Guests from Brunei

My best friends visited Dunedin 2 weeks ago. It was a very happy day for me as I haven't seen one of them for almost 2 years now and it felt wonderful to meet my good friends in a different country and showed them around the place I spent most of my last decade in.They, together with 3 other friends arrived at about 10am on the Saturday morning. They rented a car but I decided one day is too precious for me and I didn't want to waste it in any way so I still went to pick them up from the airport.

The schedule was pretty full and they did not waste a single moment mucking around. Straight after the pickup, we went to the Esplanade for brunch (also to give them a chance to see the beach). To save time, we had gourmet pizzas as we were running late for the Speights brewery tour.


Seafood pizza and us in action trying to look cool @_@"


We managed to get to the brewery in time. Speights (pronounced as "Spayts") is the most popular South New Zealand beer and the main factory is situated in Dunedin. There are factories scattered around New Zealand but the tour guide claimed that the beer made from Otago tastes different because they have better tasting water here. I have never fancied beer too much so I couldn't quite tell the difference. My thinking is - as long as it gets me tipsy - it's good beer.

Towards the end of the tour, we were led into the tap bar where we got to taste all the 6 different kinds of beer they produce - from lager to dark ale.

Picture with James Speights - the founder of Speights


"Yum Seng" using the most popular Speights gold medal ale.

After the tour, we went to the former 'World's steepest street" (apparently now taken over by a street in the US). It was still pretty impressive though as it's almost 45 degrees steep. SJ and friends had a good time walking/running up and down the street while worrying they might tip and tumble downhill due to the steepness and difficulty in achieving balance.



We then toured around my University before they went off to the Peninsula by themselves while I quickly stole a short nap at home.

Dinner was done at my place. I have a fierce and strong passion towards Korean BBQ and had just recently bought a proper BBQ hot plate just to fulfill my cravings. Of course, it was the best opportunity to do it when they were here. I felt it would be better for them too as I figured they would be too exhausted by then after a long flight and lack of sleep. They were nice to get some liquor from the duty free shop. It was really fun as we got to feast, drink and catch up at the same time.




Pork belly is my favourite although I could sense my blood vessels clogging up and my butt grew larger by 1 inch the next day after I ate them. Oh well, I decided to disregard the feeling of guilt and will still eat them..

They fell asleep one by one after dinner as they were defeated by sleepiness and the fun-filled day officially ended at 12am.