Happy New Year 2012 :-)

It's time of the year again ... last day of the year for 2011. It seems only yesterday that I greet 2011 and now it is certain the sun will set today to end the year. It also means a beginning for 2012. What I would like to do at this time of the year is to reflect the past year and kind of do a wrap up before embarking on 2012 (the last human year according to Mayan calender).

2011 had been a good year. Let's start by reviewing my 2011 resolutions:

1. Restore back my relationship with my family and friends. - Done
2. Reading books that had been collecting dust. Still collecting dust
3. Run my first full marathon. - Register but did not run. Finnish 3 half marathon.
4. Climb the highest mountain in South East Asia (Mt. Kinabalu). - Done
5. Enrolling for a post graduate course (its always my dream to attend my own convocation).  - Not done

All in all, I am OK with what I had achieved for year 2011. Even though its nothing to brag about but certainly felt a sense of joy. In terms of working, its up and down. After completing a big project and moving to another product portfolio hasn't been easy. I did learn how to manage organization change and learning to deal with people with different personality.

For self, I think I do more exercise. Mountain biking,running and badminton had been my main exercise. One of the highlight was to complete the round Penang island bike event. It was one heck of an experience where biking in heavy rains can be exhilarating.

For self development, I did felt that I start to analyze more and can relate to people more. I still need to improve on my time management, interpersonal relationship and self discipline.

For relationship, well ..... thanks for giving me the opportunity.... I will do my best to sustain and continue to improve the relationship further. Any comments?

To sum it up, for 2011 I learned to live a sustainable life I need to eat well, exercise more and have a balance life (balancing between work and self).

What's in store for 2012:

1. To spend more time with family and friends. To spend more time with my dad.
2. Sustaining a healthy life style. To exercise more and eat healthily.
3. To sustain a healthy relationship with my dear.
4. To define my next career move.
5. To read more books.

I hope I can go for a family trip this year. All in all, I hope to spend my time and money wisely.

Happy New Year 2012. Stay healthy and stay happy. Good bye 2011 and Hello 2012.

Bless with simplicity....

I cannot feel more bless, no words can describe my feeling but to feel appreciative and grateful. I am more focus in my work, have a simple lifestyle that combine excersizing with loads of weekend spending with people that I care much. I want to remind myself to keep things easy and also there are rooms for improvements:

• time management
• more focus in my current task
• put in more effort to do planning
• financial planning
• communication skills
• "karaoke"

I would like to have simplicity blend in my lifestyle.

What's in my mind?

I had a good weekend. Yes, it's a very good weekend. I spent the weekend without internet connection to my emails and access to my company's network. Besides the much talked about yellow t-shirt rally in the hearts of KL, everything else is calm. I wanted to continue remind myself about trust, honesty, sincerity and responsibility. This is what in my mind. No matter it's personal or non-personal, I felt the need to be sincere in whatever things that we do. I constantly remind myself to stay in the middle path. I want to love with responsibility, to talk with honesty, to act with sincerity, to pray hard with faith and to constantly remind myself I am not perfect after all. Thanks for everything !

Resolution # 4 - DONE

4. Climb the highest mountain in South East Asia (Mt. Kinabalu).

Yesssss! Strike through one of my resolutions in 2011 is such a great feeling. I had climbed up to the submit of Mt Kinabalu which is Low's Peak (highest peak in South East Asia). The feeling is indescribable. It's the toughest climb I have attempted. I am glad that all my teamates made it to the submit. We did the climb safely and everyone descend safely as well.

The climb from Kinabalu park entrance to Laban Rata took me 6 and half hours. Its challenging due to:

1. The air gets thinner as we ascend upwards (from ~1900m to 3300m)
2. The trail is made of steps and rocky path, at some point need to hold on to ropes
3. The chill wind occasionally blew on us
4. The bag packs that I carry weigh roughly 6kg
5. My tired legs

We stayed one night at Pendant Huts. Its the accommodation that is provided to those who enroll in Via Ferrata (world's highest via ferrata is located in Mt KK). After had our buffet dinner we rest for tomorrow's ascend up to the submit.

Everyone woke up at 1.30am gear up for the climb to the submit. After had our breakfast all are ready for the final climb (another 2.5km) to Low's Peak. We are lucky because the rain the night before stop before our climb started. We started to climb at 2.30am.

It's all dark and we only rely on our headlamps to guide us through the path. Along the path, we had to climb through some steep rocks. With assistance of the rope, we had to carefully maneuver ourselves through this dangerous cliff. It's definitely end of the world if at any one time, I let go my hands. The most dangerous cliff is at km 6.0 where we need to climb up the rock using just the rope.

All of us had to register ourselve at Sayat Sayat hut before continue our climb to the submit. From km7 to km8.5 is all rock (as Mt KK used to be a volcano but its now dead). Along the way, I manage to catch a glimpse of South Peak (the one on the RM1 note), Donkey's ear, Sister ugly etc. Low's peak is the submit.

The final climb up the submit was a bit torturous as its made of rocks and its steep. So we had to be extremely careful.

Finally when I reached the submit, all the sweat and toil was forgotten momentarily. While I stood there to enjoy the marvellous view, my thought is WOW such a magnificent place no earth. I felt I am tiny. It's such a great feeling.

After spending about 15 minutes on the top, I descend down the mountain to embark on another adventure. Fia Verrata (Work the Torq circuit) is where we want to go. It's an adventure where the climber hook on harness will ascend down Mt KK alike rock climbing style. 5 all us plus the trainer went down together. I was made the leader. I was kind of nervous in the beginning as I need to climb down first and having only one time experience rock climb, I slowly build my courage to go down. I have to find my way down and also guiding my team members down safely. It's such a good experience.

It took us 1 hour 45 minutes to complete the circuit. What a relief.

From there we adjunct to our hut where we had our deserved breakfast. After breakfast we packed and ready to climb down Mt KK. It started to rain quite heavily when we started our descend down the mountain. We had to put on our rain coat.

The descend was all wet, slippery and rocky. Finally after 6 hours of hiking, we reach our park HQ. It's such a good feeling to finally made it. Although I am tired, its still a good experience for me. All in all I enjoyed the climb.

Even though I enjoyed the climb, I still felt something is missing. Yes, I miss my dear ! Sorry for making my dear sob sob, you're definitely in my mind and I can feel your motivation.

Just a note to remember...

Woke up early in the morning. I was thinking over the last weekend events, and in order to keep my memory strong i thought why not I blog something. I had wonderful time together with someone (*sincerely from my heart), yes it seemed unbelievable but its really happening. Please do a self check ... (to someone). I have to admit the food was good (minus cold), the atmosphere was perfect and most important I had a good time chatting and doing nothing. It sounds too nice. This brought us to think that we should appreciate more and should share the happiness with others. I totally agree ! Happy moments as always short but the memory stays on (*if someone forget the feeling / memory you may visit this blog). I enjoy the movie too (p/s: first movie together). The lunch outing was nice. Thanks !

There are other people that have to walk alone in life for certain reasons they did not choose, I know I have someone that I choose to walk together. This makes it even a good reason to share and help others that in need.

You have a good week ahead and please do miss me :P  

What a GREAT week ...

I will remember 15-May-2011 for a long time to come. Why is this date so significant ? I have finally promoted my personal assistant to some position more important. She accepted that position. I was ecstatic ! I hope time will stand still for me to enjoy that moment longer. 

I hope to have a new beginning , let go the past and treasure the moment. By treasuring the moment, we can also plan for the future.

I hope that we can continue to move forward, care for each other and plan for the future.

THANK YOU SO MUCH for giving me this opportunity.

p/s: you are such an adorable and lovely person. :-)

2012 ... coming soon

It's only 3 months since I last blog, it seems a lot had happened in 2011, personally and around the world. Personally, I went through some ups and downs. My work had been crazy for the last few weeks and occupying most of my time. The other portion of me is dealing with a broken relationship. I am glad to be where I am today. I am dealing one day at a time and appreciate what I have. I know I could not make it without GREAT support from my friends and family. There is one person that I really want to thank for. Without this person, I will not know where I get the strength and support and :-) . I felt that she is an amazing and simple person. Thank you !

Around the globe, we have:

1. Political unrest in the Arab world (Egypt, Yemen, Libya...). Dictators will not stay long as leader and people will lose their patience soon. These incidents are causing the oil price to sky rocket.
2. Natural disaster one after another. Earthquake in New Zealand and the recent 8.9 magnitude quake in land of rising sun (Japan). What happen? 2012 coming soon...
3. Economic situation does seem to showing sign of recovery, with the latest happening I don't know.....

What I know is : I am going to appreciate what I have today and make today a good day and tomorrow a better day !



New Year..New Bike

This is my new Mountain Bike (Brand-Haro, Model-Shift R1) - 2009 release. Its a full suspension XC bike. I used it in my maiden ride up Kek Lok Si (1200 steps). For the price I paid (RM2,600) I can say it's worth it. Why I said so? It offers a smooth ride uphill with its 8 speed Shimano (Alivio) gear and it has better efficiency in terms of pedaling (as compare to what i have previously-Polygon normal MTB). It also offers Tektro IO disc brake which is not so efficient (according to my friend, once the disc brake pad starts to exercise it will improve). It comes with front fork suspension that offers 120mm travel and back suspension with 4.5" travel. Its great when going down hill. Originally it comes with a small pedal. I had to upgrade to a bigger one with additional RM150 (picture as below).

There are few downsides to this bike (besides small pedal and disc brake). The paint on the handle bar came off easily (as seen in the pictures below).

Also, I had my bike on the bike rack (behind my car). Can be seen in the pictures below the paint works easily came off (sigh)

This is the logo on the front of the bike.

The one that I got is a size 16"

Conclusion, its a good recommendation for beginners that wants to feel the adventure to bike off road. I think the new release of Shift R1 (2011) has a better color and hopefully they improve on the paint work.