Wednesday, December 30, 2009

the entry about a year-end getaway

i'm whiling away at a foreign airport, listening to the intermittent public announcement that commences with "tuan tuan dan puan puan" and other incoherent bahasa melayu-esque bulletin. the morning airport is littered with the occasional traveller who is either a) beleaguered with huge loads of carrying luggage b) burdened with children in tow.

two hour hours in transit till my destination holiday. hands outstretched, yawn beckons.. so thus, i've hogging on the public terminal so long a snaking queue is forming behind me. i swear someone's sticking their middle finger at me. can't wait till my fiesta of a holiday begins.

peace out!

Thursday, December 24, 2009

the entry about christmas presents and such

it's christmas eve and i can hardly contain my excitement about the hols. i was never a sucker for festivities. in plain dumb english vernacular, it's depressingly boring. however, i fathom that this year might be a tad different. what with me turning three-tenths of a century, i might have a disparate perspective about caroling around pine trees lit with gazillion bulbous lights.

there are always hordes of people thronging the city streets clamoring for a little bit of the feverish christmas-season-gift-buying bug, and i had to bludgeon my way through get a crowd deep to get my own fair share of presents for my cronies. these are the list of gifts i got in reciprocation (and in no order of price-worth):


a clam card-holder from paul that doubles up as a marquee standee


avant garde spoon kartell rollers from eric


a puma-inspired printed pumps from gabe


stussy bomber from kevin


thoughtful thrift gifts from my family.


every shrewd christmas shopper knows that buying of gifts doesn't stop at just for friends, or for family, so logically, i schlepped around a little longer and after much consideration and tenacious conviction, i got myself a real nice present that is da bomb, practically.


pimp my new ride.



a mercedes benz c180, finally!



a juxtaposition of my old car and my new one.


and in all truisms of truths, the saying you'll never know what you're missing out on till you've really lost it couldn't be farther from the, well, truth. i'm missing my old car already. so, in remembrance of it, here's a look-it before it's sent away to the scrappers. thanks for all the good-old fond memories, old car.



once mine, the volkswagen golf 1.6 fsi


adieu, old car...

Friday, December 18, 2009

the entry puma rocks k.l.

i've been moping around doing anything other than work too much it's disgusting. being on the ball during office hours is one thing, but practically thwarting my gym sessions and thus, throwing caution to the wind about my nonetheless expanding waistline, and virtually flat-lining my blogging activities is quite another. gone are the party-boy days; behold, herald the incoming workaholic.

so, anyways, i've decided to take some time off my 24/7 business-as-usual dogma of a spiel, and spend some quality me-time with the puma folks in upstart fashion city, kuala lumpur. if you know your sports apparel well, you'd be in the loop about puma's crazy-ass of a world campaign called "create your own style". what it entails is essentially this: randomly grabbing folks off the streets and getting them to pen their ingenious creativity about puma onto a white board and pose a picture with it.



this way to budget-ville



prepping up for a fiery year of the tiger 2010.


suffice to say, i was put up at the millennium grand hotel, albeit being hoisted via the third-class-meets-cargo-friendly airline. it was an atrociously short shuttle between the two cities (singapore and kuala lumpur), but the journey from the airport to town was so unbearably long it lulled me into a deep slumber.




by the time i arrived, it was a little past midnight, and no sooner i had checked in, i slipped on my eyeshades and knocked myself out. so much for day one of sabbatical.

the next morning, it was meeting with some of the regional celebs who would be gracing the event the following evening. first on the list: the doyenne of asia models aka leon lai's wife, gayle lai. a phalanx of people, otherwise known as the entourage, or unceremoniously known as nannies, surrounded her whenever she went. well, or at least for the first fifteen minutes.

then, there was the up-and-rising taiwanese star eddie peng. you might think he's your typical poster-calibre, mega-watt grin, sunshine boy-next-door, but he's so much more than that. it was an awesome time hanging out with him, we drank some awesome beer (well, i drank), and soaked up in each others' awesomeness. here's pictures:


third from left: doe-eyed gayle


me with puma marketing manager gabriel



good things come in small packages, nicole




last look at meself before my locks get chopped off by the banger of a prepubescent stylist


me and the ever efferverscent eddie





day three was pretty unfortunate for me. with half my follicles snipped off (no thanks to the stylist at spa@esprit; seems like a trim and a cut was just a fine line she couldn't distinguish), i was too busy speed-running through the day's itinerary to get a more representative example of the event per se. anyway, this is how i spent my day. in eyelet 'n' denim pieces, muted grey dukes, preppy yellow-meets-blue tie. blogging, photog-ing, posin' a grin. dignified-like. expect little photos of me showing bald-pate-esque hair.


get that guy out of the concrete already.




the one and only picture i took of myself during the event. i hate my hair!






supper with pal sk low before calling it a night.


Thursday, December 10, 2009

the entry that's a little grey

we spend our whole lives worrying about the future, planning it, but at some point, you start to realise, your life is happening now. not after your next fat paycheck. not after your next promotion. it's happening right now. this is it. it's here. blink, and you will miss it.

the future is the home of our deepest abject fears, but yet it also houses our wildest hopes. yet one thing is certain: when it finally reveals itself, the future, is never the way we imagined it. for better or for worse, cest la vie.

so today, i stood in the wind, carefree, and let it run through my skin and hair. it's just one of those impossibly little quirks i have amassed, like staring into the vast openness of the night sky or listening to the ebbs and flows of the waves. the solidarity, thoughts awash with nothing and simply taking in the esoteric beauty of it all. the leaves, roused up in cyclical patterns, as they make gentle ruffling sounds. a harmless vortex. and for a moment, for that moment, nothing else really matters so much after all. not the workload, not any stressors or pressures of life. the wind helps me unwind.

i need to stand more in the wind.