Went on a day tour around Chengdu 2 Saturdays ago. We’d signed up for the tour as we had some places of interest like Wu Hou Ci and Du Fu Cao Tang, that we haven’t visited.

Yong Ling Mausoleum
This was our first stop. We met our tour guide there – this young woman who is a third year university student. I forgot her name, but well, this tour group was kind of small, hence they didn’t rent a bus for the whole group. Instead, we travelled in smaller groups in mini-buses.

Anyway, the Mausoleum was a memorial place for one of China’s emperor. I can’t remember his name =X But that Mausoleum’s kind of cool.

Wu Hou Ci
Next stop was Wu Hou Ci – a memorial place for Zhu Ge Liang, Liu Bei and a few other people who are mentioned in 三国演义 (Romance of the Three Kingdoms).

Qing Yang Gong 青羊宫
Basically a Taoist Palace where you can get your fortune told by priests. Directly translating the name would mean “Green Goat Palace” and there really was a “green goat”.

The green goat

Zodiac

Then we had lunch. 13 Sichuan Dishes! What happened was the waitresses kept serving the dishes, one after another and we had to hurriedly finish those that were served before so that there would be enough space for the other dishes. lol.

Du Fu Thatched Cottage
Du Fu Thatched Cottage! It used to be the former home of Du Fu, a poet.

The tour guide gave us discounts for a Sichuan Opera show at night. Glad that I didn’t miss it, coz it’s an experience of a lifetime!

There were Chinese musical instruments ensemble, Sichuan Opera, Skits, a puppet show, Er Hu and Suo Na solo performance, hand shadow performance and the best was “Bian Lian” – the famous show where they change their masks very quickly.

View all the photos and videos here.

You know how sometimes you look forward to weekends because of certain positive factors? Well, last Friday I was looking forward to my weekend and it really didn’t disappoint.

Friday was good. Went to Peter’s Tex-Mex Grill for dinner. Had this tortilla beef salad which was just the right serving for me. You know how sometimes you’re hungry but not that hungry to finish one whole meal? That salad was just right for me. Plus the amount of vegetables in there made the whole dish healthy.

Went to Ikea – Chengdu on Saturday morning. I’ve been quite interested in going to Ikea Chengdu for quite a while as I missed eating the Swedish meatballs there (=X) and I always have fun visiting Ikea. I haven’t been to the Ikea Tampines store since it’s opening, but the location of Ikea Chengdu always reminds me of it.

Our first stop was Ikea’s Restaurant and Cafe where we had our lunch. Just like the one in Singapore, you pick your food before queuing to pay for it. And in the menu, they included a few local dishes. Over here, the dishes are stuff like Kung Bao Chicken Rice.

The whole Ikea is almost the same as the one in Singapore, except for the fact that everything is in Mandarin. I guess the Ikea standard’s the same all over the world. Had great fun there. Lol. Innocent stuff like soft toys became obscene after Henry‘s doing. Let the pictures do the talking =)

Went to this place called 锦里 Jin Li after that. It’s mainly a tourist attraction I guess, since it’s situated next to Wu Hou Ci. Since the Chengdu Day Tour, we’d planned to go there to do some shopping. So there we went.

Made this pendant thing where they write your name out on a rice and put it in to a bottle. It used to be quite popular in Singapore a few years back but was quite expensive back then and now. In fact, when my sis checked the price of it just a few days ago, it cost SGD$12 + whatever amount for the string. Over here, the lowest price was SGD$3 + whatever amount for the string. Cheap eh?? Huzz and I made one each with both our names on it 🙂 Though for mine, the glue kinda came off, so I’m planning to visit the place again and hopefully the person would be able to fix it back properly. Unfortunately, mine dropped off somewhere in the house 🙁

Also bought a 笛子 (di zi: Chinese flute, usually made of bamboo) for SGD$36. Those professional kind. Quite cool lah. And it’s way worth it compared to the not-professional one my aunt bought for me in SG (which costs SGD$50).

Had a blackout on Sunday morning. Many of us thought that it was because we didn’t pay the electricity bills. The internet went off the night before and we also thought it was because of the bills =X We’re kind of interesting eh? Only pay bills when the electricity’s cut off. =X
Played badminton after that.

Happy 2 months! 😀