Huiting wedding

She had many major bumps here and there in her teenage years but she remained so pure and true to herself. Now she found her long deserved fairy tale! Very happy for her and she is also very happy!!!

Me and Albert.

I had a bad haircut the day before but I managed to save it using my styling skills haha.
No shortcuts to the hair.

Anyway I just found my old hairstylist Chloe in a new salon at....... Kovan. KOVAN. T_T
Worth traveling 1 hour for a haircut?

Friday adrenaline

It was a very productive Friday for me. And adrenaline rush.

I was doing the following at the same time:

• Fighting a law case on "if you don't share this you will have bad luck" posts on fb
• Reading lots of organisation changes emails because there are so many changes
• Helping somebody find his lost iphone using findmyiphone because he got pickpocketed in China
• Deciding if I should have a weekend trip to Hong Kong because Scoot is giving away free tickets, and eventually buying a return trip for $76 nett for a Jan weekend. A very competitive online bargain with heavy website traffic. Such an impromptu buy!

A different day from the rest of my week.

complicating future

It's always on my mind to leave this job but as some of my friends tell me, this is the best job in the world because you get paid to surf the net. True enough.

I met Betty for lunch the other day and got to know that they are expanding this year, expecting to hire more people. But if I go in, I'd have to start from scratch because I don't have any experience. Well, three months doesn't really count. 

Earlier on she had reserved a place for me when I'm finishing my year 4 but the timing wasn't right so she gave it to one of her temp staff. If I were to join this time round, I would be more junior than him, which makes it awkward because he's younger and more experienced but my qualifications are above him. In addition, she has another 2 temp staff waiting for that full time position which makes it even more awkward if she had me fill in instead of them.

Anyway I'm just thinking out loud here. I had also researched on getting a part time Masters in financial engineering that will increase my chances of getting a great paying job dramatically.

Should I? One year of studies will cost 30k. It would be best if there's some sort of sponsorship if I join a bank, but I'm not quite sure if the cost of education is worth the lack of income. 

Income: est 36k per year 

Masters: 30k

If my increase in income is 1k after graduation, I would take 30 months or 2.5 years to recover my cost. That's even more than my whole 4 years of college! Sighs.

I don't come from a rich family, unlike some of my friends who can just go somewhere to study as much as they like and I'm already behind by 2 years of NS as compared to the female counterparts.

Career is so damn complicating. 

After work excuses

Monday: I slept too late yesterday, I need to nap
Tuesday: It's only Tuesday, there's the rest of the week
Wednesday: It's raining, good weather to nap
Thursday: There's still Friday....
Friday: I'll be swimming on Saturday anyways.
Saturday: Swimming
Sunday: I swam yesterday, and I'll start next week

focus at home

I always have a problem focusing on what to do after work at home.
I need to focus because I'm trying to do too many things at a time.

plan for travelling

bake

make ice cream

learn Japanese

learn ukulele

exercise

read novels

read comics

search for jobs

watch shows

Ok since I have high cholesterol problem and fat problems, I should concentrate on exercising. 

And I should prepare to go Japan soon again, I'm gonna learn Japanese.

2 main priorities now.

encounters on omegle

My week has been "fulfilling" with the discovery of Omegle.

After my last post I went on to find out if yahoo chat still exists and apparently yahoo removed the chat in 2012. Then I typed yahoo chats in the yahoo search bar and found Omegle, an online chatting website and within a week I have accumulated LOTs of stories.

I have encountered the following:

• a shemale, and I immediately exit the chat
• a double major in Econs and marketing who just finished his 1500 word literature essay who has a cocky friend from Harvard living in a mansion in a small town
• somebody who liked tranny porn
• a Cali girl who found out her chatmate was from NC and exited immediately stating "I don't like hillbillies"
• a girl who has friends who were raped and one of them are in hospital currently, but refuse to admit sometimes it's the girl's fault for seducing the guy. Oh and she assumes that guys can "aim" when they are peeing and want to try that one day.
• a 20 yo guy who has encounters with somebody from the navy, has a girlfriend and intends to break up with her next month because he's moving to San Diego stating "we are only together because of sex"
• a lost student whose friend is mad at him for no reason and not knowing what to do with his life so I guided him to study literature in college
• a guy who would choose invisibility instead of flight because "i can grope people and get away with it by saying I'm a ghost or something"
• two person doing some role play cybersex for 1 hour
• two person doing LOTR role play cyber.

yea and the list goes on and on....

a lost penpal

I just vaguely recalled that when I was 12 years old, I used to hang out at the CCK library after school to surf the net or play games on the computers. At that point of time, online chatting is a very cool and popular thing to do.

I was on yahoo chat. I forgot how I started, I began chatting with this guy at Arizona, USA and he was serving the military. I think he was 19 or 21 at that point of time, so we began chatting and we agreed to exchange addresses to become penpals. 

I will always remember after exchanging, he wrote, "looks like you got yourself a penpal, buddy."

He was in the Marine Corps, and at that point of time I didn't know what is the marine corps. I thought he meant marine crops, so I was thinking, is he in marine farming or something?

After a week, I consulted my form teacher how much the stamp costs to US and I bought a $1 stamp before sending out the the letter. 

I never got a reply, and some of the reasons might be due to:

1. I forgot to write his name on his address

2. I forgot to write Marine Corps

3. The letter never got to him

Well this was 14 years ago. By now he should be like 35? I dunno. I wonder if yahoo still keeps a history of chat logs, because I totally forgot his name. I think it was John or something. 

In any case, I hope he is still doing well, or at least, still alive.

colleague just quit

That's the thing with working.

You either have to do a reasonable amount of things, have a lot of time in your hands and earn reasonable amount of money.

or

Have a lot of things to do, have little time in your hands and earn a lot of money.

Well the best thing is to take the best of both, do what you like, have a lot of time and earn a lot of money, but that's not going to happen to just anyone. It's always a trade-off between time and money.

I just heard that one of my colleagues under the same program just quit the company because he was feeling unsatisfied with his work because he's not really doing or learning anything. And he hasn't found another job yet! 

Its's such a risk! And the employment market in Shanghai is still so competitive!

I mean you should at least have a backup plan right, and we need to do another half a year for the bonus. The best thing is to start finding another job now, wait to take the bonus and run. 

I'm also not very sure if I would like the other job, but if it's a change, it's always good.

Robinsons at Heerens

Saturday I had a rare day to really explore Orchard all by myself since I came back.

It was all window shopping and I almost bought a tee but decided I have too much clothes and maybe wait for the end of year sale.

So I went to the new Robinsons at the Heerens and I'm very impressed by their offerings in the new store!
It used to be a departmental store for the older generation but the store at Heerens turns out to cater to the young and modern adults!

I'm really impressed by the layout of the store, the brands they carry and the design of their products, which cleared a path for the younger generation to shop. I was wowed by the exclusive stuff that they carry, like Uniformware watches, Kiel James Patrick bracelets and Herschel Supplies bags. The chocolate section at the basement carries Valrhona chocolates too!

Congratulations, Robinsons, you have re-branded yourselves to be the new departmental store for young adults and I know where to get my new furniture next time.

How to become rich

Ten Keystone Habits That Will Make Your Rich:

1. Wealthy individuals have eliminated most of their bad daily failure habits and replaced them with good daily success habits. Yes I need to start doing that.
2. Wealthy individuals set daily, monthly, annual and long-term goals. They understand the difference between a wish and a goal. Yes I need to start doing that.
3. Wealthy individuals engage in 30 minutes a day of daily career-related reading. I do read the news.
4. Wealthy people are healthy people. They exercise aerobically 30 minutes a day, four days a week and stay below their “caloric threshold” (This is the number of calories consumed each day that will neither make you gain weight nor lose weight). For men this ranges from 2,000 calories a day to 2,600 calories a day. For women this ranges from 1,500 calories a day to 2,100 calories a day. I need to exercise more...
5. Wealthy individuals manage their relationships every day. Strong relationships are the currency of the wealthy. They employ certain strategies to grow their relationships such as: “The Hello Call”, “The Happy Birthday Call” and “The Life Event Call”. They use a specific strategy to help them increase their Rich Relationships and eliminate their Poverty Relationships. Yes I need to start doing that.
6. Wealthy individuals live each day in moderation.They eat in moderation, spend in moderation, work in moderation and play in moderation. I do that.
7. Wealthy individuals complete at least 70% of the tasks on their daily “to do” list. I do that.
8. Wealthy individuals engage in “Rich Thinking”. They are upbeat, positive and focused on achievement.  I do that.
9. Wealthy individuals save a minimum of 10-20% of their income and live off of the remaining 80-90%.  I do that.
10. Wealthy individuals control their thoughts and emotions, every day.  I do that.

Need to do: 1,2,4,5.

Bad Habits That Are Keeping You Poor

1. You watch more than one hour of T.V. a day. Guilty... need to keep that in check.
2. You spend more than an hour a day on recreational Internet use (Facebook, Twitter etc.) Guilty...
3. You eat more than 300 junk food calories a day. 
4. You drink more than two glasses of beer, wine or hard alcohol a night.
5. You drink more than 12 ounces of non-diet soda a day.
6. You don’t exercise aerobically a minimum of 30 minutes a day, four days a week. Sometimes...
7. Your relationships are on an “as needed” basis. You only reach out to your friends to socialize or when you have problems and need their help. You don’t call them just to say hello, happy birthday or to congratulate them or console them when something happens in their lives. In other words, you ignore them unless you need them for something. A little bit guilty...
8. Procrastination is the rule rather than the exception. You don’t maintain a daily “to do” list, or if you do, you don’t accomplish 70% or more of your daily “to do” list each.
9. You devote very little time to your career beyond working. You do not read a minimum of 30 minutes a day of career-related reading material. I do read the news... on twitter...
10. You do not network or volunteer a minimum of 5 hours a month. Guilty.
11. You do the bare minimum at work. You have “it’s not in my job description” syndrome.
12. You talk too much and don’t listen enough. You violate the ”5 to 1 Rule” (Listening for 5 minutes for every 1 minute of talking). I don't talk. Does that count?
13. Oftentimes, you are putting your foot in your mouth and saying inappropriate things. Not me.
14. You are not generous with your time or money with respect to your relationships. Maybe...
15. You are a spender and not a saver. You don’t save 10% of your net income every month. You violate the “90 % Rule”
16. You spend more than you earn and your debt is overwhelming you.
17. You don’t control your thoughts and emotions on a daily basis. You lose your temper too often and belittle others too much. Def. not me.
18. You think a wish is a goal. Goals require a specific physical activity, otherwise they are just wishes and wishes don’t come true. Sometimes...

Need improve on: 1, 2, 7, 10, 14, 18

Taken from: http://richhabits.net/?s=20+things

Focus

I've been wanting to do too many things lately that everything is not done completely. It's like trying to do this and that but it's getting me nowhere.

Like I bought so many ingredients to bake so many things but I didn't have the time or equipment to bake! and the things are going to expire quickly. Argh.

Focus on one item to make, then buy ingredients and make.
Focus on one thing to do, do and get it done so that you can move on.

I need to focus focus focus.