In Australian, people like to buy Christmas gifts for family and friends, Therefore, to facilitate everyone’s shopping, many shopping malls have extended their opening hours. The Garden City Shopping mall where is near our home also extended their opening hours this week. Both Tuesday and Friday are open until 9:00, and even open until midnight on Thursday, Friday, and Sunday. Also, on the 23rd, there was a fireworks show at the town of Town Square at 10:00 on Sunday night. It also sounds very exciting, but according to our previous years’ experience, not all stores are trading until the mid-night, only major chain stores, such as Myer, Target, and BigW, are open for the whole extended trading hours.
If you want to shop, check the opening hours of the major shopping malls near you. I believe it is similar to Garden city.

4KQ Christmas lights

Runner-Up Christmas Lights @ Algester

In Brisbane, a lot of passionated households setup Christmas lightings and decorations in their own garden, turn it into a Christmas theme park! Some of them joined the competition from 4 KQ radio. The winner’s garden city looks very beautiful. I went to 1 st runner-up of this year in Algester. It seemed impressive! There is a Christmas tree made by LED lights.

LED Christmas Tree@ Algester


Moreover, there is some “man-made” snow. It gave you of White Christmas! Please note that, the “man-made” snows will fall on your head, you may need to take a shower afterward. 

Man-Made Snow

Besides of lightings, there are some inflated Christmas decorations. The family must spend a lot of efforts on this. I think that is worth to check out whether there is a winner at nearby you. That is worth to pay a trip for visiting.

Chicken Congee@Landmark
Yam Cha as breakfast, that is a kind of Cantonese traditional. However, because there are not many Chinese in Brisbane. The market is not big enough, so as far as I know, there is no restaurant offers Yam cha before 11am.
Recently, the situation is changed. Last Wednesday, after I did a tour of the pre-prep school for my daughter. We went to Sunnybank plaza for breakfast around 9.30am. I found Landmark restaurant has already opened for business. They opened weekdays from 8 am to 11am and serving breakfast. Moreover, if you pay your bills before 11am, They won’t charge for tea. It saves you a few dollars per person. Besides, there is a breakfast combo deal from 8am to 10.30pm, that included a bowl of congee and Steamed Vermicelli Roll or Boa for $9.8. That is value for money. On that, we had two combo deals, including two bowls of chicken congee, Steamed Vermicelli Roll, BBQ Bao,
BBQ Pork Bao

Steamed Vermicelli Roll
and extra dim sim. That cost only $24.90. We finished that after 11pm, I was so full, I only had a few pieces of biscuit as my lunch.

Address:

Shop 101,
Sunnybank Plaza Shopping Centre,
358 Mains Road,
Sunnybank
QLD 4109
Tel: 07 3344 3288 Continue Reading

Black Friday Sales@Brisbane
In the United States, Black Friday sales are on this weekend, it happens every year for a while, and many big department stores will have some good deals on this Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. This year, I have received emails from many Australian online stores, such as Amazon, which has black Friday sales. This afternoon, when I had lunch in Carindale, I found that there were a lot of shops, such as cotton on and JB HiFi, which had significant price cuts, up to 70% off. That is another event to attract us to spend more!

Click Frenzy - Online Stores Sales

Source:Open Clip ArtUsing Under Public Domain Attribution

In the US, there is Cyber Monday, In China, there is a Single day. In Australia, there is a similar online sales event calls ClickFrenzy, which From 7pm AEDT Tomorrow to the next day 7pm AEDT. Same as the overseas, some major online stores will have a fast sale on their selected products during the time, such as Myer, Big W, Woolworths, Sheridan and Chemist Warehouse to promote online shopping. Those participated stores are from computer stores to supermarket and houseware. Almost every things are covered. I need to check it out tomorrow 7pm, I wish I can find some good stuff!

For the further details, please check their website.

Ramen@Carindale

Tonkotsu Ramen
Last Friday, I went to Carindale for picking up a work computer. After the pickup, I had lunch in there. This times, I tried a ramen restaurant, Shinobi Ramen. I read their reviews online, and they are very positive. Thus, I chose to have my lunch there. I arrived there before noon. That was not too crowded, but there were already a few people sitting in. Then I ordered Tonkotsu Ramen for $13.90. That is a bit expensive. Other Ramen places only cost around $12 with a free extra noodle, but I don’t think this restaurant offers this.
After the wait for 10 minutes, my ramen arrived. There are a few ingredients including Chashu, Japanese Spring Onion, Marinated Sliced Egg, Nori, and Kikurage. That is not too small portion. The most important is the taste. It tasted very good. The soup is very good, I just drank them all. In addition, their noodle is very fresh! I love it. However, the portion can be bigger for this price, then it will be more reasonable!
Shinobi Ramen
Besides, the restaurant looks nice and clean! I had a comfortable lunch!
If I go to Westfield Carindale, I will have this ramen again!
Address:
K104 1151 Creek Rd,
Westfield Carindale
QLD 4152
(At Glasshouse)

Opening Hours:
Monday – Wednesday 11:00AM – 8:00PM

Thursday – Saturday 11:00AM – 9:00PM

Sunday 11:00AM – 6:00PM

Continue Reading

black pepper sauce chicken fillet spaghetti
There is a “new” Hong Kong style fusion restaurant, Your personal chef, opened in Sunnybank plaza a few months ago. Now, it became a popular choice for lunch after the Sunday service. The primary reason is their lunch special. You can use a Hong Kong style fusion rice, noodle or pasta, such as my favorite dish, black pepper sauce chicken fillet spaghetti. There are around 20 different choices of meals. Most of them are just for$7.8. Moreover, you can have a Hong Kong style special drink with an extra $2. Lastly, and their atmosphere is very comfortable and fresh. I like there.

Address:
90D
Sunnybank Plaza,
358 Mains Rd & McCullough St,
Sunnybank
QLD 4109
Telephone:07-3423 8188
Continue Reading

Local Purple Rains

Jacaranda Flowers
Now is Jacaranda Flowers Blooming Season in Brisbane. As I mentioned before, you can go to UQ or New Farm Park, even go to Grafton, there is a Jacaranda Festival. However, in Brisbane, that is easy, if you drive around your local area, you can find some streets will have a lot of Jacaranda tree. This weekend, we went to a local side street in Sunnybank Hills. I found the whole street has Jacaranda planted in both sides. That looks great. That is a Purple Rain! I love it!
Jacaranda Flowers @Sunnybank Hills

Taiwan Festival 2018

Taiwan Festival 2018
I went to Taiwan Festival 2018 on the Saturday before last week. We arrived there at around 4 pm. There was not too quiet, but not very crowded. Maybe, on that Friday, their online payment was not working very well. As a result, there was a long queue. I guess some people were losing interest to go there.

Because of the technical difficulties of the payment system, They started to accept any cash. Thus, we have no troubles for payments. They had a walk around their street market. We found around 20 stalls to sell Taiwanese food such as and Taiwanese drinks.
Deep fried chicken fillet
For us, firstly, we had a deep fried chicken fillet, that was very crispy!
Taiwanese egg waffles.

Taiwanese egg waffles.
And then we tried Taiwanese egg waffles. They look like a real egg. That is fancy. It tastes really not bad, it tasted like waffles. I think that is ok. However, I have spent half an hour in the queue, that is a bit much. Moreover, four little waffles cost $9, that was a bit expensive for me too. Anyway, I went there for fun, spending a bit more is ok.
Taiwanese bottled drinks
Besides, there was a distributor of Taiwanese bottled drinks in there for promotion. Their promotion price was great, a bottle and pack of Taiwanese drink is only for $1. I like it.
Besides food and drinks, there are also Taiwanese cultural performances. I saw a group of people performing fan dances on the stage. It seems that they have spent a lot of time rehearsing, they were well prepared

fireworks
At around 9 pm, we went out to Sunnybank Hills to watch the fireworks display at the Taiwan Festival. It is also about ten minutes. It’s free, I certainly like it.
Fortunately, we went on Saturday, we did not encounter the problem of the payment system, and we lived nearby, so it was a bit of fun for. But some friends went there on Friday, because of the payment system issues, they had to spend the time to queue up to buy the food, they had some unpleasant experience. I hope that the organizer can learn from the experience, next times, they can handle it better and faster next time.

Purple Tree Blooming
Yesterday, when I was running nearby, I found that the purple trees (Jacaranda) were blooming. It’s the time of nearly November, this is the season of the purple tree blossoming. This tree is ubiquitous in Brisbane, so now I see a few purple trees on the roadside, it seems that there is “a little purple ocean” on the roadside.
Purple Tree Blooming@UQ
If you want to see more, I went to the Busway bus at the University of Queensland’s St Lucia in previous years , there are a number of Jacaranda planted along the footpath, I remember they are quite beautiful. If you are not satisfied, you can go to Grafton to attend the Jacaranda festival, which will be held from this Saturday to November 4. Someone told me there is a street where Jacaranda planted at both sides. Unfortunately, it is almost three hours drive from Brisbane, too far away. Maybe, we might go to Goodna, this Saturday and Sunday, there is also the Jacaranda festival, just a lot of small, Evan Marginson Park has several big jacarandas, but there is much closer to our home!