Went up Whistler today for snowboarding. Went up with Angela, her sister Kim and her sister’s husband Kelvin. Daryl was supposed to come but he was sick so he couldn’t. We got there real early around 8:30am, it was already pretty crowded. I bought an Edge Card online for $69 which was kind of like a discount card for Whistler…it includes a free lift ticket plus you get discount when you buy ticket next time. The weather condition was okay, not too sunny and very cold; luckily I brought my face mask with me so I was okay. It brightened up a bit later in the afternoon though. I think I’ve only been to Whistler once last year, plus I was really bad at boarding last year so today was pretty much my first trip there that I actually “learned” how to board “properly”.

We went up to the Blackcomb Mountain first, did a couple run, then met up with Kim and Kelvin. We then did a few more runs together and took the “Peak2Peak” gondola (new in 2008) which was a 10-minute ride that brought us from the peak of the Blackcomb Mountain to that of the Whistler Mountain. The ride was really cool, the cable car was large (I think it would fit 30+ people), and the ride was very stable and quiet - must be some pretty high tech kind of mechanical design.

We had lunch after we got across. The cafeteria was really huge (never been there before) and offered basically any kind of food that you could imagine - pasta, rice, salad, bread, cookies, sandwiches, soup….etc. and it was PACKED. We got our seats after about 10 minutes of searching.

The condition of the snow was pretty bad I’d say. It was okay near the top of the mountain, where you could still find a fair amount of soft/fluffy snow, but when we got to the lower part of the mountain it was hard packed. My snowboard wasn’t sharpened so it didn’t really have any traction against some of the “icy” areas and I fell down a couple times. Butt and the lower part of the hand hurt really bad as the ground was hard If it wasn’t that icy I would have fallen way less often…:(

It was a fun day though and money well spent. I was pretty exhausted at the end of the day (we did a super long run from the top of the mountain all the way to the bottom, with only 2 or 3 rests) as I pretty much maxed out my stamina since the other guys were really good and I had to make sure I wasn’t too slow or I would lose sight of them…

My Wendy got a pass on her CFA level 1 exam, congrats~! only 35% of the candidates passed it so seems to be a rather tough exam. I could never imagine myself doing these type of math/business related exams - will probably go crazy and die.

It’s been two years since I last went for Dine Out Vancouver’s dinner events. Tonight I went to one used to be one of my favorite restaurants - Joe Fortes Seafood and Chop House, with Benny and his friends. Turned out to be quite a disappointment.

We ordered a bottle of red wine, which was average to good. Most of us ordered the same set dinner which included the Oyster Sampler (4 oysters), Steak for the main course, and Molten chocolate cake for dessert. The Oyster was alright, it was fresh but it didn’t have the sort of yummy “oyster” taste, probably was the lack of seawater within the oysters…but it was okay. The steak, well it’s not “bad” but it was just warm, probably was cooked and been sitting there for couple minutes. The taste was okay and the quality of the meat was pretty good, it was cooked really well too, but I expected better stuff from this restaurant - I had really really tasty sockeye salmon two years ago. It came with two tiger prawns too, they were fresh but again wasn’t really that tasty…. It was actually the mash potato that I liked the best…lol. Benny’s girlfriend Janet ordered a regular fully cooked salmon and it was quite bad too.

The dessert was alright, I liked the crispy outer crust of the chocolate cake, and the inside was warm too which was nice, but it was a bit too chocolaty and sweet. Luckily it came with vanilla ice-cream so the whole thing turned out okay.

I’m not sure if I’ll be back for this restaurant. I might, as i really liked it before, so might as well give it a second chance. Overall, it was a disappointment.

Today is the day for the traditional Lunar Chinese New Year. Since they don’t appreciate Chinese New Year as much as actually turning it into an official holiday here in Canada, it was a regular work day for me (pretty envy that the folks in China are all having a 1-week vacation). Anyway, I got a chance to have dinner with Alice and Matthew last night. Had a bunch of traditional Chinese food for New Years like dried oyster/mushroom, BBQ duck….etc. It was pretty tasty and I got to see the folks counting down for the New Year at Aberdeen Centre (a Chinese mall) on TV.

Today after work I went to visit Wendy’s family, I brought over some Ferrero Rocher, got some red pocket (=D) and was invited to go up to have a drink. Chatted about some random stuff like the economy crisis (that I really don’t care about), their newly installed floorings and decorations…etc.

Also I finished watching another Japanese drama called “Monster Parent”. It was pretty interesting and I will do a review soon.

I’ve been feeling pretty bad for the entire week since I landed in Vancouver on Monday, totally underestimated the power of jet lag… I’ve had no jet lag at all when I landed in Hong Kong, was able to sleep properly and having no problem getting up and such. Strangely for this entire week I’ve felt like a dead fish, had no energy throughout the day and wasn’t able to sleep at all at night. Got up at 5pm today, and didn’t feel like doing any work at all. Am I having jet lag or just getting sick?

Apart from that, it was cool to be able to spend a week in Hong Kong. Was able to see my family and relatives, my girlfriend, and then got a chance to goto XJapan’s Asia Tour =D It was really a dream-come-true, once-in-a-lifetime kind of experience. Having been their huge fan since about 8 years ago, having watched most if not all of their performance on VCD/DVDs, having listened to most of their songs to the extend that all the lyrics and tunes were memorized deep in brain, I had never imagined that I’d be able to watch them live. Click here for more photos from the event.

The trip was actually quite tight in schedule so I wasn’t able to meet any of my friends (and I got kind of sick near the last couple days), which sucked but oh well….life sucks in general anyway. Oh, I also had fun taking photographs at various places in Hong Kong, going to places that I’ve never been to before - the tall banks hi-rises in Central, the Legislation Building, taking a traditional Ferry across the Victoria Harbour from Tsim Sha Tsui to Central….etc. It gave me a strange feeling to see all these things that had actually been there for the entire time when I was still living in Hong Kong however didn’t have a chance to get to them - I felt like I was a tourist, which was great.

One thing that I felt really bad about was that my grandma broke her leg 2 days before I had to leave. She’s 90 years old now and when I was at the hospital the next day she broke the leg, she was acting really weird, almost like between the state of being unconscious and normal. I felt really bad looking at her in such state and I really hope that she will recover ASAP…

I was on Air Canada flight AC 007 for 13 hours. When I got on the plane I was pretty surprised that I was assigned this seat that is right at the emergency exit….so much leg room Also was pretty happy to see that this personal entertainment system with a pretty huge LCD monitor that you can tilt whatever way you want. Found my favorite shows too like Mythbusters, How it’s made, Daily Planet, Mega World….etc (see picture I was eating my meal while watching Mythbuster, pretty cool). I was given a whole can of coke too while on some other airlines they only fill up your cup. The meals were okay, nothing facny but did the job. Also found some classical music that I could listen to. Too bad the earphone was so quiet even though I’ve maxed out the volume.

There was a super annoying Chinese guy that was talkin with his friend in friggin Chinese right in front of me. He was speaking it loud in Cantonese with occasion bad words, just plain annoying. Was hoping that he would go away soon but he ended up standing there for a good one hour..

Anyway, the view from above the sky was amazing as usual. I think I was above Alaska, and Russia…etc. There were amazing icefields and mountain range filled with snow. Strange enough I was able to see the ground so clearly while usually layers of clouds would be blocking your view to the ground.