Michelin Guide 2020 Thailand Results

The Michelin Guide Thailand 2020 results are out! I’m particularly interested in checking out 80/20 (modern local restaurant run by a Thai-husband-and-Japanese-wife duo) and Sorn (saw the Mark Weins video review and everything looks delicious) on my next trip. I went to Bangkok last year and picked up a total of 9 Michelin stars.

2 of the Michelin stars came from Gaggan ⭐⭐– still the most wonderful dining experience I’ve had. He has closed down his restaurant and thus is ineligible this round. I’m sure his new restaurant Gaggan Anand will be in the Michelin Guide Thailand 2021.

All the other Michelin star restaurants I’ve been to retained their stars. I’ve listed my reviews below:

Upstairs
Nahm
Bo.lan
Saneh Jaan
J’aime by Jean-Michel Lorain
Jay Fai
Sra Bua by Kiin Kiin

Sleep is a symptom of caffeine deprivation

drinking

Coffee is arguably one of the essential items in the food pyramid. It’s the first thing most of us drink in the morning, especially if you’ve been out and indulging in alcohol the previous night. The entire global economy would probably collapse without coffee – problems waking up and staying alert is detrimental to most tasks. 😉

I used to massacre the system when I was in university. I lived on campus and we’re allowed one drink per meal purchased. However, the drink station is unregulated – it’s based on the trust system. My usual beverage back then probably had enough caffeine to kill a small elephant.

slops

The coffee dispenser deals out one teaspoon of instant coffee per turn and I would turn the knob 10-14 times into a small Styrofoam cup and fill it with hot milk. This evil beverage is drunk in one shot and is enough to keep me awake and wired for the entire night.

I would love to say that I used the time to study or catch up on assignments, but more often than not, that massive dose of caffeine is used to fuel all night sessions of Counter Strike or reading books which has nothing to do with my major. -_-

books

I pretty much continued this after I graduated and joined the rat race, except at a much lower dose. I would drink 2 sachets of instant coffee first thing when I wake up in the morning, just to jolt myself awake.

The sound of people trudging into the office in the morning is often followed by the long trek to the hot water dispenser with a packet of 3-in-1 instant coffee in hand. It is the cornerstone of the workforce – men and women just can’t function before their morning cup of Joe.

I have sampled pretty much most of the brands of instant coffee out there. I can’t say I have favorites per se, I usually pick up what I haven’t tried or is on offer. To me, coffee is just a vessel for delivering caffeine.

super coffeemix promotion

Anyway, I was walking the aisles of the local hypermarket doing my weekend shopping when I noticed a promotion with Super. They’re having a offer where you get a free JJ Lin notebook with every purchase of two packets of Super 3in1 Regular coffee. Each packet has 30 sachets of coffee each and at RM 13.99, that comes out to be a pretty good bargain.

free notebook

JJ Lin is the brand ambassador for Super’s Coffee and the notebook has a nice embossed cover with a matte finish. The inside of the notebook contains the storyline of Super Coffeemix’s TVC which aired earlier this year. It’s perfect as a gift for JJ Lin fans or to keep for yourself to jot down notes.

jj lin notebook

I keep mine beside my bed as a dream journal – a new project I’m going to start. 🙂

How I WON 200 pounds and LOST 1,100 pounds

This is a tragic tale of why you shouldn’t gamble on vacations. T_T

casino

I didn’t spend a lot – most of it was on meals, beer and stuff for people so I still had a lot of pound sterling left. It got to a point where I had to put my wallet in my coat instead of my pants pocket coz it was bulging so badly I couldn’t stuff it in.

The GBP 200 win

I was about to have lunch on Sunday when I noticed that everywhere was closed coz the eating establishments open from 12 pm onwards and I had an hour to kill.

I went into a sbobet mobile – it’s a very small operation with 3 roulette tables and 2 blackjack tables plus a couple of slot machines. I went in and got 400 pounds worth of chips as my buy in. The interesting thing about their roulette tables is that it’s yellow and black instead of red and black.

casino 100 pound chips

I thought that was interesting and put down 200 pounds (the maximum bet limit) on yellow. Lo and behold, around and round the ball it goes and what number it drops on I do not know but it’s a yellow number. =D

I snapped a picture of the GBP 200 pound win and cashed out 600 pounds (400 pounds was my original buy in). w00t! *pops champagne bottle and pours a bubbly for everyone and all that

I thought this 200 pound (RM 1,000) would be nice to pay for my excess baggage home.

The GBP 1,100 loss

Anyway, just a couple of hours ago I got off a bus at Victoria Coach Station and said goodbye to a friend. I had two options – go back and pack (it was dark and I was really tired) and head to the airport for Amsterdam…

OR

Go to the lucky William Hill betting place where I won my GBP 100 for the lousy exchange rate I got the first day.

This was a losing streak so bad I embarrass myself recounting it. The roulette machine’s maximum bet limit was GBP 100 – I went in with a decision that I’ll bet 100 pounds on Black on the first spin and then 100 pounds on Odd on the second spin.

I figured this extra 200 pounds will help offset the exchange rate deficit since I’m going to be exchanging at least 1,300 pounds when I get back.

Well, I had to wait behind this dude who was playing 20 pence roulette so it took a while for him to finish. After he’s done I went and put 200 pound into the machine. I wanted to go for red since there was a bit of a red dragon going on but I remembered the Black-Odd routine and did that instead.

I lost. I went for Odd and lost again. T_T

I fed in another GBP 400 into the machine (for a 600 pound total now) and lost 4 times in a row.

Un-fucking-belivable.

It would be damn hard to get up from a 600 pound loss so I had a choice of walking away or hoping for a very unlikely last minute rally. I chose the latter and put in another 300 pounds into the machine.

The cashier at William Hill had to stop me coz the notes compartment was full and he took out the cash and rebooted the machine. Sigh. That was my money.

Anyway, with 300 pounds I had to go for numbers. I went for 10 numbers with 10 pounds each round (max bet limit) so the odds are slightly better than ¼ for a 36 times return. I swear Lady Luck was against me coz I thought I pressed 33 but apparently I didn’t. It came out 29, which I also didn’t put despite it being one of my favorite numbers (my age).

The next round was a savior round, if I had taken it. I didn’t pick 29 this time but 10 other random numbers coz I figured it won’t come out twice in a row. That was my lifeline, given by The Lord but I didn’t take it. T_T

29 came out TWICE in a row. Arrrghhhhh!

I’m down to my last 100 pounds and again I did not listen to the voice of God, resigning myself to fate and pressing random numbers. The result was a 6. A fucking 6 which I always get but didn’t in the last round coz I expected to lose.

I walked out with the tail between my legs having lost 900 pounds. That’s more than RM 4,500.

william hill dog races

Anyway, I was walking home, dejected when I saw another William Hill and though hmm…why not? I’ve already lost so much anyway.

I went in, asked what the quickest race was (it was a dog race) and quickly bet 100 pounds on some random canine. He didn’t even place. T_T

william hill betting slips

I decided to split my bets for the second round since this is not an even payout – the odds can be as high as 16 times so I can easily recoup my losses from a 50 pound bet.

I bet 50 on one horse and 50 on another – one a favorite to win and one a long shot with a high payout.

william hill dog races

Both of my dogs didn’t even get into the top 3. T_T

Total loss: GBP 1,100 in about 20 minutes. That’s over a RM 5,000 loss (more if you factor in the loss in currency conversion).

What you can do with RM 5,000:
Buy a nice d-SLR
Go on an exotic holiday to Egypt
Buy a new notebook

I could have used that RM 5,000 to squeeze in another trip to Iran before the end of the year. 🙁

Third time is not the charm. I should have just gone home instead of trying to win a measly 200 pounds and losing 1,100 pounds in the process. It was a mistake to head in when I still had one leg of my vacation to go. Oh well.

I stopped betting coz I only had 1,000 pounds left and I needed to change that to Euros to go to Amsterdam. Now I’m here at the airport. I just paid 20 pounds to store my excess luggage for two days while I fly to Amsterdam and I’m starving but I don’t want to eat until I’m in Amsterdam coz the things here are so expensive.

I’m even too cheap to pay GBP 9.95 for 24 hour Internet access at the airport so I’m going to post this when I’m in Amsterdam.

I go die now. Kthxbai.

Written: 4:35 am London time (GMT 0)

Posted: 11:42 am Amsterdam time (GMT +1)

Hail to the King, baby!

Okay, I’m back and I’ve survived the migration from MT to WP.

It’s a lot harder than it seems at first coz I have 8 fucking years of blog entries so I’m going to have to double check on whether it all came out fine.

london

Anyway, in other news, I’ll be heading off to London this Thursday. =D

w00t!

Happy Deepavali everyone! I’ve got an early meeting tomorrow so I’ll post tomorrow night. Thanks for reading and yes, I will fix the fugly site layout soon. 😉

A bad case of the flu

flu meds

I’m currently coughing my lungs out, running a fever and feeling like crap due to this flu that I caught. It’s a good thing I followed my doctor’s orders and did not fly to Melbourne coz:

1. I might get quarantined (which won’t be fun)
2. This is just going to get worse (and she was right)

That was just the start of the flu, it’s been getting worse since then. I can’t eat anything coz I have no appetite and I’ll just throw it back up and my body aches everywhere – even in places I didn’t know exist!

fluhalt

I’m also being prescribed Tamiflu (generic oseltamivir made by Ranbaxy called FluHalt) as a precaution against H1N1. Photo taken using Sony Cyber-shot TX-5. I like this one, even though it makes me nauseous, it really helps in the body aches.

I hope I don’t have H1N1 though – that’s like so passe. It would be interesting if I was Patient Zero in a new influenza subtype from rats (kinda like the black death) from my rodent eating activities. 90% mortality rate and all that. Now that would be something new.
smirk

How much floor should you use to make a pizza?

pizza floor

I’m much more interested in the pounds of ceiling and wall the toppings are made from. 😉

The funny thing is that this came out in an issue where there was an insert apologizing about a misprint in the previous one saying that Kadazans are from Sarawak with an addendum that more care will be taken for future publications. Kadazans are from Sabah, with the exception of Karen Mayer coz she’s just special that way.

What’s the story?

morning glory

I’m back from Port Dickson! Stayed in a water chalet above the sea, with morning glories adorning the (man-made) beachhead. All in all, it was a pretty chill weekend. 🙂

…and now I’m back at home, playing Spymaster. Crap.

P/S – I just realized I spilled Jack Daniels all over the back seat. It seems that I have neglected to properly cap the damn thing in PD before transporting it back. You probably know how atrocious whisky-on-fabric smells like. Fuck me.



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