my very awesome saturday

Ny surprised me to Tsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights! I've always wanted to that temple, but never knew Ny actually paid enough attention to take me there lol.

well, the temple was huge! beautiful and very well maintained, very clean indeed. I was a bit upset that day because I dress somewhat inappropriately, I wore sandals to the temple and I was not allowed in the main shrine .. :( I didnt know. I didnt know Ny was gonna take me there.

Tsi Lai Temple is a Taiwanese Temple that practices Humanistic Buddhism. I dont know too much because I didnt read through enough, but I know that they follow the Linji Chan Buddhism, something I've learned in Buddhism last semester hehehe. anyway, another fact about Tsi Lai temple, they claim to be the largest Buddhist temple in the Western Hemisphere! how awesome is that???

my pictures dont do justice because we are obviously not professionals. beside, my camera lense is broken so I have no idea what I took until after I uploaded it

in front of the temple facing down

facing up/camera view

in the center of the temple, walking to the main shrine

you get the picture

looking down from the main shrine

their little pool with "gold" statue of gods

I just wanted a picture too

I seriously felt like I was in China

poem that I cant read

I dont know he posed like that lol

found this and a bunch of other little statues on the outside entrance

isnt he cute? little buddhist scholar I think

they're so adorable I just couldnt get enough haha

on our way out. it just too beautiful not to capture a picture

and then after the temple... I had to get Chinese food. $40 fish right there! its funny cus they waiter guy asked what did I want and I was " Can I get steam fish, please." he said, "what kind of fish?".. I responded "I dont know.." lol and so he list a bunch of fish for me. the only fish that I recognized was red fish and that was I ordered. I expected it to be around $20 for the dish, but damn! $40 for a plate of steam fish. thats my lesson, next time I should know exactly what I wanted and the price before ordering lol.

my day went well. so worth it! Ny drove around back and forth without complaining. I felt like it was my birthday hehehe

keeping myself busy

so I've found a used bookstore that I can buy for cheap... very cheap. I just bought two excellent condition books for $1 each and a new book for half off. yea, Im far more than happy, Im ecstatic. this will keep me busy the entire summer. I actually have about five books that I bought long ago and havent read it yet. Im excited to read this summer. I just finished The Secret today even though I started last night! whew! never new I can be so attached to books. anyway, this means less time for me to waste my time online. I hate it, I spend so much time online doing nothing, then Im gonna go ahead and get a headache and backache from it. so anyway, in addition to that, I also bought a sketch book awhile back that I can always work on. Im seriously gonna keep myself busy this summer. If I cant go anywhere Im just gonna pull out my book to read or my sketchbook to work on. I need to brush up on my artistic ability anyway hehehe. I havent drawn anything for almost ten years!

book Im starting to read now: The Mercy of Thin Air

I honestly have no idea what this book is about. I just wanted to

change my genre because Im always reading either zombie stuff or historical and/or science fiction. hopefully its not those sappy love stories

website to the used bookstore:

http://www.bookoffusa.com/

food! yummm....

first...

happy birthday to my parents. their birthdays were couple days ago and wow I am broke because of them. For the things they've done for me, just buy them nice gifts and took them out to eat was nothing. I knew I gotta do something nice for my parents since I am their spoiled child. My parents never asked for anything big and gaudy, but when I do surprise them with something, they're more grateful to accept it lol. just anything at all, they'll automatically love it if it was given to them from their children. I love how they're so easy to work with :D

anyway, Ny and I took the entire family out to dinner last sunday. it was fun, but oh boy my dad made a scene. It wasnt anything, my dad just being himself; he ordered anything and everything he can thing of. he took a bunch of pictures with his camera phone telling everything to pose lol. I love how hes so extroverted with his family. people may see him as a quiet and mysterious type, but around his family hes so silly!

I liked the food, definitely would go there again. I love asian food in general, but these kinds of food is more comforting, like home.

I dont remember what we ordered, but they consists mostly of seafood...stir fried clams and mint, fried shrimps, seafood soup, frog legs, stir fried lobster, beef lemon grass (my favorite!) etc.. poor Ny, he doesnt like seafood at all. but I am sorry Ny, nobody likes fried chicken like you do

looking at this pic makes me hungry again.. damn me..

on a side note, my friends and I went out yesterday.. girls day out I guess. to my surprise, one of my friends, who's allergic to seafood and doesnt eat raw fish, decided to order raw oyster! omg what in the world she was thinking? but Im glad she did cus I never knew raw oyster taste so damn good!! I've always had oyster at those asian buffet and they taste like crap! so yea, I thought oyster just taste like that in general. of course, im quite clear now that I was wrong all these time haha

huy... Im just blogging about these cus Im hungry... :/. I know the oysters dont look too tempting with my camera phone, but I can assure you that it was amazing.

now... how can I get my very adventurous hubby to try this with me next time?...

MAC to the beach collection

omg I had to blog about this. I was never a MAC makeup fan, but I just love the cute packaging they have for the limited edition items. right now they have this summer beach collection and I adore all the colors! I especially love their high-lighter powder. I honestly dont even know how to use it. its suppose to be a high-light powder, but why does the color look so pinkish-orange? I'll probably use it as a blush. but anyway, maybe I wont because the case itself is too darn cute to use! I also bought a pinkish-nude lipstick along with a pinkish-orangy shadow. I got a thing for coral color so this time of the year is so perfect to wear it! oh yea, forgot to mention, their high-light powder is sold out the last time I went back to Macys and MAC stores. I even check online and they're longer sell those O_0. thank god I bought it couple days ago. the sales lady even told me that the high-light powder will sell out fast and it was already sold out at most places. if you look at it closely, the high-light powder has a seahorse texture with gold shimmers highlighting along the edges, how cute is that?? thank you Ny for buying those for me hehehe

the picture says so justice, they're so adorable in person. what tha hell, Im describing it as if it were human lol. anyway, cant wait to wear them. I just dont know how yet....

what better time to hike than now?

my wonderful and very long weekend just passed :/ .... well, at least I had a very awesome one. went to watch sex and the city 2 with my ladies, did some shopping for my dad's bday, and went hiking at malibu. first of all, I like to mention that sex and the city got me inspired to do even more shopping! I wanna be old and fabulous just like the fab four. nicely placed, I have a very close circle of friends that consist of only four of us so we ask each other if were them which one of us is who. My gay friend takes the character of samantha, the slutty cougar. samantha is actually my favorite character in sex and the city. and then my youngest friend, cina, took Charlotte, the naive and innocent one. My oldest friend, Alice, took Miranda, but I actually think I have more in common with Miranda than she does :/ so whats left? Carrie... ahh Carrie, I dont know why but I dont think she and I have anything in common. Im not a dreamer, Im more of a control freak who likes to make plans and expect everything to be done according to my plans, which very well described Miranda. I dont like to write, and Carrie is a journalist. but ahh whatever, its some characters that my friends are obsessed with right now.

anyway, this weekend was pretty amazing. Ny and I decided to go hiking cus it just seem like a perfect weather to do something outdoor. hiking has always been our favorite among the many things we can do here in southern california. dont you just love california?! we can hike and swim at the beach in matter of minutes!

and yes, thats what we did. we hiked up in malibu mountains and when we got tired we went down to the beach and just hung out. the just two of us.. awww I love it! I'll invite some friends next time hehehehe

pretty amazing day, Ny got a pretty bad tan as a consequence and I got couple of bug bites. I didnt tan, but I was scratching myself all over. maybe getting a tan is better :/

we initially wanted to go to the Grotto, but end up at Canyon View

there I was, looking happy and ready

the bushes and shrubs are pretty dense and narrow.

reaching the top, a bit exhausted to smile

we took the street on our way back cus it was just too dense of a forest down, and it was getting late. Ny wanted to hitchhike back to the ranger station lol!

going to the beach, coming from hiking

drive for miles to get some water. wrong direction though. we ended up in Oxnard and that place is just sad

sad to live there. there is nothing going on in the city. this is actually their down town

went back to malibu beach and just hanging out