Got scammed in Vietnam on Hai San

This week second time I dream about Andy Lau. First is about him sponsoring coffee for $8.80 I ask if he is really endorsing on the product. Second time is when. Jackie and me walking in a tourist attraction I suddenly sing the song 我和我追逐的梦。I just fell asleep like a baby on the hotel sofa. We had been enjoying our one month travel in Nha Trang. This is like living the dream of working 4 hours work week on the nice beach sipping mojito. It must be the power of law of attraction. You are what your thoughts are.

Having Oc Zang with uncle and father

Tonight we went to eat hai san (seafood) again. After last night where we paid 460k/kg for the grouper fish which we choose the place as Jackie like to eat there. We felt we were scammed for the tourist price. Tonight we ask the same fish it was selling for 350k/kg. Although we got sold the tourist price. But on a brighter note without knowing the high price we would never to so sure of finding the cheap price. The reason why we will choose to eat at this place firmly is we felt we found the better price. 

I tend to have the ability to find reason to be happy even if I got scammed. Which is a very important attribute as I will be more resistance to adversity. Life is great. 

Speaking of scamming in Vietnam, I want to share that my Uncle got scammed for iphone repair in Vietnam. Uncle's iphone 11 got short circuited after it was splashed with seawater. The phone just kept restarting. He brought the phone to a shop near our hotel and was told that he will open up and help to dry the phone for a small fee of 50k ($3SGD). I was very skeptical why the shop owner was charging so little for the work of opening up the phone. I used to be selling and repair mobile phone back in the days and things like this was worth at least a repair fee of >$10 - $20 in SGD.

He opened up the screen and blow the phone with hair dryer, since I didn't want to sit there to wait so I went to away to buy fruit juice. You know end up the owner took the phone backstage and replaced his original screen with another used screen. I knew it when I ask Uncle to take back the old "spolit screen" which I observed is a China knock off screen. Kanna 狸猫换太子 liao. I saw the china sticker at the screen somemore is partially peeled off, this cannot be the original apple LCD.

Over the phone, Uncle ask if he should proceed with the repair cost of 2.2mil ($120). I didn't tell him about the scam, I just ask him to proceed with the repair since paying the money is the only way to solve the problem of turning on the phone again, the owner will disconnect and reckon the phone useless if Uncle dont' agree to the repair. 

Classic using low bait to entice you in the shop and disable your phone and say its spolit and provide you with "illusion" of choices of screen like grade A / original. Even worst they replaced the screen with an old "grab driver" phone LCD. I can tell cause there is burn mark of map navigation that is barely visible. The owner earned 2.2mil and replaced his fault LCD with Uncle working LCD. The LCD was not the issue to begin with since it was restarting loop showing apple logo all along which suggest that the LCD is not the issue in the short circuit issue.

However, the world is not ready to take the truth. People will do all they can or lie to themselve but to listen to the cold hard truth of the world. I must learn to 看破不说破。

Nha trang cloud chasing is disappointing

Social media create anxiety and disappointment

Last 2 day we went for clouding chasing at Dalat with Uncle and Father. I came to a realisation that social media had really bring people disappointment for no reason. Weather was bad hence we didn't get to see any cloud. However, we engaged Chi to drive us to the hill at 5am in the morning. Super tired.

I find that uncle is like a baby that we have to take care for them. This reminded me when I was 10 years old, Uncle and Father is the one whom brought me to Australia, Perth for holiday. That time I was a baby and they had to take care me, guide me, show me and entertain me. Now is my time to return the same favour.

Uncle like to ask for Wifi password at all location. This is due to he needs to consistently be on the phone doing his "work". Like taking picture before we eat, sorting out the photos and sent to each other and back up on google photo etc. He was like teenager like that so addicted to phone. Being exposed to social media like Facebook and google, so he had a expectation of how cloud chasing looks like. However in real life, it is just impossible to replicate the Instagram worthy picture, a lot of luck, timing and weather will play a role in having that best moments. Sometime we often forget that those nice photo could be the result of many days waiting or the google showing the most pretty photos of our searched results. Therefore to benchmark our experience to those photo is to call for disappointment for sure.

what google show you when you find "dalat cloud chasing"

actual what we see for cloud chasing

I shall not keep asking why, but how instead

 Today I watched a man talk a good show many learning point for me. 

王达峰-光哥知识论

All engineering problem even like iphone or airplane construction that seems like a complicated problem, they are all simple problem. As you reverse engineer you can find the source problem, doing the replacement to the problem you will solve the problem 100%. Therefore all things that can be isolated are simple problem. 

On the other hand, child raising and business are complex problems. Even if you follow all steps exactly you don’t get the same result. Example you narrow down to gene problem for child bringing or even the business steps are wrong you eventually cannot pin point the problem. (Many due to luck and natural selection reason) Therefore, if you keep digging into the why this issue have a problem, you sure to end up with more problems.

I have the issue of keep digging the why a problem happen. I tend to seek for a reason instead of how a problem should be solved. Not matter how you narrow down and pin point you can say it’s right or wrong. It’s just means that there is a possibility and you cannot prove that it is right and you can’t say it’s wrong either. 

不要执着的追究问题为什么是这样子，你是找不到答案的。一直在追究你一直看的是过去，你找的答案永远是可能但是你永远不知道因为你不能证实。一个爱追究的人往往培养的是会找借口的孩子或同事。”既然已经这样子了，我们因该怎么样解决问题呢？”一个爱追究的人只是想显得有权威和正确罢了。

Reach Dalat and plan to stay 2 nights

Red pill or blue pill

 Today uncle iPhone heat up repeatedly turning on and off. The phone got so hot that it’s too hot to touch. The phone die off after the battery went flat. 

Enjoying mud bath during island hopping

We went to a shop to repair and the men started to say he will open up the phone and dry for 50k ($3). It is so cheap and it almost felt like a trap. The men proceeded to open the phone fast and swiftly. I saw the workmanship apparently he is very skilled so I don’t know why he charge so cheaply for opening and drying for so little money. 

It’s too long so I went around to shop. Uncle called and say the men took the phone away as he say he need to PC to help to test the phone. Later the men return to show that the phone still couldn’t open and suggested him to change LCD with 3 kind of grade. Uncle ask me if he should proceed. Although I already felt it was a scam but I didn’t tell him as his objective is to repair the phone so that he can access his data in the phone. 

He decided to go for 2.2mil ($120) screen the highest quality. He didn’t take back the original LCD which I ask him to pick it up from the shop later he say he told it from the trash bin. The original LCD got 狸猫换太子. The men got a business, charged $120 for a grade A LCD and got himself an original iPhone LCD as spare parts. I knew because I was in this industry before. 

Question, if knowing the truth in this world hurts. Would you want to let ignorance people know about it? Red pill and blue pill which one would you choose. Letting people know, once it’s been seen it cannot be unseen. My experience is when I tell them the truth sometime people will be sad and say why this world is like this. They became very sad but unfortunately it is the truth. I started to ask myself if truth is really that important?

Dream about Andy Lau

 I had a dream of Andy Lau. He was doing a sponsor for in game 皮肤. I find it wasn’t worth it for the money. So I tried to ask him if a coffee is selling for $8.80 and ask him to be an ambassador will he take up the challenge. End of dream. 

10pm we are caught up in the hotel

I know it is kind of stupid dream but well, most dream are stupid anyway. Even in dream I was thinking that the coffee was expensive. That’s crazy which mean in real life I had been really been tied up with money. It’s not so much that I had not enough is just that I didn’t earn surplus so every amount is ensured that I do not overspend it. 

Uncle and father finally landed in Nha Trang, there is no direct flight coming from Singapore hence it took them 8 hours including transfer. 

Going out with them is very mental draining as they are very excited and kept talking and asking. So tiring. Like many 自说自话的总裁. Many opinions and question have to answer. Also they kind of like to do touristy stuff which I hated. Tmr we are heading to island hoping. Shag

Overeat in Nha Trang, getting fatter.

 I felt over eating this month. 

I had been working hard to play basketball everyday in SG and managed to reduce one KG. Furthermore, in Johor I had food poisoning from taking fried insect so I suppose to be thinner before I come Vietnam. So I took the thailand insect in KSL and end up in the hospital.

warded in class 3 ward in Johor hospital

But food in Vietnam and beer is too too cheap and as usual being greedy, I overeat a lot. Today we walk across the river and get over to Anrizon hotel and have shell and BBQ. At 10pm we are at the Nha Trang beach having beer and fruit and we saw a crab on the shore.

Tomorrow is me time day and I will go to paranoma hotel for swimming and gym. Good night blog.

Watching severance movie summary

Weather is bad today. Raining for most of the day therefore we didn't meet up with Jon or Xavier. We had a short dinner just below the hotel and call it a day. We still went swimming at level 15. Its been a few days since I going to exercise at the pool. Everyday I progressively increase one more lap and today I did my 7th lap.

Since today we are around the laptop at 10pm hence we do not need to provide picture on what we are doing. 

"真正的牢笼是让囚禁者觉得他们是自由的" this is one of the quote that I come across while watching a review of the show severance. I love the concept of the show about technology that can separate the real work life balance. The big corporate in the show are able to install a chip so that any person can separate the 8 hours of working hour out of the life. They will not be able to remember anything something like a spilt personality。 

Weekend part at Lastcall Nha Trang

Friday night we brought our new friend Jon for New Zealand to try local back ally store which cannot be found on Google map. I think all of them is impressed with the low price. They also try the duck egg with us. 

Good food around the corner of hidden back ally

For dinner we ate hu tieu, then to jelly brew bar we play card games. I learn an ice breaking game that you put a deck of card on a water bottle and blow at least 3 cards off to the table. The person who end up blew off the deck will have to drink. 

To end the night we tried the last call bar near our hotel and they tried the laughing man and they seem to like it. But I just don’t like the feeling at all. Don’t know maybe I outgrew all these? Or maybe I afraid of the health impact of it?

Being cross our 40 yrs old mark. Life is feeling like counting down. Last time when we are young we are so used to try new things and take bigger risk. Now is about managing risk

Getting fatter in Nha Trang

Today was unlucky. We lost our hotel room card. After drinking Jackie lead me to track back all the way to the dessert place and back to the Pho place where we ate our dinner. Glad we found our keycard at the pho place. If not for her, I could have just given up and go back hotel to report lost. So today I clock >10,000 steps because of this. 

I realise I getting fatter after we reach Vietnam. Really strange, usually people slim down due to the food, I put on weight instead. I started to miss playing basketball alone in Singapore. That’s how I lose weight one. Today I went up to Prime New Hotel level 15 to do 8 small lap. I enjoyed it. I need to incorporate some exercise regime in my travelling plan. 

Found our hotel keycard

Next month we plan to move to Hanoi. Kind of want to go Taiwan or Japan to try instead. Since we getting to Hanoi which is a good place to cycle. Let plan to bring our Brompton. 

Read, exercise and love more. 

We stumble upon a good Pho Bo in Nha Trang

 

Having Kem Bo in Nha Trang

Today photo of the day at 10pm is eating dessert after dinner for Goat meat steamboat with Xavier. 

Today highlight of the day is that wonder around the town and stumble upon a Pho which was heavily reviewed 7000+ people go there and a lot of Korean, alomost full house for during lunch time. This place is a Pho Hanh Phuc. The Pho Cuon is very nice with the sweet sauce and the Pho Bo is served in a marble pot which ensure the temperature to keep hotter for a longer time.

Today I watch in the hotel the trump and harris debate and surprising to me that Harris had been hiding and prepare for very long. She felt very scripted and of course well prepared for the debate. I shall say she had performed better over her usual word salad but this performance is only good to prove her worth to her own base supporter. Since this is the first time she appeared online to answer question. However, the ABC news outlet moderator was heavily leaning to Harris by fact checking Trump only. If anything they should leave it to Harris to point out herself but not to beat Trump by 3 : 1. However I felt she still had not been speaking to the swing voter if any of her policy changes.

I felt asleep half way. Either way although I like Trump more, but if he is elected China will be very jialat which I don't want Hua Wei to be keep getting suppressed.

See hows the election goes...

Nice condotel and food around Anrizon hotel

 Today is the 2nd week. I rented the ebike for the second time in Nha Trang. 140k per day at motor4free. The service was fast as usual, got it in less than 10mins since I have the old record. 

Today we explored a new food for tea break banh beo, banh nam and banh hoi. The location is at Banh Beo Be Tu. Very cheap serve by local aunty, 3 dish for only 90k ($5.5SGD) in total only.

Then we went back to Anrizon side, north of the Nha Trang centre. Anrizon side is a condotel which we booked for 280k per night. Which is around $15 per night. The hotel is very clean and looks like a service apartment with daily room services. We reckon that we can stay here long term as per month rental work out to be only $450 SGD which most HDB room rental are able to cover with some positive cashflow. The cost of living is around 30% cheaper than Nha Trang centre. 

Anrizon condotel is 30% cheaper than Nha Trang Centre

iphone alarm to remind us to blog for the day

In case you don't know we are still 3rd day doing our daily blogging. You can find jackie's blog over here. 

For dinner we bring Xavier to eat Oc at Oc Zang 96 which is the local shell seafood which we recommend due to the cheap price for local. Cheap but good for of course which we had endorse for people who wants to come visit Nha Trang. 

Lastly, after dinner, we went to Anrizon hotel to drink the 1L Bia Tuoi a local beer brewed in Nha Trang. For the price of 29k for 1L. Like OMG. $1.80 SGD where can you find.

Wendy is like super impressed with Vietnam, she comment if not for us, she will never get to Vietnam in the first place. Let alone try "Street Food" or snail as she thinks it will be very unhygienic. Well we can definitely be a local tour guide or Vietnam ambassador.

To end the day, we throw a last final touch for supper. Our favorite Hu Tieu around anrizon. It cannot be found on google map as it is a night vendor like a pop up store which doesn't have any online presence. She operate just in front of bakeboy only after 10pm. I believe it is not legal to do business there? But damn, Xavier and Wendy was super impressed with our recommendation. 

If you stay around Anrizon, after 10pm at night, drop by bakeboy bakery, the vendor aunty is there. Don't forget to ask to have the pork rib. It is super tender. You will not miss it as the smell of radish pork soup linger at the vacinity.   

Our friend Xavier come visit at Nha Trang

 

Hosting Xavier and Wendy from Singapore

As spoken yesterday, we are supposed to blog on a daily basis and today we missed the 10pm blogging time again. Therefore we are supposed to take a picture regardless of what we are doing. Stop and reflect why today we are not on schedule again. 

Today, our friend Xavier and Wendy came over from Bali as they are just starting to enjoy their first trip after Xavier quit his full time job. 裸辞 and join Jackie to do their freelance SAP job. They are super impressed with Nha Trang Vietnam over Bali. They review is that out of their expectation they didn't expect Vietnam to be so clean, road so wide and not too much traffic. Food is very refreshing and cost of living is so low. They had express that they will return to do a long stay if they had the chance.

You see, that's why all my friend ask me why I keep returning to Vietnam. From my blog history you can tell that I am a long time Vietnam ambassador. I had been on and off staying in Vietnam for a period of 2 years. Been traveling south and north. Next stop we will plan for a Da Nang trip next year.

Today we also went to enjoy KTV in Nha Trang. Can sing Chinese song and 240k dong (~$15) per hour and 28k ($1.60) for 1 can of beer. Exchange rate is 100 SGD to 1,900,000 dong. That is super cheap. 

Enough for the ranting. Next week 4th Uncle and Father will fly to Nha Trang and meet us. So stay tuned we will post more of our Vietnam trip here.

Today is Monday hence is our "Me Time" day. We will spend one day away from each other and go experience Vietnam on our own. On track for our changes. Jiayou!!!

We coming back for blogging hopefully

 Finally, its time to come back and blog. 

Currently, Jackie and me is at Nha Trang for a one month getaway. For her is like a remote working for at a different country for her new freelancer job. For me is I am taking a semi retirement break (3 years) since my last job at RHB.

The reason why we are blogging is because we find that we are very lost at Nha Trang without much to do and she mentioned that if I were to be very focus at least on something I seem to be more appealing. As such since we enjoyed Nha Trang a lot and potentially we coming back for a 1 to 3 month short term rental here. We like to set up a good routine for our life. As such

Weekly outlook

Monday - "Me Time" day between 9am to 5pm where we are not allowed to disturb each other, we can work, go excerise, go play or go read book at cafe. Anything is fine but we have to spend time apart. 

Tuesday / Wednesday / Thursday - This is our offical 4 days work week, where we suppose to work from 12noon to 4pm religiously. Hopefully we can do the dress up and show up at a cafe to work on her SAP.

Friday - TGIF, our dress down half day work day. Which we suppose to end work at 3pm to go for our date day, ranging for movie, dinner and couple discussion and weekly review.

Saturday - We shall reserve this day for event and meet up with other people and stranger community. This can be for leisure or work related. We shall mix some new blood in our systems.

Sunday - Will be our family day, this day is reserve for us only. We hope to adopt the Jew concept of strict no work day. To detox and what not.

On a daily basis

We like to add exercise and journaling into our daily activities. This is to I'mprove our physical health and mental health. 

We love to do the gratitude journal and daily blogging for appreciation and what not. We set 10pm to do blogging on a daily basis. In the event we cannot come online at 10pm for blogging then we have a take a picture of the day and do a description on that picture. For example:

Jackie is sick with flu and we brought pill at Nha Trang Centre.

Kulai Work Stay 流连宿 打工换宿 - List of place for work exchange

 Last week, we worked on the gardening part and this week we are more into the construction part. The owner Tai Soon will periodically need manpower to help him in building expansion of the guesthouse. 

Most of the time, 1 or 2 volunteers are needed to water and harvest plant in the garden. But sometime he also need people to help in carpentry wood work or brick constructions. Like for example this week, all of us was assigned to dig (executvate), waterproof, laying of brick and mortar and then filling up with sand etc. He wants the pond to have a waterfall and plants growing around the pond.

Following is we are all getting ourselves dirty to maintain the fishing pond and remove some soft soil at the bottom (something like compost) and this soil will be used to build a outdoor oven for making plaza. So the intnetion to use soil over concrete is that in the even they decided to relocate or remove the oven, soil can be easily turned back to soft soil and removed. 

Beach

• Sea Turtle Research Unit (SEATRU), Terengganu Malaysia

• Laguna Redang Island Resort, Terengganu Malaysia
  

• The Gingerbread Cafe, Tioman Malaysia

• Tioman Dive Buddy, Tioman Malaysia

• Udive Tioman, Pahang 打工换证

• Barat Dive Centre, Tioman

Kulai Work Stay 流连宿 打工换宿 - Week 1

I am too busy to break down the experience at work for lodging program day by day so I decide to you know, compile and share these few days together.

Paku Pakis free veg in wild

Paku Pakis (Diplazium esculentum) is a type of wild grown fern and we were taught to harvest these fern from the wild and turn that into a dish that many Malay will enjoy. They have different grade depend where you harvest it and they also can be found in Singapore as the name 过山猫. You can cook it with salted egg as well. 

This aunty has a nice online cookbook for instruction how to cook sambal with Paku Pakis she can follow back easily in the future. Recommended format which I can try in the future.

Belacan and flour for fish bait

I was trying to hand reel catch fish at the local river at Kulai. Ah Ong shared with us that instead of using white bread as bait, we can try belacan mix with flour. I didn't think of that and I realise that belacan is made of shrimp paste and that why it will attract fish. 

Concrete Mix for basic construction

Well, as we all know that I studied civil and environmental in poly. Other than the short time (2 years) in Semborp I don't get to really practice my trade. Even during my ID time last year, I didn't really get to do site supervision job.

Then out of the blue, I got the chance to help out in the farm for the construction of swimming pool, waterfall and a outdoor baking oven!!!! OMG, who in the right mind build these things at home?? Don't worry Durian Guesthouse 流连宿 will be so crazy enough to build all these using raw material.

And we got to experience doing cement mix and concrete curing ourselves and do the whole 流水线 by ourselve. 

Thats all for today. Next week I update more on my work stay

Kulai Work Stay 流连宿 打工换宿 - Day 1

打工换宿

Okie, exciting. My friend Ben for the ID firm recommended me to try 打工换宿. Interesting concept from crouchsurfing!!! You can literally work / volunteer and exchange for lodging at different country, hence experience different culture from different country. Therefore, we decided to start our first experience at 流连宿.

流连宿

This self sustaining farm at Kulai is owned by Tai Shun. He used to work in Singapore as a mobile phone retailer and other job for many years but he ends up returning to Malaysia to start a homestay. His idea is not to keep chasing for the money and wants a farm that is fully substainable. He learn all the skill like electrical, plumbing, construction, carpentry and gardening from all around the world. More of his stories can be seen here. 

Direction

From Queenstown MRT to Kranji MRT > take SBS 170x to JB central > T30 bus for 40mins to Kulai. I went during Tuesday afternoon 12 as it was off perk and so it took me 2 hours to reach Kulai bus terminal from Queenstown MRT. No jam and straight through.

Day 1 

Banana tree only grow one branch of banana and they will weed. You can cut off the stem and sucker will start to grow from the base near to the original plant.

Compost method using permaculture, which instead of more modern industrialization method, permaculture is adopting a more traditional or natural method。

Good place as a 2nd home

Crystal shared that Kulai is a good place to start a homestay beside the hot and sunny weather which is the cons.

• - 40mins drive to JB if you want to enjoy some city time
• - 15mins drive to JB airport (small) which connects to the rest of malaysia via domestic flight. 
• - as a semi rural area, they still have good amount of facilities like police, fire, school and hospital around.

Brompton weight saving

 Jackie plan to make her Brompton lighter. The weight seems negligible, but every gram shave off from mean money out of pocket.

This post is to provide reference in the future for all the weight comparison. Will update as and when.

If useful can reference as well.

The best method to eat cat fish, rose mary butter fry

 Catfish pan frying is still the best

So we did catch and cook a couple of time for the catfish. I tried pan frying with alone and andrian, then we become more adventurous and tried streaming it couple of times and invite different people to try. Lastly we still think that pan frying with rosemary is the best. A bit 黏牙 like that is the best.

I have been actively promoting the benefit of eating catfish. Many of my friend steer away from it as they find it smelly so they say. Actually they hasn't try eating it before. But I guess is that catfish generally eat waste so they assume the meat is muddy. 

Convince friend to give catfish a try

According to this articles, catfish is low is calories, high in vitamin D, omega 3 and rich in protein.  In fact due to the low cost of production Chinese restaurant those selling 烤鱼, many are using fry catfish as their choice of meat. Thailand people also like to grill them on 2 chopstick commonly found in golden mile (demolished). In fact in Malaysia, a lot of people treat catfish 白稣公 as one of their local delicacy. 

Talking about this week right, I went Labrador park to fish for salt water. Too bad, that day I did witness the oil spill first hand and found 2 otto kanna coated in oil. I really can feel for the marine life as fisherman over harvest fish and constant pollution of sea by big corporate and oil company. The world is so bad and everything is getting from bad to worst. World is not getting to a better place but heading south. I make me really deter of having children as I don't wanna bring another person out to suffer in the world.

Gutting the catfish and review

As compared to Tilapia. Catfish is surprising easy to clean as their guts are cleaner and they don't have to be descaled. Only draw back from the fish is the meat is close to tasteless albeit meat is firm and sometime chewy if you don't overcook it. I also felt that the meat is quite oily and make it very 腻 after a while. Unless of course if the cooking method is rose mary pan fry :)

The first time I gut it is very gruesome so watch with empty stomach.

Not suitable in-service line

 

Jacky went to find Andrian to ask about my temperament issue when I am dealing with retail client. I tend to stick to my principle a lot and unable to 扮可怜 or 博同情. 

I would rather jeopardise the whole deal rather than meeting client at the "middle". 

I acknowledge that I am not very end goal driven. I always do thing without an end in mind. Sort of a very process kind of person.

Jacky came to a conclusion I might not be very suitable to be working in the service line. She asks me to do back my leather project and at least start off with a product. She says since I don't work really well with bosses and colleagues, I am not a very people person as I like to exercise my world view on people around. She recommends that I should at least be enforcing my control on a product as a solopreneur. 

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Brompton P Line

​well. I sold my old superlight raw lacquer for a $700 profile. This bike is so great that both of us has seller remorse over it. I mean I could have profit a 1.3k at least. Show u by ex photo. 

Well. My 3sixty chrome is still with me. Like my 初恋情人. Cannot be replaced even by the atas Brompton. Show u my 初恋. Although she is also available on carousel. 

Now after Jacky gets her red superlight and I buy another P line storm grey. Our collection in garage as follows.

Soon we will need to buy the sets of tools to repair and maintain our bike. Stay tuned. 

using a new blogging platform blogger plus

​I love blogging again. But I hate google blogspot platform. Doesn’t have a good app for me to use to publish my post. 

Let try to upload my Macau trip

Okie. Just realise I need to allow the “blogger plus” have Google drive access to upload picture. 

And lastly I think there is a double up strategy to almost sure win in casino. I play the game big small with near 50% win rate. With enough capital, I can sure win without black swan events. The trick is to only buy 1 option only. Everyday win $100 go home sleep. Eat and drink free inside. Nice!!

Update: 06 Feb 2024. Deleted the useless blogger platform. As the photos need to have certain google access which I am not comfortable with. Decided you know to convert back to blogging using PC.

 This week recap on what's happening. 

Gardening

On my way to renaissance man, I had joined Jacky to do a community work at a community garden. This is to give my to community and also extending my social circle boarder and not confine in just my working networks. Giving back is a good way to feel better about ourselves.

1st week, I met up with Felicia, she told us main tools we need is a shovel and a cutter. She introduce us to the layout of the garden. We helped in washing some veg with ETL solutions. And we get to harvest longevity spinach and eggplant. Then we are tasked to distribute some to the household for presidents to enjoy and raise awareness to the community garden there. Therefore inviting them to come to the garden to ask for more harvest from the volunteers and of course come and volunteer for garden's manpower.

2nd week, as usually we kept our schedule to 9am to 12noon. We started off my restarting the soil for another pod, namely Cai Xin. Felicia shared 

• the closer the seed are planted, the smaller the root and hence the veg will be smaller too
• a seed and be harvested 2 to 3 times, rather than rooting it out, just cuts off all leaves leaving 2 smaller sprout for photosynthesis.
• Cai Xin life cycle from seed to harvest usually is 4 weeks, she manged to harvest it within 18 days
• To grow healthy plants, need to watch their PH 6.5 which is neutral and the soil quality. Remove pest by covering them with nets.

While she mentioned that she is proud that this community is harvesting at a faster rate due to some special formula of hers. She encourage and motivate us to learn quicker and harvest faster as this community garden is the faster growing within the hundreds of garden around Singapore.

However, this makes me question about this capitalism world. Everyone is now focus on competition over collaboration. It is a toxic cycle come to think about it. Many will agree that having "healthy competition" is good for the world / corporate / community. But I see this will eventually turns into hurting the world just like all the big corporate did. Nestle, Shell, Apple etc. The uncalled for competition just motivate company to use extreme methods of agriculture, industrialized methods that end up causing issue like carbon footprint.

Within the community is fine, all teams are willing to share tip and trick to help each other. But we just end up creating unreal competition with other communities. Therefore it is not advantages for us to share among inter-community. I hopefully can advocate we should not compete. Focus on the real why you are doing this and like about collaboration instead. Volunteer work wise of working wise.

Week 1 of work

Back to my new job. Love and hate for the first week. 

I love it as they are not as toxic as the place I came from before. Colleague are willing to set aside work and mentor me. That doesn't happen in my previous place. I guess is due to the unreal expectation from the top management. Also from the 奋斗逼. 

I am tore between choosing central area where a lot of experience colleague around or somewhere at the suburb heartland mall where our team starts at the same place and learn together. You know, the pro and con between learning things faster vs taking things slowly.   

Becoming a renaissance man

 Being a renaissance man

3 more days starting new job. 2 more books to go.

1. Early retirement extreme 
2. Outlier

Wah, early retirement extreme really intrigue to me read word for word and the concept is very align to mine. As though, the writer help me to put up a more detailed version of what my worldview is. I really recommend this book to people who like to retire early. Comparing to FIRE, although I haven't read it. I would think this is a better book.

In the book is part people into 4 groups. Salary man / working man / business man and renaissance man. What renaissance man is also a polymath, or commonly known as "jack of all trade". This align with me to be a generalist over a specialist. Being a special come with a benefit but people often overlook the cost of specialisation. 

So I advocate being a renaissance man, which the following clip say you need to have 2 things,

• dedicated learning : Cross learning a skill which can help you to learn another skill easier
• opportunistic learning : ability to learn things as it present itself and therefore able to learn new things quickly. 

Very good video and I like this speaking cadence which show so much confidence. Love it. 

Being a handy man

I want to research should I invest in bicycle maintenance tools. Which has some cross between handyman tools for general repair. If much item is similar or overlay. I think I will bite the bullet to invest in a set of tools.

These are long term ROI and very possible income generating. I need to start working on some hard skills, technical skills or blue collar skill. 

Everyone is a natural builder. From young as a baby, we smile with curosity as we touch the world around us and realise we are able to touch and modify things. As we grow older, we lose this kind of instint due to the busiest of work. We outsource simple things to others in term of services. To escape capitalism, I want to learn more DIY. 

When I finish my notes on retirement extreme, will share it. Inside a lot of example why we need to be a handyman

Be a generalist

 This weekend got fly aeroplane by 2 group of friends. 

1. Lilian suppose to meet at SP for singing end up cancelling as her daughter is sick. 
2. Flo and Herm cancelled Sunday cycling as Herm bike Brompton got gear issue. Same things that the connector just got disconnector. 

Knowing how to fix the Brompton yourself can help to save the $70 servicing fee. This information can be easily found on YouTube provided you have the leisurely of time of not working to study and DIY. Of course I agree the opportunity cost of spending time to research, study, trial and error vs paying for an expert to help you solve the problem. However, as a typical "S" quadrat guy. Learn a general repair skill has the potential to ROI the opportunity cost in your life time. 

I am advocate for general specialist. I no longer see the upside to specialise very deep. Able to know a vest knowledge broadly will help us to see solution from different angles. Your solutions are usually unique and more out of the box. 

Frugal living

End up I need to go through my phonebook to jio friend out for a pint. So hard to find friends now as all has their own group. Meet up with Michael at Bugis and he had been working for grab part time for 2 years. Very powerful, beside his main job, he part time as a grab and all good weeks he can get 1.4k usually in the 800 to 1k weekly. Due to his past 1 year, he say he got 20k annual from grab part time. 

He shown me that he has also upgrade his bike to electrical one. I tried and it was very good and responsive. He is getting fitter which is a good thing. He encourage me to go get the shirt and start doing it now. Well the bundle will need $70 so typically 2 days are enough to break even the start up cost.

I told him I don't really want to do it for the money. I looking more for the experience and also the work out part of the job. We had a small talk which revolve how he is inspired to clear debt, buy condo in the future and a car really soon. I really advice him against it as a frugal woke man. However, he is very quick to dismiss my point of view of course thinking I am a crazy man or a outlier. I really hope I can come out with either a book / podcast / video to advocate the frugal lifestyle. 

Aline, my friend from Vietnam had done a similar thing which is very good I think. Can copy her style.

Outlier is a good book, recommended. 10 hours rule in the core teaching and even Ali also recommend it as a very easy to read book which are being listed in the top 10 for a reason.

Feeling inspired. 

Internet review

Before I buy something online, eat something or watch a movie; I had the habit to search for review online. I almost enjoy the process of researching for review more than buying the item or experience. 

Sometime it will just cause me a lot of dilemma and confusion, even it will make to procrastinate on taking action or avoid doing it all together.

However, I am a very compare dot com kind of guy. 

I know a lot of reviews can be brought or fake, however it didn't know that review market had evolve to a state where most of the review are fake. 

At the end of clip, she mention that although it seems like the review system had benefit the food store, user and the broker. However, in the long run, it is damaging to all parties.

1. Restaurant have to particulate in rhetoric star rating system, waste energy and money
2. Broker / Platform that contain fakes review in the mix and lose real client base
3. User long longer able to get real information on platform

I should remind myself not to get too involve in comparing different product. Goes with the middle option to save more opportunity cost.

Blogging

Blogger is very hard to use and it don't have a app to do it. Wordpress had gotten better over the years.

3sixty

My brakes cable replacement parts had arrived. Thanks Jacky for the help. Too bad she is down with COVID also. It was so hard to avoid. Even I catch it when I go golden mile.

This weekend might go out for a foldie ride on Sunday. This bike is really good and I like it after 1 year still. Although the ride frequency reduced but the need to use it once in a while is always there. If I take care the bike and dry and oil it. I can last me a life time. So it is a 1k well spent.

In between job, 2 months break

Today after watching Samurai Matcha, I got inspired to start writing my online dairy. I guess I still love my blog. 

Travel

I am midway between my job. Now taking a short 2 months break. I did travel a bit after COVID reopen. In case you had missed out my Selangor Trip and Dalat Trip. The motive behind these trip is first, relax and secondly, introduce Jacky to micro retirement. From blogging for many years, I realise it is good to have records over the years so we had started both a channel on Youtube and a mini project for podcast. 

Capitalism

Today I was telling Jacky about capitalism market and how they suck you in to keep purchasing things that you end up throwing out a while later. I was trying to avoid falling into all the marketing and selling technics in recent years. Take for example that, fashion industry was so saturated so capitalist designed fast fashion that promotes planned obsolescence which phrase out product in a certain life span. Fast fashion had been known to cause depletion to our earth natural resources. 

Living a frugal life

• Spend only on my needs not want, when I want to buy something I usually delay my purchase, only if I sleep over it and I had the urge I will return again to buy
• When buying I always avoid single purpose products, there needs to be multi functions
• Instead of buying for comfort, I buy for value. Looking for potential ways the item could ROI or be monetized in other ways

 Gig economy 

Recently, we had plans to move from E to S quadrant. For the lower and non guaranteed income, we hope to exchange for anatomy, flexibility, diversified, purposeful and aligning to vision type of life. I had borrowed the book "The Gig Economy" on Kobo. This E-reader is better than kindle due to the app is able to connect to local library via overdrive to read infinite books. So far I had read 2 books. Barefoot investor and 中国历史一点通

COVID make me positive

 This week I was tested positive for COVID.

My first instinctive thought is the fear of horrible lung infection and long term organ damage the virus can do to my body. I guess many will feel the same way. The worries, fear or pressure may be overwhelming to a lot of people. I can see some few might even suffer from depression from his unfortunate mishap in life.

However, this fear lasted only 3 minutes within me. Fear I believe is due to the natural human defend mechanism when facing dangerous situation that we naturally comes out with some worst case scenario to better prepare our brain.

But what went through my thought was, my belief system that our life is all being watched over by an good person. Many call that god while I just call it a good person. They will watch over us and make sure they will provide us the best possible outcome for us. All choice that you make regardless of good or bad ultimately is the only choice that you will make to lead you to the best outcome.

The virus was cast against me so that my body will build up the natural defend mechanism probably to protect me against another bigger problem. Which otherwise will kill me in an instant if not because of this COVID experience.

Measurement of time in second, measurement of length using metrics, measurement of wealth using dollars. How funny all this are just man made. And if we are always worry about how young, how tall and how successful base on these metrics. We just leads ourselves to misery. No one cause us to feel sad. We just allow ourselves to be measure against other's expectation. Hard to describe but 你懂的

I was shocked how come I can be so positive as if I can’t even be scared in front of this kind of life and death situation what else can hurt me anymore. I felt invincible.

The reason I am sharing how I mitigate stress and pressure is because I felt a lot of people are always worrying too much. While a lot of illness is cause by stress and pressure itself. And it was only amplified by our own mind. So nice if I am able to advocate to people how to be as positive like me.