a decade and then some...

In November 2005, I wrote about looking for my buddy, PJ. Thanks to the internet, the search ended in 2007 when I found him through Aline, a mutual friend, on an online networking portal. We later hooked up through MSN Messenger and then Facebook - not that we chatted a lot over MSN or send pokes or virtual gifts over Facebook much. As I have mentioned in my post in 2005, PJ has not been good with writing e-mails. He is the kind of person who you would enjoy his company in the flesh than over a conversation over MSN or the phone. So, yeah, we exchanged a couple of short e-mails and the occasional short chats over messenger since. I am so glad that we managed to get in touch again.

Then, last week, he surprised me when he pinged me on MSN and asked if I am free for lunch this week. Off course, in an instant I knew that he would be making his way to this part of the world. I was elated! He and his wife, Michelle (yes, he is married now) were going to be in this part for a week or so, visiting his brother-in-law and family in Singapore before going to Hanoi for a few days.

So, I met PJ yesterday, ten years since I last saw him. He is a bit 'healthier' now but other than that, he is still the same fun guy that I used to hang out with. I could not believe that it has been ten years but PJ thought that it was only five years ago. Obviously some people have a good memory. :-P It is like nothing has changed. We were talking away like when the last time we met was only a day ago. We were catching up on what we have been up to and off course, reminisced on the good old days. How could we not? However, trying to cramp the conversations missed for the last decade into a couple of hours was difficult but it was better than not having it at all. We had quite a bit of laugh over lunch and coffee. The plan is to meet up again in ten years. Crazy but it might just work. Whatever it is, I am delighted to have met PJ again and I certainly look forward to meeting him again. In the meantime, it is back to the occasional short chats over MSN messenger.

Dinner, Seattle, October 1998



















Coffee, Singapore, February 2008

democrats to demonstrate..

When George W Bush was re-elected to the White House in 2004, the rest of the world was disappointed, yours truly included. That American election was closely followed by most of us because we all wanted Bush out and a democrat back in the White House. The one thing that I still remember till this day was what Cyrille said to me during the days leading to the election. It was funny - "the American election is being covered so much by the French media that I don’t know if I am still French." Hilarious!

So, we all waited for 4 years for the next election and hoping the Democrats can find a strong candidate to run against the Republicans. At the time, we thought Hillary Clinton is the best candidate... until now, that is. Barack Obama came along and now I am torn. I admire them both - strong leaders, great speakers and their plans to improve the American economy (honestly, don't care much about American economy, I just want the American leader to start minding their own business. You are not the leader of the free world, mind you!) sounds promising towards changing the domestic situation in America. I have not lived long enough to see how other democrat presidents fared during their term in the White House (I can always google that later) but Democrat Bill Clinton has done well during his eight year term - the American Dollar strengthened against other currencies is one indication that the American economy was doing well at the time.

Regardless of who will be running for the Presidential election, I just hope that a Democrat gets back to the White House. I am sure Cyrille will have to go through a couple of months later this year asking himself the question, "Am I still French?". However, once a democrat is sworn in as the next American president, we can move on because we know, the Democrats will show the Republicans how to run a country.

need to up the gear...

This morning, I brought my new pair of running shoes for a long jog - It is a Saucony Progrid Paramount, which I bought last Monday. I tried it out on Tuesday but thought I should try it over long distance to see its performance on my feet.

This new pair, Saucony Progrid Paramount is the fourth pair of running shoes I bought since last July. The last pair, Asics TN712, which I bought in November, gave me so much misery after I brought it out for a long jog the first time around - I suffered from aching feet and back ache which got me bed ridden all day that day. This has never happened to me before.

Prior to the Asics, I had an Adidas but it was too narrow that it hurt my feet after a long jog. Since the failure of Asics, I have been relying on my 7 month old New Balance N755, who has been there for me for some of the races I have participated, including the Standard Chartered Marathon last December.

Despite being a good servant, the N755 are not exactly a comfortable pair of running shoes, especially after running for than 10km. You can feel just how hard the shoes are. No disrespect to the brand - perhaps it was just not suitable for my feet.

So far, this new Saucony pair has been good. I was not in any pain after the long jog, like I did after I bought my Asics pair. This pair better not give me any issues because I certainly do not want to fork out any more cash and go through another search of the ultimate pair of running shoes. The last 7 months has seen yours truly heavily investing in running shoes and found a couple of them unsuitable. Painful, really, for both the feet and the pocket.

Honestly, I have not been running more than 10km since participating in the Standard Chartered Marathon last year. I am not sure if it takes THAT long for my body to recover or I have just been lazy. One thing for sure I know is that I did not have a pair of comfortable shoes since I gave up on my Asics running shoes. Aside from that, getting up in the morning for runs and other exercises has been rather difficult.

I have also been bad this week. I have been letting myself go as far as food is concerned. I have been taking in too many bad carbs, minimal intake of fruits and vegetables, eating big meals instead of 5 small ones like I am used to and not drinking enough water. Hence, a long distance run was in order this morning, whether I like it or not. I was a bit reluctant because I was concerned if I was going to suffer in pain if the shoes are not suited to my feet. I pushed myself regardless and I am glad I did because I benefited from abundance of energy afterwards.

Looks like February will be the month where I get my groove back with a new pair of running shoes to keep me going and ready for my next race! Don't let me down, Saucony! You are supposed to kick ass and you better!

time out...

I am off from work this week. 3 days of leave and I have 9 days off, what with the Chinese New Year holidays at the end of the week, including the two weekends in between this week.

I usually don't have a problem clearing my annual leave entitlement. Sometimes, by the third quarter, I would have exhausted my leave and would have to resort to advance leave, no-pay leave and medical leave or make an agreement with the boss for time off if I needed to get away from work. It is easy to clear your leave when your annual entitlement is 15 days. I have never been so lucky to get more than 18 days of annual leave and that made it easy. I am envious of those people in Europe whose annual entitlement is 25 days, as soon as they start working.

The funny bit now is that I just had this new job last September and last month, I found out that I have 5 days of leave to clear despite having taken 2 during the last quarter. The worse part is we have to clear it by end of March or it will be forfeited, which I hate, unlike in my previous employment when we have up till end of June to clear our leave from the previous year.

Having had enough of the craziness at work, I decided to just clear part of it off this month and use the remaining next month. See? I don't have an issue to clear my leave. I can just put drop everything at work and just go. Call me irresponsible but I care about my well-being. My life does not revolve around work. I can love my job but will my job love me back?? I don't think so. Even if my days off are not spent going on holidays, I just like spending time at home doing nothing or go out during the day catching up with friends for lunch or coffee. Make full use of the time away from work to do whatever you want to do. It is your prerogative.

So, I don't understand how some people just don't know how to take time off from work. I often hear things like, “I have 20 days of leave to clear but I have a lot of things to do.” If only they can transfer those leave to me. I will make full use of it. Go on major holidays twice a year and short ones in between, with leftovers to be used to get over the holiday blues. Now, that is the life! Time off from work is good because you will come back refreshed and perhaps perform better. Things will not come to a stand-still just because you have to go away. No one is indispensable these days. So, make full use of your entitlement and it will not benefit anyone else but yourself.