Update on 'Training' Programme

So, it's been 3 weeks since I started on my intensive training programme and it has definitely paid off. OK, a little bit about the training programme...

Mondays are spent playing tennis and jumping into the pool for a quick 10+ laps depending on when I get to the swimming pool.

Tuesdays are spent swimming 30 laps with an hour of yoga for flexibility.

Wednesdays are spent swimming 40 laps.... or 2 hours of salsa, depending on what takes my mood.

Thursdays are spent playig tennis and jumping into pool just like Mondays.

Fridays are my favourite. The training involves copious amount of bicep curls with pints of beer or VRB's! ;p

Saturdays and Sundays involve another 40 laps in the pool each. Or diving, or more bicep curls .... depending on what sort of a weekend I'm planning.

The result of which is a good half a stone gone in 3 weeks!! Woo hoo!!

When I first started my dive course in the pool, they gave me an XL wetsuit. Well, it meant nothing to me as Asian sizes are always much much smaller than European sizes. But I keep being reminded that I am Asian and I keep reminding myself that I am a big-boned Asian. Let's face it, I have never worn anything with the tag S!!

When we went for our open water dive, they gave me an L wetsuit. Ok, an improvement. At least I know I am not an XL.

I had to get a new wetsuit for my next dive, so I went to a recommended shop on Friday. I enquired about the type of wet suits, etc and asked if I could try one out. The guy said that I would probably need an M. Can you believe it, a MEDIUM!! But he gave me the L to try as well.

After much tugging and pulling, well wetsuits are meant to be put on wet not dry, I managed to get myself in the Medium, pulled the zipper, it fits. I was asked to show the bloke once I've had it on. He took a quick look and said it fitted perfectly but I had to pull my sleeves up more as my shoulders were a bit wide. I could've kissed the bloke and jumped up and down for joy. I fit into a MEDIUM and I have wide shoulders!!! Gawd, all that swimming definitely paid off!!

So I'm looking forward to Monday when I have to go back to the shop to purchase my wetsuit with my instructor to get a discount. I'm gonna say to the bloke 'I'll have that one, in a MEDIUM please' He he he....

As they say, motivation is what gets you started, habit is what gets you going.

Obviously my motivation was rather materialistic, what with the bets with my sister and T. Plus having a bit of an OCD and always wanting to overdo things a little - that's my habit to keep me going.

Watch this space.... by mid-July I've gotta have 1.5 stone off what I was when I first got here, by end of Sept, I've gotta shave another stone off that. I am motivated by bets, and I am confident of winning them!!! After achieving all that, I wouldn't mind getting back to some martial arts training. I've always been a good little fighter, I'm sure all this training will get me back to top condition for the ring again. :)

Ill-Treated Expat

It's like the saying 'You can take the girl out of the city but you can't take the city out of the girl. Except that in my case it's more like 'You can take the girl out of China but you can't take the Chinese out of the girl'.... okay it doesn't quite make sense. I don't even come from China.

Anyways, my point is, I feel rather cheated as an expat working out here. Having never been an expat before, getting the big salary, relocation expenses and the yearly ticket 'back' to the UK seemed like a good deal. Until I found out about the package my mate was offered for pretty much the same job, except on the construction rather than the commercial side.

I was put up in a hotel for 2 weeks when I first moved here and pretty much had to beg for an extra week when I couldn't move into my apartment. My mate gets 4 weeks in a hotel AND daily living expenses. Not to mention the the 2 weeks extra pay for 'settling allowance'. Where the hell was my settling allowance???

Back in the UK, my wage was a good 50% more than his for the jobs that we do. OK, my position was more senior than his. But now that he's moved here, and we're doing virtually the same jobs as we did in the UK and the pay gap has closed in too much for my own comfort.

I guess there is only one explanation for all this - he is a white male and I am a chinese female. No matter how 'expat' I am, the colour of my skin still gives me a slight disadvantage.

But then again, the definition of an expatriate is .... to banish (a person) from his or her native country. I guess I was never banished from my native country, I have actually come back closer to my native country.... and reaped the benefits he he he :)

A Month Full of Excitement

It's June. I've been in Singapore nearly five months now. Time has certainly flown by. I don't miss London as much as I did when I first got here. Time heals, it's true. But I still miss the ease of getting a Starbucks Venti Latte in the morning. Nowadays, I have to settle for a Teh-C. For those who don't know, it's very strong tea drunk with evaporated milk and sugar. I used to love it when I was in Brunei. I still love it now.

So, things have moved on a little. I no longer moan about my job as much. I think I've now found my feet and my way. I discovered an area (facades) where my boss hardly pays any attention and have selfishly grabbed as many packages as I can. So much so that I've built my own little 'territory' by introducing one of my ex-colleagues to the company to do one of these facades packages. Plus, I think I've been ear-marked by my boss for a promotion. But how close I am to getting it, I don't know. So do watch this space.

Aside from that, now that most people know how I work, I've been giving it a bit of attitude at work as well. Mainly towards my boss, mainly because I don't actually care if he sacks me. None of the other girls dare do any backchatting. I do it all the time. My sister thinks I have too much attitude. But I think a bit of fire between the subordinate and the boss is required sometimes to take them off their own pedestal. Plus, I can afford to give it some. What's the worse that can happen? I'll go back to UK or even go to Vancouver and take up that job offer for a more challenging Project Manager's role.

So, this is a month full of excitement. Knowing that I'm ear-marked for a possible promotion. Knowing that I can finally give a bit of attitude at work and talk to most 'senior' people like equals rather than someone who works 'for' them.

On top of that, I've just been to the Grasshopper concert, which was my teenage dream come true. Gawd, I love them!

Then there's the dive trip at the end of the month. My second trip, really excited, really looking forward to it.

Then there's the fitness finally coming together. Doing loads of swimming, playing loads of tennis. I can finally see the biceps forming and finally feeling strong again.

And finally.... there's someone from the UK coming over to work with us. I introduced him to the company three months ago and I can't believe in two weeks' time he will physically be here. I'm excited. Not only does he bring me closer to my life in the UK, I finally have a drinking buddy who can possibly match me drink for drink.

So I'm thankful I'm well into June, the month of endless excitements!

Forever Grasshopper.... Indeed!

This has been a concert nearly 20 years in waiting for me. Grasshopper, possibly the greatest boy band Hong Kong has ever produced for Asia, were the ONLY boy band whom I was completely and utterly smitten with through my teens. When I went to the UK, they kinda fell by the wayside but everytime I was back in Brunei and notice that there was a new Grasshopper album on sale, I would not think twice about buying it.

When I moved to Singapore and unpacked my boxes, I found one or two Grasshopper Greatest Hits album. And I thought, hmmm.... I'm in Asia... ok, they're really old, but you never know. So I googled them and found that they had staged a comeback with a concert in Singapore in 2007. I was pretty gutted. But a couple of months ago, whilst surfing the net to see what concerts are on in Singapore, I found out that Grasshopper were touring in Genting Highlands in Malaysia. I never hesitated, got myself a VIP ticket, no less, booked my flight and hotel and sat in excited anticipation until yesterday when I took the flight out and finally got to see Grasshopper LIVE!!!

Ok, these people aren't exactly young. They're in their 40's now. I feel old.... and probably the rest of the audience. I struggled to find anyone in theirearly 20's! And the age does show too. Their dance moves were still there, but it wasn't quite as crisp and punching as they were about 15 years ago. But I still loved them.

Opening act, as always, cool hip hop chinese dance music and loads of prancing about for the three in extremely flamboyant outfits:

Followed by mellow slow romantic love songs. I don't listen much to their slow tunes anymore, but preformed live, I was completely in love with them!

This is Remus Choy, one of the two brothers, the best looking of the bunch. But also the gay one. But he was never my favourite anyway (my gaydar must have been well refined from a very young age!!)

This is Edmund So. He was my least favourite. Nothing special about him really.

And.... presenting MY FAVOURITE of the bunch.... Calvin Choy. He's the eldest of the bunch, a bloke with 11 fingers - freak - but I still like (love) him!!

I managed to get right up to the barrier and saw them real close. I'd never been to a concert whereby I could make out the person's face without the help of a screen. The VIP ticket was definitely worth it. I realised even after all these years, I could still sing along to at least 75% of their songs. I have never been to a concert where I can sing along to more than 3 songs. Their fast little medley was the best. Everyone was on their feet dancing to the tunes.

Sad but true, I think I'm in love. I LOVE GRASSHOPPER!!!!

Perv!

So, I've been doing LOADS of swimming lately in an effort to get much much fitter. Well... more like I've a bet with a mate to lose a stone in 6 weeks. Feeling much fitter and heathier, I was more than up for the challenge. Whoever wins gets a new swimsuit from the other. And I'm pretty confident I'll be the recipient of said swimsuit.

I try and fit a swim it whether it's 10 or 40 laps almost everyday with Fridays as rest days... for the drinking session obviously. OK, in a bid to be healthier, maybe I should stop drinking for a while. But there's gotta be a balance in life. This is mine.

Anyways, I was in a bit of a rush one day last week. My only free night and I wanted to do 40 laps in the pool. But I had to go to the doctor's to have my diving wounds looked at as they weren't the fastest at healing. On top of that, I had to try and get some dinner cooked before my sister complains to my parents that I hadn't been feeding her and she's wasting away. By the time I got everything done, I had about an hour before the pool shut so I figured I could probably get about 30 laps in.

So off I went, doing my laps up and down the pool. By about 8.40pm, the pool was quietening. There were about 6 people left in the pool. I was sharing a lane with this bloke and now there's more space, I thought I'd move onto the next lane.

Let's just describe this bloke for a minute. Who, or rather, what guy, in their right mind would wear a bright yellow swimming cap in the pool??? Not only that, he had white (white?) swimming trunks on. And he didn't appear to know how to swim in a straight line either.

I moved to the next lane to give myself more space and swam down the pool. When I swam back up, I saw Blokey swimming down in my lane. I was thinking 'You f**king d**khead, it's a 50m f**king pool with about 4 people and you have to swim in my f**king lane even though I had moved to give myself more space' I was mentally thinking all sorts of expletives. But as I got closer and tried to swim to the other lane, I noticed something rather odd.

Despite the white swimming trunks, there appear to be something else.... black.... and then I realised what it was. The dude's trunks must have been a bit big for him and they were flapping in the water. What I saw was a black mound of pubic hair!!!!! EEUGGGHHHHH....

So i just finished my lap and jumped off the pool.

What a f**king perv!

My First Dive Trip

So, it had been 3 months in the planning and I had finally done it. I am a certified PADI diver although it didn't come without a bit of pain. Ok, maybe not 3 months. Couple of weeks before we were due to go out on the boat trip, I thought I was not going to be diving as I had run out of weekends to do the course before the trip and the instructor still hadn't told us when we were doing our pool and theory session. We ended up doing this in the week we were due out on the boat. Best way I guess, that way we would still remember what we had to do once in the sea.

It was a painful week as we had a book AND a DVD to get through on top of a busy week at work and the pool sessions and all other lifey stuffy. The theory bit was a murder. Life's too busy to be sitting down reading and learning from a book. The DVD was even worse, I kept falling asleep everytime I turn it on and it's a good 3-hr DVD!

So, after all our pool sessions over and done with, Friday came and we're all set to leave work on the dot at 5.30pm. There were about 15 of us. Needless to say the drinking spirits were on a high! As soon as we got on the boat we got our beers from our special cooler and got on the sun deck to lounge. It's a pretty big boat and suprisingly spacey for the number of people on the boat.

We set off at about 8pm after waiting for a few late-comers. Tsk tsk! Dinner was served and we were away. After dinner we were asked to check our equipment and make sure everything fits. Here's my equipment - and my beer!! :P

By about 9pm, we had already set up home next to our beer cooler and the party had begun. The vodkas and JD's all came out and everyone were on a high.

By about 11pm I was well and truly pissed. The pic says it all....

From here until my third dive, there were no pics on my camera. I had gone to bed about 2am on the first night, having drunk half a litre of vodka and a few beers. My first dive ever was at 10am the next day. I thought I would be alright. Boy, was I wrong! Hangovers are normally pretty mild for me. But put me on a boat, I was rotten as hell. I threw up rather comically before the first dive. Although it was comical at the time. My instructor was nagging me 'I told you not to drink so much' What is he, my dad?!?!

But the first dive went pretty well. We were in the Tioman Marine Park. Not a lot to see, sandy bottom and a fake wreck. We had to concentrate on doing our skills right. I was ok in the water. As soon as I surfaced I was feeling ill and seasick again. Needless to say I threw up before my second dive. All of my breakfast and lunch. Second dive was also all sorts of skills testing which went well. I was feeling fine by dinner but learnt my lesson and stayed off anything alcoholic!

Our third dive was a leisure dive as there was a mild current so we wouldn't have been able to stay still long enough to do any skills. We went to the dive site on a rubber dinghy and I must say, trying to get back on the rubber dinghy is no glamour school stuff. They literally yank you onto the boat and you fall flat on your face! But the water was beautiful and visibility was a good 10m. I should've read up on the fishes we might see. Saw a few things but didn't really know what I was looking at. My instructor shone his torch on a moray eel hiding in the rocks and I didn't even know I was looking at one!! I cut my legs on the corals pretty badly though, still learning to control the buoyancy and stuff.

Our last dive was the most fun although visibility was only about 1m and we had a few final skills to get through. At one point my dive buddy lost me and there I was in the middle of the ocean not being able to see beyond a metre and wondering what I should do. All I can think of was how to do the 3min safety sto without a watch on me if I had to ascend on my own. Luckily after about 5mins my instructor found me and we were away.

I thought I'd done pretty well to get the certificate considering I was feeling pretty rotten on the first day. OK, self-inflicted, I know. Thank god they didn't stop me from getting into the water and just got on with it.

So here I am, now officially a diver. Before this trip I had planned to doing some travelling once a month. Now I think I'll just do my travelling in the water. Diving is just so much fun and I felt very comfortable indeed in the water... probably until I see a shark one day. But for now, the next trip will have to be at the end of June. Don't think I can leave it for much longer than that. But I've heard that we may have enough people to charter the whole boat to ourselves in September. Now that's gonna be a trip not to be missed! I shall certainly have a fresh bottle of vodka on the boat with me!! ;p