My Personal Travel Essentials Checklist

Like I mentioned in my earlier post regarding how I organize my life, I have a few online or mobile apps that handle tons of stuff for me. Inside my Todoist app, I have a travel checklist that I can print out whenever I do luggage packing.

Below is a basic essential checklist for me whenever I go for oversea trips. Do you have one too?

What to Prepare

1. VISA -

This site has a list of nationals of countries that have "Reciprocal Visa Exemption Arrangements" with Japan. Be sure to check and apply for VISA before booking your air tickets.You may also want to check out the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website for Japan too.

2. Passport 

Needless to say, always check to make sure your passport is not close to its expiration date (renew it if it is less than 6 months from expiry date) or you may get into trouble in certain countries.

3. Medications

I have a travel medication bag which I never fail to bring along whenever I am oversea. Medications for headaches, fever, diarrhea, gastric etc are must-bring-along medications for me.

4. Winter/Summer Clothing

Although you can always buy them aboard, it is often better to buy it local or bring it along if you already have them at home.

5. International Chargers 

Invest in a few international chargers will provide a smooth "juicing" time for all your devices.

6. Foreign Currency 

Be sure to change them in your local country as the rate is often lower when you are at the hotel or bank.

7. Time zone difference

Make sure to tune your watch to the correct time zone.

8. Battery Powerbanks

It's a torture to run into low-battery situation when you needed the devices most.

9. USB Thumb drives

Off load the photos/videos from your camera or camera phone.

10. International Calling Cards

Just in case your mobile get stolen or lost.

The above 10 items are my travel essentials. What are yours? Do you have a checklist too?

Daily Routine of a Working Mum

I am sure everyone has some sort of a daily routine to run every single day. You may not have a 100% fixed daily routine like those boys in the army camps but it is still pretty much a routine if you happen to religiously do it most of the day.

Below is just an account of my daily routine which I kind of separate them between weekdays and weekends since the activities I do are quite different.

Weekdays

Unless I happen to be on leave due to medical reasons or personal/family commitments, my routine for weekdays is pretty standard.

6am - 6.30am => prepare kiddo for school

6.30am - 7am => stalk check Facebook updates from friends and family members

7am - 730am => get ready (bath, doll up and get dressed) for work

730am - 830am => leave for work

8.30am - 5.30pm => slogging away in the office with an hour for lunch at 1pm. I love to
prepare/cook my own lunch when I am in the mood.

5.30pm - 6.30pm => journey back home. I do not usually never cook after work as I am already dead tired so yeah, you may guessed it. My and my hubby will usually take turns to packet dinner home or may choose to eat out depending on the weather, occasions and sometimes the mood. :)

6.30pm - 7pm => bathed and get ready for dinner

730pm - 8pm => family dinner + TV (if eating at home)

8pm - 10pm => TV time!! Yup, I will checked for Facebook updates in between commercials. Hubby and kiddo may join in if that's good show on the TV.

10pm - 11pm => prepare kiddo for bed and I will play a little bit of mobile game and Facebook updates before entering slumber-land. I may stay up longer on Friday nights or/if I happen to be on leave the next day.

Weekends

830am to 930am => Weekends are valuable and although I would have loved to sleep till 10am or so, I would usually wake up at about 9am +/-.

930am - 10am => breakfast + TV with family

10am - 12pm => I would usually do my laundry on Saturdays and laze around  watching some Toggle catch-ups on Sunday.

12pm - 1.30pm => Unless there are plans to go out for retail therapy or family outings, I would usually cook a simple meal for the whole family.

1.30pm - 3.30pm => If we are not going out, we would usually catch a online movie together in the bedroom (yeah, there is a wall-mounted TV in the bedroom) while munching junk food.

3.30pm - 6pm => usually catch a nap or do some online shopping or watching more video on my Samsung Galaxy Tab while hubby brings kiddo out for various outdoor activities (badminton, jogging, cycling etc)

6pm - 6.30pm => bath and get ready for dinner

6.30pm - 730pm => dinner time. We would usually buy back home and eat if there are good movies to be watch on TV. If we are out and about, we will eat at the malls or coffeeshops.

7.30pm - 9pm => More TV shows or occasionally go out for a stroll at parks (very rare).

9pm - 10pm => more TV shows or play mobile games

10 pm - 1030pm => prepare kiddo for bed + check Facebook updates

1030pm - 11.30pm => more TV shows or games till the eyelids become tired.

I stick to the above routines about 80% of the time but it can become very different whenever we go out for family outings/social commitments.

Do you have a routine that you follow religiously? Do you think sticking to routines is bad for our life? Let me know what are your thoughts, will ya? :)

3 Tools that I Use to Organize my Life

Unless you have been living off as a hermit high up in the mountains or cave, most of us already have our life deeply integrated with the advances in modern technologies.

Take SMS (Short Message Service) for example, I seriously cannot imagine writing letters to friends a.k.a penpals anymore when a few SMSes could have been written and sent within minutes.

Whenever the Internet or the mobile phone service provider is down, most of us feel totally crippled. Life becomes meaningless for me when I could no longer stalk check updates from my families and friends in Facebook or other social media platforms. :)

Beside all these techie stuff that already form part of my/our life, there are a few online tools which I, too cannot live without. Truth be told, these 3 tools are what glue my life together as it is right now - my daily to-do-lists, my appointments, my grocery list, shopping lists, my health insurance details, my passwords and PIN numbers and hundreds more...

These 3 tools may look similar at first glance but they each serve a separate functions (at least to me) and I hope they will be useful to you too should you decide to make use of them. All of them are totally free although there are paid/premium versions if you wish to upgrade.

1. Trello

Trello is my "can't live without" project tool. I have to have it for any new projects or when existing projects' milestones and timelines need to get updated.

Yes, Trello also allows you to share out your boards and notes and what I like best about Trello is that every single change you (or anyone you share the board with) make to the boards or notes will be recorded with date and time stamps.

 

2. Evernote

Evernote is a different animal altogether if you were to compare it with Trello. For me, I love to make use of Evernote to keep all my important business cards, utility bills, meeting notes, photos and so on. Since they have a built-in scan function, I scan most of stuff into Evernote.

For privacy reasons, I can only showcase a screenshot from their blog

What's really cool about Evernote is that every single thing can be found using their awesome search function. Yes, you can even search for images and also words within PDF scanned documents. So yes, it is essentially my personal secretary where anything I need is just a simple search away. :))

3. Todoist

My daily life would be in total ruin if I do not have my fair share of this app. Most of appointments, daily routines, to do lists and shopping lists are all within. I have depend on it so much that I even have checklist for oversea travel all neatly tucked away within Todoist. :)

Again, this screenshot is from Todoist blog.

Besides sending me daily email reminders on what's due and forth coming, I can also choose to churn out reports on what's been completed over the weeks and even months.

Do you really need all 3 Tools?

No. You really do not need to. Different people have different needs. You may have other tools that you like and that's perfectly ok. Like I mentioned before, these tools are already deeply integrated into my life and have saved me from the edges of insanity on countless situations. If you feel that your life is currently in a big mess right now or you have a messy project that need some serious organization, one of these tools may be what you need.

If you have some cool and awesome tools that you would like to share, feel free to comment below.

Social Stigma and Prejudices Against Doing O.T (Overtime)

Have you ever feel guilty having to stay back in the office to finish up those unfinished work?

No, I am not referring to the group of O.T (overtime) mercenaries who laze around in the day and stay back in the evening to finish up what could have been done in the day for that measly 1.5x monetary compensation.

Most supervisors/bosses do not want to see their staff working overtime. Why? Besides having to pay for the O.T claims, it is a direct signal to the boss that you have poor time management and/or you are not skilled in doing the work given to you i.e. inefficiency.

Of course it all depends on the nature of the industry you are in. If you are in the I.T industry, working O.T is part and parcel of the job. A server crash in the computer room or in one of the regional office (where there is zero I.T staff) would mean canceling that dinner appointment with friends or loved ones. While it also means extra money in the pocket, most people would rather choose to spend the evening watching TV with family members at home.

Companies with work life balance policy usually do not encourage their employees to stay back after normal working hours. They believes that staff that do not have a healthy work life balance will either get physically or mentally burnt out and will end up clocking in more medical leaves.

Although I personally do not like to do O.T, I do see the rationale behind doing one if the situation calls for it. And there are works to be done and if you have nothing much to do at home, it does not hurt to do a few hours a week for help pay off some of that car or mortgage loan.

And if you are one of those "couch potatoes" who happen to have unfinished works in the office, then instead of feeding the stomach with junk food while lying on a couch watching predictable drama series on the TV, you are obviously better off working in the office for some extra cash for you to splurge on your next holidays in Korea. :)

Like I said, while it is fine to earn that extra pocket money, do also consider the social and personal impact on your life. e.g. If you are someone with a new born kiddo at home and a single mum, the impact for your case will be HUGE and it will come back to haunt you for years to come.

Part 1 - 10 Must Eat Hawker Food in Singapore

Most Singaporeans love to eat - and that includes yours truly too. :)

Although there are chains after chains of restaurants in Singapore, I am sure most of you would agree most of the food are pretty much the same. After all, there are only so many ways you can prepare a US beef steak, Japan Bento sets, Korean Bibimbap, Italian pizza and so on.

Boring.

Unlike hawker food, there are basically endless varieties you can choose from when you step into hawker centers. Although hawker centers are not air-conditioned, and seats are hard to find during peak hours, the food there are good and economical for the most part.

If you are like me who has gotten sick and tired of restaurant food, below is a list of food that you must really try - especially if you are a tourist. :))

1. Hainanese Chicken Rice

Truly one of the most popular local hawker food in SG

Just a simple Google search will reveal a few stalls in Singapore

If you are new to Singapore, you really MUST try out this local delicacy. You can easily find it across hawker centers. If you really can't find any, refer to the above few that I screenshot from Google search portal.

2. Bak Kut Teh

 

Yet another DDMT (die die must try) food in Singapore

 

Almost every hawker centers in Singapore have at least one Bak Kut Teh stall and personally I feel that the hawker center ones taste so much better than those in restaurants. So why spend that extra ten or more bucks (including GST) eating out at air-conditioned Bak Kut Teh restaurants when you can get a more authentic and more economical version everywhere else.

3. Indian Rojak

 

 This food needs no introduction for local Singaporeans. I have not known anyone who has not eaten or tried Indian Rojak before. If you really have not tried it before, please, do yourself a favor, order one today. This dish can also be found at almost hawkers out there.

4. Fried Hokkien Mee

 

My favourite food of all time!!

With the few locations listed inside the Google listing above, there is really no reason for you to miss trying out this local delicacy if you are new to Singapore. Try it and thou shall hath no regret...:)

5. Fried Carrot Cake (Chai Tow Kway)

 

 

I have been eating this food since I was six years of age and no, I have not grow sick of eating it at all. I personally like it fried in black sauce but the white one is equally yummy. Please never try this dish in restaurants, most of them will never be as nice as those in hawker centers. Trust me on this. 

6. Satay

 

This is probably one of those food which my hubby and I have different opinions when it comes to which meat taste the best when dipped inside the peanut sauce. I like the mutton best and my hubby love only the pork and the chicken meat. Anyhow, please give it a shot if you are tourist and have never eaten a single stick of satay your entire life.

7. Roti Prata

 

 

There are many argument in the web where this food originate from but to me, who cares. My stomach wouldn't care any more than I do. :) Good food are meant to be eaten, and not to be argued about, ya?

8. Katong Laksa

 

Another one of my all time favorite local delicacy.

 

If you are a tourist and have only one more food to eat and one more place to go - your choice is clear. Go to the above address listed in the image above - 328 Katong Laksa. Yo will simply love it
!!! Nope, unlike typical Laksa, you do not need a chop stick to eat this bowl of delicious Laksa.

9. Char Kway Teow

 

How can any restaurant food beat hawker food like this one!

 

My whole family is in love with this simple looking hawker food and although there are many version of it in Singapore, most of them taste the same. Refer to the above Google search listing if you can't find any decent one.

10. BBQ Sambal Sting Ray

 

This one SIMPLY rules them ALL! IMHO of course.

BBQ Stingray. Who could ever resist its taste and its sambal fragrance. This food go extremely well with rice and if you are simply NOT a sambal lover like me, do ask for a non-sambal version. :)

As you can see by now, Singaporeans will never ever grow sick and tired of hawker center food - there are just too many to choose from and this post is only part 1 of the series of hawker food.

Meanwhile, make sure to go try out the above list of food and stay tuned for the next post.