A quarter of a century.

Today I turn twenty five,
and I look back at the past year of my life.
I'm in a much better place,
knowing that last year hadn't gone to waste.

The arrival of my niece,
oh that cute little tease!
She brought so much joy to my family:
To my mummy, daddy, koh koh and to me.

Then there's the other baby,
which will be completed in August, maybe.
One I will call my home,
a place to return to so I no longer roam.

I have been blessed, I know...
so complaints are a no-no.
Okay, I lie, I'll still complain about some, =P
Look out 26, here I come!

Two dozen years.

As I turned twenty four
I thought back to the days before
back when I used to blogged
back when my friends thought I rocked.

Life was easy then
when it was all going according to plan
wake up in the mornings and head to class
head to work in the afternoons to earn some moolahs.

Nowadays I dread the sound of my alarm
whacking the snooze button with my palm
for that horrible sound
meant I have to leave my lovely dream grounds
head back to reality
back to the insanity.

And I pray and I pray
each night and day
for a better job
whilst competing with the newly graduating mob.

At my current occupation
I've been stuck at the same position
for the past year and a half
oh, who would not laugh
at the silly girl who studied for four years
yet fares poorly compared to her peers.

But life's not all bleak for me
I have a wonderful boyfriend you see
and a wonderful lot of friends and family
who all love me unconditionally.

While I whine and complain daily
I'm actually pretty lucky
for I have life's most important treasures
love, health and many other pleasures.

So now, as I slowly reach twenty five
I shall seek out the good in my life
hope and wish that it gets better
for me, for you and for everyone else who matters.

Contagious!

I have been taking part in this Contagious thing where you sign up to be like a sample tester, then you spread the word to other people and then rate whether you liked the product or not.

It's a pretty nifty idea I think...I mean you give people free stuff and in turn you get free feedback and free advertising.

So, I've been waiting for a chance to do this, and then my chance came! I got chosen for this St Ives promotion thing for their green tea facial products.

So in the mail I received this whole big pack of green tea facial scrubs and one bottle of green tea facial wash. And the best thing is, I like green tea stuff. They smell nice. And green tea tastes nice, and so does green tea ice cream.

Anyway...so I now have this big bag of stuff, so...whoever wants free St Ives green tea products (they're not even out in the market yet I don't think), just let me know. Leave me a comment or email me or text me or call me or just talk to me. And I can hand a bunch to you, then you can come back and tell me how good or not good it was. Thanks in advance!

Grown Up Day : 1st Anniversary

It's been a year since the day I deemed my very own Grown Up Day. And a year since then, lots of things have happened that have made me more grown up than ever before. It's just life taking its course you see.

In no particular order at all, I present the few things that I remember achieving in the past year.

• I am in a relationship - one that's for the long run.


• My boyfriend met my parents, twice.


• I jointly bought a car with my boyfriend. I now have an asset to my name (not including my bicycle).


• I have decided to buy a house. Hopefully the buying part will occur in the next year. Oh, and yes, again, it's a joint purchase.


• I am officially an Australian Citizen now - a huge step from that Student Visa I came here with.


• I stuck to my job for a year and in that year, I have achieved quite a bit.


• Having stuck there for a year, I have earned an employee share scheme of $1000 worth. So I now have shares too, in addition to the car, under assets to my name.


• I was the best teller for the first half of the year (that I started).


• My manager told me she has never seen anyone who has done over 2000 transactions in a month. She has been working in banks for over 20 years. I did 2002 that one month, not including certain transactions that don't count as "transactions".


• I have earned over $400 in gift cards at work - either through votes from peers, recognition from the Regional Manager or from mini competitions held by my manager.


• I now have my very own cheque book! =)


• I spent my first Chinese New Year without my parents. I was surrounded with friends, but it just wasn't the same.


• I spent my first Valentine's having a Valentine but not being with my Valentine.


• I fell in love.

That's not too bad for a year huh.

Hopefully there's better news to come in the new year - ones that involve a new job and a new home!

Who do we want to be?

I realise, as we grow up, we change who we want to be.

As a child, I wanted to be the kid who gets the most attention.
As the only daughter, I wanted to be an older sister so I could share my playthings with my younger sibling (or order them around =P).
As I grew up, I wanted to be someone's best friend so I had someone to share all my secrets and spend my time with.
Then, I wanted to be someone's girlfriend so I had a companion who cares for me as much as I do him.

Moving on from there, I want to be someone's fiancee so I have someone who has decided that he wants to marry me and spend forever with him.
Then, I want to be someone's wife, with someone who loves me and cherishes me (and me him) and to spend my life together with.
Following that, I want to be someone's mother to pass on our love to the next generation and to build our own family.
I then want to be someone's mother-in-law, as our children grow up and find their own partners in life.
Then, I want to be someone's grandmother, as our children celebrate having their own families, and us expanding ours on top of having little kids to brighten our old days.

By then, I should be more than content with my life, but then I don't mind being someone's great-grandmother, and great-great-grandmother. AND by then, life should be about done for me.

Kids gets asked, "Who do you want to be when you grow up?". The expected answers are usually career choices. Like an astronaut, or a teacher, or a scientist, or a lawyer, or whatever rocks the kid's boat at that time the question was asked. But then as we grow older, we realise that it's not our careers that define us. It's who we are, and the priorities we set in life.

Our loved ones should be our utmost priority - our family, our friends.

So, who do YOU want to be?

Grown Up Day.

From this day onwards, I shall celebrate every 15th of December as my very own Grown Up Day.

Today I:
- signed a lease where I have to pay my own utility bills for the first time
- got my very own name card
- received a Christmas present from a customer
- enquired about a home loan
- enquired about insurance
- got my very first credit card
- changed my alerts from "Finding a property to rent" to "Buying an investment property"

All of those things are very grown up to me, and I did it all, ALL, on the same day. Oh, and I got a free bus ride home from work after all that. =P

I'm a big big girl, in a big big world...

Learn this.

I WAITED A WHOLE WEEK TO DO MY LAUNDRY. BE CONSIDERATE AND WAIT YOUR TURN. MY CLOTHES WERE NOT EVEN DRY. YOU'RE WELCOME.

That's what I wrote on a sheet of paper, for this bitch who took my clothes (which were not even done spinning in the dryer) out and put them on the filthyass washing machine.

I turned off the dryer dial. Wouldn't let my hands touch anywhere near those filthy clothes.

Karma's a bitch. And it's no good to be on the receiving end, when I'm on the other.

How was work, you ask?

So I recently started my job.

It deals with so much money I found only one way to explain what I do.


~I am a perpetual Monopoly banker.~

Guilt, but happy guilt. If that's possible.

Firstly, I just realised that HOTDOG SONG became my 400th post. Hee hee hee.

Right.

Then hior, (for stalkers, ahem, you know who you are) I got the job at Westpac. YAY!! I will be starting in 2 weeks. So fast lo. Suddenly all the plans I have made are crumbling. I have to miss things, and skip things, and say no to things. Cause I'm a working girl now, babeh.

So right, the happy guilt part. I promised, well, not promised lah, more like told, Mr Miller (my bakery boss) that I would be free to work. And he actually needed me to work full time from the week of 23rd onwards. The exact same week that I am starting in Westpac. I was the only person left that week onwards to work, since everyone else is leaving for summer. And now, I can't too. I feel really really really really really really really bad.

At first I asked Westpac if I could start on the 30th of November, give time for me to sort things out, since I'm moving out, and to allow Mr Miller time to find someone, or figure out that no one's needed, something along those lines. Then I called Westpac back to ask if there're complications if I decide to start later. The HR person says it is entirely up to me, but they would prefer if I started with the rest of the new recruits. And then I thought, I would somehow be disadvantaging myself by starting a week later. Career-wise, that's not a smart decision. Loyalty-wise, it's quite mean to just leave Mr Miller in the lurch like that.

So in the end, I went for the career-wise option. It's mighty selfish of me, but sometimes in life, hard decisions have to be made.

Oh, and I will have to make a really bad career-wise decision to take leave during my first month (and it's still training period, I haven't even really worked yet) for graduation. I wouldn't miss graduation of my dear friends for the world.

So, it really is a whole medley of happy-sad-joy-guilt-hope feelings right now. While Westpac is a good stepping stone, I still hope that DREAM JOB is what I will end up with. Nevertheless, I will give my all to working happily in Westpac.

I made my choice, I feel like a royal backstabber, and I just have to live with that.

For exam destressing.

Hotdog song