Air Bed & Breakfast

In short, it's called Airbnb. It's a website - a community marketplace - founded by Brian Chesky (CEO, Co-Founder) and Joe Gebbia (Chief Product Officer, Co-Founder). Both of them used to study in the same university and on the day of the graduation, Joe said Brian that one day they will start a company together and guessed what. It became reality.

It all started with Brian Chesky who was having problem looking for a a place to stay when he was in San Francisco for a conference. All the hotel rooms was fully booked and he had to pay a lot for the rental during those period due to the conference. That's when an idea struck, they decided to create a temporary bed and breakfast as they were pulling their air beds from the closet to sleep on. Eureka! That's how the concept of airbnb apartments were created.

Airbnb.com was launched but nobody noticed them until their 4th launch in August 2008. They never gave up. Their idea is to take people online and bring them together offline. Currently they have 35,000 properties in 8,000 cities in 165 countries. From the site that nobody noticed, to a community where people welcome each other into their home, with a price of course. But what better way to travel and learn one's culture if not through witnessing directly how one lives? I am really glad to stumble upon this website and hope one day when I travel elsewhere on my own again, I will opt for staying with a local rather than in a hotel. Hope the price will be cheaper and hope the host is cute haha!

Risk and Traveling

Recently I have been traveling quite a lot, mostly is to discover my own country. It's so big, I guess it may take a lifetime to discover into details. With my short-term memory, it doesn't really help much either. I guess I need to make multiple trips to one place. Hah! I will write more on the experiences and realizations in the few more posts to come.

To prepare for the trip, I have purchased travel insurance quite a few times. I used to see it as a taboo product but since it has helped me last time, I will never take it for granted anymore. I will not go anywhere without my travel insurance. The amount may be quite insignificant compared to the risks one may be exposed to when one's overseas.

To me, the most crucial point when one can decide an insurance policy is useful is when one finally makes a claim on it. So far I have been very happy with the company I have been using all these while. I just learned recently that one can claim if one's flight is delayed by 6 hours. My flight back to Singapore from Yogyakarta was delayed 4 hours -_-" .... 2 more hours to be able to disturb my agent :p ... but it is not a laughing matter. I believe as long as one has arrived at the destination healthily and safely, you can't really put a price on those things.

The holiday season will soon be here, wish my dearest readers a safe and jolly holiday if you do travel somewhere. If not, still be safe and happy always! See you at the next post!

Full Circle Moment & What Would You Do If You Have 3 Days and 3 Nights in Singapore?

Life has its funny way of unfolding itself. In December 2008, I was planning a trip to Europe in 3 weeks (including 2 weeks of Visa application with lots of hope and prayers). It was all planned last minute and I seriously didn't know what to do as I am simply not an average traveler.

Luckily, I was active in Plurk and just by posting it amongst the European plurkers, one very nice French lady responded and rescued me from being deserted in Bordeaux all alone during Christmas. She invited me to be with her family in Toulouse and to spend Christmas together. 2 strangers who hardly chatted online but crazy enough to say "YES" to the experience. The rest is history and I blogged about how much I missed Paris and how I will be confident to converse with French kids! To accompany that, 1 couple from Geneva (Swiss) welcomed me to their humble home with fantastic cheese and coffee, then 1 artistic kind soul from Liège (Belgium) showered me with great food and great booze for New Year's Eve party!

Time has passed and it's now November 2011, 3 years have passed just like that! The full circle moment has arrived for one of my saviour. This time, I am able to play host to my French friend! The one who was crazy enough to invite one stranger from Asia, finally came to Singapore! It's her first trip to Asia and she made sure she would stop by Singapore. (She demanded that to the travel agent). She has 3 days and 3 nights in Little Red Dot and I am glad she maximized it to the max.

So what did my friends manage to do in such a short period of time?

Day 1
Places she attacked:
- Botanic Garden
- Tanglin Mall for lunch
- Orchard Road
- Little India
- Chinatown
- Lao Pa Sat for dinner
- Customs House for drinks

Bear in mind she walks from Orchard to Little India in a rainy day. Pretty impressive, I should say.

Food and drinks she conquered:
- Char kway teow
- Satay (chicken and beef) + Rice
- Oyster omelet
- Prata
- Tiger beer
- Ume

Day 2
Places she attacked:
- Holland Village
- Wet market (woke up too late, so it did look like dry market instead)
- Hawker center
- Arab Street
- Peranakan Museum
- Raffles City
- Raffles Hotel
- Suntec City
- Esplanade
- Merlion
- Fullerton Hotel
- Colonial District
- National Museum
- Plaza Singapura
- Newton Circus

Food and drinks she conquered:
- Chicken rice
- Nasi lemak
- Grass jelly drink
- Ice teh limau (Ice lime tea)
- Kue lupis
- Breadtalk's chicken floss
- Yakun's kaya toast, half boiled egg, kopi-o and teh-o
- Stingray
- Rojak
- Hokkien Mee
- Soursop juice

Day 3
Places she attacked:
- Singapore zoo
- Orchard road again as the weather didn't permit her to go to Sentosa (*pout*) and ended up she made Steve Jobs happy. *ehem*
- Clarke Quay
- Geylang

Food and drinks she conquered:
- Starbucks coffee that put her to sleep (oops, I'm not sure on this :p I am just imagining)
- Chili crab
- Mantou
- Turkish ice cream
- Durian

Overall, I think she has done a great job. She conquered a lot and experienced the main attractions of Singapore. What more, she has a very "authentic" Singaporean guide too besides the "fake-made-in-Indonesia" one. I hope she enjoyed her stay with my passable planning and guiding and story telling ... or more like blabbering. I am glad she enjoyed durian with its stench still lingers on our fingers as I am typing this. I am glad I am able to return the favour that her family and she have done to me in 2008. I hope one day her family too will come and let me have the privilege to show them how awesome Singapore can be (in the rain). I hope my other Internet friends who have shown me how great people are just few clicks away, will be here too one day. I am so grateful for this full circle moment that keeps expanding in its own amazing way.

Life becomes more awesome when one is able to share a piece of themselves with others.

17 December 2008 - First photo taken after our dinner on the first night I arrived in Paris

31 October 2011 - First photo taken after our dinner on her first night in Singapore
(Image courtesy of my friend's FB. Approval is pending as she's busy with her novel at the moment of this blogging)

Redefine Oneself

Huh!

As if I know anything about the subject.

Exactly, thanks to me not knowing, I'm compelled to write about it. For years I've been trying to define me, define my blog as the expert says, you need to find a niche. You need to specialize in something.

Alas, after so many years of figuring things out, I still can't find my niche. I still specialize in nothing. This frustrates me to the core.

When I look at people around me, I'm able to pinpoint:
- she is a supply chain specialist
- he dwells in hardware
- she is so good in her French
- it is so good in loving people (yes, I'm referring to the wonderful four-legged creature that I adore)

Then I take a look back at myself, what am I good at? I am not expert in skin care just because I'm working in the industry. I'm not a specialist in short term rental just because I dwelled in it for a while and worse, my beloved language of French, I'm so far from mastering it. My passion was procrastinated as I lost my steam then I stopped the course as I couldn't commit. Well, simple case look at my blogging habit, kinda say it all about me and specializing in something. This just sadden me to the core. How am I going to define myself? What am I good at?

That's when I realize defining myself in such a rigid manner doesn't work for me at all. I am who I am and I am who I'm evolving into (thanking someone for this insight). I am accepting to be the specialist in nothing and everything. I may not know a particular subject in depth but I am sure I at least heard of it or willing to learn about it. I am not ignorant.

I may not be the top student in French anymore (thanks to my lazy other half :p) but throw me back to Paris and I should be able to converse to the children now instead of playing alphabet games with them like I did in December 2008 (as shown below).

I am evolving and I love who I am becoming so far. I still not sure what is my niche, who I want to be and it may get fuzzier as I think harder. But as I let things simply flow together with life, so far it had never failed to surprise me.

I define myself as a human being with a curious mind and ever evolving soul that when I come to the end point, one thing I am sure is that I have grown to be better than I was before.

How was 2008?

So, it's a brand new year already. How is the celebration for everyone? I hope everything goes well and wishing everyone a blessed year ahead.

I am typing this on a brand new Macbook which is equipped with French keyboard, which obviously is not mine, and with a cat just passing down my cheek to let me know that he wants some attention. I had a wonderful and really "rare" new year's eve celebration last night. I am currently in Liege, Belgium and my journey so far, has been awesome. You may hear more about my experiences if I finally have the discipline to blog hee hee ... but for now, I am determined to at least write something out to start the new year.

So, how was 2008 for everyone? Did it start and end on the high note? Even if it didn't, did you manage to at least learn an important lesson out of it? Or at least something different from what you have been experiencing every year?

I think I did. Oh ... of course I did. To be able to land my arse in Europe for 3 weeks during winter when I am even scared of the air conditioning system in Singapore, living and meeting with completely real-life strangers (I have considered them friends in my mind but to most people, they are strangers), travel mostly on my own and alone with my very broken and basic French language, met up with 3 awesome internet friends in 3 different countries and know even more new friends, etc etc etc ... the list goes and and yes, I did have an awesome 2008. (OMG the cat just passed in front of me again ... huahhhh)

Consider myself blessed, but what is blessing without having the faith and taking the risks to explore something completely out of the comfort zone and being called crazy by some people for taking the leap?

And most importantly, if I have ever learned anything from this trip, it is not the things and places you have seen that matter. Seriously, those are secondary. What I cherish the most from my crazy adventure alone in a strange land are the people. From the people who have been giving me moral support, accompanied me shopping for my winter clothing, helped me in getting great discount on my super important winter coat, made sure I have everything packed, etc to the people whom I have not yet met and yet never failed to show warmth that I don't even get normally from people that I know for long.

So, what makes 2008 special for me? It is the realization that the people that I know have given me the most in the way they could never imagine. And no words can express how grateful I am to know each and everyone of them. The footprints they have left in my heart are more impactful than the sights of Eiffel Tower.

I hope one of the resolution that we all can make for 2009 is to not take everyone that you know and have not yet known for granted. Without people, there wouldn't be much meaning in the game we call Life. But well, feel free to dispose those people who aren't giving much values in your life too. As, you need more spaces for better people to come into your lives.

Have a great 2009, everyone.