Life to live and explore

Dream to work part time and live on investments

My friend Pauline was here for a visit over the weekend. We spent some good time catching up and talked till 1.00 a.m on Saturday. Both of us have been suffering from similar health problems in the last 2-3 years. That certainly have our views on work, career and money changed over the years. We have spent 10 years of our youth at a stressful job, gain our financial independent and lost our health in the process!

We dream of a day that we can retire early, take up a less stressful job or live on a part time pay. One thing we know, with the high inflation rate and the pathetic interest we get for putting our money in the bank, that’s probably a far fetched dream!

We certainly need to learn more about other investment vehicles that bear better returns. Do not think we have the time and patience to invest in individual stock, but we like the idea of mutual funds and foreign currencies deposits. Anyone heard of trust deed investing? Diamond Bay Investments claims that real estate trust deed investments can  produce a margin of return as high as 12 % and has a low margin of risk. Do you think it’s a viable for retirement income?

Friends visited me at my parents’ place

Friends Jo and Christine came to visit me at my parents’ house. Though they have lived in this small town for years, they have never been to this side of town where my parents live! Mom cooked Hakka Lei Cha for them. They liked it very much.

They have wanted to visit me after the surgery since they have not seen me for weeks at the home fellowship. I did inform Jo about the backache when I couldn’t attend the bible study.

Proof read doctorate dissertation

Molly called yesterday evening, she wanted to know whether I can help her to proof read her doctorate dissertation. Since I have not been feeling to well and under a lot of stress right now dealing with the migration process, I told her to try to get another person to help. I also told her if she really cannot get someone else, then I would help.

She sent a text message this morning, told me her husband has agreed to do the proof reading for her. That’s good!

The busy doctors

I was at the hospital accompanied my mom for a MRI scan, while mother was waiting for her turn, thought I would walk over to say hello to a friend MK, who is an eye specialist at the same hospital since his office is just across the hallway. The nurse told me he was at the emergency unit.

After the MRI, mom had to see the orthopedic and it was a long line. So, I thought I would try to drop by my friend’s office again. This time the nurse said he was doing a laser surgery.

I really admire all the busy doctors, everyday at work is like going to war and yet they can stay sane! I would have gone crazy with all this demands and attention to details. :-)

Corporate incentive tour to Paris

Bumped into an ex-classmate who also happens to be a distant relative at the bank two weeks ago. She works for her brother who owns the distributorship of a beauty product from France. The irony is that she is overweight and suffers from acne problem, doesn’t seem like the treatments for acne and slimming products they sell are helping her!!

She is quite an arrogant woman. Most of us often have to listen to her brags about her trips to Paris. May be due to inferior complex, she tries so hard to impress people that she is a globe trotter and an important person in the company!

We know that her brother’s company often rewards the local distributors who have good sales performance with corporate incentive travel. We are pretty sure she gets to travel along because her brother owns the company, not anything else. :-)

Friend’s mother passed away

KW’s mother just passed away. Though She was diagnosed with cancer middle of last year, she seemed to be doing really well after all the cancer treatments. I think KW and his family didn’t expect her to leave so sudden.

Poor little old woman, she left the world without any of her children by her side, only the maid was with her. KW was of course devastated because that she left without knowing the Lord. It reminds of the same feeling when my grandma passed away years ago.

Friend’s mother has lung cancer

SL’s mother was diagnosed with fourth stage lung cancer. The fiercely independent woman decided not to go through chemotherapy or radiotherapy, but seeking alternative treatment. She is going through the all organic natural remedy to fight cancer.

She is still doing fine right now despite of the pain she often suffers. SL and her siblings have gotten her a maid, but she still cooks and washes around the house. She is also active in the Church. Outwardly, it’s hard to tell that she is a cancer patient and the doctor has diagnosed that her days are numbered. You really see courage and hope in her.

My friend said her mom was always so thrifty, she didn’t take the opportunity to enjoy her time or go places with her husband since they retired about 5 years ago. Even if her children wanted to pay for a vacation to the Outer Banks for them, she didn’t want to go because she didn’t want her children to spend their hard earned money!

Meeting up with an old friend

Met up with SL today, we chatted for almost 4 hours! We had our lunch at a small cafe and then adjourn to KFC so that we can continue to yak.

The last time we met were December last year, we had so much to catch up with one another about what happened in a year. Of course, we gossiped too.

SL was my college mate and we were colleagues sharing an office for 3 years. We were friends since our first year in college although we were doing different courses as we lived in the same hostel. However, we didn’t really get to know each other well until we worked together and shared an office. She is married to one of my course mates, brother-in-law of my ex-roommate from hell.  So she understands me perfectly what hell it was to live with a bitch.:-)

What do this doctors have in common

We have several doctors in the bible study group that we belong. With this doctors, they talk a lot about medical things and they sometime didn’t realize people in the non-medical field might not understand all the medical jargons they use. Since this doctors are all golf enthusiasts, they like to talk golf too.

They might not know much about the xbox 360 or video games in general, but they are very crazy about golf, they would bring the golf equipment to work and go to the golf course straight after work. I know two of them were really good and won some hole-in-one prizes before. They can get so excited talking about their favorite sport, you will see them getting up demonstrating the proper golf swing at the dinner table while we were having supper after the bible study. Their wives said they even bought “How to play golf” DVDs to learn from the pro. If they are any Internet savvy, they would properly find out this online golf lessons and learn to improve their golf swing.:-)

Friends are visiting

My friends TJ and WT will be here visiting with their two children, I got to get the guest room tidy up for them. :-) They were here twice this year, this is the third time in this year they bring their children to visit, we really appreciate their effort to keep in touch and to keep us in prayers.

They are certainly our most faithful and kindest friends who have been with us through thick and thin, and are always there for support. It is our privilege to have them as friends.

Older friends

It’s interesting to me when I noticed that my circle of friends is so different compare to, lets say 7-8 years ago. Before I was 30, most of the people I associated with were peers.

After moving back to this small town when I was 30, I have to start all over in getting to know new people. I realized that many people I associate with right now tend to be much older than I. They are either closer to 50 or have retired from full-time work! One of the reasons is because they are more elderly people in the bible study group we belong than the younger ones.:-)

The older people tend to be more patient and they are less competitive. They have years of wisdom behind them, and if they are willing to share with us, we would be benefited so much from them. Peers who are at the same age tend to like to compare and compete, people get envious or jealous about one another and start all the bitching and back stabbing, especially among the women, sad to say.

Happy 25th anniversary

My friend MK and his wife are celebrating their 25th anniversary this week. In this age and time, I bet staying married for 25 years is a reason to celebrate!

Let me tell you, my friend MK is not exactly the kind of person who is easy to live with.:-)The fact that they are still talking with one another after being married for 25 years is enough to impress me. For people who have married for two and half years and can’s see each other eye-to-eye majority of time, it’s a lot of lessons for us to learn.

See you next year

Today we have the last bible study group meet for the year. We aren’t going to meet for bible discussion until next January. Though we are probably going to meet at the church Everyone is excited about the coming Christmas party that they are going to host.

WE celebrated 3 people’s birthdays tonight. Looks like we have a lot of year end baby in the bible study group. MK said 50 is the old age of youth but the youth of old age. Can you guess how old is MK? :-)

Meeting people online

Most of my close friends are still single, they were not looking and were spending too much time at work previously. Now that they are ready to find somebody to share their lives, they find it difficult to meet any decent men in their present social circles because most men they know are married now.

I hope they would get to know someone and get hitched really soon. They are great friends and nice women, but most of them are spending too much time at work and they don’t have a lot of interactions with other people at work.

If they find it really hard at meeting people in real life, maybe they can just try out the Online Dating Sites. I do know a few friends who have successfully dated people they met online and now they are happily married with kids. There is always a possibility, we just have to be more careful and take extra precautions when trying to find a date online.

Actually, to get to know someone online is rather simple, my friends just have to start by creating profiles for themselves. Pretension may work online, but if they what to continue this in real life, they got to be real and honest about who they are. They can can write short introduction about themselves. I think a little sense of humor is great as it will be more eye-catching.

Additionally, they can also search through the database of dating sites and find those people that share the same interests. Most of the dating sites also have premium service that members pay a small fee for extra privileges. I think the members who are willing to pay a small fee show their eagerness and commitment to look for serious relationships. If not, will you be paying for it?