Self-isolation countdown: 4 days to go

Sunday 

My lunch and dinner today.  Healthy lunch, not so healthy dinner.  Both involved frying which is messy and needs a bit of cleanup.  Needless to say I won't be frying stuff too often.

After today it/s four more days. Or is it 5?  OK just checked the official website. 4 more days.  So I am on Day 10 now.  Hmm... I am missing a day in my last entry.  So Day 8 should have been 9.  I guess nothing much happened on Day 8 - now I recall I was working on a paper for much of the day.

I will be free on Friday!  Back to the office. There is a split-team arrangement for the office in which we take turns working in the office. I am in Team B.  Actually it doesn't really affect me unless I need to print stuff or have access to things I need that are locked up in the office.  But it's good to be part of the team and be present.

I guess I will have to do my cleaning routine again.  6 months worth of dust.  I will also bring the Bengawan Solo pineapple tarts and kueh bangkit for colleagues.  And also the Adam Road soto paste.  Hope it will bring some cheer. I am guessing food and snacks from home are in short supply.  They usually have visitors who bring such stuff - or they may have work trips home and can resupply the office pantry then. Call it my care package.

After dinner I dozed off - that's what you get from an unhealthy dinner!  Then I decided I needed to compensate for it.  Did an hour's worth of pilates mat work following two YouTube videos by this French trainer Juliet Wooten.

It's actually fascinating thinking about what makes such videos popular among the millions out there.  And many more added daily.  Of course how the algorithms work, the level of difficulty etc play a part but beyond that, what makes one video more successful than another?  The key difference is of course the presenter - that much is obvious.

Maybe it's her charming French accent but as I thought about it, there's more to it than just looks and competence. After all, you aren't actually watching all the time while doing the routines (and even then most of them look OK) and you'd also assume most of these people know what they're doing.  A lot of it i think has to do with what I call relatability.

It's like someone you feel comfortable with, someone you could be friends with in real life.  Or as Jules (Samuel Jackson) says in Pulp Fiction, "Personality goes a long way."

Monday -day 11

Three more days to go after today.  Finally remembered to take my vitamin D.  Getting old means changing habits.  Never put off something important thinking that you'll get to it later.

Of course if it's really important and critical, it will come back to you...but it may be too late.

Rode my bike nearly two hours while watching Liverpool 3 Arsenal 1.  Oh well at least I got some exercise done.

Back to London - Part 2

Day 5

Impending mini lockdown coming.  And they are calling it Circuit breaker - hey that's copyrighted!  Isn't it remarkable that a small country like us is punching so much above its weight?  I think there's a catch phrase about making London like "Singapore on the Thames."

Plans to get fans back to stadiums are shelved for now.  Oh well, watching it on TV is cheaper and less time-consuming if that's any consolation.  But I will miss watching it with you boys.  And Mummy will have one less thing to help her fall asleep to.

Am I worried about the Covid situation here?  Not too much.  I really think the high rate of infections here is just due to the nature of society here. People insist on the right to gather, to drink, to party, though opinion polls show that a majority of the public want to police to enforce the rules more strictly.  And the police themselves are a bit conflicted - they say it is not a law and order problem but a health issue.  And they want more clarity, and more support from the public when they enforce, because they say the public becomes critical and call them heavy-handed when they do try to enforce.  I think one contributory factor is the role of the mainstream media, and social media that play up these sentiments because well, it makes good copy.  But it may not really represent how most people feel.

 The collective sense of community has fragmented I think, into smaller groups.  People identify themselves more by their tribes - in other words, they choose to accentuate the differences more rather than the commonalities.  It's that streak of individualism that is taking over the world.  I think it has always been there, but people understood that you needed to find a balance.  And they trusted that political leaders were there to tell them what this balance was.  No one trusts politicians anymore.  We are also headed in that direction, but we still have a greater sense of conformity for the collective good.

The BBC interviewed some freshmen and I got the sense that they were more disappointed that their drinking and partying would be affected, than how their classes or studies might be affected.

Day 6

Watched a Japanese movie called 100 yen love.  I had bought the DVD because this was a movie with good reviews that featured Sakura Ando.  She was in this great movie called Shoplifters that Mummy and I watched - she was the 'mother' who took the girl into their home. It was a remarkable movie and her performance really was one of the highlights.  Lately I have become tired of the usual Hollywood fare - even those that seem to want to be different somehow manage to feel the same no matter the storyline.

The movie Shoplifters was a revelation because it showed us a side of Japanese society that is different from what we encounter as tourists or on TV. Like the Korean movie Parasite, it takes a look at those who live at the margins of society.  There are no triumphant heartwarming endings.

How to describe this movie?  Calling it the Japanese female equivalent of 'Rocky' doesn't quite nail it.  Anyway it was good and Ando was very good in it.

Day 7

It's been a week.  Not too bad actually.  There were times though when I felt like Tom Hanks in Castaway and wished I had a volleyball to talk to :)  I did talk to myself on occasion.  I just found out you can actually buy this volleyball!  Amazing what people will buy.  Perhaps they should just dump a container load of it in the ocean in case someone needs it yah?

Did two Youtube workouts back to back.  First one was too short (about 20 minutes) though it did get my heart pumping.  Followed up with another from the same site (Popsugar Fitness - I highly recommend it if you ever want to do a home workout) but this one was 40 minutes and I was really sweating by the end even though I had opened the balcony door and it was single-digit temperature outside.  It was intense.  Or else I am just getting old.  Strange though that when I checked my Garmin app later, my heart rate wasn't as high as I thought it reached.

Day 8

After chatting with you guys, I spent most of the afternoon on my laptop, sorting out all the photos we've taken over the years.  These are on my Onedrive account online - if you need to access it, it is registered under my gmail account (awkumcheong). Password should be my favourite manager08.  It was a bit confusing at first because I needed to figure out how it worked so as not to accidentally delete stuff.  It was a really great and productive way to spend the day - with an incredible Pop Soul classics playlist on Spotify playing in the background.  So many great songs - they don't write stuff like this anymore.  Right Matt?  And the best testimony of the merits of this playlist? I never once felt like changing playlists or turning it off or switching to something else.  When was the last time you felt that way listening to the radio or whatever?

Lots of wonderful memories from the photos - I will post them on this blog.  Lots of love, especially when I see photos of the birthday celebrations that Mummy put together for you boys over the years. And for me too:)  So much love that went into the food, the cakes, the games...

And there are so many photos of you guys that I like.

Back to London

Prologue

In the week or so before I was due to return, I was depressed at the thought.  Back in April 2019, as I embarked on a new adventure, there was an air of excitement and also joy, that I would be doing so with Mummy.  This was our first time away without you boys, a rehearsal for the coming empty nest syndrome in a way.  The initial challenges of setting up a home and office meant that I was kept busy - along with hosting Uncle Jerry and family, Uncle Kum Mun and Aunt Eva and meeting other friends in London.  But when Mummy left and the weather got colder, loneliness did set in and I was always looking forward to coming home in December, even if it was just for a short spell.  I was also grateful for the few months that I spent at home in lockdown with you guys as it was an unexpected bonus during the posting.  God always watches over us, even in difficult times.  Just being around, having meals and conversations, doing stuff together like watching the Godfather 1 and 2 (I guess we will watch Part 3 many months/years later, just like how it was made years after the first 2), cycling, going to the driving range, eating durians (except Matt).  And voting with you in your first elections (except for Ethan)  I loved watching you guys mature and help out, especially with the cooking!  It was great that I got to celebrate all your birthdays this year.  There is so much we tend to take for granted but these things become all the more precious when they are no longer available or within easy reach.  I wish I was a better communicator in person, but just being around, being there meant so much to me.  What I am most proud of though, is seeing you guys grow up in the faith.  Never lose that.

Day 1

The flight was uneventful except for one short spell of turbulence but it wasn't the worst I have experienced.  But the depression persisted and for the first time in a long time, I hardly enjoyed the movies on the flight.  Maybe it was the poor fare available and I tried to rewatch two movies - the last Star Wars movie and another one I can't even remember but I couldn't even get past the 5-minute mark.

My mood was lifted on landing, and though I was a little concerned that I would face delays at customs because of my luggage (the bike being in a large box), it turned out to be incredibly smooth. I was met by SQ staff who were sent by Imran the assistant station manager who I met previously when a VIP came through London.  I breezed through the staff lane, my luggage was collected for me and I was really grateful for all the assistance as my back had stiffened up again during the flight.  Thankfully it wasn't that bad.  Imran was so kind - he bought me a coffee and sent me to the flat in his own car!  The bike was a bit of a squeeze in the back of his car - it was a normal Mercedes saloon.  I did warn him about the box before departure but he said it should be fine, and it was, though he had to move the kids' car seats to accommodate it.

Lunch was that British institution - Fray Bentos' Steak and Kidney Pie.  It was alright - I've had better though some friends swear by it.  Though I did shop for groceries after lunch, I decided that I would try to work my way through my emergency Brexit rations since they have been sitting around for months. So I had a tuna sandwich for dinner because there was tinned tuna among my rations.  Googled and found that cheddar is good for grilled cheese so I put that in my sandwich.  Don't worry - the cheese was freshly bought:)  Got stuff for breakfast, chicken pieces (which are really cheap here though I wonder if things will stay that way after the UK really leaves at the end of the year.)  Oh and bananas:)  I can eat them here when Mummy's not here.  The only upside to her absence.

Didn't do much the rest of the day, partly because of my back and partly I wasn't much in the mood.  It feels strange being back.

Day 2

Mini-crisis - I couldn't unlock the car!  Tried to use the manual key that is in the remote but couldn't open the door.  This is a very important thing to remember - that there is a manual key.  Like knowing there is a pump on the Brompton.  The key is usually removed by pressing some panel to pop it out and you then slide it out.  Will try again tomorrow with the spare key. Maybe I am doing something wrong.

The rest of the day I mostly cleared stuff away (like stuff Gabe left behind heh) and repacked the cupboards. It would save time when I cooked if I knew where everything was.  I definitely felt more productive.  Also cleared a lot of the physical mail, both from last year and in the intervening 6 months.  Lots of stuff to recycle.

Lunch of overpriced instant Taiwan Beef Noodles in soy sauce.  $9 a pack!  Not much beef in it.  It is a bit better than the other pack I tried (different flavour I think). Added an egg and some vegetables.  For dinner I cooked chicken soup and curry!  1 kg of chicken goes a long way and I really should separate them into portions when I get home.  Then I don't have to cook everything at one go.  The soup is really good comfort food.

Arsenal win 2-1 against West Ham!  Two for two.  When was the last time we started a season this way? I feel better already.

Day 3

Still couldn't unlock the car door.  Called for Lexus Roadside Assistance.  Received a message that a vehicle will be coming - LD19OBK, which I thought was LD190BK.  Went to the carpark entrance to wait and saw an AA van come.  I sort of registered that Lexus may have outsourced the service to AA but mentally I was looking for a vehicle with registration number 190, and so I got confused by the plate - it was LD19 ODK.  Threw me off totally:)  The chap who came was really friendly and helpful and he took the time to check that the battery was really beyond salvaging before putting in a new one.  

Sometimes I don't know what to feel about that.  Should we be happy that someone provides good service because it is so rare?  Or is the converse a sense of entitlement? That we should expect good service?  Then again I suppose there is a difference between what is competent service (which we should expect) and good service.  And we should appreciate good service and show it.

More cleaning.

Finally set up the bike and the indoor trainer and did a 30-minute spin just to get moving again.  Felt good to sweat it out.  Also good to get the boxes out of the way.  Not that I am a fan of Marie Kondo, but it does feel good to clear the clutter.  This is the part where Mummy will tell me I should have done more of it at home:)  And she's right.

Day 4

First working day.  It's important to keep a routine just as if I am going to the office.  Shower, change out of my pajamas and get going.  The only concession I make to being at home is that I like to sit in my bean bag chair.  

Lunch was premium Haggis (ingredients include lamb lobes and oatmeal so it is healthy:)).  It is a very heavy dish and I couldn't finish it all at once.  The can did warn that it was 1-4 servings, though 4 sounds like a stretch.  Unless it is eaten as an appetizer.  Needed something to pair it for balance.  A bit of spinach and a tomato did the trick.  I can imagine it can be something of an acquired taste but I liked it.

Dinner was leftover special.  Scottish haggis-don (I am nothing if not creative) and leftover chicken soup.

Finally mopped the floor!  It didn't feel dirty otherwise I would have done this sooner.  And because of all the packing, there was lots of stuff lying around that I needed to clear.  Also started working out throughout the day.  The weather turning colder definitely adds extra motivation.  Every time I get up and feel cold, I do push ups and pull ups.  Or just hang from the bar to strengthen my arms.   Weight bearing exercises are important as you age.

Changed the sheets.  Clean sheets are nice - not just in football.  These are the small things that you take for granted when others are doing the work for you. The smell of clean bedsheets is wonderful.  I didn't change them earlier because I needed to make sure the rest of the place was clean first, if that makes sense.