Spectacles no more

Hurray!
No more banging on the wall because of fogging glasses when I get out of an air-conditioned place or drinking hot soup.

Guess what?
A week ago, I finally went for the LASIK surgery on my eyes. I had been thinking about doing it for a long time, if not for my broken spectacle, I may still be procastinating because it's beyong my budget. But recent clinic competition has encourage the price to fall, and with a 24 months interest free installment plan, what's more to wait!

I am so happy I don't have to wake up to the world of blur and wiping accidental finger prints off my glasses.
And shooting every picture when using my DSLR makes more easy.
Before my surgery, I always wondered what kinda haircut my hairdresser is giving me. Now, I can spot if my sideburn is unevenly level. "Hello, Hairdresser, do you hear me?"

But most importantly, I can look stylo-milo again with sunglasses bought from the counter. Steady steady poo pee pee la....

My first shot after repaired

....... finally got my baby back and these are the first few shots i got after reaching home (just to few the kick and warm it up a little bit).



One more week before my reservist ends... gotta make full use of it. We're planning to take a ride on the Singapore Flyers next week with two free tickets. Hopefully, we can capture a few good shot from high.

$240 to learn how to slot in a memory card.

Go on… call me a dupe, a clumsy penguin or a dumbbell. I just broke or twisted 4 pins inside my CF cardholder for my Canon Eos 400D. Call myself a modern tech savvy chap living in a 1st world country which embrace itself with latest technology, it’s such an embarrassment when I brought in my baby to the Canon service center for repair. I can see the jeering eyes of the customer service staff flashing at me when he was told I damage my CF cardholder because I had made a mistake by putting my memory card upside down and used some force when it refused to slot in nicely.

Anyway, I had paid $240 from that silly lesson and now, I am only looking forward to get back my baby and start shooting at my target… if you’re wondering why I had not been posting any picture of my little pricess, now you know why…

Too bad I won’t be taking any nice Chinese new-year photo this year….

I always like and wanted to do things slowly and nicely, but whenever I find myself in a chaotic or messy situation, I seems to be a little bit disorganized. I’ve got to learn to calm down and really be cool and focus man! …I’ve got to be one man…

Happy New Year 2009.

Farewell 2008.
This year felt muck like a F1 race that whizzed by in a flash during the night race at the Singapore Grand Prix.

I have hardly had time to look back and take in all that transpired in the last 12 months or so, and now I am already trying to make a fresh new resolution for 2009.

I have always looked forward to a new year – not just because it reminds me of Gracia getting older and more independent but also the distance away to my goals and dreams are getting nearer.

But a New Year, however, means a whole lot more to me than just seeing Gracia growing up and knowing my dreams are getting nearer.

It has always been a time of renewal. I see every year-end as a period for self-reflection. This is also the time to surrender my heart to those who mean the most to me, especially my wife whom we had our fair share of conflicts as a husband and wife so that I can be renewed, refreshed, and restored. I am going to be a better husband this year.

There’s no better time than a new year to rethink our priorities. And for 2009, I am set to burn my access fat, improve my stamina, eat well, sleep more and most of all, to focus on the over all well being of my health.

Gosh… I hate to sound like a broken records, I know (like many of you) I had made this kind of resolution before and failed to fulfilled the promised that I made. But for 2009, somehow, I felt I am having a uncompromising determination and will power within me that will push me to succeed and hopefully by end of 2009 I am not only a gangster dad but a macho dad too… lol….

Good-bye 2008 and welcome 2009!

Happy New Year and all the best for every one of you too.

Broken Bridges.

About : 过河拆桥










There is a story about a blind girl who hated herself because she was blind. She detested everyone except her loving boyfriend, who was always there for her.

One day, she turned to him and said:"If only i could see the world, i will marry you."

It wasn't long someone donated a pair of eyes to her.When the bandages came off, she finally able to see everything, including her boyfriend.

He asked her:"Now that you can see the world, will you marry me?"

The girl look at him and saw that he was also blind, just like her before.
She has not expected that and the thought of looking at his closed eyelids for the rest of her life totally turned her off.

Her boyfriend left in tears. Days later, he wrote her a note saying:"Take good care of your eyes, my dear, for before they were yours, they were mine."

This story illustrates how selfish - knowingly or otherwise - we can sometimes be.

Lets use this story as a gentle reminder and not forget where we have come from and who had given us a hand when we're down.

A tougher time for couples.

Dual-career couple, frequent and prolonged separation due to work, arguments over different extra-curricular interests, resentful over money issues and young kids to bring up.... Sound familiar? Just to name a few common obstacle modern couple are facing now a day.

I used to dwell on the personal "sacrifices" I was making as a husband and a father, until i realised this: You have to give up some things in order to build something bigger, better and more lasting than you could ever achieve on your own. This is esp real in building a family.

One thing for sure: Marriage isn't for wimps. There's something about marriage that, by definition, requires two people to give up "mine" and "yours" in order to create an "ours". And that's not an easy take consider this generation of focusing too much on individual achievement and self-interest.

Singapore has become a first world country from the 3rd. Our country are more successful than ever and so are our fellow men, and i am glad we are. But the down side is that sometimes we're so focus on achievement, that from childhood, we are encouraged to compere fiercely for success, recognition and material rewards, only to suddenly find these principles ill-suited to marriage. Perhaps that's why it's not uncommon these days to find couples who keep their financial resource secret, who fall out over divergent career demands, or who find it too hard to compromise their career and personal interests to have children.

I am humble to say that in my three years of marriage and one beautiful daughter, I am still finding out how tough it really is for a die-hard self-achiever to change a "me" perspective into an "us". Fortunately i have had enough fun when i was young and i do not hold any resume to become a career man, lol.....
I am just happy to be a loving husband and a caring dad, and what ever i do and sacrifices for my family, i will always do it with the strength of my loving daughter and a supportive and understanding wife.


Note for my wife: The world is going thru a rough time after many FI collapsed . Singapore are not spare from it either, many of us are starting to experience the recession coming thru, I am some how effected by a slowing demand of retail goods and my trips of handphone delivery are fewer than ever and it will affect my pay check somehow... I hope we can brave this tough time together and withstand all the obstical we may face concerning money. I believe we can go thru this together .


Above image are mainly for leisure and entertaining purpose. Both character are impressive fictional and do not represent any one of us.

Brayan is out.

Ever since I lost contact to the secret society world I used to associate, there is really no one else i missed and wanted to meet except for one. His name is Brayan, or Buaya which i would usually call. We know each other since our army days all the way till we ORD and then to the world of vice and crime. We had gone thru many dramatic and adventures events which I cannot forget. But thats the passed and i do not want to talk about it here.

Like in the army, the ss world usually had their buddy pair system to look out for one another and i consider Buaya one of mine. If a fight broke out, we would usually paired up and make sure the other is ok. We also shared almost everything we can including underwear if neccessary (no joke). And the loftiest of our time was when he introduced me to horse racing, then, we won almost every weeks a couple thousands each. We party all night for a few months untill one day we discovered nobody can really make a living out of gambling. We lost all our winning and started to borrowed from loan shark. I remembered one day, we lost so much and couldn't make payment for the bookies and ah long. Crazy Buaya suggested the only way we could at that time was either to rob or drive all the way to the casino in Genting using our remaining thousand and risk it, it was do or die at that time and we choosed the latter. Immediatly, we took turn driving on the malaysia highway and i found myself in the miste of the cloud within 7-8 hours i guess. God gracious, although we did not win much, but we won enough to settle for the bookie and loan shark for that week. Everything happened so fast so furious.

There are still many old stories if i wanna recall. But today i am not here to look back my passed because i am already a happily married man with a daughter. But today is a day to rejoy, today is the day where my buddy realise from prison after 8 years of sentencing. Yes, we havent seen or talk to each other for 8 years. He just called me an hour ago informing me his freedom. I am so dame happy for him for i know the misery behind bars.

Anyway, I am looking forward to meet up with him very soon. Maybe with my family and his. To celebrate his liberty. Hopefully he will be like me and turn over a new leaf.

Inauspicious?

Well, I am not a pantang person in nature(pantang means superstitious in malay), but last week I can't help but to accept and believe there is a certain degrees of inauspicious on that particular day. Was it a astrology crash on my birth date or was it because of that mirror? You see, we just bought a mirror from Ikea the day before, and it collapse when I placed it improperly against our desk. Fortunately it did not break into pieces, but still we got a fright from that thunderstorm sound when it felt. Despite the mirror toughness, the glue that stick in between the frame seems powerless enough to hold any longer. So we change a new one from Ikea and the rest is history. Now lets go back to what happen after that unexpected day.

The first thing I got that next morning was an unwanted call from my boss to do some additional job, after which, thru out the whole day, everything seems unfortunate, miserable and hapless. I'll just cut short the minor issues and talk about the most disastrous encounter of that day. It seems to me that all the other road user are either asking me to knock them down or they'll bump me back if I do not. After avoiding a couple collisions, a SBS bus driver finally smashed onto my side, splitting my van's left signal and headlight. That's bad enough for me to leave my van for repair at least 3 to 4 days.




Inauspicious because of the mirror blunder? Astrology or Zodiac Influences?
Or was it just mere coincident of all the infelicitous events in one day?
You decide.

Egoistic Or Just Highly Sensitive.

Recently I've been reflecting on my own personality if i am a egoistic man or if there's something else i need to address.

The reason i wanted to find out if i am a egoistic person is because friends and family who love me have always told me that it's very difficult to give comments, esp negative comments on me. Well, i checked on the dictionary and it translate ego as someone who acts and thinks that he is "extremely superior". I sat down for a while, calmly recall all the incidents, quarrel and my behaviour i had in the past. Honestly, as a man, when i see myself doing and helping out on house chord i don't feel i am superior(but i am happy). I wear simple and drive a broken van i don't feel superior either, (but i am also happy). I don't think i am self-centered or selfish when there are many occasion i allow and permit my wife to go ahead with her decision even though i had a different point of view from hers. ( that's because i love her give her respect) . So, from all these sacrification and contribution, my conclusion is, i am not as egoistic as anyone might think. But if it's not of my great ego, why is it that i am so easily agitated when receiving comments?

Well, I remember reading this book call "HIGHLY SENSITIVE PERSON" or HSP.

Highly sensitivity is not a flaw but a gift from God, but without knowing how to handle your sensitivity correctly, it may lead to many unpleasant experiences and will cause you your job, friends and even your spouse. To know if i was a HSP, I'd to take the test below.....


.Do you get overwhelmed by stimuli such as lights, noises, and smells?
.Do other people’s moods and emotions deeply affect you?
.Are you easily startled?
.Are you aware of other things in your environment that most other people are not aware of?
.Do you enjoy delicate tastes, scents, sounds, soft fabrics, or beautiful works of art?
.Have you always been labeled as shy or sensitive by other people?
.Are you sensitive to certain foods such as foods containing caffeine, sugar or alcohol?
.Do you become unpleasant when you are hungry?
.Are you attracted to the deeper things such as spirituality, self-development and philosophy?
.Are your feelings easily bruised?
.Do you have a vivid imagination?
**

The answer i got are mostly "YES", drinking coffee makes me so awake. Light and sound disturb my sleeps much too easy and considered i do not even have a proper professional training but have a good sense of music and act. I guess most likely i am a HSP than a egoistic man. Being a HSP means you can see, feel and listen more deeply than non HSP. It has it advantages and disadvantages which can be taxing at times.
One of the downward side of being HSP is "you can't handle comments well" esp negative comments. You will tend to take things very personally whenever someone ask you a negative question which might not necessary direct to you. For example, if my daughter is not feeling well after i took care of her for a day and my wife came back asking me what happen. Instead of confidently and unguiltily explaining to her the actual reason, i have the urgency to feel she's blaming me, that's how sensitive i am.

It has been estimated that 15-20% of the population or 50 million people are highly sensitive. Among this population, there is a scale of sensitivity levels since some people are slightly sensitive while others are extremely sensitive.

Highly sensitive people have been around forever, but they have been mislabeled as shy, timid, inhibited, or introverted. However, Highly sensitive people tend to be extraordinarily creative and productive workers. In relationships, if the other party know how to strike a balance and not do or say words too sensitive, they are usually attentive and thoughtful partners with acute listening skills and compassionate hearts. Most are also intellectually gifted individuals. HSPs could contribute much more to society or relationship if they received the right kind of attention.

So, my final conclusion is that, since i considered myself as a HSP instead of being a unreasonable, irrogant, egoistic macho man. I ask that those who love me, my friends and family, please read and understand more about HSP and help me overcome and make good use of this remarkable ability. Just talk to me tactfully and care for my sensitivity and i believe, i strongly believe i will not be as timid as i had been in the past. In fact, i am prefer to be a loving husband, a caring father and a sincere friend for many and it's because of my sensitivity that i am able to read, write and take many nice picture for this blog even without education or training.

If you're willing to help me, talk to me tactfully and reduce the impact I'll have from my nervous system, i am willing to improve and not use my sensitivity as a excuse to get the way i want. Love all of you and may peace be with us forever....

About My Grammar And Spelling.

Many people like to read, but few really enjoy writing. That's probably because most of our writing experiences have centered around undesirable projects, such as research, essay and many school works. And unlike reading books, there's no such thing as "skimming" your writing. You can skip a few pages or chapters if you like, but for writing, there's no shortcut.

Another reason i feel why ppl are reluctant to write is that they're afraid someone else is going to read it and then judge their writing. Maybe they can't get past the idea that someone's going to "grade" their spelling and grammar, and their afraid they will be criticize or worst being laugh at. So they rarely write and miss out on one of the greatest forms of communication and self-expression.

But even so, nobody is going to stop me from writing. Consider i never had proper training and education, for your record, i only had a certificate equivalent to PSLE standards and is taken privately at a night school. Not only did i mess around with my academic results, i have a history as a hooligan or a 'AH BENG' in singlish term. So for a ex-AB like me to even starts writing, i am already proud of myself for coming this far regardless of how many spelling and grammar mistake I'd made altogether.

When i write, i am expressing my thought thru words. Sometimes i feel that i can reveal more about myself thru writing than talking. Writing allow me to choose my words more carefully and forces me to think more deeply. I do not want to be the next novelist or even thinking that my blog, my journal or anything of my writing will get published.(although i wish i can)

I just want to write down all my feelings, good and bad, happy or sad. Write down the detail of my life and those of my love one's. Never mind if there're mistake all around my spelling and grammar as long as my words and statement get across to the receiver and myself. Whenever i read back all the entries i'd writen, i am already amazed by the result. I also believe that my child or children will enjoy reading every piece of my work and will be glad that daddy did not stop writing because of the flaws i made and will continue to make as long as i write.

Thanks to all the good heart reader that gives me honest comments and i am really very very glad from the bottom of my heart, I will try my best to improve my grammar so that i can write better and proper English as a good example for my children also.

Reunion With Shine...

The person i want to thank is Mr Ricky, the current proud owner of my previous Golden Retriver 'Shine'. Thanks for the love and care to all the dogs under your ownership. The time, money and effort you unselfishly given to each of them is unmeasureable. You are such a passionate person i am glad to know, you're truely the hero of all the dogs and a man of a kind soul.

Also want to thank you for the hospitality we recieved during our visit to Malaysia.
Your sincerity is unspeakable, thanks for driving all the way with us up and back so that we won't lost our way. More than thanks, i want to dedicate all the amazing pictures below to you and your nice beautiful wife, WeiLing. Enjoy!

Note: The Quote Added In Each Of The Picture Is Not Related To The Blog.
Just For Creativity Purpose So The Picture Looks More Alive.