Farewell 2014!

After a turbulent start to 2014, I have witnessed first hand of God's sovereignty and faithfulness. To think what could've been a long, tough, trying year, God turned it around to be one of abundant blessings.

As 2014 comes to a close, I am reminded of God's love, grace & goodness. I thank God for His protection, deliverance & guidance in our family.

Thank you Lord for being our Jehovah Rapha, God our healer. When tragedy strikes and there is nothing in this world we can cling onto, you are there. You remain Sovereign & faithful. In your name we trust.

Thank you God for all things new this year; a new job, a new boss who is such a great one too I might add, a new work life balance (finally), a new car, new destinations (11 countries, 3 continents traveled in 1 year alone!), new QFF status (finally made it to Platinum! woo hoo!), new house, new family members (a niece & nephew) and these are just to name a few..

Here is a snippet of our final few moments of 2014. Happy New Year's Eve everyone!

 

 

 

 

 

上海市

After more than 3 decades of my life, I've finally been given the opportunity to visit the place where my ancestors are from. This was not at all by choice but for work. I was fortunate enough to be sent by our agency on an all expenses paid trip to Shanghai (inclusive of my business class fares!) to get the job done.

As soon as we landed back from our Europe trip, I made my zombie husband (God bless him) to drive me to the Chinese embassy to get my Visa as I would be flying in less than 2 days time. To my absolute horror, they were closed due to Mid-Autumn festival. Who would've thought the Chinese embassy also honour Chinese public holidays in Australia?!!  So the next day, here I was again by myself this time, lining up amongst the 100 to get my Visa which mind you costed over $200 as it was a 'RUSH' Visa as well as 1hr of my precious time! On Day 3, off I went back there again to pick it up! The whole process was so tiring just to get a sticker on my passport. Nonetheless, we got there in the end.

I must admit, I did not enjoy China much at all purely due to two things:

1) Air Pollution - this was absolutely suffocating. If you thought Shanghai is bad, wait till you see Kunshan (industrial area, about 1hr drive away from SH). After 3hrs in the office, I was already having shortness of breath & a headache. The hotel I stayed did not have good ventilation at all and that is largely due to the bad outside air.
2) Food safety - everything you see on social media about how the Chinese make fake food is all true. The scariest of them all is the making of gutter oil. It's so true that my colleague in China told me that they recycle oil from their neighbourhood as they can't even trust the oil from the supermarkets! I remember watching this on Youtube over a year ago and those images of the aunties pulling used oil out of the gutter re-played in my mind as I took a bite of my Xiao Long Bao which mind you oozed out of so much oil! I remember my local tour guide looking at me asking me how it tasted and all I could do was give a smile  and wanting to vomit.  Each time I ate anything in China, all I could think of was where the food came from and how safe or more so unsafe it was to eat it (eg. raw carrots, which could have been sprayed with so much pesticides that has not been regulated by the government).

The only thing I liked about Shanghai was a place called YU YUAN. This, I called it the Chinatown of Shanghai. It would be the place to buy Chinese scarves, traditional Chinese outfits for the kids/ladies at only AUD$10/$20 and lots of traditional Chinese souvenirs. It's the only place in Shanghai that I truly felt like I was in China.

Now that I've been to Shanghai, I can say without a doubt I would never pay to go to Beijing (even though seeing the Great Wall would be totally awesome) as everyone tells me the pollution in BJ would be 20 times worst than SH. So very sad to see a country that has so much culture and history could totally be ruined by its pollution/population and food safety!

Until we meet again... farewell 中国

Falling in love with Europe.

Hubby and I recently came back from a 1.5wk tour of Europe. Each time we come back here, we fall more in love with Europe (vs our first time there together where we had thought US 10 times better vs Europe).  It wasn't quite for pleasure. I had to be in Athens for our annual cosmetics conference which was an amazing experience in itself. Mr M decided to come along to eat the gyros  'protect' me in case of any dangers that may come my way. So we thought why not make it an European holiday? This was our first time traveling without the kids since being pregnant with Makayla more than 3yrs ago!.

1st stop: Dubrovnik, Croatia
I've always wanted to go to Dubrovnik for its picturesque cliffs overlooking the sea. It is about 2.5hrs flight from London. The city reminded me a lot of certain places in Italy (Isola Bella) cross with Greek Islands (more so Mykonos). Everything about it was great except the food. The food there are all Italian influenced however it was no where near the quality or taste of Italy. It was rather quite a huge disappointment. The cost of a meal was similar to back home in Australia. A Main would set you btw $15-$33 (Depending on where you go).

 

2nd Stop: Berlin, Germany

I really loved Berlin. So much history yet blended with so much modern art. The Berliners are so artistic and really knows how to enjoy their outdoors and art. I absolutely loved shopping in Germany especially their scarves! Every Germans I see on the streets just know how to wear their scarf in all sorts of ways. They also have like over 1000 designs and every store you find sell scarves! I also love shopping in C&A for kids & women's clothing whenever I'm back in Germany (which is like a Mid-Tier department store). I don't know... there is something about Germany that makes me want to go back all the time. I think it's because I studied the language and its culture back in High School from Year 7-10 and it fascinates me when the text book finally comes to life! 

If you are ever in Berlin, make sure you do the Brewers Free Walking tour. Also shop at Primark at Alexander Platz for some great designs and yet cheap clothing as well as amazing collection for boys clothing!  oh yes and coffee in Berlin is also unsurprisingly good!! One of the best place we had coffee was at Einstein Kaffee which is a chain but they have really good coffee that doesn't taste like the chains! They also have the BEST Apple Strudel w the yummiest custard EVER at their Checkpoint Charlie branch. 

3rd Stop: Athens, Greece

Out of the 4 cities we went in Europe (London included), both Mr M & I agrees that Greece has the best and most tastiest food not to mention the cheapest too! We really had only 1 day to explore this ancient city given that I was attending my work conference for 3 days. So the best way to explore is to hop on their Sightseeing tour bus (red double decker ) which you can buy at Intercontinental hotel (where we stayed) at a discounted price.

Surprisingly we absolutely loved Acropolis. It's quite a walk to get up there but once there, the view is simply breathtaking!

 
The best Gyros in town has got to be in a restaurant called O'Thanasis in the heart of Monastraski. There are two O'Thananis restaurants so make sure you go to the one that sells gyros.  For 2.60euros, you can have a delicious pork or chicken (which was our fav on the right) gyros and slightly cheaper if you have a takeaway. The restaurant is very clean, fresh ingredients and most importantly the meat has a very nice charcoal (but not burnt) taste to it!

We then caught out flight from Athens to Dubai and by the favour of God, He helped upgrade Mr M's economy class ticket to business so that he could sit next to me! Gosh you should've seen his face! By the time we boarded the plane it was like 11:20pm and instead of going to sleep for 5hrs, Mr M was utilising everything in business class. When we finally got onto our next flight which was for 13hrs, Mr M was stuck in Economy and for the entire flight, he could not sleep. So when we got off our flight, I looked so fresh and awake (thank you flat beds on Emirates business!) while Mr M looked like he hadn't slept in 40yrs! too funny!

So that ends our 3rd time journey back to Europe together!

7 years.

Tonight I came home late from work at 8pm with a killing headache. All I wanted to do was to quickly put the kids to bed then go to bed myself. When I reached home, I was very surprised that Mr M did not mutter a word of complaint as I was already late by half hour.

Instead, he presented me with a love heart shaped box of chocolates, took me to the dining table where he had bought a bottle of bubbly with wine glasses all set up and dinner spread out ready to be indulged (in the midst of our crazy noisy kids playing in the background). He was waiting and waiting and waiting for me to come home to celebrate our 7th year wedding anniversary and as for me, I had totally forgot!
I mean I remembered it days leading to the actual day until the day itself. Shoot.Me.Now.

I love you Mr M! You are my rock, my patience, my stability, the missing ribcage that completes me to this very day.

Happy Anniversary hub! 

xo

Blessed.

Earlier this year, God blessed me with an amazing job opportunity, still with the same company, but now managing a very girly girl brand(s) managing the AsiaPac region. It is a dream job for any girl in the company & so many people have asked me how I landed such an amazing job. All I can say is that it was really God behind it all.  My new role enables me to:
   1. Work from home 5 days a week
   2. Drop off my kids/pick them up from school due to the flex hours
   3. Travel around the world literally on business class!
   4. An awesome boss that encourages us to take annual leave during market visits so that we can have a mini-break before or after working period. I know right?!

So this week, I had to be in Manila for work. Instead of wasting my time in Manila, I decided to make my way to Boracay traveling 3 days by myself to just relax, practicing His presence & enjoy my taste of freedom sans kids and hubby (oh thank you Mr M for letting me go!).  The easiest way to get to Boracay is to fly into Caticlan airport which Cebu Pacific (PH's budget airline) is able to get you there. Effective Aug 1, they now fly to and fro Sydney so Aussies can also get cheaper access to the amazing PH's islands & to Manila of course.

Anyway, my friends from Singapore then joined me a day later to discover Boracay together. We stayed at Monaco Suites which had really good facilities/suites/views but failed on their free van service to town/beaches as it was always late/never to schedule/1hour intervals. Nonetheless, we still had an amaaazing time. Highlight of the trip were:
1. Having a shower in the communal pool bathroom when a little hermit crab greeted me near my feet too!
2. $10 per hour entire body massage including head, shoulder, hands, feet, shoulder & body massage. I had it done twice (one in an actual massage parlour and the other on the beach which was just so relaxing).
3. Having lunch at an island when all of a sudden the locals came to present their hand made goods and I stopped one to see their basket full of goodies. All of a sudden they were like seagulls and 1 became 12 ppl surrounding me and presenting their goodies in front of my face. Quite a funny encounter really.
4. Being reunited with the kampong life of dirt, banana plantations, stray dogs, cement/wooden houses, chickens running free etc.. ah always reminds me of my awesome childhood spent in the oil palm estate in Kahang.
5. Snorkeling for the first time since I was preggers with Z which would've been at least 7.5yrs ago! Funny thing was the the last time I snorkeled was during my babymoon in Mactan Island in Cebu and here I was back again in one of PH's most beautiful islands snorkeling again!
6. Got myself a huge blister after walking in Manila's massive shopping complex (8 shopping complex all joined together) for over 5 hours. I didn't realise I had the blister until day 2 of Boracay and freaked out after seeing a huge white tough skin near my little toe. This wasn't like your normal air bubble as it was hard. I had thought it was an infection after my left foot kicked into a coral (yep snorkeling without any fins). It was only after I got back to Manila again (day 4 of getting the blister) that I realised the reason the blister was hard was because it was full of SAND inside! It freaked me the first time I saw it as I thought it was little spider eggs rowing inside! lol.
7. Being engrossed by two very beautiful Philippino girls who then turned out to be 'lady boys' when I heard them talk!

Anyway, I am so thankful and grateful to God for giving me such amazing opportunities in life that money can't buy. I am also tremendously blessed to have such an understanding husband & a wonderful MIL who has helped me look after my 3 kids while I'm off enjoying my holiday working.  Praise The Lord in deed!

Rest In Peace my friend..

As I listen to the song '10,000 reasons' by Matt Redman, I can't help but to think of my friend's last breath on earth. Hearing the news of his passing last week deeply shocked me. He passed at a very young age (31 to be exact) and leaves behind his loving wife & daughter who is only 2y.o. I feel so sad that his daughter will never get to know what a fine man her father was. I feel even saddened to know that even a great man who loved God so much, who cared about his family and friends, who treats people with so much love and respect can still have his life cut short.

He was a man who had such great charisma, who made you feel so important and always spoke the word of God into your life. What moved me about his death was that even at the end of his last breath, he remained steadfast in His faith. He never once doubted that God had a plan for His life even though it may seem somewhat unfair. He never once complained about the pain & situation that he was in. Instead, he continued to read and immerse himself in the word of God. He continued to believe that he would be healed and I know it was also because he wanted to do all he could to live for his daughter.
Even when the end was near, he asked all to surround him singing only worship songs to God. Yet when he realised that he may soon depart from this so called life, he texted his friends a message saying 'I am at peace, come what may and asked all to whisper a prayer for his family. And even if God doesn't heal him, He is still Lord of all'. He truly exemplified a good and faithful servant who 'fought the good fight, finished the race & kept the faith until the very end'.

I am truly honoured to have known him and will always remember the beautiful heartfelt song he wrote for me and sang with my life group on my 21st birthday. Farewell my friend and until we meet again...