The Best of 2010 for the Chronicles of Ms I-Hua

It's that time of the year (or end of the year, I might say!)... I can hardly believe it... 2010 has come and gone so quickly, faster than you can say supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!

The Sphinx, The Pyramid and the Asian Girl

At the start of 2010, the Boy, Madam Mummy, Big Sis and I had just returned from our glorious Egypt trip! We went, we ate and we conquered the knowledge and history of the ancient Egyptian past. You can read all about it here (9 days split into 13 parts)...

Q Eleven Breakfast Review @ South Melbourne (Market)

Sometimes one just can't decide what to eat for breakfast. Sometimes one is just driving aimlessly up and down the inner suburbs of Melbourne on a Sunday morning. Sometimes, one can't find any good places to eat at.

Sometimes... one does! That's how we found Q Eleven at South Melbourne (Right in front of the market!)...

Old Town Kopitiam Mamak @ QV, Melbourne (An Asian Snack Food Tasting)

I have been very slack with putting up this post. So slack that I've been letting it slide since September... So here it goes...This is quite a visually long post :P

Thanh decided to host a Asian Snack Food Tasting at Old Town Kopitiam Mamak in QV... and it was also my first time meeting Agnes and Thanh in person (Twitter really does not count) :P Now this is a branch of Old Town Kopitiam located in Chinatown (and I'm quite sure of the one in Malaysia)... and this outlet caters for those wishing for a taste of Mamak (that just sounds wrong)...

Click here for their menu, as it is quite different from the menu at Old Town Kopitiam in Chinatown...

Paramore - Melbourne Concert Review @ Sidney Myer Music Bowl, Melbourne

It's been a while since I did one of these. But I had so much fun and such a great night that it'll be a waste if I didn't share my experience on this. So taking a break from food (blasphemous I know!), I shall do a quick recap of the Paramore concert that took place in October :)

On the 13th of October (yes I know, this is slow)... Paramore performed at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl... Now I have to admit, I'm a new fan... I only discovered them (as I'm sure many of their new fans have also had the same discovery) on the Twilight OST...and I fell in love with their music!

Meeeoooowwww... the Persian Prince

NOTE: Some Spoilers ....

It's been a while since I've done one of these... and it seems that I only do movie reviews when there are rippling muscles to be seen... (OTHERWISE... why else would I watch it???)


As you can guess, this is about the great Prince (Watch me jump and ripple everywhere) Dastan of Persia...

Having never played the game before and not being a big fan of Jaky Gyllenhaal (I keep picturing him in Brokeback)... I was quite amazed that the show was quite enjoyable...

Quite...

And I was wondering why the chick (Gemma Arteton) playing Princess Tamina was so familiar looking...


And then I recalled, she played the rather dubios character of Io in Clash of the Titans as the love interest opposite Sam Worthington...

So it seems she has the same taste in men as I do... rippling muscles trying to save the world... (Okay, I don't really.. but heck!)

And the Great Gandhi.. I mean... Ben Kingsley... who has the role of the evil nemesis



The plot of the movie was pretty easy to follow and entertaining... explains how a rugrat from the streets of Persia caught the attention of the King to become his adopted son... then flash forwards to the present time where the adopted prince (Jake Brokeback) and his two brothers are on the verge of invading the holy city of Alamut...

Now I enjoyed the movie right up to the ending... methinks, the director just wanted to finish the movie off and end it quickly...

If, the said sands of time was over used and went back too far in time (longer than the given 1 minute), then how is it that the movie ending wasn't a catastrophic end of the world scene???

Why do people need to forget the past? Why can't dead people stay dead? Why are they all speaking with bad English accents? Why is Princess Tamina wearing such sexy clothing in the dessert?

So many questions unanswered....

Enjoyable to an extent... but I have no idea how they will ever make a sequel to this movie having erased nearly all of the happenings and relationships at the end of the movie...

So... I give it a 3 out of 5... just for rippling muscles and sexy girls...

Fun House

Ahh.. this was meant to be up last week .. but a bit of this and a bit of that.. this concert post ended up here...

This is my 2nd Pink Concert.. and I hope I get to go to many more... absolutely the best!!

Went a bit late and only caught Evermore midway through... and apparently I knew more of their songs, than originally thought...



This group of family caught my attention =)



Waiting and waiting and waiting... Day 16 of her Melbourne run of the Funhouse Tour



She flew in (literally)... to a magnificent start

Check out those abs!!!



And that ass!!



It was hard to catch a good shot of her, as she was moving around so much... but it was awesome!!



Costume Change!



Another costume change and a slow blue version of Family Potrait.. which I loved



This time round, she actually played a bit more on her guitar and remembered all the words!!




Must be the fact that she's had this concert for 2 months... hard to get it wrong I suppose.



Close up shot



Pink doing her death defying trapeze act (okay, it wasn't so death defying, but it was still pretty cool!)



Costume change again!



Jacket off, and an added feather bottom... singing to FunHouse



Sang her little heart out!



Crazy stage dancer's and rocker chicks performing circus acts...



It was a spectacular night, worth every penny and a testament to what concerts should be!!

Fingerprints

Awesome to see Katy Perry live again.

The first time we went to see her was last year (2008) and she was doing a promotional tour.. which meant.. sucky venue and not many people aware of who she was... (this was in the early "I Kissed A Girl" stages)... and it was at the Prince's Bandroom in St.Kilda...

Fell in love with her quirkiness then and been waiting for her to return down under...

The bar staff had fun with their tip signs... with another one reading, "Tip me and you will wake up in Vegas!"



The backdrop to her stage.... full of pink, flowers, and flamingo's



She ran out on stage. Electric performance of Fingertips...

She's so hyper.. and still has a really funny sense of humour.. great PR, as she keeps engaging the crowd.. (unlike some other artist.. *cough* Avril Lavigne *cough*)



This time round, she played the guitar on quite a few songs, and led on acoustics for Thinking of You...



Towards the end of the night, a very short encore/ intermission of 5 minutes, Kitty Purry popped up on stage!



She ran out with a really hot pink err... pant suit... and had a mask on...



Allowing the crowd to sing along to one of her songs...



Ending the brilliant electric power charged night with a cherry chap stick I Kissed A Girl



And for the curious, she performed every single song on the album, sans I'm Still Breathing (I really don't remember her performing this, but then the night passed by so quickly, and my memory is a sieve)

And she did two covers... one which was really cute and funny... Mr. Postman and another from Queen.

All in all a great night.

Oh and Rove McManus was sitting int he VIP section again...

Knock 'Em Out

Ahh... it was a packed venue. Sold out with the only chance via eBay or so the radio DJ announced previously...

I've always been a fan of Ms Lily Rose Allen. From her MySpace days to her current twitter bashing on Perez days. She is an exciting person to watch and talented too.

The opening act was alright. Electro Pop band from Sydney. Nothing exciting there.

The the white screen dropped to reveal, Ms Lily and her band!



She started the concert with "Back to the Start" from her new album.



It was really hard to take a good shot, she was moving around so much, and there were a lot of TALL people standing right in the middle of the crowd... sigh... 1 reason why I hate GA's so much...

She was drinking (white wine) she said.

She also performed her cover of Kaiser Chief's Oh My God.



This looks like the same picture but it isn't.

There was a funny point in the concert where she mentioned she could smell cigarette smoke and told the crowd that she was warned beforehand about lighting a ciggy on stage. Apparently it was a $10k fine and after converting it to "English", was still too heavy a penalty. To which people started throwing ciggies at her to tempt her! It was funny...



She got hot and started stripping!.. Nah...

She ended the concert with the eagerly awaited and anticipated "F**k You!", which everyone happily screamed/sang along to.



She came back out for her encore, with a new top and performed, Smile and The Fear...

AND ended it with an awesome rendition of "WOMANIZER" by Britney!!!



Other random highlights was spotting Rove McManus amongst the VIP guests, and they were all stuck in their area, as everyone was pushing to exit. Caught a glimpse of Natalie Bassingwaithe as well as Josh Thomas the dude from the show, "Talking about your generation", and he's Gen-Y.

All in all, a great performance (Credit to Lily and her Showmanship and ability to sing live!) and a decent venue.

The Avenue Q Theme

(This picture is the Original Broadway cast)

It's amazing. How could I have forgotten to put up a post about this musical?

Avenue Q. An x-rated sesame street/Muppet Broadway musical had be gasping for air in between laughter!

I swear I haven't laughed this much since Spamalot.

It was funny and adapted for the Aussie audience but it was still hilarious. I still can't believe that you could do that and THAT to puppets!! Oh my!!

Go watch it if you need a good laugh!!

Story revolves around this character "Princeton" a fresh eyed graduate with a BA in English finding his way in the world. He moves to Avenue Q and meets a bunch of characters there and together they sing, dance and swear their way to each other's hearts....

The Boy said that it was an "Ok" musical.. and that he preferred Spamalot. However, I did hear him laughing a lot as well.

He's also got a little crush on the lead female (Michala Banas)so he was a bit bias when it came to her.

But it is a totally different type of musical, with puppets.

Tickets weren't that expensive if I recall, around the $80 mark. And we were seated right in the middle of the stalls in Row B. So I was stoked. I did buy the tickets exactly a year ago on recommendations from people who have watched it at the West End.

And yes, the "Internet is for Porn"!! Hehehe...

Starstruck

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh... that was the beautiful screen that greeted us when we sat upon our seats.

I sitting at the edge of my seat, jumping up and down excitedly like a 5 year old girl. The Boy sitting back and watching with a bemused expression on his face at my glee and at all the screaming girls in the crowd.

Here and there were groups of *ahem* boys that seem to be a bit confused at their arrival on this location. Methinks they came to pick up some girls, and boy were some of the girls dressed to kill... but unfortunately.. or fortunately... majority of them were underage!!! ...

And thus began, one of the greatest opening acts I've ever had the liberty to attend. That being said, Lady GaGa should never have been some other groups/persons opening act (I am a tad bias here), and should have her on show. If what the opening hints of what's to come in the near future, I am more than happy to cheer and scream and fork out another $140... *ouch I know*


The Haus of GaGa screen drops to invites us into the world of Lady GaGa


She opened up with Paparazzi!! Which was fantastic as that is one of my favourite songs from her album.

And there she is!!! Waving around her Disco Stick!!!!


A continuation from her opening video. Ahh.. I <3 Candy Warhol....


GaGa in all her glory performing Pokerface...


She performed Love Game, Pokerface, Paparazzi, The Fame, Beautiful Dirty Rich, and Just Dance.

I was really sad to see her walk off the stage after about 6 songs (none of them Eh Eh- Nothing I can say). The reason I said about 6... well there was a surprise =)

She was awesome, and made the oncoming Main Act Pussycat Dolls seem a tad disappointing.

The came onto the stage. Missing one Pussycat... My fave Doll... Jessica apparently has a back injury. I was disappointed!


Nicole doing her thang!


La La La... Nicole and Melody rocking the house


Kimberly and Nicole doing some ra-ra dancing!!


Nicole and Ashley =)


The Boy was entertained with the little burlesque cabaret show they put on... depicting how they first started out at the Viper Room, PCD Lounge... He was.. *ahem*.. really entertained!!

The really sad part was that GaGa totally Pwned PCD!!!....Sad because she was the "supporting" act...

The night was good. My extremely high expectations of Lady GaGa were met and I go home a very happy girl indeed!!