On my trip to Japan, I found out that bubble tea is having a bit of a moment. It’s a bit of a surprise, because Singapore is already in round 2 of the bubble tea boom. But our bubble tea craze never resulted in bubble tea-related products such as this instant bubble tea that I… Read More Trying Instant Bubble Tea from Japan
After reading The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict, I was pretty excited to continue the rest of the series. The only thing was that I read the first book – The Mysterious Benedict Society – six years ago and only remembered that I really enjoyed the book (present me tsks at past me). So it… Read More The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
I’ve been sitting on this post for at least a month, which is weird because the Central Public Library is one of the libraries that I visit at least a couple of times a year. I definitely don’t go there as much as I do to Clementi Public Library or Jurong Regional Library, but I… Read More SingLib #3: Central Public Library
The alternative title for this was “Reading slow does not mean reading better”, but I don’t have anything against ‘slow readers’ (how do you even categorise reading speeds anyway?) and I thought that the title above was a bit more unwieldy but accurate. The inspiration for this post came from this BookRiot post titled “Why… Read More Your Reading Speed is NOT Related to Your Reading Quality
This is another one of the books that’s been on the TBR list for some time. While it’s not related to the overuse of social media, I thought it would be interesting to read about how social media is being used as “weapons”. LikeWar argues that social media is being used by various groups to… Read More LikeWar by P.W. Singer
I mentioned in my Hachimanjyu Tea Farm visit post that I didn’t get to buy tea made only from the kuritawase cultivar. It’s a pity that I couldn’t try it, but on the other hand, I did manage to get my hands on single-cultivar green teas. Three of them, in fact. Two of the teas… Read More Trying 3 Different Japanese Green Tea Cultivars (Round 1)
It took me some time but I’ve finally read the third book in the Invisible Library series. Sadly, I wasn’t as impressed as I was with the first two books, which means that I’m at a bit of a crossroads as to whether I want to continue the series. The Burning Page takes place right… Read More The Burning Page by Genevieve Cogman
So this is the main reason why I went to Yakushima. I got to know Hachimanjyu Tea while I was working for teapasar and decided to visit them on my trip to Japan to say hi properly and thank them for being willing to work with us. Who is Hachimanjyu Tea? Hachimanjyu Tea is a… Read More My Visit to Hachimanjyu Tea Farm
Although I enjoyed Rebecca and My Cousin Rachel, I haven’t actually read any of Daphne du Maurier’s short stories. Until now, that is. The blurb for The Doll describes it as “short fiction in which she explored the images, themes, and concerns that informed her later work” so I was cautiously excited about what the… Read More The Doll by Daphne du Maurier
It’s been slightly over my month since my last update, so I thought it would be a good time to check-in. This month has had slightly unusual phone usage habits because I had to depend on my phone quite a bit in Japan and I was worried that I would continue the high usage after… Read More Breaking the Smartphone Habit: One Month Update
