Cold Feet + Budget airlines' dirty tricks

After thinking so much about and planning to do more meaningful things during my break from work, I am suddenly getting cold feet and feeling v tempted to just nuah3 at cafes/ at home instead. The annoying admin/ travel logistics for upcoming volunteer trips must have gotten to me too much. :( But yeah as the trips draw closer I am suddenly confronted with fears like - will I be bored/ have no skills to help/ not be able to get along with other volunteers cos I am AS/ unadventurous/ too old etc etc

So we were supposed to be flying off to Taipei tmr morning - but alas on Wed morning I was suddenly woken up by call from Dad. He narrated to me the scary news about impending typhoons (which will strike this weekend) showing on CCTV and urged me not to go for my trip and endanger my life... I mean I knew the weather wldn't be good, but not to the extent of life endangering..? But in any case, to save my Dad from worrying every single night while I'm there (and my mum from all the nagging) I gave in and decided to postpone my trip to Oct..

And then my nightmare with changing flights on budget airlines began. Cheapo me booked budget tics which were not refundable/converted to credits but luckily they can be still be changed for a fee - but with A LOT of hassle. Had extended conversation with tel operator about extra charges; was given lousy explanations for rationale behind fee policies (that was last night with JETSTAR) and this afternoon I had to make like 4 phone calls to Tiger Airways about various issues like sneaky booking fees slapped on online on top of change fees; system errors arising from incompatibility of the online booking system with Safari and Mozilla Firefox and such.

On the sneaky booking fee - was quite disgusted how Tiger Airways secretly slaps on a new booking fee (though small) for changing flights - in addition to the change fees (Abt $60 Sing) and fare difference. When I asked the tel operator - she was like oh, the system involuntarily does this but you can call us back to refund you the double-charged booking fee after you confirm and pay for the flight change online. Also thought it was v evil that in the payment summary, despite the new booking fee slapped on, the consumer is misled by the summary stating $0 booking fees though the total additional balance payable INCLUDES the booking fees! What inethical things you discover when you scrutinise the fee breakdown...

The total new fare is 5827 TWD, including the 191 TWD booking fee..

Since we had alri previously paid 3901 for the 'old' ticket, the balance due was thus 5827 - 3901 = 1926. But 1926 TWD includes the 191 TWD booking fee, yet the summary shows that there is no booking fee! Horrible.

Mini baking marathon and WWOOFing

Last Fri was quite exhausting, as I whipped up a record 3 desserts in a day - the blueberry cheesecake I made a couple of weeks back (sadly it turned out less yummy this time round); pear and cinnamon frangipane tarts and more cake pops! I wanted to treat my ex-colleagues to some home-made desserts at our housewarming and had planned to make 2 things... But I got a little paranoid that my pears (painstakingly sourced by D) wld become stale if I left them for too long and so ended up making 3 things. It was tiring though still satisfying - just wished someone else cld have done the washing up for me as my hands were rougher from all the washing up :( How do the real bakers manage to whip up so many things everyday?!

Come this Fri I will also fly off to Taiwan to volunteer at an organic farm as a WWOOFer! D and I will have a weekend getaway in Taipei before I begin my 2-week self-imposed hardship posting... Am getting cold feet and wondering if I can take 2 weeks of manual labour and scorching sun... but it's too late to regret and will just try to make the best of it. Hopefully turning vegetarian for 2 weeks can help me shed some calories :P Unfortunately typhoons are looming large - crossing my fingers that Taiwan wun be too badly affected while I'm there! And that we'd be lucky enough to get at least one nice sunny day this weekend (it's likely to be rainy the whole weekend. boo.)

Above: Tarts before cooking and while baking. 

Was really pleased that my tarts turned out quite pretty! :)

 and yummy too! (thanks to an excellent but a bit mafan recipe from What Katie Ate)

Also attempted to replicate the cake pops I learnt to make last Wed. They were relatively successful too - though the white choc coating provided by the instructor was a lot thicker than the one I made...

If you feel like you've had an overdose of baking blog posts - I can assure you that you wun be seeing any more in the next couple of weeks :P Will try to pen an entry or two about my farming adventures - if the internet access at the farm is good :)