2010 Reflections

January

Visited Langkawi Island with my sis, Shane (my best best friend) and Alvin despite Alvin and I failed in our professional exams.

Started my final semester for bachelor's degree.

Visited Shuzhen in Setapak (yes, Setapak seemed to be far for me from PJ), and we decided to go Genting Highlands on the spur moment, in the following weekend.

Went in casino for the first time and lost RM50, will never gamble anymore.

February
Celebrated Chinese New Year with family! I really afraid I need to work during CNY in the future in overseas (though I hope I can develop my career in overseas) :( I love CNY! Didn't save pictures in my hard-drive. All are with my sister.

Finished reading The 8th Habit From Effectiveness to Greatness, was greatly motivated.

March
Got bored by the lame UTAR studies.

April
Went for interview in Singapore in an international general reinsurance company, failed it at the third interview. Singapore is clean! The journey was quite rush, so we didn't go around the small island.

after the interview, somewhere near the big fountain

Visited Hui Boon in Malacca with Alvin and Shuzhen. She is a tough girl, encountered all the hardship strongly.

May
My sister got JPA scholarship, will be doing medicine in Ireland! We are proud of her!

Sat for school exams and professional exams.

June
Hunting for job but to no avail. Very down.

July

Passed two professional exams! I cleared preliminary exams! Failed my attempt in general insurance professional exam though.

Got a job offer from one general insurer and one life insurer. Decided to put aside my passion in general insurance temporarily due to the limited opportunity in Malasysia.

August
Started my first job in AmLife Insurance Berhad as an actuarial executive. Exploring and learning.

Read Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude.

Graduation united my whole family in KL.

Each of us has different character but we love this family!

I don't really treasure this graduation, but it seems my parents were happy about it, and so I was happy too.


September
Busy working, preparing exams and sampling food!

October
Visited Hong Kong with Alvin. He was attending workshop at the day time, while I was studying and doing gym. Exploring Hong Kong at night.

November
Got our first car. Was hit by a motorcycle in a month. The tree at where Alvin parked the car during working time gave us the present in the second month.


Sat for professional exam. This was Alvin's final paper, and my second last paper. Crossed fingers!

December
Started to grow at work, asked for rotation from experience studies to reporting. Hopefully there will be more sparks with the new team!

Went to Berjaya Hill, a fantastic and fancy place!

Submitted three (3/3) FSA modules and two (2/8) FAP (Fundamental of Actuarial Practice) modules.

Had gatherings with friends and colleagues in this festive season.

All in all, 2010 is a fulfilling year! Challenges of up and down make me appreciate my family and my love one more.

Inspiring Movies

Watched two inspiring movies recently - The Social Network and Three Idiots. I was at first very reluctant to watch Three Idiots as it is a Bollywood movie, I would not want to waste my 2 hours on silly movie. But as the plot developed, it caught my attention more and more. As for The Social Network, I didn't know anything about it beforehand, it was strongly recommended by Alvin's colleague, and so I just nodded to watch it last night. Not watching trailer and synopsis always brings surprises. *smile*

I am inspired by one of the "idiots" in the Bollywood movie. He is someone who thinks out of the box, who is not restricted to some stupid and silly regulations, who chases after excellence and who cares about and inspires friends to pursue their dreams instead of the society or parents' wants. In the movie, the very whole idea is to pursue our dream, chase after excellence and then success will chase after us!

As for The Social Network, it is a bibliography of the well-known and youngest billionaire in the world, Mark Zuckerberg (the founder of Facebook in case you don't know). Mark founded Facebook in a "night". When recruiting interns, he held hackathon to choose participants who were able to complete a task in a night. In reality and at current, he still practices this in hiring. "The idea is that you can build something really good in a night", said Mark during an interview.

Many times we are bolted down by what we are doing until we lose our direction in the midst. We chase after what we are not clear of, we just follow. We are scared, we start to fear this and that, and be "superstitious" to the extent that we don't have our stand, we don't know what are we doing, we are just running blindly.

Good movies!

Colmar Tropicale

Went to Berjaya Hills last Saturday. It is truly a special tourism spot.


Berjaya Hills mainly consists of a few main parts, Colmar Tropicale, Japanese Village, paintball spot, horse riding spot, rabbit farm and golf club.

We were "welcomed" by a squad of mini-coopers once we entered the castle.

Our first stop after the castle was Japanese Village. At the first glance, I was shocked of why the ever first Japanese Village is located at Berjaya Hills, until I read the second line...

in tropical forest... I was like @@

There is a variety of striking plants inside the forest.

Alvin was perspiring hard while we were exploring the forest as it was not windy at all. Also Berjaya Hills is not a summer getaway! It is extraordinarily WARM!

There are a few spas inside the village but it was too dear, the cheapest is 400 bucks!

Also there are a few japanese restaurant selling normal japanese food at exorbitant price!


After one hour of venturing, we bumped back to Colmar Tropicale in this truck.

Colmar Tropical is really a jolly place. It is fancy.

The colorful western architeture gives us a kind of jovial and fresh feeling which cannot be experienced anywhere else in Malaysia.

There are toys which make you feel young!

There are cordial country girls selling cookies!

There is band singing "i want nobody nobody but you" when you 're enjoying your meal!

There are BLACK and white swans swimming swiftly in the ponds!

We ended our outing by playing paint balls. Both of us were able to hit the target twice out of 5 trial shots.

Berjaya Hills is indeed a fantastic getaway during weekends.

Gym

It's been a month I don't visit gym. *shake head* However, I went for gym everyday when I was in Hong Kong. Ironic huh? I love the gym in the hotel. The air circulation is good.

The view is great!

Also can see how Caucasian reading while exercising!

My bro and sis have both successfully conquered Penang bridge marathon, for a few times! Feel like challenging myself for that. Treadmill can never give us me achievement sense.

Hmnn.. Conquering marathon has been sunk in my heart for quite some years. When will I be able to do that?

I AM FAT! I NEED TO SLIM DOWN!

Sick

Amidst the heavy workload and hectic studies schedule, I FALL sick! Last Saturday, I was rushing for FAP Module 1 then suddenly I started to have headache, but my will defeated it, it was gnawing at me, I didn't care, I continued until I got partial of the assignment done (the spreadsheet). I went to sleep at 1am and got up at 845am the next day to have breakfast with a former colleague. I started to sneeze. However, I thought, hmm, morning chill, I should be alright. I skipped going meeting again as my colleague we had too much to talk. Right from the breakfast, I continued drafting the memo for the assignment. I started to get very drowsy. A bad sign. 7-hour sleep should be sufficient for me. However, I didn't have time to think so much so I forced myself to continue. Then I took a break for lunch. Thinking of resuming the assignment after the lunch, but I gave up and told my assignment partner I got to take a nap. Before napping, I took flu medicine. I had a two-hour sound nap. Then I called my assignment partner to wake up (10 calls) but couldn't avail. I gave up. Then I lay on bed to read Eat Pray Love. I fell asleep after a few pages. Woke up one hour later and called my assignment partner. 3 calls. He woke up finally. @@ I then swore I must get the assignment submitted before I went to sleep. I successfully finished the assignment but at the same time Lee Chong Wei lost his game to Lin Dan (a bit incohesive here? No.. I had been concerned about his game, especially with Lin Dan. I loathe Lin Dan for his haughtiness).

After dinner, I went to sleep. Before I slept, I took fever pill. I could feel heat from the tip top of my head to my toe. That night I couldn't really sleep well, I felt hot at one moment pulling off my blanket and pulling over the blanket the next moment finding myself trembling. The next morning when I woke up, I didn't feel well at all, but I still had to go to work as I promised my boss to have a discussion on the task I did. In addition, he had to present the thing I prepared for him that afternoon. So I roughly needed to go through once with him. That one hour in the office was my ever dreadful hour. I was so cold. I started to perspire. After that, I told my supervisor I got to leave. I couldn't resist anymore, I was so cold. I quickly flagged down a taxi to go home and consulted a doctor at the clinic nearby my house. I slept the whole day after consuming pill.s The doctor said if my fever didn't subside the next day, I might need to drop by again, as recently there are many cases of dengue fever. After dinner, I went to sleep. Though the fever had subsided a bit, but still I had to constantly wake up to drink water (I always afraid I will become stupid after a fever). When it approached wee hours, then only I started to feel better, finally I could grab a few hours of sleep. However, when I woke up, I still felt very weak. I hate myself for being so. I have tonnes of work waiting for me to finish yet I was soooo energyless. But no choice, I still had to rest. I got to get recuperated as soon as possible. Fever subsided, but flu caught me. Sneezing the whole day until dusk. Things became better. I even told my supervisor I could resume working the next day (today). However, after dinner, I started to feel something amiss, I was a bit dizzy. I quickly went to sleep. It was only nine something. I set alarm to wake up at 2am to take medicine.

7am today he came to see if I had rashes on my body as this is a obvious symptom of dengue. We were planning to work since I don't have rashes and I thought I had had enough of rest. Not long after we talked (I think around 3 minutes), my sight became gray and then darker and darker. The block of condo in front of me was swirling. I quickly held my head and closed my eyes. I was too dizzy, I was so scared I would black out. I then slowly walked back into my room with my feeble legs. At 830am, he fetched me to see doctor. (he has been overwhelmed with his work too until barely has time for me. I don't blame him, he has his stress too). The doctor said it might be because I took medicine at midnight and didn't have any intake of food until morning. She gave me another day of leave and some flu medicine, this time stronger!

I decided not to take her pills anymore as I don't feel comfortable with it.

NOW NOW.. 430pm! I think I am finally able to resume working tomorrow. Sigh. I am a new comer yet took so many days of sick leave. Hopefully my boss doesn't take this to discount my KPI.

Time to meow tomorrow and ROAR next week! Really got to get things done! Auditors are coming in. Stresses are piling up!

Working under deadline and the supervision of KPI is not something enjoying =(

A Meeting with Ex-lecturer in Hong Kong

Met up with our Actuarial Expository Project lecturer, Simon in Hong Kong. I really got to pen down this meeting as we were actually looking for each other in ifc tower for nearly an hour!

We emailed him the day before to meet at the Starbucks in ifc (mind me, I use the article the).

(just to show ifc in lower case)

We reached ifc tower (it is in lower case, a special naming way) Starbucks at 7pm. But as minutes crept away, we started to feel something amiss. It was already 730pm and he still hadn't shown up. At first, we thought he was busy with his work (he is a chief actuary). But it was already 30 minutes past 7pm, we asked the Starbucks staff if there is another Starbucks in the tower. She said yes, and then we quickly headed there. But Simon was not there! We then approached the concierge for assistance (we don't have blackberry, iphone, any smartphone to actually email or call). The concierge was very helpful (again, we are lame enough not knowing how to use Hong Kong phone) to help us call Simon. We told Simon where were we and he asked us not to walk away, he would come to us. 10 minutes had passed but he still hadn't shown up. I asked Alvin if Simon was impatient (letting a chief actuary to look for us, the two trivial people for almost 40 minutes!), Alvin said he was seemingly still relaxed, perhaps it was Friday. Not long after, the concierge approached us (we were waiting not far from the concierge) telling us Simon called back. Simon still couldn't find us; the concierge saw us having difficulty explaining where were we, then offered to explain to Simon.

And.. and.. finally Simon reached!

He told us there are FIVE Starbucks in ifc tower! @@ I guess Starbucks cannot be a meet up place especially when we are not familiar with the place! *grin*

After greeting, Simon brought us to Tsim Sa Tsui to sample chinese cuisine, to be exact, Beijing, Sichuan, Hong Kong and Hangzhou cuisine.

(the ever luxurious meal we had in our Hong Kong trip)

Simon had been 2 years in Malaysia, and he said the chinese cuisine here is not that decent. Practically there is no difference between any specific cuisine. *shame*

(while waiting for our turn)

(the restaurant was crowded)

(Don't ask me the name of the dish, their description is beyond my apprehension)

the noodle tastes special, but a bit like jawa mee

mini shark fin

chicken stewed in traditional chinese wine but it is served chilly

crispy chicken but quite different taste from ours

Golden prawn (I like this very much).
Simon said Hongkongers like to eat prawns during autumn.

Bun. Alvin said it tastes like doughnuts. (@@)

Simon shared a lot of his valuable experience with us. (when actuarial people are together, we always have too many things to share and update, simply too resonant). Giving may surprisingly result in a lot gaining. Taking risk to some extent might not be a very bad thing. Impossible mission might not be that impossible, just that we perceive it is impossible. Failures always contribute a lot of hindsight to the next success.

After the 2-hour dinner, we went to Avenue of Stars to continue chatting until the staff approached us to ask us leave as it is closed at 11pm. Being amazed at the spectacular buildings across Victoria Harbour, Simon shared with us which building was the ever first tallest building in Hong Kong then which then which then now ICC (International Commerce Center).


After that, we made our way to the 1881 Mall (which is a former navy headquarter) next to Avenue of Stars to take some pictures.

Around 12pm, we bid farewell with Simon!

You Raise Me Up

Yea, finally I have some spare time. Exam is over. Workload is lighter every final week of the month.

Another milestone reached in my institutional studying life. I am finally free of the bondage of studying in my small alma mater. Put aside the teaching quality (I still think UTAR lets me grow a lot, especially personality wise), I really appreciate the chance I had to know a lot of people throughout the foundation studies and bachelor's degree years to church brothers and sisters.

Besides, one of the most important people I can never stop giving thanks is my family. I am overwhelmed with gratitude to my parents for their unremitting support.

It's heartening that I reached another milestone in my ACADEMIC LIFE, but it is even more touching that I have my beloved family always with me to reach this milestone, and I believe their unceasing support will keep me to another milestone in my LIFE.

At this point, I am humming this song (I cannot sing, I cannot remember any lyrics besides our national anthem)

When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary;
When troubles come and my heart burdened be;
Then, I am still and wait here in the silence,
Until you come and sit awhile with me.

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up: To more than I can be.

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up: To more than I can be.

There is no life - no life without its hunger;
Each restless heart beats so imperfectly;
But when you come and I am filled with wonder,
Sometimes, I think I glimpse eternity.

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up: To more than I can be.

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up: To more than I can be.