Cooking craze:
Lets begin by talking about food! This year was a year full of cooking and baking! I guess it's our favourite thing to do :) We cooked at Ting's in the beginning of the year, had a miniature cooking day during March in the girls' mini, made food for Maisie's birthday picnic, cooked at Maisie's during the summer and again at Maisie's for the end-of-year. Oh, and a semi-cooking day at Llywelyn's... though we all got lazy in the first few minutes of the preparation and his maid basically took over. xD Dunno if that counts but it was still a fun day!
High tea:
The quest for high tea continues in 2013 for N's Girls. We don't really high tea much compared to other girls our age (we're too cheap to go to nice places like Sevva, we only dream about it) but this year we tried Cucina (again), Le Goûter Bernardaud, and FINDS.
Outback addiction:
Julian got me hooked onto Outback's chicken salad this year! I think he introduced it to me in the beginning of the year and I've been addicted ever since. I go back to Outback with either Julian, Jason, my friends or my parents at least once a week or at the least once a fortnight. I can't get enough of the chicken. Most girls can't finish the whole salad (it's two whole chicken breasts - that's like 8oz of meat) but I can devour the whole thing in less than 30 mins. Outback has become my favourite restaurant since then. God I must really thank Julian for introducing this gem to me.
Binge crazy:
My binging habits got worse and worse... then they got better... and worse. Hmm. It's definitely a battle I'll have to fight for the rest of my life, my love/hate relationship with food! Binge foods this year include: granola and yoghurt, whole wheat bread, plums, cherries, Arnott's milk arrowroot biscuits and lemon crisp biscuits, dark chocolates like Tim Tams and Belgid'or balls... "Healthy" food addictions I had in 2013 include Dressed's detox salad and asian chicken salad, Grove's chicken wrap and pumpkin salad, Just Salad's immunity bowl, Fusion's meat salad mix...
Disneyland:
In the beginning of January, the "Yesterday" whatsapp group members went to Disneyland! Initially we wanted to go during Christmas, but our times didn't match, so we delayed the day to 2013. It wasn't as great as I anticipated it to be though, and I remember how Whitney and I didn't even want to watch the fireworks, we just wanted to leave the damn place to have dinner.
AS Annual Dinner 2013:
The ending to our winter break: AS Annual Dinner. The only event where architecture students in HKU get to dress up nicely. It was sort of lame as usual but I enjoyed getting ready for the night with my girls in their mini. And afterwards we went clubbing in LKF which was suuuper fun! I got home the next morning and slept at 7AM!
Year 2 Sem 2:
The second semester of Year 2 was when my depression sort of began. Actually it had always been there, but it wasn't until 2013 did I become aware of it. And it just became worse and worse as the year went by. I barely survived Year 2... I was so sad and tired and I couldn't handle the stress mentally and physically. But I surprised myself by making it through! Best memory from Year 2 Sem 2 is Shau Kei Wan with Whitney during project one!
Maisie's birthday:
For Maisie's birthday we had a mini picnic at Kwun Tong Promenade Park (or whatever it's called)! It was our first picnic and it was when Hong Kong winter started to melt away and it was beginning to get warmer! We made the food beforehand at Clar's house then after eating we went to APM to take sticker photos. What a happy day :)
Whitney's birthday:
Whitney celebrated her Forever 21 with her twin Tracy and we were all invited to Gold Coast. We had a BBQ, and the best part? People helped us cook the food so all we needed to do was EAT! My favourite thing to do! :D
Rugby 7's:
My first Rugby 7's! Went with Vikki, Jacklyn and Crystal to the South Stand and I can't say I liked it much. Maybe it's because I've never been a partier or a drinker - I'm much more of an introvert than an extrovert and I don't like loud environments. It just wasn't my scene lol, I hated how all these teenagers were drinking and throwing beers into the sky. I spent some time with Cherry in the North Stand when I left and it was much more my scene HAHA - the calm family atmosphere with the people there actually watching the rugby games, who weren't just at the stadium to get drunk! (pfft, if I really wanted to get drunk I would not drink beer... silly tween noobs)
My 20th birthday:
One of my favourite birthdays yet! My 20th birthday! :) It was during a really busy time in our school year (it's like this every year because my birthday's in April, so I'll never have a big birthday celebration - but it's okay!). I felt very loved from all my family and friends! Even in the summer, after all our finals, Julian went to Outback and "celebrated" with me, getting me a very late birthday gift. Thank you so much! I may not know how to show it in real life because I'm so awkward with emotional situations, but I'm truly, truly grateful for the people around me.
Anyway in April, I had my first birthday cake two weeks early with my parents (then dinner at my favourite Outback) because they would be in Japan on my actual birthday, then one Monday at school after the Easter holidays, Whitney and the rest of the N's Girls surprised me with a surprise sugar-free birthday cake, baked by Whitney herself! I was so shocked and happy :) We then had a salad buffet at MoMo Café on my actual birthday... but as if that wasn't enough, they surprised me with more cupcakes from Eat My Cakes when we got back to the studio! The next day, I had a birthday lunch with my SIS girls in Brunch Club - they got me a surprise cake too! :D And at night, I went to Ruby Tuesday with my grandma and uncle :) and I had ANOTHER cake! So happy!
Family buffets:
(not included is the Christmas Eve buffet) This year my Mum quit her job and my whole family adopted a new attitude to life: to enjoy every moment of it, because none of us are doing very well health-wise (hopefully this will improve in 2014! It must improve!). Although money is definitely more of a struggle now that our source of income only comes from my Dad, we decided that if we don't spend the money, then who will? And family is the most important... so what's better than spending more to have more family time? We actually wanted to have a buffet once a month at a nice hotel but somehow that plan failed, hahahaha... I ended up only going for a few buffets with my family because of school work and we didn't have them monthly because we went on vacation too, which was fine by me. But it was great to actually adopt a new mindset this year!
Bao period:
This year's bao period really got me thinking about how my own final would be like in 2014... and it's really, really daunting and scary. I guess I'm up for the challenge though! Basically this year's bao included a lot of all-nighters and tired eyes and faces!
Seoul with N's Girls:
Thankfully there was light at the end of the tunnel after our Year 3 bao period... and that was the sudden planned trip for the N's Girls! Sadly, Clar had to drop out last minute after paying everything as well... but there is always next time! Seoul is such a wonderful place for girls to go crazy with shopping, eating and night life! And it was my first time booking a hostel all by myself, and actually experiencing the hostel life.... can't say I liked it too much, perhaps I'm too used to the expensive five-star hotels that I stay in whilst in another country with my parents, but it was definitely a fresh new experience I'll need to get used to! Our trip was a mere five days, it ended WAY too quickly, but we tried to fit it in the time gap between the Year 3 final and Year 5 final so we could return to Hong Kong and sacrifice our free time like good little girls to help our seniors with their architecture finals... nevertheless, I enjoyed our brief time in Seoul and it'll definitely be something I'll remember for the rest of my life :)
Dyeing my hair red:
After much, much contemplation and hesitation... I did it! I dyed my hair red! Most significant transformation of 2013 (apart from my weight loss, that is, haha). Dyeing my hair red was something I'd been considering for like, half a year to one year? I don't even remember how long! I don't know why I suddenly felt the need to do it but I felt like I needed a fresh change, and I was really inspired by the girls with red hair on Tumblr and on Instagram HAHAHA! So I just did it one summer day before I travelled to Japan (so I could have nice hair throughout my trip hehe). I did shittons of research on red hair beforehand as well, like I changed my shampoo and only washed my hair with cold water once every THREE days... it took a while to get used to, only shampooing once in three days (ew!) but my hair eventually got used to it and it actually became less greasy and healthier because of the less shampooing haha! Sadly all good things come to an end and it faded away by September (which is a LONG time btw!) and I dyed it back to black in December because the faded colour was so disgusting and intolerable. And I didn't want to shower with cold water in winter.
Japan with family:
Decided to go to Japan with my family this summer. A family trip with my mum, dad, uncle and grandma :) going on trips with your family is a completely different experience than going on trips with your friends... I definitely prefer the higher class hotels but there was less laughter because my parents have a different mentality from me LOL.
Running:
In an unexpected turn of events, running became a passion for me in early to mid 2013. Initially I did it to lose weight, but after a while I used it as a counter for stress. I didn't always enjoy the actual RUNNING (lol who does? Okay I guess some people do) but the feeling it gave me afterwards was great. I even signed up for the Standard Chartered Marathon because I liked it so much. I even got special running shoes. But I stopped running in October when my weight got too low... I really hope it pick it up again in 2014 though. I want to do it with a positive attitude! :)
Architecture summer internship:
I have a full entry on all the details on my internship but I'll just summarise it here: I spent the summer of 2013 working for an architecture company, full time, for two months. I know it sounds cheesy but it was a great opportunity and I couldn't be more grateful I had this chance to see how an actual architecture firm really works! Plus I met tons of great people, including the super-friendly draftsman and the other interns from universities all around the world. Definitely a great eye-opener for the frog-in-the-well (aka me!).
Colonoscopy:
One of the most surprisingly and unexpected things to happen this year was my colonoscopy. I think it only comes third to my eating habits and chickenpox HAHA. Okay I guess if you really think about it, it's not that surprisingly I had to go through this mini-surgery because I've been constipated since the summer of 2012... and it just kept getting worse and worse this year. Anyway I had to stay overnight in the hospital, it cost a BOMB, it was pretty much one of the worse experiences of my life... and in the end we found out that there was nothing wrong with my colons, so it must be my hormones which are screwed up. Anyway it was a great motivation for me to stay healthy because I would not want to go through that experience again... (I have a full blog post on this too if you're interested)
Beach day with Sarah and Vikki:
Definitely tried to embrace the sun more this summer! One of my favourite "summer" activities in 2013 was my brief beach day in Shek O with Sarah and Vikki. It was a really last minute beach day and I basically got my blood tests done that morning and my colonoscopy the previous day LOL. Realising that I had the rest of the day off from work, I made plans with my friends to go to the beach... days off were super rare during my internship! Such is work life!
RCHK boat party:
Another summer essential! And I guess a life time essential - my first boat trip! I know, I'm such a noob and a fail international school student in Hong Kong... twenty years old and never been on a boat trip? What a loser! That's why I decided to join Cherry and Maisie's boat trip organised by their high school friends, since I didn't get to go to the South Island one because I was supposed to have my wisdom teeth removal surgery that day (which didn't happen in the end, wtf). I was a bit of a sour thumb but the food prepared by the others was GOOD and I tanned intentionally for the first time in my life!
Ishii-Shoten:
Had the opportunity to work for Ishii-Shoten in the HKTDC Food Expo 2013 again :) Very thankful for this chance (thanks again, Karina!) and it was nice to see all the girls again/meet new girls! And guys I guess, haha! And this year's yukata fitted me much better than last year's LOL!
Year 3 Sem 1:
The first semester of my final year of architecture really, really tested me. I can't even put my emotions and everything that happened into words. Most of it isn't pleasant though, but I'm thankful for all that has happened because it has taught me to love myself and love my body and to put happiness above all. Some very, very valuable life lessons learned. The nights of crying and binging and starving and hating myself are officially over. I'm going to face the final semester with a new mindset!
Chickenpox:
Because of my dwindling health and immune system, I caught the chickenpox in September in a strange twist of events. I know, funny, right! I was kind of amused by it and the experience sucked but after reading some of the accounts by other people who had had chickenpox in their adulthood, I guess my experience wasn't that bad. Obviously it wasn't rainbows and butterflies but it was bearable. And I didn't scar, so that's good! But it forced me to take a timeout from school for one week and I was concerned about missing important stuff... thankfully it was the beginning of the semester so I was able to catch up quickly!
Joint bao bbq:
My final year of HKU Architecture means that I'm now Bao ju (包主)! How strange, I'm now the oldest one out of the people studying degrees! Time really flies, it feels like just a second ago I was a lost freshman, now supposedly I'm one of the most experienced students in the whole undergraduate course... excuse me while I die of laughter. But anyway. I've already blogged about it but my friends and I organised a huge BBQ event for the "little ones" at Maisie's! :)
Halloween 2013:
Halloween this year was nowhere as epic as last year's Halloween in Shanghai (I don't think I'll ever forget that night, actually). In fact, it was a bit of an anti-climax since none of us were planning to go out as we are now grannies in our final year of our degree. But um... YOLO, right? The night wasn't very YOLO-esque though because it basically involved trailing around LKF and IFC Rooftop trying to find a nice place to chill, but quickly failing. I went home at midnight because I wanted to catch the last MTR train and that was that.
Christmas Eve:
Fast forward to Christmas, after all the finals mess in November (where nothing significant really happened because it was all working for the semester one finals), but this end of the year marked the beginning of my recovery from my negative thoughts and bad body image. Was very grateful to be able to spend Christmas Eve lunch with my favourite people in the world, my parents... at my favourite place, a high class hotel buffet! LOL!
Food Festival:
Had another opportunity to whip out my yukata during Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day to work during the 11th Hong Kong Food Festival 2013! It was quite a last minute thing, and I don't know what prompted me to sacrifice my much-needed holidays and relaxation time for a busy and crazyyyy few days at the Convention Centre, but I did. It was a good experience though and quite different from working for Ishii-Shoten! Got to see and work with the Food Expo girls again too, which was a bonus!
New Years Eve:
Rounded off this year with my favourite groups of people in the world, my family and then my friends. Didn't stay out too late though cos I'm a granny now and I need my sleep and I easily get cold, but it was a nice 31st of December.
And to conclude...
Well that's that! 2013 has definitely been an eventful year, though I do think it pales in comparison in terms of social drama to 2012 and and 2011. Perhaps it's because I'm older and wiser now? 2013 was also the year where my personal health, both mentally and physically, took a huge plunge. But I'm going to fix myself in 2014 (I'm already on the way to more positivity!). I'm going to graduate. I'm going to treasure my friends and family. And most of all, I'm going to be happy.
Here's to a great 2014! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment