Thursday 5 December 2013

柳暗花明又一村

昨天我因有要事在身得到Burma Road走一趟，却因为找不到泊车位而阴差阳错地来到Lengkok Burma。

有别于Burma Road的繁忙喧哗，这里朴素幽静。我喜欢这个环境，也不介意得走得比较远，就在这儿泊车。

在我的泊车位不远处、在一片绿荫当中，有个小小的小贩中心。我来得迟，大多数都已经收档了。（安娣说过了三点就没有办公族来吃饭，所以大家都在三点左右就收档）

我们点了一碗面线羹和一碟Roti Babi。

在树荫下、沙地上，摆着一张张高低不平的桌子，我们就坐在那儿闲聊，看安娣从容不迫地为我们准备食物。

小贩中心周围全是“走地鸡”，鸡啼声此起彼落，啼着啼着就把童年回忆给提住来了。鸽子们也来凑热闹，咕咕声为幽静的环境添上浓浓乡趣。

与我同行的小妹妹毕竟年纪小，面线羹和Roti Babi都不是这个年代普及的食物，对她而言倒是新奇。而我，虽然这称不上槟城数一数二的美味，但我爱煞在繁华都市当中难得的原始绿肺，所以我也很享受这简单的美味。

由于我们的时间有点儿紧迫，倒没有作太长的逗留。匆匆离去时还在马路边看见母鸡生蛋，我的车子旁还有一颗仍然热乎乎的鸡蛋躺在那儿呢！

下次吧，下次我带上相机再到这儿探索探索。




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Day 5 - Relatively Easy

Day 5 consist of 100 high kicks and 75 Russian twists. Though the names sound intimadating, to my surprise, these are relatively easy.
High kicks are good warming up exercise. Though not as challenging, but you will start to feel your whole body getting warm after around 20 of these. I think I'll use these for my warm up in the future.
Russian twist is more challenging. To me, the balancing act of "sitting-on-the-ground-with-your-knees-bent-and-your-heels-about-two-feet-from-your-bum-and-lean-back-without-rounding-your-spine" is harder than the twist itself. So I actually took some time to practise the balancing act first before I start the twisting with dumbbells. Though not as challenging, I still have to do these 75 in 20-20-15-15 four sessions.
Overall, because of relatively easier, I did enjoy my session today :)


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Day 4 - Start to Fall in Love with This

Ok, maybe not REALLY fall in love, but at least I enjoyed today session.
Day 4 is 200 crunches (ouch!) and 100 skaters. Crunches are killing me as usual, but skaters are fun! You can just imagine yourself as a Winter Olympic speed skating athlete, trying your best pursuing the gold medal. It's so cool that I didn't even notice that I have done much more than the Challenge required.
Even during my usual dumbbell session, I unintentionally ended up doing the skaters with dumbbells.  I guess after this 30 Days Beach Body Challenge, I'm going to put skaters into my daily routine :)


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Tuesday 3 December 2013

Day 3 - Don't Ever Over Estimate Your Capability

OK, so staying in my bed for the visualization may not be a good idea. I accidentally fell asleep when I was half way to the future. When I gained my consciousness again, it was already 6:20am!! (I better change my "Get Grateful and Visualize" session from lying comfortably on the bed, to a sitting position on the floor.) I have to skip the normal stretching exercise. Instead, I immediately started the burpees after warm up.

I watched the burpees video last night, and I thought it must be more fun to do it a bit faster, maybe do it with some upbeat music. So today, I started at a very fast pace. It's fun at the very beginning, but I almost had heart attack at my #15th burpee. Apparently I have over estimated my physical capability.

So instead of continue and finish the 50 burpees, I rested in a lying position, and continued with kickdowns instead. My stomach muscles were already in pain due to the first 2 days crunches, planks and bicycles, so it was actually quite hard to complete the 50 kickdowns in a row too.

So this was how I completed my Day 3: 15 burpees --> 20 kickdowns --> 15 burpees --> 15 kickdowns --> 10 burpees --> 15 kickdowns --> 10 burpees


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Monday 2 December 2013

Day 2 - Hour of Power

I felt that something was missing from my Day 1 of 30 Days Beach Body Challenge. So, last night I searched my feelings, and 'ting', a light bulb!
It was the first CD of "Get the Edge" program that fired up my desire to change. Naturally, I missed the "Hour of Power" so I made some modification to my routine.

I woke up at 5:50am this morning. Still lying on my bed, I started the 1:4:2 breathing exercise (inhale for 1 count, hold for 4 counts, exhale for 2 counts), while I visualize about everything that I'm grateful for. I visualize everything I want in my life as if I had already achieved.  (I always love this part!)

After the breathing and visualization exercise, I started my stretching exercise on my bench. 15 minutes on each leg.
I normally don't time myself so I get Chinese Traditional Music 流水and平沙落雁 (these 2 pieces add up to around 15 minutes) as my stretching music so that I know when to switch side. Besides, these pieces are calm and peaceful, good for meditation while stretching.

After stretching and warm up, I finally came to the actual "30 Day Beach Body Challenge". Day 2 is 100 bicycles and two 30s planks.

To make sure it's not too boring, I break the planks into 2 different sessions. I started the workout with 30s plank (much easier than yesterday) and followed by the bicycle then 30s plank again.

The bicycles part was easy, but the bicycles crunch part was killing me. So instead of doing 100 bicycle crunches, I did 20 bicycles, 20 bicycle crunches and alternate doing this for 140 times.

After the Day 2 of "30 Day Beach Body Challenge", I had some fun with dumbbell session, dancing to the Faye Wong's 浮躁 before I went to shower and off to work.


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Sunday 1 December 2013

Day 1 - Accidental Healthy Start (relatively)

I woke up at 6:30am as I promised. (trust me, this is super hard for me, almost never happened on Sundays!) Instead of start my day with warm ups and stretching on my bench, I headed to toilet for "colon cleansing". I guess I had too much oily food the day before, and the 大肠经 really working effectively during this hour.
7am, I started my stretching routine for 30 minutes. Then, I start to follow the 30 Day Beach Body Challenge. The first 60s plank was easy. The 50 crunches were not terribly hard too. It was the second 60s plank that killed me. I couldn't hold. Arms muscles not strong enough, stomach muscles not strong enough, even my back pain! To ensure I won't give up easily, also base on the advice online, I broke this 60s plank into two 30s sessions with a brief 30s rest in between, and I finally made it.
To end my early Sunday workout session, I had some simple dumbbell dance to 蓝莲花(no joke!)
After the workout, I'm super hungry. Mum still sleeping so I ended up with relatively healthy breakfast (山药薏米芡实莲子drink, Jacob's Hi Cal biscuit with tuna, some guavas and a cup of coffee), not what I intended to but there's all I can find with no cooking involve :)


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Saturday 30 November 2013

Challenge Accepted!

I used to wake up at 5am every morning to workout before I go to office. That felt like centuries ago......
I know I am not as healthy as I wish to be, and I have been wanted to restart this habit, but I have been procrastinating. (When it comes to procrastinating, I'm a PRO.)

Somehow, TODAY, out of sudden, I decided that I want my old self back! I searched the web for some fitness programs. Instead of "get fit in x weeks" programs, I have decided to challenge the "30 Day Beach Body Challenge". I just want to tone the muscle so there are no diet plans involve here.

To make sure that I keep this promise to myself, and to prove that I can achieve anything if I wish to, I decide that I MUST announce my plan here. I'll monitor my progress and this blog is my journal. I'll start to workout again, start from 1st Dec 2013.

Tomorrow, I'll wake up at 6:45am for my usual stretching, and I'll continue with 60 second planks, 50 crunches, and 60 second planks again.




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Sunday 24 November 2013

A Little Bit of Curiosity Never Killed Me

I'm currently reading "In the Plex", and I couldn't help but amazed by Google.

(Well, I am always a fan. It's not a secret. I always love to tell the younger generations how painful it was to search for information online during the "pre-Google-era". The "physically finding information in library" way of research is almost unspeakable.)

When I read about the stories behind AdSense, I decided to add an AdSense to my blog too. Not for making money, since I never plan to draw any audience to this half-diary, but more for better understanding. I'm not those genius geeks so I don't really plan to understand the algorithm behind. However, I'd love to test it out, to randomly check what are the advertisements showed. I haven't really completed the appropriate setting so Google crawler now unable to access my page to determine its contest and display relevant ads. I shall monitor for at least a month before I allow the crawler to access. 



So excited to see the results :)
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Thursday 24 October 2013

在KK山水之间：四天三夜（三）

我其实已经很懒惰提起几个月前的旅程了，但承诺了就必须实践。

话说，在KK的最后一天，大伙儿都懒了，只决定无所事事。我们浩浩荡荡到附近吃早餐，可是同行有个小妹妹病倒了，早餐后我负责给她买药，其他人则购物去了。

我俩在公寓内呆了不久就开始觉得对不起自己，小妹妹坚持得买手信，又嚷着到了KK不买海产有些说不过去，于是我顺她意，就真的带她到Handicraft Market物色珍珠项链去了。

我相中一位看起来非常忠厚老实的马来妇女，然后非常认真地和她讨价还价。最后我们俩以少过半价成交了几对耳环、手链等。基于她的随和与诚恳，我们答应她一定会到自己的部落格给她打打广告的：
铺名：Sana Kraft
那位和蔼可亲忠厚老实的售货员：Aishah (019-8804676)
老板：Noriman binri Sirad (019-8520821)
Cawangan Pusat Kraftangan Sinsuran
Jalan Tum Stephen
88000 Kota Kinabalu
之后，我们因朋友‘指点’，顶着烈日千里迢迢（其实也不是很远啦~）走到KK邮政局附近的大街找海产店。兜了几圈，问了几个路人，终于让我们找到了“海城海产”。我们俩平时虽不走巴杀，但原来在亚庇买海产容易之极。你只要告诉店员你想找些什么、几个人吃的分量，他们就会一一给你介绍，你付钱后他们会问你还有几个小时才能抵达自家门，并以此预测帮你做保温包装让你无忧无虑带回家。
Ocean Seafood
Lot 9, Block F, Segama Complex,
88000 Kota Kinabalu
Tel: 088257824
Email: oceanseafood_kk@yahoo.com

到了机场，才发觉原来不需要千里迢迢去寻找。Departure hall也有一家海产店，虽然选择较少，但方便得多了，价钱也和外头不相上下。反正亚航业只允许handcarry海产，即买即带就是了。


请你也读：
在KK山水之间：四天三夜（一）
在KK山水之间：四天三夜（二）

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Monday 14 October 2013

Work Happily

I've said this a million times, and I still want to repeat this: I'm a Disney baby. I grew up believing you can just whistle while you work; you can get all the animals sing along "we can do it, we can do it"; you can think of the happiest things and it's the same as having wings......

"In every job that must be done there is an element of fun" is what my pseudo-nanny, Mary Poppins taught me.

So, in my work area, I focus in cultivate a team that laugh in the face of challenges and difficulties. We do great in physiology. Sometimes, just like the rest, we do feel down, but we always try hard to uplift each others' spirit. We passionately discuss about works, about life, about dreams and about everything else.

So if you choose to stress yourselves at work, if you envious of our happiness, I am sorry for you. If my happiness affect your moral and make you depressed, I am sorry for you. I am sorry that you can't understand how this team works. I am sorry that we have different perspective of "professionalism".

All of us spend more than 1/3 of our daily life at work. Please learn to be happy. Please learn to enjoy. Please learn to find all the fun elements at work. Even if you are not depressed but only emotionless, that is still sad.

I am sorry. I just can't go to the dark side......
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