french

Despite having my birthday fall on Halloween, I never really had any elaborate celebrations for it, neither have I attended any halloween parties. You would think being born on the 31st of October would give me a free pass to any halloween party, but i've never been into celebrating halloween.
This is because,
a) I don't do spooky/gore/horror very well - nope i've never watch a horror film, and I will never
b) Halloween isn't that big in Singapore, at least not when I was younger.

So, while many londeners (and people around the world) dress up, paint their faces (I must say some of their self painted scars and wounds were so real. Props to them!) and head for parties, I had a nice quiet dinner with 2 of my favourite people from school, who just so happen to come down to London to spend some quality time with me.
(btw, to my other classmates - thank you for the midnight surprise and the cake. No wonder Jerald refused to let me go to sleep!)

The Bleeding Heart is a nice french restaurant located in Holborn.
According to the New Yorker, it is "Bleeding hard to find, but worth it." And it is true. It was pretty confusing trying to find the restaurant, but the bleeding heart bar is pretty prominently located, so the waiters at the bar were really nice and directed us to the restaurant.
I was so excited to finally go for a fancy dinner after having self-cooked meals for so long (not that I don't enjoy cooking with my friends).

Stepping in and being greeted with "Bonjour" and "Mademoiselle", plus waiters saying "Bon Appetite" after every course is served, really brought back memories of Paris. The whole ambience was amazing, the food was good, and the company was definitely the best part of my night.

Jerald and I both got wine. He got White wine and I got Rosé, and of course, they were both tasted pretty good. Not that I have any form of knowledge of how to judge the quality of wine, but my palette was very very happy with what was served.

That evening, I was having a meat craving. So I went for a duck and chicken starter, and suckling pig for mains. Jerald, who loves seafood, went for a lobster and avocado salad for starters, and both Fungyee and he got Fish for their main course.

Before our starters arrived, we were served some smoke salmon on a crispy toasted biscuit. Which was REALLY good. Like a burst of flavour in your mouth. All three of us loved it.

On a completely different note, the heart shaped lights in the ceiling left really nice heart shaped reflections on our plates!

Jerald swapped his starter with me halfway through the course because I realised finishing a whole meat starter would result in me being unable to finish my suckling pig. That is not the way it should go.

Our starters, mine (top) and Jerald's (bottom)

I actually think the portion was big enough for an afternoon snack, or even a main course. But disclaimer - I'm a small meals many meals sorta girl, I had to skip lunch that day to make sure I was hungry enough during dinner.

The waiters were really nice and kept checking with us if we were enjoying our meal, which made me feel warm, welcomed and at home.

I remember bubbling with delight upon the arrival of our main courses - the smell of the roast on the suckling pig was divine. It has been ages since I've had suckling pig, hence the joy.

I wished the skin was crispier and less hard, but the meat was nice and tender, and to my surprise, it really blended well with the apple sauce.

I've never really like mixing my salty and sweet when I'm hungry - it's just an unexplainable preference. But I thought the slight sweetness from the apple sauce balanced very nicely with the suckling pig.

Fungyee's Sea Bass and Jerald's Halibut respectively

I liked how they served the sea bass with something like a potato puree instead of regular mash potatoes. It was called saffron pomme mousseline. I thought pomme means apple in french, but I swear it tasted like potatoes. Regardless, it was different and I liked it!

Dinner ended off with complimentary madelines dusted off with icing sugar. Oh how I miss having croissants and madelines!

On a whole, we had a really good time, and a great meal. It wasn't cheap, but the ambience and good service made it an A-worthy experience.

Disclaimer: I wish my meal was sponsored, but no, I was not. Opinions are entirely my own. Ok, Jerald settled the bill, so technically I did not pay for my meal.

Birthday Dinner @ The Bleeding Heart, London

9 November 2014 Bleeding Heart Yard, London EC2N 8SJ, UK

As with new environments, it takes sometime getting use to things in the working world - what more in a foreign company with a foreign working language!

Honestly, I wouldn't ever dare say that i've been cruising through my internship. I was merely surviving (and occasionally having fun!). Somedays, I dread having to wake up and practically haul my butt to work, other days, i'm pretty chirpy through out the day - all depends on the social situations and amount of work to complete each day. I am in no way qualified to give tips but anyhow, I managed to survive without bursting in to tears, without calling home and complaining, plus I actually kind of enjoyed the process.
I guess this post sort of summarises what I have learnt through my experience, andddd... I hope its useful to at least one person out there!

SOCIALIZING

1 | Don't Take Yourself Too Seriously

People on the other side of the world sometimes have very little knowledge about Asia (similarly, people in Asia, myself included, do sometimes have a very limited knowledge about europeans). Much less a tiny country like Singapore. To them, in Asia, there is China, Japan and Korea, and they can't tell the difference in our appearance. Despite that, they wouldn't hesitate to judge you base on your appearance. Or make jokes about Asians in front of you.

Walking along the streets I do face with people going "CHINA? KOREA? JAPAN? VIETNAM?" and they say it as if I'm illiterate and would not understand the phrase "Which country are you from?" Initially I was a little annoyed, I wasn't affected by the fact that they didn't know where I came from, but more of annoyed they thought I couldn't speak english.
But after a while I realised, its not about me. Don't ever make it about you.
Eventually, I stopped being bothered about people asking me if i'm from China/ All sorts of weird questions about China (as if Singapore was ever part of china). The best thing to do in such situation is to brush it off. When people joke about china or asia, I typically just laugh it off. Its funny because sometimes the stereotypes are true, and there is no denying it!

Sometimes people choose not to speak english even though they can (because of various reasons, some legit, some not), or they cannot speak english/the language you speak, just let it slide. And as much as you don't like it, conversations will go on as though you are not there.
For me I found myself lost in all of the french conversations. Before I left for France, somebody told me this 'Be expected to be treated like a chair - you're there, people know it, but you're just THERE', it was kind of true, but only when there is a really big group of people. So I played a game of guessing, where I just count the number of words I can pick out in the whole conversation. I do text sometimes (but that's not polite, and you come across as unfriendly, so, try not to do that haha!)

In fact when the other interns notice that i'm trying to understand, they do try to include me in the conversation by randomly asking me the same question in english, or explaining the conversation in english for me.

Point is - I realised that there are always nice people around, its better to take things lightly, and be thankful for every single time somebody is nice!

2 | Don't Get Involved in/Create Drama

Working in an office with interns, there will definitely be drama, cliques, people liking someone more than another person. ALWAYS take the neutral stand. Especially if you don't understand what they are saying!
(I think this is more of a reminder to myself when I graduate and start working. Dear Future Carina: Don't EVER be involved in politics. Avoid it like the plague. As far as you can.)

If people approach you with their problems, be nice, and JUST LISTEN. Never add oil to fire, don't commit social suicide.

Sometimes you get approached only when people need something for you, always be genuine about helping them. Don't be upset and think they're making use of you etc. don't create drama for yourself. I believe, if i'm not genuine, people will know. There is no faking it. Being fake nice is gross - another self reminder.
I actually enjoyed helping the other interns in the company, mostly to read through english stuff, made me feel a little more useful (see point under work)!

Oh, and, if people expect you to be a certain way that you're not, just smile and let it go. I realised, its never a good thing to get upset over that.

3 | Be Nice and Make Friends

This is pretty obvious. If you want people to be nice to you, you should be nice first. Truth be told, it's hard to make friends when you speak a different language. Somedays you just want to shut up and not try, but, sulk for 5 minutes, listen to your favourite song, and then put on a happy face and go talk to people (or at least look approachable - I think I struggle with this generally!)

Most of the time I feel weird cutting in/openly speaking to everyone whilst they are having a french conversation, but, when there is a smaller group, or if I'm speaking to one or 2 people at a time, I tend to open up a lot more!

Whatever it is, I think interacting with people as much as possible should be the way to go - I wish i had opened up more earlier and faster! But well, it was definitely fun talking to people who have such different lifestyles and upbringing, be it 1 or 100 new friends, its nice to get to know a part of somebody else's story.

WORK:

1 | Google(and google translate/any translating device) is Your Best Friend
I think everyone realised this since stepping in to University. But really, I had to google something / look to google for help regarding the work I had to do, almost every single day.

The job scope that I had was nothing related to my major in Uni. Some people may prefer to do something more related to what they are studying, but I enjoyed learning more about business, excel etc, things I otherwise would not have the opportunity to learn whilst studying engineering.

Google has been a great at help.

2 | Keep Yourself Occupied

Unfortunately, working in a big company your bosses don't really have time to bother too much about you, (well talking to my other friends on internship, this seems to be a such norm) or they might be away for a day, a week (a month - french have a 5week paid leave, why do Singaporeans only get 14 days, sigh!) and you find yourself being unoccupied after completing the relevant assignments/allocated workload.

There were a couple of times I found myself browsing thought catalog, chatting up random friends on FB, tumblr-ing for the 100x in the day, and still feeling immensely bored, and just... being very useless.

For most companies, any form of audio/video/filesharing website will be blocked - thankfully for me, facebook and blogger were available - so i spent my free time switching between Doing My French Homework, Editting Photos, and Planning for my Holidays/Weekend trips! Planning for trips are the best, because I do get tips on where to go/what to see/what they liked about the place/where else I should visit etc. from the other interns who have been to these other European cities!

What I found interesting - and this is probably a better tip - was that the other interns proactively approach other managers and ask if they could help in any sort of work. I admire them for that. Typically not done in Singapore I guess? Well I have never heard of it until then - my ignorance maybe. But its nice being more proactive and not just doing nothing when your supervisor is on holiday right?

Other ways to keep yourself occupied can include reading Ebooks or listening to Audible - But please FINISH your work first.

LIFE:
1 | Learn the Language

I cannot stress how important this is. People are nicer when they see that you try. Besides, learning a new language = being able to meet new people from class! Living in a huge city alone, its hard to find friends. Going for language classes is the best way to find other people like you, plus its always fun to learn something new! I met really nice people whilst learning french. Nice and interesting people with such wonderful stories to share!

The down side though, is people have different schedules, so sometimes they leave class after a couple of weeks and come back later/go to a different class, but I'm so super thankful to have met such nice people whilst studying french, and hopefully we do meet again sometime in the future!

2 | Explore. Even If You're Alone.
I was such an enjoyable time exploring the city alone. That experience will be one of my most cherished. I gained a ton of independence, and NAVIGATION SKILLS - thank you citymaps2go. I would say the only I wish I did was travel to a different city alone. I did not have the guts to do that. But well, Paris is never boring, so weekends alone, was how I discovered more about myself, learned to live alone, and gained a lot of confidence.

Not many people know, but my relationship with myself was a wreck for quite sometime, and I depended a lot on others to feel worthy, but living alone sort of changed that. I am happy with myself and what I have. Thankful, and hopefully more appreciative. My mum noticed I became a lot more confident as well. It wasn't that I was not confident before, but now I am more comfortable with myself, I have accepted myself for who I am. I feel like I've learned how to take care of myself, love myself, and be proud of myself.

3 | Have Little Reminders of Home
I'm not very dependent on my family, and I have never felt homesick even on school trips/camps/overseas with friends etc. but I being able to do things that reminded me of my lifestyle back at home helped a lot.
Back in Singapore I watch a lot of american dramas, sitcoms, etc. Being able to do that while having dinner, really made it feel as though I was back at home. At least for that hour.
Then again, I didn't have the stress of having to study and keep my grades up, so more on this topic when I officially start school in London. I hope I cope just fine!
Time to pack pictures and bring some dorm room decorations along :)

If you actually took the time to read everything in this post, THANK YOU! Do share with me any tips/stories that would help with my year abroad. I hope this was not too much of a bore, and if it was too wordy, at least the photos made up for it! Thats all from me about Paris, hopefully I get to go back again as a full fledge tourist sometime in the future.

Pictures from a lazy sunday out in the Louvre/Concorde Area of Paris