Review: My Zalora Adventure aka “Where’s my refund?”

It has been over a hot minute since I last posted here. It’s been an interesting year, and I should have been documenting it more (for myself, but also for the one person who may or may not stumble across this blog – hi!), so what better time to try again than now?

Aaaaanywho, since this site is about reviewing stuff, let’s get into the meat and bones of this post.

**Also,  this post is solely a reflection of my experiences, and of my personal opinions. Others may have had a completely different experience, and in that case, good for them. Seriously.**

You’ve seen their ads on Facebook, Instagram, and on random websites you’ve visited. Their marketing game is strong – only in the sense that they seem to have a presence wherever you dilly dally on the interwebz. I’ll just be on Facebook, creeping on other people’s lives, and oh wait- who’s that creeping on mine?

See what I mean??

 

Anyways, I’m slightly ashamed to say that I’ve been looking for a pair of gladiator sandals. Yes, I know they were cool like two summers ago. Yes, I know I’m late to the party. But I decided now (of all times) was when I really needed them, and thus began my hunt.

I went to a few stores (Top Shop, H&M, Cotton On to name a few) and after not finding what I wanted, I decided to continue my search online. I went on ASOS and found a really nice pair of sandals but wasn’t quick enough; the last pair in my size disappeared when the page refreshed.

Not sure where else to look, I thought about the Zalora ads splattered all over my Facebook, and decided to try my luck there. After perusing the sandal section, and searching with my keywords, I managed to find a somewhat cute pair of sandals; they weren’t exactly the gladiator style I was looking for, but they would do. Plus, they were only HKD 280 at the time, which was pretty cheap. The cherry on top was that you could pay Cash on Delivery, they’d be delivered in a few days (less than a week!), and there were free returns in 30 days. With all that in mind, I put my order in and waited.

Cute no? These were the one I got.

The shoes came 3 business days later, and I had them mailed to my work. I paid the delivery guy, and rushed back to my desk to open the package. The shoes were in a shoebox that was wrapped in a nondescript black plastic bag. I tore through the middle and got to the shoes and put them on.

Cue disappointment. (And apologies for the lack of pictures, I wrote this on a whim of inspiration.)

This part is my fault, and I’ll admit to that. I ordered the sandals in a US size 7. I’m actually a size 6.5, and, worried that the shoes would be too tight in a 6 (there were no half sizes), I ordered a 7. So guess what. They were too loose. I jostled my foot around, trying to see if there was a way I could make it work. Nope.

Le me, if I had kept the sandals.

Cursing myself for choosing to size up instead of down (“Dammit, these are sandals, what were you thinking?”), I decided that I would return the shoes, and try my luck with another pair in a more fitting size. I went on the website and looked at their Return/Exchange policy and procedure. Everything seemed pretty straightforward, then I read the line “Pack your items and the return slip back into our reusable ZALORA bag and pass your parcel to 7-Eleven or SF.”

Oh no.

I had literally ripped through the middle of my bag to get the box out. But after closer inspection of the bag, there was no Zalora label, or nothing to indicate that it was nothing other than a black plastic bag. It didn’t even say reusable. Not wanting to miss out on my refund due to this, I managed to stuff the shoebox back in. I filed an exchange form online, and decided to drop the package off at the 7-Eleven near Boo’s home (not to be confused with B).

That night, Boo came with as I dropped the package off at the 7-Eleven. The poor guy seemed to have never had to deal with such a return before, and balked even more when I started speaking to him in English. Thankfully it all worked out, and after giving him my phone number, we got my exchange record, and he took the half ripped shoebox filled bag from me, and we went off to enjoy the rest of our night.

Now everything up to this point was great, and had gone pretty smoothly. I sent the package back the day I received it (early in the week), and after tracking the package, I saw that it arrived on the Friday. Processing the return would take 1 – 2 working days, according to the website, so I decided to check in the following Tuesday.

I checked my account balance on Tuesday, and didn’t see the money back (I asked for the refund in store credit). Hmmmm. I decided to give them a few more days, maybe there was a backlog of returns. Pulled open the page on Wednesday. Nothing. Checked again on Thursday. Nothing.

Surely, it must be there by Friday? And of course, nothing. I didn’t even get an email notifying me that the had received my package. I decided to email their Customer Service, and see what was up. I attached a photo of my receipt, and asked them when I could expect a return.

To be fair, their CS got back to me fairly quickly. They acknowledged my package’s arrival, but didn’t give me an estimated time of when I would receive my refund. They also mentioned that they got a spike in return packages (good thing or bad thing?) I decided to cut them some slack and give them a few days.

When I still did not see the store credit, I started to get annoyed. I sent them another email, and got the standard “we are investigating your case, blah blah blah” email, and in the following few days, I sent two more emails and received the exact same response.

I eventually got fed up and sent a somewhat snippy email back, but that seemed to work (or maybe enough time had passed) because I got the credit back within a day. YAY.

Fed up me after receiving the same responses the last two emails.

I ended up using it to buy a pair of workout shorts from Lorna Jane (didn’t want to risk it with shoes again), and the process for getting the shorts was just as easy as getting the shoes. And thankfully, they fit, so I didn’t have to go about asking for another refund. Aaaand big plus, they came in a proper Zalora delivery bag this time, with the logo across it and an indication to where the bag should be opened.

So, verdict? 3/5

Conclusion: While the process of buying and getting your items delivered to you is painless and super easy, God have mercy on your soul if you decide to ask for a refund. Returning the items and speaking with CS is pretty convenient, but the actual process of getting your money back will probably take some time. Also, keep in mind this is for store credit, so maybe those of you who got it via bank transfer had more luck.

So if you know what you want, and are super confident with sizing (and the fact that you’ll like your purchase), Zalora is great and definitely for you.

I, however, do not think I’ll be trying them again anytime soon.

 

 

Let’s talk about games: Clash Royale (iOS + Android)

Hey y’all, long time no see!

During my year-long hiatus, I’ve gone through a lot of ups and downs, and basically forgot I even had this blog. When I logged in, I found an unfinished draft for a food review that I was supposed to put up and never did. Unfortunately, I don’t have the photos for that post, so it will never go live, but I did decide to write about something else that I’ve been doing recently.

So onto the fun stuff.

CLASH ROYALE.

Main Loading Page

Let me start off by saying I’m not much of mobile gamer; I’m kind of old fashioned and think that all “real” gaming should be done via PC or console. But I read an article on Pocket Gamer about how Clash Royale is basically the world’s top grossing game, and wanting to see what the fuss was about, I downloaded it. I was a little skeptical because I had previously downloaded Clash of Clans, and had not found it to be my cup of tea, but wanting to be open-minded (and really needing something new to play), I decided to give this a shot.

In the most simple terms, this game’s aim is to take down the other player’s main castle, and you do this by sending out a motley crew of troops that will do their darnedest to make sure it happens. Your main castle (or Crown Tower in the game) is flanked by two smaller Crown towers, and  your opponent must destroy at least one of your towers to access your main tower. You don’t have to destroy all 3 buildings to win, just the main one.

Battle Set Up

While battling, your hand only has access to 4 out of the 8 cards you have in your chosen Battle Deck, and the card you can play depends on the how much elixir you have. Your elixir bar fills up over time, so you do have chances to play your more costly (and usually stronger) cards, if you’re patient enough. Each game runs for 3 minutes, but once you hit the last 60 seconds, your elixir bar fills up twice as fast, allowing you to dish out  more troops faster. Whenever you send out a troop, a random one from your Battle deck is chosen to replace it in  your 4 card hand.

Mid-battle!

As Clash Royale is also developed by Supercell (Clash of Clan’s developer daddy), the graphics and style of characters are pretty much same for both games. Its characters look more cute and quirky, rather than tough and menacing, which I’m sure opens the game up to an audience of more casual gamers. Each character is unique in look and fighting style, and you can fight with everything from a horde of skeletons (whose strengths are in numbers rather than damage), to a baby dragon (who’s tough as  nails and shoots out fireballs).

My Battle Deck and Card Collection

Every battle you win rewards you with a chest, which you can open to get new cards/characters. There are a few types of chests, and winning a silver or gold chest is pretty standard. However, there are rare occasions where you can get chests like the Magical chest that contain rare Epic cards. It is also possible to receive multiples of cards you already own, and you can use these to upgrade your characters, making them stronger, and simultaneously adding to your level bar. The higher your level, the stronger you Crown Towers are.

A Golden Chest waiting to be unlocked!

Opening a Silver Chest.

Leveling up!

There is also an option to join a clan. Now this is a fairly new function for me (I tend to be a very anti-social gamer) but I recently joined a clan that consists of a few of my coworkers, and the cool thing is that you can ask clan members to donate cards to you, and sometimes they will! You can also chat with your clan members and share recent battles that you’ve had, for them to watch. And if you’re really into watching other people battle, there is a whole tab called TV Royale where you can watch other players (not necessarily your clan members) battle against each other in what the game claims are some of the best battles, so take notes!

Card Requests from Clan members.

TV Royale for your viewing pleasure.

Despite the fact I don’t like to play against people, I find that I do quite enjoy this game. At first I was just sending out whatever troops I could afford to, but I’ve slowly started to develop more of a strategy than just trying to “THIS IS SPARTA” my way through everything.

Your Main screen.

What I don’t like about the game, however, is the amount of push notifications you get. There are several times I would get a push saying that my chests were open, when in reality, I still would have to wait  few hours before I could get any new cards. You, of course, have the option to open chests faster with gems, which you can earn through battles (opening “victory” chests), or buy as in-app purchases. You can also use these gems to buy the rarer chests that contain Epic cards.

The Shop – buy cards, chests, and gems here.

So whether you’re a hardcore gamer, or someone who’s never played games before, I urge you to give this one a try. The tutorial is easy to understand and helps you pick up the game fairly quickly, and playing against different people will always keep the game consistently challenging, and make every victory you earn that much sweeter.

I’m a winner. 🙂

Verdict: 4/5

Get Clash Royale on the Play Store and on iTunes.

 

 

SZ Adventures: Colleague Music Restaurant (音乐主题餐厅)

Hello hello!

So it’s definitely been a while since I last posted… Sorry about that, general life stuff got in the way and I was in Korea for a week visiting family. I did take some photos there, but it’s mostly me hanging out with a bunch of dogs and some food photos here and there. I’ll post them later, ’cause today, I wanna talk about this cool restaurant I found when I was hanging out with B in the good ol’ SZ.

I tend to get to Shenzhen pretty damn early, around 7.40 to 8.00 am, and the first thing I usually say when I see B is “I’m hungry.” So while we were on the subway, brainstorming places around his neighborhood we could eat at (that were actually open at this time), he mentioned a nice little ramen shop he liked and we decided to go there. As we exited the subway station, I spotted an advertisement for a restaurant that served some kind of coconut chicken, and B mentioned this restaurant was literally across from the ramen shop. He also mentioned that it was super popular, and there were usually a lot of people waiting outside for seats.

So guess where we went instead.It was actually open too! A sign next to their door boasted that they served food around the clock, from 0.00 to 24.00. Unsurprisingly, there were no lines outside the restaurant when we got there. B laughed at me and asked who would eat something like this for breakfast. (Me. I’ll eat this for breakfast.) I get it though. For most, breakfast is usually pancakes, or toast, or congee… What we were going to eat was definitely more of a lunch/dinner type of meal.

But hey, that’s how I roll. I’d have pasta for breakfast if you gave it to me.

So we went in, got seated near the windows by sleepy staff members who gave us curious looks, and looked at the menu.

This restaurant’s main thing is coconut chicken, and it’s cooked in sort of a hotpot style. Each table has a small stove in the middle where you put your pot of chicken and let the lil guy cook till you get to nom. You can get the all original Coconut Chicken, but there are other options like the Coconut Chicken with Bamboo Fungus, Braised Wenchang Chicken with River Turtle, Characteristic Mutton Pot (name-wise, this may be a lost in translation thing…), etc. Just like Hai Di Lao, there is a list of other things (both vegetable and meat) that you can order to dump into your pot and hang out with your chicken. The menu’s flipside also offers some small snack dishes, kebabs (available after 6.00 pm) and a variety of drinks.

We ordered the “Original Flavor Coconut Chicken Suite for 2 people” (hey, that’s what it said on the menu, man) which consisted of the coconut chicken, assorted veggies, fried yuba, beef balls, and a side of claypot rice with dried duck. We also ordered a side of spicy jellyfish and spicy seaweed ’cause it sounded delicious.

After we ordered, the waiter poured water into the pot, turned on the stove, then went to get our chicken. He brought it out, and dumped the plate of chicken and coconut shavings into the pot, and asked us to set the timer (it’s a little hourglass!) while telling us the chicken would be ready once the sand ran out.As we were the only customers there at that time, the server kept coming over to see if we needed anything. When he saw that the timer had run out, and we were reaching for the chicken in the pot, he stopped us and insisted we try the broth first. B and I were confused, as it didn’t seem like the combination of water + chicken + coconut – any seasoning or spices = anything that would taste good at all, but we gave it a shot.

AND MAN, DID I NOT REGRET THAT.Honestly, I’m not 100% sure whether the broth was just water and chicken and coconut, or if they had used some kind of flavored broth to boil the chicken to begin with, but honestly, it didn’t really matter. The taste was a perfect combination of sweet and savory; first you get the sweet taste of coconut before a slightly salty chicken taste comes and pokes at your taste buds. Trust me, it’s delicious.We drank our soup and started on the chicken, which was tasted slightly “coconuty”, but the dipping sauce (which was a light sweet soy sauce that you could add chili and coconut to) added a little more flavor and a little more punch to the lightly flavored chicken. After making our way through some of the chicken, we added the veggies, the beef balls, and the yuba (basically tofu skin) and when also paired with the sauce, they were just as delicious as the chicken.

As for the side dishes, I loved the jellyfish dish. It was bouncy and soft, but had a slight crunch to it on the first bite. The sauce was nice and spicy as well. For those that are grossed out about eating jellyfish, DON’T BE! I promise, when done right, it’s possibly one of the most delicious things ever, but like with a lot of things, you just gotta make sure it’s made with the right sauce. Jellyfish itself is quite bland, but it’s a texture food, so sauce it up right! (Apologies, we ate most the jellyfish before I remembered to take a photo… this is what was left)The seaweed dish was… meh. Definitely wasn’t gonna order that one again. It was spicy, but it tasted too much like the sea. Don’t get me wrong, I like my seaweed with a little bit of sea left in there, and things from the sea should be fresh from the sea, but I do like there to be some cleaning and slight soaking to get rid of sea taste and smell. I don’t think this particular dish may have gone through a very “de-seaing” process, so again, not my favorite.

Claypot rice is always a winner in my book, but by that time, we were reaching our limit. The rice was well cooked and covered in sauce, and there was a good amount of dried sausage and dried duck meat in there. If you’re familiar with the Chinese dried meats and rice dish, you’ll know everything is slightly salty and tough, but in a good way. It goes well with the rice and the sauce, and if we had the room, I’m sure we could have cleared that dish right up. B and I tried to finish what we could, but in the end, the food was the last one standing.Since I have first gone to this restaurant, we have been back again, and this time at night. We had to wait for a table for around 10 minutes (there were lots of people sitting outside the restaurant, also waiting) and when seated, we had to share a table with another party of 6. This is common in HK but not something that I think anyone really enjoys. The nice thing about having dinner there is that they usually have live music shows. We ate dinner fairly early that night (around 5.30) and we left as they were just starting their show. I didn’t get any photos of that night, but there was a girl on the guitar singing “Pumped Up Kicks” by Foster the People, and she had a nice voice. The restaurant is called “Colleague Music Restaurant”, so it definitely makes sense that the would have live music.The restaurant’s interior is also very unique, their lights are covered in birdcages, they have floor to ceiling bookcases next to their stage that have random books and lamps, as well as little knick knacks like a vase, a radio, a french horn and other things on their shelves. It gives off an “artsy” kind of feel, which I’m sure is what they’re going for. Honestly, I could be eating inside of a cave and not really care as long as the food was delicious and clean, but this was a nice little something to enjoy while I was inhaling my breakfast.

So a big YES to the coconut chicken, and even though it’s open all hours of the day, come for dinner to enjoy the live show! (But come earlyish otherwise you’ll probably have to wait a long time before you get seated.)

I know this is usually where I put the address and phone number of the place (and website if there’s one) but I’m waiting on B to help me with all that right now, so sorry y’all! I’ll update later with the details, but I wanted to publish this first so y’all could see the photos 😛

SZ Adventures: Mu Wu Shao Kao (木屋烧烤)

So after 5 weeks apart, I was finally reunited with B last last Saturday, when he returned from his hometown trip. It was a great day, vegged out, went to see Taken 3, and we went to my other favorite SZ restaurant, Mu Wu Shao Kao (木屋烧烤).

B being from Northeastern China has a big thing for beer and skewers of meat, and when we first went to Mu Wu, he said that it was pretty decent. It’s also a chain that’s found in several districts in SZ, and specializes in skewered meats (beef, chicken, seafood, etc). Skewered meat. I guess I can just say “kebabs.” Kebabs.

They take a break from about 3pm – 5pm, so we got to the restaurant around 2 to get our food on. The menu has some English on there, but it also had pictures, so I picked a bunch of things according to what my eyes/stomach were telling me. Each item is assigned a number, and to order, you just jot the number down onto your order form along with the quantity that you want. 

We ordered beef balls, lots and lots of lamb kebabs, honey glazed ribs and sausage, grilled squid, mushrooms, raw cucumbers with awesome sauce (reminds of Korean fermented bean sauce) and my favorite, POTATOES. Man, I love potatoes. 

We also ordered a 7 Up for him and a “Coconut Palm” drink for me, but since we’ve never had kebabs without beer, we also ended up ordering that too. 🙂 

We both eat fairly quickly, so it wasn’t long before our plates were clean and our drinks drained. Service at that particular branch wasn’t great – even after people left, they wouldn’t clear the tables until new customers arrived, and the branch we were eating at only had two servers. 

Nevertheless, the food came out pretty quickly, and it was delicious as usual. It’s not super pricey, so you can get a decent meal for less than 200 RMB (we paid around 160RMB). Also, if anyone reading this ever goes, I wholly recommend the oyster dish. We’ve had it before and can vouch for its yumminess.

Here’s their website: (all in Chinese unfortunately)

http://www.muwu.net.cn/

PS. If anyone is wondering about Taken 3, it was ok. Really, once you’ve seen one Taken, you’ve seen them all. If you’re looking for an easy action movie with the bonus of Liam Neeson’s horrendous accent, go watch it!

To my best friend and oldest friend – I miss you. So much.

I’m still in the very early stages of blogging (this being my fourth post and all) and so far things have been light and fun.

Unfortunately, something not so light and fun happened this past weekend, and it’s still something that weighs very heavily on my heart.

On Saturday morning at 5am, I got a call from the vet. My cat, Nanau, had collapsed and the vet was trying to resuscitate her.

“We don’t know what happened, but she suddenly collapsed,” she told me. “I’ve done some massage and we’re trying to get her heart beating again, but sometimes when we try to bring them back, it can be worse for them…”

Though I had just woken up, I knew that I she was asking me to make a decision. I could tell her to keep trying, to keep massaging my cat so maybe I could see her again. So maybe I could give her one last hug, one last kiss.

But I knew that wasn’t the right choice.

“Well… I don’t want to her to suffer anymore… So I guess you can let her go.”

The vet assured me this was the right thing to do, and though I could hear her talking, it was hard for me to listen to anything. A selfish part of me wondered if I had made the right choice. If I had asked her to keep trying, would Nanau have been able to pull through? Maybe she could beat the odds and bounce back to a somewhat healthy state…

A part of me still wonders that now, but it’s so hard to say. If she had not gone to the vet and just stayed with me, could she have possibly lived longer? Even for a few more days?

The Sunday before she passed, I had noticed her walking off balance. Yes, she was getting on in years, but she had always been a healthy cat. We had checked her a year before and found out she had suffered from Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD), something common in aging cats. But at that point, it hadn’t been serious, so we had taken her home, and lived on as usual. She drank a lot more water than before, but otherwise, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. But when I saw her stumbling around, unable to jump down from places without waddling a few steps after, I decided she should go see the vet.

The vet examined her and everything on the outside seemed fine. She had lost a little weight, and was not walking around great, but nothing seemed seriously wrong. We did a blood test, then waited around 20 minutes for the results. I was relieved and thought Nanau would be able to come home soon and away from what I’m sure she thought was a traumatic experience.

But when we were called back into the exam room, I could see her test results pulled up on the computer screen. Many of her results were in the red… and not just in the red, but farrrrr in the red. Her CKD had rapidly progressed to Stage 3  (out of 4) and the vet said she had to be hospitalized and put on fluids immediately. I was also told that it was possible she may not have long to live, and after hearing that, I cried on the way home.

I visited her everyday for the next few days. I would give her pep talks on how she should tell her kidneys to fight the disease, and how she should start eating food so she could come home. Every day I told her I loved her, I missed her, and I had not forgotten her.

She looked like she was getting better. She was scheduled to take a blood test on Saturday, and it would determine if she’d have to stay longer or if she could come home. I was optimistic. Friday night she had seemed cranky, which is how healthy Nanau would act if kept at the vet’s for this long. She had given me the stink eye but had still let me stroke her chin, and meowed in annoyance when I playfully grabbed her tail. I was so sure she would be home on Monday. I postponed my plans to see B in SZ on Saturday, so I could be there for the blood test results.

Then the call came.

Nanau lived a full and happy (albeit boring) life. She was by no means young when she died, but I don’t think anyone is ever 100% ready to let go of a loved one. In 1998, we found her under a car, and that was when she could still fit in the palm of my hand. We took her home and though I think she resented it at first, she grew to tolerate/somewhat love us. There are four of us in my family, but for some reason, she picked me. She would follow me around, playfully bat at my ankles, sleep with me at night (sometimes on my feet, next to my head, on top of my head) and attack my toes when I accidentally kicked her in my sleep. She was never overly affectionate, but as she got on in years, she mellowed out and in the last year before her death, she would always find a way to crawl onto my lap whenever I was at the computer.

It’s still weird to come home and not see her hiding under my covers, or trotting over to me, asking for water. I keep looking at the ground, expecting to see her looking back up at me, and see her give me a content slow blink.

Nanau, thank you for being a part of my life, and letting me be a part of yours. You were my first cat, you taught me so much and you let me experience the joy of having a crazy furball as a best friend. I will always cherish our time together, and the memories we made will always be close to my heart.

I love you, I miss you, and I’ll never forget you.

Nanau

1998 – 2015

To all cat owners (esp. those with older cats), please get your cats checked for CKD. Here are some links that will tell you more about it:

http://pets.webmd.com/cats/kidney-failure-uremia-symptoms-cats

http://www.icatcare.org:8080/advice/cat-health/chronic-kidney-disease-cats-%E2%80%93-management

Also, speak to your local vet if you are concerned.

A huge thank you to the East Island Animal Hospital staff for taking great care of Nanau in her final days. For those in HK looking for good reliable vets, look no further:

http://www.eastislandvets.com.hk/en/

Lastly, one of my best friends sent me a poem she found and I have found it comforting. I hope it brings comfort to others who have also lost a furry friend.

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.

When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge.
There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together.
There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor; those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by.
The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind.

They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent; His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.

You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart.

Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together….

Author unknown…

Let’s talk about Games: Tales from the Borderlands

***All images used are direct screenshots taken from actual gameplay – yeah, I took screenshots during my third play through of this game. ***

So when I said I would review stuff, I really did mean stuff. Like all kinds of stuff. And since I love games, why wouldn’t I include that? Here’s the first review of something that is not edible.

TALES FROM THE BORDERLANDS!!!

I have never played any of the Borderlands games. Honestly, I bought Borderlands 2 when it was on sale on Steam, but after playing the first half hour, I stopped. It’s not that it wasn’t entertaining, the issue I had was that I suck at shooters. I do the thing where when something comes running at me, I panic and my hand does this crazy dance trying to aim at my attacker, and I end up emptying my gun 3 feet left of the target I was aiming for. This “strategy”only works to my advantage if there  happens to be something else I have to shoot already standing there, but usually this is not the case. But enough about Borderlands 2. I will stick to my story heavy games thank you.

TFTB (as it will be henceforth known in this post) is developed by Telltale Games. Anyone familiar with Telltale knows that they were the masterminds behind The Wolf Among Us, and the Walking Dead series, starring Lee and Clementine. I had played Wolf and Walking Dead, and have fallen in love with the gameplay and the stories from each of the games. When I heard Telltale was developing TFTB, I wasn’t super interested at first, but since the other games had been a hit, I figured “what the hell” and bought it off Steam when the first episode came out. I didn’t actually get around to playing it until recently, and I am so glad I did. In episode one (“Zer0 Sum”), you start out playing as Rhys, an ambitious member of the Hyperion corporation who’s on his way to the top of the corporate ladder. (Flattering screen of him below, isn’t it?)

But after he suddenly finds himself screwed over by his biggest rival, he decides to screw said rival over and this leads him on a crazy adventure to the planet Pandora, and also links his story to your other character, Fiona.

Fiona is a con artist, and has her own back story that I won’t talk about as it might spoil the story for those who haven’t played it yet. What’s great is that from the options you are given in conversations with other NPCs, you can make Fiona and Rhys as “heart of gold” or as “badass” as you like. There are also several “big” decisions you have to make in game later, and this will affect how some of your future episodes will play out. Por ejemplo, there are some choices you make that could determine whether someone lives or dies. If you let them die, how will it affect the story later? And vice versa.

**Oh yeah, for those unfamiliar with Telltale games, each game usually consists of 5 episodes, and the episodes are not released all at once. You pay for the package of 5 episodes, so you don’t have to pay every time a new episode is released. **

As someone who is unfamiliar with the Borderlands world, I was worried I wouldn’t really be able to follow the story, but the game does a good job of explaining the world around you, and not in a way that takes you out of the story. There are some QTEs (Quick Time Events) that show up during fight scenes so it’s not just “all story no action”, but don’t expect to have full control over your character and be able to kick ass Mortal Kombat style.

You also meet a wild bunch of colorful characters in the game, because I guess everyone’s a little bit nuts in that world. The game is well-written, and there were times where I honestly was laughing out loud at how ridiculous it was and how funny some of the characters were.

I don’t really get the Psychos though, but they say funny nonsensical stuff.

If you like story-driven games with a small dose of action/fighting, I’d say this is a good game for you. It’s kind of like reading a “choose your own adventure” book, or watching a movie where you get to make all the choices. Though there is currently no news to when the second episode will be released (as Telltale is currently working on a couple other games like Game of Thrones and A Minecraft Story), fingers crossed that it’ll be sometime soon!

Tales From the Borderlands – USD 24.99 on Steam (Also available on Mac, PS3, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox 360, Android, and iOS)

Rated M (Ages 17+)

https://www.telltalegames.com/talesfromtheborderlands/

For a more fleshed out/ in depth review, I’d suggest checking out IGN’s review of TFTB: http://www.ign.com/articles/2014/11/26/tales-from-the-borderlands-episode-1-zero-sum-review

HK Nights: Gurkha

I don’t go out as much as I used to. Not that I was a crazy party girl before, but I remember I came back from college one summer holiday, and went out every night of the week just because I wanted to. Now, I’ve grown into such a lazy hermit, even thinking about going out makes me want to crawl into bed with a TV show playing on my laptop so I can watch other people go out and have fun while not having to deal with sweaty and drunk people myself. JUDGE ME NOT, PJS AND BED TIME ARE JUST AS FUN AS DRINKING AND SOCIALIZING.

Meh.

But, on the occasion that I do make it out, it’s usually with my friend J, and I usually end up going to the same two bars, one of which is Gurkha.

I’ve known Gurkha’s owner, Meenu, for quite some time now. In my senior year of high school, I used to frequent a shisha bar called Sahara and I met her while she was working there. She eventually got her own restaurant/bar in Soho called Annapurna, and after several years of being in Soho, she has since moved her businesses down to the hustle and bustle of Lan Kwai Fong. And yes, I said businesses. She owns Gurkha, its sister bar Fresh, and private kitchen/restaurant Annapurna. Impressive lady, no?

Gurkha is nestled between China Bar and some other bar I never pay attention to which has a bouncer outside, so it may actually be a club. It’s across from Al’s Diner, and is near the “new” 7Eleven. (Sorry for the potato quality picture of the sign below)

As with most bars in LKF, it’s generally pretty busy on the weekends, and they have Happy Hour every day from 5 pm – 10 pm . The atmosphere is pretty relaxed before 9ish/10ish on weekends, then the music gets turned up and it kinda turns  into a club with flashing lights and green lasers shooting around your face. There are a few TVs in the bar that will start with Just For Laughs videos at the beginning of the night, providing you the distraction of laughing at awkward people on TV if you don’t feel like talking to your date/friend/person you’re hanging out with. Or you could be laughing together. Later in the night, Just For Laughs turns into the music videos of the songs you are bumping to/bobbing your head to as you drink to get to bumping level.  DJ Troy plays a wide variety of music, from old school hip hop to today’s top 40, K-pop to 80s hits. 

The staff are friendly and can make a mean drink too. You can get your gin and tonics, whisky neats, vodka redbulls, and there are also a selection of signature Gurkha drinks, and some snacks if you’re feeling peckish as well. Though I usually don’t eat when I’m there, the pizza, sandwiches, and the momos are a must try! THE MOMOSSSSSS!!! (Sorry, no pictures cuz though we did order them later, I did not take photos. I blame the alcohol.)

Price-wise, a cocktail will probably be around 60 – 80ish HKD, if you go during Happy Hour, you’ll, of course, have slightly cheaper drinks. I did take a picture of a page off the menu below, but I doubt you can really see anything… I had a Tom Collins that night I went out (pictured below) and it was dangerously easy to drink. A couple of those and I was feeling pretty happy for the rest of that night. One of the highlights was when “Wannabe” and “Say You’ll Be There”came on, and I rocked that shit like I was the sixth Spice Girl. Yuppp.

So come one, come all to Gurkha. The music’s great, the staff professional and friendly, and the regulars are not bad either. Heh.

I’ll add posts about Fresh and Annapurna whenever I end up going there next.

Until next time.

Gurkha – Shop B, LG/F, Ho Lee Commercial Building, 44 D’aguilar Street, LKF Central District, Hong Kong
Phone: 2790 8311

SZ Adventures: Hai Di Lao Hotpot

So.

First post ever.

I’ve decided to use this blog to give writing a shot. So I’ve decided to write about food that I eat. But since I’m not sure whether this whole blog will be limited to food, I’ve just put that “I review stuff” as my tag line. Or was it “I review things”? Now I have to go back and check. Maybe I’ll change it. Also, I was struggling to make the quotation marks appear as I was typing and now I feel like a fool.

SO.

I live in Hong Kong, and on weekends, I like to go visit my boyfriend in China, specifically, Shenzhen. Since I get up at the buttcrack of dawn and get on the train pretty early (around 7), it takes me around 40 – 50 minutes to get there and though there are usually a lot of people going through immigration on the weekends, the whole process takes about 10 -20 minutes tops. YAY.

My boyfriend has only taken me to a handful of restaurants (we’re a super lazy couple that likes to watch TV and do not much else), but he knows how much I love food, and usually takes me to places with pretty decent food.

B (my bf) is originally from the north-eastern part of China, and over there (according to him), they like their beer, their meat skewers, and their hotpot. When B’s friend T came to visit him in SZ a few months ago, he took us to this restaurant called Hai Di Lao Hotpot (HDL), and it’s been one of my favorite places to eat at ever since.

HDL is actually a chain of hotpot restaurants found in many cities in China. On top of (what I consider to be) pretty awesome hotpot, they’re also known for their impeccable service. As soon as you step into the restaurant, waiters fly at you from left and right, greeting you as they show you to your table. As soon as you sit down, you’re given an iPad (the menu) and someone will come over to offer you a hot towel. If you have long hair, someone will come over with a hair tie. If they see your smart phone out, they will bring a small ziploc bag the exact size of your phone so you can keep hotpot soup from splashing all in its business. If your jacket is draped over the chair, someone will bring a cover to keep your jacket from getting dirty. Oh, and they give you aprons to wear so your clothes can be kept clean. Though I’ve never had to wait for a table, I’ve heard from B that some places offer free manicures for customers, and you can even get your shoes shined while waiting! Nuts.

I went to HDL with B last Sunday as a late Valentine’s Day lunch. You’d think we’d go somewhere more romantic with candles, and pasta that we could fork into each other’s mouths, but nah. Not to say I dislike that stuff, but I was craving for some hotpot and when I crave, I crave bad.

We got to the restaurant and were led to our table immediately. After sitting down, we got the iPad and got to ordering food. I love ordering with the iPad, it’s so damn convenient. There’s the option of ordering in English or in Chinese, but since there are pictures of the food, unless I really don’t know what something is, I just stick to Chinese. To you non-Chinese speakers, just warning you, no one really speaks English at these restaurants. Thankfully I have B with me so he takes care of the talking to people part, but if you don’t have your own B, good luck! Nah, I’m sure you’ll manage alright, but there might be some made up sign language and awkward moments ahead.

Back to the iPad. I should have taken a photo of it, but when I get to restaurants, I get distracted with the prospect of eating, and tend to forget to take photos of things until after I’ve eaten them. You can order all sorts of meat and seafood on there – lamb, beef, oysters, mussels, the works! In another section, you order veggies/non-meat stuff like white baby cabbage, spinach, potatoes, etc. You can also order noodles to put in your hotpot, and the first time I ate at HDL, a man dressed in all white (and topped with a white fedora) did what I can only describe as noodle dancing. I have a video if it somewhere so I’ll put it up eventually, but he basically has a loooooong noodle strand that he twirls around himself and around his head for a minute or two before breaking it up into smaller pieces to dump into your pot. It’s great.

We ordered a two different soup bases (WHICH YOU CAN TOTALLY DO AND IS AWESOME). B likes spicy stuff and though I do too, his level of spice wayyy surpasses mine. His spicy soup base is on the left, while mine is on the right, and according to him it was the Yuanyang Guo (鸳鸯锅), which is the spicy and non-spicy soup set. We’re not exactly sure what’s in the soup bases, which is pretty noobish of me, so I apologize, and will ask next time I go. (Hopefully I’ll remember to.)

Oh, and when you first sit down, a waiter/waitress will bring you a small plate of fruits. We got tomatoes and what I think were kumquats.

For meat, we ordered lamb and frog. Yes, FROG. I’m generally not a big fan of frog, but we had it last time and it was pretty damn good. For those who haven’t had it, yes, it does kind of taste like chicken, but the texture (to me) is kind of like fish. It’s not flaky, but it’s tender and can be a little bit chewy, like how steamed fish can be.

We also got beef balls, white baby cabbage, potatoes, seaweed, tofu strips, and corn. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a picture of the corn, but I’m sure you guys can imagine what it looks like.

The most important thing to me when it comes to hotpot, is the sauce. Sure everything is boiled in a soup base that’ll add flavor to meat/veggies/whatever else you put in there, but THE SAUCE. Man, if you can make a good sauce to go with your food, you’ve hit food heaven.

Yes, you have to make your own sauce. After ordering your food, you can go up to a counter that has a selection of different ingredients for you to choose from to make a sauce tailored to your taste buds. There are things like chopped garlic, cilantro, sesame seeds, peanut bits, vinegar, homemade soy sauce… There’s a ton of stuff. MAN, I really should have taken more photos…

UPDATE: I added photos of the sauce section! Check it out! But I did not remember to take photos of the iPad… GAH. Next time y’all, apologies. 

My sauce that B makes for me (and it tastes better ’cause it’s made with LOVE dammit) has garlic, cilantro, spring onions, cut chili bits, black vinegar, sesame seed oil, salt, sesame seeds, and I added fried/dried soy(?) beans to it. I tend to like sour stuff, and this sauce was bomb. Gave all my food a tangy, vinegary tinge that I loved, and the chilies gave it the extra kick that it needed. I also got a small bowl of sesame sauce, which is sweet and tastes like peanuts. Honestly,  you can get as many sauces as you want, so experiment away! But don’t waste food. That’s bad.

There are also fruits and some small dishes at the sauce station. We dumped some of the contents of the small dishes onto our small plate and sampled those. Nothing to go raving to your mom about, but it was alright. Again, can’t remember what exactly each of anything was, but there was a spicy black fungus dish, some beans, and I really don’t know what the last thing was. I’LL BE BETTER AT THIS IN THE FUTURE, I PROMISE.

UPDATE: LOOK LOOK I ADDED THE SIDE DISHES! No black fungus that day, but here’s an example of other things they may have.

Just writing about this is making me craveeeeeee… And I won’t be able to have this in a while, so DAMN YOU CRAVINGS, DAMN YOU. Anyways, we had our lunch plus two bottles of beer, and it was lovely. I do recommend this restaurant to anyone looking for hotpot in SZ – there’s a wide variety of soup bases, meats, veggies to choose from, and it’s all delicious.

HDL = good service + decent food + clean + many restaurants in different districts of SZ so easy-ish to find.

I’m gonna try take better photos and notes of what I’m doing, so hopefully I’ll get better at this.

Oh, and I got roses. Heehee.

http://www.haidilao.com/index.php – in Chinese