Personal Growth

I am kept awake all night because of upheaval of emotion that is surging through my mind and heart right now. However, reflecting on my past year experience, it has been a year of tremendous professional and personal growth. Through pain, tears, and sweats I feel a bit burned out, and ready to take a break actually. But with the recent feeling, I feel the need to channel this energy and restlessness to something productive. This is an excellent article by Ben Casnocha, about the time he spent supporting Reid Hoffman as his Chief of Staff. I copied here for learning purposes but what an insightful article.

http://casnocha.com/reid-hoffman-lessons by Ben Casnocha
 

Holiday in Maldives

Wow, Maldives is really beautiful. The chain of atoll looks like emerald encircling blue-green water. So clear water and natural white sandy beach. Clear air that you can count stars and bright moon appear pure and serene. Bliss. Sun sea sand and coconuts make this paradise. After 10-day holiday it is amazing how much nothing-planned turned out to be full of delights and surprise.

First view at the sea in front of airport terminal

Day 0, Friday I had full day of work then went home at 6. Started count down at 4 while lunching with KS. Uneventful SQ flight, almost full. Arrived and met mom dad Henry whose Scoot flight was delayed by more than an hour. Waited another hour for our local guide to guide us to a comfortable SUV over 10mins ride to Hulmale. Our guest house is modest with haphazard service, we were allocated 202 and 302 on different floors. Feel asleep at 12am local time.


Day 1, Saturday arrived at Royal Island and spa. We took local domestic flight and was asked to standby at airport from 930 for 1115flight which was delayed by an hour.

Propeller plane ATR-72 used on the domestic flight

The flight itself is only 20mins and we flew low on propeller plane over rings of atoll atop Maldives archipelago.

Arrived and was ushered to a van towards local jetty. Was served coconut water decorated with a pink hibiscus. Went to Jetty at back and tried snorkelling. However, since it's the first day I was apprehensive and holding on to the rail to attempt to float without a life jacket.

Clear water and sea

Day 2 Sunday, Sunrise view relax by the pool in a group of 3-lounge chairs.

Sunrise on the Earth day 22 Apr 2018

Ming Lee's farewell

Spent Friday attending Ming Lee's farewell after cancelling my trip to Bangkok. Then yesterday a nice dinner party at Ming Lee's place well prepared by her and her husband Agustin. They are nice hosts, and very generous. They invited us to their house at Seletar, and hosting a dinner from 7 thru midnight with lots of wine, sake, and more wine.

I am now awake on Sunday afternoon typing this note while getting ready for my flight to Colombo. Laundry is on, vacuum my room, threw away garbage, and recycle newspaper. Also had packed, run 30 mins, and play a bit of game. So it's been a productive mundane weekend.

Now I am going to write about our holiday.

This is in front of Paris Nord train station, after train from Brussels

The following morning we explore the Paris around La Marais neighbourhood, this is Hotel Du Ville

Department store, closed on Sunday (boo)

Mom and Dad

Breakfast with croissant budget at a cafe nearby Pompidou

A nice church at Jardin Nelson Mandela that is under construction

This is the backyard of the Bourse

Vienna

I had a terrible jetlag, so it is 230am right now and I am wide awake. Might as well documenting my thoughts of the recent holiday before time and memories fade away...

Next up is Vienna, a well developed city. It feels wealthier, especially off our train which departed from Venice, which is another expensive city. The city is clean, I spotted the main sights around the compact area which I had researched throughout my trip.

Breakfast onboard the OBB train

Resting at OBB Lounge

In essence we spent the day around the Stephendom, travelling from Schwedenplatz U-Bahn (the metro stop), strolling towards south passing Fleichmarkt, Stephansplatz, around the Vienna Opera house and finally Karlsplatz. The St Stephens cathedral is of course majestic, but what I can remember is the stop for horse-carriage next to it. We also wander around the shopping street, and found Petersplatz where the magnificent St Peters church was a highlight.

Domkirche St. Stephan

Graben

Hotdog stand or Vienna's hotdog (Würstelstand)

In front of St. Peter's Church

The Baroque interior of the Church

We then stroll to the and Albertina where we stop to rest at the junction near the famous Sacher Hotel. Through a kirschy time-travel exhibition that depicts the old Vienna from Roman time. It looks interesting for history-buff we had the time.

We passed the large public square Heldenplatz where the old imperial Palace was.

Public square & gardens in front of the old imperial Hofburg Palace, with imposing statues

Heldenplatz

 Crossed to the east for Vienna Opera House (Wiener Staatsoper), arriving at Ringstrassen area.

There is tourist information centre where we rest, while Henry and Mom hunted some photo at Sacher hotel.

Velvet sofa at Cafe Museum

Sacher torte

Apfelstudel with vanilla sauce (divine)

Original "Wiener Schnitzel"
golden brown breaded veal cutlet, parsley potatoes, lettuce and cranberry sauce

Viennese mixed sausage platter
four kinds of different, typical Viennese sausages,
onion mustard, horseradish, gherkin and rye bread

The desserts bar

Omigosh

We then capped our trip via a superb lunch at Cafe Museum, a smart cafe on Operngasse with replicas of original Adolf Loos decor, a former hangout for Klimt, Schiele & others. It opened in 1899; although their desserts selection is very tempting, we selected Vienna's speciality. My favorite is the original Wiener Schnitzel (made of veal not pork) and Apple strudel (Apfelstrudel).

Karlsplatz

 

Paris

Why is Paris always have this unique flair in the air. The weather and atmosphere seems dramatic, and chic when I stroll around the city. We are back to Singapore right now, landed 7am this morning, and after a quick check at luggage services, we quickly take taxi home to rest before my office hour. The 3-day in Paris passed quickly. We use the first day to stroll around the city and has the one experience of tourist cheat over the ticket - infuriating. Other than the upsetting experience in Paris (which seems like everyone we know had experience in Paris) we enjoyed our final leg of the journey...

Arrival at Paris Gare Du Nord station

Department store, closes on Sunday... (boo)

Classic Hotel Du Ville

The following morning we went to explore Paris by ourselves, nearby La Marais neighbourhood

Breakfast with a croissant at a budget cafe around Pompidou Centre

Church (Paroisse Saint Eustache) that is adjacent to Jardin Nelson Mandela.
The nearby site is under construction, also the RER interchange for Les Halles-Chatelet

The Bourses

Louvre Pyramid

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel

Musee D'Orsay

Pont Royal

Mini bug at Palais Bourbon

Lunch at Le Saint Germain

outstanding Pave du Thon (seared tuna steak)

big plate of mussels dish (very good as well)

third dish we ordered was Pork Medallion

Eiffel view from Esplanade des Invalides

Musee Rodin

Walking along Invalides

Invalides

Afterwards we took bus 89 back to our accomodation which was at Le Marais. That is a good bus touring around the city passing famous sights (preciously the direction we were walking earlier in the morning!). A bus ticket costs 2 Euro on board of the bus, if you bought in advance from ticket machines, the generic ticket (which can be used for bus,train,tram, or metro) costs 1.90 each or 14.40 in a pack of 10.

the next morning Carousel near Place du Concorde

Champ-Élysées

Arc du Triomphe

We then continued to shopping at Outlet area La Vallee, which is at the end of rail RER A, the last station just before Disneyland Paris. A couple of very good brand at good deal, we shopped at Tumi and Gucci.

At night we went straight to sunset at Basilica.