As a Dutchman i've grown up on Coffee around me a lot....and as the title suggests, its a good tool to keep sane... (-:
Here in Malaysia I went straight for the Starbucks, as that's the easy option I guess.
However, I quickly adjusted to the local variation Kopi ((o) ais ) but 2 of my friends on separate occasions have introduced me to a small coffee chain in KL that's called Artisan Roast
(with what i just found out a link to a coffee place in the UK aswell..
UPDATE... Its actually in my Beloved Edinburgh, right near where i used to live in Bruntsfield... http://www.artisanroast.co.uk/ check em out)
In any case... they have 2 great relaxing places in KL one in a busy mall and one in a more urbanised area ...
I have on a couple of occasions really enjoyed their coffees and latte's and even what I reckon is one of the best cheesecakes i've ever had in my life.....
and suddenly I discovered the other day that they have just opened a place next to the office where i'm currently based. so I couldn't resist and got myself this...
The other day I was handed a little leaf wrapped parcel by a friend of mine,
saying: “here, you’ll like this…. “
And me (not owning a
verbal filter sometimes…..) saying, hmmm, thanks, but eh its evening, why are you handing
me breakfast?
(I was referring to Nasi Lemak a
dish wrapped in pandang leaves and mainly taken for breakfast in Malaysia)
My friend laughed and
said “noooooooo its not that… its something else completely…it’s a very
traditional Chinese dish…”
“Its something called BakChang” and
she proceeded to tell me the story of Qu Yuan a
famous poet during the Chu Dynasty as legend goes (according to various sources
on the interweb and of course my friend who gave me one of these)
The Bak Chang is a
traditional Chinese rice dumpling usually available around the time of Dragon
Boat Festival.
Like many Chinese festivals and their associated foodie
traditions, there is also a legend surrounding the origin of this yummy food.
The story goes that Qu
Yuan tried to warn the King and his fellow countrymen of the expansion of the
neighbouring Qin kingdom, with little success.
When the capital of the
Chu kingdom fell to a Qin general, the patriotic Qu Yuan was supposedly so
overcome with grief that he drowned himself in the Miluo River. The Chu people
threw packets of rice (the Bak Chang ) in to the river to keep
the fish from feeding on the poet’s body. (i have also heard a version where it was meant for feeding him in the afterlife..)
Bak Zhang or Zhongzi as
they are known today, are made with glutinous rice with a variety of filling,
then wrapped in bamboo leaves, bound and tied together in a bundle and consumed
once a year on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Chinese lunar calendar.
Although I was out by the
exact day I was still in on the exact week, and went to try this last night…
As you can see it looks
kinda lush, and that it was…
Quite filling.... that’s the
glutinous rice itself I guess.. but very flavoursome and tasty….
Over the last year I’ve been trying to push
myself out of my comfort zone on occasions, determined not to let me vision issues get me down... climbing Batu Caves in Kuala Lumpur…
going for a Swim in a rocky Waterfall area, and this weekend I added another something…
I went up Bukit Saga , a trekking spot near Kuala Lumpur..
Purely to see if I could
physically and mentally do it…, it wasn't very high, but still I wanted to see
if I could do something like this and if it was something I could or should
continue doing…….
I was kind of inspired by a friend of mine who recently climbed Mount Kinabalu, a mountain on the Borneo side of Malaysia and she provided me with some amazing pictures and stories that got me kinda hooked and intrigued now… knowing that that probably wasn't something I
could ever do, It did make me think if hiking itself was possible…
Was it possible?
Well, see below…
The “going-up” bit
was a wake-up call as towards my overall fitness…. I was with someone from work and 2 of her
friends they were all my senior in years, they were regular gym goers, and
runners etc, (they even had hiked and climbed before, including Mount Kinabalu)
… in other words …. healthy…
Me? Well, I’m a many things, but not that… I have indeed
shifted approx. 35kg since having figured out that I had KC, and that it was
manageable and that I can live with it very well, but that was without being
fit, or making an efforts as such towards the weight loss….. and for sure I haven’t
started any proper sports as such, apart from a small attempt at rowing last
year in the UK before moving to the Asia Pacific region and a little bit of
swimming and a tiny bit of Yoga…
Someday soon I will have to start some regular exercise for
sure , but just now, I need to deal with the “storm” in my head that has been this
roller coaster ride that my life has been since having had my Contacts fitted
and ive been able to pick up my life again…
So halfway up the hill, my body was sending me shocked
message as to what the hell I was suddenly doing, and yeh, it hit a stage where
I did have to sit down for a while and recover… but so far, no visions issues,
just climb and use my hands to gauge where i'm going…. All good…
By the time we finally were on top of the hill, and were
joyous to find we got there, we discovered that another hour further we would
be able to reach some great waterfalls…. However we decided to set that task
for next time, as it would be a good motivator to come back soon….
The bit going down was next… and eh.. .that was eh fun….
As i've explained before with a lot of the people that have
KC there is a common thing where we don’t see depth very well, Stairs and
steps, and even pavement curbs become a tricky thing to navigate, as it will
either become in our perspective a ramp or even as bad as a massive ski slope..
depending where you are ofcourse… in any case, a tricky thing to navigate, so
just imagine how this would look to us…..
Scary!!!!!!
But that’s why I was here, to conquer that fear and move on
and push beyond my comfort zone….
One thing to highlight aswell is that my travel companions
all knew the score with me on this, so they were very patience and took their
time when needed, pointing out where to be extra careful etc…
In any case, here I found my overall fitness not to be
lacking whatsoever, it was just a very tough mental thing, where things came
down to a lot of, what If I go right, or left, what about this drop, would that
be as high as I think it is… but by anticipating and gauging these uneven
grounds with a solid hiking cane it became a very intense but pleasurable thing
to do…
I definitely want to come back and maybe even aim for something
more extreme, like the previously mentioned Mount Kinabalu…
(let’s see if my friend is up for taking that challenge with
me next year, or if she (and others) will talk me out of it…. )
So it’s been a year since stepping out of
the plane in Singapore to start my Time in the Asia Pacific region…. And it’s
now just a bit over a year since
returning back to work after a rather traumatic couple of months just before
that...
So where do I stand now?
It’s been a year of ups and down, (sometimes
even literally.. )on a Physical (ocular) level, Mental level, an Emotional
level and many other levels, all in all its been a year of personal growth...
Work brought me here, and that’s been a
hell of a ride in itself, but I think mostly I ended up getting re-acquainted
with myself again, sometimes that wasn’t nice, sometimes it was great....
I have noticed that I have become a more
emotional person since my "Blurry" days, maybe from being isolated
and spending time with myself a bit too much, maybe for other reasons. But,
whatever the reason is….I don’t see it necessarily as a bad thing, but i need
to learn to guide and contain it a bit better i think..
but im working on that...look up the Chimp Paradox, it makes sense..
Anyway, going back to where i stand now?
Well, work is going fairly good, It has its
up and downs as well of course, but its going...
On a personal level, I have met some great
people that have flowed in and out of my life, just like that goes, and I hope that I
can keep calling some of them my friend for a long time to come.
I have had big time support from old
friends and family along the way aswell, sometimes mixed with causing them
concern, and stress and maybe sometimes even letting them and myself down, but
their continued support has certainly made these last 12months easier to navigate.
But.. but what about my eyes?
My Eyes, seem to have stabilised... don’t
get me wrong, I have bad days, where i wake up and just know there’s no use of getting
up in the first place, and just rest my eyes.. In fact, it happened last
weekend.. But overall, they have become manageable
As I documented, I had to go through a week
of "blindness" to
give my eyes a rest for some rigorous
testing, and the results from that initially said I should be looking at
Surgery, two different surgeries as such.... cross-linking and keraring, (see
previous post on these procedures) these procedures would cost me a quite a bit
to do, and would not fix the issue, they would just slow down the deterioration
of the cornea.. Which basically means, it will get worse much slower..... and
although I’m not dismissive of those procedures, I have done some online
research and spoken to some optometry professional I have come across via the
Keratoconus GB Facebook page, and have found that as I,
A, have had KC happening to me at a later
stage in live than the average patient and
B. I’m hitting 40 in a couple of years,
it’s not the most effective procedure in the
first place, as the deterioration is slowing down and stabilizing around this
age, granted I got it quite late, but the big possibility is that I won’t deteriorate
fast, and if it does there’s always the future …..
So for now its stick with another set of
RGP’s……
That’s sort of where im standing now I guess…
Where am going? Will see…I hope more
pushing outside of my comfort zone
Got some hiking lined up next weekend,
kinda scary, very scary actually, but I need to keep pushing… I just need to
and if all fail, maybe , just maybe this is the future
