EL Paso Restaurant

Last Friday night me and my wife went to a Mexican Restaurant called El Paso in City Road, Cardiff. The restaurant is a family business, running by a father and his son. It was actually my second time dining at El Paso and my first visit was to celebrate my mate's farewell party. We totally had an awesome night and this time even better cause I was encompanied by my wife. Even though she turned up a bit late as usual, it was worth the wait. We ordered a chicken buffalo meal and some salad for starters, and a Mexican paella dish as the main course. The paella was served in a big frying pan full with stuff like chicken, mussels, prawns and etc. We were shocked with the portion and I think it probably needs at least 3 Asian grown adults to finish it in one go.

Me and Pete

Pete farewell party

They have a great environment in the restaurant with the Mexican theme and Mexican songs playing in the background. The price of the food is not bad as well, I would say as reasonable considering the portion of dishes that they serve. They got great and friendly service too so I would really recommend this restaurant, not to mention a 15% discounts for students. At the end of the day, we had a great night out and came home with full stomach, plus unfinished take-away paella :)

Mexican hat

The starter

The paella

Me

Mexican man

GAMEware PS3 Controller Charging Dock

I bought a GAMEware PS3 controller charging dock for around £13. I redeemed my card point to get this dock so technically, I'm not really paying any single penny for this. Plus, the dock is on-sale for half the price at that time. I go for PS3 accessories this time cause I am trying to make sure I wont buy any more PS3 games that can lead me to waste my time and sit in front of my telly for few hours when I can do my PhD workloads instead. Check out the unboxing video below and some pictures of this charging dock. I am quite pleased with this additional accessory of my current PS3 collection now ;). The dock has two additional USB hubs so it provides another hub to the console and placing the controllers on the dock next to my PS3 makes them look cool. Hope you enjoy the video guys and have nice long weekend!

Street Dance 3D

    We went to watch Street Dance the Movie straightly after it was released yesterday. I actually prefer to see Prince of Persia instead but my wife was crazy about watching the 3D street dance movie she dragged me to Cineworld to see it. On our way there, we even got a chance to see Flawless performing life in Cardiff town to promote the movie. We ended up spent almost an hour in front of Queens Street's CarPhoneWareHouse where the dance group had their poster signing session inside the store before came out and performed some dance routines. I say they are one of the best street dancers in UK but I still love Diversity more.

    I found the storyline of the movie a bit lame but the dance action is quite interesting. Unfortunately, I think Step Up sequels are much better. However considering it as the first British street dance movie, I give them some credit for their pretty good attempt. I'm not going to write more details about the movie cause I don't want to ruin your experience watching it but it's probably worth to see the 3D effects. If you are lucky enough like us, you might get a chance having Flawless or even Diversity of George Sampson deliver an opening speech before the movie start! These are the videos I took during the street performance and their opening speech so enjoy!

Open Space

It is still fresh in my memory seeing the door next to the teaching office at the 1st floor as the access and hall way to the west building, and as a shortcut route to Trevithic building. For the last few months the door had been closed but never cross my mind that I'm gonna see this!

Entrance door 

Computers

Armchairs

What a transformation and superb idea. They change the place to become an open area, well equipped with armchairs, tables and computers for student to relax or study. I've been to Uni for the last 6 years but as far as I remember, nothing major has ever happen around the Engineering building, except to our library which had a quite similar renovation, but even that construction was a year ago . I'm really impress and honestly think it is a really good job. Well done!

Gourmet Society

To all food lovers out there, there is a bargain offer for a Gourmet Society's membership Card with an almost 90% discount privilege. The membership will be valid for 6 months at the price of £0.99, you can later extend the period but after that you need to pay it at the retail price value of £35. I first saw this amazing bargain in the KGB website not long time ago, they stopped the offer for a while after that but the good news is the deal is back again. I haven't try use the card yet but I certainly plan to take advantage of it later on some coming special occasions. The website seems to be reliable cause it's supported by the 118 118 advertisement company and the deal only works after they manage to gather certain number of applications. Either way, I reckon it wont be a big deal since I've got nothing to lose if I try this card. Give it a go guys... it might save you some pounds but make sure to read the terms and conditions and do check the site for more details as well. 


Have a nice weekend.

D-lux 4 Brown Leather Case

After went for my regular Friday's PhD management course yesterday, I straightly headed back home as I didnt feel like staying in the office and decided to work at home instead. Voila! I saw a white parcel left by the postman at my house door. I've been waiting for this delivery for ages. Guess what?! It's the original brand new D-lux camera case with box that I won from Ebay for a tenner. The retail price for the case is around £80, so I managed to save more than 50% this time, plus a cashback receipt from the topcashback website. The only thing that upset me a bit is the fact that the seller not honest to describe that the case is apparently for a D-lux 3 camera. Never mind though, it just need some minor alteration so that the camera will fit properly into the case later.

This is also my first time to strike a bargain when purchasing stuff from Ebay. At first I couldn't believe it and I even thought the case would never arrive after paying to the seller. Luckily it arrived just fine. I'm not going to write a review for this camera case cause there is actually nothing much to describe about it. Just want to mention that it is indeed a nice accessory to go along with my Leica. The leather texture feels soft to touch and it has the cool-and-old-school-look appeal carrying the camera with the case. Unfortunately I need to remove the camera stripe as it doesnt fit into the case cause they made it to nicely fit the camera alone but with very little space for anything else. Perhaps it does so to protect the camera from wobbling. Overall I am satisfied with it, just hoping Leica can reduce its price in the future.

BELKIN Cush Top

After I left for work this morning, Royal Mail delivered the cushtop that I bought from the play.com website. It was supposed to be send last Friday but I missed it. Luckily I managed to request for re-delivery and so glad to see the parcel when I came home. 

I firstly stumbled upon this useful laptop cushion at the House of Fraser in Cardiff, with £20 price tag but the one that I purchased online only costs me half-price. This cushtop can support my laptop when I don't feel like working on my study desk, and it can also avoid my lap feels the heat coming from the bottom of the laptop. Apart from looks smart, this mini cushion is practical, comfortable to use and also has compartment to put my laptop cable. I totally love it!

Iron Man 2

Last night we went to watch Iron Man 2 at Cineworld cinema in Cardiff and honestly I feel a little bit disappointed with the storyline and the ending. The actions however was awesome, just as the first movie.  The story concentrates too much on Tony Stark but despite that, they still introduced too many new side characters, for example the special agent portrayed by Samuel Jackson, thus making the other characters no chance to develop throughout the movie. I am a fan of IronMan and I even bought a special collector-edition DVD of the first movie but this sequel is definitely not my cup of tea. Anyway it still can be considered as an interesting stuff to watch in cinema this year.

Talking about watching movie, I would like to share a special website suggested by Martin Lewis page called the KGB. From this site you can get lots of great deals such as discounted cinema tickets etc. I even got myself a movie ticket voucher for a pound which I then used to purchase Iron Man ticket online. It was worth a try plus we did enjoyed our night out after a week of tiring weekdays! But then again, the movie is a bit let down, totally prefer the first one but if you going to watch it, remember to try the website I have just recommended! ;)

Malaysian Iron Man in action lol!

D-lux 4 Video Test

Today is a big day for UK citizen cause it's the election day. The day itself is gloomy and rainy perhaps to drop a hint about the outcome of the election. Hopefully, the result will bring new vision to UK economy and society. But I hope the current policies are not going to change much, especially the immigration law, no matter who becomes the new Britain prime minister. I am almost towards the end of my student visa with only six months left, so hopefully no more rubbish rules is added to the existing one. They are already cumbersome to me and the other international students.

Okay enough about the election.. now to the interesting bit. Here's a sample of video taken from my D-lux 4 just to kill my boredom. The HD movie is not bad at all but the build-in microphone is not really as good as my canon 500D. Another drawback about D-lux 4 is the incapability of the camera to zoom during the video, instead I can only shoot static movie capture just like Panasonic GF1.

Nevertheless, I can say that it is a nice feature to have a video mode for this camera; definitely better compared to other cameras in its class.

Semana Santa

In one of my previous entries I did mentioned about my experience seeing Easter celebration in Granada, Spain. Here's a short video clip that I'd like to share. I apologies for some interruptions in the clip cause I snapped some photos while taking the video. Hopefully it is not a big deal as the main thing I want to share is the event itself which was incredible. Enjoy!

Save Money When Shopping Online

My wife always told me I'm a money conscious person but I beg the differ! How a person like me can be a money concious person? Hahahaaa.. the answers is cause I always looking for better deals like Money Supermarket advertisement here.

Over the years living in Britain, I've learnt how to save money and figured out lots of ways to do it. For today's entry, I want to share with you a famous website called TopCashBack; a site where you can get cash backs when you shop online. I did tried it and it is absolutely brilliant as it helps me saves every penny I have spent. From booking bus tickets, registering my new broadband connection up to bidding on Ebay, they redeemed me cash backs. There is no catch or trick about this site. They make their own money from  advertisements and you are guarantee 100% to get cash back. What you need to do is to register your details and if you refer your friends or family members they'll also credit a pound to you for each referral.  

So guys what are you waiting for? Register now and enjoy your cash back but do read the terms and conditions to know how the cash back works. Here I show you my referral link and screen shot of my cash back payments so you know I am not playing around. Last but not least, remember not be too addicted with the website cause it only saves your money, not to make you a rich person ;). Nevertheless, be a smart shopper and save every penny while you can!!

Top CashBack