flight had been delayed by 30 minutes, so it wasn't until 8pm that we were actually boarding. However, some moron had decided that he'd check in his bags, but not show up on the aircraft. So we waited an extra 30 minutes for him to show up, and Qantas finally decided that they wouldn't wait and started to unload his bags. So yup, just as they finish unloading, aforementioned moron shows up and boards the plane (with heavy glares from the other passengers) and we finally fly off at 8.50pm or something like that.
It was around 10.30pm when we finally got to May's house. After the initial greets, I started scoffing some food that John had saved for me while the speeches started. It was a really good party, quite cosy and really friendly. It was midnight or so (time really flew by) before everyone started leaving, so I texted Andrew and the others to see what they were up to. No one wanted to drive out to Te Atatu to go for milk tea, so we canned the idea and made plans to meet up on Saturday afternoon.
On Saturday morning, my sister and I went to this place called Fuze on the peninsula for brunch, and I ordered some bacon and eggs with an extra lamb chop. It was good to catch up with her, especially over such good food.
I met up with Andrew, Richard, Mat, Nat and Jono at Benediction, just off Newton Road. I was still full from brunch, so I didn't eat anything, but I had a milkshake and watched the others enjoy their meals. Jono had to head off, so we split up: Nat, Mat and I went to Dress Smart, looking for a jacket for Mat, while Andrew and Richard dropped Jono home. We reconvened at the flat, which smelled like rubber thanks to Richard's ingenuity, and just hung around. Pretty soon after, Mat went with his family to see Kung Fu Panda, so the remaining four of us went to... MOMO'S! So good. So much better than Wellington milk tea.
Pretty soon after, we were at the Blockhouse Bay Tennis to celebrate Matt and Andrew's 21sts. It was...strangely familiar. But there were lots of people, lots of good food (again) and lots to do. There was music, there was dancing (no Singstar though), there was some alcohol (I went totally pink...but so did Matt), there was a really good atmosphere about the place. Great time.
Sunday was church, lunch at Wendy's with the youth, a quick catch up at Amy's place with her, Ted and Bobby (the food looked awesome :/) then dinner with my parents. We had beef stroganoff and roast chicken, plus my sister had made some apricot choc-chip muffins and my dad had brewed some feijoa wine. It was awesome.
One of the best weekends ever. Sigh.
Posted by Jeremy at 10:16am on Monday June 30, 2008 :: 3 comments ::
Last Week
Wednesday May 21, 2008
Hmm, I haven't blogged in ages. Oh well, here goes:
Firstly, I've made some changes to the gallery, so you can post some comments about the photos I've uploaded. There's a summary of the comments posted so far on the right-hand side, so you can see the most recent ones.
Secondly, I've uploaded photos I took last week, covering events like Heong's Graduation, Jane's Birthday, and the Wellington Food Show. The Food Show was absolutely delicious - a must for next year! There are also three Graduation Photoshop pictures for you to see :3
Posted by Jeremy at 12:18pm on Wednesday May 21, 2008 :: 0 comments ::
Birthdays
Friday April 25, 2008
It was Andrew's birthday yesterday, so we made an expedition to Matiu/Somes Island in the middle of Wellington Harbour for a walkabout and a picnic. Really awesome weather, the skies were blue and the sun was out in full April force. We got to see some wildlife as well, including some skinks, a fantail and a robin. And sheep, sheep are cute :3 Pictures in the gallery.
Dave had his birthday earlier in the week as well; Jono and I had homegroup so we joined the gang afterwards - just in time for delicious cake, I might add.
Only another week to go before I'm back in Auckland \o/
Posted by Jeremy at 11:59pm on Friday April 25, 2008 :: 0 comments ::
Lately
Saturday December 1, 2007
So I've had a real busy two days. On Friday I went out for dinner with my sister to this Japanese place called Moto on Paramount Drive (It connects Central Park and Lincoln Road) and we ate so much, and it was really good as well. We both had a bento box, except I had beef and she had chicken. The bento came with sashmi, sushi, teriyaki chicken skewers, tempura and some miso. We also shared 8 dumplings and a tofu salad. Of course, my sister couldn't finish some stuff so I had to finish it for her. I think the only thing left on the table were my two sushi, so we did a pretty good job.
After that we went walking around West City for present ideas. We came out empty handed. West City was about to close anyway, so yeah.
Then I went to pick Bobby up and we went to town for Linh's birthday thingy. Her Facebook invite thingy said 9pm, so we were a bit surprised that she was..um..not there when we arrived at 10pm. She was "running late"...haha. Poor Linh. We had a good time though. The music was a bit loud and it was hard to hear people talking, but it was good to catch up and meet new people. Half the time I didn't know the person's name, because you know, you introduce yourself over the loud music and then you spend the rest of the night trying to figure out what they said... and whether you got it right. Oh, we got her a drinks set where you add your favourite alcohol, freeze the mix, and then you have an instant cocktail. She also got this punching bag thingy that swears each time you hit it. O_o
Today, my CS friends went to Wenderholm for a picnic thingy. As usual, Amy organised a huge amount of food, so we were exceptionally well fed. We had fun cooking on the barbeques, and kicking soccer balls around, and lazing about, and catching waves in the water (It was cold, but wasn't unbearable, yet Ted came out shivering like he had hypothermia). Raymond kept washing things. Al and Ted "wrestled" on the grass. There was a turd in the urinal. No one ate the "kerosene sausages". We fail at capturing ducks. Pics and video of Al and Ted at Casey's blog.
In the evening, we had nothing to do, so we made a stop to Plantations in Orewa and had some ice cream before going to Al's house and play PS2 and Mafia. Ah Mafia. I haven't played Mafia in ages. And today I was reminded as to why I hate it so much. Everytime I'm mafia, the sheriff investigates me, then reveals himself and points the finger at me, so I die. Everytime I'm not mafia, the mafia kill me. So that leaves me with two places left - when I'm the doctor, I get to heal myself all the time; also, when I'm the sniper, I get to randomly kill someone. Han also introduced a "Joker" who has a one-per-game ability to either shoot, save or investigate someone. I guess it opens possibilities, but in the end, I suppose people just shoot for fun.
Eh. It was a good day. I'm tired. I'm on piano at church tomorrow so I have to get up early.
Posted by Jeremy at 11:33am on Saturday December 1, 2007 :: 0 comments ::