How to peel a banana

break it!

Aussie bananas are most of the time thick, hard, and huge.

Not like the typical Asian bananas which are tiny with soft, thin skin.

It's BANANA I'm talking about. 

Don't think of something else! Hahaha.

I once complained to a colleague about how difficult it is to peel it from the top, especially if the banana is still 5% green.

It's like playing Tug-of-war with the banana.

And he said, Don't you know it's easier to peel from the bottom?

From then on, I started peeling from the bottom. 

There's nothing to 'grip' and pull at the bottom, so it has to be done like how we peel oranges. 

But the gum from the banana skin always leaves stain in my nails. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

After 2 years...

I realised, we have been treating it with too much care and wasting too much time.

There must be a better way to do it.

If top and bottom don't work, middle it is.

So I tried breaking it like breaking a sugar cane but with less force of course.

Voila!

It only takes less than 2 seconds, without staining the nails, and you can eat it in parts (convenient when multitasking).

I thought I should share this banana-breaking strategy, for people out there who also tend to struggle with thick banana skin.

    

P.S: Slow application of force would mash/bruise the banana, make it out-of-shape and looks disgusting. Apply all your force instantaneously.

Whitsundays - Part 1

Sometimes we need some random impromptu decisions to land us somewhere we barely thought of visiting. 

HAPPY BELATED OZ-DAY!

So, I went on a 4D3N getaway to the Whitsundays over the Australia Day long weekend.

Exploring Australia is always EXPENSIVE; from getting there, to the accommodation, the entrance fees, activities, and food. On a tight budget, it would still add up to at least $700 for a 4D3N trip. It's only gonna get more expensive if it coincides with a long weekend. Due to all the flying and transits, 3D2N won't be sufficient for an interstate holiday. And 4D3N would mean 2 x Annual leaves (AL) + Sat Sun with cheaper flights, hotel, etc. OR 1 x AL + Public hols + Sat Sun with more expensive costs. Either way makes no difference - something has to be compromised.

I opted for the '1 x AL' as leaves are more scarce.

When Tiger Airways was having its sales last May 2014, I thought I might check out some flights and go somewhere I've never heard of or never planned on visiting in Australia.

I've come across people who last visited Melbourne 10 years ago, who have never been to the Gold Coast, or only visited NSW for business purposes, etc. This is how rarely people in Australia travel around Australia. I thought I should start visiting the beautiful places on this massive piece of desert, bit by bit before it backlogs and eventually never gets fulfilled.

Getting there
Direct Sydney - Whitsunday (Proserpine) route is only serviced by Tiger Airways (Tue, Thu, Sat). Approximately 190 aud return on Light Fare (no checked baggage). 10 kg (max 2 pieces of hand-carry baggage) is allowed on board the 2 hours flight.

Alternatively, you can also fly with other airlines to Proserpine or Hamilton Island Airport with stopover at Brisbane, Melbourne, or Adelaide - not quite time efficient nor economical.

Where exactly are the Whitsunday Islands? 
It's located at the central coast of Queensland, some 900 km to the North of Brisbane. I have absolutely no idea about Whitsunday until 7 months after buying the tickets, when I had to plan for the trip that I started checking out this place on the internet. Lol. As impromptu as it was.

There are the Whitehaven Beach, Great Barrier Reef (GBR) adventures, and sailing trips.

Seasickness
The thing that started freaking me out was the seasickness. On the internet, most people talked about having seasick during the trip and whatsoever. I thought well, it's too late to back out, come what may! I went to the chemist and got myself a pack of Kwells and those motion sickness wristbands. It says on the pack that Kwells may cause drowsiness but I didn't get that effect at all.

However, the sea was surprisingly calm - just a little choppy at times but that's more like bumpy than sway-ey so it was okay. No biggy. Maybe the wristbands worked really hard to keep me straight? I guess if you're doing the island hopping (Whitsunday Island, Long Island, Hamilton Island, Daydream Island), the islands are pretty much 'hidden' from big waves anyway. I can't be sure with the GBR though, as it's way out in the deep sea.

Weather
I honestly don't think January is the best season to visit Whitsundays. I just found out that the highest rainfall occurs in January, with temperature easily shoots above 30 degrees, humidity level above 70%, and thunderstorms almost everyday. Everyone knows Queensland is prone to flooding and you don't want that to happen because the roads will be closed and you can't access the airport. Don't expect to get lucky all the time so please do a thorough research on the crazy weather before booking.

Overall, it was extremely HOT - I felt like my Havaianas were reaching its melting point as it started burning my feet and causing blister, sunblock is mandatory and adding to the high humidity, my body was as sticky as glue. I couldn't cross my legs as skin-to-skin contact makes everything sweaty and wet. The rain and thunderstorms have been very very kind as they only visited during the evenings and cleared before sunrise. Too lucky!

Enough of talking...

Sydney

Nearing Whitsundays - blue sky, blue sea, blue air

Green undeveloped land as we descend

to be continued...

flaker

flaker is a new found word

Have you come across someone who is:
     - always if not often late for an appointment
     - turns up late by the same amount of time (say 30 mins), all the time. 
       (Being 'punctually' late by 30 mins every time is a kind of discipline, just missing some ethics and time management skill.)
     - often not punctual that it becomes one of his trademarks;
     - agrees to attend an event/gathering and eventually not turn up because it's perfectly ok to do so
     - cancels at the very last minute, though the gathering was planned weeks ahead

Msians (in Msia) have this mentality that 45mins late is not late YET. 45 is default.
Nobody arrives before time.
Few may be on time (only because the traffic lights decided to turn green throughout), DAMN!
Most would be at least 45mins late.

I used to ALWAYS miss my school bus and had to walk home and knock on my Dad's door to get a lift to school.
And then, he would ALWAYS (deliberately) drive at 10 km/h on local roads, while I panic in the car.

Me: Dad, it's 7.10 am (school starts at 7.30)
Dad: Slowly la...
Me: Are you doing this on purpose?
Dad: It's only being late. No big deal.

I eventually grew up thinking that it's ok to be late. When it's already late, don't rush, take it easy and remain calm. That's the whole point.
Even if it means missing a flight, that's ok, book the next flight out.
We want to get into classes, exams, office, gathering, dinner, etc, in a relaxed manner and the right mood. Not panicking, worrying, sweating, and afraid of getting blamed.
If people are late, that's ok too. At least they turn up.

Then, came a day in 2013, we were supposed to have dinner with a friend who came from inter state. Most of them arrived before the proposed meeting time and got seated immediately. 3 others (including me) were going to be less than 10 mins late.

Then we got a phone call saying that they are seated and there is not enough seat at the table so 3 persons have to sit elsewhere in the restaurant. Freaking Serious??? Wasn't it meant to be dinner with an interstate friend? What's the logic of sitting elsewhere in the restaurant? And by the way, they decided to also place order without the 3 latecomers. Eventually, the latecomers found no reason to turn up any more so we backed out.

It was really a BIG lesson for me. An eye-opening one. It teaches more about being patient, tolerant, flexible, and understanding than teaching about being punctual to the dot. Do you really have to 'punish' people for being late? Like 10 mins? What's the big deal? Socially, you haven't seen worse. If one gets mad with people being late, in the end of the day the mad person is uglier than the late person. This shows how important it is to keep cool at all time.
Because of this lesson, I made it an aim to be 'more' punctual starting 2014 and also more tolerant with people's crazy habits - so there will be one less 'mad ass' on Earth.

Being so attached to punctuality defeats the purpose of the event. It's the process that matters, not how punctual or how early people arrive for the event. I'm not supporting the idea of being late nor am I having no remorse for being late, but the world would be a better place if people can just be less hard on others.

There's also a type of person who always turns up late no matter what, when, where, and how. You could get seated at a restaurant, give he/she a call, and he/she is still home typing an email. This is ethically bad, in my opinion. He/she could have informed me about it so I won't be looking like an idiot.

I know of a person who belongs to this group. (I'll refer to this person as a 'he' because all things beautiful are female and all things bad are male.) Worse thing is when people joke about him being late, he got pissed and quit the chatgroup because he thinks people keep repeating the same old joke when he's not the same late-him anymore. The next thing you know, he is late again and again. Oh well, Hello? Who should be pissed?

And another type who flakes his/her (will just use 'his' from here) way through; failing to commit to his own words and actions. This is ethically VERY BAD. Not something I condone. If you don't mean it, don't agree to it in the first place. As simple as that. Don't take people's trust/kindness/forgiveness/time for granted.

For example, you agreed to attend an event though at the back of your head you really aren't sure about it. You also don't know how to get to the event so you've asked some kind souls to call you and guide you there. And when the kind souls call your mobile, there was no answer. The event ended, you did not show up. Later, you proudly admitted that you're too old for the event. This is just a made-up example, situations along this line happen all the time because there are just too many dickheads around - messing with people around them - deprived of ethics, responsibility, and discipline. 

There's a term for these dickies - they are called flakers. (<<click to understand more from the Urban Dictionary) 

If you are one of them, from today, please do yourself and everyone else a favour - be less flakey and more punctual.

Jaywalk

Not all policeman is scary. 

I was walking with a mate from George St to Elizabeth St on Martin Place.
Before arriving at Pitt St, my mate saw a policeman standing across the street. "Ohh look at that, a police, they really bumped up the security around here, huh?"

When we arrived at Pitt St, the pedestrian light was red.
We waited for a second before the thought of jaywalking pops up.
It is quite usual for people to jaywalk on Pitt and Castlereagh at Martin Place reason being the streets are not vehicle-busy after all.
I looked to the left. No vehicle. To the right, no traffic. To the front. Policeman.

Me: Hmm.
Mate: ...
Me: Should we jaywalk right in front of a police?
Mate: I don't know man. Should we? There's no car, really.

Before long, more pedestrians arrived and were also waiting for the lights. Some of them tourists.
So the tourists started crossing - obviously not knowing that they could get a good 90dollars fine for that.
Then a few locals did. But they did it with watchful eyes on the policeman. He was at ease, leaning against the traffic post.

We decided to follow the crowd, also with watchful eyes on the poor police. If anything were to happen, we would be the first to get caught as we were nearest to the police.

All of a sudden, the police realised the number of eyes who were 'watching' him.
He started smiling to himself.

Police (looking at all the fearful pedestrians): Why???? I'm not here to give out tickets. I'm just here waiting to get a lift. 

We LOL-ed.

Perhaps the authority should turn the green man on by default and only change it to red when there's vehicle approaching. Most of the time, the people who programme traffic light timers are not the frequent pedestrians there themselves.

15 secs spent waiting for the green man, while there's no vehicle passing through is like a great 15 mins wasted. They should start reviewing how the lights work to increase efficiency across the city.

Time waits for no man.

Weekend Shift

For every person we meet, there will be lessons to learn. 

It was Sunny 25 deg Celcius on Saturday and cold + rainy 17 deg on Sunday - the typical indecisive Australia weather.

Work was meant to start at 6am. Four of us arrived on time but there was only one man there. As we tried to contact the persons in charge, he said there will be no reception here unless we head 500m back for a Telstra signal or 2km for Optus and don't even bother trying Voda.

'A': In the history of the weekend possessions I did, they never started on time. Nobody starts on time. Why ask us to be here at 6.00 when there is nobody?!?!?

Junior 'B': Manager 'E' said we should get here at 6.00.

'A': I know it's scheduled for 6.00am but they normally start between 8-9am!!

Ok. So we waited till 6.30am. No sign of other humans. Got back into the car and drove 500m to make a phone call. The person in charge said she's caught up with other issues elsewhere, and she's 1.5 hours away! We couldn't start till she's here.

Finally, the persons in charge arrived at about 8.30am. We had a short briefing. It wasn't until 1 hour later that we got the ball rolling. How efficient was that?

The inspection involved a lot of photo-taking, note-writing, and walking (with heavy safety boots, under the sun, 4 km, a bag of 2.0 litre water + site drawing + packed lunch + miscellaneous items)

The sun gave way to rain at 4pm. We stopped work and headed back to where we started. 

Back at the start up point before heading back to the hotel, 'A' started whining about the weather and how it might hamper the progress of the work on Sunday as it was forecast to rain as well. "It won't be accurate, the photos will be blur, we won't be able to write in the rain, we can't see clearly.....blablabla."  I was too tired to take part in the conversation. 

At the hotel, she repeated the same thing to another group of 4 colleagues. OK. I'm exhausted and sleepy, I need a break from this repeated topic. Grrrrrrrrrrr.

The next morning, true enough it rained. She repeated the same thing in the car. "It won't be accurate, the photos will be blur, we won't be able to write in the rain, we can't see clearly.....blablabla."

T_T

Worst of all, these words have been repeated so many times in front of two juniors and they took her words for REAL without justifying if what she said were right. Then Junior 'B' met the client's representative, 'C' on site and repeated, "It won't be accurate, the photos will be blur, we won't be able to write in the rain, we can't see clearly.....blablabla."

'C' was a blur guy himself as he doesn't know what was our job scope. He was only told to be there on standby for arising issues (if any). He then called his boss 'D' and told him the same thing. "They say their results won't be accurate, the photos will be bad, the notebook will be wet, they won't bother writing any notes......blablabla."

After 'A' left the meetup point to start work and while the 2nd and 3rd teams were getting ready to start, Boss 'D' arrived and told Team 2 and 3 to stop. He had a go on us and Junior 'B' defended the 'fact' that It won't be accurate, the photos will be blur, we won't be able to write in the rain, we can't see clearly.....blablabla. He insisted that we hold an umbrella so that we have no excuse not to write down notes. Hello, it's 8.00am, can we start work already???

Not long after, Manager 'E' (working on another site nearby) called up Junior 'B'.

Manager 'E': Did you tell Boss 'D' that we can't do a great job due to the rain?

Junior 'B': It's raining and it's the truth. "It won't be accurate, the photos will be blur, we won't be able to write in the rain, we can't see clearly.....blablabla."

Manager 'E': Yes I know it's raining, we have the same rain on this site as well but we still have to get the inspection done and we shouldn't be telling the client that we can't do a great job due to the rain.

Junior 'B': zzzzzzz

...................................................Inspection was completed at 2.30pm................................................

While everyone used the toilet one last time before heading back to Sydney, 'A' decided that the site toilet was too dirty to her standard. So the decision was to head 16 km away from Sydney to the nearest Lithgow Maccas for toilet and lunch. What the? Has site toilet ever been clean? I was so exhausted that I wouldn't even bother about lunch. I was left with no option.

Once we got into the car, Junior 'B' repeated the phone conversation to 'A'. 

OMG.....get me outta here!!!

'B': Maybe because 'E' is sick that's why he talked the way he did?

'A': He shouldn't even come on site in the first place if he was sick...

And the whining and complaining went on and on and on................

What I observed from this memorable weekend shift:

- When people are tired mentally, physically, or/and emotionally, they forget to practise compassion and they speak irresponsibly. I'll remember to speak mindfully when I'm in this state of mind. And take it less lightly when others speak to me in this state of mind.

- Adapt to any environment we are in rather than insisting of having the same luxury while out in a bush where Telstra is unstable, Optus is dying, and Voda is dead.

- The same complaint repeated one too many times becomes a burden for the ears.

- Words need to be filtered differently when talking to different people because the level of understanding and justification skills vary between people. Like how 'A' complained to the inexperienced 'B', 'B' told the uninformed 'C', 'C' told 'D', 'D' told the sick 'E', then the shocked 'E' called 'B', and 'B' complained back to 'A' and 'A' back to 'B'. If only they all know when and what to filter...

- Efficiency is important. Use the least resources to complete the same task. Hello?? Travel 16 km opposite to Sydney to use a toilet, burn unnecessary fuel and waste of time, this is zero efficiency.

itchy souvenir

A gift tells much of the giver and how the giver sees the receiver.

The gift itself is not important. It's the heart that counts.

So, my colleague bought me a souvenir from her holidays. 

It is a pretty cool and yummy tee. 

Don't quite know what 'Welch's' means but a search on Google says it's an American juice brand.

What does it tell of her? And what does it tell of what she thinks about me?

She probably loves juices and thinks I'm cool, funky, and artsy?  Hehehe.

The 3D 'water effect' on the tee makes me want to scratch them off.

Gahhhhhh~! I still love it though xoxo.

She also gave us a red pen each. Soft gel 0.5 mm tip with rubber grip.

Maybe she wants us to be more efficient in checking and marking up drawings. =_=""

Like students with their 'Back to School' shopping, she did her 'Back to Work' shopping.

I once told a friend that I will never buy something I dislike for someone else as a gift - though it could be suitable for that person, still I have to like it first. This could justify why we sometimes think that people tend to have the weirdest gift ideas (pranks aside). You may think that they should be giving you things that you like. On the other hand, they thought they have given you something precious; something they'd otherwise rather keep for themselves. 

This leads me to think that the Secret Santa who gave out two dozens of Ferrero Rocher in the 2014 mini Christmas party must love chocolate A LOT. Or the Santa knows the receiver is a chocolate lover? Or the Santa was trying to pull off a prank? Only Santa knows....

Regardless, giving is an act of kindness and generosity. Give sincerely without hoping for anything in return. Receive gratefully without hoping for something big.

It's the heart that counts, remember?