sugarloaf ♥ express

Well, hello!
lisette です✿

I've successfully registered DW, imported my LJ, and configured this and that a little bit.
I might be crossposting in the future. But for now I'll be at LJ.

LJ friends in DW: please add me here ^^
(lisette is also myself, but this is my main DW account)

Well then...
Back to LJ! xD

Who still needs a Dreamwidth invite?

I have 5 DW invite codes ready to be given out to the first five persons who comment in this post ^^ Don't forget to include your email address when commenting.

When was the last time you stayed up all night? What were you doing?


Um.... last night? *lol* xD
Some of you already know that I'm nocturnal, so yes I stay up all night (almost) EVERYDAY (＾∇＾) I go to bed when the sun rises. That's my original body clock since birth *nods nods*

As for what I'm doing every night...
Well, the usual activities one usually does after working hours, including: finishing up work, fangirling & flailing, watching dorama, chatting, emailing, browsing, reading, downloading (mostly videos), having intimate conversation with Dad, talking to mom, etc. It's so much more comfortable doing all those in the silence of the night in my own private space with no one bugging me! Yes, I really came to love the night ♥

An explanation of my journal entries, because some of you might wonder why I do it the other way around! (i.e. many of you unlock the fangirling entries & lock personal entries, but I tend to do it the other way around *lol*)

★ General & some personal entries are unlocked, because I have non-LJ friends who sometimes read this journal *waves to non-LJ friends: hellooo~~ xD*

★ Fangirling entries are mostly friends-locked, because my non-LJ friends don't have any passion for... uh... fangirling & stuff so this way my journal looks neat & uncluttered without much fangirling entries! :D

★ Some very private entries are custom-friends-locked, because I do have secrets, too, you know :D And I only make them visible to a custom group of friends, which are very few of you.

So yup... that's how my journal goes.
Lately I see myself locking many more entries than I have ever before... does that mean I'm becoming more private and introvert? xD

How many languages do you speak?

Fluently? Only 2: Indonesian & English.
I can speak regular Javanese, although not too fluent.

In the past, I learned French, Mandarin, and Japanese. I could speak those languages a little bit when I was still learning them. But since I don't practice them anymore... I totally lost my ability to speak them! >_< Well, unless for the very few commonly used words, such as: je ne parle pas français, 再见, or とてもおいしいかった (＾∇＾)

I wanna learn French and Japanese again...!

*random rambling mode: ON*

Gyaaa, what's up with this Jin vs Tego rumor & especially the icon wars going on in both kattunlove and news_jpop these past 2 days! It's only a funny/silly rumor to be laughed at, so just stop it already! >_<

And no, I'm not taking sides, coz I love both of them for their beautiful voices ♥
That's my greatest weakness by the way: I adore anyone (cute or handsome alike) with GREAT singing voice! ^^

Confession: I'm addicted to karaoke too much lately, it's not healthy!
I just had one with Vero today (YES, AGAIN!)! xD Doremido is 50% off on weekdays between the hours of 10am to 4pm, so we wanted to take advantage of that.

Oh! The nyonya lunch set at Sing Sing Ramen is pretty good! The set consists of small ramen (you can choose whichever taste you like), rice with either shirashu or something else (I forgot what the choices are), yaki gyoza (not pictured), 2 flavors of mini ice cream (not pictured), and free refill of oolong tea / ocha.



I told the Doremido staff today to download new songs to their DAM machines. I even gave them the list of songs (and song numbers I got from ClubDAM) I especially wanted them to download (hint: KAT-TUN's newest album! :D). I hope they'll do it soon ^^

*rambling mode: OFF & goes to bed*

Yes, really! （＾○＾）

I really should be sleeping, but after a marathon of watching KAT-TUN Queen of Pirates Concert, I got adrenalin rush instead! xD

I want to highlight a couple of things from this awesome concert (I wish I were there! But have I been a Jin fangirl during this concert last year? I think I haven't or just barely started!):

1. Jin dear, you didn't have to remind your fans how great your voice is, really! 
Poor him, he was already so tired from dancing oh so sexily in Love Juice, but then he sang the opening of Bokura no Machi de acappella and WITHOUT MICROPHONE, OMG!!! ♥♥♥

Do see this, you'll be in awe of how awesome his raw voice is!!!
(Turn your speaker volume up when he took off his microphone)


2. Jin's dance on Love Juice is 100% YUMMY! No, really. I've always loved to see him putting so much effort in his dance. And Love Juice is where you can see his 100% effort! No wonder he was panting so much after that song. And yet, he pushed himself to the max by singing Bokura no Machi de (see above) without a microphone!!! ♥_♥
Btw, I don't particularly like moon walk dance, but when it's Jin who did it.... it's just ラブ！

3. Yamapi (the special guest) really didn't wanna be more than 2 metres away from Jin, AWWWW! Mabudachi rabu! xD They kept gazing into each other, toooo! *glomps them both* I really love their friendship! ♥
Btw, Yamapi was following Jin wherever he went, as if he didn't know what to do if Jin wasn't there! xD I find it too funny, Pi's just like a puppy *lol*

4. Pi has always been a very polite person, and thus he failed while trying to be like KAT-TUN (read: using slang much) :D

5. As much as I like Jin speaking English, his swore during Six Senses is a bit... um... inappropriate >_< But I forgave him immediately after his sexy dance in the middle of the song! xD

6. Ueda sang Mother/Father very nicely. But I might be biased since Mother/Father is my ichiban daisuki KAT-TUN song!

7. A lot of shouting! I wonder how they managed to maintain their voice for the next day's performance (although this DVD was the last day of their concerts in Tokyo Dome, but I'm sure they had been shouting much in the previous days of concerts, as well!).
But I love to see Yamapi shouting for a change. He's always sooo well behaved in NEWS! I wanna see him breaking out all the politeness for once xD

8. I fell in love with Crazy Love all over again after watching this! On the second line, in the word "nani mo", Jin sounded like he was about to cry ;_;
I know a friend whose love story is reflected pretty accurately in this song, so I dedicate this song for him & his ex-girlfriend :) It was a sad love story, though. Crazy Love is the correct title, methinks ^^


As you might expect, coming from a Jin fan like me, the highlights that I remember are (almost) all about Jin (and Yamapi)! xD

Download the full concert from here (MQ) or here (HQ).
The subtitles can be found here.

For more detailed review (with screencaps), check this post!

Credits: jone_records, jin_no_yume, pinkujisatsu, newshfan, ihearyourtears 

Blame my ramen addiction to my bro!

I initially wasn't a big fan of noodles. But then my bro kept brainstorming me how good ramen is, etc. I didn't really believe him, until I tried Ramen 38 at Pondok Indah (which is only a branch & not as good as the main shop at Kamome building) around the end of 2007. Then I went to US & Tokyo last January 2008. THAT! was the lifechanging experience. I tried Santouka Ramen at Costa Mesa, CA (inside Mitsuwa). I love their negi meshi & shio ramen and vowed to come back.

The Tokyo experience was the peak of it all (but of course!). I don't even know the shop name, but it was beside Sunroute Plaza Shinjuku hotel where mom and I stayed at. It was totally random, because we were hungry when we arrived (the journey from Narita airport to Shinjuku took 2 hours by airport limousine bus) and found the nearby ramen shop very tempting. You go into any ramen shop in Tokyo, and you'll be sighing in satisfaction, I tell you! xD Since I'm pretty faithful when I find one GOOD restaurant, of course I came back! Look at how oishii it was! *drools*




I went through the rest of 2008 wishing for another satisfying ramen experience, but didn't really find any up to par. So I had to make do with Ramen 38. A month ago, I found out that Santouka Ramen has a branch in Singapore -- at The Central, Clarke Quay (thanks to nefretiriii), so I immediately went there during my Singapore trip last Easter! A friend of mine also told me that Miharu Ramen at The Gallery hotel is also very good.

Actually, the taste of negi meshi & shio ramen at Santouka wasn't as good as the one in Costa Mesa. But I still love it nonetheless!




As for the ramen (the noodle) itself, I like the one in Miharu better than Santouka. I heard the ramen is shipped directly from Sapporo everyday. No wonder it tastes SO GOOD & fresh! :9



We wanted to go back there again on the last day of Singapore trip, but didn't have time ¬_¬ Still very much craving! Must go back to Singapore again soon!

I have since become a true ramen aficionado! xD

And now I'm OFFICIALLY HUNGRYYYY gyaaaa >_<
Shouldn't have written all this in the wee hours of the morning! *lol*

Added on 1.50 PM:
The last thing I remember before waking up, I dreamed of eating ramen (Miharu Ramen, but on a certain airport *lol* and self service!) o(>▽<)o
I'm so gonna have ramen tonight!

Finally, Java Jazz 2009 report! It took me more than a month to be able to write this entry, because I didn't really have the time (or was simply being lazy :P) to upload an important video to YouTube. I finally succeeded last nite, so here goes the report ^^


JAVA JAZZ 2009
March 6 - 8 at Jakarta Convention Center

The venue is still the same as the previous years. Always getting more packed as the years go by. Always full of cigarette smoke in every corner. Always too crowded that people are jostling each other and pushing their way to get the better seats/view/spot. It became very tiring, that sometimes could beat the enjoyment of seeing the performances. That's why I usually stayed until around midnight, because there were less people after 10pm so I could breathe more freely!

This year's artists lineup is probably the worst compared to the 4 previous years! -_-
My favorite jazz artists didn't come. The hype was more towards the very popular but actually not really jazz artists, such as Jason Mraz, Brian McKnight, Peabo Bryson, etc. AND! Most of the aforementioned were only performing in special shows, meaning one has to pay extra (on top of the daily pass ticket) to see them! Since I'm not really a fan of those special show artists, I didn't see them. I actually wanted to see Laura Fygi, but her special show ticket was already sold out. Oh well.

Now, from the free performances (well, not really free, coz one has to buy a daily pass ticket to enter the venue), I only remembered one outstanding name: IVAN LINS! I was sooooo happy that there was one artist in the regular shows lineup that I'm a huge fan of! :D

At Ivan Lins' performance, I happened to video-record one song that I really like, but initially didn't know the title. I heard that song before, but because Brazillian jazz has similar vibe/rhythm, I had a hard time remembering the song titles, except for the very famous ones.

This is the recorded video:
(sorry for the low video quality. I recorded it using my tiny Leica C-Lux 1 digicam with only 3.6x optical zoom and the hall was really dark and spacious!)

After Java Jazz was over, I went on Ivan Lins discography downloading spree! *lol* I wanted to know the title of the song so badly, that I practically listened to each one of them xD Thankfully, I found it pretty quickly on his Cantando Histórias & Live in Cuba albums. The title is.... *drum rolls* .... Lua Soberana! *jumps up and down in delight*
This is perhaps the only song that I perfectly remembered from Java Jazz 2009!

My scheduled artists itinerary during those 3 days:
March 6: Ivan Lins, Alex Ligertwood (Santana) & David Garfield, Benny Likumahuwa Jazz Connection & Five Bones, Matt Bianco.
March 7: Harvey Mason Quartet, Chielli Minucci & Special EFX, Oleta Adams (ft. Michael Paulo), Toku, Quasimode, Karizma ft. David Garfield, Ron King Big Band.
March 8: Isao Suzuki, Tom Scott & Paulette McWilliams, Nita Aartsen ft. Michael Paulo, Ron King Quartet, Ron King Big Band ft. Gary Anthony, Ivan Lins.

Yes, my Java Jazz 2009 experience started with Ivan Lins and was closed by Ivan Lins ^^ Such an interesting coincidence! :3
I went with my bro everyday (my dad joined only on March 6) and met up with caramichi at the venue upon arrival each day.

PS: I only wanted to write a brief summary, but look at how long it became! *lol*

I don't know why, but I couldn't really sleep well in Singapore (but have I ever really slept well in Jakarta either? o_O *lol*). My sleeplog graphic clearly shows my severely erratic sleeptime! In truth, I could sleep better in daytime, and mostly was awake in nighttime (or slept very little, then I was awoken and couldn't go back to sleep no matter how long I stayed in bed trying to!). That was why I didn't really explore Singapore in the last 2 trips this year -_-

Buuuut...
It's probably been a while that I never really think of Singapore as a holiday destination :P There's really not much to explore *lol* I usually just go to Singapore for culinary and shopping purposes (don't we all? xD). And also to relax & escape from the boring yet stressful routine in Jakarta.

Ah, I forgot to mention in my last entry: I brought my own bolster! xD xD
That's because my suitcase is only one third full, and still so much empty space, so I decided I wanted to sleep well with my own bolster! But I guess it didn't really make any difference for I couldn't sleep anyway *sighs*

Last night, the initial plan was to have dinner at Santouka before karaoke at Cashbox, but then the karaoke was cancelled in last minute. So my bro, my cousins (Irene & Edwin), and I headed straight to Santouka Ramen at Central, Clarke Quay. The only chicken ramen that my cousins can eat (which doesn't have pork ingredients coz they're Muslims) was sold out! So they basically just watched me & my bro eat >_ < ごめんね~~ I felt bad, obviously. After that, it was my & my bro's turn to watch them eat at Pasta de Waraku :P And to complete the Japanese culinary session, we had dessert at Azabu Sabo. Very satisfying indeed! xD

It might have been a stupid coincidence, but I left my camera's SD card in my mom's laptop last night, so I couldn't take pictures using my Leica! That was the stupid part -_-;; The coincidence is: my cousin Irene also left her Sony digicam's memory card in her apartment as well *lol* Thankfully my bro brought our Canon 30D, so we got nice photos alright ^^ All photo-related posts will be done when I'm back in Jakarta, coz it's easier to do everything in my PC instead of this tiny Kohjinsha!

Today's the last day for shopping (which I haven't done yet!), so I'm gonna head to Bugis Junction later on. The flight back to Jakarta is at 8p, so I still have plenty of time to visit Muji, Americaya shoes at BHG, and Topshop before checking out, having late lunch with my cousin Edwin (and perhaps roaming around a bit afterwards), and heading to the airport.

And now.... I'll try to have 2 hours of sleep! ~_~