Ikea, Tampines.

Today is the official day which Ikea Tampines opens its doors.

...

And bloody hell, there are a lot of people.

Thankfully, the parking lots are pretty huge, and there are plenty of places to park, so parking isn't a problem.

After parking, you have to head to the first floor (note: no directions given), and join the insanely long queue to go into the show. The queue is due to the crowd control people ensuring that not too many people crowd into Ikea at the same time.

However, with my 1337 ninja skills, I stealthily blended into the crowd which was making their way into the store. The reason why I could exploit it was because the place where everyone was queuing was in a car park, and the guy will let people cross the road once he gets the signal to do so.

So, by shadow stepping into the crowd who is moving in, I avoided the insanely long queue, probably made up mostly of people coming by bus.

Once I entered Ikea, I took an escalator to the main show room. Once there, the first thing I noticed was the insanely huge eating area which looks like some kind of a canteen found in one of those new primary schools.

However, despite the huge canteen, the queue was so long, you couldn't see where it start.

Which means that it is not a very good idea to eat at the place.

Ikea Tampines itself is pretty big, as it has the entire building to itself. Following the style set by Ikea Alexandria, the show room is on the upper level, while the market place is on the lower level. The market place is the area where most of the things, such as light bulbs and whatever, are sold.

Without much to buy, I settled on buying a lamp for my room in Australia, and also a cheap pillow for my cat. My mom, on the other hand, stayed rooted in the plant section, ended up buying 2 pots of plant.

Trick question:

Who has to carry them? ._.

Oh well.

Lunch was at the snacks bar where hot dog is sold at $1 each, while a combo (ie, with a drink), goes for $1.70. I opted for a salmon sandwich ($3.50 was very reasonable for it's size and filling) and another hot dog.

As I left, people were still streaming into Ikea.

Looks like the launch is quite a huge success.

---

Seems like the latest food craze in town is the "Hong Kong Tea house/Restaurant".

So, it was of not much of a surprise when I saw one opening up in Whitesands, seeing plenty of similar stores opening up all over the place.

However, such stalls, only put the name "Hong Kong" to shame.

Firstly, is the speed. The thing Hong Kong restaurants pride themselves in is speed. Place an order, reply a quick SMS, and your food will most likely be on your table by the time your SMS is sent. Some orders take longer, but most orders arrive within 5 minutes (Some are insanely fast).

Sadly, the restaurants here don't have that idea. I ordered a cup of milk tea, and waited a full 10 minutes for it. In fact, only on inquiring about the status of my cup of tea was made and sent to me.

All is fine IF the food is good though.

However, the food taste pretty bad. My milk tea was way too watered down that time, and I've heard countless times from friends and family about how poor the food quality here is.

Seriously, if they can't even keep up in quality, they shouldn't call themselves "Hong Kong styled (whatever)", because it is deceiving. Moreover, people like me will have some sort of a standard made when they claim that they cook food the same was as they do back at home.

If they can't, then they shouldn't say it, because it just makes people like me walk away in disgust and never come back for a second try.