Peace at last.

Made the absolutely right decision. Big rock off my chest. Peace at last.

I’m happy being bored and lonely, boredom and loneliness are not depressive …

 

February’s Ukulele Meetup came and went. The new ensemble piece was “Always With You”, a lovely theme song from the Japanese Animation “Spirited Away”. Nice.

 

Gab’s 1^st weekend book-out came and went. Glad that he is doing well, and glad that now I’ve something to look forward to every weekend !

 

Chinese New Year came and went. Generally very usual. The unusual part is I managed to slow down my eating J. They next gathering will be on 7^th March Saturday, at Khoy’s Pasir Ris home.

Nao and IZ are in their rooms. Ling is in front of the TV. Gab is in BMTC ...

 

 

I am fighting boredom and loneliness. This is hard, since I’m also trying to diet at the same time. Sometime, I feel like gorging down a good dinner, and regret later J.

 

It is the ukulele meetup this weekend !  can’t wait for the new songs to practise with. In the meantime, I practise playing “Red River Valley” and “Greensleeves” without looking at the song sheets.

 

I play less weiqi now, off-form. Still playing Texas hold’them Poker and thinking about my aquarium …

I've gone back to the semi-GI look, felt the wind in my hair as I rode out for coffee.

Haiz, bored, time to pick up my camera again ...

Stocktake …

 

Gabriel has done well in Badminton and Weiqi for Hwa Chong Institution. He will join the army in February.

 

Naomi has done well in Softball, A-Div Champs and National Youth Team. She will sit for her A-Level Exams under RVHS’s Integrated-Program at the end of this year.

 

Isaac has done well in the National Schools Gymnastics. He has gotten into Hwa Chong Institution, Mathematic-Talents Class.

 

Ling Ling is enjoying her shopping and K-drama.

 

I go for coffee at the coffee-shop often. While there, my activities include reading newspapers, general-idling, and practising the ukulele. It gets boring when I run out of new songs to practise with. As such, I look forward to the monthly ukulele-meetups when new songs and ensemble pieces will be introduced.

 

 

For exercise, I swim 1km (23mins) everyday. Only bad-weather can stop me. Therefore, I always pray for bad-weather. After swims, I may go to Pa’s house to eat Ma’s cooking, talks to my extended-family members and play with the nephews.

 

 

When Isaac is not hogging the laptop, I play weiqi on the internet. I can’t play too much weiqi though. If I do, I will tire, think less, make mistakes and lose games which I’m not supposed to lose.

 

 

My aquarium has always been a part of me. I feed my fishes and tend to my java-moss once a day. They are all growing well. I kick-back and enjoy looking at them. I intend to add a pair of Altum Angels to the aquarium soon.

 

 

I try to read more but I’m very choosy, can’t find interesting books most times. When I really have absolutely nothing to read or do, I play Texas Hold’em Poker on my iPad. Cheers.

 

Depression & Life in Singapore

It has been 4 years since my first episode of Depression, the Depression which brought about the premature end to my Shanghai adventure. Returning from Shanghai to Singapore was the right thing to do. It is much easier to handle Depression with family and friends around.

The hospitals in Singapore were a big part of my journey of recovery from Depression. I was warded once in SGH and thrice in IMH. Those hospital-stays were very helpful; as I learned more about Depression, the wonderful people who suffer from various forms of it, and the ways to overcome the illness.

Depression is nausea, hot-flush, insomnia, and rapid bowel-movements. It is also the lost of mood and energy to do anything, including reading the newspapers, surfing the web, playing weiqi and the ukulele. Although it is deliberating, the experience has made me a “kinder” person who has become closer to my family.

Now that I’ve kept Depression at bay with the doctor’s medications, I hope I can tackle mid-life boredom. I’ll continue to spend more time at my hobbies : weiqi, ukulele meetups, aqua-culture, and reading. Cheers !

I'm back !

Portraits

Saturday :-

As usual, I started the day at KFC and a copy of China Daily. I must say that I am not a fan of the food at KFC nor of their coffee served in paper-cups. But it is coffee ! Talking about it, I missed the coffee in porcelain-cups back home.

That is the magazine-kiosk that I buy Weiqi Tiandi from. While some places get their Weiqi Tiandi late, that kiosk gets theirs on the day of its publication !

my water-supplier

I had my simple dinner here. Beehoon fried with egg and cabbage costs $1. William is right, the fried beehoon at such Sha Xian Xiao Chi is like those at home.

Sunday :-

Few people are at the park because it is raining and is therefore quite cold. Breakfast is KFC, lunch is a sausage bun and a black-sesame bun from a bakery, afternoon is TV.

For dinner, I went to try 鲜肉汤包@老盛昌. When the order arrived, I realized that it is 小笼包 !

There is a strike by the contract-workers because they didn't get annual-bonus, which is not their entitlement in the 1st place. The HR should be able to settle it easily.

The weather is dry. Luckily, I have a humidifier, which I bought from Carefour @ Biyun when I just came here.

For ths 1st time, it was hot ! Some to keep the winter jacket and bring out just the wind-breaker.

I had 2 Shao Mais (@ 20 cents ) this morning. Other than having the same skin, it is rather different from Singapore's ...

* bigger.
* the filling is glutinous rice instead of meat.

It is nice though. Now I have an additional breakfast option.

The customer will visit from 1st to 13th Apr. I can to go to the Singapore Day after all :-)

You guys already knew I can't have the April home trip anymore, customer is visiting. Now I plan the home trip for 30/Apr-4/May, to coincide with Labour Day.


I'll be busy for the next 2 weeks (including weekends) when the customer is here. I wish it will end in time for me to go to the Singapore Day @ Shanghai Century Park on 16th Apr. I'll tell you guys about it if I go. I can expect Singapore food and celebrities there :-).


I went for my second haircut today.

Walk round the lake in Jin Qiao (Golden Bridge) Park today. Saw people fishing ...

Then, I went home to work on my laptop.

After that, I went to gym for the 1st time. I expect my muscles to ache for the next 2 days, which is good ...

Views of Pudong Xin Qu ...

I went to KFC again, for breakfast. Why ? It is the nearest place that serves coffee ! Chinese shops do not have coffee :-(  I had coffee, a chicken burger and a dough fritter for $2.50. Oh yes, and China Daily for 30 cents.

The Shanghai Science and Technology place ... I'll be there ...

Sunny and comfortable, and a long workday for me :-)

The good and the bad about taking a bath in winter ...
* The water is heated.
* The bath lotion is not.

The bad about my residential area ...
* Too old.
* Smoking in lifts, spitting in public.
* Too many pet dogs and their poo on grass.

The good about living & working in SH …
* Many challenges, many things to learn.
* Power-up my Chinese and Mandarin.
* Temporarily a 无车阶级上班族. Quite fun.
* Can watch live sports free-to-air.
   In Singapore, I would've to pay SCV or MIO.

My heart goes out to the people of Japan and Libya. Hang-in there, persevere, 疾风知劲草. Time changes things. It may even be 沧海桑田 … 阿.

Life depends on little decisions made at crossroads. This is the land of the dragon. I am glad that our homeland has done well in the past few years. It just needs to work on being more graceful; no littering, no spitting in public, no unruly behavior, more polite and courteous, etc.

In this Middle Kindom, I get to go behind-the-scenes to see how the technology company with the highest market-capitalization work to churn out the most popular electronics products in the world.

Let me tell you why I don't eat breakfast at 1st Restaurant anymore ...
* it is hard to describe but it is far from being a place you want to spend time, any more than necessary, in.
* the sunny-side-up is cold.
* the soya bean milk is "no big deal".
I just buy and take-away 2 meat baos (2 x 20 cents).

I visited Wen Feng Mall on the weekend. It reminded me of a smaller version of IMM, just a little ...

The rain will bring the temperature down to below 10 for the next 3~4 days :-(

Yahoo Singapore ... my daily dose of home news.

My favorite words is "Integrity". Now,I added another very important word, "Perseverence".

Some mornings & evenings are cold, somtimes it drizzles, some days are really windy ... However, today is almost perfect ...

I found out today that Healthway Shanghai charges $100 for consultation. That's 5 time more than in Singapore !  Are they ripping off expatriates and insurance companies ?