400% daily intake of vitamin A

My lunch was rice with four pieces of egg with yolks (2 large eggs in total probably) and tofu + tuna mix. Talk about PROTEIN. Feeling kinda unbalanced after that kind of a lunch, I went downstairs in search for vegetable. but it had to be cheap and tasted good.

To maximize nutrients while minimizing calories, I opted for bolthouse farm`s 100% carrot juice. (this decision was made after about 5 minutes of reading the labels on 6 varieties of juice).

Thinking it`ll be something nasty, like the stuff my mom made for me once when i was small, i prepared myself. Only, it was sweet, smooth and succulent. this was carrot juice. It tasted like carrot of course, but it was creamy and sweet! there was no hint of vegetable bitterness or nastiness stuck at the back of my throat. I am quite impressed.

And so that`s how I got about 400% of my daily intake of vitamin A.

I repeated this incident with vitamin E (blueberry juice) and vitamin C (orange juice), because Bolthouse farm drinks come in large sizes.

random cute thing of the week.


newest amigurumi:

I am tutoring my colleague in English. But actually, I'd much rather eat lunch by myself and read the newspaper or zone out or download apps onto my phone than spend 1 hr across from a unibrow, balding man who is talking more than listening, and complaining that he is not improving. But I get 100$ each week just for that. I'd be dumb not to take it. Okay I am very mean. My colleague is very very nice. But it's reality. He really IS balding, and his eyebrows are really stuck together.

Ruby tuesday. I balled on a $600 HKD membership (half price for everything).

Burger of epic proportions.
Salad of epic proportions.
I am slightly curious as to what kind of happiness 'happy sex shop' entails. Actually no I'm not.

This past month, I have been agonizing over whether or not my boss will renew my contract if he will simply deem me to be useless and expensive. I mean, I don't think I am horribly dumb or excessively lazy, but you never know.... HK is a different playing field. I read the local news about the HK phenomenon of young couples who can't get married because they can't save enough to buy a house, or about the young fresh university graduates who can't find a decent job with normal working hours and respectable income. This scares me.

Anyway. He kept me so I think I must be somewhat useful. I feel much better this week about my life while feeling worse about the world. For class, I had to read a journal on sustainability, and in this article, the author cited statistics on poverty and other socioeconomical issues in the world. He chalked it all up to capitalism and globalization, which to me, is really the manifestation of greed in human nature. Which disappoints me to no end. It is atrocious that in some countries, military spending exceeds spending in society. For a frickin' tank, you could feed hundreds.

I am a 'weak bean'!

Latest amigurumi creation (keychain sized)



Random photos of the month:

Octopi are cute...

Sculptures made out of car wheels


Excellent indian soup. I think I talked about this before in one of my posts (don't remember). Anyway, as I was enjoying my Indian meal, I saw a bunch of Indian MVs, and they all feature a man flirting with some pretty girl singing in high-pitched, frolicking about in highly unrealistic romantic settings. Anyway, it all seemed so romantic and lovely that I wanted to be in an Indian MV too until I realized that the men always had bad hairstyles.






I am exhausted like never before in my life. So I took a random sick leave this week so I can sleep until noon and recharge, and actually be able to do some work on Friday as opposed to using all my energy to pretend I'm awake.

This worries me a bit. I'm such a "weak bean" (a chinese saying) compared to everyone else in HK it seems, who work their infamous hours, go on business trips, then take part time jobs over the weekend for yet more money (which apparently is still not enough to afford a house because prices are *that* exorbitant.)

If it's survival of the fittest (which it is), I lose. Somehow, I'm surviving... in fact, to many, it seems like I'm thriving.

Sometimes I feel that I am going to fall through the golden cloud that I am floating on someday. Someday, I may lose something, or get thrown violently headfirst into some cold reality. And so accustomed to my way of life that I would not be able to adapt...

I can't talk about this to my HK friends (nor would they come to this blog)... because chances are, they probably have it worse than me.

But in fact, I feel bad for even worrying... I really should be punished for not being more grateful >__< I've been blessed with so much, while so many people are going through things far more difficult than myself.

Yet... I really want to rant about my worries sometimes!



Lots of activities, but otherwise nothing new to report (actually I think I'm so forgetful that I don't remember life past last week, hahah...). Some very happy events have been dotting the otherwise plain landscape of work-life, but details are already mixed into the spaghetti of my memories like spaghetti sauce.

I still miss school ><

September represents a fresh start t0 the sea of students that form enormous lines at the caf and blockades in the hallway at my workplace (ie a university). I still remember the familiar autumn air in waterloo, which still has a hint of manure in it, but is otherwise crisp and leafy. My textbooks were all shining in their wrappers, immaculate and expensive.

I dream of Canada. I am in my oversized room, when a biologically enhanced male without his shirt on approaches. He is sent to prevent my 'escape' from the confines of my own room.

Meanwhile, my boyfriend is showering in the other room, singing to himself, oblivious and happy as a seal eating fish.

This is not the beginning of a cheap porn flick. The mysterious stranger has been sent to prevent the escape from the confines of my room. I size him up.

The dream ends, and I wake up bewildered.

Interpretations anyone?

A week in the life of... (warning, boring entry)

I go through life, and I forget. I forget the times when I did this or did that. After awhile, it becomes a 'I don't remember what it was like, but I think there was time when I woke up super early and piled into the car to go to a dusty, dirty, dingy, hot, stinky place where I had to wear steel toed shoes for 4 months straight'.

So I will document life at work now. A week life example.

A week in the life of cherry: approx one year after graduating from undergrad

Monday

It is Monday morning, and it is not the worse day of the week. I still do not realize that I am at work, and my mind is still turning around dazedly and without any aim, wondering what new happy thing will be in store for me (aka still in weekend mode). If I'm lucky, the fire breathing spider (aka boss, nicknamed inspired by first boss from Devil May Cry 1) would not have crawled its way into my office. Either way, I must be "immersed" in work as if I was actually awake.

Curing chronic sleepiness

Waking up in the morning is the worst part of my job, and I have not gotten used to it. Seems like being in the working world for more than 2 years is not going to help, if my sleepy boyfriend is any indicator. So I decided to try something drastic. I am going to turn myself into a chirping morning animal. The type who will annoy the heck out of the current me. After reading the first few articles that came up in a google search, I realized that it is simple in theory, but difficult to put into practice. The formula is basically ‘wake up every day at the same time but sleep at different times every day based on when you are able to sleep. Before sleeping, wind down and use melatonin pills if necessary for the first few nights’. Including Saturdays and Sundays. I’m going to be one grumpy animal, but I will do this for the sake of living like a normal human being on weekday mornings. I WILL KEEP YOU ALL POSTED ON HOW I DO!

Somehow I think it’s going to work. I was once on the edge of being sick one night (and I was overjoyed at the prospects of a potential sick leave the next day) but my mother stuffed me with drowsy cold medicine, which put me out, and I woke up healthier and less sleepy than normal the next day. I was so angry because I was looking forward to a sick leave. So it is not the amount of sleep I get (because I do get enough), but it is my internal sleep cycle. I’m a bit better around noon, but after lunch, I’m out again. In other words, I’m rarely using my brain to its fullest extent because I’m always half dead.

Monday mornings pass pretty quickly. Then, I start wondering what to eat, and questioning my friends on MSN when my colleagues start yelling that they are off for lunch right after 12. Most eat together, and go off in packs, like wolves.

Lunches with self

I love having lunches with myself. I’d avoid people during this time, and avoid even those farewell/birthday lunches. Cuz I'm antisocial like that!

Chinese class

After work, I am off to chinese class. Sometimes, when I am not dead tired, I go shopping, and all the salespeople approach me in mandarin, and when I look at them blankly, they go "oh sorry, just that there are too many mainlanders these days." It's true... soon my office will be full of them. I need to learn potonghua next.

Tuesdays

Tuesdays are the worse. Either I'm just in a plain bad mood due to the shock of being back at work (this time it hits me), or I am despairing at why it is still tuesday and that there is still a full 4 days left until weekend.

Exercise and Diet

Because I eat out too much, I am now motivated to do things that I’ve always wanted to do but did not have time/too lazy to in the past. Like go downstairs and swim. Or jog. Run up a hill. Go on salad diets. Order the cheapest things on the menu with the most vegetables. Or go belly dancing.

Belly dancing

I don't think it's normal to get toe cramps 7 out of 10 times. But I get them. And they hurt. But I cope each lesson.

Money

I am currently tutoring a colleague. His inability in language is my opportunity to capitalize, and so of course I took the liberty of offering my services to him. It's at the expense of one quiet lunch by myself per week, in which I am sitting across from a uni-browed balding man struggling to find the words.

Money is a good thing. I don’t know if it’s the HK effect or if it is growing up and realizing that everything costs money. But one day, I hope to spiritually mature enough to give it all away to causes in the world, and live a happy frugal abundant life.

Crocheting

And with more yarn and supplies than ever, because HK is just sooo good like that--I'm back at this hobby. I would love to say that I crochet on the bus to save time, but sad to say, I don't. Which brings me to my next topic.

Commuting (I typed transmuting by accident)

During my daily 1 hourish commutes, I just sleep or sit there half dazed.

Fridays

By this point in the week, I don't mind work so much. At 4:30 I am working hard after my post lunch slump. I am gungho, doing things at lightning speed and awake. But time to go! Clock strikes 5;45 and I skip happily to meet my friend to eat and then to go belly dancing together.

AND, congratulations to self, I have reached the WEEKEND! And hoping for lucky things like getting sick or typhoons the next following week.

Life at Mach Speed. Observations about puzzling HK patterns

O mouth Octopus, OMG!

I think I lost my ambition. That may be a good thing. This thought came to me on the minibus. Why minibus? Because drivers are crazy and thus inspiring.

My feet took me onto the last piece of transportation that would take me home. (side note: I must talk about the poor feet later, maybe in a future post with diagrams of my shoes and the unique types of pain they inflict).

Everything flared to life. The door was slammed shut, the engines roared, and we desperately tried to escape from a giant alien that was obviously out to get us (think Cloverfield. think The Mist).

As we grazed people walking across the street, I came up with the following list of HK societal patterns that I do not wish to be a part of, and theoretically should be able to avoid, having been 'chilled' in Canada (haha, get it? being chill in Canada... okay okay fine. a very bad pun...):

1. Mach Speed Society!

HK is all about adrenaline. Go Go Go! It's like Super Mario Speed runs (btw, there was once a time when I finished Super Mario World in 18 minutes) It's not only acceptable to be deathly fast and dangerous (ie minibuses) but celebrated. The intercom in the subway goes "we apologize for the delay" when there is like, a 2 minute interval between the door opening and closing. -__-'' Really.

I get shoulder checked as people worm their way around me in extreme hurry. It really amazes me how fast tiny old women can go, and how sharp their bags and umbrella spokes and elbows are.

2. Work Insane Hours in the Mindless Pursuit of Money!

HK is all about working yourself to death and squeezing life out of your days. It's about making your ass wider from sitting in a chair all day long.

Because. People love money very much.

Material, we're living in a material world.

But I don't want to be a material girl.

Living. In a material world. Living. In a material world. (-terial -terial!)

3. Geeky Boys who cannot socialize and their counterparts: smart savvy stylish and stuck up women

There is an epidemic of unmarried people. We have slang to describe them. "HK women" and "poisonous males". HK women have very picky tastes in everything, including hand bags, food, facial parlours and unfortunately for the male population, men. Thus, they are unmarried. There is also a growing population of males who grow up under the financial shelter of their parents, and don't go out enough.

4. Fanatical Consumerism!
In addition to filopinos and cell phones, malls and its variants are ubiquitous in HK. Maybe this could explain the Mindless Pursuit of Money.

5. Super Intelligent and Demanding Babies!
It's a combination of hovering helicopter parents and filopinos who dote upon them

6. Pervertedness.
One day I shall upload a snippet of the MTR station, and you help me count how many half naked women are there.

The point is, I don't want to be part of any of the above. People can compete all they want for their success and excessive money and stuff. I'll just try to find medium ground and stay happy where I am. God is right. Proverbs 30:8-9: “... give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. {9} Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, 'Who is the LORD?' Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.”



Did I upload this crocheted heart yet? I don't remember so here it is.


So many Godiva chocolates in one setting...

Scared of salespeople

My mom bought me a $600 handbag. I went to thank her, as it was very nice (as one would hope for $600 HKD), but she demanded that I pay her back in cash. I said "in that case, can I opt out of taking the bag?" since I felt rather broke at the moment, but seems like it wasn't an option.

The wet summer months have arrived, which reminds me of some of the things I don't like about HK:

1. umbrella spokes in eye. Many people in HK are vertically challenged. Mind you, I'm not very tall, but when I wear heels (which I usually do on rainy days), the spokes are at eye level.

2. layers of sweat that form due to multiple entry-exits from excessively air conditioned indoors into the dirty sauna that is outdoors

3. vulture like salespeople. I like to look at things for no reason...and take ages to make a decision about what to buy. salespeople fly over and start explaining whatever I happen to be looking at, and the every other related product.

4. perverted men on the subway. especially when it's crowded.

5. clipping of nails on public transport.

6. Milk beverage. what the heck is "milk beverage"???

7. Hello Kitty, with alternate spellings.

8. Very young couples arguing in broad daylight. Actually, this could be kinda entertaining.

9. Food dipped in oil. They are prevalent.

10. TV on buses. They blare weight loss ads non-stop. I hate the weight loss ads at the MTR station too actually. They all feature a half naked woman, and somehow I don't think it's healthy for society. I will rant about this in detail in a future post (refer to point 4).

More student-artwork, all over his piano book (they're all drawings of a creature called 'cherry' whom he's clearly a fan of)

Bad english. To quote some highlights from the below:

Please prevent clothes from being infected by powder gel liner.

Do not use if skin has hurt or eczema

Please prevent other occasion of using it besides drawing powder gel liner

Crocheted draw-ribbon bag (salvaged a failed beanie):
Surprise!
Hanging next to the dirty wall of the lab (my office)
I did my nails again.

Ultra Sleepy. Dead Fish. Zombie. No Coffee. Snoozing Inside.

I noticed that every work morning, my msn name reads some uncreative variation of "I'm sleepy"....

Since it is in fact morning, there will be little text in this entry because I'm incoherent.

Expensive cute chocolate, instantly gobbled up, but didn't taste very good.

Giant pizza (24 inch). Everyone was full after one slice.
Passion world tour concert!!
My student's sticker "zoo". He later put letters next to each animal, and played it like a song on piano.
Dumplings!!! I made them from scratch : )

The wrapping process... filling includes: ground pork, chinese mushrooms, and bok choy; stir fried with egg and sesame oil.
I did my nails : D

Bloody Moogle

Last year December, I had wished for this year's May. I wanted to fast forward time, to days without having to trudge to lecture after work, to a moment where I wasn't on a learning curve and be so damn confused all the time at work, to when I feel more "established" in HK, having survived one year here with no issues.

My one year has come and passed. I'm now wishing for this December, when I would have passed the one year mark on my first job after graduation, and when I will be smarter and leaner.

I'm a sucker for progress.

I'm so happy to be done a semester of school. Because it gave me the chance to join a belly dancing class. It's all to offset the gifts of food I keep getting from my colleagues who come back from trips and such. When they present it to me, I go 'nononono let's share it with everyone in the office' I am surprised when they pull out another bag and say in poor English 'no... this one for everyone, this one just for you'. I reluctantly accept and if it is good, I eat it. If it is not, I secretly stick it into the 'arsenal' (a special drawer) where hungry guys will find and help consume.

I love my workplace. My colleague gave me "hand cream" and I looked at her quizzically when it felt really sticky. "It goes on white but will become clear as it absorbs." I thought I found a new breakthrough product since it smelled sooo nice like soap until I read the ingredients an hour later. 'Sodium Laureth Sulfate' was the second ingredient. We stuck our hands under the water and it foamed.

Other nice quotes:

"Im getting engaged! I'm in love, but I've never seen the guy before. My parents arranged it."

"Your english sucks."

"(insert name) is so good looking but he works with fecal coliforms. I'm not interested anymore."

"LA is horrible.... someone got shot in the restaurant where I was at and the cops surrounded me."

"Cherry is a Banana."

I also went hiking, which was supposed to be an easy trail but we went onto the wrong path and it became difficult. I was wearing really tight low cut jeans, carrying a heavy bag and was carrying hot tea in my bag. Never again.

There are honestly so many things that has happened this semester but for some reason, I can't recall anything right now and I'm too lazy to take out the agenda to check. I remember going to ocean park again but I already posted my first trip. I also watched a slew of movies including Robin Hood, Ip Man 2, Toy Story 1 3D Prince of Persia and Mist.

Cuteness overload. I will so make these one day.

People say this bunny looks like me... actually, I was the first to say that about myself as I was the one who bought it because I thought it looked like me. wow, talk about bad sentence.

This would be my newest creation, but because I haven't cut the yarn yet, it looks like it has a nose bleed.