catching up

just in case if you are wondering how i spent my xmas week, here is a short summary:

Dec 23 - Sake sake sake. Finished a bottle of 1.8L sake between hkgirl and I
Dec 24 - drinking at a friend's till 4am
Dec 25 - 2 bottles of red wine between me and hkgirl, but we slept from 10pm till 11am the next day
Dec 26 - Beer'ing (i just invented this word) from 3pm till 1am, passed out immediately after i get home
Dec 27 - whiskey soda till 4am
Dec 28 - Just beer. sake. and some more beer from 7-midnight. I was playing it safe.
Dec 29 - White Wine. Sake. 1/2 Bottle o gin, some beer.

umm... x'mas week = hangover week

Happiness in financial crisis

By now if you are reading this blog, you should know that the world is in a financial crisis. So in other words, you probably also find out during your christmas shopping that everything is so much cheaper this year. Why? because all the shops are doing insane discounts cos of the "financial crisis" wooooooooooooo

while i know a lot of people have lost their jobs, the majority still have their monthly salary in tact. You are still getting paid...say... $10000 a month. But everything else in the world is cheaper. For example, I bought 4 shirts yesterday for the same price I would have bought 2 shirts last year in Christmas. Stores are doing never seen before level discounts and its up to us to take advantage of it

Shopaholic Heaven~

In 2008...

Funny thing about us bloggers are that, more often than most, we forget what we wrote before and get pretty amazed when reading the stuff we wrote before. Feels just like a random blog if it wasn't for the familiar web address.

The more I think about it, the more I think this financial crisis isn't a bad thing. Hear me out before bananas, tomatoes, and shoes (lol). Did it not baffle any of you that banks were selling us shit that we never understood? Yea it went up but WTF was it?

Without bad times, we wont cherish the good times. Humans are naturally dumb - we don't learn how to tighten our pocket unless we are forced to; and when we have money, we use it all... as if the every 10 year stock market crash doesnt already teach us a lesson. Yes finance people do make a load of money but we are omitting all the people who get fired on their way up top. A fortuneteller once told me that I should go into finance and I told him the daily life of a stressful 8-6 job just isnt me.

Let's see if my feelings towards this changes in 2009.

Small Break

Apologize for the lack of updates recently. Exams are hitting up pretty hard and I have been drinking a lot to write. ...yea exam and drinks. Not study, drinks. I am, by no means, implying that MBA is something you get through with alcohol. MBA is something bigger than textbooks and lecture notes - there is no right or wrong, its all about how well you argue your case; which is essentially the case for things in life, there is no right or wrong.

We make our best judgment on any circumstances based on the scenario presented; our best judgment has no right or wrong behind it, its just what we felt like doing.

...and i just happened to feel like drinking before exams

Cocky MBA part 2

Just want to elaborate a bit more on my previous topic.

I think all students put way too much emphasis on their grade. MBA for example, prepares you for the business world. In the real world, no body gives you a grade. You are evaluated by how much money you made or how well you managed your team and the MBA's purpose is to well equip yourself to do so. It is not your grade, but your knowledge, that matters out there. Getting high marks and then forgetting everything 2 months later is more useless than getting average marks but remembers everything. I am seriously more worried about how i can apply the things i learned than my exam grades.

...chances are that I will probably forget everything I learn 3 months after I graduate though...

Cocky MBA

Exams are coming up and professors do revision sessions to help students get through the exams. I am not being cocky here but while everyone is worried about their grades, I am overconfident to a point where I dont see the need of over studying.

Most of the people I talked to in this MBA thought our class and works are intense, but this is nothing new to me. This MBA is busy, yes, but it has also been a relatively easy ride for me, at least compare to the 4 years of hell I went through as a Biomed undergrad in JHU.

I have always told my parents this... "unless there is some other planet with living people, I graduated from the best biotech university from the universe and everything else in life will not be as challenging as that" Seriously, how do you top from being the best in the universe? This doesnt mean I dont treat my MBA course with the attention it needs... I just dont see the need of stressing over it, especially when its just an exam of your analytical skills (somethings you cant train in 10 days).

Why so serious?

Getting around the system

Christmas is coming up and everyone will be going home for the holidays. Do you live in the EU region (UK especially)? Will you be traveling out of the EU region for Christmas?
If your answer is yes to both of the questions above, then I have a good suggestion for you. If not, you can go back to living your life.

Student Discount + Tax Refund. UK has this amazing thing called student discount where students get a nice 10% discount for every purchase they made at most of the shops. What you dont know is that you can also get a 15% tax refund (starting 3 months prior to your departure date) for your purchases. That is 25% off of all items you buy! Crazy right?

I am a huge sucker for Yohgi Yamamoto (used to be CdG too but they got way too expensive) and guess what? I got a nice 15% discount off the pair of pants i bought and it was a nice 100 pound refund. (I was trying REALLY hard to avoid directly showing the price of the pair of pants here) This is essentially a buy 6 get 1 free scheme that us international kids can use. ON TOP OF THAT, you can also give your tax free receipts to your friends who comes to visit as well (works especially well with XXX <--> EU flight attendants). This is pretty much a year round 15% discount for all items that we can get around.

(PS - the 10+15% combo is available at top shop)


Happy shopaholics!

Winter and Fashion

Phewwwwwwwwwwww

It is hitting zero and the negatives here in london... yes the stupid weather report says its 5C, but the 14mph wind takes it to like -10C, which brings me to another point - why cant those weather people just tell us how cold it is AFTER the wind here in UK? Windchill was a nice thing to have in US. Anyway, so weather is getting cold and everyone is looking for that thick jacket and scarf inside their closet. The problem is, everyone's thick jacket is either black or dark brown. How do you get fashionable when everyone is wearing the same thing?

My dad once told me "when its fxxking freezing, you shouldnt think about how you look but how warm you are"

No fashion advice is the answer. Get warm silly.

I was originally going to write about something else... but its been a while since I have felt such crappy in a long while today so I would just like to reflect on that a little.

I don't know how but I have this special ability to let negative stuff bounce off of me rather easier and I get happy again easily. Exceptions are things that keep coming back to haunt me, for example - me being in London and not being able to fix anything bad that is happening in Hong Kong.

(there is a lot of "I" in this entry)

I sometimes (i guess) over criticize myself too much for being in London while everything I really love is in HK. It's just a crappy feeling to have something bad going on back home and not be able to do anything about it.

I will drink myself to death tonight and when I wake, its a brand new day!

...oh for fxxk sake...

Conventional Wisdom

I think everyone pretty much can tell that I go to the gym rather frequently. I would walk past this pub every time I go home from the gym and they have this giant Plasma or LCD TV (i am sorry, I really cant tell the difference between LCD and Plasma) showing the latest news and every time I see the same damn headline - "FINANCIAL CRISIS". I seriously thought the owner of the pub was just playing a DVD or VCR over and over again, but then I realized the date is different and that headline everyday for SKY NEWS / BBC / etc is really FINANCIAL CRISIS. Are you burnt out from all the financial crisis news yet? I am.

At a time when even my 12 year old cousin can tell me something about financial crisis, do i really need to be reminded of it every hour? On top of that, we have the pirates robbing an oil ship in middle east, news of companies laying off people, unemployment rates rising, suicides at all time high (soon), and yea, FINANCIAL CRISIS. Is there any good news? I brought this up as a comment once to the hkdad and he said that people are never interested in good news. But thats not the point now, its more like, there is nothing good coming out. Neo had Agent Smith to balance him out so where are our good news to balance our lives? To quote Jack Johnson, "Where all the good people go"

However, in light of some optimism, conventional wisdom tells us that in 20 years, we will be ok again... that is, if you are not 70 or above now...

Killing Joke

"See, there were these two guys in a lunatic asylum... and one night... one night they decide they don't like living in an asylum any more. They decide they’re going to escape! So like they get up on to the roof, and there, just across the narrow gap, they see the rooftops of the town, stretching away in moon light... stretching away to freedom. Now the first guy he jumps right across with no problem. But his friend, his friend daren't make the leap. Y'see he's afraid of falling... So then the first guy has an idea. He says "Hey! I have my flash light with me. I will shine it across the gap between the buildings. You can walk across the beam and join me." But, the second guy just shakes his head. He says... he says "What do you think I am, crazy? You would turn it off when I was half way across." - The Clown

Idiot's guide to losing weight

So yea Obama won. I am a bit disappointed but I kind of knew it was going to happen. Went hiding for a bit and now I am back, and I am back with an interesting topic that all females are interested in - weight loss. (umm... wasnt trying to say all women i met are fat but... hahah yea)

I weigh about 175-185 pounds now, the deviation is caused by the amount I eat and drink, so it averages out to be 180 pounds. Little do you know, I used to weigh at a big 285 pounds (during the end of my university days). Waist size 42 (now 34), and I was huge. I was the asian Shaquille O'Neal.

I wasnt trying to lose weight on purpose to beging with. It all started when I see my parents and my friends' parents' health all deteriorating from age and lack of exercise, it was then when I decided to start moving that flab and start exercising for my healthiness's sake. 2 years later, I have lost 120 pounds and I was at 160 pounds for a good time (until I decided that food was too good to turn down and I am now back at 180, which I am happy about).

People who knew me before the weight loss always ask me "whats your secret?" / "How the Fxxk did you do it?" The answer is simple. Stay off the greasy shxt and exercise! It really is that simple. Do you ever see any athlete being fat? No! And it is THAT simple. Start doing some cardio exercise, stay off the greasy food and BAM! weight loss! There really is no secret formula other than determination. All the dietary pills and programs all have the same requirements - exercise and eat well. They put that little "*" next to their product and tell you that "in order for this drug to work, you must accompany with healthy diet and exercise".

Sometimes, hard work is what you really need.

Vote for McCain

Wow. 3 posts in 3 days. And i am writing again immediately after a very emotional blog that I really like too. Normally I would let my last blog sit and marinate for a good 3-4 days but given that today is US election day. I want to give my 2 cents on it.

Its not so much about why I like McCain that I am telling you guys to vote for him but i am just not sure about Obama. I just think people expect too much from Obama, especially from his "change" slogan. I firmly believe that if he gets voted in, he wont "change" anything - people will realize that he is just another politician doing the similar things. He will just do the same things, listen to the same people, and nothing will be "changed". Both Obama and McCain cant save the financial shxthole we are in now but at least people dont have any expectations from McCain. Do we really need someone who is going to underachieve (because we expect too much) when the entire world's confidence is already so low? My answer is no.

On top of that, McCain does have more experience. And if for some silly health reasons he cant continue, Sarah Palin is actually NOT THAT BAD OF A CHOICE. It is pretty much due to the same expectation reason I gave above. She is so fxxking dumb that people have zero expectations for her and chances are that she will overachieve and surprise people, and if she doesn't, at least you will have some good youtube videos to laugh at.

At the end of the day, its your vote. I am just trying to convince you to vote for McCain.

Thank You

It is very rare for me to do posts in consecutive days but there is something I really want to get off my chest right now.

hkgirl sends me packages with letters and small gifts every other week. I am sure you read this blog also but I was rather sad when I got your first mail. I was pretty much guilt tripping myself a lot for leaving you alone in hong kong during the entire month of september. Why am I the reason that we cant see each other face to face. I mean, after all, I am the cause of this 1-year long distance relationship. Well, time has passed and I received another one of your packages today. I think after that first package, I have smiled genuinely from my heart each time I receive your package. I appreciate every moment you spent writing those letters, cutting out new clips, picking gifts. I read your letter with a big smile and hope you write them with one too.

In a time when we can only see each other through skype, your package is the only thing I can touch to feel your presence.

My friend L7 once told me that "life is too short to be unhappy all the time" and it's true. Life is brighter if we can appreciate all the good things around us. It is time for everyone to step back, look at the person next to you, and say...

Thank You.

WTF is going on

What an ambiguous topic. "WTF is going on" can pretty much be applied to anything that is going on around us now, from the economy to hockey mom running for vice president, but I am just going to share a personal experience from today.

I couldnt be bothered to cook tonight after gym earlier so i decided to go buy takeaway instead. Sunday night was rather quiet for the restaurant, there were just 2 other guys waiting for their takeaway with me and the owner had her 2 kids running around the restaurant like its a playground. So the older brother (about 6) asked me some advice on his drawing homework (i typed assignment first but then realized how un-preschool the word "assignment" is) and I helped him a bit with his coloring. Then the young brother (around 4) saw us giggling, ran over, and demanded my attention. So i picked up the younger brother's toy gun on the ground and started shooting him.

Here is a million dollar question, what was the reaction i got?

A - "Fxxk you"
B - "Fxxk you" + 1-5 punches
C - "Fxxk you" + 5-10 punches
D - "Fxxk you" + 11+ punches

LOL. I actually dont remember the exact punches but he was definitely machine gun punching me for a good 2 seconds. Oh yea, did i mention? He dropped an F-bomb on me also.

I have fxxk'd a lot of people and got fxxk'd (both verbally) probably more times by others. But by a kid who just stopped sucking his thumb? WTF IS GOING ON?

hkgirl said people in UK are like this. WHAT? i am sure there are more kids like him. WHAT? Seriously, if hockey mom becomes vice president in 48 hours, then everyone should do an AP news search for "man from HK struck by lightning".

Until next time.

Finding Equilibrium

Just came back from a 3 day vacation in Lala-land. Lala-land is definitely one of the places that everyone should visit once in their life time. Who doesnt like floating in the air for 72 hours straight? What I noticed was that people in lala-land actually don't lala that much. Its similar to what I tell people about England - they are not drunks.

I guess its difficult for outsiders to understand but when something (whether it be lala or alcohol) is so incorporated into a culture, its no longer something to go crazy over. People get off work for a happy hour drink daily in england, but nobody goes crazy over it. Why? Because people have learned to be responsible with their alcohol consumption. Everyone understands that it is something they do after work to chill / relax; its not like everyone goes get trashed every night. It is a bit hard to implement it but I would suggest country leaders to look into educating people how to utilize these things rather than straightup banning them or supressing them. The US drinking age limit (21) one of these silly examples. Kids find their way to alcohol anyway and these are the kids that gets mad trashed each time they drink because drinking is such a "special" thing for them. Moral of the story is to teach kids how to drink and not ban them until 21.

The forbidden fruit is always tempting.

Here and there

Its been a while but I had McDonald's today for lunch. I pretty much tell myself the same thing every time I step into a McD... "wow, its been the longest time since I had Mickie Dee", but its also the truth. My motivation for McDonald's is just not that big unless I feel like having their McNuggets, pretty much the only thing i really like from them.

James Bond is coming out next week. Is it just me or does it really look like Daniel Craig can break us all in half?

Do you ever wonder how people go to the gym on a weekday between 2-5pm? Don't they have work?

Don't you also wonder why Arnold and Stallone didnt make a movie together? It was everyone's dream back in the 90's.

School was pretty insane last week but the entertainment after has been great. A mountain of one. Justice (umm... that didnt quite happened). NFL at Wembley. Amsterdam tomorrow... looking forward to some of my posts after some funny cigarettes.

bleh

I apologize for the lack of updates lately... things have just been incredibly busy for me.

Old School

A lot of people have told me that my blog is rather sad. Thats actually a good thing beause my purpose of this blog from the beginning that to show insights the real me wouldnt do. This blog is the batman to my usual happy bruce wayne. But the question is... is Batman or Bruce Wayne the true identity? hah

Back onto what I wanted to write in the first place. I consider myself a fairly old tradition style guy. You work hard, capture opportunities, and you make money. Simple as that. What i noticed within the past 3 to 5 years is that the younger generation (maybe because the economy was great back then) tend to find money easy to come by.

A real example. This guy just randomly bought a chinese stock which was going up anyway and tripled his fortune in the year from 2006 to 2007. Another example, about half of the fresh-grads I saw entering my old company was pretty much a bum. They show up (even on their first week, when you are supposed to impress your boss), work at their snail speed and expect the world to tolerate that. I swear to god this was the case. My colleagues from my old job still bitches to me daily about how lazy this person is and that monitoring this person takes more time than doing their stuff. Ridiculous.

I was at a Johnsons & Johnsons job fair last night and the presenter said something that i totally agree with. (i am paraphrasing here) "Ever since the dot com boom, the chance of capitalizing on innovative methods have decreased greatly". Even if you have idea, note this: Larry Page didnt create google from being a lazy schmuck. Steve Jobs doesnt just sit in his desk and play with his iPhone all day (actually, does anyone know if he even has an iPhone?! and if he does, would his version be like... super souped up?) There is always only one way to ensure success - Work your f**king ass off.

I am totally old school on this one.

Bring it

I have noticed that I usually write about a topic and then do a twist at the end and I have fallen pretty comfortable with that format so I have decided to change things up a bit this time. The ending will come before the story this time.

"Bring it"

It wasnt until when I finished that bottle of gin last night until I realized that i havent been drunk for a while. A little history here... I used to get drunk every night! If it wasnt from doing shots at clubs it was doing shots at home with hkgirl. There was a week when we would finish a bottle of vodka every night! (I BS you not)... and that's AFTER we probably drink 2 bottles of wine or a bottle of 720ml sake. And speaking of sake, I love sake. I finished like... a 1.8L bottle of sake this year in my birthday. If I have to choose 1 drink to have for the rest of my life it has to be sake... though i'd probably die without water.

Back to my main point, so i had my bottle of wine last night during dinner and wanted to drink more. Spotted my bottle of gin on the corner of my table and decided to finish the 1/2 bottle remaining. An hour and half later, that gin is gone and my crave for alcohol was even larger then. Then something hit me. I havent been drunk for a long time. Like, 1 month long time, and thats like 1 month in dog year for me. Don't get me wrong, I go out drinking and I have my bottle of wine every dinner, but I just havent been DRUNK. you know? Delirious drunk.

Just kind of miss that feeling

So for those of you who wants to get me fucted. Like i said in the beginning... Bring it!

...I actually dont think a normal person who bitch about being sober for a month

P.S. - I got bored today, so I went back and read my old blog at xanga and my early blogging style was... lets just say very different.

since when?

umm... no... I am not going to talk about paris hilton on this post, I actually want to focus on "since when"... did we decide that it is ok to upload drunken pictures of ourselves...

really? imagine 5 years ago (yea there was internet back then too), people were still conscious of their image. You wouldnt see drunken pictures of anyone online. No one would upload pictures of themselves smoking. Your brothers and sisters wouldnt do it, but everyone is doing it now. why? Since when? Since when did we start uploading our crazy pics? Is it because of all the paparazzi taking crazy celeb pics? Is it because our lives are too bleh? I seriously see no point of having my drunken pic online...

...that is, unless, i am doing it for charity... umm... who would want to see hkbomber drunk anyway?!?!?!?!

P.S. ... did anyone find the memory improvement thing useful? Comments anyone?

Continuing from where we left off...

basically, its pretty much impossible to memorize 30 words in order within 3 minutes. what you can do is make it easier for you to memorize. the memory improving lecturer taught us that if you make the words something more than just words, it will be easier to memorize them.

For instance, try coming up with a story like this:

I am now inside the ARENA looking right at the CARGO. I grabbed a CHISEL and i opened up the PARCEL. get it? basically you make a story out of it and the 30 words will be a lot easier to memorize. try it out yourself...

...except there isnt much situation in real life where u need to just memorize words...

Silly Learnings

Considering that I (super not myself-ly) pretty much completed all my studies and even read ahead (!), I have some time to blog again.

Instead of diving into another topic I am going to give you readers (yea the few of you) a memory test. Try to memorize the following 30 words in order. You have 3 minutes to memorize them. If you get a word and its position correctly, you get 2 points, and you get 1 point deducted for every wrong position and words. Blanks are just plain Zero.

1 arena 11 calcium 21 cannon
2 cargo 12 bung 22 editor
3 chisel 13 grain 23 wrist
4 parcel 14 Leonardo da Vinci 24 bride
5 eighteen 15 head 25 coral
6 moment 16 astronaut 26 window
7 kink 17 cradle 27 bank
8 craft 18 lung 28 daffodil
9 console 19 coin 29 target
10 bride 20 box 30 alarm

Yep its a memory test and basically there is a way to improve your memory and I will reveal show how you can memorize all 30 words in order within 3 minutes in 2 days after you guys try the memory test out.

Value

I used to think that I am unimportant, to the point where I can wholeheartedly admit that I can die at any point in my life and I would have no regrets. Why? Because I live my life fullest to the point where I leave no marks of regrets. Yea, everyone looks back and wishes that they had done things differently. Well I'd rather spend time thinking how i would do things differently in the future than worry about what happened. Learning from it, yes, losing sleep over it, no. That's how the no regret, I can die anytime thing came on.

I always told myself that unless I get kids, otherwise there are no responsibilities big enough to a point where I cant be replaced. Honestly, unless you are a major political figure or mother teresa, chances are that the regular day you and me can be replaced at any point. Imagine your boss hired someone else to take your place. There would be that 1-2 months training period but ultimately, you can be replaced.

It gets really depressing if I continue. How should we value ourselves / our existence then? The question may seem pretty big but you should really just look at two things. 1 - From the impact you made and 2 - by the people around you. I am not going to talk about 1 because i would be opening a new topic (when I am trying to close this). I didn't really realize how important I am to people around me until I am now in London. I was too young to grasp my value when I left for the US 15+ years ago, but this time I really feel it. There are just so much I can do for the people waiting for me in HK now.

I cant die just yet... not until I go back to HK and put smiles in all your faces.

I AM SO TIRED!!!

So yea.. MBA is on its 4th week and my ass fell off already.

For the past week, i have been sleeping from 3-8:30 daily, there were 2 days I even worked until 5 before I passed out.

This wasnt what i signed up for...

bed time... I can finally sleep at 2:12 tonight! yippeee!!!

Something Simple

Noticed something when I see a person do public speaking. There is no need to panic, your message will come across a lot more convincingly (is that a word?) if you dont A, stutter, B, shake, or C, look down. I know its easy to say and hard to do but its really simple. You just have to believe that you have what it takes to do the speech. You cant convince others if you cant even convince yourself. You might as well give up and not do the speech really.

Confidence is the main point I would like to emphasize. A lot of people lose their confidence and worry about their performance and gets that stage fright and I understand that. But confidence is something that even if you dont have it, you can pretend like you have it. The fear of failing itself probably increases the chance of failing... Elvis Presley is amongst one of the many celebrities who gets super nervous before going on stage. I dont want to go too much into details... but I am sure public speaking in front of hundreds cant be worse than Elvis performing.

These are advices for my friends... problem is I have a teacher who panics daily during lectures...

Who you want to see before you die

Quick deviation before I move onto today's topic. Thanks for everyone's kind words, the heavy workload that my MBA program gives me is not giving me much time to be unhappy... so I am generally ok. As for hkgirl... I have been encouraging her to drink to death at home so I am pretty sure she has had a very wooooo week as well. Countdown to seeing each other again : 11 weeks.

back onto the original topic... it actually stem from one of my conversations with hkgirl before she went back to hong kong. Who do you want to see before you die? Think about it for a short bit before continuing...

think...

THINK!

Let me guess... you want to see the people you love the most right?

Most people would generally think that way. See and talk to the people they love the most. Talk to them for that one last time, see their faces one last time. But if you think about it, does it REALLY matter that much that you see someone for one last time before you die? You probably see these people daily or weekly anyway so that one last moment is not really going to matter that much. Plus, I really dont like the thought of having people I love giving me fake smiles in front of me.

Who would I want to see then? 3 types of people.
1 - The people who hate me the most
2 - The people who wants to apologize at me; and
3 - The people who I hate the most

It isnt hard to guess why those 3 types of people are chosen but I will briefly explain anyway..

1 - I want to give these type of people that one last chance to bitch at me, swear at me, give me shit, do random shit to me. Basically I want them to have that one last chance to f**k (not sure if blogspot allows it...) with me that one last time.
2 - I talk to some old people a lot and a lot of times they say that "I wish I had that chance to explain myself or apologize to XXX". Well I am about to die and this is your last chance. This is your last chance for redemption and chances are that I am not going to hold any grudge when my life is going to end in any minute.
3 - This is where the fun part begins. I want to be in a room with 8-10 people I want to cuss out. Imagine a old man with his dying voice "XXX! I have always hated your guts and now you will know it! You @!#!$!%!@#!#" Imagine how fun would that be. I might even come back alive after that.

You may ask ... why do I not want to see that people I want to apologize to? Honestly... regret will probably be the last time I will be thinking at that point so I am probably better of dying without it.

So yea, I strongly encourage you guys to consider my way. More importantly... this way, I will be one of the last person you think of before you die haha.

until next time

The Day When Tofu Is Hard To Find

Living alone means doing everything alone. You wash your clothes yourself. You cook yourself. You clean the room yourself. You prepare your gym clothes yourself. Everything done by self, get it?

So today I went to the gym for the first time since I got here to London. I had a great workout. Lifted and ran for a total of 2 and a half hours. Loads of sweat. Felt great and erased most of my negativity. BUT... then problem came. I DIDNT BRING AN EXTRA PAIR OF BOXERS!!! I actually didnt realize that I didnt bring an extra pair of boxers AFTER spending my time in the sauna in my original sweaty boxers. (Usually I go in sauna naked but all the UK people were wearing boxers inside so I figure I should just follow them) So I have the choice of wearing a pair of SOAKED boxers or not wearing them. Let's guess what I did.

I went and do groceries shopping after gym. I have been reading on how to cook a corn & tofu soup. (I should really start a topic on tofu because that's actually the only *REAL* chinese food that a common westerner will eat. I don't understand why no one else has made a point about it) Buying canned sweet corn was easy. Tofu was the difficult part. You would THINK that tofu is so common worldwide that you can get it in any supermarket. In fact, I have never been inside a US or UK supermarket that doesn't have it. Well there is a first time to everything, the supermarket I went to had NO tofu. The best alternative I had was fried tofu. I bought it and made the soup with fried tofu anyway... By the way.. the soup was a failure.

I lived in the US alone before too but I think living in HK with my mom and maid has made me totally lost my independent skills. Chances are that by the time I learn how to cook again I will be back in HK spoiled by my mom and my maids again...

oh yea... time for the answer from earlier. For the first time in my life, I didn't wear boxers inside my jeans today. The feeling was quite free, actually made me question if i should actually give up boxers...

I feel like shit

I have probably been crying for a minute or two . I just arrived home from sending hkgirl to the airport. Its been a while… or should I say, I have never felt this shit about life ever. Negativity can grow like a virus inside you and gives you a reason to be negative and angry about everything. Here is a list of things i found myself hating when i was on the train ride back home.

1 - I hate how there is no cell phone coverage in the london subways. I cant even say a final goodbye to hkgirl before her flight leaves.
2 - i hate how i didnt smile more for her in her week here.
3 - i hate how I had no one to talk to cos london's timezone is weird. my friends in US are still sleeping and my friends in HK just went to bed.
4 - I hate how I didnt buy much alcohol to drink myself to sleep.
5 - I hate how I cry each moment I think of her.
6 - I hate the fact that I cant go back in time.
7 - or for that matter, move time forward so I can see her sooner
8 - I hate the fact that I discovered a new level of love just as she left
9 - I hate how I couldnt tell her my feelings because I was too unhappy earlier
10 - i still hate how my cell phone still has no coverage cos I cant tell all these things to her.

these 10 thoughts hit me within a minute. It was then when i decided to just plug my iPod in and blast myself with Tricky's latest album and close my eyes. Then the on and off cell phone coverage got me several SMS's from hkgirl. I cried again.

... I guess this is how people feel like when they are forced to leave someone they love.

I am ok!

I have arrived...

first day in school here... spent all day learning how to use the internet, library, and where to go...

the irony of "learning" the simplest things at a high level education...

P.S. - for those of you who care, hkgirl is wandering in the street of London.

I had tons to write about... just that its been a very busy week and I have had no time to blog.

Countdown to UK - less than 24 hours.

I will try to update my blog but i dont expect an update until the middle of next week.

PDA

totally PDAing here...

I love you hkgirl. hope not much is going to change between us for this coming year...

yea this is a post

Who Moved My Cheese?

As my countdown to London is less than a week now, I figure I should write something about it.

It is very interesting how a person's mind works. When I first start out with the idea of doing MBA in UK, I was excited about it, I looked forward to it and thought of many things I could do in London. Now with less than a week away, I cant say I feel the same. In fact, it has gotten to the point where I can tell everyone "I am not looking forward to it anymore". I am already missing HK before I leave.

HK has just been too nice to me for the past 3 months. I have learned to appreciate everyone better because I know I won't be seeing them for most of the next year. This kind of also means that I wasnt cherishing what I had before... at least not until I was about to lose it. Its just sad that I have to leave just as I am starting to super love HK .

I just hope HK will treat me the same when I come back.

erm....

ermm.... does anyone actually read my blog?

a comment or two would be nice lol

The world is going to end.

Hong Kong was once again hit with a typhoon, except this time we had the "strongest typhoon of the year" hitting us. (Ironically, it was hkgirl's birthday last saturday and both of our birthdays had been typhoon days in Hong Kong)

So we had the strongest typhoon of the year on friday, hitting us directly. 6 hours later, we had no rain, no wind; all we had was sunshine. WTF? wasn't that supposed to be to the strongest storm of the year? No rain? No wind? When was the last time you hear that you can go out and get a nice tan after "the strongest storm" hit your town.

If that wasn't proof that our world is ending soon, I don't know what is. Honestly, I don't think we can make a difference. Even with the whole world recycling we probably still cant offset what computer company like Dell/HP/IBM does with computer waste. And computer waste isnt the only pollution we face.

Recycling is not enough. Support Green Peace is the best we can do.

The pursuit of HAPPYness

Had a disagreement (fight & argument are too strong to use here) with hkgirl earlier the week and the conversation pretty much boils down to the quote "life is too short to be unhappy all the time". There are a million reasons to be happy and there are also a million reasons to be unhappy, yet people generally choose to be unhappy. Why? A friend told me last week that "it is so hard for me to be happy" and I told him "just go out and do things you like to do and you will be". My mom gets upset with our house maid daily for some random reasons. You can probably find more people =| and =( in the world than you do =)

My solution to happiness is very simple. Smile more and do things you like more. Everyone's lives are full of negative, why let your brain put the focus on them? Focus on the positives, and try your best to ignore the negatives. When something bad happens, handle it the best you can and leave it behind. Don't let that one small/big thing hinder your mood for the rest of the day. Kids are happier because they don't let their negative emotions affect themselves. I don't understand but sometime somewhere everyone started doing things the other way around. Ignore the positives, amplify the negatives, and asks "how come I was so happy when I was a kid?"

It is time to unlearn your methods.

Start with smiling more. =)

Holiday Motivation

I am such a cunt... I have a ton of topics I want to write about but I am just too lazy to spend the 5 minutes to type them up... which brings me to my topics today - holiday motivation.

The way I see it, there are 3 ways people manage their time.
Type 1 - This type of people finish their tasks the moment it appears.
Type 2 - These people doesn't see the need to finish their task ASAP, but also wont wait until the last minute to finish their task
Type 3 - This is your typical procrastinator. Their brain doesn't start operating until 5 minutes before the deadline.

In general, type 1 people are your workhorses. They are your workaholics. They finish the tasks ASAP, get bored, and finds more new things to do. Moms are generally like that, they have nothing to do at home, gets bored, and goes to your room to nag. Nag nag nag nag.

I believe most people at my age-ish falls under type 3 category. We don't study until 2 days before the exam. We don't start moving until we start smelling deadline. We are your 15-29 crew. Motivation to finish stuff? Deadline. The funny thing is that these people understand that procrastination is bad and that their quality of work is poor from it but they just keep procrastinating. Very LOL.

Type 2 is generally the luckiest of all. They have the option to do what they want whenever they want. These people are most likely your boss. They go to work whenever they want, they do things at their own pace. And how did they get here? Most likely by being a Type 1 worker. But this is very much like how I am with holidays now. Things that usually take me an hour to finish now needs 2+ to finish simply because I have no reason to do it any faster. I feel very much like a boss now... except I am just an unemployed fool.

Countdown to UK - 17 days

Events = Alcohol?

It has been a rather alcohol filled weekend.

Last Friday, I attended my ex colleague Rexx's wedding. Last Saturday, I had my birthday party. Alcohol played an important role in both events. I totally understand the concept of drinking for occasions but that "drinking for occasion" has now changed to "get drunk because its your occasion". Alcohol Alcohol Alcohol. As much as I love getting a drink, I have realized how much overboard people have been going. May our livers suffer.

Some small items:

The crazy 4x100 relay that took place yesterday. It was about the most exciting live sporting event experience I have ever through a TV. You dont even have to like swimming to enjoy it. Here is a link of the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYnlW-CzIx4


Countdown to UK = 25 days.

my first real post. my first birthday in typhoon.

It was very hard finding motivation to start writing again. Someone once asked "when do you feel like reading?" The answers are not difficult go guess: "when i am bored" "when i breakup". The only books I read are journals and autobiographies, usually because I want to be inspired by how others think and how others lived their lives. Well that's not the point. Why does people feel like writing so much nowadays? Blogs. Journals. Forums. Everyone's voice gets heard somehow. The reason why I write is simple, is to hopefully inspire some people just like how the authors inspire me. There are no guarantees but I am pretty sure my blog will be a pretty interesting one.

Today, August 6th, is my birthday. It just so happens that a huge typhoon hit Hong Kong so I had to stay home all day. For students, people who work, everyone dreams of a mini typhoons hitting your city once a week so that you get an extra day off, whereas for people like me, jobless waiting for school to start, or students on a holiday, getting a day of nothing to do at home is pretty much a waste. But when you think about it, it is going to be impossible for me to have a peaceful birthday at home for a long time, so today was well worth it. Thank you Typhoon.

I am going to start writing again...

-GT