Easy goes exploring

It's more than half of January in, how are you doing? Have you remembered to stop and look around at the things around you? Or are you already overwhelmed with the workload, be it in school or at work? The start of the year is often chaotic: everyone is picking up on incomplete tasks left before the Christmas break.  This is the first January I've started with work on 2 Jan. It was a weird feeling, I have to admit. Not that I really mind it, it has still been a surprisingly chill first few weeks. What's different is that this January, I feel like I'm in a 'going through motion' phase of my life. There's a sort of routine, and life is getting more stable - or rather, I'm choosing not to think about things that are out of my control. This has made it a really unusual: I had absolutely no motivation to write new year resolutions (anyway I don't particularly do them anymore, you can read why here), and I did not have the resolve to make any significant c...

While I was in the UK, I met so many film-loving friends, got to watch so many movies that I never knew existed, and even became an extra in a friend's directorial debut (I'm keeping bragging rights Pedro for the day you make it big!). But one thing I never got to do in the UK was to watch a film alone. Why not? I was a broke student lol. Anyway so when I got the chance to in Singapore, I've been watching loads of films, many of them alone. Partially because my taste in movies have evolved, often to more niche, arthouse films that many of my Singaporean friends haven't acquired the taste for. But there is still a great selection of films on show in Singaporean cinemas, especially The Projector (love it). So, what's the best thing to do? Just watch films alone. A movie is in itself already a highly personal experience. You won't be yapping away to your friends (if you do, please shut up the next time you are in a cinema, thanks). The auditory and visual experienc...

Hello everyone! It's been a while, and I apologise for the lack of updates. You know what they say, writer's block. I guess I've just been too busy with other things in life and didn't have the inspiration to write. I hate to break the news to you, but this might be my last post in this blog for a while (more on this later). Now that I've got the hardest part out of the way, let me give you a little update of my life.  I've finished my three years of studies in the UK, and I'm now back in Singapore indefinitely. Applying for jobs in both the UK and SG, but it's looking more and more likely that I'll be staying in SG. It's quite a strange combination of feelings: bittersweet that I'm leaving all the friends I made in the UK behind, but also happy that I get to spend more time with friends and family in SG.  What's next? I'm hoping to start a travel blog, where I document my travels (mainly in Europe for now), but I will also dedicate a...

  The Cologne Cathedral I'm writing this post from a rather fancy hostel in Maastricht (south of the Netherlands, right at the border with Belgium)! From March 2022 till now, I've been fortunate enough to travel to 13 different towns/cities in Europe: Peak District (UK), Lisboa (Portugal), Amsterdam (the Netherlands), Marseille (France), Edinburgh (Scotland), Iceland, Riga (Latvia), Mallorca (Spain), Dublin (Ireland), Brussels, Li è ge (Belgium), Cologne (Germany) and now Maastricht! In all of them except Mallorca (which was a field trip paid by my university) and Marseille, I stayed in hostels and got to meet people from an incredibly diverse range of backgrounds! I thought it would be nice to share some of my experiences for any of you guys who are considering backpacking: first, basic hostel tips and second, what I have learnt from these experiences. Let's start with the basic hostel tips: 1) Choose a highly rated hostel (HostelWorld is your best friend) Hostels aren...

Yesterday I did my first ever full day fast! It was actually longer than 24 hours because I finished dinner around 10pm on Monday and only ate breakfast this morning around 9am. Anyway, I'm sure you guys are curious as to why I chose to fast: 1) I have been eating wayyyyy too much since winter and especially over Christmas and CNY. Just felt like my body needs a bit of a break from food. 2) I was inspired by my friend who fasts 3 days every 6 months 👀. That's pretty damn insane.  I was not crazy enough to attempt to do a 72-hour fast so just 1 day was enough :) It actually wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, maybe that's a sign that I have really been well fed recently? So once you stop eating for around 8 hours your body starts burning fat (ketosis) instead of carbs and any glycogen stores. Accompanying this is a whole host of other benefits such as removing toxins. If you're interested just do quick googling and read up widely (just make sure you don't a...

    Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash So I wanted to write some reflections on 2022, but I got caught up with work and other stuff so I decided since I missed the timing, I might as well write something about the year ahead! It's always better to look forward rather than back.  I'm not a super firm believer of new year resolutions, but I do admit that they keep one on track (especially if you have them written down somewhere visible!). I did do up some resolutions too but I guess what I've been doing for the past 2 years is to keep post-it notes on my laptop for 'long-term' goals. I update them regularly when I feel they don't apply (let's face it, so many things can change in the course of 1 year). The key idea here is that I see them frequently enough to keep me grounded towards my general direction. So far it's worked amazingly well for me! Just make sure to keep it rather simple and achievable; don't give yourself too much stress by targeting ...

Hello! I know it's been a really long time since I've last written anything (more than a year in fact) and I apologise if you have missed my writing. Somehow I just haven't really felt the motivation or urge to write. Writer's block maybe? I don't really know. It's not that I haven't really reflected or wrote down anything, it's just that I didn't feel like publishing articles on things which I don't really find interesting. Of course my other excuse is that life just got busy since I'm in university. But face it, I could probably have written an article a month if I just wasn't spending so much time on Instagram.  Whatever. Doesn't really matter now anyway.  It just feels nice to be writing this at 10.38pm on a random Wed evening while it's storming outside in London. There really is something about writing at night - it somehow keeps my brain active and in a reflective state of mind whereas studying at night is just sleep-induci...

 这篇文章非常短，完全写之此刻的心情。。。 明天我就飞去英国了，开始生命中的另一个阶段。我真的很兴奋认识各国的朋友和接触新的文化。在新加坡生活了21年，偶尔也会觉得闷，因为新加坡真的太小太小了。有趣的地方，适合观赏夕阳黎明的地方，也就只有那些。对于即将面临的新阶段，我想提醒我自己这几点： 1）保持乐观的态度 许多事情都不在我们能控制的范围内 ，也不应该为每件事情烦恼。既然生命随时都可能结束，那何必闷闷不乐，愁眉苦脸呢？ 2）思想开方，永远学习 世界太大太辽阔，智慧也是无限制的。只要我们肯乐意每天学一件新知识，累积的智慧是非常珍贵的。 3）尊敬每个人，每个生命都有价值 我们应带着慈悲的心，感激我们拥有活在地球上的机会。每个人都有自己逃不离开的绳索，想在各自的范围内超越自己，做个更好的人。 目前就只有这三点，在飞机上也许会再想一想，日后补充。

  Photo by Fab Lentz on Unsplash Just scroll through LinkedIn and you will see posts of 'successful' individuals receiving thousands of likes. Some overcame their financial situations and are now multi-millionaires; some overcame workplace discrimination and created their own start-up; some never received formal English lessons but are the first in their families to graduate from university. Regardless of their narrative, there is one central and consistent theme: They overcame all the odds stacked against them, worked their asses off and are now 'successful' - which unsurprisingly, seems to be only defined by 'landing a job in a famous company or matriculating into a good university'.  I'm sure you have seen such inspiring stories on the web. I used to and still find them inspirational, but they also elucidate the problems with a capitalist system: only individuals who achieved a sufficient degree of 'success' dare to come out and share their st...