Life goals

The best thing about being an adult is that you have total control over your life. It means that you can do whatever you want and pursue whatever you desire. It also means that you must take complete responsibility for all your actions and their consequences; you can no longer blame your parents or family for something that happens or for not being able to do something you always wanted to.

Armed with the knowledge that my parents no longer have any control over my life and that I do not owe it to them to do anything (other than pay my dues as a son should), I feel very excited about the future. There are so many things I want to do with my life, so many possibilities, and I am the one that can make it all happen.

I think in the next ten years, I envisage one of two scenarios for my life:
1. I have married and settled down in Australia; or
2. I am living in the south coast of France, chatting with beautiful French girls in fluent French while drinking French wine. Or maybe I'll be kicking it in Germany as a promising Environmental Engineer. Or in Sweden. Or the Netherlands.

Either way, it is my goal to make one of those two above scenarios happen in the next 10 years. There will be no excuses not to make it happen. I will no longer able to blame my parents for holding me back, or blame youth for being the source of my ineptitude. I am solely responsible for what happens in my life now.

Well...me and fate.


Also, it has always been my dream to attend Oxford. Perhaps one day I will be able to make it a reality.

Orange

On a sleepless night

I sigh all alone  

How's everyone?  

I feel kind of lonely

I don't know why, but i'm feeling all sentimental towards the past again. I don't know what it's like for other people, but I've been suffering from a more serious case of nostalgia than normal lately.

Is this because im finding the adult, working life miserable? Or is it simply natural to miss the past as you grow older?

On a side note, i do have to say this though: 
Its been raining continuously for 3 days so i've had to ride my bike in the rain to and from work, so yes at present i am finding the working life miserable.
I mean wtf is this shit Melbourne, i thought you were supposed to have a dry climate.

Anywho...

I really don't know, because to be honest, there is no period in my life where as a whole it is better than it is now. 

I am quite happy with where I am, or where I am heading towards. 

More importantly, I have happy with the person I have become - as in im not as much of an idiot anymore.

So why do I keep reminiscing about the past? I guess a part of me really wish that I could be the person I am now, 5 years ago. 

Perhaps then, things would have turned out differently.

Or maybe not. Maybe our fate has already been predetermined, and no matter what kind of person I am or becomes, things would've still turned out the way they did.

Still, i do miss those days.

Just applied for a graduate role today

Coincidentally, I found out that on the exact same day one year ago, I applied for the exact same role for last years intake. Wow, what are the chances of that haha!

I was turned down for the job last time. Second time lucky I hope?
What a story that would be to tell my kids.

Time waits for no one

At 7am this morning my phone alarm dutifully roused me from my sleep with its delightful music, signalling the start of another work week. As I scrambled for my phone to shut it down, my eyes by chance glanced at the date-

17 March 2014.

Despite it being a Monday morning and having only had 6 hours sleep the previous night, my brain somehow managed to do a series of complex logarithmic calculations which led to the final deduction of a single, raw, undeniable, ugly fact: its exactly one month away from my 23rd birthday.

What the fuck. What the actual fuck.

That can't be right. I must still be half asleep. I must really need that coffee.
I can't be nearly 23 years old. I couldn't believe it. I refuse to believe it.

The sudden realisation that time waits for no one was a real wake up call to me (no pun intended).

It seems that for the past year and a half or so, I have been so absorbed in moving forward that I forgot to stop, take stock of my life, and look back on how far I have come.

It's as if I have been in a trance all this time, and finally awoke one day to find that I am living in a strange place surrounded by strange faces, and that I am no longer young.

I suddenly felt extremely nostalgic and sentimental. I began to miss all my friends in NZ and reminisce about the good times that we used to have. One moment we were all happily hanging out in IC0 or having dinner, going karaoke and playing pool, and the next everyone is in different places doing different things. It's as if in the blink of an eye, we have all been teleported into the real world and forced into adult roles.

I know this all sounds stupid, because I know there were times during last year when days felt like years, when time passed by painfully slow as I laboured away on assignments. But for some reason, looking back now, the past 5 years of uni seemed to just flash by.

As much as I am enjoying the adult life now, I really do miss those years, for whatever they were worth. Sure, i was a fucking idiot at times, but I even feel nostalgic about that idiotic naivety and innocence (or ignorance) which I have lost.

Living on my own for the past year has forced me to grow up faster than I would have liked to. In my drive to make something of myself, it seems as if I have become alienated from many of my friends. Of course this is in a large part associated with me being in another country. But nonetheless, recently I am increasingly feeling like I have lost touch with people that I used to know so well. Sure, I have many friends in Melbourne now, and even some of my Auckland friends are moving here. But I really miss the friendships and good times that I used to have.

It sounds kinda cliched I know, but its the cruel reality of nature. People change. Lives change. Nothing is ever static. Even if i wanted to stop everything right now and try to go back to the past, I cant. Time waits for no one.

So its the year of the horse...

And in the wake of horse puns spurring all of us to success, I have left my old job at EPA and galloped into a new one (pun intended). Its a 4 month full time casual contract with a contaminated soil treatment facility as Junior Environmental Engineer. My goal of becoming an environmental engineer has finally been realised! (for now).

So today was my first day. I had to get up at 5:50am because the facility is located 50km from where i currently live. I have to bike to the train station, take the train into CBD, transfer to another train there, then finally bike from the train station to the facility. The whole trip takes 2 hours, and consists of a 7km bike ride, some of which is over unpaved grass "paths". Then I have to do it again after work.

As bad as I think that is, apparently 2 hour commutes to work are normal in China, so really I dont have much to complain about. The things we do for our dreams aye?

Other than that, today was pretty good. The office is made up of 8 people in total, excluding me. Of the 8, 6 of them are executive management roles, so other than a receptionist chick and a secretary lady, im like the only normal employee in the office. The execs all have their own offices, so its just me in the communal working area, which is kinda weird lol. The good thing is, I have a bunch of very highly qualified industry experts to mentor me.

On the bright side, I will be moving in 3 weeks to a place much closer. It is in a better part of Melbourne and it will reduce my travel time by half. If you don't know already, Nick is also moving to Melbourne, so the two of us will be flatting together. I found (with the help of Jeannie) a nice two bedroom apartment thats fully furnished, so looking forward to when we move in.

Since its a new year, I will also make some new years resolutions:

1. Stay smokefree (have been for the last 2 months)
2. Get fit and healthy
3. Make my relationship even stronger
4. Save up money
5. Find a more permanent job (as much as I'd like to work in a variety of places).

Wish you all a happy new year and 祝你马到成功，马上发财，早开宝马！！

All I want for Christmas

Is for my Grandma to get better. If there is a God out there, I pray to you, I beg you, please make her better again.

Life Update

It's been a long time since my last life update, or even blog post for that matter. I've felt the urge to write many times, but somehow never managed to put fingers to keyboard (modern version of pen to paper). I guess I just don't know what to write, or how to articulate my feelings anymore. All I know how to write these days it seems is emails.

I'm going to start off my life update by telling you about the news that finally got me to write this post. I just got off the phone with my dad, and he has informed me that my grandmother's condition has visibly deteriorated. Its been exactly 3 years since she was diagnosed with lung cancer, and for a while, we all thought she was going to beat it. Usually if the person is still present after 2 years, its a very good sign. But I guess the sickness and the treatment combined just took too much of a toll on her body, and now her health is deteriorating fast and things are looking bleak. She has already moved back to XiAn with my grandad and uncle, as it is their wish for this city to be their final resting place.

I hope that there is still hope. When she was first diagnosed, the doctor gave her 6 months, and now its been 3 years. Who's to say she can't beat the odds again? I really hope that some miracle can happen and she would be alright again, and go on to live at least another 10, 20 years. I mean she's only 72, she still has many years ahead of her. She still has to see me get my first proper job and tell me how proud of me she is. She still has to see me get married and give us her blessings. She still has to hold her first great grandchild and giver him/her a name. I still want to be able to play cards with her. I still want to be able to eat her cooking. I still want to be able to watch TV with her or just take a stroll outside.

I know I am fortunate to still  have all of my grandparents present at my age, compared to people around me. I've also never lost someone close to me. Sometimes, I would actually wonder what it would feel like to lose someone close. Well, fuck that. I don't think I ever want to experience it, even though I know that as I grow older it becomes an inevitable part of life. Whether it be death or heartbreak, I know that somewhere down the road, I'm going to go through the emotional turmoil of losing a part of me. I don't really think about it, but in the back of my head, I know its a fact of life, just like how one day I'm going to die too. The thought of me dying on a hospital bed surrounded by my family when im old and grey doesn't particularly scare me. What scares me is dying in a tragic or horrible accident, especially a plane crash. Knowing you're about to die a horrible and painful death as you plummet 10 thousand meters into the ocean/land fucking terrifies me. This is why I have a fear of flying.

I wonder if it gets easier, you know, accepting loss. Perhaps as I grow older, and I experience all these things, perhaps more than once, it will become easier as I fully understand (not just know rationally) that it is a part of life, and that we just gotta take the bitter with the sweet. I wonder.

Anyways, enough about death, this is a LIFE update! So in terms of other things that are going on in my life, well, it's been 10 months since I arrived in Melbourne. In this short (long?) period, I feel I have really grown fond of this city, from the people to the architecture to the food to the trams. The only thing I still can't get used to is the fickleness of the weather. It literally can be 4 seasons in one day, or at least in one week. But other than that, I love Melbourne, and I think I will be staying here for a while longer. My contract at the EPA has been extended on a month to month basis, so I will be here at least for another few months. With the added experience and money, I also have a greater chance of finding a more permanent job in Melbourne, although I'm still open to the idea of living in other big cities.

In terms of my job, I am working 3 paid days a week, and on the other 2 days I often come into the office anyways to learn more stuff. I quite enjoy what I do, and the work environment is generally very friendly and relaxed. I wouldn't quite say this is my ideal job, especially given the area of work that I'm paid to do, but it's pretty close to it. I find the work very challenging, as it is mostly project management, but at the same time its allowing me to develop a set of new skills.

In other news, I have finally graduated! I don't really want to drown you with my sentiments here, but it has been a really tough year, in particular this last semester. Towards exam/assignment hand in period, I was working 3 days a week and still having to deal with 4 subjects. On top of that, I came down with a really nasty flu with 1 big assignment to go. It was the first time I truly felt the pain of living away from my family. I had to look after myself, cook for myself, and still do my assignment, while having a fever, body aches, cough, and bleeding nose. And I had to go to a job interview.

Needless to say, it was probably one of the toughest periods in my life. I felt like giving up many times, but somehow I managed to pull through, like I always do. But my grades did take a hit this semester, and I ended up averaging 87 across the whole year (first semester was borderline 90). I still got First Class Honours in the end, and this year has turned out to be my best academic performance so far. I feel like I have finally proved to myself, and my parents, what my true potential is. Im glad that after a disastrous Bachelor's degree, I have been able to turn things around and finish everything on a high note. It just goes to show, it's never too late to turn your life around.

Of course, I still have a long way to go. This is only the end of the beginning, for I still have to work hard for another 10, 20 years to reach anywhere respectable in my career. However at this moment, I am just content to bathe in the feeling of having no assignments to do. If you haven't already stopped reading or fallen asleep, here are some graduation photos to break up the monotony of my words:

 

On another note, as you know, the real reason I came to Melbourne is to discover and pursue my culinary career. I have had some requests (from Simon) to post up photos of my masterpieces, so without further a due:

Marinated steak with risone pasta

Marinated steak with spring rolls and steamed veges

Tomato vege noodle soup with cajun chicken thigh fillets

I have also made a lot of chinese food, but I never seem to remember to take pictures of them :/

The last piece of news is that my girlfriend came to Melbourne for a week at the end of November on her way back to China. It had been 4 months since we last saw each other, and it most likely won't be till Easter 2014 that we'll see each other again. I was the happiest I had been in a while (4 months) when she was here, and like all good things, the week went by in a flash. The fact that I had to work 3 of those days didn't help either. But it was a good week nonetheless. I guess that's the best part about long distance - that period when you see each other again. It's like the best time of your life. However, that's only 5% of the time; the other 95% is just hell, which is why LDR is still fucking shit. Sometimes the pain becomes almost unbearable, but I guess there's really nothing you can do about it, so you just deal with it (which usually means distracting yourself from it). In a way, i guess i'm almost used to it (if one can ever be). I mean, in the 16 months that we've been together, 12 of those was spent apart. It's like being single most of the time but having a girlfriend occasionally from time to time. It's clearly not an ideal situation, but I know how I feel about her and I think in the long term, it will be worth it. Just over one year to go till she graduates...Anyways, here are a few snaps we took in Geelong to keep you entertained:

 

Wow this has been a long post. To conclude this life update (and to make the post even longer), here are some photos of Melbourne:

From the top floor of the state library

An empty tram!

From the window of a corporate office

Melbourne on a dark moody day

A shot of the same day from other side

Panoramic view

Yellow, green, and red leaves in my backyard framed by a beautiful blue sky

Another empty tram! I love it when its just me on the tram

Euro Beer Cafe half price Mondays! So massive and so delicious...

Drinking european beer with my european friends ;)

Me under a boabab tree!

Our office when its empty!

Office shenanigans with my fellow interns :)