we went to the burial site of my grandparents today and i'm actually quite thankfully that the graveyard uses plaques instead of tombstones. aside from looking quite nice, it actually makes the place look a little less sad and daunting, where it feels more like a place of quite mourning and longing than something out of a bad horror movie. it was drizzling so we quickly placed the flowers and left for the temple to leave incense sticks.
on the way, my sister had to explain to my nieces the idea of idea and a graveyard. although they awkwardly said that they wanted to know what heaven was like (obviously what happens when death is sugar coated... not that there is any other way of doing it), my sister accidentally mentioned that to go to heaven you have to have been a good person. my older niece was fine, probably realizing that it was a topic my sister was trying very hard to approach (kind of like the 'birds and the bees'), my little niece burst into tears. she said that she cried, sulked and got into trouble sometimes and was afraid that she wouldn't be able to go to heaven and see her parents when the time came. i didn't really expect that kind of reaction, but it did make me want to cuddle her. my sister reassured her that it was okay to cry if she was upset as long as she didn't do something really bad. i was tempted to say 'yeah like murder someone', but i don't think that would have improved the situation. my little niece just kept insisting that crying was bad because you could get in trouble for it, and didn't calm down until my sister found a way to flick the conversation to 'the princess and the frog'.
aside from that, we had a great breakfast as a hong kong style cafe with the best lemon tea ever. it was legit lemon tea, not some kind of lipton concentrate, and they had the best club sandwich and garlic chicken wings. we got there a bit late so ended up having our lunch there instead of breakfast, which was the original plan. i hope we get up earlier tomorrow because we're going to las vegas.
after that and the graveyard visit, we got prepaid sim cards for national calls (in case we got lost) and bought groceries at the 99 asian market. i found this massive bottle of gatorade there. i swear, it's nearly than entire litre! i also found a billion bottles of ramune in different colours and flavours that i've never seen in australia before. it's so cheap too! i took photos of it and bought a few because i thought lisa might want to see and i wanted to drink it all. hehe.
we headed to an outlet shops afterwards because my niece's flats had completely ripped in the sole. we only had about two hours until our dinner that was planned with my uncle so it was a very short trip. the girls got converse shoes (my sister was originally looking at reebok and nike, so i told her she was silly and dragged her to a store with decent shoes). i found a nice pair but i thought they were much too similar to what i already had, so i held off. i found a cute pair of pink sequinned ones but they're the most impractical things i've ever seen, especially with the way i abuse them in the city. i ended up with a cute white sweater and oversized pink cardigan from GAP and this really sweet pink sweater from H&M. i'm really hoping to buy a nice blazer, a bunch of dresses, a new pair of combat boots (since the plane ride, my boots are officially gone) and some vans.
we'll be going to vegas tomorrow morning and will be trying to get in a trip to the outlets again beforehand. my nieces and sister don't have a thick enough jacket and it's taken a turn for the frozen over here. plenty of beautiful photos to come tomorrow and my perspective on the david copperfield show!
here's a photo of the eeyore and the necklace i got yesterday too, as well as the adorable cinderella animator's doll my baby niece got (i wanted one too but they don't have tinkerbell and she's kind of 'my thing'. i'm hoping to find more at the store outside disneyland, especially peter pan collectibles.
"Holy Water" from the Temple.
Cutest princess bracelets from the Disney store.
Car we rented. The doors are automatic and it's a seven seater awesomeness.
MAGIC SCHOOL BUS!
Really cool fire from dinner, it was like lighting a gel ball.
Since I'm not a fan of Viet cuisine, most of my dinner consisted of this strawberry smoothie. Legit strawberry and yummy, I might add, although too cold in this weather.
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