My Portuguese Holiday

Slept like a baby.
Woke up to a Madeiran sunrise by the Atlantic Ocean.
Had international breakfast like a king. (Of course I had the portugese egg tart too)Dived with rainbow-coloured fish, sea urchins and sea snakes.
Lunched like a pauper (Breakfast was just too good.)
Watched the sun set behind mountains of deep green and gold.
Scanned the horizons and the limitless span of sky, sea and ever-changing clouds.
I am happy.

Yeah, I was a teeny bit enslaved to work on Monday, and some of Tuesday. I must say I have underestimated how potent the work poison is. One drop of work is capable of dissolving the most delightful holiday mood. That single drop of work was capable of conjuring up thoughts of removing myself from my profession altogether. I finally understood why a person who works has an occupation. If you allow it, your work will just occupy you.

Now that I’ve gotten the last ounce of work off my chest, I’M FREE!!! Free to sit out in the open like now, free to watch the blue skies and clouds reflected off the glass on my table, and free to watch seagulls soar above the sapphire ocean.

To my right lies an endless stretch of shimmering blue and green that blend straight into the sky. Above this undefined line of water and sky lies puffy clouds dyed pink and orange by the morning sun. I enjoyed my lovely breakfast to this every single morning. And as I look at the calm infinity pool, I see the pink, orange and blue sky all mirrored on it. A perfect reflection like no other.

To my left lie the hills and valleys of Madeira. I have never seen hills and mountains that extend up thousands of feet up into the clouds! You cannot even see the sky, just green, brown, yellow and gold shrouded in mist.

I was buzzing around like an excited kid on my mini tour up the mountains. It just felt surreal to be in the clouds and to look at postcards in live size. I couldn’t even believe that they weren’t postcards. (My friend had to put up with me and remind me to calm down.) Dotted all over the hills are houses, white with orang-tiled roofs. There’s the occasional bright pink house too. If kids ever colour their drawings of houses, fish and hills in rainbow colour, they’re not wrong. These exist!

On top of these hills, I enjoyed Strawberry Cheesecake B&J ice-cream. Yes, B&J ice-cream business has soared to certain heights eh? I also had to take away with me Madeiran chestnut liquer as souvenir. I do not take much alcohol, as some already know. But, I’m a tourist right? Of course I have to bring something back with me that is unique and only available from here.

I am a happy tourist. Happy enough, and inspired enough to blog again. :)

Wishlist updated

Wishlist
1) Shoes. Seriously comfy and lasting flats.
(I bought plenty of these! Once I favoured Summer Story, then it was Noda, then it was Pazzion, now it is Gripz!)

2) Bags. Waterproof, rugged and classy bag that I can fling around and still have it in one perfect piece.
(I love my black Harvey's Lola Ruffles! And I'd tell you it's made of seat belt)

3) Clothes. Shirts that are either so long that they can be easily tucked in, or classic enough to betucked out and still go with a blazer.
(I'm still looking for this one.)

3) I want to watch Rapunzel!
Watched it and loved it!

4) Go on leave after Christmas!
Yes I had a good Christmas last year!

5) A new phone. A smart one. I need to FB and google map around. Okie, maybe blog and tweet.
I love my Samsung Ace too. Yes, I FB, googlemap and tweet!

6) Ipod nano. I need to expand the KTV song list. haha.
Better than that, I got an iPod touch for my birthday last year!

What can I say, I'm a very happy kid.

My new wishlist
1) To visit the Hort park and Henderson wave.
2) To eat plenty of local food like Bak Kut Teh and Rojak at the Food Trail@ Singapore Flyer.
3) To check out the new Marina Bay Sands area
4) To go to Universal studios!
5) To climb Bukit Timah Hill.
6) To go to Mount Faber.

Once the list was filled with items. Now, there are places at home I wanna go.

Weekends

It feels like a long time since I last enjoyed a work-free weekend.
I cannot begin to describe how light-hearted, how enjoyable, how delectable and how delicious the sweet weekend is when there's no burden and no shadow of work lurking around any corner.


The weekend is mine!


Time always seem to be be running short, running out and running out of hand. And the mind tries to work ahead of time, to beat it, but the body hasn't followed.


Then, this sweet weekend came. I can't believe how time slows, and how every minute is so pleasurable.


I read the book I've displayed on my shelf for 6 months.


I attended a talk and met my old old friends there.


I had a leisurely Starbucks with my good old friend as time, surprisingly, crawled by. I thought time usually flies when you are enjoying yourself.


I bought the white skirt I was looking for.


I had dinner at my old primary school, which is now a youth hostel.


I reminisced. And many many thoughts, reflective ones, that never had time to surface ahead of work, all came to me one after another.


If I tweeted, I would have at least 20 tweets per hour.


I thought, "I miss my ex-colleagues. My old workplace, it feels the same, yet different. Yes, same same, but different."


I looked at my old primary school and thought, "The first time I was here, it was TWENTY years ago!!!"


I looked at the kids learning Wushu at the new Wushu school in my ex-primary school (which is now a youth hostel) and I thought, "That is so cool! I want to go back for classes! Baking class, kickboxing class, language class.... and I want to do that before I age anymore and I become slow to learn!"


I looked at my school canteen and thought, "The canteen looks so small now! Have I grown that big? Or was I that tiny?"


I looked at where the old eco-garden was and thought, "I used to catch tadpoles in that pond. And one day, during science outdoor class, spiders fell from the trees and brought about a spate of screaming."


I thought about the then and now.


I never really dreamd that I would be where I am today. Tomorrow is always a surprise.


The world tells me to worry.


Worry about cash and retirement. Worry about being alone for the rest of my life. If I'm not planning, striving and acting on fixing that, I haven't grown up.


Really? Is that why grown-ups wear an aged, weathered expression, with much weight on their shoulders?


Maybe, I'll look just like that very soon. Maybe, that's why we all look back so fondly at the carefree past.


So then, I am actually younger and more carefree today than tomorrow.


So, why worry about tomorrow? Tomorrow will worry for itself.


Look yourself in the mirror and smile, because today, you look good! No lines, no wrinkles... you look better than you will be 20 years later.


Cheers, wonderful weekend!

Home

11 days away from home. I lost my routine. I lost my sense of belonging. I didn't feel I was home. I felt like a tourist. I looked at my home with new eyes, as if it was all new and unfamiliar. It took me a day to recover, to remember what I've anchored myself to, to what I call home.

Then again, maybe I've attached myself too much to the routines of this earth. This temporary sense of detachment reminded me that home is not really the here and now. I'm a tourist, a traveller, a passerby. I'm on a long journey home, heavenwards.

Parting.

天无不散之宴席。
夕阳无限好， 只是近黄昏。

I remembered how it was when my my senior resigned. My tear ducts would be activated whenever she put her arms around me. And on my last day at my previous , I cried buckets, and missed my dear kakis to bits.

People do come and go. It's an event, and the aftermath of such events fade with time. Somehow, just somehow, I don't think I can get used to such bittersweet partings.

Parting is such sweet sorrow.

9th day away from home, and my first snow

The 9th day away from home. My last bit of sunshine is neither withstanding the cold, nor the dreariness of it. And “It” refers to the humdrum of work.

7 days into the trip, I was over the moon. I saw my first snowfall, and scrutinized the first snowflake that stuck to the airplane window. I was overjoyed when I saw the fluffy bits float down and disappear into shiny puddles that turned the ground into a colourful reflection of lights from nearby planes and the airport terminal. I even exclaimed aloud that it’s snowing, and refused to believe myself till I heard the passenger in front of me exclaim that too. It rarely snowed in Shanghai, and yet, there I experienced my very first snowfall on 18 Jan 2011.

Needless to say, I took plenty of photos of the snowscape and the bare, leafless trees that lined the roads. Like an overgrown and extremely excited kid, I openly stretched out my hands to catch snowflakes. I opened my mouth to attempt to eat a snowflake, and I was happy to walk out in the cold, day or night. I discovered a new use for the umbrella. It’s good against the snow too, next to rain and shine. I realized the importance of ear muffs and gloves. I felt what it was like to live in a fridge, and to no longer feel your ears, nose and face. I was delighted to be in the cold!

It always took me 10 minutes longer to get dressed with all the clothes. And it always takes forever for me to take my eyes off the snowscape outside my window.

And then, day 9 came. Day 9 just splashed me with cold icy water somehow. Every morsel of novel enthusiasm was frozen. I’m bound to go home on Day 11, back to sunny island, back to a normal life. No more taxi-taking from place to place. No more sumptuous international breakfast waiting for me. No more gatherings with friendly colleagues across the globe. I’m going home to the mundane and usual. 1.5 hours MRT ride to work, emails to read, and problems to solve. Not that I’m not doing that now, but from day 11 onwards, it’s all without all the novelty of being in a new place.

Work and travel, travel and work. I enjoy it no doubt. But alas, this is an intense lifestyle.

As with my only new year resolution, I need to pull the brakes, pause, think, and see. Humdrum is never humdrum, and a piece of an amazing, grand and perfect plan. Oh how great, how great my Creator God is!

New year resolutions

I only have one for this year.
To wake early, to work hard. So that finally when the weekend comes, I rest, and see that the world revolves around so much besides work.

Happy new year!

On the road

For the lack of battery in my camera.

Honking non stop during peak hour.
Boy walking calf on leash.
Man riding horse on the road alongside heavy vehicles, Japanese cars, Korean cars, local Tata cars, single-seater electric cars.
Boy holding garden hoe along the roadside.
Clothes left to dry on rusty fence by the main road.
Three-wheeler rickshaws jamming up the traffic in all directions.
Gasoline tank delievery on bicyles.
Lady dressed in bright orange sari, sweeping the road bare-footed.
Advertisment for Chronicles of Narnia, The Dawn Treader.
Advertisement for Pond’s gold radiance.
Houses built of canvas, bricks and wooden planks.
Undressed little boy squatting by the roadside.
Three wheelers plastered with sign that says “Stop TB, do not spit.”
In contradiction, the driver of the three-wheeler spits nonchalantly on the road.
Kingfisher academy.
Vroom vroom of the three wheelers.
Roads with undefined lanes. No, not undefined. Just faded, forgotten and disregarded with time.
Honking war ensues.
Sparse traffic lights.
Hawkers peddling good, and whole bunches of cauliflowers by the road.
Man walking with a basket of bananas comfortably balanced on his head.
Red buses plastered with adverts and crammed full of people.
Sign that says, “Every vice has its excuse ready.”
Sign that says, “Married by day, single by night. Whatever it is, be pure.”
Bulky luggage bags balanced atop the small moving car.
KFC.
MacDonalds.
May big fat crows and eagles.
The Holy Family Church, with aged walls and a statue of Jesus on the cross.
INRI was written on the cross.
More posters of glamourous woman and spa advertisements.
Vodaphone.
Limping dog crossing the road.
Kids peeping out of narrow lanes.
Adverts for the Gold flake snack.
Poster saying, "Son of shiva. God is great."

An incomprehensible homogenous co-existenence of the ostenstatious elite and the unhidden marginalized.

The Traveller pens.

So, I’ve been warned that I should brush my teeth with mineral water and stay away from anything that’s not steaming hot enough to disintegrate micro-organisms. Nevertheless, convenience got the better of me. The people here use this tap water every single day right? And that yoghurt looks too good to be left out of the chicken biryani set. Therefore, I ate.

I’m still alive. Alive enough to be sitting in the club lounge, typing this while looking out at the lounge balcony filled with pigeons twice the size of those I see at home. I thought they’d be scrawny, but no, they are absolutely not.

I caught the sunrise too, much to my pleasant surprise. An orange-red disc that rose slowly from the old building across, and slipped behind clouds dyed a sea of orange and vermillion.

I like the sun. But sunrise and sunsets always evade me. I had to do a 300m-dash to catch the sunrise at Surfer’s Paradise at 4am in the morning. I was rushing on a cab to Dan Shui, Fisherman’s wharf, Taipei, only to catch a glimpse of the orange egg-yoke of a sun disappear behind the shadows of traffic and buildings. The storm at Bondi beach totally rained disappointment on my dreams of having a sunshine beach day. Perhaps, my middle name is Rainie. Make that Rainy.

The sunrise from my room pretty much made up for the plane ride at unearthly hours, and fellow passengers who hog the plane toilet for an average of 20minutes each. Contrary to popular belief, smells seemed only to be a myth. Nevertheless, I think we do have differing concepts of personal space. Too close. Much too close.

I started queuing at the immigration at 5.16am. I collected my luggage at 6.40am. I impatiently placed my hands on my hips three times, and quickly caught myself when I remembered that was supposed to be a rude gesture here. Otherwise, I made it to the hotel pretty smoothly.

All is well. All is well.

And I remember, once upon a time, I wanted to travel, and write. That’s exactly what I’m doing. Suddenly, going on trips alone doesn’t feel so bad. I feel alive, because I'm writing!

Dream again.

My bags are packed, but I'm not so ready to go.

I once wrote that I wanted to travel. Yes, I so do want to travel, but I guess the innocence, and ignorance, of my daydreaming youth failed to include the hard work behind a jet-setting career.

That's why it's a dream. Reality smacks you in the face, and the dead weight pulls at your feet to bring you back to earth.

Once upon a time, when I was fourteen or fifteen, I once idealisitically and unrealistically said, "If my first job doesn't pay me at least 2.5 to 3K, I will never take that job." Ya right. The number that glared off my very first payslip was less than 2K.

I started that job without intending to stay, but I did. Why?

Three reasons:
1) I wanted to work with people.
2) I wanted to keep learning.
3) I wanted to do something still related to what I studied. (And once upon a time, when I was fifteen, I had wanted to do medicine.)

There's a 4th reason perhaps. I'm not ambitious, and just happy to do what I do.

Hang on, let me rephrase that. I'm not ambitious with titles and job progression, but I have to keep learning.

Maybe that is why I unintentionally repeated my quotable quote in mandarin, "这份工作不适合我." (This job is not suitable for me). And on some days when I'm down, I'd think, "I'm not suitable for this job."

(Side-note: I wanted very much to teach, but apparently that was not my calling. haha! If that was not the intended plan for you, you get a very firm NO.)

And so, I stuck to the same job for years. And my dear colleagues all thought that I would root there and become part of the furniture.

Don't get me wrong. I love my colleagues, and I like my job.

Then one day, a miracle happened. I was offered something else. I still get to work with people. I will definitely learn much more, and re-learn what I've lost. It's true that we lose what we don't use. I had missed being creative. I had missed writing. And I had dreamt about travelling.

Here I am. My bags are packed. Am I ready to go?

I miss my ex-colleagues, the teamwork, the camaraderie. Perhaps this is part of "the-grass-is-greener-on-the-other-side" syndrome. I'm sometimes bogged down by the harsh reality of work. No one would disagree that work can be a chore, and that's the nature of work ever since it has been cursed in the time of Adam and Eve.

But we were meant to work, and enjoy working! So, let me work, and dream again!