This trip has been so much fun. But today I was hit with the downhill of this roller coaster ride. I knew this was going to hit, so I was prepared. I sat down and had a nice long, and at times, teary chat with a talented 20-year-old girl. Roxy’s voice was dynamic. Refined, mature, and super powerful. Man, this girl has a huge future (I hope she remembers me when she’s a star). It was when we were talking about her struggles that I found consolation to my own insecurities. This singing competition taught me so much, but I’m most grateful for this bunch of new friends — my singing buddies.

Check out more photos on Flickr. Click the photo below.

Upgraded to 500GB hard drive even before turning my 13″ MacBook Pro on.

Now that’s a sweet machine. It really reminds me of my 12″ PowerBook, which my mom is still using.

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Check out all the in between pictures here.

I’ve been craving simple and modest meals like this one for months. In Chinese we call this a modest home cooked meal. Simply prepared with simple ingredients. But boy, was that good!

Twelve years ago, when I was still a student in the USA, I went back to Malaysia during my summer break. I also visited Mei Chi in Singapore, a friend that I know for the longest period of time (I guess I have to be careful using the world old). She was my neighbor. We started playing together when we were about four years old. We became good friends since then.

When I visited her in Singapore, she realized that I had an old and completely beat up wallet. The next day when I met her in front of Starbucks, she gave me this Esprit wallet. I was very touched. I took great care of it. It has never been on my butt. My beat-up wallet was molded into the shape of my right butt cheek. So, when I started using this one, I decided not to ever put my wallet in my back pocket.

Last few months, I observed some obvious tears and ripped seams on the wallet. Yesterday, I finally went out and bought a cheap Wal-mart wallet to replace this one. (I don’t usually shop at Wal-mart. I had a $50 gift card that I needed use up before it expired. The wallet was only $12.48. Made in India. I hope not child labor)

It was hard to part with this old wallet. But I’m also glad that my belongings won’t fall out from it. The wallet was easily replaceable. But the story behind the wallet will never  be replaceable. 

I am keeping the wallet for now. I’m sentimental like that. It reminds me of my good friend Mei Chi. I just can’t chuck that out.

I hope by writing down my thoughts about this wallet, and by taking some photos of it would allow me to share with everyone how special this wallet has been to me. It really doesn’t matter which wallet I’m using, Mei Chi will always be my oldest friend.

A friend and I started a Flickr iPhone 365 group today.

Rules:
1. Take a photo each day with your iPhone
2. Submit ONE photo for each day to the group (catchup is ok – send all 7 from last week)
3. Tag your photo with “iphone365″ (optional)
4. Start your photo with “iPhone x/365 Title Optional” (iPhone 2/365 Old Shark)

See if you can live up to the challenge! See you there! And tell all your iPhone/Flickr users about the group.

This week would be a good time to start, especially if you took some photos yesterday!

There has been so many levels (the world down to my own site) of noise and chaos. Realistically, we all need to face that every day. But I hope you will take a moment and think of your ultimate goal of doing what you do. At the end of the day, it’s hard to argue that we want love and peace.

I wish you all peace and love. Our conversations will continue, but don’t let us get distracted or hurt by losing our focus on our bigger goal. Again, love and peach to all.

A friend at work showed me how to trigger the Easter Christmas Hanukkah Kwanzaa Christmas Easter Egg. So go to your own Flickr photos and type in ho ho ho hat or ho ho ho beard to trigger these Easter Eggs. Have fun.