Failed Attempt on Tasting The First High Tea.

I heard the so much hyped about this place called "Brava Parlour" at Arista Hotel, Palembang.
My friend was there last month, and told me the ambience is so cool, almost like Social House at Grand Indonesia, Jakarta.
So, I'm thinking, this place gotta be dope, right?

I searched online about the place, and apparently it's mentioned that they got "TEA TIME".
And once I saw that word.. TEA TIME. I immediately got excited. My mind is imagining about the afternoon tea that I had at Lovejoy's, Crown & Crumpets, and Rotunda at San Francisco, and also TWG Salon at Singapore.

Here's a brief explanation about "tea time". People around the world usually called it with several names; tea time, high tea, or afternoon tea.
Here are some descriptions that I cited from Wikipedia ('cos I'm too lazy to summon the descriptions in my own words);

• Afternoon tea or low tea is a small meal snack typically eaten between 4 pm and 6 pm. Observance of the custom originated amongst the wealthy classes in England in the 1840s.
• Traditionally, loose tea is brewed in a teapot and served with milk and sugar. 
• For laborers, the tea was sometimes accompanied by a small sandwich or baked snack (such as scones) that had been packed for them in the morning. For the more privileged, afternoon tea was accompanied by luxury ingredient sandwiches (customarily cucumber, egg and cress, fish paste, ham, and smoked salmon), scones (with clotted cream and jam) and usually cakes and pastries.
• In hotels and tea shops the food is often served on a tiered stand; there may be no sandwiches, but bread or scones with butter or margarine and optional jam or other spread, or toast, muffins or crumpets.

A few pictures of afternoon tea meals that I had before;

Afternoon tea usually comes with snacks/finger foods type of meal as the companion with the tea.

(Rotunda - Neiman Marcus, San Francisco)

It's usually served in two or three tier of serving. The savory and sweets are placed accordingly. 

(Crown & Crumpets, San Francisco)

Finger (mini) sandwiches.

(Lovejoy's Tearoom, San Francisco)

Now with the expectations according to the above pictures, of course I'm pretty excited to go to Brava, meet my girls, and have a wonderful tea time.

As I walked in, the ambience is nice. Not crowded at all (in fact, nobody's there, ha!). And they played a smooth jazz music which is perfect for relaxing and a long chat time with friends.

I grab a seat with my girls, and the nice lady came to us, offering their menu. I quickly asked about the tea time, and apparently.... SHE'S CONFUSED! What the... 

So I have to described it again, the so-called "tea time" that they promoted in their website. And the lady said that THEY DON'T HAVE ANY PROMO YET ON THE TEA TIME.

Why the heck you put it on your website if you don't have it at all? Then she offered other "promotion" about getting a main course dish, with free tea or coffee, et cetera. NO! I WANT MY AFTERNOON TEA! *sobs*

But to wipe away my disappointment was rather quick. Their "tea mudd" is quite good. I order the kiwi tea mudd, which basically is tea infused with chopped of kiwi fruit. It's refreshing. And after a long and great chat with the girls, I didn't really think about the tea time anymore.

But what I really hope is, they're going to bring the afternoon tea to their menu. If they're not going to, better delete that section on their website. Rather than giving a prospect customers a false hope.

Or maybe I should open my own afternoon tea place?

When you are right in the middle of THAT situation.

I guess when I grow older, I don't make a lot of friends as many as when I was in high school or college.
Even worse, some close friends turn out as foes through complicated matters and conflicts.
And maybe it's myself who like to set myself apart from those "reunion". For example; when I met one of my high school friend in the mall, I recognize him right away, and I know he's kind of questioning himself "Wait, is that...". But I discourage myself from saying "Hi" to him. I acted like I didn't know him at all.
Maybe based on that attitude, people starting to pull themselves away from me.

I think I personally try to avoid those cliche questions;
"What do you do now?",
"Have you married?",
"Why haven't you got married? Oh you must be really choosy when picking boyfriend!",
"You don't have boyfriend? Liar!",
And the typical of conversations with locals in Palembang who like to brag about their business;
"My job is....",
"I know this governor, that general, this coal mine boss",
"I made $$$ this month. How about you?"
Usually when I start to hear that kind of conversation, I feel I want to run away and hide.

And my recent confrontation was with a long lost "frenemy" (frien-enemy) that I've been trying to avoid to meet.
I know we live in the same city. I know apparently we'll meet each other one day. But, oh-my-Lord, why it had to be on that day?
The conversation went awkward, well, for me. And I could tell that I was putting a fake smile in my face.
I don't really know if he know our situation, but I think he's just too ignorant to know that I actually not so fond of him (anymore).
But thanks God it didn't last for too long. I got off from the scene and liberated myself.
Now I hope that I don't have to meet him again.

Mean? Probably I am. It's something personal to me. Yeah, I'm the kind of person who's rather picky in making friends.
But don't we're all like that? I mean, you can't befriended all of the human in this universe, right?

Feeling old now.

I'm not becoming any younger for sure. Looks might deceiving, as many people can't really tell my real age (uh-huh!). But it does reflect on my attitude and what I feel inside.

I get irritated easily with people around me, including my family members. Simple little things annoyed me. And when I get annoyed, I simply burst out of anger. I feel that my toleration level is become thinner than before.
I remember during my junior high time, one of my friend told me that I always smiled at every situation even it's not a nice one. She said that I looked like I didn't have any burden at all in my life.
Well, as time passes by, I wish I still can put that kind of face.

My body, that's another thing. I feel that my bones can't take much heavy pressure as before. Not to mention that I had to suffer from sciatica (back pain) in 2011. And my right knee has this kind of thing that hurts if I sit for too long.
Even I was much over weight back then, I feel that I'm not as quick as before. But lately, I discover that  when it comes to exercise, I begin to love the sport that I hated before, running.
I'm not talking a running in a marathon matter, but more to small run in the thread mill.

Honestly, I'm a pretty lazy person. I don't find sport is a fun thing to do. Slap me in the butt, but yeah...
Hopefully, I'll do more running.