2016 has finally gone and the consequences of our mistakes over the last year will finally be biting us in the rear soon! Hopefully you all had a good holiday because, at the risk of being called a pessimist, I have not much hope for humanity in general in 2017.

I suppose that's not a very nice thing to say on the first blog of the year, but I think, in a way, it's helpful to keep one's expectations low. That way we can only be either slightly disappointed by a tasteless pasta or pleasantly surprised by a delicious cake.

We spent the holidays in Malaysia, flying on the 23rd and arriving in the wee hours of Christmas Eve. Before our flight we ate at Mary Grace in the airport's relatively new dining area. I say it's relatively new because it wasn't there when I last traveled, so I don't know for sure how long it's been there. But a quick Google search shows a tweet from NAIA announcing the restaurant's opening. Yay, internet!

I really should stop ordering carbonara because they all end up not tasting as good as they look like. It's difficult for me to choose pasta, since the ones that look delicious are either bland or spicy. I can't take even the slightest hint of heat! Thankfully, their black velvet cake was amazing.

Our Christmas Eve dinner was hotpot at home!

Most of our downtime was spent watching movies and shows (we watched the first season of Community), or playing my brother's Sushi Go! or Codenames. We played Sushi Go! so much that we ended up going out for sushi at some point. Christmas lunch was at Chili's, though.









My brothers tried this fancy looking soft serve. It tasted good but we were all mostly impressed at how they get people interested in their product. You see people walking around with a soft serve in what appears to be a clear cone, which tends to intrigue the curious. I'm not sure if it was just us or everyone else in the queue were just mystified by its Instagram-able appearance, but I bet it plays a big part. We weren't the only one taking pictures, after all.

We also tried the Hokkaido Baked Cheese Tart, which were amazingly delicious. I prefer them quite warm, although they're still yummy straight from the fridge and apparently can be eaten frozen? I was curious, but not enough to try it out. I was, however, horrified to discover that they are quite expensive. RM29 for a box of six small tarts is around PHP300.




Traveling with my brothers usually means eating at different places, which is good news for my Instagram. I've become that person who takes pictures first before eating. Well, I always have been that person, but I've probably gotten worse. Of course, I always try to be as quick as I can, especially when taking pictures of someone else's food. I'd like to think I have some kind of manners.

Of course, it cannot be a trip to Kuala Lumpur if we don't eat shawarma from Tarbush at least once and drop by the Central Market at some point. I also got to stop by Kinokuniya, although I didn't get to take any pictures this time.








There was this popup store at Tokyo Street in Pavilion. I'm not too fond of the toys themselves but I have a soft spot for Kylo Ren, so there's that. (We also saw Rogue One sometime during the holidays. My family was a lot less emotional about it than I was, which may largely be because I am more susceptible to getting sucked in fandoms and having fandom-y feels in general than they are.)

We ate at Pigs & Wolf and I am happy to say that I did not regret their pasta at all! At least, in terms of taste. The serving size was just a little too much for me, but I still got to eat most of it. All of their stuff looked so good, I found it difficult to choose. Their menu is super cute too.






We spent our New Year's Eve peacefully indoors after eating out... somewhere... for dinner. I forgot what the place was called. I ate a burger with black buns. Anyway, there was some sort of party in Pavilion so it was packed with people. At times like that it makes me wish I was more of a party person with friends to go to such events with. For me as I am it looked really tiring and all I wanted was to go home to my country in my own room and sleep on my own bed. But maybe in another universe, there is a me who would get all dressed up and go out with friends to party on New Year's Eve. Maybe somewhere out there is a cooler version of me celebrating 2017.











I've taken more photos during the holiday but these are the last ones from 2016. It still feels weird to write 7 instead of 6 on the date. A strange thing to say goodbye to a year that never really loved me. I don't have any meaningful resolutions either. I guess I'm just going to do my best to survive this year and I hope everyone else will too. At the very least, I hope 2017 will treat you all better than last year did!

Happy New Year!