London... London

It has been a while since the last time I posted something on this blog. My apology to all of you who have taken the time to drop by only to find the same old post. And my gratitude to all of you who have sent warm regards and concerned emails asking how I was doing. Thank you!



A couple of things happened that took my time entirely away from blogging. First I was so overwhelmed of preparing my entry to the ICCA Wedding Cake Competition in Malaysia taking place end of last September. It was my very first competition so it was understandable how seriously I must have taken it. A three week dedication that consisted of flower preparation, coloring and dusting, and a lot of rolling and folding. In the meantime I also had to worry about the flight, accommodation, and how to carry my cake on board.



I was just super busy. There were times when I thought it was just too tiring joining such overseas event and should just quit. But then T was always there to comfort me and put me back on track thinking positively that it was a worthwhile journey of experience, either win or lose at the end. Due to the number of things we need to hand carry into the airplane, T finally decided to accompany me for the trip. A great support came just right in time, one week to the competition day.



We arrived in Petaling Jaya, the city where the competition took place 2 days earlier. It was nice since we could do a final touch to the cake, check out the distance between the hotel and the competition hall and figure out the feasibility of hand carrying the cake on the competition day, and of course have time to find good food and enjoy ourselves a little bit.



We were asked to deliver the cake between 8:00 and 10:30am in the morning of 30th September and since my cake was fully done the night before we had the luxury to show up at 9:00. I carried the cake with my hands, out of my hotel room and all the way to the competition hall, going through lift, pavement, stairway, and escalator. T was right in front of me looking out for my steps. It was such a relief when I finally lied my cake on the display table.



Everything went smoothly and we had the privilege to see the judges take their rounds, observe and jolt down their comments. Our judges were Rosalind Chan - the owner of ICCA, Chef Wan and Chef Ami - both celebrity chefs of Malaysia, and Alan Dunn and Lorraine McKay - gurus of sugar flower and sugar modeling.



The surprise came about the next day while I was attending classes with Alan Dunn and Lorraine McKay. On a coffee break, I bumped into Adlina from ICCA who asked whether I had heard about the winner announcement and since my answer was "No", she invited me to walk with her to the exhibition hall.

There I strolled around passing through other participants’ cakes before finally stood in front of mine which happened to be at the end corner, and noticed that there was a 1st sign placed right beside my cake. Good heaven!! I jumped in joy and quickly shared my bliss with T. Guess what? I won a sponsored trip to London to attend Squires Kitchen's 5 day professional cake decorating class and Squire Kitchen exhibition in March 2012! Oh, London... London...



So from there I and T got to celebrate the winning with our friends in Malaysia - Jerry and Suki. We had a wonderful time exploring Petaling Jaya and traveling in Malacca. It was such a great trip packed with beautiful places and delicious food that we promised to go back again as soon as we could.



Our following destination, Jakarta was supposed to be a sweet one week trip which happened to be over extended due to flooding in Bangkok. Being away for that long made me realize how much I missed home and wanted to fly back and return to my routine life, and of course blogging and cake decorating.