The hottest topic in town for the past month is the Vancouver Winter Olympics 2010. The atmosphere was amazing even though I didn't really have the mood or time to take everything in.

I didn't go to any of the celebration sites until the end (http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/RandomPicsMarch201002#), but just walking on the streets make you feel like you're in a different city. There were so many tourists and so many Canadians!! The smiles and the patriotism are something I'll never forget.

Especially on nights when the Canada hockey team were playing, I could even hear people cheering on the streets even though my office is on the 18th floor! Haha, even I followed the games on radio while I was working overtime and asked my housemate to 'broadcast' the game to me over the cell while I took the train home (THANKS!)

And last but not least, of course we brought some very cute Olympic mascots home to cheer on our country They even had 'Game Day Snack' for the hockey games! (http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/RandomPicsNov2009Feb2010#)

Here's to a successful Paralympic Games! Go Canada Go!

Work has been crazy for as long as I can remember... and I don't really know why...

It probably all started when I got bored at work.. and volunteered for more work (I know... stupid bad idea!!) One volunteering that led to coding, presentation (http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/MontrealSept2009#) , more presentation, countless meetings, more coding, and many OT... We keep on charging forward even though not everything is clear...

Sometimes I find myself quite contradicting... I wanted to be a contributing member of the team, but I don't like to be too important... I wanted to be knowledgeable at the job, but I don't like being the go-to person...  (I know I don't get paid OT, but I still keep doing it )

I guess the crazy work made me realize I'm really getting old... 10 hrs work day isn't really that much... And the project shouldn't really be as stressful as school assignments + exams... But I was totally exhausted... Haha, once work started showing up in my dream and I started waking up in the middle of the night thinking about work, I knew I gotta stop... I guess our stress tolerance drops as we age?!

Anyway, after a week of recharging, I'm somewhat ready to head back to the challenge. Since I'm officially turning older soon, I should really start to learn to pace myself Hopefully everything will work out at the end (whenever that is)...

My first home purchase was finalized in August, but it took until October to move in. Haha, I'm looking at that sentence and thinking it looks too 'not excited'. But the fact is, it was one of the most memorable periods in my life.

I never imagined it's such a BIG task to buy a home... All the paperwork, renovating, buying + assembling furniture, buying household stuff, etc. It's a huge accomplishment to finally turn an empty condo (http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/NewHome#) into a home (http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/NewHomeFurnished#).

I will never forget...

• Figuring out how a dream house should look like (using Ikea building blocks )
• Pushing 7 or 8 carts of furniture to the cashier at Ikea
• Going to work in the morning, then assembling furniture until late night everyday for a month
• All the crazy shopping... being picky on every single thing I put into my home
• Being distracted at work (by all the preparation for the new home) even though there were LOTS of stuff to do
• etc etc

AND I'll never forget.. Oct 1st... The day of my move-in.. uncle passed away... I partially chose the new home location to be close to my sick uncle... but it turned out to be too late... But it's OK... I guess in life for every beginning there's an end... And things never really go the way YOU plan them to be...

I'm now settled in my new life: grocery shopping, laundry, cooking dinner, etc. And when I pass by uncle's home, it brings back memories of him. I'm sure he's also watching in heaven.

Wow, it's been so long since my last entry... July 2009!?!? I guess time flew by too quickly since then...

I really don't like leaving the blog for so long, because it means I don't have the time to reflect on things.. and that's a dangerous thing... It means I'm too occupied with the present, and not taking the time to look back and ask myself how I actually feel...

Anyway, now that I finally have the chance (down to the last weekend of my holiday) and the mood (after a relaxing week away from work, today I FINALLY feel like I'm enjoying the blue sky + crisp air + chirping birds), I'll try to catch up the last 8 months with a few short entries.

As I approach the final day of my one-week holiday, I thought it's a good time to write a short blog entry... It's a very unusual holiday... Because normally after a holiday I'll be at least semi-recharged mentally + physically... But this time, it's kinda neither...

The originally planned one-week vacation at the Sunshine Coast turned out to be quite an eventful week in another sense...

• Grandma and uncle both got sick and were admitted to hospital... So the trip was cancelled.
• Instead of chilling out at the beach, it's driving to-and-from hospital everyday and helping out with chores at home. I find it as tiring and stressful as going to work... I even had to get up on most days at 6am just like workdays!
  
• On the brighter side of things, my FIRST home purchase is almost finalized! It's a long road starting from two months ago: from reading dummy book on personal finance + real estate investment, to researching online, to going to open houses, to getting a real estate agent, to negotiating price of the place, to securing the financing, to all the paperwork, etc. etc. I NEVER thought it'd be so much work... I think it's quite an accomplishment even tho I just got myself into a HUGE debt. 
• Spent two days touring furniture stores in Vancouver... Again I never knew it's so hard to find pieces of furniture that match the "dream" image of my house... Haha, I don't even know what that 'dream' is... I guess it'll take a lot more work.

So overall it's been a tiring and stressful week... I'm just not as happy as I thought I'd be when I get my first home... Maybe the worries of grandma + uncle is just covering up all the excitement of the new home... Maybe when they're recovered and when I finally get the keys to the home in mid-August, I'll write a MUCH happier blog entry...

But for now, I'm kinda glad that I'll be going back to work on Monday... coz it'd SEEM life is somewhat back to 'normal'... even tho I still long for a truly relaxing holiday very badly...

Been some time since my last post again... I guess that meant either nothing special happened or I've been too busy to blog... I guess it's a bit of both... Regular readers know I tend to blog when I'm at the library "skipping out" from work...  I guess I'll leave that to your interpretation

Nothing really special to blog about... But I'm getting a bit bored from replying work e-mails and doing work stuff when I don't have access to most of the required stuff... So here are some random updates since the last blog entry:

1. DSi - That was the most exciting thing recently Traded in my old DS Lite for the latest DSi... I wasn't really buying into its new functionalities when it was first announced... cameras on a game console seems gimmicky... downloadable content (DSiWare) has potential but there's nothing that interest me yet.. built-in web browser is nice but I bought the extra plug-in browser before... SO I wasn't going to buy it, but a pretty good deal came along (trade-in old DS lite and add $100) for the new DSi. That was enough to bait me into the upgrade. Altho never groundbreaking yet, I'm pretty happy with it so far (bigger + brighter screens).

2. Playoff fever - It's been VERY busy in the sport scene lately.. NBA and NHL playoffs... Our TV is so busy that we keep switching channels to try catch all the games AND regular tv series every night... I guess it's nice, it gives you something to look forward to every morning (haha, go home and watch the game after work). Too bad Canucks lost to the Hawks... My brother said it seems like the city suddenly went quiet and grey after Canucks lost... Oh well, good thing Penguin won, so at least I can still watch Crosby

3. Visits - Cousin came from HK to visit a few weeks ago... We also had a work team meeting here last week (for a change ) It's nice to hang out with relatives and colleagues. In both instances the question came up: what do Vancouerites do in their spare time? Given what I did with them while they're here.... I think the answer is: EAT, EAT, and EAT.

4. Work - Work is coming along... I think we've made some good progress in the last little while. I'll quote what I said in the team meeting: "Before I'll think to myself, if I get hit by a bus, I don't want to be known as the last person who touched the code for our component"... Yes, I was THAT ashamed of it... And I probably only understood about 25% of the code that I'm supposed to know inside-out... After the recent work, I'm more at ease with it... I probably know about 60% now, and I'll feel OK if that's the legacy I leave behind... Certainly NOT proud of it yet (still have a VERY long way to go), but I won't be ashamed. So I consider that good progress! There will be some brand-new work starting soon, so I'm excited for it altho it normally means LOTS of document writing (requirements, design, etc.)

Wow, that guy over there, he's using a library computer to play video games! I mean not the online kinds, he literally rebooted the computer and loaded his game on start-up and play it with a joystick!! Hm, makes me think about what I'm doing now... I should get back to doing some work (altho I'm on day-off) to make myself feel productive. Altho who is to say writing blog to "talk" to you guys isn't productive?

Haven't had time to blog for a while. But today is a day-off and I finally got my home internet fixed, so I thought it's a good time to share some random pictures from the last few months. So here they are: http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/RandomPicsDec08ToMar09

Also wanted to take this chance to thank everyone for their b-day wishes/dinner/presents. (To those who sent your greeting through e-mail but I still haven't responded yet, I promise I'll get to them eventually  ) You always make me feel special around my birthday, and the older I grow, the more I get humbled by all these love. Thanks God for His blessings!

Wow, who could have believed that the Canucks would go on a 4-game winning streak!?

I came across a miniature Canucks jersey on the weekend and thought it'll suit my moose very well. It took a little bit of tailoring but it turns out very cool! So here's the new fan-club at home on Canucks game nights.

I find myself with 20 mins to spare tonight and decided to write a blog entry... And then I realized it's been 2 months since my last post! For whatever strange reason, it seems like I have a higher chance of blogging when I'm in a "not-so-good" mood... Haha, maybe it's just one of my ways of "venting"...

It's been a very "interesting" two weeks, both at work and at home. Hmm, don't really know what "stories" I want to tell here, so you'll have to excuse my random point forms.

Home:

• Grandma had a fall 2 weeks ago and it's severely limited her mobility AND her mood. And all of a sudden it seems like she has Alzheimer's... And that's still waiting for specialist's assessment...
• We went to emergency a few times for that... And I realize just how much I hate going in and out of hospital (although I was pretty confident there's nothing seriously wrong with her physically...) I guess I just don't like to be reminded of all the memories with mom's and dad's incidents the past few years...
• Suddenly it just put everyone in the family in "bad" mood... because grandma doesn't want to do anything but sleep and everyone gets so worried... Even when it's Chinese New Year period and with so many relatives in town (partly because of grandma), and they act all festive and stuff during dinner, I just can't help but kinda "see through" them...  It's just a weird feeling to have during the biggest festival of the year...
• Fortunately, some helper/nurse has been coming to take care of grandma the past few days. And that seems to relieve everyone's stress a bit. Hopefully everything will only get better from now on.

Work:

• Hmm, always difficult to talk about work stuff on the blog... Hard to express my feelings without revealing too much fine details...It's just been a stressful 2 weeks...
  
• Last week I suddenly realized I've been working on the same issue for the past 7 months!! Hm, I guess that 'realization' hurts... because I would have thought it'll be over by now... While I can appreciate the complexity of the issue, sometimes you just have to question... is it I'm the one that's stupid and so nobody understood what I'm trying to do? At one point, I said openly in a meeting "I don't want to deal with this issue ever again when it's done...." The frustration... I bet it surprised many of my colleagues. Haha, it even surprised myself... ANYWAY, it seems to be FINALLY wrapping up soon... I REALLY hope it doesn't come back to haunt us again...
• Speaking of "haunting"... I did a framework migration work maybe 1.5 yrs ago now... It was a VERY difficult task due to various reasons that were out of my control... I did the best job I possibly could, knowing the result was going to be far from satisfactory... Haha, even then, it felt like a miracle when it finally worked... 1.5 yrs after, people are starting to notice the flaws... I offered to take the blame at the first instance I heard the 'complaint' because really, I know the kind of mess I did... But of course everyone says I shouldn't feel guilty because of all the constraints back then... I don't know... I know ppl are sincere and I know how hard I tried already... but still... MAYBE I could have done it just a little better? (Hmm, as I'm typing this I suddenly remember I promised myself to lower my own expectation... Haha, I guess always easier said than done...)
• Other stuff: office move... organization structure re-org... etc. Workplace just seems to get very political and complicated... 

Sigh, OK, there, enough venting... I guess that DOES make you feel better.

Most of you knew I went to Germany last month for work. I think most of you even saw the photos already... So, yes, this post is very very late but "better late than never" right?

It was a very interesting FIRST time to Europe. Lots of other first time actually...

• first time having to deal with foreign currency exchange
• first time going on business trip for 2 long weeks
• first time taking a transfer flight and being on a 9+ hours flight by myself
  
• first time being in a country where I don't understand their language at all
• first time giving a presentation to a relatively large group (50 ppl) for work
• first time drinking hot wine on the street
• ...

I think it's a really rare opportunity to travel so far away for work, especially in this kind of economy. I learned a lot during the training week and had some pretty eye-opening meetings. And although I didn't get a lot of time sightseeing (yes, I REALLY spent most of the time working, haha), it's still a very enjoyable trip. My only complain is travelling for so long was REALLY quite tiring... and I still can't recover from the tiredness even though I had no jet-lag problem at all...

Anyway, without further rambling on, here are the photos. Enjoy!  http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/Germany_2008#