Day 14 into retirement

MORNING
Two weeks have passed and time flies really fast. Did some self reflection and soul searching. The past few days back in my home town Jenjarom, Malaysia were crucial to re-connect with love ones and with my own internal self. To re-align my value system and what is important to me.

My core character and value system (some of those things that I feel/think/do automatically even without much thinking, in the subconscious mind) were very much tied into my childhood days in those places.

With better clarity and awareness of this, will well prepare me for my next phase of life I hope..... the 2nd Half-Life (or half-time?). Still have not read this book that SuiLeng recommended. Need to go find it.

"The first half of life is a quest for success, the second is a quest for significance." - by Bob Buford








AFTERNOON
Went to run together with my regular running group ---> the AMK Hot-Runners. Felt great to be back in action with the running group again after a 2 weeks break (since the Break-away run they held for me). They are a bunch of energetic, fun loving and capable people.

Run for Health, Run for Fun, Run for Life.

http://hot-runners.blogspot.com/

EVENING

Felt very good after the run..... felt great to acclimatize back into my regular routines here in Singaproe again.

Day 13 into retirement

Just came back from Malaysia yesterday. The past 13 days have passed pretty fast.

Morning : sent wife to work. Read newspapers, read emails, check internet news. Not too productive.

Afternoon : Access internet news, check trading accounts, bank accounts. Read book. Went to swim at SCC in late afternoon. Picked wife from office. Not too productive either.

Evening : Spent time with family at home. Helped wife sold her company shares (employee purchased program) at $4.73 each. Sold all of mine as well tonight at $4.82, nothing left in my ex-employee trading account.

Found a fairly big and long crack line across the bricked fencing wall at the back of my house. Developer warranty is only 6 months. Not sure whether can get them to repair for free or not since this maybe a structural problem and they should still be liable.

Attended nephew Wei Jer's wedding dinner in Klang

EVENING

WeiJer and YongYee were already married in US. His parent threw a celebration dinner tonight in their home town Klang. Met many relatives there.

Overall quite an enjoyable event with good company and excellent food.

With 2nd sister.








Restaurent name is "Restorn Imperial" (picture taken from the napkin). Excellent food. Will come here in future with some of my friends.

This is not the bride and groom. Just invited guest lah. Notice the Garmin speed/distance monitoring device still attached onto his shoe ?

With 3rd sis.








Hmmm... who's this pretty lady in green?

With nieces and nephew.

With Lid Jlen.








3rd sister and her family in full strength.

Eldest brother and his family in full strength.

Lovely family. Wonderful people.

Visit 2nd brother and 2 nieces home

Late evening, went to visit my 2nd brother's home and 2 of his daughters home (JiangHua and EngHua) along Jalan Bancang 13.

Photo taken in JiangHua's home.

Pick up wife and kid and visit 4th sister's home along the way

Went to airport to pick up wife and kid. Fourth brother-in-law was kind enough to provide the transport as I did not drive the car into Malaysia for this trip.

Along the way from the airport, we stopped by 4th brother-in-law house in Bukit Sri Cheeding.

He renting out some of his free space to people for Fish Farming. Mainly for Catfish and they typically will start with few million of tiny baby fishes. An eye opener for my kid who have not seen a Fish Farm.

My running partners while in Malaysia

While in Malaysia, I still try to allocate time to continue to run so as to stay fit and do not slag down. Two of my young brother's children have been keeping me company for most of my runs while in Jenjarom, Malaysia.

My running route typically were several rounds around the 400m running track infront of my younger brother's house, all the way to the north main road, run towards the Chinese Temple (TongZanShi), back along the shop houses, south towards the end of the village, back to home running tracks, spring several rounds and rest. Distance covered approximately 6km.

These two children are really lovely...

Day 8 into retirement - With nephews

Photo taken with nephews in my younger brother house.

LengYeng (spent more than a year in Japan).

ZuXian (basketball player and computer game addict).

Visiting niece ZhaoLing's family

Went to Klang town to visit my niece (daughter of my eldest daugther) ZhouLing's family.

Visited their home and office. They have 2 very lovely sons, look street smart too. Good for them.

Her husband is in Fruits distribution business. His phone was working almost non-stop that day. Looks like a very busy man.

Had a nice lunch together with them. The restaurant is famous for pork ribs. The boss was a man from the same village (Jenjarom) that I came from. He knows my mom and started quite a long chat over lunch. His wife and 2 sons helping him in the restaurant, and a lot of workers ! He is a multi-millionaire now and own several properties in that town. One comment he made is that people need to spend what they earn, no point keep earning and not spending.....

Day 7 into retirement - Visiting 3rd sister, nieces and cousins

MORNING
Slept over night in my niece Jean Chua house near KL last night.

Her daughter is so so cute and adorable. Very lovely and intelligent kid. Spent sometime in the morning playing with her. She does not speak much but understand a lot of things.

My 3rd sister helps take care of her as her parents are both working.

AFTERNOON
Went to Kajang to visit my cousin sister MayKwee at her stationary shop. Have a late lunch (my favorite Wanton mee) there. She and both her children manages the business. Looks very organized and doing well. Forgot to take some pictures there.

Went to visit cousin brother SengSeng whose shop is a few doors away. Shop was also clean and well organized.

After that, went to KL to visit cousin sister MayLan at her stationary shop.

Co-incidentally another cousin ChiewKwee from Seremban was also there at her shop. Was glad to meet her there since I have not seen her for a long long time.






EVENING
Went for dinner with my 3rd sister and all her children with their partners (spouses or fiancees).
Good choice of restaurant with good food.
After dinner drove back to Klang town to my eldest brother son's house to stay over night. Very clean, nice and fairly big house (about 22' x 75' ?). Elder brother and wife and mom was there too. Will visit his daugther place tomorrow at the other side of Klang (cross the river).

Visit Eldest Sister and Brother-in-law in Klang

Went to visit Eldest sister and brother-in-law in Klang Lid Chong's (nephew) house and stayed there over-night.

In the evening 2nd sister, her husband and 3rd sister came visiting and have supper and some beers together.

My niece Siow Cheng and her husband just bought the house next door.

Day 5 into retirement

Went for breakfast with eldest sister and her husband, younger brother and his family and mom. 3rd sister came and visit later in the morning.

Spent most of the time reading the book "Jungle".

5pm left Jenjarom with eldest brother-in-law to stay over-night at his house in Klang town. Planning to visit his sibling homes tomorrow, some of whom I have not met for more than 10 years. Was glad that the internet access in Klang is much more stable and faster.

Ching Ming Tomb Cleaning Day

All my 3 brothers and myself woke up early today before sunrise and drive to the grave yard at Bukit Cheeding to clean up our father's tomb. It is Ching Ming, a Chinese traditional day for tomb cleaning.

Have done this before for my grandpa and grandma. But this is the first time I am doing this for my Dad's. I thought it has been about three year since my dad passed away, but just realized that it is already eight years (since 2001) !!

Look how long the grass has grew over a year. Whole place (above the soil area) looks messy. But the cement and granite area looks great. The gold color labelings over the granite area did not show any sign of fading. The method and technology used seems very robust.

Pulling out and digging up all the grass. Saw a lot of ants, insects and some funny looking insects running all over the place.

Cleaning up the tomb area.

Tomb number marked.

For our dialet group the decease's wife and daughters are not allow to go.

Early in the morning, sun just rising.

Putting a new layer of good fertilized soil.

Putting a new layer of good quality cow-grass over the tomb.

Cleaning up and washing the tomb area.

Scattering of colored papers over the tomb (do not know the significant of this... will find out).

My 2nd brother offering prayers.

Me with the OK Lah t-shirt. Prayer for good health, happiness and success for the whole family.

Packing off to leave.

Day 2 into retirement

Will try to blog the first 10 days on Life into Retirement.

Day 2. Wife dropped me off at Yio Chu Kang MRT by 9am. Took the subway train and arrive Changi airport within about an hour. Along the way have to change train at City Hall to go east and then at Tanah Merah to go to Changi airport. Train arrived at Changi airport Terminal 2. Took the free shuttle bus from T2 to the Low Cost Carriers Terminal (LCCT). Arrived LCCT at 10:15am.

Booked the Tiger Airway one-way air-ticket few days ago for KL, cost only S$25 all-in and another $5 for insurance which I later felt unneccesary. Really cheap. Flight was at 12:15pm. The airline adviced to be at airport 2 hours before flight time. Found that it is a total waste of time. One hour before flight time will be more than enough. Fortunately I brought along one of my wife books ("Jungle" by Yossi) to read.

Found a very meaningful quote from the book and SMS to some friends.

"When work is a labor of true love laced with a sense of calling, we cease to work and become purposeful." by Yossi.

I found this to reflect very closely to what I am looking for at this critical juncture of my life. Must get and read the book "Half Time" recommended by my ex-colleague SuiLeng.

My 4th brother-in-law picked me up from the airport and I reached my mom's home around 2pm. Was glad to meet my mom again, she looked much older and weak as compared to the last time I met her. Spent the remaining of the day interacting and catching up with my mom and relatives.

Spent quite a far bit of time trying to fix and setup the wireless internet access in my younger brother's house.

Day 1 into retirement

Last day at work was on 31-Mar-09.

Today is Day 1 into my early retirement. Will take a good 3 to 6-month break and think through on what's important in the 2nd half of my life and to do next.

Waked up early as usual. Dressed up and send wife to work. I dropped by the office for a short while about 20 minutes to clear up a few remaining things.

Spent the remaining of the morning at home reading newspaper and surfing the internet a little while. Very relaxing and peaceful. Can hear the insects chirping away by the park beside my home, felt like in the wilderness. Enjoyed the serenity.

In the afternoon went to attend an "Entrepreneur" workshop organized by Right Management. Key takeaway is that an entrepreneur need to think out-of-the-box and need to have drive and have people of different attributes to work together with you to be successful.

Late afternoon, went to pick kid back from school. Evening went to pick wife from office.

Overall Day 1 passed pretty fast and enjoyed the peaceful morning Best.

Plan to spend the next 10 days in Malaysia to catch-up with my mom and some relatives.