The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 1,800 times in 2013. If it were a cable car, it would take about 30 trips to carry that many people.
2013 has been a good year for me from family to career to personal development. It also marks the 30th year I have lived, started a new beginning to the future.
1. Obtained my Advance Open Water certification in Phuket and diving for the first time with my OCS Folks. They have mad the trip very fun and memorable.
2. Achieving Basic Level grading for Muai Thai class with my old time buddies. It feels good to have a kick out after a hard day work. Too bad that now I’m unable to online with an income but will consider going back at a later time.
3. An impromptu trip to Dubai with my wife to visit her best friend, WanHui, who was working as an Emirates crew. It was so surreal being in a country that I never dreamt of going to. It was an eye opener to live and enjoy the dessert safari. What’s more, we did a dive in Oman! First time away from Malaysia!
4. I quit and left my job to venture on my own. It was a bold decision to leave my job to spent more time with my family and work on my own business.
5. Started my own wedding photography and videography business. It was a dream come a true to owned a business and being an entrepreneur.
6. Gone for my first solo holiday trip to South Korea, a place I visited for the 3rd time. It was a wonderful experience wandering in a foreign country on your own.
7. Hosting my customary wedding dinner on 19th October, almost a year plus since our ROM. It was a great night and I’m glad that everything’s when on smoothly.
8. Finally gone out of Asia for a holiday in Gold Coast, Australia. It was surprising a good and relaxing country to be in to get away from our fast pace society.
I guess this year I have been really following my heart to do things I wanted to do without much worries. Now that things had settle down, in 2014, I will be looking forward to developing my career, growing my business,going for the biggest trip in my life so far, setting up a place I call home, owning a car and starts to build and grow my family.
Bye 2013, it will be a year to remember and hello 2014, a year that will probably define my future for the net 10 years.
It’s been 3 months since I left my comfort zone to start a new beginning, a new lifestyle to fulfill a dream of our own.
Seldom do I get excited about things and ideas people had told me. Be it how much money you can earn, how much fame you can get, I am just not excited at all. It is only when I heard of the idea of a Wedding themed Café that is designed specially for wedding couples, to meet up, discuss about their love story and weddings that strikes a chord in me.
This idea of a wedding café comes from no one else but my beloved wife who is always full of ideas. She had shared with me a lot of things she wanted to do but this one strike it well into my heart. It is something feasible and nice to have.
Wedding, Café and Coffee! Isn’t it fabulous?
Running a café of our own, providing wedding planning, photography and videography services to wedding couples, building a network of wedding vendors around the café making it a one-stop shop for wedding couples.
That’s OUR idea, OUR dream!
Ironically, right after I left my job, I did not immediately start this wedding café business. I went o to start something that I have to admit, an area that I have no experience and network to start off. Doing something that is practically not my area of expertise.
I look at myself, thinking of what I am good at, exploring the opportunities out there; Realizing going back to my core isn’t a bad idea. Starting something that solely belongs us makes it even more meaningful and motivated for us to do it.
Here I go, after going round the bush for a month, I start planning and executing the things required for the business. We decide to retain the name of the initial idea to call our company Vows Café: Weddings over Coffee. Though we might not have the initial capital to start a physical café, which in fact is our goal and dream to do it in 3-5 years time.
As a start, we will focus on building our core business in Wedding Photography, Videography and my wife’s favorites, Wedding Planning. All of a sudden, things that we have learnt during our undergraduate days started to get useful again. The special skill sets in storytelling is what make us different from others out there, fusing filmmaking and photography knowledge, creating a new unique way to paint a story.
On 2nd August 2013, we officially launch Vows Café: Photography, Videography and Wedding Planning services. At the point of writing this blog, Vows Café is still less than a month old. However, it seems that we have done a lot to kick-start the business. With this progress, we really do hope that in years to come our Wedding Café business will grow it into a MUST visit place for every wedding couples.
This is OUR dream, a BIG dream, a dream that can be made POSSIBLE!
It’s been a surreal feeling from the day I tender my resignation till the day I’m actually venturing on my own, doing things I always wanted to do, trading and setting an eCommerce site. Out of a sudden, this two to do list surfaced to trigger me from weighing the cost of leaving my job to fulfill my dreams.
It’s hard to leave a good company, a good boss and good team that has provide me the career development and basic financial needs to start a family and venture on my own. I am really thankful to them though I did not specially show it.
Till the last day of work, I am totally lost and felt emotionless to everything that was going around me; From the exit clearance to the farewell calls and finally the farewell dinner and gifts from my boss. I thank them for the last farewell and wishes for my futures endeavors.
From now on, I will put my heart and soul in my trading and eCommerce business. Regardless the results of the effort going to be poured into running my own business, I will have no regret taking this step. I can accept failure but not failing to try. It will be an exciting and daunting emotional and physical roller coaster ahead of me, I’m ready and ready to fly!
Exactly 2 years from the time I did the Carl Jung’s and Isabel Briggs Myers‘ Personality test, I am surprise how little change and accurate it has been. From being a ISTJ to ESTJ which makes sense as I’m more expressive now a days. 🙂
The Guardian
(Extraverted Thinking, Introverted Sensing, Extraverted Intuition, Introverted Feeling)
As an ESTJ, your primary mode of living is focused externally, where you deal with things rationally and logically. Your secondary mode is internal, where you take things in via your five senses in a literal, concrete fashion.
ESTJs live in a world of facts and concrete needs. They live in the present, with their eye constantly scanning their personal environment to make sure that everything is running smoothly and systematically. They honor traditions and laws, and have a clear set of standards and beliefs. They expect the same of others, and have no patience or understanding of individuals who do not value these systems. They value competence and efficiency, and like to see quick results for their efforts.
ESTJs are take-charge people. They have such a clear vision of the way that things should be, that they naturally step into leadership roles. They are self-confident and aggressive. They are extremely talented at devising systems and plans for action, and at being able to see what steps need to be taken to complete a specific task. They can sometimes be very demanding and critical, because they have such strongly held beliefs, and are likely to express themselves without reserve if they feel someone isn’t meeting their standards. But at least their expressions can be taken at face-value, because the ESTJ is extremely straight-forward and honest.
The ESTJ is usually a model citizen, and pillar of the community. He or she takes their commitments seriously, and follows their own standards of “good citizenship” to the letter. ESTJ enjoys interacting with people, and likes to have fun. ESTJs can be very boisterous and fun at social events, especially activities which are focused on the family, community, or work.
The ESTJ needs to watch out for the tendency to be too rigid, and to become overly detail-oriented. Since they put a lot of weight in their own beliefs, it’s important that they remember to value other people’s input and opinions. If they neglect their Feeling side, they may have a problem with fulfilling other’s needs for intimacy, and may unknowingly hurt people’s feelings by applying logic and reason to situations which demand more emotional sensitivity.
When bogged down by stress, an ESTJ often feels isolated from others. They feel as if they are misunderstood and undervalued, and that their efforts are taken for granted. Although normally the ESTJ is very verbal and doesn’t have any problem expressing themself, when under stress they have a hard time putting their feelings into words and communicating them to others.
ESTJs value security and social order above all else, and feel obligated to do all that they can to enhance and promote these goals. They will mow the lawn, vote, join the PTA, attend home owners association meetings, and generally do anything that they can to promote personal and social security.
The ESTJ puts forth a lot of effort in almost everything that they do. They will do everything that they think should be done in their job, marriage, and community with a good amount of energy. He or she is conscientious, practical, realistic, and dependable. While the ESTJ will dutifully do everything that is important to work towards a particular cause or goal, they might not naturally see or value the importance of goals which are outside of their practical scope. However, if the ESTJ is able to see the relevance of such goals to practical concerns, you can bet that they’ll put every effort into understanding them and incorporating them into their quest for clarity and security.
ESTJs generally have the following traits:
ESTJs have a lot of flexibility in the types of careers that they choose. They are good at a lot of different things, because they put forth a tremendous amount of effort towards doing things the right way. They will be happiest in leadership positions, however, because they have a natural drive to be in charge. They are best suited for jobs which require creating order and structure.
The following list of professions is built on our impressions of careers which would be especially suitable for an ESTJ. It is meant to be a starting place, rather than an exhaustive list. There are no guarantees that any or all of the careers listed here would be appropriate for you, or that your best career match is among those listed.
Possible Career Paths for the ESTJ:
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