Nachos with Chi

My friend Chi and her hubby Punch (aka Panda) came back to Singapore for a visit last week. Chi used to work in Singapore and Punch used to visit her all the time. They consider this one of their favorite countries to visit and usually come by every year that we have nicknamed them the FV’s for Frequent Visitors. 😀

I was at my too-lazy-to-blog phase last year so I wasn’t able to blog about their visit last August, so I’ll post our photos of that day here instead.

Tea time at TWG

Shopping for silver moon tea and macarons

At Gardens by the Bay with our Zamboanga friends

Drink-all-you-can at Bar 25

Gelle and I were super excited to see Chi and when we asked her what she wanted to do and where she wanted to go, she said she just wanted to the normal things she used to do when she was living here. “Let’s just eat at a hawker then go to a coffee shop later to catch up!” she said. Then after a while, she added, “Let’s watch a movie! I miss nachos!” Well that was unexpected. Haha.

So our original plans stood as thus: hawker breakfast + coffee shop + movie. Then it got changed to having pancakes for brunch followed by the movie. However on the day itself, last Saturday, plans changed once again. Hahaha well what can I say, we’re girls, so we’re allowed to be fickle-minded, okay?

So what did we finally do? Well since our movie was in GV Plaza, it made sense to meet in the mall that movie house is in, which is Plaza Singapura. Gelle suggested meeting in Starbucks first and then deciding from there where to go for pancakes. When Chi showed up, the first thing we did was giggle like teenage girls and swap gifts. She gave me Speculoos cookie butter, bagoong and green mangoes. I gave her my pasalubongs for her sister Ngangi, and a pair of Cotton On foldable sunglasses for her.

Who is that actress??

Chi realized that she had to have coffee, so we decided to stay in Starbucks and have breakfast there instead. We ordered our usual – hot white mocha for her, hot mocha for me. Then we ordered a croissant and toasty cheese bagel that we could pair with the Speculoos cookie butter which she was excited for me to try. I loved it, by the way. Read my review about that product here. Then Gelle arrived and I of course we had to “camwhore some more” with our new matchy-matchy leopard print foldable sunnies! 😀

New friendship sunglasses! 😀

We sent this pic over to Ngangi, the fourth member of the group who calls itself the meanies. She was back in Manila and she said she was so jealous. I know exactly how she feels, that was how I felt when Gelle went to Manila last time!

We had so much fun catching up over coffee and croissant with the added bonus of our lovely new find. I say “new” because this Starbucks is a new one, located in the newly built wing of Plaza Singapura which I talked about here. I think this is the most beautiful Starbucks branch I have ever been to so far. It’s so roomy and tastefully decorated. Take a look for yourself.

Beautiful Starbucks in new Plaza Singapura wing

My beautiful friends! 😀

We were aghast to realize when it was already noon. Time flies when you’re having fun! We had decided earlier that we would have a proper lunch at Nandos Peri-Peri Chicken, which was one of our most favorite restaurants when Chi was still working here. We had first tried it when we went on a trip to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and fell in love with it that we ate there twice on that same trip. When they opened their first branch in Singapore, we were one of the first ones who braved the long queues for it.

This time there was no queue and we were quickly ushered into a seat. We didn’t even need to think about what to order, we knew exactly what we wanted – a quarter of peri-peri chicken with two sides and a glass of sparkling apple juice. If you will look at this old post, you will see that this is our usual.

Nando’s peri-peri chicken (mild spicy) with mediterranean rice and corn on the cob

Sparkling apple juice with fruit bits and a wedge of lemon

Meanies in Nando’s Plaza Singapura branch. We miss you, Ngangi!

Throwback pic: Meanies in Nando’s Bugis (2010)

After we polished off everything, we realized we were so full and decided to walk around for a while so that we would digest our food and later have space for the nachos that Chi so craved. Our movie was at 2:30, so we headed upstairs to collect our tickets, buy snacks and meet the boys, and by boys I mean Chi and Gelle’s hubbies Punch and Joey.

Happy pandas with their very Singaporean movie snacks

Smile, Nachos! 😀 I also gave her leopard-print sunnies. Hihi.

“Heaven!” was how Chi described her feeling the moment she munched on her prized nachos. In case you’re wondering, we also do have nachos in the Philippines, but they’re usually covered with meat and mayo. Chi just likes the one with cheese. Me, I just like them with Chi. 😉

We all loved the movie and all the girls cried at one scene towards the end because we’re all crybabies like that. Haha! Read my full movie review of it here.

And then it was time to part and we felt very sad, suddenly. “We already spent almost the entire day together but it still feels so bitin!” we bemoaned. Punch saw the stricken look on his wife’s face then, and told us, “But you can still see each other tomorrow!” Waaahhh thank you Punch! I love you! Not in that way, okay, like in a brotherly way! Please calm down.

And that was how we ended up making plans to see each other again the next day!

To be continued…