travel food for thought

I came across this article today about what you learnt from travelling the world. It is very true and I don't want to forget these lessons learnt as I continue to travel the world. So here is the link and the article below, some food for thought :)
http://news.bitofnews.com/life-lessons-from-traveling-the-world/?utm_source=newsletter

Here are the life lessons I learned from 5 years of traveling the world

Mark Manson  |  January 26, 2016
 

Almost five years ago today, my apartment lease expired, I shipped a few boxes to my mom’s house, packed a suitcase to (hopefully) last me a few months, and took off across the Atlantic. I had less than $1,000 in my bank account.

The first stop was Paris, where, still reeling from breaking up with my girlfriend, selling all of my possessions, and maintaining an online business that was hardly making any money, I proceeded to sulk and gripe my way through the streets of La Ville-Lumiéretotally not appreciating what was around me.

Eventually, things got better though. And I moved on. Both from Paris and my own personal pity parade. I moved on to Belgium, then Holland, then Germany, then Prague. I moved back home again only to move on to South America a few months later. Then Southeast Asia after that, then Australia, then Central America, then Eastern Europe, and then South America again.

Over the span of five years, I moved on to 55 separate countries, dozens of new friendships, hundreds of fascinating people and experiences, and even picked up a couple languages along the way.

Don’t worry, I’m not going to get all misty-eyed and tell you how I discovered my true calling or how happy starving children in Africa really are if you could have just seen them playing with trash and shitting in buckets — they were soooooooo happy. I’m not going to get up my own ass with false self-importance. And I’m certainly not going to claim I “found myself” or something.

No. Traveling the world, like any life path you choose, has its ups and downs, its highs and lows, its pros and cons.

But I will say: picking up and leaving my life behind in 2009 and spending the past five years vagabonding about the planet was both one of the most challenging and rewarding decisions I’ve ever made. And I wouldn’t take it back.

Because you do learn a lot. About people, about the world, about life. You just don’t always learn what you expect to learn. Sometimes the lessons come at unwanted times and give you unwanted truths. Sometimes you learn things you can’t unlearn and see things you can’t unsee.

But regardless, you grow. Here are some of the lessons that I’ve learned and some of the ways I have grown.

1. Happiness is common – human dignity is not

The stereotype of world travelers is the upper-middle-class college kid who goes to some random, third-world country, sees a bunch of poor, half-naked kids joyfully playing in sewage puddles with toys made out of string and broken sticks, and suddenly has the life-changing epiphany that, no, you do not in fact need an XBox 360 and 24-hour delivery from Dominos to be happy in this world.

Who would have thunk it?

It turns out, the human capacity for happiness is surprisingly flexible. Psychological research shows that people quickly adjust to their surroundings and are able to find joy in most situations, regardless of their culture, material wealth or political situation.

For this reason, traveling the world has lowered my estimation of happiness. When I left Boston back in 2009, my aims were somewhat hedonic: party a lot, meet interesting people, have crazy adventures. But over the years I’ve grown to see that “feeling good” in and of itself is often overrated.

I don’t mean to be a stick in the mud. Happiness is important, sure. But it’s also common and can be found in most situations once your mind adjusts to your surroundings. You can find happiness in any slum or in any mansion, on the beach, in the mountains, or in the middle of the desert.

But what is rare in many parts of the world is human dignity. You know, people who aren’t treated like animals — used, ignored, cheated, beaten, mutilated, silenced, or suppressed. Again, not to be a stick in the mud, but those happy kids playing in sewage pipes and shitting in buckets will be lucky to make it to middle age without serious violence, addiction or health problems in their lives.

In American culture, we are so fixated on feeling good all of the time, it seems we sometimes forget that there are more important things in the world than being happy or entertained. Traveling has shown me that there are things that are more important than pleasure or happiness. And it’s made me far more conscious of a lot of the injustices and cruelties that go on not just around the world, but here in our own backyard, without us necessarily taking much notice.

Again, not getting on my soapbox or anything. These realizations have actually made me happier overall. Ironically, it’s by making these other values — community, connection, self-expression, honesty — more important than my own gratification that my happiness and fulfillment happen naturally as a side effect.

That and 24-hour Dominos delivery.

2. World travel gives you greater perspective on life, but it limits your ability to commit to things

The beauty of traveling around the world is that it allows you to get altitude.

No, I don’t mean airplane altitude.

I mean it allows you to get a big-picture perspective on things, to see the various ways cultures mesh and collide with one another and how the different streams of history have eroded and hardened each country’s social structures into their respective places.

You realize that much of what you believed to be unique in your home country is often universal, and that much of what you thought was universal is often specific to your home country.

You realize that humans are by and large the same, with the same needs, the same desires and the same awful biases that pit them haplessly against each other.

You realize that no matter how much you see or how much you learn about the world, there’s always more — that with every new destination discovered, you become aware of a dozen others, and with every new piece of knowledge obtained, you only become more aware of how much you really don’t know.

You realize that you will never be able to explore or encounter all of these destinations. Because you realize that the more you spread the breadth of your experience across the globe, the thinner and more meaningless it becomes.

You realize that there’s something to be said to limiting oneself, not just geographically, but also emotionally. That there’s a certain depth of experience and meaning that can only be achieved when one picks a single piece of creation and says, “This is it. This is where I belong.”

Perpetual world travel literally gives you a whole world of experience. But it also takes another away.

3. The best part of a country or culture is also usually the worst

In 1965, Singapore, a small island at the tip of the Malaysian Peninsula, was granted independence. Impoverished, uneducated, sparsely populated and with no natural resources, Singapore’s new leaders understood that in order to survive they would have to act fast and find a way to make the tiny island indispensable to the global community.

From the start, the new government put an almost maniacal emphasis on education, commerce, and financial success, generating a culture built around rapid economic growth. A metropolis was soon built specifically to cater to foreign investors, bankers, and international trade. It was a Disneyland for rich foreigners, an island paradise where they’d want to bring their money and never leave.

Today, Singapore is one of the richest countries in the world. The island is more or less devoid of crime and poverty. When I visit Singapore, I always feel like I’m visiting the future, like what Manhattan should have become. The city is modern, spotless and perfect.

But this appearance of perfection came at a cost. The country is a bit soulless. Everything is designed and catered for financial gain. There’s no history, no identity, no deeper values, no deeper respect for individuals beyond money and productivity.

And so, ironically, what is most impressive and admirable about Singapore, is also what is most depressing about it. It was so driven by necessity to become financially indispensable that it sacrificed its cultural identity in the process.

Each cultural trait has advantages and disadvantages. And the more extreme the cultural trait, the more extreme the advantages and disadvantages. Therefore, it’s often the most apparent and obvious aspects of each country’s culture that is both the best and the worst about that country.

For instance, Brazilians often speak proudly of o jeito brasileiro, or “the Brazilian way.” It refers to a typical attitude of being able to cut corners and find the simplest route to success so that one can spend more time relaxing, batting footballs around on the beach, and sipping caipirinhas in the sun. Brazilians take pride in their leisurely ways.

It’s this jeito that gives Brazilians the relaxed and fun attitude that is so attractive to foreigners who visit — nobody parties quite like Brazilians party, and nobody vacations quite like Brazilians vacation.

But this jeito is the same reason why Brazil, as a country, is a freaking mess. Nothing works the way it’s supposed to. The government is completely corrupt and the infrastructure is still stuck in the 1970s. It’s both the best and worst thing about Brazilian culture.

The same could be said for Japanese politeness, for Russian bluntness, for German orderliness, and for American consumerism. They’re both the best and worst things about these countries and cultures. And whenever you take on one, you must be prepared and willing to take on the other.

4. The vast majority of the planet doesn’t care what you say or do – this is a good thing

When everything is familiar — when we wake up in the same home, get coffee at the same cafe, drive on the same roads, say hello to the same people, shop at the same stores, eat lunch at the same restaurants, and crap in the same bathrooms — we get an unrealistic impression that all of the little things matter.

If you say something dumb at the cash register, well crap, you buy muffins from this place every morning — now you’re going to look like an idiot every time you come back.

Or if you accidentally piss off a co-worker, you have to worry that you see them every day, and it’s going to be awkward, and then the awkwardness will make them hate you even more, which will just make it more awkward, which will then probably make you say something even stupider and then they’ll get even more offended and then it will beeven more horrible, and oh my god, I just want to stay in bed and play video games forever.

But when you’re abroad, you can’t help but embarrass yourself constantly — whether it’s stuttering through an unknown language, ordering something disgusting and almost vomiting all over the tablecloth, or just saying really stupid things in a moment of confusion.

And the beautiful thing is, you soon realize that nobody cares. Nobody. Ever.

The vast majority of people don’t care what you say or do the vast majority of the time. And this is liberating.

I once told an Argentine friend that American food is unhealthy because they put condoms in it. I think she nearly choked on her beer when I said it. Apparently “preservative” was not the same as “preservativo” in Spanish.

I once wandered into a gay bondage party in Berlin. I then had to embarrassingly explain to a number of nice German boys that no, I was not rejecting them, I reallywas trying to get the hell out of there.

I once, in jetlagged frustration, began talking shit about a Thai taxi driver, only to discover that he was somehow fluent in English and understood everything I had said. He then turned around and started explaining to me, in an American accent, why he moved to Thailand and why I should have more patience with people.

These things happen. A lot. But what you quickly notice is that the world moves on. And what may feel like a suicide-inducing embarrassment for you is usually but a mild novelty or smirk for everybody around you. Understanding this is healthy. And it’s a lesson that’s hard to learn sitting comfortably at home, and spending your life shuttling between the same three or four locations every day.

Because once you learn that the vast majority of the planet doesn’t care who you are or what you’re doing, you realize that there is no reason to not be who you want to be. There is no one to please. There is no one to impress. Most of the time, it’s just you, yourself and the stories you invent in your mind.

5. The more you travel, the more you lose sight of who you are – this is also a good thing

Many people embark on journeys around the world in order to “find themselves.” In fact, it’s sort of cliché, the type of thing that sounds deep and important but doesn’t actually mean anything.

Whenever somebody claims they want to travel to “find themselves,” this is what I think they mean: They want to remove all of the major external influences from their lives, put themselves into a random and neutral environment, and then see what person they turn out to be.

By removing their external influences — the overbearing boss at work, the nagging mother, the pressure of a few unsavory friends — they’re then able to see how they actually feel about their life back home.

So perhaps a better way to put it is that you don’t travel to “find yourself,” you travel in order to get a more accurate perception of who you were back home, and whether you actually like that person or not.

But here’s the problem: Travel is yet another external influence.

The person you are on a beach in Cuba is not the person you are sitting in the cubicle in the middle of butt ass winter in Chicago. The person you are on a road trip through Eastern Europe is not the person you are at a family reunion in Toronto.

The self is highly adaptable to its external environment, and ironically, the more you change your external environment, the more you lose track of who you actually are, because there’s nothing solid to compare yourself against.

With frequent travel, so many variables in your life are changing that it’s hard to isolate a control variable and see the effect everything else has on it. You are in a constant state of upheaval. And so if you wake up depressed one week, it’s hard to know if it’s because you miss your family back home, or because of the stress of a work project you screwed up before you left, or because you don’t speak the language of the country you’re in, or maybe you have been depressed for months or years and just covered it up until now.

You don’t know. It’s impossible to know. It all kind of blurs together.

And rather than discover who you are, you begin to question who you are. One year you go to France and love it. The next you go and hate it. Taking that new job sounded like a great idea back home, now it sounds like a horrible idea, but then it sounds like a great idea as soon as you get back. One year you are a certifiable beach bum, the next beaches bore you and you have no idea why.

Is everything really changing that much? Or is it just you?

Frequent travel puts your identity into constant flux where it’s impossible to distinguish with certainty who you are or what you know, or whether you really know anything at all.

And this is a good thing.

Because uncertainty breeds skepticism, it breeds openness, and it breeds non-judgment. Because uncertainty helps you to grow and evolve.

And when you go long enough being uncertain of who you really are, what results is a form of subtle, long-term meditation — a persistent and necessary acceptance of whatever is arising, because you don’t actually know if it was the food that made you sick, and you don’t actually know if you like Eastern European cultures anymore, and you don’t really know how you feel about income inequality anymore, and you don’t know if your career path is the best for you or not, and you don’t really know if you miss your friends back home or if you just like the idea of missing your friends back home.

And at some point, you just stop asking questions. And start listening. To the waves and the wind and the calls for love in all of the beautiful languages you will never understand.

You just let it be. And keep moving.

Love stories

Now, everytime I read love stories, I'm going to think of my relationship with him. It makes me happy and sad...but it's nostalgic in a way, that everytime I read romance or watch romance it will make me think of him and me, together, once. The way I used to feel and the way I still feel sometimes, the way I soar with happiness and the way I fall with despair. It's going to take a while to get used to this.

Have you ever felt that overwhelming wave of sadness overcome you? Feel it rising but pushing it down, trying not to give in to it but you realise you should just let it out? It happened to me, reading a love story on the plane, and as I walked through the airport I was struggling to keep myself together, to get to the nearest ladies' room so I can sob my heart out. But when I do, I feel hollow, like all I'm mourning is the loss of something good, kindof a wishful thinking of a child who never wants to grow up. I'm wishing that me, too, could be loved for just being who I am, and there could be someone waiting for me, putting his arms around me.

Then I blink away my tears and think of the future, where I will be loved for who I am and there will be someone else putting his arms around me. That I will be happy, and no longer depending on another person's 认可 to be happy. I guess that's how I've been dealing with the situation all this while, thinking of the brighter future. These days I even surprise myself at how happy and calm I've been going through this!

But sometimes, just sometimes, it gets unbearable and I let it wash over me. I guess I'll have to get used to it, where out of the blue, anything can bring that feeling back on.

pondering work-life balance

wow, seems like my friends in Singapore are all being "overworked". Then again, maybe I'm having a biased sample size...accountant, pharmacist, doctor, consultant, lawyer...

i was just reaching out to some friends because i'm returning home to singapore for CNY, but my accountant friend says she's got to work OT for the next 4 months until May, and definitely can't make weekday nights. maybe weekends but not sure, have to check with her supervisor.

my pharmacist friend says she's got to check her weekend schedule, whether she's working on saturday or sunday...

my consultant friend works average 80+ hour weeks. which means 8am - 12am workday is quite usual for him...and even on weekends...

my doctor and lawyer friends are definitely overworked. i don't even need to ask to know that their hours are not theirs, and they work weekends and public holidays as well...

i'm just stunned that everyone i'm asking is actually working on weekends. wow.

for me, i'm working 45 - 60 hour weeks, and that includes travel. so a lot of the travel time i'm reading a book or sleeping, and maybe doing some work but not much. so i have pretty decent work-life balance, especially since i have weekends to myself and don't need to work beyond the usual monday - friday week. i really like it, and this is me being single and away from home and family obligations!

so now i'm concerned, i plan to go home to singapore to have kids and raise a family and also find a high-paying job that has good work-life balance (with better opportunities than what i'm working at now). is that possible? i'm afraid i'll just end up getting sucked into that 80-hour work week lifestyle and end up being drained and leaving the workforce to be a housewife.

i don't mind being a housewife so much, but i realise i'd get bored unless i get to work on something productive, either it's work or volunteer work or taking care of kids etc. and i like having $$$ to spend, mmm. i'm kindof wondering how we can make work-life balance happen in the beginning of our careers, instead of everyone having to go through it as though it's a phase while you're junior, and then you get better hours once you get promoted to more senior positions. i really don't like the idea that we spend 2/3 of our lives doing work we don't necessarily enjoy, and miss out on so many other things in our lives.

maybe i'll end up tutoring or babysitting or ubering or doing something with flexible hours instead of a traditional job. though i do like consulting work, maybe i can be a sub-contractor or work part-time?

don't get cheated!! -rants-

Disclaimer: this is a rant post about $$$. I'm in a bad mood about this so really needed a place to vent my anger, GAH. really brings me back to my teenage days but hey, we all need a channel to vent sometimes.

I'm so tired of people cheating me of money. now i understand that it's true - as long as they have leverage over you, they will always take advantage of you, whether they want to or not. Even if they don't want to, they will still happily charge you money, then you have to go back to them and dispute it and argue with them and feel unhappy, then they withdraw the charges. And people who didn't dare to dispute or didn't know that they can/should dispute would just suck it up and pay all the fees and money. It's sooo annoying! It's so not fair when the power is all in the hands of corporations and large organizations!! It's not like we can just throw money around and pay all their fees for nothing!

So what happened was, first a doctor's visit. Online i checked (*yodaspeak) - the hospital i'm going to is covered by my insurance, so there should be very minimal copay, if even any. Then i checked with the counter there and they confirmed, it's $0 co-pay. So i'm happy.

I saw the doctor, did the lab tests and urine sample, and left with prescriptions. Of course prescriptions cost money, as I've expected and insurance covers a portion. However, one month later, the doctor's visit bill showed up and it was a whopping $733!!! Like what??? If i knew doing those tests would cost me hundreds of dollars I wouldn't have done them, I could have just told the doctor I know I have this problem can you just give me the medication? This is an exploit of my expectations - first telling me it's free and then telling me it's hundreds of bucks!

I got pretty mad, and called the hospital. I also emailed both the hospital and the insurance company. How could the insurance pay $0 of my bill? I'd be fine to pay a portion of it but only if the insurance covers a usual reasonable amount (like 80% of the bill).

Turns out the hospital may or may not have made a mistake on my insurance and missed out on one of the insurance companies I'm covered under, so they added it to my profile and told me i will find out within 30 days how much the insurance will bill me. Seems like insurance covers everything after all - my current bill has returned to $0.

Second incident, I hurt my wrist and went to see a doctor. He got me to do an X-ray, and there was a copay for it. I paid on the spot and went home happy. One month later, I got a bill in the mail for the SAME. EXACT. amount of money! Again I'm pissed because I've already paid it and now you're telling me I should pay again? I called the hospital and found out they automatically send out a bill before you even pay it and does not register the fact that yeah I paid it on the spot. So I don't need to pay anything. Unless I were dumb and just paid it without calling them.

This is clearly inefficient - they should send the bill after the visit, and only if there's a balance. Somehow hospital electronic systems need to be better updated and be in sync with the payments and claims and everything. This is such a nightmare!

Third incident, my friend owes me rent and is paying me money through PayPal. Fine, I think it's free for personal transactions so she sent me the money. Now she paid me $1800, but the amount showing up is $1720.50 for me. A whole $79.50 missing!! Why? It seems like PayPal thought I'm selling a good and is charging a fee on the transaction because I'm a seller. EXCEPT I'M NOT! It's a personal transaction and not a seller thing!! So now I'm really mad and confused and upset, and I sent an email to PayPal. If they don't respond favorably I'll call them and prove to them it's a personal transaction and not a sale. And if all else fails, I'll suck up that $79.50 loss and never, EVER use PayPal again. or at least be more educated about it somehow, but why use PayPal when every other money transfer thing is free (google wallet, amazon payments, venmo, etc etc etc).

Bottom line is, people will always want to charge you $$$, especially when they have leverage over you. Thus you need to be aware and check everything carefully. To them, it's your job to call them out and escalate it sufficiently so you are paying the fair and correct amount. Their behavior is a classic example of "ask for forgiveness" (they just do it, then backtrack if you were smart enough to check it), rather than "ask for permission" (where they actually ask you if it's ok to charge this much before letting you use their service, then you can negotiate with them or choose not to use it).

I realise how important expectations management is in not just the business world, but also in any relationship or interaction. Otherwise, someone feels betrayed and hurt and wants to lash out/take revenge (by boycotting that company, telling everyone to avoid that friend etc). Worse still if you feel helpless to do anything, your quality of life just degrades, like that.

If only these services act more like the Google and Apple of today, where customer service is of utmost importance and the customer is always first. I'm getting spoilt here, with these tech companies that think in our shoes so they can manage our expectations better and not cause such anger and misery...how am i going to survive the real world?

Moving on

I've just graduated from the most accelerated and intensive growth, self-discovery and self-improvement course, which lasted 2 years and 2 months! Yes, I've just walked out of my first relationship, bruised and hurt but so much stronger, more self-aware and more emotionally and intellectually mature than I've ever been before.

I don't regret the 2 prime years of my youth spent with him, in fact it's the happiest, most fruitful and eventful 2 years of my life. I've learnt so much pretty much for free (or maybe earned some money from him treating me so much! And from living together) that I can't believe it. I feel almost sorry for him, because I've learnt and grown so much, whereas for him he's only stagnated and maybe regressed. To console myself, at least he's learnt tolerance and patience! And better understood girls and how normal average people think! And hopefully gained some happiness out of it too!

The reason we decided to break up is incompatibility. Now this is such a vague term that everyone throws around and no one really knows what you mean, but after going through it, I finally understand. He is someone who likes to play to win. He isn't afraid of pain and suffering, he isn't afraid of failures or embarrassments or being wrong or doing something stupid. In fact he relishes it, because this way he can really learn from his mistakes and grow. Me on the other hand, I play not to lose. I cower and hide my insecurities and fears behind a shield that says hey I'm contented just the way I am, and I cruise through life without suffering and I think, success! It's not a bad thing, but it means I'll never become a better person. I'll stagnate and I'll become a typical judgmental person who listens to no one but myself, and that's not really who I want to be. I know I can improve and become play to win eventually, but it's going to take time, and in the meantime I'm just holding him back. That's why I'm letting him go, and we both can be happier. I can do things at my own pace in my own way, while he can go check out the world some more and find girls who are a better fit for him. So yeah, i guess it is a peaceful breakup. And I hope we remain good friends, because he is a really awesome friend and mentor and teacher and advisor. Great guy with his unique flaws.

And this is really hard to explain unless you've already gone through it before, but now I understand all the love songs where they are crazy blinded with love, and also the hurt and pain and misery of rejection and break up. The depression when you feel like you are not wanted or loved, where your self-esteem and happiness and sanity hang by a thread and change according to his whims and wishes and feelings and mood and glance for the day. That's how it's like when you're in love, where you sacrifice and compromise so much for him, and he does the same for you. When you intertwine two complete strangers' lives and put them together in the same room, day in and day out.

It's life changing. It's crazy. And it's a hell of a roller coaster ride. So many ups and downs, and of course more downs than ups towards the end, which means it will eventually hit the ground and it's time to cruise to a stop and separate ways. I loved him, and I still do, but I know he's unhappy and I know I'm unhappy, so we are letting each other go.

At first I blamed him because I thought he's just indecisive, that he wants some ideal girl that doesn't exist realistically and even if she does, he won't get to meet her and fall in love with her. And I'm going to become such an awesome person that he's going to regret leaving me and he will come back to me. I still feel a little that way now.

But now I know I should improve for my own sake. He's shown me how wide the world is and how lacking we all are, how much more we have to learn constantly, to grow and improve. I've had a taste of it and I can't have enough, and I'm going to keep working to become a better person. I'm going to spend this time to work on myself and rediscover my passions and all my friends again.

And that spells the end of a chapter and the beginning of the rest of my life.

bug bites

so i'm in DC for training and got to stay at the Ritz Carlton at tysons corner (yay!). and it's so beautiful and fancy and posh - i've forgotten hotels should be like this, and not like those dark dank run down places i stay in for the past year and 4 months!

 view of the room, so fancy!

so the last thing i expect in this wonderful hotel in the winter (where it's cold and dry) are bugs. but the next morning i woke up, noticed an itch on my left arm so i put some aloe vera on it and went off, thinking i just got one tiny mozzie bite. as the morning went on my arm itched more and more so i looked, and turns out i had 4 bites in a row! in a straight line! now could it be.....-horror- bed bugs?

those eeky pesky bed bugs that can follow you home and infest your bed and home??!! omg i was so worried i kept googling the differences between bed bug bites and mosquito bites and it was really unclear. both bites look similar but bed bug bites should be tinier/pimplier/redder and have no center bump the way mozzie bites do...

What are you...bed bug bites, mosquito bites or just some other bite?

then i got back to the hotel and by then the bites have progressed to this stage:

Uh-oh...looks worse than before...

So now the bites are no longer just itchy, but have become painful and itchy. bah! they look more like mozzie bites now, or some other bites that cause some allergic reaction of sorts...

i complained to the hotel people, they came by and checked the room for bugs and bed bugs but couldn't find any, i made a report and they switched me to another room. ok fine.

after i got to my new room, i looked into the bathroom and up at the light, and there it was. i was seething with vengeance and anger and hatred and such painnnn!! I've got to get you I've got to GET YOU, if not your comrade who got me so bad I've got TO KILL YOUUU!!!

so i chased it down, and viciously stabbed at it with a tissue paper.
it repeatedly evaded my stabs.
i almost smacked it with my two hands but no, it prevails, but i'm relentless, i'm determined and my blood boils with burning vengeance, and at last with one final stab against the mirror it stopped moving. i slowly lifted the tissue paper, and there it lay, broken.
wings broken, four legs fallen, with some yellowish substance under its crushed torso and no sign of blood. it was one of at least two mosquitoes that resided in this floor, not to mention this hotel.
SUCH OUTRAGE!!!!
then i called and told the hotel it's probably mosquitoes and not bed bugs and what do i get? i get nothing but a set of painful welts on my arms that swell and make me unhappy and distract me for the next two weeks. at least.

                                       

At long last, vengeance is mine...

What this has taught me is there will ALWAYS be mosquitoes in DC area, even in the winter. even in a fancy hotel room. argh. and that even after you've taken revenge, it's never really sweet because the harm is done - i'm hurting forever (or for the next two weeks), and the mosquito is dead forever. it's not even the same mosquito that attacked me, so well. violence never solves any problem (other than avoiding more mosquito bites)...

survived half dome

At the top of the world! (or just half dome)

don't think i'll ever do something so crazy again - i just completed the half dome hike in Yosemite National Park yesterday - spent over 12 hours on this hike (beginning 3.05am and ending at 3.27pm), the longest I've ever done, and probably the longest I'll ever do unprepared.

it was gorgeous with plenty of beautiful scenery on the way up and down. the main problem was my fitness level (or lack thereof), lack of preparedness for the burning of around 4000 calories on the trip, lack of good shoes, and lack of awareness of the need for electrolytes replenishment (i.e. gatorade drinks that will replenish my salt from all the sweat...). with a good pair of hiking shoes, trekking poles i'm pretty sure the effort needed for the hike would be quartered or even halved. sigh.

also, i didn't train at all for this, and maybe i should have - at least climbing something like 100 flights of stairs everyday would have helped. i did absolutely 0 preparation for this, except hike mission peak the weekend before (which did help in strengthening my climbing muscles, but not enough, soo not enough...)

the one good thing was the weather was perfect for the hike - cool when we started because it was dark, and not too hot when we reached half dome as it was still morning around 9+

i must brag - i climbed up the cable section in around 25 minutes (9.05am to 9.30am), when others may have taken 40 min or more! hohoho...

perhaps because of my overenthusiasm and misguided belief in my strength i thought i could make my way down with no problem, now that the difficult part is done! unfortunately, here's where my body started to protest way too hard...my muscles started to strain really hard and it got painful to walk, especially uphill or downhill. it definitely felt like walking in a viscous liquid (not just water, more like gel), and with lead weights on my calves.

i think what i should have done was be prepared for the descent, not just the ascent. should have taken a lot more breaks on the way down, drank more electrolyte water, ate more food etc. especially after the super strenuous hike up, my muscles were dead tired and being over-stressed. every step felt worse than the last, and after a while 0.3 miles felt no different from 3 miles or 30 miles to me...it was that long when i'm suffering every step of the way. interesting how your perspective changes when you suffer, time grows longer and everything becomes harder.

now i know better what suffering means, and what being stone tired really means - it means your muscles have turned to stone and you literally can't move faster than a snail's crawl.

honestly - really really proud of myself for doing this - 4800 feet in elevation rise (an equivalent of 450 storeys climb!!), at 8800 feet of elevation above sea (which also makes it difficult at high elevation) and around 16 mile hike roundtrip! i was so certain i can't do it, i won't do it, won't suffer and won't put myself in the situation where i'm constantly being embarrassed by my lack of fitness, but i still chose to do it.

till today i still wonder why, but i think it's due to the enthusiasm of all my coworkers and other people i've spoken to - they made it seem easy and so i took the chance.

half dome was never on my bucket list, but doing something crazy once in a while isn't too bad. i guess i do have that adventurous streak despite my risk averseness and dislike of suffering =P

also many thanks to my wonderfully strong boyfriend, who carried most of my load and eventually all of my load (and my love), and waited for me patiently and tried to encourage me with his constant "go go"s (btw, those aren't encouraging at all, those are just scathing to me when i AM going, just going really slowly because i can't go faster). maybe more breaks and going faster in between would work better than going slowly at a snail's pace?

look at this link! it says it's America's 10 most dangerous hikes! if i had read this i probably wouldn't have done it lol, i didn't even think twice about the danger, only worried about my fitness level haha http://www.backpacker.com/trips/california/yosemite-national-park/america-s-10-most-dangerous-hikes-mist-trail-half-dome-ca/ 

----------

on a side note: figured out 3 important elements to helping a friend/bf/gf who is suffering and making a slow and pained hike back down:

1. Distract - sing songs, make conversation, point out happy and nice things, take things slow. This distracts them from their pain and makes the experience positive instead of constant negativity from the pain
2. Follow them, don't lead - Following behind will help as it doesn't make them feel like they need to hurry up to catch up to you, but don't follow too closely either. Let them set the pace and you go along behind while doing number 1 and 3.
3. Encourage - give positive encouragements, e.g. You're doing great! You've done so well to come this far, I'm really impressed with how much effort you're putting into this, I can see that you are trying hard, good job! The effort and the trying is what matters, turn it into a positive experience. Even white lies could help - you have done better than most other people i know, i'm so proud of you!

Number 3 is kind of over kill, number 2 is nice to have but not necessary - number 1 is the easiest and best one of all. By doing those things, you're not only distracting them from the pain, you're distracting them from their looming sense of failure. No one is concentrating on them being so slow and failing, we are all concentrating on the joy of the moment. That's the most important part to hiking - the process, not the speed or strength or how fast or slow.

this is me.

this is real, this is me. just did this big 5 personality type test, and a lot of it does seem like me at my worst. this is me with my bf, the way i act with him brings out the worst in me. that's kind of counterintuitive right?

Big Five Test Results

Extroversion (72%) high which suggests you are overly talkative, outgoing, sociable and interacting at the expense too often of developing your own individual interests and internally based identity. Accommodation (48%) medium which suggests you are moderately kind natured, trusting, and helpful while still maintaining your own interests. Orderliness (74%) high which suggests you are overly organized, neat, structured and restrained at the expense too often of flexibility, variety, spontaneity, and fun. Emotional Stability (24%) low which suggests you are very worrying, insecure, emotional, and anxious. Inquisitiveness (60%) moderately high which suggests you are intellectual, curious, imaginative but possibly not very practical.

Take Free Big Five Personality Test
Personality Test by SimilarMinds.com

i am SLOEI (3.1% of women, 2.2% of men): http://similarminds.com/global5/sloei.html 

i am also limbic (14.3% of women, 6.6% of men): http://similarminds.com/global5/limbic.html 

seems like i'm kind of doing what my personality type suggests, so not too bad.

bursting with energy and excitement!

ahhh music makes the world go round...and makes a joy very happy!

i just listened to Apink's Remember and watched their happy dance, i feel so energized and restless because of that. it's playing over and over on loop in my head, and i want to jump up and dance and sing out loud! except no i can't, i'm at work T.T

anyhow, i'm even more excited by a little surprise i've been preparing for the significant other :D unfortunately, i have to keep it to myself for another 3 freaking months. i've kept it in for 1 month alrd, but i'm bursting. i want to shout out loud and show off to the whole world how ingenious i am, and how much i love him! but no i can't. got to keep it quiet. got to keep it secret for another 3 months. mission impossible >.>

the most i can do is hint at it here, since he doesn't really read my blog, like EVER. and if he somehow does check it, it's not like he can tell what it is anyway hohoho. and serves him right for not reading my blog.

lalala. visiting texas this weekend, bought my friend her favorite gummy bear candy haribo! i'm happy :D

places to check out in west of singapore!

http://www.thesmartlocal.com/read/singapore-west

Here are 23 things to do in Singapore West side! My favorites are the Tea Party Cafe, star-gazing at Science Center and walking the old railway line.

Also, today there was an odd coincidence. I was standing behind this guy who was dressed quite casually in jeans and t-shirt at the priority access security line. Piqued my interest because he's kindof cute and he's so casually dressed, yet group 2. i looked at his bag to figure out if he's silver, gold or what status, but couldn't figure it out. his bag was quite formal though, so i figured he had some kind of professional job, but was creative/music-related maybe?

i also wondered where he was flying to, maybe my flight to denver? or maybe a flight to chicago like so many others were flying to? i wondered if he would end up sitting next to me, which would be kindof funny.

as i walked past him to get to security, he was walking my direction too. i turned out to go to the united club and he vanished. that was the last i thought of him - or so i thought.

i got on the plane later, and put my stuff up and down. then sat down. 

and lo and behold! it was the same guy who was standing in line in front of me at security! the guy i briefly wondered whether we would end up sitting next to each other! and then we DO! what are the odds of that??

he didn't seem to recognise me though, so i was wondering if i wanted to talk to him or not. in the end i did. he sneezed, i blessed him, he thanked me and then i told him i noticed him at security because he was dressed differently from us.

we launched into conversation and turned out he's deloitte. learnt a lot about his practice. interesting stuff. he's also a berkeley alumni! gobears!

life is so full of odd coincidences.

wow

saw this today, about hate and how it grows. really cool, and i would love to teach this to my children one day

https://i.imgur.com/ueJez27.jpg 

moving on, moving in

i'm feeling a little sad. i'm moving out of my current place in dc and selling casey (my car), and moving in with the bf in california. feeling a little nostalgic.

casey has been with me for 2 years and she has served me well. she's my first car, and she underwent a sex change from female to male and now back to female again (because when i bought her, she was female, but i thought of casey as a guy name so i called the car him, but now i think of him as her again...).

goodbye casey. i love you, and i'll dearly miss you. treat your new owner well, and think of me once in a while ok?

goodbye dc. you've been pretty good to me, and i'll definitely be back to visit again!



i still have another weekend here, but i am feeling detached already. and it's hard to dislike this place when now i'm finally having friends and the weather is warm and good...

i guess i'm moving on. and starting a new phase of my life soon.

milestone number 2!

hello all!

wondering what milestone number 2 is? well, milestone number 1 was when i got my first paycheck last september. milestone number 2 is ~ getting my first raise and bonus!

woots! it definitely came much faster than i thought it would, and it's because we lucked out with the financial year change to april - it means that we would have worked longer than 6 months and are eligible for the raise and bonus. we got ours pro-rated for 8 months out of 12, but it's still pretty good and a lot better than nothing. i'm really happy and enthused about this!

what shall i get my parents? what shall i get my bf? i don't even know, what should i even do with my first bonus other than save it up...

life is good and my firm is doing well, work is going great and i am really happy where i am right now. sometimes i can be happy really easily about life, and this is one of those times. :D

useful stuff

I read this article today and realised that there was a very applicable lesson to be learned here - just two days ago i failed and scolded myself repeatedly in my head and out loud at how dumb "I" was. I was then stuck in an endless cycle where "I" am dumb and the anxiety levels and depressive levels both rose sky-high.

Maybe instead of doing that, I should have addressed myself in 3rd person and thought about it objectively. thought about how I acted, reacted and then handled the whole situation, and then give "Joy" the right advice. I guess it would have been much better if "Joy i being dumb. What should she do next?" were the thoughts...

Another lesson to be learned from another article. i think my boyfriend is this kind of guy, who actively seeks network across groups, he seeks to understand as many kinds of people as possible, and he is kindof a loner. he doesn't fit in well with any particular group, so he enjoys being a drifter. meeting people who are of different groups, different cultures, backgrounds etc.

i've got to take a leaf from his book and be like that too haha. then we will be successful :D

Women, low confidence and how it impacts our careers

i've been reading articles about how women tend to have lower confidence than men, and so seem to do worse than men in getting themselves promoted etc. Confidence seems to correlate with people's perception of your competence, so it's quite important to act confident. though for us women, if we act too confident, we are penalised for being too aggressive...we are really walking a tightrope here.

Here's the article, it's kind of long though: http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/04/the-confidence-gap/359815/

Here's a shorter one if you'd rather just read this: https://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blogs/5-common-confidence-mistakes-women-confidence-quiz-114141437--abc-news-deals.html

Here are my results for the confidence quiz here: http://theconfidencecode.com/confidence-quiz

Seems quite true, i do have low confidence and i'm constantly trying to act more confident at work. not sure if it's succeeding but i do see the importance of acting confident, and i need to really speak up more and do these things.

Low Confidence

Thank you for participating in The Confidence Code Assessment!

You are now part of one of the first research studies specifically related to women and confidence and we’re excited to work together to gather insight that will help women around the world embrace confidence in their lives.

Based on your responses to this quiz, you have lower than average confidence. 

What does that mean?

First, you are not alone. Many women, at some point in their lives, including us, find ourselves on this end of the spectrum. In general, you are more likely to feel uncertain of your opinions and of your abilities. You are probably quite risk-averse, and may be critical of what others would embrace for themselves as success.

How can you work to improve your confidence?

We believe there are a number of things you can do to start improving your confidence – here’s what we suggest:

Get focused. 

To help build your confidence, start small. Those of us who are confidence-challenged frequently feel overwhelmed. So start by deconstructing a larger challenge or assignment into smaller ones. Teasing out the individual parts of a challenge, and accomplishing even one-tenth of it, can give you a confidence boost. And just working towards a goal and taking action creates positive momentum. 

For example, if you are nervous about giving a speech at an upcoming event, break it down by setting a small goal for yourself of brainstorming for just 5 minutes a day. Once you’ve brainstormed, spend another 5 minutes a day polishing the speech. And once it’s polished, spend 5 minutes a day practicing in front of a mirror. 

Be grateful

New research shows that gratitude is one of the keys to happiness and an optimistic mindset. That mindset encourages confidence. And this demands a slight change in perception. Find gratitude in the tiny things: As someone lets you merge into traffic, notice, and be grateful, instead of just zipping ahead looking for your next maneuver. And – just say thank you when you get a compliment. Believe, and be grateful for, the kind words said about you. It will transform your mood, and simply saying, “Thank you, I appreciate that,” will also make the other person feel good.

Ban NATs

NATS man the frontlines in the assault on confidence, and they are every bit as annoying and insidious as their phonetic twin. We’re talking about negative automatic thoughts. Unfortunately, they buzz around more frequently than positive thoughts, and can multiply at lightning speed. They are thoughts such as, “That dress was too expensive, why did I waste my money?” or “I’ll never finish this project; I knew I wasn’t up to it,” that never seem to leave our brain.

The only way to get rid of NATs is by challenging them with logic. First, recognize the NAT. Then, use the 3 to 1 rule to get rid of them. For every 1 NAT – a bad thought – think of 3 good things you’ve done that day to banish the NAT. Do this every time a NAT pops into your head. “That dress looks good on me. I’ll wear it often. I needed a new one.”

If you’re struggling to come up with positive alternatives by yourself, imagine what you would tell a friend who confessed to having that same negative thought. This is putting self-compassion into action. You’ll be surprised how quickly you can trim those debilitating feelings down to size. It’s easy to do for others, yet we let them roam freely in our own brains.

Face failure

That’s right – you’re terrified of asking for a pay raise, talking to a stranger or raising your hand at a meeting. Imagine the very worst thing that could happen to you if you did. You’d be surprised at that how really, even the worst possible outcome isn’t that bad. The sky won’t fall on your head. The earth won’t swallow you whole – you will still be alive and standing. Just knowing that can help you realize the costs of failure are nearly always worth the risk that comes with trying something just outside your comfort zone. Actively identify one bite-sized risk each week you are willing to take. And tell us how it goes.

dumb me

sometimes it's good to have some failures. they keep you grounded, make you realise you have so much more to learn, and how dumb you really can be.

i've had a lot of things going well for me recently, and i think i'm getting a little complacent. gotta tone it down - i got a really outstanding performance review and have received good feedback the past couple of months, i've been told i'm really smart by these coworkers over and over and that i'm doing good work etc. really making me think i'm good.

and this week i've gotten myself invited to dinner with these much older coworkers, learnt so much from them regarding their experiences and their points of view and how they walk the political tightrope in the corporate world. one of the lady coworkers gave me really good advice - that we've got to observe and study the audience and cater to them in order to get what you want from them. for example, if someone has a super ego, you have to let them talk first, ask them for their opinion, and listen very carefully and sincerely.

i suddenly realised that the power of listening is so powerful, i should learn to use it more often and correctly with my friends, family and bf especially. i am too eager to talk and rant and get it all out and hear my own voice, when really i should be listening, observing and studying. i should also be willing to talk in a professional setting instead of being too passive. these guy coworkers i talk to - they are so aggressive and assertive, i feel the need to follow their suit. i think everyone has their own style, i'm going to sit tight and be humble and keep my eyes and mind wide open and learn as much as i can and listen. keep listening and observing.

and then i went and did something dumb, and said something thoughtlessly and really i was trying to make a joke, but it ended up sounding really racist. omg i didn't realise how insensitive i can be, growing up in singapore where we say things so bluntly and joke about each other's race/ethnicity without fear. it could just be my friends or my brother or even my bf's influence, but i realised that america is a very different country. they are super sensitive when it comes to things like race, religion, etc. we have to be careful what we say and how we say it, and whether to say it at all. we have to be careful to steer clear of stereotypes, and not fall into the trap of making racist jokes in front of colleagues (where it's not appropriate!)

now that i'm grown up and in the adult world, i can't be so insensitive anymore. i have to be smart about things, to be more prudent and tactful, to think before i speak, and think again before actually saying a word. all these jokes i want to make, i should save them for later with my friends or just throw them aside. you don't have to make them out in the open and embarrass yourself. sigh.

dumb me.

quiz of love!

i've been really interested in the quiz of love thing ever since it showed up on big bang theory, and sheldon and penny tried it out! then i read about it in an article from my bit-of-news app so i found those questions. totally going to try it out with bf when he's here :D

it's supposed to foster closeness between strangers such that two strangers can fall in love after doing this quiz and staring into each other's eyes for 4 minutes.

Here are the questions:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/fashion/no-37-big-wedding-or-small.html

Set I

1. Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?

2. Would you like to be famous? In what way?

3. Before making a telephone call, do you ever rehearse what you are going to say? Why?

4. What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?

5. When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?

6. If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the mind or body of a 30-year-old for the last 60 years of your life, which would you want?

7. Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?

8. Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.

9. For what in your life do you feel most grateful?

10. If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?

11. Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much detail as possible.

12. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?

Set II

13. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future or anything else, what would you want to know?

14. Is there something that you’ve dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven’t you done it?

15. What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?

16. What do you value most in a friendship?

17. What is your most treasured memory?

18. What is your most terrible memory?

19. If you knew that in one year you would die suddenly, would you change anything about the way you are now living? Why?

20. What does friendship mean to you?

21. What roles do love and affection play in your life?

22. Alternate sharing something you consider a positive characteristic of your partner. Share a total of five items.

23. How close and warm is your family? Do you feel your childhood was happier than most other people’s?

24. How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?

Set III

25. Make three true “we” statements each. For instance, “We are both in this room feeling ... “

26. Complete this sentence: “I wish I had someone with whom I could share ... “

27. If you were going to become a close friend with your partner, please share what would be important for him or her to know.

28. Tell your partner what you like about them; be very honest this time, saying things that you might not say to someone you’ve just met.

29. Share with your partner an embarrassing moment in your life.

30. When did you last cry in front of another person? By yourself?

31. Tell your partner something that you like about them already.

32. What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?

33. If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?

34. Your house, containing everything you own, catches fire. After saving your loved ones and pets, you have time to safely make a final dash to save any one item. What would it be? Why?

35. Of all the people in your family, whose death would you find most disturbing? Why?

36. Share a personal problem and ask your partner’s advice on how he or she might handle it. Also, ask your partner to reflect back to you how you seem to be feeling about the problem you have chosen.

the little things in life

hello! felt bored and totally feeling like sharing thoughts, so here i am again! back to posting something just to keep my thoughts in order and make myself happy :)

i spent the past two weeks being confused about my united miles...they used to be very consistent number of miles because i always fly the same distances so the numbers should remain the same. but these two weeks my miles have gone haywire and they've been awarding me not less, but more miles each trip! and every trip has different number of miles! i was so confused and thought their system screwed up (but i'm not complaining ^^"), but i was trying to figure out if it was because of the flight class or what, but no...

until i looked at the dates:

How could the same trip in opposite directions have such different number of miles?? turns out one occurred in february, and the other occurred in march. figured it out yet?

for those who didn't know, united just updated their miles award program in march 2015, which i KNEW but TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT until this morning. seriously, sometimes i get my best epiphanies when i'm just waking up, all groggy and lying in bed and thinking about life, the universe, and united miles.

so before that, united awarded miles based on the actual number of flight miles you flew, plus bonus miles for having status, but now they changed the program so it awarded miles based on the plane fare. so base miles = 5x cost of plane ticket (excluding taxes etc), and with status you get extra multipliers, like i get bonus 2x for being united silver: total of 7x of plane fare. now i always fly the more ex flights because of the timing of flight and last minute booking, so it's around $452 one way without taxes, giving me a total of 3164 miles!! woots!

life is good. it's the little things in life :)

p.s. the wind keeps howling outside. so noisy. just because of a 35km/h wind! gah.

p.s.s. i woke up thinking about "wake me up when september ends". it's a nice song.

p.s.s.s. having fun singing chinese songs. i miss those days.

fun goings-on

just learnt that it's goings-on and not going-ons. kind of counter-intuitive hmm.

anyhow i really enjoy talking to my girl group of singaporean friends, we are all over the world right now - me in dc/denver/cali, yb in china, grace in switzerland, rachel in amsterdam, wenyu in cornell, vanessa in paris (and soon to be in nyc), and eileen and hc in singapore! so cool haha.

here's one of the random conversations they had where they were trying to name the couples...

well i guess we ended up as "soy", though i do like soy haha. i mean to eat/drink. not so sure as a couple name >.> solojoy is not bad but kindof depressing, joylomon does sound like a pokemon haha. maybe soljoy?

and i did some digging around of solomon's name, and found this!

whaa...?

that's right, and there's more here: http://www.hercampus.com/school/cmu/solomon-sia-0

HAHAHA yes he was interviewed and posted on hercampus.com as a campus cutie! what a cutie hahaha...

let it snow...

it's snowing in denver! again. it gets annoying, and it's kindof the first time i got caught in snow as a driver (i've always been just a passenger so far at my work in denver).

then my rental car kindof looks like this (it's not the actual car but it's a sample one):

so i spend 15 min alternating between getting out to scrape ice off the windshield and getting back in to squirt windshield liquid (hopefully with antifreeze) and warm my feet up. by the end of it i was quite annoyed and tried driving off before the whole thing melts off, and i realised my visibility was too low for me to drive safely so i parked again and did somemore of the scraping and melting. so annoying omg. remind me never to live in a cold place like this, snow just complicates everything!

can you imagine, living a normal life in a normal city is already tough enough, now you have to deal with cold weather, low visibility, possibility of frostbrite and snow and ice and spending 15min heating up your car engine every time you want to go somewhere for half the year??!! what a waste of my life, and it's so dangerous to be driving around with snow and ice everywhere! you can skid! another car can skid! you cannot see easily when people are running across the road in the middle of the night!

anyhow i found icicles on the car too, something like this. who would have thought?!

on a good note, we did find ourselves some canadian geese hanging around despite the snow. they somehow can dig grass up under the snow, so cool right.

also, i've just been complimented on my nice beige coat (courtesy of my mum, who sent it over alllll the way from singapore last december! thanks mummy! ^^) twice in two days! so yesterday someone complimented on my coat when i was in the elevator at my client's place, and she asked me where i got it. i replied my mum bought it for me so i'm not sure haha.

then today someone else complimented on my coat when i was in the hotel elevator! she asked if she could touch it, seems like the coat had some texture to it, and i said sure! she touched it and was amazed by the texture of it hahaha.

 both of them are white females around 30s or 40s. seems like they've got good taste haha. i wonder why people suddenly started noticing/complimenting the coat only now, when i've been wearing it since december...maybe they've gotten tired of everyone else's black coats by now so my coat stands out to them hee. and i really like the coat myself too, it's classy and beautiful. my mum has great taste in fashion!

Winter travels 2014

again it's that time of the year. I went traveling with my bf to the Middle East this time! So adventurous! I could never have done such a thing by myself or even with my friends. It's truly a thing I do because my bf gives me the strength and motivation to. However I am at my limit - I don't like traveling so adventurously, I am more interested in checking everything out once and move on. I already feel like exotic adventurous travel destinations are getting to be too much for me. I only go because it's a great way to learn about each other, but also because I want him to think I am an adventurous person like him, and that I am open minded and up for anything. I want to be that cool girl, that's why. I wonder if it's ok to show him my uncool self...will he still love me？

Anyhow we went to Jordan - wadi rum, Petra, Aqaba, amman, dead sea. So beautiful this country, such wonderful people. Really loved Petra and learnt to recalibrate distances and what we can and cannot do...even got to sneak into amman citadel because we were so up for taking the back roads, the path less traveled! We also went to Cairo, Egypt and Jerusalem, Israel. Saw so much and learnt so much about the world and myself. And about him. I am humbled by how ignorant and naive I am, and learnt the complexity of humans and countries and politics. I only hope he doesn't think me too dumb :(

On the way back to the U.S., I had a layover at Frankfurt. I fell asleep at these cool chairs in Frankfurt airport. Perfect for sleeping because my legs can be raised to chest level, which is crucial for good sleep. Anyway while sleeping at the airport with lots of ppl walking past and disturbing me -yes that was an experience in itself-, I dreamt that I went to my gate and somehow the flight became earlier but now it's going to Houston and not dc anymore!!! I was so irritated because there's no flight to dc and I can't get home. I was thinking about whether I could go Houston and stay there then fly to work directly but I don't have any work clothes and stuff humph. And I was hungry so I dreamt there was kfc, McDonald's and Carl's jr. They all sold crepes and ice creams and sprinkles (these are the unfulfilled desires in Jerusalem where we didn't get to eat crepes), so I was choosing McDonald's for its joy berries and ice cream and crepe and sprinkle combo. It's got to be a pair combo though, so I was convincing some random guy to buy the combo with me. Hmm. And they sold soup noodles too, from size medium to size xl, which was hugeeeee like half the size of the table. Odd.

Then a kid cried near me and I woke up. Decided crying is annoying and I shouldn't cry where possible. It annoys people and make you unhappy. No good. And wifi in Frankfurt airport required registering and they send a passcode to my email. No wifi how to check email!!! What a joke, it's a catch 22...

Then for my Frankfurt to dc flight, it was overbooked so they were giving out 600 dollar travel certificates for people to give up their seats. I did that since I had time, didn't need to be back in dc asap, and it's 600 yo! I got rerouted through Boston then to dc, and here begins my airport "hitchhiking" experience! It was so tiring though, going through line after line, service desk after service desk, each leg of my flight required talking to at least 3 different people about my situation, which got so repetitive and annoying so far. I originally wanted to buy food from McDonald's but it was far from my old gate. Turns out my new flight to Boston was right where McDonald's was but cannot eat...there was no time, had to run to catch the Boston flight!

And wow it's been such a long time since I'm in a two storey aircraft!!! Time to find out why Lufthansa flights are always overpriced. The food was good but there was no good movie playing on the flight :( I saw gone girl, and guess what? I was just looking it up on wiki before the flight and talking about it with Solomon haha. So I watched. I wanted to watch it with him but I couldn't resist!

Omg gone girl is so creepy and good. Lots to think about and to discuss with Solomon haha

Ok that's about it for my rant today. I'm still stranded at the airport and waiting for my flight home, but I'm becoming some kindof airport veteran now, hitchhiking from flight to flight and getting step by step to my destinatio with minimal hassle and fuss :) we got a 7 dollar meal voucher for a coffee or something, but I got myself a green tea latte and lemon poppyseed muffin. Yum!

And I just got upgraded to first class for the first time! Looking forward to it, though it's not much since the flight will be only 1.5hour and I'll be sleeping...

cute vendor

is it cheating if you fantasize about getting the attention of another guy (and having him gain romantic interest in you) while you have a bf?

possibly. does this mean i'm dissatisfied, and i crave the attention of other guys?

maybe i just want to feel loved. i just want the excitement of feeling like i still have the power to make heads turn because of the way i am.

there's this cute guy (youngish, probably only a few years older than me) in one of my vendor groups. i've worked closely with him on a few things in our project, and if i were single, i would really want to flirt with him and get his attention. he's smart, attentive, nice and very smiley. doesn't hurt that he's so good-looking and not yet married (but we don't know if he's unattached, haven't got the nerve to ask). i know this is wrong, but i feel the impulse to try and flirt a little or be nicer to him, just because we don't have a generation gap the way i do with the others, and also because we're both at the bottom of the hierarchy in our respective project teams. i feel both sorry for him and a connection with him in that sense.

still, even if i weren't attached, there might be quite some problems with us getting together since he's a vendor and i'm supposed to be impartial and representing my client. it might go against certain unspoken social rules for us to get too close hmm? maybe that's why it's so exciting, so fun. like almost breaking the rules but not quite. the sparkling possibilities that might arise because of this interaction. or nothing would happen at all.

i know i'm still level-headed enough to not do anything beyond just talking with him and getting our work done, but i still feel guilty for my slight fantasy and desire to try and attract his romantic interest. sigh. what to do when there are cute temptations around and your bf is not?

UPDATE: 1/20/15
Nothing happened (as expected). I have discussed this with my bf like right after writing this post, and we have resolved this issue quite straightforwardly. Seems like temptation is normal, and as i weigh the consequences/choices and still make the decision to love and stay with my bf, our relationship grows stronger!

great article on how to be masters of love + psychological tools

i came across this article on how to maintain a relationship long-term and keep a happy marriage. i realise it's so true! i should "turn toward" my bf/husband more and respond kindly and enthusiastically when they're looking for respect and appreciation.

i should keep this in mind, esp when i'm feeling depressed or upset and angry, and not be so mean and sharp or destructive to my bf next time.

we just celebrated our one year anniversary a week ago, i'm renewing my feelings of affection and happiness and love with him. it's quite amazing how honey-mooney i still feel even though it's been a year. wow i think it's really the cycles of kindness and generosity that is keeping this going so well - my bf is great at caring for me and showing me appreciation and kindness, which makes me want to reciprocate and this forms a virtuous circle, as he loves to say.

:D

also, i learnt about a bunch of psychological traps that go on in our everyday lives and in negotiations that we often fall into over my year of master's. but also in a bunch of books and again in the negotiation class i'm taking online on coursera. the professor recommended a checklist that we can pull out and go over regularly to make sure we are not falling into these traps when making decisions, so here it is! hope this will help me remember and help others too!

1. Mythical Fixed Pie Assumption (remember, you can expand the pie and get win-win!)
2. Anchoring (are you anchored to certain numbers? check the facts)
3. Overconfidence (aren't you being too confident? check your assumptions)
4. Framing (reframe it. think from the other person's perspective, what does he want?)
5. Availability (aren't you clamping on the first thing that comes to mind? question it)
6. Escalation (avoid the competition threat and publicity. it's all psychology. think objectively)
7. Reciprocation (are you reciprocating because they are doing good to you?)
8. Contrast Principle (it's all about comparison and contrast. does this look good only because you are comparing it to something much worse?)
9. Big-Picture Perspective: Don’t get lost in the details (oh yes the gorilla test. see the big picture man https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGQmdoK_ZfY)

especially useful in helping us reframe problems and also to get what we want in negotiations. kokoko. 

loving every bit-of-news

the moment i realised i loved bit-of-news, was when i suddenly stopped receiving it. at first i thought they had a glitch (like they did once before), so i just waited for the next day to get the bit-of-news. but nope, still no news. i really was frustrated and started googling and looking for the website and stuff, and i realised there weren't any problems. it's just me, how come?

and i realised i must really like bit-of news, if not i wouldn't be able to constantly checking for it and finding ways to get my next bit of news.

i wanted to sign up for it again to see if there were problems with the previous one, but i didn't want to receive duplicate emails...until i noticed the .edu standard signup. then i realised i must have signed up for it under my berkeley/stanford email. so i checked. and lo and behold! i signed up for it with my stanford email, which means they have finally cut me off of the stanford email as of 10/15, which was why i stopped receiving bit-of-news.

wow. with that one bit-of-news thing, i discovered two useful pieces of info:
1. i love bit-of-news.
2. stanford emails won't forward to me anymore!

why i love bit-of-news? it's a great concept for ppl like me who hate trawling through long newspapers (and getting hands dirty), and hate trawling through endless internet news that are half junk half politics. i would rather get interesting snack-bites that are things i would never find otherwise, but were just curated there for me!

they're great for posting to facebook and upping my klout score too koko :D

maximizer vs satisficer

http://online.wsj.com/articles/how-you-make-decisions-says-a-lot-about-how-happy-you-are-1412614997

I read the above article, and was struck by how seemingly schizo i might be - i am quite a maximizer when it comes to some decisions, but i am such a satisficer in others! I'm a perfectionist only in some area, and in others i'm just too lazy to scout out all the options, and just settle for whatever works. it's so odd!

Here are my scores:

1. 4             
2. 7             
3. 6             
4. 3             
5. 2             
6. 4             
7. 6             
8. 5             
9. 1             
10. 2             
11. 3             
12. 2             
13. 2             

giving a total of 47 out of 91 (13 * 7 for total score). oh i'm in the middle after all!

Seems like for the first 7 decisions I am a high maximizer, while for the important decisions I am quite a satisficer. i guess for things with low cost and time needed to evaluate my options i just do it (e.g. switching radio channels and tv channels, shopping), but for things that are important i would rather go with something i'd be happy with and not worry so much about getting the absolute best option. there would be too much to think about and ponder through, especially since i don't know that much about my options in this area! it's a lot to do with my self-confidence and what i perceive of myself...i don't think i'm in the position to find much better options for myself hmm.

argh. i think solomon is qiute a maximizer in the options that matter like jobs and careers (and movies!!), but a satisficer with things like tv or radio or shopping. yeah movies are important for him so he really follows rottentomatoes. and jobs are important, so he might go for the maximimzer option always, but maybe he'll end up unhappy? hmm we're quite the opposite aren't we? i guess that's good as you want opposites in a couple, so we can balance each other out haha.

live each day as if it was your last

i've finally started work, and has since received my first paycheck! i'm on the 5th week of work now, and i'm slowly getting used to the rhythm of it. i still feel like there's a lot more to learn though.

i just came across steve jobs' commencement speech at stanford in 2005 today, and i was truly impressed by it. You can check it out here.

His 3 main points:
- do what you love, because you cannot connect the dots looking forward. you can only connect the dots looking back, so just do what your heart says.
- do what you love, so no matter how badly you fail, you can still pick yourself back up and bounce back. if you love what you do, you will never fear failure, because there is no real failure
- do what you love, for death is always soon. "live each day as if it was your last, for someday you will be right". ask yourself if you want to live today the way you are going to, and if not, change something. so true! i can't tell if my work is what i want to be doing now, but it's not a definite no either. i know for sure i want to spend time with solomon all day, so maybe that's something i should be working towards? work can also become something i love?

i love interacting with people and helping others out and working in teams though, so i kindof like what i have so far. and earning money is not bad too :D living in hotels and taking flights is not bad, but it's not the lifestyle i would choose exactly. i feel pretty lonely and wish i could be at home sometimes, wish i could be with family and friends, or with my love. hmm.

i shall look on the bright side and gain as many miles and points as possible while working hard. so i'm working towards a future with the people i love, so i can share these miles/benefits with the people i love. muah. i love you. :D go get them!

first day at work

my first day of work! so excited, but so tired omg. still jetlaggy from ca time, so having to wake early at 7+ = 4+ ca time, didn't make it better for me. i feel awfully tired now, but still oddly pumped.

got my first business card, got to meet other new ppl. went through an entire day of training, ok, a bit boring but useful, esp when i start projects next week, i'll need to refer back.

another day of training tmr and i'll find out where i'm posted for the next week. possibly could be posted to a denver client, will look forward to finding out!

i write like cory doctorow

I write like
Cory Doctorow

I Write Like. Analyze your writing!

have no idea who cory doctorow is, but turns out he's a blogger, sci-fi author and stuff. maybe he's the only guy who writes like without proper sentences or capital letters etc in his blogs, that's why i got this result. repeatedly.

cool.