Spring at Osaka & Kyoto, Japan

Posted on November 2, 2017 by ahevaeva

March/April 2017.

I’ve yet touched down this amazing land my whole life, and everyone who knew I’m heading there already warned me that once you did, you will fall in love. That’s true. That’s really true. I’m back with my heart so full.

Since parenthood hits me, I’ve always there, stand by for my daughter. It’s been a very tough period for us, as to cope with a new life, with all the new priorities. We felt that this vacation is really important for us, to have a good break, enjoy meal time slowly, walk slowly or to just staring at the river empty minded. In other words, to just feel the luxury of just being alone, the two of us. I’ve been always looking forward to this trip, yet missing our daughter back home. But everything is alright and I knew she’s in good hands. Turn out, she enjoyed herself so much that she never look for daddy or mummy for the whole 9 days. 🙂

Back to Japan, we touched down Osaka hoping to have Sakura welcome us, but…NONE. There isn’t any. Apparently, the forecasts are a bit off this year due to the extraordinary weather. It’s still raining hard and extremely cold! We aren’t preparing for this. It can go down to 3 degrees at night and extremely cold and windy when it’s rain. Anyway, we still hope for the best for at least a glimpse of the Sakura before we leave. And 2-3 days before we fly off back home, we finally catch a glimpse of it. 🙂

Tired from the overnight flight. But, hello Osaka!

Everything looks really appetizing in Japan!

Night at Dotonburi.

Long queue, always and forever.

We spent our days at two cities, Osaka and Kyoto. Needless to say, Kyoto is amazing. Osaka is pretty cool as a city, but to me, Kyoto indeed mesmerizing! We spent a day in Osaka once we touched down, then headed to Kyoto the next day. First stop, we went to the Suntory Yamazaki distillery. Amazingggg experience!

Let’sssss GO!

That’s me on the other side. With my luggage. We can’t wait for the whiskey tasting. No time to check in yet. Haha.

The whiskey lover. While I’m not a fan of alcoholic drinks myself, I find it worth every penny for it. I enjoyed myself very much. Do make a reservation here preferable weeks before for the tour.

While this located nearby our Airbnb, whenever we pass by it’s always a long queue. We checked online to find out it’s serving some fancy desserts.

Wrong focusing, but plenty of people taking wedding/couple/family portraits by dressing traditional kimono here.

Sakura oh sakura. Why aren’t you blooming yet.

All the yummy food at Nishiki market. We literally stop by there every day. To grab some Oden, snacks and some yummy sashimi.

And for cheap lunch, drop by these small udon place.

Good hot coffee is very much needed on this cooling spring weather.

My view.

His view.

Hello, Fushimi Inari Taisha. Ticked one off the bucket list.

We are up! Worth all the steps!

Golden hour.

The sunsets are particularly amazing that day. It’s so beautiful.

Next day we head up to Arashiyama.

The well-known bamboo groove. Despite the busy crowd, it’s actually pretty cooling walk around here.

It’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever visited.

Connected from the bamboo groove, we walk over to this amazing view. It’s all sakura’s buds. Can’t wait for it to bloom. It’s going to be so mesmerizing.

I would definitely come back for a visit in the future for this view. Autumn season would be great as well.

Since it’s a peak season, it’s so crowded, but it’s still worth our visits. We spent almost the whole day there and we enjoyed to slowly stroll around and just enjoy the scenery.

% Arabica Arashiyama. It’s such a longggggg queue! We can’t get a chance to taste it because it’s raining soon. Maybe next time perhaps?

Hi handsome 😀

On our “romantic train ride”. The Sagano Scenic Railway.

My picture can’t justify the journey. It’s breathtaking.

Since it’s a romantic ride, we shall have a picture together. 😀

No planning for the day. We just explore the Kyoto town with our small bike!

One of the oldest coffee shops. The old couple owners are really friendly and cute too.

We sit down there, by the river. To day-dream.

Catch a glimpse of the Sakura finally! But sadly we are leaving Kyoto already.

The big man with a small bicycle.

We are so heavy hearted to leave Kyoto. I love this city. 🙂

And we are back to the busy Osaka city!

Good morning, Kuromon Market.

I can’t believe we visited this Instant Ramen Museum. HAHAHA. And we queue to DIY our own instant ramen! Hahaha. But that’s because it’s a rainy day, so we got no place to go. Hmm.

The final full day in Osaka. So we visited the castle.

Hanami.

SAKURASSSS!

The weather is great that day.

Thank you Osaka. You’ve been really great too.

Japan, we will definitely be back.

This series were taken by using Canon F-1, Canon AE1, Lomo LC-A+ and LC-Wide loaded with various films.

p/s: It’s been awhile since the last I shoot with films. It’s strange and unpredictable. I like this feeling. 😉

Love,

Eva Eva

The Amazing Two

Posted on June 26, 2017 by ahevaeva

My dear baby Nana,

On 26 June 2015, you made me a mother. On 26 June 2016, you turned 1 year old and today you are turning 2.

Eva_Lai_4 Eva_Lai_5 Eva_Lai_6 Eva_Lai_7 Eva_Lai_8 Eva_Lai_9 Eva_Lai_10 Eva_Lai_11 Eva_Lai_12 Eva_Lai_13

Where does all the time go?

In this year, you learned how to walk, run, jump, talk, sing, speak, communicate, draw, read books, make friends, bite and push other kids, greet, said sorry and thank you, being compassionate and expressing yourself. You are developing your own little character throughout your first birthday until today. You are demanding, sometimes annoying but yet you are very loving. You impress me every single day on all the tiny little milestones that you achieved. I’m truly grateful that I’m there, to be with you, to witness all of them and to teach as well as learn together with you.

You speak Malaysian English, Cantonese and a little bit of Mandarin. By age of 2, you can speak a short sentence with 3 different languages. You are truly Malaysian.

You still hurt yourself every now and then because sometimes I’m not fast enough to run towards you and protect you. You are very petite in size as to compare to your age and sometimes I get comments from strangers as if I starve you and ate all the food myself. Sometimes we eat out when I’m too lazy (or frustrated to cook). There you might have eaten some msg or whatever seasoning that isn’t good for your health. Sometimes I ignore you because I’m too tired (or lazy) to response. I just wanted to let you know that I’m not a perfect mother. But I’m trying to be as good as possible, to love and to protect you with everything I have.

Thank you for calling me “mummy mummy mummy” endlessly. Thank you for giving me a pat on my shoulder when I told you “mummy is sad”. Thank you for letting me sleep in a little bit more in some days without waking me up and greet me with your charming smile with your best “good morning mummy” greeting every morning. Thank you for kissing me good night before you go to the bed. Thank you for loving me wholeheartedly every minute every second until you need to peak on me when I’m on the toilet doing my business. Thank you for running towards me and hug my leg when I’m in the kitchen cooking our meal just because you wish I can sit down and play with you. Thank you for giving me a thumbs up on the food I cook for you. Thank you for testing my limit and challenge my patience. Thank you for giving me joy and laughter. Most of all, thank you for being my friend and spending these beautiful moments with me.

Eva_Lai_14 Eva_Lai_15 Eva_Lai_16 Eva_Lai_17 Eva_Lai_18 Eva_Lai_19 Eva_Lai_20 Eva_Lai_21 Eva_Lai_22 Eva_Lai_23 Eva_Lai_24 Eva_Lai_25 Eva_Lai_26 Eva_Lai_27

26 June 2017.

Happy 2nd Birthday my baby girl. You are and always will be my baby.

Love,

Your mummy mummy mummy.

Eva_Lai_28

Images taken at various places using Lomo LC-A+ & LC-Wide loaded with various film.

The Lion City

Posted on April 3, 2015 by ahevaeva

As I remember, we went to Singapore January or February last year. Haha. Well, we took a long weekend break at Singapore and kinda do nothing but just walk around the city and chill.

It’s my first visit to Gardens by the Bay and it was spectacular. We just walk around the garden and snap some pictures. It was really windy that day. We kinda enjoy ourselves very much to just chill and relax by the garden.

000005

It’s polka dots kind of day 😀

We went to the colorful Haji Lane as well. I’ve always love this lane. It’s more or less like our Bangsar, with so many indie fashion brands as well as cafes. So we kinda just walk around and have a good cup of coffee.

We are the 1984 kid 🙂

Other than that, we went to Chinatown and it’s so crowded due to it’s before Chinese New Year. But pretty interesting, there’s so many snacks and decorations items as well as some street performance.

I manage to meet up with Hakimbo, my colleague during my Lomo days and we had a great conversation over the coffee near Orchard. Besides that, I’m glad that my brother is there to host us and bring us around for good food as well.

Open mouth 😀

This series of images taken by Canon F1 and LC-Wide.

Bye Singapore. See you soon.

Love,

Eva Eva

A Get-Away From The Hustle Bustle City, Kin Tick Orchard Village

Posted on October 9, 2014 by ahevaeva

May 2014.

A short weekend getaway with my dear friend Jinboon and her dear neighbours to Kin Tick Orchard Village, a resort somewhere nearby Bentong and Bukit Tinggi.

Well, basically, there’s nothing to do here. People who came here, looking for a good environment, to stay overnight, to do nothing, to just chill with family and friends, to get away from the busy daily life at the hustle bustle city. The village are still new, and there’s few activities you can do over here, like e.g. jungle tracking, swimming, jogging and cycling. The good thing about this place is, low internet connectivity and coverage. Basically, you might lost contact with the world. Which is important when you came to a place like this, you can really just put away your phone and stay connected with the people beside you.

Slow internet connectivity.

Read and just chill.

Sweet couples.

Single and available. Any takers? Haha!

Taking nap.

Same skin color. Friend friend.

Well, under such environment and weather, it’s perfect to take a nap.

Groupie by self-timer.

It’s indeed a great place for a bunch of friends or family members to gather together.

This series taken by Canon F1 loaded with Fomapan 100 (B&W).

Horas, Danau Toba!

Posted on September 15, 2014 by ahevaeva

It’s our annual trip and from 13th – 17th Sept 2013, exactly one year ago, we heading to Lake Toba, Northern Sumatra, Indonesia.

Lake Toba is the site of a massive super volcanic eruption that occur many thousands years ago, and it was the largest known explosive eruption on Earth. The moment I knew the history of this particular lake, am really impressed.

We flew from different places and meeting up at Medan; from Kuala Lumpur, Pekanbaru, Penang, Singapore and Kuantan. Then we start our journey to the ‘danau’ (it means lake in Malay) and it tooks about 5-6 hours bus ride. It was a very tiring journey, but despite all the tiredness, we are glad that we could meet up and gather together. Well, after 5-6hours bus ride we finally reached the jetty where it’s the place we wait for the big ferry which bring us to across to the island where all the resorts located. And, we waited for a great 4-5hours to finally reached our turn to go in. GOSH! We accidentally bump into the same weekend of the “Festival Danau Toba” which there’s lots of happening events, which is great, but, it explain why the queue to the island is so long as well. At 2am local time, we finally reached the resort and everyone is superb exhausted.

But the scenic view of the lake does worth all the waits. We went for sight-seeing, cruise, swim at the lake (which is really hard, haha, as we need to use lots of energy to make ourselves float and move around compare to swimming in the pool or by the sea.). Oh, and we had one very “magical night” as well. 😀

We spent around 2 days here and then we head to Berastagi, where by the time we visiting Mt. Sinabung near the hill towns of Berastagi erupted again! Gosh, and by the time we visited Berastagi, it’s full of ashes and it’s not suitable for sightseeing. Anyhow, we head back to Medan after a night stay at the town. We did nothing much but just walking around and enjoying some Chinese delicacy around the town.

A short trip, pretty tiring, few of us experience food poisoning and fever during the trip but then, it’s good to be able to meet up and travel together with my dear friends.